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Morose   /mərˈoʊs/   Listen
Morose

adjective
1.
Showing a brooding ill humor.  Synonyms: dark, dour, glowering, glum, moody, saturnine, sour, sullen.  "The proverbially dour New England Puritan" , "A glum, hopeless shrug" , "He sat in moody silence" , "A morose and unsociable manner" , "A saturnine, almost misanthropic young genius" , "A sour temper" , "A sullen crowd"



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"Morose" Quotes from Famous Books



... is a blessing to me, and I never see her without being the better for her company." Mrs. Unwin's character is written in her portrait with its prim but pleasant features; a Puritan and a precisian she was, but she was not morose or sour, and she had a boundless capacity for affection. Lady Hesketh, a woman of the world, and a good judge in every respect, says of her at a later period, when she had passed with Cowper through many sad and trying years: "She is very far from grave; ...
— Cowper • Goldwin Smith

... man was Aaron Stark, — Cursed and unkempt, shrewd, shrivelled, and morose. A miser was he, with a miser's nose, And eyes like little dollars in the dark. His thin, pinched mouth was nothing but a mark; And when he spoke there came like sullen blows Through scattered fangs a few snarled words and close, As if a cur ...
— The Children of the Night • Edwin Arlington Robinson

... flight he gave up the world for love. Springing from his ship-of-war into a light galley, he hastened in wild pursuit after his flying mistress. Overtaking her vessel, he went on board, but seated himself in morose misery at a distance, and would have nothing to do with her. Ruin and despair were ...
— Historic Tales, Volume 11 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris

... heroic way Jerry goes into the collar at a hard steep hill or some swirlin', rushin' ford. Sech bein' Jerry's work habits I'm prepared to overlook a heap of moral deeficiencies an' never lays it up ag'in Jerry that he's morose an' repellant when I flings ...
— Wolfville Nights • Alfred Lewis

... spoke I felt my heart swell with hope; the gloomy feelings of disappointment passed away, and I found myself gazing with astonishment at Mr Gunson, whose morose, disfigured face seemed to brighten up and glow, while his eye flashed again, as when Mr Raydon finished speaking he leaned forward and grasped ...
— To The West • George Manville Fenn

... the nobler traits of their nature, yet, without yielding a due allowance for the peculiarities of their situation, the Indian character has been presented with singular uniformity as being cold, cruel, morose, and revengeful; unrelieved by any of those varying traits and characteristics, those lights and shadows which are admitted in respect to other people no less wild and uncivilized ...
— The Loyalists of America and Their Times, Vol. 2 of 2 - From 1620-1816 • Edgerton Ryerson

... cousins had to go home, and soon left us, taking the deck with them. But the fatal act had been done. That night my brother was in the city until a late hour, which was a thing that had never occurred before. When he came home, he seemed morose; and to our inquiries for the cause, ...
— Stories Worth Rereading • Various

... very morose, and Wessex, who had lighted his pipe, did not seem to be in a talkative mood either. He had the utmost faith in Paul Harley, but it was evident enough that he was oppressed by the weight of evidence against Camber. I divined the fact that he was turning over in his mind the idea ...
— Bat Wing • Sax Rohmer

... who think or declare me to be hostile, morose, and misanthropical, how unjust you are, and how little you know the secret cause of what appears thus to you! My heart and mind were ever from childhood prone to the most tender feelings of affection, and I was always disposed to accomplish ...
— Beethoven's Letters 1790-1826, Volume 1 of 2 • Lady Wallace

... had shown a strong interest in the Indian boatmen from the beginning of their journey and had struck up an especial friendship with the Indian whose dog had tackled the wild cat and had been later crushed by the Kodiak bear. The red man, while not morose, was taciturn, and replied to all questions with monosyllables and scarcely a smile. He showed friendliness in other ways, and as he became better acquainted with the boys responded to the young Scout leader's approaches. Day by day and word by word he inducted Rand into the ...
— The Boy Scouts on the Yukon • Ralph Victor

... all these personal attacks aside, all these recriminations against science and its agents, who unfortunately had not succeeded in restoring the health of the morose magistrate. What remains then of his pamphlet? Two chapters, only two chapters, in which Bailly's report is treated seriously. The medical commissioners and the members of the Academy had not seen, in the real effects ...
— Biographies of Distinguished Scientific Men • Francois Arago

... is generously hospitable, that he is profuse; of him that is prudently frugal, that he is niggardly; of him that is cheerful and free in his conversation, that he is vain or loose; of him that is serious and resolute in a good way, that he is sullen or morose; of him that is conspicuous and brisk in virtuous practice, that it is ambition or ostentation which prompts him; of him that is close and bashful in the like good way, that it is sneaking stupidity, or want of spirit; of him that is reserved, that it is craft; of him that is ...
— The World's Best Orations, Vol. 1 (of 10) • Various

... is not all. Mr. Micawber is morose. He is severe. He is estranged from our eldest son and daughter, he has no pride in his twins, he looks with an eye of coldness even on the unoffending stranger who last became a member of our circle. The pecuniary means of meeting ...
— David Copperfield • Charles Dickens

... to time Barnett saw little things which convinced him that so long as John Grange was near he would have no chance of making any headway with the object of his pursuit, and this made him so morose and bitter that he would often walk up and down one of the shrubberies on dark nights, inveighing against his rival, who still did not accept his position, but hung on in a place where he ...
— A Life's Eclipse • George Manville Fenn

... prominent. His countenance expresses courage, and his well-set jaws betoken firmness and resolution. He does not belie his looks, for he possesses these qualifications in a high degree. There is a gravity in his manner, somewhat rare in one so young; yet it is not the result of a morose disposition, but a subdued temperament produced by modesty, good sense, and much experience. Neither has it the air of stupidity. No: you could easily tell that the mind of this youth, if once roused, would exhibit both energy ...
— Popular Adventure Tales • Mayne Reid

... recall the gay transformation in my shop-mates when the whistle blew on Saturday night. The dullest and most morose showed intelligence then. The prospect of rest, be it ever so remote—even in the hereafter—roused them from their lethargy. How alert and cheerful we were on holidays, even the prolonged holiday of a strike brought its pinched joys. Quite a number of my ancient ...
— An Anarchist Woman • Hutchins Hapgood

... foreign acquaintances in Washington because the Spaniard spoke little English; and Dick knew Washington well enough to understand that while a girl and a man who speak different languages may sit comfortably together at table, men in like predicament grow morose and are likely to quarrel with their eyes before the cigars are passed. It was Friday, and the whole party had witnessed the drill at Fort Myer that afternoon, with nine girls to listen to their explanation of the manoeuvers and the earliest spring ...
— The Port of Missing Men • Meredith Nicholson

... States decides to go off its collective rocker," Boyd finished. "Exactly." He stared down at his cigarette for a minute with a morose and pensive expression on his face. He looked, Malone thought, like Henry VIII trying to decide what to do about all ...
— Occasion for Disaster • Gordon Randall Garrett

... that Sheridan did, who put them into livery to wait upon his guests. The debtor starts and grows pale at every knock at his door. His friends grow cool, and his relatives shun him. He is ashamed to go abroad, and has no comfort at home. He becomes crabbed, morose, and querulous, losing all pleasure in life. He wants the passport to enjoyment and respect—money; he has only his debts, and these make him suspected, despised, and snubbed. He lives in the slough of despond. He feels degraded in others' eyes as well as in his own. He ...
— Thrift • Samuel Smiles

