"Grumpy" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... and after dinner we sat on the stoop; he was still rather grumpy, though we pretended not to notice it. Presently Chad came along and took a seat beside us; but at first I don't think anybody, except, perhaps, Nora, paid him much attention. Felix had been very quiet all day, ...
— We Ten - Or, The Story of the Roses • Lyda Farrington Kraus
... yourself be misled by his grumpy growls. If you'll only be careful not to spend your strength before the last number begins— (Lulu steps out in a classical, sleeveless dress, white with a red border, a bright wreath in her hair and a basket ...
— Erdgeist (Earth-Spirit) - A Tragedy in Four Acts • Frank Wedekind
... young woman uses her father-confessor as a go-between for herself and her lover. In the Adelphi there are two old men of dissimilar character, who give a different education to the children they bring up. One of them is a dotard, who, after having for sixty years been sullen, grumpy and avaricious, becomes suddenly lively, polite, and prodigal; this Molire had too much common ...
— The School for Husbands • Moliere
... to him and begged him not to consider us any more for the present. We must think of the maids too. You see, Hugo makes a good deal of extra work, and I'm afraid Hannah might turn grumpy if there was yet another man to ...
— Jan and Her Job • L. Allen Harker
... case of an heir apparent of seventy; his father was ninety-five. One day the young man was very grumpy. They tried to find out what was the matter with him; at last he broke out, "Everybody's father ...
— Correspondence & Conversations of Alexis de Tocqueville with Nassau William Senior from 1834 to 1859, Vol. 2 • Alexis de Tocqueville
... shall be off, he's sure to be out of temper; masters and missuses are always grumpy when they first get up. (DIBBS kisses TILLY, who slaps him. Exit, ...
— Three Hats - A Farcical Comedy in Three Acts • Alfred Debrun
... have felt was carefully locked in his own breast. His underlings, the farm-labourers, found him a little more "grumpy" than usual, and his daughter scarcely dared open her lips to him for a month after the funeral. But from that time forward Miss Carley, who was rather a spirited damsel, took a very different tone with her father. ...
— Fenton's Quest • M. E. Braddon
... don't be so grumpy,' Randolph put in, 'and do fix what you're going to buy. There's something over here that papa would like, I know. A whistle, such a jolly strong one, and only two-pence. It would do for him to call me in by, and much less trouble than ringing ...
— The Rectory Children • Mrs Molesworth
... a governess, a learned lady, who taught me in person the picturesqueness of grumpiness. Her temper was ever perfect, because she was never in the wrong, but I being so, she was grumpy. She carried my iniquity under her brows, and looked out on me through it. I was a ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... Anthea quickly. 'Robert dear, don't be so grumpy - we won't say a word, you shall be the one to speak to the Fairy and tell him what we've decided to wish for. You'll say it ...
— Five Children and It • E. Nesbit
... was a very easygoing fellow, you know. He worked every one—himself included—like the devil, of course. But he was hardly ever nervy or grumpy. And so I was a bit surprised to find—after I had been with him for a time—that every now and then he sort of shrivelled up. He used to look ... well, careworn and ... and haggard. And at these times he was pretty short with ...
— The Yellow Streak • Williams, Valentine
... Despite his grumpy silence he showed an air of repressed excitement, sending frequent, shifty glances over the room; and that he possessed the temper of a fiend I did not doubt after seeing him turn upon the waiter for ...
— Wings of the Wind • Credo Harris
... a week later with a look in his face which made her want to take his young head in her arms and weep over it. A shadow had fallen on his comely youth. He looked "grumpy," as he had been accustomed to look in his darling childhood when he was about to have a croupy attack, at which times the sense of injury against all the world had been part humorous, whole poignant, to ...
— Love of Brothers • Katharine Tynan
... cool and self-possessed. He acted the role of an ordinary visitor, talking of the country and the news from Spain. The General, though extremely grumpy, was still capable of ordinary conversation, and his remarks, especially on the Spanish campaign, were those of an intelligent soldier who ...
— Angelot - A Story of the First Empire • Eleanor Price
... the widow's mind; she sorely wanted money, and she might not have another chance of letting the room. This grumpy old man might prove pleasanter on further acquaintance; at any rate he might not be so disagreeable as many another; and with one glance at her little sick boy upon the rug, the mother made up her mind and decided to take her lodger ...
— The Boy Artist. - A Tale for the Young • F.M. S.
... lunch and put on another exhibition of free-hand feeding, getting more grumpy and disgusted every minute. We were all ready to yell for mercy and put on our civilized clothes when we heard a terrific riot from outside. ...
— At Good Old Siwash • George Fitch
... too stupid for words. Since the trial and the bank failure I haven't been able to get a smile out of anybody! I hope the Turtle won't be grumpy." ...
— A Romance of Billy-Goat Hill • Alice Hegan Rice
... "Always feel grumpy until I eat," grumbled the blackbeard. "None of this coffee-cigarette breakfast for me. A real meal, coffee with gin in it, a cigar—then I ...
— The Pathless Trail • Arthur O. (Arthur Olney) Friel
... days later I saw the grumpy old brute again in a curious way. I was sweeping the lake with my field glasses when I saw what I thought was a pair of black ducks near a grassy shore. I paddled over, watching them keenly, till a root seemed to ...
— Wood Folk at School • William J. Long
... to do?" said Granger, in an extremely grumpy tone. "Bet's a strong lass, and a cute lass, and a cunning one; and she have got that Irishwoman Mother Bunch to back her up. I don't see what's to be done with a gel like Bet, if her will's ...
— A Girl of the People • L. T. Meade
... a jolly sight more sensible than you, Chris. But I say," he added in a grumpy, husky voice, ...
— Christopher Hibbault, Roadmaker • Marguerite Bryant
... Lin Tai-yue smiled. "Yes," she observed, "your servant-girls must, I fancy, have been too lazy to budge, grumpy and in a cross-grained ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin
... guides the soul from perilous dallying and dissipation. Nevertheless, it is not so much that characters are energetic or virtuous because they have ruling plans or maxims as it is that they have ruling plans or maxims because they are energetic or virtuous. Say to a penurious, hard, grumpy man, "It is more blessed to give than to receive." Will you thus make him liberal, sympathetic, affable? No, his character will neutralize your precept, as vinegar receiving the sunshine into its bosom becomes ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XI., February, 1863, No. LXIV. • Various
... all together for many years, and if they could only have forgotten Rotherwood, and their altered circumstances, they would have enjoyed it immensely. Mrs. Saxon, the unfailing sunshine-radiator of the household, tried to ignore the tone of discontent in her husband's voice, the grumpy attitude of Egbert, Quenrede's fit of the blues, and Athelstane's rather martyred pose. She insisted on bundling everybody out for ...
— A Popular Schoolgirl • Angela Brazil
... you know I would?" asked Rose Mary quickly, in her simplicity of heart not at all catching the subtle drift of his question. "They all missed you, and Uncle Tucker went to bed almost grumpy, ...
