"Helplessly" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... showers were sent, which quite dissipated any fears which the expedition had entertained about suffering from thirst, while the rain cooled the sand and thus tempered the hot air of the desert to a pleasant warmth. Next, when the guides lost their way, and all were wandering helplessly, birds appeared who guided them on the right path, flying before them and encouraging them to march, and waiting for those of them who fell behind wearied. "We are even assured by Kallisthones that, at night, the birds ...
— Plutarch's Lives Volume III. • Plutarch
... was ill; his uncle, my vakeel, came to me with a report that "his nose was bleeding violently!" Several other men fell ill: they lay helplessly about the deck in low muttering delirium, their eyes as yellow as orange-peel. In two or three days the vessel was so horribly offensive as to be unbearable; THE PLAGUE HAD BROKEN OUT! We floated past the river Sobat junction; ...
— The Albert N'Yanza, Great Basin of the Nile • Sir Samuel White Baker
... what drug was to be used, namely toobah, a vegetable production—in fact the root of a plant which the doctor knew that the Malays used to throw in the pools of the rivers and streams, with the effect that the fish were helplessly intoxicated, and swam or floated on the surface of the water. This plant he had several times tried to obtain and examine, while he made experiments upon its power; but so far he had been unsuccessful. ...
— Middy and Ensign • G. Manville Fenn
... hand over his mouth. For an instant he caught a glimpse of the girl's white face as she stood in the trail; then strong hands pulled him back, while others bound his wrists and still others held his legs. Everything had passed in a few seconds. Helplessly bound and gagged he lay on his back in the snow, listening to the low voices that came faintly to him from beyond the bushes. He could understand nothing that they said—and yet he was sure that he recognized among them ...
— The Danger Trail • James Oliver Curwood
... and as the smoke cleared away, the golden flag of Spain, which the last moment flaunted above their heads, hung trailing in the water. The ship, her tiller shot away, and her helmsman killed, staggered helplessly a moment, and then fell up into ...
— Great Sea Stories • Various
... approach to the city by night a thick mist set in, and the column completely lost its way. The citizens had received news of its coming, and the church bells were rung and cannon fired to guide it as to its direction; but the column was so helplessly lost, that it at last wandered in among the Spaniards, who fell upon them, slew many and scattered the rest — a very few only succeeding in entering the town. Batenburgh brought off, under cover of the mist, a remnant of his troops, but all ...
— By Pike and Dyke: A Tale of the Rise of the Dutch Republic • G.A. Henty
... for help!" she cried, and broke down utterly. She dropped into a chair in the chart-room and cried softly, helplessly, while I stood by, unable to think of anything to do or say. I think now that it was the best thing she could have done, though at the time I was alarmed. I ventured, finally, to put my ...
— The After House • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... always drew her nearer and nearer to him; and the forest and its strange voices seemed a dark, opposing influence, which strove to take possession of her heart and to wrest her away from him forever; she helplessly clung to him; every thought and emotion of her soul clustered about him, and every hope of life and happiness was staked ...
— Tales From Two Hemispheres • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen
... to withdraw even now, my poor, dear, deluded Ernest. It isn't too late to withdraw even now. Think of the disgrace and shame to the family! Think of your dear brothers and their blighted prospects! Don't allow this designing girl to draw you helplessly into such an ill-assorted marriage! Reflect upon your own future happiness! Consider what it will be to drag on years of your life with a woman, no longer perhaps externally attractive, whom you could never possibly ...
— Philistia • Grant Allen
... be a new distress to him even to know that I earn a little money, and that Fanny earns a little money. He is so anxious about us, you see, feeling helplessly shut up there. ...
— Little Dorrit • Charles Dickens
... urged the horse into the water, and once out of his depth, the old horse struck out boldly for the island. The sleeping water-steeds drifted helplessly against him, and in a short time he reached the island safely, and he neighed joyously as ...
— The Golden Spears - And Other Fairy Tales • Edmund Leamy
... her words immediately. They had sounded undignified, if not positively rude. But she had been so sure that Blair could not fail. This call from Richmond, coming in the moment of crisis, drove her to desperation. She looked at Blair helplessly and he rallied to ...
— The Man in Gray • Thomas Dixon
... storm that although before it we had been making way continually for two days and nights, yet in little more than fourteen hours we saw ourselves again within six or seven miles of the island, and driving helplessly against it, not where the shore was low, but just where the rocks were highest and threatened us with inevitable death. We saw near us the other galley, on board of which was Leonisa, and all its Turk and captive rowers straining every nerve to keep themselves off ...
