"Feeble" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... she pointed to the infant's face, which was disfigured as she had stated, by a strange and unnatural disposition of the eyes, one of which was set much lower in the head than the other. Awakened from sleep, the child uttered a feeble cry, and stretched out its tiny arms ...
— The Lancashire Witches - A Romance of Pendle Forest • William Harrison Ainsworth
... too curiously into motives. They are apt to become feeble in the utterance: the aroma is mixed with the grosser air. We must keep the germinating grain away ...
— Pearls of Thought • Maturin M. Ballou
... for eleven hours! He spoke above an hour and a half, with scarce a bad sentence: the most admired part was a comparison he drew of the two parts of the new administration, to the conflux of the Rhone and the Saone; "the latter a gentle, feeble, languid stream, languid but not deep; the other a boisterous and overbearing torrent; but they joined at last; and long may they continue united, to the comfort of each other, and to the glory, honour, and happiness ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 2 • Horace Walpole
... "We may be feeble land-creatures without legs, but we can show Captain Larsen that we are at least as brave ...
— The Sea-Wolf • Jack London
... me when you least expect it," murmured the brook, but with so feeble a voice that it was lost ...
— Laboulaye's Fairy Book • Various
... Such a man was Godwin, father of Harold, last Saxon King; in England; and such a man was Boris Godunof, a boyar, who had so faithfully served the terrible Ivan that he leaned upon him and at last confided to him the supervision of his feeble son Feodor, when he should succeed him. The plans of this ambitious usurper were probably laid from the time of the tragic death of Ivan's son, the Tsarevitch. He brought about the marriage of his beautiful sister Irene with ...
— A Short History of Russia • Mary Platt Parmele
... his feelings, and from that hour, whatever they were, kept them entirely to himself. There could be no doubt that, up to this last moment, he had nourished a feeble hope of regaining Grace in the event of this negotiation turning out a success. Not being aware of the fact that her father could have settled upon her a fortune sufficient to enable both to live in comfort, ...
— The Woodlanders • Thomas Hardy
... Strangers, where Tommy was not afraid to go, down to the Under-world? Or will you stay here in the sun? Perhaps you will do better to stay here in the sun, for the Under-world has terrors for weak hearts that were born but yesterday, and feeble feet may stumble ...
— When the World Shook - Being an Account of the Great Adventure of Bastin, Bickley and Arbuthnot • H. Rider Haggard
... long discussion. Mrs. Thomas stoutly refused to admit the stranger without evidence of identity, and Beatrice, embracing his cause, as stoutly pressed his claims. As for the lawful owner, he made occasional feeble attempts to prove that he was himself, but Mrs. Thomas was not to be imposed upon in this way. At last they came to a ...
— Beatrice • H. Rider Haggard
... 1:26 So that the princes and elders mourned, the virgins and young men were made feeble, and the beauty ...
— Deuteronomical Books of the Bible - Apocrypha • Anonymous
... should you ever be tempted to harbour Pride, on account of a well-furnished head or a beautiful face—oh, remember how soon the fairest features may be made unsightly, the most talented mind rendered feeble and weak, by a sudden accident or fever. The labours of years may be swept away—the highest powers rendered useless; and one whom all admire to-day, may be but ...
— The Crown of Success • Charlotte Maria Tucker
... The bunks are plain wooden benches, covered with leather cushions stuffed with straw and packed as hard as tombstones by the weight of previous passengers. The ceiling is of boards pierced with a hole for a glass globe, which prevents the oil dripping upon your bald spot from a feeble and dejected lamp. It is too dim to read by and scarcely bright enough to enable you to distinguish the expression upon the lineaments of your fellow passengers. A scoop net of green cloth on a ...
— Modern India • William Eleroy Curtis
... of the most powerful noblemen in the mother country. Horror-struck, we fled. The next day the whole city resounded with the fame of the so-called assassination. The government offered immense rewards for the discovery of the murderer. Since that time I hold my life, fortune and honor by the feeble tenure of Don Carlo's silence. His power over me is very great. I distrust him much. Unknown to but very few, I have a yacht lying at a little estate in a rocky nook at Point Yerikos, in complete order to sail at any moment. On board of her is a large amount of property in money and jewels, but ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 3. March 1848 • Various
... knowing how unlike were the dispositions of his brother and his wife's cousin, had contrived their meeting with special reference to his own amusement. When the clock told the hour for retiring he brought Bessie a tin candlestick, in which a tallow candle smoked and spluttered in a feeble way, but filled the soul of the young lady with admiration, it ...
— The House that Jill Built - after Jack's had proved a failure • E. C. Gardner
... despair. She watched for the return of her family with no enviable feelings, and when she heard them coming she lifted a board and concealed herself in the potato hole, under the floor. Her mother soon discovered what had befallen Poll, and search was made for her. After a time, a feeble voice was heard from under the floor, and Poll was induced to come forth, by the promise of her mother's second petticoat, which was converted into the slip she then wore. She ended her recital with a merry laugh, ...
— The Loyalists of America and Their Times, Vol. 2 of 2 - From 1620-1816 • Edgerton Ryerson
... Magdalen's experience, Mrs. Wragge was deaf to the customary stimulant. She actually ventured on a feeble remonstrance in the ...
— No Name • Wilkie Collins
... whose bend doth awe the World, Did loose his Lustre: I did heare him grone: I, and that Tongue of his, that bad the Romans Marke him, and write his Speeches in their Bookes, Alas, it cried, Giue me some drinke Titinius, As a sicke Girle: Ye Gods, it doth amaze me, A man of such a feeble temper should So get the start of the Maiesticke world, And ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare
... gone to Braunau to meet her sister-in-law. The Duchess of Montebello, a beautiful, sensible woman, the mother of five children, who had lost her husband in the last war, had been appointed a maid-of-honor,—a feeble compensation on the part of the Emperor for her sad bereavement. The Countess of Lucay, a gentle, kindly woman, thoroughly familiar with the customs of good society, was lady of the bedchamber. I shall speak later of the other ladies of the suite, whose ...