... seven of his people went headlong, and drove silver tridents into the steaming cave at random, and speared a kid, a cygnet, and a flock of wildfowl. These presently smoked before Gerard and company; and Peter's face, sad and slightly morose at the loss of the savage hog, expanded and shone. After this, twenty different tarts of fruits and herbs, and last of all, confectionery on a Titanic scale; cathedrals of sugar, all gilt painted in the interstices of ...
— The Cloister and the Hearth • Charles Reade

... give you so much trouble!" murmured Mrs Hunt, with a sweet smile. "But, Del, my love, you must try not to look so morose for trifles—it gives such an ugly turn to the features. You'll find the jelly in that nice corner cupboard in the kitchen. Here's the key"—feeling in her pocket—"no; it is not here—where did I leave my keys? Oh, you'll find them in the pocket of my black serge dress—and ...
— Thistle and Rose - A Story for Girls • Amy Walton

... favourite of the captain, and intimate with Hillebrant, the first mate; the second mate, Struys, was a morose young man, with whom he had little intercourse. As for the supercargo, Mynheer Jacob Janz Von Stroom, he seldom ventured out of his cabin. The bear Johannes was not confined, and therefore Mynheer Von Stroom confined himself; hardly a day passed that he did not look over ...
— The Phantom Ship • Captain Frederick Marryat

... Second looked very thoughtful, even morose. He poured out another glass of champagne, drank it slowly in sips, and when the glass was empty ran the forefinger of his right hand slowly round and ...
— The Prophet of Berkeley Square • Robert Hichens

... Club, Jockey Club, and of the Society for Promoting the Breeding of Hounds. Enjoys perfect health, and has imperturbable self-assurance. Speaks loud and abruptly. Is either perfectly serious—almost morose, or is noisily gay and ...
— Fruits of Culture • Leo Tolstoy

... are often only vaguely aware of the nature of the satisfaction they are seeking, and frequently no struggle precedes the manifestation; such was the case of the overworked clergyman described by Hughes,[61] who, after much study, became morose and absent-minded, and committed acts of exhibitionism which he could not explain but made no attempt to deny; with rest and restorative treatment his health improved and the acts ceased. It is in the first class of cases alone that there is a developed sexual perversion. ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 5 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis

... she was merry and playful, while others describe her as solemn and morose. The reproduction on page 170 is from an old print discovered by some ardent antiquaries hanging upside down in ...
— Terribly Intimate Portraits • Noel Coward

... brandy-and-soda, as nearly as I could calculate, and it lasted till the eleventh, when he usually relapsed into gloom again, and became overcast until the next recurrence of the phenomena. But whatever his mood was, Evadne humoured it. She responded always—or tried to—when he was genial; and when he was morose, she was dumb. I thought ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand

... time, he slowly fed the flame that flickered on his hearth. In this way the windows of the cabin at times sprang into light, making a somewhat confusing beacon for the somewhat confused Arthur Wayne, who was returning from a visit to Angel's, and who had fallen into that slightly morose and irritated state which follows excessive hilarity, and is also apt to indicate ...
— The Bell-Ringer of Angel's and Other Stories • Bret Harte

... I am very little indeed,' returned the Child of the Marshalsea; and so began to sob over that unfortunate defect of hers, which came so often in her way. The milliner—who was not morose or hard-hearted, only newly insolvent—was touched, took her in hand with goodwill, found her the most patient and earnest of pupils, and made her a cunning work-woman in course ...
— Little Dorrit • Charles Dickens

... the same. You understood You too, defensive and morose, Encloaked your secret puppyhood— Your ...
— Twenty • Stella Benson

... inflict my misanthropy on you, dear Miss Campion; as it is, you are far too indulgent to my morose moods." ...
— Wee Wifie • Rosa Nouchette Carey

... visited was Lunnasting Castle, where I made the acquaintance of Sir Marcus Wardhill and his daughter, a handsome person, though no longer young. He is a hale old man, but somewhat eccentric, and rather morose, I suspect; has a bee in his bonnet—that is the case with many of his family. There is a cousin who lives there; not quite as old as Sir Marcus—a very odd fellow; indeed, I should say decidedly mad. You may probably know something ...
— Ronald Morton, or the Fire Ships - A Story of the Last Naval War • W.H.G. Kingston

... the attenuated creature, with a morose reflection of his loss, the latter, with a rebellion which she could not control, selected with trembling fortitude a thick slice of bread, which she buttered liberally and began to devour with pathetic haste, despite the rebuking gleam of the ...
— The Flaw in the Sapphire • Charles M. Snyder

... large family of 10 five of each but he grew very morose as the years rolled by and his little cottage was very noisy and his wife was a bit annoying at times especially when he took to dreaming of Ethel and wishing he could have marrid her. Still he was a pius man in his way ...
— The Young Visiters or, Mr. Salteena's Plan • Daisy Ashford

... advance of Charley and Bert as the trio returned from repairing the fences wrecked by the flood that had swept over the east bottom-lands of the Quarter Circle KT. All morning he had been silent and morose. Only when necessary had he spoken while he directed the cowboys at their labor, helped them reset posts, or untangle twisted wires and build up again that which the rush of water had torn down. The damage had not been great and by noon the fence was as good as new. As soon as the ...
— The Ramblin' Kid • Earl Wayland Bowman

... habitually grave expression, verging towards melancholy; induced, probably, by the vicissitudes of a wild life (in which he had seen much of the rugged side of nature in men and things) acting upon a sensitive heart, and a naturally warm temperament. Redfeather, however, was by no means morose; and when seated along with his Canadian comrades round the camp fire, he listened with evidently genuine interest to their stories, and entered into the spirit of their jests. But he was always an auditor, and rarely took ...
— The Young Fur Traders • R.M. Ballantyne

... wayward, humorsome^; restiff^, restive; cantankerous, intractable, exceptious^, sinistrous^, deaf to reason, unaccommodating, rusty, froward; cussed [U.S.]. dogged &c (stubborn) 606. grumpy, glum, grim, grum^, morose, frumpish; in the sulks &c n.; out of sorts; scowling, glowering, growling; grouchy. peevish &c ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget

... of dissolvinge the Monarchy, and lesse of levellinge the rankes and distinctions of men, for no man valewed himselfe more upon his title, or had more ambition to make it greater, and to rayse his fortune, which was but moderate for his title. He was of a prowde, morose, and sullen nature, conversed much with bookes, havinge bene bredd a scholar, and (though nobly borne) a fellow of New-Colledge in Oxforde, to which he claymed a right, by the Allyance he praetended to have from William of Wickam ...
— Characters from 17th Century Histories and Chronicles • Various

... to have conquered, in the strife with Remus, the difficulty was not yet fully settled. Remus was very little disposed to acquiesce in his brother's assumed superiority over him. He was sullen, morose, and ill at ease, and was inclined to take little part in the proceedings which were going on. Finally an occasion occurred which produced a crisis, and brought the rivalry and enmity of the brothers suddenly and forever to an end. Remus was one day standing by a part of ...
— Romulus, Makers of History • Jacob Abbott

