"Regretful" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... departure and made him socks, comforters, slippers, and other consoling gear of the like description to recall their sweet memories to his saintly mind during his absence from their society. But, truth to tell, Mr. Dyceworthy gave little thought to these fond and regretful fair ones; he was much too comfortable at Bosekop to look back with any emotional yearning to the ugly, precise little provincial town he had left behind him. The minister's quaint, pretty house suited him perfectly; the minister's servants ...
— Thelma • Marie Corelli
... shiver of regretful change Sighs through the whispering boughs that overhead Sway in the wind's breath: down the red sun dips, And in the twilight's ...
— All Round the Year • Edith Nesbit
... happy," Perpetua is going on, her tone regretful. "We could have gone everywhere together, you and I. I should have taken you to the theatre, to balls, to concerts, to afternoons. You would have been so happy, and so should ...
— A Little Rebel • Mrs. Hungerford
... I would eat only porridge," responded Ruth, beginning to think that perhaps she had been more severe with herself than had been really necessary; and she wondered, with a little regretful sigh, if Aunt Deborah was having stewed oysters for dinner; for Ruth was sure that nothing could ...
— A Little Maid of Old Philadelphia • Alice Turner Curtis
... discover, literally at a glance, the condition of his eyes. Had I not made up my mind to disburse nothing further than the bare shilling I had already expended, I should certainly have ascertained if the time had arrived for my regretful assumption of a pinch-nose or a ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 99., Dec. 20, 1890 • Various
... you, to seek your friendship, and to bring about those arrangements which resulted in my becoming your constant companion. In accomplishing this point, I was urged partly, and perhaps principally, by a regretful memory of the deceased, but also, in part, by an uneasy, and not ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 3 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... Vincenza's story. If we could do that, we should be abundantly recompensed for training this lad in the doctrines of the Church—but it will never be. Unless, indeed, the woman Vincenza could be found and urged to confession. But that," said the monk, with a regretful sigh, "that is not likely to occur. And, therefore, the boy will be Dino Vasari, as far as I can see, to his life's end. And Vincenza's child is living in the midst of a rich English family under the name ...
— Under False Pretences - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... Mr. Lloyd left us. Rayne bade him a regretful farewell, after making him promise to return to us for a fortnight when he got back ...
— The Golden Face - A Great 'Crook' Romance • William Le Queux
... in short, who had grown tired of having to stop their game and stand aside in order to allow perspiring experts to whiz past them. The Cape Pleasant golfers did not make themselves slaves to the game. Their language, when they foozled, was gently regretful rather than sulphurous. The moment in the day's play which they enjoyed most was when they were saying: 'Well, here's ...
— The Man Upstairs and Other Stories • P. G. Wodehouse
... Sir John's eye. He made no remark as to the soup; it was the best of its kind, and its French name made it no better than the other triumphs in the same field which the Marchesa had achieved. But when Sir John tasted the first mouthful of the fish he paused, and after a reflective and regretful look at his plate, he cast his eye round the table. All the others, however, were too busily intent in consuming the Turbot la Vatel to heed his interrogative glance, so he followed suit, and after he had finished his portion, asked, sotto ...
— The Cook's Decameron: A Study in Taste: - Containing Over Two Hundred Recipes For Italian Dishes • Mrs. W. G. Waters
... intellectual powers to sentiments, which are the soul of powers, we shall find renewed proofs that the spirit which animates the kingdoms of mind is the youthful spirit of health and hope and energy and cheer. In the regretful tenderness with which all great thinkers have looked back upon their youth do not we detect the source of their most kindling inspirations? Time may have impaired their energies, clipped their aspirations, deadened their faith; but there, away off in the past, is the gladdening vision ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 93, July, 1865 • Various
... called in and delivers his weekly report of the conduct of the inmates, and any events that have happened. One inmate, an ancient labourer, died that morning in the infirmary, not many hours before the meeting of the Board. The announcement is received with regretful exclamations, and there is a cessation of business for a few minutes. Some of the old farmers who knew the deceased recount their connection with him, how he worked for them, and how his family has lived in the parish as cottagers from time immemorial. A reminiscence of a grim joke that ...
— Hodge and His Masters • Richard Jefferies
... him a chance to speak. But he only gazed at her with a thoughtful, regretful perplexity. ...
— The Mystery of Murray Davenport - A Story of New York at the Present Day • Robert Neilson Stephens
... everybody knew, grew rapidly old when the Association broke up. I never saw such a change. It seemed as though regretful remembrances of former times clung to him. There was no more the music of "the sounding horn" to awaken him from his drowse, and he passed much of his time under the woodshed. But he was not the sleek and canny dog of yore. He grew thin and weak. Long locks of indifferent ...
— Brook Farm • John Thomas Codman
... yet grown entirely accustomed to what is called "Government straight," i.e., salt meat and hard-tack, the bumboat did a thriving business. Young Potter's bill was tremendous, and Mrs. Bumboat bade him a regretful farewell when she visited ...
— A Gunner Aboard the "Yankee" • Russell Doubleday
... looked at him strangely with a regretful, wistful gaze, and he melted in a moment into unmixed gentleness. "Why are you being obstinate to-day? Go and lie down and get to sleep," ...
— A Sheaf of Corn • Mary E. Mann
... England as their names testify. The first land they used was on the cliffs, for it had already been improved by Indian planting; then the salt marshes, covered with a natural crop of grass, and then the mellow intervales near the river. When the sea was forced to the regretful realization that she could not monopolize the entire attention of her fellows, she was persuaded to yield up some very excellent fertilizer in the way of seaweed. But she still nags away at the cliffs and shore, and proclaims with every flaunting wave ...
— The Old Coast Road - From Boston to Plymouth • Agnes Rothery
... He was in a regretful spirit and begged forgiveness. [Bertha straightens out her fichu.] But what is the matter with you ...
