"Inexpressible" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... each other as at suppers in the early ages of the world, and so silent and absorbed were they that her breathing could almost be heard between the bars; and at the end of the ballad, when the last tone loitered on to an inexpressible close, there arose that buzz of pleasure which ...
— Far from the Madding Crowd • Thomas Hardy
... like an exquisitely lovely woman, with floating hair and clear, earnest, unfathomable eyes. Azul and the Angel sank reverently down and drooped their radiant heads like flowers in hot sunshine. I alone, daringly, yet with inexpressible affection welling up within me, watched with unshrinking gaze the swift advance of that supreme Figure, upon whose broad brows rested the faint semblance of a Crown of Thorns. A voice penetratingly sweet ...
— A Romance of Two Worlds • Marie Corelli
... morbid side. We must admit that it was a great pity, a very great pity, that your poor uncle did not realise the responsibility of wealth, did not even take some comfort for himself from it. But I may tell you it was a great, an inexpressible joy to him to leave it in your hands. I daresay he felt assured, as I do, that, though so young, you would know how to use ...
— The Guinea Stamp - A Tale of Modern Glasgow • Annie S. Swan
... an hour before Morgan and his soldiers arrived to execute their inhuman inquisition. The care of Williams had frustrated the sagacity of the blood-hounds by a chemical preparation; and a night of inexpressible alarm and emotion was succeeded by a happy day, in which Isabel had the transport of having her dear father lodged close to her own dwelling, in a more comfortable place of concealment, where she could pay a more minute attention to his wants, and have ...
— The Loyalists, Vol. 1-3 - An Historical Novel • Jane West
... while it was at one moment thirty feet above the sea, rigid as a bar of iron, and the next moment several feet under the mad turmoil of the raging billows—this it was that filled his little bosom with inexpressible horror, and induced him to cling with a tight embrace to the hair of the head of ...
— The Red Eric • R.M. Ballantyne
... that was Frank's lookout. If Frank had been commonly discreet, he would have been decently courteous. And there was another consideration. The secret he was protecting was not his own merely; it was hers: it belonged to that inexpressible she who was fast taking possession of his soul, and whom he would soon have defended at the cost of burning cities. By the time he had watched Frank as far as the Swingleburn-foot, appearing and disappearing in the tarnished heather, ...
— Weir of Hermiston • Robert Louis Stevenson
... little bed, repulsing with a feeble fretfulness every attempt to give her food. Lydia's heart swelled so that she was choked with its palpitations. Paul was out of town. She was alone in the house except for her servant. To that ignorant warm heart she turned with an inexpressible thankfulness. "Oh, 'Stashie! Stashie!" she called in a voice that brought the other clattering breathlessly up the stairs. "The baby! Look at the baby! And she won't touch ...
— The Squirrel-Cage • Dorothy Canfield
... occasion, and all was gaiety and expectation; and Churchill was mortified when he saw how well the thing was likely to take, that he was not to be the giver of the fete, especially as he observed that Helen was particularly pleased—when, to his inexpressible surprise, Granville Beauclerc came to him, a few days before that appointed for the hawking-party, and said that he had changed his mind, that he wished to get rid of the whole concern—that he should be really obliged to Churchill if he would take his engagement ...
— Helen • Maria Edgeworth
... and early in the forenoon it was a dead calm; if it had blown hard, the ship must inevitably have been destroyed. At eleven in the forenoon we expected high water, and anchors were got out, and every thing made ready for another effort to heave her off if she should float; but, to our inexpressible surprise and concern, she did not float by a foot and a half, though we had lightened her near fifty ton, so much did the day tide fall short of that in the night. We now proceeded to lighten her still more, and threw overboard every thing that it was possible for us to spare: Hitherto she ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 13 • Robert Kerr
... conceive the inexpressible, inconceivable joys that are there! None but they who have tasted of them. Lord, help us to put such a value upon them here, that in order to prepare ourselves for them, we may be willing to forego the loss of all ...
— Miscellaneous Pieces • John Bunyan
... me inexpressible harm, and get nothing whatever,' said Havill. 'If you would renew for another three months there would be ...
— A Laodicean • Thomas Hardy
... to bring fish to the camp, and there were plenty of them. The Captain is to take the ship in as near as possible to the hill, and it is determined to go on shore with the same party who assisted us at Shelburne Bay, and go up to the camp to-morrow well armed. All this evening a solemn, silent, inexpressible gloom; no rockets, no gun, no fire, to-morrow ...
— Voyage Of H.M.S. Rattlesnake, Vol. 2 (of 2) • John MacGillivray
... to a whisper, and she sat clasping and unclasping her hands about the handle of her sunshade. The young man laid his upon them with a gentle pressure; his heart dilated with an inexpressible relief. ...
— The Age of Innocence • Edith Wharton
... with it a decided improvement in Maurice's condition: he was much calmer, the fever had subsided, and it afforded Jean inexpressible delight to behold a smile on Henriette's face once more, as the young woman fondly reverted to her cherished dream, a pact of reciprocal affection between the three of them, that should unite them in a future that might yet be one of happiness, under ...
