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Grope   /groʊp/   Listen
Grope

verb
(past & past part. groped; pres. part. groping)
1.
Feel about uncertainly or blindly.  Synonym: fumble.
2.
Search blindly or uncertainly.
3.
Fondle for sexual pleasure.



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"Grope" Quotes from Famous Books



... sufficient number of trials—and over and over again if the trials are repeated often enough. For example, if a million grains of corn, of which a single one was red, were all placed in a pile, and a blindfolded person were required to grope in the pile, select a grain, and then put it back again, the chances would be a million to one against his drawing out the red grain. If drawing it meant he should die, a sensible person would give himself no concern at having to draw the grain. The probability ...
— Side-lights on Astronomy and Kindred Fields of Popular Science • Simon Newcomb

... the horrid, crumbling slope! It breathes up damp and fust! What man would for his lost loves grope Amid the ...
— The Poetical Works of George MacDonald in Two Volumes, Volume I • George MacDonald

... hands began to grope wistfully about as if they sought something—she had been blind some hours. The end was come; all knew it. With a great sob Hester gathered her to her breast, crying, "Oh, my child, my darling!" A rapturous light broke in the dying girl's face, for it was mercifully vouchsafed her to ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... with what pertinacity I grope about old alleys, old courts, by-lanes, and unfrequented corners—in search of what is curious, or precious, or rare in the book way. But ere we touch that enchanting chord, let us proceed according to the plan laid down. First therefore for printing-offices. Of ...
— A Bibliographical, Antiquarian and Picturesque Tour in France and Germany, Volume One • Thomas Frognall Dibdin

... relieved to find it dark, and to all appearance, untenanted. He drew a long breath. Here he was, home again in safety, and this should be his last folly as certainly as it had been his first. The matches stood on a little table by the bed, and he began to grope his way in that direction. As he moved, his apprehensions grew upon him once more, and he was pleased, when his foot encountered an obstacle, to find it nothing more alarming than a chair. At last he touched curtains. From the position ...
— New Arabian Nights • Robert Louis Stevenson

... dark and empty when Ritter and his following entered. They could scarcely see and had to grope their way after the young man that led them to seats in the parquet. Gradually, their eyes grew accustomed to the darkness, and they could distinguish the vast windowless cave, with its rows of seats, ...
— Atlantis • Gerhart Hauptmann

... while her literary hopes were waning, an anxiety of another kind was increasing. Her father's eyesight had become seriously impaired by the progress of the cataract which was forming. He was nearly blind. He could grope his way about, and recognise the figures of those he knew well, when they were placed against a strong light; but he could no longer see to read; and thus his eager appetite for knowledge and information of all kinds was severely ...
— The Life of Charlotte Bronte • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell

... mistaking his start. Beyond doubt he had winced as though stung, and was now striving to grope his way to the railing. She divined his purpose in an instant, and her slender hand was laid pleadingly yet ...
— The Deserter • Charles King

... turn aside from laws and statutes and consider the ordinary life and social intercourse of the Negro, we shall find more than one contradiction, for in the colonial era codes affecting slaves and free Negroes had to grope their way to uniformity. Especially is it necessary to distinguish between the earlier and the later years of the period, for as early as 1760 the liberalism of the Revolutionary era began to be felt. If we consider what was strictly ...
— A Social History of the American Negro • Benjamin Brawley

... to count his pulse and judge how long it took him to descend that causeway in the dark. It was not so very rough, nor so very dangerous, but of course he only knew that fact afterward. He had to grope his way inch by inch, trusting to sense of touch and the British army's everlasting luck, with an eye all the while on a red light that was something like ...
— King—of the Khyber Rifles • Talbot Mundy

... solemn funeral, Alone and weeping and disconsolate, I sat at evening by the cottage door. I felt as if a dark and bitter fate Had fallen on me in my tender years. I seemed an aimless wanderer doomed to grope In vain among the darkling years and die. One only star shone through the shadowy mists. The moon that wandered in the gloomy heavens Was robed in shrouds; the rugged, looming hills Looked desolate;—the silent river seemed A ...
— The Feast of the Virgins and Other Poems • H. L. Gordon

... Channel. Pains and penalties were threatened against any newspaper which should dare to publish a word of military information beyond the official communiques issued in order to hide the truth. Only by a careful study of maps from day to day and a microscopic reading between the lines could one grope one's way to any kind of clear fact which would reveal something more than the vague optimism, the patriotic fervour, of those early dispatches issued from the Ministry of War. Now and again a name would creep into these communiques which after a glance at the ...
— The Soul of the War • Philip Gibbs

... a hole, he sat for a bit on his coat and panted and breathed foul air. 'Twas dark as a wolf's mouth, of course, and he didn't know from Adam what dangers lay around him; but he couldn't bide still long and so rose up and began to grope with feet and hands. He kicked a few of the big stones that Ernest Gregory had thrown down, as he thought atop of him; and then he found the bottom of the hole was bigger than he guessed. And then he kicked a soft object ...
— The Torch and Other Tales • Eden Phillpotts

... with an object, which a timely flash of lightning showed me was a column, standing in exactly the opposite direction from my own house. I could now locate myself correctly, and the lightning becoming every moment more vivid, I was enabled to grope my way by slow degrees to the mess, where I expected to find some one to show me my way home; but the servants, who knew from experience the probable effects of a cyclone, had already closed the outside Venetian shutters and barred all the doors. In vain I banged at the door and called ...
— Boys' Book of Famous Soldiers • J. Walker McSpadden

... were none of the common-places of poetic diction in our author's time, no reflected lights of fancy, no borrowed roseate tints; he was obliged to inspect things for himself, to look narrowly, and almost to handle the object, as in the obscurity of morning we partly see and partly grope our way; so that his descriptions have a sort of tangible character belonging to them, and produce the effect of sculpture on the mind. Chaucer had an equal eye for truth of nature and discrimination of character; ...
— Lectures on the English Poets - Delivered at the Surrey Institution • William Hazlitt

