"Unstrung" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... on every side. There were only six men, all told now, including Folsom (of course not counting Hal, who was defenseless), altogether too small a number to successfully protect so large a knot of buildings against an insidious and powerful foe, and even of these six there were two who seemed so unstrung by tidings of the massacre ...
— Warrior Gap - A Story of the Sioux Outbreak of '68. • Charles King
... morrow, as she held Mrs. Mayo's hand. "It—it was your happiness," she said; "I was unstrung. I couldn't listen to it. ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... in life and death simultaneously. That these trials surpassed any that had hitherto ruffled the noiseless tenor of our way was a truism. But coming at a moment when our nerves were sufficiently unstrung by the dearth of tonics, they were doubly enervating. Stomachal grievances were forgotten, and few ventured to desert the imaginary security of their homes to face the risks the redress of grievances would entail. Thus did the hours creep on until darkness ...
— The Siege of Kimberley • T. Phelan
... present at the speech the night before. Even she, bred amid hardships and dangers, was forced to admit that her nerves were somewhat unstrung, and she rested quietly in a warm room at the hotel. Harley knocked once on her door, and received the reply that she was all right. Then he turned away and went slowly down the hall, thoughtful, and, for the first time in many days, thoroughly understanding ...
— The Candidate - A Political Romance • Joseph Alexander Altsheler
... utterly undone. And then, in the terrible loneliness of her room, with the darkness on the world and round her bed and at her heart, she wept—terrible, tearless sobbing that left her in the morning weak, unstrung, utterly ...
— The Wooden Horse • Hugh Walpole
... mad, but the mixed excitement and terror of her position as she was waiting her doom, joined to her fears, her doubts, and, worse than all, her certainties as to her condition in the sight of God, had almost unstrung her mind. She had almost come to believe that the world was at its end, and that the punishment of which she had heard so much was already upon her. "If this is to be a doom for ever," she said to herself, "the God I have striven to love is very cruel." But then there ...
— Linda Tressel • Anthony Trollope
... to the pen of a man who naturally wished to find some extenuation for himself: "I doubt the power of man being equal to even imagine how wretched I felt. No language can describe my feelings. My position was painful, trying, and awful; my brain seemed to be on fire; my nerves were for a moment unstrung; humanity was overpowering as I thought of the cruel, unmanly part that I was acting. Tears of bitter anguish fell in streams from my eyes; my tongue refused its office; my faculties were dormant, stupefied and deadened by grief. ...
— The Story of the Mormons: • William Alexander Linn
... Hartel on June 12, 1799, he says: "The world daily pays me many compliments, even on the fire of my last works; but no one could believe the strain and effort it costs me to produce these, inasmuch as many a day my feeble memory and the unstrung state of my nerves so completely crush me to the earth, that I fall into the most melancholy condition, so much so that for days afterwards I am incapable of finding one single idea, till at length my heart is revived by Providence, ...
— Haydn • J. Cuthbert Hadden
... birth To change eternal, mingled with the earth;— With darker horror shook the conscious wood, 580 Groan'd the sad gales, and rivers blush'd with blood; On cypress-boughs the Loves their quivers hung, Their arrows scatter'd, and their bows unstrung; And BEAUTY'S GODDESS, bending o'er his bier, Breathed the soft sigh, and pour'd the tender tear.— 585 Admiring PROSERPINE through dusky glades Led the fair phantom to Elysian shades, Clad with new form, with ...
— The Botanic Garden - A Poem in Two Parts. Part 1: The Economy of Vegetation • Erasmus Darwin
... were still more or less unstrung from her mental struggles of the night, and the memory of her dream came to her like a dim foreboding of misfortune. As though in sympathy with its mother's feelings, the baby did not seem as well as usual. The new nurse was by no means an ideal nurse,—Mammy ...
— The Marrow of Tradition • Charles W. Chesnutt
... indicated feminine tastes and occupations, breathing that perfume of elegance which the presence of woman ever communicates. Vases of flowers decked the sideboards; a few books, the works of the best Spanish poets, lay upon the table; and a guitar, unstrung, it is true, was suspended against the wall. Two persons occupied the apartment. One of them, who was seated on a low stool at its inner extremity, near to the folding doors that separated it from an antichamber, was a robust, ruddy-cheeked Navarrese girl, whose abundant hair, of which ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 364, February 1846 • Various
... all this you suppose with composure. But far from it; I cannot think of it without agitation. Nothing but your earnest desire so repeatedly expressed, could have induced me to sit down to a task that has unstrung my nerves for months to come, and reinduced a shadow of the unspeakable horror which years after my deliverance continued to make my days and nights dreadful, and ...
— Carmilla • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... in that telegram," he said. "If Miss Gray wasn't a bit tired and unstrung I'd let her explain. I want you to tell Mrs. Blackton that she has come to Tete Jaune on a rather unpleasant mission, old man. Nothing less than to attend to the grave ...
— The Hunted Woman • James Oliver Curwood
... Apollo slew. But if ye name the spear, mine flies a length By no man's arrow reach'd; I fear no foil 280 From the Phaeacians, save in speed alone; For I have suffer'd hardships, dash'd and drench'd By many a wave, nor had I food on board At all times, therefore I am much unstrung. He spake; and silent the Phaeacians sat, Of whom alone Alcinoues thus replied. Since, stranger, not ungraceful is thy speech, Who hast but vindicated in our ears Thy question'd prowess, angry that this youth Reproach'd thee ...
— The Odyssey of Homer • Homer
... up, gulping convulsively. He was thoroughly unstrung. The cold, desperate mood had passed. In its place came the old feeling of desolation. He was a child, aching for sympathy. He wanted to tell his troubles. Punctuating his narrative with many gestures and an occasional gulp, he proceeded to do so. ...
— The Man Upstairs and Other Stories • P. G. Wodehouse
... old lady Chia exclaimed. "These women have never known what good manners mean. Put the table down." Saying this, she picked up the cash, and loosening the knots, she unstrung them and piled ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin
... squirrel up there in the oak and the rabbit under the hedge. I listen as of old to the chirp of the grasshopper in the stubble, to the hum of the bees among the foxgloves, to the song of the blackbird on the hawthorn, and, best of all—yes, best of all for brain unsteadied and nerve unstrung—I see the ...
