mauvais quart d'heure
Britishnoun
Etymology
Origin of mauvais quart d'heure
literally: (a) bad quarter of an hour
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Those fifteen minutes had none the less proved a mauvais quart d'heure for Mr. Kelly.
From Parson Kelly by Lang, Andrew
During the mauvais quart d'heure before the meal, Charteris kept up an animated conversation with the Oldest Inhabitant, the Babe joining in from time to time when he could think of anything to say.
From Tales of St. Austin's by Wodehouse, P. G. (Pelham Grenville)
They give Falstaff a mauvais quart d'heure, and end by convincing him that his amorous wiles are useless against the virtue of honest burghers' wives.
From The Opera A Sketch of the Development of Opera. With full Descriptions of all Works in the Modern Repertory. by Fuller-Maitland, J. A.
Liane herself had long since put quite out of mind that mauvais quart d'heure.
From Alias the Lone Wolf by Vance, Louis Joseph
For Eglah, the clock of fate had begun to chime that mauvais quart d'heure which Mrs. Maurice had known would inevitably overtake her, and the preliminary whirring of the hidden cogs had found her unprepared.
From A Speckled Bird by Wilson, Augusta J. Evans
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