... a small house here, but a very comfortable one, and the people are exceedingly obliging. Their demeanor in these country parts is invariably morose, sullen, clownish, and repulsive. I should think there is not, on the face of the earth, a people so entirely destitute of humor, vivacity, or the capacity of enjoyment. It is most remarkable. I am quite serious when I say that ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster

... of the sorrow of Thomas had driven him to despair. He found it hard to believe always. Here he found it impossible. Now, there are some folks who are sweetened by sorrow and made better. There are others that are made bitter and morose and despairful. I heard a man cry one day, an awful cry "Oh, I could curse God," he said, "if I knew there was a God, for letting little Mary die!" For Thomas everything had collapsed. There was not a star in his sky. There ...
— Sermons on Biblical Characters • Clovis G. Chappell

... foreman of the Doubleday ranch. His head, carried habitually forward, gave him the appearance of always looking out from under his eyebrows; and the natural expression of his face, bordering on the morose, was never lighted by more than a strained smile—a smile that suggested a grin, that puckered the corners of his eyes and drew hard furrows down his cheeks, but evidenced nothing akin to even ...
— Laramie Holds the Range • Frank H. Spearman

... person is often morose and unsocial—perhaps because he is not understood, perhaps because he falls so short of his own ideals. Often he does not find kindred spirits anywhere. I do not think we should drive such a man into conditions that hurt, but I do believe that if ...
— The Untroubled Mind • Herbert J. Hall

... saw me quite plainly she turned away her eyes. I had been waiting for my cue, so I did not lift my hat, but passed on as if we were strangers. I reckoned it was part of the game, but that trifling thing annoyed me, and I spent a morose evening. ...
— Mr. Standfast • John Buchan

... friendly feeling which prevails among them may be judged by the fact that, when one of the males becomes lost or is driven away from its associates, it does not seem to be able to join any other tribe, but becomes a "rogue," or solitary individual, and in this state develops a morose ...
— Domesticated Animals - Their Relation to Man and to his Advancement in Civilization • Nathaniel Southgate Shaler

... gracefully devil-may-care and witty good-humor. Of course, he was admired by everybody, and loved, as only mankind can love, by not a few. But in his twenty-ninth year a change came over him. Like one whose hair turns gray in a night, so in a day Charlemont turned from affable to morose. His acquaintances were passed without greeting; while, as for his confidential friends, them he pointedly, unscrupulously, and with a ...
— The Confidence-Man • Herman Melville

... his royal patron, Henry VIII., lived, all went well; after the death of that monarch his anxieties and troubles began. His pension became smaller, and at length ceased. No one seemed to appreciate his toil. He became melancholy and morose, and the effect of nightly vigils and years of toil began to tell upon his constitution. At length his mind gave way, ere yet the middle stage of life was passed; and although many other famous antiquaries have followed his steps ...
— Books Fatal to Their Authors • P. H. Ditchfield

... his work these days oppressed by a foreboding. He suspects that before long a censor is going to materialize out of thin air to take stern and morose charge of the American theatre. It is true that no statutory precipitation of such an agent has been definitely proposed. It is true that the policeman from the nearest corner has not gone so far ...
— Nonsenseorship • G. G. Putnam

... attractive and quite improbable, except that it was one of Naseby's peculiarly sneaking ways to tell the truth. Anyway, Naseby had left Cherry Street for good, and had gone back to the country to work there. This all helped to make Snipes morose, and it was with a cynical smile of satisfaction that he watched an old countryman coming slowly up the street, and asking his way timidly of the Italians to ...
— Gallegher and Other Stories • Richard Harding Davis

... calls for this and for that, not knowing his own mind, And the mistress's violence, always so easily kindled, With the children's rough and supercilious bad manners,— This is indeed hard to bear, whilst still fulfilling your duties Promptly and actively, never becoming morose or ill-natured; Yet for such work you appear little fit, for already the father's Jokes have offended you deeply; yet nothing more commonly happens Than to tease a maiden about her liking a youngster." Thus he spoke, and the maiden felt the weight of his language, And no more ...
— The Poems of Goethe • Goethe

... three weeks later, Paul travelled homewards, his disappointment was quite forgotten, and he was in the best of spirits, for it is beyond the power of any ordinary boy to feel morose and sulky the day his school breaks up and he goes home for his summer holiday; and when the family joined him at Slewbury station,—all except his father, who was to follow later,—and they journeyed on together, he was the life ...
— Paul the Courageous • Mabel Quiller-Couch

... peered anxiously out of their chamber windows at six o'clock on Monday morning to see a clear, calm, beautiful sky, with a faint roseate flush in the east, where, by-and-by, the sun would come up brilliantly. Aunt Hepsy was as cross as two sticks, and Uncle Josh morose and taciturn; but even these things failed to damp their spirits, and at a quarter to eleven they set off, a very happy pair, across the meadow to the parsonage. Both looked well. Lucy's mourning, though simple and inexpensive, was wonderfully becoming; and some ...
— Thankful Rest • Annie S. Swan

... were on the promenade deck of the steamer with a passage-way between them. This admitted of entirely separate existences, which was well, for knowing or guessing my share in our altered arrangements, my husband had become even more morose than before, and no conversation ...
— The Woman Thou Gavest Me - Being the Story of Mary O'Neill • Hall Caine

... again, and even morose; and I think it possible he may have had some suspicions of me; for he suspected everyone, I think. But he brightened wonderfully when I said with a very innocent air that I would like my servant to be fetched, and that ...
— Oddsfish! • Robert Hugh Benson

... all are fled. My Lord Mayor and the whole City had been in armes, above 40,000. Tom and I and my wife to the Theatre, and there saw "The Silent Woman." Among other things here, Kinaston the boy had the good turn to appear in three shapes: first, as a poor woman in ordinary clothes, to please Morose; then in fine clothes, as a gallant; and in them was clearly the prettiest woman in the whole house: and lastly, as a man; and then likewise did appear the handsomest man in the house. In our way home ...
— The Diary of Samuel Pepys • Samuel Pepys

... pestilence that walks in darkness. Indigestion is indeed a fruitful source of crime. It casts the black shadow of chronic pessimism athwart the sunniest soul and transforms happy homes into dens of despair. It makes men irritable, morose, and prompts them to homicide. Who can tell how much misery and crime the wretched cookery of female Prohibitionists is responsible for? How the cost of our criminal courts might be reduced if these she-reformers would but attend to their kitchens and dish ...
— Volume 12 of Brann The Iconoclast • William Cowper Brann

... symptoms of another attack of heart disease, a tendency to start for town, or openly defied him by walking away. Yet, Jimmy stuck to him closer than he ever had, and absolutely refused to go anywhere, or to do the smallest piece of work alone. Sometimes he grew sullen and morose when he was not drinking, and that was very unlike the gay Jimmy. Sometimes he grew wildly hilarious, as if he were bound to make such a racket that he could hear no sound save his own voice. So long as he stayed at home, helped with the work, and made an effort to please Mary, Dannie ...
— At the Foot of the Rainbow • Gene Stratton-Porter

... faces. Alcohol is a capricious master, seldom setting the same task twice, nor directing his slaves into similar pathways. He delights, moreover, in reversing the edge of a person's disposition, making good-natured people pettish or morose, while he sometimes improves those of naturally evil temper. Often under his sway the somber and the stoical become gay and impulsive, while the joyful sink into despondency. But with Robert Wharton, liquor intensified a natural agreeableness until it cloyed. His amenities were ...
— The Auction Block • Rex Beach

