"Wan" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... remorsefully within her when she saw suddenly appear upon the speaking countenance of the young lady before her a wan desolate look of agony. ...
— Desperate Remedies • Thomas Hardy
... sky scudded ragged masses of clouds, advanced guard of the storm that was mustering along the horizon; everywhere there was a feeling that foreboded snow. In the sky, few stars were visible, and those glimmered with a cold, wan light; at the zenith a solitary planet burned steadfastly. The road stretched away into the night; it was dark under the trees beside the fence; away in the distance the ...
— Princess • Mary Greenway McClelland
... perfectly awake, he strove to recollect his dreams. He thought that he heard people coming up the staircase that he had a glimpse of; that the door opened, and there entered a warrior, leading a lady by the hand, who was young and beautiful, but pale and wan; The man was dressed in complete armour, and his helmet down. They approached the bed; they undrew the curtains. He thought the man said, "Is this our child?" The woman replied, "It is; and the hour approaches that he shall be known for such." They then separated, ...
— The Old English Baron • Clara Reeve
... an olde and worn-out Man, And evrie droppe of Bloud hath left my Vaynes; Als' my fayr Daughters twaine lie cold and wan And bloudless, bound ...
— The Mysteries of All Nations • James Grant
... pickin' up the quarter scornful. "Thim Swedes are the tightwads! And if ever I find this wan ...
— The House of Torchy • Sewell Ford
... as he lay on the great bed, a huge, bloated, old man; but so wan, so weak, it was heart-rending. As he rested, his mind ...
— The Trembling of a Leaf - Little Stories of the South Sea Islands • William Somerset Maugham
... Fogarty. "An' ye'll remimber, if anny wan asks ye, that I ixprissed me contrition for arristin' Snooksy. Whist!" he said, putting his hand alongside his mouth and whispering: "Some wan wanted me t' search th' house here t' see did Snooksy have sivin bottles iv beer an' ...
— Philo Gubb Correspondence-School Detective • Ellis Parker Butler
... by step perforce returns to couthless youth, wan, white and cold, Lisping again his broken words till all the ...
— The Kasidah of Haji Abdu El-Yezdi • Richard F. Burton
... before some unseen enemy as she moved about, her face all wan and weary, glanced at her half resentfully. "I guess she 'ain't had any such night as I have," she thought. "Girls don't ...
— Pembroke - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... room. As he did so Colwyn pushed back his chair and walked across to the window, where he stood for a few moments looking out. A wan young moon gleamed through the black tapestry of the avenue of trees, pointing white fingers at the house and plunging the old garden into deep pools of shadow. The trees huddled in their rows, whispering menacingly, and stretching ...
— The Hand in the Dark • Arthur J. Rees
... opened wide the eyes of the Chevalier, who had been sorely smitten through the friends of his heart, out at sea Night and Death were closing the eyes of another wan old man who had been a ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... upon the followers of Hung Hsiu-ch'wan, a village schoolmaster of China, who, coming under the influence of Christian teaching, sought to subvert the religion and ruling dynasty of China; he himself was styled "Heavenly King," his reign "Kingdom of Heaven," and his dynasty ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood
... pier lookin' down at her I heard footsteps and brisk remarks from behind the bushes on the bank, and here comes Williams, puffin' and blowin', followed by a sulky-lookin' hired man totin' a deckload of sweaters and ileskins, with a lunch basket on top. Williams himself wan't carryin' anything but his temper, but he hadn't forgot none ...
— The Depot Master • Joseph C. Lincoln
... grave in which to fall. Life—empty and blank and bare of love and tenderness, stretched before her imagination; she saw herself toiling along the monotonously even road of duty till her hair became gray and her face thin and wan and wrinkled, and never a gleam again of the beautiful, glowing, romantic passion that for a short time had made her days splendid with the dreams that are sweeter than ...
— Ziska - The Problem of a Wicked Soul • Marie Corelli
... and wan, A pale consumptive coughed with labored breath, His sunken eyes and hectic flush upon His cheek, foretold a sure but lingering death; I thought, whene'er I met his hollow stare, A wasting death like that was ...
— Mountain idylls, and Other Poems • Alfred Castner King
... love of a great people bore the pale sufferer to the longed-for healing of the sea. There with wan face lifted to the cooling breeze, he looked wistfully out upon the changing wonders of the ocean; its far-off sails white in the morning light; its restless waves rolling shoreward to break in the noon-day sun; the red ...
— Wit, Humor, Reason, Rhetoric, Prose, Poetry and Story Woven into Eight Popular Lectures • George W. Bain
... bringing me small offerings with open hand. On me is placed a many-tinted wreath of early spring flowers and the soft green blade and ear of the tender corn. Saffron-coloured violets, the orange-hued poppy, wan gourds, sweet-scented apples, and the purpling grape trained in the shade of the vine, [are offered] to me. Sometimes, (but keep silent as to this) even the bearded he-goat, and the horny-footed nanny sprinkle my altar with blood; for which honours Priapus is bound in return to ...
— The Carmina of Caius Valerius Catullus • Caius Valerius Catullus
... bridegroom when he met his sister in the morning. Thick-coming fancies, for which there was more than good reason, had disturbed him only too successfully, and he was as full of apprehension as one who has a league with Mephistopheles. Charlotte told him nothing of what made her likewise so wan and anxious, but drove off to the castle, as had been planned, about nine o'clock, leaving her brother and ...
— A Laodicean • Thomas Hardy
... lowly-minded Jenkins! The bishop appeared to divine the state of the case, for he stopped when he came up. Possibly he was struck by the wan hue ...
— The Channings • Mrs. Henry Wood
... saddled to carry Eli Kirke to the docks. 'Twas a wan hope, but in a twinkling I was riding like wind for the barking behind the hill. A white-faced man broke from ...
— Heralds of Empire - Being the Story of One Ramsay Stanhope, Lieutenant to Pierre Radisson in the Northern Fur Trade • Agnes C. Laut
... this conquerour myghty Upon a season played at the Chesse With one of his knyghtes which wan ynally Of hym great golde treasoure and rychesse And hym ouercame, but in a furyousnes And lade with wyne, this conquerour vp brayde And to his knyght in wrath ...
— The Ship of Fools, Volume 1 • Sebastian Brandt
... Sounds more deadly than 5 those three shouts have never been heard in this land. They shall resound from Land's End to Cold Blast Ridge in Ireland, and turn the hearts of youths and maidens cold as stone. Matrons shall grow wan and weakly and many a mother's child shall die of fright—so dreadful 10 will ...
— Story Hour Readings: Seventh Year • E.C. Hartwell
... the end of the procession; he could not think of any consideration that would have stayed him. He scarcely troubled himself to keep at a fit remove from the rest; and as he followed in the deepening twilight he felt a sweet, unselfish gladness of heart that the poor girl whom he had seen so wan and sad in Boston should be the gay soul ...
— A Pair of Patient Lovers • William Dean Howells
... giving the hand a friendly shake, "it's somethin' you're wantin', sure. What a pity it is wan can't spake wid ...
— Under the Waves - Diving in Deep Waters • R M Ballantyne
... wonder. However we doubt, there is a mystery beyond our penetration. And yet 'tis near our grasp. I sometimes deem a step, a single step, would launch us into light. Here comes my patient. The rose has left his cheek, and his deep brow is wan and melancholy. Yet 'tis a glorious visage, Meditation's throne; and Passion lingers in that languid eye. I know not why, a strong attraction draws me to ...
— Alroy - The Prince Of The Captivity • Benjamin Disraeli
... sad steps, O moon, thou climb'st the skies! How silently, and with how wan a face! What, may it be, that even in heavenly place That busy archer his sharp arrow tries? Sure if that long with love-acquainted eyes Can judge of love, thou feel'st a lover's case. I read it in thy looks—thy ...
— Storyology - Essays in Folk-Lore, Sea-Lore, and Plant-Lore • Benjamin Taylor
... like a tender grief, About an English ruin clings— What time the wan autumnal leaf Faints, after many wanderings On ...
— The Poems of Henry Kendall • Henry Kendall
... course the miracle of dawn was enacted on the river. The world stole out of the dark like a woman wan with watching. First the line of tree-tops on either bank became blackly silhouetted against the graying sky, then little by little the masses of trees and bushes ...
— The Fur Bringers - A Story of the Canadian Northwest • Hulbert Footner
... I brooded longer, With my faint eyes on the feeble square of wan-lit window frame, A quick conviction sprung within me, grew, and grew yet stronger, That the month-night ...
— Time's Laughingstocks and Other Verses • Thomas Hardy
... was torn—for dregs of ale And slops of gin had rusted it; His pimpled face was wan and pale, Where filth ...
— Bab Ballads and Savoy Songs • W. S. Gilbert
... a wan smile and a little broken sigh. Almost involuntarily, in the heaviness of her fatigue, she had surrendered to the hospitable arms of a ...
— The Lone Wolf - A Melodrama • Louis Joseph Vance
... looks fierce on that green dress—but I reckon blood will tell, even if it's Injun blood. G'wan, or you'll be late and have your trouble for your pay. But hurry back soon's the agony's over; the bread'll be ready to ...
— Lonesome Land • B. M. Bower
... arm was in a sling; his face, thin and wan with suffering, wore an expression of anxiety and alarm which deepened ...
— Elsie at Nantucket • Martha Finley
... a change had come. The moon had got round, and was fronting her from the west, and she saw that her face was altered, that she had grown pale, as if she too were wan with fear, and from her lofty place espied a coming terror. The light seemed to be dissolving out of her; she was dying—she was going out! And yet everything around looked strangely clear—clearer than ever she had ...
— Harper's Young People, December 23, 1879 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... Father," she said, stretching out her hand to greet him, yet with no hint of welcome in her wan face, "they have stripped me of every joy; I had thought the Holy Christus and the Blessed Mother of ...
— The Royal Pawn of Venice - A Romance of Cyprus • Mrs. Lawrence Turnbull
... Macbeth and foreboding Banquo; and the hermit-sun, hutted in an Adullum cave, well towards the south, according to his season, did little else but, by indirect reflection of narrow rays shot down a Simplon pass among the clouds, just steadily paint one small, round, strawberry mole upon the wan cheek of northwestern hills. Signal as a candle. One spot of radiance, ...
— The Piazza Tales • Herman Melville
... nurture sweet Which give his gentleness to man— Train him to honor, lend him grace Through bright examples meet— That culture which makes never wan With underminings deep, but holds The surface still, its fitting place, And so gives sunniness to the face And bravery to the heart; what troops Of generous boys in happiness thus bred— Saturnians ...
— John Marr and Other Poems • Herman Melville
... man too! Sich a very smart man! No Rip wan Winkle HARTY affectation! Yet 'e somehow made yer feel That 'e jest knowed 'ow to deal With the ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Volume 102, March 19, 1892 • Various
... with wan ray that other sun of Song Sets in the bleakening waters of my soul. One step, and lo! the Cross stands gaunt and long 'Twixt me and yet bright skies, a ...
— Among Famous Books • John Kelman
... kindness. Now, the Secretary had lived in modern capitals for many years, was trained in diplomacy, and had schooled himself never to appear surprised. But the Princess Kalora fairly bowled him over. He had pictured her as a wan and waxen creature, who would be carried to the hotel in a closed carriage or ambulance, there to recline by the windowside and look out at the rustling leaves. He had decided, after hours of deliberation, ...
— The Slim Princess • George Ade
... campaign which Philip proposed could not cost less than a further L170,000; and so much money could not be had "without the people should have strange impositions set upon them, which they could not bear." There was but "a wan hope of recovering Calais," and "inconveniences might follow" if the attempt was made ...
— The Reign of Mary Tudor • James Anthony Froude
... 1766 to 1123. Of those five, the latest piece should be referred to the twelfth century B.C., and the most ancient may have been composed five centuries earlier. All the other pieces in the Shih have to be distributed over the time between Ting and king Wan, the founder of the line of Ku. The distribution, however, is not equal nor continuous. There were some reigns of which we do not ...
— The Shih King • James Legge
... I hev heern said. I won't say that ar's true, as I ain't acquainted with yur jography. I know, howsomdever, they're mighty big freshets thur, as I hev sailed a skift more 'n a hundred mile acrosst one o' 'm, whur thur wan't nothin' to be seen but cypress tops peep in out o' the water. The floods, as ye know, come every year, but them ar big ones only ...
— The Hunters' Feast - Conversations Around the Camp Fire • Mayne Reid
... game, Muster Lumley," said Bane, as they came up, and flung down the deer. "Not only teer an' rabbits, but tucks an' geese, an' all sorts o' pirds. Moreover, Tougall, she got into a bog after wan o' the peasts, an' I thought I wass goin' to lose him altogither. 'Shames Tougall,' says I, 'don't you go anither step till I come to you, or you're a lost man,' but Shames went on—he was ...
— The Big Otter • R.M. Ballantyne
... make him for us to hold a life's battle with? Is that vital power which reddens the cheek of the peach and pours sweetness through the fruits and flowers of no use to us? Look at plants that grow without sun,—wan, pale, long-visaged, holding feeble, imploring hands of supplication towards the light. Can human beings afford to throw away a vitalizing force so pungent, so exhilarating? You remember the experiment of a prison, where one row of ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 85, November, 1864 • Various
... extra efforts to talk and appear interested in what was going on around her. She was afraid her keen-eyed Aunt Maria would see that she was unhappy. But alone with Georgina who shared her secret, she relapsed into a silence so deep it could be felt, responding only with a wan smile when the child's lively chatter seemed to force an answer of some kind. But to-day when Georgina came to the table she was strangely silent herself, so mute that Belle noticed it, and found that she was being furtively watched by the big brown eyes opposite her. Every time ...
— Georgina of the Rainbows • Annie Fellows Johnston
... in icy fetters lie! See black Suspicion bend his gloomy brow, The hideous image of himself to view! And fond Belief, with all a lover's flame, Sink in those arms that point his head with shame! 40 There wan Dejection, faltering as he goes, In shades and silence vainly seeks repose; Musing through pathless wilds, consumes the day, Then lost in darkness weeps the hours away. Here the gay crowd of Luxury advance, Some touch the lyre, and others urge the dance: On every head the rosy ...
— Poetical Works of Akenside - [Edited by George Gilfillan] • Mark Akenside
... with a hand far from clean; but it was the hand of a brave man, and I liked it all the better for being dirty. It seemed somehow to belong to a hero. I think that I would have been disappointed if he had had clean hands and well-trimmed finger-nails. On our taking leave of him he conjured up a wan smile and said, very pleasantly, giving us his ink- stained hand, ...
— In the Courts of Memory 1858-1875. • L. de Hegermann-Lindencrone
... beyond a limited number of characters, and that all she committed to memory were the examples of these few worthy female characters of dynasties of yore; while she attached special importance to spinning and female handiwork. To this reason is to be assigned the name selected for her, of Li Wan (Li, the weaver), and the style of ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... of Ophir, from which King Solomon had enriched the temple of Jerusalem, could rekindle the dormant enthusiasm of the nation. The novelty of the thing had passed. They heard a different tale, moreover, from the other voyagers, whose wan and sallow visages provoked the bitter jest, that they had returned with more gold in their faces than in their pockets. In short, the skepticism of the public seemed now quite in proportion to its former overweening confidence; ...
— The History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella The Catholic, V2 • William H. Prescott
... wid er stitch in my side, Marster, so I'se jes got dese yer close done dis mawnin'. Dar wan' noner de chillen at home ter tote um down yer, so I low I 'uz gwine ter drap by wid um on my ...
— Virginia • Ellen Glasgow
... 're not the only wan that notices, Miss Nora. I'm a noticin' lad mesilf. An' it's the truth that I'd be glad enough to meet yuh some fine evenin' when I'm off duty. But about this strong-arm guy that tied up the janitor. The Swede says he went into wan av these houses. Now here's the wet color from ...
— The Big-Town Round-Up • William MacLeod Raine
... he dun got so hongry dat he et yarbs en sapplin' bark er ennything. De fawmer look at him en say, 'I cudden' hev yo' erbout de house; de wimmen wouldn' stan' fer hit, but I got some hawgs up de holler yo' kin feed, but yo'll hev to stay erway frum hyar, ez I doan' wan' my ...
— Shawn of Skarrow • James Tandy Ellis
... rose, all wan as death, With broken steps of care; And oft' he check'd his quick-heav'd breath, And turn'd his ...
— Poems, &c. (1790) • Joanna Baillie
... to wark we gaed, And raised the slogan ane and a', And cut a hole through a sheet of lead, And so we wan to ...
— Types of Children's Literature • Edited by Walter Barnes
... when the wind did not blow were the only times Rea and Jones got out of doors. To the plainsman, new to the north, the dim gray world about him was of exceeding interest. Out of the twilight shone a wan, round, lusterless ring that Rea said was the sun. The silence and desolation ...
— The Last of the Plainsmen • Zane Grey
... rapidly to and fro, and moved in circles, and then, with the same swift, silent motion, sailed toward him, as if blown thither by the gale. Its long, thin arms, with something like a pale flame spiring from the tips of the slender fingers, were stretched out, as in greeting, while the wan smile played over its face; and when he rushed by, unheedingly, it made a futile effort to grasp the swinging arms with which he appeared to buffet back the buffeting gale. Then it glided on by his side, looking ...
— Little Classics, Volume 8 (of 18) - Mystery • Various
... silhouettes; The sun in universal carnage sets, And, halting higher, The motionless storm-clouds mass their sullen threats, Like an advancing mob in sword-points penned, That, balked, yet stands at bay. Mid-zenith hangs the fascinated day In wind-lustrated hollows crystalline, A wan Valkyrie whose wide pinions shine Across the ensanguined ruins of the fray, And in her hand swings high o'erhead, Above the waste of war, The silver torch-light of the evening star Wherewith to search the faces of ...
— Artemis to Actaeon and Other Worlds • Edith Wharton
... half-frightened by the tenderness in her voice; and what I saw frightened me wholly. The sullenness had gone from her eyes; as a mother upon the child in her lap, so she looked down upon me; but her face was wan, even in the warm sunlight, and pinched, and hollow-eyed. I lifted her hand—a little way only, my own being so weak. It was frail, transparent, as though wasted ...
— Sir John Constantine • Prosper Paleologus Constantine
... woman stepped up close to the canoe, reached out and touched the little brooch at the girl's throat. "Su-wan! Su-wan!" she exclaimed. After examining it most carefully, she turned upon the captors and addressed them in an angry manner. They merely grunted at what she said, and pushing the canoe from the shore, once more continued on ...
— The King's Arrow - A Tale of the United Empire Loyalists • H. A. Cody
... for compliments; but, sure, if ut hadn't ut wouldn't begin to do th' pair iv yez justice. Oh, divil th' bit iv soodher am I givin' yez. It's two pretty women yez are. Well, well, I'm an old felly who's had his day. Ye won't mind me. Annyways, wan iv yez has a man, an' th' other is spoken for, belike. Now whatever makes Casey, there, blush? I didn't think he knowed how. An' Miss Burnaby, too! What'll yez do whin they's rice lodged in yer ...
— Desert Conquest - or, Precious Waters • A. M. Chisholm
... his old cheerful grin, but the boys were shocked at his wan and wasted appearance, so different from his usual vigorous self. They did not let him see this, however, but talked and joked with him in the usual way, and when the doctor finally signaled for them to leave they had the satisfaction of knowing that they had cheered ...
— The Radio Boys at the Sending Station - Making Good in the Wireless Room • Allen Chapman
... Watson, what wud you like?' she says, and Danny ups and says, 'Chockaluts and candy men and taffy and curren' buns and ginger bread,' and she had every wan of them." ...
— Sowing Seeds in Danny • Nellie L. McClung
... strong, and I caught myself up, but the girl offered me the pardon of a beautiful wan smile. "So Ray himself declares. He says he has ...
— Embarrassments • Henry James
... "Fifteen minutes later, Peter, wan and covered with cuts and bruises, entered the priest's house, and swooned on the threshold. It was nearly daylight before he recovered himself sufficiently to corroborate the story of the lad, that the ghost of Matthew Collins jealously watched ...
— Adrift in the Ice-Fields • Charles W. Hall
... many-colored woods, Shade deepening over shade, the country round Imbrown; a crowded umbrage, dusk and dun, Of every hue, from wan declining green to ...
— Excursions • Henry D. Thoreau
... said Jem, melting under the happy allusion, "a gintleman of your grate expayrince in building should know that, of all things else, a laddher is the wan ...
— My New Curate • P.A. Sheehan
... that are not used in prose, or are used but seldom; as, azure, blithe, boon, dank, darkling, darksome, doughty, dun, fell, rife, rapt, rueful, sear, sylvan, twain, wan. ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... as a perpetual witness of those people that have found life too hard for them and have been compelled to give in. The streets of those melancholy squares seen beneath flickering lamp light and a wan moon protest against all gaiety of spirit and urge resignation and a mournful acquiescence. Bloomsbury is Life on Thirty Shillings a week without the drama of starvation or the tragedy of the Embankment, but with all the ignominy ...
— Fortitude • Hugh Walpole
... don't think you are posing. It's getting on for dinner-time, and you've got that wan, sinking feeling that makes you look upon the world and find it a hollow fraud. The bugle will be blowing in a few minutes, and half an hour after that ...
— Piccadilly Jim • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
... the judgment of the King of kings," Cried the wan Prince; "and lo, the powers of Doorm Are scatter'd," and he pointed to the field, Where, huddled here and there on mound and knoll, Were men and women staring and aghast, While some yet fled; and then ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 5 • Charles Sylvester
... Consider, friends, the deep reproach— Harnessed to drag the gilded coach, To drag the plough, to trot the road, To groan beneath the pack-horse load! Whom do we serve?—a two-legged man, Of feeble frame, of visage wan. What! must our noble jaws submit To champ and foam their galling bit? He back and spur me? Let him first Control the lion—tiger's thirst: I here avow that I disdain His might, that I reject his reign. He freedom claims, and why ...
— Fables of John Gay - (Somewhat Altered) • John Gay
... must be very good and make no noise. There was little fear of that! I gazed in utter silence at the sweet face that was whiter than the sheet below it, the hair that shone brighter than ever in the candlelight. Only when I kissed her, and she had laid her wan hand on my head, I whispered to my father, "Why is mamma ...
— A Flat Iron for a Farthing - or Some Passages in the Life of an only Son • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... up a hand commanding silence and rolled out his Irish with gusto: "'Th' longer th' wurruld lasts th' more books does be comin' out. They's a publisher in ivry block an' in thousands iv happy homes some wan is plugging away at th' romantic novel or whalin' out a pome on th' typewriter upstairs. A fam'ly without an author is as contemptible as wan without a priest. Is Malachi near-sighted, peevish, averse to th' suds, an' can't tell whether ...
— In the Mist of the Mountains • Ethel Turner
... that they heard a groaning, as of dead men, a very great groaning. They thought, also, they did hear words of lamentation spoken, as of some in extreme torment. These things made the boys to quake, the women also looked pale and wan; but their guide bid them be ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... that very morning, with this motto:—And is not Johnson ours, himself a host? Under which stared you in the face—From Miss More's "Sensibility." This little incident amused us; but, alas! Johnson looks very ill indeed—spiritless and wan. However, he made an effort to be cheerful.' Miss Adams wrote on June 14, 1782:—'On Wednesday we had here a delightful blue-stocking party. Dr. and Mrs. Kennicott and Miss More, Dr. Johnson, Mr. Henderson, &c., dined here. Poor Dr. Johnson is in very bad health, but he exerted himself ...
— Life Of Johnson, Volume 4 (of 6) • Boswell
... said Terence, "was as beautiful as ye'd find in a day's thravel, an' 'twas herself that'd dhrive men crazy afther wan look at her. An' she was good to the poor, but divii a bit av love did she have for a redcoat. Whin she'd take human form an' a bowld buck av a British dragoon would come making love to her, 'tis herself would say to him: ...
— Cappy Ricks Retires • Peter B. Kyne
... months afterwards seemed doubtful, there were only broken revelations of the laborious hours renewed, and the white nights when he had seen the moonlight fade and the gaslight grow wan at the approach ...
— The Hill of Dreams • Arthur Machen
... years of age he was made professor of natural philosophy at the University of Glasgow. Though young, he proved entirely successful, and wan immensely popular with his students. At that time the university had no experimental laboratory, and Professor Thomson and his pupils performed their experiments in the professor's room and in an abandoned coal-cellar, slowly developing a laboratory ...
— Masters of Space - Morse, Thompson, Bell, Marconi, Carty • Walter Kellogg Towers
... Not the sign of a hope was nigh, In the sea, in the air, or the sky; And the lifted faces were wan and white, There was nothing without them but storm and night And nothing within but fear. But far to a Father's ear: Lost! Lost! Lost! Floated the ...
— Poems: Patriotic, Religious, Miscellaneous • Abram J. Ryan, (Father Ryan)
... Brunow came in and shook hands with at least a score of the men assembled. The light was anything but clear, and I could not be quite certain of his aspect; but to me he wore a troubled and harassed look, and I thought I had never seen him so pale and wan. He talked loudly and excitedly; and little as I understood the language with which he was so familiar, I made out enough to tell me that he was exulting in the news that day had brought us, and was prophesying success for the Italian cause. ...
— In Direst Peril • David Christie Murray
... reached me, O auspicious King, that when Gharib asked news of Fakhr Taj, Rustam informed him that she had been drowned in the river by her sire's command. And when Gharib heard this, the world waxed wan before his eyes and he cried, "By the virtue of Abraham the Friend, I will assuredly go to yonder dog and overwhelm him and lay waste his realm!" Then he sent letters to Jamrkan and to the governors of Mosul and Mayyafarikin; and, turning to Rustam, ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 7 • Richard F. Burton
... to be moving except the Thames, whose embanked waters flowed on sullenly in their eternal act of escape to the sea. All along the wan stretch of Cheyne Walk the thin trees stood exanimate, with not a breath of wind to stir the snow that pied their soot-blackened branches. Here and there on the muffled ground lay a sparrow that had been ...
— A Christmas Garland • Max Beerbohm
... and pellucid as a sapphire, were still cool, but from the lower slope down the east a radiance began to crawl upward. The peaks of the Libyan desert grew wan. ...
— The Yoke - A Romance of the Days when the Lord Redeemed the Children - of Israel from the Bondage of Egypt • Elizabeth Miller
... lay stretched on the ground. He looked bloodless and wan, the grizzled beard not able to hide the thinness of his face. The healthful vigor he had found on the prairie had left him, each day's march claiming a dole from his hoarded store of strength. He knew—no one else—that he ...
— The Emigrant Trail • Geraldine Bonner
... otherwise, meantime, Employ'd, into the wine of which they drank A drug infused, antidote to the pains Of grief and anger, a most potent charm For ills of ev'ry name. Whoe'er his wine So medicated drinks, he shall not pour 280 All day the tears down his wan cheek, although His father and his mother both were dead, Nor even though his brother or his son Had fall'n in battle, and before his eyes. Such drugs Jove's daughter own'd, with skill prepar'd, And of ...
— The Odyssey of Homer • Homer
... eye, and almost oppressed brow. Mary thought it would be hard to define where was that difference. It was not want of bloom, for of that Laura had more than any of the others, fresh, healthy, and bright, while Amy was always rather pale, and Lady Eveleen was positively wan and faded by London and late hours; nor was it loss of animation, for Laura talked and laughed with interest and eagerness; nor was it thought, for little Amy, when at rest, wore a meditative, pensive countenance; but there was something either added or taken away, which made it ...
— The Heir of Redclyffe • Charlotte M. Yonge
... white. What could I do? I talked with her, as I saw she wished; her grey eyes had dark circles round them and a strange kind of dark light in them; her cheeks were flushed, but her lips were white and wan. I wondered that others did not read these signs as clearly as I did. But perhaps they did; I think, from what came afterwards, the minister did. Poor cousin Holman! she worshipped her husband; and the outward signs of his uneasiness were more patent to her simple heart than were her ...
— Cousin Phillis • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... could prevail upon it to do was to hold hard and fast by a chair, or by Robin's fist, and gaze across the great gulf which separated her from Meg and the piece of bread and treacle stretched out temptingly towards her. It was a wan, sickly baby with an old face, closely resembling Meg's own, and meagre limbs, which looked as though they would never gain strength enough to bear the weight of the puny body; but from time to time a smile kindled suddenly upon the thin face, and shone out of the serious ...
— Little Meg's Children • Hesba Stretton
... pale and wan fond Lover? Prithee, prithee, Prithee why so pale: Will, when looking well can't move her, Looking Ill, looking ill prevail? Why so dull and mute young Sinner? Prithee, prithee why so mute; Will, ...
— Wit and Mirth: or Pills to Purge Melancholy, Vol. 5 of 6 • Various
... He smiled a wan sort of smile through a grimy, unshaven mask, as he looked into the sweet face above him. Then he closed his eyes again, as if he ...
— The Spoilers of the Valley • Robert Watson
... though still on the flood, as I desired; and each visible tuft of marsh-grass might, but for its motionlessness, have been a prowling boat. Dark as the night had appeared, the water was pale, smooth, and phosphorescent, and I remember that the phrase "wan water," so familiar in the Scottish ballards, struck me just then as peculiarly appropriate, though its real meaning is quite different. A gentle breeze, from which I had hoped for a ripple, had utterly died away, and it was a warm, breathless Southern night. There was no sound but the ...
— Army Life in a Black Regiment • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... Szechwan, had mixed extensively with remains of the Yueeh-chih; the others, the Ch'iang, were northern Tibetans or so-called Tanguts; that is to say, they contained Turkish and Mongol elements. In A.D. 296 there began a great rising of the Ti, whose leader Ch'i Wan-nien took on the title emperor. The Ch'iang rose with them, but it was not until later, from 312, that they pursued an independent policy. The Ti State, however, though it had a second emperor, very soon lost importance, so ...
— A history of China., [3d ed. rev. and enl.] • Wolfram Eberhard
... her, I could not tear myself away from such a sorrowful object of contemplation. She was no longer the little pink and white child I had seen in the Champs-Elysees; she had grown taller and thinner, and her face was wan as a waxen taper. Her languid eyes were encircled with blue rings. And her temples . . . what invisible hand had laid those two sad violets upon ...
— Marguerite - 1921 • Anatole France
... glanced at her in dismay. She looked very wan and fragile sitting there; whatever the truth, he could not but ...
— The End of Her Honeymoon • Marie Belloc Lowndes
... pointing his long ears toward the direction of the sound; "Wan! that is the work of cruel Double-Face. Shameless coward! he delights in torturing ...
— Old Indian Legends • Zitkala-Sa
... arms moving with unexpected power, and only the hunter himself could tire her out. As for him, he was not happy unless he was working, and at times he made the screw spin again under his fierce strokes, whenever his eyes fell on the wan faces of his young companions stewing in the insufferable heat. He shortened the journey by twenty-four hours, for on the afternoon of the fourth day the woman, for the first time, ...
— In Search of the Okapi - A Story of Adventure in Central Africa • Ernest Glanville
... of Guadalquiver, Glowing, waving as they hung Mid fragrant blossoms ever young, In gardens of romantic Spain,— Lovely land, and rich in vain! Blest by nature's bounteous hand, Cursed with priests and Ferdinand! Lemons, pale as Melancholy, Or yellow russets, wan and holy. Be their number twice fifteen, Mystic number, well I ween, As all must know, who aught can tell Of sacred lore or glamour spell; Strip them of their gaudy hides, Saffron garb of Pagan brides, And like the Argonauts of Greece, Treasure ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 12, - Issue 323, July 19, 1828 • Various
... eyes. What was the use of denying to himself that he loved her? If he had not known it before, the past half-hour had made it clear to him. With those wan shadows below her long eye-lashes and that charming manner of shy dependence upon him, she was infinitely more attractive to him than she ...
— The Sheriff's Son • William MacLeod Raine
... sat gazing at a jovial party seated round a mahogany table, with some crackers and cheese, and wine and cigars. Their faces were flushed with the good dinner they had eaten; and mine felt pale and wan with a long fast. If I had presumed to offer to make one of their party; if I had told them of my circumstances, and solicited something to refresh me, I very well knew from the peculiar hollow ring of their laughter, they would have had the waiters ...
— Redburn. His First Voyage • Herman Melville
... substance, or else a tremulous shadow cast upon the deck by some unseen being's body. And that shadow was always hovering there. For not by night, even, had Fedallah ever certainly been known to slumber, or go below. He would stand still for hours: but never sat or leaned; his wan but wondrous eyes did plainly say—We ...
— Moby Dick; or The Whale • Herman Melville
... seem to have passed over black torrents and desolate moorlands, through pallid sunlight and grim primeval forests, and become drenched with them. The instrumentation is all wet grays and blacks, relieved only by bits of brightness wan and elusive as the northern summer, frostily green as the polar lights. The works are full of the gnawing of bassoons and the bleakness of the English horn, full of shattering trombones and screaming violins, full of the sinister rolling of drums, the menacing reverberation of cymbals, the icy ...
— Musical Portraits - Interpretations of Twenty Modern Composers • Paul Rosenfeld
... They were steadily drifting back to the commonplace. Whilst she stitched together some muslin strips he knocked the head off a bottle of brandy. They each drank a small quantity, and the generous spirit brought color to their wan cheeks. The sailor showed Iris how to fasten a bandage by twisting the muslin round the upper part of his boot. For the first time she saw the ...
— The Wings of the Morning • Louis Tracy
... up and down with a glance of contempt that would have withered another man, poor, wan, haggard little maid of all work ...
— The Fortune Hunter • Louis Joseph Vance
... the discomforts of the month he had been forced to spend in Melbourne getting his slender outfit together; the miseries of the tramp to Ballarat on delicate unused feet, among the riff-raff of nations, under a wan December sky, against which the trunks of the gum-trees rose whiter still, and out of which blazed a copper sun with a misty rim. He scamped, too, his six-months' attempt at digging—he had been no more fit for the work than a child. Worn to skin ...
— Australia Felix • Henry Handel Richardson
... hast been blowing leaves, O wind of strife, Wan, curled, boat-like leaves, that ran and fled; Unresting yet, though folded up from life; Sleepless, though cast among the unwaking dead! Out to the ocean fleet and float; Blow, ...
— The Poetical Works of George MacDonald in Two Volumes, Volume I • George MacDonald
... form: none conventional short form: Taiwan local short form: T'ai-wan local long ...
— The 2004 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency
... if he doesn't,' replied her father, with a wan smile. 'Now, run away, my love, I am busy. To-morrow we shall settle the question ...
— The Bishop's Secret • Fergus Hume
... mind of a story," came from Shadow. "An old Irishman was dying and wanted to make his will. 'How do ye want to lave yer money, Pat' asked his friend. 'Sure,' says Pat; 'I want to lave it all to me woif an' me four childer, equal loike, so ivery wan gits a quarter!'" ...
— Dave Porter and His Rivals - or, The Chums and Foes of Oak Hall • Edward Stratemeyer
... wise man but as an honest man, he had better let the young lady alone. She is well as she is, and he sees around him so many who have tried the chances of marriage and who are not well! Look at Jones with his wan, worn wife and his five children, Jones who is not yet thirty, of whom he happens to know that the wretched man cannot look his doctor in the face, and that the doctor is as necessary to the man's house as is the butcher! What heart can Jones have for his work with such a burden as this ...
— He Knew He Was Right • Anthony Trollope
... Violet comes into the room, so wan and changed that yesterday seems a month ago. It is a scene of heart-breaking pathos at first, but she nerves herself and summons all her fortitude. It must be so, if she ...
— Floyd Grandon's Honor • Amanda Minnie Douglas
... narrow arched window of the room where Alwyn lay, still wrapped in that profound repose, so like the last long sleep from which some of our modern scientists tell us there can be no awakening. His condition was unchanged,—the wan beams of the early clay falling cross his features intensified their waxen stillness and pallor,—the awful majesty of death was on him,—the pathetic helplessness and perishableness of Body without Spirit. Presently the monastery bell began to ring ...
— Ardath - The Story of a Dead Self • Marie Corelli
... commiseration. The sound must have been heard by those who were huddled around the miserable fire, for they scrambled to their knees. As the tiny blaze sprang up just then, it showed the scouts the four Stanhope boys looking pinched and wan, with their eyes staring the wonder they must have felt at ...
— The Banner Boy Scouts Snowbound - A Tour on Skates and Iceboats • George A. Warren
... away; before many minutes were over Leah's wan face brightened a little, and her eyes lost their ...
— Herb of Grace • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... calk up every chink in the bunk house, fill the air-tight stove full of pitch pine and set down with a good book by Elinor Glyn. They never been at all mad about romping out in the keen frosty air that sets the blood tingling and brings back the roses to their wan cheeks. ...
— Ma Pettengill • Harry Leon Wilson
... was coming on fast, for the twilight which had followed the disappearance of the sun was brief; but as the evening passed away, the moon which had looked pale and wan began to grow more and more silvery, till it was dazzling in the pure bright air, casting the riders' shadows on the rustling grass and ...
— The Peril Finders • George Manville Fenn
... a dear good child," quavered Mrs. Gray. Under the white glow of the electric lamp, her Dresden-shepherdess face looked pinched and wan. Fear and uncertainty had robbed her small features of that look of perennial youth which so individualized her. "It was thoughtful in you to telegraph me that you were coming. I knew then that you hadn't heard from Tom, but I knew, too, that ...
— Grace Harlowe's Golden Summer • Jessie Graham Flower
... a wan smile, Angel stood; and with joy, wordless because unspeakable, they fell almost like dead things into each other's arms. For an hour they sat thus, and never spoke a word, only stroking each other's hands and hair. It was ...
— Young Lives • Richard Le Gallienne
... rushing stream, With the wan moon overhead, There stood, as in an awful dream, The ...
— Initial Studies in American Letters • Henry A. Beers
... prepared and ate his supper. This done, ending the work of that day, he sat down and filled his pipe. Twilight had waned into dusk. A few wan stars had just begun to show and brighten. Above the low continuous hum of insects sounded the evening carol of robins. Presently the birds ceased their singing, and then the quiet was more noticeable. When night set in and the place ...
— The Lone Star Ranger • Zane Grey
... that you had come a few years earlier into the life of Sanchia Murray!' She sighed and squeezed his hands. Then she smiled a wan little smile. 'You have come to mean so much, oh, so much, in ...
— The Desert Valley • Jackson Gregory
... her! What a fortunate thing that she had the money and could give it back to him! But she suppressed her agitation and said "Thank you" herself as she shoved the bill over toward him. When she saw him reach for his pen again, she said with a wan smile: ...
— Shallow Soil • Knut Hamsun
... disappeared. And strange! short as had been the interval of time, he was altered, and it seemed as though years had rolled over him, writing on him in an instant the wrinkles of old age. For he looked like an incarnation of dejection, worn and wan, with eyes that were red and hollow, as if sleep had fled away from them, ousted by her jealous rivals, sorrow and her sister care. And as he saw the sun just on the very point of going down, he murmured to himself: He is but showing me the way, and now very soon, I shall follow his ...
— Bubbles of the Foam • Unknown
... as much of a case for her, in proportion, as her own made out for himself. She affected him as almost insolently young; but an easily carried five-and-thirty could still do that. She was, however, like himself marked and wan; only it naturally couldn't have been known to him how much a spectator looking from one to the other might have discerned that they had in common. It wouldn't for such a spectator have been altogether insupposable that, each so finely ...
— The Ambassadors • Henry James
... toward the house presently, he thought of Norah's unwonted pallor. Poor child, the heat seemed to be trying her more than anybody. And he thought of how wan and limp and sad she looked early this morning, when he had again sent her out of his office and flatly refused to let her do any more writing or tidying for him. Even her red lips had gone pale; she dropped her head; her white eyelids and black lashes fluttered as she looked up at him piteously, ...
— The Devil's Garden • W. B. Maxwell
... had laid a red-hot iron on her palm, it would scarcely have been more scorching than the touch of his gold, and only the vision of a wan and woeful face in that far off cheerless attic room, restrained her impulse to ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... for your kindness. You are the first friend I have seen this many a year," said the poor woman, while hot tears trickled down her wan cheeks. ...
— Aunt Amy - or, How Minnie Brown learned to be a Sunbeam • Francis Forrester
... met Dawn he was greatly dejected. She thought he appeared too old and wan for one of his years. The brow on which the light of hope and life should repose, was indeed wrinkled, and furrowed with unrest because the spirit was ill at ease. There was a claim upon him, a voice calling for retribution, which through the very law of ...
— Dawn • Mrs. Harriet A. Adams
... of the Mean and the Great Learning were preserved. No text of these Books was given, and Hsi-ho tells us that in the reign of Chia- ching [1], the most flourishing period of the Ming dynasty (A.D. 1522-1566), when Wang Wan-ch'ang [2] published a copy of the Great Learning, taken from the T'ang edition of the Thirteen Ching, all the officers and scholars looked at one another in astonishment, and were inclined to supposed that the Work ...
— THE CHINESE CLASSICS (PROLEGOMENA) • James Legge
... received were not capable of lessening the anguish of his mind, which kept his body so weak, that tho' youth and an excellent constitution threw off the fever in a short time, yet he was unable to quit his chamber in near three weeks, and when he did, appeared so wan and so dejected, that he seemed no more than the shadow of the ...
— The Fortunate Foundlings • Eliza Fowler Haywood
... and, after the funeral, moved to Mrs. Frost's house. But, though not actually ill, she was incapable of exertion, could not walk up stairs without fatigue; and after writing a letter, or looking over papers, Aunt Catharine would find her leaning back, so wan and exhausted, that she could not resist being laid down to ...
— Dynevor Terrace (Vol. I) - or, The Clue of Life • Charlotte M. Yonge
... to loathe all sustenance; her cheeks grew wan, her bright eyes lost their splendour, the roses vanished from her lips, and her delicate limbs could hardly support their burden; in a word, her sole consolation was limited to the prospect of depositing her sorrows in the grave; and her only wish was to procure a retreat ...
— The Adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom, Complete • Tobias Smollett
... and droll as ever, with a wan face as eloquent of grief as any face I ever saw; he had it in his head that the right eye would go the same way as the left. He could no longer see the satellites of Jupiter with it: hardly Jupiter itself, except as a luminous blur; indeed, it was getting quite near-sighted, ...
— The Martian • George Du Maurier
... foine wan,' Murty says," responded his father; "since it's Irish: Garryowen, unless you'd like to ...
— Mates at Billabong • Mary Grant Bruce
... Theresa Zapp quarreling with her mother, but he said nothing. He gathered the driest bits of thatch and wood he could find in the litter on the stable floor and kindled a fire, while she sat sullenly glaring at him, her face wrinkled and tired in the wan firelight. When the blaze was going steadily, a compact and safe little fire, he spread his coat as a seat for her, and called, cheerily, "Come on now, honey; here's a regular ...
— Our Mr. Wrenn - The Romantic Adventures of a Gentle Man • Sinclair Lewis
... forth through door, looks at them with an expression of cynical amusement. His gaze wan-ders, and he sees the documents, within arm's reach, on top of bookcase. He picks up documents, holds them to the light of stage to glance at them, and, with triumphant expression on face, ...
— Theft - A Play In Four Acts • Jack London
... outward change which was thus made in the circumstances of the exiled queen, she was very unhappy. As the excitement of her danger and her efforts to escape it passed away, her spirits sunk, her beauty faded, and her countenance assumed the wan and haggard expression of despair. She mourned over the ruin of her husband's hopes, and her separation from him and from her children, with perpetual tears. She called to mind continually the ...
— History of King Charles II of England • Jacob Abbott
... greatest generals. In 227 A.D., Meng Ta, governor of Hsin-ch'eng under the Wei Emperor Wen Ti, was meditating defection to the House of Shu, and had entered into correspondence with Chu-ko Liang, Prime Minister of that State. The Wei general Ssu-ma I was then military governor of Wan, and getting wind of Meng Ta's treachery, he at once set off with an army to anticipate his revolt, having previously cajoled him by a specious message of friendly import. Ssu-ma's officers came to him and said: "If Meng ...
— The Art of War • Sun Tzu
... was a bedrock confidence that there was, there must be somehow in the essence of things, an eternal rightness which would keep me safe from Captain Magnus. And as I looked across at Dugald Shaw and met for an instant his steady watchful eyes, I managed a swift little smile—a rather wan smile, I dare ...
— Spanish Doubloons • Camilla Kenyon
... "Big difference," he said. "Cheditafa don' like boy for boss. He wan' me tell you, if boy is boss, he don' wan' stay. He wan' go ...
— The Adventures of Captain Horn • Frank Richard Stockton |
