"Sinking" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... and then it was again on an American effort which seemed to indicate the ineffectiveness of blockading squadrons and a plan to remedy this by unusual, even "uncivilized," if not illegal, methods. This was the "Stone Boat Fleet" plan of blocking Charleston harbour by sinking vessels across the entrance bar[532]. The plan was reported by Lyons and the news received in England at the most uncertain moment as to the outcome of the Trent controversy[533]. British press and Government at first placed no stress on it, presumably because ...
— Great Britain and the American Civil War • Ephraim Douglass Adams
... heaving with thirst, its eyes closed, and its lips parched and burning. Hans eyed it deliberately, drank, and passed on. And a dark gray cloud came over the sun, and long snake-like shadows crept up along the mountain-sides. Hans struggled on. The sun was sinking, but its descent seemed to bring no coolness; the leaden weight of the dead air pressed upon his brow and heart, but the goal was near. He saw the cataract of the Golden River springing from the hillside, scarcely five hundred feet above him. He ...
— Stories of Childhood • Various
... It has been shown that the long skeletal processes which grow out from these organisms have significance not merely as a supporting skeleton, but also as an extension of the superficial area, which increases the contact with the water-particles, and prevents the floating organisms from sinking. It has been established that the processes are considerably shorter in the colder layers of the ocean, and that they may be twelve times as long[36] in the warmer layers, thus corresponding to the greater or smaller amount of friction which takes place in ...
— Evolution in Modern Thought • Ernst Haeckel
... whether any one of those to whom he addressed himself heard him; if they did they certainly took no notice. In a moment the ship's crew were swept away from the davits and tackle falls, and in another the maddened mob, with a wild yell of "We're sinking, we're sinking!" were struggling together, striking and trampling down everybody who happened to be in the way, and fighting desperately with each other for a place in the boats, that had been swung out and were ready for lowering. The skipper ...
— Dick Leslie's Luck - A Story of Shipwreck and Adventure • Harry Collingwood
... impels friends and servants to fly from sinking fortunes is a well-established fact in human natural history; but Fouquet's hold upon his followers was extraordinary: it resisted the shock of ruin. They risked court-favor, purse, and person, to help him. Gourville, before he thought of his own safety, carried a hundred thousand livres ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 13, No. 78, April, 1864 • Various
... on the cover or fluttering round the room, for more than three hours they continued their frenzied saraband. But the sun was sinking, and the temperature was slowly falling. The ardour of the butterflies also cooled. Many went out not to return. Others took up their positions to wait for the gaieties of the following day; they clung to the cross-bars of the closed ...
— Social Life in the Insect World • J. H. Fabre
... open opposition was withdrawn, and Caroline had only herself to struggle with. There was no reason why she should not once more seek comfort from Marian, yet all that day she kept at a distance, and it was not till the next evening that she came into Marian's room, and sinking into a chair, murmured, ...
— The Two Guardians • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... not a sound disturbed its tranquillity; and the sun was just sinking to repose in all his dying glory. At this part of the coast, the sands are hard and firm to walk upon; and on arriving at their extremity, where the waves were gently breaking at my feet, "forming sweet music to the thoughtful ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 19, No. 543, Saturday, April 21, 1832. • Various
... scenery merged queerly and the place was by waters she had never seen. They were upon some board or ground or something that reached far out, and at the end of this was Carrie. They looked about, and now the thing was sinking, and Minnie heard the low sip of ...
— Sister Carrie • Theodore Dreiser
... fixed, dull, wandering, expressing Fearfulness and Despair; the Voice slow, interrupted, complaining; the Tongue almost always white, towards the end dry, reddish, black, rough; the Face pale, Lead-coloured, languishing, cadaverous; a frequent Sickness at the Stomach; mortal Inquietudes; a general sinking and Faintness; Distraction of the Mind; dosing, an ...
— A Succinct Account of the Plague at Marseilles - Its Symptoms and the Methods and Medicines Used for Curing It • Francois Chicoyneau
... portion of the surface that is fixed in its present position. The land is either rising or sinking continually. If the area that is pushed upward is large, it becomes a plateau; but if long and narrow like a wrinkle, it forms a mountain range. We should not be aware of these movements in many cases if it were not for the horizontal shelf cut upon the borders of the ...
— The Western United States - A Geographical Reader • Harold Wellman Fairbanks
... Spaniards dared not give him warning that he was to be attacked;' but mounted their batteries in the dark, and from land and sea 'every gun which could be brought to bear' opened upon the unprepared English. After sinking two Spanish ships and setting a third on fire, Hawkins saw that flight was their only chance, and, gathering his men together in two small tenders, he 'crawled out under the fire of the mole and gained ...
