"Spark" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... superstition. But Isabel had been too well trained by the Society of Jesus not see that a chance yet remained of glorifying her Church—a heaven-sent chance which was not to be lost. Her husband's body was not yet cold, and who could tell for certain whether some spark of life yet lingered in that inanimate form? The doctor declared that no doubt existed regarding the decease, but doctors are often mistaken. So hardly had the priest crossed the threshold than she ...
— The Romance of Isabel Lady Burton Volume II • Isabel Lady Burton & W. H. Wilkins
... food; their officers, exhausted like themselves, feebly gave orders to take more care, and neglected to see that their orders were obeyed. A piece of burnt wood, at such times escaping from an oven, or a spark from the fire of the bivouacs, was sufficient to set fire to a castle or a whole village, and to cause the deaths of many unfortunate soldiers who had taken refuge in them. In other respects, these disorders were very ...
— History of the Expedition to Russia - Undertaken by the Emperor Napoleon in the Year 1812 • Count Philip de Segur
... not only original himself, but he had to a great degree that rare faculty of bringing to the surface in others the very smallest spark of originality, and of remembering it and appreciating it in a way that was stimulating and helpful to those who had the pleasure of knowing him. When the little seaside town was empty of visitors, and it was not time to pay Edinburgh ...
— Robert Louis Stevenson • Margaret Moyes Black
... in the morning, I put a red spark in my pipe. I went to the Cnoc-Maithe To get satisfaction ...
— The Aran Islands • John M. Synge
... far as we knew, except that Japan had lined up with the Allies. The Youngster had come near to striking fire by wondering how the United States, with her dislike for Japan, would view the entering into line of the yellow man, but the spark flickered out, and I imagine we settled down for the story with more eagerness than on the previous evening, especially when the Doctor thrust his hands into his pockets and lifted his chin into the air, as if he were in the tribune. More ...
— Told in a French Garden - August, 1914 • Mildred Aldrich
... I said, in reassuring tones, "for this cartridge, if opened out and set on fire by a spark or flame, would not, in the first place, light readily, and, in the second place, it would merely burn without exploding; but if I were to put a detonator inside and fire it by means of that, it would explode with a violence that far exceeds ...
— In the Track of the Troops • R.M. Ballantyne
... is a very little warmth just where the back of the skull joins the neck. Yet there is enough left to reanimate the whole being in a little time, so that life goes on as before. So in Rome's darkest and most dead days, the Capitol has always held within it a spark of vitality, ready to break out with little warning and ...
— Ave Roma Immortalis, Vol. 2 - Studies from the Chronicles of Rome • Francis Marion Crawford
... the hill. It was a sound which had nothing to do with the storm. It was the voices of men, urgent, strident. A tiny spark suddenly grew out of the blackness. It was moving, swinging rhythmically. A moment later shadowy figures moved in the darkness. They were vague, uncertain. But they came, following closely upon the spark of light, which was borne in the hand ...
— The Triumph of John Kars - A Story of the Yukon • Ridgwell Cullum
... gentleman of great estate fell desperately in love with a great beauty of very high quality, but as ill-natured as long flattery and an habitual self-will could make her. However, my young spark ventures upon her like a man of quality, without being acquainted with her, or having ever saluted her, until it was a crime to kiss any woman else. Beauty is a thing which palls with possession, and the charms of this lady ...
— History of English Humour, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange
... like a dog on a race course, till at last, among a lot of cordage and fishing gear, I thought I espied a man cast ashore, and so it was. He was entangled in the mass of wreckage, and appeared dead. As I thought a spark of life might still remain, I tried to disengage him, but try as I would I could not disentangle his legs, so had recourse to my knife to cut away the ropes which held him so fast. This I found a long process, but ...
— Jethou - or Crusoe Life in the Channel Isles • E. R. Suffling
... vital elixir as are the splendors of naphtha or phosphor. As it was, the weird rite had no magic result. The magician was not rent limb from limb by the fiends. By causes as natural as ever extinguished life's spark in the frail lamp of clay, he had died out of sight—under ...
— The Lock and Key Library • Julian Hawthorne, Ed.
... know. When I came back from abroad, knew I'd lost you, I was unhappy, terribly. Yet, it was enough for me to learn that you at least remembered me. Afterward, when we became friends, and you were kind to me, and into our friendship wavered a spark of something more than friendship, ah, I was almost happy! Only one thing tormented me: fear that such a feeling wronged Fedya. Afterwards, when Fedya tortured you so, I saw I could help. Then a certain definite hope ...
— Redemption and Two Other Plays • Leo Tolstoy et al
... the tan of the outlaw's face. It had been many years since an innocent child had made so naive a confession of faith in him. He was a bad-man, and he knew it. But at the core of him was a dynamic spark of self-respect that had always remained alight. He had ridden crooked trails through all his gusty lifetime. His hand had been against every man's, but at least he had fought fair and been loyal to his pals. And there had never been a time when a good woman need be ...
— Oh, You Tex! • William Macleod Raine
... insurrect here, and are to honour me with a call thereupon. I shall not fall back; though I don't think them in force or heart sufficient to make much of it. But, onward!—it is now the time to act, and what signifies self, if a single spark of that which would be worthy of the past can be bequeathed unquenchedly to the future? It is not one man, nor a million, but the spirit of liberty which must be spread. The waves which dash upon the shore are, ...
— Life of Lord Byron, With His Letters And Journals, Vol. 5 (of 6) • (Lord Byron) George Gordon Byron
... admitted to the Lord's Supper, were encouraged to offer their children in baptism, prevailed in many of the churches. Great apathy was prevalent among professing Christians, and the ruinous vices of profaneness, Sabbath-breaking and intemperance were affectingly prevalent among all classes. The spark of evangelical piety seemed to be nearly extinct in the churches. Revivals of religion were scarcely known except in the recollections of a former age. Some of the essential doctrines of grace were not received even by many in the churches.[12] Respecting the operations of ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 4, 1919 • Various
... was afterward told by a person who had known him intimately from his childhood, that, though courteous, his main characteristic was an absolute indifference to most persons and things about him, and that he never showed a spark of ambition of any sort. This was confirmed by what I afterward saw of him at court. He seemed to stand about listlessly, speaking in a good-natured way to this or that person when it was easier than not to do so; but, on the whole, indifferent to all which ...
— Autobiography of Andrew Dickson White Volume II • Andrew Dickson White
... for soul is wanting there. Hers is the loveliness in death That parts not quite with parting breath; But beauty with that fearful bloom, That hue which haunts it to the tomb, Expression's last receding ray, A gilded halo hovering round decay, The farewell beam of Feeling passed away! Spark of that flame—perchance of heavenly birth— Which gleams, but warms no ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 7 • Various
... events of the years 1786 made a profound impression upon the minds of all responsible and conservative men. In undisguised alarm, Washington wrote: "There are combustibles in every State which a spark might set fire to.... I feel ... infinitely more than I can express to you, for the disorders which have arisen in these States. Good God! Who, besides a Tory, could have foreseen, or a Briton, predicted them?" Rightly or wrongly, ...
— Union and Democracy • Allen Johnson
... one with regard to a French Class that he caused to be held during School hours in his own house, by a man of his own choice. On both occasions the immediate cause of disagreement was but the final spark of a smouldering and mutual discontent, and it is impossible to ...
— A History of Giggleswick School - From its Foundation 1499 to 1912 • Edward Allen Bell
... Some people, be it noted, are gravest when alone, and they are wise, for the world has too much gravity for us to go about it with a long face, making matters worse. Let each of us be the centre of his own gravity. Maggie Delafield had, perhaps, that spark in the brain for which we have but an ugly word. We call it "pluck." And by it we are enabled to win a losing game—and, harder still, to lose a losing game—without ...
— The Sowers • Henry Seton Merriman
... an immense green spark a foot long, or like a fireball. It exploded in one creature's white face and she gave a wild howl of terror and anguish, scrabbled blindly at her eyes, and with a despairing shriek, ran for the shelter ...
— The Planet Savers • Marion Zimmer Bradley
... affectionately for years, without knowing for certainty their ultimate fate, though I firmly believe that the living principle is never extinguished. Since the atoms of matter are indestructible, as far as we know, it is difficult to believe that the spark which gives to their union life, memory, affection, intelligence, and fidelity, is evanescent. Every atom in the human frame, as well as in that of animals, undergoes a periodical change by continual waste and renovation; the abode is changed, not its inhabitant. If animals ...
— Personal Recollections, from Early Life to Old Age, of Mary Somerville • Mary Somerville
... at them one sighs even in the midst of admiration, thinking that if the hand which produced them had been guided by a spark of divine genius instead of the finest talent, what glorious works they would have been! The truth is that Andrea's was a receptive, rather than an original and productive mind. His art was more imitative than spontaneous, ...
— Fra Bartolommeo • Leader Scott (Re-Edited By Horace Shipp And Flora Kendrick)
... for a moment think that his words would so touch his uncle. He had spoken from his own stand-point, with thought of himself alone, and would have been amazed indeed could he have known what a steady flame within his uncle's mind his little spark ...
— Barbara's Heritage - Young Americans Among the Old Italian Masters • Deristhe L. Hoyt
... the normal action of the intercostal muscles, it is plain that if this action is stopped by strychnine, a man must die. Again, a slight rise of temperature may be a sufficient inciting power to occasion extensive chemical changes in a collocation of elements otherwise stable; a spark is enough to explode a powder magazine. Hence, when sufficient energy to account for any effect cannot be found in the inciting power, or manifestly active condition, we must look for it in the collocation which is often supposed ...
— Logic - Deductive and Inductive • Carveth Read
... too sharp on him, also. I was in hopes that she would marry and punish him. I don't wonder at his course, though; for if he has a spark of spirit he would not forgive her treatment after she learned that you had not failed. ...
— A Young Girl's Wooing • E. P. Roe
... ratification by the heads of the two governments. Of course the mass of subjects—indeed not ten men in each country—knew aught of what had transpired near Schlangenbad. Politicians had worked up a war scare to such pitch that the people of the two nations were ready to rush into conflict. Only a spark was needed to fire the situation. Realizing that under the menace of existing conditions, the unforeseen might happen, the Kaiser was not lessening his secret diplomatic intrigues; rather he was ...
— The Secrets of the German War Office • Dr. Armgaard Karl Graves
... is practical. The thing that will inevitably impress itself on the thinking and feeling man and woman is that the sight of brutal clubbing of innocent victims in a so-called free Republic, and the degrading, soul-destroying economic struggle, furnish the spark that kindles the dynamic force in the overwrought, outraged souls of men like Czolgosz or Averbuch. No amount of persecution, of hounding, of repression, can stay ...
— Anarchism and Other Essays • Emma Goldman
... which fell from my shoulders at these words! I was to hear, then, what had intervened between me and my purpose. The wearing night I had anticipated was to be lightened with some small spark of knowledge. I had confidence enough in the kind-hearted inspector to be sure of that. I caught at my uncle's arm and squeezed it delightedly, quite oblivious of the curious glances I must have received from the various officials we passed on our ...
— The Woman in the Alcove • Anna Katharine Green
... the body of the rash man if he was unable to answer the questions of this last sentinel. These rigorous precautions were rendered necessary by the vicinity of these terrible powder magazines, which a single spark might blow up, and with it the town, the fleet, and ...
— The Private Life of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Constant
... into execution without great hazard to themselves; which fact pressed itself so powerfully on their minds, that for the present they discreetly vented their rage in abuse, and returned to their quarters. Satisfied by the feeble beating of the Indian's pulse that the vital spark was not extinct, I would not allow his kinsmen to remove him. Towards morning, recovering the use of speech, he inquired, in a voice scarcely audible, if he "had shed the blood of a white man?" I replied in the affirmative. "Then," said he, "it would have been better had you despatched ...
— Service in the Hudson's Bay Territory • John M'lean
... controlled by those aboard. They may switch the motors onto the tanks of fuel in the cargo holds, and continue onwards. If they were celestial navigators, they might try to turn, and seek earth again. But they are not navigators, and the sun will be but a tiny spark in the limitless darkness, one with a million others, not to be told apart. They will know that only Proxima Centauri in all space may the Vulcan hope to reach in their lifetime, or perhaps even in that of their descendants, for ...
— The Indulgence of Negu Mah • Robert Andrew Arthur
... back. She leaped not only because of her own boldness, but because he seemed to stir. It was as if this kiss, so light, so imperceptible, had sent a galvanic throbbing through his frame. She herself felt it, as now and then in winter she had felt an electric spark. ...
— The Dust Flower • Basil King
... gunpowder, probably hoping that it might contain more of their favourite fire-water. They were very likely smoking at the time, and perhaps all bending round the cask in their eagerness to get some of its contents. A spark from one of their pipes must in an instant have finished their business. I cannot say that I indulged in any sentimental grief at what had occurred. It was vexatious to lose so many things which might have been of use, but the most serious loss was that of the gunpowder. Fortunately, however, ...
— Dick Onslow - Among the Redskins • W.H.G. Kingston
... the statesmen of France failed to threaten Germany with a Russo-Gallic alliance in the spirit of the Erfurt congress of 1808; while Russia perseveres in the prohibitory system so prejudicial to German commerce, attempts to suppress every spark of German nationality in Livonia, Courland, and Esthonia, and fosters Panslavism, or the union of all the Slavonic nations for the subjection of the world, among the Slavonian subjects of Austria ...
— Germany from the Earliest Period Vol. 4 • Wolfgang Menzel, Trans. Mrs. George Horrocks
... in the room below, and in a moment was at the bedside, doing all that could be done to fan into a flame that little spark ...
— Holidays at Roselands • Martha Finley
... manner; and he continued languid and sluggish all through the interview. It struck me more forcibly than any other change could have done, that he never once appeared to pluck up any spirit, or attempted to recall a spark of his ancient sprightliness. He spoke more to Julia than ...
— The Doctor's Dilemma • Hesba Stretton
... natural equality of mankind, and the tyranny of artificial distinctions; and the poorer classes, still smarting under the exactions of the late reign, were by the impositions of the new tax wound up to a pitch of madness. Thus the materials had been prepared; it required but a spark to set the ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... one should propose, by such dreams and reasonings concerning faith as he has invented in his heart, to enter therein. There must be a living, active, tried faith. God help us! How have our deceivers written, taught and spoken against this text, yet whoever has even the least measure and only a spark of faith, shall be saved when ...
— The Epistles of St. Peter and St. Jude Preached and Explained • Martin Luther
... Bengal, to escape unnoticed and uncensured,—transactions which seem to demonstrate that every spring of this government was smeared with corruption, that principles of rapacity and oppression universally prevailed, and that every spark of sentiment and public spirit was lost and extinguished in the unbounded lust of ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. X. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... crank-case encloses reduction gear for the propeller shaft, together with the shaft and bearings. There are two suction and one pressure type oil pumps driven through gears at half-engine speed, and two 12 spark magnetos, giving ...
— A History of Aeronautics • E. Charles Vivian
... interference, were both at fault, a Yankee girl, but nine years old, following up more in sport than in earnest, a chance observation, became the instigator of a movement which, whatever its true character, has had its influence throughout the civilized world. The spark had been ignited,—once at least two centuries ago; but it had died each time without effect. It kindled no flame till the middle ...
— Modern Spiritualism • Uriah Smith
... portrait well the lover's voice supplies; Speaks all his heart must feel, his tongue would say: Yet ah! not all his heart must sadly feel! How oft the flow'ret's silken leaves conceal The drug that steals the vital spark away! And who that gazes on that angel-smile, Would fear its charm, or ...
— The Mysteries of Udolpho • Ann Radcliffe
... something that had quickened to life under the blazing magic of the sun. Soon her spirit would abandon her body and go on, while her flesh and bone returned to dust. This frame of hers, that carried the divine spark, belonged to the earth. She had only been ignorant, mindless, feelingless, absorbed in the seeking of gain, blind to the truth. She had to give. She had been created a woman; she belonged to nature; she was nothing save a mother of the future. She had loved neither Glenn Kilbourne nor life itself. ...
— The Call of the Canyon • Zane Grey
... return like a tender, forgiving father for the return of his prodigal son. Human life, according to this view, may be mean and sordid and may be spent in the grossest sin; but there is hope. All is not lost while there is a spark of life left. God is still seeking and trying to bring the soul to new life. The million agents of His loving will conspire to help man; and so the possibilities of his life are still great. Thus, to our Lord Christ, the vision of human life ...
— India, Its Life and Thought • John P. Jones
... that even in his day the idea that both light and heat are modes of motion had taken possession of many minds. 'First,' he says, 'that all kind of fiery burning bodies have their parts in motion I think will be easily granted me. That the spark struck from a flint and steel is in rapid agitation I have elsewhere made probable;... that heat argues a motion of the internal parts is (as I said before) generally granted;... and that in all extremely hot shining bodies there is ...
— Six Lectures on Light - Delivered In The United States In 1872-1873 • John Tyndall
... amongst these states some arise mainly from contact with our fellow-men. They are the most intense as well as the most violent. As contrary electricities attract each other and accumulate between the two plates of the condenser from which the spark will presently flash, so, by simply bringing people together, strong attractions and repulsions take place, followed by an utter loss of balance, in a word, by that electrification of the soul known as passion. Were man to give way to ...
— Laughter: An Essay on the Meaning of the Comic • Henri Bergson
... who had been studying phrase books, 'je vwa.' But in reality he saw with difficulty, for a spark had got into his eye, and its companion optic, wandering as usual, was suffused with ...
— A Prisoner in Fairyland • Algernon Blackwood
... for literature and knowledge founded to our certain knowledge solely on the stupidity and false methods of the teacher, who alike in what he knew or did not know was incapable of connecting one spark of pleasurable feeling with any science, by leading his pupils' minds to re-act upon the knowledge he attempted to convey. Being thus important, how shall a love of knowledge be created? According to the ...
— The Uncollected Writings of Thomas de Quincey—Vol. 1 - With a Preface and Annotations by James Hogg • Thomas de Quincey
... which I am anxious to refer to, as corrections or criticisms of parts of the Experimental Researches. The first of these is one by Jacobi (Philosophical Magazine, 1838. xiii. 401.), relative to the possible production of a spark on completing the junction of the two metals of a single pair of plates (915.). It is an excellent paper, and though I have not repeated the experiments, the description of them convinces me that I must have been in error. The ...
— Experimental Researches in Electricity, Volume 1 • Michael Faraday
... when started it tends to persist, so that if its circuit be suddenly broken, it refuses to stop quite suddenly, and bursts through the introduced insulating partition with violence and heat. It is this ram or impetus of the electric current which causes the spark seen on breaking a circuit; and the more sudden the breakage, the more violent is the spark apt to be. We shall understand them better directly; meanwhile they appear to be direct consequences of the inertia ...
— Aether and Gravitation • William George Hooper
... not, indeed, at this period, possess the elements of an ordinary education. A very simple circumstance sufficed to apply the spark which fired his latent energies, and nascent poetical tendencies: and he henceforward became a different being, elevated far above his former self. He called one evening, after a drinking bout on the previous night, on a maiden aunt, named Robinson, a widow possessed of about L30 a year, by whom ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 3, August, 1850. • Various
... Berkley, outraged pride had aided to buoy her above the grief over the deep wound he had dealt her. She never doubted that his insolence and deliberate brutality had killed in her the last lingering spark of compassion for the memory of the man who had held her in his arms that night so long—so ...
— Ailsa Paige • Robert W. Chambers
... is a garden tired with autumn, Heaped with bending asters and dahlias heavy and dark, In the hazy sunshine, the garden remembers April, The drench of rains and a snow-drop quick and clear as a spark; ...
— Flame and Shadow • Sara Teasdale
... rock—a giant, primitive stone statue imbued with life. But it was impossible that it should really be fashioned of rock. At least it ought to be impossible. Rock is inorganic, inanimate. It simply couldn't have the spark of life in it. Harley had seen many strange creations, on many strange planets, but never had he seen inorganic mineral matter endowed with animation. ...
— The Planetoid of Peril • Paul Ernst
... almost entirely granitic; and thus, at the epoch of its first emergence from the waters of the Mediterranean, no spark of animal or vegetable life existed in the ...
— Rambles in the Islands of Corsica and Sardinia - with Notices of their History, Antiquities, and Present Condition. • Thomas Forester
... for their purposes it is not now my business to examine. But we all know that our resolutions in favor of Ireland are trifling and insignificant, when compared with the concessions to the Americans. At such a juncture, I would implore every man, who retains the least spark of regard to the yet remaining honor and security of this country, not to compel others to an imitation of their conduct, or by passion and violence to force them to seek in the territories of the separation that freedom and those advantages which they are not to look for ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. II. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... winds reached down the big schoolhouse chimney and drew up a spark of fire from the furnace in the basement. They lodged it where it would do the most harm, and, in a short time, the janitor was running with a white face to the principal's office. As quietly as possible each teacher was called out into the hall and warned. And, ...
— The Widow O'Callaghan's Boys • Gulielma Zollinger
... his chain and muzzle grew upon him. The muzzle galled his nose and the chain was a continual reminder of his slavery. Pedro had prodded and clubbed him this spring until his body was sore. He no longer had the slightest spark of affection for the man, but instead a fearful hate that burned in his breast like ...
— Black Bruin - The Biography of a Bear • Clarence Hawkes
... do not believe, I will tell you no more of our mysteries, no, not whence this light comes nor what are the properties of the Water of Life, both of which you long to know, nor how to preserve the vital spark of Being in the grave of dreamless sleep, like a live jewel in a casket of dead stone, nor aught else. As to these matters, Daughter, I bid you also to be silent, since Bickley mocks at us. Yes, with all this around him, he who saw us rise from the coffins, still ...
— When the World Shook - Being an Account of the Great Adventure of Bastin, Bickley and Arbuthnot • H. Rider Haggard
... some of us when the heart of the one man beats for the one woman, and there alights and resides in their breasts that spark of devotion that we call "love." When there is born to that union a child, even though in Nature's stupid way, then a bond is created more precious than anything else in this world. Without this little circle of loving joy, the earth is a prison and life a grave injustice for those ...
— Tyranny of God • Joseph Lewis
... it down, Hid it with honey-words that win you Wreaths that you know bedeck the clown. Kings they will call you and uplifters Of your kind? Lord save the mark, That we are still for fire dependent On so false a spark. ...
— Many Gods • Cale Young Rice
... first knowledge of him, was never rent; yet occasionally it seemed to me to gape in a manner that let a little momentary finger of light through, in the flashing of which a soul kindled and shut in his eyes, like a hard-dying spark in ashes. I wished to know what gave life to the spark, and I ...
— At a Winter's Fire • Bernard Edward J. Capes
... voyage out he had fallen in with twenty-six Moravian fellow-passengers, on their way from Germany to settle in Georgia; and they spoilt all. On his as yet unsettled, enthusiastic, self-dissatisfied frame of mind, the spectacle of their confident, tranquil, yet fervid piety, fell like a spark on tinder. He writes, in his journal, now first begun, 'From friends in England I am awhile secluded; but God hath opened me a door into the whole Moravian Church.' Here, Wesley learned, and took in, the doctrines of Peter Bohler, the Moravian, ...
— The Christian Foundation, Or, Scientific and Religious Journal, - Volume I, No. 9. September, 1880 • Various
... open rebellion would have occurred, had not Miller proceeded to high-handed and arbitrary deeds, making himself so obnoxious to the people that finally they were wrought up to such an inflammable state of mind that only a spark was needed to light the flames ...
— In Ancient Albemarle • Catherine Albertson
... so serene, So innocent, befits the scene: There's magic in that small bird's note— See, there he flits—the Yellow-throat; A living sunbeam, tipped with wings, A spark of light ...
— Songs Out of Doors • Henry Van Dyke
... afternoon when we gathered what remained of the crops, cleaned off the beds, heaped the refuse in the center of the garden, and had a most glorious bonfire, though it was not election day. We watched the last spark die out, closed the gate, and with regretful steps wended our way back to the schoolroom, to await the ...
— Construction Work for Rural and Elementary Schools • Virginia McGaw
... conceive and write the book. His poorer human thoughts and emotions centred in the hope that now Adrian's restless ghost would be laid forever and that for Doria there would open a new life in which, with the past behind her, she could find a glory in the sun and an influence in the stars, and a spark in her own bosom responsive to his devotion. For the tumultuous moment, however, when Adrian's name was on all men's tongues, and before all men's eyes, the ghost walked in triumphant verisimilitude of life. At all the meetings of Jaffery and Doria, he ...
— Jaffery • William J. Locke
... is useful but dangerous. A spark from it might set a house on fire. We ought to be very careful about it. Children should ...
— Chambers's Elementary Science Readers - Book I • Various
... the boat which was to take him off to the man-of-war was not there. He was obliged to wait five, ten, fifteen minutes before the boat came. This displeased him very much. But the hand of God was in this delay. For, just as the boat was leaving the dock, a spark fell into the powder magazine on board the man-of-war. An explosion took place. The huge vessel was blown to pieces, and all the men on board of her were killed. That delay of a quarter of an hour saved Mr. Newton's ...
— The Life of Jesus Christ for the Young • Richard Newton
... spark herself appeared, amid a hysteria of applause. She played the part of the wife of a military officer, and displayed therein a marvellous, a terrifying vitality of tongue, leg, and arm. The young men in white flannels surrounded her, and she could flirt with all ...
— The Roll-Call • Arnold Bennett
... such genius as this be chiefly comic, its work cannot but awaken in one a deep sense of the pathetic. To stand before the poor little picture that has been so much to its painter, and yet holds no spark of vitality or touch of distinction; to take up the poor little book into which all the toil of so many wasted days could breathe no breath of life, formless, uninspired, unnecessary. Think of the pathos of the illusion that has waved 'its purple wings' around ...
— Prose Fancies • Richard Le Gallienne
... blood Shall sink beneath a crimson flood, While o'er it from the highest crag, Will wave the glorious meteor flag! I've wandered somewhat from my track, But quietly I now come back; Into my train of thought there blew A passing spark, away it flew, And I was gone before I knew— Like nitro-glycerine it sprung, And from the pathway I was flung. Yet no uncertain sound give I, I risk it as a prophecy. By George Street north, I pass and see There Pierre ...
— Recollections of Bytown and Its Old Inhabitants • William Pittman Lett
... rooted to the spot in unutterable horror; but when the ghost at length actually came into view, and, (owing to Poopy's body being dark, and her garments white), presented the appearance of a dimly luminous creature, without head, arms, or legs, the last spark of endurance of man and boy went out. The one gave a roar, the other a shriek, of horror, and both turned and fled like the wind over a stretch of country, which, in happier circumstances, they would have crossed ...
— Gascoyne, the Sandal-Wood Trader • R.M. Ballantyne
... board, seeing us work so hard, assisted us in manning the capstern, hauling in ropes, and performing all sorts of labour. If they had had the least spark of a treacherous disposition, they could not have found a better opportunity of distressing us; but they approved themselves good-natured, and friendly in this, as ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 14 • Robert Kerr
... materially advance the business in hand. Towards the end of the fourth act, however, we approach the climax, and matters begin to move. Alexis' marriage being now imminent, Silvia thinks she can venture at least to give her lover some spark of hope by narrating her story under fictitious names. This she does, making use of the transparent anagrams Isulia and Sirthis[256]. As Silvia ends her tale Montanus rushes in, determined to be revenged for the ...
— Pastoral Poetry and Pastoral Drama - A Literary Inquiry, with Special Reference to the Pre-Restoration - Stage in England • Walter W. Greg
... number of Iraqi civilian casualties. Iraq is in the grip of a deadly cycle: Sunni insurgent attacks spark large-scale Shia reprisals, and vice versa. Groups of Iraqis are often found bound and executed, their bodies dumped in rivers or fields. The perception of unchecked violence emboldens militias, shakes confidence in the government, and leads Iraqis to flee to places where their ...
— The Iraq Study Group Report • United States Institute for Peace
... which Heaven holds suspended over the city of Rome, stifles even the subtle spark of passion. If Vesuvius were here, it would have been cold for the last forty years. The Roman princesses were not a little talked of up to the end of the thirteenth century. Under the French rule their gallantry ...
— The Roman Question • Edmond About
... hear something of them by-and-by, or I am mistaken. In secret and in the open alike there is a vast power growing and growing, increasing in volume and bulk from hour to hour, from year to year, God only knows in what fashion it will reveal itself. But you may depend on it that when the spark does spring out of the cloud—when the clearance of the atmosphere is due—people will look back on 1688, and 1798, and 1848 as mere playthings. The Great Revolution is still to come; it may ...
— Sunrise • William Black
... man had determined to seek an asylum in England; and is, therefore, justly and generously condemned by D'Alembert. This considered, Hume failed both in honour and friendship not to show his dislike; which neglect seems to have kindled the first spark of combustion in this madman's brain. However, the contestation is very amusing, and I shall be very sorry if it stops, now it is in so good a train. I should be well pleased, particularly, to see so seraphic a madman attack so insufferable a coxcomb as Walpole; and I think ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole Volume 3 • Horace Walpole
... endowed with a brighter spark of the divine fire than Longfellow, he himself was conscious ...
— American Men of Mind • Burton E. Stevenson
... Poets opened the aspiration valves, ignited the divine spark plugs, and whiz! went their motor-meters in a whirring, ...
— The Re-echo Club • Carolyn Wells
... this way; we must find the stairs." But Mrs. Fisher held her with firmer fingers than ever, and they turned into a narrower hall, up toward a blinking red light that sent a small bright spark out through the thick smoke, and in a minute, or very much less, they were out on the fire-escape, and looking down to hear—for they couldn't see—Jasper's voice calling from below, "We are all here, Polly," ...
— Five Little Peppers Abroad • Margaret Sidney
... the bonfire, Fin-fin rubbed two sticks briskly together. Soon a spark fell upon the wood, and instantly the flames leaped upward. Then the fishes put some roots in front of the ...
— Story Hour Readers Book Three • Ida Coe and Alice J. Christie
... THE CRUSADES.—After this, only a spark was needed to kindle in the Western nations a flame of enthusiasm. The summons to a crusade appealed to the two most powerful sentiments then prevalent,—the sentiment of religion and that of chivalry. The response made by faith ...
— Outline of Universal History • George Park Fisher
... only thing now left for him was to live his life as it was, minus one spark of brightness. Certainly he didn't feel like singing, but whining was no earthly good. And since he could not sing, and would not whine, silence alone was left him. He would work as best he could till the year was out. He had no intention of going ...
— Antony Gray,—Gardener • Leslie Moore
... is a fortunate spark, Mr. Bloundel," he said. "No sooner does he lose one mistress than he finds another. Tour daughter is already forgotten, and he is at this moment enjoying a tender tete-a-tete in Bishop Kempe's chapel with Nizza Macascree, the ...
— Old Saint Paul's - A Tale of the Plague and the Fire • William Harrison Ainsworth
... mak' it plaintee fuss about hees daughter Emmeline, Dat's mebby nice girl, too, but den, Mon Dieu, she's not de queen! An' w'en de young man's come aroun' for spark it on de door, An' hear de ole man swear "Bapteme!" he's never ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume IV. (of X.) • Various
... you, I'm sure," retorted Dan, good-humoredly; though there was a spark in his eye that told the fire was smoldering still, as even under the beacon light ...
— Killykinick • Mary T. Waggaman
... provincial mayors was so little to Haydon's taste that by the close of this year we find him in deep depression of spirits, unrelieved by even a spark of his old sanguine buoyancy. 'I candidly confess,' he writes, 'I find my glorious art a bore. I cannot with pleasure paint any individual head for the mere purpose of domestic gratification. I must have a great subject to excite public feeling.... Alas! I have no object ...
— Little Memoirs of the Nineteenth Century • George Paston
... The spark came at last which was to set fire to the magazine. The startling news of Lincoln's election reached Charleston on the 7th of November. As this event was sure to lead to secession, the Disunionists were wild ...
— Reminiscences of Forts Sumter and Moultrie in 1860-'61 • Abner Doubleday
... answered his big brother. And, as soon as Dick had lighted the lantern, Tom and Sam set to work to render the touring car unusable for the time being by turning off the flow of gasoline from the tank and disconnecting the spark plugs. ...
— The Rover Boys in the Air - From College Campus to the Clouds • Edward Stratemeyer
... in His saints, but the vestiges of His divine virtues appear as imprinted in those in whom shines a superior force of soul and mind, for this elevation of heart and this spark of genius could only come from God, their ...
— Christopher Columbus and His Monument Columbia • Various
... his gaze slowly softened to a smile compound both of humor and grimness. He was a man to appreciate a piquant situation, none the less because it was at his expense. The spark that gleamed in his bold eye held some ...
— A Texas Ranger • William MacLeod Raine
... first object which met the eyes of the incoming Suzanne. The grisette, who belonged to a class which certainly has the instinct of misery and the sufferings of the heart, suddenly felt that electric spark, darting from Heaven knows where, which can never be explained, which some strong minds deny, but the sympathetic stroke of which has been felt by many men and many women. It is at once a light which ...
— An Old Maid • Honore de Balzac
... was ready, and on such occasions the devil is never far away with the spark. The Sunday after the sermon, Francis de Bard, the aforesaid Lombard, and other foreign merchants, happened to be in the King's Gallery at Greenwich Palace, and were laughing and boasting over Bard's intrigue with the citizen's wife. Sir Thomas Palmer, ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... Sally. And there were lots of books—not the sawdusty, dry kind that Miss Sandal had in her house, but jolly good books, the kind you can't put down till you've finished. But just now we hardly looked at them. For who with a spark of manly spirit would think twice about a book with a new free-wheel champing the oil like ...
— Oswald Bastable and Others • Edith Nesbit
... soul! I never noticed that I called her Dexter; and so that was the spark that caused the explosion? Well, I shall not forget it in ...
— Miss Dexie - A Romance of the Provinces • Stanford Eveleth
... political considerations, were to them the subject of much offence; and the king hoped that, in their present disposition, the plight of their native prince, flying to them in this extremity of distress, would rouse every-spark of generosity in their bosom, and procure him their ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part E. - From Charles I. to Cromwell • David Hume
... the First Man with his own hand put from him the cup of innocence, and went forth from the happy garden, sin-stained and fallen, the whole head sick, and the whole heart faint,—even then she saw within him the divine spark, the leaven of life, which had power to vitalize and vivify what Crime had smitten with death. Though sea and land teemed with strange perils, though night and day pursued him with mysterious terrors, though the now unfriendly elements combined to check his career, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume V, Number 29, March, 1860 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... wires from the other end of the cable are attached to small magnets specially wound so that no spark results when the electric contact at the key is broken. This magnet attracts a thin disc of iron about 1/4 inch in diameter, (held up by a high wind pressure from underneath) and draws it downward through a space of less than 1/100 of ...
— The Recent Revolution in Organ Building - Being an Account of Modern Developments • George Laing Miller
... a minister of the Almighty to faithfully carry out our part of His great plan according to our strength and ability?) 0 believe we cannot live one moment for ourselves, one moment of selfish repining, and not be failing him at that moment, hiding the God-spark in us, letting the flesh conquer the spirit, the evil ...
— [19th Century Actor] Autobiographies • George Iles
... his calfskin vest. There was not a coat between them to save the dignity of their profession at the boss lady's board. Taterleg's green-velvet waistcoat had suffered damage during the winter when a spark from his pipe burned a hole in it as big as a dollar. He held it up and looked at it, concluding in the end that it would ...
— The Duke Of Chimney Butte • G. W. Ogden
... when it was dark, She blew up such a tiny spark That all the town was bothered; From it she raised such flame and smoke That many in great terror woke, And many more ...
— Pinafore Palace • Various
... Romanior ipsis Romanis: Greek body, but ultra-Roman ego. One may see the like thing happen with one's own eyes at any time: men European-born, who are quite the extremest Americans. In his case, the spark of his Greek heredity set alight the Roman conflagration of his nature. He was born in Calabria, a Roman subject, in 239; and had fought for Rome before Cato, then quaestor, brought him in his train from ...
— The Crest-Wave of Evolution • Kenneth Morris
... Mint a little incident occurred, which suggested how, in the excited state of affairs, a spark might have caused a great conflagration. Seeing a crowd of natives, almost all servants, at the gate, I went to it, and there the sentry, a little peppery Irishman, was threatening to stab with his bayonet a native servant with a note in his hand. I ...
— Life and Work in Benares and Kumaon, 1839-1877 • James Kennedy
... who united all those qualities of prudent forethought, with prompt execution and attention to business, which was so necessary in controlling the irritable Alexandrians, who were liable to be fired into rebellion by the smallest spark. Justice was administered fairly; the great were not allowed to tyrannise over the poor, nor the people to meet in tumultuous mobs; and the legions were regularly paid, so that they had no excuse for plundering ...
— History Of Egypt From 330 B.C. To The Present Time, Volume 11 (of 12) • S. Rappoport
... the fire must have been so much larger! One cinder, one spark of theirs would have filled his little grate. And how did he do to read ...
— Practical Education, Volume II • Maria Edgeworth
... having occurred within the twenty-four hours, the cause of this fire in Ladbroke Square was reported "unknown." Of the other eight, the supposed causes were, in one case, "escape of gas," in another, "paraffin-lamp upset," in another "intoxication," in another, "spark from fire," in another, "candle," in another, "children playing with matches," and so on; but in this mansion none of these causes were deemed probable. The master of the house turned off the gas regularly every night before going to bed, ...
— Life in the Red Brigade - London Fire Brigade • R.M. Ballantyne
... a very real and individual woman, with a nature in which the wild spark of passion might some day be roused with disastrous results. It is unsafe to play with the emotions of a person who is simply labelled, often mistakenly and insufficiently, in your mind as belonging to a class, and possessing the characteristics ...
— Name and Fame - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... had only one single speck of light. The falling wall of water stood out grey green and ghostly on the left, and I noticed that higher up it was lit as if from the open air. There must be a great funnel in the hillside in that direction. I walked a few paces, and then I made out that the spark in front was ...
— Prester John • John Buchan
... might shift and prevent the ship reaching the land ahead, or a gale might spring up and cast the ship helplessly upon the rocks, or a calm might come on and delay her progress, or the masts, burnt through, might fall and crush those on deck, or, still more dreadful, a spark might reach the magazine, and ...
— From Powder Monkey to Admiral - A Story of Naval Adventure • W.H.G. Kingston
... the erstwhile procession were distributed about the embankment in various conditions, but, as I have said, nobody seemed to have parted company with the vital spark. ...
— Mr. Hawkins' Humorous Adventures • Edgar Franklin
... Linkinwater,' said brother Charles, looking at him without the faintest spark of anger, and with a countenance radiant with attachment to the old clerk. 'Damn your obstinacy, Tim Linkinwater, what do you ...
— The Life And Adventures Of Nicholas Nickleby • Charles Dickens
... and as Contesse passed him to set down the cup, caught him by the sleeve. The other looked pityingly at the man into whose face had come a flush of hope. "'T is but the last flickering of the flame," he said. "Soon even the spark ...
— Audrey • Mary Johnston
... great pleasure that I can inform you of the satisfactory condition of things in this section of Missouri. There is more security for men and property in northwestern Missouri than there has been since the rebellion began. There is not a spark of rebellious feeling left here, and all citizens seem to be, and I believe are, ready to discharge all the duties of ...
— Forty-Six Years in the Army • John M. Schofield
... even ere I had touched him I knew that the comely shell held no spark of life. But Karamaneh fondled the cold hands, and spoke softly in that Arabic tongue which long before I had divined must be her ...
— The Insidious Dr. Fu-Manchu • Sax Rohmer
... evil masses, preying upon one another as no other creature has ever preyed upon its kind, they have become a festering heap which all the oceans in vain lave with their antiseptic waters, and all the winds of heaven cannot purify. It is only in the unextinguished spark of reason within him that salvation for man may ever be found, in the realization that he is his own star, and carries in his hands his own fate. The impulses of Individualism and of Socialism alike prompt us to gain self-control and to learn the vast extent of our responsibility. The ...
— The Task of Social Hygiene • Havelock Ellis
... called, is barely treated with proper respect in these days. What is all knowledge but a continued accumulation and comparison of facts, by "following the example of time?" Yet, all this is not original; but we ask, in what does the intellectual originality of the present day consist? does it add a spark to the minds of men which they cannot find in the labours of past ages? New books (we mean new original works) are like dull, pointless flints; the reader cannot scintillate, strike-fire, or steal from them; they ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 565 - Vol. 20, No. 565., Saturday, September 8, 1832 • Various
... sees a spark fly, and he jumps up and cracks a joke. It doesn't make any difference what he does—I've known him to crow like a rooster, or stumble over his own feet—anything to ...
— The Moneychangers • Upton Sinclair
... passer-by. No self-respect restrained matrons or young women heretofore accustomed to severe restraints; they walked hither and thither, with pallid faces, groaning and searching everywhere for somewhat to eat; and they in whom the pangs of hunger had not extinguished every spark of modesty went and hid themselves in the most secret places, and gnawed their hearts in silence, preferring to die of want rather than beg in public. Children still in the cradle, unable to get milk, were exposed at the cross-roads, crying in vain for their usual nourishment; and men, ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume I. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... sketch for you but did not show the spring that holds the circuit breaker in contact with the spark point. That thin finger was part of it. A spring was wound spirally—not helically—around the projecting end of the breaker pivot and the end of the spring hookt over the thin finger. See ...
— The 1893 Duryea Automobile In the Museum of History and Technology • Don H. Berkebile
... to ask for what she proffered freely; and having requested Nicholas to take the dairyman's daughter, led Christine to her place, Long promptly stepping up second with his charge. There were grim silent depths in Nic's character; a small deedy spark in his eye, as it caught Christine's, was all that showed his consciousness of her. Then the fiddlers began—the celebrated Mellstock fiddlers who, given free stripping, could play from sunset to dawn without turning a hair. The ...
— A Changed Man and Other Tales • Thomas Hardy
... where praise is due; entering, almost without the help of language from me, into my inmost thoughts; assisting me, if I may so speak, to comprehend myself; and raising to a steadfast and bright flame the spark that my wayward fancy, left to itself, would have instantaneously ...
— Jane Talbot • Charles Brockden Brown
... and now and then chimes in with a word of soothing assent by way of emphasizing the subject, when the khan is explaining about the Ameer, or Allah, or kismet. Mahmoud Tusuph Khan himself comes to the garden in the cool of the evening, and for half an hour occupies bungalow No. 2. He betrays a spark of Oriental vanity by having an attendant follow behind, bearing a huge and wonderful sun-shade, into the make-up of which peacock feathers and other gorgeous material largely enters. Noticing this, I make a determined assault upon his bump of Asiatic ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle Volume II. - From Teheran To Yokohama • Thomas Stevens
... to find in this age of commercialism which has all but quenched the spark of true patriotism in the hearts of the people. I have sought for the ideal leader in all the States and was on the point of giving up the quest in despair when I suddenly came upon him. Once I determined that the man had been found, ...
— The Transgressors - Story of a Great Sin • Francis A. Adams
... of human nature, Mr. Port presently became not a little annoyed by Dorothy's failure to supply the spark that was to touch him off. In fact, her conduct was bewilderingly strange. She drew away from the lively circle of which Mrs. Rattleton was the animated centre and voluntarily associated herself with the elderly ...
— The Uncle Of An Angel - 1891 • Thomas A. Janvier
... the mind is most open to impressions, and ready to be kindled by the first spark that falls into it. Ideas are then caught quickly and live lastingly. Thus Scott is said to have received, his first bent towards ballad literature from his mother's and grandmother's recitations in his hearing long before he himself had learned to read. Childhood is ...
— Character • Samuel Smiles
... all probability arranged beforehand by the Spanish and German envoys, produced on the whole army the effect of a spark applied to a train of gunpowder. Commines and the Venetian 'proveditori' each tried in vain to arrest the combat an either side. Light troops, eager for a skirmish, and, in the usual fashion of those days, prompted only by that personal courage which led ...
— The Borgias - Celebrated Crimes • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... us with uncomplimentary indifference until it fell on the Story Girl, leaning back in an arm-chair. She looked like a slender red lily in the unstudied grace of her attitude. A spark flashed ...
— The Story Girl • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... upon it—this, to begin and end with—whatever higher matter of thought, or poetry, or religious reverie might play its part therein, between. At last, with final mastery of all the technical secrets of his art, and with somewhat more than "a spark of the divine fire" to his share, comes Giorgione. He is the inventor of genre, of those easily movable pictures which serve neither for uses of devotion, nor of allegorical or historic teaching—little groups of real ...
— The Renaissance - Studies in Art and Poetry • Walter Pater
... dark glen a spark of light suddenly shot—almost like a rocket in swiftness. Jack saw it ...
— On a Torn-Away World • Roy Rockwood
... her eyes upon the Etheling's handsome face. Though its prevailing characteristic was the easy amiability of one who has known little of opposition or dislike, there was no lack of steel in the blue eyes or of iron in the square chin; now and then a spark betrayed them, ...
— The Ward of King Canute • Ottilie A. Liljencrantz
... slowly dropped so low down as to attract the notice of the bear when it awoke. Rising to its full height on its hind legs, and protruding its tongue to the utmost, it just managed to touch Tim's toe. The touch acted liked an electric spark, awoke him at once, and the leg was drawn ...
— The Prairie Chief • R.M. Ballantyne
... our human nature, arouse in most minds only a strong feeling of distaste. There is something congruous with the impassive piety of the man in his waiting on accident from without to take start for the work, which, of all his work, is most truly touched by the "divine spark." Delightsome as its eloquence is actually found to be, that eloquence is attained out of a certain difficulty and halting crabbedness of expression; the wretched punctuation of the piece being not ...
— Appreciations, with an Essay on Style • Walter Horatio Pater
... them more than once. She told me she could not live without you," answered Almayer, speaking without the faintest spark of expression in his face, "so it behoves you to go to her quick, for fear you may ...
— Almayer's Folly - A Story of an Eastern River • Joseph Conrad
... held out against them, and then his friends perceiving that he believed the young man was not really dead, but under some apoplectic fit, proposed to him, for his satisfaction, that trial should be made upon his body by doctors and chirurgeons, if possibly any spark of life might be found in him, and with this he was content.—So the physicians are let to work, who pinched him with pincers in the fleshy parts of his body, and twisted a bow-string about his ...
— Biographia Scoticana (Scots Worthies) • John Howie
... is an essential part of the Esoteric Philosophy. Man is primarily divine, a spark of the Divine Life. This living flame, passing out from the Central Fire, weaves for itself coverings within which it dwells, and thus becomes the Triad, the Atma-Buddhi-Manas, the reflection of the Immortal Self. This sends out its Ray, which becomes encased in ...
— Death—and After? • Annie Besant
... beach," said he, "but they are of no use at all without a steel. However, we must try." So saying, he went to the beach, and soon returned with two flints. On one of these he placed the tinder, and endeavoured to ignite it; but it was with great difficulty that a very small spark was struck out of the flints, and the tinder, being a bad, hard piece, would not catch. He then tried the bit of hoop-iron, which would not strike fire at all; and after that the back of the axe, with no better success. During all these trials Peterkin sat with his hands ...
— The Coral Island - A Tale Of The Pacific Ocean • R. M. Ballantyne
... curses, because he has robbed them of their gold to satisfy his greed. I am not able to contend with men, and am forced to suffer every kind of humiliation. There is no one here to whom I can speak, for even our servants are given us by him. But if you have any fatherly compassion, if a spark of royal or noble feeling still lives in your heart, if love of me and the sight of my tears can move your soul, I implore you to come to our help, and deliver your daughter and son-in-law from the fear of slavery, and restore them once more to their rightful kingdom. But if you will not help us, ...
— Beatrice d'Este, Duchess of Milan, 1475-1497 • Julia Mary Cartwright
... beautiful butterfly, feeling convinced that that butterfly was merely a phantom. To-day, from minute observation, the conjecture rose in her that something uncommon had happened, and that something more must happen, also; she was colder and more formal than ever, with a burning spark of fear in the depth of her blue, clear eyes. Her dress was of cloth, closely fitting, somewhat masculine in the cut of the waist, and on the top of her head was a Japanese knot of fiery hair, pierced by a pin with steel lustres. In her hand was an open book, and she walked along slowly through ...
— The Argonauts • Eliza Orzeszko (AKA Orzeszkowa)
... meeting steel—a sound that spread along the ranks that lay unseen beyond Prat and Cnut. And behold—a spark! a glow! a little flame that died down, leapt up, caught upon dry grass and bracken, seized upon crackling twigs, flared up high and ever fiercer—a devouring flame, hungry and yellow-tongued that licked along the earth—a vengeful flame, ...
— Beltane The Smith • Jeffery Farnol
... and Dick chafed and warmed the limbs of the old woman until he brought back the vital spark. Then he set on the kettle to boil. While a new mess was preparing, he went into the wood, and, with lusty blows, brought down the trees and cut them into huge billets, which he piled upon the fire until it roared again, and the heart of the feeble creature ...
— The Wild Man of the West - A Tale of the Rocky Mountains • R.M. Ballantyne
... more and more careful every year; and, as I have said, amongst our precautions, was that of keeping as little wool as possible in the shed. Most flock-owners waited until the shearing should be quite over before they carted the wool away; but in that case, a spark from a pipe, a match carelessly dropped in a tussock outside, when a nor'-wester was blowing,—and the slight wooden building would be blazing like a torch, and your year's ...
— Station Amusements • Lady Barker
... mirthful incidents. Soldiers, above all people, have an eye for the ridiculous, and are ever ready to make merry and laugh over the most trivial matter. Even the horrors of battle are unable to quench the spark of gaiety ever present in the make-up of a "Yankee ...
— Bamboo Tales • Ira L. Reeves
... then, I hated him so. At least, I thought I could; but just then Tom sent a spark out of the corner of his eye to me that ...
— In the Bishop's Carriage • Miriam Michelson
... aloud the famous “Rainbow Scene” in ‘Silas Marner’ and certain passages in Charles Dickens’s novels. These readings were as fine as Rossetti’s recitations of ‘Jim Bludso’ and other specimens of Yankee humour. And yet it is a common remark, and one that cannot be gainsaid, that there is no spark of humour in the published poems of either of these two friends. Did it never occur to any critic to ask whether the anomaly was not explicable by some theory of poetic art that they held in common? It is no disparagement ...
— Old Familiar Faces • Theodore Watts-Dunton
... abandonment of many of life's highest pleasures. Truly wise men called on each element alike to minister to their joy, and while the touch of sun-bathed air, the fragrance of garden soil, the ductible qualities of mud, and the spark-whirling rapture of playing with fire, had each their special charm, they did not overlook the bliss of getting their feet wet. As I came forth on the common Harold broke out of an adjoining copse and ran to meet me, the ...
— Dream Days • Kenneth Grahame
... not falter. In the twinkling of an eye she had dashed into the burning room, had caught Stella from her bed, the others from their chairs, and with all four hugged tight to her heart was making for the door. Ah! a spark fell on the white apron, on the holland frock! Her rapid movement fanned it. It flickered, blazed, the red flame rushed upward. What would have happened I dare not think, if just at that moment a gentleman, ...
— Nine Little Goslings • Susan Coolidge
... minds are governed wholly by cold commonsense, and whose souls hold no spark of vitalizing imagination, scoff at moon-witchery and lunar madness. Let them declare that the earth's haunting satellite is merely a dead world which cannot even shine with its own light. Magic it does wield. And, just as it distorts ...
— 'Smiles' - A Rose of the Cumberlands • Eliot H. Robinson
... I thought you did, by your taking fire so quickly. I am glad to hear you say you did not. How soon a little spark kindles into a flame; especially when it meets with such ...
— Clarissa, Or The History Of A Young Lady, Volume 8 • Samuel Richardson
... and George Houston here left us, and went on to a salt-lick famous for game, but this proved a failure, some one having carelessly set fire to the tract. Indeed, in summer it is hard not to start these almost endless fires, since a spark or a bit of pipe-cinder will at once set the grasses ablaze, to the destruction of hunting and the annoyance of all travellers, to whom a fire is something which suggests man, and the presence of man needs, sad to say, an explanation. At 6 A. M., August 6th, ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 26, July 1880. • Various
... was his gallant steed bestrode, And forth upon his way he rode, As spark flies from a brand; Upon his crest he bare a tower, And therein stuck a lily flower: ...
— Playful Poems • Henry Morley
... 'For,' thought I, 'I see by the delicacy of her person, the brilliancy of her eye, and the sweet apprehensiveness that plays about every feature of her face, she must have tinder enough in her constitution, to catch a well-struck spark; and I'll warrant I shall know how to set her in a blaze, in a ...
— Pamela (Vol. II.) • Samuel Richardson
... was altogether of an intense and sentimental turn of mind quite in contrast with his practical and merry appearance. The sentimental side of his nature, fed by the productions of his favourite poets and fanned by the romantic temperament of his tutor, soon found an object to kindle the spark into a blaze, and a most unfortunate ...
— Boys and girls from Thackeray • Kate Dickinson Sweetser
... admit them. The work of widening and deepening the passage was undertaken by the government, and was finally completed on July 1, 1914. Preparations for the Great War were complete at last, both on land and sea. The gunpowder was ready. All that was needed was a spark ...
— A School History of the Great War • Albert E. McKinley, Charles A. Coulomb, and Armand J. Gerson
... here. There's some devilment plotting among those rascals. They're only awaiting an opportunity; a single flash would be enough to set them in a blaze, even if the fire wasn't lit and smouldering already like a spark in a bale of cotton. I'd cut the whole thing and clear out if I didn't think it would make it harder for Miss Dows, who would be ...
— Sally Dows and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... casting about impatiently for an immediate causus belli, Wenceslas had hit upon poor, isolated, little Simiti as the point of ignition, and the pitting of its struggling priest against Don Mario as the method of exciting the necessary spark. He could not know that Wenceslas had represented to the Departmental Governor in Cartagena that an obscure Cura in far-off Simiti, an exile from the Vatican, and the author of a violent diatribe against ...
— Carmen Ariza • Charles Francis Stocking
... a spark from the fire. No matter how it was done now. It is done, and can't be helped. I have lost the satisfaction of seeing half the Yankee fleet burnt up. I would rather have given a year's pay than have had this ...
— The Young Lieutenant - or, The Adventures of an Army Officer • Oliver Optic
... wood-thrush there is the whip-poor-will,—instead of butterflies in the meadows, fire-flies, winged sparks of fire! who would have believed it? What kind of cool deliberate life dwells in those dewy abodes associated with a spark of fire? So man has fire in his eyes, or blood, or brain. Instead of singing birds, the half-throttled note of a cuckoo flying over, the croaking of frogs, and the intenser dream of crickets. But above all, the wonderful trump of the bull-frog, ringing from Maine to Georgia. The ...
— Excursions • Henry D. Thoreau
... the United States has served notice on the American people that from it they can hope for nothing in the way of preservation of their liberties. Their liberties are dead. Well may those Americans who still have in their souls a spark of the old fire, turn back 143 years and read these words from the Declaration ...
— The Debs Decision • Scott Nearing
... those milliners climb over a high board fence head first, and Bolivar actually seemed to laugh. Bolivar run one of his tusks through a barrel of gasoline, and it run out on the street car track, and an electric spark set it on fire, and the fire department turned out, but the engines had to all go around Bolivar, 'cause he wouldn't budge an inch, but seemed to say: "Let 'er rip, boys; this is the ...
— Peck's Bad Boy at the Circus • George W. Peck
... we were going on a journey!" she said, as she obeyed him. Her eyes shone with a spark of their old light, in approval of the adventurous nature ...
— Maurice Guest • Henry Handel Richardson
... understand why it is we actors avoid making acquaintance with local families. Why is it? To say nothing of dinners, name-day parties, feasts, soirees fixes, to say nothing of these entertainments, think of the moral influence we may have on society! Is it not agreeable to feel one has dropped a spark in some thick skull? The types one meets! The women! Mon Dieu, what women! they turn one's head! One penetrates into some huge merchant's house, into the sacred retreats, and picks out some fresh and rosy little ...
— The Horse-Stealers and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... held his knuckle to the key. A tiny spark flashed between the key and his knuckle. It was a little flash ...
— Stories of Great Americans for Little Americans • Edward Eggleston
... rubbing each wart with a separate piece of the cloth; but you will find people in every town or village who will assure you that their warts were driven away by one of these charms or lingoes. Warts are either better left alone or removed by a physician with the high-frequency spark or ...
— The Mother and Her Child • William S. Sadler |