— The Happy Days of the Empress Marie Louise • Imbert De Saint-Amand
... down The sailor's deeply-furrowed cheek, to bathe Those recollections with the dew of Thought! Some deem it weak to weep. Away the thought! It is not weakness when Affection's fount O'erflows its borders, and to man displays The feelings that its powers cannot conceal. It is not weakness when our feeble words Find utterance only in our flowing tears. Call not such language "weakness"! Worlds may laugh, Yet know no joy like that which often flows In silent tears. As nearer drew the seaman to his home, ...
— Town and Country, or, Life at Home and Abroad • John S. Adams
... overmuch importance to what she says, in her startled condition—she rushes off and drowns herself. The savage mother-in-law, who is to blame for the entire tragedy, sternly commands her son not to mourn for his dead wife, whom he has loved in the feeble way which such a tyrant has permitted. This outline gives hardly an idea of the force of the play, and its value as a picture of Russian manners of the old school in general, and of the merchant class (who retained them long after they ...
— A Survey of Russian Literature, with Selections • Isabel Florence Hapgood
... smaller; and every hand was steady, and every eye was fixed for the moment of trial: and soon the headlong pursuit commenced. At the first scattering of the wild troop, several of the younger and more feeble horses were secured; and some of the hunters, who despaired of nobler game, contented themselves with capturing or slaying either elks or buffaloes. But the finest horses escaped the first assault, and ...
— The Pilgrims of New England - A Tale Of The Early American Settlers • Mrs. J. B. Webb
... thought he could not be worse off with Mr. Sponge and Mr. Bugles than he was with Mr. Bugles alone; so, having finished a poor appetiteless breakfast, he repaired to what he called his 'study,' and with a feeble, shaky hand, scrawled an invitation to Mr. Sponge to come over to Nonsuch House, and take his chance of a run with his hounds. He then sealed and posted the letter without ...
— Mr. Sponge's Sporting Tour • R. S. Surtees
... had the Spaniards left the coast than troubles and perils thickened around them. The country was difficult to traverse, the people were bold and hostile. With their poisoned arrows they proved no feeble antagonists. As the adventurers left the plain and toiled up the mountains, a warlike cacique, with a large body of followers, met them in a narrow pass and boldly disputed the way. A fierce battle ensued, ending in favor of the Spaniards, who cut their way through the savages, leaving hundreds ...
— Historical Tales - The Romance of Reality - Volume III • Charles Morris
... still. In England the news of Concord had not moved the king to lenity; he saw no lesson in the tragedy, and insisted on pressing his policy. Lord North's feeble endeavor to resign was checked, supplies were sent to Virginia to support the governor in his project of a rising of the slaves, a scheme was pressed to raise in Carolina a regiment of veteran Highlanders, and orders were sent to rouse the Iroquois against the rebels. ...
— The Siege of Boston • Allen French
... discoverer of Truth, to "feel the soul of Nature, and see things as they are"; and when, instead of this, it turns to glorifying its own powers and achievements, or sets up any end apart from such discovery and interpretation, it becomes sickly, feeble, foolish, frivolous, vicious, joyless, and moribund; and meanness, cruelty, sensuality, impiety, and irreligion are the companions ...
— Shakespeare: His Life, Art, And Characters, Volume I. • H. N. Hudson
... shows that the Australian aborigines are accustomed to let their own blood flow on to the corpse of a dead kinsman and to place their cut hair on the corpse. He suggests that in both cases the object is to strengthen the feeble spirit within the corpse and sustain its life, in order that it may be born again. As a development of such a rite the hair might have become an offering to the dead, and later still its removal might become a sacrifice and indication of grief. In this manner the common custom of tearing the hair ...
— The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India - Volume IV of IV - Kumhar-Yemkala • R.V. Russell
... dryness of membrane in surfaces that ought to be freely lubricated and kept apart. In old age we see the effects of modification of membrane naturally induced; we see the fixed joint, the shrunken and feeble muscle, the dimmed eye, the deaf ear, ...
— Grappling with the Monster • T. S. Arthur
... A feeble moan and a flutter of the eyelids told that she was coming out from the effects of the anaesthetic ...
— Guy Garrick • Arthur B. Reeve
... brother in Minnesota, and many of the boys and girls in the neighborhood had gone across the Atlantic and found homes on the saeterless prairies of our Northwest. She would like to go herself, she said, but her mother was old and feeble and the work of the farm fell upon her little shoulders. Yet she was brave and contented. Her mind was clear, her imagination active, and among her homely surroundings she had found food for thought and an opportunity to give expression to the poetic sentiments that inspired her. Each of ...
— Norwegian Life • Ethlyn T. Clough
... or two his quick ear caught the sound of a feeble mewing inside the arch, and, of course, he wanted to know what it was. So he was told that kittens had to be kept quiet and that Down would be very vexed if her kitten was disturbed; but that by-and-bye she would doubtless bring it out ...
— The Adventures of Akbar • Flora Annie Steel
... direct sensibility, the chrysotype paper is certainly inferior to the calotype; but it is one of the most remarkable peculiarities of gold as a photographic ingredient, that extremely feeble impressions once made by light go on afterwards, darkening spontaneously and very slowly, apparently without limit so long as the least vestige of unreduced chloride of gold remains in the paper. To illustrate this curious and (so far as applications go) ...
— Photographic Reproduction Processes • P.C. Duchochois
... previously whether any error had crept into the time-keepers' rates since leaving Kangaroo Island, and also to procure there a few more fresh meals for my ship's company. Our course was in consequence directed for the island, which was visible from aloft; but the winds being very feeble, we did not pass Kangaroo Head until eleven at night. I purposed to have run up into the eastern cove of Nepean Bay, but finding the water to shoal from 12 to 7 fathoms, did not think it safe to go further in ...
— A Voyage to Terra Australis • Matthew Flinders
... lies along your path, the dawn sleeps behind the shadowy hills. The stars hold their breath counting the hours, the feeble moon swims the deep night. Bird, O my bird, listen to me, ...
