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Churl   Listen
adjective
Churl  adj.  Churlish; rough; selfish. (Obs.)






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Churl" Quotes from Famous Books



... harbouring place for thieves, and murders have been committed here, if all tales be true." I looked at these two people attentively; they were both young, the man apparently about twenty-five years of age. He was a short thick- made churl, evidently of prodigious strength; his features were rather handsome, but with a gloomy expression, and his eyes were full of sullen fire. His wife somewhat resembled him, but had a countenance more open and better ...
— The Bible in Spain • George Borrow

... faithful band Came o'er the stormy wave To dwell within this lonely land, Their hearts were blithe as brave; And Winter, by their mirth beguiled, Forgot his sterner mood, As by the prattling of a child A churl may be subdued. ...
— Fleurs de lys and other poems • Arthur Weir

... 14th centuries "child" was used, in a sense almost amounting to a title of dignity, of a young man of noble birth, probably preparing for knighthood. In the York Mysteries of about 1440 (quoted in the New English Dictionary) occurs "be he churl or child," obviously referring to gentle birth, cf. William Bellenden's translation (1553) of Livy (ii. 124) "than was in Rome ane nobill childe ... namit Caius Mucius." The spelling "childe" is frequent in modern usage to indicate its archaic meaning. Familiar instances are in the line ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 2 - "Chicago, University of" to "Chiton" • Various

... Antilochus; strength and beauty are no more; we welter all in the same gloom, one no better than another; the shades of Trojans fear me not, Achaeans pay me no reverence; each may say what he will; a man is a ghost, 'or be he churl, or be he peer.' It irks me; I would fain ...
— Works, V1 • Lucian of Samosata

... hopes of rich plunder in England, and knight and squire, man-at-arms and archer, were eager for their reward. Norman, Breton, Angevin, clamored for possession: families of peasants crossed the sea, expecting, in right of their French tongue, to be gentry at once, and lords of the churl Saxons; while the Saxons, fully conscious of their own nobility, and possessors of the soil for five hundred years, derided them in such ...
— Cameos from English History, from Rollo to Edward II • Charlotte Mary Yonge

... scoff, Declare they are "smoked off," Is there no room inside? If smoke means Hades, We, "to oblige the ladies," Have taken outside seats this many a year, Cold, but with weeds to cheer Our macintosh-enswathed umbrella'd bodies; Now we are called churl-noddies Because we puff the humble briar-root. Is man indeed a "brute" Because he may upon the knife-board's rack owe Some solace to Tobacco? If so it be, then man's last, only chance, Is in the full advance Of the "emancipated" ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 101, July 25, 1891 • Various

... the keyhole, outside which she waited and listened. It was long before he would reply, and when he did it was to say sternly at her from within: 'I am ashamed of you! It will ruin me! A miserable boor! a churl! a clown! It will degrade me in the eyes of all the ...
— Life's Little Ironies - A set of tales with some colloquial sketches entitled A Few Crusted Characters • Thomas Hardy

... that arch-churl Diabelli when the French copy of the Sonata in C minor [Op. 111] is to be published. I stipulated to have five copies for myself, one of which is to be on fine paper, for the Cardinal [the Archduke ...
— Beethoven's Letters 1790-1826 Vol. 2 • Lady Wallace

... boots, and a bow and arrows, in a russet gown, and brought wild geese in his hand, and it was on the morn after Candlemas day; but King Arthur knew him not. Sir, said Merlin unto the king, will ye give me a gift? Wherefore, said King Arthur, should I give thee a gift, churl? Sir, said Merlin, ye were better to give me a gift that is not in your hand than to lose great riches, for here in the same place where the great battle was, is great treasure hid in the earth. Who told thee so, churl? said Arthur. Merlin told me so, said he. Then Ulfius and Brastias ...
— Le Morte D'Arthur, Volume I (of II) - King Arthur and of his Noble Knights of the Round Table • Thomas Malory

... omit so good an opportunity of pointing out the way to others. The very basis of true peace of mind is a benevolent wish to see all the world as happy as one's Self; and from my soul do I pity the selfish churl, who, remembering the little bickerings of anger, envy, and fifty other disagreeables to which frail mortality is subject, would wish to revenge the affront which pride whispers him he has received. For my own part, I can safely declare, there is not a human being in the universe, whose ...
— Charlotte Temple • Susanna Rowson

... speak first of the dedication. I thank you for it from the heart. It is beautifully said, beautifully and kindly felt; and I should be a churl indeed if I were not grateful, and an ass if I were not proud. I remember when Symonds dedicated a book to me; I wrote and told him of "the pang of gratified vanity" with which I had read it. The pang was present again, but how much more sober and autumnal—like ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 25 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... which the same subjects are discussed. "Grimner's Song" contains a description of twelve habitations of the celestial deities, considered as symbolical of the signs of the zodiac. "Rig's Song" explains, allegorically, the origin of the three castes: the thrall, the churl, and the noble, which, at a very early period, appear to have formed the framework of Scandinavian society. "The Havamal," or the High Song of Odin, is the complete code of Scandinavian ethics. The maxims here brought together more resemble ...
— Handbook of Universal Literature - From The Best and Latest Authorities • Anne C. Lynch Botta

... nature," is not commonly called a Transcendentalist, but is known colloquially as a "crank." The person who does not thank, by word or look, the friend or stranger who has pulled him out of the fire or water, is fortunate if he gets off with no harder name than that of a churl. ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)

... doubt. But I think that for once I may have been eloquent. And in the midst of my demand for ideals in politics that were wider and deeper than artful buying and selling, that looked beyond a vulgar aggression and a churl's dread and hatred of foreign things, while I struggled to say how great and noble a thing empire might be, I saw Rachel's face. This, it was manifest, was a new kind of talk to her. Her dark eyes were alight with a beautiful enthusiasm for what ...
— The Passionate Friends • Herbert George Wells

... such serious topics, and less to such frivolities as fighting and making love. The latter is a fine art, no doubt, and, when done according to rule, is well enough; but as for fighting, getting oneself grimed with dust and sweat, and very likely some vulgar churl's common blood to boot—pah! it is intolerable ...
— Gycia - A Tragedy in Five Acts • Lewis Morris

... King. Who talks to me of my own son? You put me into my earldom to see justice done and law obeyed; and how shall I make others keep within bound if I am not to keep in my own flesh and blood? Here is this land running headlong to ruin, because every nobleman—ay, every churl who owns a manor, if he dares—must needs arm and saddle, and levy war on his own behalf, and harry and slay the king's lieges, if he have not garlic to his roast goose every time he chooses,'—and there your father did look at Godwin, once and for all;—'and ...
— Hereward, The Last of the English • Charles Kingsley