... the wind-flower would grope its way Out of the darkness into the day; That the rain would fall and the sun would shine, And the rainbow hang in the ...
— St. Nicholas, Vol. 5, No. 5, March, 1878 • Various

... under water till only his antler tips showed, and nose around on the bottom till he found a lily root. With a heave and a jerk he would drag it out, and stand chewing it endwise with huge satisfaction, while the muddy water trickled down over his face. When it was all eaten he would grope under the lily pads for another root in ...
— Wood Folk at School • William J. Long

... the middle of the floor; And, trembling at each breath of air that stirr'd, He grope'd down stairs, and open'd the street door, While Toby was performing peal ...
— Broad Grins • George Colman, the Younger

... idea of how much she may think it necessary to remove, and thankful that you are sleeping peacefully through all the turmoil, I get up and grope ...
— Round the Wonderful World • G. E. Mitton

... deny to be her guide, 830 She must renounce Decorum's plan, And get back when, and how she can; As parsons, who, without pretext, As soon as mention'd, quit their text, And, to promote sleep's genial power, Grope in the dark for half an hour, Give no more reason (for we know Reason is vulgar, mean, and low) Why they come back (should it befall That ever they come back at all) 840 Into the road, to end their rout, Than they ...
— Poetical Works • Charles Churchill

... Then, brethren, let us cherish a noble discontent with all that we at present are. Let our spirits stretch out all their powers to the better things beyond, as the plants grown in darkness will send out pale shoots that feel blindly towards the light, or the seed sown on the top of a rock will grope down the bare stone for the earth by which it must be fed. Let the sense of our own weakness ever lead to a buoyant confidence in what we, even we, may become if we will only take the grace we have. To this touchstone ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren

... it to continue its existence elsewhere, but that those who hated the thought of such change could, by taking thought, prolong life and live for a thousand years, like the adder and tortoise or for ever. But no, he would not leave the poor boy to grope alone and blindly after that hidden knowledge he was burning to possess. He pitied him too much. The means were simple and near to hand, the earth teemed with the virtue that would save him from the dissolution which so appalled him. He would be startled to hear in ...
— Birds in Town and Village • W. H. Hudson

... was foggy, but they thought it would soon clear up. They had only proceeded a short distance, however, when they got on to a sandbank, where they were obliged to remain for two hours, feeling the gravest anxiety all the time. At last the tide floated them off again, and they endeavoured to grope their way through the fog, passing several vessels, which were only visible when quite close upon them. Mr Montefiore was standing near the bow of the ship, when suddenly a steamer was seen to be quite close to them, and before it was possible ...
— Diaries of Sir Moses and Lady Montefiore, Volume I • Sir Moses Montefiore

... you grope With your half-blind periscope, Lo, your hateful trail we mark, Send you ...
— Songs for a Little House • Christopher Morley

... for a daring policy, had undertaken to attack the Danish defences with a squadron of twelve seventy-fours, and the frigates and bomb-vessels of the fleet. He determined to shun the open way of King's Channel, grope through the uncertain passage called the Dutch Deep, at the back of the Middle Ground, and forcing his way up the narrow channel in front of the shallows, repeat on the anchored batteries and battleships of ...
— Deeds that Won the Empire - Historic Battle Scenes • W. H. Fitchett

... Europe is so tragic as this. That two peoples should, within the space of nine months, abjure their friendly relations and furiously grapple in a life and death struggle over questions of secondary importance leads the dazed beholder at first to grope after the old Greek idea of ate or Nemesis. In reality the case does not call for supernatural agency. The story is pitiably human, if the student will but master its complex details. It may be well to close our study with a few general observations, though they ...
— William Pitt and the Great War • John Holland Rose

... Both psychology and science grope when they would explain to us the strange adventures of our immaterial selves when wandering in the realm of "Death's twin brother, Sleep." This story will not attempt to be illuminative; it is no more than a record of Murray's dream. One of the most ...
— Rolling Stones • O. Henry

... no tree, nor grass, nor anything that would serve for food, in this gloomy abyss. But when the Giant Ymir began to grope around for something to satisfy his hunger, he heard a sound as of some animal chewing the cud; and there among the ice-hills he saw a gigantic cow, from whose udder flowed four great streams of milk, and with this his craving was ...
— Told by the Northmen: - Stories from the Eddas and Sagas • E. M. [Ethel Mary] Wilmot-Buxton

... such trouble in his face that Nan had to turn away. He understood her too well. Could he read in her eyes what her mind had resolved not to tell him? Yet she would tell him. He shouldn't grope about in the dark among these mysteries. She wanted, as much as Old Crow wanted it, to be ...
— Old Crow • Alice Brown

... up in bed and began to grope for the matchbox. But this passed away. The face of Death grew mild, and then seemed to smile. He lay down on his side, his face turned from the open window, composed himself into a comfortable attitude, and fell softly into ...
— Kafir Stories - Seven Short Stories • William Charles Scully

... they met often—in the ward for a few sentences that meant much to each of them; down town by arrangement in a cafe, or once or twice for dinner; and once for a day in the country, though not alone; and he was always the same. Sometimes, on night duty, she would grope for an adjective to fit him, and could only think of "tender." He was that. And she hated it, or all but hated it. She did not want tenderness from him, for it seemed to her that tenderness meant that he was, as it were, standing aloof from her, ...
— Simon Called Peter • Robert Keable

... and what they had escaped—all these had distracted them. They danced, sang, wept, laughed, shouted in a sort of maudlin frenzy, spun about deliriously until they dropped. They were deafened, and some of them could not see but had to grope their way. I remember one man who sat down and pulled off his boots and socks and threw them away and then hobbled on in his bare feet until he cut the bottoms of them to pieces. I don't care to see anything like that again—even if it is my enemies ...
— Paths of Glory - Impressions of War Written At and Near the Front • Irvin S. Cobb

... touch of rheumatism, so she waited for me on the doorstep as I climbed the stairs to the third floor. The noise-proof back room where "The French Revolution" was writ, twice over, was so dark that I had to grope my way across to the window. The sash stuck and seemed to have a will of its own, like him who so often had raised it. But at last it gave way and I flung wide the shutter and looked down at the little arbor where Teufelsdrockh sat so ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Vol. 1 of 14 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Good Men and Great • Elbert Hubbard

... grope for Somewhat far off, yet to hope for, That through some future repentance, Justice ...
— My Life as an Author • Martin Farquhar Tupper

... figure crouching on the doorstep I had anticipated finding as empty as the road. It was an old man's figure, and as I paused in my embarrassment he slowly and with great feebleness rose to his feet and began to grope about for the door. As he did so, I heard a sharp tinkling sound, as of something metallic falling on the doorstone, and, taking a quick step forward, I looked over his shoulder and espied in the moonlight at his feet ...
— Agatha Webb • Anna Katharine Green

... before, they ascended to the Staked Plain, and are now nearly across it. Guided by the traitor, they had no need to grope their way, and have made quick time. In a few hours more they will pounce upon the prey for which ...
— The Lone Ranche • Captain Mayne Reid

... hath him be the bridel sesed, And seide: "O thou, which hast desesed 3010 The Court of France be thi wrong, Now schalt thou singe an other song: Thin enterdit and thi sentence Ayein thin oghne conscience Hierafter thou schalt fiele and grope. We pleigne noght ayein the Pope, For thilke name is honourable, Bot thou, which hast be deceivable And tricherous in al thi werk, Thou Bonefas, thou proude clerk, 3020 Misledere of the Papacie, Thi false bodi schal abye And soffre that it hath deserved." ...
— Confessio Amantis - Tales of the Seven Deadly Sins, 1330-1408 A.D. • John Gower

... should like to know, things about that dark future where some of our hearts live so constantly, things about the depths of His nature and the divine character, things about the relation between God's love and God's righteousness, things about the meaning of all this dreadful mystery in which we grope our way. These and a hundred other questionings suggest to us that it would have been so easy for Him to have lifted a little corner of the veil, and let a little more of the light shine out. He holds ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture: St. John Chaps. XV to XXI • Alexander Maclaren

... than old school-friends—friends who had scarcely met for years but whom this unlooked-for chance had brought together with a rush. It was a relief, Miss Gostrey hinted, to feel herself no longer groping; she was unaccustomed to grope and as a general thing, he might well have seen, made straight enough for her clue. With the one she had now picked up in her hands there need be at least no waste of wonder. "She's coming to see me—that's for YOU," Strether's counsellor continued; "but ...
— The Ambassadors • Henry James

... false!—And I? O, she shall find me true— "True as a fabl'd devil to the soul "He longs for with the heat of all hell's fires. "These myths serve well for simile, I see. "And yet—Down, Pity! knock not at my breast, "Nor grope about for that dull stone my heart; "I'll stone thee with it, Pity! Get thee hence, "Pity, I'll strangle thee with naked hands; "For thou dost bear upon thy downy breast "Remorse, shap'd like a serpent, and her fangs "Might dart at me and pierce my marrow ...
— Old Spookses' Pass • Isabella Valancy Crawford

... cold, And he shrank from the tawny wizard's boasts, And the hovering shadows seemed full of ghosts, And above, below, and on every side, The fear of his creed seemed verified;— And think, if his lot were now thine own, To grope with terrors nor named nor known, How laxer muscle and weaker nerve And a feebler faith thy need might serve; And own to thyself the wonder more That the snake had two heads, and not ...
— Selections From American Poetry • Various

... description of this magnificent universe written by the Omnipotent hand! Of man it should set forth his relations to other living beings, his place among them, his privileges, and responsibilities. It should not leave him to grope his way through the vestiges of Greek philosophy, and to miss the truth at last; but it should teach him wherein true knowledge consists, anticipating the physical science, physical power, and physical well-being ...
— History of the Intellectual Development of Europe, Volume I (of 2) - Revised Edition • John William Draper

... top, without being able to get back to the bottom. The difficulty of descending is much greater than that of ascending. In the latter, you can see where you are to set your feet, and also what you are to take hold of with your hands; whereas, in the former you have not this advantage; but must grope your way downward, and are therefore continually exposed to the danger of missing your footing, and being precipitated ...
— The Plant Hunters - Adventures Among the Himalaya Mountains • Mayne Reid

... carefully in both his dogskin-gloved hands. He crossed to the hearth, stubbing his toe against a jutting floor-brick, and as he did so he caught his breath. Then he stepped down under the yawning gape of the chimney, and seemed to grope and fumble at the back of the hearth. He raised himself then, stepped back, and called out sharply in ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves

... was all over and she came out from under the opiate, she lay for a while, open-eyed but unseeing, too inert to grope for the lost thread of memory. She felt a stirring in the bed beside her, the movement of some living thing. She looked and there, squeezed into the edge of the pillow was a miniature head of a little old man—wrinkled, copperish. ...
— The Cost • David Graham Phillips

... not a word, but uttered ugly growls; and she heard his hands rub and grope along the wall, against herself. She pulled open the door of her bedroom and fled up the stairs and fell in a heap in the corner beside her bed. There she sat waiting, out of breath.... Yes, his heavy shoes had found the steps; and, still growling, he entered the room. He felt the bed, lay down ...
— The Path of Life • Stijn Streuvels

... ye have the greatest risk of it, and so it will go on ever growing and growing with your disgrace, that ye will never get rid of it until ye bring yourselves into a strait, and have to fight your way out with weapons; but in that there is a long and weary night in which ye will have to grope your way." ...
— The story of Burnt Njal - From the Icelandic of the Njals Saga • Anonymous

... of the police officer's apartment Dermot wished him good-night and proceeded down the passage, which was lit only by a feeble lamp placed in a niche high up in the wall. He had to grope his way through the outer chambers by the aid of matches, and when he reached his room, was surprised to find it in darkness, for he had left a light burning in it. He struck more matches, and was annoyed to discover that his lamp had been taken away. Being very tired he felt inclined ...
— The Elephant God • Gordon Casserly

... We build to mimic life with pygmy hands, Not in those earliest days when men ran wild And gashed each other with their knives of stone, When their low foreheads bulged in ridgy brows And their flat hands were callous in the palm With walking in the fashion of their sires, Grope as they might to find a cruel god To work their will on such as human wrath Had wrought its worst to torture, and had left With rage unsated, white and stark and cold, Could hate have shaped a demon more malign ...
— The Poet at the Breakfast Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

... chord in the music That's missed when her voice is away!" Though I listen from midnight tel morning, And dawn tel the dusk of the day! And I grope through the dark, lookin' upwards And on through the heavenly dome, With my longin' soul singin' and sobbin' The words "Do ...
— Riley Love-Lyrics • James Whitcomb Riley

... of letters broke on the torpor of the dark ages of the North in speculative disquisition; the Arabian and the Aristotelian subtleties engaged the attention of the earliest cultivators of modern prose (as separated from poetic fiction), and the first instinct of the awakened reason was to grope through the misty twilight after TRUTH. Philosophy precedes even history; men were desirous of solving the enigmas of the world, before they disentangled from tradition the chronicles ...
— Athens: Its Rise and Fall, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... your bed, leddie," said Bob Tubbs, the old man whose acquaintance I had so unceremoniously formed. "Ye'll find it there, for'ard, if ye'll grope your way. It's not over airy, but it's ...
— Tales of the Sea - And of our Jack Tars • W.H.G. Kingston

... he passes; and if not speedily rubbed with snow, the nose of the poor passenger is lost! Men's very eyes are sometimes frozen up, and they have no resource but to beg admission at the first door to which they can grope, to unthaw their glued lashes ...
— The Rambles of a Rat • A. L. O. E.

... well hab a candle," she said, after a time. "Git yer knittin', chile, an' 'pear as ef ye didn't distrus' de Lord. What ef de wind is blowin'? what ef de sea is a-screamin'? Don't ye know whose wind and whose sea 'tis?" She got up to grope for a candle on ...
— Culm Rock - The Story of a Year: What it Brought and What it Taught • Glance Gaylord

... so pitch dark that he had almost to grope his way, for it was impossible to see a hand's breadth in front of him. In the adjacent country not a leaf moved. Only some night-birds flying across the road from one hedge to the other brushed Pinocchio's ...
— Childhood's Favorites and Fairy Stories - The Young Folks Treasury, Volume 1 • Various

... Borrow's differences from him are far greater than the resemblances between them. Giant force was in both of them; both were enigmas; but the deeper we penetrate into Borrow, the more we like him; not so with the blue-eyed Dean. Borrow's depths are dark and tortuous, but never miasmic; and as we grope our way through them, we may stumble upon treasures, but never ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 5 • Various

... Where Hunger and Vice, like twin beasts of prey, Have hunted their victims to gloom and despair; Raise the rich, dainty dress, and the fine broidered skirt, Pick your delicate way through the dampness and dirt. Grope through the dark dens, climb the rickety stair To the garret, where wretches, the young and the old, Half starved and half naked, lie crouched from the cold; See those skeleton limbs, those frost-bitten feet, All bleeding and ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume VIII (of X) • Various

... not see far enough through the blurring snow to judge in which general direction the least dangerous route lay, while the few dim, momentary glimpses I caught of mountains through rifts in the flying clouds were far from encouraging either as weather signs or as guides. I had simply to grope my way from crevasse to crevasse, holding a general direction by the ice-structure, which was not to be seen everywhere, and partly by the wind. Again and again I was put to my mettle, but Stickeen followed easily, his nerve apparently growing more ...
— Stickeen • John Muir

... up into the region of faith, and quiet himself there when the result of the seeking was known, was almost impossible for Loretz. He could fear the Judge who had decreed, but could he trust in Him? He began to grope back among his follies of the past, seeking a crime he had not repented, as the cause of this domestic calamity. But ah! to reap such a harvest as this for any youthful folly! Poor soul! little he knew of vengeance and retribution. ...
— Lippincott's Magazine Of Popular Literature And Science, No. 23, February, 1873, Vol. XI. • Various

... the Philanthus were guided in her operation solely by the question of vulnerability, it is here certainly that she ought to strike, instead of persistently seeking the narrow slit in the neck. The weapon would not need to hesitate and grope; it would obtain admission into the tissues off-hand. No, the stroke of the lancet is not forced upon it mechanically: the assassin scorns the large defect in the corselet and prefers the place under the chin, for eminently logical reasons which we ...
— More Hunting Wasps • J. Henri Fabre

... one November evening at dusk, when all was mud, mist, and darkness, out of doors, and a good deal of fog had even got into the family parlor. To say the truth, the parlor was on no occasion fog-proof, and had, at divers notable times, been so misty as to cause the whole Bull family to grope about, in a most confused manner, and make the strangest mistakes. But, there was an excellent ventilator over the family fire-place (not one of Dr. Arnott's, though it was of the same class, being an excellent invention, called Common Sense), and hence, though ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 2, No. 8, January, 1851 • Various

... aside and see The little Child on Mary's knee? Enter the stable bleak and cold, Grope through the straw and myrrh and gold; Seek in the darkness near and far— Lift up the lantern and the Star. Rough shepherds came to love and greet, There knelt three kings at Mary's feet. Ah! draw thee nigh the holy place— He sleepeth well in ...
— Eyes of Youth - A Book of Verse by Padraic Colum, Shane Leslie, A.O. • Various

... its name from a word that may signify the meadow of Eois, or high meadow. It has a history that goes back to grope about Ararat for the potsherds thrown out of the ark. It has a very old and famous round tower, used at some time as a place of sepulchre, for a great quantity of human bones have been found in it. In one stone of this tower is the mark of two toes printed into the stone, or the mark ...
— The Letters of "Norah" on her Tour Through Ireland • Margaret Dixon McDougall

... what sounded, at one moment, like a shivering of her whole body; at another, like a rustling of her garments; at a third, like a slow scraping of her hands over the table on the other side of her, and of her feet over the floor. She had summoned courage enough at last to move, and to grope her way out—he knew it as he listened. He heard her touch the edge of the half-opened door; he heard the still sound of her first footfall on the stone passage outside; then the noise of her hand drawn along the ...
— Hide and Seek • Wilkie Collins

... could not see a foot before him, and could only worm his way among them, testing each before he trusted it, and finding at times monsters become but mediocre when his hand was on them. More than once he had to rest his hands on cautiously-tried ledges and swing his legs forward and grope with his feet for foothold, and whether the space below was trifling, or whether it ran to incredible depth, he ...
— A Maid of the Silver Sea • John Oxenham

... brief while ago that mine was work without glory, ye said truly. But consider that in this confused and dark world, in which we grope our way like shepherds in a mist, we have to do what lies to our hand, and ask no questions—and the weariness of it is that in the darkness we strike ane another. We know not which be right, and shall not know till the day breaks: we maun just do our duty, and mine, by every drop ...
— Graham of Claverhouse • Ian Maclaren

... pass an old log cabin about which there hangs a ghostly superstition. At a certain hour in the night, during the time the bark is loose on the hemlock, a female form is said to steal from it and grope its way into the wilderness. The tradition runs that her lover, who was a bark-peeler and wielded the spud, was killed by his rival, who felled a tree upon him while they were at work. The girl, who helped her mother cook for the 'hands,' was crazed by the shock, and that night stole forth into ...
— Locusts and Wild Honey • John Burroughs

... Jordan did not roll between. Rolling had long ceased to be a pleasant figure of speech with me. How frail are all things here below, how false, and yet how fair! My mind is naturally picturesque. In the midst of my sadness the force of nature compelled me to grope after an illustration. I could only think that my own foothold was frail, that the Jane Moseley was false, that the Pretty Girl was fair. A dizziness of brain resulted from this rhetorical effort. I silently ...
— The Wit of Women - Fourth Edition • Kate Sanborn

... strike a light. There are biscuits somewhere, in a box. Grope for them. There's a couch in ...
— The Wild Olive • Basil King

... with him in all his appreciations, has alone caught with his haughty eye the characteristic lineaments of this catastrophe of human genius contending with divine chance. All the other historians suffer from a certain bedazzlement in which they grope about. It was a flashing day, in truth the overthrow of the military monarchy which, to the great stupor of the kings, has dragged down all kingdoms, the downfall of strength and the ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume 4 (of 10) • Various

... aerial cope, With eyes enkindled as the sun's own sphere, Hope from the front of youth in godlike cheer Looks Godward, past the shades where blind men grope Round the dark door that prayers nor dreams can ope, And makes for joy the very darkness dear That gives her wide wings play; nor dreams that fear At noon may rise and pierce the heart of hope. Then, when the soul leaves off to dream and yearn, May truth first purge her eyesight to discern ...
— Sonnets, and Sonnets on English Dramatic Poets (1590-1650) • Algernon Charles Swinburne

... were discovered in the obscurest recesses of monasteries; they were not always imprisoned in libraries, but rotting in dark unfrequented corners with rubbish. It required not less ingenuity to find out places where to grope in, than to understand the value of the acquisition. An universal ignorance then prevailed in the knowledge of ancient writers. A scholar of those times gave the first rank among the Latin writers to ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli

... live alone in the dark, confusing the day and night; dropping to sleep through sheer weariness at mid-day, and rising restless in the chill of the dawn. At first Dick, on his awakenings, would grope along the corridors of the chambers till he heard some one snore. Then he would know that the day had not yet come, and return wearily to ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling

... love and pain Into dull slumber; still we can retell How young blithe valour broke the powers of hell; We grope for hands that will not stir again In ours, hear still in every ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, June 9, 1920 • Various

... me my mind and sperit loved to grope around more and find out things to praise and blame by rote and not by note, and Dorothy and Robert Strong ...
— Around the World with Josiah Allen's Wife • Marietta Holley

... stood for some seconds. His lips moved, but no words escaped them. His hand remained within his shirt, and his fingers continued to grope about mechanically. And all the time the dazed, strained look burned ...
— The Hound From The North • Ridgwell Cullum

... day they make more history in Secessia than here. Jeff. Davis overshadows Lincoln. Jeff. Davis and his gang of malefactors are pushed into the whirlpool of action by the nature of their crime; here, our leaders dread action, and grope. The rebels have a clear, decisive, almost palpable aim; ...
— Diary from March 4, 1861, to November 12, 1862 • Adam Gurowski

... Estrangement of their exile, twice accursed If they forget and join the accursed throng. How doth my heart that is so wrung not burst When I remember that my way was plain, And that God's candle lit me at the first, Whilst now I grope in darkness, grope in vain, Desiring but to find Him Who is lost, To find him once again, but once again! His wrath came on us to the uttermost, His covenanted and most righteous wrath. Yet this is He of Whom we made our boast, Who lit ...
— Poems • Christina G. Rossetti

... mine of long ago. How could we know?—) For who should guess The shock and smiting of that perfectness?— The lily-thrust of those ecstatic feet Unpityingly sweet?— Sweet beyond all the blurred blind dreams that grope The upward paths of hope? And who could guess The dulcet holiness, The lilt and gladness of those jocund feet, Unpityingly sweet? Ah, for your coolness that shall change and stir With every glee of her!— Under the fresh amaze That drips and glistens from her wiles and ways; When the endearing air ...
— The Singing Man • Josephine Preston Peabody

... ruins—grey lumps against the moon: they were the houses of a little town. A sort of gulf, winding like a river gorge, and narrower than a column of men, was the street that brought us in. But just as we feared that we should have to grope our way to find companionship we saw that great surprise of modern mountain villages (but not of our own England)—a little row of electric lamps hanging from ...
— Hills and the Sea • H. Belloc

... so fragile! just twenty— How mocking the bells sound to-night! She starved in this great land of plenty, When she tried to grope back to the light. Christ. are Thy disciples inhuman, Or only for men hast Thou died? No mercy is shown to a woman Who once ...
— The Kingdom of Love - and Other Poems • Ella Wheeler Wilcox

... overdrawn. Hundreds of these Indians have long lost faith in paganism, and in their hours of peril, or in the presence of death even, many of them who have learned but little about Christianity cling to those who have some knowledge of the great salvation and strive to grope into the way. ...
— Oowikapun - How the Gospel Reached the Nelson River Indians • Egerton Ryerson Young

... desire to note the progress of this humanity-freighted vessel in its voyage over an uncertain sea, yet, as we trust, toward lands of perpetual security and peace. All are voyagers on the sea of life. Some, with the knowledge of ancient days only, grope their way by headlands, or trust themselves occasionally to the guidance of the sun or the stars; while others, with the chart and compass of the Christian era, move confidently on their course, attracted by the Source and Centre of all good. And it is a blessing of this state of existence, though ...
— Thoughts on Educational Topics and Institutions • George S. Boutwell

... himself to his feet, and with one shaking hand on the table felt his way around until he stood directly in front of her; he put his face close to hers and stared into her eyes, his lower lip opening and closing in silence. Then, without speaking, he began to grope about on the table ...
— The Awakening of Helena Richie • Margaret Deland

... still, not from any bravery or presence of mind, but from utter annihilation of both qualities in the shock and surprise of it all. At last I began trying to grope my way toward the door. I found it. Some people—I heard and felt rather than saw—were standing about the battered-in door, and there was the sound of water hurrying past the door-way. The Rhine was rushing down ...
— The First Violin - A Novel • Jessie Fothergill

... swarming about. How pathetic it is to see the father with one child in his arms and two clinging to his coat-tails, while the mother (poor bedraggled soul) is vainly striving to quieten a squalling fourth! Some children have lost their parents, and grope about underneath, nipping the legs of tourists to attract attention and get hold of the right father; others fall among bales of strawberries that were pulled yesterday in the fresh country air, but are now being trampled into gory pulp. Even in the fetid and dust-laden air, rendered ...
— Literary Tours in The Highlands and Islands of Scotland • Daniel Turner Holmes

... aisles were almost dark when he entered, and he had to grope his way to the chapel steps. Under the momentary evocation of the sunset, the saint's figure emerged pale and swooning from the dusk, and the warm light gave a sensual tinge to her ecstasy. The flesh seemed to glow and heave, the eyelids to tremble; Wyant stood fascinated by the ...
— The Early Short Fiction of Edith Wharton, Part 1 (of 10) • Edith Wharton

... quibblers he has to silence. The writing of explanatory notes is like no other species of literature. History throws {52} little light upon their origin [the ballads, I suppose?], or the cause which gave rise to their composition. He has to grope his way in the dark: like Bunyan's pilgrim, on crossing the Valley of the Shadow of Death, he hears sounds and noises, but cannot, to a certainty, tell from whence they come, nor to what place they proceed. The one time, he has to treat of fabulous ballads ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 65, January 25, 1851 • Various

... then spun around so as to confuse his sense of direction. He then says, "Still pond; no more moving!" whereupon the other players must stand still, being allowed only three steps thereafter. The blindfolded player begins to grope for the others. When he catches one, he must guess by touching the hair, dress, etc., whom he has caught. If he guesses correctly, the player changes places with him. If incorrectly, he must go on with his search. The players may resort to any reasonable devices for escaping the hands ...
— Games for the Playground, Home, School and Gymnasium • Jessie H. Bancroft

... dreadful, whenever I go into the house alone so late at night. I bolt the inside door. I mount the hall-chair, left waiting by papa, and, trembling with a nameless fear, turn out the gas and leave myself in darkness. I make two vain dashes for the stair; a third, and I have found it. I grope for the heavy rail and go rapidly up, two steps at a time, and finally, out of breath, badly frightened, reach my room. What a relief! I turn on the light—two, three, yes, four burners, and wish for ...
— The Inner Sisterhood - A Social Study in High Colors • Douglass Sherley et al.

... sanctuaries in the sacred studies which God has not willed that we should probe, and if we try to penetrate there, we grope in ever deeper darkness the farther we proceed, so that we recognize, in this manner, too, the inscrutable majesty of divine wisdom and ...
— Erasmus and the Age of Reformation • Johan Huizinga

... to say, my boy," retorted the yeoman. "Pray God he never has, and never may. Slow work this, however! I should really be glad to find something! Pshaw! What a notion that is, when the only good luck would be to paddle, and drift, and poke, and grope, hereabouts, till morning, and have our labor for our pains! For my part, I shouldn't wonder if the creature had only lost her shoe in the mud, and saved her soul alive, after all. My stars! how she will laugh at us, ...
— The Blithedale Romance • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... where was an unfindable thing. And she dared not strike forward without the track; she might get further and further from it, and never get home to breakfast at all! — There was nothing for it but to grope about seeking for indications; and Miss Haye's eyes were untrained to wood-work. The woodland was a mazy wilderness now indeed. Points of stone, beds of moss, cat-briar vines and huckleberry bushes, in every direction; and between which of them lay that little invisible track of a ...
— Hills of the Shatemuc • Susan Warner

... Mother, and its hilts are come to hand, And look that thou whet it duly; for the Norns are departed now; From the blood of our foster-brother no branch of bale shall grow; Hoodwinked are the Gods of heaven, their sleep-dazed eyes are blind; They shall peer and grope through the darkness, and nought therein shall find, Save the red right hand of Guttorm, and his lips that never swore; At the young man's deed shall they wonder, and all shall be covered o'er: Ho, Guttorm, enter, and hearken to ...
— The Story of Sigurd the Volsung and the Fall of the Niblungs • William Morris

... scarcely two, I am suddenly aware Of the angels in the air. All your softly gracious ways Make an island in my days Where my thoughts fly back to be Sheltered from too strong a sea. All your luminous delight Shines before me in the night When I grope for sleep and find ...
— Rivers to the Sea • Sara Teasdale

... which we passed, I embraced him with an extreme pleasure. We had entered by the backstairs; we descended by the same, so as not to be observed. It was dark, so that on both occasions we were obliged to grope our way. Upon arriving at the bottom I could not refrain from again embracing Millain, so great was my pleasure, and we ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre

... Mackenzie enjoyed after coming out of his shock was that somebody was smoking near at hand; the next that the sun was in his eyes. But these were indifferent things, drowned in a flood of pain. He put them aside, not to grope after the cause of his discomfort, for that was apart from him entirely, but to lie, throbbing in every nerve, indifferent either ...
— The Flockmaster of Poison Creek • George W. Ogden

... in, ye'll fin' a' ready," and she blew out her crusie which she had in her hand, and letting the captain grope in by himself, hirpled as fast as she could to one of the neighbours; for, although she had covenanted with him to come without his sword, she was terrified with the fear ...
— Ringan Gilhaize - or The Covenanters • John Galt

... with poisonous malodorous gases arising from accumulations of sewerage, refuse scattered in all directions, and often flowing beneath your feet; courts, many of them, which the sun never penetrates, which are never visited by a breath of fresh air. You have to ascend rotten stair-cases, grope your way along dark and filthy passages swarming with vermin. Then, if you are not driven back by the intolerable stench, you may gain admittance into the dens in which these thousands of beings herd together. Eight feet square! That is about ...
— Deaconesses in Europe - and their Lessons for America • Jane M. Bancroft

... termes coude he, two or three, That he had lerned out of some decree; No wonder is, he herd it all the day. And eke ye knowen wel, how that a jay Can clepen watte, as well as can the pope. But who so wolde in other thing him grope, Than hadde he spent all his philosophie, Ay, Questio ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury

... grope seem to have no grasp in it, and, if a stationary balloon will, in half an hour, not cast a stationary shadow from the setting sun, we have to think of two triangular objects that accurately maintained ...
— The Book of the Damned • Charles Fort

... mine hands grope up and down, And cannot find thee; I am wondrous sick: Have I thy hand Amintor? Amint. Thou greatest blessing ...
— The Maids Tragedy • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher

... and console us ordinary mortals, who advance no pretence to superior wisdom and ability, to see the huge mistakes made by both these very sagacious personages,—Dr. Riccabocca, valuing himself on his profound acquaintance with character, and Randal Leslie, accustomed to grope into every hole and corner of thought and action, wherefrom to extract that knowledge which is power! For whereas the sage, judging not only by his own heart in youth, but by the general influence of the master passion on the young, had ...
— My Novel, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... grope between light and darkness only with the help of the uncertain guidance offered it by analogy. It has reduced to fact and mathematical precision the physical motion and the paths of the heavenly bodies, and—no more. So far, it has been unable to discover with any approach to certainty the physical ...
— Five Years Of Theosophy • Various

... fire-fly made a spot of light in the blackness, only to leave a deeper spot of blackness when he shut off his intermittent ray. And when at last Julia found herself at the place where the path entered the woods, the blackness ahead seemed still more frightful. She had to grope, recognizing every deviation from the well-beaten path by the rustle of the dead leaves which lay, even in summer, half a foot deep upon the ground. The "fox-fire," rotting logs glowing with a faint luminosity, startled her several times, and the hooting-owl's shuddering bass—hoo! hoo! hoo-oo-ah-h! ...
— The End Of The World - A Love Story • Edward Eggleston

... hitherto dealt strictly with the physical; it has made almost no effort to test the claims of the spiritual. In fact, the highest of these claims, that of the existence of a deity, must lie forever beyond its reach. God may exist, and science grope for Him through eternity in vain. Finite facts can never gauge the infinite. Proofs and disproofs alike have been offered of the existence of an infinite deity, but the problem remains unsolved. None of these proofs or disproofs are positive; they all depend on ideal conceptions, and ideas are ...
— Man And His Ancestor - A Study In Evolution • Charles Morris

... born blind; blank, yet they sought; tortured, yet dry of tears. His head was tilted back, and a little sideways. So may you see an infant's as he nuzzles to his mother's breast. The two hands seemed to grope for a moment, then fell limp at ...
— True Tilda • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

... and a patriot," Furley continued, "just as much as you are, although you are a son of the Earl of Maltenby, and you fought in the war. You must listen to me without prejudice. There are thoughtful men in England, patriots to the backbone, trying to grope their way to the truth about this bloody sacrifice. There are thoughtful men in Germany on the same tack. If, for the betterment of the world, we should seek to come into touch with one another, I do not consider that treason, or communicating with an enemy country in the ordinary ...
— The Devil's Paw • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... often repeated that arrogant Hebraic cry: they have told us in their systems what God thinks about the world. Such pretensions would be surprising did we not remind ourselves of the obvious truth that what men attribute to God is nothing but the ideal they value and grope for in themselves, and that the commandments, mythically said to come from the Most High, flow in fact from ...
— The Life of Reason • George Santayana

... hopeless. I feel that there is reason lurking in you somewhere, so we will patiently grope round for it. We will now leave the dead American and proceed with my narrative. You can imagine that I could hardly come away from the Amazon without probing deeper into the matter. There were indications as to the direction from which the dead traveler ...
— The Lost World • Arthur Conan Doyle

... a certain extent, but it glanced off his left arm and caught the side of his head; and he, too, measured his length. All three, detective and police, were on their feet promptly, for none was seriously injured; but Furneaux was dazed and had to grope for the torch, and the second constable's lamp had gone out owing to a rush of oil from the cistern. Thus, during some precious seconds, they were ...
— The Strange Case of Mortimer Fenley • Louis Tracy

... the window, where the draught was strongest, Prescott found the smoke so thick that he had to grope his way through it; but bending low, he quickly came to where Grace Dodge ...
— The High School Left End - Dick & Co. Grilling on the Football Gridiron • H. Irving Hancock

... shall be none to fray them away. The LORD shall smite thee with the boil of Egypt, and with the emerods, and with the scurvy, and with the itch, whereof thou canst not be healed. The LORD shall smite thee with madness, and with blindness, and with astonishment of heart: and thou shalt grope at noonday, as the blind gropeth in darkness, and thou shalt not prosper in thy ways: and thou shalt be only oppressed and spoiled alway, and there shall be none to save thee. Thou shalt betroth a wife, and another man shall lie with her: thou shalt build an house, and thou shalt not ...
— Select Masterpieces of Biblical Literature • Various

... on my Chateau, cousin, to locate it on the road to Hell. But we will let it pass. For, between us, it is a good road and an easy; and they, who travel it, are a finer lot than the superstitious dreamers who grope, in darkness, along the bleak and stony path they fancy leads upward ...
— The Colonel of the Red Huzzars • John Reed Scott

... not scream at what she found there. Vic, sleeping on the couch behind a screen in the living room, yawned himself awake and proceeded reluctantly to set his feet upon the floor and grope, sleepy-eyed, for his clothes, absolutely unconscious that in the night sometime Peter had passed a certain mountain of difficulty and had reached out unafraid and pulled wide open the door of ...
— Starr, of the Desert • B. M Bower

... sufficient answer at last; he took his leave and departed. He could scarce find the door by which he had entered, and he had to grope his way down to the street. The loafers there who saw him nudged each other with a grin and said, "That chap has had ...
— A Hungarian Nabob • Maurus Jokai

... to see Mr. Gresham, I was directed to an unfashionable part of the town, to one of the dark old streets of the city; and from all appearance I thought I was going to grope my way into some strange dismal den, like many of the ancient houses in that quarter of the town. But, to my surprise, after passing through a court, and up an unpromising staircase, I found myself in a spacious apartment. The darkness changed to light, the smoke ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. VII - Patronage • Maria Edgeworth

... be some other door," said Rose after they had screamed themselves hoarse. "We must not be frightened, Anne, for father is sure to look for us. Let's go round the room and try and find a door. We can feel along the wall," so the two girls began to grope ...
— A Little Maid of Massachusetts Colony • Alice Turner Curtis

... in human evolution begins a World Teacher comes into voluntary incarnation and founds a religion that is suited to the requirements of the new era. Humanity is never left to grope along alone. All that it can comprehend and utilize is taught it in the various religions. World Teachers, the Christs and saviours of the race, have been appearing at propitious times ...
— Elementary Theosophy • L. W. Rogers

... I'm strong in body and brain; this robs me of my usefulness. All my life I have prayed that I might some time love a woman; that time has come, but this means I must give her up and be lonely all my days. I must grope my way through the dark with never a ray of light to guide me. Do you know how awful the darkness is?" He clasped his hands tightly. "I must go hungering through the night, with a voiceless love to torture me. Just at the ...
— Laughing Bill Hyde and Other Stories • Rex Beach

... the penal codes of slave states treat slaves and their masters. When we consider that guilt is in proportion to intelligence, and that these masters have by law doomed their slaves to ignorance, and then, as they darkle and grope along their blind way, inflict penalties upon them for a variety of acts regarded as praise worthy in whites; killing them for crimes, when whites are only fined or imprisoned—to call such a 'public opinion' inhuman, savage, murderous, diabolical, would be to ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society

... a candle," she said, after a time. "Git yer knittin', chile, an' 'pear as ef ye didn't distrus' de Lord. What ef de wind is blowin'? what ef de sea is a-screamin'? Don't ye know whose wind and whose sea 'tis?" She got up to grope for a candle on the ...
— Culm Rock - The Story of a Year: What it Brought and What it Taught • Glance Gaylord

... blends his thoughts of existence with the spiritual and works only as God works, 263:9 he will no longer grope in the dark and cling to earth because he has not tasted heaven. Carnal beliefs defraud us. They make man an involun- 263:12 tary hypocrite, - producing evil when he would create good, forming deformity when he would outline grace and beauty, injuring those whom he would bless. He 263:15 becomes ...
— Science and Health With Key to the Scriptures • Mary Baker Eddy

... suburbs of trading towns. This one went round the four sides of a square, with the yard for the vats in the middle. The ladders and passages she passed down were on the inside, narrow and dimly lighted: she had to grope her way sometimes. The floors shook constantly with the incessant thud of the great looms that filled each story, like heavy, monotonous thunder. It deafened her, made her dizzy, as she went down slowly. It was no short walk to reach the lower hall, but she was ...
— Margret Howth, A Story of To-day • Rebecca Harding Davis

... sun looks dull to me this morning. I have come from such a riotous dream. All last night I walked in a realm of such golden splendor, that I think even in our fullest noon I shall only see enough light to grope by ...
— Saxe Holm's Stories • Helen Hunt Jackson

... mankind will be equal to the effort required to assimilate the essential truth. They very nearly failed to assimilate the Copernican cosmogony. For sixteen hundred years after it was first offered to mankind the race preferred to grope in the darkness and confinement of ...
— Essays Towards a Theory of Knowledge • Alexander Philip

... commenced to grope. It stole into his own and lay there quietly. "Because I couldn't bear to see you hurt. You're so good. In some ways you're so strong; in others you're just as tiny as my Eric. I felt you needed me for ...
— The Kingdom Round the Corner - A Novel • Coningsby Dawson

... of darkness and terror, When I would grope nearer to God, With my back to a record of error And the highway of sin I have trod, There come to me shapes I would banish— The shapes of the deeds I have done; And I pray and I plead till they vanish— All vanish ...
— Poems of Passion • Ella Wheeler Wilcox

... to be a saint or a madonna; she had fallen from her pedestal so low that he could not find the way to descend and grope after the fragments of ...
— I Will Repay • Baroness Emmuska Orczy



Words linked to "Grope" :   fondle, seek, try, look for, touching, caress, search, assay, touch, essay, attempt



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