"Verge" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... your adjectives. We all know that Steve is square on every side, and straight in every corner. Don't be so earnest; you fatigue me to-night. I am on the verge of a nervous headache, and I really think you had better leave me." She turned her chair towards the fire as she spoke, and hardly palliated this act of dismissal by the faint "excuse me," which accompanied ...
— The Squire of Sandal-Side - A Pastoral Romance • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
... however, as he walked on for mere walking's sake, he found himself on the verge of a cliff, and saw, over the brow of it, a few feet below him, a ledge of rock, where he might find some shelter from the blast, which blew from behind. Letting himself down by his hands, he alighted upon something that crunched beneath his ...
— The Portent & Other Stories • George MacDonald
... to rave under the vile restraints of Philistine surroundings? Then you can form some notion of the state I was in when I took the step of writing that advertisement; I was, I firmly believe, on the verge of lunacy! For two or three days I had come back home from the school only to pace up and down the room in an indescribable condition. I get often like that, but this time things seemed reaching a head. Why, I positively cried with misery, absurd as it may sound. My blood seemed ...
— The Unclassed • George Gissing
... John XXIII seemed not unlikely to gain his end. Constance was thrown into confusion by the news of his flight. The mob rushed to pillage the papal residence. The Italian and Austrian prelates prepared to leave the city, and the council was on the verge of dissolution. But Sigismund's zeal and energy succeeded in averting such a disaster. He restored order in the city, persuaded the prelates to remain, and took prompt measures to punish his rebellious vassal. An armed force ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... her low, possessed voice, she asked him how he was. And he answered her, in the habit of more than thirty years: 'Well, I don't think I'm any the worse, dear.' But he was frightened of her, underneath this safeguard of habit, frightened almost to the verge of death. ...
— Women in Love • D. H. Lawrence
... keeping anything from me?" she cried, I thought on the verge of "nerves," so hesitating no longer I arose and turned ...
— Wings of the Wind • Credo Harris
... we will allow her time enough, after giving mankind the inspired tinker who painted the Christian's life as that of a hunted animal, "never long at ease," desponding, despairing, on the verge of self-murder,—painted it with an originality, a vividness, a power and a sweetness, too, that rank him with the great authors of all time,—kind Nature, after this gift, sent as his counterpoise the inspired ploughman, ...
— Pages From an Old Volume of Life - A Collection Of Essays • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... the white man's sail Swayed free before the sunrise gale. Cloud-like that island hung afar, Along the bright horizon's verge, O'er which the curse of servile war Rolled its red torrent, surge on surge; And he, the Negro champion, where In the fierce tumult struggled he? Go trace him by the fiery glare Of dwellings in the midnight air, The yells of triumph and despair, ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier
... to the verge of understanding one thing. Man has so fanned the flame of the loves of men and women, as to make it overpass its rightful domain, and now, even in the name of humanity itself, he cannot bring it back under control. ...
— The Home and the World • Rabindranath Tagore
... 21st of August, 1673, by the battle of the Texel. In it, as in others, were amply justified the words with which a modern French naval officer has stamped them: "United by momentary political interests, but at bottom divided to the verge of hatred, never following the same path in counsel or in action, they have never produced good results, or at least results proportioned to the efforts of the powers allied against a common enemy. The navies of France, ...
— The Influence of Sea Power Upon History, 1660-1783 • A. T. Mahan
... opposition. When Mr Gladstone resigned the leadership of his party in 1875, Bright was chairman of the party meeting which chose Lord Hartington as his successor. He took a less prominent part in political discussion till the Eastern Question brought Great Britain to the verge of war with Russia, and his old energy flamed up afresh. In the debate on the vote of credit in February 1878, he made one of his impressive speeches, urging the government not to increase the difficulties manufacturers had in finding employment for their workpeople by any single word or act which ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 3 - "Brescia" to "Bulgaria" • Various
... along the seashore, called Parali, preferred a constitution midway between these two forms, and thus prevented either of the other parties from carrying their point. Moreover, the state was on the verge of revolution, because of the excessive poverty of some citizens, and the enormous wealth of others, and it appeared that the only means of putting an end to these disorders was by establishing ...
— Plutarch's Lives, Volume I (of 4) • Plutarch
... that their shovels bore down into the precious pocket. The earth flew. They worked like madmen, with nervous energy and power of will; and when the chest finally came into sight, rotten with age and the soak of earth, they fell back against a tree, on the verge of collapse. The hair was damp on their foreheads, their breath came harshly, almost ...
— A Splendid Hazard • Harold MacGrath
... charmed by her voice, I could see that; and poor, dear Reginald was positively absurd about her voice. And dear Margaret does not sing so well—it is no use pretending that she does—and Sir Philip is trembling on the verge—oh, yes, I am sure that I have been very wise. What is that ...
— A True Friend - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... south of Leeds, on the verge of a wild moorland tract, lay an ancient manor, now rich with cultivation, then barren and unenclosed, which was known by the name of Hallamshire. Iron abounded there; and, from a very early period, the rude whittles ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 1 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... was quenched by the first tears she had shed since the shadow fell upon her; and when 'Lena produced the note, and she saw it was indeed true, the ice about her heart was melted, and in choking, long-drawn sobs, her pent-up feelings gave way, as she saw the gulf whose verge she had been treading. Crouching at 'Lena's feet, she kissed the very hem of her garments, blessing her as her preserver, and praying heaven to bless her, also. It was the work of a few moments to array her in her traveling dress, and then very cautiously ...
— 'Lena Rivers • Mary J. Holmes
... a tomb, and never will I, hapless one, betray thy sister's bed, since I shall hold thee more a friend dead than living. But the oracle of the God has never yet wronged thee, although thou art indeed on the very verge of death. But excessive mischance is very wont, is very wont to present changes, when ...
— The Tragedies of Euripides, Volume I. • Euripides
... make this clearer. In 1887 Germany was on the very verge of War with France and Russia. At that moment her superior efficiency, the consequence of this inborn sense of duty—surely one of the highest qualities of humanity—was so great that it is more than probable that less than six weeks ...
— On War • Carl von Clausewitz
... in old and humble houses they had room to breathe and an eminence for light and air. Their shanties clung to the side of the hill or hung on the very edge of the precipice overlooking the bay, on the verge of which a wall kept their babies from falling. The effect was picturesque, and this hill was the delight of painters. It was all more like Italy than anything in the Italian quarter of New York and Chicago—the very climate and surroundings, the wine country close at hand, the bay for ...
— The City That Was - A Requiem of Old San Francisco • Will Irwin
... operations was perfectly simple. A tradesman on the verge of bankruptcy would come to him, Verminet would look into his case and make him sign bills for the sum he required, handing him in exchange bills drawn by other tradesman in quite as serious a predicament as himself, and pocketed a commission of two per cent. upon both ...
— The Champdoce Mystery • Emile Gaboriau
... in the domain of intellectualism it is impossible to deny that there was some justification for their gloomy apprehensions. In St. Thomas Aquinas this intellectualizing process marked its highest point and beyond there was no margin of safety. He himself did not overstep the verge of danger, but after him this limit was overpassed. The perfect balance between mind and spirit was achieved by Hugh of St. Victor, but afterwards the severance began and on the one side was the unwholesome hyper-spiritualization of the Rhenish mystics, on the other the false intellectualism ...
— Historia Calamitatum • Peter Abelard
... home; but in 1782 she had one hundred and twenty in commission or ready for commission, while France had never been able to exceed seventy-one. Again, as late as 1840, when the two nations were on the verge of war in the Levant, a most accomplished French officer of the day, while extolling the high state of efficiency of the French fleet and the eminent qualities of its admiral, and expressing confidence in the results of an encounter with an equal enemy, goes on to ...
— The Influence of Sea Power Upon History, 1660-1783 • A. T. Mahan
... life, it is not difficult to understand the peculiar fascination which such a problem as he solved in Robinson Crusoe must have had for him. It was not merely that he had passed a life of uncertainty, often on the verge of precipices, and often saved from ruin by a buoyant energy which seems almost miraculous; not merely that, as he said of himself in one of ...
— Daniel Defoe • William Minto
... for you will forget me in the excitement of discovery and adventure; but I—what can I do in the midst of all the old associations?" "Never mind, sweetheart," he said, kissing her hand, "I have seemed on the verge of despair all the time." Seeing that their separation must shortly begin, Ayrault tried to assume a cheerful look; but as Sylvia turned her eyes away they were suspiciously moist. Just one minute before the starting-time Ayrault took Sylvia back to her mother, and, after pressing ...
— A Journey in Other Worlds • J. J. Astor
... men, after they had become lost in the prairies, to wander about for days without exercising the least judgment, and finally exhibiting a state of mental aberration almost upon the verge of lunacy. Instead of reasoning upon their situation, they exhaust themselves running a-head at their utmost speed without any regard to direction. When a person is satisfied that he has lost his way, he should stop and reflect upon the course he has been traveling, ...
— The Prairie Traveler - A Hand-book for Overland Expeditions • Randolph Marcy
... Bell, who thus sadly ended his career when on the verge of an honored retirement, was in a way an old acquaintance of mine. It was he who had refused me a transfer to the Monongahela during the war; and he and my father, having been comrades when cadets at the Military ...
— From Sail to Steam, Recollections of Naval Life • Captain A. T. Mahan
... fertile meadow-land before flowing back into the narrow gorge past Intombi Spruit Camp. How the Boers got there one can only imagine, for neither the Imperial Light Horse pickets on Waggon Hill, nor the Manchesters holding the very verge of that cliff which we call Caesar's Camp and the Kaffirs Intombi, nor the mixed force of volunteers and police watching the scrub lower down, saw any form or heard a movement during the night. It was intensely dark for two or three hours, but in that still ...
— Four Months Besieged - The Story of Ladysmith • H. H. S. Pearse
... conquered by his clear, open life the occasional hostility of a later day; and at the period of his accession to the Throne was, without and beyond question, the best liked Prince in Europe—the most universally popular man in the United Kingdom and its external Empire. Upon the verge of His Majesty's Coronation there occurred that sudden and dramatic illness which proved so well the bravery and patience of the man, and increased so greatly the popularity ...
— The Life of King Edward VII - with a sketch of the career of King George V • J. Castell Hopkins
... by his window he was recalling the separate events of the day. The court room had been crowded to the verge of suffocation; when he entered it a sudden hush and a mighty craning of necks had been his welcome, and he had felt his cheeks redden and pale with a sense of shame at his hapless plight. Those many pairs of eyes that were fixed on him seemed ...
— The Just and the Unjust • Vaughan Kester
... scenery became softer, gentler, yet more picturesque. At one point we saw what I believe to be the utmost northern verge of Sherwood Forest,—not consisting, however, of thousand-year oaks, extant from Robin Hood's days, but of young and thriving plantations, which will require a century or two of slow English growth to give them much breadth of shade. Earl ...
— Our Old Home - A Series of English Sketches • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... At the southern verge of the mighty forest called the Andredsweald, or Anderida Sylva, Gilbert d'Aquila, last of that name, founded the Priory of Michelham for ...
— The House of Walderne - A Tale of the Cloister and the Forest in the Days of the Barons' Wars • A. D. Crake
... revelations, and revelations of a kind which caused him to gasp. He saw middle-aged matrons dipping and hopping and twisting about the room in company with middle-aged, stout, red-faced men who looked as if on the verge of apoplexy. He saw Mr. Hungerford laboring dutifully to pilot a woman of forty through the sinuosities of the "hesitation waltz," and when the lady, who was inclined toward plumpness, had collapsed into an armchair, he sought out her late ...
— Cap'n Dan's Daughter • Joseph C. Lincoln
... are acting unselfishly. They say it is so selfish to be always considering whether this is good or harmful or that is likely to encroach upon the domain of health. If this sentiment is carried to the verge of hypochondria, we grant its truth. There is nothing more odious than a person who is constantly looking out for the weathercocks, and who, as soon as he finds the wind in a certain quarter, shuts himself ...
— The Girl's Own Paper, Vol. VIII, No. 357, October 30, 1886 • Various
... one morning, on the little bridge over the stream that ran at a distance of a few hundred yards from the Red House. The two boys were bespattering themselves in the meadow below, by the water's verge. They called up at intervals to their mother the announcement of some new ...
— The Daughters of Danaus • Mona Caird
... her—and saw that her lips trembled, and that she was still on the verge of tears. He hurried off at once, realising that she wanted a minute or two to recover herself. His heart beat foolishly fast and uncomfortably,—he wondered what ...
— God's Good Man • Marie Corelli
... subsidiary grip upon belt or pantaloons. But to the Frenchman all smooth and rugged came alike: his legs sprawled impartially: and once, having floundered on top of the leading Samaritan with a shock which rolled the pair to the very verge of a precipice, he recovered himself, and sat up in an attitude which, at half a mile's distance, was eloquent of tipsy reproach. In short, when the procession had filed past the edge of my tent-flap, I crawled out to watch: ...
— The White Wolf and Other Fireside Tales • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... to his afflicted members?"-(Saint's Privilege, vol. 1, p. 674). The text here quoted forms the foundation of Bunyan's admirable Advice to Sufferers, in which he delightfully dwells upon the topics which Evangelist addresses to the Pilgrims, when on the verge of bitter persecution-(ED). ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... within the Ring upon your right down to its Center; then by straightning a little your left Rein, and laying your right Leg Calf to his side, make a half Circle to your left hand, from the Center to the outmost Verge, and these you see contrary turned make a Roman S. Now to your first large Compass, walk him about on your left hand, as oft as before on the right, and change to your right within your Ring; then Trot ...
— The School of Recreation (1696 edition) • Robert Howlett
... Nevertheless, he permitted Madison to draft new instructions for the commissioners, in the hope that the treaty could be made a basis for further negotiations. While these new instructions were crossing the ocean, a disaster occurred which brought the United States and Great Britain to the verge of war. ...
— Union and Democracy • Allen Johnson
... helped their mother. But all three, my Master, were lost to me, taken away by the unfathomable wisdom of the Father. Two fell in war, the third was killed by the machinery while at his work. That broke my strength, and when they brought me to the hospital I was on the verge of despair, and life seemed a greater burden than I could bear. Your image, my Saviour, had just been finished by a sculptor, who had carved it from the wood of the nut-tree by the Fresh Spring. They put it up opposite to my bed. It represented you, my Lord, on ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... still gripping Ida, who was on the verge of collapse. She looked at Cora with wonder ...
— The Motor Girls • Margaret Penrose
... night had fairly set in a hundred fires blazed upon the mountains—far as the eye could reach, for miles and many miles, one dazzling gigantic illumination. Papal monograms, crosses, tiaras shone forth in startling proportions. High up, far from any human habitation, on the verge of the snow, in clearings of the mountain forests, on Alpine pastures, these fiery letters had been patiently traced by toiling men and lads. Anton and Jacobi were not behind-hand, and by means of two hundred little bonfires had devised the papal initials ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Volume 11, No. 26, May, 1873 • Various
... down from the north, chilling all the earth, and the Northmen imagined that these were set in motion by the great giant Hrae-svelgr (the corpse-swallower), who, clad in eagle plumes, sat at the extreme northern verge of the heavens, and that when he raised his arms or wings the cold blasts darted forth and swept ruthlessly over the face of the earth, blighting all things ...
— Myths of the Norsemen - From the Eddas and Sagas • H. A. Guerber
... of men of genius to be afraid of coldness and insipidity, from which they think they never can be too far removed. It particularly happens to these great masters of grace and elegance. They often boldly drive on to the very verge of ridicule; the spectator is alarmed, but at the same time admires their ...
— Seven Discourses on Art • Joshua Reynolds
... driver behind Amy's back and was preparing to get away, but these views of Amy's mother were so complete an innovation that I paused. On the verge of a first drive I had never in my life stopped to consider the ethics of golf-club cleaning. Why had not Amy a pocket and a rag of sand-paper like resourceful Jimmy Baines? I don't remember to have ever read anything on the niceties of the art of scouring clubs. It is a subject ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, August 5th, 1914 • Various
... him as compelled me always to remember and think of him, though I had no intention of offending God: however, I was pleased to see him, to think of him and of his good qualities. All this was so hurtful, that it brought my soul to the very verge of destruction. ...
— The Life of St. Teresa of Jesus • Teresa of Avila
... irregularity in the outcome of the separate naphtha-bearing plots. An instance was mentioned to me of a peasant proprietor who had made enough money on which to live sumptuously, but he hungered for more, and engaged in further boring operations. He was on the verge of losing everything, when oil was suddenly struck, and he made a fortune. He laboured hard himself, and literally went to sleep a poor working man, and awoke to find his dream ...
— Persia Revisited • Thomas Edward Gordon
... delicate fancies, could have breathed no atmosphere less richly perfumed with old romance. In New York he would certainly have been in danger of a Barnum's museum, beside Washington's nurse and the woolly horse. It is a triumph of art that a being whose nature trembles on the very verge of the grotesque should walk through Hawthorne's pages with such undeviating grace. In the Roman dreamland he is in little danger of such prying curiosity, though even there he can only be kept out of harm's way by the admirable skill of his creator. Perhaps it may be thought by some severe ...
— Hours in a Library, Volume I. (of III.) • Leslie Stephen
... curious absence of detail as to the fight. The combat, indeed, owes its enduring fame to two somewhat irrelevant circumstances—first, that it was fought when France and England were not actually at war, but were trembling on the verge of it. The sound of the Arethusa's guns, indeed, was the signal of war between the two nations. The other fact is that an ingenious rhymester—scarcely a poet—crystallised the fight into a set of verses in which there is something of the ...
— The Junior Classics • Various
... bushmen do not advertise their chivalry—and wandered round the straggling Settlement vaguely surprised at its sobriety, and turning up in such unexpected places that the little bushman was constantly on the verge of apoplexy. ...
— We of the Never-Never • Jeanie "Mrs. Aeneas" Gunn
... very precipitous rock. Not the faintest glimmer of daylight reaches that spot; but after a while we stand on the brink of a perpendicular precipice, the bottom of which is strongly illuminated through a hole in the surface rock more than 200 feet above. Standing on the verge of this awful pit in the dim light, the rocks and crags seem to take on most weird shapes. We go down into the great hole by a ladder eighty feet high and twelve wide, and, reaching the bottom, are as yet but at the mouth of ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 508, September 26, 1885 • Various
... system of the predatory beast that he uses fear to weaken the powers of his prey before he assaults it. Animal psychology is essentially utilitarian. Cowering, trembling, muscularly relaxed, on the verge of emotional shock, we are easier ...
— Hunting with the Bow and Arrow • Saxton Pope
... Yorkshire town where he usually had his abode, he came little short of being adored by the women of his own particular sect, who crowded to listen to his fervent discourses, and came away from them on the verge of hysteria, so profoundly moved were their sensitive souls by his damnatory doctrines. The men were more reluctant in their admiration, yet even they were always ready to admit "that he was an excellent fellow, with his heart in the ...
— Thelma • Marie Corelli
... upon the cruel murder of his father that he was constantly on the verge of insanity, devising plans to either slaughter himself or wreak a terrible vengeance ...
— Shakspere, Personal Recollections • John A. Joyce
... with it, or at the present day are eager to part with it for a consideration. In order to get the Whigs into power, and themselves places, they brought the country by their inflammatory language to the verge of a revolution, and were the cause that many perished on the scaffold; by their incendiary harangues and newspaper articles they caused the Bristol conflagration, for which six poor creatures were executed; they encouraged ...
— The Romany Rye • George Borrow
... his every effort to assure himself that no harm could come to Virginia Maxon before they reached her. The girl's father had not spoken since they discovered that she was missing from the campong, but his face was white and drawn; his eyes wide and glassy as those of one whose mind is on the verge of madness from ...
— The Monster Men • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... were always a good, honest little girl, and you have grown up an honest woman; you want to do your duty and slave for Marcus and Dot, and you have begun nobly by starving yourself until you are on the verge of an hysterical attack, but we must think of Marcus. Martha must not go, at least, not until the winter is over. I have been saving a few pounds for your Christmas present I meant you to have had a new dress and jacket, and a few other little ...
— Doctor Luttrell's First Patient • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... that voyage in the Scotia has killed me. I went to Dr. Abercromby, and he told me I was on the verge of an attack of jaundice. I am certainly better, but feel far from well. Listless, worried in body, not a bit in spirits, and as if I had eaten copper. I want to get into the position of delighting to accept and do ...
— General Gordon - A Christian Hero • Seton Churchill
... was translated into English, under the title of The Religious Philosopher, 3 vols. 8vo., 1718-19. The charge against Paley has been ably and satisfactorily discussed in the same volume of the Athenum (see pp. 907. 933.), and at the present time we have neither "ample room nor verge enough" to re-open ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 216, December 17, 1853 • Various
... alluding to his own declining strength, he thus proceeds:—"I am fast approaching that end which we must all come to. My own term I feel is expiring, and happy is the man who does not live to see the destruction of his country, which discontent has brought to the verge of ruin. Hitherto thrice happy England, how art thou torn to pieces by thine own children! Strangers, who a year ago looked up to you as a happy exception in the world, with admiration, at this moment know thee not! Fire, riot, and bloodshed, ...
— The Life of Admiral Viscount Exmouth • Edward Osler
... impelled by a huge enthusiasm, and seeing ahead of him something he had had no practical reason for aspiring to. He went out in all weathers and stayed out to all hours. Whatsoever rebuffs or difficulties he met with he never was even on the verge of losing his nerve. He actually enjoyed himself tremendously at times. He made friends; people began to like to see him. The Munsbergs regarded him as an inspiration of ...
— T. Tembarom • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... and calm, though in the west heavy clouds were gathering and seemed to promise rain soon. But overhead the sun shone brightly, the air was calm and warm, and the little dell on whose verge he stood a very pretty ...
— The Bittermeads Mystery • E. R. Punshon
... hills Shone clear upon the horizon. Then awoke A strange and unknown longing in their souls, As if for something loved in years gone by, And vanished in its beauty and its love So long, that it retained no name or form, And lay on childhood's verge, all but forgot, Wrapt in the enchanted rose-mists of that land: As if amidst those hills were wooded dells, Summer, and gentle winds, and odours free, Deep sleeping waters, gorgeous flowers, and birds, Pure winged throats. But here, all things ...
— A Hidden Life and Other Poems • George MacDonald
... he had initiated an amphibious campaign of highly original daring, he was not on the battlefield when his army was suddenly attacked. He arrived to find his right wing crushed and his whole force on the verge of defeat. He blamed no one. Without more than a passing second's hesitation, he said quietly to his chief subordinates: "Gentlemen, the position on the right must be retaken." Then he mounted his horse, and galloped along the line shouting to his men: "Fill your cartridge cases quick; the enemy ...
— The Armed Forces Officer - Department of the Army Pamphlet 600-2 • U. S. Department of Defense
... must be sure that nothing was divulged which passed between them on these matters, and he might repose the same confidence in us. As to the formation of the Household, the Queen made two conditions, viz. that the persons to compose her Court should not be on the verge of bankruptcy, and that their moral character should bear investigation. On the Queen's accession Lord Melbourne had been very careless in his appointments, and great harm had resulted to the Court therefrom. Since her marriage I had insisted upon a closer line being drawn, and though Lord ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Vol 2 (of 3), 1844-1853 • Queen Victoria
... very obliging and attentive; but if it would not seem ungrateful, I would hazard the statement that their attentions are unremitting to the degree of being almost embarrassing, and proffered to the verge of obtrusiveness. I think, in short, that they are hardly quite delicate in their politeness. They press their hospitality on you till you sigh for a little marked neglect. They are not content with simple statement. They offer ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XII. July, 1863, No. LXIX. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... marching in the distance, the chink of money in the counting, and the creaking of doors held stealthily ajar, appeared to mingle with the patter of the drops upon the cupola and the gushing of the water in the pipes. The sense that he was not alone grew upon him to the verge of madness. On every side he was haunted and begirt by presences. He heard them moving in the upper chambers; from the shop he heard the dead man getting to his legs; and as he began with a great effort to mount the stairs, feet fled quietly before him and followed ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 8 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... lines, saying he had found much to admire in the work, but that a gracious public full of nerves would not stand so much cold water poured upon it. The seventh firm to whom he submitted the tale was on the verge of bankruptcy. Kinross was absolutely startled when he received a laconic note accepting his MS., and offering a very fair royalty. He was not to know that these publishers had taken it in the spirit of a man who with six shillings for his only capital ...
— In the Mist of the Mountains • Ethel Turner
... was thinking of getting away to bed, the worthy man must needs insist on having family worship, to which the servants had also to be summoned. It was the inordinate length of this service at such a time of night that had driven old Lord Fareborough to the verge of madness. ...
— Prince Fortunatus • William Black
... said Mr. Brownlow, solemnly, "do not say that now, upon the very verge of death, but tell me where they are. You know that Sikes is dead, that Monks has confessed, that there is no hope of any further gain. ...
— The Speaker, No. 5: Volume II, Issue 1 - December, 1906. • Various
... Indians concealed by the prairie grass and timber, and from this situation, in almost perfect security, they fired down upon Braddock's men. The only exposure of the French and Indians, resulted from the circumstance of their having to raise their heads to peep over the verge of the cliff, in order to shoot with more deadly precision. In consequence, all of them who were killed in the early part of the action, were shot through ...
— Chronicles of Border Warfare • Alexander Scott Withers
... the lighthouse in a hurry, intending to call on a shipping agent, naturally he wouldn't stay in port long," said Blake. "Besides——" He stopped suddenly, being on the verge of saying something that would give Joe ...
— The Moving Picture Boys on the Coast • Victor Appleton
... himself on the verge of a proposal—with an effort he choked back the impulse. "You're just the romantic age," she continued—"fifty. Twenty-five is too worldly-wise; thirty is apt to be pale from overwork; forty is the age of long stories ...
— Tales of the Jazz Age • F. Scott Fitzgerald
... multifarious vows, I am a candidate for thy eternal wealth.' 'O thou of ascetic wealth, returned Rama, 'My gold and whatever other wealth I had, have all been given away unto Brahmanas! This earth also, to the verge of the sea, decked with towns and cities, as with a garland of flowers, I have given unto Kasyapa. I have now my body only and my various valuable weapons left. I am prepared to give either my body or my weapons. Say, ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa - Translated into English Prose - Adi Parva (First Parva, or First Book) • Kisari Mohan Ganguli (Translator)
... in genius for commerce with the Indians, and in skillful marketing of Indian products, that Hanna calls him "The King of the Traders." Lavish in his expenditures, big in his ventures, he made and lost fortunes with equal facility. He alternated between the height of opulence and the verge of bankruptcy. Like Sir William Johnson, Croghan had a special aptitude for making friendships with the Indians, so that, according to his own statement, "he was in such favor and confidence with the councils of the Six Nations ...
— The Story of Cooperstown • Ralph Birdsall
... corrupt governments had contracted foreign loans under conditions that made their repayment almost impossible and had spent the proceeds in so reckless and extravagant a fashion as to bring the country to the verge of bankruptcy. Bolivia, similarly governed, was still the scene of the orgies and carnivals which had for some time characterized its unfortunate history. One of its buffoon "presidents," moreover, had entered into boundary agreements with both Chile and Brazil, under which the nation ...
— The Hispanic Nations of the New World - Volume 50 in The Chronicles Of America Series • William R. Shepherd
... Harold, my brother, may prepare for battle. Never shall it be said that the son of Godwin forsook the son of Sigurd." It must have been a strange look that passed between those two brothers, thus on the verge of a deadly strife, each surrounded with dangers that could scarcely be averted, and but of late actuated with bitter hate, but, at the decisive moment, that hatred giving way, and their hearts yearning to each other, with the memories of long-past days, yet both too proud to show how they ...
— Cameos from English History, from Rollo to Edward II • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... three centuries of their recorded history, they were in a sense a dependency of America. As a dependency of New Spain they constituted the extreme western verge of the Spanish dominions and were commonly known as the Western Islands. When the sun rose in Madrid it was still early afternoon of the preceding day in Manila. Down to the end of the year 1844 the Manilan calendar was reckoned after that of Spain, that is, Manila time was ...
— Historical Essays • James Ford Rhodes
... present cause for agitation, except, if you will pardon me for saying it, your own needlessly alarming words and manner," said Ishmael cheerfully, to reassure the frightened women, who seemed upon the very verge of hysterics. ...
— Self-Raised • Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte Southworth
... great was the humiliation when one who stood beside me heard the distant sound of a shepherd's pipe, and I heard nothing; or heard the shepherd singing, and I heard nothing. Such experiences brought me to the verge of despair;—but little more and I should have put an end to my life. ...
— Beethoven: the Man and the Artist - As Revealed in his own Words • Ludwig van Beethoven
... that a man does not carry exploded cartridge-cases, especially "browns," which will not bear loading twice, about with him when shooting. In other words, that cartridge-case had been fired inside the crater. Consequently there must be a gun somewhere. I was on the verge of asking Gunga Dass, but checked myself, knowing that he would lie. We laid the body down on the edge of the quicksand by the tussocks. It was my intention to push it out and let it be swallowed up—the only possible mode of burial that I could think of. I ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... quivering on the verge of half-discovered things, flashes of intuition, fragments of deduction, Beth ...
— The Furnace of Gold • Philip Verrill Mighels
... which would enable man to rise above the abject state into which he has fallen, and to return to his original perfection." To the evil offices of these demons, he attributed his late disaster. He had been on the very verge of the glorious discovery; never were the indications more completely auspicious; all was going on prosperously, when, at the critical moment which should have crowned his labours with success, and have placed him at the very summit of human power and felicity, the ...
— Bracebridge Hall, or The Humorists • Washington Irving
... you're on the verge and preparing to leap in—and you know it. Let some other man be the life-saver, Harleston. You're much too fine a chap to waste yourself ...
— The Cab of the Sleeping Horse • John Reed Scott
... more than in almost any other land, the Reformation was a political revolt. Indeed, it may well be called a political necessity. At the moment when Gustavus Vasa was elected king, Sweden was on the verge of bankruptcy. The war just passed had drained the resources of the country, and left her heavily involved in debt. The principal creditor was Lubeck. Precisely how much had been borrowed from that town it is impossible to determine, though ...
— The Swedish Revolution Under Gustavus Vasa • Paul Barron Watson
... him?" Larry was quite eager now. He seemed to be on the verge of discovering something; if not of the Potter mystery then of the other, that cropped up every now and again—that of the man he had ...
— Larry Dexter's Great Search - or, The Hunt for the Missing Millionaire • Howard R. Garis
... was bound to come up and you must sit down and listen quietly." The elder, on the verge of a tempestuous reply, constrained himself to a painful attention. "It's useless to point out to you the beneficial changes in sea carrying, for you are certain to deny their good and drag out the past. So I am simply forced to tell you that after careful consideration we ...
— Java Head • Joseph Hergesheimer
... tongue is sharper than a two-edged sword; to noble natures like his, it strikes home to the heart. Ralph Wilson, you are an old man standing on the very verge of the grave. You accused my son of theft, and declared on your word of honour as a Christian that you ...
— George Leatrim • Susanna Moodie
... of nervous oppression burst its way into relief. She laughed loudly and wildly—she was on the verge of hysterics, when Benjulia's eyes, silently questioning her again, controlled her at the critical moment. Her laughter died away. But the exciting influence still possessed her; still forced her into the ...
— Heart and Science - A Story of the Present Time • Wilkie Collins
... grew to the verge of the precipice. A full foliaged oak and a luxuriant maple, the former still fresh with its dark green leaves, the latter making a vivid contrast with its pale yellow, purple-red, and orange hues, leaned ...
— The Last Trail • Zane Grey
... Yet lest our gift should stretch too far, We will it with this law restrain, That when from hell he takes his flight, He shall from looking back refrain.' Who can for lovers laws indite? Love hath no law but her own will. Orpheus, seeing on the verge of night Eurydice, doth lose and kill Her and himself with foolish love. But you this feigned tale fulfil, Who think unto the day above To bring with speed your darksome mind. For if, your eye conquered, you move Backward to Pluto left behind, All the rich prey which thence you took, You lose while ...
— The Theological Tractates and The Consolation of Philosophy • Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius
... girl I ever saw in my life," he admitted. "I wanted to speak to you. Two or three times I was on the verge of it but I never could quite get up the courage. I'm not much good at starting conversations with girls. My kid brother, Ted, has the monopoly of that sort of thing ...
— Wild Wings - A Romance of Youth • Margaret Rebecca Piper
... and then he would stagger along for minutes after consciousness of what he was doing had deserted him, for there are men in that Bush, at least, who know what it is to stop with suddenly opened eyes on the verge of a collapse, and find that they have wandered from the path—only in Nasmyth's case there was no ...
— The Greater Power • Harold Bindloss
... me, as he had heard from the hunters, who had been on my trail about eighty miles to the Saltpetre caves on the Currents River, that I had been killed by the Indians. Every one was pleased to see me, and no one more so than my kind Kentucky host, who had been the last to bid me adieu on the verge of the wilderness. ...
— Personal Memoirs Of A Residence Of Thirty Years With The Indian Tribes On The American Frontiers • Henry Rowe Schoolcraft
... limits.... Such a decision is all that slavery now lacks of being alike lawful in all the States.... We shall lie down," continued the orator, "pleasantly dreaming that the people of Missouri are on the verge of making their State free; and we shall awake to the reality instead, that the Supreme Court has made Illinois ...
— Abraham Lincoln, A History, Volume 2 • John George Nicolay and John Hay
... respect for principles that he teaches and applies so loosely himself. It is, furthermore, difficult to understand how he expects submission to the decisions of his organization when he himself has been on the verge of revolt both against the national and international movement. He has always avowed his profound disagreement with the methods of the Socialists in practically every State but his own. He and his associates were at one moment ...
— Socialism As It Is - A Survey of The World-Wide Revolutionary Movement • William English Walling
... entered upon his duties at a crisis in public affairs which required the utmost foresight, resolution and prudence. Great Britain and the United States were on the verge of war. In 1807 the long series of wrongs inflicted by England upon the commerce of America, and the rights of her seaman, had been consummated by the affair of the Leopard and Chesapeake. This wanton insult had thrown the country into violent commotion, and occasioned the embargo ...
— Hidden Treasures - Why Some Succeed While Others Fail • Harry A. Lewis
... to represent Covenanting as a mere Jewish thing, is an error. It was engaged in before the father of the Hebrew race was called. It was practised when the Levitical economy was on the verge of dissolution, and attended to in the apostolic age by churches that were not subjected to its peculiar institutes. It was provided for the Church, whether existing in Old or New Testament times. It was independent ...
— The Ordinance of Covenanting • John Cunningham
... Though ever the sight that salutes them again and adores them awhile is blest, And the heart is a hymn, and the sense is a soul, and the soul is a song. Alone on a dyke's trenched edge, and afar from the blossoming wildwood's verge, Laughs and lightens a sister, triumphal in love-lit pride; Clothed round with the sun, and inviolate: her blossoms exult as the springtide surge, When the wind and the dawn enkindle the snows ...
— A Channel Passage and Other Poems - Taken from The Collected Poetical Works of Algernon Charles - Swinburne—Vol VI • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... approaching ever nearer; a soulless, heartless, and unjoyous laugh, like that of the loon, solitary by the lakeside at midnight; a laugh which culminated in an unearthly shout close at hand, then died away by slow gradations, as if the accursed being that uttered it had withdrawn over the verge of the world whence it had come. But the man felt that this was not so—that it was near by and ...
— Can Such Things Be? • Ambrose Bierce
... investigation was extended to all the northern region of Lincoln Island, whose most secret nooks were explored. The colonists even went the length of tapping every rock. The search was extended to the extreme verge of the mountain. It was explored thus to the very summit of the truncated cone terminating the first row of rocks, then to the upper ridge of the enormous hat, at the bottom ...
— The Secret of the Island • W.H.G. Kingston (translation from Jules Verne)
... and the Chemung, but it was scarcely the thought of any one of the five that they would travel the vast distance without interruption. Henry, as he sat in the boat in the darkness, felt that once more they were on the verge of great events. Used so long to the life of the wilderness and its countless dangers, the sudden throb of his heart told not of fear, but rather of exultation. It was the spirit rising to meet what lay before it. The same strength ...
— The Border Watch - A Story of the Great Chief's Last Stand • Joseph A. Altsheler
... these savages he suffered from 'cold, heat, smoke, and dogs,' and bore in silence the foul language of a medicine-man who made the missionary's person and teachings subjects of mirth. At times, too, he was on the verge of death from hunger. Early in the spring he returned to Quebec, after having narrowly escaped drowning as he Crossed the ice-laden St Lawrence in a frail canoe. He had made no converts; but he had gained valuable experience. It was ...
— The Jesuit Missions: - A Chronicle of the Cross in the Wilderness • Thomas Guthrie Marquis
... a delicious meal was spread before her, to which she did full justice, feeling by this time on the verge of starvation. ...
— Lucile Triumphant • Elizabeth M. Duffield |
