"Nervous" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... afternoon, before they loaded up the camels, there was another conference between Grim, Jael Higg, Narayan Singh, our prisoner Yussuf, and myself. The ancient hills of Edom were not far away, and we were near enough to Petra to feel nervous. Jael made a pretty good pretense of meeting Grim half-way, and I think she had made up her mind to let him dig his own pit ...
— The Lion of Petra • Talbot Mundy
... story, and continued in such evident distress that at last his father took him home, hoping that his mother would be able to soothe him. For many weeks, however, the boy gave his parents much anxiety; he became nervous and strange in his manner, refusing to leave the cottage by himself, and constantly alarming the household by waking in the night with cries of "The man in the wood! ...
— The Great God Pan • Arthur Machen
... was about three hours in reaching the Exposition grounds, and during all of this time the sun was shining down upon us disagreeably hot. When we reached the grounds, the heat, together with my nervous anxiety, made me feel as if I were about ready to collapse, and to feel that my address was not going to be a success. When I entered the audience-room, I found it packed with humanity from bottom to top, and there were thousands outside who could ...
— Stories of Achievement, Volume III (of 6) - Orators and Reformers • Various
... a servant, her two daughters cheerfully assisting; choosing, as well as herself, to descend to anything before unnecessary obligations. During her prosperity, and consequent idleness, she did not, I am told, enjoy a good state of health, having a train of nervous complaints, which, though they have not a name, unless the significant word ennui be borrowed, had an existence in the higher French circles; but adversity and virtuous exertions put these ills to flight, and ...
— Letters written during a short residence in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark • Mary Wollstonecraft
... tramp, will ever so make the student of life participant of the innermost experience of the tramp, his experience of dull despair, his loss of his grip on life, as Beranger's "The Old Vagabond." No expert in nervous diseases, no psychological student of mental states, normal and abnormal, can give the reader so clear an understanding of that deep and seemingly causeless dejection, which because it seems to be causeless seems also to ...
— The World's Best Poetry, Volume 3 - Sorrow and Consolation • Various
... lassoing as a sheer matter of sleight of hand made his loop again carefully, slowly, trying to convince himself that here was an easy matter, and that the next time he should succeed. And even as he began whirling it above his head, one half of both mind and muscle given over to restrain his nervous mount, he saw another rope shoot out from behind him and settle, tightening, about the ...
— Under Handicap - A Novel • Jackson Gregory
... with an aggrieved air, her logic evidently concluding that somebody was to blame for her nervous fright. "Oh, yer on'y sulkin' 'bout yer supper. I thought ...
— Men, Women, and Boats • Stephen Crane
... in Grantley Mellen's suspicious mind, and, in spite of Elizabeth's cheerful manner, her color would come and go with tremulous fitfulness. Sometimes there was a restless expression in her eyes, and she seemed with difficulty to repress a nervous start at any sudden sound—she had not recovered wholly, it appeared, ...
— A Noble Woman • Ann S. Stephens
... board the vessel. Dr. Mitchell was immediately summoned; but, before he reached the poor captain, he was dead. A postmortem examination revealed the cause of his unfortunate disease. His heart was found literally torn in twain! The tremendous propulsion of blood, consequent upon such a violent nervous shock, forced the powerful muscle tissues asunder, and life was at an end. ...
— Life and Literature - Over two thousand extracts from ancient and modern writers, - and classified in alphabetical order • J. Purver Richardson
... organisation of the body generally and the organisation of the brain, which may be regarded as an executive assemblage of delegates from all parts of the body. Fundamental differences in the organisation of the body cannot fail to involve differences in the nervous system generally, and especially in that supreme collection of nervous ganglia which we term the brain. In this way the special adaptation of woman's body to the exercise of maternity, with the presence of special organs and glands subservient to that object, and without any ...
— Essays in War-Time - Further Studies In The Task Of Social Hygiene • Havelock Ellis
... often thought since, though, that if any ordinary man had been placed in the same situation he would have been as nervous as I; for to awake out of a deep sleep in a dark forest in a wild land, where dangerous beasts might be lurking, to hear a peculiar rustling noise, and through the faint light to make out the figure of the black, looking ...
— Nat the Naturalist - A Boy's Adventures in the Eastern Seas • G. Manville Fenn
... ostrich's egg, no beard unless the unshorn growth of a week could be so described, and a long hooked nose that supported a huge pair of spectacles such as with many near-sighted people seems to have become a part of their individuality. His nervous system was remarkably developed, and his body might not inaptly be compared to one of the Rhumkorff's bobbins of which the thread, several hundred yards in length, is permeated throughout by electric fluid. But whatever he was, his life, if possible, ...
— Off on a Comet • Jules Verne
... incendiarism. If the Wallacks go on destroying the forests in this way, they will end in injuring the value of the place as a health resort; for the efficacy of the perfumed air of the pine-woods is well known, especially for all nervous diseases. ...
— Round About the Carpathians • Andrew F. Crosse
... a deep violet, with black eyelashes and eyebrows. Black, once, had been the hair under the widow's cap, now streaked with silver; but Jane Louder's skin was fresh and daintily tinted like her daughter's, for all its fine wrinkles. Her voice when she spoke was mellow and slow, with a nervous vibration of apology. "Never mind, dear," she said, "I was just reading ...
— Stories of a Western Town • Octave Thanet
... was nervous, showing it by being overtalkative, and that worried Jack. He'd stopped twice at mirrors along the hallway to make sure that his gold-threaded gray neckcloth was properly knotted and that his black ...
— Little Fuzzy • Henry Beam Piper
... system. Lying still, with eyes closed, and three or four of these birds singing near, so that their strains overlap and leave no silent intervals, the listener can imagine that the sound originates within himself; that the numberless fine cords of his nervous ...
— Birds in Town and Village • W. H. Hudson
... hope, illuminating his soul, changed almost in an instant the whole tenor of his mind. It might be compared to a stream of nervous energy, emanating from the brain, and shooting down through the network of chords, confirming convulsed muscles, and; imparting to trembling members consistency of action and graces of motion. His reveries were scared by it, as owls under the influence ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, XXII • various
... those described, is it to be wondered at that many Anarchists are frankly cynical as to the benefits labor will derive from the labor parties? There will be at least two, that have suddenly forced the gilded doors of the "Mother of Parliaments" and about which the guilty middle class grew nervous. We know that men like T. Burt, H. Broadhurst, W. Abraham, F. Madison and a score of others are but nominal labor men not having worked at their various trades for years and are middle class by training and income, that others like Keir Hardie, J. ...
— Mother Earth, Vol. 1 No. 1, March 1906 • Various
... asleep. The wind outside sang its mournful winter-song; the tramp of passing footsteps, the roll of passing wheels on the road ceased in dreary silence. He slept on quietly. The firelight rose and fell on his wizen little face and his nervous, drooping hands. Mrs. Lecount had not pitied him yet. She began to pity him now. Her point was gained; her interest in his will was secured; he had put his future life, of his own accord, under her fostering care—the fire was comfortable; the circumstances were favorable to the ...
