"Predicament" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... same alarming circumstances—a congested National Treasury and a depleted monetary condition in the business of the country. It need hardly be stated that while the present situation demands a remedy, we can only be saved from a like predicament in the future by the removal of ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... there is any other object of pursuit in the same predicament—wealth, health, knowledge, fame, power. These are, every one, a means or instrument of happiness, if not happiness itself. Must we, then, in the case of each, avoid aiming straight at the goal? must we look askance in ...
— Practical Essays • Alexander Bain
... neutrality, but the menace of French armaments wrung an unwilling compliance from her. Wuertemberg and Frankfurt were too near France to hesitate at all. Saxony was in a position far different from that of any other state in the confederation, the predicament of Frederick Augustus, her king, being peculiar and exceptional. After his interview with Napoleon on the latter's flight through Dresden he felt how precarious was the future. Warsaw, the gem of his crown, was gone, and the Prussian people were in revolt against the Emperor ...
— The Life of Napoleon Bonaparte - Vol. III. (of IV.) • William Milligan Sloane
... said she, 'you do not at all understand your own predicament, and must just leave your matters in the hands of those who do. I dare say you have never even heard tell of the drove- roads or the drovers; and I am certainly not going to sit up all night to explain it to you. Suffice it, that it is me who is arranging this affair—the more shame ...
— St Ives • Robert Louis Stevenson
... county—talks of starting at the first day of the poll. I told him it could not do, as I was engaged to you. He answered, that of course was only a conditional promise, in case none of my own relations stood. I fought shy, and he pressed confoundedly.—Gad! he would put me in a very awkward predicament, if he was really to stand! for you know what the world would say, if they saw me opposing my own nephew, a rising young man, and not for a relation either; and Marmaduke Lidhurst is just your deep fellow to plan such a thing and execute it, not caring at what or whose expense. I can tell him, however, ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. V - Tales of a Fashionable Life • Maria Edgeworth
... rose. It was a momentous predicament, but he must do the best he could in it. He was a man of nice honour, and he wished with all his heart that the earth would open and engulf him. "Eliza, my love, allow me to deal with this matter," he said, his voice taking a low, tender, considerate tone. "I will ...
— The Argosy - Vol. 51, No. 5, May, 1891 • Various
... looks hideously cold and dangerous," she sighed, shivering in the clear sunlight, despite her long fur coat. "But I have a horror of the motor, since yesterday. I may get over it, but it will take me days. It's a hateful predicament—between two evils, one as bad as the other. I oughtn't to have been subjected ...
— The Motor Maid • Alice Muriel Williamson and Charles Norris Williamson
... question whether organic evolution has been caused by physical agencies or by intelligent design is in precisely the same predicament. There can be no logical doubt that, theoretically at all events, the physical agencies which the present chapter is concerned with, and which are conveniently summed up in the term natural selection, are as competent to produce these ...
— Darwin, and After Darwin (Vol. 1 and 3, of 3) • George John Romanes
... Gad! but it's fine to see you. And what fool put you in this idiotic predicament? Wring his damned neck, I would. How are you, ...
— The Riddle of the Frozen Flame • Mary E. Hanshew
... disturb the working of the system, it would have gradually slided into absolute freedom if they were permitted to regulate their own affairs, but the government, or rather, the people of England, had forced on the predicament in which they were placed. The ministry could not help themselves—They were driven to violate the national compact, not in express words, it is true, but in fact. It was, however, the force of public opinion that operated in producing the change. ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... be devised. It was difficult, however, to figure out exactly how the teaching of religion to slaves could be made successful and at the same time square with the prohibitory measures of the South. For this reason many masters made no effort to find a way out of the predicament. Others with a higher sense of duty brought forward a scheme of oral instruction in Christian truth or of religion without letters. The word instruction thereafter signified among the southerners a procedure quite different ...
— The Education Of The Negro Prior To 1861 • Carter Godwin Woodson
... on one for dinner would of course be an outrageous offense. I dressed as hastily as I was able, but just as I was putting on the finishing touches to my costume my white tie bursted. I was in a predicament from which for a moment I saw no means of rescuing myself. I did not have time to get another tie, and of course I could not wear the black one. As well as I could, however, I put the white tie about my neck, fastened it with a pin, ...
— Booker T. Washington - Builder of a Civilization • Emmett J. Scott and Lyman Beecher Stowe
... legitimate inhabitants of these muddy waters. Coasting the island on our return home we found a trap, which the last time we examined it was tenanted by a creature called a mink, now occupied by an otter. The poor beast did not seem pleased with his predicament; but the trap had been set by one of the drivers, and, of course, Jack would not have meddled with it except upon my express order, which, in spite of some pangs of pity for the otter, I did not like to ...
