"Faltering" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... everyone else's sight; the fever that throbbed his brain and parched his lips, and made him long to drink up Ocean; the eyes that felt like burning lead; the powerless hands that trembled like a weak old man's; the voice that came in faltering tones that jarred the brain at every word! How he despised himself; how he loathed the very idea of wine; how he resolved never, never to transgress so again! But perhaps Mr. Verdant Green was not the only Oxford freshman ...
— The Adventures of Mr. Verdant Green • Cuthbert Bede
... straight in the face, perfectly calm, without the least faltering in her glance. 'You hurt me,' she replied, 'but you are different now. Why should I ...
— Abbe Mouret's Transgression - La Faute De L'abbe Mouret • Emile Zola
... Faltering and undecided still, the Jew went on. "Very scarce, you know. Ten francs a day, I think, would not be ...
— Off on a Comet • Jules Verne
... woman, as a right. Fairly vanquished, she must accept the fate of battle,—no dignity, as no success, would pertain to further struggle. When with a gesture of command he points her to her stone chamber, trembling and with faltering step she obeys. Siegfried, following, draws his sword and in his natural voice again, smooth and happy, addresses it: "Now, Nothung, do you bear witness to the restraint which marks my wooing. Guarding my truth to my brother, ...
— The Wagnerian Romances • Gertrude Hall
... mother," said Katie, her voice for the first time faltering. "I'll bear it. Never fear me, mother; but I'm best alone for a bit. Ye'll give my warm love to Elspie, an' send her down here to me to stay till she's married. I'll help her best if she's here. There'll be much to be done. I'll do 't, ...
— Between Whiles • Helen Hunt Jackson
... obstacle on their northward way, though sometimes, as they crossed the rough ironstone ranges which crop up now and then on this great and ever rising table-land, there was little feed, and the sharp stones cut the feet of the animals as they trod with faltering footsteps down the precipitous gulleys, out of which the floods had for ages torn a path. As they followed the dry bed of such a path leading to rich flats, they would come upon quiet pools deeply shaded by gums and marsh mallow, that had ...
— The Red True Story Book • Various
... did mine—no, not to have gained Heaven! Let me again appeal to your dear self, if Sylvander, even when he seemingly half-transgressed the laws of decorum, if he did not shew more chastened trembling, faltering delicacy than the many of the world do in ...
— The Letters of Robert Burns • Robert Burns
... embarrassment enough as it was, I am sure. I never saw such faltering, such confusion, such amazement ...
— Bleak House • Charles Dickens
... she has done with none of the hard, consistent strength and intelligence of your make-believe heroine in a book, so disheartening an example to our faltering impulses for good. She has been infinitely human and pathetically fallible; she has cried out and hesitated and complained and done the wrong thing and wept and failed and still fought on, till to think of her is, ...
— Hillsboro People • Dorothy Canfield
... at the time when I retired from the world, or rather when I was retired from the world—that was a hundred years ago, for it happened in the nineteenth century—at that time, I say, the footsteps of the world were faltering under the heavy cross of oppression, injustice and misery, and I could hear the anguish-cry of the suffering multitudes, even above the clanking of my own heavy chains. * * * But all that is different now—I thought as I left the prison—for ...
— Mother Earth, Vol. 1 No. 4, June 1906 - Monthly Magazine Devoted to Social Science and Literature • Various
... test, the second comes when the bridegroom's eyes are uncovered. They are then to converse with each other, and they must not for a moment relax the talk. Neither has any knowledge of the time that this test must continue. There must be no faltering, or hesitancy. ...
— The Wonder Island Boys: Adventures on Strange Islands • Roger Thompson Finlay
... the library clutching the silken curtains. She hesitated a moment at sight of him and then faltering forward, ...
— The Seventh Noon • Frederick Orin Bartlett
... horror, panic, and imbecility; his feet trembled as if incessantly shaken by the force of a stream; the inlets of his hearing were expanded and quickened by the horrors of lunacy; his speech became faltering from the giddiness of imbecility; his very soul fluttered with hallucinations, and with many and various phantasms. He might be compared to a salmon in a weir, or to a bird after being caught in the strait prison of a crib," &c. "When he was seized ...
— The International Monthly Magazine - Volume V - No II • Various
... addition to being tied together. These ropes were cut from time to time, and were left behind. Even with their assurance the men were afraid to proceed, and several times old Peter turned, with ashy face and faltering limbs, and said, with terrible emphasis, ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... woes that she had during a long and dreary year borne with fortitude, she temporarily overcame her weakness, and with a clear voice she counted: "One, two, three," and then the poor woman paused, it seemed the strain had almost been too much for her, and then in a faltering, almost inaudible voice she continued: "Peoria Red, Helen McDonald, Henry ...
— The Trail of the Tramp • A-No. 1 (AKA Leon Ray Livingston)
... cortege. The corpse was that of a wealthy rancher's wife, and the coffin was strung on two long poles borne by four men. Accompanying the coffin alongside of those carrying it were about two hundred horsemen. The bearers kept up a jog-trot, never once faltering on the way, each horseman taking his turn on the poles. When it became a man's turn to act as bearer nobody told him, but he slipped off his horse, letting it run wherever it pleased, ran to the coffin, ducked under the pole and started with the others on the jog-trot, while the man ...
— Arizona's Yesterday - Being the Narrative of John H. Cady, Pioneer • John H. Cady
... protection, and for their sake more than for his own, suppressed the impulse and continued his flight. The Indians were nearly half a mile behind him, and, as nearly as he could tell, were not gaining upon him very rapidly. His colt seemed equal to a long continued race, and as yet showed no sign of faltering or fatigue. The question had now resolved itself, Sam thought, into one of endurance. How long the Indians would continue a pursuit in which he had the advantage of half a mile the start, he had no way of determining, but that his horse's ...
