"Spoil" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... knows how to cry, 'My mother' and 'My father,' they shall carry off the riches of Damascus and the spoil of Samaria ...
— Stories of the Prophets - (Before the Exile) • Isaac Landman
... uncertain. You can never be absolutely sure of the meaning of anything you read in such circumstances; you are chasing an alert and gamy riddle all the time, and the baffling turns and dodges of the prey make the life of the hunt. A dictionary would spoil it. Sometimes a single word of doubtful purport will cast a veil of dreamy and golden uncertainty over a whole paragraph of cold and practical certainties, and leave steeped in a haunting and adorable mystery an incident which had been vulgar ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... listen to reason!" cried David. "No good can come of this. They are happy and contented. Don't spoil it all for them. Go away, man. Try to forget your grievance against Colonel Grand. God ...
— The Rose in the Ring • George Barr McCutcheon
... you here already? I was certain you'd be late and miss the train. Not a very pleasant day, is it? I wish we had planned to go to-morrow instead. Why, Patty, you are wearing your best hat! You'll spoil it, I'm sure. Have you your trunk check? Give it to me, you'll certainly lose ...
— Patty Fairfield • Carolyn Wells
... on the pile of burnt and ruined meat in disgust. "I knowed you chillen's would go an' spoil de best part ob my bear. Now you-all jis get out ob de way an' dis nigger goin' to show you ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... too long been friends on foot and in gilded coaches, Now that the whole thing ends, to spoil ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 4 (of 4) • Various
... walk, the guard left for their protection deserting their charge on a false alarm of General Harrison's approach. This success, for which Colonel Proctor was immediately promoted to the rank of Brigadier, together with the spoil obtained at Frenchtown, brought down several warlike tribes of Indians from the river Wabash, and even from the more distant Mississippi, to join the British standard. Towards the end of March, Proctor learnt that General Harrison intended to commence ...
— The Life and Correspondence of Sir Isaac Brock • Ferdinand Brock Tupper
... treated sharply in the presence of a respectable man who was courting her. That would not be fair-play: every woman was young in her turn, and had her chances of matrimony, which it was a point of honour for other women not to spoil—just as one market-woman who has sold her own eggs must not try to balk ...
— Adam Bede • George Eliot
... coming—seize the hour! Divide the spoil, the prey devour! Howl o'er the dead and dying, cry All ye that raven earth and sky! With beak and talon rend the prey, Track carnage on her gory way, To chide o'er many a gleamy bone The moon, or with ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 57, No. 351, January 1845 • Various
... above all, do see if there is a good fire upstairs. These country-people are so backward in civilization!" he added. "Alas!" he sighed, "there is but one Paris in the world; what a pity it is I can't transport it to sea! Heavens! spoil-sauce!" he suddenly cried out to the cook; "what makes you put vinegar in that fricassee when you have lemons? And, madame," he added, "you gave me such coarse sheets I couldn't close my eyes all night." Then he began to twirl a huge cane, executing with a silly sort of care a ...
— The Chouans • Honore de Balzac
... to steal, unclench the spoil, deliver, Lest yet that haunch voluptuous, those tender hands caressant, 10 Should take an ugly print severe, the scourge's ...
— The Poems and Fragments of Catullus • Catullus
... my dear, you don't spoil me by this excess of civility, for my only merit is that of ...
— The History of Emily Montague • Frances Brooke
... drawing-room in a week—imagine, only in a week!—and how can she go into the presence of the Queen full of infection? I acknowledge, I acknowledge," cried the Contessa, through her handkerchief, "you have been very kind—oh, more than kind. But why then now will you spoil all? It might make a revolution—it might convey to Majesty herself—— Ah! it might spoil all the child's prospects. Who is she? Why should you reproach me with my little mystery now? She is all that is most natural; Guido's child, whom you remember well enough, Sir Tom, who married my poor little ...
— Sir Tom • Mrs. Oliphant
... I've done nothing, and could do nothing. I often wonder why people are all in league to spoil me. What have I done, and what could I do? In your heart there was found love enough ...
— Anna Karenina • Leo Tolstoy
... right, dear,' Mrs. Harrington said; 'I do spoil the child, but she is so pretty, I ...
— Mabel's Mistake • Ann S. Stephens
... does not do ridiculous things like that. I will meet whoever you wish. I only thought it might spoil your pleasure if I were there, unless of course you have told them that I am only a permanent secretary masquerading under the name of your wife—so that they need not ...
— Man and Maid • Elinor Glyn
... and throne-mountains that I found! Oh strange and shaking thoughts that touched me there, Ere I beheld the bright returning wings That came to spoil my secret, silent lair! ...
— Chinese Nightingale • Vachel Lindsay
... been before, it was even worse now. The soldiers had everywhere broken into the cellars, and numbers of them were already drunk. Many discharged their muskets recklessly, some quarrelled among themselves as to the spoil they had ...
— Under Wellington's Command - A Tale of the Peninsular War • G. A. Henty
... Brutus gave the word too early; Who, having some advantage on Octavius, Took it too eagerly: his soldiers fell to spoil, Whilst we by ...
— Julius Caesar • William Shakespeare [Hudson edition]
... said the father, who heard the affecting incident for the first time. "It won't do to humor children so much: it will spoil them." ...
