"Harsh" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... which was free and diffusive, the Minister did not mention a syllable of the King's discontents, nor hint the least dissatisfaction at the conduct of Congress towards this Court. I cautiously avoided making any harsh strictures on the delays I constantly met with, and though the Minister's excuses for them were frivolous and merely ostensible, yet it could have answered no good purpose to have declared that opinion of them, especially at so delicate a period ...
— The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Vol. VIII • Various
... in friendly wise the Eskimo and their children, a feeling of loving admiration and appreciation tightens round our hearts. We had never heard a harsh word bestowed upon a child, no impatient or angry admonition. If a boy gives way to bursts of temper, and this is rare, he is gently taken to task, reproved, and reasoned with after the fit of passion ...
— The New North • Agnes Deans Cameron
... remarkable summer months in this wild and extraordinary fashion, I at last received reassuring news of Minna, who had remained in Dresden. Although her manner of taking leave of me had been both harsh and wounding, I could not bring myself to believe I had completely parted from her. In a letter I wrote to one of her relations, and which I presumed they would forward, I made sympathetic inquiries about her, while ...
— My Life, Volume I • Richard Wagner
... widows, and keep himself unspotted from the world. Thus, with all his conviction and devotion, there was nothing hard or fanatical in his feeling or conduct, and he held pleasant personal relations with men of every faith. Few men indulged in so little harsh criticism of others, and he expressed censure or disapprobation by humorous indirection rather than by open accusation. 'We must not be too hard,' he was fond of saying, 'it is so difficult to know all the circumstances. If you should insist, for instance, that the use of tobacco ...
— Great Fortunes, and How They Were Made • James D. McCabe, Jr.
... did in nowise approve of the harsh language, nor of the blow which Antinous had dealt; and some of them said, "Who knows but one of the deities goes about hid under that poor disguise? for in the likeness of poor pilgrims the gods have many times descended to try the dispositions of men, whether they be humane or impious." While ...
— THE ADVENTURES OF ULYSSES • CHARLES LAMB
... them—a course of conduct at once cowardly and farcical. Pitt's speech also proves him to have known of the irregularities that disgraced the trials. But he, a lawyer, condoned them and applauded the harsh and vindictive sentences. In short, he acted as an alarmist, not as a dispenser ...
— William Pitt and the Great War • John Holland Rose
... to keep foreign publications away from him, but he was plucky in his own harsh way. He insisted on seeing them. Always the same thing happened. His face would grow grim, the seam-worn forehead would corrugate, the muscles of his jaw throb nervously. His gray eyes would flash—and the fist come down heavily on ...
— Shandygaff • Christopher Morley
... journey seemed—usually—but the matter of a few hours. Only rarely did we enjoy a few moments of open travel. Most of the time the thorns caught at us. In the mountain passes were sometimes broad trails of game or of the Masai cattle. The country was harsh and dry and beautiful with the grays and dull greens of arid-land brush, or with the soft atmospheric tints of arid-land distances. Game was fairly common, but rather difficult to find. There were many buffalo, a very few zebra, leopards, hyenas, plenty ...
— African Camp Fires • Stewart Edward White
... on account of his services to his Majesty in these regions, and on my own account. The thing which pleased me most in this undertaking, and which is worthy of being remembered, is that, contrary to the proverb of the old Portuguese women, in the course of this war there was not one harsh word between the Spaniards and Portuguese, though they ate together at one mess. But your Lordship may attribute this to your good fortune, and to the intelligence and experience of Joan ...
— History of the Philippine Islands Vols 1 and 2 • Antonio de Morga
... always struck us with particular force in the history of these people, namely, that Gitanismo—which means Gypsy villainy of every description—flourished and knew nothing of decay so long as the laws recommended and enjoined measures the most harsh and severe for the suppression of the Gypsy sect; the palmy days of Gitanismo were those in which the caste was proscribed, and its members, in the event of renouncing their Gypsy habits, had nothing farther ...
— The Pocket George Borrow • George Borrow
... endeavoring to make soft and agreeable his harsh voice, "I trust you have been well treated since ...
— Sir Henry Morgan, Buccaneer - A Romance of the Spanish Main • Cyrus Townsend Brady
... ill humour. Appetite without moral affection, social sympathy, and even without passion and imagination—(in plain English, mere lust,)—is the basest form of egotism,—and being 'infra' human, or below humanity, should be pronounced with the harsh breathing, as 'he-goat-ism'. 1820. ...
— Literary Remains (1) • Coleridge
... this visit, which I little expected so soon, I had the honour of one from the lieutenant-general of police, or, to call things by their right names, I was subjected to an official examination. He upbraided me certainly, but not in any harsh or annoying manner. He told me, in the kindest tone, that he bitterly lamented my bad conduct; that I had committed a gross indiscretion in making an enemy of such a man as M. G—— M——; that in truth it ...
— Manon Lescaut • Abbe Prevost
... who happened that day to dine at Mr. Payne's house, confirmed all the former evidence, deposing moreover, than when Mr. Payne gave the prisoner some harsh language, the prisoner replied, Sir, I am as innocent as the child is at my mistress's breast; that the prisoner also pretended the deceased took a knife in her hand when she went into the cellar, upon which this evidence and Mr. Payne went down, and found not a drop ...
— Lives Of The Most Remarkable Criminals Who have been Condemned and Executed for Murder, the Highway, Housebreaking, Street Robberies, Coining or other offences • Arthur L. Hayward
... Loudwater was compelled to grind his teeth. Then he laughed a harsh, barking laugh, and cried: "It's no good! I've just had a short interview with that scoundrel Grey. And I put the fear of God into him, I can tell you. I made him admit that you'd kissed him in the ...
— The Loudwater Mystery • Edgar Jepson
... moment, his laughter sounded harsh and ominous; but I had done no wrong, and so, ...
— The Lady of the Ice - A Novel • James De Mille
... that two or three days later old Mrs. Haskell, in her tumbling-down white house, read the letter which her soldier boy had written her more than two years before. Little did she dream as she laid this reverently away with that blunt, harsh notification of his death, that a scout had taken off his hat to her as scouts do across all those ...
