"Overcast" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... cheeks. She knew she was pretty and always strove to look nice for the mere pleasure of the thing. All her instincts were aesthetic. Now she had the air of a saint wrought up to spiritual exaltation. She was almost frightened by the vision. She had seen her face frowning, weeping, overcast with gloom, never with an expression so fateful. It seemed as if her resolution was writ large upon every feature for all ...
— Children of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... brought with her might well have been an object of competition to sovereigns; three great dukedoms, an independent principality with its own mint and with its own tribunals, and an income greatly exceeding the whole revenue of the kingdom of Scotland. But this splendid prospect had been overcast. The match had been broken off. The aspiring suitor had been, during many years, shut up in an Alpine castle. At length Lewis relented. Lauzun was forbidden to appear in the royal presence, but was ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 2 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... brought the screen and placed it about the bed—the last service she could render. For hours the end was expected, but moment by moment he held death at bay, refusing to accept the freedom that he so earnestly longed for. At noon the sky became overcast and the slow falling of rain was heard on the low wooden roof. But still his ...
— Miss Mink's Soldier and Other Stories • Alice Hegan Rice
... better to be active: sun and wind were full of healing. Such a day was in truth one of those captain jewels "that seldom placed are" among the blusterous days of late autumn, with winter already present to speed its parting. For a long time the sky had been overcast with multitudes and endless hurrying processions of wild-looking clouds—torn, wind-chased fugitives, of every mournful shade of color, from palest gray to slatey-black; and storms of rain had been frequent, impetuous, and suddenly intermitted, or passing away phantom-like towards the misty hills, ...
— A Crystal Age • W. H. Hudson
... fascinated by the beauty of night in the tropics. Our evenings no doubt are often delicious also, though the mild climate we enjoy is partly due to the sky being so often overcast. In parts of the tropics, however, the air is calm and cloudless throughout nearly the whole of the year. There is no dew, and the inhabitants sleep on the house-tops, in full view of the brightness of the stars and the beauty of the sky, ...
— The Beauties of Nature - and the Wonders of the World We Live In • Sir John Lubbock
... of the feast was dark and overcast, and the inhabitants of Paradise Street looked at the sky with great misgiving, but the curio dealer ...
— The Pointing Man - A Burmese Mystery • Marjorie Douie
... political heavens are getting somewhat overcast. Some of this old rebel element, I think, are in favor of taking away the colored man's vote, and if he loses it now it may be generations before he gets it again. Well, after all perhaps the colored man generally ...
— The Underground Railroad • William Still
... Lancastrian, married the Princess Elizabeth, the daughter of Edward IV, the Yorkist. The Battle of Towton, like many others both before and since, was fought on a Sunday, which happened to be Palm Sunday in the year 1461, and the historian relates that on that day the "heavens were overcast, and a strong March wind brought with it a blinding snowstorm, right against the faces of the Lancastrians as they advanced to meet the Yorkists, who quickly took advantage of the storm to send ...
— From John O'Groats to Land's End • Robert Naylor and John Naylor
... said the Jester, who was frequently wont to act as peace-maker in the family, "our master did not propose to hurt Fangs, but only to affright him. For, if you observed, he rose in his stirrups, as thereby meaning to overcast the mark; and so he would have done, but Fangs happening to bound up at the very moment, received a scratch, which I will be bound to heal with a ...
— Ivanhoe - A Romance • Walter Scott
... darkness dim, Efface both light and quiet; No shape is in those shadows grim, No voice in that wild riot. Sustain'd and strong, a wondrous blast Above and round him blows; A greenish gloom, dense overcast, Each ...
— Poems • (AKA Charlotte, Emily and Anne Bronte) Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell
... looked away. There was a long interval. Into the shuffle and chatter of the passing crowd crept the muffled blare of the orchestra. The acrobat still held the boy's hand tight—still anxiously watched him, his face overcast. ...
— The Mother • Norman Duncan
... inculcate respecting the doctrine of Providence and Immortality. They frequently affirmed that fear generated superstition, and that superstition, in its turn, deepened and perpetuated the fear from which it sprung; that the minds of men must necessarily be overcast with anxiety and gloom as long as they continued to believe in a moral government and a future state; and that the only sovereign and effectual antidote to superstitious terror is the spirit of philosophical ...
— Modern Atheism under its forms of Pantheism, Materialism, Secularism, Development, and Natural Laws • James Buchanan
... courtyard of an old temple half-way up the hill, buried in a wood of centennial trees of gigantic branches; it is reached by granite steps, through strange gateways, as deeply furrowed as the old Celtic dolmens. The trees have also invaded this yard; the daylight is overcast with a greenish tint, and the drenching rain that pours down in torrents, is full of torn-up leaves and moss. Old granite monsters, of unknown shapes, are seated in the corners, and grimace with smiling ferocity; ...
— Madame Chrysantheme • Pierre Loti
... to praise when all shines fair; but when life is overcast, when all things seem to be against us, when we are in fear for some cherished happiness, or in the depths of sorrow, or in the solitude of a life which has no visible support, or in a season of sickness, and with the shadow of death approaching,—then to praise God; then ...
— Daily Strength for Daily Needs • Mary W. Tileston
... the house commanded an extensive and beautiful prospect, and the ancient trees that overshadowed it imparted a venerable and imposing aspect. The building was of brick, overcast to represent granite, and along three sides ran a wide gallery, supported by lofty circular pillars, crowned with unusually heavy capitals. The main body consisted of two stories, with a hall in the centre, and three rooms on either side; while two long single-storied wings stretched ...
— Macaria • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson
... leaving the rest to guard the intrenchments, Washington set out forthwith for the Indian camp. Their way led them through tall and thick woods, that were then in the full leaf of early summer. As if to deepen their gloom, the sky was overcast with the blackest of clouds, from which the rain poured down in torrents; and the night, of course, was as dark as dark could be. No wonder, then, that they were continually losing their path, which was but a deer-track, and none of the plainest, even in broad daylight. When ...
— The Farmer Boy, and How He Became Commander-In-Chief • Morrison Heady
... this sort. The Crystal Palace Hotel was bare of provender. Achieving a discreet retirement from the hostelry he stood irresolute in the street. This morning there was no genial sun to warm him. A high fog overcast the sky, and the air was chill. At intervals he shivered violently. For no reason, except that he had there last beheld actual food, he went back to ...
— Merton of the Movies • Harry Leon Wilson
... Kentucky, in company with five families more, and forty men that joined us in Powel's Valley, which is one hundred and fifty miles from the now settled parts of Kentucky, This promising beginning was soon overcast with a cloud of adversity; for, upon the 10th day of October, the rear of our company was attacked by a number of Indians, who killed six, and wounded one man. Of these, my eldest son was one that fell in the action. ...
— Life & Times of Col. Daniel Boone • Cecil B. Harley
... my voyages, when I was a man and commanded other men, I have seen the heavens overcast, the sea rage and foam, the storm arise, and, like a monstrous bird, beating the two horizons with its wings. Then I felt that my vessel was a vain refuge, that trembled and shook before the tempest. Soon the fury of the waves and the sight of the sharp rocks ...
— The Count of Monte Cristo • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... to be lightly dispersed. But she was not a person to enlarge upon them. After another moment she pointed out something from the window and laughed; but the unshadowed gladness that he had imagined for their meeting was overcast. ...
— Tante • Anne Douglas Sedgwick
... shut the mountain peaks entirely from view. The wind moaned between the gorges and occasionally swept along in such sudden gusts that they could with difficulty retain their feet. The sky became gradually overcast, and frequently light specks of snow, so small as to be scarcely perceptible, were driven along on the blast, making their faces smart by the force ...
— Winning His Spurs - A Tale of the Crusades • George Alfred Henty
... triviality of useless words. That afternoon she had ridden with her son to the funeral, holding him up with her strength, fortifying him with her courage. But now that his wife was gone for ever, and the pleasant house was overcast with its haunting emptiness, it seemed that her ...
— The Second Class Passenger • Perceval Gibbon
... the Preface to the third edition of his Corsica:—'Whatever clouds may overcast my days, I can now walk here among the rocks and woods of my ancestors, with an agreeable consciousness that I ...
— Life Of Johnson, Volume 5 • Boswell
... came to me: suppose Mary should not accept me? Then, with this great invention lost,—for I never should have the heart to make another,—I should have nothing left in the world. No; I would be cautious, lest in every way my future life should be overcast with disappointment. The sun had risen, and I felt I must go out; I must have air. Before I opened the front door, however, I said to myself, 'Remember it is all settled. It is Mary you must have—that is, if you can ...
— John Gayther's Garden and the Stories Told Therein • Frank R. Stockton
... picture roaming around out of stock without a frame! Him and me together can do Ariel and Prospero without a scratch of make-up." Grant beamed, but when Brotherton exclaimed as an afterthought, "Say, man, what about that boy's eyes?" Grant's features mantled and the old grim look overcast his face, as Brotherton went on: "Why, them eyes would make a madonna's look like fried eggs! Where did he get 'em—they're not Sands and they're not Adams. He must take back to some Peri that blew into Massachusetts ...
— In the Heart of a Fool • William Allen White
... overcast, the sky red, rimmed with the lingering sunset of mid-summer. They sat at the open window, trying to fancy the air was fresher there. The trees and shrubs of the garden stood stiff and dark; beyond in the roadway a gas-lamp burnt, bright orange against the hazy blue of ...
— The Door in the Wall And Other Stories • H. G. Wells
... arrogances—tail of a peacock, horns of a stag, dollars of a capitalist—eclipses of astronomers. Though I have no desire for the job, I'd engage to list hundreds of instances in which the report upon an expected eclipse has been "sky overcast" or "weather unfavorable." In our Super-Hibernia, the unfavorable has been construed as the favorable. Some time ago, when we were lost, because we had not recognized our own dominant, when we were still of the unchosen and ...
— The Book of the Damned • Charles Fort
... pricking up their ears as he drove by, the men at work, the fertility of the soil—all these things had done his soul good, and now, in harsh contrast with that, he was glad when clouds came up and began slightly to overcast the laughing blue sky. They steamed down the river and soon after they had passed the splendid sheet of water called the "Broad" the Kessin church tower hove in sight and a moment later the quay and the long row of houses ...
— The German Classics Of The Nineteenth And Twentieth Centuries, Volume 12 • Various
... English emigrant may be checked, by reading complaints like the following, which are, at intervals, only too well founded in many parts of the Australian colonies. "We have now for upwards of four months been watching with anxious interest the progress of every cloudy sky; but, overcast as the heavens most usually are towards evening, the clouds have appeared to consist more of smoky exhalations than moist vapours; and even when at times they have seemed to break darkly over us, their liquid ...
— Australia, its history and present condition • William Pridden
... are the high coral plateaux across which our road lies. While we tackle the ascent, the sky has become overcast, the gay aspect of the landscape has changed to sad loneliness and a heavy shower soaks us to the skin. The walk through the jungle is trying, and even the moli loses the way now and again. Towards nightfall we enter a high forest with but little underbrush, and work our way slowly ...
— Two Years with the Natives in the Western Pacific • Felix Speiser
... the look of the Cross, nor use it as our fathers used. It savoreth of Popery, they say," interposed Alden glancing at the captain's face for sure approval, but to his surprise he saw it overcast and frowning. ...
— Standish of Standish - A story of the Pilgrims • Jane G. Austin
... by beginners in many ways. Squares of duck, fringed out on the edges, and overcast or hem-stitched, can have simple borders or stripes of any desired width worked in this stitch (see Fig. 3). You can draw the lines yourself with a pencil and ruler; those lines which slant in one direction may be worked in one shade, those slanting in the opposite direction ...
— Harper's Young People, October 26, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... ridden circumspectly around the outbuildings and corrals, dismounted from their horses at some little distance from the door of the Calabasas Inn. They shook out their legs as men do after a long turn in the saddle and faced each other in a whispered colloquy. An overcast sky, darkening the night, concealed the alkali crusting the riders and their horses; but the hard breathing of the latter in the darkness told of a ...
— Nan of Music Mountain • Frank H. Spearman
... like her own, was overcast. He looked gloomily at his mother for a moment; then with a slight twitch of the shoulders he turned and moved past her slowly in the direction of the hearth. He leaned his elbow on the overmantel and rested his brow against his clenched right hand, and stood so awhile ...
— St. Martin's Summer • Rafael Sabatini
... then turning to the right went on to a path which led up to Bray Hill on the St. Eloi road. I found some men of one of our battalions bent on the same enterprise. We got into the field and climbed the hill, and there on the top of it waited for the attack to begin. The sky was overcast, but towards the east the grey light of approaching dawn was beginning to appear. It was a thrilling moment. Human lives were at stake. The honour of our country was at stake. The fate of ...
— The Great War As I Saw It • Frederick George Scott
... the soul took lesson from her past, And found a vale wherein to dwell, With no Arcadian visions overcast Or history ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 12, No. 72, October, 1863 • Various
... with it after dinner," Rance announced. But when they came out after dinner, they found the sky overcast and a strong ...
— Short Stories of Various Types • Various
... uproar of the stall-keepers, the donkey drivers and the cosmopolitan passengers, casts here a sullen, impassive and consuming fire. And meanwhile the shadows shorten—and just as they do every day, beneath this sky which is never overcast, just as they have done for five and thirty centuries, these columns, these friezes and this temple itself, like a mysterious and solemn sundial, record patiently on the ground the slow passing of the hours. Verily for us, the ephemerae ...
— Egypt (La Mort De Philae) • Pierre Loti
... An expression of discomfiture overcast the good Father's face at this discovery; but there was trace neither of malice nor satisfaction in the stranger's air, which was still of serious and fateful contemplation. When Father Jose recovered ...
— Legends and Tales • Bret Harte
... handed up her breakfast to her, looking at her with shy, worshipping eyes. But his face was overcast, and he sighed heavily as he took up his hatchet and turned away; for he was the sole support of his mother and sisters, and if he did not do his work in Soignies they ...
— Bebee • Ouida
... close, overcast summer evening. The clouds, which had been threatening all day, spread out in a dense and sluggish mass of vapour, already yielded large drops of rain, and seemed to presage a violent thunder-storm, when Mr. and Mrs. Bumble, turning ...
— Oliver Twist • Charles Dickens
... The sky was becoming overcast, the beauty of the morning was waning. They called at the school-house for orders. Yakob ...
— Selected Polish Tales • Various
... and the sky was overcast by dull grey clouds; but just over the Brahman quarter there was a rift in the grey, and the pent-up gold shone through. It seemed as if God were pouring out His beauty upon those Brahmans, trying to make them look up, and they would not. One by one ...
— Things as They Are - Mission Work in Southern India • Amy Wilson-Carmichael
... prevailing southwest winds over the North Atlantic Current; more than one-half of the days are overcast ...
— The 1997 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... on which Hugo also arrived on his way to Netherglen. They had seen each other at the station, where Brian incautiously appeared without the blue spectacles which he relied upon as part of his disguise. From the white, startled horror which overcast Hugo's face, this young man saw that he had been almost, if not quite, recognised; and he expected to be sought out and questioned as to his identity. But Hugo made no effort to question him: in fact, he did not see the tutor again ...
— Under False Pretences - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... Far up the coast I could see—with the surges dashing up like the explosion of shells, and the cliffs, and the rampart of hills grown with grass and cactus. A bold promontory terminated the coast view to the north, and behind it I could glimpse a more fertile and wooded country. The sky was partly overcast by the volcanic murk. It fled before the Trades, and the red sun alternately blazed and ...
— The Mystery • Stewart Edward White and Samuel Hopkins Adams
... a momentary mood, and will it pass and leave no trace?" he thought. But the same instant, going back to his mood, he felt with delight that something new and important had happened to him. Real life had only for a time overcast the spiritual peace he had found, but it was ...
— Anna Karenina • Leo Tolstoy
... a cool, overcast forenoon when I alighted next at the familiar gate, and gave my horse into Tulp's charge. The boy, though greatly rejoiced to see me back again, had developed a curious taciturnity in these latter years—since his accident, in fact—and no longer ...
— In the Valley • Harold Frederic
... Mole; Sirius and Brilliant shifted their course for Ostend; and the great swarm of destroyers and motor craft sowed themselves abroad upon their multifarious particular duties. The night was overcast and there was a drift of haze; down the coast a great searchlight swung its beams to and fro; there was a small wind and ...
— World's War Events, Volume III • Various
... fidelity he would attach himself to her, with what affection serve her, how studiously obey her commands, with what sports he would dispel the light clouds of her melancholy sadness on the days when the skies should be overcast. Fashioning himself one out of his imagination, he would throw himself at her feet, kiss, fondle, caress, bite, and clasp her with as much reality as a prisoner scampers over the grass when he sees the green fields ...
— Droll Stories, Complete - Collected From The Abbeys Of Touraine • Honore de Balzac
... the point of starting when a party of Indians, under Weatherford, the great half-breed chief, who was the life and soul of the war, rode across a neighboring field, and settled themselves for supper within a dozen yards of Sam's camp. The sky was overcast with clouds, and so night fell even more quickly than it usually does in Southern latitudes, where there is almost no twilight at all. Sam made his companions lie down at the approach of the savages, and as soon as it was ...
— The Big Brother - A Story of Indian War • George Cary Eggleston
... and in its glorious results; hastened somewhat by the supposed danger of Burnside, at Knoxville, yet so completely successful, that nothing is left for cavil or fault-finding. The first day was lowering and overcast, favoring us greatly, because we wanted to be concealed from Bragg, whose position on the mountain-tops completely overlooked us and our movements. The second day was beautifully clear, and many a time, in the midst of its carnage and noise, I could not help stopping ...
— The Memoirs of General W. T. Sherman, Complete • William T. Sherman
... up the creek having been effected in the intense darkness of an overcast and rainy night, it had of course been quite impossible for us to form any conception of the appearance of our surroundings; but now, in the broad daylight and clear atmosphere of a fresh and brilliant ...
— The Pirate Slaver - A Story of the West African Coast • Harry Collingwood
... species. Internationalism, due to increased traffic, advanced with unparalleled strides in the third and fourth decades. The seclusion of rural life seemed to remain the quiet and unshakable realm of patriarchal virtue and venerable tradition. The political skies were overcast with the thunder clouds of approaching revolutions; France had just passed through another violent upheaval. Village conditions seemed to offer a veritable haven of refuge. The pristine artlessness of the peasant's intellectual, ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VIII • Various
... froth, mantle, sparkle, guggle^, gurgle; effervesce, ferment, fizzle. Adj. bubbling &c v.; frothy, nappy^, effervescent, sparkling, mousseux [Fr.], frothy [Fr.Tr.], up. cloudy &c n.; thunderheaded^; vaporous, nebulous, overcast. Phr. the lowring element scowls o'er the ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... books I went out into the open. The sky was overcast, yet the day by no means gloomy, for a soft, diffused light oozed through the clouds and turned all things warm and almost summery. But I saw the grounds now in their nakedness because I understood. Hate means strife, and the two together weave the robe that terror wears. Having no so-called religious ...
— The Damned • Algernon Blackwood
... clouds, that overcast Thy young morning, may not last. Soon shall arrive the rescuing hour, That yields thee up to Nature's power. Nature, that so late doth greet thee, Shall in o'er-flowing measure meet thee. She shall recompense with cost For every lesson thou hast lost. Then wandering ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb IV - Poems and Plays • Charles and Mary Lamb
... north beyond the ice cliffs all had been bright and dazzling; now the sky was overcast, the sun had disappeared, and though a little blue sky was visible to the south it was a dingy kind of ...
— Steve Young • George Manville Fenn
... what they were. If only the ladder rests on the low earth, where we live and move and have our being, there is some hope of our climbing to stand with others who have ascended its successive rungs and reached the starry heights. Yes, let us believe that, for some days at least, John's mind was overcast, his faith lost its foothold, and he seemed to be falling into bottomless depths. He sent them to Jesus, saying, Art Thou He that should come? We can easily trace this lapse of ...
— John the Baptist • F. B. Meyer
... in a clover field a little after ten o'clock. The night was dark, the sky being overcast; and here we had our first bivouac. No sooner had we reached the spot than we saw what convinced us that we had entered in good earnest upon the business for which we professed to have left our homes; for far away to the front rose the ...
— Our campaign around Gettysburg • John Lockwood
... is overcast, the morning low'rs, And heavily in clouds brings on the day, The great, the important day, big with the fate Of Cato and of Rome——Our father's death Would fill up all the guilt of civil war, And close the scene of blood. Already Caesar Has ravaged more than half the globe, and sees Mankind grown ...
— Cato - A Tragedy, in Five Acts • Joseph Addison
... embellishing my life by all kinds of delicious cares. Come, come, Croustillac," said the adventurer, with increased exaltation, "I say truly, your star is in the ascendent, and shall shine more than in the past it has been overcast! Yes, it is in ...
— A Romance of the West Indies • Eugene Sue
... generally a louder snore than ever, in the end, Dick, rendered desperate, jumped out of bed, and walked, or rather staggered across the floor. He looked through the window. It was light, but the sky was overcast, though objects below might readily be distinguished. The outhouse where the box lay was in full view; and as he was looking out listlessly for a few minutes he saw a female figure bearing a light, who was gliding down stealthily, as he thought, in the ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 2 (of 2) • John Roby
... eating, the gray light of a bedraggled morning revealed tiny lakes in every hollow, and each coulee and washout was a miniature torrent of muddy water—with a promise of more to come in the murky cloud-drift that overcast the sky. Horner sent out two men to relieve the night-herders, remarked philosophically "More rain, more rest," and retired to the shelter of the cook's canvas. His drivers sought cover in and under ...
— Raw Gold - A Novel • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... shrines at Ise, bearing his petition to the gods. It was noonday, and the sky perfectly clear, when he offered the prayer, but immediately afterwards a broad streak of cloud rose on the horizon, and soon the sky was overcast with dense and rolling ...
— Historic Tales, Vol. 12 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... asked to carry the mail-bag, which was heavy with newspapers. Edwards, with his wife and family, were still believed to be here. A heavy snow-storm was expected, and all the sky—that vast dome which spans the Plains—was overcast; but over the mountains it was a deep, still, sad blue, into which snowy peaks rose sunlighted. It was a lonely, mournful-looking morning, but when I reached the beautiful canyon of the St. Vrain, the sad blue became brilliant, and the sun warm and scintillating. Ah, ...
— A Lady's Life in the Rocky Mountains • Isabella L. Bird
... with pleasure on the fortunate condition of Italy; but our fancy must not hastily conceive that the golden age of the poets, a race of men without vice or misery, was realized under the Gothic conquest. The fair prospect was sometimes overcast with clouds; the wisdom of Theodoric might be deceived, his power might be resisted and the declining age of the monarch was sullied with popular hatred and patrician blood. In the first insolence of victory, he had been ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 4 • Edward Gibbon
... overcast, warm, quiet, and very dark under the trees: there was husbandry in heaven, their candles were all out. And by the bridge under the pleated and tasselled branches of an alder coppice the river ran quiet as the night, only uttering an ...
— Nightfall • Anthony Pryde
... soot-stained, cracked, and uncared-for, the steps broken and unwashed. As he entered it a cold rain was falling, and a yellow fog that rolled between the houses added to its dreariness. It was now late in the afternoon, and so overcast the sky that in many rooms the gas was lit and the ...
— The Lost House • Richard Harding Davis
... dark, for it was past six o'clock in the afternoon, late in March, and the sky was overcast; but there was still light enough to see in the large room on the left into which Mr. Van ...
— The Primadonna • F. Marion Crawford
... little world, relieved only by a few leering stars in the zenith, and, where the Laconia's lights had shown, there remained only the dim outlines of a blacker hulk standing out above the water like a jagged headland, silhouetted against the overcast sky. ...
— "And they thought we wouldn't fight" • Floyd Gibbons
... beautiful, although the sky was overcast by a mist from south-east to souih-west. Owing to this there was some difficulty in identifying the vague outlines which stood out like floating vapour in the sky, disappearing and then reappearing between ...
— An Antarctic Mystery • Jules Verne
... a convent near his own. They met once a year. On his last visit to her, Scholastica begged him to remain and "speak of the joys of Heaven till the morning." But Benedict would not listen; he must return. His sister then buried her face in her hands weeping and praying. Suddenly the sky was overcast with clouds, and a terrific storm burst upon the mountains, which prevented her brother's return. Three days later Benedict saw the soul of his sister entering heaven. On March 21, 543, a short time after ...
— A Short History of Monks and Monasteries • Alfred Wesley Wishart
... we trace all our future woe, with loss of Eden. But there was a short and precious interval between, like the first blush of morning before the day is overcast with tempest, the dawn of the world, the birth of nature from "the unapparent deep," with its first dews and freshness on its cheek, breathing odours. Theirs was the first delicious taste of life, and on them depended all that was to come ...
— Lectures on the English Poets - Delivered at the Surrey Institution • William Hazlitt
... year is well-nigh past, Since first our sky was overcast; Ah, would that this might be the last! ...
— English Poets of the Eighteenth Century • Selected and Edited with an Introduction by Ernest Bernbaum
... secret exultation. But now that the first exquisite days of love were over, the trammels, the forgotten trammels, were all there again—for the fretting of her patience. That his mind was often disturbed, his cheerfulness overcast, that his letters gave him frequently more pain than pleasure, and that a certain inward unrest made his dealings with himself more stern, and his manner to those around him less attractive than before,—these things were constantly plain to Laura. As she dwelt upon them, they carried flame and ...
— Helbeck of Bannisdale, Vol. II • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... book of this kind comes to have a permanent binding, all the leaves and plates have to be pared at the back and made up into sections with guards—a troublesome and expensive business. The custom with binders is to overcast the backs of the leaves in sections, and to sew through the overcasting thread, but this, though an easy and quick process, makes a hopelessly stiff back, and no book so treated can ...
— Bookbinding, and the Care of Books - A handbook for Amateurs, Bookbinders & Librarians • Douglas Cockerell
... until one night, when searching for the bridge that crosses the Salt River, the sky became suddenly overcast, the rain fell in torrents, and soon the river was in flood. There was nothing to be done but to sit down and wait until the moon should rise. The fierce wind buffeted them, the rain drenched them; they had lost their way, and were at the mercy of ...
— The Cat and the Mouse - A Book of Persian Fairy Tales • Hartwell James
... Then I knotted it over my hand, tossed a blanket over me, and blew out the light. From where I lay I could see the running lights of the Shelton ships swaying in a freshening breeze, three together in port for the first time in ten years. The sky had become so overcast that every shape outside had merged into an inky monotone. I could hear the low murmur of the wind twisting through the branches of our elms, and the whistle of it as it passed our gables. Once below I heard my father's step, quick and decisive, his voice ...
— The Unspeakable Gentleman • John P. Marquand
... the allowance of food and water; he now took stock of what remained. Half a dozen yams had been discovered, and these, beaten up with some oil, were all they had to sustain life. It was nauseous at best, but they ate it greedily. Another night came on; the sea was tolerably smooth, the sky was overcast, and a thick mist arose, although it still blew very fresh. The boat was kept under easy sail, close-hauled. Tom had the first watch with Billy and Pat. It was unusually dark, so that it was with difficulty that he could ...
— The Three Admirals • W.H.G. Kingston
... any sounds reach or disturb them for hours. Not one of the sleepers stirred enough to know that the sky gradually became overcast and that there was a distant ...
— The High School Boys' Canoe Club • H. Irving Hancock
... only ones seen since leaving the head of Long Lake, were found on the first portage, and on the second I gathered my first moss berries. A heavy shower passed late in the afternoon and the sky remained overcast; but we were not delayed, and towards evening arrived at the point, twenty miles below Thousand Island Expansion, where a large tributary comes in from the west, and the George River turns abruptly northward ...
— A Woman's Way Through Unknown Labrador • Mina Benson Hubbard (Mrs. Leonidas Hubbard, Junior)
... a Sunday, foggy and overcast, but not cold. The vines about the porch were covered with tiny beads of moisture; among the bushes in the garden little scarfs and veils of fog were caught, and from far across the ridge the droning warning of the fog horn ...
— Sisters • Kathleen Norris
... by Mr. Darrell having been paid off and discharged, the departure of his two remaining friends left the young proprietor entirely alone, in a place as desolate as though it were beyond the reach of human knowledge. The sky was overcast, making the day dark and cheerless, so that, as Peveril wandered disconsolately about his deserted property, the future looked to him as ...
— The Copper Princess - A Story of Lake Superior Mines • Kirk Munroe
... the sinking of the shaft was in progress, a strange new power was coming upon Pele. The gods of the earth and air had seen this assault and had resolved to take her part. The sky became overcast with brown, unwholesome-looking clouds, the ground grew hot and parched, vegetation drooped and withered, birds flew seaward with cries of distress, and a waiting stillness fell upon the world. Kamapua had cut away ten feet of rock, when the ...
— Myths & Legends of our New Possessions & Protectorate • Charles M. Skinner
... morning of the twenty-eighth we knew the time was come. The longboat rolled drearily on an empty, windless sea, and the stagnant, overcast sky gave no promise of any breeze. I cut three pieces of cloth, all of a size, from my jacket. In the ravel of one of these pieces was a bit of brown thread. Whoever drew this lost. I then put the three lots into my hat, covering it ...
— The Jacket (The Star-Rover) • Jack London
... African conjurer, as a charm against evil spirits. Dolph was escorted on his way by the doctor and Peter de Groodt, who had agreed to accompany him to the house, and to see him safe lodged. The night was overcast, and it was very dark when they arrived at the grounds which surrounded the mansion. The sexton led the way with a lantern. As they walked along the avenue of acacias, the fitful light, catching from bush ...
— Bracebridge Hall, or The Humorists • Washington Irving
... smiled, but with a stiffness of countenance; when he laughed, it was in a short, jerky, mechanical manner. As for me, I was in different mood from that preceding my own first trial of arms: I was now overcast in spirit, ...
— Philip Winwood • Robert Neilson Stephens
... Buck Daniels saw that morning, hardly brightened as the day grew, for the sky was overcast with sheeted mist and through it a dull evening radiance filtered to the earth. Wung Lu, his celestial, slant eyes now yellow with cold, built a fire on the big hearth in the living-room. It was a roaring blaze, for the wood was ...
— The Night Horseman • Max Brand
... know all about it," returned Phillis, carelessly; but Dulce's bright face looked a little overcast. "Son Hammond is in the case; and we can all judge of a father's feelings by a certain example that shall be nameless. Good gracious, mammie! there comes the Alcides himself, and Dorothy has not cleared the tea-things! I vote we meet him in the garden, to avert ...
— Not Like Other Girls • Rosa N. Carey
... on were other and higher hills, and in the distance the forests looked blue. Nothing about them stirred. They had sighted no game as they passed; the deer had already fled before the Indian army. The skies, bright and blue in the morning, were now overcast, a ...
— The Young Trailers - A Story of Early Kentucky • Joseph A. Altsheler
... letter, and he had not read three lines when Julia's face caught expression from his, which had become overcast. ...
— Vain Fortune • George Moore
... through the gateway and directly out upon the darkened field. Something bellowed and raced down a runway and took to the air. Other things followed it. They gained altitude and circled back overhead. Tiny bluish flickerings moved across the overcast sky. Exhaust flames. ...
— The Invaders • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... Thasos, an island valuable for its mines; and the army forced the Macedonians to exchange their position of semi-independence for that of full Persian subjects, liable to both tribute and military service. But this fair dawn was soon overcast. As the fleet was rounding Athos a terrible tempest arose which, destroyed 300 triremes and more than 20,000 men, some of whom were devoured by sea-monsters, while the remainder perished by drowning. On shore, a night attack of the Brygi, a Thracian ...
— The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 5. (of 7): Persia • George Rawlinson
... long, long night, for the boat, though roomy, was uncomfortable. O'Reilly steered as straight a course as he could without compass, but toward morning he saw that the sky was growing overcast and his apprehensions stirred anew. Daylight brought an increased breeze which heeled the boat further. She made better speed, but she likewise took more water through her seams and it became necessary to lend Leslie and Jacket a hand with the bailing. The deep channel was far behind ...
— Rainbow's End • Rex Beach
... His countenance was thoughtful and overcast. His manner abstracted. He addressed a few words to Simon, and then, seating himself by the window, leant his cheek on his hand, and was soon lost in reverie. Fanny, finding that he did not speak, and after stealing ...
— Night and Morning, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... was nearly dark, the sky was overcast with heavy leaden clouds, and only a faint lurid glow on the horizon in the west showed where the sun had gone down. An icy wind, blowing full in their faces, and the hard, frozen surface of the snow, made their progress both difficult and painful. The poor old horse slipped at every step, ...
— Captain Fracasse • Theophile Gautier
... at the interwoven cipher and crest of the Amelyns still above, she was conscious that the wind was blowing more chill, and that a few clouds had gathered. As she walked on down the long winding avenue, the sky became overcast, and, in one of those strange contrasts of the English climate, the glory of the whole day went out with the sunshine. The woods suddenly became wrinkled and gray, the distant hills sombre, the very English turf beneath her feet grew brown; a mile and a half away, through the opening of the ...
— Stories in Light and Shadow • Bret Harte
... fancy of youth, which courts melancholy as an indulgence, and loves to assume a sadness it has not had time to earn, may have had some share in, at least, fostering the gloom by which the mind of the young poet was overcast, I am not disposed to deny. The circumstance, indeed, of his having, at this time, among the ornaments of his study, a number of skulls highly polished, and placed on light stands round the room, would seem to indicate that he rather courted than shunned ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. I. (of VI.) - With his Letters and Journals. • Thomas Moore
... had watched these grim proceedings intently; it became quite silent now. The hour was growing late, the day had been overcast, and a damp chill that searched the marrow was settling as the short afternoon drew to a close. The prisoner's naked body showed very white beneath his shock of coal-black hair; his flesh seemed tender and the onlookers stared at it ...
— The Winds of Chance • Rex Beach
... September the Emperor mounted the heights of Borodino, hoping to take in at a glance the respective positions of the two armies; but the sky was overcast. One of those fine, cold rains soon began to fall, which so often come in the early autumn, and resemble from a distance a tolerably thick fog. The Emperor tried to use his glasses; but the kind of veil which covered ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... an indication of fine weather. So is fog. Neither of these two formations occurs under an overcast sky, or when there is much wind. One sees the fog occasionally rolled away, as it were, by wind—but not ...
— Barometer and Weather Guide • Robert Fitzroy
... And this 'tis thine To know from these examples: soon as clouds Have first begun to under-pass the sun, And, as it were, to rend the rays of light In twain, at once the lower part of them Is lost entire, and earth is overcast Where'er the thunderheads are rolled along— So know thou mayst that things forever need A fresh replenishment of gleam and glow, And each effulgence, foremost flashed forth, Perisheth one by one. Nor otherwise Can things be seen in sunlight, lest alway The fountain-head ...
— Of The Nature of Things • [Titus Lucretius Carus] Lucretius
... September was well in, and the sky was moonless and overcast, somewhat before midnight the dame came and hung over Birdalone as she lay abed, and watched to see if she waked; forsooth the witch's coming had waked her; but even so she was wary, and lay still, nor changed her breathing. So the witch turned away, but even therewith Birdalone made ...
— The Water of the Wondrous Isles • William Morris
... residence in London was overcast by growing anxiety about the condition of his friend Hume, who had always enjoyed fairly good health till the beginning of the year 1775, and then seemed to fall rapidly away. As Smith said one evening at Lord Shelburne's to Dr. Price, ...
— Life of Adam Smith • John Rae
... Sicilians on shore, who watched the progress of it from every projecting point and headland as it moved majestically out of the harbor, was extremely grand. For some time the voyage went on very prosperously, but at length the sky gradually became overcast, and the wind began to blow, and finally a great storm came on before the ships had time to seek any shelter. In those days there was no mariner's compass, and of course, in a storm, when the sun and stars were concealed, there was nothing to be done but for ...
— Richard I - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... things pleasanter in the history of literature than the friendship of these two great men, untinctured, at least on Hortensius's part, by any drop of jealousy; and on Cicero's, though now and then overcast by unworthy suspicions, yet asserted afterwards with a warm generosity and manly confession of his weakness which left nothing to be desired. Though there were but eight years between them, Hortensius must be held to belong to the older period, since ...
— A History of Roman Literature - From the Earliest Period to the Death of Marcus Aurelius • Charles Thomas Cruttwell
... of the black child were overcast with tears; large bright drops rolled heavily down, one by one, and fell on the little white hand. Yes, in that moment a ray of real belief, a ray of heavenly love, had penetrated the darkness of her heathen soul. She laid her head down between ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 455 - Volume 18, New Series, September 18, 1852 • Various
... moment Caspar Brooke's face was overcast; then he broke into uneasy laughter, and rose from his chair, shaking himself a little as a big dog sometimes does when it comes out ...
— Brooke's Daughter - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... not the gentleness and patience of Nature; we puddle the ground in our hurry, we seal it up and exclude the air, and the plants are worse off than before. When the sky is overcast and it is getting ready to rain, the moisture rises in the ground, the earth opens her pores and seconds ...
— Locusts and Wild Honey • John Burroughs
... overcast, rain began to fall, and there was a rush for the carts. In half an hour Tynwald Hill was empty, and the people were splashing off on every side like the big drops of rain that were ...
— The Manxman - A Novel - 1895 • Hall Caine
... baked." And he wiped the sweat from his brow on his coat sleeve. Presently clouds began to rise out of the water. They grew darker and darker, and the day, instead of being bright, gradually became gloomy and overcast. ...
— Pinocchio in Africa • Cherubini
... of his mind were inexhaustible. He had commenced life with an attention so vigilant that nothing had escaped his observation; and a judgment so solid that every incident was turned to advantage. His youth had not been wasted in idleness, nor overcast by intemperance. He had been, all his life, a close and deep reader, as well as thinker; and by the force of his own powers, had wrought up the raw materials which he had gathered from books, with such exquisite skill and felicity, that he has added a hundred fold to their original value, and justly ...
— McGuffey's Sixth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... time next morning, and the depression of the night before was still with her. But when she jumped up she saw that it was no longer raining. The sky was overcast, but she could venture forth without running the risk ...
— The Girl from Sunset Ranch - Alone in a Great City • Amy Bell Marlowe
... the sky was oftener blue than black; and my floral experiences in the garden taught me that it was the sunshine, and not the cloud, that makes the flower. It became my study to look only on the bright side of things, convinced, that, if the present were a little overcast, there was a future for us that would be all delightful. I was full of hope; and the eye of hope can discover a star in the thickest darkness, a rainbow even ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 89, March, 1865 • Various
... Is overcast, and musters muttering thunder, In clouds that seem approaching fast, and show In forked flashes a commanding tempest. 1884 BYRON: ...
— Handy Dictionary of Poetical Quotations • Various
... where the vague grey earth meets the overcast sky. Five miles deep in less than twelve hours. The thrill of it—and what you ...
— Norman Ten Hundred - A Record of the 1st (Service) Bn. Royal Guernsey Light Infantry • A. Stanley Blicq
... sky being overcast, the woodcutters wanted to stop their work, putting off till next day the fall of an enormous beech tree, but the mayor objected to this and insisted that they should at once lop and cut down this giant, which had ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant
... Shooba hath a Spiritt. When it worketh upon him he is Dull and Overcast and may not Labour untill it be gone. And then will he rise and Speak strange and sometimes Terrible things, and Prophesy. In the old times my Father smil'd, and let him be. But here 't is otherwise. When Shooba's ...
— A Woman Named Smith • Marie Conway Oemler
... noblest minds in all ages.' BOSWELL. His preface to the third edition thus ends:—'When I first ventured to send this book into the world, I fairly owned an ardent desire for literary fame. I have obtained my desire: and whatever clouds may overcast my days, I can now walk here among the rocks and woods of my ancestors, with an agreeable consciousness that I have done something worthy.' The dedication of the first edition and the preface of the third ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 2 • Boswell
... the doctor, clasping his hands together, while his face became pale and overcast with disappointment. "Who could have been so unkind, ...
— The Last Penny and Other Stories • T. S. Arthur
... grave for the rest of us, using the life overcast To ripen our wine of the present (too new) in glooms of ...
— The World's Best Poetry, Volume 8 • Various
... those of the women. Strangers came in crowds from other States [5].' Confucius became the idol of the people, and flew in songs through their mouths [6]. But this sky of bright promise was soon overcast. As the fame of the reformations in Lu went abroad, the neighboring princes began to be afraid. The duke of Ch'i said, 'With Confucius at the head of its government, Lu will become supreme among the States, and Ch'i which is nearest to it will be the first swallowed up. Let us propitiate ...
— THE CHINESE CLASSICS (PROLEGOMENA) • James Legge
... a slightly soiled negligee, answered his ring, then, recognizing him, blocked the door hastily, exposing a face overcast with defiance ...
— The Auction Block • Rex Beach
... maritime; modified by North Atlantic Current; mild winters, cool summers; consistently humid; overcast about ...
— The 1996 CIA Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... braved the deluge long, He bow'd to the sweeping blast, And smiled when the frowning heavens above Were the deepest overcast; He hath perish'd beneath a smiling sky— He hath laid him ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volumes I-VI. - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... we have a chance," said Brigadier General Robert K. Evans. "The Germans will attack at daybreak and—by the way, what's the matter with our wireless reports?" He peered out into the night which was heavily overcast—not a star in sight. He was looking toward the radio station a mile back on the crest of a hill where the lone pine tree stood ...
— The Conquest of America - A Romance of Disaster and Victory • Cleveland Moffett
... two men were sleeping, a change came over the scene—a slow, gentle, scarce perceptible change, which, however, had a powerful influence on the prospects of the sleepers. The sky became overcast; the temperature, which had been down at arctic depth for many months, suddenly rose to that of temperate climes, and snow began to fall—not in the small sharp particles to which the fur-traders of the great northern wilderness ...
— The Big Otter • R.M. Ballantyne
... who in the silence wait Is harder than the fighting soldiers' fate. Back to the lonely post two women passed, With unaccustomed sorrow overcast. Two sad for sighs, too desolate for tears, The dark forebodings of long widowed years In preparation for the awful blow Hung on the door of hope the sable ...
— Custer, and Other Poems. • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... overcast and soon a great storm began to rage. Prince Inga and King Rinkitink took refuge within the shelter of the room they had fitted up and there Bilbil joined them. The goat and the King were somewhat disturbed by ...
— Rinkitink in Oz • L. Frank Baum
... there before seven o'clock in the morning. It will stop three times at small stations for water and fuel—circumstances favorable to the success of my project. I add that the night is dark, the sky overcast, no moon, no stars. It threatens rain; the wind is freshening. It is no time for walking on platforms, and nobody walks there. It is important to choose the moment ...
— The Adventures of a Special Correspondent • Jules Verne
... the sky. His hat had gone flying at the first unexpected plunge; he ought to return and look for it. But he shrank from the additional fatigue, the delay in reaching home this would mean. The sky was still overcast: he decided to risk it. Knotting his handkerchief he spread it cap-wise over his head and ...
— Australia Felix • Henry Handel Richardson
... the Dragon-fly if she could decide for him between the Upper and the Nether—the height and the depth? The Dragon-fly flew above, and beneath, and around; but the Water spake:- "The foliage and the sky above are not the true ones: the leaves wither and fall; the sky is often overcast, and sometimes quite dark." Then the Leaves and the Sky said, "The water only apes us; it must change its pictures at our pleasure, and can retain none." Then the Dragon-fly remarked that the height and the depth existed only in the eyes of the Child, and that the Leaves and the Sky were true ...
— Peter Schlemihl etc. • Chamisso et. al.
... hurt, and somehow he felt that even Mavis was vaguely on their side against him, and of a sudden the pang of loneliness that Marjorie saw in his eyes so pierced him that he pulled his old nag in and stood motionless in the middle of the road. The sky was overcast and the air was bitter and chill; through the gray curtain that hung to the rim of the earth, the low sun swung like a cooling ball of fire and under it the gray fields stretched with such desolation for him that he dared ride no farther into them. And ...
— The Heart Of The Hills • John Fox, Jr.
... once the middle of the wood. About eleven in the morning the Jacobite army was seen, marching in two columns, and advancing to the rising ground. Scarcely had they begun their march than the sky was overcast, and a violent storm blinded their enemy, who were, on the other hand, marching with their bayonets fixed; the fury of the tempest was such, that they could hardly secure ...
— Memoirs of the Jacobites of 1715 and 1745 - Volume III. • Mrs. Thomson
... that night; it kindled and warmed my heart with a reverential fire. If, in the course of years, my way should be overcast; if, for a time, I should let the artificial—the ignoble, clog the path, and shut me out from the light of heaven, even then I shall be saved from doubt, which is always engendered by our stupidity—the things of our own manufacture—I ...
— How to Cook Husbands • Elizabeth Strong Worthington
... muzzle to the ground and deliberately howls. This was his looming—perhaps the wildest sound that is ever heard here, making the woods ring far and wide. I concluded that he laughed in derision of my efforts, confident of his own resources. Though the sky was by this time overcast, the pond was so smooth that I could see where he broke the surface when I did not hear him. His white breast, the stillness of the air, and the smoothness of the water were all against him. At length, having come up fifty rods off, he uttered one of those prolonged howls, ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 7 • Charles H. Sylvester
... trades which had previously wafted her so well on her way; when, all at once, without hardly a warning, the sea began to grow choppy and sullen, and the air thick and heavy. The sky, too, which had been for days and days nearly cloudless, became overcast all round, heavy masses of vapour piling themselves upwards from the horizon towards the zenith, to the southward and westward, gradually enveloping ship and ocean alike in ...
— The Island Treasure • John Conroy Hutcheson
... her knees drawn up and her chin resting on them, Georgina looked into the fire through the slits of the damper and thought and thought. Then she looked out through the little square window-panes across the wind-swept dunes. It did not seem like summer with the sky all overcast with clouds. It was more like the end of a day in the early autumn. ...
— Georgina of the Rainbows • Annie Fellows Johnston
... was thunder for, although the fall of avalanches makes the same noise, avalanches choose the noon time to fall when the sun is hottest and the snows softest. Soon I could see the heads of some dark clouds peering at us over the mountains and before dark the clouds crept over the mountain tops and overcast ...
— The Black Wolf Pack • Dan Beard
... myself in my room most of the afternoon, I went into the garden to walk about. The day was overcast, with an autumnal flavor in the warm, still air. Finding myself near the excavation, I entered the subterranean chamber and sat down there. "This," I muttered to myself, "is the only home I have. Let me stay here, and not go forth any more." Seeking aid from ...
— Looking Backward - 2000-1887 • Edward Bellamy
... Paradise; but swiftly came the reaction, the chill. To lie there in his present condition meant but one thing, that never would he arise again; and with an effort the man got to his feet and started walking. It was dark again now, and the sky was becoming rapidly overcast. Within an hour it began to snow, a steady big-flaked snow that fairly filled the air and lay where it fell. The night grew slightly warmer, and, rolling in the blanket once more, Ben lay down; but the warning chill ...
— Ben Blair - The Story of a Plainsman • Will Lillibridge
... William. Though he seemed plunged in gloom, Marion was radiant. She gaily prepared her trousseau, and took William on long shopping expeditions from which he returned more overcast than ever. Sometimes I wondered if he had really got over his infatuation for Gladys, and if he had merely proposed to Marion out of pique. A strange foreboding came over me that all was not ...
— Our Elizabeth - A Humour Novel • Florence A. Kilpatrick
... away, extended at full length on a settee, which he insisted was a divan. There was a glass bottle holding half a gallon of red wine on a table near him, also a bottle of Marsala, and half a dozen glasses. There was a roaring wood-fire in his stove—for it was December, and the day was overcast ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. II. July, 1862. No. 1. • Various
... The overcast sky had partly cleared to windward during the last minutes; a few stars glinted where hitherto nothing but the most impenetrable pall had hung. In the east, the rays of a yet invisible moon, edging with faint silver the banks of clouds just above the horizon, had made for ...
— The Light of Scarthey • Egerton Castle
... God with the transcendent crime of infanticide perpetrated in the most deliberate manner and on the most gigantic scale. Who can bear, by thus quenching the hope of another life, to add death to death, and overcast, to every thoughtful eye, the whole sunny field of life with the melancholy shadow of a bier? There is a noble strength and confidence, cheering to the reader, in these words of one of the wisest and boldest of thinkers: "I should be the very last man to be willing to dispense with ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger
... the direction in which his house lay; and there is no doubt, had the day remained clear, he would in a few hours have extricated himself from the dilemma into which he had fallen. His disappointment was great when he again beheld the sky overcast, and the snow falling thickly around him. He pushed on, however, bravely, till at length a thick cedar-swamp lay before him. For some time he travelled along its edge, in the hope of finding a narrow spot to cross, but in this he was disappointed, so he determined to attempt the passage. He ...
— Twenty-Seven Years in Canada West - The Experience of an Early Settler (Volume I) • Samuel Strickland
... a servant knocked at his door. The afternoon was far gone and the sky was overcast with sinister streaks of clouds that did not move, but hung like vast Zeppelins over the harbour beyond: long, blue- black clouds with white bellies. Mournful clouds that waited for the time to come when they could burst into tears! He had been watching ...
— From the Housetops • George Barr McCutcheon
... scissors is an unlucky omen; wives will be jealous and distrustful of their husbands, and sweethearts will quarrel and nag each other into crimination and recrimination. Dulness will overcast business horizons. ...
— 10,000 Dreams Interpreted • Gustavus Hindman Miller
... the emigrants had set out, the sky, which had previously been clear and radiant, began to be overcast with clouds, dropping occasional rains, which Roland scarcely observed with regret, their effect on the sultry atmosphere being highly agreeable and refreshing. They continued thus to fall at intervals until nine ...
— Nick of the Woods • Robert M. Bird
... air as Captain Hazzard, not able to imagine what had happened rushed out on deck in his night clothes. The sky had become overcast and it was terribly black. It was hardly possible for one to see his hand before his face. A heavy sulphurous smell was ...
— The Boy Aviators' Polar Dash - Or - Facing Death in the Antarctic • Captain Wilbur Lawton
... dream too bright to last! Ah, starry Hope, that didst arise But to be overcast! A voice from out the Future cries, "On! on!"—but o'er the Past (Dim gulf!) my spirit hovering ...
— The Golden Treasury of American Songs and Lyrics • Various
... their journey for that night, and stimulating the old man with a similar assurance, led them at a pretty swift pace towards their destination, which he was the less unwilling to make for, as the moon was now overcast and the ...
— The Old Curiosity Shop • Charles Dickens
... to see the blue vault of a few moments since overcast with gray and filled with a swirl ...
— The Lion's Brood • Duffield Osborne
... river the myriad lights of the metropolis give the scene air appearance as of fairyland. The night is overcast and the clouds act as a reflector to the million lights in the city below; the sky line of Brooklyn is a dull salmon color. A chill October wind sweeps from east to west. It is a bad night to speak out of doors. Upon reaching Cortlandt slip Trueman descends to the lower deck ...
— The Transgressors - Story of a Great Sin • Francis A. Adams
... Phineas agreed, his legs giving way alarmingly, so that he collapsed on a brocade-covered couch. "It's a touch of the sun, which I would give you to understand," he continued with a self-preservatory flash, for it was an overcast day in June, "is often magnified in power when it is behind a cloud. A wee drop of whisky is what I require for ...
— The Rough Road • William John Locke
... only; a solas alone, privately. slo adv. only; tan —— only. soltar let go, loosen, utter; —— una carcajada burst out laughing. sollozante adj. sobbing. sombra f. shadow, shade, darkness, trace, vestige, wraith, spirit. sombrero m. hat. sombro, -a somber, dark, overcast, cloudy, gloomy, melancholy, sullen. sn m. sound, noise, manner. sonar sound, resound. soneto m. sonnet. sonido m. sound, peal. sonoro, -a sonorous, resounding, loud, harmonious. sonrer smile. sonrisa ...
— El Estudiante de Salamanca and Other Selections • George Tyler Northup
... with a light wind, partly aided by the tide, up the Para river. Towards evening we passed Vigia and Colares, two fishing villages, and saw many native canoes, which seemed like toys beneath the lofty walls of dark forest. The air was excessively close, the sky overcast, and sheet lightning played almost incessantly around the horizon— an appropriate greeting on the threshold of a country lying close under the equator! The evening was calm, this being the season when the winds are not strong, so we glided ...
— The Naturalist on the River Amazons • Henry Walter Bates
... the connecting run from The Rocks, I killed, after a fussy tussle and plenty of leaping out of the water, a grilse of 4 lb.; and we had barely rowed out into the stream when a fish of 6 lb. or 7 lb. leaped head and tail out of the water at my fly without touching it. The overcast character of the evening suggested to me the use of a Bulldog, and we were now enabled to practise the formulas at which Ole and Knut at first appeared so much amused. On hooking a fish I keep my seat, and direct the course of the boat to a suitable landing place. The craft must be pulled partly ...
— Lines in Pleasant Places - Being the Aftermath of an Old Angler • William Senior
... that settles upon three generations of these Coleridges; a romance of beauty, of intellectual power, of misfortune suddenly illuminated from heaven, of prosperity suddenly overcast by the waywardness of the individual. The grandfather of the present generation, who for us stands forward as the founder of the family, viz., the Rev. John Coleridge; even his career wins a secret homage of tears and smiles in right of its marvellous ...
— The Posthumous Works of Thomas De Quincey, Vol. II (2 vols) • Thomas De Quincey
... became more and more overcast, but Andrew could think of no way in which he could take the little girl home without being late and losing ...
— The New McGuffey Fourth Reader • William H. McGuffey
... night early gave place to the dawn—not rosy that sad morning, but overcast—gloom was in everything. Piero was still praying by his dead wife's side when the tramp of footsteps upon the gravel outside the house fell upon his ears. Swiftly he ran and closed the entrance-doors, and then calling in a creature of ...
— The Tragedies of the Medici • Edgcumbe Staley
... into the inlet and the Mariella had swung around on her anchor chains until she was pointed directly for the hidden opening to the sea. The boys left O'Connor to his thoughts and strolled forward. The sky was partially overcast and the moon, which had just risen, was almost obscured by heavy, slowly moving clouds. Now and then, however, it broke through a rift, flooding the lagoon with its silvery light and throwing the black sides of the Mariella into bold relief. Not a breath of air ...
— A Voyage with Captain Dynamite • Charles Edward Rich
... of day we launched the canoe again and pursued our course for the mouth of the Winnipeg River. The lake which yesterday was all sunshine, to-day looked black and overcast—thunder-clouds hung angrily around the horizon, and it seemed as though Winnipeg was anxious to give a sample of her rough ways before she had done with us. While the morning was yet young we made a portage—that is, we carried the canoe ...
— The Great Lone Land - A Narrative of Travel and Adventure in the North-West of America • W. F. Butler
... and disliking the vehicle of a hackney coach, I walked forward to the inn at which the stranger had been left; musing much on the prospect before me, which was once more beginning to be heavily overcast. ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft
... the hayfields, so that there must have been the usual myriads of the insects that cause this sound. While I was thinking in this way a swallow alighted on the turf, picked up a small white moth from among the short grass, and went off with it. In gloomy overcast weather the swallows at the sea-side frequently alight on the pebbles of the beach to pick up the insects which will not rise and fly. Some beaches and sandbanks are much frequented by insects, and black clouds ...
— Field and Hedgerow • Richard Jefferies
... smile; every virtuous attempt He will bless; every act of obedience He will reward. Life in this manner will be pleasant amid all its sorrows; and beams of hope will continually shine through the gloom, by which it is so often overcast. Virtue, the seed that can not die, planted from heaven, and cultivated by the divine hand, will grow up in your hearts with increasing vigor, and blossom in your lives with supernal beauty. Your path will be that of the just, and will gloriously resemble the dawning light, "which ...
— The world's great sermons, Volume 3 - Massillon to Mason • Grenville Kleiser |
