|
|
|
More "Omen" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... pleasure in pictures of filthy, ruined hovels, in which health and even virtue are impossible, is a strange sign of the times. It is more than strange; it is an omen and a prophecy that people will go into sham ecstasies over one of these pigstyes so long as it is in a gilt frame; that they will give a thousand guineas for its light and shade—light, forsooth!—or for its Prout-like quality, or for its quality of this, ...
— Catharine Furze • Mark Rutherford
... crowd was immense, but all went well so long as the spectacle lasted. When the crowd began to move away, a panic took place. The old and the feeble were thrown down and trampled on. Twenty-four persons were killed, the fetes were broken up, and all hearts were saddened both by the disaster and the omen. ...
— France in the Nineteenth Century • Elizabeth Latimer
... There was ill omen in the light reply. "Why, as to that, my Lord," said Law, "if you should think my poor service useful, your servants might get trace of me at the Green Lion—unless I should be in prison! No man knoweth ...
— The Mississippi Bubble • Emerson Hough
... present occasion shows only a general change of weather with a tendency towards rain. If Dr. Forster's theory be true, it is decidedly one of the minor instances, as far as London weather is concerned.—It will take a good deal of evidence to make us believe in the omen of a Saturday Moon. But, as we have said of the Poughkeepsie Seer, the thing is very curious whether true or false. Whence comes this universal proverb—and a hundred others—while the meteorological observer {323} cannot, when he ...
— A Budget of Paradoxes, Volume I (of II) • Augustus De Morgan
... reception did not last long, and the end was better than the beginning; for the rain ceased, and a rainbow shone beautifully over them as the good fellows stood upon the lawn singing sweetly for a farewell. A happy omen, that bow of promise arched over the young heads, as if Heaven smiled upon their union, and showed them that above the muddy earth and rainy skies the blessed sun still shone for all. Three cheers, and then away they went, ...
— Jo's Boys • Louisa May Alcott
... Walker was attacking the Costa-Ricans in Rivas, the dog entered the plaza ahead of the rest, and, finding there one of his own species, he forthwith seized him, and shook him, and put him to flight howling,—giving an omen so favorable, that the greasers were driven out of the town with ease by the others. Even his every-day life was sublime, and elevated above the habit of vulgar dogs. He allowed no man to think himself his master, or attach him individually by liberal feeding ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 27, January, 1860 • Various
... to his chamber, he observed on his dressing-table a small packet addressed to his name, and in an unknown handwriting. Opening it, he found a pretty racing-jacket embroidered with his colours of pink and white. This was a perplexing circumstance, but he fancied it on the whole a happy omen. And who was the donor? Certainly not the Princess Lucretia, for he had observed her fashioning some maroon ribbons, which were the colours of Sidonia. It could scarcely be from Mrs. Guy Flouncey. Perhaps Madame Colonna to please ...
— Coningsby • Benjamin Disraeli
... Miss,' I said. 'He's a bird of bad omen: no mate for you. Mrs. Linton spoke strongly, and yet I can't contradict her. She is better acquainted with his heart than I, or any one besides; and she never would represent him as worse than he is. Honest people don't hide their ...
— Wuthering Heights • Emily Bronte
... of serpents came to be considered of good omen, and by a natural consequence they were kept (a harmless sort of course) in the houses, where they nestled about the altars, and came out like dogs or cats to be patted by the visitors, and beg for something to eat. Nay, at table, if we ...
— Museum of Antiquity - A Description of Ancient Life • L. W. Yaggy
... contracted during the civil wars, were such as to oblige him to sell a great portion of his lands, and to part with the ancient Barony of Erskine, the first possession of the family. This necessity may almost be considered as an ill omen for the future welfare of a family; which never seems to be so utterly brought low by fortune, as when compelled to consign to strangers that from which the first sense of importance and stability ...
— Memoirs of the Jacobites of 1715 and 1745. - Volume I. • Mrs. Thomson
... or brother of his foregoer (though no strict rule of succession seems to appear in Saxo), and duly chosen and acknowledged at the proper place of election. In Denmark this was at a stone circle, and the stability of these stones was taken as an omen for the king's reign. There are exceptional instances noted, as the serf-king Eormenric (cf. Guthred-Canute of Northumberland), whose noble birth washed out this blot of his captivity, and there is a curious ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")
... that, according to Hippocrates's Doctrine, Deafness is a very dangerous Symptom in the Beginning of acute Disorders, though it be a good Omen, and portends Health, when it does not appear till the Height of Fevers, especially those of a malignant Kind; and adds, that he himself has a thousand Times observed, that those labouring under this Fever have recovered, when this Symptom of Deafness came on at the Height (in ...
— An Account of the Diseases which were most frequent in the British military hospitals in Germany • Donald Monro
... to regard this as a favourable omen, many even asserting their conviction that the savages had quarrelled among themselves, and that attack from them was no longer to be feared; but Dick and Grosvenor took quite another view of the matter. They regarded the cessation of news as ominous in the extreme, and ...
— The Adventures of Dick Maitland - A Tale of Unknown Africa • Harry Collingwood
... knowledge of feminine nature; nor did her feebleness in sustaining it displease him. A steady look of hers had of late perplexed the man, and he was comforted by signs of her inefficiency where he excelled. The effort and the failure were both of good omen. ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... [146] "Evil Omen," a nickname applied by the friars to General Joaquin Jovellar, who was governor of the Islands from 1883 to 1885. It fell to the lot of General Jovellar, a kindly old man, much more soldier than administrator, to attempt the introduction ...
— The Social Cancer - A Complete English Version of Noli Me Tangere • Jose Rizal
... to Petrograd is regarded as a favorable omen, as this diplomat had expressed previous to his departure that he would not come back to his post if he were not successful in placing Rumania on the side of the ...
— Current History, A Monthly Magazine - The European War, March 1915 • New York Times
... by a band to the westward, and echoed back from the north in a single voice, each apparently many miles distant. Animal instinct is usually unerring, and the boys readily recalled the statement of the old trail foreman, that the howling of wolves was an omen of ...
— Wells Brothers • Andy Adams
... occurred later, but have been antedated by the popular tradition to the year above mentioned. For such a birth would, in the opinion of the times, be regarded undoubtedly as a most evident prodigy or omen of evil. Still, even admitting that the date 1100 must be allowed to stand, its remoteness from the present time is not a convincing argument against a belief in the real occurrence of the phenomenon; for of the dicephalic ...
— Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine • George M. Gould
... omen. Burke was now rewarded by the discovery that his labours had earned for him recognition and gratitude beyond the narrow limits of a rather exclusive party. He had before this attracted the attention of the mercantile ...
— Burke • John Morley
... came it that the lion's tail was lost, witched from him by that villain of mischief, the monkey; but, O great Genie, I knew there was a lion among men, reverenced, and with enemies; that lion, he that espoused me and my glory, Shagpat! 'Twas enough to know that and tremble at the omen of my dream, O Genie. Wherefore I thought it well to summon thee here, that thou mightest set a guard over Shagpat, and shield him from the treacheries that ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... believed that if this course were adopted he was pretty sure who would be put on shore, if a vote were taken by officers and crew; but he was too wise to say anything upon this point, and contented himself with positively refusing to send southward any news of the evil omen. ...
— The Great Stone of Sardis • Frank R. Stockton
... copies,' he thought, 'have been sold. Seven is a mystical number, and the omen is good. Let me find the seven purchasers of my seven copies, and they shall be the seven golden candle-sticks with which I ...
— Nightmare Abbey • Thomas Love Peacock
... ray of the evening sunlight suddenly illuminated the spot where the soldier sat, so that his noble, blanched face, his black hair, and his clothes were bathed in its glow. The effect was simple enough, but to the girl's Italian imagination it was a happy omen. The stranger seemed to her a celestial messenger, speaking the language of her own country. He thus unconsciously put her under the spell of childhood's memories, while in her heart there dawned another feeling as fresh, as pure as her own innocence. For a short, very short moment, ...
— Vendetta • Honore de Balzac
... for it—ever so small—had flickered in her face, but had vanished before the omen of tears, a little less uncertain, had shown themselves in his own. His eyes filled—but that made her continue. She continued gently. "I think that what it really is must be that you're afraid. I mean," she explained, "that you're afraid of all the truth. If you're in love with ...
— The Wings of the Dove, Volume II • Henry James
... and eye, uprose in his stirrups and clove Bohun's helmet, the axe breaking in that stroke. It was a desperate but a winning blow: Bruce's spears advanced, and the English van withdrew in half superstitious fear of the omen. His ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... royalists, disapproved of the condemnation of the two women, who had only been convicted of a crime by which neither of them had profited. The reprieve granted to Mme. Acquet, "whose declaration had deceived no one," seemed a good omen, indicating a commutation of her sentence. The nine "brigands" condemned to death received no pity. Lefebre was not known in Rouen, and his attitude during the trial had aroused no sympathy; the others were but vulgar actors in the drama, and only interested ...
— The House of the Combrays • G. le Notre
... she had shown signs of joy and confusion at seeing me again. Yet I was unhappy because I met her still filling a holy office which built a wall between us, also because it seemed to me an evil omen that I should have been repelled from her by a priest of Isis who talked of the curse of the goddess. Moreover the sacred statue, I suppose by accident, turned towards me as it passed and perhaps by the chance of light, seemed to ...
— The Ancient Allan • H. Rider Haggard
... hanging down to the ground, knew that she had descended thence and had fled forth, as one distracted and mad with passion. Presently, he turned and seeing there two birds, an owl and a raven, deemed this an ill omen; so he groaned and recited ...
— The Book Of The Thousand Nights And One Night, Volume IV • Anonymous
... something unusual, the sky became obscured by clouds. It might be a good omen, or a bad one. If a storm, their frail boat would run a terrible risk of being swamped; but if rain should accompany it, there might be a chance of collecting a little water upon a tarpaulin that lay ...
— The Castaways • Captain Mayne Reid
... villain, 'twas well done! May hell get you! To suspect me of cutting trees!—me, the most honest woman in the village. To hunt me like vermin! I'd like to see you lose your cursed eyes, for then we'd have peace. You are birds of ill-omen, the whole of you; you invent shameful stories to stir up strife between ...
— Sons of the Soil • Honore de Balzac
... Oxford, is he?' Miss Luttrell chimed on vacantly, wagging her wrinkled old head in solemn deprecation of tke evil omen. She knew it as well as Mrs. Oswald herself did, having heard the fact at least a thousand times before; but she made it a matter of principle never to encourage these upstart pretensions on the part of the lower orders, and just to keep ...
— Philistia • Grant Allen
... in a rude nest or in a hole in the ground, and in small communities; he builds a few deep cells or sacks in which he stores a little honey and bee-bread for his young, but as a worker in wax he is of the most primitive and awkward. The Indian regarded the honey-bee as an ill-omen. She was the white man's fly. In fact she was the epitome of the white man himself. She has the white man's craftiness, his industry, his architectural skill, his neatness and love of system, his foresight; and above all his eager, ...
— Birds and Bees, Sharp Eyes and, Other Papers • John Burroughs
... forehead, and stood gazing at the door, shaking his head mournfully, and with the dread of something wrong on the increase. But all was still, and even that Jerry looked upon as a bad omen. ...
— The Queen's Scarlet - The Adventures and Misadventures of Sir Richard Frayne • George Manville Fenn
... great consternation in the mind of good-wife Louder. To have seen the man with the book was an evil omen, and to sign this book was the loss of ...
— The Witch of Salem - or Credulity Run Mad • John R. Musick
... Africa had moulded into his features! I held him in my arms, after we had sped far away from our Southern home,—held him, and glanced at the hot red soil of Georgia and the breathless city of a hundred hills, and felt a vague unrest. Why was his hair tinted with gold? An evil omen was golden hair in my life. Why had not the brown of his eyes crushed out and killed the blue?—for brown were his father's eyes, and his father's father's. And thus in the Land of the Color-line I saw, as it fell across my baby, the shadow ...
— The Souls of Black Folk • W. E. B. Du Bois
... She scarcely knew then. But she knew that she wanted a light to be shining for her when she neared home—longed for it, needed it specially that night. If San Francesco's lamp were burning quietly amid the fury of the sea in such a blackness as this about them—well, it would seem like an omen. She would take it as an ...
— A Spirit in Prison • Robert Hichens
... three days we were in suspense a monster vulture kept hovering over our house. The people said it was a bad omen, and so I fetched my little gun, though I rather begrudged the cartridge just then; and when it was out of what they call reach, I had the good luck to bring it down. This gave them great comfort, and we hung the vulture on the top ...
— The Romance of Isabel Lady Burton Volume II • Isabel Lady Burton & W. H. Wilkins
... and bitter was the feeling against the horseflesh fable—for fable, our anger notwithstanding, we insisted it was—that thinking meat-eaters began to look upon it as a bad omen, and to wonder why a baseless rumour should stir up so much indignation. Tales of this kind, whether or not they tallied with probability, had come to be pooh-poohed, to be treated with disdain. Hence it was ...
— The Siege of Kimberley • T. Phelan
... days of first bud and leaf Dorothy Thornton looked out of her window with a psychological anxiety. If the first hint of life that came to the great tree were diseased or marked with blight, it would be an omen of ill under which she did not see how she could face her hour, and with fevered eyes she searched the gray branches where the sap was rising and studied the earliest ...
— The Roof Tree • Charles Neville Buck
... if, at such an hour as this, we are prone to magnify trifles, or that the most insignificant thing becomes an omen full of ghastly meaning and possibilities? The creak of a door in the silence, a rustle in the dark, become to us of infinitely greater moment than the ...
— The Broad Highway • Jeffery Farnol
... nearly all mutilated. The heads, necks, and busts were all destroyed, leaving the lower part of them—mere quadrangular pillars, without arms, or legs, or body—alone standing. The sacrilege sent universal dismay into the city, and was regarded as a most depressing omen, and was done, doubtless, with a view of ruining Alcibiades and frustrating the expedition. But all efforts were vain to ...
— Ancient States and Empires • John Lord
... fortune of war, they drive us utterly away, what they will do next can only be conjectured. If a new monarchy is erected, they will want a KING. He who first takes into his hand the sceptre of America, should have a name of good omen. WILLIAM has been known both as conqueror and deliverer; and perhaps England, however contemned, might yet supply them with ANOTHER WILLIAM. Whigs, indeed, are not willing to be governed; and it is possible that KING WILLIAM may be strongly inclined to guide their ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 2 • Boswell
... joy the sailors felt at seeing a living creature after the days in which they had seen "nor shapes of men nor beasts," they had a special pleasure in welcoming the albatross because it was regarded as a bird of good omen. ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 7 • Charles H. Sylvester
... must return home." I was weeping like a child. "Jatinda's callous departure is an ill omen. This ...
— Autobiography of a YOGI • Paramhansa Yogananda
... hardly touched by the ravages of war, and which by its prosperity alone might have proved the amenity of British military rule. This force seems to have skirted Wepener without attacking a place of such evil omen to their cause. Their subsequent movements are readily traced by ...
— The Great Boer War • Arthur Conan Doyle
... blush of modesty, the embarrassment, and the tears of the young virgin. The bright torch of Hymen is not forgotten among the modern Greeks. It is carried before the new married couple into the nuptial chamber, where it burns till it is consumed, and it would be an ill omen were it by any accident extinguished, wherefore it is watched with as much care as of old was the sacred fire of the vestals. Arrived at the church, the bride and bridegroom each wear a crown, which, during the ceremony, the priest changes, by giving the crown ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 14, - Issue 403, December 5, 1829 • Various
... my right lid and, as I opened wide my eyes, lo and behold! both were stone-blind: naught could I see for the black darkness before them and ever since that day have I been sightless and helpless as thou foundest me. When I knew that I was blinded, I exclaimed, "O Darwaysh of ill-omen, what thou didst fore tell hath come to pass;" and I fell to cursing him and saying "O would to Heaven thou hadst never brought me to the hoard or hadst given me such wealth. What now avail me all this gold and jewels? Take back thy forty camels and make me whole again." Replied he, ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton
... a very ancient custom, not yet fully explained, but which clearly had for its object the reverential burying of a rabbit or hare. It is characteristic of the totem animal that it serves as an omen to its clansmen, and we find that the hare is an omen in Britain. Boudicca is said to have drawn an augury from a hare, taken from her bosom, and which when released pursued a course that was deemed fortunate ...
— Folklore as an Historical Science • George Laurence Gomme
... not. The death that had gone before the bridal seemed to have left its shade upon the house. The air was heavy and oppressive; the rooms were dark; a deep gloom filled up every chink and corner. Upon the hearthstone, like a creature of ill omen, sat the aged clerk, with his eyes fixed on some withered branches in the stove. He ...
— Life And Adventures Of Martin Chuzzlewit • Charles Dickens
... solitary prayer; 18th of every August (Franz's death-day) she has gone down punctually to the vaults in the Stephans-Kirche, and sat by his coffin there;—last August, something broke in the apparatus as she descended; and it has ever since been an omen to her. [Hormayr, OEsterreichischer Plutarch, iv. (2tes) 94; Keith, ii. 114.] ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XXI. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... Telemachos sat down, and Zeus sent two eagles flying over the heads of the wooers, close to each other. They looked down upon the crowd of people and tore each other's heads and vanished. The Ithacans saw the deadly omen, and a venerable prophet among them stood up and said: "Noble youths, I advise you seriously to depart from this royal house, for this is a sign that Odysseus is coming home. Woe to you if he finds you in his palace. You will ...
— Odysseus, the Hero of Ithaca - Adapted from the Third Book of the Primary Schools of Athens, Greece • Homer
... he cannot want the inclination, to act with promptitude. The enclosed note Mr. Alan Fairford must be pleased to consider as his first professional emolument; and she who sends it hopes it will be the omen of unbounded success, though the fee comes from a hand so unknown ...
— Redgauntlet • Sir Walter Scott
... a big and powerful man—he was also courageous, but the absence of Dodge and the presence of Cunningham offered such sinister omen that temporarily he was bereft of his natural wit ...
— The Pagan Madonna • Harold MacGrath
... claim to a more enduring national existence. In honest truth, what with the hope-inspiring influence of the design, and what with Leutze's undisturbed evolvement of it, I was exceedingly encouraged, and allowed these cheerful auguries to weigh against a sinister omen that was pointed out to me in another part of the Capitol. The freestone walls of the central edifice are pervaded with great cracks, and threaten to come thundering down, under the immense weight of the iron dome,—an appropriate ...
— Sketches and Studies • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... Myriads of bats and owls, and all manner of fowls of darkness and bad omen, crazed by the glare of twenty torches, startled the echoes with infernal clangor. Screaming and huddling together, some fled under the wide skirts of sable, which Darkness, climbing to the roof in fear, drew up after her; some hid with lesser shadows between columns of great girth, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 26, December, 1859 • Various
... it was pitch dark, and the armour gave out glistering beams as of fire, and he said to his father, "The pillars of the house are on fire." And his father said, "It is the gods who sit above the stars, and have power to make the night as light as the day." And he took it for a good omen. And Telemachus fell to cleaning ...
— THE ADVENTURES OF ULYSSES • CHARLES LAMB
... I have obtained (according to the usual expression) a place of dignity, but no great omen of future pomp or riches; and possessing a small residence {64} near the castle of Brecheinoc, well adapted to literary pursuits, and to the contemplation of eternity, I envy not the riches of Croesus; happy and contented with that mediocrity, which I prize far beyond all ...
— The Itinerary of Archibishop Baldwin through Wales • Giraldus Cambrensis
... sunshine came into the room. "Look! how bright and propitious for our plans. Dear Ruth, it seems like an omen for the future!" ...
— Ruth • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... due to no natural and incurable condition. It is the direct result of certain artificial ligatures and compressions; remove these and it disappears. This spectre haunts the conscience of England to incite her not to a deed of blood but to a deed of justice; every wind is favourable and every omen. It is, indeed, true that if she is to succeed, England must do violence to certain prejudices which now afflict her like a blindness; she must deal with us as a man with men. But is not the Kingdom of Heaven taken ...
— The Open Secret of Ireland • T. M. Kettle
... Life of Pericles, says:—"The whole fleet was in readiness, and Pericles on board his own galley, when there happened an eclipse of the Sun. The sudden darkness was looked upon as an unfavourable omen, and threw the sailors into the greatest consternation. Pericles observing that the pilot was much astonished and perplexed, took his cloak, and having covered his eyes with it, asked him if he found anything terrible in that, or considered it as a bad presage? Upon his ...
— The Story of Eclipses • George Chambers
... these institutions themselves, so far as they relate to religion and war. As I have no wish to keep those who would know my views on these matters in suspense, I say at once, that to many it might seem of evil omen that the founder of a civil government like Romulus, should first have slain his brother, and afterwards have consented to the death of Titus Tatius the Sabine, whom he had chosen to be his colleague in the kingship; since his countrymen, if moved by ambition and lust ...
— Discourses on the First Decade of Titus Livius • Niccolo Machiavelli
... hands, what could move him to visit us? Surely, he could have no sinister motive just then? Could he, after all, be willing to trust to his luck and release us, his predestined victims, as the unhappy Prince had trusted to his? The omen was ill. The barricades had been removed evidently before Legrand had arrived on the scene to interfere, and even as I hesitated Barraclough turned the key, and the door fell open. Holgate waddled heavily into the corridor ...
— Hurricane Island • H. B. Marriott Watson
... years had we lived here without the blessing of a public service of praise and thanksgiving. We regarded this commencement as an omen of better times, and our little "sewing-society" worked with renewed industry, to raise a fund Which might be available hereafter in securing the permanent services ...
— Wau-bun - The Early Day in the Northwest • Juliette Augusta Magill Kinzie
... feet, with his handsome person, princely fortune, and magnificent home near New Orleans, while off in the dim distance loomed up a dark coffin, in which was the cold, pale form of one whom she knew too well. Was her dream an omen of the coming future? We ...
— Tempest and Sunshine • Mary J. Holmes
... heap upon you—you, the most pointless things imaginable, saucy apes, brewers of odious contrasts, haunting birds of ill omen, mocking echoes, unseasonable reminders, oft-returning vexations, skeletons in my morris-chair, jesters in the tomb, death's-heads at the wedding feast, outlaws of the brain that every night defy the mind's police ...
— The World I Live In • Helen Keller
... dances and telling of stories. It was the subject of several superstitions. If it did not burn all night that was looked upon as a misfortune, and if a barefooted or squinting person came to the house while it was burning that also was a bad omen. The name Yule carries us back to the far-off ages when the heathen nations of the North held their annual winter festival in honour ...
— Little Folks (December 1884) - A Magazine for the Young • Various
... behind the victim, with her sable plumage and her hooked beak, like a bird of ill-omen. She was out of breath—for Mr Dombey, full of great thoughts, had walked fast—and she croaked hoarsely as she waited for the opening of ...
— Dombey and Son • Charles Dickens
... lucky of all dreams, they say in Izumo, is a dream of Fuji, the Sacred Mountain. Next in order of good omen is dreaming of a falcon (taka). The third best subject for a dream is the eggplant (nasubi). To dream of the sun or of the moon is very lucky; but it is still more so to dream of stars. For a young wife it is most for tunate to dream of swallowing a star: this signifies that ...
— Glimpses of an Unfamiliar Japan • Lafcadio Hearn
... tolerated by the law.[529] Barlow had been openly preaching that purgatory was a delusion; that a layman might be a bishop; that where two or three, it might be, "cobblers or weavers," "were in company in the name of God, there was the church of God."[530] Such ill-judged precipitancy was of darker omen to the Reformation than papal excommunications or imperial menaces, and would soon be dearly paid for in fresh martyr-fires. Latimer, too, notwithstanding his clear perception and gallant heart, looked with bitterness on the confiscation of establishments ...
— History of England from the Fall of Wolsey to the Death of Elizabeth. Vol. II. • James Anthony Froude
... down it, and found himself at last on the great Esplanade, whither the little porter had taken him three days before. He was close then to the Museum, and to her house. Destiny had led him, unconsciously, towards the scene of his enterprise. It was a good omen; he would go thither at once. He might sleep upon her doorstep as well as upon any other. Perhaps he might catch a glimpse of her going out or coming in, even at that late hour. It might be well to accustom himself ...
— Hypatia - or, New Foes with an Old Face • Charles Kingsley
... little better than an ass, he cannot be so false of word as to train me to prison under false pretexts? I trow he shall first see for the last time how the English axe plays, if such is to be the sport of the evening. But let us see the upper end of this enormous vault; it may bear a better omen." ...
— Waverley Volume XII • Sir Walter Scott
... Blest omen of victory, symbol divine Of peace after tumult, repose after pain; How sweet and how glowing with promise the sign, To eyes that ...
— War Poetry of the South • Various
... whom can we else oppose, Who could from Hector bring his honour off, If not Achilles? the success of this, Although particular, will give an omen Of good or bad, even ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Vol. 6 (of 18) - Limberham; Oedipus; Troilus and Cressida; The Spanish Friar • John Dryden
... to his soldiers, uttered this sentiment: "With the help of the gods we have the surest hope that we shall save ourselves with glory." At this point a soldier sneezed. At once all adored the god who had sent this omen. "Since at the very instant when we are deliberating concerning our safety," exclaimed Xenophon, "Zeus the savior has sent us an omen, let us with one consent offer ...
— History Of Ancient Civilization • Charles Seignobos
... one of evil omen. We went to Gorizia, that pretty Austrian spa that was taken by the Italians last year, and has suffered from the war as much as Udine, its neighbor across the old frontier, has prospered. In the heart of the town its old ...
— World's War Events, Volume III • Various
... get any more money for him. Instead of complaining or boasting, or flattering his princely friend, or trying to incite him to activity of some kind, as he had been accustomed to do, he wrapped himself in a silence that could not be regarded as a favourable omen. ...
— The Goose Man • Jacob Wassermann
... and Magog, emblems of strength, stand as guardians of the chief Buddhist temples. The figures are protected by a network of iron wire, through which the votaries, praying the while, spit pieces of paper, which they had chewed up into a pulp. If the pellet sticks to the statue, the omen is favourable; if it falls, the prayer is not accepted. The inside of the great bell at the Tycoon's burial-ground, and almost every holy statue throughout the country, are all covered with these outspittings ...
— Tales of Old Japan • Algernon Bertram Freeman-Mitford
... any of her relations, and no right to eat with them. She sleeps, eats and works separately; her touch is considered impure for seven years. If a man, going out on business, meets a widow, he goes home again, abandoning every pursuit, because to see a widow is accounted an evil omen. ...
— From the Caves and Jungles of Hindostan • Helena Pretrovna Blavatsky
... Jacobites are so transported, that they are opening subscriptions for all boroughs that shall be vacant—this is wise! They will spend their money to carry a few more seats in a Parliament where they will never have the majority, and so have none to carry the general elections. The omen, however, is bad for Westminster; the High-bailiff went to ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 2 • Horace Walpole
... "It's an evil omen, Miss," a waitress said to Nance one evening. "In Ireland ghosts come to foretell bad news. It's no good to the college, shure, that ...
— Molly Brown's Senior Days • Nell Speed
... mask always made Venters remember; now that it was gone he seldom thought of her past. Occasionally he tried to piece together the several stages of strange experience and to make a whole. He had shot a masked outlaw the very sight of whom had been ill omen to riders; he had carried off a wounded woman whose bloody lips quivered in prayer; he had nursed what seemed a frail, shrunken boy; and now he watched a girl whose face had become strangely sweet, ...
— Riders of the Purple Sage • Zane Grey
... I woo'd and wedded: know too that my Queen In childing died; but not, as you believe, With her, the son she died in giving life to. For, as the hour of birth was on the stroke, Her brain conceiving with her womb, she dream'd A serpent tore her entrail. And too surely (For evil omen seldom speaks in vain) The man-child breaking from that living tomb That makes our birth the antitype of death, Man-grateful, for the life she gave him paid By killing her: and with such circumstance As suited such unnatural tragedy; He coming into light, if light it were That darken'd at his very ...
— Life Is A Dream • Pedro Calderon de la Barca
... the natives supposed it, occurred. Among the presents offered by the king was ajar of honey; this one of the servants upset without breaking the pot. Had it been broken, the omen would have been unfortunate; as it was, the governor was highly pleased, and ordered the poor to be called in to lick up the honey. They rushed in, squabbling among themselves. One old man, having a long beard, came off with ...
— Great African Travellers - From Mungo Park to Livingstone and Stanley • W.H.G. Kingston
... from you. I never reflected on your Actions (answer'd Agnes with all the Indifference of which she was capable) and if you think you offend me, you are in the wrong to make me perceive it. This Coldness is but an ill Omen for me (reply'd Don Alvaro) and if you have not found me out to be your Lover to-day, I fear you ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn - Volume V • Aphra Behn
... the Asikni, which means "black." That river had another name also, Kandrabhaga, which means "streak of the moon." The Greeks, however, pronounced that [Greek: Sandarophagos], and this had the unlucky meaning of "the devourer of Alexander." Hesychius tells us that in order to avert the bad omen Alexander changed the name of that river into [Greek: Akesines], which would mean "the Healer;" but he does not tell, what the Veda tells us, that this name [Greek: Akesines] was a Greek adaptation of another name of the same river, ...
— India: What can it teach us? - A Course of Lectures Delivered before the University Of Cambridge • F. Max Mueller
... hand and affectionately kissing it, while her face kindled with a sense of her sex's rights, "and I should be unfaithful to my womanhood were I to say otherwise. You had entered into the most solemn of all human contracts, and evil is the omen when such an engagement is veiled by any untruth. But, still, one would think you might have been happy with ...
— Home as Found • James Fenimore Cooper
... applied the match, and some white splinters were seen to fly from the enemy's topmast. A cheer burst from the throats of the crew who saw the success of the experiment. It was looked upon as a good omen for the future. The cheer, however, was repressed by the officers. The men stood at their quarters. The captains of guns, with their matches in their hands, most of them stripped to the waist, to allow them the better to work the tackles, and also, should they be wounded, to escape the ...
— The Heir of Kilfinnan - A Tale of the Shore and Ocean • W.H.G. Kingston
... in other newspapers, and indeed it went about Great Britain later and found its way to the Colonies. "An Oriental Omen" it was headed, and Madame's only regret appeared to be that it could not be held to be distinguished by the quality of absolute truth. But there it stood in print, and there was the name of Hilbert and Co., the old established firm, making a speciality of manufacturing military accoutrements, dating ...
— Love at Paddington • W. Pett Ridge
... again. Raiding parties cling to the river-courses, which they know; but she and her people must have been far to the west of any place these adventurers of the Minnetarees ever saw. Sacajawea she calls herself—the 'Bird Woman.' I swear I look upon that name itself as a good omen! She has come back like a dove to the ark, this Bird Woman. William Clark, we shall reach the sea—or, at least, you will ...
— The Magnificent Adventure - Being the Story of the World's Greatest Exploration and - the Romance of a Very Gallant Gentleman • Emerson Hough
... it sounded so like an omen. 'No, but Hazel, listen,' he said; 'the Indians are coming ...
— The Talking Horse - And Other Tales • F. Anstey
... of innocence should be good omen; the gods grant it!" said Nicanor. He pushed onward through the press to get a nearer view of the Saxons; and heard as he came a great voice ...
— Nicanor - Teller of Tales - A Story of Roman Britain • C. Bryson Taylor
... in little demand and little appreciated. A compensation for this is found in the beautiful surroundings. Yesterday I was in the cemetery where Beethoven and Schubert are buried. Just think what I found on Beethoven's grave: a pen, and, what is more, a steel pen. It was a happy omen for me and I shall preserve it religiously." On Schubert's grave he found nothing, but in the city he found Schubert's brother, a poor man with eight children and no possessions but a number of his brother's manuscripts, including "a few operas, four great masses, four or five ...
— Chopin and Other Musical Essays • Henry T. Finck
... fancies, in fanciful play, 'If I want a rose,' I demurely said, 'I must look for an omen to point the way, And I must look for ...
— Harry • Fanny Wheeler Hart
... walls of the tent were hung with costly Gobelin tapestry, all of which represented scenes of bloodshed. On one side was the massacre of the innocents, on the other the execution of the Maccabees. The archduchess herself was horror-stricken at the omen. On that night, two of the ladies in waiting, who had assisted the queen in her toilet, died suddenly. Think of the terrible storm that raged on the dauphin's wedding night; and of the dreadful accident which accompanied ...
— Joseph II. and His Court • L. Muhlbach
... intended coming to Whaling in a few days. He had posed among the natives as a spirit-doctor and had, according to reports, worked many wonderful cures by his incantations. Three whales had come into the hands of the East Cape hunters. This was an excellent catch and had been taken as a good omen; the bearded stranger was doubtless highly favored by the spirits of ...
— The Blue Envelope • Roy J. Snell
... who were scattered in all directions, came running back to me, calling out, "Peace! peace! you will finish all your work in spite of these people, and in spite of everything." Like them, I took it as an omen of good success to crown me yet, thanks to ...
— The Last Journals of David Livingstone, in Central Africa, from 1865 to His Death, Volume II (of 2), 1869-1873 • David Livingstone
... moment or two betwixt every note, and you will have some idea of the moaning of the goatsucker of Demerara. You will never persuade the native to let fly his arrow at these birds. They are creatures of omen and of reverential dread. They are the receptacles of departed souls come back to earth, unable to rest for crimes done in their ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Volume 19 - Travel and Adventure • Various
... bad omen of the reception which he was to expect; but a worse followed, when, upon inquiry for his daughter and her husband, he was told they were weary with travelling all night, and could not see him; and when lastly, upon his ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles and Mary Lamb
... countries of Israel and Judah which were nearly coterminous with far-off Egypt. The rapidity of the victories which he had just succeeded in winning at the foot of Mount Taurus and Mount Amanus must have seemed a happy omen of what awaited his enterprise in the valleys of the Orontes and the Jordan. Although the races of southern and central Syria had suffered less than those of the north from the ambition of the Ninevite kings, they had, none the less, been sorely tried during the previous century; ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 7 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... to be relieved." After this, again, come pastimes and relaxations before the evening exercises, after which the herald's cry is heard "to take the evening meal." When they have sung a hymn to the gods to whom the offerings of happy omen had been performed, the final order, "Retire to rest at the place of ...
— The Polity of the Athenians and the Lacedaemonians • Xenophon
... his face took the fire of a new enthusiasm: "Leonard," he went on, "why should not we retrieve the past? Let us take that motto—the more ancient one—for an omen, and let us fulfil it. I believe it is a good omen, I believe that one of us ...
— The People Of The Mist • H. Rider Haggard
... Carol in the gallery of the church and her being carried out just before the commencement of the ceremony, was looked upon by some of the more superstitious of the immediate spectators as a sign of evil omen to the happiness of those who, in the phrase which is so often only the echo of devils' laughter, were about "to be ...
— The Missionary • George Griffith
... quadrupeds inside the cooler shadow of their coverts. Only two of the former are seen—a brace of urubus, or "king vultures," soaring in circles aloft—beautiful birds, but less emblematic of life than death. A bad omen he might deem their presence; and worse, if he but saw what they see. For, from their more elevated position, they command a view of the plain to a much greater distance, and see mounted men upon it; not a single party, but three distinct groups of them, ...
— Gaspar the Gaucho - A Story of the Gran Chaco • Mayne Reid
... sense of England; and if it rested on any depth of conviction, and were not rather (as I always flatter myself it is) a thing of rumour and hearsay, of repetition and reverberation, mostly from the teeth outward, I should consider it of evil omen to the country and to its highest interests in these times. For my own share, all the light that has yet reached me on Mr. Eyre and his history in the world goes steadily to establish the conclusion that he is a just, humane, and valiant man, faithful to his trusts everywhere, and ...
— On the Choice of Books • Thomas Carlyle
... two-year-old, on his knee, as if to guard him from some moral or social contagion. Then Bertram remembered how he had seen African mothers beat or pinch their children till they made them cry, to avert the evil omen, when he praised them to their faces; and he recollected, too, that most fetichistic races believe in Nemesis—that is to say, in jealous gods, who, if they see you love a child too much, or admire it too greatly, will take it from you or do it some grievous bodily ...
— The British Barbarians • Grant Allen
... the former fight fared ill, hero Adrastos, is now endowed with tidings of a better omen. Yet in his own house his fortune shall be contrariwise: for he alone of all the Danaan host, after that he shall have gathered up the bones of his dead son, shall by favour of the gods come back with unharmed folk to ...
— The Extant Odes of Pindar • Pindar
... might have seemed a good omen. The great gate which leads into a square courtyard was shut; it opened. The post of the National Guards, composed of some twenty men, took up their arms and rendered military honors to the Assembly. The Representatives entered, a Deputy Mayor received them with ...
— The History of a Crime - The Testimony of an Eye-Witness • Victor Hugo
... am over-wary; but if I am not, there is even now something of ill omen amongst us. I mean the increasing disregard for law which pervades the country—the growing disposition to substitute the wild and furious passions in lieu of the sober judgment of courts, and the worse than ...
— The Papers And Writings Of Abraham Lincoln, Complete - Constitutional Edition • Abraham Lincoln
... Ann street, and then made his way into Nassau, and down that thoroughfare into Wall, where his appearance caused a sensation. Some superstitious persons believed him the spirit of a departed Ursa Major, and others of his fraternity welcomed the animal as a favorable omen. The bear walked quietly along to the Custom House, ascended the steps of the building, and became bewildered, as many a biped bear has done before him. He seemed to lose his sense of vision, and, no doubt, endeavoring ...
— A Unique Story of a Marvellous Career. Life of Hon. Phineas T. • Joel Benton
... Maqueda was trembling, for she, too, thought this occurrence a very bad omen, and even Oliver remained silent, perhaps because he feared its ...
— Queen Sheba's Ring • H. Rider Haggard
... them, just as a dog would. But what was his surprise to find, as he gnawed, in the mouth of each fish a piece of silver! Some one had read the story of Saint Peter to a purpose. Young Bach looked in vain for a person to thank, but perceiving no one he took it as the act of God and an omen that his pilgrimage to hear the great organist should ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great - Volume 14 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Musicians • Elbert Hubbard
... but he dropped into it the deadly drop. Only no man saw the thing that he did. But when they were all about to drink, some one spake an evil word to his neighbour, and Ion heard it, and having full knowledge of augury, held it to be of ill omen, and bade them fill another bowl; and that every one should pour out upon the ground that which was in his cup. And on this there came down a flight of doves, for such dwelt in the temple of Apollo without fear, and sipped of the wine that had been ...
— Stories from the Greek Tragedians • Alfred Church
... is a beautiful black bird with a chestnut band across the back and wings; it has also a fleshy lappet on either side of the head. The tieki is considered a bird of omen: if one flies on the right side it is a good sign; if on the ...
— A Dictionary of Austral English • Edward Morris
... goddess, saying, "Oh, Kalee! Kun-kalee! Bhud-kalee! Oh, Kalee! Maha-kalee! Calkutta Walee! if it seems fit to thee that the traveller now at our lodging should die by the hands of this thy slave, vouchsafe us thy good omen." They then sit down and watch for the good omen; and if they receive it within half an hour, conclude that their goddess is favourable to the claims of the new candidate for admission. If they have a bad omen, or no omen at all, some other Thug must ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions - Vol. I • Charles Mackay
... syncopate. Show (noun), display, ostentation, parade, pomp, splurge. Show, exhibit, display, expose, manifest, evince. Shrink, flinch, wince, blench, quail. Shun, avoid, eschew. Shy, bashful, diffident, modest, coy, timid, shrinking. Sign, omen, auspice, portent, prognostic, augury, foretoken, adumbration, presage, indication. Simple, innocent, artless, unsophisticated, naive. Skilful, skilled, expert, adept, apt, proficient, adroit, dexterous, deft, clever, ingenious. Skin, hide, pelt, fell. Sleepy, drowsy, slumberous, ...
— The Century Vocabulary Builder • Creever & Bachelor
... masters," he called, in a loud voice, to those around him. "Do you know who that black raven before you is? If not, I will tell you. He would peck out your eyes if he could, and devour you and your substance, as he has done that of many others. That bird of ill omen ...
— The Star-Chamber, Volume 2 - An Historical Romance • W. Harrison Ainsworth
... long-waited for moment has come at last. We march from Bloemfontein on a glorious autumn morning, in fresh cool air and the sky cloudless. Forty miles off Thaba Nchu, that hill of ill omen, might be ten, so bold and clear it stands up above the lower ranges. The level plain between the island hills is streaked ...
— With Rimington • L. March Phillipps
... they flew to: she would anxiously watch the road at her feet, and when a spider crossed her path in the morning she would cry out aloud: then she would wish to go home and there would be no other means of not interrupting the walk than to persuade her that it was after twelve, and so the omen was one of hope rather than of evil. She was afraid of her dreams: she would recount them at length to Christophe; for hours she would try to recollect some detail that she had forgotten; she never spared him one; absurdities piled one on the other, strange ...
— Jean-Christophe, Vol. I • Romain Rolland
... chase, and sold his mantle to redeem a lamb from the butcher. He taught the people not to be afraid of the strange, ugly creatures which the light of the moving torches drew from their hiding-places, nor think it a bad omen that approached. He tamed a veritable wolf to keep him company like a dog. It was the first of many ambiguous circumstances about him, from which, in the minds of an increasing number of people, a deep suspicion and hatred ...
— Imaginary Portraits • Walter Pater
... of such Indeavours, when not one of a hundred of the vulgar have believed their undertakings feasable. And it it also fit to be added, that they have one advantage peculiar to themselves, that very many of their number are men of Converse and Traffick; which is a good Omen, that their attempts will bring Philosophy from words to action, seeing the men of Business have had so great a share ...
— Micrographia • Robert Hooke
... learned something of the ravages of smallpox among the unvaccinated—to try to forecast their natural and, in the view of many, their almost certain end. Hence these pages from the life history of the pitiable, but unfortunate Dr. Therne.[*] Absit omen! May the prophecy be falsified! But, on the other hand, it may not. Some who are very competent to judge say that it will not; that, on the contrary, this strange paralysis of "the most powerful ministry of the generation" ...
— Doctor Therne • H. Rider Haggard
... the kindred -cultus- of the Penates of the community.(7) Six chaste virgins, daughters as it were of the household of the Roman people, attended to that pious service, and had to maintain the wholesome fire of the common hearth always blazing as an example(8) and an omen to the burgesses. This worship, half-domestic, half-public, was the most sacred of all in Rome, and it accordingly was the latest of all the heathen worships there to give way before the ban of Christianity. The Aventine, moreover, was assigned to Diana as the representative ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen
... look after the numbering and registering of the people in their tribes and centuries. The consuls in general commanded the army, but sometimes, when there was a great need, one single leader was chosen and was called dictator. Sometimes a dictator was chosen merely to fulfil an omen, by driving a nail into the head of the great statue of Jupiter in the Capitol. Besides these, all the priests had to be patricians; the chief of all was called Pontifex Maximus. Some say this was because ...
— Young Folks' History of Rome • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... who accepted the incident as an omen of the victory that crowned their arms before the fight was over. They cheered and felt ...
— Elsie's Vacation and After Events • Martha Finley
... honour; but he dropped into it the deadly drop. Only no man saw the thing that he did. But when they were all about to drink, some one spake an evil word to his neighbour, and Ion heard it, and having full knowledge of augury, held it to be of ill omen, and bade them fill another bowl; and that every one should pour out upon the ground that which was in his cup. And on this there came down a flight of doves, for such dwelt in the temple of Apollo without ...
— Stories from the Greek Tragedians • Alfred Church
... father's hand with heart-felt but melancholy emotion, for this praise from the man he so truly loved was a keen pleasure; and yet he felt that it was of ill-omen that his duties as judge, of which he knew the sacred solemnity, should be ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... a woman!" cried the captain, and stamped with fury. "Not without reason have I been trembling and in fear of her from the first time I saw her! It must have been a warning of fate that I stopped playing ecarte with her. It was also a bad omen that I passed so many sleepless nights. Was there ever mortal in a worse perplexity than I am? How can I leave her alone without a protector, loving her, as I do, more than my own life? And, on the other hand, how can I marry ...
— First Love (Little Blue Book #1195) - And Other Fascinating Stories of Spanish Life • Various
... soldiers, uttered this sentiment: "With the help of the gods we have the surest hope that we shall save ourselves with glory." At this point a soldier sneezed. At once all adored the god who had sent this omen. "Since at the very instant when we are deliberating concerning our safety," exclaimed Xenophon, "Zeus the savior has sent us an omen, let us with one consent offer sacrifices ...
— History Of Ancient Civilization • Charles Seignobos
... his uncle as well as his very moderate acquaintance with the law permitted, of anything like intimacy between himself and the girl whose face had fascinated him so strangely, it was gone now: that bird of evil omen had baulked his hopes as effectually as its ancestors ...
— The Giant's Robe • F. Anstey
... Providence to make plain to the persecuted Countess his mission and business there: 'Then our vocation is at last revealed to us! Quinsey-doctor! I remember when a boy, wandering over the paternal mansion, and envying the life of a tinker, which my mother did not think a good omen in me. But the traps of a Quinsey-doctor are even lighter. Say twenty good jokes, and two or three of a practical kind. A man ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... which it has power? Cambyses, from having dreamt that his brother should be one day king of Persia, put him to death: a beloved brother, and one in whom he had always confided. Aristodemus, king of the Messenians, killed himself out of a fancy of ill omen, from I know not what howling of his dogs; and King Midas did as much upon the account of some foolish dream he had dreamed. 'Tis to prize life at its just value, to abandon it for a dream. And yet hear the soul triumph over the miseries and weakness of the body, and that it is exposed to ...
— The Essays of Montaigne, Complete • Michel de Montaigne
... the 4th of August; she had started to go round the world on the 4th of August; she had become a low fellow's mistress on the 4th of August. On the same day of the year she had married me; on that 4th she had lost Edward's love, and Bagshawe had appeared like a sinister omen—like a grin on the face of Fate. It was the last straw. She ran upstairs, arranged herself decoratively upon her bed—she was a sweetly pretty woman with smooth pink and white cheeks, long hair, the eyelashes falling like ...
— The Good Soldier • Ford Madox Ford
... was free, if she chose, to leave the Temple service, and even to marry. But Fabia had no intention of taking a step which would tear her from the circle in which she was dearly loved, and which, though permitted by law, would be publicly deplored as an evil omen. ...
— A Friend of Caesar - A Tale of the Fall of the Roman Republic. Time, 50-47 B.C. • William Stearns Davis
... plays. These scribbling insects have what they deserve, Not plenty, nor the glory for to starve. That Spenser knew, that Tasso felt before; And death found surly Ben exceeding poor. Heaven turn the omen from their image here! May he with joy the well-placed laurel wear! Great Virgil's happier fortune may he find, And be our Caesar, ...
— Poetical Works of Edmund Waller and Sir John Denham • Edmund Waller; John Denham
... latest effort of your literary power one further claim, besides the many you have already established, to the gratitude and veneration of Catholics, and trust that the reception which it has met with on all sides may be the omen of new successes which you are destined to achieve in the vindication of the teaching ...
— Apologia Pro Vita Sua • John Henry Cardinal Newman
... landed his machine had burst into flames, as the escaping petrol caught fire. Jack considered that a good omen ...
— Air Service Boys Flying for Victory - or, Bombing the Last German Stronghold • Charles Amory Beach
... the town and completely destroying many of the buildings, the cone or funnel, which had accompanied the Tornado like a dreaded omen, disappeared, showing that the whirling motion of the air had ceased, and the storm for the time being was spent. The rotary movement was to the left, which may be shown by standing upon one heel and turning around in that direction. ...
— A Full Description of the Great Tornado in Chester County, Pa. • Richard Darlington
... for one year at least, rejoice in the supreme rule of the Savory. We can't write of SAVORY without adding MOORE, so we must mention that the name of SAVORY is ominous for the continuation of the Mayoralty. The Guildhall Banquets end with a Savory. Absit omen! ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 99., Nov. 1, 1890 • Various
... determine the antiquity of some of them, in which the idols are exact representations of woolly-haired Negroes, although the inhabitants of those countries to-day have straight hair. Among the Japanese, black is considered a color of good omen. In the temples of Siam we find the idols fashioned like unto Negroes.[43] Osiris, one of the principal deities of the Egyptians, is frequently represented as black.[44] Bubastis, also, the Diana of Greece, and a member of the great Egyptian Triad, ...
— History of the Negro Race in America From 1619 to 1880. Vol 1 - Negroes as Slaves, as Soldiers, and as Citizens • George W. Williams
... beams as of fire, and he said to his father, "The pillars of the house are on fire." And his father said, "It is the gods who sit above the stars, and have power to make the night as light as the day." And he took it for a good omen. And Telemachus fell to cleaning ...
— THE ADVENTURES OF ULYSSES • CHARLES LAMB
... news from Brighton. Sophia is confined; both she and her baby are doing well, and the child's name is announced to be Walter—a favourite name in our family, and I trust of no bad omen. Yet it is no charm for life. Of my father's family I was the second Walter, if not the third. I am glad the name came my way, for it was borne by my father, great-grandfather, and great-great-grandfather; also by the grandsire of that last-named venerable ...
— The Journal of Sir Walter Scott - From the Original Manuscript at Abbotsford • Walter Scott
... wonder at euery strange thing, as this doubtlesse was, to see a lion in the Ocean sea, or fish in shape of a lion. What opinion others had thereof, and chiefly the Generall himselfe, I forbeare to deliuer: But he tooke it for Bonum Omen, reioycing that he was to warre against such an enemie, if it were ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, and Discoveries of The English Nation, Vol. XII., America, Part I. • Richard Hakluyt
... motor-boat, sat straining his eyes beyond the dripping bow, till he saw nothing but flashes of light that did not exist. The Flying Dutchman—the Flying Dutchman—why had he not known that she must be a boat of ill omen? Joe Pasquale—drowned in February. "We got him, but we never did find his boat"—"cur'ous ...
— The Happy Venture • Edith Ballinger Price
... had the honor—and it was an honor for so young a man—to make a speech, which proved to be effective, in Lynch's behalf; and when the vote was taken, Lynch was chosen by 424 to 384. This first victory over the Blaine Machine, the Edmunds men hailed as a good omen. ...
— Theodore Roosevelt; An Intimate Biography, • William Roscoe Thayer
... live on for a while to enjoy all this kindly circumstance. So do not grieve. There are many after-dinner pipes to be smoked, many talks to be talked yet.—Come into the house, and see it as you used to know it when we both were young. Surely it is a good omen that you, my earliest friend, should be my first visitor when I ...
— The Far Horizon • Lucas Malet
... the hillocks behind the hotel at Huelva you can see in the distance East Rabida, Palos, Moguer, San Juan del Porto, and the sea, where the three birds of good omen went skimming past in the vague morning light 400 years ago, lest they might be seen by the Portuguese. Columbus means dove, and the arms of Columbus contained three doves. From Huelva I sailed to Rabida first. Rabida is on the last point of the promontory, nearest ...
— Christopher Columbus and His Monument Columbia • Various
... eyes from the face of the orator. She too was pale with excitement; had she been willing to acknowledge it, it was fear. That deep-toned beginning of a protest from the great concourse was like an omen of failure to her sensitive ear. She longed to see John Harrington succeed and carry his hearers with him into an access of enthusiasm. John expected no such thing. He only wanted the people to understand thoroughly what he meant, for he was sure that if once ...
— An American Politician • F. Marion Crawford
... would give me two numbers and I could have an ambo, I should not win on a single number unless it came out first, whereas, if I did not specify their positions, my two numbers might come out anywhere and if they did I should win about 250 francs. Angelo accepted as a good omen the fact that neither of my numbers exceeded 90, and next morning we called on his cousin and put a franc on ...
— Diversions in Sicily • H. Festing Jones
... the hour for the march, and almost came too late through suddenly receiving orders to take a circuitous route through the city. On former occasions they had marched out by the Via di Borgo Santi Apostoli, and the campaign had been unsuccessful. It was clear that there was some bad omen connected with the exit through this street against Pisa, and consequently the army was now led out by the Porta Rossa. But as the tents stretched out there to dry had not been taken away, the flags—another ...
— The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy • Jacob Burckhardt
... women, enemy of the government and of France, without which she cannot live;" and several days previously he wrote to Fouche, "When I occupy myself with Madame de Stael, it is because I have the facts before me. That woman is a true bird of bad omen; she believes the tempest already arrived, and delights in intrigues and follies. Let her go to her Lake Leman. Have not the ...
— Worlds Best Histories - France Vol 7 • M. Guizot and Madame Guizot De Witt
... thing before—and for the immediate moment could not realise where, till a sudden flash of light through the cells of my brain reminded me of that scene of love and death in the vision of the artist's studio when the name 'Cosmo de Medicis' had been whispered like an evil omen. The murderer in that dream- picture had worn a collar of jewels precisely similar to the one I now saw; but I could only keep silence and listen with every nerve strained to utmost attention while ...
— The Life Everlasting: A Reality of Romance • Marie Corelli
... Kor is haunted," she said, "and of a truth I do believe their saying, for never did I know so ill a night save one. I remember it now. It was on that very spot when thou didst lie dead at my feet, Kallikrates. Never will I visit it again; it is a place of evil omen." ...
— She • H. Rider Haggard
... less they please the more they drink, the more they drink the less they please. They don't quit because they can, if they couldn't quit they would, because they can, they won't. Thus they reason, while appetite eats its way into their wills, birds of ill omen peck into their characters and finally they will go down to drunkards' graves, as thousands before them have gone. Young men, in the morning of life, while the dew of youth is yet upon your brow, ...
— Wit, Humor, Reason, Rhetoric, Prose, Poetry and Story Woven into Eight Popular Lectures • George W. Bain
... said, "the Douglas badge is indeed a heart—but it is a bleeding heart. God avert the omen, and keep this young man safe—for though many love him, there be more that would rejoice at ...
— The Black Douglas • S. R. Crockett
... told the following story: When Abbas the Great was hunting, he met one morning as day dawned an uncommonly ugly man, at the sight of whom his horse started. Being nearly dismounted, and deeming it a bad omen, the king called out in a rage to have his head cut off. The poor peasant, whom the attendants had seized and were on the point of executing, prayed that he might be informed of his crime. "Your crime," said the king, "is your unlucky countenance, which is the first object I saw this morning, and ...
— Flowers from a Persian Garden and Other Papers • W. A. Clouston
... crashed through her rigging, a piece hit the flag-halyards—parted them—and unstopped the flag. It unfurled itself gallantly in the breeze, and, as its beautiful striping waved aloft, the sailors upon the deck gave a loud cheer, for this was the omen of Victory. ...
— Famous Privateersmen and Adventurers of the Sea • Charles H. L. Johnston
... the guttering of a candle is a sign of impending death. All this he believes firmly, and acts upon, although he would candidly acknowledge his inability to explain the principle supposed to underlie the sequence between the omen and its fulfilment. It is the irrationality of the belief that constitutes its superstitious character, the contented acquiescence in some inconceivable and impossible law, whether physical or metaphysical, in virtue of which the predicted event is expected ...
— Austin and His Friends • Frederic H. Balfour
... the less experienced were beside themselves with enthusiasm and delight. But Mr. Bob Blagdon was wondering what little Miss Blythe would think and say, and he thought it unkind of her, under the circumstances, to be the last to arrive. Unkind, because her doing so was either a good omen or an evil one, and he could not make up his ...
— IT and Other Stories • Gouverneur Morris
... notes, something like "do, mi, mi, do," repeating them without pausing till it is too dark to see him, all the time getting lower, sadder, more deliberate, till one feels like running out and committing suicide or annihilating the bird of ill-omen. ...
— A Bird-Lover in the West • Olive Thorne Miller
... the dust of the disloyal city, whose superstitious people were alive to many an omen that boded his approaching ruin,14 the unfortunate commander held on his way towards Pastos, in the jurisdiction of Benalcazar. Pizarro and his forces entered Quito not long after, disappointed, that, with all ...
— History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William Hickling Prescott
... the deplorable alternative—the extirpation of the seceding member, or the never-ceasing struggle of two rival confederacies, ultimately bending the neck of both under the yoke of foreign domination, or the despotic sovereignty of a conqueror at home. May Heaven avert the omen! The destinies of not only our posterity, but of the human race, are ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 1 • Charles Dudley Warner
... her, but the stepmother, the traditional oppressor, was thoughtful of her, and wanted to include her in the love afloat. This little circumstance made a deep impression on the three witnesses. It was a good omen for Leam, and promised what indeed her new mother did honestly ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 17, - No. 97, January, 1876 • Various
... out of the window, and feel how deliciously fresh and cool it is!" commanded Winona. "Look at that bright planet! I think it must be Jupiter. I take it as a good omen for to-morrow. The storm will have cleared your brain, and your star's in the ascendant. Here's ...
— The Luckiest Girl in the School • Angela Brazil
... happiness are promoted by care regarding trifles, they will not appear unimportant. The existence of schools to teach library science, and of manuals devoted to similar laudable aims, is an auspicious omen of the new reign of refined taste in those nobler arts of life which connect themselves with literature, and are to be hailed as authentic evidences of the onward progress ...
— A Book for All Readers • Ainsworth Rand Spofford
... held his hands and looked long into his face. All indecision, all mournful forebodings were over; he felt again as the head of his house should feel. Before him stood, blooming in youth and health, the future of his family. He took it as an omen, as the voice of fate to him in the hour of decision. "And now," said he, "come home; there is no further need for ...
— Debit and Credit - Translated from the German of Gustav Freytag • Gustav Freytag
... can be safely made for guidance on this point. Do not minimise danger when a timely warning may avert an accident, or other misfortune, nor should symbols of ill omen be exaggerated. As students become proficient, they will find many meanings in the tea-leaves in addition to those which they learn from this book. Much will depend upon circumstances ...
— Telling Fortunes By Tea Leaves • Cicely Kent
... the Alps. Soared over Mount Terrible whither I dared not venture—yet! Saw no Huns. Back by sundown. Manitou dropped in to dinner—like a thunderbolt from the zenith. Astonishment of Blue Devils on guard. Much curiosity. Manitou a hero. All see in him an omen of American victory. ...
— In Secret • Robert W. Chambers
... doubt that the augury of the ancients was a good deal founded upon the observation of the instincts of birds. There are many superstitions of the vulgar owing to the same source. For anglers, in spring, it is always unlucky to see single magpies,—but two may be always regarded as a favourable omen; and the reason is, that in cold and stormy weather, one magpie alone leaves the nest in search of food, the other remaining sitting upon the eggs or the young ones; but when two go out together, it is only when the weather is warm and ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 12, - Issue 323, July 19, 1828 • Various
... said to be found in no part of the world but China. It is described as of most admirable beauty; and their absence for any time from the imperial city regarded as an omen of misfortune to the royal family. The emperor and mandarins have the semblance of these birds embroidered ...
— The English Spy • Bernard Blackmantle
... only of a few shillings; yet, with a cheerful heart, he walked to Philadelphia, a distance of thirty-three miles, with only his fowling-piece on his shoulder. He shot a red-headed woodpecker by the way,—an omen of his future pursuits, for hitherto he had devoted no attention to the ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volumes I-VI. - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... out of place here? No! no! you are at home on the ramparts of Quebec, quite as much as in your own drawing-room at Tilly. The walls of Quebec without a Tilly and a Repentigny would be a bad omen indeed, worse than a year without a spring or a summer without roses. But where is my dear ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... be quite well to-morrow—the darling little man,' said Rachel, all the more fondly for that vague omen that seemed ...
— Wylder's Hand • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... condemnation of the two women, who had only been convicted of a crime by which neither of them had profited. The reprieve granted to Mme. Acquet, "whose declaration had deceived no one," seemed a good omen, indicating a commutation of her sentence. The nine "brigands" condemned to death received no pity. Lefebre was not known in Rouen, and his attitude during the trial had aroused no sympathy; the others were but vulgar actors in the drama, and only interested the populace hungry for a spectacle ...
— The House of the Combrays • G. le Notre
... with great crashing waves, then everything grew calm under a golden sunset. I take this as a good omen. I feel happier already. The infinite peace of Nature is quieting my soul. I love the sea. I can almost say my prayers to ...
— Possessed • Cleveland Moffett
... September came at once too rapidly and too slowly, and dawned crisp and clear; a good omen ...
— A Dixie School Girl • Gabrielle E. Jackson
... Creoles—to the incoming lower class of superstitious Germans, Irish, Sicilians, and others—he became an omen and embodiment of public and private ill-fortune. Upon him all the vagaries of their superstitions gathered and grew. If a house caught fire, it was imputed to his machinations. Did a woman go off in a fit, he had bewitched her. Did ...
— Old Creole Days • George Washington Cable
... Dick has come?" she asked, joyfully. "Oh, how good of Mrs. Pine to send the chicken! We didn't have anything for supper but coffee and rolls and eggs. He's certainly bringing good things in his wake. How delicious that chicken does smell! Let's take it as a good omen, Alec, a forerunner of better days. He'll surely get you out of ...
— Flip's "Islands of Providence" • Annie Fellows Johnston
... their high cliffs to look. Wunpost scrambled to his hillock and watched their effortless flight; and they swung to the north, where they circled again, not far from the spot where he was hid. Here was an omen indeed, a sign without fail, for below where they circled his enemy was hiding—or slipping up ...
— Wunpost • Dane Coolidge
... have fallen just as he entered the room and this seemed to him an omen, though whether of good or ...
— The Bittermeads Mystery • E. R. Punshon
... you again, my boy!" exclaimed the proprietor of the circus, as he held out his big hand to Toby; "and I must say this looks like a good omen to me, meeting you away up here, after you had so much to do with finding the rest of my stock. I'm shy just one fine educated monkey, the famous Link who's said to be the Missing Link, which he is right now, at least. ...
— Chums of the Camp Fire • Lawrence J. Leslie
... people that every bird chose its mate on Valentine's day; and at one time it was the custom for young folks to go out before daylight on that morning and try to catch an owl and two sparrows in a net. If they succeeded, it was a good omen, and entitled them to gifts from the villagers. Another fashion among them was to write the valentine, tie it to an apple or orange, and steal up to the house of the chosen one in the evening, open the door quietly, and throw ...
— Our Holidays - Their Meaning and Spirit; retold from St. Nicholas • Various
... rash standing out; but most frequently they occur when there is little or no eruption, or when it fades, becomes livid, or disappears altogether. A sudden disappearance of the rash, before the sixth day, commonly increases the typhoid symptoms, and must be considered a bad omen. Also the invasion of the larynx, which is happily of rare occurrence, is ...
— Hydriatic treatment of Scarlet Fever in its Different Forms • Charles Munde
... the lovely glow in the sky was a sort of good omen for our life at Windy Gap, and she felt happier on her journey back in the railway that evening than she had done since papa and ...
— My New Home • Mary Louisa Molesworth
... great regard to omens; and, in the important affairs of life, are guided rather by considerations of lucky and unlucky than the maxims of wisdom. The name of the present Pope the Romans hold to be decidedly of evil omen; so much so, that to affix it anywhere is to make the person or thing a mark for calamity. And I was told a curious list of instances corroborative of this opinion. The first year of the reign of Pius was marked by an unprecedented and ...
— Pilgrimage from the Alps to the Tiber - Or The Influence of Romanism on Trade, Justice, and Knowledge • James Aitken Wylie
... the child had breathed on them in order to look out, but they had soon closed up again. The old woman sat staring straight into the stove with big, round eyes; her little head quivered continually; she was like a bird of ill omen, that knew a great deal more than any one could bear ...
— Pelle the Conqueror, Complete • Martin Andersen Nexo
... and he undertook a lesson on the spot, pointing out that they saw life through similar eyes; that art, music, literature spoke with a common voice; that if true marriage were perfect companionship, the auguries were not uncertain in their happy omen; so on till he ...
— The Henchman • Mark Lee Luther
... for that recommendation. I take it as a good omen for the future and invite you to my wedding on the spot," answered Mr. Brooke, who felt at peace with all mankind, ...
— Little Women • Louisa May Alcott
... strip of rattan rapidly back and forth beneath a piece of dry wood. This process of making fire he called Musa, and it is still the only method used in obtaining fire for ceremonials, such as the naming of a child, or when communicating with the omen-birds. Laki Oi also taught them the use of the fire-drill, which he ...
— Folk-lore in Borneo - A Sketch • William Henry Furness
... remembered that General de Lorencez's violation of the sacredness of a treaty had taken place on Good Friday at half-past three o'clock, and I was told that this coincidence had been looked upon by many among the soldiers as a bad omen. ...
— Maximilian in Mexico - A Woman's Reminiscences of the French Intervention 1862-1867 • Sara Yorke Stevenson
... of weather with a tendency towards rain. If Dr. Forster's theory be true, it is decidedly one of the minor instances, as far as London weather is concerned.—It will take a good deal of evidence to make us believe in the omen of a Saturday Moon. But, as we have said of the Poughkeepsie Seer, the thing is very curious whether true or false. Whence comes this universal proverb—and a hundred others—while the meteorological observer {323} cannot, when he puts down a long series of results, ...
— A Budget of Paradoxes, Volume I (of II) • Augustus De Morgan
... always cries click; Then woe be to those in the house who are sick: For, as sure as a gun, they will give up the ghost, If the maggot cries click when it scratches the post; But a kettle of scalding hot-water injected Infallibly cures the timber affected; The omen is broken, the danger is over; The maggot will die, and the sick will recover. Such a worm was Will Wood, when he scratch'd at the door Of a governing statesman or favourite whore; The death of our nation he seem'd to foretell, ...
— Poems (Volume II.) • Jonathan Swift
... walk with Mr. Barmby, reading the omen of his tones in the request. Dorothea and Virginia would have her go. The clerical gentleman, a friend of the Rev. Abram Posterley; and one who deplored poor Mr. Posterley's infatuation; and one besides who belonged to Nesta's musical choir in London: seemed a safe companion for ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... words of ill omen! Give vent to joy and command all men to keep silence, to close down their drains and privies with new tiles and to stop up ...
— Peace • Aristophanes
... as an omen of success when about 8 o'clock in the morning of May 22, 1916, six captive balloons stationed over the right bank of the Meuse exploded, thus depriving the German batteries of their observers on whom they counted to ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume V (of 8) • Francis J. (Francis Joseph) Reynolds, Allen L. (Allen Leon)
... central Texas and Pan-Handle cattle. Both my ranches sent out their usual contribution of steers and cows, consigned to the care of the firm, which was now giving more attention to quality than quantity. The absence of the men from the Northwest at the cattle convention that spring was taken as an omen that the upper country would soon be satiated, a hint that retrenchment was in order, and a better class of stock was to receive the firm's attention in its future operations. My personal contingent of steers would have passed muster in any country, and as to my consignment of cows, they were ...
— Reed Anthony, Cowman • Andy Adams
... Hayward as he came up with his prize. "I regard it as a good omen—a sort of turn in the tide which will encourage ...
— The Coxswain's Bride - also, Jack Frost and Sons; and, A Double Rescue • R.M. Ballantyne
... to Whaling in a few days. He had posed among the natives as a spirit-doctor and had, according to reports, worked many wonderful cures by his incantations. Three whales had come into the hands of the East Cape hunters. This was an excellent catch and had been taken as a good omen; the bearded stranger was doubtless highly favored by the spirits of ...
— The Blue Envelope • Roy J. Snell
... and the light died out of his voice. Surely it was an evil omen, this man's coming; for it was Captain Francis who had taken the vacant seat and who was watching his astonishment with a ...
— A Millionaire of Yesterday • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... a sharp decline in stocks. A few hours after the House of Peers adjourned at six o'clock in the morning, a run for gold began on the Bank of England. The simultaneous effort of the French to abolish their hereditary peerage was hailed as an omen of what was coming in England. Riots broke out all over England. The return to Bristol of Sir C. Wetherell, one of the chief opponents of the bill, was made the occasion of ominous demonstrations. A riotous mob burned the ...
— A History of the Nineteenth Century, Year by Year - Volume Two (of Three) • Edwin Emerson
... grows wild—a friend May introduce, and name the bloom, the fruit!' Here somebody dares wave a handkerchief— She'll want to hide her face with presently! Good-by then! 'Cigno fedel, cigno fedel, Addio!' Now, was ever such mistake— Ever such foolish ugly omen? Pshaw! Wagner, beside! 'Amo te solo, te Solo amai!' That's worth fifty such! But, mum, the grave face at ...
— Browning's England - A Study in English Influences in Browning • Helen Archibald Clarke
... the Chevalier, rising; 'Good-night, and joy be with you!—Good-night, fair ladies, who have so highly honoured a proscribed and banished Prince.—Good-night, my brave friends;—may the happiness we have this evening experienced be an omen of our return to these our paternal halls, speedily and in triumph, and of many and many future meetings of mirth and pleasure in the ...
— Waverley • Sir Walter Scott
... watched curiously to see what religion the Queen would establish. Even before her accession the keen eye of the Spanish ambassador had noted her "great admiration for the king her father's mode of carrying on matters," as a matter of ill omen for the interests of Catholicism. He had marked that the ladies about her and the counsellors on whom she seemed about to rely were, like Cecil, "held to be heretics." "I fear much," he wrote, "that in religion she will not go right." As keen an instinct warned the ...
— History of the English People - Volume 4 (of 8) • John Richard Green
... hope it is. 'The wine-dark sea' and the 'rosy-fingered dawn' are all I remember; though I'm glad you know what comes next. It's a good omen. But look at the yacht; she's ...
— The Stolen Singer • Martha Idell Fletcher Bellinger
... extract the pilot and parts of the machine, which was deeply embedded in the hole. For hours the wreckage remained the centre of attraction to many visitors. The General hailed the burnt relics, not inappropriately, as a lucky omen. ...
— The Story of the 2/4th Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry • G. K. Rose
... might, by a different conduct, be sometimes delayed. This has surely now happened to the veteran advocates for an absolute and unaccountable ministry, who have discovered on this occasion, by the weakness of their resistance, that their abilities are declining; and I cannot but hope, that the omen will be fulfilled, and that their infatuation will be quickly ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, Vol. 11. - Parlimentary Debates II. • Samuel Johnson
... dreams, not all, but I can tell the significant ones, usually by the impression they make on me. The dream that comes to me just before waking up generally means something to me. To dream of snakes has always been a bad omen to me. When I first started out smashing, while in Wichita jail, I dreamed of two enormous snakes, one on one side of a road, the other on the other; one raised to strike me, the other made no move. I was impressed that the one that was the most venomous and in the attitude of ...
— The Use and Need of the Life of Carry A. Nation • Carry A. Nation
... winding path she walked, and I as slowly followed. When I reached her, she was standing at her mother's grave, just as she had stood the morning we first met. I tried to accept this as an omen, but failed miserably, and omens, after all, depend on the point of view. She raised her eyes, and, seeing me, blushed, another omen which means comparatively little to a man who is aware of the thousand emotions that are responsible for the blush of woman. I was again ...
— The Romance of an Old Fool • Roswell Field
... very jealous of a Raven, because the latter was regarded by men as a bird of omen which foretold the future, and was accordingly held in great respect by them. She was very anxious to get the same sort of reputation herself; and, one day, seeing some travellers approaching, she flew on ...
— Aesop's Fables • Aesop
... of plantain-eaters here, but, although their screech was as appalling as I have heard in Angola, they were not regarded, by the Ajumba at any rate, as being birds of evil omen, as they are in Angola. Still, by no means all the birds here only screech and squark. Several of them have very lovely notes. There is one who always gives a series of infinitely beautiful, soft, rich-toned whistles just before ...
— Travels in West Africa • Mary H. Kingsley
... disappeared from view just as Ted started from the corral, and Kit could see it no more. He took this for a bad omen. Evidently, the wolf had seen that he had lured a rider from the ranch house, and, having accomplished its purpose, it was no longer necessary ...
— Ted Strong in Montana - With Lariat and Spur • Edward C. Taylor
... distinctive, and poetical words, thou, thyself, thy, thine, and thee, would certainly be in no danger yet of becoming obsolete. Nor can they, indeed, at any rate, become so, till the fairest branches of the Christian Church shall wither; or, what should seem no gracious omen, her bishops and clergy learn to pray in the plural number, for fashion's sake. Secondly, it is not true, that, "thou, who touch'd," ought indispensably to be, "thou, who touchedst, or didst touch." It is far better to dispense with ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... a man kisses his child, said Epictetus, he should whisper to himself, "To-morrow perchance thou wilt die."—But those are words of bad omen.—"No word is a word of bad omen," said Epictetus, "which expresses any work of nature; or if it is so, it is also a word of bad omen to speak of the ears of corn being reaped" (Epictetus, ...
— Thoughts of Marcus Aurelius Antoninus • Marcus Aurelius Antoninus
... scene in Hesperian sky, When the courts of heaven are all ablaze With the glorious tints and pageantry That to mortal mind so clearly portrays The mighty power of omnipotent hand, And the tender touch of a boundless love, Is an omen true—infallible proof Of a Deity ...
— Our Profession and Other Poems • Jared Barhite
... the future by the past, the Fifth Column, that shadowy group of secret agents now entrenched in every important country throughout the world, is an omen of what is to come. Before Germany marched into Austria, that unhappy country witnessed a large influx of Fifth Column members. In Czechoslovakia, especially in those months before the Republic's heart was handed to Hitler on a platter, there was a tremendous increase in the numbers and activities ...
— Secret Armies - The New Technique of Nazi Warfare • John L. Spivak
... Message of joy.]—Creon says this for the sake of the omen. The first words uttered at such a crisis would be ominous ...
— Oedipus King of Thebes - Translated into English Rhyming Verse with Explanatory Notes • Sophocles
... good omen, for, sensible as he was, he believed in presentiments and prognostics. He entered without waiting to be urged. When he had crossed the lawn he stood facing two detached buildings, separated by a mass of verdure: to the right, an old summer-house, used from ...
— Samuel Brohl & Company • Victor Cherbuliez
... hasten to sell their warm tunic and to buy some light clothing. We are your Ammon, Delphi, Dodona, your Phoebus Apollo.(7) Before undertaking anything, whether a business transaction, a marriage, or the purchase of food, you consult the birds by reading the omens, and you give this name of omen(8) to all signs that tell of the future. With you a word is an omen, you call a sneeze an omen, a meeting an omen, an unknown sound an omen, a slave or an ass an omen.(9) Is it not clear that we are a prophetic Apollo to you? If you recognize ...
— The Birds • Aristophanes
... prevented from renewing attempts by sea through the fact that they had been worsted when first making a trial of it, although this is the ordinary course that people pursue who fail in the first undertaking and think that they can never again succeed, viewing the past in the light of an omen. On the contrary, they applied themselves to the watery element with an even greater zeal, and chiefly because they were ambitious and did not wish to appear to have been diverted from their purpose by the disaster. (Mai, p.180. Zonaras 8, 8, sq.) 5. Hanno, who was in no wise disposed to make ...
— Dio's Rome, Vol VI. • Cassius Dio
... call that an omen!" said Carlo, with forced cheerfulness. "This time, princess, I am the fatum which has alarmed you! It is my own fault that this string broke. It was already injured and half broken this evening when ...
— The Daughter of an Empress • Louise Muhlbach
... decapitated, it being considered an essential that the head should be severed with one blow. As soon as the head was cut off there was a rush on the part of the sacrificers to see in which direction the head faced. If the head faced towards the north or west, it was considered an evil omen; if it faced towards the south or east, a good omen. The east is a lucky quarter amongst the Assamese also. The people ended up the proceedings by giving a long-drawn-out, deep-toned chant, or kynhoi. Immediately after the ceremony ...
— The Khasis • P. R. T. Gurdon
... Scotland, England, France, and Ireland, etc. 'Tis reported, that when this standard was first erected, the ball on the top of it fell off, which the superstitious Highlanders were very much concern'd at, taking it as an omen of the bad success of the cause for which they were then appearing, and indeed, the event has proven that it was no less. Thereafter they went to a small town named Kirkmichael, where having proclaim'd the Pretender, and summon'd the people to attend his standard, they staid some few days, and ...
— The Jacobite Rebellions (1689-1746) - (Bell's Scottish History Source Books.) • James Pringle Thomson
... Gertrude, look not so reproachfully at me. Thou shalt soon see that I mean not to die, but to live for thee. Here in this fair, free spot we begin our new life together. It may be even yet — for see, is not that bright sky, illumined by those quivering shafts of light athwart our path, an omen of good? — that as thou showest me this fair spot with which thou hast endowed me, I may one day show thee again and endow thee with the broad lands ...
— The Lord of Dynevor • Evelyn Everett-Green
... he might pass the tombstone of one long dead; it has fallen face upwards, loosened by time, but he wastes no moment deciphering it. Another will take the next turning when he sees me in the distance; I am a sight of ill omen, to be shunned by the man whose saviour and benefactor I had been not so ...
— Works, V1 • Lucian of Samosata
... o'clock, the way to Mrs. Agnew's was so intricate that we could not find it, till one of the king's footmen recollecting me, I imagined, came forward, a volunteer, and walked by the side of the chaise to show the postilion the house.—N.B. No bad omen to worldly augurers. ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 3 • Madame D'Arblay
... decline in the author's power of awaking interest. Many of his best works were, however, still to follow. And, as regards imagination and the elements of mystery and awe, surely in the "Underground City" with its cavern world, its secret, undiscoverable, unrelenting foe, the "Harfang," bird of evil omen, and the "fire maidens" of the ruined castle, surely with all these "imagination" is ...
— Off on a Comet • Jules Verne
... to be shaded by the Indulgent Boughs of an ancient Bay-Tree. He was delighted with the Choice he had made, for he found a Hollow in the Myrtle, as if purposely contriv'd for the Reception of one Person, who might undiscovered perceive all about him. He looked upon it as a good Omen, that the Tree Consecrated to Venus was so propitious to him in his Amorous Distress. The Consideration of that, together with the Obligation he lay under to the Muses, for sheltering him also with so large a Crown of Bays, had like to ...
— Incognita - or, Love & Duty Reconcil'd. A Novel • William Congreve
... great nest of Indian pipe. She bent listlessly to pick the waxen mystic blossoms, thinking to herself that they were like some beautiful dead thing; and then she came upon a delicate flush on the side of their clear, translucent pearl, and wondered if it were an omen. ...
— Judith of the Cumberlands • Alice MacGowan
... (i. e. wonder) and of the ocean nymph Electra (i. e. splendour); was the goddess of the rainbow, and as such the messenger of the gods, particularly of Zeus and Hera, the appearance of the rainbow being regarded as a sign that communications of good omen were passing between heaven and earth, as it was to Noah that they would continue to be kept up; she is represented as dressed in a long wide tunic, over which hangs a light upper garment, and with ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood
... have the same effect upon your other work," said Tom modestly. "If I do, you will call me a lucky omen." ...
— Elam Storm, The Wolfer - The Lost Nugget • Harry Castlemon
... making the Eastern sign to scare away evil spirits. "The omen!" she whispered. "The omen! A broken string of ...
— The Hawk of Egypt • Joan Conquest
... star of promise. Myriads of upturned faces greeted it from hills, mountains, temples, terraces, teocallis, house-tops, and city walls; and the prostrate multitudes hailed the emblem of light, life, and fruition, as a blessed omen of the restored favor of their gods, and the preservation of their race for another cycle. At regular intervals, Indian couriers held aloft brands of resinous wood, by which they transmitted the "New Fire" ...
— Choice Specimens of American Literature, And Literary Reader - Being Selections from the Chief American Writers • Benj. N. Martin
... be in society certain persons who are mercuries[412] of its approbation, and whose glance will at any time determine for the curious their standing in the world. These are the chamberlains of the lesser gods. Accept their coldness as an omen of grace with the loftier deities, and allow them all their privilege. They are clear in their office, nor could they be thus formidable, without their own merits. But do not measure the importance of this class by their pretension, or imagine that ...
— Essays • Ralph Waldo Emerson
... cheered up amazingly. It actually seemed as if they were preposterous enough to take this ordinary meteorological incident as an omen. ...
— The Prodigal Father • J. Storer Clouston
... ground was barren and my bed-rock swept clean by that unseen hand which I always felt but could never avoid. I leased proven properties, only to find that the pay ceased without reason. I did this so frequently that owners began to refuse me and came to consider me a thing of evil omen. Once a broken snow-shoe in a race to the recorder's office lost me a fortune; at another time a corrupt judge plunged me from certainty to despair, and all the while my time was growing shorter and I ...
— The Silver Horde • Rex Beach
... own day would find readier sale were they to pander to various superstitions not altogether different from that here suggested. The man, for example, who believes that to have a black cat cross his path is a lucky omen would naturally find himself attracted by a book which took account of this and similar important details of natural history. Perhaps, therefore, it was its inclusion of absurdities, quite as much as ...
— A History of Science, Volume 1(of 5) • Henry Smith Williams
... war, nomads in way of life, and whose civil polity was like our discipline in war-time. Therefore, as one who by God's help shall to-morrow conquer—nay, conquer again if needful (for I would say nothing of bad omen) I commit to thee the care of my children: for it is fitting that thou, their uncle, shouldest carry over ...
— A Letter Book - Selected with an Introduction on the History and Art of Letter-Writing • George Saintsbury
... word which kept on returning, the thought too, that for a month past she had been busying herself for a corpse, quite froze her, brought her to the very depths of despair, like an omen of the cold death into which she herself must soon descend, in the shroud of her last passion. And, meantime, Pierre, despite himself, smiled bitterly at the atrocious irony of it all. Ah! that lame and halting Charity, which proffers ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... at, the ill-favoured thing that was hanging from my old love's hand, was none other than a flag of evil omen—a pirate's flag, the barbarous piece of bunting that they call the Jolly Roger. There could be no doubt of that—no doubt whatever. I had heard of that flag and read of it, and now I was looking at it with my own eyes; ...
— Marjorie • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... unsay that word.—It was a bad omen for Thoas to say at so critical a moment that a rule was broken. The priestess declares the word unsaid—just the opposite of "accepting" an omen.—Dr. Verrall, however, suggests to me that the ...
— The Iphigenia in Tauris • Euripides
... she spake, Telemachus sneezed, and all the house rang with the noise. And Penelope said again to Eumaeus: "Call now this stranger; didst thou not mark the good omen, how my son sneezed when I spake? Verily, this vengeance shall be wrought, nor shall one escape from it. And as for this stranger, if I shall perceive that he hath spoken truth, I will give him a new ...
— The Story Of The Odyssey • The Rev. Alfred J. Church
... but the standard of the Prince, the Motto of which was, For the Protestant Religion and Liberty, soon undeceived them.... Bells were ringing as we were sailing towards the Bay, and as we landed, which many judged to be a good omen.' A little later, when they had landed, people 'came running out at their doors to see this happy sight. So the Prince with Marschal Schomberg, and divers Lords, Knights and Gentlemen, marched up the Hill, which all the Fleet could see over the ...
— Devon, Its Moorlands, Streams and Coasts • Rosalind Northcote
... smiled. She liked the allusion to St Martin's summer; it seemed like a good omen. Was this bright young life, so strangely associated with her own youth, to bring back some spring-time to her winter?—was Jacinth to be a St Martin's summer ...
— Robin Redbreast - A Story for Girls • Mary Louisa Molesworth
... procession and ran straight to the river, and there'd have been four other funerals if the schooner at the wharf hadn't stopped the runaways. And Timlins has a way, too, of letting white horses follow the hearse with the first mourning-coach, and it's very bad luck, very—an ill omen; a prophecy of Death and the Pale Horse again, you know. And I won't have them from Shust's, either," said Aunt Pen, "for he is simply the greatest extortioner since ...
— Humorous Masterpieces from American Literature • Various
... Agnew's was so intricate that we could not find it, till one of the king's footmen recollecting me, I imagined, came forward, a volunteer, and walked by the side of the chaise to show the postilion the house.—N.B. No bad omen to ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 3 • Madame D'Arblay
... day which is a gringo fete because it is the natal anniversary of the great George Washington," Benito's chronicle concluded. "May it prove a good omen, and may we bring freedom, life to the poor souls engulfed by the snowdrifts. I kiss your ...
— Port O' Gold • Louis John Stellman
... certain field Where the devil's paint-brush spread 'Mid the gray and green of the rolling hills A flaring splotch of red, An evil omen, a bloody sign, And a token of ...
— The Red Flower - Poems Written in War Time • Henry Van Dyke
... the place of the gods, they placed the other five signs which were wanting to complete the twenty. The first was a tiger, which is a very ferocious animal, and accordingly they considered the echo of the voice as a bad omen and the most unlucky of any, because they say that it has reference to that sign. The second was a skull or death, by which they signified that death commenced with the first existence of mankind. The third sign was a razor or stone knife, by which ...
— Notes on Certain Maya and Mexican Manuscripts • Cyrus Thomas
... Johnson, pacing the floor slowly. Now he stopped by a chair and pointed as though to the falling snow. "Suppose we say that's an omen—that the old trail is blotted out and there is a fresh road. Would you take it with me a stranger, who says: From this day I mean to be all you'd have me. Would you take it with me far away ...
— The Girl of the Golden West • David Belasco
... of Pitt seemed to be an omen of utter ruin to the House of Brandenburg. His proud and vehement nature was incapable of anything that looked like either fear or treachery. He had often declared that, while he was in power, England should never make a peace of Utrecht, ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 2 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... were, of herself; for having heard the dogs howl very much one night, the circumstance made such an impression upon her weak, fearful mind, that it was with the greatest difficulty she could be persuaded that she was better. The howling of the dogs she considered as a certain omen of her death, and she gave herself up entirely to this ridiculous notion; nor could any thing short of a most excellent constitution have saved her from falling a prey to her own superstition. However, having been almost forced out of ...
— Memoirs of Henry Hunt, Esq. Volume 1 • Henry Hunt
... and a half, I rode to Magdalen-hill fair near Winchester, a distance of thirty-one miles, and back again the same day, with my father. To ride sixty-two miles in one day for a boy not five years and a half old, which I did without any apparent fatigue, was considered rather an extraordinary omen of my future capability for active exertion. I was sent to a boarding-school at Tilshead in Wiltshire, at five and a half years of age, and, my father told me at my departure, "that I was going to begin a little world for myself." Before I mounted my poney he seriously gave me his ...
— Memoirs of Henry Hunt, Esq. Volume 1 • Henry Hunt
... in forgiving, Mr Vane, and I think the best thanks you could give her would be an opportunity of befriending Lottie still further, and helping her to regain her position in the school. I think it is an encouraging omen for the future that it is the girls themselves who have persuaded me to ...
— Pixie O'Shaughnessy • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... felt it more keenly than Jefferson, startled in his scholarly and peaceful retirement at Monticello, as he said, as by "a fire-bell in the night." He wrote: "In the gloomiest movements of the Revolutionary war, I never had an apprehension equal to that I feel from this source." It was a grave omen that Jefferson's sympathies were with his section rather than with freedom; he joined in the opposition to the exclusion of slavery from Missouri. He had no love for slavery, but he was jealous for the right of each State to choose its own way, for good or evil; a political theory ...
— The Negro and the Nation - A History of American Slavery and Enfranchisement • George S. Merriam
... an omen, Webb?" she asked, turning a little from him that she might look upward, and leaning on his shoulder with the unconsciousness ...
— Nature's Serial Story • E. P. Roe
... prating," said the meditative lover, when the "strain" was concluded. "It bodes no good; and I'd as lief see a magpie, and hear a screech-owl, as one of those silly beasts. The salutation of an ass by night is ever held a sound of ill-omen; and lo! there be two of ye, reckoning thine own ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 2 (of 2) • John Roby
... of his Guardian Man of Science to publish an article on Meteorology. A condition of things in which the omne scibile was left entirely at his disposal, to be knocked about as he pleased, appeared to him no small omen of a near millennium; and what subject could be more suitable to begin with than the weather, a topic of general interest, (since we have no choice of weather or no,) in which exact knowledge is comfortably impossible, and in which he felt himself at home from his repeated experiments ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 6, Issue 35, September, 1860 • Various
... they complain, are dim. The strands of the coil become tangled between their fingers. One of them descries an angry face—Alberich's—floating before her; another becomes aware of an avenging curse gnawing at the threads of the coil. This suddenly snaps—terrific omen! Appalled, with the cry that "eternal wisdom is at an end," they vanish in search of their mother, ...
— The Wagnerian Romances • Gertrude Hall
... within the field, To see what comfort it would yield; And as I went my private way, An olive-branch before me lay; And seeing it, I made a stay, And took it up, and view'd it; then Kissing the omen, said Amen; Be, be it so, and let this be A divination unto me; That in short time my woes shall cease, And love shall crown my end ...
— A Selection From The Lyrical Poems Of Robert Herrick • Robert Herrick
... brought over leaders. The force must come from you folk at home. He has with him Lord Grey of Wark, with Wade, the German Buyse, and eighty or a hundred more. Alas! that two who came are already lost to us. It is an evil, evil omen.' ...
— Micah Clarke - His Statement as made to his three Grandchildren Joseph, - Gervas and Reuben During the Hard Winter of 1734 • Arthur Conan Doyle
... out of the baby business. In the region dominated by the Forminiere it is no infrequent thing to see three or four children in a household. A woman who bears twins is not only hailed as a real benefactress but the village looks upon the occasion as a good omen. This is in direct contrast with the state of mind in East Africa, for example, where one ...
— An African Adventure • Isaac F. Marcosson
... beautiful mare, not very tall, but a mare whose every inch of her fifteen three proclaimed strength and speed. At that moment she raised her head and looked across to him, and the heart of the rider jumped into his throat. The very sight of her was an omen of victory, and he made a long stride in her direction, but two men came before him. The old fellow jumped from the chair ...
— Ronicky Doone • Max Brand
... passes me by as he might pass the tombstone of one long dead; it has fallen face upwards, loosened by time, but he wastes no moment deciphering it. Another will take the next turning when he sees me in the distance; I am a sight of ill omen, to be shunned by the man whose saviour and benefactor I had been not ...
— Works, V1 • Lucian of Samosata
... with thee! May the graves open and swallow thee ten thousand fathoms deep, thou bird of ill omen! Who bade thee come here? Away, I tell thee, or I will run thee through ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... raising poetical produce, by means of bounties, from soil too meagre to have yielded any returns in the natural course of things. The plan for the cultivation of Dartmoor has, I hear, been abandoned. I hope that this may be an omen of the fate of ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 1 (of 4) - Contibutions to Knight's Quarterly Magazine] • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... sprang to his feet as if moved by an electric shock. A second shot, and then through the depths of the quarry rang the cry, quivering on the wings of the bird of ill-omen, "To arms!" ...
— The Companions of Jehu • Alexandre Dumas
... of sensation that buyers stuck at nothing to embrace them! Do not let it hence be said that black-letter lore is the only fashionable pursuit of the present age of book-collectors. This sale may be hailed as the omen of better and brighter prospects in Literature in general: and many a useful philological work, although printed in the Latin or Italian language—and which had been sleeping, unmolested, upon a bookseller's shelf ...
— Bibliomania; or Book-Madness - A Bibliographical Romance • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... sacrifice. A party, preparing to surround and capture them without bloodshed, would move with quiet steps, without giving notice to the aborigines; but just when all was prepared for the last movement, some cur of ill omen would start up, and rouse them. They would seize their spears and attempt to flee; and the whites, now disappointed of a bloodless capture, would ...
— The History of Tasmania , Volume II (of 2) • John West
... Capitol, which the Romans at that time called the Tarpeian Hill. There the chief of the prophets made him turn towards the south, covered his head, and then standing behind him with his hand laid upon his head, he prayed, and looked for a sign or omen sent from the gods in every quarter of the heavens. A strange silence prevailed among the people in the Forum, as they watched him eagerly, until a prosperous omen was observed. Then Numa received the royal robes and came down from the hill among the people. They received him with cheers ...
— Plutarch's Lives, Volume I (of 4) • Plutarch
... private. There was no second letter to explain away the first from Miss Crawford; there was no intelligence from Mansfield, though it was now full time for her to hear again from her aunt. This was an evil omen. She had, indeed, scarcely the shadow of a hope to soothe her mind, and was reduced to so low and wan and trembling a condition, as no mother, not unkind, except Mrs. Price could have overlooked, when the third day did bring the sickening ...
— Persuasion • Jane Austen
... off her beautiful helmet, and her surcoat of cloth of silver, and laid aside all her haughty arms, and dressed herself (hapless omen!) in black armour without polish, the better to conceal herself from the enemy. Her faithful servant, the good old eunuch Arsetes, who had attended her from infancy, and was now following her about as ...
— Stories from the Italian Poets: With Lives of the Writers, Vol. 2 • Leigh Hunt
... though it would be wrong to construe it as an omen of Divine wrath, cannot but have an injurious effect on the fruits of the earth. Let it be your care to see that the scarcity of this one year does not bring ruin on us all. Even thus was it ordained by the first occupant of our present dignity[889], that the preceding ...
— The Letters of Cassiodorus - Being A Condensed Translation Of The Variae Epistolae Of - Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator • Cassiodorus (AKA Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator)
... Benjamin Franklin told the delegates that they must unite to meet a common enemy. Unite, however, they would not. No one of them would surrender to a central body any authority through which the power of the King over them might be increased. The Congress—the word is full of omen for the future—failed to ...
— The Conquest of New France - A Chronicle of the Colonial Wars, Volume 10 In The - Chronicles Of America Series • George M. Wrong
... and incurable condition. It is the direct result of certain artificial ligatures and compressions; remove these and it disappears. This spectre haunts the conscience of England to incite her not to a deed of blood but to a deed of justice; every wind is favourable and every omen. It is, indeed, true that if she is to succeed, England must do violence to certain prejudices which now afflict her like a blindness; she must deal with us as a man with men. But is not the Kingdom ...
— The Open Secret of Ireland • T. M. Kettle
... be the real place for our abode. I remember that we strolled out one day, for a sort of second honeymoon, and went upon a journey into the void, a voyage deliberately objectless. I saw a passing omnibus labelled "Hanwell" and, feeling this to be an appropriate omen,* we boarded it and left it somewhere at a stray station, which I entered and asked the man in the ticket-office where the next train went to. He uttered the pedantic reply, "Where do you want to go to?" And I uttered the profound and philosophical rejoinder, "Wherever ...
— Gilbert Keith Chesterton • Maisie Ward
... Of earth restored to the long-labouring ark, The relics of mankind, secure of rest, Oped every window to receive the guest, And the fair bearer of the message blessed: So, when you came, with loud repeated cries, The nation took an omen from your eyes, And God advanced his rainbow in the skies, To sign inviolable peace restored; The saints with solemn shouts proclaimed ...
— Palamon and Arcite • John Dryden
... our hero was to volunteer to gratify the curiosity of his worthy sire, but a glance at the old man's countenance changed his "notion," and he remarked that "Bill was a long ways the best hand." Bill, who did not deem Simon's modesty an omen very favorable to himself, was inclined to reciprocate, compliments with his young master; but a gesture of impatience from the old man set him instantly upon his knees, and, bending forward, he essayed to lay ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume V. (of X.) • Various
... in sight. It used to be painted white; it was drab now, and there was a bay-window in the sitting-room. There was a new pump in the old place, and, happy omen, he discovered it was one of his own manufacture. He made his way by sheer force of habit past the kitchen windows to the side door. That was where they had quarreled mostly. He had a kind of sentiment about that side door. He paused a ...
— Ladies-In-Waiting • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... a large army. Staff duties require special studies, they are the highest military science; and where, in the name of all, could Butterfield have acquired it? I am certain Butterfield is not even aware that staff duties are a special science. All this is a very bad omen, very bad, very bad. Literally they laugh at me; now they hurrah for Hooker. May they not cry very soon on account of Hooker's staff. When I warn, Senators and Representatives tell me that I am very difficult to ...
— Diary from November 12, 1862, to October 18, 1863 • Adam Gurowski
... overhead. March absently lifted his eyes to it. It was suddenly strange after so many years' familiarity, and so was the well-known street in its Saturday-evening solitude. He asked himself, with prophetic homesickness, if it were an omen of what was to be. But he only said, musingly: "A fortnightly. You know that didn't work in England. The fortnightly is published once ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... with an excited crowd of customers. They all talked in low tones as if fearing the spirits of the air that hovered near. An eager group leaned over the bulletin from the London market. London was up half a point. The credulous were pleased. It was a good omen. The pessimists scoffed. ...
— The Root of Evil • Thomas Dixon
... was much unaffected rejoicing In the home of the woodcutter then, And his wife, her exuberance voicing, Proclaimed him most lucky of men. "'Tis an omen of fortune, this gold egg," She said, "and of practical use, For this fowl doesn't lay any old egg, She's a ...
— Fables for the Frivolous • Guy Whitmore Carryl
... war-banner. The thrill of the wailing crept through Stephen's veins, and roused an old, childish superstition which an Irish nurse had implanted in him when he was a little boy. According to Peggy Brian it was "a cruel bad omen" to meet a funeral, especially after coming into a new town. "Wait for a corpse," said she, "an' ye'll wait while ...
— The Golden Silence • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... evil omen we that year begin: A Child of Shame,—stern Justice adds, of Sin, Is first recorded;—I would hide the deed, But vain the wish; I sigh, and I proceed: And could I well th'instructive truth convey, 'Twould warn the giddy and awake the gay. Of ...
— The Parish Register • George Crabbe
... it was stifling. By mid-afternoon I felt strangely tired, and even more strangely depressed. I even attempted to shake myself together, arguing that my condition was purely mental, for I had remembered that it was unmistakably Friday, a day of ill-omen to the superstitious. ...
— The Prairie Mother • Arthur Stringer
... Zora's letter, simple and brief, but breathing youth and strength of purpose. Miss Smith seized upon it as an omen of salvation. In vain her shrewd New England reason asked: "What can a half-taught black girl do in this wilderness?" Her heart answered back: "What is impossible to youth and resolution?" Let the shabbiness ...
— The Quest of the Silver Fleece - A Novel • W. E. B. Du Bois
... is specified by Sozomen, (l. ii. c. 25;) but Athanasius himself, so copious on the subject of Arsenius and the chalice, leaves this grave accusation without a reply. Note: This grave charge, if made, (and it rests entirely on the authority of Soz omen,) seems to have been silently dropped by the parties themselves: it is never alluded to in the subsequent investigations. From Sozomen himself, who gives the unfavorable report of the commission of inquiry sent to Egypt concerning the cup. it does not ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon
... laugh as she heard him shut the hall-door, almost before she was aware he had left the room, well pleased with this indication of susceptibility on his part, which she took as a good omen of the future, fully believing that "future events cast their shadows before." "If Harry were nervous already, what would he be ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 3. March 1848 • Various
... Yellow, Blue, Green and Violet. At last I make stand at foot of rainbow before the High Priest of the Temple. Strange, most strange! Last night I dream of rainbow. I speak unto the Priest my dream. He make interpretation as follows: The rainbow you beheld in sleep is an omen of good promise. Likewise the street in which you walked in fear and darkness for Success crowns him who works to win. The violets you gathered at end of street were Happiness, Fame and Riches. All these shall be yours if you break not the string of Pearls that are entwined about your ...
— Seven Maids of Far Cathay • Bing Ding, Ed.
... change, the movement, and the open air fan the flame. They had muttered a word to one another, they had wondered, they had reasoned. And though the silence of their guards—from whose sour vigilance the keenest question drew no response—seemed of ill-omen, and, taken with their knowledge of the man into whose hands they had fallen, should have quenched the spark, these two, having special reasons, the one the buoyancy of youth, the other the faith of an enthusiast, cherished the flame. In the breast of one indeed it had blazed into a confidence ...
— Count Hannibal - A Romance of the Court of France • Stanley J. Weyman
... far, since I now abandon him, and allow him to depart alone to the baneful climate of Africa? Oh, I have been base, cowardly, I tell you; I have abjured my affections, and like all renegades I am of evil omen to those ...
— The Count of Monte Cristo • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... he said, like "shaking hands with himself," the reaction had been so great, and Bob's news so satisfactory. It might be looked at as an omen of good luck for the momentous occasion. Surely a day that had opened in such a glorious manner for Big Bob, and the team in general, could not have bitterness and gall in store for those gallant Chester fellows who expected ...
— Jack Winters' Gridiron Chums • Mark Overton
... unbounded, Mr. Gregory, and the introduction you have so happily obtained from her weighs more with me than any other that you could have had. Let me welcome you to your own home, as it were. But see, your hand is bleeding, where the burr pricked you. Is this an omen, also? If our first meeting brings bloody wounds, I fear you ...
— Opening a Chestnut Burr • Edward Payson Roe
... mattock was struck into the earth, and the trenches were opened. It was an unlucky hour; the planet Mars (El-Kahir) was in the ascendant; but it could not be undone, and the place was accordingly named after the hostile planet, El-Kahira, "the Martial" or "Triumphant," in the hope that the sinister omen might be turned to a triumphant issue. Cairo, as Kahira has come to be called, may fairly be said to have outlived all astrological prejudices. The name of the Abbasside caliph was at once expunged from the Friday prayers at the old mosque of Amr at Fustat; ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 5 • Various
... communicates directly with the heart. So universal is the custom of wearing the wedding ring among Jews and Christians that no married woman is ever seen without her plain gold circlet, and she regards the loss of it as a sinister omen; and many women never remove it. This is, however, foolish, and it should be taken off and put on several times at first, so that any subsequent removal or loss need not jar painfully ...
— Manners and Social Usages • Mrs. John M. E. W. Sherwood
... bundle," he said mendaciously. "Too bad! And I might have to search an hour before laying my hands on the right one. I evidently wasn't intended to bore you with any of my ancient mariner tales this evening. This is distinctly an omen." He lifted his brows slightly and significantly to Kitty, and she who was playing hostess, ...
— The Silver Butterfly • Mrs. Wilson Woodrow
... performing an eccentric journey round that luminary in a period of seventy-five or seventy-six years. To realise the importance of this discovery, it should be remembered that before Halley's time a comet, if not regarded merely as a sign of divine displeasure, or as an omen of intending disaster, had at least been regarded as a chance visitor to the solar system, arriving no one knew whence, and ...
— Great Astronomers • R. S. Ball
... morning. The present occasion shows only a general change of weather with a tendency towards rain. If Dr. Forster's theory be true, it is decidedly one of the minor instances, as far as London weather is concerned.—It will take a good deal of evidence to make us believe in the omen of a Saturday Moon. But, as we have said of the Poughkeepsie Seer, the thing is very curious whether true or false. Whence comes this universal proverb—and a hundred others—while the meteorological observer {323} ...
— A Budget of Paradoxes, Volume I (of II) • Augustus De Morgan
... the queenly Wiwaste stood Alone in the moon-lit solitude, And she was silent and he was grave. "And fears not my daughter the evil spirit? The strongest warriors and bravest fear it The burning spears are an evil omen; They threaten the wrath of a wicked woman, Or a treacherous foe; but my warriors brave, When danger nears, or the foe appears, Are a cloud of ...
— Legends of the Northwest • Hanford Lennox Gordon
... were signed there came a storm such as no living Englishman remembered. The summer evening grew black as night. Cataracts of water flooded the houses in the city and turned the streets into rivers; trees were torn up by the roots and whirled through the air, and a more awful omen—the forked lightning—struck down the steeple of the church where the heretic service had been read ...
— The Reign of Mary Tudor • James Anthony Froude
... every golfer, no matter whether he accepts the hypothesis of Spencer or that of Weismann concerning the inheritance of acquired characteristics, should rejoice to see his large family in the links as a good omen for the future of this game, although there be some other reasons that also justify the ...
— Birth Control • Halliday G. Sutherland
... Another method of augury was performed by the feeding of chickens specially kept for this purpose. This was done just before sunrise by the pullarius or feeder, strict silence being observed. If the birds manifested no desire for their food, the omen was of a most direful nature. On the other hand, if from the greediness of the chickens the grain fell from their beaks and rebounded from the ground, the augury was most favourable. This latter augury was known as tripudium solistimum. "Any ...
— Bygone Beliefs • H. Stanley Redgrove
... the bride went through the ceremony without her bridal bouquet is looked upon by many as an unfavorable omen. In her anxiety not to impose any longer upon the patience of her guests, she had descended ...
— The Filigree Ball • Anna Katharine Green
... part opens with the impressive prayer, "Father of Heaven, from Thy eternal Throne," sung by the Priest. As the fire ascends from the altar, the sanctuary having been purified of its heathen defilement, the Israelites look upon it as an omen of victory and take courage. A Messenger enters with tidings of Judas's triumph over all their enemies. The Israelitish Maidens and Youths go out to meet him, singing the exultant march chorus, "See the Conquering Hero comes," which is familiar to every one by its common use on all ...
— The Standard Oratorios - Their Stories, Their Music, And Their Composers • George P. Upton
... of ill-omen had a very considerable lien on the conscience of poor Mr. Thomas Leigh, the father of Eustace, in the form of certain lands once belonging to the Abbey of Hartland. He more than half believed that he should be lost for holding those ...
— Westward Ho! • Charles Kingsley
... are already coming over; and I am glad indeed of their aid, which I regard as an omen that England will some day bestir herself on our behalf. But you look young for such rough work, young sir. I should not take you for ...
— By Pike and Dyke: A Tale of the Rise of the Dutch Republic • G.A. Henty
... over! over! For the winds and the waters surcease; Ah, few were the days of the rover That smiled in the beauty of peace, And distant and dim was the omen That hinted redress or release! From the ravage of life, and its riot, What marvel I yearn for the quiet Which bides in the harbor at last,— For the lights, with their welcoming quiver That throb through the sanctified river, Which girdle the harbor at last, This ...
— The World's Best Poetry, Volume 3 - Sorrow and Consolation • Various
... struggle, and the volunteers of the Confederacy, enduring all things and sacrificing all things, the prototype and model of a new army, in which North and South shall march to battle side by side. ABSIT OMEN! But in whatever fashion his own countrymen may deal with the problems of the future, the story of Stonewall Jackson will tell them in what spirit they should be faced. Nor has that story a message for America alone. The hero who lies buried at Lexington, in the Valley of Virginia, belongs ...
— Stonewall Jackson And The American Civil War • G. F. R. Henderson
... recognized in the formation of the Capital Guards a hopeful omen. Drill develops precision and accuracy, aside from physical development; discipline is invaluable in inculcating the idea of subordination, without which no constitutional government can long exist. Even if they never come within ...
— Shadow and Light - An Autobiography with Reminiscences of the Last and Present Century • Mifflin Wistar Gibbs
... watched till the sun has gone down, and the streets have become indebted for their illumination solely to the gas lamps. As the night deepened, the interest of the scene deepened also, for the character of the crowd had insensibly but materially changed, and strange features and aspects of ill omen begin to ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, Number 385. November, 1847. • Various
... men of her goodness, and we of her valour," said the father, and he sighed. "This is now the fourth siege of Compiegne I have seen, and twice have the leads from our roofs and the metal of our bells been made into munition of war. Absit omen Domine! And now they say the Duke of Burgundy has sworn to slay all, and spare ...
— A Monk of Fife • Andrew Lang
... out; but most frequently they occur when there is little or no eruption, or when it fades, becomes livid, or disappears altogether. A sudden disappearance of the rash, before the sixth day, commonly increases the typhoid symptoms, and must be considered a bad omen. Also the invasion of the larynx, which is happily of ...
— Hydriatic treatment of Scarlet Fever in its Different Forms • Charles Munde
... rose leaves from the offering of the morning—no, the very first thing that went into Jean's memory book was a frayed silken tassel that had been cut from a rose-colored curtain! She had carried down her little scissors the night before, and had snipped it, and here it was—an omen for ...
— The Tin Soldier • Temple Bailey
... representative chair you sit; figure to yourself the form and fashion of your sweet and cheerful country from Thames to Trent, north and south, and from the Irish to the German sea east and west, emptied and embowelled (may God avert the omen of our crimes!) by so accomplished a desolation. Extend your imagination a little further, and then suppose your ministers taking a survey of this scene of waste and desolation; what would be your thoughts if you should be informed, that they ...
— Selections from the Speeches and Writings of Edmund Burke. • Edmund Burke
... very quietly for the space of 3. or 4. houres, being nothing dismayed all that while, euery man gazed and looked much vpon her, and spake their minds and opinions, yet all concluding by no meanes to disquiet her: I for my part, tooke it for a very good omen and boading, as in trueth (God be thanked) there fell out nothing in the end to the contrary. And as at our very first comming to Cadiz this chanced, so likewise on the very last day of our departing from the same towne, another Doue presented her selfe in the ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, and Discoveries of The English Nation, v. 7 - England's Naval Exploits Against Spain • Richard Hakluyt
... reach the top of it, where I sat in fancied security. But the merciless whelp, in his ire, sprang at me, seized my coat, and tore a large piece out of it! That coat, thus cur-tailed, I wore all through Dixie. I mention this incident, because it was what some would call a bad omen. ...
— Daring and Suffering: - A History of the Great Railroad Adventure • William Pittenger
... be observed in birds, the former by the ear, the latter by the eye. If, however, these observations have for their object men's words uttered unintentionally, which someone twist so as to apply to the future that he wishes to foreknow, then it is called an "omen": and as Valerius Maximus [*De Dict. Fact. Memor. i, 5] remarks, "the observing of omens has a touch of religion mingled with it, for it is believed to be founded not on a chance movement, but on divine providence. It was thus ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas
... of unity in England which made the Norman Conquest possible. If Harold's own brother, Tostig, had not turned traitorously against him, or if the north country had stood squarely by the south, Duke William might have found his fall on the beach an omen ...
— The Leading Facts of English History • D.H. Montgomery
... Daisy that her heart would burst with impatience; or rather with its eager longing to know how things were at home and to get some relief. The hours of the day went by, and no relief came. Dr. Sandford did not return. Daisy took it as no good omen. ...
— Melbourne House, Volume 2 • Susan Warner
... the Roman people seem over great to any god or man, I pray that such jealousy may be appeased by my own loss rather than by the damage of the State." But as he turned him after making this prayer he stumbled and fell. And this omen was judged by them that interpreted it by the things that followed, to look first to the condemnation of Camillus by the people, and second to the great overthrow of the city at the hands of the Gauls; both of which things will ...
— Stories From Livy • Alfred Church
... The omen of the raven did not at once bring good luck: however, it did chance to be the turning-point, solstice of this long Greenland winter; after which, amid storms and alarms, daylight came steadily nearer. Storms and alarms: for ...
— History Of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. VIII. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... her; she is so strong, so noble, so gentle, that she wins all hearts; it is impossible for anybody to be naughty when Mrs. Willis is in the house. Nan, the arrival of Mrs. Willis on your birthday is the happiest possible omen for the whole year. Oh, how truly rejoiced ...
— Red Rose and Tiger Lily - or, In a Wider World • L. T. Meade
... column was contrived for love and not for rapine, my friend. Should the white stone from Coromandel that can be cunningly wrought into marble ever cross your fate, be on your guard lest the omen mean, not the gaining of a fortune, but the ...
— Tales of Destiny • Edmund Mitchell
... but a small portmanteau containing their food and Major Washington's important papers, they now made rapid headway, and soon left their friends far behind. The next day, they came upon an Indian village called Murdering Town; a name of evil omen, given it, perhaps, from its having been the scene of some bloody Indian massacre. What befell them here, I will tell you, as nearly as I can remember, in Mr. ...
— The Farmer Boy, and How He Became Commander-In-Chief • Morrison Heady
... they went forth from the monastery doors it seemed to them a good omen that the last words echoing in their ears were those of ...
— Under False Pretences - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... neighbors, who gazed on the festal scene with an impressive curiosity that can not be described. Pale-faced, wide-eyed, statuesque, their presence, interpreted by a vivid imagination, might have been regarded as an omen of impending misfortune. They stood on the outskirts of the wedding company, gazing on the scene apparently without an emotion of sympathy or interest. They were there, it seemed, to see what new caper the townspeople ...
— Free Joe and Other Georgian Sketches • Joel Chandler Harris
... premonition. Omen of it came with the first wailing night winds that bore the smell of icebergs from over the black forests north and west. The moon came up red, and it went down red, and the sun came up red in the morning. The loon's call ...
— The Country Beyond - A Romance of the Wilderness • James Oliver Curwood
... mother lay buried. I closed with him. When I went to his solicitor to sign the deeds, I felt a cavern-like chill in the dark office that made me shudder; it was the same cold dampness that had laid hold upon me at the brink of my father's grave. I looked upon this as an evil omen. I seemed to see the shade of my mother, and to hear her voice. What power was it that made my own name ring vaguely in my ears, in spite ...
— The Magic Skin • Honore de Balzac
... long, Ever to this sick heart told him, Be the spirit of his song? Touch not, sea, the blessed letters I have traced upon thy shore, Spare his name whose spirit fetters Mine with love forevermore!' Swells the tide and overflows it, But, with omen pure and meet, Brings a little rose, and throws it Humbly at the maiden's feet. Full of bliss she takes the token, And, upon her snowy breast, Soothes the ruffled petals broken With the ocean's fierce unrest. 'Love is thine, O heart! and surely Peace shall ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of James Russell Lowell • James Lowell
... distance. He was gathering wood, and as he straightened from stooping his eyes fell upon Pio. With a yell he dropped his load and fled at topmost speed, emitting such sounds as we try, but vainly, to utter in a nightmare. This, though a tribute to Pio's impressive aspect, and a gratifying omen of his success in the role of medicine man, was also a warning of danger. He dived again into the brush and devoted strenuous hours to threading his way through thickets of chaparral until he emerged on the trail that led northeast ...
— The Penance of Magdalena & Other Tales of the California Missions • J. Smeaton Chase
... it all out she lay down on her pillow again. I got up and went downstairs to light the fire. I felt terrible old and tired. My feet seemed to drag, and the tears kept coming to my eyes, though I tried to keep them away, for well I knew it was a bad omen to be weeping on ...
— Further Chronicles of Avonlea • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... every other great soldier of reaction, he showed in his early life a decided inclination for new ideas. The truth that the wildest extravagances of youthful aspiration are a better omen of a vigorous and enlightened manhood than the decorous and ignoble faith in the perfection of existing arrangements, was not belied in the case of De Maistre. His intelligence was of too hard and exact a kind to inspire him with the exalted schemes that present ...
— Critical Miscellanies (Vol. 2 of 3) - Essay 4: Joseph de Maistre • John Morley
... Nassau, and down that thoroughfare into Wall, where his appearance caused a sensation. Some superstitious persons believed him the spirit of a departed Ursa Major, and others of his fraternity welcomed the animal as a favorable omen. The bear walked quietly along to the Custom House, ascended the steps of the building, and became bewildered, as many a biped bear has done before him. He seemed to lose his sense of vision, and, ...
— A Unique Story of a Marvellous Career. Life of Hon. Phineas T. • Joel Benton
... then, another night," she insisted. "No," she continued, "If you are going to look like that, I take it back. I sup with you to-night. This is an ill omen for our future acquaintance. I have given in to you already—I, who give in to no man. ...
— Havoc • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... day time over the fields of dead carrion birds gathered, led by the gray-throated crow of evil omen with a host of lesser marauders at his back. Robbers, too, ...
— America's War for Humanity • Thomas Herbert Russell
... I had thought I should have been allowed at least 3 days to prepare; but it is a bad omen to commence any career by hesitation, so I just stepped to the professor's desk near which we stood, and faced the circle of my pupils. I took a moment to collect my thoughts, and likewise to frame in French the ...
— The Professor • (AKA Charlotte Bronte) Currer Bell
... the blackness ate out the light, and a weird gloaming overspread the scene. River and forest became stern, the men silent. The more ignorant were in fear of a cataclysm, the others taking it for an omen. ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... the fertilising flood of which was attributed to the influence of this beautiful star. It is believed that the Mazzaroth in Job is an allusion to this brilliant orb. Among the Romans Sirius was regarded as a star of evil omen; its appearance above the horizon after the summer solstice was believed to be associated with pestilence and fevers, consequent upon the oppressive heat of the season of the year. The dies caniculares, or dog-days, were reckoned to begin twenty days before, ...
— The Astronomy of Milton's 'Paradise Lost' • Thomas Orchard
... led the Argonauts to find the Golden Fleece—it is a good omen. Would you help me to find the Golden Fleece ...
— Halcyone • Elinor Glyn
... refused to go farther, and he was forced to renounce the prize. On his way back he doubled the Cape, which, from his former experience, he called the Cape Tempestuous, until the king, showing that he understood, gave it a name of better omen. Nevertheless, Portugal did no more for ten years, the years that were made memorable by Spain. Then, under a new king, Emmanuel the Fortunate, Vasco da Gama went out to complete the unfinished work of Diaz, lest Columbus, fulfilling the prophecy ...
— Lectures on Modern history • Baron John Emerich Edward Dalberg Acton
... "Without you Tutt & Tutt would not be Tutt & Tutt. My junior partner may be the eyes and legs of the firm and I may be some other portion of its anatomy, but you are its heart and its conscience. Out with it! What rascality portends? What bird of evil omen hovers above the offices of Tutt & Tutt? Spare not an old man bowed down with the sorrows of this world! Has my shrewd associate counseled the robbing of a bank or the kidnapping from a widowed mother ...
— By Advice of Counsel • Arthur Train
... Empyrean by that course rather? Be immediate about it, then; the time is now, or else never!—No fair judge can blame the young man that he laid hold of the flaming Opportunity in this manner, and obeyed the new omen. To seize such an opportunity, and perilously mount upon it, was the part of a young magnanimous King, less sensible to the perils, and more to the other considerations, than one older ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XI. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... dinner and to spend the evening, and treated me generally with a friendliness which astonished the old Turkish element, who considered me the devil of the island. (In fact, my appearance was considered the omen of trouble, and the Mussulmans said when they saw me, "Are we going to have another war?") It was easy to see, however, that the elements of trouble in the island had not been eliminated by the appointment of a Christian governor or the concessions which had been made to the Christian majority. ...
— The Autobiography of a Journalist, Volume II • William James Stillman
... strike breakers! Ruth knew that name well, and what the arrival of the man of evil omen foretold. It promised violence, ...
— Youth Challenges • Clarence B Kelland
... hopeless motor-boat, sat straining his eyes beyond the dripping bow, till he saw nothing but flashes of light that did not exist. The Flying Dutchman—the Flying Dutchman—why had he not known that she must be a boat of ill omen? Joe Pasquale—drowned in February. "We got him, but we never did find his boat"—"cur'ous tide-racks ...
— The Happy Venture • Edith Ballinger Price
... the avoidance of such an omen(113) were not sufficient, it would at least have been seemly to abstain from injuring the ornaments of the Senate House. Allow us, we beseech you, as old men to leave to posterity what we received as boys. The love of custom is great. Justly did ...
— A Source Book for Ancient Church History • Joseph Cullen Ayer, Jr., Ph.D.
... try my luck in the same way, and see whether I am to be in jail: I shall take the blue pigeon as my bad omen, as ...
— The Pirate and The Three Cutters • Frederick Marryat
... Lane,' or 'Niagara.' The action began forty minutes before sunset, and it is recorded that the head of the American column, as it advanced, was encircled by a rainbow—one which is often seen there, formed from the rising spray. The happy omen faithfully prefigured the result; for when, under the cloudy sky of midnight the battle at length terminated, the Americans were in possession of the field, and also the enemy's cannon, which had rained such deadly death into their ranks. In this action General ...
— Sword and Pen - Ventures and Adventures of Willard Glazier • John Algernon Owens
... forehead with tika, or curdled milk, is a superstitious ceremony in Hindustan, as a propitious omen, on beginning a voyage or journey. It is probable that the Musulmans of India borrowed this ceremony, among ...
— Bagh O Bahar, Or Tales of the Four Darweshes • Mir Amman of Dihli
... movement, when history hung on his hand and eye, uprose in his stirrups and clove Bohun's helmet, the axe breaking in that stroke. It was a desperate but a winning blow: Bruce's spears advanced, and the English van withdrew in half superstitious fear of the omen. ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... should keep up ten thousand with the consent of Parliament. That a great constituent body should be so forgetful of the past and so much out of humour with the present as to take this base and hardhearted pettifogger for a patriot was an omen which might well justify the ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 5 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... paused, and then looked up to Mowbray. "It's a good omen. That's the real war.... ...
— Red Fleece • Will Levington Comfort
... exquisite design, Sir Howard exclaimed gaily, "Lady Rosamond, a coincidence—the cross followed by an anchor!" producing at the same time a costly ornament in the form of an anchor. "Have no fear, your cross is outweighed by the anchor Hope in the end. What a beautiful encouraging omen!" ...
— Lady Rosamond's Secret - A Romance of Fredericton • Rebecca Agatha Armour
... provoked in vain." But thou, Supreme, by whose eternal hands Fair Liberty's heroic empire stands; Whose thunders the rebellious deep control, And quell the triumphs of the traitor's soul, O turn this dreadful omen far away! On Freedom's foes their own attempts repay; Relume her sacred fire so near suppressed, And fix her shrine in every Roman breast: Though bold corruption boast around the land, "Let virtue, if she can, my baits withstand!" Though bolder now she urge the accursed claim, ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 1 • Charles Dudley Warner
... and colonial produce at Carlshamn, were ordered by the Governor of Carlscrona to be discharged and conveyed up the country. Admiral Puke had also ordered three of the largest merchant ships to be fitted as block ships for the additional defence of Carlshamn, which was considered as a bad omen. ...
— Memoirs and Correspondence of Admiral Lord de Saumarez. Vol II • Sir John Ross
... had to look after the numbering and registering of the people in their tribes and centuries. The consuls in general commanded the army, but sometimes, when there was a great need, one single leader was chosen and was called dictator. Sometimes a dictator was chosen merely to fulfil an omen, by driving a nail into the head of the great statue of Jupiter in the Capitol. Besides these, all the priests had to be patricians; the chief of all was called Pontifex Maximus. Some say this was because he was the fax (maker) of ...
— Young Folks' History of Rome • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... European society—albeit these eyes were quite aware, in general, of missing everywhere no more of the human scene than possible, and of having of late been particularly awake to the large extensions of it spread before him (since so he could but fondly read his fate) under the omen of his prodigious "hit." It was because of his hit that he was having rare opportunities—of which he was so honestly and humbly proposing, as he would have said, to make the most: it was because every one in the world (so far had the thing gone) was reading "The Heart of Gold" ...
— The Finer Grain • Henry James
... terrible end, for she had seen in him a brilliant model for her John. In hours of depression, the sudden fall of this favourite of the people seemed like an evil omen. But she would not let these disquieting thoughts gain power over her, for she wished at last to enjoy life and, as the mother of such a son, felt entitled to ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... Necessities in the Tour I design'd to take. The old Captain I intended to take along with me to be my Guide as well as Adviser; for I saw so many Perfections in him, which the ungrateful World had neglected, That I judg'd it would be an honourable Omen in one that was beginning the World, not to let him leave the Stage of Life unrewarded: But as his Years had render'd him incapable to attend me in my Rambles, so Death came in to release him, and this worthy Person was taken from me ...
— Memoirs of Major Alexander Ramkins (1718) • Daniel Defoe
... advise against it—sent off the money to Long Jim for the outward voyage, and a few pounds over. For there were superstitious depths in him; and, at this turn in his fortunes, it would surely be of ill omen to refuse the first appeal for help that ...
— Australia Felix • Henry Handel Richardson
... cried a voice on the edge of the throng, and the news was passed along from man to man until it swept up the steps, through the lobby and to the dining room upstairs where the football men of the Varsity team were impatiently awaiting lunch. "A good omen," said the ...
— The Half-Back • Ralph Henry Barbour
... I have not sent for you that you should grow presumptuous, because I was unmaidenly enough to dream of so badly behaved a person as yourself. It—it was because it—I thought you should know, so that the omen ...
— The Lion's Brood • Duffield Osborne
... urged the men to put forth all their strength, and very soon the boat was flying along under the western shore, and divided by an oozy flat from the eastern bank. Day was breaking, and the sky was tinged red as with blood—a sinister omen that this morning was destined to witness bitter strife ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... "Lo, a lucky omen for me, not by me to be mocked! Hail, darling and dancer, friend of the feast, welcome art thou! whence gatst thou the gay garment, a speckled shell, thou, a mountain-dwelling tortoise? Nay, I will carry thee within, and ...
— The Homeric Hymns - A New Prose Translation; and Essays, Literary and Mythological • Andrew Lang
... round, fearful sounds filled the building, thousands of ravens and birds of ill omen croaked loudly and flapped their wings, and all the doors opened with ...
— Fairy Tales of the Slav Peasants and Herdsmen • Alexander Chodsko
... glory burst through a rift in the dull sky, whereupon our fleet, welcoming the omen, threw forth the stars and stripes from every flyer and sailed nearer the stricken fleet hungry for further victories. I counted twenty transports and half a dozen battleships. Proudly we circled over them, knowing that ...
— The Conquest of America - A Romance of Disaster and Victory • Cleveland Moffett
... might be. But night had set in, before my faithful assistant, Henry Luethy, came with the news, that the notarius (as he is called) had an order to summon all the priests to attend early in the morning in the hall of the convent. I esteemed it a good omen, that the business was to be opened by a courser so dull and limping. Scarcely had we assembled on the morrow, when the bishop began in a fashion, which I will portray further on in the conduct of affairs before the ...
— The Life and Times of Ulric Zwingli • Johann Hottinger
... beat her with a staff of almond-wood, till she cried out, "Help, O Moslems!" and he increased the beating upon her, till the folk heard her cries and coming to her, found Abu al-Hasan bashing his mother and saying to her, "O old woman of ill-omen, am I not the Commander of the Faithful? Thou hast ensorcelled me!" When the folk heard his words, they said, "This man raveth," and doubted not of his madness. So they came in upon him, and seizing him, pinioned his elbows, ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton
... The tutelar genius of the city, a venerable matron sinking under the weight of years and infirmities, was suddenly transformed into a blooming maid, whom his own hands adorned with all the symbols of Imperial greatness. [27] The monarch awoke, interpreted the auspicious omen, and obeyed, without hesitation, the will of Heaven The day which gave birth to a city or colony was celebrated by the Romans with such ceremonies as had been ordained by a generous superstition; [28] and though Constantine might omit some rites which savored too ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon
... long before Mrs. Colwood could sleep. Was the emotion she had just witnessed—flinging itself geyserlike into sight, only to sink back as swiftly out of ken—was it an effect of the past or an omen of the future? The longing expressed in the girl's heart and voice, after the brave show she had made—had it overpowered her just because she felt herself alone, without natural protectors, on the brink ...
— The Testing of Diana Mallory • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... and more beautiful than ever; also because she had shown signs of joy and confusion at seeing me again. Yet I was unhappy because I met her still filling a holy office which built a wall between us, also because it seemed to me an evil omen that I should have been repelled from her by a priest of Isis who talked of the curse of the goddess. Moreover the sacred statue, I suppose by accident, turned towards me as it passed and perhaps by the chance of light, ...
— The Ancient Allan • H. Rider Haggard
... it robbed the days I had spent of half their brightness and roused me into dark meditations in the silence of the night. And as I stood and watched Evesham's aeroplanes sweep to and fro—those birds of infinite ill omen—she stood beside me watching me, perceiving the trouble indeed, but not perceiving it clearly—her eyes questioning my face, her expression shaded with perplexity. Her face was gray because the sunset was fading out of ...
— The Door in the Wall And Other Stories • H. G. Wells
... received was one of evil omen to the hapless garrison. It came from General Webb, and repeated that, until reinforced from the provinces, he could do nothing for the garrison of Fort William Henry; and advised Colonel Monro to make the best terms that he ...
— French and English - A Story of the Struggle in America • Evelyn Everett-Green
... torture beneath, such should be the all concentrating anxiety to secure safety that there would be neither time nor taste for any thing else. Every object should seem an altar drenched with sacrificial blood, every sound a knell laden with dolorous omen, every look a propitiatory confession, every breath a pleading prayer. From so single and preternatural a tension of the believer's faculties nothing could allow an instant's cessation except a temporary forgetting or blinking of the awful scene and the immeasurable hazard. Such would be ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger
... finding him alone he saluted him with reverence and distressed at (the sight of) the partiality of the citizens for Yudhishthira, he addressed the monarch and said, 'O father, I have heard the parting citizens utter words of ill omen. Passing thee by, and Bhishma too, they desire the son of Pandu to be their king. Bhishma will sanction this, for he will not rule the kingdom. It seems, therefore, that the citizens are endeavouring to inflict a great injury on us. Pandu ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa - Translated into English Prose - Adi Parva (First Parva, or First Book) • Kisari Mohan Ganguli (Translator)
... "Absit omen!" cried Reginald, fervently, taking the hand she had put out to bid him good night, and holding it fast to detain her; and was there moisture in the eyes which she lifted to him, and which glistened, he thought, ...
— Phoebe, Junior • Mrs [Margaret] Oliphant
... my whole desire, And listened for the queen of all the quire. Fain would I hear her heavenly voice to sing, And wanted yet an omen to the Spring. ...
— Highways and Byways in Surrey • Eric Parker
... was already weak with fever; was seized with giddiness whenever he looked up quickly, and, if he could not catch hold of some support, fell heavily—a bad omen for his chance of passing through the unknown country ahead—but his purpose never faltered for a moment. On January 1, 1854, he was still on the river, but getting beyond Sekeletu's territory and allies, to a region of dense forest, in the open glades of which dwelt the Balonda, ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 17 • Charles Francis Horne
... about these consecrated strains without incurring ridicule? Moulds or types must be first framed, and one of the types shall be—Abstinence from evil words at sacrifices. When a son or brother blasphemes at a sacrifice there is a sound of ill-omen heard in the family; and many a chorus stands by the altar uttering inauspicious words, and he is crowned victor who excites the hearers most with lamentations. Such lamentations should be reserved ...
— Laws • Plato
... are a Diamond Jubilee man—that's a good omen," rejoined Nalini, with a shade of sarcasm in his voice. "What were ...
— Tales of Bengal • S. B. Banerjea
... hovered behind the victim, with her sable plumage and her hooked beak, like a bird of ill-omen. She was out of breath—for Mr Dombey, full of great thoughts, had walked fast—and she croaked hoarsely as she waited for the opening ...
— Dombey and Son • Charles Dickens
... of Frederick William was destined to remain unfulfilled. It was no good omen for Prussia that Stein, who had rendered such glorious services to his country and to all Europe, was suffered to retire from public life. The old court-party at Berlin, politicians who had been forced to make way for more popular men, landowners who had never pardoned the liberation ...
— History of Modern Europe 1792-1878 • C. A. Fyffe
... sets now, when it does so visibly, just where Pembury is. I take it as an omen. In your diary to-morrow you may write down in the business column that you have had a business letter from me, or as near to one as I can go:—chiefly for that it requires an answer on this matter of "outside importance," ...
— An Englishwoman's Love-Letters • Anonymous
... she, "we will requite him for all this, according to our power." Then she called the eunuch, who came and kissed Zoulmekan's hand, and she said, "Take thy reward for glad tidings, O face of good omen! It was thy hand reunited me with my brother; so the purse I gave thee and its contents are thine. But now go to thy master and bring him quickly to me." The eunuch rejoiced and going to the Chamberlain, summoned him to his mistress. ...
— The Book Of The Thousand Nights And One Night, Volume II • Anonymous
... self-respect, the good-nature, and the obliging dispositions shown by the mass of our people; while American travelers seem to be more and more ready to acknowledge the charm and the substantial qualities of the mother country. It is a good omen. One principal source of the pleasure which each takes in the other is no doubt to be found in the novelty of the impressions. It is like a change of cookery. The flavor of the dish is fresh and uncloying to each. The English probably tire of their own snobbishness and flunkeyism, and we of our ...
— Winter Sunshine • John Burroughs
... strong for him, and he was driven out of the city. He was a native of Siena, aged 30.[1] We may compare with this picturesque apparition of Jeronimo in Milan what Varchi says about the prophets who haunted Rome like birds of evil omen in the first years of the pontificate of Clement VII. 'Not only friars from the pulpit, but hermits on the piazza, went about preaching and predicting the ruin of Italy and the end of the world with wild cries and threats.'[2] In 1523 Milan beheld the spectacle ...
— Renaissance in Italy, Volume 1 (of 7) • John Addington Symonds
... a storm today with great crashing waves, then everything grew calm under a golden sunset. I take this as a good omen. I feel happier already. The infinite peace of Nature is quieting my soul. I love the sea. I can almost say my prayers ...
— Possessed • Cleveland Moffett
... From omentum—caul, the membrane enclosing the bowels. Hence "omen." Minced meats wrapped in caul and fried are ...
— Cooking and Dining in Imperial Rome • Apicius
... endurance, capable of travelling from Tomita, in that province, to Kyoto, a distance of one hundred and sixty miles, between dawn and darkness. The courtiers welcomed the appearance of this horse as an omen of peace and prosperity, but Fujiwara Fujifusa interpreted it as indicating that occasion to solicit speedy aid from remote provinces would soon arise. He plainly told the Emperor that the officials were steeped ...
— A History of the Japanese People - From the Earliest Times to the End of the Meiji Era • Frank Brinkley and Dairoku Kikuchi
... tidings. Was she patient? It seemed to Daisy that her heart would burst with impatience; or rather with its eager longing to know how things were at home and to get some relief. The hours of the day went by, and no relief came. Dr. Sandford did not return. Daisy took it as no good omen. ...
— Melbourne House, Volume 2 • Susan Warner
... I be made to walk by these meddlesome archers?" I asked myself, annoyed at this interruption, and considering it an incident of ill omen. I looked ahead, to see whither my walking would ...
— An Enemy To The King • Robert Neilson Stephens
... and finding him alone he saluted him with reverence and distressed at (the sight of) the partiality of the citizens for Yudhishthira, he addressed the monarch and said, 'O father, I have heard the parting citizens utter words of ill omen. Passing thee by, and Bhishma too, they desire the son of Pandu to be their king. Bhishma will sanction this, for he will not rule the kingdom. It seems, therefore, that the citizens are endeavouring to inflict a great injury on us. Pandu obtained of old the ancestral kingdom by virtue ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 1 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... of being the first to land. The race was won by the ship of the prince Protesilaus, who was first of all to leap on shore, but as he leaped he was struck to the heart by an arrow from the bow of Paris. This must have seemed a good omen to the Trojans, and to the Greeks evil, but we do not hear that the landing was resisted in great force, any more than that of Norman William was, when he ...
— Tales of Troy: Ulysses the Sacker of Cities • Andrew Lang
... "Well, Herbert, the omen wasn't altogether up to the mark this time," said Journeyman, with a malicious twinkle in his small ...
— Esther Waters • George Moore
... faster,— Out from the Millpond's purlieus gush The streams of white-faced millers, And down their slippery alleys rush The lusty young Fort-Hillers— The ropewalk lends its 'prentice crew,— The tories seize the omen: "Ay, boys, you'll soon have work to do For England's rebel foemen, 'King Hancock,' Adams, and their gang, That fire the mob with treason,— When these we shoot and those we hang The ...
— The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... written in blood on the Bitter Mount and on the Plain of Nomentum. Who raised it first? Perhaps some humble Sicilian fisherman. Its haunting music coming he knew not whence, sounding in his ear like an omen, was what wedded Garibaldi irrevocably to the undertaking. It was the casting interposition of chance, or, shall it be said, of Providence? Like all men of his mould, Garibaldi was governed by poetry, by romance. Besides the general patriotic sentiment, ...
— The Liberation of Italy • Countess Evelyn Martinengo-Cesaresco
... the surface of the lake, was filled with dazzling spray, which had an appearance not unlike that of a brilliant mist, while above all the sun was shining gloriously in a cloudless sky. Jasper had noted the omen, and had foretold that it announced a speedy termination to the gale, though the next hour or two must decide their fate. Between the cutter and the shore the view was still more wild and appalling. The breakers extended nearly half a mile; while the water within their line ...
— The Pathfinder - The Inland Sea • James Fenimore Cooper
... weight of years and infirmities, was suddenly transformed into a blooming maid, whom his own hands adorned with all the symbols of imperial greatness. The monarch awoke, interpreted the auspicious omen, and obeyed without hesitation the will of Heaven. The day which gave birth to a city or a colony was celebrated by the Romans with such ceremonies as had been ordained by a generous superstition: and though Constantine might omit some ...
— Gibbon • James Cotter Morison
... half-light pervaded the studio; but a parting ray of the evening sunlight suddenly illuminated the spot where the soldier sat, so that his noble, blanched face, his black hair, and his clothes were bathed in its glow. The effect was simple enough, but to the girl's Italian imagination it was a happy omen. The stranger seemed to her a celestial messenger, speaking the language of her own country. He thus unconsciously put her under the spell of childhood's memories, while in her heart there dawned another feeling as fresh, ...
— Vendetta • Honore de Balzac
... years. The command of the Parliamentary army had been given to the Earl of Essex, and he and all his officers were proclaimed traitors by the king. Charles I. assembled an army at Nottingham in 1642 to chastise them, and it was considered an evil omen that when the royal standard was set up on the evening of the day of assemblage, a gale arose and it was blown down. Charles moved west from Nottingham to Shrewsbury to meet reinforcements from Wales, and then ...
— England, Picturesque and Descriptive - A Reminiscence of Foreign Travel • Joel Cook
... event, the Brahmin, having mentally reflected, said, "Sire, from beholding, at this time, this good omen, it appears to my mind that, just as these are advancing, having accomplished their object, just so you will return, having effected yours." Arrived at Kundalpore, he finds preparations made for ...
— Diary of a Pedestrian in Cashmere and Thibet • by William Henry Knight
... "Is it an omen, Webb?" she asked, turning a little from him that she might look upward, and leaning on his shoulder with the unconsciousness ...
— Nature's Serial Story • E. P. Roe
... much both human taste and human happiness are promoted by care regarding trifles, they will not appear unimportant. The existence of schools to teach library science, and of manuals devoted to similar laudable aims, is an auspicious omen of the new reign of refined taste in those nobler arts of life which connect themselves with literature, and are to be hailed as authentic evidences of ...
— A Book for All Readers • Ainsworth Rand Spofford
... then as much as I learned afterwards of what it meant to be "taken up" by Mrs. Minchin, I might not have thought the comparison a good omen for my friendship with Matilda. To be hotly taken up by Mrs. Minchin meant an equally hot quarrel at no very distant date. The squabble with the bride was not slow to come, but Matilda and I fell out first. I think she was tyrannical, and I know I was peevish. My ...
— Six to Sixteen - A Story for Girls • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... non-resisting, ignorant victim of the past and the self-reliant, enlightened, eugenically minded woman of the future. The divorce statistics of the present are perfectly logical and the divorced woman is a cheering omen, as she ...
— The Red Conspiracy • Joseph J. Mereto
... the Sabines of the Capitoline Hills. It was also the home of Julius Caesar during the greater part of his life, where Calpurnia, his wife, dreamed that the pediment of the house had fallen down, and the sacred weapons in the Sacrarium were stirred by a supernatural power; an omen that was but too truly fulfilled when Caesar went forth to the Forum on the fatal Ides of March, and was carried back a bloody corpse from the Curia of Pompey. It ceased to become the residence of the Pontifex when Augustus bought the house of Hortensius on the Palatine, and elected ...
— Roman Mosaics - Or, Studies in Rome and Its Neighbourhood • Hugh Macmillan
... was in progress, if a storm arose it was looked upon as an omen of disaster. At such a time, when clouds gathered, the people joined in ceremonial songs and appeals for clear sky, the ...
— Indian Games and Dances with Native Songs • Alice C. Fletcher
... by means of bounties, from soil too meagre to have yielded any returns in the natural course of things. The plan for the cultivation of Dartmoor has, I hear, been abandoned. I hope that this may be an omen of the fate of ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 1 (of 4) - Contibutions to Knight's Quarterly Magazine] • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... with his head covered in a gown, peculiar to his office, and turning his face towards the east, marked out the heavens into four quarters, with a short, straight rod, with a little turning at one end: this done, he staid waiting for the omen, which never signified anything, unless confirmed by another of the ...
— Roman Antiquities, and Ancient Mythology - For Classical Schools (2nd ed) • Charles K. Dillaway
... vista of the allee defendue: thither rushed Sylvie, glistening through its gloom like a white guelder-rose. She ran to and fro, whining, springing, harassing little birds amongst the bushes. I watched five minutes; no fulfilment followed the omen. I returned to my books; Sylvie's sharp bark suddenly ceased. Again I looked up. She was standing not many yards distant, wagging her white feathery tail as fast as the muscle would work, and intently watching ...
— Villette • Charlotte Bronte
... massage on temperature, and some very interesting results were obtained. In general, when a highly hysterical person is rubbed, the legs are apt to grow cold under the stimulation, and if this continues to be complained of it is no very good omen of the ultimate success of the treatment. But usually in a few days a change takes place, and the limbs all grow warm when kneaded, as happens in most people from the beginning of the treatment.[19] The extremely low temperature ...
— Fat and Blood - An Essay on the Treatment of Certain Forms of Neurasthenia and Hysteria • S. Weir Mitchell
... Governor of Carlscrona to be discharged and conveyed up the country. Admiral Puke had also ordered three of the largest merchant ships to be fitted as block ships for the additional defence of Carlshamn, which was considered as a bad omen. ...
— Memoirs and Correspondence of Admiral Lord de Saumarez. Vol II • Sir John Ross
... girl regarded it with superstitious feelings, but whether as an omen of good or evil she would not tell. On all matters connected with her religious notions she was shy and reserved, though occasionally she unconsciously revealed them. Thus the warnings of death or misfortunes were revealed to her by certain ...
— Lost in the Backwoods • Catharine Parr Traill
... with Captain Bartholomew Sharp in his South Sea voyage. One October day he fell into the sea while going into the spritsail-top and was drowned. "This incident several of our company interpreted as a bad omen, which proved not so, through the ...
— The Pirates' Who's Who - Giving Particulars Of The Lives and Deaths Of The Pirates And Buccaneers • Philip Gosse
... the omen good, And bent his lips to the trickling flood; Then—as the chronicles declare, On the honest faith of a true believer— His cheeks, though wasted, lank, and bare, Filled like a withered russet-pear In the vacuum of a glass receiver, And the snows that seventy winters bring ...
— East and West - Poems • Bret Harte
... Permanent pain shows that the structures of an organ are inflamed, while intermittent pain is a sign of neuralgia, gout, or rheumatism. Absence of pain in any disease, where ordinarily it should be present, is an unfavorable sign. Internal pain, after a favorable crisis, is a bad omen. Or, if pains cease suddenly without the other symptoms abating, the import is bad. If, however, pain and fever remit simultaneously and the secretions continue, it ...
— The People's Common Sense Medical Adviser in Plain English • R. V. Pierce
... with glad fondness, invoking Heaven to confirm the omen. Mother was told of it; the phenomenon was talked of,—beautifulest, hopefulest of little drummers. Painter Pesne, a French Immigrant, or Importee, of the last reign, a man of great skill with his brush, whom History yet thanks on several ...
— History Of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Volume IV. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—Friedrich's Apprenticeship, First Stage—1713-1728 • Thomas Carlyle
... For days old Genendel, the ragpicker, had prophetically been showing about the village the rising knobs of his knotting rheumatic knuckles, ill omen of storm or havoc. A star had shot down one night, as white and sardonic as a Cossack's grin and almost with a hiss behind it. Mosher, returning from a peddling tour to a neighboring village, had worn a furrow between his eyes. Headache, ...
— The Vertical City • Fannie Hurst
... Grace, in his great rage against her, struck the table with his ivory crook, so that he broke a bottle filled with red ink which stood thereon, and the said ink (alas! what an evil omen) poured down upon Duke Philip's white silk stockings, and stained ...
— Sidonia The Sorceress V2 • William Mienhold
... answered. "I dreamed that I went fishing, and saw my net burst. A great fish was taken in it, and I thought to have drawn him out safely; but he broke from my hands, and rent the meshes of the net. It is in my mind that this dream is of ill omen for us, Horn, and that the great fish signifies you yourself, whereby I know that ...
— The Junior Classics, V4 • Willam Patten (Editor)
... her, and overhead wheeled a golden eagle. To her it was an emblem, a good omen, and her spirit became quiet and happy amid all the contradictions of her rough life. She sat down at last on the log before her door, ...
— The Log School-House on the Columbia • Hezekiah Butterworth
... J. W. DAM'S new Play (the initial letters, save the name—and as to the name, absit omen!) treats of Russian life. There is a "toff" in it, played by Mr. KENDAL, whose name is Prince Karatoff, which reminds us of the Duke of Turniptop. Or, if he is an insouciant sort of person, he would more properly be titled, Prince Don't-Kar-a-toff. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 104, April 15, 1893 • Various
... him, but did not pay any attention to his advice. As the train was about to start we entered the only first-class compartment there was; in it were two young German officers. They saluted, and I took this as a good omen. The train whistled, and I thought what good luck we had, as no one else would get in! Well, the wheels had not turned round ten times when the door opened violently and five German officers ...
— My Double Life - The Memoirs of Sarah Bernhardt • Sarah Bernhardt
... security of the Government in that hour. As the boiling waters subside and settle to the sea, when some strong wind beats it down, so the tumult of the people sank and became still. All took it as a divine omen. It was a triumph of eloquence, inspired by the moment, such as falls to but one man's lot, and that but once in a century. The genius of Webster, Choate, Everett, Seward, never reached it. What might ...
— From Canal Boy to President - Or The Boyhood and Manhood of James A. Garfield • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... said to the men, "and may the saints bring you much happiness. Do not forget that to-morrow is Palm Sunday, and that it is a good omen." ...
— The Texan Scouts - A Story of the Alamo and Goliad • Joseph A. Altsheler
... exclamation. For I had seen the thing before—and for the immediate moment could not realise where, till a sudden flash of light through the cells of my brain reminded me of that scene of love and death in the vision of the artist's studio when the name 'Cosmo de Medicis' had been whispered like an evil omen. The murderer in that dream- picture had worn a collar of jewels precisely similar to the one I now saw; but I could only keep silence and listen with every nerve strained to utmost attention while Santoris took the ornament in his hand and looked at it with an intent earnestness ...
— The Life Everlasting: A Reality of Romance • Marie Corelli
... sun, the circle showed like a pattern in the grass; and this morning, when the first light spray of snow lay over it, it came out with wonderful distinctness, like strokes of Chinese white on canvas. The old figure stirred me as it had never done before and seemed a good omen for the winter. ...
— My Antonia • Willa Sibert Cather
... here, but, although their screech was as appalling as I have heard in Angola, they were not regarded, by the Ajumba at any rate, as being birds of evil omen, as they are in Angola. Still, by no means all the birds here only screech and squark. Several of them have very lovely notes. There is one who always gives a series of infinitely beautiful, soft, rich-toned whistles just before the first light of the dawn shows in the sky, ...
— Travels in West Africa • Mary H. Kingsley
... made a hasty sign to attract the happy omen of his saying to herself. "Kushto bak," cried Chaldea, using the gypsy for good luck. "And to me, to me," she clapped her hand. "Hark, my golden rye, and watch me dance ...
— Red Money • Fergus Hume
... "are an ill omen for us. It is not to-morrow that the siege should be raised, but ...
— The Tiger Hunter • Mayne Reid
... by way of the Potomac River were the volunteers of the first call, ninety-day men; the steamship Daylight—name of good omen! It was torrential rain, but the President and Secretary Seward came out to welcome them on the wharf. As he would give a reception then and there, four sailors held a tarpaulin over his head like a canopy, and he shook hands all around, including ...
— The Lincoln Story Book • Henry L. Williams
... books in question—which had fully answered the high character given of them—I returned to the auberge—dined with an increased appetite in consequence of such a sight—and, picking up a "white stone," as a lucky omen, being at the very extent of my Bibliographical, Antiquarian, and Picturesque Tour—returned to Vienna, to a late cup of tea; well satisfied, in every respect, with ...
— A Bibliographical, Antiquarian and Picturesque Tour in France and Germany, Volume Three • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... "Omen, monster, prodigy! Or nothing is, or Jove, from thee. Whether various Nature's play, Or she, renversed, thy will obey, And to rebel man declare Famine, plague or wasteful war . . . No evil can from Thee proceed; 'Tis only suffered, not ...
— Hetty Wesley • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... de well was just a slashin. I tried to pray like de rest of de people. Some say dey was ready to get on de old ship of Zion. I cut loose from de white folks en went in de woods to pray en see a big snake en I ain' been back since. I know dat ain' been nothin but a omen en I quit off cuttin up. I know it ain' been no need in me gwine on like dat cause I ain' never do no harms dat I ...
— Slave Narratives Vol. XIV. South Carolina, Part 1 • Various
... excellent soil, well watered and fit for all purposes of cultivation, with partial exceptions of stony and brushy ridges. Many hills and elevated flats were entirely clear of timber, and the whole had a very picturesque and park-like appearance. I hailed Erskine River as a good omen of ultimate success: it was the first stream we had met with falling from the eastward, and was a proof to me that the Macquarie was the natural reservoir or channel for the waters from the north-east, as I knew it to be from the south. We had as yet seen no inhabitants, ...
— Journals of Two Expeditions into the Interior of New South Wales • John Oxley
... Whether, therefore, it would not be an omen of ill presage, a dreadful phenomenon in the land, if our great men should take it in their heads ...
— The Querist • George Berkeley
... shall the omen fail, and, rooting out All that has marked its life with fear and doubt, The child spring up ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2, No 3, September, 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various
... crawl between their trunks. The ground was covered with a soft bed of pine needles, brown and fragrant. In her hurry she pricked her ungloved hand on a sharp pine cone and drew the blood. She sucked the tiny wound. "Shore I'm wonderin' if that's a bad omen," she muttered, darkly thoughtful. Then she resumed her sinuous approach to the edge of the thicket, and ...
— To the Last Man • Zane Grey
... gentlemen of the Yokohama Chamber of Commerce at a big reception in a theatre. The governor, through his interpreter, said that our arrival was on the first sunny day they had had in some time, that the chrysanthemums were just blooming, and that this was a good omen, for the war clouds had vanished. Geisha girls danced while singing a specially composed chant of welcome, and an elaborate luncheon was served in an adjoining hall. A. I. Esberg and F. R. Eldridge answered the welcome saying, "That we hoped to establish much more friendly and permanent ...
— The Log of the Empire State • Geneve L.A. Shaffer
... flame. They had muttered a word to one another, they had wondered, they had reasoned. And though the silence of their guards—from whose sour vigilance the keenest question drew no response—seemed of ill-omen, and, taken with their knowledge of the man into whose hands they had fallen, should have quenched the spark, these two, having special reasons, the one the buoyancy of youth, the other the faith of an enthusiast, cherished the flame. In the breast of one ...
— Count Hannibal - A Romance of the Court of France • Stanley J. Weyman
... and tied up in bundles, is an omen of tears. If you see it growing in your dreams, it is a sign of ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds • Charles Mackay
... session I was glad that another proposal of the Delegates of France was accepted almost unanimously by the Conference. That fact should be considered as a good omen of a more complete and unanimous agreement at some future time in behalf of the general interest ...
— International Conference Held at Washington for the Purpose of Fixing a Prime Meridian and a Universal Day. October, 1884. • Various
... seventh and last! The hero hailed the sign! And on the wished-for beam hung fast That slender, silken line; Slight as it was, his spirit caught The more than omen, for his thought The lesson well could trace, Which even "he who runs may read," That Perseverance gains its meed, And ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 5 • Charles Sylvester
... an ace of falling into a water-course which crossed the park in that direction, I gave the matter up as hopeless; and with a sigh (for I love not to be foiled in anything I have attempted, and, moreover, I could not help looking upon it as an unlucky omen) dismounted, 285 and leading my rebellious steed by the rein, advanced on foot towards the house. As I did so a figure abruptly turned the corner of a shrubbery walk, which ran at right angles to the road, and I found myself face to ...
— Frank Fairlegh - Scenes From The Life Of A Private Pupil • Frank E. Smedley
... Bruce-Errington establishment removed again to town, where business, connected with his intending membership for Parliament, occupied Sir Philip from morning till night. The old insidious feeling of depression returned and hovered over Thelma's mind like a black bird of ill omen, and though she did her best to shake it off she could not succeed. People began to notice her deepening seriousness and the wistful melancholy of her blue eyes, and made their remarks thereon when they saw her at Marcia Van Clupp's wedding, ...
— Thelma • Marie Corelli
... of the Cornish part of the Celtic movement remains to be seen, but it is not without good omen that this book is published at ...
— A Handbook of the Cornish Language - chiefly in its latest stages with some account of its history and literature • Henry Jenner
... the King of the Franks himself. The King brought no fewer than five thousand mounted men-at-arms. As this host was about to set out, a great clap of thunder resounded in the vault of heaven, and the King's nobles perforce regarded it as a bad omen. ...
— Legends & Romances of Brittany • Lewis Spence
... seen Marco Antonio Adorno, the son of Don Leonardo Adorno, on board one of them. This intelligence rejoiced Don Rafael, to whom it appeared that since he had so unexpectedly learned what it was of such importance for him to know, he might regard this an omen of his future success. He asked his friend, who knew his father well, to exchange the hired mule he rode for his father's nag, giving him to understand, not that he was coming from Salamanca, but ...
— The Exemplary Novels of Cervantes • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... warmly grasping her hand. "You out of place here? No! no! you are at home on the ramparts of Quebec, quite as much as in your own drawing-room at Tilly. The walls of Quebec without a Tilly and a Repentigny would be a bad omen indeed, worse than a year without a spring or a summer without roses. But where is my dear ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... it will prove a good omen, your Majesty." Turning her wondrously beautiful, though melancholy black eyes on him, she replied, with ...
— The Story of Paul Boyton - Voyages on All the Great Rivers of the World • Paul Boyton
... taught to believe any occurrence a good or evil omen, or any day of the week lucky, hath a wide inroad made upon the soundness ...
— Pearls of Thought • Maturin M. Ballou
... with pain the shooting of Colonel Rutler. I am superstitious, sir; this death seems to me a bad omen. The crime was one entirely personal to me; I then formally demand from you ...
— A Romance of the West Indies • Eugene Sue
... little office was packed with an excited crowd of customers. They all talked in low tones as if fearing the spirits of the air that hovered near. An eager group leaned over the bulletin from the London market. London was up half a point. The credulous were pleased. It was a good omen. The pessimists scoffed. ...
— The Root of Evil • Thomas Dixon
... as he said, like "shaking hands with himself," the reaction had been so great, and Bob's news so satisfactory. It might be looked at as an omen of good luck for the momentous occasion. Surely a day that had opened in such a glorious manner for Big Bob, and the team in general, could not have bitterness and gall in store for those gallant Chester fellows who expected to improve upon their work in Marshall, ...
— Jack Winters' Gridiron Chums • Mark Overton
... are all of the indomitable kind, and well charged with threats of unlimited slaughter. The custom survived all the social and religious changes of Europe. But the wild war-phrases which the Germans shouted for mutual encouragement, and to derive, like the Highlanders, an omen from the magnitude of the sound, became hymns: they were sung in unison, with the ordinary monkish modulations of the time. The most famous of these was written by Notker, a Benedictine of St. Gall, about the year 900. It was translated by Luther in 1524, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 57, July, 1862 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... into the little boudoir it happened that Hyacinth was turning her back to him. It was usually a part of their ritual that she came to meet him. So this seemed to him an evil omen. ...
— Love's Shadow • Ada Leverson
... provinces, when from all of them we hear news of the great famine being experienced, and when we see that many renowned mandarins, captains, and soldiers have been killed in this war, we are well able to understand that this man was an omen from Heaven, and the whole affair causes fear. If you, our king, wish to go forth to encounter the Tartars you cannot do so unless you have several millions of men, and thousands of thousands of wagon-loads of supplies. We humbly beg that you undertake to release ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898: Volume XVIII, 1617-1620 • Various
... dream that betokened some coming trouble—it might, to be sure, be ever so small—(it had once come with no worse result than Dr. Walsingham's dropping his purse, containing something under a guinea in silver, over the side of the ferry boat)—but again it might be tremendous. The omen ...
— The House by the Church-Yard • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... overturned salt-cellar is a ship wrecked. If a person take salt and spill it on the table, it betokens a strife between him and the person next to whom it fell. To avert the omen, he must lift up the shed grains with a knife, and throw them behind ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 81, May 17, 1851 • Various
... Sencha son of Ailill: "Come, O Sencha my master," said Conchobar; "stay the men of Ulster, and let them not go to the battle till there come the strength of a good omen and favourable portent, till the sun mounts to the roof-tree of heaven and sunshine fills the glens and lowlands and hills and watch-towers ...
— The Ancient Irish Epic Tale Tain Bo Cualnge • Unknown
... disconcerted; but I perceived his uneasiness was tinctured with resentment, and derived a good omen from this discovery. I ordered the horses to be put to the carriage, and, though he made some efforts to detain us all night, I insisted upon leaving the house immediately; but, before I went away, I took an opportunity of speaking ...
— The Expedition of Humphry Clinker • Tobias Smollett
... the derrick, all hands on the rock spontaneously gave three hearty cheers, as a favourable omen of our future exertions in pointing out more permanently the position of the rock. Even to this single spar of timber, could it be preserved, a drowning man might lay hold. When the Smeaton drifted on the 2nd of this month such a spar would have been sufficient to ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 16 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... was found in other newspapers, and indeed it went about Great Britain later and found its way to the Colonies. "An Oriental Omen" it was headed, and Madame's only regret appeared to be that it could not be held to be distinguished by the quality of absolute truth. But there it stood in print, and there was the name of Hilbert and Co., the old established firm, making a speciality of manufacturing military ...
— Love at Paddington • W. Pett Ridge
... drifting along like a cock-boat in the surf; now swallowed up in a huge billow of cloud, and now lifted upon its bosom and dashed with silvery spray. The trees by the road-side groaned with a sound of evil omen; and before him lay three mortal miles, beset with a thousand imaginary perils. Obedient to the whip and spur, the steed leaped forward by fits and starts, now dashing away in a tremendous gallop, and now relaxing into a long, hard trot; while the ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume VII. (of X.) • Various
... beside thy horse.' It pleased him for two things: because he had walked with little fatigue and because he had been enabled to show her great and prodigal honour by so serving her for groom. 'This too I set to thy account as my good omen. And that thou art. No woman shall have such honours as thou in this land, save only the Mother of God.' And, after touching his green and jewelled bonnet, he cast it from his head on to ...
— Privy Seal - His Last Venture • Ford Madox Ford
... courage was of so strange a quality, that he was ready, if jay or magpie did not cross him, to fight for Spartan or Persian. Plato, whom thou esteemest much, and knowest somewhat less, careth as little for portent and omen as doth Diogenes. What he would have done for a Persian I cannot say; certain I am that he would have no more fought for a Spartan than he would for his own father: yet he mortally hates the man who ...
— Imaginary Conversations and Poems - A Selection • Walter Savage Landor
... quibble about Rex—or at the tristis severitas in vultu, or inspicere in patinas, of Terence—thin jests, which at their first broaching could hardly have had vis enough to move a Roman muscle.—He had two wigs, both pedantic, but of differing omen. The one serene, smiling, fresh powdered, betokening a mild day. The other, an old discoloured, unkempt, angry caxon, denoting frequent and bloody execution. Woe to the school, when he made his morning appearance in his passy, or passionate wig. No comet ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Volume 2 • Charles Lamb
... to dissuade the Hangwan from going there, because she had dreamed in the night a dream of ill omen. ...
— Kokoro - Japanese Inner Life Hints • Lafcadio Hearn
... temperate regions I have obtained (according to the usual expression) a place of dignity, but no great omen of future pomp or riches; and possessing a small residence {64} near the castle of Brecheinoc, well adapted to literary pursuits, and to the contemplation of eternity, I envy not the riches of Croesus; happy and contented with that ...
— The Itinerary of Archibishop Baldwin through Wales • Giraldus Cambrensis
... door with a white knob. Hence, great was my satisfaction when near the southeast corner of Eighteenth and K streets, we halted in front of a cottage of that description; and it was regarded as a lucky omen for me, that my first wish amid new scenes should ...
— The Expedition of the Donner Party and its Tragic Fate • Eliza Poor Donner Houghton
... win yet," he shouted to the silent sky; "my troubles are done with. I will shine like the sun; I will rule like the sun, and my enemies shall whither beneath my power. It is a good omen. Now I am glad that the Roman spared my life, that in a day to come I may ...
— Pearl-Maiden • H. Rider Haggard
... or it may not," the old scribe said cautiously; "if the statue has fallen by the action of the gods the omen is surely a ...
— Beric the Briton - A Story of the Roman Invasion • G. A. Henty
... centennial circle, and at the very hour of its completion, Switzerland vindicates her ancient renown in these fair pages, at once pledge and performance, of another of her honored children. May the auspicious omen lead ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I., No. 3, January 1858 - A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics • Various
... and recruiting its strength from a district which had been hardly touched by the ravages of war, and which by its prosperity alone might have proved the amenity of British military rule. This force seems to have skirted Wepener without attacking a place of such evil omen to their cause. Their subsequent movements are readily traced by a ...
— The Great Boer War • Arthur Conan Doyle
... the priest, "this is a foul hearing! John Amend-All! A right Lollardy word. And black of hue, as for an omen! Sirs, this knave arrow likes me not. But it importeth rather to take counsel. Who should this be? Bethink you, Bennet. Of so many black ill-willers, which should he be that doth so hardily outface us? Simnel? I do much question it. The Walsinghams? Nay, they are not ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 8 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... of," answered the admiral. "I have not been let into their secret intentions, and I don't wish to act the part of a bird of ill-omen; though I confess that, were he to have the offer of a ship, I should ...
— The Three Commanders • W.H.G. Kingston
... promising omen, to be thus introduced to court, yet he did not instantly reap any advantage from it. He was indeed created poet laureat to Queen Elizabeth, but he for some time wore a barren laurel, and possessed only the place without the pension [2]. Lord treasurer ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) - Volume I. • Theophilus Cibber
... the prettiest idyl to us onlookers," she wrote to Lady Adeline. "Love at first sight with both of them, and their first glimpse of each other was in church, which we all take to be the happiest omen that God's blessing is upon them, and will sanctify their union. Evadne says little, but there is such a delicate tinge of colour in her cheeks always, and such a happy light in her eyes, that I cannot help looking at her. George ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand
... erect,—envied by the bravest even. On an occasion when General Walker was attacking the Costa-Ricans in Rivas, the dog entered the plaza ahead of the rest, and, finding there one of his own species, he forthwith seized him, and shook him, and put him to flight howling,—giving an omen so favorable, that the greasers were driven out of the town with ease by the others. Even his every-day life was sublime, and elevated above the habit of vulgar dogs. He allowed no man to think himself his master, or attach him individually by liberal feeding or kind treatment, but quartered ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 27, January, 1860 • Various
... gods to show him a manifest signal which of those children should come to the government; being very desirous to leave it to his son's son, but still depending upon what God should foreshow concerning them more than upon his own opinion and inclination; so he made this to be the omen, that the government should be left to him who should come to him first the next day. When he had thus resolved within himself, he sent to his grandson's tutor, and ordered him to bring the child to him early in ...
— The Antiquities of the Jews • Flavius Josephus
... boy, having died,) the whole frame of carved woodwork at the back of the queen's bed, representing the crown and other regalia of France, with the Bourbon lilies, came rattling down in ruins. There is another and more direct ill omen connected, apparently, with the birth of this prince; in fact, a distinct prophecy of his ruin,—a prophecy that he should survive his father, and yet no reign,—which is so obscurely told, that one knows not in what ...
— Autobiographic Sketches • Thomas de Quincey
... done up in curl-papers, and a very stiffly starched dress, which stood out on all sides almost horizontally, entered, accompanied by Mrs. Van Kirk. Halfdan immediately recognized his acquaintance from the park, and it appeared to him a good omen that this child, whose friendly interest in him had warmed his heart in a moment when his fortunes seemed so desperate, should continue to be associated with his life on this new continent. Clara was evidently greatly impressed by the change in his appearance, and ...
— Tales From Two Hemispheres • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen
... air sweep from the clean hill-country with such revivifying power? It seemed a glad world of abiding youth. Surely "Town" was but a dreary illusion, a mirage that hung in the unmapped spaces of this new world that God had made and called good; an omen of the abominations that men would make when they grew blind to the ...
— Judith Of The Plains • Marie Manning
... sorry!" the priest exclaimed as Anubis disappeared. "It is an omen. Toth[2] visiteth Ptah; Wisdom seeketh Power! Came he by divine summons or did he seek the great god? It is a problem for the sorcerers and is ...
— The Yoke - A Romance of the Days when the Lord Redeemed the Children - of Israel from the Bondage of Egypt • Elizabeth Miller
... which lies in the hands of the children of Montreal, and the Province of Quebec generally, will be for the good of the Dominion. Certainly the attitude of the people as shown in the packed and ecstatic streets of Montreal was a very good omen. ...
— Westward with the Prince of Wales • W. Douglas Newton
... America most symbolically making dirt pies, and chip forts, in its shadow. But high above the squabbling little throng and their petty plans, the sun shone full on Liberty's broad forehead, and, in her hand, some summer bird had built its nest. I accepted the good omen then, and, on the first of January, the Emancipation Act gave the statue a nobler and more enduring pedestal than any marble or granite ever carved and quarried ...
— Hospital Sketches • Louisa May Alcott
... he looked hard at me, who stood farther from the door, mumbled something, bowed to us all, and withdrew. I was struck with his manner, which seemed vexed and unwilling, and the whole thing appeared to me to be awkward and uncomfortable. I thought it a bad omen for the influence of ...
— A Residence in France - With An Excursion Up The Rhine, And A Second Visit To Switzerland • J. Fenimore Cooper
... until they reached the defile; but just as they were entering it a black cloud rose over the mountain crest, and there was a sudden shower. The warriors turned to their leader, as if to read his opinion of this unlucky omen; but the countenance of Blue John remained unchanged, and they continued to press forward. It was their hope to make their way undiscovered to the very vicinity of the Blackfoot camp; but they had not proceeded ...
— The Adventures of Captain Bonneville - Digested From His Journal • Washington Irving
... scorn replied "A poor maimed copy of Brutus!" Too much like, Indeed, to be so unlike! too unskilled At Philippi and the honest battle-pike, To be so skilful where a man is killed Near Pompey's statue, and the daggers strike At unawares i' the throat. Was thus fulfilled An omen once of Michel Angelo?— When Marcus Brutus he conceived complete, And strove to hurl him out by blow on blow Upon the marble, at Art's thunderheat, Till haply (some pre-shadow rising slow Of what his Italy would fancy meet To be called BRUTUS) ...
— The Poetical Works of Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Volume IV • Elizabeth Barrett Browning
... feeling, she bade the girl good-afternoon, and went on over the stumps of hazel to where Grace and Winterborne were standing. They saw her approach, and Winterborne said, "She is coming to you; it is a good omen. She dislikes me, so I'll go away." He accordingly retreated to where he had been working before Grace came, and Grace's formidable rival approached her, each woman taking the other's measure ...
— The Woodlanders • Thomas Hardy
... cavaliers—perhaps another reinforcement like that of Montmorency? This new band, however, consisted but of two gentlemen and their immediate attendants, the Duc de Bar and the Comte de Clermont,(1) always a bird of evil omen, riding hot from St. Denis with orders from the King. These orders were abrupt and peremptory—to turn back. Jeanne and her companions were struck dumb for the moment. To turn back, and Paris at their feet! There must ...
— Jeanne d'Arc - Her Life And Death • Mrs.(Margaret) Oliphant
... Manichee, the old enemy of Athanasius, was placed in command. Gratian hurried Thraceward with the Gaulish legions, and at last Valens thought it time to leave his pleasant home at Antioch for the field of war. Evil omens beset his march, but no omen could be worse than his own impulsive rashness. With a little prudence, such a force as he had gathered round the walls of Hadrianople was an overmatch for any hordes of barbarians. But Valens determined to storm the Gothic camp without waiting for his Western colleague. ...
— The Arian Controversy • H. M. Gwatkin
... several cities of the adjoining States, there came letters in cordial appreciation of the critical recognition which it was my pleasure no less than my duty to offer Paul Dunbar's work in another place. It seemed to me a happy omen for him that so many people who had known him, or known of him, were glad of a stranger's good word; and it was gratifying to see that at home he was esteemed for the things he had done rather than ...
— The Complete Poems of Paul Laurence Dunbar • Paul Laurence Dunbar
... to the tree, which had so long sustained his family and fortune, with the utmost concern; it seemed an omen of approaching destruction so plain and unmistakable that he could not look at it; he turned his mournful gaze in the opposite direction. The day passed slowly, as slowly as it did to the keeper lying beneath ...
— Wood Magic - A Fable • Richard Jefferies
... in the moment of death. God is her judge. But I shall never forget that morning; and I feel that my presence at your party imposes on me some measure of responsibility. As for you, Mike, I really think you ought to consider her fate as an omen. It was ...
— Mike Fletcher - A Novel • George (George Augustus) Moore
... of Eminency for his Learning, and of Exquisite Curiosity in his Researches, Even that Incomparable Sir Kenelme Digbie Knight, Fellow of the Royal Society and Chancellour to the Queen Mother, (Et omen in Nomine) His name does sufficiently Auspicate the Work. I shall only therefore add, That there is herein (as by the Table hereunto affix'd will evidently to thee appear) a sufficiency of Solids as well as Liquids for the sating the Curiosities of each or the nicest Palate; ...
— The Closet of Sir Kenelm Digby Knight Opened • Kenelm Digby
... Telemachus sneezed, and all the house rang with the noise. And Penelope said again to Eumaeus: "Call now this stranger; didst thou not mark the good omen, how my son sneezed when I spake? Verily, this vengeance shall be wrought, nor shall one escape from it. And as for this stranger, if I shall perceive that he hath spoken truth, I will give him a new ...
— The Story Of The Odyssey • The Rev. Alfred J. Church
... party, and presided over by your chief officer, for the purpose of expressing respect to the memory of the man who was the leader of the Confederate armies in the late war between the States. It is in itself the omen of reunion. I am not surprised at the spectacle presented here. Throughout the entire South one universal cry of grief has broken forth at the death of General Lee, and in a very large portion of the North manly and noble tributes have been paid ...
— A Life of Gen. Robert E. Lee • John Esten Cooke
... from my chains with evil omen did I come; now I perceive that with like ill omen to my bonds I ...
— The Captiva and The Mostellaria • Plautus
... seemed to be no truth in this western omen. Following the first mysterious disappearance of the water, and its equally strange reappearance, peace seemed to settle down ...
— The Boy Ranchers in Camp - or The Water Fight at Diamond X • Willard F. Baker
... "It is an omen," he says: and the next moment the heavy door behind him swings open, and Honor stands ...
— Only an Irish Girl • Mrs. Hungerford
... the two triumphant figures on the other side of me, overwhelmed and defeated me. I bent my head; I felt a shame, a degradation as though I should have crept into some shadow and hidden.... I would not mention this were it not that afterwards, in retrospect, the moment seemed to me an omen. After all, life is not always to ...
— The Dark Forest • Hugh Walpole
... branches, with its little tail cocked upwards. The cheucau is held in superstitious fear by the Chilotans, on account of its strange and varied cries. There are three very distinct cries: One is called "chiduco," and is an omen of good; another, "huitreu," which is extremely unfavourable; and a third, which I have forgotten. These words are given in imitation of the noises; and the natives are in some things absolutely ...
— A Naturalist's Voyage Round the World - The Voyage Of The Beagle • Charles Darwin
... forced to renounce the prize. On his way back he doubled the Cape, which, from his former experience, he called the Cape Tempestuous, until the king, showing that he understood, gave it a name of better omen. Nevertheless, Portugal did no more for ten years, the years that were made memorable by Spain. Then, under a new king, Emmanuel the Fortunate, Vasco da Gama went out to complete the unfinished work of Diaz, lest Columbus, fulfilling ...
— Lectures on Modern history • Baron John Emerich Edward Dalberg Acton
... parapet to see. Then she drew back, and cried, with hands clasped above her head, "Now blessed be Isis! 'Tis he—Ben-Hur himself! That he should appear while I had such thought of him! There are no gods if it be not a good omen. Put your arms about ...
— Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ • Lew Wallace
... 1880. (Sunday, half-past eight in the morning).—The sun has come out after heavy rain. May one take it as an omen on this solemn day? The great voice of Clemence has just been sounding in our ears. The bell's deep vibrations went to my heart. For a quarter of an hour the pathetic appeal went on—"Geneva, Geneva, remember! I am called Clemence—I am the voice of church and of country. People of Geneva, ...
— Amiel's Journal • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... old tradition that the future ruler of the Soudan will be from that isle. Zebehr Rahama knew this, but he fell on leaving his boat at this isle, and so, though the Soudan people looked on him as a likely saviour, this omen shook their confidence in him. He was then on his way to Cairo after swearing his people to rebel (if he was retained there), under a tree at Shaka. Zebehr will most probably be taken prisoner by the Mahdi, and will then take the command of the Mahdi's forces. ...
— The Life of Gordon, Volume II • Demetrius Charles Boulger
... a sense of acute impatience. Was this an omen of obstacles to bar him now from Phyllis Bruce? He had a wild thought of saddling a horse and riding to town, but at that moment the storm came down afresh. Besides, there ...
— Dennison Grant - A Novel of To-day • Robert Stead
... not only a big and powerful man—he was also courageous, but the absence of Dodge and the presence of Cunningham offered such sinister omen that temporarily he was bereft of his natural ...
— The Pagan Madonna • Harold MacGrath
... his appearance in black instead of white stockings, which was regarded by the scholars as a bad omen; and fully were their prognostications justified, on this occasion, at least. The joy of the half-holiday for Scotch boys and girls has a terrible weight laid in the opposite scale—I mean the other half of the day. This weight, which brings ...
— Alec Forbes of Howglen • George MacDonald
... was the only answer, and oranges from up stairs flew about his head and struck upon the table,—an omen only fearful from what it prophesied. Then there was such a row for five minutes as I hope I may never see or hear again. People kept their places fortunately, under a vague impression that they should forfeit some magic rights if they ...
— The Man Without a Country and Other Tales • Edward E. Hale
... Arkady into the garden. His meeting with her struck him as a particularly happy omen; he was delighted to see her, as though she were of his own kindred. Everything had happened so splendidly; no steward, no formal announcement. At a turn in the path he caught sight of Anna Sergyevna. She was standing with ...
— Fathers and Children • Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev
... wand'ring birds that flit with every wind? Ye vagrants of the sky! your wings extend Or where the suns arise or where descend; To right or left, unheeded take your way, While I the dictates of high heaven obey. Without a sigh his sword the brave man draws, And asks no omen but his country's cause. But why should'st thou suspect the war's success? None fears it more, as none promotes it less. Tho' all our ships amid yon ships expire, Trust thy own cowardice to escape the fire. Troy and her sons may find a general grave, But thou canst live, for thou canst be a slave. ...
— Alexander Pope - English Men of Letters Series • Leslie Stephen
... Wednesday morning, she remembered that the best train from Dulwich was at three o'clock, and she asked herself why she had thought of this train, and that she should have thought of it seemed to her like an omen. Her father sat opposite, looking at her across the table. It was all so clear in her mind that she was ashamed to sit thinking these things, for thinking as clearly as she was thinking seemed equivalent to accomplishment; ...
— Evelyn Innes • George Moore
... "I wonder if the owl is an omen and whether the other inhabitants of this desert are like him; however much you turn their heads, they won't fall for you. Charms and counter-charms!... Be a good child, Io," she admonished herself. "Haven't you ...
— Success - A Novel • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... attendants, and most qualified to conduct its business. Publicity in its accounts and proceedings is, from the magnitude of its funds, more essential to the Zoological than to any other society; and it is rather a fearful omen, that a check was attempted to be given to such inquiries at the last anniversary meeting. If it is to be a scientific body, the friends of science should not for an ...
— Decline of Science in England • Charles Babbage
... in a great flurry and worry, telling me that her shoulders are round, and that she simply can't make them nice and square as they should be for the new tailor-made that is to transform her into a happy little Easter girl! The woman who is horrified to find wrinkles appearing like wee birds of omen does not have to tell me that she is a pillow fiend and sleeps with her head half a foot higher than her heels. It stands to reason that a pillow will push the flesh of the face up into little lines. There is no necessity ...
— The Woman Beautiful - or, The Art of Beauty Culture • Helen Follett Stevans
... to that place Assembled; for its strength was great, enclos'd On all parts by the fen. On those dead bones They rear'd themselves a city, for her sake, Calling it Mantua, who first chose the spot, Nor ask'd another omen for the name, Wherein more numerous the people dwelt, Ere Casalodi's madness by deceit Was wrong'd of Pinamonte. If thou hear Henceforth another origin assign'd Of that my country, I forewarn thee now, That falsehood ...
— The Divine Comedy • Dante
... evening, on his work intent, Alone he practised Archery, When lo! the bow proved false and sent The arrow from its mark awry; Again he tried,—and failed again; Why was it? Hark!—A wild dog's bark! An evil omen:—it was plain Some evil ...
— Ancient Ballads and Legends of Hindustan • Toru Dutt
... directly with the heart. So universal is the custom of wearing the wedding ring among Jews and Christians that no married woman is ever seen without her plain gold circlet, and she regards the loss of it as a sinister omen; and many women never remove it. This is, however, foolish, and it should be taken off and put on several times at first, so that any subsequent removal or loss need not jar painfully ...
— Manners and Social Usages • Mrs. John M. E. W. Sherwood
... ancients was a good deal founded upon the observation of the instincts of birds. There are many superstitions of the vulgar owing to the same source. For anglers, in spring, it is always unlucky to see single magpies,—but two may be always regarded as a favourable omen; and the reason is, that in cold and stormy weather, one magpie alone leaves the nest in search of food, the other remaining sitting upon the eggs or the young ones; but when two go out together, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 12, - Issue 323, July 19, 1828 • Various
... was greatly in advance of his time, for it will be recalled that fully two hundred years later the Greeks under Nicias before Syracuse were so disconcerted by the appearance of an eclipse, which was interpreted as a direct omen and warning, that Nicias threw away the last opportunity to rescue his army. Thucydides, it is true, in recording this fact speaks disparagingly of the superstitious bent of the mind of Nicias, but Thucydides also was a man far in advance of ...
— A History of Science, Volume 1(of 5) • Henry Smith Williams
... have done some work notwithstanding. Thanks to Providence, we have made some progress, and it is likely our operations will yet have a decided effect on slave-trading in Eastern Africa. I am greatly delighted with the prospect of a Church of England mission to Central Africa. That is a good omen for those who are sitting in darkness, and I trust that in process of time great benefits will be conferred on our own overcrowded population at home. There is room enough and to spare in the fair world our Father has ...
— The Personal Life Of David Livingstone • William Garden Blaikie
... which means "black." That river had another name also, Kandrabhaga, which means "streak of the moon." The Greeks, however, pronounced that [Greek: Sandarophagos], and this had the unlucky meaning of "the devourer of Alexander." Hesychius tells us that in order to avert the bad omen Alexander changed the name of that river into [Greek: Akesines], which would mean "the Healer;" but he does not tell, what the Veda tells us, that this name [Greek: Akesines] was a Greek adaptation of another name of the same river, namely Asikni, which had evidently ...
— India: What can it teach us? - A Course of Lectures Delivered before the University Of Cambridge • F. Max Mueller
... the incoming lower class of superstitious Germans, Irish, Sicilians, and others—he became an omen and embodiment of public and private ill-fortune. Upon him all the vagaries of their superstitions gathered and grew. If a house caught fire, it was imputed to his machinations. Did a woman go off in a fit, he had bewitched her. Did ...
— Old Creole Days • George Washington Cable
Copyright © 2025 Free-Translator.com
|
|
|