... followed, Edgar's friends found him unusually silent, yet not morose. Serenity sat on his broad, thoughtful brow and in his great, soft eyes. Nat Howard and his chums gave him the cold shoulder and wore, in his presence, the air of offended dignity which the small-minded are apt to assume when ...
— The Dreamer - A Romantic Rendering of the Life-Story of Edgar Allan Poe • Mary Newton Stanard

... follow, with interest and admiration, the flights of genius; or, with cooler approbation suck in the instruction, which has been elaborately prepared for them by the profound thinker, ought not to be disgusted, if they find the former choleric, and the latter morose; because liveliness of fancy, and a tenacious comprehension of mind, are scarcely compatible with that pliant urbanity which leads a man, at least to bend to the opinions and prejudices of others, instead ...
— A Vindication of the Rights of Woman - Title: Vindication of the Rights of Women • Mary Wollstonecraft [Godwin]

... through a sort of antechamber, and entered a room in which was a turn-up bed. On a black wood table were many phials, which had contained different medicines. The prelate's countenance seemed uneasy and morose; his complexion was still yellow and bilious; the brown circle which surrounded his black, squinting eyes appeared still darker ...
— The Wandering Jew, Complete • Eugene Sue

... to fathers of families, and frequently cited to mothers-in-law. She had made over her property to Moina in her own lifetime; the young Countess' happiness was enough for her, she only lived in her daughter. If some cautious old person or morose uncle here and there condemned the course with—"Perhaps Mme. d'Aiglemont may be sorry some day that she gave up her fortune to her daughter; she may be sure of Moina, but how can she be equally sure of her son-in-law?"—these prophets ...
— A Woman of Thirty • Honore de Balzac

... night, and the next day till four in the afternoon, the Boreal went driving alone over the sea, whither she would: for I lay unconscious. When I woke, I found that I had received really very small injuries, considering: but I sat there on the floor a long time in a sulky, morose, disgusted, and bitter mood; and when I rose, pettishly stopped the ship's engines, seeing my twelve dead all huddled and disfigured. Now I was afraid to steam by night, and even in the daytime I would ...
— The Purple Cloud • M.P. Shiel

... Paul, 'they are going to see to our quarters.' The wheels grazed on the narrow road, the seconds bowed, the doctors exchanged professional smiles. Then the brougham went by, showing behind the window glass, pulled up in spite of the heat, a morose motionless profile, as pale as a corpse. 'He won't be paler than that an hour hence, when they take him home with a hole in his side,' thought Paul, and he pictured the exact thrust, feint No. 2, followed by a direct lunge straight in between the ...
— The Immortal - Or, One Of The "Forty." (L'immortel) - 1877 • Alphonse Daudet

... de Berny was unhappy; she was intelligent and sentimental; he, capricious and morose. She seems to have realized the type of the femme incomprise; she too was an etrangere, and bore some traits of her German origin. Coming into Balzac's life at about the age of forty, this femme de quarante ...
— Women in the Life of Balzac • Juanita Helm Floyd

... sort of conviction related to these morose days through which we are living and letters will shower upon you like leaves in October. No matter what your conviction be, it will shake both yeas and nays loose from various minds where they were hanging ready to fall. Never was a time when ...
— A Straight Deal - or The Ancient Grudge • Owen Wister

... of moods. It is inevitable that such a man produces work of varying merit; inequality must be a characteristic feature of his art. In less fortunate circumstances than those in which Giorgione was placed, such temperaments as his become peevish, morose, morbid; but his lines were cast in pleasant places, and his moods were healthy, joyous, and serene. He does not concern himself with the tragedy of life, with its pathos or its disappointments. In his two ...
— Giorgione • Herbert Cook

... sullenly. His defeat that evening had left him glum and morose. He felt that he had cut a sorry figure in the affair, and his vanity was wounded. "I deplore I had so little share in the fight," ...
— St. Martin's Summer • Rafael Sabatini

... in it rather than in a desert, like you. Few men can bear absolute retirement, and we English worst of all. We grow so humorsome, so obstinate and capricious, and so prejudiced, that it requires a fund of good-nature like yours not to grow morose. Company keeps our rind from growing too coarse and rough; and though at my return I design not to mix in public, I do not intend to be quite a recluse. My absence will put it in my power to take up or drop as much as I please. Adieu! I shall inquire about ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole - Volume II • Horace Walpole

... any person or friend, denotes that you will fail to find happiness, as you will cultivate a morose and repellent bearing. ...
— 10,000 Dreams Interpreted • Gustavus Hindman Miller

... a person say, "I would rather die than be blind." But no one says, "I would rather die than lose my hearing." As a matter of fact, the person who is totally blind generally appears to be more cheerful, happier, than one who is totally deaf. Deaf mutes are often dull, morose, quick tempered, obstinate, self-willed, and difficult to get along with, while the blind are not infrequently distinguished for qualities quite the reverse. It is worthy of remark that the eye is that organ of sense which is most ornamental as well as useful, and the deprivation of which ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 647, May 26, 1888 • Various

... friends and acquaintances would least unworthily fill his place in our lives.' 'Violet! Violet!' 'If you persist in misunderstanding me,' she answered, 'I have no more to say,' whereupon the Marquis tried to persuade the Marchioness out of the morose silence that had fallen upon them, and failing to move her he raised the question that had divided them. 'If you mean, Violet, that our racing friend would be a poor shift for our dead friend, meaning thereby that nobody ...
— Muslin • George Moore

... unhitched and the wagons dragged into the stream bed. It was heavy work, and when they camped, ferociously hungry, no fire could be kindled, and there was nothing for it but to eat the hard-tack damp and bacon raw. Leff cursed and threw his piece away. He had been unusually morose and ill-humored for the last week, and once, when obliged to do sentry duty on a wet night, had flown into a passion and threatened to leave them. No one would have been sorry. Under the stress of mountain faring, the farm boy was ...
— The Emigrant Trail • Geraldine Bonner

... son, who was the governor of the province of New Jersey, came to the house at Christmas time. He was a silent, morose, dignified, self-seeking man, who astonished Jack with his rabid Toryism. He nettled the boy by treating the opinions of the latter with smiling toleration and by calling his own ...
— In the Days of Poor Richard • Irving Bacheller

... differently. Mytton, a nephew of the member of Parliament, assumed an air of bravado, smiled and winked at his friends in court, evidently trusting to his high connections to get him off lightly. Vetch, on the other hand, was sullen and morose, never lifting his eyes from the floor except when I was giving my evidence, and then he threw me a glance in which I read, as clearly as in a book, the threat of venomous hate. Both he and Mytton were very heavily ...
— Humphrey Bold - A Story of the Times of Benbow • Herbert Strang

... born in London on the 2nd day of September, 1694. It was remarkable that the father of a man so vivacious, should have been of a morose temper; all the wit and spirit of intrigue displayed by him remind us of the frail Lady Chesterfield, in the time of Charles II.[23]—that lady who was looked on as a martyr because her husband was jealous of her: 'a prodigy,' says De Grammont, 'in the city of London,' where indulgent critics endeavoured ...
— The Wits and Beaux of Society - Volume 1 • Grace Wharton and Philip Wharton

... this same Viktor whom I have every right to think and to call my enemy. From the time of his birth my mother never regained her health, which had always been weak. Mr. Ratsch did not think fit in those days to keep up such a show of good spirits as he maintains now: he always wore a morose air and tried to pass for a busy, hard-working person. To me he was cruel and rude. I felt relief when I retired from Ivan Matveitch's presence; but my own home too I was glad to leave.... Unhappy was my youth! For ever tossed from one shore to the other, with no desire ...
— The Jew And Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev

... circled over the clean blue linoleum, with their short wings going so fast they fairly crackled, till the air was electric: and then, swirling over the dresser, their great moment came. Unhappily, Logan, with his usual bad luck, bumped the bread-box. The doe, with a shrill, morose whistle, went and laid on the floor; but Logan seemed too balked to pursue her. His ...
— The Crow's Nest • Clarence Day, Jr.

