"Soporific" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... range, put my back against a tree and tried to read. Mercury was ever a blithe and sportive god, and his gambols on Mount Olympus were noted in days of yore; but the modern namesake—or else my present position—had soporific tendencies; and fear of the target shooters growing dimmer and dimmer, ...
— Four Years in Rebel Capitals - An Inside View of Life in the Southern Confederacy from Birth to Death • T. C. DeLeon
... out that when I did actually leave Australia I was too busy at my clerking, and at inventing soporific answers to the mostly irrelevant inquiries of more or less distracted passengers, to catch a glimpse of the land disappearing below the horizon—the land in which I had spent the most formative years of my life—or to spare a thought for any ...
— The Record of Nicholas Freydon - An Autobiography • A. J. (Alec John) Dawson
... not having yet domiciled within the walls of a college. Although I had little to expect from the apprehension of any of these troubles, as my person was, from my short residence, most likely unknown to any of the authorities—yet did Morpheus refuse his soporific balsam to the mind—I could not help thinking of my young and giddy companions, of the kind-hearted Eglantine, immured within the walls of a dungeon; of the noble-spirited Echo, maltreated and disfigured by the temporary ...
— The English Spy • Bernard Blackmantle
... Times, the only newspaper he was in the habit of reading daily. It was there the gentlemen visitors, chiefly diplomats, who wanted to speak to him, joined him; while the lady visitors sat round the Queen's table, at which the conversation was general, if occasionally soporific. It used to brighten up again with the arrival of any ladies whose wit or beauty attracted the men who had scattered about the drawing-room. This was always the case on the appearance of Mesdames de St. Aulaire and de Castellane, of some charming members of the corps diplomatique, the Princess ...
— Memoirs • Prince De Joinville
... put the question calmly, considering his elation at his good luck. He had made up his mind that he might have to spend days in this soporific hamlet. ...
— In Apple-Blossom Time - A Fairy-Tale to Date • Clara Louise Burnham
... and Garrett knew nothing of this, and were all abroad, but they thought Rooke must have the key; so they proceeded to drink with him, and were just about to administer a really effective soporific in his grog, when they and all the merry party were suddenly startled by violent ringing at the bell, and thundering and halloaing at the hall door. The men jumped to their feet and balanced themselves, and looked half wild, half ...
— Hard Cash • Charles Reade
... be buoyant on the glistening bubble of Dignity, she had likewise a modest estimate of her dues. Alack, my poor heroine had no pride! Mrs. Ford's silent censure awakened no resentment. It sounded in her ears like a dull, soporific hum. Lizzie was deeply enamored of what a French book terms her aises intellectuelles. Her mental comfort lay in the ignoring of problems. She possessed a certain native insight which revealed many ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 89, March, 1865 • Various
... means whereby I can grasp your jokes without being bored to weariness? They're more soporific than bromide. ...
— The Strange Case of Mortimer Fenley • Louis Tracy
... means. I have already told you of my passion for books, and cannot, therefore, dislike bibliography. I think, with Lambinet, that the greater part of bibliographical works are sufficiently dry and soporific:[95] but I am not insensible to the utility, and even entertainment, which may result from a proper cultivation of it—although both De Bure and Peignot appear to me to have gone greatly beyond the mark, in lauding this study as "one of the most attractive and vast pursuits ...
— Bibliomania; or Book-Madness - A Bibliographical Romance • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... than the rest, and had resolved to effect her removal. For this a favourable opportunity soon occurred, owing to the sultan's departure for twenty days upon a hunting excursion. In a day or two after his absence, the sultana invited Koout al Koolloob to an entertainment, and having mixed a strong soporific in some sherbet, presented it her to drink. The effect of the potion was instantaneous, and she sunk into a trance; when the sultana putting her into the chest, commanded it to be given to a broker, and sold without examination of the contents, for a hundred deenars; hoping, ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Complete • Anonymous
... from the path, and, followed by L'Isle, was soon ascending the hill. Moodie, somewhat under the influence of his soporific draughts, was in a reverie, wondering whether Lord Strathern would get his letter in time to send a troop of horse after the fugitives, and whether it might not come within the provisions of the military code to have L'Isle court-martialed ...
— The Actress in High Life - An Episode in Winter Quarters • Sue Petigru Bowen
... and I spent an hour at my house before they walked home to bed, and Choti read as a soporific, with a few bottles of Munich beer, the "Sermon to the Fishes" of St. Antonius. As he read, we heard the joyous stridence of an accordion in a hula harmony. The upaupahura was beginning in the grove where ...
— Mystic Isles of the South Seas. • Frederick O'Brien
... this instrument that had pricked the skin of Lanyard's neck; beyond reasonable doubt it contained a soporific, if not exactly a killing dose of some ...
— The Lone Wolf - A Melodrama • Louis Joseph Vance
... touch. He sometimes felt as if they walked the English lanes together. His intimacy with her neighbours, and her neighbourhood, was one of his relaxations. He found himself thinking of old Doby and Mrs. Welden, as a sort of soporific measure, when he lay awake at night. She had sent photographs of Stornham, of Dunholm Castle, and of Dole, and had even found an old engraving of Lady Alanby in her youth. Her evident liking for the Dunholms had pleased him. They were people ...
— The Shuttle • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... the doors of their houses, smoking in the evening air; the barbers were still at work preparing their customers for the night. Like Washington Irving, these may have considered a good clean shave the best soporific. Here and there a citizen of the better class was to be seen picking his way by the light of a lantern, held by a boy, and twice we met sedan chairs containing women, preceded by a lantern bearer. The passage of two sedans in these narrow streets is a difficult ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 6, No. 6, December 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... looked over, to find exactly what he expected: the boat made fast to one of the cross timbers, with a big swarthy man in a blue jersey asleep in the stern, and a rough-looking, shock-headed boy also asleep in the bows, the hot sunshine having a soporific effect on both. ...
— Steve Young • George Manville Fenn
... to bed than I determined, by a violent effort, to sleep. I had always a ready soporific at hand. It was a repeating and re-repeating of a pious little ode by a late fashionable poet. It seldom failed to produce somnolency at about the twelfth or thirteenth repetition. I would recommend a similar prescription ...
— Rattlin the Reefer • Edward Howard |
