"Helpless" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... understand anything better when she was ill. Pain acted like a girdle, to give tension to her powers. A lady, who was with her one day during a terrible attack of nervous headache, which made Margaret totally helpless, assured me that Margaret was yet in the finest vein of humor, and kept those who were assisting her in a strange, painful excitement, between laughing and crying, by perpetual brilliant sallies. There were other peculiarities of habit and power. When she turned her head on one side, ...
— Memoirs of Margaret Fuller Ossoli, Vol. I • Margaret Fuller Ossoli
... of unrequited love in this world. There are hearts that love with all the strength of purest and holiest affection, whose love seems to meet no requital. There is much unrequited mother-love and father-love. Parents live for their children. In helpless infancy they begin to pour out their affection on them. They toil for them, suffer for them, deny themselves to provide comforts for them, bear their burdens, watch beside them when they are sick, pray for them, and teach them. Parent-love is likest God's love of ...
— Personal Friendships of Jesus • J. R. Miller
... does not rage at thee and thrust them back; He gives thee humble thanks and praises sweet And swears with thousand oaths to be thy man. But when, the honeyed words still in thine ear, Thou lay'st thy weary limbs upon thy couch, Bare and defenseless as a helpless child, Then creeps the traitor up and murders thee, And even while ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. IX - Friedrich Hebbel and Otto Ludwig • Various
... up to it, and touched it with such an appearance of suspicion as if it had been an electrical battery, and then looked round at me with a look of such helpless ignorance that my soul was moved. "I never see one of them things before," ...
— The May Flower, and Miscellaneous Writings • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... know, when the nation was in its hour of extreme peril, with a nearly depleted treasury, with England and France waiting with large fleets for a few more evil days in order to raise the blockade, with President, Congress, and people nearly helpless and despairing, there arose this woman, who with strategic science far in advance of any military or naval officer on land or sea, pointed out the way to victory, sending her plans and maps to the War Department, which adopted them. ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume II • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage
... wretch (no cause descried), Touch'd by Diana's vengeful arrow, died. Down dropp'd the caitiff-corse, a worthless load, Down to the deep; there roll'd, the future food Of fierce sea-wolves, and monsters of the flood. An helpless infant I remain'd behind; Thence borne to Ithaca by wave and wind; Sold to Laertes by divine command, And now ...
— The Odyssey of Homer • Homer, translated by Alexander Pope
... mixture of curiosity and scorn, no more, however, than would be bestowed upon a mushroom or a spider. Inwardly he weighed, as it were, the slender, childlike form, wondered casually at the agitation of her gestures, her flashing eyes, the helpless twitching of her lips, wondered at the lace lying on the floor, and thought he was dreaming when he became aware that an imploring gesture of her hands was meant ...
— The German Classics, v. 20 - Masterpieces of German Literature • Various
... the rising tide, the gale swelled once more to its former violence, the remnants of the barque fast yielded to the resistless waves. The cabin went by the board, the after-parts broke up, and the stem settled out of sight. Soon, too, the forecastle was filled with water, and the helpless little band were driven to the deck, where they clustered round the foremast. Presently, even this frail support was loosened from the hull, and rose and fell with every billow. It was plain to all that ...
— Memoirs of Margaret Fuller Ossoli, Vol. II • Margaret Fuller Ossoli
... effected. On the 26th Sale continued his march, having made up his baggage animals at the expense of the 37th Native Infantry, which, with half of the sappers and three guns of the mountain train, he sent back to Kubbar-i-Jubbar, there to halt in a dangerously helpless situation until transport should be sent down from Cabul. His march as far as Kutti Sung was unmolested. Mistrusting the good faith of his new-made allies, he shunned the usual route through the Purwan Durrah by taking the ...
— The Afghan Wars 1839-42 and 1878-80 • Archibald Forbes
... How would he fight this unseen, unknown foe? He could take his suspicions to Steiner—but what could that futile fellow do? He would fiddle around and scratch his head and mumble inanities! Varr gritted his teeth in helpless rage as he watched the men fighting their slow but certain battle to victory ...
— The Monk of Hambleton • Armstrong Livingston
... nobody came. Returning to the yard I discovered a place where I could get over the fence, and so I escaped into the street. Immediately I searched the sky for the mysterious car, but could see no sign of it. They were gone! I almost sank upon the pavement in a state of helpless excitement, which I could not have explained to myself if I had stopped to reason; for why, after all, should I take the thing so tragically. But something within me said that all was wrong. A ...
— A Columbus of Space • Garrett P. Serviss
... if they don't!" Eleanor flashed back at him. "They do, though, only you men don't know the real thing when you see it. You have an idea that a woman ought to be helpless and clinging. Maybe that was all right in the old days, when there were always plenty of men to look after a woman. But how about the way things are now? Women have to go into shops and offices and factories to earn a living, don't they, just the ...
— A Campfire Girl's Happiness • Jane L. Stewart
... to be explained, to be discovered. I would willingly have recommended him for the chieftainship of his tribe, but he is not wealthy; he wisely prefers to see the dignity in the hands of his cousin 'Alayan, who, by-the-by, is helpless without him. He remained with us to the end: he seemed to take a pride in accompanying the expedition by sea to El-Haura, and by land to the Wady Hamz, far beyond the limits of his tribe. When derided for mounting a pair of Government "bluchers," tied over bare feet, with bits of glaring tassel-string ...
— The Land of Midian, Vol. 1 • Richard Burton
... ago, Monsieur. For three years he has been helpless and bedridden. The archbishop is the real king nowadays. But he meddles not with ...
— The Puppet Crown • Harold MacGrath
... sae heinous in human life As taking a helpless baby's life; There's naething sae kind aneath the sky As cheering the ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 19, No. 533, Saturday, February 11, 1832. • Various
... is the thought of Christ's departure as being a step in advance, and a positive gain, even to those poor, bewildered men who were clustering round Him, depending absolutely upon Himself, and feeling themselves orphaned and helpless without Him. ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture: St. John Chaps. XV to XXI • Alexander Maclaren
... showed the symmetry and fine outlines of the vessel's rig, resembling the effect of a group of statuary seen by torch-light,—and fearful, since the dark void beyond seemed to declare their isolated and helpless state. ...
— The Water-Witch or, The Skimmer of the Seas • James Fenimore Cooper
... the man—I deemed it was a swaggering fit, as he sometimes took when he was in liquor; and, may the Merciful Virgin forgive me! I let him go without company, in which I did him inhuman wrong. Holy St. John be my witness! I would have gone with any helpless creature; and far more with him, with whom I have so often sat at the same board and drunken of the same cup. Who, of the race of man, could have thought of harming a creature so simple and so unoffending, excepting by ...
