"Intentness" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... either embarrassed or alarmed by his presence. He had been captured many times, but the trick had never been turned by any one so cool as this young woman. She seemed to be pondering with the greatest calmness what disposition she should make of him. In the intentness of her thought the revolver wavered for an instant, and The Hopper, without taking his eyes from her, made a cat-like spring that brought him to the window he had raised ...
— A Reversible Santa Claus • Meredith Nicholson
... time he was already filled with a new idea; hearkening with a rapt intentness, his head on one side, his face puckered; and he struck me rudely, to make me hold my peace. Then he smiled and ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume XXI • Robert Louis Stevenson
... he is forcing Governor Faulkner to hold up on some others who want to do a service to France?" As she questioned me, the beautiful Madam's eyes became much narrower and I could observe that she watched me with intentness for any sign of intelligence. ...
— The Daredevil • Maria Thompson Daviess
... to her grief convinced him that something more than ordinary was amiss, that some danger more serious than ordinary threatened. He felt no surprise therefore when, a little later, she arrested her sobbing, raised her head, and with suspended breath and tear-stained face listened with that scared intentness which ...
— The Long Night • Stanley Weyman
... then that Von Gerhard proposed the thing that set us staring at him in amused wonder. He came over and stood looking down at us, his hands outspread upon the big library table, his body bent forward in an attitude of eager intentness. I remember thinking what wonderful hands they were, true indexes of the man's character; broad, white, surgeonly hands; the fingers almost square at the tips. They were hands as different from those ...
— Dawn O'Hara, The Girl Who Laughed • Edna Ferber
... and viewed the spectacle with a mind undisturbed, with a gentle philosophy inspired by an experience which he alone could appreciate. It was a wonderful sight. The effort, the haste, the almost insane intentness of these people seeking the yellow metal, the discovery of which was the whole bounds of their horizon. He felt that it was good to see them. Good that these untamed passions should be allowed full sway. He felt that such as these were the advance guard of all human enterprise. ...
— The Golden Woman - A Story of the Montana Hills • Ridgwell Cullum
... from her writing and saw him there, saw also that there was no guard, but, as little Fay had not yet come, thought Tony far too sensible to interfere with the fire in any way. She went on with her writing; then when she looked again something in the intentness of his attitude caused her to say: "Be sure you don't get too near the fire, Tony; it ...
— Jan and Her Job • L. Allen Harker
... looking down upon him, a face that was almost immediately hidden, the face of the girl he had seen overnight in the little room beyond the theatre after his escape from the Council. And she was looking with much the same expression of curious expectation, of uncertain intentness, upon his proceedings. For the moment he did not remember when he had seen her, and then with recognition came a vague memory of the stirring emotions of their first encounter. But the dancing web of melody about him kept the air of that great marching ...
— When the Sleeper Wakes • Herbert George Wells
... solemn appearance, and even from time to time shut her eyes to encourage him. Once, when she opened them again, it was to perceive that he was becoming very hot and exhausted, and that Jacob was watching him with such an unpleasant intentness that she re-closed her eyes that she might not ...
— Benita, An African Romance • H. Rider Haggard
... were at table, that is, she was at the bar, seated indeed as a concession to her weakness, about to be tried for her life before those august judges, Geoff and old Soames, both of whom had their attention fixed on her with an intentness which the whole bench could scarcely equal. She held her head very high, but she did not dare to lift up ...
— A Country Gentleman and his Family • Mrs. (Margaret) Oliphant
... Every disturbance in the room, and they were not few nor slight, appeared to come from the one source; yet by the time Miss Hulburt could focus her little spectacles upon them, Phebe and Isabel were swaying to and fro and whispering their lessons to themselves with an intentness ...
— Teddy: Her Book - A Story of Sweet Sixteen • Anna Chapin Ray
... room he knew. One or two ladies gave him a preoccupied nod, a plain little woman whom he had talked with about books at a recent dinner smiled upon him encouragingly. But what specially impressed him at the moment was the seriousness of the function, the intentness upon the presentation, and the look of worry on the faces of the women in arranging ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... syllable with a curious intentness, and then asked me to repeat it all again, which ...
— She and Allan • H. Rider Haggard
... to be wound up to an extreme tension of excitement—she forgot all her troubles in listening with painful intentness to the rush and roar of the train through the darkness. The lights of passing stations and signal-posts gleamed like scattered and flying stars—there was the frequent shriek of the engine-whistle,—the serpent-hiss of escaping steam. She peered ...
— Thelma • Marie Corelli
... did she once frame any other inquiry in a way to lead indirectly to a betrayal of the much-desired information on that particular point: though when Mabel of her own accord touched on any matter that might by possibility throw a light on the subject, she listened with an intentness ...
— The Pathfinder - The Inland Sea • James Fenimore Cooper
... rough and tumble of the inky hills of water. I remember thinking quite stupidly to myself that the moon was a dead world, and that I envied her for being dead. All this happened to me," he said, frowning across the table with sudden intentness, "the week before last." ...
— The Tale Of Mr. Peter Brown - Chelsea Justice - From "The New Decameron", Volume III. • V. Sackville West
... away into silence, and still he stood motionless, now listening with a new and sudden intentness, for, even as the clock rang the last stroke, he heard soft, heavy footsteps, moving slowly and cautiously along the pathway before the house and directly below the open window. A few seconds more and he heard the creaking of rusty hinges. The mysterious ...
— Howard Pyle's Book of Pirates • Howard Pyle
... his eyes on the speaker with an intentness, a cold penetration, that seemed to bore to the very recesses of his mind. In that look there was something questioning and ...
— In the Shadow of the Hills • George C. Shedd
... rolled over; they propped him up; he looked round rather wildly from one to the other. His face cleared. His eye fell upon Pringle, where it rested with a steady intentness. When he spoke, at last, ...
— The Desire of the Moth; and The Come On • Eugene Manlove Rhodes
... with the intentness which one gives to strangers in a quiet car, till he laughed, "I feel as if I knew her like a book." The century's greatest problem was whether he would finally prefer her to Olive, if he knew them. If he could speak to them——But that was, in New York, more difficult than beating a policeman ...
— The Trail of the Hawk - A Comedy of the Seriousness of Life • Sinclair Lewis
... her words, Monck's hand left hers. He lay still looking at her, but with that steely intentness that told her nothing. She could not have said whether he were vitally interested in the matter or not when he ...
— The Lamp in the Desert • Ethel M. Dell
... in the bright facts of being captain of the track team, and holding the interstate record for the high jump, in the all-suffusing brightness of being twenty-one. Yet sometimes, in the pauses of his work, the young man frowned and looked at the ground with an intentness which suggested that even twenty-one might ...
— O Pioneers! • Willa Cather
... intelligence,—of great human depth and richness, but special nevertheless. Of a particular order of truths you are an incomparable champion; but always you are the champion and on the field, always your genius has its visor down, and glares through a loop-hole with straitened intentness of vision. A particular sort of errors and falsities you can track with the scent of a blood-hound, and with a speed and bottom not surpassed, if equalled; but the Destinies have put the nose of your genius to the ground, and sent it ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 12, No. 72, October, 1863 • Various
... true betting-men: they do not wish to be seen in betting-shops, yet cannot keep away. They are not loungers, for they may be observed passing along the thoroughfare seemingly with all desirable intentness upon their daily business; but they suddenly disappear as they arrive at the door of the betting-shop. These are your respectable men; worthy, solid, family men. But it is not easy to enter a betting-shop, and avoid rubbing against some ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 447 - Volume 18, New Series, July 24, 1852 • Various
... Church is a folly which keeps men from enjoying the communion of the Church Invisible, and that in the desire to be helped by, and to help others, men lose sight of the only sufficient help, which they might find by faithful solitary intentness of spirit," I answer it is true, and the present deadness and emptiness summon us to turn our thoughts in that direction. Being now without any positive form of religion, any unattractive symbols, or mysterious rites, we are in the less danger of stopping at surfaces, of accepting a mediator ...
— Memoirs of Margaret Fuller Ossoli, Vol. II • Margaret Fuller Ossoli
... shortly—it was not a subject on which he cared to dwell; and the clergyman listened thoughtfully, his sunken eyes fixed on the pale face beneath the clustering black hair with an intentness of regard which would have disturbed anyone less engrossed than the narrator of the ...
— Afterwards • Kathlyn Rhodes
... I have grown calm; I am becoming simpler, clearer. Too late I've gained sense!... It's a strange thing! I have grown calm—certainly, and at the same time ... I'm full of dread. Yes, I'm full of dread. Half hanging over the silent, yawning abyss, I shudder, turn away, with greedy intentness gaze at everything about me. Every object is doubly precious to me. I cannot gaze enough at my poor, cheerless room, saying farewell to each spot on my walls. Take your fill for the last time, my eyes. Life is retreating; slowly and smoothly she is flying away from me, as the shore flies from the ...
— The Diary of a Superfluous Man and Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... the center of a plot of grass with her arms outstretched. Fluttering about her head were a family of wrens. Two had alighted within the palms of her hands and were gazing toward her with serious intentness. ...
— The Girl Scouts in Beechwood Forest • Margaret Vandercook
... face which would have made him change colour if keener suspicion had helped it to be read there. M. de Mauves didn't change colour, but he looked at his wife's so oddly, so more than naturally (wouldn't it be?) detached friend with an intentness that betrayed at once an irritating memory of the episode in the Bois de Boulogne and such vigilant curiosity as was natural to a gentleman who had entrusted his "honour" to another gentleman's ...
— Madame de Mauves • Henry James
... suddenly conscious of a strange intentness of gaze on the old man's part. A peculiar, indescribable chill swept over him; he had a distinct, vivid impression that some subtle power was exercising itself upon him—a power that, for the briefest instant, held him in a grip of iron. What it was, he could not ...
— Truxton King - A Story of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... finally, who, of all human beings, could so well understand and interpret to others my inner and outer being, as this one, of such nobleness in her way of thinking, such great intellectual capacity, and so free from the theological perplexities that enveloped me?" Let any one peruse, with all intentness, the lineaments of this portrait, and he will be impressed with the fact, that it is possible for woman to fulfil her mission, and become a true helpmeet. This woman was not a copy. She was not a cipher. She was an original; ...
— The True Woman • Justin D. Fulton
... which time the train had made no stop, he had been alone in his compartment. Yet, to his surprise, he was suddenly aware that the seat opposite to him had been noiselessly taken by a girl whose eyes, also, were fixed with curious intentness upon the broad expanse of marshland and sands across which the train was slowly making its way. Hamel had spent a great many years abroad, and his first impulse was to speak with the unexpected stranger. He forgot for ...
— The Vanished Messenger • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... his hand. Leaning heavily on one of the chairs, he stared with a passionate intentness. ...
— O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1921 • Various
... Opposite her sat a young girl, who was also engaged in something, and who trembled in the same manner. Both women appeared to be afflicted with St. Vitus' dance. I stepped nearer to them, and looked to see what they were doing. They raised their eyes to me, but went on with their work with the same intentness. In front of them lay scattered tobacco and paper cases. They were making cigarettes. The woman rubbed the tobacco between her hands, pushed it into the machine, slipped on the cover, thrust the tobacco ...
— The Moscow Census - From "What to do?" • Lyof N. Tolstoi
... muscular strength and endurance. A powerful neck supported a great head surmounted by a crop of hair like a lion's mane. His complexion was as delicate as a woman's, but his pale blue eyes were bent close to the table as he wagered his money with an almost painful intentness, and Prescott saw that the gaming madness ...
— Before the Dawn - A Story of the Fall of Richmond • Joseph Alexander Altsheler
... them on my own image in the glass, when a feeling of startled surprise, as if I had not known I was there and did not immediately recognize my own reflection, would cause me to remain looking at myself, the intentness with which I did so increasing as the face appeared to me not my own; and under this curious fascination my countenance has altered, becoming gradually so dreadful, so much more dreadful in expression than any human face I ever saw or ...
— Records of a Girlhood • Frances Anne Kemble
... ship as an evident destination; and the brig had barely swung to the current when the hoarse voice of the mate was heard ordering the ladder over the side. The preparation to receive the boat drew the attention of the crowd, and they stared at its occupants with an intentness which implied some deeper interest than mere curiosity; low words were exchanged, and some of the poor frightened creatures seemed to take ...
— Janice Meredith • Paul Leicester Ford
... sudden call to war, one knows with a flash of recognition the presence of military genius in such a man as he. The agent spent his days in following what seemed to many observers to be only a dull routine, but all his steadiness of purpose, all his simple intentness, all his gifts of strategy and powers of foresight, and of turning an interruption into an opportunity, were brought to bear upon this dull routine with a keen pleasure. A man in his place must know not only how to lead ...
— A Country Doctor and Selected Stories and Sketches • Sarah Orne Jewett
... gloom would, in spite of his very obvious exertions to the contrary, steal over his open, generous countenance; but the recruiting officer maintained an air of immovable coolness and composure. Twenty times did he detect the piercing looks of Katherine fastened on him, with an intentness that a less deliberative man might have had the vanity to misinterpret; but even this flattering testimonial of his power to attract failed to disturb his self-possession. It was in vain that Katherine endeavored to read his countenance, where everything was fixed in military rigidity, though his ...
— The Pilot • J. Fenimore Cooper
... personality which is the power of story-telling, is to have a power of life gained through the experience of having lived; to have a power of emotion acquired through the exercise of daily affairs; a power of imagination won from having dwelt upon the things of life with intentness, a power of sympathy obtained from seeing the things of others as you meet them day by day; and a first-hand knowledge of the sights and sounds and beauties of Nature, a knowledge of bird and flower, tree and rock, their names and some of their secrets—knowledge accumulated ...
— A Study of Fairy Tales • Laura F. Kready
... thee and of thine errand to the Gipsy Queen—something he must surely have heard, else could he not have spoken of the 'Trevlyn spawn,' and what he would do if one of that 'brood' dared to come betwixt him and his design. And then he leaned against a tree and waited, listening with an intentness that showed a deep suspicion; and he must have heard sounds that I could not—for my heart beat so wildly I feared he would hear it where he stood—and he smote his hands softly together and laughed a low laugh like that ...
— The Lost Treasure of Trevlyn - A Story of the Days of the Gunpowder Plot • Evelyn Everett-Green
... intentness of her single eye, his every motion, her head swaying in unconscious sympathy. Although her body sat so stiff and awkward in the chimney-seat, her spirit, inspired with the grace of love, was dancing with Manetho's. But the body kept its place, ...
— Idolatry - A Romance • Julian Hawthorne
... exaggerate the sensitive, the almost miniature, beauty of her. If anything, its charm was greater there in the full glare of the electric chandelier, as she faced him, giving him glance for glance, quite undismayed by the intentness of his scrutiny. ...
— The Brass Bowl • Louis Joseph Vance
... now de Courcelles did not interfere. The others, hearing loud and harsh words, drew near. Jumonville came very close and regarded Robert with great intentness, evidently curious to see what he would do. The youth stared at Boucher in amazement, but he exercised ...
— The Hunters of the Hills • Joseph Altsheler
... her absorption preventing her from differentiating the human species beyond the broad classification of those likely to be run over and those in no such danger. Her color was high, and her face despite a grim intentness indicated keen satisfaction. A handsome boy sat beside her, and Justin had a confused impression of a number of other children in charge of a buxom girl on the back seat. He stood motionless gazing after the flying car and oblivious ...
— Other People's Business - The Romantic Career of the Practical Miss Dale • Harriet L. Smith
... looking about them with strained intentness, for they had left the guiding trail behind them now. Suddenly a faint cry came out of the silence followed by a beat of hoofs that grew louder every second, until it seemed to swell into a roar. Either there was clearer ground in the ...
— The Cattle-Baron's Daughter • Harold Bindloss
... thickish, more level; a full brown colour. She looked as if she had not yet attained to any sense of her being a professed beauty: but the fair widow was clearly bent upon winning you, and had a shy, playful intentness of aspect. Her pure white skin was flat on the bone; the lips came forward in a soft curve, and, if they were not artistically stained, were triumphantly fresh. Here, in any case, she beat her rival, whose ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... as the hours crept slowly by. Now and then he lifted his head and listened with painful intentness. He felt stiff in every muscle, and yet he had a dread of making an effort to change his [v]constrained position. He might lose control of his rigid limbs, and fall into those ...
— The Literary World Seventh Reader • Various
... guess we're very well here." Ann Eliza had become suddenly aware that Mr. Ramy was looking at her with unusual intentness. Involuntarily her hand strayed to the thin streaks of hair on her temples, and thence descended to straighten ...
— Bunner Sisters • Edith Wharton
... better in the next breath, for she lifted her face, ever so little, and with a sense of deep relief he gave her the brotherly kiss she thus permitted. When he looked at Jefferson Craig he found that the keen, fine eyes were regarding him with a very friendly intentness, and he wrung the hand offered him as he would have wrung the hand ...
— Under the Country Sky • Grace S. Richmond
... were locked together in a clasp that expelled the blood and left them white. Her regard had the intentness of ...
— The Iron Furrow • George C. Shedd
... can't you?" said Stan. His smooth forehead wrinkled and a sudden cleft appeared between his eyebrows, witness of an unaccustomed intentness of thought. "Say, Pete; this partnership of ours isn't on the level. You put in half the work and all ...
— Copper Streak Trail • Eugene Manlove Rhodes
... Jay Pendick, their own headman, with its small, alert dark eyes reflected the intentness of his mind. His capacity had been tried over and over again in his long years of service. Then Lal Hobhouse, the best-hated man on the countryside for his ruthless genius in obtaining work from those under him, and the driving force of Jeff's side of the partnership. ...
— The Forfeit • Ridgwell Cullum
... is going to be a native race." Shann made a statement instead of a question and saw that the other was watching him with a new intentness, as if he had at last been recognized as a person instead of rank and file and very low ...
— Storm Over Warlock • Andre Norton
... the sightliness of the neatly kept hall. Then, nodding towards a maid whom she had placed on watch at the extreme end of the hall, she muttered some assurances as to this woman's faithfulness, and turned away with a cordial good night. Georgian watched her go with a strange and lingering intentness, or so it seemed to Ransom; then slowly entered her ...
— The Chief Legatee • Anna Katharine Green
... eating and drinking mechanically, watching all the time the woman who sat opposite to him, who had now engaged Mr. Raymond Greene in an animated conversation on the subject of the suitability for filming of certain recent plays. He was trying with a curious intentness to study her dispassionately, to understand the nature of the charm on which dramatic critics had wasted a wealth of adjectives, and of which he himself was humanly and personally conscious. She wore a high-necked gown of some soft, black material, ...
— The Cinema Murder • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... challenge, and it was made with deliberate intention. Accustomed as she was to the semi-imaginary mental crises of struggling, strenuous youth, she yet shrank from the intentness of Thayer's mood. ...
— The Dominant Strain • Anna Chapin Ray
... his arm to push his unwelcome companion aside. Basil took him by the shoulders and stared into his face with an intentness that made the young fellow fancy that the fierce, black orbs confronting him were burning holes in his brain. For two minutes, that seemed two full hours, the gaze was concentrated upon him. Windybank felt his body shrinking into a smaller compass under the fascination. His breath came thickly, ...
— Sea-Dogs All! - A Tale of Forest and Sea • Tom Bevan
... Raven, striding along the road, listened with all possible intentness to hear whether husband and wife spoke together. He thought not, but he did hear the closing of ...
— Old Crow • Alice Brown
... commenced his story when the smile died out of Seaforth's eyes. He seemed to listen with breathless intentness, and his voice shook a little as he said, "And you asked her to marry you. Did you think for ...
— Alton of Somasco • Harold Bindloss
... growing. It seemed only an attractive novelty and I still believed a brown hackle would suffice. But then I became aware that this trout, to its stringed accompaniment, ever whistled and sang one song with a desperate intentness. That song was "The Rosary." The fish had presumed too far. "This," I shrewdly told myself, "is almost certainly a dream." The soundless words were magic. Gorge and stream vanished, the versatile fish faded ...
— Somewhere in Red Gap • Harry Leon Wilson
... observed both," returned the girl, a smile struggling about her beautiful mouth, in spite of the singular and engrossing intentness which caused her cheeks to flush and lighted her eyes with a brilliancy that was almost dazzling—"I have observed both, and have thought the last remarkable for a man of Harry ...
— The Deerslayer • James Fenimore Cooper
... not spoken for a moment. It might be that he was careless of the poetic lights with which Mr. Howth tenderly decorated his old faith, or it might be, that even he, with the terrible intentness of a real life-purpose in his brain, was touched by the picture of the far old chivalry, dead long ago. The master's voice grew low and lingering now. It was a labour of love, this. Oh, it is so easy to go back out of the broil of dust and meanness and barter into ...
— Margret Howth, A Story of To-day • Rebecca Harding Davis
... to my appeal. It was not pleasant to have twelve masked faces turned upon you and to see twelve pairs of vindictive Italian eyes fixed with fierce intentness upon your face. But I stood as a debonair soldier should, and I could not but reflect how much credit I was bringing upon the Hussars of Conflans by the dignity of my bearing. I do not think that anyone could have carried himself better under ...
— The Adventures of Gerard • Arthur Conan Doyle
... an eating-house, or to even approach the "snack-stand" on the edge of the circus lot. For a long time he stood afar off in the darkness, his legs trembling, his mouth twitching, his eyes bent with pathetic intentness upon the single pie and hot sandwich stand that remained near the sideshow tent, presided over by a kind-faced, sleepy old ...
— The Rose in the Ring • George Barr McCutcheon
... is needed," he remarked, his eyes flashing from his mother's face to mine with equal force and intentness. "My mother"—his words were low, but it was impossible not to hear them—"has not been well since my father died, two months ago. It needed but the slightest shock to produce the result you unhappily see before you. That shock this very ...
— The Mill Mystery • Anna Katharine Green
... fixed upon her with cold intentness, a strange feeling of superstitious dread suddenly crept over her from head to foot. Like a bird fascinated by a snake she came a little nearer, down the steps, towards him, her eyes, too, riveted on his face, ...
— The Nest of the Sparrowhawk • Baroness Orczy
... and her white ruffling, that she was daintily hemstitching, fell to her lap, as she looked, still with a certain wide intentness in her eyes, upon the pleasant window, and the bright, fresh things it framed. Not the least bright and fresh among them was the human creature in her early girlhood, tender and pleasant in its beautiful leafage, but waiting, like any other young and growing life, to prove ...
— A Summer in Leslie Goldthwaite's Life. • Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney
... then threw it down again, and glanced at me out of the corners of her eyes; then hummed again, and finally became silent, and sat bending forward a little, her dark lustrous eyes gazing with strange intentness through the slight screen of foliage into the vacant space beyond. What to see? The poet has omitted to tell us to what the maiden's fancy lightly turns in spring. Doubtless it turns to thoughts of something real. Life is real; so is passion—the quickening of ...
— Birds in Town and Village • W. H. Hudson
... them sped a form. It crossed the road, entered one of the old buildings and hurriedly emerged, entering another. It seemed like some lost spirit of the night. It passed within ten feet of the scouts, never noticing them. It seemed intent with a kind of diabolical intentness. Meanwhile the voice continued, now mournful, now petulant, now clear, now modulated, ...
— Roy Blakeley in the Haunted Camp • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... perhaps, when the slow-built hope of life was destroyed by some chance, as you called it, no more controllable than this paltry burning of a mill. Yet, now that the great hope was gone on which his brain had worked with rigid, fierce intentness, now that his hands were powerless to redeem a perishing class, he had time to fall into careless, kindly habit: he thought it wasted time, remorsefully, of course. He was seized with a curiosity to know what plan in living these people had who crossed his way on the streets; ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 52, February, 1862 • Various
... was a broom, made of a bundle of sticks, such as street-sweepers use. She would make a hasty dash at the snow, and then, as if struggling between duty and pleasure, would rush from her sweeping to the shop window, and gaze with an eager and fascinated intentness at the toys within. Lily looked at her until she became tired; then, impatient of restraint, she jumped out of the carriage, and went into the shop after her mother; but Mrs. Douglas was down at the end of ...
— Harper's Young People, December 16, 1879 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... air, and was so cheerful and complaisant to me, that he did credit to his kind choice, instead of shewing as if he was ashamed of it: And as I was resolved to busy my mind entirely with the duties of the day, my intentness on that occasion, and my thankfulness to God, for his unspeakable mercies to me, so took up my thoughts, that I was much less concerned, than I should otherwise have been, at the gazings and whisperings of the ladies ...
— Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded • Samuel Richardson
... I continued dreamily gazing down the thoro'fare toward Mollychunkamug only a certain length of time. Man keeps up to his highest elations hardly longer than a danseuse can poise in a pose. To be conscious of the highest beauty demands an involuntary intentness of observation so fanatically eager that presently we are prostrated and need stimulants. And just as we sensitively felt this exhaustion and this need, we heard a suggestive voice calling us from the front-door of ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 10, Number 59, September, 1862 • Various
... of fighting, to strike and leap away; but there was more to it than this. Thirty or forty huskies ran to the spot and surrounded the combatants in an intent and silent circle. Buck did not comprehend that silent intentness, nor the eager way with which they were licking their chops. Curly rushed her antagonist, who struck again and leaped aside. He met her next rush with his chest, in a peculiar fashion that tumbled her off her feet. She never regained them, This was what the onlooking ...
— The Call of the Wild • Jack London
... that we could seldom stand upright, nor see without a candle. Upon the attic floor a map was roughly drawn in chalks of different colors, with mountains, rivers, towns, bridges, and roads of two classes. Here we would play by the hour, with tingling fingers and stiffening knees, and an intentness, zest, and excitement ...
— The Life of Robert Louis Stevenson for Boys and Girls • Jacqueline M. Overton
... being borne in upon La Boulaye's mind as he stood by that window, his men behind him watching also, with no less intentness and some uneasiness for themselves—for they misliked ...
— The Trampling of the Lilies • Rafael Sabatini
... already saluted the mother, but when his eye fell on the face and person of Mildred, it was riveted, for an instant, with an earnestness and intentness of surprise and admiration that all noted, though no one saw fit ...
— The Two Admirals • J. Fenimore Cooper
... she looks a little sad: then she smooths her dress, straightens herself, shakes her head, and is absorbed in the music, beating time with tiny foot and hand, and following every strain with an intentness which draws her brows together into a slight frown. Elise almost smiles as she glances toward her mother: she knows where to find enthusiasm at a white heat when it is wanted. With the final repetition, "Ye shall find rest to your souls," the dame rises quickly, ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 11, - No. 22, January, 1873 • Various
... the man of extremes who spoke, and he spoke quite sincerely. Christina, however, neither answered him nor heard. Her eyes were fixed with a strange intentness upon him; her breath came and went as if she had run a race, and in ...
— Ensign Knightley and Other Stories • A. E. W. Mason
... with increased eagerness and intentness to the one resource she had—her Bible. The cry for happiness is so natural to the human heart, that it takes long oppression to stifle it. The cry was strong in Esther's young nature—strong and imperative; and in all the world around her she ...
— A Red Wallflower • Susan Warner
... awkward silence, Briscoe remained motionless in his easy chair, a rueful reflectiveness on his genial face incongruous with its habitual expression. When a sudden disconcerted intentness developed upon it, Bayne, every instinct on the alert, took instant heed of the change. The obvious accession of dismay betokened the increasing acuteness of the crisis, and Briscoe's attitude, as of helpless paralysis, stricken as it were into stone as he gazed toward the ...
— The Ordeal - A Mountain Romance of Tennessee • Charles Egbert Craddock
... air, a vague memorial of the world of men below. From that too the colour vanished, and those other lights began to shine which to some are the only lights of day. The skies dropped close upon the mountains and the silver seas, like a vast face brooding with intentness; there was enchantment, mystery, and a living motion in its depths, the presence of all-pervading Zeus enfolding his starry children with the dark radiance ...
— AE in the Irish Theosophist • George William Russell
... were still clasped over her father's eyes, and McNally took the opportunity this afforded him to accompany his words with a meaning look that was insolent in its intentness. In spite of herself Katherine felt the blood mounting into her cheeks and forehead, and McNally, seeing the blush, made no effort to conceal his smile. Katherine did not flinch from his gaze, ...
— The Short Line War • Merwin-Webster
... chair sacred to the duke himself; and a cricket cap of Diavolo's was discovered on one of the tall candles which stood on the altar in the private chapel of the castle, as if it had been used as an extinguisher, A peculiar intentness was also observed in the expression of the children's countenances which was thought to betoken mischief, because always hitherto it had been noticed that when the gravity of their demeanour was most exemplary, the wickedness of the design upon which they were engaged was sure to be extreme. ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand
... a wonderful mine of wealth; all this fresh paper, and such an assortment of pencils to choose from. He selected two pencils, and then, spreading a sheet of white paper before him, he began his sketch. Emma watched every stroke with silent intentness. But, as the picture grew under the boy's fingers, she could not control ...
— Gritli's Children • Johanna Spyri
... don't think we can prove anything by your father, for he's just been telling me that there was no one in the place but himself. No one came in, and he was quite alone—" Ranson had begun speaking eagerly, but either his own words or the intentness with which Cahill received them caused him to halt ...
— Ranson's Folly • Richard Harding Davis
... soft soap, pretty neatly," and gave the man before him a look of friendly understanding. He was a little startled, for an instant, by the expression in the other's bright eyes, which he found fixed on him with an intentness almost disconcerting. "Does he think I'm trying to put something over on him?" he asked himself with a passing astonishment, "or is he trying to put something over on me?" Then he remembered that everyone had spoken of Marsh's eyes as peculiar; it was probably just his habit. "He can look right ...
— The Brimming Cup • Dorothy Canfield Fisher
... the privilege, and the habit, of the Widow Lewis to sit idly when she liked, but her attitude now was not that of idleness. Intentness, reposeful acceptance of life, rather, showed in her motionless, long-sustained position. She was patient, as women are; but her strong pose, its freedom from material support, her restrained power to do or to endure, gave her the look of owning something more than resignation, something ...
— The Magnificent Adventure - Being the Story of the World's Greatest Exploration and - the Romance of a Very Gallant Gentleman • Emerson Hough
... of Miss Du Prel's appearing at the door of the library, whence she surveyed the group with absent-minded intentness. ...
— The Daughters of Danaus • Mona Caird
... bearers came and went, from house to house and between the village and the plantation, working, working steadily. Yet they were aware, all the time, of the pursuing terror, behind the turn of the road; they were held still in their intentness. Over all of them was a quiet, fixed serenity. McClane's body had lost its eager, bustling energy and was still; his face was grave, preoccupied and still; only Trixie Rankin went rushing, and calling out to her quiet man ...
— The Romantic • May Sinclair
... Brumley had a psychic experience. It seemed to him as he stood observing Lady Harman with an entirely unnecessary and unpremeditated intentness, that for the briefest interval her attention flashed over Lady Beach-Mandarin's shoulder to the end verandah window; and following her glance, he saw—and then he did not see—the arrested figure, the white face of Sir Isaac, bearing an expression ...
— The Wife of Sir Isaac Harman • H. G. (Herbert George) Wells
... Physiological Chemistry and Physics; the student should then pass a real, practical examination in these subjects; and, having gone through that ordeal satisfactorily, he should be troubled no more with them. His whole mind should then be given with equal intentness to Therapeutics, in its broadest sense, to Practical Medicine and to Surgery, with instruction in Hygiene and in Medical Jurisprudence; and of these subjects only—surely there are enough of them—should he be required to show a knowledge ...
— Science & Education • Thomas H. Huxley
... Ruth said nothing. She was leaning back in the farthest corner of her chair, her head resting slightly upon her fingers, her eyes studying with a curious intentness the outline of Wingrave's pale, hard face. He himself, either unconscious of, or indifferent to her close scrutiny, had simply the air of a man possessed of ...
— The Malefactor • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... and with passionate intentness she looked from the gaily ornamented galley to the shore, which several men in Greek ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... parasol, and swaying it to and fro amid the ferns she continued in a low laughing voice her tale of Mrs. Fargus and the influence that this lady had exercised upon her. Her words floated along a current of quiet humour cadenced by the gentle swaying of her parasol, and brought into relief by a certain intentness of manner which was peculiar to her. And gradually Morton became more and more conscious of her, the charm of her voice stole upon him, and once he lingered, allowing her to get a few yards in front so that he might notice the quiet figure, a little ...
— Celibates • George Moore
... reply to the west. His heart stood still for a moment. He knew that they were the whoops of the savages and he felt that they signified a discovery. Perhaps chance had disclosed their trail. He listened with great intentness, but the shouts did not come again. Nevertheless ...
— The Masters of the Peaks - A Story of the Great North Woods • Joseph A. Altsheler
... answered Fleda, abstractedly, stroking into order some old man in her drawing with great intentness. "King! you rascal keep ...
— Queechy, Volume I • Elizabeth Wetherell
... them a quaint-looking old woman, in what appeared to be a white scalloped nightcap. She had a pan of corn in her hand, and was attended by a retinue that would have rejoiced an epicure's heart. Chickens, ducks, geese, turkeys, and Guinea fowls thronged around and after her with an intentness on the grain and a disregard of one another's rights and feelings that reminded one unpleasantly of political aspirants just after a Presidential election. Johnny made a dive for an old gobbler, and the great red-wattled bird dropped his wings and seemed inclined to show ...
— Opening a Chestnut Burr • Edward Payson Roe
... the storekeeper in some doubt. Bill was watching them with a curious intentness. And before Sunny could challenge the two scoffers, his harsh voice ...
— The Twins of Suffering Creek • Ridgwell Cullum
... they sought the answer, a clear sign appeared as it were by the way, and unsought. Julian was watching haggardly. He snarled a question at Jim. His cook-boy's big round eyes showed very big and very round just now. He was watching with painful intentness. ...
— Cinderella in the South - Twenty-Five South African Tales • Arthur Shearly Cripps
... to focus upon the Montgomerys with a new intentness. Before her escapade they had been accepted as a matter of course; now that she had demonstrated that the Montgomerys were subject to the temptations that beset all mankind, every one became curious as to the further definition of the family weaknesses. The community may be said to have ...
— Otherwise Phyllis • Meredith Nicholson
... wait a minute, mama." She held her pen suspended to look through the shop-window. She looked carelessly at first, and then with intentness. A closed carriage was passing down the narrow street, the wheel grating against the pavement had caused her to look up. "There is some one, all in white, in that ...
— Mrs. Day's Daughters • Mary E. Mann
... disturbed was when my surgeon brought another to examine John, who scrutinized their faces with an anxious look, asking of the elder: "Do you think I shall pull through, sir?" "I hope so, my man." And, as the two passed on, John's eyes followed them with an intentness which would have won a clearer answer from them had they seen it. A momentary shadow flitted over his face; then came the smile of serenity, as if, in that brief eclipse, he had acknowledged the existence of some ...
— Incidents of the War: Humorous, Pathetic, and Descriptive • Alf Burnett |
