"Qualm" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... time in his life fear swept over Terry—fear of himself compared with which the qualm he had felt after turning from Slim Dugan that morning had been nothing. For the second time in one day he was being tempted, and the certainty came to him that he would kill Larrimer. And what made that certainty more sure was ...
— Black Jack • Max Brand
... close chase in the darkness through the trees. Mr. Watkins was a loosely built man and in good training, and he gained hand over hand upon the hoarsely panting figure in front. Neither spoke, but, as Mr. Watkins pulled up alongside, a qualm of awful doubt came over him. The other man turned his head at the same moment and gave an exclamation of surprise. "It's not Jim," thought Mr. Watkins, and simultaneously the stranger flung himself, as it were, at Watkins's knees, and they were forthwith ...
— Golden Stories - A Selection of the Best Fiction by the Foremost Writers • Various
... confess the theft of a postage-stamp. I was sure that his coming interview with Carthew rode his imagination like a nightmare; when the thought crossed his mind, I used to think I knew of it, and that the qualm appeared in his face visibly. Yet he would never flinch: necessity stalking at his back, famine (his old pursuer) talking in his ear; and I used to wonder whether I most admired, or most despised, this quivering heroism for evil. The image that ...
— The Wrecker • Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne
... got to the Keeper's lodge, And had been jocund in the house awhile, Tossing off ale and milk in country cans, Whether it was the country's sweet content, Or else the bonny damsel fill'd us drink That seem'd so stately in her stammel red, Or that a qualm did cross his stomach then, But straight he fell ...
— The Growth of English Drama • Arnold Wynne
... brother, I am not too obstinate for saving Englishmen, 'twas but a qualm of conscience, which profit will dispel: I have as true a Dutch antipathy to England, as the proudest he in Amsterdam; that's a ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Volume 5 (of 18) - Amboyna; The state of Innocence; Aureng-Zebe; All for Love • John Dryden
... as you please. I don't mind if he doesn't. What fine horses. Aren't you conscious of a little qualm of regret, Clover?" ...
— In the High Valley - Being the fifth and last volume of the Katy Did series • Susan Coolidge
... never forgot this tete-a-tete with Burr; but an inexplicable qualm kept her from mentioning it to her belated lord on his return from Farmers' Castle. It was nearly midnight when the two visitors reluctantly took leave of the ladies and stepped out into the diffused ...
— A Dream of Empire - Or, The House of Blennerhassett • William Henry Venable
... between 'em we jest slip along, But do dooty for both of 'em? Snakes! that is coming it slightly too strong. The tenants 'old on jest as long as they can, and the landlords 'old orf. A sort of a ketchy sore-throat, or a bit of a qualm or a korf, Make some idjots go fair orf their chumps on diphtheria, and typhod and such; But then others, who don't like a hupset, put up with the lot, pooty much, Jest to save topsy-turvey and 'oles in the garden, and mud on the stairs; Landlords, likeways, is dabs ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 101. October 10, 1891 • Various
... rarely passes the lips of a woman. Since a year after her husband's death she had been the mistress of the manager of the quarry. She had lived in the most atrocious debauchery for years; no one had suspected, and she had not suffered a qualm. But two nights since she had gone to the bed where her two little girls lay asleep, and suddenly it had come upon her that she was to be discovered, now very soon, not by strangers, but by her own children growing ...
— A Circuit Rider's Wife • Corra Harris
... them and placed them in the roll of buckskin that I carried for moccasin-patches. And my heart being hardened, I scalped the murderer with never a qualm. No warning was longer needed at the Grisdol cabin. The Indians ...
— A Virginia Scout • Hugh Pendexter
... of my triumph, which was as intense as if I myself, instead of pure luck, had engineered our journey, I became aware of a tiny qualm as I sat gazing across the stream. Perhaps the gathering night affected me, or the air, which was growing chilly, or the remnants of the village, which were cheerless, to say the least. But that castle, perched so darkly on its crag, with ...
