"Lamely" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... absolutely wicked man, the ideal sinner, at whom the preacher too often aims ideal arrows, which vanish in the air: not to him merely will it come home, but to ourselves, to us average human beings, inconsistent, half-formed, struggling lamely and confusedly between good and evil. Oh let us take home with us to-day this belief, the only belief in this matter possible in an age of science, which is daily revealing more and more that God is a God, not of disorder, but of order. Let us take home, I say, the awful belief, that every wrong ...
— Town and Country Sermons • Charles Kingsley
... great many practical applications can be found," Fenwick said lamely. "We'll have to make a report, first, however. There will be a need for a great many ...
— The Great Gray Plague • Raymond F. Jones
... felt warranted in taking an optimistic view of these vague words. "It's awfully good of you"—he began, lamely, and then paused. "I wonder,"—he took up a new thought with a more solicitous tone,—"I wonder if you would mind returning to me that ...
— The Market-Place • Harold Frederic
... with the leather but ten yards from the north goal, and a great murmuring sigh of relief went up from the seats and from along the side-lines when the whistle sounded. Then the Hillton players, pale, dirty, half defeated, trotted lamely off the field and around the corner of the stand to the little weather-beaten shed which served for dressing room. And the blue-clad team trotted joyfully down to their stage, and there, behind the canvas protections were rubbed down and plastered up, and slapped on the back by ...
— The Half-Back • Ralph Henry Barbour
... me," Adelle protested lamely, feeling that in her invective Pussy was reflecting upon ...
— Clark's Field • Robert Herrick
... it,” I admitted lamely. Larry had always been able to instruct me about most matters; it was wholly possible that he could ...
— The House of a Thousand Candles • Meredith Nicholson
... was Don Carlos to be thought of as well as you, and—and I thought the only hope of being any help was to get away," Standish went on lamely. "Myra, I beg of you not to expose me to the world as a coward, and to forgive me. There are officials down below waiting to question you about what happened. They've been questioning me, and I'm afraid I didn't tell them the truth. Now they're questioning Don Carlos. From what I ...
— Bandit Love • Juanita Savage
... "Reckon the Sweet Williams 'ull be out in the garden now; they do smell oncommon sweet. And mother-o'-thousands on the wall. Oh-h-h." A spasm of pain contracted his face. The nurse was hovering near and I saw my time was up. "My dear fellow," I said lamely, "I fear ...
— Leaves from a Field Note-Book • J. H. Morgan
... when Third Reading moved, and debate lamely set on foot again. WALTER LONG, who has greatly helped BONAR LAW in his successful management of Bill, set good example by moving Third Reading without additional word of comment or argument. Example thrown away. More last words spoken under embarrassing accompaniment of private conversation and ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 150, February 2, 1916 • Various
... caught in a wrong act, "That talk we had was so queer—I mean it was as if—don't you know?—as if we were—well, sort of the same at heart. I mean, of course, if he hadn't been German. War is queer," he continued, lamely, raising his cropped head and looking off at the horizon. "Awfully queer," he murmured, watching a dark cloud steal across the water, ...
— Four Days - The Story of a War Marriage • Hetty Hemenway
... realize," I said lamely. "Doesn't a little whiff of it ever eddy around somehow, ...
— The House of Pride • Jack London
... be in at the death. But the great trial was an anthem that had been prepared and arranged by Master Simon, and on which he had founded great expectation. Unluckily there was a blunder at the very outset; the musicians became flurried; Master Simon was in a fever, everything went on lamely and irregularly until they came to a chorus beginning "Now let us sing with one accord," which seemed to be a signal for parting company: all became discord and confusion; each shifted for himself, and got to the end as well, ...
— Old Christmas From the Sketch Book of Washington Irving • Washington Irving
... kicked the bleeding figure till it arose lamely. "Why did you do that?" His desire to strangle the life from him ...
— Pardners • Rex Beach
... was and how broken. She came a step or so towards me and then stopped short, and so we stood, shyly and awkwardly under Guy and Tarvrille's eyes, two yards apart. "You see," she said, and stopped lamely. ...
— The Passionate Friends • Herbert George Wells
... lamely, for Miss Prescott suddenly leaned back in the shadow, and it seemed to Patty that her face had grown pale and the hand that held ...
— When Patty Went to College • Jean Webster
... just as it trembled on his lips. Some brief inspiration of discretion warned him that that was ground too sacred for his blundering intrusion. "She seems downright lonely," he concluded, somewhat lamely and suggestively. "I don't think Mrs. Davies is cut out for this kind of army life. Here comes Langston now." He needn't have made that announcement. Mrs. Cranston was watching, waiting for him, and she glanced quickly to see where Miss Loomis was. That young lady, however, never ...
— Under Fire • Charles King
... must still be greatly dark, The moving why they do it; And just as lamely can ye mark How far perhaps ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 7 • Various
... history I had a royal namesake—an English king, with an ugly hump on his shoulders—as he's said himself, 'deformed, unfinished, sent into the world scarce half made up,' so that the 'dogs barked at him,' just as this brute of Clancy's has been doing at me. And this royal Richard, shaped 'so lamely and unfashionable,' made court to a woman, whose husband he had just assassinated—more than a woman, a proud queen—and more than wooed, he subdued her. This ought to encourage me; the better that I, Richard ...
— The Death Shot - A Story Retold • Mayne Reid
... nice chap—I think the best of the lot," he began, with assumed jocularity; then, seeing Cecily's eyes suddenly fixed on him, he added, somewhat lamely, "the padre! There were also two women in ...
— The Bell-Ringer of Angel's and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... forgetting that he had never suggested buying a typewriter. "I didn't stop to think. I'm sorry," he concluded, lamely. ...
— At the Sign of the Jack O'Lantern • Myrtle Reed
... to know the worst at once," said Raffles, rather lamely for him; "and then a man playing in a 'Varsity match is never quite his own master, you know. Still, he oughtn't to keep you waiting ...
— Mr. Justice Raffles • E. W. Hornung
... under hands, to see the circling battle that dwindles in the zenith. Then, perhaps, a wild adventurous dropping of one close beneath the other, an attempt to stoop, the sudden splutter of guns, a tilting up or down, a disengagement. What will have happened? One combatant, perhaps, will heel lamely earthward, dropping, dropping, with half its bladders burst or shot away, the other circles down in pursuit.... "What are they doing?" Our marksmen will snatch at their field-glasses, tremulously anxious, "Is that a white flag ...
— Anticipations - Of the Reaction of Mechanical and Scientific Progress upon - Human life and Thought • Herbert George Wells
... you that it ain't to be beat anywheres in the country. I'd say it is the best land your fa—er—ahem!" The speaker was seized with a violent and obviously unnecessary spell of coughing. "Somethin' must ha' gone the wrong way," he explained, lamely. "Feller ort to have more sense'n to try to ...
— Viola Gwyn • George Barr McCutcheon
... done all that is possible for the people," Father Ricardo began lamely. "The Church has always taught, for one thing, that the labourer ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand
... interruption, confessed a little lamely: "No, I haven't. I haven't—as it turns out. But I might have—if it wasn't for—" He paused a moment; sadly said, "Anyway, just as I thought I'd got her, I've ...
— Once Aboard The Lugger • Arthur Stuart-Menteth Hutchinson
... and added lamely "I thought you were—were—were some one else." She paused, then she went on with some slight return of her earlier sternness "Just the same, your coming ...
— Black Caesar's Clan • Albert Payson Terhune
... asking one of the masters how he reconciled the death of a kid like that, whom everybody loved, with his conception of an all-wise and all-merciful God. He answered, it has always seemed to me very lamely, that if we didn't believe that all was for the best, in this best of all worlds, we ...
— We Three • Gouverneur Morris
... returned the lad eagerly. "I should be glad to have your opinion of"—he hesitated, and then finished lamely, "of the Jacobis, I mean. You are such a judge of character, and all that ...
— Herb of Grace • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... your father, and your mother, who was ill, died with the shock, because they refused to go to Zululand whither Dingaan had ordered that they should be taken. So seeing that you were travelling here I came to rescue you, lest you should fall into their hands, and," he added lamely, ...
— The Ghost Kings • H. Rider Haggard
... So lamely told I the tale, as I had heard my Aunt Elizabeth tell it, when she knew not I listened or understood. Alicia heard me through and said nothing, save that it was a tale worthy of the Montressors. Whereat I bridled, for I too was a Montressor, ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1896 to 1901 • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... Douglas asked rather lamely, being at a loss for any adequate comment upon a tragedy which the child before him was ...
— Polly of the Circus • Margaret Mayo
... you—" began Tutt. Then he paused, recalling a certain celebrated wager which he had lost to Mr. Tutt upon the question of who cut Samson's hair. "I bet you don't know who said it!" he concluded lamely. ...
— By Advice of Counsel • Arthur Train
... Navy," added he Who sailed a thunder-junk upon the sea. Better they know than men unwarlike do What is an army and a navy, too. Pray God there may be sent them by-and-by The knowledge what a Christian is, and why. For somewhat lamely the conception runs Of a ...
— Shapes of Clay • Ambrose Bierce
... your brother man, Still gentler sister woman; Though they may gang a kennin' wrang, To step aside is human. One point must still be greatly dark, The moving why they do it, And just as lamely can ye mark How ...
— Practical English Composition: Book II. - For the Second Year of the High School • Edwin L. Miller
... turn aside or shut the child up either by pulling rank or cuffing the young offender with an open hand. To have this upstart defend Mrs. Bagley, in whose presence he could hardly lash back, put Mr. Fisher in a very unhappy state of mind. He swallowed and then asked, lamely, "Why does he ...
— The Fourth R • George Oliver Smith
... once illustrated his legal acquirements at this time by the relation of the following anecdote to his nephew: Josiah Ogden Hoffman and Martin Wilkins, an effective and witty advocate, had been appointed to examine students for admission. One student acquitted himself very lamely, and at the supper which it was the custom for the candidates to give to the examiners, when they passed upon their several merits, Hoffman paused in coming to this one, and turning to Wilkins said, as if in hesitation, "though all the while intending to admit him, Martin, I think he knows ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... might withdraw from the bargain. Thoroughly alarmed by that, Jefferson pressed the Senate for a ratification of the treaty. He still clung to his original idea that the Constitution did not warrant the purchase; but he lamely concluded: "If our friends shall think differently, I shall certainly acquiesce with satisfaction; confident that the good sense of our country will correct the evil of construction when it shall produce ill effects." Thus the stanch advocate ...
— History of the United States • Charles A. Beard and Mary R. Beard
... then, it will be because I truly—-" She paused, halted at the great word. "Because I truly do admire and care for him," she substituted, somewhat lamely. ...
— Harriet and the Piper - (Norris Volume XI) • Kathleen Norris
... ran up, and, as I supposed, found the Indian only bruised and stunned by his tumble. As I removed the dead beast from his body, Ollabearqui grunted and uttered a laconic "Good!" He then rose somewhat lamely, and he and I set about digging at the cave. Soon we managed to pull out the dog, which was dead, and then, pushing the panther's corpse into the cavern, we stopped up both ends with heavy stones and went on, descending to a track ...
— Captain Mugford - Our Salt and Fresh Water Tutors • W.H.G. Kingston
... manners, mysteries, and trades, Decrees, observances, customs and laws, Decline to your confounding contraries, And yet confusion live! Plagues incident to men, Your potent and infectious fevers heap On Athens, ripe for stroke! thou cold sciatica, Cripple our senators, that their limbs may halt As lamely as their manners! lust and liberty Creep in the minds and marrows of your youth; That 'gainst the stream of virtue they may strive, And drown themselves in riot! itches, blains, Sow all the Athenian blossoms; and their ...
— Shakspere, Personal Recollections • John A. Joyce
... write," he said, "or at least try to write. I think I can make a living at it. It's worth trying. There's nothing else, you see," he added, a little lamely. ...
— People of Position • Stanley Portal Hyatt
... it's the way one must talk when great folks stand near to hear. The Governor was there!" he said, lamely. ...
— All-Wool Morrison • Holman Day
... ambling nymph; I, that am curtailed of this fair proportion, Cheated of feature by dissembling nature, Deformed, unfinished, sent before my time Into this breathing world, scarce half made up, And that so lamely and unfashionable That dogs bark at me as I halt by them,— Why, I, in this weak piping time of peace, Have no delight to pass away the time, Unless to spy my ...
— Familiar Quotations • John Bartlett
... chains too long," said the Major. "I should have had them knocked off before, but—" he paused for a second, "but your coming so surprised me that of a truth I forgot," he continued lamely. Then he turned to Tessin. "See to it, Tessin! Ensign Barbour of the Tangier Foot was killed to-day. He was quartered in the Main-Guard. Take Knightley to his quarters and see what you can do. By the way, Knightley, there's a question I should have ...
— Ensign Knightley and Other Stories • A. E. W. Mason
... rather lamely it seemed, however. The editor said that it read amateurish, and he felt he would have to make a change. Carl made for some files where all the daily papers were kept, and read and re-read the yellowest ...
— An American Idyll - The Life of Carleton H. Parker • Cornelia Stratton Parker
... accept the somewhat unscientific theory that it's a soul which is responsible for feelings and emotions, these ... these ... creatures would be handicapped." Brent paused as if uncertain of his ground. "Wouldn't they?" he asked lamely. "I mean, they couldn't—theoretically, at least—react to situations ... or ...
— Ten From Infinity • Paul W. Fairman
... this ring she would destroy—has indeed destroyed—the remainder of my team of oxen. This made me angry; and in my anger I flung myself upon her, snatched the ring from her thumb, and placed it upon my own finger. And—and—there it is, as you see," I finished lamely. ...
— Through Veld and Forest - An African Story • Harry Collingwood
... she cried. "I'm perfectly horrid, and I know I don't deserve a friend like you. But—well, I'm just a beast, that's all," she finished lamely. ...
— The Outdoor Girls at the Hostess House • Laura Lee Hope
... what he hoped was a calm, hearty, hopeful voice. He was reasonably sure it wasn't any of those, and even surer that it wasn't all three. "You seem like a—like a fairly intelligent young lady," he finished lamely. ...
— Pagan Passions • Gordon Randall Garrett
... men, beginning to be sensible of this convenience, have here and there registred and printed some few Centuries, yet for the most part they are set down very lamely and imperfectly, and, I fear, many times not so truly, they seeming, several of them, to be design'd more for Ostentation then publique use: For, not to instance, that they do, for the most part, omit those Experiences they have made, wherein their Patients have miscarried, ...
— Micrographia • Robert Hooke
... immortality of the great human race. He was sublimer, that gray old man, hunted from the circle of his kind, in his words, than ever is action in its deeds; for words can fathom truth, and deeds but blunderingly and lamely seek it. ...
— The Last Of The Barons, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... he, "I wouldn't stand a particle more chance than that foolish ant did. Now if I were big and strong, like Old Man Coyote, or had swift wings, like Skimmer the Swallow, or were so homely and ugly looking that no one wanted me, like—like—" Danny hesitated and then finished rather lamely, "like some folks I know, I ...
— The Adventures of Danny Meadow Mouse • Thornton W. Burgess
... in heaven."25 He proves the genuineness of his faith in this doctrine by continually urging it, in the most earnest, unaffected manner, as an animating motive in the formation of character and the conduct of life, saying, "He who neglects his soul will pass lamely through existence, and again pass into Hades, aimless ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger
... gifts to the Babe in the manger. They invented the art of giving Christmas presents. Being wise, their gifts were no doubt wise ones, possibly bearing the privilege of exchange in case of duplication. And here I have lamely related to you the uneventful chronicle of two foolish children in a flat who most unwisely sacrificed for each other the greatest treasures of their house. But in a last word to the wise of these days let it be said ...
— Children's Literature - A Textbook of Sources for Teachers and Teacher-Training Classes • Charles Madison Curry
... a faint by a wheeze close in his ear. The wolf leaped lamely back, losing its footing and falling in its weakness. It was ludicrous, but he was not amused. Nor was he even afraid. He was too far gone for that. But his mind was for the moment clear, and he lay and considered. The ship was no more than four ...
— Love of Life - and Other Stories • Jack London
... hard as we are," answered Phil, lamely. "If he was—well, he might look at things ...
— Dave Porter and the Runaways - Last Days at Oak Hall • Edward Stratemeyer
... effort to crush it out of him. Now she perceived that it could come to nothing and only breed bitterness. She had, therefore, begun to tone her indifference and withhold the little bitter speeches that only fortified Abel's hate. She had even argued with him—lamely enough—and advised him not to persist in a dislike of his father that could not serve him in ...
— The Spinners • Eden Phillpotts
... subjects; but when Saturday night came she could put it off no longer, so, fetching down her writing-case, she spoiled a dozen sheets of paper in the effort to make her news fairly palatable, finally dashing off an unsatisfactory scrawl, badly written and lamely expressed; and, having folded and directed it, she flew out into the yard to find a messenger to take it. The first who presented ...
— The Village by the River • H. Louisa Bedford
... astounding to think that he is human like myself. He and I are actors in the same play, yet ignorant of each other's lines. But I may guess at his part. He is frightened. He looks furtively toward me. And he walks rather lamely. Aha, a fornicator! He has left a warm bed, illegally occupied for the night. A woman in a rumpled night dress moaned under him. The plot is simple. How pleasing it was for a moment. She came so close. She was like an incredibly intimate secret. He gasped ...
— Fantazius Mallare - A Mysterious Oath • Ben Hecht
... the word inventiveness for lack of a better name. It expresses but lamely the peculiar faculty that distinguishes Chekhov. Chekhov does not really invent. He reveals. He reveals things that no author before him has revealed. It is as though he possessed a special organ which enabled him to see, hear and feel things of which we other mortals did not even dream the ...
— Best Russian Short Stories • Various
... oppression, in vindication of their rights and privileges: A good prince, says he, will commend such virtuous patriots" and will "mistrust the selfish suggestions of a minister, who represents to him as rebels, all those citizens who do not hold out their hands to chains, who refuse lamely to suffer the ...
— The Writings of Samuel Adams, volume II (1770 - 1773) - collected and edited by Harry Alonso Cushing • Samuel Adams
... not immediately respond. He had forgotten for the moment that the suggestion to follow Percival had come from him. But after a moment's reflection he answered lamely: ...
— The Hero of Garside School • J. Harwood Panting
... know of. And you can drive all the way back. But—well, there's a hill or two coming, and—and I'd like just to take her so far," I concluded lamely. ...
— Jonah and Co. • Dornford Yates
... of sticks and stones on my side of the slide, and they held us back," he protested lamely. "I guess some of the fellows who didn't want to see the Yellow Streak ...
— The Rover Boys on a Hunt - or The Mysterious House in the Woods • Arthur M. Winfield (Edward Stratemeyer)
... Millsburgh so long before the end of the summer season. Then she continued slowly, as if remembering that she must guard her words, "Brother wrote me that they were expecting serious labor troubles, and with father as he is—" Her voice broke and she finished lamely, "Mother is so worried and unhappy. I—I felt that I really ought not to ...
— Helen of the Old House • Harold Bell Wright
... nonplussed and at a loss for words. "O well, it would be silly to pretend to be surprised, wouldn't it?" she said rather lamely, and crossed to the tea-table to pour out her own cup of tea. "And it is superfluous to hope you'll be happy and prosperous and all that; so I'll just say, my dear future-in-law, I think you're a devilish lucky man!..." And Diana snapped it out as if an unaccountable ...
— The Rhodesian • Gertrude Page
... then she said, with her straight look: "You're a perfect lamb, Maurice! You are awfully"—she wanted to say "patient," but there was an implication in that; so she said, lamely—"nice to Eleanor." ...
— The Vehement Flame • Margaret Wade Campbell Deland
... But yonder, halting lamely along, thou noticest next Bishop Talleyrand-Perigord, his Reverence of Autun. A sardonic grimness lies in that irreverent Reverence of Autun. He will do and suffer strange things; and will become surely one of the strangest things ever seen, or like to be seen. A man living in falsehood, and ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle
... lamely, "I couldn't altogether blame you for concealing the boy if he had shown up here, but you will realize that as a King's officer I have a serious duty ...
— My Lady of Doubt • Randall Parrish
... the lie, she told it so lamely and unconvincingly that neither of the other two believed it for a moment. Nelly stood up—tottering—but mistress of ...
— Missing • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... she asked with sudden interest. "It seems, somehow, unnatural in a ... " she hesitated, then finished a little lamely, ...
— Winding Paths • Gertrude Page
... For he was all day with my father at his elbow, and at the worst I shall have another chance of seeing"—he did not call the beloved by her Christian name even to himself, so he compromised by adding somewhat lamely—"her." ...
— The Black Douglas • S. R. Crockett
... experience that could not fail to be one of exceptional trial. "For reasons which will be explained to you by those in greater authority than myself, you are wanted at the house where—" I could not help stammering under the light of her melancholy eyes—"where I saw you once before," I lamely concluded. ...
— The Filigree Ball • Anna Katharine Green
... small and despicable link in the chain of nature, yet, if lost, would make a lamentable chasm. For, to say nothing of half the birds, and some quadrupeds, which are almost entirely supported by them, worms seem to be the great promoters of vegetation, which would proceed but lamely without them, by boring, perforating, and loosening the soil, and rendering it pervious to rains and the fibres of plants, by drawing straws and stalks of leaves and twigs into it; and, most of all, by throwing up such infinite numbers of ...
— The Natural History of Selborne • Gilbert White
... no illusions as to the man before him—a man of inferior morale and weak will, incapable, indeed, of the clever brutalities by which the wicked flourish; incapable also of virtues that must, after all, be tolerably common, or the world would run much more lamely than it does. Straight, honorable, unselfish fellows—Lankester knew scores of them, rich and poor, clever and slow, who could and did pass the tests of life without flinching; who could produce in any society—as politicians or green-grocers—an impression of uprightness ...
— The Testing of Diana Mallory • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... declared that they were not framed by Cardan at all, but by Giovanni Colla. Colla, he declared, had sent him one of these questions for solution some two years ago. Another, he (Tartaglia) had given to Colla, together with a solution thereof. Juan Antonio replied by way of contradiction—somewhat lamely—that the questions had been handed over to him by Cardan and no one else, wishing to maintain, apparently, that no one else could possibly have been concerned in them, whereupon Tartaglia replied that, ...
— Jerome Cardan - A Biographical Study • William George Waters
... lamely; "these particular things are—are lent by an eccentric Oriental gentleman, as a ...
— The Brass Bottle • F. Anstey
... he began again, "I think it has to do with light rays passing through a—well, hm-mm, there's an electric impulse, see—I guess it's that that sends out—" He stopped altogether. "Well golly Moses, Mr. Wicker," he ended lamely, "it seems to be pretty complicated to ...
— Mr. Wicker's Window • Carley Dawson
... her story very lamely, and conscious of an unsympathetic audience. The very parrot ruffled up his feathers and turned his glistening eye upon his mistress when it was over, as though he ...
— A Pair of Clogs • Amy Walton
... since to see Kenney's new piece, 'The Alcaid.' It went off lamely, and the Alcaid is rather a bore, and comes near to be generally thought so. Poor Kenney came to my room next evening, and I could not have believed that one night could have ruined a man so completely. I swear to you I thought at first it was a flimsy suit of clothes ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 61, November, 1862 • Various
... that vast mount of marble which was to have been erected in the Tribune of St. Peter's. The socles, upon which captive Arts and Sciences were meant to stand, remain; but instead of statues, inverted consoles take their places, and lead lamely up to the heads and busts of terminal old men. The pilasters of these terms have been shortened. There are four of them, enclosing two narrow niches, where beautiful female figures, the Active Life and the Contemplative Life, still testify to the enduring warmth and vigour of ...
— The Life of Michelangelo Buonarroti • John Addington Symonds
... I asserted—though, I fear, but lamely; for the robustness of his attitude impressed me, he being a man, presumably, of wide experience, and, what is more, a clergyman—the kind of man I had been taught to treat ...
— Oriental Encounters - Palestine and Syria, 1894-6 • Marmaduke Pickthall
... Brewster," said Robert. "I am quite warm in this coat, unless," he added, lamely, "I could go out where you ...
— The Portion of Labor • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... niece, and so I considered that I had a double right to stick in my oar. But I wasn't prepared for the depth of trouble that I encountered in the glance George Estes turned on me. 'So bad as that!' I finished, lamely. ...
— The Gates of Chance • Van Tassel Sutphen
... of me and the innumerable lies to which I lamely submit. I am the public to him—one of a herd of identical faces drifting by. And this beggar has perfected a technique of attack. It is his duty to sit on the pavement and lay for me and hit me with a slapstick labeled platitude and soak me over the head with a bladder labeled in stern white ...
— A Thousand and One Afternoons in Chicago • Ben Hecht
... the folded sheep and the sleeping cattle. But when he got into the high road, Gatesboro' full before him, with all its roofs and spires, he turned his back on the town, and tramped once more along the desert thoroughfare,—more slowly and more, more lamely and more, till several milestones were passed; and then he crept through the gap of a hedgerow to the sheltering eaves of a haystack; and under that roof-tree he and Sir Isaac lay ...
— What Will He Do With It, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... Phil," she said, "but I can't. Thanks just as much. I would spoil my lunch," she added, lamely, making a ...
— Lucile Triumphant • Elizabeth M. Duffield
... the unexpected sight of your special standing on the 'Y' that made the passenger engineer lose his head," he countered lamely, evidently striving to recover himself and to efface the ...
— The Taming of Red Butte Western • Francis Lynde
... Amy paused, then went on rather awkwardly. "You see, Alice happened to be at the house when the boys came and—well—we brought her along," she finished, lamely. ...
— The Outdoor Girls on Pine Island - Or, A Cave and What It Contained • Laura Lee Hope
... place. At last he caught hold of a fold of his opponent's throat, which he began to tear open with fingers and teeth. Wrenching himself free with a supreme effort the crocodile shot into the stream and disappeared with a sounding splash of its tail, while the mias waded lamely to the shore with an expression of sulky indignation on its great ...
— Blown to Bits - or, The Lonely Man of Rakata • Robert Michael Ballantyne
... divino husband by a sublime fiction of law to every woman on the sacred soil of Africa, and master of the lives of all of both sexes. What to this stupendous and perfect theory is the impotent and imperfect scheme so lamely announced by the sociologists of the C. ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol I, Issue I, January 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... Marsh would have thrown themselves into an orgy of retrenchment—ranging from the dismissal of a dairymaid to the substitution of a cheaper brand of tea—she made no new occasions for thrift, and persevered but lamely in the old ones. She was fond of spending—liked to see things trim and bright; she hated waste, especially when others were guilty of it, but she found a ...
— Joanna Godden • Sheila Kaye-Smith
... have been material for him. If there is nothing worse"—Kathryn flushed here—"it is because I have come in time. May I ask you now to leave me here in Mr. Northrup's"—Kathryn sought the proper word—"study?" she said lamely. "I will rest awhile; try to compose myself. If he comes I will meet him here. If not, I will ...
— At the Crossroads • Harriet T. Comstock
... foster uncle had not been present, she might have forgotten her woes, but whenever she glanced at either, the sorrowful face of the Mary girl rose before her. To make matters worse, Jerry proposed to her that they call upon Constance the next day, and Marjorie was obliged to refuse lamely without giving any apparent reason. It was in the nature of a relief to her when the party broke up. In spite of the gratifying knowledge that the girls had pronounced her new white silk frock the prettiest gown of all, and that Hal Macy had been her devoted cavalier, Marjorie ...
— Marjorie Dean High School Freshman • Pauline Lester
... himself with a start. Evidently he had said more than he intended. It was some time before he answered the question and then he did so lamely. "Its theft by someone interested in its value as a curiosity would enable me to recover it most readily—by the payment, of course, of a ...
— The Ivory Snuff Box • Arnold Fredericks
... attraction like the call of fate and marched blindfold on her doom. But Archie, with his masculine sense of responsibility, must reason; he must dwell on some future good, when the present good was all in all to Kirstie; he must talk - and talk lamely, as necessity drove him - of what was to be. Again and again he had touched on marriage; again and again been driven back into indistinctness by a memory of Lord Hermiston. And Kirstie had been swift to understand and ...
— Weir of Hermiston • Robert Louis Stevenson
... He hesitated, ended lamely, and fell suddenly into a settled silence. The hard lines about his lips deepened; his eyes, cast to the ground, glowed dully; and in every feature Lucy read the despair that was gnawing at his heart. And with it there was something more—a ...
— Hidden Water • Dane Coolidge
... defended the girl hotly, she had turned from the window and stood facing the stern faced Scotchman with flushed cheeks. Then the words of the hand-bill seemed to burn into her brain. "He's—he's—if he were a common cowpuncher Mr. Colston would never have made him foreman," she concluded lamely. ...
— Prairie Flowers • James B. Hendryx
... lost the thread of his discourse. "I must have a look at him," he concluded, lamely; "he may be all right, but then, ...
— Sailor's Knots (Entire Collection) • W.W. Jacobs
... All-wise placed his talking shells on the neck of the Duck, and the singing shells in her beak, and though painfully and lamely, yet he followed the sound she made with the shells. From place to place with swift flight she sped, then awaiting him, ducking her head that the shells might call loudly. By and by they came to the country of thick rains and mists on the borders of the Snow World, ...
— Myths and Legends of California and the Old Southwest • Katharine Berry Judson
... made havoc with the sense here, which can only be guessed at from the context. Perhaps for go we should read God, in allusion to the woman's protestations. Yet even then the passage reads but lamely.] ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VIII (4th edition) • Various
... stopped again. Apparently his candle had not helped him to any suitable expressions. He stared into the flame now instead of into Feversham's face, and for an equal length of time. He could think of nothing whatever to say, and yet he was conscious that something must be said. In the end he said lamely:— ...
— The Four Feathers • A. E. W. Mason
... grateful to the gallant Skirmisher for this diversion in my favour. I answered him, I fear, somewhat lamely; but he kept the conversation up, and presently one or two others joined in and so the difficulty, whatever it might have been, was bridged over—bridged over, but not repaired. A something, an awkwardness, a visible constraint remained. The guests hitherto had been simply dull, but now they were ...
— Stories by English Authors: England • Various
... held his head lower to hide it. "To—to—the picture looks so funny this way," he said lamely, and then, to his great relief, the maid said dinner was ready, and he escaped any further embarrassment for the moment. ...
— Paul the Courageous • Mabel Quiller-Couch
... death while he told his story, and very dreadful to him her silence was. He told it very lamely and badly, but still in such a manner that she soon ...
— Barchester Towers • Anthony Trollope
... individualist, a pronounced egoist, could not "fall in." Even in his simple field—one concerned chiefly with but the outward flourishes—the big machine irked and embarrassed him. He withdrew. When an imperial prince was publicly "received," with ceremonies that mingled old-world formalities (however lamely followed) and local inspirations (however poorly disciplined), the moving event went off with no help of his: I believe he even smiled at it all from ...
— On the Stairs • Henry B. Fuller
... be so much obliged," she said, "if you would tell him that I wish to see him. I have a message for his sister," she concluded, a little lamely. ...
— A Lost Leader • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... statement might not be accurate. No such thought had ever suggested itself to him before, and it now filled him with guilty confusion. He met the clear, honest gaze of her eyes for a moment, then he stammered lamely: ...
— In the Midst of Alarms • Robert Barr
... Oh, the story ran lamely, I grant you. But, vanity apart, I told it with conviction. Stella must and should die in content; that much at least I could purchase for her; and my thoughts were strangely nimble, there was a devilish fluency in my speech, and lie after lie ...
— The Cords of Vanity • James Branch Cabell et al
... neighbours, I was lately married to a woman, and she's my vocation now, and so ye see—" The young man halted lamely. ...
— Far from the Madding Crowd • Thomas Hardy
... course," he answered lamely and was silent for a few moments. Then he resumed: "You're interested in ...
— Blake's Burden • Harold Bindloss
... with Henry that very night, and to leave Vico Averso at once. If he would not do so much for me, I knew that I might take the diligence back again the way I came, and report my failure. But, for all that, I did not mean thus lamely to fail or go home with my finger ...
— Bog-Myrtle and Peat - Tales Chiefly Of Galloway Gathered From The Years 1889 To 1895 • S.R. Crockett
... for his vulgar way of looking at things. "It's no fault of Morten's that his father's like that!" he retorted lamely. ...
— Pelle the Conqueror, Complete • Martin Andersen Nexo
... bewilderment. Then he lamely apologized for the trouble he had caused, and tried to thank the women ...
— Heart of the Sunset • Rex Beach
... Raymond asked, lamely. One had to say something or turn back. Joan felt like crying. Then ...
— The Shield of Silence • Harriet T. Comstock
... display. He prowls if he moves about softly and stealthily, as in search of prey or booty. He hobbles if he jerks along unevenly, as from a stiff or crippled condition of body. He limps if he walks lamely. He perambulates when he walks through, perhaps for observation or inspection. (Perambulates is of course a ...
— The Century Vocabulary Builder • Creever & Bachelor
... replied distantly, if somewhat lamely. "You'll excuse me mentioning it, Miss Heritage, as it's only in your own interests, but I believe it's considered the proper thing when you're addressed by—by Royalty, don't you know, to throw in a 'Your Royal Highness' occasionally. Of course, Court Etiquette and that may be all tosh, but ...
— In Brief Authority • F. Anstey
... best of books, the pleasantest of companions, the easiest of billiard tables. Yet if our hostess were to see us marching out with an umbrella, how odd she would think us. "Where are you off to?" she would ask, and we could only answer lamely, "Er—I was just going to— er—walk about a bit." But now we tell her brightly, "I'm going to see the pond. It must be nearly full. Won't you come too?" And with any luck she comes. And you know, it even reconciles us a little to these streaming days to reflect that it ...
— Not that it Matters • A. A. Milne
... to see if that 'Red Rover' had disappeared while we were away," answered the red-headed Larry. "You can't tell about that craft. It's just as likely not to be there as it is to be there," he added lamely, then flushed when ...
— The Meadow-Brook Girls Afloat • Janet Aldridge
... that he had a book he wanted to read. So he sent me after what he called my mare's nest. It isn't, you see—no, not quite, not quite," Mr. Woods murmured, with an odd smile, and then laughed and added, lamely: "I—I suppose I'm the only person ...
— The Eagle's Shadow • James Branch Cabell
... a most awfully good sort," I said lamely, for I wanted to help him so much that my head felt hot and I ...
— Godfrey Marten, Undergraduate • Charles Turley
... about me just at present are—" he was just about to say "six shirts of imported gingham" but he bethought himself that she would be certain to demand to see them, so he finished lamely with—"my game of ...
— Outside Inn • Ethel M. Kelley
... Anderson, for I'll warrant he's the only man in Heart's Desire that ever heard an opera singer before, or who would ride a hundred miles—that is—anyhow, Mr. Anderson, you are precisely the man we want to see." He finished his sentence lamely, for he understood in some mysterious fashion that he had not ...
— Heart's Desire • Emerson Hough
... at last, as calmly as she could. "I daresay we should have managed. I mightn't have come. But I've come, and you had all these beautiful things ready; and...." Her courage to be severe abruptly failed; and lamely she concluded: "And it's simply like fairyland.... I'm ...
— Nocturne • Frank Swinnerton
... "Oh!" he said lamely. "Thank you, Miss Cohen; I'll make a memorandum of it." He went over to the commercial agency book and scanned three or four pages with an unseeing eye. Then he repaired to the sample room, where Abe sat ...
— Abe and Mawruss - Being Further Adventures of Potash and Perlmutter • Montague Glass
... future lay before the librettist who should produce topical light operas on the GILBERT and SULLIVAN model, dealing with our present-day economic crises. The thing became an idee fixe, as the French say, or, as we lamely put it in English, a fixed idea. There can be no doubt that he was engaged in the terrible task of fitting the current coal dispute to fantastic verse when a brain-cell unhappily buckled, and he was found destroying the works of his grand piano with ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 159, October 6, 1920 • Various
... been concerted: however, a majority, shrunk to thirteen, frightened them out of the small senses they possess. Heaven, Earth, and the Treasury, were moved to recover their ground to-day, when the question was renewed. For about two hours the debate hobbled on very lamely, when on a sudden your brother rose, and made such a speech[1]—but I wish anybody was to give you the account except me, whom you will think partial: but you will hear enough of it, to confirm anything I can say. ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole - Volume I • Horace Walpole
... d'Oleron—which were, in effect, the maritime laws of that period— all wrecks or wreckage belonged to the Crown when neither an owner nor an heir of a late owner could be found for it. But in those days the king's law travelled lamely through Cornwall; so that when, in 1605, these galleons were put up to auction and sold by the Lord of the Manor—who happened to be High Sheriff—nobody inquired very closely where the money went. It is more to the point that the timber of them ...
— Wandering Heath • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... their primitive simplicity un-Europe-tainted, with those little short fore puds, looking like a lesson framed by nature to the pick-pocket! Marry, for diving into fobs they are rather lamely provided a priori; but if the hue and cry were once up, they would show as fair a pair of hind-shifters as the expertest loco ...
— A Dictionary of Austral English • Edward Morris
... wager five shillings you never had such an inexpensive one before," said John. Phyllis didn't answer that; and John added, "Your uncle will send your pretty clothes to—to—wherever you go," he ended lamely. ...
— Old Valentines - A Love Story • Munson Aldrich Havens
... generation after generation, altho the cultivated class did not discover their merits until long after the plain people had taken them to heart. Cervantes and Shakspere were widely popular from the start; and appreciative criticism limped lamely after the approval of the mob. Whatever blunders in belauding, the plain people may make now and again, in time they come unfailingly to a hearty appreciation of work that is honest, genuine, and broad in its appeal; and when once they have laid ...
— Inquiries and Opinions • Brander Matthews
... you going to do?" she asked breathlessly. "I must know I have a right to, I think. I have told you so much. I was in great doubt whether I should tell you anything. But—" Her voice broke and she ended her plea lamely enough: "I ...
— Witness For The Defense • A.E.W. Mason
... lamely, "it is easily apparent, the difference between the American and the Englishman." Then, as though a bright idea had come to him, "The English never engage in conversation with strangers while traveling. ...
— Arms and the Woman • Harold MacGrath
... a story of Basque seamen which contains a charming picture of a childhood in a seaside village in Guipuzcoa, delightful as it is to read, is too muddled in romantic claptrap to add much to his fame. El Mundo es Asi ("The World is Like That") expresses, rather lamely it seems to me, the meditations of a disenchanted revolutionist. The latest series, Memorias de un Hombre de Accion, a series of yarns about the revolutionary period in Spain at the beginning of the nineteenth ...
— Rosinante to the Road Again • John Dos Passos
... something when I wasn't looking," he explained lamely. Then he added eagerly: "I did not know that you were on this gallery. First time I've put up at a hotel in ...
— Parrot & Co. • Harold MacGrath
... hopelessly; the curliness makes it worse. My face, too, is rapidly hardening under this sun. If only I had a few more clothes—" She stopped and looked at him. "I feel the need of them," she finished lamely. ...
— Claire - The Blind Love of a Blind Hero, By a Blind Author • Leslie Burton Blades
... she stammered some commonplace expression of pleasure, and he replied almost as lamely, then turned to the mother. "I hope you have forgiven me for my action of last night?" Then again to Viola. "I only intended to touch your arm. I trust you suffered no lasting ...
— The Tyranny of the Dark • Hamlin Garland
... said lamely. "I want to thank you for the flowers you placed in my cabin. And the ...
— The Alaskan • James Oliver Curwood
... friends that has cut him out for the job of politics, if he would just put himself on the right side. Of course he has no more idea of practical politics than—" Mr. Murdock looked around for an object of comparison and concluded lamely, "than that girl on your magazine cover. And what do you think is ...
— Jewel Weed • Alice Ames Winter
... his apostrophe to empty air. The arrival of the belated spectre in the middle, with a jerk that made him nod all over, was the last accident in the chapter, and worthily topped the whole. It may be imagined how lamely matters ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. XXII (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... gently scan your brother man, Still gentler sister woman; Though they may gang a kennin' wrang To step aside is human: One point must still be greatly dark, The moving why they do it: And just as lamely can ye mark How far, perhaps, ...
— Poems with Power to Strengthen the Soul • Various
... ridden with me till my heart was sick; gibed me till I could 'a' wept; and when certain of my friends pursued, thinking to have me back, claps me in the rear to stand their shot! I was even grazed in the right foot, and walk but lamely. Nay, there shall come a day between us; he ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 8 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... had been ill I would have been the first to go to you, but I knew you were quite well, and I've been so busy," he finished lamely. ...
— Some Everyday Folk and Dawn • Miles Franklin
... service-book broke its neck before this ark of the covenant. Prelacy and prerogative have bowed down, and given up the ghost at its feet. What a reformation hath followed at the heels of this glorious ordinance! and truly, even among us, as poorly and lamely, and brokenly, as it hath been managed among us. I am confident, we had given up the ghost before this time, had it not been for this water of life. Oh! what glorious success might we expect, if we did make such ...
— The Covenants And The Covenanters - Covenants, Sermons, and Documents of the Covenanted Reformation • Various
... of a sudden. There was his shyness again, so lamely come upon him that it colored his face. And the halting boyishness of the request had warmed Cecille's face too; warmed her through and through. She knew an impulse to hug his head to her breast, a very mature ...
— Winner Take All • Larry Evans
... yesterday, and finding no one to welcome him but little Edward, had set forth for Buxton almost with daylight, and having found himself obliged to rest his horse, he had turned aside to—-. And here he recollected just in time that Cis was in every one's eyes save his father's, his own sister, and lamely concluded "to take a draught of water," blushing under his brown skin as he spoke. Poor fellow! the Queen, even while she wished him in the farthest West Indian isle, could not help understanding that strange doubt and dread that come over the mind at the last ...
— Unknown to History - A Story of the Captivity of Mary of Scotland • Charlotte M. Yonge
... his tongue to say that he would not have her so; but he checked himself, and said, lamely enough: "Perhaps you will ...
— Between The Dark And The Daylight • William Dean Howells
... at her. "I kind of felt," he said lamely, "that I had got to find out what it was like. But"—he shook his head with his deprecatory smile—"but that don't tell it, Miss Arundel. It's more than that." He smiled again. "I bet you, you could think of somethin' better to ...
— Hidden Creek • Katharine Newlin Burt
... think the biggest difference would be that animals eat plants and plants eat—what do plants eat?" ended Dorothy lamely. ...
— Ethel Morton's Enterprise • Mabell S.C. Smith |
