"Unexpectedness" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... know as there is much to tell," he replied, a little nonplussed by the unexpectedness of the implied question. "Of course she is very nice and very lovely, as ...
— 'Smiles' - A Rose of the Cumberlands • Eliot H. Robinson
... accomplished scholar, the late Mr. Chenery (of The Times), translated twenty-six of his poems from the Arabic, and added most interesting notes. This curious book is a fusion of the Arabian Nights, Ecclesiastes, and Rabelais. There is the magical unexpectedness of the Arabian Nights, the vanity of vanities, all is vanity, of the Preacher, and the humour of the French satirist. Wisdom is scattered about it; at one moment you acknowledge a great thought, the next you are reproached for a folly, and ...
— Amaryllis at the Fair • Richard Jefferies
... contrast to those of the wife in the preceding verse. Schmid says: "The punishment is by the law of retaliation. She had said, 'I will go to my lovers;' but God threatens, on the contrary, that He will obstruct the way so that she cannot go." The [Hebrew: hnni] points to the unexpectedness of the result. The wife imagined that she would be able to carry out her purpose with great safety and ease; it does not even occur to her to think of her husband, who had hitherto allowed her, from weakness, as she imagines, to go on her way undisturbed; ...
— Christology of the Old Testament: And a Commentary on the Messianic Predictions, v. 1 • Ernst Wilhelm Hengstenberg
... felt as it were the chill of a gulf between herself and this man, then the brutal grasp of a faun. She beheld an unknown Jenkins, wild-looking, stammering with a besotted laugh and outraging hands. In the surprise, the unexpectedness of this bestial attack, any other than Felicia—a child of her own age, really innocent, would have been lost. As for her, poor little thing! what saved her was her knowledge. She had heard so many stories of this kind of thing at ...
— The Nabob • Alphonse Daudet
... same way in historical study. You come upon the most extraordinary things: little things, but things whose unexpectedness is enormous. I had an example of this the other day, as I was looking up some last details to make certain of the ...
— On Something • H. Belloc
... hardly knew, something about the unexpectedness of meetings that were common enough in London. At any rate she spoke, and was rewarded by the look that came into his face. A starving dog could not have looked more gratitude to one who had flung him a bone than Hugh Alston, starving for her, thanked ...
— The Imaginary Marriage • Henry St. John Cooper
... the most shocking episode that ever occurred in North-Western history. The standing of the victims, including a Governor appointed by the Hudson's Bay Company, his staff men of position, the unexpectedness of the collison, the suddenness of the attack, the destruction of life, the cruelty and injustice of the killing, and the barbarous treatment of the bodies of the dead, by the Bois-brules war party, fill one with horror, ...
— The Romantic Settlement of Lord Selkirk's Colonists - The Pioneers of Manitoba • George Bryce
... narrative that is in the least questionable in its import. This is utterly inexcusable, and, to so sin, is to render one's self unfit for social companionship. Avoid repetition. If some portion of an anecdote has met with applause, do not repeat it. Its unexpectedness was its ...
— Social Life - or, The Manners and Customs of Polite Society • Maud C. Cooke
... skipping like so many incarnate notes of interrogation. We pry into the counsels of the great powers of nature, we keep our ears at the keyhole, and know everything that is going to happen. There is no longer any sacred inaccessibility, no longer any enchanting unexpectedness, and life turns to prose the moment there is nothing unattainable. It needs no more a voice out of the unknown proclaiming "Great Pan is dead!" We have found his tombstone, deciphered the arrow-headed inscription upon it, know his age to a day, and ...
— The Function Of The Poet And Other Essays • James Russell Lowell
... the rising sun, with its suggestion of beauty and healthfulness! Then the far-reaching, transfiguring imagination, that, in a twinkle, transmutes into the squire of Hyperion a stolid rustic, making him suddenly radiant with the glory of morning. It is by this union of unexpectedness with fitness, of solidity with brilliancy, of remoteness with instantaneous presence, in his figures, denoting overflow of resources, a divine plenitude, so that we feel after Shakespeare has said his best things, that he could go on saying more and better,—it is especially by this ...
— Essays AEsthetical • George Calvert
... by younger men; but he loved to pour out reminiscences of the past to an audience of one or two at most: "Let an old man gather his recollections and glance at them under the right angle, and his life is full of pantomime transformation scenes." The chief characteristic of his wit was its unexpectedness; sometimes acrid, sometimes humorous, his sayings came forth, like Topham Beauclerk's in Dr. Johnson's day, like Talleyrand's in our own, poignant without effort. His calm, gentle voice, contrasted with his startling caustic utterance, reminded people ...
— Biographical Study of A. W. Kinglake • Rev. W. Tuckwell
... particular section, driven to retreat, with heavy losses in ground, guns and prisoners; and then, as soon as he had discovered a line on which to stand and had thrown in his reserves, the attack would be broken off, only to begin again elsewhere, and with the same energy, unexpectedness, and success. British Staff work and British tactics were at their highest point of excellence, and the spirit of the men, fanned by that breeze which Victory and Hope bring with them, were, in the ...
— Fields of Victory • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... through Peele and Nash to Marlowe, hence to the wondrous summer of Shakespeare, to die later on in the mist and yellow and brown of the autumn of Crowes and Davenants. I have seen music-hall sketches, comic interludes that in their unexpectedness and naïve naturalness remind me of the comic passages in Marlowe's Faustus, I waited (I admit in vain) for some beautiful phantom to appear, and to hear an enthusiastic worshipper ...
— Confessions of a Young Man • George Moore
... camp, with their bare swords in their hands, they saluted him as Caesar; whereupon Martialis, the tribune in charge of the watch, who was, they say, noways privy to it, but was simply surprised at the unexpectedness of the thing, and afraid to refuse, permitted him entrance. And after this, no man made any resistance; for they that knew nothing of the design, being purposely encompassed by the conspirators, as they were straggling here and there, first submitted for fear, and afterwards ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... in its unexpectedness, deserves closer analysis. My brother had come from New York City. Father and mother were from central Dakota. My own home was still in Boston. David and his family had reached this little tenement by way of a long trail through Iowa, Dakota, Montana, Oregon and Northern California. ...
— A Son of the Middle Border • Hamlin Garland
... to Mr. Phillips, the dear friend of our revered Dr. Charming, I asked him if he remembered what recumbent statue it was of which Dr. Charming was wont to speak as of a sight that impressed him more than anything else in Rome. He said, indeed, his mood, and the unexpectedness in seeing this gentle, saintly figure lying there as if death had just struck her down, had no doubt much influence upon him; but still he believed the work had a peculiar holiness in its expression. I recognized at once the theme of his description (the name he himself had forgotten) as I entered ...
— At Home And Abroad - Or, Things And Thoughts In America and Europe • Margaret Fuller Ossoli
... does not appeal to the more amiable side of our sense of mirth, for it excites in us a conceited feeling of superiority over those who are making us laugh,—but its unexpectedness and infinite variety render it irresistible to a certain class of minds. The duly labeled "joke" follows a certain law and rule; whereas no jester could invent the grotesqueries of ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume VI. (of X.) • Various
... With an unexpectedness which made Mr. Massy jump and drop the coat at his feet, there came from the next berth the crash and thud of a headlong, jingling, clattering fall. The faithful Jack must have dropped to sleep suddenly as he sat at his revels, and now had gone over chair and all, ...
— End of the Tether • Joseph Conrad
... still. The mere unexpectedness of the demand rendered her silent. The autocrat of all the Russias treated as though he were one of his own ministers of state could ...
— The Dew of Their Youth • S. R. Crockett
... the midnight cry and the waking of the maidens. The hour, 'of night's black arch the keystone,' suggests the unexpectedness of His coming; the loudness of the cry, its all-awaking effect; the broken words of the true reading, 'Behold the bridegroom!' the closeness on the heels of the heralds with which the procession flashes through ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - St. Matthew Chaps. IX to XXVIII • Alexander Maclaren
... in the eschatological passages of the Synoptics, ought to be mentioned, though it does not now act upon Christians in the same form—the Shortness and Uncertainty of life. Our Lord enjoins men to work while it is day for the night cometh; and in view of the suddenness and unexpectedness of the coming of the Son of Man He exhorts to watchfulness and preparedness. A similar thought forms the background of the apostle's conception of life. His entire view of duty as well as his estimate of earthly things are tinged with the idea ...
— Christianity and Ethics - A Handbook of Christian Ethics • Archibald B. C. Alexander
... Mrs. GAMP, with a vehement explosiveness whose utter unexpectedness quite disconcerted ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 98, May 24, 1890 • Various
... The unexpectedness of the reply reduced Mrs. Ansell to a sound of inarticulate interrogation; and Mr. Langhope continued: "Not at first, that is. She had thought it all out—foreseen everything; and she wrung from me—I don't yet know how!—a promise that when I saw him I would make it appear that I cleared ...
— The Fruit of the Tree • Edith Wharton
... he caught the saddle-horn with one hand and vaulted vaingloriously into the saddle without touching a toe to the stirrup. The buckskin ducked and danced sidewise at the end of the rope in Shorty's hand, and more than one gun flashed into sight at the unexpectedness of the move. ...
— The Gringos • B. M. Bower
... stood gazing at Sunnysides. In the dusk the horse glowed like a living jewel that holds the light when the sun has gone. Night fell, and the golden hide became a shimmer in the dark, as the outlaw moved restlessly to and fro in his prison. Then, of a sudden, with the unexpectedness and unreason of a dog's wolf-howl at the rising moon, there rose from the gloom of the corral a shrill, wild neigh that shattered the peaceful silence of ...
— The Heart of Thunder Mountain • Edfrid A. Bingham
... violence and unexpectedness of the Austrian attacks are testified to by articles published at this time in Italian newspapers. A writer in the "Giornale d'Italia" of Rome says that "the Austrian offensive came as a surprise to the Italian command and the taking of Monte Maggio and other important positions ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume V (of 8) • Francis J. (Francis Joseph) Reynolds, Allen L. (Allen Leon)
... competence, a confidence staggering to behold. It seems to say of the works of Nature, "I'll show you a trick worth two of that." For the subtlety of Nature's geometry, and for her infinite variety and unexpectedness, Arranged architecture substitutes a Euclidian system of straight lines and (for the most part) circular curves, assembled and arranged according to a definite logic of its own. It is created but not creative; it is imagined but not imaginative. Organic architecture ...
— Architecture and Democracy • Claude Fayette Bragdon
... Holyrood, if desired. She had had an hour or two of solitude by this time, and was well weary of it, while the last vestige of headache disappeared under the temptation of appearing at court with all the eclat of unexpectedness. She dispatched a note of acceptance to Lord Colquhoun, summoned Mrs. M'Collop, Susanna, and the maiden Boots to her assistance, spread the trays of her Saratoga trunks about our three bedrooms, grouped all our candles on her dressing-table, and ...
— Penelope's Progress - Being Such Extracts from the Commonplace Book of Penelope Hamilton As Relate to Her Experiences in Scotland • Kate Douglas Smith Wiggin
... was a little disconcerted at the unexpectedness of the meeting, and returned the salutation in a confused way. The attempt which he had made to prevent Lord Blandamer from entering the choir was fresh in his memory, and ...
— The Nebuly Coat • John Meade Falkner
... bowled, he pivoted himself violently on his left foot and, going through a complete half-circle, finished, facing the wicket-keeper, with both feet outside the crease, but his bat well over the line. The chief attraction of this gymnastic feat was the unexpectedness of it all. No one knew where the ball would go if it was hit. Once when he timed his shot a little late he caught the ball just as it was passing him and drove it flying past the wicket-keeper's head to where long-stop would have been. The ...
— The Loom of Youth • Alec Waugh
... him steadily, though her heart was beating rapidly, for this moment had come upon her with sudden unexpectedness. ...
— Blue Aloes - Stories of South Africa • Cynthia Stockley
... Carthaginian had his enemy enclosed by the lake and mountains, and surrounded by his troops, he gives the signal to all to make a simultaneous charge; and each running down the nearest way, the suddenness and unexpectedness of the event was increased to the Romans by a mist rising from the lake, which had settled thicker on the plain than on the mountains; and thus the troops of the enemy ran down from the various eminences, sufficiently ...
— The History of Rome; Books Nine to Twenty-Six • Titus Livius
... Guard—half an hour after it had been taken by a charge of men from the Blankth Regiment, United States Army. There has been a mistake and the charge was not preceded by artillery preparation as usual. However, the Americans have taken the trench by the unexpectedness of their attack, and the Prussian Guard has been routed in confusion. But the German artillery has at once opened fire on the Americans, and also a German machine gun has enfiladed the trench. Ninety-nine Americans have been killed in the trench. One is alive, but ...
