"Break off" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... saying: "These transparent creatures break off berries and fruits and branches; I have seen a flower, too, plucked from its stem by invisible digits and borne swiftly through the forest—only the flower visible, apparently speeding through the air and out of sight among ...
— In Search of the Unknown • Robert W. Chambers
... Comus. Break off! break off! I hear a footstep not our own approaching this place. Run to your places lest you frighten the traveler ...
— Dramatic Reader for Lower Grades • Florence Holbrook
... unites into a complete bower of dense greenery. The beech is known as the "groaning tree," because the branches often cross each other, and where the tree is exposed to the wind sometimes groan as they rub together. The rubbing often causes a wound where one of the branches will eventually break off, or occasionally automatic grafting takes place, and they unite. In the Verderer's Hall at Lyndhurst specimens are to be seen which have crossed and joined a second time, so that a complete hollow oval, or irregular circle of the wood could be cut ...
— Grain and Chaff from an English Manor • Arthur H. Savory
... on and off, with a view of taking some on board on the return of light. But at four o'clock in the morning, finding ourselves to leeward of this ice, we bore down to an island to leeward of us; there being about it some loose ice, part of which we saw break off. There we brought-to; hoisted out three boats; and in about five or six hours, took up as much ice as yielded fifteen tons of good fresh water. The pieces we took up were hard, and solid as a rock; some of them were so large, that we were obliged to break them with pick- axes before they could ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 14 • Robert Kerr
... off into other people; he's as neat as an outline cut out of paper with scissors. I like him, therefore, because in dealing with him you know what you've got hold of. With most men you don't: to pick the flower you must break off the whole dusty, thorny, worldly branch; you find you're taking up in your grasp all sorts of other people and things, dangling accidents and conditions. Poor Nash has none of those ...
— The Tragic Muse • Henry James
... I think, out of respect to another, as not to disturb the company, as Rusticus did, or not to break off another affair of importance in hand, defer to read or hear any new thing that is brought him; but for his own interest or particular pleasure, especially if he be a public minister, that he will not interrupt his dinner or break his sleep is inexcusable. ...
— The Essays of Montaigne, Complete • Michel de Montaigne
... to forget her vivacity, which she claimed was due to her love, and she insisted that I should continue to give her good counsel. But Good Heavens! Of what use are my counsels except to provide you with an additional triumph? The best advice I can give her is to break off her relations with you, for whatever confidence she may have in her pride, her only preservative against you is flight. She believes, for example, that she used her reason with good effect in the conversation ...
— Life, Letters, and Epicurean Philosophy of Ninon de L'Enclos, - the Celebrated Beauty of the Seventeenth Century • Robinson [and] Overton, ed. and translation.
... must break off, after dealing with a page and a half of the Duke of Argyll's article. A state of health which has prevented me from publishing anything since "The Factors of Organic Evolution," now nearly two years ago, prevents me from carrying the matter further. Could ...
— Essays: Scientific, Political, & Speculative, Vol. I • Herbert Spencer
... it at all events," he muttered in a somewhat desponding tone; "but I've tried before now to break off the accursed habit without success, and have my doubts of ...
— Post Haste • R.M. Ballantyne
... what miss of it, and never let your hand run away with you, or get into any habit or method of touch. If you want a continuous line, your hand should pass calmly from one end of it to the other without a tremor; if you want a shaking and broken line, your hand should shake, or break off, as easily as a musician's finger shakes or stops on a note: only remember this, that there is no general way of doing any thing; no recipe can be given you for so much as the drawing of a cluster of grass. The grass may be ragged ...
— The Elements of Drawing - In Three Letters to Beginners • John Ruskin
... of the Wangs, Gordon, still fuming with rage, suddenly determined to break off all relations with Li, to retire to Quinsan, and to take his "Ever-Victorious Army" with him. Though his friends, singly and in company, did their best to dissuade him from this rash course, and pointed out the consequences, he would not listen, ...
— Sir Robert Hart - The Romance of a Great Career, 2nd Edition • Juliet Bredon
... your character, and I revere your office; but if what you have to say relates to me, and not to yourself, let us break off this conversation at once. There are subjects, there are names which I never suffer any human being to allude to before me; and the sacred character which you bear, gives you no right ...
— Ellen Middleton—A Tale • Georgiana Fullerton
... said the youth to himself every day as the pile of gold grew higher; but, alas for human calculation! he awoke one morning to find his huge mountain of gold one solid mass. The action of the light, heat, and atmosphere had fused them together, and no exertion of his could break off even ...
— Allegories of Life • Mrs. J. S. Adams
... particular family above another: it would be a nobility by itself. This family would remain in the midst of us, like the indestructible root of that nobility which we have destroyed—it would be the germ of a new aristocracy." Violent murmurs hailed these remarks of Robespierre. He was obliged to break off and apologise. "I see," he said in conclusion, "that we are no longer allowed to utter here, without reproach, opinions which our adversaries amongst the first have maintained in ...
— History of the Girondists, Volume I - Personal Memoirs of the Patriots of the French Revolution • Alphonse de Lamartine
... I have said to you. It is not that I desire to break off our engagement; but that I cannot allow my wife to keep the diamonds which belong of right to her late husband's family. You may be sure that I should not be thus urgent had I not taken steps to ascertain that I am right in my judgment. In the meantime ...
— The Eustace Diamonds • Anthony Trollope
... unavoidable that at this point the narrative should break off again, for a certain very painful reason that will presently be apparent. While these things were going on in the parlour, and while Mr. Huxter was watching Mr. Marvel smoking his pipe against the gate, not a dozen yards ...
— The Invisible Man • H. G. Wells
... to comfort him, and the liking for me, which he had always entertained, evidently increased. I was in his watch, and, as we walked the deck together, he would talk to me by the hour of Scotland, and the estate of his ancestors, which he hoped one day to recover. Suddenly he would break off, and in a tone of deep melancholy, exclaim, "Ah, but those are dreams—all dreams—never to be realised. I am never to see bonnie Scotland again; her heathery hills, and blue, blue lochs, and my own Mary; but I've never told you of her. She's been the pole-star ...
— Marmaduke Merry - A Tale of Naval Adventures in Bygone Days • William H. G. Kingston
... might and thy prowess, it is said, none may withstand. This evil one, Sir Tarquin, hath taken captive my true knight, who, through my cruelty, betook himself to this adventure, and now lieth in chains and foul ignominy, without hope of release, until death break off his fetters." ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 1 (of 2) • John Roby
... That cause of delay is serious. For when you are dealing with very large bodies of men, such as half a dozen army corps, to change suddenly from the direction S (see Sketch 29) for which your Staff work was planned, and to break off at a moment's notice in direction E, while you are on the march towards S, is impossible. You have to think out a whole new set of dispositions, and to re-order all your great body of men. White was under no such compulsion, for though he had to ...