... if uttered rapidly, but soon becomes as familiar as the less foreign language of the Athole men, whose tongue we Argiles find some strange conceits in. If the Irish were affable, the men of our own side of the ocean were most singularly morose—small wonder, perhaps, for we have little reason to love each other. Sour dogs! they gloomed at us under their bonnets and swore in their beards. I have no doubt but for their gentry there had been dirks in us before we ...
— John Splendid - The Tale of a Poor Gentleman, and the Little Wars of Lorn • Neil Munro

... than I expected: my clownish conductor was not so morose as he appeared to be. He was a middle-aged man, wore his black, grizzly hair, in a queue, had a martial air, a strong voice, was tolerably cheerful, and to make up for not having been taught any trade, could turn his hand to every one. Having ...
— The Confessions of J. J. Rousseau, Complete • Jean Jacques Rousseau

... Little Demon" Sologub has shown us how the evil within us peering out through our imagination makes all the world seem evil to us. In "The Created Legend," feeling perhaps the need of reacting from his morose creation Peredonov, the author has set himself the task of showing the reverse of the picture: how the imagination, no longer warped, but sensitized with beauty, is capable of creating a world of its own, legendary yet none the less real ...
— The Created Legend • Feodor Sologub

... thus betraying the extent of her grief. Mazarin saw all this, and fearing that Louis XIV. might repent his decision, in order to draw attention another way he began to cry out, as, at a later period, Scapin was to cry out, in that sublime piece of pleasantry with which the morose and grumbling Boileau dared to reproach Moliere. His cries, however, by degrees, became fainter; and when Anne of Austria left the ...
— Ten Years Later - Chapters 1-104 • Alexandre Dumas, Pere

... consequence the boat would swing in abruptly, driving them back, helpless and jostling against each other. They would stand nonplussed for a while, exchanging in fierce whispers all the infamous names they could call to mind, and go at it again. Three times this occurred. He described it to me with morose thoughtfulness. He hadn't lost a single movement of that comic business. "I loathed them. I hated them. I had to look at all that," he said without emphasis, turning upon me a sombrely watchful glance. "Was ever there any one ...
— Lord Jim • Joseph Conrad

... Teeka been play-fellows, and Teeka still continued to be playful while the young bulls of her own age were rapidly becoming surly and morose. Tarzan, if he gave the matter much thought at all, probably reasoned that his growing attachment for the young female could be easily accounted for by the fact that of the former playmates she and he alone retained any desire to ...
— Jungle Tales of Tarzan • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... I repeated to myself, "alienate from me, by coolness and gloom, the friends who have loved me from my orphan childhood. Let him be morose and dark, if he will; I will not follow his example. I will not be the slave of ...
— Ernest Linwood - or, The Inner Life of the Author • Caroline Lee Hentz

... without availing to eradicate their inbred instincts of servility in the presence of the very men they hated. Precisely this self-contemptuous recognition of his own servile feeling, operating on a morose temper, was the key to Hubbard's special bitterness toward the silk stockings. That Perez had none of this peasant's instinct, must, after all, be partly ascribed to the fact that his descent, by his mother's side, had been ...
— The Duke of Stockbridge • Edward Bellamy

... back, spoken of scruples about such unconscious vows, and had finally only consented under stress of the personal friendship of the King, and on condition that he and his wife should at once have the sole custody of the little bride. Even then he moved about the gay scene with so distressed and morose an air that he was evidently either under the influence of a scruple of conscience or of ...
— The Chaplet of Pearls • Charlotte M. Yonge

... Mr. Gregg she had lived in a Dublin suburb. Accustomed to the rich and varied life of a metropolis she found Ballymoy a little dull. She recognised Major Kent as "a dear old boy," but he was quite unexciting. Mrs. Ford, the wife of a rather morose stipendiary magistrate, had severely snubbed Mrs. Gregg. There was no one else, and the gay frocks of Mrs. Gregg's bridal outfit were wasting their first freshness with hardly an opportunity ...
— General John Regan - 1913 • George A. Birmingham

... conversation as this with a mother from whom he had learnt to hate even the thought of evil? Nor will any one despise the simplicity of heart which made him mingle with the peasants as an amateur vintager, unless he is so tasteless and so morose as to think with scorn of Scipio and Laelius as they gathered shells on the seashore, or of Henry IV. as he played at horses with his little boys on all-fours. The capability of unbending thus, the genuine cheerfulness which enters at due times into simple amusements, has been found ...
— Seekers after God • Frederic William Farrar

... of a morose and dignified disposition, surly with strangers, and inclined to quarrel with any one who carried a stick or whip in their hands; never forgetting an injury, and growling whenever any person who had offended him made their appearance. He was also particularly irritable and tenacious ...
— The Dog - A nineteenth-century dog-lovers' manual, - a combination of the essential and the esoteric. • William Youatt

... plan succeeded, and by Adams's account, everything went on smoothly for a short time; but it was clear enough that this misguided and ill-fated young man was never happy after the rash and criminal step he had taken; that he was always sullen and morose; and committed so many acts of wanton oppression, as very soon incurred the hatred and detestation of his companions in crime, over whom he practised that same overbearing conduct, of which he accused his commander Bligh. The object he had in view when he last left Otaheite had now been accomplished; ...
— The Eventful History Of The Mutiny And Piratical Seizure - Of H.M.S. Bounty: Its Cause And Consequences • Sir John Barrow

... storming car, but Patricia was looking straight ahead, and she made no movement to slacken speed. At the passing glimpse, Blount's mind went shuttling backward to the homecoming night in the Lost Hills, and he made sure he recognized the rider as Hathaway's morose henchman, ...
— The Honorable Senator Sage-Brush • Francis Lynde

... steady set of nerves, and a constitution such as Sallust describes in Catiline, patient of cold, of hunger, and of watching. Philanthropists are commonly grave, occasionally grim, and not very rarely morose. Their expansive social force is imprisoned as a working power, to show itself only through its legitimate pistons and cranks. The tighter the boiler, the less it whistles and sings at its work. When Dr. Waterhouse, in 1780, travelled with Howard, ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)

... old nor the morose appear to be calculated for Friendship, because the pleasurableness in them is small, and no one can spend his days in company with that which is positively painful or even not pleasurable; since to avoid the painful and ...
— Ethics • Aristotle

... old, but looks perhaps ten years older. His height is over six feet two, and he does not stoop or slouch at all. His hair is long and abundant, but white; his eyes are dark, piercing, and gloomy. His features are fine, and of Italian cast, but stern, morose, and forbidding, and he never uses razor. On the back of his left hand, near the wrist, there is a broad scar. He dresses in half-mourning always, and never wears any jewelry, but strictly shuns all society, ...
— Erema - My Father's Sin • R. D. Blackmore

