"Gasp" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... at each other long and steadily. When he spoke, his words were those she had invited, but they made her gasp as one gasps at that which suddenly takes ...
— The Inner Shrine • Basil King
... oxygen and hydrogen. There is no water in oxygen, no water in hydrogen: it comes bubbling fresh from the imagination of the living God, rushing from under the great white throne of the glacier. The very thought of it makes one gasp with an elemental joy no metaphysician can analyse. The water itself, that dances, and sings, and slakes the wonderful thirst—symbol and picture of that draught for which the woman of Samaria made her prayer to Jesus—this ...
— Unspoken Sermons - Series I., II., and II. • George MacDonald
... for the purpose. "Do you mean she—at all confidently!—expects?" he went on, not much minding if it couldn't but sound foolish; the time being given it for him meanwhile by the sigh, the wondering gasp, all charged with the unutterable, that the tone of his appeal set in motion. He saw his companion look at him, but it might have been with the eyes of thirty years ago; when—very likely.—he had put her some such question about some girl long since dead. ...
— The Finer Grain • Henry James
... He did not hesitate. Still holding the turned knob in his hand, he quickly crouched back and brought his flexed shoulder heavily against the door. It flew open with a breaking sound, and, with a little gasp of triumph, he was in the room ...
— The Lions of the Lord - A Tale of the Old West • Harry Leon Wilson
... put a hand into her bosom and drew out a small poniard. Rachael Closs gave a sharp gasp, and snatched at the poniard, but the old woman held ...
— The Old Countess; or, The Two Proposals • Ann S. Stephens
... with a sharp gasp. Ought I to turn back to my parents? Had I been so naughty that I had called the naughtiest girl in the whole county ...
— Painted Windows • Elia W. Peattie
... handling," "incomparable artistry"—I found nothing that it didn't seem a sort of impertinence to apply to JOSEPH CONRAD's Chance, which METHUEN has just had the good luck to publish. For the whole thing is much nearer wizardry than workmanship. I put the book down with a gasp, so close had I been to realities as conjured up by one to whom realism is a servant and not a master. I had come to know, in that piecemeal way in which one actually gets to know one's fellows—waiting for later experience to confirm or modify earlier impressions—the ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 146, January 28, 1914 • Various
... the doctor, sitting down beside him with a gasp of relief; 'let a wave-worn mariner ...
— Quit Your Worrying! • George Wharton James
... had come prepared to strike a blow without making any noise. As the mastiff sprang at him, he held the atomizer at full length and let a portion of the contents fly full into the animal's face. There was a snarl and a gasp and the magnificent canine fell over on her side. Leaping forward, the detective held the atomizer at the dog's nostrils and used it vigorously for a few seconds. It was more than sufficient for his purpose and soon the animal stiffened ...
— The Mansion of Mystery - Being a Certain Case of Importance, Taken from the Note-book of Adam Adams, Investigator and Detective • Chester K. Steele
... on her forehead. The swoop of bats in the darkness over her was as the wings of unearthly creatures. When she reached Mr. William Bell's field she fled across it as if pursued by an army of white things, and arrived at the Barry kitchen door so out of breath that she could hardly gasp out her request for the apron pattern. Diana was away so that she had no excuse to linger. The dreadful return journey had to be faced. Anne went back over it with shut eyes, preferring to take the risk of dashing her brains out among the boughs ...
— Anne Of Green Gables • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... heart and hands, and lifted eyes, I'll praise thee while I've life and breath; And, while my loosened spirit flies, I'll gasp thy praise in ...
— The Power of Faith - Exemplified In The Life And Writings Of The Late Mrs. Isabella Graham. • Isabella Graham
... finger to the root of the tongue, in hopes that the offending substance may in this way be dislodged; or it may possibly be effected by suddenly and unexpectedly dashing in the face a basin of cold water, the shock suddenly relaxing the muscular spasm present, and the involuntary gasp at the same time may move it up or down. If this cannot be done, as each instant's delay is of vital importance to a choking man, seize a fork, a spoon, a penholder, pencil, quill, or anything suitable at ...
— Burroughs' Encyclopaedia of Astounding Facts and Useful Information, 1889 • Barkham Burroughs
... neither their stores of gold or of grain avail. With a breath I lay low their strongest, and wither up their fairest. I come upon them without warning, lancing invisible death. From me they flee with eyes and mouths distended; I poison the air for which they gasp, and I strike them down fleeing. 'Tis thus, great Prince, that I ...
