"Unstrung" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... music in that thought, Unto a heart unstrung, Like sweet bells at the evening time, Most ...
— The World's Best Poetry Volume IV. • Bliss Carman
... here are now nervous and unstrung and actually believe that America will now enter the war against them. It is impossible to conceive of the general breakdown ...
— Face to Face with Kaiserism • James W. Gerard
... be said. We will not waste our time in discussing impossibilities. And I am really so depressed and unwell that I must return to my room. I hope to hear you are better in the morning, and I think you will be. The excitement of this night and your anxiety about the girl have unstrung your nerves, and you have lost that courage and endurance ...
— Aylwin • Theodore Watts-Dunton
... gulping convulsively. He was thoroughly unstrung. The cold, desperate mood had passed. In its place came the old feeling of desolation. He was a child, aching for sympathy. He wanted to tell his troubles. Punctuating his narrative with many gestures and an occasional gulp, he proceeded to do so. The American ...
— The Man Upstairs and Other Stories • P. G. Wodehouse
... skin hunting-shirt his body, and a hairy boar-skin was thrown across his broad shoulders. Altogether, he seemed to his visitor the very personification of ferocity. A huge bow, ready strung, leaned against his hut. As Bladud advanced with his own bow unstrung, the man apparently scorned to take it up, but he grasped and leaned upon a staff proportioned to ...
— The Hot Swamp • R.M. Ballantyne
... the sward, mechanically unstrung his bow, sighing oft, and oft frowning; and—without vouchsafing other word to his lords than "No further sport to-day!" rose slowly, and went alone through the thickest parts of the forest. But his faithful Fitzosborne marked his gloom, and fondly followed ...
— Harold, Complete - The Last Of The Saxon Kings • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... raiment on him, and done on him the said warder's coat and sallet over all; and there stood the man of worship, waked up now, as it seemed, but looked before him as if he saw naught, even as a man who walks in sleep. Stephen the meantime unstrung his fiddle and began to play a slow sweet tune thereon, and let his big but melodious voice go with it, and thus they brought the lordship of Deepdale to the door, and still he seemed of no avail, save to walk on as ...
— The Sundering Flood • William Morris
... hatchet is broken, The bow is unstrung; The bell peals afar Where the war-whoop once rung: The council-fires burn But in thoughts of the Past, And their ashes are strewn To the ...
— Indian Legends and Other Poems • Mary Gardiner Horsford
... escapes asylum care and custody except in its exacerbations; it is the insanity of organism which gives so much of the erratic and unstable to society, in its manifestations of mind and morals; it is the form of unstable mental organism which, like an unstrung instrument jangling out of tune and harsh, when touched in a manner to elicit in men of stable organisms only concord of sweet, harmonious sounds; it is the form of mental organism out of which, by slight exciting causes largely imaginary, the Guiteaus and ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 488, May 9, 1885 • Various
... sons their harps unstrung, On Babylonian willows hung, And mute their songs—with sorrow wrung, ...
— The Poetry of Wales • John Jenkins
... it is necessary for me to take a short rest. Recent excitement in Manti has left me very nervous and unstrung. I shall be away from Manti for about two weeks, I think. During my absence any pending litigation must ...
— 'Firebrand' Trevison • Charles Alden Seltzer
... which is half- way between Pillnitz and the border of what is known as 'Saxon Switzerland.' Frequent excursions to the Porsberg, to the adjacent Liebethaler, and to the far distant bastion helped to strengthen my unstrung nerves. While I was first planning the music to Lohengrin, I was disturbed incessantly by the echoes of some of the airs in Rossini's William Tell, which was the last opera I had had to conduct. At last I happened ...
— My Life, Volume I • Richard Wagner
... worked for him, loved him, spoilt him; and now, in these weeks, her lifework was utterly undone. And then, in the terrible loneliness of her room, with the darkness on the world and round her bed and at her heart, she wept—terrible, tearless sobbing that left her in the morning weak, unstrung, utterly unequal ...
— The Wooden Horse • Hugh Walpole
... am not sure! If love makes a man as thoroughly unstrung and nervous as I am to-day, then love is a very ...
— Ziska - The Problem of a Wicked Soul • Marie Corelli
... promised to accompany her over to Dr. Mead's after he had made his examination of the wrecked car to confirm what the doctor had already observed. It took several minutes for them to satisfy themselves and meanwhile Violet Winslow, already highly unstrung by the news from Garrick, ...
— Guy Garrick • Arthur B. Reeve
... "Oh, Annie, I'm so unstrung," replied the girl, then recollecting Constance, added, "let me introduce my friend, Mrs. Dunlap. This is Mrs. Annie Grayson, who has taken me in as a lodger and is ever so ...
— Constance Dunlap • Arthur B. Reeve
... instant," I said, "because I'm hardly myself. I'm tired and excited, unstrung, as I always am on ...
— The Powers and Maxine • Charles Norris Williamson
... of the practical man became distinguishable to them as that of a plain brother of the poetic. Diana said of him to Arthur: 'He does not supply me with similes; he points to the source of them.' Arthur, with envy of the man of positive knowledge, disguised an unstrung heart in agreeing. ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... Pindar sung in these words, ossa de me pephileke Zeus atuzontai boan Pieridon aionta; for he had no sooner begun to repeat the mellifluent strains of that divine poet, than the wretch his antagonist was confounded, and his nerves unstrung. ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett
... but he puckered his lips discreetly to cover a grin, and with his head still cocked sidewise, looked off to the lifting front of Cerberus, whistling softly Queen Among the Heather. But the tune ceased abruptly and, straightening like an unstrung bow, he swerved the machine out of the thoroughfare and brought ...
— The Rim of the Desert • Ada Woodruff Anderson
... all unstrung. Why couldn't you have let him come in and talk awhile? It would have been the best way to get me quieted down. But no; you must always have your own way Don't twitch me, my dear; I'd rather undress myself. You pretend to be very careful of me. ...