— The Downfall • Emile Zola
... it was sweet to be the object of her anxiety and care, even on these terms—on any terms. And I felt a sort of profound, inexpressible, grateful emotion, as though no one, never, on no day, on no occasion, had taken thought ...
— Romance • Joseph Conrad and F.M. Hueffer
... having thrown itself down this incredible precipice, continues its impetuous course for two leagues together, to the great rock above mentioned, with an inexpressible rapidity: But having passed that, its impetuosity relents, gliding along more gently for two leagues, till it arrives at ...
— Great Epochs in American History, Volume I. - Voyages Of Discovery And Early Explorations: 1000 A.D.-1682 • Various
... inexpressible honor and the delightful joy of aiding me in any way: if so, command him to do it," or words to that effect. I can't put down his smiles, and genteel looks, and don't ...
— Sweet Cicely - Or Josiah Allen as a Politician • Josiah Allen's Wife (Marietta Holley)
... the figure and back to Wharton without speaking. Presently Wharton added with a smile of inexpressible content: ...
— Esther • Henry Adams
... the valleys being black whilst the snowy peaks of the Andes yet retained a ruby tint. When it was dark, we made a fire beneath a little arbour of bamboos, fried our charqui (or dried slips of beef), took our mate, and were quite comfortable. There is an inexpressible charm in thus living in the open air. The evening was calm and still; — the shrill noise of the mountain bizcacha, and the faint cry of a goatsucker, were occasionally to be heard. Besides these, few birds, or even insects, frequent these ...
— The Voyage of the Beagle • Charles Darwin
... the cold stillness of the winter mornings was broken by agitating waves of sound, penetrating the souls of sleepers. Janet would stir, her mind still lingering on some dream, soon to fade into the inexpressible, in which she had been near to the fulfilment of a heart's desire. Each morning, as the clamour grew louder, there was an interval of bewilderment, of revulsion, until the realization came of mill bells ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... shall have the inexpressible happiness of seeing you and dearest Louise so soon, I write these few lines to thank you for your very kind letter of the 9th. We arrived here yesterday morning, having come by the railroad, from Windsor, in half an hour, free from dust and crowd ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Volume 1 (of 3), 1837-1843) • Queen Victoria
... Glasses, by Irvin S. Cobb.' It was the face of a man scarred with uncertainty; an even money proposition that he had either just emerged from the Commune or was about to enter it. Grief was written on the brow; more than written, it was emblazoned. The eyes were heavy with inexpressible sadness. The corners of the mouth were drooped, heightening the whole effect of incomprehensible depression. Quickly I turned to the next page among the stock quotations, where I got my depression in a blanket form. The concentrated Cobb kind was ...
— When Winter Comes to Main Street • Grant Martin Overton
... of Rome that it seems to be one of the most central cities in Europe during the winter, whereas in the summer months it appears to be immensely remote from the rest of the civilised world. From having been the prey of the inexpressible foreigner in his shooting season, it suddenly becomes, and remains during about five months, the happy hunting ground of the silent flea, the buzzing fly and the insinuating mosquito. The streets are, indeed, still full of people, and long lines of carriages may be seen towards sunset ...
— Don Orsino • F. Marion Crawford
... there was a commotion; then heads were put together, and, to the inexpressible surprise of young Little and of the Sheriff, Grace Coventry was put into ...
— Put Yourself in His Place • Charles Reade
... contributed to save, and desired them to carry it to his friend Cornelius Plaats, who would give them the full value for it. The woman, unacquainted with the real worth of the present, concluded she might receive a moderate gratuity for the picture, but her astonishment was inexpressible, when she received the sum ...
— Anecdotes of Painters, Engravers, Sculptors and Architects and Curiosities of Art (Vol. 3 of 3) • S. Spooner
... my affliction is inexpressible at the news you send me of your being surprised; I am not able to wait on thee yet—not being suffered to leave the cabal, I only borrow this minute to tell thee the sense of my advocate in this case; which was, if thou should be taken, there was no way, ...
— Love-Letters Between a Nobleman and His Sister • Aphra Behn
... Say-nothing-to-me,-or-I'll-contradict-you sort of countenance, who remained very quiet; occasionally looking round him when the conversation slackened, as if he contemplated putting in something very weighty; and now and then bursting into a short cough of inexpressible grandeur. At length, during a moment of comparative silence, the little man called out in a very loud, ...
— The Pickwick Papers • Charles Dickens
... up the lane all the way to the mill, just to see the icicles hang on the great wheel; and when I was once out, I could hardly find in my heart to come in, even to mother, sitting by the fire;—even to mother," she added, in a low, melancholy tone, which had something of inexpressible sadness in it. "Why, Jenny!" said she, rousing herself, but not before her eyes were swimming with tears, "own, now, that you never saw those dismal, hateful, tumble-down old houses there look half so—what shall I call them? almost beautiful—as they do ...