— Plays: Comrades; Facing Death; Pariah; Easter • August Strindberg
... like to go upstairs now, ma'am?" the landlord said. She looked around for Francis, but he was nowhere to be seen. She picked up the handkerchief which had slipped from her lap, cast a regretful look at the yard of ...
— I've Married Marjorie • Margaret Widdemer
... hospital they locked up the men's clothes, as the only way of preventing them from escaping too soon and rejoining the hike. The camp has been one last buzz of personal talks, excited, pensive, or regretful. ...
— At Plattsburg • Allen French
... best methods—if method there were—of discovering what foul play had been on foot with the horse. That there was some, and very foul too, the testimony of men and angels would not have dissuaded the Seraph; and the event had left him most unusually grave and regretful. ...
— Under Two Flags • Ouida [Louise de la Ramee]
... I was very fond of her once, and there's not much consolation in reflecting that she'll probably scare the fellow out of his wits the first time she breaks out in one of her rages." Then his voice grew regretful. "Ellice's far from perfect, but she's much ...
— Prescott of Saskatchewan • Harold Bindloss
... the wind-driven grass. And the night was coming fast as the sun, hidden by the cliff wall, sank into the sea. Dalgard, knowing that his night sight was far inferior to that of the native Astran fauna, resignedly settled himself for an all-night stay, not without a second regretful memory of the snug ...
— Star Born • Andre Norton
... blown waywardwise, Faces of olden days uprise, And in his dreamers revery They haunt the smoker's brain, and he Breathes for the past regretful sighs. ...
— Pipe and Pouch - The Smoker's Own Book of Poetry • Various
... with Pere Jerome two friends to whom he was deeply attached—one, Evariste Varrillat, a playmate from early childhood, now his brother in-law; the other, Jean Thompson, a companion from youngest manhood, and both, like the little priest himself, the regretful rememberers of a fourth comrade who was a comrade no more. Like Pere Jerome, they had come, through years, to the thick of life's conflicts,—the priest's brother-in-law a physician, the other an attorney, and brother-in-law ...
— Old Creole Days • George Washington Cable
... not. wi' fient an arrow] i. q. with deuce an arrow. swithe] hie quickly. laithfu'] regretful. dowie] dejectedly. weelfaur'd] well-favoured, comely. happit] covered up. lootit] lowered. pawkie] sly. glower'd] stared. e'e-bree] ...
— Book of English Verse • Bulchevy
... darken over you, the beams of the wan stars, which, like human hopes, tremble upon your breast, and are broken, even before they fade, by the very turbulence of the surface on which they fall. Rove, repine, murmur on! Such was my fate, but the resemblance is no more. I shall no longer be a lonely and regretful being; my affections will no longer waste themselves upon barrenness and stone. I go among the living and warm world of mortal energies and desires; my existence shall glide alternately through crested ...
— Devereux, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... did he die! A meteor from the sky Falls not so swiftly as his spirit fled; When with regretful, half-averted eye He gave one little smile, one little ...
— The Galaxy, Volume 23, No. 2, February, 1877 • Various
... told of the past year, the last Christmas, the days which would never come again—the so many days nearer the grave. Thackeray continually expressed the same feeling. He reverts to the merry old time when George the Third was king. He looks back with a regretful mind to his own youth. The black Care constantly rides, behind his chariot. "Ah, my friends," he says, "how beautiful was youth! We are growing old. Spring-time and Summer are past. We near the Winter of our days. We shall never feel as we have felt. We ...
— Brave Men and Women - Their Struggles, Failures, And Triumphs • O.E. Fuller
... Barr, "but no more for me. There's too many British gunboats and 'Merican gunboats and Dutch gunboats and what not about now to make it comfortable or healthy. No, I've retired from that business—but there's money in it," he concluded with a regretful sigh. ...
— The Boy Aviators in Africa • Captain Wilbur Lawton
... in the afternoon, casting back many regretful glances at the three giant sentinels of the plain, looming preternaturally large in the rapidly fading light of a starless evening. At that hour we felt we could understand and sympathise with the poor untutored peasant's fear and avoidance of these lonely ...
— The Naples Riviera • Herbert M. Vaughan
... page-boy, one of the house-serfs—at best, a person of the working class. Pasinkov was extremely courteous and gentle to everybody, though he never sought the society of any one. If he were rudely treated, he was neither humiliated nor sullen; he simply withdrew and held himself aloof, with a sort of regretful look, as it were biding his time. This was just how he behaved with me. About two months passed. One bright summer day I happened to go out of the playground after a noisy game of leap-frog, and walking into the garden ...
— The Diary of a Superfluous Man and Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... yestereve, I tried hard to forget: words far apart Struck on my heart something like this; one said: What eh! a Gascon with an English name, Harpdon? then nought, but afterwards: Poictou. As one who answers to a question ask'd, Then carelessly regretful came: No, no. Whereto in answer loud and eagerly, One said: Impossible? Christ, what foul play! And went off angrily; and while thenceforth I hurried gaspingly afraid, I heard: Guesclin; Five thousand men-at-arms; Clisson. My heart ...
— The Defence of Guenevere and Other Poems • William Morris
... back to her lover. "Father don't feel as if I ought to take it, and I guess you'd better keep it now, Barney," she said, with regretful tears in her eyes. ...
— Pembroke - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... was the regretful reply, "you see it was awfully poky, having to sit so still. I must have grown desperate at last and kicked ...
— Idle Hour Stories • Eugenia Dunlap Potts
... the ruined bosom with a regretful stare, plucking at the gaping tear with his graphite-dusted fingers and shaking his head mournfully. Yet as he stepped out into the street, bound for his lodgings, he jarred his heels down upon the sidewalk with the brisk, snapping ...
— The Escape of Mr. Trimm - His Plight and other Plights • Irvin S. Cobb
... mother felt regretful for the change, she was far too wise to show it. Indeed, it is quite likely that she felt no regrets at all. By the time that Scott came to his 'teens, Mrs. Brenton was doing her level and conscientious best to conceal from him the demoralizing fact of her belief that he could do almost ...