... Winesburg, who became a banker. Louise and her husband did not live happily together and everyone agreed that she was to blame. She was a small woman with sharp grey eyes and black hair. From childhood she had been inclined to fits of temper and when not angry she was often morose and silent. In Winesburg it was said that she drank. Her husband, the banker, who was a careful, shrewd man, tried hard to make her happy. When he began to make money he bought for her a large brick house on Elm Street in Winesburg and he was the first man in that town to keep a manservant ...
— Winesburg, Ohio • Sherwood Anderson

... his slow rise in political and civic power. And it is a peculiar feature of the day and of Franklin's individual character that many of his reforms took their start in the gayety of social intercourse. There was nothing morose, nothing stern, in our genial philosopher. Though always temperate, his vivacity and easy politeness made him welcome in any merry company of the day. He could sing with the best of the young blades and even compose his ...
— Benjamin Franklin • Paul Elmer More

... too long? New Year is a good time to take a fresh start. Everyone is going to welcome me, so I must be gay in spite of myself, unless I'm willing to seem very ungrateful and morose," said Rose, glad to have so good a reason to offer for her ...
— Rose in Bloom - A Sequel to "Eight Cousins" • Louisa May Alcott

... survived this cruel misfortune many years, yet he could never recover his former humour, but grew melancholy and morose; however, in order to provide better for the peace and settlement of the kingdom after his death, about five months after the loss of his son, his former Queen having died three years before, he married Adeliza, a beautiful young lady of the ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, Vol. X. • Jonathan Swift

... Ireland, after all, people have fun. Old and young, merry and morose, the gay and cross-grained, are crammed into a lively country-dance; and ill-matched, ill-suited, go jigging away together to the blast of a bad band, till their heads, half turned by the noise, the heat, the novelty, ...
— Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon, Volume 2 (of 2) • Charles Lever

... general wantonness there was only one who remained morose and anxious, and this was Heideck, the newly-made ...
— The Coming Conquest of England • August Niemann

... found a vent. From the distracting condition of wandering uncertain suspicion, it had been recalled into the glad security of individual hate. Although up to this time Kerkel had borne an exemplary reputation, it was now remembered that he had always been of a morose and violent temper, a hypocrite in religion, a selfish sensualist. Several sagacious critics had long "seen through him"; others had "never liked him"; others had wondered how it was he kept his place so long in Lehfeldt's shop. Poor fellow! his life and actions, like those of ...
— The Lock and Key Library • Julian Hawthorne, Ed.

... was no favorite with the officers of the yard. They kept him hard at work, and seemed to take a delight in harrying him. More than once, unjustly, as it appeared to Desmond, he had made acquaintance with the punishment tank. In his dealings with his fellows he was morose and offensive. A man of great physical strength, he was a match for any two of his shed companions save the Biluchis, who, though individually weaker, retained something of the spirit of their race and made common cause against him. The rest he bullied, and none more than the Bengali, ...
— In Clive's Command - A Story of the Fight for India • Herbert Strang

... Indians sat silent and morose, stretching, braiding, and hooping their Seneca scalps. And I heard them conversing among themselves, mentioning frequently the Three Sisters* they had destroyed; and they spoke ever with a hint of tenderness ...
— The Hidden Children • Robert W. Chambers

... most generous, the most warm-hearted and obliging of mortals, under this sort of training, made the most morose and disobliging of husbands. Sure to be found fault with, whatever they do, they have at last ceased doing. The disappointment of not pleasing they have abated by ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 88, February, 1865 • Various

... absurd, stupid, not to be imagined, but so it is—this proves it that this little woman has completely subjugated me. I was gay, careless and loquacious as a bird on the bough, but little scrupulous as to delicacy, and now behold me, sad, morose, taciturn, and of a delicacy so inordinate that I had a horrible fear lest Blue Beard should offer me, in parting, some remuneration other than the medallion from which she had the generosity to remove the jewels. Alas! from this time forth, this memory will be all my happiness—sad ...
— A Romance of the West Indies • Eugene Sue

... markedly refined and autocratic temperament. Yes, I knew their joint stories which Mr. Powell did not know. The chapter in it he was opening to me, the sea-chapter, with such new personages as the sentimental and apoplectic chief-mate and the morose steward, however astounding to him in its detached condition was much more so to me as a member of a series, following the chapter outside the Eastern Hotel in which I myself had played my part. In view of her declarations ...
— Chance • Joseph Conrad

... and of our home as a place full of the heart's warmest sunshine. But the father of my childhood and the father of my more advanced years wore a very different exterior. He had grown silent, thoughtful, abstracted, but not morose. As his children sprang up around him, full of life and hope, he seemed to lose the buoyant spirits of his earlier manhood. I did not observe this at the time, for I had not learned to observe and reflect. Life was ...
— All's for the Best • T. S. Arthur

... actual denizens! One gazed with a dull, wondering pity at the poor, pale, rickety children; the slatternly, coarse women who never smiled (except when drunk); the dull, morose, miserable men. How they lacked the grace of French deformity, the ease and lightness of French depravity, the sympathetic distinction of French grotesqueness. How unterrible they were, who preferred ...
— Peter Ibbetson • George du Marier et al

... should awaken sexually, and in some manner and somewhere that awakening must come. To ensure they do not awaken too soon or in a fetid atmosphere among ugly surroundings is not enough. They cannot awaken in a void. An ignorance kept beyond nature may corrupt into ugly secrecies, into morose and sinister seclusions, worse than the evils we have suppressed. Let them awaken as their day comes, in a sweet, large room. The true antiseptic of the soul is not ignorance, but a touch of the heroic in the heart and in the imagination. ...
— Mankind in the Making • H. G. Wells

... harnessed the dogs, and got away from the pine bluff two hours before daybreak. Oh, how biting cold it was! On in the grey snow light with a terrible wind sweeping up the long reaches of the river; nothing spoken, for such cold makes men silent, morose, and savage. After four hours travelling, we stopped to dine. It was only 9:30, but we had breakfasted six hours before. We were some time before we could make fire, but at length it was set going, and we piled the dry driftwood ...
— The Great Lone Land - A Narrative of Travel and Adventure in the North-West of America • W. F. Butler

... similar situation in the island of Mull. They entered into a humorous correspondence in prose and verse. "Your verses on the Unfortunate Lady," writes Campbell to his friend, "I read with sweet pleasure; for there is a joy in grief, when peace dwelleth in the breast of the sad.... Morose as I am in judging of poetry, I could find nothing inelegant in the whole piece. I hope you will in your next (since you are such a master of the plaintive) send me some verses consolatory to a hermit; for my sequestered ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volume II. - The Songs of Scotland of the past half century • Various

... understood a joke about himself, though he liked one about other people; while Elsley, who hated all jokes, made no answer—at least none worth recording. In fact, as the reader may have discovered, Elsley, save tete-a-tete with some one who took his fancy, was somewhat of a silent and morose animal, and, as little Scoutbush confided to Mellot, there was no getting a rise out of him. All which Lucia saw as keenly as any one, and tried to pass off by chattering nervously and fussily for him, as well as for herself; whereby she ...
— Two Years Ago, Volume II. • Charles Kingsley