— Devon, Its Moorlands, Streams and Coasts • Rosalind Northcote
... and thus he stood as the questions and answers passed to and fro. They were solemn questions and solemn replies, drawn out of the deeps of life and sinking back ...
— Bride of the Mistletoe • James Lane Allen
... hunting, and boatbuilding, and science, you seem a very handy, skilful fellow, Haunte.... But the sun's sinking, ...
— A Voyage to Arcturus • David Lindsay
... the cottagers, we were told that our old man was a bit of a humbug; that he was a great talker, with a hundred schemes for the improvement of his fortunes, and, incidently, for the benefit of his neighbours and the world at large; but nothing came of it all and he was now fast sinking into the lowest depths of poverty. Yet who would blame him? 'Tis the nature of the gorse to be "unprofitably gay." All that, however, is a question for the moralist; the point now is that in walking, even in that ...
— Afoot in England • W.H. Hudson
... had been shaken, with great loss of property though not of life, in the Guadaloupe earthquake of 1843, when 5000 lives were lost in the town of Point- a-Pitre alone. The only well-marked effect which Dr. Davy could hear of, apart from damage to artificial structures, was the partial sinking of a causeway leading to Rat Island, in the harbour of St. John. No wonder: if St. John's harbour be—as from its shape on the map it probably is—simply an extinct crater, or group of craters, like English Harbour. A more picturesque or more uncanny little hole than that latter ...
— At Last • Charles Kingsley
... Capable as it is of producing almost every thing, and actually producing nothing which might not become a staple with a proper application of capital and skill, its inhabitants are miserably poor, and daily sinking deeper and deeper into the ...
— The trade, domestic and foreign • Henry Charles Carey
... small duties of the household, had been one of the wailing-women, who, with hair all dishevelled, accompanied the corpse on its way to the grave, weeping, and lamenting, and casting Nile-mud on their forehead and breast. Uarda still lay, when the sun was sinking, ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... standing near looked upon the flower and said: "God bless you, my brother, heaven is nearer to me." So, if by the perusal of "Victor Roy" one ear hears more distinctly the Apostolic declaration, "Pure religion is to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction," or if one poor sinking spirit is strengthened, as Longfellow says, to "touch God's right hand in the darkness," the wishes of the Authoress ...
— Victor Roy, A Masonic Poem • Harriet Annie Wilkins
... remembering, too, even in that awful moment, that if they escaped they would owe their lives to one whom they regarded with scorn and hostility. Ella's hope buoyed her spirit, although she felt herself sinking deeper every moment in the cold waters. With love's confidence she believed that Houghton would be equal to the emergency, and his swiftly coming sail was like the white wings of an angel. Then for an instant she was perplexed and troubled, for he seemed to be ...
— The Earth Trembled • E.P. Roe
... unhealthy place; but they were as essentially safe as at Stoneborough; their living alone for a few weeks, or at most months, would be far less remarkable here than there; and he would be likely to be able to improve or to alter their present situation, whereas they were now sinking deeper and more hopelessly into poverty every day. Then, too, he read aloud piteous accounts of the want of medical attendance, showing that it was absolutely a cruelty to detain such assistance from the sick and wounded. This ...
— The Trial - or, More Links of the Daisy Chain • Charlotte M. Yonge
... attainable because we have seen it in another sphere of sacrifice where it has already been secured. The war has brought all classes together. In the trenches, at sea, and in all theatres of danger, men of all classes are now labouring shoulder to shoulder. There you have had a sinking of individual interests. There you have had a common sacrifice, a common endeavour for a common cause. Surely, as all classes have been able to unite in their sacrifice and in their resistance of the aggression of a foreign foe, it is, I hope, not asking too much that when ...
— The War and Unity - Being Lectures Delivered At The Local Lectures Summer - Meeting Of The University Of Cambridge, 1918 • Various
... for me!' continued Marie, sinking her voice to a low whisper, but still making her words quite audible to her companion. Now Hetta was strongly of opinion that her brother did not in the least 'care for' Marie Melmotte, and that it would be very much for the best that Marie Melmotte should know the truth. ...
— The Way We Live Now • Anthony Trollope
... out of consideration their composition; they were found with weaving tools and they fit the position. So far the ingenuity of our ablest archaeologists at home and abroad has not succeeded in ascribing the use of these objects to anything else than net-sinking or warp tension. The adaptability of the articles for use as warp weights, the small groups in which they are found, the discovery of weaving implements in the closest proximity, our knowledge of the Greek representations ...