— A General Sketch of the European War - The First Phase • Hilaire Belloc
... group what was done in another, never enough to prevent the eye from feeling that, however regular and mathematical may be the structure of parts, what is composed out of them is as various and infinite as any other part of nature. Nor does this take place in general effect only. Break off an elm bough three feet long, in full leaf, and lay it on the table before you, and try to draw it, leaf for leaf. It is ten to one if in the whole bough (provided you do not twist it about as you work) you find one form of leaf exactly like another; perhaps you ...
— English Prose - A Series of Related Essays for the Discussion and Practice • Frederick William Roe (edit. and select.)
... no good can be looked for to those countries by yielding this large authority to the French. If they shall continue their title by this grant to be absolute lords, there is no end, for a long time, to be expected of this war; and, contrariwise, if they break off, there is an end of any good composition with the ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... sunrise. If a convenient spot can be found we halt for breakfast about nine a.m. To save time, this meal is generally cooked the night before, and has only to be warmed. We continue the march after breakfast, rest a little in the middle of the day, and break off early in the afternoon. We average from two to two-and-a-half miles an hour in a straight line, or as the crow flies, and seldom have more than five or six hours a day of actual travel. This in a hot climate is ...
— A Popular Account of Dr. Livingstone's Expedition to the Zambesi and Its Tributaries • David Livingstone
... break off at their blunt end, and they grow like the hair; so the porcupine has a plenty for use ...
— Friends in Feathers and Fur, and Other Neighbors - For Young Folks • James Johonnot
... Mr. Payne's edition, there has been a scramble to secure it, and it is no longer to be had for love or money. The fact is, it fills a void, the world has been waiting for this chef d'aeuvre, and all lovers of the Arabian Nights wonder how they have got on without it. We must break off from remarks to give some idea of the originality of the style, of the incomparable way in which the very essence and life of the East is breathed into simple, straightforward Anglo-Saxon English. In certain ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 6 • Richard F. Burton
... objectionable only because it looked insecure; and the spurs were added as a kind of pledge of stability to the eye. But evidently the projecting corners of the abacus at a, Fig. XIX., are actually insecure; they may break off, if great weight be laid upon them. This is the chief reason of the ugliness of the form; and the spurs in b are now no mere pledges of apparent stability, but have very serious practical use in supporting ...
— The Stones of Venice, Volume I (of 3) • John Ruskin
... act towards you as I should towards my own daughters. It is a disappointment to me that you will not be as comfortably off with Stanton as I had supposed you would be at first, and there is his state of health that is a drawback; but still I cannot press you to break off the engagement, having given my sanction to it. I only wish he had not acted in the extraordinary quixotic way he has. Then all this trouble might have been spared you both. For a man of his age and stamp, I consider he has been most foolish, if not to say culpable, in the manner he has treated ...
— Dwell Deep - or Hilda Thorn's Life Story • Amy Le Feuvre
... Gabriel said he had decided on a plan which might break off this detestable marriage if the others would help him. They all declared they would do anything for him, and he then told them he had privately sent word about it by Manette to Celeste; and Celeste was willing to have ...
— The Chase Of Saint-Castin And Other Stories Of The French In The New World • Mary Hartwell Catherwood
... so eloquently in it, would have been dried and crimped out of it! The workmanship, in short, to borrow an illustration from Schlegel, would have been like the mimic gardens of children; who, eager to see the work of their hands, break off twigs and flowers, and stick them in the ground; which done, the childish gardener struts proudly up and down ...
— Shakespeare: His Life, Art, And Characters, Volume I. • H. N. Hudson
... all very well, in some things. But, where my son is concerned, pray never keep the truth from me again. When did she break off with Henry—or did he quarrel ...
— Put Yourself in His Place • Charles Reade
... it was not till the latter had done a deal of protesting that the younger girl was able to give her sister due credit for self-sacrifice and generosity. So when Mr. John Dashwood came round to his sisters to tell them how Edward had refused to break off his engagement, and how Mrs. Ferrars, on hearing of this, had resolved to cut him off with a shilling, and to do all in her power to prevent his advancing in any profession, and had settled on his brother Robert ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol. I • Various
... Fox, however, had sufficient penetration to discover that he had other ambitious demands to be satisfied, should this be complied with—that he would demand Holland for his brother Louis, etc.; and therefore he determined to break off the negociations, and to continue the war. He made this determination fully known, when he rejected the treaty of Amiens as a basis, and insisted on the Emperor of Russia being admitted as a party. Yet the French Government seem to have considered that England ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... perceive," he said, "how terribly your silence affects me? Oh! mademoiselle, how pitilessly inexorable you would become if you were ever to resolve to break off all acquaintance with any one; and then, too, I think you changeable; in fact—in fact, I dread this deep affection which fills my ...
— Louise de la Valliere • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... so easy. You see, I've been trained all my life to carry them. You can't break off a thing like that in an instant. A priest doesn't turn atheist in a night... and this Family Tradition business is like a religion. It gets into your bones. You RESPECT it. You feel it demanding things of you and you can't refuse.... I ...
— Youth Challenges • Clarence B Kelland
... "Break off your mad engagement to Miss Dulane," he said. "Be a man, Howel; wait and hope! You are throwing away your life when happiness is within your reach, if you will only be patient. That poor young creature is worthy of you. Lost? Nonsense! In this narrow ...
— Little Novels • Wilkie Collins
... fell, as he spoke, with a tremendous crash upon the ice-belt, along which it rolled for fifty yards. There it would lie all winter, and in spring the mass of ice to which it was attached would probably break off and float away with it to the south, gradually melting until it allowed the rock to sink to the bottom of the sea, or depositing it, perchance, on some distant shore, where such rocks are not wont to lie—there to remain ...
— The World of Ice • Robert Michael Ballantyne
... conceived the foolish notion of becoming your second self! I made myself a Pole: did Poland ever have the least idea of government? You of all men were the most incapable of making your way; I aped a poor model indeed. Abel Larinski, I break off all connection with you; I wind up the affairs of our firm, I put the key under the door, or drop it down the well. O my great Pole! I return to you your title, your name, and with your name all that you gave ...
— Samuel Brohl & Company • Victor Cherbuliez
... replied Halibut, with suspicious glibness, "and was so upset that I had one of my bilious attacks come on, where should I be? Why, I might have to break off in the middle and go home. A fellow can't propose when everything in the room is going round ...
— Lady of the Barge and Others, Entire Collection • W.W. Jacobs
... are not a father, or you would alter your theories. Hang it! You can't say I am enchanted at it, but you must put yourself in a man's place. She is a child, who leaves school, mark that well, where she was obliged, compelled to perform her religious duties, and one does not break off in a couple of days the habits of ten years like that. Give her time to reach it. I reason with her; hang it, I can't do everything in a day. When she goes from time to time to Mass, on Sunday, it does not follow that she is becoming ...
— The Grip of Desire • Hector France
... it in that informal way, with only her first name, if she meant to break off the acquaintance," he argued with himself. And yet the substance of the note was discouraging in the extreme, so that Guilford Duncan was a very apprehensive and unhappy man as he hurried to Barbara's home. He still held ...
— A Captain in the Ranks - A Romance of Affairs • George Cary Eggleston
... Chester, not at all abashed, 'to which I wished to lead you. A marriage with my son, whom I should be compelled to disown, would be followed by years of misery; they would be separated, my dear madam, in a twelvemonth. To break off this attachment, which is more fancied than real, as you and I know very well, will cost the dear girl but a few tears, and she is happy again. Take the case of your own daughter, the young lady downstairs, who ...
— Barnaby Rudge • Charles Dickens
... them on the stage. His friends of both sexes quarrelled with him for his attachment to her, and so much resented it, that Mrs. Oldfield frequently remonstrated to him, that it was for his honour and interest to break off the intrigue: which frankness and friendship of hers, did, as he often confessed, but engage him the more firmly; and all his friends at last gave over importuning him to leave her, as she gained more and more ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) - Vol. III • Theophilus Cibber
... is coming. I had to break off: the pain was too much for me. Now to pull myself together.... How silent everything is! Outside the house and in the house are emissaries of the police watching over my crime. At no great distance, Marie, in obedience to my letter, is hurrying to the trysting place, where ...
— The Teeth of the Tiger • Maurice Leblanc
... curved track one of the truck wheels often breaks off, and the truck swivels around on its center pin in consequence, and throws the engine off the track, but with my device one wheel, or even the two wheels on the opposite sides diagonally of the truck might break off and still the truck would not run off, because its position is set and it has no axis of motion around which ...
— Introduction of the Locomotive Safety Truck - Contributions from the Museum of History and Technology: Paper 24 • John H. White
... do nothing? "But," says one, "what good can I do by signing the pledge? I never drank, even without signing." This question has already been asked and answered more than a million of times. Let it be answered once more. For the man suddenly or in any other way to break off from the use of drams, who has indulged in them for a long course of years and until his appetite for them has grown ten or a hundredfold stronger and more craving than any natural appetite can be, requires a most powerful moral effort. ...
— The Papers And Writings Of Abraham Lincoln, Complete - Constitutional Edition • Abraham Lincoln
... (Elector Palatine) himself, in the Rhine Countries; of Kur-Pfalz, who is acknowledged Chief Protestant: official "President" of the "Evangelical Union" they have lately made among them in these menacing times;—Pfalz-Neuburg too, this young Wolfgang Wilhelm, if he do not break off kind, might be very awkward to the Kaiser in Cleve-Julich. Nay Saxony itself; for they are all Protestants:—unless perhaps Saxony might become pliant, and try to make itself useful to ...
— History Of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. III. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—The Hohenzollerns In Brandenburg—1412-1718 • Thomas Carlyle
... most furious attack upon the fort. Every stratagem was resorted to, but the attack failed. Pontiac then invested it, cut off all their supplies, and the garrison was reduced to great distress. But I must break off now, for here we are at Trois Rivieres, where we shall remain for the night, I hope you will not find your accommodations very uncomfortable, Mrs. Campbell: I fear as we advance you will have ...
— The Settlers in Canada • Frederick Marryat
... at times resided, and finds that the object of his old love and his fondest dreams is there installed as the banker's mistress. She is greatly moved at the sight of the youthful lover of old days, who, with more chivalry than prudence, offers forgiveness if she will break off this degrading alliance. She cannot resolve to take the step. She has become used to luxury and continuous amusement, and she cannot face the return to a duller domesticity. Finally, however, she dies penitent, and ...
— Crabbe, (George) - English Men of Letters Series • Alfred Ainger
... you and cry out to your fashionable circle: 'I, Ferdinand Lassalle, the pernicious demagogue of all your journals, Governmental and Progressive alike, the thief of the casket-trial, the Jew-traitor, the gaol-bird, I am the brother-in-law of your host,' And so you've rushed to Berlin to break off ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... wished that he'd invite Mr. Norman to break off from his sister, but he didn't. Perhaps that would not have been etiquette. I don't know anything about such things. The etiquette book Heppie lent me to read once was too uninteresting, worse than ...
— The Heather-Moon • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... sea, and varied with the sea. And all her life through they were searching, unceasingly searching, for she knew not what—something she never had found, never would find. At times, when talking with you, she would break off as though words were of no use to her, and her eyes had to seek your soul on their own account. And in those silences your soul had to render up the truth to her, though it could never be the truth she sought. When at length her gaze relaxed and she remembered and begged pardon (perhaps with a deprecatory ...
— The Laird's Luck • Arthur Quiller-Couch
... of Shakespeare's works, but the three volumes of preliminary essays on Shakespeare's biography and writings, and the illustrative notes brought together in the final volume, are confusedly arranged and are unindexed; many of the essays and notes break off abruptly at the point at which they were left at Malone's death. A new 'Variorum' edition, on an exhaustive scale, was undertaken by Mr. H. Howard Furness of Philadelphia, and eleven volumes have appeared since 1871 ('Romeo and Juliet,' 'Macbeth,' 'Hamlet,' 2 vols., ...
— A Life of William Shakespeare - with portraits and facsimiles • Sidney Lee
... thought—and then it grew in volume and became hysterical, until it reminded him of a girl he had seen overcome with nervous laughter at a vaudeville performance. Then it sank, receded, only to rise again and include words—a coarse joke, some bit of obscure horseplay he could not distinguish. It would break off for a moment and he would just catch the low rumble of a man's voice, then begin again—interminably; at first annoying, then strangely terrible. He shivered, and getting up out of bed went to the window. It had reached a high point, tensed and stifled, almost the quality ...
— The Beautiful and Damned • F. Scott Fitzgerald
... long neck[Footnote: although a giraffe's neck is so long, it has exactly the same number of vertebrae as all other mammals—seven—but each vertebra is exceptionally long.—Author.] and, stretching his tongue out to its full length—about eighteen or twenty inches—break off a tender, young branch of the "camel-thorn," which is a sort of acacia tree and considered a great dainty by giraffes, and offer it to her. Gean was very independent, as well as shy, and much preferred to pick leaves and blades of grass ...
— Rataplan • Ellen Velvin
... CHRISTMAS. Shall we describe it? No. But there is everything there which any reasonable person could want, from ices to catapults. And the decorations, done in candy so that you can break off a piece whenever you are hungry, ...
— Second Plays • A. A. Milne
... life; his Coriolanus, too, had to fail, and almost forgoes sympathy by his faults; but this Antony ought not to have failed: we cannot understand why the man leaves the sea-battle to follow Cleopatra's flight, who but an act or two before, with lesser reason, realized his danger and was able to break off from his enchantress. Yet the passion of desire that sways Antony is so splendidly portrayed; is, too, so dominant in all of us, that we accept it at once as ...
— The Man Shakespeare • Frank Harris
... Old Age is managed by a high committee of sixteen, which must include two deputies, two state councillors, two presidents of mutual aid societies, and one manufacturer. Workmen who choose to avail themselves of the fund may break off and renew their payments into it as they like, and increase or diminish the amount of their annual deposits without affecting by any interruption the value of their previously acquired interest in the fund. Deposits may be made in the name of any person at ...
— France and the Republic - A Record of Things Seen and Learned in the French Provinces - During the 'Centennial' Year 1889 • William Henry Hurlbert
... a superhuman effort not to laugh, while Mary stooped to break off a spray of azaleas and Elinor examined intently a stunted pine tree planted in a big ...
— The Motor Maids in Fair Japan • Katherine Stokes
... GRIFFITH—I am afraid it is true that you have not always seemed to be doing right, and papa and mamma forbid our going on as we are. You know I cannot be disobedient. It would not bring a blessing on you. So I must break off, though—' ...
— Chantry House • Charlotte M. Yonge
... ask the reader's permission to break off the thread of our story for a time—came of an old noble family. The founder of the house of Lavretskky came over from Prussia in the reign of Vassili the Blind, and received a grant of two hundred chetverts of land in Byezhetsk. Many of his descendants filled various offices, ...
— A House of Gentlefolk • Ivan Turgenev
... the creatures stoop to break off a protruding end of pinkish, nameless substance; the thing seemed to struggle in his hands while he took it to his mouth and munched on it. Even when Spud realized that this living food was vegetation of some sort, he was still sickened with the sight of its being taken alive ...
— The Finding of Haldgren • Charles Willard Diffin
... that not one word of love had ever passed between them, that their intercourse was really nothing more than that of intimate friends, and he assuring me that he had not a particle of love for the girl, I advised him strongly to give up any idea of offering her marriage and to gently but firmly break off the intimacy. ...
— The Romance and Tragedy • William Ingraham Russell
... like him; and then, you know, there was that great danger about poor Owen. It was a great danger then. But now she is so determined about this, because she thinks it would be ungenerous to go back from her word; and in this way she will ruin the very man she wishes to serve. Of course he cannot break off the match if she persists in it. What I want you to perceive is this, that he, utterly penniless as he is, will have to begin the world with a clog round his neck, because she is so obstinate. What ...
— Castle Richmond • Anthony Trollope
... off!" cries her sister, horror-struck. "Good heavens, Vera! what can you mean? Have you gone suddenly mad? What is the matter with you? Break off a match like this at the last minute? You must ...
— Vera Nevill - Poor Wisdom's Chance • Mrs. H. Lovett Cameron
... which the congregation have brought together to pay the ferry, and thou canst order the maid to wait for us till eventide at the water-side to carry home the victuals. She agreed to all this, but said we had better first break off some more amber, so that we might get a good round sum for it at Hamburg; and I thought so too, wherefore we stopped at home next day, seeing that we did not want for food, and that my child, as well as myself, both wished to refresh ourselves ...
— Sidonia The Sorceress V2 • William Mienhold
... and let me speak a word. I will break off my relations with Fraulein Ellrich, and then I shall not be in a position to fight ...
— The Malady of the Century • Max Nordau
... his own affairs in Touraine when news came to him that the marriage was to take place immediately. "If he mourned, it is not marvellous when I myself mourn it for the future result. But the king used all kinds of machinations to break off the alliance.... God suffered two young proud princes to try their strength each at his will, often in ways that would have been incompatible in ...
— Charles the Bold - Last Duke Of Burgundy, 1433-1477 • Ruth Putnam
... a bay to the south-east, and in the evening the ship came to anchorage, being then eleven leagues from North Cape. Of this place her Commander writes, "There are three islands laying to the south-east by north; one to the north which will break off all sail from this point of the compass. One of these islands is very thinly inhabited." The boat was lowered to sound between the island and the main, as a reef was perceived running out astern, and ...
— The Logbooks of the Lady Nelson - With The Journal Of Her First Commander Lieutenant James Grant, R.N • Ida Lee
... recently," Sir Lucius replied. "I must break off to tell you that while I was abroad this summer, Victor promised, at my request, to try to trace your mother; but I am thoroughly convinced now that he made no effort whatever, and that he lied to me basely, with the hope of making me believe ...
— In Friendship's Guise • Wm. Murray Graydon
... opportune publication of an intercepted letter said to have been written by the Duke of Guise to his brother, the Cardinal of Lorraine, on the eve of his departure for Chateaudun, and disclosing treacherous designs,[140] decided the Huguenot leaders to break off the negotiations.[141] ...
— History of the Rise of the Huguenots - Volume 2 • Henry Baird
... laughing, "this is not the first time I have been paid by relations to break off the marriages I had formed. Egad! if one could open a bureau to make married people single, one would soon be a Croesus! Well, then, this decides me to complete the union between Monsieur Goupille and Mademoiselle de Courval. I had balanced a little ...
— Night and Morning, Volume 3 • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... Attorney Despeaux fastened upon Blanchard, of the Conawin, the moment the latter left the company of Mayor Morrison on the arrival of the twain at the Corson mansion; and Mr. Blanchard seemed alertly willing to break off his companionship with the passenger he ...
— All-Wool Morrison • Holman Day
... until the cold drove me in for shelter. Our horses having been fed with corn, which Mr. Easton took with him, were tied at the back of the building, under the cover of a thick growth of hemlocks, which served to break off the night wind. The widow and I had a comfortable bed in the corner of the room, which we made of small hemlock sprigs, having our cloaks to cover us, and our saddlebags for pillows. My companions were soon asleep, but the exceeding strangeness ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier
... round of the camp, and the singer became a great friend of the emperor. But even such favour did not drive the shadow from Ronald's soul, and often when he was singing one of his most beautiful songs to Henry, he would suddenly break off and rush out of the tent in great grief. One day the emperor found out what he had long guessed, and made Ronald confess ...
— Legends of the Rhine • Wilhelm Ruland
... when God is dishonoured. 'Rule thy own house well, having thy childrenwith others in thy familyin subjection, with all gravity' (1 Tim 3:4). Solomon was so excellent sometimes this way, that he made the eyes of his beholders to dazzle (2 Chron 9:3, 4). 7 But to break off from this general, and ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... "But don't break off the match!" said Virgilia, with a nervous titter. What state of overtension could have prompted her to a piece of bravado so rash, ...
— Under the Skylights • Henry Blake Fuller
... Nellie Smith?" I demanded. "A story about a handsome girl named Nellie, who could make a break of twenty-eight at billiards, and a handsome dog like Ellis Carter, and a fire, and the girl wearing the youth's jacket—it can't break off like that." ...
— The Matador of the Five Towns and Other Stories • Arnold Bennett
... your host's fiancee that if she, on mature reflection, likes you better than him, there is still time; but Haddington was not afflicted with delicacy. After all, in such a case a great deal depends upon the lady, and Haddington, though doubtful how Kate would regard a direct proposal to break off her engagement, was yet tolerably confident that she would not ...
— Father Stafford • Anthony Hope
... Beacon, the Ashdown Forest Ridge, and the hills about Battle Abbey. Southward, and the way of the setting sun, the Downs ran out in huge spurs, line behind line of them, into the shining splendour of the sea, to break off abruptly in the white cliffs of the Seven Sisters. The hills were bare and bleak in their austere yet rounded strength, stripped of trees, clothed only in resplendent gorse, here a squat haystack dumped upon a ridge against the sky, there a great patch of plough let ...
— Boy Woodburn - A Story of the Sussex Downs • Alfred Ollivant
... "I am forced to connect your refusal to hazard even a surmise as to the identity of that hand with your sudden desire to break off all connection with this matter. I am forced to come to a conclusion, Ducaine. You have discovered the ...
— The Betrayal • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... bit-stock and one-half or three-quarter-inch bit, the farmer and his older boys go from tree to tree, and, selecting a favorable spot a few feet from the ground, break off any rough pieces of outer bark, and bore a hole into the tree to the depth of one or two inches. Formerly a larger bit was used, and the bore was rarely more than an inch in depth; but experience has shown that the smaller and deeper bore injures the tree ...
— The New England Magazine Volume 1, No. 3, March, 1886 - Bay State Monthly Volume 4, No. 3, March, 1886 • Various
... enters towards end of song from door R., looking white and worn, without noticing Fel.; she crosses slowly to window L., enters the recess, opens casement, and looks out. The Villagers, who are supposed to be enjoying themselves in the court below, break off their singing as Kate appears and ...
— The Squire - An Original Comedy in Three Acts • Arthur W. Pinero
... strange impression (it amounted at times to a positive distress, and shot through the sense of pleasure—morally speaking—with the acuteness of a sudden twinge of neuralgia) that it would be better for each of them that they should break off short and never see each other again. In later years he called this feeling a foreboding, and remembered two or three occasions when he had been on the point of expressing it to Georgina. Of course, in fact, he never expressed it; there were plenty of good reasons for that. Happy love is ...
— Georgina's Reasons • Henry James
... Mr. White's own niece, and taken out of Mrs. White's hands," said Magdalen. "Besides," as Agatha still looked unconvinced, "one thing that made me think the invitation desirable was that it would break off any foolishness with Wilfred Merrifield—I think it was in their ...
— Modern Broods • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... considerably the advantage of him—as occasionally to call me "sir." I always paid for this inadvertency, however, it usually putting a stop to the communications for the time being. In one instance, he took such prompt revenge for this implied admission of equality, as literally to break off short in the discourse, and to order me, in his sharpest key, to go aloft and send some studding-sails on deck, though they all had to be sent aloft again, and set, in the course of the same watch. But offended dignity is seldom considerate, ...
— Afloat And Ashore • James Fenimore Cooper
... quite deserted. It took them fully half an hour to find the tools. The rings round their ankles were sufficiently loose to enable the pick to be inserted between them and the leg; thrusting it in as far as it would go under the rivet, it was comparatively easy work to break off the head with the hammer. In ten minutes both were free. Leaving the chains and tools behind them, they made their way out of the cutting and struck across the country, and in an hour entered the forest. It was too dark here to permit them to proceed farther; they lay down and ...
— Condemned as a Nihilist - A Story of Escape from Siberia • George Alfred Henty
... his plaintive songs; or he would frequently break off in the midst of a mournful chant, and begin to recite a mirthful story, and then in the midst of Wassamo's laughter he would return to the plaintive ditty—just as it suited his fancy; for the cousin was gay of spirit, and shifted his humor ...
— The Indian Fairy Book - From the Original Legends • Cornelius Mathews
... beautiful things, but you don't know how to use them; and you wrap yourself up in art and books and music, and would try to wrap up me. I won't be stifled, not by the most glorious music, for people are more glorious, and you hide them from me. That's why I break off my engagement. You were all right as long as you kept to things, but when you came to ...
— A Room With A View • E. M. Forster
... comtesse," replied la Peyrade, allowing her to read in his eyes an astonishment mingled with distrust, "all the appearances, you must admit, were of that nature. A suitor interposes to break off a marriage which has been offered to me with every inducement; this rival does me the service of showing himself so miraculously stupid and awkward that I could easily have set him aside, when suddenly a most unlooked-for ...
— The Lesser Bourgeoisie • Honore de Balzac
... American army was paraded at one o'clock that morning, but it was near four before the head of the French column reached the front. "The whole army then marched towards the skirt of the wood in one long column, and as they approached the open space, was to break off into the different columns, as ordered for the attack. But, by the time the first French column had arrived at the open space, the day had fairly broke; when Count D'Estaign, without waiting until the other columns had arrived at their position, placed himself at the head of his ...
— The Life of Francis Marion • William Gilmore Simms
... wrapping a cord saturated in kerosene oil around it several times at the point you wish to cut it, then setting fire to the cord, and just when it has finished burning plunge the bottle into cold water and tap the end you wish to break off. Odd shaped or prettily colored bottles make nice vases. The top of a large bottle with a small neck makes a good funnel. Large round bottles make good ...
— Fowler's Household Helps • A. L. Fowler
... tremulous with suppressed emotion, while his eyes gleamed with rage and hatred. The evil spirit on the other hand, cowed, and trembling, seemed transfixed with terror. At intervals he would make an effort to break the spell, and darting to one side attempt to break off in the direction of the prairie; but the ever-vigilant chief was at his side in a twinkling and holding the potent charm to his nose, reduce him to instant obedience. Thus they stood, the one with his body painted black and representing ...
— Seven and Nine years Among the Camanches and Apaches - An Autobiography • Edwin Eastman
... will puzzle more yet, till society is different from what it is now—how much a refined and sensitive woman is bound to suffer from a coarse and disgusting master, legally called her husband, before she is entitled to break off a bad bargain she scarce had a hand in making. I've sat here to-night and heard about men getting goods under false pretences; you've told some astonishing big stories, gentlemen, about rogues stealing horses and sleighs; and ...
— The Man Who Stole A Meeting-House - 1878, From "Coupon Bonds" • J. T. Trowbridge
... only if he did his share, and when the scheme proved successful," Laura interrupted. "I know, if he has sold them, what an opportunity of harassing you it will give the men who are plotting against you. Still, now you know, you can, perhaps, break off the bargain. I want you to do what you can"—and she glanced at him with a tense look in her eyes—"if it ...
— The Greater Power • Harold Bindloss
... probably tacitly appealed from that corrupted system of Christianity to the volume on which Christianity itself is founded, had nevertheless been regular in her attendance on the worship of the Church, not, perhaps, extending her scruples so far as to break off communion. Such indeed was the first sentiment of the earlier reformers, who seemed to have studied, for a time at least, to avoid a schism, until the violence of the Pope rendered ...
— The Monastery • Sir Walter Scott
... natives were only kept off by firing at any that exposed themselves. At this moment a spear struck the Governor in the leg just above the knee, with such force as to cause it to protrude two feet on the other side, which was so far fortunate, as it enabled me to break off the barb and withdraw the shaft. The Governor, notwithstanding his wound, continued to direct the party, and although the natives made many attempts to approach close enough to reach us with their spears, we were enabled, by keeping on the most open ground, ...
— Journals of Australian Explorations • A C and F T Gregory
... for another reason. I feel grateful that your suspicions have caused you to break off our engagement. And now that it is broken,—irremediably so,—let me tell you that for once your priceless sight has played you false. I admit that Philip placed his arm around me (but not unrebuked, as you ...
— Molly Bawn • Margaret Wolfe Hamilton
... Viareggio is a noble forest of stone pines where the wind is scarce felt, though you may hear it sighing overhead among the crowns. This is the place for a promenade at all hours of the day. Children climb the trunks to fetch down a few remaining cones or break off dried branches as fuel. A sportsman told me that several of them lose their lives every year at this adventure. What was he doing here, with a gun? Waiting for a hare, he said. They always wait for ...
— Alone • Norman Douglas
... was now cried on all sides, for the fall of the leading elephant and the volleys of musketry from the Hottentots had so frightened the herd, that they had begun to separate and break off two or three together, or singly, in every direction. The shrieks and trumpetings, and the crashing of the boughs so near to them, were now deafening; and the danger was equally great. The Major had but just levelled his other rifle when the dense foliage close to him opened as ...
— The Mission; or Scenes in Africa • Captain Frederick Marryat
... ready to boil over, compels me to break off my meditations, in order to fill up the coffee-pot. I then remember that I have no cream; I take my tin can off the hook and go down ...
— An "Attic" Philosopher, Complete • Emile Souvestre
... fetch her portrait, and the King was so greatly struck by Desiree's beauty that he agreed to follow his son's wishes and break off his engagement with the Princess Noire, that he might wed the Princess Desiree. So the King despatched as ambassador a ...
— My Book of Favorite Fairy Tales • Edric Vredenburg
... into three equal parts, whereby we find eight hours for the service of God and a worthy distressed brother; eight hours for our usual vocations; and eight for refreshment and sleep; the common gavel is an instrument made use of by operative Masons to break off the corners of rough stones, the better to fit them for the builder's use; but we, as Free and Accepted Masons, use it for the more noble and glorious purpose of divesting our hearts and consciences of all the vices and superfluities of life, thereby fitting our minds ...
— The Mysteries of Free Masonry - Containing All the Degrees of the Order Conferred in a Master's Lodge • William Morgan
... work of it you have made, Master Redmond,' said he. 'What! you a friend to the Bradys, and knowing your uncle to be distressed for money, try and break off a match which will bring fifteen hundred a year into the family? Quin has promised to pay off the four thousand pounds which is bothering your uncle so. He takes a girl without a penny—a girl with no more beauty than yonder bullock. Well, well, don't look furious; let's say she ...
— Barry Lyndon • William Makepeace Thackeray
... an idea, a quixotic, foolish and most unhappy one, one that if carried out will mar his life and ruin his prospects, and in the end break his heart. Now, I want you to help me break off this idea; he thinks of returning to England in June, and if he does, all hope is over. He never allows himself to be coerced or persuaded; as to the word 'marriage' it would be a fatal one, but we might, I am sure, influence him—that is, if you will ...
— A Mad Love • Bertha M. Clay
... find out that we don't like each other, and break off the day you go home. I'll come back from the train very ...
— The Wishing-Ring Man • Margaret Widdemer
... exactly go to a clinch, but they shook hands so long the waiter had to slide the caviar canape between 'em, and even after we got 'em to sit down they couldn't seem to break off gazin' at each other. As a fond reunion it was a success from the first tap of the bell. They went to ...
— Wilt Thou Torchy • Sewell Ford
... Breaking off one sin is not Repentance. Forsaking one vice is like breaking off one limb of a tree, when the whole tree has to come down. A profane man stops swearing; very good: but if he does not break off from every sin it is not Repentance—it is not the work of God in the soul. When God works He hews down the whole tree. He wants to have a man turn from every sin. Supposing I am in a vessel out at sea, and I find the ship leaks in three or four places. I may go and stop ...
— The Way to God and How to Find It • Dwight Moody
... the neighbours for coming so promptly to my help, and as we stood for a moment at the road leading to Dos d'Ane, where Abraham Guille would break off to get back to his ...
— Carette of Sark • John Oxenham
... for guarantees; but it seems to us impossible to maintain that Werther's report, which was put into his majesty's hand at such a critical moment, and which undeniably gave serious offence, did not exacerbate relations which had already been strained, or induce the king to break off abruptly the personal negotiations with the French minister. And we may add that if Benedetti had been cognisant of this report, he might have understood the king's sudden change of temper, and might have spared himself some rebuffs. When the matter came afterwards to his knowledge, ...
— Studies in Literature and History • Sir Alfred Comyn Lyall
... break off an acquaintance; but for Fanny's sake—as I told my son, if Fanny had done so we should consider it a great disgrace—and Fanny might ...
— North and South • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... laughed—she had a pretty wit! And stroking his comely moustache where it had been kissed, he moved out into the sunshine. All the evening, throughout his labours, not inconsiderable, for this jury business had put him behind time, he was afflicted by that restless pleasure in his surroundings; would break off in mowing the lower lawn to look at the house through the trees; would leave his study and committee papers, to cross into the drawing-room and sniff its dainty fragrance; paid a special good-night ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... remedied. If the paper starts to come off, it should be re-papered at once. When the joint is finished, it should be left in position until the solder has had time to set and cool, otherwise the branch will break off and considerable time will be lost in correcting ...
— Elements of Plumbing • Samuel Dibble
... should go no further than keeping a primrose in a pot for society. Farewell, dear Allen. I am astonished to find myself writing a very long letter once a week to you: but it is next to talking to you: and after having seen you so much this summer, I cannot break off suddenly. ...
— Letters of Edward FitzGerald - in two volumes, Vol. 1 • Edward FitzGerald
... ring of the doorbell caused her to break off abruptly the sentence she had begun. With that curious intuition which sometimes manifests itself unbidden, she was seized with the startled conviction that the bell had conveyed the news of an arrival important to herself. Listening ...
— Grace Harlowe's Golden Summer • Jessie Graham Flower
... Doubleday reported of his inspection: "The arms which were manufactured at Philadelphia, Penn., are of the most worthless kind, and have every appearance of having been manufactured from old condemned muskets. Many of them burst; hammers break off; sights fall off when discharged; the barrels are very light, not one-twentieth of an inch thick, and the stocks are made of green wood which have shrunk so as to leave the bands and trimmings loose. The bayonets ...
— Great Fortunes from Railroads • Gustavus Myers
... us very little about his life on the large plantations because his feeble old mind would only be clear at intervals. He would begin relating some incident but would suddenly break off with, "I'd better leave that alone 'cause I done forgot." He remembered, however, that he trained dogs for his "whie folks," trained them to be good hunters as that was one of the ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves - Georgia Narratives, Part 3 • Works Projects Administration
... much. Such a woman few men have bred. Well, I must make the best of her. My son-in-law must be one who will prop up my old age, one to whom, in my need or trouble, I could always go as to a dry log,[*] to break off some of its bark to make a fire to comfort me, not one who treads me into the mire as the buffalo did to Macumazahn. Now I have spoken, and I do not love such talk. Come back with the cattle, and I will listen to you, but meanwhile understand that ...
— Child of Storm • H. Rider Haggard
... break off the straight lateral shoots, of the height required, and plant them closely side by side, in a trench, sufficiently deep to ensure their standing firmly; and it is a curious sight to see a labourer bearing ...
— Anahuac • Edward Burnett Tylor
... more, to secure both the fish and the shop custom of the fishermen in his neighbourhood; while fishermen so often need accommodation from the merchants, that even those who for the time are clear do not think it prudent to break off their connection with the merchant of the place from whom they have hitherto got supplies, and by whom they expect to be assisted in future bad years. But it does not mean, and probably was not intended ...
— Second Shetland Truck System Report • William Guthrie
... as we do, you will say, by using a kind of umbrella! Of course you mean that an elephant could break off a large bough, and hold it over his head and over his back! But his trunk would soon get tired of holding anything as big as that! Besides, he has to use his trunk all the time to feed! If you had only one hand, you could not eat with it and at the same time hold an ...
— The Wonders of the Jungle - Book One • Prince Sarath Ghosh
... Foreign Secretary was becoming an almost independent power, acting on his own initiative, and swaying the policy of England on his own responsibility. On one occasion, in 1847, he had actually been upon the point of threatening to break off diplomatic relations with France without consulting either the Cabinet or the Prime Minister. And such incidents were constantly recurring. When this became known to the Prince, he saw that his opportunity ...
— Queen Victoria • Lytton Strachey
... Duke of Mecklenburg-Strelitz, and there is little doubt that she would have become his wife had not King George III. soon afterwards sought the hand of the Princess's younger sister in marriage, when it was considered necessary to break off the match, partly for political reasons, and partly because 'it was deemed indecorous that the elder sister should be the subject of the younger.' This was a great disappointment to both the Duke and the Princess, who evinced the strength ...
— English Book Collectors • William Younger Fletcher
... Bavaria fell back with his army to Augsburg, under the cannon of which fortress he encamped, in a position too strong to be attacked. His strong places all fell into the hands of the allies; and every effort was made to induce him to break off from his alliance with France. The elector, however, relying upon the aid of Marshal Tallard, who was advancing with 45,000 men to his assistance, refused to listen to any terms; and the allied powers ordered Marlborough to harry his country, and so force him into submission ...
— The Cornet of Horse - A Tale of Marlborough's Wars • G. A. Henty
... Archester, the chapter stood hushed to a man, and the surrounding curates were only prevented by a salutary fear of ruining their chances of preferment from laying themselves, their pittances, and their garnered store of slippers at her pretty feet. Then in a fit of charming petulance, she would break off in the middle of the piece, lay down her violin, and, with a pretty imperiousness, command a younger sister to fetch her zither, on which to complete the subjugation of her adorers. And then her caricatures—summer-lightning ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 101, November 14th, 1891 • Various
... The Chorus break off their Processional Chant [keeping the same rhythm] to enquire what is the meaning of these solemn rites, and whether the Queen can solve their doubt, which wavers between hope ...
— Story of Orestes - A Condensation of the Trilogy • Richard G. Moulton
... dividing the joint with the knife, in the direction from 1 to 2. The four quarters having been removed in this way, take off the merry-thought and the neck-bones; these last are to be removed by putting the knife in at figs. 3 and 4, pressing it hard, when they will break off from the part that sticks to the breast. To separate the breast from the body of the fowl, cut through the tender ribs close to the breast, quite down to the tail. Now turn the fowl over, back upwards; put the knife ...
— The Whitehouse Cookbook (1887) - The Whole Comprising A Comprehensive Cyclopedia Of Information For - The Home • Mrs. F.L. Gillette
... meal, when Master George's health was pledged in the cup "that cheers but not inebriates;" and he regaled himself on choice plum-cake made by the dear old lady herself for that special occasion, taking care, every now and then, to break off a bit and throw it to Boxa, who sat by his side, wagging her tail, in evident ...
— Georgie's Present • Miss Brightwell
... statesman. Who were the greatest statesmen this country ever had to boast? They were, my lord, the two Villiers's, dukes of Buckingham. Did not the first of these take his young master to the kingdom of Spain, in order to marry the infanta, and then break off the match for no cause at all? Did he not afterwards involve the nation in a quarrel with the king of France, only because her most christian majesty would not let him go to bed to her? What was the character of ...
— Four Early Pamphlets • William Godwin
... grind girls into the dust under the heel of a terrible despotism, and make them sue for mercy. To think that girl, on whom I have lavished my heart's best love and over thirty cents, in the past two weeks, could let the smell of a goat on my clothes come between us, and break off, an acquaintance that seemed to be the forerunner of a happy future, and say "ta-ta" to me, and go off to dancing school with a telegraph messenger boy who wears a sleeping car porter uniform, is too much, and my heart ...
— Peck's Bad Boy and His Pa - 1883 • George W. Peck
... be supposed, I waited with anxiety till night came. Though I was still somewhat weak, as soon as the jailer had gone his last round I rose from my couch, and managed to break off a piece of iron, as the doctor had advised. I then placed the bedstead against the wall, in a position which enabled me to stand on it so that I could work at the bars. Next I looked out to ascertain where the sentries were posted, and was thankful to see that none were opposite my cell ...
— The Young Llanero - A Story of War and Wild Life in Venezuela • W.H.G. Kingston
... sprouts which came up afterward might be more vigorous and a sled might slide over the stumps; and instead of leaving a whole tree to support his corded wood, he would pare it away to a slender stake or splinter which you could break off with your ...
— Walden, and On The Duty Of Civil Disobedience • Henry David Thoreau
... practising. If I could get some more clear time to it, I know I could get on. But it's always the same; the days get frittered up into tiny bits with things which don't seem to matter, and I feel I don't make any way; just as I am getting a hard passage right, I have to break off." ...
— Thistle and Rose - A Story for Girls • Amy Walton
... master of my own pen, and could write as I pleased, without being hurried along helter-skelter by the tyrannical exactions of that "young Rapid" in buskins and chiton called "THE HISTORIC MUSE," I would break off this chapter, open my window, rest my eyes on the green lawn without, and indulge in a rhapsodical digression upon that beautifier of the moral life which is called "Good Temper." Ha! the Historic Muse is dozing. By ...
— What Will He Do With It, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... until the tide drove us back. Colliver stood quite tamely beside me all this while and watched the treasure disappearing from his view; only every now and then he would chatter a few wild words, and with that break off again in vacant ...
— Dead Man's Rock • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... mud of a greenish colour, in which the flukes of an anchor are entirely embedded. A great deal of the anchoring ground is entirely land-locked, and some shoal points which narrow the entrance would serve to break off any heavy sea from the eastward. The depth of water in most parts is greater than could be wished, but several good berths are pointed out in the accompanying survey made by Lieutenant Sherer. The beach on the west side is a fine bold one, with four fathoms within twenty yards of low water ...
— Journal of the Third Voyage for the Discovery of a North-West Passage • William Edward Parry
... Governor Pownall, in taking the same side of the question, declared that there was not so unfair, so hellish an engine of war as savages mingled with civilized troops; and he recommended that terms should be proposed to congress whereby the two countries should mutually agree to break off all alliance with the Indians, and treat them as enemies whenever they should commit any act of hostility against a white person, American or European. He would answer for it, he said, that congress would embrace ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... wisdom has grown in me at last. You undertake too steep a climb when you try to make me believe in your love while before my eyes you give to the man I hate my lands and the woman you had promised me and my place above your men—" His rage choked him so that he was obliged to break off and stand drawing his sword from his sheath and slamming it back with a sharp sound. His voice came back in a hoarse roar. "When I reckon up the debt against you, I know that the only thing to wipe ...
— The Ward of King Canute • Ottilie A. Liljencrantz
... old man exulting in the blessing thus found, Rejoices, and kindly shares with all his brothers. They eagerly At early night-fall, indulge in pleasant banquets and drain great bowls. No longer is it hard for them to break off sweet sleep and to leave their soft beds as formerly. O fortunate ones! whose hearts the sweet draught has often Bathed. No sluggish torpor holds their minds, they briskly Rise for their prescribed duties and rejoice to outstrip the rays of ...
— All About Coffee • William H. Ukers
... late regent had admitted into the citadel gave a momentary check to his career. The English governor hesitated to surrender on the terms proposed, and while his first flag of truce was yet in the tent of the Scottish monarch, a second arrived to break off the negotiation. Whatever were the reasons for this abrupt determination, Bruce paid him not the compliment of asking a wherefore, but advancing his troops to the Southron outposts, drove them in ...
— The Scottish Chiefs • Miss Jane Porter
... not an oath: If not the face of men, The sufferance of our soul's, the time's abuse, If these be motives weak, break off betimes, And every man hence to his idle bed; So let high-sighted tyranny range on, Till ...
— The Philosophy of the Plays of Shakspere Unfolded • Delia Bacon
... reigned supreme. There was to be a gala performance of Racine's great tragedy, "Phedre," with Adrienne, of course, in the title-role. The Duchesse de Bouillon sent a large number of her lackeys with orders to hiss and jeer, and, if possible, to break off the play. Malignantly delighted with her plan, the duchess arrayed herself in jewels and took her seat in a conspicuous stage-box, where she could watch the coming storm and gloat over the discomfiture of ...
— Famous Affinities of History, Vol 1-4, Complete - The Romance of Devotion • Lyndon Orr
... however it may tend to public instruction, and though I have picked out the noxious creature to be anatomised, yet doth scarce excuse the offensiveness of the scent and fouling of my fingers: therefore, I will here break off abruptly, leaving many a vein not laid open, and many a passage not searched into. But if I have undergone the drudgery of the most loathsome part already (which is his personal character), I will not defraud myself of what is more truly pleasant, the ...
— Calamities and Quarrels of Authors • Isaac D'Israeli
... deepening colour, and Violet's glowed still more, as she answered: 'Arthur asked him, and he said he would not BEGIN an acquaintance, but that there was no occasion to break off the ordinary civilities of society. He accused her of no more than levity. ...
— Heartsease - or Brother's Wife • Charlotte M. Yonge
... Parliament were resented, showed how egregiously he was in error. At the suggestion of the Assembly, a paper was circulated through the province by the committee of correspondence, entitled "a solemn league and covenant," the subscribers to which bound themselves to break off all intercourse with Great Britain from the 1st of August, until the colony should be restored to the enjoyment of its chartered rights; and to renounce all dealings with those who should refuse to enter into ...
— The Life of George Washington, Volume I • Washington Irving
... "Break off the yoke of inbred sin: And fully set my spirit free: I cannot rest till pure within: Till I am wholly ...
— Life and Labors of Elder John Kline, the Martyr Missionary - Collated from his Diary by Benjamin Funk • John Kline
... of the Duke of Rothsay with the Earl of March's daughter, Douglas, as if he had postponed his share in the negotiation to show that it could not be concluded with any one but himself, entered the lists to break off the contract. He tendered a larger dower with his daughter Marjory than the Earl of March had proffered; and, secured by his own cupidity and fear of the Douglas, Albany exerted his influence with the timid monarch till he was prevailed upon to break the contract with the Earl of March, and ...
— The Fair Maid of Perth • Sir Walter Scott
... most disaffected were purchased with the largest presents. Even Malatchee himself seemed fully contented with his share, and the savages in general perceiving the poverty and insignificance of the family of Bosomworth, and their total inability to supply their wants, determined to break off all ...
— An Historical Account Of The Rise And Progress Of The Colonies Of South Carolina And Georgia, Volume 2 • Alexander Hewatt
... is said—that they would break off from the North and set up for themselves. It is not foolish people that say ...
— Daisy • Elizabeth Wetherell
... folk, and her way of life, and she told him of all freely. But no word did she say to him of the man whom she loved; nay, when the talk seemed drawing near to such a point that it seemed he must be told of presently, she would break off and hold her peace straightway; neither did the Knight say aught, nor ask her wherefore she went not on with her tale, but let speech be till the spring thereof began to run again of its ...
— The Sundering Flood • William Morris
... clumsy wood-knives. Sitting thus, they gossip with a passing neighbour, who stops to chatter as he sits propped upon the stair ladder, or they croak snatches of song, with some old-world refrain to it, and, from time to time, break off to cast a word over their shoulders to the wife in the dim background near the fireplace, or to the little virgin daughter, carefully secreted on the shelf overhead, in company with a miscellaneous collection of dusty, grimy rubbish, ...
— In Court and Kampong - Being Tales and Sketches of Native Life in the Malay Peninsula • Hugh Clifford
... suspected that she never really cared for Don Felipe, and had done his best to break off the engagement before the catastrophe had overtaken the latter; but this was different. That of which he was loath to think, yet which he knew must inevitably happen, ...
— When Dreams Come True • Ritter Brown
... they give, that they are nothing else but "the ways of death," and go down to the chambers of hell; that they will delude and deceive us, and so in end destroy us;—if we might once believe this with our heart, there were some hope that we would break off from them, and choose the untrodden paths of godliness, which are pleasantness and peace. However, this is the condition of all men, once to be under sin, and under a sentence of death for sin. It is the unbelief of this, and a conceit of freedom, ...
— The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning • Hugh Binning
... the most indulgent of husbands, would check up his gay horses, and spring from the carriage and break off branch ...
— Bertie and the Gardeners - or, The Way to be Happy • Madeline Leslie
... not wish to expose me to any future importunities on the part of the man and woman. I need hardly tell you that this commission struck me as being a strange one; but, in my position with Mr. Forley, I had no resource but to accept it without asking questions, or to break off my long and friendly connection with my client. I chose the first alternative. Business prevented me from doing my errand on Monday last—and if I am here to-day, notwithstanding Mr. Forley's unexpected death, it is emphatically ...
— A House to Let • Charles Dickens
... a melancholy fact that were it not for United States troops, these beautiful objects would be mutilated by relic-hunters. Hence, another duty of our soldiers is to watch the formations constantly, lest tourists should break off specimens, and ruin them forever, and lest still more ignoble vandals, whose fingers itch for notoriety, should write upon these glorious works of nature their worthless names, and those of the ...
— John L. Stoddard's Lectures, Vol. 10 (of 10) - Southern California; Grand Canon of the Colorado River; Yellowstone National Park • John L. Stoddard |