— Rose of Old Harpeth • Maria Thompson Daviess
... the dark was Colonel Clifford. He was nearly always confined to his room. However, one day he came down, and found Julia and Percy together. She introduced Percy to him. The Colonel was curt, but grumpy, and Percy soon ...
— A Perilous Secret • Charles Reade
... to tell," was the grumpy response. "I went upstairs about half-past eleven and got down the next morning at the usual ...
— The Red Seal • Natalie Sumner Lincoln
... hundred talks with Lord Cromer, was exactly like the last. In the art of unfolding his mind and his subject he was a master. I questioned and he answered, and I remember distinctly feeling that I had never before put myself so easily en rapport with any man. I had been told that he was gruff, nay, grumpy, and quite without any of the arts of the diplomatist, and that I should find him very different from the statesmen and politicians to whom I was accustomed. Instead, I found him plain and straightforward, but as kind as ...
— The Adventure of Living • John St. Loe Strachey
... Weld, the Assistant Secretary, said, "Well, I congratulate you." I confess I did not see at that moment what any mortal man had to congratulate me about. I had a deuced bad cold, with rheumatism in my head; it was a beastly November day and I was very grumpy, so I inquired in a state of mild surprise what might be the matter. Whereupon I learnt that the Medal had been conferred at the meeting of the Council on the day before. I was very pleased...and I thought you would be so too, and I thought moreover ...
— The Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley Volume 1 • Leonard Huxley
... turn sway from these who want to help you! I'm a grumpy old woman, but I can feel for you. Don't try and keep it all back, like this! A woman would cry, and it would all seem clearer at once. ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... matter with you to-night, Kenneth, old man? You're more than commonly grumpy, it seems to ...
— The Price • Francis Lynde
... cost much to put the potatoes in. If they came on well, it would be a few pounds in my pocket; if the crop was a failure, I'd have a better show with Mary next time she was struck by an idea outside housekeeping, and have something to grumble about when I felt grumpy. ...
— Joe Wilson and His Mates • Henry Lawson
... grumpy, with a fine forgetfulness as to the saltness of time, says that young Mr. Mill had been kept such a recluse that when he met Mrs. Taylor he considered that he was the first man to discover the potency of sex, ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Vol. 13 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Lovers • Elbert Hubbard
... that the colonel had extracted the information he sent her FROM Briones. They had parted from Pendleton in London, as he was grumpy and queer, and, as Milly thought, becoming very miserly and avaricious as he grew older, for he was always quarreling over the hotel bills. But he had Mrs. Woods's New York address at Under Cliff, and, of course, guessed where she was. There was no address on his letter: ...
— A Ward of the Golden Gate • Bret Harte
... stairs, or she would not have allowed it, for she was very fond of mice. Mr. and Mrs. Mouse knew they were perfectly safe with her, but they were not at all as sure of her maid, who looked very cross and grumpy. So things went on for some time very happily, and Mrs. Mouse began to look about for a good place to put her babies in, for she had fifteen of them. She found a large bottle under the wardrobe at one end, ...
— Harper's Young People, November 25, 1879 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... happened at last! The Leverings brought a friend to call this afternoon, who has just arrived in Lone-Rock to spend the rest of vacation with them; a grumpy, middle-aged, absent-minded, old professor from the East, who seemed rather bored with us at first. But when he was taken out to the side-show in the 'Zoo,' he waked up in a hurry. His very spectacles gleamed and his gray whiskers bristled ...
— The Little Colonel's Chum: Mary Ware • Annie Fellows Johnston
... Janet took a plate of tongue over to his bunk, he was fast asleep. The others had a dismal, grumpy meal, and they were glad when the washing-up was done and it was bedtime. But no one had a good night. The rain dropped from the trees on to the Slowcoach's roof with loud thuds, and at midnight the thunder and lightning began, and Janet got up and splashed out in the wet to the tent to ask ...
— The Slowcoach • E. V. Lucas
... Commander was the only person in the kingdom who was not sharing the general joy. He was grumpy because he had lost all the honor of winning a bloody battle. Even the sight of all his army alive and well could not soothe the wound to his vanity; so when the Princess and the Wizard were exchanging the last courtesies, he strode forward, ...
— The Faery Tales of Weir • Anna McClure Sholl
... night," Jimmy muttered gloomily, as he made his way down to the dining room, from which issued a tempting aroma of bacon. "It's all too good to be true." But then, Jimmy always did feel grumpy before breakfast. ...
— The Radio Boys' First Wireless - Or Winning the Ferberton Prize • Allen Chapman
... leap; having for our splendid inheritance love in youth and memory in old age, and we are to take one miserable little faculty, our one-legged, knock-kneed, gimcrack, purblind, rough-skinned, underfed, and perpetually irritated and grumpy intellect, or analytical curiosity rather (a diseased appetite), and let it swell till it eats up every other function? Away with ...
— The Path to Rome • Hilaire Belloc
... complained. She bore the scoldings and bad temper of mother and sister with a smile on her lips, and the patience of a lamb. But this angelic behavior did not soften them. They became even more tyrannical and grumpy, for Marouckla grew daily more beautiful, while Helen's ugliness increased. So the stepmother determined to get rid of Marouckla, for she knew that while she remained, her own daughter would have no suitors. Hunger, every kind of privation, abuse, every means was used to make the ...
— Good Stories For Great Holidays - Arranged for Story-Telling and Reading Aloud and for the - Children's Own Reading • Frances Jenkins Olcott
... like you do. He used to get very grumpy, and very, very unhappy. He begged and pleaded with me for understanding, and I couldn't give it to him. Then one day he got dreadfully drunk, after a whole year away from it. And mother's cousin ...
— Captivity • M. Leonora Eyles
... the first call to the school connected the Mitchells with a grumpy-voiced janitor who growled that teachers and principals had headed for their hills of freedom and wouldn't be back until Monday Week. It took some calling to locate a couple of James Holden's classmates who asserted that he hadn't been in ...
— The Fourth R • George Oliver Smith
... and adventurous foreigners whom the grumpy officers jostle and hustle about. For neither poverty, nor oppression, nor both together can drive a man out of his country, unless the soul within him awaken. Indeed, many a misventurous cowering peasant continues to live on bread and olives in his little village, chained in the fear of dying of ...
— The Book of Khalid • Ameen Rihani
... seemed disposed to be so grumpy, the sailmaker took a book and began to read. Huerlin sat opposite him and threw occasional glances of suspicious observation at him. Once, when the reader could not help laughing at something amusing, the other was very much tempted to ask him what it was. ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries - Masterpieces of German Literature Vol. 19 • Various
... expressions of horror, amazement, and abject terror.... Early in the morning of Wednesday 24th, I, with some others, was ordered to the barricade of La Roquette.[1] My companions were very good fellows, with one exception,—a grumpy old wretch who had served in Africa, and could talk about nothing but the heat of Algeria and the chances for plunder he had let slip there. Finding nothing to do at the barricade, I tied my horse and fell asleep upon the pavement. I dreamed I was ...
