"Magic spell" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... at once to see if this were true, and, sure enough, the glass dog ran out and began barking at him. Then the wizard spread out his hands and chanted a magic spell which sent the dog fast asleep, when he picked him up and carried him to his own room on the top ...
— American Fairy Tales • L. Frank Baum
... These were measures which were not possible in the days of David as they were in those of George. But a further step was common to both centuries—the forfeiture of lands, and although a later Government restored many of these to descendants of the attainted chiefs, the magic spell had been broken, and the proprietor was no longer the head of the clan. Such measures, and the introduction of sheep-farming, had, within sixty years, changed the whole face of ...
— An Outline of the Relations between England and Scotland (500-1707) • Robert S. Rait
... little sister then was dear as life to me, And woke, in my unconscious heart a wild idolatry. I worshipped at an earthly shrine, lured by some magic spell, Forgetful of the praise of Him "who doeth all ...
— A Book For The Young • Sarah French
... metaphors, the exquisite harmonies, the subtle refinements which distinguished his metrical style and the mysterious artifices of the endecasyllabic verse learned from the admirable poets of the fourteenth century, and more especially from Petrarch. Once more the magic spell of versification subjugated his soul, and he felt the full force of the sentiment of a contemporary ...
— The Child of Pleasure • Gabriele D'Annunzio
... unnaturally supposed at such times that he used the occasions of our personal association to secure these contributions. The cartoonists used to find this a fruitful theme. They would picture Dr. Harper as a hypnotist waving his magic spell, or would represent him forcing his way into my inner office where I was pictured as busy cutting coupons and from which delightful employment I incontinently fled out of the window at sight of him; or they would represent me as fleeing across rivers on cakes of floating ice ...
— Random Reminiscences of Men and Events • John D. Rockefeller
... face with the corpse, he contrived to achieve some likeness to his Sosia. And to complete a change almost as marvelous as that related in the Arabian tale, where a dervish has acquired the power, old as he is, of entering into a young body, by a magic spell, the convict, who spoke Spanish, learned as much Latin as an Andalusian priest ...
— Scenes from a Courtesan's Life • Honore de Balzac
... the people followed his path, As if drawn on by a magic spell,— By the royal hill and the haunted rath, By the hallowed spring and the holy well, By all the shrines that to Erin are dear, Round which her love like the ivy clings,— Still folding in leaves that never grow sere The cell of the saint and the ...
— Poems • Denis Florence MacCarthy
... to itself in the Dresden Gallery, where the most frivolous forget to chat and the thoughtful sit for hours in quiet meditation under its magic spell. One man says, "I could spend an hour every day for years looking at this picture and on the last day of the last year discover some new beauty ...
— Great Artists, Vol 1. - Raphael, Rubens, Murillo, and Durer • Jennie Ellis Keysor
... gold, as if some highly honoured guest were expected. But he hurried on without pausing, until he reached the spot where the Vala had rested undisturbed for many a year, when he began solemnly to chant a magic spell and to trace the runes which had the ...
— Myths of the Norsemen - From the Eddas and Sagas • H. A. Guerber
... as if the head of Medusa had gazed upon them. The solitary stone, still called the King Stone, is the ambitious monarch; the circle is his army; and the Five Whispering Knights are five of his chieftains, who were hatching a plot against him when the magic spell was uttered. The farmers around Rollright say that if the stones are removed from the spot, they will never rest, but make mischief till they are restored. Stanton Drew, in Somersetshire, has a cromlech, and there are several in Scotland, the Channel Islands, ...
— English Villages • P. H. Ditchfield
... cheeks of roseate hue, Whose eyes are violets bath'd in dew, So liquid, languishing, and blue, How they bewitch me! Thy bosom hath a magic spell, For when its full orbs heave and swell, I feel—but, oh! I must not tell, Lord! ...
— Poetic Sketches • Thomas Gent
... into her lap. She sat as one watching a scene upon a stage, rapt and listening. She wanted to rise and move away, to break the magic spell that bound her, to flee—to flee—but ...
— The Knave of Diamonds • Ethel May Dell
... a strong and virile Christianity which Paul and the other apostles proclaim. It is no magic spell they seek to exert. They are convinced that there is that in {67} the mind of man which is ready to respond to a thoughtful Gospel. If men will only give their unprejudiced minds to God's Word, it is able to make them 'wise unto salvation.' It would lead us beyond the scope of this chapter to ...
— Christianity and Ethics - A Handbook of Christian Ethics • Archibald B. C. Alexander
... and canal-boatmen they cannot be got together so as to be brought under its influence. Their darkness, ignorance, and flitting habits, prevent them either reading about Jesus or being brought within the magic spell of the Gospel. When once the Gipsy children have learned to read and write I shall then have more faith in the power of God's truth reaching the hearts of the Gipsies and ...
— Gipsy Life - being an account of our Gipsies and their children • George Smith
... been described, and castles, filled with spectres and chimeras, conjured up by the magic spell of genius to harrow the soul, and absorb the wondering mind. But, formed of such stuff as dreams are made of, what were they to the mansion of despair, in one corner of which Maria sat, endeavouring to recal ...
— Posthumous Works - of the Author of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman • Mary Wollstonecraft
... by chance, far down the steep, Crept a live speck, a straggling sheep; Yet one lone object, plainly seen, Curv'd slowly, in a line of green, On the brown heath: no demon fell, No wizard foe, with magic spell, To chain the senses, chill the heart, No wizard guided POWEL'S cart; He of our nectar had the care, All our ambrosia rested there. At leisure, but reluctant still, We join'd him by a mountain rill; ...
— The Banks of Wye • Robert Bloomfield
... that cadaverous, unchanging countenance, in the peculiar low, drawling voice, and rather tremulous accents in which he spoke. His intonations were very much those one fancies a ghost would use if forced by some magic spell to give utterance to sounds. The mild venom of every word was a remarkable trait in his conversation. One might have compared the old poet to one of those velvety caterpillars that crawl gently and quietly over the ...
— The Bed-Book of Happiness • Harold Begbie
... walked lightly and spoke softly, as if they feared that by some rude noise they might break the magic spell ...
— The Girl Scouts' Good Turn • Edith Lavell
... my beloved child! Look at these wonderful papers. Ten banknotes, each one fifty thousand francs. That is half a million, my Leonore! Look at these papers. Yet no, they are no papers, each is a magic spell, with which you can make a palace rise out of nothing. See this thin scrap of paper; a spark would suffice to transform it to ashes, yet you need only carry it to the nearest banker's to see it changed into a heap of gold, or glitter as a parure ...
— A Conspiracy of the Carbonari • Louise Muhlbach
... seemed perfectly natural, as if he were addressing a jury on an ordinary question of law. This feature of his speech—this evidence of sincerity in every word—with the almost boyish beauty of his face, bound his distinguished audience as with a magic spell. When, at the conclusion of the speech, Mr. Webster left the hall, he remarked to a friend, with his comprehensive brevity, "Nobody can equal ...
— The Life and Letters of Elizabeth Prentiss • George L. Prentiss
... to Bayreuth I had always believed that some magic spell rested upon the Franconian hills like a musical benison; some mystery of art, atmosphere, and individuality evoked by the place, the tradition, the people. How sadly I was disappointed I propose to tell you, prefacing all by remarking that in Philadelphia, dear old, dusty Philadelphia, ...
— Old Fogy - His Musical Opinions and Grotesques • James Huneker
... sad of colour, appeared a mere forlorn fragment of civilisation left derelict upon the savage bosom of an untamable land. It might have represented some forsaken, night-foundered abode of men, torn by earthquake or magic spell from a region wholly different, and dropped and stranded here. It sulked solitary, remote, and forgotten; its black roof frowned over its windows, and green tears, dribbling down its walls in time past, had left their traces, as ...
— Children of the Mist • Eden Phillpotts
... The magic spell was in Latin, of course; but the princess knew Latin very well, and soon she had the magic song by heart. Then she closed the book and put it back on the shelf. Then she threw open the window and drew back the curtains, and put out all the ...
— Prince Ricardo of Pantouflia - being the adventures of Prince Prigio's son • Andrew Lang
... one little word 'marriage,' simply spoken, is a magic spell for taming savage relatives. They'll eat out of your hand after that—at least ...
— The Incomplete Amorist • E. Nesbit
... trying, sickness, by the observation of a certain easy but daily regimen, is completely and duly nailed up between the four planks of his coffin, after having said every evening: "Dear me! to-morrow I will not forget my pills!" How are we to explain this magic spell which rules all the affairs of life? Do men submit to it from a want of energy? Men who have the strongest wills are subject to it. Is it default of memory? People who possess this faculty in the highest degree ...
— The Physiology of Marriage, Part I. • Honore de Balzac
... soon made an end of the monster, and they found themselves in a vaulted chamber full of gold and silver and precious stones. Beside the treasure stood a young and handsome man, who advanced to meet, them, and thanked the nun, the blacksmith, and the countryman, for having freed him from the magic spell he was under. He told them that he was a king's son, who had been banished to this castle by a wicked magician, and that he had been changed into the three-headed dwarf. When he had lost two of his heads the magic power over the two princesses had been ...
— The Grey Fairy Book • Various
... fairy Land of Oz was that whoever managed to enter it from the outside world came under the magic spell of the place and did not change in appearance as long as they lived there. So Dorothy, who now lived with Ozma, seemed just the same sweet little girl she had been when first she came to this ...
— The Tin Woodman of Oz • L. Frank Baum
... to seek for your shady dell, For that spot in the moonlit grove, Where first you were bound by the magic spell, And thrilled ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 3 September 1848 • Various
... A'zam, or the "Most Mighty Name" [of God] is a magic spell or incantation which the acquirer can apply to wonderful purposes. God hath, among the Muhammadans, ninety-nine names or epithets; the Ismi A'zam is one of the number, but it is only the initiated few who can say which of the ...
— Bagh O Bahar, Or Tales of the Four Darweshes • Mir Amman of Dihli
... of wonders! Didst not thou O Dronacharjya, promise me Thy crown in time should deck my brow And I be first in archery? Lo! here, some other thou hast taught A magic spell—to all unknown; Who has in secret from thee bought The knowledge, ...
— Hindu Literature • Epiphanius Wilson
... fables: but you have refined The poets mythologic dreams, To real Muses, gods, and streams. Who would not swear, when you contrive thus, That you're Don Quixote redivivus? Beneath, a dry canal there lies, Which only Winter's rain supplies. O! couldst thou, by some magic spell, Hither convey St. Patrick's well![6] Here may it reassume its stream, And take a greater Patrick's name! If your expenses rise so high; What income can your wants supply? Yet still you fancy you inherit A fund of such superior merit, That you can't ...
— The Poems of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Volume I (of 2) • Jonathan Swift
... sprite To chill, with magic spell, The tender feelings of delight, And anguish sung ...
— Poems (1786), Volume I. • Helen Maria Williams
... "That gentle lady who so loves thee, who Were well deserving love upon thy part; To whom (unless forgot, thou know'st how true The tale) thou debtor for thy freedom art, This ring, which can each magic spell undo, Sends for thy succour, and would send her heart, If with such virtue fraught, her heart could bring Thee safely in thy ...
— Orlando Furioso • Lodovico Ariosto
... of emotion the chant leaped wildly to meet the urgency of her thought, or deepened in melting tenderness to its pathos; for such was the intensity of Margherita's emotion and dramatic quality that she endued each character with an almost startling vitality—or had she put her auditors under some magic spell with the compelling gaze of her deep eyes? They felt as if living in that past time, partakers in its very action, and they surrendered ...
— The Royal Pawn of Venice - A Romance of Cyprus • Mrs. Lawrence Turnbull
... Vilda! Fifty years old, and in twenty summers and winters scarcely one lovely thought had blossomed into lovelier deed and shed its sweetness over her arid and colorless life. And now, under the magic spell of tender little hands and innocent lips, of luminous eyes that looked wistfully into hers for a welcome, and the touch of a groping helplessness that fastened upon her strength, the woman in her woke into life, and the beauty and fragrance of ...
— Timothy's Quest - A Story for Anybody, Young or Old, Who Cares to Read It • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... seemed to break the magic spell which had hitherto kept them silent. With another emphatic "Waugh!" the elder savage declared that the goose was good; that it distended him pleasantly, and that it warmed the cockles of his heart—or ...
— The Big Otter • R.M. Ballantyne
... no more; only a mortal like the rest of us—and so she looks into her heart, and lo! vacuae sedes et inania arcana. And now, supposing our lady to have a fine genius and a brilliant wit of her own, and the magic spell and infatuation removed from her which had led her to worship as a god a very ordinary mortal—and what follows? They live together, and they dine together, and they say "my dear" and "my love" as heretofore; ...
— The History of Henry Esmond, Esq. • W. M. Thackeray
... did DANTE manage to indite His admirable tale of Hell, Or BUONARROTI sculp his sombre "Night" Without the kodak's magic spell— No Press-photographer, a dream of tact, To snap the artist ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 159, December 8, 1920 • Various
... Phillips justly observes that it has been "not a little cheapened and obscured by frequent copies, in which the delicate essence of the original has been allowed to evaporate; but a glance at the picture itself renews the magic spell ...
— Child-life in Art • Estelle M. Hurll
... on a hot chase after the receding ghost of Hamlet's sire; but she is "tone-deaf"— can't tell Ophelia's plaint from the performance of Thomas' orchestra. Svengali hypnotizes her, and, beneath his magic spell she becomes the greatest cantatrice in Europe. Hypnotism is a power but little understood; so we must permit Du Maurier to make such Jules Verne's excursions into that unknown realm as may please him. ...
— Volume 1 of Brann The Iconoclast • William Cowper Brann
... all that Tira said which Laura did not know before; but it was uttered in such a way that it sounded in her ears like a new revelation, filling her heart with peace and comfort, and inspiring her with hope and courage. The magic spell that had enthralled her spirit was broken by the power of a few cheery, confident, assuring words. A heavy weight seemed lifted from her heart, and, relieved from the pressure, her spirits rose, joyous and elastic. The ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I., No. 3, January 1858 - A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics • Various |