— The Gardener • Rabindranath Tagore
... of good family she could read, and during the first two years of her married life she had often—very often—had the opportunity of puzzling, and yet rejoicing, over the feeble signs which the iron hand of the charioteer had scrawled on the papyrus for her whose slender fingers could guide the reed pen with firmness ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... former line the Londoners had reached a point to enfilade it, and it suffered heavily. We soon got this position, and then our troops, ascending some spurs, poured a destructive fire into the defile and so harassed the Turks re-forming for a counterattack as to render feeble their efforts to regain what they ...
— How Jerusalem Was Won - Being the Record of Allenby's Campaign in Palestine • W.T. Massey
... head tone, without admixture of palatal resonance, is feeble close at hand, but penetrating and of a carrying power equalled by no other. Palatal resonance without admixture of the resonance of the head cavities (head tones) makes the tone very powerful when heard near by, but without vibrancy for a large auditorium. This is the proof of how greatly ...
— How to Sing - [Meine Gesangskunst] • Lilli Lehmann
... philosopher. With pretensions much less reasonable, the anatomical novice tears out the living bowels of an animal, and styles himself physician, prepares himself by familiar cruelty for that profession which he is to exercise upon the tender and the helpless, upon feeble bodies and broken minds, and by which he has opportunities to extend his arts of torture, and continue those experiments upon infancy and age, which he has hitherto ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson in Nine Volumes - Volume IV: The Adventurer; The Idler • Samuel Johnson
... leagues of territory which had been wrested from the inheritance of his fathers. Henry imbibed his mother's spirit, and chafed and fretted under wrongs for which he could obtain no redress. Ferdinand and Isabella could not be annoyed even by any force which feeble Navarre could raise. Queen Catharine, however, brooded deeply over her wrongs, and laid plans for retributions of revenge, the execution of which she knew must be deferred till long after her body should have mouldered to dust in the grave. She courted ...
— Henry IV, Makers of History • John S. C. Abbott
... any pride in the readiness with which Lloyd had answered Squire Wilson in the argument they had on foreordination at Hiram Graham's infare. Indeed, she had felt it a personal rebuke when her father had said on the way home that he hoped no child of his would ever set up his feeble intellect against the eternal purposes of God, as Lloyd Archer was doing. Marg'et Ann knew perfectly well that if she married Lloyd in his present unregenerate state she would, in the estimation of her father and mother, be endangering ...
— The Wizard's Daughter and Other Stories • Margaret Collier Graham
... gazing into the quiet street, and watched a daughter of the night, with dilatory steps and neglected mien, go up towards the more frequented quarter of Piccadilly. Life was grim in so much of it, futile in more, feeble at the best, foolish in the light of a single generation or a single century or a thousand years. It was only reasonable in the vast proportions of eternity. It had only little sips of happiness to give, not long draughts ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... hero of Gautier's witch story, who was a pious priest one-half of the twenty-four hours and a wicked libertine the other: all power of selection, of reaction gone in this passive endurance of conflicting tendencies; all identity gone, save a mere feeble outsider looking on at the alternations of intentions and lapses, of good and bad. And the soul of such a person—if, indeed, we can speak of one soul or one person where there exists no unity—becomes like a jangle of notes ...
— Laurus Nobilis - Chapters on Art and Life • Vernon Lee
... him. Men must not always be judged by their external appearance. He who shows himself our enemy to-day, lends us to- morrow, it may be, a helpful arm, and becomes our friend, sometimes because his heart has been changed, and sometimes because his character is feeble. I cannot with certainty say which of these reasons has determined Fouche, but I am firmly convinced that he will be a protector and a friend to you, and that in no hands will your property and your papers ...
— Marie Antoinette And Her Son • Louise Muhlbach
... able to do at least as much as artificial selection in the way of thus creating new types out of old ones. Artificial selection, indeed, notwithstanding the many and marvellous results which it has accomplished, can only be regarded as but a feeble imitation of natural selection, which must act with so much greater vigilance and through such immensely greater periods of time. In a word, the proved capabilities of artificial selection furnish, in its best conceivable form, what ...
— Darwin, and After Darwin (Vol. 1 and 3, of 3) • George John Romanes
... on that suicidal talk of marrying," replied John, "and all that harangue of incoherency about your growing old. Why, my dear fellow, you're at least a dozen years my junior, and look at me!" and John glanced at himself in the glass with a feeble pride, noting the gray sparseness of his side-hair, and its plaintive dearth on top. "Of course I've got to admit," he continued, "that my hair is gradually evaporating; but for all that, I'm 'still in the ring,' ...
— Pipes O'Pan at Zekesbury • James Whitcomb Riley
... importance. Ever since man has thought, since he has been able to express and write down his thoughts, he has felt himself close to a mystery which is impenetrable to his coarse and imperfect senses, and he endeavors to supplement the feeble penetration of his organs by the efforts of his intellect. As long as that intellect remained in its elementary stage, this intercourse with invisible spirits assumed forms which were commonplace ...
— Selected Writings of Guy de Maupassant • Guy de Maupassant
... Protestants. Fortunately, d'Aygaliers had not accomplished so much without having learned not to draw back when the road grew rough, so he also on his side went about confirming the strong and encouraging the feeble, and called on M. de Paratte to beg him to carry out the orders of M. de Villars. De Paratte was happily an old soldier, whose one idea was that discipline should be maintained, so that he gave the guns and bayonets to d'Aygaliers on the spot, without a word ...
— Massacres Of The South (1551-1815) - Celebrated Crimes • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... a man with feeble digestion, this sort of thing can lead to trouble. One waiter I met at an hotel in Dijon knew very little English—about as much as a poll parrot. The moment I entered the salle- a-manger he started to ...
— The Angel and the Author - and Others • Jerome K. Jerome
... poets sang their songs Beneath their breath in terror of the thongs I snapped about their shins. Though mild the stroke Bards, like the conies, are "a feeble folk," Fearing all noises but the one they make Themselves—at which all other mortals quake. Now from their cracked and disobedient throats, Like rats from sewers scampering, their notes Pour forth to move, where'er the season serves, If not our legs to dance, at least our nerves; ...
