"Untoward" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... such an untoward accident as this, and, as he expressed it, "to bring his daughter's mind into intimate relations with nature," the fanatical philosopher established the town of Lindsleyville, determined that no family in which there was a young ...
— Duffels • Edward Eggleston
... by mistake; they had wrangled over the correct procedure if you lay in a rabbit-scrape or on the tram lines; the Major had lost a new ball; there was a mushroom on one of the greens between Puffin's ball and the hole.... All these untoward incidents had come crowding in together, and from the Major's point of view, the worst of them all had been the collective incident that Puffin, so far from being put off by the rain, had, in spite of mushroom and falling down, played with a steadiness of ...
— Miss Mapp • Edward Frederic Benson
... wasting precious moments in Sophia's antechamber, whilst Mademoiselle de Knesebeck apprised her Highness of his visit. Sophia had already retired to bed, and the amazing announcement of the Count's presence there startled her into a fear of untoward happenings. She was overwhelmed, too, by the rashness of this step of his, coming after the events of yesterday. If it should be known that he had visited her thus, terrible consequences might ensue. She rose, and with Mademoiselle de Knesebeck's aid made ready to receive him. Yet for all ...
— The Historical Nights Entertainment, Second Series • Rafael Sabatini
... to belittle the vast services thus rendered by a single individual to the Teuton race, or to overlook the degree of responsibility that attaches to the nations now banded together, and in especial to Russia, for the sequence of untoward phenomena which, now that they are not only seen, but felt, and felt ...
— England and Germany • Emile Joseph Dillon
... betrayed not the slightest sense of anything untoward in this mode of address, but looked round to the chauffeur with a slow, not ...
— Alias The Lone Wolf • Louis Joseph Vance
... the oldest Greek theorists supposed that the sports of chance had changed the material universe from its simple primitive form into its present heterogeneous condition, so their intellectual descendants imagined that but for untoward accident the human race would have conformed itself to simpler rules of conduct and a less tempestuous life. To live according to nature came to be considered as the end for which man was created, and which the best men were bound ...
— Ancient Law - Its Connection to the History of Early Society • Sir Henry James Sumner Maine
... pretensions to this large slice of territory of a Prince with whom he was at peace. If he did withdraw them, it was not from respect for the treaties which, a year before, had confirmed the King of Sardinia's rights as an independent sovereign, but from respect for the untoward results to himself which he was afraid, on reflection, might arise from enforcing his claims with the bayonet. But people forget; and it was of vital consequence that virtuous Austria should figure in the coming conflict not as the victim of aggression ...
— The Liberation of Italy • Countess Evelyn Martinengo-Cesaresco
... up, until the workers demanded the full product of their toil. Now it is clear that, when labor receives its full product capital must perish. And so the pygmy capitalists of that post-Plague day found their existence threatened by this untoward condition of affairs. To save themselves, they set a maximum wage, restrained the workers from moving about from place to place, smashed incipient organization, refused to tolerate idlers, and by most barbarous legal penalties punished those who disobeyed. ...
— War of the Classes • Jack London
... than before, and Betty, looking at her, was conscious of a sudden tender outgoing of the heart, a longing to help and comfort, such as had inspired Nan Vanburgh months before, but after which she herself had striven in vain. This was evidently a meeting of old lovers parted by some untoward fate. Ah, poor soul, and it had come too late! Youth and health, and joy and beauty, had all paid toll to the long years as they passed. How shocked and pained the General must be, to meet his love in such a sadly different guise! It was not possible he could ...
— Betty Trevor • Mrs. G. de Horne Vaizey
... remainder of his information. He had witnessed the scene, unobserved of his father, and had heard him say that he was on his way to see his daughter, who was going to marry a rich gentleman. The only good fortune attending the untoward incident was that the millwright's name had been printed as ...
— Life's Little Ironies - A set of tales with some colloquial sketches entitled A Few Crusted Characters • Thomas Hardy
... to Territorial law, assuming the character of insurrection, which, if it should occur, it would be my duty promptly to overcome and suppress. I cherish the hope, however, that the occurrence of any such untoward event will be prevented by the sound sense of the people of the Territory, who by its organic law, possessing the right to determine their own domestic institutions, are entitled while deporting themselves ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 3 (of 4) of Volume 5: Franklin Pierce • James D. Richardson
... service of Justice and Retribution. On whomsoever the choice of Fate shall fall, I vow the sentence of Death shall be fulfilled, by mine own hands if needs be, without weakness, or hesitation, or mercy. And if by any untoward chance this hand should fail, I swear—I swear, before the third day shall have passed, to ...
— The Black Cross • Olive M. Briggs
... triumph. On the second occasion, Bill Jones shared the captain's ducking, and all who chanced to be working about the dam at the time were completely drenched. But, however much their bodies might be moistened, no untoward accident could damp the ardour of their spirits. They resumed work again; repaired the breach, and, finally, turned the obstinate stream out of the course which, probably, it had occupied since creation. It rushed hissing, as if spitefully, along its new bed for a few yards, ...
— The Golden Dream - Adventures in the Far West • R.M. Ballantyne
... England in between the sea and those mountains yonder. You have heard, I doubt not, how England is resolved not to be thus held in check. Major George Washington and General Braddock have both made attacks upon Fort Duquesne, and though both have suffered defeat owing to untoward causes and bad generalship, the spirit within them is still unquenched. Fort Duquesne, Fort Niagara, Fort Ticonderoga—these are the three northern links of the chain, and I think that England will never rest until she has floated her flag over ...
— French and English - A Story of the Struggle in America • Evelyn Everett-Green
... colours may deck our mast in entering a new harbour, this will be found inside the space aft of the caboose; and again, by reaching the arm still further into the hollow behind our seat, it will grasp the storm mizen, a strongly made triangular sail, to be used only in untoward hours, and for which we must prepare by lowering the lug mizen, and shifting the halyard, tack, and sheet. Then the Rob Roy, with her mainsail and jib reefed, will be under snug canvas, ...
— The Voyage Alone in the Yawl "Rob Roy" • John MacGregor
... their raft, and loading up, started without untoward incident. Traveling day and night, allowing for stoppages and delays, they expected to be nearly five days on ...
— The Fur Bringers - A Story of the Canadian Northwest • Hulbert Footner
... performing a legitimate stroke of State, and imitating the vigorous policy of Ghazi-ud-din the younger; perhaps the plunder of the palace was necessary to conciliate his followers; perhaps the firing of the palace was an accident. But the result of the combination of untoward appearances has been to make his name a bye-word among the not over-sensitive inhabitants of Hindustan, familiar, by tradition and by personal experience, with almost every form of cruelty, and almost every degree of rebellion. It is said that during moments of reaction, after some of ...
— The Fall of the Moghul Empire of Hindustan • H. G. Keene
... rusty pan the minister had set under a broken spot in the ceiling. Upstairs a loosened shutter banged intermittently under the impact of the wind, which howled past, to lose itself with great commotion in the tops of the tall evergreens in the churchyard. It was the sort of day when untoward events, near and far, stand out with unpleasant prominence against the background of one's everyday life. A day in which a man is led, whether he will or not, to take stock of himself and to balance with some care the credit and ...
— An Alabaster Box • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman and Florence Morse Kingsley
... chief attraction. She wished me to take the leading part in the opening play and coach the others. I knew that I would have to give more time, than I could really spare, to make it a success. Further, there was always the possibility of some untoward event happening which at the last moment might prevent me from taking my part and probably breaking up the show. My scruples were, however, overcome by my hostess's kind insistence. We set to work, and all went happily until three nights before the date ...
— The Chronicles of a Gay Gordon • Jose Maria Gordon
... increased facilities which improved means of transit now offer to bachelors for running home on short leave have resulted in making the Anglo-Indian "spin" rather a drug in the market; and operating in the same untoward direction is the growing predilection on the part of the Anglo-Indian bachelor for other men's wives, in preference to hampering himself with the encumbrance of a wife of his own. Among other social products of India ...
— Camps, Quarters, and Casual Places • Archibald Forbes
... withdrawing the key the adventurer stood at alert attention; but the heavy silence of that sinister old rookery sang in his ears untroubled by any untoward sound.... ...
— The Lone Wolf - A Melodrama • Louis Joseph Vance
... not expect such a declaration to change the temper of the Lower House. Speeches were heard still more violent than those previously made. The Scots, to whose influence every untoward occurrence was imputed, were threatened with a repetition of the Sicilian Vespers. There were other members however who counselled moderation; for it almost appeared as if the dissolution of this Parliament might ...
— A History of England Principally in the Seventeenth Century, Volume I (of 6) • Leopold von Ranke
... perhaps she would be washed away by the fast rising tide before he could return. This thought had also decided him to take Alice, for should Isabel be washed off he might be able to save her, but how could he hope to save two in such untoward circumstances. ...
— Isabel Leicester - A Romance • Clotilda Jennings
... he's changed his lot for worse, Let him betimes the untoward choice reverse: For still, when all is said, the rule stands fast, That each man's shoe be made ...
— The Satires, Epistles, and Art of Poetry • Horace
... are unalterable, they often fall upon days of high seas and tempestuous winds, when the vessel pitches and rolls in a frightful manner. In consequence, many valuable lives are jeopardised from the razor being plied under such untoward circumstances. But these sea-barbers pride themselves upon their sea-legs, and often you will see them standing over their patients with their feet wide apart, and scientifically swaying their bodies to the motion of the ship, as they flourish ...
— White Jacket - or, the World on a Man-of-War • Herman Melville
... heath-croppers had returned noiselessly, and were looking on with erect heads just as before, their timid eyes fixed upon the scene, as if they were wondering what mankind and candle-light could have to do in these haunts at this untoward hour. ...
— The Return of the Native • Thomas Hardy
... that the situation of the Government at the end of the last session was such that he did not know how far its stability could be depended upon; that a variety of untoward circumstances had arisen which made their situation precarious, and under these impressions he did not feel himself authorized or justified in proposing a connexion with the Government to any person ...
— Memoirs of the Court of George IV. 1820-1830 (Vol 1) - From the Original Family Documents • Duke of Buckingham and Chandos
... of liberty. Tory dissentients fell slowly in to heel, as they found their governor no lath painted to look like iron, but very steel. To desponding Montreal merchants his reciprocity treaty yielded naturally all they had expected from a more drastic change. It is true that, owing to untoward circumstances, the treaty lasted only for the limited period prescribed by Elgin; but it tided over an awkward interval of ...
