Online dictionaryOnline dictionary
Synonyms, antonyms, pronunciation

  Home
English Dictionary      examples: 'day', 'get rid of', 'New York Bay'




Bantering   /bˈæntərɪŋ/   Listen
Bantering

adjective
1.
Cleverly amusing in tone.  Synonyms: facetious, tongue-in-cheek.  "Facetious remarks" , "Tongue-in-cheek advice"






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








Advanced search
     Find words:
Starting with
Ending with
Containing
Matching a pattern  

Synonyms
Antonyms
Quotes
Words linked to  

only single words



Share |
Add this dictionary
to your browser search bar





"Bantering" Quotes from Famous Books



... erected to him at Cologne, because he "didn't care to see himself fossilized"; whether he spoke of the unprecedented popular ovations given to him at his final departure from Berlin as a "first-class funeral"—there are always the same childlike directness, the same naive impulsiveness, the same bantering earnestness, the same sublime contempt for sham ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. X. • Kuno Francke

... or to his chaplain so far as to put himself in their power. Cromwell had obtained some information of these intrigues; but, unable to discover any real ground of suspicion, he contented himself with putting Monk on his guard by a bantering postscript to one of his letters. "Tis said," he added, "there is ...
— The History of England from the First Invasion by the Romans - to the Accession of King George the Fifth - Volume 8 • John Lingard and Hilaire Belloc

... this at once," he said. "I think I'll go down and meet him. He's sure to be coming up here, isn't he?" he added, with a bantering smile; and Nell actually tried ...
— Nell, of Shorne Mills - or, One Heart's Burden • Charles Garvice

... the postilion, in the same bantering tone, "the citizen Marquis shan't be disturbed. Forward, hoop-la!" And he started his horses, and cracked his whip with that noisy eloquence which says to neighbors and passers-by: "'Ware here, 'ware ...
— The Companions of Jehu • Alexandre Dumas, pere

... in a bantering tone: What! still repeating the same old talk, (13) Socrates, which I used to ...
— The Memorabilia - Recollections of Socrates • Xenophon

... flashed and she bit her lip. Then, though her words came quickly, they were smooth and quiet and had a note of bantering laughter in them. ...
— The Desert Valley • Jackson Gregory

... was a young lawyer in Illinois, he and a certain Judge once got to bantering one another about trading horses; and it was agreed that the next morning at nine o'clock they should make a trade, the horses to be unseen up to that hour, and no backing out, under a forfeiture of $25. At the hour appointed, the Judge came up, leading ...
— Lincoln's Yarns and Stories • Alexander K. McClure

... fully realized his error, but failure before all these bantering youngsters was a contingency not to be accepted lightly. As he phrased it to himself, it was worth "another throw." "Seems kind o' lonesome not having any one to talk to while you're eatin', ...
— Judith Of The Plains • Marie Manning

... fresh bridals, was not however able to discover the name she had assumed at Avignon; and his residence with the Cardinal closely but respectfully watched as he was, forbade Nina all opportunity of corresponding with him. Some half bantering hints which Albornoz had dropped upon the interest taken in his welfare by the most celebrated beauty of Avignon, had filled him with a vague alarm which he trembled to acknowledge even to himself. But the volto sciolto (Volto sciolto, pensieri stretti—the countenance open, the ...
— Rienzi • Edward Bulwer Lytton

... in undress uniform, strung out carelessly along the road, as though returning from a tramp into the country. As I approach them, pedalling laboriously against a stiff head wind, both myself and the bicycle fairly yellow with clay, both officers and soldiers begin to laugh in a good-natured, bantering sort of manner, and a round dozen of them sing out in chorus "Ah! ah! der Englander." and as I reply, "Yah! yah." in response, and smile as I wheel past them, the laughing and banter go all along the line. The sight of an "Englander" ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle V1 • Thomas Stevens

... the neighborhood, and the towheaded young dispatch-rider from the Toul sector was hardly less of a celebrity than the terrible Prussian himself. "Paul Revere" and his compass became the subjects of much mirth, touched, as usual, with a kind of bantering evidence ...
— Tom Slade Motorcycle Dispatch Bearer • Percy Keese Fitzhugh

... to slip into the baker's and purchase a loaf, which he carried off furtively to his attic as though he had stolen it. Sometimes there could be seen gliding into the butcher's shop on the corner, in the midst of the bantering cooks who elbowed him, an awkward young man, carrying big books under his arm, who had a timid yet angry air, who, on entering, removed his hat from a brow whereon stood drops of perspiration, made a profound bow to the butcher's astonished ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo

... and startling, rather than cultured, of speech—a blazing human solitaire, unfashioned, unset, tossed by the drift of fortune at her feet. He disturbed rather than gratified her. She sensed his heresy toward the conventions and forms which had been her gospel; his bantering, indifferent attitude toward life—to her always so serious and sacred; she suspected that he even might have unorthodox views on matters of religion. When he had gone she somehow had the feeling that a great fiery meteor ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine

... rats of any sort——" began Watts hotly, spurred to anger by an audible snigger among the men, but De Sylva stopped his protest peremptorily. It was idiotic, this bantering when the next half hour ...
— The Stowaway Girl • Louis Tracy

... croaking frogs and whip-poor-wills. At first the way was enlivened by humorous suggestions on the part of my companions as to what had become of Colonel Gaylord, but as I did not respond very freely to their bantering, they finally fell silent with only an occasional imprecation as someone stubbed his toe or caught his clothing on a brier. After a half hour or so of plodding we came to a clear path through the woods and in a few minutes reached the ...
— The Four Pools Mystery • Jean Webster