— Mushrooms on the Moor • Frank Boreham
... mine eyes did show Why I am silent, and my lute unstrung; Else it were better we should part, and go, Thou to some lips of sweeter melody, And I to nurse the barren memory Of unkissed kisses, and songs ...
— Poems • Oscar Wilde
... of foreign grammars and dictionaries were before you. Every kind of musical instrument seems to have met with a companion in this tiny apartment. Here are a violin, violoncello, horn, and cornopean; there an old Welsh harp and unstrung guitar. On this shelf are pipes of all sorts and sizes, forms, and nations—the straight English, the short German, and the long Turkish; on that are cigar-boxes, snuff-boxes, and tobacco-boxes of various ...
— Gladys, the Reaper • Anne Beale
... to hear such awful stories, as our nerves were unstrung already, so we asked our friend Walter not to pile on the agony further, and, after rewarding him for his services, we hurried over the remaining space of land and sea that separated us from our comfortable quarters at Lerwick, where a substantial tea ...
— From John O'Groats to Land's End • Robert Naylor and John Naylor
... and, facing the opening and the stars, she lay down to rest, if not to sleep. The darkness did not keep her from seeing the prostrate figure of Kells. He lay there as silent as if he were already dead. She was exhausted, weary for sleep, and unstrung. In the night her courage fled and she was frightened at shadows. The murmuring of insects seemed augmented into a roar; the mourn of wolf and scream of cougar made her start; the rising wind moaned like a lost spirit. Dark fancies beset her. Troop on troop of specters moved out of the black night, ...
— The Border Legion • Zane Grey
... doubt One woman's loyal heart—whose pain Filled it with pure celestial light— Shone starry-constant like the North, Or that still radiance beaming forth From sacred lights in some lone fane. But he whose ring Jemima wore, By want and weariness all unstrung, Though strong and honest of heart and young, Shrank at the blast that pierced so frore— Like a huge, invisible bird of prey Furious launched from Labrador And the ...
— Dreams and Days: Poems • George Parsons Lathrop
... enough. Such are the imperfections of mere men! The ship knew, and sometimes would correct the presumptuous human ignorance by the wholesome discipline of fear. We had heard ominous stories about past voyages. The cook (technically a seaman, but in reality no sailor)—the cook, when unstrung by some misfortune, such as the rolling over of a saucepan, would mutter gloomily while he wiped the floor:—"There! Look at what she has done! Some voy'ge she will drown all hands! You'll see if she won't." ...
— The Nigger Of The "Narcissus" - A Tale Of The Forecastle • Joseph Conrad
... now. Groups of shivering, unstrung people stood about, utterly incapable of thinking what to do next. But Peter was not ...
— Queensland Cousins • Eleanor Luisa Haverfield
... now—when the very streets of the city in which she lived were hallowed ground. He had supposed that emotion dead. Probably it was dead. It must be dead. It was merely that, owing to the constraint of the voyage, his nerves were unstrung, inducing the frame of mind in which people see ghosts. Yes, that was it; he had been seeing ghosts. It was not a living thing, this renewed yearning for a sight of her. It was only the reflex of something past. It could be explained psychologically. It was ...
— The Letter of the Contract • Basil King
... resolving to make a stand at my tent door. At the same time I tried to show by signs that I could, if I liked, kill two or three of them, but that I was ready for peace if they were. At last I lowered my rifle from my shoulder, and they unstrung their bows and advanced with outstretched hands towards me. Knowing their treacherous character, however, of course I could not depend on them. I bethought me that the best way to win their friendship was to offer them food, as is practised in civilised communities with some ...
— Dick Onslow - Among the Redskins • W.H.G. Kingston
... awhile unstrung Till health again invigorate thy frame; With brain renewed, with vigorous heart and lung Take up thy work once more, and greater fame— A richer man by far than e'er before, For thou hast ...
— Gleams of Sunshine - Optimistic Poems • Joseph Horatio Chant
... gory weapon on the greensward, and returned it to the sheath. He then sprang to the side of his wife, and, with the help of the foreman and two brakemen, raised her. She said her nerves were all unstrung, and she 'never could walk home in the world;' so she was placed on the box of the hose carriage and ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 3, No. 1 January 1863 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... the awful sounds had died away Anne knelt there, sobbing, utterly unstrung, all her pride laid low, herself no more than a broken, agonised woman. But gradually, from sheer exhaustion, her sobs became less anguished, till at length they ceased. A strange peace, wholly unaccountable, fell gently upon her torn spirit. But even then it was long before she moved. She felt ...
— The Knave of Diamonds • Ethel May Dell
... brought down the wrath of God upon her, threatened her with damnation. All of which she never seemed to hear. But when he tried to touch her she flew at him like a she-panther. That's what he called her. She said she'd kill him! And she drove him out of her house.... He was all weak and unstrung, and I believe scared, too, when he came to me. She must have been a fury. Those quiet, gentle women are furies when they're once roused. Well, I was hours up with him and finally he got over it. He ...
— The Rainbow Trail • Zane Grey
... talking meantime in fitful outbursts, sometimes wholly irrelevantly and occasionally with a startling pertinency,—all this, though no more than an excess of his customary habit, seemed to denote a mind unstrung. The landlord had called that morning for his rent, which was long in arrears. He must have it. Sim laughed when he told Ralph this, but it was a shocking laugh; there was no heart in it. Ralph would rather have heard him whimper and shuffle ...
— The Shadow of a Crime - A Cumbrian Romance • Hall Caine
... sound it was, when the pale shadow spoke; For there was striving in its piteous tongue, To speak as when on earth it was awake, And Isabella on its music hung: Languor there was in it, and tremulous shake, As in a palsied Druid's harp unstrung; And through it moaned a ghostly under-song, Like hoarse ...
— The Mysteries of All Nations • James Grant
... held a daughter in his arms. His tears fell on the baby, for now he realised his responsibility, a responsibility which he was unable to shoulder. He made new resolutions. But his nerves were unstrung. He was working at a translation which he seemed unable to finish, for he had to be constantly out ...
— Married • August Strindberg
... sorrow in silence endured; Fighting, at last I have fallen, and sought the breast of the Mother,— Quite cast down I have crept close to the broad sweet earth. Lo, out of failure triumph! Renewed the wavering courage, Tense the unstrung nerves, steadfast the faltering knees Weary no more, nor faint, nor grieved at heart, nor despairing, Hushed in the earth's green lap, ...