— The Exemplary Novels of Cervantes • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... four thousand years ago in the Egyptian papyrus of the Scribe Ani: "What manner of place is this unto which I have come? It hath no water, it hath no air; it is deep, unfathomable; it is black as the blackest night, and men wander helplessly about therein; in it a man may not live in quietness of heart." For the unfortunate entity on that level it is indeed true that "all the earth is full of darkness and cruel habitations," but it is darkness which radiates from within himself and causes his existence to ...
— The Astral Plane - Its Scenery, Inhabitants and Phenomena • C. W. Leadbeater
... of problems is nothing more than democracy beating itself helplessly against the color bar,—purling, seeping, seething, foaming to burst through, ever and again overwhelming the emerging masses of white men in its rolling backwaters and held back by those who ...
— Darkwater - Voices From Within The Veil • W. E. B. Du Bois
... apparent. To snatch us up at a mouthful it was necessary for him to turn on his back, which motion necessarily caused his legs to kick up helplessly in the air. ...
— A Journey to the Centre of the Earth • Jules Verne
... whose only knowledge of the water was in an occasional bathe, or in a river steamer; and his first attempt at placing the oars in the rowlocks resulted in one falling overboard, while he helplessly grasped the other; and Vera ...
— Modern Broods • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... I just as soon," agreed Cleo, giggling helplessly. "But go ahead and dilute. I'm having ...
— The Girl Scouts at Sea Crest - The Wig Wag Rescue • Lillian Garis
... Helplessly, she carried out Cain's orders, and as hopelessly, wondered of the fate of Lance and Kriijorl. Captives, with the Earthwomen, in the Thrayxite ship with which Cain was so rapidly closing? Or lying ...
— The Women-Stealers of Thrayx • Fox B. Holden
... mitred abbots among the lords, were charged with a denial of the King's supremacy and hanged as traitors. But Cromwell relied for success on more than terror. His single will forced on a scheme of foreign policy whose aim was to bind England to the cause of the Reformation while it bound Henry helplessly to his minister. The daring boast which his enemies laid afterward to Cromwell's charge, whether uttered or not, is but the expression of his system—"In brief time he would bring things to such a pass that the King with all his power should not be ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 9 • Various
... their friends with disrespect and reproach, under the thin disguise of cold civility and humiliating advice. O! to be a sturdy savage, stalking in the pride of his independence, amid the solitary wilds of his deserts; rather than in civilized life, helplessly to tremble for a subsistence, precarious as the caprice of a fellow-creature! Every man has his virtues, and no man is without his failings; and curse on that privileged plain-dealing of friendship, which, in the hour of my ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham
... one of the life-buoys which had been cut away. Soon after, one of the cutters picked me up. As they dragged me out of the water into the air, the sudden transition of elements made my every limb feel like lead, and I helplessly sunk into the bottom of ...
— White Jacket - or, the World on a Man-of-War • Herman Melville
... and throwing off the cowl and robe, I made a vicious thrust at him, piercing his leather jacket. He sank at my feet helplessly wounded. ...
— Chit-Chat; Nirvana; The Searchlight • Mathew Joseph Holt
... Mary, "if you will help me to make it alive I'll—I don't know what I'll do," she ended helplessly. What could you do for a boy ...
— The Secret Garden • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... from the chamber above, "don't you let Mr. Hilary go before I get there. I want to speak to him," and while they stared helplessly at each other, they heard her saying to Mrs. Newton, "Yes, I shall, too! I'm perfectly rested, now; and I shall go down. I should think I knew how I felt. I don't care what the doctor said; and if you try to ...
— The Quality of Mercy • W. D. Howells
... teased out of the boat and assisted into the perambulator, with her dripping white legs dangling helplessly over the end. Little Patience's tears were assuaged when she was placed in the doll buggy, with Margery's doll in her arms. Florence Dombey was tied papoose fashion to Lydia's back. The bicycle was hidden in the cave and with Kent wheeling Margery and Lydia, Patience, ...