— Roy Blakeley in the Haunted Camp • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... of the prisoners had, in the meantime, been led on one side to await their turn. The firing-party now advanced—the doomed men gazed at them with pale, though undaunted countenances. The commanding officer, in a loud, harsh voice, gave the usual order, "Make ready," "Present," then came the fatal word—"Fire!" Some fell forward, shot dead; others were struggling and writhing on the ground; Colonel O'Regan alone was standing upright. ...
— The Three Lieutenants • W.H.G. Kingston
... to say that a gentle and docile horse is always the more valuable, other qualities being equal, and it is almost obvious that gentle treatment tends to develop this admirable quality in the horse as well as in the human species, while harsh treatment has the contrary tendency. Horses have been trained so as to be entirely governed by the words of his driver, and they will obey and perform their simple but important duties with as much alacrity as the child obeys ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 303 - October 22, 1881 • Various
... that sounds very harsh, does it not? Let in one thought into it, and it all becomes very gracious. The Apostle Peter, who also once uses this word 'despot,' does so in a very remarkable connection. He speaks about men's 'denying the despot that bought them.' Ah, Peter! you were getting ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... she would marry me if I win out with the ditch. Being practical, she would accept money as a substitute for love. That reminds me: she herself once declared that if circumstances necessitated she could take a rich man for his riches." Bryant uttered a harsh laugh. "My Lord, I was frightened lest in a fit of anguish at losing my love she should go to the devil!" Again he yielded to an outburst of laughter that made Imogene shudder. "I fancied that at finding herself out of money, unable to work, disinclined to ...
— The Iron Furrow • George C. Shedd
... he went to the King of Temoria, who was called Tuathal Mael-gharbh, in that he was harsh, so that he should set free a woman unjustly held in servitude with that king. The king released not the woman to him. Then Saint Kiaranus blessed her, and bade her go with him to her own people. So she forthwith ...
— The Latin & Irish Lives of Ciaran - Translations Of Christian Literature. Series V. Lives Of - The Celtic Saints • Anonymous
... goes the chase. Now, then, or never! I must avail me of the precious moment,— Must hear my doom decided by thy lips, Though it should part me from thy side forever. Oh, do not arm that gentle face of thine With looks so stern and harsh! Who—who am I, That dare aspire so high as unto thee? Fame hath not stamped me yet; nor may I take My place amid the courtly throng of knights, That, crowned with glory's lustre, woo thy smiles. Nothing have I to offer but a heart That overflows ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... the twilight seemed to fit her best, although at all times she was fair. But to-night she was a picture in her traveling dress of golden brown, with soft, white folds about her throat. I wondered if she thought of Beverly as she spoke. It hurt me so to be harsh with his memory. ...
— Vanguards of the Plains • Margaret McCarter
... know Lady Roseville well?" said I. "Very," answered Glanville, laconically, and changed the conversation. As we were leaving the Park, through Cumberland Gate, we were stopped by a blockade of carriages; a voice, loud, harsh, and vulgarly accented, called out to Glanville by his name. I ...
— Pelham, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... one of his failings," thought Martin; but somehow his face appeared neither harsh nor cynical, from which it might be surmised that he was not at all displeased. He sauntered back, rejoined his guest, and then said. "When do ...
— Mixed Faces • Roy Norton
... excitement; Sacheverell was regarded as a political martyr by all who wished the war ended. A reaction against the Government set in; the Whigs (S479) were driven from power, and the Tories passed two very harsh laws[2] against Dissenters (S472), though they were repealed a few years later. The Duchess of Marlborough had to leave her apartments in the palace of St. James, and in her spite broke down marble mantels and tore off the ...
— The Leading Facts of English History • D.H. Montgomery
... same way you should have all sorts of colors; but see to it that the colors are good,—in themselves "good color," not harsh nor crude. It does you no good as a student to learn how to express bad color. Neither is it good training for you, in studying how to represent what you see, to have to change bad color in your group into good color ...
— The Painter in Oil - A complete treatise on the principles and technique - necessary to the painting of pictures in oil colors • Daniel Burleigh Parkhurst
... became aware that his arm was broken, this man, so harsh to others, fell swooning on the threshold, where he remained motionless and cold, ...
— The Black Tulip • Alexandre Dumas (Pere)
... drawn by highly pamper'd steeds, Of rank and wealth; and intermix'd with these, The hackney chariot, urg'd to sober pace Its jaded horses; while the long-drawn train Of waggons, carts, and drays, pond'rous and slow, Complete the dissonance, stunning the ear Like pealing thunder, harsh and continuous, While on either side the busy multitude Pass on, ...
— Real Life In London, Volumes I. and II. • Pierce Egan
... Marko," Nona agreed, "when you're not too matter-of-fact. Yes, do come up. There's always a harsh word and a blow for ...
— If Winter Comes • A.S.M. Hutchinson
... to my home!' she exclaimed in harsh accents. 'Many thanks. I know very well what that means. Get up before dawn, work like a slave, go out in the fields, ruin your hands with callouses. Look, see how my hands still ...
— Luna Benamor • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... you out, Ware," Sylvanus Power continued, his harsh voice ringing through the room, "to tell you what probably every other man here knows except you. If you know it you're a fool, and I'm here to ...
— The Cinema Murder • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... the course of this little volume, I have been obliged to use language that seems harsh, I beg my readers to remember that it was in defence of the character of the people under my spiritual charge and of my own. The Marshpees have been reviled and misrepresented in the public prints, as much more indolent, ignorant, and degraded than they really are, and it was ...
— Indian Nullification of the Unconstitutional Laws of Massachusetts - Relative to the Marshpee Tribe: or, The Pretended Riot Explained • William Apes
... conceive the happiness to know some one person dearer to you than your own self—some one breast into which you can pour every thought, every grief, every joy! One person, who, if all the rest of the world were to calumniate or forsake you, would never wrong you by a harsh thought or an unjust word,—who would cling to you the closer in sickness, in poverty, in care,—who would sacrifice all things to you, and for whom you would sacrifice all—from whom, except by death, night ...
— Night and Morning, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... always a black frock-coat and trousers, elastic gaiters, and a stiff, black hat. His face was long and oval and the color of old ivory. He had tried to gain admission to Australia and New Zealand, and then the United States, and had been excluded under some harsh laws. He was plainly a scholar, but had brought with him from China a store of curios, probably to enable him to earn money in the land of the white. Australia had refused him; he had been shut out of San Francisco, and the very steamship that brought him was ...
— Mystic Isles of the South Seas. • Frederick O'Brien
... his late employer and members of his family, and was bound over to keep the peace for six months and to find L50 surety for the same, failing which he should go to gaol for that period. This seemed to be rather a harsh sentence to pass upon a man who was over fifty years of age, entirely destitute of means, of very inferior physique, and who had been charged at the instance of an individual who could certainly have protected himself against five such men as Grant. No doubt the accused was an eccentric man, and ...
— The Transvaal from Within - A Private Record of Public Affairs • J. P. Fitzpatrick
... "Mine These fruits unknown, in thorny combs that shine, Or gray-green spikes that glow, dull on the sands. Fain would I pluck, out-reaching eager hands, Save that a marvel grows of ruddier rind Out-flinging fruity breath upon the wind, Beneath harsh spines half-hid. Nor drains My wilful spouse such nectars fine. Nor gains His patient care the fruitage rare, these plains That heaps unheeded. Nay, nor bearded grains Golding this goodly land, where ...
— Lilith - The Legend of the First Woman • Ada Langworthy Collier
... not uncommon; Thirlwell had known men leave work and home to follow an elusive clue to mineral treasure in the barren solitudes. Some had come back broken in fortune and courage, and some had not come back at all. Then while he mused the harsh cry of the loon rang through the dark. It fired his blood, and unconsciously he fixed his eyes on the North, for in summer the birds of the lakes and rivers push on towards the Pole. He had done his duty ...
— The Lure of the North • Harold Bindloss
... King James, we know him well. The babe 'wronged in his mother's womb;' threatened by conspirators before his birth; terrified by a harsh tutor as a child; bullied; preached at; captured; insulted; ruled now by debauched favourites, now by godly ruffians; James naturally grew up a dissembler, and betrayed his father's murderer with a kiss. He was frightened into ...
— James VI and the Gowrie Mystery • Andrew Lang
... would thus dare to address GOD each night: "LORD, deal with me to-morrow as I have this day dealt with others; ... those to whom I was harsh, and from malice, or to show my own superiority, exposed their failings; others, to whom, from pride or dislike, I refused to speak,—one I have avoided, another I cannot like because she displeases me; I will not forgive,—to whom I will not show ...
— Gold Dust - A Collection of Golden Counsels for the Sanctification of Daily Life • E. L. E. B.
... that Jake was exceptionally harsh and cruel at all times, may account for this, as it accounted for his sobriquet of Flint. He was called by some of those who knew him a "God-forsaken man." We merely state the fact, but are very far from adopting the expression, for it ill becomes any man of ...
— Charlie to the Rescue • R.M. Ballantyne
... seated smiling by my side, And earth has not a gift or power That I would envy, in that hour. Envy!—oh never let its blight Touch the gay hearts met here tonight. Far hence be slander's sidelong wounds, Nor harsh dispute, nor discord's sounds Disturb a scene, where all should be ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al
... in the quiet evening You may give me the kiss of peace, Yet it might be That never for me, The pain of the heart should cease. How many go forth in the morning, That never come home at night! And hearts have broken For harsh words spoken That sorrow ...
— Poems Teachers Ask For, Book Two • Various
... of English law had distorted and besmirched her own perfectly legitimate action. They had given a handle to such harsh critics as Alfred Boyson. But she meant somehow to put herself right; and not only herself, but the great cause of woman's freedom and independence. No woman, in the better future that is coming, shall be forced either by law or opinion to continue ...
— Marriage a la mode • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... prototype is no favourite with the ladies. PUNCH is (and we reluctantly admit the fact) a Malthusian in principle, and somewhat of a domestic tyrant; for his conduct is at times harsh and ungentlemanly ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 1, July 17, 1841 • Various
... you are sure that every happines that can befall to you will make me vastly happy. I beseech you therefore to let me know everytime how far you are gone, I take it to be a very good omen for you, that your lovely mistress out of compliance has vouchsafed to learn a harsh high-dutch name, which would otherwise have made her starttle, at the very hearing of it. I am very thankful for her kind desire of seeing me in Engelland which I dont wish the less but you know my circumstances enough, to guess that I cannot follow my inclinations. I have not heard hitherto ...
— Baron d'Holbach - A Study of Eighteenth Century Radicalism in France • Max Pearson Cushing
... hostiles had obeyed the agent's order, and came in close to the troops, totally unlike hostiles in general; for Cheschapah had told them he would protect them with his medicine, and they shouted and sang all through this last night. The women joined with harsh cries and shriekings, and a scalp-dance went on, besides lesser commotions and gatherings, with the throbbing of drums everywhere. Through the sleepless din ran the barking of a hundred dogs, that herded and hurried in crowds of twenty ...
— Red Men and White • Owen Wister
... rural parishes, and there was perhaps too little disposition on the part of the commissioners to allow any temporary relaxation of the system. The rigorous enforcement of the workhouse test, and the harsh management of workhouses, continued for years to shock the charitable sensibilities of the public, and actually produced some local riots. When the price of bread rose the clamour naturally increased, and petitions multiplied until a committee was appointed ...
— The Political History of England - Vol XI - From Addington's Administration to the close of William - IV.'s Reign (1801-1837) • George Brodrick
... was a mood that I enjoyed less than that which had induced it. I did not wish him to humble himself; I was willing that he should be severe, even harsh, if he felt so inclined; his age, his position, his genius entitled him to special privileges; yet I am glad, as I remember it now, that the other side revealed itself, for it completes the sum of ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... she said, speaking in clear and even tones, "you must not be concerned at my father's harsh expressions. I felt no disgust for you; on the contrary, I asked an opportunity to make your better acquaintance. As for what has passed to-night, believe me it has filled my mind with ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 4 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... we are from all this with our mammon-worship and our fantastic social unrealities, every student of our times must know, or at least must have often heard. He would not have heard it so often, however, had not Thomas Carlyle cried it out with that harsh voice of his, in this and many others of his books. It was his gunpowder, more than any other explosive of the nineteenth century, that broke up the immense complacency into which half England ...
— Among Famous Books • John Kelman
... early youth, redeemed by him nobly, according to his light, he was condemned to undergo the world's harsh judgment: not for the ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... she fled, with harsh laughter, to the cave's depth, Hermod knew that it was Loki who had this second time ...
— Journeys Through Bookland V2 • Charles H. Sylvester
... that way about it. He's called down thim nature writers just th' same way he'd call me down if I wint befure th' fifth grade at th' Brothers' school an' told thim what I thought wud inthrest thim about Dock Haggerty. What does he say? I'll tell ye. 'I do not wish to be harsh,' says he, 'but if I wanted to charackterize these here nature writers, I wud use a much shorter an' uglier wurrud thin liar, if I cud think iv wan, which I cannot. Ye take, f'r example, What's-his-name. Has this man iver been outside iv an aviary? I doubt it. Here ...
— Mr. Dooley Says • Finley Dunne
... Spray and on the Oise in the Arethusa at one and the same time. And so the Spray reeled off the miles, showing a good ran every day till April 11, which came almost before I knew it. Very early that morning I was awakened by that rare bird, the booby, with its harsh quack, which I recognized at once as a call to go on deck; it was as much as to say, "Skipper, there's land in sight." I tumbled out quickly, and sure enough, away ahead in the dim twilight, about twenty ...
— Sailing Alone Around The World • Joshua Slocum
... you who move about at will, And live in sweet communion with your kind, After an hour lost in these lonely rocks Hunger and thirst after some human voice To drink, and human face to feed upon; What must one do where all is mute, or harsh, And ev'n the naked face of cruelty Were better than the mask it works beneath?— Across the mountain then! Across the mountain! What if the next world which they tell one of Be only next across the mountain then, Though I must never see it ...
— Life Is A Dream • Pedro Calderon de la Barca
... imperative that we should have her, I have been compelled to use guile. However, I will keep my word with you in the matter of something to quench your parched throats; and if you choose to be sensible, and make no foolish attempts at escape, you shall have no reason to complain of harsh treatment." ...
— A Middy of the Slave Squadron - A West African Story • Harry Collingwood
... that hue which study and late vigils give to men; so that she wanted the freshness and bloom of youth, and looked older than she was,—an effect confirmed by an absence of roundness in the cheek not noticeable in the profile, but rendering the front face somewhat harsh as well as sharp. In a word, the face and the figure were not in harmony: the figure prevented you from pronouncing her to be masculine; the face took from the figure the charm of feminacy. It was the head of the young Augustus upon the form of Agrippina. One touch ...
— Lucretia, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... the hair on the cow's back and spoke in a harsh voice. "Will you marry me?" he said, frowning and looking her in the eyes. "I've hardly any money, but I love you. I want you. I didn't know what to do. If I'd waited till I had as much as you, I might have lost you. I didn't know what to do, but I ...
— Moor Fires • E. H. (Emily Hilda) Young
... bear to see even an instant's pause, and he came out of the shadow, and bade them, with harsh words, go on grinding, and cease not except for so long as the cuckoo was silent, or while he himself sang a song. Now it was early summer-time, and the cuckoo was calling all the day and most of ...
— Stories to Tell Children - Fifty-Four Stories With Some Suggestions For Telling • Sara Cone Bryant
... understand the English. Browning has anticipated, but not altogether answered, this objection. For, besides those passages which in their fidelity to every "minute particular," simply reproduce the obscurity of the original, there is much that seems either obscure or harsh, and is so simply because it gives "the turn of each phrase," not merely "in as Greek a fashion as English will bear," but beyond it: phrases which are native to Greek, foreign to English. The choruses, which are attempted in metre as close as English can ...
— An Introduction to the Study of Browning • Arthur Symons
... certainly a rich woman. It is true that she was not a handsome woman, nor a fashionable woman, nor perhaps altogether an agreeable woman. She was tall, thin, ungainly, and yellow. Her voice, which she used freely, was harsh. She was a politician and a patriot. She regarded England as the greatest of countries, and Jamaica as the greatest of colonies. But much as she loved England she was very loud in denouncing what she called the perfidy of the mother to the brightest of her children. And much as she loved Jamaica ...
— Miss Sarah Jack, of Spanish Town, Jamaica • Anthony Trollope
... against wood, and shattered prows, and rocking masts, uprose over the clear water the hideous din of battle. High above all the cry of "Rou," and the shouting "Dieu aide," "God and St. Michael," "Duke William and St. George." Then the wild diabolic cries from the Moors in their harsh ugly tongue, "Le Grand Sarrasin," or "Le Grand Geoffroy," echoing among their ...
— The Fall Of The Grand Sarrasin • William J. Ferrar
... respects him. A Chinese gentleman in no way friendly to missions, speaking of the good relations that existed between Europeans and Chinese in Nanking, declared it was all because the missionaries came first. And Dr. Soothill tells the story of an Englishman who applauded the harsh criticism of mission work by a Chinese river captain, and met the retort, "That's all well enough, but if it were not for the missionaries we should not know there were any good men in ...
— A Wayfarer in China - Impressions of a trip across West China and Mongolia • Elizabeth Kendall
... listening open-mouthed to the affable and friendly conversation between the Rupun and myself, a practice not common in Tibet between captor and prisoner, followed their chief's example, and from being harsh and rough, turned quite kindly and respectful. They placed a cushion under me and tried to make me as comfortable as they could ...
— In the Forbidden Land • Arnold Henry Savage Landor
... raised his hand to command silence, and continued in a loud, harsh voice: "When she is older, she will become too big for us; mortals have the strange habit of growing. No, I have thought the matter over. Young birds are after all safest in the nest. But this baby would never be able to find the way home, not even down her own street. So I have ...
— Fairy Tales from the German Forests • Margaret Arndt
... become an ally in the effort to lure young Haldane from his evil associations, and awaken within him pure and refined tastes, was decidedly attractive. She was peculiarly romantic in her disposition, and no rude contact with the commonplace, common-sense world had chastened her innocent fancies by harsh and disagreeable experience. Her Christian training and girlish simplicity lifted her above the ordinary romanticism of imagining herself the heroine in every instance, and the object and end of all masculine aspirations. On this occasion she ...
— A Knight Of The Nineteenth Century • E. P. Roe
... and harsh punishment is meted out to any one whose actions are thought to tend to impair German military authority or dignity. Thus placards posted on many street corners day before yesterday informed the people that a Belgian city policeman had been sentenced to five years' ...
— The New York Times Current History of the European War, Vol 1, Issue 4, January 23, 1915 • Various
... the sacrifice complete, and incur any harsh judgment it may bear. I see that I shall be driven for sympathy to the last place in the world I anticipated: to my husband's heart. Yes, there is something besides love in marriage: if I cannot love him, he can ...
— The Entailed Hat - Or, Patty Cannon's Times • George Alfred Townsend
... name, remember that I only offer you "Hendecasyllables." I appeal to your candour to speak to me frankly about my tiny volume as you would to a third person, and this is no hard request. For if this trifling work of mind were my chef d'oeuvre, or my one solitary composition, it might perhaps seem harsh to say, "Seek out some other employment for your talent," but it is perfectly gentle and kindly criticism to say, "You have another sphere in which you show ...
— The Letters of the Younger Pliny - Title: The Letters of Pliny the Younger - - Series 1, Volume 1 • Pliny the Younger
... number of earnest people should be thinking about them shows that they are in the air; but the interest felt in them is the sign and not the cause of their increase. I believe that one must go forwards, trying to avoid anything that is consciously harsh or pompous or selfish or base, and the great ideas will take care ...
— At Large • Arthur Christopher Benson
... rose will outblossom the rest, one rose in a bower. I speak after my fancies, for I am a Troubadour, you know, and won the violet at Toulouse; but my voice is harsh here, not in tune, a nightingale out of season; for marriage, rose or no rose, has ...
— Becket and other plays • Alfred Lord Tennyson
... this might be the case. Society? It is a great mystery. I can hardly think of it without taking off my boots and prostrating myself orientally. To criticize it is a mistake; it is even, if I may for once use a harsh word, subversive. It is the only one we've got. Oh, hush! Only in whispers at the dead of night to the most trusted friend under the seal of secrecy can we think of criticizing it. But holding, as I do, perhaps the most important ...
— Marge Askinforit • Barry Pain
... was ordered to summon Jacinta. A young woman of the same persuasion, and of harsh and forbidding exterior, entered, and to her care Calderon briefly consigned the ...
— Calderon The Courtier - A Tale • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... fine spectacle, apart from all its indissoluble associations of awe and beauty. The mitigating hour softens the austerity of a mountain landscape magnificent in outline, however harsh and severe in detail; and, while it retains all its sublimity, removes much of the savage sternness of the strange and unrivaled scene. A fortified city, almost surrounded by ravines, and rising in the center of chains of far-spreading hills, occasionally offering, ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. VI (of X)—Great Britain and Ireland IV • Various
... the geese kept up a loud cackling, to which the yellow-billed ducks quacked a powerful bass. This, with the clacking of the liberated fowls, and the chattering of the boys, formed a perfect Babel; mingled with these, were the harsh cries of the penguins and flamingoes, which hovered over our heads, or sat on the points of the rocks. They were in immense numbers, and their notes almost deafened us, especially as they did not accord with the harmony of our civilized fowls. However I rejoiced ...
— The Swiss Family Robinson; or Adventures in a Desert Island • Johann David Wyss
... sharp contrast of climate on the two sides of the mountain system. Except in the Roman period, the southern face of the Alps has been an enclosing wall to the Italians. The southern cultivator penetrated its high but sunny valleys only when forced by poverty, while the harsh climate on the long northern slope effectively repelled him. On the other hand, Switzerland has overstepped the Alpine crest in the province of Ticino and thrust its political boundary in a long wedge down to the lowland of the Po near Como; and the Alpine race, spilling ...
— Influences of Geographic Environment - On the Basis of Ratzel's System of Anthropo-Geography • Ellen Churchill Semple
... deprived the Exhibition of one of its rarest specimens of art, specimens which we are certain would severely test, if not outvie,—all other competitors in that department. We are glad to know, however, that the artiste's credit will not suffer from this harsh exclusion. The labour, skill, and expense she has bestowed are already duly appreciated by a discerning public, thousands of the elite of the aristocracy and gentry having already visited Mrs. Peachey at her residence in ...
— The Royal Guide to Wax Flower Modelling • Emma Peachey
... published, testify to this approximation[300]. Still they are all cold, forced and artificial; very different from the letters Cicero addressed to his real intimates, such for instance as Sulpicius, Caelius, Paetus, Plancus, and Trebatius. They all show a fear of giving offence to the harsh temper of Varro, and a humility in presence of his vast learning which is by no means natural to Cicero. The negotiations between Atticus and Cicero with respect to the dedication of the second edition, as detailed already, show sufficiently that this ...
— Academica • Marcus Tullius Cicero
... never once looking back. Thus the two men crossed the Trastavere, and each in turn, emerging from a gate in the wall of the Leonine City, passed out into the marshy country beyond. They had not gone very far, when Esperance saw Giovanni suddenly give a start; at the same time he heard a loud, harsh voice cry out: ...
— Monte-Cristo's Daughter • Edmund Flagg
... had cleared up the polar basin; the shattered ice was floating away in every direction; the largest pieces, forming icebergs, had just weighed anchor and were sailing on the open sea. The wind had made a harsh attack upon the field. Fragments of ice covered the surrounding rocks. The little which was left of the ice-field seemed very soft; on the rocks were large pieces of sea-weed. The ocean stretched beyond the line of vision, with no island or new land ...
— The Voyages and Adventures of Captain Hatteras • Jules Verne
... uncle, (the last worse than the first,) came and conversed together with Asaad in his chamber a considerable time. Hearing them very earnest, I took the liberty also to go in. They continued their rebukes and arguments, (especially the uncle,) in so harsh and unfeeling a manner, that it made me tremble to hear them. They contradicted Asaad, scoffed at and threatened him, calling him possessed, mad, under the power of Satan, and so on. Asaad consented to go home and leave the English, which was the great ...
— Fox's Book of Martyrs - Or A History of the Lives, Sufferings, and Triumphant - Deaths of the Primitive Protestant Martyrs • John Fox
... bone. A great bull head; undershot jaw, square and lengthy and terrible; vicious, yellow-gleaming eyes; cropped ears; and an expression incomparably savage. His coat was a tawny, lion-like yellow, short, harsh, dense; and his back, running up from shoulder to loins, ended abruptly in the knob-like tail. He looked like the devil of a dogs' hell. And his reputation was as bad as his looks. He never attacked unprovoked; but a challenge was never ignored, and ...
— Bob, Son of Battle • Alfred Ollivant
... hideous things were done: And you have nourished hatred, harsh and blind. But in that Golgotha perhaps you'll find The mothers of the men ...
— The War Poems of Siegfried Sassoon • Siegfried Sassoon
... little heart-broken cry and clapped her hands to her eyes to blot out some horrid picture. It was harsh, but the way she was inclining ...
— A Virginia Scout • Hugh Pendexter
... Averil, and starting forward, she cried, 'Dr. May, Dr. May, you will save him! He is fatherless and motherless, and his brother has always been harsh to him; but you will not forsake him; you said you would be a father ...
— The Trial - or, More Links of the Daisy Chain • Charlotte M. Yonge
... back, and darted behind a barn. Through a garden we ran, not stopping to load, through another barnyard, scattering the chickens into frantic flight, then out along a stony way, our ears ringing with the harsh din of ...
— The Reckoning • Robert W. Chambers
... war. France therefore stood on the defensive; England was always the attacking party. On two sides, in Flanders and in Brittany, France had outposts which, if well defended, might long keep the English power away from her vitals. Unluckily for his side, Philip was harsh and raw, and threw these advantages away. In Flanders the repressive commercial policy of the Count, dictated from Paris, gave Edward the opportunity, in the end of 1337, of sending the Earl of Derby, with a strong fleet, to raise the blockade of Cadsand, and to open the Flemish ...
— Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois, Complete • Marguerite de Valois, Queen of Navarre
... with second thoughts, with a subdued philosophy, a love of security. He is married, with a child or two; his garden is warm in the afternoon sun. He turns wistfully to the young, who are so sure, to cheer him. With him it is bloodshed, the moaning of shell-fire, and harsh command. ...
— Golden Lads • Arthur Gleason and Helen Hayes Gleason
... thing!" he muttered, his tone frankly sincere though his voice was still hardly more than a harsh whisper. "If I just had time to play with you ... I said you'd know what I want. And don't get funny with the little toy pistol you'd be sure to have in your dress. It won't do you any good; you ...
— Six Feet Four • Jackson Gregory
... at once brightened, and he rubbed his hands, remarking, "Ah! then so much the better, Senor Douglas, for in that case they will not miss you." Then his whole appearance changed, and his voice dropped to a harsh, hissing note as he resumed, "It is a great pity, though, that you are an Englishman, and so well known in the Chilian navy, for that fact prevents me from dealing as I had intended with the miscreant who destroyed ...
— Under the Chilian Flag - A Tale of War between Chili and Peru • Harry Collingwood
... and aiming loyally to make it in reality all that it was in its devotional language and its classical literature. But after what passed about No. 90 a change came. The party came under an official ban and stigma. The common consequences of harsh treatment on the tendencies and thought of a party, which considers itself unjustly proscribed, showed themselves more and more. Its mind was divided; its temper was exasperated; while the attitude of the governing authorities ...
— The Oxford Movement - Twelve Years, 1833-1845 • R.W. Church
... the principal of the school, was troubled and apprehensive. She had encouraged a friendly rivalry between the two sets of boys in matters of intellectual achievement, but she greatly deprecated such a state of hostility as would give rise to harsh feelings or physical violence. She knew that it would be difficult, if not impossible, to coerce them into peace and harmony, so she set about to contrive some method by which the mutual interest of the boys could be aroused and blended ...
— The Flag • Homer Greene
... present viewpoint the treatment may have been at times rather harsh but we must be careful to judge it from the general standard of those times. It has been pointed out that it would bear "favorable comparison with the treatment of the white sailors in the British and American navies of the same period."[386] ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 3, 1918 • Various
... should at once effect the liberation of Saint Aldegonde, with certain other prisoners, or himself return into confinement. He had done neither the one nor the other. The patriots still languished in prison, some of them being subjected to exceedingly harsh treatment, but Mondragon, although repeatedly summoned as an officer and a gentleman, by the Prince, to return to captivity, had been forbidden by the Grand ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... swell from the bows of the Inverness rolled away to the low shore and set the bulrushes nodding a stately welcome. The echoes of the little engine clattered away into the deep woods, startlingly clear. An ugly brown bittern, with a harsh exclamation of surprise at the intrusion into his quiet domain, shot across the bow and disappeared into the swamp. A great heron sailed majestically down the channel ahead of the boat, his broad ...
— The End of the Rainbow • Marian Keith
... the child on her knee, she laid her cheek against his bright hair, but she told me with harsh, self-accusing rigor, "Tain't right for me to be here alive enjoying ...
— Hillsboro People • Dorothy Canfield
... asked much, 'How shall we feed, and may we have servants?' and wished to live pleasantly; yet, when at Richmond, SLIDELL had reviled the Yankee prisoners sorely, and counseled harsh treatment. ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol I, Issue I, January 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... yet the government, which has the power to confiscate, will have the power to restore; and I have no fears that your own interests will eventually be made to suffer by a measure which may now appear as harsh to you as it appeared necessary to the upright and patriotic men who felt themselves constrained to adopt it. In this you may trust, I think, as regards the future. As for the present, I am only empowered to offer you an asylum in some friendly family of the neighborhood, with ample means of support, ...
— The Rangers - [Subtitle: The Tory's Daughter] • D. P. Thompson
... be amiss to add an explanation of the Serb names which appear throughout the book in the original spelling. The names have often an unpronounceable appearance, and look harsh and forbidding. This is far from the case, for the Serb language is full-toned ...