— France in the Nineteenth Century • Elizabeth Latimer
... laughed Tom—who had got out of his grumpy state quickly enough; for his disposition was almost as light-hearted as that of his friend, and it was only the heat and the confinement on board ship when in harbour that had previously oppressed his spirits—"let us look smart, and be off. Here's that fellow Tompkins just coming up the ...
— Picked up at Sea - The Gold Miners of Minturne Creek • J.C. Hutcheson
... decide in your favour. But, mark my words, young man, you'll never win her by getting grumpy and sour just because she smiles on another man. In fact, you'd better praise Mr. Lansing. That would be the best way to make her lose interest ...
— Patty's Social Season • Carolyn Wells
... got home dad was grumpy, and wondered what we wanted riding the horses about when there was nothing to do and nothing to see. But Warrigal had made him a pot of tea, and he was able to smoke now; so he wasn't so bad after all. We made ourselves pretty comfortable—Aileen ...
— Robbery Under Arms • Thomas Alexander Browne, AKA Rolf Boldrewood
... taken his beautiful new yellow and red and blue and black and white rattle, which rattles so beautifully, over to show to Grumpy Grundy, the Owl!" said ...
— Friendly Fairies • Johnny Gruelle
... manner and grumpy in speech with the seamen. To his successive captains, he was outwardly as deferential as he knew how, and as a rule inwardly hostile—so very few seemed to him of the "all there" kind. Of Lingard, with whom he had only been a ...
— The Rescue • Joseph Conrad
... first things to remember in the cultivation of beauty is expression. Who doesn't enjoy looking upon the young girl, with a bright, cheerful face, laughing eyes and all that? Everybody! And when the grumpy lady or the whiney lady or the lady of woes trots in and sullies your near landscape, how do you feel? Just about as cheery as if she'd come to ask you to ...
— The Woman Beautiful - or, The Art of Beauty Culture • Helen Follett Stevans
... grumpy this afternoon, wasn't he?" said Mary, without preamble. "But I've noticed once or twice lately that he can't take a joke any more. He's grown queer altogether. Do you know he's the only person who still persists in calling me by my old name? He was quite rude about it when I ...
— Australia Felix • Henry Handel Richardson
... you; just hinting and insinuating as usual. He's no end grumpy at being sent off; seemed to think he had the inside track with the Jersey bluebell. (Look out, William, or you'll be moth to that candle next. She's the winningest thing I ever saw,—winning as four aces, i' faith!) Gad! Did you hear the K. O. ...
— Marion's Faith. • Charles King
... in his seething brain. Feuerbach, however, was sent about his business as soon as Schopenhauer entered. Wagner immediately wrote enthusiastically to Liszt, telling how peace and light had come into his soul; and one might wonder what particular doctrine of the grumpy old pseudo-philosopher had this remarkable effect. (This is to assume it to have had the effect. As a bare matter of fact it hadn't. Wagner's soul knew no peace until he died.) It was the great gospel of Renunciation. After reading this, in his own way, Wagner realized, if you ...
— Richard Wagner - Composer of Operas • John F. Runciman
... outward, or at best produce some whiffling husky cachinnations as if they were laughing through wool. Of none such comes good." A young lady must not speak too loud or be too boisterous; she must even tone down her wit, lest she be misunderstood. But she need not be dull, or grumpy, or ill-tempered, or careless of her manners, particularly to her mother's old friends. She must not talk slang, or be in any way masculine; if she is, she loses the battle. A young lady is sometimes called ...
— Manners and Social Usages • Mrs. John M. E. W. Sherwood
... doors. A meeting of the creditors was called, at which H. H. Rogers was present, representing Clemens. For the most part the creditors were liberal and willing to agree to any equitable arrangement. But there were a few who were grumpy and fussy. They declared that Mark Twain should turn over his copyrights, his Hartford home, and whatever other odds and ends could be discovered. Mr. Rogers, discussing the matter ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... gets much thanks, I believe," was my grumpy comment, which he unexpectedly chose to accept as an apology and with a large, fine, generous gesture ...
— The Firefly Of France • Marion Polk Angellotti
... camp in almost complete silence, except for a grunt or two from the O. C. who seemed in a grumpy mood. ...
— The Sky Pilot in No Man's Land • Ralph Connor
... Still grumpy but mollified by the silver Jens let them go up and opened the door to our rooms again. There stood the cabinet, as outwardly innocent as when ...
— The Exploits of Elaine • Arthur B. Reeve
... his head bobbing, and I dashed my boat-hook in the water. It caught in his breeches and I nearly went overboard, as I thought I would, only old Symons let go the tiller and grabbed my legs—the boat nearly swamped. Old Symons is a fine old chap. I don't mind a bit him being grumpy with us. He swore at me all the time he held my leg, but that was only his way of telling me to stick to the boat-hook. Old Symons is awfully excitable—isn't he? No—not the little fair chap—the other, the big one with a beard. When we pulled him in he groaned, "Oh, my leg! ...
— Lord Jim • Joseph Conrad
... another, on the various coasts,—solemn Frank, long Gus, gallant Ed, fly-away Molly Loo, pretty Laura and Lotty, grumpy Joe, sweet-faced Merry with Sue shrieking wildly behind her, gay Jack and gypsy Jill, always together,—one and all bubbling over with the innocent jollity born of healthful exercise. People passing in ...
— Jack and Jill • Louisa May Alcott
... seat, nodding to the men. A slightly grumpy silence reigned. Collins and Fox had not yet appeared. Bob saw Roaring Dick at the other table, rather whiter than the day before, but carrying himself boldly in spite of his poor head. As he looked, Roaring Dick caught his eye. The riverman evidently ...
— The Rules of the Game • Stewart Edward White
... off to business and the very last crumb of the Macomber breakfast having vanished, the Macomber children proceeded to go through their usual morning routine. Lemuel, who did chores for grumpy old Captain Elijah Samuels at the latter's big place on the depot road, departed to rake hay and be sworn at. Sarah-Mary went upstairs to make beds; when the bed-making was over she and Edgar and Bemis would go to school. ...
— Fair Harbor • Joseph Crosby Lincoln
... their families arrived, the women guests at the hotel bubbled, "Oh, isn't it nice! You must be so excited;" and the proprieties compelled Babbitt and Paul to look excited. But they went to bed early and grumpy. ...
— Babbitt • Sinclair Lewis
... the grounds with me, at sunset," she explained, in intervals of cajoling the grumpy mass of fluff to descend. "And he ran ahead of me, to-day, to the edge of the path. That must have been when Bobby ...
— Black Caesar's Clan • Albert Payson Terhune
... more!—than one has any idea of performing," murmured the president's daughter, dropping out to walk beside the victim when the party trooped down the long platform of the Crow's Nest to the service-car. And when he did not reply: "Please don't be grumpy." ...