... notable French authors of the time, Alexandre Dumas the Great, most prolific of romance writers; and Scribe of the innumerable plays; and the poets Lamartine and Victor Hugo; and Chateaubriand, then in his sad and somewhat morose old age. And in Paris too, with the help of streets and crowded ways, he wrote the great number of Dombey, the number in which little Paul dies. Three months did Dickens spend in the French capital, the incomparable ...
— Life of Charles Dickens • Frank Marzials

... bath, go to bed early and see if I can sleep," she muttered. "I don't know what it is that James is contemplating, but his face haunts me. Really, if he doesn't be more civil, and stop his morose glowering when I do see him, I'll put him or myself where we won't come in contact. He makes it plain every day that he blames me about Elizabeth. Why should he? He couldn't possibly know of the call of that wild-eyed reformer. So unfortunate that she ...
— Michael O'Halloran • Gene Stratton-Porter

... friend. In the next, when he surveyed his altered state, he was almost reconciled to the disappointment. Then, reproaching himself for a pride so unbecoming his principles and dishonorable to friendship, he asked, if he were in Somerset's place, and Somerset in his, whether he could ever pardon the morose delicacy which had prevented the communication of his friend's misfortunes, and arrival in the same ...
— Thaddeus of Warsaw • Jane Porter

... assigning some happiness proportioned to the soul of man that caused many of them, either on the one hand, to be sour and morose, supercilious and untreatable, or, on the other, to fall into the vulgar pursuits of common men, to hunt after greatness and riches, to make their court and to serve occasions, as Plato did to the younger Dionysius, and Aristotle ...
— Three Sermons, Three Prayer • Jonathan Swift

... avail, for Geoffrey was not a man to be stopped against his will. Several actual encounters took place between the two men, and many more were threatened and avoided. At last Wykham Delandre settled down to a morose, vengeful ...
— Dracula's Guest • Bram Stoker

... dinner. Long years of service done for him, however, had made him clumsy. He cooked a wretched meal, and then, leaving the dishes as they were, he sat by the fire and brooded. When Rudolph came in, later, he found him there, in his stocking-feet, a morose and untidy figure. ...
— Dangerous Days • Mary Roberts Rinehart

... Mr. Wyllys examined this point, the clearer it appeared to him, who had known his friend's only son from an infant, and had always felt much interested in him. As a child, and a boy, William Stanley had been of a morose temper, and of a sluggish, inactive mind—not positively stupid, but certainly far from clever; this claimant, on the contrary, had all the expression and manner of a shrewd, quick-witted man, who ...
— Elinor Wyllys - Vol. I • Susan Fenimore Cooper

... are living proofs: He always led an easy, cheerful life; Good-humor'd, mild, offending nobody, Smiling on all; a jovial bachelor, His whole expenses centred in himself. I, on the contrary, rough, rigid, cross, Saving, morose, and thrifty, took a wife: —What miseries did marriage bring!—had children; —A new uneasiness!—and then besides, Striving all ways to make a fortune for them, I have worn out my prime of life and health: And now, my course near finish'd, what return ...
— The Comedies of Terence • Publius Terentius Afer

... our table sit Miss Cross, Edna (Miss Cross calls her Edner), the Cuban girl, who refused to eat with the colored girls; Annie, the English girl, who had worked in a retail shoe shop in London; Mrs. Reilly, who is always morose at lunch and never speaks, except one day when she and Miss Cross nearly came to blows over religion. Each got purple in the face. Then it came out that there was a feud between them—two years or more it had lasted—and neither ...
— Working With the Working Woman • Cornelia Stratton Parker

... standing solitary and morose on a little knoll in his pasture, caught sight of the strange, dark figure of the running moose. A spark leapt into his heavy eyes. He wheeled, pawed the sod, put his muzzle to the ground, and bellowed a sonorous challenge. ...
— Kings in Exile • Sir Charles George Douglas Roberts

... for he is somewhat of a recluse, and we must often follow the disagreeable noise to its source in the tree-tops before we can catch a glimpse of the screecher. Perched on a high lookout, he appears morose and sluggish, in spite of his aristocratic-looking crest, trim figure, and feathers that must seem rather gay to one of his dusky tribe. A low soliloquy, apparently born of discontent, can be overheard from the foot of his ...
— Bird Neighbors • Neltje Blanchan

... all head-gardeners, was opinionated. Living always at Vauxe, he had come to believe that the gardens belonged to him, and that the family were only occasional visitors; and he treated them accordingly. The lively and impetuous Lady St. Jerome had a thousand bright fancies, but her morose attendant never indulged them. She used to deplore his tyranny with piteous playfulness. "I suppose," she would say, "it is useless to resist, for I observe 'tis the same everywhere. Lady Roehampton says she never has her way with her gardens. It is no use speaking to Lord St. Jerome, ...
— Lothair • Benjamin Disraeli

... charge; still my desires go after you, as well as the kind thoughts of many others; and since I cannot now speak to you, I take this way of expressing my thoughts to you. I do not know in what light you look upon me, whether as a grave and morose minister, or as one who might be a companion and friend; but really, it is so short a while since I was just like you, when I enjoyed the games which you now enjoy, and read the books which you now read, that ...
— The Biography of Robert Murray M'Cheyne • Andrew A. Bonar

... subject of his visit; besides, what cared he for delays? He had found him at last, he was face to face with the mysterious, infallible physician, the successor of the great Albert. Boiviel was even more savage and morose than the Abbe de Voisenon had anticipated. He spoke of offering his services to the Missionary Society in order to get appointed to preach the Gospel in Japan, although, to tell the truth, he did not believe over-much in Christianity. "And I do not believe in Japan," might have perhaps ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 2, No. 4, March, 1851 • Various

... without a stain?' 'Enough of all,' said she; 'but then To see those idle, worthless men Neglect the flocks, it gave me pain. I told them, plainly, what I thought, And thus their hatred quickly bought; For which I do not care—not I.' 'Ah, madam,' did her spouse reply, 'If still your temper's so morose, And tongue so virulent, that those Who only see you morn and night Are quite grown weary of the sight, What, then, must be your servants' case, Who needs must see you face to face, Throughout the day? And what must be the harder lot Of him, I pray, Whose days and nights With you must be ...
— The Fables of La Fontaine - A New Edition, With Notes • Jean de La Fontaine

... Walker, Colonel Butler had not been so obedient to his daughter's wishes. He had changed in many respects. He had grown old, white-haired, feeble and despondent. He was often ill at ease, and sometimes morose. That he grieved over the boy's absence there was not a shadow of doubt. Yet he would not permit the first suggestion of a reconciliation that did not involve the humble application of his grandson to be forgiven and taken back. But ...
— The Flag • Homer Greene

... greenish cast of the moonlight silhouetted the figures of the three men in grotesque shapes against the cemetery wall and the crumbling tombs. The morose call of a toucan floated weirdly upon the heavy air. The faint wail of the frogs in the shallow waters below rose like the despairing sighs ...
— Carmen Ariza • Charles Francis Stocking

... the sons became a Catholic. The eldest son, Marc Antoine, disliked his father's business and studied law. He could not be allowed to practice unless he became a Catholic. He tried to get his license by concealing that he was a Protestant. He was discovered—grew morose. Finally he became discouraged and committed suicide by hanging himself one evening in his father's store. The bigots of Toulouse started the story that his parents had killed him to prevent his becoming a ...
— Lectures of Col. R. G. Ingersoll - Latest • Robert Green Ingersoll