— Ancient Egyptian and Greek Looms • H. Ling Roth
... if to ask how much farther his master meant to go over this rough country road. It was getting late and the sun was sinking towards the flat prairie. Milly began to feel unaccountably worried and suggested turning back. Instead the man cut the horse with his whip so that he shot forward down the narrow road. The buggy rocked and ...
— One Woman's Life • Robert Herrick
... anxiously to see whether any of his sable passengers, young or old, had been washed away. In spite of the risk they had run, all were safe. The poor mother had grasped her child, and the men the other young ones. The sun was by this time sinking behind the land; the crew pulled away with right good will towards the corvette, which could be seen at a distance of three miles or so. She was standing away from the land to get a good offing during the night. "They've seen the state of the surf, and have thought we couldn't get ...
— The Three Commanders • W.H.G. Kingston
... Josephin should have been made to write it," the old notary cried wrathfully. "He is a good creature; he would have taken it all on his shoulders. But there is an end of it; the world is falling to pieces," the old man continued, sinking exhausted into a chair. "Du Croisier is a tiger; we must be careful not to rouse him. What time is it? Where is the draft? If it is at Paris, it might be bought back from the Kellers; they might accommodate us. Ah! but there ...
— The Jealousies of a Country Town • Honore de Balzac
... them, so as to exhibit a constant order, an all-pervading harmony, his views of God and Providence became less impressive in proportion as the domain of "law" was extended, and that he was in imminent danger of sinking, if not into theoretical, at least into practical Atheism. "It is a fact," says Dr. Channing, "that Science has not made Nature as expressive of God in the first instance or, to the beginner in religion, as it was in earlier times. Science reveals a ...
— Modern Atheism under its forms of Pantheism, Materialism, Secularism, Development, and Natural Laws • James Buchanan
... Gentlemen's Outfitter called. It had prevented his seeing until now, that the chief difference between himself and his fellow boarders, was that for most of them, this was a place where they had come to stay. Having let Miss Havens go on alone to the place she was bound for, he had moments of dreadful sinking, as it occurred to him to wonder if he hadn't made a mistake in the nature of his own destination. Suppose, after all, he should find himself castaway in some oasis of determined sprightliness with Wally Whitaker in whose pocket pretenses of tips and margins he began to discern ...
— The Lovely Lady • Mary Austin
... back, men! She is sinking by the head!" And with much ado some were dragged back, some leaped back—all ...
— Westward Ho! • Charles Kingsley
... the fearless, sounded the Irish war-cry in far Alpine passes, and how the Geraldine forayed Leinster. The deeds of O'Neil and O'Donnell. The march of Cromwell, the destroying angel. Ireland's sun sinking in dim eclipse. The dark night of woe in Erin for a hundred years. '83—'98—'48—'68. Ireland's sun rising in glory. Surely the Youth of Ireland will find in their country's records ...
— A Popular History of Ireland - From the earliest period to the emancipation of the Catholics • Thomas D'Arcy McGee
... commanded Joe sternly, his voice sinking again even below its accustomed level, gruff and deep in his chest. "I heard you—I didn't mean to, but I couldn't help it—and I know what you're up to tonight. Don't come around here tonight after her, for I'm not going ...
— The Bondboy • George W. (George Washington) Ogden
... replied, as I took up my hat and gold-headed cane and set out to interview and reprimand my curate. Clearly, something should be done, and done quickly. There was a good deal of talk abroad, and I was supposed to be sinking into a condition of senile incompetence. It is quite true that I could not challenge my curate's conduct in a single particular. He was in all things a perfect exemplar of a Christian priest, and everything ...
— My New Curate • P.A. Sheehan
... the second day after Evelina's going, seemed to have grown coldly unfamiliar. The whole aspect of the place had changed with the changed conditions of Ann Eliza's life. The first customer who opened the shop-door startled her like a ghost; and all night she lay tossing on her side of the bed, sinking now and then into an uncertain doze from which she would suddenly wake to reach out her hand for Evelina. In the new silence surrounding her the walls and furniture found voice, frightening her at dusk and midnight with strange sighs and stealthy whispers. ...
— Bunner Sisters • Edith Wharton
... contemplated bargains. Her first destination was the French islands off Madagascar, where she left part of her cargo, and took in a few valuables in return. Thence she proceeded to the Philippine Islands, passing in the track of English and American traders, capturing two of the former, and sinking them after taking out such portions of cargo as suited her own views. From Manilla, la Pauline shaped her course for the coast of South America, intending to leave certain articles brought from France, others purchased at Bourbon, the Isle of France, ...
— Afloat And Ashore • James Fenimore Cooper
... actually declared, you understand, and Japan was still officially awaiting our decision; yet the Japanese fleet, in its full strength, lay in wait for our transports and the convoying men-of-war, and attacked them, sinking the transport Kowshing, with over a thousand men on board, and one of our cruisers. The other transports and cruisers escaped and got safely to Asan, where the troops were landed, the ships sheltering ...
— A Chinese Command - A Story of Adventure in Eastern Seas • Harry Collingwood
... part of the ship was utterly wrecked. In this catastrophe 2 officers and 264 of her crew perished, those who were not killed outright by her explosion being penned between decks by the tangle of wreckage and drowned by the immediate sinking of the hull. ...
— Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents • William McKinley
... door, put the key in his pocket, and crossed the lane, sinking five or six inches into the mud at every step. He came out at last into a long deserted street. He knew the town like the five fingers of his hand, but Bogoyavlensky Street was a long way off. It was past ten when he stopped at last before the locked gates of ...
— The Possessed - or, The Devils • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... what has happened?" cried Lady Royland, starting from her chair, clapping her hands to her ears, and then sinking back palpitating in the nearest chair. "Run and see; ...
— The Young Castellan - A Tale of the English Civil War • George Manville Fenn
... the religious cults draw out their existence to a late period; but as the writing and the civilization yield before new forces that entirely alter the character of Oriental culture, so also the religion, after sinking ever lower into the bogs of superstition, disappears, much as the canals and little streams of the Euphrates valley, through the neglect which settled over the country, become lost in the ...
— The Religion of Babylonia and Assyria • Morris Jastrow
... present. For some little time the price was steady at fifty-seven shillings; that is, assuming the mint price in England to be seventy-seven shillings (neglecting the fraction of 10-1/2d.), and the Australian price sank by twenty shillings; which sinking, however, we are not to understand as any depreciation that had the character of permanence; it arose out of local circumstances. Subsequently the price fell as low even as forty-five shillings, where it halted, and soon ascended again to sixty shillings. Sixty ...
— The Posthumous Works of Thomas De Quincey, Vol. II (2 vols) • Thomas De Quincey
... sudden flame, as broad as the pyramid, and as high as the clouds; and it dazzled me; and I closed my eyes for an instant; and when I looked again, the pyramid stood on its rock, perfect; and purple with the light from the edge of the sinking sun. ...
— The Ethics of the Dust • John Ruskin
... roof; the upper part is of the Decorated, with a mixture of the early Perpendicular styles. It has an elegant appearance from its rich pinnacles, and is of a softened and gray tint. Beginning to show signs of sinking, it was raised in the fourteenth century, and was strengthened by the introduction beneath it of inverted buttressing-arches, which give to the interior a strange effect. These arches, architecturally considered, are undoubtedly blemishes, ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume I. - Great Britain and Ireland • Various
... principal use of a silver vessel is not its consumption, and so one may lawfully sell its use while retaining one's ownership of it. On the other hand the principal use of silver money is sinking it in exchange, so that it is not lawful to sell its use and at the same time expect the restitution of the amount lent. It must be observed, however, that the secondary use of silver vessels may be an exchange, and such use may not be lawfully sold. In like manner there may be ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas
... leaving the village of Prosnes to their right, in order to avail themselves of a short cut across a sandy heath diversified by an occasional thin pine wood, and the entire division, with its interminable train at its heels, turned and twisted in and out among the trees, sinking ankle deep in the yielding sand at every step. It seemed as if the cheerless waste would never end; all that they met was a flock of very lean sheep, guarded ...
— The Downfall • Emile Zola
... sees not why, into more total dissolution, leaving a few jagged teeth, like the edges of knives eaten away by vinegar, projecting through the half-dislodged mass from the inner rock, keen enough to cut the hand or foot that rests on them, yet crumbling as they wound, and soon sinking again into the smooth, slippery, glutinous heap, looking like a beach of black scales of dead fish, cast ashore from a poisonous sea, and sloping away into foul ravines, branched down immeasurable slopes of barrenness, ...
— Modern Painters, Volume IV (of V) • John Ruskin
... angling steel and wrenched the cage so not a part of it was square. In time he clearly would break out. They dragged the prisoner to another that an elephant could not break down, but it stood on the ground, and in an hour the great beast had a cavern into the earth and was sinking out of sight, till a stream of water sent after him filled the hole and forced him again to view. They moved him to a new cage made for him since he came—a hard rock floor, great bars of nearly two-inch steel that reached up nine feet and then projected in for five. The ...
— Monarch, The Big Bear of Tallac • Ernest Thompson Seton
... his head with an expression of perfect acquiescence in anything that had been said or might be; and Lord George gradually sinking down upon ...
— Barnaby Rudge • Charles Dickens
... over the gates—this one and that one—trying to look down the Foyle toward the point where the ships lay beyond the boom, and to fancy the feelings of the stout-hearted defenders of Derry, as they watched with hungry eyes, and waited with sinking hearts but unflinching courage on the relief that the infamous Colonel Kirk kept lying, a tantalizing spectacle, inactive, making no effort of succor. But the houses are thick outside the walls, and shut up the view and choke sentiment. Of course I was in the cathedral, and looked ...
— The Letters of "Norah" on her Tour Through Ireland • Margaret Dixon McDougall
... garden was fast held in the warm peace of a summer afternoon. I found a most happy little neglected orchard with old gnarled apple-trees and thick waving grass. Here I lay on my back, watching the gold through the leaves, soaked in the apathy and somnolence of the day, sinking idly into sleep, rising, sinking again, as though rocked in a hammock. I was in England once more—at intervals there came a sharp click that exactly resembled the sound that one hears in an English ...
— The Dark Forest • Hugh Walpole
... snow-topt mountains, thy wild harper's song, Thy fruitful vallies deep, where oft between Rise hamlets, rocks, and tow'rs to grace the scene. Where solitude and calm contentment dwell, And contemplation roves each rocky dell, Or climbs the snow-topt mountain's cloudy height To watch the sinking shades of evening light; To view the foaming torrent's misty shower, To list' the brooding tempest's rising roar, Mark the blue mists the silvery moonbeams shroud, Or golden ev'ning edge the dusky cloud; Yet, till this hour my doubting heart has thought Thy glowing scenes ...
— The "Ladies of Llangollen" • John Hicklin
... that had been washed into the bed of the stream, and was there stuck fast, root downwards. This formidable chevaux-de-frise (or snag, as it was termed by the captain) fortunately did not do much damage to the vessel, although at first an alarm was raised that she was sinking, and much confusion ensued. This apprehension was, however, soon dissipated by the report of the carpenter, whose account of the damage was so far favourable, that after extrication by backing the vessel, and a few temporary repairs, she was again ...
— An Englishman's Travels in America - His Observations Of Life And Manners In The Free And Slave States • John Benwell
... it sinking into the bones o' the young and I have seen it lying down with the aged in the dust o' their graves. It is a big book—the one we are now opening. God help us! It has more pages than all the days o' your life. Just think o' your body, O brave and tender youth! ...
— The Light in the Clearing • Irving Bacheller
... very quiet now; he was falling asleep, and sinking on her knees beside the bed, the wretched woman ...
— Bessie's Fortune - A Novel • Mary J. Holmes
... Who but himself could undergo that great trial, and hardship, and self-denial, and firm purpose, never wavering, never sinking for a moment, keeping his grasp on life like one who holds up by main force a sinking and drowning friend?—how could a woman do it! He must then give up the thought. There was a choice,—friendship, and the love of woman,—the long life of immortality. There was something heroic and ...
— Septimius Felton - or, The Elixir of Life • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... inflicted by an unintelligent agent. Judge, then, to what pitches of inflamed, distracted fury the .. minds of his more desperate hunters were impelled, when amid the chips of chewed boats, and the sinking limbs of torn comrades, they swam out of the white curds of the whale's direful wrath into the serene, exasperating sunlight, that smiled on, as if at a birth or a bridal. His three boats stove around him, and oars and men both ...
— Moby-Dick • Melville
... write more than perhaps a clumsy signature, were to be found everywhere in England; and great masses of the population were getting no instruction at all. Only a few schools flourished upon the patronage of exceptional parents; all over the country the old endowed grammar schools were to be found sinking and dwindling; many of them had closed altogether. In the new great centres of population multitudes of children were sweated in the factories, darkly ignorant and wretched and the under-equipped and under-staffed National and British schools, supported by ...
— The New Machiavelli • Herbert George Wells
... disturbance of the day until she was lying wide awake in her hot bed. Then the old longings came in once more; she saw the commonplace present growing each month more dreary; her husband drudging away, with his hopes sinking. Suddenly he spoke: ...
— Literary Love-Letters and Other Stories • Robert Herrick
... and begin searching among the woods. It might be at least a half-hour before they found the trail and his strength would be restored fully then. His sinking of the canoe had been in reality a triumph, and so he remained at ease, ...
— The Rock of Chickamauga • Joseph A. Altsheler
... his breathing hurried, with other evidences of great exhaustion. About midnight he was seized with a shivering from extreme debility, and Doctor Barton was obliged to announce the danger to the family. On October 11th, he was evidently sinking; his respiration was hurried, his pulse feeble and rapid. Though less observant, he still recognised whoever approached him, but refused to take anything unless prescribed by his physicians. It now became ...
— Recollections and Letters of General Robert E. Lee • Captain Robert E. Lee, His Son
... The sun was sinking. Away over the water the world seemed rose colored, but the shadows were deepening on the land. Phil espied Lillian and Eleanor coming toward the houseboat. Lillian waved a handful of white envelopes, but Eleanor ...
— Madge Morton's Victory • Amy D.V. Chalmers
... made an attempt on the journal of the late Reverend Mr. Thomas Hill, then fast sinking in years; but he had ill-treated my father, pursuing him before Mr. Justice Fielding for robbing him of a snuff-box, in the year 1740; and he continued his resentment towards my father's unoffending son. I was cruelly rebuffed by Mr. Hill, as indeed I have ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various
... and curious commotion, rearing up around us as it were in little mountains, and breaking in upon us in all directions,—washing away some of our boats, and tumbling the vessel about in a most eccentric and exceedingly uncomfortable manner, almost as if the bottom of the sea were sinking beneath us. One night was particularly dreadful and awfully grand; the forked lightning cutting the black clouds asunder, the winds howling terribly, and occasionally an outburst of flame,—or rather the reflection of it, from the far-distant Mount ...
— Fair Italy, the Riviera and Monte Carlo • W. Cope Devereux
... the medium of books, statues, or pictures, is to purify and exalt; but the curse of our age is, that the fashionable pantheistic raving about Nature, and the apotheosizing of physical loveliness,—is rapidly sinking into a worship of the vilest elements of humanity and materialism. Pagan aesthetics were purer and nobler than the system, which, under that name, finds favor with ...
— Vashti - or, Until Death Us Do Part • Augusta J. Evans Wilson
... of the UK in the upper hoist-side quadrant and the Bermudian coat of arms (white and green shield with a red lion holding a scrolled shield showing the sinking of the ship Sea Venture off Bermuda in 1609) centered on the outer half ...
— The 2008 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... Then, very quietly, sinking her voice instinctively, as though the unseen might be at our very elbows listening, Miss Barrison recounted the curious adventure which had befallen the dog and the first batch ...
— In Search of the Unknown • Robert W. Chambers
... while the shot[424] is tinking; Some heads be swimming,[425] but mine will be sinking, And upon drinking my eyes will be pinking: For winking ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Volume I. • R. Dodsley
... support so pure, so continual, and so universal a pleasure. Indeed, he is running away whilst he is there, and naturally makes haste to escape, as from a place where he cannot stand firm, and where he is afraid of sinking. ...
— The Essays of Montaigne, Complete • Michel de Montaigne
... undertake any pains with great cheerfulness on his account, and in that case there would be some comfort for them also, though they should be taken: that it became him neither to fly from his enemies, nor to desert his friends, nor to leap out of that city, as out of a ship that was sinking in a storm, into which he came when it was quiet and in a calm; for that by going away he would be the cause of drowning the city, because nobody would then venture to oppose the enemy when he was once gone, upon whom they wholly confided. 16. Hereupon ...
— The Wars of the Jews or History of the Destruction of Jerusalem • Flavius Josephus
... changeless calm. There was no monotony in the unbroken succession of the days, but the changes were wrought by light, not by darkness. The singing of the sea, never rising into those shrill upper notes which bode disaster, nor sinking into the deep lower tones through which the awful thunder of the elements breaks, came to us as out of the depths of an infinite repose. The youth of an untroubled world was in it. The joy of effortless activities ...
— Under the Trees and Elsewhere • Hamilton Wright Mabie
... But one man's luck is harder than another's. They've been too many for me, and I feel that I'm sinking under them. It's no good my thinking of ...
— Mr. Scarborough's Family • Anthony Trollope
... We saw Schiller gradually sinking into a German professor, the sphere of his sympathies narrowed, the aim of his ambition lowered. His energies were absorbed in collecting materials and elaborating his "History of the Thirty Years' War," which was ...
— Chips From A German Workshop. Vol. III. • F. Max Mueller
... rapidly covering the loveliest sky in Europe, save that of Italy. Thunder growled in the distance, and gusts of biting wind were driving huge drops of rain over the thirsty plain. Looking upwards, I beheld a large Alpine falcon, now rising, now sinking, as he floated bravely in the very midst of the storm and I could almost fancy that he strove to battle with it. At every fresh peal of thunder, the noble bird bounded higher aloft, as if in answering ...
— Literary and Philosophical Essays • Various
... acknowledged with a low bow. Leaping into the saddle of the richly-accoutred steed which had been presented to him, he rode up to where the Lady Rowena was seated, and, heedless of the many Norman beauties who graced the contest with their presence, gracefully sinking the point of his lance he deposited the coronet which it supported at the feet of the fair Saxon. The trumpets instantly sounded, while the heralds proclaimed the Lady Rowena the Queen of Beauty and of Love for ...
— The Junior Classics, V5 • Edited by William Patten
... were forced to withdraw a moment the combat, and rush into the narrow rivulet. While they lay panting in the water, the bear turned his head back against the rocks, and lapped in the dripping moisture without moving from his position. But he was fast sinking under his wounds: a stream of blood, which constantly issued from his body and ran down and discoloured the water, indicated that his career was nearly finished. Yet his spirit was not daunted; for while ...
— Wild Western Scenes • John Beauchamp Jones
... an excessively stubborn merchant he had not hesitated to draw a formidable knife and to gash himself in a superficial but very imposing manner; then he had rushed out uttering cries of terror, and sinking down by the door had remained there for the greater part of the day, warning those who would have entered to be upon their guard against being enticed in and murdered, at the same time groaning aloud and displaying his own wounds. Even this seeming disregard of time was well considered, ...
— Kai Lung's Golden Hours • Ernest Bramah
... HE, sinking mechanically into the chair she indicates: "Oh, just as you like!" He looks up at the ceiling in hopeless bewilderment, while ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... sinking back. "Make it easier for her—Russ, you're a damned schemer. You have given me the double-cross. You have ...
— The Rustlers of Pecos County • Zane Grey
... miles from the widow, Margery was rather surprised, and even felt a slight sinking of the heart, when her new acquaintance appeared at her door so soon as the evening of the following Monday. She asked Margery to walk out with her, which the young ...
— The Romantic Adventures of a Milkmaid • Thomas Hardy
... his voice fills her with fear, and looking up she reads death in his face, and sinking on her knees she holds out her helpless hands with a pitying ...
— Madame Midas • Fergus Hume
... gang from th' O-Bar-O," hummed Waffles, sinking the branding-iron in the flank of a calf. The scene was one of great activity and hilarity. Several fires were burning near the huge corral and in them half a dozen irons were getting hot. Three calves were being held down for the ...
— Hopalong Cassidy's Rustler Round-Up - Bar-20 • Clarence Edward Mulford
... The fire was sinking, and he built it up quietly, ashamed of this proof of his regard for physical comfort, and hoping it would pass unnoticed. His pain expressed itself less vehemently than Julia's; but for all that his mind ached. He remembered how he had taken everything ...
— Vain Fortune • George Moore
... he said, "is the use of advising unconditional surrender when Conroy and Malcolmson are engaged at this moment in making plans for sinking the Fleet with rifles?" ...
— The Red Hand of Ulster • George A. Birmingham
... surpassing splendor, for these two courts were at this time the most luxurious in Europe. Stirling says the fatigues of the life of Velasquez shortened his days. He arrived at Madrid on his return, on June 26th, and from that time was gradually sinking. He died August 6th. He was buried with magnificent ceremonies in the Church of San Juan. His wife survived him but eight days; she was buried in ...
— A History of Art for Beginners and Students: Painting, Sculpture, Architecture - Painting • Clara Erskine Clement
... directed to rendezvous. It was while thus assembling for the relief of Gibraltar that there occurred the celebrated incident of the Royal George, a 100-gun ship, while being heeled for under-water repairs, oversetting and sinking at her anchors, carrying down with her Rear-Admiral Kempenfelt and about nine hundred souls, including many women and children. This was on the 29th of August, 1782. On the 11th of September the expedition started, one hundred and eighty-three sail in all; thirty-four ...
— The Major Operations of the Navies in the War of American Independence • A. T. Mahan
... monkeys may have been among the early victims. To-day the apes of Gibraltar are the only ones existing in a wild state in Europe, and it is doubtful if they are of an original stock. There is good reason to believe that escape by migration southward was cut off by the sinking of the ancient land bridges, so that the animals north of the Mediterranean had no ...
— Man And His Ancestor - A Study In Evolution • Charles Morris
... interviewer, and the ghoul with the camera; how the home is stripped of its sanctity, blessed charity made a vehicle for display, the very grave-yard transformed into a parade ground; while the outsider looks on with a sinking of the vitals because the drumstick is beyond his reach and the bom-bom-bom is not for him! It shows——! [Checking himself and leaving the arm-chair with a short laugh.] Oh, well, that's the setting of my story, Sir Randle! I won't inflict the ...
— The Big Drum - A Comedy in Four Acts • Arthur Pinero
... "Sinking!" echoed Jim, bearing down again, with lowered revolver, on his enemy. "Well and good! You're going to be drowned, not shot, after all! And now you shall speak, you scamp! Your game's up, whatever happens. Get up and lead ...
— The Stolen Singer • Martha Idell Fletcher Bellinger
... and smoke they could see the Uhlans staggering, sinking, floundering about. A mounted figure passed like a flash through the mist, another plunged after, a third wheeled and flew back around the bend. But the rest were doomed. Already the franc-tireurs were among them, whining with ...
— Lorraine - A romance • Robert W. Chambers
... drifted aimlessly about Chicago, from pillar to post, working a little, earning here a dollar, there a dime, but always sinking, sinking, till at last the ooze of the lowest bottom dragged at his feet and the rush of the great ebb went over him and engulfed him and shut him out from the light, and a park bench became his home and the "bread line" his chief makeshift ...
— A Deal in Wheat - And Other Stories of the New and Old West • Frank Norris
... situation, and place a guard over both the wounded man and his strange, shivering companion, Rix. Some of the soldiers are sent for water, and others start a fire in the little stove in the adjoining room. The doctor makes his examination, and does what he can for his sinking patient, but when he comes out he tells Abbot that Hollins has not many hours to live, "and he wants to see you," he adds. ...
— A War-Time Wooing - A Story • Charles King
... forth to the cheerful light. How lively, see! the multitude sallies, Scattering through gardens and fields remote, While over the river, that broadly dallies, Dances so many a festive boat; And overladen, nigh to sinking, The last full wherry takes the stream. Yonder afar, from the hill-paths blinking, Their clothes are colors that softly gleam. I hear the noise of the village, even; Here is the People's proper Heaven; Here high and low contented see! Here I ...
— Faust • Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
... paints melancholy disintegration and crumbling downfall, a strain to be heard many times in the closing opera of the trilogy, when the prophecy comes to pass and the gods enter their twilight. The apparition is sinking back into the earth. Wotan beseeches it to tarry and tell him more. But with the words, "You are warned.... Meditate in sorrow and fear!" it vanishes. The masterful god attempts to follow, to wrest from the weird woman further knowledge. His wife and ...
— The Wagnerian Romances • Gertrude Hall
... certainly revelled in the sumptuousness of the mighty Eastern tyrant, in royal mantle and ermine tippet, seated on his throne, and stretching his jewelled sceptre to Esther, who is in the rich costume of a Venetian lady of the period, and sinking into the arms of her watchful maids, with a fair baby face, and little helpless hands, having dainty frills round the wrists, which scarcely answer to our notion of the attributes of the magnanimous, if meek, ...
— The Old Masters and Their Pictures - For the Use of Schools and Learners in Art • Sarah Tytler
... that the end had come, staggered to his feet and instinctively reached for the body of the woman who lay before him. He did not know that she was conscious, nor did he know whether the ship was afloat or sinking. A gigantic wave swept over her, tons of water pouring in upon them. Blankly he dragged her to the opening which led to the watery deck, clinging to a railing with all his might. He was gasping for breath, his life almost crushed out of his body. It ...
— Nedra • George Barr McCutcheon
... own heart a lesson of patience, and quiet submission to the will of Him who holds the issues of life,—and Oh, how difficult for us to learn the solemn lesson, that her wasting form, her gradual sinking away, was hourly ...
— Twenty-Two Years a Slave, and Forty Years a Freeman • Austin Steward
... desirous of knowledge should have faith. One possessed of knowledge should perform the rites laid down in respect of the Pitris and the gods, practise all religious duties, perform sacrifices, judiciously pursue virtue, profit, and pleasure. Alas, no one understands that the world is sinking on the ocean of Time that is so very deep and that is infested with those huge crocodiles called decrepitude and death. Many physicians may be seen afflicted with all the members of their families, although they have carefully studied the science of Medicine.[82] Taking bitters and diverse kinds ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown
... be out of a sinking ship," said the ex-boss. "The Works will go down, sure as shooting. And I think myself well out of the clutches of these men. They're a bullying, swearing, drinking set of infernal ruffians. Foremen are just as bad as hands. I never felt safe of my ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 09, No. 51, January, 1862 • Various
... terrible during his remaining words. His fingers were sinking into the table, on which he rested his hand. The cluster of wrinkles between his brows became deeper, his eyes had the flash of steel in them; he was all hatred, anger, contempt. But Kranitski, who at first listened ...
— The Argonauts • Eliza Orzeszko (AKA Orzeszkowa)
... to go home right now," growled Donny, sinking his chin between his two palms. "But I guess the ...
— Good Indian • B. M. Bower |