... thou survive my well-contented day When that churl Death my bones with dust shall cover, And shalt by fortune once more re-survey These poor rude lines of thy deceased lover, Compare them with the bettering of the time, And though they be outstripped by every pen, Reserve them for my love, not for their rhyme, ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 2 (of 4) • Various

... individual pan, skillet, kettle, frying-pan, dripping-pan, and brass and iron pot in the land, for want of windmills, which were his daily food. Whence it happened that somewhat before day, about the hour of his digestion, the greedy churl was taken very ill with a kind of a surfeit, or crudity of stomach, occasioned, as the physicians said, by the weakness of the concocting faculty of his stomach, naturally disposed to digest whole windmills at a gust, yet unable to consume ...
— Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais

... horseman of the band, Who little deference for his lord confest, His lance uplifting, wounded overhand The unhappy suppliant in his dainty breast. Zerbino, who the cruel action scanned, Was deeply stirred, the rather that, opprest, And livid with the blow the churl had sped, Medoro fell as he ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 2 • Charles Dudley Warner

... churl's our oldworld name is, The lands we leave are fair: But fairer far than these are, But wide as all the seas are, But high as heaven the fame is That if ...
— Astrophel and Other Poems - Taken from The Collected Poetical Works of Algernon Charles - Swinburne, Vol. VI • Algernon Charles Swinburne

... the brute, in his kind, serves God far better than he. He is the very stain, reproach, and shame of religion to all that know him: it can hardly have a good word in that end of the town where he dwells, through him—a saint abroad, and a devil at home! His poor family find it so. He is such a churl; such a railer at and so unreasonable with his servants, that they neither know how to do for him nor speak of him. Men that have any dealings with him say it is better to deal with a Turk than with him, for fairer dealings they shall have at his ...
— Talkers - With Illustrations • John Bate

... Sybil, generously. "You shall deny yourself no pleasure, for my sake, dear, dear Lyon! I am not such a churl as to require such a sacrifice. Only let me feel sure of your love, and then you may read with her all the morning, and play and sing with her all the evening, and I shall not care. I shall even be pleased, because you are so. But ...
— Cruel As The Grave • Mrs. Emma D. E. N. Southworth

... but a second, Fill round the cup, while you may; For Time, the churl, hath beckoned, And we must away, away! Grasp the pleasure that's flying, For oh, not Orpheus' strain Could keep sweet hours from dying, Or charm them to life again. Then, quick! we have but a second, Fill round the cup while you may; For Time, ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al

... — N. parsimony, parcity^; parsimoniousness^, stinginess &c adj.; stint; illiberality, tenacity. avarice, greed &c 817.1. miser, niggard, churl, screw, skinflint, crib, codger, muckworm^, scrimp, lickpenny^, hunks, curmudgeon, Harpagon, harpy, extortioner, Jew, usurer; Hessian [U.S.]; pinch fist, pinch penny. V. be parsimonious &c adj.; grudge, begrudge, stint, pinch, gripe, screw, dole out, hold ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget

... goods were saved. After that she went to find Helgi, her brother, followed by twenty men; and when she came there he went out to meet her, and bade her come stay with him with ten of her folk. She answered in anger, and said she had not known that he was such a churl; and she went away, being minded to find Bjorn, her brother in Broadfirth, and when he heard she was coming, he went to meet her with many followers, and greeted her warmly, and invited her and all her followers to stay with him, for he knew his sister's high-mindedness. ...
— Laxdaela Saga - Translated from the Icelandic • Anonymous

... of Beaubocage, the wealth of Cotenoir. It was the story of auld Robin Gray reversed. Gustave perceived that his refusal to avail himself of this splendid destiny would be a bitter and lasting grief to these people who loved him so fondly—whom he loved as fondly in return. Must he not be a churl to disappoint hopes so unselfish, to balk an ambition so innocent? And only because Madelon was not the most attractive or ...
— Charlotte's Inheritance • M. E. Braddon

... archaeologist finds—and is now teaching the public to find—as great an attraction in studying the arts of peace as in studying the arts of war; for in his eyes the life, and thoughts, and faith of the merchant, and craftsman, and churl, are as important as those of the knight, and nobleman, and prince—with him the peasant is as grand and as genuine a piece of antiquity as ...
— Archaeological Essays, Vol. 1 • James Y. Simpson

... hurry," said his uncle, coolly. "Let me think this over again. After all, we are of the same stock, although your father always flouted me for a mean-spirited churl. Poor Gavan, we may forgive ...
— The Doomsman • Van Tassel Sutphen

... semblance of them. It is the misshapen, hairy, Scandinavian Troll again who lifts the cart out of the mire, or threshes the corn which ten day-labourers could not end: but it is done in the dark, and with muttered maledictions. He is a churl with a soft place in his heart, whose speech is a brash of bitter waters, but who loves to help you at a pinch. He says, No; and serves you, and his thanks disgust you." Such, was Tardrew,—a true British bulldog, who lived pretty faithfully up to his Old Testament, but had, ...
— Two Years Ago, Volume I • Charles Kingsley

... in his own impatient pleasure; and, delighted with the shipmaster's report and with the financial promise of the voyage, the cargo, the freights, and ventures and all, had greeted Andrew with a large-hearted warmth and after a manner that no churl could withstand; and unwilling to listen to any refusal, had taken Andrew up to the mansion-house with him the moment the ...
— Not Pretty, But Precious • John Hay, et al.

... I am Covetousness, begotten of an old churl, in a leather bag: and, might I now obtain my wish, this house, you, and all, should turn to gold, that I might lock you safe into my ...
— Dr. Faustus • Christopher Marlowe

... the other side, had taken the start, of me! White or red? Which fired the shot? If an Indian, my head would be in as much danger of losing its skin as the sheep. If a white man, I might still hope for a breakfast of broiled mutton. Even a churl might be expected to share with a starving man; but it was not the quarter in which to encounter a Christian of that kidney. It was the crack of a rifle. The red man rarely hunts with the rifle. The arrow is his favourite weapon for game. Notwithstanding ...
— The Wild Huntress - Love in the Wilderness • Mayne Reid

... the wings have not yet begun to sprout on thy shoulders, raven though thou be. Now I am glad that thou art going thy ways to the Glittering Plain to-morrow; for thou wilt be good company to me on the way: and I deem that thou wilt be no churl when thou ...
— The Story of the Glittering Plain - or the Land of Living Men • William Morris

... Rommany churl And the Rommany girl, To-morrow shall hie To poison the sty, And bewitch on the mead ...
— Lavengro - The Scholar, The Gypsy, The Priest • George Borrow

... critical in chronicling this event; to which indeed dithyrambs are more appropriate than criticism. For when a man writes Opus vitae meae at the conclusion of such a task as this, and so lays down his pen, he must be a churl (even if he be also a competent critic) who will allow no pause for admiration. And where, churl or no churl, is the competent critic to be found? The Professor has here compiled an entirely new text of Chaucer, founded solely on the manuscripts and the earliest printed editions that are accessible. ...
— Adventures in Criticism • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

... "Churl!" said an officer of dragoons, "how know you that our payments are light? The emperor takes nothing without payment; surely not from such as you. But propos of ransoms, what now might be Holkerstein's ransom for a farmer's barns stuffed with a ...
— Memorials and Other Papers • Thomas de Quincey

... bellies are full, and although they are conscious that in the end they will tear one another to pieces over them. Why should you prepare their prey? Were your fire and effulgence given you for this? Why, in short, did you thank this churl? Why did you recommend him to his superiors for preferment on ...
— Imaginary Conversations and Poems - A Selection • Walter Savage Landor

... Lady," said the King's Son, "thou art jesting with me; thou and thy might and thy wisdom, and all that thy wisdom may command, to be over- mastered by a gangrel churl!" ...
— The Wood Beyond the World • William Morris

... the same seed of which churls spring, of the same seed spring lords; as well may the churl be saved as the lord. Wherefore I counsel thee, do just so with thy churl as though wouldest thy lord did with thee, if thou wert in his plight. A very sinful man is a churl as towards sin. I counsel thee certainly, thou ...
— Chaucer • Adolphus William Ward

... pines away Because her Cyrus loves another; The ruthless churl informs the girl He loves her only as ...
— Echoes from the Sabine Farm • Roswell Martin Field and Eugene Field

... I am shamed to think my sovereign's son should wait, Through a churl's ignorance, ...
— The Poems of Emma Lazarus - Vol. I (of II.), Narrative, Lyric, and Dramatic • Emma Lazarus

... her equanimity. Could there be anything more refined and charming in the world than this landscape, this hospitable, smiling house, with the throng of easy-mannered, pleasant-speaking guests, leisurely flowing along in the conventional stream of social comity. One must be a churl not to enjoy it. But Irene was not sorry when, presently, it was time to go, though she tried to extract some comfort from her mother's enjoyment of the occasion. It was beautiful. Mr. Benson was in a calculating mood. He thought it needed a great deal of money ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner

... heaven, Jack Ireton, 'tis you who are the true lover and the gentleman; and I am naught but a selfish churl with my face in my own trencher!" he burst out, wringing my hand yet again. "'Tis as you say; yet I will not be driven from this; for aught you have told me to prove it otherwise, Madge has yet to choose between us, and she shall have that choice, fairly and squarely, ...
— The Master of Appleby • Francis Lynde

... said sternly, turning to one who rode behind him, "you have failed in your trust. I told you to watch the boy, and from time to time you brought me news that he was growing up but a village churl. He is no churl, and unless I mistake me, he will some day be dangerous. Let me know when he next returns to the village; we must then take speedy steps for preventing ...
— In Freedom's Cause • G. A. Henty

... Oakley in the same way, because the student of place-names might be able to show from early records that the place was originally an ey, or island, and that the first syllable is the disguised name of a medieval churl. These four simple etymons themselves may also become perverted. Thus -ham is sometimes confused with -holm (Chapter XII), -ley, as I have just suggested, may in some cases contain -ey, -ton occasionally interchanges with -don and -stone, and -lord with ...
— The Romance of Names • Ernest Weekley

... sit with clown or churl Nor feel himself disgraced thereby; But he who has but small ...
— Poems with Power to Strengthen the Soul • Various

... the other, you crooked churl," replied one of the crippled beggars. "The Sheriff is returned from London with his daughter, and the folk are giving him a welcome, such as you will never have from the city! Stand back, for there is no room for you there. Four of us as it is are too many, and we have come here to settle who shall ...
— Robin Hood • Paul Creswick

... I am much obliged to you. You would only think me a churl if you had, for I should decline it, I believe, in spite of all the temptations of such agreeable company,' said Mr. Bell, bowing all round, and secretly congratulating himself on the neat turn he had given to his sentence, which, ...
— North and South • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell

... valuable prose contributions to English literature of the century; his letters to Mr. Carlyle carried into all our homes the charm of a most delightful personality; the quaint melody of his poems abides in many ears. He would, indeed, be a churl who ...
— Obiter Dicta - Second Series • Augustine Birrell

... and give me half a peck Of nice bouquets; then I will hire a band And celebrate my entrance to your land. I'll dance the Hula, up and down the street And cry Aloha, to each girl I meet; And if she frowns, and calls me cad, and churl, I'll shout, Long Live the New Hawaiian Girl - Rah, ...
— Poems of Experience • Ella Wheeler Wilcox

... he not cause to distrust that baron, and to believe that means neither fair nor honourable might be employed by his enemy to wipe out the feud? What if this self-styled harper should turn out to be no minstrel after all, but a hired assassin, a follower of that base churl, his hated foe! To suspect was to believe. In his excited, drink-clouded brain wrath sprang up, fully armed. He would speedily put an end to that treacherous scheme; his enemies should learn that if one can plot, another may have cunning to bring to naught such ...
— Stories of the Border Marches • John Lang and Jean Lang

... your drawings to every thing in the world, that I am such a churl as to refuse Mrs. Bentley's partridges: I shall thank her very much for them. You must excuse me If I am vain enough to be so convinced of my own taste, that all the neglect that has been thrown upon your designs cannot make me think I have overvalued them. ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 2 • Horace Walpole

... him, to the Maydan plain, where he played at arms with his father and his lords, till night fall, when he returned to the palace, preceded by all the folk. He rode forth thus every day to the tilting ground, returning to sit and judge the people and do justice between earl and churl; and thus he continued doing a whole year, at the end of which he began to ride out a-hunting and a-chasing and to go round about in the cities and countries under his rule, proclaiming security and satisfaction and doing after ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 7 • Richard F. Burton

... whereas Herdegen seized her hand to wrench away the paper she shrieked out to the Bohemian: "Give him his due, for a knave who offends maidens; that outcast for whom I scorned and misprized you! Help, help, if you are no churl!" ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... expression mai, or komo mai, this way, or come in, was the most common of salutations. The Hawaiian sat down to meat before an open door; he ate his food in the sight of all men, and it was only one who dared being denounced as a churl who would fail to invite with word and gesture the passer-by to come in and share with him. This gesture might be a sweeping, downward, or sidewise motion of the hand in which the palm faced and drew toward the speaker. This seems to have been the usual form when the two parties were near to ...
— Unwritten Literature of Hawaii - The Sacred Songs of the Hula • Nathaniel Bright Emerson

... craved the boon so sweetly That I had been a churl Had I repulsed the homage Of this gentle, timid girl; With bright illuminations I decked the manuscript, And in my choicest paints and inks My brush and pen ...
— The Love Affairs of a Bibliomaniac • Eugene Field

... churlish," said she, "I will even ask him himself." "That thou shalt not," he cried, and struck her across the face with his whip. So the maiden, alarmed and angered, rode back to the Queen and told her all that had happened. "Madam," cried Geraint, "the churl has wronged your maiden and insulted your person. I pray you, suffer me to do your errand myself." With the word, he put spurs to his horse and rode after the three. And when he had come up with the dwarf, he asked the knight's name as the maiden had done, and the dwarf answered ...
— Stories from Le Morte D'Arthur and the Mabinogion • Beatrice Clay

... up sprang the maid. "Ye shall not rumple thus my shift so white. Ye are a clumsy churl and it shall rue you sore, I'll have you to know fall well," spake the comely maid. In her arms she grasped the peerless knight; she weened to bind him, as she had done the king, that she might have her case upon the bed. The lady avenged ...
— The Nibelungenlied • Unknown

... come of high lineage, And was of a lady born, And ill it beseems thee, a false churl's son, To ...
— The Book of Brave Old Ballads • Unknown

... Then when these two traitors understood that they had driven all the lords of his blood from him, they were not pleased with that rule, but then they thought to have more, as ever it is an old saw: Give a churl rule and thereby he will not be sufficed; for whatsomever he be that is ruled by a villain born, and the lord of the soil to be a gentleman born, the same villain shall destroy all the gentlemen about ...
— Le Morte D'Arthur, Volume II (of II) - King Arthur and of his Noble Knights of the Round Table • Thomas Malory

... king, Even the emerald stone which some do call The Emerald of the Virtues Mystical." And they who thronged the hall of judgment were Astonished at the stranger who could dare Ask such a boon; and some base mouths did curl With sneers, churl whispering to his fellow churl, "Who could have deemed the man so covetous, So void of shame in his great greed?" For thus It shall be ever underneath the sun, Each man believing that high hearts are none Whose own is as the dust he ...
— The Poems of William Watson • William Watson

... bonder, "Make one or other choice speedily, or what counsel is that big churl giving thee who stands there before thee; is it not so that ...
— The Story of Grettir The Strong • Translated by Eirikr Magnusson and William Morris

... a churl!" said the smith; "Sir Osmund grudges every mouth about him; but"—and here he looked wondrous knowing—"he may happen to be ousted yet, if Earl Thomas should come by the worst ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 1 (of 2) • John Roby

... was actually gone! not a trace of it; but the spot where it had stood for ages, turfed, planted with young spruce trees, and fenced off with post and rail! The exasperated people now launched forth an immensity of fulminations against the churl Sir Roger, and a certain number of them resolved to come and seat themselves in the street of the hamlet and there dine; but a terrific thunderstorm, which seemed in league with Sir Roger, soon routed them, drenched them through, and on attempting to seek shelter in the cottages, the poor people ...
— International Miscellany of Literature, Art and Science, Vol. 1, - No. 3, Oct. 1, 1850 • Various

... ancient writings say that having naught To pay the ferryman, the churl refused To ferry him across the swollen stream, When he was raised and wafted through the air. What matter whether that all-powerful Love Which moves the worlds, and bears with all our sins, Sent him a chariot and ...
— The Dawn and the Day • Henry Thayer Niles

... quoth the fiend unto the Sumner; "see, I told thee how 'twould fall. Thou seest, dear brother, The churl spoke one thing, but he thought another. Let us prick on, for we take ...
— Playful Poems • Henry Morley

... native country, and to stand as its citizens on their own dignity? Men and women may be conscious of faults and weaknesses in their parents, but they are not expected to expose these weaknesses on that account: instinctive delicacy in any one but a churl would keep him from acknowledging any such failings to his own heart. And a similar feeling should teach us, even if our sympathies were not with our own country, to treat it in word and deed with respect. Until we do learn to show this respect ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 26, October, 1880 • Various

... alluded to by Froude seem to have remembered that from the times of Athelwolf, the possession of a certain quantity of land, with gatehouse, church, and kitchen, converted the ceorl (churl) ...
— Landholding In England • Joseph Fisher

... hearkened this a great while, he said to the knight: "Hast thou heard it of yonder churl how he prayeth that his wife may be delivered of her child, and another while prayeth that she may not be delivered? Certes, he is worser than a thief. For every man ought to have pity of women, more especially of them that be sick of childing. And now, so help me Mahoume and Termagaunt! ...
— Old French Romances • William Morris

... treated Madame Clesinger invariably with rudeness. One day as Clesinger and his wife went downstairs the person in question passed without taking off his hat. The sculptor stopped him, and said, "Bid madam a good day"; and when the gentleman or churl, as the case may be, refused, he gave him a box on the ear. George Sand, who stood at the top of the stairs, saw it, came down, and gave in her turn Clesinger a box on the ear. After this she turned her ...
— Frederick Chopin as a Man and Musician - Volume 1-2, Complete • Frederick Niecks

... and cap's black curl," Quoth the Abbot below, "I know the churl! 'T is the hunted outlaw Zyps ...
— Myth and Romance - Being a Book of Verses • Madison Cawein

... frown or smile. When well received by hospitable foes, The kindness he returns, is to expose: For courtesies, though undeserved and great, 1170 No gratitude in felon-minds beget; As tribute to his wit, the churl receives the treat. His praise of foes is venomously nice; So touch'd, it turns a virtue to a vice: "A Greek, and bountiful, forewarns us twice." Seven sacraments he wisely does disown, Because he knows Confession stands for one; Where sins to sacred silence ...
— The Poetical Works of John Dryden, Vol I - With Life, Critical Dissertation, and Explanatory Notes • John Dryden

... did not upbraid the ungracious driver; he only swung his two canes a little more briskly, and kept breast of the horses all the way, entering the town side by side with the inhospitable vehicles—a running reproach to the churl on ...
— A New England Girlhood • Lucy Larcom

... him and his family. "There he goes," was the saying about any one who passed the door at any time without coming in to take a spoon—"there he goes; I'll warrant he's a miser at home to be so much of a churl abroad" The very gipsy claimed the cleanest bed in a Glenman's house whenever he came that way, and his gossip paid ...
— John Splendid - The Tale of a Poor Gentleman, and the Little Wars of Lorn • Neil Munro

... "subjects"? That word irritates a German, because he is conscious that he is not a subject, but a citizen of the empire. Yet he will not infer from the English King's use of the term in formal utterances that an Englishman is a churl, a "servant of his King." That would ...
— New York Times Current History: The European War, Vol 2, No. 1, April, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various

... enjoyed themselves! I understood their happiness well. Mrs. Edson was not quite so buoyant with spirits as usual; but she conversed with Rufus in her charming style. I was quite indignant to hear so much eloquence and refinement wasted on a churl like him, and just malicious enough to think the fair speaker would have preferred to say her pretty things in the ear of one who could have better appreciated their worth and beauty, namely, Col. Malcome. He is really a splendid man, though I hardly relish the ...
— Eventide - A Series of Tales and Poems • Effie Afton

... Chancellor. Hence it is, that a miser, though he pays every body their own, cannot be an honest man, when he does not discharge the good offices that are incumbent on a friendly, kind, and generous person: for, faith the prophet Isaiah, chap. XXXII. ver. 7, 8. The instruments of a churl are evil: he deviseth wicked devices to destroy the poor with lying words, even when the needy speaketh right. But the liberal soul deviseth liberal things, and by liberal things shall he stand. It is certainly honest to do every thing the ...
— The Life and Most Surprising Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, of - York, Mariner (1801) • Daniel Defoe

... mattered to Odysseus if he had been seen travelling in a cart, like Lancelot; though for Lancelot it was a great misfortune and anxiety. The art and pursuits of a gentleman in the heroic age are different from those of the churl, but not so far different as to keep them in different spheres. There is a community of prosaic interests. The great man is a good judge of cattle; he sails ...
— Epic and Romance - Essays on Medieval Literature • W. P. Ker

... by our most polite and obsequious prisoner, Lieutenant Preville. "If we could but fall in with two or three more fat prizes we should be able to set up as independent gentlemen when we get back home again, and I should be able to regain the lands of the McAllisters from the southern churl who has dared to take ...
— Marmaduke Merry - A Tale of Naval Adventures in Bygone Days • William H. G. Kingston

... have it so, be it as you please. I have offended: you have a right to punish me, and play the churl ...
— The Disowned, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... page of some ancient illuminated manuscript, centuries old, you may see the churl, or farmer's man, knocking away with his flail at the grain on the threshing-floor. The knock knocking of the flail went on through the reigns of how many kings and queens I do not know, they are all forgotten, God wot, ...
— Field and Hedgerow • Richard Jefferies

... up again soon, shook her dry, withered fist at the porter, and cried, "Ha! thou insolent churl, I will pray thee to ...
— Sidonia The Sorceress V2 • William Mienhold

... she had sought, on occasions of unwonted cheerfulness, to please him with certain charming tricks of attire; and sometimes, with only a white rose-bud gleaming through the braided shadows of her hair, lighted herself up as with a star; then, not a carping churl, not an envious coquette in Hendrik, but confessed to ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 12, October, 1858 • Various

... have said farewell, and now, madam, to you. Yet do not think that I am a man without eyes for your beauty, or a heart to know your worth. I seemed to you a fool and a churl. I grieved most bitterly, and I wronged you bitterly; my excuse for all is now known. For though you are more beautiful than she, yet true love is no wanderer; it gives a beauty that it does not find, and weaves a chain no other ...
— McClure's Magazine December, 1895 • Edited by Ida M. Tarbell

... year was Exeter demolished, through the French churl Hugh, whom the lady had appointed her steward there. And the army destroyed the town withal, and took there much spoil. In the same year came the army up into Wiltshire. Then was collected a very great force, from Wiltshire and from Hampshire; which was soon ready on their march ...
— The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle • Unknown

... body; and therewith he said: "In our days and the olden time it was the wont of fathers to bless their children in this wise; but for thee, thy father is dead, and thy nighest kinsman is little-hearted and somewhat of a churl. Thus then have I done to thee to take the place of a father to thee, I who am of the warriors of while agone. And I think it will avail thee; and it is borne in upon me that before very long thou wilt need this avail, if thou art to live and do the deeds I would ...
— The Sundering Flood • William Morris

... My father has been robbed; his people have been foolish; it is not a new thing in the Highlands of Scotland, Count Victor. You must not be thinking him a churl to be moping and leaving you to my poor entertainment, for it is ill to keep the pipes in tune when one is ...
— Doom Castle • Neil Munro

... knave, With his sins in the sod! And death for the brave, With his glory up to God! And joy for the girl, And ease for the churl! But the great game of war For ...
— Songs from Vagabondia • Bliss Carman and Richard Hovey

... no sooner gone, than a wild-looking, bearded churl made his appearance upon the threshold of the door and greeted the count ...
— The Daughter of an Empress • Louise Muhlbach

... turning from his daughter to her lover,—"you sir, have well repaid the liberal confidence which I placed in you with so little reserve. You I have to thank also for some lessons, which may teach me to rest satisfied with the churl's blood which nature has poured into my veins, and with the rude nurture which my ...
— Peveril of the Peak • Sir Walter Scott

... found his horizon enlarged. There was more scope for a man of parts. Things moved more rapidly. The world seemed full of philanthropists, anxious to "dress his front" and do him other little kindnesses. Mr. McEachern was no churl. He let them dress his front. He accepted the little kindnesses. Presently, he found that he had fifteen thousand dollars to spare for any small flutter that might take his fancy. Singularly enough, this was the precise sum necessary ...
— The Intrusion of Jimmy • P. G. Wodehouse

... own thoughts with thy own ears, but start up in thy promised likeness, and shake the pillared rottenness of the world! Leave not thy sounding words in air, write them in marble, and teach the coming age heroic truths! Up, and wake the echoes of Time! Rich in deepest lore, die not the bed-rid churl of knowledge, leaving the survivors unblest! Set, set as thou didst rise in pomp and gladness! Dart like the sunflower one broad, golden flash of light; and ere thou ascendest thy native sky, show us the steps by which thou didst scale the ...
— Table-Talk - Essays on Men and Manners • William Hazlitt

... espy, Soon to the boy I heard him call, "You, Sir, you never buy a book, Therefore in one you shall not look." The boy pass'd slowly on, and with a sigh He wish'd he never had been taught to read, Then of the old churl's books he should have ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Volume 2 • Charles Lamb

... the laws of history. For our own part, we honestly confess, that we have met with more than one passage, that has puzzled us whether it ought to be understood in jest or earnest. The irony of a single word he must be a churl who would condemn; but the continuance of this figure in serious composition, throws truth and falsehood, right and wrong ...
— Four Early Pamphlets • William Godwin

... be no more called bountiful, or the churl called liberal: flattery and cringing to the evil great would be at an end. The people would have sense to see the truth about right and wrong, and courage to speak it. Men would then be held for what they really were, and honoured and ...
— Sermons on National Subjects • Charles Kingsley

... girl, Blithe and pretty blue eyed Jane; She wore golden locks in curl, Which showed Nature was no churl, If it did not make ...
— The Emigrant Mechanic and Other Tales In Verse - Together With Numerous Songs Upon Canadian Subjects • Thomas Cowherd

... feeling. We ought to be proud, too, we are bearing it. It's a grand country! I wasn't born here, like you, but I came here as a child, and the bones of my people are here. I mean to live in America and take what it offers, and wouldn't I be the churl not to give the little I can in return! I haven't money, but I can live up to the laws. Scotchman though I be 'twill no hinder me from making a good American ...
— The Story of Wool • Sara Ware Bassett

... avoid the blow the Englishman boldly struck him on the head, and beat in his helmet, though without doing much injury. He was very near falling, however, but bearing on his stirrups he recovered himself immediately; and when he thought to have revenged himself upon the churl by killing him, he had escaped, dreading the Duke's blow. He ran back in among the English, but he was not safe even there; for the Normans seeing him, pursued and caught him; and having pierced him through and through with their lances, left him ...
— The Fifteen Decisive Battles of The World From Marathon to Waterloo • Sir Edward Creasy, M.A.

... panting sore, Had gained the home of the Interpreter, He saw a sorry fellow with great stir Ply a vile muck-rake on a filthy floor; And the more mire the churl raked, the more He smiled, although a winged messenger Floating aloft was eager to confer On him the crown that in her hands she bore. So is it with those fools that waste their days In raking stores of dross and minted gear, Oblivious of ...
— Literary Tours in The Highlands and Islands of Scotland • Daniel Turner Holmes

... him that is a judge be as an hiding-place from the wind, and a covert from the tempest; as rivers of water in a dry place; as the shadow of a great rock in a weary land. Then the vile person shall no more be called liberal; nor the churl bountiful; and the work of justice shall be peace; and the effect of justice, quiet and security; and wisdom and knowledge shall be the stability of the times. Walk ye righteously and speak uprightly; despise the gains of oppression, ...
— Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry • Albert Pike

... the monster, the fierce-souled Hymir, late returned home from the chase. He the hall entered, the icebergs resounded, as the churl approached; the thicket ...
— The Elder Eddas of Saemund Sigfusson; and the Younger Eddas of Snorre Sturleson • Saemund Sigfusson and Snorre Sturleson

... "What a churl he was!" continued Madge, not heeding the words of Peverell; "I only asked him to keep the grave open till to-morrow, and he denied me! Only till to-morrow—for then, said I, the cold earth can cover us both. But he denied me! So I fell upon my knees, beside my Marian's grave, and prayed that he ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. - Volume XIII, No. 376, Saturday, June 20, 1829. • Various

... flashed from a yawn-mouthed cave, Like a red-hot eye from a grave. No man stood there of whom to crave Rest for wayfarer plodding by: Though the tenant were churl or ...
— Poems • Christina G. Rossetti

... so full of fun? What indeed but their merry, martial, mellow calling. Who could he a churl, and play a flageolet? who mean and spiritless, braying forth the souls of thousand heroes from his brazen trump? But still more efficacious, perhaps, in ministering to the light spirits of the band, was the consoling thought, that should the ship ever go into action, they would be ...
— White Jacket - or, the World on a Man-of-War • Herman Melville

... And with a forg'd Tale would not wrong his Friend, Nor am I so much fir'd with lust as Envie, That such a churl as Bartolus should reap So sweet a harvest, half my State to any To help ...
— The Spanish Curate - A Comedy • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher

... felled timber was rolled off the clearings), house-raisings, maple-sugar-boilings, and the like were scenes of boisterous and light-hearted merriment, to which the whole neighborhood came, for it was accounted an insult if a man was not asked in to help on such occasions, and none but a base churl would refuse his assistance. The backwoods people had to front peril and hardship without stint, and they loved for the moment to leap out of the bounds of their narrow lives and taste the coarse pleasures that are always dear to a strong, simple, and primitive race. Yet underneath ...
— The Winning of the West, Volume One - From the Alleghanies to the Mississippi, 1769-1776 • Theodore Roosevelt

... Alive to earth: Helenor, now in spring-tide of his years: Bond-maid Licymnia privily to that Maeonian king Had borne the lad, and sent him forth to Troy's beleaguering With arms forbidden, sheathless sword and churl's unpainted shield. But when he saw himself amidst the thousand-sworded field Of Turnus, Latins on each side, behind, and full in face, E'en as a wild beast hedged about by girdle of the chase 550 Rages against the point and edge, and, knowing death ...
— The AEneids of Virgil - Done into English Verse • Virgil

... returned a black, bronzed hunter, pressing to the front, 'that what I hold of thee, King William, on tenure of homage, and of two good horses and staunch hounds yearly, I yield to no English mongrel churl, who dares to ...
— More Bywords • Charlotte M. Yonge

... Roman galleries or the valets of painters have any elevation of thought, or that librarians are wiser men than others. There are graces in the demeanor of a polished and noble person which are lost upon the eye of a churl. These are like the stars whose light has not yet ...
— Essays, First Series • Ralph Waldo Emerson

... not all of which were at any one time regular communities. They were almost constantly at war with one another and with the natives. They had a king elected from the royal family. Freemen were either Earls or Churls, the "gentle" or the "simple." The churl was attached to some one lord whom he followed in war. The thanes were those who devoted themselves to the service of the king or some other great man. The thanes of the king became gentlemen and nobles. There were thralls, or slaves, either prisoners in war, or made ...
— Outline of Universal History • George Park Fisher

... execution. Ferdinand then advanced towards the window, and, throwing it open and listening to the rich notes of a concert of nightingales, forgot the cause of his torments—his situation reminded him of The Churl and the Bird—he rushed with renewed madness into the cupboard, then searched for the bell, but finding none, he made all sorts of strange noises. The landlady rose, and, conceiving robbers to have broken into the stranger's room, came and demanded ...
— Book-Lovers, Bibliomaniacs and Book Clubs • Henry H. Harper

... who might reign over any of the kingdoms of the earth, to be flouted by you, a mere churl? Out of my chamber this instant, and betake yourself to working in the fields, for they are fitter setting for one of your ...
— The Red Romance Book • Various

... a man is at home and happy with a book, sitting by his fireside, he must be a churl if he does not communicate that happiness. Let him read now and then to his wife and children. ...
— The Guide to Reading - The Pocket University Volume XXIII • Edited by Dr. Lyman Abbott, Asa Don Dickenson, and Others

... wonder you frown, Och hone! widow machree: 'Faith, it ruins your looks, that same dirty black gown, Och hone! widow machree. How altered your hair, With that close cap you wear— 'Tis destroying your hair Which should be flowing free: Be no longer a churl Of its black silken ...
— Handy Andy, Vol. 2 - A Tale of Irish Life • Samuel Lover