— The Brentons • Anna Chapin Ray
... think you've had an escape, Griff; and if I were you, I'd make the best of it." Sir Griffin spoke not another word, but left the church with his friend in the brougham that had brought them, and so he disappears from our story. Mr. Emilius looked after him with wistful eyes, regretful for his fee. Had the baronet been less coarse and violent in his language he would have asked for it; but he feared that he might be cursed in his own church, before his clerk, and abstained. Late in the afternoon Lord George, when he had administered ...
— The Eustace Diamonds • Anthony Trollope
... they could never again be to each other what they had been when these two young creatures, strangely separated from all about them, had been alone in the world, having entire and perfect confidence in each other. They both looked back upon these bygone times with a sort of regretful consciousness of the difference; but Lucy was very happy in her new life, and Jock was a perfectly natural boy, given to no sentimentalities, not jealous, and enjoying his existence too completely to sigh for the time when he was a quaint old-fashioned ...
— Sir Tom • Mrs. Oliphant
... he did was to crumble away with a regretful kind of superiority the arguments of two Conservative speakers, to the sudden amusement of the Opposition, who presently cheered him. He looked up as though a little surprised, waited patiently, and went on. The iconoclasm proceeded. ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... years go by, He will think sometimes, with regretful sigh, The other woman was less true ...
— The World's Best Poetry, Volume 3 - Sorrow and Consolation • Various
... portion of my life more choice to me (Though brief, yet in itself so round and whole) 275 Than all the imperfect residue can be;— The Artist saw his statue of the soul Was perfect; so, with one regretful stroke, The earthen model into fragments broke, And without her the ...
— The Vision of Sir Launfal - And Other Poems • James Russell Lowell
... marry one another, he reflected. There was nothing to interfere, if she consented. He felt an elder brother's outrush of impatient protection for the boy; involuntarily he turned to Flavia with a movement of regretful irritation at the folly of it all, a folly he divined that ...
— From the Car Behind • Eleanor M. Ingram
... bard, that he thus inly stirr'd; A muse beholding in each fervent trait, 30 Took Mary H—— for Polly Hymnia! Or haply as there stood beside the maid One loftier form in sable stole array'd, If with regretful thought he hail'd in thee Chisholm, his long-lost friend, Mol Pomene! 35 But most of you, soft warblings, I complain! 'Twas ye that from the bee-hive of my brain Did lure the fancies forth, a freakish rout, And witch'd the air ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... or short,—should know the hour when the withering touch of age begins to shrink the soft, round curves distinctive of the full, sweet throat of healthful youth. No regretful vanity should be allowed to glamour their eyes to the fact that Time has them by the throat, to put it melodramatically. The wise woman will not please herself with a fatal delusion. She will realize it is illusion she needs-yards of it—lace or velvet, or any beautifying texture ...
— What Dress Makes of Us • Dorothy Quigley
... Romantics either shunned the subject altogether, or simply echoed Blake's isolated lines in isolated passages as regretful and almost as despondent. From Persia to Paraguay Southey could wander and seek after exotic themes; his days could be 'passed among the dead'—but neither the classic lands nor the classic heroes ever seem ...
— Proserpine and Midas • Mary Shelley
... all of a long while the hunger grew for that one I had lost in the early days—she who had sung to me in those faery days of light, that had been in verity. And the especial thoughts of that age looked back with a keen, regretful wonder ...
— The Night Land • William Hope Hodgson
... hour passed in pleasant chit-chat, Fred. proposed a stroll on the lake shore. Alice was soon ready, and they sallied forth. The weather was delightful, and that walk along Erie's sounding shores was fraught with a life-interest to one, and regretful sorrow to both. ...
— Eventide - A Series of Tales and Poems • Effie Afton
... his daughter, General Herbert had lived through the period of his bereavement with very tolerable comfort. He had rendered the dead the dead's due of regretful tenderness; but Elizabeth never asked him when he was going to make his reentry into politics; and she never reproached him with having wasted the very best years of his life in trying to make four hundred acres of ...
— The Just and the Unjust • Vaughan Kester
... known as Gli Ottimati. Florence held within itself, from this epoch forward to the final extinction of liberty, four great parties: the Piagnoni, passionate for political freedom and austerity of life; the Palleschi, favourable to the Medicean cause, and regretful of Lorenzo's pleasant rule; the Compagnacci, intolerant of the reformed republic, neither hostile nor loyal to the Medici, but desirous of personal licence; the Ottimati, astute and selfish, watching their own advantage, ever-mindful ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Complete - Series I, II, and III • John Symonds
... Warren presently began to enlarge upon the subject. His tone was that of frank and unashamed, if regretful, narrative. Rachael perceived, with utter stupefaction, that although he was sorry, and even angry at being drawn into this talk, he was far from being confused ...
— The Heart of Rachael • Kathleen Norris
... his strength; so far as it expresses a shrinking from reality and a refuge in sentimentalism; so far as it is aristocratic as in Tennyson, or mocking and rebellious as in Byron, or erotic and mephitic as in Swinburne, or regretful and reminiscent as in Arnold, or a melodious baying of the moon as in Shelley, or the outcome of mere scholarly and technical acquirements as in so many of our younger poets,—so far as literature or ...
— Whitman - A Study • John Burroughs
... him whithersoever he went, unless he repelled her by force. She gave one regretful thought to her young mistress, and to a certain project which she had determined to put into effect that night, and then she thought of the Brookes no more. She must leave them, and follow her husband's fortunes. There was no other ...
— Brooke's Daughter - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... the ranch and prevented a final leave-taking with Miss Colebrooke. He made his adieux by letter, and they were frankly regretful. Miss Colebrooke's reply mingled sorrow in parting from her old friend with joy in having found him. Her letter, a masterpiece of phrase-spinning, presented to Peter the one significant fact that she would not be averse to the renewal of his suit. ...
