"Alarming" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... have been their inclination, because not their interest, to raise questions on the extent of parliamentary rights, or to enfeeble privileges which were the security of their own. Powers evident from necessity, and not suspicious from an alarming mode or purpose in the exertion, would, as formerly they were, be cheerfully submitted to; and these would have been fully sufficient for conservation of unity in the empire, and for directing its wealth to one common centre. Another use has produced other consequences; and a power which refuses ...
— Selections from the Speeches and Writings of Edmund Burke. • Edmund Burke
... Blackfoot warriors seized his canoe at once; hands rudely hauled him out, and upon the bank, wrenched his gun from him and tore off all his clothes. It was an alarming welcome. ...
— Boys' Book of Frontier Fighters • Edwin L. Sabin
... sounds gradually ceasing, he continued his walk with greater haste, and only heard the hollow and muffled sound of his own beating heart. At the moment he saw the lights of the chateau, another agonized cry, more shrill and alarming than the first, arose. ...
— Monsieur de Camors, Complete • Octave Feuillet
... Bagwell's communications were certainly alarming, but we had scarcely time to reply to them before we reached the house. When we entered the hall the frown departed from his face like magic, he assumed a thoroughly pleasant manner, and conducted us quickly into the presence of the owner ...
— A Master of Mysteries • L. T. Meade
... and alarming dissensions have arisen between the Northern and the Southern States, concerning the Rights and security of the Rights of the Slaveholding States, and especially their Rights in the common territory of the United States; and whereas, it is eminently desirable and ...
— The Great Conspiracy, Complete • John Alexander Logan
... ten years. The mother sat by her coffin four days and nights, speechless and still; we dared not attempt to remove her, there way an alarming expression in her eyes if we did, that made the medical men uncertain how to act. She had tasted no food since the child died; she was hopeful to the last: it was impossible, she said, that her child ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 2, No. 12, May, 1851. • Various
... set out,—that of October 27, 1864. Up the stream headed the little launch, with her crew of seven, and towing two boats, each containing ten men, armed with cutlasses, grenades, and revolvers. Silently they proceeded, keeping to mid-stream, so as to avoid alarming the sentinels on the banks. In this success was attained; the eight miles were passed and the front of the town reached without the Confederates having an inkling of the disaster ...
— Historic Tales, Vol. 1 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... fears or disturb the repose of the members of the party. The doctrines of apostasy, dependence on grace for salvation, necessity of atonement, and special influence of the Holy Spirit, were all thought to be alarming doctrines. They were therefore laid aside silently and without controversy. Men were suffered to forget that the Son of God, and the Spirit, have anything to do ...
— History of Rationalism Embracing a Survey of the Present State of Protestant Theology • John F. Hurst
... of the bridge, had not altered its position a quarter of an inch. For a long time Captain Whalley stared down over the parapet, till at last the floating immobility of that beshrouded thing seemed to grow upon him into something inexplicable and alarming. The twilight abandoned the zenith; its reflected gleams left the world below, and the water of the canal seemed to turn into pitch. Captain ...
— End of the Tether • Joseph Conrad
... the Prince, among them the indisposition contracted by the Princess Royal at the coronation of her father-in-law, the King of Prussia, and the alarming illness at Cannes of Sir Edward Bowater, who had been sent to the south of France in charge of Prince Leopold. After a fortnight of sleeplessness, rheumatic pains, loss, of appetite, and increasing weakness, the Prince ...
— Life of Her Most Gracious Majesty the Queen, (Victoria) Vol II • Sarah Tytler
... on shore before he became so much worse that I secured the best medical assistance Cartagena could afford. For a day or two the doctors differed, as usual, about the nature of his complaint, but ere long alarming symptoms displayed themselves. The medical men declared that his life was in danger, and told me that his disease ...
— The Queen of Hearts • Wilkie Collins
... their search around the room they noticed one very alarming thing. At the south corner there was a step-ladder, which led up into the attic, thus affording an easy entrance to any one who might be above. Frank rushed up to the step-ladder and shook it. To his great relief, it was loose, and not ...
— Among the Brigands • James de Mille
... There is no use of alarming him before we are ready for work. I will give the signal, and let ...
— Wild Bill's Last Trail • Ned Buntline
... ice, and they had scarcely arrived in those lonely waters when Scott was aroused from sleep by a loud knocking and a voice shouting, 'Ship's afire, sir.' Without waiting to give any details of this alarming news the informant fled, and when Scott appeared hastily on the scenes he found that the deck was very dark and obstructed by numerous half-clad people, all of whom were as ignorant as he was. Making his way forward he discovered that the fire ...
— The Voyages of Captain Scott - Retold from 'The Voyage of the "Discovery"' and 'Scott's - Last Expedition' • Charles Turley
... he had gone to the tie cutter's cabin, and for many minutes he stared and listened, while Peter seemed to stand without breathing. Then making a wide megaphone of his hands, he shouted. It was an alarming thing to do and Peter started as if struck. For there were only ghosts to answer back and the hollowness of a shriven pit for the cry to travel in. Nothing was there. Even the great sawdust piles had shrunk into black scars under ...
— The Country Beyond - A Romance of the Wilderness • James Oliver Curwood
... with a stick. If this is justification, then almost any form of resistance to the police is justification for the immediate killing of the person resisting, who may be perfectly innocent of any offence. This would be an alarming doctrine anywhere. It is peculiarly alarming when applied to a city like Johannesburg, where a strong force of police armed with revolvers have to deal with a large alien unarmed population, whose language in many cases they do not understand. The emphatic affirmation of such a doctrine by ...
— A Century of Wrong • F. W. Reitz
... their warden that when the Pelicans returned that season to occupy the island as before, they took one look at this declaration of the President and immediately departed, one and all, to a neighbouring island entirely outside of the reservation! Signs less alarming in size were substituted, and the Pelicans, their feelings appeased, condescended to return, and have since dwelt peacefully under the ...
— The Bird Study Book • Thomas Gilbert Pearson
... and looked up. He had a full view of her face as she gazed about as if startled by some unexpected, even alarming, sound. For a second or two he held his breath, stunned by the amazing loveliness that was revealed to him. Then she discovered ...
— Green Fancy • George Barr McCutcheon
... taste of it all was again sweet on her lips. A few days later she began to wonder how the thought of Strefford's endearments could have been so alarming. To be sure he was not lavish of them; but when he did touch her, even when he kissed her, it no longer seemed to matter. An almost complete absence of sensation had mercifully succeeded to the first wild flurry ...
— The Glimpses of the Moon • Edith Wharton
... ear, Lida was at once joyful and afraid. Now, as on all occasions when Sarudine embraced her, she felt a strange thrill. She knew that in intelligence and culture he was her inferior, and that she could never be dominated by him; yet at the same time she was aware of something delightful and alarming in letting herself be touched by this strong, comely young man. She seemed to be gazing down into a mysterious, unfathomable abyss, and thinking, "I could hurl myself in, if ...
— Sanine • Michael Artzibashef
... farmer, who drank right smart," that on the morning he "took out," while innocent of having committed any crime, suddenly in a desperate fit of passion, his master took him "by the collar," at the same time calling loudly to "John" for "ropes." This alarming assault on the part of his master made the preacher feel as though his Satanic majesty had possession of him. In such a crisis he evidently felt that preaching would do no good; he was, however, constrained to make an effort. ...
— The Underground Railroad • William Still
... warmth of one's hand flatteringly soon, as if it liked to do so, yet kept its freshness; it was smooth without being glossy, mat as a pearl, and as delightful to roll in the hand; and of an exquisite, alarming frangibility that gave it, in its small way, that flavour which belongs to pleasures that are dogged by the danger of a violent end. As elaborately as this she had felt about it; for she was silly, as poets are, and believed it possible that things ...
— The Judge • Rebecca West
... but, being countenanced by the duke of Lancaster, was both times dismissed without condemnation. Wickliffe, therefore, continued to spread his new principles, as usual, adding to them doctrines still more alarming; by which he drew after him a great number of disciples. Upon this, William Courtney, archbishop of Canterbury, called another council in 1382, which condemned 24 propositions of Wickliffe and his disciples, and ...
— The Book of Religions • John Hayward
... the school of adulation, or the courts of sycophants, we speak forth the pure sentiments of Independence. We give you our warmest approbation. We behold with true patriotic pride the dignified conduct of our Chief Magistrate at this alarming crisis. We are highly pleased with the moderation, candor, and firmness which have uniformly characterized your administration. Though measures decisive and energetic will ever meet with censure from the unprincipled, the disaffected, and the factious, yet virtue must ...
— A Williams Anthology - A Collection of the Verse and Prose of Williams College, 1798-1910 • Compiled by Edwin Partridge Lehman and Julian Park
... which, till one is accustomed to it, is very alarming, is the noise which the balloon makes when it is struck by successive gales of wind. When the wind has passed, the balloon, which has been pressed into a concave form by the wind, suddenly resumes its globular form with a loud noise heard at a great distance. ...
— Wonderful Balloon Ascents - or, the Conquest of the Skies • Fulgence Marion
... whispered in his ear the expression of her anxiety, and the panic which always followed those rash steps which she was in the habit of taking. "Oh, my dear, I hope you don't think I'm to blame," she said, with her lips at his ear, and gained but cold comfort from the Curate's face. The alarming member of the party was Miss Leonora. She rose and made two steps forward to meet the unfortunate young man. She shook both his hands cordially, and said she was very glad to see him, and hoped he was well. She was the sensible sister of the ...
— The Perpetual Curate • Mrs [Margaret] Oliphant
... after Melvina, and can't find her," thought Luretta; and she was right; the colored man had been to Captain Horton's house to walk home with his little mistress, and had been told that Melvina had not been there that afternoon; and he was now hurrying home with this alarming news. ...
— A Little Maid of Old Maine • Alice Turner Curtis
... been for such great undertakings as Telford's Holyhead Road, which familiarized men's minds with costly engineering operations, it is probable that projectors would long have stood aghast at the alarming expense of a nearly level iron road running through tall hills and over broad rivers the whole ...
— Biographies of Working Men • Grant Allen
... she must have passed that way; but at what hour, or for what purpose, Mowbray dared not conjecture. The path, after running a quarter of a mile or more through an open grove of oaks and sycamores, attained the verge of the large brook, and became there steep and rocky, difficult to the infirm, and alarming to the nervous; often approaching the brink of a precipitous ledge of rock, which in this place overhung the stream, in some places brawling and foaming in hasty current, and in others seeming to slumber in deep and circular eddies. The temptations which this dangerous scene must have ...
— St. Ronan's Well • Sir Walter Scott
... thereafter taken for its destruction and the filling up of swamps. The rate of mortality among the natives from tropical diseases is also high, one of the most fatal being that known as sleeping sickness. (The ravages of this disease, which also attacks Europeans, reached alarming proportions between 1893 and 1907, and in the last-named year an international conference was held in London to consider measures to combat it.) When removed to colder regions natives of the equatorial districts suffer greatly from chest complaints. Smallpox also makes great ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... still more alarming quickly followed. Two captives, white men, securely bound, were one day brought before him on their way to the stake, followed by a crowd of old and young squaws and children. The unhappy Elijah recognized ...
— A Drift from Redwood Camp • Bret Harte
... that she would trample on him next. He told me that she really was a very alarming sight. Stimulated by terror, his ...
— The Island Mystery • George A. Birmingham
... paper and the press have put an end to all these restraints. They have made every one a writer, and enabled every mind to pour itself into print, and diffuse itself over the whole intellectual world. The consequences are alarming. The stream of literature has swollen into a torrent—augmented into a river-expanded into a sea. A few centuries since five or six hundred manuscripts constituted a great library; but what would ...
— The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent. • Washington Irving
... own cat came down from her place of safety, and dropped the bird on the carpet without doing it the smallest injury; for it commenced again picking crumbs, as if nothing alarming ...
— Minnie's Pet Cat • Madeline Leslie
... inventing it. She dismissed his words about leaving Wall Street with scarcely a thought; he always talked in this way when the times were bad or his ventures unlucky. They had been on the eve of ruin so many times, that the cry of "wolf" was not so alarming as formerly. ...
— A Young Girl's Wooing • E. P. Roe
... concealing the cause of her absence from prayers, though acute at the moment of enquiry, was nevertheless more transient than one might suppose from the alarming effects it produced. Her mind was at the time in a state of tumult and excitement, such as she had never till then experienced, and the novel guilt of dissimulation, by superinducing her first impression of ...
— Jane Sinclair; Or, The Fawn Of Springvale - The Works of William Carleton, Volume Two • William Carleton
... haven't," retorted Belle hastily. "And I hope, with all my heart, that Gridley gains the only points that are allowed. Yet, sometimes, so much confidence all the while seems just a bit alarming." ...
— The High School Captain of the Team - Dick & Co. Leading the Athletic Vanguard • H. Irving Hancock
... narrative, Tertius had returned with further news. And these, of a truth, were very alarming. The lower slopes of the Palatine, as well as the Forum and the surrounding streets, were now in the hands of the mob. The few legions who were in the city had been cut off from the Palatine, and though ...
— "Unto Caesar" • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... approbation of it from any quarter is improper. That the Senate, indeed, had given many indications of their wish to invade the executive power: the Representatives had done it in one case, which was indeed mischievous and alarming; that of giving orders to the Heads of the executive departments, without consulting the President; but that the late vote for directing the Secretary of the Treasury to report ways and means, though carried, ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... at a glance that he was the bearer of important, nay, even alarming, intelligence; his eye was startled and anxious, his manner full of discomposure, and without waste of a moment he opened abruptly upon the business which ...
— King John of Jingalo - The Story of a Monarch in Difficulties • Laurence Housman
... him to the floor. Now, a month ago, I would rather have had anything happen to me than to sit in the presence of Mr. Douglass Byrd, but all that reverential awe has gone—changed, the awe gone and only reverence left. As we feared, he has bought the new spring clothes, but we see no alarming signs of affection toward Helena Kirby yet developed by them. How magnificent he is in them, is beyond my pen to describe ...
— Phyllis • Maria Thompson Daviess
... who would move no more, lying on every side. The defenders had suffered also. Fannin lay upon the ground, while two of his men bound up a severe wound in the thigh that he had sustained from a Mexican bullet. Many others had been wounded and some had been killed. Most alarming of all was the announcement that the cannon could be fired only a few times more, as there was no water for the sponges when they became heated and clogged. But this discouraged only the leaders, not the recruits themselves, who had ultimate faith ...
— The Texan Scouts - A Story of the Alamo and Goliad • Joseph A. Altsheler
... reechoed among the cliffs. I could not tell the direction from which it came; a sudden chill crept along my spine, my hair prickled and lifted. Then the echoes ceased, the silence that followed was equally terrifying. I bethought me of my unfinished camp. Later I learned that alarming sound was the bugling of a bull elk. It was ...
— A Mountain Boyhood • Joe Mills
... Forth they set in the morning; and in travelling through a solitary and dreary glen, the discourse again turned on John Gunn. 'Would you like to see him?' said the guide; and without waiting an answer to this alarming question, he whistled, and the English officer, with his small party, were surrounded by a body of Highlanders, whose numbers put resistance out of question, and who were all well armed. 'Stranger,' resumed the guide, 'I am that very John ...
— The Lady of the Lake • Sir Walter Scott
... him on the run!" cried Tom. "Give it to him!" and he let go another stone, which hit the bull in the tail and made him throw up his rear hoofs in a most alarming fashion. ...
— The Rover Boys in Camp - or, The Rivals of Pine Island • Edward Stratemeyer
... who had been suddenly convinced, beyond power of further unbelief, of something he had never suspected, never dreamed of. And the conviction seemed to be bitter to him, even alarming. ...
— The Garden Of Allah • Robert Hichens
... Craskell, the banished superintendent, gave it to the Assembly as his opinion, that the whole slave population of the island was in sympathy with the Maroons, and would soon be beyond control. More alarming still, there were rumors of French emissaries behind the scenes; and though these were explained away, the vague terror remained. Indeed, the Lieutenant-Governor announced in his message that he had satisfactory evidence that the French Convention was concerned ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 5, No. 28, February, 1860 • Various
... would remove the Northern army still further from its sources of supply and its principal depots. One circumstance, however, would probably in any event, have impelled him to take the bolder course. The situation in Vicksburg was becoming alarming. It was evident the town must fall and with its surrender the Federal fleet would soon regain possession of the Mississippi. The fall of Vicksburg, supplemented by the retreat of Lee's army on Richmond, ...
— Chancellorsville and Gettysburg - Campaigns of the Civil War - VI • Abner Doubleday
... The most alarming feature of the affair, however, was the manner of Franz von Blenheim, which was not so much melodramatic as businesslike and hard. At Miss Falconer's defiance he looked her up and down quite coolly. Then, turning in his seat, he began ...
— The Firefly Of France • Marion Polk Angellotti
... was Blucher? A cut-throat looking dog, with his black bull-muzzle thrust through a gap in the hedge. And his master? A sturdy farmer, with an alarming cudgel ...
— Redburn. His First Voyage • Herman Melville
... average man of a certain age is an alarming creature when dinner delays itself; the literary man in such a moment goes beyond all parallel. If there be added the fact that he has just returned from a very unsatisfactory interview with a publisher, wife and daughter may indeed regard the situation as appalling. Marian came in, and ...
— New Grub Street • George Gissing
... not utter a sound. One of the peculiarities of these birds is their fearlessness in the presence of man, or perhaps more correctly their intelligence, which prevents them, as it does our native thrushes, from being frightened unless there is something really alarming. ...
— Upon The Tree-Tops • Olive Thorne Miller
... Hapley that his conduct and appearance had been strange and alarming. Confound the moth! and Pawkins! However, it was a pity to lose the moth now. He felt his way into the hall and found the matches, after sending his hat down upon the floor with a noise like a drum. ...
— The Country of the Blind, And Other Stories • H. G. Wells
... the house but herself, and although this was neither alarming nor unusual, it was unusual—and Miss Calista considered it alarming—that the sum of five hundred dollars should at that very moment be in the upper right-hand drawer of the sideboard, which sum had been up to the previous day safe in the coffers of ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1896 to 1901 • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... supported by an international force,) Americans see, in the treatment by the German Government of the Belgian neutralization treaty as nothing but a piece of paper which might be torn up on the ground of military necessity, evidence of the adoption by Germany of a retrograde policy of the most alarming sort. That single act on the part of Germany—the violation of the neutral territory of Belgium—would have determined American opinion in favor of the Allies, if it had stood alone by itself—the reason being that American hopes for the peace and order ...
— The New York Times Current History of the European War, Vol. 1, January 9, 1915 - What Americans Say to Europe • Various
... who earned his name by drawing a load of pumpkins for Seraphina, the cow, to eat. It is of note that his horseship carried "a very light whisp of a tail, and had a gait all his own in going at times on three legs and, at times, kicking up both hind ones in a way more amusing than alarming, by leaving an interesting doubt as to fore or aft movement, in ...
— James Fenimore Cooper • Mary E. Phillips
... surveillance of the attorneys. During the night, or that part of it which at sea would form the middle watch, he was driving. This explanation certainly accounted for his drowsiness, but in a way which made it much more alarming; since now, after several days' resistance to this infirmity, at length he was steadily giving way. Throughout the second stage he grew more and more drowsy. In the second mile of the third stage he surrendered himself finally and without a struggle to his perilous temptation. All his past resistance ...
— The English Mail-Coach and Joan of Arc • Thomas de Quincey
... air, that fine, sandy soil, made it a haven, indeed, to people who were afraid of sickness. And in those days the island was continually swept by epidemics—violent, far-reaching, and registering alarming mortality. Greenwich seemed to be the only place where one didn't get yellow fever or anything else, and terrorised citizens began to rush out there in droves, not only with their bags and their baggage, and their wives and children, but ...
— Greenwich Village • Anna Alice Chapin
... sun for months. You have had a great deal on your spirits, and been exceedingly dull. You have missed your excellent sister, and I do not wonder at it. It would have been a miracle if you could have kept your health this unkindly spring, with all these drawbacks. But you have nothing whatever alarming ...
— Mr. Hogarth's Will • Catherine Helen Spence
... and all on my side. I wrote him one letter to introduce Mr. Sinclair (now Sir John), the member for Caithness, to his acquaintance; and informed him in another that my wife had again been affected with alarming symptoms of illness. ...
— Life Of Johnson, Volume 4 (of 6) • Boswell
... from under the burdock leaves, those three duck children did, and ran to grandpa's house as fast as they could, leaving the bad foxes in the woods. Well, you can imagine how surprised all the folks were, even Uncle Wiggily, when they heard the alarming news which the ...
— Lulu, Alice and Jimmie Wibblewobble • Howard R. Garis
... my nature, strong in me even in those days, that I felt in such an existence, the share of the great majority, something amiss. I recognised its social values, I saw its ordered happiness, but a fever in my blood asked for a wilder course. There seemed to me something alarming in such easy delights. In my heart was a desire to live more dangerously. I was not unprepared for jagged rocks and treacherous shoals if I could only have change — change and the excitement ...
— The Moon and Sixpence • W. Somerset Maugham
... gathered up and interred secretly, as fast as they were found; still, exaggerated rumors of the number and magnitude of these disasters were circulated in the camp, and the discontent and apprehensions grew every day more and more alarming. ...
— William the Conqueror - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... and supporters, and assisted by, or in close touch with, town councils and local industries, have been much less willing to sanction political free-thought amongst their undergraduates, and the pernicious influence of wealth, or rather the fear of alarming the wealthy, has at times induced the authorities to interfere with the freedom of the undergraduates to combine for the study ...
— The History of the Fabian Society • Edward R. Pease
... was written and signed by every man there. It was a long list of signatures and an alarming total of indebtedness. The ...
— The Depot Master • Joseph C. Lincoln
... members named by the authority which called it into existence. This is not the disposal by Parliament of any office derived from the authority of the crown, or now disposable by that authority. It is so far from being anything new, violent, or alarming, that I do not recollect, in any Parliamentary commission, down to the commissioners of the land-tax, that it has ever ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. II. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... might choose to do. Of course she had felt ill, he told himself. So wretched that she hadn't known what she was saying when she stormed at him so angrily. He resolved to watch her closely, and take matters in his own hands if she showed any more alarming symptoms. ...
— The Little Colonel's Christmas Vacation • Annie Fellows Johnston
... family, with the addition of a little boyfriend, gathered together in a very purposeful and alarming way in the library There was about them an undefinable air of the chase, for they were all well-booted and belted, and Peggy had a large clasp-knife dangling at her waist. "It is for the hare," she said, ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 146, January 7, 1914 • Various
... to be more liquid and the gas pressure stronger than anticipated. Quicksands ran through the sheet piling as through a sieve. The walls of the excavation began to slough and cave. The gas pressure became alarming when the weight of earth and water was taken off; sand boils began to develop at the bottom; the floor of the ...
— The Industrial Canal and Inner Harbor of New Orleans • Thomas Ewing Dabney
... was a witness of the alarming catastrophe on the hilltop, and reached the front gate just in time to see Henry go galloping by, dragging the four wheels and springs of the sulky, while, sprawled across the rear axle and still clinging to the reins, hung a familiar, howling, and most wickedly profane ...
— Cy Whittaker's Place • Joseph C. Lincoln
... previous part of this series of papers was sent to the press, new and alarming indications have appeared in various quarters, of the drift in the public mind—North—in favor of an easy-going and conceding policy toward the South as the war draws to a close; a policy which would be nearly certain to lose to ourselves and to the ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol V. Issue III. March, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... between the sloping curved walls, the pinyon patches in the amphitheater under the circled walls. That was a wild place they were approaching, and, once in there, he believed pursuit would be useless. However, there were miles to go still, and those hard-riding devils behind made alarming decrease in the intervening distance. Shefford could see the horses plainly now. How they made the dust fly! He counted up to six—and then the dust and moving line caused the ...
— The Rainbow Trail • Zane Grey
... early the next morning, just as dawn was breaking, the peacefully sleeping inhabitants of Mr. Caryll's house were awakened by strange and alarming sounds which seemed to come from the direction of the nursery. The children's mother was one of the first to wake, and yet the sounds which had roused her having been heard indistinctly through her sleep, she was not able to ...
— Hoodie • Mary Louisa Stewart Molesworth
... alarming interlude, like a herald of evil, to shake the nerves of the company—nothing more unpropitious than the contretemps to an unlucky lady of being overcome by the heat and seized with a fainting-fit, which caused her over-zealous supporters to remove her ...
— Life of Her Most Gracious Majesty the Queen, (Victoria) Vol II • Sarah Tytler
... instant, realized how wise had been Oak's alarming cry and how well it was for them that they were so distant from the clump of trees so near the river. What he saw was that which would have made the boys' fathers flee as swiftly had they been in their children's place. Yet what Ab looked upon was only a waving, in sinuous regularity, of the rushes ...
— The Story of Ab - A Tale of the Time of the Cave Man • Stanley Waterloo
... stream a little, which has here expanded into a broad surface, and view its "goings on." There is a water-spider taking most alarming leaps, as if afraid of wetting his feet; a dragon-fly is darting hither and yon, his long, slender body flashing with green, golden and purple hues; a large dace has just apparently flattened his nose against ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 3 September 1848 • Various
... of family life, and the responsibility of the parentage of a large and healthy brood, but at three-and-thirty we take a different view of the matter. The temptation may be great, but the per contra list is so very alarming, and we never know even then if we see all the liabilities. Such are the black thoughts that move in the breasts of selfish men, to the great disadvantage of the marriage market; and however it may lower John Niel in the eyes of those who take the trouble to follow this ...
— Jess • H. Rider Haggard
... Dublin and other cities, the grand juries of Derry, Donegal, Leitrim, Roscommon, Limerick, Cork, and other counties, at once pronounced most strongly against the proposed Convention. They declared it "unconstitutional," "alarming," "most dangerous;" they denounced it as a copy of the National Assembly of France; they declared that they would "resist it to the utmost of their power;" they pledged "their lives and fortunes" to suppress it. The only answer of the Catholics was the legal opinion ...
— A Popular History of Ireland - From the earliest period to the emancipation of the Catholics • Thomas D'Arcy McGee
... wont to prevail when there is little to fear, as in a calm voyage or a trifling disease. But as we observe the voyager and the invalid implore the aid of some one competent director, as soon as the sea grows stormy and the disease alarming, so our nation in peace and security commands, threatens, resists, appeals from, and insults its magistrates, but in war obeys them as strictly as kings; for public safety is, after all, rather more valuable than popular license. And in the most serious wars, our countrymen have even chosen ...
— Cicero's Tusculan Disputations - Also, Treatises On The Nature Of The Gods, And On The Commonwealth • Marcus Tullius Cicero
... and resolute, had no idea of permitting him to deliver so hasty and alarming a message without subjecting him to a cross-examination. He had already got him by the collar, and now he dragged him into the house, the man not daring to resist for fear of outcry ...
— Cudjo's Cave • J. T. Trowbridge
... He was alone. The nearest of his fellows were beside a fire sixty or seventy feet beyond. To enter the hut Korak must either silence the sentry or pass him unnoticed. The danger in the accomplishment of the former alternative lay in the practical certainty of alarming the warriors near by and bringing them and the balance of the village down upon him. To achieve the latter appeared practically impossible. To you or me it would have been impossible; but Korak, The Killer, was not as you ...
— The Son of Tarzan • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... foreigner as a qualification for the right of suffrage. Its career was as remarkable as it was disgraceful. Thousands were made to believe that the Romish hierarchy was about to overthrow our liberties, and that the evils of "foreignism" had become so alarming as to justify the extraordinary measures by which it was proposed to counteract them. Thousands, misled by political knaves through the arts of the Jesuits believed that the cause of freedom was to be sanctified and ...
— Political Recollections - 1840 to 1872 • George W. Julian
... of the lad on awaking to the alarming fact, was that his father and the other two men had been killed by the Winnebagos. The thought overcame him so that he leaned against the nearest tree and was on the point ...
— The Hunters of the Ozark • Edward S. Ellis
... appointed to the command of the Department of Arkansas, and had gone to Little Rock. General Osterhaus marched the same day, and on the 23d I was summoned to Vicksburg in person, where General Grant showed me the alarming dispatches from General Halleck, which had been sent from Memphis by General Hurlbut, and said, on further thought, that he would send me and my whole corps. But, inasmuch as one division of McPherson's corps (John E. Smith's) had already started, he instructed ...
— The Memoirs of General W. T. Sherman, Complete • William T. Sherman
... in hot haste: the steed, The mustering squadron, and the clattering car, Went pouring forward with impetuous speed, And swiftly forming in the ranks of war; And the deep thunder peal on peal afar; And near, the beat of the alarming drum Roused up the soldier ere the morning star; While throng'd the citizens with terror dumb, Or whispering with white lips—"The foe! They come! ...
— Graded Poetry: Seventh Year - Edited by Katherine D. Blake and Georgia Alexander • Various
... after this act of revealing and unnecessary courage, that the Houghton family entirely accepted Eleanor. There were a few days of anxiety about her, and about Maurice, too; for, though his slight concussion was not exactly alarming—yet, "Keep your shirt on," Doctor Bennett cautioned him; "don't get gay. And don't talk to Mrs. Curtis." So Maurice lay in his bed in another room, and entered, silently, into a new understanding of love, which, as soon as he was permitted to see Eleanor, he tried ...
— The Vehement Flame • Margaret Wade Campbell Deland
... been his course had he not heard a most alarming sound directly behind him. It was the faint cough of a person seeking to clear his throat. The Indian turned like a flash, and saw the dusky youth a rod distant, holding his bow loosely in his right hand, while his terrible left was drawn back over his shoulder, ...
— Camp-fire and Wigwam • Edward Sylvester Ellis
... detected in the schools and removed to the proper institutions before they fell prey to the clever schemes of the procurer.[Footnote: Of 647 wayward girls recently at the Bedford Reformatory, over 300 were accounted mentally deficient.] For a falling-off in this alarming number of mental defectives we must await scientific eugenic laws to be ...
— Problems of Conduct • Durant Drake
... how to deal with life, and it was safer to have an enthusiasm for an Order than for an individual. Seculars were the right people for daily routine and work among the poor, but for a young secular priest to become a bright, particular star was unusual and alarming. ...
— Great Possessions • Mrs. Wilfrid Ward
... The portrait, sketched by Tomsky, coincided with the picture she had formed within her own mind, and thanks to the latest romances, the ordinary countenance of her admirer became invested with attributes capable of alarming her and fascinating her imagination at the same time. She was now sitting with her bare arms crossed and with her head, still adorned with flowers, sunk upon her uncovered bosom. Suddenly the door opened ...
— Best Russian Short Stories • Various
... exertion on his own account. Now that she felt sure he had heard of it, and it had not spurred him, she was as anxious to conceal the fact that, both to Mrs. Winthrop and herself, these attentions were becoming alarming. If he did not care for Viva, the chances were that so soon as he found that public attention had been drawn to her acceptance of such devotions, Paul would drop the matter entirely, and that would be a calamity. Knowing ...
— A War-Time Wooing - A Story • Charles King
... of this place where she knelt became terrible to her. She felt the horror of solitude, of approaching darkness. The outlines of the rocks and of the ruined castle looked threatening, alarming. The pale light of the lamp before the shrine and of Lucrezia's votive candle drew to them not only the fluttering night-moths, but the spirits of desolation and of hollow grief that dwell among the waste places and among ...
— The Call of the Blood • Robert Smythe Hichens
... Rev. Mr. Ray live here?' and receiving an affirmative answer, whistled as a signal to attract the notice of his comrades, then cried out, 'Come on, boys!' and forthwith fourteen men in all entered, quite alarming the inmates of the house on seeing such a ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 4, 1919 • Various
... Alarming accounts of the resolution taken by the insurgents being communicated to the queen, she lost no time in adopting measures for the preservation of her power. She summoned around her all those counsellors in whose judgment she had ever confided, and those champions on ...
— Gomez Arias - The Moors of the Alpujarras, A Spanish Historical Romance. • Joaquin Telesforo de Trueba y Cosio
... Magnier is so bent with rheumatism that each movement is accompanied by an alarming cracking of his bones, and one is tempted to ask him not to stir for fear of suddenly seeing him drop to pieces, as would an antiquated, over-dry grandfather clock, on being removed from a long stay ...
— With Those Who Wait • Frances Wilson Huard
... monuments in this church, and among others, is the beautiful one to the memory of Sir Richard Hoare, Knt. who was Lord Mayor of London in the memorable year 1745, at which "alarming crisis," in the words of the inscription, "he discharged the great trust reposed in him with honour and integrity, to the approbation of his sovereign and the universal satisfaction of his fellow citizens." He died ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 14, Issue 394, October 17, 1829 • Various
... simulating death, foretells unhappiness caused by illness. To mash them, and water appears instead of blood, denotes alarming but not fatal illness or accident. To see bedbugs crawling up white walls, and you throw scalding water upon them, denotes grave illness will distress you, but there will ...
— 10,000 Dreams Interpreted • Gustavus Hindman Miller
... the uncertainties of our present state, the most dreadful and alarming is the uncertain continuance of reason.' Rasselas, ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 1 • Boswell
... them, or simply the result of present excitement. But when he began to talk I detected an unmistakable tremor in his tones, and decided that he was in a state of suppressed agitation; though he appeared to have nothing more alarming to impart than the fact that he had seen a light burning in some ...
— The Filigree Ball • Anna Katharine Green
... back in his office chair at an alarming angle, scowling at his distressed subordinate who sat on the edge of a chair at the other side of ...
— The Clue of the Twisted Candle • Edgar Wallace
... pride of youth and vigour, who rushed along in arms, and seemed to breathe deliberate rage and unconquerable opposition. When they were all assembled on a spacious plain, Sophron rose, and with a becoming modesty, recited the adventures of the preceding night, and the alarming intelligence he had just received. He had scarcely finished before a general cry of indignation burst unanimously from the whole assembly. When it had a little subsided, a venerable old man, whose beard, white as the ...
— The History of Sandford and Merton • Thomas Day
... this family to an alarming extent," said Bessie Sandford, when she heard the story, "but I wish that I had been there to see pet Daisy ...
— Uncle Rutherford's Nieces - A Story for Girls • Joanna H. Mathews
... threatened the detective with death if he should make any overt omission, she was eagerly casting about in her mind how to get him entirely into her power to do with as she would without alarming the others that were ...
— A Woman at Bay - A Fiend in Skirts • Nicholas Carter
... her sickbed; her watchful attentions triumphed over the malignity of the distemper—Elizabeth was saved, but the consequences of this imprudence were fatal to her preserver. On the third day my mother sickened; her fever was accompanied by the most alarming symptoms, and the looks of her medical attendants prognosticated the worst event. On her deathbed the fortitude and benignity of this best of women did not desert her. She joined the hands of Elizabeth and ...
— Frankenstein - or The Modern Prometheus • Mary Wollstonecraft (Godwin) Shelley
... Casanova saw that the heavens were overcast. He had no sense of fatigue, but felt tense and wakeful. He thought over his situation, considering it from every possible point of view, and coming to the conclusion that, though grave, it was less alarming than it might have seemed to timid spirits. He would probably be suspected of having killed Lorenzi, but who could doubt that it had been in an honorable fight? Besides, Lorenzi had been lying in wait, had forced the encounter upon him, and ...
— Casanova's Homecoming • Arthur Schnitzler
... they kept their boats in one of the bayous near by, and in it we intended to take them to the sea, where we would meet the girls, who would then fly with them to the Twilight Country. But we could not figure out how to capture them without alarming the city. We were sure they were unarmed; they had been carefully searched by the authorities when they entered the country. But they were ten to ...
— The Fire People • Ray Cummings
... broke out by far the most alarming danger of universal dominion, which had ever threatened Europe. The most military people in Europe became engaged in a war for their very existence. Invasion on the frontiers, civil war and all imaginable horrors raging ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXVIII. February, 1843. Vol. LIII. • Various
... be alarming every one for nothing. We talked about seeing things pass the grey stones, and that made you think you ...
— Charge! - A Story of Briton and Boer • George Manville Fenn
... that I shall meet you there, and if you will promise that I shan't be called upon to do any thing remarkable. I have heard alarming reports." ...
— Only an Incident • Grace Denio Litchfield
... nothing but Lady Rockminster to Samuel, when that youth came to partake of beef-steak and oyster-sauce and accompany his parent to the play. There was a simple grandeur, a polite urbanity, a high-bred grace about her ladyship, which he had never witnessed in any woman. Her symptoms did not seem alarming; he had prescribed—Spir:Ammon:Aromat: with a little Spir:Menth:Pip: and orange-flower, which would be all ...
— The History of Pendennis, Vol. 2 - His Fortunes and Misfortunes, His Friends and His Greatest Enemy • William Makepeace Thackeray
... penetrated the breast below the throat. It did not bleed much externally; but Bertram, accustomed to see gunshot wounds, thought it the more alarming. 'Good God! what shall we do for this poor woman?' said he to Hazlewood, the circumstances superseding the necessity of previous explanation or introduction ...
— Guy Mannering, or The Astrologer, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... population of Warley this solution was a very agreeable one. The fact of a gigantic footpad being in the neighborhood was alarming for all, and nervous people were already having great bolts and bars placed upon their shutters and doors. The discovery, therefore, that the object of this giant was not plunder, but only to gratify a spite against the master, was a relief to the whole place. Every one was, ...
— The Young Buglers • G.A. Henty
... forget Mr. Johnson's loyalty when it was hard to be loyal, nor the many evidences he has given of a sincere desire to accomplish what seemed to him best for the future of the whole country; but, at the same time, we cannot help thinking that some of his over-frank confidences of late have shown alarming misconceptions, both of the position he holds either in the public sentiment or by virtue of his office, and of the duty thereby devolved upon him. We do not mean to indulge ourselves in any nonsensical rhetoric about usurpations ...
— The Writings of James Russell Lowell in Prose and Poetry, Volume V - Political Essays • James Russell Lowell
... expedient to drive him to extremity. "What I have to say," continued he, "must so soon be public news, that it little matters who hears it; and yet the West, so full of strange changes, never sent to the Eastern half of the globe tidings so alarming as those I now come to tell your Imperial Highness. Europe, to borrow an expression from this lady, who honours me by calling me husband, seems loosened from its foundations and about ...
— Waverley Volume XII • Sir Walter Scott
... breast, a less regular pulse, a propensity to be cold, or to perspire, or sometimes a suppression of a former disposition to perspire, are any of them symptomatic of a diseased state, though not to any very serious or alarming degree. Yet under such circumstances persons are generally restless, and scarcely know what to do with themselves; and often for the sake of change, or on the supposition that their sensations proceed from lowness, they unhappily adopt the ...
— The Cook and Housekeeper's Complete and Universal Dictionary; Including a System of Modern Cookery, in all Its Various Branches, • Mary Eaton
... defense of Fort McHenry Colonel Armistead had under him about 1,000 men, including soldiers, sailors, and volunteers. It is said he was the only man aware of the alarming fact that the powder magazine was not bombproof. During the night of September 13 the fort was under constant bombardment by the enemy, but the attack failed. Discouraged by the loss of the British ...
— Presentation Pieces in the Museum of History and Technology • Margaret Brown Klapthor
... visitor to Oxford was Tennyson. His first visit to our house was rather alarming. We lived in a small house in High Street, nearly opposite Magdalen College, and our establishment was not calculated to receive sudden guests, particularly a poet laureate. He stepped in one day during the long vacation, when Oxford was almost empty. Wishing to show the great man all civility, ...
— Stories of Authors, British and American • Edwin Watts Chubb
... know that I was attired in a tourist's blouse stained with red ochre; besides, I must have had that haggard look and startled expression which impart to one rudely snatched from sleep a countenance at once comical and alarming. Add to all this, my hair in utter disorder, my beard strewn with dead leaves, and you will have no difficulty in understanding the terror that suddenly overpowered the young huntress at the first glance she cast upon me; she uttered a feeble cry, and wheeling her ...
— Led Astray and The Sphinx - Two Novellas In One Volume • Octave Feuillet
... their hostilities; and, about the tenth of August following, two boys were taken from Major Hoy's station. This party was pursued by Capt. Holder and seventeen men, who were also defeated, with the loss of four men killed, and one wounded. Our affairs became more and more alarming. Several stations which had lately been erected in the country were continually infested with savages, stealing their horses and killing the men at every opportunity. In a field, near Lexington, an Indian shot a man, and running to scalp him, was himself ...
— The Adventures of Colonel Daniel Boone • John Filson
... down, with a fair amount of success. At length getting tired of taking nothing on my big line, I thought I would coil it up and examine the bait, but when I had got the line straight up and down it refused to leave the bottom, tug as I would. I pulled till my canoe danced and bobbed about in an alarming manner, in fact, till the coaming was in danger of going under the gently heaving sea, but to no purpose; it would not budge, so tripping anchor I paid out line and paddled fifty yards, thinking that if my hook had fouled a rock I might by a side pull clear it. I hauled in gently, ...
— Jethou - or Crusoe Life in the Channel Isles • E. R. Suffling
... of insect pests need not be regarded as an alarming obstacle to nut growing in the North, and yet there are numerous species of insects which are capable of destroying our nut crops. On the whole I presume there are fewer insects that attack nuts in this country than commonly ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Report of the Proceedings at the Fifteenth Annual Meeting • Various
... a kind of colonial dependence on the parsonage at Camenz, the bonds gradually slackening, sometimes shaken a little rudely, and always giving alarming hints of approaching and inevitable autonomy. From the few home letters of Lessing which remain, (covering the period before 1753, there are only eight in all,) we are able to surmise that a pretty constant maternal cluck and shrill paternal warning were kept up ...
— Among My Books - First Series • James Russell Lowell
... surrounded by that ocean, the low grounds exposed to the west are seldom covered with snow for any length of time, and thus the birds easily find a supply of food. The numbers which there congregate are often very great, and the din of their united cry is sometimes very loud and even alarming. The love of home and the certainty of returning to it is very conspicuous in the rock-pigeon or biset, as it is called by the French. Flocks from different parts of the coasts often meet on the feeding-grounds; but when the time of returning to ...
— The Book of Household Management • Mrs. Isabella Beeton
... him, "a single pressure symptom that I consider alarming and Doctor Cole has done wonders with his leg. But any emotional excitement is a danger. Three minutes, old man." He followed Kenny up the stairway, watch ...
— Kenny • Leona Dalrymple
... so alarming was the shock that it created something almost amounting to panic among the crew, a few of whom, in their alarm, raised a cry to launch the boats; and it was not without some difficulty that they were eventually persuaded that the yacht was ...
— The First Mate - The Story of a Strange Cruise • Harry Collingwood
... Lightwood, and stated his desire to 'have it out with him' on the spot, and defied him to come on, upon the liberal terms of a sovereign to a halfpenny. Mr Dolls then fell a crying, and then exhibited a tendency to fall asleep. This last manifestation as by far the most alarming, by reason of its threatening his prolonged stay on the premises, necessitated vigorous measures. Eugene picked up his worn-out hat with the tongs, clapped it on his head, and, taking him by the collar—all ...
— Our Mutual Friend • Charles Dickens
... lady was suffering from a severe attack of influenza, which, coupled with age and the depression caused by her heavy sorrow, had reduced her physical powers in an alarming degree. It was obvious that she urgently required good food and careful nursing. I never before felt so keenly my lack of money. My means barely sufficed to keep myself, educational expenses being heavy. I was a shy man, too, and ...
— My Doggie and I • R.M. Ballantyne
... situation remained deplorable. Nothing was done for the provinces whose paper currency was depreciating from month to month in an alarming manner; whilst the rivalries between the various leaders instead of diminishing seemed to be increasing. The Tutuhs, or Military Governors, acting precisely as they saw fit, derided the authority of Peking and sought to strengthen their old position by adding to their armed ...
— The Fight For The Republic in China • Bertram Lenox Putnam Weale
... Then—— Ah, what shall I say, my dearest? I tremble in thinking! You will imagine my feelings,—the blending of hope and of sorrow. How can I bear to abandon Papa and Mamma and my Sisters? Dearest Louise, indeed it is very alarming; but, trust me Ever, whatever may change, ...
— Amours de Voyage • Arthur Hugh Clough
... to make his morning call, was most welcome. He said there was nothing alarming about Miss Walton's symptoms, but added very decisively that she would need rest and quiet of mind for a long time in order to regain her ...
— Opening a Chestnut Burr • Edward Payson Roe
... justify it on this particular voyage. Down, down, down the great hull would slide till Katy would hold her breath with fear lest it might never right itself again; then slowly, slowly the turn would be made, and up, up, up it would go, till the cant on the other side was equally alarming. On the whole, Katy preferred to have her own side of the ship, the downward one; for it was less difficult to keep herself in the berth, from which she was in continual danger of being thrown. The night seemed endless, for she was too frightened to sleep except in broken snatches; ...
— What Katy Did Next • Susan Coolidge
... Wilkes, Lord North, Mr. Grenville, and Mr. T. Townshend—names which alone serve to secure one's interest, and also to raise the expectation that something would be done. Their Report, while evidently drawn up in a cautious manner, shows, as had been insisted upon by Daniel Defoe, with what alarming facility the liberty of the subject could be taken away on the plea of insanity, and how frequently persons availed themselves of this facility in order to get rid of a troublesome wife or daughter, or to obtain some selfish object equally improper. ...
— Chapters in the History of the Insane in the British Isles • Daniel Hack Tuke
... undeniable. The ferment and the anxiety increased every hour amongst the rebel occupants of Killala. The French had no power to protect, beyond the moral one of their influence as allies; and, in the very crisis of this alarming situation, a rebel came to the bishop with the news that the royal cavalry was at that moment advancing from Sligo, and could be traced along the country by the line of blazing houses which accompanied their march. The bishop ...
— Autobiographic Sketches • Thomas de Quincey
... by both the ladies that nothing alarming was the matter, when they arrived at their lodgings he descended from the driver's seat to assist them in alighting. Mrs. Delano, with polite regrets at having thus disturbed his pleasure, thanked him, and bade him good evening. She hurried after Flora, whom she found in her room, weeping ...
— A Romance of the Republic • Lydia Maria Francis Child
... These alarming sounds reached the ears of the worshippers, and quickly brought their devotional services to an end. In an instant all thought of dependence upon the Almighty was replaced by the instinct of dependence upon themselves. Grasping their weapons, they hurried out, to find themselves face ...
— Historic Tales, Vol. 1 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... Xenophon had persuaded the other generals to adopt his views, and had a plan to cheat the soldiers and take them back to the Phasis. The soldiers were highly indignant; meetings were held; little groups gathered ominously; and there seemed an alarming probability that they would repeat the violence with which they had lately treated the heralds of the Colchians and the clerks of the market; when all who did not save themselves by jumping into the ...
— Anabasis • Xenophon
... occurring as it did three times a week on the average, but this was not all; for when the company did go away, instead of walking quietly down the street, as anybody else's company would have done, they amused themselves by making alarming and frightful noises, and counterfeiting the shrieks of females in distress; and one night, a red-faced gentleman in a white hat knocked in the most urgent manner at the door of the powdered-headed old gentleman ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens
... Masters, I know Aunt Ann will never enter that alarming, fascinating Ferris Wheel without an escort whom she can trust should we lose our heads and want to jump out one hundred feet above terra firma; and I am quite sure I shall want to jump. I always am tempted to jump from any great height. Do you believe ...
— Against Odds - A Detective Story • Lawrence L. Lynch
... were in trouble, and entreating some one to help her. She stood for some few moments at the foot of my bed looking towards me, and then she made a movement towards the door, but before she reached it she had vanished. I was not at all frightened, as there was nothing at all alarming in her appearance. I cannot write a better description of her, as the vision was so short. The figure was the same as that I had seen at the burn, only very ...
— The Alleged Haunting of B—— House • Various
... These unhappy beings seem to want to suck the last juices of the life they mean to leave; their eyes see things invisible, their ears are listening to a death-knell, they pay no attention to the minor things about them. These alarming symptoms Marie perceived one evening at Lady Dudley's. Raoul was sitting apart on a sofa in the boudoir, while the rest of the company were conversing in the salon. The countess went to the door, but he did not raise his head; he heard neither Marie's breathing ...
— A Daughter of Eve • Honore de Balzac
... You are simply too charming. No doubt you'll be modern enough (Though the speed of the world is alarming) To ...
— More Songs From Vagabondia • Bliss Carman and Richard Hovey
... tiresome," he thought, "that this priest is leaving Paris before me, for indeed if I have need of spiritual help or counsel, to whom shall I go? It is clearly written that I must end as I have begun, alone, but ... but ... solitude under these conditions is alarming. I am no spoilt child, whatever the abbe ...
— En Route • J.-K. (Joris-Karl) Huysmans
... to a mild adventure story considered suitable to his years, "that I don't take any interest in the story until the decks are dripping with gore?" Here we have no opportunity of deciding whether or not the actual description demanded would be more alarming than ...
— The Art of the Story-Teller • Marie L. Shedlock
... and Honorius succeeded respectively to the government of the East and the West in 395. The symptoms of decay, which not even the wise rule of Theodosius had been able to remove, had grown more alarming. The luxury of the Romans was more shameless and dissolute, and as the increasing depredations of the barbarians had checked industry and diminished wealth, this profuse luxury must have been the result of that indolent despair which enjoys the present hour ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol XI. • Edited by Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton
... descending. But finally the open ground was preferred, and, the wood being left behind, a ploughed field was selected as the place to drop, and the gas was allowed to escape by wholesale. The balloon swooped downward at a somewhat alarming pace, and if Barker had had all his wits about him he would have thrown out half a bag of ballast and lightened the fall. But after giving instructions for all to stoop down in the bottom of the car and hold onto the ropes, he himself promptly illustrated the ...
— Faces and Places • Henry William Lucy
... came to be a perfect infatuation. He concealed himself one night in Mary's bed-chamber, armed, as if to resist any attack which the attendants might make upon him. He was discovered by the female attendants, and taken away, and they, for fear of alarming Mary, did not tell her of the circumstance till ...
— Mary Queen of Scots, Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... verge of bankruptcy, had done so as long as most of them could remember; but it was only of late that matters had begun to look really serious for them. It was rumoured that the Hall was already mortgaged beyond its value, and it was common knowledge that the Colonel's debts were accumulating with alarming rapidity. This marriage, so it was openly surmised, had been arranged in haste for the sole purpose ...
— The Odds - And Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell
... action had been previously agreed upon. It was a rule that the ladies should be politely handed out of the theatre before the commencement of any violent acts of hostility; and this disappearance of the ladies from among the audience was always viewed by the management as rather an alarming hint of what might be expected. Then wine was sent for into the pit, the candles were thrown down, and the gentlemen drew their swords. They prepared to climb over the partitions of the orchestra and to carry the stage by assault. Now and ...
— A Book of the Play - Studies and Illustrations of Histrionic Story, Life, and Character • Dutton Cook
... my dear. Look! you are positively alarming Miss Burnham. The new volunteer is a perfect stranger to us. There is his name—last on the ...
— The Frozen Deep • Wilkie Collins
... hear all that was said on the front seat but the fragments of talk that he did hear were alarming in ...
— Pee-wee Harris on the Trail • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... grandfather, "it's very alarming; Lucky, here, has just been telling me that there's likely to be a straemash among the Reformers. Surely they'll ne'er daur ...
— Ringan Gilhaize - or The Covenanters • John Galt
... had been conscious of a feeling of uneasiness. It had first manifested itself when he was engaged upon a lightly grilled cutlet; had developed as he tackled the lower joint of a leg of chicken; and become an alarming certainty when he was half-way through a plate of apple tart and custard. Gladys Norman's interest in Malcolm Sage had become ...
— Malcolm Sage, Detective • Herbert George Jenkins
... some of the writers on human nature, that to the fair sex the loss of beauty is more alarming and insupportable than the loss of life; but even this loss, however opposite to the feelings of their nature, they have voluntarily consented to sustain, that they might not be the objects of temptation to the lawless ...
— Sketches of the Fair Sex, in All Parts of the World • Anonymous
... present and advise in the Council, he was able to contribute much to this result by his lawyerly gravity and frequent mentions of the Great Seal. Altogether the Constitution as it passed the Council may be considered as his. And what was it? Nothing very alarming. A new Parliament, of a Single House, to be elected by the people very much as by use and wont, but in conformity with a well-considered scheme of "qualifications" for keeping out the dangerous; a separation, however, of the Executive from the Legislative, ...
— The Life of John Milton, Volume 5 (of 7), 1654-1660 • David Masson
... the undesigned rustling of my night-gown, from changing my posture, alarming the watchful Pamela, she in a fright came towards the closet to see who was there. What could I then do, but bolt out upon the apprehensive charmer; and having so done, and she running to the bed, screaming to Mrs. Jervis, would not any man have followed her thither, detected ...
— Pamela (Vol. II.) • Samuel Richardson
... position was the more striking owing to the respectfulness and the affection with which it was accompanied. From start to finish the unmoved Queen remained the devoted niece. Leopold himself must have envied such perfect correctitude; but what may be admirable in an elderly statesman is alarming in a maiden of nineteen. And privileged observers were not without their fears. The strange mixture of ingenuous light-heartedness and fixed determination, of frankness and reticence, of childishness and pride, seemed to augur a future that was perplexed and full ...
— Queen Victoria • Lytton Strachey
... staying in recognising. It was not completely enterprising that which was creating following. It was not determining that which was intending some destroying. It was completely enlivening this which was contrasting what was remaining. It was completely intending that which was opening alarming. It was completely meaning that which was beginning explaining understanding. It was vaguely attacking that which was distinctly clearing. It was deciding believing ...
— Matisse Picasso and Gertrude Stein - With Two Shorter Stories • Gertrude Stein
... chaise, or if the third cart had followed instantly on the second, I should certainly have come back a cripple or a headless horseman. The results of the collision were broken shafts, torn traces, yokes and luggage scattered on the ground, the horses scared and harassed, and the alarming feeling that we had just been in danger. It turned out that the first driver had lashed up the horses; while in the other two carts the drivers were asleep, and the horses followed the first team with ...
— Letters of Anton Chekhov • Anton Chekhov
... so unfrequented a region, this was not necessarily alarming, and the first proof O'Malley had that the man experienced no ordinary physical fear was the fact that he had left both knife and rifle in his blankets. Hitherto, at the least sign of danger, he changed into a perfect arsenal; he invariably slept "in his weapons"; ...
— The Centaur • Algernon Blackwood |
