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Swearing   /swˈɛrɪŋ/   Listen
Swearing

noun
1.
Profane or obscene expression usually of surprise or anger.  Synonyms: curse, curse word, cuss, expletive, oath, swearword.
2.
A commitment to tell the truth (especially in a court of law); to lie under oath is to become subject to prosecution for perjury.  Synonym: oath.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Swearing" Quotes from Famous Books



... hunger oppressed all the land greatly. And when the corn that they brought from Egypt was consumed, Jacob said to his sons: Return ye into Egypt and buy for us some meat, that we may live. Judah answered: That man said to us, under swearing of great oaths, that: Ye shall not see my face ne come into my presence, but if ye bring your youngest brother with you. Therefore if thou wilt send him with us, we shall go together and shall buy for us that shall be necessary, and if thou wilt not we shall not go. The man ...
— Bible Stories and Religious Classics • Philip P. Wells

... Aristophanes, or some of his adversaries and emulators might object; but neither they nor [4425]Anytus and Melitus his bitter enemies, that condemned him for teaching Critias to tyrannise, his impiety for swearing by dogs and plain trees, for his juggling sophistry, &c., never so much as upbraided him with impure love, writing or speaking of that subject; and therefore without question, as he concludes, both Socrates and Plato in this are justly to be excused. But suppose they had been a little overseen, ...
— The Anatomy of Melancholy • Democritus Junior

... hope and humbly advise your Royal Highness that, when God shall place you in the sovereignty over this people, you will take care to provide a remedy and reformation herein, and also of that sin of excessive drinking and swearing with which the people are so much infected, and which may cause a fear lest the anger of God should go forth against this nation; but it will be very much in your power to apply a fit remedy to these evils, and doubtless God will require it at your ...
— A Journal of the Swedish Embassy in the Years 1653 and 1654, Vol II. • Bulstrode Whitelocke

... dialogues in which Colonel Carter so freely takes part; for in his development of Carter, at least, Mr. De Forrest is mainly dramatic. Indeed, all the talk in the book is free and natural, and, even without the hard swearing which distinguishes the speech of some, it would be difficult to mistake one speaker for another, as often happens ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 117, July, 1867. • Various

... name is given in the work, down even to the rabble, for which he has not contemporary authority; but what he is particularly proud of are his oaths. Nothing, he tells me, has cost him more trouble than the management of the swearing: and the Romans, you know, are a most profane nation. The great difficulty to be avoided was using the ejaculations of two different ages. The 'sblood' of the sixteenth century must not be confounded with ...
— Vivian Grey • The Earl of Beaconsfield

... solemn oath of fidelity was administered, the candidate swearing by the Holy Law to guard the secrets of the Holy Vehm from wife and child, father and mother, sister and brother, fire and water, every creature on whom rain falls or sun shines, everything between earth and heaven; to ...
— Historical Tales, Vol 5 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality, German • Charles Morris

... Tommy was driving a tram—a swearing Tommy that you could hear a block away. He came on the mourners from behind. He was in a hurry, and by clanging his bell he could have crowded by. But he held the tram in check, nursing it so as not to frighten the two old women in the rear—until they came to a wide square. Here there ...
— The U-boat hunters • James B. Connolly

... his father's ship outside Boston when Master Ben sailed for the north and Captain Gillam was agoing home to England with Mistress Hortense in his ship. When no answer comes to our firing, Master Ben takes to climbing the masthead and yelling like a fog-horn and dropping curses like hail and swearing he'll shoot him as fails to keep appointment as he'd shoot a dog, if he has to track him inland a thousand leagues. Split me fore and ...
— Heralds of Empire - Being the Story of One Ramsay Stanhope, Lieutenant to Pierre Radisson in the Northern Fur Trade • Agnes C. Laut

... discarded gun. At that moment, the squaw tried to pass. I ordered her back. She called me a "Seechy doe squaw" meaning "mean squaw" and tried to push me back. I raised the bayonet saying, "Go back or I'll ram this through you." She went back growling and swearing in Sioux. Probably in half an hour I was relieved of my self-appointed task. Martin Tanner taking my place, I said to him, "Don't let that squaw get away." I sat down on a board over some chairs and made the squaw sit beside me. ...
— Old Rail Fence Corners - The A. B. C's. of Minnesota History • Various

... something the way his first wife had trained him not to. Of course," meditated the Captain, "right at first, I suppose a man may feel a little coltish and all. But, Doc, honest and true, when mother first left I kind of thought—well, I used to enjoy swearing a little before we was married, and I says to myself I guess I may as well have a damn or two as I go along—but, Doc, I can't do it. Eh? Every time I set off the fireworks—she fizzles; I can see mother looking at me that way." The old man went on earnestly: ...
— In the Heart of a Fool • William Allen White

... had never dreamt of the honour of being commander, and he was prudent enough not to endeavour to climb beyond his capacity. Therefore he protested against the election, shouting and swearing ...
— Historical Miniatures • August Strindberg

... his pocket, pulled the cork, and handed the bottle to his companion. He took a drink, and the smell of liquor filled the car. Then the first one took a drink, and back and forth the bottle passed, until at last it was empty and they were full. Then one of them commenced swearing, and such blasphemy I never heard in all my life. It made the very air blue—women shrank back, while the heads of men were uplifted to see where the stream of profanity came from. It went on for some time, ...
— The Children's Portion • Various

... feeble to abide the test, Many a one on scaffold lost his head. Now these ten warriors so approved the best, Were made partakers of their rule and bed; First swearing at the sovereign ladies' hest, That they, if others to that port are led, No mercy shall to any one afford, But one and all will put them to ...
— Orlando Furioso • Lodovico Ariosto

... that royal lady and satisfactorily answered, and then the archbishop, armed with a huge tome, administered a severe and searching oath, which the candidates took with a great deal of sang frond, and were then permitted to kiss the hand of the queen—a privilege worth any amount of swearing—and retire. ...
— The Midnight Queen • May Agnes Fleming

... their sovereign and the saviour of their capital seemed to produce a profound impression. The march was then begun in confidence, with no premonition of the approaching defection of these very men who had so often greeted the Emperor with their cries of enthusiasm, swearing to fight to the death rather than ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton

... though the angel knew that imps were never over nice In swearing at their master's call to prop each foul device, He felt perplex'd, because the case look'd really rather shady, And so declared, "I daren't decide ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 54, No. 334, August 1843 • Various

... kept under cover. Jimmy managed to keep her diverted till we put into Port Mozambique. There I sent a note aft to her, letting on that I had already landed, and swearing that I was going to steer clear of her until after she got back to her father. But I kept aboard, in the forecastle, as Jimmy had made me promise to do. At Aden, Jimmy put her on a P. and O. liner in the care of a ...
— Out of the Primitive • Robert Ames Bennet

... this, then. I want to take the lead in swearing, and to use the first oath on board this ship, before any of you ...
— Chatterbox, 1905. • Various

... all things, Mr. Bhaer hated drinking, gambling, and swearing; smoking he had given up that the lads might not be tempted to try it, and it grieved and angered him deeply to find that the boy, with whom he had tried to be most forbearing, should take advantage of his absence to introduce these forbidden vices, and teach his innocent little ...
— Little Men - Life at Plumfield With Jo's Boys • Louisa May Alcott

... with his narrative. "No man. Simone's luck is proverbial as his enmity deadly. But Vittoria grinned at him, swearing no such maid would marry him, and at last so goaded him that he defied her to a wager. Then she dared him to this—staking her great emerald, in a ring that the French prince gave her, on the terms that if he failed to gain the daughter of Folco Portinari he was in all honor and solemnity to ...
— The God of Love • Justin Huntly McCarthy

