"Strained" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the warning cry, booming deeply over the sea while one and all we strained to hear it—"beware of any Arab ship. Arabs have captured the English ship Alert and have murdered her captain and ...
— The Mutineers • Charles Boardman Hawes
... de Ferrier instead of my Cloud-Mother, a strained and puzzled look replaced her usual satisfaction. I did not often use the name, nor did I try to make her repeat my own. It was my daily effort to fall in with her happiness, for if she saw any anxiety ...
— Lazarre • Mary Hartwell Catherwood
... telephone to the next man; also his flask, which he held for a moment to his lips. Rees gurgled greedily. His voice sounded strained, however, and cracked. ...
— The Profiteers • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... their usual art. Paddling westward they rounded the high red and white South Point, where a projecting reef broke the rollers. We waited for some twenty minutes for a lull; at the auspicious moment every throat was strained by a screaming shout, and the black backs bent doughtily to their work. We were raised like infants in the nurse's arms; the good craft was flung forward with the seething mass, and as she touched shore we sprang out, whilst our conveyance was beached by a crowd of stragglers. The dreaded ...
— Two Trips to Gorilla Land and the Cataracts of the Congo Volume 2 • Richard F. Burton
... ensued, for the Roman catholics, on the very first attack, retreated in great confusion, and were pursued with much slaughter. After the pursuit was over, some straggling papist troops meeting with a poor peasant, who was a protestant, tied a cord round his head, and strained it till his skull ...
— Fox's Book of Martyrs - Or A History of the Lives, Sufferings, and Triumphant - Deaths of the Primitive Protestant Martyrs • John Fox
... put a piece of paper doubled over it, and the light color will be retained; when taken from the oven, if it should look dry, pour some of the liquor that was drained from the oysters in the dish, having previously strained and ...
— Domestic Cookery, Useful Receipts, and Hints to Young Housekeepers • Elizabeth E. Lea
... there a "seat" of the imagination? Such is the form of the question asked for the last twenty years. In that period of extreme and closely bounded localization men strained themselves to bind down every psychic manifestation to a strictly determined point of the brain. Today the problem presents itself no longer in this simple way. As at present we incline toward scattered localization, functional rather than properly ...
— Essay on the Creative Imagination • Th. Ribot
... crushing victories of the allies, the resurrection of the lost Serb Empire, the long-deferred revenge for the defeat of Kosovo. The whole Southern Slav provinces of Austria-Hungary were carried off their feet by a wave of enthusiasm for the allies, and an impossibly strained situation was reached when the Government of Vienna placed itself in violent conflict with Serbia, vetoed her expansion to the sea, insisted upon creating a phantom Albanian State, egged on Bulgaria against her allies, and finally mobilised ...
— The War and Democracy • R.W. Seton-Watson, J. Dover Wilson, Alfred E. Zimmern,
... and viewing in anticipation the exile or extinction of his race, his noble soul became fired with the hope that he might retrieve the fallen fortune of his country, and restore it to its pristine dignity and grandeur. His attachment to his tribe impelled him to exertion and every nerve was strained in its cause. ...
— Chronicles of Border Warfare • Alexander Scott Withers
... illustrated the Definition of Wit, they are common and trite; but are the best, which I could find upon deliberate Enquiry. Many Modern instances of Wit, which left very lively Impressions upon me, when I heard them, appearing upon Re-examination to be quite strained and defective. These, which I have given, as they are thus trite, are not designed in themselves for any Entertainment to the Reader; but being various, and distant from each other, they very properly serve to explain the Truth, ...
— An Essay towards Fixing the True Standards of Wit, Humour, Railery, Satire, and Ridicule (1744) • Corbyn Morris
... was so well aware of the strained relations between Spain and America, that the s.s. Leon XIII., in which he travelled from Manila to Barcelona, was armed as a cruiser, with two 4-inch Hontoria guns mounted aft of the funnel and two Nordenfeldts ...
— The Philippine Islands • John Foreman
... and he felt her arms strained about him, as if she could not hold him near enough to her. It seemed to him as if she was striving to draw him into the very heart of her motherhood; but she knew how deep the gulf was between her and him, and shuddered at her ...
— Cobwebs and Cables • Hesba Stretton
... in his face. He listened. Again it came, distincter than before, with a sharper, deeper cadence. He shuddered visibly, and his face grew paler in the dim light, and large drops of sweat broke out upon his forehead. The third time it was repeated, and then all was silent. He listened long, with strained ear and eye, which seemed to pierce his dungeon walls; but he heard no more. He sunk back, and covering his face prayed in an agony. Now, too well he knew what was to be his doom. He had heard the voice of his executioner. It was the desert lion roaring for his prey. Now he ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 5 November 1848 • Various
... had reached old Clopton bridge, and the banners strained upon their staves in the freshening river-wind. The trumpeters and the drummers led, their horses prancing, white plumes waving in the breeze, and the April sunlight dancing on the brazen horns and the silver bellies of ...
— Master Skylark • John Bennett
... seat, returned to the outer room and opened the door. Immediately outside, in the passage, appeared Grandfer Cantle singing in concert with those still standing in front of the house. He came into the room and nodded abstractedly to Wildeve, his lips still parted, and his features excruciatingly strained in the emission of the chorus. This being ended, he said heartily, "Here's welcome to the newmade couple, ...
— The Return of the Native • Thomas Hardy
... sharp pluck at his mouth, and his head was turned north once more. As well go that way as another, but the man was mad indeed if he thought that such a horse as Pommers was at the end of his spirit or his strength. He would soon show him that he was unconquered, if it strained his sinews or broke his heart to do so. Back then he flew up the long, long ascent. Would he ever get to the end of it? Yet he would not own that he could go no farther while the man still kept his grip. He was white with foam and caked with mud. His eyes were gorged with blood, his ...
— Sir Nigel • Arthur Conan Doyle
... street; and, from behind him, and from doors and windows, and from the opposite side of the street, and at length from before him, the very welkin rung with the cries of "Stop thief! stop thief!" A hundred eyes were strained to catch a glimpse of the culprit; but Rodney dashed on, the crowd never thinking that he was the hunted fox, but only one of the hounds in pursuit, eager to be "in at the death." At the corner of Fifth and Market-streets, a porter was standing ...
— The Runaway - The Adventures of Rodney Roverton • Unknown
... for thirty years, and if we have a partnership right in those mines and factories, it's our business to protect them.' So I talked the boys into putting up the trocha. I tell you, George," said Grant, and the tremor of emotion strained his voice as he spoke, "it won't be long until we'll have a partnership in that trocha, just as we'll have an interest in every hammer and bolt, and ledge and vein in the Valley. It's coming, and coming fast—the Democracy of Labor. I have faith, the men and women have faith—all over ...
— In the Heart of a Fool • William Allen White
... a cord, and to the great surprise of the Egyptian, lifted it on her back. Avarice lent to that broken-down frame unexpected strength of muscles; all the nerves and fibres of the arms, the neck, the shoulders, strained to breaking, bore up under a mass of metal which would have made the most robust Nahasi porter bow down. Her brows bent, like those of an ox when the ploughshare strikes a stone, Thamar staggered out of the palace, knocking up against the walls, walking almost on all-fours, for every now ...
— The Works of Theophile Gautier, Volume 5 - The Romance of a Mummy and Egypt • Theophile Gautier
... going to spend our honeymoon in Paris," said Helene in a curiously strained voice, for it was all she could do to keep back her tears; "but now we have changed our plans! We are going to the little town ...
— The Music Master - Novelized from the Play • Charles Klein
... spot, where the stag, incapable of sustaining a more prolonged flight, had turned upon the hounds, and, in the hunter's phrase, was at bay. With his stately head bent down, his sides white with foam, his eyes strained betwixt rage and terror, the hunted animal had now in his turn become an object of intimidation to his pursuers. The hunters came up one by one, and watched an opportunity to assail him with some advantage, which, in such circumstances, ...
— Bride of Lammermoor • Sir Walter Scott
... beautiful, which carries with it nothing abrupt, nothing violent. And moreover this phenomenon, if we consider only our senses, is rather painful than agreeable, for the nerves of our sight and those of our hearing are each in their turn painfully strained, then not less violently relaxed, by the alternations of light and darkness, of the explosion of the thunder, and silence. And in spite of all these causes of displeasure, a storm is an attractive phenomenon for whomsoever is not afraid ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... reality of her piety that through all this trying season she held fast her trust in God, and kept on her way, though uncheered for a time by the joyous emotions with which she had so long been favoured. It was well that her mind, which had been overtaxed and strained by the intensity of her religious fervour, and by its unbroken continuity of introspection, should be brought into a more healthful state by this ...
— Excellent Women • Various
... Cloud, atomic physicist, sat at his desk in a strained, dull apathy. His face was a yellowish-gray white, his tendoned hands gripped rigidly the arms of his chair. His eyes, hard and lifeless, stared unseeingly past the small, three-dimensional block portrait of all that ...
— The Vortex Blaster • Edward Elmer Smith
... makes a very good report in the morning. The patient's back has been strained, and the ankle is bad enough, but good care will soon overcome that. She must lie perfectly still for ...
— Floyd Grandon's Honor • Amanda Minnie Douglas
... If he but once admitted the idea of failing, all was lost. He must believe that he could do this thing, or he surely could not. To question it was to surrender his wife; to despair was to abandon her to her fate. So, as a wrestler strains against a mighty antagonist, his will strained and tugged in supreme stress against the impalpable obstruction of space, and, fighting despair with despair, doggedly held to its purpose, and sought to keep his faculties unremittingly streaming to one end. Finally, as this tremendous effort, which made minutes ...
— At Pinney's Ranch - 1898 • Edward Bellamy
... and that desperately: the water foamed past me. I soon breasted the black, but could not head him. We both strained every nerve to be first, for we each fancied the last man would be taken. Yet we scarcely seemed to move: the ship appeared as far as ever from us. We were both powerful swimmers, and both of us swam in the French way called ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 4, September, 1850 • Various
... had cleared, serfs inside the tower strained at the windlass in obedience to the commands of their overseer, and the chain rose jerkily, to regain its ...
— Millennium • Everett B. Cole
... upon her knees and was praying desperate prayers with face upturned to heaven; but none was there to mark her now amid that silent gathering—all eyes were strained to watch those grim and silent horsemen that fronted each other, the length of the lists between; even Duke Ivo, leaning on lazy elbow, looked with glowing eye and slow-flushing cheek, ere he ...
— Beltane The Smith • Jeffery Farnol
... a little toward their side, but our silent, quick-breathing crew, braced and strained outboard, bore us off as though we had been a ...
— Traffics and Discoveries • Rudyard Kipling
... not conveniences for keeping milk sufficiently warm in cold weather, place it over the stove at once, when drawn, and give it a scalding heat, and the cream will rise in a much shorter space of time, and more plentifully. Milk should be strained and set as soon as possible after being drawn from the cow, and with the least possible agitation. The unpleasant flavor imparted to milk from the food of the cows, such as turnips or leeks, may be at once removed by adding to the milk, before straining, one eighth ...
— Soil Culture • J. H. Walden
... Parliamentary assistance. And for such aids it is likewise apparent that she received more, and that with the love of her people, than any two of her predecessors that took most; which was a fortune strained out of the subjects, through the plausibility of her comportment, and (as I would say, without offence) the prodigal distribution of her grace to all sorts of subjects; for I believe no prince living, that was so tender of honour, and so exactly stood ...
— Travels in England and Fragmenta Regalia • Paul Hentzner and Sir Robert Naunton
... cannot always overcome. At such times I have wished myself a clerk, quill-driving for twopence per page. You have at least application, and that is all that is necessary, whereas unless your lively faculties are awake and propitious, your application will do you as little good as if you strained your ...
— The Journal of Sir Walter Scott - From the Original Manuscript at Abbotsford • Walter Scott
... repeatedly demonstrated by the official documents, of both sides, strained every means to bring about a common understanding. The appeals of Sir Edward Grey for more time in the Servian ultimatum and for a council of Ambassadors were met by the Austrian and German Governments respectively with evasion. And England was the last ...
— The New York Times Current History of the European War, Vol. 1, January 9, 1915 - What Americans Say to Europe • Various
... stars. He was making no speed at all. He panted on. His heart hammered. His legs drummed with Lilliputian paces. Now he was among the village stores, all utterly black. At one point the echo of his feet chattered back at him, as if some other futile runner strained amid vast spaces ...
— Birthright - A Novel • T.S. Stribling
... were a tube, three feet and more in diameter. That tube writhed and twisted. It began to form itself into an awkward and seemingly impossible shape, while metal surfaces sliding on each other produced screams that cut through the din of the motor and dynamo. The writhing tube strained and wriggled. Then there was a queer, inaudible snap and something gave. A part of the tube quivered into nothingness. Another part hurt the ...
— The Fifth-Dimension Tube • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... biological science, goes back very far. The word Biology, used in our sense, would, it is true, have been an impossibility among them, for bios refers to the life of man and could not be applied, except in a strained or metaphorical sense, to that of other living things.[6] But the ideas we associate with the word are clearly developed in Greek philosophy and the foundations of biology are of ...
— The Legacy of Greece • Various
... overhead, blue sky and just a hint of frost, though it was not very cold. After dinner the first day in the trenches, I suddenly noticed an excitement among the English soldiers. We became excited, too, and strained ...
— Private Peat • Harold R. Peat
... became quite strained as the day wore on. Women gathered in little knots to discuss the unprecedented "nerve" of the men. By nightfall they were pretty thoroughly worked up over a matter that had mildly amused them at the outset of the day. A comparatively small proportion had cared one way or the other in the beginning. ...
— West Wind Drift • George Barr McCutcheon
... had taken many long flights, removed his goggles and smiled at the young pilot as he climbed awkwardly over the side and dropped to the ground. His head whirled, and his eyes felt strained out of his head. With fingers that trembled he undid his helmet and pushed off ...
— Battling the Clouds - or, For a Comrade's Honor • Captain Frank Cobb
... being struck with the natural air with which he arrogates supremacy in his conversation and proclamations. We never feel as if he were putting on a lordly air. In his proudest claims, he speaks from his own mind, and in native language. His style is swollen, but never strained, as if he were conscious of playing a part above his real claims. Even when he was foolish and impious enough to arrogate miraculous powers and a mission from God, his language showed that he thought there was something in his character and exploits to give a color ...
— Choice Specimens of American Literature, And Literary Reader - Being Selections from the Chief American Writers • Benj. N. Martin
... But it strained his relations with the Thesigers for the time being. The Rosalind of the "Journal" is so obviously Viola, and though he is careful to refer to her as his wife, the book reminded people that they were said to have travelled together before they were married. Her figure moves through ...
— The Belfry • May Sinclair
... dialogue the men in the cave had strained both eyes and ears to comprehend the speakers. The distance was too great for them to catch all the words, but this much was clear from the first, that one of the men wished to stay on the spot for some purpose, and ...
— It Is Never Too Late to Mend • Charles Reade
... husband who, at the far end of the room, was red in the face from the unusual exertion of trying to coax the buckle of a strap into a hole obviously out of reach. He pulled and strained till the muscles stood out on his neck and brawny arms like whipcord, and still the obstinate buckle declined to be coerced. The more it resisted, the more determined he was to make it obey. Go in it must, if sheer strength would do it. The ...
— The Mask - A Story of Love and Adventure • Arthur Hornblow
... gloomy stuff!" snapped Jimmy. Afterward he admitted that his nerves were pretty well strained. In fact that was the condition of all of them. "You're almost as bad ...
— The Khaki Boys Over the Top - Doing and Daring for Uncle Sam • Gordon Bates
... think that when the contest shall close, Cuba, with her resources strained, but unexhausted (whatever may be her political relations), will resume and continue her old commercial relations with the United States; and it is not impossible that at some day, not far distant when measured by the course of history, she will be called upon ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents: Ulysses S. Grant • James D. Richardson
... back with linement, for he had strained it bad a liftin' that piano, and I had jest got back to my washin' again (I had had to put it away to git dinner) when I heerd a knockin' again to the front door, and I pulled down my dress sleeves and went and opened it, and there ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume IV. (of X.) • Various
... but, alas! he was poor, and, what was worse, in debt; "his poverty, but not his will, consented." He was reinstated; but though prodigiously improved as a debater, he felt that he had not advanced as a public man. His ambition inflamed by his discontent, he had, since his return to office, strained every nerve to strengthen his position. He met the sarcasms on his poverty by greatly increasing his expenditure, and by advertising everywhere his engagement to an heiress whose fortune, great as it was, he easily ...
— Alice, or The Mysteries, Book III • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... feeling horribly frightened. She strained her ears in vain for a sound. The whole house seemed wrapped in a grave-like quiet. The smile had never left Mr. Schulz's face. But it was a cruel, wolfish grin without a ray of kindliness in it. The girl felt ...
— The Yellow Streak • Williams, Valentine
... into his arms and kissed her on the cheek twice, and again on the mouth, as, crimson, breathless, she strained away from him. ...
— The Danger Mark • Robert W. Chambers
... Loutherbourg was decidedly an innovator and reformer. He was the first to use set-scenes, and what are technically known as 'raking pieces.' Before his time the back scene was invariably one large 'flat' of strained canvas extending the whole breadth and height of the stage. He also invented transparent scenes, introducing representations of moonlight, sunshine, fire, volcanoes, etc., and effects of colour ...
— Art in England - Notes and Studies • Dutton Cook
... started, and looking up, beheld the round black head of Sam just above them. His white eyes strained half out of their orbits; his white teeth chattering, and his whole ...
— Tales of a Traveller • Washington Irving
... after breakfast. He never dreamed of the relief it was to her not to have him come, as he lay flushed and heated upon his pillow, the veins upon his forehead swelling with their pressure of hot blood, and his ear strained to catch the first sound of the servant's returning step. Ethelyn would either come herself to see him, or send some cheerful message, he was sure. How, then, was he disappointed to find his own note returned, with the assurance that "it ...
— Ethelyn's Mistake • Mary Jane Holmes
... husband's heart was established for life, independent of any effort to retain it. She had not realised that love is a treasure which must needs be guarded with jealous care, that the delicate cord may be strained so thin that a moment may come when it reaches breaking-point. That moment had not come yet; surely, surely, it could not have come, ...
— The Love Affairs of Pixie • Mrs George de Horne Vaizey
... happy now, and her large eyes strained through the lantern of the tower to catch sight of the ship. She had not long to wait. Between the reef and the long stretch of eastern shore, a red light pulsed upon a ...
— Annette, The Metis Spy • Joseph Edmund Collins
... neighboring town had just completed a beautiful new church building with a high spire, projecting far above any other building in the town. When it was nearing completion, the question arose, should they put on a lightning-rod. The great church itself had strained their financial resources, and one party in the board were of the opinion that they should avoid this unnecessary expense, supporting their economic attitude by the argument that, to put on a lightning-rod, would argue a lack of trust in Providence. Finally, after ...
— Preventable Diseases • Woods Hutchinson
... oxen strained, the lumbering waggons groaned as they moved away, and while the Scotch band passed over the Zuurbergen range and headed in the direction of the Winterberg mountains, their English friends spread themselves over the ...
— The Settler and the Savage • R.M. Ballantyne
... of the hounds. The uneasy gleam of those eyes was turned on him so fixedly that, after receiving it for fully a minute, during which he examined the singular sight, he felt like a bird at which a setter points; a feverish tumult rose in his soul, but he quickly repressed it. The two faces, strained and suspicious, were doubtless those of Cornelius ...
— Maitre Cornelius • Honore de Balzac
... cannot pretend to say. In love with lush, sensuous melody, attracted by the gorgeous pyrotechnical effects in Berlioz and Liszt and the pomposities of Meyerbeer, this Russian, who began study too late and being too lazy to work hard, manufactured a number of symphonic poems. To them he gave strained, fantastic names—names meaningless and pretty—and, as he was short-winded contrapuntally, he wrote his so-called instrumental poems shorter than Liszt's. He had no symphonic talent, he substituted Italian tunes for dignified themes, and when the development ...
— Old Fogy - His Musical Opinions and Grotesques • James Huneker
... not be! Whom should he be likely to meet with, here, miles and miles away from Wilton. He strained his eyes. The figure came nearer, was just passing with a half-careless look at the show. A brave, stern face,—a sad, earnest face—a stout, manly form. Harry looked again eagerly through the darkening shadows ...
— Wilton School - or, Harry Campbell's Revenge • Fred E. Weatherly
... westward, and far from any coast at all. Indeed, they had no hope left, nor any expectation but to founder, when they sighted the island; and so came by God's blessing to the harbour which, in their joy, they named Porto Santo. There, finding their caravels strained beyond their means to repair for a long voyage, and deeming that this discovery well outweighed their first purpose, they stayed but a sufficient time to explore the island, and so put back for Lagos. But their good fortune was not yet at an end: for off the Barbary coasts they ...
— The Laird's Luck • Arthur Quiller-Couch
... when expectation had been strained almost to breaking point, it was set at rest. The doors were thrown open, and, lightly leaning on Colonel Estcourt's arm, appeared Mrs Jefferson's much talked of, ...
— The Mystery of a Turkish Bath • E.M. Gollan (AKA Rita)
... Eskimos, girls and boys who have been with us from the start. God let me live to see the blessed day that brings good news once more from home." His prayer was heard. The next summer brought word that the mission was to be continued, partly because Egede had strained every nerve to send home much blubber and many skins. But it was as a glimpse of the sun from behind dark clouds. His greatest trials trod ...
— Hero Tales of the Far North • Jacob A. Riis
... Europe, in the place of the junior partner, who was sick, and might never get well. That he should stay away a year, but when he came back, he was sure the old fellow would make him a partner, and then—and he strained her to his heart as he said it—'then I will make you my little wife, Fanny, and take you to Boston, and you shall be a fine lady—as fine a lady as Kate Russell, the old man's daughter.' And again he danced and sung, and again she wept, but this ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2, No 3, September, 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various
... failed to grasp his meaning in some one of his instructions. He could put the whole matter in some absolutely new light—take it from an utterly different point of view; so that, while giving another chance to the slow-witted, he did not keep his whole class waiting. The quality of teaching is not strained. It is doubtful if it is capable of being learnt, if not in the first instance, in some measure, innate. Lying dormant in a man's being—even if, perhaps, its presence is unrecognized by its owner—it can certainly be developed by ...
— Memoir and Letters of Francis W. Newman • Giberne Sieveking
... Bed-chamber, noble ladies also, no doubt, but by the time the superb procession reached them, with the gathering up of the whole in Goldsticks, Captains of the Royal Archers, of the Yeomen of the Guard, of the Gentlemen-at-Arms, though pages and coronets still abounded, the strained attention could take in no more accessories, but was fain to return to the principal figure in the pageant, and dwell ...
— Life of Her Most Gracious Majesty the Queen V.1. • Sarah Tytler
... arm round his wife's waist, and they both strained their eyes to see what the captain was pointing out. As last they saw some pointed rocks that the boat rounded before entering a large, calm bay, surrounded by high mountains, whose steep sides looked as though they ...
— The works of Guy de Maupassant, Vol. 5 (of 8) - Une Vie and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant 1850-1893
... above the summit of the rock, and for a moment covered him. A great shout went up from the rowers beside me. They strained in every nerve to reach him; and the roll of a fresh swell of water lifted the boat farther than their uttermost effort could achieve, but lifted her backward, backward to ...
— Wisdom, Wit, and Pathos of Ouida - Selected from the Works of Ouida • Ouida
... uneasily aware that much of the carefree confidence of the last hour had deserted him. In a more normal state of mind again he became prey to tension once more, a pounding heart and dry mouth recalling mercilessly the essential frailties of his kind. So, with aching neck and burning eyes he strained for a clear view past the length of ...
— Far from Home • J.A. Taylor
... would be instantly covered with a powdery scum that sank slowly and made way for more. The scum was absolutely insoluble, and it is a strange thing, seeing the instant effect of the gas, that one could drink without hurt the water from which it had been strained. The vapour did not diffuse as a true gas would do. It hung together in banks, flowing sluggishly down the slope of the land and driving reluctantly before the wind, and very slowly it combined with the mist and moisture of the air, and sank to the earth in ...
— The War of the Worlds • H. G. Wells
... to the only harbour of refuge between the Downs and the Moray Firth, it breathed abroad along the whole coast an atmosphere of terror and perplexity; and no ship sailed that part of the North Sea at night, but what the ears of those on board would be strained to catch the roaring of the seas on ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 16 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Liberals in other constituencies? What would be the relations between the Liberal and Labour parties if in a constituency now represented by a Labour member, a Liberal candidate, with the aid of Conservative votes, displaced him? These strained relations would not only exist within the House of Commons itself, but also and perhaps in a more pronounced form in the constituencies themselves. Such conditions would not only invite the sarcasm of all critics of democracy, ...
— Proportional Representation - A Study in Methods of Election • John H. Humphreys
... curious phenomenon I have witnessed many times since. Even in the morning choir, when every little throat seems strained in emulation, if the mocking-bird breathes forth in one of its mad, bewildered, and bewildering extravaganzas, the other birds pause almost invariably, and remain silent until his song is done. This, I assure you, is no figment ...
— Choice Specimens of American Literature, And Literary Reader - Being Selections from the Chief American Writers • Benj. N. Martin
... York. I was much excited by what had happened, and if I had ever been used to kick or rear I am sure I should have done it then; but I never had, and there I stood, angry, sore in my leg, my head still strained up to the terret on the saddle, and no power to get it down. I was very miserable, and felt much inclined to kick the first person who came ...
— Black Beauty, Young Folks' Edition • Anna Sewell
... said smiling. "So can any other fool!" Then, after a minute of rather strained silence: ...
— King—of the Khyber Rifles • Talbot Mundy
... artilleryman start as if he had been shot; he strained his blazing eyes to follow the receding shape. Goliah Steinberg, the journeyman butcher, the man who had set him and his father by the ears, who had stolen from him his Silvine; the whole base, dirty, miserable story, ...
— The Downfall • Emile Zola
... higher from the base of the ship and thus more insecure, strained and creaked; so we went to the lower decks. By this time the engines had been reversed, and I could feel the ship backing off. Officers and stewards ran through the corridors, shouting for all to be calm, that there was no danger. We were warned, however, ...
— Sinking of the Titanic - and Great Sea Disasters • Various
... face turned on the pillow, bringing her head against his shoulder. Was it the magnet of his touch drawing her unconsciously toward him, or merely the renewal of strength, attested already by the quickened throb of the pulse that beat under his clasp? By degrees her breathing became audible to his strained ear, and once a sigh, such as escapes a tired child, told that nature was rallying her physical forces, and that the tide was turning. Treacherous to his plighted troth, and to the trusting woman whom he had assiduously wooed and ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... to do was to hide in the Bad Lands and pick off their pursuers. Cavalry could only go there in single file. Ten Indians could hold the narrow, tortuous trail against ten hundred troops. Relations were strained between Mac and the military anyhow. Everybody knew by this time that he had lied about Boynton and Davies, and had striven to make it appear, and with no little success, too, so far as Eastern newspapers were concerned, that all the turbulence ...
— Under Fire • Charles King
... however, necessary, if we would enjoy Chaucer, Dante, and Shakespeare, to obtain some notion of that system of the universe from which they drew so many of their analogies. The symbolism of Dante appears to us unnaturally strained until we know that the science of his ...
— Mediaeval Lore from Bartholomew Anglicus • Robert Steele
... corrupted or alloyed, if there was such a revelation it could be no other than the Bible;—and his acceptance of the whole scheme of Christianity now hung upon the turn of a hair. Yet he could not resolve himself. He balanced the counter-doubts and arguments, on one side and on the other, and strained his mind to the task;—he could not weigh them nicely enough. He was in a maze; and seeking to clear and calm his judgment that he might see the way out, it was in vain that he tried to shake his dizzied head from the effect of the turns it had made. By dint of anxiety to ...
— Queechy • Susan Warner
... thunder-cloud had not been observed by any but Andrew, and it had already climbed half-way to the zenith, blotting out a third of the firmament. This inverted thunder-bolt produced a startling effect upon the over-strained nerves of the crowd. Some cried out with terror, some sobbed with hysterical agony, some shouted in triumph, and it was generally believed that Virginia Waters, who died a maniac many years afterward, lost her reason at that moment. Bill Day ceased his mocking, ...
— The End Of The World - A Love Story • Edward Eggleston
... dawn before we were abed, but I for one had no sleep, being strained to such a pitch of rapture and pain by what I had discovered. The will I had not, to take the joy which I seemed to see before me like some brimming cup of the gods, but not yet, in the first surprise of knowing it ...
— The Heart's Highway - A Romance of Virginia in the Seventeeth Century • Mary E. Wilkins
... all at once, while she struggled in vain to repress an inclination to prance, and never failed to give a vigorous tweak to Wang Kum's pigtail, as she passed him. The relation between the two servants was unique, and, at times, somewhat strained. Although Wang Kum, left to himself, would have been the most peaceable of mortals, Janey persisted in treating him as an embodied joke, and lost no opportunity to tease and torment him, until he came to regard her with a strange ...
— In Blue Creek Canon • Anna Chapin Ray
... the doom that is closing on us both has already changed and crushed him. Half an hour from now, when I shall again and for ever re-indue that hated personality, I know how I shall sit shuddering and weeping in my chair, or continue, with the most strained and fearstruck ecstasy of listening, to pace up and down this room (my last earthly refuge) and give ear to every sound of menace. Will Hyde die upon the scaffold? or will he find the courage to release himself ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 5 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... not to overlook our many advantages and comforts, but by looking at both good and bad to feel that the good preponderate. When our eyes are dazzled with things too bright we turn them away, and ease them by looking at flowers or grass, while we keep the eyes of our mind strained on disagreeable things, and force them to dwell on bitter ideas, well-nigh tearing them away by force from the consideration of pleasanter things. And yet one might apply here, not unaptly, what was said to the man ...
— Plutarch's Morals • Plutarch
... become relaxed with severe labour, its bolts had been loosened, its rubbing surfaces, despite the oil poured so liberally on them by Will Garvie, had become heated. Some of them, unequally expanded, strained and twisted; its grate-bars and fire-box had become choked with "clinkers," and its ...
— The Iron Horse • R.M. Ballantyne
... Take of the roots of goldenrod, six ounces or in summer, two large handfuls of the roots and branches together, and boil them in two quarts of water to one quart, to which also may be added, a little hoarhound and sassafras; to this decoction after it is strained, add a glass of rum or brandy, and sweeten with sugar for ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Vol. I. Jan. 1916 • Various
... her dagger. Her eyes went wide in horror. The priestesses, her votaresses, screamed and fled madly toward the exits. The priests roared out their rage and terror according to the temper of their courage. Werper strained his neck about to catch a sight of the cause of their panic, and when, at last he saw it, he too went cold in dread, for what his eyes beheld was the figure of a huge lion standing in the center of the temple, and already a single victim lay mangled ...
— Tarzan and the Jewels of Opar • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... John Morley. If on any day it were seen that either of these two men had left the side of their leader, and was separated from him by several others, the rumour would run like wildfire through the House of Commons that the relations of the Premier and one of his chief lieutenants were strained. ...
— Sketches In The House (1893) • T. P. O'Connor
... inconsiderable revenue, at the beginning of his reign, he was annually enabled to make great savings. He thus preserved, towards the end of it, his people in peace, tranquillity, and order; and though he was an arbitrary prince, he never strained his revenue to such a degree as to lose their affections while he filled his exchequer. Such appears to have been the true character of Sujah Dowlah: your Lordships have heard what is the character which the prisoner at your ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. XI. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... Commissioner has been trying by a strained exercise of his prerogative to make me spend this day with the Bishop, and not with the Archdeacon; but I disregard the Press Commissioner; I make light of him; I treat his authority as a joke. What authority has a pump? Is a pump an analyst ...
— Twenty-One Days in India; and, the Teapot Series • George Robert Aberigh-Mackay
... Roger's the Doctor slipped away to his study for a quiet hour with a book. His lamp was barely lighted and the book upon his knee when the door opened and Jim stood before him, his face so white and strained that the Doctor laid aside his book, thinking instantly, of course, that here again ...
— When the Yule Log Burns - A Christmas Story • Leona Dalrymple
... emotions should in the heart of Nigel Bruce obtain that ascendency, which to sensitive minds must become pain. Had it been a night of calm and holy stillness, he would in all probability have felt its soothing effect; but as it was, every pulse throbbed and every nerve was strained 'neath his strong sense of the sublime. He could not be said to think, although he had struggled long and fiercely to compose his mind for those devotional exercises he deemed most fitted for the hour. Feeling alone ...
— The Days of Bruce Vol 1 - A Story from Scottish History • Grace Aguilar
... every State, threatens none of those geographical schisms which go immediately to a separation. The line of division now is the preservation of State rights as reserved in the constitution, or by strained constructions of that instrument, to merge all into a consolidated government. The tories are for strengthening the executive and General Government; the whigs cherish the representative branch, and the rights reserved by the States, as the bulwark ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... He strained his eyes to watch something which appeared to be crawling along among the blocks of stone close by, but he could not be sure ...
— Syd Belton - The Boy who would not go to Sea • George Manville Fenn
... so vile that on the earth doth live But to the earth some special good doth give; Nor nought so good but strained from that fair use, Revolts from true birth, stumbling on abuse: Virtue itself turns vice being misapplied, And vice sometimes by action ...
— The Truth About Woman • C. Gasquoine Hartley
... [2] Amydoun. "Fine wheat flour steeped in water, strained and let stand to settle, then drained and dried in the sun; used for bread or in broths." Cotgrave. Used in No. 68 for colouring white. [3] ...
— The Forme of Cury • Samuel Pegge
... than the plague was before him. In the course of his studies he found himself compelled to take the position that the "Song of Solomon" was an ancient love poem, and that the traditional interpretation of it as a revelation of the true relation between Christ and the Church was a strained and unnatural interpretation. He also felt that as a scholar he could not with intellectual honesty agree with the statement in the Catechism that "Christ descended into Hell." Calvin challenged both ...
— Spiritual Reformers in the 16th & 17th Centuries • Rufus M. Jones
... knife-edge of the balance shall be the standard of truthfulness, the professionally encouraging manner, the "stimulating" manner, the manner of those whose ambition is to be "an earnest teacher," the strained tone of one whose ideal is to to be overworked, the kindergarten manner, scientifically "awakening," giving the call of the decoy-duck, confidentially inviting co operation and revealing secrets—these are types, ...
— The Education of Catholic Girls • Janet Erskine Stuart
... adjusted their oars, and the coxswain pushed off. Having adjusted the rudder-lines, Trix affixed the megaphone, and lifted her hand. The eight strained forward, and the coxswain began to ...
— Ruth Fielding At College - or The Missing Examination Papers • Alice B. Emerson
... quail. I am the Head—and thereby hangs a tale! This big blue paper, ruled in many a column, Gives rise to some misgivings sad and solemn. Relation to that Head? That Head's buzz-brained, And its "relations" are—just now—"much strained." Citizen-duty I've no wish to shirk, But would the State do its own dirty work— (My daughters swear 'tis dirty). I'd be grateful. Instructions? Yes! Imperative and fateful! But, oh! I wish they would "instruct" me how To tell the truth without a family row. "Best of my knowledge and belief"! ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 100, April 11, 1891 • Various
... high for her. Searching about the littered yard she found a square tin, such as the ranchers use to carry coal-oil. Mounting this she was able to bring her face to the bars. The window was open for ventilation, and she strained her ear, but at first could hear nothing for the tumultous beating of her own heart. But at length she seemed to catch the sound of regular breathing ...
— The Homesteaders - A Novel of the Canadian West • Robert J. C. Stead
... meeting," Bertram said, and his voice was cordial, though rather strained. Then he turned to his wife. "Blanche, ...
— Blake's Burden • Harold Bindloss
... good as his word, and went down without an effort, his water-soaked clothing aiding him to sink. He caught hold of the rock and the roots and strained his eyes in all directions. Then the rock began to move once more, and he had to get out of the way just as ...
— On the Trail of Pontiac • Edward Stratemeyer
... very moment the smoke rising under the slab of the chimney bent itself with a peculiar gracefulness, and formed rotundities quite likely to be taken for well-arched loins by a rather strangely strained imagination. Therefore I did not tell an absolute lie by saying ...
— The Queen Pedauque • Anatole France
... up. He saw the parlour, the ground glass of the door, the tumblers and bottles on the table, the sharp features and strained, farcical eyes of Malkiel framed in the matted, curling hair. Then all was not over yet. There was something still in store for him. He sat up, pushed the creaming four-shilling foam out of his sight, turned to his interlocutor, and with a great ...
— The Prophet of Berkeley Square • Robert Hichens
... there were moments following the repulse of some great effort when the energy of the assailants flagged and there was a lull in the storm of sound made by human voices and the clatter of arms. Then the men on the walls would look with strained attention on the cavalry battle in the plain, would follow the fortunes of the king with every alternation of joy or fear, and shout advice or exhortation as though their voices could reach their distant friends.[1041] Marius, who conducted ...
— A History of Rome, Vol 1 - During the late Republic and early Principate • A H.J. Greenidge
... to be able to bestow a play on myself, I do not remember that I saw so many by half of the ordinary 'prentices and mean people in the pit at 2s. 6d. a-piece as now; I going for several years no higher than the 12d. and then the 18d. places, though, I strained hard to go in then when I did: so much the vanity and prodigality of the age is to be observed in this particular. Thence I to White Hall, and there walked up and down the house a while, and do hear nothing of anything done further in this ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys
... said Carlton, "is to make the best of things, not the worst. Do keep this in mind; be on your guard against a strained and morbid view of things. Be cheerful, be natural, ...
— Loss and Gain - The Story of a Convert • John Henry Newman
... youth could not make out if the figure was a man or an animal. He strained his eyes and then made out the form of ...
— Dave Porter in the Gold Fields - The Search for the Landslide Mine • Edward Stratemeyer
... Psalms, who sang in a strange and weird fashion, and brought discredit on their office. Indeed, the clergy were not always above suspicion in the matter of reading, and even now they have their detractors, who assert that it is often impossible to hear what they say, that they read in a strained unnatural voice, and are generally unintelligible. At any rate, modern clergy are not so deficient in education as they were in the early years of Queen Elizabeth, when, as Fuller states in his Triple Reconciler, they were commanded ...
— The Parish Clerk (1907) • Peter Hampson Ditchfield
... in air; Catch him though, with special care Lest his little back be strained, Lest his little joints be sprained, Lest his bones ...
— Mother Truth's Melodies - Common Sense For Children • Mrs. E. P. Miller
... strengthened the pretexts of indolence: when men were reduced from a plentiful allowance, to a weekly ration, which scarcely sufficed to preserve existence; when the storehouses were almost empty of provisions, and the boundless ocean presented no object of relief to the aching and strained eyes of the sufferers; and when the busy mind painted to itself the dangers, inseparable from a voyage of such length, which might intervene to delay the arrival of succours, until horror and wretchedness should have been heightened to the utmost; no inclination ...
— The Present Picture of New South Wales (1811) • David Dickinson Mann
... nature to the utmost of his power, as we see more especially in one of the archers, who, bending towards the ground, and resting his bow against his breast, is employing all his force to prepare it for action; the veins are swelling, the muscles strained, and the man holds his breath as he applies all his strength to the effort. All the other figures in the diversity of their attitudes clearly prove the artist's ability and the labour he has bestowed ...
— Six Centuries of Painting • Randall Davies
... the boy Cotton was fourteen, he received a round dozen of canings for lounging about among the shipping. The thirteenth caning was one too many. It was more severe than the others, and it cracked the long-strained situation. The caning occurred in his father's office, after hours, one June night. The Thankful was booked to sail, the next morning at eight. When, at eight-ten, it slipped down the harbor, it bore away as cabin-boy and general ...
— The Dominant Strain • Anna Chapin Ray
... from Monmouth.) We believe a Greek at all times against an Indian; forgetting that the Greeks themselves, when they got to India, were astounded at the truthfulness of the people they found there. Such strained avoidance of the natural lie,—the harmless, necessary lie that came so trippingly to a Greek tongue,—seemed to them extraordinary.—So too our critics naturally set out from the position that the Indian Drama ...
— The Crest-Wave of Evolution • Kenneth Morris
... somethin' there on the ground, Jack. Looky yonder, honey, an' sure ye can't miss the same, by the token," Jimmy presently said, in a low, strained voice, as he pointed a ...
— Motor Boat Boys Down the Coast - or Through Storm and Stress to Florida • Louis Arundel
... of a versified tale. It is saved from ruin by subtlety of intellect, striking dramatic verisimilitude, an extraordinary vigour, and occasional lines of real poetry. Retrospectively, apart from the interest, often strained to the utmost, most readers, I fancy, will recall with lingering pleasure only the opening of "The Other Half Rome," the description of Pompilia, "with the patient brow and lamentable smile," with flower-like ...
— Life of Robert Browning • William Sharp
... swiftly on toward the wider reaches of the lake, and the Onondaga never relaxed his watchfulness, for an instant. He was poised in the canoe, every nerve and muscle ready to leap in a second into activity, while his ears were strained for the sounds of paddles or oars. Now he relied, as often before, more upon hearing than sight. Presently a sound came, and it was that of oars. A boat parted the wall of dusk and he saw that it contained both French and Indians, eight in all, the warriors uttering a shout ...
— The Masters of the Peaks - A Story of the Great North Woods • Joseph A. Altsheler
... health has been strained to breaking, and her life darkened, by the laying on her shoulders of a burden of responsibility that never ought to have been placed there; and many a mother has been hindered from using such powers as God has given ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 92, June, 1865 • Various
... woman did not stir. Then a strange, inarticulate cry was smothered in her throat. Swiftly, all but desperately, she stumbled blindly forward, although her eyes were shining with the enchantment of his presence; close to him she came, flung her arms around his broad chest, and strained him to her with the abandon of a ...
— A Breath of Prairie and other stories • Will Lillibridge
... streaks of dawn found us still waiting, our ears strained for the hum of an airplane motor. But hardly had the golden rim of the sun appeared over the horizon when it came. It came from the east—straight out of the golden glory of the sun. Nearer and nearer ...
— The Floating Island of Madness • Jason Kirby
... Hampden, not greatly interested in what they felt was some new strained humor on Yancey's part, pushed back from the table and started for the door, their objective being the French town of Is ...
— Aces Up • Covington Clarke
... Beebe, John D. Townsend, and other Tammany talkers, who had a special aptitude for knockdown personalities which the metropolitan side of a Democratic convention never failed to understand. Their loud voices, elementary arguments, and simple quotations neither strained the ears nor puzzled the heads of the audience, while their jibes and jokes, unmistakable in meaning, sounded familiar and friendly. Townsend, a lawyer of some prominence and counsel for Kelly, was an effective and somewhat overbearing ...
— A Political History of the State of New York, Volumes 1-3 • DeAlva Stanwood Alexander
... a long, long time that night listening with strained ears to the subdued noises in the house. She heard Dr Martin come and go away again, his boots creaking softly on each stair; she heard Aunt Hannah's voice, mysterious and low, wishing him good-night, and after that the shutting of the door. Then a great stillness seemed to fall over ...
— Susan - A Story for Children • Amy Walton
... on leave, and I, fearing bloodshed, went up to the officer and explained who they were and why they had come. He told me that there had been a mutiny in Turin that summer and relations between the British and Italians were very much strained, owing to the action of German agents. He said he had been living on the top of a volcano for the past three months, and was afraid to allow any large body of troops to go about the town lest there ...
— The Great War As I Saw It • Frederick George Scott
... used to offer for sale venison, fish, and maple sugar, but the line was always drawn on the latter, for it was commonly reported that they strained the sap through their blankets. And you should have seen their blankets! About 1846 a company of civilized Oneidas, some of whom my father had known in the East, camped near by and manufactured a large number of handsome and serviceable baskets. From wild berries ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 5 • Charles Sylvester
... indeed a model of such an instrument. The oils which are thus collected are contaminated with watery extracts, which exudes at the same time, and from which it has to be separated; this it does by itself in a measure, by standing in a quiet place, and it is then poured off and strained. ...
— The Art of Perfumery - And Methods of Obtaining the Odors of Plants • G. W. Septimus Piesse
... coming along the road, and then the noise of cavalry jingling and clattering into the inn yard. A horse whinnied, the old horse in the stable whinnied in answer. A curt voice called to the men to dismount, and for some one to hold the horses. I strained my ears to hear any further words, but some one banging on a door (I guessed it to be the inn door) drowned ...
— Jim Davis • John Masefield
... far as 1843. In 1846 Messrs. Boutron and Fremy, in a Memoir on lactic fermentation, published in the Annales de Chimie et de Physique, strained the conclusions deducible from it to a most unjustifiable extent. They asserted that one and the same nitrogenous substance might undergo various modifications in contact with air, so as to become successively alcoholic, lactic, butyric, and other ferments. There is nothing ...
— The Harvard Classics Volume 38 - Scientific Papers (Physiology, Medicine, Surgery, Geology) • Various
... should go to Rome together with those of Venice, Naples, and Florence; but Piero de' Medici, whose vanity made him wish to send an embassy in his own name, contrived that Lodovico's proposal should be rejected both by Florence and the King of Naples. So strained was the situation of Italian affairs that Lodovico saw in this repulse a menace to his own usurped authority. Feeling himself isolated among the princes of his country, rebuffed by the Medici, and coldly treated by the King of Naples, he turned in his anxiety to France, and advised the young king, ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Second Series • John Addington Symonds
... MACQUARIE had not yet made a nearer acquaintance with the shores of Auckland. The wind was fair, nevertheless, and blew steadily from the southwest; but the currents were against the ship's course, and she scarcely made any way. The heavy, lumpy sea strained her cordage, her timbers creaked, and she labored painfully in the trough of the sea. Her standing rigging was so out of order that it allowed play to the masts, which were violently shaken at every ...
— In Search of the Castaways • Jules Verne
... that it was quite possible to live comfortably, even while wild war was blustering and raging without—that weak, frail human nature, refused to be ever strained, ever excited, in the expectation of great events. In the course of these three fearful years, even the saddest had learned again to laugh, jest, and be gay, in spite of death and defeat. They loved their fatherland—they shouted loudly ...
— Frederick The Great and His Family • L. Muhlbach
... precious liquid secured, the vessel moved away, sluggishly now because of its prodigious load. In their quarters in the fourth section the three Terrestrials, who had watched with strained attention the downfall and absorption of the planetoid, stared at each other with drawn ...
— Triplanetary • Edward Elmer Smith
... permitting, for several weeks before Midwinter's Day. Thus the drivers gained experience, while the animals, with a wholesome dread of the whip, became more responsive to commands. Eagerly the huskies strained at their traces with excited yelps. The heavily laden sledges would break out and start off with increasing speed over the rough ice. The drivers, running at full speed, jumped on the racing loads—Mertz in the lead shouting some quaint yodel song; Ninnis, ...
— The Home of the Blizzard • Douglas Mawson
... donors. Togo is working with donors to write a Poverty Reduction and Growth Facility (PRGF) that could eventually lead to a debt reduction plan. Economic growth remains marginal due to declining cotton production, underinvestment in phosphate mining, and strained ...
— The 2008 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... credible enough. The final scene of the mother's death is stamped on the reader's imagination by the writer's power of giving intense significance not only to the speech but to slight movements of the actors, so that the mental picture becomes almost objective, while the strained expectation of the crowd makes itself felt by the force ...
— Studies in Literature and History • Sir Alfred Comyn Lyall
... strained mast should quiver as a reed, and the rent canvas fluttering strew the gale, still must I on; for I am as a weed flung from the rocks on Ocean's foam to sail, where'er secession breeds, or treason's works prevail,'"—added ...
— The Drummer Boy • John Trowbridge
... clothing rustled loud in the strained silence as he turned to the screen behind him. For some obscure reason the perfume about him, flowers of tsin-tsin, seemed to grow ...
— The Affair of the Brains • Anthony Gilmore
... the middle of the night by the violent flapping of her chamber door. Startled, she sat bolt upright and strained her eyes to pierce the mysterious darkness. Aunt Fanny, on her bed of grass, stirred convulsively, but did not awake. The blackness of the strange chamber was broken ever and anon by faint flashes of light from without, ...
— Beverly of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... her hands behind her; but all the knots held good! She writhed her hands till her fingers were wet with sweat or blood! They stretched and strained in the darkness, and the hours crawled by like years, Till, now, on the stroke of midnight, Cold, on the stroke of midnight, The tip of one finger touched it! The trigger at least ...
— Collected Poems - Volume One (of 2) • Alfred Noyes
... doubt its authenticity: "one perceives," writes Cartier, "his religious conception, and desire to follow his model, but the whole composition lacks order and space, the figures are heavy, attitudes embarrassed, proportions short, outlines coarse and the whole painting is strained."[17] ...
— Fra Angelico • J. B. Supino
... Vince patted and stuffed the woollen jersey as tightly as he could into the place where the water rushed up, Mike sat fast, till with a rush they glided by the dangerous rock, and the boy strained his eyes to catch the ...
— Cormorant Crag - A Tale of the Smuggling Days • George Manville Fenn
... besides sitting still, before he commenced work, until the slight dust caused by his entrance had settled. I have read somewhere that his paintings are improved by being viewed through a magnifying glass. He strained his eyes so badly with the extra finishing, that he was forced to wear spectacles before he was thirty. At forty he could scarcely see to paint, and he couldn't find a pair of glasses anywhere that would help his sight. At last, a poor old ...
— Hans Brinker - or The Silver Skates • Mary Mapes Dodge
... silently to Miss Taylor. Mary Taylor was beside herself with impatient anger—and anger intensified by a conviction of utter helplessness to cope with any strained or unusual situations between herself ...
— The Quest of the Silver Fleece - A Novel • W. E. B. Du Bois
... approached any spot of very especial difficulty the trumpets sounded the charge, which re-echoed, with sublime reverberations, from pinnacle to pinnacle of rock and ice. Animated by these bugle notes the soldiers strained every nerve as if rushing upon the foe. Napoleon offered to these bands the same reward which he had promised to the peasants. But to a man, they refused the gold. They had imbibed the spirit of their chief, his enthusiasm, and his proud superiority to all mercenary ...
— Napoleon Bonaparte • John S. C. Abbott
... himself on his hind legs and commenced gnawing vigorously at the socket-hole. The position was a terribly strained one, and time after time his teeth slipped and met with a scrunching jar upon ...
— "Wee Tim'rous Beasties" - Studies of Animal life and Character • Douglas English
... been back with prisoners. The church had been turned into a hospital. It was full of wounded, and many were laid on the ground outside. A few rods past the church we lay down to sleep. There came a reaction after the excitement of the day. Nerves, strained to their utmost tension for hours, relaxed, and seemed to tingle with the pain of weariness. The jarring noises of battle were reproduced as the senses glided through that strange interval between waking and sleeping, ...
— In The Ranks - From the Wilderness to Appomattox Court House • R. E. McBride
... to make my cheese, I had a right to stay in the house. Cousin Lydia let me look on, and see it all done. First, I picked the pigweed and tansy, or how could she have made the cheese? Then she strained some milk into a pan, and squeezed the green juices through a thin cloth. After that she put in a little rennet with ...
— Aunt Madge's Story • Sophie May
... tureen; thereupon were poured instantly three pints of pale old Cognac; and these were left to steep, without admixture, until Tim Matlock made his entrance with the cold, strong, green tea; two quarts of this, strained clear, were added to the brandy, and ...
— Warwick Woodlands - Things as they Were There Twenty Years Ago • Henry William Herbert (AKA Frank Forester)
... for thou hast striven with God and with men, and hast prevailed." Jacob called the place Peniel, "for," said he, "I have seen God face to face, and my life is preserved." The hollow of his thigh was "strained as he wrestled with him," and he became permanently lame.* Immediately after the struggle he met Esau, and endeavoured to appease him by his humility, building a house for him, and providing booths for his cattle, so as ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 4 (of 12) • G. Maspero |