— Lydia of the Pines • Honore Willsie Morrow
... strokes—and hewed into the mass of the English, so that the field, whither Bruce brought up his reserves to support Edward Bruce on the right, was a mass of wild, confused fighting. In this mellay the great body of the English army could deal no stroke, swaying helplessly as southern knights or northern spears won some feet of ground. So, in the space between Halbert's bog and the burn, the mellay rang and wavered, the long spears of the Scottish ranks unbroken and pushing forward, the ground before them so covered with fallen men and horses that the English advance ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... up like a shot—her face set, her hands clenched. What was she to do? It would take an age to explain to the housekeeper, who, when she did understand, would in all probability simply howl helplessly. ...
— Till the Clock Stops • John Joy Bell
... them too much, my dear," said Mrs. Westfield coldly. She looked around the room helplessly as if seeking in some mute object tangible evidence ...
— Madcap • George Gibbs
... freedom, they are none the less there. There is also a mitigated form of this atheism as follows: many believe in a personal God, yet conceive Him to be fettered by his own laws; as if He had made the machine of the universe, wound it up, and could now only stand helplessly aside to see it go. Prayer is of no avail to such a God; thus the first need of the soul is left unsatisfied, and man stands in the universe alone. Herein is their error: because He has always acted in this manner, they reason that He always will, and then go farther and ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol V. Issue III. March, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... into the mouth of the ant-bear hole as I could. In a single instant the buffalo was after me. Kneeling down on his uninjured knee—for one leg, that of which I had broken the shoulder, was swinging helplessly to and fro—he set to work to try and hook me out of the hole with his crooked horn. At first he struck at me furiously, and it was one of the blows against the base of the tree which splintered the tip of the horn in the way that you see. Then he grew more ...
— Hunter Quatermain's Story • H. Rider Haggard
... to move. She glared upon the approaching monster helplessly, and it had almost reached her when a black object fell from the skies with the swiftness of a lightning streak and struck the dog's back, tearing the flesh with its powerful talons and driving a stout, merciless beak straight through the ...
— Policeman Bluejay • L. Frank Baum
... confusion like this occurred upon a field of battle, it was almost impossible to recover from it, for the iron armor which these knights wore was so heavy and so cumbersome, that when once they were unhorsed they could not mount again, and sometimes could not even rise, but writhed and struggled helplessly on the ground until their ...
— Richard II - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... eyes seemed to get softer and more life-like, and he looked at us piteously and helplessly. From face to face he gazed in mute inquiry, and then, striking his chest feebly with his ...
— Captains All and Others • W.W. Jacobs
... Caleb's face fell a full inch; but he led his master down and planted him resolutely in front of the board. Mr. Fogo stared helplessly from it to ...
— The Astonishing History of Troy Town • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... the attractors, which had never been entirely released from their prisoner, thus again pinning the Fenachrone helplessly ...
— Skylark Three • Edward Elmer Smith
... his feet, all the cleverness which all day long he had been weaving like a silk net to catch, to bewilder, to draw away her brain from the anguish of full comprehension, was shriveled. He stood and stared helplessly at her, dumb as a youth. And, obedient, he went out and shut the door, taking the white patch of moonlight ...
— The Branding Iron • Katharine Newlin Burt
... the aircar ground at the huge stone head, outlining the stern mouth, the resolute, bearded jaw. Helplessly, Weaver returned the stare of that remorseless, brooding face: ...
— The Worshippers • Damon Francis Knight
... out of the bolt ropes. By keeping in with the African coast, we had a strong current in our favour, which helped us along materially, at the same time that we were exposed to the risk of a westerly gale, which might send us helplessly on shore. With careful navigation there would have been little danger of this, but unhappily, with the exception of Mr Henley, not one of the officers could be depended on. Some of my readers may be astonished at hearing of a ship sailing from the port of London, towards ...
— My First Voyage to Southern Seas • W.H.G. Kingston
... am) I only say meekly that one cannot have a Revolution without revolving. The wheel, being a logical thing, has reference to what is behind as well as what is before. It has (as every society should have) a part that perpetually leaps helplessly at the sky and a part that perpetually bows down its head into the dust. Why should people be so scornful of us who stand on our heads? Bowing down one's head in the dust is a very good thing, the humble beginning of all happiness. When we have bowed ...
— Alarms and Discursions • G. K. Chesterton
... I lose it?" she demanded, helplessly. "It had the safest, strongest kind of a clasp. When do you suppose I did it, and where? I must have been a sight parading the street this way like ...
— The Little Colonel's Christmas Vacation • Annie Fellows Johnston
... dominated, and holding this corner by an uncertain tenure, a few Blackfeet still exist, the pitiful remnant of a once mighty people. Huddled together about their agencies, they are facing the problem before them, striving, helplessly but bravely, to accommodate themselves to the new order of things; trying in the face of adverse surroundings to wrench themselves loose from their accustomed ways of life; to give up inherited habits and form new ones; to break away from ...
— Blackfoot Lodge Tales • George Bird Grinnell
... son, whom he had not seen cry since he was ten, moved Jolyon terribly. He recognised to the full how fearfully soft the boy's heart was, how much he would suffer in this business, and in life generally. And he reached out his hand helplessly—not wishing, indeed not daring ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... a gasp, and began to laugh helplessly. The others watched her with faces that clearly showed that they began to suspect having entertained ...
— Back To Billabong • Mary Grant Bruce
... Egalite, Fraternite, Liberte, he flattered himself he was on an equality with me, therefore he could take any amount of liberty. He took advantage of the unavoidable questions that belong to the making out of a passport, and showed a diabolical pleasure in tormenting la citoyenne who stood helplessly before him. ...
— In the Courts of Memory 1858-1875. • L. de Hegermann-Lindencrone
... While he was helplessly wrestling for a decision, the Pastor concluded the ceremonies, and there immediately arose the wildest tumult. All the bearers of clubs, men and women, rushed forward yelling and screaming and flourishing ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VII. • Various
... dangled the common Vine-bamboo, {161c} ugly and unsatisfactory in form, because it has not yet, seemingly, made up its mind whether it will become an arborescent or a climbing grass; and, meanwhile, tries to stand upright on stems quite unable to support it, and tumbles helplessly into the neighbouring copsewood, taking every one's arm without asking leave. A few ages hence, its ablest descendants will probably have made their choice, if they have constitution enough to survive in the battle of life—which, from the commonness of the plant, they seem likely to have. ...
— At Last • Charles Kingsley
... first words, she felt as if she were hurled into a deep, ice-cold abyss, filled with darkness, into which she plunged swiftly, helplessly, well knowing that she would never return to the light. She was suffocating. She would have liked to resist, to struggle, to ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... hands helplessly. He always expected other people to do things for him. Beatrice began to see her side of the case. Richford was dead, and the large sum of money that he had promised Sir Charles was no longer available. And Beatrice recalled the night of the dinner party, when her father had taken her to the window, ...
— The Slave of Silence • Fred M. White
... by her that night in a quieting sea, and spent wakeful hours in the cabin, struggling rather helplessly with schemes. ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day
... helplessly at me. I explained briefly the nature of a grist-mill, and said truly that Ham's mill was one of the pleasantest places in the neighbourhood. Yvon was enchanted. He would come with the most lively pleasure, he assured Ham, so soon as Madame Belfort's health should be ...
— Rosin the Beau • Laura Elizabeth Howe Richards
... Part of Bishopp's men were landed and drove the enemy back into the woods.... Bishopp was everywhere commanding, directing, getting his men off. In the confusion of the moment some of the oars of his own boat were lost, and she drifted helplessly down stream exposed to an ever-increasing fire. Here Bishopp received his death-wound. He was borne back to his quarters, where, in a few days he expired at the early age of twenty-seven. 'Never was any officer, save always the lamented Brock, regretted more than ...
— Laura Secord, the heroine of 1812. - A Drama. And Other Poems. • Sarah Anne Curzon
... Persia are likely to be vain, for Britain has a hold upon the former and Russia upon the latter which it would be Quixotic in the Japanese to attempt to break. The Islanders are not fools. But the Siamese, helplessly exasperated by the encroachments of the French, would doubtless be glad enough to enter into an alliance with Japan and China. In 1902, the Crown Prince of Siam visited Japan, where he was most graciously welcomed, and increasing numbers of Japanese ...
— An Inevitable Awakening • ARTHUR JUDSON BROWN
... Sid gazed helplessly about. Truly this newly made maze of parliamentary law was bewildering. "Nobody's seconded John's," he ...
— A Son of the City - A Story of Boy Life • Herman Gastrell Seely
... below; he had climbed a tree above Waubeeneemah and remained a silent witness of this wordy war, until, looking up the river, he saw a canoe that had broken from its fastenings and was rushing down to the rapids below. It contained the families of the two warriors, who were helplessly striving against the ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 7, No. 44, June, 1861 • Various
... each side, helped Ada into the cab. Her feet scraped helplessly over the flagged pavement her head lolled on her shoulder, and the baleful white gleam of the huge electric lamps fell like limelight on her face ...
— Jonah • Louis Stone
... before the animal had made the spring. The first impulse of the youth on finding the ferocious brute thus near, was to club his gun and strike it on the head; and now he discovered that it was wounded in one of the forward legs, which hung helplessly down. But the wound, instead of disabling or intimidating, only inflamed the ferocity of the creature. It made repeated attempts to jump upon its foe, which, in spite of the crippled condition of its leg and the ...
— The Knight of the Golden Melice - A Historical Romance • John Turvill Adams
... found themselves on the edge of a deep ravine which separated them from the enemy like a moat. Some were able to check their horses in time, but others, despite desperate efforts, pressed upon by those behind, were pushed into the ravine, and rolled helplessly to the bottom. At the same moment the order to fire was given in a sonorous voice, there was a rattle of musketry, and several dragoons near M. ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... that again it sloped gradually outwards, culminating in a broad, projecting ledge which formed the lip of the actual precipice itself. Tony lay on the ledge, motionless, with outflung arms and white, upturned face. He had evidently lost his footing, and, after the first drop, rolled helplessly downward. Only the presence of a jagged, upstanding piece of rock had saved him from falling clean ...
— The Vision of Desire • Margaret Pedler
... Mrs. Hicks will say," she answered rather helplessly, knowing, as she watched the young people, that she would not have the heart to bar Pepper ...
— Highacres • Jane Abbott
... stopped dead still for a second and then began to pound in his breast as if entrapped. For the moment his voice was utterly useless and he prayed helplessly for a meed of self-control that might aid him to gain a ...
— Andrew the Glad • Maria Thompson Daviess
... right enough," said Ansell, rather uneasily. "Only take care you pick out a decent one. I can't think why you flop about so helplessly, like a bit of seaweed. In four years you've taken as ...
— The Longest Journey • E. M. Forster
... immediate neighbourhood! In walking from land during the darkness of the night and in drifting snow it would have been very difficult to find one's way to the vessel without guidance, and he would have been helplessly lost who went astray. To prevent such an accident, the precaution was taken of running a line over high ice-pillars between the Observatory and the vessel. Even with the help of the guideline it was often difficult enough to find ...
— The Voyage of the Vega round Asia and Europe, Volume I and Volume II • A.E. Nordenskieold
... his feet. He glared down upon the approaching motorboat. Then he glanced around helplessly, ...
— The Girls of Central High in Camp - The Old Professor's Secret • Gertrude W. Morrison
... chose to take gun or fishing-rod and go off on long excursions in his canoe. On one of these occasions, when far down the river and in vigorous pursuit of a wounded duck, he had the misfortune to break his only paddle short off. In a moment he was helplessly drifting with the powerful current toward the open waters of Lake Erie. In this dilemma, his only resource was to paddle with his hands, and attempt by this tedious method to force his craft to the nearest shore. ...
— At War with Pontiac - The Totem of the Bear • Kirk Munroe and J. Finnemore
... duties still have to be done, in the midst of sorrow and trial. There is something in homely material duties which heals and calms the mind and gives it power to come back to itself. And in sudden calamities those who know how to make use of their hands do not helplessly wring them, or make trouble worse by clinging ...
— The Education of Catholic Girls • Janet Erskine Stuart
... panic-stricken, had fled from the palace into the gardens, in hopes to make his escape by the garden walls. The soldiers pursued him. In his excitement and agitation he leaped down from a wall too high for such a descent, and, in his fall, broke his leg. He lay writhing helplessly on the ground when the soldiers came up. They were wild and furious with the excitement of pursuit, and they killed him with their spears ...
— Genghis Khan, Makers of History Series • Jacob Abbott
... uncertainty of the future added to his misery. At the very moment when he thought he had reached port, he found himself completely at sea again. He stood there in the middle of the square, his arms hanging helplessly, and stared at the ...
— Stories by Foreign Authors: Polish • Various
... possible when nations, which may be involved in a controversy, are inspired by a reasonably pacific purpose. Only when the masses of the people are inflamed with a passionate desire for war, and in a time of popular hysteria responsible statesmen are helplessly borne along the turgid flow of events as bubbles are carried by the swift current of a swollen river, ...
— The Evidence in the Case • James M. Beck
... "Henri looked helplessly around, and then, rising hurriedly, paced the room. Once he came up to me, where I stood near the window, and stared at me, or rather stared across me, as though he did not see me. He was yielding, I knew, and another sob from Diane ...
— Orrain - A Romance • S. Levett-Yeats
... perhaps naturally, that the bat was going to be brought into discussion. He was wondering helplessly how he was going to keep O'Hara and his midnight exploit out of the conversation, when the headmaster resumed. "An unpleasant thing has ...
— The Gold Bat • P. G. Wodehouse
... were all dressed in blackish brown suits of long thick fur, and considering that they live in snow for at least eight months out of twelve, they appeared not the least too warmly clothed. As we went by they used to come out and sit up on their hind legs, with their fore paws hanging helplessly over their paunches, while, with a shrill discordant cry, they bid us good-morning and then hurried back to their houses again. Not having our rifles handy they escaped scot free, otherwise we might have borrowed a coat from one of them as a reminiscence of the country. After another kos ...
— Diary of a Pedestrian in Cashmere and Thibet • by William Henry Knight
... this cheerful theology, "well, I hope it is grace that sustains you, Mistress Perkins, and not the vain elation of the natural man. The Lord is in His holy temple; the earth is His footstool—h-m!" The parson struggled helplessly with a tangle of texts here; but the right one seemed to fail him, till Hannah audaciously put ...
— Good Cheer Stories Every Child Should Know • Various
... the loose ice did not change. The brig was, therefore, blown right in among the rushing masses. The three cables that held her were snapped as if they had been pieces of packthread, and she was whirled out into the pack, where she drove helplessly, exposed to the fury of the howling storm and the dangers of the grinding ice. Captain Harvey now felt that he could do nothing to save his vessel. He believed that if God did not mercifully put forth His hand to deliver them by a miracle, ...
— Fast in the Ice - Adventures in the Polar Regions • R.M. Ballantyne
... Hank dear, won't you?" she cried helplessly, and the mule said "Hee-haw!" again, in tones that ...
— Tik-Tok of Oz • L. Frank Baum
... wait for an answer. When she had recovered from the first shock at the sight of the letter, she took it, laid it on the table, and dismissed Yakob. She tried to go on with her work but her hands fell helplessly on her lap. ...
— The Precipice • Ivan Goncharov
... trying moment. Mrs. Marsden, well knowing, as who in Honolulu did not, of Mrs. Frank's devotion to the young lieutenant, barely six months agone, was striving to welcome the shrinking little scare-faced thing that blindly and helplessly had drifted in in the elder sister's wake. The introductions that followed, after the American fashion, were as perfunctory as well-bred women can permit. The greetings were almost solemn, smileless, and, on part of Nita, fluttering to the verge of a faint; ...
— Found in the Philippines - The Story of a Woman's Letters • Charles King
... like old times to the boatmen and natives who could look back over many Catalina years. The cause, of course, was a favorable season when the sardines and anchovies came to the island in incalculable numbers. Acres and acres of these little bait fish drifted helplessly to and fro, back and forth with the tides, from Seal Rocks to the west end. These schools were not broken up until the advent of the voracious tuna; and when they arrived the ocean soon seemed littered with ...
— Tales of Fishes • Zane Grey
... helplessly at his wife, but she avoided his gaze. He turned and gazed in a fascinated fashion at Mr. Price, and received a ...
— Short Cruises • W.W. Jacobs
... and hold his own in a hand-to-hand struggle. He had no rights that the herd of children among whom he was thrown felt bound to respect; and if he were not able to maintain his rights, he must go down helplessly, and he did go down daily, often hourly. But he had will and vital force, and these brought him always to his feet again, and with strength increased rather than lost. On the days that Mrs. Burke went out he lived for most of the time in the ...
— Cast Adrift • T. S. Arthur
... they found all in confusion. The bowsprit of the Golden Wave was gone, and also the main topmast, while a mass of the rigging littered the forecastle. It was also announced that the rudder was broken and the vessel was pounding helplessly on the rocks, with a big hole in the bow directly below ...
— The Rover Boys on Land and Sea - The Crusoes of Seven Islands • Arthur M. Winfield
... ferocious, curiosity, linking up rapidly about him. The rough and ready cordon of special constables seemed powerless to dam the human tide, and caught in that tide's eddies, Sherston struggled helplessly. ...
— Defenders of Democracy • Militia of Mercy
... to my own knowledge. It was up by Boveney, one rather windy morning. We were pulling down stream, and, as we came round the bend, we noticed a couple of men on the bank. They were looking at each other with as bewildered and helplessly miserable expression as I have ever witnessed on any human countenance before or since, and they held a long tow-line between them. It was clear that something had happened, so we eased up and asked them what was ...
— Three Men in a Boa • Jerome K. Jerome
... helplessly, Low at his trembling side; For on his brow the death drops rose, While in his heart the life-blood froze And died his ...
— Love or Fame; and Other Poems • Fannie Isabelle Sherrick
... was raging, when after a long passage and at the end of a sultry calm day, wasted in drifting helplessly in sight of his destination, Lingard, taking advantage of fitful gusts of wind, approached the shores of Wajo. With characteristic audacity, he held on his way, closing in with a coast to which he was a stranger, and ...
— The Rescue • Joseph Conrad
... actually quivering with sympathy. Her more important dinner parties might have been likened to ill-matched fours-in-hand, and Holder had sometimes felt more of pity than of amusement as she sat with an expression of terror on her face, helplessly watching certain unruly individuals taking their bits in their teeth and galloping madly downhill. On one occasion, when he sat beside her, a young man, who shall be nameless, was suddenly heard to remark in the midst of an ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... awed to silence by what they termed Johnson's "style," Happy and Handsome stood staring helplessly at one another; at length Happy broke ...
— The Girl of the Golden West • David Belasco
... for an adventure," she groaned, looking helplessly around at the hundreds of strange faces sweeping past her. "It's like 'water, water everywhere, and not a drop to drink.' People, people everywhere, and not a soul that I ...
— The Little Colonel's Chum: Mary Ware • Annie Fellows Johnston
... and rapid passage, Lawless had looked on helplessly, and even when all was over, and Dick, already re-arisen to his feet, was listening with the most passionate attention to the distant bustle in the lower stories of the house, the old outlaw was still wavering on his legs like a shrub in a breeze of wind, and still stupidly ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 8 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... growled; but the cow was mad with fury. She alternately threw a large dark mass above her head, then quickly pinned it to the ground on its descent, then bored it against the wall as it crawled helplessly toward a corner of the shed. This was the "beef-eater" in reduced circumstances! The gallant little cow had nearly killed him, and was giving him the finishing strokes. The blacksmith perceived the leopard's helpless state, and, boldly opening the door, he discharged his pistol, and ...
— Eight Years' Wandering in Ceylon • Samuel White Baker
... stood still looking at her helplessly, turned away at the direct appeal and walked up and down, up and down, the room. He was still saying to himself, "And if she goes, ...
— The Immortal Moment - The Story of Kitty Tailleur • May Sinclair
... the platform, gazing helplessly at one another and at the padrone, who was cursing them for a lot of stupid fools, and bidding them get upon a flat car that stood upon a siding. Antonio had to be pushed upon it by main force, but the journey this time was short, and in half an hour he found himself upon an embankment ...
— True Stories of Crime From the District Attorney's Office • Arthur Train
... a character and history so different from what he had supposed. His was not a mind that took rational account of the differences between characters, yet he began to realise now that the girl who had made her own way, as this one had, was not the same as the girl he had imagined wandering helplessly among pathless hills, ...
— What Necessity Knows • Lily Dougall
... and men who could work it; but it found neither. Adams had tried his own little hands on it, and had failed. His friends had been driven out of Washington or had taken to fisticuffs. He himself sat down and stared helplessly ...
— The Education of Henry Adams • Henry Adams
... nodded helplessly, and the blacksmith gazed at Harlan, open-mouthed, as he started uphill. "Must sure have a ailment," he commented, "but I hear tell, Hank, that in the city they never carry nothin' round with 'em but perhaps an umbrell. Everythin' else ...
— At the Sign of the Jack O'Lantern • Myrtle Reed
... abode Mrs. Henderson stowed her household goods and nine small children. With the stove, table, chairs, tubs and trunks, there was room for but one bed to be put up. Poor, unresourceful Henderson surveyed the crowded shack helplessly, but that round-faced, smiling wife of his was not a particle discouraged. "We'll just build in two sets of bunks, on each end of the house," she laughed. "The children won't mind sleeping on 'shelves,' for the bread-winners must ...
— The Moccasin Maker • E. Pauline Johnson
... be throwing yourself away!" exclaimed Jack, coming to the help of his chum, who was gazing helplessly at him in this new crisis. "Tell her, Mrs. Gleason," he went on, "that it is utterly impossible, even if the army authorities would let her. Even if she should give herself up to the Germans, they wouldn't keep any agreement they made to exchange her brother. ...
— Air Service Boys in the Big Battle • Charles Amory Beach
... hoped that the young forester should at this moment be able to grasp anything so subtle, as he helplessly confesses: "Wonderful sounds what you winningly sing; but the sense of it is dark to me. I see your eye beam bright; I feel your warm breath; I hear the sweet singing of your voice; but that which ...
— The Wagnerian Romances • Gertrude Hall
... it had repelled, was now pouring on David. Saul's suspicions were hardened into certainties. He was sure now that what his jealousy had whispered, when the women chanted their chorus, was grim fact. And he could but helplessly watch his supplanter's steady advance in favour with men and God. The two processes of growing darkness and growing light go on side by side in the two men, and each makes the other more striking by contrast. Twice is it repeated ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... of clapping was the reply, and as the audience slowly filed from the hall, John Martin staggered into the wing, reeled past Gladys ere she could catch him, and sank helplessly on to the floor. ...
— The Sorcery Club • Elliott O'Donnell
... came to, Saxtorph was sitting helplessly on the rail, waiting to ask me what he should do. I told him to overhaul the wounded and see if there were any able to crawl. He gathered together six. One, I remember, had a broken leg; but Saxtorph said ...
— South Sea Tales • Jack London
... know," she said helplessly. "The marriage is to be at twelve, and before then there will be a great deal of coming and ...
— Good Old Anna • Marie Belloc Lowndes
... at first, from his old habit of starting off whenever he had performed any of his abominable jokes; but he soon ventured to come back again, and round and round the table he went, laughing as if he would kill himself at the tiny people sprawling helplessly ...
— Prince Vance - The Story of a Prince with a Court in His Box • Eleanor Putnam
... with its look of perpetual innocence—the incorruptible innocence of a man who has never imagined anything—turned helplessly in the direction of his wife. All things relating to propriety came, he felt instinctively, within the natural sphere of woman, and to be forced, on the spur of the moment, to decide a delicate question of manners, awoke in him the dismay of ...
— Life and Gabriella - The Story of a Woman's Courage • Ellen Glasgow
... the hundred million people—in what we call helplessly "the public group" and looking on at strikes would be ready, except in his own strike, to write a ...
— The Ghost in the White House • Gerald Stanley Lee
... The words won't come. He gazes at his uncle helplessly. Mr. Reiss goes slowly to the writing-table and sits down. Taking a blank cheque from a pocket-book he always carries, he fills it in and passes it to ...
— War-time Silhouettes • Stephen Hudson
... by I saw John towering above the others while he bobbed about helplessly in the sea of women's heads that filled the rooms and even rose upon the "bleachers," as he calls the stairs. There were not really so very many people, but he didn't know how to reach us, he is so awkward. When he had steered his course among the women and had ...
— The Bacillus of Beauty - A Romance of To-day • Harriet Stark
... just when she proclaimed herself most awfully modern that she struck him as most helplessly backward; yet the moment after, without any bravado, or apparent desire to assume an attitude, she would propound some social axiom which could have been gathered only in ...
— The Reef • Edith Wharton
... I was making a humorous speech. At that discovery I cast dignity aside and continued my speech in the language of a German vaudeville comedian, with a dash of Weber and Field here and there. With the presentation of the silk umbrella Frau Knapf burst into tears, groped about helplessly for her apron, realized that it was missing from its accustomed place, and wiped her tears upon her cherished blue silk sleeve in the utter abandon of her sorrow. We drank to the future health and prosperity of our tearful host and hostess, and some one suggested drei ...
— Dawn O'Hara, The Girl Who Laughed • Edna Ferber
... sympathy as when overcome with sleep in meeting time? Against the insidious seduction he arrays every conceivable resistance. He stands up awhile; he pinches himself, or pricks himself with pins. He looks up helplessly to the pulpit as if some succor might come thence. He crosses his legs uncomfortably, and attempts to recite the catechism or the multiplication table. He seizes a languid fan, which treacherously leaves him in a calm. He tries to reason, to notice the phenomena. Oh, that one could carry his ...
— Little Masterpieces of American Wit and Humor - Volume I • Various |