... the flight of the sons of Usnac from Emain, and how terrible was the black anger of Concobar; what passionate fire had gleamed in his eyes as he tossed the golden locks back from his shoulders and grasped the haft of his spear, and pledged himself to be avenged on Naisi and all his kin, swearing that he ...
— Ireland, Historic and Picturesque • Charles Johnston

... latter auspicious event, things start into quick and double-quick time; and the Gazetteers get vocal, almost lyrical: About Howard's regiment, Ponsonby's regiment, all manner of regiments, off to Flanders, for a stroke of work; how 'Ligonier's Dragoons [a set of wild swearing fellows, whom Guildford is happy to be quit of] rode through Bromley with their kettle-drums going, and are this day at Gravesend to take ship;'"—or to give ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XIV. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle

... under the direction of Patrick, from which every positive element of Paganism was rigidly excluded. He saw, unopposed, the chief idol of his race, overthrown on "the Plain of Prostration," at Sletty. Yet withal he never consented to be baptized; and only two years before his decease, we find him swearing to a treaty, in the old Pagan form—"by the Sun, and the Wind, and all the Elements." The party of the Druids at first sought to stay the progress of Christianity by violence, and even attempted, more than once, to assassinate ...
— A Popular History of Ireland - From the earliest period to the emancipation of the Catholics • Thomas D'Arcy McGee

... Bill, they hid certain exchanges of grins and glances under their hat-brims (Bill being above them and the brims being wide) and did not by a single word belittle the escape he had had from man-eating cows. Instead, Dade coaxed him down from the tree and onto Surry, swearing solemnly that the horse was quite as safe as the limb to which Bill showed a disposition to cling. Bill was hard to persuade, but since Dade was a man who inspired faith instinctively, the exchange was finally ...
— The Gringos • B. M. Bower

... had for companions. And the Lady Mirdath was no longer able to endure, and cried out in her sudden fear and disgust, and struck the rough hind that embraced her, so hard that he loosed her a moment, swearing great oaths. And directly he came back to her again, and had her in a moment, to kiss her; and she, loathing him to the very death, beat him madly in the face with her hands; but to no end, only that I was close upon them. And, in that moment, she screamed my name aloud; and ...
— The Night Land • William Hope Hodgson

... shouting "Ruin!" with each tick and slip: and that night Whitney's head-quarters was little better than a mob. Frantic men demanded money, money due to them for votes, money they had promised for margins to the brokers before the Stock Exchange opened the next day, and swearing desperate consequences to Whitney and Towle regardless of ...
— Frenzied Finance - Vol. 1: The Crime of Amalgamated • Thomas W. Lawson

... gaining each time in significance. From much thinking about it, Buck could almost reconstruct the scene, with its familiar, humdrum background of bawling calves, lowing mothers, dust, hot irons, swearing, sweating men, and all the other accompaniments of the spring branding. That was the picture into which Thorne had suddenly ridden, his face stamped with an excitement in marked contrast to his usual phlegmatic ...
— Shoe-Bar Stratton • Joseph Bushnell Ames

... and began to swear at the luckless youngster again, and I relaxed. He evidently hadn't recognized me, either. I took the strap in my hand, guiding it through the saddle loop. "Like that," I told the kid, and Cuinn stopped swearing long enough to give me a curt nod of acknowledgment and point out a heap of boxed and ...
— The Door Through Space • Marion Zimmer Bradley

... interrogated the Chinaman; and then he declared that they lied to him, that they knew more than they said; and when he was unable to bear it any longer, he mounted his horse and galloped over to Slow Down Ranch. As he went, he kept swearing to himself that Louise had flown thither; and anger made his brain malignant. He could scarcely frame his words intelligibly when he ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker

... like that!" and many who did not speak wished privately that they could change places and be Mignon. Alice did not wish this any longer. The noise and confusion behind the scenes, the stamping horses and swearing men, had given her a new idea of the life which poor Mignon had to lead among these sights and sounds, the only child among many grown people, dependant upon the chance kindness of clowns and head grooms for her few pleasures, her little education. She no longer desired to ...
— Nine Little Goslings • Susan Coolidge

... tubs?" "What a fool the Chief is." "Oh, damn your eyes, that's my towel." "No, there's yours, you blasted idiot." Gordon was immensely shocked at the language. He had come from a preparatory school run by a master with strong views on swearing, and for that matter on everything. He had been kept thoroughly in order. He got out of the bathroom as quickly as possible and made for his dormitory. It did not take long to dress. There was indeed very ...
— The Loom of Youth • Alec Waugh

... on the hill-side Are piled ploughs and harrows, With rakes, spades, and hatchets, And all kinds of iron-ware, And pliable wood To make rims for the cart-wheels. 230 And, oh, what a hubbub Of bargaining, swearing, Of jesting and laughter! And ...
— Who Can Be Happy And Free In Russia? • Nicholas Nekrassov

... to the edge of the wharf he miscalculated his balance, and would have toppled into the water, but that a burly tar, standing close by, caught him by his waistband and dragged him back to safety, swearing a round oath at him ...
— All Aboard - A Story for Girls • Fannie E. Newberry

... sufficiency of truth-speaking, according to Christ's own form of sound words, of yea, yea, and nay, nay, among Christians, without swearing, both from Christ's express prohibition to swear at all; (Mat. v.) and for that, they being under the tie and bond of truth in themselves, there was no necessity for an oath; and it would be a reproach to their Christian veracity to assure ...
— A Brief Account of the Rise and Progress of the People Called Quakers • William Penn

... compressed the glories of the place into a few sentences. '... I can say with exact truth,' he writes to George Selwyn,' that I never was so agreeably astonished in my days as with the first vision of the whole place. I had heard of Vanburgh, and how Sir Thomas Robinson and he stood spitting and swearing at one another; nay, I had heard of glorious woods, and Lord Strafford alone had told me that I should see one of the finest places in Yorkshire; but nobody ... had informed me that should at one view see ...
— Yorkshire Painted And Described • Gordon Home

... continued, "on a bed of the hotel. He had a red spot like a star on the bandage of his forehead,—the hole of the pistol shot. He died clutching my hands, swearing that he loved me and that he had killed himself for me ... a tiresome, horrible scene.... And nevertheless I am sure that he was deceiving himself, that he did not love me. He killed himself through wounded vanity on seeing that I would have nothing to do with him,—just for stubbornness, for theatrical ...
— Mare Nostrum (Our Sea) - A Novel • Vicente Blasco Ibanez

... we're swearing at Durks for that, back he comes with a young officer and four armed sailors. The officer looks at me and says: 'You have ...
— Sonnie-Boy's People • James B. Connolly

... lit the intruder's face as if with a white ray from a police lantern. Pelle and a dozen others recognized the man from the Eleventh, who could have but one midnight errand in the sleeping-room of the Tenth: the errand of a thief. Like wolves they leaped on him, snapping and growling, swearing the strange oaths of the Legion. Bayonets flashed in the moonlight; blood spouted red, for a soldier of the Legion may "decorate" himself with a comrade's belt, or bit of equipment, if another has annexed his: that is legitimate, even chic; ...
— A Soldier of the Legion • C. N. Williamson

... not have removed one tumor from his agonized body; would not have brought to his door one of the captured camels; would not have restored any one of the dead children. Swearing would have made the pain more unbearable, the pauperism into which he had plunged more distressing, the ...
— The Abominations of Modern Society • Rev. T. De Witt Talmage

... I speak of my dear old friend Charles Lever, and his rattling, jolly, joyous, swearing Irishmen. Surely never did a sense of vitality come so constantly from a man's pen, nor from man's voice, as from his! I knew him well for many years, and whether in sickness or in health, I have never come across him without finding him ...
— Autobiography of Anthony Trollope • Anthony Trollope

