"Undercurrent" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... imminent, the American effaced himself. Other men in the hotel were not like that—they rather sought the great man's company. She wondered if Bower had noticed it. Despite his candid, almost generous, disclaimer of motive, there was an undercurrent of hostility in his words that suggested a feeling of pique. She climbed the rocky path in silence until ...
— The Silent Barrier • Louis Tracy
... sense of metrical values. We are sure that the defective second line is the fault of the printer rather than of the author. "The Blind Prince," by Henriette Ziegfeld, is an excellent juvenile tale involving a fairy story. The only serious objection is the undercurrent of adult comment which flows through the narrative. Particularly cynical is the closing sentence: "'And here's Mother,' finished poor Auntie with a sigh of relief." The ordinary fairy stories told to children are bits of actual ...
— Writings in the United Amateur, 1915-1922 • Howard Phillips Lovecraft
... Conne, of the United States Secret Service, had come over from Liverpool via Dover on a blind quest after an elusive spy. There had been a sort of undercurrent of rumor, with many extravagant trappings, that a mysterious agent of the Kaiser was on his way to Europe with secrets of a most important character. Some stories had it that he was intimately related to Bloody ...
— Tom Slade Motorcycle Dispatch Bearer • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... woods and turned into a broad country lane. Both had forgotten the proposed trip to "The Glen," but it made no difference. At last the undercurrent of feeling ...
— The Right Knock - A Story • Helen Van-Anderson
... a little later with everything in the pantry spread before him. His voice, gay and charming, sounded as if he had liked Hannah for a very long time. And Hannah's best lamp was on the table. There was a pleasant undercurrent of excitement in the kitchen. Joan found her guest's engaging air of adaptability bewildering. He seemed ...
— Kenny • Leona Dalrymple
... three full weeks or a month. Thus to imprisonment was added the gall and wormwood of total dependence upon others; the unthinkable prospect of parting with Paul, with the Border itself—with everything that had hitherto made life worth living; and, worse than all, the undercurrent of striving to ignore that veiled danger, which he refused to name, even in his thoughts, and which lay like a millstone upon ...
— Captain Desmond, V.C. • Maud Diver
... an undercurrent of meaning in all this of which each man present was fully aware. Unziar was presumed to have very strong private reasons to propitiate rather than to offend the powerful Minister. But this happened to be a typical instance in which the interests of the corps over-rode ...
— A Modern Mercenary • Kate Prichard and Hesketh Vernon Hesketh-Prichard
... No reproaches that he could have heaped upon me would have cut half so deeply into my heart as did this kind, forgiving letter. My heart was full. Yet I felt a deep undercurrent of joy at knowing that my father loved me still. I looked at Jack. He seemed to be asleep, but he was not. A single tear coursed over his pale cheek as he ...
— Freaks on the Fells - Three Months' Rustication • R.M. Ballantyne
... Mississippi River bottom, over sandy roads; but nearing Rock River, the sand disappears, and, for some distance, an excellent road winds through the oak-groves lining this beautiful stream. The green woods are free from underbrush, and a cool undercurrent of air plays amid the leafy shades, which, if not ambrosial, are none the less grateful, as it registers over 100 in the sun; without, the silvery sheen of the river glimmers through the interspaces; the dulcet notes of church-bells come ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle V1 • Thomas Stevens
... was wrapped. These involve a yearly pilgrimage from the nearer places, and a great feast every seventh year, when a holy fair is kept up for weeks round the cathedral. There is no better living specimen of the Middle Ages than such gatherings, and no doubt then, as now, there was some undercurrent of worldly excitement mingling with the flow of genuine devotion. Aachen's old cornhouse, the bridge gate and the many houses full of unobtrusive beauties of carving and metal-work lead us by hook and by crook—for the streets are very winding—out on the road ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 20, August 1877 • Various
... little soberly that afternoon. Touched as she was by what Mrs. Snow had said, there was yet an undercurrent of sadness in it all. She was thinking of Aunt Polly—Aunt Polly who played the game now so seldom; and she was wondering if she herself always played it, when ...
— Pollyanna Grows Up • Eleanor H. Porter
... a confused mass. Where these rocks were—a spot which my men called the "porteira" or gateway—the river turned sharply from 70 deg. b.m. to 290 deg. b.m. The water seemed almost stagnant there, and we had to make a great effort to get on. It seemed as if there had been an undercurrent pushing us back. The water was surely held up by some obstacle, and I feared we had at last reached the extensive rapids which I had expected for some days. Rocks were to be seen in abundance all along, and three more sets of giant boulders were reached, one after ...
— Across Unknown South America • Arnold Henry Savage Landor
... and overflowing humor never obscures the deep seriousness that is the undercurrent of all his writing. A high idealism characterizes all his work. One of his greatest services to his country was the effort to create a saner and sounder political life. As he himself realized, he often moralized ...
— The Vision of Sir Launfal - And Other Poems • James Russell Lowell
... the alert. The bronzed and brawny seamen were grouped in clusters around the great guns. The creole soldiers came of a race whose habit it has ever been to take all phases of life joyously; but that morning their gayety was tempered by a dark undercurrent of fierce anxiety. They had more at stake than any other men on the field. They were fighting for their homes; they were fighting for their wives and their daughters. They well knew that the men they were to face were ...
— The Naval War of 1812 • Theodore Roosevelt
... Mr. Merrick, "that there is always this raspy feeling when the English meet Americans. On the surface we're friendly enough and our governments always express in diplomatic relations the most cordial good will; but I've always noticed in the English individual an undercurrent of antipathy for Americans that cannot be disguised. As a race the English hate us, I'm positive, and I ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces in the Red Cross • Edith Van Dyne
... volumes, however, of "Twice Told Tales,"—the second published two years later,—the tragical element only appears as an undercurrent of pathos in such stories as "The Gentle Boy," "Wakefield," "The Maypole of Merry-mount," and "The Haunted Mind," but reaches a climax in "The Ambitious Guest" and "Lady Eleanor's Mantle." There are others, like "Lights from a Steeple," and "Little Annie's ...
— The Life and Genius of Nathaniel Hawthorne • Frank Preston Stearns
... the two events painted for her fancy; and she did not know which picture she preferred. So all was still bewilderment, all still rocking from the sudden gust that had proceeded out of dear Lady Mildmay's gentle lips. But the undercurrent of wonder and of reproach that there had been in the warning May Quisante now almost missed. By an effort at last she realised its presence, the naturalness of it, and its rightness. But still it seemed to her a little conventional, ...
— Quisante • Anthony Hope
... than she had feared it would be. There was a strong undercurrent of excitement in her heart, flushing her cheeks and sparkling in her eyes; yet never for one moment was she even tempted to forget that he was now vowed to God. It seemed to her as if she talked with him in the spirit of that place where there is neither marrying nor giving in marriage. Those ...
— Come Rack! Come Rope! • Robert Hugh Benson
... Baron Petrescu had fought a duel and had been wounded, but she did not know who his opponent was. Later, in the Bois, Frina heard many versions of the story, but not in one of them was Captain Ellerey's name mentioned. She did not understand it. There was some undercurrent of intrigue going on of which she was ignorant. Her carriage was drawn up to the side of the road, where she was holding a small court of pedestrians, when she caught sight of Lord Cloverton. It was seldom that he walked in the Bois, but that he ...
— Princess Maritza • Percy Brebner
... approach to happiness lies through a religious discipline of the feelings, and protest that death is not to be feared but welcomed—as the passage from a troublous existence to everlasting peace. In most of the poetry of the time, religion, if at all noticeable, is a mere undercurrent; but whenever it rises to the surface, it reflects ...
— English Poets of the Eighteenth Century • Selected and Edited with an Introduction by Ernest Bernbaum
... abiding. Secession was a common word among the constituents of New England Senators after 1840, and even Northwestern States threatened disruption of the Union as late as 1859 if the national policy should continue to run counter to their interests. There was, however, a strong undercurrent of devotion to the idea of nationality in both North and South[12] in 1860, and when South Carolina proceeded with her long-contemplated scheme of secession early in November of that year, Jefferson Davis, who had formerly talked freely of that "last remedy" ...
— Expansion and Conflict • William E. Dodd
... preventing the overrunning of Montenegro, which could not but constitute a direct menace to herself. Apart from the landing of a number of troops at Avlona in Albania, Italy kept aloof. This rigid abstinence, coupled with the appearance of deadlock on Italy's two main frontiers, set in motion an undercurrent of criticism among the friends of the Allies. A further source of uncertainty was found in the relations still maintained between Italy and Germany. "Why did not Italy declare war against Germany as well as against Austria?" was a query that was continually put. In ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume IV (of 8) • Francis J. (Francis Joseph) Reynolds, Allen L. (Allen Leon)
... even more usually than coins gain rather than lose if they are enlarged. Yet they were executed without the help of magnifying glasses. Their subjects are taken from the widest field, the figures of deities, tales from mythology, portraits, animal forms; like the coins they introduced as an undercurrent to the prosaic life of every day an ...
— The Legacy of Greece • Various
... they to do? Here were a wife and four little children depending upon this man for their lives. What would become of his family if justice was meted out to him? Soon there developed an undercurrent of opinion that it was probably better to waive punishment than to endanger the lives of the family; but the council would not be swerved from its resolution. At sundown of the third day the criminal was hanged in the presence of the whole camp. This was not done until ample provision ...
— Ox-Team Days on the Oregon Trail • Ezra Meeker
... good. We examined the room many times that night; both of us. In the end there was nothing, only the weirdness and uncertainty and the magnetic undercurrent which we could feel, but could not fathom. When we called in the dog she stepped to the portieres and commenced her vigil. She crouched slightly behind the curtains, alert, ready, waiting, at her post of honour. From that moment she never left ...
— The Blind Spot • Austin Hall and Homer Eon Flint
... This undercurrent of suffering, which increased week by week as the writing on the wall grew longer, was in pitiful contrast to the enthusiasm with which the women sent their men and sons away to war. More than once I watched troops ...
— The Log of a Noncombatant • Horace Green
... wit and humor, there was an undercurrent of agony. So great were his kindness, gentleness, tenderness of heart, that he could not live in this cruel world, especially in the period when the times were so much out of joint, without being a man of sorrows. The present writer never saw Lincoln's face but twice, once in life and once in ...
— The Life of Abraham Lincoln • Henry Ketcham
... reward of a man meaning business; until a topper on his hat, a cut over the right thigh, and the stick in his middlerib, told the spectators of a scientific adversary; and loudly now the gentleman was cheered. An undercurrent of warm feeling ran for the plucky little one at it hot again in spite of the strokes, and when he fetched his master a handsome thud across the shoulder, and the gentleman gave up and complimented ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... ever since she had last seen her. She seemed to be in a perpetual brown study, which was compatible, however, with a curious watchfulness which struck Cicely particularly. She was always aware of any undercurrent in the room—of anyone going in or out—of persons passing in the road. At lunch she scarcely opened her lips, but Cicely was all the time conscious of being observed. After luncheon Bridget got up abruptly, and said she was going down to Grasmere ...
— Missing • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... heard clearly. The tempo of the first movement, which begins after a grand pause, is allegro con brio, and the first subject is given out in a sparkling cascade of sound. But, despite the buoyancy of the music, there is an unmistakable undercurrent of melancholy in the playing. The audience doesn't fail ...
— A Book of Burlesques • H. L. Mencken
... let me decide for myself, but don't you think I felt the undercurrent of your attitudes? All the other girls settling down, as you put it. You and Albert such good friends, and then Albert himself ...
— Star-Dust • Fannie Hurst
... felt a strong undercurrent, and, finding that he could not reach the island, he tried to get back to ...
— Jack North's Treasure Hunt - Daring Adventures in South America • Roy Rockwood
... from them evinced their approval by a murmuring which had something like applause in it. A queen was chosen! A real queen at last had been chosen. Ramabai had accomplished by diplomacy what yonder Durga Ram had failed to do by force. But Umballa secretly smiled as he sensed this undercurrent. Presently they should see. ...
— The Adventures of Kathlyn • Harold MacGrath
... from thoughtfulness, or the putting off of responsibility, or God knows what, I find will not answer. I have been on my guard against that which everyday life might present—a lie, a theft, or a meanness; but of the undercurrent, which really bears you on, I have ...
— The Morgesons • Elizabeth Stoddard
... then, of which the first was "Punch and Peel" (July 24th, 1841), were, in fact, political leading-articles, satirical, ironical, bitter, and more often demagogic than humorous, though of wit and humour both there was a generous undercurrent. Punch showed himself at once a fighting man who meant to be in the thick of the fray, a politician as impulsive as Macaulay; and though Jerrold did not begin to sign his articles until the ninth week ...
— The History of "Punch" • M. H. Spielmann
... tabernacle age, weakly engrossed her." And a propos of Miss Mayjar, an evangelical lady who is a little too apt to talk of her visits to sick women and the state of their souls, we are told that the model clergyman is "not one to disallow, through the super crust, the undercurrent toward good in the subject, or the positive benefits, nevertheless, to the object." We imagine the double-refined accent and protrusion of chin which are feebly represented by the italics in this lady's sentences! We abstain from quoting any of her oracular doctrinal passages, because ...
— The Essays of "George Eliot" - Complete • George Eliot
... twenty-eight out of the thirty captains who had been in the line were summoned as witnesses. Most of them swore that if Keppel had chased in line of battle that day, there could have been no action, and the majority of them cordially approved his course; but there was evidently an undercurrent still of dissent, and especially in the rear ships, where there had been some of the straggling inevitable in such movements. Their commanders therefore had uncomfortable experience of the lack of mutual support, which the line of battle was meant ...
— The Major Operations of the Navies in the War of American Independence • A. T. Mahan
... Carlyle was now launched upon his life-work as "a writer of books." He translated Goethe's "Wilhelm Meister," for which he received L180. I do not see the transcendent excellence of this novel, except in its original and forcible criticism, and its undercurrent of philosophy; but it is nevertheless famous. These two works gave Carlyle some literary reputation among ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XIII • John Lord
... the work of going over a bed containing hundreds that have just bloomed for the first time, and marking the finest with tags upon which are inscribed a few characters that mean much to the owner, and almost nothing to anyone else, will give one an undercurrent of joy for the rest of the day. Another special pleasure that comes to the grower of choice seedlings is that of naming one for a friend, and this pleasure has been mine a number of times. The most notable example of this ...
— The Gladiolus - A Practical Treatise on the Culture of the Gladiolus (2nd Edition) • Matthew Crawford
... same time the strong undercurrent of the Greek spirit rife in Florence was bearing him irresistibly on to his mission as leader of all that is beautiful, joyous, and noble in classical art. Fra Bartolommeo could not fail to be distressed by these tendencies in his disciple. Raphael came to him one ...
— Romance of Roman Villas - (The Renaissance) • Elizabeth W. (Elizbeth Williams) Champney
... driving home in their sober intimacy that had yet an undercurrent of that rushing river of life, Marietta turned suddenly ...
— Country Neighbors • Alice Brown
... regarded by many in his lifetime as a coarse, hard, practical man, full of prejudices, there was yet a strong undercurrent of poetry in his nature; and, while he declaimed against sentiment, there were few men more thoroughly imbued with sentiment of the best kind. He had the tenderest regard for the character of woman. He respected her purity and her virtue, and in his 'Advice to Young ...
— Character • Samuel Smiles
... parti-speeched, crackling and sputtering under the hot sun like a dish of fritters over a kitchen fire. Tony, agape, shouldered his way through the press, aware at once that, spite of the tumult, the shrillness, the gesticulation, there was no undercurrent of clownishness, no tendency to horse-play, as in such crowds on market-day at home, but a kind of facetious suavity which seemed to include everybody in the circumference of one huge joke. In such an air the sense of strangeness soon wore off, and ...
— The Early Short Fiction of Edith Wharton, Part 2 (of 10) • Edith Wharton
... Mrs. Constantine had overruled her at a committee meeting. With a flood of disconnected talk she had overwhelmed Maggie until the girl felt as though her head had been thrust into a bag of flour. Through it all there had been an undercurrent of complaint as though Maggie ...
— The Captives • Hugh Walpole
... to look at that success, but to look forward to the next difficulty that is to be conquered. And now, having had so much to say to the successful candidates, you must forgive me if I add that a sort of undercurrent of sympathy has been going on in my mind all the time for those who have not been successful, for those valiant knights who have been overthrown in your tourney, and have not made their appearance in public. ...
— Critiques and Addresses • Thomas Henry Huxley
... and that there was never any intention on the part of A. G. Spalding and his confreres to let me get possession of the club. It was not until several men who had promised to aid me backed down squarely that I realized that there was an undercurrent at work, and that the option, which it was often denied at that time that I had, had been given to me in bad faith and just for the purpose of letting me down easily, but when once convinced that such was really the case I gave up making ...
— A Ball Player's Career - Being the Personal Experiences and Reminiscensces of Adrian C. Anson • Adrian C. Anson
... spoke the Speaker—almost softly—and, in a moment, when he had realized what had taken place, the Old Man was upright, and the Liberal and Irish members were on their feet, waving their hats, cheering themselves hoarse. And yet an undercurrent and audible note of anxiety ran through all the enthusiasm. The honeymoon of Home Rule is over, and, curiously enough, the very sense of a great victory after a long struggle has always about it a solemnity too sad ...
— Sketches In The House (1893) • T. P. O'Connor
... wonderment at his powers in the author. Oftentimes since then, in pursuing French tragedies, I have fancied two marks of admiration at the end of each line, as hieroglyphics of the author's own admiration at his own cleverness. Our genuine admiration of a great poet is a continuous undercurrent of feeling! it is everywhere present, but seldom anywhere as a separate excitement. I was wont boldly to affirm, that it would be scarcely more difficult to push a stone out from the Pyramids with the bare hand, than to alter a word, or the position ...
— Biographia Literaria • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... stroke towards the beach, which I aimed for at first, the undercurrent pulling me back and sweeping me out seaward; while, the rough water, smacking against my face, bothered me and ...
— Young Tom Bowling - The Boys of the British Navy • J.C. Hutcheson
... the undercurrent of thought in Mary's mind, while she heard Humphrey describe to her uncle, who promptly obeyed the summons, the capture of the four ...
— Penshurst Castle - In the Days of Sir Philip Sidney • Emma Marshall
... seemed to take a pleasure in destroying them, she returned a casual: "What does it matter?" and taking up as many violets as she could hold, looked defiantly at him over their purple leaves. Through all she said and did ran a strong undercurrent of excitement. ...
— Maurice Guest • Henry Handel Richardson
... This sensation made the undercurrent of a long fully filled day. She almost never had time to look at it but she knew it was there. It enabled her to take with equanimity the unlooked-for arrival (so far as she and her aunt were concerned) of Graham's young torn-boy sister, Sylvia. It made it possible ...
— Mary Wollaston • Henry Kitchell Webster
... must be added to the golden image of Dionysus Meilichius—the honey-sweet, if the old tradition in its completeness is to be, in spite of that sophism, our closing impression; if we are to catch, in its fulness, that deep undercurrent of horror which runs below, all through [79] this masque of spring, and realise the spectacle of that wild chase, in which Dionysus is ultimately both the hunter and ...
— Greek Studies: A Series of Essays • Walter Horatio Pater
... her services at this time, and of the undercurrent of terror and sadness of this triumphal march, we can do no better than to give some extracts from her journal, kept during this period, and published without her knowledge in the Sanitary Commission Bulletin. It was commenced on the 15th of May, 1864, ...
— Woman's Work in the Civil War - A Record of Heroism, Patriotism, and Patience • Linus Pierpont Brockett
... the trees were bare. A large bell rang for breakfast, its loud metallic voice crashing through the belfry overhead and into our sensitive ears. The annoying clatter of shoes on bare floors gave us no peace. The constant clash of harsh noises, with an undercurrent of many voices murmuring an unknown tongue, made a bedlam within which I was securely tied. And though my spirit tore itself in struggling for its lost ...
— American Indian stories • Zitkala-Sa
... seemed to be both unutterably dull and colored by a possibility of excitement like an undercurrent of hardly perceptible fever. Her mother, it was true, took on herself most of the duties of Barzil Dunsack's house; but there were still a large number of little things that returned unvaried with every morning, noon and night for the girl's attention. ...
— Java Head • Joseph Hergesheimer
... had dwelt upon his machine in an undercurrent of thought; and an idea just then occurred to him, which he was desirous to test immediately. He therefore rose, and said that they would not detain Miss Pillbody any longer, and that his daughter would call and receive the first lesson at any time which that ...
— Round the Block • John Bell Bouton
... of the ticket-buying public he had secured a seat in the back row of a low-priced gallery, whence he might watch, observant and unobserved, the much talked-of debut of Gorla Mustelford, and the writing of a new chapter in the history of the fait accompli. Around him he noticed an incessant undercurrent of jangling laughter, an unending give-and-take of meaningless mirthless jest and catchword. He had noticed the same thing in streets and public places since his arrival in London, a noisy, empty interchange of chaff and laughter that he ...
— When William Came • Saki
... slops along through the slush and tells me that my lunch is ready. He is not a happy-looking nigger by any means. A white man looks bad enough in the mud and cold, but a nigger presents a pitiful spectacle. His face goes whitish green, with an undercurrent of slatey grey running through it. The brilliancy leaves the coal-black eyes, and they become as lifeless and limp as a professional politician at a prayer meeting. The mouth goes agape, the thick lips become flabby, and fall away from the teeth. The mouth ...
— Campaign Pictures of the War in South Africa (1899-1900) - Letters from the Front • A. G. Hales
... This undercurrent of rivalry with the father came out in a religious disguise as well. His first attack when he was for many months interned he described as a religious mania. By means of identifying himself with Christ he dramatized both his subjugation and defiance. He went through many crucifixion ...
— The Journal of Abnormal Psychology - Volume 10
... the gazelle is always looking for trouble when the elephant is around, so he can be pulled out!" returned Danvers, in the same strain; yet with the undercurrent of affection that always crept into his tone when ...
— A Man of Two Countries • Alice Harriman
... message Harold gave me, that I should write you a little concerning political conditions. They are very, very mixed. Curiously enough, my article on the trusts was generally accepted as bringing me forward for the Presidential nomination. Evidently what really happened was that there had been a strong undercurrent of feeling about me, and that the talk concerning the article enabled this feeling to come to the surface. I do not think it amounts to anything. It merely means that a great many people do not get the leadership they are looking for from any of the prominent men in public life, and that under ...
— Theodore Roosevelt and His Times - A Chronicle of the Progressive Movement; Volume 47 in The - Chronicles Of America Series • Harold Howland
... A proud stage-driver makes a mistake about a female passenger. Thinks he has got an heiress, and she turns out to peddle sarsaparilla. "So he's naturally used up," commented Genesmere. "You estimate a girl as one thing, and she—" Here the undercurrent welled up, breaking the surface. "Did she mean that? Was that her genuine reason?" In memory he took a look at his girl's face, and repeated her words when she besought him to come the longer way and hesitated over why. ...
— Red Men and White • Owen Wister
... he dislikes beef and beer, raw brandy or raw beefsteaks. Romance is too masculine for his taste. You will find throughout his criticisms, amid all their truth, their wild justice or pungent impartiality, a curious undercurrent of prejudice upon one point: the preference for the refined rather than the rude or ugly. Thus he will dislike a joke because it is coarse without asking if it is really immoral. He objects to a man sitting down on his hat, whereas the austere moralist should only object to his sitting ...
— George Bernard Shaw • Gilbert K. Chesterton
... more calmly, as if relieved, but still with an undercurrent of passion, "whether I could ever live again in the life of another. But if I did it would be in the life of a man. I am not made to live in a woman's life, really to live, giving out the force that is in me. I know I'm a ...
— A Spirit in Prison • Robert Hichens
... of women listening to my inspiring verses ... visits as honoured guest to the homes of great popular leaders like Roosevelt ... dignity and rides in parlour cars, instead of dusty, dirty box cars ... interviews of weight and speeches of consequence ... and the newspapers would drop their undercurrent of levity when I was written about in them, and treat ...
— Tramping on Life - An Autobiographical Narrative • Harry Kemp
... falsehood; and that, in whatever form it comes, from the courteous white lie—as man dares to call it—of polished society, to the double-dyed blackness of malignant hypocrisy, God sees only the varying shades of dissimulation; springing, in whatever form, from a deep-running undercurrent of selfishness and worldliness. We may be deceived into believing words are genuine when they are not so; but every disingenuous word uttered is, before God, the image and likeness of the duplicity that reigns within. To us they may seem the beautiful garments that envelop purity and truth; but ...
— The Elements of Character • Mary G. Chandler
... confidence in perfection it has makes it love the lords of change. What makes revolutionists is either self-pity, or indignation [252] for the sake of others, or a sympathetic perception of the dominant undercurrent of progress in things. The nature before us is revolutionist from the direct sense of personal worth, that chlide, that pride of life, which to the Greek was a heavenly grace. How can he value what comes of accident, or usage, or convention, whose ...
— Miscellaneous Studies: A Series of Essays • Walter Horatio Pater
... working toward its completion; and yet we neared the end with misgiving and doubt, for we had the necessity of believing, if we would keep ourselves still sane. All of us had noticed that so far as there was an element of terror in the strange incidents, it lay in the fact of a subtle undercurrent of connections, as if Fate were dimly pointing all the while toward the invisible culmination. Suddenly there would be a new manifestation of Auber's faculty, and a new instance would be added, illusive, baffling, and yet forming each time new threads ...
— Shapes that Haunt the Dusk • Various
... "being taken from an affectionate father," while the remaining members of the family were entirely ignored. Mrs. Scott immediately bristled up and with much warmth of feeling said that she had noticed the omission and believed that the action of the Archbishop was premeditated. Just here was an undercurrent which as an intimate friend of the family I fully understood. After Virginia Scott's death at the Georgetown Convent Mrs. Scott was most outspoken in her denunciation of the Roman Catholic Church, which she felt had robbed her of ...
— As I Remember - Recollections of American Society during the Nineteenth Century • Marian Gouverneur
... the quick light of his eyes had given place to a dark, dreamy expression, his skin became a little dulled, and his talk slower, though not less musical or pleasant. Indeed, his conversation had distinctly improved. Previously there was an undercurrent of self-consciousness; it was all gone now. He talked as one knowing his audience. His office became again, as it had been before, a rendezvous for the few interesting men of the place, including the Avocat, the Cure, the ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... thence into a discussion of local affairs in which they had recently acted as allies when Ryumin had been Lieutenant-Governor of the Moscow province. No undercurrent of enmity marred their intercourse. Gregoriev was certainly an adept at applying or loosening his screws. His guest had felt them sharply once or twice before to-day. He knew Gregoriev's power; and Michael asked no more. He had soon made the General ...
— The Genius • Margaret Horton Potter
... only a few meager details, with a portrait that suggests plainly enough those qualities of boldness and craft which characterized his tactics. Governor Dobbs appears to have had a special love towards Hugh, whose family he had known in Ireland, for an undercurrent of almost fatherly pride is to be found in the old Governor's reports to the Assembly ...
— Pioneers of the Old Southwest - A Chronicle of the Dark and Bloody Ground • Constance Lindsay Skinner
... undercurrent of water, due to the presence of the high range of mountains, becomes more apparent as the traveller advances into the interior; though the soil is still sandy and barren, and little vegetation can as yet be seen, trees and shrubs become more plentiful, ...
— A Narrative of Captivity in Abyssinia - With Some Account of the Late Emperor Theodore, - His Country and People • Henry Blanc
... savoury the dinner progressed, the latter proving to be a novelty that the hostesses of Red Gap thereafter slavishly copied, and with the advent of the coffee ensued a noticeable relaxation. People began to visit one another's tables and there was a blithe undercurrent of praise for my efforts to smarten the ...
— Ruggles of Red Gap • Harry Leon Wilson
... conscious of an undercurrent of sympathy with the forlorn waif her father had brought from the city some months before. The very love and awe with which the mountains filled her imaginative soul gave her comprehension of the fear with which they imbued the dull-witted ...
— The Junior Classics Volume 8 - Animal and Nature Stories • Selected and arranged by William Patten
... seemed to her that everyone was feeling happy and at ease except herself and Craven. They were ill matched. She became horribly self-conscious. She felt as if people were looking at them with surprise, as if an undercurrent of ridicule was creeping through the room. Surely many were wondering who the painted old woman and the young man were, why they sat together in the corner by the window! She saw one of the musicians smile and whisper to the companion beside him, and felt certain he was speaking ...
— December Love • Robert Hichens
... yet with an undercurrent of deep enthusiasm that struck an answering chord in Cuthbert's heart. All true and deep feeling moved him to sympathy. His friend was talking in riddles to him; but he felt the earnestness and devotion of the man, and his sympathy was ...
— The Lost Treasure of Trevlyn - A Story of the Days of the Gunpowder Plot • Evelyn Everett-Green
... claim his bride. In the earlier part of the play, a hint is given of Gonzales' rancorous hate of Laval, the undercurrent of which is now revealed. Gonzales, beneath the seal of confession, obtains the secret of the crime of Francoise. In her presence, as the betrothed Laval rushes to embrace his bride, he taunts him with her guilt. ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 19. Issue 539 - 24 Mar 1832 • Various
... Seward's character and career had developed, as always happens, strong antagonisms. One of the earliest symptoms among the delegates at Chicago was the existence of a strong undercurrent of opposition to his nomination. This opposition was as yet latent, and scattered here and there among many State delegations, but very intense, silently watching its opportunity, and ready to combine upon any of the other candidates. The opposition ...
— Abraham Lincoln, A History, Volume 2 • John George Nicolay and John Hay
... he was shocked and distressed by the sudden and horrible disaster; and yet as an undercurrent to these first natural thoughts, there ran presently a distinct notion that he would have felt the grievousness of it more keenly had Madeleine perished in that cruel manner and her sister survived to ...
— The Light of Scarthey • Egerton Castle
... introductions with a charming courtesy, but Carlisle detected beneath his agreeable manner a faint undercurrent of stoic weariness. The cold weather had lately touched the troublesome throat: Mr. Canning spoke to-night with perceptible hoarseness. Carlisle assured him that he had won a permanent place in Foxe's "Book of Martyrs" (of which she ...
— V. V.'s Eyes • Henry Sydnor Harrison
... but a few of those who really shared in the heretical view; the testimony of orthodox writers is all in support of this surmise. Equally clear is the fact that while the religious authorities were thus rigorous a steadily deepening undercurrent of opinion made for 'Latitude.' How far this Latitude might properly go was a troublesome question, but at any rate some were willing to advocate what ...
— Unitarianism • W.G. Tarrant
... is quicksand, a flour-barrel, perforated with small holes, should be used as a curb, to prevent the sand from caving in. The barrel must be forced down as the sand is removed; and when, as is often the case, there is an undercurrent through the sand, the well will ...
— The Prairie Traveler - A Hand-book for Overland Expeditions • Randolph Marcy
... of life and the primitive joys of life. They worked, that company, and they made of their work a game that every man of them loved to play. And Dade, loving the things they loved and living the life they lived, speedily forgot that there was still an undercurrent of antagonism beneath that surface of work and play and jokes and songs and impromptu riding and roping contests (from which Jose Pacheco was laughingly barred because of his skill and in which Dade himself was, somehow, never invited to join). He forgot that the antagonism ...
— The Gringos • B. M. Bower
... the grip that weak little Reverend has already got on this town," he went on. "He's a sly one. Preaching ain't in it with the undercurrent he's let loose here. It's just sapping the foundations of society. It's setting free a lot of good stuff, but it's striking Tate ...
— Joyce of the North Woods • Harriet T. Comstock
... the thrill, swing, and excitement of the Spinney movement were gone. Red fire, hilarity, and stimulants could not be used to spice this daylight gathering of men ranged in orderly rows on their settees—and subtle suggestion had already gone abroad. Yet the undercurrent of opposition to the further dictation by the party ring was shown by the applause that greeted every reference by the speaker to the conditions that existed in the party. On the text of Spinney, personating Protest, the orator ...
— The Ramrodders - A Novel • Holman Day
... that possesses him. Certain it is, he feels the hush and solitude of the great forest, and, whether he will or not, all his musings are in some way cast upon that huge background of the night. Unless he is an old camper-out, there will be an undercurrent of dread or half fear. My companion said he could not help but feel all the time that there ought to be a sentinel out there pacing up and down. One seems to require less sleep in the woods, as if the ground and the untempered ...
— In the Catskills • John Burroughs
... groups of students and professional workers, especially those who are united in "Bohemian life" by artistic or literary interests. But while such sexually anarchistic women are not common in America, there is reason for fearing that, unless some unexpected check comes to this undercurrent towards sexual freedom, it may be found ten or twenty years hence that a surprisingly large number, but never a majority, of unmarried young women have fallen into the sexual promiscuity that is so common among unmarried men ...
— Sex-education - A series of lectures concerning knowledge of sex in its - relation to human life • Maurice Alpheus Bigelow
... of that I was sure. But whatever it was it did not affect the Schuyler sisters. They were eager to talk, anxious to hear, but they felt nothing of the undercurrent of mysterious meaning that ...
— Vicky Van • Carolyn Wells
... only the second wave that broke—curled over in that curious way. For our theory—which may be entirely wrong—is that the breaking is due to the undertow of previous waves. After a wave sprawls up on the beach, it runs swiftly back. This receding undercurrent—you can feel it very strongly if you are swimming just in front of a large wave about to break—digs in beneath the advancing hill of water. It cuts away the foundations of that hill, which naturally ...
— Pipefuls • Christopher Morley
... suspect that some sullen undercurrent of intense feeling drove these eddying foam bells of flattery into the stream of conversation; or was her reply merely a chance ricochet shot, more accurately effective than ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... her. Though Francis Madigan rarely ate anything that was prepared for the family dinner, she could remember the rare times when he had absented himself from it, and feel again the usually ignored undercurrent of the realities upon which their young lives ...
— The Madigans • Miriam Michelson
... met by a sombre but unalterable determination to carry the war to a successful conclusion and to spare no sacrifices which could lead to that end. Amid the humiliation of our reverses there was a certain undercurrent of satisfaction that the deeds of our foemen should at least have made the contention that the strong was wantonly attacking the weak an absurd one. Under the stimulus of defeat the opposition to the war sensibly decreased. ...
— The Great Boer War • Arthur Conan Doyle
... and that he saw another face as he mixed his colors, and not that of the siren before him. Or it may have been that, as he looked into the eyes of the Countess, he saw too deeply into the whirlpool of passion and pain which made up the undercurrent in this beautiful ...
— The Fortunes of Oliver Horn • F. Hopkinson Smith
... speaking of Flanders. From the time of Charles the Fifth the most severe laws were enacted to put down the outrages, but there was an undercurrent of sympathy with the outrage-monger which kept the system alive until 1840. Then the Government took the matter in hand, and treated outrage-mongering as what it is—an act of war; and quartered troops on the inhabitants and stamped the ...
— Muslin • George Moore
... patrons in a row for their stinginess. Now and again there suddenly comes to light an undercurrent of aversion and hatred which we did not suspect. Where had more good things fallen to his lot than in England? Which country had he always praised more? But suddenly a bitter and unfounded reproach escapes him. England is responsible for his having become faithless ...
— Erasmus and the Age of Reformation • Johan Huizinga
... sort dragged from course to course. Absolute strangers would have exhibited less restraint; for the ghost of an old comradeship made the fourth at the feast and prated to them in exiguous voice of paths that had diverged. Drake noticed, besides, an undercurrent of antagonism between Conway and Mallinson. He inquired what each had ...
— The Philanderers • A.E.W. Mason
... one phase of what may be seen in Trafalgar Square. But with early autumn and the shortening days and the steadily increasing pressure of that undercurrent of want and misery through which strange flotsam and jetsam come to the surface, one saw, on the long benches or crouched on the asphalt pavement, lines of men and women sitting silently, making no appeal to passers-by, but, as night fell, crouching lower in their thin garments or wrapping ...
— Prisoners of Poverty Abroad • Helen Campbell
... songs there is ever in them something of the melancholy undercurrent that has been detected under the laces and arabesques of Chopin's nominally frivolous dances. Foster's ballad form was extremely attenuated, but the melodic content filled it so completely that it seems to strain ...
— Marse Henry, Complete - An Autobiography • Henry Watterson
... you ask such a question? Because of the emeralds. It is only a mad lark, after all, and no one need know of it. Oh, Monsieur Valmont,' she cried pleadingly, clasping her hands, and yet it seemed to me with an undercurrent of laughter in her beseeching tones, 'will you not enact for us the part of clergyman? I am sure if your face were as serious as it is at this moment, the robes of a ...
— The Triumphs of Eugene Valmont • Robert Barr
... maids, come buy! come buy!" with an undercurrent of the long rhymed cry of the hawker of haberdashery, of which Shakespeare has given us a specimen as regards the ...
— Mistress Margery • Emily Sarah Holt
... Calabar is one of the most thrilling in the history of missions, yet through it also there runs an undercurrent of tragedy— the tragedy of unseized opportunities and unfulfilled hopes. As one reads, he can fancy that he is standing by a forest at night listening to the sound that the wind brings of a strange conflict between a few brave spirits, and legions ...
— Mary Slessor of Calabar: Pioneer Missionary • W. P. Livingstone
... half-hours when she was alone with him she showed her love for him with a passion and emphasis that was almost terrifying. Sometimes when she clung to him it was as though she was afraid that it was not going to last. He discovered in the very beginning that below all her happy easy life, an undercurrent of apprehension, sometimes only vaguely felt, sometimes springing into sight like the eyes of some beast in the dark, ...
— Fortitude • Hugh Walpole
... to followers instead of to the master. Painters change their styles, but seldom their original bent of mind. With Giorgione there was a lyric feeling as shown in music. The voluptuous swell of line, the melting tone of color, the sharp dash of light, the undercurrent of atmosphere, all mingled for him into radiant melody. He sought pure pictorial beauty and found it in everything of nature. He had little grasp of the purely intellectual, and the religious was something he dealt with in no strong devotional way. The fete, the concert, the fable, the legend, ...
— A Text-Book of the History of Painting • John C. Van Dyke
... consumption developed themselves. As a young man he was lively and joyous, always ready for frolic, and with a great fund of humor, especially in caricature. Students of human character know how consistent these traits are with a deep undercurrent of melancholy, which colors the whole life when the immediate impulse ...
— The Great German Composers • George T. Ferris
... or alloyed with the pride, of the world, betoken His original agency, and His long-suffering presence. Even where there is habitual rebellion against Him, or profound far-spreading social depravity, still the undercurrent, or the heroic outburst, of natural virtue, as well as the yearnings of the heart after what it has not, and its presentiment of its true remedies, are to be ascribed to the Author of all good. Anticipations or reminiscences of His glory haunt the mind of the self-sufficient sage, ...
— The Idea of a University Defined and Illustrated: In Nine - Discourses Delivered to the Catholics of Dublin • John Henry Newman
... you. You are making an odd yet vivid impression on me. I believe you will face danger just as you did Mr. Lanniere, in a half-nonchalant and a half-satirical mood, while all the time there will be an undercurrent of downright earnestness and heroism in you, which you will hide as if you ...
— An Original Belle • E. P. Roe
... appreciate his conduct therein, I entreat thee, O candid reader (not that any reader ever is candid), to remember that he is brimful of new ideas, which, met by a deep and hostile undercurrent of old ideas, become more provocatively billowy ...
— Kenelm Chillingly, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... felt that her gaiety rippled over an undercurrent of pain, Stephen bent forward and touched her hand with ...
— One Man in His Time • Ellen Glasgow
... with an undercurrent of dislike. Shirley lost no time. He compelled the old man to run through his paces, as Holloway criticized each study in miming. Just as the capitalist would swing his arms, limp with his left leg, shift his head ever so little, from side to side in his walk, so Shirley copied ...
— The Voice on the Wire • Eustace Hale Ball
... Even the sinister undercurrent of antagonism against the Quirt could not whip her emotions into feeling that she was doing anything more than live the restricted, sordid little life of a poorly equipped ranch. She had ridden once with Frank Johnson to look through a bunch of ...
— Sawtooth Ranch • B. M. Bower
... up to the delicious intoxication of some loved presence. How many a passionate heart throb, how many sweet pains are engendered in one's heart, how many sighs given and returned, what tender passages on such nights! And what would a ball be without this undercurrent of what we call flirtation; in reality, this yearning for ...
— A Heart-Song of To-day • Annie Gregg Savigny
... at the back of his mind there ran an undercurrent of thought, or as of some one talking, to the effect that the Pope's old method of remaining as a prisoner in the Vatican was a foolish and unhumble pose. (He supposed he must have read it all somewhere in history.) Surely even Catholics used to talk like ...
— Dawn of All • Robert Hugh Benson
... we went to the opera, and afterwards, our plans made out, we walked to the house of the insulted and virtuous lady. She received us with great dignity, but yet there was an agreeable undercurrent in her voice and manner which I thought ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... personal use, are perfect models for a man of business. And this may be remarked throughout his whole career, that no pressure of events nor multiplicity of cares prevented a clear, steadfast, undercurrent of attention to domestic affairs, and the interest and well-being of all dependent ...
— The Life of George Washington, Volume I • Washington Irving
... Thus an extensive circulation is carried on. The air that moves from the equator in the upper atmosphere, gradually sinking to the surface of the earth, finally ceases to move toward the poles, and returns as an undercurrent to the equator, where it again rises ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I., No. 3, January 1858 - A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics • Various
... different from Hawaii, has an extreme beauty altogether its own, which wins one's love, though it does not startle one into admiration like that of the Hawaiian gulches. Is it because that, though the magic of novelty is over it, there is a perpetual undercurrent of home resemblance? The dash of its musical waters might be in Cumberland; its swelling uplands, with their clumps of trees, might be in Kent; and then again, steep, broken, wooded ridges, with glades of grass, suggest the Val Moutiers; and broader sweeps ...
— The Hawaiian Archipelago • Isabella L. Bird
... his mind was an undercurrent of disgust—with himself, with Jeff, with the whole situation. Why had he ever let himself get mixed up with such an outfit? Government by the people! The thing was idiotic, mere demagogic cant. Power was to the strong. He had always known ...
— The Vision Spendid • William MacLeod Raine
... labor and capital) with the utmost efficiency." Also the best authorities, and even the government investigators themselves, are urging a speedy return to private ownership and operation at the earliest possible moment after the war. The same undercurrent of feeling, or rather conviction, is rapidly spreading among our own people ...
— Socialism and American ideals • William Starr Myers
... accompaniment), we were reminded of these lines from Roger's "Human Life": "And feeling hearts, touch them but rightly, pour a thousand melodies unheard before." He seemed to sing out of very wantonness, and his song seemed to have that soft undercurrent of melody heard in the chimes of Belgium—with just a hint of plaintiveness in it to make the joy and the brightness ...
— See America First • Orville O. Hiestand
... There's no water so treacherous and deceitful as you'll find in some of those billabongs. A man starts to ride across a place where he thinks the water is just over the grass, and blunders into a deep channel—that wasn't there before—with a steady undercurrent with the whole weight of the Darling River funnelled into it; and if he can't swim and his horse isn't used to it—or sometimes if he can swim—it's a case with him, and the Darling River cod hold an inquest on him, if they have time, before he's buried deep in Darling River mud ...
— Children of the Bush • Henry Lawson
... cold, dignified tone of hauteur, as it was her bounden duty to speak; but, nevertheless, she was conscious of an undercurrent of feeling, whispering that, under other auspices, the avowal would have brought to her ...
— East Lynne • Mrs. Henry Wood
... the cruel distinctions based on sex. Though our State laws have been essentially changed, and positions in the schools, professions, and world of work secured to woman, unthought of thirty years ago, yet the undercurrent of popular thought, as seen in our social habits, theological dogmas, and political theories, still reflects the same customs, creeds, and codes that degrade women in the effete civilizations of the old world. Educated in the best schools to logical reasoning, trained to liberal thought in politics, ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume III (of III) • Various
... voter must be not only a citizen versed in government, but one loyal to his country, and generous and forbearing with his fellow-citizens, not looking always to the word and the act, but looking sometimes to the undercurrent which actuates these—to the presence of immediate interest, which is always strong in human nature, to the love of race, and to the love of section, which comes next to the love ...
— Black and White - Land, Labor, and Politics in the South • Timothy Thomas Fortune
... The northern and larger of the two floes, acted strongly upon by the gale, and opposed by the smaller floe, was slowly but irresistibly swinging round, and in its sweep it had come into contact with a very large berg, which, influenced apparently by some undercurrent, was with equally irresistible force actually making its way to windward in the teeth of the gale. The result was a scene of wild chaos and confusion and destruction compared with which that upon which ...
— The Log of the Flying Fish - A Story of Aerial and Submarine Peril and Adventure • Harry Collingwood
... the relative value or rank of the two bents of mind there has ever been, and probably forever will be, great difference of opinion. Even in this intensely "practical" age there is an undercurrent of feeling that the narrowly "practical" individual is not the final ideal, and the innermost conviction of many is the same as that of the poet who declares that "a dreamer lives forever, but a thinker dies in a ...
— Essay on the Creative Imagination • Th. Ribot
... terrible," adds Merejkovsky. But earlier his humour was lighter, less tinged with the tragic; in those days Pushkin never failed to be amused by what Gogol had brought to read to him. Even Revizor (1835), with its tragic undercurrent, was a trifle compared to Dead Souls, so that one is not astonished to hear that not only did the Tsar, Nicholas I, give permission to have it acted, in spite of its being a criticism of official rottenness, but laughed uproariously, and led the applause. Moreover, he gave Gogol a grant of money, ...
— Dead Souls • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol
... any man's bosom,' he was able to say. His patience was inexhaustible. He had naturally a most cheerful and sunny temper, was highly social and sympathetic, loved pleasant conversation, wit, anecdote, and laughter. Beneath this, however, ran an undercurrent of sadness; he was occasionally subject to hours of deep silence and introspection that approached a condition of trance. In manner he was simple, direct, void of the least affectation, and entirely ...
— The Every-day Life of Abraham Lincoln • Francis Fisher Browne
... quietly, but as it seemed to me with an undercurrent of emotion in her voice; "I did not misunderstand him. He meant what he said, and I would have forced the truth from him, whatever happened. I was determined to make him show me what he felt. That London season was sometimes ...
— Miss Bretherton • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... they spoke, an undercurrent of pensive thought was flowing in the old scholar's soul and his tones grew tenderer and tenderer. The echoes of Ebenezer's effusive speech were in his ears and the artificial notes rang strangely genuine. ...
— Children of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... of Unionism, there were many secret friends of slavery in San Francisco. One felt them like an undercurrent, covert and disquieting. To determine where men stood, a public meeting had been called for May 11. Where Post ran into Market street, affording wide expanse for out-door gathering, a speaker's stand was built. Here the issues of war, it was announced, ...
— Port O' Gold • Louis John Stellman
... and ascendency wherever they may be thrown; his vast strength, his redundant health, had a power of themselves—a moral as well as physical power. He naturally possessed high animal spirits, beneath the surface of which, however, at times, there was visible a certain undercurrent of malignity and scorn. He had evidently received a superior education, and could command at will the manner of a man not unfamiliar with a politer class of society. From the first hour that Philip ...
— Night and Morning, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... them busy. The narrow escape of the King from assassination, followed by his excommunication from the Church, worked a curious effect on the minds of the populace, who were somewhat bewildered and uncertain as to the possible undercurrent of political meaning flowing beneath the conjunction of these two events; and their feelings were intensified by the announcement that the youth who had attempted the monarch's life,— being proved as suffering from hereditary brain disease,—had received ...
— Temporal Power • Marie Corelli
... intensity of "Jerusalem" is happily relieved by the undercurrent of Miss Lagerloef's sympathetic humour. When she has almost succeeded in transporting us into a state of religious fervour, we suddenly catch her smile through the lines and realize that no one more than she feels the futility of fanaticism. The stupid blunders ...
— Jerusalem • Selma Lagerlof
... past into the house. Miss Rosetta composedly stepped into the cab and drove to the station. She fairly bridled with triumph; and underneath the triumph ran a queer undercurrent of satisfaction over the fact that Charlotte had spoken to her at last. Miss Rosetta would not look at this satisfaction, or give it a ...
— Further Chronicles of Avonlea • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... cigars and talked intermittently then; they were close enough together to be silent when they chose. And all the while the undercurrent of Dr. ...
— The Glory Of The Conquered • Susan Glaspell
... fact of not having to listen to her any longer added immensely to her charm. She continued, of course, to talk to him, but it didn't matter, because he no longer made any effort to follow her words, but let her voice run on as a musical undercurrent to his thoughts. ...
— The Reef • Edith Wharton
... aware," went on the Chancellor, who had not touched the undercurrent, "that you are guilty ...
— Arms and the Woman • Harold MacGrath
... because you have never opened your mind to me, I have not known what you were thinking, or have left you to think alone about it. Mother and daughter are too near not to hear each other without words. There is between you and me a constant undercurrent of communion, and occasionally a passing of almost definite thought, I believe. We may not be aware of it at the time, but none the less it ...
— Weighed and Wanting • George MacDonald
... He had traversed it a hundred times, and not having to inquire the way he had only to remember and to reflect. An undercurrent of speculation had been flowing through his mind as to where ...
— The Redemption of David Corson • Charles Frederic Goss
... formless and intuitive fashion she felt a slight undercurrent of distrust for Halloway, which she combated as ungenerous but could not ...
— A Pagan of the Hills • Charles Neville Buck
... This pestiferous creature should be exterminated by traps, by grain soaked in alcohol, or strychnia, by fair means or foul. But personally, I am taking no share in his destruction. Any bird-lover, after reading the foregoing account, can scarcely have missed the undercurrent of my affection for the little rascal. He is a thorough optimist; he is absolutely persistent; no hardship seems to dampen his ardor. His heart is valiant above that of most birds so that he has dared to make of man his ...
— The Meaning of Evolution • Samuel Christian Schmucker
... at him, he was conscious, through some subtle undercurrent of feeling, that her spirit was drenched with the young summer, with the pulsing of life of the June forest and the scent of wild grape and honeysuckle which filled the air. Her face was lifted to the fluted leaves of a sycamore, from which the song of a thrush rippled like ...
— The Miller Of Old Church • Ellen Glasgow
... another month was gone these were the changes it had wrought. The four so strangely bound together by ties of suffering and sin went on their way, to the world's eye, blessed with every gracious gift, but below the tranquil surface rolled that undercurrent whose mysterious tides ebb and flow in human hearts unfettered by race or rank or time. Gilbert was a good actor, but, though he curbed his fitful temper, smoothed his mien, and sweetened his manner, his wife soon felt the vanity of hoping to recover that which never had ...
— Pauline's Passion and Punishment • Louisa May Alcott
... where he warns his friend, as it were with a bright twinkle in his tearful eyes and a smile on his face, not to kiss him at that moment, as he must wash himself. This joking about his friend's dislike to osculation is not without an undercurrent of seriousness; indeed, it is virtually a reproach, but a reproach cast in the most delicate form and attired in ...
— Frederick Chopin as a Man and Musician - Volume 1-2, Complete • Frederick Niecks
... dispassionately prescribing for Ireland in 1784, while there was yet time, the radical remedy, Reform, patiently turning, when that was refused, to palliatives like mutual free trade in 1785 and the Catholic franchise in 1793; and meanwhile, with an undercurrent of cool scepticism, preparing the ground for the only alternative to Reform, short of a revolutionary separation of the two countries, legislative Union, and remorselessly pushing that Union through by the ...
— The Framework of Home Rule • Erskine Childers
... determined upon his voyage. The breath of the bright June morn as he threw open the window-shutter filled him with hope; his heart responded to its joyous influence. The excitement which had disturbed his mind had had time to subside. In the still slumber of the night the strong undercurrent of his thought resumed its course, and he awoke with his will still firmly bent in ...
— After London - Wild England • Richard Jefferies
... enter the bay, we must take one of two passages, one to the right of the islet, the other to the left. The fate of the Roman fleet is in my hands. I could pilot you by one of these passages, which to the eye is exactly like the other, and an undercurrent would tow your galleys onto a sunken reef. Not one ...
— The Brass Bell - or, The Chariot of Death • Eugene Sue
... really like to do," he whispered to me, in confidence, "is to give him one for his tete, as we say in cribbage. But suppose I must speak him fair." Did his best in that direction though undercurrent of observation in lengthy paper he read decidedly set in direction of making TATE out as a cantankerous wrong-headed person who, proposing to bestow some L160,000 in way of free gift, expected to have his wishes consulted in such matter of detail as selection ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Volume 102, March 19, 1892 • Various
... of discourse the liability to failure lies in the direction of dullness, monotony, lack of vitality and warmth. This is because the feeling is deep and still; is an undercurrent, strong but unseen. This restrained, repressed feeling is the most difficult fittingly to express. In this kind of speech some marring of just the right effect is difficult to avoid. Simplicity, absolute genuineness, are ...
— Public Speaking • Irvah Lester Winter |
