"Detestable" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... think of the gentle Louise, secretly anticipating the rigours of convent life, torturing her delicate skin by wearing coarse serge, and burning tallow candles in her chamber to accustom herself to their detestable odour. ...
— A Versailles Christmas-Tide • Mary Stuart Boyd
... long remember. "Hogarth," he said, "it is true, is often gross; but it must be remembered that he painted in a less fastidious age than ours, and that his great object was to expose vice. Debauchery is always made by him detestable, never attractive." Charles Lamb, one of the best of his commentators, who has viewed his labors in a kindred spirit, speaking of one of his most elaborate and varied works, the "Election Entertainment," asks, "What is the result left on the mind? Is it an impression of the vileness and worthlessness ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 2, May, 1851 • Various
... take it," argued Polly, "is a house where the detestable human vipers known as boarders are 'taken in ...
— Polly Oliver's Problem • Kate Douglas Smith Wiggin
... sudden acquaintance and somewhat intimate relation between us two seemed to afford no real pleasure either to Belknap or Orme. For my part, with no clear reason in the world, it seemed to me that both Belknap and Orme were very detestable persons. Had the framing of this scene been left utterly to me, I should have had none present at the fireside save myself and Ellen Meriwether. All these wide gray plains, faintly tinged in the hollows with green, and all this sweeping sky of blue, and all this sparkling ...
— The Way of a Man • Emerson Hough
... congratulate myself upon having at last fallen upon a school that furnished a combination of what I consider the best features of both the English and Scotch schools, to the exclusion of all that is detestable and soul-harassing in either. "No more for me," I soliloquized, "of presiding magisterially at the odious dinner-table, at which not a whisper is tolerated, and even the irrepressible chuckle over some ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 22, September, 1878 • Various
... grudgingly that the Colonel was justified in his decision,—that as Second in Command he was the right man to remain in charge of the station. But the acknowledgment did not make the necessity one whit less detestable in his eyes; and to-night the two men's positions were reversed. It was Paul who moved to and fro with long restless strides; while Theo, enveloped in a cloud of blue smoke, sat watching him in profound sympathy and understanding, ...
— Captain Desmond, V.C. • Maud Diver
... gravely told that education must precede emancipation. The logic of this plea is, that intellectual superiority justly gives one man an oppressive control over another! Where would such a detestable principle lead but to practices the most atrocious, and results the most disastrous, if carried out among ourselves? Tell us, ye hair-splitting sophists, the exact quantum of knowledge which is necessary to ...
— Thoughts on African Colonization • William Lloyd Garrison
... who was known to be a skillful thief. To her presence I have an irrational impulse toward belief in her possible purity and a very reasonable mistrust of her not less probable trickery. I feel myself in contact with an abnormal being, beyond the pale of natural laws, an exquisite or detestable creature—I ...
— Yvette • Henri Rene Guy de Maupassant
... is you who are accountable for the accident to Ruth Newton? You urged her to go with you, and when she fell—oh, you are a coward! It was detestable!" ...
— The Governess • Julie M. Lippmann
... roadside trundled the very Wheel itself, eating, drinking, trading, marrying, and quarrelling—all warmly alive. Often the lama made the living pictures the matter of his text, bidding Kim—too ready—note how the flesh takes a thousand shapes, desirable or detestable as men reckon, but in truth of no account either way; and how the stupid spirit, bond-slave to the Hog, the Dove, and the Serpent—lusting after betel-nut, a new yoke of oxen, women, or the favour of kings—is bound to ...
— Kim • Rudyard Kipling
... "Permit me to remark," went on Miossens, "permit me to remark, Mademoiselle, that such an announcement, if it had not at once entailed disastrous results upon me, would at any rate have involved me in a most detestable trial. Would La Regnie, who ferrets out crime everywhere—would he have believed my unsupported word if I had accused honest Cardillac, the pattern of piety and virtue, of an attempted murder? What if the sword of justice had turned its point against me?" ...
— Weird Tales, Vol. II. • E. T. A. Hoffmann
... no propagandist. I would not seek to force upon other nations our principles and our liberty if they did not want them. I would not disturb the repose even of a detestable despotism. But if an abused and oppressed people will their freedom; if they seek to establish it; if, in truth, they have established it,—we have a right, as a sovereign power, to notice the fact, and to ...
— Choice Specimens of American Literature, And Literary Reader - Being Selections from the Chief American Writers • Benj. N. Martin
... protecting, and so long as there are gentlemen worth cutting. The Brighton Bridge Battery is a delightful promenade on a warm summer's day, it is so shady; but it is closed, I may say, every Wednesday and Thursday, to accommodate these detestable pets of the public. It seems, as my brother informs me, that the drovers, from humane considerations, are in the habit of driving their cattle over to Brighton, (when the weather is pleasant,) and back again on the next day, in order that their health may be improved by the ...
— Autumn Leaves - Original Pieces in Prose and Verse • Various
... age-limit in Finland.[124] According to Mittelmaier, two considerations should guide us in regard to the protection of children: bodily immaturity, and moral weakness. The existence of the former leads the normal and healthy man to regard sexual approaches to children as unnatural and detestable. But, apart from the question of immaturity, we have to recognise that in children the moral sphere also deserves consideration; that notwithstanding the possible recent development of physical maturity, the child ...
— The Sexual Life of the Child • Albert Moll
... Herts. Three witches executed. From title of pamphlet mentioned by Lowndes, The Arraignment and Execution of 3 detestable Witches, John Newell, Joane his wife, and Hellen Calles: two executed at Barnett and one ...
— A History of Witchcraft in England from 1558 to 1718 • Wallace Notestein
... between the extreme sides of the instrumental body, if he has absurdly hurried a movement, or allowed it to linger unduly, if he has interrupted a singer before the end of a phrase, they exclaim: "The singers are detestable! The orchestra has no firmness; the violins have disfigured the principal design; everybody has been wanting in vigor and animation; the tenor was quite out, he did not know his part; the harmony is confused; the author is no accompanist; the voices ...
— The Orchestral Conductor - Theory of His Art • Hector Berlioz
... manage French, and do pretty well in history and geography, but I can't learn Latin," groaned Winnie. "I didn't mind so much when we only did sentences, but now we've begun Caesar it's simply detestable. I'm ...
— The Nicest Girl in the School - A Story of School Life • Angela Brazil
... business, late rising is perfectly detestable; but to him, instead of the arguments of health and moral responsibility for time, (or rather in addition to these arguments,) I would urge the argumentum ad crumenam; which is so pithily, however homelily, expressed in these two proverbs, which he ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, - Vol. 10, No. 283, 17 Nov 1827 • Various
... I had thought that he wrote out of his head; I had seen him at the detestable job of doing it. I myself have hated this business of writing ever since I found out that it was not so easy as it looks, and I can always spare a little sympathy for a man who is driving a pen to the task of putting words in their right places. Yet the clergyman persuaded me at last. Who am ...
