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Unpretentious   /ˌənpritˈɛnʃəs/   Listen
Unpretentious

adjective
1.
Lacking pretension or affectation.  "Her quiet unpretentious demeanor"
2.
Not ostentatious.  Synonyms: unostentatious, unpretending.  "Unostentatious elegance"
3.
Exhibiting restrained good taste.  Synonyms: understated, unostentatious.



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"Unpretentious" Quotes from Famous Books



... and flowers sprang up, and great trees with leafy branches rose on every side.... As they rode on beneath the leafy trees from every tree the birds sang out, for the spell of silence over the lonely moor was broken for ever." This unpretentious story, a child's story, is as engaging as a gem. And so, I think, are most of the others. One more example to illustrate the quality of Leamy's style—say, the description of the contest of the bards before the High King at the Feis of Tara in the story called "The ...
— Irish Fairy Tales • Edmund Leamy

... brows until his eyes were merely cavities of blackness. Very tenderly he fondled the rifle-butt which lay across his knees, and never in the mountain-desert had there been a more humbly unpretentious ...
— The Seventh Man • Max Brand

... view, lay between the garden and the road. Above the hedge showed an occasional shrub; at the corner nearest to the car a chestnut flourished. The wooden gate, once white, which they had passed, was grimed and rickety. The road itself was still the unpretentious country lane that the advent of the electric car had found it. When Carrados had taken in these details there seemed little else to notice. He was on the point of giving Harris the order to go on when his ear ...
— Four Max Carrados Detective Stories • Ernest Bramah

... Society is to teach rather than to perform in public. Hence the rarity of their displays, and the better reason why we should seize, when they come, our chances of assisting at these delightful exhibitions of an art whose revival has done so much to restore to the countryside the unpretentious joys that gave ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, July 1, 1914 • Various

... peasant. He could barely read and write. When finally he came to see that she affected no airs of superiority, but treated him on the footing of an equal, his confidence returned to him in a measure and he showed himself in his true colors, as a man of intelligence by reason of his sound, unpretentious common sense. Besides, he was surprised at times to think he could note a change was gradually coming over him; it seemed to him that his mind was less torpid than it had been, that it was clearer and more active, that he had novel ideas in his head, and more of them; could ...
— The Downfall • Emile Zola

... boys were sitting on a narrow balcony that projected from the second floor of a neat but unpretentious boathouse. The rear end of the edifice was built against the sloping ...
— Canoe Boys and Campfires - Adventures on Winding Waters • William Murray Graydon

... This unpretentious little book is the outcome of my own experiences and adventures in Alaska. Two trips, covering a period of eighteen months and a distance of over twelve thousand ...
— A Woman who went to Alaska • May Kellogg Sullivan

... like those who wade through a stream in winter; irresolute like those who are afraid of all around them; grave like a guest (in awe of his host); evanescent like ice that is melting away; unpretentious like wood that has not been fashioned into anything; vacant like a valley, and ...
— Tao Teh King • Lao-Tze

... professional brethren whose names I hold in honor and whose writings are in my library. If any such failed to receive our cards of invitation, it was an accident which, if I had known, I should have deeply regretted. So far as we could judge by all we heard, our unpretentious party gave general satisfaction. Many different social circles were represented, but it passed off easily and agreeably. I can say this more freely, as the credit of it belongs so largely to the care and self-sacrificing efforts of Dr. Priestley ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)

... unpretentious. The translators are content to exhibit such a work to the American military public without changing its poignancy and originality. They hope that readers will enjoy it as much as they ...
— Battle Studies • Colonel Charles-Jean-Jacques-Joseph Ardant du Picq

... been transformed! No one would have recognized it, covered as it was with a wealth of pure white blossoms and dark-green leaves, for it looked more like the throne of a fairy than like anything so ordinary and unpretentious. Mrs. Seabrook, who possessed exquisite taste, had so massed the blossoms around her and daintily perched an inverted one on her head that the effect was exceedingly beautiful and picturesque. Katherine, who had chosen ...
— Katherine's Sheaves • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon

... once into a room, half library, half smoking-room, that opened out of the low-ceilinged hall. The Manor House gave the impression of a rambling and glorified farmhouse, solid, ancient, comfortable, and wholly unpretentious. And so it was. Only the heat of the place struck me as unnatural. This room with the blazing fire may have seemed uncomfortably warm after the long drive through the night air; yet it seemed to me that the hall itself, and the whole atmosphere of the house, breathed a warmth that ...
— Three John Silence Stories • Algernon Blackwood

... distinguished Provider had been immersed in a most unenviable condition of despair, for his enlightened but exceedingly perverse-minded master had, of late, declined to be in any way amused, or even interested, by the simple and unpretentious entertainment which could be obtained in so inaccessible a region. The well-intentioned efforts of the followers of the Court, who engagingly endeavoured to divert the Imperial mind by performing certain feats which they remembered to ...
— The Wallet of Kai Lung • Ernest Bramah

... things." Then she hopelessly involved them in a presentation to me, and between us we contrived to elide Mrs. Ricker and Kitton from all save her perfunctory office, until her voice and lips ceased their trembling. Poor little hostess, in her starched lawn which had seemed to her adequate for her unpretentious role of mother! All her humour and independence and self-possession had left her, and in their stead, on what was to have been her great night, had settled ...
— Friendship Village • Zona Gale

... he said, 'and do not open it until you are safely at home and in your father's conservatory. Plant it in an unpretentious pot at night, and do not tell anyone what it is, but watch it every day yourself. The fairy too will watch it and pick the blossoms for you, as no mortal can do that. She will pick the seed flower as soon as it blooms, so that the Evil Magician may ...
— The Enchanted Island • Fannie Louise Apjohn

... morning Camellia wore an unpretentious dress of white—one which made the thing the Gay Lady had worn at dinner the evening before seem to her memory poor indeed. Later in the morning the Skeptic took Camellia boating on the river, and she went up and ...
— A Court of Inquiry • Grace S. Richmond

... in a square building, decent and well-lighted enough, but not otherwise remarkable—the very chapel of music—four business-like gentlemen, in modern attire and spectacles, take their places on an unpretentious platform amid refined applause; and soon the still air vibrates to the trembling of sixteen strings—only ...
— Peter Ibbetson • George du Marier et al

... England Spohr visited Paris for the first time, and made the personal acquaintance of Kreutzer, Viotti, Habeneck, Cherubini, and other eminent musicians, who received him with the greatest cordiality. But the public did not seem to appreciate his merits, for his quiet, unpretentious style was not quite in keeping with the taste ...
— Famous Violinists of To-day and Yesterday • Henry C. Lahee

... in inspecting the fleet. May 2 there was launched a ship of eighty guns, the largest ship that had ever been built on the stocks of this port. It was blessed by the Archbishop of Mechlin. According to the Baron de Meneval, "the Empress was affable, simple, and unpretentious. Possibly the memory of Josephine's charm and earnest desire to please was a misfortune to Marie Louise. Her reserve might have been attributed to German family pride, but that would have been a mistake; no one was ever simpler or less haughty. Her ...
— The Happy Days of the Empress Marie Louise • Imbert De Saint-Amand

... had not, however, allowed his title to be used, as he shrank from the notoriety which the knowledge of his position and wealth would create among the settlers of that region. He had come there in an unpretentious way, and he wished to leave as quietly. There would be time enough, he thought, to resume his honors when he and his bride should go ...
— Virgie's Inheritance • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon

... distractions of the secular world. A new light irradiated the thick gloom by which he had long been encompassed. Gradually the mist and shadow of doubt and difficulty rolled away, disclosing at length the gray walls of a silent monastery in spirit of unpretentious work and pious exercise, far sequestered from the busy haunts of worldly men. Step by step he was approaching the humble cell of recollection and prayer, in the religious solitude of which he was to ...
— Donahoe's Magazine, Volume 15, No. 1, January 1886 • Various

... The unpretentious chapel was small and nearly dark, for the usual dimness was increased by the lowering clouds outside. The deep, narrow window openings, fitted with stained glass, ran almost to the rough-hewn rafters supporting the steep-pitched roof, upon which the heavy rain beat again with a ...
— The Boy Scouts Book of Campfire Stories • Various

... the Chapel Royal, Savoy, when enter Wife No. 1 who explains that she was a married woman when she met Cuthbertson, and therefore, a fair, or rather unfair, bigamist. Upon this Cuthbertson (who is conveniently near in a pew, wearing the unpretentious uniform of the Royal Horse Artillery), rushes into the arms of the lady who has erroneously been numbered Wife No. 2, when she has been in reality Wife No. 1, and all is joy. Now I need scarcely point out to you that nothing like this has ever been seen on the stage before. It is ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 101, August 22, 1891 • Various

... temperaments. Each is endowed with keen perception and wonderful magnetism. Their combined influence has brought to their support the most contumacious of the delegates. On the issue of the following day the hopes of each are centered. Nevins has asked his young champion to visit him at his rooms in an unpretentious hotel on Clark street; there are details for the work of the morrow that have to ...
— The Transgressors - Story of a Great Sin • Francis A. Adams

... sure it was right for you to come here where the life is so different from the quiet, unpretentious one you have led," the doctor thought, but he merely said: "It's my impression they wear their best dresses here, ...
— Aikenside • Mary J. Holmes

... blank, ugly line of sun-blistered shanties, along a road, yellow-sand deep, is a mill village. The word village has a cheerful sound. It summons a country scene, with the charms of home, however simple and unpretentious. There is nothing to charm or please in the villages I have already, in these pages, drawn for you to see and which with veritable sick reluctance I summon again before your eyes. Every house is like unto its neighbour—a shelter put up rapidly ...
— The Woman Who Toils - Being the Experiences of Two Gentlewomen as Factory Girls • Mrs. John Van Vorst and Marie Van Vorst

... later Francisco entered the unpretentious establishment of Christopher Buckley. He found it more like an office than a drinking place; people sat about, apparently waiting their turn for an interview ...
— Port O' Gold • Louis John Stellman

... residences of all the Legations are quite comfortable, pretty and unpretentious, with the usual complement of furniture of folding pattern, so convenient but so inartistic, and a superabundance of cane chairs. Really good furniture being very expensive in Teheran, a good deal of the upholstery ...
— Across Coveted Lands - or a Journey from Flushing (Holland) to Calcutta Overland • Arnold Henry Savage Landor

... and genuine individuality will transpire through the most limited amount of creative art. This has been the case with the few published works of a writer, whose compositions, though unpretentious in size and sentiment, yet reveal a graceful fancy, and a marked contemplation upon the details of ...
— Contemporary American Composers • Rupert Hughes

... fine. And the Emperor with his cortege rode directly through the middle of the avenue. The trembling trees bowed toward him as he advanced, the sun-rays quivered, frightened, yet curious, through the green leaves, and in the blue heaven above there swam visibly a golden star. The Emperor wore his unpretentious-green uniform and the little world-renowned hat. He rode a white palfrey, which stepped with such calm pride, so confidently, so nobly—had I then been Crown Prince of Prussia I would have envied that horse. The Emperor sat carelessly, almost laxly, holding ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VI. • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke

... possible for us to maintain, if it so pleased us, that, in spite of certain evidence to the contrary, the Balzacs were simple, unpretentious people, who, having dropped the "de" at the time of the Revolution, did not care to resume it; but here M. Edmond Bire, who furnishes us with the information already given, completely cuts the ground away from under our feet. It appears that M. ...
— Honore de Balzac, His Life and Writings • Mary F. Sandars

... unpretentious man came out in broken sections as the special sped along the smooth track, while the General Manager talked with the resident director and the General Superintendent talked with his assistant, who, not long ago, was the conductor of a work-train upon which the G.S. was employed ...
— The Last Spike - And Other Railroad Stories • Cy Warman

... deserved success. It was little more or less than the first lady's newspaper, consisting of a small half sheet printed on both sides, and sold three times a week. The price was a penny, and the form was so unpretentious that deprecators spoke of its "tobacco-paper" and "scurvy letter." Like Defoe's review, it was strong in Foreign War intelligence, but beyond this the aim was to attract readers, not by political sarcasm or coarse ...
— History of English Humour, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange

... the home just described arose the spacious but unpretentious residence of President Davis, the Confederate "White House" (in this case only in a figurative sense, for the executive mansion was of dark brown stone or stucco). As nearly as I can remember, the main entrance was on Clay Street. On one side the windows opened on Twelfth ...
— Memories - A Record of Personal Experience and Adventure During Four Years of War • Fannie A. (Mrs.) Beers

... little more than a cottage, though one of its walls was an indubitable relic of that establishment which a pious Howard had erected in the thirteenth century. A small and unpretentious building, built in the Elizabethan style with quaint gables and high chimneys, its latticed windows and sunken gardens, its rosary and its tiny meadow, gave it a certain manorial completeness which was a source of great pride to ...
— The Clue of the Twisted Candle • Edgar Wallace

... ceremonies which the English church still retained: some of the ministers ceased to wear gowns in preaching, performed the marriage ceremony without using a ring, and were in favor of simplifying all the church service. Unpretentious workers began to tire of the everlasting quarreling, and to long for a religion simple and quiet. These soon met trouble, for the rulers had decided that salvation was by the Church of England, as the sovereign, its head, should order. Dissent was the two-fold guilt of heresy and ...
— Ten Great Events in History • James Johonnot

... his words were as the dew falling to refresh the earth. He had left Paris, and was now in a provincial town under the protection of the princess Margaret, who, loving the gospel, extended her protection to its disciples. Calvin was still a youth, of gentle, unpretentious bearing. His work began with the people at their homes. Surrounded by the members of the household, he read the Bible, and opened the truths of salvation. Those who heard the message, carried the good news ...
— The Great Controversy Between Christ and Satan • Ellen G. White

... Standing chronologically almost midway between Dryden and Johnson, Kames, and Richardson, the Remarks shows decisively the direction in which criticism, under the steadily mounting pressure of liberal, empirical thought, is traveling. This little unpretentious book gathers into itself, either in faint adumbration or in fairly advanced form, the tendencies in method and ideas that are to remake criticism in the eighteenth century. There are reflected here the growing distrust of ...
— Some Remarks on the Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, Written by Mr. William Shakespeare (1736) • Anonymous

... him his thankoffering in recognition of the kindly treatment he had met with, and it might happen that these free gifts constituted no small portion of the income on which the canons— for the most part a humble and unpretentious set of ...
— The Coming of the Friars • Augustus Jessopp

... a small and unpretentious structure. The door opened directly into the living-room, to which there was only one small window looking out on the verandah. A second door led into a small kitchen, off which opened another small room used by Dudgeon ...
— The Rider of Waroona • Firth Scott

... locality in the neighbourhood of York. "The ground was elevated, and the situation afforded excellent air and water, as well as a very extensive and diversified prospect." The illustration (Frontispiece) will convey a better idea than any verbal description of this unpretentious building. Its character as a labour of love and humanity was embodied in an inscription written at the time, which may be discovered whenever the foundation stone ...
— Chapters in the History of the Insane in the British Isles • Daniel Hack Tuke

... an unpretentious sort of pleasure that Teeny-bits and his friend shared that Sunday afternoon. When the meal was over they walked lazily through the village to look at some of the old buildings that were standing in Revolutionary ...
— The Mark of the Knife • Clayton H. Ernst

... social centre of this leadership in the British world was at Marlborough House—a large and unpretentious residence in the heart of London. That the place was exquisitely furnished and equipped goes without saying; that it was comfortable in the extreme is equally a matter of course to those acquainted with the ...
— The Life of King Edward VII - with a sketch of the career of King George V • J. Castell Hopkins

... effigies of Sir H. Fitzroger and wife, and a modern mural tablet with medallion to Viscountess Waldegrave. In the churchyard is a weather-worn but fine cross, with a canopied crucifix. The Communion plate is pre-Reformation, dating from 1511. The neighbouring Priory (Earl Waldegrave) is an unpretentious modern building, occupying the site of an ancient Benedictine house, afterwards tenanted by Carthusians. Portions of the old causeway which once connected the priory with ...
— Somerset • G.W. Wade and J.H. Wade

... immense palm-trees, the wind shook the large flowering shrubs and their perfumed crimson petals fell like rain, almost to the church itself. Thence we marched to the ceremony, very far off. Our little procession of sailors was very unpretentious, but the coffin remained conspicuously wrapped in the flag of France. We had to traverse the Chinese quarter, through seething crowds of yellow men; and then the Malay and Indian suburbs, where all types of Asiatic faces looked ...
— An Iceland Fisherman • Pierre Loti

... most striking is the number of cases of individual kindness shown by Germans to "alien enemies." The minds of many might be cleared on this subject if they would read a charming and unpretentious little book, "An English Girl's Adventures in Hostile Germany," by Mary Littlefair, published by John Long, Ltd. The authoress saw and heard absurd Press charges on the other side, and something, too, of the irrational hatred of war-time, but the little ...
— The Better Germany in War Time - Being some Facts towards Fellowship • Harold Picton

... adequately to repay you for your many valuable services to me and mine. Nevertheless, in recognition of what you have been to us, allow me to dedicate this unpretentious volume to you. I shall have more respect for my little stories if in some way they ...
— Ilka on the Hill-Top and Other Stories • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen

... shops in darkened London conducting the last hour of business under lowered awnings, "as if it were a liaison." There are many such rewarding passages, some perhaps a little facile, but, taken together, quite enough to make this unpretentious little volume a very agreeable companion for the few moments of leisure which are all that most of us can get in these ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, August 1, 1917. • Various

... footpath through copse and spinney, not without pleasant fellowship with feather and fir. Nor does it follow from all this that the god is unsocial. Albeit shy of the company of his more showy brother-deities, he loveth the more unpretentious humankind, especially them that are adscripti gleb, addicted to the kindly soil and to the working thereof: perfect in no way, only simple, cheery sinners. For he is only half a god after all, and the red earth in him is strong. When the pelting storm drives the wayfarers ...
— Pagan Papers • Kenneth Grahame

... the hotel, or in his own home, or on protracted drives when he made his round of visits, taking these new friends along. Dr. John was beloved by everybody in Edinburgh, everybody in Scotland, for that matter, and his story of Rab had won him a following throughout Christendom. He was an unpretentious sovereign. Clemens ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine

... not been born to like privileges with himself. He does not brag of his achievements or of his calling, or "talk shop" whenever he opens his mouth. On the contrary, in all that he says or does, he will be modest, unpretentious, unassuming; exhibiting his true character in performing rather than in boasting, in doing ...
— Character • Samuel Smiles

... the wit and distinction of a French woman. General Merlin married her in Madrid in 1811, and brought her to Paris, where she created a sensation. Being an accomplished musician, she gave delightful concerts, and though also gifted as a writer she was as simple and unpretentious as if she had been created to remain obscure. In addition, she was so truly good that she had almost no enemies; her charity was inexhaustible, and she possessed one of those hearts which live only to do ...
— Women in the Life of Balzac • Juanita Helm Floyd

... the unpretentious, the quiet soir,e to which the woman of fashion shall welcome the litt,rateur and the artist, the aristocrat who is at the top of the social tree and the millionaire who reached his culmination yesterday, would seem to be that Ultima Thule for which all people have been ...
— Manners and Social Usages • Mrs. John M. E. W. Sherwood

... Reasoning that would apply to nearly any other man did not at all fit Bruce's father. Helen had the sensation of having run at full speed against a stone wall when Burt came toward her slowly, leading his saddle-horse through one of the corrals near the unpretentious ranch-house, which she had reached after a ...
— The Man from the Bitter Roots • Caroline Lockhart

... chief-mourner at the unpretentious funeral. He seemed much affected by his uncle's death; and his manner towards his ...
— Milly Darrell and Other Tales • M. E. Braddon

... we not have such magazines now-a-days? We have philosophical and scientific articles on the one hand, and insipid stories and travels on the other, but no such unpretentious miscellanies which the ordinary person can read in comfort—such as Chambers's or Cassell's or the Strand in England—which supply the general reader with a simple, but satisfying fare and are of the greatest use to the ...
— My Reminiscences • Rabindranath Tagore

... truth," June said frankly, "none of my friends know where I am living. Call it false pride if you like, but there you are. I have all my letters, except business ones, sent to my club—I belong to an unpretentious club—I'll take you there some day—and not even Micky knows that I live here. You see, when I flew in the face of providence, otherwise my noble family, they stopped my allowance, so as I'm entirely ...
— The Phantom Lover • Ruby M. Ayres

... to note 'chance and change' and to lament the loss of the days that are no more. The exceeding appropriateness of this in a narrative poem dealing with departed habits and customs must be quite apparent. The thorn grows to a very great age, and many an unpretentious Scottish homestead receives a pathetic grace and dignity from the presence of ...
— Marmion • Sir Walter Scott

... begins to peter out into brick- and limestone-kilns and great scars of unworked and overworked quarries, the first and more unpretentious of its suburbs take up—Benson, Maplehurst, and Ridgeway Heights intervening with one-story brick cottages and two-story packing-cases—between the smoke of the city and the carefully parked Queen Anne quietude of Glenwood ...
— Gaslight Sonatas • Fannie Hurst

... profanity, and other small vices. Cowperwood could tell from looking at him that he must have a fund of information concerning every current Chicagoan of importance, and this fact alone was certain to be of value. Then the old man was direct, plain-spoken, simple-appearing, and wholly unpretentious—qualities which Cowperwood ...
— The Titan • Theodore Dreiser

... other, and very little standing room between these and the wall. By paying nearly double fare a passenger might secure a room for himself, but the room given him did not compare well even with that of small and unpretentious modern steamers. ...
— Sinking of the Titanic - and Great Sea Disasters • Various

... walking through the fragrant roads, in a dream they entered the unpretentious little church, and were questioned by the small Spanish sexton at the door. No, that was Miss Carroll,— this was Miss Brown. Yes, everyone was here. The groom and his best man had gone in the other door. Who would give away the bride? This gentleman, Mr. Eastman, ...
— Saturday's Child • Kathleen Norris

... an unpretentious glazed door and we followed him into the restaurant, whereof the atmosphere was pervaded by an appetising meatiness mingled with less agreeable suggestions of the destructive ...
— The Vanishing Man • R. Austin Freeman

... and make acquaintances; as these cafes are frequented by male street prostitutes (Pupenjunge) the invert risks being blackmailed or robbed if he goes home or to a hotel with a cafe acquaintance. There are also a considerable number of homosexual Kneipen, small and unpretentious bar-rooms, which are really male brothels, the inmates being sexually normal working men and boys, out of employment or in quest of a few marks as pocket money; these places are regarded by inverts as very safe, as the proprietors insist on good order and allow no extortion, ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 2 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis

... light to be seen in any of the front windows. The house seemed to be fast asleep. How warm and friendly and unpretentious it looked, and there was all about it the same sense of strength that there was about Martin. In which window had they stood in the dark, looking out on to a world that they were going to brave together? Was it in the right wing? Yes. She remembered that tree whose branches turned over ...
— Who Cares? • Cosmo Hamilton

... in the affairs of the State, which had been admitted to the Union only four months before. Whatever the speculation aroused by the personnel of the party, however, the business that called them to Ann Arbor caused little comment, if we are to judge from contemporary reports. Yet this unpretentious gathering of notables was charged with the inauguration of what was to become one of the most significant developments in the history of American education,—the establishment and successful maintenance of a University by the ...
— The University of Michigan • Wilfred Shaw

... beginning of their stay she had scarcely been able to believe that she was really in Athens. A great name had aroused in her imagination a conception of a great city. The soft familiarity, the almost rustic simplicity and intimacy, the absolutely unpretentious brightness and homely cheerfulness of the small capital of this unique land had surprised, had almost ...
— In the Wilderness • Robert Hichens

... wildly and inappropriately named. But we considered this an excellent chance "to wax sarcastic," and we let ourselves go, although I do not think that our task-masters, being by nature dense, grasped the purport of our humour. Our residence rejoiced in the unpretentious designation of "Camera Villa," ...
— Sixteen Months in Four German Prisons - Wesel, Sennelager, Klingelputz, Ruhleben • Henry Charles Mahoney

... course; and each street is lined with neat frame or brick houses, surrounding a square in such a manner that within each household has a sufficient garden. The broad streets have neat foot-pavements of brick; the houses, substantially built but unpretentious, are beautified by a singular arrangement of grape-vines, which are trained to espaliers fixed to cover the space between the top of the lower and the bottom of the upper windows. This manner of training vines gives the town quite a peculiar ...
— The Communistic Societies of the United States • Charles Nordhoff

... If this unpretentious book gives satisfaction to the lovers of California, both in and out of the State, the compiler will reap his highest reward. If any suitable author has been left out the omission was inadvertent, and will gladly ...
— The California Birthday Book • Various

... Togarog, and separated from the main village by a number of wretched lanes, lay the Jewish quarter. A decided improvement in the general condition of the houses which formed this suburb was plainly visible to the casual observer. The houses were, if possible, more unpretentious than those of the serfs, yet there was an air of home-like comfort about them, an impression of neatness and cleanliness prevailed, which one would seek for in vain among the semi-barbarous peasants of Southern Russia. To the ...
— Rabbi and Priest - A Story • Milton Goldsmith

... briskly, and a few minutes later they entered a narrow court off Duke street, St. James. Through a dingy and unpretentious doorway, unmarked by sign or plate, they passed into the premises of Benjamin and Company. In a dark, cramped office, scantily furnished, they found an elderly Jewish gentleman seated at ...
— In Friendship's Guise • Wm. Murray Graydon

... interior with packing going forward, and, right in the middle, Mercy yearning to go—every line of the girl's figure yearning. In "The Chamber called Peace" we see a simple English room, bed with white curtains, window valance and door, as may be found in many thousand unpretentious houses; but far off, through the open window, we behold the sun uprising out of a great plain, and Christian hails ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. XXII (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... Thackeray's favourite period; he liked the rational, unpretentious tone of its best literature, its practical politics and tolerance, its common sense, and its habit of keeping very close, in art as in action, to the realities of the world as we find it. Swift is the most unromantic of any ...
— Studies in Literature and History • Sir Alfred Comyn Lyall

... most interesting acquaintance at this most historic little town was the great-nephew of Danton. Middle-aged, unpretentious of aspect, yet with that unmistakable look partly of dignified self-possession, partly of authority, seldom absent from the French official, I looked in vain for any likeness to the portraits of his great kinsman. Yet perhaps in the stalwart figure, manly proportions and bronzed ...
— East of Paris - Sketches in the Gatinais, Bourbonnais, and Champagne • Matilda Betham-Edwards

... pause to express my admiration for Lockhart's criticism of Scott, and particularly for his description of the way in which the Lay came to be written. It is really wonderful, Lockhart's sensible, unpretentious, thorough interpretation of the half-unconscious processes by which Scott's reading and recollections were turned into his poems and novels. Of course, it is all founded on Scott's ...
— Sir Walter Scott - A Lecture at the Sorbonne • William Paton Ker

... called to Calgary on business. It sounds simple enough, in these Unpretentious Annals of an Unloved Worm, but I can't help feeling that it marks a trivially significant divide in the trend of things. It depresses me more than I can explain. My depression, I imagine, comes mostly ...
— The Prairie Child • Arthur Stringer

... fancy me possessed of either castle or keys. I was to him only an unpretentious English companion in attendance on Madame Blanc in ...
— The Bondwoman • Marah Ellis Ryan

... company were four or five boys and young men, eighteen to twenty-one years of age, also a kindly and unpretentious but droll young fellow, named John C. Aston, whose age was about twenty-five. This younger element was responsible for most of the occurrences of lighter vein, which became a feature of ...
— Crossing the Plains, Days of '57 - A Narrative of Early Emigrant Tavel to California by the Ox-team Method • William Audley Maxwell

... Threading narrow streets, with the stenographic reporter of the courts, Mr. R. A. West, for my guide, we came into a quiet locality where the ancient landmark reared its steeple, like the finger of faith pointing heavenward. Few indeed must be the fashionable Christians who worship under its unpretentious roof, but there is an air of antiquity surrounding it which interests every visitor ...
— Voyage of The Paper Canoe • N. H. Bishop

... before to every house in the settlement, bidding the people to come to devotions on Sunday morning. He knew that not one of them would refuse his invitation. There was no hero larger in the eyes of these unfortunates than the simple priest who walked among them with his unpretentious piety. The promises were given with whispered blessings, and there were voices that broke in making them, and hands that shook with honest gratitude. The priest, remembering these things, and all the awful suffering of the winter, determined to make the service symbolic, indeed, of the resurrection ...
— A Mountain Woman and Others • (AKA Elia Wilkinson) Elia W. Peattie

... of a solicitor, and all his early circumstances were homely, unpretentious, and rather straitened. His mother died when he was eight years old, and when his father followed her five years later, two of his uncles provided means for continuing at Cambridge the education which had been begun in the rural ...
— Studies in Literature • John Morley

... nor any of the time-honoured trappings that characterize this rather feeble literature of the supernatural. On the contrary, the scenes enacted in houses that appear to be really haunted are generally very simple and insignificant, not to say dull and commonplace. The ghosts are quite unpretentious and go to no expense in the matter of staging or costume. They are clad as they were when, sometimes many years ago, they led their quiet, unadventurous life within their own home. We find in one case an old woman, with a thin grey shawl meekly folded over her breast, who bends at night ...
— The Unknown Guest • Maurice Maeterlinck

... single file along the narrow bush track towards the ranges in which the little mining camp was situated. The sun was well towards the west when they came in sight of the rough, bark-roofed shed with uncovered sides, which contained the battery plant, and Fraser's equally unpretentious dwelling, which, with three or four miners' huts constituted the camp. A bright, brawling little mountain stream, with high banks lined with the graceful whispering she-oaks, gave a pleasant and refreshing ...
— Tom Gerrard - 1904 • Louis Becke

... science. Surgery was bare of his exploits. Medical annals knew him not. All he had thought to do was undone by him; and yet here he was, contented, happy and healthy in a realm of little duties. In so unpretentious a life as this he had found satisfaction; and for the first time it came upon him that thus simply and calmly satisfaction comes to the great mass of men who have nothing to do with ...
— A Prairie Infanta • Eva Wilder Brodhead

... that Chinatown site was Rialto and Market-place for the overgrown mining camp. The wall moss which blew in with the trade winds, and the semi-tropic growth of old ivies and rose-bushes, had given to these houses the seasoning of two centuries. Unpretentious hovels beside the structures of stone turrets and mill-work fronts by which later millionaires shamed California Street and Van Ness Avenue, they had the simple dignity of a mission, a colonial farm-house, ...
— The Readjustment • Will Irwin

... little parish church is of the very far past, having lost its Cathedral rank over six hundred years ago to Sainte-Marie in Grasse, a town scarcely younger than its own. It is the type of the church of this coast, with its unpretentious smallness, its strength, and its disfiguring restorations; and it is, especially in comparison with Vence and Grasse, of small architectural interest. The facade, and the double archway which connects the church and the tower, are of the unfortunate XVIII century, the older exterior is ...
— Cathedrals and Cloisters of the South of France, Volume 1 • Elise Whitlock Rose

... last. They are scrupulously plain; utility rather than beauty seems conspicuously stamped upon them, within and without. Economy has been manifestly a ruling law in their construction; the furniture is equally unpretentious and unostentatious; and, as to garniture, there is absolutely none. To some few, they are almost too destitute of embellishment, and Mr. Muller has been blamed for not introducing some aesthetic features which might relieve this bald utilitarianism ...
— George Muller of Bristol - His Witness to a Prayer-Hearing God • Arthur T. Pierson

... from Brooke Market, established here by Fulke Greville, Lord Brooke, but demolished a hundred years ago. It was in Brooke Street, in a house on the west side, that poor Chatterton committed suicide. St. Alban's Church is an unpretentious building at the north end. An inscription over the north door tells us that it was erected to be free for ever to the poor by one of the humble stewards of God's mercies, with date 1860. Within we learn that this benefactor was the first ...
— Holborn and Bloomsbury - The Fascination of London • Sir Walter Besant

... to be free to a select public, but now the chosen, who are nearly always people from the hotels, must pay ten pesetas each for their pleasure, and it is not too much for a pleasure so innocent and charming. The academy is on the ground floor of the maestro's unpretentious house, and in a waiting-room beyond the shoemaker's shop which filled the vestibule sat, patient in their black mantillas, the mothers and nurses of the pupils. These were mostly quite small children in their every-day clothes, but there were two ...
— Familiar Spanish Travels • W. D. Howells

... silver, and I like to see mine come up to table without a speck! However, after being with me for a while, she improved, and I can conscientiously say that she became quite competent in time. That is, for a household like ours, you know, where things are done in quite an unpretentious style." ...
— In Brief Authority • F. Anstey

... a conscious thought connection. She remembered that Mrs. Bell had told her of her faithful landlady, Mrs. Mellen, with whom she always stopped when she came North; she remembered calling there many times for Mary, her smart motor waking the quiet, unpretentious street. Now she remembered recalling the boarding house and seeking shelter there in her fear and pain. Fear and pain—why, what was it? There was something cataclysmic, overpowering, that had happened. What could it be? Something was hanging over her head, some dreadful punishment. ...
— Out of the Ashes • Ethel Watts Mumford

... every tooth on edge should I go by there now,—now that I have heard the story,—and see the old site covered by the "Shoo-fly Coffee-house." Pleasanter far to close my eyes and call to view the unpretentious portals of the old cafe, with her children—for such those exiles seem to me—dragging their rocking-chairs out, and sitting in their wonted group under the long, out-reaching eaves which shaded the banquette ...
— Old Creole Days • George Washington Cable

... though in an unpretentious store, at last attracted attention, and after some little time it became the thing in the fashionable world to go there, and from that time ...
— Barriers Burned Away • E. P. Roe

... private shop. They seemed part of a superior charm belonging exclusively to Rosamond Merton, and Patricia sighed as she saw in the mirror over the mantel-shelf the image of a fluffy-haired girl in an unpretentious blouse. ...
— Miss Pat at Artemis Lodge • Pemberton Ginther

... unpretentious, but excellent, almost perfect in its way. A clear soup, a sole, an entree or two, a bit of venison, a sweet—with good wines, but not too ...
— The Dictator • Justin McCarthy

... not an ordinary parrot, and the conviction was dawning on Travers that Nehal Singh was not an ordinary Hindu. The unusual simplicity of his dress, which nevertheless concealed a costly and refined taste, his firm though unpretentious bearing, the energy with which he had overthrown what Travers guessed must have been a fairly violent opposition on the part of his priestly advisers, pointed to a decided, interesting and perhaps, under certain circumstances, dangerous personality. The latter part of this deduction had not as ...
— The Native Born - or, The Rajah's People • I. A. R. Wylie

... guitar and piano by ear. These men were not only grateful to Von Barwig for his kindness, but they loved him, and recognising in him the real artist had unbounded respect for him. As for Von Barwig, he found them simple fellows, sentimental, unpretentious and good-hearted, and he liked them and felt at ease with them because they did not seek to probe into that part of his life which he preferred should remain unknown to them. They merely accepted him as they found him and for this Von Barwig was grateful. As time went on, ...
— The Music Master - Novelized from the Play • Charles Klein

... of one of our large mill towns, at the very end of a narrow street lined on each side by a row of dwelling houses of the poorer class, stood a tiny cottage. It was a humble, unpretentious abode of only four rooms, but it was home to the weary girl struggling up the hillside. The tired eyes brightened and lagging steps quickened involuntarily as she turned the corner and saw the welcoming light streaming from ...
— The Alchemist's Secret • Isabel Cecilia Williams

... stooping and looking for ancient tracks, grass-grown and dim. Each argument travels the highway—"the big road." It is logical. The facts and conclusions agree, and fall naturally into line of battle. It is sincere and candid—unpretentious and unanswerable. It is a grand defence of human rights—a brave and manly plea for universal justice. It leaves the decision of the Supreme Court without argument, without reason, and without excuse. Such an exhibition of independence, courage ...
— The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Volume VIII. - Interviews • Robert Green Ingersoll

... way of becoming familiar with history, is to delve into the origin and development of periods in furniture. The story of Napoleon is recorded in the unpretentious Directoire, the ornate Empire of Fontainebleau, while the conversion of round columns into obelisk-like pilasters surmounted by heads, the bronze and gilded-wood ornaments in the form of the Sphynx, are frank ...
— The Art of Interior Decoration • Grace Wood

... prototype's tub, at Khetwadi. Though he had amassed money he kept no servants, but went every morning to the bazaar, and purchased his provisions, which he cooked with his own hand. He lived frugally, and his dress was mean and threadbare, nevertheless, this strange, austere, unpretentious man was one of the greatest linguists of his time. Not only could he speak most of the languages of the East, including Arabic and Persian, but he wrote good idiomatic English. To his translations, and his connection with the Kama Shastra Society, we shall refer later. ...
— The Life of Sir Richard Burton • Thomas Wright

... and found, alas! several in a sorry plight. All seemed to be as well as the tenderest care and the most lavish expenditure of money could make them. All told much the same tale—the pluck and spirit of the troops, the stubborn unpretentious valour of the Boer, the searching musketry. Everyone predicted a ...
— London to Ladysmith via Pretoria • Winston Spencer Churchill

... books in the world! A cloud of dust rose under his feet as he went up to the cases and tried to read the tarnished titles of the volumes on the shelves. Again Chance led him aright, and his eye brightened as he discovered an unpretentious volume that proclaimed itself: The Official Visitors' Guide to the City of New York for the Year 1905. He pulled out the book and opened it. Of course it contained what he wanted, a large folding map, and spreading the latter out upon a table Constans set himself to studying ...
— The Doomsman • Van Tassel Sutphen

... Ashton had met his fate years before, when, as a young man of eighteen, he attended a social party given by a Mrs. Edmunds, whose husband was a great friend of his father's, and a member of the same guild. He was there introduced to a modest, unpretentious, but yet cultivated and refined country maiden, Ruth Hamilton by name, who was a niece of his host. We will not say it was a case of love at first sight, though they certainly were, from the first, mutually attracted each to the other, for, when he entered ...
— From Wealth to Poverty • Austin Potter

... of the twenty miles one comes to a small and unpretentious village and an equally small and unpretentious wayside tchai-khan, both owing their existence to a stream of fresh water as small and unpretentious as themselves. Beyond this cheerless oasis stretches again the ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle Volume II. - From Teheran To Yokohama • Thomas Stevens

... more efficient friends than Walter Scott. And richly he deserved them, for he was generous, companionable, loyal, a brilliant story-teller, a good hunter and sportsman, bright, cheerful, and witty, doubtless one of the most interesting young men in his beautiful city; modest, too, and unpretentious, yet proud, claiming nothing that nothing might be denied him, a favorite in the most select circles. His most striking peculiarity was his good sense, keeping him from all exaggerations, which were always offensive to him. He was a Tory, indeed; but no aristocrat ever had a more genial ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XIII • John Lord

... a tiny room in an unpretentious cottage with the commander, I followed the preparations which were being made for the assault. The ticking of the instruments gave news from the front, the line of which was visible from the windows by ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume V (of 8) • Francis J. (Francis Joseph) Reynolds, Allen L. (Allen Leon)

... His quiet, unpretentious ministry of "three months" shadowed forth the loving, gentle, yet vigorous and successful ministry of a quarter of a century; a ministry so like the Master's, not confined to sect or nationality, limited ...
— History of the Negro Race in America from 1619 to 1880. Vol. 2 (of 2) - Negroes as Slaves, as Soldiers, and as Citizens • George Washington Williams

... Rough hemlock lumber, rudely put up and whitewashed, would be a cheap mode of construction, which might be tolerated on a merely commercial place, but would illy correspond with neatly-kept private grounds, however humble and unpretentious they might be. The plan selected may be devoid of mere ornament, which would increase the cost, without adding to the capacity or usefulness, but the proportions should be satisfactory, the arrangement convenient, the materials the very best of their kind, and the workmanship well ...
— Woodward's Graperies and Horticultural Buildings • George E. Woodward

... he called. He could see by the weak-flamed, unpretentious parlor-lamp that she was dressed for him, and that the occasion had called out the best she had. A pale lavender gingham, starched and ironed, until it was a model of laundering, set off her pretty figure to perfection. There were ...
— Jennie Gerhardt - A Novel • Theodore Dreiser

... was what might have been expected from the tone of the preceding prayer. It was so full of Christ, pointing to His constant presence,—to Him as the only true comforter and sustainer either in sorrow and temptation,—that, simple as was the language and unpretentious the style, it touched the deepest springs in Lucy's heart, and she leaned back in her seat to hide ...
— Lucy Raymond - Or, The Children's Watchword • Agnes Maule Machar

... bungalow type. The only distinction observable is two crouching lion figures, life size, on pedestals about three feet high, at the balustrade entrance to the front verandah. A lawn of about thirty feet across extends to the street limit, where at a very unpretentious gate two armed burgher guards are constantly stationed. These will receive an intending visitor's name, an unarmed domestic guard will then come forward, who, after a short scrutiny, if the person is a stranger, will report to the President and will immediately return ...
— Origin of the Anglo-Boer War Revealed (2nd ed.) - The Conspiracy of the 19th Century Unmasked • C. H. Thomas

... daughter were transforming their Concord home into a small repository of the fine arts. Without much that would pass by the title of elegance, they succeeded in giving it an unpretentious air of refinement, and one could not enter it without realizing that the materials of a world-wide culture had been brought together there. Hawthorne soon found the dimensions of the house too narrow ...
— The Life and Genius of Nathaniel Hawthorne • Frank Preston Stearns

... Hart" is an ancient structure and very unpretentious (as great age often is), and being so very old, it has known full many a golden dawn. But surely never, in all its length of days, had it experienced quite such a morning as this. All night long there had been a strange hum upon the air, and now, early though the hour, Eltham village was awake ...
— The Amateur Gentleman • Jeffery Farnol et al

... were happening at Vivey, the person whose name excited the curiosity and the conversational powers of the villagers—Marie-Julien de Buxieres—ensconced in his unpretentious apartment in the Rue Stanislaus, Nancy, still pondered over the astonishing news contained in the Auberive notary's first letter. The announcement of his inheritance, dropping from the skies, as it were, had found him quite unprepared, and, at first, somewhat ...
— A Woodland Queen, Complete • Andre Theuriet

... Opportunity,' a story by Helen Campbell, is in a somewhat lighter vein than are the earlier books of this clever author; but it is none the less interesting and none the less realistic. The plot is unpretentious, and deals with the simplest and most conventional of themes; but the character-drawing is uncommonly strong, especially that of Miss Melinda, which is a remarkably vigorous and interesting transcript from real life, and highly finished to the slightest ...
— The Easiest Way in Housekeeping and Cooking - Adapted to Domestic Use or Study in Classes • Helen Campbell

... you," retorted Endicott, "the requiring of people vowed to the Lord, to dress themselves in a plain and unpretentious manner, a burden too heavy ...
— The Knight of the Golden Melice - A Historical Romance • John Turvill Adams

... himself to the inevitable, he sold his goods, distributed the money to the poor, read the Koran through once every three days, and died in the holy month of Ramadan. His tomb at Hamadan, the ancient Ecbatana, still exists, a simple brickwork building, rectangular in shape, and surrounded by an unpretentious court. It was restored in 1877, but is again in need of repair. The illustration here shown is from a photograph sent by Dr. Neligan of Teheran. Though dead, the great Persian has still a large practice, as his tomb is ...
— The Evolution of Modern Medicine • William Osler

... formerly been always in the tabernacle, and that its present harbourage is therefore in the highest degree unlawful, but, on the contrary, that the present state of matters is the right one,—that until now the ark has invariably been housed under an equally simple and unpretentious roof. As David's tent does not date back to the Exodus, Nathan is necessarily speaking of changing tents and dwellings; the reading of the parallel passage in 1Chron. xvii.5, therefore, correctly interprets the sense. There could be no more fundamental contradiction to the representation ...
— Prolegomena to the History of Israel • Julius Wellhausen

... structures of the Madras Christian College, downward; churches there are of all sizes and architectural design, from the magnificent and beautiful stone edifice which accommodates its thousands and which was erected by the Church Missionary Society in Megnanapuram, Tinnevelly, down to the unpretentious prayer-house of a small village congregation. A host of suitable buildings for hospitals, presses and publishing houses, residences for missionaries and native agents, school dormitories, gymnasia and lecture halls; Y. M. C. A. and other societies' buildings—all these represent ...
— India's Problem Krishna or Christ • John P. Jones

... the bare fact that he had dined with the President was obscurely announced by the Washington papers as a routine item of White House news. Some days later, however, an enterprising correspondent for a Southern paper lifted this unpretentious item from oblivion and sent it to his paper to be blazoned forth in a front-page headline. For days and weeks thereafter the Southern press fairly shrieked with the news of this quiet dinner. The very papers which had most ...
— Booker T. Washington - Builder of a Civilization • Emmett J. Scott and Lyman Beecher Stowe

... scandals, without the promises of Christ having failed, and even that it had to be so, fulfilling His word, "it must needs be that scandals come" (St. Matthew XVIII. 7), that they are therefore rather a confirmation than a stumbling-block to our faith, this is a necessary safeguard. To have some unpretentious knowledge of what is said and thought concerning Holy Scripture, to know at least something about Modernism and other phases of current opinion is necessary, without making a study of their subtilties, for the most insecure attitude of mind for girls is to think they know, in these difficult ...
— The Education of Catholic Girls • Janet Erskine Stuart

... and unpretentious huts where travelling soldiers or Malays put up, these shelters are very useful, especially for the night. There is another kind of pasang-grahan, comfortable structures provided with beds, similar to the rest-houses in India. ...
— Through Central Borneo: - An Account of Two Years' Travel in the Land of Head-Hunters - Between the Years 1913 and 1917 • Carl Lumholtz

... finally, in the great war of the Rebellion, there was constant need of regulars to act as mustering and disbursing officers at the rear. Such had been old Whaling's career, and, so long as he himself was utterly unpretentious,—never claimed to have done any war service, and was content to drift along and draw his pay,—nobody would have said much in detraction had it not been for his wife's persistent pushing. He was merely second in command of his regiment, but the lady spoke of him as "the general" on all occasions, ...
— Marion's Faith. • Charles King

... Oscar went on to the street, and proceeding up town entered a very respectable-looking house which he entered with a night key. It was his home. He had made considerable money and had provided a home for himself. The house outside was very unpretentious, but inside it was as luxurious as the home of a rich bachelor. We will here state for the information of our readers who are making their first acquaintance with Oscar Dunne that in a great case in which he had ...
— Cad Metti, The Female Detective Strategist - Dudie Dunne Again in the Field • Harlan Page Halsey

... and of wants at that forceful period. It is this very variety of the ideas, feelings, interests, motives, and motive tendencies involved in that incident which accounts for the fact that the battle of the Thirty has remained so vividly remembered, and that in 1811 a monument, unpretentious but national, replaced the simple stone at first erected on the field of battle, on the edge of the road from P1o6rmel to Josselin, with this inscription: "To the immortal memory of the battle of the Thirty, gained by Marshal Beaumanoir, on ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume II. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot

... on the Brook—"plain-looking, whitewashed plaster front, and a small garden before and behind"—next door to the former Providence (Baptist) Chapel, now the Drill Hall of the Salvation Army, is a very humble and unpretentious six-roomed dwelling, and of a style very different to the one in Ordnance Terrace. Here the Dickens family lived from 1821 to 1823. The Reverend William Giles, the Baptist Minister, father of Mr. William Giles, the schoolmaster, ...
— A Week's Tramp in Dickens-Land • William R. Hughes

... the house. It was a fairly typical fazenda dwelling, if more substantial than most. It was wholly unpretentious, with whitewashed walls, and the effect of grandeur it would give to natives of this region would come solely from the number of buildings. There were half a dozen ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, June, 1930 • Various

... Darrin had encountered and spoken with or signalled to the commanders of not less than a dozen mine-sweeping craft. What struck Dave as the most prominent feature of these small, unpretentious craft was the slow, systematic way in which ...
— Dave Darrin After The Mine Layers • H. Irving Hancock

... true that the ladies, "one and all," had spoken with entire enthusiasm of their afternoon at the unpretentious home of my neighbor, I, nevertheless, deemed it vital to hold plain speech with that impulsive woman immediately. I saw, indeed, that I should have acted after the ...
— The Boss of Little Arcady • Harry Leon Wilson

... reasonable and more "congruous" that Bacon's book should suggest Bacon. But there it is. That illogical "succession of ideas" which puzzled my Uncle Toby, invariably recalls to me, not the imposing folio to be purchased "next to the Mytre Tauerne" in Fleet Street, but the unpretentious eighteenpenny octavo which, two years later, was on sale at Richard Marriot's in St. Dunstan's churchyard hard by, and did no more than borrow its erudition from the riches ...
— De Libris: Prose and Verse • Austin Dobson

... simple and unpretentious in its architecture, and beautifully embowered amid elms and oaks. Several graceful fawns, and a noble elk, were stalking in the shade of the trees, apparently unconscious of the presence of a few dogs, and not caring for the numerous turkeys, geese, and other domestic animals ...
— John James Audubon • John Burroughs

... unpretentious ceremony that took place inside the long, low house of logs, and yet it was a wonderful thing to the dark, shy maid who hearkened so breathlessly beside the man she had singled out—the clean-cut man in uniform, who stood so straight and tall, making response in a voice that ...
— The Barrier • Rex Beach

... stood overcome by this discovery, retraced his steps almost to the shop-door, in spite of his fear of being recalled, and then raced on his original way, laying a hand on each lamp-post as he passed it In this fashion he arrived at the gate of an unpretentious little house which had many reasons for looking glorious and palatial in his eyes. For one thing, it was a private house. No business of any sort was done there, and its inhabitants lived on their own money. Then it stood back from the road, ...
— Despair's Last Journey • David Christie Murray

... requires enormous vigilance and sympathy. No one can write conclusively about it. Compared with this creative statesmanship, the administering of a routine or the battle for a platitude is a very simple affair. But genuine politics is not an inhuman task. Part of the genuineness is its unpretentious humanity. I am not creating the figure of an ideal statesman out of some inner fancy. That is just the deepest error of our political thinking—to talk of politics without reference to human beings. The creative men appear in public ...
— A Preface to Politics • Walter Lippmann

... in peace with Aristagoras the tinker. Their little home was cosey and comfortable. Xanthippe used to go to see them sometimes, but the sight of their unpretentious happiness made her even more miserable. Meanwhile, too, Xanthippe's old beau, Gatippus, had married; and from Thessaly came reports of the beautiful vineyard and the many wine-presses he had acquired. So Xanthippe's life became somewhat ...
— Second Book of Tales • Eugene Field

... began to converse together, perforce of trivialities. Marian Yule spoke in rather slow tones, thoughtfully, gently; she had linked her fingers, and laid her hands, palms downwards, upon her lap—a nervous action. Her accent was pure, unpretentious; and she used none of the fashionable turns of speech which would have suggested the habit of intercourse with distinctly ...
— New Grub Street • George Gissing

... used to speculate about his antecedents and associations. But I have not known this story long. He only told it me this evening; just an hour or two before he died. Well, we all have our little romances, as you are pleased to call them!" "Yes, yes, all of us. Even I, unpretentious, plain Elizabeth Fairleigh,—but no matter." I mind me, reader, that I promised not to talk of my own experiences. Ah, there are no such phenomena in the world really, as "commonplace" lives, and "commonplace" persons! "Poor little old man!" I sighed again. "Did he ...
— Dreams and Dream Stories • Anna (Bonus) Kingsford

... in regard to the preliminaries and to the building of his house, which was to be on a scale both generous and dignified, were too many, and he also thought the enclosure of two families within the same confines might lead in time to inconveniences on both sides. There happened to be an unpretentious little country house with a garden which I had admired, and which was only separated from his estate by a narrow carriage drive; and this Wesendonck decided to buy for me. I rejoiced beyond measure when I heard of his intention. The shock experienced by the over-cautious buyer ...
— My Life, Volume II • Richard Wagner

... for the reception of the machinery for the cooperative laundry. Not far from the creamery, and also across the road, stood the blacksmith and wheelwright shop. Still farther down the stream were the barn, poultry house, pens, hutches and yards of the little farm—small, economically made, and unpretentious, as were all the buildings save the schoolhouse itself, which was builded for ...
— The Brown Mouse • Herbert Quick

... uttering praises, like one who keepeth crying, 'In the name of God.'"[24] And the Afghan poet Abdu 'r-Rahman says: "Every tree, every shrub, stands ready to bend before him; every herb and blade of grass is a tongue to mutter his praises." And Horace Smith, that most pleasing but unpretentious writer, both of verse and prose, has thus finely amplified the ...
— Flowers from a Persian Garden and Other Papers • W. A. Clouston

... there a phrase in our language more eloquently significant of physical and mental refreshment, more expressive of remission of toil and restful relaxation, or so rich in associations with the comforts and serenity of home life, and also with unpretentious, informal, social intercourse? ...
— Tea Leaves • Francis Leggett & Co.

... there stood in a side street in Kiel an unpretentious old frame house which had a forbidding, almost sinister appearance, with its old-fashioned balcony and its overhanging upper stories. For the last twenty years the house had been occupied by a greatly respected widow, Madame Wolff, to ...
— The Most Interesting Stories of All Nations • Julian Hawthorne

... typical of the man who ruled there and over the little neighbourhood, a tyrant and a despot. The misery of those days laid hold of him, He turned away from the railings and walked Strandwards, past the door of his lodgings and round many side streets, grimy and unpretentious. He walked like a man possessed, but his memories had taken firm hold of him, shadowy but inexorcisable fiends. It was Cicely now who was walking by his side, and his heart was beating with something ...
— The Survivor • E.Phillips Oppenheim

... book. I shall do neither: I have tried to explain my meaning simply and clearly in the book itself, and I am optimistic enough to think that my favourite game is too popular to require an apology for increasing its literature, however unpretentious the attempt may be. Moreover, I am still too much affected by the "brilliant and feverish glow" of enthusiasm to dream of ...
— Lawn Tennis for Ladies • Mrs. Lambert Chambers

... unseemly to go about during the whole week in Sunday clothes. After all he was but an ordinary, commonplace person with whom he was well content, and he came to the conclusion that he had a better chance of living in peace with himself if he lived a simple, unpretentious, unassuming life. ...
— Married • August Strindberg

... explain here that Olaf Jansen, a man who quite recently celebrated his ninety-fifth birthday, has for the last half-dozen years been living alone in an unpretentious bungalow out Glendale way, a short distance from the business ...
— The Smoky God • Willis George Emerson

... past the Bastille and up the Rue des Tournelles to the door of an unpretentious house, upon which he knocked. We were admitted by an old woman to whom Montresor appeared to be known, for, after exchanging a word or two with her, he himself led the way upstairs and opened the door of ...
— The Suitors of Yvonne • Raphael Sabatini

... town is very small, There's no cathedral nor a club, In fact the township, all in all, Is just one unpretentious pub; And there, from all the stations round, The local ...
— Rio Grande's Last Race and Other Verses • Andrew Barton 'Banjo' Paterson

... La Boulaye was no less elegant in dress, for all that, from head to foot—saving the silver buckles on his shoes and the unpretentious lace at throat and wrists—he was dressed in the black that his office demanded. His countenance, too, though cast in a mould of thoughtfulness that bordered on the melancholy, bore a lofty stamp that might have passed for birth and breeding, ...
— The Trampling of the Lilies • Rafael Sabatini

... unpretentious poem, describing in six short cantos the six seasons into which the Hindus divide the year. The title is perhaps a little misleading, as the description is not objective, but deals with the feelings awakened ...
— Translations of Shakuntala and Other Works • Kaalidaasa



Words linked to "Unpretentious" :   plain, modest, quiet, pretentious, tasteful, unpompous, ostentatious, honest, restrained



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