... weight careened the vessels over toward each other—officers flew hither and thither cursing and storming, trying to drive the people amidships—both captains were leaning over their railings shaking their fists, swearing and threatening—black volumes of smoke rolled up and canopied the scene,—delivering a rain of sparks upon the vessels—two pistol shots rang out, and both captains dodged unhurt and the packed masses of passengers surged ...
— The Gilded Age, Part 1. • Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) and Charles Dudley Warner

... "False men, swearing by false gods!" Annette replied. "No; we will not trust them. But let the braves listen. We do not want to kill them, and have decided ...
— Annette, The Metis Spy • Joseph Edmund Collins

... servant was quartered. She hid herself in the fields and the vegetable garden, but at last she emerged, thinking that he would have forgotten. He struck her with the whip while she sought refuge in one corner after another, swearing by all that was sacred that the devil had taken on her figure and had made a fool of him. But when he exchanged the whip for the stick she cried out aloud at the first blow and fell at his feet. "I am guilty," she cried, begging for mercy. She promised not to transgress again, calling God to witness ...
— The Precipice • Ivan Goncharov

... a better idea of the noise which now arose than by desiring him to imagine I had the hundred tongues the poet once wished for, and was vociferating from them all at once, by hollowing, scolding, crying, swearing, bellowing, and, in short, by every different articulation which is within the scope ...
— The History of the Life of the Late Mr. Jonathan Wild the Great • Henry Fielding

... out no longer. Poor creature! the tear of affection glistened in her eye; while her convulsed features betrayed uncontrollable sensations. It was a struggle between the heart and the stomach: the heart, remained true, but the stomach turned. At this the patient commenced cursing, swearing, and blaspheming, in a way which will be found fully detailed with all due dashes —! —! —! &c. &c. in the last number of a Northern magazine. "Zounds!" cried he, starting up on his seant—"Who are you? who sent for you? May the fiends catch you and cleave ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 472 - Vol. XVII. No. 472., Saturday, January 22, 1831 • Various

... feast is eaten uninterruptedly, the maiden who gave the feast is vindicated, and the gossip disbelieved; but if the challenge is taken up by any young buck, he steps forward and seizes the girl he accuses by the hand, pulls her out of the ring, and makes his charges. She has the right of swearing on the stone and knife to her innocence, which goes a great way in her vindication, but is not conclusive. If she swears, and he persists, an altercation ensues, and public sentiment is formed on view of the ...
— The History of Minnesota and Tales of the Frontier • Charles E. Flandrau

... Then it came to be used of the ceremony itself, and thence to signify any religious ordinance. In this extended sense the Church of England acknowledges other rites to be sacraments beside Baptism and the Eucharist; thus in the Homily on Swearing we find, "By the like holy promise the sacrament of matrimony knitteth man and wife in perpetual love," &c. So the catechism does not limit the number of sacraments to two, but says, "Two only, as generally necessary to salvation." Thus in ...
— The Church Handy Dictionary • Anonymous

... sweating and swearing; the Irish maiden, swinging a bundle in one hand and a flaring bandanna in the other, following after her patron with a duck-waddle; and finally the carriage came; all got in but Triangle, who started on foot ...
— The Humors of Falconbridge - A Collection of Humorous and Every Day Scenes • Jonathan F. Kelley

... grew daily more numerous, more powerful, and more radical in that city; and when the great solemnity of swearing allegiance to the new order was to be celebrated, it was chosen as a convenient and suitable place for a convention of twenty-two similar associations from the neighboring districts. The meeting took place on July third, 1791; the official administration of the oath to the civil, military, ...
— The Life of Napoleon Bonaparte - Vol. I. (of IV.) • William Milligan Sloane

... were swearing from morning till night, some singing abominable songs, some kissing the crucifix and making vows to the saints. The ship in the meanwhile helmless, but with sails set, driving on like the phantom ...
— The World of Waters - A Peaceful Progress o'er the Unpathed Sea • Mrs. David Osborne

... maintained upon the condition that the women were trained to war. In war times the children were led out to look upon the struggle, and become accustomed and hardened to blood. The teachings of the best minds were immoral. "He may lie," says Plato, "who knows how to do it." Profane swearing was enjoined by the example of their best writers. Oaths are of common occurrence in the writings of Seneca and Plato. Aristippus taught that adultery and theft were commendable in a wise man, and Cicero plead for the last dreadful tragedy—suicide. Such immoralities are ...
— The Christian Foundation, Or, Scientific and Religious Journal, Volume I, No. 7, July, 1880 • Various

... denied the debt, but he produced against me a bond for that sum, attested by four of those who were in company on the occasion; and they were present and bore witness to the loan. I reminded them of my kindness and paid the amount, swearing that I would never again follow a woman's counsel. Is not this marvellous? The company admired the goodliness of his tale and it pleased Al-Malik al-Zahir; and the Wali said, "By Allah, this is a strange story!" Then ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 2 • Richard F. Burton

... did but little damage, only one touching the canoe, and it passed harmlessly through the side far above the water line. Before the pursuers could draw near enough to make their fire certain, the canoe had passed in amongst the trees and the outlaws reined in their mounts swearing loudly. ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely

... his father's soul, and he began to act as head of the family. One Sunday he went to church to pray to God. As he passed along the road a woman was pounding away in front of him. She walked and walked, stumbled over a stone, and began swearing at it, saying, "What devil ...
— Russian Fairy Tales - A Choice Collection of Muscovite Folk-lore • W. R. S. Ralston

... thereupon ensued no shorthand reporter could have reproduced, for the pair of them began forthwith to rave and storm at one another with all their might, stamping, swearing, shaking their fists, and loading each other with abuse. When they had got as far as calling each other robber and scoundrel, the magistrate thought it high time to interfere, and at his command Margari was torn forcibly out of the tomato bed, led to a hackney coach and thrust inside; yet even ...
— The Poor Plutocrats • Maurus Jokai

... sorrowfully, "that's the third half-penny for swearing this year. You mean that the Doctor has always evinced a marked partiality for the society of ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Aug 29, 1917 • Various

... think himself as great a prophet as his master, and took upon himself to imitate the Koran according to his fancy; but the imitator got himself into trouble, and only escaped with life by falling on his knees, and solemnly swearing he would never again imitate the Koran, for which he was sensible God ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli

... lawful authority of the General Government. The question with the citizen to whom this oath is to be proposed must be a fearful one, for while the bill does not declare that perjury may be assigned for such false swearing nor fix any penalty for the offense, we must not forget that martial law prevails; that every person is answerable to a military commission, without previous presentment by a grand jury, for any charge that may be made against him, and that the supreme authority ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 2 (of 2) of Volume 6: Andrew Johnson • James D. Richardson

... glorious. O God!" cried Marjorie, who did not know whether that was swearing or praying, and ...
— Four Days - The Story of a War Marriage • Hetty Hemenway

... she importuned Satan for a husband. This time she gained one "not so rich as the other." She bore a daughter to him, but the marriage was an unhappy one. "They lived not so quietly as she desyred, beinge stirred to much unquietnes and moved to swearing and cursinge." Thereupon she employed the spirit to kill her child and to lame her husband. After keeping the cat fifteen years she turned it over to Mother Waterhouse, "a ...
— A History of Witchcraft in England from 1558 to 1718 • Wallace Notestein

... of the water brought full recollection back. He had been looking at it all day, and he hated it. It was the water that made his prison. He sat up swearing at his dream. It was a fine thing a man should have no better control over ...
— The Huntress • Hulbert Footner

... was sitting on an earth-filled packing-case, swearing softly, nursing a disabled right arm, and looking at the corded network of hairy, sunburned muscles that were delicately outlined in the bright red stream that trickled from beneath the rolled-up shirt-sleeve ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves

... promises of fidelity, to thee I plighted my troth. That another—a liar and deceiver, should have inserted his odious name for thine, laid his dishonored hand in mine, has never bound ME! I was, I am, I will ever be thine, so help me, God! who heard the oath I swore, and knew that, swearing, ...
— Prince Eugene and His Times • L. Muhlbach

... cutter close aboard of us, and with the captain and both the mates swearing at them, I suppose that the men at the hatch—who were swinging the things below with a whip—got rattled a little. At any rate, some of them rigged the sling so carelessly that a box fell out from it, and shot down to the main-deck ...
— In the Sargasso Sea - A Novel • Thomas A. Janvier

... Randolph, and myself met at Knox's, where Hamilton was also to have met, to consider the time, manner, and place of the President's swearing in. Hamilton had been there before, and had left his opinion with Knox; to wit, that the President should ask a judge to attend him in his own house to administer the oath, in the presence of the Heads of ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson

... you if this is a frame-up you'll all go on the woodpile for the winter. D'you hear me? Of course, if you want to press this charge I'll make the arrest, but I'll just take you three fellows along so you can do some swearing before the colonel, where it'll go on ...
— The Winds of Chance • Rex Beach

... them back to the stream in rather an abrupt manner. The greatest officer of the land swore revenge, but as his guides did not understand him, he was lucky enough to reserve his tongue for more lies and more swearing at a ...
— Monsieur Violet • Frederick Marryat

... got something the matter with her legs, and that Mary has gone home because she's worn out with nursing, And won't be fit to work for months? (will she be convalescent, because it was such hard work waiting on me?) and did Cook say, "So much grumbling and complaining is nigh as big a sin as swearing and cursing"? I wish I hadn't been so cross with poor Mary, and I wish I hadn't given so much trouble about my medicine and my food. I didn't think about her. I only thought what a bother it was. I ...
— Verses for Children - and Songs for Music • Juliana Horatia Ewing

... commander of the Chartist forces, which practically comprised the whole army. The King was powerless; besides which, when pushed up into any corner people who do not mind breaking their word have a facility for hard swearing. On the 13th of July, Ferdinand standing at the altar of the royal chapel, with his hand on the Bible, swore to defend and maintain the Constitution which he had just granted. If he failed to do so, he called upon his subjects ...
— The Liberation of Italy • Countess Evelyn Martinengo-Cesaresco

... So came the swearing to an end, and they fell to on their meat and feasted on the Boar of Atonement after they had duly given the Gods their due share, and the wine went about the hall and men were merry till they drank the parting cup and fared to rest in the shut-beds, and whereso else ...
— The Roots of the Mountains • William Morris

... long afterwards when drunken footsteps came up the passage and woke me up, and then a fumbling at the Senator's door and frightful swearing because the key would not fit. The creature, whoever it was, was perfectly furious, and one could hear him muttering "29, yes it's 29," and then fearful oaths, and at last, with a shove, he wrenched down the crazy ...
— Elizabeth Visits America • Elinor Glyn

... If it's that gay you are, you'd have a right to walk down and see would you get a few halfpence from the rich men do be driving early to the fair. MARY. When rich men do be driving early, it's queer tempers they have, the Lord forgive them; the way it's little but bad words and swearing out you'd get from them all. SARAH — losing her temper and breaking out fiercely. — Then if you'll neither beg nor sleep, let you walk off from this place where you're not wanted, and not have us waiting ...
— The Tinker's Wedding • J. M. Synge

... Billy Fish. ‘Make a run for it down the valley! The whole place is against us.’ The matchlock-men ran, and we went down the valley in spite of Dravot’s protestations. He was swearing horribly and crying out that he was a King. The priests rolled great stones on us, and the regular Army fired hard, and there wasn’t more than six men, not counting Dan, Billy Fish, and Me, that came down to the bottom of ...
— The Man Who Would Be King • Rudyard Kipling

... the floor of his little bed-chamber, fuming and swearing to himself in a mild, impotent fashion—and in some dread of the door. Such words and sentences as these fell from his lips:—"Nobody!" "Keeps me on the place!" "Because she's tender-hearted!" "I will fire her!" "Can't ...
— What's-His-Name • George Barr McCutcheon

... take in her ground. During the winter they'd opened up a hundred and fifty feet of awful rich pay right next to her line, and she'd raised the devil. Injunctions, hearings and appeals, and now she was coming back, swearing she'd been "jobbed," the judge had been bought, and ...
— Pardners • Rex Beach

... who had left the front of her hovel and had gone to call her assistant, shouting in the passage at the back of the store, returned cursing and swearing, and seated herself near the store in the lean-to which ...
— Messengers of Evil - Being a Further Account of the Lures and Devices of Fantomas • Pierre Souvestre

... Admiral that great sword which still hangs in S. Matteo. But now, when Andrea's brother, Abbate di San Fruttuoso came to die, and it was known that he had left the Admiral much property close to Naples, the Pope, swearing that the estates of an ecclesiastic necessarily returned to the Church, claimed Andrea's inheritance. But the Admiral thought differently. Ordering Giannettino, his nephew, to take the fleet to Civitavecchia, he seized the Pope's ...
— Florence and Northern Tuscany with Genoa • Edward Hutton

... money for lost. But of a sudden they woke to life again, took an upward bound, and within a month were quoted at five pounds—on rumour alone. "Very sensitive indeed," said the STAR. Purdy, his only confidant, went about swearing at himself for having let the few he owned lapse; and Mahony itched to sell. He could now have banked two hundred ...
— Australia Felix • Henry Handel Richardson

... Macbeth's 'swearing' might have occurred in an interview off the stage between scenes v. and vi., or scenes vi. and vii.; and, if in that interview Lady Macbeth had with difficulty worked her husband up to a resolution, her irritation at his relapse, in sc. vii., ...
— Shakespearean Tragedy - Lectures on Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, Macbeth • A. C. Bradley

... matter. In the bath they are seen promiscuously with the men[5]. They have no notion of fornication or adultery; neither do they marry from sensual motives, but merely to conform to the divine command. They also abstain from cursing and swearing. At the death of relations, they shew the greatest resignation to the will of God, and even give thanks in the churches for having spared their friends so long, and in now calling them to be partakers of the bounty of heaven. They shew so little extravagance ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 1 • Robert Kerr

... Solos were dispensed with, and each chorus was sung many times. The wine was evidently a huge success, the noise was magnificent, and everybody was reasonably peaceful. No one noticed that Lambert and Webb were now sitting side by side on the floor, swearing eternal friendship and requiring champagne in which to pledge each other, until Webb got hold of the idea that he was Leander trying to swim the Hellespont, and Collier poured a jug of water over his head so that he might ...
— Godfrey Marten, Undergraduate • Charles Turley

... almost in the same breath to whimper for mercy; for his antagonist, dismounting almost as soon as he fell, offered a whinger, or large wood knife, to his throat, while he rifled the pockets of the unlucky citizen, and even examined his hawking bag, swearing two or three grisly oaths, that he would have what it contained, since the wearer had interrupted his sport. He pulled the belt rudely off, terrifying the prostrate bonnet maker still more by the regardless violence which he ...
— The Fair Maid of Perth • Sir Walter Scott

... hastened to the imperial palace; the great and the noble again brought out their state coaches for the purpose of throwing themselves at the feet of the new possessor of power and swearing a new allegiance; again nothing was heard but the sound of universal rejoicing, nothing seen but faces lighted up by ecstasy and eyes glistening with tears of joy. And this was, in fourteen months, the third time that they had done homage to a new ruler who had as ...
— The Daughter of an Empress • Louise Muhlbach