— Judith Of The Plains • Marie Manning
... away from it than this; but then I took the best part of it with me, and missed nothing. I felt solitary as I dropped asleep here, and, missing it a little, wandered back to it.' There was a sorrowfully affectionate and regretful sound in her voice, which made her visitor refrain from looking ...
— Little Dorrit • Charles Dickens
... roused the tiger in the Senator from Illinois. When he addressed the Senate on January 30th, he labored under ill-repressed anger. Even in the expurgated columns of the Congressional Globe enough stinging personalities appeared to make his friends regretful. What excited his wrath particularly was that Chase and Sumner had asked for a postponement of discussion, in order to examine the bill, and then, in the interval, had sent out their indictment of the author. It was certainly unworthy ...
— Stephen A. Douglas - A Study in American Politics • Allen Johnson
... at least was now, however, quite clear to Felix. While the natives, especially the women, displayed toward both of them in their personal aspect a sort of regretful sympathy, he could not help noticing at the same time that the men, at any rate, regarded them also largely in an impersonal light, as a sort of generalized abstraction of the powers of nature—an embodied form of the rain and the weather. ...
— The Great Taboo • Grant Allen
... to have—seen him." It was just audible, this little regretful murmur. Several minutes passed before there was another. "Just—just once," she whispered, and ...
— The Magnificent Ambersons • Booth Tarkington
... the little Doctor, looking quite portentously regretful and oppressed. "It is not only that Tom Robinson is an excellent fellow and would have made Dora the best of husbands—given her a safe and happy home, and all that sort of thing; but in case of anything happening, I am convinced ...
— A Houseful of Girls • Sarah Tytler
... world is really very like a large chocolate drop; it's rather bitter on the outside, but when you have bitten through, you find the heart of it sweet. Oh, how greedy!—you've taken the last candied cherry, and I am specially fond of candied cherries!" And indeed, she looked frankly regretful as I ...
— The Cords of Vanity • James Branch Cabell et al
... took a fancy to me, and let me sit in his room, and helped me in my work. The night before he left the school I was sitting there, and just before I went away, being rather overcome with regretful sentiments, he caught hold of me by the arm and said, among other things, 'And now that I am going away, and shall probably never see you again, I don't believe you care one bit.' I don't know how I came to do it," he said, "because I was never demonstrative; but I bent down and kissed ...
— Memoirs of Arthur Hamilton, B. A. Of Trinity College, Cambridge • Arthur Christopher Benson
... you see, apparently coming from below the other lights, are our guns," he was saying. "They seem to be below the others because they are nearer to us. Personally I don't think these evening volleys do very much damage," he went on as though vaguely regretful that the dole of death by night should be so scanty, "because it is impossible for the men in the outermost observation pits to see the effect of the shots; but we answer, as you notice, just to show the French and English we are ...
— Paths of Glory - Impressions of War Written At and Near the Front • Irvin S. Cobb
... while he might have repeated at leisure the decision he had made in haste, he knew even now that he was leaving the ways and means of proving his innocence behind him. The perception came, not as the result of a process of thought, but as a regretful, scarcely detected sensation. ...
— The Wild Olive • Basil King
... the tender, regretful glance of her mother's eyes. She was not as yet very well acquainted with the English language, and did not know what "tolerably" meant; ...
— Dotty Dimple At Home • Sophie May
... lovely scene; the sun has set, But left his glory in the western sky Where daylight lingers, half regretful yet That sombre Night, her sister, draweth nigh, And one pale star just looketh from on high; 'Tis neither day nor night, but both have lent Their own peculiar charms to please the eye,— Declining day its sultry heat has spent, And calm, refreshing ...
— Canadian Wild Flowers • Helen M. Johnson
... children round me play, My husband's smiles approve; I dash regretful tears away, And lift my thoughts above: In humble gratitude to bless The Almighty hand that spread Our table in the wilderness, ...
— Roughing it in the Bush • Susanna Moodie
... all my memories dating far back to my entrance, fresh and hopeful, into the new West. It rather flabbergasted me to find myself thinking that the future was going to be very tame; perhaps, as she had suggested, regretful. I had not apprehended that the ...
— Desert Dust • Edwin L. Sabin
... cold, half satirical tranquillity of Aubrey's pale clear-cut features, he felt that any attempt at "acting" his part would be seen through in a second by a man who was so terribly in earnest. So with a benevolent and regretful ...
— The Master-Christian • Marie Corelli
... unhappy experience," he explained—"thanks to your thoughtfulness for me. I do not deserve so much consideration; and that only makes me feel all the more regretful." ...
— The False Faces • Vance, Louis Joseph
... into the dismal smoke and gloom of the mountain-top like a very butterfly of sound. It struck on the sad, leaden ear of the monk much as we might fancy the carol of a robin over a grave might seem, could the cold sleeper below wake one moment to its perception. If it woke one regretful sigh and drew one wandering look downward to the elysian paradise that lay smiling at the foot of the mountain, he instantly suppressed the feeling, and set his face in its ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 09, No. 51, January, 1862 • Various
... before Thursday." He considered. "I'll have a wire sent to the Groves, say something regretful and polite ...
— Cytherea • Joseph Hergesheimer
... occasionally commanded views so remote as those of the Hartz Mountains, to Jagersruh, a hunting-lodge on a height "among stately firs that look like cedars." Here the late Duke had excited all his skill and taste to make a hunter's paradise, which awoke again the regretful thought, "How it would have pleased him to have shown all this himself to those he loved ...