... so you thought, Where Nature played the churl, it would be fit That fortune played it too. You would have had My lord absolve me of my agency! Fair lord, the flaw did cost me fifty times— A hundred times my agency:—but all's Recovered. Look, my lord, a testament To make a pension of his lordship's rent-roll! It is my father's, and was ...
— The Hunchback • James Sheridan Knowles

... was strappin, the Miller was ruddy; A heart like a lord and a hue like a lady: The Laird was a widdiefu', bleerit knurl; She's left the guid-fellow and ta'en the churl. ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham

... Saxon churl, though still surviving in the name of a constellation, befitted only an age little advanced ...
— A History of Horncastle - from the earliest period to the present time • James Conway Walter

... freedom almost as into their own wigwams. If now and then a circumstance occurred inconsistent with the sacred duty of hospitality, it was not considered as reflecting disgrace upon the whole community, but only on the sordid churl who was the occasion of it, and whose domicile ...
— The Knight of the Golden Melice - A Historical Romance • John Turvill Adams

... the name," said Haward coolly. "I drink with the man. The churl or coward may pass me by, but the gentleman, though his hands ...
— Audrey • Mary Johnston

... honour of her guard. It was an ancient and a sad matron of a sedate look and christian walking, in habit dun beseeming her megrims and wrinkled visage, nor did her hortative want of it effect for incontinently Punch Costello was of them all embraided and they reclaimed the churl with civil rudeness some and shaked him with menace of blandishments others whiles they all chode with him, a murrain seize the dolt, what a devil he would be at, thou chuff, thou puny, thou got in peasestraw, thou losel, thou chitterling, thou spawn of ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce

... two, we must own that noblesse oblige in a sense sweeter than we knew, and be glad when young Sculpin invites us to see the family portraits. Could a man be named Sidney, and not be a better man, or Milton, and be a churl? ...
— Prue and I • George William Curtis

... face to face, To hold her close and teach What in this Hell I'm learning—that a man Is only half a man without his girl, That sure as grass is green and God's above A chap's real happiness, If he's no churl, Is home and folks and girl, And all the comforts that come in ...
— "Over There" with the Australians • R. Hugh Knyvett

... stranger passed the tent of Hoseyn, he cried, "A churl's!" Or haply, "God help the man who has neither salt nor bread!" —"Nay," would a friend exclaim, "he needs nor pity nor scorn More than who spends small thought on the shore-sand, picking pearls, —Holds but in light esteem the seed-sort, bears instead 5 On his breast a moon-like ...
— Selections from the Poems and Plays of Robert Browning • Robert Browning

... Take thou, and wear henceforth, As a sure talisman 'gainst future perils, This little, little ring. [SAV. makes awkward gesture of refusal. Angry murmurs from the crowd. Cries of 'Take thou the ring!' 'Churl!' 'Put it on!' etc. Enter the Borgias' FOOL and stands unnoticed on fringe of crowd.] I hoped you 'ld like it— Neat but not gaudy. Is my taste at fault? I'd so look'd forward to— [Sob.] No, I'm not crying, But just a ...
— Seven Men • Max Beerbohm

... disordered and opprest with gloom; Having twice summoned, by her waiting-maid, The favoured dwarf, who yet delayed to come; A third time by the lady sent, she said: — 'Engaged at play, Madonna, is the groom, Nor, lest he lose a doit, his paltry stake, Will that discourteous churl his game forsake.' ...
— Orlando Furioso • Lodovico Ariosto

... after he pitched Nak over the cliff, there was but one. But tell me this: was he noble or a churl?" ...
— The Yoke - A Romance of the Days when the Lord Redeemed the Children - of Israel from the Bondage of Egypt • Elizabeth Miller

... relish sweet, Is it on that account less mine? If for six stallions I can pay, Do I not own their strength and speed? A proper man I dash away, As their two dozen legs were mine indeed. Up then, from idle pondering free, And forth into the world with me! I tell you what;—your speculative churl Is like a beast which some ill spirit leads, On barren wilderness, in ...
— Faust Part 1 • Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

... of the Teutonic gods, also dwelt for a time among men as "Rig", and had human offspring, his son Thrall being the ancestor of the Thralls, his son Churl of churls, ...
— Myths of Babylonia and Assyria • Donald A. Mackenzie

... into letting thee have a peep at the holy Ladies—thou bold, bad man!—and then carrying off the Reverend Mother, Herself! Ha! Hadst thou but caught away Mother Sub-Prioress, she would have reformed thy home, whipped thy children, and mended thine own vile manners, thou graceless churl! Or hadst thou taken Sister Mary Rebecca, she would have brought the place about thine ears, telling thy wife fine tales of thine unfaithfulness; whispering that Mary Antony is younger and fairer than she. But, nay, forsooth! Neither of these will do! Thou must ...
— The White Ladies of Worcester - A Romance of the Twelfth Century • Florence L. Barclay

... with various crimes. "We have," said the Master, "summoned to our presence a Jewish woman, by name Rebecca, daughter of York—a woman infamous for sortileges and for witcheries; whereby she hath maddened the blood, and besotted the brain, not of a churl, but of a knight—not of a secular knight, but of one devoted to the service of the holy temple—not of a knight champion, but of a preceptor.... By means of charms and of spells, Satan had obtained dominion ...
— The Mysteries of All Nations • James Grant

... Pike, branded on the forehead, without hands, without feet, without tongues, lived as an example of the danger which attended the commission of petty crimes, and as a warning to all men who had the misfortune of holding no higher position than that of a churl.[29] Wealthy people might do wrong with impunity. It has been clearly shown that there was one law for the rich, and another for the poor, in England during the four centuries ...
— Bygone Punishments • William Andrews

... thrown together for a sufficient period of time, and utterly dependent on one another for daily intercourse, fall into the places allotted to each by temperament and heredity. Each little community would own a wit and a butt; the sentimentalist and the cynic. The churl by nature would appear through some veneer of manner, if only to bring into relief the finer qualities of his fellows; lastly, and most surely, one other would jingle a merciful cap and bells, and ...
— The Long Trick • Lewis Anselm da Costa Ritchie

... the vocabulary of war and of the chase. The master-builders of the Norman castles and cathedrals contributed technical expressions proper to the architect and the mason. The art of cooking was French. The naming of the living animals, ox, swine, sheep, deer, was left to the Saxon churl who had the herding of them, while the dressed meats, beef, pork, mutton, venison, received their baptism from the table-talk of his Norman master. The four orders of begging friars, and especially the Franciscans or Gray Friars, introduced into England in 1224, became intermediaries ...
— Brief History of English and American Literature • Henry A. Beers

... land So royally, I understond. Brethren," said Little John, "Here are no more but we three; But we bring them to dinn-er, Our master dare we not see. Bend your bows," said Little John, "Make all yon press to stand! The foremost monk, his life and his death Is clos-ed in my hand! Abide, churl monk," said Little John, "No farther that thou gone; If thou dost, by dere-worthy God, Thy death is in my hond. And evil thrift on thy head," said Little John, "Right under thy hat's bond, For thou hast made our master wroth, He is fast-ing ...
— A Bundle of Ballads • Various

... object of the exclusive attachment of a strong-minded and noble-hearted woman: and when, in addition to this, her society affords the delight of mental accomplishment and personal beauty, such as Hester's, he must be a churl indeed if he does not greatly enjoy the present, and indulge in sweet anticipations for the future. Hope also brought the whole power of his will to bear upon his circumstances. He dwelt upon all the ...
— Deerbrook • Harriet Martineau

... as these of one thousand years since—or indeed in any times, for the matter of that. So let us finish with Ceolwulf, just noting that a year or two later his pagan lords seem to have found much of the spoil of monasteries, and the pickings of earl and churl, of folkland and bookland, sticking to his fingers, instead of finding its way to their coffers. This was far from their meaning in setting him up in the high places of Mercia. So they strip him and thrust him out, and he dies ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 5 • Various

... this beggar was, I should sure choose to be as I am, tortured still with cares and fears; but out of peevishness, and not out of truth." That which St. Austin said of himself here in this place, I may truly say to thee, thou discontented wretch, thou covetous niggard, thou churl, thou ambitious and swelling toad, 'tis not want but peevishness which is the cause of thy woes; settle thine ...
— The Anatomy of Melancholy • Democritus Junior

... representative of the good cause of absolutism. He was received by Metternich with great interest, and his fortunes were taken under the protection of the Austrian Court. In due time, it was hoped this savage and ignorant churl would do yeoman's service to Austrian principles in the Peninsula. But the Regency and the new Constitution of Portugal had not to wait for the tardy operation of Metternich's covert hostility. The soldiery who had risen at Miguel's bidding in 1823 ...
— History of Modern Europe 1792-1878 • C. A. Fyffe

... is in his name some Ron...Ronte... Or...Oronte... No. Ge...Geronte. Yes, Geronte, that's my miser's name. I have it now; it is the old churl I mean. Well, to come back to our story. Our people wished to leave this town to-day, and my lover would have lost me through his lack of money if, in order to wrench some out of his father, he had not made use of a ...
— The Impostures of Scapin • Moliere

... eloquence. A few days later the manufacturers, being met in conclave at Mr. Blake's office, sent for the young Scotsman and personally thanked him for his good offices in settling the strike. Both sorts were there—the kind and the unkind, the gentleman and the churl—but all alike united in grateful praise for the mediation which Angus had accomplished. Many unctuous things were said, but when one tyrant arose to speak his gratitude, Angus's face bore a look ...
— St. Cuthbert's • Robert E. Knowles

... what a picture for the soldier who so loved his queen! Him the kiss maddened! Measuring Pascal with his een, He thundered, "Peasant, you have filled my place most sly; Not so fast, churl!"—and brutally let fly With aim unerring one fierce blow, Straight in the other's eyes, doubling the ...
— Jasmin: Barber, Poet, Philanthropist • Samuel Smiles

... though he were taking leave of an old and tried friend. By homely methods, this unerring diagnostician of the human soul had been reading him, liking him, and making him feel a heart-warming sympathy. The man who shrunk from lion-hunters, and who could return the churl's answer to the advances of sycophant and flatterer, enthusiastically poured out for the ungainly mountain boy all the rare quality and bouquet of his seasoned personal charm. It was a vintage distilled from experience and humanity. It had met the ancient requirement for the mellowing ...
— The Call of the Cumberlands • Charles Neville Buck

... of Messire Gawain, and Messire Gawain saith that he holdeth himself a churl in that he hath not asked him of his name. But the knight said, "Fair Sir, I pray you of love that you ask not my name until such time as I shall ...
— High History of the Holy Graal • Unknown

... from midnight hate one who shirks his turn; notwithstanding you swear you are afraid of the fumes of wine by night. Dispel gloominess from your forehead: the modest man generally carries the look of a sullen one; the reserved, of a churl. ...
— The Works of Horace • Horace

... not give his consent? Sampson shrugged his broad shoulders and swore a great roaring oath. My mother would not relent? What then? A man was a man, and to make his own way in the world? he supposed. He is only a churl who won't play for such a stake as that, and lose or win, by George! shouts the chaplain, over a bottle of Burgundy at the Bedford Head, where he dined. I need not put down our conversation. We were two of us, and I think there ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray

... for tongue-tied churl To shorten all palaver; "Have Patience!" cried he, "dearest girl! And ...
— The Wit of Women - Fourth Edition • Kate Sanborn

... Found every hostel full, and everywhere Was hammer laid to hoof, and the hot hiss And bustling whistle of the youth who scour'd His master's armor; and of such a one He ask'd, "What means the tumult in the town?" Who told him, scouring still, "The sparrow-hawk!" Then riding close behind an ancient churl, Who, smitten by the dusty sloping beam, Went sweating underneath a sack of corn, Ask'd yet once more what meant the hubbub here? Who answer'd gruffly, "Ugh! ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 5 • Charles Sylvester

... minute to comprehend the rascality in which he'd been an unconscious partner, but when he finally got it through his head that Jim had substituted the child of a base-born churl for the Earl's daughter, he fairly raged. Threatened him with exposure and arrest if he didn't make restitution to Castle, but Jim simply grinned and asked him whether he allowed to sing his complaint to the police. Wound up by saying that, even though Thorn had rounded on him, old ...
— Old Gorgon Graham - More Letters from a Self-Made Merchant to His Son • George Horace Lorimer

... her as leagued with a traitor against the King, and as having caused the death of so many good knights. Now in those days the law was that if any one were accused of treason by witnesses, or taken in the act, that one should die the death by burning, be it man or woman, knight or churl. So then the murmurs grew to a loud clamour that the law should have its course, and that King Arthur should pass sentence on the Queen. Then was the King's woe doubled; "For," said he, "I sit as King to be a rightful judge and keep all the law; wherefore I may not do battle ...
— Heroes Every Child Should Know • Hamilton Wright Mabie



Words linked to "Churl" :   barbarian, Goth, misanthrope, boor, crabby person, niggard, hoarder, grump, crab, peasant, tyke, disagreeable person, pinchgut, scrooge, fire-eater, grouch, crank



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