"Startled" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... Italian boy, and here is his violin. The poor child may be dead," he said to himself in a startled tone. "I must carry him home, and see what I can do ...
— Phil the Fiddler • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... concealed the necklace behind him. Now, he brought it forward, and dangled it silently before the eyes of Molly and his lordship. Excellent as were his motives for being in that room with the necklace in his hand, he could not help feeling, as he met Molly's startled gaze, quite as guilty as if his intentions ...
— The Intrusion of Jimmy • P. G. Wodehouse
... you to let me out but I am not so sure I ought to be let out. I'd give a good deal this minute if I could go back and not take Uncle Phil's car that night." Ted leaned forward suddenly and for a startled instant Madeline thought he meant to kiss her. But nothing was farther from his wish or thought. It was the scar he was looking for. He had almost forgotten it, just as he had almost forgotten the episode ...
— Wild Wings - A Romance of Youth • Margaret Rebecca Piper
... a girl was standing—a girl who turned a startled face at his unexpected appearance. Alan Douglas had thought he knew all the girls in Rexton, but this lithe, glorious creature was a stranger to him. She stood with her hand on the head of a huge, tawny collie dog; another ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1907 to 1908 • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... dark mahogany door was so glossy, that she dimly saw her own image on its polished panels, as she lifted and let fall the heavy silver knocker, in the middle of an oval silver plate, around the edges of which were raised the square letters of the name "Darrington." The clanging sound startled a peacock, strutting among the verbena beds, and his shrill scream was answered by the deep hoarse bark of some invisible dog; then the heavy door swung open, and a gray-headed negro man, who wore a white linen ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... have startled you, madame,' said I. 'I chanced to overhear your remark, and I could not refrain from offering you my assistance.' I bowed as I spoke. You know my bow, and can realize what its effect ...
— The Exploits Of Brigadier Gerard • Arthur Conan Doyle
... not all that my startled eyes perceived. Chattering and gibbering through the lower branches of the trees came a company of manlike creatures evidently urging on the dog pack. They were to all appearances strikingly similar in aspect to the Negro of Africa. Their skins ...
— At the Earth's Core • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... the next day, they were startled by the dread summons of the boatswain and his mates at the principal hatchway—a summons that ever sends a shudder through every manly heart ...
— White Jacket - or, the World on a Man-of-War • Herman Melville
... of the autumn evening, deep as a limpid lake, stars throbbed with light, when the guards of the palace garden were startled to see through the trees a row of lamps burning at ...
— Fruit-Gathering • Rabindranath Tagore
... a motor boat party were startled by shots in the second floor of a house, about which five feet of water swirled. The boat was stopped and a man ...
— The True Story of Our National Calamity of Flood, Fire and Tornado • Logan Marshall
... fixed unreality of things he saw her clearly, standing, awaiting him, saw her sensitive face as she quietly laid her hand on his—saw it suddenly alter as the light contact startled both. ...
— Ailsa Paige • Robert W. Chambers
... the philosophy of a lock. After a while the conversation again subsides; again all is still; you hear only the trampling of horses and the rippling of the rope in the water, and sleep again is stealing over you. You doze, you dream, and all of a sudden you are startled by a cry, "Chambermaid! wake up the lady that wants to be set ashore." Up jumps chambermaid, and up jump the lady and two children, and forthwith form a committee of inquiry as to ways and means. "Where's my bonnet?" says the lady, half awake and fumbling among the various articles ...
— The Wit of Women - Fourth Edition • Kate Sanborn
... a mouse, to swell his spoils, In his toils he spears with skill; Now a meaning deeply thought I have caught with startled thrill. ...
— A Celtic Psaltery • Alfred Perceval Graves
... but I held my peace and awaited the result with resignation. A few strokes of the oars, seconded by the swift though silent current, brought us to a wooden pier surmounted by two glaring lanterns. Captain B—— handed us out. My child, startled from a deep sleep, was refractory, and would not trust himself out of my fond keeping. When finally I had struggled with him in my arms to the landing, I saw in the shadow a form coiled on a piece of striped matting. Was it a bear? ...
— The English Governess At The Siamese Court • Anna Harriette Leonowens
... satchel is a pure joy of bright threads and patches and wonderful needlework, and is a little suggestive of a magnificent sporran. His expression is said to be sly, but I don't think so. His head is held straight on a longish neck for his size, his dark, slightly oblique eyes are wide open and mildly startled looking—ditto his mouth, he is neater in figure than the Chinese, and does not look so heavy and potent. The top of his head is wide, his nose short and jaw and ...
— From Edinburgh to India & Burmah • William G. Burn Murdoch
... very difficult to surprise or startle an inspector of police. But Mr. Murray was really more than surprised or startled. He was shocked and appalled, as his countenance betrayed when he dropped his pen and fell ...
