"Can't" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... to have husbands. What about the ones who have no husbands—the girls, the widows, the abandoned? Isn't it better to give them a trade than to force them to take a lover? Some of them want to leave off being obliged to beg for the help of a man. Can't you see that for a lot of women work means freedom? Can you blame them for demanding the right to work? That's the ...
— Woman on Her Own, False Gods & The Red Robe - Three Plays By Brieux • Eugene Brieux
... cargo won't be much in her great hold. Hatches are too small. Now, I'm all hatch. Can't open up in this weather. We can turn to and get our running tackle bent. It'll moderate before the evening, and if it does we can work all night. Will your Rile Highnes' be ready ...
— The Vultures • Henry Seton Merriman
... dollars. At the end of the seventh week I shall have over fifty dollars clear. I have made up my mind to give up the place at the end of that time. Twelve dollars is the most I ever earned, but I can't ...
— The Journal of Arthur Stirling - "The Valley of the Shadow" • Upton Sinclair
... It can't be done. You're here. Period. Forget about trying to get back. Earth doesn't want you." Her voice sounded choppy, as though she were trying to keep ...
— The Man Who Hated Mars • Gordon Randall Garrett
... on the young fellow, himself?" he demanded. "It can't do him any good, Josie. That sort ...
— Heart of the Blue Ridge • Waldron Baily
... it shocks you I can't help it. I don't want to live, and I don't want my child to live, either. Life is too hard. If—if I had had any choice in the matter, I would never have been born. And so if I die before the baby comes, it is the best thing that could possibly happen for ...
— The Rocks of Valpre • Ethel May Dell
... "of course, we can't all stay here and wait for that woman; but I propose that three of us shall stay and that the rest shall go home. I'll be one to stay. And then, in an hour three of you come back, and let us go and get our suppers. In this way we can keep a committee here all the time. All night, if ...
— The Captain's Toll-Gate • Frank R. Stockton
... such a chaos?" he exclaimed. "I can't see my way through it, and when I try to get information from the people here, they seem to have an understanding among themselves to leave me under a wrong impression, or even to make my uncertainties still greater! ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... It depends on what I find him thinking. Of all things, my boy, keep your face to the Sun. You can't shine of yourself, you can't be good of yourself, but God has made you able to turn to the Sun whence all goodness and all shining comes. God's children may be very naughty, but they must be able ...
— Ranald Bannerman's Boyhood • George MacDonald
... "I can't stand that, and I won't," he exclaimed, aiming a blow at Pigeon's head which sent him backwards; while Alick Murray, who had likewise jumped up, appeared on the other ...
— The Three Midshipmen • W.H.G. Kingston
... have tried then and lost? It's my turn then. Miss Glen, you have heard the worst of me this afternoon. I have been a drunkard, a scoundrel. I have fallen low, very low. But sometimes I am a gentleman. Perhaps in your presence I might always be. I can't tell. I'm not sure. Will you take me for your lover, and in good time your husband, under such circumstances? Faith, I'm afraid it'll not be for better, but ...
— A Little Traitor to the South - A War Time Comedy With a Tragic Interlude • Cyrus Townsend Brady
... all right," he murmured. "I'll just oil her up while I'm waiting. This can't last long; ...
— Tom Swift and his Motor-cycle • Victor Appleton
... delight in Avery, my cuddy man, who is as quick as 'greased lightning', and full of fun. His misery is my want of appetite, and his efforts to cram me are very droll. The days seem to slip away, one can't tell how. I sit on deck from breakfast at nine, till dinner at four, and then again till it gets cold, and then to bed. We are now about 100 miles from Madeira, and shall have to run inside it, as we were thrown so far out of our ...
— Letters from the Cape • Lady Duff Gordon
... jolt," agreed Judith, "to have the romp come in on merit when she can't prove it. It really looks like ...
— Jane Allen: Junior • Edith Bancroft
... "We can't do anything. He looks like a beggar, anyhow. I'll see if I can find a watchman, on my way down town, and ...
— Gold Seekers of '49 • Edwin L. Sabin
... "Can't help it, sah. Dey makes me swar. Feels as if I could bust inter ten thousand emptins, dey's so agerwatin. Heah, my sister, take dat row. You, gemlin" (to a white man), "take dat. Heah, chile, step in dar an' pick right smart, or ...
— Success With Small Fruits • E. P. Roe
... where a distinguished-looking young man, having declined the lady's invitation to dance, but being pressed by,' I can't make up the lancers without you,' somewhat reluctantly accepted, performed his part so well that his partner was quite eprise with him, and even ventured on a little flirtation. You can imagine her dismay when, a little later in the evening, she saw her charming acquaintance ...
— Frost's Laws and By-Laws of American Society • Sarah Annie Frost
... of him," owned Flouflou; "you can't rile me by saying that. Didn't I love you first? And a lump better than ...
— A Chair on The Boulevard • Leonard Merrick
... little boy wants to hear a story about Washington," said Wilson. "Can't you tell him something about the man? I think I could. Any one who wants to appreciate the character of Washington, and the extent of his services during the Revolution, should know the history of the campaign of 1776, when every ...
— The Old Bell Of Independence; Or, Philadelphia In 1776 • Henry C. Watson
... I shall call her—the darling! We must not wait until her papa comes home. She can't be 'baby' for three years. I shall have to decide on her name myself. Oh, what a pity! I, who never could decide anything. Poor dear Angus! he does all—he had even to fix the wedding-day!" And her musical laugh—another rare charm that she ...
— Olive - A Novel • Dinah Maria Craik, (AKA Dinah Maria Mulock)
... thugs at Ceralvo's. They've just been paid off and had no chance for any fun at all before they were ordered out on this escort duty. That money's been burning in their pockets now for three whole nights, and they just can't stand it so long as a drop of liquor's to be had by hard riding. No soldier is happy till he's dead broke, major, leastwise none I ...
— Foes in Ambush • Charles King
... tide of adversity, you're already a long way up the medical ladder. If you climb straight you'll end with an appointment of Physician-in-Ordinary and a knighthood thrown in as makeweight. Old Macalister used to prophesy it, you remember, when we were up at Edinburgh. Therefore, I can't, for the life of me, discover any cause why you should allow yourself to have these touches of the blues—unless it's liver, or some other internal organ about which you know a lot more than I do. Why, man, you've got the whole world before you, and ...
— The Seven Secrets • William Le Queux
... cried Turkey Proudfoot. He was almost frantic. "How can I fight that fellow if I can't see him?" he cried. He looked up at the roof of the barn; but there was no one there except the gilded rooster that told which way the wind blew. He looked up at the roof of ...
— The Tale of Turkey Proudfoot - Slumber-Town Tales • Arthur Scott Bailey
... the Gilded Rose, although she's the simplest creature, really, with a tremendous sense of the responsibility of her riches. Poor child! There she is, walking toward us now, with those two young men. Of course, young men! Droves of young men! She can't get away from them any more than she can from her money. No, she's ...
— It Happened in Egypt • C. N. Williamson & A. M. Williamson
... On one occasion, in an address to a Captain Beer, who had pleaded to have his sloop returned to him, Captain Bellamy, after clearing his throat, began as follows: "I am sorry," he said, "that you can't have your sloop again, for I scorn to do anyone any mischief—when it is not to my advantage—though you are a sneaking puppy, and so are all those who will submit to be governed by laws which rich men have made for their own security, for the cowardly whelps have not the courage ...
— The Pirates' Who's Who - Giving Particulars Of The Lives and Deaths Of The Pirates And Buccaneers • Philip Gosse
... I got a little chat with two or three people as they were passing, for, you know, when one sits there, they can't help saying something; though I assure you all the men are so exceedingly odd they don't care whether they speak to one or no. As to Mr Meadows, he's really enough to provoke one to death. I suppose he's in one of his absent fits. However, I assure you I think it's ...
— Cecilia Volume 1 • Frances Burney
... she passed under when I met her was Helen Vaughan, but what her real name was I can't say. I don't think she had a name. No, no, not in that sense. Only human beings have names, Villiers; I can't say anymore. Good-bye; yes, I will not fail to call if I see any way in which you can help ...
— The Great God Pan • Arthur Machen
... to remaining in the camp, that is out of the question. I can't stay there; when I hear a musket-shot, I should be ill did I not see the flash. As for my business, that is to take care of your horses, and you are on them. Monsieur, think you I should not have saved, had I been able, the life of the poor black horse down there in the trench? Ah, how I loved ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... Fauntleroy, "and that's what makes me wonder. She told me not to ask you any questions, and—and I won't, but sometimes I can't help thinking, you know, and it makes me all puzzled. But I'm not going to ask any questions. And when I miss her very much, I go and look out of my window to where I see her light shine for me every night through an open place in the trees. It is a long way off, but she puts it ...
— Little Lord Fauntleroy • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... to be pleased to see me delighted with them, but she had no pleasure in them herself, any more than I have now; and once, when Harris said: 'Come, Miss Vaughan, why can't you play with these things as Miss Reynolds does?' she answered: 'Ah, Harris! what have I to do with these? ...
— The Fairchild Family • Mary Martha Sherwood
... him to prison? it can't be possible.... Why! you don't know him! God himself is not ...
— The Gods are Athirst • Anatole France
... in New York who know her awfully well told me that she'd never see twenty-nine again. An actress of twenty-nine who can't look nineteen had better go into a convent! Though, when you notice, her mouth and eyes are hard, aren't they? What would Max Doran's wonderful mother say if ...
— A Soldier of the Legion • C. N. Williamson
... small collection be made for the present support of the mother; and, when her health is recovered, I will take her into my family, in quality of an upper servant, or medium between me and my woman; for, upon my life! I can't endure to chide or give directions to a creature, who is, in point of birth and education, but one ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett
... to do anything of the sort. If you think I can't stand it as long as you can, you are mistaken," replied Thomas, proudly; and taking the dipper, he continued to bale out the water, whistling an air to indicate his indifference to the perils that ...
— Little By Little - or, The Cruise of the Flyaway • William Taylor Adams
... o'clock of this same day, dim with snow, and dizzy in a hurricane of wind, "We can't go on like this," said the ...
— The Magnetic North • Elizabeth Robins (C. E. Raimond)
... "I can't make out why it matters to you, one way or the other, nor why you should think it worth talking about," the ...
— Sir Dominick Ferrand • Henry James
... said. "I'm to greet you kindly from my sweetheart, and here's a little loaf for you. She took it from the kitchen. There's plenty of bread there, and you must be hungry. You can't possibly get into the palace, for you are barefooted, and the guards in silver and the lackeys in gold would not allow it. But don't cry; you shall go up. My sweetheart knows a little back staircase that leads up to the bedroom, and she knows where ...
— Journeys Through Bookland V2 • Charles H. Sylvester
... requesting to have his garment "The rather that be possible," he overwhelms the procrastinating man of cloth with the stern remark "You have me done to expect too," evidently a bold version of "Vous m' avez fait trop attendre," which draws forth the natural excuse "I did can't to come rather." Passing by a number of good things which one would like to analyse if space permitted, we arrive at "For to ride a horse," a fine little bit of word painting almost Carlylean in its grotesqueness. "Here is a horse who have a bad looks. ...
— English as she is spoke - or, A jest in sober earnest • Jose da Fonseca
... under the landlord's tax is given in one old man's memory of his childish hunger and his mother's pitiful self-denial! "We was not allowed free speech," he writes, "so I would just pull mother's face when at meals, and then she would say, 'Boy, I can't eat this crust,' and O! the joy it would bring ...
— Essays in Rebellion • Henry W. Nevinson
... Domesticks, are all left to swim for their Lives, without one friendly Plank to assist them to Shore. In short, he left me sick, in Debt, and without a Penny; but as I begin to recover, and have a little time to Think, I can't help considering myself, as one whisk'd up behind a Witch upon a Broomstick, and hurried over Mountains and Dales through confus'd Woods and thorny Thickets, and when the Charm is ended, and the poor Wretch dropp'd ...
— The Wits and Beaux of Society - Volume 1 • Grace Wharton and Philip Wharton
... of a smile, too, at the idiocy of the thing? I locked the poor beggar in the drawing-room. I saw him there, as plainly as I ever saw anything in my life, and the furniture glimmering, though it was pitch dark: I can't describe it. It all seemed so desperately real, absolutely vital then. It all seems so meaningless and impossible now. And yet, although I am utterly played out and done for, and however absurd it may sound, I ...
— The Return • Walter de la Mare
... remember, it was marking some shirts which she had taken to make, and after a while she began to talk to me. 'Thou foolish child,' says she, 'thou art always crying (for I was crying then); 'prithee, what dost cry for?' 'Because they will take me away,' says I, 'and put me to service, and I can't work housework.' 'Well, child,' says she, 'but though you can't work housework, as you call it, you will learn it in time, and they won't put you to hard things at first.' 'Yes, they will,' says I, 'and if I can't do it they ...
— The Fortunes and Misfortunes of the Famous Moll Flanders &c. • Daniel Defoe
... will make too much noise. We will bury it under this straw for a few days, and open it somehow or other by-and-by, when they have given up looking for the box. You can get the real key of it for us, Rodolphus, can't you!" ...
— Napoleon Bonaparte • John S. C. Abbott
... as "heavy foregrounds" nor yet far enough away to be panoramas. Buildings which are light in color and sunny street scenes fall into this division of exposures. When in doubt, take it at one twenty-fifth of a second with stop "16." You can't miss it far, ...
— If You Don't Write Fiction • Charles Phelps Cushing
... came to the priest's house intoxicated and asked permission to sleep in the barn. "No," said the Father, "go sleep in the gutter." "Ah, Father, sure an' I've shlept in the gutter till me bones is all racked with the rheumatism." "I can't help that; I can't let you sleep in the barn; you will smoke, you drunken beast, and set the barn on fire and maybe burn the house, and they belong to the parish." "Ah, Father, forgive me! I've been bad, very bad; I've murdered an' kilt an' shtole ...
— Literary Hearthstones of Dixie • La Salle Corbell Pickett
... a kind of sinking of the heart that I thought I could not bear up against, until he finished. 'You must know then,' continued my father, 'since you appear as yet ignorant of it, that M. de B—— has won the affections of your idol; for he can't be serious in pretending that it is his disinterested regard for me that has induced him to take her from you. It would be absurd to expect such noble sentiments from a man of his description, and one, besides, who is a perfect stranger ...
— Manon Lescaut • Abbe Prevost
... I can't tell how pleased I was with the enterprise I had in mind: it suggested all sorts of amusing and surprising developments. Moreover, I left Harriet, finally, in the breeziest of spirits, having quite forgotten her disappointment over the non-arrival ...
— Adventures In Friendship • David Grayson
... say of those deplorable "personal interviews" which appear in the newspapers, and in which the important person interviewed is made by the cub reporter to say things which he never said, or thought, or dreamed of—"You can't expect a fifteen-dollar-a-week brain to describe a ...
— Appreciations of Richard Harding Davis • Various
... or a god," Thus say the lexicons; I'll not belie 'em, For though I mind not in the least the nod Of these same critics, still I'll not defy 'em; But that you may know more of this same god, (Though I can't sing as Homer sung of Priam,) I'll write a very pretty little poem, Of which this ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 12, Issue 330, September 6, 1828 • Various
... be frightened, but I can't help that. I must have somebody here," she murmured, and slapped the mare sharply on the flank. "Home, Clover. Oats! ...
— Kildares of Storm • Eleanor Mercein Kelly
... eyes of what was evidently a portly women. "What do you want?" snarled out the female defender of the premises. "We want to come and see if we can place a few wounded officers in this house." "You can't come in here!" shouted the woman slamming the door together. A few knocks induced her again to open the door two or three inches. "Madam, we must come in here; we shall do you no harm." "You can't come here; I am a lone ...
— Three Years in the Sixth Corps • George T. Stevens
... away with Aladdin, yet incur no "blood-guiltiness" (see ante, p. 52 and note), he might surely have contrived to send him down into the Cave again and then close it upon him. As to the Magician giving his ring to Aladdin, I can't agree with Sir Richard in thinking (p. 48, note 1) that he had mistaken its powers; this seems to me quite impossible. The ring was evidently a charm against personal injury as well as a talisman to summon an all-powerful and ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton
... So, had I nothing to say but in reply to your comments on state affairs (hang them!) or in applause of your Italian friend, of whom I say, as Charles II. said of the honest yeoman, "I can admire virtue, though I can't imitate it," I think it highly probable that your letter might still remain in a certain box of tortoise-shell and gold (formerly belonging to the great Richelieu, and now in my possession), in which I at this instant descry, "with many a glance of woe and boding dire," sundry ...
— The Disowned, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... camp that carries so small a bullet," said our host, holding up the ball, "and there can't be the least doubt that the Hindu is the man who ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, April, 1876. • Various
... me more like a series of combats, hand-to-hand fights for life, and fierce struggles between men and strange powers. You buy your newspaper and that's your ticket to the amphitheatre. But the distance is hazy and far; there are clouds of dust and you can't see clearly. To make out just what is going on you ought to get down in the arena yourself. Once you're in it, the view you'll have and the fighting that will come your way will more than repay you. Still, I don't ...
— In the Arena - Stories of Political Life • Booth Tarkington
... a beggar!" he burst out; "a beggar who has taken me in about his fine family, and his fine prospects; a beggar who can't support my child—Yes! I say it again, a beggar who looks me in the face, and talks as you do. I don't care a damn about you or your father! I know my rights; I'm an Englishman, thank God! I know my rights, and my Margaret's rights; and ...
— Basil • Wilkie Collins
... in his study. They followed him. "My God!" he cried, "can't they understand that I want to be ...
— The History of a Crime - The Testimony of an Eye-Witness • Victor Hugo
... in 'us'—for it's only these clerical gentlemen that end in 'us'; and if I say that some fellow of that kind has the key hanging on a nail in his bedroom: then I don't mean to say that he has locked up the Lord and put the key on a nail in his bedroom: but all I mean to say is that we can't get in, and that there will be no divine service for its to-night—for us who have toiled six days making shoes and coats—who have spent the whole week brewing and baking and butchering for the reverend clergy in order that the said clergy might have strength enough on the seventh ...
— Master Olof - A Drama in Five Acts • August Strindberg
... Porter, as Alice Langham entered the drawing-room. "I want to ask a favor of you. I'm sure you won't mind. I would ask one of the debutantes, except that they're always so cross if one puts them next to men they don't know and who can't help them, and so I thought I'd just ask you, you're so good-natured. You don't mind, ...
— Soldiers of Fortune • Richard Harding Davis
... glad,' he answered. 'Thank you. I'm very fond of you. I can't help it. I suppose I love you, and I have no business to—and sometimes you say things that ...
— Fair Margaret - A Portrait • Francis Marion Crawford
... "D'you think you can fix me with a buck for a job like this? You can't bribe me to stand around while you bump off Donnegan. ...
— Gunman's Reckoning • Max Brand
... and marrow of all philosophy. Your practical man, poor wretch, will try to help this and that, and torment his soul with ways and means, and preventives and forestallings; your philosopher quietly says—It can't be helped. If it ought to be, it will be—if it is, it ought to be. We did not make the world, and we are not responsible for it.—There is the sum and substance of all true wisdom, and the epitome of all that has been said and written thereon from Philo the Jew to ...
— Hypatia - or, New Foes with an Old Face • Charles Kingsley
... building all opening upon it, and once again comes the feeling of playing a rather ridiculous role, as I circle awkwardly around the tank over very uneven bricks, and around short corners where an upset would precipitate me into the tank—amid, I can't help thinking, "roars of laughter." The Prince is very lavish of his flowery Persian compliments, and says, "You English have now left nothing more to do but to bring the dead back to life." In the court-yard my attention is called to a set of ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle Volume II. - From Teheran To Yokohama • Thomas Stevens
... collapsing upon the nearest chair with all the prostration a news bearer's heart could desire. "And she was always talking about what he used to do and used to think and used to say. Why—why I can't ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume VII. (of X.) • Various
... fourteen childer.' 'Well, Paddy, then I must distrain that cow.' 'If your honor has law for it, to be sure you will.' Well, what does Paddy do? He stamps the word 'Tithes' upon her side, and the parson can't find a soul to take the cow. So he gets a regiment and a half, by way of brokers (much laughter)—fourteen or fifteen companies, with those amiable young gentlemen, their officers, at their head, who march seventeen or eighteen miles across the Bog of Allen to take his cow; they bring the cow ...
— Irish Wit and Humor - Anecdote Biography of Swift, Curran, O'Leary and O'Connell • Anonymous
... Just then I let go the oar to feel for a cud, to steady my narves, and I hadn't any. The tide swept me under her counter, and away I slipped top o' water. I couldn't manage to get back, so I pulled the lock and let the thunder-box slide. That's what comes of sailin' short of supplies. Say, can't you raise ...
— Historic Tales, Vol. 1 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... into the mouth of the radical, Felix Holt? "This world is not a very fine place for a good many of the people in it. But I've made up my mind it shan't be the worse for me if I can help it. They tell me I can't alter the world—that there must be a certain number of sneaks and robbers in it, and if I don't lie and filch somebody else will. Well, then, somebody else shall, for I won't—I will never be one of the sleeks dogs—I would never choose to withdraw myself ...
— Volume 10 of Brann The Iconoclast • William Cowper Brann
... war of course I can't remember," she said pensively. "I imagine, however, that there was a sort of instinctive jealous dislike towards England and everything English, simply because England had had a long start in colonisation, commerce and all the rest ...
— The Great Prince Shan • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... rejoices in a well-conducted daily journal, the East Anglian Times, which I hear, and am glad to hear, is a fine property, and I see all the leading towns in Suffolk have a paper to themselves, even if they can't get up a decent paragraph of local news—and some of them I know, from my experiences of Suffolk life, are quite unequal to that—once a week. The plan is to have some sheets already printed in London, at some great establishment, whence perhaps a hundred ...
— East Anglia - Personal Recollections and Historical Associations • J. Ewing Ritchie
... goodness' sake, cut some bread on the sideboard," said the angry master, "and hand it round instead of staring about you like a stuck pig. What they taught you at Sir William Jute's I can't conceive. I didn't undertake to make ...
— Marcella • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... "You can't do anything to-night," said the cat, for he knew what the prince was thinking of, "but when morning comes go down to the sea, and look not to the right or the left, and let no living thing touch you, for if you do you shall never leave the island. Drop the second ball into the water, ...
— The Golden Spears - And Other Fairy Tales • Edmund Leamy
... Property.' He is extraordinarily popular in Boulogne (the people in the shops invariably brightening up at the mention of his name, and congratulating us on being his tenants), and really seems to deserve it. He is such a liberal fellow that I can't bear to ask him for anything, since he instantly supplies it whatever it is. The things he has done in respect of unreasonable bedsteads and washing-stands, I blush to think of. I observed the other day in one of the side gardens—there are gardens at each side of the house too—a ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster
... read him! But he is published by the same firm that publishes Home Gossip, and I can't help seeing his cover sometimes while I am waiting in the waiting room to ...
— Something New • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
... the class-room, puts his hands in his pockets and whistles, and thanks Heaven that he will see no more of the boys for so many hours. I do not know what the corresponding action on the part of a mistress may be, as I believe they have no pockets and can't whistle, but there is probably a corresponding state of mind. I venture, therefore, to suggest that in our High Schools there should be a greater rapprochement than is usual between parents and mistresses and girls in order ...
— Three Addresses to Girls at School • James Maurice Wilson
... justice is interverted when Those engines of the law, Instead of pinching vicious men, Keep honest ones in awe. . . . Tell them the men that placed him there Are friends unto the times; But at a loss to find his guilt, And can't commit his crimes. ...
— Bygone Punishments • William Andrews
... me, sakes alive, and a bottle of stove polish! I can't make this out," said Uncle Wiggily. "That little girl is so worried about her lost sister that she doesn't pay any attention to me. But I'll help her just ...
— Uncle Wiggily's Travels • Howard R. Garis
... likely true in part," rejoined Wallace, "though it can't be quite accurate, as the old gentleman had but one leg, and running was altogether out of the question with him. It was probably old Tim Viner, who ran like a deer when a young man, ...
— Afloat And Ashore • James Fenimore Cooper
... can't arrest the real murderer," he said with an air of supreme irony, "you can always indulge in the luxury of ...
— The Mystery of the Yellow Room • Gaston Leroux
... madam; would you were,— So that my lord your son were not my brother,— Indeed my mother!—or were you both our mothers, I care no more for than I do for heaven, So I were not his sister. Can't no other, But, I your daughter, he must be ...
— All's Well That Ends Well • William Shakespeare [Collins edition]
... horrid thing one can't "try on one's body" and choose such a one as would suit one; but do you consider your body accidental, as it were, or do you really think we could do better for ourselves than has been done for us in this matter? After all, ...
— Records of a Girlhood • Frances Anne Kemble
... at him again, with a quick turn of her head, her eyes less wide-open while she searched his face. "I want to employ you. Can't I—what ...
— No Clue - A Mystery Story • James Hay
... you prove that," said the Deacon, "for if it is true, I will sell no more clover-hay. I can't get as much for clover-hay in the market as I can ...
— Talks on Manures • Joseph Harris
... can't be expecting common grubbers of men to have all the advantages of manners that you've got. No, sir; you can't. They hain't had the bringing up. They hain't had the schooling, and they hain't had the soldier drills to teach them to carry themselves ...
— That Girl Montana • Marah Ellis Ryan
... deductions. I do not believe that all the sermons, so called, that have been preached in this land, put together, are equal to it for preaching. We ought greatly to rejoice in him. He occasionally suggests something a little more than human. You can't confound him with the other inhabitants of Brooklyn. How they must shudder when they ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great Philosophers, Volume 8 • Elbert Hubbard
... "I can't help no other, Squire!" said the voice overhead; "such a cauch o' pilm an' twigs, an' birds' droppins'! If I ...
— The Ship of Stars • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... do but wait on me. My cousin Drinkwater and I were soon great friends; he took me to the Opera, where I listened to singing such as I had never heard at Gorse Bush; he took me to the Chiswick Fete, where I saw flowers such as I had never dreamed of; and he took me—how many times? well, I can't recollect—to that dear, delightful Crystal Palace, where we visited more foreign countries than I knew of in my Geography, and where we often found ourselves quite alone, looking at those charming seeds from the West India Islands; and where we enjoyed ...
— Comical People • Unknown
... says Mr. Bright, "those Southerners, I hate 'em, And hope the Black Republicans will soon exterminate 'em; If freedom can't rebellion crush, pray tell me what's the use of her?" And so he chuckles o'er the ...
— War Poetry of the South • Various
... Silver Makhorka kind—have sailed as a stoker on the Azov Sea, have been a fisherman on the Black—on the Dubinin fisheries; I have loaded watermelons and bricks on the Dnieper, have ridden with a circus, have been an actor—I can't even recall everything. And never did need drive me. No, only an immeasurable thirst for life and an insupportable curiosity. By God, I would like for a few days to become a horse, a plant, or a fish, or to be a woman and experience childbirth; I would like to live with the inner life, ...
— Yama (The Pit) • Alexandra Kuprin
... the German, "I can't give you any. I come from Etain, and you know where that is as ...
— Flying for France • James R. McConnell
... sir," returned my wife, "you are pleased to be facetious: but I wish I were a queen, and then I know where my eldest daughter should look for an husband. But now that you have put it into my head, seriously, Mr. Thornhill, can't you recommend me a proper husband for her? She is now nineteen years old, well grown and well educated, and, in my humble opinion, does ...
— The Ontario High School Reader • A.E. Marty
... we know. We've got eight men locked up in St. Elizabeth's, all of them absolutely psychotic, and one human vegetable named Paul Wendell. We can't get ...
— Suite Mentale • Gordon Randall Garrett
... "I can't throw a rope as good as Nort," answered the stouter lad, as he urged his pony, Blackie, into the ...
— The Boy Ranchers on the Trail • Willard F. Baker
... I can't say exactly how much farther I tramped that evening. When one is stumbling along at night through an exceedingly ill-kept wood in a state of hunger, dampness, and exhaustion, one's judgment of distance is apt to lose some of its finer accuracy. I imagine, however, that I must have covered at ...
— A Rogue by Compulsion • Victor Bridges
... "And I can't tell either; that's more, ain't it. Now listen, and I'll tell you where I got it, and then you may find out what it is, for I don't know. Promise ...
— The Wide, Wide World • Susan Warner
... let him learn Latin? Too much knowledge, you see; it is that which does harm. Now I, for instance, can't read or write, and therefore I am not in prison." Aramis looked at the man, who seemed to think that being a jailer in the Bastile was not being in prison. As for Baisemeaux, noticing the little effect produced by his advice and his port wine, he left the ...
— Ten Years Later - Chapters 1-104 • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... conventional distance. "Do you know," he said long afterwards, "the thought that first loosened me from the life I led? How can I love my fellow-men and yet get rich by the sweat of their brows? I couldn't do it. You are not a Christian, and can't call yourself one, I said to myself, if you do that. The heathenish selfishness of business competition started me away ...
— Life of Father Hecker • Walter Elliott
... trick! Do it again," observed the commanding officer of the battery. "I don't go in for tricks," Tyeglev answered drily and walked into the other room. How it happened that he guessed the card right, I can't pretend to explain: but I saw it with my own eyes. Many of the players present tried to do the same—and not one of them succeeded: one or two did guess one card but never two in succession. And Tyeglev had guessed ...
— Knock, Knock, Knock and Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... I want to ask you about something that troubles me—I don't know what is right. I know I know very little—I know I cannot say much or can't say it well—but I feel sometimes as if I must speak to everybody I can reach, and tell them what I do know, and beg them to be safe and happy. And then something tells me that if I do so, people will think me crazy, or be offended,—that ...
— Say and Seal, Volume I • Susan Warner
... terrific, we nearly jumped out of our skins, thinking it was the din of war, and not of a football game that we heard. But, in spite of all their wild efforts, neither side was scored, and we all laughed and said, "Oh, well now the pot can't call the ...
— Story of My Life • Helen Keller
... For one can know Him as well in a wood, in a field, or even contemplating the eternal vault like the ancients. My God! Mine is the God of Socrates, of Franklin, of Voltaire, and of Beranger! I am for the profession of faith of the 'Savoyard Vicar,' and the immortal principles of '89! And I can't admit of an old boy of a God who takes walks in his garden with a cane in his hand, who lodges his friends in the belly of whales, dies uttering a cry, and rises again at the end of three days; things absurd in themselves, and completely opposed, moreover, to all physical laws, which prove ...
— Madame Bovary • Gustave Flaubert
... I can't give you credit. It ish against my rules, and if I proke tem for you I vill have to ...
— The Trials of the Soldier's Wife - A Tale of the Second American Revolution • Alex St. Clair Abrams
... and if ever love, and tenderness, and sympathy could be distilled in tones, such drops were those that fell upon the mind's ear "can't ...
— Queechy, Volume II • Elizabeth Wetherell
... and yet Rose says they are poor now to what they used to be—is not that very strange? She says it is because of the increased expenditure, and that I don't understand; but it's very hard, very hard in my old days. If she can't live upon thirty thousand a-year, I wonder how she expects her poor old grandmother to live upon thirty pounds, for that's all my certainty; and the little farm, I must say, would have gone to destruction, but for Edward Lynne—he does every thing for it, poor fellow. She ...
— Turns of Fortune - And Other Tales • Mrs. S. C. Hall
... turned to his companion with the same good-natured, half humorous authority. "Let your wife wait; take a drive with me. I want to talk to you. She'll be just as glad to see you an hour later, and it's her fault if I can't come home with ...
— The Argonauts of North Liberty • Bret Harte
... at her father. "What do you think of all this, sir?" she asked. "If I stay at home, dismiss Delia, and do the housework myself, and Lanse finds some suitable position, can't we get on? Charlotte can put off the school of design another year. We will all be ...
— The Second Violin • Grace S. Richmond
... yours too, Asticot," she said gently, "and you will see how nice that will be. Men can't do these things where there is a woman to look after them. It ...
— The Beloved Vagabond • William J. Locke
... you are ill, ma belle," then as he gazed upon her lovely form and face, half affectionately, half in defiance, he suddenly exclaimed: "O Teresa, you're the handsomest woman I ever saw. I could love you so, if you'd let me. Why can't we be friends, Teresa? I know I did wrong, but why need we make an eternal quarrel of the matter. Ah, my charming prize, why not transfer to me the affection you are wasting upon one, who, perhaps ere this, is false ...
— The Duke's Prize - A Story of Art and Heart in Florence • Maturin Murray
... seem all mad," said the admiral. "I can't make out what you are about. How came you ...
— Varney the Vampire - Or the Feast of Blood • Thomas Preskett Prest
... tavern, and ordered drink. Here they are—the three knaves. "Who's to pay? I can't," said ...
— The Gaming Table: Its Votaries and Victims - Volume II (of II) • Andrew Steinmetz
... right—the devil's in him! If we could only make him murder Sedgett and get hanged for it! He's got a friend who's a major in the army? Oh, come, I say; this is pitching it too stiff. I shall insist upon seeing his commission. Really, Ned, I can't advise. I'll stand by you, that you may be sure of—stand by you; but what the deuce to say to help you! Go before the magistrate.... Get Lord Elling to issue a warrant to prevent a breach of the peace. ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... that young gorilla at home. Hitherto, I always thought that the old prophet was very cruel for calling the bears to kill the children for making sport of his head, but now I am forced to believe that he did a Christian act. If your boy had been in the crowd, he would have died first. If I can't find another seat on this train, I'll ride on the cow-catcher rather ...
— The Canadian Elocutionist • Anna Kelsey Howard
... to herself, 'as soon as I've made a frock for Eleanor, I'll have a tea-party. Eleanor and Amy shall be new friends coming to tea for the first time—if only the parlour chairs weren't too big for the table!' she sighed deeply. 'They can't look nice and real, when they're so high up that their legs won't go underneath. People don't make our tables and chairs like that—I don't see why they can't make doll-house ones properly. Now, if I was a carpenter I'd make a doll-house just ...
— The Rectory Children • Mrs Molesworth
... back. "He can't get across!" shouted some. But others cried: "He can! He's coming! Save yourselves!" And with shrieks they scattered wildly across the open, making for the kiosks, the pavilions, the trees, anything that seemed to promise hiding or shelter ...
— Kings in Exile • Sir Charles George Douglas Roberts
... by my chimney in a November day is as good for an invalid as a long season spent in Cuba. Often I think how grapes might ripen against my chimney. How my wife's geraniums bud there! Bud in December. Her eggs, too—can't keep them near the chimney, an account of the hatching. Ah, a ...
— I and My Chimney • Herman Melville
... we're both ambitious. Well, I'm in charge of a strip of frontier territory, but so far I've had the veto of a cautious and vacillating superior to contend with. The climate, however, is breaking down his health, and he can't keep his post much longer; I want full control. Now to the north of my malaria-haunted district there's a belt of dry and valuable country, inhabited by industrious Mohammedans. The French have their eye upon it, but our people know its worth. Though our respective ...
— Blake's Burden • Harold Bindloss
... warm-breathed summer night, Long, deep draughts of pure delight,— Quick the shaken foliage parted, And from out its shadows darted Dwarf-like forms, with hideous faces, Cries, contortions, and grimaces. Still I stood beneath the lonely, Sighing lilacs, saying only,— "Little friends, you can't alarm me; Well I know you would not harm me!" Straightway dropped each painted mask, Sword of lath, and paper casque, And a troop of rosy girls Ran and kissed me ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 83, September, 1864 • Various
... cliff—the season's new-dropped lamb, its earliest fleece; and then the Christmas dawn, draping those dim highlands with red-barred plaids and tartans—goodly sight from your piazza, that. Goodly sight; but, to the north is Charlemagne—can't have the Hearth Stone Hills ...
— The Piazza Tales • Herman Melville
... sail from the Elbe, wind N.E. in the ship called The Jonas-in-the-Whale.... Some say the whale can't open his mouth, but that is a fable.... They frequently climb up the masts to see whether they can see a whale, for the first discoverer has a ducat for his pains.... I was told of a whale taken near Shetland, ...
— Moby Dick; or The Whale • Herman Melville
... wretchedly thin field out again yesterday," said Mrs. Hoopington. "Why you didn't bring one or two hunting men down with you, instead of that stupid Russian boy, I can't think." ...
— Reginald in Russia and Other Sketches • Saki (H.H. Munro)
... and ask him, Jobson!" said Paddock, smiling; "I don't know his reasons, if he had any. At all events, I tell the tale as I heard it, and can't alter it!" ...
— The International Monthly Magazine, Volume 5, No. 1, January, 1852 • Various
... and tied in big knots," she said ruefully, "but Sophie will just have to do them all over again when she gets up. Oh, dear, where are my boots, I wonder? I can't see them anywhere about. Well, I must go out in these, I suppose;" and sitting down on the floor she put on a pair of dainty Queen Anne shoes, with satin bows and steel stars, that she had worn the evening ...
— Naughty Miss Bunny - A Story for Little Children • Clara Mulholland
... it—or Smith," Ralston answered. "He has come to his inevitable end. When there's bad blood, mistaken ideals, and wrong standards of living, you can't do much—you can't do anything. There is only one thing which controls men of his type, and that is fear—fear of the law. His love for you is undoubtedly the best, the whitest, thing that ever came ...
— 'Me-Smith' • Caroline Lockhart
... where Bishop claimed the true line to be. When he came to that part of the case, he rose mightily in his stirrups. Turning upon Chapman, who was a quiet, mild-mannered old gentleman, he said: "The gentleman's eyes may twinkle like Castor and Pollux, twin stars; but he can't wink out of sight that town line of Blandford. He may place one foot on Orion and the other on Arcturus, and seize the Pleiades by the hair and wring all the water from their dripping urns; but he can't wash out that town line of Blandford." The local newspaper got hold of the ...
— Autobiography of Seventy Years, Vol. 1-2 • George Hoar
... to boil the pot, One can't always watch the kittle. You may credit it or not— Now and then ...
— Tobogganing On Parnassus • Franklin P. Adams
... the middle of the Yorkshire miners that are on strike now, when Mr. Grieve fired up. And everybody backed him. Reggie told me it was splendid; he never saw a better shindy. It is a pity about her. Everybody says he might have a great career if he pleased. And she can't be any companion to him.—Now, Marcia, you know your head is better, so don't say it isn't! Why, I have used a whole bottle of eau de ...
— The History of David Grieve • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... been very well since morning; he hasn't much strength, and he can't go out. But don't worry yourself; there is some one who can replace ...
— Parisian Points of View • Ludovic Halevy
... not," he said sulkily. "I can't walk. I haven't walked two consecutive blocks in three years. Automobiles have made legs mere ornaments—and some not even that. We could have Johnson out there chasing us over the country at five dollars ...
— The Man in Lower Ten • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... a foreground, and then the rest melts away. I don't know what is meant by a middle distance—that's why I can't shoot." ...
— Great Possessions • Mrs. Wilfrid Ward
... he; and heav'd a sigh, Die when he will he's not your debtor: I must obey, and he must die,— That's if I can't contrive it better. ...
— Wild Flowers - Or, Pastoral and Local Poetry • Robert Bloomfield
... strangers was levied and brought in with great cheerfulness. On which occasion it was, says Theophrastus, on the allies requesting that their contributions for the war might be ascertained and stated, Crobylus, the orator, made use of the saying, "War can't be fed at so much a day." Now was all Greece up in arms, and in great expectation what would be the event. The Euboeans, the Achaeans, the Corinthians, the Megarians, the Leucadians, and Corcyraeans, their people and their cities, were ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... "You can't pull the wool over my eyes, Baxter. That man's name is no more Nolly than mine is George Washington ...
— The Rover Boys at School • Arthur M. Winfield
... cashier is a first-class business man and can add up four columns of figures at once, and I have sent this boy to several business colleges with the request that he be taught the same accomplishment. I have spent seven hundred and fifty dollars on this boy's mathematics, and he can't add up one column of figures with any certainty of being correct. If there is any sense in him, I would like ...
— How to Become Rich - A Treatise on Phrenology, Choice of Professions and Matrimony • William Windsor
... mamma-Annie's dead now. You can't be a real live angel without being dead first, and I'd rather ...
— Star-Dust • Fannie Hurst
... a judge—and ought to be a good one, Froumois! A gentleman can't live at court as you have done, and learn nothing of the points of a fine woman!" The good dame liked a compliment as well as ever she had done at Lake Beauport in her hey-day of ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... "don't you think it your duty to help people realise that they can't regard such transactions de haut en bas, if they happen to have taken part in them? I have heard of the shameful condition of things down in Maine, where I'm told the French Canadians who've come in regularly ...
— The Minister's Charge • William D. Howells
... report of a vedette. "Fremont pushing forward. Horse and guns and the German division. Hm!" He sat the bay stallion, looking about him, then, "Cuninghame, you go back to General Ewell. Rear guard can't be more than three miles away. Tell General Ewell about the Germans and ask him to give me a little infantry. Hurry now, and if he gives them, ...
— The Long Roll • Mary Johnston
... the gate for us? Shall we be obliged to go home again? Can't we start to-day, M. ...
— Adventures of a Young Naturalist • Lucien Biart
... I can't claim to have been guided by any subtle theories—I have merely collected together the kind of ...
— The Nest Builder • Beatrice Forbes-Robertson Hale
... "I can't tell till I get there, but I'll try to find out how much they know. Don't you be afraid. I'll run fast enough if there's any sign of trouble. And if you come across a telegraph wire, cut it. The message may not have gone ...
— Soldiers of Fortune • Richard Harding Davis
... Mr. Barton had one son, Abner, who treated me well, and agreed to run away with me to New York, if we could get money from papa. But we waited and waited, and no letter came. So at last we decided to run away at any rate, for I was afraid Mr. Ford would come back and take me somewhere else. I can't tell you much about the journey, except that we walked most of the way, and we got very tired—or, at least, I did, for I am not so strong as Abner—till I broke down. I am stopping now at the house of Dr. Stone, who is very kind, and so is his sister, ...
— Helping Himself • Horatio Alger
... came in increasing numbers. Finally he asked them, "What shall I do with you? Where shall I send you? I don't know; I can do nothing for you." Their reply was, "Only pray with us; that can do no harm; if we can't go we must even stay. But if it is God's work, and his holy will that we go, he will open ...
— History of Rationalism Embracing a Survey of the Present State of Protestant Theology • John F. Hurst
... preceding chapter relate, as I have said, to the last year or two of my five years of life in the place of my birth. Further back my memory refuses to take me. Some wonderful persons go back to their second or even their first year; I can't, and could only tell from hearsay what I was and did up to the age of three. According to all accounts, the clouds of glory I brought into the world—a habit of smiling at everything I looked at ...
— Far Away and Long Ago • W. H. Hudson
... 'I can't stay a minute, auntie,' the vivacious girl burst out in the unmistakable accents of condescending pertness, and then she caught sight of the well-dressed, good-looking man in the corner, and her bearing changed as though by a conjuring trick. She ...
— Leonora • Arnold Bennett
... "I can't refuse to do anything for such a charming gentleman, who gives me such excellent cigars," responded Don Jose gaily, and having made the child give him the mandolin, he sang to his own accompaniment. His voice, ...
— Carmen • Prosper Merimee
... "Can't be very strong or those fellows would be heading this way," declared Hal. "Maybe they think ...
— The Boy Allies in the Balkan Campaign - The Struggle to Save a Nation • Clair W. Hayes
... is come for a great big change." He emphasised the word with a tap of his cue upon the floor. "We can't play our game the way we've been playing it the last three years. We've been hammering wheat down and down and down, till we've got it below the cost of production; and now she won't go any further with all the hammering in the world. The other fellows, ...
— The Pit • Frank Norris
... that it is enough to receive him at the door, and to wait upon him. For my part, who as much as I can endeavour to reduce the ceremonies of my house, I very often forget both the one and the other of these vain offices. If, peradventure, some one may take offence at this, I can't help it; it is much better to offend him once than myself every day, for it would be a perpetual slavery. To what end do we avoid the servile attendance of courts, if we bring the same trouble home to our own ...
— The Essays of Montaigne, Complete • Michel de Montaigne
... worse, at two o'clock in the morning Mrs. Worthington thought it best to examine the child's throat; but when the mother asked the little girl to open her mouth, she said, "Mama, I can't." ...
— The value of a praying mother • Isabel C. Byrum
... true father would cast out a child because it got angry and shook its fist in his face? You will find Him again when you search for Him with all your heart. You have told Him you were sorry, and He has promised to forgive. You can't save yourself, but He can save you. Now, son, go and ...
— The City of Fire • Grace Livingston Hill
... know t' reets on 't missel, but I'st be sorry when yo conno see ony moor where Miss Charlotte an Miss Emily used to sit o' Sundays—An theer's th' owd house. Yo used to be 'lowed to see Miss Charlotte's room, where she did her writin, but they tell me yo can't be let in now. Seems strange, doan't it, 'at onybody should be real fond o' that place? When yo go by it i' winter, soomtimes, it lukes that lonesome, with t' churchyard coomin up close roun it, it's enoof to gie a body th' shivers. But I do bleeve, Miss Charlotte she could ha kissed ...
— The History of David Grieve • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... brains," amended Darrow. "I have enough of that sort myself," he added. He leaned forward, a hunger leaping in the depths of his brown eyes. "Helen," he pleaded, "can't you see ...
— The Sign at Six • Stewart Edward White
... her,' said Janet. 'But I would rather not go to my mother's yet, because my husband is sure to think I am there, and he might come and fetch me. I can't go back to him ... at least, not yet. Ought I to go back ...
— Scenes of Clerical Life • George Eliot
... couldn't control had forced him to do this thing; that he was sorry, but it couldn't be helped. He hoped his uncle would forgive him, and forget there was such a fellow in the wide world as Hen Condit. There was also some more that I can't just recollect; but it was to the effect that he believed he had money coming to him, so Mr. Condit could take it out of that and call it square. But just think what all this is going to do to the scouts, Elmer! Never since ...
— Afloat - or, Adventures on Watery Trails • Alan Douglas
... at the door, Sir," he said. "Me and Burler can't make out what he wants, but he won't go away, ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Sept. 26, 1917 • Various
... "You can't make a ribbon, what's worthy to be called a ribbon, with foliage plants," gruffly retorted the old gardener. "Master would be glad to see you in the house, Miss Frances, and yer's a letter what carrier ...
— Frances Kane's Fortune • L. T. Meade
... grandmother through a red haze. "It's the things you say, not mother's lovely clothes, that are exactly like a brood of horrid, ugly imps!" she cried. "Always you've kept everything about her a secret from me, but you can't go on doing it now. I've seen her beautiful picture. I know it's hers without any telling. Nothing can make me believe it isn't, no matter what you say, either of you. So you may as well tell me all about her. I won't move till ...
— The Heather-Moon • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... come up just at the right moment to rescue me?" she asked. "I have not thanked you yet for saving me, but I do so now most heartily. I can't tell you how grateful I feel. I am sure, no matter what you say, that those elephants would have killed ...
— The Elephant God • Gordon Casserly
... Freddy yelled. "You can't get to him anyway. I told you I threw away your semaphore flags, your blinker—everything. This country's hilly. You can't get your message to him anyway. Listen, Joe, you've still got time. You can stunt these things better than ...
— Frigid Fracas • Dallas McCord Reynolds
... "Americans can't understand 'em, and never will. No one ever saw a white man look at a country as a 'Pache does: he'll see everything. Ther ain't a ravine, gully, rock, bush, or tree, a foot high, thet he don't hev ...
— The Young Trail Hunters • Samuel Woodworth Cozzens
... miserable pittance doled out to me here. I have avoided even considering them before. Shall I tell you why? Because I didn't want to face the temptation they might bring with them. I always knew what would happen if escape became hopeless. It's the ugliness I can't stand—the ugliness of cheap food, cheap clothes, uncomfortable furniture, coarse voices, coarse friends if I would have them. How do you suppose I have lived here these last three years, a teacher in the national schools? Look up and down this long, dreary ...
— The Cinema Murder • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... can't be so," Ruth said. "There isn't a girl friendly enough with her for her to say ten pleasant words to. The poor little mite! I'm just as sorry as I can be for ...
— Ruth Fielding in Moving Pictures - Or Helping The Dormitory Fund • Alice Emerson
... a second time and with increased emphasis. She turned to Silvey. "You can go home, Bill. John can't come out. He's going to stay in ...
— A Son of the City - A Story of Boy Life • Herman Gastrell Seely
... it's nice and cool," said the old Capuchin. It was so damp that I actually shivered. "Would you like to see the church?" said the monk; "a jewel of a church, if we could keep it in repair; but we can't. Ah! malediction and misery, we are too poor to keep our church ...
— The Queen of Hearts • Wilkie Collins
... food, and wine, Will damp the genius, curb the spirit: These wants I'll own are often mine; But can't allow a want ...
— Poetic Sketches • Thomas Gent
... to try the rod; but something in my manner seemed at once to excite the suspicion and scorn of the sorcerer. "Yes, take it," said he, with uncalled-for vehemence, "but you can't stop it; there's water below here, and you can't help its bending, if you break your back trying to hold it." So he gave me the twig, and awaited, with a smile which was meant to express withering sarcasm, the discomfiture ...
— Myths and Myth-Makers - Old Tales and Superstitions Interpreted by Comparative Mythology • John Fiske |
