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Dreadful   Listen
adjective
Dreadful  adj.  
1.
Full of dread or terror; fearful. (Obs.) "With dreadful heart."
2.
Inspiring dread; impressing great fear; fearful; terrible; as, a dreadful storm. " Dreadful gloom." "For all things are less dreadful than they seem."
3.
Inspiring awe or reverence; awful. (Obs.) "God's dreadful law."
Synonyms: Fearful; frightful; terrific; terrible; horrible; horrid; formidable; tremendous; awful; venerable. See Frightful.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Dreadful" Quotes from Famous Books



... is nothing to stagger you, nothing to make you mistrust, no suspicion of alloy, no drop or dreg of the worldly or ambitious spirit. You will here read the true story of that much-injured, ridiculed man (who perhaps hath been a by-word in your mouth,)—James Naylor: what dreadful sufferings, with what patience, he endured even to the boring through of his tongue with red-hot irons without a murmur; and with what strength of mind, when the delusion he had fallen into, which they stigmatised ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Volume 2 • Charles Lamb

... things you mention were all, Bab, I should tell you to stop thinking of them, and let Mr. Duncan judge for himself. But there is something else, Bab—something very dreadful. I never intended to tell you of it, but now I must. You would find it out very soon, for Tandy's wife knows it, and if she heard that there was anything between you and Mr. Duncan, she would make haste to talk of it—particularly after what has happened between Tandy and Mr. ...
— A Captain in the Ranks - A Romance of Affairs • George Cary Eggleston

... curtseyings of those Blacks to persons whom they had no reason to suspect of unfriendliness, or whose white face they may in the white man's country have greeted with a civility perhaps only prudential, we fail to discover the necessity of the dreadful agency we have adverted to, for securing the results on manners which are so warmly commended. African explorers, from Mungo Park to Livingstone and Stanley, have all borne sufficient testimony to the world regarding the natural friendliness of the ...
— West Indian Fables by James Anthony Froude Explained by J. J. Thomas • J. J. (John Jacob) Thomas

... This dreadful blow, when the news reached him in the woods where he watched near Lamoriciere's command, almost overwhelmed, for a time, even the exalted and undaunted spirit of the Sultan. He spent some hours alone in his tent, in meditation and prayer. He came forth with a smile and addressed ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 17 • Charles Francis Horne

... Those dreadful hot flashes, sending the blood surging to the heart until it seems ready to burst, and the faint feeling that follows, sometimes with chills, as if the heart were going to stop forever, are only a few of the symptoms of a dangerous nervous ...
— Treatise on the Diseases of Women • Lydia E. Pinkham

... sport which are not courteous, but shocking. 'Le diable t'emporte!' 'Allez au diable!' and so forth. But I trow they mean not such dreadful wishes: custom belike. Moderate in drinking, and mix water with their wine, and sing and dance over their cups, and are then enchanting company. They are curious not to drink in another man's cup. In war the English gain ...
— The Cloister and the Hearth • Charles Reade

... following year the dreadful plague broke out, when he and one other Commissioner were left to deal with the task of providing for the sick and wounded prisoners. From 1,000 deaths in a week in the middle of July, the mortality ...
— Sylva, Vol. 1 (of 2) - Or A Discourse of Forest Trees • John Evelyn

... whispered to me that they were asleep. The awful crisis was now arrived when I was again either to taste the blessing of freedom or languish out my days in captivity. A cold sweat moistened my forehead as I thought on the dreadful alternative, and reflected that, one way or another, my fate must be decided in the course of the ensuing day. But to deliberate was to lose the only chance of escaping. So, taking up my bundle, I stepped gently over the negroes, who were sleeping ...
— Travels in the Interior of Africa - Volume 1 • Mungo Park

... allies and Latin confederacy; and had remained, with these troops, in the nearest district of the province about Ariminum. He immediately informed the senate, by letter, in what confusion the province was. That, "of the two colonies which had escaped in the dreadful storm of the Punic war, one was taken and sacked by the present enemy, and the other besieged. Nor was his army capable of affording sufficient protection to the distressed colonists, unless he chose ...
— History of Rome, Vol III • Titus Livius

... passed over Viviette's bright face. The manor-house would indeed be very lonely. Her occupation as Dick's liege lady, confidante, and tormentor would be gone. Parting from him would be a wrench. There would be a dreadful scene at the last moment, in which he would want to hold her tight in his arms and make her promise to join him in Vancouver. She shivered a little; then tossed her head as if to throw ...
— Viviette • William J. Locke

... dreadful in your wrath!" The words broke from her lips. "Where others blame, you can destroy; and you do it, too, when passion carries you away. I am bound to obey your call, and here I am. But I fancy myself like the little dog—you may see him any ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... she exclaimed, "what is this awful secret? I know that something is killing you. You mutter in sleep; you are sullen at times; and then you break out in this dreadful way." ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, Issue 15, January, 1859 • Various

... and he cried almost all day; for he knew this dreadful thing had happened because he did not latch the back yard gate—and because he had told Daddy ...
— A Hive of Busy Bees • Effie M. Williams

... Husband, should be recorded with Veneration; she who had wasted his Labours, with Infamy. When we are come into Domestick Life in this manner, to awaken Caution and Attendance to the main Point, it would not be amiss to give now and then a Touch of Tragedy, and describe [the [3]] most dreadful of all human Conditions, the Case of Bankruptcy; how Plenty, Credit, Chearfulness, full Hopes, and easy Possessions, are in an Instant turned into Penury, faint Aspects, Diffidence, Sorrow, and Misery; ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele

... remember when Christian was going through the Valley of the Shadow of Death, the fiends came and whispered to him all sorts of dreadful things which he would not have thought of for the world. 'But,' as Mr. Bunyan says, 'he had not the discretion either to stop his ears, or to know from whence those blasphemies came.'" Reuben blushed a little at his own advice-giving, but made no ...
— Say and Seal, Volume II • Susan Warner

... forgetting very soon in a hundred mutual recollections and inquiries, the rain and the wind, the thunder and the hurricane. Now and then, as some louder crash would resound above our heads, for a moment we would turn to the window, and comment upon the dreadful weather; but the next, we had forgotten all about it, and were deep in ...
— Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon, Volume 2 (of 2) • Charles Lever

... that time, and had a dreadful story to unfold. At nine o'clock that evening Bones had called upon him and had offered to buy his shares. But Bones had said he ...
— Bones in London • Edgar Wallace

... conscious of some terrible burden, which she could not define nor reason upon, but which seemed to oppress and weigh her down, making her incapable of thought, or speech, or motion. When they got into the railway-carriage she could only lean back in the corner, with a general sense that something dreadful had happened, or was going to happen; but that her head ached too much, and felt too confused, for her to remember ...
— My Little Lady • Eleanor Frances Poynter

... stared hopelessly from the one to the other. It had always seemed possible that this dreadful mania might develop into actual insanity, and he had little doubt but that the younger man's brain was slightly affected. But this did not account for the delusion and expectations of the elder. Harry ...
— A Protegee of Jack Hamlin's and Other Stories • Bret Harte

... be asleep, and Bill was just going to turn over agin when Silas let off another groan. It was on'y a little one this time, but Bill sat up as though he 'ad been shot, and he no sooner caught sight of Silas standing there than 'e gave a dreadful 'owl and, rolling over, wropped 'imself up in all the bed-clothes 'e could lay his 'ands on. Then Mrs. Burtenshaw gave a 'owl and tried to get some of 'em back; but Bill, thinking it was the ghost, only ...
— Sailor's Knots (Entire Collection) • W.W. Jacobs

... till mother come in. "Good-day, Miss Langdon!" says she, with a kind of a snuffle, "how dew you dew? I thought I'd come and see how you kep' up under this here affliction. I rec'lect very well how I felt when husband died. It's a dreadful thing to be left a widder in a hard world;—don't you find it out ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 11, September, 1858 • Various

... both, as ye will answer at the dreadful day of judgment when the secrets of all hearts shall be disclosed, that if either of you know any impediment whereby ye may not be lawfully ...
— Summer • Edith Wharton

... made her almost faint to write about it, and yet she did compose four whole pages in that condition. The barrack, she informed me, was turned into a hospital, and she and "Tante" both worked hard. There was much work—dreadful work to do—such poor groaning fellows to nurse! "Herrgott!" cried poor little Clara, "I did not know that the world was such a dreadful place!" Everything was so dear, so frightfully dear, and Karl—that was ...
— The First Violin - A Novel • Jessie Fothergill

... have met a man who had seen it himself on his first voyage, when he was quite a youth; and he said it had a bull's head and horns, with a dreadful long body all over scales, and something like an ass's ...
— The Hot Swamp • R.M. Ballantyne

... family physician, and for others whose official or private relations to the President gave them the right to be there. A crowd of people rushed instinctively to the White House, and, bursting through the doors, shouted the dreadful news to Robert Lincoln and Major Hay, who sat together in an upper room. They ran down-stairs, and as they were entering a carriage to drive to Tenth Street, a friend came up and told them that Mr. Seward and most ...
— A Short Life of Abraham Lincoln - Condensed from Nicolay & Hay's Abraham Lincoln: A History • John G. Nicolay

... No girl is. But you all think it must be dreadful to be a moneyless spinster of fifty. I believe, for my part, that there's many a vieille fille who is not particularly sorry for herself or for the man who ...
— The Way of Ambition • Robert Hichens

... these simple figures are contained the elements of a warning sermon that would startle all America. We seem to be rapidly becoming a nation of cocaine fiends. If the number of those addicted to the use of the dreadful drug continues to increase at the present rate, the importation of what was originally regarded as a blessed alleviation of pain, will have to be classed with opium, and its use prohibited by law, ...
— Alcohol: A Dangerous and Unnecessary Medicine, How and Why - What Medical Writers Say • Martha M. Allen

... a dreadful feeling to realize that one has lost a chance of happiness. There is a feeling called remorse that can gnaw like a sharp little tooth. Babouscka felt this little tooth cut into her heart every time she remembered the visit of the ...
— Christmas in Legend and Story - A Book for Boys and Girls • Elva S. Smith

... with him,—no, it's hereditary damnation. Siward after Siward, generation after generation you know—" She bit her lip, thinking a moment. "His grandfather was a friend of my grand-parents, brilliant, handsome, generous, and—doomed! His own father was found dying in a dreadful resort in London where he had wandered when stupefied—a Siward! Think of it! So you see what that outbreak of Stephen's means to those whose families have been New Yorkers since New York was. It is ominous, it is more than ominous—it means that the master-vice has seized on ...
— The Fighting Chance • Robert W. Chambers

... boys had actually been guilty of the dreadful crime of setting fire to a stable. It was used by two or three poor men for their horses and carts, which was the only means they had of making an honest living; and yet these wicked boys had tried to burn it down, just for the fun of going to a fire, and getting up a fight! There ...
— The Runaway - The Adventures of Rodney Roverton • Unknown

... but as if relieved from some dreadful anxiety, drew a deep breath, and with a grateful look to ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 54, No. 335, September 1843 • Various

... connection with voluntary associations in which a special sanctity was held to accrue to the initiates through the medium of a cult in which special sacrifices were prominent It was natural that peculiarly solemn or dreadful offerings should be made to the deity in times of great distress; the placating efficacy in such cases seems to have been due to the pleasure taken by the deity in the proof of devotion given by ...
— Introduction to the History of Religions - Handbooks on the History of Religions, Volume IV • Crawford Howell Toy

... gulls, creating a dreadful din, drew my attention to a spot amongst the rocks, and, on nearing it, I found them squabbling around the carcase of a xiphoid whale, about sixteen feet long, which had been cast up apparently only ...
— The Home of the Blizzard • Douglas Mawson

... Cimbrian victories and that great and glorious success, did not choose to dedicate himself to honour so great and to be an object of admiration, but through insatiate desire of glory and power, though an old man, entered into political warfare with young men, and so ended his career in dreadful acts, and in sufferings more dreadful than acts; and they say that Cicero also would have had a better old age if he had withdrawn from public life after the affair of Catiline, and Scipio after he had added the conquest of Numantia to that ...
— Plutarch's Lives, Volume II • Aubrey Stewart & George Long

... is a night of terror to our young hero. He does not dare to throw himself upon the bench, lest he should sleep, and, sleeping, be attacked by these dreadful rats. ...
— The Boy Broker - Among the Kings of Wall Street • Frank A. Munsey

... not attempt by any sophistry to misrepresent slavery in order to prove its dreadful wickedness. For, I presume there are none who may read this narrative through, whether Christians or slaveholders, males or females, but what will admit it to be a system of the most high-handed oppression and tyranny that ever was ...
— Narrative of the Life and Adventures of Henry Bibb, an American Slave, Written by Himself • Henry Bibb

... said the red-haired girl behind him. "I was reading it to Maisie the other day from The City of Dreadful Night. D'you know ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling

... of their Pantheon, together with the fabulous adjudgers of future punishments, could not but dismiss the punishments, which were, in fact, as laughable, and as obviously the fictions of human ingenuity, as their dispensers. In short, the civilized part of the world in those days lay in this dreadful condition; their intellect had far outgrown their religion; the disproportions between the two were at length become monstrous; and as yet no purer or more elevated faith was prepared for their acceptance. The case was as shocking as if, with our present intellectual needs, ...
— The Caesars • Thomas de Quincey

... trees, of river, of flowers. She could listen to the song of the wild birds, and thank her Maker that she was born into so good a world. Nothing rested her, as she expressed it, like a visit into the country. Nothing made the dreadful things she had often to encounter in town seem more endurable than the sweet-peas, the roses, the green trees, the green grass, the fragrance and perfume of the country; and when she saw her little niece—for ...
— A Modern Tomboy - A Story for Girls • L. T. Meade

... imperial majesty; these dreadful German names are too hard for my Italian tongue. As soon as I had obeyed his majesty's commands, I forgot the name of ...
— Joseph II. and His Court • L. Muhlbach

... a ship unloading, and box by box were being handed to the lighter, according to the number each respectively bore. Some mistake, more or less important, had apparently been made by one of the native operatives on the occasion. Instantly two sticks were laid on his head with dreadful effect. The poor fellow seemed to be stunned and stupified for a time. On this account it probably happened, that he fell into a second similar blunder, when a stick was thrown, not horizontally, but ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 459 - Volume 18, New Series, October 16, 1852 • Various

... itself; might not his interference for me with Lord Dawton, arise rather from policy than friendship; might it not occur to him, if, as I surmised, he was acquainted with my suspicions, and acknowledged their dreadful justice, that it would be advisable to propitiate my silence? Such were among the thousand thoughts which flashed across me, and left my speculations in debate ...
— Pelham, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... "Don't talk in that dreadful voice," shivered Elsie; "it sounds as if you were dying. I thought you had more courage. Don't be afraid of me; if he held a bowl of poison to ...
— A Noble Woman • Ann S. Stephens

... of the night then in sleep; but Finn saw a dreadful vision through his sleep that made him start three times from his bed. "What makes you start from your bed, Finn?" said Diorraing. "It was the Tuatha de Danaan I saw," said he, "taking up a quarrel against me, and making a great slaughter ...
— Gods and Fighting Men • Lady I. A. Gregory

... and New Mexico men had taken part in warfare with the Apaches, those terrible Indians of the waterless Southwestern mountains—the most bloodthirsty and the wildest of all the red men of America, and the most formidable in their own dreadful style of warfare. Of course, a man who had kept his nerve and held his own, year after year, while living where each day and night contained the threat of hidden death from a foe whose goings and comings were unseen, was not apt to lose courage ...
— Rough Riders • Theodore Roosevelt

... was suddenly glad he was dead, gone for ever. She almost hated him once more. It was dreadful to live with people whom she did not understand, who knew things they kept secret, whose minds and thoughts and motives were incomprehensible to her, who believed horrible untrue things of her. It had been a fixed idea with Fay during her husband's lifetime ...
— Prisoners - Fast Bound In Misery And Iron • Mary Cholmondeley

... another murderous fire was discharged by those who had been left at the station. Then Cathelineau, who was still in front of the crowd, and who was now armed with the bayonet, which he had taken from the point of the musket, remembered the cannon, and he became for a moment pale as he thought of the dreadful slaughter which would take place, if the colonel were able to effect his purpose of playing ...
— La Vendee • Anthony Trollope

... heroical glory he aspires to is but to be reputed a most potent and victorious stealer of deer and beater-up of parks, to which purpose he has compiled commentaries of his own great actions that treat of his dreadful adventures in the night, of giving battle in the dark, discomfiting of keepers, horsing the deer on his own back, and making off with equal ...
— Character Writings of the 17th Century • Various

... organization of world peace. This organization must be the fulfillment of the promise for which men have fought and died in this war. It must be the justification of all the sacrifices that have been made—of all the dreadful misery that this ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various

... dreadfully stupid to see no one but his old tutor, and never to go outside of these great ramparts except for donkey-rides, which were generally very short. He therefore determined, late one moonlight night, to go out and take a ramble by himself. He was not afraid of the dreadful soldier of whom the old man had told him, because at that time of night this personage would, of course, be in bed and asleep. Considering these things, he quietly dressed himself, took down a great key from over his sleeping ...
— The Bee-Man of Orn and Other Fanciful Tales • Frank R. Stockton

... is. Why, bless you, if I wasn't there to meet him when he steps ashore, as likely as not he would meet with friends and go on the spree, and I shouldn't hear of him for a week; and a nice hole that would make in his earnings. Young man, you are scrouging me dreadful! Can't you ...
— One of the 28th • G. A. Henty

... were unusually frequent in the coal mines of Northumberland and Durham about the time when George Stephenson was engaged in the construction of his first locomotives. These explosions were often attended with fearful loss of life and dreadful suffering to the workpeople. Killingworth Colliery was not free from such deplorable calamities; and during the time that Stephenson was employed as a brakesman at the West Moor, several "blasts" took place in the pit, by which many workmen were scorched and killed, and the owners of ...
— Lives of the Engineers - The Locomotive. George and Robert Stephenson • Samuel Smiles

... off her bonnet, and throwing herself down on a stool at her mother's feet, "we have had such a dreadful accident, or hardly an accident either, for I feel perfectly certain Arthur did it on purpose; and I just expect he'll kill her some day, the mean, wicked boy!" and she burst into tears. "If I were Mr. Dinsmore I'd have him ...
— Holidays at Roselands • Martha Finley

... he cries, dragging her along; "something awful bad is going on at home. There is a stranger at our door crying just dreadful; and mother's red in the face, sayin' no end of angry words, stampin', fumin', and wringing her hands. The stranger wanted to see me and speak; but mother just hustled me out at the back, and tells me to go and ...
— When the Birds Begin to Sing • Winifred Graham

... Lincoln, who saw him face to face, who heard his voice in public assemblage, have with few exceptions passed to the grave. Another generation is upon the busy stage. The book has forever closed upon the dreadful pageant of civil strife. Sectional animosities, thank God, belong now only to the past. The mantle of Peace is over our entire land, and prosperity ...
— Something of Men I Have Known - With Some Papers of a General Nature, Political, Historical, and Retrospective • Adlai E. Stevenson

... of him to be at home, if possible, at the hour fixed. This arrangement went on for a while to her great satisfaction, but news reached her one day that Father —— seldom partook of her dinner. Such dreadful cases of starvation came to his door, that he frequently gave the good lady's dinner away. She determined that he must not sink and die; and to carry out her view she hit upon an ingenious plan. She gave the servant, who took the dinner to Father——, ...
— The History of the Great Irish Famine of 1847 (3rd ed.) (1902) - With Notices Of Earlier Irish Famines • John O'Rourke

... swallowing it mingled with blood. Though by this means exceedingly refreshed, the Germans were much too strong for them; but the storm being driven by a violent wind upon their faces, and accompanied with dreadful flashes of lightning, and loud thunder, the Germans were deprived of their sight, beaten down to the ground, and terrified to such a degree, that they were entirely routed and put to flight. Both heathen ...
— The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints - January, February, March • Alban Butler

... brought up with great care; and, as soon as he could speak, they told him all sorts of dreadful stories about people who had short noses. No one was allowed to come near him whose nose did not more or less resemble his own, and the courtiers, to get into favor with the Queen, took to pulling their babies' ...
— Boys and Girls Bookshelf (Vol 2 of 17) - Folk-Lore, Fables, And Fairy Tales • Various

... Nobody knew where you were, until I saw your horse tied here, and Mr. Wynkoop has been hunting for you everywhere. He is nearly frantic, poor man, and I cannot learn where either Mr. Moffat or Mr. McNeil is, and I just know those dreadful creatures will kill him before ...
— Bob Hampton of Placer • Randall Parrish

... Pope Julius II. and Leo X. As soon as they were finished, they were sent to Flanders to be copied in tapestry, for adorning the pontifical apartments; but the tapestries were not conveyed to Rome till after the decease of Raphael, and probably not before the dreadful sack of that city in 1527, under the pontificate of Clement VII; when Raphael's scholars having fled from thence, none were left to inquire after the original Cartoons, which lay neglected in the storerooms of the manufactory, the money for the tapestry having ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 10, Issue 273, September 15, 1827 • Various

... ruefully, "he's so far from being Philistine that he has a dreadful faculty for making me ...
— The Moon out of Reach • Margaret Pedler

... and perhaps ignorant of, the occurrences taking place around him. He had interfered when the youth and Rivers were in contact, but so soon after the event narrated, that time for reflection had not then been allowed. The dreadful process of thinking himself into an examination of his own deeds was going on; and remorse, with its severe but salutary stings, was doing, without ...
— Guy Rivers: A Tale of Georgia • William Gilmore Simms

... great calamities and slaughters came on the Jews. On the very same day two dreadful massacres happened. In Jerusalem the Jews fell on Netilius and the band of Roman soldiers whom he commanded after they had made terms and had surrendered, and all were killed except the commander himself, who supplicated ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol XI. • Edited by Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton

... on the expectant hush, Langham writhed in his seat. Each word, he felt, had a dreadful significance; the big linen handkerchief went back and forth across his face as he sought to mop away the sweat that oozed from every pore. He had gone as deep in the prosecutor's counsels as he dared go, he knew the man's power of invective, ...
— The Just and the Unjust • Vaughan Kester

... Cicely, "how dreadful thou dost look!" and, frightened, she caught him by the hand. "Why, oh!—what is ...
— Master Skylark • John Bennett

... cried Sir Giles. "Iris! With my cloak on!! With my hat in her hand!!! Sergeant, there has been some dreadful mistake. This is ...
— Blind Love • Wilkie Collins

... to do by Magna Charta, it is quite out of the question when a man is looking in your face all the time with a cruel expression in his eye amounting to 'Surely, that's enough!' or a pathetic expression which says, 'Have you done?' throwing a dreadful reproach into the Have. In Cumberland, at a farmhouse where I once had lodgings for a week or two, a huge dog as high as the dining-table used to plant himself in a position to watch all my motions at ...
— The Posthumous Works of Thomas De Quincey, Vol. II (2 vols) • Thomas De Quincey

... fight when thou art fighting—and, quitting the army, went away, then, O Sanjaya, I had no hope of success. When I heard that Vasudeva and Arjuna and the bow Gandiva of immeasurable prowess, these three of dreadful energy had come together, then, O Sanjaya, I had no hope of success. When I heard that upon Arjuna having been seized with compunction on his chariot and ready to sink, Krishna showed him all the worlds within his body, then, O Sanjaya, I had no hope of success. When ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa - Translated into English Prose - Adi Parva (First Parva, or First Book) • Kisari Mohan Ganguli (Translator)

... maddened by the terrible pain; and there lay our beloved chief mortally wounded in the spine, parched with thirst and heat, crying out for air and drink to cool the fever raging within. For two hours and a half there he lay suffering dreadful pain, yet eagerly inquiring how the battle was going. Twice Captain Hardy went below to see him; the first time, to tell him that twelve of the enemy had struck; the last time that still more had given ...
— The Grateful Indian - And other Stories • W.H.G. Kingston

... help you—of course he told me that," Susie, on her side, eagerly contended. "Why shouldn't he, and for what else have I come out with you? But he told me nothing dreadful—nothing, nothing, nothing," the poor lady passionately protested. "Only that you must do as you like and as he tells you—which is just simply to do as ...
— The Wings of the Dove, Volume II • Henry James

... "Well, that is certainly dreadful," said Simpson. "I'm very sorry for Chicago. I have many friends there. I shall hope to hear that it is not so bad ...
— The Financier • Theodore Dreiser

... to say that. I know I've just scrambled up and am not ladylike and proper. Sometimes I don't care. I like to be able to do things like boys. But I suppose it's dreadful." ...
— Brand Blotters • William MacLeod Raine

... these places are too dreadful for publication, and as for the taste—well, I tried a speck of fried sausage and thought I had touched a live wire! it left a scar on my tongue. We made a special excursion to see these sights and experience the smells. The driver of our carriage took advantage of a stop to take a drink at a ...
— A Fantasy of Mediterranean Travel • S. G. Bayne

... banquet in the School-Yard; and the programme of the day's proceedings had announced, rather to the terror of intending visitors, that after luncheon there would be "speeches, interspersed with songs, from three hundred and fifty of the boys." The abolition of the second comma dispelled the dreadful vision of three-hundred-and-fifty school-boy-speeches, and all went merry as a marriage-bell—all, except the weather. It seemed as if the accumulated rain of three centuries were discharged on the devoted Hill. It was raining when we went to the ...
— Fifteen Chapters of Autobiography • George William Erskine Russell

... crimes have subjected them to the dreadful punishment of solitary imprisonment for life, in any of the southern parts of Spain, are most generally sent to Tarifa.[3] Along both sides of the port, there is a mole nearly half a mile in length; at the extremity ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. - Volume 20, No. 567, Saturday, September 22, 1832. • Various

... must pay her very little. It's dreadful for people who have as much as we to have to look on at the ...
— The Inner Shrine • Basil King

... by her cries quickly brought up the landlord of the house, but too late—the dreadful scene presented to him the mother lifeless, pierced to the heart, on a chair, her daughter yet wildly standing over her with the fatal knife, and the venerable old man, her father, weeping by her side, himself bleeding at the forehead from the effects of a severe blow he received from ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Vol. 5 • Edited by E. V. Lucas

... surrounded on all sides by human beings of the most dreadful character, to whom the shedding of blood was mere pastime. On shore were the natives, whose practices were so horrible that I could not think of them without shuddering. On board were none but pirates of the blackest dye, who, although not cannibals, were foul murderers, and ...
— The Coral Island - A Tale Of The Pacific Ocean • R. M. Ballantyne

... and sad of cheer, As loath to leave his cottage dear, And march to foreign strand; Or musing, who would guide his steer, To till the fallow land. 60 Yet deem not in his thoughtful eye Did aught of dastard terror lie; More dreadful far his ire, Than theirs, who, scorning danger's name, In eager mood to battle came, 65 Their valour like light straw on name, ...
— Marmion • Sir Walter Scott

... of the ground over which he passed. His head swung out slightly to either side and he snapped each time. There was something sinister in every move, as if his body was driven on without conscious volition, actuated by some dreadful, unclean force. Breed knew it for some sort of poisoning, and his muscles bunched for flight. Shady barked angrily as if to drive the thing away. Then Breed saw a hairless travesty of a coyote move out of a draw and halt directly in the path of ...
— The Yellow Horde • Hal G. Evarts

... distressful scenes have been supposed to give pleasure to the spectator from exciting a comparative idea of his own happiness, as when a shipwreck is viewed by a person safe on shore, as mentioned by Lucretius, L. 3. But these dreadful situations belong rather to the terrible, or the horrid, than to the tragic; and may be objects of curiosity from their novelty, but not of Taste, and must suggest ...
— The Temple of Nature; or, the Origin of Society - A Poem, with Philosophical Notes • Erasmus Darwin

... the village; and he managed to hold frequent communication with me. The rest you know. My great fear now is lest he should fall into the hands of the Indians, who would, on finding that he had assisted to carry me off, wreak a dreadful vengeance ...
— In the Wilds of Florida - A Tale of Warfare and Hunting • W.H.G. Kingston

... man should do with his playthings; but, alas! this is what he does not by any means always do with them, and hence a great deal has been said against them. Little girls, in particular, are apt to fail on this point, and that is how the dreadful word gluttony came to be invented. For the same reason, also, people get punished from time to time; such punishments being the consequence of ...
— The History of a Mouthful of Bread - And its effect on the organization of men and animals • Jean Mace

... mustache and laugh a great deal. Once she said maybe none of us would ever get any; but the look Maudie Joyce and I turned upon her checked her thoughtless words. Life is bitter enough as it is without thinking of dreadful things in the future. I sometimes fear that underneath her girlish gayety Mabel Blossom conceals a morbid nature. But I am forgetting Josephine James. This story will tell why, with all her advantages of wealth and ...
— Different Girls • Various

... incident may seem to you too trivial to be noticed in this place. To me, gentlemen, it was by no means trivial. It meant, in the depth of it, such absence of all true [Greek: charis], reverence, and intellect, as it is very dreadful to trace in the mind of any human creature, much more in that of a child educated with apparently every advantage of circumstance in a beautiful English country town, within ten miles of our University. Most of all is it terrific when we regard it as the exponent (and this, in truth, it is) ...
— Aratra Pentelici, Seven Lectures on the Elements of Sculpture - Given before the University of Oxford in Michaelmas Term, 1870 • John Ruskin

... law taxing Megarian imports without first consulting the citizens; and he has invited Askoithios to do the same thing, and not to give autonomy to the Samians without first consulting the citizens. Is that the dreadful thing?" ...
— The Casual Ward - academic and other oddments • A. D. Godley

... This order was executed with all the atrocity incident to the character of the savages, and the bodies of the victims were thrown into a well near their prison. Now, if you please, we will drive to the memorials of this dreadful butchery." ...
— Across India - Or, Live Boys in the Far East • Oliver Optic

... effectually destroyed all pleasure on her part, and had made the change appear an unmitigated misfortune, even though she did not know what she would have thought the worst. Congratulations were dreadful to her, and it was all that Isabel could do to persuade her to repress her dislike so as not to ...
— Dynevor Terrace (Vol. II) • Charlotte M. Yonge

... happened, loosened his grasp of my collar and hurried over to his men to try to save Carver from the dreadful current. One of the wooden planks was thrown into the water for him to take hold of, but Carver must have failed in his attempt to reach it. One of the cutter's men ran to the mouth of the cave and brought back with him ...
— The Pilots of Pomona • Robert Leighton

... and bid the bearer of it tell him, that, beginning from a certain line in Virgil which he mentioned, he could recite twenty verses on, which he well remembered having read with this gentleman, when suffering all the time the most dreadful pain. ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. I. (of VI.) - With his Letters and Journals. • Thomas Moore

... 'Spanish papers' recently reproduced are forgeries and false. It requires no great stretch of the imagination with this little messenger in hand to believe that the ingenious teacher and friend of his youth, and for nearly two score years the constant companion of his manhood, passed that dreadful night with Sir Walter in the Gate House at Westminster, and after ' dear Bess' had taken her leave at midnight, penned out this note of remembrance for his friend's morning guidance, that nothing should be forgotten in case the ague ...
— Thomas Hariot • Henry Stevens

... alone, and the murderer— That dreadful thing did know, How he lay in his sin, a murdered ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 14, No. 396, Saturday, October 31, 1829. • Various

... horror or embarrassment could hardly be determined. The Cardinal said nothing,—Babette trembled a little,—what a dreadful boy Henri really was, she thought!—Madame Patoux shut up her eyes in horror, crossed herself devoutly as against some evil spirit, and was about to speak, when Henri, nothing daunted, threw himself into the breach again, ...
— The Master-Christian • Marie Corelli

... notwithstanding the numerous distractions of such a novel mode of life, he added many admirable stanzas to his great epic, inspired by the very scenes among which his hero, Godfrey, and his knights had lived. He left just in time to escape the dreadful massacre of St. Bartholomew; but he may be said to have suffered indirectly on account of it. Though treated with distinction by the French court, his personal wants were left unsupplied, and his patron, Cardinal Lewis, did ...
— Roman Mosaics - Or, Studies in Rome and Its Neighbourhood • Hugh Macmillan

... devoted husband at the agency, and Mira's cheeks were flaming, her eyes, full of a feverish excitement, flitted from one to another. She had but very, very little to say. She was glad, oh, yes, so glad, though it was dreadful to leave Fort Scott, where so many people had been ...
— Under Fire • Charles King

... You'd had a good deal better time, you an' your ma, if you'd been freer in your ways; now don't you s'pose you would? 'T ain't what you give folks to eat so much as 't is makin' 'em feel welcome. Now, there's Mis' Timms; when we was to Longport she was dreadful methodical. She wouldn't let Cap'n Timms fetch nobody home to dinner without lettin' of her know, same's other cap'ns' wives had to submit to. I was thinkin', when she was so cordial over to Danby, how she'd softened ...
— The Life of Nancy • Sarah Orne Jewett

... enjoyed and abused; and the many favours of providence which he had received, particularly in rescuing him from so many imminent dangers of death, which he now saw must have been attended with such dreadful and hopeless destruction. The privileges of his education, which he had so much despised, now lay with an almost insupportable weight on his mind; and the folly of that career of sinful pleasure which he had so many years ...
— The Life of Col. James Gardiner - Who Was Slain at the Battle of Prestonpans, September 21, 1745 • P. Doddridge

... never be able to chide the Sisters like the other Mothers: and to have them coming up to me, when they are chidden, and kissing the floor at my feet—I do not know how I can stand it. I am sure it will give me a dreadful feeling. However, I hope nothing will ever happen of that kind, for a long, ...
— In Convent Walls - The Story of the Despensers • Emily Sarah Holt

... arms; not to stray from them again, I trust, my boy, my boy!" She pressed her forehead with its fine white hair against the cruel bars, and seemed to devour him with her loving eyes. "All will yet be well," she continued; "your innocence can not fail to be established, and this dreadful time will be forgotten ...
— Bred in the Bone • James Payn

... from such another jury! The Judgment-day will be a picnic to 't. Their satire was more dreadful than their fury, And worst of all was just a kind of brute Disgust, and giving up, and ...
— Gloucester Moors and Other Poems • William Vaughn Moody

... up himself within half an hour to see if all was well; but said nothing of his dreadful employment or of Mr. Stewart; and Sir Nicholas did not like to ask for fear of getting Mrs. Jakes into trouble. The gaoler took away the supper things, wished him good-night, went out and locked ...
— By What Authority? • Robert Hugh Benson

... a word she says, but you are so good and clever, and you found out about the Russian gentleman's wife directly. Can't you find out who did the treason because he wasn't Father upon my honour; he is an Englishman and uncapable to do such things, and then they would let Father out of prison. It is dreadful, and Mother is getting so thin. She told us once to pray for all prisoners and captives. I see now. Oh, do help me—there is only just Mother and me know, and we can't do anything. Peter and Phil don't know. ...
— The Railway Children • E. Nesbit

... man who had no connection with Macedonia, but had committed many dreadful crimes, and for this reason was tried before him in an appealed case. His name proved to be Alexander, and when the orator accusing him said repeatedly "the bloodthirsty Alexander, the god-detested Alexander," the ...
— Dio's Rome, Vol VI. • Cassius Dio

... Within that form was in process a most dreadful activity. The spirit was preparing to vacate the habitation it had so long occupied. It gave no sign. The better to hide its preparations it had drawn that mask about the face. Seventy years it had ...
— If Winter Comes • A.S.M. Hutchinson

... we fellow-sinners call vile. Unless your faith be deep-rooted and of most vigorous growth, it is the safer way not to turn aside into this region so suggestive of miserable doubt. It was a place "with dreadful faces thronged," wrinkled and grim with vice and wretchedness; and, thinking over the line of Milton here quoted, I come to the conclusion that those ugly lineaments which startled Adam and Eve, as they looked backward to the closed gate of Paradise, were no fiends from ...
— Our Old Home - A Series of English Sketches • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... her on her own ground. As for the Bumble, she's quite distraught. She keeps glancing at us as if she expected somebody all the time to spill her tea, or break a plate, or pull a face, or do something dreadful. We're not ...
— The Madcap of the School • Angela Brazil

... you really mean I may say anything I like? However dark it is? However dreadful it is? However damnable ...
— Magic - A Fantastic Comedy • G.K. Chesterton

... obliged Edward Ruhberg to do the horrid deed. Suicide is shocking; but the condemnation of an enraged father, her love, and the fear of a convent, lead Marianne to drink the cup, and few would dare to condemn the victim of a dreadful tyranny. Humanity and tolerance have begun to prevail in our time at courts of princes and in courts of law. A large share of this may be due to the influence of the stage in showing ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller

... girl agitatedly. "Hannah, do go and call the steward to open the windows. Is it really strong?" she implored as Hannah went out. "How dreadful. It's only orris and I didn't know Hannah had ...
— The Shuttle • Frances Hodgson Burnett

... attitudes, the carbines, the broad-brimm'd western hats, the powder-smoke in puffs, the dying horses with their rolling eyes almost human in their agony, the clouds of war-bonneted Sioux in the background, the figures of Custer and Cook—with indeed the whole scene, dreadful, yet with an attraction and beauty that will remain in my memory. With all its color and fierce action, a certain Greek continence pervades it. A sunny sky and clear light envelop all. There is an almost entire absence of the stock ...
— Complete Prose Works - Specimen Days and Collect, November Boughs and Goodbye My Fancy • Walt Whitman

... "The first of these Christian elements [in Bewulf] is the sense of a fairer, softer world than that in which the Northern warriors lived.... Another Christian passage (ll. 107, 1262) derives all the demons, eotens, elves, and dreadful sea-beasts from the race of Cain. The folly of sacrificing to the heathen gods is spoken of (l. 175).... The other point is the belief in immortality (ll. ...
— Beowulf • James A. Harrison and Robert Sharp, eds.

... round and observed eight or ten huge ostriches stalking towards me with slow funereal gait. I felt somewhat uneasy,—for their youth, of which Hobson had assured me, was in no way indicated by their huge bodies and dreadful legs. However, I had taken the precaution to carry my forked stick, and drawing it nearer continued at my work with an easier mind. If they meant war I knew escape to be hopeless, for the nearest wall was a quarter of ...
— Six Months at the Cape • R.M. Ballantyne

... have a debt of vengeance to extort from him. One scoundrel has been handed over to the law, another lies dead, another is in London in the hands of Langhetti's friends, the Carbonari. The worst one yet remains, and my father's voice cries to me day and night from that dreadful ship." ...
— Cord and Creese • James de Mille

... shouts of jubilee and exultation, their countrymen were employed in securing the plunder of the field; while some, impelled by hatred and revenge, mangled and mutilated the limbs of the dead Normans, in a manner unworthy of their national cause and their own courage. The fearful yells with which this dreadful work was consummated, while it struck horror into the minds of the slender garrison of the Garde Doloureuse, inspired them at the same time with the resolution rather to defend the fortress to the last extremity, than to submit to the mercy of so vengeful an enemy. [Footnote: ...
— The Betrothed • Sir Walter Scott

... flowing sails, Undaunted by the fiercest gales, In dreadful pomp she plows the main, While adverse tempests rage in vain. When she displays her gloomy tier, The boldest Britons freeze with fear, And, owning her superior might, Seek their best safety in their flight. But when she pours the dreadful blaze And thunder from her cannon plays, The bursting flash ...
— The Story of Commodore John Barry • Martin Griffin

... not wickedness, but fear. That dreadful white thing rushing near Appeared to his affrighted eyes Full ...
— A Horse Book • Mary Tourtel

... has arrived in this country to invoke our assistance in the time of their dreadful need. What action our government can or will take I know not. It has been announced that no action can be taken that will interfere with our entire neutrality. It is certainly eminently desirable that we should remain entirely neutral and nothing but urgent need ...
— Woodrow Wilson as I Know Him • Joseph P. Tumulty

... Pinta was overtaken off the Haitian coast, but a dreadful storm parted the ships once more, and neither again saw the other till the day when, but a few hours apart, they dropped anchor in the haven of Palos, whence they had sailed seven months before. As the news spread, the people went wild with joy. The journey of Columbus ...
— A Brief History of the United States • John Bach McMaster

... this dreadful deed by her husband's brother, who became ruler over the land, holding sway eight years, when Orestes, the son of Agamemnon, slew ...
— Odysseus, the Hero of Ithaca - Adapted from the Third Book of the Primary Schools of Athens, Greece • Homer

... it seemed to him that M. de Valorsay was twisting and turning his cane in a most ominous manner. "I must confess, Monsieur le Marquis," he at last replied, "that I had not the courage to tell you of the dreadful misfortune ...
— The Count's Millions - Volume 1 (of 2) • Emile Gaboriau

... know that I ought to tell you what he said the morning the dreadful news came, that President Lincoln was assassinated," she continued, after a pause and in a very saddened tone. "I would not speak of it if I did ...
— When Life Was Young - At the Old Farm in Maine • C. A. Stephens

... friend; my wounded self-assertion demands satisfaction. It was a very little slight, and I should make myself ridiculous if I showed my resentment. But in imagination I magnify the injury done me, and go on to picture a dreadful state of affairs, in which my friend has treated me very badly indeed, and perhaps deserted me. Then I should not be ridiculous, but so deeply wronged as to be an important person, one to be talked about; and thus my demand for importance and recognition is ...
— Psychology - A Study Of Mental Life • Robert S. Woodworth

... surgical cases, and in those of Klebs, Koch, and others, had been the means of detecting the cause of many diseases both in man and animals, the latest and not the least important of which was the remarkable series of successful researches by Pasteur into the nature and mode of cure of that most dreadful of maladies, hydrophobia. The value of his discovery was greater than could be estimated by its present utility, for it showed that it might be possible to avert other diseases besides hydrophobia by the adoption of a somewhat similar method ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 613, October 1, 1887 • Various

... belligerent or irascible stage; he was then inveighing against the dwellers in the Shenandoah Valley, where he had lately been quartered, for their want of patriotism in declining to furnish their defenders with gratuitous whisky and tobacco; threatening the most dreadful reprisals when he should visit "thim desateful Copperhids" again. Suddenly, without any warning, he slid into the maudlin phase, taking his parable of ...
— Border and Bastille • George A. Lawrence

... to get in a word, failed, and took a step toward the door. His foot caught in the rug, and for one dreadful moment he thought he was doomed to create another scene. As he recovered his balance, Ada Nansen came ...
— Betty Gordon at Boarding School - The Treasure of Indian Chasm • Alice Emerson

... friendlessness, weakness, foolishness, flightiness, and just simple, real, human poorness of spirit. Now, what we find so redistributed in the course of years, we often find crushed together and fallen apart in a short time. Today the prisoner seems to us the most dreadful criminal; in a few days, we have calmed down, have learned to know the case from another side, the criminal has shown his real nature more clearly, and our whole notion ...
— Robin Hood • J. Walker McSpadden

... slave mother; doubtless she had been expecting some such exposure for years, and was, at least, partially steeled to meet it. But for the two girls, brought up as sisters, close companions since infancy, having no previous suspicion of the dreadful truth, this sudden revelation would be worse than death. Yet now concealment would be no kindness; indeed, the tenderest mercy I could show was to tell them in all frankness the whole miserable story of crime and neglect; and then point ...
— The Devil's Own - A Romance of the Black Hawk War • Randall Parrish

... cruel tyrant, and the chief business of his life seemed to be selecting and marrying new queens, making room for each succeeding one by discarding, divorcing, or beheading her predecessor. There were six of them in all, and, with one exception, the history of each one is a distinct and separate, but dreadful tragedy. As there were so many of them, and they figured as queens each for so short a period, they are commonly designated in history by their personal family names, and even in these names there is a great similarity. There were three ...
— Queen Elizabeth - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott

... of her!" said Clover, smiling. "I wish children could be born with a sense of the fitness of times and seasons. Jeffy is pretty good as to sleeping, but he is dreadful about eating. Half the time he doesn't want anything at dinner; and then at half-past three, or a quarter to eight, or ten minutes after twelve, or some such uncanonical hour, he is so ragingly hungry that he can scarcely wait till I fetch him something. He is so tiresome about his bath ...
— In the High Valley - Being the fifth and last volume of the Katy Did series • Susan Coolidge

... and lay in bed most of the day bewailing her fate, scribbling answers to letters of condolence, and occasionally dipping into a novel. "Read she must," she declared, "as it diverted her mind from the too dreadful present. A good novel was the ...
— The Road to Mandalay - A Tale of Burma • B. M. Croker

... or treat him, an' he acts like a diff'rent hoss, an' the feller allows you swindled him. You see, hosses gits used to places an' ways to a certain extent, an' when they're changed, why they're apt to act diff'rent. Hosses don't know but dreadful little, really. Talk about hoss sense—wa'al, ...
— David Harum - A Story of American Life • Edward Noyes Westcott

... Wakungu. The boy who had provoked me was then dragged in, tied by his neck and hands, when the king asked him by whose orders he had acted in such a manner, knowing that I objected to it, and wished to speak to him on the subject first. The poor boy, in a dreadful fright, said he had acted under the instructions of the Kamraviona: there was no harm done, for Bana's men were not hurt. "Well, then," said the king, "if they were not injured, and you only did as you were ordered, no fault rests with ...
— The Discovery of the Source of the Nile • John Hanning Speke

... you! I'm ashamed that I believed my cousin Floyd! He lied—he lied. I'm all in the dark, strangely distressed. My father wants me to go back home. Floyd is trying to keep me here. They've quarreled. Oh, I know something dreadful will happen. I know I'll need you if—if—Will you ...
— The Lone Star Ranger • Zane Grey

... looming out of the shadow was Theophil's pulpit, and beneath was her little harmonium,—to-morrow night would be her choir-practice, she mustn't forget that; no, she mustn't forget that—and then the darkness began to frame flashing pictures of that dreadful glimpse of brightness—were they still standing like that?—how happy they looked!—and would they always go on standing together in brightness like that, while she sat here in the darkness. Well, the darkness was good; how she should ...
— The Romance of Zion Chapel [3d ed.] • Richard Le Gallienne

... widely in form, structure and voice from those of Europe that there can scarcely be a doubt of their descent from distinct species. But both have entirely disappeared as wild animals, unless indeed the white cattle of Chillingham are really descendants of Caesar's dreadful urus and not merely domestic cattle lapsed into savagery. So have the camel, and, with a similar possible exception, the horse. Was the whole race in each of these cases subjugated, or exterminated, and that by uncivilised man with his primitive weapons? There is no ...
— Concerning Animals and Other Matters • E.H. Aitken, (AKA Edward Hamilton)

... dreadful state, for (according to his making out of the story) the possible consequences of what he had done in recklessness and hardihood, flashed upon him in their fulness for the first time. When they had stood gazing at one another for a little while, ...
— The Bed-Book of Happiness • Harold Begbie

... himself ready to treat the army and navy of England as enemies; and thousands of citizens in Massachusetts were compelling royal councilors to resign their places, and answering those who threatened them with the charge of treason and death with—"No consequences are so dreadful to a free people as that of being made slaves." Jay's suggestion to form a union under the auspices of the king was disapproved: "We must stand undisguised on one side or the other." Gage's orders were ignored; judges appointed by royal ...
— The History of the United States from 1492 to 1910, Volume 1 • Julian Hawthorne

... before, but must I take it without proof for granted?—A. I will give you a proof or two: 'God hath concluded them all in unbelief' (Rom 11:32). And again it is said, 'faith cometh' (Rom 10:17). And again, the Holy Ghost insinuateth our estate to be dreadful 'before faith came' ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan

... to say, a man in love sees everything through a false medium. It must be a dreadful calamity to ...
— Gryll Grange • Thomas Love Peacock

... thus far to make white men just, fair, and honorable, and to gain the respect of the red man for the Christian's God. It is a sad reflection, too, that we are doing so little, and that the world's conversion is so far, so very far away in the future. There is a dreadful responsibility resting somewhere! ...
— Three Years on the Plains - Observations of Indians, 1867-1870 • Edmund B. Tuttle

... cries of the poor inhabitants in tears, and placed a child as he would an arrow in the dark. Although the gentle Bertha was not used to such treatment (poor child, she was but fifteen), she believed in her virgin faith, that the happiness of becoming a mother demanded this terrible, dreadful bruising and nasty business; so during his painful task she would pray to God to assist her, and recite Aves to our Lady, esteeming her lucky, in only having the Holy Ghost to endure. By this means, never ...
— Droll Stories, Volume 3 • Honore de Balzac

... a man come to town, and then he did not do anything very dreadful. He was not a trapper, he was only an amateur naturalist who wanted to see the beavers at their work, and who thought he was smart enough to catch them at it. His plan was simple enough; he made a breach in the dam one night, and then climbed a tree and ...
— Forest Neighbors - Life Stories of Wild Animals • William Davenport Hulbert

... may remark, that what I underwent from Mrs. Crupp, in consequence of the tyranny she established over me, was dreadful. I never was so much afraid of anyone. We made a compromise of everything. If I hesitated, she was taken with that wonderful disorder which was always lying in ambush in her system, ready, at the shortest notice, to ...
— David Copperfield • Charles Dickens

... fortune and—me!' And at the same moment Rogers, in his deep arm-chair before the fire, was saying to himself, 'I'm glad Minks has come to me; he's just the man I want for my big Scheme!' And then—'Pity he's such a lugubrious looking fellow, and wears those dreadful fancy waistcoats. But he's very open to suggestion. We can change all that. I must look after Minks a bit. He's rather sacrificed his career for me, I fancy. He's got ...
— A Prisoner in Fairyland • Algernon Blackwood

... this sort, and Gwen was talking with her cousin at a respectful distance, to comply with existing prejudices; but without the slightest belief that her doing so would make any difference, one way or the other. The dreadful flavour of fever was in everything, and lemons and hothouse grapes were making believe they were cooling, and bottles that they contained sedatives, and disinfectants that they were purifying the atmosphere. It was all their gammon, and the fiend Typhus, invisible, was chuckling over their preposterous ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan

... and began to meditate dreadful bloodthirsty thoughts, of which hair-triggers and Lord's ...
— My Novel, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... your presence, sister-in-law, I utter a single word of falsehood, may the thunder from heaven blast me!" protested Chia Jui. "It's only because I had all along heard people say that you were a dreadful person, and that you cannot condone even the slightest shortcoming committed in your presence, that I was induced to keep back by fear; but after seeing you, on this occasion, so chatty, so full of fun and most considerate to others, how ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin

... struggling hosts, And shouts of victory from contending hordes Blended with sorrowing moans of dying men. "Thy sons, O King!" a breathless herald cried, Fresh from the carnage, bowing low his head, Where Saul, heart-weary, watched the dreadful strife On Gilboa's height. "Thy sons, O mighty King!" The herald cried, and sank upon the ground By haste exhausted. Saul, with fitful start, Upraised the prostrate messenger. "My sons! "What of them? Speak!" he gasped, with startled ...
— The Death of Saul and other Eisteddfod Prize Poems and Miscellaneous Verses • J. C. Manning



Words linked to "Dreadful" :   direful, horrific, penny dreadful, dire, fearful, bad, painful, dreaded, alarming, abominable, frightening, awful, dreadfulness, unpleasant, horrendous, dread, unspeakable, fearsome



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