— The Angels of Mons • Arthur Machen
... perpetual slavery, while his wife and his little ones are left to struggle alone, in poverty, for the bread of mere existence. This is a melancholy but a faithful picture of the miseries occasioned by the detestable kidnapper. Let us exert our best faculties for the purpose of eradicating such evils. Those societies who form the line of demarcation between the states in which slavery has been partially or totally abolished, and those in which it is unconditionally ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 6, 1921 • Various
... through a straw in my boyhood, and I never doubted that this would be as dulcet, but finer and more ethereal; as much more delectable, in short, as these grapes are better than puckery cider apples. Positively, I never tasted anything so detestable, such a sour and bitter juice, still lukewarm with fermentation; it was a wail of woe, squeezed out of the wine-press of tribulation, and the more a man drinks of such, the ...
— Passages From the French and Italian Notebooks, Complete • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... ladies talking. From time to time he followed the glances which both frequently directed to the stranger. Then, comparing the Countess with the new beauty, made so attractive by a touch of mystery, the Baron fell a prey to the detestable self-interest common to adventurous lady-killers; he hesitated between a fortune within his grasp and the indulgence of his caprice. The blaze of light gave such strong relief to his anxious and sullen face, against the hangings of white silk moreen brushed by his black hair, ...
— Domestic Peace • Honore de Balzac
... tone of thought which prevailed in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, and even, though in a minor degree, throughout the sixteenth and seventeenth, causing a permanent disorder of the mind, and exhibiting, in those cities to whose inhabitants it was a novelty, scenes as strange as they were detestable. ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... treacherous and inhuman treatment which their brethren in Spain, France, and the Netherlands, had suffered; by the disgraceful subterfuge of the Romish princes, who held that the Pope had power to relieve them from the obligation of the most solemn oaths; and above all, by the detestable maxim, that faith was not to be kept with heretics, the Roman Church, in the eyes of all honest men, had lost its honour. No engagement, no oath, however sacred, from a Roman Catholic, could satisfy a Protestant. What security then could the religious peace afford, when, ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... it was not likely that he should borrow: he loves nothing, praises nothing, esteems nothing of this poor visible present; but it was an additional recommendation to the Puritanic piety, that it had left a detestable memory behind it, and was in declared hostility with all contemporaneous ways of thinking. What could he better do, therefore, than borrow this old volcanic crater of Puritanism, and pour out from it his religion and his anger ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 61, No. 378, April, 1847 • Various
... intimated, had entered into the Conde family through the detestable influence of authority and politics. The Duke d'Enghien, therefore, unhappily held his wife in aversion; her mother-in-law, Charlotte de Montmorency, despised her; Madame de Longueville, her sister-in-law, did not esteem her; Mademoiselle ...
— Political Women, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Sutherland Menzies
... of her education. Her half-brother, Hippolyte Chatiron, and she received lessons from M. Deschartres, who had educated Maurice Dupin. He was steward and tutor combined, a very authoritative man, arrogant and a great pedant. He was affectionate, though, and extremely devoted. He was both detestable and touching at the same time, and had a warm heart hidden under a rough exterior. Nohant was in the heart of Berry, and this meant the country and Nature. For Aurore Dupin Nature proved to be an ...
— George Sand, Some Aspects of Her Life and Writings • Rene Doumic
... The barber pausing with the razor in his hand, the young gentleman asked him, angrily, why he did not begin. "I am waiting," replied the barber, "for your beard to grow." Specimens of writing were handed round, which were good; drawings, which, strange to say, were detestable. I praised the recitations and dialogues to the gentleman who sat next me. "Ah! oui," was his reply, "tout cela vient de Paris." So complete is the centralization of French intellect, even in such little matters as these! While I was ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 105, July 1866 • Various
... whether he was acquainted with all the manuscripts and printed documents relating to the subject. It was then that I pricked up my ears. They spoke at first of original sources; and I must confess they did so in a satisfactory manner, despite their innumerable and detestable puns. Then they began to speak about ...
— The Crime of Sylvestre Bonnard • Anatole France
... I was such a spoiled baby that I couldn't be courteous to a stranger even if she was a detestable little vamp? You're not to bother about it any more. She'll come into my room with me of course. You didn't expect me to sail through life without any sacrifices at all did you, Motherie? Suppose I had gone to Africa as ...
— The City of Fire • Grace Livingston Hill
... twenty francs. In the reign of Louis XVI, Arthur Young referred with horror to the black bread eaten by the French. Since that time half a century has passed, and whilst the agricultural produce in France has tripled in value, the labourers who produce it continue, from custom and necessity, to eat a detestable bread made from rye, barley, or peas and potatoes; and, to make the matter still worse, it is badly baked, without yeast, and being sometimes kept for weeks, it becomes covered with mould, and altogether presents an appearance enough to turn the ...
— The Commercial Products of the Vegetable Kingdom • P. L. Simmonds
... easy setting down. He rose shortly after and took Jock by the arm and led him away. "You are not smoking, which I am glad to see—and shows your sense," he said. "Come out and have a breath of air before we go upstairs. Can you imagine anything more detestable than that little precocious roue, that washed-out little man-about-town," he added with some energy, as they stepped out of the open windows of the library, left open in case the fine night should have seduced the gentlemen on to the terrace ...
— Sir Tom • Mrs. Oliphant
... think he is a man of very sublime religion, as much above this world as a great mountain; but he has the true sense of liberty and fraternity; for he has dared to oppose with all his might this detestable and cruel trade in poor negroes, which makes us, who are so proud of the example of America in asserting the rights of men, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 25, November, 1859 • Various
... martyrdom for anarchy, which marks the Secretary. But then that very fanaticism in the Secretary has a human pathos, and is almost a redeeming trait. But the little Doctor has a brutal sanity that is more shocking than the Secretary's disease. Don't you notice his detestable virility and vitality. He bounces like an india-rubber ball. Depend on it, Sunday was not asleep (I wonder if he ever sleeps?) when he locked up all the plans of this outrage in the round, black head of ...
— The Man Who Was Thursday - A Nightmare • G. K. Chesterton
... and florid complexion. Four other coffins were soon after brought in and placed in the church, attended by another clergyman of less pre-possessing appearance, who, to my disappointment, read the service. He did it in the most detestable manner, with much grimace, and with the addition of a supernumerary syllable after almost every word ending with a consonant. The clerk delivered the responses in such a mumbling tone, and with so much of the Lancashire dialect, as to be almost unintelligible. The other clergyman looked, ...
— Letters of a Traveller - Notes of Things Seen in Europe and America • William Cullen Bryant
... appear'st to me after thy grant, The ugliest, loathed detestable thing That I ever met with. Thou hast eyes Like the flames of Sulphur, which me thinks do dart Infection on me, and thou hast a mouth Enough to take me in where there do stand Four ...
