"Unavailing" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the writer of the above remarkable story, was hanged in the jailyard at A—— for the wilful and brutal murder of Doctor Ambrose Matthai, a retired practitioner of that place. The plea of insanity, so strongly urged by the prisoner's counsel, proved unavailing, and the condemned man paid the penalty for his crime on ...
— The Statesmen Snowbound • Robert Fitzgerald
... living, and in that solemn companionship he saw all that he had been blind to for so many years. Then he understood what it must be to sit in the silent halls of eternal despair, and count over and over the wasted blessings of love and endure the agony of unavailing repentance. ...
— Winter Evening Tales • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
... have some influence with others in the city who have power to move the Dey. There is one thing, however," here the Jew glanced pointedly at Mariano, "in regard to which I would give you most earnest counsel, namely, that you should at once dismiss all idea of rebellion. It will be utterly unavailing. You may, like the caged lion, if you will, dash yourselves to death against your prison bars, but you cannot break them. Countless thousands of bold and brave spirits have attempted this plan, with no good result, in time past. The ...
— The Pirate City - An Algerine Tale • R.M. Ballantyne
... were filled with remorse. As he stood there, silent, with his grave, utterly mournful face, he had robbed a bank, he had forged a note, he had committed a murder, he was guilty of treason. All the horror of conscience, all the shame of discovery, all the unavailing regret of a detected, atrocious, but not utterly hardened pirate tore his poor little innocent heart. Yet children are seeing ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 11, No. 63, January, 1863 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... the Host having been divided in two, the king received one half with the greatest devotion, and his sister the other half. The sick man felt himself sustained by a supernatural force; a celestial consolation descended into the soul that had been despairing. Marguerite's prayer had not been unavailing—Francis I. ...
— Women of Modern France - Woman In All Ages And In All Countries • Hugo P. Thieme
... the prepuce was enormously distended, and the penis seemed in a state of erection as far as dimension and rigidity were concerned. The man, a steam-boat cook, informed us that it was fully twice as large as when rigidly erect in health. All efforts to reduce the swelling were unavailing; neither punctures, leeches, nor scarifications were of any avail; catheterization was impossible, but, after relieving the bladder by the supra-pubic aspiration, the patient experienced some relief. He, nevertheless, ...
— History of Circumcision from the Earliest Times to the Present - Moral and Physical Reasons for its Performance • Peter Charles Remondino
... flew away, and the other perched on the topmost dead branch of a tree a little farther off, and proceeded to express his mind by a scolding "kr-r-r," accompanied by violent bows toward us. Finding his demonstration unavailing, he soon followed his mate, and weeks passed before we saw him again, although we often walked down the lane with the ...
— Little Brothers of the Air • Olive Thorne Miller
... never have done?" he demanded. "Am I for ever to listen to this weakness—this unavailing reproach of yourself and everything around you? Do I not know that all your complaints and reproaches, though you address them in so many words to yourself, are intended only for my use and ear? Can ...
— Guy Rivers: A Tale of Georgia • William Gilmore Simms
... absolutely, madam, though I am certain no more tenderly, than a lady to whom I am indebted for such kindnesses," returned the Prince. "But this is unavailing. We are not here to ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 7 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... child and learning to "suffer and grow strong." Fate had ordained, however, that Russell's father should not die upon the gallows; and soon after the verdict was pronounced, when all Mrs. Aubrey's efforts to procure a pardon had proved unavailing, the proud and desperate man, in the solitude of his cell, with no eye but Jehovah's to witness the awful deed, took his own life with the aid of a lancet. Such was the legacy of shame which Russell inherited; was it any marvel that at sixteen that boy had lived ages of sorrow? Mrs. Aubrey found ...
— Macaria • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson
... unbroken friendship. We love our friends, but ofttimes we lose them in proportion to our affection. The sacrifices made for others are not infrequently met by envy, ingratitude, and enmity, which smite the heart and threaten to paralyze its beneficence. The unavailing tear is shed both for the living and ...
— Retrospection and Introspection • Mary Baker Eddy
... are so weak, it is not surprising that mere ethical systems should prove unavailing. Nicolai shows us what a travesty Kant's disciples have made of their master's teaching. Willy-nilly, the author of the Critique of Pure Reason has been compelled to put on the field-grey uniform. Have not his German commentators insisted that the Prussian army is ...
— The Forerunners • Romain Rolland
... Rochefort squadron will be taken, and the Minister will be the most holy of men: if it comes from some other point, Ireland is gone; we curse ourselves as a set of monastic madmen, and call out for the unavailing satisfaction of Mr. Perceval's head. Such a state of political existence is scarcely credible: it is the action of a mad young fool standing upon one foot, and peeping down the crater of Mount AEtna, not the conduct of a wise and sober people deciding upon their ...
— Political Pamphlets • George Saintsbury
... that a trap had been laid for me, and the vexation of knowing that I had fallen into it, fortunately restrained me from making my position still worse by an unavailing struggle with two men, one of whom would, in all probability, have been more than a match for me single-handed. I repressed the first natural movement by which I had attempted to shake them off, and looked ...
— The Woman in White • Wilkie Collins
... work, I have not even glanced at those of the Saxons, in this island; when one should have thought that the majestic name of ALFRED alone, would have made a search of this nature interesting, even if such search were unavailing. I have also inadvertently omitted any allusion to those of the Danes and the Normans. I have only then now to say, that Mr. Johnson's researches, as to these gardens, in pp. 31, 37, 38, 39 and 40 of his lately published History of English Gardening, with his elegant language and the ...
— On the Portraits of English Authors on Gardening, • Samuel Felton
... before by nature out of the depths of her treasures, and now swept rapidly away again by her careless hand—rare, sweet, lovely virtues, whose peaceful workings the thirsty world had welcomed, while it had them, with gladness and joy; and now was sorrowing for them in unavailing desire. ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. II • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... I had made, than with the gentlemanly spirit which will surprise no one who has the pleasure of his acquaintance, he instantly announced to me his intention of leaving the subject open to me. While I do but justice to Mr. IRVING by this statement, I feel the prejudice it does to myself in the unavailing regret I am exciting in the ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, January 1844 - Volume 23, Number 1 • Various
... but a drop in the stream of fate, which was all too swift for her strength. He paused at the last turn of the road and rested, settling his burden more closely in his arms, drawing her to him in the unavailing embrace of regret. Another kind of life, he said,—some average marriage with children and home would have given her more fully the human modicum of joy. But his heart rejected also this reproach. In no other circumstance could he place her justly. She was ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick
... existence! Were anything to happen now to make you forsake me, upon whom will you have me depend?" And then after heaping reproaches upon herself for a time, break out afresh in lamentations for her, unavailing offspring, Chia Cheng was much cut up and felt conscious that he should not with his own hand have struck his son so ruthlessly as to bring him to this state, and he first and foremost directed his attention ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin
... on every side by a band of active and unpitying hunters, who press and gall them on every side, and exterminate them at leisure in their flight; just such was the situation of our unfortunate countrymen. After a few unavailing discharges, which never annoyed a secret enemy that scattered death unseen, the ranks were broken and all subordination lost. The ground was covered with gasping wretches, and stained with blood; the woods resounded ...