— Shapes of Clay • Ambrose Bierce
... success could not be expected. This was on the 27th of May, 1846. Four days later General Scott was notified that he need not go to Mexico. General Gaines was next in rank, but he was too old and feeble to take the field. Colonel Zachary Taylor—a brigadier-general by brevet—was therefore left in command. He, too, was a Whig, but was not supposed to entertain any political ambitions; nor did he; but after the fall of Monterey, his third battle and ...
— Personal Memoirs of U. S. Grant, Complete • Ulysses S. Grant
... completely new, religious edifices, girding the capital with a belt of glittering structures, had been built. On the other hand, only a single modern school, at all comparable to the ordinary public schools of any town in England or Switzerland! The young men of the nation were feeble, unenthusiastic, selfish and—pious—in contrast with fathers, who had adored the generous ideals of liberty and democracy and had stood for action, revolt! The son was an old man at majority, his ...
— The Torrent - Entre Naranjos • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... appointed a week beforehand for a party of pleasure being almost invariably rainy, blowy, haily, snowy, drizzly, foggy, cold, uncomfortable, villainous weather; or else so hot that the mere act of breathing is too much for feeble human nature—and this, too, whether the party is made for sailing, riding, rambling about in the woods, or even for dancing, or tea-drinking, or whist-playing in a warm, comfortable room. This is, perhaps, ...
— An Old Sailor's Yarns • Nathaniel Ames
... indicator; it is more sensitive to acids than litmus is. Now there are some salts which contain a preponderance of acid in their composition, i.e. in which the acid has not been fully neutralised by the base; such salts are termed acid salts. Bicarbonate of soda is one of these acid salts, but so feeble is carbonic acid in its acid properties and practical evidences, that we shall see both monocarbonate or "neutral" carbonate of soda and bicarbonate or "acid" carbonate of soda show evidences of, or, as chemists say, react with alkalinity ...
— The Chemistry of Hat Manufacturing - Lectures Delivered Before the Hat Manufacturers' Association • Watson Smith
... he looked into their faces, as if he would read their souls, and asked them to look up through the tree tops and tell him what they could see in a certain space of sky. In fear of his mood, and lest he might call them feeble of sight or purblind, his disciples, or many among them, fell to disputing among themselves as to what might be discerned by human eyes in the cloud; till John, thinking to raise himself in the Master's ...
— The Brook Kerith - A Syrian story • George Moore
... mother pondered over these words for some time, until a feeble smile played upon ...
— Little Meg's Children • Hesba Stretton
... the poet had already been accomplished; and they paid homage to his superior genius. He held up before his nation the mirror in which they were to behold the world of gods and heroes, no less than of feeble mortals, and to behold them reflected with purity and truth. His poems are founded on the first feeling of human nature; on the love of children, wife, and country; on that passion which outweighs all others, the love of glory. His songs were poured forth from a breast ...
— The Odyssey of Homer • Homer, translated by Alexander Pope
... without visiters but me. I remained at Mount Vernon several days and had many and long conversations with the General. While there, one of his newspapers mentioned the return of General Reed from England, in feeble health; and this induced a conversation concerning that person. I reminded the General of the coolness with which I had seen him treat Reed at the final leave-taking of his officers; and of the remark I had afterwards heard him make at Annapolis. ...
— Nuts for Future Historians to Crack • Various
... partially open mouth. For a moment there was no result, then a cough and a splutter on the part of the sick man showed that the potent elixir was making its way down his throat, and, with another groan, the patient made a feeble effort to struggle to his feet. But the attempt was a failure, the last particle of strength had already been spent, and, sighing heavily, Butler subsided back upon the supporting arm of the Indian, and lay staring ...
— Harry Escombe - A Tale of Adventure in Peru • Harry Collingwood
... in the Union may come from California, in which State a feeble cry has already been heard of—"a Western Republic." The facility of intercourse afforded by railroads seems likely to stop the swelling of that cry; but if California did separate, it would not be attended with those evils which a disruption of the Southern States would inevitably produce. ...
— Lands of the Slave and the Free - Cuba, The United States, and Canada • Henry A. Murray
... concealed from them, and for which, even if they had foreseen them, it would have been almost impossible to provide a remedy. The Greek emperor, Alexis Comnenus, who had applied to the Western Christians for succor against the Turks, entertained hopes, and those but feeble ones, of obtaining such a moderate supply, as, acting under his command, might enable him to repulse the enemy: but he was extremely astonished to see his dominions overwhelmed, on a sudden, by such an inundation of licentious barbarians, who, though they ...
— The Ontario Readers: The High School Reader, 1886 • Ministry of Education
... smooth buildings into rough ones, but only drawing what you see, with Prout's simple method and firm lines. Don't copy his coloured works. They are good, but not at all equal to his chalk and pencil drawings, and you will become a mere imitator, and a very feeble imitator, if you use colour at all in Prout's method. I have not space to explain why this is so, it would take a long piece of reasoning; trust ...
— The Crown of Wild Olive • John Ruskin
... Kurwenal and the shepherd, who looks over the wall to ask how the patient is progressing, Tristan awakes, asking with feeble voice where he is. Kurwenal relates how he has brought him to his own home in Kareol, where he is soon to recover from wounds and death. It is some time before Tristan fully understands, and as memory begins to awaken, he tells of where he ...
— Wagner's Tristan und Isolde • George Ainslie Hight
... led me to travel almost daily on one of the Great Eastern lines—the Woodford Branch. Every one knows that Muller perpetrated his detestable act on the North London Railway, close by. The English middle class, of which I am myself a feeble unit, travel on the Woodford branch in large numbers. Well, the demoralization of our class,—which (the newspapers are constantly saying it, so I may repeat it without vanity) has done all the great things which have ever been done in England,—the ...
— Railway Adventures and Anecdotes - extending over more than fifty years • Various
... Zal heard the news he was cut to the heart, and sent without delay for Rustem. "Rustem," said he, "this is no time for a man to eat and drink and take his pleasure. The King is in the hands of Satan, and we must deliver him. As for me, I am old and feeble; but you are of the age for war. Saddle Raksh, your horse, and set forth without a moment's delay. The White Genius must not escape the punishment of his misdeeds ...
— Young Folks Treasury, Volume 2 (of 12) • Various
... the campaign in Sicily was thus left in the feeble hands of Nicias; for though Lamachus nominally held an equal command, his poverty and political insignificance prevented him from holding the position to which his military talents entitled him. The few remaining weeks of summer were frittered away in trivial operations ...
— Stories From Thucydides • H. L. Havell
... Weak and feeble states like those of Central America may not feel themselves able to assert and vindicate their rights. The case would be far different if expeditions were set on foot within our own territories to make private war against a powerful ...
— State of the Union Addresses of James Buchanan • James Buchanan
... terrors for the lowly since the anointed head was not spared. With the fury of lions the Upland, Smaland, Finland, East and West Gothland regiments rushed a second time upon the left wing of the enemy, which, already making but feeble resistance to General Horn, was now entirely beaten from the field. Bernard, Duke of Saxe-Weimar, gave to the bereaved Swedes a noble leader in his own person; and the spirit of Gustavus led his victorious ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. VIII (of X) - Continental Europe II. • Various
... was passed more than two years since, has remained unexecuted in the absence of regulations for its enforcement. It was but a feeble step toward emancipation, but it was the recognition of right, and was hailed as such, and exhibited Spain in harmony with sentiments of humanity and of justice and in sympathy with the other powers of the Christian ...
— State of the Union Addresses of Ulysses S. Grant • Ulysses S. Grant
... used in telephones pulsate very rapidly, but are very feeble. Electric disturbances caused by the proximity of telegraph or tram wires would much interfere with them if the earth were used for the return circuit. It has been found that a complete metallic circuit (two wires) is practically free from interference, though ...
— How it Works • Archibald Williams
... Duke has asked me to write about Trumpeton Wood, as he knows nothing about it, and I know just as little. But if you say what you want, it shall be done. Shall we get foxes and put them there? Or ought there to be a special fox-keeper? You mustn't be angry because the poor old Duke was too feeble to take notice of the matter. Only speak, and ...
— Phineas Redux • Anthony Trollope
... tendrils around that book of books! How familiar its sacred pages! How often in the sunny days of childhood, we were fed from its manna by the maternal hand! It was our guide to the opening path of life, and a lamp to the feeble, faltering steps of youth. Who can forget the family bible? It was the household oracle of our grandfathers and grandmothers,—of our dear parents. It bears the record of their venerated names; their birth, their baptism, ...
— The Christian Home • Samuel Philips
... undoubtedly helped to frame the novel of manners, they were properly discarded as useless lumber when once the new species of writing had taken tangible form. Perhaps they are chiefly significant to the modern student, not as revealing now and then the first feeble stirrings of realism, but as showing the last throes of sensational extravagance. The very extreme to which writers of the Haywoodian type carried breathless adventure, warm intrigue, and soul-thrilling passion exhausted the possibilities of their method and made progress ...
— The Life and Romances of Mrs. Eliza Haywood • George Frisbie Whicher
... when very possibly the soil might not have been ours to settle. Fortunately Hamilton did not yet realize the importance of the Kentucky settlements, nor the necessity of crushing them, and during 1777 the war bands organized at Detroit were sent against the country round Pittsburg; while the feeble forts in the far western wilderness were only troubled by smaller war parties raised among the tribes on their own account. A strong expedition, led by Hamilton in person, would doubtless at this time ...
— The Winning of the West, Volume Two - From the Alleghanies to the Mississippi, 1777-1783 • Theodore Roosevelt
... that mysterious shore, as if I were some wandering inhabitant of a distant planet, present for the first time at the spectacle of some terrestrial phenomena belonging to another existence. To give body and existence to such new sensations would have required the coinage of new words—and here my feeble brain found itself wholly at fault. I looked on, I thought, I reflected, I admired, in a state of stupefaction not ...
— A Journey to the Centre of the Earth • Jules Verne
... year brought round the time Of an error that left the sting of crime, When he sat on the bench of the witchcraft courts, With the laws of Moses and Hale's Reports, And spake, in the name of both, the word That gave the witch's neck to the cord, And piled the oaken planks that pressed The feeble life from the warlock's breast! All the day long, from dawn to dawn, His door was bolted, his curtain drawn; No foot on his silent threshold trod, No eye looked on him save that of God, As he baffled the ghosts of the ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier
... does not present so lamentable a picture as a Briton in a foreign land, without resources in himself, and with a rooted aversion to the use of any language except his own. In this case, the victim actually attempted some feeble remonstrance and argument on the subject. Cecil was almost as much astonished as the Prophet was under similar circumstances; but she considered that habits of discussion in beasts of burden and the lower order of animals generally were ...
— Sword and Gown - A Novel • George A. Lawrence
... close these remarks, by appealing to the consciences of all who have ever set about the work of religion in good earnest, whoever they may be, whether they have made less, or greater progress in their noble toil, whether they are matured saints, or feeble strugglers against the world and the flesh. They have ever confessed how great efforts were necessary to keep close to the commandments of God; in spite of their knowledge of the truth, and their faith, in spite of the aids and consolations they receive from above, still how ...
— Parochial and Plain Sermons, Vol. VII (of 8) • John Henry Newman
... or fall together,' said I sadly, for at every step his horse grew more and more feeble. 'In this darkness they will make ...
— Micah Clarke - His Statement as made to his three Grandchildren Joseph, - Gervas and Reuben During the Hard Winter of 1734 • Arthur Conan Doyle
... the most delicious biscuit. Each of us had a crisp, tender head of lettuce with a spoonful of potato salad in the center. We had preserves made from canned peaches, and the firmest yellow butter. Soon it was quite dark and we had a tiny brass lamp which gave but a feeble light, but it was quite cool so we had a blazing fire which made ...
— Letters of a Woman Homesteader • Elinore Pruitt Stewart
... side; I lured her on to talk of indifferent subjects,—the weather, the gardens, the bird in the cage, which was placed on the table near her. Her voice, at first low and feeble, became gradually stronger, and her face lighted up with a child's innocent, playful smile. No, I had not been mistaken! That was no lymphatic, nerveless temperament, on which consumption fastens as its ...
