"Godsend" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... during the previous year, that it had slight respect for Europe as a collective entity. In fact, Europe's prestige at Constantinople had disappeared. J'y suis, j'y reste was the answer of the Turks to the demand to evacuate Adrianople. The recapture of that city had been a godsend to the Young Turk party. The Treaty of London had destroyed what little influence it had retained after the defeat of the armies, and it grasped at the seizure of Adrianople as a means of awakening enthusiasm and keeping office. As the days passed ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 21 - The Recent Days (1910-1914) • Charles F. Horne, Editor
... cultivating him Mrs. Wilcox felt that she was doing something particularly esoteric and rather daring. She had taken a line. She loved everything that was a little flagrant, a little out of the common, and a little dubious. To a lady with these tastes Tyson was a godsend; he more than satisfied her desire for magnificence and mystery. For economical reasons Mrs. Wilcox's body was compelled to live with Mr. Wilcox in a cottage in Drayton Parva; but her soul dwelt continually in a side-street in Bayswater, in a region haunted by the shabby-refined, ...
— The Tysons - (Mr. and Mrs. Nevill Tyson) • May Sinclair
... pulled out my purse, for I had bought one since I came to town, and, reckoning my money in my hand, which was now reduced to five guineas seven shillings and twopence, assured him I had lost nothing. "Well, then, says he, so much the better; this is a godsend, and as you two were present when I picked it up, you are entitled to equal shares with me." I was astonished at these words, and looked upon this person to be a prodigy of integrity, but absolutely refused to take any part of the sum. "Come, ...
— The Adventures of Roderick Random • Tobias Smollett
... desires. And if, after all, there should be any one so dull that he can not hope to succeed in his occupation or make a better exchange with another, yet there is no occupation now tolerated by the state which would not have been as to its conditions a godsend to the most fortunately situated workman of your day. There is none in which peril to life or health is not reduced to a minimum, and the dignity and rights of the worker absolutely guaranteed. It is a constant study ...
— Equality • Edward Bellamy
... frightening my creditor; anyway, he assured me I only need pay the original sum with interest upon it at the legal rate. Moreover, he undertook to procure me an honourable loan on easy conditions, which to me was a veritable godsend. And so now you know, my dear friend, why Vamhidy is so welcome a guest at my house that I leave even you all alone with my companion when he comes. But you can see for yourself how dear and necessary he is to me and how ...
— The Poor Plutocrats • Maurus Jokai
... as a prisoner of war was to most men more of a Godsend than a tragedy. The prisoner knew that he was to be corralled in a camp. But he was alive at any rate and he had but to await the end of the war—then it was home again. The pictures show phalanxes of these men smiling ...
— In the Claws of the German Eagle • Albert Rhys Williams
... you receive," stated Gail further, still indolently, bringing herself further into the circle as she spoke, where Joy could see her. "I brought a stray cousin along—sex, male. I knew you wouldn't care—men are a godsend in New England ...
— The Wishing-Ring Man • Margaret Widdemer
... at the time a perfect godsend. There were not many stones—about a dozen—and they not nearly so large as many of those we had received in exchange for our ivory. At the same time they were of the utmost value to us now, as we should be able to dispose of them at the ...
— Tales of the Caliph • H. N. Crellin
... of proper pabulum. Just then there was no talk of a new American president. No wonderful tragedies had occurred on railway trains in Georgia, or elsewhere. There was a dearth of broken banks, and a dead dean with the necessity for a live one was a godsend. Had Dr Trefoil died in June, Mr Towers would probably not have known so much about the ...
— Barchester Towers • Anthony Trollope
... no taste for such diversions. To them they may have little value or usefulness. But, to the ordinary missionary who has done a hard day's work an hour's diversion in tennis, badminton or golf has often been a godsend. It has brought relief to the tense nerves and a new lease of life to the organs of the body. In a similar way an interest in carpentry, in geology, photography, or any other set study, brings to the jaded mind a diversion and a new lease of power, ...
— India's Problem Krishna or Christ • John P. Jones
... them thought getting into debt a capital joke and betting on horse-races one of the most meritorious actions that a human being can perform. They were, no doubt, excellent fellows in their way; but the worst of them was, they were all exactly alike. It was a perfect godsend to meet with a man like Midwinter—a man who was not cut out on the regular local pattern, and whose way in the world had the one great merit (in those parts) of being a way ...
— Armadale • Wilkie Collins
... large stomach, the dark eyes, crafty and watchful; the seductively mendacious manner, the sensual mind. We made friends at once—he consciously making use of me, I unconsciously making use of him. To him my forty francs, a month's subscription, were a godsend, nor were my invitations to dinner and to the theatre to be disdained. I was curious, odd, quaint. To be sure, it was a little tiresome to have to put up with a talkative person, whose knowledge of the French language had been acquired in three months, but ...
— Confessions of a Young Man • George Moore
... Bayeux, a picturesque place about six miles from the sea, the patient therefore betook himself, and was received with the cordiality characteristic of relatives who lead very retired lives, and regard a new arrival as a godsend. ...
— The Deserted Woman • Honore de Balzac
... biographer—Ramon Rodriguez Correa, who had come to the capital with the same aims as Becquer, and whose robust health and jovial temperament appealed singularly to the sad and ailing dreamer. The new-found friend proved indeed a godsend, for when, in 1857, Gustavo was suffering from a terrible illness, Correa, while attending him, chanced to fall upon a writing entitled El caudillo de las manos rojas, tradicion india. Charmed by its originality in form and conception, he urged his friend to publish it. Becquer ...
— Legends, Tales and Poems • Gustavo Adolfo Becquer
... deemed it best to much out on the high land, and soon after continued his journey, by slow marches, to Rock Island. On reaching Rock river, where Milan is now situated, the cholera had disappeared, and he went into camp with his entire regiment. The clear water of this beautiful stream was a Godsend to the many tired men, for the ablution of their bodies and the cleansing of their apparel, tents, etc., and seemed to have a general invigorating ...
— Autobiography of Ma-ka-tai-me-she-kia-kiak, or Black Hawk • Black Hawk
... that the Church enjoys, for at the annunciation of every new miracle the faithful are quickened to devotion and to contributions, which, above all things, is to be desired by the "impoverished Church" of Mexico.[61] An earthquake is always a windfall or a godsend to the priesthood. An outsider is often surprised at the number of miracles that, in old times, were connected with earthquakes. But rarely do we hear of modern miracles. The spirit of miracles works only in times of most profound ignorance; and experience has convinced the Church that the ...
— Mexico and its Religion • Robert A. Wilson
... been a godsend to her, and everybody else. She still talked revolution, and she was always ready to spar with Lord Buntingford, or other people. But all the same Lucy Friend was often aware of a much more tractable temper, a kind of hesitancy—and appeasement—which, even if it ...
— Helena • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... and a road one-and-a-half-miles long, made out of three-inch thick planking, was placed ready for use in three days' time, together with a narrow-gauge railroad, for rushing up ammunition and taking back wounded men. This road and narrow-gauge railway took a short cut across the valley and proved a godsend in relieving the congestion on the regular road, and was of inestimable ...
— S.O.S. Stand to! • Reginald Grant
... for the rank and file. Of the officers we need only say that the old hands have been a godsend to our young regiment; while the juniors, to quote their own Colonel, have learned as much in six months as the average subaltern learns in three years; and whereas in the old days a young officer could always depend on his platoon sergeant to give him the right word of command ...
— The First Hundred Thousand • Ian Hay
... with his diggings, he said, liked the natives, and considered this a splendid chance for improving his Spanish. He was reading "Don Quixote" in the vernacular. In a sense, I looked upon his presence as a perfect godsend to us, as he came in most appropriately as a Deus ex machina to create the character of Barbarossa's invented friend. O'Donovan was in good standing with the Republicans of the town, as he was a staunch ...
— Romantic Spain - A Record of Personal Experiences (Vol. II) • John Augustus O'Shea
... from what she had been herself, so ambitious, so longing for refinement and showing such a distaste for common ways. The failure of her own health, the impossibility of keeping the girl at school any longer when Mrs. Barrington's proffer had seemed a perfect godsend. But it was too late to recover the health that had been so shattered by poverty ...
— The Girls at Mount Morris • Amanda Minnie Douglas
... be a queer sort of place, and water very scarce; all they get there is a Godsend, as it comes from Heaven; and they look sharp for the rain, which is collected in large tanks, and an inch or two more of water in the tank is considered a great catch. I've often heard the ladies there talking ...
— Jacob Faithful • Captain Frederick Marryat
... abominations may look better on their native heath: I sincerely hope they do. Judging by the "Dead Heart of Australia"—a book which gave me a nightmare from which I shall never recover—I should say that a varnished hop-pole would be an artistic godsend out there. ...
— Old Calabria • Norman Douglas
... neighbourhood of Dunk Island—myriads of fish, about the size of a sardine, appear in shoals, an acre or so in area, or encircle the islands with a living, bluish-grey frill yards broad. The blacks bestow on this godsend, popularly known as "sprats"—HARENGULA ...
— Tropic Days • E. J. Banfield
... which grew so plentifully in the vicinity of the Blyde River Valley were a godsend to indigent "Pilgrims." How the trees originated is a mystery. But there they were, on the "flats" of Pilgrim's Creek, along the Blyde River terraces and in many of the surrounding Valleys, groves of trees bearing ...
— Reminiscences of a South African Pioneer • W. C. Scully
... arms and legs, our packs seemed filled with lead, our haversacks rubbing against our hips felt like sand paper; the whole march was a nightmare. The water we carried got hot in our bottles and became almost undrinkable. In the reserve trench we got some tea, a godsend to us all. ...
— The Red Horizon • Patrick MacGill
... returned Paco. "I knew him well in former days, when I went to buy mules in the mountains of Arragon. An arch rogue is Master Jaime, who will do any thing for gold. I daresay he serves the general honestly, being well paid; but he will look upon our job as a godsend, and jump ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 363, January, 1846 • Various
... He can't be more than eighteen or nineteen, and was an urchin in the lower school, I suppose, when we were leaving. I don't remember his face, but it's a very good one, and he is a bright gentlemanly youngster as you would wish to see. His name is Jones. Do you remember him? He will be a godsend to me. I have him to chum with me on ...
— Tom Brown at Oxford • Thomas Hughes
... better quarters in the military hospital. I soon learned that there was trouble among the natives. A war had broken out among some of the Moorish tribes, some two hundred miles up the Senegal, and my Aguila was a godsend to the Frenchmen, who needed just such a light craft to guard their returning flotilla with merchandise from Gatam. Accordingly, the craft was armed, manned, and despatched on this expedition without waiting the decree of a court as to the lawfulness ...
— Captain Canot - or, Twenty Years of an African Slaver • Brantz Mayer
... Buffum's household, a visitor was a godsend. Socially, they had lived all their lives in a state of starvation. They knew all about Jim Fenton, and had exchanged many a saucy word with him, as he had passed their house on his journeys to and ...
— Sevenoaks • J. G. Holland
... by Mosby himself as a veritable godsend, since he was acquainted with the location of every Union force in Fairfax County, and knew of a corridor by which it would be possible to penetrate Wyndham's entire system of cavalry posts as far as Fairfax Courthouse itself. Here, then, was the making of the spectacular coup which Mosby ...
— Rebel Raider • H. Beam Piper
... who seems to be a blend Of Balaam's Ass, the bore's godsend, And Mrs. Gamp's elusive ...
— Mr. Punch's History of the Great War • Punch
... again wanted to push on, but I determined to hold onto him. I was alone at the time—that is, without a white companion, Judson having gone down to Zanzibar with some despatches for the company—and his companionship was a godsend. ...
— Homo - 1909 • F. Hopkinson Smith
... same boy who on his hospital cot the next day said: "Don't you think you could do something for the chap next to me, there on my left? He's really suffering: cried like hell all last night. It would be a Godsend if you could ...
— The Americanization of Edward Bok - The Autobiography of a Dutch Boy Fifty Years After • Edward William Bok
... counter or desk within doors, and the effort to pass each other without collision outside; so that from morning to evening the only possible variation of the monotony of the hours, and lightening of the penalty of existence, must be some kind of mischief, limited, unless by more than ordinary godsend of fatality, to the fall of a horse, or ...
— On the Old Road, Vol. 2 (of 2) - A Collection of Miscellaneous Essays and Articles on Art and Literature • John Ruskin
... throws the poor upon our charge—in mercy to us. Couldn't he take care of them without us if he wished? Are they not his? It's easy for the poor to feel, when they are helped by us, that the rich are a godsend to them; but they don't see, and many of their helpers don't see, that the poor are a godsend to the rich. They're set over against each other to keep pity and mercy and charity in the human heart. If every one were ...
— Dr. Sevier • George W. Cable
... had got his chance. He had known her at Philadelphia, and at other places had met her, and this was a godsend. You could not talk in contra-dances as you do in cotillions, or even in the pauses of waltzing; but there were chances for tongues and sounds, as well as for eyes and blushes. He began with her travels, and Europe, and Vesuvius, and the French; and then, when they ...
— Famous Stories Every Child Should Know • Various
... produced for inspection, not supposing that I would buy it) a quarto history of the town, published by subscription, nearly forty years ago. The bookseller showed himself a well-informed and affable man, and a local antiquary, to whom a party of inquisitive strangers were a godsend. He had met with several Americans, who, at various times, had come on pilgrimages to this place, and had been in correspondence with others. Happening to have heard the name of one member of our party, he showed us ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 09, No. 51, January, 1862 • Various
... unions. They realised the spirit in which I wrote that article and the condition of the country at the time I wrote it. My apologia was accepted by every one who counted. The publication of that article," he went on, "was Miller's scheme to drive me out of politics. It has turned out to be the greatest godsend ever vouchsafed to our cause, for it is going to put Mr. Miller out of the power of doing mischief for ...
— Nobody's Man • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... language. In a few minutes a group went rushing away with the sketch tablets held jealously to their breasts, bound for workshops. Other men appeared to present new problems. A wave of sheer enthusiasm was in being. A new idea which would lessen the demands of the machines was a godsend to ...
— The Fifth-Dimension Tube • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... he, and they drove off. "If you have anything to do, please tell me. But I know nobody in this furnace of a town. You're a godsend." ...
— The Mountebank • William J. Locke
... Amy Kelly was a godsend to "Dodd" Weaver. She came to him through the medium of a country school. She won the boy as such teachers always do win boys, and always will win them; and her reward ought to be great. It was only twenty-five dollars a month, reckoned on the order book of ...
— The Evolution of Dodd • William Hawley Smith
... reclaim those who have fallen. They may be thanked also for having been the means of diminishing, if not altogether extirpating, a loathsome tribe of ruffians who were accustomed to feast on their blood. These Missions are a Godsend not only to the sailor, but to the nation. No other agency has done the work they are doing. The Church is apt, to gather its robes round a cantish respectability, and call out "Save the people," and the flutter falls flat on the seats. These missions owe any ...
— Windjammers and Sea Tramps • Walter Runciman
... "That's another radio receiver, an old fashioned regenerative set, sensitive enough and reliable enough, but a nuisance to everyone but its owner—except when it's a godsend, as it is ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, June, 1930 • Various
... canoe a godsend. It left no trail, and he had been careful to leave none when he came to the bank for its capture. Perhaps the Indian would think he had tied it carelessly and the current had pulled its fastenings loose. In any event, the fugitive ...
— The Eyes of the Woods - A story of the Ancient Wilderness • Joseph A. Altsheler
... effort of active conversation; one wishes to rest, to observe, to be amused without an effort; and a mansion which opens wide its hospitable arms, and offers itself to you as a sort of home, where you may rest, and do just as the humor suits you, is a perfect godsend at such times. You are at home there, your ways are understood, you can do as you please,—come early or late, be brilliant or dull,—you are always welcome. If you can do nothing for the social whole to-night, it matters not. ...
— Household Papers and Stories • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... state what is Utopia. At present many people who are really married are in the chains of slavery; the more who get out of it the better. As the number of those whose marriages are a farce will gradually diminish, thus will divorce be a godsend. Divorce is, in certain cases, a godsend, but the priests refuse to ...
— Gilbert Keith Chesterton • Patrick Braybrooke
... ignorant sailor, who had no news to communicate beyond the latest varieties of forecastle blasphemy. My hosts gratefully assured me that, as a person of some little education, they considered me a veritable godsend. No less a task was mine than to relate to them the history of the world for the past two centuries, and often did I wish, for their sakes, that I had made a ...
— To Whom This May Come - 1898 • Edward Bellamy
... his twenty-fourth year, and was successful from the first, his practice soon growing to nearly five hundred cases annually, which yielded an income that would be a godsend to the majority of lawyers in ...
— Thomas Jefferson • Edward S. Ellis et. al.
... the main room, Robin was unfeignedly delighted. They made rows of shelves with the packing-cases, and arranged the books thereon. It was not an extensive library, but it occupied one side of the room, and was a godsend to them. Under the window Robin placed the green covered desk, and placed on it Adam's writing materials. Along the inside wall Adam built a bunk, after the fashion in miners' cabins, and with a mattress stuffed with the soft inner cornhusk, and a pillow from the other room, and blankets from ...
— The Master-Knot of Human Fate • Ellis Meredith
... Proceeding then to the animal, which he found saddled—it belonged no doubt to one of the pursuers who had left it there while in the woods with the hounds—he tightened the girths, mounted and rode away. This was indeed a godsend! He had not proceeded far when he saw a horseman approaching, The stranger stopped and ...
— The Four Canadian Highwaymen • Joseph Edmund Collins
... short, who seems to be a blend Of Balaam's Ass, the bore's godsend And Mrs. Gamp's ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 150, April 5, 1916 • Various
... Bill says to me, 'Bill, you oughtn't show yellow like thet. You shore don't savvy thet boy of yours.' ... I thought I did, son, but when it come to a showdown I was chicken-hearted. Your comin' home was a Godsend to Mother an' Lucy. An' more to me! Then to think you might get shot right off.... Wal, it was too ...
— Valley of Wild Horses • Zane Grey
... most popular social sport is "Americanization." It is in many ways an ideal movement. It fully satisfies the passion of the comfortable classes for uplift, and is a Godsend to the candidate who wants something to grow fervent about in lieu of a frank facing of fundamental issues of politics and industry. Above all, Americanization work gives one the righteous feeling of a defender of the faith. The epidemic faddist character of ...
— Catholic Problems in Western Canada • George Thomas Daly
... didn't instead - and abouth the village and the doctor's wife. He'll be so interested. You will be a positive godsend to him. May I tell him to expect you to ...
— Winding Paths • Gertrude Page
... from the Syracuse club. For some occult reason there was to be a lay-off next day and then on the following another double-header. These double-headers we hated next to exhibition games. Still a lay-off for twenty-four hours, at that stage of the race, was a Godsend, and we received the ...
— The Redheaded Outfield and Other Baseball Stories • Zane Grey
... popular. Hasn't enough devil. Girl ought to have some devil, hang it all! Dance with her myself? Well, I do—about three times a year. Have her left on my hands an hour at a time. Fellow can't afford that. Think we have no chivalry? Should come to dances yourself, old chap. You'd be a godsend to the ...
— The Side Of The Angels - A Novel • Basil King
... winced, at the impact of his thought. Since their brief talk, the fact of the engagement had been tacitly accepted—tacitly ignored. Lance had a positive genius for that sort of thing; and in this case it was a godsend to Roy. ...
— Far to Seek - A Romance of England and India • Maud Diver
... of the after awning were tied up in a sort of huge bag for the rain to drain off into it, so that none of it might be wasted—the canvas being let down, when the receptacle was pretty full, to empty the contents into the water-puncheons—for the pure liquid was a precious godsend, being an agreeable relief to the brackish supply which the ship carried in ...
— The Wreck of the Nancy Bell - Cast Away on Kerguelen Land • J. C. Hutcheson
... He is a bore, but there is no harm in him. Ah! he is quickening his pace; I am afraid he has seen us; and anybody he knows will be a godsend to ...
— Phoebe, Junior • Mrs [Margaret] Oliphant
... extra engine; and, mounting Frank's triumphal car, we bumped away from fellow travelers, wandering dolefully through the mud in vain attempt at time-killing until the evening train. That freight-car—piled as it was with ammunition, wheels and harness—was a Godsend, after the past three days. Cicero, Frank's ancient and black Man Friday, dispensed hot coffee and huge hunks of bread and ham; and a violin and two good voices among the Crescents made the time skim along ...
— Four Years in Rebel Capitals - An Inside View of Life in the Southern Confederacy from Birth to Death • T. C. DeLeon
... interested in that absorbing employment came a couple of May-flies, and then a gnat, and then a blue-bottle,—all at different angles of the web. Never was a poor spider so distracted by her good fortune! She evidently did not know which godsend to take first. The aboriginal victim being released, she slid half-way towards the May-flies; then one of her eight eyes caught sight of the blue-bottle, and she shot off in that direction,—when the hum of the gnat again diverted her; and in the middle of this ...
— The Caxtons, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... said, tapping them with his cane, and looking round at his sister. "What a lot of wear I've got out of them since he threw them away! His overcoat, too. And now that it's the thing to be shabby, Dick's clothes are really a godsend. I defraud Jones. But I have no doubt that Jones gets a good deal more than is ...
— Harvest • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... too late; the tide was by then too far out to allow a vessel to put off to sea. The wind had changed, and was settling down to a comfortable north-westerly breeze—a veritable godsend for a speedy ...
— The Scarlet Pimpernel • Baroness Orczy
... four different languages. I speak and write them with equal fluency; yet in all four I do not find words enough to express the horror I experienced during those two months, or what I still feel when memory reverts to the scene. Suicide would have been a relief, a happiness, a godsend! Many a time I had the muzzle of my pistol in my mouth and my finger on the trigger, but the faces of my helpless, dependent wife and child would rise up before me, and my hand would fall powerless. I was not the cause of my ...
— History of the Donner Party • C.F. McGlashan
... not bring him here?" interrupted Dulce, with a pout. "You tiresome Dick, when you must know what a godsend a strange young ...
— Not Like Other Girls • Rosa N. Carey
... at low tide. It is difficult to see what would be the fate of a nation hemmed in by mines and devoid of a mercantile fleet sufficiently numerous to provide powerful sweeping units. The trawlers and pleasure steamers were a godsend to England in those years of intensive submarine warfare. This undeniable fact incidentally provides another example—if such is now needed—of naval power resting not entirely on fleets and dockyards, but on every branch ...
— Submarine Warfare of To-day • Charles W. Domville-Fife
... a godsend. I will order payment for it. Duke Notaras, the Grand Admiral, will agree ...
— The Prince of India - Or - Why Constantinople Fell - Volume 2 • Lew. Wallace
... sighed the Comandante. "What a godsend! I was growing dull—very dull of this monotonous frontier life. With this new excitement, perhaps, I may kill another month. Will she last me that long, ...
— The White Chief - A Legend of Northern Mexico • Mayne Reid
... godsend for the lovers of the marvellous had not appeared in the country side within the memory of that sapient individual—the ...
— Varney the Vampire - Or the Feast of Blood • Thomas Preskett Prest
... godsend for Gresham," said one gentleman to Mr. Ratler very shortly after the strong eulogium which had been uttered on poor Mr. Bonteen by ...
— Phineas Redux • Anthony Trollope
... dearie, but I been through the mill in my day. But that's all over now, him layin' there—my husband. Will was a good Strong in his day—nobody can't ever take that away from him. I'm leavin' you the funeral money out of what he had under his pillow. It's a godsend to me my husband layin' up that few hundred when things ain't so good with me. You was a good influence, dearie. I never knew him to save a cent. I'd never have thought it. Not a cent from him all these months. My legs for ...
— Humoresque - A Laugh On Life With A Tear Behind It • Fannie Hurst
... a moment undecided. He did not stoop even now to greet his wife with that salutation usual at this moment. The group at the bedside broke apart. The bride, white as a ghost, dropped back on her blankets. It was a godsend that at this instant Tim, the little dog, broke in the door, barking and overjoyed, welcoming the company, and making a diversion, ...
— The Sagebrusher - A Story of the West • Emerson Hough
... cosmopolitan that he had become, the place and the people had shrunk terribly during his absence, and there seemed to be little left in common between him and them. The presence of the Americans was a godsend to him, while he in turn was like a fresh breeze from ...
— When Dreams Come True • Ritter Brown
... the least idea but what I should bid my lady good-bye when it suited, and I didn't want any swearing at all—not a bit. I didn't do any. But what happened had to be with or without any ring or book and 'Forasmuch as.' There had been so much funeral and sudden death that a marriage would be a godsend anyhow. So the old Esquimaux got our two hands in his, babbled away in half-English, half-Esquimaux, with the girl's eyes shining like a she- moose over a dying buck, and about the time we kissed each other, his head dropped back—and that is ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... lived quietly and uneventfully for two or three years at Sir Ashley Mottisfont's residence in that part of England, with as near an approach to bliss as the climate of this country allows. The child had been a godsend to Philippa, for there seemed no great probability of her having one of her own: and she wisely regarded the possession of Dorothy as a special kindness of Providence, and did not worry her mind at all as to Dorothy's possible origin. Being a tender and ...
— A Group of Noble Dames • Thomas Hardy
... gentleman (Capdepont is a Pyrenean peasant by origin), rather undignified, and even a little tyrannical; while a cardinal towards the end makes a distinction—between the impossibility of the Church lying and the positive duty of Churchmen, in certain circumstances, to lie—which would have been a godsend to Kingsley in that unequal conflict of his with a colleague of ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 2 - To the Close of the 19th Century • George Saintsbury
... how much that would amount to, and his mouth watered; thirty pounds would be a godsend just then, and he thought the fates owed him something. He told Mildred what he had done when he saw her at breakfast next morning. ...
— Of Human Bondage • W. Somerset Maugham
... putting his sack under the spout. When his sack was full of whole wheat meal, he tied it, paid the miller and rode off rejoicing. When he found the command that night, some hogs had been brought and issued by the commissary, and the two bushels of wheat meal was a Godsend. Our mess, after breakfast next morning, divided out to each, eleven big army biscuits apiece, but before dinner time, one gaunt member of the mess had finished up his lot and was ...
— A History of Lumsden's Battery, C.S.A. • George Little
... ways. In Lambeth (1685), George Speedwell is put down as "a merry begot;" Anne Twine is "filia uniuscujusque." At Croydon, a certain William is "terraefilius" (1582), an autochthonous infant. Among the queer names of foundlings are "Nameless," "Godsend," "Subpoena," and "Moyses and Aaron, two children found," not in the bulrushes, but "in ...
— Books and Bookmen • Andrew Lang
... very peaceful of late," he said to himself ruefully, "as far at least as Hester ever lets her be. Preston's wife was a godsend. Perhaps now she'll come out of her shell and go more among the people. It would help her. Anyway, we can't have everything rooted up again just yet—before ...
— The Case of Richard Meynell • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... accepted Miss Tancred's invitation to join them in a week's cruise in English waters. He spent his mornings in his own yacht, his afternoons and evenings on board the schooner. The proposal had been a godsend to him in his state of indecision. After his aimless wanderings he was exhilarated by this eager challenge and pursuit, absurdly pitting the speed of his own small craft against the swiftness and strength of the larger vessel. But he enjoyed still more sitting ...
— The Return of the Prodigal • May Sinclair
... deep interest and for whom I saw little hope. He had a chest wound, and had seemed to be doing well when there was a hemorrhage, and he lay white and still almost as death. He must not attempt to speak, and I was a godsend to him, for I knew what he needed without being told, and gave him the best care I could. He was of a Western State, and his name Dutton, and when I left him I thought he must die in being moved, as he must be soon; but I must go with a boat-load ...
— Half a Century • Jane Grey Cannon Swisshelm
... work that she could pick up, between discreet outings with—friends who failed to suggest matrimony. Hans, on some secret mission to San Francisco, where she had gone as companion to a friend, had seemed a veritable Godsend and Prince Charming, when, in her thirtieth year, he actually offered legal marriage, completely overcome by her great physical charm. But although she loved Hans with whatever of that emotion such a nature could be ...
— The Price of Things • Elinor Glyn
... for an upper lodger is quite a godsend to Mrs. Whimple," said Herbert, "for of course people in general won't stand that noise. A curious place, ...
— Great Expectations • Charles Dickens
... that sleep this winter night on the bare floor of filthy tenements or huddled like swine on an armful of foul rags and straw; delicate women and children dying for lack of proper warmth and nourishment; hundreds of men who regard it as a godsend to get arrested that they may have shelter from the piercing winds of the night and a bite to eat in the morning. Put your head into this 10-cent lodging house if you want to get some new ideas regarding ...
— Volume 1 of Brann The Iconoclast • William Cowper Brann
... are no burden," the woman replied; "but rather a godsend, for both my husband and I have longed for two little angels like these long ago. How they will comfort our hearts in those weary hours of winter when the days are so short and the nights so long! And, please you, sir, there will be enough for ...
— Three Young Pioneers - A Story of the Early Settlement of Our Country • John Theodore Mueller
... said; "we must repulse them. Gil, this is a godsend. I want every man I have to fight. These are scoundrels from ...
— Gil the Gunner - The Youngest Officer in the East • George Manville Fenn
... 5. 'A useful godsend are you to me now, King of the dance, companion of the feast, Lovely in all your nature! Welcome, you 35 Excellent plaything! Where, sweet mountain-beast, Got you that speckled shell? Thus much I know, You must come home with me and be my guest; You will give joy to me, and ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley Volume I • Percy Bysshe Shelley
... Alder Creek Valley to our tent that first afternoon, Messrs. Cady and Clark had seen fresh tracks of a bear and cubs, and in the evening the latter took one of our guns and went in pursuit of the game which would have been a godsend to us. It was dark when he returned and told my mother that he had wounded the old bear near the camp, but that she had escaped with her young through the pines into a clump of tamarack, and that he would be able to follow her in the morning by ...
— The Expedition of the Donner Party and its Tragic Fate • Eliza Poor Donner Houghton
... she took the sheet of paper from the old lady's hands and began to read it. It was from Mrs Harper—a touching yet dignified letter, and the cheque was not returned. Mrs Harper began by thanking Lady Myrtle warmly for her kindness; the money she had sent seemed indeed a 'godsend' in the real sense of the word, and no secondary considerations could make her think it would be right to refuse what might—what, she trusted and almost believed, would save her husband's life and restore him to health—'even,' ...
— Robin Redbreast - A Story for Girls • Mary Louisa Molesworth
... and bewildering him, he saw this second net into which he had permitted himself to be drawn. As if the first had not been colossal enough! Where would it all end? Private secretary and two hundred the month—forty pounds—this was a godsend. But to take her orders day by day, to see her, to be near her. . . . Poverty-stricken wretch that he was, he should have declined. Now he could not; being a simple Englishman, he had given his word and meant to abide by it. There was one ...
— The Voice in the Fog • Harold MacGrath
... householder opened the door wider, and Spike entered. Cold as the house was, from the standpoint of the man within, its hold-over warmth was a godsend to Spike's thoroughly ...
— Midnight • Octavus Roy Cohen
... Phyllis Carey as a godsend, a harbinger of other better-class girls going into trade. The woman not only took the girl under her wing, she fell back instinctively and inevitably on Phyllis for companionship, with a selection flattering in ...
— A Houseful of Girls • Sarah Tytler
... drove his hunting-knife into the next; but the Acadian alone was man enough to give us abundant occupation, now he had got in our rear. Just then there was a crack of a rifle, the Acadian gave a leap into the air and fell dead, and at the same moment my son Godsend, a boy of ten years old, sprang forward, Asa's rifle in his hand still smoking from muzzle and touchhole. The glorious boy had loaded the piece when he saw that Rachel did not do it, and in the very nick of time had shot ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 54, No. 334, August 1843 • Various
... the fort!" said Willet. "We've already done 'em damage they can't repair in a long time, and maybe we've broken up their camp for the winter! What a godsend the snow was!" ...
— The Shadow of the North - A Story of Old New York and a Lost Campaign • Joseph A. Altsheler
... the beach-stone cottages—were sometimes hard-pressed to keep body and soul together. They did what they could, eking out their scanty earnings by eel-fishing on the marshes, and occasionally snaring a few wild fowl. Mr. Glenthorpe's researches in the district had been a godsend because of the employment he had given, which had brought a little ...
— The Shrieking Pit • Arthur J. Rees
... folk want their luck buttered. If I had a choice as wide as the ocean sea I wouldn't wish for a better man. A poor twanking woman like her—'tis a godsend for her, and hardly a pair of jumps or night-rail to ...
— The Mayor of Casterbridge • Thomas Hardy
... women of Paradise recognized in this influx a godsend—a few francs to gain with which to face those coming wintry months while their men were absent. And they opened their tiny houses to ...
— The Maids of Paradise • Robert W. (Robert William) Chambers
... to see us, and the young father left at once to get Grandma Mortimer, a neighborhood godsend such as most Western communities have one of. We busied ourselves relieving the young mother as much as we could. She wouldn't leave the baby and lie down. The child is teething and had convulsions. We put it into a hot bath and held the convulsions ...
— Letters on an Elk Hunt • Elinore Pruitt Stewart
... godsend his holidays are to me!" said Owen. "When they come round I can ride over here and see him, and you—and your mother. Do you think that I am not dull also, living alone at Hap House, and that this is not an infinite blessing ...
— Castle Richmond • Anthony Trollope
... moves on schedule time. I expected to board the steamer immediately after my arrival at Matadi and proceed to Antwerp. There was the usual delay, and I had to wait a week. Hence the diversion provided by "The Schoodic" was a godsend. ...
— An African Adventure • Isaac F. Marcosson
... are a godsend, for I can read all your letters through again. There they are—spread out on my sheet! By Jove, little woman, you've treated me jolly well! And now I can pay you back a little. But perhaps you won't mind, dearest, if I don't write ...
— Missing • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... bird flying low on the water from the direction of Dunk Island, 2 1/2 miles away. It was labouring heavily, and some little distance from land fell exhausted into the sea. When it drifted ashore—a godsend to the boys—it was found to be a megapode—and the feat was camp talk. None could credit that a "kee-rowan" ...
— The Confessions of a Beachcomber • E J Banfield
... cried, "I am delighted to see you, and so will be Mrs. Stowe and the girls. They associate with the natives but very little, and old friends like you will be a godsend." ...
— Graham's Magazine, Vol. XXXII No. 4, April 1848 • Various
... sleeves elbow-cut, displaying still plump and rounded arms (although she was nearly seventy), and her smooth white fingers flew rapidly in and out of the blue yarn as she resumed her knitting of Peter's stocking. Peter was rather a godsend to grandma in the matter of stockings; no wool that was ever carded could resist his vigorous onslaughts, and it kept grandma busy all her spare moments to supply his restless feet with ...
— An Unwilling Maid • Jeanie Gould Lincoln
... enthusiast complexion and large sticks. The City, through all streets, is flowing thitherward to see: 'two cartloads of paving-stones, that happened to pass that way' have been seized as a visible godsend. Another detachment of Gardes Francaises must be sent; Besenval and the Colonel taking earnest counsel. Then still another; they hardly, with bayonets and menace of bullets, penetrate to the spot. What a sight! A street choked up, with lumber, ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle
... the crowd were professional beggars. Most of them were workmen, long since out of work, forced into idleness by long-continued "hard times," by ill luck, by sickness. To them the "bread line" was a godsend. At least they could not starve. Between jobs here in the end was something to hold them up—a small platform, as it were, above the sweep of black water, where for a moment they might pause and take breath before ...
— A Deal in Wheat - And Other Stories of the New and Old West • Frank Norris
... he had given evidence against Mitya, and so she was angry. The whole effect on the public, of Rakitin's speech, of his noble sentiments, of his attacks upon serfdom and the political disorder of Russia, was this time finally ruined. Fetyukovitch was satisfied: it was another godsend. Grushenka's cross-examination did not last long and, of course, there could be nothing particularly new in her evidence. She left a very disagreeable impression on the public; hundreds of contemptuous eyes ...
— The Brothers Karamazov • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... sense with us from what it had during the Middle Ages, from what it had at the time of the Apostles, and from what it had at the time of Moses. Yet to the drowning sailor his rescue was miraculous; to the despairing King the arrival of his brother was a godsend; and to Joinville and his crew, who were in imminent danger of being carried off as slaves by Moorish pirates, the wind that brought them safe to Cyprus was more than a fortunate accident. Our language differs from the language of Joinville, ...
— Chips From A German Workshop. Vol. III. • F. Max Mueller
... the scenes, Count Saito was directing the course of the famous trial which had come to be known as the Fujinami Affair. For the Count had certain political scores of his own to pay off; and Asako proved to be a godsend. ...
— Kimono • John Paris
... always kept a grip by the hook) in a farmhouse. It was his boast that his letters always reached their destination eventually. They might be a long time about it, but "slow and sure" was his motto. Hooky emphasized his "slow and sure" by taking a snuff. He was a godsend to the postmistress, for to his failings or the infirmities of his gig were ...
— Auld Licht Idyls • J.M. Barrie
... therefore the sun streams in undisturbed; and when a room has four windows, as happened to us at Sordavala, the light of day becomes a positive nuisance, and a few green calico blinds an absolute godsend; indeed, almost as essential as the oil of cloves or lavender or the ammonia bottle for gnat bites, or the mosquito head-nets, if one sleeps with open windows. Mosquitoes have fed upon me in tropical lands, but they are gentlemen in comparison with the rough ...
— Through Finland in Carts • Ethel Brilliana Alec-Tweedie
... the first week. 'Turn out or pay,' said the landlord, a brute absorbed in the present, and with no faith in the glorious future. They offered him 1,500 pounds worth of shares instead of his paltry eight guineas cash. On this he swept his premises of them. What a godsend you would have been to these Jeremy Diddlers, you and the ten thousand they ...
— Love Me Little, Love Me Long • Charles Reade
... hundreds of thousands of homes in the country an opportunity of gaining a very moderate sum in addition to the present income by the expenditure of some weeks of care and light work would be hailed as a Godsend, and that, too, in families where the feeling of self-respect and the desire to keep the family together are far too strong to permit the women to go away from home in any way to ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 324, March 18, 1882 • Various
... is ill beyond the power of herb teas," said James Henry. "What a godsend that we should have Rachel! And oh, Heaven grant that it may not be as it was before! the strong and helpful one taken, ...
— A Little Girl in Old Philadelphia • Amanda Minnie Douglas
... promised to take her with him on his return to Thorbury. She had arranged with a neighbor to prepare the minister's supper, but she must be on hand to give him his breakfast. As there was nothing to interest her at Cobhurst, and nothing to report, she was glad to go, and considered this oxcart a godsend, for her plan of getting Mike to drive her over in the spring cart had ...
— The Girl at Cobhurst • Frank Richard Stockton
... him, exclaiming that it were a godsend indeed, did all our critics merely speak the plain truth as they see it for themselves. The professor would not have it so, ...
— The Guest of Quesnay • Booth Tarkington
... of the big man twinkled. "Our little fracas has been a godsend to Mrs. Selfridge. Wally and I will both emerge as heroes of a desperate struggle. You won't even get a mention. But it's a pity about Wally's injuries—and ...
— The Yukon Trail - A Tale of the North • William MacLeod Raine
... was a special godsend and comfort, for before the first month had gone they were good friends, and Emily had made a discovery which filled her head with brilliant plans for Becky's future, in spite of her mother's warnings, and the sensible girl's own reluctance to be ...
— A Garland for Girls • Louisa May Alcott
... care a damn, since I'm to lose you," said I. "It'll be a godsend to have a hard row to hoe the next ...
— The Deluge • David Graham Phillips
... His left mind doesn't know what his right mind is doing. He has to think of himself as a person of sentiment—idealism, and—quite a job, at times. Clever—how he gets away with it. The war must have been a godsend to people who were in danger of getting on to themselves. But I should think you could fool all of yourself ...
— Plays • Susan Glaspell
... Headquarters at Sailly there was a large steam laundry which was used as a bath for our men. It was a godsend to them, for the scarcity of water made cleanliness difficult. The laundry during bath hours was a curious spectacle. Scores of large cauldrons of steaming water covered the floor. In each sat a man with only his head and shoulders showing, looking as if he were ...
— The Great War As I Saw It • Frederick George Scott
... brute would have done as much at a time like that! Afterwards I would have set him right, but I was afraid of thrusting back the friendly imputation in his face. He credits me with having been this and that of a godsend to his son, when as a fact we parted, that last time, not even good friends. Perhaps you can forgive me for saying it? You see how ...
— A Touch Of Sun And Other Stories • Mary Hallock Foote
... was childless, a widow and very dependent on companionship for such enjoyment as she could get out of her existence. She had few resources as she grew older, for she did not read much and had no especial tastes. The presence of such a girl as Margaret was a godsend in many ways, and she looked forward with something like terror to the not distant time when she should be left alone again, unless she could induce one of her nieces to live with her. But that would ...
— Fair Margaret - A Portrait • Francis Marion Crawford
... said Joseph Atkins. Sargent boarded with him, and the board money was a godsend to him, now he was out of work. John Sargent had fixed his own price, and it was an unheard-of one for such simple fare as he had. His weekly dollars kept the whole poor family in food. But John ...
— The Portion of Labor • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... quite as good in its way as Treasure Island, and is full of adventure of a stirring yet most natural kind. Although it is primarily a boys' book, it is a real godsend to the elderly reader who likes something fresh—something touched with the romance and magic ...
— The Dash for Khartoum - A Tale of Nile Expedition • George Alfred Henty
... up by mere teaching. Nowadays a man who's hired to teach is expected to teach until his daily supply of gray matter has run out, and his original work has to wait until after he's dead. There's where I'm more fortunate than some. The fifteen hundred dollars—a veritable godsend—which I receive annually under the will of my aunt, will keep the wolf at a respectful distance and enable me to play the investigator to my heart's content. I'm determined to be thorough, George. There is no excuse for superficiality in science. But in the end ...
— The Law-Breakers and Other Stories • Robert Grant
... expired on Scattergood's arrival, and the group on the porch converted itself into an audience. It was an audience that got its money's worth. Not for an instant did the attention of a single member of it stray away from this Godsend come to furnish them with their first real topic of conversation since Crazy French stole a box of Paris green, mistaking it for a new sort of ...
— Scattergood Baines • Clarence Budington Kelland
... purpose of considering the necessity for a new Cabinet and a line of policy less conciliating than that of Mr. Lincoln; and while everybody was shocked at his murder, the feeling was nearly universal that the accession of Johnson to the presidency would prove a godsend to the country.... On the following day, in pursuance of a previous engagement, the Committee on the Conduct of the War met the President at his quarters at the Treasury Department. He received us with decided cordiality, and Mr. Wade said to him: 'Johnson, we have faith in you. There will ...
— The Life of Abraham Lincoln • Henry Ketcham
... "It's just the thing for Joan. Really a godsend. She worries me more than all three of the boys. They are east at school for the winter and of course don't come home for the Christmas holidays. If you want to be housekeeper you may. I don't know anything I should like better than a ...
— The Sisters-In-Law • Gertrude Atherton |
