acerbities

BY THE time Stilwell got out of Burma, he and Chiang Kai-shek had settled even more firmly into their chosen acerbities.

The Last Empress Hannah Pakula 2009

If this was a Russian spy he would avoid such in future, and keep himself for the milder acerbities of

The Claverings 2005

I was never a coward, and cared for a thrashing as little as any boy, but one cannot make a stand against the acerbities of three hundred tyrants without a moral courage of which at that time I possessed none.

An Autobiography 2004

He was of an equable temper, with only such acerbities and touchinesses as are generally to be found in those who have had a love affair in their youth and remained, as they fancy, unwed because of it.

The Common Reader, Second Series 2004

Such an abounding, affectionate, friendly, loving feeling did this avocation beget; that at last I was continually squeezing their hands, and looking up into their eyes sentimentally; as much as to say, — Oh! my dear fellow beings, why should we longer cherish any social acerbities, or know the slightest ill-humor or envy!

Moby Dick; or the Whale 2002

There is much to be said against indulging in golden-ageism whereby the acerbities and absurdities of the past disappear into the glow of nostalgia.

The Decline and Fall of Literature Delbanco, Andrew 1999

In an age when Moscow and Washington are seeking to abate the acerbities of the cold war, West Berlin inevitably faces a major problem of adjustment: Berlin did not create the crises which centred on the city in the past two decades, but it certainly thrived on them.

Berlin and the Future of Germany 1968

The acceptance that the Renaissance is dead and gone is, however, important as it has removed at any rate some of the acerbities from the discussion of this part of the past.

IDEA OF RENAISSANCE DENYS HAY 1968

Accustomed to acerbities of criticism for their many shortcomings from her ever-pointed tongue, they marvelled the more at her semi-partnership with Jim, whom of all the population of the town she had scorned and verbally castigated most frequently.

Bruvver Jim's Baby Philip Verrill Mighels

Then there were exchanged certain melodious acerbities, which proved that these ladies had entered the lists on previous occasions, and that each was well practised in the other's methods of warfare.

In and out of Three Normady Inns Anna Bowman Dodd