— The Big Brother - A Story of Indian War • George Cary Eggleston
... below. It was in bloom, and all the invitation of spring was in the air. That he saw all the glorious prospect reflected in her mobile face I do not doubt—all the nobility and tenderness of it. If I knew the faltering talk in that hour of growing confidence and expectation, I would not repeat it. Henderson lunched at the Forsythe's, and after lunch he had some talk with Miss Forsythe. It must have been of an exciting nature to her, for, immediately after, that good woman came over in a great flutter, ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... and Molly came forth, the darkness hid the pallor of her face, but it could not hide the faltering of her steps. Captain Jack sprang forward and gave her his arm, and she leant upon it without speaking, heavily. For one moment she stopped as if she could not tear her feet from the beloved planks, but Curwen caught her by the other arm; and ...
— The Light of Scarthey • Egerton Castle
... boy," old Van Quintem had said to him, in faltering accents; "go among the gambling houses, and other dens of infamy, and you will surely hear of ...
— Round the Block • John Bell Bouton
... a terrible crisis; he remained for a fortnight without going to his studio in the Rue Tourlaque, and when he did so, it was as to a house desolated by death. He turned the huge canvas to the wall and rolled his steps into a corner; he would have smashed and burned everything if his faltering hands had found strength enough. Nothing more existed; amid a blast of anger he swept the floor clean, and spoke of setting to work at little things, since he was incapable of perfecting paintings ...
— His Masterpiece • Emile Zola
... to him my poor Harry wrote. And I am the brother whom you have heard of, sir; and who was left for dead in Mr. Braddock's action; and came to life again after eighteen months amongst the French; and live to thank God and thank you for your kindness to my Harry," continued the lad with a faltering voice. ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... whirling him about and sucking him under. He felt as if a clear light broke upon his mind, and with it a conviction that good was, after all, stronger than evil, and that good was possible to men. He seemed to discover that there was a kind of rapture in which he could love forever without faltering and without sin. He looked across the heads of the people at Frank Shabata with calmness. That rapture was for those who could feel it; for people who could not, it was non-existent. He coveted nothing that ...
— O Pioneers! • Willa Cather
... faltering then In vague lisps and whispers fell silent again. Old Glory: the story we're wanting to hear Is what the plain facts of your christening were,— For your name—just to hear it, Repeat it, and cheer it, 's a tang to the spirit As salt as a tear;— And seeing you fly, and the boys marching ...
— Graded Poetry: Seventh Year - Edited by Katherine D. Blake and Georgia Alexander • Various
... Dashwood ever visit here?" said I, with a voice faltering and uncertain enough to have awakened suspicion in ...
— Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon, Volume 2 (of 2) • Charles Lever
... "Each faltering tongue imperfect speech supplies; Each labouring bosom heaves with frequent sighs. Each took the example as their chieftains led, With naked feet the hallowed soil they tread. Each throws his martial ornaments aside, The crested helmets ...
— Palestine or the Holy Land - From the Earliest Period to the Present Time • Michael Russell
... a half years that I was President, I pursued without faltering one consistent foreign policy, a policy of genuine international good will and of consideration for the rights of others, and at the same time of steady preparedness. The weakest nations knew that they, no less than the strongest, ...
— Theodore Roosevelt - An Autobiography by Theodore Roosevelt • Theodore Roosevelt
... forced to give the gelding his head and go at a jarring trot most of the day. On the fourth and fifth days, however, he had the reward for his caution. The chestnut's ribs were beginning to show painfully, but he kept doggedly at his work with no sign of faltering. The sixth day brought Andrew Lanning in close view of the lower hills. And on the seventh day he put his fortune boldly to the touch and jogged into the first ...
— Way of the Lawless • Max Brand
... minutes before oozed away as every street corner brought him nearer his destination, and when at last the stately front of Saint Nathaniel's loomed before him, he wished his journey could never end. He gazed with faltering heart up at the ward windows, as if he could read his fate there. The place seemed deserted. A few street boys were playing on the pavement, and at the door of the in-patients' ward a little cluster of visitors were collected round a flower ...
— Reginald Cruden - A Tale of City Life • Talbot Baines Reed
... ye none," she told him in a faltering voice, "despite hit's goin' ter nigh kill me ter see ye go. Somehow hit seems like I wouldn't be so skeered ef ye war guilty yoreself ... but ter hev ye risk ther gallers fer somethin' ...
— The Roof Tree • Charles Neville Buck
... Southerner, heard a well-known yell. And out of the distance moved a regiment as if on dress parade, faces set like steel, keeping step like a machine, their comrades falling here, there, everywhere, moving into the storm of invisible death without one faltering step, passing the rough riders, conquering up the hill, and never stopping until with the rough riders El-Caney was won. This was the Twenty-fifth Regiment (colored), United States Infantry, now quartered at Fort Logan, Denver. We have asked the chaplain, T.G. ...
— The Colored Regulars in the United States Army • T. G. Steward
... this faltering faint-heart all over from head to heel with withering scorn, and demanded: "Ain't you got sportin' blood enough to know the difference between a high-station game-cock and that old bow-legged Mormon down there ...
— The Skipper and the Skipped - Being the Shore Log of Cap'n Aaron Sproul • Holman Day
... could have had the illusion that he had stolen away, unheard, on the thick mats. But I don't think that either of us was deceived. The voice returned, stammering words without connection, pausing and faltering, till suddenly steadied it soared into impassioned entreaty, sank to low, harsh tones, voluble, lofty sometimes and sometimes abject. When it paused it left us ...
— The Arrow of Gold - a story between two notes • Joseph Conrad
... now, Frank," said the poor, sorrowful woman; "do not come again until after the wedding. When will it take place?" she inquired, with a trembling and a faltering voice. ...
— Frank Mildmay • Captain Frederick Marryat
... is with Christ and HIS words. It matters not where we meet the word, if it is Christ's we are touched and made tender. An aged man stands in a prayer-meeting in a bare and cheerless hall, and says in broken and faltering voice, "The dear Lord has blessedly SANCTIFIED my heart," and like a flash the room lightens, and the whole place seems changed and made cheery. The heart cries, "That is my Master's word," and the entire being is ...
— The Heart-Cry of Jesus • Byron J. Rees
... there were broad stretches of moonlit foliage visible on the rising slopes beneath, Bell felt the engine faltering. He switched on the instrument board light. One glance, and he was cold all over. The motor was hot. Hotter than it had ever been. The oil ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, June, 1930 • Various
... said she, in a faltering tone, opening a little slide which was so protected by bars and cross-bars as to prevent the intrusion of a dagger or even the muzzle of a ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. I, No. V, May, 1862 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... you ought to beg my pardon," said Lord Delacour, in a faltering voice, but without moving ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. III - Belinda • Maria Edgeworth
... that the Chancellor's peaceful professions would be taken seriously by anybody save his own satellites. Loudly the compliant Minister vaunted in the Reichstag his country's military successes, but he could point to no signs either of any faltering in military preparations on the part of the Allies, or of their willingness to entertain ...
— Raemaekers' Cartoons - With Accompanying Notes by Well-known English Writers • Louis Raemaekers
... youth, whose faltering feet with difficulty bear him on his course?" Buttercup asks—which is quite ridiculous, if you only dissect her language! Those "faltering feet which with difficulty bear him on his course" belong to Ralph Rackstraw, who is ...
— Operas Every Child Should Know - Descriptions of the Text and Music of Some of the Most Famous Masterpieces • Mary Schell Hoke Bacon
... a new path out of his familiar routine. But Giotto seems to have turned without a moment's hesitation from his paints and panels to the less easily-wrought materials of the builder and sculptor, without either faltering from the great enterprise or doubting his own power to do it. His frescoes and altarpieces and crucifixes, the work he had been so long accustomed to, and which he could execute pleasantly in his own workshop or on the cool new walls of church or convent, with his trained school ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume 7 - Italy, Sicily, and Greece (Part One) • Various
... intimacies of the headquarter's tent, discerned in him, and now so mildly, but so frequently, smiled at. "Major Garnet," she said, and silently indicated that some one was waiting in the doorway. The Major, standing, turned and saw, faltering with conscious overboldness on the threshold, a tawny figure whose shoulders stared through the rags of a coarse cotton shirt; the man of all men to whom he was just then the most ...
— John March, Southerner • George W. Cable
... money enough left to pay my way to New York; and even if I should walk back, I've no place there to go back to, and no one at all—now—" He broke off here, his voice faltering; and his blue eyes filled with moisture. But he made a swallow, and checked the tears, and sat gently stroking the head of ...
— Philip Winwood • Robert Neilson Stephens
... for them to wipe out this slur. That explains Australia's pride in "Anzac." It meant for us not merely our baptism in blood—it was more even than a victory—for there, with the fierce search-light of every nation turned upon it, our representative manhood showed no faltering—but proved it was of the true British breed, having nevertheless a bearing in battle that was uniquely its own. In this age of bravest men the Australian has an abandon in fight which on every battlefield marks him as ...
— "Over There" with the Australians • R. Hugh Knyvett
... in the name of the Society of Agriculture, Sciences, and Arts. They were followed by MM. Azais and Pozzi, who recited some choice pieces of poetry in the Gascon patois. M. Mistral came last—the celebrated singer of "Mireio"—who, with his faltering voice, recited a beautiful piece of poetry composed for the ...
— Jasmin: Barber, Poet, Philanthropist • Samuel Smiles
... humanity over which his fairly fascinating ugliness played like the whirl of an eddy. "Martyr!" she gently exclaimed. But there was no smile with it. She turned to Vanderbank, who, during the previous minute, had moved toward the neighbouring room, then faltering, taking counsel of discretion, had come back on a scruple. ...
— The Awkward Age • Henry James
... with new enthusiasm. From the fainter shadowings of his own life, he sensed instinctively the vaster tragedy of theirs. His soul yearned to give voice and being to this human thing. He early turned to the sorrow songs. He sat at the faltering feet of Paul Laurence Dunbar and he asked (as we sadly shook our heads) for some masterpiece of this world-tragedy that his soul could set to music. And then, so characteristically, he rushed back to England, composed a half-dozen exquisite harmonies haunted by slave-songs, ...
— Darkwater - Voices From Within The Veil • W. E. B. Du Bois
... rushing deluge raging Flung its flanks, and shook the staging, Priesthood, cowering from the brim, Chanted thus its faltering hymn. ...
— Fringilla: Some Tales In Verse • Richard Doddridge Blackmore
... black horse, by pointed oast-house, by gloomy church, on and ever on, his nostrils flaring, his eye wild, his laboring sides splashed with mire and streaked with foam and blood; on he galloped, faltering a little, stumbling a little, his breath coming in sobbing gasps, but maintaining still his long, racing stride; thundering through sleeping hamlets and waking echoes far and near, failing of strength, scant of breath, ...
— The Amateur Gentleman • Jeffery Farnol et al
... Presently, he donned armour and arms and bidding the twain adieu, he took horse and was about to ride forth with the stoutest of hearts, whereat Princess Perizadah's eyes brimmed with tears and in faltering accents she addressed him saying, "O dear my brother, this bitter separation is heart-breaking; and sore sorrowful am I to see thee part from us. This disunion and thine absence in a distant land cause me grief and woe ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton
... at will. And the shaggy god called her, wounded and outworn, kindly to him and said, "I am but a rustic herdsman, pretty maiden, yet wise, by favour of my great age and long experience; and if I guess truly by those faltering steps, by thy sorrowful eyes and continual sighing, thou labourest with excess of love. Listen then to me, and seek not death again, in the stream or otherwise. Put aside thy woe, and turn thy prayers ...
— Marius the Epicurean, Volume One • Walter Horatio Pater
... was speedily unbarred, And now the soldier touched his hat once more With his lean hand, and in a faltering voice, Whose tone bespake reviving interests Till then unfelt, he thanked me; I returned 465 The farewell blessing of the patient man, And so we parted. Back I cast a look, And lingered near the door a little space, Then sought with quiet ...
— The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth, Vol. III • William Wordsworth
... further preliminary, substituting a blank phrasing for uncomprehended words; but the melody swept without faltering to its conclusion. Janin answered irritably, disturbed by ...
— The Happy End • Joseph Hergesheimer
... lips set a trifle more sternly than usual, his handsome head was held high with fine military bearing. He came forward without faltering for even so much as the fraction of a waver. There was not a flicker in his eyes set straight ahead. One would never have known from his looks that he recognized the oncoming man, or had so much as realized that an officer ...
— The Search • Grace Livingston Hill
... pasts. Like the lost poet he had "gone with the wind." Now it was for him to be true in his fashion. A man may falter for weeks and weeks, consciously, subconsciously, even in his dreams, till there comes that moment when the only thing impossible is to go on faltering. The black cap, the little driven grey man looking up at it with a sort of ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... tablets and a pencil to facilitate our conversation, on that our first acquaintance; and I well remember how awkward and constrained I was in writing down my share of the dialogue, and how easily he guessed my meaning before I had written half of what I had to say. He told me in a faltering voice that he had not been accustomed to be alone on that day - that it had always been a little festival with him; and seeing that I glanced at his dress in the expectation that he wore mourning, he added hastily that it was not that; if it had been he thought he could have borne it better. ...
— Master Humphrey's Clock • Charles Dickens
... by that much the journey he had resolved upon, and Nigger never ran as he was running now. The black seemed to feel that he was on the last lap of a race that had lasted for more than forty-eight hours, with short intervals of rest between, and he did his best without faltering. ...
— 'Firebrand' Trevison • Charles Alden Seltzer
... rail; its four wheels revolved in a line, one behind another; and it traveled with the level, flexible equilibrium of a ship moving across a dock. It swung over the sharp curves without faltering, crossed the switch, and floated—floated is the only word for the serene and equable quality of its movement—round and round the quarter-mile circle. A workman boarded it as it passed him, and sat on the edge with his legs swinging, and its level was unaltered. ...
— How To Write Special Feature Articles • Willard Grosvenor Bleyer
... to thank you for than I can express by words," he whispered, in a low, faltering voice. "I first followed a shadow, but you showed me the glorious reality, and led me to Him, whom to know is life eternal. I die happy, resting in His love, with the thought also that I have preserved your ...
— Villegagnon - A Tale of the Huguenot Persecution • W.H.G. Kingston
... had paused, confused and faltering in the doorway, in her dismay at seeing me engaged in this inspection instead of in replacing the rug as I had proposed, now advanced a step, so that our glances met as I looked up with ...
— The Millionaire Baby • Anna Katharine Green
... and his voice had changed also, changed from its faltering tone of appeal to one of steadfast resolution, the steadiness of desperation. "I have made my appeal to you, Falconer, and I gather that I have failed to move you; that you intend to exact ...
— At Love's Cost • Charles Garvice
... across twenty miles of distance. Now, the infernal belching clamor broke in his very ears, stunning him. He quivered under the impact, stricken to the soul for seconds of shock. But the few careless eyes that chanced to scan the mountaineer noted no faltering in face or form. He stood to all appearance serenely, easily poised, his attitude replete with the grace of physical power, his mouth firmly closed, his widely-set eyes unwavering. Even the cudgel, and the black bag still dangling from it, could not offset a certain ...
— Heart of the Blue Ridge • Waldron Baily
... for theoretical rightness; they want the real article. And a right man will not be satisfied to have even the Most High think of him as being perfectly right when he knows he falls far short of it. He would rather be the faltering pursuer of actual rightness than the possessor of a ...
— Levels of Living - Essays on Everyday Ideals • Henry Frederick Cope
... declined, fearing that the associations would be too overwhelming for him. This proved to be the case when at last, in his old age, he preached at the church. Suddenly breaking in his sermon, he explained with faltering voice, "I stand amid the dust of those near and dear to me." It is little wonder that his listeners shared his emotion; and some touch of it may still come over those to whom the records of Hawker are very dear. The number of such lovers should have been much increased ...
— The Cornwall Coast • Arthur L. Salmon
... cornered hat, of which he was very proud, shot away, but, bare-headed, calm and resolute, he strode about among his men, handling his forces like the veteran that he had become, strengthening the weak points, applauding the daring and encouraging the faltering. Willet, who was crouched behind the logs, firing his rifle with deadly effect, glanced at him ...
— The Lords of the Wild - A Story of the Old New York Border • Joseph A. Altsheler
... in black sat silent for a considerable time, and at length answered, in rather a faltering voice, "I was not prepared for this; you have frequently surprised me by your knowledge of things which I should never have expected any person of your appearance to be acquainted with, but that you should ...
— The Romany Rye - A Sequel to 'Lavengro' • George Borrow
... hurried the painter's hand or confused his eye this time. In vain she wears such sadness in her eyes, such pensive dignity of attitude, such a wistful smile on her lips. He knows them, now, for false lights on the wrecker's coast. No faltering; no turning back. He can even fit a new head-dress on the lovely hair, and add the puffed sleeves below the short ones. He is a painter now; not a lover. And lest there should be one doubt as to his purpose, he flings a heap of gold where "Cupid's" ...
— Holbein • Beatrice Fortescue
... Helen in a faltering voice, and then added resolutely, "I cannot foresee what Mr. Beauclerc may do, but of this be assured, Miss Clarendon, that until I stand as I once stood, and as I deserve to stand, in the opinion of your brother; unless, above all, I can bring proofs ...
— Helen • Maria Edgeworth
... was led forward by the priest. When he reached the place the executioner touched him on the arm and gave him, probably, a few instructions. The confessor, meantime, turned the victims so that they might not see the fatal blows. But, like true Spaniards, they stood erect without faltering. ...
— El Verdugo • Honore de Balzac
... came and rocked my cradle, I got alarmingly lively and entered into the sport with spirit. If she, with weary eyes and faltering voice, attempted to sing me to sleep, I lent my shrill treble to aid my own lullaby; or else I lay quiet with my eyes wide open, and defied every effort to coax ...
— Parkhurst Boys - And Other Stories of School Life • Talbot Baines Reed
... dreary. Descending some thirty feet down rather rude steps of stone, you are fairly under the arch of this "nether world"—before you, in looking outwards, is seen a small stream of water falling from the face of the crowning rock, with a wild faltering sound, upon the ruins below, and disappearing in a deep pit,—behind you, ...
— Rambles in the Mammoth Cave, during the Year 1844 - By a Visiter • Alexander Clark Bullitt
... reach'd That tenderest strain of all the ditty, My faltering voice and pausing harp Disturb'd her ...
— Book of English Verse • Bulchevy
... he returned, with a husky voice, and after a moment of faltering he gave her the letter. It was from Grayson, and it was to the effect that he had seen Sterne, and that Sterne had agreed to a proposition he had made him, to take Maxwell's play on the road, if it succeeded, and in view of this had agreed to let Yolande Havisham ...
— The Story of a Play - A Novel • W. D. Howells
... babe that slumbered on thy breast. —And, sister, mine the lips that called thee bride. —Mine were the silvered locks thy hand caressed, That faithful hand, my faltering ...
— The Poet at the Breakfast Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... rubbed two tiny wax hands across her two glass eyes. "You have guessed rightly," she said in a little faltering voice. ...
— Adventures in Toyland - What the Marionette Told Molly • Edith King Hall
... waving in the breeze Her tender limbs embrace; Her lovely form, her native ease, All harmony and grace: Tumultuous tides his pulses roll, A faltering, ardent kiss he stole; He gaz'd, he wish'd, he fear'd, he blush'd, And sigh'd ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham
... divine and noble; tears were rolling down her eyes. I guessed at once that she was also of Athenian lineage; and that in my prayer for Athens her heart had responded to mine. I spoke to her, though with a faltering voice—"Art thou not, too, Athenian?" said I, "O beautiful virgin!" At the sound of my voice she blushed, and half drew her veil across her face.—"My forefathers' ashes," said she, "repose by the waters of Ilissus: ...
— The Last Days of Pompeii • Edward George Bulwer-Lytton
... walking in the shrubberies; and some of the younger damsels had begun to heed warnings from L'Ouverture himself not to go out of bounds—by no means to pass the line of sentinels in any direction. Instead of everything French being spoken of with a faltering voice, any one was now welcome who might be able to tell, even at second or third hand, that Madame Leclerc had been seen, and what she wore, and how she looked, and what she had said, either about ...
— The Hour and the Man - An Historical Romance • Harriet Martineau
... air blew upon the faces of those in the hall. The curtains in the window of the room were flapping and whipping in the wind. Mrs. Wrandall caught her breath. For the briefest instant, it seemed as though she was on the point of faltering. She dropped farther behind the sheriff, her limbs suddenly stiff, her hand going out to the wall as if for support. The next moment she was moving forward resolutely into the ...
— The Hollow of Her Hand • George Barr McCutcheon
... With sudden faltering, Mrs. Packard reseated herself, while the mayor, outraged by what was evidently a very unexpected answer, leaned ...
— The Mayor's Wife • Anna Katharine Green
... faltering accents Benito told his story, laying stress on the villainy of others and making light of the part he ...
— The Thin Red Line; and Blue Blood • Arthur Griffiths
... echo of it—which, alas, proves that it still lasts without hope of change for the future. It is especially at the initial stages of revolutions that these sorts of people abound. It is then, indeed, that the abnormal and unhealthy spirits predominate over the faltering and the weak and drag them on to excesses by ...
— Violence and the Labor Movement • Robert Hunter
... obligation between my heart and man, and so uplifted was I by the sense of a commission which even candidature could neither invalidate nor deform, that all sense of servility, all cringing thought of livelihood, all fear of faltering and all faltering of fear, seemed to flee away even as the blasphemy of darkness retreats before the sanctities of the morn. In very truth I forgot that I was a candidate of St. Cuthbert's and seemed but to remember that I was a minister ...
— St. Cuthbert's • Robert E. Knowles
... parting life was laid, And sorrow, guilt, and pain, by turns dismayed, The reverend champion stood. At his control Despair and anguish fled the struggling soul; Comfort came down, the trembling wretch to raise, And his last faltering accents whispered praise. ...
— The Evolution of Expression Vol. I • Charles Wesley Emerson
... before me the gladiator lie," And tier on tier, the myriads waiting there The bow of grace without one pitying eye— He was a slave—a captive hired to die— Sam was born free as Caesar; and he might The hopeless issue have refused to try; No! with true leap, but soon with faltering flight— "Deep in the roaring gulf, he ...
— Masterpieces Of American Wit And Humor • Thomas L. Masson (Editor)
... suffered till such time he heard Helen's light foot and faint and gray in the mist Descried her slim veiled outline, saw her twist And slip between the sleepers on the ground, Atiptoe coming, swift, with scarce a sound, Not faltering in fear. No fear she had. From head to foot a sea-blue mantle clad Her lovely shape, from which her pale keen face Shone like the moon in frosty sky. No case Was his to waver, for her eyes spake true As Heaven ...
— Helen Redeemed and Other Poems • Maurice Hewlett
... signature. It was his wife's without doubt. Then he studied the rest of the writing and compared it with that of the note which had been thrust into his hands earlier in the day. There was no difference between them except that there were evidences of faltering in the latter, not noticeable in the earlier communication. As he noted these tokens of weakness or suffering, he caught up the telephone receiver in good earnest and called out Gerridge's number. When the ...
— The Chief Legatee • Anna Katharine Green
... board—oh, what a racket! And everything on deck apparently at sixes and sevens. Mail-bags and passengers mixed up in every direction, The latter engaged with their relatives in fond farewells; On the one hand the faltering accents of affection, On the other the unpolisht seamen emitting yells, With criticisms of a Custom House official Whose action for some ...
— Poison Island • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch (Q)
... out of the house, and walked the three miles to the country cemetery where his mother slept beside his father. He sat beside her last bed, and remembered the cold hand that had crept into his, the faltering whisper that prayed him to take his chance when it ...
— The Purple Heights • Marie Conway Oemler
... as earth when dawn takes flight And beats her wings of dewy light Full in the faltering face of night, His soul awoke to claim by right The life and death of deed and doom, When once before the king there came A maiden clad with grief and shame And anguish burning her like flame That ...
— The Tale of Balen • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... sex; there such women are found to have a certain vague similitude to man; they have neither the suppleness nor the soft abandonment of those whom Nature destines for maternity; their gait is not broken by faltering motions. This observation may be called bi-lateral; it has its counterpart in men, whose thighs are those of women when they are sly, cunning, false, and cowardly. Camille's neck, instead of curving inward at the nape, ...
— Beatrix • Honore de Balzac
... believer and the scoffer, had each his welcome place and was called by his name,—as only Ruth could have said or Isaiah sung. As for me, I only lay there with closed eyes, very still, lest I should offend the angels, for I knew the room was full of them,—as for me, I only write here with a faltering heart, lest I should offend those prayers, for I know heaven is full of them, and I know that for every time my name arose to the throne of God on that beatified handmaid's hopes and cries, I have ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 105, July 1866 • Various
... flames burst out that the warwhoop was sounded; and when the eyes of the sleepers opened, it was only to see themselves surrounded by flames and raging Shawnees. Then, friend," continued Nathan, speaking with a faltering and low voice, graduated for the ears of Roland, for whom alone the story was intended, though others caught here and there some of its dismal revealments, "then, thee may think, there was rushing out of men, women, and children, with ...
— Nick of the Woods • Robert M. Bird
... hoped you might know some honorable—— You see, I have come on rather extraordinary business," she said, faltering a little helplessly. "Let me ask you first—is the confidence of a possible client quite sacred with a ...
— A Husband by Proxy • Jack Steele
... might either support or oppress their infancy and weakness; and the dying emperor demanded the head of the Persian prince. With savage delight he recognized the familiar features of his brother: "Thou art no longer Theophobus," he said; and, sinking on his couch, he added, with a faltering voice, "Soon, too soon, I shall be ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 4 • Edward Gibbon
... praise That perfect bodily beauty which is hers, Even as those worshippers Who bore rude offerings of honey and maize, Their all, into the gold-paved ministers Of Aphrodite, I have given her these My faltering melodies, That are ...
— The Line of Love - Dizain des Mariages • James Branch Cabell
... They were more than half disposed to pronounce the Colonists unworthy to defend that liberty which they gloried in with so much complacency. But it deserves to be noted here especially that there was no sign of faltering on the part of the people, no disposition to submit to the invading force. The success of the enemy did but nerve our fathers to more vigorous resolves to maintain the cause of liberty ...
— Life And Times Of Washington, Volume 2 • John Frederick Schroeder and Benson John Lossing
... though, perhaps, faintly foreshadowed in some of the earlier speculations, are, in their fulness and completeness, first given to the world by the Founder of Christianity. The claims made for these doctrines, too, gave them a unique character. In contrast with the half-hearted, faltering conclusions of the prevalent philosophical schools, Christianity asserted that its teachings were absolute truth; it claimed to be nothing less than a revelation from the Creator of the world. It will be ...
— The Basis of Early Christian Theism • Lawrence Thomas Cole
... difficult not to, in face of his direct gaze, from which all faltering had now vanished. Yet the matter not being completely thrashed out, Mr. Gryce felt himself obliged to say in answer ...
— The Mystery of the Hasty Arrow • Anna Katharine Green
... as it descended. He then tried to spit me with his sword, but I checked its point with the guard of my dagger. I thought I was near my end. He had only to draw up his sword for another downward thrust; but there was a sudden faltering, or hesitation, in his movements, probably a blindness of his eyes, the effect of his wound. In that instant of his uncertainty, I swung my dagger around and ran it through his leg. He fell forward upon me, nearly driving the breath out of my body. My ...
— The Bright Face of Danger • Robert Neilson Stephens
... jealous wall, are niches where the faltering replies of the accused were heard and noted down. Many of them had been brought out of the very cell we had just looked into, so awfully; along the same stone passage. We had trodden in their ...
— Pictures from Italy • Charles Dickens
... 1789 more through the enormous number and variety of mechanical inventions that have marked the nineteenth century than through a corresponding increase in mental or moral growth. While production and wealth have advanced by strides, education has taken a few faltering steps forward. Pecuniary honesty has probably increased, honesty and industry being the virtues especially fostered by commerce and manufactures. Bigotry, the unwillingness to permit in others thought and language unpalatable to ourselves, has become ...
— The Eve of the French Revolution • Edward J. Lowell
... me abruptly, her naturally firm voice faltering as she spoke those last words. A sensitive, vehement, passionate nature—a woman of ten thousand in these trivial, superficial times. I had known her from her earliest years—I had seen her tested, as she grew up, in more than one trying family crisis, and my long experience ...
— The Woman in White • Wilkie Collins
... week he had conquered in the bitter, heart-crushing struggle with himself. If he had weakly given way to the first mad sweep of a new passion, the strength of his manhood reasserted itself at last. Faltering and wavering were over, though there was passionate pain in his voice when he said at last, "I am not ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1896 to 1901 • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... Miles in a voice faltering with emotion; while several of the men, quite unnerved, ...
— The White Squall - A Story of the Sargasso Sea • John Conroy Hutcheson
... a dry gloss to the text. She had been able to bear her forsaking with a purer heart, but for the narrow eyes that witnessed it and gleamed. One of her ladies, Magdalene Coucy, put an arm about her; so Countess Jehane stiffened and jerked up her head, and after that walked with no more faltering. If she had seen, as Milo saw, Gilles de Gurdun glowering at her from a corner, it might have gone hard with her. ...
— The Life and Death of Richard Yea-and-Nay • Maurice Hewlett
... at him and uttering no word, but within his heart the fire seemed to glow and kindle; and when Lord Claud paused and searched his face with his keen glance, he saw no faltering there. ...
— Tom Tufton's Travels • Evelyn Everett-Green
... crowned and vested; And the King, arising, speaketh: 'Guide him to his seat of glory, To the mansion he hath gained.' Then, as magic fell amid them, Every voice is mute and silent, Every sound subdued resideth, Every strain on faltering pinion From its gaysome course alighteth; Still and peaceful is the white throng, Calmness, as in death, prevaileth. Now he sits enthroned amid them, And again the strains are wakened, Mighty as to storms of thunder Born as from ...
— A Leaf from the Old Forest • J. D. Cossar
... throat, and her faltering gaze passed from him to the hotel attendant, who responded to her unspoken appeal as readily as if it were a part of his regular business. Pushing her gently inside, he placed her bag and umbrella on an empty chair, took up ...
— Virginia • Ellen Glasgow
... time the sentry spoke, and spoke in no faltering tone. He was an American. He was wearing the rough garb of the private soldier in the ranks of the regulars, but, like scores of other eager young patriots that year, he held the diploma of a great, albeit a foreign, university. He had education, intelligence, and assured social ...
— Ray's Daughter - A Story of Manila • Charles King
... my mean desires From faltering lips and fitful veins To sexless souls, ideal quires, Unwearied voices, wordless strains: My mind with fonder welcome owns One dear dead ...
— Ionica • William Cory (AKA William Johnson)
... from my quivering lips in vain The faltering accents strove to flow, It was because my heart's deep pain Bade tears be swift and utterance slow; For in that moment rose the ghosts Of pleasant hours in bygone years; And your kind faces, O my hosts! Showed blurred and dimly through ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science - Vol. XI, No. 27, June, 1873 • Various
... praise or blame is bestowed on actions and motives according as they tend to this end; and, as happiness is an essential part of the general good, the Greatest Happiness principle INDIRECTLY serves as a NEARLY safe standard of right and wrong.' It is perhaps not impertinent to suspect that the faltering adverbs which we have printed in italics indicate no more than the reluctance of a half-conscious convert to pure utilitarianism. In another place (i. 98) he admits that 'as all wish for happiness, the Greatest Happiness principle ...
— More Letters of Charles Darwin - Volume I (of II) • Charles Darwin
... be directed toward attacking and driving back the enemy. An army which can no longer advance must at all costs keep the ground it has won, and allow itself to be killed on the spot rather than give way. In the present circumstance no faltering ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume II (of VIII) - History of the European War from Official Sources • Various
... firmly, with no faltering in his voice, and no signs of hesitation or relenting in his face. The sense of surprise which I might otherwise have felt at the strange words he had addressed to me was lost in the sense of relief that they brought ...
— Armadale • Wilkie Collins
... rises at it; God forbids such marriages; you dishonor your white hair. Oh, my uncle, pity me! There is not a woman in all the world but would prefer death to such a nuptial. Is it possible," she added, faltering—"is it possible that you do not believe me—that you still think this" and she pointed at Denis with a tremor of anger and contempt—"that you still think this to be ...
— The Short-story • William Patterson Atkinson
... sorrow faint He murmured forth his sad complaint: Her brimming eyes with tears ran o'er, As spouts the new fallen water pour; His suppliant hands, with fear dismayed She gently clasped in hers, and laid, Like a fair lotus, on her head, And faltering in her trouble said: "Forgive me; at thy feet I lie, With low bent head to thee I cry. By thee besought, thy guilty dame Pardon from thee can scarcely claim. She merits not the name of wife Who cherishes perpetual strife With her ...
— The Ramayana • VALMIKI
... the patrol on the edge of the woods skirting the Vaga River was having considerable difficulty extricating itself, however, and without faltering Lieut. Cuff immediately deployed his men and opened fire again upon the enemy. During this engagement, he, with several other daring men, became separated from their fellows and it was at this time that he was severely wounded. He and ...
— The History of the American Expedition Fighting the Bolsheviki - Campaigning in North Russia 1918-1919 • Joel R. Moore
... quietly to the faltering words, and when they were ended she said nothing. She sat looking at her brother-in-law, her hands hanging inertly, and thought how strange it seemed to see a big, strong man like John Coulson with tears running down his face. It seemed strange, ...
— 'Lizbeth of the Dale • Marian Keith
... man and woman, you know, sir, I shall be willing to pay them almost any amount of money. But I don't want them to know this beforehand. I must have a father and mother for my little family. It would be just as well," he added in faltering tones, "if they had lost a little one of their own. And I should like them to be some good Christian man and his wife, who would undertake the work without asking about salary at all, and would leave it to me to make that all right. Do you think they would ...
— The Golden Shoemaker - or 'Cobbler' Horn • J. W. Keyworth
... sent with the accusations, were somewhat astonished at receiving these angry denunciations and invectives in reply, instead of the meek and faltering defense which they had expected. They were overawed, too, by the lofty and passionate energy with which Agrippina had spoken. They answered her with soothing and conciliatory words, and then went back to Nero, and reported the result of ...
— Nero - Makers of History Series • Jacob Abbott
... aid the Insurgent cause was by no means limited to such matters. Every time their troops made a stand they were promptly defeated and driven back, but their faltering courage was bolstered up by glorious tidings of wonderful, but wholly imaginary, victories won elsewhere. It was often reported that many times more Americans had fallen in some insignificant skirmish than were actually killed in the whole war, while generals perished by the ...
— The Philippines: Past and Present (vol. 1 of 2) • Dean C. Worcester
... and meeting his faltering feet in the lane, would toss him up on his shoulder and canter him ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1917 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... Dick Larrabee locked the parsonage door and took the well-trodden path across the church common. It was his father's feet, he knew, that had worn the shoveled path so smooth; his kind, faithful feet that had sped to and fro on errands of mercy, never faltering in all the years. ...
— The Romance of a Christmas Card • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... to respect you as a rare person," Kolya muttered again, faltering and uncertain. "I have heard you are a mystic and have been in the monastery. I know you are a mystic, but ... that hasn't put me off. Contact with real life will cure you.... It's always ...
— The Brothers Karamazov • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... father? O God! where is he?" and I fell down in a fit. The handkerchiefs of the ladies were applied to their faces, the whole court were moved, for I had, by my appearance, excited considerable interest, and the judge, with a faltering, subdued voice, desired that ...
— Japhet, In Search Of A Father • Frederick Marryat
... quickly followed found expression in a barbecue attended by all the Democrats of the neighborhood and by some of note from a distance. "We have restored the Government to sound principles," declared the host in a brief, faltering speech from the Hermitage portico, "and extended the area of our institutions to the Rio Grande. Now for ...
— The Reign of Andrew Jackson • Frederic Austin Ogg
... face. Then I saw upon it an expression which I have often marked since, a strange straggling desire to say something, which that excessive and ever-present terror of hers made her incapable of uttering. Some secret thought was in her whole face, but her faltering tongue was paralyzed ...
— Cord and Creese • James de Mille
... you mean? What are you saying?" she asked in a low, faltering voice. "Have I not told you that whatever happens I shall never love another man ...
— Mademoiselle of Monte Carlo • William Le Queux
... Love's bow. Winged with that shaft, from Love An angel flew, cried, "Love, nay Burn! Who dies, Hath but Love's plumes whereby to soar above! Lo, I am He who from thine earliest years Toward, heaven-born Beauty raised thy faltering eyes. Beauty alone lifts live ...
— The Life of Michelangelo Buonarroti • John Addington Symonds
... away. Supposing, further, that no Ecclesiastical writer of the iind or iiird century could be found who quoted them: even so, it would not follow that there existed no such verses for a primitive Father to quote. The earliest of the Versions might in addition yield faltering testimony; but even so, who would be so rash as to raise on such a slender basis the monstrous hypothesis, that S. Mark's Gospel when it left the hands of its inspired Author was without the verses which at present conclude ...
— The Last Twelve Verses of the Gospel According to S. Mark • John Burgon
... in his being cast down to a lower depth of wretchedness and misery than that out of which he had arisen. In this painful struggle he stood not alone. Good spirits clustered around him, anxiously interested in his fate, and endeavouring to sustain his faltering purposes; and evil spirits were also nigh, infusing into his mind reasons for the abandonment of his useless pledge. It was a period in his history full of painful interest. Heaven was moving forward to aid ...
— The Lights and Shadows of Real Life • T.S. Arthur
... in his throat. At this hesitation Jeanne drew her head back, and, with her hands pressing against his breast, looked into his face. There were in her eyes the same struggling emotions, but with them now there came also a sweet faltering, a piteous appeal to him, a faith that rose above her terrors, and the tremble of her lips was like that of a crying child. He drew her face back, and kissed the quivering lips, and suddenly he felt the strain against him give ...
— Flower of the North • James Oliver Curwood
... forthwith formed the nucleus of a gambling club, which was reinforced during the day by recruits coming back from the town. Members came to see whether we were still at it, members also went away, but I with the original six held out for days and nights without faltering. ...
— My Life, Volume I • Richard Wagner
... attention to the service, following it in the prayer-book, which lay on the table before him. His voice indeed failed, but his humble demeanour and uplifted eyes gave expression to the feeling of devotion and of gratitude to the Almighty which his faltering lips refused to utter. The performance of this act of religion, and this public attestation of his communion with that church, for the welfare and prosperity of which he had more than once during his illness ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... tighter. Second by second they gained on us, relentlessly. Were we near the fort? Hoarse shouts answered the question, but they seemed distant—too distant. The savages were gaining, and Polly Ann's breath quicker still. She staggered, but the brave soul had no thought of faltering. I had a sight of a man on a plough horse with dangling harness coming up from somewhere, of the man leaping off, of ourselves being pitched on the animal's bony back and clinging there at the gallop, the man running at the side. Shots whistled ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... Jaqui, his voice faltering a little, 'you will excuse the intrusion of a stranger when I tell you ...
— John Gayther's Garden and the Stories Told Therein • Frank R. Stockton
... suffering and privations by land and water, in the woods, and swamps of North Carolina and Virginia, were before him, as his experience in traveling proved. But the hope of final victory and his daily sufferings before he started, kept him from faltering, even when starvation and death seemed to be staring him in the face. For several months he was living in dens and ...
— The Underground Railroad • William Still
... Accordingly, the discourses of Gotama, and the sacred books of the Buddhists, are filled with vivid accounts of every thing disgusting and horrible connected with existence, and with vivid descriptions, consciously faltering with inadequacy, of every thing supremely fascinating in connection with Nirwana. "The three reflections on the impermanency, suffering, and unreality of the body are three gates leading to the city of Nirwana." The constant claim is, that whosoever by adequate ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger
... and modernization of the fixed-line telephone network has been slow due to faltering efforts at privatization domestic: the addition of a second fixed-line provider in 2002 resulted in faster growth in this service; wireless telephony has grown rapidly, in part responding to the shortcomings of the fixed-line network; four wireless (GSM) service providers operate ...
— The 2007 CIA World Factbook • United States
... for all that I have, with His aid, been able to do in His cause,' said Louis, with a faltering voice, and tears rolling down his cheeks, ...
— The Boy Crusaders - A Story of the Days of Louis IX. • John G. Edgar
... singing pine, Its murmuring voice shall blend with mine, Till, lost in dreams, my faltering lay In sweeter music ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... pass from earth away, Palsied though I be and grey, May my spirit keep so young That my failing, faltering tongue Frames that prayer so dear to me, Taught me at my mother's knee: "Now I lay me down to sleep," (Passing to Eternal rest On the loving parent breast) "I pray the Lord my soul to keep;" (From all danger safe and calm In the hollow of His palm;) "If ...
— The Kingdom of Love - and Other Poems • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... armour-bearer thrust his sword Hilt-deep into his heart. "Better to die "By friendly hand," he cried, "than owe my death "To yonder hated victors. Quick! Thy sword! "Thrust deep and quickly!" But the faltering hand That held the sword fell nerveless. "Mighty King! "I dare not!" spake the trembling armourer. "Then by my own I die," exclaimed the King. And as he spake he poised the glittering blade Point upward from the earth, and moaning fell Upon the thirsty steel. The ruddy gush Came spurting ...
— The Death of Saul and other Eisteddfod Prize Poems and Miscellaneous Verses • J. C. Manning |