— In Divers Tones • Charles G. D. Roberts
... in this apartment interested me more than Major Pitcairn's pistol, the discharge of which, at Lexington, began the war of the Revolution, and was reverberated in thunder around the land for seven long years. The bow of Ulysses, though unstrung for ages, was placed against the wall, together with a sheaf of Robin Hood's arrows and the rifle of ...
— A Virtuoso's Collection (From "Mosses From An Old Manse") • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... "Mr. Lund is unstrung," said the captain. "He is under the delusion that we deliberately deserted him and, later, found the gold he speaks of. The first charge is nonsense. We did all that was possible in the frightful weather. We barely ...
— A Man to His Mate • J. Allan Dunn
... unstrung by the fearful strain he had gone through and the frightful decision he would have to make later on, nay, had made after Bentley's words, was in no mood to ...
— For Love of Country - A Story of Land and Sea in the Days of the Revolution • Cyrus Townsend Brady
... bright Venus yielded up her Charms, The blest Adonis languish'd in her Arms; His idle Horn on flagrant Myrtle hung, His Arrows scatter'd, and his Bow unstrung; Obscure in Covert lay his dreaming Hounds, And bay'd the fancy'd Boar with feeble Sounds: For nobler Sports he quits the savage Fields, And all the ...
— Two Poems Against Pope - One Epistle to Mr. A. Pope and the Blatant Beast • Leonard Welsted
... his proposal with a sudden realization of what a desperately brutal thing this unstrung creature was about to do, with a terrible arraignment of self-reproach because she had made no effort to dissuade him or place an obstacle in the way of accomplishing his design. It was not strange, thought she, ...
— Claim Number One • George W. (George Washington) Ogden
... insensible for a while, and was henceforth looked upon as a mortal who had lost his wits. Yet at odd moments his cloudiness was illumined by a gleam of intelligence such as had not been detected in him previous to his mischance. As Polonius said of Hamlet—another unstrung mortal—Tilton's replies had "a happiness that often madness hits on, which reason and sanity could not so prosperously be delivered of." One morning, he appeared at the flour-mill with a sack of ...
— An Old Town By The Sea • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... and unstrung. That's the reason I came in here. I've got to get my wits about me again, ...
— The Talking Leaves - An Indian Story • William O. Stoddard
... maiden, and be still!' 'O! thou look'st kindly, and I will. Mine eye has dried and wasted been, But still it loves the Lincoln green; And, though mine ear is all unstrung, Still, still it loves the ...
— The Lady of the Lake • Sir Walter Scott
... she was, in her way, provoking, charming. I was sitting close to her. The moonlight played upon her daring, wilful face through the leaves of the grape-vines. It was unpremeditated; my nature was, most probably, unstrung at the instant by ungratified longings for Georgiana; but suddenly I ...
— Aftermath • James Lane Allen
... bronchitis, fever and corns. He was replacing him. The Mayor retorted that Pere Bracasse being a municipal functionary could not transmit his functions except through the Administration. Monsieur Pujol must desist from drumming and crying. Aristide bowed to authority and unstrung his drum. ...
— The Joyous Adventures of Aristide Pujol • William J. Locke
... It gives me a horrible sense of guilt." She shuddered again. Then suddenly, with the nervous quickness of a woman unstrung, thrust a small black golliwog ...
— The Girl on the Boat • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
... suddenly upon mine as he said this. For a second I thought that he imagined my whiskers were false, and that this was only a plant to lock me up! It was evident my nerves were becoming unstrung, and as soon as we were in the street my good-humoured and excellent guide told me that in another five minutes we would begin our voyage of discovery. We passed through the Chinese quarter, down Mott Street, and I could not but feel a ...
— The Confessions of a Caricaturist, Vol 2 (of 2) • Harry Furniss
... from the ground the bow was unstrung. Hay-uta carefully bent it over and slipped the noose in place on the notched end. Then, after examining one of the feather-tipped arrows, he fitted it in place and looked around for some target at which to ...
— Footprints in the Forest • Edward Sylvester Ellis
... that Mabel Harrington would send the young girl away. Her nerves were yet unstrung, her strength all gone. A look of anguish, keen but tender, swept over her face. Her hand fell slowly on the bowed head of poor Lina. She struggled to sit upright and speak words of encouragement, but the brave ...
— Mabel's Mistake • Ann S. Stephens
... Congress, and I presume that the mechanical skill I once possessed in the art has suffered by the unavoidable neglect. I may possibly recover this skill, and if anything will tend to this end, if anything can tune again an instrument so long unstrung, it is the kindness and liberality of my Cousin Edward. I would wish, therefore, the matter put on this ground that my mind may be at ease. I am at present engaged in taking portraits by the Daguerreotype. I have been at considerable expense in perfecting apparatus and ...
— Samuel F. B. Morse, His Letters and Journals - In Two Volumes, Volume II • Samuel F. B. Morse
... nerves were unstrung with the din of the guns, and it was an hour before he could be calmed down. The wildcat was skinned, and it was days before the orang could be reconciled to the sight of the pelt or the smell ...
— The Wonder Island Boys: Exploring the Island • Roger Thompson Finlay
... were, in helpless bewilderment, watching the ship until she slowly drifted out of sight round a projecting bluff; and then, in a dazed, halfhearted way, and with nerves all unstrung by disappointment and the dreadful accident which had befallen the baronet, they began to slowly retrace their steps, in the faint hope of stumbling upon ...
— The Log of the Flying Fish - A Story of Aerial and Submarine Peril and Adventure • Harry Collingwood
... a crowd of boys at play with nuts,[34] stopped and laughed at him for a madman. As soon as the Sage,—a laugher at others rather than one to be laughed at,—perceived this, he placed an unstrung bow in the middle of the road: "Hark you, wise man," said he, "unriddle what I have done." The people gather round. The man torments his invention a long time, but cannot make out the reason of the proposed question. ...
— The Fables of Phdrus - Literally translated into English prose with notes • Phaedrus
... there to think? You saw where the arrow came from. You saw that the only bow the place contained was hanging high and unstrung upon the wall, and you are witness to this woman's irresponsible condition of mind. The sight of those arrows well within her reach evidently aroused the homicidal mania often latent in one of her highly emotional nature; and when this fresh ...
— The Mystery of the Hasty Arrow • Anna Katharine Green
... you see, I am sick with an infernal cold," he said. "Got it tramping in the rain without my overcoat, and that fight I told you of has unstrung me. It was a regular battle. But you go yourself, and perhaps Eloise will come to see me. I shall show her the Colonel's confession, and she can do as she pleases about telling ...
— The Cromptons • Mary J. Holmes
... changed her dress, and put on her walking things, more than half inclined all the time to press her mother to go with them. She was a little unstrung and tremulous, pursued by a feeling that she was somehow letting herself go, behaving disloyally and indecorously towards whom?—towards Aldous? But how, or why? She did not know. But there was a curious ...
— Marcella • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... into a coupe, having ordered a carriage to follow him to the Grand Central Station. It was ten minutes yet before the express was due. Nervously he puffed at his unlighted cigar, wishing he had a match; in fact, his nerves were never more unstrung. It was a happy surprise, and no doubt his youthful vanity was elated, that his father should have named his new palace car "Alfonso." At least it convinced him that ...
— The Harris-Ingram Experiment • Charles E. Bolton
... case upon her knees, and, drawing forth The monarch's bow, she wept aloud. As soon As that new gush of tears had ceased to fall, Back to the hall she went, and that proud throng Of suitors, bearing in her hand the bow Unstrung, and quiver, where the arrows lay Many and deadly. Her attendant maids Brought also down a coffer, where were laid Much brass and steel, provided by the king For games like these. The glorious lady then, In presence of the suitors, stood beside The columns that upheld the ...
— National Epics • Kate Milner Rabb
... lack nothing [he writes in July, 1831] except more life, more spirit! I often feel unstrung, but sometimes as merry as I used to be at home. When I am sad I go to Madame Szaszek's; there I generally meet several amiable Polish ladies who with their hearty, hopeful words always cheer me up, so that I ...
— Frederick Chopin as a Man and Musician - Volume 1-2, Complete • Frederick Niecks
... and smiled upon each other largely and vacuously. We were all a little unstrung that night, I think. After all, it seems rather unreasonable to lavish one's time, labour, and money on an electoral contest, and then laugh when you lose, and say it doesn't matter, just because a child isn't going to die. Oh, I am glad Mr Cash was ...
— The Right Stuff - Some Episodes in the Career of a North Briton • Ian Hay
... wonder at thee, poor thing, being timid; but thou needs not fear us; we would as soon send one of our own daughters into slavery as thee; so thou mayest make thyself quite at ease!" These soft and soothing words fell like balm upon my wife's unstrung nerves, and melted her to tears; her fears and prejudices vanished, and from that day she has firmly believed that there are good and bad persons ...
— Running a Thousand Miles for Freedom • William and Ellen Craft
... marked division of mind and body, of will, emotion, understanding; the division is good in logic, but its convenient lines are lost to us as we watch a being with soul all blurred, body all shaken, unstrung, poisoned, by erotic mania, rising in slow clouds of mephitic steam from suddenly heated stagnancies of the blood, and turning the reality of conduct and duty into distant unmeaning shadows. If such a disease were the furious mood ...
— Rousseau - Volumes I. and II. • John Morley
... and stared at the uncertain trees behind me. One black shadow seemed to leap into another. I listened, rigid, and heard nothing but the creep of the blood in my ears. I thought that my nerves were unstrung, and that my imagination was tricking me, and turned resolutely towards the sound ...
— The Island of Doctor Moreau • H. G. Wells
... allowance for his wife's high spirit and physical weakness. She, on her side—nervous, fitful, and hard to please—thought herself a slave, the servant of a harsh and brutal master. She screamed at him when her nerves were too unstrung; and then, with a natural reaction, she called herself "a devil who could never be good enough for him." But most of her letters were harsh and filled with bitterness, and, no doubt, his conduct to her was at times no better ...
— Famous Affinities of History, Vol 1-4, Complete - The Romance of Devotion • Lyndon Orr
... the parsonage, Captain Monk was softly closing the garden gate behind him—for when in sorrow we don't do things with a rush and a bang—when a whirring sound overhead caused him to start. Strong, hardened man though he was, his nerves were unstrung to-night in company with his heartstrings. It was the church clock preparing to strike twelve. The little doctor, Speck, who had left the house but a minute before, was standing at the churchyard fence close by, his arms leaning on ...
— The Argosy - Vol. 51, No. 2, February, 1891 • Various
... they tried to save a drunken soldier while all the gang seemed crowding after the safe and the girls, but they were shot down inside, and must have burned to death if they wasn't killed. Oh, God, what a night!" And weak, unstrung, unmanned, the poor ...
— Foes in Ambush • Charles King
... were predicted in the Old Testament availed to draw the Jews, and it was only in the streets that he came upon the scowling faces of his brethren. For months he preached in patient sweetness, then one day, desperate and unstrung, he sought an interview with the Pope, to petition that the Jews might be commanded to come to his sermons; he found the Pontiff in bed, unwell, but chatting blithely with the Bishop of Salamanca and the Procurator of the Exchequer, apparently of a droll mishap that had befallen the ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... Sarah was very naturally unstrung and nervous in this hardness of circumstance and her terror of destitution. As she told her story, she sobbed and wrung her hands. In the next six months she had better occupation, however, in spasmodically busy shops, where the hours were shorter ...
— Making Both Ends Meet • Sue Ainslie Clark and Edith Wyatt
... society. He was very much intoxicated; and, like Jehu the son of Nimshi, he drove furiously. I felt very timid and nervous. Sickness makes us sad cowards, and what the mind enjoys in health, becomes an object of fear when it is enfeebled and unstrung by bodily weakness. ...
— Life in the Clearings versus the Bush • Susanna Moodie
... said; "you are unstrung. 'Twould be ridiculous to take amiss words said in haste. In cold blood—well, you know me, Captain Barker. I will leave you to recover ...
— In Clive's Command - A Story of the Fight for India • Herbert Strang
... for him to reply. His shoulders quivered, but he remained silent. She went on soothingly: "You are all unstrung. The shock was too sudden. It must have been a terrible one! Won't you tell me about it? Perhaps that will ...
— Out of the Depths - A Romance of Reclamation • Robert Ames Bennet
... papa! I am not ill; only my nerves have had a great, a terrible shock; they seem all unstrung, and my temples are throbbing ...
