"Disappointing" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... unfrequently so in other instances, as is well remembered. It will be necessary, in the subsequent pages of this work, to omit the narratives of a great many who, unfortunately, were but briefly noted on the books at the time of their arrival. In the eyes of some, this may prove disappointing, especially in instances where these pages are turned to with the hope of gaining a clue to certain lost ones. As all, however, cannot be mentioned, and as the general reader will look for incidents and facts which will most fittingly bring out the chief characteristics in the career ...
— The Underground Railroad • William Still
... of such a thing. We will receive him with true kindness, because we feel it towards the good old man. But we must not cease to do what we know to be right, thus disappointing and marring the pleasure of many, out of deference to a mere prejudice of education in a single person. When we go to see him, we do not expect that any change will be made out of deference to our prejudices or peculiar opinions; and when he comes to see us, ...
— Home Scenes, and Home Influence - A Series of Tales and Sketches • T. S. Arthur
... had been somewhat cold and formal, for he could not forget how harshly she had expressed herself regarding his choice, while she could not and would not forgive him for disappointing all her ambitious ...
— Virgie's Inheritance • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... line of corpses on an upper deck, waiting the dawning hour and the parting words of the padre to plunge with firebars at their feet into the blue Mediterranean. Of what had finally happened on those Gallipoli heights no one could say definitely, and there were disappointing and unsatisfactory rumours. About noon one day the vessel passed much wreckage of shattered boats, oars, sun helmets, lifebelts and so on, and cruised about for some time looking for survivors, but found none. It was the scene of the foundering a few hours earlier of the Royal Edward ...
— The Tale of a Trooper • Clutha N. Mackenzie
... specimens of textile fabrics found at Awatobi was small, and their character disappointing for study, for the conditions of burial in the soil are not so good for their preservation as in the dry caves or cliff houses, from which beautifully preserved cloth, made at a contemporary period, ...
— Archeological Expedition to Arizona in 1895 • Jesse Walter Fewkes
... woolsack. The lad's diffidence and extreme youth had indeed prevented him from forming the usual connections which his father anticipated as the result of a college life. His career as a barrister was short and grievously disappointing to the parental hopes. His father, like the Elder Fairford in Redgauntlet, had 'a cause or two at nurse' for the son. The son's first thought was to 'put them to death,' A brief was given to him in a suit, upon which L50 depended. He advised that the ...
— The English Utilitarians, Volume I. • Leslie Stephen
... began at last to attract attention. The rumor of it spread through the rooms, and the crowd about the roulette received a large contingent of spectators. Bernard felt that they were looking more or less eagerly for a turn of the tide; but he was in the humor for disappointing them, and he left the place, while his luck was still running high, with ten thousand francs in his pocket. It was very late when he returned to the inn—so late that he forbore to knock at Gordon's door. But though he betook himself to his own quarters, he was ...
— Confidence • Henry James
... an utterly disappointing evening; and, to make matters worse, Mr. Mayne actually lit his cigar and strolled down the garden-paths, keeping quite close to Nan, and showing such obvious intention of accompanying them to the very gate of ...
— Not Like Other Girls • Rosa N. Carey
... Medical examination of school children is now required in many states, but unless it is followed up by some one who will see the parents and encourage them to secure the necessary medical or dental treatment, the results of these examinations are often disappointing. ...
— The Farmer and His Community • Dwight Sanderson
... after herself. I can't do anything for her. I'm not supposed even to know about her. I daresay she'll find her consolations. I suppose you want to go out of London and get away from it all. I can help you there, perhaps. I'm tired of London too. It's been a tiresome season. Oh! tiresome and disappointing! I want to go over to Ireland and travel about a little. The Pothercareys want us to come. ...
— The Research Magnificent • H. G. Wells
... sea chest, and from under his belongings pulled out a second chest. Fitting a key to the lock, he lifted up the lid. Chris, perched on his shoulder, peered over to see the contents. They were disappointing—merely a gray powder carefully packed in a ...
— Mr. Wicker's Window • Carley Dawson
... disappointing not to get a letter—postcards meant nothing. He only exchanged a few words with Mrs. Horlock, and passed on to the General, who, at the corner of the Southdown Road where the gossipers met, was ...
— Spring Days • George Moore
... Grover's voice in the hall. He handed his card to the girl and inquired for the Frau Professorin. There was a council of war on the spot, and the Frau Professorin sent word that she was "not at home." Grover then asked permission to see "the young ladies." It was a very disappointing message; the plural number was especially disheartening. The sisters, however, were equal to the occasion. Minchen and Gretchen nobly declared that they were "out." Accordingly there was nothing to do, except for Roeschen to receive the visitor. She donned her white muslin, stuck ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 10 • Various
... River Tamar as far as One Tree Reach, and Mr. Brown resumed his botanical researches; his letters show that he made several excursions into the inland country in order to examine its flora, which, however, he found disappointing. He writes to Banks: "The whole number of plants observed in this port did not much exceed 300, of which about 40 were new to me and, I believe, nondescript. From Port Dalrymple we had a short ...
— The Logbooks of the Lady Nelson - With The Journal Of Her First Commander Lieutenant James Grant, R.N • Ida Lee
... the fundamental pattern. In prose, the writer works with greater freedom; and his problem is therefore at once more easy and more difficult. Instead of starting with a standard pattern, he has to invent a web of rhythm which is suited to the sense he wishes to convey; and then, without ever disappointing the ear of the reader by unnecessarily withholding an expected fall of rhythm, he must shatter every inkling of monotony by continual and ...
— A Manual of the Art of Fiction • Clayton Hamilton
... of the laboratory men, "we started on another series of record-breaking experiments that lasted over five years. I might almost say heart-breaking, too, for of all the elusive, disappointing things one ever hunted for that was the worst. But secrets have to be long-winded and roost high if they want to get away when the 'Old Man' goes hunting for them. He doesn't get mad when he misses them, ...