— A Foregone Conclusion • W. D. Howells
... and kindness were lavished on the delicate woman, who would scarce have needed either in her present delight; every luxury that could add to her slowly increasing strength, every attention that could quiet her fluttering and unstrung nerves, was showered on her, and for a time her brightest hopes seemed all to ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 22, Aug., 1859 • Various
... of their readers. Their God is not a Being, their religion is not a worship, their duty is not a law, their immortality is not the hope of a world to come. Amidst these equivocations and contradictions thought is blunted, and the sinews of the intellect are unstrung. The public, bewitched by talent and captivated by success, is deluged with writings which have the same effect as the talk of a frivolous man, or the showy tattle of a woman of the world. They give an agreeable exercise to the mind, ...
— The Heavenly Father - Lectures on Modern Atheism • Ernest Naville
... her came very near making her ill and finally decided her to learn the truth if possible. She addressed a note to Mr. Francis Grimke. The answer she received confirmed her worst fears. He and his brothers were her nephews. Her nerves already unstrung by the dread of this cruel blow, Angelina fainted when it came, and was completely prostrated for several days. Her husband and sister refrained from disturbing her by a question or a suggestion. Physically stronger than she, they felt the superiority of her spiritual strength, ...
— The Grimke Sisters - Sarah and Angelina Grimke: The First American Women Advocates of - Abolition and Woman's Rights • Catherine H. Birney
... feminine tastes and occupations, breathing that perfume of elegance which the presence of woman ever communicates. Vases of flowers decked the sideboards; a few books, the works of the best Spanish poets, lay upon the table; and a guitar, unstrung, it is true, was suspended against the wall. Two persons occupied the apartment. One of them, who was seated on a low stool at its inner extremity, near to the folding doors that separated it from an antichamber, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 364, February 1846 • Various
... house. He claimed to be an agent of the gas company, in search of a rumoured leak. Eliza immediately spotted Priapus, and indignantly ejected him by force of arms. In the scuffle a dish pan and several chairs were overturned. Mary, whose nerves were rather unstrung by the sustained comedy she was witnessing, uttered an obbligato of piercing yelps which soon brought Kathleen to the scene. Eliza received a severe rating, and so admired the angry sparkle in Kathleen's eyes ...
— Kathleen • Christopher Morley
... two cups of coffee, and then fell back into the same death-like stupor; but of all this, I did not retain the least knowledge. On the morning of the second day, after a sleep of thirty hours, I awoke again to the world, with a system utterly prostrate and unstrung, and a brain clouded with the lingering images of my visions. I knew where I was, and what had happened to me, but all that I saw still remained unreal and shadowy. There was no taste in what I ate, ...
— The Lands of the Saracen - Pictures of Palestine, Asia Minor, Sicily, and Spain • Bayard Taylor
... blot; No moment of unkindness shrouding, No speck of anger overclouding: An awful and a sweet controul, A rainbow arching o'er the soul; A soothing, tender thrill, which clung Around the heart, while, all unstrung, The thought was still, and ...
— The Lay of Marie • Matilda Betham
... Wattelet, all the gommeux of the Grand Club little guessed when the king, quitting the Avenue de Messine, rejoined them at the club with heavy fevered eyes, that he had spent the evening on a divan, by turns repulsed or encouraged, his feelings played upon, his nerves unstrung by the constant resistance; rolling himself at the feet of an immovable, determined woman, who with a supple opposition abandoned to his impassioned embrace only the cold little Parisian hands, so skillful in defense and evasion, ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern — Volume 11 • Various
... Utterly unstrung, he gazed at that mighty, loathsome mass, listening to its snapping jaws as it took on the tons of nourishment needed for its machinelike ...
— The Raid on the Termites • Paul Ernst
... Aylward, having unstrung his bow, had remounted his horse during this conversation, and the two rode swiftly past the little squat Chapel of the Martyr and over the brow of the hill. From the summit they looked back. The injured archer lay upon the ground, with several ...
— Sir Nigel • Arthur Conan Doyle
... many exclamations of astonishment among them, when Ned and Tom issued from their hut in the morning to join the hunting party, carrying their new weapons. The bows were, of course, unstrung; and Ned handed his to the chief, who viewed it with great curiosity. It was passed from hand to hand, and then returned to the chief. One or two of the Indians said something, and the chief tried its strength. He shook his head. Ned signed to him to ...
— Under Drake's Flag - A Tale of the Spanish Main • G. A. Henty
... between us! Cease your mirth! Damned be a friendship that so shames my worth! Never may I set eyes on one so low! I fling you off, an unstrung, ...
— The Little Clay Cart - Mrcchakatika • (Attributed To) King Shudraka
... them, and left her to be tended by the women. She was not unconscious, but the shock had utterly unstrung her. She lay with closed eyes, listening vaguely to the buzz of excited comment about her, and wondering, wondering with an aching heart, why ...
— The Way of an Eagle • Ethel M. Dell
... was entirely an unpretending man—and may be said to have collected rather from the pleasure and reputation attached to such pursuits than from a thorough and keen relish of the kind of taste which it imparts. He had an ample purse, and it was most liberally unstrung when there was occasion for effectual aid. This observation may equally apply to matters out of the bibliomaniacal record; but as a book-purchaser he was considered among the most heavy-metalled and determined champions ...
— English Book Collectors • William Younger Fletcher
... figures that surround her evidently point, by their attitudes, towards her; particularly St. John, who, with a tender yet impassioned gesture, bends his countenance towards her, languid with the depth of his emotion. At her feet lie various instruments of music, broken and unstrung. Of the colouring I do not speak; it eclipses nature, yet has all her ...
— Great Pictures, As Seen and Described by Famous Writers • Esther Singleton
... Delme. He sought the solitude of his chamber, a prey to the agonies of a self-reproaching spirit. He considered himself instrumental in taking the life of his best friend—of one, richly endowed with the loftiest feelings humanity can boast. His nerves previously had been unstrung; body and mind sank under the picture his imagination had conjured up. His servant was alarmed by startling screams, entered his room, and found his master in fearful convulsions. A fever ensued, during which George's life hung by a thread. To this succeeded a long state of unconsciousness, ...