— A Strange Story, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... winds of temptation draw the lot that put the five-pound note into her hands; if she had come to the cottage just one day later, or if the rain had gone on just half an hour longer and kept Fritzing indoors, she would, I have no doubt whatever, be still in Symford practising every feeble virtue either on her father or on her John, by this time probably her very own John. As it was she was a thief, a lost soul, a banished face for ever from the ...
— The Princess Priscilla's Fortnight • Elizabeth von Arnim
... in the midst of unspoilt nature, I never felt depressed, no matter what happened, and was absolutely regardless of climatic conditions; but in those miserable settlements—feeble attempts at civilization—I must confess that I used to get low-spirited too, and often thought what an idiot I had been to leave my happy homes in Florence and in London, in order to ...
— Across Unknown South America • Arnold Henry Savage Landor
... shaken by excitement, and pulling out his note-book he tilted it this way and that under the starlight, but he could not read it, and all the stars in that sky were no use to him. He struck a match and held the feeble flame under that heavenly magnificence, and a puff of wind ...
— The Happy Foreigner • Enid Bagnold
... door. As the faint driver, trembling with nervous debility from great excess of deathly admonition addressed to him, through the front window of his hack, all the way from the ferry, checked his horses in one feeble gasp of remaining strength, the Reverend OCTAVIUS stepped forth from the doorway to greet Mr. SCHENCK and the dark-complexioned, sharp-eyed young brother and sister who came ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 13, June 25, 1870 • Various
... a senile laugh, and her companion having taken advantage of the long speech to drink some gin out of the broken cup, Mother Guttersnipe seized the unfortunate old creature by the hair, and in spite of her feeble cries, banged her ...
— The Mystery of a Hansom Cab • Fergus Hume
... like a "blast from the mountain. He came in his terror and shook his dusky spear. His eyes were flames, and his voice like distant thunder. 'Son of night,' said Fingal, 'retire. Do I fear thy gloomy form, spirit of dismal Loda? Weak is thy shield of cloud, feeble thy meteor sword.'"[TN-4] Then cleft he the gloomy shadow with his sword. It fell like a column of smoke. It shrieked. Then rolling itself up, the wounded spirit rose on the wind, and the island shook to ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook, Vol. 3 • E. Cobham Brewer
... within his capital. Tumults and bloodshed ensued; and Joseph Buonaparte, the French ambassador, narrowly escaped with his life. A French army forthwith advanced on Rome; the Pope's functions as a temporal prince were terminated; he retired to the exile of Siena; and another of those feeble phantoms, which the Directory delighted to invest with glorious names, appeared under the title of "the ...
— The History of Napoleon Buonaparte • John Gibson Lockhart
... instance, is infinitely farther away from us than the sun, yet its brightness is more than 50 times that of the sun. Polaris, still farther away, has 100 times the light and heat of the sun. In fact the sun, considered as a star, is relatively small and feeble. ...
— Lectures in Navigation • Ernest Gallaudet Draper
... honor, love and obey our parents while we are young; and we should still love and honor them when we are older. We must not despise or be ashamed of them if we happen to rise to a higher position in life than they. When they have grown old and feeble, we should care tenderly for them; and after they are dead, we ...
— An Explanation of Luther's Small Catechism • Joseph Stump
... the wildest, saddest tone, Yet sweet, of some loved voice heard long ago. I wept. 'Shall this fair woman all alone, Over the sea with that fierce Serpent go? His head is on her heart, and who can know 320 How soon he may devour his feeble prey?'— Such were my thoughts, when the tide gan to flow; And that strange boat like the moon's shade did sway Amid reflected stars that in the ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley Volume I • Percy Bysshe Shelley
... though with a hand much too feeble indeed for any but moral suasion. It was enough. Barby stood silently and very anxiously watching her, till the fire had removed the outward chill at least. But even that took long to do, and before it was well done Fleda again ...
— Queechy • Susan Warner
... through a long avenue of arches, an iron-grated door; within was a dim light which just sent its feeble rays upon some objects in its neighborhood, not strong enough to show what they were. It required no great effort of the imagination to fancy an emaciated, spectral figure of a monk poring over a large book which lay before him. ...
— Samuel F. B. Morse, His Letters and Journals - In Two Volumes, Volume I. • Samuel F. B. Morse
... brothers," were glowing enough, but they never whipped up business sufficiently to attract the required number of boarders. Nevertheless, I must admit that old Trigger, with all his faults and severity, was really good-hearted. He was a little sniffing, rasping man, with small, spare, feeble, bent figure; mean irregular features badly arranged round a formidable bent, broken red nose; thin straggling grey hair and long grey mutton-chop whiskers; constantly blinking little eyes and very assertive, energetic manners. He had a constant air of objecting ...
— The Great White Queen - A Tale of Treasure and Treason • William Le Queux
... riot read us a plain lesson on our condition. There was no party spirit—no unity of interests. A few, who were mischievously inclined, marched off to the College of Surgeons in a pretentious file; but even before they reached their destination the feeble inspiration had died out in many, and their numbers were sadly thinned. Some followed strange gods in the direction of Drummond Street, and others slunk back to meek good-boyism at the feet of the Professors. The same is visible in better things. As you send a man to an English University ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. XXII (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... advise a future career. We can speak from experience of the warm interest she took in the Hospital for the cure of Consumption, and the Governesses' Benevolent Institution; during the progress of the latter, her health was painfully feeble, yet she used her personal influence for its success, and worked with her own hands for its bazaars. She was ever aiding those who could not aid themselves; and all her thoughts, words, and deeds, were evidence of her clear, powerful mind and kindly ...
— The International Weekly Miscellany, Vol. 1, No. 7 - Of Literature, Art, and Science, August 12, 1850 • Various
... Landor.—Diffuse, feeble, and, like Boileau, meanly thievish. The most admired verse of Racine is stolen, [107] so is almost every other ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - April 1843 • Various
... feeble gait of one who fears a pitfall at every step, so easily recognisable in the "numerous, successive, slight alterations" in the foregoing passage, may be traced in many another page of the "Origin of Species" by those who will be at the trouble of comparing the several ...