— The Taming of Red Butte Western • Francis Lynde
... were well enough enjoyed his discomfiture immensely. Going into Salle III where there were shouts of laughter (the convalescents were sent to that room) I saw a funny sight. One little man, who was particularly fussy and grumpy (and very unpopular with the other men in consequence), slept near the stove, which was an old-fashioned coal one with a pipe leading up to the ceiling. The concussion had shaken this to such an extent that accumulations of soot had come down and covered him from head to foot, and ...
— Fanny Goes to War • Pat Beauchamp
... may quarrel with it, The Peace of the Augustans is a book to read with delight—an eccentric book, an extravagant book, a grumpy book, but a book of rare and amazing enthusiasm for good literature. Mr. Saintsbury's constant jibes at the present age, as though no one had ever been unmanly enough to make a joke before Mr. Shaw, become amusing in the end like Dr. Johnson's rudenesses. And Mr. ...
— The Art of Letters • Robert Lynd
... our ship were in the same humour, and so were the crews of the rest of the squadron. We knew that we could trust our stout old admiral, for if he was at times somewhat grumpy, he was as gallant a man and as good an officer as any in the service. I heard it said, many years after, that when some of the Government gentlemen offered to make a lord of him, he declined, saying, ...
— Will Weatherhelm - The Yarn of an Old Sailor • W.H.G. Kingston
... piano near the door played through a valse cheekily, then fell silent all at once, as if gone grumpy. ...
— The Secret Agent - A Simple Tale • Joseph Conrad
... of the family, without a tincture of affectation, will languish as they gaze on the lovely Luna. Not, as a grumpy, grisly old bear of a bachelor once said, "Because there's a man in it!" No; the precious pets are fond of moonlight rather because they are the daughters of Eve. They are in sympathy with all that is bright and beautiful ...
— Moon Lore • Timothy Harley
... Tonnison was grumpy, and I felt out of sorts. It was a somewhat dismal day, and there was a touch of chilliness in the air. There was no mention of going out fishing on either of our parts. We got dinner, and, after that, just sat and ...
— The House on the Borderland • William Hope Hodgson
... a "scorcher," I know I am torcher To buffers and mivvies who're not up to date; But grumpy old geesers, and wobbly old wheezers, Ain't goin' to wipe me and my wheel orf the slate. I mean to go spinning and 'owling and grinning At twelve mile an hour through the thick of the throng. And shout, without stopping, whilst, frightened and flopping, My elderly victims ...
— Mr. Punch Awheel - The Humours of Motoring and Cycling • J. A. Hammerton
... may sometimes have been—sour as his compatriots now and then are said to have found him, "the world it appears, is indebted for much of its progress, to uncomfortable and even grumpy people," and Tyler whose analysis of the Puritan character has never been surpassed, writes of them: "Even some of the best of them, perhaps, would have seemed to us rather pragmatical and disputatious persons, with all the edges and corners of their ...
— Anne Bradstreet and Her Time • Helen Campbell
... "Don't look so grumpy, old man," said he as he passed. Lars Peter had not time to answer before he was out again. He put the sack over the horse's head, measured the distance, and swung the ax backwards; a strange long-drawn crash sounded from behind the sack, and the ...
— Ditte: Girl Alive! • Martin Andersen Nexo
... home just now,' Kenneth said; 'Hugh is as grumpy and cross as two sticks. I dine out whenever I can, and shoot everything I come across in the day-time. I even condescend to rabbits, if there's nothing better on hand. I think we shall have the house pretty full when the ...
— Dwell Deep - or Hilda Thorn's Life Story • Amy Le Feuvre
... other man gives him a chance to pose a lot, an' mebbe it's got a heap of effect on Number Two, who sort of thinks that if she gets tied up to such a sucker she'll be able to wrap him around her finger. But if he loves Number Two, he'll be mighty grumpy to the next fellow that goes to makin' ...
— The Range Boss • Charles Alden Seltzer
... John's place two more years, and he got so grumpy and his wife got so mean I make up my mind to run off. I bundle up my clothes in a little bundle and hide them, and then I wait until Miss Kate take the children and go off somewhere, and I light out on foot. I had me a piece of that hard money what Master Dr. Alexander had give ...
— Slave Narratives, Oklahoma - A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From - Interviews with Former Slaves • Various
... sister states as "the meddler," the "maker of trouble," and the duke as "Old Grumpy"—Brummbaer. To use a familiar Yankee expression, Barscheit had a finger in every pie. Whenever there was a political broth making, whether in Italy, Germany or Austria, Barscheit would snatch up a ladle and start in. She took care of her own affairs so easily ...
— The Princess Elopes • Harold MacGrath
... "It was such a comfort to me. I'd been feeling so grumpy because my own was horrid compared to yours, but when I saw that grey flannel atrocity I felt I ...
— Betty Trevor • Mrs. G. de Horne Vaizey
... near the garage. But she did not have much success with him. He was grumpy and, replying to Sara's assertion that the situation was rapidly becoming rife with disagreeable possibilities, he replied that he did not care a very little bit, and that Anne could marry all the princes in Christendom ...
— Prince or Chauffeur? - A Story of Newport • Lawrence Perry
... of farmyard fights," he sniffed. "If Fatty Coon or Grumpy Weasel or my cousin Solomon Owl grabbed you, you'd find that a fight in the woods is a very different matter from ...
— The Tale of Turkey Proudfoot - Slumber-Town Tales • Arthur Scott Bailey
... could see, and wanted drawing out; but he soon took to me, and in a surprisingly short time we became friends. He was in the next cabin to mine, and evidently wished so much to have been with me, that I tried to get another man to exchange; but he was grumpy about it, and I had to give it up, much to young Carr's disappointment. Indeed, he was quite silent and morose for a whole day about it, poor fellow. He was a tall handsome young man, slightly built, with the kind of sallow complexion ...
— The Danvers Jewels, and Sir Charles Danvers • Mary Cholmondeley
... on shore and seen the inside as well as the outside of things," observed Cousin Silas, who had overheard us. We thought he was in what we used to call one of his grumpy humours, and did not heed him. We sailed on, and dropped our anchor opposite to the city of Funchal. A health-boat came off, but as no one was sick on board, the people in her did not trouble us much. When she went away, we were surrounded with other boats pulled by swarthy, muscular, ...
— A Voyage round the World - A book for boys • W.H.G. Kingston
... a pity that in Pleasant Valley, where Farmer Green's meadow lay, there were many of the fat-loving kind. Not only Peter Mink and Tommy Fox, but Grumpy Weasel, Solomon Owl, Ferdinand Frog, Henry Hawk and even Miss Kitty Cat were usually on the watch for Master Meadow Mouse. Naturally, he soon learned to be on the lookout for them. And if he hadn't ...
— The Tale of Master Meadow Mouse • Arthur Scott Bailey
... crew were all much frightened, and tried to bail out the ugly water, but it rose too fast, and soon the monkeyish boat began to sink. After it had sunk through the water about a mile, it struck plump on a rock, and then it glided into a dwarfish cave at the bottom of the sea. The grumpy and genial Cricket immediately fell out of the boat, in her surprise. Cunning Will jumped after her. The sugary party had come to a mountainous spot down below the sea, and they found a minute garden ...
— Cricket at the Seashore • Elizabeth Westyn Timlow
... a rude kind of harp specially for his poor blind daughter, and on which Dot used to play when she visited the toy-maker's. Caleb's musical contribution would be 'a Bacchanalian song, something about a sparkling bowl,' which much annoyed his grumpy employer. ...
— Charles Dickens and Music • James T. Lightwood
... remember a grumpy old fellow who travelled with you on your first journey to London rather more than a year ago? You never told me your name, but I kept a note of the address you gave through me to your taxi-driver, and ...
— Innocent - Her Fancy and His Fact • Marie Corelli
... a grumpy old shopkeeper who needed neither tables nor bedsteads, so he said. But I had thought it all over and made up my mind that the first blow was half the battle. Therefore I knew better. I pushed my album under his nose, and it fell open at the extension tables. Cheap, I said, ...
— The Making of an American • Jacob A. Riis
... swift, comprehending sympathy, fortitude, sunny resignation, and a goodness of heart that has ripened into wisdom. For Flaubert, too, though he was seventeen years her junior, the flamboyance of youth was long since past; in 1862, when the correspondence begins, he was firmly settled, a shy, proud, grumpy toiling hermit of forty, in his family seat at Croisset, beginning his seven years' labor at L'Education Sentimentale, master of his art, hardening in his convictions, and conscious of increasing estrangement from the spirit of his age. He, with his craving for sympathy, and she, with ...
— The George Sand-Gustave Flaubert Letters • George Sand, Gustave Flaubert
... at an early hour upon the morrow, Mistress Winthrop cool and distant; his lordship grumpy and mute; Mr. Caryll airy and talkative as was his habit. They set out soon afterwards. But matters were nowise improved. His lordship dozed in a corner of the carriage, while Mistress Winthrop found more interest in the flowering hedgerows than ...
— The Lion's Skin • Rafael Sabatini
... the tears ever falling are turned into fog That hangs o'er the vale damp and chill, And in it the little folks shiver and shake Till they really are well-nigh ill! So I long to cry out to the sad little crew, "Come up to the sunshine, you grumpy ones, do! Your tears are all needless, if only you knew— Come out of the Valley of Grump, poor dears, Come out of the ...
— Dew Drops, Vol. 37, No. 34, August 23, 1914 • Various
... of the evening, however—the poet still remaining moody, not to say positively grumpy—Senator Wrengold proposed a friendly game of Swedish poker. It was the latest fashionable variant in Western society on the old gambling round, and few of us knew it, save the omniscient poet and the magazine editor. It turned out afterwards that Wrengold ...
— An African Millionaire - Episodes in the Life of the Illustrious Colonel Clay • Grant Allen
... his tentative knock thereon the night before. The picture showed an anemic and woebegone couple haggling and shaking their fists at each other, while a large caption announced that "Thousands of Married Folks Lead a Cat and Dog Life—Are Cross, Crabbed and Grumpy!"—all of which could be obviated if they ...
— The Prairie Child • Arthur Stringer
... tears of a son are seldom lasting." The terrible spectacle of the French Revolution excited in his mind only a feeling of self-pity because his retreat in Switzerland was invaded by the unhappy refugees, just as a grumpy country gentleman in England might complain that he was annoyed by the trippers. There is a touch of dislike in all the allusions which Boswell makes to Gibbon—often without even mentioning his name—and one cannot read the great historian's ...
— Through the Magic Door • Arthur Conan Doyle
... table, on which he placed the bird-cage, so that she could see it, and watch its little occupant hopping about, while it now and then uttered its sweet song. He offered a stool to Norman, who sat down with his hat on looking very grumpy and somewhat angry. Old Alec, however, did not appear to remark this, but busied himself in pouring out some cups of milk, which he brought to Fanny and him, and then offered them the bannock of which he ...
— Norman Vallery - How to Overcome Evil with Good • W.H.G. Kingston
... the grumpy checkroom tyrant like a friend and brother, and has just slipped him a cigar when a husky-built square-jawed gent steps up behind and taps ...
— Shorty McCabe on the Job • Sewell Ford
... "Why, my dear old boy," continued Wildney, "the Gordonites'll be the first to laugh at the trick when we tell them of it next morning, as of course we will do. There, now, don't look grumpy. I shall cut away and arrange it with. Graham, and tell you the whole dodge ready prepared ...
— Eric • Frederic William Farrar
... John—has sent Cleena 'the furnishing of a good dinner,' she told me. I don't know when we may have another such a meal, one that thee would think fit to eat. I'd like to ask thee to come and share it with us, instead of staying here alone, all grumpy with the gout. But it isn't my dinner, thee sees, and I'm going home to tell my people everything. About the picture and the donkey and all. If, after that, they agree with me that it would be nice to ask thee to spend the holiday with us, I'll bring thee ...
— Reels and Spindles - A Story of Mill Life • Evelyn Raymond
... the chalet in the wood, it was rather fun. Mr. Hodgkinson and Lord Doraine sat on either side of me. Lord Valmond came up with the last guns, rather late, and he looked round the table and frowned. He seems quite grumpy now, not half so good-tempered as he used to be. I expect it is ...
— The Visits of Elizabeth • Elinor Glyn
... the wind veered to the south, and Friday proved to be mild and sunny, save for a touch of autumnal haze in the air. But not even this freakish return of summer could rouse him from the grumpy mood which held over ...
— A Son of the City - A Story of Boy Life • Herman Gastrell Seely
... fun. There are no end of foreign titles coming, I believe. The Colonel's a bit grumpy about it,—he always is when he has to wear his dress suit. He just hates it. That man hasn't a particle of vanity. He looks handsomer in his evening clothes than in anything else, and yet he doesn't see it. But tell me," and her pretty face became serious with a true feminine anxiety, ...
— A Romance of Two Worlds • Marie Corelli
... didn't say; but he carried himself with as much swaggering importance as if it were he, and not Mr. Selincourt, who intended buying up as much of Roaring Water Portage as he could lay hands upon," Miles answered, in a grumpy tone. The group of men at the door had moved outside, where it was cooler, so brother and sister were for the ...
— A Countess from Canada - A Story of Life in the Backwoods • Bessie Marchant
... kind to him I shouldn't ever have dared to speak to him. But when was a child father and mother—especially mother—forced me to go and see him and be affectionate to him. He wasn't ever even civil to me, that I can remember—grumpy old bear! But, then, he never saw Rupert at all, so that I take it Master R—- is out of the running altogether for testamentary honours. The last time I saw him myself he was distinctly rude. He treated me as a boy, though I was getting ...
— The Lady of the Shroud • Bram Stoker
... very simple case. Where both occupants of a room claim it all to themselves, and where both are angry and abuse me at the same time, then it gets a bit lively. I don't envy him his talk with the captain. If the old man happens to be feeling a little grumpy today, and he most generally does at the beginning of the voyage, Mr. Hodden will have a bad ten minutes. Don't you bother a bit about it, sir, but go down to your room and make yourself at home. It ...
— One Day's Courtship - The Heralds Of Fame • Robert Barr
... He is grumpy and stumpy, and old and gray, With a sleepy look in his lonely eye, (The other he lost at a matinee— Knocked out by a boot from a window high.) Wherever he goes, he never knows— Quarter or pause in the midnight spree, For the life of a cat is a life of blows, ...
— The Prairie Farmer, Vol. 56, No. 2, January 12, 1884 - A Weekly Journal for the Farm, Orchard and Fireside • Various
... opportunity of 'making his soul.' He fasts and washes vigorously, prays his five times a day, goes to mosque on Fridays, and is quite merry over it, and ready to cook infidels' dinners with exemplary good-humour. It is a great merit in Muslims that they are not at all grumpy over their piety. The weather has set in since five or six days quite like paradise. I sit on my lofty balcony and drink the sweet northerly breeze, and look at the glorious mountain opposite, and think if only you and ...
— Letters from Egypt • Lucie Duff Gordon
... man," urged the other. "You're getting too grumpy; you live too much alone. Just to ...
— Will Warburton • George Gissing
... never be but one great Dr. McAlister," Theodora answered loyally. "No, mother, I must not stay to lunch, not even if Babe would grill her tibia for me. Billy gets very grumpy, if I leave him alone at his meals. Good-bye, Babe. Don't let anything happen to ...
— Phebe, Her Profession - A Sequel to Teddy: Her Book • Anna Chapin Ray
... a Cat's-butcher at Clapton, who's bin in luck's way, and struck ile, Is dead nuts on Yours Truly. Old josser, and grumpy, but he's made his pile. Saw me settin' about in the garden, jest like a old saffron-gill'd ghost A-waiting for cock-crow to 'ook it, and hanxious ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 103, Sep. 24, 1892 • Various
... reluctance, and put off suddenly till next day—till next week, as like as not! The neglected, uncared-for pen, flung away at the slightest provocation, and under the stress of dire necessity hunted for without enthusiasm, in a perfunctory, grumpy worry, in the "Where the devil is the beastly thing gone to?" ungracious spirit. Where, indeed! It might have been reposing behind the sofa for a day or so. My landlady's anemic daughter (as Ollendorff ...
— A Personal Record • Joseph Conrad
... the house-mouse had a very enjoyable time; and she had a good time also with regard to the people she lived with. True, the forester was a grumpy sort of man, who could not hear the word "mouse" mentioned without flying into a rage. But he was a very old man and the house was managed by his daughter. She never forgot the house-mouse; and this came of a meeting that once took place between the two. ...
— The Old Willow Tree and Other Stories • Carl Ewald
... the infinite amusement of Lucian Gay's conversation and company. This was the genial hour when the good story gladdened, the pun flashed, and the song sparkled with jolly mirth or saucy mimicry. To-night, being Coningsby's initiation, there was a special general meeting of the Grumpy Club, in which everybody was to say the gayest things with the gravest face, and every laugh carried a forfeit. Lucian was the inimitable president. He told a tale for which he was famous, of 'the very respectable county family who had been established ...
— Coningsby • Benjamin Disraeli
... he answered when Robert asked him what he was so grumpy about. 'I'll tell you when ...
— The Story of the Amulet • E. Nesbit
... old husband. Clo imagined that Beverley had been poor (she must have known poverty to be so sympathetic!) and that she'd married an elderly man because—well, not entirely because he was rich (that wouldn't be like an Angel) but because she needed protection. Clo expected to see a grumpy graybeard. ...
— The Lion's Mouse • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... beginning is made by the entrance of a single shepherd, grumpy, frost-bitten, and growling rebelliously against the probably widely resented practice of purveyance whereby a nobleman might exact from his farm-tenantry provisions and service for his needs, even though the farmer's own land should suffer from neglect ...
— The Growth of English Drama • Arnold Wynne
... was sour-tempered and grumpy, at first, but before they had journeyed far, the crystal creature had discovered a fine amusement. The long tails of the monkeys were constantly sticking through the bars of their cage, and when they did, the ...
— The Magic of Oz • L. Frank Baum
... especially in youth, are more strong than sweet, or from a better feeling, the fact was noticeable, that when every one else's spirits went down Elizabeth's went up. Nothing could bring her out of a "grumpy" fit so satisfactorily as her mistresses falling into one. When Miss Selina now began to fidget hither and thither, each tone of her fretful voice seeming to go through her eldest sister's every nerve, till even Hilary said, impatiently, "Oh, ...
— Mistress and Maid • Dinah Craik (aka: Miss Mulock)
... somewhat grumpy-countenanced young man, made no answer. He began to pace the hall with looks of eminent dissatisfaction. But he had only taken a turn or two when a quietly appointed one-horse coupe brougham came up ...
— The Chestermarke Instinct • J. S. Fletcher
... Lady Amelia Beaudesert was a difficulty. Her mother insisted on going to a far-away Bavarian lake on which she had a villa;—but Lady Amelia at the last moment surrendered the villa rather than break up the bevy, and consented to remain with a grumpy old aunt in Essex till an opportunity should offer. It may be presumed, therefore, that it was taken to be a great thing to be one of the bevy. It is, no doubt, a pleasant thing for a girl to have it ...
— Marion Fay • Anthony Trollope
... grumpy. He did not intend to leave the field clear and the stew to its fate if he could help it. He gave Ann ...
— T. Tembarom • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... queer little bear cub that lived with Grumpy, his mother, in the Yellowstone Park. They were among the many Bears that found a desirable home in the country about the ...
— Johnny Bear - And Other Stories From Lives of the Hunted • E. T. Seton
... adjoining ten or more other rooms—a dormitory arrangement without supervision and without the quiet needed for rest. The difficulty of securing good service under these conditions, together with the thousand and one annoyances of living at too close quarters, noisy children and pianos, grumpy janitors, smelly garbage, have led to the latest phase: non-housekeeping flats with daily care of a sort supplied by the janitor if desired, a kitchenette where eggs and coffee for breakfast and dishes for invalids may be prepared, and restaurants galore for other meals. Thus the women of the ...
— The Cost of Shelter • Ellen H. Richards
... bite," said the lady; "he has no teeth. He is like one of the family, faithful and grumpy; but the latter is my grandchildren's fault, for they have teased him; they play at wedding, and want to give him the part of the bridesmaid, and that's too much for him, poor ...
— Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen • Hans Christian Andersen
... cloud which was all radiance above, was all drizzling fog below, and we reached Ainepo in a regular Scotch mist. The ranchman seemed rather grumpy at our successful ascent, which involved the failure of all their prophecies, and, indeed, we were thoroughly unsatisfactory travellers, arriving fresh and complacent, with neither adventures nor disasters to gladden people's hearts. We started ...
— The Hawaiian Archipelago • Isabella L. Bird
... spleenish^, spleenly^; splenetic, cankered. cross, crossgrained^; perverse, 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 ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... laughed and talked and finally O'Malley joined in. It was clear that the boys had buried the hatchet, so he saw no reason for being grumpy. Besides, the cook had just made some blueberry pies and they ...
— A Yankee Flier Over Berlin • Al Avery
... home to stir the fault-finders. Sawdy and Carpy took grumpy counsel together. Presently they hunted up Laramie, who in front of the ranch-house was talking horses with Kitchen and Doubleday. They told him the situation and asked for help: "Come over to the creek and show the bunch ...
— Laramie Holds the Range • Frank H. Spearman
... pretty ones upon his knee, and making foolish jokes, talking and giggling like an imbecile, bestowing sweetmeats. With them—for the most sinful motives, as Rashid averred, and, I suppose, believed—he was all sugar; but when he came back to the house he was as grumpy as could be. Rashid would have destroyed him at a nod from me one ...
— Oriental Encounters - Palestine and Syria, 1894-6 • Marmaduke Pickthall
... a time, there lived a family of bears in a thick wood. Grumpy-growly, the father, was a jolly, cross old fellow—oh! I guess he was! and the little ones didn't dare so much as to snap at a fly without ...
— Red, White, Blue Socks, Part First - Being the First Book • Sarah L Barrow
... is," he said with a feeble attempt at cheerfulness, "we are both hungry and consequently grumpy. Now, suppose you prepare lunch. We will feel ever so much better ...
— The Wings of the Morning • Louis Tracy
... natural golden blonde, just chin-high on me, and cute enough to earn her way through a Ph. D. doing modelling. She had a laugh that would melt a brass statue and which she used too much on Doc Napier, on our chief, and even on grumpy old Captain Muller—but sometimes she used it on me, when she wanted something. And I never did have much use for a girl who was the strong independent type where there was a man to do the dirty work, so ...
— Let'em Breathe Space • Lester del Rey
... would shake his hand off. It was almost as serious as being a Presidential candidate. It is needless to say, however, that Mr. Jones was not one of the friends who congratulated him. He, on the other hand, looked decidedly grumpy, and as if he had lost his best friend. He pushed his way through the crowd up to the ...
— Five Hundred Dollars - or, Jacob Marlowe's Secret • Horatio Alger
... live on in the memory as ornamental symbols of a vanished past—a day when fiction-writers impressed it, on their readers with every means at their command, that a hero was well-dressed, well-washed, and well-groomed. Such details have become unnecessary, and grumpy stand-patters no longer contemptuously mutter, 'Soap! Soap!' when a hero comes down to breakfast. Some of our older politicians, to be sure, still wear a standard costume of Prince Albert coat, pants (for so one must call them) that bag at the knee, and an impersonal ...
— The Perfect Gentleman • Ralph Bergengren
... Even the grumpy passengers were disarmed. The conductor took Mr. Bentley's bill deprecatingly, as much as to say that the newly organized Traction Company—just out of the receivers' hands—were the Moloch, not he, and rang off the ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... But Keith was grumpy and monosyllabic. He refused to discuss the situation or Mrs. Sherwood, returning with an obvious effort to commonplaces. Mrs. Morrell exerted all her fascination to get him back to the former level. A little cold imp sat in the back of Keith's brain and criticised sardonically; ...
— The Gray Dawn • Stewart Edward White
... assured him anxiously. The mail carrier was a rather grumpy old personage who did not at all look the part of a messenger of Cupid; and Anne was none too certain that his memory was to be trusted. But he said he would do his best to remember and she had ...
— Anne Of Avonlea • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... of course," she owned lightly, as she shook hands. "I have met so many people, and am stupid at connecting names and faces. I recall Mr. McAllister perfectly." And straightway she plunged into New York and what was going on there. Had he seen "Grumpy" and wasn't it dear? And so on, and so on. Margaret Elizabeth could talk, and more than this she could look bewitching, and did, when she slipped out of her long coat, and with many graceful upward motions, removed her ...
— The Little Red Chimney - Being the Love Story of a Candy Man • Mary Finley Leonard
... did not converse on the way to the store. Zoeth made an attempt, but Shadrach refused to answer. He was silent and, for him, grumpy all the forenoon. Another fortnight passed before the subject of the decision which must, sooner or later, be given Judge Baxter was mentioned by ...
— Mary-'Gusta • Joseph C. Lincoln
... found that they were headed toward home the journey occupied surprisingly little time, and at ten Neil was back in his room awaiting the return of Paul. To Neil's surprise that gentleman was at first decidedly grumpy. ...
— Behind the Line • Ralph Henry Barbour
... Woolwich once while Mary was with her grandparents, but it was not, from her point of view, a very satisfactory visit. Reggie was grumpy, and looked very tired and overworked. Moreover, Mary, though she could not have confessed it for the world, was just a trifle hurt that he never reminded her of that last ...
— The Ffolliots of Redmarley • L. Allen Harker
... of good that does, when he's never there!" flashed Evadna, unintentionally revealing her real grievance. "He just eats and goes—and he isn't even there to eat, half the time. And when he's there, he's grumpy, like all the rest." She was saying the things she had told herself, on the way up, that she would DIE rather than say; to Miss Georgie, of ...
— Good Indian • B. M. Bower
... applause when our labour was completed, but never uttered the slightest expression of gratitude for that, or for any thing else we could do for her. She was constantly asking us to lend her different articles of dress, and when we declined it, she said, "Well, I never seed such grumpy folks as you be; there is several young ladies of my acquaintance what goes to live out now and then with the old women about the town, and they and their gurls always lends them what they asks for; I guess you Inglish thinks we should poison your things, just as bad as if we was Negurs." And here ...
— Domestic Manners of the Americans • Fanny Trollope
... another. I don't say but that a husband is a good thing to have, mind you! I guess I'm like all other women and want to have one some time, but so long as I've got pa I'm in no hurry. He's as much trouble as a husband would be, and as grumpy when things don't go to suit him. Sometimes I feel like in the end I'd choose to marry the Colonel, since it wouldn't be so much of a change, the Colonel bein' like pa in some ways, such as bein' economical; and then again I feel ...
— Kilo - Being the Love Story of Eliph' Hewlitt Book Agent • Ellis Parker Butler
... is, young merely in the sense of being single, not in actual years, for at the time I met him he was nearer the forty than the thirty line. Nature seemed to have marked him for single—cussedness, I had almost said, from the first. He was no favorite with any set, being grumpy, fussy, and peculiar. But five years after he rose into sight above my horizon he married a most sensible, lovely woman; not a child, by the way, for she was almost forty; and in less than no time, it seemed to us, had a family of four children about him, one following ...