— The Fair Maid of Perth • Sir Walter Scott
... can do to prevent them; which eggs do not hatch till the spring following, as I have often experienced. Several intelligent folks assure me that they have seen the viper open her mouth and admit her helpless young down her throat on sudden surprises, just as the female opossum does her brood into the pouch under her belly, upon the like emergencies and yet the London viper-catchers insist on it, to Mr. Barrington, that no such thing ever happens. The serpent kind eat, I believe, but once ...
— The Natural History of Selborne • Gilbert White
... of nausea at the pit of her stomach. She did not weep or lose control of herself. But she felt frightfully helpless. ...
— Nan Sherwood at Rose Ranch • Annie Roe Carr
... but compassion for the weak, helpless, defenceless infant that craves the mother's milk and the comfort of her breast? And woman's love is ...
— Tragic Sense Of Life • Miguel de Unamuno
... were men, and therefore, drunken and brutal as they were, they hesitated to close upon one helpless girl. ...
— The Missing Bride • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... haunted him, no slightest premonition of danger clouded his sky. His terrible fate was upon him in an instant. One moment he stood erect, strong, confident in the years stretching peacefully out before him. The next he lay wounded, bleeding, helpless, doomed to weary weeks of torture, to ...
— Public Speaking • Irvah Lester Winter
... moment, and she felt so helpless. She longed to urge her deer to go faster. She could not do that. He was keeping his place with difficulty. She could only sit and hope that somehow the wolf-leader would ...
— The Blue Envelope • Roy J. Snell
... a mirror. At this he instantly stood erect upon his hind legs, crashing my tall hat into the crystal chandelier. His four legs all gave way on the polished floor and down we went with a noise like thunder, the pony on the top of me, the chandelier on the top of him and my father and the footman helpless spectators. I was up and on Tatts' head in a moment, but not before he had kicked a fine old English chest into a jelly. This misadventure upset my father's temper and my pony's nerve, as well as preventing me from dancing ...
— Margot Asquith, An Autobiography: Volumes I & II • Margot Asquith
... Satan; for I saw close beside me a most frightful little negro, gnashing his teeth in despair at losing what he attempted to seize. When I saw him, I laughed, and had no fear; for there were some then present who were helpless, and knew of no means whereby so great a pain could be relieved. My body, head, and arms were violently shaken; I could not help myself: but the worst of all was the interior pain, for I could find no ease in any way. Nor did I dare to ask for holy water, lest those who ...
— The Life of St. Teresa of Jesus • Teresa of Avila
... Mark Twain is before the people as a candidate for Governor, he will condescend to explain how he came to be convicted of perjury by thirty-four witnesses in Wakawak, Cochin China, in 1863, the intent of which perjury being to rob a poor native widow and her helpless family of a meager plantain-patch, their only stay and support in their bereavement and desolation. Mr. Twain owes it to himself, as well as to the great people whose suffrages he asks, to clear this matter ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... could be lifted from the carriage, by two careful servants, and slowly taken in at the great entrance, wan, wasted, and helpless, Ernestine was going into ...
— Six Girls - A Home Story • Fannie Belle Irving
... was helpless. It was only her love of Mark and Jesus that was strong. Something would happen if she told her—something awful. She could feel already the chill of an intolerable separation. She could give up Jesus, the lover of her soul, but she could ...
— Mary Olivier: A Life • May Sinclair
... the Upper Gambia the disappearance of man is ever followed by a springing of bush and forest so portentous that a few hands are helpless and hopeless. Such is the case with the great wooded belt north of the Gold Coast, where even the second-growth becomes impenetrable without the matchet, and where the swamps and muds, bred and fed by torrential rains, bar the transit ...
— To The Gold Coast for Gold, Vol. II - A Personal Narrative • Richard Francis Burton and Verney Lovett Cameron
... returned to my work from the East, where dear friends showed me every courtesy and sympathy possible, and while at the Mohonk Conference of Indian Workers I met many whose hearts and purses were open to pray for and help the helpless and abused red man. During my visit East I found a general interest and sympathy from churches and individuals, and money was put into my hands sufficient to add two or three warm rooms to our parsonage, which we have vacated and turned over to the sick and distressed ...
— The American Missionary — Volume 54, No. 01, January, 1900 • Various
... then compensates by making us divine ourselves. Man is a mere worm, but he can by priestly magic bring God to earth; he is hopelessly ignorant, but set on a throne and properly manipulated he becomes an infallible vice-God; he is a helpless creature, and yet this creature can define with more than scientific accuracy the precise nature of his inconceivable Creator; he grovels on the ground as a miserable sinner and stands up to declare that he is the channel of Divine inspiration; all his wisdom is ...
— Prose Masterpieces from Modern Essayists • James Anthony Froude, Edward A. Freeman, William Ewart Gladstone, John Henry Newman and Leslie Steph
... and helpless, I had recourse to my dear sister Zobeide, whose adventures your majesty has just heard. To her I made known my misfortune; she received me with her accustomed goodness, and advised me to bear my ambition patience. "This is the way of ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments vol. 1 • Anon.
... on my hands and knees, I thought for the last time, as I then thought I should die. Stomach troubles then set in, and for more than three months, I endured the utmost agony. Night and day sweats absorbed my little remaining strength, and I became helpless. I had taken leave of my family, not expecting to last the day out, when I was seen by a young doctor, who is fast becoming an eminent man, who said he thought he could alleviate my sufferings—though he did not expect to cure me. ...
— The People's Common Sense Medical Adviser in Plain English • R. V. Pierce
... serve him and be taught the mechanical details of his art. My father had no clue whatever to my direction, for he had not dreamed of anything unusual in my thoughts or plans. He was now entirely alone. But I knew that I was helpless against the phantom which was leading me forth; it also contained a stimulant which was able to bear me safely through ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 58, August, 1862 • Various
... secret to anyone, of his pride and magnanimity; for he had used his utmost endeavour to purchase her of her master, but he had failed. At last when his patience was at an end and his passion was sore on him and he was helpless in the matter, he went in to al-Maamun, one day of state after the folk had retired, and said to him, 'O Commander of the Faithful, if thou wilt this day make trial of thine Alcaydes by taking them unawares, thou wilt know the generous from the mean and note each one's place, after the quality ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton
... the two met, in a display of aggressive tennis so remarkable that the boy was helpless before it. Richards was stale and below form, but even if he had been at his best, he could not have withstood Johnston's attack. Little Bill followed this up by sweeping Williams off the court by another marvellous streak ...
— The Art of Lawn Tennis • William T. Tilden, 2D
... cubs, for some hunters had stolen them that very day while she was away from home. She heard the moans of the little babe, and wondered if it was not one of her lost cubs; and when she saw it lying so helpless on the moss she went to it and looked at it kindly. Was it possible that a little bear could be changed into a pretty babe with fat white hands and with a beautiful gold chain around its neck? The old bear did not know; ...
— Old Greek Stories • James Baldwin
... approach to the river from the south was only by one narrow gulch, whereas, on the northern side, lay a long, sandy stretch where troops could easily be deployed. Moreover the Japanese had no boats wherewith to negotiate a broad and swiftly flowing river. During ten days the invaders remained helpless on the southern bank. Then the Koreans allowed themselves to be betrayed by the common device of a simulated retreat. They crossed in exultant pursuit, only to find that they had been trapped into an ambush. Konishi and Kato now again separated, the former continuing ...
— A History of the Japanese People - From the Earliest Times to the End of the Meiji Era • Frank Brinkley and Dairoku Kikuchi
... invisible quarter of the evening, they, one and all, shook him, likewise, as heartily by the hand—a dumb but eloquent expression of their grateful sense of the humanity he had shown their little friend in his hour of helpless peril and piteous need. The young brave received the demonstration with dignified composure; not, though, as if he had expected it, for, at the first greeting, he did lose his self-possessed reserve so far as to betray a little sign of ...
— Burl • Morrison Heady
... the Eighth United States, (colored) had fallen into the hands of the rebels by reason of a severe wound in the leg, which left him helpless upon the field at Oolustee. The Rebels treated him with studied indignity. They utterly refused to recognize him as an officer, or even as a man. Instead of being sent to Macon or Columbia, where the other officers were, ...
— Andersonville, complete • John McElroy
... light—green! A boat was emerging from the big basin of water beyond. The starboard signal, set high above the waves, belonged to no small craft such as the woman had embarked in. The sight of it fitted a contingency that had flashed through his brain on the beach. The realization left him helpless now—his last opportunity ...
— A Man and His Money • Frederic Stewart Isham
... the normal, natural development of the Boy Jesus made clear. He came among men to experience all the natural conditions of mortality; He was born as truly a dependent, helpless babe as is any other child; His infancy was in all common features as the infancy of others; His boyhood was actual boyhood, His development was as necessary and as real as that of all children. Over His mind ...
— Jesus the Christ - A Study of the Messiah and His Mission According to Holy - Scriptures Both Ancient and Modern • James Edward Talmage
... a whip that cut into his flesh; his eager hands clawed piteously at Thibaut's grasping arm, until his very agony of terror aroused the contempt of his captor. He pushed the king from him contemptuously, and the king dropped on the ground a black and helpless ...
— If I Were King • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... things to which she stands irrevocably committed. She has recalled the commander whose brutal orders inflamed the American mind and shocked the civilized world. She has modified the horrible order of concentration and has undertaken to care for the helpless and permit those who desire to resume the cultivation of their fields to do so, and assures them of the protection of the Spanish Government in their lawful occupations. She has just released the Competitor prisoners, heretofore sentenced to death, and who have been the ...
— Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents • William McKinley
... all, longed to have the cunning enemy, who had so long baffled him, helpless in his power; he wished to gloat over him, to enjoy his downfall, to inflict upon him what moral and mental torture a deadly hatred alone can devise. The brave eagle, captured, and with noble wings clipped, was doomed to endure the gnawing of the ...
— The Scarlet Pimpernel • Baroness Orczy
... the voices rose again; there was the distinct sound of the crack of a whip, followed by a high-pitched throaty articulation as of an animal in pain. It sounded so helpless and piteous, that Eileen drew herself up nervously and shuddered. ...
— The Spoilers of the Valley • Robert Watson
... had appeared, and swung himself to the tiny ledge that had given him foothold as he came up, and so looked at the place. There was a long cleft between two layers of rock which went back into the cliff's face for some depth, with a little backward slope that had saved the helpless man from rolling out again, and there was a raven's nest at one end of it. One may see that cleft from below and across the gorge if one knows where to look, but not by any means from above, by reason of the overhang of the brink. It was plain that, as he thought, the horse's body, ...
— A Prince of Cornwall - A Story of Glastonbury and the West in the Days of Ina of Wessex • Charles W. Whistler
... his adversary downward; and then came a movement of Herculean power in which the long arms approximated with a twisting, bending effect; two vertebras in Ahpilus's back at the point of least resistance separated, the spine was dislocated, and a mass of helpless, vibrating human flesh fell at the feet of the victor. Peters, whilst his brute instinct was in full possession of him, might, instead of dropping Ahpilus to the ground, have thrown the body into the abyss; but ...
— A Strange Discovery • Charles Romyn Dake
... appearance about November 20th (I presume they resort to the rivers to spawn), and are always followed by a great number of very large sharks and saw-fish,{*} which commit dreadful havoc in their serried and helpless ranks. Following the sea-salmon, the rivers are next visited in January by shoals of very large sea-mullet—blue-black backs, silvery bellies and sides, and yellow fins and tails. These, too, will not take a bait, but are ...
— Ridan The Devil And Other Stories - 1899 • Louis Becke
... going on now, and the family was helpless with dismay. So long they had toiled, and such an outlay they had made! Ona stood by, her eyes wide with terror. Those frightful bills—how they had haunted her, each item gnawing at her soul all day and spoiling her rest at night. How often she ...
— The Jungle • Upton Sinclair
... was almost their sole escape into the world. They sometimes met friends, and after a moment, or an hour, of prayer they could cheer their hearts with neighborly gossip. But for the greater part they appeared and disappeared silently and swiftly, and left the spectator to helpless conjecture of their history. Many of them would have first met their husbands in the cathedral when they prayed, or when they began to look around to see who was looking at them. It might have been their trysting-place, safeguarding them in their lovers' ...
— Familiar Spanish Travels • W. D. Howells
... ministry. He is said to have freed some slaves at that time, so he must have been a 'planter,' He became a Congregational minister. My grandfather Jacobs was a carpenter; but, as I knew him, and for some years before my birth, he was a helpless invalid from paralysis on ...
— Analyzing Character • Katherine M. H. Blackford and Arthur Newcomb
... you the things that might keep it from hurting, without saving for you the things you had thought you saw. I don't know why I did that—desperate, I suppose, because it was all spoiled, frantic because I was helpless to keep it from being spoiled. And then I said things to you—that must show—And yet, Katie, as long as I'm trying to be honest I've got to say again, though all differently, that I was surprised—shocked, ...
— The Visioning • Susan Glaspell
... people, must be acute sufferers for the good of many. The question always is, has everything been done to make the sufferings of these exceptions as small as possible? Or, in the triumph of the crowded procession, have the helpless been trampled on, instead of being gently lifted aside out of the roadway of the conqueror, whom they have no power to accompany on ...
— North and South • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... matter. "You wanted my uncle, David Arnold Hanson. But because his friends called him Dave and cut that name on his monument, and because I was christened by the name you called, you got me instead. He'd have been helpless here, probably, but with me you have no chance. I couldn't even build a doghouse. I wasn't even a construction engineer. Just a computer operator ...
— The Sky Is Falling • Lester del Rey
... him in these simple words, it checked the recriminatory speech which, his mind having recovered to some extent from the first shock of the meeting, he had intended to deliver. He swallowed his words, awed. He felt dazed and helpless. Mrs. Porter ...
— The Coming of Bill • P. G. Wodehouse
... appear. However this may be, the beautiful widow came into the presence of the king, and, throwing herself at his feet, begged and implored him to revoke the attainder of her husband for the sake of her innocent and helpless children. The king was much moved by her beauty and by her distress. From pitying her he soon began to love her. And yet it seemed impossible that he should marry her. Her rank, in the first place, was far below his, ...
— Richard III - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... that sweet meekness which belongs to huge, but limited organisms,—which one sees in the brown eyes of oxen, but most in the patient posture, the outstretched arms, and the heavy-drooping robes of these vast beings endowed with life, but not with soul,—which outgrow us and outlive us, but stand helpless,—poor things!—while Nature dresses and undresses them, like so many full-sized, but ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 10, August, 1858 • Various
... of the Child I think that three of the followers of Jana, or more, lie dead upon this field. Also the caravan is now out of your reach with two of the white lords and many of such tubes which deal death, like that which we have surrendered to you. Therefore because we are helpless, do not think that the Child is helpless. Jana must have been asleep, O King, or you would have set ...
— The Ivory Child • H. Rider Haggard
... was thus helpless every fellow who could get near enough dealt him one or more blows, and not until they were tired of the sport did ...
— Down the Slope • James Otis
... of the bed. He was still pale and looked tired, but his voice was strong. He was setting down a half-empty glass of water on a tray near the bed, and his hand, although it wavered a little, had lost the helpless tremulousness Braceway had ...
— The Winning Clue • James Hay, Jr.
... cat came from, and to whom she belonged, ever remained a mystery, but as she curiously poked her head into the forbidden precinct she caught sight of Chico, lying stunned and helpless from his fall. Here was her chance. Straightway flinging caution to the winds, with a quick spring she landed full upon the trembling bird, at the same time seizing him with her paws and burying her cruel ...
— Chico: the Story of a Homing Pigeon • Lucy M. Blanchard
... journey—a journey which, child as I was, I remember as well as if it were yesterday—she kept the sad fact hidden from me. This reserve was necessary; for, could I have known all, I should have given grandmother some trouble in getting me started. As it was, I was helpless, and she—dear woman!—led me along by the hand, resisting, with the reserve and solemnity of a priestess, all my inquiring looks ...
— My Bondage and My Freedom • Frederick Douglass
... may, the self-immolation of this sweet-souled man, who, in the winter of life, the shadows of eternity fast gathering about him, bends his black shoulders again to the burden which Love would lay upon them. Aye, Love, into which all else merged—Love for the unknown babe, left helpless and alone on the great river's bank—Love for the radiant child, whose white soul the agents of carnal greed and lust would prostitute ...
— Carmen Ariza • Charles Francis Stocking
... upon her,—he could not touch his lips to her cheek; nay, there would sometimes come into his soul such frightful suggestions that he would hurry from the room lest the hinted thought should become a momentary madness and he should lift his hand against the helpless infant which owed ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. VI.,October, 1860.—No. XXXVI. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... practical jokes. Only a week or so ago one lively mail-carrier started prematurely, smashing a gangway, and dropping a portmanteau quietly into the ocean. On my return from foreign shores, I passed the same cheerful ship lying in mid-channel as helpless as an infant. However, the accident (something, I fancy, had gone wrong with the engines) appeared to be treated as more amusing than important. Still, perhaps, it would be better were the name of this luckless boat changed to ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 99., September 20, 1890 • Various
... we 've seen him appeasing With a wave of one hand the confusion of strife; With the other unsheathing his sword, and, unbreathing, Following on for the right in the havoc of life. To the wants of the helpless, the wail of the weak, His hand aye was open, his arm was aye strong; And under yon sun, not a tongue can bespeak His word or his deed that was ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volumes I-VI. - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... to assist me in the discovery of a crime. I even offered him money. He drew back from my hand. "You shall have it for nothing," he said, "if you will only go away and never come here again." He tried to cut it out of the page—but his trembling hands were helpless. I cut it out myself, and attempted to thank him. He wouldn't hear me. "Go away!" he said, "I don't like ...
— Little Novels • Wilkie Collins
... While the brave fought on the field of battle, you slaughtered their wives and children; while they risked their lives before the cannon's mouth you attacked the house of the sleepers and robbed and massacred the helpless and the innocent. Fall down on your knees and pray for your souls, for the angel of death stands over you, to blot out your memory ...
— The Continental Classics, Volume XVIII., Mystery Tales • Various
... that she simply beat the water in a helpless fashion, and this frightened the horse still more. Swimming up behind the little one, Jerry caught her under the arms. It was a perilous thing to do, for Jerry was in great danger of having his brains dashed out by one of ...
— The Young Oarsmen of Lakeview • Ralph Bonehill
... associations; I sketched, the Shyster spouted poetry and copied epitaphs. Who could doubt we were the usual Americans, travelling with a design of self-improvement? Who was to guess that one was a black-mailer, trembling to approach the scene of action—the other a helpless, amateur ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 13 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... waste this apple-tree. Oh, when its aged branches throw Thin shadows on the ground below, Shall fraud and force and iron will Oppress the weak and helpless still? What shall the tasks of mercy be, Amid the toils, the strifes, the tears Of those who live when length of years Is wasting ...
— Our Holidays - Their Meaning and Spirit; retold from St. Nicholas • Various
... of Sheridan at Stafford completed his ruin. He was now excluded both from the Theatre and from Parliament:—the two anchors by which he held in life were gone, and he was left a lonely and helpless wreck upon the waters. The Prince Regent offered to bring him into Parliament; but the thought of returning to that scene of his triumphs and his freedom, with the Royal owner's mark, as it were, upon him, was more than he could bear—and he declined the offer. ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Rt. Hon. Richard Brinsley Sheridan Vol 2 • Thomas Moore
... young officer and his bride, as Bluebell immediately decided the latter to be, partly from her helpless exigeante demeanour, and partly from the extreme newness of her fashionable ...
— Bluebell - A Novel • Mrs. George Croft Huddleston
... lumbar muscles on one or both sides. The amount of tenderness varies, and so long as the patient is still he is free from pain. The slightest attempt to alter his position, however, is attended by pain, which may be so severe as to render him helpless for the moment. The pain is most marked on rising from the stooping or sitting posture, and may extend down the back of the hip, especially if, as is commonly the case, lumbago and gluteal fibrosis coexist. Once a patient has suffered from lumbago, it is liable to recur, and an attack may be ...
— Manual of Surgery - Volume First: General Surgery. Sixth Edition. • Alexis Thomson and Alexander Miles
... proved to be one of the greatest achievements of his life. From the very Valley of the Shadow of Death he drew back the struggling, fluttering spirit of the helpless lady. And when the first gray streaks of dawn flushed the eastern sky, the doctor drew a great sigh ...
— Jolly Sally Pendleton - The Wife Who Was Not a Wife • Laura Jean Libbey
... his hands in a helpless gesture. "You don't understand, my dear," he said patiently. "I can't tell Special Agent Sanders 'not to' do anything. I don't happen to have ...
— The Camp Fire Girls Do Their Bit - Or, Over the Top with the Winnebagos • Hildegard G. Frey
... what did he fight with there But sidelong and spitting and helpless shadows of the dim air? And what did he carry away but straw ...
— The Green Helmet and Other Poems • William Butler Yeats
... It was not long before she had ample proof of the success of her enchantments. Almost before her eyes the children put on the size and strength of adults, while the old men and women instantly became helpless, tiny babies. Indeed, so pleased was she with the result of her work, that she could no longer remain hidden, and went about telling everybody what she had done, and enjoying ...
— The Grey Fairy Book • Various
... laughed at her curls, and her funny ways, which hid from child's eyes a noble heart. It was she who bound up your black eye after the battle with Bouncer, the bully, whose face and reputation you wrecked in the same hour for his oppression of the most helpless boy in school. That feat made you the leader of the secret society which met at awful hours in the deserted shanty just below the sawmill. What a creep went up and down your spine as in the chill of the evening the boys came stealing out of ...
— The Art of Disappearing • John Talbot Smith
... "Margaret Pearson."] This Padiham witch fared better than her neighbours, being sentenced only to the pillory. Nothing affords a stronger proof of the vindictive pertinacity with which these prosecutions were carried on than the fact of this old and helpless creature being put on her trial three several times upon such evidence as follows. Chattox, like many other persons in her situation, was disposed to have as many companions in punishment, crime or no crime, as she could ...
— Discovery of Witches - The Wonderfull Discoverie of Witches in the Countie of Lancaster • Thomas Potts
... and even he's helpless. And as I came out poor Mr. Bradley was jammed up against the wall. He seemed perfectly stunned ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... she could. "Joke away, Mr. George; there's nobody to defend ME." And George Osborne, as she walked away—and Amelia looked reprovingly at him—felt some little manly compunction for having inflicted any unnecessary unkindness upon this helpless creature. "My dearest Amelia," said he, "you are too good—too kind. You don't know the world. I do. And your little friend Miss Sharp must ...
— Vanity Fair • William Makepeace Thackeray
... dead; nineteen years of petulant, helpless, hopeless wretchedness were at last over, and all that his daughter cared to live for was gone; she was an orphan, without near relatives, without friends, old, and tired out. Do not despise me that I say "old," you plump and rosy ladies whose life is in its prime of joy and use at thirty-six. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 22, Aug., 1859 • Various
... concerned, it will have Federal consideration. It seems to me we should be indifferent to our own heart promptings, and out of accord with the spirit which acclaims the Christmastide, if we do not give out of our national abundance to lighten this burden of woe upon a people blameless and helpless in famine's peril. ...
— State of the Union Addresses of Warren Harding • Warren Harding
... infants and small children during warm weather. Two legal-aid societies, the Chicago Bureau of Justice (1888) and the Protective Agency for Women and Children, collect small wage claims and otherwise aid the poor or helpless. The most important charitable societies of the city are the United Charities of Chicago (1909), the United Hebrew Charities (1857), and the Associated Jewish Charities (1900). The first is the union of the Relief and Aid Society (1857) ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 1 - "Chtelet" to "Chicago" • Various
... Rising, who had come in with us, and stood a little way off in the press. Although preserving his dazed, unconscious air in the midst of these calamities, he had exhibited many symptoms of physical distress. He now remained sitting helpless on the floor, and while I was trying to contrive some means of assisting him, I saw the next man behind him very coolly step over his body, spurning it with his foot. Poor Mr. Rising fell on his back, groaning, and was ...
— Athelstane Ford • Allen Upward
... a sudden helpless, angry feeling that this man had been covertly watching me. Annoyed as I was, I was glad that he had interrupted us, for his presence would effectually stop Mrs. Lester's surmises ...
— Revelations of a Wife - The Story of a Honeymoon • Adele Garrison
... only for manhood to renounce; yet the battles of Waterloo and of Sobraon have been won, and Englishmen are not a jot the less brave all over the world. Probably they are braver, that is to say, more deliberately brave, more serenely valiant; also more merciful to the helpless, and that ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 2, July, 1850. • Various
... origin and growth of the great fortunes, this vital fact is constantly forced upon the investigator: that Law has been the most valuable asset possessed by the capitalist class. Without it, this class would have been as helpless as a babe. What would the medieval baron have been without armed force? But note how sinuously conditions have changed. The capitalist class, far shrewder than the feudalistic rulers, dispenses with personally ...
— History of the Great American Fortunes, Vol. I - Conditions in Settlement and Colonial Times • Myers Gustavus
... and useless than this war? Alford, I alone have suffered enough to make the thing accursed; and I must suffer to the end: and I am only one of countless women. What is there for me, what for them, but to grow lonelier and sadder every day? But I won't submit to the evil. I won't be a mere bit of helpless drift. While I live there shall be a little less suffering in the world. Ah, Alford! you see how far removed I am from the sportive girl you saw on that May evening years ago. I am an old, white-haired, broken-hearted woman; and yet," with a grand look in her eyes, ...
— His Sombre Rivals • E. P. Roe
... "Suppose England had taken up the challenge, what had we to defend ourselves with?" And we compared the long roll of the great British Fleet with the paltry list of our own ships, and realized that we should have been helpless. ...
— Theodore Roosevelt; An Intimate Biography, • William Roscoe Thayer
... strayed—a man, a clergyman, answers to the name of John Storm. Or rather he does not answer, having allowed himself to be written to twice without making so much as a yap or a yowl by way of reply. Last seen six days ago, when he was suffering from the sulks, after being in a de'il of a temper, with a helpless and innocent maiden who 'doesn't know nothin',' that can have given him offence. Any one giving information of his welfare and whereabouts to the said H. and I. M. will be generously and ...
— The Christian - A Story • Hall Caine
... to them that the pure light of the voiceful Graces might not forsake me. For at Aigma and on the hill of Nisos twice ere now I say that I have sung Kyrene's praise, and by my act have shunned the reproach of helpless dumbness. ...
— The Extant Odes of Pindar • Pindar
... Saleratus Bill halted for the night at a little meadow. He fed Bob a thick sandwich, and offered him a cup of water; after which he again shackled the young man's ankles, bound his elbows, and attached the helpless form to a tree. Bob spent the night in this case, covered only by his saddle blanket. The cords cut into his swelled flesh, the retarded circulation pricked him cruelly. He slept little. At early dawn his captor ...
— The Rules of the Game • Stewart Edward White
... of others; to see a powerful swimmer breasting the billows with a fixed purpose to do or die. But it is terrible and spirit-crushing to see such a one tossed by the breakers as if he were a mere baby, and hurled back helpless on the sand. Twice did the young sailor dash in, and twice was he caught up like a cork and hurled back, while the people on shore, finding their remonstrances useless, began ...
— The Coxswain's Bride - also, Jack Frost and Sons; and, A Double Rescue • R.M. Ballantyne
... always the same round, a few words would always bring the confession, and that pitiful kind of helpless repentance, which had only ...
— The Young Step-Mother • Charlotte M. Yonge
... tube. Peering downwards, she saw that it was connected with the cylinder, and that it was undoubtedly pouring whatever gas the cylinder contained through the hole into Room A. For a moment she had difficulty in repressing a shriek; but realizing how perfectly helpless she was, even if an alarm were raised, she fought down all exclamation. She saw that the man who was regulating the escape of gas was not the one who had spoken to the conductor. Then, fearing that he might turn his head and see her eye at the ...
— Jennie Baxter, Journalist • Robert Barr
... heterogeneous throng, One might discern all stages and degrees, From wealth and power to helpless indigence; Extravagance to trenchant penury, And all extremes of want and misery. Some blest by wealth, some cursed by poverty; Some in positions neutral to them both; Some wore a gaunt and ill-conditioned look Which told its tale of lack of nourishment; ...
— Mountain idylls, and Other Poems • Alfred Castner King
... no mercy knows In which hell's flame most fiercely glows— Lights this devouring fire, All's sacrificed unto its lust— Nothing too sacred, good or just To fall to its desire. Oh, woe to those whom passion sweeps Helpless and ...
— King of the Jews - A story of Christ's last days on Earth • William T. Stead
... town's-people broke into his house, and found him dead, with his head badly burned. They supposed he was intoxicated, and fell, striking his head upon the andiron, which stunned him; and while he lay helpless, he was so badly burned that he soon died. And that was the last ...
— Oscar - The Boy Who Had His Own Way • Walter Aimwell
... of light spread from wheel to foremast, with Yellow Rufe at the main rigging in the center of it. The light dazzled him for a second, and his throw was stayed. The three yachtsmen, huddled in their chains aft, stared in helpless amazement at the tableau; for such it became, when the fight stopped for a breath and every man's passion-filled face was ...
— The Pirate Woman • Aylward Edward Dingle
... sandstone, mud, and shingle, on the opposite sides of the Strait, and on some intervening islands, one is strongly tempted to believe that the land was once joined, and thus allowed animals so delicate and helpless as the tucutuco and Reithrodon to pass over. The correspondence of the cliffs is far from proving any junction; because such cliffs generally are formed by the intersection of sloping deposits, which, before the elevation of the land, had been accumulated near the then ...
— A Naturalist's Voyage Round the World - The Voyage Of The Beagle • Charles Darwin
... Starlight put the muzzle of his pistol to his forehead and swore he'd blow out his brains there and then if he didn't stop quiet. We had to use the same words over and over again. Jim used to grin sometimes. They generally did the business, though, so of course he was quite helpless. We hadn't to threaten him to find the key of the safe, because it was unlocked and the key in it. He was just locking up his gold and the day's cash as ...
— Robbery Under Arms • Thomas Alexander Browne, AKA Rolf Boldrewood
... difference between the ideas; or perhaps he retains a vague notion of a difference which he never attempts to define to himself, and dimly hints to others by adding to his inadequate word some such phrase as "you see" or "you know," in the helpless attempt to inject into another mind by suggestion what adequate words would enable him simply and distinctly to say. Such a mind resembles the old maps of Africa in which the interior was filled with cloudy ...
— English Synonyms and Antonyms - With Notes on the Correct Use of Prepositions • James Champlin Fernald
... frozen to her place. The words—the words were worse than the touch! Her heart was beating all over her body—in her throat, her limbs, her helpless useless hands. Her eyes travelled despairingly about the room—they lit on the bell, and she remembered that help was in call. Yes, but scandal with it—a hideous mustering of tongues. No, she must fight her way out alone. It was enough that the servants knew her to be in the ...
— House of Mirth • Edith Wharton
... from the poor cow's eyes tears were falling, steadily, rapidly: big limpid tears that trickled down her cheek, her great homely hairy cheek, and dropped on the grass: tears of helpless pain, uncomprehending endurance. "Why have they done this thing to me?" they ...
— The Cardinal's Snuff-Box • Henry Harland
... of a judge and another officer, both of whom were notoriously corrupt; the two men were promptly murdered. Then the popular fury turned upon Morozof, who would have suffered the same fate, had not the czar helped him to escape. The government was helpless. In some places, such as Pskof, Novgorod, and elsewhere, the streltsi joined the people, and Russia was for some time at the mercy ...
— The Story of Russia • R. Van Bergen
... that were the worst she could do. No, Sir Amyas Belamour, if you have any kindness for the poor helpless girl under your mother's roof, you will make no advance to excite alarm or anger against her. Remember it is she who will be the sufferer and not yourself. The woman, however guiltless, is sure to fall under suspicion and bear the whole penalty. And oh! what would become of her, defenceless, ...
— Love and Life • Charlotte M. Yonge
... forced the rein from Wolfe, stood erect for a moment of horror to the spectator, and then, as its footing and balance alike failed, it fell backward, and rolled over and over its unfortunate and helpless rider. ...
— The Disowned, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... the sad cases of poverty, when the helpless victim is not of the calibre which can beg, and suffers an empty larder in silence and behind ...
— Some Everyday Folk and Dawn • Miles Franklin
... a good conscience were my support and my reward. And may the favours of a grateful monarch enable my Eustace to enjoy those noblest privileges of greatness for which I pined with ineffectual desire! I am now old and helpless, tottering on the brink of eternity, a blank, as far as respects this world. May I then divest my soul of those passions which will unfit it for the abodes of peace! The injuries of Walter De Vallance are not irremediable. Still do I clasp my ...
— The Loyalists, Vol. 1-3 - An Historical Novel • Jane West
... enemy, always ready to fight, and never running from danger nor allowing himself to be driven anywhere, when he is not quite well he is a timid bird. In moulting, this spring, my jay lost his entire tail, and was extremely awkward in getting about, almost helpless, in fact; and at that time he was afraid to hop to the floor, and refused to come out of the cage. (I should have said, by the way, that he feared hurting himself; he was quite as spirited as ever, as ready to show fight.) To get ...
— In Nesting Time • Olive Thorne Miller
... along in pregnancy, and when the antlers are fully grown she drops the fawn. When the fawns are dropped vegetation is plentiful and lactation sets in. During this time the male is kept fully employed in getting food and guarding his more or less helpless family. As the season advances the vegetation increases and the fawn begins to eat grass. When the summer heat commences the little streams begin to dry up, and the animal once more has difficulty ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 1 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... seen what was going on—that if Providence was going to be tempted in this fashion again, the matter would be brought before the Town Council. The Count himself would have been faithfully dealt with had he not been considered a helpless tool in the hands of Speug, who was now understood to have filled the cup of his sins up to the brim. He might indeed have been at last expelled from the Seminary, of which he was the chief ornament, had it not been that the Count went to the Rector and explained ...
— Young Barbarians • Ian Maclaren
... presence. A little smothered cry broke from her lips—the curtains were thrown aside and a man stepped out. She was powerless to move from her chair. All through that brief but measureless space of time during which wonder kept him silent, as fear did her, she cowered there, a limp helpless object. Her courage and her presence of mind had alike deserted her. She could neither speak nor move nor ...
— Anna the Adventuress • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... lines of mighty three- deckers of the old pattern, British and French,—one hundred in all,—stretched across the Gulf of Finland in front of the fortresses of Cronstadt. Behind the fortresses lay the Russian fleet, helpless and abject; and yet, as events showed during our own Civil War half a dozen years later, a very slight degree of inventive ability would have enabled the Russians to annihilate the hostile fleet, ...
— Volume I • Andrew Dickson White
... Free Joe appeared to have clearer ideas concerning his peculiar condition. He realized the fact that though he was free he was more helpless than any slave. Having no owner, every man was his master. He knew that he was the object of suspicion, and therefore all his slender resources (ah! how pitifully slender they were!) were devoted to winning, not kindness and appreciation, but ...
— Free Joe and Other Georgian Sketches • Joel Chandler Harris
... increase of our wealth and population. And do we owe all this to the kind succor of the mother-country? No! We owe it to the tyranny that drove us from her, to the pelting storms which invigorated our helpless infancy. ...
— The American Union Speaker • John D. Philbrick
... only too surely passed away, and when the General Election of 1895 was over it was a battered, broken and bitterly divided Irish Party which returned to Westminster—a Party which had lost all faith in itself and which was a byword and a reproach alike for its helpless inefficiency and its ...
— Ireland Since Parnell • Daniel Desmond Sheehan
... was a pilgrim and a stranger; it was peopled with shadowy fantastic rivals, who left her with no field and no favour; flesh and blood were powerless to contend against them. They excited no jealousy—they were too intangible for that; but in their half-seen presence she had a sense of helpless irritation and bewilderment—it baffled, overpowered, and humiliated her. To a woman thirsting for a great experience, it was hard to find that the best things lay always just beyond her reach; that in Ted's life, after all of it that she had absorbed and made her own, there was still an elusive ...
— Audrey Craven • May Sinclair
... heart at the same time sinking with a fear she had hitherto happily not yet experienced. "Does not every manly quality of your heart rebel at the thought of thus addressing one so totally unprotected, so helpless as I am. With regard to the unhappy gentleman who has just quitted the room, I am innocent of any other feeling than profound pity for his misfortunes; and with regard to yourself, how can you expect me to feel other than indignation at the outrage to ...
— The Pirate of the Mediterranean - A Tale of the Sea • W.H.G. Kingston
... band of horses, but were very sorry to have one of their comrades so badly used up. After they had breakfast over, the saddle horses were brought in, my horse was saddled for me and they assisted me in getting on him, or rather put me on, for I was almost as helpless as a child. ...
— Thirty-One Years on the Plains and In the Mountains • William F. Drannan
... had retired they had come into newly-ploughed ground, which had been so soaked by the heavy rain that the horses sank in the deep mud to their knees, many almost to their bellies. Into the midst of this helpless crowd of armed men the English archers burst. Embarrassed by their struggling horses, scarcely able to wield their arms in the press, seeing but scantily, and that only in front through the narrow slits of their vizors, the chivalry ...
— At Agincourt • G. A. Henty
... Assembly was weary of the subject. For six years the war with Philip had been a theme of barren talk. Demosthenes urges that it is time to do something, and to do it with a plan. Athens fighting Philip has fared, he says, like an amateur boxer opposed to a skilled pugilist. The helpless hands have only followed blows which a trained eye should have taught them to parry. An Athenian force must be stationed in the north, at Lemnos or Thasos. Of 2000 infantry and 200 cavalry at least one quarter must be Athenian citizens capable of ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 8, Slice 2 - "Demijohn" to "Destructor" • Various
... Canyon, by this time clothed in funereal drapery and shadows. The redwoods, burying their moccasined feet in the red soil, stood in Indian-file along the track, trailing an uncouth benediction from their bending boughs upon the passing bier. A hare, surprised into helpless inactivity, sat upright and pulsating in the ferns by the roadside, as the cortege went by. Squirrels hastened to gain a secure outlook from higher boughs; and the blue-jays, spreading their wings, fluttered ...
— Tennessee's Partner • Bret Harte
... attempts. Trafford gave up the idea of a rescue, and paced up and down the sand in the very face of the surf that drenched him at every tumble. Utterly helpless! The cold, cruel sea mocked his despair and frenzy. It was great and mighty, and even now was swallowing his treasure, he thought, which lay almost within his power to save. So near!—and yet death between! The thought made him half wild with despair ...
— Culm Rock - The Story of a Year: What it Brought and What it Taught • Glance Gaylord
... helpless arm of his, and felled her to the ground, she could not have felt so stunned and bruised and giddy as she stood there, winding and unwinding the fringe of the quilt between her cold fingers, with that strange filmy look in ...
— Wee Wifie • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... with some of them, sir," observed Owen, "but he certainly is not with others, and I could not bear longer to see a helpless boy ill-treated, as young Midge has been for ...
— Owen Hartley; or, Ups and Downs - A Tale of Land and Sea • William H. G. Kingston
... seemed to reach their bones. It was not the place for a fever patient; and Harding was getting anxious. He had led his comrade into the adventure, and he felt responsible for him; moreover, he had a strong affection for the helpless man. Blake was very ill, and something must be done to save him; but for a while Harding could not see how help could be obtained. Then an idea crept into his mind, and he got Benson to ask the Indian a few more questions about the locality. When they were answered, he began to ...
— The Intriguers • Harold Bindloss
... pr[o]ptem[e]t se ingere." Beneath the small window at the top of the tower on the same side, the game called "Mainchaude" is in full progress. A shepherdess blindfolds with her hand the shepherd whose head is resting in her lap, and his comrades stand ready to take advantage of his helpless position. Various modest sheep pretend they are not looking, another man calls to his friend in the distance, and a fifth is pensively playing a hautbois in the usual miraculous countryside with artistically disposed tufts of clouds ...
— The Story of Rouen • Sir Theodore Andrea Cook
... about the King's recovering his prerogatives. Are these the prerogatives with which he flattered the King? Binding him hand and foot, and excluding him from every privilege, and then casting him a helpless dependant on the caprice of a volatile plebeian faction! The French nation is very different from the English. The first rules of the established ancient order of the government broken through, they will violate twenty others, and the King will be sacrificed, before this ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... was helpless. Miss Lavinia stared, but was helpless. Apparently with no compunction, and assuredly with no ceremony, Bella tossed her bonnet away, and sat down ...
— Our Mutual Friend • Charles Dickens
... tangle of striking hoofs and wriggling coils of the foiled reptile, while Charley leaning over in his saddle struck with the butt-end of his riding whip at the writhing coils. Though it seemed an eternity to the helpless watchers it was really only a few seconds ere the pony sprang away from its loathsome enemy and Charley with difficulty reined him in a few paces away. The snake with a broken neck lay lifeless on the ground, while Walter, sobbing ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... rough-featured sailors gathered before the mast, and loud and bitter were the curses they uttered against slavery and against those officers of government who had then constrained them to murder women and helpless children, merely for ...
— Autographs for Freedom, Volume 2 (of 2) (1854) • Various
... have the world believe that there are British boys for whom the acquisition of knowledge has almost the same attraction as for their heroes in fiction has the acquisition of somebody's apples, or the tormenting of helpless animals. ...
— The Story of Baden-Powell - 'The Wolf That Never Sleeps' • Harold Begbie
... look for virtuous wives to be highly respectable and somewhat wearisome beings; dressing neatly, but having had neither poetry, youth, gayety, nor vague desires; ignorant of everything, undesirous of learning anything; helpless, thanks to the weighty virtues with which you have crammed them; above all, to ask of these poor creatures to bless your wisdom, caress your bald forehead, and blush with shame at the echo ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... of baby-talk. Everybody knew how she doted on Tom: she called him names as one scolds a pet dog. Widdicombe had the helpless manner of one, and was always at heel with Polly. But he was a Titan financially, and he was signing his name now to munitions-contracts ...
— The Cup of Fury - A Novel of Cities and Shipyards • Rupert Hughes
... We've made of our darling such a pet, I think the little one may forget There's any creature beneath the sun Beside herself to waste thought upon." I'm going to show him what I can do For a dumb little helpless thing like you. I'll not be selfish and slight you, dear; Whenever I can I ...
— Our Boys - Entertaining Stories by Popular Authors • Various
... and began to read, slanting the page to the fall of the light. It was a phrenetic indictment, but under the paltry rhetoric of the man there was genuine indignation and pain. There were revolting details of cruelty to the miserable, helpless, and defenceless; there were greed, and self-seeking, stripped naked; but more revolting to see without a mask was that falsehood which had been hiding under the words that for ages had spurred men to noble deeds, ...
— The Inheritors • Joseph Conrad
... one another in helpless dismay. Miss Roberts, the leader and head of the expedition, who was accustomed to give orders which they promptly obeyed, to be lying there injured and half fainting! The situation was unparalleled. ...
— The Youngest Girl in the Fifth - A School Story • Angela Brazil
... "your speech is so friendly, and my own state so helpless, that I know not how to refuse your kind proffer, even while I blush to accept it at the hands ...
— The Fortunes of Nigel • Sir Walter Scott
... cause, the woes of life are not to be compared with those of death. My first thought as I sat beside my father's bedside was that I was a helpless child, knowing nothing, understanding nothing; I can not say that my heart felt physical pain, but I sometimes bent over and wrung my hands, as one who wakens from ...
— Child of a Century, Complete • Alfred de Musset
... Harry's fortune was just on the point of being made, for the gracious monarch promised to provide for him. But alas! he was taken in charge by another monarch, whose will have no delay or denial,—by Death, namely, who seized upon my father at Chester races, leaving me a helpless orphan. Peace be to his ashes! He was not faultless, and dissipated all our princely family property; but he was as brave a fellow as ever tossed a bumper or called a main, and he drove his coach-and-six ...
— Barry Lyndon • William Makepeace Thackeray
... compell'd to leave me by strong urgent circumstance, bade me seek shelter in this holy pile, till one he named could hasten to my relief—and you'll consent! You pious men must feel, that virtue never seems more lovely, than when her arm is stretched to raise the helpless and unfortunate. ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor, Vol. I, No. 6, June 1810 • Various
... United Nations fleet, a darkening spot to westward became visible. It drew nearer and grew larger. It was dense. It was huge. It was deadly. It was the Com-Pub battle-fleet, nearly equal to the imprisoned ships in number. It swept up to view its helpless enemy. It came close, so every man could see their only possible ...
— Invasion • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... savage tide. Virginia was suffering in the same way: the settlers on her border were slaughtered or were driven back in herds upon the more settled districts, and Washington, with a nominal strength of fifteen hundred who would not obey orders, was forced to stand a helpless spectator of the general flight and misery. There was no adequate force or army anywhere within reach. The British had been put to flight and had gone to the defense of New England and New York. Neither Pennsylvania nor Virginia had a militia ...
— The Quaker Colonies - A Chronicle of the Proprietors of the Delaware, Volume 8 - in The Chronicles Of America Series • Sydney G. Fisher
... begun to be really in love herself, though he felt that she liked him. On the other hand—for in the flash of a second he argued the case—he did not feel that she was the hypothetical defenceless maiden, helpless to resist the wiles of an equally hypothetical wicked young man. She had been brought up by a worldly mother since she had left the convent where she had associated with other girls, most of whom also had worldly ...
— The Heart of Rome • Francis Marion Crawford
... creature by the baby that Verkimier has tamed. A full-grown male is quite as large as a man, though very small in the legs in proportion, so that it does not stand high. It is also very much stronger than the most powerful man. You would be quite helpless in ...
— Blown to Bits - The Lonely Man of Rakata, the Malay Archipelago • R.M. Ballantyne
... express, as in the apostle's words, (Eph. ii. 12,)—"Without Christ, aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world." A deplorable estate indeed, hopeless and helpless! No hope in it, that is the extremity of misery, the refuse of all conditions. "Without Christ, and without God." Oh! these are words of infinite weight: without those, without whom it is simply impossible to be happy, and without whom it is not possible ...
— The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning • Hugh Binning |
