"Awful" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... awfully sorry," he said apologetically. "I suppose you mean you're a bit sick of me, don't you?" Estelle wiped her eyes, and returned to her toast. "Can't you see," she asked bitterly, "that our life together is the most awful tragedy?" ...
— The Dark Tower • Phyllis Bottome
... with which the disciples of Christ performed the offices of religion were at first dictated by fear and necessity; but they were continued from choice. By imitating the awful secrecy which reigned in the Eleusinian mysteries, the Christians had flattered themselves that they should render their sacred institutions more respectable in the eyes of the Pagan world. But the event, as it often happens to the operations of subtile policy, deceived their wishes and ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon
... one of the carvers came to me and, with an abased and apologetic air, very different from his jaunty manner of yore, explained in a husky half whisper that I might have jugged hare or I might have boiled codfish, or I might have one of the awful dishes. Anyhow, that was what I ...
— Eating in Two or Three Languages • Irvin S. Cobb
... lay over the high upland of the Salt Mountain, among its dry and beautiful woods. The trip would have been glorious but for the awful things that I am not allowed to ...
— The Arctic Prairies • Ernest Thompson Seton
... At last the awful suspense, a thousand times more cruel for their being unable to do anything, was broken by even the welcome incident of a new danger. Breakers were visible in the direct course of their drift. "Maybe she'll turn over, Jim," whispered the skipper. ...
— Labrador Days - Tales of the Sea Toilers • Wilfred Thomason Grenfell
... way thither he was attacked by a Zulu force at Inyesani. This force, though it more than doubled the strength of his own, he drove back with heavy loss, and marched to the Norwegian Mission station, Eshowe. On his arrival there on the 23rd of January, he learnt the awful news of the disaster, and instantly sent his cavalry back to Natal, fortified his station, and waited there ...
— South Africa and the Transvaal War, Vol. 1 (of 6) - From the Foundation of Cape Colony to the Boer Ultimatum - of 9th Oct. 1899 • Louis Creswicke
... farces to be habitually merry; or whether we are really justified in concluding, from the fact that Shakespeare wrote nothing but tragedies for six years, that, during that period, more than at any other, he was deeply absorbed in the awful problems of human existence. It is not, however, the purpose of this essay to consider the question of what are the relations between the artist and his art; for it will assume the truth of the generally accepted view, ...
— Books and Characters - French and English • Lytton Strachey
... from the dog to the empty sleeve above it. "Well," she declared, at last, "I wouldn't give him up while the country is at peace. I'd wait till the last minute, until there was goin' to be an awful battle, and then I'd make them promise to let me have him again when the wah was ovah. Just the minute it was ovah. It would be like givin' away part of your family to ...
— The Story of the Red Cross as told to The Little Colonel • Annie Fellows-Johnston
... a awful sight to her. And as she looked at me so earnest and solemn, with tears in them pretty brown eyes, there wus in her look all that that word could ...
— Sweet Cicely - Or Josiah Allen as a Politician • Josiah Allen's Wife (Marietta Holley)
... of it—I deplore it. I took for earnest what you insist was jest, and now this that I pray to be jest you say is awful, wretched earnest. Our moods meet at wrong places. I wish your feeling was more like mine, or my feeling more like yours! Oh, could I but have foreseen the torture that trifling trick was going to lead me into, how I should ...
— Far from the Madding Crowd • Thomas Hardy
... have it different," beseeched Betty. "Last year it was awful. All the new girls cried and there wasn't enough ...
— Polly's Senior Year at Boarding School • Dorothy Whitehill
... did! My dear child, it was just what he had been waiting to do! And, O, I can tell you he talked to me in such a way about the awful sin of lying, that I never, never forgot it, and shan't, if I live to be a hundred ...
— Little Prudy • Sophie May
... declare that he was now ashamed to bear the name of Frenchman;[**] yet he was obliged to obey his orders, and make use of the apology which had been prescribed to him. He met with that reception from all the courtiers which he knew the conduct of his master had so well merited. Nothing could be more awful and affecting than the solemnity of his audience. A melancholy sorrow sat on every face: silence, as in the dead of night, reigned through all the chambers of the royal apartment: the courtiers and ladies, clad in deep mourning, were ranged on each side, and allowed him to pass without affording ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part D. - From Elizabeth to James I. • David Hume
... the functions of guide, genius, or guardian to one so young and guileless? Could you be the Mentor to this Telemachus? Think of the temptations of a metropolis. Look at the question well, and let me know speedily; for I've got him as far as this place, and he's kicking up an awful row in the hotel-yard, and rattling his chain like a maniac. Let me ...
— Tales of the Argonauts • Bret Harte
... very bright, but we must make allowance for the awful fright that, as we hear, has been caused by the expedition. Possibly, when they have got over the shock, things may ...
— In the Irish Brigade - A Tale of War in Flanders and Spain • G. A. Henty
... in horror at the gleaming knife which Rathburn held by its hilt with the blade pointing backward. The jailer was from the border; he knew the awful possibilities of a quick motion of the wrist in that position, a half turn of the knife as it streaked toward its target. ...
— The Coyote - A Western Story • James Roberts
... never did it before and certainly never can again. Rosy's tracks curved and twisted, and I felt I was losing time, but dared not risk missing them, for I was coming nearer to that awful voice steadily, though it echoed so I should have been helpless without ...
— Margarita's Soul - The Romantic Recollections of a Man of Fifty • Ingraham Lovell
... is awful in this horrible darkness. The mountain seems to have been cut in half somewhere about here, and this fog confuses so that it is impossible to stir. We must wait till it blows off I think we are safe now, but I dare not try to find a better place. ...
— Patience Wins - War in the Works • George Manville Fenn
... of a young believer falling into sin, how much more tragic that of a man who abandons Christ after many years of service, allowing sins, which he had overcome, once more to have dominion over him. It is an awful reality of life that the point on which a man has most conspicuously conquered is likely to be his weakest, for the enemy plays ...
— The Fulfilment of a Dream of Pastor Hsi's - The Story of the Work in Hwochow • A. Mildred Cable
... in their very modesty, as if even standing on the defense of his profession, the noblest of human occupations! and of his science—the most wonderful and awful of human intelligences! showed me that I had yet not wholly made clear to you the exactly limited measure in which I have ventured to dispute the fitness of method of study now assigned ...
— On the Old Road, Vol. 2 (of 2) - A Collection of Miscellaneous Essays and Articles on Art and Literature • John Ruskin
... a time in a state of some perplexity between truth and fiction. That immovable attitude, those fixed eyes, those features which never alter the expression of the grief or the joy impressed upon them by the hand of the artist, have in themselves something of the awful and mysterious, which powerfully affects us, despite our reason and experience. How many persons are there who could look, without shuddering, on the statue of Fieschi, the celebrated French murderer, ...
— Roman Catholicism in Spain • Anonymous
... our cab mounted the small hill on which our house stood, the faithful clerk, with more zeal than discretion, said, "You look awful ill, sir; why your face is as white as my shirt." I looked at his shirt, seemingly guiltless, for days past, ...
— Canada and the States • Edward William Watkin
... impossible." The sermon of Dr. Beecher was unusually sweet and tender and when he appealed to his hearers to trust themselves to Jesus, their faithful friend, she says, "I longed to cry out I will. Then the awful thought came over me that I had never had any conviction of my sins and consequently could not come to him." Happily the inspiration came to her that if she needed conviction of sin and Jesus were such a friend, he would give it to her; she would trust him for ...
— Daughters of the Puritans - A Group of Brief Biographies • Seth Curtis Beach
... admirably timed. It was sustained up to the last possible instant. 'As it was,' said the captain of the leading company, 'a 94-pound shell burst about thirty yards in front of the right of our lot. The smell of the lyddite was awful.' A pom-pom and twenty prisoners, including the commander of the police, were the trophies of the day. An outwork of the Boer position had been carried, and the rumour of defeat and disaster had already spread through their ...
— The Great Boer War • Arthur Conan Doyle
... an awful pause, in which the conspirators could hear the beating of each other's hearts, my name ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume II. (of X.) • Various
... to calling them Paget—and she didn't ask anything about him. I guess she was pretty mad at him. She never had liked the Emmet cousin, and she'd had nothing but trouble with him all the time he had been in her family, and then that awful disgrace, that she always THOUGHT was all him, but she couldn't prove it, and she ...
— Laddie • Gene Stratton Porter
... down her face—it'lI be goin' on five year ago now—'Jack,' says she; 'promise me you'll always make a bit of a prayer before turnin'-in; for the Lord says anybody that 's ashamed o' Him, He'll be ashamed o' him at the day o' judgment.' Awful—ain't it? Course, I promised, but it went in o' one ear, an' out o' the other, till about two year after, when I got word she was dead. I was on Runnymede then—for I come straight here when I bolted from the ship— an' I begun to bethink myself that she could see how I was keepin' ...
— Such is Life • Joseph Furphy
... that the man whom he accused was the guilty man. Read the papers, father, and you will see how I have been victimized by the most unheard-of combination of circumstances. Every thing is against me. Never has that mysterious, blind, and absurd power manifested itself so clearly,—that awful power which ...
— Within an Inch of His Life • Emile Gaboriau
... be an awful lark to bolt," said Gully, with a chuckle. "But," he added, seriously, "if you really mean it, by George, I'll go too! Wilson has just given me a thousand lines; and I'll be hanged if I ...
— Cashel Byron's Profession • George Bernard Shaw
... at seven. The wind, which had been at south-east, veering to north, and the thermometer falling five degrees; it lasted for about an hour, during which time the harsh screams of the affrighted birds—the moaning of the wind—the awful roll of thunder, and the fearful brilliancy of the lightning, combined to supply all the terrible beauty which invests such scenes; especially when they surprise the startled adventurer upon his unknown path, and add their ...
— Discoveries in Australia, Volume 2 • John Lort Stokes
... various. It was reaction against oppressive government. It was iconoclasm inspired by a spurious Christianity. It was pride of race that would not tolerate a Manchu on the throne. For fourteen years China staggered under this awful scourge. Whole provinces were devastated and almost depopulated. For a long time the issue was uncertain. At length the united strength of foreigners and Chinese battered the serpent's head and destroyed ...
— Forty Years in South China - The Life of Rev. John Van Nest Talmage, D.D. • Rev. John Gerardus Fagg
... too well, yet that did not set a curb upon him. He pressed his master's business upon the King with an ardour amounting to disrespect, and disrespect was a thing the awful majesty of Philip could never brook. Escovedo complained of delays, of indecision, and finally—in the summer of '76—he wrote the King a letter of fierce upbraidings, criticizing his policy in terms that were contemptuous, and ...
— The Historical Nights' Entertainment • Rafael Sabatini
... deserved. But I never would have married while she was alive. Not but what I had a right to, you understand, but I guess I'm old-fashioned more ways than one. I read about her death a year or so ago. I don't believe she had any too good a time herself. She had an awful temper. But she certainly did have pretty hair," ...
— Julia The Apostate • Josephine Daskam
... attending, by no staff sustained, 400 He stood, and in his very dress appeared A desolation, a simplicity, To which the trappings of a gaudy world Make a strange back-ground. From his lips, ere long, Issued low muttered sounds, as if of pain 405 Or some uneasy thought; yet still his form Kept the same awful steadiness—at his feet His shadow lay, and moved not. From self-blame Not wholly free, I watched him thus; at length Subduing my heart's specious cowardice, 410 I left the shady nook where I had stood And hailed him. Slowly from his resting-place He rose, ...
— The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth, Vol. III • William Wordsworth
... officials of the Inquisition, and some friars of the order of St. Dominic, surrounding the unfortunate Landon, who wore the corazo, or pointed cap, upon his head, and the san benito, a robe painted all over with flames and devils, typifying the awful fate which awaited him. He ascended the scaffold with a firm step, while the cortege ranged themselves around it; and the governor of Valencia, mounted on a splendid barbed charger, and wearing his inquisitorial robes over his military uniform, rode into the square, amid the vivas of the crowd ...
— The Three Brides, Love in a Cottage, and Other Tales • Francis A. Durivage
... a young lady calls, selling tickets for a concert, and his wife would have bought them, but he says: "Go slow, Minnie, you can't buy everything. It's awful the way money goes in town. We'll see about this concert—maybe we'll go, but we won't buy ...
— In Times Like These • Nellie L. McClung
... fifteen, then to forty, then to sixty. Some were armed with muskets, some with axes, some with scythes, some came on their masters' horses. As the numbers increased, they could be divided, and the awful work was carried on more rapidly still. The plan then was for an advanced guard of horsemen to approach each house at a gallop, and surround it till the others came up. Meanwhile, what agonies of terror must have taken place within, shared alike by innocent and by guilty! what ...
— Black Rebellion - Five Slave Revolts • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... another bound his eyes, a third person drew his feet out of the stirrups, while a fourth stepped behind his horse with a heavy riding-whip. All was done in the deepest silence; not a word was breathed; not a footfall heard on the soft yielding turf. There was something awful and oppressive in the profound stillness that reigned in ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 54, No. 338, December 1843 • Various
... and consume not will some day cease? For the torment she suffers is like that of the damned, and the flames wherewith she is burned are even as the flames of hell. This I would fain know, that at this awful moment I may feel no doubt, that I may know for certain whether I dare hope or ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - THE MARQUISE DE BRINVILLIERS • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... "It's an awful tension to be in," said the willow-tree. "If only I don't go to pieces for sheer fright. As it is, the boy took a good pull at me; and Heaven knows I ...
— The Old Willow Tree and Other Stories • Carl Ewald
... this is," he thought. "What a hash I've made of it. What a cruel thing to happen to me. What an awful ...
— The Devil's Garden • W. B. Maxwell
... never rose to its full height," he added, standing in the window, and gazing pensively into the summer sky. "Oh, Ebbo! this knighthood has come very suddenly after our many dreams; and, even though its outward tokens be lowered, it is still a holy, awful thing." ...
— The Dove in the Eagle's Nest • Charlotte M. Yonge
... be able to banish that awful moment from my memory. Pepper's roar, expressive of astonishment, indignation, and pain, is still ringing in my ears. I looked upon him as a corpse, and, glancing not far into the dreary future, pictured myself led forth to execution in ...
— McGuffey's Fourth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... which shows among other things that there is latitude, if not longitude, at a Brooklyn New England dinner. Meanwhile we think we hear Uncle Rastus quoting the prophecy, "The morning cometh and also the night," but he can't help laughing because it is "awful funny." ...
— The American Missionary, Vol. XLII. April, 1888. No. 4. • Various
... indifference to the value of money, misunderstanding the genius of their chief, and looking out every morning for some sign in the clouds, a prophecy of their immediate appointment as vicegerents of a power that would supersede the awful majesty of the Imperial city? He may have been heated by a long series of petty annoyances to such a degree that at last they may have ended in rage and a sudden flinging loose of himself from the society. It is the impulsive man who frequently suffers what appears to ...
— Pages from a Journal with Other Papers • Mark Rutherford
... that an entire people may lose for a time its sense of logic. We have just had the most awful proof that, through a long-continued and deliberate education for that purpose, the German people lost its moral sense and set up diabolical standards in place of those common to all civilized races. ...
— Theodore Roosevelt; An Intimate Biography, • William Roscoe Thayer
... three months thereafter, was called upon to lay our first-born, Oliver D. Coursey, into his snow-lined baby tomb amid the bleak silence of a cold winter's night, with no strong arm to bear her up in those awful hours of ...
— The Woman with a Stone Heart - A Romance of the Philippine War • Oscar William Coursey
... Wallace (November 19), "I never in my lifetime regretted an interruption so much as this new edition of the 'Descent.'" And later (in December) he wrote to Mr. Huxley: "The new edition of the 'Descent' has turned out an awful job. It took me ten days merely to glance over letters and reviews with criticisms and new facts. It is ...
— The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, Volume II • Francis Darwin
... her stead a changeling A little angel child, That seems like her bud in full blossom, And smiles as she never smiled: When I wake in the morning, I see it Where she always used to lie, And I feel as weak as a violet Alone 'neath the awful sky. ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of James Russell Lowell • James Lowell
... there were also Christians who, while they hated the olden culture of Paganism, were ambitious to supply a Christian literature in prose and verse to take the place of the Classical. There had been an awful devastation of Gaul; the barbarians of the north had been, now and again, uneasy and troublesome; but see how Julian—even he, with the Grace of God all against him—had chastised them! The head of the Roman State would always be ...
— The Crest-Wave of Evolution • Kenneth Morris
... issuing, should meet in convention at Williamsburgh, on the first of August, for the purpose of appointing delegates to sit in congress. This was a monster stride in the march of revolution, and it was easy to foresee its ultimate and awful consequences. ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... party were soon assembled at home, and after cheerful "good-nights,"—Harry remarking that "he was awful tired, but there never had been a nicer picnic,"—the wearied excursionists soon lost all sense of fatigue in peaceful slumbers and ...
— Lucy Raymond - Or, The Children's Watchword • Agnes Maule Machar
... must lie alone in the sage brush near the pool in the hollow of the low hills by moonlight; it will never reach your ears through the bars of the menagerie cage. To know the mountain, you must confront the avalanche and the precipice uncompanioned, and stand at last on the breathless and awful peak, which lifts itself and you into a voiceless solitude remote from man and yet no nearer to God; but if you journey with guides and jolly fellowship to some Mountain House, never so airily perched, you would as well visit ...
— The History of the United States from 1492 to 1910, Volume 1 • Julian Hawthorne
... With what awful cry, His Spirit takes its flight; That cry, it smote His Mother's heart And wrapt her ...
— The St. Gregory Hymnal and Catholic Choir Book • Various
... in the region of the tree Ner: whose soul is existing for vigilance; Lord of the great dwelling in Sesennou(443) the very awful in Shashotep; Lord of the length ...
— Egyptian Literature
... mandarin were both painful subjects to her, and she felt just now as though the world were full of trials. There was this dreadful dancing-class looming in the distance—something awful and unknown, to which she was daily getting nearer and nearer. Ambrose understood much better than Nancy what she felt about it, and was a much more sympathetic listener, for he knew very well what it was to be afraid, and to dread what was strange ...
— Penelope and the Others - Story of Five Country Children • Amy Walton
... No coffee! Only a little salt! All the hosses except your big Nagger are played out. We're already in strange country. An' you know what we've heerd of this an' all to the south. It's all canyons, an' somewheres down there is thet awful canyon none of our people ever seen. But we've heerd of ...
— Wildfire • Zane Grey
... no wish to attack people. It is not fierce. But to the Crabs it must seem an awful ogre. I once watched an Octopus on the lookout for food. It had its lair between two rocks, its twining arms showing outside, its eyes and body in the shadow. Along came a Crab, scuttling near the rocks. ...
— Within the Deep - Cassell's "Eyes And No Eyes" Series, Book VIII. • R. Cadwallader Smith
... proceed are called 'the enemies of Ashur,' the troops of the king are the troops of Ashur, and the weapons with which they fight are the weapons of Ashur. It is he who causes the arms of Tiglathpileser I. to strike down his foes. The nations cannot endure the awful sight of the god. His brilliancy—the reference being no doubt to the shining standard as it was carried into the fray—inspires on every side a terror that casts all enemies to the ground. All warfare is carried on in the name of Ashur. The statement may be taken literally, ...
— The Religion of Babylonia and Assyria • Morris Jastrow
... on their shoulders, and as they passed out of the room an awful voice—as much so as the barber, not he of the pack-saddle but the other, was able to make it—was heard to say, "O Knight of the Rueful Countenance, let not this captivity in which thou art placed afflict thee, for ...
— Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... in a position that was unfavourable for eating purposes, Crusoe opened his jaws and took it. An awful crash was followed by two crunches—and it was gone! and Crusoe looked up in the old squaw's face with a look that said plainly, "Another of the same, please, and as quick as possible." The old woman gave him another, and then a lump of meat, ...
— The Dog Crusoe and His Master - A Story of Adventure in the Western Prairies • Robert Michael Ballantyne
... she said, "you can't kid me! I bought a whole set of books last year from an agent—'The World's Great Funeral Orations'—twenty volumes. Sam and I ain't read more'n the first volume yet. It's awful ...
— Parnassus on Wheels • Christopher Morley
... He was a precocious child; he did not quite understand, and yet he understood partly. He knew that his grandmother was scolding Vera, and telling her she was to go away and marry Mr. Gisburne. That Vera should go away! That, in itself, was sufficiently awful. Tommy adored Vera with all the intensity of his childish soul; that she should go away from him to Mr. Gisburne seemed to him the most terrible visitation that could possibly happen. His little heart swelled within him; the tears were very ...
— Vera Nevill - Poor Wisdom's Chance • Mrs. H. Lovett Cameron
... which characterized some of the participants in this war may be conceived from the awful scene of the siege of Magdeburg; a picture for which, says Schiller, "History has no speech, and Poetry no pencil." "Neither childhood, nor age," another author affirms, "nor sex, nor rank, nor beauty were able to disarm the conqueror's wrath. Wives were mishandled ...
— History of Rationalism Embracing a Survey of the Present State of Protestant Theology • John F. Hurst
... further side of the meadow as fast as I could go, and there I stood snorting with astonishment and fear. In the course of the day many other trains went by, some more slowly; these drew up at the station close by, and sometimes made an awful shriek and groan before they stopped. I thought it very dreadful, but the cows went on eating very quietly, and hardly raised their heads as the black frightful thing came ...
— Black Beauty • Anna Sewell
... rather excited in the evening after dinner and so much Perrier water,—walking back to the Ritz in the moonlight, and talking about London, I invented a long story.—No, he won't repeat it, don't be frightened; it was really rather awful; and when Van Buren gives you his word of honour not to tell ...
— The Limit • Ada Leverson
... awful nights!" he answered. "How happy would many poor mortals be, but for the terrible time of darkness. Lady Studley has had dreadful nights for some time: perspirations, cough, restlessness, bad dreams, and all the rest of it. But I must hasten to tell ...
— The Strand Magazine: Volume VII, Issue 37. January, 1894. - An Illustrated Monthly • Edited by George Newnes
... pronounced over him and at that same moment, as he afterwards declared, he was seized with such terror of the supreme judgment of God, that he besought the intercession of the Blessed Virgin and of St. Philomena, and he implored the Almighty through them to vouchsafe to postpone the awful moment of his appearance before Him. His ...
— The Life of Blessed John B. Marie Vianney, Cur of Ars • Anonymous
... darkness and we were only aware of our situation from time to time as the lightning flashed: the interval therefore between the flashes, which were so vivid as to illumine the horizon round, was of a most awful and appalling nature, and the momentary succession of our hopes and fears which crowded rapidly upon each other, may be better imagined than described. We were evidently passing the line of breakers very quickly; but our escape appeared to be only possible through ...
— Narrative of a Survey of the Intertropical and Western Coasts of Australia - Performed between the years 1818 and 1822 • Phillip Parker King
... modified in a general way the pictures of the Madonna, we may array before us, and learn to compare, the types which distinguished in a more particular manner the separate schools, caught from some more local or individual impulses. Thus we have the stern, awful quietude of the old Mosaics; the hard lifelessness of the degenerate Greek; the pensive sentiment of the Siena, and stately elegance of the Florentine Madonnas; the intellectual Milanese, with their large foreheads and thoughtful ...
— Legends of the Madonna • Mrs. Jameson
... Gulf Stream; he did not dash upon this continent as the ocean does; he was not a mighty rushing river. His eloquence was a flight of arrows, sentence after sentence polished, and most of them burning. He slung them one after the other, and where they struck they slew. Always elegant, always awful. I think his scorn is and was as fine as I ever knew it in any human being. He had that sublime sanctuary in his pride that made him almost insensitive to what would by other men be considered obloquy. It was as if he said every day in himself: ...
— Brave Men and Women - Their Struggles, Failures, And Triumphs • O.E. Fuller
... Sunday school will take place tomorrow evening at the Brownsville Labor Lyceum. The capitalist press has lately discovered that there are Socialist Sunday schools in the city. They even send their reporters to discover what awful things Socialist children are taught there. The American Defence Society has just undertaken a vigorous nation-wide fight against Bolshevism in general and Socialist Sunday schools in particular. All school ...
— The Red Conspiracy • Joseph J. Mereto
... Christ and idols, between the love that will give up all and the self-love that will endure nothing. Which shall it be with you? Will you add your voice to the side which tamely yields the priceless treasures purchased for us by these noble men and women at this awful cost? or will you meet the Romanising enemy with a firm front, and a shout of "No fellowship with idols!—no surrender of the liberty which our fathers bought with their heart's blood!" God grant you ...
— The King's Daughters • Emily Sarah Holt
... spirits, a very ecstasy of excitement, brimmed with an exuberance of valiant glee that played itself away in boyish freaks of daring and reckless acts of horsemanship. Now a loftier mood had followed, and, still wrought to some extreme tension, full of blind anticipation and awful assurance, he sat between the camp-fires, his hands clasped over his knees, and watched the evening star where it hung in a cleft of the rocks and seemed like the advent of some great spirit of annunciation. The tired horses had been staked out to graze, a temporary abatis erected, scouting-parties ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 75, January, 1864 • Various
... ascends this throne, His head impal'd with England's diadem,[212] And in his hand the awful rod of rule, Giving the humble place of excellence, And to the low earth casting down ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VIII (4th edition) • Various
... with an awful expression of grief, looked at him, wiped away her tears, looked at ...
— The Chouans • Honore de Balzac
... bosom tear; Their foul deformities by all descry'd, No maid to flatter, and no paint to hide. Then melt, ye fair, while crouds around you sigh, Nor let disdain sit lowring in your eye; With pity soften every awful grace, And beauty smile auspicious in each face; To ease their pains exert your milder power, So shall you guiltless reign, ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 1 • Boswell
... landscape as he went. The river ran between the stepping-stones with a pretty wimple; a bird sang loudly in the wood; the hill-tops looked immeasurably high, and, as he glanced at them from time to time, seemed to contemplate his movements with a beneficent but awful curiosity. His way took him to the eminence which overlooked the plain; and there he sat down upon a stone, and fell into deep and pleasant thought. The plain lay abroad with its cities and silver river; everything was asleep, except a great eddy of birds which ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 6 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... bier; his uncles, his elder brothers, and more than one true friend were there. But amid all the strong, contending emotions of those who crowded the humble room, who hung over the coffin, still that youthful form lay rigid in the fearful chill, the awful silence of death; he, whose bright eye, whose pleasant smile had never yet met the look of a friend without the quick glance of intellect, or the glow of kindly feeling. Patsey felt the change; she felt that the being ...
— Elinor Wyllys - Vol. I • Susan Fenimore Cooper
... Markham's breakfast had been taken to her, and that when she [Eunice] came away she was still in bed, or at all events had not yet made her appearance below." This, together with Eunice's assertion that she was handsome, and Tim Jones' testimony that she was "mighty stuck-up, but awful neat," was all the disappointed Olneyites knew of Mrs. Richard Markham, who, as Eunice reported, had breakfasted in bed, and was still lying there when the one bell in Olney rang out its summons for church. She did not pretend to be sick—only tired and languid, ...
— Ethelyn's Mistake • Mary Jane Holmes
... earthquakes, of which we counted eighteen in less than thirty minutes. To examine the depths of the crater thoroughly we lay on our faces, and I do not think imagination could conceive anything drearier, more gloomy, or more awful than what we saw. The crater consists of a circular hole nearly a league in circumference, the jagged edges of which are surrounded by snow. The interior is of pitchy blackness, but so vast is the gulf that the summits of several mountains ...
— Celebrated Travels and Travellers - Part 2. The Great Navigators of the Eighteenth Century • Jules Verne
... never heard the bell of the sabbath sound, who had never beheld the solemn ceremonies of authorized adoration, was told that those awful and splendid piles, which filled his eyes with wonder, and his mind with instinctive reverence, were raised for other purposes than those of becoming auxiliary to the ferocity of war. That genius and taste, and toil and cost, had not thus ...
— The Stranger in France • John Carr
... such awful wonder as I felt When first my smitten eyes beat full on thee, And all night long before thy feet I knelt Till thou ...
— Poems • Oscar Wilde
... out at sea in some awful storms, Cap'n. I often think of the sailormen at sea when the snow beats against the window and the ...
— The Skipper and the Skipped - Being the Shore Log of Cap'n Aaron Sproul • Holman Day
... Bumble paused to take breath, after delivering this address in an awful voice, the tears rolled down the poor child's face, and ...
— Oliver Twist • Charles Dickens
... story am not a long one. Dat man dat bought me he rode in two days someting like one hundred miles. It wor a lucky ting dat Jake had tramp on his feet de last four years, else soon enough he tumble down, and den de rope round him neck hang him. Jake awful footsore and tired when he git to de end ob dat journey. De Kentucky man he lib in a clearing not far from a village. He had two oder slaves; dey hoe de ground and work for him. He got grown-up son, who look after dem while ...
— True to the Old Flag - A Tale of the American War of Independence • G. A. Henty
... look almost like animated skeletons. Others, except for and sometimes in spite of their bandages, looked like horrid, partially decomposed cadavers. It was a sight to make one shudder and devoutly hope that a cure for this awful disease may soon be discovered. These extreme cases are cared for carefully and their last hours are made ...
— Wanderings in the Orient • Albert M. Reese
... affable to the smooth-haired man seated before her, expressing regret that he was called away so suddenly, while he, on his part, declared that it was "awful hard luck," as he had been looking forward to a week's ...
— Mademoiselle of Monte Carlo • William Le Queux
... easy, as if unconscious of evil, sat coolly beside the bed, as any doctor might have done. From time to time he felt the slackening pulse, and looked at the glassy and sightless eyes which turned in their orbits, and he saw without terror the approach of night, which rendered this awful 'tete-a-tete' even more horrible. The most profound silence reigned in the house, the street was deserted, and the only sound heard was caused by an icy rain mixed with snow driven against the glass, and occasionally the howl of the wind, which penetrated the chimney and scattered ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - DERUES • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... lot of solid comfort In an old clay pipe, I find, If you're kind of out of humor Or in trouble in your mind. When you're feeling awful lonesome And don't know just what to do, There's a heap of satisfaction If you smoke a ...
— Pipe and Pouch - The Smoker's Own Book of Poetry • Various
... without consulting the gods, and no evil impends but they seek to propitiate the gods. All daily life, to the minutest particular, is religious. This stage of religion is characterized by fetichism. Every Indian is provided with his charm or fetich, revealed to him in some awful hour of ecstasy produced by fasting, or feasting, or drunkenness, and that fetich he carries with him to bring good luck, in love or in combat, in the hunt or on the journey. He carries a fetich ...
— Sketch of the Mythology of the North American Indians • John Wesley Powell
... continue my report. The voice gave us some trouble, as you foresaw, and the whole plan hung in the balance during a few awful moments; for, though he easily accepted the explanation we had planned, he sent me out, and told Dr. Mackenzie my voice in his room would madden him. Dr. Rob was equal to the occasion, and won the day; and Garth, having once given ...
— The Rosary • Florence L. Barclay
... window-sill. Opening it, she drew from it a small vial containing white, glistening crystals, and hid it nervously in her bosom; then, with trembling feet, she recrossed the room, opened her door, and peered breathlessly out into the dimly lighted corridor. No sound broke the awful stillness. ...
— Kidnapped at the Altar - or, The Romance of that Saucy Jessie Bain • Laura Jean Libbey
... There is something very awful in these words, too late! We read of and hear them often, and we use them sometimes, lightly it may be, but it is only when they can be used by ourselves with reference to something very serious, that we have a glimmering ...
— The Battery and the Boiler - Adventures in Laying of Submarine Electric Cables • R.M. Ballantyne
... every thing she had ever heard; and then when she could think of nothing else, boldly began on the family secrets. Well, I believe I am just like that girl—because I am constantly telling things about our domestic life which is by no means pleasant. Pa and ma lead an awful kind of an existence—live just like cats and dogs. Now I ought never to tell that, yet somehow it will slip out in ...
— The Inner Sisterhood - A Social Study in High Colors • Douglass Sherley et al.
... steamer was right abreast the party, and not twenty steps away. The awful thunder of a mud-valve suddenly burst forth, drowning the prayer, and as suddenly Uncle Dan'l snatched a child under each arm and scoured into the woods with the rest of the pack at his heels. And then, ashamed of himself, he halted in the deep darkness ...
— The Gilded Age, Complete • Mark Twain and Charles Dudley Warner
... sudden strength. She sprang up with wild, despairing eyes, and hands clenched frantically across her heaving breast; then, with a bitter cry, she dropped on to the floor, her arms flung out across the wide, luxurious bed. It was not true! It was not true! It could not be—this awful thing that had happened to her—not to her, Diana Mayo! It was a dream, a ghastly dream that would pass and free her from this agony. Shuddering, she raised her head. The strange room swam before her eyes. Oh, God! It was not a dream. It ...
— The Sheik - A Novel • E. M. Hull
... the eastern mountains, Where the awful pass climbs their brow, He halts on his onward journey And builds him a ...
— Japanese Literature - Including Selections from Genji Monogatari and Classical - Poetry and Drama of Japan • Various
... had slipped; but felt secure in my own strength. Ah! that strength was weakness itself. I a drunkard!" He shuddered as the thought presented itself. "And Mary, the hopeless, brokenhearted wife of one lost to every ennobling sentiment of the human mind! It is awful to think of it!" ...
— The Two Wives - or, Lost and Won • T. S. Arthur
... profess. The subject is of infinite importance; let it not be driven out of our minds by the bustle or dissipations of life. This present scene, and all its cares and all its gaieties, will soon be rolled away, and "we must stand before the judgment seat of Christ." This awful consideration will prompt the writer to express himself with greater freedom than he should otherwise be disposed to use. This consideration he trusts, also, will justify his frankness, and will secure him a serious and patient perusal. But it would be trespassing on the indulgence ...
— 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
... market to market, and passing from the authority of a parent to the rod of the stranger, until these horrid anticipations worked his expiring imagination into frenzy. When I saw him he was a prey to all the anguish of despair, and he made me feel how awful is the retribution of nature upon those ...
— Democracy In America, Volume 1 (of 2) • Alexis de Tocqueville
... threw open the window of my bedroom and looked out upon the night. It was illumined, not by moon nor by stars, but by lightning flashes, which followed one another with such rapidity that there was no darkness. The quivering flame threw an awful brightness into the great woods upon the tops ...
— Two Summers in Guyenne • Edward Harrison Barker
... it was awful to listen to, yet most entrancing. From the black, smoke-veiled pit where the fire had burned it welled and echoed—now a single heavenly voice, now a sweet chorus, and now an air-shaking thunder as of a ...
— Ayesha - The Further History of She-Who-Must-Be-Obeyed • H. Rider Haggard
... should swell my store; That when the fates would send their minion, To waft me off on shadowy pinion, I might some hours of life obtain, And bribe him back to hell again. But since we ne'er can charm away The mandate of that awful day, Why do we vainly weep at fate, And sigh for life's uncertain date? The light of gold can ne'er illume The dreary midnight of the tomb! And why should I then pant for treasures? Mine be the brilliant round of pleasures; The goblet rich, ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 2 • Charles Dudley Warner
... "Awful shame of me to drop old Lyon for Chiselhurst, eh? But an earl, my dear fellow! Hang it all, you know! Poor old Mo had to get back in his hansom all by himself, but he's bought ...
— Peter Ibbetson • George du Marier et al
... himself to Pepin to ask for help: and so awful has the name and person of a Pope become, that he is allowed to do it; allowed to pass safely and unarmed through the very land upon which he is going to let loose all the horrors ...
— The Roman and the Teuton - A Series of Lectures delivered before the University of Cambridge • Charles Kingsley
... French hired men, or engages, Brebeuf was now alone among the savage people. In this awful solitude he laboured with indomitable will, ministering to his flock, studying the Huron language, compiling a Huron dictionary and grammar, and translating the Catechism. The Indians soon saw in him a friend; and, when he passed through the village ...
— The Jesuit Missions: - A Chronicle of the Cross in the Wilderness • Thomas Guthrie Marquis
... overjoyed Mrs. Nash. "You'll find Boston an awful hard place to get along," she said, shaking her head with ...
— A Modern Instance • William Dean Howells
... be awful dull without you!" said Captain Powell. "He's been as jolly, and as much at home here as you would yourself, Owen! He's read to me and he's brought me cigars, and always with a smile on his face; and Ay ...
— By Berwen Banks • Allen Raine
... front of them, and beyond that was a massive building, which Fanny found was Machinery hall. As they went on to it, Fanny read to them that it covered over twenty acres of ground and cost nearly a million and a half dollars. As they entered the door they saw one awful mass of moving machinery. ...
— The Adventures of Uncle Jeremiah and Family at the Great Fair - Their Observations and Triumphs • Charles McCellan Stevens (AKA 'Quondam')
... surface now on certain memorable days, with a vehemence that is terrifying. Look across the Pont Alexandre, at the serene gold dome of the Invalides, surrounded by its sleepy barracks. Suddenly you are in the fires and awful slaughter of Napoleon's wars. The flower of France is being pitilessly cut down for the lust of one man's ambition; and when that is spent, and the wail of the widowed country pierces heaven with its desolation, a costly asylum is built for the handful of soldiers who are left—and the ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume 3 • Various
... this awful threat, Miss Inches persisted in her plan. Johnnie's little trunk was packed by Clover and Katy, who watered its contents with tears as they smoothed and folded the frocks and aprons, which looked so like their Curly as to seem a part of herself,—their ...
— Nine Little Goslings • Susan Coolidge
... heart, his love, his griefs, were given, But all his serious thoughts had rest in Heaven. As some tall cliff, that lifts its awful form, Swells from the vale, and midway leaves the storm, Though round its breast the rolling clouds are spread, Eternal sunshine settles on ...
— Oliver Goldsmith • E. S. Lang Buckland
... the cattle passed, bellowing and thrashing the water,—an awful mob of steers in panic. Presently in this circle there was a rift where a bull, infuriated by the crowding, swam by, fighting to clear a place around him. He was a tremendous creature, glistening black, active and dangerous as a ...
— Dwellers in the Hills • Melville Davisson Post
... you were yet an Awful Baby, And bawled o' bed-time, I said "Maybe It is not best to spank or scold her: Suppose a fairy-tale were told her?" And gave you then, to my undoing, The wolf Red Riding-Hood pursuing; Sang Mother Goose her artless rhyming; Showed Jack the ...
— A Woman Named Smith • Marie Conway Oemler
... Their awful influence upon the wrongdoer was intensified by the softness of his insinuating voice, that seemed to pry down into human secrets as a sort of intellectual jimmy, delicate but powerful, and by the noiselessness of his tread, which had the effect ...
— Mlle. Fouchette - A Novel of French Life • Charles Theodore Murray
... brilliant, sublime, awful, the poem dazzles criticism, and belittles the critic. It is the grandest poem ever written. It almost sets up a competition with Scripture. Milton's Adam and Eve walk before us instead of the Adam and Eve of Genesis. Milton's Satan usurps the place of that grotesque, ...
— English Literature, Considered as an Interpreter of English History - Designed as a Manual of Instruction • Henry Coppee
... fly back. But he wouldn't let me come. He wrote me a letter, though, that I shall keep with my treasures, and I wish what he said was so. It isn't so. He just thinks it, but it does your heart good to know somebody cares an awful lot about you and no matter what you do is going to stand by. What ...
— Kitty Canary • Kate Langley Bosher
... treason and atrocity deserved. Nearly every house all over the country was fed on the flames of Yankee vengeance. When their houses were burnt, the proud chivalry were obliged to seek refuge in negro shanties—an awful condescension, but scores of them have had their pride ...
— History of the Eighty-sixth Regiment, Illinois Volunteer Infantry, during its term of service • John R. Kinnear
... the water was yet stained with his life-blood, who, hurrying to kill, had met with a violent death, the unwounded sailor, Fenner, excited by the fracas, broke forth into singing, and so completed the horror of a wild and awful scene; for still, while he shouted, laughed, and sang, the shark swam calmly round and round, and the boat crept on, her white sail bespattered with blood—which was not so before—and in her bottom lay one ...
— Foul Play • Charles Reade
... this, an allusion to that which, in the case of actual marriage, the husband was bound to give to his wife, viz., clothing and food; compare Is. iv. 1. If God withdraws His gifts, the consequences are infinitely awful, because, altogether unlike the natural husband, He has everything in His possession; if He does not give anything to drink. He then slays by thirst. If we keep in view this aggravation of the punishment, which has its ground ...
— Christology of the Old Testament: And a Commentary on the Messianic Predictions, v. 1 • Ernst Wilhelm Hengstenberg
... waist, and I ask you if this side of a painted feathered savage you can find any thing more unpleasant to behold. And yet just such young women we meet by the hundred every day on the street and in all our public places. It is awful to think of. Why is it so? It is only because woman is regarded as a doll to be dressed—a plaything to be petted—a house ornament to exhibit—a thing to be used and kept from crying with a ...
— Aims and Aids for Girls and Young Women • George Sumner Weaver
... Sohrab and Rustum is, of course, a flight of poetic fancy; but its "local colour" is founded on good evidence. Probably the Huns, despite the terrors of their name, the echoes of which still come down the corridors of time; despite the awful titles which their leaders won (such as Attila, "the Scourge of God"), were not on a very much lower plane of civilisation than the Goths with whom they fought, or with the other barbarians who ...
— Bulgaria • Frank Fox
... Such an awful threat reduced the juniors to order, and they submitted quite peaceably to be apportioned among their various benefactresses. Irene secured Little Flaxen, Lorna had a pair of solemn-eyed sisters, Peachy pounced upon the liveliest trio and proclaimed them as her ...
— The Jolliest School of All • Angela Brazil
... to the farm beyond the priest's," he answered Gordon's query; "Tol'able's an awful slack ...
— Mountain Blood - A Novel • Joseph Hergesheimer
... dangerous country. No Indian tribe lived there, but all the tribes roamed over it as a hunting-ground. Upon these hunts, the fierce and warlike people would often meet and wage their bloody battles. These fights were so frequent and so awful, that the region was known by the name of the "Dark and Bloody Ground." In spite of danger, Finley lived there, until at last the traders and the Indians began to quarrel, and, for safety's sake, he was forced to run off. He returned to North Carolina, filled with wonderful stories. ...
— The Adventures of Daniel Boone: the Kentucky rifleman • Uncle Philip
... not up to tricks, I shall do very well with him, I don't doubt," the skipper said; "but boys are an awful trouble, the first voyage or two. However, I will do my best ...
— For Name and Fame - Or Through Afghan Passes • G. A. Henty
... cowshed door and went out in the yard. It was a fearful night! Neither moon nor stars shone; the wind blew a gale, and the rain came down in torrents. And the worst of all was that seven great owls sat in a row on the eaves of the cabin. It was awful just to hear them, where they sat and grumbled at the weather; but it was even worse to think what would happen to him if one of them should set eyes on him. That would be the last ...
— The Wonderful Adventures of Nils • Selma Lagerlof
... his subjects. If a king acts heedlessly, a great evil becomes the consequence. Unrighteousness increases causing a confusion of castes. Cold sets in during the summer months, and disappears when its proper season comes. Drought and flood and pestilence afflict the people. Ominous stars arise and awful comets appear on such occasions. Diverse other portents, indicating destruction of the kingdom, make their appearance. If the king does not take measures for his own safety and does not protect his subjects, the latter first meet with destruction ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown
... Lights; Caesar's Character is chiefly made up of Good-nature, as it shewed itself in all its Forms towards his Friends or his Enemies, his Servants or Dependants, the Guilty or the Distressed. As for Cato's Character, it is rather awful than amiable. Justice seems most agreeable to the Nature of God, and Mercy to that of Man. A Being who has nothing to Pardon in himself, may reward every Man according to his Works; but he whose very best Actions must be seen with Grains of ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... and listened. The dumb misery of a terrible expectance held every faculty in its iron grasp. Was his dread to be realised? It seemed so, for all control was gone; a higher power had seized the reins. She had escaped him, and an awful horror was upon him lest he, in his folly and shortsightedness, had assembled these people here only to be witnesses of the degradation of the peerless creature he had so worshipped and ...
— The Mystery of a Turkish Bath • E.M. Gollan (AKA Rita)
... in my two last Letters [1] that awful and tremendous Subject, the Ubiquity or Omnipresence of the Divine Being. I have shewn that he is equally present in all Places throughout the ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... where they had been pursued by the enemy. Of that proud army which had held Brescia with bold defiance, such as were not slain were taken prisoners, and among these was the Doge of Venice himself. Then followed an awful time of pillage and every form of cruelty and disorder, as was ever the way in those days when a city was taken by storm. The spoils taken were valued at three millions of crowns, and this in the end proved the ruin of the French power in Italy, for so many of the soldiers, demoralised ...
— Bayard: The Good Knight Without Fear And Without Reproach • Christopher Hare
... stretches of trench separated by intervals of from two hundred to three hundred yards of open ground. There were no dug-outs. It was impossible to leave these trenches except under cover of darkness—or to get to them or to get up rations. They were awful holes. Any raid by the Germans in large numbers at this time would have wiped us out, as there was no means of retreating or ...
— A Yankee in the Trenches • R. Derby Holmes
... of being compromised, by communications with them; or, in short, because his answers might have thrown light on that mysterious affair? How was it that the name of the illustrious accused was not once mentioned in the course of that awful trial? ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... An awful night followed in the still burning or smouldering town. Meanwhile, at nine o'clock in the evening a party of German officers betook themselves to the hamlet of Poteau—a village north of Senlis—where M. Odent had been kept under guard since the afternoon. Six other hostages were produced, and they ...
— Towards The Goal • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... us out of existence, I felt the need of prayer more than ever before, and I cannot now imagine how those men could sleep, without first asking God to take care of them. I am afraid, though, that some of the sailors don't even believe that there is such a being, and they say his awful name without any fear, and ask him to curse each other every few moments, as if they had never heard what a dreadful thing it is to be under the displeasure of ...
— Hurrah for New England! - The Virginia Boy's Vacation • Louisa C. Tuthill
... at once, finding himself alone, to horror came fear, and stumbling to his feet Spike began to draw away from that awful thing that held his gaze; slowly he retreated, always going backwards, and though he stumbled often against tree and sapling, yet so long as it was in sight needs must he walk backwards. When at last a kindly bush hid it from his sight, ...
— The Definite Object - A Romance of New York • Jeffery Farnol
... a while as though some awful recollection overcame him. "Listen," he went on presently. "We worked up the hill-side without firing, although we saw plenty of partridges and one buck, till just as twilight was closing in, we came to the cliff face. Here we perceived a track that ran to the mouth ...
— The Ivory Child • H. Rider Haggard
... Miss Marigold sitting at the piano and hear her singing as I passed the window. It was awful nice, and, to prolong the pleasure, I stayed outside about half an hour, then a summer shower came up, and I made up my mind and rang the bell. Jane came ...
— The Blunders of a Bashful Man • Metta Victoria Fuller Victor
... my admired friend, came to stay with us. She came January 19, and on the 22d died in the drawing-room in an instant! It was an awful visitation, and ...
— Reminiscences of Scottish Life and Character • Edward Bannerman Ramsay
... a dreadful noise, At first he thought it must be a dream, but the noise continued, the whole place resounding with the most terrible shrieks and yells. The young warrior raised himself cautiously, and seizing his sword, looked through a hole in the ruined wall. He beheld a strange and awful sight. A troop of hideous cats were engaged in a wild and horrible dance, their yells meanwhile echoing through the night. Mingled with their unearthly cries the young warrior could clearly distinguish ...
— Tales of Wonder Every Child Should Know • Various
... he became angry. "Lord love you, Mr Vavasor," said Scruby, "that's nothing! I've had a candidate so mauled,—it was in the Hamlets, I think,—that there wasn't a spot on him that wasn't painted with rotten eggs. The smell was something quite awful. But I brought him in, ...
— Can You Forgive Her? • Anthony Trollope
... and his line became sterner, its traceries more gothic; he made Bach his chief god and within the woven walls of his strange harmonies he sings the history of a soul, a soul convulsed by antique madness, by the memory of awful things, a soul lured by Beauty to secret glades wherein sacrificial rites are performed to the solemn sounds of unearthly music. Like Maurice de Guerin, Chopin perpetually strove to decipher Beauty's enigma and passionately demanded ...
— Chopin: The Man and His Music • James Huneker
... at the Commission every day, and don't make any rapid progress. An awful fear creeps over me that we ...
— The Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley Volume 2 • Leonard Huxley
... holy Sun from whom I spring? My father's sire was king of all the gods; My ancestors fill all the universe. Where can I hide? In the dark realms of Pluto? But there my father holds the fatal urn; His hand awards th' irrevocable doom: Minos is judge of all the ghosts in hell. Ah! how his awful shade will start and shudder When he shall see his daughter brought before him, Forced to confess sins of such varied dye, Crimes it may be unknown to hell itself! What wilt thou say, my father, at a sight So dire? I think I see thee ...
— Phaedra • Jean Baptiste Racine
... hour ago, when I was in hiding—poor timid soul of me, for I had nothing to lose by the French coming—and he looked awful with the stirrups dangling and the saddle empty. 'Tis a gloomy sight, Festy, to see a horse cantering without a rider, and I thought you had been—feared you had been thrown off and killed as ...
— The Trumpet-Major • Thomas Hardy |