— Through Forest and Fire - Wild-Woods Series No. 1 • Edward Ellis
... accessible, and a hard climb on the rocks, perhaps with a burning sun making them almost too hot to hold, will bring you within reach of a Shag's nest; but I would not advise any one who tries it to put on his "go-to-meeting clothes," as the deposit of guano on the rocks will spoil anything; and only let him smell his hands after his exploit—they do smell so nice! One of the parents generally stands by the young after they are hatched, I suppose to prevent them from wandering about ...
— Birds of Guernsey (1879) • Cecil Smith
... till the voice is inflected, then sinks again, and ends with a just cadency, And perhaps there is not a word in it, whole situation would be altered to an advantage. Let us now but shift the place of one word in the last member, and we shall spoil the beauty of the whole sentence. For if, instead of saying, as it now stands, cannot but approve the steadiness and intrepidity, with which you pursue them; we put it thus, cannot but approve the steadiness and intrepidity which you pursue them with; the cadency will be ...
— Cicero's Brutus or History of Famous Orators; also His Orator, or Accomplished Speaker. • Marcus Tullius Cicero
... ill luck would have it, the side-bone came first into my head, and 'Side-bone, sir,' I said. Oh what a lecture I got when we got home, the wretched little chit that compelled a gentleman to cut up a whole turkey to serve her! I cried myself to sleep that night." It was too bad to spoil that dinner party for ...
— Daughters of the Puritans - A Group of Brief Biographies • Seth Curtis Beach
... Meleagrus say, and that word was the name, "Atalanta." The maiden came and Meleagrus, his spear upon the head, said, "Take, O fair Arcadian, the spoil of the chase. All know that it was you who inflicted the first wound upon ...
— The Golden Fleece and the Heroes who Lived Before Achilles • Padraic Colum
... is this that I hear?" he said, turning to the lad. "You are generally a well-behaved boy; but inattention is a sad fault, as you now see. One single careless scholar can easily spoil a whole song. Now we will begin anew; ...
— Rico And Wiseli - Rico And Stineli, And How Wiseli Was Provided For • Johanna Spyri
... my wife, "and yet requires a delicate care and watchfulness. There are fifty ways to spoil good bread; there are a hundred little things to be considered and allowed for that require accurate observation and experience. The same process that will raise good bread in cold weather will make sour bread in the heat of ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 84, October, 1864 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... I'd do more than that to oblige your reverence in the matter of making a match for any boy about the place; for I'm not one to spoil his chances on a boy, not if I hated him worse than I ...
— The Simpkins Plot • George A. Birmingham
... that the effort would spoil his morning and urged him to remain where he was, at which he smiled with the care of a movie star, presenting an even, white line ...
— Alcatraz • Max Brand
... one, you shall tell me anything—say, as soon as we are settled in our lodging; not now. I, too, will tell you my faults then. But do not let us spoil the day with them; they will be excellent ...
— Tess of the d'Urbervilles - A Pure Woman • Thomas Hardy
... trustees for a Baptist university. There are two or three parties, members of Dr. Armitage's church in New York City, that are going to give us a hundred thousand dollars endowment. A hundred thousand dollars. Don't say anything about it. There are people who—well, who would spoil the thing if they could. We have neighbors, you know. Not very friendly ones. Not very friendly. Perritaut, for instance. It isn't best to tell one's neighbor all one's good luck. Not all one's good luck," and Plausaby, Esq., ...
— The Mystery of Metropolisville • Edward Eggleston
... that Hal was a sprig of one of the old "families." "Well, Joe," said Hal, a little confused, "it is a little strange. The fact is I didn't mean to be here, but I concluded to compromise by coming, and not being introduced to the host." Hal could come, eat Potiphar's supper, drink his wines, spoil his carpets, laugh at his fashionable struggles, and affect the puppyism of a foreign Lord, because he disgraced the name of a man who had done some service somewhere, while Potiphar was only an honest man who ...
— The Potiphar Papers • George William Curtis
... expectations. He ducked, and the car swerved out of the trail and went wavering spitefully across the prairie. Old King sent another rifle-bullet my way—I must have made a fine mark, standing up there—and he was a good shot. I was mighty glad he was getting jolted enough to spoil his aim. ...
— The Range Dwellers • B. M. Bower
... an unexpected compliment to Julia. She will be flattered that your partiality for her is as warm as ever. We have no engagements for the first of next week. The parties with which my friends will try to spoil Julia do not come ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 3. March 1848 • Various
... coffin were hypocritical. The people only wept in all sincerity, because the people were too strong to be jealous, and they, far from reproaching Mirabeau with his birth, loved in him that nobility as though it were a spoil they had carried off from the aristocracy. Moreover, the nation, disturbed at seeing its institutions crumbling away one by one, and dreading a total destruction, felt instinctively that the genius of a great man was the last stronghold left to them. This genius quenched, it saw only ...
— History of the Girondists, Volume I - Personal Memoirs of the Patriots of the French Revolution • Alphonse de Lamartine
... is more to your honour that you do not complain; but I know my father well, and, of course, amongst a great many high qualities, there are some not quite so pleasant. We must mend this matter for you, however, and what I wish to say to you now, is, that you must not spoil all I do, by any pride of that kind which will make you hold ...
— The King's Highway • G. P. R. James
... advantage of his phrase. "Have loved? Yes, I know that you do not love me as you did; otherwise you could not have refused to build that house, against my wish and advice. It means this, Wilbur Littleton, that I am determined not to let you spoil my life. You forget that in marrying you I gave up my own ambitions and hopes for your sake; because—because I believed that by living together we should be more, and accomplish more, than by living apart. You said you needed me, and I was ...
— Unleavened Bread • Robert Grant
... the news to the 195th, though there had been consternation in the Colonel's household for an hour before. The little beast came in through the parade ground in front of the main barracks, where the men were settling down to play Spoil-five till the afternoon. Devlin, the Color Sergeant of E Company, glanced at the empty saddle and tumbled through the barrack-rooms, kicking up each Room Corporal as he passed. "Up, ye beggars! There's something happened to the ...
— The Short-story • William Patterson Atkinson
... shook his head indulgently. "Girls will be girls," he said, glancing through the window at Gertrude, who had thrown herself on the ball and was being dragged round the garden by her heels. "I'm afraid you spoil ...
— Salthaven • W. W. Jacobs
... not to do so," he said. "It will spoil all. Nor Mistress Dorothy. It is far easier to do without ...
— Oddsfish! • Robert Hugh Benson
... her French blood—her grandparents had been emigres—and to the fact that Charles liked to see her in light colours. The gown she was now wearing on this mild November day was a French flowered silk, the spoil of a smuggler who pursued his profitable calling on the coast hard by. The short, high bodice and puffed sleeves were draped with a scarf of Buckinghamshire lace which left, as was the fashion of those days, the wearer's ...
— Studies in love and in terror • Marie Belloc Lowndes
... (Crosses R, and takes cloak.) Don't let us spoil a pleasant friendship with nonsense of this kind. Let me ...
— The Black Cat - A Play in Three Acts • John Todhunter
... one singular instance of cannibalism. The savage Chippewas from the far-off north devoured one of the slain soldiers, probably in a spirit of ferocious bravado; the other tribes expressed horror at the deed. [Footnote: Brickell's Narrative.] The Indians were rich with the spoil. They got horses, tents, guns, axes, powder, clothing, and blankets—in short everything their hearts prized. Their loss was comparatively slight; it may not have been one twentieth that of the whites. They did not at the moment follow up their victory, each band going ...
— The Winning of the West, Volume Four - Louisiana and the Northwest, 1791-1807 • Theodore Roosevelt
... hands] You're a cruel fellow if you can spoil a woman's life who never did you an ounce ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... Bridgeman," replies my mother; "it is only to keep herself out of mischief. She spoils a bit like that every week. And that's why it is so small, Captain Bridgeman; it would be a pity to spoil a ...
— Percival Keene • Frederick Marryat
... cavern. If not, they could hold out to the last and sell their lives dearly. Already he had conveyed to it, by degrees, a considerable supply of ammunition, some of the arms and a quantity of such provisions as would not readily spoil with time. Among other things, he carried to that elevated outlook Carteret's book of voyages and some other works, which had formed the very small library of the Bounty, including a Bible and a ...
— The Lonely Island - The Refuge of the Mutineers • R.M. Ballantyne
... a mistake, Jack. I made the worst one when I allowed you to over-persuade me a year ago; but we are not going to spoil two lives by ...
— The Preacher of Cedar Mountain - A Tale of the Open Country • Ernest Thompson Seton
... for his own pleasure than for others' pain. His friends gave them no weight, and when he wanted to talk emphatically he kept them back, though they were then as troublesome to him as eggs to the bird-nesting boy who has to speak with his spoil in his mouth. ...
— The Little Minister • J.M. Barrie
... board fifteen thousand disciplined troops. Canaris advised a combat on the sea, but was overruled; and the consequences were fatal. The island was taken and sacked, and all the inhabitants were put to the sword. In addition to this great calamity, the spoil made by the victors was immense, including two hundred pieces of artillery and ninety vessels. Canaris, however, contrived to escape in a boat, to pursue a victorious career with his fire-ships. The Turkish and Egyptian fleets had effected a junction, consisting of one ship-of-the-line, twenty-five ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume IX • John Lord
... broke in. "Bless me, if there aren't those little dogs of mine! Lena Vivian does spoil them. Send them home, ...
— The Three Brides • Charlotte M. Yonge
... I, "as everybody seems going to the 'Saint Antoine,' we may as well go, and not spoil ...
— The Christmas Books • William Makepeace Thackeray
... that, with his accustomed good nature, he would laugh. If nobody were present, we should both laugh at the strange occurrences and stranger jumbles of political life that should have brought us to sit down cosily and snugly, side by side, on the same platform. That the leader of the Free Spoil party should so suddenly have become the leader of the Free Soil party would be a joke to shake his sides ...
— The Great Speeches and Orations of Daniel Webster • Daniel Webster
... saw a symptom in Central America, nothing but selfish partisanship, willing at any moment to set the country in a state of war if there was only a prospect of a little spoil. The states of Central America are republics in name only; in reality, they are tyrannical oligarchies. They have excellent constitutions and laws on paper, but both their statesmen and their judges are corrupt; with some honourable exceptions, ...
— The Naturalist in Nicaragua • Thomas Belt
... the Christian is a man under continual exercises, sometimes one way, and sometimes another; but all his exercises have a tendency in them more or less to spoil him; therefore he is rather for flying to Christ than for grappling with them in and by ...
— The Pharisee And The Publican • John Bunyan
... duly to press on Monday night—there is not much correctable in them,—you make, or you spoil, one of these things; that is, I do. I have adopted all your emendations, and thrown in lines and words, just a morning's business; but one does not write plays so. You may like some of my smaller things, ...
— The Letters of Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett, Vol. 1 (of 2) 1845-1846 • Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett
... the discipline of the best masters, to the end that he might acquire a good manner. And coming by degrees to believe that he had been born, so to speak, with brushes in his fingers, on the one hand they urged him on, and on the other, fearing lest overmuch study might perchance spoil his health, they would sometimes hold him back. Finally, having come to the age of sixteen, and having already done miracles of drawing, he painted a S. John baptizing Christ, of his own invention, on a panel, which he executed in such a manner that even now whoever sees it stands ...
— Lives of the Most Eminent Painters Sculptors and Architects - Vol. 05 ( of 10) Andrea da Fiesole to Lorenzo Lotto • Giorgio Vasari
... to do with this paper?" said Stephane with a gesture of disdain. "You have told me your news, that is sufficient for me. Anything more you could add would spoil my happiness." ...
— Stories of Modern French Novels • Julian Hawthorne
... hair, and his beard, They paint as black as my shoe With burnt stick, but they spoil his nose, For they ...
— King Winter • Anonymous
... poop. Thither Colin followed him and told him all the story of the whale. The captain, who was an old friend of Colin's father when they both lived in a lumbering town in northern Michigan, was greatly taken aback when he found how dangerous the boat-trip had been, but he did not want to spoil the boy's vivid memories ...
— The Boy With the U. S. Fisheries • Francis Rolt-Wheeler
... back the hair from her forehead, and giving herself a kind of mental shaking. "I am glad of that. After all, they can't spoil the best part of our lives! I shall go into the garden to get rid of my bad temper; it ...
— We Two • Edna Lyall
... genius of Drake and the great English seamen of the age of Elizabeth the field of operations was transferred from the Channel to the American coast. The sack of Spanish towns and the spoil of treasure ships enriched the adventurers, whose methods were closely akin to piracy, and who rarely paused to ask whether the two countries were formally at war. "No peace beyond the line" was a rule of action that scarcely served to cloak successful piracy. In Spanish eyes ...
— Anson's Voyage Round the World - The Text Reduced • Richard Walter
... of puberty, that she might be continuously pregnant and have a multitude of children, and this was subsequently united with the wish that she might have them from as many men as possible. Against this immoderate wish there arose a powerful defensive impulse. But as the vomiting might spoil the patient's figure and beauty, so that she would not find favor in the eyes of mankind, the symptom was therefore in keeping with her punitive trend of thought, and, being thus admissible from both sides, it was allowed to become a reality. This is the same manner of consenting ...
— Dream Psychology - Psychoanalysis for Beginners • Sigmund Freud
... thrashed a friend of the Prince Regent, and somewhat spoiled a very fine gentleman, and, I fear, am like to be necessitated to spoil another before the day is much older; from each of whom I learn that a Prince's friend may be ...
— The Amateur Gentleman • Jeffery Farnol et al
... in an undertone to her mother as she passed her, "it will spoil the meeting. The labourers will turn sulky. I shouldn't wonder if they did or said something unpleasant. As it is, you had much better not come, mamma. They are sure to attack the ...
— Marcella • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... To spoil everything. (To Mme. Giraud) Madame, kindly tell your daughter that the counsel of M. Jules Rousseau is here and desires ...
— Pamela Giraud • Honore de Balzac
... the end of Royce Wood, who I found were laying out the plan for an iron railway from Manchester to London. It is to cross over Round Oak spring by Royce Wood corner for Woodcroft Castle. I little thought that fresh intrusions would interrupt and spoil my solitudes. After the enclosure they will despoil a boggy place that is famous for orchises at ...
— Life and Remains of John Clare - "The Northamptonshire Peasant Poet" • J. L. Cherry
... my happiness... I am so sorry... I do not want to trouble you, and I fear I shall spoil your pleasure. I beg you... I entreat you, dear brothers, take no notice of me...it is nothing, it will pass,' and he broke ...
— Selected Polish Tales • Various
... this. Even, gentlemen, when you do a good thing, you may do it in so bad a way that you may entirely spoil the beneficial effect; and if we were to make ourselves the apostles of peace in the sense of conveying to the minds of other nations that we thought ourselves more entitled to an opinion on that subject than they are, or to deny their rights—well, very likely ...
— Selected Speeches on British Foreign Policy 1738-1914 • Edgar Jones
... evening, and found that Mr. Hearn and Miss Warren were out enjoying a moonlight ride. As on the previous evening, all the family gathered around Reuben and me as we sat down to our late supper, the little girls arranging with delight the sylvan spoil that I had brought them. They were all so genial and kind that I grieved to think that I had but one more evening with them, and I thought of my cheerless quarters in New York with an ...
— A Day Of Fate • E. P. Roe
... them, and by the light they made we'd sit down here and frame our own laws. And they would be laws for the rich as well as the poor. Columbus did one good thing for us. He discovered a new world. The capitalists have done their best to spoil it, and turn it into a world as rotten as the old ones. But Columbus showed us you can find a new world if you try. And we're going to have a new world out of this one yet. New laws, new laws, I tell you, ...
— The Prisoner • Alice Brown
... to pass that he had been such a dupe in her hands? When he entered his club in St James's Street his mind had left Lady Glencora, and was hard at work considering how he might best contrive to get that spoil out ...
— Can You Forgive Her? • Anthony Trollope
... new-fangled armour which we call lizard-mail. Not rings like my hauberk here'—Sir Richard tapped his chest—'but little pieces of dagger-proof steel overlapping on stout leather. We stripped it off (no need to spoil good harness by wetting it), and in the neck-piece De Aquila found the same folden piece of parchment which we had ...
— Puck of Pook's Hill • Rudyard Kipling
... was making some such knight for myself," replied the other. "See! He was to have been tall, of good figure, wearing a wide hat and plume withal. But lest I spoil him, my knight—now a plague take me indeed if I do not ruin him complete!" So saying, she drew with vengeful fingers at the intricately woven silks until she had indeed undone all ...
— The Mississippi Bubble • Emerson Hough
... Silas Ashburn and his sons from the most profitable job of the season, even though the defection is sure to result in entire loss of the offered advantage; and if the hunt prove successful, the luscious spoil is generally too tempting to allow of any care for the future, so long as the "sweet'nin" can be persuaded to last. "It costs nothing," will poor Mrs. Ashburn observe; "let 'em enjoy it. It isn't often we have such ...
— Choice Specimens of American Literature, And Literary Reader - Being Selections from the Chief American Writers • Benj. N. Martin
... quenched. Now would I have thee know that the other time when I descended hither into the nether hell, this cliff had not yet fallen. But in truth, if I discern clearly, a little ere He came, who levied the great spoil on Dis from the supernal circle, in all its parts the deep foul valley trembled so that I thought the universe had felt the love by which, as some believe, oft times the world has been converted into chaos:[1] and, at that moment, this ancient cliff here and elsewhere made this downfall. ...
— The Divine Comedy, Volume 1, Hell [The Inferno] • Dante Alighieri
... water before taking coffee, but never after it. "Once in Syria", says a traveler, "I was recognized as a foreigner because I asked for water just after I had taken my coffee. 'If you belonged here', said the waiter, 'you would not spoil the taste of coffee in your mouth by washing ...
— All About Coffee • William H. Ukers
... India was literally encumbered with spoil. The amount of the plunder that he carried from that country has been estimated variously. The highest calculation makes it upward of seventy millions sterling; the lowest is considerably more than thirty. A great part of this was in precious stones, of which Nadir ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, v. 13 • Various
... to get lost again," he said, "and I intend to keep well behind our army. The battle line is not the place for Jean Castel. Why spoil a first-class herder to make ...
— The Hosts of the Air • Joseph A. Altsheler
... their arrows, as the latter desired. They did not possess cattle or goats or sheep, and they ate bread made of roots and bread made of grain the same as the islanders of Hispaniola. Their hair is black, thick, half curly, and long. They try to spoil the whiteness of their teeth, for almost the entire day they chew a herb which blackens them, and when they spit it out, they wash their mouth. It is the women who labour in the fields rather than the men, the latter spending their time ...
— De Orbe Novo, Volume 1 (of 2) - The Eight Decades of Peter Martyr D'Anghera • Trans. by Francis Augustus MacNutt
... institutions and traditions of Ireland were favourable to Christianity. She had preserved in a large measure the patriarchal system of the East. Her clans were families, and her chiefs were patriarchs who led their households to battle, and seized or recovered the spoil. To such a people the Christian Church announced herself as a great family—the family of man. Her genealogies went up to the first parent, and her rule was parental rule. The kingdom of Christ was the household of Christ; and ...
— The Legends of Saint Patrick • Aubrey de Vere
... was dark with dreadful ships Full of strange spoil and fire, And hairy men, as strange as sin, With horrid heads, came wading in Through the long ...
— Henrik Ibsen • Edmund Gosse
... I may remember my own word this day: that the hour of communion is the hour for the foxes—the little foxes—to spoil the wine. Two things that defile this day in looking back, are love of praise running through all, and consenting to listen to worldly talk at all. Oh that these may keep me humble and be my burden, leading me to the cross. Then, Satan, thou wilt ...
— The Biography of Robert Murray M'Cheyne • Andrew A. Bonar
... of the band lying against the boy's back causes the feathers to stand out and not fall flat and spoil the effect, as they otherwise might do. The photograph of the boy chieftain standing was taken expressly that you might see exactly how the newspaper costume of the Indian brave ...
— Little Folks' Handy Book • Lina Beard
... a great effort, and assisted by Venia and the sergeant, sat up. He felt that he had made a good impression, and had no desire to spoil it by riding the barrel. With one exception, everybody was regarding him with moist-eyed admiration. The exception's eyes were, perhaps, the moistest of them all, but admiration had ...
— Odd Craft, Complete • W.W. Jacobs
... "Take care; you will spoil her, Arnold. Don't you know, you old cynic, that women can't stand such flattery ...
— Macaria • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson
... name in the Christian Bibles, and they published the Bible as the source of their new faith. Their faith amounted to a frenzy, giving them courage in battle, but not imparting the self-control essential to Christian morality. Filling their coffers with spoil, they stocked their harems with the wives and daughters of their enemies. If their lives had been more decent, they might have had a better chance to secure the favor of those powerful nations which had now become the ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XIV • John Lord
... intrude upon him but his laundress and his clerk. Both these, as figured by our author, are admirable specimens of the natural history of the Temple; but we have no room to give them entire, and must not spoil them by abridgment. Besides, the aspirant waits: ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 461 - Volume 18, New Series, October 30, 1852 • Various
... The general opinion among manufacturers was unfavorable to the employment of boys under 16. "They are more of a nuisance than a help," said one; "they are not old enough to understand the responsibilities of work." "They break more machinery and spoil more material than they are worth," said another. In several of the building trades apprentices must be 17 years old, as the law forbids boys under this age to work on scaffoldings. The new workmen's compensation law ...
— Wage Earning and Education • R. R. Lutz
... satisfaction, my dear Betsey; and if Dr. Etherington will consent to receive him, I will send Jack to his house this very evening; for, to own the truth, I am but little qualified to take charge of a child under a year old. A hundred a year, more or less, shall not spoil so good a bargain." ...
— The Monikins • J. Fenimore Cooper
... that she decided to take him with her to Sydney. At Brisbane they had to explain to him that his master was a mistress, and they sailed without delay for Sydney, none the worse for their experience, but feeling rather subdued at the tragic disaster which had robbed them of the spoil after which ...
— Australia Revenged • Boomerang
... good boy, and give my love to Little Brown-Eyes." Then, as if to prove the immortal saying that there is no such thing as ultimate total depravity in the human atom, she leaned over to whisper the parting word: "Make good with her if you can, and want to, Bertie: I didn't mean it when I said I'd spoil your chances. Good-night and good-by." And with that the train moved off ...
— Branded • Francis Lynde
... veranda and stood looking in a troubled silence at the broad, well-kept lawn, stretching down to the asphalt street, shaded by vigorous young maples. Her father waited for her to speak, too good a lawyer to spoil by superfluous words the effect ...
— The Squirrel-Cage • Dorothy Canfield
... building his cottage, making them unavailable for the architecture of more elaborate edifices. One very great advantage is thus secured for the scenery they compose, namely, that it is rarely broken by quarries. A single quarry will often spoil a whole Alpine landscape; the effect of the lovely bay of the Lago Maggiore, for instance, in which lie the Borromean Islands, is, in great part, destroyed by the scar caused by a quarry of pink granite on its western ...
— Modern Painters, Volume IV (of V) • John Ruskin
... with joy a aching, oh! For why, O maid, with locks of jetty flax, Should grief convulse my heart with joyful knocks? It is but reasonable you should ax, Because it soundeth like a paradox. Hear, then, bright virgin! if the rain comes down, 'Twill wet the roads, and spoil my morning ride; But it will also spoil thy bran-new gown, And therefore cure thee of thy cursed pride. Moral—this sonnet, if well understood, Shows the same thing may ...
— Poetic Sketches • Thomas Gent
... what a rude boy! When all your guests are just suffering to be soldiers, you go and spoil the whole business. ...
— Dorothy on a Ranch • Evelyn Raymond
... that he should make a very creditable hare. He, however, thought that it would be more satisfactory if he was to consult with Bouldon and Buttar, as to what line of country he should take. They told him that if they knew, it would spoil their fun; so they went and found Lemon, who gladly undertook to give him his advice on ...
— Ernest Bracebridge - School Days • William H. G. Kingston
... are the designs of Cortez, the leader whom you call Malinzin. I should say the Spaniards are here with several motives. In the first place, there is the desire for wealth and spoil; in the second, religious ardor—the desire to bring all within the pale of their Church; in the third place, the love of adventure; and, lastly, the honor they will receive, at the hands of their sovereign, for opening so rich ...
— By Right of Conquest - Or, With Cortez in Mexico • G. A. Henty
... primitive as the rest of the apparatus, and the bagasse could be burned in them only by first drying it. This naturally required an enormous quantity of handling of the fuel in spreading and collecting and frequently entailed a shutting down of the mill, because a shower would spoil the supply which ...
— Steam, Its Generation and Use • Babcock & Wilcox Co.
... beneficent action on the part of the Great Powers infringed none of the principles of international law, whereas the Treaty of London took away from the smaller Power nearly everything of value it possessed and stripped it of the possibility of future greatness; the spoil was presented by the Great Powers to one of themselves. We may concede, as Mr. C. A. H. Bartlett of the New York and United States Federal Bar points out in his closely reasoned monograph[89]—we may concede that belligerents can by way of anticipation allot enemy ...
— The Birth of Yugoslavia, Volume 1 • Henry Baerlein
... without speaking Veturia began: "Why are you surprised, my child? Why are you startled? We are not deserters, but the country has sent to you, if you should yield, your mother and wife and children, if otherwise, your spoil; hence, if even now you still are angry, kill us first. Why do you weep? Why turn away? Can you fail to know how we have just ceased lamenting the affairs of state, in order that we might see you? ...
— Dio's Rome, Vol VI. • Cassius Dio
... it is for me; I see it in your face, and I feel as if I didn't half deserve it. Aunt Jessie said you would spoil me, and I must not let you. I'm afraid this looks like it, and perhaps oh me! perhaps I ought not to have this beautiful room after all!" and Rose tried to look as if she could be heroic enough to give it up ...
— Eight Cousins • Louisa M. Alcott
... fact that they were for the very first time traveling alone (at least, the Camerons had never traveled alone before) did not spoil their enjoyment of the journey. The trip down the lake on the little side-wheel steamer was very interesting to all three. First the Camerons and Ruth Fielding went about to see if they could find any other girl or boy who appeared to be bound to school like ...
— Ruth Fielding at Briarwood Hall - or Solving the Campus Mystery • Alice B. Emerson
... to pay a tax to his audience which I have not. Whenever Gerard was in too much danger, the female faces became so white, and their poor little throats gurgled so, he was obliged in common humanity to spoil his recital. Suspense is the soul of narrative, and thus dealt Rough-and-Tender of Burgundy with his best suspenses. "Now, dame, take not on till ye hear the end; ma'amselle, let not your cheek blanch so; courage! it looks ugly; but you shall hear how we won through. Had he miscarried, ...
— The Cloister and the Hearth • Charles Reade
... to a Mr. Maginnis, a friend of Bat Jarvis, and was under the direct protection of that celebrity. It was, therefore, sacred ground, and Mr. Dawson visited it in a purely private and peaceful capacity. The last thing he intended was to spoil ...
— The Prince and Betty - (American edition) • P. G. Wodehouse
... God I do believe in avenging gods Who plague us for sins we never sinned But who avenge us. That's why I'll never have a child, Never shut up in a chrysalis in a match-box For the moth to spoil and crush its bright colours, Beating its wings against the ...
— Confessions of a Book-Lover • Maurice Francis Egan
... the spoil was Ranadar's, but this he forced upon Monilon, in order to enable him again to rebuild his ruined home in Komao. Monilon took it, for well he knew that Ranadar would have it again-well he knew it, by the happy smile ...
— The Duke's Prize - A Story of Art and Heart in Florence • Maturin Murray
... me with maternal solicitude lest I should strangle myself with my chains, these pretty bracelets which I have had to wear ever since poor Renny was found out, or swallow my pillow—dash me! it's small enough—and spoil the pretty show for Saturday! Why, ...
— The Light of Scarthey • Egerton Castle
... the way," remarked the trapper with a quiet chuckle as he peered earnestly at the ground which the moon enabled him to see distinctly, "if a band o' men only mention campin' when they're on the march they're sure to waver a bit an' spoil the straight, go-ahead ...
— The Prairie Chief • R.M. Ballantyne
... Australia thrown in; Alsace-Lorraine for France's neutrality. There's bribery for you. What's to become of poor England then? Our friends are only human, after all, and it's merely a question of handing over to them sufficient spoil. They must consider themselves first: that's the first duty of their politicians ...
— The Vanished Messenger • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... are three of us come on purpose for the game, you won't be so cantankerous as to spoil ...
— Familiar Quotations • John Bartlett
... gave myself up to an unfettered consideration of the mystery of life and the complexity of our multitudinous contacts with one another. It is not enough, I reflected, to say that we make and pass. We make and remake, we pass and, pausing on the brink of oblivion, return to spoil our first fine careless raptures. We make and pass; but the early dawn of our making is reddened by the sunset of another's decline. We are agitated by the originality of our ideas, unaware that they are born simultaneously in a thousand minds, and are woven into the texture of our time-spirit ...
— Aliens • William McFee
... "I have never thought that you believed. I have felt this always in the bottom of your heart. I only ask you not to spoil this day for me. I have stolen it. Let me enjoy it. I shall not put you out of my life—at least not yet. Later, when we are both calm, we will talk that out. But let it rest now, for I ...
— The House of Mystery • William Henry Irwin
... scene for those who had no finery to spoil, and who ran only the risk of taking cold, to see these poor women drenched with the rain, running in every direction, with or without a cavalier, and hunting for shelter which could not ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... at war, or on the brink of war, to suspend all military operations in order to give diplomatic intervention an opportunity; and it is equally significant that, when the great war broke out, Italy remained neutral, in spite of the pressure from her allies and the tempting bait of a share of the spoil, which, it is said, is even now being offered to her.[159] This is but a bald description of Italy's policy, but it can be substantiated in detail from official documents. As early as July 25th the Italian Ambassador in a conversation with Sir Edward Grey 'made no secret ...
— Why We Are At War (2nd Edition, revised) • Members of the Oxford Faculty of Modern History
... thou wilt, for gold a life of toil! Let endless acres claim thy care! While sounds of war thy fearful slumbers spoil, And far-off trumpets scare! ...
— The Elegies of Tibullus • Tibullus
... little wooden fort, and lastly, over the tops of the wagons, a ridge pole was fixed formed of a small tree which fell to Uncle Jack's axe, and across this three wagon cloths were stretched, forming a fairly waterproof roof to protect goods that would spoil, and also promising to be strong enough to check a spear which might reach it through ...
— The Dingo Boys - The Squatters of Wallaby Range • G. Manville Fenn
... for the left hand of the cembalist (or, in the double concertos, two left [v.03 p.0128] hands) without disturbing the already complete score, is astonishing; and it fails only in the slow movements, which he prefers to leave obviously in the condition of an arrangement rather than to spoil their broad cantabile style ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 1 - "Austria, Lower" to "Bacon" • Various
... complacent eye on the crucifix set with brilliants, the bowls, chalices, and other articles, which, according to his view, having been taken from the idolatrous temples of the hated foe, were his proper share of the spoil; and he was ready to receive as many more similar articles as might ...
— Notable Voyagers - From Columbus to Nordenskiold • W.H.G. Kingston and Henry Frith
... the uncircumcised Philistine hath fallen before his lance,—even as Og the King of Bashan, and Sihon, King of the Amorites, fell before the sword of our fathers!—Surely he shall take their gold and their silver, and their war-horses, and their armour of brass and of steel, for a prey and for a spoil." ...
— Ivanhoe - A Romance • Walter Scott
... as the modes of dividing the spoil, were reduced to system and method; and the religious observation of oaths was conducive to the success of both. Every soldier was sworn to be faithful to his country, both in fighting its battles, and in giving a rigid account of whatever might be the fruits of ...
— An Inquiry into the Permanent Causes of the Decline and Fall of Powerful and Wealthy Nations. • William Playfair
... Kettering, and Mr. Gotch came into the warehouse just as I had emptied my bag. He took up one of the shoes and said, "Let me see, Carey, how much do you earn a week?" I said, "About 9s., sir." Mr. Gotch then said: "I have a secret to tell you, which is this: I do not intend you should spoil any more of my leather, but you may proceed as fast as you can with your Latin, Greek, and Hebrew, and I will allow you from my own private purse 10s. a week!" With that sum and about 5s. a week which I get from my people at Moulton, ...
— The Life of William Carey • George Smith
... way. Oscar had often heard his uncle describe their manner of life, and, to him, there was something quite fascinating about it. He thought he should like the logging business very much—all but the working part of it; he was afraid that would spoil the whole, for his Uncle John always represented it as ...
— Oscar - The Boy Who Had His Own Way • Walter Aimwell
... results that might offend the precisionist. But after all it is what she has to say that matters most; and the story of The Candid Courtship will hold you amused and curious to the end. I will not spoil it by re-telling, save to indicate that (as the title implies) it is about a suitor who, in proposing to the girl of his choice, confessed to her that he had a past. Not a very lurid past, but quite bad enough for the G.O.H.C., who happened to entertain strong ...
— Punch, July 18, 1917 • Various
... hair as close as an ape's tail; or else clap so much pitch on it, that they must cut it off themselves to their great shame. Slovens also that neglect their masters' business, they do not escape. Some I find that spoil their masters' horses for want of currying: those I do daub with grease and soot, that they are fain to curry themselves ere they can get clean. Others that for laziness will give the poor beasts no meat, I oftentimes so punish them with ...
— The Sources and Analogues of 'A Midsummer-night's Dream' • Compiled by Frank Sidgwick
... It should be scalded and aired one day every week in winter and three times weekly during the spring, summer and early fall. Keep the fact in mind that the bread kept in a poorly ventilated box will mould and spoil and thus ...
— Mrs. Wilson's Cook Book - Numerous New Recipes Based on Present Economic Conditions • Mary A. Wilson
... stenographers busy." His father told, in turn, the plan his corporation was considering, of putting in an electric railway plant at Cairo. Paul snapped his teeth; he had an awful apprehension that they might spoil it all before he got there. Yet he rather liked to hear these legends of the iron kings, that were told and retold on Sundays and holidays; these stories of palaces in Venice, yachts on the Mediterranean, and high play at Monte ...
— Youth and the Bright Medusa • Willa Cather
... think of other things besides their love. Perhaps they were not so much in love as he was! He began to see difficulties arising from this great devotion of his to Maggie. It would be very hard to concentrate his mind on a story if it were full of thoughts of her. He would probably spoil any work he attempted to do, because his mind would not be on it, but away with Maggie. In none of the books he had read, had he seen any account of the length of time a pair of lovers took in which to get used to each other and to adjust their affections to the ordinary ...
— The Foolish Lovers • St. John G. Ervine
... the passionate nature of the Italians to have incredible ado about buying and selling, and a day's shopping is a sort of campaign, from which the shopper returns plundered and discomfited, or laden with the spoil of ...
— Venetian Life • W. D. Howells
... Mr. Waterman. "But here is another thought. If we put in a claim for this gulch, we may have a hundred mining sharks down here right away and that would spoil the whole thing, especially if there is more ...
— Bob Hunt in Canada • George W. Orton
... much distressed, now put in her word: "Come, Pierre, what ails you? For once it cannot hurt him? Think of what an occasion it is for him, for all of us. You will spoil his pleasure and make us all unhappy. It is too bad of you to do such ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume VIII. • Guy de Maupassant
... Milner, this is the old argument. He may love you too well to spoil you—consider that he is your guardian as well as your lover, he means also to become your husband; and he is a man of such nice honour, that he will not indulge you with any power before marriage, to which he does not intend to ...
— A Simple Story • Mrs. Inchbald
... lifted a hand for him. That's the bald truth. But I couldn't let the boys spoil the moral effect of their victory by so gross a mistake. It would have been ...
— Ridgway of Montana - (Story of To-Day, in Which the Hero Is Also the Villain) • William MacLeod Raine
... what you may call fire about him. He wrote poetry, and he rode, and he ran, and he cricketed, and he danced, and he acted, and he done it all equally beautiful. He was uncommon proud of Master Harry as was his only child; but he didn't spoil him neither. He was a gentleman that had a will of his own. and a eye of his own, and that would be minded. Consequently, though he made quite a companion of the fine bright boy and was delighted to see him so fond of his fairy books, ...
— Half-Hours with Great Story-Tellers • Various
... he was averse to trust to her for any part of his success. Though Mr. Saul was no knight, though he had nothing knightly about him, though he was a poor curate in very rusty clothes and with manner strangely unfitted for much communion with the outer world, still he had a feeling that the spoil which he desired to win should be won by his own spear, and that his triumph would lose half its glory if it were not achieved by his own prowess. He was no coward, even in such matters as this, or in any other. When circumstances demanded that he should speak he could speak his mind freely, ...
— The Claverings • Anthony Trollope
... Ethelred died, and young Olaf, thirsting for new adventures, sailed away to the south and fought his way all along the French coast as far as the mouth of the river Garonne. Many castles he captured; many rival vikings subdued; much spoil he gathered; until at last his dragon-ships lay moored under the walls of old Bordeaux, waiting for fair winds to take him around to the Straits of Gibraltar, and so on "to ...
— Historic Boys - Their Endeavours, Their Achievements, and Their Times • Elbridge Streeter Brooks |