— The History of Sandford and Merton • Thomas Day
... exhibition tickets are nearly always sold at a premium. The devotion of the Spaniards to this national sport is universal, from the grandee to the peasant. More than once has the attempt been made by the throne to bring the cruel business into disrepute, but it has been found unavailing. The taste is too deeply rooted in the masses of the people. We were told subsequently, at Madrid, that an attempt to suppress the bull-fights in Spain would be more likely to lead to a revolution than would the most stringent political measure that could be named. ...
— Due West - or Round the World in Ten Months • Maturin Murray Ballou
... had found his way into the military prison at Fort Leavenworth; and the cattle-thieves whom Bob Owens had captured at the squatter's cabin had been turned over to the civil authorities. George did all he could to secure Springer's release, but his efforts were unavailing, and with his companions he was sentenced to the penitentiary for a long term of years. Mr. Wentworth had come out all right. With the aid of his friend, Mr. Holmes, he had gathered up all his cattle that had been stampeded by the Mexican raiders, and rebuilt his ranche ...
— George at the Fort - Life Among the Soldiers • Harry Castlemon
... but to die at the very moment when, by any momentary collapse, he is self-denounced as a murderer. He had but the twinkling of an eye for his effort, and that effort might, at the best, have been unavailing; but from this shadow of a chance, small or great, how if he has recoiled by a treasonable lachete? The effort might have been without hope; but to have risen to the level of that effort, would have rescued him, though not from dying, ...
— Miscellaneous Essays • Thomas de Quincey
... troops. She lavished presents upon her officers, and in high-sounding phrase harangued the soldiers; but there was not a private in the ranks who did not know that she was a wicked and a polluted woman. She had talent, but no soul. All her efforts were unavailing to evoke one single electric spark of emotion. She had sense enough to perceive her signal failure and to feel its mortification. No one either loved or respected Catharine. Thousands hated her, yet, conscious of her power, either courting her smiles or dreading her frown, they ...
— Henry IV, Makers of History • John S. C. Abbott
... struggled for fifty-four days, and then expired. 'For the first twenty-one days and nights of these,' says Dr. Jones, 'Lady Sutherland never left his bedside; and then at last, overcome with fatigue, anxiety, and grief, she sank an unavailing victim to an amiable but excessive attachment, seventeen days before the death of her lord.' The period, though not very remote, was one in which the intelligence of events travelled slowly; and in this instance the distraction of the family must have served to ...
— Leading Articles on Various Subjects • Hugh Miller
... enough to believe or imagine it?" D cowers beneath the moral lash; and hints rather than proposes, that if one country did not respect the Pope's freedom, he could move into another, though he admits at the same time, he can see grave difficulties in the project. Even this admission is unavailing to protect him from X's savage onslaught, who winds up another torrent of vituperation with these words: "Yes! This is no question of the Pope and the Pope's person, but of the liberty of all the Church, and of all the Episcopate, ...
— Rome in 1860 • Edward Dicey
... ceased his unavailing racket. Would never a policeman lay hands on him? In his fancy the Island seemed an unattainable Arcadia. He buttoned his thin coat against ...
— The Four Million • O. Henry
... it otherwise. I admire Mr. Yancy—he is simple and direct, and fit for any company under heaven except that of fools. His treatment of you has placed me under everlasting obligations; he shall share what we have. My one bitter, unavailing regret is that Solomon Mahaffy will not be here to partake of our altered fortunes." And ...
— The Prodigal Judge • Vaughan Kester
... unremitting, and were directed especially against the quarter of Achradina[33] from the side of the sea; but, though he brought many powerful military engines against the walls, these were rendered wholly unavailing by the superior skill and science of Archimedes, which were employed on the side of the besieged. All the efforts of the assailants were baffled; and the Roman soldiers were inspired with so great a dread ...
— A Smaller History of Rome • William Smith and Eugene Lawrence
... 1641. Next year, after the death of his father, he went to Scotland to set his family affairs in order, and to redeem his house in Cromarty. But, in spite of another sojourn in foreign lands, his efforts to free himself from pecuniary embarrassments were unavailing. At the king's death his Scottish loyalty caused him to side with those who opposed the Parliament. Formally proscribed in 1649, taken prisoner at the defeat of Worcester in 1651, stripped of all his belongings, he was brought to London, but was released on parole at Cromwell's recommendation. ...
— Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais
... He was refined and urbane; of a casuistical and prying disposition; like many sensitive men, unduly preoccupied with the sexual life of youth; like a true feudal aristocrat, ever ready to apply force where verbal admonition proved unavailing. . . . ...
— Old Calabria • Norman Douglas
... misery. In those days he was very miserable. It was only now that he knew how thoroughly he loved this woman—now that she was so utterly beyond his reach. Weak and wavering as he was in many things, he was not weak enough to abandon himself altogether to unavailing sorrow. He knew that work alone could preserve him from sinking—hard, constant, unflinching work, that one great cure for all our sorrow, that only means of adapting ourselves to ...
— The Bertrams • Anthony Trollope
... on that dark and bloody ground, a man was beaten to death in an open shed, on the corner of two public streets, where the sound of the blows, the curses of his two tormentors, and his shrieks and unavailing prayers for mercy were continued a whole forenoon, and sent the complaining air shuddering to the ears of thousands, not one of whom ...
— Half a Century • Jane Grey Cannon Swisshelm
... not wholly unavailing to obtain him the professional employments usually so hard to get in times of peace. For five of the ten years, 1783-1793, he commanded frigates, chiefly on the Newfoundland station; and in them, though now turning ...
— Types of Naval Officers - Drawn from the History of the British Navy • A. T. Mahan
... consequence compared to this knowledge. She must be found, and whether that could be done quickly, by search or by chance, or whether it would take a long time of waiting, he could not say. He felt sure, that she must disclose herself, sooner or later, but if not, and if their search continued unavailing, then he held out ...
— Vicky Van • Carolyn Wells
... love more absolutely, madam, though I am certain no more tenderly, than a lady to whom I am indebted for such kindnesses,' returned the Prince. 'But this is unavailing. We are not here to hold a court ...
— Prince Otto • Robert Louis Stevenson
... which this challenge to a possible burglar was uttered rendered it unavailing, for there was no reply; but that there was some one below who could reply Thaddeus was now convinced, for there were sounds in the library—sounds, however, suggestive of undue attention to domestic duties rather than of that which fate has mapped ...
— Paste Jewels • John Kendrick Bangs
... letter to me, blaming himself severely for having introduced Lewis into the family, or permitted him to confer an obligation, which had brought inevitable ruin on us all. He begged me, whatever might be the event of the ensuing morning, not to suffer regret or unavailing sorrow for his fate, to increase the anguish of my heart, which he greatly feared was ...
— Charlotte Temple • Susanna Rowson
... action, prevented any release of the German armies, and the mobilization orders for the transference of German troops from the western theatre to the eastern theatre of war during the first few weeks of the struggle proved to be unavailing, for the men could not be spared. Slowly but heavily the mobilization of Russian forces continued. Lacking strategic railroads, lacking the motor-lorry system of England, the heavy-footed but untiring Russian infantry marched the scores and hundreds of miles from their homes to the ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume I (of 8) - Introductions; Special Articles; Causes of War; Diplomatic and State Papers • Various
... awful shriek I ever heard, the wail of a woman in horror and dismay. Then dull, heavy blows; oaths, curses, stifled exclamations; a fall that shook the windows; Gleason's voice commanding, entreating; a shrill Chinese jabber; a rush through the hall; more blows; gasps; curses; more unavailing orders in Gleason's well-known voice; then a sudden pistol shot, a scream of "Oh, my God!" then moans, and then silence. The casement on the second floor was thrown open, and a fair young face and form were outlined upon the bright light within; ...
— Starlight Ranch - and Other Stories of Army Life on the Frontier • Charles King
... six weeks old Shady felt the call to help Breed rustle food and she hunted by herself in the neighborhood of the den, but her earnest efforts were unavailing, as there was no small game and she was unable to stalk ...
— The Yellow Horde • Hal G. Evarts
... lost river of fabulous wealth in gold that disturbed all his sense of value. In one of his prospecting tours he had come upon an old Indian hunter, torn by a grizzly and dying. For weeks he nursed the old Indian in his camp with tender but unavailing care. In gratitude, the dying man had told of the lost river that flowed over rocks and sands sown with gold. In his young days the Indian had seen the river and had gathered its "yellow sand and stones"; in later years, however, when he had come to know something ...
— The Prospector - A Tale of the Crow's Nest Pass • Ralph Connor
... first letter had hinted that he possessed fair looks. Yet moments came in which the mere idea of him was terrifying, and this, in swiftly changing moods, changed to forms that seemed to bring her peace, a surcease of hunger and cold, of unavailing toil, of carking ...
— The Peace of Roaring River • George van Schaick
... for evidences of the men who had taken the boats was made, and Zeke and Fred even went down the stream a mile vainly hoping that they might find the boat stranded somewhere in the region. Their search was unavailing and when they returned to the camp it was with a fixed opinion that the sole solution of their difficulties was to be found in patiently remaining in camp until Pete and John had made their long ...
— The Go Ahead Boys and Simon's Mine • Ross Kay
... the men in the group, including Alexander Graham Bell, Admiral Peary, Henry A. Wise Wood, Henry Woodhouse, Albert B. Lambert, and Byron R. Newton, head of the Coast Guard and Life Saving Service. For years they had all made supreme but unavailing efforts to make Congress realize the value of an aeroplane reserve which could be employed every day for peaceful purposes and would be available in ...
— The Conquest of America - A Romance of Disaster and Victory • Cleveland Moffett
... and distressed in her situation; while faction was exerting itself, and gathering new strength every day. He exerted the utmost of his skill to unite the ministers, and to cement the apertures of the state: but he found his pains fruitless, his arguments unavailing, and his endeavours, like the stone of Sisyphus, rolling back upon himself. He retired to a friend's house in Berkshire, where he remained 'till the Queen died. So fatal an event terminated all ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753),Vol. V. • Theophilus Cibber
... piece of green glass in the focus. Still no companion showed itself. Could it be that our instrument, in a more favorable location, would fail to show what had been seen with one so much smaller? This question I could not answer, but wrote to my European friend of my unavailing attempts. ...
— The Reminiscences of an Astronomer • Simon Newcomb
... unavailing, was not at all less spirited in the following reign, when they were compelled, in common with the rest of France, to acknowledge the power of the fifth Henry. But they again disengaged themselves from the English crown in 1431, after having remained in subjugation ...
— Architectural Antiquities of Normandy • John Sell Cotman
... older Africanus had once threatened the government,(16) and procured for himself one of the principal military commands against the distinctly- expressed will of the governing body. Public opinion, unavailing in the hands of the so-called popular party, became an irresistible weapon in the hands of the future king of Rome. We do not mean to say that Marius intended to play the pretender, at least at the time when he canvassed the people for the supreme command in Africa; ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen
... Their own compatriots—save those previously known or properly accredited—they treated with an even more pronounced disdain; so that, unless they ran across a Chivers, a Dagonet or a Mingott, their months abroad were spent in an unbroken tete-a-tete. But the utmost precautions are sometimes unavailing; and one night at Botzen one of the two English ladies in the room across the passage (whose names, dress and social situation were already intimately known to Janey) had knocked on the door and asked if Mrs. Archer had a bottle of liniment. The other lady—the intruder's sister, Mrs. Carfry—had ...
— The Age of Innocence • Edith Wharton
... in doing so, I did no more than my duty to a motherless girl. Of the reasons which I gave to her I will say nothing now. Her reasons were so much stronger, that mine were altogether unavailing. Her resolutions were built on so firm a rock, that they needed no persuasions of mine to strengthen them. I had ever known Marion to be pure, unselfish, and almost perfect. But I had never before seen how high she could rise, how certainly she ...
— Marion Fay • Anthony Trollope
... operation the Spaniards had the hardest duty, being employed in their boats in carrying out hawsers, and even in heaving them in. Success seemed certain to the British squadron till the Pompee broke her sheer; after that, it was one continued but unavailing struggle to recover the ground we had lost by this misfortune: and we retreated to Gibraltar when all hope was at an end, the Admiral justly considering the importance of repairing the damages already sustained, and of preserving the lives of his gallant crew, ...
— Memoirs and Correspondence of Admiral Lord de Saumarez, Vol. I • Sir John Ross
... the strict law of Christ) is sin, there is sin of a believing brother which is not unto death, and may be repented of in this world; and there is sin unto death, respecting which prayer for repentance would be unavailing (1 Epist. v. 16, 17). This is "the blasphemy of the Spirit," which is not forgiven in this world, because forgiveness implies repentance; neither is it forgiven in the world to come, because beyond the grave there is no repentance. ...
— An Essay on the Scriptural Doctrine of Immortality • James Challis
... whose king Clovis, however, desiring to obtain the Gothic province in Gaul, found a pretext for war in the Arianism of Alaric. The intervention of Theodoric, king of the Ostrogoths and father-in-law of Alaric, proved unavailing. The two armies met in 507 at the Campus Vogladensis, near Poitiers, where the Goths were defeated, and their king, who took to flight, was overtaken and slain, it is said, by Clovis ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... outcast and a stranger in mine own house? The shades of the prison-house closed round about us all: walls strait and stubborn to the whitest, but relentlessly narrow, tall, and unscalable to sons of night who must plod darkly on in resignation, or beat unavailing palms against the stone, or steadily, half hopelessly, watch the ...
— The Souls of Black Folk • W. E. B. Du Bois
... him a week ago, even I who knew the circumstances, could see no difference whatever in his manner. I thought he was wrong, at first, but I came to the conclusion afterwards that his decision was not an unwise one. He spared you three months of unavailing pain; he had no fear of death, and was able to go about as before to meet his friends without his health being a subject of discussion, and in all ways to go on as usual until the call came. His death was evidently painless; he sat ...
— A Girl of the Commune • George Alfred Henty
... Whalley invested the city with five thousand troops. Sir Henry dispatched messenger after messenger in quest of the king to know his pleasure. None of them returned. A female emissary was equally unavailing. Week after week elapsed, until nearly three months had expired. Provisions began to fail. The city was in confusion. The troops grew insubordinate. Yet Sir Henry persisted in the defence. General Fairfax, with ...
— The Life of George Washington, Volume I • Washington Irving
... came from the lips of Flora, and flinging herself past Varney, who stepped aside, she clung to her brother, who made an unavailing pass with his sword at the vampyre. It was a critical moment; and had the presence of mind of Varney deserted him in the least, unarmed as he was, he must have fallen beneath the weapon of Henry. To spring, however, up the seat which ...
— Varney the Vampire - Or the Feast of Blood • Thomas Preskett Prest
... old schoolmaster in the centre of the picture. Such an humble castle in the air! Christmas morning was surely something to him. Yet, as the night passed, he went back to the years that had been wasted, with an unavailing bitterness. He would not turn from the truth, that, with his strength of body and brain to command happiness and growth, his life had been a failure. I think it was first on that night that the story of the despised Nazarene came to him with a new meaning,—One ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IX., March, 1862., No. LIII. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics, • Various
... lost upon Lloyd George, and he diligently attuned himself to the new medium. This would have been unavailing if there had been nothing in his speeches, but it was soon realized that here was an interesting new member, a man inexperienced in some directions, but with bold thoughts, apt phrases, and an almost ...
— Lloyd George - The Man and His Story • Frank Dilnot
... at Darnley Hall were thus a prey to unavailing sorrow, the lovely little girl who had occasioned it was beginning to grow more reconciled to the cruelty of her destiny, and to support her different mode of life with resignation and composure. She had acquired such a degree of skill in the art of lacemaking (which was the business her employer ...
— Forgotten Tales of Long Ago • E. V. Lucas
... from time to time among the Indians men of penetration, who foresee the final destiny which awaits the native population, and who exert themselves to unite all the tribes in common hostility to the Europeans; but their efforts are unavailing. Those tribes which are in the neighborhood of the whites, are too much weakened to offer an effectual resistance; whilst the others, giving way to that childish carelessness of the morrow which characterizes savage life, ...
— Democracy In America, Volume 1 (of 2) • Alexis de Tocqueville
... the surprise of the escort and capture of his friend, and his grief was warmly sympathized in by the other officers of the regiment, with whom Herrera was a universal favourite. But Torres was not the man to content himself with idle regrets and unavailing lamentations, and he resolved to rescue Herrera, if it were possible, even at the hazard of his own life. He confided his project to the colonel of his regiment, who, with some difficulty, was induced to acquiesce in it, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 364, February 1846 • Various
... Emperor Wu, of the Han dynasty. When the Emperor had lost his beautiful favorite, the Lady Li, he sorrowed so much that fears were entertained for his reason. But all efforts made to divert his mind from the thought of her proved unavailing. One day he ordered some Spirit-Recalling-Incense to be procured, that he might summon her from the dead. His counsellors prayed him to forego his purpose, declaring that the vision could only intensify ...
— In Ghostly Japan • Lafcadio Hearn
... little son or daughter; never felt a tugging of tiny hands at her voluminous calico skirts! Nora had burnt many candles before the statue of the blessed Virgin without remedying this deplorable condition. She had sent up unavailing prayers—she had, at times, wept hot tears of longing and loneliness. Sometimes in her sleep she dreamed that a wee form, warm and exquisitely soft, was pressed against her firm body, and that a hand with tiniest pink nails ...
— The Shape of Fear • Elia W. Peattie
... midst of the lagoons which form and protect the Cadiz roads; while a contrary wind prevented the attack which, from desperation, he wished to make upon the Spanish, their gun-boats and sloops were already gathering round him, and on the 9th June the firing began, but it was weak and unavailing on the part of our ships, in spite of the heroic resolution of the crews. The fighting lasted two days, and on the Junta of Seville demanding a surrender pure and simple, Admiral Rosily, who knew that General Dupont had entered ...
— Worlds Best Histories - France Vol 7 • M. Guizot and Madame Guizot De Witt
... to time to get information from a common friend in New Haven of his progress. But there was no good news. While Bourne, with the help of his devoted wife, made an energetic fight for life, it was unavailing. In his death Yale lost an excellent teacher of history and this Society a candidate who, if he had been chosen, would have made an ...
— Historical Essays • James Ford Rhodes
... marsh turned their left flank, which was composed of militia, and poured a heavy and most destructive fire on their rear. The word "retreat" was pronounced by some person and the efforts of the officers to check it were unavailing. The fate of the day was decided, and a flight commenced on the left which was soon followed by the right. As soon as the line was broken the Indians, throwing down their rifles and rushing upon them with the tomahawk, completed the confusion. The attempt of ...
— Life And Times Of Washington, Volume 2 • John Frederick Schroeder and Benson John Lossing
... thee, Once having felt thy generous flame? Can dungeons, bolts, or bars confine thee? Or whips thy noble spirit tame? Too long the world has wept, bewailing That falsehood's dagger tyrants wield, But freedom is our sword and shield, And all their arts are unavailing. To arms! ...
— The World's Best Poetry, Volume 8 • Various
... of Frazer's River, they found the ice beginning to form along its shores. They persevered, however; sometimes forcing their way through the ice, sometimes carrying the canoes and property overland where the passage was blocked up by the ice. But all their efforts proved unavailing, for they were at ...
— Service in the Hudson's Bay Territory • John M'lean
... use of vitriol. It could only be decided that it had not been an ordinary case of neighborly "punsing," and that there must have been a "grudge" in the matter. Spring and Braddy had disappeared, and all efforts to discover their whereabouts were unavailing. ...
— That Lass O' Lowrie's - 1877 • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... voce with Britton, that excellent rascal spending most of his time leaning against the spare tires in order to catch what she was saying for his benefit. All efforts to draw me into the general conversation were unavailing. I was as morose and unresponsive as an Egyptian mummy, and for a very excellent reason, I submit. The Countess deliberately refused to address a single remark to me. Indeed, when I seemed perilously near to being drawn into the ...
— A Fool and His Money • George Barr McCutcheon
... described the Costumer, and told him of the unavailing attempts that had been made to find him. There were a great many ...
— The Children's Book of Christmas Stories • Various
... our nobler and what we might in some instances speak of as our altruistic selves. This condition is equally serviceable to the ambitious youth and to the successful superintendent of men. We all look out for number one, but appeals made to the higher self are not unavailing. We are most profoundly stirred when we are appealed to from all sides. However, the love of the game will never be universal in the professional and industrial world. We can scarcely imagine the millennium when all employees would cease to despise their toil and ...
— Increasing Efficiency In Business • Walter Dill Scott
... even, who are not penitent. He is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. How dishonoring to God, then, to represent Him as unwilling to save agonizing sinners; so that the protracted prayers of the church are necessary, and often unavailing! Paul says that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto Himself. The world had transgressed, had gone away from God, and Christ's mission as mediator, is to bring it back in agreement and submission ...
— Autobiography of Frank G. Allen, Minister of the Gospel - and Selections from his Writings • Frank G. Allen
... Crania ethnica americana appeared, and after that time he wrote a vigorous protest against the new-fangled spelling of the German language which he accused the schoolmasters of trying to foist on the people. This was published in his Archiv. It may well be that his arguments have not been unavailing, since it is observable that several German publications that had adopted the new spelling have ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XIV • John Lord
... entertained by the Egyptians; [106] and their mummies were embalmed, their pyramids were constructed, to preserve the ancient mansion of the soul, during a period of three thousand years. But the attempt is partial and unavailing; and it is with a more philosophic spirit that Mahomet relies on the omnipotence of the Creator, whose word can reanimate the breathless clay, and collect the innumerable atoms, that no longer retain their form or substance. [107] The intermediate state of the soul it ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 5 • Edward Gibbon
... woman, but yet more at the silent fortitude with which he bore it. Many blamed him for enduring it, apparently without efforts to check her; others answered that he had probably made such at an earlier period, and finding them unavailing, had resigned himself to despair, and was too delicate to meet the scandal that, with such a resistance as such a woman could offer, ...
— Summer on the Lakes, in 1843 • S.M. Fuller
... it be said that "his presence would set the church bells ringing, and give schoolboys a holiday, would bring children from school and old men from the chimney-corner, to gaze on him ere he died." The great and unavailing lamentations first revealed the deep place he had in the hearts of ...
— The Art of Public Speaking • Dale Carnagey (AKA Dale Carnegie) and J. Berg Esenwein
... ought rather to be her comforter, especially since she knew her own truth to be such, that no man should have cause to weep for her. Then rising, she entered the prison, and its gloomy doors were locked and bolted on her. Shocked and dismayed, but still resisting the weakness of unavailing lamentation, she called for her book, and devoutly prayed that she might build her house upon ...
— Memoirs of the Court of Queen Elizabeth • Lucy Aikin
... All night we dragged the woods without avail; The ground got drenched—we could not keep the trail, Three times again my cabin home I found, Half hoping she might be there, safe and sound; But each time 'twas an unavailing care: My house had lost its soul; she ...
— Poems Teachers Ask For • Various
... Where the joyous troops Of children, and the haunts I did so love? 0 my companions! O ye loved names Of friend, or playmate dear, gone are ye now. Gone divers ways; to honour and credit some: And some, I fear, to ignominy and shame! I only am left, with unavailing grief One parent dead to mourn, and see one live Of all life's joys bereft, and desolate: Am left, with a few friends, and one above The rest, found faithful in a length of years, Contented as I may, to bear me on, T' the not unpeaceful evening of a ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Vol. 5 • Edited by E. V. Lucas
... to provide for the daughters," continued Mr. Pendril, "was, as you know, rendered unavailing by the dangerous nature of Mrs. Vanstone's illness. Her death left the infant who survived her by a few hours (the infant born, you will remember, in lawful wedlock) possessed, in due legal course, ...
— No Name • Wilkie Collins
... before the typewriter, which clicked and rattled for several minutes under her stubby fingers. The clicking ceased with sudden abruptness, and she prodded the carriage of the machine viciously with a hairpin. As this appeared unavailing, she used her forefinger, and when at length it slid along the rod with a clash there was a smear of grimy oil upon her cheek and her nose. The machine gave no further trouble, and she endeavored to make up some of the time that she had spent ...
— Masters of the Wheat-Lands • Harold Bindloss
... court to prove a man discreditable evidence because he was known to visit bar-rooms! It was the influence of these, and such like, that made James drink, and caused the labor of George to prove all unavailing. It is the example of the rich that impedes the progress of temperance,—they who loll on damask sofas, sip their iced champagnes and brandies, and never get "drunk," though they ...
— Town and Country, or, Life at Home and Abroad • John S. Adams
... happened that he fell sick. The two brothers forthwith placed physicians and servants in attendance upon him, and omitted no means meet and apt for the restoration of his health. But all remedies proved unavailing; for being now old, and having led, as the physicians reported, a disorderly life, he went daily from bad to worse like one stricken with a mortal disease. This greatly disconcerted the two brothers; and one day, hard by the room in which Ser Ciappelletto lay sick, they began to talk ...
— The Decameron, Volume I • Giovanni Boccaccio
... Lord North, 1768-83, 2 vols., 1867, edited by W. B. Donne, with copious notes and comments, shows the king's system of personal rule through his ministers in full working, the position held by North under it, and his unavailing attempts to resign office when forced to carry out a policy he disapproved, together with much that concerns the conduct of the war. Lord EDMOND FITZMAURICE, Life of the Earl of Shelburne (Marquis of Lansdowne), 3 vols., 1875-76, based on papers at Lansdowne House ...
— The Political History of England - Vol. X. • William Hunt
... was unavailing, then and always thenceforth. Nowhere in Entepfuhl, on the morrow or next day, did tidings transpire of any such figure as the Stranger; nor could the Traveller, who had passed through the neighboring Town in coach-and-four, be connected with this Apparition, except in the way ...
— Sartor Resartus - The Life and Opinions of Herr Teufelsdrockh • Thomas Carlyle
... the lady in vain entreating him to wait the return of her beloved, or send her on shore, for he was captivated with her beauty. Finding herself thus ensnared, as she was a woman of strong mind, instead of indulging in unavailing complaint, she assumed a satisfied air; and as the only way to preserve her honour, received the addresses of the treacherous master with pretended complacency, and consented to receive him as a husband at the first port at which the ship might touch. With these assurances he ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments vol. 4 • Anon.
... for ever fled! And am I left to unavailing woe! When fortune's storms assail this weary head, Where cares long since have shed untimely snow, Ah, now for comfort whither shall I go! No more thy soothing voice my anguish chears: Thy placid eyes with smiles no longer glow, My hopes to cherish, and allay my fears. 'Tis meet ...
— The Minstrel; or the Progress of Genius - with some other poems • James Beattie
... therefore, was a serious menace to Japan. But Japan did not purpose to draw ridicule by unavailing protests. Feverishly the preparations for more emphatic action were continued; in the latter part of 1903, Japan was ready. Safe from a possible European intervention by her treaty with Great Britain, Japan reminded Russia of her promise to evacuate Manchuria on October 7, and requested an explanation ...
— The Story of Russia • R. Van Bergen
... a strain much more effectual among princes and powers who are generally actuated by interested motives, than was the repetition of complaints, equally pathetic and unavailing, uttered by the unfortunate king of Poland, elector of Saxony. The damage done to his capital by the last attempt of the Prussian monarch on that city, affected the old king in such a manner, that he published at Vienna an appeal to all the powers of Europe, from the ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... agitation, by turns angry with Lady Pierrepoint, with the marquis, with Lady Gabriella, with Mrs. Vickars, and with herself. After her anger had spent itself, the sorrowful certainty that it was unavailing remained; the disappointment was irremediable, and her mortification was the more poignant, because she had no human being to sympathize in her feelings, no one to whom ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. V - Tales of a Fashionable Life • Maria Edgeworth
... notice the little creature's existence; so that even the holidays lost their gloomy menace and became like the normal halcyontide. Meanwhile Doggie grew up. When he reached the age of fourteen, the Dean, by strenuous endeavour, rescued him from the unavailing tuition of Miss Gunter. But school for Marmaduke Mrs. Trevor would not hear of. It was brutal of Edward—the Dean—to suggest such a thing. Marmaduke—so sensitive and delicate—school would kill him. It would undo ...
— The Rough Road • William John Locke
... Molly into the house, his face no whit less white than her own. A great pain is tugging at him,—a pain that is almost an agony. For what greater suffering is there than to watch with unavailing sympathy the anguish ...
— Molly Bawn • Margaret Wolfe Hamilton
... again come under fire until we reached Malvern Hill, the 1st of July. There McClellan had skilfully stationed his entire army, and all the valorous efforts of Lee's army to storm the position were unavailing. One of our men addressed a North Carolina regiment as "Tarheels" and received for answer, "If you had had some tar on your heels, you would have stuck to that battery ...
— Reminiscences of a Rebel • Wayland Fuller Dunaway
... were robbed of everything they possessed by secessionist Indians,[563] who would not, however, permit them to go in search of relief northward.[564] When all efforts to induce them to throw in their lot with the Confederacy proved unavailing, the strict watch over them was somewhat relaxed and they eventually managed to make their escape. They, too, fled into Kansas. And so did about one hundred Delawares, who had been making their homes in the Cherokee ...
— The American Indian as Participant in the Civil War • Annie Heloise Abel
... near—but in vain. On the fourth day, they at length discovered her lying dead at the foot of a tree. The pages of her book were covered with sentences, pricked in with a pin, expressive of her sufferings and of her unavailing efforts to retrace her steps. She was only three miles from her father's house when she sank down to die of hunger, thirst, and exhaustion; and probably during the whole time of her wanderings had never exceeded that distance from ...
— A Lady's Visit to the Gold Diggings of Australia in 1852-53. • Mrs. Charles (Ellen) Clacey
... unavailing love borne to the Queen of Castile by a gentleman named Elisor, who in the end ...
— The Tales Of The Heptameron, Vol. III. (of V.) • Margaret, Queen Of Navarre
... passing of this law. The proposer narrowly escaped with his life, and Pompey himself was threatened. "If you will be another Romulus, like Romulus you shall die" (one form of the legend of Rome's first king represented him as having been torn to pieces by the senators.) But all resistance was unavailing. The new command was created, and of course bestowed upon Pompey. The price of corn, which had risen to a famine height in Rome, fell immediately the appointment was made. The result, indeed, amply justified the choice. The new general made short work of the task that had ...
— Roman life in the days of Cicero • Alfred J[ohn] Church
... he was ever conservative and regardful of the views and business interests of the numerically weak but financially strong minority of Democrats, and by supporting a compromise ticket that gave most prominence to the minority sought to preserve harmony. But the efforts of such men have proved unavailing to stem the tide of political usurpation, now rampant at many places ...
— Shadow and Light - An Autobiography with Reminiscences of the Last and Present Century • Mifflin Wistar Gibbs
... months before agreeing upon its provisions. This hall seemed the most appropriate place for establishing the centennial rooms of the National Woman Suffrage Association, but the effort to obtain it proved unavailing[4] as will be ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume III (of III) • Various
... sprang from a faith more confirmed than that of the French poet: and from a charity which, in combination with faith, showed its power unimpaired amidst the languors and pains of approaching dissolution. I will hope that a prayer, which, I am sure, was deeply sincere, may not be always unavailing. ...
— Life of Lord Byron, With His Letters And Journals, Vol. 5 (of 6) • (Lord Byron) George Gordon Byron
... about her and his piercing kisses upon her face, Helen felt as if sinking helplessly into a mighty ocean; as if all struggles must be unavailing, and she could only yield to the ...
— The Pagans • Arlo Bates
... Blewett—running up the main rigging over the heads of several others in a way which showed he had some reason for so doing. All the efforts of the officers to discover the culprit, however, were unavailing; and I thought it wisest to say nothing about the matter. The commander could not justly have punished the man for knocking him down, as it was done unintentionally, though he might have done so for coming up the officers' passage. And so ...
— Saved from the Sea - The Loss of the Viper, and her Crew's Saharan Adventures • W.H.G. Kingston
... of the like kindly guile, and some wise and simple reasoning, the Italian prevailed. Together, without objection from the captain of the yard, with many unavailing protests from Richling, who would now do it alone, and with Ristofalo smiling like a Chinaman at the obscene ribaldry of the spectators in the yard, they scrubbed the cell. Then came the tank. They had to stand in it with the water up to their knees, ...
— Dr. Sevier • George W. Cable
... the door of the king's house, with the intent to prevail for the right or to protest against the wrong, he saw the biers standing ready; and so knew that all the efforts previously made to hinder the barbarous rites had been unavailing. The house as he entered was in the hush of death. One woman lay strangled. Another sitting on the floor, covered with a large veil, was in the hands of her murderers. A cord was passed twice round her neck, and the ends were held on each side of her by a group ...
— The Old Helmet, Volume II • Susan Warner
... the morning at daylight, and resumed his patient but unavailing study of the metal trunk. This he continued during the whole day with the same result—humiliating disappointment, which overwrought his nerves and made his head ache. The result of the long strain was seen later ...
— The Lair of the White Worm • Bram Stoker
... KING,—These are times of terrible strain and stress, and we cannot easily fall back upon those sources of power which seem so distant and unavailing. I like to think of you as in our last talk in the Millers' drawing room, where you had a much better opportunity to express yourself than in the one that we later had out on the porch. You then seemed to live your thought and to have the capacity for its expression. I think of you, too, up on that ...
— The Letters of Franklin K. Lane • Franklin K. Lane
... appeared active enough before sat listless about the decks. Books, if open, were unread. The seamen even exhibited the same listlessness as the rest of those on board. Emily and May did their best to keep up their spirits, but their efforts were unavailing. Captain Westerway and Bill Windy were among the few who appeared unaffected. Mr Paget, also exerting himself to the utmost, went about his usual occupations, and endeavoured to revive the spirits of his companions. It was evident, however, that unless a breeze should spring up some evil consequences ...
— The Voyages of the Ranger and Crusader - And what befell their Passengers and Crews. • W.H.G. Kingston
... took the life of his child to save her from a fate incomparably worse than that of death; and made his name historic by doing so. Thousands of fathers have found their efforts to protect the innocence of their daughters as unavailing as did the unhappy Virginius, unless, like him, they shortened life. The victims, too, are as little free-will agents in the matter as Virginia would have been; and many thousands of daughters have fallen, not ...
— Woman: Man's Equal • Thomas Webster
... his roof. The vessel in which she embarked sailed at the appointed time, but never reached its destination. It took fire the night after leaving the harbor, and all efforts to quench the flames were unavailing. The passengers, of whom there were a large number on board, attempted to escape in boats; some were fortunate enough to succeed, but the ladies, among whom was Miss Wiltshire, without exception, found a watery grave. It appears that the females had been ...
— Woman As She Should Be - or, Agnes Wiltshire • Mary E. Herbert
... honest Sir Joseph Raikes took his seat in his carriage; and tried, by artless blandishments, by humility, and by simple conversation, to coax his wife into good humor; but all his efforts were unavailing. She would not speak a word during the journey to London; and when she reached home, rushed up to the nursery and instantly burst into tears upon the sleeping little Adolphus's pink and ...
— The International Magazine, Volume 2, No. 2, January, 1851 • Various
... circuit of my father's acquaintance, cap in hand, and begging to sweep offices! No, by Napoleon! I would die at my chosen trade; and the two who had that day flouted me should live to envy my success, or to weep tears of unavailing penitence behind ...
— The Wrecker • Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne
... the fugitive prisoner; and the law would have borne him out in the act. I saw, I comprehended the whole. I groped, as far as I could without letting my wife drop, for my pistols; but all that I could do would have been unavailing, and too late—she would have been murdered in my arms. But—and that was what none of us saw— neither I, nor Pierpoint, nor the hound Manasseh—one person stood back in the shade; one person had seen, but had not uttered a word on seeing Manasseh advancing through the ...
— Narrative And Miscellaneous Papers • Thomas De Quincey
... the saintly monarch was not quite agreeable to his family or his subjects, any more than to his mother, Blanche of Castille; and many of his lords made earnest efforts to divert him from his purpose. But remonstrance proved unavailing. Clinging steadfastly to his resolution, Louis summoned a Parliament at Paris, induced the assembled magnates to take the Cross, occupied three years with preparations on a great scale, and ultimately, having repaired to St. Denis, and received from the hands of the papal legate the famous ...
— The Boy Crusaders - A Story of the Days of Louis IX. • John G. Edgar
... more than once disappointed by carriages passing us and disappearing at the end of the street. Edward and his friend walked up and down, east and west, north and south, in hopes of descrying the travellers in the remotest distance. But after each unavailing walk, they took up their ...
— The Doll and Her Friends - or Memoirs of the Lady Seraphina • Unknown
... a life of indulgence, eating and drinking to excess. At this time, having been endowed with a feeble constitution, he was suffering from dyspepsia, gout, and an almost continual slow fever, with an intolerable thirst continually hanging upon him. The skill of the best physicians of Italy was unavailing. At length he completely changed his habits of diet, and made a complete recovery. At the age of 83 he wrote a treatise on a "Sure and certain method of attaining a long and healthful life." He says, what with bread, meat, the yolk ...
— The Chemistry of Food and Nutrition • A. W. Duncan
... she said, or what de Crucis answered, he could never afterward recall. He had a confused sense of having cried out a last unavailing protest, faintly, inarticulately, like a man struggling to make himself heard in a dream; then the room grew dark about him, and in its stead he saw the old chapel at Donnaz, with its dimly-gleaming shrine, and heard the voice of the chaplain, harsh and yet ...
— The Valley of Decision • Edith Wharton
... run away; he accused the coachman of helping me off, and, despite the poor man's denials, hurried him away to the calaboose and put him under the lash, in order to force a confession. Finding this course unavailing, he offered a reward to the negro catchers, on the same evening, but ...
— From the Darkness Cometh the Light, or Struggles for Freedom • Lucy A. Delaney
... and as Audrey had passed to gather her flowers she had had a glimpse of a dark, closely-cropped head, and the perfect profile that she had admired last night, and she knew the new master would be fully occupied all the morning. Audrey felt a little needle-prick of unavailing compunction as she remembered her allusion to the ...
— Lover or Friend • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... circulation, to the present worth of that mass, which was five millions; a sum not too great for the circulation of the States, and which, they therefore hoped, would not depreciate further, as they continued firm in their purpose of emitting no more. This effort was as unavailing as the former. Very little of the money was brought in. It continued to circulate and to depreciate, till the end of 1780, when it had fallen to seventy-five for one, and the money circulated from the French army, being, by that ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... the petted child became an accusing spirit. Alas! who is there that is not chained to some rock of the past, with the vulture of memory tearing at his vitals, screaming forever in the ear of conscience? These unavailing regrets are inexorable as the ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 11, No. 65, March, 1863 • Various
... for the kind recognition of my unfortunately unavailing efforts to be of service to your brother-in-law which is ...
— The Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley Volume 2 • Leonard Huxley
... oar and setting-pole proved unavailing, the men were out and overboard, running the banks with the cordelle. As they labored thus on the line, like so many yoked cattle, using each ounce of weight and straining muscle to hold the heavy boat against the current, snags would ...
— The Magnificent Adventure - Being the Story of the World's Greatest Exploration and - the Romance of a Very Gallant Gentleman • Emerson Hough
... us, he "early next morning (Saturday, 23d July) had his tents pitched;" which was but an unavailing procedure, with poor Zittau gone such a road. "Bring us bread out of that ruined Zittau," ordered the Prince: his Detachment returns ineffectual, "So hot, we cannot march in." And the Garrison Colonel (one Dierecke and five battalions ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XVIII. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—Seven-Years War Rises to a Height.—1757-1759. • Thomas Carlyle
... thy generous flame? Can dungeons, bolts, or bars confine thee, Or whips thy noble spirit tame? Too long the world has wept, bewailing That falsehood's dagger tyrants wield; But freedom is our sword and shield, And all their arts are unavailing. To arms, to arms, ye brave! The avenging sword unsheathe! March on, march on, all hearts resolved On victory ...
— Home Pastimes; or Tableaux Vivants • James H. Head
... the vehemence of her emotion, she would have sunk upon the ground, had not Luke caught her in his arms. Pressing her to his bosom, he renewed his passionate protestations. Every argument was unavailing. ...
— Rookwood • William Harrison Ainsworth
... but unless a general rush were made, nothing could be done. I felt as if my heart would burst with indignation and dread—indignation that strong men should see innocent ones suffer, dread lest our efforts might be unavailing. A'Dale and I rushed among the crowd, calling on them to come on. Our actions were perceived, though our words may not have been heard, by those in authority. Guards were advancing towards us. The magistrates ordered the executioners to proceed ...
— The Golden Grasshopper - A story of the days of Sir Thomas Gresham • W.H.G. Kingston
... the President was unwilling to resort; yet the necessity of doing something that did not transcend the law, was morally right, and would tend to the ultimate freedom of the slaves was felt to be an essential and indispensable duty. Unavailing but seductive appeals continued in the mean time to be made by the secessionists to the people of the border slave States to unite with the further South for the security and protection of slavery, in which they had a common interest, and against which there was increasing hostility ...
— The Galaxy, Volume 23, No. 2, February, 1877 • Various
... the vagaries of the untameable world, and suffer the pedant's disaster. A martyr to the good that is to be, he has voluntarily maimed himself "for the kingdom of Heaven's sake"—if, perchance, the kingdom of Heaven might come by observation. The enthusiasm of his self-denial shows itself in his unavailing struggle to chain language also to the bare rock of ascertained fact. Metaphor, the poet's right-hand weapon, he despises; all that is tentative, individual, struck off at the urging of a mood, he disclaims and suspects. Yet the very rewards that science promises have their parallel in the domain ...
— Style • Walter Raleigh
... wife, or friend, with the object dearest to their hearts, to listen to the bubling cry of their agony, as they sank to their chins in the water, there to remain for ever, beholding and regretting the rewards enjoyed by the good, and doomed to struggle, till the stars shall cease to shine, in unavailing endeavours to reach the blissful island. They beheld the lake thick and black with the heads of the unhappy swimmers, as the surface of the Great Bear Lake is dotted in summer with the wild fowl that seek subsistence ...
— Traditions of the North American Indians, Vol. 1 (of 3) • James Athearn Jones
... indefinite, on-leading expansiveness, such a multitude of features without apparent redundance, their lines graduating delicately into one another in endless succession, while the whole is so fine, so tender, so ethereal, that all pen-work seems hopelessly unavailing. Tracing shining ways through fiord and sound, past forests and waterfalls, islands and mountains and far azure headlands, it seems as if surely we must at length reach the very paradise of the poets, the ...
— Travels in Alaska • John Muir
... attempted, for more than two hundred years, to raise against the progress of the terrible disease which carries off upon an average, half a million of human beings annually. All the efforts of medical men to stop the ravages of Scarlet-Fever have hitherto proved unavailing; every remedy which was considered, for a while, a specific proved subsequently inefficient; and, notwithstanding the assertion to the contrary of a few, the Dr. Jenner who shall discover a reliable prophylactic against scarlatina, is probably not yet born. The patients die in ...
— Hydriatic treatment of Scarlet Fever in its Different Forms • Charles Munde |