— Ruth • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... they had since been exposed. The brightest sunshine could not have made the scene cheerful, nor have taken away the gloom from the dilapidated town; for, besides the natural shabbiness, and decayed, unthrifty look of a Virginian village, it has an inexpressible forlornness resulting from the devastations of war and its occupation by both armies alternately. Yet there would be a less striking contrast between Southern and New-England villages, if the former were as much in the habit of using white paint as we are. ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 57, July, 1862 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... Stephen, had left, never to return again. He went on that "breaking" ship to a "cold grave." Bacha Filina could not resist that desire. For about a quarter of an hour he kneeled at the cross, and rested his forehead on the stone step. Inexpressible sorrow shook him. It wanted to rob him of his assurance of forgiveness, but in and around him it was ...
— The Three Comrades • Kristina Roy
... ambition of grown-ups he felt something heavenly in children, a breath of the Kingdom of God. They are nearer the Kingdom than those whom the world has smudged. To inflict any spiritual injury on one of these little ones seemed to him an inexpressible guilt. See Matthew 18:1-6. ...
— The Social Principles of Jesus • Walter Rauschenbusch
... homeward his heart seemed overflowing with generous and happy feelings. As we passed over a rising ground which commanded something of a prospect, the sounds of rustic merriment now and then reached our ears; the Squire paused for a few moments, and looked around with an air of inexpressible benignity. The beauty of the day was of itself sufficient to inspire philanthropy. Notwithstanding the frostiness of the morning, the sun in his cloudless journey had acquired sufficient power to melt away the thin covering of snow from every southern ...
— Old Christmas From the Sketch Book of Washington Irving • Washington Irving
... queen and the cardinal should take place. The cardinal was to put on the simple, unpretending dress of a citizen of Paris, a blue cloth coat, a round hat, and high leather boots. The cardinal, full of inexpressible delight at this, could, notwithstanding, scarcely believe that the queen would show him this intoxicating mark of her favor; upon which the Countess Valois, laughing, showed him a letter of the queen, directed to her, on gold-bordered paper, and signed like the note which he had received ...
— Marie Antoinette And Her Son • Louise Muhlbach
... and immediately, following her example, all the nymphs came to a halt also. The ringing laughter died away. I saw how the face of the goddess, suddenly rendered dumb, became covered with a deathly pallor; I saw how her feet grew petrified, how inexpressible terror parted her lips, strained wide her eyes, which were fixed on the remote distance.... What had she descried? ...
— A Reckless Character - And Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... the silence of Ellen, and the supposed rejection of his kind overtures. His unhappy state of mind had evidently an effect upon his body; he grew weaker and more querulous every day. At last a letter arrived from Ellen, which I now blush to say, gave me inexpressible joy. It announced the death of her husband— a trifling wound on the thumb having terminated in locked-jaw ...
— Valerie • Frederick Marryat
... the Holy See had been vacant for two years and nearly four months, because the Conclave of Perugia could not agree upon a Pope, a humble southern hermit of the Abruzzi, Pietro da Morrone, had been suddenly elevated to the Pontificate, to his own inexpressible surprise and confusion, and after a few months of honest, but utterly fruitless, effort to understand and do what was required of him, he had taken the wholly unprecedented step of abdicating the papacy. He was succeeded ...
— Ave Roma Immortalis, Vol. 1 - Studies from the Chronicles of Rome • Francis Marion Crawford
... proportionate consciousness to her breathing sense of life. Her bust was of the slightest fullness which the sculptor would choose for the embodying of his ideal of the best blending of modesty with complete beauty; and her throat and arms—oh, with what an inexpressible pathos of loveliness, so to speak, was moulded, under an infantine dewiness of surface, their delicate undulations. No one could be in her presence without acknowledging the perfection of her form as a woman, and rendering the passionate ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol. XXXII No. 2. February 1848 • Various
... mere flutter of something white. But he had straight-glancing, quick, far-reaching eyes, that only seemed to flinch and lose their amazing power before the immensity of the sea. He was barefooted, and looking as outlandish as the heart of Swaffer could desire. Leaving the horses on the turn, to the inexpressible disgust of the waggoner he bounded off, going over the ploughed ground in long leaps, and suddenly appeared before the mother, thrust the child into her arms, and ...
— Amy Foster • Joseph Conrad
... Duke that his conscience called upon him to resign. The Duke listened and bowed his head, and with one or two very gently-uttered words expressed his regret. Then Sir Orlando, in another long speech, laid bare his bosom to the Chief whom he was leaving, declaring the inexpressible sorrow with which he had found himself called upon to take a step which he feared might be prejudicial to the political status of a man whom he honoured so much as he did the Duke of Omnium. Then the Duke bowed again, but said nothing. The man had been guilty of the impropriety ...
— The Prime Minister • Anthony Trollope
... their inexpressible joy, they saw the course of the projectile change. It was headed toward them, and a few minutes later it settled slowly to the ground about ...
— Lost on the Moon - or In Quest Of The Field of Diamonds • Roy Rockwood
... we went down the steps, and into Shepherd's Inn, where the setting sun was just shining on the statue of Shepherd; the laundresses were traipsing about; the porters were leaning against the railings; and the clerks were playing at marbles, to my inexpressible consolation. ...
— Roundabout Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray
... country lay open before us, covered with olive trees, pomegranate trees, and delicious vines, all of which seemed to belong to anybody who pleased to claim them. Besides, in our state of destitution and famine we were not likely to be particular. Oh, the inexpressible pleasure of pressing those cool, sweet fruits to our lips, and eating grapes by mouthfuls off the rich, full bunches! Not far off, in the grass, under the delicious shade of the trees, I discovered a spring of fresh, cool water, ...
— A Journey to the Interior of the Earth • Jules Verne
... Blas, Don Quixote, and the Vicar of Wakefield, or mountain sceneries with young idiots of Londoners wearing Highland bonnets and brandishing rifles in the foregrounds. Do but think of these things in the breadth of their inexpressible imbecility, and then go and stand before that broken bas-relief in the southern gate of Lincoln Cathedral, and see if there is no fiber of the heart in ...
— On the Old Road Vol. 1 (of 2) - A Collection of Miscellaneous Essays and Articles on Art and Literature • John Ruskin
... beloved sister, and she cry'd most sadly to part with me, wringing her hands, and discovered every sign of grief that can be imagined. Indeed if I could have known when I left my friends and country that I should never return to them again my misery on that occasion would have been inexpressible. All my relations were sorry to part with me; my dear mother came with me upon a camel more than three hundred miles, the first of our journey lay chiefly through woods: at night we secured ourselves from the wild beasts by making fires all around ...
— A Narrative Of The Most Remarkable Particulars In The Life Of James Albert Ukawsaw Gronniosaw, An African Prince, As Related By Himself • James Albert Ukawsaw Gronniosaw
... mandate of the gods above. They possessed no recollection of what they had done upon earth. Domestic affection, friendships, and the memory of good offices rendered to one another,—all were effaced from their minds: nothing remained there but an inexpressible regret at having been exiled from the world of light, and an excruciating desire to reach it once more. The threshold of Allat's palace stood upon a spring which had the property of restoring to ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 3 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... impression of the senses. Notwithstanding, my condition was, in truth, very easy and quiet; I had no affliction upon me, either for others or myself; it was an extreme languor and weakness, without any manner of pain. I saw my own house, but knew it not. When they had put me to bed I found an inexpressible sweetness in that repose; for I had been desperately tugged and lugged by those poor people who had taken the pains to carry me upon their arms a very great and a very rough way, and had in so doing all quite tired out themselves, twice or thrice ...
— The Essays of Montaigne, Complete • Michel de Montaigne
... growls and groans truly appalling, though evidently to his own great comfort and satisfaction. The bassoon, the clarinet, the flute—but how shall we describe them! Suffice it to say, that they appeared to be suffering inexpressible torments at the hands of their apoplectic-looking performers; who were all at the last gasp, and all determined to die bravely at their posts. And then the entranced audience, with half-shut eyes and quivering palms! Oh, it was too much; we lost our character typo ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 54, No. 338, December 1843 • Various
... Sir." To my inexpressible relief he seemed to consider it the most likely request in ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 156, April 16, 1919 • Various
... seem cheap and poor, when we consider the greatness of the truth that we are endeavoring to convey by means of them. For who can find words to express the inexpressible? All that we may hope to do is to awaken a keen interest and attention on your part, so that you will practice the Mental Drill, and thus obtain the evidence of your own mentality to the truth. Truth is not truth to you until you have ...
— A Series of Lessons in Raja Yoga • Yogi Ramacharaka
... fugitive debated whether he should not allow himself to drop from his seat and die; no torture that could await him at Hamadan but seemed preferable to the prolonged and inexpressible anguish which he now endured. As he rushed along, leaning on his bearer's neck, he perceived a patch of the desert that seemed of a darker colour than the surrounding sand. Here, he believed, might perhaps be found water. He tried to check ...
— Alroy - The Prince Of The Captivity • Benjamin Disraeli
... upon General Sherman, prior to his arrival, as a man, in the providence of God, specially set apart to accomplish this work, and we unanimously felt inexpressible gratitude to him, looking upon him as a man who should be honored for the faithful performance of his duty. Some of us called upon him immediately upon his arrival, and it is probable he did not meet the secretary with more courtesy than he did ...
— The Memoirs of General W. T. Sherman, Complete • William T. Sherman
... he was gratified to see how he had finally caught and expressed, with his pencil, a look of Julia, that had always eluded him before. But was he to be overcome by a girl? Was life and its ambitions to be crushed out and brought to nought by one small hand? He would see. It would be inexpressible luxury to tell her once—but just once—all his passion and worship, and then, of course, remain silent forever, and go out of her presence. He wished her to know it all, so that, as she would hear and know of him in the coming ...
— Bart Ridgeley - A Story of Northern Ohio • A. G. Riddle
... so manly, yet gentle, and withal so great. While admired and beloved by men of such calibre, he was equally a favourite with women and children. He put himself upon the level of all, and charmed them no less by his inexpressible kindliness of manner than by ...