— Life of Her Most Gracious Majesty the Queen, (Victoria) Vol II • Sarah Tytler
... regretful tribute to genius—which may perhaps some day be heard before the portraits of Henner, of Bonnat or of Madrazzo—will ever be inspired by those of M. Carolus Duran. This artist is the painter of elegant trifles and ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 22, November, 1878 - of Popular Literature and Science • Various
... valiantly, but unskillfully, from the back seats. The Honourable Jacob Botcher arose, and filled the hall with extracts from the "Book of Arguments"—in which he had been coached overnight by the Honourable Hilary Vane. Mr. Botcher's tone towards his erstwhile friend was regretful,—a good man gone wrong through impulse and inexperience. "I am, sir," said Mr. Bascom to the Speaker, "sincerely sorry—sincerely sorry that an individual of such ability as the member from Leith ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... a regretful tone so new to me that I inwardly repeated, as if that would help me to his meaning, ...
— Bleak House • Charles Dickens
... once vivid and beautiful, and we feel almost regretful at the fate which his recitation brought on the unhappy poet. 'Those who were walking in the colonnade began to throw stones at Eumolpus as he recited. He recognized this method of applauding his wit, covered his head with his cloak and fled from the temple. I was afraid ...
— Post-Augustan Poetry - From Seneca to Juvenal • H.E. Butler
... furiously, without thinking of direction. Some clock struck half-past nine. His temper faded swiftly, leaving him cold, miserable, regretful. There went his damnable temper again, surging up suddenly so hot and fierce that it had control of him almost before he knew that it was there. How like him, too! Now when things were bad enough, when he must bend all his energies to bringing peace back into the house again, he must ...
— Fortitude • Hugh Walpole
... was even better than many others society had already rejoiced over. The picture raised in the minds of the hearers of her Grace foiled in the purchase of stockings marked down to 1s. 11-1/2d. would be a source of rapture for some time to come. And Emily's face! The regretful kindness of it, the retrospective sympathy and candid feeling! It ...
— Emily Fox-Seton - Being The Making of a Marchioness and The Methods of Lady Walderhurst • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... is a strong tendency in the human mind to look with a regretful feeling to the past, and to compare it to the disadvantage of the present. It is a general belief with most people that the old time was the best time; that the seasons were more genial formerly; that provisions were cheaper and more abundant; ...
— The Stock-Feeder's Manual - the chemistry of food in relation to the breeding and - feeding of live stock • Charles Alexander Cameron
... warm April afternoon, heightened it may be by her determined unmercenary pose, betrayed too the faintest hint of shabbiness in her dress. He had never noticed these shadows upon her or her setting before and their effect was to fill him with a strange regretful tenderness.... ...
— The Research Magnificent • H. G. Wells
... royal presence. Whatever the mother of the Brahmans has sent word of, is all true; inasmuch as it is the great idol's decision; how can it be false?' When the king heard the very same story from all, he was much ashamed and regretful of what he had said. He instantly gave me a rich khil'at; and having written an order with his own hand, and sealed [335] with his sign manual, he consigned it to me; he also wrote a note to the mother of the Brahmans, and having laid trays of gold and jewels before ...
— Bagh O Bahar, Or Tales of the Four Darweshes • Mir Amman of Dihli
... I in daytime. I had enough by moonlight. Nell is some on looks, but I'm regretful passin' the ribbon to the lady from Mex. Jim, where ...
— Desert Gold • Zane Grey
... unfortunate fate of Lord Robert Cecil. He is regarded by his countrymen as unpractical. Men speak well of him, and confess willingly that he is vastly superior in character and intellect to the ruck of politicians, but nevertheless wind up their panegyrics with the regretful judgment that, alas, ...
— The Mirrors of Downing Street - Some Political Reflections by a Gentleman with a Duster • Harold Begbie
... midnight hour with her; they had all taken a morning ride together; and he had ended by having Mrs. Ellison sprain her ankle and faint in his arms. It was outrageous; and what made it worse was that decency obliged him to take henceforth a regretful, deprecatory attitude towards Mrs. Ellison, whom he liked least among these people. So he sat vindictively eating an enormous breakfast, in a sort of angry abstraction, from which Kitty's coming roused him to say that he hoped Mrs. ...
— A Chance Acquaintance • W. D. Howells
... young exquisite, with a monocle who had been hovering around one party, in which were two or three pretty girls whose sly fun at his expense he was too dense to appreciate, thought it would be a cunning thing to fling after them the handkerchief he had pretended to drench with regretful tears; but being very close to the edge of the wharf he miscalculated his balance, and would have toppled into the water, but that a burly tar, standing close by, caught him by his waistband and dragged him back to safety, swearing a round oath at ...
— All Aboard - A Story for Girls • Fannie E. Newberry
... he used to be, I'd resk him to tree any coon that ever run," said the regretful master. "This smart creature o' Topliff's can't beat him, I know. The poor old fellow's eyesight seems to be going. Two—three times he's run out at me right in broad day, an' barked when I come up the yard toward the ...
— The Queen's Twin and Other Stories • Sarah Orne Jewett
... out that way; as if luck took charge of a man's play and carried him through. Three of the five goals made by the second team fell to his mallet, and he left the field heartily cursed on all sides for his recalcitrancy in throwing himself away on work when the sport of sports called him. Regretful, yet well pleased with himself, he had his bath, his one, lone drink, and leisurely got into his evening clothes. Cressey met him at the entry to the guest's lounge giving on ...
— Success - A Novel • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... was to see no one, to receive no letters, to be worried by no messages. Absolute quiet was necessary. Her nerves had received a severe shock. Neither from the papers, in the fashionable columns of which he read regretful accounts of her indisposition, nor from the servants who answered his continual inquiries, was there ever the slightest reference to the tragical nature of it. It was obvious that she had recovered consciousness ...
— The Survivor • E.Phillips Oppenheim
... clasping fingers, but they closed upon nothing. Around the statue's base lay scattered stones. Evadne gathered them, and reunited they formed the lyre of Apollo. She replaced, for an instant, in the cold and constant grasp a fragment of the ruined harp. Then the aspect of the god became regretful, sad, as of one who desires a voice from the lips of the dead. Hastily she flung the charm away, and gentle grace returned to the listening boy, from whom, sleeping, some nymph might have stolen his lyre, whose complaining chords ...
— The Atlantic Monthly , Volume 2, No. 14, December 1858 • Various
... There are green alleys, with long vistas overshadowed by ilex-trees; and at each intersection of the paths, the visitor finds seats of lichen-covered stone to repose upon, and marble statues that look forlornly at him, regretful of their lost noses. In the more open portions of the garden, before the sculptured front of the villa, you see fountains and flower-beds, and in their season a profusion of roses, from which the genial sun of Italy distils a fragrance, ...
— The Marble Faun, Volume I. - The Romance of Monte Beni • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... a few paces higher up the barranca. He made me no answer, but looked at me with a calm, cold, and yet somewhat regretful smile upon his countenance. Then all at once he ceased the efforts he was making to resist the stream and gain the bank, folded his arms on his breast and gave a look up and around him as though to bid farewell to the world he was about to leave. The current was sweeping him rapidly down towards ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLII. Vol. LV. April, 1844 • Various
... twilight. First she plays slowly, a confused medley of fragments which she does not seem to remember perfectly, of which one waits for the finish and waits in vain; while the other girls giggle, inattentive, and regretful of their interrupted dance. She herself is absent, sulky, as if she were ...
— Madame Chrysantheme Complete • Pierre Loti
... all busy sorting out the salvage, retaining what was necessary to furnish the shanty, and storing the remainder in a log-house used as a workshop. How we raked amongst the still hot embers in the hope of picking up a relic, or with regretful interest traced the shape of some favourite object in the ashes! As my room was the first burned, I saved nothing but a few clothes, most of which were comparatively useless, silk dresses and a log shanty not being harmonious ...
— A Trip to Manitoba • Mary FitzGibbon
... They looked regretful, but saw nothing for it but to go. Kathleen in a breathless sort of way, scarcely uttering a word, spread out her treasures on the bed. Was there ever such a box? Skirts, bodices, blouses, shirts; an evening dress, an afternoon ...
— The Rebel of the School • Mrs. L. T. Meade
... the elder Davies bade a regretful farewell to their young companions. "I am sorry," said the former, "that as yet we have had no story from you, La Salle; but I hope to see you at my house in C., and hear it there when your trip is over. Take care of yourself, and make Lund out ...
— Adrift in the Ice-Fields • Charles W. Hall
... all rich and in splendor, and our uncle had come from India. I wished, saving his soul, that the ship that brought him over had foundered off Barnegat Light. It would always have been a tender and regretful memory to both of us. And how sacred is the memory ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... successive transitions the husband has remained obediently and tranquilly indifferent. He has in his heart considered them all equally unfitting and uncomfortable and sighed in regretful memory of a deep, old-fashioned arm-chair that sheltered his after-dinner naps in the early rosewood period. So far he has been as clay in the hands of his beloved wife, but the anaemic ladies and the communion table are the last drop that causes ...
— Worldly Ways and Byways • Eliot Gregory
... in the night when he rose from his seat at last, extinguished the lights himself and left the room, with a regretful look on his face; for, after his manner, he had been very happy in his solitude, if indeed he had been alone where his ...
— Fair Margaret - A Portrait • Francis Marion Crawford
... man spoke in a decided but regretful tone, and his manner showed more respect to his father than his words implied. Unwilling to interfere in such an affair, I said nothing; but Preston, in a ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol 3 No 3, March 1863 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... other arms Around thy form are prest, Oh! heave one fond regretful sigh For him thy love once blest! Oh! drop one tear from that dark eye, That was his guiding light, And cast the same deep tender glance, That thrills his ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volumes I-VI. - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... the Water Rat followed the Adventurer league by league, over stormy bays, through crowded roadsteads, across harbour bars on a racing tide, up winding rivers that hid their busy little towns round a sudden turn; and left him with a regretful sigh planted at his dull inland farm, about which he desired ...
— The Wind in the Willows • Kenneth Grahame
... are affected to sadness by certain forms of placid beauty is twofold: movement is stimulating and joy-producing, while quietude leads to reflection, and reflection in turn often brings out the tone of regretful longing for that which is past; secondly, quiet beauty produces a vague aspiration for the relatively unattainable, yet does not stimulate to the tremendous effort necessary to make the dimly ...
— The Art of Public Speaking • Dale Carnagey (AKA Dale Carnegie) and J. Berg Esenwein
... four sets of policemen's feet went heavily down the stairs. Beneath her bedclothes Mrs. De Peyster began faintly, ever so faintly, to return to life. Judge Harvey glared at Mr. Pyecroft, hands spasmodically clutching and unclutching; his look grew darker and darker. Respectful, regretful, ...
— No. 13 Washington Square • Leroy Scott
... or speak to her, or take any notice of her delay of obedience. That she would obey he knew; and he let her take her time. So he did not see the big tears that filled her eyes, nor the quiet way in which she got rid of them; while the hurt, sorrowful, regretful look on her face would have certainly moved Pitt to indignation if he had been where he could see it. I am afraid, if the colonel had seen it, he would have been moved quite in a different way. Not to anger, indeed; Colonel Gainsborough was never angry with his child, as truly she ...
— A Red Wallflower • Susan Warner
... regretful, but not cast down. He changed the subject, commented on the building that was going on, the prospects of a good harvest, and finally took refuge in that stale old subject, the weather. Then he said in a casual way—as if it had ...
— The Buffalo Runners - A Tale of the Red River Plains • R.M. Ballantyne
... the evidence of it in himself, in the periodical insurrection of the ape and tiger element in him against the authority of some mysterious power which in the course of his long sojourn here has been acquired, and to which he recognises that the allegiance of his life is due. That tearful, regretful expression of the Grand Monarque, after one of Massillon's searching, scathing sermons on the sensual and spiritual in every man, "Ah, voila deux hommes que je connais tres bien!" may be repeated with even greater truthfulness by every one of us, now that Darwin has superseded St. ...
— Morality as a Religion - An exposition of some first principles • W. R. Washington Sullivan
... though he afterward tried to gratify his own vanity and to gain the ear of Charles IV by claiming to be the bastard son of Henry VII. A wrong which he could not venture to avenge excited his bitter hostility against the baronage, while the study of Livy and other classical writers inspired him with regretful admiration for the ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... street, any man under ninety would have looked at her three times, the first glance instinctively recognising an attractive woman, the second ranking her as a lady; while the third, had there been time and opportunity, would have been the long, lingering look of respectful or regretful admiration. ...
— The Colonel's Dream • Charles W. Chesnutt
... was not like going away irrevocably from all she knew and loved, to be going under Lady MacMillan's wing. Still, she went weeping, wondering how she had ever made up her mind to the step, half passionately grateful to Reverend Mother for not being angry with her weakness and lack of faith, half regretful that some one in authority had not thought it right ...
— The Guests Of Hercules • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... had noticed that Shepard led the way as if he were the ruling spirit, but he did not consider it necessary to say anything to the others about him. The trumpet blew and Sherburne's force, mounting, rode away from the cove. Harry cast one regretful glance back at the splendid fire which still glowed there, and then resigned himself to the cold ...
— The Shades of the Wilderness • Joseph A. Altsheler
... regretful, and not at all unfriendly. Dave was shrewd enough to discover this, and politic enough to take quick ...
— Dave Dashaway and his Hydroplane • Roy Rockwood
... of summer To the time of buds look back?— Does the river moan regretful For the brooklet's mountain-track? Does the ripened sheaf of summer, Heavy with precious grain, Ask for its hour of blossom, And the breath ...
— Poems of the Heart and Home • Mrs. J.C. Yule (Pamela S. Vining)
... permanent, profitable connections. A formidable barrier presented itself in the gradually ascendant tendencies of the English language and English trade, with corresponding neglect of the Dutch factors. Regretful forebodings aroused energetic efforts to check rival interests. The prize was too valuable, and increasing each year in importance. A dyke needed to be erected to stem the English encroachments and to preserve and consolidate the Hollander position of vantage. ...
— Origin of the Anglo-Boer War Revealed (2nd ed.) - The Conspiracy of the 19th Century Unmasked • C. H. Thomas
... Schofield asked testily. "What are you talking about?" His nerves were jarred, and he was rather hoarse after what he had been saying to Penrod. (That regretful necromancer was now upstairs doing unhelpful things to his nose over a washstand.) "What do you mean by, 'Where, where, where?'" Mr. Schofield demanded. "I don't see ...
— Penrod and Sam • Booth Tarkington
... books, magazines; and two of the jurors who convicted her, sent from time to time generous contributions of dainty articles that materially promoted her comfort; while a third, whose dead child had clung to her Christmas card, eased his regretful pangs by the gift of a box containing paper, canvas, crayons, brushes, paints, and all requisite appliances ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... a three-course meal (all out of the same pot, but no matter), and onwards to our destination we fed royally. In parting with the men after our safe arrival at Chung-king, we left with them about seven-eighths of the picul—and were not at all regretful. ...
— Across China on Foot • Edwin Dingle
... woman (I believe she weigh'd 230 pounds.) I never have had such coffee since. About nice drinks, anyhow, my recollection of the "cobblers" (with strawberries and snow on top of the large tumblers,) and also the exquisite wines, and the perfect and mild French brandy, help the regretful reminiscence of my New Orleans experiences of those days. And what splendid and roomy and leisurely bar-rooms! particularly the grand ones of the St. Charles and St. Louis. Bargains, auctions, appointments, business conferences, &c., were generally held in the spaces or recesses ...
— Complete Prose Works - Specimen Days and Collect, November Boughs and Goodbye My Fancy • Walt Whitman
... when we can get them. But they've been very scarce for a few years and we usually have to be content with elephants or buffaloes," answered the creature, in a regretful tone. ...
— Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz • L. Frank Baum.
... rough hillocks, over the sandy turf of which swept a wild northwester, "shrill, chill, with flakes of foam," and now and then a driving hailstorm across the shelterless plain. So little hospitable was our welcome to a home from which we were sometime to part not without regretful memories. ...
— Uppingham by the Sea - a Narrative of the Year at Borth • John Henry Skrine
... flew to the door. She had a glimpse—which she pretended not to have seen—of the Merry Zingara crumbling in a passion of regretful sobs to the floor. Then she was standing outside, her back to the closed door, a determined, fat little Horatius in purple, with two red cheeks,—one, indeed, redder than the other where the slipper had struck,—vowing to hold the bridge against all ...
— The Madigans • Miriam Michelson
... There, crouching out of sight, she had remained concealed for the last hour—watching the revellers through a crevice in the needlework, and vainly hoping, either in the words or face of Sergius, to detect some tone or expression indicative of regretful thought or recollection of herself. When at last her name had been mentioned, for a moment she had eagerly held her breath, lest she might lose one syllable from which an augury of her fate could be drawn. Then, repressing, with a violent effort, the cry of ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol 6, No 5, November 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... disposal. He wanted more weight, especially in the center trio, and was soon pleading with Mills to have Cowan reinstated. The head coach ultimately relented, and Devoe was given to understand that if Cowan expressed himself decently regretful and determined to do good work he could go back into the second. The big sophomore, who, by his frequent avowals, was in college for no other purpose than to play football, had simply been lost since his dismissal, and, upon hearing Devoe's message, eagerly came off his high horse and made a visit ...
— Behind the Line • Ralph Henry Barbour
... With one regretful backward glance, Cabot left the little schooner on which he had come to feel so much at home, and sprinted towards the station, where was gathered half the population of the village—men, women, children, and dogs. The train was already at the platform as he made his way through ...
— Under the Great Bear • Kirk Munroe
... its echo. We are never happy; we can only remember that we were so once. And while in the very heart and structure of the happy moment there lurked an obscure consciousness of death, the memory in which past happiness dwells is always a regretful memory. This is why the tritest utterance about the past, youth, early love, and the like, has always about it an indefinable flavour of poetry, which pleases and affects. In the wake of a ship there is always a melancholy splendour. The finest set of verses ...
— Dreamthorp - A Book of Essays Written in the Country • Alexander Smith
... sighed, "'Tis day already!" And now 'twas her voice was doleful whiles her eyes gazed regretful round about the white sands of Deliverance and the tree-clad highlands beyond. "O indeed I do love this dear island ...
— Black Bartlemy's Treasure • Jeffrey Farnol
... told what a good husband he was. He felt so pleased over it that he went on, sincerely regretful: "She's visiting friends in Pennsylvania or I'd ask you to dine with us." And they went to a fashionable ...
— The Tipster - 1901, From "Wall Street Stories" • Edwin Lefevre
... returned with some sewing and without evincing undue curiosity led Marilla to talk of her past, though the child really knew very little about her mother and seemed to have no tender or regretful regard for this Mrs. Jaques. But her whole heart went out to Miss ...
— A Modern Cinderella • Amanda M. Douglas
... group sought safety in flight. The British marched on, leaving on that peaceful common, under the very shadow of the church, eight figures stark and motionless in death. From this baptism of blood they moved on, regretful, perhaps, at the stern necessity of their action, but rejoicing that all opposition had been ...
— Ten Great Events in History • James Johonnot
... he'd say: "Excuse me, but will you please to gimme a light?" Then the man w'u'd hand over his cigar, and Dock w'u'd plough that wood stub uv his'n around in the lighted cigar and would pertend to puff away till he had put the real cigar out, 'nd then Dock w'u'd hand the cigar back, sayin', kind uv regretful like: "You don't seem to have much uv a light there; I reckon I'll wait till I kin git a match." You kin imagine how that other feller's cigar tasted when he lighted it ag'in. Dock tried it on me oncet, 'nd when I lighted up ag'in seemed ...
— A Little Book of Profitable Tales • Eugene Field
... and reprovingly Fred shook his head; but his smile was kindly even regretful, as though he were sorry he could not longer enjoy the ...
— The Red Cross Girl • Richard Harding Davis
... its place stood angry resentment, ready to rend and tear. Pity and ruth were going: the daily report from Margery told of the lessening chance of life for Andrew Galbraith, and the stirrings evoked were neither regretful nor compassionate. On the contrary, he knew very well that the news of Galbraith's death would be a relief for which, in his heart of hearts, he was ...
— The Price • Francis Lynde
... shoot again. I have to content myself with writing books to occupy my time, a very poor form of amusement compared to tramping the fields after partridge. I suppose it is inevitable that a man in my position should indulge in regretful memories. My mind goes back now and then to certain days in my boyhood and I find myself picturing scenes through which I shall not ...
— Gossamer - 1915 • George A. Birmingham
... forward in his seat and shook his head in grave dissent. The speaker bent his gaze directly upon his great antagonist and spoke with strange regretful tenderness. ...
— The Victim - A romance of the Real Jefferson Davis • Thomas Dixon
... that," he said, with a regretful glance at the place where Baxter's dead body lay under its sheet. "I wish that fellow had been alive, to tell more! For he's right about those rubies—quite right. The ...
— Ravensdene Court • J. S. (Joseph Smith) Fletcher
... accepted the invitation, and clad in their richest garb, and with festive smiles, they appeared in the coral caves at the appointed time. None were absent save the radiant Balder, for whom many a regretful sigh was heaved, and the evil Loki, whom none could regret. In the course of the feast, however, this last-named god appeared in their midst like a dark shadow, and when bidden to depart, he gave vent to his evil passions in a torrent of invective ...
— Myths of the Norsemen - From the Eddas and Sagas • H. A. Guerber
... of remonstrance, said, "Boys, you're being looked at," and there was a regretful sigh or two, ...
— Stories by English Authors: Africa • Various
... ceased struggling and remained motionless. Almayer had stood up to answer his guest, turning his back to the doorway, unaware of what was going on on the other side. He spoke in a tone of regretful irritation. ...
— Almayer's Folly - A Story of an Eastern River • Joseph Conrad
... outside. When I thought of it again, the blood began once more to course in my veins. Lecamus went on by my side with his head down, the eyelids drooping over his eyes, not saying a word. He followed me when I called him: but cast a regretful look at the postern by which we had gone out, through which I had dragged him back in a panic (I confess it) unworthy of me. Only when we had left at some distance behind us that door into the unseen, did my ...
— A Beleaguered City • Mrs. Oliphant
... watching him till he had disappeared round the corner. She had a slightly regretful feeling that, now it was too late, she would think of a whole lot more good things which it would have been agreeable to say to him. And it had become obvious to her that Fillmore was not getting nearly enough of that kind of thing said to him nowadays. ...
— The Adventures of Sally • P. G. Wodehouse
... attainment for that man. Our Lord, as we see from so many of His parables, must have had many such cases among His first followers. Our Lord might be speaking prophetically, as well as out of His own experience, so well do His regretful and lamenting words fit into so many of our own cases to-day. For, look at that young business man. He has been born and brought up in the Church of Christ. He has gladdened more hearts than he knows by the ...
— Bunyan Characters (Second Series) • Alexander Whyte
... with an expression of regretful sadness upon his face. "I fear it will be of little use to name the price!" said he, "the fish is as good ...
— The Daughter of an Empress • Louise Muhlbach
... is far too good a girl for such a fate; but I am afraid she is really quite fond of him," said Mona, with a regretful sigh. "But shall you come up to Forty-ninth street this ...
— True Love's Reward • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon |
