Sentence Examples:
In defiance of this favorable report, experience proved that there were defects in that system of locomotion greater than its advocates were disposed to admit, and that the mechanism was frequently broken or disarranged by the constant jarring caused by the roughness of the road.
To-day there comes flying across the heavens a resolute young hero, in a few feet of wood and fabric, throwing defiance to shot and shell alike, suspended thousands of feet up between heaven and earth, peering from that swaying airplane at the panorama of the earth beneath.
I thought over my debts and other troubles, and over the unlucky risings of the poor oppressed peoples abroad, and over the railroad and steamboat accidents, and over even the loss of my dear friend, with a calm, good-natured rapture of defiance, which astounded myself.
The wide range and general prevalence of the superstition in modern times being thus established, it remains only to record a few recent cases in which the peasants, in defiance of law and order, have gone the length of exhuming and burning the suspected body.
Many proud ladies and gentlemen, procured themselves objects of luxury for a visit to the baths of a few weeks, which were quite useless to them for the remainder of the year, and displayed themselves therein, in defiance of any reformers who chanced to be present.
No one had ever shown her any passionate devotion, and, conscious of her lack of beauty, she had sadly resigned herself to swell the ranks of those women whom reason might prompt a suitor to woo, but who could never hope to be wooed in defiance of reason.
It could not be said that all these men, the instigators, the participants, the accomplices in this business, were rascals, who, in defiance of conscience, realizing the utter abomination of the act, were, either from mercenary motives or from fear of punishment, determined to commit it.
Being polygamous, he now takes possession of a certain "beat," from whence he drives every male intruder, and commences his crowing, which is accompanied by a peculiar clapping of his wings as a note of invitation to the other sex, as well as of defiance to his own.
The various narratives of suffering have awakened our sympathies, and taught us to feel how much we owe to the intrepidity of the adventurous seamen, who, bidding defiance to the perils of the deep, bear the blessings of commerce and civilization to the farthest corners of the earth.
Nancy looked up alarmed at the coming of this large lady, and if it was partly defiance and resistance, it was also partly shyness, and fright, and ignorance as to what it was right to do, that kept her from rising to receive this imposing introduction.
Firm and undaunted in the confidence of that sacred bond; conscious of the purity, and convinced of the importance of your motives, you put your trust in the protecting shield of Providence, and smiled defiance at the combining terrors of human malice and of elemental strife.
And the blood rushed to Arthur's cheek, his hand involuntarily clenched, and his eye glanced defiance towards Don Felix, as if, even at such a moment, insult even in thought towards Marie should not pass unquestioned; but he restrained himself, and the emotion was unnoticed.
If the man has an indomitable will and conquers the woman, he becomes a morose and sarcastic tyrant, who makes her tremble at his scowl, while she becomes a beaten drudge who makes up for long spells of submission by shrill outbursts of casual defiance.
The earl built an almost impregnable tower for himself on the summit of the rock on which the castle stood, in a situation so inaccessible that he thought he could retreat to it in any emergency, with a few chosen followers, and bid defiance to any assault.
In vain the members of the holy college, in vain the civic authorities, implored him not to set tradition at defiance: he ordered for instant execution those legally deserving of death, and in the case of the others, did not abate a single day of their confinement.
She knew how the merest accident might frustrate all she had in view, and stood hesitating and uncertain, when Joan, who now recognized her, vacillated between her instinctive sense of respect and a feeling of defiance in the consciousness of where she was.
This mode of proceeding, however, was so far from producing, its intended effect on the young and impetuous King Eric, that it appeared to rouse him to such a pertinacious defiance of papal authority, as might be followed by dangerous consequences both to himself and the kingdom.
In proportion to the coarseness of a fleece will generally be its openness, and its inability to resist either cold or wet; while the coat of softer, smaller, more pliable wool will admit of no interstices between its fibers, and will bid defiance to frost and storms.
And while the fat-faced officer of State who had so ingeniously plotted her downfall stood abashed in silence, and confused at her defiance, she swept past him, mounted the stairs haughtily, and turning into the corridor, made her way to the royal apartments.
In this manner the article continues, revealing, in defiance of all sense of delicacy and discretion, the English attempt to undermine the foundations of our national life by tampering with the children of the public schools and the young men and women in the universities.
Suddenly, in direct defiance of his orders from the Duke, this General took upon himself to attack in real earnest; but the French fell upon his column with such resistless energy that the Dutch, stubborn fighters as they were, were driven back with hideous slaughter.
This apparent revelry is an effort to keep from swooning: it is the forced continuance of a life familiar to us, when that life is to be crushed into nothingness; it is the defiance of habit, the revolt against extinction, the mortal protest against the infamous tyranny of circumstances.
Then Grandma Padgett put on her rubber overshoes, pinned a shawl about her and descended; and their fire was soon burning, their kettle was soon boiling, in defiance of water streams which frequently trickled from the leaves and fell on the coals with a hiss.
She can not consent that a title transmitted by the fathers of the Revolution shall be destroyed or defeated by acquiescence in the adverse occupation of a foreign state, and that what was once fairly yielded shall be reclaimed in utter defiance of a solemn deed of cession.
Ragging banter and jest and worse than jest and grim defiance are exchanged between the trenches when they are within such easy hearing distance of each other; but always from a safe position behind the parapet which the adversaries squint across through their periscopes.
For half an hour the man stood gazing longingly at this seeming avenue of escape, and at last, with a muttered oath, he straightened up and throwing back his shoulders in a gesture of defiance, he walked slowly and deliberately down the center of the courtyard.
To this they sent an exasperating response of defiance, and a challenge, after which they seriously went about fortifying their dwelling, and putting it into the best posture of defense against the assault which they were very certain would be made on them sooner or later.
It makes a striking picture, this little band of patriots, in a far-off mountain region in the dead of winter, with no arms but their picks and axes, strong only in their high resolve, and yet breathing defiance against the whole army of the Danish king.
The defense objected to the use of Downs' picture, as it did on every occasion where a picture of one of the prisoners was used, on the grounds that the photographs were obtained by force and in defiance of the constitutional rights of the imprisoned free speech fighters.
As if reared to the situation, she would have thrown up her head, and breathing defiance upon the tempter, would have murmured to the sympathetic air, "Honor above everything," and so, full of dignity, would have moved away from her discomfited companion, her nose high in the air.
Her queer ways, defiance of dress codes, and above all her fondness for horseback riding, naturally stirred up criticism, but Peg was as oblivious of this as she was of the taunts so often flung at her by school girls, whose companionship she seemed to ignore.
Any way the little woman is unconquerable; and a tiny fragment of humanity at a public show, setting all rules and regulations at defiance, is only carrying out in the matter of benches the manner of life to which nature has dedicated her from the beginning.
There may still be the scowl of defiance from the lawless, and plots on the part of the disaffected, while on the other hand, there are still some remains of a class fast verging to extinction, who would doom the people to hopeless ignorance and toil.
Throughout the later sixties and the seventies, English adventurers were engaged in making good their claims, in spite of nominal peace and law, by force of arms, raiding Spanish settlements or compelling local authorities to allow them to trade in defiance of all injunctions from headquarters.
With the characters, either as conceived or preserved, I have no fault to find; but was much inclined to congratulate a writer, who, in defiance of prejudice and fashion, made the Archbishop a good man, and scorned all thoughtless applause which a vicious churchman would have brought him.
Its ample lawn, shaded by a few native trees, had been set with grass, as if in defiance of Southern custom, and the broad walks were not flanked with the conventional parallel rows of shrubs and flowers so dear to the heart of the old-time Southerner.
That attack rested upon her mind, in defiance of all her endeavors to banish it; the contempt with which it was made seemed intentionally offensive, as if he had been happy to derive from her supposed ill conduct, a right to triumph over as well as reject her.
They come over my fancy like some snatch of an old nursery song, which one loves to hear in defiance of taste and reason, merely because it is something that carries us back to those days which, whatever they were in reality, always look bright and sunny in retrospection.
He delivered his missive with becoming ceremony, accompanying it with a flourish of defiance on his trumpet to the whole council, ending with a significant and nasal twang full in the face of Captain Partridge, who nearly jumped out of his skin in an ecstasy of astonishment.
Since the crowd is comparatively lacking in the judicial faculty and cannot look upon a play from a detached and disinterested point of view, it is either all for or all against a character; and in either case its judgment is frequently in defiance of the rules of reason.
Even the Jesuit Lana felt inclined to weep over his abortive project (he did pray over it) when he considered how easy it would be for warlike marauders to set the stoutest walls and ramparts at defiance, and to hurl destruction into any city they might select.
This had begun with the French Revolution, when France bade defiance to the rest of the world; and, kept alive by the aggressive policy and military ambition of Napoleon, it continued, with occasional interruptions, until the power of the French Emperor was overthrown at Waterloo.
Many of the poor animals stopped before night, and resolutely refused to proceed; and others with the remarkable sagacity, peculiar to them, left the track in defiance of those who drove and guided them, sought and found water, and spent the night in its vicinity.
Brandishing a stout cudgel over his head, and pealing forth shouts of defiance, he rolled from side to side on his spirited charger, like some laboring bark careening to the violence of the winds, but ever, like that bark, regaining an equilibrium that was never thoroughly lost.
It was indeed a splendid sight to behold that proud monarch of the horned tribe bidding defiance to all about him, his huge and shaggy head, surmounted by a pair of pointed, powerful horns, high in air, and with an expression of countenance that was almost diabolical.
Later, out on the plains, where we were less harassed by bureaucracy, one captain after another began to shed, and finally, after ten years' defiance of regulations and orders by courageous and sensible captains, the army shed its scales as a snake sheds its skin.
Following up a tributary of this river, the Margaret, they gradually managed to work round the southern end of the range, which still frowned defiance at them, and at last reached the summit of the tableland, and saw before them good grassy hills and plains.
The beaver is exceedingly wily, and if by scent or sound or sight he had any intimation of the presence of a trapper, he put at defiance all efforts to capture him, consequently it was necessary to practice great caution when in the neighborhood of one of their lodges.
To her battle against age she had brought the ambition of a conqueror and the devotion of a martyr; and at the last, even to-day, there was a superb defiance in her refusal to acknowledge defeat, in her demand that her surrender should be regarded as a capitulation.
His practice was, on such occasions, to get a case of pistols, mount his horse, and, in defiance to all entreaty to the contrary, proceed to the place of danger, which he rode past, and examined with an air of pompous heroism that was ludicrous in the extreme.
They only made a short delay, though, during which we were not idle with our guns and revolvers; for, the next moment, with another yell of defiance, the pirate craft flung their grapnels in our rigging and climbed up on both sides of the ship simultaneously.
There was something contemptuous in it despite its admiration, and a sort of defiance, too, as if he were quite, quite sure of himself and secure from all temptation; but then they do begin like that sometimes, and the siren weaves on them her spells, and they succumb.
The people hated Germany for the sinking of the Lusitania and all the other submarine outrages, for her crimes in Belgium, for the plots and explosions in this country, for the Zimmermann note, and finally for her direct and insulting defiance of American rights.
The faults which are ordinarily found in dominant castes and dominant sects have not seldom shown themselves without disguise at her festivities; and even with the expressions of pious gratitude which have resounded from her pulpits have too often been mingled words of wrath and defiance.
Tom had no sort of objection to whey, but he had a decided liking for curds, which were forbidden as unwholesome, and there was seldom a morning that he did not manage to secure a handful of hard curds, in defiance of Charity and of the farmer's wife.
In the street and the houses of their friends, he was the strict, somewhat severe father, to whom her childish eyes lifted at first with awe, but afterwards with a quiet defiance, that when I first saw it, made my heart stand still with unreasoning alarm.
This is a fair sample of the abuses practiced by many of those in authority, who in lieu of holding out a pattern for imitation, both by example and precept, are unfortunately too prone to indulge their own vicious propensities, setting all propriety, honor, and justice at defiance.
We uncovered the priming of our swivels, and greased their muzzles, to make them speak in a louder tone of warning and defiance to the enemy; they were discharged with a loud report, that made the island ring, and must have resounded with effect upon the hostile shore.
Emanuel, on the contrary, although he returned the salutation, as politeness required, allowed those hostile feelings which the presence of the man whom he regarded as his personal and determined enemy had awakened to flush his features, and they instantly assumed a look of fierce defiance.
Any country town is so extremely pronounced in its disapproval of sins of a certain kind that a man would have to be covered with a rhinoceros hide not to feel it; and to stand up against it means to a man of Tom's disposition a constant attitude of defiance.
One of the lions held his piece between his teeth for certainly a quarter of an hour, merely growling and gloating over it in savage joy, while his flashing eyes glared upon the spectators, and his tail was swung from side to side with an expression of defiance.
Then turning towards the breastworks upon the island, he shook his clinched fist in savage defiance at the enemies of his country, and raising himself to his full height, struck the palm of his hand across his mouth as he uttered a wild, piercing battle cry.
One of the lions held his piece between his teeth for certainly a quarter of an hour, merely growling and gloating over it in savage joy, whilst his flashing eyes glared upon the spectators, and his tail was swung from side to side with an expression of defiance.
Flesh and blood without doubt was the intruder, no hollow-eyed apparition of the dead, such as they had half dreaded: a man, short, thick-set, with a red stubbly beard and hard, reckless eyes, which stared now into theirs with a fierce, yet frightened defiance.
With navigable rivers running into the heart of it, it was impossible, with our means, to prevent our Eastern brethren, who, in some parts of the Union, in defiance of the authority of the General Government, have been engaged in this trade, from introducing them into the country.
The Spanish committee of Paris, which had sent a deputation to the department of the Marne, to report upon the disasters of the war, protested as soon as they received the report of their deputies against the crimes committed in defiance of the Spanish flag and of humanity.
The hours dragged on, the silence of the night infrequently broken by bits of querulous cursing by some wounded puncher, an occasional taunt from besieger or besieged and sporadic bursts of firing which served more for notifications of defiance and watchfulness than for any grimmer purpose.
These have determined the site, the plan, and the building of the town, but one can scarcely describe as natural features the two sinuous ditches that drain the prairie into the lake, apparently in defiance of the law that water runs, and even oozes, down hill.
Deliberately to choose a site on the ridge with such a wind blowing and in defiance of every threat in the sky was a folly not to be contemplated, and our suppositions as to the lee side above us (they were afterwards proved correct) were all unfavorable to going higher.
Inlaid with mosaics, depicting landscapes and animals; graceless in form and fashion, but still picturesque, and winning admiration, when more closely observed, from the patient defiance of all rules of taste which had formed its cumbrous parts into one profusely ornamented and eccentric whole.
The great scheme of liberation built up through nearly three years of elaborate conspiracy, and designed to be executed in defiance of law, by individual enterprise with pikes, rifles, forts, guerrilla war, prisoners, hostages, and plunder, was, after an experimental campaign of thirty-six hours, in utter collapse.
Sir Nicholas enters the town, and shows his commission: the magistrates are at a loss what to do, till the hero comes amongst them, outfaces the messenger, tears up his commission, makes him eat the seals, and sends him back with an answer of defiance.
The castle on which I dwelt stood upon a rock, a bold and craggy one, which, at first sight, would seem to bid defiance to any feet save those of goats and chamois; but patience and perseverance generally enable mankind to overcome things which, at first sight, appear impossible.
The acquitted person himself, in defiance of all law and justice, was remanded to the Tower, and did not regain his liberty till the commencement of the following year, when the intercession of king Philip obtained the liberation of almost all the prisoners there detained.
The moment the Danes got on board, they imprudently ran up their ensign; and, as this act of apparent defiance occurred just as the Esperanza was receiving the lifeless form of her officer, my excited crew discharged a broadside in reply to the warlike token.
The original frame of his mind joined a defiance of formal precedent and an intense openness to every fine pleasure of sense with an impatience of all that makes for secrecy and an abhorrence of the substitutes which are sometimes basely, sometimes madly, accepted in default of true objects.
The Castle in which I dwelt stood upon a rock, a bold and craggy one, which, at first sight, would seem to bid defiance to any feet save those of goats and chamois; but patience and perseverance generally enable mankind to overcome things which, at first sight, appear impossible.
In the face of this fact, and of the many acknowledged masterpieces, every one of which was painted in defiance of some rule some time or other alleged to be the only right one, it is not possible to prescribe or proscribe anything in the direction of the manipulation of colors.
He was almost always the minister of wickedness, revenge, and caprice; but the various ways in which he had employed his power impressed upon all minds a great idea of his capability to devise and perform his acts in defiance of every obstruction, whether lawful or unlawful.
They could not even tell whether they were drinking their own cow's milk, or that of the critter over'n the next yard; for John drove the cows together to whichever pasture he happened to fancy, and milked them together, whistling defiance as he did so.
They kept the one large piece carefully wrapped up, to prevent its melting, in defiance of the advice of most household teachers of housekeeping, who had declared that the truest economy consisted in letting the ice melt as it would, in order to best preserve the food.
Both forces remained during the day facing each other on opposite sides of the river, and the Dervishes, who evidently did not admit a defeat, brandished their rifles and waved their flags, and their shouts of loud defiance floated across the water to the troops.
In this view of it, I am not able to understand how it can be persisted in, without setting at defiance the dictates of reason and conscience, and what is of more importance, the uncompromising authority of Scripture, the arguments of wise and talented men to the contrary, notwithstanding.
She, however, will remember nothing of the past, or if she does, it is with repugnance and regret; her manner to me is a sort of cold defiance, not to dare to revive our old intimacy, nor to fancy that I can take up our acquaintanceship from the past.
Their conduct on first seeing a ship, as described by Captain Cook, strongly illustrates this: the act of throwing volleys of stones at so great and novel an object, and their defiance of "Come on shore, and we will kill and eat you all," shows uncommon boldness.
When she reflected, she became frightened more and more by that sort of defiance of the future which she had had the imprudence to hurl; it seemed to her that she had compromised the cherished hope of her son in exasperating thus the hatred of that woman.
He was usually beaten, and sometimes with heavy loss, which he repaired with astonishing facility; for he always contrived to make his escape, and so true were his followers, that, in defiance of pursuit and ambuscade, he found a safe shelter in the secret haunts of the sierra.
All, I suppose, yielded to circumstances, and suffered this disgraceful act to take place, as though Fortune had wished to display her power by disposing human affairs so that events came about in utter defiance of reason, and human counsel seemed to have no share in directing them.
Notwithstanding, too, the general boldness and recklessness of his tone, there were occasionally mingled with this defiance some allusions to his own fate and character, whose affecting earnestness seemed to answer for their truth, and which were of a nature strongly to awaken curiosity as well as interest.
The last load rollicked away to join the mad race, where far ahead a dozen buggies, with foam-flecked horses, vied with one another, their youthful jockeys waving their hats, hurling defiance back and forth, or shrieking with delight as each antagonist was caught and left behind.
Their murder was nothing else than a most foul assassination, the gravity of which was augmented by the fact that it was perpetrated by those who claimed to be upholders of law in contradistinction to the Mormons, who (they said) desired to set law at defiance.
There is a tone of vulgar, insolent defiance in all that is recorded of the manner and language adopted by the partisans of these Lyons prisoners, which gives what must, I think, be considered as very satisfactory proof that the party is not one to be greatly feared.
Brandishing a stout cudgel over his head, and pealing forth a shout of defiance, he rolled from side to side on his spirited charger, like some laboring bark careering to the violence of the winds, but ever, like that bark, regaining an equilibrium that was never thoroughly lost.
With a loud bark of defiance Albatross darted away, scurrying through the turnips at the rate of fifteen miles an hour, utterly unmindful of whistle, call, blandishment, or threat, appearing now in one direction, now in another, and barking as though it had been part of its training.
Rider stood by the bedside holding up his candle, attracting the wandering wistful glances of his patient, who ceased to look at him with defiance as her eyes again and again returned to the face, of which, often as it had bent over her, she had no knowledge.
Those results may, no doubt, be tampered with by some external agency; but if that is not done, it is impossible that a highly civilized people, accustomed to reason and to doubt, should ever embrace a religion of which the glaring absurdities set reason and doubt at defiance.
During all these years, when he was setting at defiance every principle of morality and decorum, the interest of the female mind all over Europe in the conversion of this brilliant prodigal son was unceasing, and reflects the greatest credit upon the faith of the sex.
For legal writers lay it down as a rule, that to offer personal violence to ambassadors, whose characters are deemed sacred, is a defiance of the law of nations, and Tacitus calls the privileges we are now discussing, the rights of embassy, sanctified by the law of nations.
Bertha was now no longer a child, but a beautiful woman, and had taken possession of the heart of my friend Ernest, in defiance of the nine Muses, and all the brilliant array of classic dames and ancient heroines with which study had stored his memory.
I was afraid that it might thus set me at defiance, and in an early chapter expressed a doubt whether I should find it redound greatly to my advantage with men of science; in this concluding chapter I may say that doubt has deepened into something like certainty.