... happily indicative of the morose angularity that words offer to whoso handles them, admirably insistent on the chief of the incommodities imposed upon the writer, the necessity, at all times and at all costs, to mean something. ...
— Style • Walter Raleigh

... we—rub it in, just now?" The fact was that Honor was anxious. Carter was pallid, haggard, morose. The brief flare of composure with which he had greeted her was gone; he showed visibly and unpleasantly what he was suffering at the sight of their vivid and hearty happiness. Mrs. King had commented pityingly on it to Honor and it was simply not in the girl to go on adding ...
— Play the Game! • Ruth Comfort Mitchell

... Lucinde, the brother of Ariste, a guardian, a faggot-maker, a doctor, he always represents the ugly side of human nature, an antiquated, grumpy, sullen, egotistical, jealous, grovelling, frightened character, ever and anon raising a laugh on account of his boasting, mean, morose, odd qualities. Moliere was, at the time he wrote Sganarelle, more than thirty years old, and could therefore no longer successfully represent Mascarille as the rollicking servant ...
— Sganarelle - or The Self-Deceived Husband • Moliere

... the family history upon his boyish sense, like the faint, perpetual touches of an unseen hand moulding the will and the character; the picture of his patient mother on her sofa, surrounded with her little religious books, twisted and tormented, yet always smiling; his early collisions with his morose and half-educated father—he passed from these to the days of his first Communion, the beginnings of the personal life. "But I had very little fervour then, such as many boys feel. I did not doubt—I would not have shown any disrespect to my religion for the world, mostly, I think, from family ...
— Helbeck of Bannisdale, Vol. II • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... came with a bowl of coffee, which Carmena had sent for Lennon to give to Slade. There was no need of words to make clear her wish to be rid of the visitors. Lennon found Slade lying as torpid as Farley. But the hot coffee roused him to morose alertness. ...
— Bloom of Cactus • Robert Ames Bennet

... In short, by much repetition, a legend had grown up around the dachshunds, a legend of fierceness inhibited only by circumstances, of pathetic deprivation of the sports of their native land. If only we could have a badger, we could almost hear them say to each other in dog language, a strong, morose, savage badger! Alas! we are wasting our days in idleness, our talents rust from disuse! Finally, Uncle Jim remained ...
— The Killer • Stewart Edward White

... grew she, and more morose and stern the Black Earl, and of their tragedy there seemed no end. But when a year had nigh passed, one rosy morning a servant-lass met Black Roderick as he came from his chamber, her ...
— The Story and Song of Black Roderick • Dora Sigerson

... grievance, that, with half-a-dozen women in the house, he the exhausted breadwinner should have been obliged to attend to such a trifle. Bessie sprang to pull the chain of the Welsbach tap, and the white and silver of the tea-table glittered under the yellow light. Every woman looked furtively at John's morose countenance. ...
— Leonora • Arnold Bennett

... semitropical plants in the glow of a desert sunset. Two other men were with him, the third being the now celebrated second in command, familiar to everybody as Tom Travers, a lean, dark man, who looked older than his years, with a furrow in his brow and something morose about the very shape of his black mustache. They had just been served with black coffee by the Arab now officiating as the temporary servant of the club, though he was a figure already familiar, and even famous, as the old servant of the general. He went ...
— The Man Who Knew Too Much • G.K. Chesterton

... of future years, even then, fell across his mind. It would have been difficult to find two natures more unlike than were those of Mr. Judson and his wife. The former was stingy, even to miserly niggardliness, as well as ill-tempered, sullen and morose, while the latter was one of the most kind-hearted and motherly old ladies imaginable, that is, had her kindly nature been allowed to exhibit itself. As it was, not daring to act according to the dictates of her own kind heart, through fear of her stern ...
— Walter Harland - Or, Memories of the Past • Harriet S. Caswell

... Watson. If the lady were merely complimenting the gardener on his rose-garden, and if her smile were merely caused by the excellent appearance of that rose-garden, there would be an answering smile on the face of the gardener. But, as you see, he looks morose and gloomy." ...
— A Damsel in Distress • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse

... then, a sleepy grunt. The time was yet an hour or more before the first rising bell, so this early summons might properly be resented. But when Lambert called in a low voice: "I have a message from Doctor Field," the Italian's roommate, Johnston, a morose, dull-witted chap whose whole mind was bent on keeping up with his ...
— Radio Boys Loyalty - Bill Brown Listens In • Wayne Whipple

... every word this rascal had spoken and adduced from it that something most dishonorable must have been Jim's fate, and the oftener he attempted to unravel the mystery that lay concealed behind the ill-omened remarks made by this scoundrel, the more morose he became from the constant strain, for his troubled conscience caused him to feel that he was equally to be blamed for any disgrace that might have overtaken his ...
— The Trail of the Tramp • A-No. 1 (AKA Leon Ray Livingston)

... skies had spilt day-long torrents of rain and the sun had set red with the woods still sobbing and chill, a great fire roared on Caleb Parish's hearth. Before it sat the householder with his daughter and Kenneth Thornton; as usual, too, silent and morose yet stubbornly present, ...
— The Roof Tree • Charles Neville Buck

... policy, but Bute was the more deceived if he fancied that he was to find in Grenville the convenient mask that he had lost in Newcastle; and the King himself had yet to learn how indifferent the dry, morose pedant and preacher could be not merely to royal favor, but even to the expression of royal opinion. It was truly said of him by the greatest of his contemporaries that he seemed to have no delight ...
— A History of the Four Georges and of William IV, Volume III (of 4) • Justin McCarthy and Justin Huntly McCarthy

... becomes more free and gay, it insensibly sweetens it. It is certain that wine rouses up the forces of nature, and gives our soul a vigour capable to drive away all sorts of uneasiness. I know very well that certain morose people, at least externally so, and in appearance, will shew a great deal of aversion for a remedy, the delights of which they do not, however, too much despise. But all grimace aside. I don't trouble myself with their ill-understood severities, ...
— Ebrietatis Encomium - or, the Praise of Drunkenness • Boniface Oinophilus

... this: I am not wishing any longer to come forward with tragedies, epics, essays, or original compositions. I am old now—morose in temper, troubled with poverty, jaundice, imprisonment, and habitual indigestion. I hate everybody, and, with the exception of gin-and-water, everything. I know every language, both in the known and unknown worlds; I am ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari. Vol. 1, July 31, 1841 • Various

... diseased heart, and was quite conscious of his fate. That was his disappointment. Happy are they who, in this world of trial, meet their disappointments in their youth, not in their old age; then let them come and welcome, not too thick to render us morose, but like Spring mornings, frosty but kindly, the cold of which will kill the vermin, but will let the plant live; and let us rely upon it, that the best men (and women, too) are those who have ...
— Brave Men and Women - Their Struggles, Failures, And Triumphs • O.E. Fuller

... man plying knife and fork, and with a flagon handy beside him—a heavy, broad-shouldered man, with a copper-red complexion, and black hair that grew extraordinarily low upon his forehead. This and a short, heavy jaw gave him a morose, sullen look. I guessed his age at ...
— Corporal Sam and Other Stories • A. T. Quiller-Couch



Words linked to "Morose" :   ill-natured



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