"Divert" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... Sunset was also the time when I brushed and patted him. The intelligent brute knew that I suffered, and, in its own way, showed me that it participated in my affliction. My water, too, was boiling on the fire, and the bubbling of the water seemed to be a voice raised on purpose to divert my gloomy thoughts. "Aye, boil, bubble, evaporate," exclaimed I; "what do I care for water ...
— Travels and Adventures of Monsieur Violet • Captain Marryat
... was that a letter penned by this unknown M. de Puisaye from some hidden fastness in the Bocage of Brittany came to divert the course of Adrian Landale's existence into a channel where neither he, nor any of those who knew him, would ever have dreamed to see ...
— The Light of Scarthey • Egerton Castle
... feelings, it cannot be wondered that it gave the Lady pain to hear her husband verging towards this topic of mutual discontent. On the present, as on other similar occasions, she endeavoured to divert the knight's thoughts from this ...
— The Abbot • Sir Walter Scott
... it even dog, cat, or rat, or what it may. They are amazingly fond of shows and entertainments. Their feast of the new year, which they celebrate in the beginning of March, commonly lasts a whole month; during which they do nothing but divert themselves, chiefly in dancing, which they do in a strange manner, running round about to the sound of gongs, flutes, and trumpets, which do not form a very agreeable concert. They use the same music at their comedies, or theatrical diversions, of which ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 11 • Robert Kerr
... supper she would divert herself with her friends and attendants, and if they made no answer she would put them upon mirth and pleasant discourse with great civility. She would then also admit Tarlton, a famous comedian and pleasant talker, and other men to divert her with stories ...
— History of English Humour, Vol. 1 (of 2) - With an Introduction upon Ancient Humour • Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange
... as potent, as destructive, as a stroke of lightning. But after the fact it did not remind' him of any agency of the angry skies; to him it was like one of the obstructions of the river engineers to divert the course of the great Mississippi, a mattress-spur, a thing insignificant in itself, a mere trifle of woven willow wands, set up at a crafty angle, against the tumultuous current Yet he had seen the swirling waves, in their oncoming ...
— The Crucial Moment - 1911 • Charles Egbert Craddock (AKA Mary Noailles Murfree)
... is no more than fact, that the larger portion of all truth has sprung from the collateral; and it is but in accordance with the spirit of the principle involved in this fact, that I would divert inquiry, in the present case, from the trodden and hitherto unfruitful ground of the event itself, to the contemporary circumstances which surround it. While you ascertain the validity of the affidavits, ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 1 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... ideas to be taught. The text sets up ideas, interprets and exemplifies them; but "demonstration" can be made only as the pupils draw upon their own observation and experience. Hence, numerous SUGGESTIVE topics are interspersed throughout to divert attention from the text and to direct it to the actualities of the pupils' experience. Even the topics should not be followed literally in every case, but should be diversified to meet the needs and opportunities of the occasion. But to "omit" such ...
— Community Civics and Rural Life • Arthur W. Dunn
... games like draughts, halma, picture lotto, spillikins, ping-pong, and beggar-my-neighbour. My sole object in doing all this, you will understand, is to keep the men amused and instructed, to divert their minds and, therefore, to keep them happy and contented. After a few weeks or so they will all be so anxious to come to our entertainments, that they will have lost all desire to go ashore at all. It is a good idea, is ...
— Stand By! - Naval Sketches and Stories • Henry Taprell Dorling
... imagined that the whole scene by which we are here surrounded has over it an air of profound and deathlike stillness. The sea, where we behold nothing but water around us, presents more of life to divert the mind. The very rushing and splash of the wheels, the bounding waves, the bustle of bending or reefing sails, and the crowding of people on the steamer, brings varied pictures to temper the monotony around. Even the ride through the stony deserts which I had traversed in Syria has ...
— A Visit to the Holy Land • Ida Pfeiffer
... stories could divert one long from the peculiarities of that amazing line which exists strictly for itself. There was a bathroom (occupied) at the windy end of an open alleyway. In due time ...
— Letters of Travel (1892-1913) • Rudyard Kipling
... tool of my man's," said she. "Did he not ask me for it to kill the rats, which come and laugh at him in his cellar? Poor beasts!—not for him. They have only the old blind man to divert them, and keep them company! The least they can do is to nibble him a little. Hence I don't wish him to do any harm to the small deer, and I keep the tickler. Besides, I shall soon want it for the broker, perhaps. Thirty thousand francs' ...
— The Mysteries of Paris V2 • Eugene Sue
... of Peter Taylor about flowers and fruit, or of Thomas Neal, concerning pet heifers, and new milk and butter and cheese, became tedious; the jokes and laughter of the farm-hands and dairymaids she heard with irritation; nor could the prattle and play of her romping boys divert her mind from the one absorbing theme—the descent of the Mississippi, the conquest of Mexico, the creation of a New World. In close daily communion with Theodosia, she dwelt not in a white frame house on a woody island of the Ohio River, not in the present; but in the future, and ...
— A Dream of Empire - Or, The House of Blennerhassett • William Henry Venable
... but he still needs my arm to lean upon in his walks, and requires some one more careful that a servant to look after him. I cannot come to you, dear Jack, but I have hours of unemployed time on hand, and I will write you a whole post-office full of letters, if that will divert you. Heaven knows, I haven't anything to write about. It isn't as if we were living at one of the beach houses; then I could do you some character studies, and fill your imagination with groups of sea-goddesses, with their (or somebody else's) raven and blonde manes hanging down their ...
— Marjorie Daw • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... seems to me that the conversation is taking a painful direction, I try to divert it by telling my news; but the bloom is again taken off it by the old man, who declines to be disabused of the idea that the Peninsular is still raging, and that it is Roger's grandfather who is returning ...
— Nancy - A Novel • Rhoda Broughton
... political demand, underlying all others, giving meaning to all others, is this: The special interests must get out of politics. The old-style leaders, seeking to switch public attention away from this one absorbing and overwhelming issue are pitifully ridiculous and out of date. To try to divert the march of an aroused public conscience from this righteous inevitable conflict by means of obsolete political catchwords is like trying to dam the Mississippi ...
— The Fight For Conservation • Gifford Pinchot
... will be felt in the fields of shipping and banking. One consequence is that American enterprise has now the golden opportunity to capture a good share of each. The outbreak of the war and the simultaneous opening of the Panama Canal will tend to divert the course of trade from Europe to South America. Probably our merchant marine can be developed more successfully for this South American trade than it could for the European trade. New York can largely take the place of London as the ...
— The New York Times Current History of the European War, Vol. 1, January 9, 1915 - What Americans Say to Europe • Various
... the sweetness and indefiniteness of the dawn. Soon the mystery of the grotto spread like a perfume throughout the land; it was a ground of joy and edification for pious souls, and corrupt men endeavoured, though in vain, by falsehood and calumny, to divert the faithful from the springs of grace that flowed from the saint's tomb. The Church took measures so that these graces should not remain reserved for a few children, but should be diffused throughout all Penguin Christianity. Monks took up their quarters in the grotto, they built a monastery, ...
— Penguin Island • Anatole France
... ghastly or to be feared. But it was a disgusting nuisance and caused her fatigue. She had continually to remember to simulate proper sympathy, and concern and to subdue her vivacity, and show enthusiasm for any agreeable war work which could divert her dull days. If she had not been more than doubtful of her reception in America, even as a Polish magnate's wife, she would have gone over there to escape as far as possible from the whole situation, and she had ...
— The Price of Things • Elinor Glyn
... immutability of the life provides ample scope for indulgence in that direction. How we long for the settlement you cannot imagine, nor can you imagine with what disgust and impatience we regard every endeavour on the part of the pro-Boers, as they are called, to divert the natural and inevitable course of things. You will not be surprised at hearing this from a one-time Dutch Republican when you take into consideration that all of us who have surrendered are fully ...
— The War in South Africa - Its Cause and Conduct • Arthur Conan Doyle
... consolation, if they had not had a better friend than music to have relied upon in the hour of their distress. And here I think the Quakers would particularly condemn music, if they thought it could be resorted to in the hour of affliction, in as much as it would then have a tendency to divert the mind from its true and ...
— A Portraiture of Quakerism, Volume I (of 3) • Thomas Clarkson
... stranger served to divert the lightning of Mrs. McCall's gaze from the unfortunate Washy. Archie, catching it between the eyes, blinked and held on to the wall. He had begun to regret that he had yielded so weakly to Lucille's entreaty that he should look in on the McCalls ...
— Indiscretions of Archie • P. G. Wodehouse
... previous loves and courtships of milliners, opera-dancers, and the like easy triumphs of the clumsy military Adonis, were quite insipid when compared to the lawful matrimonial pleasures which of late he had enjoyed. She had known perpetually how to divert him; and he had found his house and her society a thousand times more pleasant than any place or company which he had ever frequented from his childhood until now. And he cursed his past follies and extravagances, and bemoaned his vast outlying debts above all, which must remain ...
— Vanity Fair • William Makepeace Thackeray
... all. Thus the commander may reduce the resistance to be encountered in dealing with what have already, or may finally, become the selected physical objectives. Feints in several directions may even divert all of the enemy's effective defense from the vital ...
— Sound Military Decision • U.s. Naval War College
... bullets, dust, and smoke. 'How shall I tell her?' he thought. There would be nothing to tell but just a sort of jagged brown sensation. He kept his eyes steadily before him, not wanting to seethe men falling, not wanting anything to divert him from getting there. He felt the faint fanning of the passing bullets. The second line must be close now. Why didn't that barrage lift? Was this new dodge of firing till the last second going to do them ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... appear probable that an attempt will ever be made to divert the public revenues of the outlying dependencies of Great Britain to the Imperial Exchequer. The lesson taught by the loss of the American Colonies has sunk deeply into the public mind. Moreover, the example of Spain stands as a warning to all the world. The principle that local revenues ...
— Political and Literary essays, 1908-1913 • Evelyn Baring
... this region. It was written in a year of great activity in that line. Gold had been discovered in California, and the thoughts of the pioneer were attracted in that direction, and it needed extraordinary inducements to divert the stream to any other point. It was extensively quoted in the eastern papers, and much commented upon, and succeeded beyond all expectations in awakening interest in the Northwest. It was particularly attractive in Maine, where ...
— The History of Minnesota and Tales of the Frontier • Charles E. Flandrau
... measures odious to the community, if the proofs of that corruption should be satisfactory, the usual propensity of human nature will warrant us in concluding that there would be commonly no defect of inclination in the body to divert the public resentment from themselves by a ready sacrifice of the authors of their mismanagement ...
— The Federalist Papers • Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, and James Madison
... its consummation. From the age of twenty, she had possessed the wondrous privilege of uninterrupted union with God. It was her habitual permanent condition; neither suffering of mind, nor infirmity of health, nor pressure of business, nor weight of care could divert her from it for a moment. Distractions might flit through, and even trouble her imagination, but they never reached the inner soul, which through all, maintained an uninterrupted view of the Divine presence. Her constant application to spiritual things never interfered ...
— The Life of the Venerable Mother Mary of the Incarnation • "A Religious of the Ursuline Community"
... sport. A snap of teeth close to his fore-legs sent him back yelping, and he retired in dudgeon to a heap of seaweed; but by and by, when the sheep were gathered into a compact crowd, he made a really heroic effort to divert attention back to ...
— True Tilda • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... written you some stories, which she hopes will please and divert you. She would rather have come to you, and told them, that she might have seen your bright faces; but as that could not be, she sends her little book instead. Perhaps you will sometime come and see her, and then won't we have ...
— Little Ferns For Fanny's Little Friends • Fanny Fern
... at this vile work when I came back to the house, and as far as I could see, though the man sat still, mute and disconsolate, and their affronts could not divert his sorrow, yet he was both grieved and offended at their words: upon this, I gently reproved them, being well enough acquainted with their characters, and not unknown in person to two of them. They immediately fell upon me with ill language and oaths: asked me what ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 12 • Editor-In-Chief Rossiter Johnson
... does not see the lusts of his evil; he sees their enjoyments, to be sure, but still he reflects little on them, for they divert thought and drive off reflection. Unless he learned from elsewhere that they are evils he would call them goods and give them expression freely according to his thought's reasoning; doing so, he appropriates them to himself. So far as he confirms them as allowable ...
— Angelic Wisdom about Divine Providence • Emanuel Swedenborg
... m., desire, wish; — curieux, curiosity. dsol, distressed, miserable. dsoler, to distress, decimate. dsordre, m., disorder, confusion. dsormais, henceforth. dessein, m., design. dessiller, to open (the eyes). destin, m., fate. destine, f., destiny, fate. dtacher, to divert. detestable, abominable. dtester, to detest, hate. dtourer, to turn away, avert, deflect. dtruire, to destroy. deux, two. devancer, to anticipate, come before, rise before. devant, before, in front of, in the sight of. dvelopper, to unravel. devenir, to ...
— Esther • Jean Racine
... entertainment in this city there are millions who are like them. But I couldn't help thinking that if so much money seems really to be needed, and this Mr. LAW is really a public benefactor, it might not be a bad idea to try to divert some of the thousands of pounds being paid every day in London alone for sheer amusement. Of course if England had the misfortune to be at war most of these places would naturally be ...
— Punch, or The London Charivari, Vol. 152, February 21st, 1917 • Various
... once more into a life of pleasure. The body is so weak, so prone to return to the old paths, that it seeks them of itself, the moment an energetic will does not stop it. Though no longer under any illusion with respect to it, Francis returned to his former life. Was he trying to divert his mind, to forget that day of bitter thought? We might suppose so, seeing the ardor with which he threw himself ...
— Life of St. Francis of Assisi • Paul Sabatier
... another visit to Ireland. His exactions and oppressions had made him very unpopular in England, and it is probable that this expedition was planned to divert the minds of his subjects. If this was his object, it failed signally; for the unfortunate monarch was deposed by Parliament the same year, and was obliged to perform the act of abdication with the best ...
— An Illustrated History of Ireland from AD 400 to 1800 • Mary Frances Cusack
... travel have lived well into, or through, an atomic age. They have survived and they can tell us their secret of survival. Maybe the threat of an atomic war unified their planet and allowed them to divert their war effort to one of social and technical advancement. To such people a searchlight on a cloud or a bright star is ...
— The Report on Unidentified Flying Objects • Edward Ruppelt
... till a few days ago. In his kind of business, he don't always tell who he is. No doubt he will tell you before night who he is. What have you been doing down here so long?" asked the skipper, wishing to divert the conversation into ...
— Little Bobtail - or The Wreck of the Penobscot. • Oliver Optic
... with a wall of four feet high on either side, and the general, who was riding at the head of the party, drew his rein when he saw the mule coming along at a furious gallop. The staff did the same, and a general shout was raised to check or divert her wild career. The obstinate brute, however, maddened by the shouts which had greeted her from all sides, and the strange manner in which she was being ridden, never swerved from her course. ...
— The Young Buglers • G.A. Henty
... had. The dread of the place which his poor wife had entertained seemed to have taken possession of him since her death. All the arguments which he once used, in the endeavor to bolster her courage, he had now forgotten. He was very cautious when he began to speak of the prisoner, and tried to divert Adolphus from the point by saying that he would much prefer a house full of convicts to one so empty as this. There was at least something like society in that, and something ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 12, October, 1858 • Various
... of his lands, with sole and exclusive power to take and use the same. (3.) All game and rabbits on his lands, and sole right to take and kill the same, with full power to enter on and use his lands for that purpose. (4.) All lochs and burns, with power to drain the lochs, and divert the course of the burns, the proprietor making compensation for damage by any of his said operations; and the tenant being entitled to take and use, for his own purposes only, the limestone, stone quarries, marl and clay in the lands occupied by him, and the shell-fish, mussels, ...
— Second Shetland Truck System Report • William Guthrie
... to show that we cannot reasonably expect civilization to divert nations from the ...
— The Navy as a Fighting Machine • Bradley A. Fiske
... in a pathetically forced attempt to read his Callimachus. He was weary physically, and intended to retire early. AEmilia, who felt sorry enough for the plight of her rather distant cousin, had tried to console him and divert him with guitar[84] music, and had called in an itinerant piper,[85] but these well-meant efforts at amusement had been dreary failures. Drusus had just bidden his body-servants undress him, when he was informed that Agias had come from the Lentulan villa, and wished ...
— A Friend of Caesar - A Tale of the Fall of the Roman Republic. Time, 50-47 B.C. • William Stearns Davis
... from the smiling lips, her eyes became thoughtful and her hand fell to her side; it occurred to Susan she would be obliged to divert suspicion from herself. The curling lips straightened; she turned abruptly and hastened toward the town. But her footsteps soon lagged and she ...
— The Strollers • Frederic S. Isham
... yield to his sudden and impetuous assault; or, if he had been in any respect deceived, that it would be easy to secure a safe retreat to the boats from which he had landed. De Valette, in the mean time, was ordered to divert the attention of the garrison, by sailing before the walls; and, if necessary, to afford a more ...
— The Rivals of Acadia - An Old Story of the New World • Harriet Vaughan Cheney
... must be powerless for good. A stone wall following somewhat the shape of the ridge ran along its base. Properly banked in its rear, it afforded an admirable protection for their troops. As there was no chance for success in storming these works, the object in making the attempt was doubtless to divert the Rebel attention ...
— Red-Tape and Pigeon-Hole Generals - As Seen From the Ranks During a Campaign in the Army of the Potomac • William H. Armstrong
... nothing of yourself, Laura," he said, wishing to divert her mind from anything unpleasant. "Tell me something of your own life—it could only be a cheerful theme, for you have means and leisure, and a perfect environment. Tell me of your occupations, ...
— The Colonel's Dream • Charles W. Chesnutt
... he felt this queer shock, his mind travelled back and he seemed to hear the series of discharges running up at short intervals to the great catastrophe. . . . To divert his thoughts, he turned to study the view of Venice above the chimney-piece . . . and on a sudden faced ...
— News from the Duchy • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... regulate the length and bearing of the hoof may make a straight leg crooked and a crooked leg worse, just as intelligent care during the growing period can greatly improve a congenitally crooked limb. If breeders were more generally cognizant of the power of overgrown and unbalanced hoofs to divert the lower bones of young legs from their proper direction, and, therefore, to cause them to be moved improperly, with loss of speed and often with injury to the limbs, we might hope to see fewer knock-kneed, bow-legged, "splay-footed," "pigeon-toed," ...
— Special Report on Diseases of the Horse • United States Department of Agriculture
... circumstances, but I managed to strike up a stave, one of those with which I had been accustomed to amuse my messmates in the Naiad's forecastle. It was not, perhaps, one of the merriest, but it served to divert Clem's thoughts, as well as ...
— Tales of the Sea - And of our Jack Tars • W.H.G. Kingston
... well as from the study of all available magazines and journals. No one could handle the subject in a more pleasant and lucid style; flashes of wit, and even of humor, are sparkling through every chapter, but they never divert the mind of the reader from the main purpose of elucidating the subject of deep drainage. The title-page does not promise so much as the book performs; and we feel confident that its reputation will increase, as our farmers begin ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 23, September, 1859 • Various
... remarked Freddy, not seeing that his sister's face was very red. She could not recover herself. Mr. Beebe saw it, and continued to divert the conversation. ...
— A Room With A View • E. M. Forster
... hardly knew. Aunt Janet had fallen into the habit of watching her covertly, pathetically; she was trying in her own way to read the secret hidden away behind a changed Joan. But she did her best to keep her curiosity out of sight; she was very gentle, very anxious to divert Joan's ...
— To Love • Margaret Peterson
... inspires. Endowed with the faculties and the rights of men, breathing an ardent love of liberty and independence, and occupying a country which left them no desire but to be undisturbed, the stream of overflowing population from other regions directed itself on these shores; without power to divert or habits to contend against it, they have been overwhelmed by the current or driven before it; now reduced within limits too narrow for the hunter's state, humanity enjoins us to teach them agriculture and the domestic arts; to encourage them to ...
— United States Presidents' Inaugural Speeches - From Washington to George W. Bush • Various
... the end) was to be followed by a succession of the hymns one knew by heart. It required an effort to begin, and to really try, but the children of such mothers as ours are taught to make efforts, and once fairly started, and holding on as a duty, it certainly did tend to divert the mind from burglars and ghosts, to get the beasts, creeping things, and fowls of the air into their right places in the chorus of benedictions. That Jem never could discriminate between the "Dews and Frosts" and "Frost and Cold" verses needs no telling. I ...
— We and the World, Part I - A Book for Boys • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... saw you again last night," he continued, ignoring her attempt to divert the stream from his channel, I had a vivid impression as of having just left you. Have you ever felt ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... assented. "It is a very reasonable suggestion. It will divert our thoughts. Here is the afternoon paper. Let us first see whether ...
— The Double Traitor • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... were! And now here was Peter with the worst one of all against him! From now on his life would be in danger from this maniac Irishman! Peter hated him—so heartily and genuinely that it served to divert his thoughts from little Jennie, and to make him regard ...
— 100%: The Story of a Patriot • Upton Sinclair
... way he sought to divert his companion's mind. Once or twice she delighted him by faintly smiling a response to his speeches. They had passed the last of the straggling houses, and the turnpike stretched before them, a white ribbon winding through the green meadow-land. They had to wait while a sleepy ...
— Southern Lights and Shadows • Edited by William Dean Howells & Henry Mills Alden
... sank lower and lower. The tears rose again. It would only irritate him if he came and found her crying. She tried to divert her mind by looking ...
— Man and Wife • Wilkie Collins
... those especially which relate to particular or universal redemption, I profess myself attached neither to the one nor the other. I neither think of them myself nor preach of them to others. If they happen to be started in conversation, I always endeavour to divert the discourse to some more edifying topic. I have often observed them to breed animosity and division, but never knew them to be productive of love and unanimity.... Therefore I rest satisfied in this general and indisputable truth, that the Judge of all the earth will assuredly do right,' ...
— The English Church in the Eighteenth Century • Charles J. Abbey and John H. Overton
... a sunny bank, with Celeste as guardian angel, love, and the remains of the repast to cheer her, and the consciousness that his clothes were shrinking on him as they dried, to divert him, and wandered off through the woods, and over the hills, gathering on the way so many flowers and green things, that Cyn declared they looked like Birnam Wood coming ...
— Wired Love - A Romance of Dots and Dashes • Ella Cheever Thayer
... be hard to say now what it is; but somehow the confusion of gables and excrescences have altogether a very picturesque effect, and luxuriant clematis and ivy conceal the architectural irregularities, or at least divert the eye from their observation. At the entrance to the house from the garden there is a porch, up a short flight of gray stone steps; its sides are of trellis-work, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, Number 385. November, 1847. • Various
... divert me, Joyce," quoth Father, looking at her. "Here be three writers, of whom one shall be wise on each page, and one on none, and one on the last only. I reckon it ...
— Joyce Morrell's Harvest - The Annals of Selwick Hall • Emily Sarah Holt
... perhaps because they look too exclusively to how much of a play may be retained by us and carried home. It is true, the Piece of Intrigue, in some degree, ends at last in nothing: but why should it not be occasionally allowable to divert oneself ingeniously, without any ulterior object? Certainly, a good comedy of this description requires much inventive wit: besides the entertainment which we derive from the display of such acuteness and ingenuity, ...
— Lectures on Dramatic Art - and Literature • August Wilhelm Schlegel trans John Black
... From that point forward, however, he adopts the tradition whereby Jerome, Lactantius, and others had identified the fallen angels with the gods of the heathen. Whether as conquerors or as corrupted guardians of the human race, they seek the same ends,—to divert worship from the true God, and by the destruction of man, to contrive a solace for their own perdition. They are the inventors of astrology, sooth-saying, divination, necromancy, and black magic; they ...
— Milton • Sir Walter Alexander Raleigh
... descent from those proud Incas, who appeared to have lived in a regal splendour only to be equalled by that of the potentates of the Arabian Nights, seemed to him to be a rare slice of good luck; he was therefore careful to say nothing calculated to divert the conversation from the channel in which it was so satisfactorily flowing, but, on the contrary, did everything he could to keep it there. He was, however, very much surprised to find his hostess looking forward so confidently to brighter and happier times for the despised Indian race; for if ...
— Harry Escombe - A Tale of Adventure in Peru • Harry Collingwood
... captain, 'it seemed to me that unless I did something to divert the minds of the people in the boat, there would probably be a panic. Then the boat would have been upset, for, as you know, it was over-crowded. My seemingly strange act attracted your attention. Watching me, you forgot ...
— Chatterbox, 1905. • Various
... and it was plain to see that she was consumed by anxiety. Now and then she would ask a question about the accident, and although I tried in every way to divert her mind to other subjects she unfailingly came ...
— Guy Garrick • Arthur B. Reeve
... high counselors, of whom it is written (Job i. 1), "That man was perfect and upright," He took and delivered to Samael, saying, as He did so, "Behold, he is in thy hand; do with him as thou pleasest." God thought to divert his evil designs by keeping him thus occupied with Job, that Israel meanwhile might cross the sea without any hindrance, after which He would return and rescue Job from his tender mercies. God then said to Moses, "Behold I have delivered Job to Satan; make haste. Speak unto the children of Israel ...
— Hebraic Literature; Translations from the Talmud, Midrashim and - Kabbala • Various
... head bad, Theo?" Geoff put on a hypo-critical look of solicitude to divert attention from ...
— A Country Gentleman and his Family • Mrs. (Margaret) Oliphant
... Bertie. You've got to. Something's got to be done to divert her mind. She's brooding about something. She's been like that for the last two days. I think she's beginning to suspect. She can't understand why we never seem to meet anyone I know at these joints. A few nights ago I happened to run into ...
— My Man Jeeves • P. G. Wodehouse
... mustachios had excited some degree of terror among those who were in the salon. He described his exploits on the march, and did not disguise his intention of bringing his troops into Hamburg next day. He talked of the Bank and of pillage. I tried for some time to divert him from this idea, but without effect, and at length said to him, "Sir, you know that this is not the way the Emperor wishes to be served. During the seven years that I have been about him, I have invariably ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... have the prosecutors in disregarding the main point, and trying to attack my character? Are they not aware that they should speak about the question at issue? Or do they indeed understand this, but thinking to divert your attention, present more arguments in regard to every sort of matter than about what they should (speak)? 2. I see clearly that they speak, not because they have a small opinion of me, but of their case. I should not be surprised if they supposed ...
— The Orations of Lysias • Lysias
... divert me from my duty. My path of duty is distinctly traced; and if a thwarting hand withdraws me from it, it must end ...
— Mary Anerley • R. D. Blackmore
... continued to consult his familiar on various subjects, I proceeded to investigate and saw a young friend of mine seated in a hammock, his head bent down and his hand placed at his mouth in an effort to divert the direction of the sound. I was within a few feet of this young fellow and could plainly see by the light of the kitchen fire the attitude of the impersonator and distinctly hear his whistling. The seance continued for some 10 minutes, the impersonator chirping out answers to the questioning ...
— The Manbos of Mindano - Memoirs of the National Academy of Sciences, Volume XXIII, First Memoir • John M. Garvan
... Pickering instructed Eaton to try to divert the Bey's mind from the jewels; but if that were impossible, to order them in England, where they could be bought more cheaply; and to excuse the delay by saying "that the President felt a confidence, that, on further reflection upon all circumstances in relation ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 6, No. 38, December, 1860 • Various
... the beach about six o'clock in the evening when the sea-breeze is making its final efforts, I have perceived it to blow with a considerable degree of warmth, owing to the heat the sea had by that time acquired, which would soon begin to divert the current of air towards it when it had first overcome the vis inertiae that preserves motion in a body after the impelling power has ceased to operate. I have likewise been sensible of a degree of warmth on passing, within two hours after sunset, ...
— The History of Sumatra - Containing An Account Of The Government, Laws, Customs And - Manners Of The Native Inhabitants • William Marsden
... class of information which, it seems to me, is more legitimate to acquire. The Russian Ministries of Commerce and Finance always imagined that they could overrule economic laws by decrees and stratagems. For instance, they were perpetually endeavouring to divert the flow of trade from its accustomed channels to some port they wished to stimulate artificially into prosperity, by granting rebates, and by exceptionally favourable railway rates. Large quantities of jute sacking were imported from Dundee to be made into bags ...
— The Days Before Yesterday • Lord Frederick Hamilton
... Portland headquarters, where they gave us very valuable assistance. I have always believed that we would have carried Oregon that year if the disaster of the California earthquake had not occurred to divert the minds of Western men from interest in ...
— The Story of a Pioneer - With The Collaboration Of Elizabeth Jordan • Anna Howard Shaw
... in the sunshine and dream of a brilliant career. He might go into parliament and become a great statesman, like that man, Lord Salisbury, who had come to Belfast once during the Home Rule agitation. Or he might turn Nationalist and divert himself by roaring in the House of Commons against the English! He wished that he could write poetry ... if he could write poetry, he might become famous. There was an old exercise book at home, full of poems that he had made up when he was much younger, about Ireland and the Pope ...
— The Foolish Lovers • St. John G. Ervine
... cried Mark eagerly jumping at the chance of saying something to divert his father's smouldering anger; "a ...
— Dead Man's Land - Being the Voyage to Zimbambangwe of certain and uncertain • George Manville Fenn
... Feb. 10th.—To help divert my mind from such incessant brooding over my sorrows, I am writing a new book. I had just begun it when baby's ill-turn arrested me. I trust it may do some little good; at least I would not dare to write it, if it could do none. ...
— The Life and Letters of Elizabeth Prentiss • George L. Prentiss
... years from this most anxious period, the translation continued as it was; and though, in the hope of its being able to divert his melancholy, I had attempted more than once to introduce it to its Author, I was every time painfully obliged to desist. But in the summer of ninety-six, when he had resided with me in Norfolk twelve miserable months, the introduction long wished for took place. ...
— The Iliad of Homer - Translated into English Blank Verse • Homer
... she saw spoke of neglect and vanished prosperity. Hoarse voices and loud laughter came from an adjoining room and a smell of cigar smoke accompanied them. Sitting at the piano, she restlessly turned over some music and now and then played a few bars to divert her troubled thoughts. Until a few weeks before she had led a peaceful life in the country, and the finding her father of such doubtful character and habits had been ...
— Blake's Burden • Harold Bindloss
... speak of the wisdom of Pagans. Convinced that the multitude, too much governed by the objects of sense to be sufficiently amused and entertained with the pleasures of the understanding, could be delighted only with sensible objects, both nations were studious to divert them with games and shows, and such external contrivances, as were proper to affect the senses; in the institution of which, each evinced and followed its peculiar ...
— The Ancient History of the Egyptians, Carthaginians, Assyrians, • Charles Rollin
... a very important War upon his Hands, it did not divert him from the Gratifications of Love; he left the entire Management of every Thing to the Mollak Jeflur. The Welfare of his Troops and Glory of his Arms were to depend on Generals of the Minister's Appointment, whose Weakness and sordid Parsimony, occasioned several very ignominious Miscarriages ...
— The Amours of Zeokinizul, King of the Kofirans - Translated from the Arabic of the famous Traveller Krinelbol • Claude Prosper Jolyot de Crbillon
... is to have all the pews filled," broke in Elizabeth, attempting to divert her father from a ...
— Captain Pott's Minister • Francis L. Cooper
... powerful allies, and without competition in tropical cultivation, has become the sole reliance of KING COTTON. Lest the sources of his aggrandisement should be assailed, we can well imagine him as being engaged constantly, in devising new questions of agitation, to divert the public from all attempts to abandon free trade and restore the protective policy. He now finds an ample source of security, in this respect, in agitating the question of slavery extension. This exciting topic, as we have said, serves to ...
— Cotton is King and The Pro-Slavery Arguments • Various
... contrived to portion out his days in such wise that certain hours were left for recreation. At such times as he was called upon to teach, the class-room, of course, had the first claims. After the lecture he would walk in the shade outside the city walls, then return to his dinner, then divert himself with music, and afterwards go fishing in the pools and streams hard by the town. In the course of time he obtained other employment, being appointed physician to the Augustinian friars. The Prior of this Order, Francesco Gaddi, was ...
— Jerome Cardan - A Biographical Study • William George Waters
... Silvio Pandono, and the other, an Archbishop whose own name and that of his diocese I am unable to recollect, will bear me witness. We were together at Granada when it was captured from the Moors, and to divert ourselves we used to go to some wooded hills, whence a murmuring rivulet flowed across the plain. While our most illustrious Ludovico went bird-hunting with his bow along its banks, the two bishops and I formed a plan to ascend the hill to discover the source of the brook, for we were ...
— De Orbe Novo, Volume 1 (of 2) - The Eight Decades of Peter Martyr D'Anghera • Trans. by Francis Augustus MacNutt
... themselves authorized in offering the present without any formal apology. If the perusal of such productions had a tendency to prevent the youth of the country from aspiring to deep and solid erudition, or to divert men of talents from the prosecution of more important studies, the editors would be among the last to make any addition to the stock already in circulation; but, convinced that, on the contrary, works of that kind ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor - Volume I, Number 1 • Stephen Cullen Carpenter
... Inez, to divert the train Of one of the most circulating scandals That had for centuries been known in Spain, At least since the retirement of the Vandals, First vowed (and never had she vowed in vain) To Virgin Mary several pounds of candles; And then, by the advice of some ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 6 • Lord Byron
... certainly conclude, from the poetical introduction, that there was little delay between the finishing of the book and its being given to the world. After having written the book, he tells us, simply to gratify himself, spending only "vacant seasons" in his "scribble," to "divert" himself "from worser thoughts," he showed it to his friends to get their opinion whether it should be published or not. But as they were not all of one mind, but some counselled one thing and some another, after some perplexity, he took the matter ...
— The Life of John Bunyan • Edmund Venables
... though my hope in Angellina's little, my honour (unto which compar'd she's nothing) shall, like the Sun, disperse those lowring Clouds that yet obscure and dim it; not the name of Brother shall divert me, but from him, that in the world's opinion ruin'd me, I will seek reparation, and call him unto a strict accompt. Ha! 'tis near day, and if the Muses friend, Rose-cheek'd Aurora, invite him to this solitary Grove, as I much hope she will, he seldome missing to pay his vows ...
— The Works of Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher - Vol. 2 of 10: Introduction to The Elder Brother • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher
... Saint Jean d'Angely, on the Boutonne, was the only remaining outwork, whose capture must precede an attack on the citadel itself. Should the victorious army of the king lay siege to Saint Jean d'Angely, or should it continue the pursuit of Coligny and the princes, who, in order to divert it from the undertaking, had retired from Saint Jean d'Angely to Saintes, and thence, not long after, in the direction of Montauban? This was the question that demanded an instant answer. Jean de Serres informs us that the Protestant leaders were extremely ...
— History of the Rise of the Huguenots - Volume 2 • Henry Baird
... the route by the Cape of Good Hope. The political and commercial interests of England were bound up with the sea route, especially after the Cape was definitively assigned to her by the Peace of Paris of 1814; but she could not see with indifference the control by France of a canal which would divert trade once more to the old overland route. That danger was now averted by the financial coup just noticed—an affair which may prove to have been scarcely less important in a political sense than Nelson's victory ...
— The Development of the European Nations, 1870-1914 (5th ed.) • John Holland Rose
... from under the twitching lids and rolled down the chubby cheeks. The clerk moved uneasily. He did hate to see anyone cry, but had not the slightest idea how to avert the threatened deluge. As his eye roved about the small store for something to divert her attention, it chanced to rest upon the candy cabinet, and hastily diving into the case, he brought forth a handful of tempting chocolates, and presented them with the tactful remark, "Aw, you're cross; have some candy to ...
— The Lilac Lady • Ruth Alberta Brown
... I hated it already from the bottom of my soul before I came to the throne, and, since my accession, I have done everything I could to suppress it. I mean to proceed on this path, without taking heed of any one, and, indeed, no power on earth shall divert me from it. ...
— THE HISTORY OF EDUCATION • ELLWOOD P. CUBBERLEY
... characterized a period of political reaction, of indifference to public life, of social stagnation and carelessness. When the volcanoes were rumbling, the masses were always dancing. At all times when tyrants wanted to divert the attention of the crowd, they gave the dances to their people. A nation which dances cannot think, but lives from hour to hour. The less political maturity, the more happiness does a national community show in ...
— Psychology and Social Sanity • Hugo Muensterberg
... him,' said the farmer, grasping him as a sort of property. 'M. le Baron had best keep up the beck. Out on the moor there he may fly the hawk, and that will best divert suspicion.' ...
— The Chaplet of Pearls • Charlotte M. Yonge
... you wish to give them this indorsement, if you wish to establish this principle, do so. I shall regret it, but it is your right. On the contrary, if you are opposed to the principle,—intend to give it no such indorsement, let no wheedling, no sophistry, divert you from throwing a direct vote ...
— The Papers And Writings Of Abraham Lincoln, Complete - Constitutional Edition • Abraham Lincoln
... things; things that had never been tried; big engines, terrible explosives, great guns. You know the silly way of these ingenious sort of men who make these things; they turn 'em out as beavers build dams, and with no more sense of the rivers they're going to divert and the lands they're going ...
— The Door in the Wall And Other Stories • H. G. Wells
... life was too weak and colourless, by contrast, to make the name of fortune an excuse for the sordid facts of meanness. There was no splendour about her, no wild gaiety, none of the glorious extravagance of conscious young wealth, and there was very little amusement to divert her thoughts. The people she would have liked to know were kept at a distance from her. She was advised not to buy the things which attracted her eyes, and was told that they were not so good as they looked, and that on the whole it was better to keep money than to spend it—but that, of course, ...
— Taquisara • F. Marion Crawford
... do belong to the contemplative life. For actual contemplation, in which the contemplative life essentially consists, is impeded both by the vehemence of the passions which distract the soul from occupation with the things of the intellect, and divert it to the things of sense, and also by external disturbances. The moral virtues, however, keep down the vehemence of the passions, and check the disturbance that ...
— On Prayer and The Contemplative Life • St. Thomas Aquinas
... she said. But he did not exactly see how he had become the friend of a mummy for which he had just paid twenty-five louis. To divert the conversation, he said to Clementine: "I have not yet shown you all the nice things I brought. His majesty, the Emperor of all the Russias, made me a present of a little enamelled gold star hanging at the end of a ribbon. Do you ...
— The Man With The Broken Ear • Edmond About
... arm, nor his services in respect to the coffee, but he was mute on the subject on which his companion was bent. He tried to divert her attention by some questions on the subject of ...
— The Marriage of Elinor • Margaret Oliphant
... had ceased, that the arms had all returned to the button banks. Then it dawned on me that Keston's master machine was directing all the destruction I was watching, that the intelligence he had given it was being used to divert the machines from their regular tasks to—conquer the world. "You sure started ...
— Astounding Stories, July, 1931 • Various
... Mrs. Bargrave;' and the character of this sober gentlewoman is supported by the testimony of a justice of the peace at Maidstone, 'a very intelligent person.' This elaborate chain of evidence is intended to divert our attention from the obvious circumstance that the whole story rests upon the authority of the anonymous person who tells us of the sober gentlewoman, who supports Mrs. Bargrave, and is confirmed by the intelligent justice. Simple as ...
— Hours in a Library, Volume I. (of III.) • Leslie Stephen
... not speak, for he was afraid to interrupt or to divert the childlike man from the channel in which his thoughts appeared ...
— Winning His "W" - A Story of Freshman Year at College • Everett Titsworth Tomlinson
... pity then, after all, there wasn't more painted canvas to divert you! Ah, decidedly, the theatre of the ...
— Picture and Text - 1893 • Henry James
... already filled with farmers and their families, adorned as for a holiday. The entire population of Shellfish Canyon had assembled, voicing high indignation at the ranger's interference. Led by Abe and Eli, who busily proclaimed that the arrest of Henry and his companions was merely a trick to divert suspicion from the Kauffman woman, they advanced ...
— They of the High Trails • Hamlin Garland
... a form of settlement that passes all my property to Miss Fleur's children in equal shares, with antecedent life-interests first to myself and then to her without power of anticipation, and add a clause that in the event of anything happening to divert her life-interest, that interest passes to the trustees, to apply for her ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... really breaks out, and the less recording and reporting the better for the peace of the subscribers. But the Empires and the Kings continue to divert themselves as selfishly as before, and the Foreman thinks that a daily paper really ought to come out once in twenty-four hours, and all the people at the Hill-stations in the middle of their amusements say, "Good gracious! ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... upon such occasions, to order dinner to be served; adding, 'Ought six people to be kept waiting for one?' 'Why, yes, (answered Johnson, with a delicate humanity,) if the one will suffer more by your sitting down, than the six will do by waiting.' Goldsmith, to divert the tedious minutes, strutted about, bragging of his dress, and I believe was seriously vain of it, for his mind was wonderfully prone to such impressions[243]. 'Come, come, (said Garrick,) talk no more of that. You are, perhaps, the worst—eh, eh!'—Goldsmith was eagerly attempting ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 2 • Boswell, Edited by Birkbeck Hill
... trouble—for giving seems to mean everything-brought to her mind the letter she had undertaken to deliver to her. Now she had no notion, as I have said, that the letter had anything to do with her present perplexity, but she hoped it might divert her thoughts for a moment, which is all that love at a distance ...
— Annals of a Quiet Neighbourhood • George MacDonald
... improvements. The movement became especially active after the War of 1812, when New York carried out De Witt Clinton's vast conception of making by the Erie Canal a greater Hudson which should drain to the port of New York all the basin of the Great Lakes, and by means of other canals even divert the traffic from the tributaries of the Mississippi. New York City's commercial ascendancy dates from this connection with interior New York and the Mississippi Valley. A writer in Hunt's Merchants' Magazine in 1869 makes the significance of ...
— The Frontier in American History • Frederick Jackson Turner
... surprised no one. Some prisoners intrench themselves behind a system of defence, and nothing can divert them from it; others vary with each new question, denying what they have just affirmed, and constantly inventing some new absurdity which anon they reject again. M. Lecoq tried in vain to draw Guespin from his silence; M. Domini made the same attempt, and also ...
— The Mystery of Orcival • Emile Gaboriau
... to use the expression of the first Duc de Biron, the old cuirassier sought to divert his mind, by occupation, from dwelling on his fall. Though he had yielded his "corps d'armee" to the Bourbons, that duty (performed by other generals and termed the disbanding of the army of the Loire) could not atone for the crime of having followed ...
— Sons of the Soil • Honore de Balzac
... though they were constantly in his thoughts, more especially as the time approached in which he had promised his friends he would return to them. He took no pleasure in the chase, with which his father sought often to divert him, nor in any of the convivial meetings of that hospitable city. All kinds of amusements wearied him, and the best enjoyments that could be offered to him were not to be compared, he thought, with those he had known at the tunny fisheries. His friend ...
— The Exemplary Novels of Cervantes • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... TRUE MANHOOD.—The question for each one is, "In what way are you going to divert the courses of the streams of energy which pertain to youthful vigor and manhood?" To be destitute of that which may be described as raw material in the human frame, means that no really vigorous manhood can have place; to burn ...
— Searchlights on Health: Light on Dark Corners • B.G. Jefferis
... of such sixpenny romances and history-books as the hedge-schools afforded. Many a time have I given up my meals rather than lose one minute from the interest excited by the story I was perusing. Having read Gil Bias, however, I felt an irrepressible passion for adventure, which nothing could divert; in fact, I was as much the creature of the impulse it excited, as the ship is of the helmsman, or the steam-engine of the principle that ...
— The Ned M'Keown Stories - Traits And Stories Of The Irish Peasantry, The Works of - William Carleton, Volume Three • William Carleton
... thinking of the dead boy and the threat to blacken his memory, but neither of them confessed it to the other. Wadley cast about for something to divert her mind and found it in an unanswered question ...
— Oh, You Tex! • William Macleod Raine
... and their businesses to destroy and be destroyed for no good purpose that might not have been achieved better and sooner by neighborly means. I am thinking of the authentic news that no papers dare publish, not of the lies that they all publish to divert attention from the truth. In America these things can be said without driving American mothers and wives mad; here, we have to set our teeth and go forward. We cannot be just; we cannot see beyond the range of our guns. The roar of the shrapnel deafens us; the black smoke of ...
— New York Times, Current History, Vol 1, Issue 1 - From the Beginning to March, 1915 With Index • Various
... enlighten me upon them all, equally an authority on matters of science or literature, philosophy or fashion. The part I bore in the conversation was by no means a prominent one; it was only necessary to set him going, and when he had run long enough upon one topic, to divert him to another and lead him on to pour out his heaps of ...
— The Oregon Trail • Francis Parkman, Jr.
... of the American Congress produced a sensation in England; they were more moderate in tone and able in quality than had been anticipated. They could not divert the king from his purpose, but they aroused sympathy in England among the People, and from Lord Chatham the remark that the annals of Greece and Rome yielded nothing so lofty and just in sentiment as their remonstrance. The non-representative character of Parliament at this juncture is illustrated ...
— The History of the United States from 1492 to 1910, Volume 1 • Julian Hawthorne
... from this perplexity, Cecilia, to divert her chagrin, again visited Miss Belfield. She had then the pleasure to hear that her brother was much recovered, and had been able, the preceding day, to take an airing, which he had borne so well that Mr Rupil had charged him to use ...
— Cecilia vol. 2 - Memoirs of an Heiress • Frances (Fanny) Burney (Madame d'Arblay)
... adventure. In years he is not yet thirty, but he is and always was a leader, mature, wise, calm, and resolved. Of courage undaunted, possessing a firmness and perseverance of purpose which nothing but impossibilities can divert from its direction; careful as a father of those committed to his charge, and yet steady in the maintenance of order and discipline; intimate with the Indian character, customs, and principles; habituated to the ...
— The Magnificent Adventure - Being the Story of the World's Greatest Exploration and - the Romance of a Very Gallant Gentleman • Emerson Hough
... the letter which I sent to you by the last mail, addressed to the care of my London agents, Messrs. Denny and Clark, Austin Friars. I have nothing new or interesting to communicate from Oude. The Burmese war seems likely to divert the Governor-General's attention from Oude and Hydrabad affairs for some time to come; and the death of the Duke of Wellington, and probable changes in the ministry at home, may prevent him from ...
— A Journey through the Kingdom of Oude, Volumes I & II • William Sleeman
... his matchless editorial letters; at other times he would make a personal visit; if necessary, he would use any available friends in a wire-pulling campaign. At all odds he must "get" his man; once he had fixed upon a certain contributor nothing could divert him from the chase. Nor did the negotiations cease after he had "landed" his quarry. He had his way of discussing the subject with his proposed writer, and he discussed it from every possible point of view. He would take him to lunch or to dinner; in his quiet way he would draw him ...
— The Life and Letters of Walter H. Page, Volume I • Burton J. Hendrick
... they had become partners served, somehow, to divert a relation between them which might otherwise have developed into a first-class friendship. Not that they quarreled or even disappointed each other in the close contacts of the day's work. They were admirably complementary. ...
— The Real Adventure • Henry Kitchell Webster
... longer." He turned away his face walked hastily up and down the room, muttering indistinctly, "We cannot go on in this manner any longer!" Charlotte, seeing the violent agitation into which these words had thrown him, endeavoured to divert his thoughts by different questions, but in vain. "No, Charlotte!" he exclaimed; "I will never see you any more!" "And why so?" she answered. "We may—we must see each other again; only let it be with ...
— The Sorrows of Young Werther • J.W. von Goethe
... several of the bystanders on his escape, but there seemed a pretty general feeling amongst many of the others that they had been unjustly deprived of their prey, and there is no saying what might have happened had not another culprit appeared on the scene to divert their attention. ...
— The Golden Dream - Adventures in the Far West • R.M. Ballantyne
... misled papists, who seem to regard the number of prayers more than their sincerity. Before going into their mosques they wash their feet, and, in entering, put off their shoes. On beginning their devotions, they stop their ears, and fix their eyes, that no extraneous circumstances may divert their thoughts, and then utter their prayers in a soft and still voice, using many words significantly expressive of the omnipotence, goodness, eternity, and other attributes of God. Likewise many words full of humility, confessing their unworthiness with many submissive gestures. ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume IX. • Robert Kerr
... her with many tender and loving words. And as soon as she was calm enough to eat and drink, he placed food and wine before her, and set her a good example by eating and drinking heartily himself, chattering trivialities all the time to divert her mind, so far as he could, from her recent terrible adventure. Then, when she had taken all that he could persuade her to swallow, he insisted that she must lie down and ...
— Dick Leslie's Luck - A Story of Shipwreck and Adventure • Harry Collingwood
... the scarcity of water in the canal running between the Bati-Anzanim canal and the canal of the royal district, on the waters of his ditch for irrigation shall they make no levy; from the ditch of his reservoir shall they not draw water, neither shall they divert (his water for) irrigation, and other land shall they not irrigate nor water therewith. The grass of his lands shall they not mow; the beasts belonging to the king or to a governor, which may be ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, And Assyria In The Light Of Recent Discovery • L.W. King and H.R. Hall
... earnestly pursued, and mournfully suspended in early youth. He did not say how or wherefore: he rushed on to dwell upon the struggles for a livelihood for himself and those dependent on him; how in such struggles he was compelled to divert toil and energy from the systematic pursuit of the object he had once set before him; the necessities for money were too urgent to be postponed to the visions of fame. "But even," he exclaimed, ...
— Kenelm Chillingly, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... thou dost filch away the napkins of the heedless. Dost thou think this a joke? it flies thee, stupid fool, how coarse a thing and unbecoming 'tis! Dost not credit me? credit thy brother Pollio who would willingly give a talent to divert thee from thy thefts: for he is a lad skilled in pleasantries and facetiousness. Wherefore, either expect hendecasyllables three hundred, or return me my napkin which I esteem, not for its value ...
— The Carmina of Caius Valerius Catullus • Caius Valerius Catullus
... sensitiveness which it is so natural for a child to feel when his own conduct is directly the object of unfavorable comment. It is surprising how slight a change in the mere outward incidents of an affair will suffice to divert the thoughts of the child from himself in such a case, and enable him to look at the lesson to be imparted without personal feeling, and so to receive ...
— Gentle Measures in the Management and Training of the Young • Jacob Abbott
... more about me,'" he said to himself that night when alone in his cabin. "I wonder how long it would be before the other one did anything to divert the talk from herself. Some time, I fancy." He smiled rather grimly as he unbuckled his sword-belt. It is unlucky for a girl when she starts a train of reflection like this. Lilly's little attempt to pique her admirer had somehow missed ...
— What Katy Did Next • Susan Coolidge
... explanation on my part, and a little attentive listening on hers, ultimately changed her opinion. She now agrees with me that there is nothing in this unexpected circumstance of the clandestine marriage which absolutely tends to divert suspicion from Mr. Jay, or Mr. "Jack," or the runaway lady. "Audacious hussy" was the term my fair friend used in speaking of her; but let that pass. It is more to the purpose to record that Mrs. Yatman has not lost confidence ...
— Masterpieces of Mystery In Four Volumes - Detective Stories • Various
... and admitting him, by imperceptible gradations of glance and manner, a step farther toward intimacy. The protective instinct always nerved her to successful dissimulation, and it was not the first time she had used her beauty to divert ...
— House of Mirth • Edith Wharton
... perhaps distant, sight, and Charlie was blamed for all my doings. It left me with a resolve to defend him to my utmost, all the more so that I was convinced in my mind that he was doing his utmost to divert suspicion from me to himself. Even his own brother believed in ...
— The Law-Breakers • Ridgwell Cullum
... the present generation, and occasionally, grim old Horace Greeley, who, if, as he said, in the course of forty years had never been able to get a day off to go "a-fishing," managed, now and then, to find an evening of leisure in which to divert himself with the pleasant, bookish talk at No. 53. A salon as "was a salon"—that of the Cary girls. With the vast, unwieldy city of today in mind we wonder how they managed it, by what charm and persuasion they gathered with such regularity so many ...
— Fifth Avenue • Arthur Bartlett Maurice
... ain't used the past four years to stimulate that imagination of yours. Of course they was purchased for the Mexicans, but what was to prevent me from lettin' the Mexicans pay for them, help out on the charter of the boat, and then have me divert the cargo to the United States of Colombia, where I can sell 'em at a clear profit, the cost bein' nothin' to speak of? Now you got to come buttin' in with the Maggie, and what happens? Why, I got to be honest, of course. I got to make ...
— Captain Scraggs - or, The Green-Pea Pirates • Peter B. Kyne
... one of I-A's answers to those fat-keistered politicians. We're setting up our own search system to find the planets before they do. We've managed to put spies in key places at R&R. Any touchy planets our spies report, we divert ...
— Missing Link • Frank Patrick Herbert
... started down toward the city. He went first to Sharpman's office, and the clerk told him that Mr. Sharpman had left word that Ralph need not go to Wilkesbarre that day. Then he went on to the heart of the city. He was trying to divert himself, trying to drown his thought, as people try who are suffering from the reproaches ...
— Burnham Breaker • Homer Greene
... master. As the Indians see the dislike of the dogs to us, they are sometimes mischievous enough to set them on single persons whom they chance to meet in the woods. A surly fellow was one day out shooting, when the natives attempted to divert themselves in this manner at his expense. The man bore the teazing and gnawing of the dog at his heels for some time, but apprehending at length, that his patience might embolden them to use still farther liberties, he turned round and shot poor ...
— A Narrative of the Expedition to Botany Bay • Watkin Tench
... of le Figaro and had laughed at it. It turns out to have assumed grotesque proportions. As for me, they gave me a grandson instead of two granddaughters, and a Catholic baptism instead of a Protestant. That does not make any difference. One really has to lie a little to divert oneself. ...
— The George Sand-Gustave Flaubert Letters • George Sand, Gustave Flaubert
... Thrale showed me my room, which is an exceeding pleasant one, and then conducted me to the library, there to divert myself ...
— Autobiography, Letters and Literary Remains of Mrs. Piozzi (Thrale) (2nd ed.) (2 vols.) • Mrs. Hester Lynch Piozzi
... who, however, had settled on the edge of the Big Town to make money and had made it. Pearson the elder was hardly more prepotent than Mr. Lusk, the banker at home. George himself was a dashing go-ahead: if he turned into a tired business-man his wife would know how to divert him. ...
— Bertram Cope's Year • Henry Blake Fuller
... but a good deal of it is mountain land, worth but little. My fund, therefore, is not as large as yours, but it amounts to a good round sum; and as I hope, either in the army or in some other way, to earn an income for myself, it is ample. I shall be sorry to divert it from the use for which I intended it, but that cannot now be helped. I have had the pleasure, year by year, of putting it by for the king's use, and, now that circumstances have changed, it will be ...
— A Jacobite Exile - Being the Adventures of a Young Englishman in the Service of Charles the Twelfth of Sweden • G. A. Henty
... the darkness began, when Christ hung upon the cross. It is understood to have been the third hour when the Jews clamored for the Lord to be crucified: and it is most clearly shown that they crucified Him when they clamored out. Therefore, lest anyone might divert the thought of so great a crime from the Jews to the soldiers, he says: 'It was the third hour, and they crucified Him,' that they before all may be found to have crucified Him, who at the third hour clamored for His crucifixion. Although ...
— Summa Theologica, Part III (Tertia Pars) - From the Complete American Edition • Thomas Aquinas
... are bad form on the golf-links, since they leave a disturbing memory in the mind to divert it from that absolute intellectual concentration which the game demands. Therefore Pickings and Booverman, as they started toward the crowded first ...
— Murder in Any Degree • Owen Johnson
... the General's House. They were met at the Head of the Stairs by the General's Women, who with a great deal of Respect conducted them into the House. Captain Swan, and we that were with him followed after. It was not long before the General caused his dancing Women to enter the Room, and divert the Company with that pastime. I had forgot to tell you that they have none but vocal Musick here, by what I could learn, except only a row of a kind of Bells without Clappers, 16 in number, and their weight increasing gradually from about three ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898—Volume 39 of 55 • Various |