— Journal of a Residence on a Georgian Plantation - 1838-1839 • Frances Anne Kemble
... down to wait, and addressed to his bewildered judgment a query as to whether or not he ought to keep on carrying the burdensome rifle. It was not only heavy, but when daylight came it might attract attention, and his bulging coat would certainly invite curiosity. He was in a predicament; nevertheless, he decided to hang ...
— The Desert of Wheat • Zane Grey
... help her out of her predicament when the belated motor came racing down the slope. As a matter of fact, I was wrong when I said that a man brought me here in an automobile. It was she who did it. She gave the order. He merely obeyed,—and not very ...
— Green Fancy • George Barr McCutcheon
... advantages in Milton's subject, there were concomitant insuperable difficulties, and Milton has exhibited marvellous skill in keeping most of them out of sight. High poetry is the translation of reality into the ideal under the predicament of succession of time only. The poet is an historian, upon condition of moral power being the only force in the universe. The very grandeur of his subject ministered a difficulty to Milton. The statement of a being of high intellect, warring against the ...
— Literary Remains (1) • Coleridge
... himself upon it in superlative contempt of every thing official, and almost simultaneously fell into a profound sleep. In this manner he received the attention of the poor colored woman whose bed he occupied, and whom he had abused in searching for the boy. In this predicament, Dusenberry continued to search alone, and kept it up until sundown, when he was constrained to report the case to the sheriff, who suspended Mr. Dunn for a few days. The matter rested until the ...
— Manuel Pereira • F. C. Adams
... proving that women have no souls. And a like book was written at Nashville, Tennessee, in Eighteen Hundred Fifty-nine, by the Reverend Hubert Parsons of the Methodist Episcopal Church (South), showing that negroes were in a like predicament. But a more notable instance of the danger of a specialty is the Reverend Cotton Mather, who investigated the subject of witchcraft and issued a modest brochure incorporating his views on the subject. ...
— Little Journeys To the Homes of the Great, Volume 3 (of 14) • Elbert Hubbard
... the way in which the new plan works, take the case of James Rawley. James was in a serious predicament. Time after time the court had overlooked his truancy and misdoings, but James had taken the pitcher once too often to the well, and the open doors of the State Reform School stared him grimly ...
— The New Education - A Review of Progressive Educational Movements of the Day (1915) • Scott Nearing
... on the 13th the French were driven down the slopes in a great rush. This predicament was a terrible one—the onrushing Germans 500 feet in front of them and the swollen river making successful retreat impossible, with the ground between almost impassable with mud and slush. French ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume III (of 12) - The War Begins, Invasion of Belgium, Battle of the Marne • Francis J. Reynolds, Allen L. Churchill, and Francis Trevelyan
... fierceness and self-seeking of Helga. Between the two parties the bishop, whose motives and intentions are, however, not brought out with sufficient clearness. Like the proverbial fifth wheel of a wagon he seems out of place and embarrassing, whenever he appears—a predicament, to be sure, which he shares with the Church itself in those times, whenever not guided ...
— Poet Lore, Volume XXIV, Number IV, 1912 • Various
... Harley P. accompanied her to the door of the eating-house, but he would go no further. He realized that Donna wanted to talk with him; in a vague way he gathered that she looked to him for some words of comfort in her terrible predicament. Not for worlds, however, would he be seen walking with her in public, thereby laying the foundation for "talk"; and under the circumstances he realized the danger to her, should he even be seen conversing with her from now on. She pleaded with him with ...
— The Long Chance • Peter B. Kyne
... a meeting!—in the midst of men and women, elbowing, crowding, embracing, exclaiming, rejoicing, chaffing, weeping! It was an awkward state of things, but as every one else was in the same predicament, and as all were more or less swallowed up in their own affairs, Miles and his mother were fain to make the best of it. They retired under the partial shelter of a bulkhead, where block-tackles ...
— Blue Lights - Hot Work in the Soudan • R.M. Ballantyne
... whose predicament suddenly flashed upon his mind; "for Heaven's sake let us get home as fast as possible! He says the Indians are about! Do let us go, Mr. Glenn; we can travel now out yonder where the ...
— Wild Western Scenes • John Beauchamp Jones
... delightfully unexplored. I rushed impetuously out of the cage of my provincialism and looked eagerly about the brilliant universe. My question was, What have we here?—not, What does this mean? That query came much later. When I now become retrospectively introspective, I fall into the predicament of the centipede in the rhyme, who got along very smoothly until he was asked which leg came after which, whereupon he became so rattled that he couldn't take a step. I know I have come on a thousand feet, on wings, winds and American machines,—I have leaped and ...
— The Promised Land • Mary Antin
... assistance, and between them they hauled Pud back, though all three were on the ground and nearly over the edge before the two could stop the heavy Pud. A yell from the opposite shore told them that Mr. Waterman and Mr. Anderson had seen their predicament. Bob and Bill held on and slowly pulled Pud up to them. When all three at last arose, probably only a minute later, they were bathed in perspiration, as they had all been under a ...
— Bob Hunt in Canada • George W. Orton
... tumult of conflicting emotions. Never had he seen a woman like this one, who radiated such strength, such confidence, such power. She stood there like a goddess, a splendid creature fashioned of snow and gold; she dominated the assembly. He was embarrassed that she should find him in this predicament, shamed that she should be forced to come to his assistance; nevertheless, he was thrilled at her ...
— The Winds of Chance • Rex Beach
... settled there will be always found some reference to their antient history, and religion. As they were particularly styled Ophitae, or Hivites, many places whither they came, were said to swarm with [1168]serpents. Rhodes was under this predicament, and had the name of Ophiusa: which name was given on account of the Hivites, who there settled, and of the serpent-worship, which they introduced. But the common notion was, that it was so called from real serpents, with which ...
— A New System; or, an Analysis of Antient Mythology. Volume II. (of VI.) • Jacob Bryant
... a Russian. He was a tall man, lithe and sinewy rather than muscular, but he had a handsome, Patrician face; and despite his condition of insensibility, or perhaps because of it, he seemed strangely out of place in the predicament in ...
— Princess Zara • Ross Beeckman
... car. I was just telling Bert to get it out when I turned around, and there was Morty sitting in it not four feet away from me. He had his cap on and his leather coat, and I saw at once that I had made a terrible mistake. Before I could even think what to do he saw my predicament and leaped out, insisting that I—should take his place. I murmured something about being sorry and tried to move away, but he caught my arm and wouldn't let go. He was so eager and excited and made such a scene that I allowed myself to be bundled into the car rather than ...
— The Motormaniacs • Lloyd Osbourne
... fearing lest she hear him gasp and find him in this awful predicament. He could not see her after she closed the hall-door, but he wondered what she was doing. At this moment, a tickling in his nose began and he knew it portended a sneeze! He must prevent it, or Polly would track him down. If she ever ...
— Polly's Business Venture • Lillian Elizabeth Roy
... sizing up the situation that he hadn't thought about his own predicament. Now he looked down and suddenly realized that he was floating free in space, a considerable distance above the asteroid, and with only ...
— Rip Foster Rides the Gray Planet • Blake Savage
... however, aware of the difficulties under which a new Government labours, and am ready to do all in my power under any circumstances. What I have to request of you is, that you will do me the justice to feel that the predicament in which I am now placed, is somewhat analogous to your own, and that if I cannot accomplish all I wish, the deficiency arises from causes beyond my control; but I entreat you to let me have—at least this ship— well manned, and I will answer ...
— Narrative of Services in the Liberation of Chili, Peru and Brazil, - from Spanish and Portuguese Domination, Volume 2 • Thomas Cochrane, Tenth Earl of Dundonald
... having blundered into a most unpleasant predicament, through a passing interest in a pretty girl, Serviss retreated to his ...
— The Tyranny of the Dark • Hamlin Garland
... applied to this and the neighboring colonies, but with what success time only can tell. The reflection of my situation, and that of this army, produces many an unhappy hour when all around me are wrapped in sleep. Few people know the predicament we are in, on a thousand accounts; fewer still will believe, if any disaster happens to these lines, from what cause it flows. I have often thought how much happier I should have been, if, instead of accepting the command under ...
— The Siege of Boston • Allen French
... Ethan and Mickey awoke, and were soon made to understand their predicament. As a matter of course, they were all disposed to blame the author of this; but when they saw how deeply he felt his own shortcoming, all three felt a natural sympathy ...
— The Huge Hunter - Or, the Steam Man of the Prairies • Edward S. Ellis
... forty-seven—nay, forty-six—yes, forty-six," the Ancient Mariner chattered. "It was a similar and worse predicament. It was in the longboat, sixteen of us. We ran on Glister Reef. So named it was after our pretty little craft discovered it one dark night and left her bones upon it. The reef is on the Admiralty charts. Captain Doane will verify ...
— Michael, Brother of Jerry • Jack London
... "But the matter is puzzling enough to convince me that it would be folly on our part to assume that the casting away of the ship is the beginning and ending of the adventure; therefore we will neglect no precautions, Mr Purchase, lest we find ourselves landed in an even worse predicament than our present one. Our first and most important precaution must be to maintain a strict watch throughout the night. It need not be a very strong watch, but it must be a vigilant one; therefore each watch will be kept under the supervision of an officer who will ...
— A Middy of the Slave Squadron - A West African Story • Harry Collingwood
... to remain so. We should think from the shape of thy letter that thou thyself hadst had a good horn from the contents of the cider barrel, a part being written one side up and a part the other way, and it would need some one in nearly the same predicament to keep track of it. We hope thy cranium will get straightened when the answer to this is penned, so that we may follow thy varied thoughts with less trouble. A little advice perhaps would be good on both sides, and they that give should be willing to receive. See to it that ...
— The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 1 of 2) • Ida Husted Harper
... have left the harbour to look for us. Judging from the appearance of the country we saw, we are not likely to find any food upon it; so that should we arrive there after she has gone, we should be in a worse predicament than we should be ...
— Twice Lost • W.H.G. Kingston
... defence is there against the machinations of a wicked, or the errors of a weak Monarch, than the impossibility of finding a minister who will lend himself to vice and folly? Every English Monarch, in such a predicament, would sacrifice his opinions and views to such a clear expression of the public will; and it is one method in which the Constitution aims at bringing about such a sacrifice. You may say, if you please, the ruler of a state is forced to give up his object when the natural love of place and power ...
— Peter Plymley's Letters and Selected Essays • Sydney Smith
... was decided, so surrendered myself to circumstances. I began to laugh at my predicament and we became exceedingly merry. We again changed horses. The mysterious torch of night lit up a sky of extreme clearness and shed around a delightful twilight. We were approaching the spot where our tete-a-tete must end. She pointed out to me at ...
— Analytical Studies • Honore de Balzac
... our laager was a great hindrance to me in my work. Indeed, I opened a correspondence with the Government on the matter, and begged them to forbid it. But here again my efforts were unavailing. Later on, we shall see in what a predicament the Republican laagers were placed through the toleration of ...
— Three Years' War • Christiaan Rudolf de Wet
... to think of something right now," declared Jack, racking his brains for some way out of the predicament. ...
— The Boy Inventors' Radio Telephone • Richard Bonner
... to Herminus the Aristotelian is equally worth recording. He was aware that this man's character was vile and his misdeeds innumerable, and yet his mouth was always full of Aristotle and his ten predicaments. 'Certainly, Herminus,' he said, 'no predicament is too bad ...
— Works, V3 • Lucian of Samosata
... of the same opinion, and found myself nearly in the same predicament with the grumbler at my left hand; but I did not betray my ignorance by venturing a remark. This brought forcibly to my mind a story that had recently been told me by a dear primitive old lady, a daughter of one of the first Dutch settlers in the Upper Province, over ...
— Life in the Clearings versus the Bush • Susanna Moodie
... The apt conclusion of the amour in The Rover with Blunt's parlous mishap is originally derived from Boccaccio, Second Day, Novel 5, where a certain Andreuccio finds himself in the same unsavoury predicament as the Essex squireen. However, even this was by no means new to the English stage. In Blurt Master Constable, Lazarillo de Tormes, at the house of the courtezan Imperia, meets with precisely the same accident, Act iii, Scene 3, Act iv, Scenes 2 and 3, and it is probable that Mrs. ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn, Vol. I (of 6) • Aphra Behn
... up to London, and met other men at the club in the same emotional predicament. He realised that it was neither very wonderful nor exceptionally tragic now to have a son ...
— Mr. Britling Sees It Through • H. G. Wells
... chairs. They importuned friends and winners to put them back in the game, and kept at it until fortune again smiled on them. I laughed heartily at this, not thinking the day was coming which would find me in the same ludicrous predicament. ...
— The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man • James Weldon Johnson
... faltered; he couldn't walk as of old. The omission made everything false; it was a dire mutilation of their lives. Our friend was frank and monotonous, making no mystery of his remonstrance and no secret of his predicament. Her response, whatever it was, always came to the same thing—an implied invitation to him to judge, if he spoke of predicaments, of how much comfort she had in hers. For him indeed was no comfort even in complaint, since every allusion to what had befallen them but made the ...
— The Altar of the Dead • Henry James
... merrier party than could have been expected. From time to time, it is true, Northmour or I would rise from table and make a round of the defenses; and, on each of these occasions, Mr. Huddlestone was recalled to a sense of his tragic predicament, glanced up with ghastly eyes, and bore for an instant on his countenance the stamp of terror. But he hastened to empty his glass, wiped his forehead with his handkerchief, and ...
— The Lock And Key Library - Classic Mystery And Detective Stories, Modern English • Various
... time the device of coincidence is left to its true monopolists, the Society for Psychical Research and the manufacturers of the penny dreadful. Unreasonable demands are, however, made upon it by Dr Bataille; never in an awkward predicament does the coincidence fail to help him; wheresoever he goes it times his arrival rightly to witness some occasional and rare event, and it places him at once in communication with the indispensable person whose presence ...
— Devil-Worship in France - or The Question of Lucifer • Arthur Edward Waite
... analysis, will see that Lavradi, sentenced to be transported for ten years to the presides, comes to ask pardon of the king. Every one knows how freely the severest penalties were in the sixteenth century measured out for the lightest offences, and how warmly valets in a predicament such as Quinola's, were welcomed by the ...
— The Resources of Quinola • Honore de Balzac
... boxer in that district, made a dead set on Paul. Jacker had often sought his friendship, and Paul had as often repulsed his advances. Jacker's own parentage lay under a cloud, and he felt angry that Paul, whom he regarded as in a like predicament, should refuse to be friendly with him. One evening, therefore, when Paul seemed less inclined than ever to be sociable, Jacker determined to have it out with him. He was passing through what is called the Church Town, when a number of youths, among whom Jacker was conspicuous, asked him ...
— The Day of Judgment • Joseph Hocking
... Another might discourse like an angel and it would be useless. I said everything I could think of, to no purpose. And so it is: there are those attractions!—just as, with her, Willoughby is the reverse, he repels. I'm in about the same predicament—or should be if she were plighted to me. That is, for the length of five minutes; about the space of time I should require for the formality of handing her back her freedom. How a sane man can imagine a girl like that . . . ! But if she has changed, she has changed! You can't conciliate a withered ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... sign of a ticket, and with but six francs in my purse? Oh, Charlie, why did you send me out with this bag?" and Will paced nervously up and down the waiting-room, trying to think of a way out of his predicament. Suddenly a ...
— Harper's Young People, March 9, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... we had a swim of some ten miles before us, but fortunately our predicament was observed from the land, and a crowd of blacks put out in their catamarans to help us. Some of the blacks, as I hinted before, always accompanied me down to the shore on these trips. They never tired, I think, ...
— The Adventures of Louis de Rougemont - as told by Himself • Louis de Rougemont
... Lacedaemonians, and determine to stone him. He undertakes to speak in defence of the Lacedaemonians, standing the while behind a block, as he is to lose his head if he does not succeed in convincing them. In this ticklish predicament, he calls on Euripides, to lend him the tattered garments in which that poet's heroes were in the habit of exciting commiseration. We must suppose the house of the tragic poet to occupy the middle of the ...
— Lectures on Dramatic Art and Literature • August Wilhelm Schlegel
... patient its worthy setting. Surely it is a moral crime, an inexcusable folly to tolerate a disease with its inevitable train of dire consequences, up to the point when the discomfort compels one to seek treatment. There are patients, of course, who have good and sufficient excuses for their painful predicament; they have, for example, tried persistently for relief and cure, but have failed to find a physician competent to treat their particular case. How many unskilled prescribers there are, and how glaring their shortcomings! Some hold out taking inducements to ...
— Intestinal Ills • Alcinous Burton Jamison
... Mahbracca, who was just beginning to find her tongue. Startled by this sudden action, she stepped back quickly, and stumbled right over into the "prince-trap." For an instant she lay on her back, astounded, but quickly perceiving her predicament, she sprang to her feet, and with loud yells tried her best to get out. But it was of no use. The trap was made by the best rules of magic, and there was no such a thing as getting out, even if one was as small as a mouse. As for the little black fellow who had been in pickle, he ...
— Ting-a-ling • Frank Richard Stockton
... hesitated, arguing with himself impatiently. But even as he did so, he kept stroking that firm, warm, living neck; and through the contact there in the savage darkness, a sympathy passed between the man and the beast. He could not help it. The poor beasts and he were in the same predicament, together holding the battlements of life against the blind and brutal madness of storm. Moreover, the herd had saved him. The debt was on his side. The caress which had been so traitorous grew honest and kind. With a shamefaced grin ...
— The Backwoodsmen • Charles G. D. Roberts
... In this frightful predicament the Bishop, finding that he could obtain no help on land, bethought of taking himself to the water. A tower was hastily erected upon the Rhine. He took ship and shut himself up there. Enclosed within double walls, and surrounded by water, he flattered himself that the rushing stream would effectually ...
— Folk-lore and Legends: German • Anonymous
... the very success of his last and most pretentious effort that had placed him in the horrifying predicament in which he now found himself—with the corpse of what was apparently a human being in his workshop and no available explanation that could possibly be acceptable to a ...
— The Monster Men • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... If you believe so, do you believe that when a swallow snaps up a gnat, that God designed that that particular swallow should snap up that particular gnat at that particular instant? I believe that the man and the gnat are in the same predicament. If the death of neither man nor gnat is designed, I see no good reason to believe that their first birth or production ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern — Volume 11 • Various
... be able to appear in the world again? Whom shall I ask to come to my help? No," thought he, with his mingled acuteness and simplicity, "I will not send in the first instance to any of my relations or my noble friends at White's. I will have Sampson's counsel. He has often been in a similar predicament, and will know how to advise me." Accordingly, as soon as the light of dawn appeared, after an almost intolerable delay—for it seemed to Harry as if the sun had forgotten to visit Cursitor Street in his rounds that morning—and as soon as the inmates ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... acts in lieu of words. Let but the art of Pantomime become universal, and this grand desideratum must be obtained. Then we shall find that candidates, instead of being able, as now, to become legislators by simply professing to be patriots, will be placed in the awkward predicament of having first to act as such; and that the clergy, in lieu of taking a tenth part of the produce for the mere preaching of Christianity, will be obliged to sacrifice at least a portion to charitable purposes, ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 1, July 17, 1841 • Various
... be conveyed to the consul Claudius. At the same time two troops of Samnites were sent with them as an escort. Having made their way to the consul, the letter was read by means of an interpreter, and the captives were interrogated; when Claudius, coming to the conclusion that the predicament of the state was not such as that her generals should carry on the war, each within the limits of his own province, and with his own troops, according to the customary plans of warfare, and with an enemy marked out for him by the senate, ...
— History of Rome, Vol III • Titus Livius
... shortest, call to Zack or his father," tried Rachel, as the light figure quickly disappeared, leaving her a little annoyed at her predicament. She was not at all alarmed for herself, there was no real danger of drowning, she could at any moment get up the rock herself if she chose to leave the dog to its fate; but that she could not bear to think of, and she even thought the stimulus of necessity might prove the mother ...
— The Clever Woman of the Family • Charlotte M. Yonge
... was my predicament, at best, I saw much reason to congratulate myself that I was on the losing side rather than the triumphant one. If, heretofore, I had been none of the warmest of partisans I began now, at this season of peril and adversity, to be pretty ...
— The Scarlet Letter • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... away from Cape Town, we sent our wash ashore; a resort of desperation. It came back clean enough, but for ironing—well; and as to starch, much in the predicament of Boatswain Chuck's frilled shirts after the gale, upon which, while flying in the breeze, he looked with a degree of professional philosophy that could express itself only by thrashing the cooper. Crumpled ...
— From Sail to Steam, Recollections of Naval Life • Captain A. T. Mahan
... heads—"Poor Abe!—he's a hopeless case," and left Lincoln to do the work of a Good Samaritan alone. He had no beast on which to carry the dead weight of the drunken man, whom he vainly tried, again and again, to arouse to a sense of the predicament he was in. At last the young man took up the apparently lifeless body of the mud-covered man in his strong arms, and carried him a quarter of a mile to a deserted cabin, where he made up a fire and warmed and nursed the old drunkard the rest of ...
— The Story of Young Abraham Lincoln • Wayne Whipple
... shall be demanded and obtained previously of the inhabitants thereof; a recommendation of Congress to the States in favor of the British who have not borne arms, possessing property in America; of the non-residents and loyal inhabitants in the same predicament, &c. &c. &c. But this article depends entirely on the recommendations of Congress, the States being the ...
— The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Vol. IX • Various
... lives are sometimes saved by it. And if you'll put away metaphysics, come out of the cloud in which you have hid yourself in your dreamy speculations, I will furnish you with a case in point, showing that a man may get into a very unpleasant predicament, where he runs a great risk and gets some hard knocks, and yet be able to thank God for it, in perfect earnestness of spirit. A case of the kind came under my own observation, and while there was not much philosophy, or abstract speculation about ...
— Wild Northern Scenes - Sporting Adventures with the Rifle and the Rod • S. H. Hammond
... but it was not the one on which I had secured passage, and as it took almost my last dollar to pay for deck passage thereon, I lived on some small cakes of my own baking, which I carried in a bag. I was now in a sad predicament unless I should connect at Lake Bennett with some one who would carry my outfit back to Skagway on credit. I ate my stale cakes and drank lake water, and thus fooled the little Jap steward out of two dollars. It was a sad ...
— The Trail of the Goldseekers - A Record of Travel in Prose and Verse • Hamlin Garland
... a—a pantry maid," with a sly look from the corner of his eyes. Evidently she had not heard. She was still laughing. "I have heard of hermits falling in love with stars, and have laughed. Now I am in the same predicament. I love a star—" ...
— The Puppet Crown • Harold MacGrath
... room, he is trying to keep cool and clear-headed; to fathom the mystery of his predicament before going to his father and telling him that between Genevieve Winthrop and himself there has arisen a cloud which at any moment may burst ...
— A War-Time Wooing - A Story • Charles King
... Jew would have accepted without hope the unfortunate predicament; the modern Jew, nerved with a distillation of the Revolutionary "rights of men" and confident that he was not combating the implacability of a religious hatred, adopted expedient and remedial ...
— The Menorah Journal, Volume 1, 1915 • Various
... sooner we begin calling for help the better. I never expected to be in such a predicament as this, but it is wonderful how that young fellow worked out his plan of rescue. ...
— Tom Swift and his Wireless Message • Victor Appleton
... theirs, they were wholly ignorant of what fate awaited them. The Indians next day marched them off rapidly towards the north, compelling them to travel at a rate which was excessively annoying to captives in their predicament-manacled, in momentary apprehension of death, and plunging deeper into the wilderness in advancing towards the permanent abode of their savage masters. It was well for them that they were more athletic ...
— The First White Man of the West • Timothy Flint
... I was provoked at my own stubbornness which had gotten us into this predicament and more angry than ever at the person who was the cause of that stubbornness. But I was not frightened. There were other shoals further out and I left the anchor as it was, hoping that it might catch and ...
— The Rise of Roscoe Paine • Joseph C. Lincoln
... a ridiculous position, and tired, sore from the spear-grass, and annoyed as I was, I could not refrain from a hearty laugh at our predicament before attempting to extricate my unhappy quadruped; this I succeeded in doing with some difficulty, and found him, with the exception of ...
— Five Years in New Zealand - 1859 to 1864 • Robert B. Booth
... consequently stretch it to a certain extent. The power that was before expended in causing the drop to move, would be now employed in striving to tear asunder the substance of the string. A heavy body hanging by a cord from a fixed point is then in this predicament. It is drawn towards the earth, but is prevented from moving to it. It consequently finds a position of rest in which it is placed as near to the source of attraction as the suspending string allows; that is, it hangs perpendicularly and immovably beneath it, stretching the string by ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal Vol. XVII. No. 418. New Series. - January 3, 1852. • William and Robert Chambers
... a situation like this could not last long. Other officers and soldiers, aroused by the explosion appeared on the scene. Hal realized that their predicament was desperate. With a cry to McKenzie, Hal darted back along the hall, turned into the first room he saw, flung open the window and ...
— The Boy Allies with Haig in Flanders • Clair W. Hayes
... entitled to feel the others' cocks. I felt theirs, but again to my mortification, the tightness of my prepuce caused jeering at me; I was glad to hear that there was another boy at the school in the same predicament, though I never saw his. This confirmed me in avoiding my companions, when they were playing at cocks-all-round; being a day scholar only, I was not forced at all times into their intimacy, as I should have been had ...
— My Secret Life, Volumes I. to III. - 1888 Edition • Anonymous
... the discontent which would result if our people tore down the old structure, to find no structure whatever into which to move. They would be in the same predicament as the people of San Francisco in the days after the earthquake and fire, when they had to camp out in the open with an insufficient food supply, exposed to the inclemency of the weather. In fact, they would be ...
— The Red Conspiracy • Joseph J. Mereto
... house, he's in a predicament," he said cheerfully. "I went to police headquarters, and the first officer I spoke to told me to go to hell. So I went into the next office, where all the big panjandrums hide—and some of the little ones—and they told me what you know, sir, ...
— Winds of the World • Talbot Mundy
... of Marlborough was now, therefore, at open variance with her cousin. Towards her Majesty she stood in a predicament the most curious and unprecedented that perhaps ever existed between sovereign and subject. The amused and astonished court beheld Anne cautiously creeping out of that subjection in which the Duchess had, according to her enemies, long held ...
— Political Women, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Sutherland Menzies
... which would arise to literature from the LOGOGRAPHIC PRESS. Nevertheless Mr. Walter was left to struggle with the interest of some, and the prejudice of others, and, though he was honoured by the protection of several persons of high rank, it happened in his predicament, as it generally happens in predicaments of a similar nature, that his foes were more active than his friends, and he still continued to struggle with every difficulty that could arise from a very determined opposition to, and the most illiberal misrepresentations ...
— Notes & Queries 1850.01.26 • Various
... were in a fearful predicament. Ere they had time to rally, they were fiercely attacked. From the roofs and windows of the houses around, the Saracens hurled stones, and poured heated sand and boiling water. Before them were the ...
— The Boy Crusaders - A Story of the Days of Louis IX. • John G. Edgar
... careful how we tamper with our ploughmen. Where a man in not the best of circumstances preserves composure of mind, and relishes ale and tobacco, and his wife and children, in the intervals of dull and unremunerative labour; where a man in this predicament can afford a lesson by the way to what are called his intellectual superiors, there is plainly something to be lost, as well as something to be gained, by teaching him to think differently. It is ...
— The Pocket R.L.S. - Being Favourite Passages from the Works of Stevenson • Robert Louis Stevenson
... be given to the enemy's cavalry. Riding to the front, I readily perceived that the information was correct, and I had to send a brigade of infantry out to help Sturgis, thus relieving him from a rather serious predicament. Indeed, the enemy was present in pretty strong force, both cavalry and infantry, and from his vicious attack on Sturgis it looked very much as though he intended to ...
— The Memoirs of General Philip H. Sheridan, Vol. I., Part 3 • P. H. Sheridan
... very disturbing for a writer to find himself in the predicament of a man with an absolutely clear conscience yet perilously near the meshes of the criminal law. He had often analyzed such a situation in his books, but fiction diverged so radically from hard fact that the sensation was profoundly disconcerting, to say the least. He did not go to the post ...
— The Postmaster's Daughter • Louis Tracy
... been ideally happy, for they had forgotten their mess-box, and had only a light lunch. They had only their lap-robe for bedding. They were in a predicament; but the girl's chief concern was lest "Honey-bug" should let the wolves get her. Though it is scorching hot on the desert by day, the nights are keenly cool, and I was wondering how they would manage with only their lap-robe, when Mrs. O'Shaughnessy, who cannot ...
— Letters on an Elk Hunt • Elinore Pruitt Stewart
... of us. He has a small but regular income, and he has expectations which it is not possible to mortgage fully. At the same time, it will be many years before they can—er—fructify. He is, therefore, with us in this somewhat unpleasant predicament in which ...
— Peter Ruff and the Double Four • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... great aggravation to the misery of their predicament. They had no resource but to fly on to Montreuil, which was still above two leagues distant from them; and should the republican troops persevere in the pursuit, their loss upon the road would be terrific. The darkness was their only friend, and on ...
— La Vendee • Anthony Trollope
... grapple with a problem, and solve it in short order. As it was a case of too many cooks spoiling the broth, one boy suggested a certain plan, only to have a second advanced as a better method of getting Noodles out of his unpleasant predicament. ...
— Boy Scouts on a Long Hike - Or, To the Rescue in the Black Water Swamps • Archibald Lee Fletcher
... hurried to the drug store as the most likely place to find Carl Linstrum. There he was, turning over a portfolio of chromo "studies" which the druggist sold to the Hanover women who did china-painting. Alexandra explained her predicament, and the boy followed her to the corner, where Emil still sat by ...
— O Pioneers! • Willa Cather
... the ground that the attack had been so sudden and treacherous, and the precautions taken so complete. He had proved himself an ass, and the whole country would ring with mockery of him! He had sense enough, too, to know that he was in a serious as well as ludicrous predicament: he had scarcely courage enough to contemplate the possible result. If he could but get his hands free, it would be easy to kill Oscar and disable Janet. For the idiot, he counted him nothing. He had ...
— Sir Gibbie • George MacDonald
... thirsted for no man's blood, when I cut the proposed accommodation short, by resenting the Justice's suggestion as an insult, that went directly to suppose me guilty of the very crime which I had come to his house with the express intention of disavowing. We were in this awkward predicament when a servant, opening the door, announced, "A strange gentleman to wait upon his honour;" and the party whom he thus described entered the room without ...
— Rob Roy, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... lost past recourse, and the cause of my destruction is nought but excess of passion and love-longing and desire and separation from my beloved, after union with her; but I beseech God to deliver us from this predicament.' Then they continued to look on, till the banquet was spread before the Khalif, when he turned to one of the damsels and said to her, 'O Gheram, let us hear some of thine enchanting songs.' So she tool: the lute and tuning it, sang ...
— The Book Of The Thousand Nights And One Night, Volume III • Anonymous |