... talking with her a young man came to us and reported that Col. Tucker had ambushed himself, with a double-barreled shotgun, near the place of baptizing, swearing vengeance against the man that attempted to baptize his wife. I tried to persuade her to return, but in vain. She said ...
— The Mormon Menace - The Confessions of John Doyle Lee, Danite • John Doyle Lee

... had a way of swearing that reminded me of my friend Cazalet. "It is no generosity, monsieur. It is a desire to make this obscene work more congenial to the spirit of a gentleman, which, devil take me, I cannot stifle, not for the King ...
— Bardelys the Magnificent • Rafael Sabatini

... accounts it is the ordinary oath of homage; in others it is an oath of fearful solemnity, taken on the holiest relics. In one well-known account, Harold is even made to swear on hidden relics, not knowing on what he is swearing. Here is matter for much thought. To hold that one form of oath or promise is more binding than another upsets all true confidence between man and man. The notion of the specially binding nature of the oath by relies assumes that, in case of ...
— William the Conqueror • E. A. Freeman

... Course it was a bloody barney. What? Swindled them all, skivvies and badhachs from the county Meath, ay, and his own kidney too. J. J. was telling us there was an ancient Hebrew Zaretsky or something weeping in the witnessbox with his hat on him, swearing by the holy Moses he was stuck for ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce

... that he was speaking of a new carriage which had come from Paris that very day, a fact of which I was entirely ignorant. I was on the point of explaining this to his Excellency; but without deigning to listen, the grand marshal rushed out of the room exclaiming, swearing, and addressing me in terms to which I was totally unaccustomed. I followed him as far as his own room in order to make an explanation; but when he reached his door he entered, and ...
— The Private Life of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Constant

... some shouting, a momentary silence, then a flare of the finest blasphemy. I turned the bend to see an officer holding his severed wrist and cursing. He was one of those dashing fellows. He had ridden alongside the transport swearing at the men to get a move on. He had held up his arm to give the signal when a ricochet took his hand off cleanly. His men said not a word,—sat with an air of ...
— Adventures of a Despatch Rider • W. H. L. Watson

... state of things was maintained all the year, Hall Leet and the Parsonage standing at daggers drawn. Never once did Captain Monk appear at church. If he by cross-luck met his daughter or her husband abroad, he struck into a good fit of swearing aloud; which perhaps relieved his mind. The chimes had never played again; they pertained to the church, and the church was in ill-favour with the Captain. As the end of the year approached, Church Leet wondered whether he would hold the annual banquet; ...
— The Argosy - Vol. 51, No. 2, February, 1891 • Various

... occasion of my ain, made it unnecessary to promulgate the haill veritie,—I say then, as I am a true man, when I saw that puir creature come through the ha', at that ordinary, whilk is accurst (Heaven forgive me for swearing!) of God and man, with his teeth set, and his hands clenched, and his bonnet drawn over his brows like a desperate man, Goblin said to me, 'There goes a dunghill chicken, that your master has plucked clean enough; it will be long ...
— The Fortunes of Nigel • Sir Walter Scott

... asked Richard if the farmer had vouchsafed any reasons, and the boy then spoke of the tampering with the witnesses, and the Bantam's "Not upon oath!" which caused Adrian to choke with laughter. Even the baronet smiled at so cunning a distinction as that involved in swearing a thing, and ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... up. We are to wait for them, being the advanced body. Expect them in the afternoon. It is exceedingly difficult to keep these various groups of merchants together; each group is its own sovereign master and will have its own way. The commandant is constantly swearing at each party to get all to march together; now and then he draws his sword and shakes it over their heads. "You are dogs," he says to one; "you are worse than this Christian Kafer amongst us," ...
— Travels in the Great Desert of Sahara, in the Years of 1845 and 1846 • James Richardson

... discharged another shot at it. The fifth truss caught him in the side and drove him against the wooden block. He turned swiftly in the direction whence the missile came, and fired again. He was half dazed, his eyes and ears seemed full of the dust of the straw. He fired once again at random, swearing savagely; and before he could recover aim his arm was seized from behind, his neck was caught in a vigorous garotte, and he fell on the floor of the hut with Captain Dieppe on the top of him—Dieppe, dusty, dirty, panting, bleeding freely ...
— Captain Dieppe • Anthony Hope

... hong oy! Una ca see fut!" said the Chinese-cook, swearing vehemently in the language likeliest to count, and he ran at once towards ...
— The Furnace of Gold • Philip Verrill Mighels

... Collector Barney on the pier with his Bible and papers, swearing in the rest of the New York delegation. The last of the cargo was slung aboard about eleven, and we started off at quarter past, in a drizzling rain, freezing fast to everything it touched. Our Boston party consisted of twenty-nine men and four women; the New York one of twenty-three men ...
— Letters from Port Royal - Written at the Time of the Civil War (1862-1868) • Various

... by the novelty of the proceedings. Wessex, very silent, came behind me, and Inspector Aylesbury, swearing under his breath, waded through the long ...
— Bat Wing • Sax Rohmer

... while on the vessel he saw four guns on one of the decks of the steamship, two forward and two aft, and all mounted on wooden blocks and covered with leather. The indictment further charges that at the time of so swearing Stahl did not believe it to be true that he had been on board the Lusitania and had ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 4, July, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various

... eighty and the gout tweezes you, you'll be swearing like a trooper," Terence remarked. "You'll be very fat, very testy, very disagreeable. Can't you imagine him—bald as a coot, with a pair of sponge-bag trousers, a little ...
— The Voyage Out • Virginia Woolf

... walked past, and inquired of a roustabout who stood by me if he had seen a well-dressed man on deck. He told them "he had not seen any gemman down on deck afore they came down." They had their guns out, and were swearing vengeance. The boat was plowing her way along up the river; the stevedores were hurrying the darkies to get up some freight, as a landing was soon to be made. The whistle blew, and the boat was headed for shore. Those devils knew I would attempt to leave the ...
— Forty Years a Gambler on the Mississippi • George H. Devol

... up the stairway. Most of their lamps were put out and it was dark in the stairway. The men were uttering hysterical, foolish cries as they rushed upward in their panic. The ladder jolting against the sides of the chamber knocked the men off their feet and there was tumbling and swearing and ...
— In the Heart of a Fool • William Allen White

... Jim Wilder stood by, swearing by all his obscene deities that if that man hurt Whetstone, he'd kill him for his hide. But he began to feel better in a little while. Hope, even certainty, picked up again. Whetstone was coming to himself. Perhaps the old rascal had only been elaborating his scheme a little at the start, and was ...
— The Duke Of Chimney Butte • G. W. Ogden

... an arm, as though by the gesture swearing to his own transgression: "I counted myself a good man, and I'll not say now but I did more for"—some name died upon his lips—"than one man in a hundred would have done; but in my folly I angered her, and when I'd have given my ...
— What Necessity Knows • Lily Dougall

... this town, who are acquainted with these objects, ridicule his rusticity. I have known a fellow with a burden on his head steal a hand down from his load, and slily twirl the cock of a squire's hat behind him; and while the offended person is swearing or out of countenance, all the wag-wits in the highway are grinning in applause of the ingenious rogue that gave him the tip, and the folly of him who had not eyes all round his head to prevent receiving it."—Spectator, ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 52, October 26, 1850 • Various

... clime, might be seen swaggering, in open day, about the streets of the little burgh; elbowing its quiet Mynheers; trafficking away their rich outlandish plunder, at half price, to the wary merchant, and then squandering their gains in taverns; drinking, gambling, singing, swearing, shouting, and astounding the neighborhood with sudden brawl and ...
— Tales of a Traveller • Washington Irving