— Joy in the Morning • Mary Raymond Shipman Andrews
... always been his stanchest supporter had left Old Jerry cringing in his place beside the stove, they had all felt the justice if not a premonition of final retribution to come. It was the debonaire dare-deviltry of Old Jerry's defiance rather than its unexpectedness which had proved its greatest sensation. That day's one supreme moment—the only one which had not suffered from too acute anticipation—came while they waited for the Judge's denial, that denial which was ...
— Once to Every Man • Larry Evans
... well as you do, Jenny Wren," retorted Peter rather crossly. "You know being suddenly startled is apt to make people feel cross. If I had seen him anywhere about he wouldn't have made me jump. It was the unexpectedness of it. I don't see what he is out now for, anyway, It isn't even dusk yet, and I ...
— The Burgess Bird Book for Children • Thornton W. Burgess
... offering a prospect of excitement so novel. He had shown more flourishing gardens to other young ladies in his past years of service, but young ladies did not come to Stornham, and that one having, with such extraordinary unexpectedness arrived, should want to look over the desolation of these, was curious enough to rouse anyone to a sense of a break in accustomed monotony. The young lady herself mystified him by her difference from such others as he had seen. What the man in the shabby livery had felt, he felt ...
— The Shuttle • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... for the stage must be ranked with the latter class. He himself would fain make an exception of the "Spanish Friar," but I confess that I rather wonder at than envy those who can be amused by it. His comedies lack everything that a comedy should have,—lightness, quickness of transition, unexpectedness of incident, easy cleverness of dialogue, and humorous contrast of character brought out by identity of situation. The comic parts of the "Maiden Queen" seem to me Dryden's best, but the merit even of these is Shakespeare's, and there is little ...
— Among My Books - First Series • James Russell Lowell
... literature, and he had learned how often the noblest virtues are found among the roughest classes. It was true, they were sometimes so latent that like the jewel in a toad's head they had the added grace of unexpectedness, but that did not interfere with the fact of their existence. He had read of California gamblers who had rushed from tables where they had sat with bowie-knives between their teeth, to warn a coming train of broken rails, and, when picked up maimed and dying, had ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 7 • Various
... farther in search of the things which always came as surprises however much he was looking for them. Many days were blanks and others would be crowded with incidents, for unexpectedness is above all the peculiar feature of hunting, and its lasting charm. One day he had gone far beyond the ridge in a new direction and passed through an open glade where lay the broken trunk of a huge basswood. The size impressed it on his ...
— Animal Heroes • Ernest Thompson Seton
... THIS, the unexpectedness of this scene, first the biography of this patriotic ship, then the excitement with which this eccentric individual pronounced these last words—the name Avenger whose significance could not escape me—all this, taken together, ...
— 20000 Leagues Under the Seas • Jules Verne
... solidity, the unexpectedness, the monumental rectitude of the whole thing leave you nothing to say—at the time—and make you stand gazing. You simply feel that it is noble and perfect, that it has the quality of greatness. A road, branching from the highway, descends to the level of the river and passes under one ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume 3 • Various
... a few scattered personal experiences, and I have no philosophy of dreams to suggest. It is in my case an inherited power. My father was the most vivid and persistent dreamer I have ever met, and his dreams had a quality of unexpectedness and interest of which I have never known the like. The dream of his, which I have told in his biography, of the finding of the grave of the horse of Titus Oates, seems to me one of the most extraordinary pieces of invention I have ever heard, because of the conversation which took place ...
— Escape and Other Essays • Arthur Christopher Benson
... unexpectedness and the inconceivable audacity of it—Lily could not restrain the tribute of an ...
— House of Mirth • Edith Wharton
... The unexpectedness of the thrust—as well as its doubtful taste—chilled his growing enjoyment of her chatter. He had really been getting to like her—had recovered, under the candid approval of her eye, his usual sense of being a personable young man, with all the privileges pertaining to the state, ...
— The Reef • Edith Wharton
... blast of the gunboat's steam-whistle made him shudder by its unexpectedness. Slowly he looked about. Swift as lightning he leaped from where he stood, bounding forward along ...
— 'Twixt Land & Sea • Joseph Conrad
... to his own, a man of letters moreover in the very act of praising him. To make the thing right he talked to me exactly as an equal and on the ground of what we both loved best. The hour, the place, the unexpectedness deepened the impression: he couldn't have done ...
— The Figure in the Carpet • Henry James
... no beauty without strangeness. He makes his favourite quotation: '"But," says Lord Bacon (how justly!) "there is no exquisite beauty without some strangeness in the proportions." Take away this element of strangeness—of unexpectedness—of novelty—of originality—call it what we will—and all that is ethereal in loveliness is lost at once.... We lose, in short, all that assimilates the beauty of earth with what we dream of the beauty of heaven!' ...
— Figures of Several Centuries • Arthur Symons
... communicating with a heap of logs, kindled a sudden blaze which scattered darkness out of being, and converted thirty yards of the primeval forest into a chamber of glorious light, round which the human beings crowded with joy enhanced by the unexpectedness of the event, and before which the wild things of the wilderness ...
— Blown to Bits - or, The Lonely Man of Rakata • Robert Michael Ballantyne
... haunted ruin chiefly attracted her thoughts as the scene and locality of uncanny occurrences that were fanciful and unusual rather than sombre or suggestive. It was the great haunted cheese in which the piskies burrowed, and out of which they hopped with amusing unexpectedness: it was the building to pass which you must always turn your stocking, if you wished to escape being pisky-ledden, or misguided: it was the place to which the "Little Folks"[P] conveyed stolen children: above all, it was the place of dark and cobwebbed corners, ...
— Drolls From Shadowland • J. H. Pearce
... it isn't a question of the wisdom of your choice; it's the unexpectedness. We all saw that you were very unhappy when you were here before, and we supposed it ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... our church, nor in fact, was he a church-goer at all, but he listened attentively to the tale of the fifty-seven cents and simply said he was quite ready to go ahead and sell us that piece of land for ten thousand dollars, taking—and the unexpectedness of this deeply touched me taking a first payment of just fifty-seven cents and letting the entire balance stand on a ...
— Acres of Diamonds • Russell H. Conwell
... man perhaps was more unexpected than exceptional. His unexpectedness took the form not of benevolence but of culture. He is a vendor of newspapers. A pleasant old fellow with a smiling weather-beaten face, grey moustache and a cloth cap, whom I have known for most of the six years during which he has stood every afternoon except Sundays on the kerb ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 159, July 7th, 1920 • Various
... his keen eyes on the boy who was now on his feet, motionless, his brows knitted. He was a little bewildered by the unexpectedness of the thing. Yet he did understand—tumultuously, what that great ...
— The Genius • Margaret Horton Potter
... more than twenty-seven years, I met him in the house of a stranger in England, whither he came in the company of a certain dethroned Indian prince. Then our acquaintance was limited to two conversations; their unexpectedness, their gravity, and even severity, produced a strong impression on me then; but, in the course of time, like many other things, they sank into oblivion and Lethe. About seven years ago he wrote to me to America, reminding me of our conversation and of a certain promise I had made. ...
— From the Caves and Jungles of Hindostan • Helena Pretrovna Blavatsky
... a time inattentive to my own situation. The dreadfulness and unexpectedness of this catastrophe occupied me wholly. The quick motion of the lights upon the shore showed me that I was borne rapidly along with the tide. How to help myself, how to impede my course or to regain either ...
— Arthur Mervyn - Or, Memoirs of the Year 1793 • Charles Brockden Brown
... last leaves,—thou once didst dwell With me year-long, and make intense To boyhood's wisely-vacant days That fleet, but all-sufficing grace Of trustful inexperience, While yet the soul transfigured sense, And thrilled, as with love's first caress, At life's mere unexpectedness. ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, No. 47, September, 1861 • Various
... speak or move again until the city was close about them; then, with a gesture that startled her by its unexpectedness, he drew from his hand the signet ring he always wore—a ring familiar to Max as the stones of the rue Mueller—and slipped it over her ...
— Max • Katherine Cecil Thurston
... awkward position by the kings, queens and knaves of the pack of cards with which she was playing coming to life. This was sufficiently embarrassing. But Clithering was much worse off than Alice. In her story all the cards came to life, and though the unexpectedness of their behaviour made things difficult for her there was a certain consistency about the whole business. A card player might in time adjust himself to a game played with cards which possessed wills of their own. But poor Clithering had to play with a pack ...
— The Red Hand of Ulster • George A. Birmingham
... then that she had begun to ask herself what Aunt Maud was, in vulgar parlance, "up to." "You may receive, my dear, whom you like"—that was what Aunt Maud, who in general objected to people's doing as they liked, had replied; and it bore, this unexpectedness, a good deal of looking into. There were many explanations, and they were all amusing—amusing, that is, in the line of the sombre and brooding amusement, cultivated by Kate in her actual high retreat. Merton Densher came the very next Sunday; but Mrs. Lowder ...
— The Wings of the Dove, Volume 1 of 2 • Henry James
... said, 'wot is it?' for I was startled by the unexpectedness of the thing I saw. Something seemed hanging round my neck that glowed and glistened and sparkled like ever so many jewels. The sort of gems that had made me wink my eyes whenever I had seen them in ...
— The Tale of Lal - A Fantasy • Raymond Paton
... walls to my room; I was faint; the windows seemed to appear and disappear, and in that sickness I reached my bed. Then I saw the door open, and John Graham came in, and closed the door behind him, and locked it. My room. He had come into my room! The unexpectedness of it—the horror—the insult roused me from my stupor. I sprang up to face him, and there he stood, within arm's reach of me, a look in his face which told me at last the truth which I had failed to suspect—or fear. His arms were ...
— The Alaskan • James Oliver Curwood
... he appeared to be looking ahead, I had begun to fear he would go by without stopping, when he suddenly wheeled and at the same instant said "Hurrah," as distinctly as I have ever heard it spoken, and dropped to the feed. The clearness, energy, and unexpectedness of his "Hurrah" startled me. He alighted and began to eat, evidently without suspecting my presence, notwithstanding the fact that I lay only a few feet away. Some days before, a mountain lion had killed a mountain ...
— Wild Life on the Rockies • Enos A. Mills
... an unexpectedness in the speech and an incongruity in Mrs. Vivian's beginning to flatter him. He needed to remind himself that if she was a Bostonian, ...
— Confidence • Henry James
... old gentleman was now retired and had been succeeded by Mr. O'Shea, who, in addition to his unexpectedness, was adorned by an abominable temper, an overbearing manner, and a sense of cruel humor. He had almost finished his examinations at the nearest school where, during a brisk campaign of eight days, he had caused five ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume III. (of X.) • Various
... Benson said she was never so surprised in her life, and the surprise seemed not exactly an agreeable one, but Mr. Benson looked a great deal more pleased than astonished. The slight flush in Irene's face as she greeted him might have been wholly due to the unexpectedness of the meeting. Some of the gentlemen lounged off to the office region for politics and cigars, the elderly ladies took seats upon the gallery, and the rest of the party strolled down to the benches ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... Fears, on Hurry and Leisure, on Work and Play, on Dulness, and on Growing Old, are full of fresh and delicate perceptions of the ordinary facts of human experience. His best and brightest remarks surprise us with the unexpectedness of homely common sense, as flashed on a world of organized illusions. The entire absence of rhetoric in the author's mode of "putting things" adds to its effectiveness. He attempts to reveal the common,—one ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, Issue 45, July, 1861 • Various
... be a-poppin' when them greasers don't get their pay checks, as we've been promisin' them," drawled Texas Joe, shaking his head mournfully. "For regular unexpectedness this here financierin' business gets me plumb locoed. What will you do, Abe? Greenfield sure takes this ...
— The Winning of Barbara Worth • Harold B Wright
... Herbert was even more embittered with Florence than he was with the fish man, and Florence found life full of unexpectedness; it had been so clear to her that the fish man would say: "Why, certainly. Here's five dollars; two dollars and a half for each of you. Would you care to have the jars back?" The facts, so contrary, seemed to wear the aspect of deliberate malice, and she felt ill-used, especially as ...
— Gentle Julia • Booth Tarkington
... his body had been extricated; and then, when Stuart, now on his feet and half upright, had placed himself in a favourable position, suddenly the German was shot back into the place from which he had just been dragged, shot back with unexpectedness and violence, till he came with a crash against the bottom of the tunnel, and, collapsing there, rolled backwards ...