— How to Cook Husbands • Elizabeth Strong Worthington
... to above was certainly startling. I was talking to an old man whom I had long known: a little wrinkled old man, deservedly esteemed for his integrity and industry, full of experience as well as of old-world notions sometimes a little "grumpy," a little caustic in his manner of talking, but on the whole quite kindly and tolerant in his disposition. You could often watch in his face the habitual practice of patience, as, with a wry smile and a contemptuous remark, he dismissed some disagreeable topic or other from his ...
— Change in the Village • (AKA George Bourne) George Sturt
... I had him card indexed as havin' more or less tabasco in his temper'ment, with a wide grumpy streak runnin' through his ego. And he is kind of crisp and snappy in his talk, I'll admit. Strangers might think he was a grouch toter. But that's just his way. It's all on the outside. Back of that gruff, offhand talk and ...
— Torchy, Private Sec. • Sewell Ford
... I replied, "or else address her, if you have any intentions that way. She does not look unapproachable; I fancy, although she appear to be a little bit grumpy." ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant
... would have expected me to begin, and when I arrived at the college lodge I must have looked as if I had come to spend a Saturday to Monday visit. One miserable bag was all I possessed, and the porter viewed me, as I thought, with suspicion. He was a grumpy old person, and when I told him that I had lost my luggage he grunted, "Gentlemen do, especially when they're fresh," which I thought very fair cheek on his part, though I did not feel at that ...
— Godfrey Marten, Undergraduate • Charles Turley
... heard of it," said Austin, genuinely surprised. "I really thought he was perfectly contented here. Of course, now and then he's grumpy—but he always has had fits of grumpiness. What kind of work does ...
— Viviette • William J. Locke
... all I've been thinkin'," said Biddy; "I feels all stirred up with thinkin', like the soup when Grumpy puts the stick in it. I never slept at all till I thinked it out as how I'd do jist ...
— Harper's Young People, March 2, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... like that! Care? Why, whoever she is, she can see that, anyhow, with half an eye. It's as plain as preaching. You came with Lu and Ruth, and were as gay and jolly as could be. Then, all of a sudden, you turn grumpy and want to go home, and say Lu and Ruth don't like you. The explanation of that is simple enough. You've heard some one saying something about you, or pretending to repeat something Lu and Ruth have said about you. There! Now haven't I hit ...
— The Governess • Julie M. Lippmann
... preservation of health in London. He had been impassioned with the theatre, and had become a diligent attendant at first-night performances. Even these ceased to have any joy for him, and he neglected, in fine, all his old sources of amusement He went about sorrowful and grumpy, expressing the dolefullest opinions about everything. There was going to be war, stocks were going down, trade was crumbling, there was no ...
— Young Mr. Barter's Repentance - From "Schwartz" by David Christie Murray • David Christie Murray
... dwellings on the Cohasset shore which the Government provides for them, and which shelter their families. The term of duty on the rocks is two weeks; at the end of each fortnight two happy men go ashore and two grumpy ones come off; that is, if the weather permits a landing, for keepers have been stormbound for as long as seven weeks. The routine of duty is much the same in all of the lighthouses. By night there must be unceasing watch kept of the great revolving light; and, if there ...
— American Merchant Ships and Sailors • Willis J. Abbot
... rude awakening," cried Du Meresq. "Dinner spoiled, and a very stern expression of paternal opinion to you, my poor Cecil. Very grumpy to me. By Jove, I won't tell him to-night! Here's your half-baked boots. We shall never get them on. Shall I carry you to the boat, and roll your ...
— Bluebell - A Novel • Mrs. George Croft Huddleston
... haven't seen you without a hat in a month. Gone bald, or something?" He was often cross like this lately. Grumpy, Cora called it. Hats were one of Cora's weaknesses. She had a great variety of them. These added to Ray's feeling of restlessness and impermanence. Sometimes she wore a hat that came down over her head, covering her forehead and her eyes, almost. The hair he used to love ...
— Gigolo • Edna Ferber
... very high, and when Claude Locker came in with his shoes soaked from a tramp in the wet grass she greeted him in such a way that he could scarcely believe she was the grumpy girl of the day before. As they went into breakfast Mrs. Fox remarked to her husband in a low voice that Miss Asher seemed to have recovered ...
— The Captain's Toll-Gate • Frank R. Stockton
... and physician, Is in so grumpy a condition I really more than half suspicion He nears his end; Who then would lie on earth to shave me, To feed me, coach me, and to save me From tedious cares that would ...
— Eugene Field, A Study In Heredity And Contradictions - Vol. I • Slason Thompson
... burden of my ditty, my baby always smiles. I am constantly wanting you to draw him for me, Margaret. It does not signify what he is doing; that very thing is prettiest, gracefulest, best. I think I love him a great deal better than my husband, who is getting stout, and grumpy,—what he calls "busy." No! he is not. He has just come in with news of such a charming pic-nic, given by the officers of the Hazard, at anchor in the bay below. Because he has brought in such a pleasant piece of news, I retract ...
— North and South • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... escape to outdoors, Una went to help Aunt Martha with the dishes—though that rather grumpy old dame never welcomed her timid assistance—and Faith betook herself to the study where a cheerful wood fire was burning in the grate. She thought she would thereby escape from the hated Mr. Perry, who had announced his intention of taking a nap in his room during the ...
— Rainbow Valley • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... would not let him spoil new year's day for me. But Hella is quite right for if the first person one meets on January 1st is a common person that's a bad beginning. The first thing this morning when I went out I met our old postman who's always so grumpy if he's kept waiting at the door. I looked the other way directly and across the street a fine young gentleman was passing, but it was no good for the common postman had ...
— A Young Girl's Diary • An Anonymous Young Girl
... a ship leaving port in heavy weather, with many a lurch and much tacking against an adverse wind. By the expression on the Semitic face you might have thought that Isaac Zahn was beholding some new and interesting object of natural history, instead of a ponderous and grumpy old sailor, who seemed to doubt somewhat the bona fides of the Kangaroo Bank. But the truth was that the young man was dazzled by the personality of one who might command such wealth; it had suddenly dawned on his calculating mind that a large sum ...
— The Tale of Timber Town • Alfred Grace
... and things and doing very, very well indeed. Why, I declare it would do you good to have a lady secretary yourself in that big, dusty office of yours in the City, never dusted from one year's end to another, I'm sure! Laetitia, wouldn't it do your father good, the cross, grumpy old thing? Give your master some more of the sauce, Parker. Isn't that trout delicate and nice, Pyke? Trout for a pike! And I'm sure very like a nasty, savage old pike the way you tried to gobble up poor ...
— This Freedom • A. S. M. Hutchinson |