— The Land of the Black Mountain - The Adventures of Two Englishmen in Montenegro • Reginald Wyon
... trusted he even expressed a preference for the scaffold, as the milder fate of the two. The lady, however, not being aware of those uncomplimentary sentiments, made her proposal to the magistrates, but was dismissed with harsh rebukes. She had need be ashamed, they said; of her willingness to take a condemned traitor for her husband. It was urged, in her behalf, that even in the cruel Alva's time, the ancient custom had been respected, and that victims had been saved from the ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... before his death in 1574, and the Grand Duke Francesco, were alike irritated by Bracciano's cool, calculating conduct; and both upheld Isabella against her husband's ill-humour and harsh judgments. Duke Paolo, however, kept his own counsel, and by means of spies discovered that Troilo d'Orsini's monthly reports were at least open to doubt as to their truthfulness with respect to his wife's conduct in private. Matters, however, drifted—he was too intent ...
— The Tragedies of the Medici • Edgcumbe Staley
... grew more harsh and angry. "Let the coin go," she said. "You've lost it, and you can suffer for it. You'll not go out of ...
— The Rival Campers Ashore - The Mystery of the Mill • Ruel Perley Smith
... delighted to hear from you, and was much interested to see the article on Stephen Crane you sent me. It seems to me the harsh judgment of an unappreciative, commonplace person on a man of genius. Stephen had many qualities which lent themselves to misapprehension, but at the core he was the finest of men, generous to a fault, with something of the old-time ...
— Men, Women, and Boats • Stephen Crane
... rightly, Sir," said Mr Milton. "This nation is not given over to slavery and vice. We tasted indeed the fruits of liberty before they had well ripened. Their flavour was harsh and bitter; and we turned from them with loathing to the sweeter poisons of servitude. This is but for a time. England is sleeping on the lap of Dalilah, traitorously chained, but not yet shorn of strength. Let the cry be once heard—the Philistines be upon thee; and at once that sleep will be ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 1 (of 4) - Contibutions to Knight's Quarterly Magazine] • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... Scottish teeth must be set on edge as well as their own. An uniformity in benefits may be well—an uniformity in penal measures, towards the innocent and the guilty, in prohibitory regulations, whether necessary or not, seems harsh law, and ...
— Political Pamphlets • George Saintsbury
... and the sentinel deserted his post to lead us into camp, a proceeding which called forth harsh criticisms from Sergeant Corney, despite the fact that he was being ...
— The Minute Boys of the Mohawk Valley • James Otis
... on the rim of the abandoned mining shaft, were not one but two of the strange birds. As if cognizant of his backward glance, they napped their gleaming, metallic wings, although they did not rise, and gave voice to what could only be their natural harsh cries, measured ...
— The Seed of the Toc-Toc Birds • Francis Flagg
... are speaking of. If this is the case with them (and I cannot think otherwise) will they reject the evidence of their own sensations? Is there nothing which their ears will inform them is defective?—nothing which is harsh and unpolished?—nothing imperfect?—nothing lame and mutilated?—nothing redundant? In dramatic performances, a whole theatre will exclaim against a verse which has only a syllable either too short or too long: and yet the bulk of an audience ...
— Cicero's Brutus or History of Famous Orators; also His Orator, or Accomplished Speaker. • Marcus Tullius Cicero
... purity, the all-pervasiveness of the dependent love which should knit us to Jesus Christ. The same thought of whole-hearted, single, absolute devotion is conveyed by other Scripture metaphors, the slave and the soldier of Christ. But all that is repellent or harsh in these is softened and glorified when we contemplate it in the light of the ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... that she looks so puzzled? Perhaps I can smooth the wrinkles from her brow!' she said in a harsh, cracked voice. ...
— Peggy-Alone • Mary Agnes Byrne
... of the conversation was growing harsh and the atmosphere of the library portentous with ...
— The Insidious Dr. Fu-Manchu • Sax Rohmer
... stood upright, still and cold, as though she neither saw nor heard anything of what passed; she would not pity nor forgive the woman even if, as they seemed to think, she lay dying. But she spoke once, asking in a harsh voice: ...
— McClure's Magazine December, 1895 • Edited by Ida M. Tarbell
... truly!—"Que tout notre raisonnement se reduit a ceder au sentiment;" and it is not impossible that the sentiment of the natural, had time permitted it, would have regained its old ascendency over the harsh mathematical reason of the schools. But this thing was not to be. Prematurely induced by intemperance of knowledge, the old age of the world drew near. This the mass of mankind saw not, or, living lustily although unhappily, affected not to see. But, for ...
— Edgar Allan Poe's Complete Poetical Works • Edgar Allan Poe
... know," replied the other, as he led Madelaine away. She walked beside him in silence, her head hanging down, for she felt too much ashamed to raise her eyes; but she became still paler, and a torrent of burning tears ran down her cheeks when she heard harsh voices saying, "She is a thief: so young and already a thief." Even the policeman now felt pity for her grief, and to turn her attention from the remarks of the passers by, he said to her, "Your teacher has reported ...
— The Young Emigrants; Madelaine Tube; The Boy and the Book; and - Crystal Palace • Susan Anne Livingston Ridley Sedgwick
... Mapuhi saw the broken bodies of those that had failed in the landing. Undoubtedly Tefara and Nauri were among them. He went along the beach examining them, and came upon his wife, lying half in and half out of the water. He sat down and wept, making harsh animal noises after the manner of primitive grief. Then she stirred uneasily, and groaned. He looked more closely. Not only was she alive, but she was uninjured. She was merely sleeping. Hers also had been ...
— South Sea Tales • Jack London
... we may mention the following names. Tertullian (160-285), in his apology for the Christians, gives much information on the manners and conduct of the early Christians; his style is concise and figurative, but harsh, unpolished, and obscure. St. Cyprian (200-258), beheaded at Carthage for preaching the gospel contrary to the orders of the government, wrote an explanation of the Lord's Prayer, which affords a valuable illustration of the ...
— Handbook of Universal Literature - From The Best and Latest Authorities • Anne C. Lynch Botta
... He called me up on the telephone and said I had ruined his life with my meddling. He said I was an unworthy example of a man of God. He said I had betrayed him ... [He is too moved to go on,] He said harsh things—very harsh things. ...
— Class of '29 • Orrie Lashin and Milo Hastings
... upon them! wherefore should I curse them? Would curses kill, as doth the mandrake's groan, I would invent as bitter-searching terms, As curst, as harsh and horrible to hear, Deliver'd strongly through my fixed teeth, With full as many signs of deadly hate, As lean-fac'd Envy in her loathsome cave. My tongue should stumble in mine earnest words; Mine eyes should sparkle like the beaten flint; Mine hair be ...
— King Henry VI, Second Part • William Shakespeare [Rolfe edition]
... most striking was the silence. Though the noise of London traffic as heard from a balloon has diminished of late years owing to the better paving, yet in day hours the roar of the streets is heard up to a great height as a hard, harsh, grinding din. But at night, after the last 'bus has ceased to ply, and before the market carts begin lumbering in, the balloonist, as he sails over the town, might imagine that he was traversing a City of ...
— The Dominion of the Air • J. M. Bacon
... and swam swiftly out of their prison and into the clear water before them, glad to put a distance between themselves and the loathesome sea devils. The monsters made no attempt to follow them, but they burst into a chorus of harsh laughter which warned our friends that they had not yet ...
— The Sea Fairies • L. Frank Baum
... horns; when present, however, they have always this peculiarity, that they spring from a triangular base, are spiral in form, and lateral, at the side of the head, in situation. The fleece of the sheep is of two sorts, either short and harsh, or soft and woolly; the wool always preponderating in an exact ratio to the care, attention, and amount of domestication bestowed on the animal. The generic peculiarities of the sheep are the triangular and spiral form of the horns, ...
— The Book of Household Management • Mrs. Isabella Beeton
... of the dragoons, lay naked across his knees, and the little taper that stood beside him upon the old chest, which served the purpose of a table, threw a partial and imperfect light upon those stern and harsh features, in which ferocity was rendered more solemn and dignified by a wild cast of tragic enthusiasm. His brow was that of one in whom some strong o'ermastering principle has overwhelmed all other passions and feelings, like the swell of ...
— Old Mortality, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... now was inevitably the boy. Captain Pelham opened his lips to claim him; but, almost to his own surprise, he found himself making some common remark about the affairs of the neighborhood. It came in harsh and forced, as if it were a fragment of conversation floated in by the breeze from the street outside. Then the Captain waited a moment, looking ...
— By The Sea - 1887 • Heman White Chaplin
... hard laugh, which froze the most burning words, and said harsh things, which fell like a jet of icy water on the most ardent protestations, while the intonations of her voice were enough to make any man who really loved her, kill himself, and there were two especially who made ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume IV (of 8) • Guy de Maupassant
... said. "I had promised before God that I would, and I did. I went back to my father—he had wondered where I had gone—and told him I had wedded a young Englishman named Douglas Graham. I think my father thought that all was right, for, while he spoke harsh words to me, he seemed presently to settle down to the conviction that my husband would soon come to me, and that I should be a lady. But my stepmother said awful things. I will not tell you what! Even now her words cut me like ...
— The Day of Judgment • Joseph Hocking
... there are in it passages of description as clear and vivid as the landscapes of Church and Turner, and touches of profound and glowing imagination; and the whole poem, in spite of its obscurity, affects the mind like a strain of high and mournful music. The Sonnets are all more or less harsh and unintelligible,—a criticism which applies to many of the other poems. Miss Whitney evidently despises foot-notes as utterly as Tennyson, and leaves much unexplained in her titles and in the poems themselves, which might help us to understand ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 26, December, 1859 • Various
... been sacrificed to those notions of training which the Westhaven party regarded as so harsh. Her home sickness and pining for her mountains had indeed fully justified the 'rampant consciences,' as to the humanity as well as the expedience of sending her home before her indulgence of the Kleiner Freiherr had had time to counteract his parents' ideas, and her place ...
— That Stick • Charlotte M. Yonge
... number of people approaching through the jungle. A few others appeared sleepily at the doors of some of the huts, and crawled out, yawning and blinking, into the fire-light. Here they remained, talking in their harsh, unmusical tongue, and chuckling at some suggestion put forward by the tall man, until the arrival of a party of men, all armed with spears and krises and, in some instances, bows and arrows, or blowpipes, who had ...
— A Chinese Command - A Story of Adventure in Eastern Seas • Harry Collingwood
... said Maximilian, "it is true we desire to speak with you on matters of the greatest moment to yourself. But we shall say things so surprising to you, so harsh and cruel, so utterly in conflict with your present opinions, that I scarce ...
— Caesar's Column • Ignatius Donnelly
... Harsh is my voice when I bewail thy woes, But when in fancy's dream I see thy freedom, forth its cadence flows Sweet as the harps that hung by Babel's stream. My heart is sore distressed For Bethel ever blessed, For Peniel, and each ...
— Hebrew Literature
... every leaf and bud with that hot languor which forces bloom. The door and windows of the little shop were set wide open. The honey and spice-breaths of flowers mingled with the rank effluvia of leather like a delicate melody with a harsh bass. Jerome pegged along in silence with knitted brow, yet with a restraint of smiles ...
— Jerome, A Poor Man - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... and softness of the skin, and the tone of the hair. If the subcutaneous fat has disappeared and the muscles are wasted, allowing the bony prominences to stand out; if the skin is tight and inelastic and the coat dry and harsh, we have evidence of a low state of nutrition. This may have resulted from a severe and long-continued disease or from lack of proper feed and care. When an animal is emaciated—that is, becomes thin—there is first a loss of fat and later ...
— Special Report on Diseases of the Horse • United States Department of Agriculture
... two tears in his handsome eyes, the first Ascott had been known to shed since he was a boy. That he felt a good deal, perhaps as much as was in his nature to feel, there could be no doubt. So his two aunts were glad and comforted; gave him his tea and the warmest seat at the hearth; said not a harsh word to him, but talked to him about indifferent things.—Tea being over, Hilary was anxious to get every thing painful ended before Selina came home—Selina, who, they felt by instinct, had now a separate interest from ...
— Mistress and Maid • Dinah Craik (aka: Miss Mulock)
... the superintendents, the supervisors, the special teachers, the principals—petty officers of a petty tyranny in which too often seethed gossip, scandal, intrigue. There were the "soft places"; the deceitful, the easy, the harsh principals; the teachers' institutes to which the poor teacher was forced to pay her scanty dollars. There were bulletins, rules, counter-rules. As she talked, Sommers caught the atmosphere of the great engine to which she had given herself. A mere isolated atom, she was set in some obscure ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick |
