"Breakdown" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... spite of the desire of Lord John Russell, the whig section of the cabinet, and the general voice of the country, that Lord Palmerston should, at such a juncture, assume that most important official position. The result was a terrible breakdown in the administration of the war department, disastrous to the ministry, the army, and the country. The vacant secretaryship of the colonies was given to Sir George Grey, who was certainly unequal to its ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... said, "we have our sources. Confidential. Top secret. I'm sure you understand, commissioner." Hurriedly, he added: "What does the breakdown look like?" ...
— Out Like a Light • Gordon Randall Garrett
... even six feet tall might easily have frightened Mr. Wordsley into a nervous breakdown by staring at him with that gaunt, hollow-eyed stare, but this creature, though manlike, was fully fifty feet tall, incredibly elongated, and stark naked. Its hair was long and matted; its cheeks sunken, its lips pulled back in an expression ...
— The Marooner • Charles A. Stearns
... her threat to build a railroad from Berlin to Bagdad and tap the riches of the East, led the British to form alliances with their traditional enemies—the French and the Russians. Russia, after the breakdown of Czarism in 1917, dropped out of the Entente, and the United States took her place among the Allies of the British Empire. During the struggle France was reduced to a mere shell of her former power. The War of 1914 bled her ...
— The American Empire • Scott Nearing
... Robespierre. Its Churches and Convents are in a deplorable state, even as those of this still more unfortunate Town. The best Houses are shut up, and its finest Buildings are occupied by the Military. We left on the morning of the 11th, travelled safely (except a slight breakdown at our journey's end) to Chalons sur Saone, and on the 11th went by the water-diligence to Macon, where we stopped to sleep. We arrived at dusk, and as we were in a dark staircase exploring our way and speaking ...
— Before and after Waterloo - Letters from Edward Stanley, sometime Bishop of Norwich (1802;1814;1814) • Edward Stanley
... for the dinner in his honor. Willis Enderby had formally withdrawn from the governorship contest. His statement given out for publication in next morning's papers, was in the office. Banneker sent for it. The reason given was formal and brief; nervous breakdown; imperative orders from his physician. The whole thing was grisly plain to Banneker, but he must have confirmation. He went to the city editor. Had any reporter been ...
— Success - A Novel • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... expression in the lovely Iberian Zarzuela.[EN28] The boy Husayn Gennah, a small cyclops in a brown felt calotte and a huge military overcoat cut short, caused roars of laughter by his ultra-Gaditanian style of dancing. I have also reason to suspect that a jig and a breakdown tested the solidity of the plank table, while a Jew's harp represented Europe. In fact, throughout the journey, reminiscences of Mabille and the Music Halls contrasted strongly with the memories of majestic and mysterious Midian. And, to make the shock ...
— The Land of Midian, Vol. 1 • Richard Burton
... not to be thought of! It was one thing to die that a fellow-creature might have all things good! another to live a living death that he might persist in the pride of life! She could not throw God's life to the service of the stupid Satan! It was a sad breakdown to the hopes that had clustered ...
— Weighed and Wanting • George MacDonald
... and Persian slippers. In another, the chorus is composed of men representing wasps, with waists pinched in, bodies striped with black and yellow, and long stings behind. The piece ends with three boys disguised as crabs, dancing a furious breakdown, while the chorus encourages them with, "Come now, let us all make room for them, that they may twirl themselves about. Come, oh famous offsprings of your briny father!—skip along the sandy shore of the barren sea, ...
— History of English Humour, Vol. 1 (of 2) - With an Introduction upon Ancient Humour • Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange
... followed by Kings in Exile; then came Numa Roumestan and The Evangelist; then, on the eve of Daudet's breakdown, Sapho; and the greatest of his humorous masterpieces, Tartarin in the Alps. It is not yet certain what rank is to be given to these books. Perhaps the adventures of the mountain-climbing hero of the Midi, ...
— The Nabob • Alphonse Daudet
... complete set of Dickens. But as soon as he had ordered it, it seemed to him pitiably flat, and he countermanded it. Then they spent weary hours at Liberty's, and other places of the kind, when Bruce declared he felt a nervous breakdown coming on, and left it to Edith, ...
— Love's Shadow • Ada Leverson
... was surprised too, but, regardless of the ruling, proceeded to make a carefully-prepared reply to the speech which the Hon. and gallant Member had not been allowed to deliver. He frankly admitted that there had been a lamentable breakdown of the hospital arrangements, but steps had been taken to improve them, and a telegram from General LAKE showed that the treatment of the men wounded in the recent engagement ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 150, March 29, 1916 • Various
... applause that greeted Lottie's conclusion. Dan executed a miniature breakdown as an expression of his feelings, and it seemed as if Mr. Dimmerly's chuckling laugh would never cease. De Forrest looked uneasy, and Hemstead was in a trance of bewildered delight. Alice and Harcourt exchanged significant glances. ...
— From Jest to Earnest • E. P. Roe
... and studied for three years with Heinrich Schwartz. In 1906 she returned to California and expected to meet her father at the station, but he was taken suddenly ill and died shortly after from a nervous breakdown. His daughter returned just two days after he died, doubly bereaved, as he had been father and mother to her and her brothers since she was a child of three years. After many months she took up her music once more, where she ...
— Sixty Years of California Song • Margaret Blake-Alverson
... authorities concerned, and immediately a thorough inspection of the line the Emperor is about to travel over is ordered. Tunnels, bridges, points, railway crossings, are all subjected to examination, and spare engines kept in immediate readiness in case of a breakdown occurring to the imperial train. The police of the various towns through which the monarch is to pass are also communicated with and their help requisitioned in taking precautions for his safety. Like any private person, the Emperor pays his own fares, which are reckoned at ...
— William of Germany • Stanley Shaw
... Had her father and mother done right by him? Her pulse stirred with unwonted quickness. She did not speak, but she kissed him, which, for her, was an indication of unusual feeling. And when he recovered command over his emotions he made no reference to his breakdown, nor did she. But that scene struck deep into Madeline Hammond's heart. Through it she saw what ...
— The Light of Western Stars • Zane Grey
... sympathetic influence upon all about him. His voice had the same sort of influence upon them as the drum and fife on a soldier's march: it quickened their movements. We were often called in by our neighbour manufacturers to repair a breakdown of their engines. That was always a sad disaster, as all hands were idle until the repair was effected. Archy was in his glory on such occasions. By his ready zeal and energy he soon got over the difficulty, repaired the engines, and set the people to work again. He became quite famous in these ...
— James Nasmyth's Autobiography • James Nasmyth
... constitution of iron," she said, "and I have always lived on the most sanitary principles, and with the utmost simplicity. So I hoped to go to my grave without much suffering. Certainly I never expected to have to consult any one on the ground of nervous breakdown. Yet that is exactly why I am here with you at this moment. The circumstances of my life have been too much for ...
— Flames • Robert Smythe Hichens
... been for that, and expressed his determination to add another hundred pounds to the reward offered by the club for the discovery of the author of the outrage. The men felt that it was hard on a fellow to win the Cup by the breakdown of an opponent in that way, and the ladies admired the sincere way in which he expressed his regrets. He was a good dancer, a good talker, and a handsome man; and as few of them knew Frank, they had no particular ...
— The Queen's Cup • G. A. Henty
... nervous system are absorbed, and the seed diverted through sexual excesses in the marriage relationship, by fornication, or by any other form of immorality, the man's power must decline: that to this very cause may be attributed the failure and breakdown of so many men ...
— Searchlights on Health - The Science of Eugenics • B. G. Jefferis and J. L. Nichols
... instrument was constantly working at high pressure. In order that these might be carried out efficiently, the whole apparatus had to be carried down to the Hut. Here, Bickerton and Correll were continually in consultation with the meteorologist on the latest breakdown. Cups were blown off several times, and one was lost and replaced with difficulty. Most aggravating of all was a habit the clocks developed of stopping during the colder spells. The old-fashioned method of boiling them was found of assistance, but it was discovered that the best treatment was ...
— The Home of the Blizzard • Douglas Mawson
... existence, this does not vitiate the fact that, when free of all external constraint, growth gains on waste. Indeed, even in the case of old age, the statement remains essentially true, for the phenomena then displayed point to a breakdown of the functioning power of the cell, an approximation to configurations incapable of assimilation. It is not as if life showed in these phenomena that its conditions could obtain in the midst of abundance, and yet its law be suspended; but ...
— The Birth-Time of the World and Other Scientific Essays • J. (John) Joly
... When you get your vehicle re-ammoed, lieutenant, suppose you buzz back to where you machine-gunned that first gang. If there are any more around, they'll have moved in for the free meal by now." This breakdown of the Jeels' taboo against eating fellow-tribesmen was one of the best things he'd heard from the cannibal-extermination ...
— Uller Uprising • Henry Beam Piper, John D. Clark and John F. Carr
... seeking to keep ever before his mind, while he preached God's word, the sin he had committed against God's law and man's. He visibly grew more pale, more thin, more distraught. The changes inspired his congregation with concern; they began to talk of overwork, of the danger of a breakdown; and seeing the dire possibility of losing so popular and pew-filling a pastor, they began to urge upon him the need ...
— Counsel for the Defense • Leroy Scott
... off now,' he said, 'we will go to the gospodarstwo and you shall give me some nails in case of another breakdown, and I will leave you some of this cordial in return. Mind, if your head or your stomach aches or you are worried and can't sleep, take a glassful of this: all your worries will at once disappear. Take good care of it and don't on any account give a drop away, it's ...
— Selected Polish Tales • Various
... diary: "Rested at home. Very glad to be there." The attempt was not attended by any lasting bad effects; he immediately regained his appetite and usual health; but his Aunt Susan was sorely disappointed. He tried to soothe her by explaining what he believed to be the combined causes of his breakdown: first the intense heat, which had made his stay in Paris very trying; the fatigue he had undergone there; and lastly the weakness supervening after the loss of appetite, also due to the abnormal heat, which was causing several sunstrokes ...
— Philip Gilbert Hamerton • Philip Gilbert Hamerton et al
... suffered a severe nervous breakdown. The physicians had ordered immediate dropping of business and ...
— Galusha the Magnificent • Joseph C. Lincoln
... happened. Dane's barely veiled threats seemed to vanish like the man himself into thin air. Beatrice, after the breakdown of her one passionate outburst, had become wonderfully meek and tractable. Sylvanus Power, who had received from Elizabeth the message for which he had waited, showed no sign either of disappointment or anger. After the storm which had seemed to be breaking in upon him from every quarter, ...
— The Cinema Murder • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... the distress of beauty and genius is sure to excite. For more than a week, now, the prevailing topic had been this young girl; first the promise of a brilliant debut, then the momentary triumph and sudden breakdown; now came the news of her illness, true, in so much that she was seriously ill, but exaggerated into a romance which gave her out as dying with a shock of ...
— The Old Countess; or, The Two Proposals • Ann S. Stephens
... with a foot on the fender and an arm on the mantelpiece, as her grandfather had done when he came in that night of the opera. She was too near a breakdown to care what she ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... Newman wrote Mr. Jameson a letter (on finding out that he was suffering from overwork and the fear of subsequent breakdown), saying these strong words of sympathy: "I charge you to give it up. Save yourself for the years to come." He went on to say that a friend of his own had kept working on for some cherished cause at the ...
— Memoir and Letters of Francis W. Newman • Giberne Sieveking
... striking personality, released from the bonds of an enforced inactivity and an objectless destiny. By just so much Stafford had altered for the worse. His character was too strong and rigid to allow an absolute breakdown. He still carried himself well; to all intents and purposes, as far as his duty was concerned, he was as hard-working and conscientious as he had ever been, but no strength of will had been able to hinder the change in his face and expression. ...
— The Native Born - or, The Rajah's People • I. A. R. Wylie
... know," Bob answered. "I never saw your father wearing his coat. But Mr. Blipper used to have an old ragged coat, and right after we had that breakdown at the Sunday school picnic grounds he had a ...
— The Bobbsey Twins at the County Fair • Laura Lee Hope
... than in any other animal, it would seem that the addition of this last demand, namely, of satisfying the sexual desires of the husband during the period of pregnancy, might prove "the straw that breaks the camel's back," and result in the more or less complete nervous breakdown of the woman. The author submits this question to all fair-minded men: Is it not due to the wife that she be not asked to satisfy the recurring sexual desires of the husband during the period when her life and ...
— The Biology, Physiology and Sociology of Reproduction - Also Sexual Hygiene with Special Reference to the Male • Winfield S. Hall
... suffering from chronic diabetes and a general breakdown, which was about to compel his retirement from the force. Operated on August 9. Left the hospital yesterday feeling like ...
— The Goat-gland Transplantation • Sydney B. Flower
... trudge through those endless trees, with Fear for a companion. Even the porters, who had been told nothing, seemed more afraid than usual, though whether this was because they "smell rat," as Jeekie called it, or owing to the progressive breakdown of their nervous systems, Alan did not know. About midday they stopped to eat because the men were too tired to walk further without rest. For an hour or more they had been looking for a comparatively open place, ...
— The Yellow God - An Idol of Africa • H. Rider Haggard
... when the future of Indian industries seemed to be at last almost assured, and largely thanks to Indian enterprise, it was gravely compromised by the miserable breakdown of the most important of all the services on which the very life of industry depends. The Indian railways proved altogether incapable of meeting the new demands made upon them. Even in the essential matter of coal supplies, though the output of ...
— India, Old and New • Sir Valentine Chirol
... of disarray I really dare not imagine, dead white at least, shaking like an aspen, and mowing at the man with speechless lips. And this was the soldier of Napoleon, and the gentleman who intended going next night to an Assembly Ball! I am the more particular in telling of my breakdown, because it was my only experience of the sort; and it is a good tale for officers. I will allow no man to call me coward; I have made my proofs; few men more. And yet I (come of the best blood in France and inured to danger from a child) did, for some ten or twenty ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 20 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... investment, but on three separate occasions I have yielded to the persuasions of a friend connected with one of the big institutions and have considered the subject. The first time was in 1887, following a breakdown from overwork. This illness my friend used as an argument to induce me to take out insurance, and I went so far as to agree to submit to a private medical examination by the leading physicians of his company for the purpose of ascertaining if my breakdown, which ...
— Frenzied Finance - Vol. 1: The Crime of Amalgamated • Thomas W. Lawson
... gaping at the insubordination. Madden flushed under the implication. He stepped forward to smash the long insolent face and white mustache, but it was plain the Englishman was on the verge of a nervous breakdown. ...
— The Cruise of the Dry Dock • T. S. Stribling
... an idea that this was all going to be rather solemn if she let it be. But she was going to give her very best imitation of undiluted sunshine, the imitation she could give even when her head was splitting or when her mother had a nervous breakdown or when she was particularly romantic and curious and courageous. This brother of hers undoubtedly needed cheering up, and he was going to be cheered up, whether ...
— Flappers and Philosophers • F. Scott Fitzgerald
... of the Rocky Mountains at midnight on the 17th. The climate changes suddenly, and the cold is intense. We resume runners, have a breakdown, and are forced to ...
— The Complete Works of Artemus Ward, Part 4 • Charles Farrar Browne
... more and more. She trembled. She felt on the verge of a breakdown ... Carolus Fonta wondered if she was ill, if she could keep the stage until the end of the Garden Act. In the front of the house, people remembered the catastrophe that had befallen Carlotta at the end of that act and the historic "co-ack" which ...
— The Phantom of the Opera • Gaston Leroux
... her way. Every hour brought her nearer to her starting point. When it became evident that the machinery was now in good working order and not liable to a breakdown, the professor ordered a meal gotten ...
— Through the Air to the North Pole - or The Wonderful Cruise of the Electric Monarch • Roy Rockwood
... opinion one of the most valuable contributions anthropologists have made in recent years is the discovery that primitive man is afflicted with essentially the same neurotic conditions as those of us who live a so-called civilized life. They have found savages displaying every symptom of a nervous breakdown among the mountain tribes of the Elgonyi and the Aruntas of Australia. No, Mr. Latham, it's time the stress-and-strain theory was relegated to the junk pile along with demoniac ...
— Disturbing Sun • Robert Shirley Richardson
... must have heard of Lucas's breakdown, and equally, of course, he must have seen them both. What happened at that interview, by what casual attitude he allayed Lucas's probable jealousy and the girl's own nervousness, Bassett had no way of ...
— The Breaking Point • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... supplemented with close observation of the working of the locomotive, the information necessary to answer satisfactorily the entire list of questions can be easily mastered in the time given. In regard to breakdowns, it is advised that he carefully inspect each breakdown or disabled engine that comes to his notice, see where the parts have given way and in what manner the work of blocking up it done. It is not expected that all the breakdowns which may happen to a locomotive ...
— The Traveling Engineers' Association - To Improve The Locomotive Engine Service of American Railroads • Anonymous
... to-day the story [Footnote: "A Nervous Breakdown."] for the Garshin sbornik: it is such a load off my mind. In this story I have told my own opinion—which is of no interest to anyone—of such rare men as Garshin. I have run to almost 2,000 lines. I speak ...
— Letters of Anton Chekhov • Anton Chekhov
... corners and avoided side streets. He became furtive and watchful; his eyes were forever flitting here and there; he chose the outer edges of the sidewalks, and he went nowhere after nightfall unattended. The time was past when he could doubt the constancy of his purpose; but he did fear a nervous breakdown, and even shuddered at the thought of possible insanity. Being in fact as sane a man as ever lived, his irrational nerves alarmed him all the more. He could not conceive that an event was immediately before him which, ...
— The Net • Rex Beach
... was a most doleful breakdown. The philanthropist deranged the symmetry of the table, sat himself in the way of the waiting, blocked up the thoroughfare, and drove Mr. Tope (who assisted the parlour-maid) to the verge of distraction by passing plates and dishes on, over his own head. Nobody could ...
— The Mystery of Edwin Drood • Charles Dickens
... breaks down," "something has snapped"—these phrases by which we describe the phases of death yield their full meaning. They are different ways of saying that "correspondence" has ceased. And the scientific meaning of Death now becomes clearly intelligible. Dying is that breakdown in an organism which throws it out of correspondence with some necessary part of the environment. Death is the result produced, the want of correspondence. We do not say that this is all that is involved. But ...
— Natural Law in the Spiritual World • Henry Drummond
... the Federal party, both within and without Connecticut from 1808 to 1815, was quite as much the real cause of their downfall in the state as that coalition between clergy and lawyers described by Dr. Beecher as causing the breakdown of party machinery and its ultimate ruin. Glancing somewhat hastily at some of the most far-reaching acts of the Federalists, we find first the Federal opposition to the embargo that from December 22, 1807, for over a year paralyzed New England commerce. In February, 1809, John Quincy ...
— The Development of Religious Liberty in Connecticut • M. Louise Greene, Ph. D.
... misfiring, fresh hesitations, followed by efforts, as though the engine was pluckily striving to do its duty. And then suddenly came the final failure, a dead stop at the side of the road, a stupid breakdown. ...
— The Teeth of the Tiger • Maurice Leblanc
... drift had forced the floe downward. The lead ahead had opened out during the night, cracked the pack from north to south and frozen over again, adding 300 yds. to the distance between the ship and "Khyber Pass." The breakdown gang had completed its work by lunch-time. The gale was then decreasing and the three- days-old moon showed as a red crescent on the northern horizon. The temperature during the blizzard had ranged from -21 to -33.5 Fahr. It is usual for the temperature ...
— South! • Sir Ernest Shackleton
... send someone out with him to lend him a hand," said Trenwith. "People around these parts are pretty nice to you if you have a breakdown, and I guess it's partly because they never know when they're going to ...
— A Campfire Girl's Happiness • Jane L. Stewart
... grow out of the breakdown of primary relations? What problems are solved by the breakdown ...
— Introduction to the Science of Sociology • Robert E. Park
... The last letter I had from him he made light of his health. But you know he only just avoided a breakdown in that strike business. We only pulled him through by the skin of ...
— Marcella • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... he said. "Even if a man has been acquitted by a jury, they'll talk, and nod and wink—and as far as the world goes, a man might often as well be guilty as not. It's a breakdown blow, and it damages Lydgate as much as Bulstrode. I don't pretend to say what is the truth. I only wish we had never heard the name of either Bulstrode or Lydgate. You'd better have been a Vincy all your life, and so had Rosamond." ...
— Middlemarch • George Eliot
... a spiritual breakdown was quite to be expected. For though he was growing more charitable towards mankind, he was still a little jaunty, and too apt to stake out beforehand the course that will be pursued by the wounded soul. It did not surprise him, however, that she should greet him naturally, with none of the ...
— Where Angels Fear to Tread • E. M. Forster
... compromise body it had no power of progressive development, and in the whole generation of its existence it did practically nothing to advance the public, intellectual, or moral interests of the people. (2) Perhaps its most serious breakdown took place, as we shall see, in the failure of its judicial system. Executive power it had none, as seen in the cases where jail-delivery took place again and again by the friends of the prisoners boldly extricating whom they would. (3) But most alarming and miserable was ...
— The Romantic Settlement of Lord Selkirk's Colonists - The Pioneers of Manitoba • George Bryce
... was not the first or only driver to complain of the packed course. The Mercury had scarcely departed when the Marathon car came in, its experienced and steel-fibred pilot on the brink of nervous breakdown. ...
— From the Car Behind • Eleanor M. Ingram
... before, a nervous breakdown had sent Mr. Peters to a New York specialist. The specialist had grown rich on similar cases and his advice was always the same. He insisted on Mr. Peters ...
— Something New • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
... possible from his appearance to believe that he might be suffering from a mental breakdown. Sally recalled that many of the soldiers were affected in this way from shell shock or the long strain ...
— The Campfire Girls on the Field of Honor • Margaret Vandercook
... maxim is true of finite numbers. For example, Englishmen are only some among Europeans, and there are fewer Englishmen than Europeans. But when we come to infinite numbers, this is no longer true. This breakdown of the maxim gives us the precise definition of infinity. A collection of terms is infinite when it contains as parts other collections which have just as many terms as it has. If you can take away some of the terms of a collection, without diminishing the ...
— Mysticism and Logic and Other Essays • Bertrand Russell
... Then he remembered O'Donnell, and spoke a message to the police-station, whence were presently despatched a couple of constables who found the man, stunned and considerably bruised. Neither did he forget Section D—with the result that there was a breakdown gang on the ...
— Adventures in Many Lands • Various
... the contemporary events in the Eastern field: in its northern part the overrunning of East Prussia by the Russians, and the heavy blow which the Germans there administered to the invader; in its southern the Austrian opposition to the Russians on the Galician borders, and the breakdown of that ...
— A General Sketch of the European War - The First Phase • Hilaire Belloc
... mind reader," laughed Grace. "I've been on the verge of a breakdown ever since we left Oakdale, and in this very instant I made up my mind to be brave and not cry a single tear. Look at Anne. She is as calm and unemotional ...
— Grace Harlowe's First Year at Overton College • Jessie Graham Flower
... honeymoon on the groom's yacht, sailing in February for an extended cruise of the Mediterranean and other "sunny waters of the globe," primarily for pleasure but actually in the hope of restoring Miss Duluth to her normal state of health. A breakdown, brought on no doubt by the publicity attending her divorce a few months earlier, made it absolutely imperative, said the newspapers, for her to give up the arduous work of ...
— What's-His-Name • George Barr McCutcheon
... says, "I could not swallow food—I could not! As the hour drew near my mother stood over me while with tear-filled eyes I disposed of a raw beaten egg; then she forced me to drink a cup of broth, fearing a breakdown if I tried to go through five such acts as awaited me without food. I always kissed her good-by, and that night my lips were so cold and stiff with fright that they would not move. I dropped my head for one moment on her shoulder; she patted me silently with ...
— Ten American Girls From History • Kate Dickinson Sweetser
... and we waited some more. But when it came to be night and you had not arrived, I set out looking for you. I went to the Junction first, and the agent there told me you had gone in Hank's stage. I happened to be near enough to the livery stable to hear some fellows talking about Hank's breakdown, with a big party aboard. I knew then what had happened, and sent Dorothy home,—she had been out most of the afternoon waiting—got this carryall, and here we are," and Uncle William only had to hint "hurry up" to his horses ...
— The Bobbsey Twins at the Seashore • Laura Lee Hope
... Bursley. Third, that on the afternoon of the opening ceremony the Countess's carriage broke down in Sneyd Vale, two miles from Sneyd and three miles from Hanbridge. Fourth, that five minutes later Denry, all in his best clothes, drove up behind his mule. Fifth, that Denry drove right past the breakdown, apparently not noticing it. Sixth, that Jock, touching his hat to Denry as if to a stranger (for, of course, while on duty a footman must be dead to ...
— The Card, A Story Of Adventure In The Five Towns • Arnold Bennett
... easily have cabled and caused his son-in-law's arrest. For a month he went about in a sort of daze, speaking to almost no one and sitting for hours alone in his room. The doctor feared for his sanity, but when the breakdown came it was in the form of a second paralytic stroke which left him a helpless, crippled dependent, weak and shattered in ...
— Kent Knowles: Quahaug • Joseph C. Lincoln
... senators made it evident that they would have their way or kill the measure. The House thereupon capitulated and accepted what became known as the Wilson-Gorman act—a law which was only less protectionist than the McKinley act. The President, chagrined at the breakdown of the party program, allowed the act to pass without his signature, but expressed his mingled disappointment and disgust in a letter ...
— The United States Since The Civil War • Charles Ramsdell Lingley
... regaining them. It was even expected that in this year the radicals would lose Louisiana and Florida to the "white man's party." The leaders of the best element of the Republicans, both North and South, looked upon the reconstruction as one of the prime causes of the moral breakdown of their party; they wanted no more of the Southern issue but planned a forward-looking, ...
— The Sequel of Appomattox - A Chronicle of the Reunion of the States, Volume 32 In The - Chronicles Of America Series • Walter Lynwood Fleming
... found out that he was the sole leader of the fifty fighting men and her quick wit had sensed the danger of the possible extermination of such a force in a battle with desperadoes. She was ashamed of her breakdown. But she knew her man was brave and that he loved a fight. She would count the hours ...
— The Man in Gray • Thomas Dixon
... ammunition and repair depots, as well as ambulance stations. The mountain road proved to be a triumph of engineering, as more than a hundred tons of war material passed over it daily without a single breakdown. The slopes which had to be stormed were thickly wooded, which greatly facilitated their defense, while the main French approach trenches were exposed to a double enfilade fire, rendering their use impossible in daytime. Between ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume IV (of 8) • Francis J. (Francis Joseph) Reynolds, Allen L. (Allen Leon)
... screamed with laughter at this exhibition, and Uncle Jake was so overcome that he felt called upon to take another dram—a contingency that was renewed when Tip swung from the measure of a cotillon to that of a breakdown, singing— ...
— Mingo - And Other Sketches in Black and White • Joel Chandler Harris
... Alexander under some trying circumstances and never with any hint of breakdown, yet just now he wondered if unexpected good tidings were not about to accomplish what bad news could not—carry out the dam of her own hard-schooled repression on a flood of tears. Her eyes became suddenly misty and her lips trembled. ...
— A Pagan of the Hills • Charles Neville Buck
... 'long, continued Overwork, the loving solicitude for Others that often prevented him taking even necessary repose, and a too rigorous devotion to the practice of Self-denial have at last brought about the inevitable Breakdown, and rendered a period of ...
— The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists • Robert Tressell
... bed talking, Elizabeth telling briefly of her own experiences and her wedding trip which they were taking back over the old trail, and the old man and woman speaking of their trouble, the woman's breakdown and how the doctor at Malta said there was a chance she could get well if she went to a great doctor in Chicago, but how they had no money unless they sold the ranch and that ...
— The Girl from Montana • Grace Livingston Hill
... the doctor and Charlotte had the whole long, hard story of Lee's guardianship of several young brothers and sisters, his struggle to get established in his profession and make money for their support, his many anxieties in the process, and this culminating trouble in the breakdown of the younger sister, just as he thought he had her safely established in a school where she might have a ...
— The Second Violin • Grace S. Richmond
... small light. He was passing a wood at the time, and the windy tumult as well as the roaring from the loch made confusion for his hearing; but presently he recognised the intruding sound as the throbbing of a motor. "Some silly fool got a breakdown," he was thinking sympathetically, when a terrific gust caught and fairly staggered him. Ere he fully recovered balance and breath something cold and clammy fell upon his face, was dragged down over his shoulders and arms, blinding, pinioning him. The suit ...
— Till the Clock Stops • John Joy Bell
... for giving way easily to the impulses of human sympathy. She was not nervous either, in the sense of her nerves being unsteady or overwrought in consequence of a long-continued strain; there was nothing in her weeping that could have suggested a neurotic breakdown even to the most sceptical of physicians. It was genuine, irresistible, overwhelming grief, and she knew that its cause was not even in part imaginary, but was altogether real, and ...
— The White Sister • F. Marion Crawford
... that your sermon last Sunday had caused a scandal. What was it you said? That, in a breakdown of Christianity like the present, we might leave talk of the public-houses and usefully consider Sunday closing of churches and chapels—or something of ...
— Nicky-Nan, Reservist • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch (Q)
... This would not do. Her nerves were getting the best of her; she was losing her own dignity and sweetness—was on the verge of a breakdown. ...
— Life at High Tide - Harper's Novelettes • Various
... forced labor, bonded labor, forced child labor, sexual servitude, and involuntary servitude at any given time. Human trafficking is a multi-dimensional threat, depriving people of their human rights and freedoms, risking global health, promoting social breakdown, inhibiting development by depriving countries of their human capital, and helping fuel the growth of organized crime. In 2000, the US Congress passed the Trafficking Victims Protection Act (TVPA), reauthorized in 2003 and 2005, which provides tools for the US to combat trafficking ...
— The 2008 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... Controller has got into his stride, the nation has begun to realise the huge debt it owes to his firmness and organising ability, and is proportionately concerned to hear of his breakdown from overwork. The queues have disappeared, supplies are adequate, and there ...
— Mr. Punch's History of the Great War • Punch
... the latter, "told us to expect you half an hour ago in a motor-boat. Did you have a breakdown?" ...
— The Spread Eagle and Other Stories • Gouverneur Morris
... tears. Her depression culminated in this breakdown, which surprised her as much as it ...
— The Way of Ambition • Robert Hichens
... not. One of the chief characters is a drug-taker; and as if that were not enough another is "out of her head," while a third, Dr. Callandar, the Montreal specialist, is in the throes of a nervous breakdown. This seems to me to be distinctly overdoing it. It is the doctor's love-story (a story so complicated that I cannot attempt a precis) which is the designedly central but actually subordinate theme. I have the absurd idea that this might really have begun life as a pathological thesis ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 156, Feb. 26, 1919 • Various
... its hold upon the sufferer, the continued strain, worry and fear bring about a condition of extraordinary malignancy, in which the trouble develops into the Chronic Mental Stage. This is a condition bordering upon mental breakdown and even though the complete breakdown never occurs, the one afflicted finds himself a chronic stutterer, without surcease from his trouble. He further finds that he has increasing difficulty in thinking of the things which he wishes to say. He seems to know, but his ...
— Stammering, Its Cause and Cure • Benjamin Nathaniel Bogue
... as well as you do. In fact, it might be best not to mention business to dad at all. You must remember that this is the third breakdown he has had since we came to Brill, and another such ...
— The Rover Boys in Business • Arthur M. Winfield
... drunkenness, which always accompanies war; the hardening of the finer sensibilities of men through the cruelty and barbarity of modern warfare; the increase of hatred and suspicion; the dividing of humanity and the destruction of its sense of unity, brotherhood, and cooperation; the breakdown of international law and respect for law and order; and the loss of reverence for human life and the sense of ...
— With Our Soldiers in France • Sherwood Eddy
... the pillow in a renewed outpour of tears. It was an utter breakdown of the nervous system, sweeping everything before it, one of those sudden lapses into hopelessness to which he was so subject, in which he despised himself and all the world. His sister, knowing as she did the best way of treating such crises, kept ...
— The Downfall • Emile Zola
... exhaustion of grief, and it is the most restless temperaments that usually suffer from it the most keenly. It is those who have watched constantly, tirelessly, selflessly, for weeks or even months, for whom the final breakdown is the most ...
— The Way of an Eagle • Ethel M. Dell
... none of these mournful memories. He had solved the mystery of the ship's breakdown, and an expert mechanical engineer had just pledged his reputation to restore wings to the Kansas—somewhat clipped wings, it is true, but sufficient, given fair weather and reasonable good fortune, to bring her to a civilized settlement ...
— The Captain of the Kansas • Louis Tracy
... Carlyle, the celebrated literary moralist, was born at Ecclefechan, Scotland, Dec. 4, 1795. He was educated at the village school and at the Annan Grammar School, proceeding to Edinburgh University in 1809. The breakdown of his dogmatic beliefs made it impossible for him to enter the clerical profession, and neither school-teaching nor the study of law attracted him. Supporting himself by private teaching, Carlyle made the beginnings of a literary connection. He fought his way under great difficulties; ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol IX. • Edited by Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton
... of civilization than that they are setting rapidly and irresistibly toward the general adoption of democratic forms of government. The oldest and greatest of the European nations, after trying almost every conceivable system, has returned, not so much from a deliberate preference as from the breakdown of every other, to that which had twice before failed as an experiment, but which now gives fair promise of successful and permanent operation—a republic based on universal suffrage. In many other countries what is virtually the same system in a somewhat ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 26, July 1880. • Various
... is remarkable that what we have here is only, in an exaggerated and perverted form, the very same action of imagination that, just before the breakdown of reason, produced ...
— Shakespearean Tragedy - Lectures on Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, Macbeth • A. C. Bradley
... talking about other things, and we had a song, and then a breakdown; and after that the captain of the watch called for another song; but it was clouding up, now, and the bar'l stuck right thar in the same place, and the song didn't seem to have much warm-up to it, somehow, and so they didn't finish it, and there ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... Wallace. "They're lucky. This beastly breakdown of mine has spoiled all my chances. My, I'd like ...
— In Orchard Glen • Marian Keith
... advised his going to the seaside for the whole of August, where he promised everything from the air and the bathing. Mr. Ewbert merely needed toning up, she said; but to correct the impression she might be giving that his breakdown was a trifling matter, she added that she felt very anxious about it, and wanted to get him away as soon as possible. She said with a confidential effect, as of something in which Hilbrook could sympathize with her: "You know it isn't merely his church ...
— A Pair of Patient Lovers • William Dean Howells
... American troops to France—were unquestionably decisive factors in the war. Failure in any one of them would have meant victory for Germany. The peace of Europe, it is true, could be achieved only by overcoming Germany's military power on land. A breakdown there, with German domination of the Continent, would have created a situation which it is difficult to envisage, and which very probably would have meant a peace of compromise and humiliation for England and ...
— A History of Sea Power • William Oliver Stevens and Allan Westcott
... walked past its door down the lane, where there were no more cottages, but only hedges and fields on either side of her. "Not well enough to make his rounds" might mean much or little. It might mean a temporary breakdown from overfatigue or a sickening for deadly illness. She looked at a group of cropping sheep in a field and at a flock of rooks which had just alighted near it with cawing and flapping of wings. She kept her eyes on them merely to steady herself. The thoughts she had brought out with her ...
— The Shuttle • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... owing to the new names which the various belligerents are giving to towns which they have conquered (like Lemberg) or temporarily occupied (like Ostend), several map-makers are reported to be suffering from nervous breakdown. ...
— Punch or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, December 23, 1914 • Various
... testimony ended in a breakdown of hysterics, between sobs of which were frequent admonitions to the child not to say that bad word; for Myra had caught sight of Rowland ...
— The Wreck of the Titan - or, Futility • Morgan Robertson
... black eyes that seemed as dangerous as loaded pistols. 'I beg your pardon, senor,' he purred. 'If I have bothered your chauffeur or delayed you in the least, I am very sorry. I trust you may get started soon and meet with no more serious accident to-day than this little breakdown.' I swear there was something in his manner so offensive that I felt like hitting him, and yet he was the very soul ...
— Frank Merriwell's Pursuit - How to Win • Burt L. Standish
... weapons officer of the Niccola. His choice had been deliberate, because he was a xenophobe. He had been a problem personality all his life. He had a seemingly congenital fear and hatred of strangers—which in mild cases is common enough, but Taine could not be cured without a complete breakdown of personality. He could not serve on a ship with a multiracial crew, because he was invincibly suspicious of and hostile to all but his own small breed. Yet he seemed ideal for weapons officer on the Niccola, provided he never commanded the ...
— The Aliens • Murray Leinster
... of the Irish movement along constitutional lines, were brutally directed to the political execution of Mr O'Brien's friends, who, now that he had gone for good, and was reported to be in that state of physical breakdown which would prevent him from ever again taking an active part in Irish affairs, were supposed to be at the mercy of the big ...
— Ireland Since Parnell • Daniel Desmond Sheehan
... of twenty old destroyers and forty-five trawlers for the East Coast convoys instead of the numbers recommended by the conference, and owing to the age of a large majority of these destroyers and the inevitable resultant occasional breakdown of machinery, the number available frequently fell below twenty, although it was really marvellous how those old destroyers stuck to the work to the eternal credit of their crews, and particularly the engineering staffs. The adoption ...
— The Crisis of the Naval War • John Rushworth Jellicoe
... the case was different. That had never grown up in the Saxon world. The starting-points in certain minor Roman institutions from which it had grown, seem to have disappeared with the Saxon occupation of Britain. The general conditions which favoured its development—the almost complete breakdown of the central government and the difficult and interrupted means of communication—existed in far less degree in the Saxon states than in the more extensive Frankish territories. Such rudimentary practices as seem parallel to early stages of feudal growth were more so in appearance than ...
— The History of England From the Norman Conquest - to the Death of John (1066-1216) • George Burton Adams
... an infinite pity for himself when he reflected that many a time nothing but a breakdown, or a loudly bawled hymn, or a series of twisted faces, had been the only thing which stood between him and the cooking fires. But there was no help for it. He was a fighting man, but he could not do battle with ...
— A Master of Fortune • Cutcliffe Hyne
... the telephone bell rang and Jack languidly went to answer it. Then he came back into the drawing-room. "Radmore's had a breakdown," he said briefly, "he's afraid he can't get ...
— What Timmy Did • Marie Adelaide Belloc Lowndes
... for a great change in Pastor Drury, but he noticed no such signs of breakdown as he had expected to see. He did not know that the beloved pastor was keyed up for this meeting. He could not guess that the beaming eye, the old radiant smile, the touch of color in a face usually pale, were on special if unconscious display because the pastor's heart was ...
— John Wesley, Jr. - The Story of an Experiment • Dan B. Brummitt
... there is much in the passage to enlighten us as to his composing processes. In his younger days his hot blood welcomed every occasion of emotional experience; toward the end, he sought such occasions for the sake of the patriotic task that lightened with its idealism the gathering gloom of his breakdown. But throughout, and this is the important point to note in relating his poetry to his life, his one mode of complimentary address to a woman was ...
— Robert Burns - How To Know Him • William Allan Neilson
... simply delighted that you've really come, because he said you were the only person he would consent to see at all—the only doctor, I mean. But, of course, he doesn't know how frightened I am, or how much I have noticed. He pretends with me that it's just a nervous breakdown, and I'm sure he doesn't realise all the odd things I've noticed him doing. But the main ...
— Three John Silence Stories • Algernon Blackwood
... cost more for installation, but have many advantages over the furnace. Their chief drawbacks are the space usurped by radiators, lack of ventilation, and the possibility of an occasional breakdown. The ingenuity of the makers, however, is partly overcoming these difficulties, mainly by the device called ...
— The Complete Home • Various
... sorry for her. I thought her looking quite thin and ill over it. It makes one doubt about women in politics! Maxwell will take it a deal more calmly, unless one misunderstands his cool ways. But I shouldn't wonder if she had a breakdown." ...
— Sir George Tressady, Vol. II • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... his eyes either meant some mischievous design, or a strong desire to "make music." But this evening he was long in coming to the point. He began by pelting the Tenor with roses through the window, and then he entered and danced an impromptu breakdown in the middle of the room; but these preliminaries might have been an introduction to anything, and it seemed as if his programme were not complete, for he next subsided into his accustomed seat on the sofa up against the wall opposite the fireplace, ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand
... a year in a government position at Washington, his rise in life due entirely to the opportunities of study offered him at Temple College. A lady who had been brought up in refined and cultured society was compelled to support herself, her husband and child through his complete physical breakdown. She took the normal course in dressmaking and millinery, and has this year been appointed the Director of the Domestic Science work in a large institution at a very good salary, being able to keep herself and family in comfort. One of the present college students was a weaver without ...
— Russell H. Conwell • Agnes Rush Burr
... filled the days sometimes from nine o'clock in the morning until six in the afternoon. The communications asked advice and made suggestions of every conceivable kind, but, above all, they were loaded with problems and difficult situations which had grown out of the breakdown of the financial ...
— The New York Stock Exchange in the Crisis of 1914 • Henry George Stebbins Noble
... experimental genius shall arise among his fellow countrymen, who will try and see if one key will not open two locks. When this possibility becomes known I can foresee nothing for the Kruboy but nervous breakdown; for even now, with his mind at rest regarding the things in his box, he lives in a state of constant anxiety about those out of it, which have to lie on the deck during the return voyage to his home. He has to keep a vigilant eye on them by day, and sleep spread out over them by ...
— Travels in West Africa • Mary H. Kingsley
... way, nor could we hope for any until we had got to the other side of the plain and had reached the Athi River, which could not be accomplished under a couple of months. As we progressed onwards into the waterless belt, this became a very serious matter indeed, as any breakdown in the supply would have had the most disastrous consequences among so large a body of men working all day under the blazing sun of a tropical climate. Every day two trainloads of water in great tanks were brought up ...
— The Man-eaters of Tsavo and Other East African Adventures • J. H. Patterson |