— Self-Raised • Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte Southworth
... uprising of the passengers. The crowd pushed toward the door, carrying the startled child with them as they surged down the aisle, and all at once—as she stepped off the train—she found herself in the depths of her dreaded jungle. It was so confusing she did not know which way to turn. The roar and clang ...
— The Little Colonel's House Party • Annie Fellows Johnston
... moved a mile lower down the river to a fine reach of water, on the banks of which was a rich sward of green grass for our horses. Shortly after we had made ourselves comfortable for the day we were startled by six of the horses coming into camp at a gallop in their hobbles, followed by eighteen armed natives. Everyone sprang to their arms in a moment, which caused the intruders to fall back. I tried to make them comprehend that we did not approve of the horses being hunted; but as they would ...
— Journals of Australian Explorations • A C and F T Gregory
... For it is not light that is needed, but fire; it is not the gentle shower, but thunder. We need the storm, the whirlwind, and the earthquake. The feeling of the nation must be quickened; the conscience of the nation must be roused; the propriety of the nation must be startled; the hypocrisy of the nation must be exposed; and its crimes against God and man must be proclaimed ...
— My Bondage and My Freedom • Frederick Douglass
... answered: "She is of course the lady of his love—a lady doubtless of high social position in Boston. There was a book about something like that once. He is just waiting to make one more grand coup, rob the bank or something and then the world will be startled by the news of their elopement. They will go and live somewhere luxuriously in the south Pacific, and travellers will bring home strange stories of their happiness and charm. Perhaps, though, he would turn pirate. That ...
— The Burglar and the Blizzard • Alice Duer Miller
... eyes with the startled, half-questioning stare of one led out from utter darkness into ...
— Wisdom, Wit, and Pathos of Ouida - Selected from the Works of Ouida • Ouida
... looking at this charming scene, I was startled by a loud noise of barking and howling higher up the river, and a confused sound, as if a great many dogs were assembled at one place, all calling out together. I ran at once in the direction of the hubbub, partly out of curiosity and in part from some other motive, perhaps the notion of ...
— The Adventures of a Dog, and a Good Dog Too • Alfred Elwes
... declared this a "stupid, cruel, unwise, and unconstitutional measure." "If I had not been prepared," said he, "by other measures hitherto adopted and others hitherto introduced into this House, I should not have been less startled at the introduction of this than if I had received the sudden intelligence that the ten States enumerated in this bill had been sunk by some great convulsion of nature and submerged under an ...
— History of the Thirty-Ninth Congress of the United States • Wiliam H. Barnes
... hours or so later they were startled by the appearance of the very man of whom the Sheikh had been speaking, and all fancied afterwards that he looked very hard at Frank, who was sufficiently recovered by the success of his plan to be able to keep about, and hence was ...
— In the Mahdi's Grasp • George Manville Fenn
... he had sulked from the previous Sunday, he came to her door at eleven in the evening. At first she refused to open it, but his voice was so gentle, so sad even, that she pulled away the barrier she had pushed against the door for her better protection. When he came in she was startled and thought him ill; he was so deadly pale and his eyes were so bright. No, he was not ill, he said, but things could not go on like this; he could ...
— L'Assommoir • Emile Zola
... Main Street for their respective homes. Rob remained up, pondering over the events of the evening for some time, without arriving at any solution of them. He was just about to extinguish his light when he was startled by a loud: ...
— The Boy Scouts of the Eagle Patrol • Howard Payson
... not start or evince the least surprise. It really is difficult to account for such firmness of nerve or self-command. It is not so much a matter of surprise that they were indifferent to its effects, for probably they knew them not, but it is certainly odd that they should not have been startled ...
— Two Expeditions into the Interior of Southern Australia, Complete • Charles Sturt
... then and there to do so. Poindexter, perceiving the sheriff on the opposite side of the street, called to him, and ordered him to open court then and there, which in all due form the sheriff proceeded to do. The bully was startled, and the judge, perceiving this, remarked to him authoritatively, "Now, you scoundrel, be off with yourself, or I will put you in jail for one year!"—when the blackguard speedily decamped, to the infinite amusement of the crowd ...
— The Memories of Fifty Years • William H. Sparks
... of readers, startled by these facts, will exclaim, with one voice, 'How very preposterous!' On my deferentially inquiring why, they will answer, 'These things are above their station.' In reply to that objection, I would beg to ask ...
— American Notes for General Circulation • Charles Dickens
... rode out steadily, and took up their positions with an amount of coolness that startled older soldiers. This was absolutely their first trial on real fighting service, and everybody connected with them was anxious to see how they would comport themselves in the face of the enemy. Not only was it their first fighting effort, but it was their debut in the saddle, as until a week ...
— Campaign Pictures of the War in South Africa (1899-1900) - Letters from the Front • A. G. Hales
... and a rumbling, And a sort of sound like a grumbling, And out there popped, as pert as you please, A milky back tooth that had taken its ease For too many weeks and months and years. An object, when loose, of anxious fears, It had now debouched and lost its place At the back of a startled schoolboy's face. Oh, out it popped, And down it dropped In the middle of ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 156, Feb. 26, 1919 • Various
... saw their own merits in an exaggerating mirror, and whose shamelessness in urging their claims was often in inverse proportion to their merits, roused only the contemptuous cynicism of the King. But Monk was a claimant of another type; and it startled the King when Monk placed in his hands a list of some seventy names as proper recipients for the dignity of Privy Councillors, Some of these names were of such unquestionable weight that application on their behalf was so unnecessary as to be ridiculous. ...
— The Life of Edward Earl of Clarendon V2 • Henry Craik
... was startled at the proposition; it seemed a wild and visionary scheme: but by degrees I began to dwell with pleasure on the subject. I had few ties beyond my native village; the income arising from my curacy was too small to make it any great obstacle: like ...
— The Backwoods of Canada • Catharine Parr Traill
... make unnecessary a long analysis of the author's new and greatest creation. We see in it originality of conception; we are touched by its intense humanness and by its inherent simplicity; but we are startled by its change, its growth, under the influence of circumstances, to a certain subtle complexity. All are great qualities, but the last is the greatest. Growth, the reaction of events upon character—not the easily portrayed action of character upon events—are the marks by which we recognize the ...
— The Growth of English Drama • Arnold Wynne
... of "Man overboard!" had startled everybody, so that the anchor had not been let go; and the steersman's attention, naturally, having been taken up, the yacht had paid off again instead of bringing up, and her head had swung; consequently, what had been ahead of us just before was now astern, and we were quite confused ...
— Tom Finch's Monkey - and How he Dined with the Admiral • John C. Hutcheson
... a few moments, they resumed their employment. I regarded them for awhile in silence, and then carelessly picking up a handful of the material that lay around, proceeded unconsciously to pick it apart. While thus engaged, I was suddenly startled by a scream, like that of a whole boarding-school of young ladies just on the point of going into hysterics. Leaping up with the idea of seeing a score of Happar warriors about to perform anew the Sabine ...
— Short Stories and Selections for Use in the Secondary Schools • Emilie Kip Baker
... of my dear Lord and Saviour, nothing else in all the world could have preserved me from losing my reason and perishing miserably. His words, "Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world," became to me so real that it would not have startled me to behold Him, as Stephen did, gazing down upon the scene. I felt His supporting power, as did St. Paul, when he cried, "I can do all things through Christ which strengthened me." It is the sober truth, and it comes back to me sweetly after twenty years, that I had my nearest and dearest ...
— The Story of John G. Paton - Or Thirty Years Among South Sea Cannibals • James Paton
... I had tried to instruct them; but I know that they regard a book as a sort of Protestant trap, made on purpose to catch them, soul and body. It is an evil that we cannot remedy.—Have you more pain than usual, my dear?" said Mrs. Lee, appearing a little startled, and bending anxiously over Annie's couch as she observed an unusual flush on ...
— Live to be Useful - or, The Story of Annie Lee and her Irish Nurse • Anonymous
... to Neuilly to make his adieux to his family, the horses of his carriage were startled by an organ-grinder on the Avenue de Neuilly. The duke, who was alone, tried apparently to jump out of the carriage. Had he remained seated, all would have been well. He fell on his head on the pave of the broad avenue, ...
— France in the Nineteenth Century • Elizabeth Latimer
... Rogacz kept passing before his vision; they had their hands full of locks and were surrounded by horses. Josel's smiling face was hovering over them and now and then old Gryb and his son Jasiek jeered from behind a cloud. He sat up...startled. But there was nothing near him except the white hen under the box and the trees ...
— Selected Polish Tales • Various
... evidently had much the same trouble understanding her partners. I heard her say—'how absurd' during supper, and it sounded so like you that I was startled ...
— Polly's Senior Year at Boarding School • Dorothy Whitehill
... conducts and reconducts the souls, has restored to me that which a hostile hand had cut away. Look! You will find that I am more graciously endowed than was Protestilaus or any other of the heroes of old!" So saying, I lifted up my tunic and showed Eumolpus that I was whole. At first he was startled, then, that he might believe his own eyes, he handled this pledge of the good will of the gods with both hands. (Our good humor was revived by this blessing and we laughed at the diplomacy of Philumene and at the skill ...
— The Satyricon, Complete • Petronius Arbiter
... quickly in his blankets at the first alarm, a startled expression upon his countenance; but at the last words of the black a sigh of relief escaped his lips and a slight smile replaced the tense ...
— Tarzan and the Jewels of Opar • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... not going out, may I come in for a few minutes? Miles has not yet—" Then, in a tone of startled concern, "I beg your pardon! I am interrupting you. You ...
— Betty Trevor • Mrs. G. de Horne Vaizey
... wet, we resumed the retreat, and soon began defiling into another valley. Our squadron was right in the rear, and suddenly the sounds of firing and the cries of startled men were heard in front ...
— At the Point of the Sword • Herbert Hayens
... staying long enough to hear the fierce murmurs that arose—a passing pageant, a momentary excitement and no more—was a sort of defiant embassage which might have pleased the fancy of a young adventurer, but scarcely of a king so wary and experienced; and his own stay in the midst of the startled country is still more inexplicable. When the monks of Holyrood sent a mission to him to beg his protection, lying undefended as they did in the plain, his answer to them was curiously apologetic. "Far be it from me," he said, "to be so inhuman as to harm any holy house, especially Holyrood in which ...
— Royal Edinburgh - Her Saints, Kings, Prophets and Poets • Margaret Oliphant
... further chance to escape, suddenly pulled out a pistol, and, turning in his saddle, discharged it at Woodburn, who, wholly unharmed by the badly-aimed instrument, instantly returned the fire. The bullet of the latter, grazing the person of the former, entered the head of his startled and rearing horse, just back of the ears, and, after two or three fearful plunges onward, brought him to the ground. Leaping from his falling horse, the desperate loyalist gained his feet and discharged another pistol at Woodburn; when, perceiving ...
— The Rangers - [Subtitle: The Tory's Daughter] • D. P. Thompson
... Gonzaga listened in startled silence. To hear the young viceroy thus bold in the avowal of sentiments, which of late he had been hearing imputed to him at the Escurial as the direst of ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLV. July, 1844. Vol. LVI. • Various
... its contrasting colours, rose and white; her figure is slight and undeveloped. She wears a plain black dress with a bit of white at the neck and wrists. She stands looking appealingly at Nicholls, who avoids her glance. Her eyes have a startled, stunned expression as if the doctor's verdict were still in ...
— The Straw • Eugene O'Neill
... of startled surprise Antonio turned round as if shot; but then he fixed his eyes upon the old woman's hideous face and cried angrily, "So that is the way you think you are going to befool me, you abominable insane old crone! The few recollections which I ...
— Weird Tales, Vol. II. • E. T. A. Hoffmann
... to its host, but my observation denounces that theory. Becalmed among the islands, where the water is transparently clear, I have seen the sucker swim cautiously to the boat, apparently reconnoitring. Shy and easily startled, a wave of the hand over the gunwale is sufficient to scare it away; but it comes again, keeping pace as the boat drifts, and liking to remain in its shadow. Then it is easily seen that it swims ...
— The Confessions of a Beachcomber • E J Banfield
... and tried to assist himself as Billy raised him to his feet. A little wailing cry came from the sledge. Startled, Deane turned his eyes ...
— Isobel • James Oliver Curwood
... Her eyes were half startled, half mischievous, for his voice had been still less impersonal than before. Then she turned back to her work, her face sober, but an amused ...
— Calumet "K" • Samuel Merwin and Henry Kitchell Webster
... bubble schemes,— Whoever can invent 'em!— How splendid the prospectus seems, With int'rest cent. per centum His shares the holder, startled, sees At eighty below par: I dawdle to my club at ease, ...
— Interludes - being Two Essays, a Story, and Some Verses • Horace Smith
... the hills are white, And, glittering in the sheen, The lake expands—a sheet of light— Its willowy banks between; From the dark sedge that skirts its edge, The startled wild-duck springs, While, echoing far up copse and ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 55, No. 343, May 1844 • Various
... you I am the last person in London to whom you should come. I know no one to whom the Duke is likely to entertain feelings so little kind as towards me." This she said in a peculiarly solemn way that startled Tregear. But before he could answer her a servant entered the room with a letter. She recognised at once the Duke's handwriting. Here was the answer for which she had been so long waiting in silent expectation! She could not keep it unread till he was gone. "Will you allow me a moment?" ...
— The Duke's Children • Anthony Trollope
... close attention of all three. That it was not of an oppressively grave character, but was enlivened by various pleasantries arising out of the subject, was clear from their loud and frequent roars of laughter, which startled Barnaby on his post, and made him wonder at their levity. But he was not summoned to join them, until they had eaten, and drunk, and slept, and talked together for some hours; not, indeed, until the twilight; ...
— Barnaby Rudge • Charles Dickens
... next hotel, at which he will sleep. From thence he will take his wagon on through the Notch to the Crawford house, sleeping there again; and when here, let him, of all things, remember to go up Mount Willard. It is but a walk of two hours up and down, if so much. When reaching the top, he will be startled to find that he looks down into the ravine without an inch of foreground. He will come out suddenly on a ledge of rock, from whence, as it seems, he might leap down at once into the valley below. Then, going on from the Crawford House, he will be driven through ...
— Volume 1 • Anthony Trollope
... his rare insight into minds he had analysed us average Catholics. He might have startled us awake by explaining to non-Catholics how those who know such Truths and feed upon such Food can yet appear so dull and lifeless. Anyhow, whether the fault lie in part with us or entirely with the world at large, certain it is that in that world a convert is always ...
— Gilbert Keith Chesterton • Maisie Ward
... proportions and uncouth forms stand out in the clear, strong gush of brilliant light! and then—all is darkness. The effect is so like magic, that one almost expects to see towering genii striding down the deep declivities, or startled by the brilliant flare, shake off their long sleep ...
— The International Monthly Magazine, Volume 5, No. 1, January, 1852 • Various
... stricken and bleeding man to his bed in the back room and started a soldier for the doctor on the run. The sight of this man, speeding down the row, bombarded all the way with questions he could not stop to answer, startled every soul along that westward-facing front, and sent men and women streaming up the line toward Blakely's quarters at the north end. The doctor fairly brushed them from his path and Major Plume had no easy task persuading the tearful, pallid groups of army wives and daughters to retire ...
— An Apache Princess - A Tale of the Indian Frontier • Charles King
... climbed to the tower of the church, Up the wooden stairs, with stealthy tread, To the belfry-chamber overhead, And startled the pigeons from their perch On the sombre rafters, that round him made Masses and moving shapes of shade— Up the light ladder, slender and tall, To the highest window in the wall, Where he paused to listen and look down A moment on the roofs ...
— The Universal Reciter - 81 Choice Pieces of Rare Poetical Gems • Various
... They admit variation as a vera causa in one case, they arbitrarily reject it in another, without assigning any distinction in the two cases. The day will come when this will be given as a curious illustration of the blindness of preconceived opinion. These authors seem no more startled at a miraculous act of creation than at an ordinary birth. But do they really believe that at innumerable periods in the earth's history certain elemental atoms have been commanded suddenly to flash ...
— On the Origin of Species - 6th Edition • Charles Darwin
... let us have no scenes here. And you'll only get the worst of it, Bobbie. Alec could just crumple you up.' He turned to the two men who stood behind, startled by the unexpectedness of the quarrel. 'Take him away, Mallins, ...
— The Explorer • W. Somerset Maugham
... the body of the performer, who turned out to be the colonel's valet—of course in the enemy's pay, and who furnished them with daily intelligence of all our proceedings. As for the loss of the sabre, which actually startled the ghost-seer most, he found it next morning hanging up in the hut, where he himself had placed it, and forgotten that he ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXXII. - June, 1843.,Vol. LIII. • Various
... starry, but the sky charged with big black clouds. The lights in house windows you could see, but the houses themselves were lost in the general blackness. A church clock struck eleven as I went past, and rather startled me. The whiteness of the road was all I had to go by. I heard an express train roaring away down the coast into the night, and dying away sharply in the distance; it was like the noise of an enormous rocket, or a shot world, one would fancy. I suppose the darkness made me a ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 23 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... so that nothing was lost of the changes of expression which animated his mobile face in conversation. He had a hearty way of meeting men, a little bustling, and an emphatic frankness of manner which Bryant says startled him at first, but which he came at last to like and to admire. Cooper was a great talker. His voice was agreeably sonorous. He talked well, and with infinite resource. He could dash into animated conversation on almost any subject, and was not slow to express decided opinions, in which ...
— The Story of Cooperstown • Ralph Birdsall
... near her, her employment cast from her, and her whole appearance expressing the utmost dejection. At sight of her uncle she roused herself, and for a short time her excessive mirth, and even the great wit with which she spoke, astonished him. The quiet man was somewhat startled by her manner, and he looked at her earnestly, half alarmed by her wild and extravagant merriment. He soon remarked that the smile seemed only to be on her lip, for every now and then her countenance changed, and expressed the deep dejection ...
— The Young Lord and Other Tales - to which is added Victorine Durocher • Camilla Toulmin
... at last he was about to be reinstated in his own opinion, he could wait no longer for the assurance of triumph; when he saw with his own eyes the effect of his genius upon Mabel, when he read the startled delight and growing admiration in her face, then at last he would know that he was not actually ...
— The Giant's Robe • F. Anstey
... conduct you to a room where you can rest and sleep, undisturbed and undiscovered." After climbing a ladder and walking through a narrow passage, they came to a secret door which opened into a bedroom. Alfred Banford looked about him, and was startled when he saw in a mirror the reflection of such a pale, hungry-looking visage ...
— After Long Years and Other Stories • Translated from the German by Sophie A. Miller and Agnes M. Dunne
... saw the moon peek over the buildings in the next street. He softly got up and turned off the impertinent gas. Beyond a startled glance over her shoulder she made no objection. He was utterly fascinated by the movements of the bright head, now raised, now lowered, now turned towards the window in the changing ...
— The Deaves Affair • Hulbert Footner
... the cook's job to get them up. The next I knew, Herman had a tin pan on which he was beating a vigorous tattoo, all the time hollering, "We haf cackle-berries und antelope steak for breakfast." The baby was startled by the noise, so I attended to him and then dressed myself for breakfast. I went down to the little spring to wash my face. The morning was lowering and gray, but a wind had sprung up and the clouds were parting. There are times when anticipation is a great deal better than realization. ...
— Letters of a Woman Homesteader • Elinore Pruitt Stewart
... I don't think I can be mistaken about this. I was way up the range about four o'clock this afternoon and could see clear across towards Rawhide Butte, and three smokes went up over there, sure. What startled me," the trapper continued, "was the answer. Not ten miles above where I was there went up a signal smoke from the foot-hills of the range,—just in here to the northwest of us, perhaps twenty miles west of Eagle's Nest. It's the first time I've seen Indian ...
— Starlight Ranch - and Other Stories of Army Life on the Frontier • Charles King
... as to clothes has already been described. One would be startled to see him with a bright tie, a loud checked suit, or a fancy waistcoat, and yet there is a curious sense of fastidiousness about the plain things he delights in. Perhaps he is not wholly responsible personally for this state ...
— Edison, His Life and Inventions • Frank Lewis Dyer and Thomas Commerford Martin
... by the noise of a loosened blind, and slipping into a dressing-gown went through the passage to fasten the latch. Passing Nancy's room I heard a moan, and, startled out of myself, listened to hear another, and still another, as though a heart were breaking. There was a light in the room, and through a small window in the door, the curtain of which was drawn a bit aside, ...
— Nancy Stair - A Novel • Elinor Macartney Lane
... Lawrence's bell rang. The noise had startled her from her first sound sleep. Dr. Maverick explained simply, and gave her a ...
— Hope Mills - or Between Friend and Sweetheart • Amanda M. Douglas
... startled me! A falling leaf; a blade of grass moved by an insect; a snake or a lizard gliding out of my path; the squeal of a monkey; the fluttering of a bird's wings as it flew up to its perch, all subjected ...
— My Friends the Savages - Notes and Observations of a Perak settler (Malay Peninsula) • Giovanni Battista Cerruti
... the music had been going on, each complementing the other. She was so absorbed in her book as not to heed the sound of the bell or Frederic's noiseless tread as he crossed the hall to answer it; but she roused from her absorption as the nocturne came suddenly to an end with a crash of startled chords, and Georgie's hands fell from the keys, at the sight of Berry Joy, who came hurriedly in at the door. Candace in her ...
— A Little Country Girl • Susan Coolidge
... exotically plumed bipeds, whose fine feathers were already bedrabbled by sand and growing limp in the sea breeze, was somewhat dissonant with the rudeness of sea and sky and shore. A few gulls screamed at them; a loon, startled from the lagoon, arose shrieking and protesting, with painfully extended legs, in obvious burlesque of the younger gentleman. The elder lady felt the justice of her gentle daughter's criticism, and retaliated ...
— Drift from Two Shores • Bret Harte
... Lucy went directly to her mamma's room. Herbert, who was more ailing than usual that day, lay on a sofa, while his mamma sat by his side, reading to him. They had not heard of the accident, and were quite startled by Lucy's ...
— Holidays at Roselands • Martha Finley
... rest and compose herself. The careful nurse brought in a reviving cup of tea. Her quaint gossip about herself and her occupations while Agnes had been away, acted as a relief to her mistress's overburdened mind. They were still talking quietly, when they were startled by a loud knock at the house door. Hurried footsteps ascended the stairs. The door of the sitting-room was thrown open violently; the courier's wife rushed in like a mad woman. 'He's dead! They've murdered him!' Those wild words were all she could say. She dropped on her knees at the foot of the ...
— The Haunted Hotel - A Mystery of Modern Venice • Wilkie Collins
... ten years ago! I dare say he has forgotten all about it long before this: however, I write him a Note of Thanks for the good, too good, messages he sent me; better late than never; supposing that he will not be startled and bored by my Acknowledgments of a forgotten Favor rather than gratified. It is really a funny little Episode in the Ten years' Dream. I had asked Carlyle to thank you also for such trouble as you have taken in the ...
— Letters of Edward FitzGerald in Two Volumes - Vol. II • Edward FitzGerald
... hill a strange, inexplicable music. As he leads his camel past in the heat of the day, a sound like the first low tones of an Aeolian harp stirs the hot breezeless air. It swells louder and louder in progressive undulations, till at length the dry baked earth seems to vibrate under foot, and the startled animal snorts and rears, and struggles to break away. According to the Arabian account of the phenomenon, says Sir David Brewster, in his "Letters on Natural Magic," there is a convent miraculously preserved in the bowels of the hill; and the sounds are said ...
— The Cruise of the Betsey • Hugh Miller
... drunk as he was, felt somewhat startled by this, but, being a man of wandering and lively imagination, turned from the point in question to an idea ...
— Fighting the Flames • R.M. Ballantyne
... next visits, if, in spite of many precautions, they discovered me, they flew to dead tree tops to watch me, or startled me by an angry quarr' quarr' quarr' over my head. When they found that I made no attempt to go near the nest, however, they finally put up with me ...
— Ohio Arbor Day 1913: Arbor and Bird Day Manual - Issued for the Benefit of the Schools of our State • Various
... too much tendency to predict what women will do when they vote? Could that good time come to-morrow, we should be startled to find to how many different opinions and "causes" the new voters were already pledged. One speaker wishes that women should be emancipated, because of the fidelity with which they are sure to support certain desirable measures, as peace, order, ...
— Women and the Alphabet • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... who stood below, were startled; and in a body they pressed forward, vying with each other as to who should pick up ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... mind, and, in spite of the present joy, I could not help feeling a little anxiety about what was to be done when breakfast was over. But just as we were about to rise from the table we were all startled by a great jingle of sleigh-bells outside. The old lady arose ...
— The Magic Egg and Other Stories • Frank Stockton
... she arranged the table. Her abrupt entry into the room, while he was in bed, startled him. No woman, except his mother, had ever been in his bedroom before, and it horrified him to think that this strange young woman could see him sitting in his nightshirt in bed. He had never in his life seen so untidy a woman as this. Her hair had been hastily pinned together in a shapeless ...
— The Foolish Lovers • St. John G. Ervine
... that startled me more, and more deeply moved my heart, was conveyed to me, some three months or so before my departure, by Trevanion's steward. The ill health of Lord Castleton had deferred his marriage, intended originally to be celebrated as soon as he arrived of ...
— The Caxtons, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... bringing it about, without desiring it. Numerous are the courses of civil action in which men of pure dispositions and honourable aims, are tempted to take part with those who are utterly destitute of both. Be not startled, if, merely glancing at the causes of this deplorable union, as it is now exhibited in this part of England, I observe, that there is no necessary connection between public spirit and political sagacity. How often does it happen that right ...
— The Prose Works of William Wordsworth • William Wordsworth
... their prize. The bargeman was asked for his knife, and Ludlow himself made the first cut upon the solid and difficult mass. The steel had no sooner touched the compact yarns, than a dazzling glare of light shot into the face of him who held it. Recovering from the shock, and rubbing his eyes, our startled adventurer gazed upwards, with that consciousness of wrong which assails us when detected in any covert act, however laudable may be its motive;—a sort of homage that nature, under every circumstance, pays to ...
— The Water-Witch or, The Skimmer of the Seas • James Fenimore Cooper
... some homes in America will be startled when they see these," purred Peachy, addressing flaming representations of an eruption. "It ought just to make Nell ...
— The Jolliest School of All • Angela Brazil
... was on her way to the fatal spot she was in a fever, but she controlled herself. The disappearance of the corpse had startled her as the crowning misfortune. She was stupefied. I feared for her reason. With great difficulty I got her home. I put her to bed again; again I called the doctor for her; but as soon as my mother partly recovered her senses she ...
— A Reckless Character - And Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... next, Bab and Betty never stopped to see, but, dropping from their roost, they went flying home like startled Chicken Littles with the astounding news that "Ben's father has come alive, and Sancho ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, October 1878, No. 12 • Various
... have been promulgated." "He had to choose between these two alternatives, either renouncing his mission or becoming a 'thaumaturge.'" The miracles "were a violence done to him by his age, a concession which was wrung from him by a passing necessity." And if we feel startled at such a view, we are reminded that we must not measure the sincerity of Orientals by our own rigid and critical idea of veracity; and that "such is the weakness of the human mind, that the best causes are not usually won but by bad reasons," and that the greatest of discoverers ...
— Occasional Papers - Selected from The Guardian, The Times, and The Saturday Review, - 1846-1890 • R.W. Church
... the greeting, some sense of the feeling of those who sat in the room, startled Finlay. He glanced quickly at the faces before him, became deadly white, took a step forward, and then turned to the door. It was shut, and James Bigger, pistol in hand, stood with his back against it. Finlay stood stock still. Neal, looking at him, saw ...
— The Northern Iron - 1907 • George A. Birmingham
... the Wise, was the most powerful elector of the German empire at the period of the reformation. A dream he had and related just before the world was startled by the first great act of reformation is so striking that I feel justified in repeating it in this connection. It ...
— The Revelation Explained • F. Smith
... of the boat soon startled Paul from his slumbers, and he rushed out into the standing room to find that the Fawn was rapidly dragging her anchor, and was in imminent peril of being dashed to pieces ...
— Little By Little - or, The Cruise of the Flyaway • William Taylor Adams
... of history. The result of my own meditations is, that the evidence of the Gospel, taken as a total, is as great for the Christians of the nineteenth century, as for those of the Apostolic age. I should not be startled if I were told it was greater. But it does not follow, that this equally holds good of each component part. An evidence of the most cogent clearness, unknown to the primitive Christians, may compensate for the evanescence of some evidence, which they ...
— Coleridge's Literary Remains, Volume 4. • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... sitting on the edge of his berth, and wondering what all the row was about. The crash that startled me had awakened him. He thought the occurrence was of little moment, and assented to my suggestion, that we were just as safe there as anywhere else ...
— Camp-Fire and Cotton-Field • Thomas W. Knox
... little way," she whispered, "to those trees and back." I had noticed at once that her voice trembled; now I perceived that her whole body was shaking; her hand gave little startled quivers ...
— The Dark Forest • Hugh Walpole
... most sacred rite of their religion.[**] And it is remarkable, that no one of these pious devotees ever entertained the least compunction with regard to the cruel massacre which they projected, of whatever was great and eminent in the nation. Some of them only were startled by the reflection, that of necessity many Catholics must be present, as spectators or attendants on the king, or as having seats in the house of peers: but Tesmond, a Jesuit, and Garnet, superior of that order in England, removed these ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part D. - From Elizabeth to James I. • David Hume
... and more impregnated with this powerful gas, colorless, odorless, tasteless, infinitely precious, but, unless when strongly diluted with nitrogen, capable of producing fatal disorders in the human system. Ardan, startled by M'Nicholl's question about the means of returning from the Moon, had turned ...
— All Around the Moon • Jules Verne
... them to that where the village was built. The window-casements were framed of stone; and the outer doors were of thick, solid oak, studded with large-headed iron nails. The iron ring that served as a rapper on the back door fell with a loud clang from Stephen's fingers upon the nails, and startled him with its din, so that he could hardly speak to the servant who answered his noisy summons. They crossed a kitchen, into which many doors opened, to a kind of parlour beyond, fitted up with furniture that ...
— Fern's Hollow • Hesba Stretton
... forced us to move to another spring where we had to stay for two months. When I came to myself (for it was not so much like sleep as a trance), I wondered; but this passed away after a time, and I had almost forgotten the occurrence, when one day, about a month later, we were startled by hearing there was no water in the spring. The winter before had been very dry, with almost no rain, and fears had been expressed that the spring would fail us, a thing which had not occurred for more than three generations. My dream flashed through my ...
— Old Mission Stories of California • Charles Franklin Carter
... It startled him. "Why—" He recovered himself and laughed. "You speak with directness." He suddenly turned solemn. He bent toward her and lowered his voice; his hand would have touched her arm, but she ...
— The White Invaders • Raymond King Cummings
... his army established their quarters at Urcos, about six leagues from the capital. *7 [Footnote 7: Pedro Pizarro, Descub. y Conq., Ms. - Conq. i Pob. del Piru, Ms. - Oviedo, Hist. de las Indias, Ms., Parte 3, lib. 9, cap. 6] The Spaniards in Cuzco, startled by the appearance of this fresh body of troops in their neighbourhood, doubted, when they learned the quarter whence they came, whether it betided them good or evil. Hernando Pizarro marched out ...
— The History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William H. Prescott
... got it out safely enough, and was just slipping it gently downwards to the dresser when somehow the brush handle, which he had left on the shelf, caught him or the box, he could not tell which, and, startled by the feeling of something pushing against him, Baby lost his balance and fell! Off the dresser right down on to the hard floor, which had no carpet even to make it softer, he tumbled, and the little t'unk on ...
— The Adventures of Herr Baby • Mrs. Molesworth
... time when she was aroused by some subtle thing that brought her upright and from thence to the floor and from the floor to the closet that connected her apartment with that of her mistress. The door was locked; this was an innovation that startled Janet to a keen alertness. She rattled the knob and knocked upon the panelling. Stooping, she saw the key was turned in the door. She hurried from the place to her own room and into the hall, and from the hall to a small corridor, ...
— Mistress Penwick • Dutton Payne
... cause, and Troy's, He still was found; but o'er him hung the doom Which none might turn aside; for from behind The fateful arrow struck him through the neck; Down from the car he fell; swerving aside, The startled horses whirl'd the empty car. Them first the King Polydamas beheld, And stay'd their course; to Protiaon's son, Astynous, then he gave them, with command To keep good watch, and still be near at hand; Then 'mid the foremost ...
— The Iliad • Homer
... prairie ran back unbroken, a dim grey waste, to the horizon. The sun had dipped behind the bluff, and the sky had become a vast green transparency. There was no wind now, but a wonderful exhilarating freshness crept into the cooling air, and the stillness was only broken by the clamour of startled wildfowl which presently sank again. Agatha could see them paddling in ...
— Hawtrey's Deputy • Harold Bindloss
... Touchy work, maneuvering into it, with the ZX-1 yawing as she was, and the need for haste desperate. Chris's hands were glued to the stick: his nerves were as tight as violin strings. Then, when only ten feet from the rack clamp, he gave a startled jump ...
— Raiders Invisible • Desmond Winter Hall |
