"Luck" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... 'Good-bye—and good luck. What shall I wish you? The D.S.O., and a respectable leave before the summer's over? You will be ...
— Missing • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... use your trying to shoot deer till ye get a pair of specs to fit yer eyes. You have brains enough, but you haven't got the eyesight of a hunter. You stay here till I go see if I have any luck." ...
— Rolf In The Woods • Ernest Thompson Seton
... the prow of the Emden to sea again, for he feared that both the Yarmouth and the French cruiser Dupleix had by then been summoned by wireless. Luck was with him. Half an hour after leaving the harbor he sighted a ship flying a red flag, which showed him at once that she was carrying a cargo of powder. He badly needed the ammunition, and he prepared to capture her. But this operation was interrupted by a mirage, which caused ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume II (of VIII) - History of the European War from Official Sources • Various
... all went well, and here we will leave the three boys, wishing them the best of good luck in ...
— The Rover Boys on the Ocean • Arthur M. Winfield
... we inquired when a boat would be in, the reply was "Seguro manana"—"To-morrow for sure." When would it leave? "Seguro manana." Nothing annoys or embarrasses a Filipino more than the American habit of railing at luck or of berating the unfortunate purveyor of disappointing news, or, in fact, of insisting on accurate information if it can be obtained. They are ready to say anything at a minute's notice. A friend of mine in Ilocos ...
— A Woman's Impression of the Philippines • Mary Helen Fee
... sure will have luck with it. I'm goin' to oil her up and put her in a glass case back home, an' when I get grandchildren I'm goin' to point out that gun to 'em and tell 'em what men used to do in the old days. Let's go in an' surround some red-eye ...
— The Untamed • Max Brand
... pluck and perseverance prevailed, and he was enabled not only to build up a good business for himself, but also to help others, and to teach them by his own experience not to be too easily discouraged, but to trust to pluck more than luck, and learn in whatever capacity they were employed to do their work heartily as unto the Lord ...
— Trial and Triumph • Frances Ellen Watkins Harper
... should receive the very minimum of pay possible for his existence," he told her once, when she talked of the increase in his income. "He works in the dark, and he is in luck if he happens to do any good. In waging his battle with mysterious nature, he only unfits himself by seeking gain. In the same way, to a lesser degree, the law and the ministry should not be gainful professions. When the question of personal gain and advancement comes in, the frail ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick
... certain important lands in Sussex as a reward for his services. During the next century the owner of the castle was that Richard de la Haye whose story is a most interesting one. He was escaping from Geoffrey Plantagenet, Count of Anjou, when he had the ill luck to fall in with some Moorish pirates by whom he was captured and kept as a slave for some years. He however succeeded in regaining his liberty, and after his return to France, he and his wife, Mathilde de Vernon, founded ...
— Normandy, Complete - The Scenery & Romance Of Its Ancient Towns • Gordon Home
... so bad but what it might be worse. I reckon the watch, chain and pin will bring me another twenty or thirty. Sparrow, you are in luck to-day." ...
— The Mystery at Putnam Hall - The School Chums' Strange Discovery • Arthur M. Winfield
... offered their gods the first-fruits, which they held to bring them good luck: or they burnt them for the purpose of secrecy. Consequently (the Israelites) were commanded to look upon the fruits of the first three years as unclean: for in that country nearly all the trees bear fruit in three years' time; those trees, to wit, that are cultivated either from seed, or ...
— Summa Theologica, Part I-II (Pars Prima Secundae) - From the Complete American Edition • Saint Thomas Aquinas
... he could not open anything by turning the key round in this key-hole, since there was no door here, he thought he would now try what luck he might have with the "yaller" key in opening the door. The key-hole might admit a brass key. But what was his amazement to find on trying, that the key-hole which had run upward from an iron key, now ran down toward the bottom of the door. He pulled ...
— Queer Stories for Boys and Girls • Edward Eggleston
... teeth had been knocking all night. "She's the stanch little craft" (he had the phrase of a book) "Good Luck. I'm the captain and you're the builder's daughter"—and so she was. "Chrissen 'er, Marg'et. Kiss her on the bow an' say she's ...
— Aladdin O'Brien • Gouverneur Morris
... on with great regret by the old miners, and many are the stories I have heard by the camp fire or the hotel bar, which explained how it was that the narrator was still poor, and how So-and-so became rich. There were few men who were successful in keeping what they had made by luck or hard work, yet gold dust flew round freely, and provisions were at famine prices. I knew one man who said he had paid forty-two dollars (or nearly nine pounds) for six pills. They were dear but necessary; and as the ...
— A Tramp's Notebook • Morley Roberts
... reproducing it. It is painted, embossed, carved, engraved, modelled in all their wares. The mass of the people regard it not only as the shrine of their dearest gods, but the certain panacea for their worst evils, from impending bankruptcy or cutaneous diseases to unrequited love or ill-luck at play. It is annually visited by thousands and thousands of pilgrims." The Japanese artist in constantly reproducing Fusi-Yama has merely voiced ...
— The Empire of the East • H. B. Montgomery
... bewildering passions, which (according to my favorite proverb, "extremes meet") the fool not seldom obtains in as great perfection by his ignorance as the wise man by the highest energies of thought and self-discipline. Luck has a real existence in human affairs, from the infinite number of powers that are in action at the same time, and from the coexistence of things contingent and accidental (such as to us at least are accidental) with the regular appearances ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Vol. V (of X) - Great Britain and Ireland III • Various
... from their labors on the Sabbath day; some from a motive of piety; others said that whenever they hunted on Sunday, they were sure to have bad luck on the ...
— Life & Times of Col. Daniel Boone • Cecil B. Harley
... the gas office, leave a deposit to secure them, in case of my sudden and absent-minded departure from the neighborhood, and ask that a man be sent around to put in a meter, and turn on the gas in our apartment. With good luck some result might be ...
— The Van Dwellers - A Strenuous Quest for a Home • Albert Bigelow Paine
... expedition arrived in the Prickly Pear Valley in Montana on September 21, 1862, having left St. Paul on the 16th of June, traveling by steamboat and wagon-train. While Captain Fisk and his expedition pushed on to Walla Walla, nearly half of the immigrants stayed to try their luck at placer-mining. But the yield was not great and the distant Salmon River mines, their original destination, still awaited them. Winter was approaching. It was now too late in the season to reach the Salmon River mines, five hundred miles across the ...
— The Passing of the Frontier - A Chronicle of the Old West, Volume 26 in The Chronicles - Of America Series • Emerson Hough
... interested than myself in your personal glory and your good fortune. The English embark in force; what do they want? I am to-day a sort of manikin, who has lost his liberty and his good fortune. Greatness is fine but in prospective and in imagination. I envy you your luck; you go with the heroes to do fine deeds. I would willingly barter my consular purple against one of your brigadier's epaulettes" (16th ...
— Worlds Best Histories - France Vol 7 • M. Guizot and Madame Guizot De Witt
... know," and away he went. "Well, mates," said one, "what was the up-shot of it, if the yarn's been overhauled already? I didn't hear it myself." "Blessed if I know," said several—"Old Jack didn't get the length last time he's got now." "More luck!" said the man-o-war's-man; "'tis to be hoped he'll finish it ...
— The International Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 1, August 1850 - of Literature, Science and Art. • Various
... luck at all on his mule hunt. And as if to add to his discomfort, while climbing down the trail from the cemetery, he saw Judith on Buster, accompanied by the leaping Wolf Cub, overtake Scott Parsons and saw them race toward the post-office. Twilight came on, with the mud of the trail ...
— Judith of the Godless Valley • Honore Willsie
... brother Chatanna and I once had a disagreeable adventure while bird-hunting. We were accustomed to catch in our hands young ducks and geese during the summer, and while doing this we happened to find a crane's nest. Of course, we were delighted with our good luck. But, as it was already midsummer, the young cranes—two in number—were rather large and they were a little way from the nest; we also observed that the two old cranes were in a swampy place near by; but, as it was moulting-time, we did not suppose that they would ...
— Indian Child Life • Charles A. Eastman
... keep her still in Expectation. Seem always about to give, but never part with a Shilling: For in this Manner doth a barren Soil often deceive its Owner. Thus, that he may not be a Loser, the Gamester pushes on his ill Luck, and one flattering Throw makes him eager to have the ...
— The Lovers Assistant, or, New Art of Love • Henry Fielding
... Harriet watched the others carefully, and soon understood the figure. At length her turn came to advance. She performed her part very well until she came to that step known as dos a dos, and here her good luck forsook her; for, in stepping back, she struck with full force her companion, a slim young man with shell eyeglasses, and sent him forward with an impetus which was only checked by his coming in collision with a plaster-of-Paris pedestal, on which stood a bust of General ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 3, No. 1 January 1863 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... & good luck go with thee: And yet I doe thee wrong, to mind thee of it, For thou art fram'd of the ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare
... of the King's life, did unquestionably make him an unfavourable subject for such a struggle, but that if it was the case of any common man, he should have no hesitation in pronouncing even now that it would be very bad luck indeed if he did not recover, and that the chances were nine to one in his favour. You will easily suppose that this was said under the seal of confidence, and that a professional man would not choose to have his name quoted in a case of so much importance ...
— Memoirs of the Court and Cabinets of George the Third, Volume 2 (of 2) - From the Original Family Documents • The Duke of Buckingham
... 18th, 1846, Le Verrier communicated his results to the Astronomers at Berlin, and asked them to assist in searching for the planet. By good luck Dr. Bremiker had just completed a star-chart of the very part of the heavens including Le Verrier's position; thus eliminating all of Challis's preliminary work. The letter was received in Berlin on September 23rd; and the same evening Galle found the new planet, of the eighth magnitude, ...
— History of Astronomy • George Forbes
... luck as mine, to come to the desert, where it never rains, and to find nothing but rain?"—rain which Owen had never seen equalled except once in Connemara, where he had gone to fish, and it annoyed him to hear that these torrential rains only happened once every three or four years in ...
— Sister Teresa • George Moore
... she is, Nell, and ill luck go with her," quoth Mistress Lewthwaite: "for it will, that know I. God shall never bless no undutiful childre,—of that am ...
— Joyce Morrell's Harvest - The Annals of Selwick Hall • Emily Sarah Holt
... and on my new play. That is bad luck!" exclaimed Adrien, looking, however, very little disturbed by the news. "It ...
— Adrien Leroy • Charles Garvice
... business to Boston, and both in coming and in going he tarried in New York, passing ten days in his first visit and about a week on his return. This time was spent with a Virginian friend, Beverly Robinson, who had had the good luck to marry Susannah Philipse, a daughter of Frederick Philipse, one of the largest landed proprietors of the colony of New York. Here he met the sister, Mary Philipse, then a girl of twenty-five, and, short as was the time, it was sufficient to engage his heart. To this interest no doubt are due the ...
— The True George Washington [10th Ed.] • Paul Leicester Ford
... explained Mary. "He hasn't actually got it yet, only the solicitor's letter. And he says he will be unable to believe in his good luck until the money is actually in ...
— The Sins of Severac Bablon • Sax Rohmer
... most deeply affected by the messiah belief have been appointed spies over the others. If any persist in the use of old medicine paraphernalia, they are reported at once and harassed by threats of plague, sickness, ill-luck, disaster, and even death, which Das Lan claims to be able to cause or to dispel at pleasure. Once the threat is made, nothing unwelcome can happen to one under the ban that is not immediately attributed, by all ...
— The North American Indian • Edward S. Curtis
... retorted my friend. "That's because of your abysmal military ignorance, Dominie. Let me tell you how it is in our army. A fellow can get himself made a captain by pull, or a major by luck, or a colonel by desk-work, or a general by having a fine martial figure, but to get yourself made a sergeant, by Gosh, you've got to show the stuff. You've got to be a ...
— From a Bench in Our Square • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... row?" asked Saunders, as he lounged forward with his hands in his pockets. The luck had been with him all the evening. He was completely satisfied, both with himself and with Captain Lockwood's taste in wines. "What's the matter? You look to me to be ...
— Famous Modern Ghost Stories • Various
... luck: congratulate me on my supreme happiness, and believe me, dear cynic and misanthrope, yours, in the best of health ...
— Villette • Charlotte Bronte
... the Council of War, my Lady," said La Corne. "A soldier's luck! just as we were going to have music and heaven, we are summoned to ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... be glad if you've got the right idea," laughed Ned. "It will be worth getting wet through for, if you strike something. Good luck!" ...
— Tom Swift and his Photo Telephone • Victor Appleton
... ham and beef to me—two pound will be Enuff—or a quarter kitt off pickuld sammun, if you can git it, and I wish you may; and sum german silver spoons, to complement prince Allbut with; and, praps, as he and his missus knos they've come to Take pot-luck like, they won't be patickler, and I think we had better order the beer from the Jerry-shop, for owr own Is rayther hard, and the brooer says, that a fore and a harf gallon, at sixpence A gallon, won't ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 1, August 21, 1841 • Various
... camped for the night under a big, bare-faced cliff that was about as homelike and inviting as a charitable institution, and made a bluff at sleeping and cussed my bum luck in a way that wasn't any bluff. At sun-up I rose and mooched on." His cigarette needed another match and he searched his pockets ...
— The Happy Family • Bertha Muzzy Bower
... the archbishopric of Paris they wished. Cambrai they looked upon with disdain as a country diocese, the residence in which (impossible to avoid from time to time) would deprive them of their pastor. Their grief was then profound at what the rest of the world took for a piece of amazing luck, and the Countess of Guiche was so affected as to be unable to hide her tears. The new prelate had not neglected such of his brethren as made the most figure; they, in turn, considered it a distinction to command his regard. Saint Cyr, that spot so valuable ...
— The Memoirs of Louis XIV., His Court and The Regency, Complete • Duc de Saint-Simon
... marriages are often very grand affairs. They come in among county people. That's their luck in life. Doctors never do; nor lawyers. I don't think lawyers ever get married in the country. They're supposed to do it up in London. But a country doctor's wedding is not a thing to be ...
— The Small House at Allington • Anthony Trollope
... or prostrated nerves and it shows itself first of all by worry. Worry means the inability to relax the attention from a definite fear or fancied hard luck. Worry leads to many physical ...
— Evening Round Up - More Good Stuff Like Pep • William Crosbie Hunter
... procured for the accommodation of the poorer British subjects. During the long interval which had elapsed, however, a good many men had gone off of their own accord, tired of waiting, and resolving to try their luck in one and another direction. Thus our procession was a somewhat smaller one when we at last ...
— My Days of Adventure - The Fall of France, 1870-71 • Ernest Alfred Vizetelly
... that they cover themselves all over with odours. When they enter the room, you feel as if a hundred scent-bottles were opened at once. There is such a smell of jasmine and vanille, that you have good luck if you get off without a headache. Other people drop in. M. Lupot does not know half his guests, for many of them are brought by others, and even these he scarcely knows the names of. But he is enchanted with every thing. A young fashionable is presented to him by some unknown third party, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXIX. - March, 1843, Vol. LIII. • Various
... his shoulders as though conscious that any luck of that kind must come to him from another quarter, ...
— Marion Fay • Anthony Trollope
... she said abruptly. "If I see her smiling there like a queen by your side—! She did—last time. I remember." She caught at a sob and dashed her hand across her face impatiently. "Jealous fool, mean and petty, jealous fool!... Good luck, old man, to you! You're going to win. But I don't want to see the end of ...
— The New Machiavelli • Herbert George Wells
... many another, though not better man, has made up his mind to go gold-seeking on the Sacramento. Still, if he be not gone, I think we might persuade him to take a trip on the craft you speak of. It was once Harry's sinister luck to slip overboard in the harbour of Guaymas—dropping almost into the jaws of a tintorero shark—and my good fortune to be able to rescue him out of his perilous plight. He is not the man to be ungrateful; and, if still ...
— The Flag of Distress - A Story of the South Sea • Mayne Reid
... it was considerably past midnight; but to my great relief, as it was important for me to be in Westmorland by the morning, I saw by the huge saucer eyes of the mail, blazing through the gloom of overhanging houses, that my chance was not yet lost. Past the time it was; but by some luck, very unusual in my experience, the mail was not even yet ready to start. I ascended to my seat on the box, where my cloak was still lying as it had lain at the Bridgewater Arms. I had left it there in imitation of a nautical discoverer, who leaves a bit of bunting on the shore ...
— Miscellaneous Essays • Thomas de Quincey
... Moth. He was returning from Valrosa alone with his captain and his crew. They had been cruising in the Atlantic with the idea of going south, but he had recently changed his mind and decided to go home. He had not expected such damnable luck as to be run down in home waters, but he supposed that Fate was against him. He only asked now to be put ashore as soon as possible, being for the moment heartily sick of sea-travel. This with his most rueful grimace ...
— Charles Rex • Ethel M. Dell
... money went, all U P, I thought, when promotion brought more pay (What luck!); but that slippery Rupee Decreased more ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 103, November 12, 1892 • Various
... the mansion of Major Villere, a Creole gentleman of the neighborhood. Villere was captured, but escaped, and at half past one o'clock Jackson knew in New Orleans that the enemy was at hand. By good luck, Major Latour, a French engineer, and the best historian of the campaign, was among the first to view the invaders, and he gave the general a correct idea of their position and numbers. As in all other crises, Jackson's resolve was taken at once. "By ...
— Andrew Jackson • William Garrott Brown
... late. I must earn something. But they're all going right by today with smug expressions on their faces. They don't want to give me a single good-luck penny. It's a miserable life. If I come home without money The old lady will throw me out. There is hardly anyone on the street any more. I am dead tired and freezing. I was never so miserable in my life. I move around ...
— The Verse of Alfred Lichtenstein • Alfred Lichtenstein
... have hailed this invitation with rapture. On the present occasion she was about to refuse it; but Fanny said with a quick glance, which was not altogether lost on Martha, "Of course go with Martha, Sibyl. You are in great luck to have such ...
— Betty Vivian - A Story of Haddo Court School • L. T. Meade
... five-hundred-dollar fee, "you're a lucky dog. Everything comes so easily with you. Let me tell you something; I've figured this out: if you don't give it back some way—give it back to the world, or society, or your fellows,—or God, if you like to bunch your good luck under one head,—you're surely going to suffer for it. There is no come-easy-go-easy in this world. I've learned that much of the scheme ...
— A Certain Rich Man • William Allen White
... Feltz died. His people in the East got it into their heads that it was a case of murder. They stirred up the county authorities till every one was taking sides. Of course, dad was cleared; but that seemed to be the beginning of a steady run of bad luck. The trial cost an awful lot of money, and made enemies, too. Feltz had plenty of friends of his own calibre—you know that to your sorrow, don't you, Sarge?—and they started trouble on the range. It was simply terrible for a while. ...
— Raw Gold - A Novel • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... for all the wealth of ancient Bagdad. Her shibrayah pitched and rolled like a small boat in a big sea, and whenever a rock leaned out over the narrow trail, or a scraggy old thorn branch swung, it was by a combination of luck and good carpentry that she was saved from being pitched down under the following camel's feet. Whoever made that shibrayah could have ...
— The Lion of Petra • Talbot Mundy
... used to it by now. I'd been hearing it, more or less behind my back, for six years. Well, if my luck held, I'd never hear it again. I strode up the white steps of the skyscraper, to finish the arrangements that would take me away from Wolf forever. To the other end of the Empire, to the other end of the galaxy—anywhere, so long as I need not wear my past like a medallion ...
— The Door Through Space • Marion Zimmer Bradley
... up. I think," Jack decided suddenly and without any visible cause, "I'll turn off here and ride around by Jerry Simpson's. Adios, old man, and heaps of good luck to you." He swung abruptly off to the right and galloped away, looking back over his shoulder when he had ridden a hundred paces, to wave his sombrero and shout a last word ...
— The Gringos • B. M. Bower
... little domestic comedy is ended. I'm grateful it didn't turn out a drama. The next time I pick out a son-in-law I hope I'll have better luck." ...
— The Lion and The Mouse - A Story Of American Life • Charles Klein
... "Great luck," answered Frank. "Get in, and we will take you ashore over yonder, where we are going to have a ...
— Frank Merriwell's Cruise • Burt L. Standish
... a great deal of progress; I thought the model did not suit me, and hoped for better luck next time. That time never came, and at the end of the first month I was left toiling hopelessly in the distance. Marshall's mind, though shallow, was bright, and he understood with strange ease all that was told him, and was able to put into immediate practice the methods of work inculcated by ...
— Confessions of a Young Man • George Moore
... instead of repeating verses I made them. But I only once proceeded farther than the first line. Anybody who finds pleasure in poetic pains may add the other thirteen; to me such a task would savour of bad luck. Here, however, are some of my brave Rydalesque beginnings, ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, April 18, 1917 • Various
... pleasure and a certain childish pride in forming part of it. The book I read was about Italy in the early Renaissance, the pageantries and the light loves of princes, the passion of men for learning, and poetry, and art; but it was written, by good luck, after a solid, prosaic fashion, that suited the room infinitely more nearly than the matter; and the result was that I thought less, perhaps, of Lippo Lippi, or Lorenzo, or Politian, than of the good Englishman who had written in that volume what ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. XXII (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... sort. You had a run of hands, that was all. Nobody can go against the kind of luck you had that night; and you took it away from Sneyd and me in rolls. But we'll land you pretty soon, ...
— His Own People • Booth Tarkington
... The influence of Coleridge has waned, and Wordsworth's poetry can no longer draw succor from this ally. The poetry has not, however, wanted eulogists; and it may be said to have brought its eulogists luck, for almost every one who has praised Wordsworth's poetry has praised it well. But the public has remained cold, or, at least, undetermined. Even the abundance of Mr. Palgrave's fine and skilfully chosen specimens of Wordsworth, in the Golden ...
— Selections from the Prose Works of Matthew Arnold • Matthew Arnold
... largely a matter of luck and chance that I gathered them in without losing a man, or even having a fight," added Deck. "The ruffians were all busy ransacking the mansion in search of the money; and if they had found it, I learned from Mr. Milton that it would have given ...
— A Lieutenant at Eighteen • Oliver Optic
... gift just less than the giver. You ought to have removed these obstructions long ago. When we come and ask of you this act of justice, you tell me to go with you into your internal improvement bill and take pot-luck ...
— Robert Toombs - Statesman, Speaker, Soldier, Sage • Pleasant A. Stovall
... about ninety-six ladies here whose husbands are gone to the wars, and about twenty-six gentlemen—at least, there will, with good luck, be about that number. We have a very dancing set of aides-de-camp just now, and they are utterly desperate at the notion of our having no balls. I suppose we must begin on one in a fortnight; but it will be difficult, and there are several young ladies here with ...
— The Magnificent Montez - From Courtesan to Convert • Horace Wyndham
... list to the other, with the exception of these two. His failure here worried him, but still, though the voyage was fast terminating, he did not lose all hope of finding out something about them. As luck would have it, he found himself standing close beside the two who were occupying ...
— Australia Revenged • Boomerang
... luck I'll have on a good errand, I hope," he exclaimed, as he leaped into the saddle; "for though the police and I weren't over friendly once on a time, I can now face them like an honest ...
— The Gilpins and their Fortunes - A Story of Early Days in Australia • William H. G. Kingston
... heard of my good luck, and how kind poor Dickie—from whom I never expected anything—proved at last. It was a great windfall for a poor devil like me; but, after all, it was only right, for it ought never to have been his at all. I went down and took possession on the 4th, the tenants very glad, and ...
— Wylder's Hand • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... "That's hard luck!" he muttered. "Here we have been hanging a whole week in the park just to enable me to get a snap at some of the creatures, and we lost our only opportunity. Well, I suppose we should be satisfied to ...
— Frank Merriwell's Bravery • Burt L. Standish
... the old coach-inn for the night; and for my amusement—besides the slumberous hound, who, after dinner, had taken up position upon the faded rug lying before the grate—there was a "Bell's Messenger" of the month past, and, as good luck would have it, a much-bethumbed copy of a work on horticulture and kindred subjects, first printed somewhere about the beginning of the eighteenth century, and entitled "The Clergyman's Recreation, showing the Pleasure and Profit of the ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 77, March, 1864 • Various
... my fore-finger. My hand seems to shake a little; but it's as honest a hand as ever was. That steel thing there, is the bell hammer, you know. And, bless your heart, the hammer's everything. Cost, Lord knows how much. Another toast, my son. Good luck to the bell!" ...
— Jezebel • Wilkie Collins
... a few weeks afterwards, as Jim was going home on his coveted sick-leave, "Mr. Thomas Carlyle calls fibs wind-bags. If that singular remedy would work to such a charm with all my men, I'd tell lies with impunity. Good by, Jim, and the best of good luck to you." ...
— What Answer? • Anna E. Dickinson
... guess I shall just have to trust to luck and do the best I can when the time comes," she decided, putting the letters back into her suit-case with a little sigh. She admired Helen Adams's way of deliberately preparing for a crisis, but in her own case it somehow ...
— Betty Wales, Sophomore • Margaret Warde
... boy, who was cook, housekeeper and general factotum for the three. When ill-luck overtook them it was felt to be some slight compensation to be at liberty to make it unpleasant for Tommy. But one day, towards the end of their self-imposed exile, it stormed so heavily and incessantly that they were compelled to remain within doors, and here Tommy's ...
— An Algonquin Maiden - A Romance of the Early Days of Upper Canada • G. Mercer Adam
... woman! A woman sitting on the sill of the open window! Of all the——. Well, if that wasn't luck he felt he would like to know what was. He wondered which of the sisters it was—Kate or Helen. He was confident it was one of them. He would soon ...
— The Law-Breakers • Ridgwell Cullum
... as it seems," he insisted, trying to say the words cheerfully. "I know these waters, and they are never long deserted. Luck will change surely; perhaps within the hour we shall be picked up, and can laugh at all ...
— The Case and The Girl • Randall Parrish
... that direction are passed off (pointing to a clearer spot). But, stay—I see small lines which branch out from the main spot. These are sons, daughters, nephews—that is pretty well." She appeared overpowered with the effort she was making. At length, she added, "That is all. You have had good luck first—misfortune afterward. You have had a friend, who has exerted himself with success to extricate you from it. You have had lawsuits—at length fortune has been reconciled to you, and will change ...
— The Memoirs of Louis XV. and XVI., Volume 2 • Madame du Hausset, and of an Unknown English Girl and the Princess Lamballe
... was sobbing like a child as he half dragged, half carried Pauline to his waiting horse. By the magic of luck, by the mystery of a protecting Fate, the lariat noose had fallen about her shoulders. To the amazed and terrified Indians up the cliff she had soared suddenly, spirit-like, out of the trench and vanished in the foliage ...
— The Perils of Pauline • Charles Goddard
... was not made for begging: you'll have more luck with your thin, sour one—so, I'll leave you to ...
— Lover's Vows • Mrs. Inchbald
... wonder which none had ever thought in his heart he would see on the screen. Raf knew that in control every second of this was being recorded as they began to establish a braking orbit, which with luck would bring them down on the surface of ...
— Star Born • Andre Norton
... job to casual job, would not degenerate into a veritable hobo, for he had drunk deep of the charm of the untrammeled and limitless road. Want touched him, but lightly; for he was naturally frugal and hardy. He got a railroad job by good luck, and it was not until he had worked himself into a permanency that his father's lawyers found and notified him of the possession of a small income, one hundred dollars per annum of which, they informed him, was to be expended by them upon such books as they thought suitable to his circumstances, ...
— Success - A Novel • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... spoken truly in saying this about Tartarin, who carried in his frame the soul of Don Quixote, the same chivalric impulses, heroic ideal, and crankiness for the grandiose and romantic; but, worse is the luck! he had not the body of the celebrated hidalgo, that thin and meagre apology for a body, on which material life failed to take a hold; one that could get through twenty nights without its breast-plate being unbuckled, and forty-eight hours on ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern — Volume 11 • Various
... a boy I was a poor speller. One day there came a word to the boy at the head of the class which he couldn't spell, and none of the class could spell it. I spelled it; by good luck; and I went from the foot of the class to the head. So the thief on the cross passed by Abraham, Moses and Elijah, and went to the head of the class. He said ...
— Men of the Bible • Dwight Moody
... part as enemies,' replied Dare, with the flawless politeness of a man whose speech has no longer any kinship with his feelings. 'Shall we share a bottle of wine? You will not? Well, I hope your luck with your lady will be more magnificent than mine has been here; but—mind Captain De Stancy! he's a fearful ...
— A Laodicean • Thomas Hardy
... luck, Doris found her godmother, perching in London between a Devonshire visit and a Scotch one. They talked long, and Doris walked slowly home across the park. A glory of spreading sun lay over the grassy glades; the Serpentine held reflections of a sky barred with ...
— A Great Success • Mrs Humphry Ward
... for anybody else," he would reply, when told repeatedly, with gruff condolence, that it was hard luck. His sensitiveness might have arisen from some hereditary taint from his orthodox ancestors of their belief that misfortune is the whip-lash for sin, or from his native resentment of pity. At home he could not talk of it either with his mother ...
— Jerome, A Poor Man - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... haven't heard the rest of the tragedy?" I asked, holding out the case. "It's frightfully bad luck for me, but it makes a ...
— The Man in Lower Ten • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... They sought on every side. As they crossed a meadow, they spied an Ass, one of the gravest and most solemn that ever was seen. Since the creation of the world, no ass had ever had such long ears. 'Ah,' said the Cuckoo, 'our luck is excellent; our quarrel is a matter of ears: here is our judge. God Almighty made him ...
— Diderot and the Encyclopaedists (Vol 1 of 2) • John Morley
... haven't. In your particular line of life you come more into contact with people who are extremely dissatisfied. Still, occasionally you must have had a chance of seeing some one who had just had an unusual stroke of good luck. Mrs. Lorimer, for instance"—Meldon winked at the judge—"when the jury brought in its verdict of 'Not Guilty.' But I really must ...
— The Simpkins Plot • George A. Birmingham
... accidents. There were few men in the country who really understood what conditions tended toward a flying accident. There were few who had ever gone into a spin and lived to tell about it. At that time a spinning-nose dive was a manifestation of hard luck—like a German shell. If you once got into it, it was only the matter of waiting for the crash and hoping that the hospital might be able to pull ...
— Opportunities in Aviation • Arthur Sweetser
... endlessly, seeking new ways, new modes, new forms, and is ever intent upon breaking away from the past. In this way, as Darwin showed, she attains to new species. She is blind, she gropes her way, she trusts to luck; all her successes are chance hits. Whenever I look over my right shoulder, as I sit at my desk writing these sentences, I see a long shoot of a honeysuckle that came in through a crack of my imperfectly closed window last summer. It ...
— Ways of Nature • John Burroughs
... as luck should now have it, our Ponto came in, And asked Mr. Puss, "What's this horrible din?" Says Puss to our Ponto, "I've caught this sly thief, And now I intend to bring ...
— Cole's Funny Picture Book No. 1 • Edward William Cole
... with a blessing for every living thing on your lips and in your soul. Say to yourself: "Health, luck, usefulness, success, are mine. I claim them." Keep thinking that thought, no matter what happens, just as you would put one foot before another if you had a mountain to climb. Keep on, keep on, and suddenly you will find you are on ...
— The Heart of the New Thought • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... it was the great moose who crossed his path; and the luck was all Charley Crimmins's, who chanced to be the spectator of what happened there beside ...
— Kings in Exile • Sir Charles George Douglas Roberts
... for mine own part, I would little or nothing with you. Your father and my uncle hath made motions: if it be my luck, so; if not, happy man be his dole! They can tell you how things go better than I can: you may ask your ...
— The Merry Wives of Windsor - The Works of William Shakespeare [Cambridge Edition] [9 vols.] • William Shakespeare
... creep under his wing like an additional ducal chick. It is very comfortable. The Duke will be quite a Providence to you. I wonder that all young gentlemen do not marry heiresses;—it is so easy. And you have got your seat in Parliament too! Oh, your luck! When I look back upon it all it seems so hard to me! It was for you,—for you that I used to be anxious. Now it is I who have not an inch of ground to stand upon." Then he approached her and put out his hand to her. "No," she said, putting both her hands behind her back, ...
— The Duke's Children • Anthony Trollope
... Mac's luck to disembark immediately on berthing, for his squadron were detailed to clean up the ship after all the men and horses had gone ashore. They stripped themselves of their shore kit, and with hoses and brooms scrubbed decks for hour after hour. ...
— The Tale of a Trooper • Clutha N. Mackenzie
... to be a dead whale, and had ordered it to be towed alongside, to cut off the blubber. Disappointed in his expectations, he swore that I was a Jonas, who had come out of the whale's belly, and there would be no luck in the ship, if I remained. The sailors, whose profits in the voyage were regulated by the number of fish taken, thought this an excellent reason for throwing me overboard; and had there not been two sail in sight, ...
— The Pacha of Many Tales • Captain Frederick Marryat
... have my new buggy and silver-mounted harness. You must go out and christen it for good luck. Hurry, Peggy, and put on ...
— A Little Girl in Old New York • Amanda Millie Douglas
... their respective parties in England; it would give them all the offices in a country where office is everything. Among them, as among ourselves, every man is disposed to rate his own abilities highly, and to have a good deal of confidence in his own good luck; and all think, that if the field were once opened to them by such a change, they should very soon be able to find good positions for themselves and their children in it. Perhaps there are few communities in the world, among whom education is more generally diffused ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I, No. 1, Nov. 1857 • Various
... ancient texts and the study of the beliefs of less cultured modern peoples indicate that our expressions: "to give birth," "to give life," "to maintain life," "to ward off death," "to insure good luck," "to prolong life," "to give life to the dead," "to animate a corpse or a representation of the dead," "to give fertility," "to impregnate," "to create," represent a series of specializations of meaning which were not clearly ...
— The Evolution of the Dragon • G. Elliot Smith
... passed at the first chance. Groping along, he actually turned into the wide opening which, narrowing further east into Cook's Strait, divides the North and South Islands. He anchored in Golden Bay; but luck was against him. First of all the natives of the bay paddled out to view his ships, and, falling on a boat's crew, clubbed four out of seven of the men. Tasman's account—which I take leave to doubt—makes the attack senselessly wanton ...
— The Long White Cloud • William Pember Reeves
... though luck had helped you much when I found you, Walt," remarked the captain, dryly. "It sorter looked to me like only hard work an' an amazin' lot of pluck an' grit had brought you ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... where some succeed, While others are beginning; 'Tis luck, at times, at others, speed, That gives an early winning. But, if you chance to fall behind, Ne'er slacken your endeavor; Just keep this wholesome truth in mind: 'Tis better late ...
— Sanders' Union Fourth Reader • Charles W. Sanders
... luck, Kid!" At this she paused to look up at him with great, sad eyes—a long, wistful look, then, speaking no more, hurried on down the stair—down, down into the ...
— The Definite Object - A Romance of New York • Jeffery Farnol
... intended—for my preliminary chapter has caused the greatest uproar that has happened here since witch-times. If I escape from town without being tarred and feathered, I shall consider it good luck. I wish they would tar and feather me; it would be such an entirely novel kind of distinction for a literary man. And, from such judges as my fellow-citizens, I should look upon it as a higher honor than ...
— Nathaniel Hawthorne • George E. Woodberry
... about; every old maid with a book to sell; every cause—as they call the thousand and one pious schemes to line their own pockets—every damned one of 'em came to Andrew Bolton for money, and he gave it to them. He was no hoarding skinflint; not he. Better for him if he had been. When luck went against him, as it did at last, these precious villagers turned on him like a pack of wolves. They killed his wife; stripped his one child of everything—even to the bed she slept in; and the man himself they buried alive under ...
— An Alabaster Box • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman and Florence Morse Kingsley
... great gratification and exceeding joy. When a creature becomes cleansed of all his sins in course of millions of births in diverse orders of being, it is then that devotion springs up in his heart for Mahadeva. It is through good luck alone that undivided devotion to Bhava who is the original cause (of the universe) fully springs up in the heart of one that is conversant with every mode of worshipping that great Deity.[185] Such stainless and pure devotion to Rudra, that has singleness of purpose and that is simply ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 4 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... examining the new aspect of the Mare Nostrum. The wireless telegraph was going to keep him in contact with the world. He was no longer a merchant captain, slave of destiny, trusting to good luck, and incapable of repelling an attack. The radiographic stations were watching for him the entire length of the coast, advising him of changes in his course that he might avoid the ambushed enemy. The apparatus was constantly hissing and sustaining invisible dialogues. Besides, ...
— Mare Nostrum (Our Sea) - A Novel • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... at his glass with a relish. "If, of course, you contemplate a try at the Tennessee—that will be a different matter. I trust your commander will be amply prepared for difficulties there. But General Morgan is not to be easily caught napping, or so his reputation stands. I wish you the best of luck." ...
— Ride Proud, Rebel! • Andre Alice Norton
... that he dwelt a little particularly on the shot which had lodged so near him, in the head of the Tigris's foremast. He spoke of the whistling it made as it approached, and the violence of the blow when it struck. He had the impudence, too, to speak of my good-luck in being on the other side of the top, when the shot passed through my station; whereas I do believe that the shot passed nearer to me than it did to himself. It barely missed me, and by all I could learn Rupert was leaning over by the top-mast rigging ...
— Afloat And Ashore • James Fenimore Cooper
... I laughed so hard. What a corker her Edward must be! See, Tom, poor old Mrs. Dowager up in the Square having the same devil's luck with her man as Molly Elliott down in the Alley has with hers. I wonder if you're all alike. No, for there's the Bishop. He had taken her hand sympathizingly, forgivingly, but his silence made me curious. I knew he wouldn't ...
— In the Bishop's Carriage • Miriam Michelson
... him the coach lumbered forward, and Mrs. Seymour's tongue rattled on gayly. So engrossed was she with being nearly at her journey's end, and their good luck at having fallen in with Yorke, that ...
— An Unwilling Maid • Jeanie Gould Lincoln |
