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Insinuating   /ɪnsˈɪnjueɪtɪŋ/   Listen
Insinuating

adjective
1.
Calculated to please or gain favor.  Synonyms: ingratiating, ingratiatory.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Insinuating" Quotes from Famous Books



... youngest child of Charles L, born July 6th, 16—, who, with his sister Elizabeth, was allowed a meeting with his father on the night before the King's execution. Burnet says: "He was active, and loved business; was apt to have particular friendships, and had an insinuating temper which was generally very acceptable. The King loved him much better than the Duke of York." He died of smallpox at Whitehall, September 13th, 1660, and was buried ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys

... Betty," said Madame Marneffe, in an insinuating voice, "are you capable of devoted friendship, put to any test? Shall we henceforth be sisters? Will you swear to me never to have a secret from me any more than I from you—to act as my spy, as I will ...
— Poor Relations • Honore de Balzac

... Francois I the Cour des Miracles had a physiognomy much more strongly marked than under Louis XIV. The narrow and miry streets, insinuating themselves between the hovels in wood, halting and crippled, turned and returned upon themselves, to end finally in a repulsive sewer. Neither air nor sunshine ever penetrated into these infamous alleys, from which escaped, at all seasons of the year, nauseating ...
— Paris from the Earliest Period to the Present Day; Volume 1 • William Walton

... smooth, deceiue, and cogge, Ducke with French nods, and Apish curtesie, I must be held a rancorous Enemy. Cannot a plaine man liue, and thinke no harme, But thus his simple truth must be abus'd, With silken, slye, insinuating Iackes? Grey. To who in all this presence speaks your Grace? Rich. To thee, that hast nor Honesty, nor Grace: When haue I iniur'd thee? When done thee wrong? Or thee? or thee? or any of your Faction? A plague vpon you all. His Royall Grace (Whom God preserue better then you would wish) ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare

... blonde, with eyebrows nearly white, and pale blue eyes, almost round; her speech honeyed, her look hypocritical, her manners insinuating and insidious. ...
— The Mysteries of Paris V2 • Eugene Sue

... voice is an agreeable one, rather deep, and not particularly smooth. She talked about America, and of our unwholesome modes of life, as to eating and exercise, and of the ill-health especially of our women; but I opposed this view as far as I could with any truth, insinuating my opinion that we are about as healthy as other people, and affirming for a certainty that we live longer. In good faith, so far as I have any knowledge of the matter, the women of England are as generally out of health as those of America; always something ...
— Passages From the English Notebooks, Complete • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... life, despite incessant snares, have the fowlers really caged me. And even then I was let out every time I had to plead in one of your cases. It was quite illegal," and he laughed at the recollection of the many miracles his eloquence, now insinuating, now ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill

... have any influence over him. Mr. Hastings himself reproaches the Nabob with raising mean men to be his companions, and tells him plainly, that some persons, both of bad character and base origin, had found the means of insinuating themselves into his company and constant fellowship. In such society it is not likely that either the Nabob's morals or his understanding could have been much improved; nor could it be deemed prudent to leave him without any check upon his conduct. Mr. Hastings's ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. VIII. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... permitted, but assisted, his fancy in shaping what it would. Nor must we omit his meagerness and entire featureliness, face and frame, which Cervantes gives us at once: "It is said that his surname was 'Quixada' or 'Quesada,'" &c.—even in this trifle showing an exquisite judgment;—just once insinuating the association of 'lantern-jaws' into the reader's mind, yet not retaining it obtrusively like the names in old farces and in the Pilgrim's Progress,—but taking for the regular appellative one which had the no meaning of a proper name ...
— Literary Remains (1) • Coleridge

... nonsense if the eyes of Europe were not on us. Mother Jael is telling fortunes in that tent, my fairy queen, so let us go in and question her about the future. Besides,' added George, with an insinuating smile, 'I don't suppose she would mind if I gave you ...
— The Bishop's Secret • Fergus Hume

... and the court having been absent for some time from Rome, this disguised heresiarch had seized the opportunity for gaining the ear of the populace by inveighing against the vices of ecclesiastics, and insinuating opinions to which he gave a color of truth by citations from Scripture and the early fathers. Two of Loyola's colleagues, Salmeron and Lainez, who in their passage through Germany had become skilled ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 9 • Various

... dark, but a sunbeam can light the side of it. Thy utmost efforts cannot prevent the fall of this castle; but thou mayst hasten it, and the doing so shall avail thee much." Thus speaking, he drew close up to Wilkin, and sunk his voice to an insinuating whisper, as he said, "Never did the withdrawing of a bar, or the raising of a portcullis, bring such vantage to Fleming as they may to thee, if ...
— The Betrothed • Sir Walter Scott

... are called Winifred and Marion. They have long pale faces, long fair hair, and charming dark-lashed eyes. Winifred looks delicate, and has an insinuating little lisp; Marion, when amused, has a deep, fat chuckle, which makes one long to hug her on the spot. They are badly dressed, badly shod, their stockings lie in wrinkles all the way up, but they look thorough little ladies despite of all, and "behave as sich". They came ...
— The Lady of the Basement Flat • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey

... allowed herself to be deluded by a Gipsy woman, of artful and insinuating address, to a very great extent. This lady admired a young gentleman, and the Gipsy promised that he would return her love. The lady gave her all the plate in the house, and a gold chain and locket, with no other security than a vain promise that they should ...
— Gipsy Life - being an account of our Gipsies and their children • George Smith

... The insinuating sneer on Kirby's lips changed into the semblance of a smile. Slowly, deliberately, never once glancing down at the face of his cards, he turned them up one by one with his white fingers, his challenging eyes on the Judge; but the others ...
— The Devil's Own - A Romance of the Black Hawk War • Randall Parrish

... what extremes the party calling itself Conservative has hinted its willingness to go, under the plea of restored Union, but with the object of regained power. At Philadelphia, they went as far as they publicly dared in insinuating that the South would be justified in another rebellion, and their journals have more than once prompted the President to violent measures, which would as certainly be his ruin as they would lead to incalculable ...
— The Writings of James Russell Lowell in Prose and Poetry, Volume V - Political Essays • James Russell Lowell

... repeated, aghast. "'For the honor of my father's memory.' What do you mean, Dr. Franklin? You have gone too far not to speak plainly. Do you dare—are you insinuating, that there was something disgraceful, dishonorable about my father's insolvency? You have been my spiritual adviser nearly all my life, and when you tell me that my father was a bankrupt, that the knowledge comes to you from his best friends and will be corroborated by his attorneys, ...
— The Crevice • William John Burns and Isabel Ostrander

... of nothing, but of breaking the law," said Williams, quickly. Then he added in an insinuating tone: "But I tell them, ladies don't stop long in country visits, not at this time of the year. And a thing can be put up with for short that any man'd kick at for long. Madame the Countess will be moving on to pay her other visits, Sir Thomas, if I might ...
— Sir Tom • Mrs. Oliphant

... again. And the temptation had a personal source. There are beings who desire to draw men away from God. The serpent, by its poison and its loathly form, is the natural symbol of such an enemy of man. The insinuating slyness of the suggestions of evil is like the sinuous gliding of the snake, and truly represents the process by which temptation found its way into the hearts of the first pair, and of all their descendants. For it begins with casting a doubt on the reality ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus and Numbers • Alexander Maclaren

... flattering observation every time anyone's name is mentioned, and she will never be guilty of criticising a living person or a dead one. She will make it her rule in life, in order to sustain her reputation, never to make an enemy. She will cultivate the insinuating art of shaking hands, of smiling sweetly, and of making apropos remarks. No one will ever leave her without feeling that she is an exceedingly gracious person. She will even convey to them, in her inimitable way, the impression ...
— The Eugenic Marriage, Vol. 3 (of 4) - A Personal Guide to the New Science of Better Living and Better Babies • W. Grant Hague

... you seem disposed to undertake his defence all of a sudden," Luzhin observed, twisting his lips into an ambiguous smile, "there's no doubt that he is an astute man, and insinuating where ladies are concerned, of which Marfa Petrovna, who has died so strangely, is a terrible instance. My only desire has been to be of service to you and your mother with my advice, in view of the renewed efforts which may certainly ...
— Crime and Punishment • Fyodor Dostoyevsky

... after the other and occasionally Parker. Poor Skinny alone was neglected. She seemed to have forgotten that he existed save when, from time to time, she suggested that he put this or that record on the graphophone. To each of the cowboys she whispered tender little sentiments, gave soulful looks and insinuating smiles—all but caressed them openly. Ophelia did like things to Old Heck, ...
— The Ramblin' Kid • Earl Wayland Bowman

... you now being conducted around Paris by your Cousin Philippe. I'll be bound he thinks you need a courier even when you go to a Duval restaurant, the sly dog. I know his type: small and dark, with a pointed beard and insinuating manner. ...
— Molly Brown's Orchard Home • Nell Speed

... almost to the top of the cage; he snatched them up one by one and ran through them. He had a sore hand, too; it had been poisoned by infectious money. Two weeks later, when the teller had returned from sick-leave, head office refused to pay his doctor's bill, insinuating that the poison ...
— A Canadian Bankclerk • J. P. Buschlen

... nothing strange in that, Bob; let me tell you, that sprightly grace and insinuating manner of yours will do some mischief among ...
— The Rivals - A Comedy • Richard Brinsley Sheridan

... him; but his logical faculty isn't quite straight, somehow: he lets his feelings have too much weight and prominence against his calmer reason! I can easily understand how, with his tastes and leanings, the clericals should have managed to get a hold over him. The clericals are such insinuating cunning fellows. A very impressionable boy Artie was, always; the poetical temperament and the artistic temperament always is impressionable, I suppose; but shoemaking certainly does develop the logical ...
— Philistia • Grant Allen

... looked at her with a mixture of awe and exultation. "Of course you realize, Adelaide, that in suggesting this you're insinuating the most ...
— The Reef • Edith Wharton

... Stanhope, unless—unless you could find it in your benevolent heart to take me in yourself;" and his smile was very insinuating. "In that case I should have the luxury of intellectual companionship superadded to the other advantages ...
— Elsie's Girlhood • Martha Finley

... be a loser now and then,' said Mr. Kingsland, softly insinuating himself among the ladies;—'it gets so much more than its due ...
— Wych Hazel • Susan and Anna Warner

... relating to rules and regulations, when he found that the unanimous opinion of the Committee was the other way, he turned himself round and argued against his own proposal, stating or anticipating the objections of the others, just insinuating incidentally counter-arguments, and ending by letting the question ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William IV, Vol. III • Charles C. F. Greville

... compliments are only an insinuating prelude to calumnious accusations against your friends ...
— The Forty-Five Guardsmen • Alexandre Dumas

... in Gloucestershire allowed herself to be deluded by a Gipsy woman of artful and insinuating address, to a very great extent. This lady admired a young gentleman, and the Gipsy promised that he would return her love. The lady gave her all the plate in the house, and a gold chain and locket, with no other security than a vain promise that ...
— The Gipsies' Advocate - or, Observations on the Origin, Character, Manners, and Habits of - The English Gipsies • James Crabb