... said his companion, "I was only bantering Henry a little; but, really, Mr. Burling, I have nothing to tell you concerning Jennie, excepting that we were schoolmates for a long time, and that in consequence we feel a great deal of fondness and affection ...
— The Elm Tree Tales • F. Irene Burge Smith

... to the deck for a bit of exercise before he turned in. When he beheld Dennison sound asleep in the chair, his mouth slightly open, his bare feet standing out conspicuously on the foot rest, a bantering, mocking smile twisted the corners of Cunningham's lips. Noiselessly he settled himself in the adjacent chair, and cynically hoping that Dennison would be first to ...
— The Pagan Madonna • Harold MacGrath

... have, have you!" cried Juve in a bantering tone, and with a quizzical look. "Let us ...
— Messengers of Evil - Being a Further Account of the Lures and Devices of Fantomas • Pierre Souvestre

... me that it was the only sort of musical instrument which the Northern tribes possessed, and that it was played upon by the young men only when they were in love. I suspected at first that he was bantering me, but I afterwards found that what he said was true. The young Indian must have been very deeply smitten, for he continued to play all day and all night, during the ...
— Diary in America, Series One • Frederick Marryat (AKA Captain Marryat)

... minister, not thinking much about his reply, but in a bantering humour willing to draw the lad out, "the learned man modestly calls ...
— Donal Grant • George MacDonald

... she has turned away,—she's deeper in the shadow,—why, she's gone! (Following STEEN with all his bright courage bubbling high again, and speaks in a bantering tone) Just some old granny going down to town, ...
— Why the Chimes Rang: A Play in One Act • Elizabeth Apthorp McFadden

... evidently, not poor, inquired the price of a rosary of amethysts, with a cross of assorted gems fit for a bishop. The attendant mentioned the price. It did not seem excessive, but the bargainer exclaimed, in a bantering tone,— ...
— Russian Rambles • Isabel F. Hapgood

... ill-fitting clothes bulged with linen tracings and rolls of blue-prints. He and Drene consulted over these for a while, semi-conscious of Quair's bantering voice and the girl's easily provoked laughter ...
— Between Friends • Robert W. Chambers

... spoke up Fred, pretending to be annoyed by the bantering of his friends. "There are always some people that try to take the joy out of life. I heard of an old man the other day who was so disgruntled that when he met a friend on the street who saluted him with a hearty 'good morning' this old man looked all over the sky to make sure he couldn't find ...
— Go Ahead Boys and the Racing Motorboat • Ross Kay

... everything," was well acquainted with this fact. He probably meant the couplet as a broad stroke of humor. But there was perhaps a chronological basis for the joke. Our Saxon ancestors did not speak of Old Nicka in a spirit of jest or levity. The bantering sense of our modern sobriquet for the Devil appears to have crept in during the decline of witchcraft. That frightful saturnalia of superstition was the Devil's heyday. He was almost omnipotent and omnipresent. But as witchcraft died out, partly through the growth of knowledge, and ...
— Flowers of Freethought - (First Series) • George W. Foote

... sarcasm or invective are always attended with danger, but good-humored bantering may be used upon occasion with most happy results. As an instance of this, there is a story of an annual dinner at which Mr. Choate was set down for the toast, "The Navy," and Mr. Depew was to respond to "The Army." Mr. Depew began by ...
— Talks on Talking • Grenville Kleiser

... Wilhelmine's beautiful face and bright clothes, had begged a paper flower from the Christmas tree and offered it to her. Partly because she loved to tease children, partly because the child's talk made a diversion from the Duchess-mother's acid remarks, Wilhelmine began bantering with the little boy, telling him the wildest tales, witty absurdities, sheer delightful fooling. The Erbprinz, accustomed to Johanna Elizabetha's prim stories always adorned with obvious moral endings, acclaimed Wilhelmine's ...
— A German Pompadour - Being the Extraordinary History of Wilhelmine van Graevenitz, - Landhofmeisterin of Wirtemberg • Marie Hay

... crowns he felt such a commotion in his cheeks that his old scummer face let little laughs exude from its pores like smoke pouring out of a chimney, and he could say nothing. Then it was the turn of the jeweller, who was a little bit of a bantering fellow, and whose lips were as tightly squeezed as the neck of a hanged man. He seized a handful of the crowns, looked at the others, even the king, and said, with a jeering air, "Baisez ...
— Droll Stories, Complete - Collected From The Abbeys Of Touraine • Honore de Balzac

... not fear thee, Death! I have a bantering thought!—though I am told Thou art inflexible, and stern, and bold; And that thy upas breath Rides on the vital air; Monarch and Prince of universal clime, Executor of the decrees of ...
— The Poets and Poetry of Cecil County, Maryland • Various

... made was due to my touching the electric bell in my office,—a signal agreed upon as an indication of my desire to assist any applicant for aid. Accordingly, when I entered Mr. Chelm's room after his visitor was gone, I was greeted with a bantering smile. ...
— A Romantic Young Lady • Robert Grant

... said Sir Peter, recoiling; "gently, my dear kinsman. My heir shall not be educated as a heathen, and Mivers is only bantering us. Come, Mivers, do you happen to know among your London friends some man who, though a scholar and a man of the ...
— Kenelm Chillingly, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... returned into the house, and were again alone in Mrs Todgers's room, the two young ladies exhibited an unusual amount of gaiety; insomuch that they clapped their hands, and laughed, and looked with roguish aspects and a bantering air upon their dear papa. This conduct was so very unaccountable, that Mr Pecksniff (being singularly grave himself) could scarcely choose but ask them what it meant; and took them to task, in his gentle manner, for yielding ...
— Life And Adventures Of Martin Chuzzlewit • Charles Dickens

... Pshaw, is that all? say no more on't, I'll do't, let me alone for Bantering—But this ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn - Volume IV. • Aphra Behn

... Arcot's bantering smile was gone. "Now you've got it, Fuller. The velocity of light, just as Einstein said, is a property of space. What happens ...
— Islands of Space • John W Campbell

... the lean-tos had not been finished when the Overlanders were summoned to supper. There was little conversation until they had dulled the sharp edges of their appetites; then their drooping spirits revived and they began bantering each other. ...
— Grace Harlowe's Overland Riders in the Great North Woods • Jessie Graham Flower

... The bantering reply of the big Irishman was lost to me as Sir George led me out of earshot, one arm linked ...
— The Maid-At-Arms • Robert W. Chambers

... now why Miss Smythe spoke of her with bated breath," returned Tom in the light, bantering tone which so often irritated Rose. "I might have known ...
— Miss Merivale's Mistake • Mrs. Henry Clarke

... full intent of bantering him into some sort of acquaintance; but he evidently measured my purchasing capacity quite accurately, for he turned like a flash to ...
— The Friendly Road - New Adventures in Contentment • (AKA David Grayson) Ray Stannard Baker

... just come back after me, and we'd take the next train. But, oh, girls, I do wish I could stay here! I never had such a disappointment before. I've grown to love this place; and all you people; and my dear Camilla!" Patty's blue eyes filled with real tears, as she dropped her light and bantering manner, ...
— Patty's Butterfly Days • Carolyn Wells

... if the girl who stood by his chair was not Sally she was her twin. He sank into his seat, watching her out of the corner of his eye as she passed through the swing door with a flutter of her snowy apron. He replied feebly to the Governor's bantering salutation and nervously played with his fork. The Governor was soaring and Archie's bewilderment was ...
— Blacksheep! Blacksheep! • Meredith Nicholson

... But bantering aside, there is no more engaging subject to the naturalist than that of animal parasites. Consider the great proportion of animals that gain their livelihood by stealing that of others. While a large proportion ...
— Our Common Insects - A Popular Account of the Insects of Our Fields, Forests, - Gardens and Houses • Alpheus Spring Packard

... in the manner in which campfires were built, and a system of sentinel guards posted, that the older men realized the nearness of danger. The cowboys had dropped their half bantering manner, and sat grim-lipped and thoughtful of eye about the blaze. This change in their manners affected our youthful heroes who looked at one another somewhat apprehensively, and more than once let their ...
— The Boy Ranchers Among the Indians - or, Trailing the Yaquis • Willard F. Baker

... bud. How does your copperosticies seems to segastuate this evenin'?" he hailed, in a bantering, insolent, ...
— Trail's End • George W. Ogden

... bend of the crag. There was a frank expectancy in her face—the expectancy of a pleasant hour's visit with a good comrade. He wondered, vaguely and with new scrutiny, if that were not all—just friendliness. They talked of nothing; but his usual bantering tone was gone, and, quick to observe, she divined that there had come to him a subtle change, ...
— The Plunderer • Roy Norton

... out, have you, Bandy-legs?" he would remark in his bantering way. "Be sure and tie your canoe to the lower limb, so it'll stay by you. And feel a little pity, won't you, please, for the other poor fellers who go ridin' down the raging flood, hangin' on to the bottom of their boats? Oh, it's a wise guy you show yourself, ...
— The Strange Cabin on Catamount Island • Lawrence J. Leslie

... large hall, each student in turn presented himself before the professors, had his credentials examined by them, and if the same proved satisfactory, entered his name in full and his residence, in the register. When the matriculation was complete and the students had retired, there was some bantering among the professors as to which of them should take the register home and prepare from it an alphabetical roll,—a work always considered rather tedious and irksome. After a little hesitation, Dr. Alexander said, "There is ...
— In the School-Room - Chapters in the Philosophy of Education • John S. Hart

... had a jubilating effect upon our guards, who paraded gayly up and down the room. One simple, good-hearted fellow harangued us in a bantering way, pointing out our present sorry plight as evidence of the sad mistake we had made in not being born in Germany. He felt so happy that he took a little collection from us, and in due time returned ...
— In the Claws of the German Eagle • Albert Rhys Williams

... listlessly smiling at the bantering of the men, too sick at heart really to take interest in any living thing. His arm pained him, and his head ached, while throughout his body he was sore and stiff and well-nigh incapable of moving. But ...
— Bred of the Desert - A Horse and a Romance • Marcus Horton

... performed, was to exorcise the insatiate kill-crop that hitherto oppressed the party. In fact, the doltish Nez Perce, who had seemed so perfectly insensible to rough treatment of every kind, by which the travellers had endeavored to elbow him out of their society, could not withstand the good-humored bantering, and occasionally sharp wit of She-wee-she. He evidently quailed under his jokes, and sat blinking like an owl in daylight, when pestered by the flouts and peckings of mischievous birds. At length his place was found vacant at meal-time; no one knew when he went off, or whither ...
— The Adventures of Captain Bonneville - Digested From His Journal • Washington Irving

... with a preoccupied air, the young girl looked about her, or leaned forward to listen to some kindly bantering addressed to her by Sir Alliston. She hardly spoke, but Gregory perceived that she was by no means shy. She so pleasantly engaged his attention that when Sir Alliston got up from his seat next hers there was another motive than the mere wish to speak to his old ...
— Tante • Anne Douglas Sedgwick

... wonderfully demure now, my pretty maiden," he remarked in a bantering tone, his countenance brightening, however, for an instant as he spoke to her; "but you were gay and frolicking enough just now, when I entered. How ...
— The Last Look - A Tale of the Spanish Inquisition • W.H.G. Kingston

... across the grass for his hat. "Then there's all the more reason for rushing back to defend our share." He spoke in the bantering tone which had become the habitual expression of his tenderness; but his eyes softened as they absorbed in a last glance the glimmering submarine light of the ancient grove, through which Undine's figure wavered ...
— The Custom of the Country • Edith Wharton

... said yes, I hope?" She turned to me with a charming conventional smile. I might have been an acquaintance of the day before yesterday. I made her a low bow. "J'avais bien l'honneur, madame," but refusing to take up our usual bantering tone, she murmured a hospitable commonplace and disappeared. Boris and I ...
— The King In Yellow • Robert W. Chambers

... coolness laid hands upon the emperor's cup, full of rich wine. Challenged by Charlemagne, the child then boldly declared that he wanted the meat and wine for his mother, a lady of high degree. In answer to the emperor's bantering questions, he declared that he was his mother's cupbearer, her page, and her gallant knight, which answers so amused Charlemagne that he sent for her. He then remorsefully recognized her, treated her with kindness as long as she ...
— Legends of the Middle Ages - Narrated with Special Reference to Literature and Art • H.A. Guerber

... gigantic oak discussing the defeat, and with them Simon, a free black, the commander of the troop of Negroes. He was deeply vexed because his troops had not stood fire, and expressed himself with so much freedom and disgust, that the French officers kept bantering him without mercy at the timidity of his soldiers, soothing their own wounded pride by laughing at his mortification. Stung to the heart, Simon finally exclaimed wrathfully, "A Negro is as brave as anybody and I will show it to you." Seizing a rope which was dangling ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Vol. I. Jan. 1916 • Various

... except in the neighborhood of the villages. They had better sport than they expected, for hares darted out in numbers from behind the rocks. Some of these were bowled over, while others escaped; and there was much bantering and laughter among the young men, none of ...
— For Name and Fame - Or Through Afghan Passes • G. A. Henty

... Maclaire protested, ably backed by the worshipful officers who still gallantly attended her; the management was obdurate. Then she would go up herself, and throw the hussy out. Indeed, too angry for bantering further words, Christie had actually started for the stairs, intending to execute her threat, when the perspiring Tommy succeeded in stopping her, by plainly blurting ...
— Keith of the Border • Randall Parrish

... in charge of the party," Hoskins retorted quickly. And Lieutenant Mackinson, unable to determine whether the remark was a facetious evasion of responsibility or an indirect compliment to himself, on the ground that no act of his would be questioned, pursued his bantering no further. ...
— The Brighton Boys in the Radio Service • James R. Driscoll

... not been wasted. He had learned something, and he had made a friend. The friend was Lonesome Pete. Night after night, with a dogged perseverance which neither towering barriers in the way of unbelievably long words nor the bantering ridicule of his fellows could affect, the red-headed man sat at the table in the bunk-house under the swinging-lamp and conned "Macbeth." Upon long rides across the range he carried "Macbeth" in his hand, a diminutive and unsatisfactory ...
— Under Handicap - A Novel • Jackson Gregory

... Colonel Esmond, of Castlewood, neither cared for quarters nor for quarterings. But his daughter had a very high opinion of the merit and antiquity of her lineage; and her sire, growing exquisitely calm and good-natured in his serene, declining years, humoured his child's peculiarities in an easy, bantering way,—nay, helped her with his antiquarian learning, which was not inconsiderable, and with his skill in the art of painting, of which he was a proficient. A knowledge of heraldry, a hundred years ago, formed part of the education ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray

... became more ready, and she began questioning gravely about this or that, listening with childlike wonder to his answers, and winning him into a pleasant bantering humor. ...
— Madeline Payne, the Detective's Daughter • Lawrence L. Lynch

... at the sight of this purse, was not small. 'Good woman,' said he, 'do you not perceive I have been bantering you all this while? I assure you my mare is not ...
— Fairy Tales From The Arabian Nights • E. Dixon

... laughed the Girl, saucily, and, apparently, trying to relieve the strained situation by her bantering tone. ...
— The Girl of the Golden West • David Belasco

... and protesting that he would not follow her to Kentucky, nor ask her of her father; he would wait for little Sarah Bledsoe, a far prettier bird, he would aver, than the one that had flown away. The maiden, then some twelve or thirteen years of age, would laughingly return his bantering by saying he "had better wait, indeed, and see if he could win Miss Bledsoe who could not win Miss Hart." The arch damsel was not wholly in jest, for a youthful kinsman of the colonel—David Shelby, a lad of seventeen or eighteen, who had fought by his side at King's Mountain—had already ...
— Godey's Lady's Book, Vol. 42, January, 1851 • Various

... this speech. From the bantering tone in which Doubleday spoke it seemed as if he half despised any one who was not used to the sound of profanity; and I began to be angry with myself for having looked ...
— My Friend Smith - A Story of School and City Life • Talbot Baines Reed

... with the good-natured beginnings of a grin. "But what would you be good for?" he queried, in a bantering tone. "People I have about me have to be of some use. They require to have heads on their shoulders. Why—just think what you've done. I don't mean so much about your letting Tavender slip through your fingers—although that was ...
— The Market-Place • Harold Frederic

... was! Talk it right out, my pretty one!" said Mrs. Talbot, in a gay, bantering tone. "Indisposed in mind. He don't like the class of people one meets at my house. Men of his ...
— After the Storm • T. S. Arthur

... with bright bantering eyes. "I knew why you deserted us at Vercelli." He uttered an exclamation, but she lifted a hand to his lips. "Ah, how angry I was then—but why be angry now? It all happened so long ago; and if it had not happened—who knows?—perhaps you would never have pitied me enough to love me as ...
— The Valley of Decision • Edith Wharton

... in this bantering way, it must not be thought that he was really in favour of remaining idle; but he was a soldier, and had to obey orders, ...
— At the Point of the Sword • Herbert Hayens

... an offhand kind of chap, and never stands bantering and chaffering a long time, but says at once what he means, as I do. "Done!" says he—"'tis mine!" and the deacon drives up to his house, gets his pay, and leaves ...
— Humour of the North • Lawrence J. Burpee

... long time Auber followed in silence, which I tried to relieve by bantering comments. I was some distance ahead, when I heard him say, "The grass ...
— Shapes that Haunt the Dusk • Various

... tree-stumps, the bushes, the dry leaves—little wood-sprites with rustling little voices, with spider-webby hair, straight ones and hunchbacked ones; little old men of the wood; the shadow-sprites and little companion spirits; bantering little sprites in green coats, midnight ones and daylight ones, grey ones and black ones; little jokers-pokers with shaggy little paws; fabulous birds and animals—everything that is not to be seen in the ...
— The Created Legend • Feodor Sologub

... and overcome with shyness as usual. She was always shy in such circumstances and was always afraid of new people, she had been as a child and was even more so now.... Pyotr Petrovitch met her "politely and affably," but with a certain shade of bantering familiarity which in his opinion was suitable for a man of his respectability and weight in dealing with a creature so young and so interesting as she. He hastened to "reassure" her and made her sit down facing him at the table. ...
— Crime and Punishment • Fyodor Dostoyevsky

... old tone, half bantering, half affectionate, and teased David out of the history of the last six months. While he sat listening he reflected once more, as he had so often reflected, upon the difference between the reality of David Grieve's life as it was ...
— The History of David Grieve • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... not curious enough to try, my dear madam. He talked rather at random; likely enjoyed bantering me. But," I hastily placated in his behalf, "he recommended Benton as a lively place, and you as a friend of value in case that you ...
— Desert Dust • Edwin L. Sabin

... Shakespeare's attitude is that of a humorist who invites to reformation half-jestingly. His bantering tone, when he turns to social censure, strikingly contrasts with the tragic earnestness that colours his criticism of political vice or weakness. Some of the national failings on the social side which Shakespeare rebukes may seem trivial at a first glance. But it is ...
— Shakespeare and the Modern Stage - with Other Essays • Sir Sidney Lee

... not know whether Miss Bessie Lynde meant to go to Mrs. Bevidge's Thursdays or not. He thought she might have been bantering him by what she said, and he decided that he would risk going to the first of them on the chance of meeting her. She was not there, and there was no one there whom he knew. Mrs. Bevidge made no effort to enlarge his acquaintance, and after ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells

... that this is a public foot-path, with a proper and legal right-of-way from time immemorial. You can't turn us off it, you know—without exposing yourself to all sorts of pains and penalties. You men know that, too," she continued, turning to the labourers and dropping her bantering tone. "You all know this is a public footpath. So stand out of our way, or I'll ...
— Scarhaven Keep • J. S. Fletcher

... reason to be grateful to you, monsieur le baron," Madame Chevreuse said, laying aside the bantering tone in which she had before addressed the young Scot, "and her majesty has done well to reward your loyalty, for the estate is a fine one, and has remained without a master since Richelieu brought its last owner to the block for having, as he affirmed, conspired ...
— Won by the Sword - A Story of the Thirty Years' War • G.A. Henty

... were stretching fast, it was too late to try another field, so back they started through the radiant air, laughing, talking, bantering, living over the incidents of the day, the men with one leg swung for rest over the pommel of their saddles, the girls with habits disordered and torn, hair down, and all tired, but all flushed, clear-eyed, ...
— The Heart Of The Hills • John Fox, Jr.

... I met Capt. Pascal at Miss Guerin's house, and asked him for my prize-money. He said there was none due to me; for, if my prize money had been 10,000 L. he had a right to it all. I told him I was informed otherwise; on which he bade me defiance; and, in a bantering tone, desired me to commence a lawsuit against him for it: 'There are lawyers enough,' said he,'that will take the cause in hand, and you had better try it.' I told him then that I would try it, ...
— The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, Or Gustavus Vassa, The African - Written By Himself • Olaudah Equiano

... gets down from the stand, views the young property from every advantageous angle, dwells upon the bid, makes further comments on its choiceness, and after considerable bantering, knocks them down to-"What name, sir?" he enquires, ...
— Our World, or, The Slaveholders Daughter • F. Colburn Adams

... him a respectable place beside Greville among the minor pastoralists of his day. Lastly, in connexion with Sidney we may note a curious poem which appeared in the first edition of the Arcadia only.[126] It is a 'bantering' eclogue, in which the shepherds Nico and Pas first abuse one another and then fall to a comic singing match. It is evidently suggested by the fifth Idyl of Theocritus, and is a fair specimen of a very uncommon class in English. Akin to this is the burlesque variety, of which we have already ...
— Pastoral Poetry and Pastoral Drama - A Literary Inquiry, with Special Reference to the Pre-Restoration - Stage in England • Walter W. Greg

... after the lapse of a week, the bishop again protested that he was unprepared, owing to his continued difficulty in obtaining a copy of the necessary document. Jeffreys was obliged once more to adjourn the case, and in so doing offered this bantering apology: ...
— All About Coffee • William H. Ukers

... A slight incident disturbed it. For the spectator saw Lady Kent, who was sitting beside her daughter, raise a gigantic fan and beckon to Lord Ancoats. He came unwillingly, and she made some bantering remark. Lady Madeleine meanwhile was bending over a book of photographs, with a flushed cheek and a look of constraint. Ancoats stood near her for a moment uneasily, frowning and pulling at his moustache. Then ...
— Sir George Tressady, Vol. I • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... Russell's, and asked for Mr. Campbell. Again and again they met during the ensuing hour, but no greeting was exchanged; then he disappeared. As Irene leaned against the window-frame in the crowded supper-room, she heard Charlie Harris gaily bantering Maria on ...
— Macaria • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson

... clamour of voices arose on the other side of the closely-clipped wall of limes by which the two youths were walking. There were the clear tones of a young maiden expostulating in indignant distress, and the bantering, indolent determination of ...
— The Chaplet of Pearls • Charlotte M. Yonge

... you're the pride of the intellect; Divil a one of us ever came in till late, Once at the bar where you happened to be— Every eye there like a spoke in you centering, You with your eloquence, blarney, and bantering— All Vagabondia shouts at your entering, King of the Tenderloin, Barney McGee! There's no satiety In your society With the variety Of your esprit. Here's a long purse to you, And a great thirst to you! Fate be no worse to ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume II. (of X.) • Various

... editor displayed the headline, "Salem Witchcraft." The New York Herald said: "The effect is weird and almost supernatural." The Providence Press said: "It is hard to resist the notion that the powers of darkness are somehow in league with it." And The Boston Times said, in an editorial of bantering ridicule: "A fellow can now court his girl in China as well as in East Boston; but the most serious aspect of this invention is the awful and irresponsible power it will give to the average mother-in-law, who will be able to send her ...
— The History of the Telephone • Herbert N. Casson

... Eulenspiegel's lustige Streiche, nach alter Schelmenweise, in Rondeauform ("Till Eulenspiegel's Merry Pranks, according to an old legend, in rondeau form"), op. 28.[173] Here his disdain is as yet only expressed by witty bantering, which scoffs at the world's conventions. This figure of Till, this devil of a joker, the legendary hero of Germany and Flanders, is little known with us in France. And so Strauss's music loses much of its point, for it claims ...
— Musicians of To-Day • Romain Rolland

... need medical advice I'll send for Courtenay," he said, a hint of authority in his bantering tone. "We were discussing tobacco, and a woman; and the conjunction reminds me of an inspired German proverb I happened on the other day. 'God made man first; then He made woman; then He felt so sorry for man that He made—tobacco.' Supreme, ...
— The Great Amulet • Maud Diver

... of character. The dialogue, particularly in the second act, is as strong and as brilliant as polished steel. In that combat of words Genevieve Ward's acting was delicious with trenchant skill and fascinating variety. The easy, good-natured, bantering air with which the strife began, the liquid purity of the tones, the delicate glow of the arch satire, the icy glitter of the thought and purpose beneath the words, the transition into pathos and back again into gay indifference and deadly hostility, ...
— Shadows of the Stage • William Winter

... excursion reached the summit of one of the highest hills on the island, where the sea was visible all round him, he shook his head with affected solemnity, and exclaimed in a bantering tone, "Eh! il faut avouer que mon ile ...
— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne

... that I understood," said Belle; "and it was very wrong of you to take advantage of my ignorance, and make me say such things." "Why so?" said I; "if you said them, I said them too." "You did so," said Belle; "but I believe you were merely bantering and jeering." "As I told you before, Belle," said I, "the chief difficulty which I find in teaching you Armenian proceeds from your persisting in applying to yourself and me every example I give." "Then you meant nothing after all?" said Belle, raising her voice. ...
— Isopel Berners - The History of certain doings in a Staffordshire Dingle, July, 1825 • George Borrow

... time to enter into a bantering conversation with my volatile companion, I made no reply, but abandoned myself again to the pleasing fancies and feelings which were called up by the singular scene in the midst ...
— The Gorilla Hunters • R.M. Ballantyne

... assumed a slightly protective air towards Johnny Liston, the son of one of the cabin passengers, between whom and himself one of those stanch friendships common to boyhood had sprung up during the voyage to Australia. "A whale, your grandmother, Jonathan!" repeated Davy Armstrong in a bantering tone, with all—as his companion thought he could detect—the conscious superiority of a sucking sailor over a raw landsman, in his voice. "Why, you'll be seeing the sea serpent soon if you look smart. Where is this wonderful ...
— Picked up at Sea - The Gold Miners of Minturne Creek • J.C. Hutcheson

... quarters into one of the large rooms in the main building, with windows opening back and front into the yard and the avenue; these latter were without bars. All through the evening of Sunday, the 24th, I listened, rather enviously, to Hardcastle's noisy mirth; his voice never ceased to rattle—now bantering a fellow-prisoner with good-natured aggravation—now shouting out a verse of some popular song—now declaiming a sentence or so of exaggerated mock-oratory—yet he did not give me the idea of being uproarious with drink (I heard afterwards ...
— Border and Bastille • George A. Lawrence

... angry; but he was no more ready than he had been at first with a suitable answer for Gorman. He was dimly aware that if he gave way to his feelings, if he even allowed his anger to appear, this grey-haired, bantering Irishman would be gratified. He had just sense enough to realize that he must make some pretence at laughing. It was, of course, impossible for him to regard disrespectful remarks about the German navy as a joke, but he succeeded in giving ...
— The Island Mystery • George A. Birmingham

... manner was grave as an owl's, a certain gleam in his eye gave the requisite sting to the concluding words. Trenholme, at any other time, would have delighted in him, but dropped his bantering air forthwith. ...
— The Strange Case of Mortimer Fenley • Louis Tracy

... nothing in Corrigan's bantering words to bring on that sudden qualm of sickening fear that seized the banker. He knew it was his guilt that had done it—guilt and perhaps a dread of Corrigan's rage if he should learn of his duplicity. But that word "lately"! If it had been uttered ...
— 'Firebrand' Trevison • Charles Alden Seltzer

... half-closed her eyes. 'Why, what did you come here for?' (when she screwed up her eyes, their expression became very kindly and a little bantering, when she opened them wide, into their clear, almost cold brilliancy, there came something-ill-natured ... something menacing. Her eyes gained a peculiar beauty from her eyebrows, which were thick, and met in the ...
— The Torrents of Spring • Ivan Turgenev

... by this time, old lady,' asked Mr Boffin, turning to his wife in a bantering tone, 'about this Rokesmith here, and his caring for the truth? You needn't say what you think, my dear, because I don't want you to cut in, but you can think it all the same. As to taking possession of my property, I warrant you he wouldn't do ...
— Our Mutual Friend • Charles Dickens

... wit," said the Abbe Brigaud in that bantering tone, thanks to which it was impossible to know whether he was serious ...
— The Conspirators - The Chevalier d'Harmental • Alexandre Dumas (Pere)

... possible that if he had been attacked face to face, Oscar would have given a better account of himself. At Mrs. Grenfell's (now Lady Desborough) he crossed swords once with the Prime Minister and came off victorious. Mr. Asquith began by bantering him, in appearance lightly, in reality, seriously, for putting many ...
— Oscar Wilde, Volume 1 (of 2) - His Life and Confessions • Frank Harris

... and voices like the voices of spirits—almost the softest voices in the world, voices of infantile sweetness—hailed us. "Alah, mika chahko!" babbled the flowers of the forest. My solitary companion responded glibly, for he was no stranger in these parts. The maids grew garrulous. There was much bantering, and such laughter as the gods delight in; and at last a shout that drew the attention of the captain. He joined us just in season to recognize the occupants of the canoe, as they shot through a stream of light under an open port, crying "Anah nawitka mika halo shem!" And then we learned that ...
— Over the Rocky Mountains to Alaska • Charles Warren Stoddard

... the foot of the steps to keep back the mob, for if the excited men once rushed into the jail nothing could check their course. The deputies, tall broad-shouldered fellows, pushed back the threatening tide, always with good-natured protests,—words half bantering, half appealing, repulsive thrusts of the arms, rough but inflicting no hurt. So peaceful a minute before had been the Square, it was difficult to comprehend the sudden ...
— Lahoma • John Breckenridge Ellis

... Bud's gathering, looking river-ward until the sound of voices, whose words he could not distinguish, brought him lazily around. As he stood when the first view of Alexander broke on his vision, so he remained—immovable. The low and bantering laughter of his companions for his rapt statuesqueness, fell on deaf ears. His lips parted and his eyes held ...
— A Pagan of the Hills • Charles Neville Buck

... specimens of the North pole and the aurora borealis were intermingled with directions for preserving birds and collecting bugs; and amid a general confusion of congratulations, good wishes, cautions, bantering challenges, and tearful farewells, the steamer's bell rang. Dall, ever alive to the interests of his beloved science, grasped me cordially by the hand, saying, "Good-bye, George. God bless you! Keep your eye out for land-snails and skulls ...
— Tent Life in Siberia • George Kennan

... Blaine's remarks his well-modulated voice assumed a conversational tone, tinged with sarcastic bitterness as he occasionally indulged in bantering allusions to his lack of legal education. As he proceeded he became more impressive in words and action, and before he had concluded he had advanced between the desks into the centre aisle, where, with head erect and sweeping gestures, he poured forth a flood ...
— Perley's Reminiscences, Vol. 1-2 - of Sixty Years in the National Metropolis • Benjamin Perley Poore

... days passed down in the little street, the bantering fellowship between Larry and Hunt took deeper root. The Duchess did not again show any of the emotion which had gleamed in her briefly when Larry had announced his new plan; but bent and silent went like an oddly revivified mummy about her affairs. And during these days he did not again ...
— Children of the Whirlwind • Leroy Scott

... The meal was ended. His father was bantering him about what he learnt, or didn't learn, at school; was offering him an extra five shillings to his school tip if he could answer three questions. The darling was deliciously excited over it. How his voice rang! He ...
— This Freedom • A. S. M. Hutchinson

... "Compliment!" in various tones of deprecation, and Josephine added a meaning little laugh for her own share, for which Edgar gave her a kiss, and said in a bantering kind of voice, "Now, Joseph! ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science - February, 1876, Vol. XVII, No. 98. • Various

... with expression and the mock-serious bantering tones in which she delivered Rosalind's witty speeches caused Mr. Southard to smile and nod approvingly as she gave full value to the immortal lines. Her change of voice from Rosalind to Orlando was wholly delightful, ...
— Grace Harlowe's Junior Year at High School - Or, Fast Friends in the Sororities • Jessie Graham Flower

... bantering colloquy. This man, so hard, yet so kindly, so innocent, yet so mature, was making him feel by every tone, gesture, glance, oddly boyish and unformed. He was quite sure that he himself was a great deal cleverer, a great deal more conscious, than Sir Basil; but these advantages somehow ...
— A Fountain Sealed • Anne Douglas Sedgwick

... o'clock. The crowd dispersed slowly in different directions, and to its different occupations and amusements. We wandered about, all eyes and ears. As yet we had not many acquaintances, and could not enter into the intimate bantering life of the old-timers. There was enough to interest us, however. A good many were beginning to show the drink. After a long period of hard labour even the most respectable of the miners would have at times ...
— Gold • Stewart White

... as their calling in life, see Garve, Zu Cicero's Pflichten, III, 64 ff. Chess-like commerce of colporteurs, and in caravans etc. Concerning the dreadful higgling of the Bedouins, see Wellsted, Reise in Arabien, Roediger's translation, I, 147; and the still worse bantering in Cashmere, where the merchant, in the first place, always denies that he possesses the desired commodity, then begins to search for it, in order to discover what value the purchaser puts upon it etc. (K. Ritter, Erdkunde, III, 475.) On the practices in Indian fairs, see Th. Skinner, ...
— Principles Of Political Economy • William Roscher

... like this bantering of Mr M'Queerie, for I saw it made Geordie's face grow red, and it was not what he had deserved; so to repress it, and to encourage the poor lad, I said, "Come, come, neighbour, none of your wipes—what Geordie has done, is but arles ...
— The Provost • John Galt

... low, peculiar chirp, not very fierce, but bantering and confident. They quickly come to blows, but it is a very fantastic battle, and, as it would seem, indulged in more to satisfy their sense of honor than to hurt each other, for neither party gets the better of the other, ...
— Locusts and Wild Honey • John Burroughs

... and bantering tones ceased, for he had reached the top of the stair. But in another moment I heard them again as he passed from room to room, pausing here and pausing there, till suddenly he gave a cheerful laugh, spoke her name in most inviting accents, ...
— The Old Stone House and Other Stories • Anna Katharine Green

... throw out as mere hints and surmises, leaving it to our readers to draw their own conclusions. It will be found, however, that the poet was subjected to shrewd bantering among his contemporaries about the beautiful Mary Horneck, and that he was extremely sensitive ...
— Oliver Goldsmith • Washington Irving

... not think I could have been so stupid," I said, angrily; and going away to the other window, so that I should not have to listen to my companion's bantering, which I felt pretty sure would come, I stood gazing at the beautiful scene without, the moon making the dark green leaves glisten like silver, while the shades grew to be of a velvety black. Every here and there patches of ...
— Mass' George - A Boy's Adventures in the Old Savannah • George Manville Fenn

... already partly decked out in their finery, exchanged bantering remarks, bearing unmistakable reference to her, on the score of the lovers whom they had found, or hoped to find, and the flat-nosed scullion, encouraged to commit the impertinence by the winks of the head farm-hand and the coachman, asked ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. IX - Friedrich Hebbel and Otto Ludwig • Various

... luster in the black eyes that roved inquiringly from the Englishman's bantering grin to the others in the room. Mukee, the half Cree, was sitting with his elbows on his knees gazing with stoic countenance at this new curiosity who had wandered four hundred miles northward from civilization. ...
— Back to God's Country and Other Stories • James Oliver Curwood

... and waited, looking intently at the wrinkled face of Mother Bontemps. When Honore returned to breakfast he seemed quite satisfied and even in a bantering humor. He was decidedly getting in his wheat ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant

... ground, arguing and bantering, till the squire grudgingly gave way. This time, after he departed, Mr. Wendover, instead of going to his work, still stood gloomily ruminating in front of the fire. His frowning eyes wandered round the great room before him. For the first time he was conscious that now, as soon as the ...
— Robert Elsmere • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... it seems, had a very good horse and a very poor one. When seen riding the latter, he was asked the reason (it turned out that his better half had taken the good one). "What!" said the bantering bachelor, "how comes it you let your mistress ride the better horse?" The only reply was—"Friend, when thee beest married ...
— The Book of Anecdotes and Budget of Fun; • Various

... and further bantering by the Bishop, and then mild talk of village affairs, after which he took his leave, and Jane was left with her ...
— Riders of the Purple Sage • Zane Grey

... Williams approvingly with a hearty laugh. "My eyes, lads, what a skipper he'd make for us if he could only be persuaded to join! But we won't ask you to do that, Ned," he continued in the same bantering tone. "You can follow your own inclinations in that matter—join us or not, just as you please; but remain with us and navigate us you shall and will, whether ...
— The Missing Merchantman • Harry Collingwood

... Queen of the Ball!" But Missy did not mind his bantering tone. The expression of his eyes told her that he ...
— Missy • Dana Gatlin

... rows surged the busy life of the coming holiday. In front of every grocery store was a grove of fragrant Christmas trees waiting to be fitted into little green stands with fairy fences. Within, customers were bargaining, chatting, and bantering the busy clerks. Pedlers offering tinsel and colored candles waylaid them on the door-step. The rack under the butcher's awning fairly groaned with its weight of plucked geese, of turkeys, stout and skinny, of poultry of every kind. The saloon-keeper even ...
— Children of the Tenements • Jacob A. Riis



Words linked to "Bantering" :   humorous, humourous



Copyright © 2024 Dictionary One.com