— A Love Story • A Bushman
... the affair until called by Hogan, when he had run to Mr. Gleason's quarters, and after a moment had taken Ray home and insisted on his going to bed. The lieutenant was just recovering from a severe illness, was weak and unstrung, and the affair threatened to bring on a relapse. There had been an open breach between the two officers for over two years, and of late, he knew not how, it had widened. The deceased frequently maligned Lieutenant ...
— Marion's Faith. • Charles King
... and yet I will never cite the Venetians as examples of vivacity. Their nerves, unstrung by disease and the consequences of early debaucheries, impede all lively flow of spirits in its course, and permit at best but a few moments of a false and feverish activity. The approaches of rest, forced back by an immoderate use ...
— Dreams, Waking Thoughts, and Incidents • William Beckford
... and sapless, which no kindness of the sun, no softness of the summer breeze, can ever restore to life and vigor? It must not, shall not be! Oh, were Regulus what he was once, before captivity had unstrung his sinews and enervated his limbs, he might pause; he might think he were worth a thousand of the foe; he might say, "Make the exchange, Rome shall not lose by it!" But now, alas, 'tis gone,—that impetuosity ...
— Elson Grammer School Literature, Book Four. • William H. Elson and Christine Keck
... damnation. All of which she never seemed to hear. But when he tried to touch her she flew at him like a she-panther. That's what he called her. She said she'd kill him! And she drove him out of her house.... He was all weak and unstrung, and I believe scared, too, when he came to me. She must have been a fury. Those quiet, gentle women are furies when they're once roused. Well, I was hours up with him and finally he got over it. He didn't pray any more. He paced the room. It was just daybreak when ...
— The Rainbow Trail • Zane Grey
... frauds, which forged in his black breast, Come forth so white and silvery from his tongue, My potency he soon shall prove; nor rest To banquet on the blood of hearts by him unstrung, ...
— Zophiel - A Poem • Maria Gowen Brooks
... right—and in this view he has plenty of support): God; road; last, waste; taught, not; break, cheek (two instances); ground, moaned; both, youth; rise, arise; song, stung; steel, fell; light, delight; part, depart; wert, heart; wrong, tongue; brow, so; moan, one; crown, tone; song, unstrung; knife, grief; mourn, burn; dawn, moan; bear, bear; blot, thought; renown, Chatterton; thought, not; approved, reproved; forth, earth; nought, not; home, tomb; thither, together; wove, of; riven, heaven. These are 34 instances of irregularity. ...
— Adonais • Shelley
... that was the last heard, by the garrison, at least, of these most recent captives of the Sioux. Gentle and sympathetic women, however, who called on Mrs. Hay, were prompt to note that though unnerved, unstrung, distressed, she declared again and again her faith that the Indians would never really harm her husband. They might hold him and Nanette as hostages for ransom. They might take for their own purposes his wagon, his mules and that store of money, but his life was safe, yes, and Nanette's ...
— A Daughter of the Sioux - A Tale of the Indian frontier • Charles King
... On that day I was compelled to stop, and that at once. I had reached a point where my will had to capitulate to Unreason—that unscrupulous usurper. My previous five years as a neurasthenic had led me to believe that I had experienced all the disagreeable sensations an overworked and unstrung nervous system could suffer. But on this day several new and terrifying sensations seized me and rendered me all but helpless. My condition, however, was not apparent even to those who worked with me at the same desk. I remember trying to ...
— A Mind That Found Itself - An Autobiography • Clifford Whittingham Beers
... daughter a happier fate. It may, however, be expected that destiny will save Mademoiselle Ada from that kind of happiness. From being a chubby, rosy child, she has changed into a pale, weak-chested girl, and her nerves are already unstrung. The number of Varvara Pavlovna's admirers has diminished, but they have not disappeared. Some of them she will, in all probability, retain to the end of her days. The most ardent of them in recent times has been a certain Zakurdalo-Skubyrnikof, a retired ...
— Liza - "A nest of nobles" • Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev
... his soul. The music, that distant, mellow phrasing of the call of love, the music had unstrung him. While he paced the bridge before her coming that music had been melting the ice of his natural reserve. But he did not pardon himself because he had ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day
... content me nor gazing upon thee assuage the fire of my heart, nor will the love of thee, that hath mastered my soul, leave me, but with the passing away of my life.' So saying, he wept and the tears ran down upon his cheeks, like unstrung pearls. When Shemsennehar saw him weep, she wept for his weeping; and Aboulhusn exclaimed, 'By Allah, I wonder at your plight and am confounded at your behaviour; of a truth, your affair is amazing and your case marvellous. If ye weep thus, what while ...
— The Book Of The Thousand Nights And One Night, Volume III • Anonymous
... grave is laid, Untuned, unstrung, it will lie there long, If you bring flowers alone dear maid Without bringing the spirit ...
— Verses and Rhymes by the way • Nora Pembroke
... were still more or less unstrung from her mental struggles of the night, and the memory of her dream came to her like a dim foreboding of misfortune. As though in sympathy with its mother's feelings, the baby did not seem as well as usual. The new nurse was by no means an ideal nurse,—Mammy Jane understood the child ...
— The Marrow of Tradition • Charles W. Chesnutt
... had a match. I had none; but there was a small fire under my frying-pan, and I brought him a coal on a chip. Miss Imogen, when she saw the coal on the chip, began to laugh again. That embarrassed me. My nerves were already unstrung, and my trembling fingers unfortunately spilled the burning ember just as the old gentleman was about to stoop over it with his cigar. It fell between his knees, onto the head of the keg, rolled over, and dropped plumb through the bung-hole onto the ...
— The Blunders of a Bashful Man • Metta Victoria Fuller Victor
... already left him; and for his part, he must needs return the way he came,—frustrated, yet not enlightened; cursing, in no measured terms, the unfathomable ways of women. No doubt she was upset, unstrung by the knowledge of all that her confession implied; and woman-like, showed small regard for his consuming impatience to possess her. But to-morrow he would ride home with ...
— The Great Amulet • Maud Diver
... unstrung, At Babylon upon the willows hung; Yours sounds aloud, and tells us you excel No less in courage, than in singing well; While, unconcern'd, you let your country know They have impoverish'd themselves, not you; ...
— Poetical Works of Edmund Waller and Sir John Denham • Edmund Waller; John Denham
... I spoke that she would never scream aloud. There was the self-control of culture about her. A woman of the lower class might shriek and cry, but this girl would try to smile at the moment when the pain was keenest. The white, round arm under my hands was cold, and the muscles were soft and unstrung. I felt the ends of the broken bone grating together as I drew the fragments into their right places, and the sensation went through and through me. I had set scores of broken limbs before with no feeling like this, which ...
— The Doctor's Dilemma • Hesba Stretton
... unstrung, and for two or three days the very mention of school brought on a fit of hysterical crying, and she begged that she might be allowed to go to some boarding-school at a distance, anywhere—away from Busyborough. Mrs. Woburn was inclined to yield to her wish; but her father would not hear of such ...
— Ruth Arnold - or, the Country Cousin • Lucy Byerley
... went straight to Sara, and took the poor, unstrung little bundle of nerves into her arms, her very touch, both firm and gentle, bringing comfort to the half-crazed girl. She did not say much of anything, only kissed her and wept with her; but soon the violence of Sara's grief was subdued, and her heart-rending ...
— Sara, a Princess • Fannie E. Newberry
... would be wiser, Alice, for you to leave Sally and me alone for a little time; she is tired and unstrung. If you and the other girls have been unfair, you will have an opportunity to apologize later. Then Sally herself will feel more ...
— The Campfire Girls on the Field of Honor • Margaret Vandercook
... Lorraine, suffered such great grief that he never was happy afterwards; and when his intimate friends and favourites tried to console him he was wont to lead them to his bedroom and there show them a picture, painted by himself (for he was an excellent painter), depicting a Turkish bow unstrung, beneath, which was written, Arco per lentare piaga non sana (The bow although unstrung ...
— Memoirs And Historical Chronicles Of The Courts Of Europe - Marguerite de Valois, Madame de Pompadour, and Catherine de Medici • Various
... the two men returned with water and salts. After a while Ethel opened her eyes and looked up at Peg. Peg, fearful lest she should begin to accuse herself again, helped her up the stairs to her own room and there she sat beside the unstrung, hysterical girl until she slept, her hand locked in both ...
— Peg O' My Heart • J. Hartley Manners
... communicating with her when they were both in the house. What did such a departure from established habits mean? Had she received her notice of dismissal? Had Lady Janet's quick intelligence found its way already to a suspicion of the truth? Mercy's nerves were unstrung. She trembled pitiably as she opened the ...
— The New Magdalen • Wilkie Collins
... at her steadily for a moment, but he saw only rigid resolution and determination in her eyes; he was too unstrung and broken to protest, or to insist on his right as head of the house, and so—he yielded. Later in the day, however, a compromise was effected. It was agreed that he should accompany his daughter and his daughter-in-law to New York, aid them in securing passage, passports and credentials, ...
— The Flag • Homer Greene
... decisions on the work, it has been almost universally considered, except by one acute and learned writer of this country, as a loose, vague, and desultory composition; a mass of shining materials; like pearls unstrung, valuable indeed, ...
— The Art Of Poetry An Epistle To The Pisos - Q. Horatii Flacci Epistola Ad Pisones, De Arte Poetica. • Horace
... her save a canter round Jakko. With my nerves still unstrung from the previous night I feebly protested against the notion, suggesting Observatory Hill, Jutogh, the Boileaugunge road—anything rather than the Jakko round. Kitty was angry and a little hurt: so I yielded from fear of provoking further misunderstanding, ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... sums of money. Frequently a child in the yard or on the back steps will give invaluable information. This is particularly true when the older persons are attempting to conceal facts or are too much excited from a death or an accident to talk. Children usually are less unstrung by distressing events and can give a more connected account. Moreover, they are almost always willing to talk, and they generally ...
— News Writing - The Gathering , Handling and Writing of News Stories • M. Lyle Spencer
... little son before her into the other world. So thinking,—I might have been almost dreaming,—a slight rustle in the shop aroused me. I was not alarmed; my nerves are now much healthier, and I wisely make a point of not getting them unstrung by violent movements, or unaccustomed feats of activity, when anything astonishing happens. I therefore lifted my head calmly and looked about,—it might be a mouse. The noise ceased that instant, as if the intruder ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XI., February, 1863, No. LXIV. • Various
... whose already unstrung nerves were further irritated by his pitiful cries, called for two volunteers to carry him to a little piece of woods a short way off where a flying ambulance had been established. Chouteau and Loubet jumped to their feet simultaneously, anticipating the others, seized the sergeant, ...
— The Downfall • Emile Zola
... no woman's nerves can bear with impunity so terrible a strain. presently Margaret turned faint, and sank on Gerard's shoulder, smiling feebly, but quite, quite unstrung. Then Gerard was anxious, and would seek assistance. But she held him with a gentle grasp, and implored him not to ...
— The Cloister and the Hearth • Charles Reade
... thought, finding it more and more difficult to co-ordinate my thoughts, "he seems to be as unstrung as I." ...
— Atlantida • Pierre Benoit
... both hands. It was just one of those swift spasms of emotion on which, in moments of peril, the crisis usually depends. Had Walter's will been weak, or his conscience a guilty one, or his strength feeble, or his body unstrung by ill-health, he would have succumbed to the sudden terror, and, fainting first, would the next instant have rolled over the edge to sudden ...
— St. Winifred's - The World of School • Frederic W. Farrar
... writes in July, 1831] except more life, more spirit! I often feel unstrung, but sometimes as merry as I used to be at home. When I am sad I go to Madame Szaszek's; there I generally meet several amiable Polish ladies who with their hearty, hopeful words always cheer me up, so that I begin at once to imitate ...
— Frederick Chopin as a Man and Musician - Volume 1-2, Complete • Frederick Niecks
... only say that the smallest of bows should sometimes be unstrung, and that if my little arrows are flimsy and light they will, I trust, wound ...
— Sagittulae, Random Verses • E. W. Bowling
... I had regarded as fabulous and frivolous in the tales respecting the Inquisition. To the victims of its tyranny, there was the choice of death with its direst physical agonies, or death with its most hideous moral horrors. I had been reserved for the latter. By long suffering my nerves had been unstrung, until I trembled at the sound of my own voice, and had become in every respect a fitting subject for the species of torture ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 2 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... in his path through life, no matter how high or how steep the mountain may be, but which often forsakes him the moment the summit is gained, the point of difficulty passed, and leaves him prostrated, with energies gone, nerves unstrung, and a feeling of incapacity pervading the entire frame that renders the most trifling ...
— The Coral Island - A Tale Of The Pacific Ocean • R. M. Ballantyne
... "Mr. Lund is unstrung," said the captain. "He is under the delusion that we deliberately deserted him and, later, found the gold he speaks of. The first charge is nonsense. We did all that was possible in the frightful weather. We ...
— A Man to His Mate • J. Allan Dunn
... only be looked upon as a means to indirect suicide. They are outbursts that lead to a spectacular martyr-like ending to brains that "too much thought expands," to hearts overladen, and to nerves all unstrung. Life is a burden to them, though they lack the courage to commit suicide directly. Such is the view of these students of criminal pathology, and they cite a long list of political criminals who can only be explained as those who have sought indirectly self-destruction. It is ...
— Violence and the Labor Movement • Robert Hunter
... light. The lyre was his, and his the breathing might Of the immortal marble, his the play Of diamond-pointed thought and golden tongue. Go seek the sunshine race. Ye find to-day A broken column and a lute unstrung. ...
— The World's Best Poetry, Volume 8 • Various
... cried. "He was taken. Brodie had nothing to do with it, nothing. That is what you mean. I know. This stuff increases my sensitiveness. Yet I hate Coke Brodie—oh—let me go. I am all unstrung. Let me see a doctor. To-night, when I am ...
— The Dream Doctor • Arthur B. Reeve
... seasonably in upon the conversation of the lovers; "on that hill to the left, what once was an abbey is now an asylum for the insane. Does it not seem a quiet and serene abode for the unstrung and erring minds that tenant it? What a mystery is there in our conformation!—those strange and bewildered fancies which replace our solid reason, what a moral of our human weakness do ...
— The Pilgrims Of The Rhine • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... of my heart is unstrung; and to gladness Respond not its chords—but to sorrow and sadness:— Then speak not of mirth which my soul hath forsaken! Why would ye my ...
— The Baron's Yule Feast: A Christmas Rhyme • Thomas Cooper
... Olive. You be all unstrung by your walk hither through the wood, Ann. I'll fold the cape up nicely for you, and you can take it when you go home. And mind you wear it next Sabbath day, sweet. Now I must to my wheel again, or I shall not finish my stint by ...
— Giles Corey, Yeoman - A Play • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... behind you?" Tarrano's voice simulated sudden alarm; he scuffled his feet on the floor. The men jumped with fright; nerves unstrung, they cowered. ...
— Tarrano the Conqueror • Raymond King Cummings
... did. He had even Fred's little way of sliding over his r's. Being troubled about having Fred's place has unstrung him. You've noticed his absent-mindedness out on the field? I know Ashley pretty well; he's always been sensitive as to what people think about him; he likes to feel that he's doing what you expect of him. He was struck ...
— Stanford Stories - Tales of a Young University • Charles K. Field
... folly," she went on, "I don't believe it. Good heavens, what is that?" she added, as a footstep crunched in the hall-way. "You've got me all unstrung, you ...
— Young Hilda at the Wars • Arthur Gleason
... disease produced upon him. At first he could not be persuaded to be quiet; the muscular energies were still unaffected, and, with continual hemorrhage from the lungs, he could not understand that work or exercise could hurt him. But as the disease gained ground, its characteristic languor unstrung his force; the hard and sinewy limbs became attenuated and relaxed; his breath labored; a hectic fever burnt in his veins like light flame every afternoon, and subsided into chilly languor toward ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 5, March, 1858 • Various
... barge neared the shore, a tall and dignified chief, his dress of the richest skins, and ornamented with gaily-coloured feathers, with a circle of plumes on his head, holding an unstrung bow of great strength in his hand, was seen standing on the beach to receive the new-comers. By his side was a youth, strongly resembling him in features, bearing his shield and quiver, and also handsomely dressed, while other chiefs were drawn ...
— Villegagnon - A Tale of the Huguenot Persecution • W.H.G. Kingston
... get to sleep I find myself diggin' in first one outlandish place and then another. And if I'm not diggin' in my sleep, your father is, with jerks and starts and grunts enough to wake the dead. I'm all unstrung. So far as I can see the only thing we're findin' is nerves. One thing I will say: It was dull and lonesome before Mr. O'Neill came and I missed him when he went but dear knows, it was peaceful. It's been one thing right after the other. Who upset ...
— Kenny • Leona Dalrymple
... numbing her leg, and she seized upon it fiercely. It was only a brief line, bidding him come to her, but it bore her name. With instant, bodiless clarity which had marked all her mental processes so far, its purport was hers. She had not written—the hand that had traced her signature had been unstrung for once. She understood, though such knowledge seemed of little ...
— Then I'll Come Back to You • Larry Evans
... that so honest looking a man could be a murderer. The good woman was shocked, and not a little unstrung by the thought that she had been in the house alone when he had come and that if he had wished to he could easily ...
— The Mucker • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... nights, he said, And prick'd him with a pin.— And hereupon Sir Walter call'd to mind The Beggar Witch that stood in the gateway, And begg'd an alms— Margaret.—I do not love to credit Tales of magic. Heav'n's music, which is order, seems unstrung; And this brave world, Creation's beauteous work, unbeautified, Disorder'd, marr'd, where such strange things ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Vol. 5 • Edited by E. V. Lucas
... been of such a very serious nature that it seemed impossible for me to fling it off. That worthy man Maestro Francesco da Norcia redoubled his efforts, and brought me every day fresh remedies, trying to restore strength to my miserable unstrung frame. Yet all these endeavours were apparently insufficient to overcome the obstinacy of my malady, so that the physicians were in despair and at their wits' ends what to do. I was tormented by thirst, but ...
— The Autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini • Benvenuto Cellini
... told, the song shall be sung, The bow shall be broken, the harp unstrung, Alarming, grieving, All hearts deceiving, Till every joy to the winds shall ...
— Old Greek Stories • James Baldwin
... clean as a cork, the devil-fish itself drawing back to the depths of the crimson pool. And then once more I am asking the doctor if he is hurt; and he is answering me, cheerily, "Not much, captain, not much," and we four are following after him as white as women, I do believe, our nerves unstrung, our hearts quaking as we crossed the ...
— The House Under the Sea - A Romance • Sir Max Pemberton
... glide my hours along, That still my griefs are sooth'd by song, That still my careless numbers flow To your successful skill I owe; You, who when sickness o'er me hung, And languor had my lyre unstrung, With treasures of the healing art, With friendship's ardor at your heart, From sickness snatch'd her early prey And bade fair health—the goddess gay, With sprightly air, and winning grace, With laughing eye, and rosy face, Accustom'd when you call ...
— Poems (1786), Volume I. • Helen Maria Williams
... draw away, and they stood facing each other, he eager, mystified, thrilling with passion almost beyond mastery, she trembling and unstrung, her cheeks crimson, her eyes filled with ...
— Bob Hampton of Placer • Randall Parrish
... this the Spanish maid, aroused, Hangs on the willow her unstrung guitar, And, all unsexed, the anlace hath espoused, Sung the loud song, and dared the deed of war? And she, whom once the semblance of a scar Appalled, an owlet's larum chilled with dread, Now ...
— Childe Harold's Pilgrimage • Lord Byron
... intolerable burden. The mind would sink under it. You would either go mad or plunge into some violent excess to recover your sanity. It is the craziest of philosophy to think that because you are engaged in a serious business you have to live in a state of exaltation, that the bow is never to be unstrung, that the top note is never to be relaxed. You will not do your business better because you wear a long face all the time; you will do it worse. If you are talking about your high ideals all day you are not only a nuisance: you are either ...
— Pebbles on the Shore • Alpha of the Plough (Alfred George Gardiner)
... spoke, "twoscore years and more have I shot shaft, and maybe not all times bad, but I shoot no more this day, for no man can match with yon stranger, whosoe'er he may be." Then he thrust his shaft into his quiver, rattling, and unstrung his bow ...
— The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood • Howard Pyle
... heart went round, and he was forced to drain them in honor of the Master. An inward shivering disjointed his members, unstrung his nerves, heart and frame fainted into weakness, a dew cold as death covered his temples, and his head fell wearily upon his breast—the walls, the floors, the ceilings, the men, the burning urns, danced, reeled, and tottered in wild confusion before him. The murmuring ...
— The Continental Monthly, Volume V. Issue I • Various
... length of his own feet—he found it exceedingly difficult to keep his balance. Had he been on the ground, there would have been no difficulty about it; but, perched as he was full twenty-feet aloft, the thing was quite different; and, with nerves unstrung by the fearful danger that threatened him below, it was just as much as he could do ...
— The Cliff Climbers - A Sequel to "The Plant Hunters" • Captain Mayne Reid
... personage, was late. It was not for him to consider the conditions that distressed the Court of Graustark. Not at all. He was a grand duke and he would take his own time in paying his respects. What cared he that every one in the Castle was tired and unstrung and sad and—sleepy? Any one but a grand duke would have waited a day or two before requiring a royal audience. When he finally presented himself at the Castle doors, a sleepy group of attendants actually yawned in ...
— Truxton King - A Story of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... unstrung and nervous in this hardness of circumstance and her terror of destitution. As she told her story, she sobbed and wrung her hands. In the next six months she had better occupation, however, in spasmodically busy shops, where the hours were shorter than in the cloak factory, ...
— Making Both Ends Meet • Sue Ainslie Clark and Edith Wyatt
... there was silence between the two for a moment, when he said, in a voice Grey would never have known as his: "When did she die? Tell me all about it, please, but tell it very slowly, word by word, or I shall not understand you. I seem to be terribly unstrung, it is so sudden and awful. Bessie dead!" and he stared at Grey with eyes which did not seem to see anything before them, but rather to be looking at something far away ...
— Bessie's Fortune - A Novel • Mary J. Holmes
... a morbid, unstrung state that the least thing startled her. But imagine if you can her wonder and terror as she saw Dennis Fleet—the dead and buried, as she fully believed—enter, carrying a picture as of old, and looking as of old, save that he was paler and thinner. Was ...
— Barriers Burned Away • E. P. Roe
... "Perhaps you did right, after all—at least, you thought you did. I am sure of that. I do not know why I was so angry at you. I am unstrung, and nervous, I suppose. Did I say very dreadful things to you, dear? I do ...
— Taquisara • F. Marion Crawford
... afternoons in summer and evening parties in winter. So much tea, such frequent use of an infusion of the herb, upsets our nerves, impairs healthful digestion, and brings on sleeplessness. I have several patients—old ladies, and those in middle life—whose nerves are so unstrung that I am obliged to dose them with opium occasionally, ...
— Daughters of the Revolution and Their Times - 1769 - 1776 A Historical Romance • Charles Carleton Coffin
... and excitement. My nerves were all unstrung by the events of the past two days; and as I finished, my tears burst forth. I wept with passionate sobs. My father made no effort to comfort me. He sat with his chin resting on his breast, weary ...
— A Romantic Young Lady • Robert Grant
... when the pale shadow spoke; For there was striving in its piteous tongue, To speak as when on earth it was awake, And Isabella on its music hung: Languor there was in it, and tremulous shake, As in a palsied Druid's harp unstrung; And through it moaned a ghostly under-song, Like hoarse night gusts sepulchral ...
— The Mysteries of All Nations • James Grant
... a little endured his essay; great-hearted Agenor saw him haling away the corpse, and where his side was left uncovered of his buckler as he bowed him down, there smote he him with bronze-tipped spear-shaft and unstrung his limbs. So his life departed from him, and over his corpse the task of Trojans and Achaians grew hot; like wolves leapt they one at another, and man ...
— The Iliad of Homer • Homer (Lang, Leaf, Myers trans.)
... reply. His shoulders quivered, but he remained silent. She went on soothingly: "You are all unstrung. The shock was too sudden. It must have been a terrible one! Won't you tell me about it? Perhaps that will make ...
— Out of the Depths - A Romance of Reclamation • Robert Ames Bennet
... replacing him. The Mayor retorted that Pere Bracasse being a municipal functionary could not transmit his functions except through the Administration. Monsieur Pujol must desist from drumming and crying. Aristide bowed to authority and unstrung his drum. ...
— The Joyous Adventures of Aristide Pujol • William J. Locke
... shoot it?" I whispered to Denviers, as my nerves seemed to be almost unstrung at the unknowableness of ...
— The Strand Magazine, Volume V, Issue 27, March 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various
... thought of. As the savages advanced I retreated, resolving to make a stand at my tent door. At the same time I tried to show by signs that I could, if I liked, kill two or three of them, but that I was ready for peace if they were. At last I lowered my rifle from my shoulder, and they unstrung their bows and advanced with outstretched hands towards me. Knowing their treacherous character, however, of course I could not depend on them. I bethought me that the best way to win their friendship was to offer them food, as is practised in civilised communities with some success; ...
— Dick Onslow - Among the Redskins • W.H.G. Kingston
... on the sky: however, it had pretty well ceased raining, that was one comfort, and, as Roger, shouldering his spade, and with the day's provision in a handkerchief, trudged out upon his daily duty, those good old thoughts of thankfulness came upon his mind, and he forgot awhile the dream that had unstrung him. Turning for a moment to look upon his hovel, and bless its inmates with a prayer, he half resolved to run back, and hear a few more words, if only not to vex his darling child: but there was now no time to spare; and then, as ...
— The Complete Prose Works of Martin Farquhar Tupper • Martin Farquhar Tupper
... be only too relieved if you will talk to Mr. Colwyn," rejoined the elder woman. "My head is really not equal to the task—my nerves are so frightfully unstrung." ...
— The Shrieking Pit • Arthur J. Rees
... think, their sharp savours. One is preoccupied with one's own happy schemes and merry visions; the bird sings shrill within its cage, and claps its golden wings. But on such soft and languorous days as these days of early spring, when the body is unstrung, and the bonds and ties that fasten the soul to its prison are loosened and unbound, the spirit, striving to be glad, draws in through the passages of sense these swift impressions of beauty, as a thirsty child drains a cup ...
— The Thread of Gold • Arthur Christopher Benson
... asking where Drake was, and what in the world was the matter with him. Captain Le Mesurier replied, and the reply rang boisterously. 'He's behind. He's a bit unstrung, I fancy, and reason enough too, after all his work, eh? You see, Drake's not in the habit of taking holidays,' and the Captain grew ...
— The Philanderers • A.E.W. Mason
... suddenly upon mine as he said this. For a second I thought that he imagined my whiskers were false, and that this was only a plant to lock me up! It was evident my nerves were becoming unstrung, and as soon as we were in the street my good-humoured and excellent guide told me that in another five minutes we would begin our voyage of discovery. We passed through the Chinese quarter, down Mott Street, and I could not but feel a pang of sympathy for these aliens, looked upon by the ...
— The Confessions of a Caricaturist, Vol 2 (of 2) • Harry Furniss
... sons I begat, and not one is remaining. Fifty were mine in the hour that the host of Achaia descended: Nineteen granted to me out of one womb, royally mother'd, Stood by my side; but the rest were of handmaids born in my dwelling. Soon were the limbs of the many unstrung in the fury of Ar[e]s: But one peerless was left, sole prop of the realm and the people: And now at last he too, the protector of Ilion, Hector, Dies by thy hand. For his sake have I come to the ships of Achaia, Eager to ransom the body with bountiful ...
— Blackwoods Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 365, March, 1846 • Various
... earth;— With darker horror shook the conscious wood, 580 Groan'd the sad gales, and rivers blush'd with blood; On cypress-boughs the Loves their quivers hung, Their arrows scatter'd, and their bows unstrung; And BEAUTY'S GODDESS, bending o'er his bier, Breathed the soft sigh, and pour'd the tender tear.— 585 Admiring PROSERPINE through dusky glades Led the fair phantom to Elysian shades, Clad with new form, with finer sense combined, And lit with purer flame the ethereal mind. —Erewhile, ...
— The Botanic Garden - A Poem in Two Parts. Part 1: The Economy of Vegetation • Erasmus Darwin
... there was a hum of insects in the air and the very pulse of living could be felt. Ab carried his new weapon proudly, hungering for the love and admiration of this girl of his, and eager to show her its powers and to exhibit his own skill. At his back hung his quiver of mammoth bone. His bow, unstrung, was in his hand. In front of the cave was a bare area of many yards in extent, then came a few scattering trees and, at a distance of perhaps two hundred yards, the forest began. Across the open space of ground, with its great mass ...
— The Story of Ab - A Tale of the Time of the Cave Man • Stanley Waterloo
... around. There sat Zamolxis[63] with erected eyes, And Odin here in mimic trances dies. There on rude iron columns, smear'd with blood, The horrid forms of Seythian heroes stood, Druids and Bards (their once loud harps unstrung) And youths that died to be by poets sung. These, and a thousand more of doubtful fame, To whom old fables gave a lasting name, 130 In ranks adorn'd the temple's outward face; The wall, in lustre and effect like glass, Which o'er each object casting various dyes, Enlarges some, ...
— The Poetical Works Of Alexander Pope, Vol. 1 • Alexander Pope et al
... penitence had won Lost favour back again, and closed the breach. But Discipline, a faithful servant long, Declined at length into the vale of years; A palsy struck his arm, his sparkling eye Was quenched in rheums of age, his voice unstrung Grew tremulous, and moved derision more Than reverence in perverse, rebellious youth. So colleges and halls neglected much Their good old friend, and Discipline at length, O'erlooked and unemployed, fell sick and died. Then study languished, emulation slept, And virtue fled. The schools became ...
— The Task and Other Poems • William Cowper
... would take him to the truck, and was a little fearful that in his desperation he might then jump overboard; for I had heard of delirious greenhorns doing such things at sea, and being lost forever. But no; he stopped short, and looked down from the top. Fatal glance! it unstrung his every fiber; and I saw him reel, and clutch the shrouds, till the mate shouted out for him not to squeeze the tar out of the ropes. "Up you go, sir." But Harry ...
— Redburn. His First Voyage • Herman Melville
... ship, sometimes flying near, sometimes dropping back, ever and anon swooping down into the foamy wake with a mournful cry, as of condemned souls. This was no vision, and yet Frederick scarcely distinguished it from a dream. With his nerves unstrung, with his being still penetrated by the marvels of his sleeping life, which remained partially present to him, the strange heaving waste of the ocean seemed no less miraculous than his dreams. Thus the ocean had ...
— Atlantis • Gerhart Hauptmann
... weak hand; but the girl's eyes were no longer closed; they were open and fixed on his face. The great fellow was trembling like a leaf. The past hour had been almost more than he could bear. He was entirely unstrung. ...
— In Connection with the De Willoughby Claim • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... which is the shadow of death, have worked right on to the accomplishment of their great purposes; toiling much, enduring much, fulfilling much;—and then, with shattered nerves, and sinews all unstrung, have laid themselves down in the grave, and slept the sleep of death,—and the world talks of them, while ...
— Hyperion • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
... Eben—" She was still looking at him with that directness which hinted at some thought foreign to her words—something as yet unmentioned which had left her unstrung. "It's not really a congenial role to you—this one of reshaping your life. At heart you hate it.... This house proves that. So does this room—and ...
— The Tyranny of Weakness • Charles Neville Buck
... said quietly, "I don't think you are 'playing good;' I don't positively. I believe you are thoroughly in earnest, but I think you have been through some very severe scenes of late, sickness and watching, and death, and your nerves are completely unstrung. I don't wonder at your state of feeling, but you will get over it in a little while, and ...
— Ester Ried • Pansy (aka. Isabella M. Alden)
... morrow, as she held Mrs. Mayo's hand. "It—it was your happiness," she said; "I was unstrung. I couldn't listen to it. ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... would not now indulge it, even when it had ceased to be a mock, the prospect of that day, or evening at furthest, lying at anchor, with plenty of water for his people, and a brother captain to counsel and befriend, seemed in no perceptible degree to encourage him. His mind appeared unstrung, if not still more seriously affected. Shut up in these oaken walls, chained to one dull round of command, whose unconditionality cloyed him, like some hypochondriac abbot he moved slowly about, at times ...
— The Piazza Tales • Herman Melville
... I wasn't practising. I was at a big gathering last night, and my hands are unstrung like. We'll talk for a while, and then I'll go out ...
— Three Plays • Padraic Colum
... the deepest philosophy, and most profound wisdom; yet speaks the language of the heart, touching the secret spring of every sense and feeling. Here we have no ideal exaltation of character, but life with its blended faults and virtues,—a gentle nature unstrung by passing events, and thus rendered ...
— Hamlet • William Shakespeare
... inexorable jaw: The luscious fat distilled upon his chin, Exuded from his nostrils and his eyes, While still like hungry death he fed his maw; Till every minor crocodile being dead And buried too, himself gorged to the full, He slept with breath oppressed and unstrung claw. O marvel passing strange which next I saw: In sleep he dwindled to the common size, And all the empire faded from his coat. Then from far off a winged vessel came, Swift as a swallow, subtle as a flame: I know not what it bore of freight or host, But white it was as an avenging ghost. ...
— Poems • Christina G. Rossetti
... rudely disturbed by an enforced realization of his own back-sliding. He had been quite furious upon discovering that the "little episode" of the moonlit cottage had filched from him all his new won strength and nervous stamina, leaving him sleepless and unstrung, ready to jump at the rattling of a stone. More and more, there grew in him a fierce disdain of weakness and a cold determination to beat Nature at her own game. Let him once again be "fit" and ...
— The Window-Gazer • Isabel Ecclestone Mackay
... Savannah, in the quarter ending June 30, two hundred and three. Something of this outburst of activity, in which neutrals of many nations shared, was due, as Mr. Clay said, to the suddenness with which commerce revived after momentary suspension. "The bow had been unstrung that it might acquire fresh vigor and new elasticity"; and the stored-up products of the country, so long barred within, imparted a peculiar nervous haste to the renewal of intercourse. The absolute numbers quoted do not give as vivid impression of conditions at differing times ...
— Sea Power in its Relations to the War of 1812 - Volume 2 • Alfred Thayer Mahan
... Mr Dolls,' remarked Eugene to Lightwood, 'are considerably unstrung. And I deem it on the whole expedient to ...
— Our Mutual Friend • Charles Dickens
... she near to bid adieu with heart unstrung, * While care and longing on that day her bosom wrung Wet pearls she wept and mine like red carnelians rolled * And, joined in sad riviere, around her ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton |
