Free Translator Free Translator
Translators Dictionaries Courses Other
Home
English Dictionary      examples: 'day', 'get rid of', 'New York Bay'




Slur   /slər/   Listen
Slur

noun
1.
(music) a curved line spanning notes that are to be played legato.
2.
A disparaging remark.  Synonym: aspersion.  "It is difficult for a woman to understand a man's sensitivity to any slur on his virility"
3.
A blemish made by dirt.  Synonyms: blot, daub, smear, smirch, smudge, spot.



Related searches:



WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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

Synonyms
Antonyms
Quotes
Words linked to  

only single words



Share |





"Slur" Quotes from Famous Books



... much occupied with the consideration of what they know that they entirely forget "the perfectly astounding fact that they know it." Also they overlook or slur the tremendous fact of spiritual individuality; "because I am I, I am not anybody else." But let the individual address to himself the question he puts to the universe, let him investigate his own pressing sense of spiritual individuality, ...
— Painted Windows - Studies in Religious Personality • Harold Begbie

... Until quite recently it was thought that this, the highest section of the chalk in England, exceeded that mystic 1,000 feet that gives such a glamour to the mere hill and makes of it a local "mountain." An added slur was cast upon Inkpen in the handing to the neighbouring Walbury Hill Camp of an additional five feet by these interfering Ordnance surveyors. The new maps now read—Walbury Camp 959 feet; Inkpen, 954. But the loss of 18 yards or so does not seem to have altered the glorious view from the flat-topped ...
— Wanderings in Wessex - An Exploration of the Southern Realm from Itchen to Otter • Edric Holmes

... brave and manly effort to wind up his father's affairs and pay his outstanding debts. He was so far stirred out of himself that it hardly occurred to his mind that a slur would be left on him if these debts were left unpaid: his strongest motive just now was the sense of right and wrong, and he knew, too late, that it was right for him to take up the load which his own acts ...
— Name and Fame - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant

... the Corneys was in abeyance for all parties, owing to Bessy Corney's out-spoken grief for the loss of her cousin, as if she had had reason to look upon him as her lover, whereas Sylvia's parents felt this as a slur upon their daughter's cause of grief. But although at this time the members of the two families ceased to seek after each other's society, nothing was said. The thread of friendship might be joined afresh at any time, only just now it was broken; and Philip was ...
— Sylvia's Lovers — Complete • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell

... loud enough to reach Nance inside the barn door, who fired up immediately at the slur upon her personal character. Coming to the door she cried regardless of consequences, "Come to that, Mr. Henchard, I can let 'ee know ...
— The Mayor of Casterbridge • Thomas Hardy

... Isabel felt the slur on her husband which the recall involved more acutely than he. Burton, though stung to the quick at the treatment the Foreign Office meted out to him for doing what he conceived to be his duty (and certainly ...
— The Romance of Isabel Lady Burton Volume II • Isabel Lady Burton & W. H. Wilkins

... finished a frame-house—Springfield still had log houses, and not only in the environs, either!—and to cap the novelty, had that other new feature, a lightning-rod, put upon it. The object of the slur at youth had listened to the diatribe, flattering only so far as he was ...
— The Lincoln Story Book • Henry L. Williams

... the incredible zeal. of the navy for Admiral Keppel crowns him with glory, and the indignation of and the indignation of mankind, and the execration of Sir Hugh, add to the triumph. Indeed, I still think Lady A.'s fears may be well founded: some slur may be Procured on her son; and his own bad nerves, and worse constitution, may not be able ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole, V4 • Horace Walpole

... young man whose voice affected to slur his r's after the fashion of the day, and who probably assumed to lead the conversation at the table d'hote, on ordinary occasions, "you know the Companions of Jehu know ...
— The Companions of Jehu • Alexandre Dumas

... try to be Canadians, It's 'ard we must confess, To drop our English adjectives And learn to say "I guess," We've chucked the bread and cheese and beer, We learning to eat pie, So please cut out that nasty slur, ...
— War Rhymes • Abner Cosens

... Cardinal thus asked of him: silence, the crime for ever hidden away for the sake of the good renown of his mother, the Church. And there could be no loftier, no more tragical grandeur than that of this old man of seventy, still so erect and sovereign, who would neither suffer a slur to be cast upon his spiritual family, nor consent to his human family being dragged into the inevitable mire of a sensational murder trial. No, no, there must be none of that, there must be silence, the eternal silence ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola

... not be that you will be content to dwell in quiet indifference, in the midst of a rum-selling community, and die, leaving your children exposed to the tempter's snare. It must not be endured that this infernal traffic, this shame to civilization, this slur on Christianity, shall continue amongst us. It must not be endured that men shall be clothed with the monstrous authority to demoralize neighborhoods and scatter the fire-brands of death and destruction. The power to arrest this ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume I • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage

... thus frightened him and, in Tom's opinion, cast a slur upon the Scouts, made matters worse by scrutinizing him (or so he fancied) whenever they met upon the deck. But that was all there was to it, and the captain's mess boy did his allotted tasks each day, and stood for no end of jollying from the soldiers, who ...
— Tom Slade on a Transport • Percy Keese Fitzhugh

... till midnight. Among the latest, when Dan had lost himself far from Boston in talk with a young lady from Richmond, who spoke with a slur of her vowels that fascinated him, came Mr. and Mrs. Brinkley. He felt himself grow pale and inattentive to his pretty Virginian. That accent of Mrs. Brinkley's recalled him to his history. He hoped that she would not see him; but in another moment he was greeting her with a warmth which Bostonians ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells

... why the tract was not included in later editions of Swift's complete works. Sir Walter Scott puts forward an explanation suggested by Dr. Barrett, who believed the reason to have been, that this "jeu d'esprit might be interpreted as casting a slur on an hospital erected upon Lazors-Hill, now on the Donny-Brook road near Dublin, for the reception of persons afflicted with incurable maladies." The reason seems a poor one, though it may have been as Dr. Barrett states. A better argument might ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Vol. VII - Historical and Political Tracts—Irish • Jonathan Swift

... us, I thought it advisable to make a forward movement; but the attitude of the 29th was not encouraging. I addressed them, and expressed a hope that they would now by their behaviour wipe out the slur of disloyalty which the firing of the signal shots had cast upon the regiment, upon which Captain Channer,[7] who was just then in command, stepped forward, and said he would answer for the Sikhs; but amongst the Pathans there was an ominous silence, and Channer ...
— Forty-one years in India - From Subaltern To Commander-In-Chief • Frederick Sleigh Roberts

... himself thereby an offender against morality appears to me tantamount to condemning the Alps as obstructions to traffic. A people, at any rate, that glories in the achievements of a Luther has no right to cast a slur upon ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. X. • Kuno Francke

... into a poisonous libel And on the honor of—oh God!—his wife, The nearest, dearest part of all men's honor, Left a base slur to pass from month to mouth, Of loose mechanics with all foul comments, Of villainous jests and blasphemies obscene; While sneering nobles in more polished guise Whispered the tale and ...
— Self-Raised • Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte Southworth

... that's her house over the rise of that land where you can see the chimblys." Mr. Gammon was perfunctory in that reply, but immediately his little blue eyes began to sparkle and he launched out into his troubles. "There's them that don't believe in witches. I know that! And they slur me and slander me. I know it. I ...
— The Skipper and the Skipped - Being the Shore Log of Cap'n Aaron Sproul • Holman Day

... makes her the daughter of Coel, King of Colchester; the "old King Cole" of our nursery rhyme, and as mythical as other eponymous heroes. Bede calls her a concubine, a slur derived from Eutropius (A.D. 360), who calls the connection ...
— Early Britain—Roman Britain • Edward Conybeare

... cast any slur, sir, upon the courage and conduct of his Catholic majesty's soldiers?" asked ...
— Westward Ho! • Charles Kingsley

... not from native lack of fur That his demise was such. We did not see the end occur, But, though it be to cast a slur Upon humanity, infer (And you will catch our meaning, Sir) He ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 146, January 28, 1914 • Various

... illustrates his professed creed as to criticism. He wrote to Ellis concerning his article: "What I could I did, which was to throw as much weight as possible upon the beautiful passages, of which there are many, and to slur over the absurdities, of which there are not a few.... This said Kehama affords cruel openings for the quizzers, and I suppose will get it roundly in the Edinburgh Review. I could have made a very different hand of it, indeed, had the order of the day ...
— Sir Walter Scott as a Critic of Literature • Margaret Ball

... Mr. Harley felt relieved; that latter speculator had been somewhat disturbed in his mind concerning Storri's opinion of what, to give it a best description, evinced niggard distrust of Storri, and cast in negative fashion a slur upon ...
— The President - A novel • Alfred Henry Lewis

... succession from father to son, that it was not till late in the seventeenth century that one man could manage the working of a frame. The man who was considered the workman employed a labourer, who stood behind the frame to work the slur and pressing motions; but the application of traddles and of the feet eventually rendered ...
— Self Help • Samuel Smiles

... least, Phaddhy, considering that it was a first station; and if the dinner goes as well off as the breakfast, they'll be biting their nails: but I should not wish myself that they would have it in their power to sneer or throw any slur over you about it.—Go along, Dolan," exclaimed his Reverence to a countryman who came in from the street, where those stood who were for confession, to see if he had gone to his room—"Go along, you vagrant, don't you see I'm not gone to the tribunal yet?—But it's no matter about that, Phaddhy, ...
— The Station; The Party Fight And Funeral; The Lough Derg Pilgrim • William Carleton

... a few men in every community, that are sons of riot and plunder, and for the sake of these the satirical and censorious throw a general slur and aspersion upon the ...
— Thoughts on Man - His Nature, Productions and Discoveries, Interspersed with - Some Particulars Respecting the Author • William Godwin

... refrained from speaking of her midnight fright to Flukey; for he would but tell her that, like all girls, she was afraid, and a slur from her brother was more than she ...
— From the Valley of the Missing • Grace Miller White

... the doorway of Mrs. Gildermere's ball-room, enveloped in the warm atmosphere of the accustomed, that twenty-four hours later the people brushing by him with looks of friendly recognition would start at the thought of having seen him and slur over the recollection of ...
— The Greater Inclination • Edith Wharton

... However, this slur did not deter Jordan in his determination to go higher, for at the battle of Manila he was a gunner's mate of the first class, and his record was so conspicuous that it could not go unnoticed by the ...
— Kelly Miller's History of the World War for Human Rights • Kelly Miller

... disproved it by a summary of bibliographical and other evidence. Into the question it is here unnecessary to enter, and it has been mentioned only because it alone, of the many Drayton-controversies, has cast any slur on the poet's reputation. ...
— Minor Poems of Michael Drayton • Michael Drayton

... comment of the press. His strong sense of humor, and still stronger sense of human weakness, caused him to overlook many things which another might regard as an affront; but if the thing printed were merely an uncalled-for slur, an inexcusable imputation, he was inclined to rage and plan violence. Sometimes he conceived retribution in the form of libel suits with heavy damages. Sometimes he wrote blasting answers, which Mrs. Clemens ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine

... has an abundant refutation of this cruel and cowardly slur upon the memory of a dead woman, for one who first hazarded her life and then gave it freely to save the lives of others—for such was the charge for which she died—is not a woman to restrict her gracious ministrations of mercy ...
— The Case of Edith Cavell - A Study of the Rights of Non-Combatants • James M. Beck

... at once to Strahan's room and tell him of the loss sustained. A deposit had been confided to me, and I felt as if there were a slur on my honour every moment in which I kept its abstraction concealed from him to whom I was responsible for the trust. I hastily ascended the great staircase, grim with faded portraits, and found ...
— A Strange Story, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... to have felt a little concern at an imputation, which was once faintly attempted to be made, he scarcely now remembers by whom, that in the character of Nathan Slaughter he intended to throw a slur upon the peaceful Society of Friends, of which Nathan is described as having been an unworthy member. This notion is undeserving of serious challenge. The whole object was here to portray the peculiar characteristics of a class of men, very limited, of course, in number, but found, ...
— Nick of the Woods • Robert M. Bird

... two after the servants all left I was again sent for to see Sir Percival. The undeserved slur which he had cast on my management of the household did not, I am happy to say, prevent me from returning good for evil to the best of my ability, by complying with his request as readily and respectfully as ever. It cost me a struggle with that fallen nature, ...
— The Woman in White • Wilkie Collins

... "though I agree with you as to the actual state of society in this respect, I must enter my protest against your slur on the memory of ...
— Household Papers and Stories • Harriet Beecher Stowe

... "culture," "cultured," "cultivated" and their antitheses. These are the terms that intimidate the vain, selfish, illiterate rich; for to be described as "rich but uncultivated" is regarded as a greater slur upon the social standing of families than to be reported as having gained wealth by dishonesty or trickery. And then the matter is made all the harder for those willing to acquire a hypocritical polish at any expense if they ...
— Letters to a Daughter and A Little Sermon to School Girls • Helen Ekin Starrett

... better acknowledge it at once so as to preserve the poor animal's character, which was, and is, so far as I know up to the present, as spotless as his coat, never having had a slur cast upon it, save in this one respect, that 'Gyp,' as the master-at-arms said, in his funny way, ...
— Young Tom Bowling - The Boys of the British Navy • J.C. Hutcheson

... wonderful fine player at whist, and piquet, and ombre, and all sorts of card-playing. So you see he could afford to play fair. The first time he came down, he fought three duels about a tipsy quarrel over a pool of Pope Joan. There was no slur on his credit, though; 'twas just a bit of temper. He wounded all three; two but trifling; but one of them—Chapley, or Capley, I think, was his name—through the lungs, and he died, I heard, abroad. I saw him killed—'twasn't the last; it was done while you'd count ...
— The House by the Church-Yard • J. Sheridan Le Fanu

... adherents at the close of the campaign. At a political reception in the interest of Blaine among New York clergymen, the Reverend Dr. Burchard spoke of the Democratic party as "the party of rum, Romanism, and rebellion." Unfortunately Blaine did not hear him distinctly enough to repudiate this slur upon the religious belief of millions of American citizens, and alienation of sentiment caused by the tactless and intolerant remark could easily account for Blaine's defeat by a small margin. He was only 1149 votes behind Cleveland in New York in ...
— The Cleveland Era - A Chronicle of the New Order in Politics, Volume 44 in The - Chronicles of America Series • Henry Jones Ford

... forced myself to advance; but my wits took new life from the crisis, and in a flash I saw how to turn my weakness into account. I made a false step on my way to the door; when I reached it I leant heavily against the jam, and I said with a slur that I felt unwell. I had certainly been flushed with wine when I left Rattray; it would be no bad thing for him to hear that I had arrived quite tipsy at the cottage; should he discover I had been near an hour on the way, here was my explanation ...
— Dead Men Tell No Tales • E. W. Hornung

... and silenced for the moment. She did not mind the greater number of the rival comet's tails. It was not that which made her feel herself at a disadvantage. It was the slur at her lesser relationship to the master of the house. Any reference to that was a blow which never failed to make her flinch; and one which the widow never lost a chance to deal. But Miss Penelope had not yielded an inch through the ceaseless contention of years, and held her ground ...
— Round Anvil Rock - A Romance • Nancy Huston Banks

... atrocities committed during the fury of the French Revolution had so entirely cured him of his predilection for the popular part of our Government, that he could not resist the opportunity, however ill-timed, of casting a slur on this nobleman, who was accused of being over-partial to it. In the third Essay, on Parochial Psalmody, he gives the preference to Merrick's weak and affected version over the two other translations that are used in our churches. The late Bishop ...
— Lives of the English Poets - From Johnson to Kirke White, Designed as a Continuation of - Johnson's Lives • Henry Francis Cary

... some psychical researchers to take no notice at all of the medium's own account of how he or she attains results, but to substitute some complicated and unproved explanation of their own, is as insulting as it is unreasonable. It has been alleged as a slur upon Mrs. B's results and character that she has been twice prosecuted by the police. This is, in fact, not a slur upon the medium but rather upon the law, which is in so barbarous a condition that the true ...
— The Vital Message • Arthur Conan Doyle

... the columns of the 'Jay Hawk.' That this complacent editorial jackass, browsing among the dock and thistles which he has served up in this volume, should make no allusion to California's greatest bard, is rather a confession of his idiocy than a slur upon the genius of our esteemed contributor." I turned hurriedly to my pile of rejected contributions—the nom de plume of "Yellow Hammer" did NOT appear among them; certainly I had never heard of ...
— The Bell-Ringer of Angel's and Other Stories • Bret Harte

... the present situation can be turned to advantage, this crowning paradox is the most hopeful element in the whole of a tangled question. It is not only that the British elector is likely to revolt at once against the slur upon his intelligence and the drain upon his purse, but that Irish Unionism, once convinced of the tenacity and sincerity of that revolt, is likely to undergo a dramatic and beneficent transformation. If they are to have Home ...
— The Framework of Home Rule • Erskine Childers

... old fireplace, in which a good fire was burning. Indeed, it was the table's location, which she had selected herself, that was the cause of her obstinacy. She had construed an innocent remark of mine into a slur upon her choice, and had evidently decided to wear her coat to emphasize the fact that in spite of the fire she was none too warm, and there she had sat all through lunch ...
— Revelations of a Wife - The Story of a Honeymoon • Adele Garrison

... promise you there were very few bad debts. On the contrary, gentlemen were grateful to us for our forbearance, and our character for honour stood unimpeached. In latter times, a vulgar national prejudice has chosen to cast a slur upon the character of men of honour engaged in the profession of play; but I speak of the good old days of Europe, before the cowardice of the French aristocracy (in the shameful revolution, which served them right) brought discredit upon our order. They cry fie now upon men ...
— Thackeray • Anthony Trollope

... to the third person. Any narrative, unless it is negative in its material, is hard to give in the first person; for where the narrator has played an active, positive part, he must either curb himself or fall under the slur of braggadocio. Yet, the world wants the details exactly as they happened; ...
— The Blind Spot • Austin Hall and Homer Eon Flint

... not the purpose of Binet to cast a slur upon the good sense and judgment of teachers. The teachers who took part in the little experiment described above were Binet's personal friends. The errors he points out in his entertaining and good-humored account of the experiment are inherent in the situation. They are the kind of errors ...
— The Measurement of Intelligence • Lewis Madison Terman

... because many people, especially Christians, have told me that they have had the same experience to a large extent; also, and chiefly, because, as far as unbelieving man is concerned, the Bible tells me that 'God is not in all his thoughts'. But, Ruby, I did not make the remark as a slur upon men in general, I merely spoke of a fact,—an unfortunate fact,—that it is not natural to us, and not easy, to rise from nature to nature's God, and I thought you would ...
— The Lighthouse • Robert Ballantyne

... in no sense implicated by his creative act, or involved in his creation. That his relation to the creatures he has made should make any difference to him, carry any consequence, or qualify his being, is repudiated as a pantheistic slur upon his self-sufficingness. I said a moment ago that theism treats us and God as of the same species, but from the orthodox point of view that was a slip of language. God and his creatures are toto genere distinct in the scholastic theology, they ...
— A Pluralistic Universe - Hibbert Lectures at Manchester College on the - Present Situation in Philosophy • William James

... at him. He liked the king, and really meant no harm whatever to his peace of mind concerning his Henrietta; and, if the worst came to the worst, everyone knew that out of France there was no swordsman fit to meet, even with a rapier, the foil of Aubyn Auberley. Neither was it any slur upon his loyalty or courage that he was now going westward from the world of camps and war. It was important to secure the wavering De Wichehalse, the leading man of all the coast, from Mine-head down to Hartland; so that, with the full consent of all the king's advisers, Lord Auberley ...
— Frida, or, The Lover's Leap, A Legend Of The West Country - From "Slain By The Doones" By R. D. Blackmore • R. D. Blackmore

... on deaths and witchcraft, and, with no intentional slur on the medical profession, on medical methods and burial customs, concluding ...
— Travels in West Africa • Mary H. Kingsley

... the shame of dreams for deeds, The scandal of unnatural strife, The slur upon immortal needs, ...
— Poems by William Ernest Henley • William Ernest Henley

... Park Row, the old City Hall, the mingling on lower Broadway of sky-challenging buildings with the history of pre-Revolutionary days. She got a momentary prejudice in favor of socialism from listening to an attack upon it by a noon-time orator—a spotted, badly dressed man whose favorite slur regarding socialists was that they were spotted and badly dressed. She heard a negro shouting dithyrambics about some religion she ...
— The Job - An American Novel • Sinclair Lewis

... had I not Been above measure happy. Now no more Wild words, no more mad words between us two, Who all the while are aching to be friends. O how your hands come waxen once again Within my own: again behind your voice The hesitating tardy bird-like word And the sweet slur of 'r's.' O but to-night Even grandeur palls, the splendid goal: to-night I am a woman ...
— Nero • Stephen Phillips

... a horse laugh and the cost of that hatchet became a standing joke and a slur on my "business ability." What aggravated me most was, that the rascals were not so far out in their calculation. And was I so far wrong? That hatchet was my favorite for nearly thirty years. It has been "upset" twice by skilled workmen; and, if my friend ...
— Woodcraft • George W. Sears

... ill-assorted furnishings of the heroine's room or cosmos; nor in setting forth the myriad phases of thought undergone by the hero in seeking to check the sway of his pet complexes. (This drearily flippant slur on realism springs from pure envy. I should rejoice to write such a book. But I can't. And, if I could, I know I should never be able to stay awake long ...
— When Winter Comes to Main Street • Grant Martin Overton

... Atlanteans, and afterward the Phoenicians, men with whom time was valuable, the natural tendency would be to simplify and condense them; and when the original meaning of the picture was lost, they would naturally slur it, as we find in the letters pp and x of the Maya alphabet, where the figure of the human face remains only in ...
— The Antediluvian World • Ignatius Donnelly

... bend that neck which refuses obedience to the canons. He must be restrained, who does an injury to the whole Church; who is proud in heart; who has a greed after a name given to none other; who by such a singular name throws a slur upon your empire also in putting ...
— The Formation of Christendom, Volume VI - The Holy See and the Wandering of the Nations, from St. Leo I to St. Gregory I • Thomas W. (Thomas William) Allies

... the comic story does not slur the nub; he shouts it at you—every time. And when he prints it, in England, France, Germany, and Italy, he italicizes it, puts some whopping exclamation-points after it, and sometimes explains it in a parenthesis. All of which is ...
— The $30,000 Bequest and Other Stories • Mark Twain

... trees which He has patiently tended. Let John's profound sense of the need for a judicial aspect in the Christ who is to meet the prophecies written in men's hearts, as well as in Scripture, teach us how one-sided and superficial are representations of His work which suppress or slur over His ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - St. Matthew Chaps. IX to XXVIII • Alexander Maclaren

... bull!" roared Thornton; "don't you dare to slur me before my people. You're making this raid because I haven't buttered you with ten-dollar bills to keep your hands off. You've taken 'em from all the other rumsellers—but this isn't one of your ...
— The Ramrodders - A Novel • Holman Day

... character that closed the doors of all his family against him, my lady (then just married) taking the lead, and declaring (with Sir John's approval, of course) that her brother should never enter any house of hers. There was more than one slur on the Colonel that made people shy of him; but the blot of the Diamond is ...
— The Moonstone • Wilkie Collins

... it in contempt, while he prided himself on his divergence from the path of its teaching, Byron never did. He wandered far, but he always knew it; and, though he could hardly find terms to express his contempt for the Church, there is no line of Byron's writing which is a slur at the Bible. On the other hand, much of his work reveals a passion for the beauty of it as well as its truth. His most melodious writing is in that group of Hebrew melodies which were written to be sung. They demand far more than ...
— The Greatest English Classic A Study of the King James Version of • Cleland Boyd McAfee

... in one. I couldn't count the number of people I've led into the right way. It takes some finding, you know. Strait is the gate—damned strait sometimes. A damned tight squeeze...." Argyle was somewhat intoxicated. He spoke with a slight slur, and laughed, really tickled at his own jokes. The man Levison smiled acquiescent. But Lilly was not listening. His brow was heavy and he seemed abstracted. ...
— Aaron's Rod • D. H. Lawrence

... conscious of her beauty, and perhaps of certain other things. Fire under that ice, I conjecture—red corpuscles rampant behind that meek white mask of hers. "Forsitan in hoc anno pulcherrima debutantium" is the verdict of a contemporary journal. For "forsitan" read "certe." No slur, that, on the rest ...
— A Christmas Garland • Max Beerbohm

... material, so ingeniously disposed as to drape the bust and lower limbs, and form a girdle at the same time. One shoulder and arm are usually left bare. The part which may be called a petticoat—though the word is a slur upon the graceful drapery—is short, and shows the finely turned ankles, high insteps, and small feet. These women are tall, and straight as arrows; their limbs are long and rounded; their appearance is timid, one might almost say modest, and their walk is the poetry of movement. ...
— The Golden Chersonese and the Way Thither • Isabella L. Bird (Mrs. Bishop)

... it whether ye like it or not," blazed Sir Terence at him. "I mean you to take advantage of it. D' ye think I'll suffer any man to cast a slur upon Lady O'Moy? I'll be sending my friends to wait on you to-day, Count; and—by God!—Tremayne himself shall be one ...
— The Snare • Rafael Sabatini

... Boswell found in the entertainments of the artist."—P. 275. If Reynolds was sparing of his wine, the word "plenty" was most inappropriate. Even the remark of Dunning, Lord Ashburton, is perverted from its evident meaning, and as explained by Northcote, and the perversion casts a slur upon Sir Joshua's guests; yet is it well known who they were. "Well, Sir Joshua," he said, "and who have you got to dine with you to-day?—the last time I dined in your house, the company was of such a sort, that by ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol. 53, No. 331, May, 1843 • Various

... sixteen officers, six of them young lads who had just arrived, and all Europeans who came their way. Happily families were in the Fort, to which they had betaken themselves in opposition to the affectionate remonstrances of the native officers, who said it was a slur on their fidelity! The Sepoys plundered the Treasury; and it is said many of them were afterwards murdered by the villagers on account of the money with ...
— Life and Work in Benares and Kumaon, 1839-1877 • James Kennedy

... bears, but in that of felicitous or happy, as was common at that time. So it seems that Shakespeare already had friends in London, some of them "worshipful," too, who were strongly commending him as a poet, and who were prompt to remonstrate with Chettle against the mean slur cast upon him. ...
— Shakespeare: His Life, Art, And Characters, Volume I. • H. N. Hudson

... while affectation is odious, crudeness must be overcome. A low voice is always pleasing, not whispered or murmured, but low in pitch. Do not talk at the top of your head, nor at the top of your lungs. Do not slur whole sentences together; on the other hand, do not pronounce as though each syllable were a separate ...
— Etiquette • Emily Post

... shame or blame on a child that's born without permit of law or blessing of priest. For it's not the child's fault,—it's brought into the world without its own consent,—and yet the world fastens a slur upon it! That's downright brutal and senseless!—for if there is any blame attached to the matter it should be fastened on the parents, and not on the child. And that's what I thought when you were left ...
— Innocent - Her Fancy and His Fact • Marie Corelli

... insult. To interrogate a glittering generality is to slur its projector; she wished her hearers to be dazzled, not moved to the impertinence of cross-examination. "I think you understand me," she ...
— The Second Generation • David Graham Phillips

... of his grandfather; not one of that purse-proud and haughty kind of men. That is why I have written to him and made the request on your behalf. Were he different to what he really is, not only would he cast a slur upon your honest purpose, honourable brother, but I myself likewise would not have been as ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin

... pleasantly modulated, and he spoke English with the faintest slur—perceptible, perhaps, only to the keenest ear—of a French accent. To ears less keen it would merely seem that he articulated with a precision so singular as ...
— The Lion's Skin • Rafael Sabatini

... the jeweller and some other tradesmen at Frankfort, so soon as they learned his departure, had forwarded their accounts to the care of the Amsterdam firm; and, although his father had not the remotest intention of paying them, he was incensed in the extreme at the slur thus cast upon his house and name. In short, the unlucky artilleryman at once saw he had no chance of a single kreuzer, or of the slightest countenance from his father. His applications to his brothers, and one or two to more distant relatives, were equally unsuccessful. ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 62, No. 384, October 1847 • Various

... not worm-like subtlety that suggested that reply. It was positive inspiration. By those simple words Juliana had done something to remove the slur she was always casting on a certain character. Tollington Moon had not managed his nieces' affairs so badly after all if one of them could afford herself extravagances of that sort. The blouse therefore might be taken as a sign and symbol of his ...
— Superseded • May Sinclair

... pathetic, playful and persuasive is it. It is in E minor and has a plaintive, appealing quality. The G major part is very pretty. In the last lines the passion mounts, but is never shrill. Kullak notes that in the fifth and sixth bars there is no slur in certain editions. Klindworth employs it, but marks the B sforzando. A slur on two notes of the same pitch with Chopin does not always mean a tie. The A flat Mazurka, No. 3, is pessimistic, threatening and irritable. Though in the key of E major the ...
— Chopin: The Man and His Music • James Huneker

... the matter in a new light," said the Rev. Joshua Twemlow; "I would be the last man in the world to cast a slur upon any brother clergyman. But it is a sad denial to me, because I had put it so neatly, and a line of Latin at the ...
— Springhaven - A Tale of the Great War • R. D. Blackmore

... wish to cast a slur upon the latter personage, but it is too much to require that he who keeps a caravansera should look upon every wayfarer as a brother. It is thus with the ostler: his feelings are never allowed ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 1, September 12, 1841 • Various

... involving much that the mind is wont to slur over in natural scruple. Mallard was no slave to the imbecile convention which supposes a young girl sexless in her understanding; he could not, in conformity with the school of hypocritic idealism, regard Cecily as a child of woman's growth. No. She had the fruits of a modern education; ...
— The Emancipated • George Gissing

... included petitions for the welfare of Grannie and father and brother Tom, and for a time, with the perfunctoriness of childhood, which attaches more weight to the act than to the meaning of it, she allowed that to pass with a stickle and a slur. But very soon brother Tom was ruthlessly dropped out of the ritual, and neither threats nor persuasion could induce ...
— A Maid of the Silver Sea • John Oxenham

... the squire said, "I am heartily glad he has got off being tried. Even if I had got a free pardon for him, it would have been a serious slur upon him that he had been imprisoned, and would have been awkward for us all in the future. I think, Wilks, I will leave it to you to ...
— With Wolfe in Canada - The Winning of a Continent • G. A. Henty

... went to sleep he knew that he was determinedly ugly. There was the slur of Flagg about his slack efficiency in meeting the schemes of Craig. There was the ireful consciousness that the narrow-gauge folks were giving him a raw deal on that dynamite matter. They had hauled plenty of explosive ...
— Joan of Arc of the North Woods • Holman Day

... was present at this moment, and could not but resent what appeared to be a most unseemly slur cast upon her friends. 'I don't understand it at all,' she said. 'Of course the Emperor is there. Everybody has known for the last month that he was coming. What is the ...
— The Way We Live Now • Anthony Trollope

... killed the best dog in the village for Captain Kettle's meal, and his guest for some fastidious reason refused to eat. He pointed angrily to the figured bowl. "Dug chop," said he. "Too-much-good. You chop him." This rejection of excellent food was a distinct slur on his menage, and he was working himself up into passion. "You chop dem dug chop one-time," ...
— A Master of Fortune • Cutcliffe Hyne

... was, Petronius by name— A cur of no degree, yet which the same Rejoiced him; because so worthless he That in his worthlessness remarkably He shone, th' example de luxe of how a cur May be the very limit of a slur Upon the honored name of dog; a joke He was, a satire blasphemous; he broke The records all for sheer insulting "bunk;" No dog had ever ...
— The Dog's Book of Verse • Various

... terrified Fanny greatly; but subsequently it tickled her fancy all the more. Who could this man be who wished to make her happy without ever appearing to have a hand in it, and who was so anxious, so fearful, lest his honest gifts should cast the slightest slur on her reputation that he would not so much as allow his ...
— A Hungarian Nabob • Maurus Jokai

... suppose we have no right to judge,' said Mr. Dutton, somewhat tremulously. 'Justice is what we have to look to, and to allow Nuttie to be passed over would be permitting a slur to be cast ...
— Nuttie's Father • Charlotte M. Yonge

... against one poor woman, quite in the old way: the Who is she? of the mocking Spaniard at mention of a social catastrophe. Rosamund had a great deal of the pride of her sex, and she resented any slur on it. She felt almost superciliously toward Mr. Romfrey and Nevil for their not taking hands to denounce the plotter, Cecil Baskelett. They seemed a pair of victims to him, nearly as much so as the wretched man Shrapnel. It was their senselessness which made her guilty! And ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... that which reconciles the known retardation of the comets with the idea of their passage through an ether: for, however rare this ether be supposed, it would put a stop to all sidereal revolution in a very far briefer period than has been admitted by those astronomers who have endeavored to slur over a point which they found it impossible to comprehend. The retardation actually experienced is, on the other hand, about that which might be expected from the friction of the ether in the instantaneous passage through the orb. In the one case, the retarding force is momentary and complete ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 2 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe

... in her distress. Such is the fate of those who stand apart from the crowd, among a nation of canting shopkeepers. To die penniless, after being the friend of duchesses, is distinctly bad form—a slur on society. True, she might have bettered her state by accepting a lucrative proposal to write her autobiography, but she considered such literature a "degrading form of vanity" and refused the offer. She preferred ...
— Alone • Norman Douglas

... followed among the audience, which was instantly checked. The prisoner was dismissed from the Bar. He slowly retired, like a man in deep grief: his head sunk on his breast—not looking at any one, and not replying when his friends spoke to him. He knew, poor fellow, the slur that the Verdict left on him. "We don't say you are innocent of the crime charged against you; we only say there is not evidence enough to convict you." In that lame and impotent conclusion the proceedings ended ...
— The Law and the Lady • Wilkie Collins

... Patriots' Association, and still had his cocked hats and his Brussels lace and his spyglass, and his top boots when he rode abroad, like any other Tory buck. His intimates were all of the King's side,—of the worst of the King's side, I should say, for I would not be thought to cast any slur on the great number of conscientious men of that party. But, being the son of one of the main props of the Whigs, Mr. Tom went unpunished for his father's sake. ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill

... which was governed by a common-wealth: so that there lies no parallel betwixt his cause and Mr Hunt's, except in the bare notion of a common-wealth, as it is opposed to monarchy; and that's the thing he would obliquely slur upon us. Yet on these premises, he is for ordering my lord chief justice to grant out warrants against all those who have applauded the "Duke of Guise;" as if they committed a riot when they clapped. I suppose they paid ...
— The Works Of John Dryden, Vol. 7 (of 18) - The Duke of Guise; Albion and Albanius; Don Sebastian • John Dryden

... slur upon the conduct of his lieutenants probably occurs in his testimony before the Committee on the Conduct of the War. Before withdrawing from the south side of the Rappahannock, after the decisive events of the battle-field had cooped ...
— The Campaign of Chancellorsville • Theodore A. Dodge

... information of all. The kindnesse, and inclination I ought to have for my own Country, had almost perswaded me to rest my self there, and to make my native tongue the basis of this universall reduction but then the rest of the Europaean world (which I have no reason to slur or contemne) would have as ill resented the project, as we did it in the Germans, who would long agoe have challenged this honour to themselves. I had in the end no other course to take, but to throw myselfe ...
— A Philosophicall Essay for the Reunion of the Languages - Or, The Art of Knowing All by the Mastery of One • Pierre Besnier

... point out that the analysis of modesty offered above robs this venerable saying of any sting it may have possessed as a slur upon women. In such a case, modesty is largely a doubt as to the spectator's attitude, and necessarily disappears when that doubt is satisfactorily resolved. As we have seen, the Central Australian maidens were ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 1 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis

... was a practice of his, thereby to raise his family; and that it was done by indirect courses. 6th. That the breaking-off of the match with Parma, in which he was employed at the very time when the match with Portugall was made up here, which he took as a great slur to him, and so it was; and that, indeed, is the chief occasion of all this fewde. 7th. That he hath endeavoured to bring in Popery, and wrote to the Pope for a cap for a subject of the King of England's (my Lord Aubigny ); and some say that he lays it to the Chancellor, that a good Protestant ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys

... Christianity might have beamed on their hearts, with all the advantages of civilisation, and far greater happiness than they had hitherto enjoyed might have been their lot. No blame can be attached to Columbus, no slur can be cast on his fair fame. He had achieved a glorious undertaking in discovering a new world, but on its inhabitants he had been thus the instrument of bringing the direst of curses, and, instead of promulgating the faith he professed, ...
— Notable Voyagers - From Columbus to Nordenskiold • W.H.G. Kingston and Henry Frith

... party that was not his, and upon some slur and insolence took from a man his office. Followed a week of glassy smoothness. Then suddenly, by chance, was discovered the plot of Bernal Diaz de Pisa—the first of many Spanish conspiracies. It involved several hundred men and was no less a thing than the ...
— 1492 • Mary Johnston

... Braxton Wyatt and his friends again impeached the credit of Henry Ware, insinuating with sly smiles that he must be a renegade, as he had taken no part in the defense and must now be with his savage friends. To the slur Paul Cotter fiercely replied that he had warned them of the attack; without him the station would have been taken by surprise, and that surely proved him to be ...
— The Young Trailers - A Story of Early Kentucky • Joseph A. Altsheler

... but it was as nothing compared with the ordeal of smuggling the cargo up to his bedroom. Superhuman though he was, George was alive to the delicacy of the situation. One cannot convey food and drink to one's room in a strange house without, if detected, seeming to cast a slur on the table of the host. It was as one who carries dispatches through an enemy's lines that George took cover, emerged from cover, dodged, ducked and ran; and the moment when he sank down on his bed, the door locked behind him, was one of the ...
— Something New • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse

... indignant at the contrast which the new King seemed deliberately to draw between himself and his grandfather. In accentuating the fact that he was born and bred in England, George the Third appeared by imputation to be casting a slur upon the German nature and German prejudices of George the Second. This boast, however much it might offend the feelings of the friends of the late King, was not at all calculated to affect the mass of the ...
— A History of the Four Georges and of William IV, Volume III (of 4) • Justin McCarthy and Justin Huntly McCarthy

... Christian land, denies to the slaves compensation for their labour, the rights of marriage and of the parental relation, which are respected even among the most savage nations; it sustains an iniquitous internal slave-trade—it corrupts the owners, and casts a slur upon the dignity of labour. It acts as an incubus on public improvement, and vitiates public morals; and it proves a very formidable obstacle to religion, advancement, and national unity; and so long as it shall remain a part of the American constitution, it gives a living ...
— The Englishwoman in America • Isabella Lucy Bird

... English, and I know what you mean, sir," Johnson answered, his flush deepening at the slur on his ...
— The Sea-Wolf • Jack London

... friends—you can reach him through Abba Bey. He hates his brother who is the head of the family and he hates his brother's wife—for family reasons which it is not necessary to waste time in telling you. I knew him in Constantinople. Underneath I believe he hates the English—there is a slur on him." ...
— The Price of Things • Elinor Glyn

... must be individually put in their places, and led up to each other till they meet at their appointed border, equally, thenceforward, unchangeable. Either process, you see, involves absolute decision. If you once begin to slur, or change, or sketch, or try this way and that with your colour, it is all over with it and with you. You will continually see bad copyists trying to imitate the Venetians, by daubing their colours about, and retouching, ...
— The Crown of Wild Olive • John Ruskin

... even a slight fault on the part of these great minds, may have made, and joining issue with other inferior judges of character) has often succeeded in throwing a shade on their glorious actions and in casting a slur upon their reputation, like those little insects which from their number actually succeed, notwithstanding their smallness, in darkening the rays of the sun. What is worse, however, is, that when history has once been erroneously ...
— My Recollections of Lord Byron • Teresa Guiccioli

... courteous, but I must walk alone—to be supported would give ground for evil tongues to slur upon my courage. Your simple presence will ...
— Beatrix of Clare • John Reed Scott

... left behind in the Gazette as well. That wound, therefore, seemed at first to go against him, but he bandaged it, and plastered it, and hoped for better luck. And his third wound truly was a blessed one, a slight one, and taken in the proper course of things, without a slur upon any of his comrades. This set him up again with advancement and appointment, and enabled him to marry and ...
— Mary Anerley • R. D. Blackmore

... love than external compulsion; it assists the husband to remain the lover, and it is often the lover more than the husband that the modern woman needs; but it has always to be remembered that in the present condition of law and social opinion a slur is cast on the children of such unions. No doubt, however, marriage and the home will undergo modifications, which will tend to make these ancient institutions a little more flexible and to permit a greater degree of variation to meet special circumstances. ...
— Little Essays of Love and Virtue • Havelock Ellis

... baritone, soprano, and a bass and tenor, too. I can thrill and slur and frill and whirr and shake you through and through. I'm a Jews' harp—I'm an organ—I'm a fiddle and a flute. Every kind of touching sound ...
— Wild Animals at Home • Ernest Thompson Seton

... whether ye like it or not," blazed Sir Terence at him. "I mean you to take advantage of it. D' ye think I'll suffer any man to cast a slur upon Lady O'Moy? I'll be sending my friends to wait on you to-day, Count; and—by God!—Tremayne himself shall ...
— The Snare • Rafael Sabatini

... one little detail which it would be disingenuous to slur over. It is this. We are told that Saint Joseph was awkward and backward in his development. As a child his boy-comrades used to laugh at him for his open-mouthed staring habits; they called him "bocca-aperta" (gape-mouth), and in the frontispiece to Montanari's life of him, which depicts him ...
— Old Calabria • Norman Douglas

... There is a disposition on the part of artists to tell stories, to encroach upon the sentiment of literature, to paint with a dry brush in harsh unsympathetic colors, to ignore relations of light-and-shade, and to slur beauties of form. The subject seems to count for more than the truth of representation, or the individuality of view. From time to time artists of much ability have appeared, but these form an exception rather than a rule. ...
— A Text-Book of the History of Painting • John C. Van Dyke

... man had a family, that is to say, his family looked upon him as one of its members, and since in their opinion he was committing an offence against morality, and casting a slur on their good name, he was summoned to appear before the assembled parents, brothers and sisters in order to be censured. He considered that he was too old for such treatment and the family tie ...
— Married • August Strindberg

... you bite me for?" pursued Swing, disregarding the slur. "Hell's bells, if you'd bit Luke I wouldn't have a word to say, but why pick ...
— The Heart of the Range • William Patterson White

... towards him and laid his hand affectionately on his shoulder. "You ought to have been an admiral, Joe," he said, gratefully, without intending any slur on a ...
— A Master Of Craft • W. W. Jacobs



Words linked to "Slur" :   obliterate, mar, utter, tie, blotch, verbalise, music, verbalize, smudge, spiel, speak, spot, splotch, inkblot, fingerprint, defect, musical notation, smirch, slur over, weaken, talk, refer, dim, splodge, depreciation, blemish, efface, ethnic slur, mouth, focus, derogation, play, disparagement, denote, fingermark



Copyright © 2024 Free-Translator.com