— British Supremacy & Canadian Self-Government - 1839-1854 • J. L. Morison
... abhorred priests; but though Parson Dale was emphatically a parson, he seemed at that moment so little of what Dr. Riccabocca understood by a priest that the Italian's heart smote him for his irreverent jest on the cloth. Luckily at this moment there was a diversion to that untoward commencement of conversation in the appearance of no less a personage than the donkey himself—I mean the donkey who ate ...
— My Novel, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... having taken it as I ought, allowing myself to give way to an oppression of the heart caused by the blackenings, the contradictions, and the pains of irresolution, and the fear of doing something untoward in a matter of extreme importance to the State. As for what you say to me about my indecision, it is true that I myself reproach myself for it, and I pray God every day to give me, together with wisdom and prudence, strength and courage to carry out what I believe ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume VI. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... exerting itself against a weak antagonist. It was not likely that this feeling was strong enough to lead to action, but at least during that summer of 1898 it was somewhat unpleasant for American tourists in Paris, and an untoward episode might easily have brought unfriendly sentiment to a dangerous head. Austria had never been very friendly to the United States, particularly since the execution of the Emperor Maximilian in Mexico, which ...
— The Path of Empire - A Chronicle of the United States as a World Power, Volume - 46 in The Chronicles of America Series • Carl Russell Fish
... the left eye of the gallant commander and compelled his immediate removal below. The wound, in three days, proved mortal. His nephew, Marco Contarini, rushing to his assistance, was also slain. These untoward events for a moment paralyzed the efforts of the Venetians. The galley became the centre of so severe a fire that its defenders were more than once swept away, and it was in great danger of being taken. Frederigo ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 1-20 • Various
... became the "learned blacksmith," how Hugh Miller brought himself to be an authority on the old red sandstone, are always inspiring stories to the ambitious student. And in any list of achievements by those bound in by untoward circumstance must be placed that of Booker T. Washington as told by himself in ...
— Children's Literature - A Textbook of Sources for Teachers and Teacher-Training Classes • Charles Madison Curry
... be supposed that the outset of Iglesias' spiritual journey was wholly serene, free from obstacle or hesitation, from risk of untoward selection, or rejection, of the safe way. Many roads, and those bristling with contradictory signposts, presented themselves. Noisy touts, each crying up his own special mode and means of conveyance, rushed ...
— The Far Horizon • Lucas Malet
... vice in both, Look on him, and see their growth. View him on the mother's side,[2] Fill'd with falsehood, spleen, and pride; Positive and overbearing, Changing still, and still adhering; Spiteful, peevish, rude, untoward, Fierce in tongue, in heart a coward; When his friends he most is hard on, Cringing comes to beg their pardon; Reputation ever tearing, Ever dearest friendship swearing; Judgment weak, and passion strong, Always various, always wrong; Provocation never ...
— Poems (Volume II.) • Jonathan Swift
... work upon but those out of which God has been pleased to form the inhabitants of this island. If these be radically and essentially vicious, all that can be said is, that those men are very unhappy, to whose fortune or duty it falls to administer the affairs of this untoward people. I hear it indeed sometimes asserted, that a steady perseverance in the present measures, and a rigorous punishment of those who oppose them, will in course of time infallibly put an end to these disorders. But this, in my opinion, is said without much observation ...
— Selections from the Speeches and Writings of Edmund Burke. • Edmund Burke
... discredited and bankrupt exile. From first to last he had insisted that the Restoration should not be brought about at the expense of conditions to any foreign Power. He had imparted much of his own undying confidence to his English correspondents, and had kept alive the flame of loyalty under untoward circumstances. He had compromised the cause by no dangerous engagement, and had maintained, with unswerving rectitude, his own convictions of constitutional principle. He had been sustained by the sure confidence that, in poverty and exile, quite as much as when in the possession ...
— The Life of Edward Earl of Clarendon V2 • Henry Craik
... Bradshaw with us to prove our point, we accepted the ultimatum, although Miss Cassandra relieved her feelings by saying that she did not believe a word of it, and that tourist's agents were a stiff-necked and untoward generation, and that she for her part felt sure that we could cut across the country to Saincaize and Bourges. However, when we hear the questions that are asked these long-suffering agents at the tourist offices ...
— In Chteau Land • Anne Hollingsworth Wharton
... that comfortable library previously referred to and were sweetly unaware that any untoward series of incidents had ever led to an ...
— The Rejuvenation of Aunt Mary • Anne Warner
... must have been, judging by her public avowal of the parricide. It is surprising, therefore—and one must bow down before the judgment of God when He leaves mankind to himself—that a mind evidently of some grandeur, professing fearlessness in the most untoward and unexpected events, an immovable firmness and a resolution to await and to endure death if so it must be, should yet be so criminal as she was proved to be by the parricide to which she confessed before her judges. She had nothing in her face that would indicate such evil. ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - THE MARQUISE DE BRINVILLIERS • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... of the army marched back to Winchester; Winder, with the Stonewall Brigade and two batteries, remaining before Harper's Ferry to hold Saxton in check. Jackson himself returned to Winchester by the railway, and on the way he was met by untoward news. As the train neared Winchester a staff officer, riding at a gallop across the fields, signalled it to stop, and the general was informed that the 12th Georgia had been driven from Front Royal, burning the stores, but not the bridges, at Front Royal, and that ...
— Stonewall Jackson And The American Civil War • G. F. R. Henderson
... each other in the years that followed; how the boy had come to her for sympathy in his childish joys and sorrows; how he had sought her counsel, and guided himself by it, in riper years. She recalled with sadness the untoward events which had interfered to separate him from her and from his early home as he advanced to manhood. Things had not gone well with him in the last years of his life, and he sank under a burden of ...
— The Orphans of Glen Elder • Margaret Murray Robertson
... throw" the ball was lost, and the barefooted fielders had to pick their way painfully about in the outlying saw-palmetto scrub till they found it. I had never seen our "national game" played under conditions so untoward. None but true patriots would have the heart to try it, I thought, and I meditated writing to Washington, where the quadrennial purification of the civil service was just then in progress,—under a new broom,—to secure, if possible, ...
— A Florida Sketch-Book • Bradford Torrey
... begun. The skilful hand that should have finished it had perhaps to grasp sword or spear in the last vain attempt to repel the assault of the invader, and we can only wonder over his half-done work, and imagine what untoward fate befell the worker, and for what unknown master, if he survived the sack, he may have exercised the skill that once gratified the refined taste of his ...
— The Sea-Kings of Crete • James Baikie
... to a close our hasty survey of the entire Norman-French period, a period mainly of formation, which has left no literary work of great and permanent fame, but in which, after all, there were some sincere and talented writers, who have fallen into forgetfulness rather through the untoward accidents of time than from lack of ...
— A History of English Literature • Robert Huntington Fletcher
... of a mother overcoming the effect of heredity by the sheer force of her own will-power. But perhaps in the long run it is as well; for there are advantages on the other side. It should be a satisfaction to mothers to know that their children will not be marked or injured by untoward events in the antenatal days; that if the child's heredity can not be changed for the better, neither can it ...
— Applied Eugenics • Paul Popenoe and Roswell Hill Johnson
... life and try another plan. One could never make sure, by such a test, how much circumstance and how much innate ideas had to do with one's disposition. Emerson insisted that man makes his circumstance, and history seemed to support that theory. How untoward had been, in appearance, the surroundings of those who had made all the great movements and done all the great deeds of the world. Let one consider the poverty, persecution, the incessant discouragement, and often the tragic end of our greatest benefactors. ...
— The Daughters of Danaus • Mona Caird
... The first untoward incident involving America's forces on land or sea was the sinking of the transport Antilles on October 27, 1917, by a German submarine, when 67 men—officers, seamen and soldiers—were lost. The vessel was returning from a French port ...
— Kelly Miller's History of the World War for Human Rights • Kelly Miller
... weak and sickly, but the favourite of my parents beyond all my brothers and sisters, because they saw that my mind was far superior to my sickly frame, and feared they should never raise me to manhood; contrary, however, to their expectations, I surmounted all these untoward appearances, and attracted much notice from my liveliness, quickness of repartee, and impudence: qualities which have been of much use ...
— Frank Mildmay • Captain Frederick Marryat
... that, a moment earlier, had bellowed vociferous cheers. The great Michael Costa, who was conducting, dropped his baton in astonishment, and, refusing to pick it up again, left his desk. There is a theory that it was this untoward incident that led him to transfer himself from the Haymarket to Covent Garden. Quite possible. Musicians ...
— The Magnificent Montez - From Courtesan to Convert • Horace Wyndham
... of these chapters saw how a late, untoward year operates on the bleak shores of the north-western Highlands, when spending a season there a good many years ago. He found what only a few twelvemonths previous had been a piece of dark moor, laid out into minute patches of corn, and bearing a dense population. ...
— Leading Articles on Various Subjects • Hugh Miller
... this time that Bad Luck, that gaunt specter that lurks unseen in the shadows and hovers over the little lives of men for the working of harm, swooped down upon the camp and in a series of untoward happenings impaired its efficiency and impregnated the atmosphere ...
— The Promise - A Tale of the Great Northwest • James B. Hendryx
... much time, blank documents were passed about for all to write upon whatever they imagined to the disadvantage of the Jesuits. By an untoward chance, a bundle of these, sent to the agent of the Bishop in Spain, was taken on the voyage by an English corsair. The worthy pirate (no doubt a Protestant) was, if we can believe the Jesuits, extremely scandalized at the bad faith of those ...
— A Vanished Arcadia, • R. B. Cunninghame Graham
... impressed by the untoward circumstances that injure great pictures, and not unfrequently bring about total destruction. I have felt sorry for the beautiful paintings condemned to travel from land to land, never finding some fixed abode whither admirers of great masterpieces may travel to see them. And I have always thought ...
— Cousin Pons • Honore de Balzac
... into general descriptions of nature: he looks at her over his clipped hedges, and from his well-swept garden-walks; or if he makes a bolder experiment now and then, it is with an air of precaution, as if he were afraid of being caught in a shower of rain, or of not being able, in case of any untoward accident, to make good his retreat home. He shakes hands with nature with a pair of fashionable gloves on, and leads "his Vashti" forth to public view with a look of consciousness and attention to etiquette, as a fine gentleman hands a lady out to dance a minuet. He is delicate to fastidiousness, ...
— Lectures on the English Poets - Delivered at the Surrey Institution • William Hazlitt
... illumined the air. One would have called it a veritable kaleidoscope, a real operatic scene; and for a moment our little locality might have thought itself transported into the midst of a dream of the 'Thousand and One Nights.' Let us state that no untoward event disturbed this family meeting." And he added "Only the absence of the clergy was remarked. No doubt the priests understand progress in another fashion. Just as you please, messieurs ...
— Madame Bovary • Gustave Flaubert
... endeavouring to inspire you with an idea that he is one of the happiest of mortals; while, perhaps, the worm of sorrow is secretly gnawing his heart, and preying upon his constitution. Honourable sentiment, struggling with untoward circumstances, is destroying his vitals; not having the courage to pollute his character by a jail-delivery, or to condescend to white-washing, or some low bankrupt trick, to extricate himself from difficulty, in order to ...
— Real Life In London, Volumes I. and II. • Pierce Egan
... approved, should present himself at an early hour to wish the compliments of the season, and the door is not opened to let any one else in until the arrival of the favoured person. He is regaled with spice cake and cheese, and with ale or spirits, as the case may be. All the 'ill luck'—that is, the untoward circumstances of the year, would be ascribed to the accident of a person with light hair having been the first to enter a dwelling on the mornings referred to. I have known instances where such persons, innocently presenting ...
— A Righte Merrie Christmasse - The Story of Christ-Tide • John Ashton
... reproved my good Hans for his untoward jest," was the easy comment of Truchsess upon ...
— Historical Tales, Vol 5 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality, German • Charles Morris
... A second time, untoward nature recalled me from the sleep of death. I found myself stretched upon the bed. When I had power to look up, I remembered only that I had cause to fear. My distempered fancy fashioned to itself no distinguishable image. I threw a languid glance round ...
— Stories by Modern American Authors • Julian Hawthorne
... the suburbs, which I have promised her to go and see. It seems that a week before he had the impertinence to offer himself to her he received word that his plans for a vast railroad station in one of the large Western cities had been accepted. But for this untoward circumstance, my dear Josie would still be the light of my house, and I should not be gnawing at my mustache in the throes ...
— The Opinions of a Philosopher • Robert Grant
... time in following his inclinations and seeking the Pearl in her own home, but his delay had cost him a word with her, and he did not arrive at the Gallito house until after she and Bob Flick had left. This was the first untoward event in a successful morning, but he concealed his chagrin and, with his usual adaptability to circumstances, exerted himself to be agreeable to Mrs. Gallito, not without hope of gaining more or ...
— The Black Pearl • Mrs. Wilson Woodrow
... this untoward condition, Mr Sparks went out one morning and entered into society. Society did not regard him with a favourable eye, but Sparks was not thin-skinned; he persevered, being determined, come what might, to seek his fortune. Poor fellow, like many a man in ...
— Life in the Red Brigade - London Fire Brigade • R.M. Ballantyne
... her—you prepared for us a soft and flowery path, all gentle thoughts adorned it—your name, O Love, was not spoken, but you stood the Genius of the Hour, veiled, and time, but no mortal hand, might raise the curtain. Organs of articulate sound did not proclaim the union of our hearts; for untoward circumstance allowed no opportunity for the expression that hovered on our lips. Oh my pen! haste thou to write what was, before the thought of what is, arrests the hand that guides thee. If I lift up ...
— The Last Man • Mary Shelley
... top of the book. "Be sure of your door. If you hear any untoward sounds in the night call to the captain whose cabin ...
— The Pagan Madonna • Harold MacGrath
... were by the Nepean River on the other, is now entitled the County Of Cumberland. For many years, this single district supplied the wants of the settlers. Upon it they found ample pasture for their herds, and sufficient employment for themselves. Nor was it until a succession of untoward seasons, and the rapid increase of their stock pointed out to them the necessity of seeking for more extensive pasturage, that they contemplated surmounting that dark and rugged chain of mountains, which, like the natural ramparts of Spain and Italy, rose high over the nether ...
— Two Expeditions into the Interior of Southern Australia, Complete • Charles Sturt
... will be closed with, being only for a Marquisate for Lord Hertford, and the sole question now being the time of doing it. Upon the whole, I am far from thinking that we end the session at all weaker than we began it, notwithstanding some untoward circumstances which occurred. Our foreign politics are going on, in my apprehension, as successfully as possible. The French were beginning to cabal against us at Berlin, but the signature of the Treaty has completely overthrown them there. They were at the ...
— Memoirs of the Courts and Cabinets of George the Third - From the Original Family Documents, Volume 1 (of 2) • The Duke of Buckingham and Chandos
... mind. What phantom trouble was threatening him? Had she been commissioned to tell him of some untoward event? Some business calamity? Had she fallen in love with some one he could not permit her to marry? He looked questioningly at her, but her expression only perplexed him still more; she was trembling no longer, and her eyes were clear and bright, there was a strong look about ...
— We Two • Edna Lyall
... when those circumstances have been such as to develop the man's powers to the utmost, and to fit him to do best that of which he is best capable. Looked at in this way, Charles Dickens' education, however untoward and unpromising it may often have seemed while in the process, must really be pronounced a prize of ...
— Life of Charles Dickens • Frank Marzials
... positive measures to ensure the prosperous course of her pregnancy and delivery. At the quickening she sacrifices a young pig and charges it to convey her prayer to Doh Tenangan; and on the occurrence of any untoward incident, such as a fall, the prayer and sacrifice are repeated. The carcases of the victims are stuck upon poles before the house near her door, and the inevitable feathered sticks, smeared with blood, are thrust behind a roof beam in the gallery ...
— The Pagan Tribes of Borneo • Charles Hose and William McDougall
... took their seats around a high soup tureen from which issued a smell of cabbage. In spite of this untoward incident, the supper was cheerful. The cider was good; the Loiseau couple and the Sisters drank of it by economy. the others ordered wine. Cornudet called for a bottle of beer. He had a peculiar way of uncorking the bottle, making the beer foam, examining it as he inclined ...
— Mademoiselle Fifi • Guy de Maupassant
... were almost universally discontinued soon after the beginning of the nineteenth century. The general trend of moderation discernible at that time, however, was hampered then and thereafter by the series of untoward events beginning with the San Domingo upheaval and ending with John Brown's raid. In particular the rise of the Garrisonian agitation and the quickly ensuing Nat Turner's revolt occasioned together a wave of reactionary legislation the whole South ...
— American Negro Slavery - A Survey of the Supply, Employment and Control of Negro Labor as Determined by the Plantation Regime • Ulrich Bonnell Phillips
... Channing, making prisoner of his hand. "I said this untoward loss of the suit might turn out to be a blessing in disguise. And so it will; it is bringing forth the sterling love of my children. You are ...
— The Channings • Mrs. Henry Wood
... untoward circumstances all hope of peace between the French and the Five Nations had not been destroyed. The Iroquois loved their revenge and were willing to wait for it, but caution warned them that it would not be advantageous ...
— The Fighting Governor - A Chronicle of Frontenac • Charles W. Colby
... surrounded in the miserable little shop and the miserable little noisy evening school, with that miserable old bundle of incompetence always to be dragged and shouldered. I reflected that even in those untoward times there must have been latent in Biddy what was now developing, for, in my first uneasiness and discontent I had turned to her for help, as a matter of course. Biddy sat quietly sewing, shedding no more tears, and while I looked at her and thought ...
— Great Expectations • Charles Dickens
... them, the causes of the temper which we are examining; and it will be seen that only the last is quite peculiar to mountain and marsh districts, although there is a somewhat greater probability that the others also may be developed among hills more than in plains. When, by untoward accident, all are associated, and the conditions described under the fifth head are very distinct, the result is even sublime in its painfulness. Of places subjected to such evil influence, none are quite so characteristic ...
— Modern Painters, Volume IV (of V) • John Ruskin
... that have appeared, rather than let the affair pass unnoticed in our pages. We do so from a wish to preserve certain traits and anecdotes which the occasion drew forth,—to give the pleasant rather than the "untoward" events of the day: though we must own the whole appears to have been a very droll business, always excepting ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. XIX. No. 532. Saturday, February 4, 1832 • Various
... I am foolish," answered Blake, a shade discomfited. "But I want not for excuse. I have it in the matter that brings me here." So solemn was his air, so sober his voice, that both girls felt a premonition of the untoward message that he bore. It was Ruth who asked him to ...
— Mistress Wilding • Rafael Sabatini
... hand all the way to church, but to appear to take it out of your pocket on entering, and some plumped it down noisily like men paying their way. I believe old Snecky Hobart, who was a canty stock but obstinate, once dropped a penny into the plate and took out a halfpenny as change, but the only untoward thing that happened to the plate was once when the lassie from the farm of Curly Bog capsized it in passing. Mr. Dishart, who was always a ready man, introduced something into his sermon that day about women's dress, which every one hoped Chirsty Lundy, the lassie in question, would remember. ...
— Auld Licht Idylls • J. M. Barrie
... down on a rude bench and rested his head on his hands as if he had come to some disagreeable, and perhaps terrible conclusion. And so indeed he had. The uneasy suspicions which had been floating in his mind in a state of solution were suddenly crystallized by this untoward event. The absurdity of a man's having tramped twenty miles through an almost unbroken wilderness to preach the gospel to a garter snake, burst upon him with a crushing force. This grotesque denouement of ...
— The Redemption of David Corson • Charles Frederic Goss
... again, and then, making a deep bow, with a knife in one hand and a toaster in the other, he said: "Madam, I prithee forgive me for my untoward conduct of an hour since. Say but the word ...
— Love Stories • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... my back to her. I had two objects in view: I wished to see the shipping-list, as it was my aim to leave the country for America by the first opportunity; and, secondly, to see what account the public had got of my untoward adventure. I felt conscious that all the city was in commotion about it, and the authorities despatched for my apprehension; for I had no doubt that my nurse would at once declare her innocence, and tell who had done the deed. ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume 2 - Historical, Traditional, and Imaginative • Alexander Leighton
... assumed the care of his lovely young niece. Some openly declared that he had done this from mercenary motives; but be that as it may, the story will divulge his character. He had not left her surrounded by the gayety and dissipation of the court of Florence without some misgivings, lest some untoward circumstance might befall her, or that she might become entangled in some alliance contrary to her own ...
— The Duke's Prize - A Story of Art and Heart in Florence • Maturin Murray
... which so often arranges favourably the events apparently very unfavourable. For, at the best, foresight has but probabilities to work with; but chance, whose tools we know not, very often contradicts all our bad prophecies, and untangles untoward events far beyond our best prudence or wisdom. And Katharine was so happy. She was really Richard's wife; and on that solid vantage-ground she felt able to beat off trouble, and to defend her ...
— The Bow of Orange Ribbon - A Romance of New York • Amelia E. Barr
... father entered on this farm at Whitsuntide, 1766, and he had reached his eighteenth when the lease came to a close in 1777. All the years between these two dates were to the family of Burness one long sore battle with untoward circumstances, ending in defeat. If the hardest toil and severe self-denial could have procured success, they would not have failed. It was this period of his life which Robert afterwards described, as combining "the cheerless gloom of a hermit with the unceasing moil of galley-slave." The ...
— Robert Burns • Principal Shairp
... physician wants to prescribe iron which will cause no untoward effects, such as disturbing the stomach, affecting the teeth, etc., this PHYSIOLOGICAL TONICUM is the best preparation of iron he can find in ...
— The Handy Cyclopedia of Things Worth Knowing - A Manual of Ready Reference • Joseph Triemens
... before, he naturally found her something a vast deal higher in the husband market than a two-hundred-a-year poster designer. Mark Spayley, the brainmouse who had helped the financial lion with such untoward effect, was left to curse the day he ...
— The Chronicles of Clovis • Saki
... was fixed upon this granddaughter who might possibly become a queen. At Rufford there are two curiously touching portraits of this dreamy child, in whose sad little face one reads the promise of untoward fortunes. In 1576 the Earl of Lennox died, and two years later Queen Elizabeth took "oure lyttl Arbella" under her protection. When she was seven years old, this "very proper child" sent a specimen of her handwriting to her royal kinswoman, desiring the bearer to present her "humble ...
— The Dukeries • R. Murray Gilchrist
... battle is nothing to the livor, the burning hatred of the drawing-room. Dalton, defeated, cast a glance of deadly hostility on the Duke. Nor was it lost. While the waltz continued, for ten minutes, he stood motionless. Fearing some untoward event, I came down and took my ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Number 9, July, 1858 • Various
... you, after telling you of my walks, that my constitution has been renovated here, and that I have recovered my activity even whilst attaining a little embonpoint. My imprudence last winter, and some untoward accidents just at the time I was weaning my child, had reduced me to a state of weakness which I never before experienced. A slow fever preyed on me every night during my residence in Sweden, and after I arrived at Tonsberg. By chance I found a fine rivulet filtered ...
— Letters written during a short residence in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark • Mary Wollstonecraft
... sanctifying those watch-towers of Nature which guard the hoary shrine of Boro-Boedoer. At Matoelan we hear that the swift river separating the great Temple from the secular world is in flood, the bridge broken down, and the supplementary raft impossible through the swirling current. This untoward event involves a further expedition to Magelang, a sordid town of continuous markets, the Javanese population being of pronounced Hindu type, silent and sad, according to the idiosyncracy of their mysterious ancestors across the ...
— Through the Malay Archipelago • Emily Richings
... wakened the astounded night-porter of the Desert Palace Hotel, and demanded a car to be brought upon the instant. And lucky it was for her that she made one of the ducal party, for nothing else would have procured her her heart's desire at that untoward hour before dawn. ...
— The Hawk of Egypt • Joan Conquest
... each other like sisters. Stonor remained at the door watching the clear space between the shack and the river. Nothing stirred there. Stonor heard no more untoward sounds. ...
— The Woman from Outside - [on Swan River] • Hulbert Footner
... that!" said the babu. "That is veree simplee told. That is simple little matter. There is nothing untoward in that connection. Risaldar-Major Ranjoor Singh, who is legal owner of ring, same being his property, gave it ...
— Winds of the World • Talbot Mundy
... forgot the prospect of untoward change. The bray of a lazy burro broke the afternoon quiet, and it was comfortingly suggestive of the drowsy farmyard, and the open corrals, and the green alfalfa fields. Her clear sight intensified the purple sage-slope as it rolled before her. Low swells of prairie-like ground ...
— Riders of the Purple Sage • Zane Grey
... dragged very reluctantly to this marriage, for he wished to be shackled by no such ties. He was the son of Peter's first wife, not of the Empress Catharine, whom the tzar had now acknowledged. Peter and Catharine attended these untoward nuptials, which were celebrated in the palace of the Queen of Poland, in which a princess as lovely in character as in person was sacrificed to one who made the few remaining months of her life a continued martyrdom. But little more than a ...
— The Empire of Russia • John S. C. Abbott
... improper'y called convulsions[409]. He could sit motionless, when he was told so to do, as well as any other man; my opinion is that it proceeded from a habit which he had indulged himself in, of accompanying his thoughts with certain untoward actions, and those actions always appeared to me as if they were meant to reprobate some part of his past conduct. Whenever he was not engaged in conversation, such thoughts were sure to rush into his mind; and, for this reason, any company, any employment whatever, he preferred to ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 1 • Boswell
... advisable to have an abundant supply of provisions in the different forts in advance of this, as well for the support of their respective garrisons, as for the subsistence of the general army, in the event of its being driven into them, by untoward circumstances. With this view, three hundred pack horses, laden with flour, were sent on to fort Recovery; and as it was known that considerable bodies of the enemy were constantly hovering about the forts, and awaiting opportunities of cutting off any detachments from the main army, major ...
— Life of Tecumseh, and of His Brother the Prophet - With a Historical Sketch of the Shawanoe Indians • Benjamin Drake
... slumbering harpers,—in the dead winter, when the white plague of the North has caged its wasted victims, shuddering as they think of the frozen soil which must be quarried like rock to receive them, if their perpetual convalescence should happen to be interfered with by any untoward accident,—at every season, the narrow sulky rolled round freighted with unmeasured burdens ...
— Elsie Venner • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... and went to bed and passed an interminable night in tossing to and fro, and bewailing the untoward fate of the two children. Dawn came at last, though it had seemed as if it never would break again, and, for the first time for many a year, the first gleam of sunlight saw her dressed and downstairs. She felt feverous and ill, and having brewed for herself a huge ...
— Julia And Her Romeo: A Chronicle Of Castle Barfield - From "Schwartz" by David Christie Murray • David Christie Murray
... and his staff and the British correspondents left next morning early, about six A. M. No untoward incidents occurred at the time of their departure which was, of course, unknown to ...
— My Four Years in Germany • James W. Gerard
... them, carried Number Nine to the water's edge, saw paddles and everything in order for a quick launching, and lolled about carelessly on the sand. They were guilty of not advertising that anything untoward was afoot, although they did steal glances up to their ...
— On the Makaloa Mat/Island Tales • Jack London
... to," faltered Mrs. Bunting. She could scarcely get the words out. She realised with acute discomfort, yes, and shame, how strange, how untoward, was that which she was going to do. Fancy a respectable woman wanting to ...
— The Lodger • Marie Belloc Lowndes
... packet into the hands of his faithful subject Latour, in England, and he, in preference to putting it into a safe, which might attract the spies of the conspirators, kept it in a small cavity behind the wainscoting in the drawing-room at Buckworth—a spot which he showed me, so that if any untoward event occurred I should at least know where the documents were secreted. When I realised the terrible fate of the unfortunate Latour and noticed the disordered state of the room and study beyond, I suspected that search ...
— The Count's Chauffeur • William Le Queux
... leaps ashore with the goods intended for barter, while the boats, with their oars shipped, and every man on his thwart, lie just outside the surf, heading off the shore, in readiness at the first untoward event to escape to the open sea. As soon as the traffic is concluded, one of the boats pulls in under cover of the muskets of the others, the fruit is quickly thrown into her, and the transient visitors precipitately ...
— Typee - A Romance of the South Sea • Herman Melville
... if he seith the thridde To love of that he hadde ment: Thus many a lovere hath be schent. Tell on therfore, hast thou be oon Of hem that Slowthe hath so begon? Ye, fader, ofte it hath be so, That whanne I am mi ladi fro And thenke untoward hire drawe, Than cast I many a newe lawe 560 And al the world torne up so doun, And so recorde I mi lecoun And wryte in my memorial What I to hire telle schal, Riht al the matiere of mi tale: Bot al nys worth a note schale; For whanne ...
— Confessio Amantis - Tales of the Seven Deadly Sins, 1330-1408 A.D. • John Gower
... Europe. Besides writing to his patron the bishop of Burgos, he lodged a complaint against Cortes before the royal audience at St Domingo; but the members sent him an answer highly favourable to us, with whose good services they were already acquainted. All these untoward circumstances gave the adelantado infinite vexation, insomuch that from being very fat, he became quite lean. But he used every exertion to collect a powerful armament on purpose to overwhelm us as rebels against his ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. III. • Robert Kerr
... wheresoe'er he be, Are at his heart; and such fidelity It is his darling passion to approve; More brave for this, that he hath much to love:— 'Tis, finally, the Man who lifted high, Conspicuous object in a Nation's eye, Or left unthought-of in obscurity,— Who, with a toward or untoward lot, Prosperous or adverse, to his wish or not— Plays, in the many games of life, that one Where what he most doth value must be won: Whom neither shape of danger can dismay, Nor thought of tender happiness betray; Who, not content that former worth stand fast, Looks ...
— Poems Teachers Ask For • Various
... so violently, that they took to flight precipitately in all directions; while the burning embers set fire to some bamboos, and nearly consumed the baggage. They, however, succeeded in snatching it up before the flames reached it; but by this untoward accident, they lost six asses and one horse, and most of the party were severely stung about the ...
— Life and Travels of Mungo Park in Central Africa • Mungo Park
... surroundings, efforts of another type, his power was now irrevocably gone; he shrank more than ever from the egotisms of competition. But within the old lines he had recovered an abundant energy. Among his workmen; amid the details now fortunate, now untoward of his labours for the solution of certain problems of industrial ethics; in the working of the remarkable pamphlet scheme dealing with social and religious fact, which was fast making his name famous in the ears of the England which thinks and labours; and in the self-devoted help of the unhappy,—he ...
— The History of David Grieve • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... high priestess of Nature; and that they were in deadly antagonism. They were Ormuzd and Ahriman. She was a strangely fanciful young woman, and she dwelt much on this thing, until, half fearing certain untoward doubts and promptings of her heart, she began to think that if now and at once Mr. Jacomb would only ask her to be his wife, she would avoid all perils and confusions by directly accepting him, and so decide her future ...
— The Beautiful Wretch; The Pupil of Aurelius; and The Four Macnicols • William Black
... all over now! Oh, Heaven, that I should have so deceived myself! Harrington loves another—Lucy whom he has known almost since childhood, and from whom a series of untoward circumstances separated him. There is, there can be no doubt—no room for a single hope—the General himself ...
— Mabel's Mistake • Ann S. Stephens
... his personal likes and dislikes. But these visits were a torture to him! To sit and talk for hours with a man, grateful enough, but peevish and commonplace, and with a curious lack of virility or self-reliance in his untoward circumstances, was trial enough to Matravers, who had been used to select his associates and associations with delicate and close care. But to remember that this man had been, and indeed was, the husband of Berenice, was madness! It was this man, whom at the best he could only ...
— Berenice • E. Phillips Oppenheim |