— With Joffre at Verdun - A Story of the Western Front • F. S. Brereton
... had become of me?" he stammered. The unexpectedness of her coming unnerved him. He forgot ...
— The Argosy - Vol. 51, No. 6, June, 1891 • Various
... Neo-Positivist Mach and the Intuitionist Bergson, do indeed attempt to construct systems composed solely of direct Experience and pure Intuition; and, at the same time, almost ceaselessly insist upon the sheer novelty, the utter unexpectedness of all direct Experience, and the entire artificiality of the constructions of Thought—constructions which alone adulterate our perceptions of reality with the non-realities repetition, uniformity, foreseeableness. Yet the amazing success of the application of such constructions to actual Nature ...
— Progress and History • Various
... this young man who was out for a bit of a lark, to sentimentalize about antiquity or the charm of the unspoiled. Yet even such young men are capable of finding the rumness of strange towns a passable enough lark, to say nothing of the general unexpectedness of life. And Dizful turned out to be quite as unexpected, in its way, as Bala Bala. Matthews found that out before he had been three days in the place, when a sudden roar set all the loose little panes tinkling in Shir Ali ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1917 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... upon the pedal achieved the desired results; the engine responded, humming pleasantly. He closed the hood and stood back eying her with a mingling of amusement and triumph. Her face reddened slowly. And then, startling him with its unheralded unexpectedness, a gay peal of laughter from her made quite another girl of her, a dimpling, radiant, ...
— Man to Man • Jackson Gregory
... they were by the unexpectedness of the attack, Colonel Edwards and Hal acted promptly. A revolver flashed in the hand of each and both fired into the woods toward the point from which the shot had come. Then they leaped for shelter among the trees that lined the ...
— The Boy Allies in the Balkan Campaign - The Struggle to Save a Nation • Clair W. Hayes
... forward and landed a blow on Beaufort's shoulder that almost upset him because of its unexpectedness. Beaufort grunted angrily and swung back. But Penny was quick on his feet and handy with his arms and the blow was blocked, and Beaufort's jab with his left fell short. There was little space between the trees and the ledge, and what there ...
— Left Tackle Thayer • Ralph Henry Barbour
... garden. It did not consist in order or system, for there was no trace of either, except, perhaps, in that prim row of poplars growing about the whole domain and shutting it away from all idle and curious eyes. For the rest, I think the real charm must have been in its unexpectedness. At every turn and in every nook you stumbled on some miracle of which you had never dreamed. Or perhaps the charm was simply that the whole garden was an expression of Uncle ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1905 to 1906 • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... Braddock's good fortune shortly came to Don Pedro's ears through the medium of the landlady. As she revealed what she had heard in the morning, the Peruvian gentleman was spared a sleepless night. But as soon as he learned the truth—which was surprising enough in its unexpectedness—he hastily finished his breakfast and hurried to the Pyramids. As yet he had not intended to see Braddock so promptly, or at least not until he had made further inquiries at Pierside, but the news that Braddock possessed the royal ancestor of the De Gayangoses ...
— The Green Mummy • Fergus Hume
... There is danger in your path." The suddenness and unexpectedness of this warning, the tone of alarm with which it was given, and, above all, the persuasion that it was my wife who spoke, were enough to disconcert and make me pause. I turned and listened to assure myself ...
— Wieland; or The Transformation - An American Tale • Charles Brockden Brown
... to be astonished at the unexpectedness of human nature,' he remarked. 'It is really very surprising that a man like you should fall so deeply in love with a girl ...
— The Magician • Somerset Maugham
... thunderstruck at the novelty and unexpectedness of the offer; and then, tickled with the comical side of it, burst into a roar of laughter. It was one of the very best jokes he had ever heard. He, an outlaw, with a price on his head, his sins forgiven, enlisted in the Guides, ...
— The Story of the Guides • G. J. Younghusband
... sun. An irresistible longing came over Edward; he would have it all settled that very evening; he would remain concealed in a village close by. The Major was to urge the business on Charlotte with all his power; he would take her prudence by surprise; and oblige her by the unexpectedness of his proposal to make a free acknowledgment of her feelings. Edward had transferred his own wishes to her; he felt certain that he was only meeting her half-way, and that her inclinations were as decided as his own; and ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. II • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... penetrative power and equal unexpectedness found the most vulnerable spot beneath the simple black of Penrod Schofield's jacket. Straightway he turned his back upon the crash-covered floors where the dancers were, and moved gloomily toward the hall. But one of the maiden aunts Rennsdale ...
— Penrod and Sam • Booth Tarkington
... its unexpectedness, held the crowd with suspended breath. What was to follow? Was this the beginning of a massacre? Each man looked at his neighbor. Another moment might bring ...
— Steve Yeager • William MacLeod Raine
... of incident and adventure, it is one of the best novels of that inexhaustible type with which I am acquainted. It possesses in an eminent degree the quality of vividness which R. L. Stevenson prized so highly, and the ingenuity of its plot, the dramatic force of its episodes, and the startling unexpectedness of its denouement are all in the Hungarian master's most characteristic style. I know of no more stirring incident in contemporary fiction than the terrible wrestling match between strong Juon the goatherd and the supple bandit Fatia Negra in the presence of two trembling, defenceless ...
— The Poor Plutocrats • Maurus Jokai
... Captain," said Mr. Rae calmly, "let me present Mr. Dunn, Captain Dunn, I might say, of International fame." The solicitor's smile broke forth with its accustomed unexpectedness, but had vanished long before Mr. Dunn in his embarrassment had finished ...
— Corporal Cameron • Ralph Connor
... began. "Mamma has asked me to write to you this time in her place, as she has succumbed to an attack of 'reunionitis.' She doesn't call it that, but we know well enough that it is nothing but the excitement and unexpectedness of having a whole family reunion which has frazzled her out so completely. She wrote you that Joyce was coming home, but none of us knew that Holland would be with her. He was the surprise—Cousin Kate's ...
— Mary Ware's Promised Land • Annie Fellows Johnston
... should you hold on with?" said Mrs. Bundle. "Many's the light cart I've rode in, but never let go my hold, unless with one hand, to save a bag or a bandbox. And though it's jolting, I'm sure a light cart's nothing to pony-back for starts and unexpectedness." ...
— A Flat Iron for a Farthing - or Some Passages in the Life of an only Son • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... was routed in the defiles of Beth-Horon, where two centuries before the Syrian hosts had been decimated by Judas the Maccabee. The two legions were cut to pieces. The fierce valor of the untrained national levies had broken the serried cohorts of the Roman veterans, and in the unexpectedness of this deliverance the party of rebellion for a time was triumphant among all sections of ...
— Josephus • Norman Bentwich
... Petrovna announced her idea of founding a magazine, people flocked to her in even larger numbers, but charges of being a capitalist and an exploiter of labour were showered upon her to her face. The rudeness of these accusations was only equalled by their unexpectedness. The aged General Ivan Ivanovitch Drozdov, an old friend and comrade of the late General Stavrogin's, known to us all here as an extremely stubborn and irritable, though very estimable, man (in his own way, of course), who ate a great deal, and was dreadfully ...
— The Possessed - or, The Devils • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... the human mind are wonderful. Sometimes they are, as the Captain said, bamboozling. If analysed it might have been discovered that, apart altogether from the shock of unexpectedness and the strain on her credulity, poor Mrs Roby suffered—without clearly understanding it—from a double loss. She had learned to love Captain Wopper for his own sake, and now Captain Wopper was lost to her in William Stout! On the other hand William, her darling, her smooth-faced chubby boy, ...
— Rivers of Ice • R.M. Ballantyne
... be invariably the case, was associated with an absence of personal beauty trenching upon the scarecrow. Possibly an excess of strong and disproportionate carving in nose, mouth and chin, accompanied by weak eyes and unexpectedness of forehead, may tend to make the Evil One but languid in his desire for the capture of its human exemplar. This may help account for the otherwise rather curious coincidence of frightful physiognomy and preternatural goodness in this world of sinful beauties[B]. Under such ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 15, July 9, 1870 • Various
... depression. The young Prince was the first to step within the door of the house. As he did so, he turned and bowed to the great company of Frenchmen—the wreckage of his father's empire. Instantly every hat was raised, and a tremendous cry went up, "Vive Napoleon le Quatre!" The suddenness and unexpectedness of this acclamation of the youth as the inheritor of the Napoleonic legend startled and impressed all those of us who were ...
— Memoirs of Sir Wemyss Reid 1842-1885 • Stuart J. Reid, ed.
... British successes in this area were gained by the unexpectedness and dash of their attacks which took the Germans by surprise. The foggy weather which prevailed had hampered the Germans so that they were unable to observe the ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume VI (of VIII) - History of the European War from Official Sources • Various
... collision with a vast number of personal vanities, and when you touch anything in the shape of personal vanity in politics you have got into a hornet's nest, the multitudinousness, the pettiness, the malignity, the unexpectedness of which you can never appreciate. I sometimes gaze upon the House of Commons in a certain semi-detached spirit, and I ask myself if there be any place in the whole world where you can see so much of the mean as well as of the loftiest passions of human nature as in a legislative assembly. ...
— Sketches In The House (1893) • T. P. O'Connor
... The unexpectedness of this presence overwhelmed him as completely as if he had seen an apparition. For an instant he did not ...
— Broken to the Plow • Charles Caldwell Dobie
... explained as best he could, and his explanation brought down on him a wealth of biting sarcasm. The husband of cet ange la! In the name of heaven! was there no limit to the blundering stupidity of men—had he no more sense than to present himself with such unexpectedness, after so long an absence? Small wonder la pauvre petite had fainted. What folly! And lashing him with her tongue she renewed her fruitless efforts. But Craven scarcely heeded her. His eyes were fixed on the little white face on the pillow, and he ...
— The Shadow of the East • E. M. Hull
... very near losing the rampart itself, but some armor-bearers and baggage-carriers happened along and saved it. In their confidence, they had started out ahead and made a rush upon the barbarians; and the unexpectedness of their sally was of advantage to them, making them appear to be armed soldiers and not mere helpers. But the [lacuna] both was not present then and [lacuna] the night [lacuna] the camps [lacuna] and the Romans followed on. The enemy, perceiving the noise that they made in going ...
— Dio's Rome, Vol VI. • Cassius Dio
... It was the very unexpectedness of seeing land—combined with the desirability of such a sight—that hindered him from proclaiming it to his companions; and it was some time before he became convinced that his senses were not ...
— The Ocean Waifs - A Story of Adventure on Land and Sea • Mayne Reid
... their quarters afforded the best means for securing this desirable prize. Nor was the enterprise so desperate, considering the great advantages afforded by the character and weapons of the invaders, and the unexpectedness of the assault. The mere circumstance of acting on a concerted plan would alone make a small number more than a match for a much larger one. But it was not necessary to admit the whole of the Indian force into the city before the attack; and ...
— History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William Hickling Prescott
... hung together with her worship of life, with her belief, as she expressed it to you, all those years ago, that life must be begun many times anew. And it is this which, for all the appalling unexpectedness, the dreadful cataclysm of her temporal ending, has made the death of Gabrielle Delzant so strangely difficult, for me, at least, to realise as death ...
— Hortus Vitae - Essays on the Gardening of Life • Violet Paget, AKA Vernon Lee
... found that evening had sunk to dusk in a strange manner of unexpectedness. The young girl with the remarkably pleasant lips and white teeth was beside him. More than this—astonishingly more—his head was upon her lap, his face and neck were disagreeably wet, and her fingers were ...
— Far from the Madding Crowd • Thomas Hardy
... unrest of misery; he had said to himself that he was going to "tell Nannie, anyhow." The impulse to "tell" had become almost a physical necessity, and when he came into the room, the whole unhappy, hopeless business was hot on his lips. The mere unexpectedness of finding her here, alone, was like a touch against that precariously balanced sense of honor, which was his god, and had so far kept him, as he expressed it to himself, "square ...
— The Iron Woman • Margaret Deland
... yearning eyes. It was as though her attention had been specially recalled to him; as though his particular loss and sorrow were brusquely brought home to her. And then she was struck by the strangeness and unexpectedness of such a meeting between them. He had been to her a judge, an authority, an embodied standard. His high-mindedness had won her confidence; his affection for his sister had touched and charmed her. But she had never been ...
— Miss Bretherton • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... opened the door before me and entered. The surprise on the face of the poor Chinaman when he turned and saw before him a lady of years and no ordinary appearance, daunted me for an instant. But another look only showed me that his very surprise was inoffensive, and gathering courage from the unexpectedness of my own position, I inquired with all the politeness I could show ...
— That Affair Next Door • Anna Katharine Green
... since her disclosure. It was the face of a man who was no longer passion's slave, yet who found no advantage in his enfranchisement. He was simply regarding the harrowing contingencies of human experience, the unexpectedness of things. Nothing so pure, so sweet, so virginal as Tess had seemed possible all the long while that he had adored her, up to an hour ...
— Tess of the d'Urbervilles - A Pure Woman • Thomas Hardy
... of Mexican desperadoes would come, dynamite the dam, fire the buildings, stampede the horses, and like shadows vanish again. In the unexpectedness of the raid, in the confusion, in the dim light, no one would with certainty be able to say who the assailants were. A scheme ferocious in its conception and diabolical in its cunning! But there was one flaw—the element of chance. Chance had ...
— In the Shadow of the Hills • George C. Shedd
... sudden light and the utter unexpectedness of it all, could collect herself sufficiently to speak, he took both her hands in his with a movement infinitely tender and possessive, and drew ...
— East of the Shadows • Mrs. Hubert Barclay
... heaping up autumn gold, a white slim hand, smoothly fascinating. Then the little, restless hand swept near to his, almost touching it; and then instinctively he took it in his own, curiously, lifting it a little to consider its nearer loveliness. Perhaps it was the unexpectedness of it, perhaps it was sheer amazement that left her hand lying idly relaxed like a white petalled blossom in his. His bearing, too, was so blankly impersonal that for a moment the whole thing appeared inconsequent. Then, as her hand lay there, scarcely imprisoned, their eyes encountered,—and ...
— The Fighting Chance • Robert W. Chambers
... but the conversation of those early hours was far more stimulating and inspiring than any memory of it can ever be. There were few men, except Poe, famous in American or English literature of that era who did not appear once at least. The unexpectedness of the company was a great charm; for a brief period Boston enjoyed a sense of cosmopolitanism, and found it possible, as it is really possible only in London, to bring together busy guests with full and eager brains ...
— Authors and Friends • Annie Fields
... chiefs from Tanganyika to Khartoum. And throughout the Congo territory, and many an equatorial tribe beyond, this man's name has been known and feared. No leader of slave-hunters can come near him for bold and wide-sweeping raids, the terror and unexpectedness of which, together with the complete and ruthless fixity of purpose wherewith the objects of them, however strong, however alert, are struck and promptly subjugated, have gained for him among his followers and allies the sobriquet of El Khanac, "The Strangler." But the reader—together ...
— The Sign of the Spider • Bertram Mitford
... with such surprising versatility. It is true that your double often shows a certain discretion, and whilst obstinately defending certain untenable positions contrives to glide over some weak places, which come to light with provoking unexpectedness when you are encountered by an external enemy. Edwards, indeed, guards himself with extreme care by an elaborate system of logical divisions and subdivisions against the possibility of so unpleasant a surprise; but no man can dispense with the aid of a living antagonist, free from ...
— Hours in a Library, Volume I. (of III.) • Leslie Stephen
... immediately to make more trouble for the enemy, whose fortress was not far away, not only by making frequent raids upon them, but also by keeping such of the barbarians as were escorting provision-trains in a constant state of terror by the unexpectedness of their movements; but finally Sinthues was wounded in his right hand by a spear in a certain battle, and since the sinews were severed, he became thereafter unfit for fighting. And the Huns likewise, after they had made their camp near by, ...
— Procopius - History of the Wars, Books V. and VI. • Procopius
... others are there in their obvious glory, but he is the only one for whom the imagination, in our expressive modern phrase, sits up. "The Marriage in Cana," at the Salute, has all his characteristic and fascinating unexpectedness—the sacrifice of the figure of our Lord, who is reduced to the mere final point of a clever perspective, and the free, joyous presentation of all the other elements of the feast. Why, in spite of this queer one-sidedness, does the picture give us no impression of a lack of what ...
— Italian Hours • Henry James
... to Lady Dashfort affirmed that her wit depended merely on unexpectedness; a characteristic which may be applied to any impropriety of speech, manner, or conduct. In some of her ladyship's repartees, however, Lord Colambre now acknowledged there was more than unexpectedness; there was real ...
— The Absentee • Maria Edgeworth
... laughed at the unexpectedness of this reply; but Mr. Candish was wounded by the most faint suspicion of anything like trifling ...
— The Philistines • Arlo Bates
... sometimes by way of the old road through the wood-lot, or I appear casually, like a gust of wind, around the corner of the barn, or I let Horace discover me leaning with folded arms upon his cattle fence. I have come to love doing this, for unexpectedness in visitors, as in religion and politics, is disturbing to Horace and, as sand-grits in oysters produce pearls, my unexpected appearances have more than once astonished new thoughts in Horace, or yielded ...
— Great Possessions • David Grayson
... Unc' Billy. It wasn't fear that caused Jimmy to hurry. No, indeed, it wasn't fear. He had been startled by the unexpectedness of Bowser's appearance. It was this that had caused him to struggle to be first through that hole under the henhouse. But once through, he had felt a bit ashamed that he had been so undignified. He wasn't afraid of ...
— The Adventures of Jimmy Skunk • Thornton W. Burgess
... westward from Butte, as he rattled peacefully along the road, conscious of golden haze over all the land, and the unexpectedness of prairie threshing-crews on the sloping fields of mountainsides, a man had stepped out from bushes beside the road, and ...
— Free Air • Sinclair Lewis
... pair of dark-rimmed spectacles bestrided her forehead midway, appearing more for ornament than use. Never did Nature provide a more convenient resting-place for twin-glasses, than the ridge of Miss Thusa's nose, which rose with a sudden, majestic elevation, suggesting the idea of unexpectedness in the mind of the beholder. Every thing was harsh about her face, except the eyes, which had a soft, solemn, misty look, a look of prophecy, mingled with kindness and compassion, as if she pitied the evils her far-reaching vision beheld, but which she had not the power ...
— Helen and Arthur - or, Miss Thusa's Spinning Wheel • Caroline Lee Hentz
... laughing over the unexpectedness of the letter when Aunt Constance came in, and they ...
— The Making of Bobby Burnit - Being a Record of the Adventures of a Live American Young Man • George Randolph Chester
... reached the end of my 'beat', and had stopped to relight my pipe, when drama broke loose with the swift unexpectedness which was characteristic of the place. The stillness of the night was split by a sound which I could have heard in a gale and recognized among a hundred conflicting noises. It was a scream, a shrill, piercing squeal that did not rise ...
— The Little Nugget • P.G. Wodehouse
... beat of drum or blast of trumpet to say that it is coming, and to put us upon our guard. The batteries that do most harm to the advancing force are masked until the word of command is given, and then there is a flash from every cannon's throat and a withering hail of shot that confounds by its unexpectedness as well as kills by its blow. The fiery darts that light up the infernal furnace in a man's heart, and that smite him all unawares and unsuspecting, these are the weapons that we ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Ephesians; Epistles of St. Peter and St. John • Alexander Maclaren
... summer evening she stood on the water's brink and watched the flood go swaying past. She felt stupefied and bewildered. Whence came the flood, and how? A more unexpected thing had never happened to her. And now she knew that the children were safe, the unexpectedness of it, the amazement of the whole thing, seemed almost to ...
— The Island House - A Tale for the Young Folks • F. M. Holmes
... Hart received the first of his long series of honours. It came with delightful unexpectedness, with no warning of its arrival; simply, one day as he was going to see his lawyer, Mr. (afterwards Sir Nicholas) Hannen, a passing postman handed him a little brown-paper parcel with Swedish stamps on it. As he had neither ...
— Sir Robert Hart - The Romance of a Great Career, 2nd Edition • Juliet Bredon
... eyes of the daughter of Dick Waldron, the keeper of the Saints' Repose. Pierre would certainly have seen it had he been looking that way. An unusual influence was working upon the frequenters of the busy tavern. Planned, premeditated excitement was out of their line. Unexpectedness was the salt of their existence. This thing had an air of system not in accord with the suddenness of the Pipi mind. The half-breed was the only one entirely at his ease; he was languid and nonchalant; the long lashes of his half-shut ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... like yo' mother, Mr. Dan," she said with an unexpectedness that brought him to a halt. "An' I was the last one to see her the night she went away. She came in here, po' thing, all shiverin' with the cold, an' she wouldn't set down but kep' walkin' up an' down, up an' down, jest like you've been doin' fur ...
— The Battle Ground • Ellen Glasgow
... unexpectedness that marked her movements when she was very intent, she leant forward again, and, with her elbow on her knee, her chin on her hand, said in a low voice: "Is ...
— Maurice Guest • Henry Handel Richardson
... lasso shot through the air; and the loop glided swiftly over the great head and tightened suddenly around the hairy neck, just at the moment the bear came to the decision to charge Thure and sprang toward him, with the result that the sudden unexpectedness of the jerk of Bud's rope yanked him off his feet and ...
— The Cave of Gold - A Tale of California in '49 • Everett McNeil
... apt to mistake it for a beauty.[1] Nay, I am convinced that many admire this or that (even) British poet from the fact that here and there his meaning has gleamed upon them with all the charm that accompanies unexpectedness. ...
— Some Private Views • James Payn
... month at Piquetberg Road seemed a chapter out of another volume. It had culminated in that languid afternoon spent around the tea-table under the wattle tree in the garden, culminated there and also ended there. With the unexpectedness that marks all things in a time of war, the next noon found him steaming across the Cape Flats, with Maitland in sight. Two days later, they were loaded on an empty hospital ship returning to Durban. Piquetberg Road was child's play now, for the front was almost in sight. The voyage had ...
— On the Firing Line • Anna Chapin Ray and Hamilton Brock Fuller
... by Rodin with a feverish animation, which had only the more influence from its unexpectedness, the princess and Father d'Aigrigny looked at each other ...
— The Wandering Jew, Complete • Eugene Sue
... since he had even beamed old Paul, in Jarviston...? Now that most of the Syrtis Fever had left him, it seemed futile even to consider such a thing. It involved memories buried in enormous time, distance, change, and unexpectedness. ...
— The Planet Strappers • Raymond Zinke Gallun
... lack of scruple, his boldness that was smooth, and polished, and cool as bronze, there went a naive crudity, a simplicity like that of a school-boy, an uncivilized ingenuousness which was startling, and yet attractive, in its unexpectedness. The man who had bought the cuckoo-clocks and the cheap vases, who had set the gilded ball dancing upon the water of the faskeeyeh, who had broken the dim harmony of the colours in his resting-place by the introduction of that orange hue which seemed to reflect certain ...
— Bella Donna - A Novel • Robert Hichens
... what I hope, Mort. I'm rather dazed with the unexpectedness of all this. Let's see what ...
— The Voice in the Fog • Harold MacGrath
... think of and to talk about for a long time," remarked Jack to Percival when they were at last on the train going back to the Highlands, "and it is all the better that the trip was not what it was originally planned to be. The very unexpectedness of our adventures gave ...
— The Hilltop Boys on Lost Island • Cyril Burleigh
... The unexpectedness of the blow was crushing. He followed his cousin out into the sunshine in a sort of dream. Bruce Carmyle was addressing the driver of the ...
— The Adventures of Sally • P. G. Wodehouse
... simple children who ever lived in the lap of Nature. Unsophisticated, credulous, and strangely wanting in reasoning powers and organized self-defence, they fell ready victims to the onslaughts of the Spaniards, who burst with such dramatic unexpectedness on their north-eastern shores. ...
— South America • W. H. Koebel
... landmarks. It was a fine spring day and the woods were flecked with the white and pink blossoms of the dogwood—a tree which in England is only an inconspicuous hedgerow bush but here has both charm and importance and some of the unexpectedness of a tropical growth. I wish we could ...
— Roving East and Roving West • E.V. Lucas
... rush over a giddy slope of shale that looked perpetually upon the brink of a general slide down en masse, with their immense shadows underrunning them, the eagles startled suddenly by their unexpectedness a great red beast into motion. There was a clatter of antlers, a click of hoofs, a little shower of stones, and away went a superb stag, a "royal," a "twelve-pointer," lordly and supercilious, picking his way without a slip on that awful incline. But until ...
— The Way of the Wild • F. St. Mars
... for expended breath, a rail at the top encircled a stone peninsula and gave you a resting-place and an outlook—an outlook startlingly beautiful by reason of its unexpectedness. For the promontory had hidden the valley's loveliness, and here you found a sudden glorious peep at it. And then your eyes looking down, down below the rail, saw that cascades had met and the water was plunging in a wide glistening ...
— In the Mist of the Mountains • Ethel Turner |