— Luck or Cunning? • Samuel Butler
... the ridge to protect themselves from the rebel batteries; yet even here the shells came, carrying death to many of our number. The Vermont brigade was sent to the assistance of French's division, who, having expended their ammunition, were making feeble resistance to the enemy. The Vermonters behaved with their usual gallantry, resisting the advance of the enemy; and although frequently subjected to the fire of artillery, they held their ground bravely. The brigade was composed ...
— Three Years in the Sixth Corps • George T. Stevens
... hopeless poor and of degraded men, I had in my mind only the feeble or detestable adults who degrade our civilisation; but I have by no means forgotten the unhappy little souls who develop into wastrels unless they are taken away from hideous surroundings which cramp vitality, destroy all childish happiness, and turn into brutes poor young creatures who bear ...
— Side Lights • James Runciman
... primate, appointed in 1369 by papal provision, was William Whittlesea, a nephew of Archbishop Islip, whose weak health and colourless character made of little account his five years' tenure of the metropolitical dignity. With Canterbury in such feeble hands, the leadership in the Church and primacy in the councils of the crown passed to stronger men: such as John Thoresby, Archbishop of York till 1373; Thomas Brantingham, treasurer from 1369 to 1371, and Bishop of Exeter from 1370 to 1394; and above all to ...
— The History of England - From the Accession of Henry III. to the Death of Edward III. (1216-1377) • T.F. Tout
... each season into the Adirondacks with impaired health, and after a few weeks of roughing it come out immensely improved, both in health and spirit, while, on the other hand, others go who are too feeble for such a journey; and again, others who know nothing how to take care of themselves, whether in the woods or out, and, of course, such must ...
— Minnesota; Its Character and Climate • Ledyard Bill
... wasted by ice; how much we have no sure means of knowing. Just below the extreme summit hot sulphurous gases and vapor issue from irregular fissures, mixed with spray derived from melting snow, the last feeble expression of the mighty force that built the mountain. Not in one great convulsion was Shasta given birth. The crags of the summit and the sections exposed by the glaciers down the sides display enough of its internal framework to prove that comparatively long periods of quiescence intervened ...
— The Mountains of California • John Muir
... yards it descended a short flight of steps, and then again went straight forward to a door so decayed that only a rusted bolt, and one rust-eaten hinge, held it in place. Beyond this door, an abrupt turn in the passage, and then a flight of steps so precipitous that the feeble beam of his lantern could give the explorer no help in fathoming their depth; and when this lantern was lowered as far as it was in his power to do so, the flame burned blue and went out, killed by the noxious gases that stagnant centuries had breathed. Dizzy and frightened, the explorer with ...
— Stories of the Border Marches • John Lang and Jean Lang
... feeble minority, who will not submit to social customs," the authoritarians say, "we must maintain magistrates, tribunals and prisons, although these institutions become a source of new evils ...
— The Conquest of Bread • Peter Kropotkin
... the experienced commuter makes the best of a bad job, knowing there is little to be gained by trying to cherish and succour a feeble remnant of fire. He will manfully jettison the whole business, filling the cellar with the crash of shunting ashes and the clatter of splitting kindling. But this pitiable creature still thought that mayhap he could, by ...
— Plum Pudding - Of Divers Ingredients, Discreetly Blended & Seasoned • Christopher Morley
... was of no avail. Though a three days' journey had been set betwixt Laban's flocks and Jacob's, the angels were wont to bring the sheep belonging to Laban down to Jacob's sheep, and Jacob's droves grew constantly larger and better.[209] Laban had given only the feeble and sick to Jacob, yet the young of the flock, raised under Jacob's tendance, were so excellent in quality that people bought them at a heavy price.[210] And Jacob had no need to resort to the peeled rods. He had but to speak, and the flocks ...
— The Legends of the Jews Volume 1 • Louis Ginzberg
... higher hopes. They were but the preservers of Italian greatness; he is its creator and its father. In the pomp of the games, amid the tumultuous applause, the immense mass of people were to be seen turning their eyes towards him alone, as if they were saying to him: 'These festivities are but feeble expressions of the gratitude that all Italy vows to you for all the good you have done her; and since you deign to accept it, since you like to sit among us as our Prince and our father, these festivities become an augury ...
— The Court of the Empress Josephine • Imbert de Saint-Amand
... were the cavalry, a small squadron consisting of some Jacobite gentlemen who had fled from the Lowlands to the mountains and of about forty of Dundee's old troopers. The horses had been ill fed and ill tended among the Grampians, and looked miserably lean and feeble. Beyond them was Lochiel with his Camerons. On the extreme left, the men of Sky were marshalled ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 3 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... into the cabin, eager to impart the news of their new acquaintance. Mrs. Hyde was glad of anything that would interest Adele, and urged her to go upon deck with Herbert. Mr. Nichols was resting from the fatigue of the ride. Mrs. Nichols, always feeble, did not feel equal to the exertion of climbing the companion way, the stairs from the upper deck to the cabin, and Mrs. Hyde wished to remain with her; so the children ...
— Eric - or, Under the Sea • Mrs. S. B. C. Samuels
... brain seemed to be clogged—inert; and though my first, feeble movement was followed by the rattle of a chain, some moments more elapsed ere I realized that the chain was fastened to a steel collar—that the steel collar was ...
— The Insidious Dr. Fu-Manchu • Sax Rohmer
... this the wailings of terrified women, the infirm condition of the aged, and the helplessness of childhood; such as strove to provide for themselves and those who labored to assist others; these dragging the feeble, those waiting for them; some hurrying, others lingering; altogether created a scene of universal confusion and embarrassment: and while they looked back upon the danger in their rear, they often found themselves beset before and on their sides; or, if they had ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 03 • Various
... view to the future use and decoration of the room. We will assume that the ceilings are proper ceilings; that they will stay in their place, i.e., the top of the room. This is a most daring assumption, because there are so many feeble and threatening ceilings overhanging most of us that good ones seem rare. But the ceiling is an architectural problem, and you must consider it in the beginning of things. It may be beamed and have every evidence of structural beauty and strength, or it may be beamed ...
— The House in Good Taste • Elsie de Wolfe
... now our evening songs won't be like a feeble chirping any more; now everything, everything will be different!" she cried out. Suddenly struck with a new idea, she ran over ...
— Cornelli • Johanna Spyri
... rushed into the ring as the gong rang, and they now supported him to his corner. At his feeble request one unlaced the glove from his right hand, which he extended to his late ...
— The Long Trick • Lewis Anselm da Costa Ritchie
... Toronto Battalion under a major arrived as reinforcements, and took cover behind our parados as there was no room in the trench. Captain Culling asked that they take on the attack, and Mr. Doxsee volunteered to lead it. The response was feeble, and the attack petered out to nothing, Bugler Hunt and a man of the Toronto Battalion being killed by the side of Doxsee, who, finding himself alone, returned ...
— From the St. Lawrence to the Yser with the 1st Canadian brigade • Frederic C. Curry
... than this he can pierce the dim recesses of the past. Before his imagination the earth rises swathed in tropical forests, and all strange forms of life issuing and jostling one another for existence in the steaming warmth of perpetual summer. Among a thousand types that flowered and fell, the feeble form of primitive man is distinguished, without fire, without clothing, without articulate speech. Through the midnight of the woods, shivering at the cries of the stealthy-footed prowlers of the darkness, he crouches huddled in fallen leaves, waiting for the rose of dawn. Little ...
— Latin Literature • J. W. Mackail
... together down the glen to the lonely beach of the great stream. Pambo was there, and with slow and feeble arms he launched the canoe. Philammon flung himself at the old men's feet, and besought their blessing and ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Volume V. • Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds.
... there are always plenty of coarse and brutal minds that take a pleasure in their torment, particularly if they at once recognise any innate superiority to themselves. Of this class was Barker. He hated Eric at first sight, simply because his feeble mind could only realise one idea about him, and that was the new boy's striking contrast with his own imperfections. Hence he left no means untried to vent on Eric his low and mean jealousy. He showed undisguised pleasure when he fell in form, and ...
— Eric • Frederic William Farrar
... chief president. This worthy magistrate, foreseeing the issue, and feeling that one so guilty should not be left till the last moment, had sent the good priest. The latter, although he had objected that the Conciergerie had its own two chaplains, and added that he was too feeble to undertake such a task, being unable even to see another man bled without feeling ill, accepted the painful mission, the president having so strongly urged it, on the ground that in this case he needed a man who could ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... many Good Samaritans are there among us? Our brothers lie wounded along life's highway in crowds. There are feeble folk who were never strong enough for the hard life battle; there are brave men who have fought, and failed; there are some crushed down by hard times, others who have "fallen on evil days and evil tongues;" some who were ...
— The Life of Duty, v. 2 - A year's plain sermons on the Gospels or Epistles • H. J. Wilmot-Buxton
... mad with joy when the first of these aerial mutterings was reported down from the mountain-top. "Only a question of time now," they cried in their delirium. But weeks went by before another sound was heard. Now the report of feeble, long-separated manifestations, like vague spirit-rappings, no longer caused excitement or enthusiasm,—only a rueful ...
— West Wind Drift • George Barr McCutcheon
... indulgent towards women and poor people, on whom the burden of human society rest. He said, "The faults of women, of children, of the feeble, the indigent, and the ignorant, are the fault of the husbands, the fathers, the masters, the strong, the rich, ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... and Beethoven kissed his hand and forehead devoutly. His departure completely overcame him. He could not address the audience, and could only give expression to his heartfelt gratitude with broken, feeble utterances and blessings. Upon every countenance there was deep pity, and tearful eyes followed him as he was taken to ...
— The Standard Oratorios - Their Stories, Their Music, And Their Composers • George P. Upton
... get our own breakfasts," I said, in a tone of very feeble expostulation, which plainly told that, at that particular moment, it was the last thing I wished ...
— The Garden, You, and I • Mabel Osgood Wright
... Scriptural ground for this feeling. The humanity of Jesus was just like our humanity. He came into the world just as feeble and as untaught as any other child that ever was born. No mother was ever more to her infant than Mary was to Jesus. She taught him all his first lessons. She gave him his first thoughts about God, and from her lips he learned ...
— Personal Friendships of Jesus • J. R. Miller
... of the brain; he may live—or he may not; a few days will decide the point: he is a poor feeble old man." ...
— Newton Forster • Frederick Marryat
... a sensitive mother, born amid such a crash of excitement, should be feeble was to be expected. No one at first ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 7 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Eminent Orators • Elbert Hubbard
... call you up at this time of night, Philip, but I wanted to see you very bad," said she, in feeble tones. ...
— Desk and Debit - or, The Catastrophes of a Clerk • Oliver Optic
... matched crystals so that each pair, in effect, was tuned in together. They said also that the stones were little more than nature's ultimate extension of man's feeble attempts at radio communication. ...
— The Wealth of Echindul • Noel Miller Loomis
... and regulars landed without molestation, and captured the feeble forts with the loss of but twenty killed. The Acadians agreed to take the oath of fidelity, but stipulated not to be forced to bear arms against their own countrymen. General Charles Lawrence, the lieutenant-governor ...
— The History of the United States from 1492 to 1910, Volume 1 • Julian Hawthorne
... before in his life had he relied on a moral or a spiritual impulse in him. What of these existed in him were in unseen quantities—for which there was neither multiple nor measure—had been primitive and hereditary, flowing in him like a feeble tincture diluted ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... tents: and there we mette with a carrier which did trauel in the countrey for the English marchants: and by him we sent word vnto them of our estate; and they returned the next day vnto vs a Moore, which brought vs victuals, being at that instant very feeble and hungry: and withall sent vs a letter with pen, inke, and paper, willing vs to write vnto them what ship it was that was cast away, and how many and what men there were aliue. For said they we would knowe with speed, for to morow is the kings ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, and Discoveries of - The English Nation, Vol. 11 • Richard Hakluyt |
