"Stupefaction" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... his Chancery, and these, as quickly as they were received, he read to his guests. His voice was quiet and subdued; there were no indications of excitement in his manner or in that of his friends, and hardly of suppressed emotion. The atmosphere was rather that of dumb stupefaction. The news seemed to have dulled everyone's capacity for thought and even for feeling. If any one spoke, it was in whispers. Afterward, in the drawing room, this same mental state was the prevailing one; there was little denunciation of Germany and practically no discussion ...
— The Life and Letters of Walter H. Page, Volume II • Burton J. Hendrick
... of his stupefaction to realize his actual loss he was heartbroken. He could not be consoled. Hours he spent crying over his saddle. Not for a long time did he go to see little Lucy. His father could not afford to buy him another horse then and indeed it was a long time ...
— Valley of Wild Horses • Zane Grey
... Calyste's stupefaction on hearing these words enabled Claude to say them without interruption and leave the young Breton, who remained like a traveller among the Alps to whom a guide has shown the depth of some abyss by flinging ...
— Beatrix • Honore de Balzac
... the men, who in vain attempted to extinguish it, from chamber to chamber; until at last, to avoid the falling of the timber, and the red hot bolts, they took refuge in a cave on the east side of the rock, where they were found at low water in a state little short of stupefaction, and conveyed to Plymouth. The present Lighthouse was erected by Mr. Smeaton on an improved plan: no expense was spared to render it durable and ornamental; the last stone was placed on the 25th of August, 1759, and the first night the ...
— The World of Waters - A Peaceful Progress o'er the Unpathed Sea • Mrs. David Osborne
... he shares her with YOU?" she exclaimed in droll stupefaction. "Take care you don't have, before you go much further, rather more of all ces dames than you may know what ...
— The Ambassadors • Henry James
... generous yet chastened energy, to comment on the false measure which people apply to the sufferings of others. Insensibility to wretchedness, or, as in the vocabulary of oppression it is called, content, is often a proof of nothing but that stupefaction of the faculties which is the natural result of long and blighting misery. A contented slave is a degraded man. His sorrow may be gone, but ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 54, No. 335, September 1843 • Various
... feting the musicians, soaking them with champagne, drunk himself without drinking a drop, solely with the music which brought him back to life. He mimicked the piston, he mimicked the harp, he snapped his fingers over his head, and rolled his eyes and danced his steps, to the utter stupefaction of the tourists running in from all sides at the racket. Then suddenly, as the exhilarated musicos struck up a Strauss waltz with the fury of true tziganes, the Alpinist, perceiving in the doorway the wife ...
— Tartarin On The Alps • Alphonse Daudet
... the last two centuries, when torturing the accused was in vogue, some individuals were found to be insensible to the most fearful tortures, and some even, who were plunged into a species of somnolence or stupefaction, slept in the ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 446, July 19, 1884 • Various
... the period of great inundations. In proportion as the pools become dry, these animals penetrate into the mud, to seek that degree of humidity which gives flexibility to their skin and integuments. In this state of repose they are seized with stupefaction; but possibly they preserve a communication with the external air; and, however little that communication may be, it possibly suffices to keep up the respiration of an animal of the saurian family, provided with enormous pulmonary ...
— Equinoctial Regions of America V2 • Alexander von Humboldt
... wall, which they are to scale; then proceed "as fast as can be" to the citadel and "secure the windows of the Governor's apartments." After this follow page after page of complicated details which must have stricken the General with stupefaction. The rocks, surf, fogs, and gales of that tempestuous coast are all left out of the account; and so, too, is the nature of the country, which consists of deep marshes, rocky hills, and hollows choked with evergreen ...
— A Half-Century of Conflict, Volume II • Francis Parkman
... one of the most absolute and complete astonishment. So surprised was he that he actually sat and rubbed his eyes as though to clear them from deluding visions. And in just that moment of stupefaction Dan acted. The papers were on the table: doubtless they were his papers. He lunged forward, spitted them on the point of his sword, and crammed them into his doublet by the time Basil was on his feet, ...
— Sea-Dogs All! - A Tale of Forest and Sea • Tom Bevan
... we were for such a thing, the cries of the drowning floating across the quiet sea filled us with stupefaction: we longed to return and rescue at least some of the drowning, but we knew it was impossible. The boat was filled to standing-room, and to return would mean the swamping of us all, and so the captain-stoker ...
— The Loss of the SS. Titanic • Lawrence Beesley
... in a stupefaction at Monsieur Hulot's living masterpiece. Hortense, forewarned, at once identified him as the artist, from the color that flushed a face pale with endurance; she saw the spark lighted up in his gray eyes by her question; she looked on the thin, drawn features, like those of a monk consumed by asceticism; ...
— Cousin Betty • Honore de Balzac
... he stared in terror and stupefaction. Rising above the center of the lake where the day before they had beheld the agitated waters, was an enormous, scale-covered neck surmounted by a long, snake-like head whose round, red eyes were sheltered beneath black, horny ...
— Omega, the Man • Lowell Howard Morrow
... along the streets is like a kind of nightmare, even when the Boches are not indulging in a spell of hate against the place. Talk of Pompeii—why, this puts it quite among the "also-rans." What a pathetic spectacle to see a whole city in ruins! Stupefaction and sadness at the wholesale destruction is my impression of this melancholy ruin of ...
— War Letters of a Public-School Boy • Henry Paul Mainwaring Jones
... had uttered the same cry as when he heard of the death of the engineer; and his stupefaction seemed even greater, combined as it was with an anguish that distorted his features ...
— The Teeth of the Tiger • Maurice Leblanc
... to by Mr. Casely had gone home in a state of stupefaction. He did not attempt to frame a thought. His limbs took him along mechanically. He passed one of his aunts as he went to his room, but he did not make any sign. When he had settled down, a tap came at ...
— The Romance of the Coast • James Runciman
... loomed faintly like a mask painted in dark grey. It belonged to Coke, and it was a mask figured in profound stupefaction. The lips opened and tensely breathed out the name: " Coleman." Instantly the correspondent felt about him that kind of a tumult which tries to suppress itself. He knew that it was the most theatric ...
— Active Service • Stephen Crane
... the sitting of Parliament! There is no doubt that Sir Robert Peel is the Lafontaine of political mesmerism—the fountain of quackery—and every pass he makes with his hand over poor John Bull serves to bring him into that state of stupefaction in which he may be most easily victimised. While Lafontaine thrusts pins into his patient, the Premier sends poor John into a swoon, for the purpose of, as it is vulgarly termed, sticking it into him; and as the French ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 1, September 25, 1841 • Various
... really critical touch-and-go illness which nurses call "a good case," turns a home into an isolation camp. The outer world retreats to an immeasurable distance, and the watchers stare out of the windows, and behold with stupefaction hard-hearted men and women walking abroad on two legs, with hats on their heads, and umbrellas in their hands, talking and laughing and pursuing their petty avocations, not in the least affected by the fact that the temperature had again soared up to 104, and the doctor spoke gravely ...
— The Lady of the Basement Flat • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... stairs, finger on lip. "Hush! Don't make any more noise than you can help. Mother's still asleep." At his gaze of stupefaction she broke into her charming light laugh, "Why, I always seem to strike you speechless. What's ...
— The Squirrel-Cage • Dorothy Canfield
... compass; and just then I saw one of them unroll a sheet of paper and lay his finger down, as though identifying features in a map. Meanwhile a third was walking to and fro, polling among the rocks and peering over the edge into the water. While I was still watching them with the stupefaction of surprise, my mind hardly yet able to work on what my eyes reported, this third person suddenly stooped and summoned his companions with a cry so loud that it reached my ears upon the hill. The others ran to him, even dropping the compass in their hurry, and I could ...
— The Merry Men - and Other Tales and Fables • Robert Louis Stevenson
... their catechism class, and these were all the religious duties he had ever known her to accomplish. For the last ten years it seemed to him that she had been as indifferent as he was about such things—naturally and frankly indifferent. When the first moment of stupefaction had passed, he opened his mouth to speak, looked at her, said nothing, and, turning suddenly on his heels, went out of the room humming a kind of air to which music and words were about ...
— Rene Mauperin • Edmond de Goncourt and Jules de Goncourt
... ideas which many of the troops held in regard to the person of their chief. "See," said one, "he needed only the time necessary for the journey. That man must be a god."—"He is a devil rather," said the Austrians, whose stupefaction was indescribable. They had reached a point when many allowed the arms to be taken out of their hands without making the least resistance, or without even attempting to fly, so deep was their conviction that the Emperor and his guard were ...
— The Private Life of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Constant
... to hide my amazement, my stupefaction. Had he had the shadowiest suspicion of my plans, of the true inwardness of the Croffut-Dominick movement, he would as readily have offered me his own head. In fact, he was offering me his own head; ...
— The Plum Tree • David Graham Phillips
... a person in a suit of black, reducing Schmucke to stupefaction by the mention of his name. He looked up with the same blank, unseeing eyes that he had turned upon ...
— Cousin Pons • Honore de Balzac
... from side to side with a vaguely worried feeling that it must take a power of dusting and wiping to keep such a clutter of things clean; and this feeling gradually rose into her consciousness above the dull stupefaction of ...
— McClure's Magazine, Vol 31, No 2, June 1908 • Various
... was waiting to carry him away. If these prospects did not attract him, he was plied with liquor till he became intoxicated, when a bargain was made over him between the landlord and the mate. After this his senses were kept in such a constant state of stupefaction by the liquor, that in time the former might do with him what he pleased. Seamen, also, were boarded in these houses, who, when the slave-ships were going out, but at no other time, were encouraged to spend more ...
— The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the - Abolition of the African Slave-Trade, by the British Parliament (1839) • Thomas Clarkson
... recognizing at first sight by his dress, weapons, mask, one of the men who had stopped the coach on the preceding day, was at first sight stupefied, then little by little, as he grasped the purport of this mysterious brigand's visit to him, he had passed from stupefaction to joy, through the intermediate phases separating these two emotions. His bag of gold was beside him, yet he seemingly dared not touch it; perhaps he feared that the instant his hand went forth toward it, it ...
— The Companions of Jehu • Alexandre Dumas
... I, pointing to Mary. I beckoned to the Dominie. We assisted up old Tom, and then his wife, and led them away; the poor old woman was in a state of stupefaction, and until she was out in the air was not aware that she had quitted her son. Stapleton had attempted to detach Mary from Tom, but in vain; they were locked together as if in death. At last Tom, roused by me, suffered his hold to be loosened, and Mary was taken out ...
— Jacob Faithful • Captain Frederick Marryat
... hands fall in stupefaction. Had I read the conceptions of an idiot—or the inspirations of a genius which had been realized? What am I to say? to think? So this man, this miserable creature, living at the bottom of a burrow like a fox, dying of hunger, had had perhaps one of those inspirations which the Supreme Being ...
— Library of the World's Best Mystery and Detective Stories • Edited by Julian Hawthorne
... a woman of gigantic stature in the act of toiling upwards from the tomb. Grave clothes impede the motion of her body: they shroud her eyes and gather round her chest. Part only of her face and throat is visible, where may be read a look of blank bewilderment and stupefaction, a struggle with death's slumber in obedience to some inner impulse. Yet she is rising slowly, half awake, and scarcely conscious, to await a doom still undetermined. Thus Michael Angelo interpreted the ...
— Renaissance in Italy Vol. 3 - The Fine Arts • John Addington Symonds
... d'heure) to the little cabaret called the Chapeau. This tavern, too, was shut and dismal. It did not matter. We sat like sparrows on a railing, and munched our egg-sandwiches and drank our wine in a sort of glorious stupefaction. For right opposite us was the vast glacier-fall, whose crashing foam was towers and parapets of ice, that went over and rolled into the valley below, ...
— At a Winter's Fire • Bernard Edward J. Capes
... her hand in silence. I could not speak. Under the pressure of thoughts and recollections that came sweeping in upon me, I was dumb; and so I wandered away, and fell into a seat. Yet, in my stupefaction, I could see that Hiss O'Halloran showed an emotion equal to mine. She had not spoken a word. She sat down, with her eyes on the floor, and much agitation ...
— The Lady of the Ice - A Novel • James De Mille
... voluble cleverness that he had no doubt Offitt would "talk him free" in a few minutes. He was confused a little by his opening words, not clearly seeing his drift; but as the story went on, and Offitt's atrocious falsehood became clear to his mind, he was dumb with stupefaction, and felt a strange curiosity wakening in him to see how the story would end. He did not, for the moment, see what object Offitt could have in lying so, until the thought occurred to him: "May be there's a reward ...
— The Bread-winners - A Social Study • John Hay
... first few months of Ibsen's life in Rome all was chaos in his mind. He was plunged in stupefaction at the beauties of nature, the amenities of mankind, the interpenetration of such a life with such an art as he had never dreamed of and could yet but dimly comprehend. In September, 1864, he tells Bjoernson that he is at work on a poem of considerable ...
— Henrik Ibsen • Edmund Gosse
... looked at me with stupefaction, then replied: "Well, she declared with the most sacred oaths that you had given it to her, but nobody could believe that you could have given a king's present to a slave, and so the rajah ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Vol. 1 (of 8) - Boule de Suif and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant
... in a state of stupefaction, then he handed it to the mate, who had followed him on deck. The mate read ...
— Sea Urchins • W. W. Jacobs
... young lady," broke in Mr. Bingle, who had been slow to grasp her meaning and even slower to recover from his stupefaction; "you— you really have knocked me silly. I hadn't the ...
— Mr. Bingle • George Barr McCutcheon
... the Lord by the act of public baptism, immediately after which I should be admitted to communion 'as an adult'. Emotion ran so high at this, that a large portion of the congregation insisted on walking with us back to our garden-gate, to the stupefaction of the rest ...
— Father and Son • Edmund Gosse
... brief demur, "Well, yes; so, precisely, you may put it!" her imagination would still do him justice. He explained that even if never a dollar were to come to him from the other house he would nevertheless cherish this one; and he dwelt, further, while they lingered and wandered, on the fact of the stupefaction he was already exciting, the positive mystification he ...
— The Jolly Corner • Henry James
... man has drained the dregs of the bitterness of life, hope and fear no longer exist in him, only indifference which produces stupefaction. ...
— Crankisms • Lisle de Vaux Matthewman
... hostile intentions—which they were doubtless in a condition of too great general stupefaction to do—the alacrity with which the two performers clambered aboard the cars would probably have foiled their designs. But as the train gathered headway once more Lombard could not resist the temptation of venting his feelings by shaking his fist ferociously at the audience ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 22, November, 1878 - of Popular Literature and Science • Various
... their naked Swords in hand to pierce their tender and naked Bodies, and spill their generous and Noble blood, till not one of them was left alive on the place, and the rest following his example in other parts, (to their inexpressible stupefaction and grief) seized on all these Provinces. Nor will the Inhabitants till the General conflagration ever discontinue the Celebration of these Festivals, and the Lamentation and Singing with certain kind of Rhythmes in their Arcytos, ...
— A Brief Account of the Destruction of the Indies • Bartolome de las Casas
... seemed irretrievably condemned, was, on the contrary, beginning quite a new life. A little later—in 1808—he might have witnessed the discovery made by Malus of polarization by reflexion, and would have been able to note, no doubt with stupefaction, that under certain conditions a ray of light loses the ...
— The New Physics and Its Evolution • Lucien Poincare
... until the 10th of May, when a horseman rode into the town, with the news that Seringapatam had been captured by the British, and that Tippoo himself was killed. A feeling akin to stupefaction was excited by the news; and it seemed, at first, that it must be false, for it was incredible that Tippoo, with so strong an army, should have been unable to defend the fortress that, as was believed, could withstand any attack, ...
— At the Point of the Bayonet - A Tale of the Mahratta War • G. A. Henty
... nature, so strangely perverted, was put into action to procure a supply of the stimulants she craved; and she escaped from her misery for a little while by losing herself in suicidal lethargy and stupefaction. ...
— Brought Home • Hesba Stretton
... a state of momentary stupefaction, for the extraordinary scene had begun to influence his own nerves. And now he heard the tread of distant feet, and a light shone through the key-hole of the nearest door. The fearful shriek had alarmed some of the household. What was to be done? In desperation Vivian caught the ...
— Vivian Grey • The Earl of Beaconsfield
... love—at the suggestion of Ambition. Matters are now brought so far, that either he or I must submit to a reverse of fortune; since no concession can assuage his malice, divert his envy, or gratify his cupidity. No sooner could I raise myself up, from the consternation and stupefaction into which the certainty of these reports had thrown me, than I began to consider in what manner my own private afflictions might become the least noxious to the republic. Into whose arms, then, could I throw ...
— Imaginary Conversations and Poems - A Selection • Walter Savage Landor
... far forward, craning his neck. He drew back, a look of stupefaction in his face. He held up his large thumb and looked at ...
— Unfinished Portraits - Stories of Musicians and Artists • Jennette Lee
... from the deepest fortress of Love to these simple and generous natures, who live in each other's lives. I tried to picture to myself what my own thoughts would be if condemned to this sad condition; I could only foresee a fretful irritability, a wild anguish, alternating with a torpid stupefaction. "I seem to love the old books better than ever," my friend had said, smiling softly, in the course of the afternoon; "I used to read them hurriedly and greedily in the old days, but now I have time to think over them—to reflect—I never knew ...
— The Thread of Gold • Arthur Christopher Benson
... could disregard calling dishes, chickens, half-churned butter, unfinished ironing, unmilked cows or an irate husband with a placidity that was worthy of the old Greek gods. Martin was dumbfounded to the point of stupefaction. He was too thoroughly self-centred, however, to let other than his own preferences long dominate his Rag-weed's actions. Her first duty was clearly to administer to his comfort, and that was precisely ...
— Dust • Mr. and Mrs. Haldeman-Julius
... of a curse, and thinking much within herself, an utter stupefaction of the senses came upon her. And she was so confounded that she could not settle what to do. Afraid, on the one hand, O king, of the reproach of friends if she obeyed the deity, and, on the other, of his curse if she disobeyed him, ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 1 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... me. When the gentlemen left, and I was again alone with the doctor, I suddenly awoke from my trance; rising from my couch, I stepped up to him, and made him a respectful obeisance. He looked at me in dismay, and seemed paralyzed with stupefaction, for you know all my limbs were palsied, and I could only move my tongue. 'My dear doctor,' I said, very calmly, 'I hope I have proved to you now that I am possessed of considerable talent as an actress, and that I am as well versed in playing ...
— NAPOLEON AND BLUCHER • L. Muhlbach
... condescension at their journey's start and found her gratifyingly amenable, but they had scarcely crossed the border, before he found to his stupefaction that he was confronted by a will as serenely implacable as ...
— The Fifth Ace • Douglas Grant
... prominent upper teeth, and wearing a black cloak and cap. This woman, swaying to and fro and muttering something, was choking with sobs. Two girls of about ten and twelve, dressed in dirty short frocks and cloaks, were staring at their mother with a look of stupefaction on their pale frightened faces. The youngest child, a boy of about seven, who wore an overcoat and an immense cap evidently not his own, was crying in his old nurse's arms. A dirty, barefooted maid was sitting on a trunk, and, having undone her pale-colored plait, ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy
... is infinite in man, and only in finding these, can we find peace. And the common insolences and petulances of the people, and their talk of equality, are not irreverence in them in the least, but mere blindness, stupefaction, and fog in the brains,[62] the first sign of any cleansing away of which is, that they gain some power of discerning, and some patience in submitting to, their true counsellors and governors. In the ...
— The Crown of Wild Olive • John Ruskin
... his ear for the first time from a white man's lips, and the stupefaction of it was a ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 90, April, 1865 • Various
... sight of these things, and Mary's expressions, impressed on my mind, almost bereaved me of my senses, and left me in such a state of stupefaction that I seemed to have no manner of will ...
— Fox's Book of Martyrs - Or A History of the Lives, Sufferings, and Triumphant - Deaths of the Primitive Protestant Martyrs • John Fox
... worlds with his spiritual vision stupified and clouded. In regard to supersensible worlds he is like a person in the sense-world who makes observations in a state of lethargy. The latter, however, will not be able to make any statements of consequence, whereas the spiritual observer, even in his stupefaction, is more awake than a person in the ordinary state of consciousness, and the results of his observations will therefore be erroneous in regard to ...
— An Outline of Occult Science • Rudolf Steiner
... life. Shut off by his affliction from the society of men, he had grown up, dumb and mighty, as a tree grows on a fruitful soil. When he was transported to the town, he could not understand what was being done with him; he was miserable and stupefied, with the stupefaction of some strong young bull, taken straight from the meadow, where the rich grass stood up to his belly, taken and put in the truck of a railway train, and there, while smoke and sparks and gusts of steam puff out upon ...
— Stories by Foreign Authors: Russian • Various
... like Fanny's, as it received the conviction of such guilt, and began to take in some part of the misery that must ensue, can hardly be described. At first, it was a sort of stupefaction; but every moment was quickening her perception of the horrible evil. She could not doubt, she dared not indulge a hope, of the paragraph being false. Miss Crawford's letter, which she had read so often as to make every line her own, was in frightful conformity with it. ...
— Persuasion • Jane Austen
... me; and I saw the stupefaction in his eyes. I looked back at him, a direct glance of hatred, as I put my ...
— The Story of Bawn • Katharine Tynan
... fortune would have it, were all gathered under the dining-room lamp, and there was a burst of laughter and welcome for Norma and "Mister Chris." Norma's wrap was tossed aside, and she revolved in all her glory, waving her fan at arm's length, pleasantly conscious of Wolf's utter stupefaction, and conscious, too, a little less pleasantly, that Aunt Kate's maternal eye did not agree with Aunt Annie's in ...
— The Beloved Woman • Kathleen Norris
... abounds in nice distinctions of this kind. Dante therefore employs the most accurate and infinitely the most poetical mode of marking the precise state of his mind. Every person who has experienced the bewildering effect of sudden bad tidings,—the stupefaction,—the vague doubt of the truth of our own perceptions which they produce,—will understand the following simile:—"I was as he is who dreameth his own harm,—who, dreaming, wishes that it may be all a dream, so that he desires that which ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 1 (of 4) - Contibutions to Knight's Quarterly Magazine] • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... intense ophthalmia, a violent and racking cough, and the phenomena which appertain to it; an intense irritation of the internal mucous membrane; diarrh[oe]a; dangerous prostration of strength; marked stupefaction and various nervous phenomena render the interference of art desirable. In all such cases, I have seen good effects from the use of Apis, which differed not only from the regular course of the disease, but likewise from the effects which have been witnessed ...
— Apis Mellifica - or, The Poison of the Honey-Bee, Considered as a Therapeutic Agent • C. W. Wolf
... babyhood that weighs so heavily upon them, they burst open the back door of their shell and slowly creep out backwards. It takes about five minutes for them to get entirely out, head, legs and all, and then for a moment or two they gaze in stupefaction at their old shell, amazed to find that they have, by their own efforts, unaided and alone, accomplished such a ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 2, No. 29, October 15, 1870 • Various
... year 1774 the Great Council promulgated a law forbidding all games of chance, the first effect of which was to close the 'ridotto'. This law was a real phenomenon, and when the votes were taken out of the urn the senators looked at each other with stupefaction. They had made the law unwittingly, for three-fourths of the voters objected to it, and yet three-fourths of the votes were in favour of it. People said that it was a miracle of St. Mark's, who had answered the prayers of Monsignor Flangini, then censor-in-chief, now cardinal, ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... slow and stately step toward the residence of Catharine de' Medici.' That queen of compromises and of magic had been holding many a conference with the leaders of both parties; had been increasing her son's stupefaction by her enigmatical counsels; had been anxiously consulting her talisman of goat's and human blood, mixed with metals melted under the influence of the star of her nativity, and had been daily visiting the wizard Ruggieri, ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... by me on the stairs in the darkness," volunteered Foster, recovering somewhat from his stupefaction. "I fear he has got ...
— I Spy • Natalie Sumner Lincoln
... difficult to read. The learned and virtuous Malesherbes and many another distinguished member of the suppressed parlements warned the king of the dangers menacing the crown, but so sunk was its wearer in sensual stupefaction that he only murmured: "Well, it will last my time," and with his flatterers and strumpets uttered the famous words—"Apres nous le deluge." So lost to all sense of honour was Louis, that he defiled his hands with ...
— The Story of Paris • Thomas Okey
... the crowd like a blind man's dog, following the stream in a state of stupefaction and excitement difficult to describe. Importuned by glances and white-rounded contours, dazzled by the audacious display of bared throat and bosom, he gripped his roll of manuscript tightly lest somebody should steal it—innocent that ...
— Lost Illusions • Honore De Balzac
... lion, with a terrible gesture, "if I am not master of myself, I will be, I promise you, of those who do me outrage. Come with me, M. d'Artagnan, come." And he quitted the room in the midst of a general stupefaction and dismay. The king hastily descended the staircase, and was about to ...
— The Vicomte de Bragelonne - Or Ten Years Later being the completion of "The Three - Musketeers" And "Twenty Years After" • Alexandre Dumas
... stupefaction following on the horrid revelation, a murmur of indignation ran from mouth ...
— The White Riband - A Young Female's Folly • Fryniwyd Tennyson Jesse
... that could have happened to her would have been to lie awake all night, and let her heart and brain hammer as they would, till they hammered her to stupefaction. Unfortunately, towards morning she fell into ...
— The Creators - A Comedy • May Sinclair
... arrests that followed immediately, and filled the country with stupefaction, made havoc on all sides of her. Among the victims were comrades of her childhood, numbers of her friends and acquaintance and their relatives—as well in Berry as in the capital—many arrested solely on suspicion of hostility to the President's views, yet none ...
— Famous Women: George Sand • Bertha Thomas
... Lawrence in a tone of stupefaction. "Are you serious? Thugs on the heath here, in ...
— Jack Haydon's Quest • John Finnemore
... On February 16, 1872, Mr Arnold's second son died at Harrow, and again the reception of the blow and its effect are marked by lesser voicefulness in the grief. Yet one phrase, "I cannot write his name without stopping to look at it in stupefaction at his not being alive," is equal to volumes. The letters of this year are few, but in September begins a correspondence of some interest and duration with a French pastor, M. Fontanes. Nor does 1873 give ...
— Matthew Arnold • George Saintsbury
... none—type of the drunkard's moral state, where virtue has lost its foot-hold, and there is no firm ground of self-respect, and conscience is a loosened ledge toppling treacherously, and there is no steady hope to stay his horrible whirling and sinking. Stupefaction became sleep; with sleep inebriation passed; and Frank awoke ...
— The Drummer Boy • John Trowbridge
... concealed under his coat, he stepped to the side of the door. It opened, and the porter, who had come alone and bareheaded, stared in stupefaction at ...
— The Historical Nights' Entertainment • Rafael Sabatini
... not tell what he was going to say, his attitude dispelled our fears at once. He gazed at us with wide astonished eyes from under the peak of his shako, and came on quietly, as if he were taking a walk, his hands in his pockets, murmuring in a tone of stupefaction: ...
— In the Field (1914-1915) - The Impressions of an Officer of Light Cavalry • Marcel Dupont
... wave of her hand. I stopped. She does not approve of me. She thinks it very indelicate in me to accept the attentions of one whose engagement had so recently been broken, and, while she will never recover from stupefaction that Elizabeth should disagree with her son, she attributed that action on Elizabeth's part to lack of sense and does not hesitate to say so, just as she has not hesitated to say things about me that were not as Christian as ...
— Kitty Canary • Kate Langley Bosher
... yet even among us large numbers of dabblers in this ancient art adopt some plan of self-hypnotization, such as gazing at a bright spot, or the repetition of some formula until a condition of semi-stupefaction is produced; while yet another school among them would endeavor to arrive at similar results by the use of some of the Indian systems of regulation of the breath. All these methods are unequivocally to be condemned as quite ...
— Clairvoyance and Occult Powers • Swami Panchadasi
... Schwarzenberg, casting a long, dark shadow upon the shining surface of the inlaid floor. Gabriel Nietzel saw all this, and yet he felt as if he were dreaming, and that all would vanish so soon as he should venture to move or step forward. The count's voice aroused him from his stupefaction. ...
— The Youth of the Great Elector • L. Muhlbach
... like a diseased nerve; and it always will till we get rid of it. Therefore, Egbert, remember—O that I could burn it into your consciousness—the best that you can gain from your proposed evil course is a brief respite in base and sensual stupefaction, or equally artificial and unmanly excitement, and then endless waking, bitter memories, and torturing regret. Face this truth now, before it is too late. Good-by for a time. I will come again when I can; or you can send for me when you please;" and she gave him ...
— A Knight Of The Nineteenth Century • E. P. Roe
... for him, he did not say anything. Of course he was bound to stand by what he had done and suffer the consequences, whatever they might be. When he left the room and went up-stairs into the wings, it was in a vague sort of stupefaction; but here were the immediate exigencies of the stage, and perhaps it was better not to ...
— Prince Fortunatus • William Black
... to nail you to the ground. I have often produced effects of this nature, a sort of animal magnetism which becomes enormously powerful when the relations are reciprocally precise. But, my dear fellow, this was not stupefaction, nor was she a common girl. Morally speaking, her face seemed to say: 'What, is it you, my ideal! The creation of my thoughts, of my morning and evening dreams! What, are you there? Why this morning? Why not yesterday? Take me, I am thine, et cetera!' Good, I said to myself, another ...
— The Girl with the Golden Eyes • Honore de Balzac
... what does. Look at your socks, too, all coming down over the tops of your boots! Nasty dirty pink and green stripes! There's another thing about my collar, too," he continued, speaking with renewed earnestness as he appreciated his senior's stupefaction. "It was clean yesterday, and that's more than yours was—or the ...
— The Double Life Of Mr. Alfred Burton • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... and quick that certainly she was the most dumbfounded there. Her utter stupefaction amazed Driscoll as much again as the question itself. He stiffened as though struck. If this were a revelation? If it could be—if it could be that she really knew no reason ...
— The Missourian • Eugene P. (Eugene Percy) Lyle
... her husband, in stupefaction at first, but then an irresistible desire to laugh shone in her eyes, passed like a slight shiver over her delicate cheeks, made her upper lip curl and her nostrils dilate, and at last a clear, bright burst of mirth came from her lips, a torrent of gayety which was lively ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume II (of 8) • Guy de Maupassant
... strange place in which to alight on the problem of the use and abuse of those products of nature or art which induce intoxication or stupefaction. Roots or juices with such properties have been known to nearly all races, the savage as well as the civilised; and they have played a great part in the life of mankind. Their history is one of the most curious. They are associated ...
— The Trial and Death of Jesus Christ - A Devotional History of our Lord's Passion • James Stalker
... so overcome was he. Even when he saw the house ablaze with many lights and the verandah as bright as day, and observed the people there waiting to welcome him home, he seemed like one in a dream. It was only when Betty danced about him and caught both of his hands in hers, that he aroused from his stupefaction. ...
— Under Sealed Orders • H. A. Cody
... Duryodhana said unto Karna and king Valhika and Duhsasana and the ruler of the Madras and the many other mighty car-warriors of his army, these words, "The preceptor of the entire order of the Kshatriyas,—he that is the foremost of all conversant with Brahma, doth not, from stupefaction, wish to slay this son of Arjuna. None can, in battle, escape the preceptor with life, not even the Destroyer himself, if the latter advanceth against the preceptor as a foe. What, O friend, shall we say then of any mortal? I say this truly. This one is the son of Arjuna, and Arjuna is ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 2 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... but she lay still, obediently, and said not another word. An unreasoning confidence in this child seized upon her. She leaned strongly upon what, until now, she had held the veriest reed—to her own stupefaction and with doubtful content, but no resistance. Jerome seemed suddenly no longer her son; the memory of the time when she had cradled and swaddled him failed her. The spirit of his father awakened in him filled her at once with strangeness ...
— Jerome, A Poor Man - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... murderers, traitors, and malefactors,—men, who had their minds seasoned with theories perfectly conformable to their practice, and who had always laughed at possession and prescription, and defied all the fundamental maxims of jurisprudence. To the horror and stupefaction of all the honest part of this nation, and indeed of all nations who are spectators, we have seen, on the credit of those very practices and principles, and to carry them further into effect, these ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. IV. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... thought that he could never reach it; the spear of Horab would crash through him at the first movement. He dismissed the thought—forgot it—and forgot all else in the fascination of beholding the sagging lips and the scowling stupefaction on the black face of Horab. And slowly there came to his throbbing brain ...
— Astounding Stories, March, 1931 • Various
... and this was a great victory to one who usually yielded to every prompting of passion. On this occasion he had restrained himself and overcome his rage at his rival's triumph. He overcame his agony at the wreck of his hopes. When he left Sorrento, and awoke, so to say, from the stupefaction into which he had plunged, the excitable brain and fiery heart ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 2, No. 4, March, 1851 • Various
... Madame," cried he, his voice choked by tears, "why were you present at this sitting? to witness—" these words were interrupted by sobs. The Queen threw herself upon her knees before him, and pressed him in her arms. I remained with them, not from any blamable curiosity, but from a stupefaction which rendered me incapable of determining what I ought to do. The Queen said to me, "Oh! go, go!" with an accent which expressed, "Do not remain to see the dejection and despair of your sovereign!" I withdrew, struck with the contrast between the shouts of joy without the palace and the profound ...
— Memoirs Of The Court Of Marie Antoinette, Queen Of France, Complete • Madame Campan
... many a thing that might have otherwise seemed improbable. Finally, we may be able properly to estimate many an excuse offered by a defendant through considering his habits, especially when we are dealing with events that are supposed to have occurred under stupefaction, absolute intoxication, distraction, etc.[1] Hume, indeed, has assigned to habit the maximum of significance; his whole system depends upon the use of habit as a principle of explanation. He shows that the essence of all our inferences with regard to facts relates to the ...
— Robin Hood • J. Walker McSpadden
... sensations on finding himself alone had been those of stupefaction. Although all that he knew of Forrester's father was that he had been in India, it never occurred to him now for a moment that the gallant officer mentioned in the telegram could be any other than the father whom he had so cruelly and irreparably wronged. And now once ...
— A Dog with a Bad Name • Talbot Baines Reed
... back from the doorway by way of being playfully dramatic—her hands on her hips, her head to one side at an astounded angle. Yet little more than a second did she let herself simulate this welcoming incredulity—this stupefaction of cordiality. There must be quick speech—especially as to Nancy's face—which seemed strangely unfamiliar, set, suppressed, breathless, unaccountably young—and there had to be the splendid announcement of ...
— The Seeker • Harry Leon Wilson
... confined to and more or less fully occupy one or two lobes. Occasionally there is a general involvement of both lungs. The body temperature has now reached 104 deg. or 105 deg. F., or in extreme cases even a degree higher. The debility of the animal is great without the stupefaction or evidence of cerebral trouble, which is constant with such grave constitutional phenomena in influenza or severe pneumonia. The animal is subject to occasional chills, and staggers in its gait. The yellow coloration of the ...
— Special Report on Diseases of the Horse • United States Department of Agriculture
... Francis had been so sudden that he desired to complete it; a few days later he went to the lazaretto.[16] One can imagine the stupefaction of these wretches at the entrance of the brilliant cavalier. If in our days a visit to the sick in our hospitals is a real event awaited with feverish impatience, what must not have been the appearance of ...
— Life of St. Francis of Assisi • Paul Sabatier
... absolute and hushed calm. Wilfred Horton picked up the discarded weapon and looked at it in bewildered stupefaction, then slowly his face flamed with ...
— The Call of the Cumberlands • Charles Neville Buck
... utter stupefaction, they were no longer there. I had seen them but two seconds before—and they were gone! I stood still; I looked to right and left; I saw no sign of them in any direction. It was as if the platform ...
— Stories by English Authors: England • Various
... and confusedly, "No, sir; we shall be grateful to you, if you can save her"—and went quickly, with a strange abstraction on her white face, into the inner room. He followed her at once, and, hardly glancing at Mrs. Flanagan, who sat there in stupefaction, with her apron over her head and face, he laid his hat on a table, went to the bedside of the little girl, and felt her head and pulse. He soon satisfied himself that the little sufferer was in no danger, under proper remedies, and now dashed down a prescription on a leaf from his pocket-book. ...
— The Ghost • William. D. O'Connor
... to him wholly stupefied, wholly intoxicated. This was, for her, language wholly new and never heard before, at which her heart trembled in blissful awe, which rushed around her in enchanting melodies and lulled her into a sweet stupefaction. Now she herself even forgot that she was queen, that she was the wife of Henry, the bloodthirsty and the jealous. She was conscious only of this, that the man whom she had so long loved, was now kneeling at her side. With rapture she drank in his words, ...
— Henry VIII And His Court • Louise Muhlbach
... spoke nor moved. Stupefaction, surprise, and a very obvious regard for Jimmie Dale's revolver mingled themselves in a ...
— The Adventures of Jimmie Dale • Frank L. Packard
... his guest presented herself. Paquin and the Fairy Godmother would have approved her gown; as to her coiffure, if her employer could have seen it, he would have wanted to put her in his window. Tricotrin gave her his arm with stupefaction. "Upon my word," he faltered, "you awe me. I am now overwhelmed with embarrassment that I had the temerity to tease you while you dressed. And what shall I say of the host who is churl enough to welcome you in ...
— A Chair on The Boulevard • Leonard Merrick
... you, men; shame upon you!" cried I, emerging from the temporary trance of stupefaction which seemed to have seized me while this frightful tragedy was in progress. "You have taken a human life, and branded yourselves as murderers. And for what? Simply because that poor craven of a fellow appropriated a small morsel of putrid meat and a few drops of disgusting liquid that, evenly ...
— The Log of a Privateersman • Harry Collingwood
... encounter with his undesired guest. Behind him shone the now smug countenance of the blond secretary, and on each side he was flanked by another man. Powerful fellows these two seemed, evidently Italian laborers, gazing at the scene uncomprehendingly, but ready for any work their master set them. In stupefaction, Laurie stared at the tableau, while eight eyes unwinkingly stared back at ...
— The Girl in the Mirror • Elizabeth Garver Jordan
... mule, and help me fasten the chest upon him. We must reach higher ground before the waters overtake us. And now——" She turned to Freeman, who by this time was sitting up and regarding her with stupefaction. ...
— The Golden Fleece • Julian Hawthorne
... seemed to subside to the ground, but he pulled her up again, not in calm self-possession, but by the sheer automatism of instinct. A spasm of horrible fright shot through him. He thought, in awe and stupefaction: ...
— The Pretty Lady • Arnold E. Bennett
... in his speech that he had only intended local reforms; that he regretted the misuse that had been made of his name; and wound up by lamenting the war as offensive to the spirit of religion. A momentary stupefaction, followed by a passion of indignation, in which the words traitor and imbecile were heard, received this astounding speech. The Pope was besieged with deputations, and, after two days' struggle, was obliged to place the power in the hands of persons most opposed to him, and nominally ...
— Memoirs of Margaret Fuller Ossoli, Vol. II • Margaret Fuller Ossoli
... beam, Randolph?" Samm's voice cut sharply through the daze of stupefaction which held spellbound most of the denizens of the Hill. But all were not so held—no conceivable emergency could take the attention of the chief ultra-wave ...
— Triplanetary • Edward Elmer Smith
... not safe. At the same time she rose to go, or rather slid herself along the sofa, for rising was impossible. We sat like mannerless louts, in blank amazement. Davies at the outset had said, 'What's the matter?' in plain English, and then relapsed into stupefaction. I recovered myself the first, and protested in some awkward fashion about the cocoa, the time, the absence of fog. In trying to answer, her self-possession broke down, poor child, and her retreat became a blind flight, ...
— Riddle of the Sands • Erskine Childers
... roar of that second broadside, Colonel Bishop awoke from stupefaction to a recollection of where his duty lay. In the town below drums were beating frantically, and a trumpet was bleating, as if the peril needed further advertising. As commander of the Barbados Militia, the place of Colonel Bishop ...
— Captain Blood • Rafael Sabatini
... the darkness to the cemetery of St. Nicaise. With heavy labour they broke up the sacred chains, detached the time-worn rivets, and dragged off the famous timber, the "Boise" of St. Nicaise, the palladium of the obnoxious parish. The next morning the gossips discovered to their stupefaction that there was no log to sit upon! Following a few traces that were left here and there, the horrified drapers and tanners found the smoking remnants of their cherished wood scattered in the square of St. Hilaire, surrounded by a laughing crowd of the children ...
— The Story of Rouen • Sir Theodore Andrea Cook
... the Bishop ran his knife into the calf's-head, the Devil changed it to the head of Hans Ruprecht, which, wild, horrible, and bloody, now stared the Bishop in the face. His reverence let fall his knife, and sank back in a feinting fit; while the whole company sat in lifeless horror and stupefaction. ...
— Faustus - his Life, Death, and Doom • Friedrich Maximilian von Klinger
... moment of stupefaction, all who had an injury to avenge arose and hurried to the chase. Sforza retook Pesaro, Bagloine Perugia, Guido and Ubaldo Urbino, and La Rovere Sinigaglia; the Vitelli entered Citta di Castello, the ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... the door of the Barricini mansion was seen to open. The prefect came out first, in travelling garb; he was followed by the mayor and his two sons. What was the stupefaction of the inhabitants of the village of Pietranera, who had been on the watch since sunrise for the departure of the chief magistrate of their department, when they saw him go straight across the square and enter the della Rebbia dwelling, accompanied by the three Barricini. ...
— Columba • Prosper Merimee
... man suddenly comprehended. The expression of his face, up to that time sombre and harsh, bore the imprint of stupefaction, of doubt, of joy, and became extraordinary. He began stammering like ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo |
