"Ashen" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... and in his latest beams Yon little cloud of ashen gray and gold, Slowly upon the amber air unrolled, The falling mantle of the Prophet seems. From the dim headlands many a lighthouse gleams, The street-lamps of the ocean; and behold, O'erhead the banners of the night unfold; The day hath passed into the land of dreams. O summer ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
... she had not spoken; no one could quite tell whether she were conscious or not; but Lesley, who sat beside her, and sometimes laid her cheek softly against the desolate young bride's cold face, or kissed the ashen-grey lips, divined by instinct that she was not unconscious although stunned by the force of the blow—that she was thinking, thinking, thinking all the time—thinking of her lost lover, of her lost happiness, and beating herself passionately ...
— Brooke's Daughter - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... whisper, thrilled with excitement. There, a few yards away from them, ashen grey against the silver-grey of a dead tree, was a great bird. To Hilda's excited fancy, it seemed the spirit of the place, changed by some wizardry into bird form, crouching there amid the ruins of the forest where once it had flitted ...
— Hildegarde's Neighbors • Laura E. Richards
... had left the trader's face, and his olive skin was ashen. "Next time," he moaned, "next time, Santa Maria, they will be in force and they—they will take the very horse from ...
— The Missourian • Eugene P. (Eugene Percy) Lyle
... Tom turned his ashen face imploring toward the speaker, made some impotent movements with his white lips, then slid limp and lifeless ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... upon the waters, and they flowed to spheral melody,—swept through the forests, and they, too, trembled into song. And though now the warmth has faded out, though the ruddy tints and amber clearness have paled to ashen hues, though the murmuring melodies are dead, and forest, vale, and hill look hard and angular in the sharp air, you know that it is not death. The fire is unquenched beneath. You go your way not disconsolate. There needs but the Victorious Voice. At the touch of the ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 10, Number 59, September, 1862 • Various
... if frozen to stone during Muller's long speech. Her face was ashen and her eyes wild with horror. When the detective ceased speaking, there was dead silence in the room for some time. Finally Muller asked: "Is this what happened?" His voice was cutting and the glance of his eyes keen ...
— The Lamp That Went Out • Augusta Groner
... words and quick utterance; a good skald too; but still for the most part he kept himself well in hand; his hair was dark brown, with crisp curly locks; he had good eyes; his features were sharp, and his face ashen pale, his nose turned up and his front teeth stuck out, and his mouth was very ugly. Still he was ...
— The story of Burnt Njal - From the Icelandic of the Njals Saga • Anonymous
... into the street; better come without it, even if she had to go back through the wet to fetch it. At that moment another gust drove the rain violently over her, forcing it through her boots. The sky was a tint of ashen grey, and all the low brick buildings were veiled in vapour; the rough roadway was full of pools, and nothing was heard but the melancholy bell of the tram-car. She hesitated, not wishing to spend a penny unnecessarily, but remembering that ...
— Esther Waters • George Moore
... ye are safe, thanks to stout hearts and arms and good ashen blades!" exclaimed Alderton drawing his first full breath since seizing the ...
— Standish of Standish - A story of the Pilgrims • Jane G. Austin
... was gone from the sky. Ruby had turned to amethyst, amethyst to the gray-blue of star sapphire, and the red fire of the dunes had burned out to an ashen pallor. The change had come suddenly while the girls talked; and when Sanda realized it, she shivered a little, with a touch of superstition she had learned from her two Irish aunts. All this cold whiteness after the jewelled blaze of colour was like the death of youth and hope. She pushed ...
— A Soldier of the Legion • C. N. Williamson
... that, like thistledown, she might almost be blown away. Nevertheless, she was anything but light, in either head or purse. Fuchsia was not pretty; indeed, to be honest, was barely good-looking. Her complexion was colourless, her thick hair a dull, ashen shade, her eyes, though remarkably lively, were much too small, her chin, on the other hand, was much too long. Beautifully marked brows, white teeth, and a fairy figure, were her assets; and, as she herself ...
— The Road to Mandalay - A Tale of Burma • B. M. Croker
... when he called in Hyde Park Place, the door was opened by the housemaid, and Father Murchison mounted the stairs, wondering what had become of Pitting. He was met at the library door by Guildea and was painfully struck by the alteration in his appearance. His face was ashen in hue, and there were lines beneath his eyes. The eyes themselves looked excited and horribly forlorn. His hair and dress were disordered and his lips twitched continually, as if he were shaken by some ...
— Tongues of Conscience • Robert Smythe Hichens
... maintenance did cease. And now, being revived, where are any better to be found? Where any greater commodity to be raised by them? Only poles are accounted to be their greatest charge. But, sith men have learned of late to sow ashen kexes in ashyards by themselves, that inconvenience in short time ...
— Chronicle and Romance (The Harvard Classics Series) • Jean Froissart, Thomas Malory, Raphael Holinshed
... and frail, with hair that was ashen under the moon and honey-coloured under the sputtering gas-lamps of the porch. Over her shoulders was thrown a Spanish mantilla of softest yellow, butterflied in black; her feet were glittering buttons at the hem of ...
— Tales of the Jazz Age • F. Scott Fitzgerald
... Riuzanjita hot-springs; in summer a sort of secular monastery for pilgrims to the Dragon peak. They were tenanted now, we had been told, by a couple of watchmen. We struck out with freer strides, while the moon, which had by this time risen high enough to overtop the wall of peaks, watched us with an ashen face, as in single file we moved across the waste ...
— Noto, An Unexplored Corner of Japan • Percival Lowell
... sprang away like a mad thing, dodged him, avoided him, then leapt suddenly upon a chair and snatched a rapier from a group of swords arranged in a circle upon the wall. The light fell full upon her ashen face and eyes of horror. She was ...
— The Swindler and Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell
... The houses made Kit think of those back at the Cove, with their spacious lawns and large restful homes of plenty. Mrs. Bellamy was filled with amusement when she heard the story of Kit's substitution of herself for the boy the Dean had asked for. She was a tall, slender woman with ashen gold hair and gray eyes, who seemed almost like an elder sister of Anne's. They occupied a suite of ...
— Kit of Greenacre Farm • Izola Forrester
... like a wind-driven storm-petrel on her way. She looked up at the ragged sierras of cloud-capped buildings that rose above the streets, shaded by the night lights and the congealed vapors to gray, drab, ashen, lavender, dun, and cerulean tints. They were so like the wintry mountains of her Western home that she felt a satisfaction such as the hundred-thousand-dollar ...
— Options • O. Henry
... horn lantern, and the faint glow of a peat fire. But after a while they perceived that it was built of sods of turf and lined with heather, neatly fixed into the turf by wooden pegs such as gardeners use; while the ceiling was also of heather, laid crosswise against ashen poles. The fire-place seemed to be built of round stones, evidently taken from a stream, which were plastered together with clay; and the chimney was carried outside the wall. Across the chimney was fixed an iron bar, from which hung a rude chain that ...
— The Drummer's Coat • J. W. Fortescue
... but he soon recovered, and the old hard, cruel, sinister look returned. Neranya's black hair and beard had grown long, and they added to the natural ferocity of his aspect. His eyes blazed upon the rajah with a terrible light, his lips parted, and he gasped for breath; his face was ashen with rage and despair, and his ...
— The Ape, the Idiot & Other People • W. C. Morrow
... expression of terror on the old man's ashen face turned into a fixed look of insane exaltation. His white lips moved; he advanced a step further, and held out both ...
— Maruja • Bret Harte
... or gregarious, ovoid or cylindrical, generally tapering upward, about 2-3 mm. high, ashen gray, sometimes with a yellowish tinge, stipitate; calyculus very small, thin; stipe about half the total height, rising from a small hypothallus, thin, gray or blackish, densely crowded with spore-like cells; capillitium dense, freely branching, ashen, or yellowish, ...
— The North American Slime-Moulds • Thomas H. (Thomas Huston) MacBride
... loose woolly coat, and the narrow furs that were no softer than her own fair skin. Flung back into a deep chair, and relaxed after her vigorous day, she looked peculiarly childish and charming, her grandmother thought. She was like both her aunts, with Annie's fair, almost ashen hair and Alice's full, pretty mouth. But she was more squarely built than either, and a hint of a tip, at the end of her nose, gave her an expression at once infantile and astonished. When Leslie ...
— The Beloved Woman • Kathleen Norris
... the appearance of the two figures leaning over the balcony. But Royson had scarce time to note his main characteristics when he heard Mrs. Haxton utter a queer gasping sob. It seemed to him that she had only just succeeded in smothering a scream. Her cheeks suddenly became ashen gray, and her tightly compressed lips were bloodless. All her beauty fled, as the tints of a rose die under certain varieties of chemical light. Her eyes dilated in an alarming way, and lines not visible previously now puckered the ...
— The Wheel O' Fortune • Louis Tracy
... first time. While the scratching and feeding are going on, all of a sudden the hen utters a loud shriek, and flaps her wings. The little chicks, although they have never seen a hawk, scurry hither and thither, and so prostrate their little brown and ashen bodies upon the ground as almost to conceal themselves. The Negro Folk Rhymes of warning must be looked upon a little in this same light. They are but the strains of terror given by the promptings of a mother instinct full enough of love to give up life itself ...
— Negro Folk Rhymes - Wise and Otherwise: With a Study • Thomas W. Talley
... Nazarite and die alone, having known neither wife nor child, and indeed this may be my lot." Having said so much, as he looked not at the girl but out of the window, he now turned his face upon her, which, always pale, began now to be ashen white, through rising ...
— Graham of Claverhouse • Ian Maclaren
... the gods appointed of yore, Two the nights of his sleeping alone in the place of gore: The drunken slumber of frenzy twice he drank to the lees, On the sacred stones of the High-place under the sacred trees; With a lamp at his ashen head he lay in the place of the feast, And the sacred leaves of the banyan rustled around the priest. Last, when the stated even fell upon terrace and tree, And the shade of the lofty island lay leagues away to sea, And all the ...
— Ballads • Robert Louis Stevenson
... careful precision of his answer struck her with a swift sense of apprehension. She looked up at him and what she saw made her catch her breath convulsively. His face was ashen, the veins in his forehead standing out like weals, and his eyes gleamed like blue flame—mad eyes. His hands, hanging at his ...
— The Lamp of Fate • Margaret Pedler
... wind-exposed, distorted tree, We are blown against forever by the curse Which breathes through Nature. Oh, the world is weak; The effluence of each is false to all; Add what we best conceive, we fail to speak! Wait, soul, until thine ashen garments fall, And then resume thy broken strains, and seek Fit peroration without ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, No. 47, September, 1861 • Various
... in the hope of finding some way to improve the color of diamond. About the only noticeable alteration that the author has been able to bring about was upon a brown diamond, the color of which was made somewhat lighter and more ashen by heating it in a current of hydrogen gas to a ...
— A Text-Book of Precious Stones for Jewelers and the Gem-Loving Public • Frank Bertram Wade
... grew ashen and sober As the leaves that were crisped and sere,— As the leaves that were ...
— The Dreamer - A Romantic Rendering of the Life-Story of Edgar Allan Poe • Mary Newton Stanard
... unnatural midnight sunset, powdered the grayest grass with gold and flushed the few tall trees up to the last fingers of their foliage. Behind them the night was black and cavernous; and one could only trace faintly the ashen horizon beyond the dark and magic Wilton Woods. As I went, a workman on a bicycle shot a rood past me; then staggered from his machine and shouted to me to tell him where the fire was. I answered that I was going to see, but thought it was the cottages by the wood-yard. ...
— A Miscellany of Men • G. K. Chesterton
... war-shields they weary did set then, [13] Battle-shields sturdy; benchward they turned then; Their battle-sarks rattled, the gear of the heroes; 10 The lances stood up then, all in a cluster, The arms of the seamen, ashen-shafts mounted With edges of iron: ...
— Beowulf - An Anglo-Saxon Epic Poem • The Heyne-Socin
... baron stood up with ashen under-lip, to say that such a scheme, it seemed to him, must remain for ever abortive, unless ...
— The Lord of the Sea • M. P. Shiel
... their ashen brows As they part the last boughs and slowly step again On to the village grass, and chill and languid pass Into the huts to sleep. Brief slumber, yet so deep That, when they wake to day, darkness and splendour seem Broken and far-away, a faint miraculous dream; ...
— Georgian Poetry 1916-17 - Edited by Sir Edward Howard Marsh • Various
... it, his face grew ashen, his mouth twitched, his eyes seemed fairly to start from his head; his knees knocked together. He glanced fearfully around, trying vainly to ...
— The Black Cross • Olive M. Briggs
... war are his desire. The heart of Cyndyllan was like the ice of winter, like the fire of spring; the horses of Geraint are ruddy ones, with the assault of spotted eagles, of black eagles, of red eagles, of white eagles; an onset in battle is like the roaring of the wind against the ashen spears. These poets are the poets of 'tumults, shouting, swords, and men in battle-array.' The sound of battle is heard in them; they are 'where the ravens screamed over blood'; they are among 'crimsoned hair and clamorous sorrow'; they praise 'war with ...
— Figures of Several Centuries • Arthur Symons
... set his teeth hard, as Dale scraped away the snow and found almost directly a narrow crack which ran parallel with the crevasse, but so slight that there was just room to force down the stout ashen staff which formed the handle of the ice-axe, the top of it and about a foot of the staff ...
— The Crystal Hunters - A Boy's Adventures in the Higher Alps • George Manville Fenn
... Warren's ashen face changed to purple hue, his hand trembled just enough to incite Shirley to a desperate chance. As the criminal drew the trigger with a spasmodic jerk, Shirley was dropping to the floor, whence he pushed himself ...
— The Voice on the Wire • Eustace Hale Ball
... more and, with glaring eyes, with agonized, ashen face, the Arizona merchant stood at the entrance of the ranch, clinging to the horse-rail for support, listening with gasping breath to Plummer's faltering recital of the events of ...
— Foes in Ambush • Charles King
... but a little gasping cry from my mother-in-law stopped me. She was feebly beating the air with her hands, her eyes were distended, and her cheeks and lips had the ashen color which I had learned to associate with my own little mother's ...
— Revelations of a Wife - The Story of a Honeymoon • Adele Garrison
... born with a thousand years of love in me and had you not come I should have gone alone with my dreams to the grave. I am all women in one, not merely Concha Arguello, a girl of sixteen." She clasped her hands high above her head, lifting her eyes to the ashen vault so soon to yield to ...
— Rezanov • Gertrude Atherton
... table-bottles crashing—the board shaking beneath its weight—and lay before the very eyes of Morton, a distorted and lifeless mass. At the same instant Gawtrey sprang upon the table, his black frown singling out from the group the ashen, cadaverous face of the shrinking traitor. Birnie had darted from the table—he was half-way towards the sliding door—his face, turned over his shoulder, met the ...
— Night and Morning, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... He tells me nothing! A marble palace this, but never a home!" The timid girl had seen no beloved woman's face upon the fretwork of the walls of this Aladdin's castle. And, in her own frightened heart, she remembered the ashen pallor of her father's face when she had faltered out the burning question of her yearning heart—the question of long years! The past was still a blank to her, while on this same night, crafty Alan Hawke in Delhi, and, in far Calcutta, a woman, pacing her ...
— A Fascinating Traitor • Richard Henry Savage
... his eyes with a wild, feverish, sullen look in them that she had never seen there. His face was ashen white: his lips were like fire. He had not slept all night; but his passionate sobs had given way to delirious waking dreams and numb senseless trances, which had alternated one on another all through the freezing, lonely, ...
— Famous Stories Every Child Should Know • Various
... up in a sunken road on two sides of a valley that was perpendicular to the enemy's front. We now began to get a few wounded; one man with ashen face came charging to the rear with shell shock. He shook all over, foamed at the mouth, could not speak. I put him under a tent and he acted as ...
— America's War for Humanity • Thomas Herbert Russell
... the Valley of Calepino had all her limbs twisted and contracted, and had in the [oe]sophagus a sensation as if a ball was sometimes rising in her throat, and again falling to her stomach. Her countenance was of an ashen hue, and she had a constant sense of weight and pain in the head. All the remedies of physicians had failed, and as evidences of possession were discovered in her, she was brought to Brignoli (a priest) who had recourse to supernatural ...
— Fasting Girls - Their Physiology and Pathology • William Alexander Hammond
... pipe I color not, nor paint; White it remains, and hence 'tis true That, when in Death's cold arms I faint, My lips shall wear the ashen hue; And as it blackens day by day, So black the grave ...
— Pipe and Pouch - The Smoker's Own Book of Poetry • Various
... taken his pipe from his lips. He looked bigger, somehow, than ever. His brown face was turning to an ashen colour, and there was a dull, steel-like gleam in his blue eyes. The terrible, slow-kindling anger of this Northerner made Durnovo catch his breath. It was so different from the sudden ...
— With Edged Tools • Henry Seton Merriman
... and Germans—and the one side are blithe thereat; and the other side, grieved; but soon will the truth be known. For now has Cliges no longer held his peace: shouting, he gallops towards a Saxon, and strikes him with his ashen lance with the head on it, full in the breast, so that he has lost his stirrups; and he calls out, "Barons, strike! I am Cliges whom you seek. On now, bold freeborn knights! Let there be no coward, for ours is the first shock. Let no craven ...
— Cliges: A Romance • Chretien de Troyes
... see the stricken look that came into the eyes of the old negress or else she hid the look behind the fit of rage that instantly possessed her. Perhaps they mistook the grey pallor that overspread the old face, turning it to an ashen colour, for the ...
— From Place to Place • Irvin S. Cobb
... half-dozen lines ought to do it. Well—she was the kind of girl who always goes around with a couple of Airedales, and in woollen stockings, low shoes and mannish shirts, and shell-rimmed glasses, and you felt she wore Ferris waists. Her hair was that ashen blonde with no glint of gold in it. You knew it would become grey in middle age with no definite period of transition. She never buttoned her heavy welted gloves but wore them back over her hand, like a cuff, very English. ...
— Gigolo • Edna Ferber
... Burrell, standing near the ashen-gray wretch, and facing the tentful of men, "this man is a thief, but ...
— The Barrier • Rex Beach
... its first quarter, threw an ashen, bluish light upon one-half of the courtyard; and the straight shadow upon the other seemed to lie at the foot of the columns, black as a broad stroke of ...
— Romance • Joseph Conrad and F.M. Hueffer
... suddenly flaring beat out the sky. There above the street itself the fiery sunset had not extended; the fair watery space was pale egg-blue; as the chimes so near at hand struck a quarter to five the pale colour began slowly to drain away, leaving ashen china shades behind it, and up to these shades the orange ...
— The Cathedral • Hugh Walpole
... ashen hue changed to a ruddy one, as he said: "Lord Clowes, 't is a bitter mouthful for a man to eat, but I ask your clemency till my luck changes, for change it must, since cards and dice cannot always run against one. I know I deserve it not at ...
— Janice Meredith • Paul Leicester Ford
... at him with ashen face. Then, plucking at her bosom she sprang from the dais and rushed along the hall, screaming. Men made way for her, and at the door ...
— Eric Brighteyes • H. Rider Haggard
... thick white mist. A spectral boat, with a sail like a gray moth's wing, slipped past her. The shadow at the helm was whistling for the wind, and the sound came strange and shrill through the filmy, ashen morning. The mist began to lift. A few moments now, and the river would lie dazzlingly bare between the red and yellow forests. She turned her boat shorewards, and presently forced it beneath the bronze-leafed, drooping boughs of a sycamore. Here she left ...
— Audrey • Mary Johnston
... to echo the words, but his tongue seemed to stick to the roof of his mouth. He knew his chum well enough to feel assured that no ordinary hovering peril could cause the other to look so ashen pale. It must be a frightful catastrophe by which they were ...
— Air Service Boys Over the Atlantic • Charles Amory Beach
... done on their apparel, the proud warriors that were to lead them out drew nigh, a mighty force, bearing shields and ashen spears. ...
— The Fall of the Niebelungs • Unknown
... for the youthful," Says a Mode oracle acknowledged truthful. Strange that Society should have a rage For that anomaly—artificial Age! Dust on their heads our pretty women toss, Just to deprive it of its pristine gloss. Make ashen-white your eyebrows, there, and lashes, Precocious hags! The world's but dust and ashes. Wrinkles and crowsfeet next must have their turn (To limn them in let toilette artists learn), Then make each belle bald, scraggy-necked and toothless, Grey hair alone ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 100, 13 June 1891 • Various
... not very particular about their dress in this part of the country.” And he paused, supposing she would observe him and escape; and seeing that she still looked before her, stood and hummed aloud. Up she leaped at the sound. Her face was ashen; she looked this way and that, and her mouth gaped with the terror of her soul. But it was a strange thing that her eyes ...
— Island Nights' Entertainments • Robert Louis Stevenson
... ashen white, and she was shaking in every limb, this stately woman who had walked so serenely into the drawing-room ...
— The Daffodil Mystery • Edgar Wallace
... the sand and by the frothing waves of the sea-shore under the dun. He had a ball and an ashen hurle shod with bronze; joyfully he used to drive his ball along the hard sand, shouting among his small playmates. The captain of the guard gave him a sheaf of toy javelins and taught him how to cast, and made for him a sword of ...
— The Coming of Cuculain • Standish O'Grady
... the desk started up, and turned round. It was Hill. When he saw Rolfe he looked as though he would fall. He made as if to step forward. Then he stood quite still, looking at the officer with ashen face. ...
— The Hampstead Mystery • John R. Watson
... rose to go he made no reply, as if he had been indifferent to what I had said. I glanced at his face: it was ashen white. He was opening a locket attached to his watchguard, from which he lifted a ring of dark hair, and then drawing it nearer his eyes he spoke as if reading a date: "Le ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 22. July, 1878. • Various
... words assured me the old man had been there. "Damn that mad chap," he said. "His horrible old yarn made me dream badly. Where is he?" Karelse stared from one to the other, his yellow face a queer ashen grey. He was plainly frightened. "Come," said I to Jason, "let us go and have a sluice: there is water in plenty." I led the way to the pool. It had been too dark for us to see it properly when we had arrived the evening before. We bent over the dark, ...
— A Rip Van Winkle Of The Kalahari - Seven Tales of South-West Africa • Frederick Cornell
... I ventured to take a nap, knowing that the slightest movement or sound would wake me. I suppose I slept until six o'clock, when I was aroused by a footfall. I sprang up, and saw before me one of our native servants. He was trembling and his face was ashen beneath the black. Moreover he could not speak. All he did was to put his head on one side, like a dead man, and keep on pointing downwards. Then with his mouth open and starting eyes he beckoned to me to ...
— Finished • H. Rider Haggard
... things, that lifts the burden of life. But for thee I should have passed away, unknowing the glory of manhood. I am a man—a man rejoicing in his strength! O my starved youth! why did I not behold thee earlier?" Tears of self-pity rolled down his ashen cheek. "O my love! my love! my lost youth! Give me back my youth, O God! Who am I, to save? A man; yea, a man, glorying in manhood. Ah! happy are they who lead the common fate of men, happy in love, in home, in children; woe for those who would climb, who would torture and deny themselves, ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... minute later Hugh Ritson and the flyman had returned to the bar. The phantom of a smile lurked about the flyman's mouth. Hugh Ritson's face was ashen, and ...
— A Son of Hagar - A Romance of Our Time • Sir Hall Caine
... laughter, bare feet dabbling in the sea, hunts, childlike, for shells, kisses, surprises, clasping hands,—call it a lifetime; death will justify the word. There are existences that are ever gloomy, lived under ashen skies; but suppose a glorious day, when the sun of heaven glows in the azure air,—such was the May of their love, during which Etienne had suspended all his griefs,—griefs which had passed into the heart of Gabrielle, who, in turn, ...
— The Hated Son • Honore de Balzac
... is it, CHERIE?" said little Suzanne, now genuinely alarmed, for Marguerite's colour had become dull and ashen. "Are you ill, Marguerite? What ...
— The Scarlet Pimpernel • Baroness Orczy
... explosion as they reached some magazine. Not a cheer broke the stillness; and even the wrangling, half-drunken bummers round the fires slunk sullenly away; while but few negroes showed their faces, and those ashen-black from indefinite fear; their great mouths gaping and white eyes rolling in curious dread that took away their ...
— Four Years in Rebel Capitals - An Inside View of Life in the Southern Confederacy from Birth to Death • T. C. DeLeon
... to see that ashen grey upon her cheek, which is the nearest approach to pallor that her race can know, he was disappointed. She neither changed color nor moved, but a gleam of horrible intelligence came into her eyes, and as her lips closed, ...
— Mabel's Mistake • Ann S. Stephens
... crawled to the opening at the front of the wagon and called at the top of his voice. Only the shrieking of the wind answered him. A dozen times he cried out, then paused to strike a somewhat damp match and light a smoky lantern hanging to the front ashen bow of the turn-out's covering. Holding the light over his head he peered forth into the inky darkness ...
— The Boy Land Boomer - Dick Arbuckle's Adventures in Oklahoma • Ralph Bonehill
... steel-hoofed War is loosened on the world, With rapine and destruction, as the smoke From ashen farm and city soils the sky. Earth reeks. The camp is where the vineyard was. The flocks are gone. The rains are on the hearth, And trampled Europe knows the winter near. Orchards go down. Home and cathedral fall In ruin, and the blackened provinces Reach ...
— The Red Cross Girls with the Russian Army • Margaret Vandercook
... each other through the chambers, And up and down the stair, And rioted among the ashen embers, And ...
— Poems • William D. Howells
... in so keenly that the ice promised to bear, and consequent upon this Dick was at the wheelwright's one evening superintending the finishing up of his pattens, as they called their skates. Hickathrift had ground the blades until they were perfectly sharp at the edges, and had made a new pair of ashen soles for them, into which he had just finished ...
— Dick o' the Fens - A Tale of the Great East Swamp • George Manville Fenn
... were ashen shafts with long steel points and the merchant seamen had been trained to use them. And the brawn of these lads made the pike a match for a pirate's cutlass. Ned Rackham bounded forward to swing at the broad, deep-chested boatswain. A wondrous pair of antagonists they were, in the prime of ...
— Blackbeard: Buccaneer • Ralph D. Paine
... he looked quickly round over the darkening landscape. There was no one in sight. This was one of the waste places of the world. Larralde seemed to remember the Eye that seeth even there, and crossed himself as he slipped from the saddle to the ground. He was shaking all over. His face was ashen, for it is a terrible thing to kill a man and ...
— In Kedar's Tents • Henry Seton Merriman
... eye can reach, a waste of wild sea moor, of a lurid ashen-gray; not like our northern moors with their jet-black pools and purple heath, but lifeless, the color of sackcloth, with the corrupted sea-water soaking through the roots of its acrid weeds, and gleaming ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume 7 - Italy, Sicily, and Greece (Part One) • Various
... loosened her collar and, removing her clothing, dressed her for bed as if she had been a little child. When nothing more could be done, he knelt by her and fondling her unresponsive hand let the tears he could no longer control pour over his ashen cheeks. ...
— The Wind Before the Dawn • Dell H. Munger
... ring harsh and servant and equal alike would cringe before him; for still he held half Moscow in the iron grip of his terrible omniscience. But Ivan noted the color of his hair—that dead white that is not the snow of years but the ashen colorlessness borne of continuous nervous strain. And there was the unexpected stoop of the powerful shoulders, the occasional unavoidable trembling of the hands, and in his face, which repeated the livid tone of the hair, were graven lines, many and deep, born ...
— The Genius • Margaret Horton Potter
... felt the sudden spurs and raced like a whirlwind over the remaining stretch of plain. Hollis had become suddenly imbued with a suspicion that brought an ashen pallor to his face and an awful rage into his heart. He slid his pony down one side of a steep arroyo, sent it scrambling up the other side, jumped it over some rocks that littered the rise, spurred savagely through a little basin, and reaching the ...
— The Coming of the Law • Charles Alden Seltzer
... beautiful form and workmanship. The sunshine came through the window, between the heavy festoons of two faded damask curtains, and fell directly across this vase; so that a mild splendor was reflected from it on the ashen visages of the five old people who sat around. Four champagne glasses ...
— The Great English Short-Story Writers, Vol. 1 • Various
... my eyes to the dying stars. The moon had set. Black shapes of tree and boulder loomed portentous through the ashen dimness that precedes the dawn. I heard men shouting, "Here she comes!" "Stand by to lend a hand!" In haste I scrambled up and tore for the beach. I must witness the landing ...
— Spanish Doubloons • Camilla Kenyon
... Beulah's face assumed an ashen hue, as she listened to these coaxing words. She had not thought of separation; the evil had never presented itself in this form, and, staggering forward, she clutched the matron's ...
— Beulah • Augusta J. Evans
... was silent. That innocent lie was the first and last upon his honest lips; for as they stood there, hand in hand, they saw his plain, hard face take upon itself, at first, the gray, ashen hues of the rocks around him, and then and thereafter something of the infinite tranquillity and peace of that wilderness in which he had lived and died, and of which he ...
— In a Hollow of the Hills • Bret Harte
... "Violet!" gasped Wallace, with ashen lips, and trembling violently from head to foot. "Did you see her? Oh, let me out, quick! quick! I must ...
— His Heart's Queen • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... Neapolitan. Yet at length I heard a low moan trailing toward me; I turned, and saw her face, as I saw it last, Anselmo,—stonily quiet, frozen from indignant pain to icy apathy, and the words she would have said had hissed inarticulately through her ashen lips. Then they brought me the confession, and, as ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 11, Issue 67, May, 1863 • Various
... Regiment, which fought so bravely at Maiwand, is composed of the sons of those who used to wield the back-sword on the Berkshire downs, and showed themselves not unworthy of their ancestry, although the quarter-staff and ashen-swords are forgotten. The old village feasts are forgotten too—more's the pity. Then old quarrels were healed, old bitternesses removed: aged friends met, and became young again in heart, as they revived old memories and sweet recollections of youthful days. Rich ...
— Old English Sports • Peter Hampson Ditchfield
... light?" asked the tavern-keeper in a hoarse undertone. Again he looked toward Ware, who, dry-lipped and ashen, was regarding him steadfastly. Glance met glance, for a brief instant they looked deep into each other's eyes and then the hand Slosson had rested on Murrell's shoulder ...
— The Prodigal Judge • Vaughan Kester
... solitude, no more to be touched until she was put into her coffin, Raven came in from his steady walk up and down before the house and went to Nan, where she sat by the window in the other front room. The strength had gone out of her. She sat up straight and strong, but her lips were ashen. As they confronted each other, each saw chiefly great weariness. Raven's face, Nan thought, was like a mask. It was grave, it was intent, but it did not really show that he felt anything beyond the general ...
— Old Crow • Alice Brown
... his sword, and standing near, Where furious Ajax plied his ashen spear, Full on the lance a stroke so justly sped, That the broad falchion lopp'd its brazen head; His pointless spear the warrior shakes in vain; The brazen head falls sounding on the plain. Great Ajax saw, and own'd the hand divine; Confessing Jove, and trembling ...
— The Iliad of Homer • Homer
... were. Their coats shone like satin in the sun; they stepped airily, spurning the dust of Kittitas, and blew the ashen powder from their nostrils; then without warning the ...
— The Rim of the Desert • Ada Woodruff Anderson
... each other. Anything more national, more completely imbued with tropical coloring and character, than this evening scene on the lake, can hardly be conceived. When we reached the landing, the gold and rose-colored clouds were fading into soft masses of white and ashen gray, and moonlight was taking the place of sunset. As we went up the green slope to the sitio, a dance on the grass was proposed, and the Indian girls formed a quadrille; for thus much of outside civilization has crept into their native manners, though they throw into it so much of their own characteristic ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 101, March, 1866 • Various
... Enemy tempted her!—too long; for ere Miss Wimple, quick as she was to take the alarm, could turn and lead her away, Madeline's vigilant, fierce glance had caught sight of him, (alack! Philip Withers!) and, ashen-pale, with parted lips and suspended breath, and wide, blazing eyes, she stood, rooted there, and stared at him. But Miss Wimple dragged her away just in time,—no, he had not seen her,—and for a brief space the ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. II., November, 1858., No. XIII. • Various
... fatal fray; In the very midst, was a pause to tell Of a gallant youth, who fought so well That his comrades asked: "Who is he, pray?" "The only son of the Widow Gray," Was the proud reply Of his Captain nigh. What ails the woman standing near? Her face has the ashen hue of fear! ...
— War Poetry of the South • Various
... With drawn and ashen face Mr. Sawtelle received back his knitting. His pose was to appear vastly preoccupied and deaf to insult. He was still counting stitches as he turned away and clattered down ...
— Ma Pettengill • Harry Leon Wilson
... at lovely Pherae still may dwell; Wait for ten days, and then may all be well, And thou to fetch thy maiden home may go, And to the King thy team unheard-of show. And if not, then make ready for the sea Nor will I fail indeed to go with thee, And 'twixt the halyards and the ashen oar Finish the service well begun ashore; But meanwhile do I bid thee hope the best; And take another herdsman for the rest, For unto Ossa must I go alone To do a deed ...
— The Earthly Paradise - A Poem • William Morris
... was destroyed or hidden away. Her rooms were changed out of all memory of her. There was nothing, nothing in the house to recall to her widower her gentleness, or her face as he had last seen it, snow-pale and pure between the long ashen-fair strands of her hair. He never came upon anything that could give him a tender stab with the thought of her. So she was forgotten, and the man was happy with his children and his beautiful passionate wife, and the constant tenderness ...
— An Isle in the Water • Katharine Tynan
... said? With frowning face, In whispered tones they speak; And lines upon their tablet's trace Which flush each ashen cheek. The Inquisition's mystic doom Sits on their brows severe, And bursting forth in visioned gloom, Sad heresy from burning tomb ...
— Christopher Columbus and His Monument Columbia • Various
... ere he started to go—with lips set tight and looking down on Bobby, whose pale face had taken on an ashen hue: ...
— The Bronze Eagle - A Story of the Hundred Days • Emmuska Orczy, Baroness Orczy
... With an ashen face of despair, the man obeyed. As he finished, he began to sag at the joints. Slowly he slackened down until he was on his knees, ...
— Average Jones • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... words—for what are words to seeing; Yet not in sight, for presence veils and hides; Not even in sleep, though then the gates of being Stand open to the large eternal tides; Neither in memory, embers fading ashen; Nor by the code, wherein the voice is dumb; Nor wild still love, fluttered by veils of passion, Rise summit ...
— Perpetual Light • William Rose Benet
... knew that the answer of Ranier came from his embarrassment; and, going to a tree hard by, she tapped on the bark with her wand. Thereupon the tree opened, and she took from a recess in its center, a keen-edged ax with an ashen handle. ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, September 1878, No. 11 • Various
... brink, This dreary Christmas Eve," she said, "And watch the dying sunset sink From pallid gold to ashen red. My eyes are hot with weary tears, I heed not how the winds may blow, While thinking of the vanished years Beyond the stormy heave and throe Of yon far sea-line, dimly ...
— The Poets and Poetry of Cecil County, Maryland • Various
... ghost in weird, sepulchral tones, "I alone am thy lawful spouse; through thee I lost all hopes of Heaven, and now I am come to reward thee for thy evil deeds." The Count turned livid with fear, and the blush on Eldegarda's cheek faded to an ashen hue; but the spectre remained with them throughout the night. And night after night she came to them thus, till at last Otto grew desperate and summoned to his aid a Churchman who happened to be in the neighbourhood, the ...
— Hero Tales and Legends of the Rhine • Lewis Spence
... off in the direction of the farm, and Joan knelt down and lifted her father's head on to her knee. He tried to smile encouragement into the ashen face. ...
— Pixie O'Shaughnessy • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... of silence, while the dark eyes of the dying man thirstily dwelt on the beauty of the flowers, and his dry, ashen lips seemed to drink in their perfumes as those athirst ...
— Under Two Flags • Ouida [Louise de la Ramee]
... fail him. But he had no remedy. Fight he must. Rinaldo, desirous to make short work of him, took his station with fierce delight; and at the third sound of the trumpets, the Duke was forced to couch his spear and meet him at full charge. Sheer went the Paladin's ashen staff through the false bosom, sending the villain to the earth eight feet beyond the saddle. The conqueror dismounted instantly, and unlacing the man's helmet, enabled the king to hear his dying confession, which he had hardly finished, when life forsook him. Rinaldo then took off his own helmet; ...
— Stories from the Italian Poets: With Lives of the Writers, Vol. 2 • Leigh Hunt
... so it fell on me a spell of wander-lust was cast. The land was still and strange and chill, and cavernous and vast; And sad and dead, and dull as lead, the valleys sought the snows; And far and wide on every side the ashen peaks arose. ...
— Ballads of a Cheechako • Robert W. Service
... discarding gold lace and velvet, thought it expedient to array themselves in doublets and hose of ashen grey, with short cloaks of the same color, all of the coarsest materials. They appeared in this guise in the streets, with common felt hats on their heads, and beggars' pouches and bowls at their sides. They caused also medals of lead and copper to be struck, bearing upon one side the head of Philip; ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... just one glimpse of his face. It was ashen. We went on smoking. 'He's a crazy Frenchman,' we said, and let it go. But my brother was out in the barn and he corralled him ...
— Sunny Slopes • Ethel Hueston
... Genuois comen in sundry wies Into this land with diuers marchandises In great Caracks, arrayed withouten lacke With cloth of gold, silke, and pepper blacke They bring with them, and of crood [6] great plentee, Woll Oyle, Woad ashen, by vessel in the see, Cotton, Rochalum, and good gold of Genne. And then be charged with wolle againe I wenne, And wollen cloth of ours of colours all. And they aduenture, as ofte it doth befall, Into ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques and Discoveries - of the English Nation, v. 1, Northern Europe • Richard Hakluyt
... away from the log fire at the sound of Bambi's footsteps running down the stairs. The soft gray gown clung to her, and floated behind her, its ashen monotone making her face more vivid than ever. Her cheeks were pink, and her eyes looked gray-green in the shadowy room, with the deep, shining fire of opals. Both hands went out to ...
— Bambi • Marjorie Benton Cooke
... were ashen and sober; The leaves they were crisped and sere— The leaves they were withering and sere; It was night in the lonesome October Of my most immemorial year: It was hard by the dim lake of Auber, In the misty mid region of Weir:— ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 5 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... us suffer so much from the cold as poor Gahra. His ebon skin has turned ashen gray, he shivers continually, can hardly speak, and sits ...
— Mr. Fortescue • William Westall
... only watching her eyes and waiting for the surprised smile of recognition which always made them feel that they had been missed; but Mrs. Shelley, she would wager, was privately noting that a dove-coloured silk dress and a scarlet shawl embroidered with birds in flight made a white face look ashen; Sonia O'Rane was probably wondering why her maid did not tell her that a band of black tulle with a red rose at one side simply emphasized her hollow cheeks and sunken eyes. . . . She moved listlessly and smiled mysteriously to ...
— The Education of Eric Lane • Stephen McKenna
... out of the reeking wound, and said, "This is the hand, this the lance, with which I conquered but now. The same will I use against him; in his {case}, I pray that the event may prove the same." Thus he said, and he hurled it at Cygnus, nor did the ashen lance miss him; and, not escaped {by him}, it resounded on his left shoulder: thence it was repelled, as though by a wall, or a solid rock. Yet Achilles saw Cygnus marked with blood, where he had been struck, and he rejoiced, ...
— The Metamorphoses of Ovid - Literally Translated into English Prose, with Copious Notes - and Explanations • Publius Ovidius Naso
... one beheld balls of various-colored feathers standing on one leg and breathing peacefully. Love-birds, nestling shoulder to shoulder, with their heads tucked under their wings and all their feathers puffed out, so that they looked like globes of malachite; English bullfinches, with ashen-colored backs, in which their black heads were buried, and corselets of a rosy down; Java sparrows, fat and sleek and cleanly; troupials, so glossy and splendid in plumage that they looked as if they were dressed in the celebrated armor of the Black Prince, which ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 24, Oct. 1859 • Various
... and its shape was more clearly marked, the boys discovered that only a single warrior sat within. He was in the stern, manipulating his long, ashen paddle with such rare skill that he seemed to pay no heed ...
— The Lost Trail - I • Edward S. Ellis
... spreading pestilence abroad every hundred yards of the way; where the army of gold-seekers turning back was as great as the army pressing on; and those of the attack had momentarily to stand aside, so narrow was the path, for the wounded and spent of the retreat, who passed them by with ashen faces, some of them with death in their eyes, bidding them, "Turn back! Turn back! You ...
— Murder Point - A Tale of Keewatin • Coningsby Dawson
... the door, and flung himself into his chair, the little book open before him. The ashen ring had widened until his whole face was like that of the dead. Not a muscle of his rigid face stirred as with desperate eyes he read on and on. Only the faint rustle of the leaves as he turned the ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 10 • Various
... remained as if entranced. The colour had again fled from her cheeks, leaving them paler, more ashen than before. It seemed as if in this moment she suffered more than human creature could bear, more than any ...
— I Will Repay • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... prodding with her whip, headed the horses over and started them. They floundered and splashed, and Andreas half rose from his seat, with lips clenched on a cry. The traces tightened under the water, a horse stumbled and vanished for a moment, and, as the cart tilted sickeningly, the man, ashen-faced and strung, leaped from ...
— Vrouw Grobelaar and Her Leading Cases - Seventeen Short Stories • Perceval Gibbon
... wild yells in his ears, roused him. The boches were on the line! He leaped up. Through the dust he saw charging gray forms, thick and heavy. They plunged, as if actuated by one will. Bulky blond men, ashen of face, with eyes of blue fire and brutal ...
— The Desert of Wheat • Zane Grey
... house of Diomed, in the subterranean vaults, twenty skeletons (one of a babe) were discovered in one spot by the door, covered by a fine ashen dust, that had evidently been wafted slowly through the apertures, until it had filled the whole space. There were jewels and coins, candelabra for unavailing light, and wine hardened in the amphorae for the prolongation of agonized life. The sand, consolidated ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 03 • Various
... of me the governor sprang to his feet; through the treasurer's lips came a long, sighing breath; West's dark face was ashen. I came forward to the table, and leaned my weight upon it; for all the waves of the sea were roaring in my ears and the lights were going up ...
— The Literary World Seventh Reader • Various
... his face ashen. One hand dived for his pistol-pocket, but before he could reach it T. B. was at his throat. That moment the Pole felt two arms gripping him, two steel bands they seemed, and likely to crush his arms into his very body. Then he went over with the full weight of the ...
— The Secret House • Edgar Wallace
... rash projector of the onslaught, shaking an ashen spear with a brazen point, cries, "Behold! {now}, behold! I am come, the avenger of my wife, ravished from me; neither shall thy wings nor Jupiter turned into fictitious gold, deliver thee from ...
— The Metamorphoses of Ovid - Vol. I, Books I-VII • Publius Ovidius Naso
... feel his face grow ashen, but his voice was very gentle. "What was it, my dear? Of course I know you couldn't have noticed such a vile slander. What do you want ...
— Out of the Ashes • Ethel Watts Mumford
... I like it for many reasons—because it is real, intimate, confidential; because it narrates a tragic experience that is all too common in actual life; because its tragedy is enhanced by dramatic contrasts, the splendour of the bright, breezy, sunlit garden contrasting with the road of ashen spiritual desolation the soul must take; the splendour of the gorgeous stiff brocade and the futility of the blank, soft, imprisoned flesh; the obstreperous heart, beating in joyous harmony with the rhythm of the swaying flowers, changed ...
— The Advance of English Poetry in the Twentieth Century • William Lyon Phelps
... The English ivy clambered to the roof, The English willow spread its branches still, And as I stood before the cottage-door My heart-pulse quickened, for methought I heard My mother's footsteps on the ashen floor. ...
— The Feast of the Virgins and Other Poems • H. L. Gordon
... and slow his speech, and slow His musing step; and slow his hand to wrath; A massive hand, but soft, that many a time Had succoured man and woman, child and beast, And yet could fiercely grasp the sword. At times As mightily it clutched his ashen goad When like an eagle on him swooped some thought: Then stood he as in dream, his pallid front Brightening like eastern sea-cliffs when a moon Unrisen is near its rising. Round the bay Meantime, as twilight deepened, many a fire ...
— Legends of the Saxon Saints • Aubrey de Vere
... His face was ashen, and his jowls sagged. "My God, it's happening all over Ullr! Why, it's the ...
— Ullr Uprising • Henry Beam Piper
... rain falling, and young Sampson arriving in the early bleakness to attend to his duties at the cottage, presented a picture of human distress to move the most hardened to pity. Though dressed comfortably in the clothing with which Fanny had apparelled him—he was ashen. Save for the chattering of his teeth, his body seemed possessed of a paralytic inability to move. He knelt before the empty fire-place as he had done on that first day, and with deep sighs and groans went about his work. Then he remained long ...
— At Fault • Kate Chopin
... another week, and the two friends had not met; but again at twilight Clelia took her walk, and this time she found Sabrina stretched out on the lounge of the sitting-room. There was a change in her. Pallor had settled upon her face, and her dark eyebrows and lashes stood out startlingly upon the ashen mask. Clelia hurried up to her and ...
— Country Neighbors • Alice Brown
... howitzers no longer explode, The cannoneers rest next to their guns. The infantry pitch tents now, And the pale moon slowly rises. On yellow fields in red trousers, the French are ablaze, Ashen pale from death and powder. Among them German medics squat. The day becomes grayer, its sun redder. Field kitchens steam. Towns are put to the torch. Broken carts stand at roadsides. Panting cyclists, hot and tanned, loiter At a scorched ...
— The Verse of Alfred Lichtenstein • Alfred Lichtenstein
... and glided bushy trained and sinuous before me, or the marble birches with ebony limbs, drew me to gloat on them. The white birch is a woman and a goddess. I have associated her forever with that afternoon. Her poor cousin the poplar, often so like her as to deceive you until ashen bough and rounded leaf instruct the eye, always grows near her like a protecting servant. The poor cousin rustles and fusses. But my calm lady stands in perfect beauty, among pines straight as candles, never tremulous, never trivial. All alabaster and ebony, she glows from a distance; ...
— Lazarre • Mary Hartwell Catherwood
... trembling, white-clad girl the great, black vulture stalked. The revelers fell away from him on either side as he approached. Carmen turned again and watched him come. Her face was ashen. "God ...
— Carmen Ariza • Charles Francis Stocking
... the woman he must always be forgetting was without her sight), balancing and posturing on well-curved legs, and jauntily pinning his plaid on his shoulder, in a flash lost backbone. He stepped a pace back, as if some one had struck him a blow, his jaw fell, and his face grew ashen. ...
— John Splendid - The Tale of a Poor Gentleman, and the Little Wars of Lorn • Neil Munro
... the darkness is grown deep. That Emperour, rich Charles, lies asleep; Dreams that he stands in the great pass of Size, In his two hands his ashen spear he sees; Guenes the count that spear from him doth seize, Brandishes it and twists it with such ease, That flown into the sky the flinders seem. Charles sleeps on ...
— The Song of Roland • Anonymous
... mere paralysed wreck of a man. But when he saw me and realised who I was—and probably, too, what my errand was—he found the strength not only to move, but to seize both his crutches and raise himself on them! I shall never forget his gaunt ashen-grey face, the feverish gleam in his sunken eyes, his unkempt hair ...
— Three Dramas - The Editor—The Bankrupt—The King • Bjornstjerne M. Bjornson
... he sigh'd. "There the sun drops, behold!" And indeed, whilst he spoke all the purple and gold In the west had turn'd ashen, save one fading strip Of light that yet gleam'd from the dark nether lip Of a long reef of cloud; and o'er sullen ravines And ridges the raw damps were hanging white screens Of melancholy mist. "Nunc dimittis?" she said. "O God of the living! whilst yet 'mid the dead And the dying ...
— Lucile • Owen Meredith
... brief sentence, and lifted the blade over her head. It caught the light of the hovering sun, and the Indians near enough to hear her words set up a scream of such unearthly emotion that the priest turned ashen, and made the sign to ...
— The Treasure Trail - A Romance of the Land of Gold and Sunshine • Marah Ellis Ryan
... eyes anxiously on Philip. They had not met since the important conversation on Ashen-down, and she found herself looking with more pride than ever at his tall, noble figure, as if he was more her own; but the calmness of feeling was gone. She could not meet his eye, nor see him turn towards ...
— The Heir of Redclyffe • Charlotte M. Yonge
... sunshine of human life. Yet it is no unprofitable task, to take one of these doleful creatures, and set fancy resolutely at work to brighten the dim eye, and darken the silvery locks, and paint the ashen cheek with rose-color, and repair the shrunken and crazy form, till a dewy maiden shall be seen in the old matron's elbow-chair. The miracle being wrought, then let the years roll back again, each sadder than the last, and the whole weight of age and ...
— Edward Fane's Rosebud (From "Twice Told Tales") • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... countenance Blurrs 'twixt glance and second glance; When the tattered smokes forerun Ashen 'neath a silvered sun; When the curtain of the haze Shuts upon our helpless ways— Hear the Channel Fleet ...
— Traffics and Discoveries • Rudyard Kipling
... the wet grass, now much paler than ever, and his lips trembling with pain. A faded leaf had fallen on his brow and was strange to behold against his ashen skin; but I bent me down and took it off. By him was lying the uprooted limetree, from which that leaf had fallen, and whereas the rain was dropping from it fast, meseemed ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... to stand where they were, and those who stand still are always timid advisers. As for us, we could have shouted aloud. If this lively and beautiful river were, indeed, a thing of death's contrivance, the old ashen rogue had famously outwitted himself with us. I was living three to the minute. I was scoring points against him every stroke of my paddle, every turn of the stream, I have rarely had better profit ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 1 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... sacrifice of himself. But he was fighting something as strong as the instinct of self-preservation, and his usually expressionless face gave the lie to his joyous words. Loud above his voice his ashen face was speaking to her, and she cried in terror, "What is wrong?" Even then he attempted to deceive her, but suddenly she knew ...
— Tommy and Grizel • J.M. Barrie
... Wilson snatched the weapon from the nerveless fingers. It was quite unnecessary. The man showed not the slightest trace of consciousness. His face was ashen gray. Wilson threw back the man's coat and found the under linen to be stained with blood. He tore aside the shirt and discovered its source—a narrow slit just over the heart. There was but one thing to do—get the man into the next room to the fire and, if ...
— The Web of the Golden Spider • Frederick Orin Bartlett
... told the names of these three, for that is needful in such work, as it passes the skill of woman to make a good likeness, nor do I think it would be lucky to do so if it could be compassed. Wondrous was the banner with gold and bright colours, and it was hung from a gilded spear, ashen hafted, and long, that it might be seen ...
— Havelok The Dane - A Legend of Old Grimsby and Lincoln • Charles Whistler
... of this kind of day had fallen on Saunderson, whose face was ashen, and who held Carmichael's hand with such anxious affection that it was impossible to inquire how he had slept, and it would have been a banalite to remark upon the weather. After the Rabbi had been compelled to ...
— Kate Carnegie and Those Ministers • Ian Maclaren
... pulled. Something attracted his attention. He looked. He saw something. The beast in him became human—the madness changed to rationality—the devil to a craven! His ashen lips uttered a low, ...
— Wildfire • Zane Grey
... Beany. He looked anxiously at the Weasel's ashen face. "The Wolf stabbed him. We have got to get him to ...
— The Boy Scouts on a Submarine • Captain John Blaine
... offering to look at the corpse, I inquired in Spanish of the vaqueros which one of the men was their corporal. A heavy-set, bearded man was pointed out, and walking up to him, with one hand I slapped him in the face and with the other relieved him of a six-shooter. He staggered back, turned ashen pale, and before he could recover from the surprise, in his own tongue I berated him as a worthless cur for deserting his employer over an accident. Following up the temporary advantage, I inquired ...
— The Outlet • Andy Adams
... may be descried a dark object. It is a small Indian canoe, in which are seated two white men and a female, all of whom are attired in the garb of civilization. The young man near the stern is of slight mold, clear blue eye, and a prepossessing countenance. He holds a broad ashen paddle in his hand with which to assist his companion, who maintains his proximity to the shore for the purpose of overcoming more deftly the opposition of the current. The second personage is a short but square-shouldered Irishman, with ...
— The Lost Trail - I • Edward S. Ellis
... a very eminent Churchman, who was also a great poet, preach his last sermon, at the age of ninety. This was the Danish bishop Grundtvig. In that case the effort of speaking, the extraction, as it seemed, of the sepulchral voice from the shrunken and ashen face, did not last more than ten minutes. But the English divines of the Jacobean age, like their Scottish brethren of to-day, were accustomed to stupendous efforts of endurance ...
— Gossip in a Library • Edmund Gosse |
