"Distressing" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... becoming civilized. Improvements were being installed in most of the houses. Boarders, which meant mainly school-teachers, preferred a house with Improvements. The abode of the sisters Weston had none. It was half a company house, with a pump in the kitchen which drew up brown water of a distressing odor. ...
— Working With the Working Woman • Cornelia Stratton Parker
... centuries of quiet was given by a series of earthquakes which did an immense amount of damage at Herculaneum and Pompeii; yet in a district which had from time immemorial been subject to similar convulsions of nature, the shocks, though unusually distressing and destructive to life and property, were evidently unconnected in the popular mind with their true cause: the reawakening to life of the mountain overhead. The mischief done by the earthquakes was accordingly repaired as quickly as ...
— The Naples Riviera • Herbert M. Vaughan
... same errand, I presume, my distressed and distressing sister, that has brought you. Have you seen her?" he demanded, with ...
— The Whole Family - A Novel by Twelve Authors • William Dean Howells, Mary E. Wilkins Freeman, Mary Heaton Vorse, Mary Stewart Cutting, Elizabeth Jo
... it a life-rule to wipe out from his memory everything that has been unpleasant, unfortunate. We ought to forget everything that has kept us back, has made us suffer, has been disagreeable, and never allow the hideous pictures of distressing conditions to enter our minds again. There is only one thing to do with a disagreeable, harmful ...
— Pushing to the Front • Orison Swett Marden
... shouting, which, if he had done so even a single moment sooner, must inevitably have frightened the animal still more instead of checking its speed, although disastrous enough to himself as it was, and rendered more melancholy and distressing by reason of the presence of his wife's mother, who was there and saw the sad occurrence, notwithstanding it is at least likely, though not necessarily so, that she should be reconnoitring in another direction when incidents occur, not being vivacious ...
— Editorial Wild Oats • Mark Twain
... Independents, there was the same lack of personal affection, or even of a capability of it—excepting always Mrs. Lane— and, in fact, it was more distressing amongst the Unitarians than amongst the orthodox. The desire for something like sympathy and love absolutely devoured me. I dwelt on all the instances in poetry and history in which one human being had been bound to another human being, ...
— The Autobiography of Mark Rutherford • Mark Rutherford
... removed half of the wet meal to another pan, filled it with water, and set both pans on the stove. Then he poured a stream of cold water into the coffee-pot, which by this time was almost red-hot. The effect was as distressing as it was unexpected. A cloud of scalding steam rushed up into his face and filled the room, the coffee-pot rolled to the floor with a clatter, and there was such a furious hissing and sputtering that poor Winn dropped his bucket of water and staggered ...
— Raftmates - A Story of the Great River • Kirk Munroe
... weight had been removed from his soul Walter moved away. The whole world had suddenly become a different place. Although the calamity of Lola's disappearance was none the less distressing at least on his own particular horizon there no longer loomed the spectre of discharge and all the disgrace that accompanied it. He could have tossed his cap into the air for very joy and gratitude. In his relief he was bursting to talk to somebody, and as he had permission to use ...
— Walter and the Wireless • Sara Ware Bassett
... dark days preceding the fall of Sumter that a crowd of office-seekers gathered at Washington, most of them men who had little interest in anything but the spoils. It is a distressing commentary on the American party system that, during the most critical month of the most critical period of American history, much of the President's time was consumed by these political vampires who would not be put off, even though a revolution was in progress ...
— Abraham Lincoln and the Union - A Chronicle of the Embattled North, Volume 29 In The - Chronicles Of America Series • Nathaniel W. Stephenson
... man's behavior is scrutinized by science, it cannot be other than grim and distressing to the reader. It is this to the writer. But all the really significant facts of life are grim and often repulsive in the material presented. To the "irony of facts" must be ascribed the shadows as well as the high lights. No distortions or speculations can influence the findings of ...
— Crime: Its Cause and Treatment • Clarence Darrow
... in Jesus' might; Against themselves the godless fight, Themselves, not us, distressing; Shame and contempt their lot shall be; God is with us, with him are we: To ...
— ZigZag Journeys in Northern Lands; - The Rhine to the Arctic • Hezekiah Butterworth
... a distressing, hopeless sight, the vessel rising before us like the roof of a house, the deck planks stove in, a horrible jumble of running rigging, booms and spars, blocking the way forward. Aft it was clearer, the top-hamper of the after mast having fallen overboard, smashing a small boat as it fell, but ...
— Wolves of the Sea • Randall Parrish
... in contact with his stepmother, to be compelled to advise her, overlook her expenditures—it was intolerable. At all cost he felt he must get out of it—that is, at all cost save that of exciting and distressing his father. Ah, that was the difficulty! How could he refuse without giving the old man some hint ...
— Juggernaut • Alice Campbell
... There were others who at first glance seemed perfectly normal, but on closer scrutiny revealed the absence of one or more toes or fingers. Others had horribly swollen ears: some had no nose left and were distressing objects; but it was not until we visited the various wards of the hospital that we saw leprosy in all of its horror. Here were dozens of cases so far advanced that they were no longer able to walk; ...
— Wanderings in the Orient • Albert M. Reese
... distressing grief Angela could not get rid of an uncomfortable feeling of awe at the way in which the old man had died. She again saw in vivid shape the picture of that terrible night when she had first seen the Chevalier as a most hardened ...
— Weird Tales, Vol. II. • E. T. A. Hoffmann
... especially before subordinates. Mr. Furze could not have suffered more than two or three days' inconvenience if Orkid Jim had been discharged, but a vague terror haunted him of something which might possibly happen. Partly this distressing weakness is due to the absence of a clear conviction that we are right; it is an intellectual difficulty; but frequently it is simple mushiness of character, the same defect which tempts us, when we know a thing is true, to whittle it down if we meet ...
— Catharine Furze • Mark Rutherford
... fault with it upon its wearer. She was very pale, even to the lips, which were full and parted, as if she must breathe through her mouth. He noticed immediately the shortness of her breath. It was very distressing, and after a little while induced the same thing in himself. And not in him only, but I can fancy that the whole group of them sitting round her where she was crouched against Miranda King's knees, were panting away like steam-engines before they had done ...
— Lore of Proserpine • Maurice Hewlett
... brought none home with me. Those who owed me, for the most part, took advantage of the depreciation, and paid me off with sixpence in the pound. Those to whom I was indebted, I have yet to pay, without other means, if they will wait, than selling part of my estate, or distressing those who were too honest to take advantage of the tender laws to quit scores with me." Should we not all be glad if to-day a hundred or two multi-millionaires could give such an account as that of their losses incurred in the public service, ...
— Four American Leaders • Charles William Eliot
... knows," said Chippo plaintively, "exceptin' that later my clothes was mysteriously dumped at th' billet with the pockets empty. But I think the distressing circumstances are such as warrants me in arsking fer the loan ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 156, April 30, 1919 • Various
... so silent, dearest Edith, and ought not to pull such a melancholy face," said the Colonel's wife, turning to her with a gentle reproach. "I perfectly understand that the sad events of your private life are distressing you. But all personal sorrow should now be merged into the general grief. What is the fate of the individual, when his country is exposed to such danger? I know that you are as good a patriot as any Englishwoman, but it appears to me that it is ...
— The Coming Conquest of England • August Niemann
... that comes with the hope of motherhood—woman's crowning glory; but the joy and happiness had gradually given place to anxiety and fear, and latterly, since it had become impossible for her to hide her condition from those around her, she was filled with trouble and distressing forebodings, Her sensitive nature received continual wounds. Suspicious looks and taunting sneers, innuendos and broad suggestions all came to her with exceeding bitterness. She knew that every day the cloud which hung over her grew blacker ...
— By Berwen Banks • Allen Raine
... the reader will now be directed to letters of Mr. Southey, briefly relating to Mr. Coleridge, and to circumstances connected with the publication of the "Early Recollections of S. T. Coleridge," 1837;—with a reference to the distressing malady with which Mrs. ...
— Reminiscences of Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Robert Southey • Joseph Cottle
... which the attempt exhibits to the demoralising influence of the slave system than to actual hypocrisy. The spectacle of a crowd of learned and no doubt pious men standing forth as the avowed apologists of a system which deprives their fellow-men of all the rights of humanity is, perhaps, the most distressing evidence of its blighting and blinding influence which has yet been exhibited to the world. It ought to have its effect. As we have said, it is the duty of every man to study the lessons which this address of the Confederate clergy has for him. If his sympathy and influence ...
— Narrative of the Life of J.D. Green, a Runaway Slave, from Kentucky • Jacob D. Green
... an occasional home for their brother, could hardly be a fitting residence for the children of strangers. They had, in all likelihood, become silently aware that his habits were such as to render his society at times most undesirable. Possibly, too, they had, by this time, heard distressing rumours concerning the cause of that remorse and agony of mind, which at times made him restless and unnaturally merry, at times rendered him moody ...
— The Life of Charlotte Bronte - Volume 1 • Elizabeth Gaskell
... was engaged, and his mother would not be idle on this occasion. She was a perfect mistress of all the camp qualifications, and thought it a duty incumbent on her to contribute all that lay in her power towards distressing the enemy. With these sentiments she hovered about the skirts of the army, and the troops were no sooner employed in the pursuit, than she began to traverse the field of battle with a poignard and a ...
— The Adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom, Complete • Tobias Smollett
... Grande Armee certainly fewer than 50,000 men—recrossed the Niemen on 13 December, and, in pitiable plight, half-starved and with torn uniforms, took refuge in Germany. Fully half a million lives had been sacrificed upon the fields of Russia to the ambition of one man. Yet in the face of these distressing facts, this one man had the unblushing effrontery and overweening egotism to announce to the afflicted French people that "the emperor has never been ...
— A Political and Social History of Modern Europe V.1. • Carlton J. H. Hayes
... away from me in utter amazement as if I had been only recently created, or with an affected modesty as if I had been just guilty of some grave indecorum towards her sex which she really could not stand. The frequency of these exhibitions in the public highway were not only distressing to me as a simple escort, but as it had the effect on the casual spectators of making Consuelo seem to participate in Chu Chu's objections, I felt that, as a lover, it could not be borne. Any attempt to coerce Chu Chu ended in ...
— The Bell-Ringer of Angel's and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... and have been on such a glorious tour: scampering over all the land. He calls himself the 'Mountain-Torrent.' He is now behind a mile or so, and may be down upon us before long, to free us from this distressing imprisonment you speak of." ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 2, No. 4, March, 1851 • Various
... swiftly but noiselessly towards the robber camp, with nothing but a tomahawk in his hand and a scalping-knife in his girdle. He soon reached the open side of the wooded hollow, guided thereto by Drake's persistent and evidently distressing cough. Here it became necessary to advance with the utmost caution. Fortunately for the success of his enterprise, all the sentinels that night had been chosen from among the white men. The consequence was that although they were wide awake and ...
— Twice Bought • R.M. Ballantyne
... separated, a few days afterward, by the distressing news which reached me of the state of my brother's health. I went at once to his house in the country. His medical attendants had lost all hope of saving him: they told me plainly that his release from a life of ...
— Little Novels • Wilkie Collins
... was aware that a young, unmarried Frenchwoman has usually less liberty than her English sister. And yet in the case of this lady it continually came out in her conversation that she had seen and known much of the world. It was the more distressing to me as whenever she had made an observation which pointed to this she would afterwards, as I could plainly see, be annoyed by her own indiscretion, and endeavour to remove the impression by every means in her power. We had several small quarrels on this account, when I asked questions to which ...
— Danger! and Other Stories • Arthur Conan Doyle
... difficult to remedy and most distressing was the want of provisions and hay. Such a scene of misery of man and beast we never saw before. There was not anything of bread kind equal to a bushel of meal for every person when the schooner sailed for Newbury the 6th of February (three months ago) and less of meat and vegetables in proportion—the ...
— Glimpses of the Past - History of the River St. John, A.D. 1604-1784 • W. O. Raymond
... Longpoint we lost him for good. I went to bed again, but I could not sleep. I used to boast that I could sleep in a boiler-maker's shop; but the long dread of that fellow's pilot had unnerved me. I had wild, distressing dreams. ...
— The Last Spike - And Other Railroad Stories • Cy Warman
... worse than profitless fashion natural to women of her stamp. But in his daughter Martin had every kind of faith, and he longed to speak to her without reserve. Two days after her return from Exeter, he took Sidwell apart, and, with a distressing sense of the delicacy of the situation, tried to persuade ...
— Born in Exile • George Gissing
... mother, take the blessing Of a grateful nation's heart; May the news that is distressing Never cause your tears to start; May there be no fears to haunt you, And no lonely hours and sad; May your trials never daunt you, But ...
— Over Here • Edgar A. Guest
... interfere with the natural course of the disease, or rob the patient of some chance he might have had of recovering by himself. On the contrary, it will simply give nature and the constitution of the patient a better chance in the struggle, probably shorten it, and certainly make it less painful and distressing. ...
— Preventable Diseases • Woods Hutchinson
... iron; such coldness and hardness, I thought, could scarcely have ever been experienc'd before by any creature, so great was the depth of my baptism at this time; nevertheless, as I endeavor'd to quiet my mind, in this conflicting dispensation, and be resign'd to my allotment, however distressing, towards the latter part of the meeting a ray of light broke through the surrounding darkness, in which the Shepherd of Israel was pleas'd to arise, and by the light of his glorious countenance, to scatter those clouds ...
— Complete Prose Works - Specimen Days and Collect, November Boughs and Goodbye My Fancy • Walt Whitman
... more unsteady in her voice as she went on. She was trying hard to keep calm, but she was evidently feeling so acutely, so violently, that it was distressing to, have to watch her. I was so sorry. I wanted to put my arms round her and tell her not to mind so much, that of course I'd go, but if only she wouldn't mind so much whatever it was. Then at last she began to lose her hold on herself, and got up and walked ...
— Christine • Alice Cholmondeley
... many, many years? Even Lenine admits that "a sound solution of the problem of increasing the productivity of labor" (which lies at the very heart of the problem we are now discussing) "requires at least (especially after a most distressing and destructive ...
— Bolshevism - The Enemy of Political and Industrial Democracy • John Spargo
... her vehemence. "Lady Mar," returned he, "I am incapable of saying anything to you that is inimical to your duty to the best of men. I will even forget this distressing conversation, and continue through life to revere, equal with himself, the wife ...
— The Scottish Chiefs • Miss Jane Porter
... to herself desperately, "what makes me so stupid. I'm afflicted with chronic mental nearsightedness. Most distressing. This is really a tragedy I'm mixed up in—a tragedy. And tragedy's a thing I never ...
— McClure's Magazine, Vol. XXXI, No. 3, July 1908. • Various
... natural transition Mr. Hogarth has passed his hero from a gaming house into a prison—the inevitable consequence of extravagance. He is here represented in a most distressing situation, without a coat to his back, without money, without a friend to help him. Beggared by a course of ill-luck, the common attendant on the gamester, having first made away with every valuable he was master of, and having now no other ...
— The Works of William Hogarth: In a Series of Engravings - With Descriptions, and a Comment on Their Moral Tendency • John Trusler
... from the fire of the enemy behind stumps, or logs, or the vacant cabins, and were waiting orders; when the Colonel finding that the Indians were on their defense, dispatched orders for a retreat. This order, received with astonishment, was obeyed with reluctance; and what rendered it the more distressing, was the unavoidable exposure which the men must encounter in the open field, or prairie, which surrounded the town: for they were apprized that from the moment they left their cover, the Indians would fire on them, until they were beyond the reach of their balls. ...
— Life & Times of Col. Daniel Boone • Cecil B. Harley
... passivity Resistance he found a mistake. But for all this a certain sense of superiority was, never wanting in Nickie the Kid; the shabbiest clothes, a deplorable hat, fragmentary boots, shirtlessness, the most distressing situations all failed to wholly eliminate a touch of impudent dignity, a trace of rakish self-satisfaction which as a rule escaped the attention of his clients; but, here and there, a student of human nature found it delightfully whimsical. Sometimes it appeared that this spice of egotism sprang ...
— The Missing Link • Edward Dyson
... New Zealand on the 26th of November, and entered the glacial regions which she had already traversed; but the circumstances attending her second voyage were distressing. The crew, though in good health, were overcome by fatigue, and less capable of resisting illness, the more so that they had no fresh food ...
— Celebrated Travels and Travellers - Part 2. The Great Navigators of the Eighteenth Century • Jules Verne
... the Histories brought forward in chapter iii that the position of married inverts (we must, of course, put aside the bisexual) is usually more distressing than that of the unmarried. Among my cases 14 per cent. are married. Hirschfeld finds that 16 per cent. of inverts are married and 50 per cent. are impotent; he is unable to find a single cure of homosexuality, and seldom any improvement, due to ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 2 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... misery. Distrust and selfishness came from misusage; they were man's defence against extortion. And the extortion came from insecure conditions, from reminders of want or unconscious fear of it. Most crimes could easily be traced back to the distressing conditions, and even where the connection was not perceptible he was sure that it nevertheless existed. It was his experience that every one in reality was good: the evil in them could nearly always be traced back to something ...
— Pelle the Conqueror, Complete • Martin Andersen Nexo
... Powell would go like that—in that distressing way—she must at least let him walk back with her. Agatha wouldn't mind. He hadn't seen Mrs. Powell ...
— The Flaw in the Crystal • May Sinclair
... that they will not do such work for double wages, for it ruptures them.' Would that have been a welcome communication to the Committee? Would that have been a communication suited to the public? I was resolved 'to do or die,' and, instead of distressing and perplexing the Committee with complaints, to write nothing until I could write something perfectly satisfactory, as I now can; {132a} and to bring about that result I have spared neither myself nor my own money. I have toiled in a close printing-office the whole day, during ...
— The Life of George Borrow • Herbert Jenkins
... the cancerous segment of the gullet, in suitable cases, even if it does not yield a permanent cure, not only prolongs life but relieves the patient of her most distressing symptoms. It is rarely possible to secure an end-to-end anastomosis, but the feeding by means of a tube introduced into the open end of the gullet is more satisfactory and the laryngeal symptoms are more efficiently relieved, than by either of the purely palliative operations. In ...
— Manual of Surgery Volume Second: Extremities—Head—Neck. Sixth Edition. • Alexander Miles
... slaves went into the pastoral communities, worked on the public highways, and served as valets in private families. Their increase was stealthy, their conduct insubordinate, and their presence a distressing nightmare to ...
— History of the Negro Race in America From 1619 to 1880. Vol 1 - Negroes as Slaves, as Soldiers, and as Citizens • George W. Williams
... distressing complications with mumps. In boys, orchitis, or inflammation of the testicles, occasionally occur. In girls, ovaritis, or inflammation of the ovaries may be present. These complications may be avoided by keeping ...
— The Eugenic Marriage, Volume IV. (of IV.) - A Personal Guide to the New Science of Better Living and Better Babies • Grant Hague
... known since her arrival. Truth to tell, she had felt many doubts as to the reception of her fineries, but the mental vision of Elma's tasteless home-made garments, against the background of the beautiful old Manor, had been distressing enough to overcome her scruples. She dimpled as she read, and laughed triumphantly. Things were going well; excellently well, and those dresses ought to exercise a distinctly hurrying effect. Four or five days—maybe a week. "My!" soliloquised Cornelia, happily; "I recollect ...
— Flaming June • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... sat alone in the embrasure, living a life of emotion in a few minutes; nor did she find any calm for her agitated spirits until the thought flashed upon her that she was distressing herself needlessly. It was most improbable that Colonel Philibert, after years of absence and active life in the world's great affairs, could retain any recollection of the schoolgirl of the Manor House of Tilly. She might meet him, nay, ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... soul of every blessing, Load to misery most distressing, Gladly how would I resign thee, And to ...
— Poems And Songs Of Robert Burns • Robert Burns
... accounts brought from France fill me with more horror than any former ones. The King is to be moved only by the fear of some approaching danger to his person. The Queen is agitated by all the alarming and distressing thoughts imaginable. Her health is visibly altered; she cries continually, and is, as Polinitz says of K(ing) James's Queen, une Arethuse. Her danger has been imminent; and the K(ing) left his capital, and her in it, as he was advised ...
— George Selwyn: His Letters and His Life • E. S. Roscoe and Helen Clergue
... only says, but FEELS, "God's will be done," is mailed against every weakness; and the whole historic array of martyrs, missionaries, and religious reformers is there to prove the tranquil-mindedness, under naturally agitating or distressing ...
— The Varieties of Religious Experience • William James
... (in spite of and against all who are occupied with works of their own choice): "Behold, this work is well pleasing to my God in heaven that I know for certain." Let them all come together with their many great, distressing, and difficult works and make their boast, we will see whether they can show one that is greater and nobler than obedience to father and mother, to whom God has appointed and commanded obedience ...
— The Large Catechism by Dr. Martin Luther
... the men were exhausting themselves in vain efforts: hunger, cold, and the Cossacks became pressing, and the Viceroy at length found himself necessitated to order his artillery and all his baggage to be left behind. A distressing spectacle ensued. The owners had scarcely time to part from their effects; while they were selecting from them the articles which they most needed, and loading horses with them, a multitude of soldiers hastened up; they fell in preference upon the vehicles of luxury; they broke in pieces and ...
— History of the Expedition to Russia - Undertaken by the Emperor Napoleon in the Year 1812 • Count Philip de Segur
... not threaten him; but I told him the distressing truth, that I am very much afraid I shall fail if compelled to attempt a solo in public, for I know the audience at Mrs. Brompton's will be critical, and I ...
— Infelice • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson
... closed in he turned his horse from the timber and mounting a slight elevation near it, he gazed around for landmarks. To his surprise, he recognized the country as that near his own ranche, and feeling the pangs of hunger in a most distressing degree, he urged his horse in the direction of ...
— Jim Cummings • Frank Pinkerton
... replace this envied tranquillity in our home. A Frenchman, named Letendre, one day suddenly presented himself. He had come from Chicago, with the distressing intelligence of the extreme—indeed, hopeless—illness of our dear relative, Dr. Wolcott. My husband immediately commenced his preparations for instant departure. I begged to be permitted to accompany him, but the rapidity with which he proposed to journey obliged ...
— Wau-bun - The Early Day in the Northwest • Juliette Augusta Magill Kinzie
... duty to see that you are cared for properly, and I must not leave you to yourself unless I am quite assured beforehand that you are certain to be bright and brave when I am gone.'He placed his hand beneath her chin, and coaxed her eyes to meet his own. 'You won't nourish these distressing fancies any more, ...
— Despair's Last Journey • David Christie Murray
... evidence against you was conclusive, and it only remains for me to pass such a sentence upon you, as shall satisfy the ends of the law. That sentence must be a very severe one. It pains me much to see one who is yet so young, and whose prospects in life were otherwise so excellent, brought to this distressing condition by a constitution which I can only regard as radically vicious; but yours is no case for compassion: this is not your first offence: you have led a career of crime, and have only profited by the leniency shown you upon past occasions, to offend yet more seriously against ...
— Selections from Previous Works - and Remarks on Romanes' Mental Evolution in Animals • Samuel Butler
... Sundry odd applications. The "autograph bed-quilt.'' Associations with the diplomatic corps. Count Delaunay. Lord Odo Russell. The Methuen episode. Count de St. Vallier, embarrassing mishap at Nice due to him. The Turkish and Russian ambassadors. Distressing Russian-American marriage case. Baron Nothomb, his reminiscences of Talleyrand. The Saxon representative and the troubles of American lady students at Leipsic. Quaint discussions of general politics by sundry diplomatists. The Japanese and ...
— Volume I • Andrew Dickson White
... he finally rose to his feet, wiped the perspiration from his face, and stood there, bowing and smiling in a manner that was little short of distressing. ...
— Frank Merriwell's Son - A Chip Off the Old Block • Burt L. Standish
... surprised at this singular view of the case, "that Rashleigh Osbaldistone has done this injury to my father, merely to accelerate a rising in the Highlands, by distressing the gentlemen to whom these ...
— Rob Roy, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... released my arm and was standing rigid and motionless in the center of the illuminated roadway, staring like one bereft of sense. His face in the moonlight showed a pallor and fixity inexpressibly distressing. I pulled gently at his sleeve, but he had forgotten my existence. Presently he began to retire backward, step by step, never for an instant removing his eyes from what he saw, or thought he saw. I turned half round to follow, but stood irresolute. I do not recall any ...
— Can Such Things Be? • Ambrose Bierce
... towards the palace, found him with a large staff, pages and officers as well as women, in a plantain garden, looking eagerly out for birds, whilst his band was playing. In addition to his English dress, he wore a turban, and pretended that the glare of the sun was distressing his eyes—for, in fact, he wanted me to give him a wideawake like my own. Then, as if a sudden freak had seized him, though I knew it was on account of Maula's having excited his curiosity, he said, "Where does Bana live? ...
— The Discovery of the Source of the Nile • John Hanning Speke
... Can Be Cured.—This most distressing and most agonizing complaint may be quickly and entirely cured by a thorough course of treatment with Lydia E. Pinkham's Vegetable Compound. This remedy should be taken continuously; not a day should pass without the ...
— Treatise on the Diseases of Women • Lydia E. Pinkham
... night, and reproached himself for his wild excesses, and his reckless and imprudent confidence in a stranger. He dreaded to think what the consequences might be, and again became confused with the memories of his distressing dreams. ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 32, June, 1860 • Various
... our grief in presence of such a loss, let us accept these catastrophes with resignation! Let us accept in it whatever is distressing and severe; it is good perhaps, it is necessary perhaps, in an epoch like ours, that from time to time the great dead shall communicate to spirits devoured with skepticism and doubt, a religious fervor. Providence knows what it does when it puts the people ...
— The Art of Public Speaking • Dale Carnagey (AKA Dale Carnegie) and J. Berg Esenwein
... I like him," was the mental comment. Aloud she said dreamily, "Gordon is my hero. I love to hear about him. He was too generous to others to heap up money for himself. I suppose he didn't care about it. I wish I didn't, but I do. It's so very distressing to be always short of money. All the good people in books are poor, but for myself I think it's bad for the temper. They talk about the peril of riches, but I should like to try it for myself, wouldn't ...
— Pixie O'Shaughnessy • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... A circumstance of a truly alarming and distressing nature, to which Dashall alluded in this place, was recently made known to the public in the daily journals, and which should serve as a lesson to ...
— Real Life In London, Volumes I. and II. • Pierce Egan
... met you! Your arrival has already been notified to us by the avant-courier of the fashionable intelligence, so that we are well aware," here laughing lightly, "of the distinctive right you have to a hearty welcome in Naples. I am only sorry that any distressing news should have darkened the occasion of your return here after so long an absence. Permit me to express the hope that it may at least be the only cloud for ...
— Vendetta - A Story of One Forgotten • Marie Corelli
... practice of the law at Bloomington; and I have heard him state that he gave Davis the first case he ever had in Tazewell County, by advising another to employ him. But he re-enacted, on the less conspicuous forum, the distressing experience of failure of Disraeli in his first attempt to address the English House of Commons. Davis broke down in the speech he had prepared to make, to the great mortification of my father, who had exhibited such unusual ...
— Fifty Years of Public Service • Shelby M. Cullom
... Miss Byron to Miss Selby.— Sir Charles Grandison communicates to Miss Byron the farther distressing intelligence he had received from Bologna:—His friend Signor Jeronymo dangerously ill, his sister Clementina declining in health, and their father and mother absorbed in melancholy. The communication comes from the bishop of Nocera, Clementina's second ...
— The History of Sir Charles Grandison, Volume 4 (of 7) • Samuel Richardson
... and old, weak and strong, to use the treatment without the possibility of danger. It achieves the desired result far more effectively than any other known apparatus, with the least possible inconvenience to the patient, and yet so gently and easily that the operation, so far from being distressing or disagreeable, becomes ...
— The Royal Road to Health • Chas. A. Tyrrell
... Stumfold]—desired that I should establish a church here, on my own bottom, quite independent of Mr Stumfold. The Stumfolds would then soon have to leave Littlebath, there is no doubt of that, and she has already made herself so unendurable, and her father and she together are so distressing, that the best of their society has fallen away from them. Her treatment to you was such that I could never endure her afterwards. Now the opening for a clergyman with pure Gospel doctrines would be the best thing that has turned up for a long time. The church would be worth ...
— Miss Mackenzie • Anthony Trollope
... a little tin steamboat she had been holding escaped from them and rattled down to the floor with a sharpness that I hear at this hour. Lord Iffield had already seized her arm; with a violent jerk he brought her round toward him. Then it was that there met my eyes a quite distressing sight: this exquisite creature, blushing, glaring, exposed, with a pair of big black-rimmed eyeglasses, defacing her by their position, crookedly astride of her beautiful nose. She made a grab at them with her free hand ...
— Embarrassments • Henry James
... missionary expressed his surprise at finding the different classes so little affected by the prejudices of sect in their intercourse with members of the mission. The illness of Mr. Lanneau became at length so distressing, as to require his absence from the field for nearly two years. Before his return to the East, which was early in 1843, the Committee had expressed an opinion, that it was expedient to suspend further efforts at Jerusalem. Mr. Lanneau, however, ...
— History Of The Missions Of The American Board Of Commissioners For Foreign Missions To The Oriental Churches, Volume I. • Rufus Anderson
... men are in haste to retire from grossness, falsehood and brutality; and hope to find in private habitations at least a negative felicity, an exemption from the shocks and perturbations with which publick scenes are continually distressing them. ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson in Nine Volumes - Volume IV: The Adventurer; The Idler • Samuel Johnson
... forcibly recommended as the great secret of her family prosperity? Was it not her duty, as everybody told her, to break his will while he was young?—a duty which hung like a millstone round the peaceable creature's neck, and weighed her down with a distressing ...
— The Pearl of Orr's Island - A Story of the Coast of Maine • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... end of this distressing business, and went listlessly along the street to attend to other errands. These occupied her till four o'clock, at which time she recrossed the market-place. It was impossible to avoid rediscovering Winterborne every time she passed that way, for standing, as he always ...
— The Woodlanders • Thomas Hardy
... was acquitted cannot be doubted. His case speaks for itself. But it is noteworthy that we hear of him no more at Oea, where he had resided for three years at the time of the trial. This distressing family quarrel must have caused some bitterness of feeling, and Augustine (Ep. 138. 19) mentions a quarrel with the inhabitants of Oea on the question of the erection of a statue in his honour. ...
— The Apologia and Florida of Apuleius of Madaura • Lucius Apuleius
... happened that every year the governor was subject to a most distressing illness, which, for the time being, entirely deprived him of his reason. When it began to come on, he would talk and chatter incessantly. Each year he had some fresh hallucination, at one time fancying himself an oil-jar, at another ...
— The True Story Book • Andrew Lang
... the day was coming when he would weigh out soap and sugar, and hand them over a counter in exchange for money, he would have held the prophet ripe for Bedlam. Yet here he was, a full-blown tradesman, and as greedy of gain as any tallow-chandler. Extraordinary, aye, and distressing, too, the ease with which the human organism adapted itself; it was just a case of the green caterpillar on the green leaf. Well, he could console himself with the knowledge that his apparent submission was only an affair of the surface. He had struck ...
— Australia Felix • Henry Handel Richardson
... ceased to belong to the Council of State. The violent hostility in which you have lately indulged, without the shadow of a pretext, against the King's government, has rendered this measure inevitable. You will readily understand how much it is personally distressing to myself. My friendly feelings towards you induce me to express a hope that you may reserve yourself for the future, and that you will not compromise by false steps the talents which may still advantageously serve the King ...
— Memoirs To Illustrate The History Of My Time - Volume 1 • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... day there was added to his growing disillusionment a third ugly impression, trivial indeed to describe, a mere necessary everyday incident of a state of war, but very distressing to his urbanised imagination. One writes "urbanised" to express the distinctive gentleness of the period. It was quite peculiar to the crowded townsmen of that time, and different altogether from the normal experience ...
— The War in the Air • Herbert George Wells
... distressing, deplorable, lamentable, painful; heinous, atrocious, flagitious, outrageous, flagrant, egregious, ...
— Putnam's Word Book • Louis A. Flemming
... this life, as well as that which is to come. Our supreme thought is to hasten on the time when there shall be a new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness. This has been, and this is, our work. Now we need to meet our indebtedness. It is a distressing load to carry. We are seeking to pay our obligations this Jubilee Year. We have not pressed our grievous burden upon the churches as urgently as we would have done, because our sister societies, in like ...
— The American Missionary - Volume 50, No. 4, April 1896 • Various
... upon its discipline and good will. Nevertheless, although the English were often obliged to content themselves with scanty rations, they did not, owing to the arrival of great numbers of birds, pass a very distressing winter. But, on the return of spring, as soon as the ship was prepared to resume her route to England, Hudson found that his fate was decided. He made his arrangements accordingly, distributed to each his share of biscuit, paid the wages ...
— Celebrated Travels and Travellers - Part I. The Exploration of the World • Jules Verne
... about it, thought I knew all about it. Yes! in others, but now began to understand it for myself. Gradually my personal appearance faded. My once faultless linen became unkempt and unclean. Down further and further went the heels of my shoes, and I drifted into that distressing condition "shabby gentility." If the odds were against me before, how much more so now, seeing that I was too shabby even to command attention, much less a reply to ...
— "In Darkest England and The Way Out" • General William Booth
... told of her misfortunes was of the most distressing nature, and was enough to stir up all the tender, as well as abhorrent feelings in the bosom of humanity. She had suffered every deprivation in fame, fortune, and person. She had been imprisoned; she had been ...
— The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner • James Hogg
... The distressing symptoms do not escape the fond father's observation. Indeed he knows all about them, now knowing their cause. Only through the Natchez newspapers was he first made aware of that secret correspondence between his daughter and Clancy. But since she has confessed all—how ...
— The Death Shot - A Story Retold • Mayne Reid
... the bridegroom was roaming sadly about, thereby distressing his wife, who followed him with her eyes, hoping to see his state of innocence come to an end, the ladies believed that the joy of that night had cost him dear, and that the said bride was already regretting having so quickly ruined him. And at breakfast came the bad jokes, which at ...
— Droll Stories, Volume 2 • Honore de Balzac
... the effect he had intended it to have. It set the young lady who was called Belinda asking about ways and means of getting to Salisbury; it brought to light the distressing fact that V.V. had the beginnings of a chafed heel. Once he had set things going they moved much too quickly for the doctor to deflect their course. He found himself called upon to make personal sacrifices to facilitate the painless transport ...
— The Secret Places of the Heart • H. G. Wells
... of all his hopes, had thrown himself into the Thames from the neighbouring boat-stairs; and though he had been hooked out uninjured by the man who always attends there with two wooden legs, the effect on his parents' minds had been distressing. Shortly after this occurrence the chief clerk had been invited to attend the Board, and the Chairman of the Commissioners, who, on the occasion, was of course prompted by the Secretary, recommended Mr. Hardlines to be a leetle more lenient. In doing ...
— The Three Clerks • Anthony Trollope
... cottage door and, not answering these distressing generalities, fell back on his one fact. "Look," he said, pointing to an empty peg, "he must have gone after fir-cones; you see the basket has gone; he took it with him; I am sure he would not have taken it to ...
— The Good Comrade • Una L. Silberrad
... her ability. The intimacy between these two young ladies was only riveted more closely by the necessity of living under different roofs; Adeline, indeed, protested that she found the separation so distressing, that she thought it would be an excellent plan, to divide the winter together, between Charleston and New York; Jane to pass the first three months with her, and she, in her turn, to accompany her friend to Charleston, later in the season. But Jane thought her ...
— Elinor Wyllys - Vol. I • Susan Fenimore Cooper
... modulated laughter saluted his ear, though startled for no stranger had the right of entry to the park, he was by no means displeased. This seemed but part of the all-pervasive magic of this strange afternoon. Richard smiled at the phantasies of his own mood; yet he forgot to be shy, forgot the distressing self-consciousness which made him shrink from the observation of strangers—specially those of the other sex. The adventure tempted his fancy. Even familiar things had put on a new and beguiling vesture in the last half ...
— The History of Sir Richard Calmady - A Romance • Lucas Malet
... in the manger lying, Me and thee Calleth He, In sweet accents crying, "Banish, brethren, what's distressing, All your ills, All that falls, I bring ...
— Paul Gerhardt's Spiritual Songs - Translated by John Kelly • Paul Gerhardt
... callous, almost inhuman; it jarred the girl's agonized transports back into a species of spiritual calm, a mental state akin to the fatalism often exhibited by Asiatics when death is imminent and not to be denied. The apparent madness of the captain was now more distressing to her than the certain loss of the ship or the invisible missiles that clanged into white patches on the iron plates, cut sudden holes and scars in the woodwork, or whirred through the air with a buzzing whistle of singularly menacing sound. She began ...
— The Stowaway Girl • Louis Tracy
... to play one more very shameful, distressing, and final role in the free life of Liubka. She had already complained to Lichonin for a long time that the presence of Simanovsky was oppressive to her; but Lichonin paid no attention to womanish trifles: the vacuous, fictitious, wordy hypnosis ...
— Yama (The Pit) • Alexandra Kuprin
... and yet I'll soon forget Those ills and cures distressing; One's future lies 'neath gorgeous skies When one is convalescing! So now, good-by To drugs say I— Good-by, thou phantom Sorrow! I am up to-day, And, whoop, hooray! I'm ...
— Songs and Other Verse • Eugene Field
... that we should feel out of place indeed had we to go back, even for a short time, to their uncouth and imperfect ways. Their extraordinarily complex method of governing themselves, and their intricate political machinery would be very distressing to us, and are calculated to make one think that a keen pleasure in governing or in being overgoverned—not a special aptitude or genius for governing—must have been very common among them. From the alarming blunders made in directing public affairs, and from the manner ...
— The Dominion in 1983 • Ralph Centennius
... an emotional man. He had never been deeply stirred by religious feelings of any kind. He had had no agonies of penitence, no distressing doubts, no strong struggles with temper, no vivid thought of the possibility of his being excluded from eternal blessedness. His heavenly Father was to him rather a theological abstraction than a near and ever-loving friend. ...
— Little Tora, The Swedish Schoolmistress and Other Stories • Mrs. Woods Baker
... Mathews would have been out of it. In the midst of my discomfiture, however, he came on to the stage by another entrance as "cool as a cucumber." He told me afterwards that he had turned the incident to good account by referring to me as "Every man in his humour," or, "A bailiff in distressing circumstances!" ...
— The Reminiscences Of Sir Henry Hawkins (Baron Brampton) • Henry Hawkins Brampton
... thoroughly, in the whole report, are the ideas of person and chattel intermingled, that, when Governor Bennett petitions for mitigation of sentence in the case of his slave Batteau, and closes, "I ask this, gentlemen, as an individual incurring a severe and distressing loss," it is really impossible to decide whether the predominant ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 7, No. 44, June, 1861 • Various
... for company, strive to appear easy and natural. Nothing is more distressing to a sensitive person, or more ridiculous to one gifted with refinement, than to see a lady laboring under the consciousness of a fine gown; or a gentleman who is stiff, awkward and ungainly in a ...
— Searchlights on Health: Light on Dark Corners • B.G. Jefferis
... glade their voices reached him. They were there, after all! He could hear them utter their pitiful "ay-ee—ay-ee!" and, as he thought, in a louder and more distressing tone than ever. What could be the matter? They had been silent for some time, he was sure, for such cries as they now uttered could have been heard easily where the rest were. What could be the meaning of this fresh ...
— Popular Adventure Tales • Mayne Reid
... during which each member of the Club secretly deplored the distressing inefficiency of the others. Only Mrs. Roby went on placidly sipping her chartreuse. At last Mrs. Ballinger said, with an attempt at a high tone: "Well, really, you know, it was last year that we took psychology, and this winter we have been so ...
— The Early Short Fiction of Edith Wharton, Part 2 (of 10) • Edith Wharton
... orator's worth. When he praises, he praises with all his heart. When he raises the strain of moral indignation we can almost always beneath the orator's enthusiasm detect the rhetorician's art. We shall have occasion to notice in a future page the distressing loss of power which at a later period this affectation of moral sentiment involved. In Cicero it does not intrude upon the surface, it is only remotely present in the background, and to the Romans themselves no doubt appeared an excellence rather than a defect. Nevertheless, if ...
— A History of Roman Literature - From the Earliest Period to the Death of Marcus Aurelius • Charles Thomas Cruttwell
... Appetite, King's Evil, Neuralgia, Gout, and kindred complaints all arise from the derangements which these PILLS rapidly cure. Take them perseveringly, and under the counsel of a good physician if you can; if not take them judiciously by such advice as we give you, and the distressing dangerous diseases they cure, which afflict so many millions of the human race, are cast out like the devils of old—they must burrow in the ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol 2, No 6, December 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... 'We will certainly respect your incog. if you wish it. Wild horses shall draw no evidence from us. It is, of course, very distressing, but what is man after all? Are we not as the beasts that perish, and is not our little life rounded by a sleep? Indeed, yes. And now—with ...
— The Pothunters • P. G. Wodehouse
... the instant, so ludicrous to Richard that, in spite of the distressing situation, he had to choke back a laugh. Years afterwards, if he wished for any momentary revenge upon Marion (and he had a keen sense of wordy retaliation), he simply said: "Wo-won't you let ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... just now in great concern for the terrible death of General Conway's son-in-law, Mr. Damer,(256) of which, perhaps, you in your solitude have not heard.-You are happy who take no part but in the past world, for the mortui non mordent, nor do any of the extravagant and distressing things that perhaps they did in their lives. I hope the gout, that persecutes even in a hermitage, has left you. ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole, V4 • Horace Walpole
... "cow-music" I am a great admirer, and take as much pleasure in it as in the cries and melody of birds and the sound of the wind in trees; but this performance of cattle excited by the smell of blood is most distressing to hear. ...
— Introduction to the Science of Sociology • Robert E. Park
... addressing Edward, while the young and lively members of the party seemed to find abundant amusement in the anecdotes and adventures he narrated. Arthur Myrvin gazed earnestly at him, and for a time banished his own distressing thoughts in the endeavour to trace in the fine manly youth before him some likeness to the handsome, yet violent and mischievous boy he had first and last seen in ...
— The Mother's Recompense, Volume II. - A Sequel to Home Influence in Two Volumes • Grace Aguilar
... bear the voyage; and the Captain drinking nothing scarcely but gin, had never troubled his head about taking in water; so that they were soon reduced to short allowance, which, in that sultry clime and season of the year, was a distressing predicament. Meeting, too, with violent squalls of wind, they were driven off their course. The leak became alarming, and their troubles increased so fast upon them, that they were obliged to steer for Boston in New England; where they arrived, with much difficulty ...
— Biographical Memorials of James Oglethorpe • Thaddeus Mason Harris
... proper niceties of sword-play which, without any indecent hacking or maiming, should have stretched Angelo, neatly slain, on the mat of green, before he had a chance. Even now the sight of the man was distressing to an honourable duellist. Angelo was scored with blood-marks. Feeling that he dared not offer another chance to a fellow so desperately close-dealing, Weisspriess thrust fiercely, but delayed his fatal stroke. Angelo stooped and pulled up a handful of grass and soft earth ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... the prevailing fallacies of the times, that to mount a Highland hill is a very difficult operation, and that one should hire a guide on the occasion. We lately witnessed a very distressing instance of the alarming prevalence of this notion, in a young Chancery barrister, fresh from Brick Court Temple, who asked us in a very solemn tone of voice, if we could recommend him to "a steady guide to the top of Arthur Seat." When matters have come to such a crisis, it ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, No. 382, October 1847 • Various
... the doings of the morning clear away from me. Little I cared about the Carstairs affairs and all the mystery that was wrapping round them in comparison with the news which Murray had sent along in that peculiarly distressing fashion! I would cheerfully have given all I ever hoped to be worth if he had only added more news; but he had just said enough to make me feel as if I should go mad unless I could get home there and then. I had not seen Maisie since she and my mother had left ...
— Dead Men's Money • J. S. Fletcher
... censure which the precipitate publication of mere conjectural suggestions may incur; but shall think himself fully rewarded by having excited the attention of those, who may point out the most appropriate means of relieving a tedious and most distressing malady. ...
— An Essay on the Shaking Palsy • James Parkinson
... up?" cried the vicar's young wife, forgetting for a moment a certain preoccupation caused by the arrival of the tea-tray, and by a rapid resignation to the thickness of the bread and butter and the distressing absence of such hot things as would have been in readiness if Mrs. Venables had been expected for a single moment. It showed the youth of Morna Woodgate that she should harbor a wish to compete with the wealthiest woman in the neighborhood, even in the ...
— The Shadow of the Rope • E. W. Hornung
... deafness on the occasion. But not long afterwards, we were compelled, during an attack of disease which affected the nervous system, to hear the whole discordant performance repeated again and again, with a pertinacity which was really very distressing. Such a case prepares us to give credit to a far more remarkable story, related in one of the works of Macnish. A clergyman, we are told, who was a skilful violinist, and frequently played over some favourite solo or concerto, was obliged to desist ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 446 - Volume 18, New Series, July 17, 1852 • Various
... and, indeed, through these bars the meals of the prisoners are served. The prison is capable of containing about 700 people; the usual number, however, is 400. The state of the apartments in which the criminals pass their time is truly distressing. The stench is overpowering; and though visitors remain in the rooms only a few minutes, they often retire seriously indisposed. The expense of maintaining the prisoners is 8,000 cruzados, or about 1,000l. per annum. Of this sum, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 12, Issue 327, August 16, 1828 • Various
... nothing left but hatred of individuals and, in the extreme case, the desire to remove those individuals. To those, on the other hand, who see in certain underlying economic forces the source of nearly all of our distressing social evils, individual hatred and malice can make in reality no appeal. This volume, on its historical side, as well as in its survey of the psychology of the various elements in the labor movement, is a contribution to the ...
— Violence and the Labor Movement • Robert Hunter
... dun-coloured spectacles when you took your walks abroad," she said, smiling. "No one else seems to have discovered so distressing a state of affairs as you have ...
— A Lost Leader • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... Ryland:—"Felix is shrivelled from a missionary into an ambassador." To his third son the sorrowing father said:—"The honours he has received from the Burmese Government have not been beneficial to his soul. Felix is certainly not so much esteemed since his visit as he was before it. It is a very distressing thing to be forced to apologise for those you love." Mr. Chater had removed to Ceylon to begin a ...
— The Life of William Carey • George Smith
... this year I made a trip to California in search of health, which I had lost through overwork, and was now paying the penalty in a very distressing form of insomnia. I took one of the first through trains to the Pacific, and on reaching the State, I found sight-seeing and travel so irresistible a temptation, that I lost the rest and quiet I so absolutely needed. I was constantly on the wing; and I encountered at every point, the "settler," ...
— Political Recollections - 1840 to 1872 • George W. Julian
... steps will give invaluable information. This is particularly true when the older persons are attempting to conceal facts or are too much excited from a death or an accident to talk. Children usually are less unstrung by distressing events and can give a more connected account. Moreover, they are almost always willing to talk, and they generally try to tell ...
— News Writing - The Gathering , Handling and Writing of News Stories • M. Lyle Spencer
... sir," sighed Burgsdorf, "would that I did not know, for it is a most sorrowful knowledge to an old soldier and in a most distressing condition is the ...
— The Youth of the Great Elector • L. Muhlbach
... inclination toward any study or any work. They have weaknesses of character that will inevitably handicap them, no matter what vocation they enter. They are the real problem. There is another class, almost equally distressing. They are the people who are brilliant, who learn easily, and who are so adaptable that they can turn their hands to almost anything. They are usually so unstable in temperament that it is difficult for them ...
— Analyzing Character • Katherine M. H. Blackford and Arthur Newcomb
... English sea-captain relates the following fact, of which he was an eyewitness:—"A collier brig was stranded on the Yorkshire coast, and I had occasion to assist in the distressing service of rescuing a part of the crew by drawing them up a vertical cliff, two or three hundred feet in altitude, by means of a very small rope, the only material at hand. The first two men who caught hold of the rope were hauled safely up to the top; but the next, ...
— The True Citizen, How To Become One • W. F. Markwick, D. D. and W. A. Smith, A. B.
... the good and bland, thou blessing Of the good, the bad's distressing, Sweet of taste by all confessing, Hail, thou world's felicity! Hail thy hue, life's gloom dispelling; Hail thy taste, all tastes excelling; By thy power, in this thy dwelling Deign to ...
— Wine, Women, and Song - Mediaeval Latin Students' songs; Now first translated into English verse • Various
... utterly unfelt. In a word, that state of the human heart, occasioned by the mutual affection between the sexes, and from whence proceed the happiest, the most interesting, and sometimes also, the most distressing moments of life, has no existence in China. The man takes a wife because the laws of the country direct him to do so, and custom has made it indispensable; and the woman, after marriage, continues to be the same piece of inanimate ...
— Travels in China, Containing Descriptions, Observations, and Comparisons, Made and Collected in the Course of a Short Residence at the Imperial Palace of Yuen-Min-Yuen, and on a Subsequent Journey thr • John Barrow
... reminds me that one distressing phase of early rising is the incongruous and unpleasant contact of the preceding night. The social yesterday is not fairly over before nine A. M. to-day, and there is always a humorous, sometimes a pathetic, lapping over the ...
— Drift from Two Shores • Bret Harte
... save for the deaths of your agent and Colonel Saint-Maurice. As for M. Roland de Montrevel, I have the satisfaction of informing you that nothing distressing has befallen him. I did not forget that he was good enough to receive me at ...
— The Companions of Jehu • Alexandre Dumas, pere
... gentleman assured me that, at times, his feelings had bordered on those of mental derangement; he thought every body hated him; and he in turn hated every body. He had often, after lying awake for several hours in the night, under the most distressing forebodings, arisen, smoked his pipe to procure a temporary alleviation of his sufferings, in fitful and half delirious slumbers. He even thought of suicide, but was deterred by the dread of an hereafter. In ...
— An Essay on the Influence of Tobacco upon Life and Health • R. D. Mussey
... prepare in youth and in middle age the means of enjoying old age pleasantly and happily. There can be nothing more distressing than to see an old man who has spent the greater part of his life in well-paid-for-labour, reduced to the necessity of begging for bread, and relying entirely on the commiseration of his neighbours, or ...
— Thrift • Samuel Smiles
... neighbours,—affairs in which they might be said to have almost a personal interest. The conversation turned to other matters; but across the way they saw enacted some of the preliminaries and accompaniments of a mysterious complication that finally became as distressing and as ...
— Mingo - And Other Sketches in Black and White • Joel Chandler Harris
... self-possession, I got through the service without any distressing error—I ought not to have read the Absolution, that being restricted to priests, nor should I have upset the cushion on which I was kneeling, for, not having sufficient confidence to replace it, ...
— Confessions of an Etonian • I. E. M.
... distressing was the condition of the besieged. While the garrison soldiers on guard were constantly compelled to face death in nocturnal sallies, or led a pitiable existence in damp huts, having inevitable surrender constantly before ...
— A History of The Nations and Empires Involved and a Study - of the Events Culminating in The Great Conflict • Logan Marshall
... like it. He preferred her as she had been when he had first come to her house on an autumn evening. To him there was something almost distressing in this change which he noticed specially to-night. And her look into the glass had shown him that she was preoccupied about her appearance. Such a preoccupation on her part seemed foreign to her character as he had conceived of it. Her greatest charm had been her extraordinary lack, or apparent ...
— December Love • Robert Hichens
... come. They saw themselves confronted by the police-court, the prison, the hospital and, in the background, the asylum. They did not know what was going to happen, but they felt instinctively that a species of scourging awaited them. Their only comfort in their distressing situation was the fact that he, Mr. Theodore, was one of them. It was not clear to them why that fact should be a comfort, but they knew intuitively that no evil would happen to the son ...
— Married • August Strindberg
... bold youth, in a Scotch play, the title of which I have forgotten, but the speech began with, 'My name is Norval: on the Grampian Hills my father fed his flocks...' And this in a voice so weak and distressing as to put me in mind of the plaintive squeaking of little pigs when the sow is lying on them. As we were going home (one of my boys and I) he, after a silence of half a mile perhaps, rode up close to the side of my horse, and said, 'Papa, ...
— Advice to Young Men • William Cobbett
... point the game became specially interesting. Dr. Rotten was aware that Herr H.'s brother and his family had been closely in touch with the Emergency Committee, and had received considerable help in difficult and distressing circumstances. In recognition of the assistance given to his brother, he at once offered to lend to the camp, for the period of the war, a spectrometer and prisms valued together at 1,650 marks. The 900 marks collected were thus released to be used for other enterprises. Herr H. also sent a warm ...
— The Better Germany in War Time - Being some Facts towards Fellowship • Harold Picton
... retaliation, which added to our trouble. This got worse on the following days, doubtless owing partly to the fact that we dug a new advanced trench. This was in a deplorable mess, and our men who had to occupy it had a most distressing time. Casualties rose rapidly, especially in B Company, whose front line trench was enfiladed from Adinfer Wood. Our carrying parties, who had to take up Royal Engineer material, ammunition of all sorts, rations and other stores ...
— The Sherwood Foresters in the Great War 1914 - 1919 - History of the 1/8th Battalion • W.C.C. Weetman
... case in these commercial cruces, the man was on the rack. My own position, if you consider how much I owed him, how hateful is the trade of fault-finder, and that yet I lived and fattened on these questionable operations, was perhaps equally distressing. If I had been more sterling or more combative, things might have gone extremely far. But, in truth, I was just base enough to profit by what was not forced on my attention, rather than seek scenes; Pinkerton quite cunning ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 13 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... matter at all, so he was to be in her company. All the same, his instinct pulled him by the sleeve. Hazily he reflected that to retrace such steps as you have taken along the path of Love is a bad business, and that the farther you have elected to venture, so much the more distressing must be your return. And he would have to return. In the absence of a miracle, that journey could not be avoided. For an instant the spectre of Reckoning leaned out of the future.... Then Patch flushed a stray pig, and Valerie laughed joyously, and—the shadow was gone. Cost what it might, Anthony ...
— Anthony Lyveden • Dornford Yates |