— Elsie's Womanhood • Martha Finley
... the smallest of bows should sometimes be unstrung, and that if my little arrows are flimsy and light they will, I ...
— Sagittulae, Random Verses • E. W. Bowling
... wert miss'd in the group when the eye look'd around, And miss'd by the ear was thy voice in the sound; Thy chamber was darksome, thy bell was unrung, Thy footstep unheard, and thy lyre unstrung: A stillness prevail'd at the mournful repast; In tears was the eye on thy vacant seat cast. Each scene wearing gloom, and each brow bearing care, Too plainly denoted that death had ...
— Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 475 - Vol. XVII, No. 475. Saturday, February 5, 1831 • Various
... who languish Their dead hopes among. In whose hearts stern anguish The harp hath unstrung! They'll soon in another Bright land roam with thee, So scorn not thy brother, ...
— Graham's Magazine, Vol. XXXII No. 4, April 1848 • Various
... severe one upon the zealous Mr. Holcombe, who found himself at the end of it in a very bad way, with nerves unstrung and brain so fagged that he assented without question when his doctor exiled him from New York by ordering a sea voyage, with change of environment and rest at the other end of it. Some one else suggested the northern ...
— The Exiles and Other Stories • Richard Harding Davis
... "I'm rather—rather unstrung to-night, and this thing gave me a jar. To be candid, my imagination took head in the fog, and I got to fancy I was ...
— The Masquerader • Katherine Cecil Thurston
... heroine, who had herself been murdered, obliterated the former horrors from her plastic mind,—Miss Macnulty could discuss the catastrophe with the keenest interest. And Lizzie, finding herself to be, as she told herself, unstrung, fell also into novel-reading. She had intended during this vacant time to master the "Faery Queen;" but the "Faery Queen" fared even worse than "Queen Mab;"—and the studies of Portray Castle were ...
— The Eustace Diamonds • Anthony Trollope
... represents the tale as told to himself by an old man with white hair, weakened limbs and unstrung nerves that tremble at the least exertion. The old man claims to be frightened at a shadow, yet he is able to throw himself down to rest with the weightier portion of his body hanging over a precipice and held back from the slippery edge ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 8 • Charles H. Sylvester
... that my nerves were somewhat unstrung during the days that followed. I wakened one night to a terrific thump which shook my bed, and which seemed to be the result of some one having struck the foot-board with a plank. Immediately following this came a sharp knocking on the antique bed-warmer which hangs beside my fireplace. ...
— Sight Unseen • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... balcony rail, they watched the Pasig running wickedly below; and across, stretching away to where the stars lay low in the rim of the horizon, the wet teeming rice-lands brooded in the night-mist.... The piano, which had seemed unstrung from the voyage, as he passed through the house, sounded but faintly now through several shut doors. The fragments ...
— Fate Knocks at the Door - A Novel • Will Levington Comfort
... there was a hum of insects in the air and the very pulse of living could be felt. Ab carried his new weapon proudly, hungering for the love and admiration of this girl of his, and eager to show her its powers and to exhibit his own skill. At his back hung his quiver of mammoth bone. His bow, unstrung, was in his hand. In front of the cave was a bare area of many yards in extent, then came a few scattering trees and, at a distance of perhaps two hundred yards, the forest began. Across the open space ...
— The Story of Ab - A Tale of the Time of the Cave Man • Stanley Waterloo
... I think, madame. If I am mistaken in my impression, so much the better for you. At present, the condition of your daughter is serious, but not dangerous. Excitement and distress of mind have unstrung her nerves, and she now has a high fever; but I hope by great care and good nursing ...
— File No. 113 • Emile Gaboriau
... me, this time without any underlying professional motive. He was to give me the key before we reached Paris. At any rate I shall always believe that part of his conversation was in an indirect way a confidence. He was still unstrung by the unexpected incident which had caused both his hasty departure and the sudden metamorphosis in what he himself, if he had been writing, would have called his "intimate heaven." The story he told me was "per sfogarsi," as ...
— International Short Stories: French • Various
... nothing for the moment. The taint was oppressive at the first breath of the still air. There were kittens—no doubt of that. He heard their scurrying; he felt their eyes and the sort of melting panic in the place that would have utterly unstrung any but a perfectly keyed ...
— Son of Power • Will Levington Comfort and Zamin Ki Dost
... brave man; ordinarily his nerves were of steel; but to be at the mercy of some unknown and nameless horror, to be unable to defend himself—it was these things that almost unstrung him, for at best he was only human. To stand in the open, even with the odds all against him; to be able to use his fists, to put up some sort of defense, to inflict punishment upon his adversary—then he could face death with a smile. It was not ...
— Out of Time's Abyss • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... at the contract," he suggested, and Wunpost, all unstrung, consented. Then he grabbed him back ...
— Wunpost • Dane Coolidge
... intimate friends and favourites tried to console him he was wont to lead them to his bedroom and there show them a picture, painted by himself (for he was an excellent painter), depicting a Turkish bow unstrung, beneath, which was written, Arco per lentare piaga non sana (The bow although unstrung heals ...
— Memoirs And Historical Chronicles Of The Courts Of Europe - Marguerite de Valois, Madame de Pompadour, and Catherine de Medici • Various
... her the option and waited. He waited in the overpowering heat, amid the low humming of bees. The minutes passed; there was neither sound among the vines nor footstep beside him; and so, with head bent and eyes streaming and head aching and nerves unstrung and conscience clamoring reproachfully, he ...
— The Side Of The Angels - A Novel • Basil King
... gone on as usual, undisturbed by anything from without, the confessions which now fell from her lips so easily would never have found words. But she had been unsettled by what had happened in the early evening, and unstrung by her great anxiety for the Count's safety. Her own words sounded in her ear before she knew that she was going ...
— A Cigarette-Maker's Romance • F. Marion Crawford
... hold for him, Familiar with all anguish, but with fear Still unacquainted? On his martial bier They laid a sword, a helmet, and a crown— Meed of the warrior, but not these among His voiceless lyre, whose silent chords unstrung Shall wait—how long?—for touches ...
— The Poems of Emma Lazarus - Vol. I (of II.), Narrative, Lyric, and Dramatic • Emma Lazarus
... breath and then, to the loathing of the twins, came on worse as she found herself very erect in one of Mrs. Gilmore's gentle arms. The eyes of both the wife and the girl were on the actor and their every nerve was unstrung. Beseechingly ...
— Gideon's Band - A Tale of the Mississippi • George W. Cable
... "you are excusably unstrung. But all danger is past; and there is still time to regain your stateroom unobserved. If you will permit me ...
— The False Faces • Vance, Louis Joseph
... his nerves had been quite unstrung, the knife fell, the ice and warm water were applied, and Diamond could not choke back the cry of horror that forced ...
— Frank Merriwell at Yale • Burt L. Standish
... did so, feeling curiously weak and unstrung. He put his arm around her, and led her into the dim ...
— The Safety Curtain, and Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell
... "her nerves are completely unstrung. She seems to have been under a great mental strain and her surroundings are not—" He paused, and then added, "Is the young ...
— Kent Knowles: Quahaug • Joseph C. Lincoln
... own voice startled him, and he looked nervously round the room. He felt unstrung. He drank another glass of water, and then began undressing, preparatory ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant
... already, and Ezra, with his hands folded behind him, paced twice or thrice along the room. Pausing before one of the green baize bags, he lifted it from its nail, and having untied the string that fastened it, he drew forth with great tenderness an unstrung violin, and, carrying it to the light, sat down and turned it over and over in his hands. Then he took the neck with his left hand, and, placing the instrument upright upon his knee, caressed ...
— Aunt Rachel • David Christie Murray
... feel it is necessary for me to take a short rest. Recent excitement in Manti has left me very nervous and unstrung. I shall be away from Manti for about two weeks, I think. During my absence any pending litigation must ...
— 'Firebrand' Trevison • Charles Alden Seltzer
... a smarting sensation. The menstrual function is frequently deranged, the bowels costive, the urethra, by being pressed, becomes irritable and burns and smarts whenever the urine is evacuated. The sleep is disturbed and unrefreshing, and the whole nervous system is unstrung. ...
— An Epitome of Homeopathic Healing Art - Containing the New Discoveries and Improvements to the Present Time • B. L. Hill
... weak and unstrung, and while a tremulous smile hovered about his mouth, his eyes so moistened that he turned toward the wall. After a moment he said, "Miss Walton, I am not worthy ...
— Opening a Chestnut Burr • Edward Payson Roe
... my deepest thanks." He unstrung his bow and leaned upon the stave; a fine figure in forest green and velvet bonnet, a black mask over eyes and nose, a generous mouth and strong chin below it. "Will your worship favor me with ...
— Beatrix of Clare • John Reed Scott
... suddenly became vigorous. My nerves were no longer unstrung. My powers, that had long been deadened, were revived. My bosom swelled with a sudden energy, and the conviction darted through my mind, that to end my torments was, at once, ...
— Wieland; or The Transformation - An American Tale • Charles Brockden Brown
... nothing has happened him. No, I'm really too unstrung by my fall to walk." She sank again to the bowlder on which ...
— Judith Of The Plains • Marie Manning
... Jim. Utterly unstrung, he gazed at that mighty, loathsome mass, listening to its snapping jaws as it took on the tons of nourishment needed for its machinelike ...
— The Raid on the Termites • Paul Ernst
... be all unstrung by your walk hither through the wood, Ann. I'll fold the cape up nicely for you, and you can take it when you go home. And mind you wear it next Sabbath day, sweet. Now I must to my wheel again, or I shall not finish ...
— Giles Corey, Yeoman - A Play • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... the coming evil, possibly close at hand, ought to make a serious effort to become so. She found herself, even at this early hour of the day, tired with the strain of a misgiving that an earthquake was approaching; and as those who have lived through earthquakes become unstrung at every slightest tremor of the earth's crust beneath them, so she felt that the tension begun with that recurrence of two days ago had grown and grown, and threatened to dominate her mind, to the exclusion of all else. Every little thing, such as the look on her husband's face ...
— Somehow Good • William de Morgan
... he tried and failed, And still that lean, persistent dog At distance, like some spirit wailed, Safe in the cover of a fog. His nerves unstrung, with many a shout He strove to frighten it away, It would not go—but roamed about, Howling, as wolves ...
— Hindu Literature • Epiphanius Wilson
... convinced myself that it was all a fantasy. I was so certain of it that I stole out into the hall, and peered down the back stairs. I was frightened, so frightened I shook from head to foot, but it was because my nerves were all unstrung. I was sure by this time there had been no one there, and forced myself to investigate. I saw nothing, heard nothing, and step by step advanced clear to the back window, and looked out. Then, without the slightest warning, something ...
— Love Under Fire • Randall Parrish
... suspect, may upset his own equilibrium. And his constant study of the Apocalypse and the Hebraic revelations—it has filled him with strange notions. Understand me: a man who can swim in the air like a fish in the sea is apt to become unstrung. He has begun to identify himself with the prophets. He insists on showing biblical pictures,—worse still, ...
— Visionaries • James Huneker
... soul rushed to the vale of Mona, to Dardu-Lena's dream, by Dalrutho's stream, where she slept, returning from the chase of hinds. Her bow is near the maid, unstrung ... Clothed in the beauty of youth, the love of heroes lay. Dark-bending from ... the wood her wounded father seemed to come. He appeared at times, then hid himself in mist. Bursting into tears, she arose. She ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama, Vol 1 - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook • The Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D.
... unstrung. Why couldn't you have let him come in and talk awhile? It would have been the best way to get me quieted down. But no; you must always have your own way Don't twitch me, my dear; I'd rather undress myself. You pretend to be very careful of me. I wonder if you ...
— A Foregone Conclusion • W. D. Howells
... sorrowfully to the salon. I was so unstrung that Mademoiselle, who in the meantime had returned, administered a cup of camomile tea to ...
— In the Courts of Memory 1858-1875. • L. de Hegermann-Lindencrone
... suppose I did," admitted the young pitcher modestly, as he thought of the times he pitched when his arm ached, and when his nerves were all unstrung on account of the receipt of bad news. "But other fellows worked hard, too," he went on. "You've got to work ...
— Baseball Joe in the Big League - or, A Young Pitcher's Hardest Struggles • Lester Chadwick
... discomfort, and sickness, which is the shadow of death, have worked right on to the accomplishment of their great purposes; toiling much, enduring much, fulfilling much; and then, with shattered nerves, and sinews all unstrung, have laid themselves down in the grave, and slept the sleep of death, and the world talks of them while they sleep! And as in the sun's eclipse we can behold the great stars shining in the heavens, so in this ...
— Opening Ceremonies of the New York and Brooklyn Bridge, May 24, 1883 • William C. Kingsley
... marriage, this second leap in the dark? No, she could not honestly pretend that she did; yet it had its sufficiently sinister side, its occasional admixture of sheer horror. But this was only when the mysteries which encompassed her happened to prey upon nerves unstrung by some outwardly exciting cause; it was then she would have given back all that he had ever given her to pierce the veil of her husband's past. Here, however, the impulse was more subtle; it was not the mere consuming curiosity which one ...
— The Shadow of the Rope • E. W. Hornung
... numbing her leg, and she seized upon it fiercely. It was only a brief line, bidding him come to her, but it bore her name. With instant, bodiless clarity which had marked all her mental processes so far, its purport was hers. She had not written—the hand that had traced her signature had been unstrung for once. She understood, though such knowledge ...
— Then I'll Come Back to You • Larry Evans
... merely created a wholesome desire for rest,—the sleepiness and indifference that come from weary muscles. But Pats's exhaustion was of a different sort. All the strength of his body had departed. Every muscle, cord, and sinew was unstrung. His spine seemed on the point of folding up. A hollow, nervous feeling had settled in the back of his head, and being something new it caused him a mild uneasiness. Moreover, his hands and feet ...
— The Pines of Lory • John Ames Mitchell
... like the song of a lark, And gathered her hair from the wanton wind. Ah, little he thought of the leagues of snow He trode on the trail of the buffalo; And little he recked of the hurricanes That swept the snow from the frozen plains And piled the banks of the Bloody River. [40] His bow unstrung and forgotten hung With his beaver hood and his otter quiver; He sat spell-bound by the artless grace Of her star-lit eyes and her moon-lit face. Ah, little he cared for the storms that blew, For Wiwaste had found her a way to woo. When he spoke with Wakawa her sidelong eyes ...
— Legends of the Northwest • Hanford Lennox Gordon
... imploring, through his throat, Both tendons sev'ring, drove his trenchant blade: Ev'n while he spoke, his head was roll'd in dust. The cap of marten fur from off his head They took, the wolf-skin, and the bow unstrung, And jav'lin; these Ulysses held aloft, And thus to Pallas pray'd, who gave the spoil: "Receive, great Goddess, these our gifts; to thee, Of all th' Immortals on Olympus' height, Our off'rings first we give; conduct us ...
— The Iliad • Homer
... feel either anger or resentment, and only conscious of a crushed, aching, exhausted sensation, she made no answer. Her nerves were thoroughly unstrung, and she clung to life but by a ...
— The works of Guy de Maupassant, Vol. 5 (of 8) - Une Vie and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant 1850-1893
... alarmed, my good man. Your young lady is none the worse for her involuntary run (just here a distinct snort came from the ground behind Mr. Cushman) though I dare say a little unstrung and exhausted. But we stopped her mount ("yes you did!" came sotto voce from Athol) and now we will lead your mistress back to the house where Mrs. Kilton will be delighted to minister to her comfort. ...
— A Dixie School Girl • Gabrielle E. Jackson
... with the "mazes of heat and sound" in which my life seemed "turning, turning," like the life of the heroine of "Requiescat." I declare that such a performance is the sort of thing that I should expect to find in hell, even down to the burning marl, as Milton says. I got away dizzy, unstrung, unfit for life, with that terrible sense of fatigue unaccompanied by wholesome tiredness, that comes of standing in hot buzzing places. I had heard not a single word that amused or interested me; and yet there were plenty of people present with whom I should have ...
— From a College Window • Arthur Christopher Benson
... weak hand; but the girl's eyes were no longer closed; they were open and fixed on his face. The great fellow was trembling like a leaf. The past hour had been almost more than he could bear. He was entirely unstrung. ...
— In Connection with the De Willoughby Claim • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... gulls were following the ship, sometimes flying near, sometimes dropping back, ever and anon swooping down into the foamy wake with a mournful cry, as of condemned souls. This was no vision, and yet Frederick scarcely distinguished it from a dream. With his nerves unstrung, with his being still penetrated by the marvels of his sleeping life, which remained partially present to him, the strange heaving waste of the ocean seemed no less miraculous than his dreams. Thus the ocean had been tossing its mountains of waves beneath the blind eyes of millions of ...
— Atlantis • Gerhart Hauptmann
... heard," said Tilly, "that you city gentlemen are great flatterers. That is not the reason why I am obliged to leave you so suddenly, but the fact is the tea caddy ran low this morning and grandma's nerves will remain unstrung until she gets a ...
— Quincy Adams Sawyer and Mason's Corner Folks - A Picture of New England Home Life • Charles Felton Pidgin
... journal the fidelity of whose reports was never questioned. You will be amazed to hear that I not only did not do that of which I am accused; but that I did the very reverse. Fearing that, nervous and unstrung as I was, I might do any injustice in the course of a lengthened speech, by even an ambiguous expression, I find these words reported in the "Times,"—"Mr. Phillips said the prosecutors were bound to prove the guilt of the prisoner, not ...
— An Essay on Professional Ethics - Second Edition • George Sharswood
... an easy prey to the methodist; her sensibility and acute fears rendered her accessible to every impulse; her love for her child made her eager to cling to the merest straw held out to save him. Her mind, once unstrung, and now tuned by roughest inharmonious hands, made her credulous: beautiful as fabled goddess, with voice of unrivalled sweetness, burning with new lighted enthusiasm, she became a stedfast proselyte, and powerful auxiliary to the leader of the elect. I had remarked her in ...
— The Last Man • Mary Shelley
... swiftly down the lonely glen, but I could not see it, for there was a trailing scarf of mist between the school-house and the road. Presently I heard the swish of the wheels in water, and so learned that they were crossing the ford to come to me. I had been unstrung by the events of the evening, and fear at once pressed thick upon me that this might be a sequel to them, as ...
— The Little Minister • J.M. Barrie
... Friend,—It is so long since I wrote that I must write, I must ruffle your thoughts with a little breath from my side. Listen to me, my dear friend. That I have not written has scarcely been my fault, but my misfortune rather, for I have been quite unstrung and overcome by agitation and anxiety, and thought that I should be able to tell you at last of being calmer and happier, but it was all in vain. I do not leave England, my dear friend. It is decided that I ...
— The Letters of Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1 of 2) • Frederic G. Kenyon
... war-worn, fever-wasted frame,—this weed, whitened in a dungeon's darkness, pale and sapless, which no kindness of the sun, no softness of the summer breeze, can ever restore to life and vigor? It must not, shall not be! Oh, were Regulus what he was once, before captivity had unstrung his sinews and enervated his limbs, he might pause; he might think he were worth a thousand of the foe; he might say, "Make the exchange, Rome shall not lose by it!" But now, alas, 'tis gone,—that impetuosity of strength which could once make him a ...
— Elson Grammer School Literature, Book Four. • William H. Elson and Christine Keck
... truth. The iron nature, so long overwrought, now utterly unstrung, had yielded for the first time to the stress of nature and of events. The relief from what he had taken to be death had come swiftly, and the reaction brought a lethal calm of its own. If he had indeed recognized ...
— The Mississippi Bubble • Emerson Hough
... heard music; overwrought nerves often play these tricks upon us. And it is owing to this same cause that you are weary and dispirited, and that you take such a gloomy view of the social and religious outlook. You are evidently out of health and unstrung;—but after you have had sufficient rest and change, you will see things in quite a different aspect. I will not for a moment believe that you could possibly be as unorthodox as your conversation would imply,—it would be a total misconception ...
— The Master-Christian • Marie Corelli
... Fouchette seemed yet to linger in the misty morning air, thrilling the distant ear, vibrating upon the unstrung nerves of the outcasts beneath the far-away bridges, borne upon the surface of the waters, when it was answered out of the darkness by a sharp, shrill ...
— Mlle. Fouchette - A Novel of French Life • Charles Theodore Murray
... no other object in view than to make my readers unwilling to retire for the night, to destroy the peace of mind of those who are good enough to purchase my literary wares, or to titillate till tense the nerve tissue of the timid who come to smile and who depart unstrung, then should I deserve the severest condemnation; but these things I do not do. I have a mission in life which I hold as sacred as my good friend Mr. Howells holds his. Such phases of life as I see I put down faithfully, and ...
— Ghosts I have Met and Some Others • John Kendrick Bangs
... in the cave began to wail while I unstrung my bow and set it in its case, from habit I think, seeing that I never hoped to look ...
— The Virgin of the Sun • H. R. Haggard
... SAW how unstrung poor Edward was! Mr. Bemis, I think you're quite prejudiced. How could Edward help their escaping? I think it was quite enough for him, single-handed, to get his watch back.' A ring at the door, and then a number ...
— The Garotters • William D. Howells
... century showed to the full those qualities of toughness and dignified reserve which for twenty years had puzzled and imposed on that lively emotional people. By the side of the downcast braggarts of the Court and the unstrung screamers of the Parisian Press, his mien had something of the heroic. Tout peut se retablir—"All may yet be set right"—such was the vague but dignified phrase in which he summarised the results of August 6 ...
— The Development of the European Nations, 1870-1914 (5th ed.) • John Holland Rose
... I was getting so unstrung by all these alarms and watchings that I began to wish that the pirates would come once for all that we might have done with them. For I had confidence in our side and the certainty of its winning which was scarcely logical, maybe, but which, after all, I ...
— Marjorie • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... view which he had taken of his own affairs. He was telling himself then,—so assuring himself, though he did not in truth believe the assurance,—that he had lost not only the estate, but also his father's private fortune. At that moment he had been unstrung, demoralised, and unmanned,—so weak that a feather would have knocked him over. The blow had been so sudden, the solitude and gloom of the house so depressing, and his sorrow so crushing, that he was ready to acknowledge ...
— Ralph the Heir • Anthony Trollope
... few moments longer, trying to compose his nerves, which had been sadly unstrung, both by the wine he had drank in much larger quantities than usual, and the incidents that had just occurred, and then sought his own room, where he rang for a brandy-and-soda, and after taking it, went below to attend to his ...
— The Masked Bridal • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... attitudes, towards her; particularly St. John, who, with a tender yet impassioned gesture, bends his countenance towards her, languid with the depth of his emotion. At her feet lie various instruments of music, broken and unstrung. Of the colouring I do not speak; it eclipses nature, yet it has all her truth ...
— A Letter Book - Selected with an Introduction on the History and Art of Letter-Writing • George Saintsbury
... to her and unstrung the bow, putting it away in its niche. But from the same place he produced a ...
— Ruth Fielding on Cliff Island - The Old Hunter's Treasure Box • Alice Emerson
... for the effort of speech. His hard-drawn breath laboured in great sobs; his limbs were powerless and unstrung in utter relax after hard service. Failure in his endeavour induced a stupor of misery and despair. In addition was the wretched humiliation of open violence and strife with his brother, and the distress of hearing misjudging contempt expressed without ...
— The Were-Wolf • Clemence Housman
... me? must I be left, As age and time had worn me out of use? These sinews are not yet so much unstrung, To fail me when my master should be served; And when they are, then will I steal to death, Silent and unobserved, to ...
— The Works Of John Dryden, Vol. 7 (of 18) - The Duke of Guise; Albion and Albanius; Don Sebastian • John Dryden
... for a long time not caring to enter. His strength had been worn down by the privations of his island life; his nerves, usually like steel, were becoming unstrung; his mind had fallen into a morbid state, and was a prey to a thousand strange fancies. The closed doors of the cabin stood there before him, and he began to imagine that some ...
— Cord and Creese • James de Mille
... lovely lightning fraught, My fluttering spirits first the infection caught? When as I gazed, my faltering tongue betray'd The heart's quick tumults, or refused its aid; 430 While the dim light my ravish'd eyes forsook, And every limb, unstrung with terror, shook; With all her powers dissenting reason strove To tame at first the kindling flame of love: She strove in vain; subdued by charms divine, My soul a victim fell at beauty's shrine. Oft from the din of bustling life I stray'd, In happier scenes to ...
— The Poetical Works of Beattie, Blair, and Falconer - With Lives, Critical Dissertations, and Explanatory Notes • Rev. George Gilfillan [Ed.] |
