"Despair" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... and indeed the very best of common hedges, is either rais'd of seeds or plants; but then it must not be with despair, because sometimes you do not see them peep the first year; for the haw, and many other seeds, being invested with a very hard integument, will now and then suffer imprisonment two whole years under the earth; and our ...
— Sylva, Vol. 1 (of 2) - Or A Discourse of Forest Trees • John Evelyn
... inconceivably small fault "lets a knife, which he is handing to or from the Serene Lady, fall," [Ranke, i. 304 ("from a Letter the Prince had written to Katte").] who, as she is weak, may suffer by the jingle; for which Friedrich Wilhelm bursts out on him like the Irish Rebellion,—to the silent despair of the poor Prince. The poor Prince meditates desperate resolutions, but has to ...
— History of Friedrich II of Prussia V 7 • Thomas Carlyle
... inscription," was the answer, and perhaps it is small wonder that Anna exclaimed in despair, "Oh, this terrible English! ...
— Notable Women Of Modern China • Margaret E. Burton
... Catholics; and fought in 1569, a great battle at Jarnac with the Hugonots, where the prince of Conde was killed, and his army defeated. This discomfiture, with the loss of so great a leader, reduced not the Hugonots to despair. The admiral still supported the cause; and having placed at the head of the Protestants the prince of Navarre, then sixteen years of age, and the young prince of Conde, he encouraged the party rather to perish ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part D. - From Elizabeth to James I. • David Hume
... up in despair and charged Sam to see that the man had his supper. Then without asking any more questions she carried a cup of coffee down the table to a meek-looking old woman who likewise seemed to be in a state of bewilderment. It was the mother of Michael the gate-keeper. She started a little too, ...
— Melbourne House, Volume 1 • Susan Warner
... metamorphosed his department. The change spread to himself. His cheeks took on a ruddier hue, the sparkle of his black eyes mellowed into a calm and steady radiance. There was no trace of feverish elation which, in solitude, recoiled to the brink of despair. He sang to himself evenings in his dormitory, clearly and with joy. His step was as elastic as that of any schoolboy. I often thought upon this change, and meditated how beautiful an illustration of confession's blessings it furnished. Frequently we were alone, but he never referred ...
— Short Story Classics (American) Vol. 2 • Various
... Hedrick knew not whither to direct his flight: he dared not dash for the street with this imminent tattered incubus—she was almost upon him—and he frantically made for the kitchen door, only to swerve with a gasp of despair as his foot touched the step, for she was at his heels, and he was sickeningly assured she would cheerfully follow him through the house, shouting that damning refrain for all ears. A strangling fear took him by the throat—if Cora should ...
— The Flirt • Booth Tarkington
... the blue beyond the tumbled chaos of loose cloud so near the earth; the riot of the wind-swept trees fighting to keep a shred of their old green on their bareness, making new concessions to the blast, and beating their stripped limbs together in their despair; the endless swirl of leaves at liberty, free now at last to enjoy a short and merry life before becoming food for worms. She could see the face she had just parted from, but twenty years younger—the same bone-structure with its unscarred youth upon it, only a lesser beard ...
— Somehow Good • William de Morgan
... ludicrous about me that I know of," said the poor child to herself, with catching breath. In spite of her seventeen years, her new dress, and all her ecstatic anticipations, a more lonely, uncomfortable, and tearfully- inclined young woman it would be difficult to find. She looked round in despair, espied a seat in a retired corner, and was making for it as quickly as might be, when she came face to face with a mirror, and in it saw a reflection which made the colour rush to her cheeks in a hot, crimson tide. A girlish figure, with a dark head set gracefully ...
— Sisters Three • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... "ride" and merely showed her feelings by moping in the corner and wiping her eyes with her handkerchief whenever he looked in her direction. After he had gone she spent the half-hour previous to Mr. Hammond's arrival in alternate fits of rage and despair. ...
— Thankful's Inheritance • Joseph C. Lincoln
... poor Finucane was in despair about his negotiation, that the majestic Mrs. Bungay descended upon her spouse, politely requested Mr. Finucane to step up to his friends in her drawing-room, while she held a few minutes' conversation with ...
— The History of Pendennis • William Makepeace Thackeray
... chief cook was in despair and could not imagine how to deceive her again. The young Queen was over twenty years old, not reckoning the hundred years she had been asleep: and how to find something to take her place greatly puzzled him. He then decided, to save his own life, to cut the Queen's ...
— The Tales of Mother Goose - As First Collected by Charles Perrault in 1696 • Charles Perrault
... keep him indoors. He was every minute pleading for leave to play with Johan, and on several occasions when permission had been granted, he and Johan left the quiet lane to play with strange boys on the Quay. It drove his mother almost to despair, and she tried one thing after another to keep ...
— The Soul of a Child • Edwin Bjorkman
... Son, however, shows that it is usually due to willful choice and to a desire for indulgence. Its results are sketched in appalling colors. We are shown all its disillusion, suffering, slavery, and despair. As a picture of the inevitable consequences of sin, no touch could be added to the scene of the prodigal in the far country when he had spent all, when the famine had arisen, when he had sold himself to feed swine and was unable to be satisfied ...
— The Gospel of Luke, An Exposition • Charles R. Erdman
... but despair! What else could I look for, being what I am, and leading such a life ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Volume V. • Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds.
... housemaids, laundrymaids, nurserymaids, or kitchenmaids, and after a year or two's training were started in life amongst the neighbouring families, with good principles and wardrobes. One of the results of this system was the perpetual despair of Mrs. Brown's cook and own maid, who no sooner had a notable girl made to their hands than missus was sure to find a good place for her and send her off, taking in fresh importations from the school. Another was, that the house was always full of young girls, with clean, shining ...
— Tom Brown's Schooldays • Thomas Hughes
... of the Greek people at the chronic mismanagement of their affairs had been quickened by the Turkish Revolution into something like despair. Bulgaria had exploited that upheaval by annexing Eastern Rumelia: Greece had failed to annex Crete, and ran the risk, if the Young Turks' experiment succeeded, of seeing the {3} fulfilment of all her national aspirations frustrated for ever. A group of military malcontents in touch with the Cretan ...
— Greece and the Allies 1914-1922 • G. F. Abbott
... could not forbear endeavouring to convince our protector how much he was imposed upon: he was not long before he was satisfied that he had been too credulous, for all those that had so industriously searched after this imaginary wealth, within five hours left the work in despair, and I continued almost alone with ...
— A Voyage to Abyssinia • Jerome Lobo
... may be upon the lives of those that would seem never destined by Heaven to come in her way. My Dante was never in those days a wooer of such ladies. As to certain things that are said of him later, in the hours of his despair, when the world seemed no better than an empty shell, I shall have somewhat to say, perhaps, by-and-by, for there is a matter that has led to not a little misunderstanding of the character of my friend. As for ...
— The God of Love • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... look where he was going. He could only strive with the desperation of despair to preserve the distance between him and his pursuer, in the faint hope that something would intervene to save him. Fred was not only firing his gun as fast as he could, but he shouted to the bear, in the hope of diverting ...
— Two Boys in Wyoming - A Tale of Adventure (Northwest Series, No. 3) • Edward S. Ellis
... tables for the Ten Commandments; it forgot that the tables were shivered in pieces by Moses. Kaf was sure of victory Kisseh, the throne of God, Kabod, His honor, and Keter, His crown, all begin with it. God had to remind it that He would smite together His hands, Kaf, in despair over the misfortunes of Israel. Yod at first sight seemed the appropriate letter for the beginning of creation, on account of its association with Yah, God, if only Yezer ha-Ra' the evil inclination, had not happened to begin with it, ...
— The Legends of the Jews Volume 1 • Louis Ginzberg
... To practise on the lute; And as he sings and travels With lingering, laggard foot, Despair ...
— New Poems • Robert Louis Stevenson
... crowded on her distracted mind, and she was ready to sink under her apprehensions. She addressed herself to every saint in heaven, and inwardly implored their assistance. For a considerable time she remained in an agony of despair. ...
— The Castle of Otranto • Horace Walpole
... the thickets, they were bombarded with shells and Congreve rockets. Mokanna and the principal chiefs were denounced as outlaws, and the inhabitants threatened with utter extermination if they did not deliver them up dead or alive. Although driven to despair, and perishing from want, not a single Caffre was to be found who would earn the high reward offered for the ...
— The Mission; or Scenes in Africa • Captain Frederick Marryat
... these people, in despair, were at the point of undergoing an operation. But the Cluthe Truss made operation unnecessary— saved the big expense— saved ...
— Cluthe's Advice to the Ruptured • Chas. Cluthe & Sons
... clearly as poetic description is capable of, indicates and says that he is on the sunset side of his day of life. I cannot at this instant quote, but I am impressed that in the plays of the great poet, the instances are frequent where sorrow or despair bring his youthful characters to picture their lot with the deprivations, the ills or forebodings of age. But in no such passages is language used which is at all equivalent to that here quoted. Nowhere does ...
— Testimony of the Sonnets as to the Authorship of the Shakespearean Plays and Poems • Jesse Johnson
... As Yea makes happier loves secure, I vow thee this Unique rejection of a kiss. I guard for thee This jealous sad monopoly. I seal this honour thine. None dare Hope for a part in thy despair. ...
— Later Poems • Alice Meynell
... is Carlyle; but so much is added, the presence is so much more vascular and human, and the whole page so saturated with faith and love and democracy, that even the great Scotchman is overborne. Whitman, too, radiates belief, while at the core of Carlyle's utterances is despair. The style here is eruptive and complex, or what Jeremy Taylor calls agglomerative, and puts the Addisonian models utterly to rout,—a style such as only the largest and most Titanic workman could effectively use. ...
— Birds and Poets • John Burroughs
... as then we should know that most of our efforts are futile, whereas now we hope they may attain complete fruition. Yet, on the other hand, we learn that the fruit of dreamy hoping is waking blank despair. We were again in a region of scrubs as bad and as dense as those I hoped and thought, ...
— Australia Twice Traversed, The Romance of Exploration • Ernest Giles
... Lundie, and the younger were absorbed in the essentially serious occupation of considering and comparing their wedding-dresses. The two young gentlemen from the University performed prodigies of yawning, in the intervals of prodigies of billiard playing. Smith said, in despair, "There's no making things pleasant in this house, Jones." And Jones sighed, and mildly ...
— Man and Wife • Wilkie Collins
... doth not admit any violent passions, such as proceed from the greatest extremity, and usually accompany despair; yet because Despairing Love is not attended with those frightful and horrible consequences, but looks more like grief to be pittied, and a pleasing madness, than rage and fury, Eclogue is so far from refusing, that it rather ...
— De Carmine Pastorali (1684) • Rene Rapin
... Not before had he known that she felt the case to be so nearly hopeless. Despair took a grip on his vitals. A something of sympathy leaped from the woman's heart to his—a something common to them both—in the yearning that a ...
— Bruvver Jim's Baby • Philip Verrill Mighels
... everything. "The natural relations of classes" disappear. Faiths melt; churches dissolve; morals fade; bonds fail; a universal magma of emancipated opinion seems to take the place of old-established dogma. The squires and the parsons of the period—call them scribes or augurs—wring their hands in despair, and cry aloud that they don't know what the world is coming to. But, after all, it is only the chrysalis stage of a new system. The old social order must grow disjointed and chaotic before the new social order can begin to evolve from it. The establishment of a plastic consistency ...
— Post-Prandial Philosophy • Grant Allen
... am in the deep waters of despair—save me once more, save me!" Thus speaking she tottered into the office, and sank all limp and powerless into a chair, unable to move or speak, but still not insensible, and soon her brow sank upon the table, and her hands ...
— A Perilous Secret • Charles Reade
... does not feel himself included in the condemnation. She must also be careful in denying the story not to deny the germ of truth which it will contain, or the child may conclude that she is talking against the facts, and is either ignorant or trying to conceal the truth. Many a mother has said in despair, "My boy of nine knows more about these ...
— The Renewal of Life; How and When to Tell the Story to the Young • Margaret Warner Morley
... a Utopian idea, very likely, as human nature is made; full of that native optimism which was always overflowing and drowning his gloomier logic. Clearly he forgot his despair of humanity when he formulated that document, and there is a world of unselfish hope ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... wanted to know whether a sixty-year-old bird was likely to stand "sauce" from a ten-year-old monkey. Now Susan D. had caught her frock on a bramble, and torn a long, jagged rent across the front breadth, that filled Margaret with despair. Poor Susan D.! By afternoon, Miss Sophronia had taken her into custody, and marched her off to her own room, ...
— Margaret Montfort • Laura E. Richards
... the boulder bank in search of a more propitious spot. Then we followed down again. Each place promised at a distance, and baulked hope at hand. At last, in despair, we came to a halt opposite the widest and shallowest part, and after no end of urging, one of the porters stripped, and, armed with his pole, ventured in. The channel lay well over to the farther side; thrice he got to its nearer edge and thrice he turned back, as the rush of water became ...
— Noto, An Unexplored Corner of Japan • Percival Lowell
... what does it matter?" replied Phineas, in despair. "There is the fact. I could not do it. Do you remember the story of Conachar in the 'Fair Maid of Perth;'—how his heart refused to give him blood enough to fight? He had been suckled with the milk of a timid creature, and, though he ...
— Phineas Finn - The Irish Member • Anthony Trollope
... be dead and in his grave without my knowing it!" Randalin cried in despair, and her voice made it quite clear that "he" no longer meant the King. Since there was no one to see it, she even allowed her head to fall forward on her arms, and let the ache in her throat ease itself in a little ...
— The Ward of King Canute • Ottilie A. Liljencrantz
... even while he clung to this hope, the monk's heart sunk within him, as, looking in every direction from which the expected succours might arrive, he could neither see nor hear the slightest token which announced their approach. In a frame of mind approaching more nearly to despair than to hope, the old man continued alternately to tell his beads, to gaze anxiously around, and to address some words of consolation in broken phrases to the young lady, until the general shout of the Welsh, ringing from the bank of the river to the battlements of the ...
— The Betrothed • Sir Walter Scott
... with an exhibition of coquetry of the sort that drives men to despair, "I have a most violent desire to know this secret. To-morrow it may be that I will not ...
— Sarrasine • Honore de Balzac
... flaming ruin is poured forth into the deep. The Victor, ensconced in his omnipotence, is fiercely triumphant; and in the dark below there is the dull gleam of unconquered pride, deadly courage, and immortal despair. But in the midst of all this vast rivalry of interests and jar of opposed systems, a cry is heard, like that muffled cry which caught Macbeth's ear as he nerved himself for his last fight. It is the cry of the human soul, left ...
— Milton • Sir Walter Alexander Raleigh
... tremendous final effort. It was almost one o'clock when it started, and it was made against the whole front of our XXth Corps. It was certainly made in unexpected strength and with a courage beyond praise. The Turk threw himself forward to the assault with the violence of despair, and his impetuous onrush enabled him to get into some small elements of our front line; but counter-attacks immediately organised drove him out. Over the greater portion of the front the advance was stopped dead, but in some places the ...
— How Jerusalem Was Won - Being the Record of Allenby's Campaign in Palestine • W.T. Massey
... by their construction to an easy statement of their contents, if those contents by their fulness must be of necessity the despair of critic and reviewer. First there is the life of the Saint, then the discussion of the manuscripts and versions which delineate the Saint and his literary remains. These are followed by exhaustive discussions upon all that tells for or against their genuineness, the whole being treated both historically ...
— The Quarterly Review, Volume 162, No. 324, April, 1886 • Various
... varmint!" he said, and went off to pick up his loaves and go about his business. Cyril, impeded by Jane, could do nothing without hurting her, for she clung round his legs with the strength of despair. The baker's boy went off red and damp about the face; abusive to the last, he called them a pack of silly idiots, and disappeared round the corner. Then Jane's grasp loosened. Cyril turned away in silent dignity to ...
— Five Children and It • E. Nesbit
... cry of despair, was wafted through space; and as if the shrieks of anguish had driven away the clouds, the veil which hid the moon was cleated away and the gray sails and dark shrouds of the felucca were plainly visible ...
— Twenty Years After • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... not despair over the discovery that no one seemed to know of Binhart or his movements. He merely waited his time, and extended new ramifications into newer territory. His word still carried its weight of official authority. There was ...
— Never-Fail Blake • Arthur Stringer
... perfect stranger, as 'the reader' usually is, but to reserve a part for the fireside, and the use of one's most beloved friends; else I could torment the reader by a longer succession of numbers, and perhaps drive him to despair. But one more of the series, viz., No. 6, as a parting gage d' amitie, he must positively permit me to drop into his pocket. Supposing, then, that No. 5 were surmounted, and that, supernaturally, you knew the value to a hair's breadth, of every separate ...
— Theological Essays and Other Papers v1 • Thomas de Quincey
... without any hopes of relief, rejecting the fairest terms of capitulation and service, till they were lost in the flames. They died in obedience to the commands of their prince; and such examples of loyalty and valor might excite their countrymen to deeds of equal despair and more prosperous event. The instant demolition of the works of Petra confessed the astonishment and apprehension of the conqueror. A Spartan would have praised and pitied the virtue of these heroic slaves; but the tedious warfare and alternate success of the Roman and Persian arms cannot ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 4 • Edward Gibbon
... consoled in his last hour by the reflection that he had always maintained his family liberally, and had tried to be a kind and indulgent husband and father; and he hoped that his daughter, thus left alone in the world without any earthly protector, would not wholly despair, but would strive for his sake to bear up against adversity, and prove herself worthy of the father who had lost his life in trying to serve her in his old age. And so farewell! His eyes were now about to close for the last time upon the scenes of this earth. Signed ELIAS HANCHETT, M.D., with ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XII, No. 28. July, 1873. • Various
... went home then; and he told his mother what sport he had had, and how Mr. Hawk had at last flown away in despair. "I hope he'll come back again ...
— The Tale of Frisky Squirrel • Arthur Scott Bailey
... thrown so high upon the rocks, and so filled with water, that the boat-keepers were unable to get her off, or to heave out the water, and so much tossed by the surges that they expected every minute to have her stove to pieces. In this extremity the seamen were almost in despair. Without the boat it was impossible for them to return on board. They had no carpenters, no tools, and no wood, with which to repair their boat, as there was no wood whatever on the island. They were all ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume X • Robert Kerr
... least not beyond human sympathy. As the wrecked sailors looked shoreward, and saw, through the thick haze of snow and sleet, the red light of the fire and the tall figure of the woman passing to and fro before it, a faint hope took the place of the utter despair which had prompted them to let go their hold and drop into the seething waters, that opened and closed about them like the jaws of death. But the day wore on, bringing no abatement of the storm that tore through the ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier
... indeed, the female part of our crew hesitated for some time; and well they might, for no sooner had we shoved from the shore than a leak was discovered which threatened serious consequences. It gained rapidly; the old Lady above mentioned was in despair, and sat with her thumb crammed over the spouting orifice the whole time, while a young man baled with his shoes as fast as possible. This was not all. The Stream carried us down, and our driver—no ...
— Before and after Waterloo - Letters from Edward Stanley, sometime Bishop of Norwich (1802;1814;1814) • Edward Stanley
... poor, because they have no leisure to mourn their departed relatives, and necessity obliges them to labour through their severest afflictions: but is not active employment the best remedy for overwhelming sorrow—the surest antidote for despair? It may be a rough comforter: it may seem hard to be harassed with the cares of life when we have no relish for its enjoyments; to be goaded to labour when the heart is ready to break, and the vexed spirit implores for rest only to weep in silence: but is not labour better than the rest we covet? ...
— Agnes Grey • Anne Bronte
... scrape your sinful wretchedness off your soul with words of prayer?" exclaimed someone loudly, almost with despair in his voice. ...
— Foma Gordyeff - (The Man Who Was Afraid) • Maxim Gorky
... And in less than half an hour the speaker is kneeling by the body on the grass; and those who found it, with others who have gathered round even in this solitude, are waiting for the first authoritative word of possible hope. Not despair, with a look like that on the face of a Fellow of the Royal ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan
... for nothing. The Indian sentinel would hear, would gaze, would be curious, would suspect, would approach; and then—death to two scouts, despair for the island. ...
— Boys' Book of Frontier Fighters • Edwin L. Sabin
... reckless fashion. One of them dropped a burning torch on his neighbor and set fire to his clothes; this led to a fight which soon became general, and they began to bang one another right and left with anything that came to hand. Blood was flowing freely and the dragoman was in despair. He rushed into a stable and came out with a wooden pitchfork with which he drove them back, ...
— A Fantasy of Mediterranean Travel • S. G. Bayne
... to bring in an armful from the pile over by the sugar-boiler. Well, the plan had been an insane one, hopeless from the first. But, at least, it had been a plan. The failure of it seemed to leave her tortured brain a blank. But the cold—that was an impression that pierced her despair. She went to the bunk, and covered the sleeping baby with warm blankets. As she leaned over him, she heard the bear again, sniffing, sniffing along the crack at the bottom of the door. She almost laughed—that the beast should want anything more after all that sugar! Then she ...
— The House in the Water - A Book of Animal Stories • Charles G. D. Roberts
... prophet He becomes the companion of Elijah Character and appearance of Elisha War between Ahab and Benhadad Naboth and his vineyard Chagrin and melancholy of Ahab Wickedness and cunning of Jezebel Murder of Naboth Dreadful rebuke of Elijah Despair of Ahab Athaliah and Jehoshaphat Death of Ahab Regency of Jezebel Ahaziah and Elijah Fall of Ramoth-Gilead Reaction to idolatry Jehu Death of Jezebel Death of Ahaziah The massacres and reforms of Jehu Extermination of idolatry Last days of ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume II • John Lord
... was so lost in the contemplation of your beautiful soul, that only to see you left me hardly anything further to imagine. And I should not now have dared to address you if I had not heard that you were leaving. What misery has that one word brought upon me! Indeed, it is my despair that has shown me the extent of my attachment—it is unbounded. Mademoiselle, you will never know—at least, I hope you may never know—the anguish of dreading lest you should lose the only happiness that has dawned on you on earth, the only thing that has thrown ...
— Louis Lambert • Honore de Balzac
... sale), and Mr. Hammerdown is sitting on the great mahogany dining-tables, in the dining-room below, waving the ivory hammer, and employing all the artifices of eloquence, enthusiasm, entreaty, reason, despair; shouting to his people; satirizing Mr. Davids for his sluggishness; inspiriting Mr. Moss into action; imploring, commanding, bellowing, until down comes the hammer like fate, and we pass to the next lot. O Dives, who ...
— Vanity Fair • William Makepeace Thackeray
... gray melancholy light, yet the waters of the river boiled angrily as if touched by a raging tempest. The billows rose foaming above its surface, all white with the whiteness of fear. When they sank back again, they were black—black as despair that knows ...
— Mother Earth, Vol. 1 No. 1, March 1906 • Various
... casket had opened wide, and from under a hideous heap of fear, disgust, lost illusions, and despair, hope had sprung, spreading her iridescent wings in ...
— Leonie of the Jungle • Joan Conquest
... beside him, and a quantity of silver coins began to roll in all directions. The nervous old lady of the bags and bundles had dropped her purse, and now she stood gazing at her scattered wealth, the very image of despair. ...
— Cab and Caboose - The Story of a Railroad Boy • Kirk Munroe
... renewed determination to oppose the enemy—a determination which displayed itself later in the fighting at Sannaspost, Moester's Hoek, and Wepener. Kruger found the burghers in the Free State in the depths of despair; when he departed they were as confident of ultimate victory as they were on the day war was begun. The old man had the faculty of leading men as it is rarely found. In times of peace he led men by force of argument as much as by reason of personal magnetism. In war-time he led men by mere words ...
— With the Boer Forces • Howard C. Hillegas
... feel the full extent of the fatal intelligence she had received, and the immediate bearing it must have upon her happiness, her rights, and those of her child. As by degrees the full measure of her misery unfolded to her comprehension, she fell into no paroxysm of angry grief; she vented her despair in no revilings against the guilty Greville. Sorrowfully indeed, but calmly, she requested to be made acquainted with the whole ...
— Theresa Marchmont • Mrs Charles Gore
... talent, and frugality. The brotherhood of genius will not refuse the need of merit, and within the sweep of our constant observations great artists, musicians, poets, and orators are more than hinted possibilities. We would be criminals to despair. The Negro is here, and here to stay, and traveling rapidly in "the wake of coming ages." We know not how far the goal may still be distant, but at least we think we see it and our most fervent hope is to approach it more and ...
— Masterpieces of Negro Eloquence - The Best Speeches Delivered by the Negro from the days of - Slavery to the Present Time • Various
... eternity, I reached the summit of the slope; the tiger was a mere speck along the line. I rushed after it as fast as I could go, stumbling, half falling, pulling myself together, and tearing on, and the faster I went the quicker moved the great white figure. A feeling of despair seized me; all my fondness for my wife became intensified tenfold, and was revealed to me then in its true nature; she was the one great tie that made life dear to me. Even my love for Eric paled away before the blinding affection I bore her. I tore madly ...
— Animal Ghosts - Or, Animal Hauntings and the Hereafter • Elliott O'Donnell
... Evander," and several other pictures yet to be mentioned, Giorgione stopped short at his work, unwilling to labour at an uncongenial task (as, perhaps, in the present case), or from some feeling of dissatisfaction at the result, nay, even despair of ever ...
— Giorgione • Herbert Cook
... STORY. Costanza loveth Martuccio Gomito and hearing that he is dead, embarketh for despair alone in a boat, which is carried by the wind to Susa. Finding her lover alive at Tunis, she discovereth herself to him and he, being great in favour with the king for counsels given, espouseth her and returneth rich with ...
— The Decameron of Giovanni Boccaccio • Giovanni Boccaccio
... back exhausted and no ship is in sight the shepherd's pipe keeps wandering through his brain with strange, weird, terrible effect, mixing with fragments of other themes; he gathers strength, and his despair rises to frenzy as he curses himself—"'Twas I by whom [the draught] was brewed"—to a phrase overwhelming in its intensity of ...
— Richard Wagner - Composer of Operas • John F. Runciman
... then you don't know what it means to receive a lot of overdue bills. [Reads one of the letters] The rent unpaid—the landlord acting nasty—my wife in despair. And here am I sitting waist-high in gold! [He opens an iron-banded box that stands on the table; then both sit down at the table, facing each other] Just look—here I have six thousand crowns' worth of gold which I have dug up in the last fortnight. This bracelet ...
— Plays by August Strindberg, Second series • August Strindberg
... Kate was in despair. She could not understand that her Wolfgang could find pleasure in having such playfellows. Moreover, he was exactly like the others that day, taciturn and awkward. Even when they commenced to look for the eggs, the ...
— The Son of His Mother • Clara Viebig
... king's children, and it behooved them to carry themselves as such in the presence of the enemy. Wherefore did they neither cry nor grieve (outwardly), nor sulk, nor cast themselves down or about with despair or rage. They just sat down side by side, and put their heads together, and stared with haughty insolence at the common crowd, "the lesser breeds without the law," who gathered to inspect them. It is not every day men get a chance ...
— The Way of the Wild • F. St. Mars
... grow older, we decrease as individuals, and as if in an immense audience who hear stirring music, none essays to offer a new stave, but we only join emphatically in the chorus. We volunteer no opinion, we despair of guiding people, but are confirmed in our perception that Nature is all right, and that we have a good understanding with it. We must shine to a few brothers, as palms or pines or roses among common weeds, not from greater absolute ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... have liked to win her clothes and food by his labour; and hearing himself speaking of love and seeing her as a maiden with the May time about her, his dreams drifted until the ticking of the clock forced him to remember that he could tell her nothing now of all his romance, so with pain and despair at heart he wrote, ...
— Spring Days • George Moore
... and chase him. The boy fled, and his flying feet hardly seemed to touch the earth, but Maharaj with long swinging strides covered the ground much faster, and in a few moments there followed a shriek of despair and Tippoo was struggling helplessly fifteen feet in the air in the grasp of that ...
— Adventures in Many Lands • Various
... fair, with rather dark eyebrows, grey eyes and the mouth and chin characteristic of Burne-Jones's and Rossetti's pictures. But though she might be in appearance a Burne-Jones, she was very modern. His favourite little photograph of her that he had shown, in his moment of despair, to Dulcie, showed a charming face, sensuous yet thoughtful, under a large hat. She had fur up to her chin, and was holding a muff; it was a snapshot taken the winter ...
— Love at Second Sight • Ada Leverson
... makes a difference, doesn't it?" Allie said. "'A difference'!" Gray flung aloft his hands in exaggerated despair. "Heaven help me! I am inspired; I have a flash of genius, a divine impulse, and with a magic pass I work a miracle. I transform you from something somber, dark, morose, into a creature of life, of passion, ...
— Flowing Gold • Rex Beach
... making gestures expressive of an important member of the party who had been especially charged to be on hand in ample time; who had outraged every moral principle by failing to keep his appointment; whose whereabouts could not be even remotely surmised; whose absence was the equivalent of ruin and despair—a far less complex series of concepts, I may add, than a southern Frenchman is capable of expressing with his head and his body and ...
— The Christmas Kalends of Provence - And Some Other Provencal Festivals • Thomas A. Janvier
... from Thebes with what is perhaps a copy of a single Cretan hieroglyph, a vase; but again, nothing bilingual. A list of "Keftian words" occurs at the head of a papyrus, also in the British Museum, but they appear to be nonsense, a mere imitation of the sounds of a strange tongue. Still we need not despair of finding the much desired Cretan-Egyptian bilingual inscription yet. Perhaps the double text of a treaty between Crete and Egypt, like that of Ramses II with the Hittites, may come to light. Meanwhile we can only do our best with the means at our hand to trace out the history ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, And Assyria In The Light Of Recent Discovery • L.W. King and H.R. Hall
... opinions prevail that the balance of the several parties is lost, and one of them obtains an irresistible preponderance, overpowers all obstacles, harasses its opponents, and appropriates all the resources of society to its own purposes. The vanquished citizens despair of success and they conceal their dissatisfaction in silence and in general apathy. The nation seems to be governed by a single principle, and the prevailing party assumes the credit of having restored peace and unanimity to ...
— Democracy In America, Volume 1 (of 2) • Alexis de Tocqueville
... Elsie was almost in despair; but Herbert, who was lying on a sofa, reading, suddenly shut his book, saying, "I tell you what, Elsie! tell us one of those nice fairy stories ...
— Holidays at Roselands • Martha Finley
... you think," deprecated Henchard running after, almost bowed down with despair as he perceived the image of unscrupulous villainy that he assumed in his former friend's eyes. "But I am not what you think!" he cried hoarsely. "Believe me, Farfrae; I have come entirely on your own and your wife's ...
— The Mayor of Casterbridge • Thomas Hardy
... to reach our new discovered port, and take refuge at the former secure anchorage near the Shag Rocks; for this gale was more violent and of longer continuance than any of the preceding. This long succession of adverse winds caused us almost to despair of accomplishing the principal object of the voyage; for of the twelve weeks, to which our absence from Port Packson was limited, nearly eight were ...
— A Voyage to Terra Australis • Matthew Flinders
... despair. He had a keen eye and a collected mind, infused with a fiery spirit. Where his line had been weakened he sent new troops. With charge after charge he drove the Confederates out of the gap and closed it up. A whole division was then hurled with its full weight against the Southern ...
— The Tree of Appomattox • Joseph A. Altsheler
... prophets of hope and of victory. The dark message of defeat and despair has also had its full expression. Satiety with material good, disappointment of inward joy, the loss of the old objects of adoration and trust, have inspired utterances in every key of gloom, impotence, despondency verging toward suicide. Schopenhauer ...
— The Chief End of Man • George S. Merriam
... slip from an Army Book 136, in Harville's neat cramped handwriting. And the message itself was formal enough: a plain bald statement of a situation that contained heroism, drama, a fight against odds—despair, probably, were the truth known; but despair crowned with the halo of glory and self-sacrifice. ...
— Pushed and the Return Push • George Herbert Fosdike Nichols, (AKA Quex)
... a sultana, but I—I shall be dead and I shall never see you again." And the good Crenmitz in despair huddled herself into a corner of the cab so that she ...
— The Nabob • Alphonse Daudet
... the children of the men who carried the great Civil War to a triumphant conclusion, praise the God of our fathers that the ignoble counsels of peace were rejected; that the suffering and loss, the blackness of sorrow and despair were unflinchingly faced, and the years of strife endured; for in the end the slave was freed, the Union restored, and the mighty American republic placed once more as a ...
— Successful Methods of Public Speaking • Grenville Kleiser
... which is three-thirds in the heart, and out of the heart are the issues of life; the heart is often wiser than the head. Do not under-value and never despise the value of the greatness of heart in the boy; for Great Heart is the only champion who ever killed Giant Despair. ...
— Parent and Child Vol. III., Child Study and Training • Mosiah Hall
... mentioned. The splendid buildings which arose in every part of the Holy Land announced the triumph of the new faith in the country where it had its origin; exciting at once the pride of the Christian, and the jealousy, resentment, and despair of the Jew. The government of Constantius was not more favourable to the children of Israel; nor was it till the accession of Julian that they were encouraged to look for revenge upon their enemies, if not for protection to their despised ...
— Palestine or the Holy Land - From the Earliest Period to the Present Time • Michael Russell
... happen, they at first produce dissatisfaction and bitterness, and in the home life this mood finds its first expression when daily, every hour, demands are made by wife and children for the most pressing needs, needs that the husband can not satisfy. Out of despair, he visits the saloon, and seeks comfort in bad liquor. The last penny is spent. Quarrel and dissension break out. The ruin of both marriage ...
— Woman under socialism • August Bebel
... Reminds thee; then, in subtle mockery, Thou smilest at the window where I wait, Who bade thee ride for life. In empty state My days go on, while false hours prophesy Thy quick return; at last, in sad despair, I cease to bid thee, leave thee free as air; When lo, thou stand'st before me glad and fleet, And lay'st undreamed-of treasures at my feet. Ah! messenger, thy royal blood to buy I am too poor. Thou art the king, ...
— The Golden Treasury of American Songs and Lyrics • Various
... monasticism, many Christian disciples voluntarily abandoned their wealth, renounced marriage and adopted an ascetic mode of life, while still living in or near the villages or cities. As the corruption of society and the despair of men became more widespread, these anxious Christians wandered farther and farther away from fixed habitations until, in an excess of spiritual fervor, they found themselves in the caves of the mountains, ...
— A Short History of Monks and Monasteries • Alfred Wesley Wishart
... while the banker, terror and despair written upon his pale features, stood staring like one who saw ...
— The Minister of Evil - The Secret History of Rasputin's Betrayal of Russia • William Le Queux
... bark off any tree, is a sign to a maiden of an approaching loss of a character; to a married woman, of a family bereavement; and to a man, of an accession of fortune. To dream of a leafless tree, is a sign of great sorrow; and of a branchless trunk, a sign of despair and suicide. The elder-tree is more auspicious to the sleeper; while the fir-tree, better still, betokens all manner of comfort and prosperity. The lime-tree predicts a voyage across the ocean; while the yew and the alder are ominous ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions - Vol. I • Charles Mackay
... would he confide himself; alone would he release the prisoner, and give her up to Heinrich. He thought upon the future, and yet darker and heavier than hitherto it stood before him. But he who confides in God can never despair the only thing that was now to be done was to obtain the key of the chamber where Sidsel was confined, and then when all in the house were asleep he would dare that ...
— O. T. - A Danish Romance • Hans Christian Andersen
... the words together and speaking with a parrot-like monotony in an unnaturally high-pitched key. Then his voice began to quaver a little till he stopped short with a cry of despair—"I cannot mind the words, I cannot say my prayers. Oh! will nobody say them for me? If mother, as is not in Lon'on, were here, she would do it fast," he ended, flinging out one thin arm and clutching convulsively at the air in a kind ...
— A Houseful of Girls • Sarah Tytler
... are not Puritans, and daily invite them to an association with them against the Puritans, as Parker(331) showeth out of a treatise entitled, Concertatio Ecclesiae Catholicae in Anglia contra Calvino Papistos et Puritanos. And we may perceive out of Franciscus a Sancta Clara,(332) that they despair of any agreement with Puritans, yet hoping that Formalists will agree with them. In these hopes they are still more and more confirmed whilst they observe this conformity in ceremonies to be yet prevailing and proceeding, and not like to take a stand. Whereupon ...
— The Works of Mr. George Gillespie (Vol. 1 of 2) • George Gillespie
... no end. Books he had inherited, books he had bought with money pinched from household expenses, and presentation books by the score. All were jumbled together in a confusion that delighted him, but which would have been the despair of an orderly mind. His rare and well-nigh complete collection of books on Horace and of editions of the poet had the place of honor in his library, with the rest nowhere in particular and everywhere in general. Hundreds of his books bear the autographs of their respective ...
— Eugene Field, A Study In Heredity And Contradictions - Vol. I • Slason Thompson
... Edith gave her heart. But the mother rejected him with anger and scorn. He was not rich, though belonging to a family of high character, and so fell far below her requirements. Under a pressure that almost drove the girl to despair, she gave her consent to a marriage that looked more terrible than death. A month before the time fixed for, its consummation, she barred the contract by ...
— Cast Adrift • T. S. Arthur
... there was no doubt that the ship was keeping away. Still, should anyone on board be using a spy-glass, and turn it towards us, we should, we hoped, be observed. We waved and shouted even more vehemently than before, but even I was almost in despair. ...
— Peter Trawl - The Adventures of a Whaler • W. H. G. Kingston
... you don't care, Grace...It seems incredible because I care so much. Grace!" His accent was that of utter despair. "How can I lose you since you are everything? What would be left to live for? Nobody else sympathizes with my aims. Who but you understands? Oh, nobody will ever ...
— Fran • John Breckenridge Ellis
... sitting down to table, had his horses saddled, and galloped off to the scene of the disaster, accompanied by Count Gamba and his suite. Women and children wept and moaned, the crowd each moment increased, lamentations were heard on all sides, but, whether from despair or laziness, none came forward. Generous anger overcame Lord Byron at this scene of woe and shame; he leapt from his horse, and, grasping the necessary implements, began with his own hands the work of setting free the poor creatures, who were there buried alive. His example aroused ...
— My Recollections of Lord Byron • Teresa Guiccioli
... "Letters from the Dead." Andersen's lack of style and violations of syntax were rather maliciously commented upon. If Gabriel's trump had sounded from the top of the Round Tower, it would not have startled Andersen more. He was in despair. Like the great child he was, he went about craving sympathy, and weeping when he ...
— Essays on Scandinavian Literature • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen
... English to attack. A few shells having been thrown into it, the Chinese evacuated the place during the night, and with many of the inhabitants fled into the country. Several persons were found to have been killed, and the governor of the town drowned himself in despair. Chusan was held for some months, at the cost of the lives of many of the soldiers, who suffered from the poisonous exhalations from the paddy-fields, having nothing to do to employ their minds; while the seamen of the Melville, which had been hove down for ...
— How Britannia Came to Rule the Waves - Updated to 1900 • W.H.G. Kingston
... his foot. The log is fastened to the chain, so it troubles him. Still on he comes. I can keep ahead, on account of the log, but the log slips off the chain. So now he comes faster. I run, I fly. I see him draw near. He looks diabolical. I despair. I see this tree like the mast broken off in the storm. I learn to climb well when I sail on the ship. I rush to the tree with the moose bull close behind me. I drop my mittens, I seize hold of the rough ...
— Winter Adventures of Three Boys • Egerton R. Young
... would I not have given to be able to see her once more, even for an instant—to say "a good bye"—to watch the feeling with which she parted from me, and augur from it either favourably to my heart's dearest hope, or darkest despair. As I continued to read on, the kindly tone of the remainder reassured me, and when I came to the invitation to London, which plainly argued a wish on their part to perpetuate the intimacy, I was obliged to read it again and again, before I could convince myself of its reality. There it was, however, ...
— The Confessions of Harry Lorrequer, Complete • Charles James Lever (1806-1872)
... after a bill has been sent to him for signing that he "cannot approve it," it is no reason to give up in despair. Many an executive approval has been snatched at the last moment, as a brand from the burning. Ask for a hearing before the bill is acted upon. At the hearing, and before it and after, the People who wish the bill to become a law must express themselves,—by ...
— Our Vanishing Wild Life - Its Extermination and Preservation • William T. Hornaday
... words terminated the story it would have been nearly perfect. Two more pages of the luckless lover's progress to resignation from despair and projected suicide seem to me to blunt ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 2 - To the Close of the 19th Century • George Saintsbury
... political building no better than the builders of Babel; we shall be divided by our little, partial, local interests; our projects will be confounded, and we ourselves shall become a reproach and a by-word down to future ages. And, what is worse, mankind may hereafter, from this unfortunate instance, despair of establishing government by human wisdom, and leave it to chance, war, and conquest. I therefore beg leave to move, that henceforth prayers, imploring the assistance of Heaven, and its blessing on our deliberations, be held in this assembly every morning ...
— The Printer Boy. - Or How Benjamin Franklin Made His Mark. An Example for Youth. • William M. Thayer
... paralysed grass-hoppers, which are invariably dragged into the burrow by their antennae. When these were cut off close to the head, the Sphex seized the palpi; but when these were likewise cut off, the attempt to drag its prey into the burrow was given up in despair. The Sphex had not intelligence enough to seize one of the six legs or the ovipositor of the grasshopper, which, as M. Fabre remarks, would have served equally well. So again, if the paralysed prey with an egg attached to it be taken out of the cell, the Sphex after entering ...
— The Formation of Vegetable Mould through the action of worms with • Charles Darwin
... dragged the Emperor Valerian in disgraceful captivity to Ctesiphon, his capital. Sapor II. was the conqueror of the Emperor Julian, and Chrosroes was an equally formidable adversary. In the year 617 A.D. Persian warriors advanced to the walls of Constantinople, and drove the Emperor Heraclius to despair. ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume IV • John Lord
... and we voted that he was discontented and out of humor because his betrothed bride was not with him. His room was next to the sick man's, to whom he gave all possible care and attention, for poor Hallberg, besides being ill, was in despair at giving so much trouble in a strange house. D'Effernay tried to calm him on this point; he nursed him, amused him with conversation, mixed his medicines, and, in fact, showed more kindness and tenderness, than any of us would ...
— The International Weekly Miscellany, Volume I. No. 9. - Of Literature, Art, and Science, August 26, 1850 • Various
... regiments on our right were retreating. I was astounded, for we were expecting an order to advance instantly. At that moment Lieutenant Handy, an aide of our brigade commander, rode up, pale, excited, his hands flung up as if in despair. My men were springing ...
— Lights and Shadows in Confederate Prisons - A Personal Experience, 1864-5 • Homer B. Sprague
... on spikes of lavender, on heads of thistle, or field eryngo, or globe-thistle, according to the season. Most of my prisoners do well on this diet and seem scarcely affected by their internment; others pine away and die in two or three days. These victims of despair nearly always throw me back, because of the difficulty of obtaining the ...
— More Hunting Wasps • J. Henri Fabre
... fighting, hand to hand. Alexander was once in great danger, but was saved by Clitus, the son of his nurse Lanika. The Persians broke and dispersed so entirely that no army was left in Asia Minor, and the satrap Arsaces killed himself in despair. ...
— Aunt Charlotte's Stories of Greek History • Charlotte M. Yonge
... his legs!" he commanded and Tom with a flash of comprehension obeyed unquestioningly. His weight on Jack's feet enabled the captain to lean far over the rail and grasp the wrists of a clinging figure gripping with the tenacity of despair the links of the cable that still ...
— Boy Scouts in Southern Waters • G. Harvey Ralphson
... escaping—but, alas! Downy had so long been used to do nothing but eat and enjoy herself, that she was no longer able to run as swiftly as she used to do; she dared not even move a step, and sat in an agony of hopeless despair. ...
— Little Downy - The History of A Field-Mouse • Catharine Parr Traill
... came a change. To use the words of the immortal Dickens, "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times; it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness; it was the season of light, it was the season of darkness; it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair; we had everything before us, we had nothing before us; we were all going direct to heaven, we were all going direct the other way." These utterances of inspiration so fittingly describing the period that ...
— Leah Mordecai • Mrs. Belle Kendrick Abbott
... she interrupted, with mock despair in her face. "Besides, I said we cannot discuss it. It requires no learned argument to move me, one way or the other. I can ...
— Truxton King - A Story of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... to the traitor, and placed under Lieutenant-General Gallas, till a new generalissimo could be appointed. In order to bring back the seduced and deluded to their duty, and not to drive the guilty to despair, a general amnesty was proclaimed, in regard to all offences against the imperial majesty ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... and, with a gesture of despair, Penelope sank forward on a little table beside her chair and sobbed hysterically, her ...
— Possessed • Cleveland Moffett
... To such attainments, were those in power but to bestow the crumbs from the national table to cherish the fine arts, we might pledge ourselves, that the genius of Britain would, in a few years, dispute the prize with the proudest periods of Grecian or Italian art. But, Gentlemen, let us not despair; we have heard from this place, the promise of patronage from the Prince Regent, the propitious light of a morning that will open into perfect day, invigorating the growth of all around—the assurance of a new era ...
— The Life, Studies, And Works Of Benjamin West, Esq. • John Galt
... were at last compelled to shut themselves up in their strong fortress, which the Sabines attempted to take, but in vain. So steep were the rocks on which it stood, so strong were the walls, that the Sabines must have given up their attempt in despair, had it not been for the treachery of Tarpeia, the governor's daughter. She looked down from the fortress into the Sabine host, and she noticed that, whilst with their right arms the Sabines held their swords, on their left arms were hung massive ...
— The King's Cup-Bearer • Amy Catherine Walton
... week was dreadful. I began with too many children, and we had six whom the mothers afterwards confessed they sent to wean. These not only cried themselves, but set all the others crying also, and we regretted having begun the experiment. At length, driven almost to despair, it became evident that something new must be done to still the tumult. As an expedient, I elevated a cap on a pole, which immediately attracted their attention and occasioned silence. Thus I obtained a clue to guide me, and my mind instantly perceived one of the ...
— The Infant System - For Developing the Intellectual and Moral Powers of all Children, - from One to Seven years of Age • Samuel Wilderspin
... the two women sat still, waiting the doctor's coming, and Liza lay gazing vacantly at the wall, panting for breath. Sometimes Jim crossed her mind, and she opened her mouth to call for him, but in her despair she restrained herself. ...
— Liza of Lambeth • W. Somerset Maugham
... possession of the golden Ring—that symbol of all earthly power, and also of the greatest dangers to himself as long as it lies in the hands of his enemies. The fear of the end and the twilight of all gods overcomes him, as also the despair at being able only to await the end without opposing it. He is in need of the free and fearless man who, without his advice or assistance—even in a struggle against gods—can accomplish single-handed what is denied to ...
— Thoughts out of Season (Part One) • Friedrich Nietzsche
... came, and then school was over. It was the long vacation. Winifred Inger went away to London. Ursula was left alone in Cossethay. A terrible, outcast, almost poisonous despair possessed her. It was no use doing anything, or being anything. She had no connection with other people. Her lot was isolated and deadly. There was nothing for her anywhere, but this black disintegration. Yet, within all the great attack of disintegration upon her, she remained herself. It was ...
— The Rainbow • D. H. (David Herbert) Lawrence
... exhibit to the General a flattering picture of the prosperity of France; and she reported to me, as follows, that part of the conversation which was peculiarly calculated to irritate Bonaparte:—"'I do not despair of the safety of the Republic, which I am certain can restrain her enemies both abroad and at home.' As Bernadotte uttered these last words,'" continued Josephine, "his glance made me shudder. One word more and Bonaparte could have commanded himself no longer! It is true," added she, "that it was ...
— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne
... so. I'm glad she writes at all. You don't know what it is to believe that God does not love you; to pray and have no answer; to be in despair." ...
— Miss Prudence - A Story of Two Girls' Lives. • Jennie Maria (Drinkwater) Conklin
... the scandal arising from their intimacy—when at the moment that he made such a proposition, and the veil fell down and revealed the heart of man in its selfishness, it is not to be wondered that, with bitter tears, arising from wounded love, anger, and despair at her hopeless position, she consented. After having lost all she valued, what did she care for the future? It was but one sacrifice more to make, one more proof of her devotion and obedience. But there are few women who, like my mother, would have recovered her position to the ...
— Percival Keene • Frederick Marryat
... to think that someone, a friend, was virtually within reach of me, yet actually as far removed as if an ocean divided us! I tasted the hellish torments of Tantalus. I cursed fate, heaven, everything; I prayed; I sank into bottomless depths of despair and rose to dizzy pinnacles of hope, when a footstep sounded on the landing and a thousand wild possibilities, vague possibilities of rescue, poured into ...
— The Quest of the Sacred Slipper • Sax Rohmer
... disorderly life,—ran races in the long corridors [not so bad a course], dressed themselves in Priests' vestures [which are abundant in such locality], and made travesties and mummeries of Holy Religion; the wretched creatures, defying despair, as buccaneers might when their ship is sinking. To surrender, everything forbids; of escape, there is no possibility. [Archenholtz i. 86; Helden-Geschichte, ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XVIII. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—Seven-Years War Rises to a Height.—1757-1759. • Thomas Carlyle
... two hours he read on and on, deeply absorbed in the tale of that solitary life, his own heart responding to each note of joy or sorrow, of hope or despair, and vibrating to the undertone of loneliness and longing ...
— At the Time Appointed • A. Maynard Barbour
... on the flat-topped division of the seat, a pistol lay; but the fingers of the small white hand which held it were nerveless. In his bearing was no menace—only the unstrung droop of despair. ...
— A Sheaf of Corn • Mary E. Mann
... and all those baskets to fill," cried the girls, in despair; for Merry's contribution had been small, and Molly had only a handful of artificial flowers ...
— Jack and Jill • Louisa May Alcott
... if the disgusting thing is tied under a boy's arms, from whence it may be slipped down over the hips and the knees to the ground, by a certain familiar twist of the body, the case is not absolutely hopeless. But Jimmy Sears's apron strings were tied about his neck; so his despair was black and abysmal. Once in a while Jimmy's bosom became too heavily freighted, and he paused to sigh. He cheered himself up on these occasions by slyly licking the churn-dasher; but the good cheer on the dasher was a stimulant that left him more miserable than it ...
— The Court of Boyville • William Allen White
... on Ginevra's birthday, her mother, in despair at the estrangement which, day by day, assumed a more serious character, meditated an attempt to reconcile the father and daughter, by help of the memories of this family anniversary. They were all three sitting in Bartolomeo's study. Ginevra guessed her mother's intention by the timid hesitation ...
— Vendetta • Honore de Balzac
... the traveling-bag, which at last, in despair of any thing suitable occurring to my mind, I have bought, and now regard with a sort of apprehensive joy. The blinds are half lowered for the heat, but, through them and under them, the broad gold sunshine is streaming and pushing itself, washing the careful twists of my flax hair, ...
— Nancy - A Novel • Rhoda Broughton
... to sink into paralyzed despair, often broke down when her husband was in town, but she never gave up trying to ...
— The Job - An American Novel • Sinclair Lewis
... I were to be married myself, I should despair ever being able to describe a wedding so well as you have done: had I known your talent before, I would have desired an epithalamium. I believe the Princess[1] will have more beauties bestowed on her by the occasional poets, than even a painter would afford her. They will cook up a ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole - Volume I • Horace Walpole
... against the powers of the world may influence the history of his age; but the fire that purified the fine gold charred and consumed the baser elements; and of those who had hoped the most after 1830, many now sank into despair, or gave up their lives to mere ...
— History of Modern Europe 1792-1878 • C. A. Fyffe
... No. 28 South Barracks, West Point, was the despair of the worthy inspector who spent his days and nights in unsuccessful efforts to keep order among the embryo protectors of his country. Poe, the leader of the quartette that made life interesting in Number 28, was destined never to evolve into patriotic completion. He soon reached the limit of ...
— Literary Hearthstones of Dixie • La Salle Corbell Pickett
... good clothes, neither too large nor too small, which he never seemed to wear out. He was shod with large square shoes with triple soles and silver buckles, which lasted so long that his shoemaker was in despair. Upon his head he wore a large hat which dated from the period when Flanders was separated from Holland, so that this venerable masterpiece was at least forty years old. But what would you have? It is the passions which wear out body as well as ...
— A Winter Amid the Ice - and Other Thrilling Stories • Jules Verne
... life's dilemmas—little dilemmas that irritate ordinary people or in which ordinary people display themselves pusillanimous; or tragic dilemmas that find ordinary people wanting and leave them in vacillation and despair—there was none of any sort that Harry, receiving with his comic, "Mice and Mumps! Mice and Mumps, old girl!" did not receive with the assurance to her that, though this was a nuisance, he had metal and to spare to settle such; that, though ...
— This Freedom • A. S. M. Hutchinson |