... commanding. Though its power be most conspicuous and least controulable in the higher classes of society, it seems, like some resistless conqueror, to spare neither age, nor sex, nor condition; and taking ten thousand shapes, insinuating itself under the most specious pretexts, and sheltering itself when necessary under the most artful disguises, it winds its way in secret, when it dares not openly avow itself, and mixes in all we think, and speak, and do. It is in some instances the determined ...
— A Practical View of the Prevailing Religious System of Professed Christians, in the Middle and Higher Classes in this Country, Contrasted with Real Christianity. • William Wilberforce

... me to say I was not insinuating anything against her people. But she was just then supersensitive on the subject, though I did not suspect it. She flushed hotly. "You will not have any cause to sneer at my people on that account hereafter," she said. "I ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 5, June 1905 • Various

... Idavold, where the gods were still hurling missiles at Balder, Hodur alone leaning mournfully against a tree the while, and taking no part in the game. Carelessly Loki approached the blind god, and assuming an appearance of interest, he inquired the cause of his melancholy, at the same time artfully insinuating that pride and indifference prevented him from participating in the sport. In answer to these remarks, Hodur pleaded that only his blindness deterred him from taking part in the new game, and when Loki ...
— Myths of the Norsemen - From the Eddas and Sagas • H. A. Guerber

... and Sophy Streatfield, a rich widow's daughter. Under January, 1779, she wrote in her "Thraliana," "Mr. Thrale has fallen in love, really and seriously, with Sophy Streatfield; but there is no wonder in that; she is very pretty, very gentle, soft, and insinuating; hangs about him, dances round him, cries when she parts from him, squeezes his hand slily, and with her sweet eyes full of tears looks so fondly in his face—and all for love of me, as she pretends, that I can hardly sometimes ...
— Anecdotes of the late Samuel Johnson, LL.D. - during the last twenty years of his life • Hester Lynch Piozzi

... talk from the lips of the two ladies had the merit of being perfect of its kind—softly insinuating and sweetly censorious, superlative in eulogy and infallible in opinion. The good visitors most conscientiously discharged what they deemed a great moral and social duty by enlightening the Lady de Tilly on all the ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby

... it would seem that the Laird of Brodie was something less than a gentleman? Could his majesty intend to satirise the alleged royal descent of Brodie from Bruidhie, the son of Billi, king of the Picts (see James' Critical Essay), by insinuating that the "Picts" and their descendants were not entitled to be ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 196, July 30, 1853 • Various

... support of her laying down that certain Americans could tell immediately who other Americans were, leaving him to judge whether or no she herself belonged to the critical or only to the criticised half of the nation. Mrs. Dangerfield was a handsome confidential insinuating woman, with whom Vogelstein felt his talk take a very wide range indeed. She convinced him rather effectually that even in a great democracy there are human differences, and that American life was full of social distinctions, of delicate shades, which foreigners often lack ...
— Pandora • Henry James

... his acquiescence, and tried to make out something complimentary; but, between his submission to her taste, and his having always intended the same himself, with the superadded objects of professing attention to the comfort of ladies in general, and of insinuating that there was one only whom he was anxious to please, he grew puzzled, and Edmund was glad to put an end to his speech by a proposal of wine. Mr. Rushworth, however, though not usually a great talker, had still more to say on the subject next his heart. "Smith has not much above a hundred acres ...
— Persuasion • Jane Austen

... nothing to that of the man he was engaged in tormenting. The terrified mouse does not struggle more eagerly to escape the claws of the cat, than the suffering father of Pandora to avoid implicating her in the eyes of his insinuating confessor. ...
— All's Well - Alice's Victory • Emily Sarah Holt

... indecisive mouth, a habit of running his hand through his light-coloured hair, and a gaze which usually settles in fixed admiration on his faultless boots, can be no one but Howard Tracy; the third, a fellow with far more meaning and strength in his face, betrays himself to be Mackworth, by the insinuating plausibility and Belial-like grace of his manner and aspect. A dangerous serpent this; one never sees him, or hears him speak, or observes the dark glitter of his eye, without being reminded of a cerastes lythely rustling through the ...
— St. Winifred's - The World of School • Frederic W. Farrar

... spoken of government as something purely negative, so little important that only when a man saw his property threatened or his shores invaded, was he forced to recollect that he had a country. Godwin saw its influence everywhere, insinuating itself into our personal dispositions and insensibly communicating its spirit to our private transactions. The idea in his hands made for hope. Reform, or better still, abolish governments, and to what heights of virtue might not men aspire? We need not say with Rousseau ...
— Shelley, Godwin and Their Circle • H. N. Brailsford

... whether you consider 'Bar' an instance, in reference to K F, of a suggested likeness in not many touches!" The likeness no one could mistake; and, though that particular Bar has since been moved into a higher and happier sphere, Westminster-hall is in no danger of losing "the insinuating Jury-droop, and persuasive double-eyeglass," by which this keen observer could express a type of character in ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster

... said, in his most insinuating tones, "I thought you might have granted so much to an old friend and faithful admirer like myself. There is no great harm ...
— A Crooked Path - A Novel • Mrs. Alexander

... dear fellow; now's your time." Or perhaps, brusquely, with a friendly scolding, "Well, so you don't mean to be one of us." When it's a man in society who is to be caught a translator of Ariosto or a writer of amateur plays, there is a gentler and more insinuating way of playing off the trick. And if our fashionable writer protests that he is not a gun of sufficient calibre, the Recruiting-Academidan brings out the regular phrase, that "the Academie is a club." Lord bless us, how useful that phrase has been! "The Academie is a club, and its admission ...
— The Immortal - Or, One Of The "Forty." (L'immortel) - 1877 • Alphonse Daudet

... arrogance exceeding all belief! Summer, my lord, this saucy upstart Jack, That now doth rule the chariot of the sun, And makes all stars derive their light from him, Is a most base, insinuating slave, The sum[44] of parsimony and disdain; One that will shine on friends and foes alike, That under brightest smiles hideth black show'rs Whose envious breath doth dry up springs and lake And burns the grass, that beasts ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VIII (4th edition) • Various

... The insinuating softness was not more acceptable than the inquisitorial curiosity. I was silent. He came into the room, sat down on the bench about two yards from me, and persevered long, and, for him, patiently, in attempts ...
— Villette • Charlotte Bronte

... inquiry—and, with all her Creole bows, smiles, and insinuating phrases, the severity of her countenance but partially waned—"I came to see my physician—your son. Ah! General, when I find you reconciled to your son, it makes me think I am in heaven. You will ...
— Old Creole Days • George Washington Cable

... New York friends, performed this amiable office. She assigned the possible cause, though not directly—Mrs. Nailor rarely did things directly. She was a small, purring lady, with a tilt of the head, and an insinuating voice of singular clearness, with a question-mark in it. She was of a very good family, lived in a big house on Murray Hill, and had as large a circle of acquaintance as any one in New York. She prided herself on knowing everybody worth knowing, and everything about everybody. ...
— Gordon Keith • Thomas Nelson Page

... to give credibility and respectability to this false and libellous publication by invoking the authority, not of reason or truth, but of his mere "professional" position as professor in Harvard University, thereby artfully suggesting and insinuating to the uninformed public that Harvard University sustains him in his attack; whereas, in conferring upon me the degree of doctor of philosophy and in committing to me formerly the conduct of an advanced course of philosophical instruction, Harvard ...
— A Public Appeal for Redress to the Corporation and Overseers of Harvard University - Professor Royce's Libel • Francis Ellingwood Abbot

... make his fortune in this ancient capital of the world must be a chameleon susceptible of reflecting all the colours of the atmosphere that surrounds him—a Proteus apt to assume every form, every shape. He must be supple, flexible, insinuating; close, inscrutable, often base, sometimes sincere, some times perfidious, always concealing a part of his knowledge, indulging in one tone of voice, patient, a perfect master of his own countenance as cold as ice when any other man would ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt

... comfortable night; but a pocketful of pears has to suffice for supper, and when the unsubstantial fuel is burned away, my airy chamber on the bleak mountain-side and the thin cambric tent affords little protection from the insinuating chilliness of the night air. Variety is said to be the spice of life; no doubt it is, under certain conditions, but I think it all depends on the conditions whether it is spicy or not spicy. For instance, the vicissitudes of fortune that favor me with bread and sour milk for dinner, ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle V1 • Thomas Stevens

... lack of authority: the real apostles always received pay. In the same way they misconstrued his abstinence from marriage. They were men not without ability for the work they had undertaken: they had smooth, insinuating tongues, they could assume an air of dignity, and they ...
— The Life of St. Paul • James Stalker

... a Spotty-faced Man, happen to pass; and join the group out of innocent curiosity.) Will you give me a penny for this, Sir? (To the Spotty-faced One, who shakes his head.) To oblige Me! (This is said in such an insinuating tone, that it is impossible to resist him.) Now you've shown your confidence in me, will you open that packet and show the company what ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 103, December 10, 1892 • Various

... fascination. It was quite unlike the way any other girl had ever looked at him. Other girls looked at you side-wise or averted their eyes when they met yours. But this was different. It was mocking, impertinent, insinuating, but it did not displease him. He saw that he had made an impression, an instantaneous impression. He mystified her perhaps but he interested her intensely. For the first time he had ...
— Skippy Bedelle - His Sentimental Progress From the Urchin to the Complete - Man of the World • Owen Johnson

... your eyes! Johanna man like English very much. God d—n! That very good? Eh? Devilish hot, sir! What news? Hope your ship stay too long while, very. D—n my eye! Very fine day.' After which, in a sort of whisper, accompanied by a most insinuating smile, his lordship, or his grace, as the rank of the party might be, would add:—'You want orange? You want goat? Cheap! I got good, very. You send me you clothes; I wash with my own hand—clean! fine! very! I got every thing, plenty, great, much! God d—n!' And then, as if to clench ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. XIX. No. 540, Saturday, March 31, 1832 • Various

... Government. In the last century and a half, the nation was often afflicted with sensual royalty, bloody wars, venal statesmen, corrupt constituencies, bribery and violence at elections, flagitious drunkenness pervading all ranks, and insinuating itself into Colleges and Rectories. The prisons of the country had been in a most disgraceful state; the fairs and waits were scenes of rude debauchery, and the theatres were—still, in this nineteenth century—whispered to ...
— Phases of Faith - Passages from the History of My Creed • Francis William Newman

... round the girls went, passing in turn out of the arms of an old into those of a young man, and back again. If they stayed their feet for a moment, Mrs. Barton glided across the floor, and, with insinuating gestures and intonations of voice, would beg of them to continue. She declared that it was la grace et la beaute, etc. The merriment did not cease until half-past six. Some of the company then left, and some few were detained for dinner. A new pianist ...
— Muslin • George Moore

... the concurrence of Mr. Pratt, the only other medical man of the same standing in Milby. Otherwise, it was remarkable how strongly these two clever men were contrasted. Pratt was middle-sized, insinuating, and silvery-voiced; Pilgrim was tall, heavy, rough-mannered, and spluttering. Both were considered to have great powers of conversation, but Pratt's anecdotes were of the fine old crusted quality to be procured only of Joe Miller; Pilgrim's had the full fruity flavour of the most recent ...
— Scenes of Clerical Life • George Eliot

... you are! How is it you've gone so deep into everything?" The woman's voice was more and more insinuating. ...
— The Brothers Karamazov • Fyodor Dostoyevsky

... new feeling in the courtroom. He was a new presence; the personality had a changed significance. At first the public, the jury, and the judge were curiously attracted, surprised into a fresh interest. The voice had an insinuating quality, but it also had a measured force, a subterranean insistence, a winning tactfulness. Withal, a logical simplicity governed his argument. The flaneur, the poseur—if such he was—no longer ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker

... disconcerting possibility occurred abruptly to Mr. Heatherbloom. It was born in the darkness of the hour; he could not dispel it. What if the person in whom he had confided in the park were not all she seemed? He hated the insinuating suggestion but it insisted on creeping into his brain. He had once, not so long ago, in his search for cheap lodgings, stumbled upon a roomful of alleged cripples and maimed disreputables who made mendicancy a profession; ...
— A Man and His Money • Frederic Stewart Isham

... the first thing of mine that had made a noise was my picture of Pepita, exhibited the year before. There'd been a lot of talk about that, orders were beginning to come in, and I wanted to follow it up with a rousing big thing at the next Salon. Then the critics had been insinuating that I could do only Spanish things—I suppose I had overdone the castanet business; it's a nursery-disease we all go through—and I wanted to show that I had plenty more shot in my locker. Don't you get up every morning meaning to prove you're equal to Balzac or Thackeray? That's the ...
— The Greater Inclination • Edith Wharton

... seen this mild black cat before, and I fancy no one had ever seen her three roly-poly, jet-black kits. Such a confiding puss I never met, for when I started back, surprised, Mrs. Bunch merely looked at me with an insinuating purr, and began to pick at my ...
— Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag, Vol. 5 - Jimmy's Cruise in the Pinafore, Etc. • Louisa M. Alcott

... what's all this?" said Thuillier; "what are you insinuating? Didn't you settle everything with Brigitte the other day? You take a pretty time to come and talk to me about your love-affairs, when the sword of justice ...
— The Lesser Bourgeoisie • Honore de Balzac

... with an insinuating mildness which seemed to touch her. "I have heard a mysterious conversation—I know of a guilty appointment—and I expect great things from my peep-hole and my pipe-hole to-night. Pray don't be alarmed, but I think we are on the ...
— Masterpieces of Mystery In Four Volumes - Detective Stories • Various

... a matter to discuss with that gentleman," he said. Paul looked surprised. "M. de Roustache," Guillaume continued with an insinuating smile, "is not ignorant of recent events; he moves in the world of affairs. I think we might help one another. And there is no harm in being popular with the—with—er—my department, instead of being—well, rather unpopular, eh, my dear ...
— Captain Dieppe • Anthony Hope

... to say that young HOWARD, who, having only laid low a couple of black cocks and a blue hare, was immoderately jealous of my superior skilfulness, did seek to depreciate it by insinuating that my grouse was one which, having been seriously wounded by other hands some days previously, had come up to the hills to shuffle off its mortal coil in seclusion, arguing thus from its total absence of heat ...
— Baboo Jabberjee, B.A. • F. Anstey

... blasphemy, cry out and stop their ears. The indignation is universal. Eusebius and his party are in consternation. Arius has been too outspoken. He has stated his opinions too crudely; such frankness will not do here; he is no longer among the ignorant. Eusebius himself rises to speak and, with the insinuating and charming manner for which he is famous, tries to gloss over ...
— Saint Athanasius - The Father of Orthodoxy • F.A. [Frances Alice] Forbes

... on the road to Ch'in we are told that he practised ceremonies with his disciples beneath the shadow of a tree by the wayside in Sung. In the spirit of Laou-tsze, Hwuy T'uy, an officer in the neighborhood, was angered at his reported "proud air and many desires, his insinuating habit and wild will," and attempted to prevent him entering the state. In this endeavor, however, he was unsuccessful, as were some more determined opponents, who two years later attacked him at Poo, when he was on his way to Wei. On this occasion he was seized, ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 1 • Various

... making a present of it to Elsie?' she returned, with an insinuating tone and turn of ...
— David Poindexter's Disappearance and Other Tales • Julian Hawthorne

... with such wonderful agility that no boy on earth could have resisted following her. The woman said something to her husband which the children did not understand, though they did not know that it was because she spoke to him in the Venetian dialect; then she turned to Beppo and said with an insinuating smile, "Where is it that ...
— The Italian Twins • Lucy Fitch Perkins

... sure of it. She must propose for him herself, for he will never have the courage to do so; I see through her, and I am sure you must do the same. He is flattered by the constant attentions, and little notes, and insinuating manners of a very handsome, fashionable, agreeable woman; and she thinks Glanyravon Park and a man of fortune that she will be able to turn round her fingers, better than the jointure she will have to live upon when her daughter leaves ...
— Gladys, the Reaper • Anne Beale

... studios we say croquer, craunch, nibble, for sketching," interposed Mistigris, with an insinuating air, "and we are always wanting to croquer beautiful heads. That's the origin of the expression, 'She ...
— A Start in Life • Honore de Balzac

... bounties showered upon Pamela by her husband, and her almost abject gratitude for them. Only of course "the good man" could never be guilty of Mr. B.'s meditated relapse from the path of rectitude, nor (one may perhaps add) does Miss Byron seem to possess the insinuating astuteness by which ...
— The English Novel • George Saintsbury

... a lad in the University of Oxford who was by his poverty forced to leave his studies there and at last to join himself to a company of vagabond gipsies. Among these extravagant people, by the insinuating subtilty of his carriage, he quickly got so much of their love and esteem that they discovered to him their mystery. After he had been a pretty while exercised in the trade, there chanced to ride by a couple of scholars who had formerly been of his acquaintance. ...
— Matthew Arnold's Sohrab and Rustum and Other Poems • Matthew Arnold

... sixteen, well set up, with a pleasant, merry, freckled face, and a pair of dancing eyes. There was an air at once deprecatory and insinuating about the rascal that I thought I recognised. There came to me from my own boyhood memories of certain passionate admirations long passed away, and the objects of them long ago discredited or dead. ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 20 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... more usual than to attempt a reconstruction of Aryan ideas in manners, customs, laws, and religious conceptions, by placing side by side similar traits of individual Aryan nations, and stating or insinuating that the result of the comparison shows that one is handling primitive characteristics of the whole Aryan body. It is of special importance, therefore, to see in how far the views and practices of peoples ...
— The Religions of India - Handbooks On The History Of Religions, Volume 1, Edited By Morris Jastrow • Edward Washburn Hopkins

... have a little talk with you, Mr. Tripp," said Debby, with her most insinuating smile. "It is such a long time since we saw you. Tom, unfasten my overall at the back, please, and I will carry it over my arm. It is very hot to-day," she added, by way of ...
— Anxious Audrey • Mabel Quiller-Couch

... Hispaniola is certainly here meant, to which Americus has chosen to give the fabulous or hypothetical name of Antilia, formerly mentioned; perhaps with the concealed intention of depreciating the grand discovery of Columbus, by insinuating that the Antilles were known long before ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. III. • Robert Kerr

... Schlegel—have depreciated the Frenchman's invention, by insinuating that were all that Moliere borrowed taken from him, little would remain of his own. But they were not aware of his dramatic creation, even when he appropriated the slight inventions of others; they have not distinguished the eras of the genius of Moliere, and the distinct classes ...
— Literary Character of Men of Genius - Drawn from Their Own Feelings and Confessions • Isaac D'Israeli

... he tells them, that that very Jesus whom they had slain and hanged on a tree, him God had raised up, and exalted to be a Prince and a Saviour, to give repentance to Israel, and forgiveness of sins: ver. 29-31. Still insinuating, that though they had killed him, and to this day rejected him, yet his business was to bestow upon them repentance ...
— The Jerusalem Sinner Saved • John Bunyan

... He paused, and then added, mair sternly, "If I understand your trick, sir, you want to take advantage of some malicious reports concerning things in this family, and particularly respecting my father's sudden death, thereby to cheat me out of the money, and perhaps take away my character, by insinuating that I have received the rent I am demanding.—Where do you suppose this money to be?—I ...
— The Haunters & The Haunted - Ghost Stories And Tales Of The Supernatural • Various

... insinuating the movement with a slight wriggle that ran through his apparently rigid body. She quickened her speed, leaning ...
— Star-Dust • Fannie Hurst

... was more pronounced. All that remained of her former attractions were the caressing glance of her eye, tresses still golden and abundant, especially as seen under the close cap of black net, white teeth, and a voice that had lost nothing of its insinuating sweetness. ...
— A Woodland Queen, Complete • Andre Theuriet

... houses, dark and solemn with heavy carved oak, the smart plate-glass windows of the modern shops, the square dogmatic church towers and the pointed insinuating spires—all seemed to listen in surprise to this being who was not content to let another suffer for her. For civilization as it now stands is based solely on this one thing—vicarious suffering. From the central doctrine of its chief creed to the system of its ...
— Gone to Earth • Mary Webb

... openly against his rival would have been madness; for he was not a man to be thwarted in his amours, any more than that stormy lover, Achilles. Ichabod, therefore, made his advances in a quiet and gently insinuating manner. Under cover of his character of singing-master, he made frequent visits at the farmhouse; not that he had anything to apprehend from the meddlesome interference of parents, which is so often a stumbling block ...
— Legends That Every Child Should Know • Hamilton Wright Mabie

... rode up-town together on the bus. Alfred was no less silky and insinuating than in the beginning, but whereas at first he had been genuinely candid, he now ...
— The Deaves Affair • Hulbert Footner

... Day and night the insinuating Count followed her; and when, at the end of a fortnight, and in the midst of a tete-a-tete, he plunged, one morning, suddenly on his knees, and said, "Leonora, do you love me?" the poor thing heaved the gentlest, tenderest, sweetest sigh ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray

... reckoned family people,—ever since their Eldest Son was affianced to the Princess Charlotte here, last visit they made. To Princess Charlotte, Wilhelmina's second junior,—mischievous, coquettish creature she, though very pretty and insinuating, who seems to think her Intended rather a phlegmatic young gentleman, as Wilhelmina gradually discovers. Then there is old Duke Eberhard Ludwig, of Wurtemberg, whom we saw at Ludwigsburg last year, in an intricate condition with his female world and otherwise, ...
— History Of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. VIII. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle

... Case, and in common Life, a wild extravagant Pencil for one that is truly bold and great, an impudent Fellow for a Man of true Courage and Bravery, hasty and unreasonable Actions for Enterprizes of Spirit and Resolution, gaudy Colouring for that which is truly beautiful, a false and insinuating Discourse for simple Truth elegantly recommended. The Parallel will hold through all the Parts of Life and Painting too; and the Virtuosos above-mentioned will be glad to see you draw it with your Terms of Art. ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele

... but she was also acutely sensitive to the bold yet deferential appeal to her emotions of the dark, distinguished, bearded man at her side, with the brown eyes and the Grecian profile, whose years spent in the Foreign Office and at embassies on the Continent had given him a tact and an insinuating address peculiarly alluring to her sex. She was well aware of Ian Stafford's ambitions, and had come to the point where she delighted in them, and had thought of sharing in them, "for weal or for woe"; but she would probably have resented the suggestion that his comparative poverty ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker

... being discontinued in some measure when the priest was a resident at the Hall. Even Sir Hildebrand himself put some restraint upon his conduct at such times, which, perhaps, rendered Father Vaughan's presence rather irksome than otherwise. He had the well-bred, insinuating, and almost flattering address peculiar to the clergy of his persuasion, especially in England, where the lay Catholic, hemmed in by penal laws, and by the restrictions of his sect and recommendation of his pastor, often exhibits a reserved, and ...
— Rob Roy, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott

... forty-six years of age, of a florid complexion and goodly presence, though a little inclined to corpulency; social, insinuating, and somewhat specious in his manners, with a strong degree of self-approbation. A long course of solicitation; haunting public offices and antechambers, and "knocking about town," had taught him, it was said, how to wheedle and flatter, and ...
— The Life of George Washington, Volume I • Washington Irving

... projects of those venerable politicians who are continually appealing to the public to surrender, bit by bit, its humanity, its morality, its Christianity, for what are ludicrously misnamed practical advantages, and who slowly sap the moral vitality of a people through an insinuating appeal to their temporary interests. The heart of a nation may be eaten out by this process, without its losing any external signs of prosperity and strength; but the process itself is resisted, and the nation kept alive and impelled forward, by the purifying, though disturbing ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 93, July, 1865 • Various

... time, through relations intimate and confidential, I became conscious that certain foreign ideas—the natural outgrowth of excessive poverty and despotism in the Old World—were insinuating themselves into the hearts and minds of American labourers to an extent perilous to their own prosperity and to the very ...
— Representative Plays by American Dramatists: 1856-1911: Paul Kauvar; or, Anarchy • Steele Mackaye

... followed the Snoodle, too, if he had wagged himself at you in that delightful, insinuating fashion, rolled over and over across your foot, and then gone frisking down the path, looking back beguilingly over ...
— The Garden of the Plynck • Karle Wilson Baker

... by the tumult and toil of the round-up. She recalled that Don Carlos had been presented to her, and that she had not liked his dark, striking face with its bold, prominent, glittering eyes and sinister lines; and she had not liked his suave, sweet, insinuating voice or his subtle manner, with its slow bows and gestures. She had thought he looked handsome and dashing on the magnificent black horse. However, now that Alfred's words made her think, she recalled that wherever she had been in the field the noble horse, with his silver-mounted ...
— The Light of Western Stars • Zane Grey

... power unsurpassed. He possessed a characteristic rare among men who have been long accustomed to lead,—he was a good listener. He gave deferential attention to remarks addressed to him, paid the graceful and insinuating compliment of seeming much impressed, and offered the delicate flattery, when he came to reply, of repeating the argument of his opponent in phrase far more affluent and eloquent than that in ...
— Twenty Years of Congress, Volume 2 (of 2) • James Gillespie Blaine

... causes of sufficient force for the same purpose. There is in the rootes of these mountaines a matter most apt to be set on fire, comming so neere as it doeth to the nature of brimstone and pitch. There is ayer also which insinuating it selfe by passages, and holes, into the very bowels of the earth, doeth puffe vp the nourishment of so huge a fire, together with Salt-peter, by which puffing (as it were with certeine bellowes) a most ardent flame is kindled. [Sidenote: Three naturall causes of firie mountaines.] ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques and Discoveries - of the English Nation, v. 1, Northern Europe • Richard Hakluyt

... he was falling asleep, a remembrance of the insinuating perfume returned to him. He wondered whose cheque it was, and regretted not having looked at the signature, and many times during the succeeding weeks he paused as he was making entries in the ledger to think ...
— The Untilled Field • George Moore

... clean-shaven; whose eyes were keen and small and twinkling; whose fat hand (offered to P. Sybarite) was strikingly white and dimpled and well-manicured; whose dignity and poise (alike inimitable) combined with the complaisance of a seasoned student of mankind to mark an individuality at once insinuating and forceful. ...
— The Day of Days - An Extravaganza • Louis Joseph Vance

... policy, not more laudable than this, in reading these moral lectures, which lessens our hatred to criminals and our pity to sufferers by insinuating that it has been owing to their fault or folly that the latter have become the prey of the former. By flattering us that we are not subject to the same vices and follies, it induces a confidence that we shall not suffer the same evils by a contact with the infamous gang of robbers ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. VI. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... the two races is as clear in their personal appearance and bearing, as in the aspect of their plantations. The Frenchman is generally a spruce, dapper little gentleman, brisk, obsequious, and insinuating in manner, and usually betraying minute attention to externals. The American is always plain in dress—evincing no more taste in costume than in horticulture—steady, calm, and never lively in manner: blunt, straightforward, and independent in discourse. The one is amiable ...
— Western Characters - or Types of Border Life in the Western States • J. L. McConnel

... went to the next berth and I could hear his softly insinuating voice. "Time to get up, sir. Are you awake? Time ...
— The Man in Lower Ten • Mary Roberts Rinehart

... then, the reference to the intoxicating bowl? It does seem to me that if Mr. Bloke had let the intoxicating bowl alone himself, he never would have got into so much trouble about this exasperating imaginary accident. I have read this. absurd item over and over again, with all its insinuating plausibility, until my head swims; but I can make neither head nor tail of it. There certainly seems to have been an accident of some kind or other, but it is impossible to determine what the nature of it was, ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... all his science of mind, and that eloquence of which he was known to be a master. For Stoicism was no longer a rude and unkempt thing. Received at court, it had largely decorated itself: it was grown persuasive and insinuating, and sought not only to convince men's intelligence but to allure their souls. Associated with the beautiful old age of the great rhetorician, and his winning voice, it was almost Epicurean. And the old man was at his ...
— Marius the Epicurean, Volume Two • Walter Horatio Pater

... instead of bad ministers. They must be well provided with gold eagles, and give the very best sort of dinners to every hungry citizen, at Sam's account; the boy will then shine in all his glory! Never dealing in sarcasms, nor casting reflections of an insinuating character, yet, Mr. Smooth cannot forbear to say that while the very polite worship at the shrine of the polished corps, stronger-minded men are always found doing homage to the meats and drinks—more particularly when they are good! Upon this most modern but very material principle ...
— The Adventures of My Cousin Smooth • Timothy Templeton

... into my lodge, and I will teach you to dance!" Some of the ducks said among themselves, "It is Nan-nee-bo-zho; let us not go." Others were of a contrary opinion, and, his words being fair, and his voice insinuating, a few turned their faces towards the land—all the rest soon followed, and, with many pleasant quackings, trooped after him, and ...
— Wau-bun - The Early Day in the Northwest • Juliette Augusta Magill Kinzie

... then she grew sad; as weeks passed away she became nettled again, and at this juncture another suitor appeared in the shape of a young immigrant farmer, whose good looks and insinuating address soothed her irritation at the strange abrupt conduct of her lover. She began to think that she must have been mistaken in supposing that she cared for the wild trapper—and, in order to prove the correctness of her supposition, she ...
— The Wild Man of the West - A Tale of the Rocky Mountains • R.M. Ballantyne

... been disturbed; the tempting tobacco plantations had been rigidly respected, and the natives could only regard my troops as the perfection of police. They were almost as good as London police—there were no areas to the houses, neither insinuating cooks or housemaids, nor even nursemaids with babies in perambulators, to distract their attention ...
— Ismailia • Samuel W. Baker

... of small size but of wonderful beauty, and with sly, insinuating ways that fitted her well to gain the mastery over strong men. But all her arts were used for evil, and she won the hatred of the people by speaking words of ill counsel in her husband's ears. The treachery ...
— Historical Tales, Vol. 9 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality. Scandinavian. • Charles Morris

... believe that it is the false name of jealousy that prevents many an early struggle against the real vice of envy. I have heard young women even boast of the jealousy of their disposition, insinuating that it was to be considered as a proof of warm feelings and an affectionate heart. Perhaps genuine jealousy may deserve to be so considered: the anxious watching over even imaginary diminution of affection or esteem in those we love and respect, the ...
— The Young Lady's Mentor - A Guide to the Formation of Character. In a Series of Letters to Her Unknown Friends • A Lady

... am not insinuating any," returned Lawyer Ball, with a wink of the eye furthest from the witness and the bench. "And, during the time that—that he was making these little morning calls upon you, did you know him ...
— East Lynne • Mrs. Henry Wood

... because the principle of evil in the Avesta is called serpent, or azhi dahaka, that therefore the serpent mentioned in the third chapter of Genesis must be borrowed from Persia? Neither in the Veda nor in the Avesta does the serpent ever assume that subtil and insinuating form as in Genesis; and the curse pronounced on it, 'to be cursed above all cattle, and above every beast of the field,' is not in keeping with the relation of Vritra to Indra, or Ahriman to Ormuzd, ...
— Chips From A German Workshop - Volume I - Essays on the Science of Religion • Friedrich Max Mueller

... spills his ink bottle at large over the pages, as Andre Chenier's friend served his copy of Malherbe. It is scarcely necessary to warn the amateur against the society of book-ghouls, who are generally snuffy and foul in appearance, and by no means so insinuating as that fair lady-ghoul, ...
— The Library • Andrew Lang

... English gentleman; she had recently come to America, and had but few acquaintances, and still fewer friends; she felt the loneliness of her situation, and admitted that she much desired a friend to counsel and protect her; the adroit adventuress concluded her extemporaneous romance by adroitly insinuating that her income was scarcely adequate to her ...
— City Crimes - or Life in New York and Boston • Greenhorn

... Lampoons and satires in time will lose their effect, as well as panegyrics. He must learn to resist the seductions of his own pen: the pretension of composing a treatise on the subject, rather than on the book he criticises—proud of insinuating that he gives, in a dozen pages, what the author himself has not been able to perform in his volumes. Should he gain confidence by a popular delusion, and by unworthy conduct, he may chance to be mortified by the pardon or by the chastisement of insulted genius. The most noble criticism is that ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli

... being in the Salon, I saw the Dauphin and the Dauphine enter together and converse. I approached and heard their last words; they stimulated me to ask the prince what was in debate, not in a straightforward manner, but in a sort of respectful insinuating way which I already adopted. He explained to me that he was going to Saint-Germain to pay an ordinary visit; that on this occasion there would be some change in the ceremonial; explained the matter, and enlarged with eagerness on the necessity of ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre



Words linked to "Insinuating" :   flattering



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