— The Firefly Of France • Marion Polk Angellotti
... the modest wimples of the Wise Virgins? "The general end of the book," he tells us in his Dedication to Sir Walter Raleigh, "is to fashion a gentleman of noble person in virtuous and gentle discipline." But a little further on he evidently has a qualm, as he thinks how generously he had interpreted his promise of cuts: "To some I know this method will seem displeasant, which had rather have good discipline delivered plainly in way of precepts or sermoned at large,[299] as they use, ...
— Among My Books • James Russell Lowell
... dressed pushed open a broken window beneath us, just as we passed by, and there issued such a blast of corruption, made up of gases bred by filth, air breathed and rebreathed a hundred times, charged with odours of unnameable personal uncleanness and disease, that I staggered to the gutter with a qualm which I could scarcely conquer. At the doors of the houses stood grimy women with their arms folded and their hair disordered. Grimier boys and girls had tied a rope to broken railings, and were swinging on it. The common door to a score of lodgings ...
— Mark Rutherford's Deliverance • Mark Rutherford
... me by her side. She was still dazed by the misery of her darkness. It was only then that I realised the part the child had played in her development. Her nature had been stirred to the quick; the capacity for emotion had been awakened. She had left me without a qualm. She had given herself to Pasquale without a glimmer of passion. She had returned to me like a wounded animal seeking its home. For the child alone the passionate human love had sprung flaming from the seed hidden in her soul. And now the child was dead, ...
— The Morals of Marcus Ordeyne • William J. Locke
... Townshend. But how can I help it? Is this a consistent age? How should I know people's minds, if they don't know them themselves? In short, Charles Yorke is not attorney-general, nor Norton master of the rolls. A qualm came across the first, and my Lord lorn across the second, who would not have Norton in his court. I cannot imagine why; it is so gentle, amiable, honest a being! But I think the Chancellor says, Norton does not understand equity, ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole Volume 3 • Horace Walpole
... on blue spectacles, and call themselves Nihilists. By doing this they have been able to persuade themselves, without further trouble, that they have acquired new convictions of their own. Some men have but felt some little qualm of kindness towards their fellow-men, and the fact has been quite enough to persuade them that they stand alone in the van of enlightenment and that no one has such humanitarian feelings as they. Others have but to read an idea of somebody ...
— The Idiot • (AKA Feodor Dostoevsky) Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... with this our hapless crew; For on the third day there came on a calm, And though at first their strength it might renew, And lying on their weariness like balm, Lull'd them like turtles sleeping on the blue Of ocean, when they woke they felt a qualm, And fell all ravenously on their provision, Instead of hoarding it with ...
— Don Juan • Lord Byron
... attraction of novelty; it had been one of a series, all bearing a strong connecting likeness. There had been small unrepaid loans which Elaine would not have grudged in themselves, though the application for them brought a certain qualm of distaste; with the perversity which seemed inseparable from his doings, Comus had always flung away a portion of his borrowings in some ostentatious piece of glaring and utterly profitless extravagance, ...
— The Unbearable Bassington • Saki
... five thousand rubles at a moment's notice; yet she will take in pledge objects worth as little as a ruble. She is quite a providence to many of our fellows—but such an old hag! I tell you what I would do. I would kill that damnable old hag, and take all she is possessed of, without any qualm of conscience," exclaimed the student excitedly. The officer laughed, but Raskolnikoff shuddered. The words just uttered so strongly echoed his own thoughts. "Let me put a serious question to you," resumed the student, more and more excited. ...
— The Continental Classics, Volume XVIII., Mystery Tales • Various
... again that little boy; he was looking once again, and with the same sense of physical revolt, at these vile pictures; he was still stunned by the thumping of the drums. A bar of that day's music returned upon his memory; and at that, for the first time, a qualm came over him, a breath of nausea, a sudden weakness of the joints, which he must instantly ...
— Stories By English Authors: Germany • Various
... why, but I had a furious, cold qualm that either Dudley or Macartney had found out,—I don't mean about Collins so much as about Paulette having been mixed up with him. Till I knew I was damned if I'd ...
— The La Chance Mine Mystery • Susan Carleton Jones
... Recalling the horses he and his companion had left picketed not far away, Jack felt a momentary qualm. If the Dinsmores should happen to stumble on them the situation would be an awkward one. The hunters would become the hunted. Deprived of their horses and supplies, the Rangers would be at a decided disadvantage. The only option left them would be to come to close quarters with the rustlers ...
— Oh, You Tex! • William Macleod Raine
... existence. Your wit's insistent and if a thing presents itself, tempting and warmly colored, you can't refuse it expression simply because it isn't true. You must make a good story. I've sometimes thought you'd have a qualm or two of conscience if you didn't, as if it's an artistic obligation you've ignored—to delight somebody's ears, even for a moment. Perhaps you don't realize how far afield you travel. But it's pretty ...
— Kenny • Leona Dalrymple
... as much noise as she could; she was in a naughty frame of mind, and enjoyed banging the door after her. She did not greatly care about either the bad mark for conduct or the Greek chronology, though she had an uncomfortable qualm when it occurred to her that the episode might possibly come to Miss Lincoln's ears. For this once, however, she was safe. Miss Rowe was anxious to manage her troublesome class without constant reference to the headmistress, and thought it better not to ...
— The Nicest Girl in the School - A Story of School Life • Angela Brazil
... her person Sally turned again to the clothes-press, by now so far gone in self-indulgence, her moral sense so insidiously sapped by the sheer sensual delight she had of all this pilfered luxury, that she could contemplate without a qualm less venial experiments with the law of meum ...
— Nobody • Louis Joseph Vance
... torn with anxiety. Nevertheless I went to the christening, and kept a calm exterior. I felt a qualm when a certain Greek said to me, with a meaning, unpleasant smile, "There is a telegram or something important arrived for you." "Oh, is there?" I said coolly; "well, I dare say I shall get it when I go home." Presently a kawwass came in, and saluted and said, "The Consul is returned, ...
— The Romance of Isabel Lady Burton Volume II • Isabel Lady Burton & W. H. Wilkins
... nature the Put-Through Clan acts on is the simplest thing in the world. We are always having moments of seeing it. We all see how true it is in babies we have personally known. We recognize it without a qualm in a baby, that his emotions and reflections about life, about Time and Eternity, and about things in general are just reflections of a milk bottle he has just had, or of a milk bottle he has not just had and wants to ...
— The Ghost in the White House • Gerald Stanley Lee
... no qualm of fear, no doubt, even, touching the issue. Not that I was an habitual ferrailleur. As I have indicated, I had fought but one man in all my life. Nor yet am I of those who are said to know no fear under ...
— Bardelys the Magnificent • Rafael Sabatini
... looked across the white table-cloth at his daughter, he had a sudden qualm of doubt, not unusual in parents, as to the capacity of the younger generation to carry on the work begun by the older. Of course, he reassured himself, this had scarcely been a fair trial. The child had been plunged into the business the day after her return, with the added ...
— The Squirrel-Cage • Dorothy Canfield
... that Agatha leaned over, trying to see his face. The violence of the chill had passed. His eyes were wide open, his face alarmingly pale. She felt a sudden qualm of pain, lest illness and exhaustion had wrought havoc in his frame deeper than she knew. But as she bent over him, his features lighted up with his rare smile—an expression full of happiness and ...
— The Stolen Singer • Martha Idell Fletcher Bellinger
... prevailing metrical unit, or foot, within the line has been frankly given over. Iambs, dactyls, and their ilk receive scant courtesy from the composer of folk-song, who without qualm or quaver will stretch one syllable, or even an utter silence (caesura), into the time of a complete bar; while in the next breath he will with equal equanimity huddle a dozen syllables into the same period. Consequently, ...
— A Syllabus of Kentucky Folk-Songs • Hubert G. Shearin
... say, "Oh, he wouldn't do anything else. Any one could have waited!" But how many would have waited in that same situation, without a qualm of fear, or without doubting the simple assurance that the master of the ranch would know best ...
— Polly and Eleanor • Lillian Elizabeth Roy
... it again now; but if I should tell thee how, thou'dst wonder at me. Lory. Indeed, sir, I should not. Fash. How dost know? Lory. Because, sir, I have wondered at you so often, I can wonder at you no more. Fash. No! what wouldst thou say, if a qualm of conscience should spoil my design? Lory. I would eat my words, and wonder more than ever. Fash. Why faith, Lory, though I have played many a roguish trick, this is so full-grown a cheat, I find I must take pains to come up to't—I have scruples. Lory. They are strong symptoms of death. ...
— Scarborough and the Critic • Sheridan
... down. When he mentioned going I played the piano so loud I couldn't hear him. I had no desire to go. Not while I could sit in my warm house and read and sew in my comfortable rocking chair. It was without a single qualm that I waved him a floury adieu from the midst of cookie-making. I closed the door and went back to my baking, which was abruptly terminated by a blazing board falling into the crock of dough. The house was burning over my luckless ...
— I Married a Ranger • Dama Margaret Smith
... pretty," urged Trent with a chivalric qualm—and he remembered her smooth brown hair parted over her rosy ears, her blue eyes, fresh as flowers, and the peculiar steadfastness ...
— The Wheel of Life • Ellen Anderson Gholson Glasgow
... ache, smart, throe, rack, agony, torture, distress, qualm, discomfort, pang, excruciation, paroxysm, gripe, twinge, cramp, travail, stitch, crick, anguish; heartache, misery, dolor. Antonyms: ease, comfort, relief, solace. Associated Words: anodyne, anaesthetic, ...
— Putnam's Word Book • Louis A. Flemming
... that queer uncontrollable qualm that comes to every one who finds himself suddenly on the edge of ...
— A Columbus of Space • Garrett P. Serviss
... had lighted there. I tried to brush it away with my hand, but in a moment it returned, and almost immediately came another by my ear. I struck at this, and caught something threadlike. It was drawn swiftly out of my hand. With a frightful qualm, I turned, and I saw that I had grasped the antenna of another monster crab that stood just behind me. Its evil eyes were wriggling on their stalks, its mouth was all alive with appetite, and its vast ungainly claws, ...
— The Time Machine • H. G. (Herbert George) Wells
... are at the point to die have more need of the physician than they that are but now and then troubled with an heart-fainting qualm. The publicans and sinners were, as it were, in the mouth of death; death was swallowing of them down: and therefore the Lord Jesus receives them first, offers them mercy first. "The whole have no need of the physician, but the sick. I came ...
— The Jerusalem Sinner Saved • John Bunyan
... I believe, wants to help the people. And I think he actually believes the best way to do it is to gain a dictatorship over the Solar System. That ambition rules everything in his life. It has hardened him and strengthened him. He will crush ruthlessly, without a single qualm, anything that stands in his path. That's why we'll have a ...
— Empire • Clifford Donald Simak
... accustomed to the sound of cannon, and she felt that she had always been a citizeness of Paris, and that Paris had always been besieged. She did not speculate about the end of the siege; she lived from day to day. Occasionally she had a qualm of fear, when the firing grew momentarily louder, or when she heard that battles had been fought in such and such a suburb. But then she said it was absurd to be afraid when you were with a couple of million people, all in the same plight as yourself. She grew reconciled ...
— The Old Wives' Tale • Arnold Bennett
... Sevenoaks and all the region round about his country home, while his confreres operated in their own localities. He chuckled over his plans as if he contemplated some great, good deed that would be of incalculable benefit to his neighbors. He suffered no qualm of conscience, no revolt of personal honor, no spasm of sympathy ...
— Sevenoaks • J. G. Holland
... books to Katy, and went into the living room She concentrated on John Gilman first, and a wee qualm of disgust crept through her soul when she saw that after weeks of suffering he was once more ready to devote himself to Eileen. Linda marveled at the power a woman could hold over a man that would force him to compromise ...
— Her Father's Daughter • Gene Stratton-Porter
... long time, as no one was seen to be searching for him, he went over into the cave, where in his hunger he ate such bread as he had never before tasted and in his thirst drank water such as he had never drunk before. This gave him such a qualm that he said: "So this is my famous frigid decocta." [Footnote: Reading [Greek: apepsthon] (Reimar, ...
— Dio's Rome, Volume V., Books 61-76 (A.D. 54-211) • Cassius Dio |
