"Inattentive" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... do justice to genius; and kindred genius alone will do it. There have been, no doubt, a great many writers of biography who had no objection to compensate their feelings for bygone slights or discourtesies, suffered from some wayward or inattentive superiority, some stroke of ridicule or malice. Literary antipathies do not die with the dead. The posthumous impression of Margaret Fuller Ossoli has been colored by some who sneer at her ways and ...
— Atlantic Monthly Vol. 6, No. 33, July, 1860 • Various
... Arguelles, are doing all in their power to keep the young Queen and the Infanta in good humour, encouraging the Princesses in many little indulgences suitable to their age and sex, especially in the article of dress, in which their royal mother was more than inattentive. This line of conduct, coupled with the expected arrival of the Infant, Don Francisco de Paula and his family, who are to be received with every mark of respect, indicates that the present rulers ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 1, October 2, 1841 • Various
... fireplace in the hall—for the nights were growing chill—playing games, or listening to Jacqueline's music, or telling stories like children, until nine o'clock; at which hour Mrs. Kildare assembled her household, white and black, read a few prayers in a firm but inattentive manner, ...
— Kildares of Storm • Eleanor Mercein Kelly
... attention and said, "Of course. It is natural," for I feared to have him know that I was inattentive even for that short ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1921 and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... words of Heraka, who was higher in rank than he, and he pursed his lips thoughtfully, trying to decide what he would do. Then he heard a woof and a snort, and a sudden lurch of a heavy body. He sprang to his feet in alarm. While he was thinking and inattentive, Rota (the grizzly bear), not yet gone into his winter sleep, vast ...
— The Great Sioux Trail - A Story of Mountain and Plain • Joseph Altsheler
... Fanny's thoughts wandered to the brave old man in the pulpit. She had heard almost nothing of the service. She looked at him now—at him, and then at his congregation, inattentive and palpably bored. As always with her, the thing stamped itself on her mind as a picture. She was forever seeing a situation in terms of its human value. How small he looked, how frail, against the background of the massive Ark with ...
— Fanny Herself • Edna Ferber
... lady watered her flowers and replaced the pot gently on the ground; then, retiring slowly to the solitary house, she returned after a while at the same slow pace, and, throwing some crumbs to the fish, began to saunter slowly about the garden-paths, inattentive to every thing but her own absorbing thoughts. At length she reached a spot where a gigantic catalpa-tree overarched the garden and bent its branches almost to the earth. A table and a couple of chairs stood beneath the fresh and fragrant shade, and a book, inkstand, and embroidery-frame, gave token ...
— The Poor Gentleman • Hendrik Conscience
... swim thoroughly well, and he made them swimming-masters. They benefited by having to give instruction to others, and by learning to keep their tempers. Nothing, perhaps, tries the temper so much as having to teach dull or inattentive boys. Blackall had been made one of the swimming-masters, but at the commencement of the bathing season the Doctor called him up, and without a word of explanation told him that he thought fit to dismiss him from the post. He lost, ...
— Ernest Bracebridge - School Days • William H. G. Kingston
... usually brisk host almost inattentive during the remainder of that afternoon. About five o'clock he dispatched a note, addressed "J. H. McPherson, Euclid House," and astonished and delighted his young waiter by an unusually early putting up of shutters, and of putting ...
— Three People • Pansy
... afternoon there was at least one man of the congregation who was neither drowsy nor inattentive. Repeatedly my eyes left the page off which I was reading and glanced towards him. Not once did I find his eyes turned away ...
— Annals of a Quiet Neighbourhood • George MacDonald
... thoughtfully, "Of course I didn't know then that it wouldn't always be there. Schoolboys have limited imaginations. I suppose I thought it was an awfully jolly thing to have it there, to know my way back to it, but there was the school tugging at me. I expect I was a good deal distraught and inattentive that morning, recalling what I could of the beautiful strange people I should presently see again. Oddly enough I had no doubt in my mind that they would be glad to see me... Yes, I must have thought of the garden that morning just as a jolly sort of place to which one might resort in ...
— The Country of the Blind, And Other Stories • H. G. Wells
... accumulating. They also have in their gift four hundred and forty-four benefices, with an annual income of $950,000. It costs a student about $1200 to $1500 a year to live at Oxford, and about $325 in university and college fees from matriculation to graduation, when he gets his degree of B.A., or, if inattentive, fails to pass the examination, and, in Oxford parlance, is said to ...
— England, Picturesque and Descriptive - A Reminiscence of Foreign Travel • Joel Cook
... Though inattentive and indifferent to his children, he had never been positively unkind, and the anger of his tone filled the timid child's eyes with tears, as he looked appealingly at his mother, and moved away, lingering, and beginning ...
— Heartsease - or Brother's Wife • Charlotte M. Yonge
... irritability is less than natural, though it is erroneously supposed to be greater; and the mind is busied in exciting a train of ideas inattentive to external objects; when this train of ideas is dissevered by any unexpected stimulus, surprise is excited; as explained in Sect. XVII. 3. 7. and XVIII. 17. then as the sensibility in these cases is greater, fear becomes ...
— Zoonomia, Vol. II - Or, the Laws of Organic Life • Erasmus Darwin
... remarks of his tortoise: "Whenever the good old lady came in sight who had waited on it for more than thirty years, it always hobbled with awkward alacrity towards its benefactress, while to strangers it was altogether inattentive." Of definite learning there are a few records. Thus Professor Yerkes studied a sluggish turtle of retiring disposition, taking advantage of its strong desire to efface itself. On the path of the darkened ...
— The Outline of Science, Vol. 1 (of 4) - A Plain Story Simply Told • J. Arthur Thomson
... therefore, the council unanimously recommended him to the emperor, and requested his approbation of their proceedings. Charles had not been an inattentive observer of Gasca's course. His attention had been particularly called to the able manner in which he had conducted the judicial process against the heretics of Valencia.9 The monarch saw, at once, that he was the man for the present emergency; and he immediately wrote ...
— History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William Hickling Prescott
... not clearly told. He is evidently thinking of other things, and his sentences are often imperfect. His mind wanders to the things he intends doing, to the storm, the strangers on the island and to his plans for the future. Miranda is not inattentive—she is fascinated by the story—but her father attributes his own wandering ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 8 • Charles H. Sylvester
... the Borderline to look after some children who belonged to a lady until a regularly ordained nurse could come out. The lady said Miss Vezzis was a bad, dirty nurse and inattentive. It never struck her that Miss Vezzis had her own life to lead and her own affairs to worry over, and that these affairs were the most important things in the world to ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... here are not more inattentive than they generally are, everywhere, to their business; their carelessness and want of conscience about it is nothing new to me, and all my bygone professional experience had fully prepared me for it. The company here is a better one than I shall probably find anywhere, even in London; ...
— Records of Later Life • Frances Anne Kemble
... discussions on bills effecting the enlargement of Australian constitutions, Mr. Gladstone's views came out in clear contrast with the old school. 'Spoke 11/2 hours on the Australian Colonies bill,' he records (May 13,1850), 'to an indifferent, inattentive House. But it is necessary to speak these truths of colonial policy even to unwilling ears.' In the proceedings on the constitution for New Zealand, he delivered a speech justly described as a pattern of close argument and classic oratory.[224] ...
— The Life of William Ewart Gladstone, Vol. 1 (of 3) - 1809-1859 • John Morley
... the restless and unhappy girl's mind she only played with her food, became distrait and inattentive, and had to be spoken to once or twice by Mrs. Clavering in order ...
— A Bunch of Cherries - A Story of Cherry Court School • L. T. Meade
... skilled hands, the active and vigorous arms. This is simply done by replacing the independent private workshop by the compulsory national workshop in this way replacing piece-work by work by the day, and the attentive, energetic workman who minds his business and expects to earn money in return by inattentive apathic workmen pressed into a poorly paid service but paid even when they botch the job or laze about.—This is what the Jacobins do by forcibly commanding the services of all sorts of laborers,[4243] "all who help handle, transport and retail produce and articles ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 4 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 3 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine
... trades and businesses related to the piano, and we presume there are not fewer in New York. Consequently, any man who knows enough of a piano to put one together, and can command capital enough to buy the parts of one instrument, may boldly fling his sign to the breeze, and announce himself to an inattentive public as a "piano-forte-maker." The only difficulty is to sell the piano when it is put together. At present it costs rather more money to sell a piano than it does to ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 117, July, 1867. • Various
... are more crabbed, or I am more dull and inattentive, for I cannot fix my Minde on my Book, and am secretlie wearie, Robin wearies too. But I will not give up as yet; the more soe as in this quiete Studdy I am out of Sighte and Hearinge of sundrie young Officers Dick is continuallie bringing over from ...
— Mary Powell & Deborah's Diary • Anne Manning
... office delighted him not; and I dare say he would fain bring his mind to believe that all ceremonial was idle, perhaps contemptible. But it is the greatest mistake to suppose that Lord Brougham is inattentive to the ceremonies with which his high place is surrounded. A careful observer will see clearly that imposing forms are perfectly agreeable to his mind; nobody could ridicule form better, so long as he held no situation which required the ...
— The Mirror Of Literature, Amusement, And Instruction, No. 496 - Vol. 17, No. 496, June 27, 1831 • Various
... their feet, with a look full of thought, and perhaps of anxiety. There was certainly grief in that gaze; for the black eyelashes which surrounded those large blue eyes became, after a moment or two, moistened with something bright like a tear; and apparently utterly inattentive to the conversation between his two companions, he still turned away, fully occupied with the ...
— The King's Highway • G. P. R. James
... sadly deficient in prudence, Mr. Stillinghast, but your suggestions shall not be lost on me," replied Mr. Jerrold, pleasantly. Although Mr. Jerrold's visit was ostensibly one of business, he was not at all inattentive to the presence of the cousins. His eye lingered on the faultless face of Helen, until she lifted her large brown eyes, and caught his glance, when a soft blush tinted her cheeks, and the long fringed lids drooped over them. May dropped ...
— May Brooke • Anna H. Dorsey
... questions discussed and decided. Cecil took part, endeavoring in a quiet way to set before the chiefs a higher ideal of justice and mercy than their own. He was heard with grave attention, and saw that more than one chief seemed impressed by his words. Only Snoqualmie was sullen and inattentive, and Mishlah the ...
— The Bridge of the Gods - A Romance of Indian Oregon. 19th Edition. • Frederic Homer Balch
... but Davies, though he had fits and starts of vivacity, seemed very inattentive, considering that we were sitting at the feet of so expansive an oracle. It was I who elicited most of the practical information—details of time, weather, and likely places for shooting, with some shrewd hints as to the kind of people to conciliate. Whatever he thought of me, I warmed ...
— Riddle of the Sands • Erskine Childers
... function, on the contrary, is, and always has been, that of the Interpreter only, in the 'Pilgrim's Progress;' and I trust that Mr. Courthope will therefore forgive my arranging his long cadence of continuous line so as to come symmetrically into my own page, (thus also enforcing, for the inattentive, the rhymes which he is too easily proud to insist on,) and my division of the whole chorus into equal strophe and antistrophe of six lines each, in which, counting from the last line of the stanza, the reader can easily catch the word to ...
— Love's Meinie - Three Lectures on Greek and English Birds • John Ruskin
... could steal, but this time were made to sit outside a line drawn on the sand, some twenty paces from the camp—an arrangement they appeared highly to disapprove of, giving expression to their dissatisfaction in a manner anything but polite; finding, however, that we were inattentive to their impertinence so long as they confined it to harmless display, they watched their opportunity, and suddenly set fire to the grass in several places at once around the camp, and ran off as hard as they could. As this was an open act of hostility that it was ...
— Journals of Australian Explorations • A C and F T Gregory
... hulk on my return. He then imitated the notes, and informed me that they were sung by females when mourning for the dead; and he added that on such occasions it was usual for the relatives of the deceased to seem inattentive or insensible to whatever people might ...
— Three Expeditions into the Interior of Eastern Australia, Vol 1 (of 2) • Thomas Mitchell
... especial carnage was of supreme and world-wide significance so long ago that it is now not worth the pains involved to rephrase for inattentive hearing the combat of the knights at Perdigon—out of which came alive only Guivric and Coth and Anavalt and Gonfal,—or to speak of the once famous battle of the tinkers, or to retell how the inflexible syndics of Montors were imprisoned in a cage and slain by mistake. ...
— Figures of Earth • James Branch Cabell
... occupy you. After lunch, Miss Fairlie and I shoulder our sketch-books, and go out to misrepresent Nature, under your directions. Drawing is her favourite whim, mind, not mine. Women can't draw—their minds are too flighty, and their eyes are too inattentive. No matter—my sister likes it; so I waste paint and spoil paper, for her sake, as composedly as any woman in England. As for the evenings, I think we can help you through them. Miss Fairlie plays delightfully. For my own poor part, I don't know one note of music ...
— The Woman in White • Wilkie Collins
... second place, because a simple-minded minister who is withdrawn from the world, and given to prayer, and a careful observer of his religion, and who will make the Indians feel that he lives as a saint, is worth more than twenty who are inattentive to their duties, and who cannot remain an hour in their cells. These virtues and other similar ones, without which a religious can not maintain himself, can ill be acquired by the religious when ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, Volume VIII (of 55), 1591-1593 • Emma Helen Blair
... shape, crystallised, caused him to see a rapid vision of de Batz sneaking into his lodgings and stealing his keys, the guard being slack, careless, inattentive, allowing the adventurer to pass barriers that should have been closed ...
— El Dorado • Baroness Orczy
... him, and by turns he has yielded to them all. Many different situations have been filled by him, and in each, as he now sees, he has either neglected or betrayed his trust. He has been a negligent and bad father, an unreasonable, nay, secretly an unfaithful husband, a careless inattentive brother, a hollow, flattering, and designing friend; perhaps, also, a mean time-serving politician, and even a mischievous common acquaintance. Do you ask what has been the turn of his common conversation? Instead of being ...
— Stories for the Young - Or, Cheap Repository Tracts: Entertaining, Moral, and Religious. Vol. VI. • Hannah More
... Times contained the only tolerable report, which was copied in the Courier, and even from that it would appear that, instead of being extremely clamorous and inattentive to Folkestone[80] (so much that he was obliged repeatedly to stop, in order to procure silence), and then listening to what I said very favourably, the House had adopted a ...
— Memoirs of the Court of George IV. 1820-1830 (Vol 1) - From the Original Family Documents • Duke of Buckingham and Chandos
... and control, and all things being dependent upon him as the movements of team and wagon are dependent upon the driver, the bishop has no time for indolence, drowsiness and negligence. He must be attentive and diligent, even though all others be slothful and careless. Were he inattentive and unfaithful, the official duties of all the others would likewise be badly executed. The result would be similar to that when the driver lies asleep and allows the team to move at will. Under such circumstances, to hope for good results is useless, ...
— Epistle Sermons, Vol. II - Epiphany, Easter and Pentecost • Martin Luther
... then, to begin at the beginning, we are already begun to be penny-wise and pound-foolish with our children when we are so particular with them about their saying their little prayers night and morning, while all the time we are so inattentive and so indolent to explain to them how they are to pray, what they are to pray for, and how they are to wait and how long they are to wait for the things they pray for. Then, again, we are penny-wise and pound-foolish with our children when we train them ...
— Bunyan Characters - Third Series - The Holy War • Alexander Whyte
... strikes the most inattentive traveller as soon as he steps into this Lower Egypt, where from time immemorial the Nile has been accumulating its mud in thin layers, is the close intimacy of the fellah and the earth. Autochthone is ...
— The Works of Theophile Gautier, Volume 5 - The Romance of a Mummy and Egypt • Theophile Gautier
... a distraite maiden who greeted the visiting swain that night and one so inattentive to his wooing that his silences became long, under discouragement, and his temper sullen. Earlier than was his custom he bade her good-night ...
— The Roof Tree • Charles Neville Buck
... men are prone to general ideas because they spare them the trouble of studying particulars; they contain, if I may so speak, a great deal in a little compass, and give, in a little time, a great return. If then, upon a brief and inattentive investigation, a common relation is thought to be detected between certain obtects, inquiry is not pushed any further; and without examining in detail how far these different objects differ or agree, they are hastily arranged ...
— Democracy In America, Volume 2 (of 2) • Alexis de Tocqueville
... words of the Brahmana, the sons of Kunti seemed to be, as it were, pierced with darts. Indeed, all those mighty heroes lost their peace of mind. Then the truthful Kunti, beholding all her sons listless and inattentive, addressed Yudhishthira and said, 'We have now lived many nights in the abode of this Brahmana. We have passed our time pleasantly in this town, living on the alms obtained from many honest and ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 1 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... their nations into two classes, wolves and sheep. I do not exaggerate. This is a true picture of Europe. Cherish, therefore, the spirit of our people, and keep alive their attention. Do not be too severe upon their errors, but reclaim them by enlightening them. If once they become inattentive to the public affairs, you and I, and Congress and Assemblies, Judges and Governors, shall all become wolves. It seems to be the law of our general nature, in spite of individual exceptions; and experience declares that man is the only ...
— The Writings of Thomas Jefferson - Library Edition - Vol. 6 (of 20) • Thomas Jefferson
... which alone reveals Him in His true and glorious character—alone discovers the way by which He comes into unison with us, and condescends to pardon us, to love us, and to guide us through all this mysterious state of being? It is observable that the only persons who are inattentive to their own sacred books are to be found among Christians. Mohammedans commit large portions of the Koran to memory; the Jews regard the Old Testament with reverence; the Hindu Brahmans are enthusiastically attached to their Shastra; while Christians ...
— The world's great sermons, Volume 3 - Massillon to Mason • Grenville Kleiser
... for me to say that I stand here unconnected with this great community. It would be mere affectation not to acknowledge that with respect to local questions I have much to learn; but I hope that you will find in me no sluggish or inattentive learner. From an early age I have felt a strong interest in Edinburgh, although attached to Edinburgh by no other ties than those which are common to me with multitudes; that tie which attaches every man of Scottish blood ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 4 (of 4) - Lord Macaulay's Speeches • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... at the mine observed that the young American owner was singularly inattentive that day to the complaints and grievances to which heretofore he had ...
— The Lady Doc • Caroline Lockhart
... know more than the polar star; and if necessity was not the sole motive of every invention! If the ancient shepherds were so studious and sagacious, how does it happen that the modern ones are so stupid, ignorant, and inattentive? And it is a fact that the Arabs of the desert know not so many as six constellations, and understand not a ...
— The Ruins • C. F. [Constantin Francois de] Volney
... headlong by the groups of men, till at last the Captain brings him up with one rein broken. A great crowd surround him, questioning, swearing, and jeering, but the Captain sat as silent, immovable, and inattentive as a statue, pointing to the broken rein. It had been cut with a knife. The Captain and his friends claimed that the friends of the Virginian had, unnoticed by him, cut the leather to a bare thread, while the friends ...
— History of Kershaw's Brigade • D. Augustus Dickert
... military abilities and early habits of Cimon naturally conspired with past success to direct his ambition rather to warlike than to civil distinctions. But he was not inattentive to the arts which were necessary in a democratic state to secure and confirm his power. Succeeding to one, once so beloved and ever so affable as Themistocles, he sought carefully to prevent all disadvantageous contrast. From the spoils of Byzantium and Sestos ...
— Athens: Its Rise and Fall, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... science. The theory of Evolution excited his bitterest scorn, and he would set up, like a row of nine-pins, the hypotheses of the greatest philosophers of the century, triumphantly to knock them down by the force of his own fearless intellect. His congregation were inattentive, and convinced beyond the need of argument, so they remained pious members of the Church ...
— The Hero • William Somerset Maugham
... connection with Robert Burns commenced immediately after his admission into the Excise, and continued to the hour of his death. In all that time the superintendence of his behaviour as an officer of the revenue was a branch of my especial province; and it may be supposed I would not be an inattentive observer of the general conduct of a man and a poet so celebrated by his countrymen. In the former capacity, so far from its being impossible for him to discharge the duties of his office with that ...
— Robert Burns - Famous Scots Series • Gabriel Setoun
... to Odo Crescenti's theory of the influence of character and climate on the course of history; and this subject soon engrossing both speakers, they wandered on, inattentive to their surroundings, till they found themselves in the thickest concourse of the Toledo. Here for a moment the dense crowd hemmed them in; and as they stood observing the humours of the scene, Odo's ...
— The Valley of Decision • Edith Wharton
... through the sunlit garden, Dot chattering gaily as her fashion was about nothing in particular while Anne walked beside her in sympathetic silence. Anne was never inattentive though there were ...
— The Knave of Diamonds • Ethel May Dell
... my brains for something which, having a slight savour of truth, might be seasoned to pungency at fancy. "Often have I heard her say that she liked a fair man," I replied, and indeed I had, and believed her to have said it because I was dark, and seemingly inattentive to some new grace of hers as to the tying of her hair ...
— The Heart's Highway - A Romance of Virginia in the Seventeeth Century • Mary E. Wilkins
... with so deadly a blight that he refused to think of it. He was startled by the sense of the presence of some one else in the room. He turned round. She had come in so gently, that he had never heard her; the street noises had been more distinct to his inattentive ear than her slow movements, in her soft ...
— North and South • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... these movements of the commander of the felucca Captain Brand was by no means an inattentive observer; and, indeed, he was so extremely critical that he stuck the tube of a powerful telescope through an aperture of the curtains around him, and not only looked at his cautious visitor, but he actually watched the expression of his uneasy eye, and ...
— Captain Brand of the "Centipede" • H. A. (Henry Augustus) Wise
... without the moonbeams flooded it, from within came no pinpoint of light. It was past the middle of the night, and almost all the town lay still and dark. Marchmont lifted the brass knocker and let it fall. The sound, deep and reverberant, should have reached every ear within, however inattentive. He waited, but there came no answering footfall. He knocked again—no light nor sound; again—only interstellar quiet. He shook the door. "Go around to the back, Roberts, and see if you can get in." Roberts departed. Marchmont picked up some pieces ...
— The Long Roll • Mary Johnston
... at the Great Pyramid, she was saying that to herself, and Nigel's words about the Sphinx fell upon inattentive ears. Although he did not know it, in bringing her to Mena House just at this moment he had taken a step that was unwise. But he ...
— Bella Donna - A Novel • Robert Hichens
... venture in the field of letters. My aunt sent me one day to carry a message to Mrs. Thoreau and my rap on her door was answered by no other man than this odd son who, on the threshold received my message. He stood in the doorway with hair which looked as if it had been dressed with a pine-cone, inattentive grey eyes, hazy with far-away musings, an emphatic nose and disheveled attire that bore signs of tramps in woods and swamps. Thinking of the forest fire I fancied he smelled of smoke and peered curiously up the staircase behind him hoping ...
— The Last Leaf - Observations, during Seventy-Five Years, of Men and Events in America - and Europe • James Kendall Hosmer
... to know?" asked Charles, inattentive and impatient, mainly occupied in trying to hide the nameless exasperation which invariably seized him when he looked at Dare, and to stifle the contemptuous voice which always whispered as he did so, "And you have given up ...
— The Danvers Jewels, and Sir Charles Danvers • Mary Cholmondeley
... little more cribbage that evening. Mrs. Kavanagh could not understand how her pupil had become embarrassed, inattentive, and even sad, and asked her if she was tired. Sheila said she was very tired and would go. And when she got her candle, Mrs. Lorraine and Lavender had just discovered another duet which they felt bound to try ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XII. No. 30. September, 1873 • Various
... of an hysterical and passing type—with sensational disturbances, falling exercises, shouts, weeping, and the like. A revival is something far different. A revival is an awakening of the community heart and mind. It is a quickening of dead, backsliding, or inattentive souls. ...
— The Warriors • Lindsay, Anna Robertson Brown
... starting subjects myself, when she was silent. This gave me an opportunity of mentioning many things that had happened in Paris during my long ten years' uninterrupted residence, which were evidently very interesting to her. Had she become grave, or inattentive, I should have drawn back ; but, on the contrary, she grew more and more veille, and her countenance was lighted up with ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 3 • Madame D'Arblay
... woman from a certain Western State seeing God's great, happy, inattentive world for the first time, and rather distressed that it was not like hers. She had always understood that the English were brutal to their wives—the papers of her State said so. (If you only knew the papers of her State I) But she had not noticed any scandalous ...
— Letters of Travel (1892-1913) • Rudyard Kipling
... the inattentive little boy to himself, "I knows who that was." So, this important question settled in his mind, he gave himself up to the full enjoyment of his chum and to the giving and receiving secret signals, the pleasure of which was decidedly enhanced by the ...
— Miss Minerva and William Green Hill • Frances Boyd Calhoun
... the remark merely to be polite and was turning away. As Susan's reply penetrated to her inattentive mind she looked sharply at her, eyes opening wonderingly. "Did you get lost? Are you a stranger in town? Why didn't you ask someone ...
— Susan Lenox: Her Fall and Rise • David Graham Phillips
... English. Family poor but fairly respectable. Brothers and sisters all retarded. In high first grade. Work all very poor except writing, drawing, and hand work, in all of which he excels. Is quiet and inactive, lacks self-confidence, and plays little. Mentally slow, inert, "thick," and inattentive. Health fair. ...
— The Measurement of Intelligence • Lewis Madison Terman
... other views for her. Pray let me hear no more of duels and quarrels. And let us go down into the ball-room; for Miss Campbell has been dressed and down-stairs this half hour; and I would not have you inattentive—that might displease as much as the other extreme. In short, I may safely leave you to your own discretion." Lady Catherine, after this prudent exhortation, entered the ball-room, where all the company soon after assembled. Seated in gay ranges, the well-dressed ...
— Tales And Novels, Volume 1 • Maria Edgeworth
... mother was never impatient, but explained our little difficulties quickly and kindly, and returned calmly to her own profound thoughts. Yet on occasion she could show both irritation and impatience—when we were stupid or inattentive, neither of which she could stand. With her clear mind she darted at the solution, sometimes forgetting that we had to toil after her laboriously step by step. I well remember her slender white hand pointing impatiently to the book or slate—"Don't ...
— Personal Recollections, from Early Life to Old Age, of Mary Somerville • Mary Somerville
... this which was to be her own special share of the splendour. She moved shyly towards Mrs. Yaverland, who had gone to the window and was looking down in the night, and said shyly, "This is a very fine room," but, she knew, too softly to reach such markedly inattentive ears. She stood there awkwardly, feeling herself suspended till this woman should take notice of her. If her mother had been with her they would have had a room with two beds, and would have talked ...
— The Judge • Rebecca West
... dust-coloured moustache, very prominent cheek-bones, and hollow checks. His forehead sloped back towards the crown of his head, and bulged out in bumps over the eyes, like foreheads seen in the Lion-house at the Zoo. He had sherry-coloured eyes, disconcertingly inattentive at times. Old Jolyon's coachman, after driving June and Bosinney to the theatre, had remarked ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... to reproduce this incarnation of the ideal of umblemished youthful and manly beauty. The passion of artistic procreation fired his blood, and threw every thing else—even the history of Selene's fall into the sea, and her subsequent rescue—into the region of commonplace. Still he had not been inattentive, and what he heard must have had some effect in his mind; for long after Antinous had ended his narrative, he said in a low voice and as if speaking to the bust, which ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... continent of America are among the most grateful that reach me. What a vast field is there open to the English mind, acting through our noble language! Let us hope that our authors of true genius will not be unconscious of that thought, or inattentive to the duty which it imposes upon them, of doing their utmost to instruct, to purify, and to elevate their readers. That such may be my own endeavour through the short time I shall have to remain in this world, is a prayer in which I am sure you and ...
— The Prose Works of William Wordsworth • William Wordsworth
... grudge—good girl, Maggie. He felt affectionate towards her and would have told her so had her aunt not been present. These thoughts underlay his rambling history. He was aware suddenly that his audience was inattentive. He saw, indeed, that his sister was standing with her back half-turned, gazing on to the shining country beyond the window. He ceased abruptly, gave his niece a wink, and when this was unsuccessful, muttering a few words, ...
— The Captives • Hugh Walpole
... rather silly and defective. He did not appear to be very much interested in his case, and never spoke of his own initiative to his attorney about it. On May 8, 1911, he was seen for the first time by a psychiatrist. He was then found to be very distractible and inattentive, seemed suspicious and excited and assumed stiff attitudes. He was well oriented, and recognized that he was on trial for murder. It might be mentioned here that although the jail officials apparently noted from the first that the patient was not right, the legal proceedings were continued, ...
— Studies in Forensic Psychiatry • Bernard Glueck
... with solemn distraction, obviously thinking of something else. I suggested that he had better take the next city-ward tramcar. He was inattentive, and I perceived that he was profoundly perturbed. As Miss de Barral (she had moved out of sight) could not possibly approach the hotel door as long as we remained where we were I proposed that we should wait for the car on the other side of the street. He obeyed rather ...
— Chance • Joseph Conrad
... who become partisans in such a cause. We are much too apt to look at schism in our church as an unmitigated evil. Moderate schism, if there may be such a thing, at any rate calls attention to the subject, draws its supporters who would otherwise have been inattentive to the matter, and teaches men to think about religion. How great an amount of good of this description has followed that movement of the Church of England which commenced with the publication of ...
— Barchester Towers • Anthony Trollope
... which our Consul at Algiers, M. Dubois Thainville, had not remained inattentive, reached us at the moment when we least expected it. We at once made preparations for our departure, and on the 28th of November, 1808, we set sail, steering for Marseilles; but, as the Mussulmen on ...
— Biographies of Distinguished Scientific Men • Francois Arago
... exerted himself to entertain her in this somewhat confidential fashion she looked occasionally at Madame Merle, who met her eyes with an inattentive smile in which, on this occasion, there was no infelicitous intimation that our heroine appeared to advantage. Madame Merle eventually proposed to the Countess Gemini that they should go into the garden, and the Countess, rising and shaking out ...
— The Portrait of a Lady - Volume 1 (of 2) • Henry James
... left Victorine to attend her, indeed she will not let Victorine go out of her sight; but Valmont thought we had better make our appearance, if only for an hour, at Lisette's fete. The Seigneur has shown much kindness and condescension to Lisette, and it would not do for us to appear inattentive for so much goodness, though I must own I shall not be easy till I return to my ...
— The Young Lord and Other Tales - to which is added Victorine Durocher • Camilla Toulmin
... tailed men has probably arisen from inattentive observers, seeing people clothed in the skins of beasts, with the tails hanging down. The natives of New South Wales wear tails in imitation of the Kangaroo: Yet, having been closely observed, are ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. II • Robert Kerr
... pas."—Les Confessions, [P. I. liv. 4, Oeuvres, etc., 1837, i. 78].—In July [June 23-27], 1816, I made a voyage round the Lake of Geneva;[359] and, as far as my own observations have led me in a not uninterested nor inattentive survey of all the scenes most celebrated by Rousseau in his Heloise, I can safely say, that in this there is no exaggeration. It would be difficult to see Clarens (with the scenes around it, Vevay, Chillon, Boveret, ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 2 • George Gordon Byron
... me to appear as inattentive as themselves; but I was very much provoked at being thus prevented enjoying the only pleasure, which, in such a party, was ...
— Evelina • Fanny Burney
... the threshold of a door nail'd fast, Three kittens sat; each kitten look'd aghast. I, passing swift and inattentive by, At the three kittens cast a careless eye; Not much concern'd to know what they did there, Not deeming kittens worth a Poet's care. But presently a loud and furious hiss Caused me to stop, and to exclaim, 'What's this?' When lo! upon the threshold met my view, ...
— The Children's Garland from the Best Poets • Various
... house-master's and form-master's report, Maria? Oh, here it is, thank goodness! Let me see; let me see—he's ringing at the door this very instant. "Blenkinsopp... major... Charles Warrington... fifteen... fifth form... average, twelfth boy of twelve... idle, inattentive, naturally stupid; bad disposition... health invariably excellent... second eleven... bats well." That'll do. Run my eye down once again, and I shall remember all about him. How about the other? "Blenkinsopp... minor... Cyril Anastasius ...
— Philistia • Grant Allen
... suddenly. In fact, only one of the ranging setters was now in sight; and Roderick had quickly run up to the top of a heathery knoll, to have them both in view. At the same moment they saw him hold up his arm to warn the inattentive Venus. ...
— Prince Fortunatus • William Black
... more than common brightness, she would make amends to his wounded feelings; such having been her usual mode of reparation in the few instances of disagreement that had occurred between them. But he was disappointed. He found her cold, silent, and abstracted, inattentive when he spoke, and indisposed to speak herself. Her eye was sedulously averted from his; and the casual meeting of their glances only proved that there were feelings in her bosom which he did not share. He was unable to account for this change in her deportment; and, added ...
— Fanshawe • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... place, she was not inattentive. The dark chancel with its flowers and incense, the rich dresses and slow movements of the priests, the excitement of the processional hymns—these things caught her and held her. Her look was fixed and eager all the time. As to the clergy, Dora spoke to Father's Russell's sister, ...
— The History of David Grieve • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... Pre-Raphaelites are as intensely objective. There is no evidence whatever in Turner's works that he ever made the slightest attempt to reproduce Nature in such guise as the Pre-Raphaelites paint her in; on the contrary, the early drawings of Turner are as inattentive to absolute truth of detail as they could well be. His course of study was one of memory. He commenced by expressing in his drawing such palpable facts and truths as were most strongly retained, and in which he conveyed the great impression ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 4, February, 1858 • Various
... difference in the language, and the barrier of the Pyrenees; a separation and an opposition in great things, and an antipathy in small. Ignorant then must he be of history and of the reports of travellers and residents in the two countries, or strangely inattentive to the constitution of human nature, who (this being true) can admit the belief that the Spaniards, numerous and powerful as they are, will live under Frenchmen as their lords and masters. Let there be added to this inherent mutual repulsiveness—those recent ...
— The Prose Works of William Wordsworth • William Wordsworth
... acting as clerk, and occasionally prompted the speaker when his eloquence failed him, or reproved members of the congregation, which consisted of the two nurses and the other children, who were inattentive. Charles spoke with a good deal of unction, and had quite a professional air when he looked down on the big open book, referred to one or other of the smaller ones at his side, or directed looks of reprehension ...
— The Vicar's Daughter • George MacDonald
... confusion and stir of material interests, are not inattentive to the progress of those claims whose growth is as silent as that of the leaves around us, and whose values find no echo in ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 21, July, 1859 • Various
... very inattentive to you this evening. Isn't there anything I can do to amuse you? Won't you come up on the table? You're welcome to walk up my leg if you ...
— The Five Jars • Montague Rhodes James
... carrying out of his design. Still lost in thought and inattentive, Dupont entrained for Nimes and at that station changed to the rapide for Lyons, where duly at four o'clock—with Lanyard still a discreet shadow—he alighted in the Gare ...
— Alias The Lone Wolf • Louis Joseph Vance
... are sitting as if it were an absolute solitude. At last he brought his speech to an end. I rose to reply. He could be seen to breathe again that it was I and no one else. I noticed, gentlemen, that he continued to laugh and be inattentive till I mentioned Chrysogonus. As soon as I got to him my friend roused himself and was evidently astonished. I saw what had touched him, and repeated the name a second time, and a third. From that time men have never ceased to run briskly ...
— Roman life in the days of Cicero • Alfred J[ohn] Church
... windows, even when the boughs were bare and the fields barren. When the grass came, she ordered handfuls to be brought her and put in saucers of water. With the coming of the blossoms she began to mend. As for me, I was as much an animal as ever—robust in health—inattentive, and seeking excitement and exhilaration. I went everywhere, to Bible class, to Sunday school, and to every funeral which took place within our precincts. But I never looked upon the dead; perhaps that sight would have marred the slumbrous security which ...
— The Morgesons • Elizabeth Stoddard
... continued to express my grateful acknowledgments for his kindness, the general, apparently inattentive to all I was saying, paced the room with hurried steps, stopping every now and then to glance at a large map of Spain which covered one wall of the apartment, while he muttered to himself some broken and ...
— Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon, Volume 2 (of 2) • Charles Lever
... which he was perfectly well acquainted. "It is well," thought he, "that she has filed down her mind, if she must spend her days with a man like him." Mason passed the evening with his uncle, though he was sadly inattentive to his uncle's remarks. Emily and Mr. Benfield took a walk, and on their return did not join the family. Benfield's object in visiting the country at this time was to fix a day for his marriage. The evening was spent by them ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 5. May 1848 • Various
... smiling, inattentive, absorbed in her own affairs, still theorising concerning her telegram. She drove on for a while, and might have forgotten the dog entirely had he not once more lifted his voice ...
— The Fighting Chance • Robert W. Chambers
... relative to alchymy:—"The ancient books of alchymy, so liberally ascribed to Pythagoras, to Solomon, or to Hermes, were the pious frauds of more recent adepts. The Greeks were inattentive either to the use or the abuse of chemistry. In that immense register where Pliny has deposited the discoveries, the arts, and the errors of mankind, there is not the least mention of the transmutations of ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli
... personal merit, which had corrected or supplied the want of discipline and courage. Fifteen generals, without concert or skill, led through the mountains of Armenia an army of thirty thousand Romans, inattentive to their signals, their ranks, and their ensigns. Four thousand Persians, intrenched in the camp of Dubis, vanquished, almost without a combat, this disorderly multitude; their useless arms were scattered ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 4 • Edward Gibbon
... praised his masterfulness, and proved to know much more about bonds than he did. They had remembrances, and laughter over old times. Once they quarreled, and he raged that she was as "bossy" as his wife and far more whining when he was inattentive. But that passed safely. ...
— Babbitt • Sinclair Lewis
... they experience unusual ardor they stammer, talk beside the mark, and are scarcely mistress of themselves. At the same time their private parts become hot and swell. All these signs should convince a husband, however inattentive he may be, that his wife craves for satisfaction" (Zacchiae Quaestionum Medico-legalium Opus, lib. vii, tit. iii, quaest. I; vol. ii, p. 624 in ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 6 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... said Coleman. " What these people need is rest, sleep. You must find a place at once. These people can't remain in the street." He spoke in anger, as if he had previously told the dragoman and the latter had been inattentive. The ...
— Active Service • Stephen Crane
... friendly impression is not alone good manners, but equally good business. The crude man would undoubtedly show his eagerness to be rid of his visitor, and after offending the latter's self-pride because of his inattentive discourtesy, be late for his own appointment! The man of skill saw his visitor for fewer actual minutes, but gave the impression that circumstances over which he had no control forced him unwillingly to ...
— Etiquette • Emily Post
... Etches, with an inattentive, plutocratic gesture handing over a five-pound note. He was one of those men who never venture out of sight of a bank without a banknote in their pockets— "Because you never know ...
— The Card, A Story Of Adventure In The Five Towns • Arnold Bennett
... clasped, as Virgil did, the huge inattentive being round the neck; and watching their opportunity, as the wings opened and shut, they slipped round it, and so down his shaggy and frozen sides, from pile to pile, clutching it as they went; till suddenly, with the greatest labour and pain, they were compelled to turn themselves ...
— Stories from the Italian Poets: With Lives of the Writers, Volume 1 • Leigh Hunt |