— Lives of the Engineers - The Locomotive. George and Robert Stephenson • Samuel Smiles
... together, and, as had been anticipated by Rivers, Ralph offered not the slightest objection, when once satisfied of the legality of his arrest, to becoming their prisoner. But the consternation of Bunce was inexpressible. He endeavored to shelter himself in the adjoining woods, and was quietly edging his steed into the covert for that purpose, on the first alarm, but was not permitted by the sharp eyes and ready ...
— Guy Rivers: A Tale of Georgia • William Gilmore Simms
... feeling similar to that produced by the most delightful music. Virtue is beautiful; it shines in the view of the conscience with the purest brightness, and, as was said by one of the ancients, if it could reveal itself to our eyes in a sensible form, it would excite in our souls feelings of inexpressible love. Vice is ugly when once stripped of the delusive fascination of the passions; the vicious excesses of the lower nature are ugly and repulsive as soon as the intoxication is over. Error is ugly too; there are no beautiful errors but those which contain ...
— The Heavenly Father - Lectures on Modern Atheism • Ernest Naville
... bare idea of her son's tutor falling in love with Lady Hilda! I assure you, Miss Oswald, she would evaporate at the very mention of such an unheard-of enormity. A man must be, if not an earl, at least a baronet with five thousand a year, before he dare face the inexpressible indignation of Lady Exmoor with an offer ...
— Philistia • Grant Allen
... I hope it has somewhat delayed disease. She is now a patient invalid, and I am her nurse. God has hitherto supported me in some sort through all these bitter calamities, and my father, I am thankful to say, has been wonderfully sustained; but there have been hours, days, weeks of inexpressible anguish to undergo, and the cloud of impending distress still lowers dark and sullen above us. I cannot write much. I can only pray Providence to preserve you and yours from such affliction as He has seen good to ...
— Charlotte Bronte and Her Circle • Clement K. Shorter
... Samuel Adams, Edmund Pendleton, Alexander Hamilton, Stephens Thompson Mason, Mann Page, Bellini, and Parson Andrews. To these I have the inexpressible grief of adding the name of my youngest daughter, who had married a son of Mr. Eppes, and has left two children. My eldest daughter alone remains to me, and has six children. This loss has increased my anxiety to retire, while it has dreadfully lessened the comfort of doing it. Wythe, Dickinson, ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... have friends, fond, dear, kind friends; but never will you have again the inexpressible love and gentleness lavished upon you which none but a mother bestows. Often do I sigh in my struggles with hard, uncaring world, for the sweet, deep security I felt when, of an evening nestling ...
— Life and Literature - Over two thousand extracts from ancient and modern writers, - and classified in alphabetical order • J. Purver Richardson
... himself in a black dress, and holding a naked rapier in his hand. The new comer had probably lost his mask in the tumult and confusion, for his features were uncovered, and Antonio saw, to his inexpressible consternation and astonishment, that they were the exact counterpart of his own. Before he could recover from this new shock, the stranger, by the aid of his fierce and determined demeanour, and the rapid play of his weapon, had made his way to the mysterious old woman, whose back was turned ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLII. Vol. LV. April, 1844 • Various
... my sensation when I saw the frowning rocks of Arran, scarcely half a mile distant on our lee-bow. To our inexpressible relief, and not less to our surprise, we fairly weathered all, and were congratulating each other on our escape, when, on looking forward, I imagined I saw breakers at no great distance on our lee; and this suspicion was soon confirmed, when the ...
— Thrilling Adventures by Land and Sea • James O. Brayman
... Under such circumstances were most of the papers composed; and they are now reissued in a corrected form, sometimes even partially recast, under the distraction of a nervous misery which embarrasses my efforts in a mode and in a degree inexpressible by words. Such, indeed, is the distress produced by this malady, that, if the present act of republication had in any respect worn the character of an experiment, I should have shrunk from it in despondency. But the experiment, so far as there was ...
— Memorials and Other Papers • Thomas de Quincey
... late in my room at the hotel the next morning, waking with a vague sense of inexpressible relief, which was quickly followed by the emotions which may come to a man regaining consciousness after he has been sandbagged and robbed. At table in the breakfast-room the boy brought me a morning paper. On the first page, in screaming headlines, I saw the complete ...
— Branded • Francis Lynde
... and friendless, for not even the discomfiture of his enemies can make up to a young man for the want of a friend to speak to. An inexpressible longing for home came over him. There was a shop in a by-street which exposed photographs of Galway scenery in its windows for a time. Hyacinth used to go day by day to gaze at them. The modest front of ...
— Hyacinth - 1906 • George A. Birmingham
... than of his hand. He was not more embarrassed than she was, but he was agitated: it was as if in the sittings (for the child, too, was beautifully quiet) something was growing between them or had already grown—a tacit confidence, an inexpressible secret. He felt it that way; but after all he could not be sure that she did. What he wanted her to do for him was very little; it was not even to confess that she was unhappy. He would be superabundantly ...
— A London Life; The Patagonia; The Liar; Mrs. Temperly • Henry James
... in nay journal, or wrote forty-page letters to my friends. It was a happy thing that poor Mrs. Hutch did not know what sums I spent for stationery and postage stamps. She would have gone into consumption, I do believe, from inexpressible indignation; and she would have been in the right—to be indignant, not to go into consumption. I admit it; she would have been justified—from her point of view. From my point of view I was also in the right; ...
— The Promised Land • Mary Antin
... grunts of pain that he had found a very fair fox-track. This was well for Beetle, since Stalky pinched him a tergo. Down that tunnel they crawled. It was evidently a highway for the inhabitants of the combe; and, to their inexpressible joy, ended, at the very edge of the cliff, in a few square feet of dry turf walled and ...
— Stalky & Co. • Rudyard Kipling
... corroded with vice and sunk deep in debauchery, in which they lived contented. But when the recollection of these beings surged through my mind, enveloped in the mists of the past, I saw nothing but a terrible tragedy, and felt only an inexpressible sorrow...." ...
— Contemporary Russian Novelists • Serge Persky
... space of time winded up by proposing to Thyri, who, humbly, and we may fancy with what secret joy, consented to say yes, and become Queen of Norway. In the due months they had a little son, Harald; who, it is credibly recorded, was the joy of both his parents; but who, to their inexpressible sorrow, in about a year died, and vanished from them. This, and one other fact now to be mentioned, is all the wedded history we ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 1 of 8 • Various
... Sumter and the stratagem of Colonel Washington deserve great commendation. It gives me inexpressible pleasure to find that such a spirit of enterprise and ...
— Life And Times Of Washington, Volume 2 • John Frederick Schroeder and Benson John Lossing
... sun, and his ardent attentions becoming altogether too warm to be agreeable he was incontinently shut outside. She turned away with that slight sense of intoxication that comes from gazing too long upon the inexpressible beauty of a world that is dimmed only by the complaints and forebodings of querulous humanity. In the cool dimness of the pretty many-windowed room she stood a moment irresolutely, and then went in search of inspiration to a row of well-used ...
— An Algonquin Maiden - A Romance of the Early Days of Upper Canada • G. Mercer Adam
... Austin arrived. Hilda was then made acquainted with her relationship to Haco, whose tender attentions during her late troubles had already won her unreserved affection. The news was an inexpressible joy to her, and it was touching to see how she nestled in the deep embrace of her father, whose feelings, so long pent up, now at last found vent. Jean absented himself during the day, but on the following ...
— The Forest of Vazon - A Guernsey Legend Of The Eighth Century • Anonymous
... his students, 'in that awful hour He took our damnation, and He took it lovingly!' When, with reverent hearts and bated breath, we peer down into the fathomless deeps that such a saying opens to us, we catch a glimpse of the inexpressible value which heaven sets upon the souls of men. And, when Michael Trevanion has led us to such inaccessible heights and to such unutterable depths as these, we can very well afford to ...
— A Handful of Stars - Texts That Have Moved Great Minds • Frank W. Boreham
... moment at the door, afraid to enter, or even look in; made one or two steps, and hearing no sound, concluded that all was over with the Hermit, and that my own doom was sealed. My delight was inexpressible, therefore, when I perceived that he still breathed, and when, on drawing nearer, I found that he slept soundly. In a moment I passed from misery to bliss. I seated myself by his side, and there remained ...
— A Voyage to the Moon • George Tucker
... ten thousand a week for all those weeks, one week with another, and a proportion for several weeks both before and after. The confusion among the people, especially within the city, at that time, was inexpressible. The terror was so great at last that the courage of the people appointed to carry away the dead began to fail them; nay, several of them died, although they had the distemper before and were recovered, ...
— A Journal of the Plague Year • Daniel Defoe
... holy, the inexpressible, the mysterious Night. Afar off lies the world, buried in some deep chasm: desolate and lonely is the spot it filled. Through the chords of the breast sighs deepest sorrow. I will sink down into the dewdrops, and with ashes will I be commingled. ...
— Peter Schlemihl etc. • Chamisso et. al.
... hither and thither in a series of narrow circles and turns and twists, in a kind of slow waltz step, Machenga began a song, the burden of which was the glory, majesty, and power of the king, and the inexpressible wickedness of those who presumptuously dared to entertain evil thoughts of him. This continued for about twenty minutes, during which the singer gradually worked himself up into a state of excitement and exaltation that finally became a perfect frenzy, under the influence ...
— Through Veld and Forest - An African Story • Harry Collingwood
... all her commissions, Mrs Gaff returned to Cove and spent an hour or two with Tottie in the four-poster—not by any means because she was lazy, but because it afforded her peculiar and inexpressible pleasure to stare at the damask curtains and wonder how Gaff would like it, and think of the surprise that he would receive on first beholding such a bed. So anxious did the good woman become in her desire to make the most of the new bed, ...
— Shifting Winds - A Tough Yarn • R.M. Ballantyne
... very hard; the rains hindering me many days, nay, sometimes weeks together: but I thought I should never be perfectly secure till this wall was finished; and it is scarce credible what inexpressible labour every thing was done with, especially the bringing piles out of the woods, and driving them into the ground; for I made them much bigger than I needed to ...
— The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe Of York, Mariner, Vol. 1 • Daniel Defoe
... preceding evening I had refreshed my memory by reading Cook's account of his visit to the same spot, and was thus able minutely to follow in the footsteps of the immortal navigator. There is an inexpressible charm in thus treading in the track of the mighty dead, and my feelings on attaining the summit of the peak, where the foot of the white man, had perhaps but once before rested, will easily be understood. Below to the eastward stretched ...
— Discoveries in Australia, Volume 1. • J Lort Stokes
... what they, no doubt, thought a rash step. He hastened into the boat, notwithstanding all they could do or say. As soon as they saw their beloved chief wholly in my power, they set up a great outcry. The grief they shewed was inexpressible; every face was bedewed with tears; they prayed, entreated, nay, attempted to pull him out of the boat. I even joined my entreaties to theirs; for I could not bear to see them in such distress. All that could be said, or done, ...
— A Voyage Towards the South Pole and Round the World, Volume 1 • James Cook
... into branching tracery: and at Bourges, for distant effect, worked into plain leaves, or bold bony processes with knobs at the points, and near the spectator, into crouching demons and broad winged owls, and other fancies and intricacies, innumerable and inexpressible. ...
— The Stones of Venice, Volume I (of 3) • John Ruskin
... Conrad has the power of fear ever at the command of his romantic imagination. In The Nigger of the Narcissus, in Typhoon, and, above all, in The Shadow-Line, he shows his supreme mastery over inexpressible mystery and nameless terror. The voyage of the schooner, doomed by the evil influence of her dead captain, is comparable only in awe and horror to that of The Ancient Mariner. Conrad touches unfathomable depths of human feelings, and in ...
— The Tale of Terror • Edith Birkhead
... then my life, and bear me to hell, where I shall never again see men in flesh and bone. I have learnt to know them; I am disgusted with them, with their destination, with the world, and with life. Since one good action brings on my head such inexpressible evils, I have reason to believe that the wicked only have a right to happiness. If such be the order of things in this world, hurl me at once into hell. Its darkness is a thousand times preferable to the light ...
— Faustus - his Life, Death, and Doom • Friedrich Maximilian von Klinger
... surpassing wonder: what is the delicate instrument that registers, with no seeming volition, these amazing pictures, and preserves them thus with so fantastic a care, retouching them, fashioning them anew, detaching from the picture every sordid detail, till each is as a lyric, inexpressible, exquisite, too ...
— At Large • Arthur Christopher Benson
... of the young women round about her, gave Rebecca inexpressible pangs of envy. "What airs that girl gives herself, because she is an Earl's grand-daughter," she said of one. "How they cringe and bow to that Creole, because of her hundred thousand pounds! I ...
— Vanity Fair • William Makepeace Thackeray
... striking a sloop, which went down with it. This explosion gave the alarm to the whole fleet; and lights instantly shone in every direction, revealing the first fire-ship advancing between the jetties, a sight which was witnessed with inexpressible anxiety. Three or four pieces of wood connected by cables fortunately stopped her progress; but she blew up with such a shock that the glasses of all the windows in town were shattered, and a great number of the inhabitants, ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... have gone on in this tender way, when the good lady entered, and, with an inexpressible sweetness in her countenance, told us "she had been searching her closet for something very good, to treat such an old friend as I was." Her husband's eyes sparkled with pleasure at the cheerfulness of her countenance; and I saw all his fears vanish in an instant. The lady observing something in ...
— Isaac Bickerstaff • Richard Steele
... impressing the other servants. Instead, therefore, of taking a by-path, he marched ostentatiously through the yard with a manner which effected his object, if not his master's, and which struck the entire circle of servants with inexpressible awe. However, after he gained the garden and reached a spot where he was no longer in danger of being observed by any one, he adopted a manner of the greatest secrecy, and proceeded to the place selected for the meeting with a degree ...
— "George Washington's" Last Duel - 1891 • Thomas Nelson Page
... friends anxiously sweep the corners of their minds in search of something to say, but any one who looked at her now could easily see that it was not poverty of thought that made her speechless, but an overburdening sense of the inexpressible. ...
— The Life of Nancy • Sarah Orne Jewett
... Brooke and Talbot was inexpressible. Brooke, however, held his tongue, seeing that as Talbot had been addressed, it would be better for her to answer. So Talbot, after a few expressions of sympathy, asked Russell ...
— A Castle in Spain - A Novel • James De Mille
... demands went not above a dollar. Grind, reluctantly as he yielded to these demands, believed it wiser to pay them than to meet the exposure Martin had it in his power to make. And so it went on, until, one day, to his inexpressible relief, Grind read in the morning papers an account of the sudden and violent death of his enemy. His sleep was sounder on the night that followed than it had been for ...
— True Riches - Or, Wealth Without Wings • T.S. Arthur
... "It is the most beautiful object the eyes of man can behold to see a man of worth and his son live in an entire, unreserved correspondence. The mutual kindness and affection between them give an inexpressible satisfaction to all who know them. It is a sublime pleasure which increases by the participation. It is as sacred as friendship, as pleasurable as love, and as joyful as religion. This state of mind does not only dissipate sorrow which would be extreme without it, but enlarges pleasures ...
— The Golden Censer - The duties of to-day, the hopes of the future • John McGovern
... into execution at Paris by that ingenious artist, M. Caffieres, sculptor to Louis XVI., king of France, under the direction of Dr. Benjamin Franklin. The monument is of white marble, of the most beautiful simplicity and inexpressible elegance, with emblematical devices, and the following truly classical inscription, worthy of the modest ...
— Memoirs of Aaron Burr, Complete • Matthew L. Davis
... was the daughter of this man. An inexpressible feeling of melancholy took possession of me as I thought of this. I understood everything now. This noble girl had heroically put away from her the one chance of bright and happy life, rather than bring upon her husband the foul taint of her father's ...
— Henry Dunbar - A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... this Letter, Leander quitted Ferara with a Grief inexpressible, but however had Resolution to finish his Journey to the Place of his Nativity without self Violence, but soon after, ...
— Tractus de Hermaphrodites • Giles Jacob
... place the images among them, he must first sacrifice the whole Jewish nation; and that they were ready to expose themselves, together with their children and wives, to be slain. At this Petronius was astonished, and pitied them, on account of the inexpressible sense of religion the men were under, and that courage of theirs which made them ready to die for it; so ...
— The Wars of the Jews or History of the Destruction of Jerusalem • Flavius Josephus
... enclosed by the river, and furnished with abundant firewood. The village, a collection of straw huts, was a few hundred yards higher up. An Indian brought in a large fish to trade, which we had the inexpressible satisfaction to find was a salmon- trout; we gathered round him eagerly. The Indians were amused with our delight, and immediately brought in numbers, so that the camp was soon stocked. Their flavor was excellent—superior, in fact, to that of any fish I have ever known. ...
— The Exploring Expedition to the Rocky Mountains, Oregon and California • Brevet Col. J.C. Fremont
... rose. But at the same moment Kitty effected an escape and he and Amy were left alone. She looked quickly at the door through which Kitty had vanished, dropped her arms at her sides and uttered a little sigh of inexpressible relief. ...
— The Choir Invisible • James Lane Allen
... the cry of a lost soul. A terrible look of inexpressible anguish and fear was written on the face of Craig's visitor, as she uttered them and sank back, trembling, in the easy chair, mentally and ...
— The War Terror • Arthur B. Reeve
... 'Inexpressible was the joy of the now elderly Father to see his deeply-beloved Son, after so many roamings, mischances and battles, at last settled as Professor in Jena; and soon thereafter, at the side of an excellent Wife, happy at ...
— The Life of Friedrich Schiller - Comprehending an Examination of His Works • Thomas Carlyle
... straight into the air, and saw the remnant of his tackle, not half a yard long, flowing in every direction to the varying puffs of wind; and turning his head slowly round towards the astounded Norwegian, gave him a mingled look of inexpressible contempt and anger; and then, casting his rod violently to the ground, stamped his foot, and vowed he would ...
— A Yacht Voyage to Norway, Denmark, and Sweden - 2nd edition • W. A. Ross
... richly he deserved the reproach that the wounded cry conveyed, and, in a sorrow that was inexpressible, leapt down and took ...
— Tess of the d'Urbervilles - A Pure Woman • Thomas Hardy
... confounded with Beethoven; and an attempt is made to show that they agree in spirit with the rarest, boldest and most profound achievements of German music! Thus Schumann's shallow bombast is made to pass for the equivalent of the inexpressible purport of Beethoven—but always with the reservation that strenuous eccentricity such as Beethoven's is hardly admissible; whereas, vapid emptiness (das gleichgiltig Nichtssagende) is right and proper: a point at which ...
— On Conducting (Ueber das Dirigiren): - A Treatise on Style in the Execution of Classical Music • Richard Wagner (translated by Edward Dannreuther)
... had steadily borne up against the pressure of her malady, and had not betaken herself finally to bed; but, on the closing in of the evening of my arrival at the house, she succumbed (as her brother told me at night with inexpressible agitation) to the prostrating power of the destroyer; and I learned that the glimpse I had obtained of her person would thus probably be the last I should obtain—that the lady, at least while living, would be seen by me ...
— Selections From Poe • J. Montgomery Gambrill
... acknowledges the loyalty of the chorus, but hints at much that is amiss which it must be his first charge to set right. Hereupon enters Clytemnestra, and in a speech of rhetorical exaggeration tells of her anxious waiting for her lord and her inexpressible joy at his return. In conclusion she directs that purple cloth be spread upon his path that he may enter the house as befits a conqueror. After a show of resistance, Agamemnon yields the point, and the contrast at which the dramatist aims is achieved. With the pomp of ...
— The Greek View of Life • Goldsworthy Lowes Dickinson
... thou indeed some superhuman power," interrupted Nisida, in a tone of inexpressible alarm; "and I dare hold no ...
— Wagner, the Wehr-Wolf • George W. M. Reynolds
... do I talk to you upon subjects of this delicate nature? you who seem ignorant of the inexpressible charms of the elbow-chair, attended with a soft stool for the elevation of the feet! Thus, vacant of thought, do I ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson in Nine Volumes - Volume IV: The Adventurer; The Idler • Samuel Johnson |