... Galland's Copy of The Nights (Zotenberg, Histoire d' 'Ala al-Din, p. 37). Scott adds, "In this copy the Genie restores the Antelope, the Dogs and the Mule to their pristine forms, which is not mentioned by Galland, on their swearing to lead virtuous lives." ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton

... retreated, kept the enemy completely at bay till the midshipmen and Wasser had reached the boat. They were not long in jumping in after them, and, shoving off, away they pulled, shouting with delight at their success, and leaving their enraged pursuers swearing and grinning with ...
— The Three Midshipmen • W.H.G. Kingston

... you to go to that man and say: "Thousands of people have been as far astray as you are, and got back." Now is the time for you to go to that man and tell him of the omnipotent grace of God, that is sufficient for any poor soul. Now is the time to go to tell him how swearing John Bunyan, through the grace of God, afterward came to the celestial city. Now is the time to go to that man and tell him how profligate Newton came, through conversion, to be a world-renowned preacher of righteousness. Now is the time to tell that man that ...
— New Tabernacle Sermons • Thomas De Witt Talmage

... so mean and contemptible in my life as when my wife told me of it. She said she wanted the floor to open and let her down out of her seat. If I have tried once, I have tried a hundred times to stop swearing. You preachers ...
— Stories Worth Rereading • Various

... whom he knew—brown, healthy, strong and sane; a figure wearing his clothes, his own clothes, the tweeds and the cloths, the brogues and the heavy boots, the soft untidy hats; the figure was hard, definite, resolute, quarrelling, arguing, loving, joking, swearing all in the sensible way. It was a figure that all the world had understood, that had been drunk often enough, lent other men money, been hard-up and extravagant and thoughtless. "A good chap." "A sensible fellow." ...
— The Captives • Hugh Walpole

... the whole opera is based is that a Dutch captain once tried to double the Cape of Good Hope in the teeth of a gale, swearing he would accomplish his purpose even if he had to plough the main forever. This rash oath was overheard by Satan, who condemned him to sail until the Judgment Day, unless he could find a woman who would love him faithfully until death. Once in every seven years only ...
— Stories of the Wagner Opera • H. A. Guerber

... cried Mrs. Sheridan, not hearing Sylvia's comment. "Michael will be pleased to see you. Doesn't he call you 'Pretty Miss Kathie'? But you will excuse the liberty in a boy. He is recovering, the doctor says, which himself was here to-day, and the car stuck out there in the mud, and the doctor swearing! Michael could hear him in his bed, which it wasn't good for the boy to hear. But the doctor is too kind, for sure, to mean any harm, even to the car, and Michael and me pretended not to hear him, nor to know that he was angry. The Lord will overlook the words he used to the car and the council ...
— Grey Town - An Australian Story • Gerald Baldwin

... her foot, (I dare say it was the first and last time in her life, for she was a douce woman,) and gave him such a kick and a push, that he played bleach over, head foremost, without being able to recover himself; and, as we ran down the close, we heard him cursing and swearing in the dark, ...
— The Life of Mansie Wauch - Tailor in Dalkeith, written by himself • David Macbeth Moir

... Upon this occasion we were unable to face the task, and, instead, a card was given to every applicant, for subsequent presentation at The Citizens' headquarters in Victoria Street, where I spent many busy hours, with a rapidly growing clerical staff, swearing in new members, and booking the full details of each man's position and capabilities, ...
— The Message • Alec John Dawson

... where the apprentices, seeing the martial figure, shouted, "What d'ye lack, sir knight?" and offered silk and velvet robes and mantles, gay sword knots, or even rich chains, under all the clamour, Stephen heard him swearing by St. George what a place this would be for a sack, if his ...
— The Armourer's Prentices • Charlotte Mary Yonge

... wrong 'un," said Paul. "We hadn't been going a fortnight before he asked me to accept half salary, swearing he would make it up, with a rise, as soon as business got better. Like an ...
— The Fortunate Youth • William J. Locke

... the wagons that had carried the hay to be brought up directly, to lift one stack, and carry it into the barn. There turned out to be only thirty-two loads in the stack. In spite of the village elder's assertions about the compressibility of hay, and its having settled down in the stacks, and his swearing that everything had been done in the fear of God, Levin stuck to his point that the hay had been divided without his orders, and that, therefore, he would not accept that hay as fifty loads to a stack. ...
— Anna Karenina • Leo Tolstoy

... their lives may have been preserved. She was a privateer out of Saint Malo. Your determined attempt to escape excited their anger to the highest degree; and at the very moment that the vessel was struck by lightning, from the effects of which she foundered, they were swearing vengeance against you, wherever you might be. Their terrific shrieks and cries, as one after the other they were overwhelmed by the waves, made my heart sink within me. Still I determined not to yield as long as my strength endured, ...
— True Blue • W.H.G. Kingston

... U. S. Navy, condemned by president of court martial for complicity with Aaron Burr, and for swearing at the United States, "never to hear the name of the United States again." He is passed from one man-of-war to another, never allowed to converse upon national affairs, to see a U. S. newspaper or read a history of the United States, until homesick and heartsick, after ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook, Vol. 3 • E. Cobham Brewer

... inquisitive cuss. He's learning that life isn't all beer and skittles, has felt the skinny talons of poverty on his elbow and has heard a truck-driver swear in the approved New York manner. That in itself was a liberal education. The worst of it was that the chap happened to be swearing ...
— Paradise Garden - The Satirical Narrative of a Great Experiment • George Gibbs

... it, and loved freedom and his copper kettle a thousand times better—a kind of hardware Diogenes. Of fiddling he has no better opinion. The picture represents the "sturdy caird" taking "poor gut-scraper" by the beard,—drawing his "roosty rapier," and swearing to "speet him like a pliver" unless he would relinquish the bonnie ...
— George Cruikshank • William Makepeace Thackeray

... upon his shoulder compellingly, and although he glared at me, and ground his teeth, and lifted his lip, he came; unwillingly, swearing under his breath, he came. We tramped up and down the garden paths, up and down, and back again, his wooden peg making a round hole, like a hoofmark, in the earth. He stared down at it, spat savagely upon it, and swore horribly, but not ...
— Slippy McGee, Sometimes Known as the Butterfly Man • Marie Conway Oemler

... command of my tormentors, I could hear the cars coming again, faster and faster, closer and closer, and that engine ran at me just that way all night. It seemed just as real, and my sufferings were just as intense, as if it had been a reality. When morning came the devils left me, swearing that they would come back at night, and thus I was tortured all day with the dread of what was coming again at night. That day, as I was walking, hens and chickens would turn into little men and women; ...
— Fifteen Years in Hell • Luther Benson

... Baxter was a stranger to Dick, but he showed by his manner that he was a rough individual, and when he talked he did a great deal of swearing, which, however, will not appear in his conversation ...
— The Rover Boys In The Mountains • Arthur M. Winfield

... a bound at the poop ladder, and rushed up the steps swearing awfully; and, first firing at the man at the wheel, whose arm the bullet penetrated, as soon as he gained the poop, he dived down the companion in pursuit of Jan Steenbock, who had disappeared below the ...
— The Island Treasure • John Conroy Hutcheson

... black coat, dirty yellow breeches, and dirty white top-boots, who was the most obstreperous of them all, at last came up to the old chap who disliked South Welshmen and tried to knock off his hat, swearing that he would stand by Sir Watkin; he, however, met a Tartar. The enemy of the South Welsh, like all crusty people, had lots of mettle, and with the stick which he held in his hand forthwith aimed a ...
— Wild Wales - Its People, Language and Scenery • George Borrow