— A King, and No King • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher
... the bravo; "dost thou think me so? Good, that glads me to the very heart! Detestable? that may be so, or it may not. I confess, the sign which I hang out gives no great promise of good entertainment within; but yet, Andreas, one thing is certain. You and I stand on the same line, for at this moment we ...
— The Bravo of Venice - A Romance • M. G. Lewis
... nine tenths of the people I meet. If a person wished to do me a favor I would say to him, 'I beg you, with tears in my eyes, to interest me. Be strong, be positive, be imperious, if you will; only be something,—something that, in looking at, I can forget my detestable self!' Perhaps that is nonsense too. If it is, I can't help it. I can only apologize for the nonsense I know to be such and that I talk—oh, for more reasons than I can tell you! I wonder whether, if I were to try, you ...
— Roderick Hudson • Henry James
... "Beer-guzzling is a detestable habit," he said to a fellow-workman, "and it is a very expensive one, too, for a poor fellow ...
— From Boyhood to Manhood • William M. Thayer
... of the Spanish kings," he observed to Gerald Burke, "to plant their capital at Madrid in the centre of a barren country, when they might make such a splendid city as this their capital. I could see no charms whatever in Madrid. The climate was detestable, with its hot sun and bitter cold winds. Here the temperature is delightful; the air is soft and balmy, the country round is a garden, and there is a cathedral ...
— By England's Aid • G. A. Henty
... animal—for, poor beast, it perished from hunger, being incapacitated from blindness to procure its customary food—was buried in a sand-hill, and from that moment misfortunes followed the abettors and perpetrators of this inhuman deed. The detestable hag, who had denounced the inoffensive seal, was, within a twelvemonth, hanged for murdering the illegitimate offspring of her own daughter. Every thing about this devoted house melted away—sheep rotted, cattle died, 'and blighted was the corn.' Of several ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 574 - Vol. XX, No. 574. Saturday, November 3, 1832 • Various
... their visit was actuated by a desire to help her, if she required help, to lend her their moral support in the face of suspicion, whether just or otherwise. The other three, including Mrs. Pennycook, Donna knew for that detestable type of womankind best known and described as "catty." Some one of these three who knew would fire the first gun in this most embarrassing campaign, and in order to nullify their fire as much as possible, Donna ...
— The Long Chance • Peter B. Kyne
... little theocracy in Geneva, modeled after the old testament, and succeeded in erecting the most detestable government that ever existed, except the one from ...
— Lectures of Col. R. G. Ingersoll - Latest • Robert Green Ingersoll
... blankly. Everything was there just as usual, the little key and the sounder, over which had come all "C's" pleasant talk. "C!" That creature! The odor of his detestable musk hovered about her even now, but not yet could she realize that ...
— Wired Love - A Romance of Dots and Dashes • Ella Cheever Thayer
... man who got the pipe promised to leave it to me when he died, but he departed from life and never kept his word. A frequent source of grief to me has been to see objects of great value, illustrating some point in archaeology, seized as "curiosities" by ignorant wealthy folk. The most detestable form of this folly is the buying of incunabula, first editions or uncut copies, and keeping them from publication or reading, and, in short, of worshipping anything, be it a book or a coin, merely because it is rare. Men never expatiate on rariora in literature or in china, or talk cookery ...
— Memoirs • Charles Godfrey Leland
... his visit to the school, and remembered the detestable mistress. He excused Sydney; he felt for her. She held the door open for him. Sure of himself, he entered ...
— The Evil Genius • Wilkie Collins
... dog. Took the family name and dropped his title in order to go gallivanting about the country with this young person.... An American, I am told—and with that detestable creature, Mrs. Devar! Nice thing! No wonder Lady Porthcawl was shocked. May I ask, ...
— Cynthia's Chauffeur • Louis Tracy
... point of view, the climate of pretty nearly the whole of this country is simply detestable. We may arrange to withstand very well the severity of our northern winters; we expect an entire shutting-up of all garden industries, and long cold seasons are an accustomed matter of necessity: but we have never yet learned to accept with ...
— Village Improvements and Farm Villages • George E. Waring
... But he met with no great success. A Scottish friend, Gilchrist, who had visited Nairne at Murray Bay, writes, in 1775, to express hope that he will not encourage French settlers who will rob him, who have "disingenuous, lying, cheating, detestable dispositions," and are the "banes of society." He adds, "I am glad you give me reason to believe you are to carry over some industrious honest people from hence with you. I am convinced 'twere easy by ...
— A Canadian Manor and Its Seigneurs - The Story of a Hundred Years, 1761-1861 • George M. Wrong
... Covetous—by covetousness. Hypocritical— by hypocrisy. For Rudolph had chosen this venerable abbe to be the agent for the restitutions and expiations imposed upon Jacques Fervand, because he wished doubly to punish him for having, by his detestable hypocrisy, obtained the esteem and affection of the good priest. Was it not, in effect, a great punishment for this hideous impostor—this hardened criminal, to be constrained to practice, at length, the Christian virtues which he had so often feigned to possess, and this ...
— Mysteries of Paris, V3 • Eugene Sue
... hours my mind was quite made up to do my duty instantly—and at each particular instant I postponed it till the next. To screw up my faltering courage, I called at dinner for some sparkling wine. It proved when it came to be detestable; I could not put it to my lips; and Bellairs, who had as much palate as a weevil, was left to finish it himself. Doubtless the wine flushed him; doubtless he may have observed my embarrassment of the afternoon; doubtless he was conscious that we were approaching a crisis, and that that evening, ...
— The Wrecker • Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne
... detestable English opera, which is crowded by all true lovers of their country. To mark the opposition to Italian operas, it is sung by some cast singers, two Italians, and a French girl, and the chapel boys; and to regale us with sense, it is Shakspeare's Midsummer Night's Dream, which is forty times more ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 2 • Horace Walpole
... believe it. Pray, try them. Takes off the diamonds, and gives away the picture to an insignificant woman, as a thing of no consequence: and gives it to her to sell, like a piece of old-fashioned plate. Is she not a detestable ...
— The Journal to Stella • Jonathan Swift
... shabby," said Miss Fanny. "Lemons, you know, are scarce to be got for any price, and as for lemonade made of sirup, it's positively vulgar and detestable; it tastes just like cream of ...
— The May Flower, and Miscellaneous Writings • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... Samoans. The law to be enforced, causes of dispute between white and brown to be eliminated, taxes to be raised, a central power created, the country opened up, the native race taught industry: all these were detestable to the natives, and to all of these he must set his hand. The more I learn of his brief term of rule, the more I learn to admire him, and to ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 17 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... nineteenth century this realization of the true form of life came with quite overwhelming force, and that was to Schopenhauer, surely at once the most acute and the most biassed of mortal men. It came to him as a most detestable fact, because it happened he was an intensely egotistical man. But his intellect was of that noble and exceptional sort that aversion may tint indeed but cannot blind, and we owe to him a series of philosophical writings, written with an instinctive skill ...
— Mankind in the Making • H. G. Wells
... next I submit (having the power to avoid it) to be crammed into a carriage and carried from place to place, whether I would or not, and be set down at the stated points de vue, while a detestable laquais points out what I am to admire, I shall deserve to endure again what I endured to-day. As there was no possibility of relief, I resigned myself to my fate, and was even amused by the absurdity of my own situation. We went to see the junction of the Arve and the Rhone: or ...
— The Diary of an Ennuyee • Anna Brownell Jameson
... enchanting descriptions from the truth! Impenetrable forests met him on every side, overgrown plants, briars, and tangled shrubs, at every step caught and tore his clothes. At the same time the explorers were attacked and stung by clouds of mosquitoes. Game was scarce and wild, the water detestable, the roadstead was never more dangerous ...
— Celebrated Travels and Travellers - Part 2. The Great Navigators of the Eighteenth Century • Jules Verne
... familiar acquaintance has gone over to that Popish religion, Sir Robert Howard, which I am very sorry for. My Lady Purbeck left her country and religion both together, and since he will not leave thinking of her, but live in that detestable sin, let him go to that Church for absolution, for comfort he ...
— The Curious Case of Lady Purbeck - A Scandal of the XVIIth Century • Thomas Longueville
... quite pretty when you are excited! Now, what did this wonderful Miss Peel do? Did she box the ears of those two detestable girls? If so, she has ...
— A Sweet Girl Graduate • Mrs. L.T. Meade
... peu communes.... La maniere de vivre, de s'habiller et de parler du comte Souvorow, est aussi singuliere que ses opinions militaires.... II mangeait dans sa tente assis par terre autour d'une natte sur laquelle il prenait le plus detestable repas. L'apres-midi, un semblable repas lui servait de souper, il s'endormait ensuite pendant quelques heures, passait une partie de la nuit a chanter, et a la pointe du jour il sortait presque nu et se roulait sur l'herbe assurant que cet exercice lui etait necessaire ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 6 • Lord Byron
... intended, she went to work. In her younger days she had worked much at schools, and was really an able and spirited teacher, liking the occupation; and laying hold of the first book in her way, she requested Conrade to read. He obeyed, but in such a detestable gabble that she looked up appealingly to Fanny, who suggested, "My dear, you can read better than that." He read four lines, not badly, but then broke off, "Mamma, are not we to have ponies? Coombe heard of a pony this ...
— The Clever Woman of the Family • Charlotte M. Yonge
... the Salle d'Hercule. Although superstition and demoniac fury had crept among the emigrants, yet several adhered with fidelity to their noble chieftain; and many, whose faith and love had been unhinged by fear, felt all their latent affection rekindled by this detestable attempt. A phalanx of faithful breasts closed round him; the wretch, who, although a prisoner and in bonds, vaunted his design, and madly claimed the crown of martyrdom, would have been torn to pieces, had not his intended ...
— The Last Man • Mary Shelley
... as I last saw it was constantly before me. The babble of the people around seemed to me detestable. I answered at haphazard, and begged permission of Mademoiselle to keep my room for a day, as I thought I should be distracted if I could not get out of ...
— Stray Pearls • Charlotte M. Yonge
... detestable folly of this kind is the very last that leaves us. One would have thought I ought to have little vanity at this time o' day; but it is an abiding appurtenance of the old Adam, and I write for penance what, like a fool, ...
— The Journal of Sir Walter Scott - From the Original Manuscript at Abbotsford • Walter Scott
... earliest form of the modern pianoforte. Then, in the same instrument is an organ bellows and pipes, the music from which is evoked by means of a separate keyboard, the bellows is worked by a foot treadle, like that most detestable abomination known to moderns as a melodeon. Thus, in the same instrument, the performer is supposed to get the powers and effect both of an upright piano and a small organ. It is, perhaps, hardly necessary to say that this instrument ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol IV, Issue VI, December 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various
... most men, I find stuffy and comfortless), and if I had given her the slightest encouragement, would have stuck my feet in hot mustard and water. Why had I come out on such a dreadful day? It was indeed a detestable day of raw fog. She pulled the curtains close, and, insisting upon my remaining among my cushions, piled the grate with coal half-way up the chimney. Would ...
— Simon the Jester • William J. Locke
... esters of the fatty acids give the characteristic savor to many of our favorite fruits, candies and beverages. The pear flavor, amyl acetate, is made from acetic acid and amyl alcohol—though amyl alcohol (fusel oil) has a detestable smell. Pineapple is ethyl butyrate—but the acid part of it (butyric acid) is what gives Limburger cheese its aroma. These essential oils are easily made in the laboratory, but cannot be extracted from the fruit ...
— Creative Chemistry - Descriptive of Recent Achievements in the Chemical Industries • Edwin E. Slosson
... easy to describe. There is something wrong with his appearance; something displeasing, something downright detestable. I never saw a man I so disliked, and yet I scarce know why. He must be deformed somewhere; he gives a strong feeling of deformity, although I couldn't specify the point. He's an extraordinary-looking man, and yet I really can name nothing out of the way. No, sir; I can make no hand ...
— Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde • ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON
... James II brings us to the era of the "penal laws." To one who lives in the twentieth century and is embued with the spirit of modern thought, the whole subject is more than painful—it is detestable. But to pass it over in silence is impossible; and in order to get a clear view of the position it is necessary to examine what the penal laws were, what they were not, and what were the circumstances of the time during which they were ...
— Is Ulster Right? • Anonymous
... idea, on leaving Winsleigh House, was to seek an interview with Sir Francis Lennox, and demand an explanation. He could not understand the man's motive for such detestable treachery and falsehood. His anger rose to a white heat as he thought of it, and he determined to "have it out" with him whatever the consequences might be. "No apology will serve his turn," he muttered. "The scoundrel! He has lied deliberately—and, by Jove, ...
— Thelma • Marie Corelli
... infernalis—hell-fury—in his natural history. It was his way of fighting back. All through his life he never wasted an hour on controversy. He had no time, he said. But once when a rival made a particularly nasty attack upon him, he named a new plant after him, adding the descriptive adjective detestabilis—the detestable so-and-so. On the whole, he had the best of it; for the ...
— Hero Tales of the Far North • Jacob A. Riis
... such scruples? They are the most detestable things in life and the least profitable. They poison pleasure even when they do not altogether deprive us of it. And what does one gain by them? Absolutely nothing, not so much as the good opinion of our friends, who can never be brought to believe we possess them,' ...
— A Modern Mercenary • Kate Prichard and Hesketh Vernon Hesketh-Prichard
... reason to bless his stars that in that moment of frenzy I did not encounter him, the detestable origin of the abomination that had just been heaped upon my head. I am no two-legged creature if I should not have sacrificed him on the spot with my razor, and so merited the gratitude of his regimental juniors ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various
... the grocers and soap-sellers; some they sent over sea to the book-binders, not in small number, but at times whole ships full, to the wondering of the foreign nations. Yea, the Universities of this realm are not all clear of this detestable fact. But cursed is that belly which seeketh to be fed with such ungodly gain, and shameth his natural country. I know a merchant man, which shall at this time be nameless, that bought the contents of two noble libraries ...
— Bibliomania; or Book-Madness - A Bibliographical Romance • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... politic, and shews, at least, a desire of being agreeable. But to lay it on as the fashion in France prescribes to all the ladies of condition, who indeed cannot appear without this badge of distinction, is to disguise themselves in such a manner, as to render them odious and detestable to every spectator, who has the least relish left for nature and propriety. As for the fard or white, with which their necks and shoulders are plaistered, it may be in some measure excusable, as their skins are naturally brown, ...
— Travels Through France and Italy • Tobias Smollett
... conversation; when on a sudden some latent ill-humour breaks out upon him, which he never discovered or suspected at his first entering into an intimacy with him. There are several persons who in some certain periods of their lives are inexpressibly agreeable, and in others as odious and detestable. Martial has given us a very pretty picture of one of this ...
— Essays and Tales • Joseph Addison
... kind, such as took place on December 13 last year, were normal or frequent, if they took place every day of the week or every week of the month, it would be dangerous and in the highest degree discreditable to our whole Government in India. It would be detestable and dangerous. But is there to be no such thing as an Emergency power? I am not talking about England, Scotland, or Ireland. I am talking about India. Is there to be no such thing as an emergency power? My view is ...
— Indian speeches (1907-1909) • John Morley (AKA Viscount Morley)
... he replied, "because it saves me a long and tedious journey, because it saves me also from a separation which I should have found detestable." ...
— The Great Prince Shan • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... words to reassure her, was thankful that her attention was demanded by her restive horse. The strain was telling on her, too, and, with less at stake than her companion, she was consumed by a longing to defeat the schemes of the cattle-men, who had, it seemed to her with detestable cunning, decided not to warn the station agent, and let the great train go, that they might heap the more obloquy upon their enemies. The risk the engineer and brakesmen ran was apparently nothing to them, and she felt, as Hetty did, that Larry was the one ...
— The Cattle-Baron's Daughter • Harold Bindloss
... the steps. The wretch managed to creep up to me again under another form, and as I was on one occasion taking the fresh air in my garden, clad as a slave, he presented me a potion which changed me into this detestable figure. He brought me hither, swooning through fear, and exclaimed in my ear with awful voice, 'There shalt thou remain, frightful one, despised even by beasts, until thy death, or till one, of his ...
— The Oriental Story Book - A Collection of Tales • Wilhelm Hauff
... and the lady, when she learnt of it, shed tears of mingled joy and rage, and wrote him impassioned letters in which she addressed him as her knight, and implored him, as he loved her, to come and deliver her from the detestable tyrant who held her in thrall. Those perfervid appeals completed his undoing, drove him mad, and blinded him to everything—even to the fact that his wife, too, was shedding tears, and that these were of rage undiluted by any ...
— The Historical Nights Entertainment, Second Series • Rafael Sabatini
... card declaring he had given Lord Byron no permission to dedicate any of his detestable works to him. Byron replied, acknowledging all this, but saying he had a right to honor the name of Southey, if he chose, just the same. No taint of excess or folly marks the name of Southey; his life was filled with good work and kind deeds. His ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 5 (of 14) • Elbert Hubbard
... the sanitary arrangements, and he condemned these unequivocally. The stench rising from the open latrines which swept over the field was indescribable. Dr. Ascher flew into a fierce temper over the shortcomings and detestable arrangements, which he maintained to be a serious menace to the health of the camp. We strove desperately to escape the horrible effluvium, but it could not be avoided unless we buried our heads. Dr. Ascher, by taking up a firm stand, had his way on this occasion, although the nature ...
— Sixteen Months in Four German Prisons - Wesel, Sennelager, Klingelputz, Ruhleben • Henry Charles Mahoney
... much fear that what you ask for are very rare things in this detestable and barren country, and I think we should do better to go and seek hospitality from the owner of a little house we see on the fringe of ...
— Twenty Years After • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... reduced to asking alms, and you're so ugly, so revolting, so despised, that soon they will toss bread to us as they do to the dogs. Alas! my poor mondes [people], take pity on us! take pity on me! I don't deserve my fate, and no woman ever had a filthier, more detestable husband. Help me to pick him up, or else the wagons will crush him like an old broken bottle, and I shall be a widow, which would kill me with grief, although everybody says it would be great good fortune ...
— The Devil's Pool • George Sand
... prosper. Who more merciless than you on slugs and other pests that fly or crawl? No, no, we are all out for a living, you as much as the spider, the spider as much as the fly." "We are all Huns," said I. "What a detestable world it is." "Not at all," said he. "It's a very jolly world. I drink to the ...
— Pebbles on the Shore • Alpha of the Plough (Alfred George Gardiner)
... the "holy languages" because they were so closely allied with the Sacred Scriptures. Throughout education a deeper sense of the value of religious teaching, a deeper conviction that sin was detestable, a greater respect for outward sobriety fastened upon the minds of those who were responsible for education, and the children whom they trained grew up to be the fathers and mothers of the intense enthusiasts, who enforced religious freedom by the ...
— A History of Giggleswick School - From its Foundation 1499 to 1912 • Edward Allen Bell
... have been harmless enough if intimacy of intercourse in the absence of all friendly feeling were not a thing detestable in itself. Moreover, his facetiousness was not very amusing. It consisted in the wearisome repetition of descriptive phrases applied to people with a burst of laughter. "Desperate butterfly-slayer. Ha, ha, ha!" was one sample of his peculiar wit which he himself enjoyed so much. ...
— A Set of Six • Joseph Conrad
... make him out perfectly detestable. I don't know why you should hate him, He's done everything he ...
— Indian Summer • William D. Howells
... that you are capable of calm judgment. Here the atmosphere is simply detestable. Everybody has knuckled under to sentiment. Perhaps your deliberate opinion could ...
— Within the Tides • Joseph Conrad
... any attention to that gentleman. His morals are detestable, and he only seeks to lead you from the narrow ...
— The Magician • Somerset Maugham
... Pryntare to London with Harry Pepwell, Bonere and Tabbe, of Powlles churchyard stationers, to order him at your pleasure. Never heard of the little book of detestable heresies till the stationers showed it me.'—(Letters and Papers, Hen. VIII., Vol. xiv., Pt. ...
— A Short History of English Printing, 1476-1898 • Henry R. Plomer
... duke's advocate in defence of assassination, which he termed tyrannicide; and that assembly, partly influenced by faction, partly overawed by power, pronounced no sentence of condemnation against this detestable doctrine.[*] ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part B. - From Henry III. to Richard III. • David Hume
... loftier than the corporeal enjoyments of the passing moment, that the fete in its essence is only the proclamation of a great idea, and so we ought to be content with the most frugal German ball simply as a symbol, that is, if we can't dispense with this detestable ball altogether," so great was the aversion she suddenly conceived for it. But she was pacified at last. It was then that "the literary quadrille" and the other aesthetic items were invented and proposed as substitutes for the corporeal enjoyments. ...
— The Possessed - or, The Devils • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... difficult for a person of ordinary capacity to talk of love and fondness, which are not felt, and to make vows of constancy and fidelity, which are never intended to be performed, if he be villain enough to practise such detestable conduct: but to a man whose heart glows with the principles of integrity and truth, and who sincerely loves a woman of amiable person, uncommon refinement of sentiment and purity of manners—to such an one, in such circumstances, I can assure you, my dear, from my own feelings at this present ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham
... slave of the emperor in a court which was a mere sink of profligacy and villainy. Then he had got his freedom, and next, the governorship of Judaea, probably by his brother Pallas's interest, who had been a slave like him, and had made an enormous fortune by the most detestable wickedness. ...
— Discipline and Other Sermons • Charles Kingsley
... amusing impertinences, advising him to marry this fine captain himself if he is so fond of him; as for her part she will never suffer her dear, beautiful mistress to become the wife of that horrid old codger, that abominable bully, that detestable scarecrow! Whereupon Pandolphe, furiously angry, orders her into the house, so that he may speak to his daughter alone; and when she refuses to obey, and defies him to make her, he takes her by the shoulders and ...
— Captain Fracasse • Theophile Gautier
... by children to old servants in Russia] Nicola came in—a neat little man who was always grave, methodical, and respectful, as well as a great friend of Karl's, He brought with him our clothes and boots—at least, boots for Woloda, and for myself the old detestable, be-ribanded shoes. In his presence I felt ashamed to cry, and, moreover, the morning sun was shining so gaily through the window, and Woloda, standing at the washstand as he mimicked Maria Ivanovna (my sister's governess), was laughing so loud and ...
— Childhood • Leo Tolstoy
... A detestable fellow this! I did the only thing I could: ignored his sarcasm and asked for work. I liked the place, I said, and he'd need of help; I could turn my hand to anything now in ...
— Wanderers • Knut Hamsun
... the savagery, the utter savagery, had closed round him,—all that mysterious life of the wilderness that stirs in the forest, in the jungles, in the hearts of wild men. There's no initiation either into such mysteries. He has to live in the midst of the incomprehensible, which is also detestable. And it has a fascination, too, that goes to work upon him. The fascination of the abomination—you know. Imagine the growing regrets, the longing to escape, the powerless ...
— Heart of Darkness • Joseph Conrad
... "you were born, of course, in this detestable country. Do not forget that where I live there are people who call the climate hell," and he laughed sardonically, with a laugh ...
— The Best British Short Stories of 1922 • Various
... reacted like the most genial warmth upon Nash. He had chosen a part detestable to him but necessary to his business. He must be a "gabber" for the nonce, a free talker, a chatterer, who would ...
— Trailin'! • Max Brand
... along the shingle to the next cutting in the cliff, and so back by way of the village; and he desired me to put down, in language as full as I could, all that I had seen in each excursion. As I have said, this practice was detestable and irksome to me, but, as I look back, I am inclined to believe it to have been the most salutary, the most practical piece of training which my Father ever gave me. It forced me to observe sharply and clearly, to form visual ...
— Father and Son • Edmund Gosse
... about his being delicate. She's not," vehemently interrupted Tod Yorke, somewhat perplexed, in his hurry, with the genders. "Charley Channing's no more delicate than we are. It's all in the look. As good say that detestable little villain, Boulter, is delicate, because he has yellow curls. I vote ...
— The Channings • Mrs. Henry Wood
... then taking favour; but I went back to my father and mother, and aunt, and Preston, and others; and comfort found no lodgment with me. Then there was an extract from a Southern paper, calling Yankees "the most contemptible and detestable of God's creation" - speaking of their "mean, niggardly lives - their low, vulgar and sordid occupations" - and I thought, How can peace be? or what will ...
— Daisy in the Field • Elizabeth Wetherell
... became more and more inconclusive and exhausting. Ann Veronica found herself incompetent, undignified, and detestable, holding on desperately to a hardening antagonism to her father, quarrelling with him, wrangling with him, thinking of repartees—almost as if he was a brother. It was horrible, but what could she do? She meant to live her own life, and he meant, with contempt and insults, to prevent her. Anything ...
— Ann Veronica • H. G. Wells
... himself is equally enslaved; his oath binds him to an implicit blind reception of tenets which he is not permitted to investigate, and which make him the pliant tool of a higher department of this detestable machinery. He receives his cue from the bishops, and they are wholly governed by the Propaganda at Rome, whither each of them is bound periodically to appear for personal examination and fresh instructions. The Propaganda is, of course, ...
— Personal Recollections • Charlotte Elizabeth
... hard Task for the greatest in Europe to give, in their own, an Instance of a Benefit better placed, or conferred with a more graceful Air. It has been heretofore urged, how barbarous and inhuman is any unjust Step made to the Disadvantage of a Trader; and by how much such an Act towards him is detestable, by so much an Act of Kindness towards him is laudable. I remember to have heard a Bencher of the Temple tell a Story of a Tradition in their House, where they had formerly a Custom of chusing Kings for such a Season, ...
— The Spectator, Volume 2. • Addison and Steele
... my uncle Toby, shaking his head,—these are but sorry fortifications, Trim.—O! very poor work, answered Trim, to what your Honour and I make of it.—The character of this last man, said Dr. Slop, interrupting Trim, is more detestable than all the rest; and seems to have been taken from some pettifogging Lawyer amongst you:—Amongst us, a man's conscience could not possibly continue so long blinded,—three times in a year, at least, he must go to confession. Will that restore it to sight? quoth my uncle Toby,—Go ...
— The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman • Laurence Sterne
... treatise: De verberatione amatoria. He had warmed more and more to his subject. His bald temples were flushed, and the veins stood out on his great forehead; every minute his mouth twitched a little convulsively and his hands, those detestable hands, were perpetually on the move, while his arms retailed their paralytic immobility. The unclean beast in him appeared in all its ...
— The Child of Pleasure • Gabriele D'Annunzio
... all day long. Provisions running short, a boat had to be sent to land, and the sailors purchased, among other things, some peculiarly detestable bread—according to them, cotto al sole. There was not a cloud in the sky; till evening, the wind whistled above our heads, but the sea about us was blue and smooth. I sat in hot sunshine, feasting my eyes on the beautiful ...
— The Private Papers of Henry Ryecroft • George Gissing
... and enemy, the wicked Haman," who had been for years watching to accomplish his downfal, because his evil was not good in the sight of the right-minded and true-hearted friend of his country,—the detestable Antoine de Chabannes, Count of Dammartin, rightly judging that Charles would be glad to rid himself of so enormous a burthen of gratitude as he owed to Jacques Coeur, concerted with other spirits as wicked as himself, and ...
— Barn and the Pyrenees - A Legendary Tour to the Country of Henri Quatre • Louisa Stuart Costello
... defended from the cruelty of their tyrannicall and bloodsucking neighbors the Canibals, whereby infinite number of their liues shalbe preserued. And lastly, by this meanes many of their poore innocent children shall be preserued from the bloody knife of the sacrificer, a most horrible and detestable custome in the sight of God and man, now and ever heretofore vsed amongst them. Many other things could I heere alledge to this purpose were it not that I doe feare lest I haue already more then halfe ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques and Discoveries of - the English Nation. Vol. XIII. America. Part II. • Richard Hakluyt
... you are too much an earthly being for that. Come, now, take off that detestable mask and let me see what you ...
— Deadwood Dick, The Prince of the Road - or, The Black Rider of the Black Hills • Edward L. Wheeler
... to be found in Italy, and Sicily, but Greece, Pontus, and [657]Libya. And however widely they may have been separated, they are still represented in the same unfavourable light. Euripides says, that their very name was detestable. ...
— A New System; or, an Analysis of Antient Mythology. Volume II. (of VI.) • Jacob Bryant
... the Louvre, within the hearing of Charles and his mother, if not actually within their sight, one of the foulest scenes of this detestable tragedy was enacted. At daybreak, says Queen Margaret of Navarre, her husband rose to go and play tennis, with a determination to be present at the King's lever, and demand justice for the assault on the admiral. ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 1-20 • Various
... whenever they overstep that, and usurp a power which would degrade Europe, then I trust we shall join Europe in crushing her ambition; then I would with pleasure go forth and risk my life for to pull down the overgrown detestable power of France." When the mob in London dragged the carriage of the French ambassador, his wrath quite boiled over. "Can you cure madness?" he wrote to his physician; "for I am mad to read that our d—d scoundrels dragged ...
— The Life of Nelson, Vol. II. (of 2) - The Embodiment of the Sea Power of Great Britain • A. T. (Alfred Thayer) Mahan
... more than the loss of his money, more than the failure of his fight to carry out his father's wishes for his success: that any one could play the game so unfairly, that there could be in all the world people so detestable, so ...
— The Making of Bobby Burnit - Being a Record of the Adventures of a Live American Young Man • George Randolph Chester
... and so politic as Madame de Maintenon doubtless was, could have encouraged the King to a measure which undermined his popularity, which cut the sinews of natural strength, and raised up implacable enemies in every Protestant country. I can palliate her detestable bigotry only on the ground that she was the slave of an order of men who have ever proved themselves to be the inveterate foes of human freedom, and who marked their footsteps, wherever they went, by a trail of ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume VII • John Lord
... hedges on either side, and I could see fields and hedgerows and red roofs clustering here and there, while the low background of blue hills spread towards the horizon. It was an unpretentious homely prospect intercepted each minute by the detestable advertisement hoardings recommending this or that rival pill. 'Tongues in trees' indeed, in a very different sense from the exiled duke's experience! Then we come within sight of the running brook, uncontaminated as yet; the ...
— Our Village • Mary Russell Mitford
... your motion, that I will throw into your hands a few materials, that may serve by way of supplement, as I may say, to those you will be able to collect from the papers themselves; from Col. Morden's letters to you, particularly that of Sept. 23;* and from the letters of the detestable wretch himself, who, I find, has done her justice, although to his own condemnation: all these together will enable you, who seem to be so great an admirer of her virtues, to perform the task; and, I think, better than any person I know. But I make it my request, that if you ...
— Clarissa Harlowe, Volume 9 (of 9) - The History Of A Young Lady • Samuel Richardson
... we need to enliven this detestable place is the presence of Beauty herself. Our worthy friends should be back soon—bringing their sheaves with them, let us hope, for otherwise matters will be complicated. Let me see: have I thought of everything, for in such ...
— Lysbeth - A Tale Of The Dutch • H. Rider Haggard
... that detestable old woman?" he exclaimed on encountering Bertha later in the evening. "I wonder that M. Villefort would permit her to talk to you. She is a wicked, cynical creature, who has the hardihood to laugh at her sins instead of repenting ...
— "Le Monsieur De La Petite Dame" • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... friend did not show to advantage in the scene which followed. Yes, there had been an accident. It was unheard of—abominable; entirely the fault of the chauffeur. Chauffeurs (and he looked bleakly at Terry) were without exception brutes—detestable brutes. You put up with them because you had to; that was all. The automobile had merely stopped. It must have been the simplest thing in the world for a professional to discover what was wrong; yet this animal, Joseph, could do nothing but poke his nose into the machinery ...
— My Friend the Chauffeur • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... the accused were so detestable, that in the beginning the torturer was always a civil official, as we read in the bull of Innocent IV. The canons of the Church, moreover, prohibited all ecclesiastics from taking part in these tortures, so that ...
— The Inquisition - A Critical and Historical Study of the Coercive Power of the Church • E. Vacandard
... Danton, "certainly! and if you had only told the people that you were going to that good Princess, I am sure your things would not have been taken from you. But," added he, "are you perfectly certain they were not for that detestable Marie Antoinette?" ...
— The Memoirs of Louis XV. and XVI., Volume 7 • Madame du Hausset, and of an Unknown English Girl and the Princess Lamballe
... have never yet had a horse down. No sooner, however, do we get to the asphalte than all this is changed. Leaders and wheelers alike are instantly on their backs, and I have now made it a rule, the moment we come to a street paved with this dangerous and detestable composition, to put my horses inside the coach, and, with the assistance of a policeman or two, drag the vehicle to the other end myself. Only yesterday, I think it was, on the north side of Leicester Square, I counted as many as nineteen ugly falls in as many minutes, necessitating, in nearly ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 98, January 18, 1890 • Various
... mechanical impulse alone keeping the thoughts in motion, as the mere act of carrying certain watches in the pocket keeps them wound up,—many times, I say, just as my brain was beginning to creep and hum with this delicious locomotive intoxication, some dear detestable friend, cordial, intelligent, social, radiant, has come up and sat down by me and opened a conversation which has broken my day-dream, unharnessed the flying horses that were whirling along my fancies and hitched on the old weary omnibus-team of every-day associations, fatigued my hearing ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 62, December, 1862 • Various
... treatment wholly depended either on our own pledges or on economic facts. The policy of reducing Germany to servitude for a generation, of degrading the lives of millions of human beings, and of depriving a whole nation of happiness should be abhorrent and detestable,—abhorrent and detestable, even if it were possible, even if it enriched ourselves, even if it did not sow the decay of the whole civilized life of Europe. Some preach it in the name of Justice. In the great ...
— The Economic Consequences of the Peace • John Maynard Keynes
... a detestable relic of barbarism, it is this custom of bargaining over every breath one draws in life. It creates a sort of incessant internal seething, which is very wearing to the temper and destructive of pleasure in traveling. One feels that he must chaffer desperately in the dark, or pay the sum demanded ...
— Russian Rambles • Isabel F. Hapgood
... and bitter herbs, of which the present generation only know the name by its occurrence in revenue acts of parliament, coupled with cider, perry, and other excisable commodities. Lovel, who was seduced to taste it, with difficulty refrained from pronouncing it detestable, but did refrain, as he saw he should otherwise give great offence to his host, who had the liquor annually prepared with peculiar care, according to the approved recipe bequeathed to him by the so-often ...
— The Antiquary, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... in 1917, and traditional enmities were extinguished in the crusade against a mutual and detestable foe. The candid naval officer became Vice-Admiral William S. Sims, commanding all the American ships and sailors in European waters, where the Stars and Stripes and the British ensign flew side by ...
— The Fight for a Free Sea: A Chronicle of the War of 1812 - The Chronicles of America Series, Volume 17 • Ralph D. Paine
... their power?" whispered the hot breath of Mr. Jones into his ear. "Can there be a more disgusting spectacle? It's enough to make the earth detestable. She seems to have found her affinity. Move on closer. If I have to shoot you in the end, then perhaps ...
— Victory • Joseph Conrad
... observations—Mary's wonder and simplicity came in so amazingly—and there was such merriment at Ethel's two precious jars, that she could hardly wish they had not come to her. On one head they were all agreed, in dislike of George Rivers, whom Mary pronounced to be a detestable man, and, when gently called to order by Margaret, defended it, by saying that Miss Bracy said it was better to detest than to hate, while Blanche coloured up to the ears, and hid herself behind the arm-chair; and Dr. May qualified ...
— The Daisy Chain, or Aspirations • Charlotte Yonge
... again it is the Cricket, the Locust and the Praying Mantis. Good in themselves, in a general way, these several victuals may be noxious to a consumer who is not used to them. The larva which dotes on Locust may find caterpillar a detestable fare; and that which revels in caterpillar may hold Locust in horror. It would be hard for us to discover in what manner Cricket-flesh and Ephippiger-flesh differ as juicy, nourishing foodstuffs; but it does not follow that the two Sphex-wasps addicted to this diet have not very ...
— More Hunting Wasps • J. Henri Fabre
... a mystery to me how human beings with any feeling at all can be satisfied to live in such abominable, detestable houses as those of the Settled Koraks. They have not one solitary redeeming feature. They are entered through the chimney, lighted by the chimney, and ventilated by the chimney; the sunshine falls into them ...
— Tent Life in Siberia • George Kennan
... to him, I suppose—heaps of love—there was some comfort in that—heaps of love from your devoted and affectionate mother. Ah! when shall I get properly off to sleep? Let me turn over on to my other side and put my hand under the pillow—but it was young Ray—Ray did it—Ray did it—how that detestable sentence swells till it packs my head!—and I must be asleep now, for I see Fillet fitting a rope across the door of an unknown bedroom wherein I am confined with some invisible Terror which drives me out of my bed: as I rush into the passage the rope trips ...
— Tell England - A Study in a Generation • Ernest Raymond
... me with that detestable nick-name she has used since I wore rompers. "Aren't you trying for a record or something? This is twice you've ...
— 32 Caliber • Donald McGibeny
... continues. 'I really do not think all is known. Very little can be known, or I am sure I could not feel as I do. It would burn me up. George Up—- does not dare; and his most beautiful lady-love had far better not. Mr. Forth may repent his whispers. But, Oh! what Evan may do! Rose is almost detestable. Manners, ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... (not, however, apparently paying them anything for it), to keep his hands clean from extortion and fraud, and to pull up the stake-nets in the channels of the five rivers mentioned in Letter 17; 'for we all know that men ought to fish with nets, not with hedges, and the opposite practice shows detestable greediness.' ...
— The Letters of Cassiodorus - Being A Condensed Translation Of The Variae Epistolae Of - Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator • Cassiodorus (AKA Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator)
... the hands of the woodman. This arrangement to give Ipley a little music, was projected as a return for the favours of the morning: nor have I in my time heard anything comparable to it in charity of sentiment, when I consider the detestable outrage ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... who has no occupation, other than the occupation of mere amusement, who has no Ideal; who has no interest other than the interest of passing the time, is not only useless, but detestable as a member of human society, while his old age is of unhappiness the most unhappy. For what is Old Age worth if it has no "memories"; and what are "memories" worth if they are not memories of having lived one's life to the full? To me, to live one's own life is to live—or, perhaps I ought to say, ...
— Over the Fireside with Silent Friends • Richard King
... on account of my knowledge of the English tongue, and also, if I may say so, on account of my natural capacity. They were happy days during which I lived in the square of Bloomsbury. The climate of monsieur's country is, it must be confessed, detestable. But then what would you have? Flowers grow best in the rain. One has but to point to monsieur's fellow country-women to ...
— The Green Flag • Arthur Conan Doyle
... particulars. The site of a few cottages in a romantic dell in the neighbourhood of Rochdale is still associated with the memory of the unfortunate Earl of Tyrone. It is yet called "Tyrone's Bed." In history, this noble chief is depicted in colours the most hideous and detestable; but if the lion had been the painter, we should have had to contemplate a different portrait. By his countrymen he was held in the most profound reverence and respect. Beloved by all, he was hailed as the expected deliverer ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 1 (of 2) • John Roby
... Spanish manners. Would it be quite impossible to find in St James's Street, or in certain buildings at no great distance from the Thames, the exact counterparts of Don Matthias de Silva and his companions? Gongora, indeed, in spite of his detestable taste, was a man of genius; and therefore to find his type among us would be difficult, if not impossible, unless an excess of the former quality, for which he was conspicuous, might counterbalance a deficiency in the latter. Are our employes less pompous and empty than Gil ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 55, No. 344, June, 1844 • Various
... name of Darius. His confidential advisers were three eunuchs, who ruled the empire in his name—Artoxares, who had taken such a prominent part in the campaign which won him the crown, Artibarzanes, and Athoos; but the guiding spirit of his government was, in reality, his wife, the detestable Parysatis. She had already borne him two children before she became queen; a daughter, Amestris, and a son, Arsaces, who afterwards became king under the name of Artaxerxes. Soon after the accession of her husband, she bore him a second son, whom she named Cyrus, in memory ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 9 (of 12) • G. Maspero |