— No Name • Wilkie Collins
... 'through,' 'unto.' They give the means, the Bestower, and the issue of the purity of soul. The Revised Version, following good authorities, omits the clause, 'through the Spirit.' It may possibly be originally a marginal gloss of some scribe who was nervous about Peter's orthodoxy, which finally found its way into the text. But I think we shall be inclined to retain it if we notice that, throughout this epistle, the writer is fond of sentences on the model of the present one, and ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Ephesians; Epistles of St. Peter and St. John • Alexander Maclaren
... a most timid and sensitive little thing. The woman who owned it carried it constantly in her bosom, and no money would induce her to part with her pet. She called it Mico. It fed from her mouth and allowed her to fondle it freely, but the nervous little creature would not permit strangers to touch it. If any one attempted to do so, it shrank back, the whole body trembling with fear, and its teeth chattered while it uttered its tremulous, frightened tones. The expression of its features was like ...
— The Naturalist on the River Amazons • Henry Walter Bates
... on the extent of the injury and the parts involved, but there is also risk from secondary haemorrhage, and from such complications as pleurisy, pericarditis, and peritonitis. Death may result from shock, haemorrhage, injury to brain or important nervous structures. ...
— Aids to Forensic Medicine and Toxicology • W. G. Aitchison Robertson
... wounded in battle and a change takes place in his nervous organism, by reason of which he loses his organic consciousness; or, to speak in the phraseology of the psychologist, he loses the sense of his own body, of his physical personality. The cause of this change is ...
— The Book of Khalid • Ameen Rihani
... his executive, met us at the landing and escorted us into the presence of the Sultan and his wife, where we were offered soda-water and whiskey, and we remained an hour. They are both likeable, but the Sultan appears rather nervous and frail, and it is rumoured that his health has suffered as a result of overindulgence in spiritualistic seances. He gave an entertaining account of natives living in the trees on the Malinau River. As it had been impossible for me to obtain cartridges for my Winchester ...
— Through Central Borneo: - An Account of Two Years' Travel in the Land of Head-Hunters - Between the Years 1913 and 1917 • Carl Lumholtz
... five years since I bought my first copy of Science and Health, the reading of which cured me of chronic constipation, nervous headache, astigmatism, and hernia, in less than ...
— Science and Health With Key to the Scriptures • Mary Baker Eddy
... thoughtfully. "Lablache means to put this marriage with me right through. I see it all. But say," bringing one of her brown hands down forcibly upon that of her companion, which was concealed in the foot of the woolen sock, and gripping it with nervous strength, "I guess he's reckoned without his bride. I'm not going to marry Lablache, auntie, dear, and you can bet your bottom dollar I'm not going to let him ruin uncle. All I want to do is to stop uncle drinking. That is ...
— The Story of the Foss River Ranch • Ridgwell Cullum
... sense of taste. The tongue is covered with minute cells surrounded by nervous filaments which are set in motion whenever any substance is brought into contact with the surface. Tasting is merely the movement of these filaments, of greater or ...
— Practical Mechanics for Boys • J. S. Zerbe
... to walk, they were subject to falls. This was amongst the most serious evils of early neglect, for it was demonstrated beyond doubt that accidents to the infant, prominent amongst which were blows received on its head, not only affected its after-growth, and laid the foundation of nervous and other disorders, but were often attended with the sadder result, that the child's intellect was impaired. Nevertheless, so little was this danger apprehended, that many people long indulged in the foolish habit of boxing children's ears, unaware that the shock produced on the nerves ...
— Another World - Fragments from the Star City of Montalluyah • Benjamin Lumley (AKA Hermes)
... much simpler affair than a presentation at home; one need not even wear veils and feathers, and the trains of our white satin gowns were modest as to length. It was silly to be nervous about such a little thing, but I quite shook with terror. I think it was the being passed along by A.D.C.'s that unnerved me, but when I reached the last and heard "To be presented," and my name shouted out, I stotted (do you know the Scots word ...
— Olivia in India • O. Douglas
... fill that responsible position, one to which I was a comparative stranger. There was nothing to do but to make the best of the situation, however, and this I did, though I can truthfully say that for the first five innings I was as nervous as ...
— A Ball Player's Career - Being the Personal Experiences and Reminiscensces of Adrian C. Anson • Adrian C. Anson
... that he amplified the initial draft as though he were attaching the muscles and tendons to the bones of a skeleton; then one set of proofs followed another, while he imparted to his story a network of veins and arteries and a nervous system, infused blood into its veins and breathed into it his powerful breath of life,—and all of a sudden there it was, a living, pulsating creation, within that envelope of words into which he had infused the best that he possessed in style and colour. But he suffered bitter disillusions when ...
— Honor de Balzac • Albert Keim and Louis Lumet
... preserve the same ideas; these naturally depend every instant upon the variations, which physical sensations oblige his organs to undergo. It will not therefore appear strange that these opinions should be fluctuating, when they depend upon the state of the nervous fluid, upon the greater or less portion of igneous matter floating in ...
— The System of Nature, Vol. 2 • Baron D'Holbach
... look after you," sang out Good in nervous Saxon. "Come, get up, there's a good girl," and he stooped and caught ...
— King Solomon's Mines • H. Rider Haggard
... however, had been too much for him. The only chance of recovery from a nervous disorder lies in freedom from mental agitation. An injured nerve requires a longer time to heal than a broken bone and quite as much care and self-denial. Any serious disturbance to the circulation ...
— Sketches from Concord and Appledore • Frank Preston Stearns
... you behold our penitential rites Performed without impediment by saints Rich only in devotion, then with pride Will you reflect:—Such are the holy men Who call me Guardian; such the men for whom To wield the bow I bare my nervous arm, Scarred by the ...
— Sakoontala or The Lost Ring - An Indian Drama • Kalidasa
... fringe. Here the children, like young colts, can be turned out to run and race, kick up their heels and enjoy life, free of warnings to be quiet lest they annoy the elderly couple in the apartment below or the nervous wreck the other side ...
— If You're Going to Live in the Country • Thomas H. Ormsbee and Richmond Huntley
... coming up and Billy loomed large in the darkness. There was a determined set to his firm young shoulders, a lithe alertness about his build, and a fine glint in his eye. Pat was really a coward. Besides, Pat was getting nervous. The hidden telephone had called him several times already. He could hear even now in imagination its faint click in the moss. The last message had said that the car had passed the state line and would soon be coming to the last point of ...
— The City of Fire • Grace Livingston Hill
... now on the west bank and now on the east—had shot out unexpectedly from behind a point, her double row of lights casting a halo in which his canoe must have been visible on the waves; and yet she had passed by and taken no note of him. For a second such good-fortune had seemed to his nervous imagination beyond the range of hope. He stopped paddling he almost stopped breathing, allowing the canoe to rock gently on the tide. The steamer puffed and pulsated, beating her way directly athwart ...
— The Wild Olive • Basil King
... destruction of property and life, while plainly laughing at man, who helplessly groaned and shrieked and shuddered, but never for a single instant could stop. The railways alone approached the carnage of war; automobiles and fire-arms ravaged society, until an earthquake became almost a nervous relaxation. An immense volume of force had detached itself from the unknown universe of energy, while still vaster reservoirs, supposed to be infinite, steadily revealed themselves, attracting mankind with more compulsive course ...
— The Education of Henry Adams • Henry Adams
... few minutes later he came to confront the clerk he saw that his task was not likely to prove quite so easy as his former experience had led him to expect. Save for a slight nervous trembling of limb and shoulder—surely not unnatural after such a night—Jake bore himself with very much the same indifferent ease he ...
— Room Number 3 - and Other Detective Stories • Anna Katharine Green
... Plot—a crime almost as deep as that of being himself a plotter. In fact, the fears of the honest Justice, however ridiculously exorbitant, were kept so much in countenance by the outcry of the day, and the general nervous fever, which afflicted every good Protestant, that Master Maulstatute was accounted the bolder man and the better magistrate, while, under the terror of the air-drawn dagger which fancy placed continually before his eyes, he continued to dole forth Justice in ...
— Peveril of the Peak • Sir Walter Scott
... leaving the Seven Emu River, these calls invariably acquainted me with the failing strength of our poor brutes; and knowing only too well the state of exhaustion in which they were, I was almost constantly expecting to be reminded of it, as I was riding along, which rendered me extremely nervous and restless. The death of our spare horses did not allow us any more to relieve the others by alternate rests, and we became soon aware of their increasing weakness. This was considerably aggravated by the necessity under which we were of keeping ...
— Journal of an Overland Expedition in Australia • Ludwig Leichhardt
... Old Jervaise, obviously nervous, accepted the invitation, but Frank, after closing the door, stood leaning with his back against it. The position gave him command of the whole room, and at the same time conveyed a general effect of threat. His attitude said, "Now we've got you, and none of you shall ...
— The Jervaise Comedy • J. D. Beresford
... is very fine, but it must not continue indefinitely; if the novel has to last longer, you must interrupt it, or vary it with distractions. Really, my dear friend, think of the life of the body, which gets upset and nervous when you subdue it too much. When I was ill in Paris, I saw a physician, very mad, but very intelligent, who said very true things on that subject. He said that I SPIRITUALIZED myself in a disquieting manner, and when I told him, ...
— The George Sand-Gustave Flaubert Letters • George Sand, Gustave Flaubert
... layers of rouge, the count showed his livid pallor; and every moment nervous tremblings shook him from head to foot. The countess affected childish happiness; but her sharp and sudden movements betrayed the storm that was raging in her heart. Daniel noticed that she incessantly filled the count's ...
— The Clique of Gold • Emile Gaboriau
... like red Indians. I could see, in the moment I snatched for a hurried glance in that direction, that the purpose of cutting loose and stampeding the horses was being accomplished; but even that comparatively simple task required time, and as the Kurds galloped nearer, the horses grew as nervous as the men who sought ...
— The Eye of Zeitoon • Talbot Mundy
... like an infuriated cat, with her perpendicular eyes gleaming green, and her hair standing half up from her horrid head. Her heart was quaking, however, and she kept moving about her skin-shod foot with nervous apprehension. When Curdie was within a few paces, she rushed at him, made one tremendous stamp at his opposing foot, which happily he withdrew in time, and caught him round the waist, to dash him on the marble floor. But just as she caught him, he came down with all the weight of his iron-shod ...
— The Princess and the Goblin • George MacDonald
... I could! I'd love to go! But I must stay with Evelyn. She is upset and nervous about Theo ...
— Captain Desmond, V.C. • Maud Diver
... a single line to any friend in, or out of Congress during the late session, having been prevented by my old nervous disorder, and am now dictating this to a confidential friend, whom you ...
— The Original Writings of Samuel Adams, Volume 4 • Samuel Adams
... the ground just as Arthur and I reached her, while Crass immediately came flying down to her feet. Having satisfied ourselves that the snake was really killed, we hastened back with Marian to the settlement, followed by Crass, which came willingly after its mistress. She was so nervous, however, that she could with difficulty walk. At every instant she started, as if expecting to see another snake appear before her to dispute her passage. Quacko, who knew very well that he had ...
— The Wanderers - Adventures in the Wilds of Trinidad and Orinoco • W.H.G. Kingston
... with many tender expressions of sorrow, the sad accident that had thrown him into that condition; then, feeling his patient's pulse on the outside of his glove, gave it as his opinion, that his disorder was entirely nervous, and that some drops of tincture of castor, and liquid laudanum, would be of more service to him than bleeding, by bridling the inordinate sallies of his spirits, and composing the fermentation of his bile. I was therefore sent to prepare this prescription, which was administered ...
— The Adventures of Roderick Random • Tobias Smollett
... constitution. At length, in [1801], poor Anne was taken ill, and died after a very short interval. Her temper, like that of her brothers, was peculiar, and in her, perhaps, it showed more odd, from the habits of indulgence which her nervous illnesses had formed. But she was at heart an affectionate and kind girl, neither void of talent nor of feeling, though living in an ideal world which she had framed to herself by the force of imagination. Anne was my ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott, Volume I (of 10) • John Gibson Lockhart
... some little knowledge of the habits of his country as contrasted with that of his adversary; but with these homebred implements he never failed to repulse the father with something of the power with which a nervous cudgel player would deal with a skilful master of the rapier, setting at nought his passados by the direct and unanswerable arguments of a broken head ...
— The Prairie • J. Fenimore Cooper
... fairly generous, manage to save enough money to purchase some lots to hold against a rise. After investing and reinvesting several times, our girl soon has a financial status of her own and secures a competency. She has no time for nervous prostration or moods, but is alert and wideawake ...
— The Empire Annual for Girls, 1911 • Various
... eyes were fixed upon the personage whom they supposed to be the son of Louvois, and the prince knew perfectly well wherefore he seemed in such nervous haste to reach ...
— Prince Eugene and His Times • L. Muhlbach
... the talking," said Lorns with a nervous rapidity that at once enlisted the ears of Quin and myself. "Don't interrupt, but listen. The chief suspects that last trunk. I can tell it by the way he acts. A bit later, when I come ashore, he'll ask to have it opened. Should he do so, we're gone; you and I." This last was to me. Then ...
— The Onlooker, Volume 1, Part 2 • Various
... invariably bring about the permanent cessation of menstruation, called the menopause. This event occurs prematurely if both the ovaries are removed by operation. In view of these facts it is not surprising that sometimes ovarian disorders abolish menstruation. An impoverished state of the blood, or nervous shock and strain, or constitutional debility may also interrupt the regular appearance of ...
— The Prospective Mother - A Handbook for Women During Pregnancy • J. Morris Slemons
... laughter, and went on up-stairs. Nathaniel was sitting on the edge of his bed, his hat on, his poor coat buttoned to his chin; he was holding his precious bag, gripped in two nervous hands, on his knee. When he heard her step, ...
— Life at High Tide - Harper's Novelettes • Various
... brass grille she had gazed out upon the lonely, good-looking, well-dressed young fellow whom she saw was very nervous and agitated. Their eyes met, when he had instantly become calm, and had ...
— The White Lie • William Le Queux
... looked at her and turned away. "Yes, I have. It isn't a death," he said, with a nervous laugh. "You need not look in that way. It is—something very different. I—I was married in this church yesterday to ...
— Frances Waldeaux • Rebecca Harding Davis
... to receive your letter, and still more gladdened by the reading of it. The exceeding kindness which it breathed was literally medicinal to me, and I firmly believe, cured me of a nervous rheumatic affection, the acid and the oil, very completely at Patterdale; but by the time it came to Keswick, the oil ...
— Reminiscences of Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Robert Southey • Joseph Cottle
... other pieces of information, that he was then at the Gray's Inn Coffee-house to lay his professional evidence before a Commission of Lunacy, touching the state of mind of a patient who had become deranged from excessive drinking. 'And I assure you, sir,' he said, 'I am extremely nervous on such occasions. I could not support being what is called Bullied, sir. It would quite unman me. Do you know it was some time before I recovered the conduct of that alarming lady, on the night of your birth, ...
— David Copperfield • Charles Dickens
... small households, the pursuit and oversight, and often the "nagging," of the employer, or, in other words, the presence of an exacting, semi-hostile, and slightly contemptuous person is constant. This and confinement in a half-dark kitchen produce that nervous crisis which sends male mechanics and other male laborers, engaged in monotonous callings, off "on a spree." In Bridget's case it works itself off by a change of place, with a few days of squalid repose among "her own ...
— Reflections and Comments 1865-1895 • Edwin Lawrence Godkin
... "I am nervous this morning, Phipps," he confided. "Had a bad night. Every one I've come across, too, lately, seems to be ...
— The Profiteers • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... "Betsy Dan," the daughter of Dan Campbell, of "The Island." Now, Betsy Dan was very red in hair and face, very shy and very nervous, and always on the point of giggles. It was a trial to her to read on ordinary days, but to-day it was almost more than she could bear. To make matters worse, sitting immediately behind her, and sheltered from the eye of the master, sat Jimmie Cameron, Don's youngest brother. Jimmie was always ...
— Glengarry Schooldays • Ralph Connor
... reckon with all certainty on the law of attraction drawing us to those correspondences which exteriorly symbolize the attitude in question. This is very different from the semi-animal screwing-up of the nervous forces which, with some people, stands for will-power. It implies no strain on the nervous system and is consequently not followed by any sense of exhaustion. The will-power, when transferred from the region of the lower mentality to the ...
— The Edinburgh Lectures on Mental Science • Thomas Troward
... experience I have never witnessed a case where the testimony of the experts on one side was not directly contradicted by the testimony of as many or more experts on the other side. Where men especially trained in mental and nervous diseases disagree, how can it be expected that a jury of twelve laymen should agree? Such testimony has been very unsatisfactory to the jury and to the court, and generally very expensive ...
— The Attempted Assassination of ex-President Theodore Roosevelt • Oliver Remey
... would not wander from the charm of his voice, from the peculiar whimsical trick of his smile, which lifted his mouth at one corner and made odd little wrinkles come and go about his eyes. His manner was full of sudden nervous gestures which surprised and enchanted her. All other men were not merely as clay beside him—they were as straw! Seeing that he was waiting for a response, she made a violent endeavour to think of one, and uttered almost inaudibly: ...
— Virginia • Ellen Glasgow
... mean that of alienating friends. Mr. Cowl is an Imperialist—of a very unemphatic type: he wears (as you will say) gold spectacles, and has a nervous cough, but he is an Imperialist. I never said that it was wrong or even foolish to alienate such a man. I said that a great and powerful section of opinion thought it a breach of honour in one of Ours to do it. Do not run ...
— On Something • H. Belloc
... sister, still staring at the letter. 'I like him well enough. I think it would do very well; and there would be no trouble with any one. I am sorry for that poor fellow Hanbury; but what is the use of his hanging about, and keeping one nervous? There is no use in it all—nothing but bother. And I know Captain King is very fond of me, and I think he would be very kind; and you know he is not going to sea again. And mamma would be pleased. Do you think I should ...
— The Beautiful Wretch; The Pupil of Aurelius; and The Four Macnicols • William Black
... when I saw who was bending over the robopilot console: Antonio Moya, Mexico City's gift to Galactic Survey some thirty-five years earlier; a cafe-con-leche type with shrewd eyes, nervous hands, silver-streaked hair that showed a defiance of geriatric injections, a slight, wiry body that couldn't have gone more than one hundred and twenty pounds at 1.0 gee, and probably the best Master Spaceman extant. ...
— Attrition • Jim Wannamaker
... said to Lionel, in tones of deep and bitter indignation. "Look at me—a skeleton—a wreck of a human being, who can only get along by the most careful nursing of his nervous system. My heart is affected; I have serious doubts about the state of my lungs? it is only through the most assiduous nursing of my nerves that I exist at all. And what is more maddening than ...
— Prince Fortunatus • William Black
... thin, nervous hand extended to him, and held it with a grasp that sent courage into the heart of Judge Latimer. It was a hand that had guided bucking bronchos and held lassoed steers, and the man weary ...
— A Man of Two Countries • Alice Harriman
... to mock her own want of hope with so bitter an aptness that in her nervous irritation she could have screamed at him outright. But she only said in self-mockery, and speaking to him as though he had been sane, "Why, Captain Hagberd, your son may not even want to look ...
— To-morrow • Joseph Conrad
... of his time, high-bred ease of language, and exquisite point and polish of anecdote; his followers, even in these few volumes, show that there were many men, even in the midst of all the practical business and nervous agitation of public life, not unworthy of their master. We have no doubt that there have been hundreds of persons, and thousands of letters, which might equally contribute to this most interesting, and sometimes most brilliant, portion of our literature. The ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 55, No. 340, February, 1844 • Various
... the departed nuns were moldering to decay. Here the timid and superstitious girls, in an agony of terror, were sent alone, to make expiation for some childish offense. The little Princess Victoire, who was of a very nervous temperament, was thrown into convulsions by this harsh treatment, and the injury to her nervous system was so irreparable, that during her whole life she was exposed to periodical paroxysms of ...
— Maria Antoinette - Makers of History • John S. C. (John Stevens Cabot) Abbott
... itself, although, by abridging our activity, it may lessen our means of usefulness. But what should we say of a man who directed his ill usage of his body to that part of our system which is most closely connected with the brain; who were purposely to impair his nervous system, and subject himself to those delusions and diseased views of things which are the well-known result of any disorder there? Yet this is precisely what they do who seek to mortify and lower their understanding. It is as impossible that they should become better ...
— The Christian Life - Its Course, Its Hindrances, And Its Helps • Thomas Arnold
... from General Saxton to risk as little as possible in this first enterprise, because of the fatal effect on public sentiment of even an honorable defeat. We had now an honorable victory, so far as it went; the officers and men around me were in good spirits, but the rest of the column might be nervous; and it seemed so important to make the first fight an entire success, that I thought it wiser to let well alone; nor have I ever changed this opinion. For one's self, Montrose's verse may be well applied, "To win or lose it all." But one has no right to deal thus lightly with the fortunes of ...
— Army Life in a Black Regiment • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... topsail, and topgallant sail, loosed from her moorings and made full sail through the straits. In an hour the capital of Denmark seemed to sink below the distant waves, and the Valkyria was skirting the coast by Elsinore. In my nervous frame of mind I expected to see the ghost of Hamlet wandering ...
— A Journey to the Interior of the Earth • Jules Verne
... between the lining and the cloth of a coat. He shewed that blood-vessels and blood were absent, in which he has been confirmed by all other observers. He declared more doubtfully against the existence of a special nervous system, and it was not until long after, when the methods of microscopic investigation were much more perfect, that the delicate nerve-cells and nerve-fibres, which we now know to exist, ...
— Thomas Henry Huxley; A Sketch Of His Life And Work • P. Chalmers Mitchell
... about forty years of age with a puckered, kindly and anxious face, and a brow that seemed to sink beneath the weight of the double crown that, save for its royal snake-crest of hollow gold, was after all but of linen, a man with thin, nervous hands which played amongst the embroideries of his golden robe—such was Pharaoh, the mightiest monarch in the world, the ruler whom millions that had never seen him ...
— Morning Star • H. Rider Haggard
... you to. He's as nervous as a witch about how you are going to take it. You see, he thinks more of your opinion than he does of anybody's, and he wants your approval. If you could jump right in and say you think it's a bully idea, and that you are coming out to see what ...
— Quin • Alice Hegan Rice
... battery, and the Maxims upon the left near Surgham hurried forward by the Sirdar himself, as I saw. General Hunter came over to the headquarters-staff galloping to get assistance, and rode back with Wauchope's brigade, which doubled for a considerable distance, so serious was the situation and nervous the tension of that thrilling ten minutes. Had the brilliant, the splendid deed of arms wrought by Macdonald been done under the eyes of a sovereign, or in some other armies, he had surely been created a General on the spot. If the public are in search of the real hero of ...
— Khartoum Campaign, 1898 - or the Re-Conquest of the Soudan • Bennet Burleigh
... old face seamed and drawn, but to his friends, the Englishmen, he seemed paler and older than ever, as he sat quietly calming his nervous horse. And Sir Gervaise Yeovil was pale, too. Not that he had any bodily fear, but the incident was so fraught with consequences which a man as experienced as he could so easily foresee, appreciate ...
— The Eagle of the Empire - A Story of Waterloo • Cyrus Townsend Brady
... little scream, and ran out into the road. "You children have such morbid minds," she said; "indeed," with a little laugh, "you have made me quite nervous." ...
— The Weans at Rowallan • Kathleen Fitzpatrick
... there was but one step from the most exquisite sensitiveness to the most violent defiance. The experience of this day had entirely cured him of his previous nervous deference to the feelings of society. Society had outraged him, and now he resolved to outrage society. He owed society nothing; his reception at the House of Lords and the riot in Palace-yard had alike cleared his accounts with all orders of men, from the highest to the lowest. He had experienced, ...
— Venetia • Benjamin Disraeli
... stronger than milk for his voice's sake. Mr. Bell, the second tenor, was a fair-haired little man who competed every year for prizes at the Feis Ceoil. On his fourth trial he had been awarded a bronze medal. He was extremely nervous and extremely jealous of other tenors and he covered his nervous jealousy with an ebullient friendliness. It was his humour to have people know what an ordeal a concert was to him. Therefore when he saw Mr. Duggan he went over to him ...
— Dubliners • James Joyce
... peril women are to the full as brave and as collected as men. Indeed, my own somewhat extensive experience leads me to go even further, and to assert that among a civil population, untrained to arms, the average woman is cooler and more courageous than the average man. Women are nervous about little matters; they may be frightened at a mouse or at a spider; but in the presence of real danger, when shells are bursting in the streets, and rifle bullets flying thickly, I have seen them standing kitting at their doors and talking to their friends across the ...
— One of the 28th • G. A. Henty
... About 11 o'clock, then, the Kite was fast overhauling her, notwithstanding that the lugger, by luffing up that extra point, came more on the wind and so increased her pace. It was at first a cloudy night—and perhaps that may have made the Kite's skipper a little nervous, for he could hardly need to be reefed in a moderate breeze—but presently ...
— King's Cutters and Smugglers 1700-1855 • E. Keble Chatterton
... built by the Germans, and taken from them by the French, at the time of the British attack at Loos. The gun crew we relieved was carried out in sandbags, having been blown to pieces by a premature shell—that is, a shell exploding in the gun. This made us pretty nervous, and we didn't fire any more till all our stock of ammunition had been inspected. After our second trip in on this line, we went out and commenced our training for the Battle of Vimy Ridge. We were taken back to a piece of country that was much like the district we ...
— Into the Jaws of Death • Jack O'Brien
... that it was out of dread of him that Lady Frances had accepted the escort of the Shlessingers to London. She had never spoken to Marie about it, but many little signs had convinced the maid that her mistress lived in a state of continual nervous apprehension. So far she had got in her narrative, when suddenly she sprang from her chair and her face was convulsed with surprise and fear. "See!" she cried. "The miscreant follows still! There is the very man ...
— The Disappearance of Lady Frances Carfax • Arthur Conan Doyle
... they not be told?" said Dona Perfecta. "He does not seem ashamed of his conduct himself. I assure you all that I keep this from my dear daughter only because, in her nervous condition, a fit of anger might ...
— Dona Perfecta • B. Perez Galdos
... he declared that there were few speakers whom he listened to with more pleasure. "His speeches are invariably marvels of conciseness, graceful expression and clear elocution". His voice was a good one, clear and distinct and well-trained. Nervous in his younger days and accustomed to learn the speeches off for delivery, he gradually changed with age and experience into the delivery of impromptu after-dinner remarks and speeches which did not show traces of the midnight oil or earnest preparation—although often full of facts and ...
— The Life of King Edward VII - with a sketch of the career of King George V • J. Castell Hopkins
... author, when in a happy mood, and employed on a noble subject, is the most wonderfully sublime of any poet in any language, Homer, and Lucretius, and Tasso not excepted. More concise than Homer, more simple than Tasso, more nervous than Lucretius, had he lived in a later age, and learned to polish some rudeness in his verses; had he enjoyed better fortune, and possessed leisure to watch the returns of genius in himself; he had attained the pinnacle ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part E. - From Charles I. to Cromwell • David Hume
... about a yard of the hole, which was much too dead for my liking. Then, while Park proceeded to carry out his ideas of accomplishing a certainty, I stood at the edge of the crowd, seeing nothing and feeling the most nervous and miserable man alive. Never while playing have I felt so uncomfortable as during those two or three minutes. After what seemed an eternity there rose from all round the ring one long disappointed "O-o-o-h!" I didn't stop to look at the ...
— The Complete Golfer [1905] • Harry Vardon
... had not seen the horseman; and, while they were recovering from their first alarm, they gave the young hunter time to subdue, with resolute good sense, his terrible nervous agitation. ...
— The Young Surveyor; - or Jack on the Prairies • J. T. Trowbridge
... thread; an enormous golden fleece, brought as a present from the Comte de Lowenthal, and which cost 2 or 3,000 francs, brings, picked to pieces, 5 or 600 francs. But they do not look into matters so closely. Some employment is essential for idle hands, some manual outlet for nervous activity; a humorous petulance breaks out in the middle of the pretended work. One day, when about going out, Madame de R—observes that the gold fringe on her dress would be capital for unraveling, whereupon, with a dash, she cuts one of the fringes ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 1 (of 6) - The Ancient Regime • Hippolyte A. Taine
... the solid chamber of her helplessness, as in a bath of benevolence artfully prepared for her, over the brim of which she could but just manage to see by stretching her neck. Baths of benevolence were very well, but, at least, unless one were a patient of some sort, a nervous eccentric or a lost child, one was usually not so immersed save by one's request. It wasn't in the least what she had requested. She had flapped her little wings as a symbol of desired flight, not merely as a plea for a more gilded cage and an extra allowance of ...
— The Golden Bowl • Henry James
... at Littlebath sufficiently memorable to need relation, unless it be necessary further to relate Miss Baker's nervous apprehensions respecting Sir Lionel. She was, in truth, so innocent that she would have revealed every day to her young friend the inmost secrets of her heart if she had had secrets. But, in truth, she had none. She was desperately jealous ...
— The Bertrams • Anthony Trollope
... were small, ill-ventilated, overcrowded, and the singing, praying and exhortation were not favorable to the welfare of the sick, nervous or tired. The long severe Winter was a cause of dread and apprehension. This was weather to which English people were not used, and they had not grown accustomed to battle with the snow and ice. Instead of facing it, they went into their houses ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 9 - Subtitle: Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Reformers • Elbert Hubbard
... urge along the sanguine flood; The labouring pulse a slower motion rules, The tendons stiffen, and the spirit cools; Each asks the aid of Nature's sister, Art, To cheer the senses, and to warm the heart. The gentle fair on nervous tea relies, Whilst gay good-nature sparkles in her eyes; An inoffensive scandal fluttering round, Too rough to tickle, and too light to wound; Champagne the courtier drinks, the spleen to chase, The colonel burgundy, and ...
— Inebriety and the Candidate • George Crabbe
... nervous and depressed over what had happened up to this time, he had reason to be still more concerned when the detective accompanied him home and began to question him privately. Before an hour had passed, Longworth had made him confess that he and his mother were very poor and that he might have to ...
— The Merriweather Girls and the Mystery of the Queen's Fan • Lizette M. Edholm
... catch a Chinaman napping, they say," Frank went on. "Three times this very day I've heard the thunder of falling rocks, and that was what kept me nervous; so I watched out above. And, Bob, it seemed as though I must have seen that big rock just trembling as it started to leave the face ...
— The Saddle Boys in the Grand Canyon - or The Hermit of the Cave • James Carson
... hundred, who had sufficient room to move easily to and fro under the eyes of officials. Priam Farll had been admitted through the cloisters, according to the direction printed on the ticket. In his nervous fancy, he imagined that everybody must be gazing at him suspiciously, but the fact was that he occupied the attention of no one at all. He was with the unprivileged, on the wrong side of the massive screen which separated the nave from the packed choir and transepts, and the unprivileged ...
— Buried Alive: A Tale of These Days • Arnold Bennett
... relation to the man she loves, in the position of a somnambulist to whom the magnetizer should give the painful power, when she ceases to be the mirror of the world, of being conscious as a woman of what she has seen as a somnambulist. Passion raises the nervous tension of a woman to the ecstatic pitch at which presentiment is as acute as the insight of a clairvoyant. A wife knows she is betrayed; she will not let herself say so, she doubts still—she loves so much! She gives the lie to the outcry of her own Pythian power. This ...
— Cousin Betty • Honore de Balzac
... frightened—of what? Up till the present time I have been frightened of nothing—I open my cupboards, and look under my bed; I listen—I listen—to what? How strange it is that a simple feeling of discomfort, impeded or heightened circulation, perhaps the irritation of a nervous thread, a slight congestion, a small disturbance in the imperfect and delicate functions of our living machinery, can turn the most lighthearted of men into a melancholy one, and make a coward of the bravest! Then, I go to bed, and I wait ...
— Library of the World's Best Mystery and Detective Stories • Edited by Julian Hawthorne
... from the clear insight of a man who has mingled with his fellow-men, and who is curiously critical of the non-romantic phenomena of their daily life. The essays on the Art of Putting Things, on Petty Malignity and Petty Trickery, on Tidiness, on Nervous Fears, on Hurry and Leisure, on Work and Play, on Dulness, and on Growing Old, are full of fresh and delicate perceptions of the ordinary facts of human experience. His best and brightest remarks surprise us with the unexpectedness of homely common sense, as flashed on ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, Issue 45, July, 1861 • Various
... The firearms with which the sailors were to do battle with the unknown enemies that might beset their path were rude and clumsy to handle. The art of compressing and condensing provisions was unknown. They had no tea nor coffee to refresh the nervous system in its terrible trials; but there was one deficiency which perhaps supplied the place of many positive luxuries. Those Hollanders drank no ardent spirits. They had beer and wine in reasonable quantities, but no mention ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... close the door on all strangers—especially strangers who were women. I contrived to pass some money to her through the grating, and asked to speak to her mistress. After waiting some time, I saw another face behind the bars—and it struck me that I recognized it. I suppose I was nervous. It startled me. I said, 'I think we know each other.' There was no answer. The door was suddenly opened—and who do you think stood ...
— Man and Wife • Wilkie Collins
... any inquiries," he asked, "about the period of her infancy before she was blind? She may be still feeling, indirectly and unconsciously, the effect of some shock to her nervous system in the time ...
— Poor Miss Finch • Wilkie Collins
... paths which they chose in preference to travelled roads, while the dogs,—for the peninsula seemed to them to be principally peopled by dogs,—by their unceasing chorus of barks, right, left, and in front, kept them in a state of nervous exasperation. Many times did they turn from their course through fear of detection from these vociferous guardians of ...
— Historic Tales, Vol. 1 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... was over he became conscious of itching palms where his nails had dug into them and left little red marks. He discovered that he was shaking as with a nervous chill, and that his knees were bending under him. He sent a wild-eyed glance to the still, purple lake down there where the snowbanks lingered, though it was the middle of May; to the far hills that were purpling already with the dropping ...
— The Lookout Man • B. M. Bower
... do; but I'm a little too nervous to sleep, for there can be no certainty about them. I hunted around for other lodges, but found none, and yet there may be plenty not far off. He may have visitors, and, if they find us here, there's no telling ...
— The Lost Trail - I • Edward S. Ellis
... window, below which the riding-ring stretched its brown surface, scarred by nervous hoofs. "I would change places with the Crown Prince," he said enviously. "Listen to him! Always laughing. Never to labor, nor worry, nor think of the ...
— Long Live the King • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... mulatta back into the corral. To my chagrin, it produced a result directly the reverse; for, on hearing it, the woman came waddling down in rapid strides towards the river. She made direct for the spot where Lilian was filling the can; and by her quick, nervous gestures, and the lurid light flashing in her half-buried eyes, I could perceive that some hideous passion was stirring within her. Lilian had already perceived that she was approaching, and stood waiting for her—evidently in awe! When within a few ...
— The Wild Huntress - Love in the Wilderness • Mayne Reid
... to the contrary, there can be no doubt whatever that the consumption of food is an intellectual treat, inasmuch as it sets the body free from the cravings of appetite, and by stimulating those nervous influences which convey vigour and vitality to the brain, not only becomes the direct cause of physical gratification, but induces that state of mind which is most favourable to the development of the interesting creations of fancy and the brilliant ...
— The Fugitives - The Tyrant Queen of Madagascar • R.M. Ballantyne
... sorely afraid something was happening to Bernardine last night—that she was attempting to commit suicide, or something of that kind. A girl in her highly nervous state of mind will ...
— Jolly Sally Pendleton - The Wife Who Was Not a Wife • Laura Jean Libbey
... afternoon for the first lecture arrived, no carriages blocked the street, and as only about half of those who had purchased tickets appeared, the difficulties of the landlady and her nervous boarder were much lessened. ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great Philosophers, Volume 8 • Elbert Hubbard
... the Irishman's cabin to see his girl, and to find out how she lived, and what sort of people composed the family. Arriving at the log hut, he found the father to be a silent, staid old man, and the mother as voluble and nervous a little woman as ever lived. Much to his disappointment, the girl was away. After an hour or two she returned, having been absent at some meeting or merry-making, and, much to his chagrin, she brought back with her a stout young fellow who was ...
— David Crockett: His Life and Adventures • John S. C. Abbott
... instinct with a charming good nature which made the members of both families quite radiant. However, a good many of the guests were following the example of the sovereigns and disappearing in small batches. And the Count, who seemed strangely nervous, and showed more sternness and bitterness than ever, was, on his side, also eager to be gone. "Ah! it's you at last. I was waiting for you," he said to Pierre. "Well, let's get off at once, eh? Your ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... both very nervous in watching her first behaviour, but were not at all prepared for the line of conduct which she adopted. John Ball and Margaret had separated when they heard the rustle of her dress. He had made a step towards the window, and she had retreated to the other side of the fire-place. Lady ...
— Miss Mackenzie • Anthony Trollope
... a febrifuge principle ought to be admitted. Is it not probable, that the particular derangement in the organization, known under the vague name of the febrile state, and in which both the vascular and the nervous systems are at the same time attacked, yields to remedies which do not operate by the same principle, by the same mode of action on the same organs, by the same play of chemical and electrical attractions? We shall here confine ourselves to this observation, that, ...
— Equinoctial Regions of America • Alexander von Humboldt
... came into the house, and began to re-arrange the teacups with a nervous haste; for she heard Jamie's steps on the rocky road, and his voice, clear as a blackbird's, whistling gayly "In the Bay of ...
— A Knight of the Nets • Amelia E. Barr
... romantic ideas about the great game but that's no reason why you should walk the thorny road. Now pop would kill me if he knew I was talking this way. It's a funny thing about pop. All I know about him I just picked up a little at a time, and he and ma never wanted me to know. Ma's awful nervous about so many of the boys stopping here, for she hung on to pop all the time he was shooting up trains out West, and having a husband in the penitentiary isn't a pleasant thing to think about. Ma's father ran a saloon down in Missouri; that's how she got acquainted with pop, but ma was ...
— Blacksheep! Blacksheep! • Meredith Nicholson
... upon an ingenious device for 'queering the scene!' Her trick was to burst into a roar of laughter just before she had time to say, 'A fat head.' The others soon tumbled to the trick, and in a night or two they worked so well together that Kate grew nervous and she could not speak her lines. This made her feel very miserable; and her stage experience being limited, she ascribed her non-success to her own fault, until one night Dick rushed on to the stage as soon as the curtain was down, and putting up his arms with a large gesture, he ...
— A Mummer's Wife • George Moore
... to see whether they can furnish a satisfactory explanation of life. Are the laws and forces of chemistry sufficient to explain digestion? Are the laws of electricity applicable to an understanding of nervous phenomena? Are physical and chemical forces together sufficient to explain life? Can the animal body be properly regarded as a machine controlled by mechanical laws? Or, on the other hand, are there some phases of life which the forces of chemistry and physics ...
— The Story of the Living Machine • H. W. Conn
... can that be?" thought Nan. She was a little nervous about approaching strange people in the wood; although at this season there was nothing to apprehend from stragglers, there were so many berry pickers ...
— Nan Sherwood at Pine Camp - or, The Old Lumberman's Secret • Annie Roe Carr
... which fill its cells. The forms of the cells are various; they are also subject to various transformations. Sometimes a number of cylindrical cells are laid end to end, and, by the absorption of the transverse partitions, form a continuous tube, as in the sap-vessels of plants, or in muscular and nervous fibre; and when cells are thus woven together, they are called cellular tissue, which, in the human body, forms a fine net-like membrane, enveloping or connecting most of its structures. In pulpy fruits, the cells may ...
— The Book of Household Management • Mrs. Isabella Beeton
... and about the last spot in which a person of a nervous disposition would care to spend the night. One half of her deck is dedicated to fuel logs, on the other half are plank stores for the goods, and a room for the black sub- trader in charge of them. I know that there must be ...
— Travels in West Africa • Mary H. Kingsley
... path—that he could no longer consider his—and smiling at his discomfiture as I remember how ashamed he is to be outdone. Then an electric shock seemed to hoist him out of the trail. He shot up the tree in a succession of nervous, jerky jumps, rising with astonishing speed for so huge a creature, smashing the little branches, ripping the rough bark with his great claws, sending down a clattering shower of chips and dust behind him, till he reached the level of the ledge above and sprang out upon it; ...
— Wood Folk at School • William J. Long
... the aisle, opened a magazine, but Mary could not settle down to read. A nervous unrest kept her going over and over in her mind, as she had done through the previous night, the scenes that lay ahead of her. There was the packing, and she checked off on her fingers the many details that she must be sure to remember. There were those borrowed books she mustn't ...
— The Little Colonel's Chum: Mary Ware • Annie Fellows Johnston
... of Coleridge: "I believe it to be notorious that he first began the use of opium, not as a relief from any bodily pains or nervous irritations—for his constitution was strong and excellent—but as a source of luxurious sensations." Hartley Coleridge, in the biographical supplement to the "Biographia Literaria," replies with what we now know to be truth: "If my Father sought more from opium than the mere absence of ...
— Poems of Coleridge • Coleridge, ed Arthur Symons
... peace. Endor consists of about twenty wretched huts on the side of a hill, and the women look like descendants of the original witch. I went to a big fountain where crones were drawing water, dreadful old women, who accused me of having the Evil Eye, which made my servant very nervous. Blue eyes are always considered to be dangerous in the East. I said, "You are quite right, O ye women of Endor; I was born with the Evil Eye"; whereupon they became very civil, that I might not hurt them. We then descended into the plain between Endor and Nazareth, and ...
— The Romance of Isabel Lady Burton Volume II • Isabel Lady Burton & W. H. Wilkins
... from tin lanterns threw the pattern of their perforations on the walls and roofs of the interior, and showed the tracery of the floury cobwebs. The people could scarcely see their way to the stairs by the glimmer, and there was more talking with nervous laughter than there had been outside. One of the Hounds called out, "I don't want any of you girls to kiss me!" and gave the relief of indignation to the hysterical emotion of the believers; the more serious of the unbelievers found escape in their helpless laughter ...
— The Leatherwood God • William Dean Howells
... nicer than lettuce. Several courses were served, and the lobsters changed the plates with each course, chattering and scolding as they worked, and as Trot said, "doing everything backwards" in their nervous, fussy way. ...
— The Sea Fairies • L. Frank Baum
... the proper use of his sex organs and as to his conduct towards girls. All this can be done with the average boy of eleven or twelve and with hundreds of even nine and ten without any fear of giving information that is startlingly new and without any danger of giving a nervous shock. ...
— Sex-education - A series of lectures concerning knowledge of sex in its - relation to human life • Maurice Alpheus Bigelow
... shivered as this superstitious fancy came into her head, her heart beat firm and regular; not from darkness nor from the spirits of the dead was she going to shrink; her great sorrow had taken away all her girlish nervous fear. ...
— Sylvia's Lovers, Vol. II • Elizabeth Gaskell
... was so nervous that she talked all the time about people the others had never seen or heard of. And she said she "never used tomattus." And she wasn't ashamed of what ...
— Mrs. Budlong's Chrismas Presents • Rupert Hughes
... end of the block-house, and the low hiss of their whispering sounded in my ear continuously like a stream. One after another they would look up, and the red light of the torch would fall for a second on their nervous faces; but it was not towards me, it was towards Silver that ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 6 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... wisdoms through space; I shall not care that the muscle which now sends the ichor through your veins is not formed of the very particles which once sent the blood to the pondering brain, the flashing eye, or the nervous right arm; I shall not care, I say, so long as it is yourselves that are before me, beloved; so long as through these forms I know that I look on my own, on my loving souls of the ancient time; so long as my spirits have got garments of revealing after their own old lovely fashion, ...
— Unspoken Sermons - Series I., II., and II. • George MacDonald
... to themselves for a few moments. Marie held out her ungloved hand to Raoul, who took and kissed it as though he were eighteen years old. The eyes of the countess expressed so noble a tenderness that the tears which men of nervous temperament can always find at their service ...
— A Daughter of Eve • Honore de Balzac
... rum, and not a single shoe have they greased. I wish you'd hurry up and come down; for if there's one thing you know I hate it's to go into church after the beginning of the first lesson with those boys squeaking and scrunching up the aisle behind me. It makes me nervous and upsets me so I can't find the place in my prayer book half ...
— Flamsted quarries • Mary E. Waller
... have a high power of regeneration, and in them the reparative process may result in almost perfect restitution to the normal. More complex structures, on the other hand, such as secreting glands, muscle, and the tissues of the central nervous system, are but imperfectly restored, simple cicatricial connective tissue taking the place of what has been lost or destroyed. Any given tissue can be replaced only by tissue of a similar kind, and in a damaged ...
— Manual of Surgery - Volume First: General Surgery. Sixth Edition. • Alexis Thomson and Alexander Miles
... you nurses are!" he said, with his queer little chuckle (all the young doctors try to imitate it in the hospital). "The daughter's a little nervous, that's all. It's for her they're taking the trip, to give ...
— The Strange Cases of Dr. Stanchon • Josephine Daskam Bacon
... back, he put them every one aside with his own hands, and lying down again, established a sharp look-out all round the bed. For he wished to challenge the Spirit on the moment of its appearance, and did not wish to be taken by surprise and made nervous. ...
— A Budget of Christmas Tales by Charles Dickens and Others • Various
... reasons, bless you, but just because I like to do things that make people wonder what the hell I'll do next. Tell her the whole story if you feel like it, but if I were you I'd wait till she is safe among her friends, where she won't be nervous. Hit it up a bit, Peter, old ...
— Green Fancy • George Barr McCutcheon
... from that inheritance, there would be no lesser prize by which he might reconcile himself to the loss. His uncle would not leave him anything from love. All this he understood thoroughly, and was therefore not unnaturally nervous as to his own conduct at ...
— Cousin Henry • Anthony Trollope
... and sit with her mistress, after she had done some righting up down stairs. Mike was bent upon routing an army of rats in the barn. Mrs. Lawrence had retired to her room with a nervous headache. ...
— Idle Hour Stories • Eugenia Dunlap Potts
... revived; but, clearly much puzzled, her helper perceived that she still had a dread of him which was sufficient to hinder her complete recovery of self-command. She spoke in a quick and nervous way to the shopkeeper, asking him to ...
— A Changed Man and Other Tales • Thomas Hardy
... devotion. There are as many eternal minutes in the week that goes by in silence, as in the one that tomes boldly towards us with mighty shout and clamour. And indeed it is we who tell ourselves all that the hour would seem to say; for the hour that abides with us is ever a timid and nervous guest, that will smile if its host be smiling, or weep if his eyes be wet. It has been charged with no mission to bring happiness to us; it is we who should comfort the hour that has sought refuge within our soul. And he is wise who always finds words of peace that he can whisper low ...
— Wisdom and Destiny • Maurice Maeterlinck
... rosemary. It is said that bees which feed on rosemary blossoms produce a very delicately-flavoured honey. Perfumers are greatly indebted to it. According to De Gubernatis, the flowers of the plant are proof against rheumatism, nervous indisposition, general debility, weakness of sight, melancholy, weak circulation, and cramp. Almost as comprehensive a cure as some of our modern ...
— Storyology - Essays in Folk-Lore, Sea-Lore, and Plant-Lore • Benjamin Taylor
... are part of ourselves? I have been pondering this question lately. Which self is the true self—the peaceful or the choleric? My wretched temper aggravated my disappointment, and my failure to write the history of the lake and its castles no doubt contributed to produce the nervous depression from which I am suffering. But this is not all; it seems to me that I may point out that your—I hardly know what word to use: "irrelevancy" does not express my meaning; "inconsequences" is nearer, yet it isn't the word I want—well, your inconsequences perplex and ...
— The Lake • George Moore
... of attendance upon our patients. The subdued glimmer of the night-lamp, the ticking of the clock, the chimes every quarter of an hour from the church-tower, all conspired to make me restless and almost nervous. ...
— The Doctor's Dilemma • Hesba Stretton
... course of modern physiological discovery tends to show, with more and more clearness, that the vascular system, or apparatus for distributing commodities in the animal organism, is eminently under the control of the cerebro-spinal nervous centres—a fact which, unless I am again mistaken, is contrary to one of Mr. Spencer's fundamental assumptions. In the animal organism, Government does meddle with trade, and even goes so far as to tamper a good deal with ...
— Critiques and Addresses • Thomas Henry Huxley
... towering figure, sharp and spare, Was with such nervous tension strung, As if on each strained sinew swung The ...
— The Poets' Lincoln - Tributes in Verse to the Martyred President • Various
... not one girl. I shall have four people, all told, two girls for day hours and two men for night hours. I intend to have them work in relays—four hours off and four on. It is too nervous a strain for longer hours than that. The night operators will have a cot for the one off duty, so that if anything unusual happens the waking one can call the other. I think it must be doleful to stay alone in such a place during those gruesome night hours. I couldn't ...
— Joyce's Investments - A Story for Girls • Fannie E. Newberry
... was because the crowd was so terrifically large. Or, there may have been something in the destiny of things that would not permit the chief actors to feel nervous. Certain it is that neither of the two men experienced the least stage fright. Had they been on display before a crowd one-tenth the size, anywhere else, both would have been ill at ease. This was different— ...
— The Blind Spot • Austin Hall and Homer Eon Flint
... not tell the ending of the feelie; he recreated it. He was the monster slurching across the floor toward her, step by scraping step and in spite of her fist on her mouth a tiny nervous scream escaped Robina. Jason wanted to stop then but she badgered him into continuing. Now he was the hero, Gregg Mason, battling the unspeakable fiend and she shivered uncontrollably as she watched them struggle ...
— The Premiere • Richard Sabia
... horizon, where the line of the blue water met the blue sky. A few floating icebergs seemed to be leaving the way free for these bold sailors. The appearance of this region was singularly strange. Was this impression simply the result of the nervous excitement of the travellers? It is hard to say. Still, the doctor in his journal has described the singular appearance of the ocean; he spoke of it as Penny did, according to whom these countries present an appearance "offering the most ...
— The Voyages and Adventures of Captain Hatteras • Jules Verne
... nice big room by himself to sleep in. The Physiology's down on crowding, and five boys in one bedroom ain't good for a nervous boy like Andy." ...
— The Widow O'Callaghan's Boys • Gulielma Zollinger
... the tickets. My friend could not find his; he searched his pockets everywhere, and although the entire evil consequence, had the ticket not turned up, could not possibly have been more than the payment a second time of four or five shillings, he got into a nervous tremor painful to see. He shook from head to foot; his hand trembled so that he could not prosecute his search rightly, and finally he found the missing ticket in a pocket which he had already searched ...
— Railway Adventures and Anecdotes - extending over more than fifty years • Various |