... and swearing in a frightful manner, which, together with the reports of the firearms and the screams and groans of the wounded, turned the deck of the Fuwalda to the ...
— Tarzan of the Apes • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... The loss of letting out Land to Till. The great Consideration for Corn borrowed. A Debt becomes double in two years. If the Debtor pay not his Debt, he is lyable to be a Slave for it. Divers other Lawes and Customes. For deciding Controversies. Swearing in the Temples, The manner of swearing in hot Oyl. How they exact. Fines. Of their Language. Titles given to Women according to their qualities. Titles given to Men. No difference between a Country-man and a Courtier for Language. Their ...
— An Historical Relation Of The Island Ceylon In The East Indies • Robert Knox

... it then, but the Zulu was swearing fidelity, and to lay down his life for him who had saved, as ...
— Off to the Wilds - Being the Adventures of Two Brothers • George Manville Fenn

... a convention of animals, all swearing and trembling with fright, were trying to conceal themselves in the same ...
— Fables For The Times • H. W. Phillips

... my pacific saw-bones, "no swearing and no threats, lieutenant. One's just as useless as the other. First of all, the Bonito's off about her business;—and next, my dear fellow, the chase she's after is one of Canot's squadron, and, of course, there's an embargo on every canoe along this beach! The Commodore's altogether too cute, ...
— Captain Canot - or, Twenty Years of an African Slaver • Brantz Mayer

... goat, catching him between the legs by the impetus she had obtained, sent him sprawling on the deck, and her horns catching in his coat-tails, he and she and I all went rolling over together. There we lay, the Captain spluttering and swearing incontinently, though scarcely able in his rage to utter a word clearly, the goat tugging away to get again on her legs, I all the time shrieking out lustily for help. The officers, who had been pacing the other side of the deck, could scarcely for laughter come to their chiefs ...
— Ben Burton - Born and Bred at Sea • W. H. G. Kingston

... assembly; so they obeyed and witnessed of his breeding and good parts that which amazed them and made them forget the breeding of the kings who had preceded him. When they were grown to like him, the Queenmother began sending privily for the Emirs and Councillors, one by one, and swearing them to conceal her project; and when she was assured of their discretion, she discovered to them that the king had left naught save a daughter and that she had done this only that she might continue the kingship in his family and that the rule should not go forth from ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton

... sides for his laughing. I, in embarrassment, dropped my hat, and the giggling continued, On and on and on, for all they kept playing and singing. Back to the house here I hurried, o'ercome with shame and vexation, Hung up my coat in the closet, and pulled out the curls with my fingers, Swearing that never again my foot should cross over that threshold. And I was perfectly right; for vain are the maidens, and heartless. E'en to this day, as I hear, I am called by ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke

... pleasantly, and beckoned to him to come still nearer; at length he came close to me; and then he kneeled down again, kissed the ground, and laid his head upon the ground, and taking me by the foot, set my foot upon his head; this, it seems, was in token of swearing to be my slave for ever. I took him up and made much of him, and encouraged him all I could. But there was more work to do yet; for I perceived the savage whom I had knocked down was not killed, but stunned with the blow, and began to come to himself: so I pointed to him, and showed him ...
— Robinson Crusoe • Daniel Defoe

... I will not. I have not committed such sins as have many men and women. I ne'er stole, nor murdered, nor used profane swearing, nor worshipped idols, nor did many another ill matter: and I cannot believe but that God shall be more merciful to such than to the evil fawtors [factors, doers] that be in the world. Where were His ...
— Clare Avery - A Story of the Spanish Armada • Emily Sarah Holt

... The boys retired swearing, and Gil, with desperate calling-up of reserves, faced his ordeal. "Ver' good, master, we go when you like. We see Escorial—fine place—see La Granja, come by Madrid thata way. I get 'orses 'ow you please." Then he had an inspiration, ...
— The Spanish Jade • Maurice Hewlett

... who are supposed to know the doctrines of the Druse religion; they superintend divine worship in the chapels or, as they are called, Khaloue [Arabic], and they instruct the children in a kind of catechism. They are obliged to abstain from swearing, and all abusive language, and dare not wear any article of gold or silk in their dress. Many of them make it a rule never to eat of any food, nor to receive any money, which they suspect to have been improperly ...
— Travels in Syria and the Holy Land • John Burckhardt

... beaten. They had come forward quite proud of their invention, and now they were received, not with ecstasies of delight, but with fresh demands, more ridiculous even than the first. They were decidedly being mystified, and were preparing in consequence to pack up and begone, furious, and swearing by all their gods that they would never again expose science to see itself disgraced by a purse-proud vulgarian's scorn; when, lo! happily, a good fairy, the special friend of learned men, came passing by that way. She raised her enchanted wand ...
— The History of a Mouthful of Bread - And its effect on the organization of men and animals • Jean Mace

... it may have been one o'clock, or two, or three, I was awakened by the awfullest screaming and sputtering, growling and swearing, that ever startled a weary man from his slumbers. I leaped out of bed under the impression that at least twenty little children had fallen into as many tubs of boiling water. I threw open the window and stepped out upon the roof of the tea-room. I don't intend to ...
— Wild Northern Scenes - Sporting Adventures with the Rifle and the Rod • S. H. Hammond

... hauberk, and wetted his ermine pelisse beneath. His beard swayed, whiter than flax, his long moustache quivered; until dawn he lamented his nephew, and the twelve peers, and all his next-of-kin who were dead. From the gate at morn a Saxon, King Dyalas, defies the old man, swearing that he will wear his crown in Paris. The Emperor has the gate opened, and sallies forth to meet him. They engage in single combat; the old Emperor kills the Saxon's horse, disarms him, and only spares his life on condition of his embracing Christianity and ...
— Hero Tales and Legends of the Rhine • Lewis Spence

... in this trying position, with the eyes of three Judges fixed on him, swearing at me under his breath in the most awful manner. But why did he depend on me? Why didn't he get up the ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 101. October 10, 1891 • Various

... officials who had ready and constant access there had become inoculated with the nihilistic bacilli and although I had no doubt that many of them were at heart loyal to the emperor, I already knew better than they did the immensity of the obligation they had undertaken in swearing allegiance to an association of persons dominated by fanatics and by actual criminals whose trade was murder and whose chiefest pleasures and relaxation was the study of how best to bring ...
— Princess Zara • Ross Beeckman

... have engaged in trade and but few till the soil, thus increasing the dearth of provisions and forcing prices still higher. The two priests do not take the oath in the same form as the laymen, but by "placing the hand upon the breast, and swearing by their priestly word." After all of these depositions, each of them attested in due form by the ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 - Volume VI, 1583-1588 • Emma Helen Blair

... the police are too much occupied with the salvation of souls, and too little with the preservation of bodies; that they prevent honest people from damning themselves by swearing, reading bad books, or associating with Liberals, but that they don't prevent rascals from murdering honest people; that property is as badly protected as persons; and that it is very hard to be able to reckon upon nothing for certain ...
— The Roman Question • Edmond About

... there be no begging, swearing, gaming, card-playing, quarrelling, or universal conversation. That all novels, plays, and other improper books be excluded; that all bad words be avoided, and any default in these particulars be reported to ...
— Elizabeth Fry • Mrs. E. R. Pitman

... and which they concluded to adopt. About a year after this he brought home another, and the good woman thought she could stand that one too. A similar period passed away, when one evening he opened the door and fell headlong into the room, swearing with studied correctness at a dog which had tripped him up, but which upon inspection turned out to be another baby. Margaret's sus- picion was aroused, but to allay his she hastened to implore him to adopt that darling also, to which, after some slight hesitation, he consented. Another ...
— The Fiend's Delight • Dod Grile

... in the writing of a humour, a man is confined not to swerve from the character, and obliged to say nothing but what is proper to it; but in the playes which have been wrote of late, there is no such thing as perfect character, but the two chief persons are most commonly a swearing, drinking, whoring ruffian for a lover, and impudent, ill-bred tomrig for a mistress, and these are the fine people of the play; and there is that latitude in this, that almost anything is proper for ...
— The Dramatic Works of John Dryden Vol. I. - With a Life of the Author • Sir Walter Scott

... the noise of the wind in the rigging was real, as if the other wasn't, for I felt that it wasn't, though I heard it. But it was, all the same; for the captain heard it, too. When I came to relieve the wheel, while the men were clearing up decks, he was swearing. He was a quiet man, and I hadn't heard him swear before, and I don't think I did again, though several queer things happened after that. Perhaps he said all he had to say then; I don't see how he could ...
— Man Overboard! • F(rancis) Marion Crawford

... such choice oratory has not hit, When it is, e'en, unanswer'd by a grunt, 'Twould justify tame Job to curse a bit, And set an Angler swearing, ...
— Broad Grins • George Colman, the Younger

... the skies fell. He was a terrible old man to swear, too," added Mrs. Frederick, dropping into irrelevant reminiscence. "He spent a long while in a mining camp in his younger days and he never got over it—the habit of swearing, I mean. It would have made your blood run cold, my dear, to have heard him go on at times. And yet he was a real good old man every other way. He couldn't help it someway. He tried to, but he used ...
— Chronicles of Avonlea • Lucy Maud Montgomery

... him, Mother Holf as though fascinated, the girl alarmed but still triumphant: she had done what the king bade her. Rudolf turned the corner of the first landing and disappeared from their sight. The old woman, swearing and muttering, stumbled back into her kitchen, set her stew on the fire, and began to stir it, her eyes set on the flames and careless of the pot. The girl watched her mother for a moment, wondering ...
— Rupert of Hentzau - From The Memoirs of Fritz Von Tarlenheim: The Sequel to - The Prisoner of Zenda • Anthony Hope

... was open, and the two bearers of heavy news entered unannounced. Benjamin Wright was in the dining-room, where the shutters were bowed to keep out the heat. He had taken off his hat, and was pottering about among his canaries, scolding Simmons and swearing at the weather. Dr. Lavendar and William, coming from the white glare of sunshine, could hardly distinguish him as he shuffled back and forth among the shadows, except when he crossed the strip of dazzling green light between the ...
— The Awakening of Helena Richie • Margaret Deland

... fields of contempt, and glided away with a dignity that denied what she was and what had happened. That struck him as a monstrous breach of the social contract, for surely if a woman was a bad woman she ought to stay still until one had finished swearing ...
— The Judge • Rebecca West

... which it was lawful to prove or deny guilt by the single combat. By the law of Gondebaldus, King of the Burgundians, passed in the year 501, the proof by combat was allowed in all legal proceedings, in lieu of swearing. In the time of Charlemagne, the Burgundian practice had spread over the empire of the Francs, and not only the suitors for justice, but the witnesses, and even the judges, were obliged to defend ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions - Vol. I • Charles Mackay

... sale came to a dead stand. The auctioneer stopped, looked around, and began in a rough manner to relate some anecdotes relative to the sale of slaves, which, he said, had come under his own observation. At this juncture the scene was indeed strange. Laughing, joking, swearing, smoking, spitting, and talking kept up a continual hum and noise amongst the crowd; while the slave-girl stood with tears in her eyes, at one time looking towards her mother and sister, and at another towards ...
— Clotel; or, The President's Daughter • William Wells Brown

... that two days previously Jacques wrote to Paul—I saw the letter—and it was something painful to read; for he not only recapitulated his vices and follies, but he taxed him with being a ruined gambler, who had brought his mother in sorrow to the grave, and ended by swearing, in the most solemn manner, that if he dared again to speak to his sister or darken their doors, he would shoot him like ...
— Captain Brand of the "Centipede" • H. A. (Henry Augustus) Wise

... demand the strangers' lives as a sacrifice to their gods, while the women are condemned to inhale the poisoned perfume of the Manzanillo-tree.—In order to save Vasco Selica proclaims him her husband and takes Nelusco {7} as witness, swearing to him that if Vasco is sacrificed she will die with him. Nelusco, whose love for his Queen is greater even than his hatred for Vasco, vouches for their being man and wife, and the people now proceed to celebrate the solemn ...
— The Standard Operaglass - Detailed Plots of One Hundred and Fifty-one Celebrated Operas • Charles Annesley

... when he suddenly stopped, and his face took a sad expression. "I have deceived my dear master, in order to save him," said he, "and in order to redeem the promise I made to his father on his death-bed, swearing that I would watch over and protect the son at the risk of my heart's blood. But if the son knew what I have done, he would call me a betrayer and curse me, for he holds his ward dearer than his own life! He leaves the princess in the belief that it is necessary for her safety, and ...
— The Daughter of an Empress • Louise Muhlbach

... Highlanders, with their muskets abandoned, and broad swords drawn, rushed by the provincials, foaming with rage, and resembling, as Captain Craighead coarsely expressed it, 'mad boars engaged in battle,' swearing vengeance and extermination upon the French troops who had permitted such outrages. Their march was now hastened—the whole army moved forward after the Highlanders, and when they arrived somewhere about where the canal now passes, ...
— An Historical Account of the Settlements of Scotch Highlanders in America • J. P. MacLean

... countries, attended by blacklegs and pickpockets and gentlemanly roues, by far the largest portion of the assembly in the pit was composed of the first young men in Mexico, and for that matter, of the first old ones also. There was neither confusion, nor noise, nor even loud talking, far less swearing, amongst the lowest of those assembled in the ring; and it is this quiet and orderly behaviour which throws over all these incongruities a cloak of decency and decorum, that hides their impropriety so completely, that even foreigners who have lived here a few ...
— Life in Mexico • Frances Calderon de la Barca

... purposes, and whenever I hear it Robert invariably has my deepest sympathy and so has Sicily. Toward midnight a cold collation is served, and you recapture your hat and escape forth into the starry night, swearing to yourself that never again will you permit yourself to be lured into an orgy ...
— Cobb's Bill-of-Fare • Irvin Shrewsbury Cobb

... a series of sermons on the bad habits of the congregation—swearing, drinking, gambling, horse-racing, smoking, and spitting. Last Sunday, right by the door in church, two men were smoking their pipes and spitting on the floor. It seems to me that Revelations XI:2 is about the right medicine for such conduct. This is the text: 'And ...
— The Preacher of Cedar Mountain - A Tale of the Open Country • Ernest Thompson Seton

... the next alarm was sounded after two unquiet decades. A widely ramified secret society, the Fenian Brotherhood, sprang up among the Irish exiles and emigrants in the United States about 1857, its members swearing "to free and regenerate Ireland from the yoke of England." The movement spread to Ireland, and Fenian lodges were organized even on British soil. The close of the American Civil War set loose many Irish veterans who eagerly enlisted in the cause of "the Irish Republic." The reports ...
— Ten Englishmen of the Nineteenth Century • James Richard Joy

... fighting, swearing, drinking, and such like interesting performances were kept up without intermission—and woe to the poor fellow who looked for repose that night. He might have as well thought of sleeping with a thousand cannons booming at ...
— The Great Salt Lake Trail • Colonel Henry Inman

... at it again. But I am nervous—these things get me into such a state that I simply can not do anything. It was not merely yesterday—I have it constantly. The dirty chambermaid singing, or yelling down to the landlady; the drunken man swearing at his wife; the boys screaming in the street and kicking a tomato-can about. When I think of how much beauty and power has been shattered in my life by such things as these, it brings tears of impotent rage into ...
— The Journal of Arthur Stirling - "The Valley of the Shadow" • Upton Sinclair



Words linked to "Swearing" :   swear, commitment, profanity, cuss, dedication



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