"Unbidden" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... denial. He seldom entered the shrine where we worship our ideals in secret. He stood outside, remarks Mr. Birrell cheerily, "with a pail of cold water." Father Faber also possessed a vein of irony which was the outcome of a priestly experience with the cherished foibles of the world. He entered unbidden into the shrine where we worship our illusions in secret, and chilled us with unwelcome truths. I know of no harder experience than this. It takes time and trouble to persuade ourselves that the things we want ...
— Americans and Others • Agnes Repplier
... than our early Middle Age tables, to have been always kept standing, but were brought in with, and cleared away after, each meal. On ordinary occasions, one row of benches on each side sufficed; but when there was a great feast, or a sudden rush of unbidden guests, as when Flosi paid his visit to Tongue to take down Asgrim's pride, a lower kind of seats, or stools were brought in, on which the men of lowest rank sat, and which were on the outside of the tables, nearest to ...
— The story of Burnt Njal - From the Icelandic of the Njals Saga • Anonymous
... earth of woes, and full the sea; and in the day as well as night diseases unbidden haunt mankind, silently bearing ills to men, for all-wise Zeus hath taken from them their voice. So utterly impossible is it to escape the will ...
— Familiar Quotations • John Bartlett
... my heart beats as I listen to the messenger's horrible tale!" she ejaculates. "From the fresh grave of the murdered man he hurried to our wigwam. Deliberately crossing his bare shins, he sat down unbidden beside my father, smoking a long-stemmed pipe. He had scarce caught his breath when, panting, ...
— American Indian stories • Zitkala-Sa
... cry which rose unbidden to my lips, I sprang wildly across the room ... for now I ...
— The Hand Of Fu-Manchu - Being a New Phase in the Activities of Fu-Manchu, the Devil Doctor • Sax Rohmer
... In the first place, such visits will be rare, and the visitor should be at least fifty years of age; he may possibly be wanting to see something that is rich and rare in other states, or himself to show something in like manner to another city. Let such an one, then, go unbidden to the doors of the wise and rich, being one of them himself: let him go, for example, to the house of the superintendent of education, confident that he is a fitting guest of such a host, or let him go to the house of some of those who ...
— Laws • Plato
... man's face, Donald determined to put an end to the child's rosy, but impossible, dream as soon as possible. His duty was plain enough, even if he had not given his promise to Rose's grandfather; yet the more he saw of her the stronger grew the unbidden thought of what a wonderful woman she would make if she could be taken to the city and given the ...
— 'Smiles' - A Rose of the Cumberlands • Eliot H. Robinson
... hostilities, "made war on the Emperor Napoleon and not on the French nation") might regale themselves without let or hindrance. Moreover, the nights were "drawing in," the evenings becoming chilly; so why not lay the fires, and place matches and candles in convenient places for the benefit of the unbidden guests who would so soon arrive? All those things being done, M. and Mme. Durand departed to seek the quietude of Fouilly-les-Oies, never dreaming that on their return to Montfermeil, Palaiseau, or Sartrouville, they would find their ...
— My Days of Adventure - The Fall of France, 1870-71 • Ernest Alfred Vizetelly
... parterres of flowers and lawns of grass, covered with the delicious shade thrown from the extended limbs and dense foliage of the great trees. These children, when wandering here, never trespass upon a parterre or pluck unbidden a flower, being restrained only by a sense of propriety and decency inculcated from the cradle, and which grows with their growth, and at maturity is part of their nature. Could children of Anglo-Norman blood be so restrained? Would the wild energies of these bow to such control, ...
— The Memories of Fifty Years • William H. Sparks
... gone. When, unbidden, the well-known laugh rang again in his ears, or he felt on his hands the touch of the slender fingers, James turned away with a gesture of distaste. Now Mrs. Wallace brought him only bitterness, and he tortured himself insanely trying to forget her.... With tenfold force ...
— The Hero • William Somerset Maugham
... showed no sign of hearing him; his mind was hard at work on this very serious problem with which he had been so suddenly confronted. More than once Erebus countered a witticism with a sharp retort, but with none sharp enough to pierce the rhinocerine hide of the gallant officer. Once this unbidden but humorous guest was under their roof, the laws of hospitality denied her even this relief. She could only treat him with a steely civility. The steeliness did not check the easy ...
— The Terrible Twins • Edgar Jepson
... untrained voice sounded sweet and clear on the night air, and to Betty's surprise, tears came unbidden into her eyes. She was not ...
— Betty Gordon in Washington • Alice B. Emerson
... the first beginnings of imaginative conception directed by the will? Are they, indeed, conscious at all? Do they not rather emerge unbidden from the vague limbo of sub-consciousness?" A.B. Walkley, ...
— Play-Making - A Manual of Craftsmanship • William Archer
... smell of the sweet jam ascended so to the wall, where the flies were sitting in great numbers, that they were attracted and descended on it in hosts. "Hola! who invited you?" said the little tailor, and drove the unbidden guests away. The flies, however, who understood no German, would not be turned away, but came back again in ...
— Types of Children's Literature • Edited by Walter Barnes
... moments of the happiest and best minds. We are aware of evanescent visitations of thought and feeling sometimes associated with place or person, sometimes regarding our own mind alone, and always arising unforeseen and departing unbidden, but elevating and delightful beyond all expression: so that even in the desire and regret they leave, there cannot but be pleasure, participating as it does in the nature of its object. It is as it were the interpenetration of a diviner ...
— English Critical Essays - Nineteenth Century • Various
... and next me was Viscus Thurinus, and below, if I remember, was Varius; with Servilius Balatro, Vibidius, whom Maecenas had brought along with him, unbidden guests. Above [Nasidienus] himself was Nomentanus, below him Porcius, ridiculous for swallowing whole cakes at once. Nomentanus [was present] for this purpose, that if any thing should chance to be unobserved, he might show it with his pointing finger. For the other ...
— The Works of Horace • Horace
... rest in his for a moment, and as their eyes met she saw in his a truth and honesty and cleanness which revealed what Theriere might have been had Fate ordained his young manhood to different channels. And in that moment a question sprang, all unbidden and unforeseen to her mind; a question which caused her to withdraw her hand quickly from his, and which sent a slow crimson to ...
— The Mucker • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... swept suddenly over Jimmie Dale, as, unbidden, of its own volition, the last paragraph he had read in that evening's paper began to repeat itself over and over again in his mind. The two little kiddies—it seemed as though he could see them standing there—and from Jimmie Dale's lips, not given ...
— The Adventures of Jimmie Dale • Frank L. Packard
... do not much affect your shows, but we cannot dismiss forever the cheerful little room, cloud-environed almost, up to which we have so often toiled, after days of hard walking among the gaudy streets of the French capital. One pleasant scene, at least, rises unbidden, as we recall the past. It is a brisk, healthy morning, and we walk in the direction of the Tuileries. Bending our steps toward the Palace, (it is yet early, and few loiterers are abroad in the leafy ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 7, No. 40, February, 1861 • Various
... earth perceives, and from her bosom pours Unbidden herbs and voluntary flowers: Thick, new-born violets a soft carpet spread, And clust'ring lotos swelled the rising bed; And sudden hyacinths the earth bestrow, And flamy crocus ...
— The Folk-lore of Plants • T. F. Thiselton-Dyer
... from mine eyes the tears unbidden start, As thee, my country, and the long-lost sight Of thy own cliffs, that lift their summits white Above the wave, once more my beating heart With eager hope and filial transport hails! Scenes of my youth, reviving ...
— The Poetical Works of William Lisle Bowles, Vol. 1 • William Lisle Bowles
... so dulled Prince Owain's ear, Her melody he may not hear? No kindly look, or word, or token, His trance of wretchedness has broken, Yet knows she, in that lonely spot, Her presence felt, tho' greeted not; Knows that no foot, save hers, unbidden; Had dared to tread the living tomb, No other hand had waked, unchidden, The echoes of that sullen gloom; And now her voice's gentle tone Blends with the harp, in ...
— The Poetry of Wales • John Jenkins
... and nettles, Lay a violet, half hidden; Hoping that his glance unbidden Yet might fall upon her petals. Though she lived alone, apart, Hope lay nestling at her heart, But, alas! the cruel awaking Set her little heart a-breaking, For he gathered for his posies Only roses - ...
— Songs of a Savoyard • W. S. Gilbert
... inspired Antonia with a melancholy awe. The gloom of night gave strength to this sensation. She placed her light upon the Table, and sank into a large chair, in which She had seen her Mother seated a thousand and a thousand times. She was never to see her seated there again! Tears unbidden streamed down her cheek, and She abandoned herself to the sadness which ...
— The Monk; a romance • M. G. Lewis
... the child and diverted its attention. The husband sat far on the bed, put one arm under the pillow that supported his wife, and held her hand in his. Recollections and anticipations, we knew, were thronging, unbidden, into that mother's soul. She had been reminded of fountains of love sealed up, and yet there were opening within her living fountains of water. She grew calm, beckoned for a little book on the table, opened it, and pointed her husband to a stanza, which ...
— Bertha and Her Baptism • Nehemiah Adams
... filled the air his mind began to clear. Like a lifted veil there rose up something that had hitherto obscured his vision. The words of the priest at the railway inn flashed across his brain unbidden: "You will find it different." And also, though why he could not tell, he saw mentally the strong, rather wonderful eyes of that other guest at the supper-table, the man who had overheard his conversation, and had later got into earnest talk with the priest. He took out his watch and stole ...
— Three More John Silence Stories • Algernon Blackwood
... are apt to talk of 'scenery' as all in all, but men require a social interest superadded. Mere scenery palls upon the mind, where it is the sole and ever-present attraction relied on. It should come unbidden and unthought of, like the warbling of birds, to sustain itself in power. And at feeding-time we observe that men of all nations and languages, Tros Tyriusve, grow savage, if, by a fine scene, you ...
— Theological Essays and Other Papers v2 • Thomas de Quincey
... land where skies bend blue and all nature seems to smile; where mosses veil the infirmities of decrepit oaks and vines spring unbidden from the ground to hide the scars of grey old walls; where the grape-vine staggers from tree to tree as though drunk with the purple juice of its own luscious fruit; where flowers lie at your plate on a winter's day and the humblest laborer ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Report of the Proceedings at the Eleventh Annual Meeting - Washington, D. C. October 7 AND 8, 1920 • Various
... life-history of the flies which dwell as unbidden guests or social parasites in the nests and hives of wild honey-bees. These burglarious flies are belted and bearded in the very self-same pattern as the bumble-bees themselves; but their larvae live upon the young grubs of the hive, and repay the unconscious ...
— Falling in Love - With Other Essays on More Exact Branches of Science • Grant Allen
... dear cousin, and shall not hesitate to do or bear all that holds out a hope of prolonging my days here upon earth; for otherwise I should feel that I was rushing into the Master's presence unbidden, and that without finishing the work he has given me to ...
— Elsie's Vacation and After Events • Martha Finley
... for Salem's hallowed towers laid low The sigh would heave, the unbidden tear would flow; And when the dull and wearying round of Power Allowed Zorobabel one vacant hour, He lov'd on Babylon's high wall to roam, And stretch the gaze towards his distant home, Or on Euphrates' willowy banks reclin'd Hear the sad harp ...
— Poems • Robert Southey
... as old Memnon's image, long renown'd By fabling Nilus, to the quivering touch 110 Of Titan's ray, with each repulsive string Consenting, sounded through the warbling air Unbidden strains, even so did Nature's hand To certain species of external things, Attune the finer organs of the mind; So the glad impulse of congenial powers, Or of sweet sound, or fair proportion'd form, ...
— Poetical Works of Akenside - [Edited by George Gilfillan] • Mark Akenside
... he swore, indeed; then pleaded; then threatened that he would fight them all with single hand. Of course, he won the ladies' hearts, as they entered the great hall, by his boyish swagger; but not the guards. Your orders were imperative—that none unbidden ...
— Mistress Nell - A Merry Tale of a Merry Time • George C. Hazelton, Jr.
... recalls her brilliant promise, her happy marriage, her] "faculty for art, which some of the best artists have told me amounted to genius." [But he was naturally reticent in these matters, and would hardly write of his own griefs unbidden even to old friends.] ...
— The Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley Volume 3 • Leonard Huxley
... then so impious?" she said, the unbidden tear rushing into her large blue eyes.—"Alas! it was a pleasure to reflect that Hereward was ...
— Waverley Volume XII • Sir Walter Scott
... Unbidden, tears leaped into Diana's eyes at the cold satirical tones. Surely, surely he had hurt her enough, for one day! Without a word she turned and made her way blindly out of the room and down the stairs. In the hall she almost ran into ...
— The Splendid Folly • Margaret Pedler
... of that council hall with barriers strong and stout, But the dead unbidden shall enter there, and never you'll shut them out. And the man that died in the open boat, and the babes that suffered worse, Shall sit at the table when peace is made by the side ...
— The Path to Home • Edgar A. Guest
... both sides. Our sudden entrance seemed to create a temporary diversion from the legitimate business of the evening. The tattooed women and shaven-headed men stared in open-mouthed astonishment at the pale-faced guests who had come unbidden to the marriage-feast, having on no wedding garments. Our faces were undeniably dirty, our blue hunting-shirts and buckskin trousers bore the marks of two months' rough travel, in numerous rips, tears, and tatters, which ...
— Tent Life in Siberia • George Kennan
... to the exclusion of pious thoughts which should occupy it in prayer, of which the office is a high form; or they may be thoughts which arise from previous laziness, thoughtlessness, pre-occupation or some engrossing worldly affair. Involuntary distractions are those which come unbidden and unsought to the mind, are neither placed directly, nor by their causes, by ...
— The Divine Office • Rev. E. J. Quigley
... wait?" he cried. "Who, in God's name, are ye to establish yourselves unbidden in my house, dog my steps, threaten me, ruin me with my friends and neighbours, and treat me as though I were a child without will, aims, or desires of mine own? Ye have tarried for me; tarry on until doomsday. Henceforth I'll be master ...
— Sea-Dogs All! - A Tale of Forest and Sea • Tom Bevan
... of old opinions in behalf of my happiness, dearest father," she resumed, the tears starting unbidden to her thoughtful blue eye, "I thank thee fervently. It is true that we are inhabitants of a republic, but we ...
— The Headsman - The Abbaye des Vignerons • James Fenimore Cooper
... on a visit to his betrothed, and his father and mother soon followed— coming to get better acquainted with their daughter-in-law to be. Then into the royal circle there came another royal guest, all unbidden—the king whose name is Death. The Prince of Leiningen—the Queen's half- brother in blood, but whole brother in heart—died, to her great grief; and soon after there passed away her beloved aunt, the Duchess of Gloucester, a good and amiable woman, and the last of the fifteen children of George ...
— Queen Victoria, her girlhood and womanhood • Grace Greenwood
... father found her, when they came out from the house, arm in arm. Who shall say what spring the words unconsciously released, conjuring up before her unwilling mental vision a picture of the years gone by? Who shall explain the apprehensiveness which came unbidden, causing known certainties to be forgotten because of the disquieting questionings which demanded ...
— The Lever - A Novel • William Dana Orcutt
... his eyes and seen what manner of man he was made to be, in the full perfection of bodily strength and beauty. But these glories are withheld from him who is guilty of self-neglect, for they are not wont to blaze forth unbidden. (10) ...
— The Memorabilia - Recollections of Socrates • Xenophon
... were a sally of banter whose blade he parried in the nick of time, her laughter-bathed eyes darted past him and squarely met my own; her lips sobered into a half parted expression of interest and, some strange thought—perhaps unbidden—coming into her mind, sent the blood surging to her cheeks. As quickly as this happened it had gone, and again she seemed to be absorbing the attention of ...
— Wings of the Wind • Credo Harris
... himself had once desired for his wife) was given in marriage to a mortal, Peleus, and there was a great wedding-feast in heaven. Thither all the immortals were bidden, save one, Eris, the goddess of Discord, ever an unwelcome guest. But she came unbidden. While the wedding-guests sat at feast, she broke in upon their mirth, flung among them a golden apple, and departed with looks that boded ill. Some one picked up the strange missile and read its inscription: ...
— Old Greek Folk Stories Told Anew • Josephine Preston Peabody
... hurrying to and fro, which would indicate that Potzfeldt must have aroused his retainers, and they were running up and down from wine-cellar to dining-room, bearing acceptable refreshments for the unbidden guests. ...
— Air Service Boys Over The Enemy's Lines - The German Spy's Secret • Charles Amory Beach
... Him who had not even refused to die. It had been a glorious day of June sunshine, when through the open windows came the robin's song and the prairie breeze laden with the perfume of wolf-willow blossoms and sweet-grass. He remembered how the tears had risen unbidden to his eyes—happy tears of love and loyalty—and he had felt that nothing could ever separate him from the Master whom he loved. But now he stood on the outside of the door—he was an outsider—he had no part in this. He made a step backward—he would go away—he would hear no more—he had come ...
— The Second Chance • Nellie L. McClung
... to kill," said Hare, darkly. The words came unbidden, his first answer to the wild influences about him. "Mescal, I'm sorry—maybe ...
— The Heritage of the Desert • Zane Grey
... girl. The veil which had concealed its burning mysteries was torn away in an instant. The key to its secret places was in her hands, and she was bewildered with her own discoveries. Her cheeks alternated between the pale and crimson of doubt and hope. Her lips quivered convulsively, and an unbidden but not painful suffusion overspread the warm brilliance of her soft fair cheeks. She strove, ineffectually, to speak; her words came forth in broken murmurs; her voice had sunk into a sigh; she was dumb. The youth once ...
— Guy Rivers: A Tale of Georgia • William Gilmore Simms
... opened and I heard the trail of a gown—whose, it was easy to guess. Only one woman could have the privilege of entering the King's presence unbidden. ...
— The Colonel of the Red Huzzars • John Reed Scott
... hate your rulers, and the heroes, and all the children of men. We are the kindred of the Titans, and the Giants, and the Gorgons, and the ancient monsters of the deep.' And another, 'Who is this rash and insolent man who pushes unbidden into our world?' And the first, 'There never was such a world as ours, nor will be; if we let him see it, he will spoil ...
— The Heroes • Charles Kingsley
... and sudden profession of love for my dead father, went so clean beyond my comprehension that it put me into both fear and hope. On the one hand, I began to think my uncle was perhaps insane and might be dangerous; on the other, there came up into my mind (quite unbidden by me and even discouraged) a story like some ballad I had heard folk singing, of a poor lad that was a rightful heir and a wicked kinsman that tried to keep him from his own. For why should my uncle play a part with a relative that came, almost a beggar, to his door, unless in his heart he had ...
— Kidnapped • Robert Louis Stevenson
... went slowly towards home. Her limbs were very stiff, and every now and then she had to choke down an unbidden sob. Her pupils had been long returned from church, and had busied themselves in preparing tea—an occupation which had probably made them feel ...
— Ruth • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... remember, and understand,"—my voice broke and tears came, unbidden tears which I did not even desire to conceal—and in that moment the spirit of my wife came near to me, and soul looked into the eyes of soul, with a perfect and bewildering joy, the very ...
— The Altar Fire • Arthur Christopher Benson
... must be; then threw myself on a mossy mound that lay like a couch along the inner end. Here I lay in a delicious reverie for some time; during which all lovely forms, and colours, and sounds seemed to use my brain as a common hall, where they could come and go, unbidden and unexcused. I had never imagined that such capacity for simple happiness lay in me, as was now awakened by this assembly of forms and spiritual sensations, which yet were far too vague to admit of being translated into any shape common to my own and another mind. I ...
— Phantastes - A Faerie Romance for Men and Women • George MacDonald
... am afraid that the above looks flippant—but think of the twitterings of the soul of him who brings in his hand an unbidden book, written by himself. To such a one much is due in the way of indulgence. Will you remember that? Have you forgotten early twitterings ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... that the psychological conditions under which we view "The Lion" are the most subtle and complete that man can devise; and these are the things that add the last touch to art and cause us to stand speechless, and which make the unbidden tears start. The little lake at the foot of the cliff prevents a too near approach; the overhanging vines and melancholy boughs form a dim, subduing shade; the falling water seems like the playing of an organ in a vast cathedral; and last, the position of ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 6 - Subtitle: Little Journeys to the Homes of Eminent Artists • Elbert Hubbard
... which gave her courage to enter unbidden into the house of Simon, where Jesus was being entertained as a guest. She had come to anoint his feet but as she beheld him, she thought again of her sins and her hot tears of penitence fell upon the feet of her Lord. She hastily unbound her hair and with it ...
— The Gospel of Luke, An Exposition • Charles R. Erdman
... worth the winning. He acknowledged no right that such a man as Hampton could justly hold over so innocent and trustful a heart. The girl was morally so far above him as to make his very touch a profanation, and at the unbidden thought of it, the soldier vowed to oppose such an unholy consummation. Nor did he, even then, utterly despair of winning, for he recalled afresh the intimacy of their few past meetings, his face brightening in memory of ...
— Bob Hampton of Placer • Randall Parrish
... book is all that's left me now,— Tears will unbidden start,— With faltering lip and throbbing brow I press it to my heart. For many generations past Here is our family tree; My mother's hands this Bible clasped, She, ...
— McGuffey's Fifth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... wanting to our annoyance, I had those of that gnawing nature which seemed to be born of the tree whose evil growth "brought death into the world and all our wo." The pang of a nameless jealousy—a sleepless distrust—rose unbidden to my heart at seasons, when, in truth, there was no obvious cause. When Julia was most gentle—when William was most generous—even then, I had learned to repulse them with an indifference which I did not feel—a rudeness which brought to my heart ...
— Confession • W. Gilmore Simms
... to be dressed"? Beautiful in form, deft and graceful in expression, with not a word too much or one that bears not its part in the total effect, there is yet about the lyrics of Jonson a certain stiffness and formality, a suspicion that they were not quite spontaneous and unbidden, but that they were carved, so to speak, with disproportionate labour by a potent man of letters whose habitual thought is on greater things. It is for these reasons that Jonson is even better in the epigram and in occasional verse where rhetorical ...
— Cynthia's Revels • Ben Jonson
... are inseparable. You cannot study history without having the name of Washington come to you unbidden. Bancroft said, "But for Washington the Republic would never have been conceived; the Constitution would not have been formed, and the Federal Government would never have been put in operation." Washington felt ...
— Washington's Birthday • Various
... regard to them? Come, you relentless foe of all bucklers, speak; I am listening to you. (Peace whispers into Hermes' ear.) Is that your grievance against them? Yes, yes, I understand. Hearken, you folk, this is her complaint. She says, that after the affair of Pylos[319] she came to you unbidden to bring you a basket full of truces and that you thrice repulsed her by your ...
— The Eleven Comedies - Vol. I • Aristophanes et al
... bathed and rubbed the sick woman's head, and held the cool cloth to the face and wiped the parched lips, and rubbed the feverish hands, while Guy stood, looking on, bewildered and confounded, and utterly unable to say a word or utter a protest to this angel, as it seemed to him, who had come unbidden to his aid, forgetful of the risk she ran and the danger she incurred. Once as she turned her beautiful face to him and he saw how wondrously fair and lovely it was, lovely with a different expression from any he had ever seen there, it came over him with a thrill of horror that ...
— Miss McDonald • Mary J. Holmes
... that he had surpassed himself. Buttar also gained a fair share of the applause bestowed on his friend, and he was not jealous that he did not gain more. No one listened more attentively than did Ellis, for he had declined to speak, though urged by Ernest to do so, and tears rushed unbidden into his eyes at the success which ...
— Ernest Bracebridge - School Days • William H. G. Kingston
... stop, I gaze; in accents rude, To thee, serenest Solitude, Bursts forth th' unbidden lay; 'Begone vile world! the learned, the wise, The great, the busy, I despise, And pity ...
— English Poets of the Eighteenth Century • Selected and Edited with an Introduction by Ernest Bernbaum
... there are mental troubles, much worse than mere worry, for which an absorbing object of thought may serve as a remedy. There are sceptical thoughts, which seem for the moment to uproot the firmest faith: there are blasphemous thoughts, which dart unbidden into the most reverent souls: there are unholy thoughts, which torture with their hateful presence the fancy that would fain be pure. Against all these some real mental work is a most helpful ally. That "unclean ...
— The Life and Letters of Lewis Carroll • Stuart Dodgson Collingwood
... minstrel art the while, Can blend the tones of weal and we, So archly, that the heart may smile, Though bright, unbidden ...
— Poems • Sam G. Goodrich
... the clammy atmosphere with the feeling that we were shut off from the rest of the world by the thick wall of fog. Memories of Katia and Oghratina sprang unbidden to the mind, and a repetition of those disastrous affairs seemed not unlikely. We felt with relief the sudden cold that precedes the dawn, and in a little while it grew lighter. Presently the sun appeared dimly over the Eastern horizon and we waited hopefully for the fog to ...
— With Our Army in Palestine • Antony Bluett
... ask no advice, friend," they answered. Again a constraint enfolded, fastened upon us by an unbidden guest. "Like as not you ...
— Desert Dust • Edwin L. Sabin
... knew not what she uttered. The words came unbidden from her lips. She laid her hand on the latch, but Clinton caught hold of it ere she had time to ...
— Helen and Arthur - or, Miss Thusa's Spinning Wheel • Caroline Lee Hentz
... in that brief period committed some of the most atrocious deeds of treachery and deviltry that have ever been, recorded. Backed by a horde of blood-thirsty mutineers, he committed deeds the memory of which causes tears of pity for his victims to come unbidden into the eyes of the English tourist thirty years after. Delicate ladies, who from infancy had been the recipients of tender care and consideration, were herded together in stifling rooms with the thermometer ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle Volume II. - From Teheran To Yokohama • Thomas Stevens
... have been the external part of the door-latch, attached by day thereto by means of a leathern thong, which at night was disconnected with the latch to prevent any unbidden guest from entering. Thus any one 'tirling at the pin' does not attempt to open the door, but signifies his ...
— Ballads of Romance and Chivalry - Popular Ballads of the Olden Times - First Series • Frank Sidgwick
... little edified by Johnson's Journal. It is even more ridiculous than was poor Rutty's of flatulent memory. The portion of it given us in this day's paper contains not one sentiment worth one farthing, except the last, in which he resolves to bind himself with no more unbidden obligations. Poor man! one would think that to pray for his dead wife and to pinch himself with Church fasts had been almost the whole of ...
— In the Name of the Bodleian and Other Essays • Augustine Birrell
... as the other is gross, gaudy, and meretricious.—All that is admirable in the Seasons, is the emanation of a fine natural genius, and sincere love of his subject, unforced, unstudied, that comes uncalled for, and departs unbidden. But he takes no pains, uses no self-correction; or if he seems to labour, it is worse than labour lost. His genius "cannot be constrained by mastery." The feeling of nature, of the changes of the seasons, was in his mind; and he could ...
— Lectures on the English Poets - Delivered at the Surrey Institution • William Hazlitt
... think that I enjoy it for itself. Despite the artificial life I have led, everything that speaks of nature has a voice that I can rarely resist. What feelings created in a city can compare with those that rise so gently and so unbidden within us when the trees and the waters are our only companions—our only sources of excitement and intoxication? Is not ...
— Godolphin, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... they gone? Where had everybody gone? Unbidden and unanswered, these questions leaped to my bewildered brain, firing it ...
— Fibble, D. D. • Irvin Shrewsbury Cobb
... intruder upon our heroine's solitude exclaimed, with half-earnest, half-jesting gallantry, "Prithee, fair woodland nymph, suffer a lone knight, who has wandered to the confines of a Paradise unawares, to bow the knee in thy service, and as atonement meet for venturing unbidden into thy hidden sanctum, to proffer thee the ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 3 September 1848 • Various
... suppress my griefs I've tried, And kept within its banks the swelling tide! But all in vain: unbidden numbers flow; Spite of myself my sorrows vocal grow. This be my plea.—Nor thou, dear Shade, refuse The well-meant tribute of the willing muse, Who trembles at the greatness of its theme, And fain would say what suits ...
— The Poetical Works of Beattie, Blair, and Falconer - With Lives, Critical Dissertations, and Explanatory Notes • Rev. George Gilfillan [Ed.]
... Culpepero! If we throw ourselves unasked at your Excellency's feet (courtesy), if we appear unsought before the light of your Excellency's eyes (courtesy), if we err in maidenly decorum in thus seeking unbidden your Excellency's presence (courtesy), believe us, it is the fear of some greater, some graver indecorum in our conduct that has withdrawn your Excellency's person from us since you have graced our roof with your company. We know, Senor Commander, how superior are the charms ...
— Two Men of Sandy Bar - A Drama • Bret Harte
... causing my eyes to water and the tears to flow unbidden. I explored my sleeve for my handkerchief. It was not there. I could not possibly go to town without one, so I hastened home again. Joan was at the ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, August 5th, 1914 • Various
... and her friend turned to fly, in a mad instinct to be anywhere behind a locked door. Yet before the instinct could reach their muscles, the unbidden ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1917 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... was so sudden that those who had stared at her sourly or scornfully, or with malicious amusement or some stirrings of pity, drew their breath and gave ground a little. Where was the shrinking, frightened, unbidden guest of a moment before, with downcast eyes and burning cheeks? Here was a proud and easy and radiant lady, with witching eyes and a wonderful smile. "I am only Audrey, your Excellency," she said, and curtsied ...
— Audrey • Mary Johnston
... and fleshers' flees come to feasts unbidden," said Mysie; but Sandy gae her a glower that garred her ...
— My Man Sandy • J. B. Salmond
... a sigh and a soldier's tear on the untimely fate of his comrade, and then pondered on the awkward mission he had undertaken. His heart was heavy, and his head perplexed; for he was to present himself an unbidden guest among hostile people, and to damp their festivity with tidings fatal to their hopes. Still, there were certain whisperings of curiosity in his bosom to see this far-famed beauty of Katzenellenbogen, so cautiously ...
— Humorous Ghost Stories • Dorothy Scarborough
... hesitation, with a firm and resolute tread, stepped over the white coral line that marked the taboo of the great god's precincts. That was a declaration of open war; he had crossed the Rubicon of Tu-Kila-Kila's empire. Toko stood trembling on the far side; none might pass that mystic line unbidden and live, save the Korong alone who could succeed in breaking off the bough "with yellow leaves, resembling a mistletoe," of which Methuselah, the parrot, had told Felix and Muriel, and so earn the right to fight for his life with ...
— The Great Taboo • Grant Allen
... her rounds in the hush of midnight as of yore, and motioned us to quench the fading embers of the fire and leave the historic precincts to herself and her kindred shades. But, as no such vision was vouchsafed, I retired unbidden, and would advise Mr. Tiffany to lay hold of another auditor, being resolved not to show my face in the Province House for a good ...
— Twice Told Tales • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... silence. The unbidden ones came.... Anna—standing looking at him. A despair, a death in her face. Something tearing itself out of her. What pain! But no sound. An agony deeper than sound in her eyes. He trembled at the ...
— Erik Dorn • Ben Hecht
... as he saw the lioness grieving over her dead cub. With the acquisition of Go-bu-balu, Tarzan had come to realize the responsibilities and sorrows of parentage, without its joys. His heart went out to Sabor as it might not have done a few weeks before. As he watched her, there rose quite unbidden before him a vision of Momaya, the skewer through the septum of her nose, her pendulous under lip sagging beneath the weight which dragged it down. Tarzan saw not her unloveliness; he saw only the same anguish that was Sabor's, and he winced. That strange functioning ...
— Jungle Tales of Tarzan • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... appreciative reader, and the student who gets fully into sympathy with a great poem will have his whole life made brighter. Class work, done sympathetically and sincerely, will aid in finding the truest interpretations. Yet studies teach not their own use. The higher blessings come to us unbidden if we as little children hope for them. We shall find the highest uses of poetry in remembering always that it may at its best come to us ...
— The World's Best Poetry, Volume 8 • Various
... And yet as she sat there it came over Dolly's mind, as things will, quite unbidden; it came over her to think how life would go on here, in Italy, with Christina, after she was gone. When the lovely Italian chapter of her own life was closed up and ended, when she would be far away out of sight of Vesuvius, in the fogs of ...
— The End of a Coil • Susan Warner
... never asked you to come. You came unbidden. You must manage for yourself as best you may. But I leave much to the chapter of accidents. We never know what will turn up, till it turns up in the end. Everything comes at last, you know, to him ...
— Hilda Wade - A Woman With Tenacity Of Purpose • Grant Allen
... turned on the power. As George and John pushed the little boat out from the dock it began to move, but not before the canal-man unbidden suddenly leaped on board. ...
— Go Ahead Boys and the Racing Motorboat • Ross Kay
... weak—oh! how entirely weak, For one who may not love nor suffer more! Sometimes unbidden tears will wet my cheek, And my heart bound as keenly as of yore, Responsive to a voice, now hushed to rest, Which made the beautiful Italian shore, In all its pomp of summer vineyards drest, An Eden and a Paradise to me. Do the sweet breezes from the balmy west ...
— Lays of the Scottish Cavaliers and Other Poems • W.E. Aytoun
... attention. But to Martin the mysterious soothing music of the mass, like strains from another world, so unlike earthly tunes, came like a new sense, an inspiration from an unknown realm, and brought the unbidden tears ...
— The House of Walderne - A Tale of the Cloister and the Forest in the Days of the Barons' Wars • A. D. Crake
... said: he speaks with a strange, bitter energy, like one that has lost control of his words; he is hardly aware of them, nor does he retain any memory of them. They are as the wind, rising we know not why, and going its way unbidden. I have seen him like that in Galilee, Joseph answered. Ah! Nicodemus answered suddenly, I remember, but cannot put words upon it. He said that before the world was, he and his Father were one, and that his great love of man induced ...
— The Brook Kerith - A Syrian story • George Moore
... appearances in the presence of their inferiors. Still the demeanor of most was feverish and excited, as if the occasion were one of compelled gaiety, into which unwelcome and extraordinary circumstances of alloy had thrust themselves unbidden. ...
— The Headsman - The Abbaye des Vignerons • James Fenimore Cooper
... one in a dream; unbidden my feet know the way To that garden where love stood in blossom with the red and white hawthorn ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 5 • Various
... good way off, indeed, and for many a year the Edera had not seen the masked men, with their belts, crammed with arms and gold, round their loins; but still, one never knew, she thought; unbidden guests were oftener ...
— The Waters of Edera • Louise de la Rame, a.k.a. Ouida
... and horror of the act and of the moment chosen for it when death's shadow already lay dark upon this vast and busy monument to her dead friend, she turned on him her dark blue eyes ablaze; and to her twisted, outraged lips flew, unbidden, the furious ...
— Athalie • Robert W. Chambers
... stir; yes it was Toby's mouth expanded into Toby's wholesale smile, and with Toby's long-lost self behind it. He had grown into a man in the interval since the conflagration and his flight. At that time the plays of Shakespeare were the only serious literature I had read. Unbidden, the song of the Page to Mariana which in some freakish fashion I had always connected with Toby's ...
— Reminiscences of a South African Pioneer • W. C. Scully
... a poet hidden In the light of thought, Singing hymns unbidden, Till the world is wrought To sympathy with hopes and fears ...
— A History of Roman Literature - From the Earliest Period to the Death of Marcus Aurelius • Charles Thomas Cruttwell
... may be, the memory of whispered words Came o'er us with subtle power, Awaking, unbidden, our full hearts' chords In the pain ...
— Lays from the West • M. A. Nicholl
... with Bacchus, that with Ceres suits; That other loads the trees with happy fruits, A fourth with grass, unbidden, decks the ground: Thus Tmolus is with yellow saffron crown'd; India black ebon and white iv'ry bears; And soft Idume weeps her od'rous tears: Thus Pontus sends her beaver stones from far: And naked Spaniards temper ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... fantasy, My own, my human mind, which passively Now renders and receives fast influencings, Holding an unremitting interchange With the clear universe of things around; 40 One legion of wild thoughts, whose wandering wings Now float above thy darkness, and now rest Where that or thou art no unbidden guest, In the still cave of the witch Poesy, Seeking among the shadows that pass by 45 Ghosts of all things that are, some shade of thee, Some phantom, some faint image; till the breast From which they fled recalls them, ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley Volume I • Percy Bysshe Shelley
... a lure of flattery; but they have been captured. American editors are much better than English editors in this supreme matter. The profound truth has not escaped them that good copy does not as a rule fly in unbidden at the office window. They don't idiotically pretend that they have far more of the right kind of stuff than they know what to do with, as does the medium-fatuous English editor. They cajole. They run round. They hustle. The ...
— Books and Persons - Being Comments on a Past Epoch 1908-1911 • Arnold Bennett
... gods and great, There bow thee and dedicate The speechless spirit in these thy weak words hidden; And mix thy reverent breath With holier air of death, At the high feast of sorrow a guest unbidden, Till with divine triumphal tears Thou fill men's eyes who listen ...
— Songs before Sunrise • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... as he was requested, and, with the baron, obeyed her request to search the anterooms, to see that no unbidden visitor remained. She herself raised the curtains and looked up ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... favourite room, then showed them their own, and went back to wait for them, while Elettra brought the tea, just as she had done of old in the Palazzo Macomer. Veronica watched her while she was arranging the tea-table. Elettra, who rarely spoke unbidden, ...
— Taquisara • F. Marion Crawford
... clamour of village oracles; past the forge, with its lifeless fires a presage of things to come; past the cross-roads, where the sign-post, silhouetted against the sky, seemed no longer a gibbet, but a crucifix; past cottages stirring with unaccustomed life, unconscious of the unbidden guest that was soon to knock with ghostly fingers at ...
— The Parts Men Play • Arthur Beverley Baxter
... destinies am I; Fame, love, and fortune on my footsteps wait. Cities and fields I walk; I penetrate Deserts and seas remote, and, passing by Hovel and mart and palace, soon or late, I knock unbidden once on every gate. If sleeping, wake; if feasting, rise before I turn away; it is the hour of fate, And they who follow me reach every state Mortals desire, and conquer every foe Save death; but those who doubt or hesitate, Condemned to failure, penury, and woe, Seek me in vain and ...
— A Williams Anthology - A Collection of the Verse and Prose of Williams College, 1798-1910 • Compiled by Edwin Partridge Lehman and Julian Park
... fern; the loveliness of the high table lands, and the intense hush that follows sunset by the trout stream—these things are theirs, and become a part of their consciousness. In later and wearier years these spectacles will flash before their eyes unbidden, they will see the water dimpled by rising trout, and watch the cattle stealing through the ford, and disappearing, grey shapes, in the grey of ...
— Lost Leaders • Andrew Lang
... as far as she could remember, and told the story of her life, pathetically, simply, without a single claim to pity, yet so earnestly and vividly that the grandmother, lying with her eyes closed, forgot herself completely, and let the tears trickle unbidden and ...
— The Girl from Montana • Grace Livingston Hill
... my heart leaps to my mouth when the knights clash at Ashby, the propulsive power of that leap had its origin in the emotions of 1870 rather than those of 1914. And when some of Dickens' pathos—that death-bed of Paul Dombey for instance—brings the tears again unbidden to my eyes, I suspect, though I scarcely dare to put my suspicion into words, that the salt in those tears is of the vintage of 1875. I am reading Arnold Bennett now and loving him very dearly when he is at his best; but how I shall feel about him in 1930 or how I might feel ...
— A Librarian's Open Shelf • Arthur E. Bostwick
... An unbidden multitude, gathered from the highways, and the byways, loitered about the vicinity, patiently—O how patiently!—awaiting our adjournment. The fandango naturally followed; and it enlivened the vast, bare chambers of an adjoining adobe, whose walls had ...
— In the Footprints of the Padres • Charles Warren Stoddard
... vainly for words. He stammered,—a promise made to an enemy struggling for supremacy. And the words seem to come unbidden: ...
— The White Desert • Courtney Ryley Cooper
... giving in his evidence, the accused discovered every token of the most poignant sensibility. At one time his features were convulsed with anguish; tears unbidden trickled down his manly cheeks; and at another he started with apparent astonishment at the unfavourable turn that was given to the narrative, though without betraying any impatience to interrupt. I never saw a man less ferocious in his appearance. ...
— Caleb Williams - Things As They Are • William Godwin
... saw him ever unshaken of fortune. Tender and protecting love he did not inspire: such love is given to weakness, not to strength. Not only was he destitute of a vulgar greed for fame, he would not extend a hand to welcome it when it came unbidden. He was without ambition, and, like Washington, into whose family connection he had married, kept duty as ...
— Destruction and Reconstruction: - Personal Experiences of the Late War • Richard Taylor
... I have sometimes thought—I mean the thought has sometimes come to me unbidden—that I would like to rest beside her at last. But it is only a fancy. I know it will make no difference ...
— Janet's Love and Service • Margaret M Robertson
... least shall we distinguish its shadows from those of the tomb? But if the impressions of what I have termed the first stage, are not, at will, recalled, yet, after long interval, do they not come unbidden, while we marvel whence they come? He who has never swooned, is not he who finds strange palaces and wildly familiar faces in coals that glow; is not he who beholds floating in mid-air the sad visions that the many may not view; is not he who ponders over the perfume of some novel flower—is ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 2 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... perfectly still and free from all clouds or vapours. Mountains fifty, nay, a hundred miles off looked sharp and near. All their details—ridge and crag, snow and glacier—stood out with faultless definition. Pleasant thoughts of happy days in bygone years came up unbidden as we recognised the old familiar forms. All were revealed, not one of the principal peaks of the Alps was hidden. I see them clearly now, the great inner circle of giants, backed by the ranges, chains, and massifs.... Ten ...
— The Beauties of Nature - and the Wonders of the World We Live In • Sir John Lubbock
... with Miss Kingsbury, to tell the clerk in the outer office to deny him; but she was too full of her own trouble to see the reluctance which it tasked all his strength to quell, and she sank into the nearest chair unbidden. At sight of her, Atherton became the prey of one of those fantastic repulsions in which men visit upon women the blame of others' thoughts about them: he censured her for Halleck's wrong; but in another instant he recognized his cruelty, and atoned ...
— A Modern Instance • William Dean Howells
... rumours pervaded the air. Now the Boers had possession of the whole stadt; again, as soon as night fell, large reinforcements were to force their way in. Of course we knew the Colonel was all the while maturing his plans to rid the town of the unbidden guests, but what these were no one could tell. About 8 p.m., when we were in the depth of despair, we got an official message to say that the Boers in the stadt had been surrounded and taken prisoners, and also that the fort had surrendered to Colonel Hore, ...
— South African Memories - Social, Warlike & Sporting From Diaries Written At The Time • Lady Sarah Wilson
... "error by defect." It has a ghastly individuality and deadly concreteness,—nay, even a vindictive aggressiveness, which have both fascinated and terrorized the imagination of the race in all ages. From the days of "the angel of the pestilence" to the coming of the famine and the fever as unbidden guests into the tent of Minnehaha; from "the pestilence that walketh in darkness" to the plague that still "stalks abroad" in even the prosaic columns of our daily press, there has been an irresistible impression, not merely of the positiveness, ...
— Preventable Diseases • Woods Hutchinson
... it?" the youth stammered, his teeth chattering. He to penetrate to Basterga's room unbidden! He to rob the formidable man and perhaps be caught in the act! He to deceive him and meet his eye at meals! Impossible! "But if I cannot—do it?" ...
— The Long Night • Stanley Weyman |