— Fifty years & Other Poems • James Weldon Johnson
... excuse for swift motion, Donald caught her hands and swept her forward with a force that made her gasp. Away they spun in a mad race up the river, Maggie propelled by the impulse of a wild glee, Donald by the anger that was consuming him. Neither had any thought of the direction they were taking, neither dreamed that their winged flight was to ...
— Duncan Polite - The Watchman of Glenoro • Marian Keith
... mind to see that he was affording them pleasure. He purposely made himself ridiculous with the vague idea that he must do something for them in payment of what they were giving him; they struck him on the shoulder-blades to see him gasp with his beanlike mouth, and to see the frightened smile run over his face like a ...
— Selected Polish Tales • Various
... o'sandwich-greased paper'll shock 'em, a ginger-beer bottle or "Bass," Wot 'appens to drop 'mong the lilies, or gets chucked aside on the grass, Makes 'em gasp like a frog in a frying-pan. Br-r-r-r! Wot old mivvies they are! Got nerves like a cobweb, I reckon, a smart Banjo-twang makes ...
— Punch, or The London Charivari, Vol. 101, August 15, 1891 • Various
... England has to undergo the revolt of the American colonies; to submit to defeat and separation; to shake under the volcano of the French Revolution; to grapple and fight for the life with her gigantic enemy Napoleon; to gasp and rally after that tremendous struggle. The old society, with its courtly splendours, has to pass away; generations of statesmen to rise and disappear; Pitt to follow Chatham to the tomb; the memory of Rodney ...
— Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges • William Makepeace Thackeray
... him in a gasp. What she wanted to hear! Were his ears playing him false? Was he dreaming? He had his hands on hers, holding it with a grip of a strong man stirred to the depths, crushing the fingers one on the other, but there was no waver in the ...
— The Rider of Waroona • Firth Scott
... system of its interests both abroad and at home. Otherwise, no rank, no toleration even, for me. I had no arts but manly arts. On them I have stood, and, please God, in spite of the Duke of Bedford and the Earl of Lauderdale, to the last gasp will I stand. ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. V. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... first draw with a slight frown and seemed to hesitate before he lifted up the second. Then a little sucking gasp came ...
— Port O' Gold • Louis John Stellman
... to the landing in front of the Grand Hotel, Celeste observed a man in evening dress, lounging against the rail of the quay. The search-light from the customs-boat, hunting for tobacco smugglers, flashed over his face. She could not repress the little gasp, and her hand tightened upon ...
— The Place of Honeymoons • Harold MacGrath
... gracefully. In bending to recover the spoon he struck the tea-table with his shoulder, and set the cups dancing. Having regained a measure of composure, he took a swallow of the hot tea and set it down with a gasp, precariously near the edge of the tea-table. Mrs. Peyton rescued the cup, and Darrow, apparently forgetting its existence, rose and began to pace the room. It was always hard for him to ...
— Sanctuary • Edith Wharton
... 7,1775, Dunmore, exercising one last gasp of royal power, declared Virginia to be in rebellion, imposed martial law, and announced that all slaves belonging to rebels were emancipated. This action cost Dunmore his creditability and destroyed his reputation ...
— The Road to Independence: Virginia 1763-1783 • Virginia State Dept. of Education
... deceivers, as inseparable from their guilt. What gift in the wide world would tempt them to exchange places with the wretched creatures? What a thorny road of perdition must their way of life be! How they must whiten and gasp, and what poignant pangs must thrill them through and through when they ...
— Summerfield - or, Life on a Farm • Day Kellogg Lee
... been looking about him, and he suddenly darted forward and took possession of some object lying upon the floor. After a glance at it he turned white, gave an odd little gasp and ...
— The Adventure League • Hilda T. Skae
... some woodland dale we catch The many-twinkling smile of ocean, Or with pleased ear bewildered watch His chime of restless motion; Still as the surging waves retire They seem to gasp with strong desire, Such signs of love old Ocean gives, We cannot choose but think ...
— The Christian Year • Rev. John Keble
... right if she fell and broke her leg," he thought severely; and the idea of such merited punishment was still in his mind when he heard a sharp gasp of surprise, and saw the girl slip, with a frantic clutch at the air, and fall at full length on the shining ground. When he sprang forward and bent over her, she rose quickly to her knees and held out what he thought at first was some queer small ...
— One Man in His Time • Ellen Glasgow
... shocked both his son and I were. His attack did not last long, however, for when we undid his collar, and sprinkled the water from one of the finger-glasses over his face, he gave a gasp or ...
— Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes • Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
... a strange little gasp. Behind the wagon a man rode on horseback; the sun glinted on a revolver in his ...
— Man to Man • Jackson Gregory
... among the irises at the water's edge. In the holiday sky a lazy cloud streamed out to its full length. Now and then, crushed by the burden of idleness, a carp would heave up out of the water, with an anxious gasp. It was time for us to feed. Before starting homewards we would sit for a long time there, eating fruit and bread and chocolate, on the grass, over which came to our ears, horizontal, faint, but solid still and metallic, the sound of the bells of ...
— Swann's Way - (vol. 1 of Remembrance of Things Past) • Marcel Proust
... sensual or sentimental relationship and hurls itself into that darker, stranger, more unearthly air, wherein one hears the voices of the great lovers; and where Sappho and Michaelangelo and Swift and Shelley and Nietzsche gasp forth their imprecations and their terrible ecstasies. Crude and rough and jagged and pitiless, the style of this astounding book seems to rend and tear, like a broken saw, at the very roots of existence. ...
— One Hundred Best Books • John Cowper Powys
... evening dress like this brought her wedding night back so vividly to her, she with difficulty kept a gasp from her breath. He was certainly the most splendidly good-looking creature, with his blue eyes and dark hair and much fairer ...
— The Man and the Moment • Elinor Glyn
... hard upon a poor soldier who has bled in his country's service. Did I not once save your life, when you were at your last gasp?" ...
— The Black Tor - A Tale of the Reign of James the First • George Manville Fenn
... no longer with gasp and effort, but with the swell of a voice which drowned all the discords of terror and of agony sent forth from the Phlegethon burning below—"and this witch, whom I trusted, is a vile slave and impostor, more desiring my death than my life. She thinks that in life I should scorn and forsake ...
— The Lock and Key Library • Julian Hawthorne, Ed.
... sailed past a hundred leagues before the breeze which Circe had lent them suddenly stopped. It was stricken dead. All the sea lay in prostrate slumber. Not a gasp of air could be felt. The ship stood still. Ulysses guessed that the island of the Sirens was not far off, and that they had charmed the air so with their devilish singing. Therefore he made him cakes ...
— Books for Children - The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Vol. 3 • Charles and Mary Lamb
... Vanderlyn fell back a step or two, staring at him in amazement. Could the man be crazy? This unexpected turn of the affair brought a gasp of sheer ...
— The Old Flute-Player - A Romance of To-day • Edward Marshall and Charles T. Dazey
... rises ahead. The roots of an island. There is nothing to fear—" The word ended abruptly in what was like a mental gasp of ...
— Star Born • Andre Norton
... adopted by thousands whose brains would have broken in the attempt to follow its processes. One of those rare deductive reasoners whose audacity marches abreast their genius, he would have been willing to fight to the last gasp for a conclusion which he had laboriously reached by rigid deduction through a score of intermediate steps, from premises in themselves repugnant to the primal instincts both of reason and humanity. Always ready to meet anybody in argument, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 90, April, 1865 • Various
... eyed him suspiciously. Perhaps I never would have mounted had not Imam, the dragoman, with the frank unceremoniousness of the East, caught me up in his arms and landed me on my donkey before I could protest. And in the face of his childish smile of confidence I could only gasp. We moved off with the ...
— As Seen By Me • Lilian Bell
... That thus so cleanly I myself can free. Shake hands for ever! Cancel all our vows! And when we meet at any time again, Be it not seen in either of our brows That we one jot of former love retain. Now at the last gasp of Love's latest breath, When, his pulse failing, Passion speechless lies, When Faith is kneeling by his bed of death, And Innocence is closing up his eyes: Now, if thou wouldst, when all have given him over, From death to life thou might'st him ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 2 (of 4) • Various
... almost too thunderstruck to speak. Think of hearing pa saying he wished to buy in! It was like an evangelist wanting to take shares in the devil. I could only say "Pa!" like that, and gasp. ...
— The Motormaniacs • Lloyd Osbourne
... between mounds of high-piled snow and under a sun which Sally Carrol scarcely recognized. They passed a little girl done up in gray wool until she resembled a small Teddy bear, and Sally Carrol could not resist a gasp of ...
— Flappers and Philosophers • F. Scott Fitzgerald
... startling, but not wholly unexpected. I demanded the names of the leaders; but on this head he refused to make any answer. I next enquired, whether the rebel directory had any hope of assistance from the Continent. "That I can fully answer," said he, now almost at his last gasp. "I myself was the negotiator. It is but a month since I was in Paris. The government agreed to send seven sail of the line, with ten thousand troops, and Hoche, the favourite general of the republic, to the north; or, in ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 57, No. 351, January 1845 • Various
... a little gasp. Parliamentary law was Hebrew to her, and speech-making a fearful and wonderful art, which she never essayed except in an emergency. But she recognized Marie's distress, and rose hesitatingly, to pour oil on the troubled ...
— Betty Wales Senior • Margaret Warde
... gasp of fear, Grace turned and buried her face in the pillows. Fingers seemed clutching at her hair. An arm, wearing a silken sleeve, brushed her cheek, lay across her throat. A low voice muttered unintelligibly in her ear, filling ...
— The Film of Fear • Arnold Fredericks
... Sioux was not painted, though it is the fashion of his people to do so when upon the war-trail. It could not have looked more frightful had it been daubed with streaks and spots, and Dot was terrified. Springing to her feet, she recoiled with a gasp, and stared at the ...
— The Story of Red Feather - A Tale of the American Frontier • Edward S. (Edward Sylvester) Ellis
... father answered, "we will try To make it easy with the present God. But, as I judge, though more by hope than sight, It seems much harder to the lookers on Than to the man who dies. Each panting breath We call a gasp, may be in him the cry Of infant eagerness; or, at worst, the sob With which the unclothed spirit, step by step. Wades forth into the cool eternal sea. I think, my boy, death has two sides to it— One sunny, and one dark—as this round earth Is every day half ...
— The Poetical Works of George MacDonald in Two Volumes, Volume I • George MacDonald
... of trees was planted on a ridge of ground that sloped towards the road and formed a second barrier between the world without and the world within. When they had crossed the ridge and looked down on the Park itself Christopher gave a gasp of astonishment. It stretched out before him in the sunset light a wide expanse of green land, with stately clumps of trees and long vistas of avenues that led nowhere. It was like some jewel in the wide circling belt of trees. It was so strange a contrast to the sordid ...
— Christopher Hibbault, Roadmaker • Marguerite Bryant
... at Reddy Fox, and Reddy looked at Jimmy Skunk, and Jimmy looked at Billy Mink, and Billy looked at Little Joe Otter, and for a minute nobody could say a word. Then Little Joe gave a funny little gasp. ...
— The Adventures of Buster Bear • Thornton W. Burgess
... night; so that if he died thinking of Madame Palomides rather than of La Beale Ysoude, who shall blame him? Not I, for one," said John Bulmer, stoutly; "If it was not heroic, it was at least respectable, and, above all, natural; and I expect some day to gasp out a similar valedictory. No, not to-morrow at noon, I think: I shall probably get out of this, somehow. And when, in any event, I set about the process of dying, I may be thinking of you, O fair lost ...
— Gallantry - Dizain des Fetes Galantes • James Branch Cabell
... her hands. "If I am to remain single and a burden for ever, perhaps it would lighten father's grief if I resided far away. My presence certainly would remind him of the wreck of all his ambitions, but if I should settle down in Vienna or Paris, or—" she paused and gave a little gasp—"or if anything should happen to me, if I should—should disappear, that is, really disappear, Jeneka would be ...
— The Slim Princess • George Ade
... looked so uncomfortable already, so totally without the least clue to his mysterious words, so unconscious of anything stranger about him than his shirt-sleeves and loss of weight, that he only uttered something between a gasp and a sigh, and, turning away from her, took up his brushes to smooth his ...
— The Prodigal Father • J. Storer Clouston
... appalled. All she could do was to gasp, "Oh, Lee, Lee! Don't laugh like that, don't think of it like that. You make it out worse ...
— The Iron Furrow • George C. Shedd
... became aware of the fact that he had a visitor. The air was fragrant with tobacco smoke; a man rose deliberately from the easy-chair, and, throwing the ash from his cigarette into the fire, turned to greet him. Wrayson was so astonished that he could only gasp out his name. ...
— The Avenger • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... gasp and almost shriek with the cold. It froze his marrow. "I shall die," he cried, "I shall die; but better this ...
— The Cloister and the Hearth • Charles Reade
... realize what he was about, he had waded across the shallows and seized the alder branch. A dash of water showered her as he shook the hook free; she stood up with an involuntary gasp and met the astonished ...
— A Young Man in a Hurry - and Other Short Stories • Robert W. Chambers
... sinking away, the last gasp, and eternity opened! In the distance there dawned upon her vision the glory of the city, the golden gates, the crowns, the harps, the white-robed throng, the wonderful music thrilling her soul. As she tremblingly ...
— Divers Women • Pansy and Mrs. C.M. Livingston
... of admiring awe swept over the assembled class—followed by a gasp of open contradiction as Sadie went on with her vindication. For Sadie's snoots were the envy of all the class. Had not Morris Mogilewsky paid three cents for lessons in the art, and, with the accomplishment, frightened a baby into what its angry mother ...
— Little Citizens • Myra Kelly
... it one way or another. But what if, in reality, without the least desire to be offensive, that sheepshead had a notion in earnest that he was superior to me and could only look at me in a patronising way? The very supposition made me gasp. ...
— Notes from the Underground • Feodor Dostoevsky
... his wine. "What do you ask with your white faces and great eyes, senors?... Oh, yes, he was made to speak—to cry out to the Lutheran's God, to gasp his defiance to Don Luiz waiting with folded arms—to wander, as they sometimes do, thinking friends about him, making appeal to the living and the dead to pluck him out of hell! at last, with froth upon his lips, ...
— Sir Mortimer • Mary Johnston
... described and more the moral agony of the survivor, haunted at the death bed by monstrous hallucinations engendered by grief and fatigue. With a frightful fascination, he dwelt on acts of terror, on the snapping of the will, coldly reasoning about them, little by little making the reader gasp, suffocated and panting before these feverish ...
— Against The Grain • Joris-Karl Huysmans
... and his eyes fell on the interior of the closet of the room, the door to which stood wide open. Then he gave a gasp. ...
— The Rover Boys Under Canvas - or The Mystery of the Wrecked Submarine • Arthur M. Winfield
... him gasp right now, as if the breath had been knocked out of him," remarked Bob. "He's going to speak, Frank, sure he is. I wonder can we understand what he says. Moqui wasn't included in my education at ...
— The Saddle Boys in the Grand Canyon - or The Hermit of the Cave • James Carson
... Aunt Hannah; but the gasp broke at once into what—in Aunt Hannah—passed for a chuckle. "If I remember rightly, when I was there at the house with you at first, my dear, William told me that Cyril wouldn't wear any sock ...
— Miss Billy's Decision • Eleanor H. Porter
... most severe in very young fowls. The affected bird opens its mouth and appears to gasp for breath, sneeze and attempt to swallow. In the severe cases the appetite is interfered with, mucus accumulates in the mouth and the bird is dull and listless. The death rate is quite high in ...
— Common Diseases of Farm Animals • R. A. Craig, D. V. M.
... from Metta's innocent pictures of kittens and grapes and daffodils. After everyone was put on the easel Henrietta Templeton Price would stick her thumb up in the air and sight across it with one eye shut and say "A stunning bit, that!" and the others would gasp with delight and mutter to each other about its ...
— Ma Pettengill • Harry Leon Wilson
... resound Young Damon dead; nor even ceased to pour His lonely sorrows at the midnight hour. 10 The green wheat twice had nodded in the ear, And golden harvest twice enrich'd the year, Since Damon's lips had gasp'd for vital air The last, last time, nor Thyrsis yet was there; For he, enamour'd of the Muse, remain'd In Tuscan Fiorenza long detain'd, But, stored at length with all he wish'd to learn, For his ...
— Poemata (William Cowper, trans.) • John Milton
... youth has fled, my rosy hue Turned to a wan and livid blue; Blanched by thy mixtures is my hair; No respite have I from despair. The days and nights, they wax and wane, Yet bring me no release from pain; Nor can I ease, howe'er I gasp, The spasm, which holds me in ...
— Horace • Theodore Martin
... little French destroyer Mousquet on his way out. The Mousquet hadn't the ghost of a chance. But she went straight for the Emden and fought till she sank; her heroic captain, with both legs blown off, commanding her to the very last gasp. By this time, however, the net was closing in; and twelve days later the big Australian cruiser Sydney finished the ...
— Flag and Fleet - How the British Navy Won the Freedom of the Seas • William Wood
... now useless to proceed to Venice, at this time in the last gasp of her struggle; so Garibaldi made his way to Spezzia, on the Gulf of Genoa, with a single companion-in-arms, but learned that Florence was not prepared for rebellion. The government of Turin, fearing to allow ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume X • John Lord
... keep my fists scientifically shut, and my heart beatifically open." She hesitated. "I—I was going to swing my life, and my undertakings—right." It became increasingly hard for her to speak, and a little gasp went round the table. "I've—I've made nothing—nothing but mistakes," ...
— Outside Inn • Ethel M. Kelley
... pointers that stood out against two white dials. He could see the Chief, the Chief whom he would so soon have to buy over and placate, moving about nervous and alert. Then he heard the tinkle of the telegraph bell, and the repeated gasp of energy as the engineers threw the levers. He could hear the vicious hum of the reversing-engines, and then the great muffled cough of power as the ponderous valve-gear was thrown into position and the vaster machinery above him was coerced into ...
— Never-Fail Blake • Arthur Stringer
... to Heaven, his eyes full of a consternation that clearly defied utterance. The violence of his gesture drew a gasp of pain from him. At last, when ...
— Love-at-Arms • Raphael Sabatini
... into a weird, uncanny dance, in which each one flapped or writhed or swayed back and forth as he pleased, in ghostly silence. The movements of the ones in the bolster-cases were the most comical, and the little audience on the porch laughed until they could only gasp and ...
— The Little Colonel's House Party • Annie Fellows Johnston
... days before this he had been able to speak only a few words at a time; but throughout this interview with his family, his voice was as strong and clear as it had ever been. After this his breathing became difficult, and he could gasp only a single word now and then. He seemed to have no wish to be occupied with this world. The weary traveler had at last reached the goal; and about nine o'clock Thursday night, January 6, 1887, his pure spirit left its frail tenement to ...
— Autobiography of Frank G. Allen, Minister of the Gospel - and Selections from his Writings • Frank G. Allen
... a gasp burst from their lips as though at a signal. For, as the Stellar seemed about to plunge off the shadowed screen into the Secret Room, a flying thing had risen out of the sea—an airplane with a bulbous body and queerly ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science April 1930 • Various
... all very well to say about Rameses or Julius Caesar or some other deceased who is pretty well seasoned, but I'll tell you it made the college gasp, coming when it did. It sounded sacrilegious and to me it sounded as if some one who was noted as an orator was going to get thumped by the late Mr. Hogboom about the next day. I perspired a lot from nervousness ...
— At Good Old Siwash • George Fitch
... man to drive to the station. Then she took the girl's hand kindly. "What is it, my dear?" she said in a motherly voice. "Are you ill, or has something frightened you?" but it was long before Leah could gasp out ...
— Herb of Grace • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... outnumbered him and the force threatening Fredericksburg would certainly start in pursuit of him as soon as it discovered that the bulk of his army had withdrawn from that city. All this was equally clear to Hooker after his first gasp of astonishment, and as he hurriedly ordered Sedgwick to attack Fredericksburg with part of his forces and to send the rest as reenforcement against Lee, he confidently believed that his foe had delivered ...
— On the Trail of Grant and Lee • Frederick Trevor Hill
... are upset by his own virtue and goodness. For that recommendation of those children, that recollection of them, and affectionate friendship for them, that attention to the most important duties at the last gasp, indicates that honesty without any thought of personal advantage was innate in the man; that it did not require the invitation of pleasure, or the allurements of mercenary rewards. For what greater ...
— The Academic Questions • M. T. Cicero
... rebellion was impending. The Government was, indeed, strangling the life out of it and out of slavery, its cause and mainspring. The monster had, however, a crowning horror to add to a long list of horrors before fetching its last gasp. The assassination of President Lincoln was the dying blow of slavery, aimed through him at the Union which he had maintained. Appalling as was the deed, it was vain, for the Union was saved, and liberty forever secured to the new-born nation. As Garrison remarked at the tomb of Calhoun, on the morning ...
— William Lloyd Garrison - The Abolitionist • Archibald H. Grimke
... her lap, and began stroking his face. Her warm hands brought him to himself. He opened his black eyes, out of which had gone all the fire, and looked up with a strange sound of fear, half moan, half gasp. But when he saw her face, he drew a deep breath, and lay motionless—gazing at her: those blue marvels above him, like a better sky, seemed to side with courage and assuage his terror. At length, in a trembling, awed voice, and a half whisper, ...
— Stephen Archer and Other Tales • George MacDonald
... mind telling you that I consider myself a very, very wonderful man. Nobody but a most remarkable man could spend so much time in the goat-feather groves gathering goat-feathers and still keep his family from starvation. I actually gasp when I think what a great man I should have been if I had stuck to business instead of being drawn aside by every sweet odor and pleasant sound. Then I actually swear when I think how many hours and days and weeks I have ...
— Goat-Feathers • Ellis Parker Butler
... now but the immature efforts of an amateur! Her heart tightened. She drew a little nearer to him, her eyes fixed apprehensively on his intent face, her breath coming quickly. At length he replaced the sketch carefully. "You have a wonderful talent," he said slowly. A little gasp of relief escaped her and her lips trembled in spite of all efforts to keep them steady. "You like it?" she whispered eagerly, and was terrified at the awful pallor that overspread his face. For a moment he could not speak. The words, the intonation! He was back again in Japan, ...
— The Shadow of the East • E. M. Hull
... figure in the bottom of the boat, uttered a gasp of dismay, as Allen began carefully to lower himself ...
— The Outdoor Girls in Army Service - Doing Their Bit for the Soldier Boys • Laura Lee Hope
... rustled uneasily about the decorations of the bed. But my efforts were fruitless. An irrepressible tremor gradually pervaded my frame; and, at length, there sat upon my very heart an incubus of utterly causeless alarm. Shaking this off with a gasp and a struggle, I uplifted myself upon the pillows, and peering earnestly within the intense darkness of the chamber, hearkened—I know not why, except that an instinctive spirit prompted me—to certain low and indefinite sounds which came, through the pauses of the storm, ...
— Short-Stories • Various
... did not notice Eveley's gasp,—for Eveley had seen a small sailor-clad form hurtle itself from the step and fall flat upon the gravel platform. It was not until a sudden lusty roar went up that Eileen remembered she had two babies en route. She dropped Betty like a ...
— Eve to the Rescue • Ethel Hueston
... Come when it will—we snatch the life of Life— When lost—what recks it by disease or strife? Let him who crawls, enamoured of decay, Cling to his couch, and sicken years away;[hk] Heave his thick breath, and shake his palsied head; Ours the fresh turf, and not the feverish bed,— 30 While gasp by gasp he falters forth his soul, Ours with one pang—one bound—escapes control. His corse may boast its urn and narrow cave, And they who loathed his life may gild his grave: Ours are the tears, though few, sincerely shed, ...
— The Works Of Lord Byron, Vol. 3 (of 7) • Lord Byron
... of surprise, Evadne awoke to the significance of all this, and she knew, too, what was expected of her; but she could not say, "I congratulate you!" try as she would. "I will wait for you in the drawing room," was all she was able to gasp, and she hastened off in ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand
... pitiless future of my children, dark with disgrace and shame. I became afraid of myself, and Bess went about with anxious face, privily beseeching my friends to entice me into taking a vacation. Then, and at the last gasp, came the thought that saved me: Why not confiscate? If their forays were bootless, in the nature of things ...
— Revolution and Other Essays • Jack London
... friends; but perhaps you will understand me, having seen to what depths I fell, that I couldn't bring myself to apply to my friends. Well, I was at my last gasp when I crawled up to your barn. I mean morally, for my strength was returning. You and your brother rode up. By God! I could have ...
— Bunch Grass - A Chronicle of Life on a Cattle Ranch • Horace Annesley Vachell
... to avow his ignorance, the fat creature mopped his brow and continued with a gasp—"Ah, your excellency, what is fame? From glory to obscurity is no farther than from one milestone to another! Not eight years ago, cavaliere, I was followed through the streets of Pianura by a greater crowd than the Duke ever drew after him! But ...
— The Valley of Decision • Edith Wharton
... realize until now the progress she had made since the day of our arrival in Gotham nearly four years previous. Her education was complete—she was a graduate in the great school of flat-life, and was contemplating a post-graduate course. Figures that made me gasp and sustain myself by the silver-mounted plumbing left her quite undisturbed. From her manner you would suppose that it was only the desirability of the apartment itself that was worth consideration. She criticised the arrangement of the rooms and the various appointments ...
— The Van Dwellers - A Strenuous Quest for a Home • Albert Bigelow Paine
... back on the pillow, unconscious and breathing heavily. He ran downstairs again, shouting, "Help! Help! My lord is dying!" The alarmed guests rushed frantically to the chamber, only to find their host almost at his last gasp. A few moments later he was dead, with the watch still clutched in his hand, pointing to half-past twelve. He had died at the very stroke of midnight, as foretold by his ghostly ...
— Love Romances of the Aristocracy • Thornton Hall
... a Sunday in Dublin, I brought Forster to the cathedral in Marlborough Street to hear the High Mass, at which Cardinal Cullen officiated. He sat it out very patiently, and I remember on coming out drew a deep sigh, or gasp, with the remark, "Well, ...
— John Forster • Percy Hethrington Fitzgerald
... to ask another question, but the wind caught him full in the face with such force that for a few moments he could only gasp and try to recover his breath, while directly after the vessel gave so tremendous a pitch and roll, he was jerked from his footing and hung by his hands with the sensation of having his ...
— Fire Island - Being the Adventures of Uncertain Naturalists in an Unknown Track • G. Manville Fenn
... puffed a cloud of smoke into the air; he was really disturbed about Jimmy. The repeated advice seemed to annoy Jimmy; he frowned and rose to his feet; he caught his breath with a sort of gasp of pain. Sangster ...
— The Second Honeymoon • Ruby M. Ayres
... pierced the air. There was a wrench, a bounding figure—-and then Tom Reade felt a jolt near his solar plexus that made him gasp. ...
— The Young Engineers on the Gulf - The Dread Mystery of the Million Dollar Breakwater • H. Irving Hancock
... Fleet Street, and walked to the foot of Ludgate Hill. Here the stranger stopped—glanced towards the open space on the right, where the river ran—gave a rough gasp of relief and satisfaction—and made directly for Blackfriars bridge. He led Zack, who was still thick in his utterance, and unsteady on his legs, to the parapet wall; let go of his arm there, and looking steadily in his face by the light ...
— Hide and Seek • Wilkie Collins
... from the lower gulch and bent their steps toward the camp. As they came nearer, Bennington, with a gasp of surprise, ...
— The Claim Jumpers • Stewart Edward White
... Pondicherry. They had witnessed the rise of French power under Dupleix; rulers deposed and others set up, in the Deccan and the Carnatic, by French arms; and then, when Mahomed Ali, the rightful ruler of the Carnatic, was at his last gasp, they had seen his cause espoused by the English, and one humiliation after another inflicted on French armies, till at last the French were forced to recognize Mahomed Ali's title, while a powerful English squadron and a King's regiment ...
— The Pirates of Malabar, and An Englishwoman in India Two Hundred Years Ago • John Biddulph
... with a handful of the ice-cold water from over-side. He caught his breath with a gasp, and shivered. Tommy turned about ...
— A Daughter of the Snows • Jack London
... summons without further query, for when all men wore swords the neighbourhood of a garrison were only too liable to such encounters outside. There was no need for her to gasp out more; from the very cottage door he could see the need of haste, for the swords were actually flashing, and the two young men in position to fight. Anne shook her head, unable to do more than sign her thanks to the good woman of the cottage, who offered her a seat. She leant against ...
— A Reputed Changeling • Charlotte M. Yonge
... surprised Father worships the ground your ridiculous little feet tread on, Mater," he said, causing his mother to gasp, so English did he sound, ...
— The Hawk of Egypt • Joan Conquest
... start and gasp for breath; I would shriek, but cannot, for a heavy hand seems to close my mouth, and an immense weight presses me down. I struggle violently with this unseen Power—little by little I gain the advantage. One effort more! I win the ...
— A Romance of Two Worlds • Marie Corelli
... Shocker's Ending.—And with a gasp and a reel, Sir RALPH fell back, back, back, down the precipice, and an hour later was found by the patrolling coast-guardsman a ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 101, December 19, 1891 • Various
... They seem to have discovered that all circumstances, all incidents wear a double face and that I am the malignant genius who can make which he pleases the true one—Yes! I am with them! I send the Incubus that hag-rides them in their dreams! They gasp and would awake, ...
— Anna St. Ives • Thomas Holcroft
... gasp of dismay. She did not want Maggie to hear her now. She would have been distressed at Maggie being acquainted with her carelessness. She felt sure that a girl like Maggie Oliphant could never understand ...
— A Sweet Girl Graduate • Mrs. L.T. Meade
... towards the wall. I did so, and I saw him remain so, his arm bent, and his head in his hand, like a man who is thinking profoundly. But about a quarter of an hour later, all of a sudden, I thought I heard him gasp. I came up softly on tiptoe, and looked. I was mistaken; the lieutenant was not gasping, he was crying like a baby; and what I had heard were sobs. Ah, commandant! I felt as if somebody had kicked me in ...
— The Clique of Gold • Emile Gaboriau |
