"Accidental" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... appointed house of her husband—he was extremely intelligent and had honorably passed the examination for licentiate, one of only two hundred successful bachelors out of twenty thousand—and the period following his accidental drowning wheeled quickly through ...
— Java Head • Joseph Hergesheimer
... that he had heard the intonation of Miss Wycliffe's voice, or had imagined it. He would doubtless have thought it mere imagination, some accidental resemblance to which his ear had given identity, had not Cardington's manner registered a sudden emotional disturbance. He paused in his narration, like one smitten with mental atrophy and searching for the word that was about to reach his lips. His position on the inside of the walk offered a ...
— The Mayor of Warwick • Herbert M. Hopkins
... which to lie, the other very convex. Usually with two handles, sometimes loops, and sometimes studs or knobs. Occasionally ornamented white ware, but most generally unadorned brown or red ware. The latter showing, on some pieces, at least, a slight, perhaps accidental, glazing. They vary in size from six or seven gallons down to less than ...
— Illustrated Catalogue Of The Collections Obtained From The Indians Of New Mexico And Arizona In 1879 • James Stevenson
... To an accidental association may be ascribed some of the noblest efforts of human genius. The Historian of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire first conceived his design among the ruins of the Capitol; and to the tones of a Welsh harp are we indebted for the Bard of Gray.—GIBBON'S ...
— Poems • Samuel Rogers
... Methuen had had a slightly stronger force under his command, the course of the campaign on the north-west frontier might have been changed, and Mafeking relieved by pressure from the south. After my accidental discovery of the Boer laager near Spitz Kop there was a long discussion by Lord Methuen and his staff of the possibilities of surrounding and attacking the enemy. It was plain that this large force, ...
— The Relief of Mafeking • Filson Young
... origin the direct result of the confused welter of conflicting forces, which was the legacy of Leicester's rule. As a preliminary to a right understanding of the political system, which was now, more by accidental force of circumstances than by design, developing into a permanent constitution, it will be necessary to trace the events of the years which immediately followed the departure of Leicester, and which under the influence and by the co-operation of three striking personalities were ...
— History of Holland • George Edmundson
... full diameter of the pipe to be ventilated. Stationary wash-tubs of wood are apt to get soaked up with organic matter and filth. Stationary washstands in bedrooms should have small traps; underneath each should be a leaden tray to protect ceilings in case of leakage, breakage or accidental overflow. This tray should have an overflow, and this overflow should be trapped, if connected with the foul-pipe system (which it should not be if possible to arrange it otherwise). Flues should have a smooth parging or lining, or they will be apt to draw with difficulty. Gas pipes of insufficient ...
— Burroughs' Encyclopaedia of Astounding Facts and Useful Information, 1889 • Barkham Burroughs
... the community that all power was to be exercised. In Homer's time popular assemblies existed, and claimed the right of conferring privileges on rank. The nobles were ever jealous of the prerogative of the prince, and ever encroaching on his accidental weakness. In his sickness, his age, or his absence, the power of the state seems to have been wrested from his hands—the prey of the chiefs, or the dispute of contending factions. Nor was there in Greece ...
— Athens: Its Rise and Fall, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... feet 3 inches; tail, 1 foot; height at withers, 3 feet; circumference of chest, 5 feet; face to insertion of horns, 9-1/2 inches; horns measured on curve, 16 inches. Twelve rings on horns, and one had a ridge behind, 1/2 inch broad, 1/2 inch high, and tapering up the horn; probably accidental. Colour: reddish-yellow, dark points in front of foot and on the ears, belly nearly white. The shell went through from behind the shoulder to the spleen, and burst on the other side, yet he ran 100 yards. I felt very thankful ...
— The Last Journals of David Livingstone, in Central Africa, from 1865 to His Death, Volume I (of 2), 1866-1868 • David Livingstone
... their having come together in the way they had done seemed something more than accidental. It looked less like mere accident than that they had been favoured by the hand of Providence; and even the rude seaman, and the still ruder sea-cook, were only too glad to give way to the fancy that Providence was ...
— The Ocean Waifs - A Story of Adventure on Land and Sea • Mayne Reid
... Loth-to-stoop again, 'But, sir, may not my master, and great Lord, by letters, by passengers, by accidental opportunities, and the like, maintain, if he shall deliver up all unto thee, some kind of old friendship with ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... filtration during the summer, when algae are likely to develop in the reservoir. The filter was installed after an epidemic of typhoid which was apparently caused by an infection of the water supply. Normally, the water has been little contaminated, but the supply is subject to accidental contamination at any time, among other possible sources of infection being the camps of workmen now engaged in constructing the Catskill ...
— Transactions of the American Society of Civil Engineers, vol. LXXII, June, 1911 • E. D. Hardy
... a little long house with a verandah and a garden in front of it with flint-edged paths; the room in which they sat and ate was long and low and equipped with pieces of misfitting good furniture, an accidental-looking gilt tarnished mirror, and a sprinkling of old and middle-aged books. Some one had lit a fire, which cracked and spurted about cheerfully in a motherly fireplace, and a lamp and some candles got lit. Mrs. Wilder, Amanda's aunt, ...
— The Research Magnificent • H. G. Wells
... who had been playing an important part in the Netherlands' drama lost his life. Count Moeurs and Niewenaar, stadholder of Utrecht, Gelderland, and Overysael, while inspecting some newly-invented fireworks, was suddenly killed by their accidental ignition and explosion. His death left vacant three great stadholderates, which before long were to be conferred upon a youth whose power henceforth was ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... justice,' Lord Montbarry persisted. 'There are not half a dozen lines more that I can make out! The accidental breaking of his jar of acid has burnt the Baron's hands severely. He is still unable to proceed to the destruction of the head—and the Countess is woman enough (with all her wickedness) to shrink from attempting to take his place—when the first news is received of the coming arrival ...
— The Haunted Hotel - A Mystery of Modern Venice • Wilkie Collins
... queer look. She was learning to think fast and decide quickly. But the news editor was quite right. Not a word of the disgraceful attempt to pervert justice appeared in either the local or any other paper. MacDonald's death was briefly recorded as accidental and the coroner's verdict given in a four line paragraph. Do not ask me the why of this, dear reader; or I shall ask you the why of a hundred other equally mysterious silences. Don't forget, as Wayland has ...
— The Freebooters of the Wilderness • Agnes C. Laut
... later in the meal that he anticipated, in an admirably accidental manner, the casual remark she had intended to ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... should run at all, until he had been deserted by his companions, and had even afterwards exchanged blows with his assailants;—and thus, a just distinction is kept up between the natural Cowardice of the three associates and the accidental Terror of Falstaff. ...
— Eighteenth Century Essays on Shakespeare • D. Nichol Smith
... less to place one of them at the head of that commission, and with a casting vote in case of an equality. The persons who could not be liable to that charge were, indeed, three to two; but any accidental difference of opinion, the death of any one of them or his occasional absence or sickness, threw the whole power into the hands of the other two, who were Mr. Hastings and Mr. Barwell, one the President, and the other high in the Council ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. VIII. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... the anterior tibial artery for such haemorrhage three-quarters of the whole lumen of the vessel had been devitalised. The resemblance of some cases of secondary haemorrhage of this class to those occasionally observed after amputation, and due to accidental non-perforative injury of the artery at the time of operation above the point of ligature, ...
— Surgical Experiences in South Africa, 1899-1900 • George Henry Makins
... been made, seeming to imply that I was a candidate "for the Presidency of the Confederate States; that my election was the result of a misunderstanding, or of accidental complications"; and also that I held "extreme views," and entertained at that period an inadequate conception of the magnitude of the war probably to be waged, information on the subject has been contributed by several distinguished members of the Provisional ...
— The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government • Jefferson Davis
... had grappled with Isom in an endeavor to prevent him turning the gun against him; told of the accidental discharge of the weapon; the ...
— The Bondboy • George W. (George Washington) Ogden
... fond, tender parents, who were both carried off by the small-pox, within a few days of each other; my father dying first, and thereby by hastening the death of my mother: so that I was now left an unhappy friendless orphan (for my father's coming to settle there, was accidental, he being originally a Kentisrman). That cruel distemper which had proved so fatal to them, had indeed seized me, but with such mild and favourable symptoms, that I was presently out of danger, and what then I did not know the value of, was entirely ...
— Memoirs Of Fanny Hill - A New and Genuine Edition from the Original Text (London, 1749) • John Cleland
... Was your interview with Field-Marshal Hindenburg and General Ludendorff brought about by any particular person or persons—either by yourself, by the Imperial Chancellor, or by the Foreign Office; or was it purely accidental? ...
— My Three Years in America • Johann Heinrich Andreas Hermann Albrecht Graf von Bernstorff
... not such a great city as this London, at least in its present amorphous, unorganised state, having grown up, and growing still, any how and any whither, by the accidental necessities of private commerce, private speculation, private luxury—is it not, I ...
— Town and Country Sermons • Charles Kingsley
... the Holy Grail Story of which Galahad is hero run about as follows: Galahad is the son of Launcelot and Elaine, the latter's nurse having, by means of enchantment, made her to appear as Guinevere—whom Launcelot loved. Deserted by the accidental father of her coming child, this Elaine—daughter of King Pelles—took refuge in a nunnery, where she gave birth to Galahad, whom when dying she entrusted to the nuns. Brought up by those holy women and strengthened in early infancy by frequent glimpses of the Holy Grail,—whose light ...
— The Book of the Epic • Helene A. Guerber
... started to crawl along so as, if possible, to get out of the course of the beaters before they should arrive on the spot. Grasping his carbine so that his hand covered the trigger-guard—in order to avoid any accidental discharge in consequence of the trigger becoming caught in some trailing twig—he began to creep forward, making as little noise as possible, and being particularly careful to avoid disturbing the bushes any more than he could ...
— Under the Chilian Flag - A Tale of War between Chili and Peru • Harry Collingwood
... subjects; but he beheld at the same time other nations launching forth into competition, emulous for a share of the golden world which he was eager to monopolize. The expeditions of the English, and the accidental discovery of the Brazils by the Portuguese, caused him much uneasiness. To secure his possession of the continent, he determined to establish local governments or commands, in the most important places, all to be subject to a general ...
— The Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus (Vol. II) • Washington Irving
... which lately in England has been called Political Economy is in reality nothing more than the investigation of some accidental phenomena of modern commercial operations, nor has it been true in its investigation even of these. It has no connection whatever with political economy, as understood and treated of by the great thinkers of past ages; and as long as its unscholarly and undefined statements are allowed to pass ...
— The Crown of Wild Olive • John Ruskin
... there," mused Clif, "or they would not have been so easily taken by surprise. Why were they there? Their capture of the Cuban courier was accidental, I'm sure. They were on some ...
— A Prisoner of Morro - In the Hands of the Enemy • Upton Sinclair
... extraneousness &c. 57; accident; appearance, phenomenon &c. 448. Adj. derived from without; objective; extrinsic, extrinsical[obs3]; extraneous &c. (foreign) 57; modal, adventitious; ascititious[obs3], adscititious[obs3]; incidental, accidental, nonessential; contingent, fortuitous. implanted, ingrafted[obs3]; inculcated, infused. outward, apparent &c. (external) 220. Adv. ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... remarkable as the ironical spirit in which he goes about doing good only in vindication of the credit of the oracle, and in the vain hope of finding a wiser man than himself. Yet this singular and almost accidental character of his mission agrees with the divine sign which, according to our notions, is equally accidental and irrational, and is nevertheless accepted by him as the guiding principle of his life. Socrates is nowhere represented to us as a freethinker or sceptic. There is no reason to doubt his ...
— Apology - Also known as "The Death of Socrates" • Plato
... well-polished, silver-plated coffee-pot in front of me," said he. "But, tell me, Watson, what do you make of our visitor's stick? Since we have been so unfortunate as to miss him and have no notion of his errand, this accidental souvenir becomes of importance. Let me hear you reconstruct the man by ...
— The Hound of the Baskervilles • A. Conan Doyle
... as it were, the terminations of the effect. The great point of distinction and power (if it have any) in the theory is, the making the dielectric of essential and specific importance, instead of leaving it as it were a mere accidental circumstance or the simple representative of space, having no more influence over the phenomena than the space occupied by it. I have still certain other results and views respecting the nature of the electrical forces and excitation, which are connected with ...
— Experimental Researches in Electricity, Volume 1 • Michael Faraday
... picture of the school of Rubens, which was owned by one of his artist friends, produced a study which he afterward seems to have developed into his well-known Boy and Bird; a Cupid-like figure, holding a bird closely against its breast. These exercises, however, seem to have been, as it were, accidental, and had little or no effect in leading him to the practice in which he afterward ...
— The Bay State Monthly, Volume I. No. VI. June, 1884 - A Massachusetts Magazine • Various
... provinces, I marv'lling not at him, nor he at me. But, if thou must go gaping, let it be That One who could make Michael should make thee. O, foolish Man, meting things low and high By self, that accidental quantity! With this conceit, Philosophy stalks frail As peacock staggering underneath his tail. Who judge of Plays from their own penny gaff, At God's great theatre will hiss and laugh; For what's a Saint to them Brought up in modern ...
— The Unknown Eros • Coventry Patmore
... of polarized condition which the molecules of the dielectrics concerned acquire (1503. 1600.). Thus, for instance, the relation of our atmosphere and the earth within it, to the occurrence of spark or brush, must be especial and not accidental (1464.). It would not else consist with other meteorological phenomena, also of course dependent on the special properties of the air, and which being themselves in harmony the most perfect with the ...
— Experimental Researches in Electricity, Volume 1 • Michael Faraday
... they are," replied Tremayne; "such a resemblance cannot be accidental. I remember in that queer double life of mine, when I was your unconscious rival, I used to interchange them until they almost seemed to be the same identity to me. There is some little mystery behind the likeness which we shall have cleared up before very long now. Natas told me to ...
— The Angel of the Revolution - A Tale of the Coming Terror • George Griffith
... than by the regular and healthy regime, the strengthening of my soul and body was helped by the wonderful, yet natural, peculiarity of our prison, which eliminates entirely the accidental and the unexpected from its life. Having neither a family nor friends, I am perfectly safe from the shocks, so injurious to life, which are caused by treachery, by the illness or death of relatives—let my indulgent reader ...
— The Crushed Flower and Other Stories • Leonid Andreyev
... returning to the Northern Light, with the possibility of Madge coming off in the interval and discovering the murder for herself. No, the risk of that appalled him. Besides, whatever happened, he had another reason for keeping the truth from Madge. The fact of Horble's death, even if she thought it accidental, would shock her to the core. It was inconceivable that she would feel anything but horror stricken, whether she judged her former lover innocent or not. She might even undergo a terrible remorse. At such a moment how little likely she would be to give way to him! Of course she ...
— Wild Justice: Stories of the South Seas • Lloyd Osbourne
... celebrated French scientist, an authority on the subject of heredity. You doubtless know something of the subject, how certain traits appear in families generation after generation. Accidental traits, if repeated for two or three generations, often become inherent traits. To show you to what a strange extent this is true, I will call your attention to the case of the ducal house of Bethune in France, where three successive generations ...
— The Strange Adventures of Mr. Middleton • Wardon Allan Curtis
... An accidental circumstance cemented the intimacy between Steerforth and me, in a manner that inspired me with great pride and satisfaction, though it sometimes led to inconvenience. It happened on one occasion, when he was doing me the honour of ...
— David Copperfield • Charles Dickens
... hospitalities of many of the principal citizens of Copenhagen; the visits to the tomb and museum of the works of Thorwaldsen, and to the room in which the immortal Oersted made his brilliant electro-magnetic discovery; the casual and accidental introduction and interview with a daughter of Oersted,—all created a train of reflection which prompted me to devise some suitable mode of showing to these hospitable people my appreciation of their friendly attentions, and I proposed to ...
— Samuel F. B. Morse, His Letters and Journals - In Two Volumes, Volume I. • Samuel F. B. Morse
... to Lord Melbourne about coming to the Castle, but in his answer he had made no allusion to it; she did not know whether this was accidental or intentional, for he very often gave no answer to questions ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Volume 1 (of 3), 1837-1843) • Queen Victoria
... knowledge, and only between the good; hence it is not possible for anyone to have many real friends. Of the conventional forms, that which is born of intellectual sympathy is more enduring than what springs from sexual attraction; while what comes of utility is quite accidental. The former may develop into genuine friendship if there be virtue in both parties. Companionship is a ...
— The Worlds Greatest Books, Volume XIII. - Religion and Philosophy • Various
... which may be called accidental, had nearly done more than repay the Austrians for all their reverses. The left of their line, stationed still further down the Mincio,—at Puzzuolo, no sooner learned from the cannonade that the French were at Borghetto, ...
— The History of Napoleon Buonaparte • John Gibson Lockhart
... attention closely to every circumstance in the case, and after a considerable amount of evidence had been given without much result, so far as implicating both prisoners in the actual murder was concerned, an accidental discovery revealed the whole of the facts of the tragedy as plainly as if I ...
— The Reminiscences Of Sir Henry Hawkins (Baron Brampton) • Henry Hawkins Brampton
... words of M. Blanqui, "he showed that labor is the universal and invariable measure of values, and proved that everything has its natural price, toward which it continually gravitates amid the fluctuations of the market, occasioned by ACCIDENTAL CIRCUMSTANCES foreign to the venal ...
— The Philosophy of Misery • Joseph-Pierre Proudhon
... slightest consequence to her whether this man remembered their brief acquaintance of the railway-carriage. And yet she would have been wounded, ever so little, if he had forgotten her. She knew so few people, that this accidental acquaintance seemed almost a friend. He had known her brother, too; and there had been something in his manner that implied ...
— The Lovels of Arden • M. E. Braddon
... description of an unknown, outcast sailor, whom one may never see again, and whom no one may care to hear about; but so it is. Some people we see under no remarkable circumstances, but whom, for some reason or other, we never forget. He called himself Bill Jackson; and I know no one of all my accidental acquaintances to whom I would more gladly give a shake of the hand than to him. Whoever falls in with him will find a handsome, hearty fellow, and ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana
... notice to Neipperg of everything the Prussian Army undertakes, and the Postscript always, "Come and deliver us, your Excellency." Of these latter Documents, I have heard of some with Syndic Guzmar's and other Official hands to them. Generally such things can, through accidental Pandour channels, were there no other, easily reach Neipperg; though they do not always. Enough, could Neipperg appear at the Gates of Breslau, in some concerted night-hour, or push out suitable Detachment on forced-march ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XIII. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... sweeping Phoebe with her, intercourse with the mill stopped almost entirely. Annie never pretended to any liking for the helpless Phoebe, who could not even answer her back when she insulted her, as she frequently did all timid people. Never since that accidental touch of quaintness on the first evening had Ishmael discovered any kindred habit of mind in Phoebe, and she, in her sweetly-obtuse way, sometimes wondered that Ishmael did not want to be ...
— Secret Bread • F. Tennyson Jesse
... curiously, for he wondered if the choice of a soft cloak which could more easily be wrapped round the burning woman than an overcoat was accidental, or whether it was the product of a ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... unremitting attention her continual change of posture, and heard the frequent but inarticulate sounds of complaint which passed her lips, was almost wishing to rouse her from so painful a slumber, when Marianne, suddenly awakened by some accidental noise in the house, started hastily up, and, with feverish wildness, ...
— Persuasion • Jane Austen
... day passed without incident. The duke, to avoid any accidental indiscretion, waited until after dinner to tell Hyacinthe to pack a trunk and a portmanteau. Hyacinthe was to accompany them, as ...
— The Confessions of Arsene Lupin • Maurice Leblanc
... that owing to the jostling (possibly accidental, but none the less actual) of an Imperial officer—Field-Lieutenant Schmidt—at the entrance to Brooklyn Bridge, the bridge is declared closed to the public until further notice. We are proud to state the Field Lieutenant at once cut down his cowardly assailant with his saber. ...
— The Hohenzollerns in America - With the Bolsheviks in Berlin and other impossibilities • Stephen Leacock
... progress of this affair the distinctive character of the inhabitants of the several great divisions of this Union has been shown more in relief than perhaps in any national transaction since the establishment of the constitution. It is, perhaps, accidental that the combination of talent and influence has been the greatest on the slave side. The importance of the question has been much greater to them than to the other side. Their union of exertion has been consequently closer and more unshakable. They ...
— Memoir of the Life of John Quincy Adams. • Josiah Quincy
... looking both sheepish and gratified, Tom suddenly bolted, leaving the elder lady to enlighten the younger at length, and have another laugh over this new sort of courtship, which might well be called accidental. Nan was deeply interested, for she knew Dora, thought her a nice little thing, and predicted that in time she would make Tom an excellent wife, since she admired and 'appreciated' ...
— Jo's Boys • Louisa May Alcott
... 'astral body' has been applied to a certain semblance of the human form, fully inhabited by its higher principles, which can migrate to any distance from the physical body—projected consciously and with exact intention by a living adept, or unintentionally by the accidental application of certain mental forces to his loosened principles by any person at the moment of death. For ordinary purposes, there is no practical inconvenience in using the expression 'astral body' for the appearance so ...
— Fashionable Philosophy - and Other Sketches • Laurence Oliphant
... sez he, "it is a great rise for her, I have hearn that she hain't worth much, as I count wealth, and as we are speakin' in confidence, I will say that there is a rich widder here who has hopes of me, and mebby I've gin her some encouragement, kinder accidental, as you may say, but I ort to know better. Widdowers can't be too careful; they do great harm, let 'em be as careful as possible. They tromple right and left over wimmen's hearts do the best they can. But ...
— Samantha at Coney Island - and a Thousand Other Islands • Marietta Holley
... was always possible, of course, that he might have been taken in somewhere. There are many who would have no compassion on man or woman, and would yet shrink from turning out a little child to perish. And he was a very attractive child. Still, do not hope too much, Ermine; it may be merely an accidental likeness." ...
— One Snowy Night - Long ago at Oxford • Emily Sarah Holt
... all. So the Romans on beholding the eclipse looked for no evil to come from it, but it made an impression of terror upon the Macedonians and they thought that the prodigy had a bearing on the cause of Perseus. While each side was in this frame of mind an entirely accidental occurrence the next day threw them into a fierce conflict and put an end to the war. One of the Roman pack-animals had fallen into the water from which a supply was being drawn, and the Macedonians laid hold of him, while the water-carriers ...
— Dio's Rome, Volume 1 (of 6) • Cassius Dio
... other motives than the one she acknowledged? She had insisted, almost unfeelingly as it might have seemed, on the abstract rightness of what she had done, on the fact that, ideally speaking, her act could not be made less right, less justifiable, by the special accidental consequences that had flowed from it. Because these consequences had caught her in a web of tragic fatality she would not be guilty of the weakness of tracing back the disaster to any intrinsic error in her original motive. Why, then, if this was her real, her proud attitude toward the past—and ...
— The Fruit of the Tree • Edith Wharton
... staying much longer in Chellaston, and he replied that as soon as Bates would go and his brother was on his feet again he intended to leave for the West. Then he begged her to lose no time in seeing Eliza, for Bates had taken to hobbling about the roads, and he thought a sudden and accidental meeting with the girl might be the death ...
— What Necessity Knows • Lily Dougall
... feeling about him—and made his way by degrees, pausing now and then to look at a picture, though he knew them all by heart. Thus he arrived at last at the piano, in what he flattered himself was an accidental way. ...
— The Marriage of Elinor • Margaret Oliphant
... his head. "It isn't really," he said. "After all, we can't figure it's the work of one person: it's too widespread for that. And it's silly to assume that everything's accidental." ...
— Supermind • Gordon Randall Garrett
... together under like climatic and political conditions indicates a stronger tenacity on the part of the Jewish part of the nations to life, a greatly less liability to disease, and a stronger resistance to epidemic, endemic, and accidental diseases. By some authorities it has been held that the occupations followed by the Jew are such as do not compel him to risk his life, as he neither follows any labor requiring any great and continued exertion, nor any that ...
— History of Circumcision from the Earliest Times to the Present - Moral and Physical Reasons for its Performance • Peter Charles Remondino
... worth hearing." I leaned my arms on the table in front of me. "This Blue Disease is not an accidental thing. It was deliberately planned, by two scientists. I was one ...
— The Blue Germ • Martin Swayne
... objectiveness, non ego; extraneousness &c 57; accident; appearance, phenomenon &c 448. Adj. derived from without; objective; extrinsic, extrinsical^; extraneous &c (foreign) 57; modal, adventitious; ascititious^, adscititious^; incidental, accidental, nonessential; contingent, fortuitous. implanted, ingrafted^; inculcated, infused. outward, apparent &c (external) 220. Adv. ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... stepped lightly just inside and to the left—as de Spain stood—of the door and faced him, the encounter seemed to de Spain accidental. While Sandusky was not a man he would have chosen to meet at that time, he did not at first consider the incident an eventful one. But before he could speak, a second man appeared in the doorway, ...
— Nan of Music Mountain • Frank H. Spearman
... that I would recall in these notes a few of the many hostelries I have rested at in the course of my journeys; and, indeed, I had taken up my pen for the purpose, when I was baffled by an accidental circumstance. It was the having to leave off, to wish the owner of a certain bright face that looked in at my door, 'many happy returns of the day.' Thereupon a new thought came into my mind, driving its ...
— The Uncommercial Traveller • Charles Dickens
... he was again made a prisoner by our troops because of his looks. Pike got some clothes, cleaned up, and I used him afterward to communicate with Wilmington, North Carolina. Some time after the war, he was appointed a lieutenant of the Regular, Cavalry, and was killed in Oregon, by the accidental discharge of a pistol. Just before his death he wrote me, saying that he was tired of the monotony of garrison-life, and wanted to turn Indian, join the Cheyennes on the Plains, who were then giving us great trouble, and, after he had gained ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan
... have expressed a desire to travel, and have requested me to give you my permission. I accede to your request, but only upon the following conditions: You must procure for me a skin of every variety of bear known upon the earth. I do not mean such varieties as are termed 'accidental,' arising from albinism or like circumstances, but every species or variety known to naturalists and acknowledged as 'permanent.' The bears from which these skins are to be taken must be killed in their native haunts, and by your own hands—with no other ...
— Bruin - The Grand Bear Hunt • Mayne Reid
... improvisatore Sgricci, and Rosini, the author of "La Monaca di Monza", have to be recorded. It will be seen from this enumeration that Shelley was no longer solitary; and indeed it would appear that now, upon the eve of his accidental death, he had begun to enjoy an immunity from many of his previous sufferings. Life expanded before him: his letters show that he was concentrating his powers and preparing for a fresh flight; and the months, though ever productive ...
— Percy Bysshe Shelley • John Addington Symonds
... what to think, Ruth," answered Jack. "One thing is certain: If the first explosions weren't accidental, then they must have been due to ...
— The Rover Boys Under Canvas - or The Mystery of the Wrecked Submarine • Arthur M. Winfield
... important words in the document, the words that represented—together with the Needle—the essential stations on the road to be followed: the Chambre des Demoiselles and Fort Frefosse: D for Demoiselles, F for Frefosse: the connection was too remarkable to be a mere accidental fact. ...
— The Hollow Needle • Maurice Leblanc
... widespread legend.[49] The resemblance of the catastrophe—presumably the appearance of Satan in the form of Lucifer—to the scene in Mickle's Sorcerer, which was published among Lewis's Tales of Wonder (1801), is vague enough to be accidental. There are blue flames and sorcery, and an apparition in both, but that is all the two scenes have in common. The tyrannical abbess may be a heritage from The Romance of the Forest, but, if so she is ...
— The Tale of Terror • Edith Birkhead
... and no doubt, if she thought it would flatter, would tell, a beautiful young girl that her destiny was to be a queen; but there is in this prediction a minuteness of detail, that cannot be accounted for on the ground of accidental coincidence. It is a brief history of her life. Unless we are prepared to believe that an ignorant old mulatto woman was gifted by divine Providence with supernatural power, constituted a second Witch of Endor, and able by "examining the ball of ...
— Graham's Magazine, Vol. XXXII No. 4, April 1848 • Various
... Wakefield.—Whoever has had much to do with the press will sympathise with MR. CHARLES KNIGHT in all that he has stated ("NOTES AND QUERIES," Vol. iii., p. 62.) respecting the accidental—but not at first discovered—substitution of modern for moderate. If that word modern had not been detected till it was too late for an explanation on authority, what strange conjectures would ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 69, February 22, 1851 • Various
... memorable night of her first grand opera Norma and Chris dined at Mrs. von Behrens's. It was Alice who urged the arrangement, urged it quite innocently, as she frequently did the accidental pairing of Norma and Chris, because her mother was going for a week to Boston, the following day, and they wanted an evening ...
— The Beloved Woman • Kathleen Norris
... earns its right to a new name only when it has lifted its head above the waters of oblivion, you must agree. For 'you saw at once,' said Narcissus, in reference to that poet, 'that his writing was so delightful because he was more so.' His writings, in fact, were but the accidental emanations of his personality. He might have given himself out to us in fugues, or canvases, or simply, like the George Muncaster of whom I am thinking, in the sweet breath and happy shining of his home. Genius is a personal quality, ...
— The Book-Bills of Narcissus - An Account Rendered by Richard Le Gallienne • Le Gallienne, Richard
... sure their father would not believe it; and that their mother, if ever she should return to her home and family, would bring a very different account—that the whole misfortune would turn out to be accidental. So they felt assured: but the fact was as Roger had said. The Snow-sewer sluice had been pulled up, by the orders of the Committee of the Parliament, then sitting at Lincoln: and it was done to destroy the king's new ...
— The Settlers at Home • Harriet Martineau
... This interview was accidental. I never went to the levee; for having seen the courts of Mussulman and Catholic sovereigns, my curiosity was sufficiently allayed; and my politics being as perverse as my rhymes, I had, in fact, "no business ...
— The Works of Lord Byron: Letters and Journals, Volume 2. • Lord Byron
... Neighborville twenty miles away is worth more space than a trip made by Mrs. Astor to Europe. Whenever possible, the good reporter seeks to localize his story and draw it close to the everyday lives of his readers. Even an accidental acquaintance of a man in town with the noted governor or the notorious criminal who has just been brought into the public eye—with a brief quotation of the local man's opinion of the other fellow, or how they ...
— News Writing - The Gathering , Handling and Writing of News Stories • M. Lyle Spencer
... pity your first visit should be spoiled by anything so dreadful as the accidental death of this young girl. It seems to have frightened you both ...
— The Mystery of the Hasty Arrow • Anna Katharine Green
... dearest, calm yourself. Recollect that all we have to go upon in this matter is a resemblance, which, after all, may be accidental. But leave it all to me, and be assured that now I have some clue to this affair, I will not lose sight of it, or of ...
— Varney the Vampire - Or the Feast of Blood • Thomas Preskett Prest
... another world, commissioned it would appear, by heaven, demands vengeance for a monstrous enormity, and the demand remains without effect; the criminals are at last punished, but, as it were, by an accidental blow, and not in the solemn way requisite to convey to the world a warning example of justice; irresolute foresight, cunning treachery, and impetuous rage, hurry on to a common destruction; the less guilty and the innocent are equally involved in the general ruin. The destiny of ...
— Lectures on Dramatic Art and Literature • August Wilhelm Schlegel
... that's all the business. I have been rather sick and have had two small hemorrhages, but the second I believe to have been accidental. No good denying that this annoys, because it do. However, you must expect influenza to leave some harm, and my spirits, appetite, peace on earth and goodwill to men are all on a rising market. During the last week the amanuensis was otherwise engaged, whereupon I took up, pitched into, ...
— Vailima Letters • Robert Louis Stevenson
... meeting on Thorpe Peak, the surgeon became a constant visitor at Raynham. Sir Oswald was delighted with the young man's talents and accomplishments; and Victor contrived to win credit by the apparently accidental revelation of his early struggles, his mother's poverty, his patient studies, and indomitable perseverance. He told of these things without seeming to tell them; a word now, a chance allusion then, revealed the story ...
— Run to Earth - A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... is not accidental. Not only does it occur at every step, but the universal historians' accounts are all made up of a chain of such contradictions. This contradiction occurs because after entering the field of analysis ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy
... of unknown lands in his clothes and conversation. Of his education we know nothing, except that he was a great reader. His father was a wine merchant, purveyor to the royal household, and from this accidental relation between trade and royalty may have arisen the fact that at seventeen years Chaucer was made page to the Princess Elizabeth. This was the beginning of his connection with the brilliant ...
— English Literature - Its History and Its Significance for the Life of the English Speaking World • William J. Long
... the Anglo-Saxons rase to the ground the early churches, that, until a few years ago, but few traces of these early buildings were thought to exist. An accidental discovery, however, in the year 1835, brought to light an undoubted relic of an early British church in the west, this being the remains of a little church which had been until the date above mentioned completely buried in the sand ...
— Our Homeland Churches and How to Study Them • Sidney Heath
... probability of his long surviving the battle of Trafalgar, had he fortunately escaped the Enemy's shot: but the Writer of this can assert that HIS LORDSHIP'S health was uniformly good, with the exception of some slight attacks of indisposition arising from accidental causes; and which never continued above two or three days, nor confined him in any degree with respect to either exercise or regimen:[29] and during the last twelve months of his life, he Complained only three times in this way. It is true, that HIS LORDSHIP, about the meridian of life, had ...
— The Death of Lord Nelson • William Beatty
... Sunday was merely retailing some knowledge recently acquired by chance. He knew all the Sunday's tones of voice; and he also was well aware that the Sunday's brain was not on the whole better stored than his own. Further, the Sunday was satisfied with his bit of accidental knowledge. Edwin was not. Edwin wanted to know why, if the clay for making earthenware was not got in the Five Towns, the Five Towns had become the great seat of the manufacture. Why were not pots made in the South, where the clay came from? He could not think of any answer to this enigma, nor of ...
— Clayhanger • Arnold Bennett
... the clouds and the mountains, covered with their immense, mute attestation what the old city murmured beneath them; they confirmed in silence the sombre truths: heaven empty as the churches are, serving for accidental phantasmagoria, and uninterrupted times rolling their flood, wherein thousands of lives, like insignificant nothings, are, one after another, dragged and drowned.—A knell began to ring in that ...
— Ramuntcho • Pierre Loti
... Ward, 'at least everything is quite right now. I had just a little trouble, but it was really accidental, and Mrs. Caryll's coming this afternoon was such ...
— Miss Mouse and Her Boys • Mrs. Molesworth
... and diamonds in my hand. If you get in, I'm down one. As it was, I made an overtrick. The only penalty for a renege is two tricks. The rule book does not differentiate between deliberate and accidental ...
— Competition • James Causey
... appearance for yourself. I fell in love with her at first sight, and having been fortunate enough, as I then thought, to favourably impress the old uncle, her only relative, with whom she was living, I followed up my first accidental introduction to the inmates of the chateau until it had ripened into a close intimacy. And if I was attracted toward your mother in the first instance by her beauty, I was still more powerfully attracted afterwards by ...
— The Rover's Secret - A Tale of the Pirate Cays and Lagoons of Cuba • Harry Collingwood
... you, young ladies, that I have been requested this year, as on previous occasions, to allow some of my young people to attend in the ante-chamber of the assembly-room with sandal ribbon, pins, and such little matters, and to be ready to repair any accidental injury to the ladies' dresses. I shall send four—of the most diligent." She laid a marked emphasis on the last words, but without much effect; they were too sleepy to care for any of the pomps and vanities, or, indeed, for any of the comforts of this world, ...
— Ruth • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... act as its purveyors. It is for their interest to send something; and their judgment of what is important is not only biased, but is formed by purely local standards. Our news, therefore, is largely set in motion by telegraphic operators, by agents trained to regard only the accidental, the startling, the abnormal, as news; it is picked up by sharp prowlers about town, whose pay depends upon finding something, who are looking for something spicy and sensational, or which may ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... It was not accidental that the movement of the French workers for emancipation emphasized a desire for control of industry. The syndicalism of France has expressed the workers' interest in production as the labor movements of other countries have laid stress exclusively on its economic value to them. The ...
— Creative Impulse in Industry - A Proposition for Educators • Helen Marot
... if not on my side to you?—But, to avoid these comparisons, let us talk of nothing henceforth but equality; although, if the riches of your mind, and your unblemished virtue, be set against my fortune, (which is but an accidental good, as I may call it, and all I have to boast of,) the condescension will be yours; and I shall not think I can possibly deserve you, till, after your sweet example, my future life shall become nearly ...
— Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded • Samuel Richardson
... first impulse is to condemn her malicious falsehood, much more severely than if she had merely told a few lies about some one else. Yet it is quite evident that if we were to estimate the doings of men with perfect justice, we should fix solely on the moral element in their doings; and the accidental circumstance of the offence or injury to ourselves would be neither here nor there. The primary vulgar error, then, in this case is, undue and excessive disapprobation of misconduct from which we have suffered. No one but a very stupid person would, if it were ...
— The Recreations of A Country Parson • A. K. H. Boyd |