— Edison, His Life and Inventions • Frank Lewis Dyer and Thomas Commerford Martin
... over and above and beyond this, there was a more blessed fulfilment of the promise; there was "a city which had foundations"—built and made by God—toward which the anticipation of this Canaan was leading them. The Kingdom of God was forming in their souls, for ever disappointing them by the unreal, and teaching them that what is spiritual, and belongs to mind and character alone can ...
— Sermons Preached at Brighton - Third Series • Frederick W. Robertson
... of Egypt as it is approached from the sea is disappointing, for the low-lying delta is hardly raised at all above sea-level, and its monotony is only broken by an occasional hillock or the lofty minarets of the ...
— Peeps at Many Lands: Egypt • R. Talbot Kelly
... disappointing you. How many tears, did you waste, little Crocodile? Why, children, you're as welcome, all of you, as crocuses in spring. But no; it's you who should bid us welcome. I understand you are keeping house, and auntie ...
— Prudy Keeping House • Sophie May
... people shared her "special" seat: a fine old man in a velvet coat, his hands clasped over a huge carved walking-stick, and a big old woman, sitting upright, with a roll of knitting on her embroidered apron. They did not speak. This was disappointing, for Miss Brill always looked forward to the conversation. She had become really quite expert, she thought, at listening as though she didn't listen, at sitting in other people's lives just for a minute while they ...
— The Garden Party • Katherine Mansfield
... duties attaching to this office he continued to discharge with his accustomed diligence and skill until promoted in the autumn of 1821 to be a member of the Senate of Higher Appeal in the same court. Notwithstanding his sad and disappointing experiences, and the tempestuous times of his "martyr years" at Bamberg, he was not yet disgusted with the life of an artist. His hopes were not yet alienated from the calling that hovered before his mind as an ideal for so many years. ...
— Weird Tales, Vol. II. • E. T. A. Hoffmann
... travelled through New England. He excelled all the whites in popularity as a preacher; sharing with them in their public services, not only in Colored but also in white congregations. When they were sick or otherwise disabled they could trust the pulpit to Harry without fear of unfavorably disappointing the people. Mr. Asbury acknowledges that the best way to obtain a large congregation was to announce that Harry would preach. The multitude preferred him to the Bishop himself. Though he withstood for years the temptations ...
— History of the Negro Race in America from 1619 to 1880. Vol. 2 (of 2) - Negroes as Slaves, as Soldiers, and as Citizens • George Washington Williams
... gave 7 bushels per acre. Four bushels would probably be about an average yield. As the price is usually relatively high compared with other clovers, the seed from white clover would be quite remunerative were it not that in a dry season the yield is disappointing. In some instances two crops are grown in succession; in others, one crop is reaped. The land is then sown to barley the next year, and the following year clover seed may be reaped again without sowing a second time. Usually, after two successive crops of seed ...
— Clovers and How to Grow Them • Thomas Shaw
... reader familiar with the Iliad and Odyssey the Hymns must appear disappointing, if he come to them with an expectation of discovering merits like those of the immortal epics. He will not find that they stand to the Iliad as Milton's "Ode to the Nativity" stands to "Paradise Lost." There is in the Hymns, in fact, no scope for the epic knowledge of ...
— The Homeric Hymns - A New Prose Translation; and Essays, Literary and Mythological • Andrew Lang
... Since the disappointing trip to the opposite shore of the island Madge had not been well. The sunshine had faded. The cold autumn rains had begun. The food in the larder, supplied from the houseboat, had grown perilously low. It was hard work to spend many hours in hunting or in fishing in such ...
— Madge Morton's Secret • Amy D. V. Chalmers
... BAD child," her hostess said, quickly. "A disappointing child perhaps, or a strong-willed child, you mean. But no good mother—and that doesn't mean merely a good woman, or a church-going woman!—could possibly have a really bad child. 'By their fruits,' you know. And then of course we haven't a perfect system of nursery training yet; we expect ...
— The Rich Mrs. Burgoyne • Kathleen Norris
... Hanover that same evening, and arrived at Berlin in time for supper and an evening stroll. Berlin is a disappointing town; its centre over-crowded, its outlying parts lifeless; its one famous street, Unter den Linden, an attempt to combine Oxford Street with the Champs Elysee, singularly unimposing, being much too wide for its size; its theatres dainty and charming, ...
— Three Men on the Bummel • Jerome K. Jerome
... manner we would open negotiations with them by some means yet to be discussed, but, if in a heathen manner, then we should consider them as savages, cannibals, and no one knows what; and, hiding close, we should quietly endure our privations as best we could, until the ill-omened, disappointing black vessel should leave us once more to ...
— Yr Ynys Unyg - The Lonely Island • Julia de Winton
... great masses of scarlet and purple, and—mostly—of a waxy white, with something deathlike in their translucent beauty. There, also, he would wade into the swamps around a certain little creek, lured by a hope of the jack-in-the-pulpit, to find only the odorous and disappointing skunk-cabbage. And there the woods were full of the aroma of sassafras, and of birch tapped by the earliest woodpecker, whose drumming throbbed through the young man's deep and ...
— The Story of a New York House • Henry Cuyler Bunner
... a week in the great, gray, prison-like barracks at Tipperary. We looked about for the "sweetest girl" of the song—but the "colleens" were disappointing. My heart was not "right there." We moved to Limerick; and in Limerick we stopped for ...
— At Suvla Bay • John Hargrave
... churches, museums, and similar buildings were to have large white crosses marked upon their roofs. Both governments pledged themselves to respect these crosses. Much importance was attached to the idea at the time, but its effects were disappointing. The marks either were not readily perceivable from an aeroplane or the pilots did not trouble themselves too much about the crosses. ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume IV (of 8) • Francis J. (Francis Joseph) Reynolds, Allen L. (Allen Leon)
... publicity, caused Wilton's Wooing to be eagerly asked for. BROWZER'S book went into ten editions, and a large issue, at six shillings. Next year BROWZER'S publishers proved that he owed them L37 14s. 6d. This was disappointing, and even inexplicable, but BROWZER'S fortune was made, and now he is much lauded by ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 103, December 31, 1892 • Various
... the irreparable was once for all to turn back with him to its contemplation. As soon as this desire had germinated it became so strong in her that she regretted having promised Effie to take her out for the afternoon. But she could think of no pretext for disappointing the little girl, and soon after luncheon the three set forth in the motor to show Darrow a chateau famous in the annals of the region. During their excursion Anna found it impossible to guess from his demeanour if Effie's presence between them was as much of a strain ...
— The Reef • Edith Wharton
... It was disappointing that Kalliope would not discuss such an interesting affair; but Gillian was sensible of the danger of being so late as to cause questions, and she allowed herself to be hurried on too fast for conversation, ...
— Beechcroft at Rockstone • Charlotte M. Yonge
... over one's sins a great deal, and I could not feel sorry enough to cry as I wanted to. I used to keep praying, 'Give me a real repentance.' Many times I dreamed I had this deep repentance and could cry over my sins, and I have awakened with my face really bathed in tears, but oh, how disappointing it was to find it only a dream and I had not got what I wanted after all. I went on like this until I was twenty, when the Lord spoke these words with great power to my soul, 'The goodness of God ...
— The One Great Reality • Louisa Clayton
... evening that Superintendent Sutherland was almost rewarded for his vigilance by having something distinctly suspicious to report. As it happened, it proved a disappointing incident, but it gave the superintendent something to ...
— Simon • J. Storer Clouston
... costume had to be altered to fit you. If it can be found before the second act, all will be well, but suppose you go on in the first act, and it can't be found, what then? You will spoil the whole production by appearing in an incorrect or misfit costume, besides bitterly disappointing the two girls who will have to give up their costumes to you. It is doubly provoking, because Mr. Southard is here to-night, and is particularly anxious to see ...
— Grace Harlowe's Junior Year at High School - Or, Fast Friends in the Sororities • Jessie Graham Flower
... no Wagner since August, 1914, and was anxious to discover the effect that hearing it again would have upon him. The effect was disappointing. The music ...
— The Best British Short Stories of 1922 • Various
... him a great deal in the way of duty and love; but he owes me something for letting me have my own way all my life, bringing me up with the notion that I should be an heiress, and then disappointing me by marrying a woman whom I utterly despise. Lady Mary—I owe her nothing whatever, beyond the common proper treatment that one must give to every one; she, on the contrary, owes me compensation for marrying ...
— Gladys, the Reaper • Anne Beale
... Indian troops had regularly had their half rations of coffee. As soon as I was got rid of, an order from Gen. Hindman took all the remaining coffee, some 3,000 lbs., to Fort Smith. Even in this small matter, he could not forego an opportunity of injuring and disappointing them. ...
— The American Indian as Participant in the Civil War • Annie Heloise Abel
... bog. I keep my health wonderfully, thank God! in spite of heat, hard work and exposure; and the men bear up like Britons. We all feel that the Government ought to allow every officer and man before Delhi to count every month spent here as a year of service in India. There is much that is disappointing and disgusting to a man who feels that more might have been done, but I comfort myself with the thought that history will do justice to the constancy and fortitude of the handful of Englishmen who have for so many weeks—months, I may say—of desperate weather, amid the greatest toil and hardship, ...
— Boys' Book of Famous Soldiers • J. Walker McSpadden
... it was rather disappointing to me, so I've decided to take a long-needed sabbatical leave and combine it with a little research on the half-intelligent natives of Mendez. I'll see you in ...
— Dead Giveaway • Gordon Randall Garrett
... disappointing to find that the duties of his position kept him closely confined to the office, and that therefore he had not yet had the pleasure of meeting Tish's nephew, but he said he had no doubt they would meet ...
— More Tish • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... began, "only there isn't any end to it; it's all unfinished and disappointing. It's about this little Philip here, whose name you have—my brother. He died when he was five, as I said, but even then he had a bit of dramatic history in his life. He was born just before war-time in 1859, and he was a beautiful and wonderful baby; ...
— The Militants - Stories of Some Parsons, Soldiers, and Other Fighters in the World • Mary Raymond Shipman Andrews
... had been seriously damaged by the episode, for the reason that rumours of the performance on the Joy Wheel had impaired the spell of eloquence and partially emptied the hall. And this was the more disappointing in that the police had been sure that nothing untoward would occur. It seemed also that the police were on ...
— The Lion's Share • E. Arnold Bennett
... back, to see the peasant women plaiting their daughters' hair outside their houses, on the high-road, and doing their best to beautify it by unblushingly introducing long artificial tresses! This was rather disappointing to my day-dreams, as I had so much admired Nature's rich dark clustering head-dress on the heads of the handsome Italian ...
— Fair Italy, the Riviera and Monte Carlo • W. Cope Devereux
... her failures to get employment, making deliciously laughable stories out of disappointing and disheartening experiences, but it was only in incidental comments that she referred to things in the past which made him know that her life had once held in abundance those ...
— Destiny • Charles Neville Buck
... of the difficulty was rendered unnecessary. A compromise, as usual, afforded a convenient escape to all parties, without disappointing any; and by an ingenious re-distribution of three or four regiments (devised by His Majesty himself), Taylor was provided for elsewhere, and Nugent obtained his lieutenant-colonelcy. There was great ...
— Memoirs of the Court and Cabinets of George the Third, Volume 2 (of 2) - From the Original Family Documents • The Duke of Buckingham
... as we see it to-day, is disappointing. It has been so much rebuilt after different convulsions, and pulled about when there has been less excuse, that many a church in an obscure village gives more pleasure as a whole to the eye that seeks unity ...
— Wanderings by southern waters, eastern Aquitaine • Edward Harrison Barker
... discovered, a little crumpled looking man in an office. We were not allowed to interview him in private, but a Montenegrin was there and all conversation had to pass by him like through an imperfect telephone. We gave the mayor a greeting from Colonel P——and little else. A very disappointing interview. ...
— The Luck of Thirteen - Wanderings and Flight through Montenegro and Serbia • Jan Gordon
... Elizabeth was disappointing so far as wounds went. She had been so much in the public eye that one expected to find her badly battered, and she had suffered little, indeed, for the amount of sport she had had in tossing her fifteen-inch shells across the Gallipoli peninsula into the Turkish batteries ...
— My Year of the War • Frederick Palmer
... old I began to practice coitus inter femora on my brother and continued it intermittently for about two years. The experience was disappointing, for I had confidently expected a great increase of pleasure over masturbation in this act; and in casting about for some stronger stimulus I recurred to the forgotten idea of intercourse with animals. I promptly tried to put the idea to a test, but failed several ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 5 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... which one hears the most contradictory accounts. The mere traveller not uncommonly pronounces it "disappointing, uninteresting, less foreign than most Continental capitals,"—"everything to be seen at best second-rate France," etc., etc. The Museo, of course, must be admired,—even the most ignorant know that to contemn that is to write themselves ...
— Spanish Life in Town and Country • L. Higgin and Eugene E. Street
... our steam vessels all we could wish, somewhat o'er lively, mayhap,—a frisky tendency to break every breakable article on board. But there was a saucy swagger in them, as they bowled along the hollow of a western sea, which showed they had good blood in them; and we soon felt confident of disappointing those Polar seers, who had foretold shipwreck and disaster ...
— Stray Leaves from an Arctic Journal; • Sherard Osborn
... easily," Priscilla returned, "and I'm like a plant we have in my old home. My roots spread, and time is needed to strengthen them; suddenly I shoot up and—flower. The little Canadian blossom doesn't seem to justify the strong, spreading roots. I hope you will not find me disappointing, Margaret." ...
— The Place Beyond the Winds • Harriet T. Comstock
... Alla ad Deen was thunder-struck. Any other man would have sunk under the shock; but a sudden hope of disappointing his rival soon roused his spirits, and he bethought himself of the lamp, which had on every emergence been so useful to him; and without venting his rage in empty words against the sultan, the vizier, or his son, he only said, "Perhaps, mother, the vizier's son may not be so happy ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments vol. 3 • Anon.
... like Grant" was miles away before this was realized, and when the procession started on his track he was safely out of reach. Doubtless, the sight of this unpretentious man in citizen attire was disappointing to many who expected to see a dashing hero in a gorgeous uniform, but his dislike of all military parade soon came to be widely known. His hosts at one village, however, were not well informed of this, for they urged him to prolong his stay with them in ...
— On the Trail of Grant and Lee • Frederick Trevor Hill
... at his lengthy vigil, elicited the information, so much desired and yet so disappointing, that a grande dame, for surely she must be such to have so many servants, had honoured the humble hotel across the way by her presence for a brief twenty-four hours and only that morning had taken ...
— High Noon - A New Sequel to 'Three Weeks' by Elinor Glyn • Anonymous
... him for an instant that the reality was disappointing, that this was not all as he had dreamed it would be, but pride bade him conceal his ...
— Old Rose and Silver • Myrtle Reed
... one of your own works marks a real advance, and a permanent occupation of new ground. But you know also how small a strip has as yet been explored of the vast continent of Sanskrit literature, and how much still remains terra incognita. No doubt this exploring work is troublesome, and often disappointing, but young students must learn the truth of a remark lately made by a distinguished member of the Indian Civil Service, whose death we all deplore, Dr. Burnell, "that no trouble is thrown away which saves trouble to others." We want men who will work hard, even at the risk of seeing ...
— India: What can it teach us? - A Course of Lectures Delivered before the University Of Cambridge • F. Max Mueller
... Himalayas are at first extremely disappointing. The scenery is enormous but not grand, and at first hardly seems large. The lower parts are at first sight a series of gently undulating hills and wooded dells; in some places it looks as if one might almost hunt the country. It is long ...
— Mr. Isaacs • F. Marion Crawford
... penetrating. 'The paces of Statius are those of the manege, not of nature';[545] he loses himself in the trammels of his art. He lacks, as a rule, the large imagination of the poet; and though his detail may often please, the whole is tedious and disappointing. Merivale sums him up admirably:[546] 'Statius is a miniature painter employed on the production of a great historic picture: every part, every line, every shade is touched and retouched; approach the canvas and examine it with glasses, every thread and hair has ...
— Post-Augustan Poetry - From Seneca to Juvenal • H.E. Butler
... There will be many lying in the no-man's land between vice and virtue who will need to be rescued at great risk. There will be many forlorn hopes to be led against disease, the foster child of vice, that has gained strength under the cover of war. The disappointing days of peace will give an opportunity for the development of Christian qualities fully as great as the bracing days of battle. Teachers will need to gird up their loins for the task of giving a wise ...
— Cambridge Essays on Education • Various
... which way he was after comin', as likely as not he'd talk about nothin' on'y the sorts of clouds he'd been watchin' goin' by over his head; and 'twould take a cliver body to tell from that what road he might ha' had under his feet." This incommunicativeness made him a disappointing guest sometimes by the firesides, where he was finding a night's lodging; though he might eke out his conversation with a little twangling on his fiddle, in which the melody would be quite as vague as his narratives. ...
— Strangers at Lisconnel • Barlow Jane
... Disappointing the address must have been to those who had expected a declaration of specific policy. Yet the historian, wiser by the march of events, may read between the lines. When Jefferson said that he desired a wise and frugal government—a government "which should ...
— Jefferson and his Colleagues - A Chronicle of the Virginia Dynasty, Volume 15 In The - Chronicles Of America Series • Allen Johnson
... an eagerly-expected event is not disappointing in some detail of its fulfilment, but there was not a shade upon the happiness on this occasion. Barbara and Miss Britton arrived at the right time, with their luggage; the archway remained firm until ...
— Barbara in Brittany • E. A. Gillie
... These were, however, rather disappointing. Mysie had not a genius for correspondence, and dealt in very bare facts. There was an enclosure which made ...
— The Two Sides of the Shield • Charlotte M. Yonge
... Phil answered, "only I've promised to have another dance with Miss Pederstone, and I couldn't possibly think of disappointing myself in the matter. Give me a line on where you'll be, and I'll come along and join you as soon as that particular dance is over. Won't you stick around till then, and we ...
— The Spoilers of the Valley • Robert Watson
... I would perish in the struggle to be up to time, rather than be such a caitiff. I would do the journey on foot, like Jeannie Deans, rather than incur the odium of disappointing so fair ...
— The Lovels of Arden • M. E. Braddon
... Columbia Lake. A portage of about a mile and a half brought him to another large river, which flowed southward. This stream—the Kootenay—led him south into the country of the Flatheads, then made a great bend and swept to the north. This was disappointing. Thompson returned to his fort on Windermere Lake, packed the furs his men had gathered, and retraced his trail of the previous year to Rocky Mountain House. He had undoubtedly found the River {106} of the West, but he had learned nothing of ...
— Pioneers of the Pacific Coast - A Chronicle of Sea Rovers and Fur Hunters • Agnes C. Laut
... more curiosity about the Sphinx than about the pyramids, and here the reality is not disappointing. An impressive figure is this of a recumbent stone lion one hundred and eighty-seven feet long and sixty-six feet high, with a man's head that is full of power and pride. The nose is gone and the face is badly scarred, but here ...
— The Critic in the Orient • George Hamlin Fitch
... waguk, and any needless decrease in the value of an estate is punished by breaking the offender's legs. Expenditures for luxuries and high living are, of course, approved, for it is universally known among us, and attested by many popular proverbs, that the pleasures of the rich are vain and disappointing. So they are considered a part of the punishment, and not only allowed but required. A man sentenced to wealth who lives frugally, indulging in only rational and inexpensive delights, has his ears cut off for the first offense, and for the second is compelled to pass six months ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce • Ambrose Bierce
... hatred of the co-operative societies and the co-operators by bitter and almost vicious attacks upon them. One of them complains: "Instances of successful co-operation in production have, as yet, been very few, and their moral results disappointing. Their general tendency has been, not to raise the workers as a class, but to raise a certain number of prudent—I had almost said selfish—workmen out of their class, and so to constitute a Labour Caste. Such co-operators ...
— British Socialism - An Examination of Its Doctrines, Policy, Aims and Practical Proposals • J. Ellis Barker
... books and four magazines, with superlatively good-looking, well-groomed young men and divinely lovely girls for the heroes and heroines. The story I was most interested in had a hero like Mr. Brett; but it was disappointing in the end, because he married a short plump girl with black eyes, and somehow it spoiled the realism, as I couldn't fancy he would really have cared so dreadfully for a girl like that. Anyway, it put me out of the mood for ...
— Lady Betty Across the Water • Charles Norris Williamson and Alice Muriel Williamson
... back of a fast-retreating man in a Balmacaan coat of Scotch tweed and a round, plush hat, turning the corner to Madison Avenue. Patsy groaned inwardly when she saw the outlines of the figure; they were so conventional, so disappointing; they lacked simplicity and directness—two salient life ...
— Seven Miles to Arden • Ruth Sawyer
... angelic for a whole day, and the next morning is so crotchety and aggravating that it nearly drives one wild. I suppose no one gets patient and long-suffering all at once; it is like convalescence after an illness—up and down, up and down, all the time; but it's disappointing to the nurses. She does try, poor dear, but it must be difficult to go on trying when one day is exactly like the last, and you do nothing but lie still, and your back aches, aches, aches. Jim is not always present to lavish his devotion upon her, and now that ...
— The Heart of Una Sackville • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... land dropped gently to scarcely more than half its depth, with barely a tree visible on its surface; and at the foot of the hill, stretched out as far as the eye could reach, was a howling, blank-looking desert, all hot and arid, and very wretched to look upon. It was the more disappointing, as the Somali had pictured this to me as a land of promise, literally flowing with milk and honey, where, they said, I should see boundless prairies of grass, large roomy trees, beautiful valleys with ...
— What Led To The Discovery of the Source Of The Nile • John Hanning Speke
... be dreadful, you know," Emily said to the two when they came into her tent and began to ask questions, "if a big boy should get a small wooden horse, or a little baby should be given a cricket bat and ball. Then it would be so disappointing if a tiny girl got a work-box and a big one got a doll. One has to get things in order. They look forward to this so, and it's heart-breaking to a child to ...
— Emily Fox-Seton - Being The Making of a Marchioness and The Methods of Lady Walderhurst • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... they were anchored, little except the spires of the churches and the roofs of a few of the more lofty houses could be seen. After the magnificent harbour of Rio, this flat, uninteresting coast was most disappointing. ...
— Out on the Pampas - The Young Settlers • G. A. Henty
... what evil influence is at work among the men," said Hartog to me one evening, when we sat together alone in the cabin, for Van Luck, except at meals, seldom joined us. "As sailors, they ought to know that treasure hunts often prove disappointing, and they will each receive a good round sum in back pay when the crew is disbanded after the voyage. What, then, would they gain by mutiny? Without a navigator they would either lose the ship, or, if they succeeded in making a port, they would become food for the ...
— Adventures in Southern Seas - A Tale of the Sixteenth Century • George Forbes
... Froud and his fixed idea of never disappointing ship owners or ship-captains, it was not likely that I should fail him in his ambition—to satisfy at a few hours' notice the unusual demand for a French-speaking officer. He explained to me that the ship was chartered by a French company intending to establish ...
— A Personal Record • Joseph Conrad
... the cover. I was constantly asked what news from Grant, for from the moment of our arrival in the Yazoo we were in expectation of either hearing his guns in the rear, or of having communication with him. This encouraged the men greatly, but the long waiting was disappointing, as the enemy was evidently in large force in the plenty of works, and a very strong position. Careful estimates and available information placed their force at fifteen to twenty thousand men. I returned to headquarters about the middle of the ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan
... than a quarter of an hour, came down to the spot where we met them yesterday, and began to wave and call to us. An opportunity now offered of punishing these wretches for their treacherous conduct, and of disappointing them in their present plans, for they were evidently intent upon some mischief. Mr. Bedwell was therefore despatched to secure their catamaran, which was hauled up on a sandy beach near the outer point, whilst another boat was sent towards the natives: ...
— Narrative of a Survey of the Intertropical and Western Coasts of Australia] [Volume 2 of 2] • Phillip Parker King
... Seminary, on the first Sunday in October, 1791. The Seminary still occupies the same site, at the corner of Paca and St. Mary's Streets. The number of the candidates for the priesthood, who entered the Seminary, was disappointing from its smallness and, in order to procure clerics, an Academy was opened in the rooms of the Seminary, on August 20, 1799. This was presided over by Rev. Wm. Du Bourg, and proved so successful, as to demand a separate building. Accordingly, the corner-stone of St. Mary's College was laid on April ...
— The History Of University Education In Maryland • Bernard Christian Steiner
... the whole, the tactics of the exodus remain much the same, the two spinstresses of my region best-versed in the art of weaving mothers' wallets failed to come up to my expectations. I went to the trouble of rearing them, with disappointing results. Where shall I find again the wonderful spectacle which the Cross Spider offered me by chance? I shall find it—in an even more striking fashion—among humbler Spiders, whom ...
— The Life of the Spider • J. Henri Fabre
... colors were but fast colors, self-conceit would be a most comfortable quality. But life is so humbling, mortifying, disappointing to vanity, that a man's great idea of himself gets washed out of him by the time he is ...
— Pearls of Thought • Maturin M. Ballou
... A most disappointing and deceptive sort of a house—inhabited, after all: its sombre and quiet aspect masking Heaven alone ...
— The Day of Days - An Extravaganza • Louis Joseph Vance
... many years, he was received with all the reverence due to their Chieftain. One of them being sharply reprehended by him, for not sending him some rum, declared after his departure, in Mr. Boswell's presence, that he had no design of disappointing him, 'for,' said he, 'I would cut my bones for him; and if he had sent his dog for it, he should have ...
— A Journey to the Western Isles of Scotland • Samuel Johnson
... depended on the personalities of the men themselves. Those who came before 1823 were on the whole disappointing. Marsden frequently compared them to the twelve spies who all failed, excepting Caleb and Joshua. Unfortunately he never lets us know who his "Caleb" and his "Joshua" were. But one of them can hardly have ...
— A History of the English Church in New Zealand • Henry Thomas Purchas
... meanwhile it is disappointing to find this organization divided, already, into so many mutually antagonistic sects. It is also a reason for regret that Mozumdar, who is a man of great culture, intelligence and deep spiritually, has recently relinquished the leadership of the movement. ...
— India's Problem Krishna or Christ • John P. Jones
... ever descended upon the Netherlands—more disappointing because succeeding a period of comparative prosperity and triumph—was the winter of 1587-8, when Leicester had terminated his career by his abrupt departure for England, after his second brief attempt at administration. ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... at least, Pauline. To be equally so, I am displeased; displeased and exceedingly annoyed. However, we will let the matter rest where it is until you have heard from your uncle, I should advise your saying nothing to your sisters until his reply comes. I am afraid you will find it disappointing." ...
— The S. W. F. Club • Caroline E. Jacobs
... BERTLEY. Disappointing. I consulted with CALWAY, and he advised me to try a certain institution. We got her safely in—excellent place; but, d'you know, she broke out three weeks ago. And since— I've heard [he holds his ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... is a mere episode and hardly even that—a chantry or out-lying chapel of the great cathedral—the Arthurian Legend, the earlier English versions, or rather the earlier versions in English, are, as has been said, not only fragmentary but disappointing. There is nothing in the least strange in this, even though (as the present writer, who can speak with indifferent knowledge, still firmly holds) the conception of the story itself in its greatest and unifying stage is probably if not certainly English. ...
— The English Novel • George Saintsbury
... reader will perceive what a strong point my magnetizers gained by this scene. After disappointing me so many times, they could not, with all their power over me, have kept me from throwing the whole thing overboard, without resorting to some such coup d'etat. Being, doubtless, on better terms ...
— Continental Monthly, Volume 5, Issue 4 • Various
... disappointing, And sorrow seems anointing Brows of care, Take a brace and go a-sailing, Either dolphin back ...
— Cap and Gown - A Treasury of College Verse • Selected by Frederic Knowles
... have coaxed me up with confidence and praise, you have steadied me with ethical culture books, and essays, and sermons. You have gotten me so far up (for me), that I am afraid to look down. I shrink with a mighty shrivel when I think of disappointing you in any way, and I expand almost to bursting when I think of justifying ...
— Lady of the Decoration • Frances Little
... alarm on this subject diminished, the private friends of the Queen turned their attention to other matters of political interest; and according to the testimony of Sully, zealously employed themselves in contravening all the wishes, and disappointing all the views, of Henri IV. "There can be no difficulty," he says with a bitterness which shows how deeply he felt his own exclusion, "in deciding upon the subject of their deliberations. The union of ...
— The Life of Marie de Medicis, Vol. 2 (of 3) • Julia Pardoe
... The result was disappointing. No traces of poison were to be, found in the stomach nor was there to be seen on the body any mark of violence, with the exception of a minute prick upon ...
— A Difficult Problem - 1900 • Anna Katharine Green (Mrs. Charles Rohlfs)
... somewhat disappointing to find that the plural was merely a bit of verbal embroidery on the caretaking butler's part, and that there was but one kitchen, situated in the basement. However, it was of good size and well furnished with closets, the contents of which ...
— Cap'n Dan's Daughter • Joseph C. Lincoln
... was short and disappointing. Osborn could not tell Hayes why he needed money and found him unusually firm. He proved that the estate was heavily overburdened, fresh loans were impossible, and stern economy must be used if it was to be saved from bankruptcy. To some extent, Osborn had expected this, but had cherished a faint ...
— The Buccaneer Farmer - Published In England Under The Title "Askew's Victory" • Harold Bindloss
... and taught by the Latter-day Saints is strikingly simple; disappointing in its simplicity, indeed, to the mind that can find satisfaction in mysteries alone, and to him whose love for metaphor, symbolism, and imagery are stronger than his devotion to truth itself, which may or may not be thus embellished. The Church asserts that the wisdom ...
— The Story of "Mormonism" • James E. Talmage
... for its great attractions of natural beauty, and is not disappointing to the traveller. It is a singular body of water, and while it is a part of the river still it differs from it in so many aspects that it is fairly entitled to be termed a lake. Below, the river is divided into numerous and devious channels ...
— Minnesota; Its Character and Climate • Ledyard Bill
... m.). This is one of the pleasantest towns of the Weald, with many old houses here and there in the High Street. The church, though of imposing appearance from a distance, is, on closer acquaintance, disappointing; the fabric dating from 1790. Note an iron tomb slab (1570). Not far from the church is the Jacobean Sackville College. Here the celebrated Father Neale was warden for twenty-five years. (In barely two miles from the centre of the town a lane leads ...
— Seaward Sussex - The South Downs from End to End • Edric Holmes
... to the occasion, as he always was; whether with the same disappointing result in view, ...
— The Pearl of the Antilles, or An Artist in Cuba • Walter Goodman
... structures and set them to work in imagination, and observe beforehand the various details performing their respective functions, as if they were in absolute material form and action. Unless this happy faculty exists ab initio in the brain of the mechanical engineer, he will have a hard and disappointing life before him. It is the early cultivation of the imagination which gives the right flexibility to the thinking faculties. Thus business, commerce, and mechanics are all the better ...
— James Nasmyth's Autobiography • James Nasmyth
... danger lies in the possibility that these foundations for conjugal love will not have been lain by the time that romantic sentiments begin to grow dim. It is this crisis in the married life which seems disappointing in the afterglow of the engagement ...
— Taboo and Genetics • Melvin Moses Knight, Iva Lowther Peters, and Phyllis Mary Blanchard
... honour they intended us, we got under weigh early and left them to comment as they pleased upon our disappointing them of the gunpowder, which, to get rid of them, we had promised to give ...
— Narrative of a Survey of the Intertropical and Western Coasts of Australia - Performed between the years 1818 and 1822 • Phillip Parker King
... "This was disappointing, and I was tempted to conclude that Fu-Manchu had blundered on to the secret in some other way, when the Assistant Keeper of Manuscripts put in an appearance. From him I obtained confirmation of my theory. ...
— The Hand Of Fu-Manchu - Being a New Phase in the Activities of Fu-Manchu, the Devil Doctor • Sax Rohmer
... a disappointing mine that has turned over night into a bonanza. I've a lot of the finest ...
— The Young Engineers in Nevada • H. Irving Hancock
... doffed, backs bent. The Archduchess moved haughtily, looking neither to the right nor left. Her coming brought no enthusiasm. Perhaps the curious imagination of the mob found her disappointing. She did not look like an Archduchess. She looked, indeed, like an unnamiable spinster of the middle class. Hilda, too, was shy and shrinking, and wore an unbecoming hat. Of the three, only the Crown Prince looked royal and as he should ...
— Long Live the King • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... we rushed down. Truth to say, the "monster" of so many startling stories was somewhat disappointing to contemplate. It was far from being so big as we had thought it in the night—indeed, it was no larger than a medium-sized dog. It had coarse black hair with two indistinct, yellowish-white stripes, ...
— A Busy Year at the Old Squire's • Charles Asbury Stephens
... Enchiridion of Epictetus, certainly one of the noblest books in the whole of literature; it has, moreover, been admirably translated. With Epictetus, [2] I think must come Marcus Aurelius. The Analects of Confucius will, I believe, prove disappointing to most English readers, but the effect it has produced on the most numerous race of men constitutes in itself a peculiar interest. The Ethics of Aristotle, perhaps, appear to some disadvantage from the very fact that they have so profoundly influenced our views of morality. The Koran, ...
— The Pleasures of Life • Sir John Lubbock
... this disappointing anti-climax, by the disciples of the Good Republican Brutus of Antiquity, except that it was something very voluble and loud, would have been as so much Hebrew or Chaldean to Miss Pross and her protector, ...
— A Tale of Two Cities - A Story of the French Revolution • Charles Dickens
... soon fell in with ice, on which account on the 13th/3rd they sought protection under Mestni Island (Staten Eiland). Here they found a sort of rock crystal resembling diamonds in all respects except hardness, a disappointing circumstance which was ascribed to the action of cold. Here also were seen images and sacrificial places, but no houses and ...
— The Voyage of the Vega round Asia and Europe, Volume I and Volume II • A.E. Nordenskieold
... generous as it is. Our post-offices are sometimes pretty far apart, too, and I'm driven to confess we don't always get our mail as often as we'd like. That's one of the outs of seafaring. So when we do touch shore and go looking for letters it is disappointing not to find any. Don't forget that. After I'm gone you will get busy with your school, and your sewing, and your fun, and you will not think so often about Uncle Frederick." He put up a warning hand to stay the protest of his listeners. ...
— Carl and the Cotton Gin • Sara Ware Bassett
... It was disappointing to hear that the Kaffir runner I sent with an account of the night attack on Surprise Hill had been captured by the Boers and robbed of his papers. I had hopes of that boy; he wore no trousers. But it is perhaps unsafe to judge character from dress alone. ...
— Ladysmith - The Diary of a Siege • H. W. Nevinson
... one person, besides myself, who can influence her in the least, so I felt that her presence would add ballast to our wildly tossing domestic craft. Needless to say, my own lack of self-control during the afternoon had been as unexpected as it was disappointing, but when it comes to anything that ...
— 32 Caliber • Donald McGibeny
... was only a probability, and no volunteers had been called for. But with the ardor that had brought them together, Gordon's company hastened to offer their services, only to be met with the laconic and disappointing reply, ...
— Historical Tales, Vol. 2 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... any of those personal circumstances or passages, which only can discover such qualities of the mind as most distinguish one man from another. These defects may perhaps appear in the stories of many succeeding kings; which makes me hope I shall not be altogether blamed for sometimes disappointing the reader in a point wherein I could wish ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, Vol. X. • Jonathan Swift
... caretaker government oversaw new elections in the spring of 2001, which ushered in Alejandro TOLEDO as the new head of government - Peru's first democratically elected president of Native American ethnicity. The presidential election of 2006 saw the return of Alan GARCIA who, after a disappointing presidential term from 1985 to 1990, returned to the presidency with promises to improve social ...
— The 2007 CIA World Factbook • United States
... they're always so disappointing, generally a railway accident out west! or a bomb thrown in Europe. Are ...
— Her Own Way - A Play in Four Acts • Clyde Fitch
... case in the days when the wooden clippers did finely to land you in Sydney or in Melbourne under the four full months. We all saw far too much of each other, unless, indeed, we were to see still more. Our superficial attractions mutually exhausted, we lost heart and patience in the disappointing strata which lie between the surface and the bed-rock of most natures. My own experience was confined to the round voyage of the Lady Jermyn, in the year 1853. It was no common experience, as was only too well known at the time. And I may add that I for my part had ...
— Dead Men Tell No Tales • E. W. Hornung
... as he hung up his hat, for he had looked forward through a dull, disappointing day to an evening with Felicite Delord. She was expecting him—she would be greatly disappointed. He sighed a second time, for he was far from happy. Life seemed to be one long constant worry over money matters and Myra Nell. Being a prim, ...
— The Net • Rex Beach
... measures Congress put the entire man power of the country at the President's command. Under these acts, he issued new calls for volunteers. Early in August, 1862, he ordered a draft of militiamen numbering 300,000 for nine months' service. The results were disappointing—ominous—for only about 87,000 soldiers were added to the army. Something more ...
— History of the United States • Charles A. Beard and Mary R. Beard
... birds are always disappointing, because such birds have nothing but their musical qualities to recommend them to us. We have separated them from that which gives quality and, meaning to their ...
— Ways of Nature • John Burroughs
... of startled innocence upon them both. "Oh!" she exclaimed, petulantly. "How disappointing...and just as I was becoming interested... Why don't you men go have your usual drink? I'll be through with ...
— Broken to the Plow • Charles Caldwell Dobie
... somewhat mollified. "You see," she then condescended to explain—"the whole thing is so extremely disappointing to me. I wanted Marcia Van Clupp to go in for the Errington stakes,—it would have been such an excellent match,—money on both sides. And Marcia would have been just the girl to look after that place down in Warwickshire—the ...
— Thelma • Marie Corelli
... disappointed in some of us; some of us are very disappointing. No doubt you have found that justice in the United States goes only with a pure heart and a right purpose as it does everywhere else in the world. No doubt what you found here didn't seem touched for you, after all, with the complete beauty of ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 3, June, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... the booklet that so greatly has enriched the Christmas festival of Denmark and Norway, is likely to be disappointing. At the time of Brorson the festival was frequently desecrated by a ceaseless round of worldly amusements. People attended the festival services of the church and spent the remainder of the season in a whirl of secular and far from innocent pleasures. With his Pietistic views Brorson naturally deplored ...
— Hymns and Hymnwriters of Denmark • Jens Christian Aaberg
... character of these things. Thus we are left to the piecemeal investigation of the world, and are unable to know the characters of those parts of the universe that are remote from our experience. This result, disappointing as it is to those whose hopes have been raised by the systems of philosophers, is in harmony with the inductive and scientific temper of our age, and is borne out by the whole examination of human knowledge which has ...
— The Problems of Philosophy • Bertrand Russell |
