"Indistinctly" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... regarded as the highest point on the earth, and it is not always carefully distinguished from the aerian regions above The idea of a seat of the gods—perhaps derived from a more ancient tradition, in which it was not attached to any geographical site—seems to be indistinctly blended in the poet's mind with that of the real mountain."—Thirlwall's Greece, vol. i. p. ...
— The Iliad of Homer • Homer
... hyperbole, above all the heroes of antiquity; every mouth was opened in execration of the late commander of the British troops in Germany. He was now made acquainted with the particulars of his imputed guilt, which he had before indistinctly learned. He was accused of having disobeyed three successive orders he had received from the general, during the action at Minden, to advance with the cavalry of the right wing, which he commanded, and sustain the infantry that were engaged; ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... Indistinctly outlined in the dull moonlight he saw the dark railing, the trees, the empty garden. It seemed to him that he beheld them—the three men who had been shot, two grown up, one a child. They were lying there now at the roadside, in the empty, silent field, ...
— Best Russian Short Stories • Various
... D'Entragues was a bold and skilful soldier, with a great desire to distinguish himself. He wished to review this regiment, and had commenced business before the dawn. While the light was still uncertain and feeble, and his battalions were under arms, he indistinctly perceived infantry troops forming at the end of the street, in front of him. He knew by the order's given on the previous evening that no other review was to take place except his own. He immediately feared, therefore, some surprise, marched at once to these troops, whom ...
— The Memoirs of Louis XIV., His Court and The Regency, Complete • Duc de Saint-Simon
... at my ease in a lounging chair, and my thoughts took quite another direction, wandering vaguely from one thing to another. All at once some people entered an adjoining room talking together; I heard what they said indistinctly, but the word Florence reached my ears, and I soon imagined myself to be in that city, and going on from one association to another I continued for some time to see again the places, monuments, and people I had known there. ...
— Myth and Science - An Essay • Tito Vignoli
... continued his stroll with an object, for at the point where the sharp descent towards the Lower Town began he brought up before a stately house of stone, of an antique architecture, on the face of which, over the door, something indistinctly glittered. It was the house of the Golden Dog; and as he surveyed it and tried vainly to read the letters of the inscription, his shadowy visitor at Troyes once more arose vividly before his imagination, and the terrible scene of Philibert's murder seemed to be enacted again upon the flight ...
— The False Chevalier - or, The Lifeguard of Marie Antoinette • William Douw Lighthall
... the Pandavas and followed them (thus far), walked around them and bidding them farewell returned to his own abode. When the citizens and Bhishma and Vidura had all ceased following, Kunti approached Yudhishthira and said, 'The words that Kshattri said unto thee in the midst of many people so indistinctly as if he did not say anything, and thy reply also to him in similar words and voice, we have not understood. If it is not improper; for us to know them I should then like to hear everything that had passed ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 1 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... ago that they were all killed together. I remember the night myself indistinctly—it is like a dream. We were on patrol—they, I, Mesnil Andre, and Corporal Bertrand; and our business was to identify a new German listening-post marked by the artillery observers. We left the trench towards midnight and ...
— Under Fire - The Story of a Squad • Henri Barbusse
... sentence I started, and, for a moment, paused; for it appeared to me (although I at once concluded that my excited fancy had deceived me)—it appeared to me that, from some very remote portion of the mansion, there came, indistinctly, to my ears, what might have been, in its exact similarity of character, the echo (but a stifled and dull one certainly) of the very cracking and ripping sound which Sir Launcelot had so particularly described. It was, beyond doubt, ...
— The Haunters & The Haunted - Ghost Stories And Tales Of The Supernatural • Various
... way to acquire a graceful utterance, is to read aloud to some friend every day, and beg of him to set you right, in case you read too fast, do not observe the proper stops, lay wrong emphasis, or utter your words indistinctly. You may even read aloud to yourself where such a friend is not at hand, and you will find your own ear a good corrector. Take care to open your teeth when you read or speak, and articulate every word distinctly; ...
— The Young Gentleman and Lady's Monitor, and English Teacher's Assistant • John Hamilton Moore
... I paused and listened. Indistinctly, I could hear the hum of voices coming from the forward part of the vessel. I knew they were the voices of the crew ...
— The Boy Tar • Mayne Reid
... colour in the skin of his face, his head juts forward, and those queer little dark amber eyes of his watch furtively round him for his fame. His clothes fit perfectly and yet sit upon him as though he had bought them ready-made. He speaks in a mumble still, but he says, you perceive indistinctly, enormous self-assertive things, he backs into the rear of groups by instinct if Banghurst drops the line for a minute, and when he walks across Banghurst's lawn one perceives him a little out of breath and going jerky, and that his weak white hands are ...
— Twelve Stories and a Dream • H. G. Wells
... sooner than usual; for a fortnight after our establishment at Pau, nothing could be more agreeable than the season, precisely answering to the beautiful weather which my letters announced from different parts of England. During this time the mountains were rarely visible, and when seen appeared indistinctly. This charming fortnight, during which Pau seemed to deserve all the commendations so profusely bestowed on it, was a promise of the calm and peaceful winter which I was told was always to be found in these favoured regions; I bore the sarcasms against the fogs ...
— Barn and the Pyrenees - A Legendary Tour to the Country of Henri Quatre • Louisa Stuart Costello
... and prayed, and I devoutly respected her devotions. The moon had begun to shine in upon one side of each of the three windows, and make a misty clearness in the room, by which I saw her indistinctly. When she rearose she made the ...
— The Merry Men - and Other Tales and Fables • Robert Louis Stevenson
... much in the same way the opium eater enjoys his dreams. For dream he did, vaguely and indistinctly, eyes wide open and awake, the lady-god's hair in a faint-scented cloud about him, her voice mourning with his, his consciousness drowning in the dreams of otherwhereness that came to him of the singing and that was the singing. Memories ...
— Jerry of the Islands • Jack London
... wardrobe," said Mrs. Flushing after a pause, speaking indistinctly because of a paint-brush in her mouth, "and look at ...
— The Voyage Out • Virginia Woolf
... gazed in the direction of the Turk's pointing finger, which was directed towards something indistinctly seen a few ...
— Yussuf the Guide - The Mountain Bandits; Strange Adventure in Asia Minor • George Manville Fenn
... indistinct. It is their motions rather than the people themselves which I see. I can feel myself getting on the train, finding a seat, and sitting down. I cannot hear the noise of the train, but can hear rather indistinctly the conductor calling the stations. I believe my mental imagery is more motile (of movement) than anything else. Although I can see some things quite plainly, I seem to feel ...
— Power of Mental Imagery • Warren Hilton
... bickering light, attended by a strong though not unpleasant odour. Their light was assisted by the red glare of a large charcoal fire, round which were seated five or six armed Highlanders, while others were indistinctly seen couched on their plaids in the more remote recesses of the cavern. In one large aperture, which the robber facetiously called his SPENCE (or pantry), there hung by the heels the carcasses of a sheep, or ewe, ...
— Waverley, Or 'Tis Sixty Years Hence, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... sit brooding, with the pall straight before us, the funeral guns are heard indistinctly booming from the far forts, with the tap of drums in the serried street without, where troops and citizens are forming for the grand procession. We see through the window in the beautiful spring day that the grass is brightly green; and all ...
— The Life, Crime and Capture of John Wilkes Booth • George Alfred Townsend
... bullets and falling masonry, into the strong tower that protected the Peter Gate. Having at last succeeded in ascending the narrow stone stairs and reaching the vaulted guard-room, he was able to make out indistinctly, through the smoke and dust that filled the room, the forms of a number of men who were keeping up an incessant and almost deafening fire on the enemy through the narrow loop-holes with which the ...
— The Young Carpenters of Freiberg - A Tale of the Thirty Years' War • Anonymous
... window with extreme caution, she lowered the letter with the crust, which made no noise against either the wall of the house or the blinds. Presently she felt the string pulled by Brigaut, who broke it and then crept softly away. When he reached the middle of the square she could see him indistinctly by the starlight; but he saw her quite clearly in the zone of light thrown by the candle. The two children stood thus for over an hour, Pierrette making him signs to go, he starting, she remaining, he coming back to his post, and Pierrette again signing ...
— Pierrette • Honore de Balzac
... the staircase, Levin caught a sound he knew, a familiar cough in the hall. But he heard it indistinctly through the sound of his own footsteps, and hoped he was mistaken. Then he caught sight of a long, bony, familiar figure, and now it seemed there was no possibility of mistake; and yet he still went on hoping that this tall man taking off his fur cloak and ...
— Anna Karenina • Leo Tolstoy
... Sahib were the most remarkable features of his attire. So much occupied, indeed, was Sonny Sahib in looking at the Maharajah's slippers, that he quite forgot to make his salaam. As for Tooni, she was lying flat at their Highnesses' feet, talking indistinctly into the marble floor. ...
— The Story of Sonny Sahib • Sara Jeannette Duncan
... I asked, "what was it that ran away from you on the meadow?" "cat!" "What did you want to do with the poor cat?" "kill!" "Have you no pity?" "no!" "Then is the cat right if she kills you?" "no!" "Why?" (The reply to this was rapped indistinctly.) "Have you no pity for any ...
— Lola - The Thought and Speech of Animals • Henny Kindermann
... it to mankind. Gunpowder, the compass, printing, cheap paper, regular armies, the concentration of states and powers, ingenious destruction, and ingenious creation—all were the work of this wondrous age. At this time, also, there began to spread indistinctly about, in Germany and many other countries of Europe, those ideas of reformation, which soon were strengthened, by the persecution of the Western Church, to array themselves in the logical head of Luther, and to flame up in that universal crater, whence the fury, lava, and smoke, were to ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 55, No. 340, February, 1844 • Various
... caution is needed in this direction; for reasons which I allude to with pain. It is a fact, I fear, that in some parishes the Curate is in danger of being rather actively pursued, by here and there a parent, as a possibly desirable son-in-law. I have even heard of a certain Incumbent who was given not indistinctly to understand that the coming Curate would be less welcome if he was a man already married. Such a state of things is of course one of exceptional social risk and difficulty for a Curate, and for a young ...
— To My Younger Brethren - Chapters on Pastoral Life and Work • Handley C. G. Moule
... mind—there is another great difficulty in their way, one that is very little considered and often, indeed, not at all understood by parents—and that is, that in the earliest years the distinction between realities and mere fancies of the mind is very indistinctly drawn. Even in our minds the two things are often confounded. We often have to pause and think in order to decide whether a mental perception of which we are conscious is a remembrance of a reality, or a revival of some image formed at some previous time, perhaps ...
— Gentle Measures in the Management and Training of the Young • Jacob Abbott
... "there's not a moment to be lost!" and as he said it, he reeled, and fell against Tom, muttering indistinctly of faintness, and that there was no time to lose. Tom lifted him in his arms, and got admission to the inn. Brandy, the country's specific, was advised by host and hostess, and forced into his mouth, reviving him sufficiently to cry out, "Tom! the bell's ringing: we shall be late," after which he ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... a heap of black ashes lay under the grate; and by the dull red glow I could see Jill's forlorn figure, very indistinctly, as she sat in her favourite attitude on the rug, her arms clasping her knees and her short black locks hanging loosely over her shoulders. She gave a little shrill exclamation of ...
— Uncle Max • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... laughs; Or growing serious, to the text resorts, And from the Sunday-sermon makes reports; While all, with grateful glee, his wish attend, A grave protector and a powerful friend: But Slander says, who indistinctly sees, Once he was caught with Sylvia on his knees; - A cautious burgess with a careful wife To be so caught!—'tis false, upon my life. Next are a lower kind, yet not so low But they, among them, their distinctions know; And when a thriving landlord aims so high, As to exchange ...
— The Borough • George Crabbe
... packed together. Peasants, men and women—he did not see a single member of the middle-class. In front of him under the altar there was a blaze of light, and figures moved in the blaze uncertainly, indistinctly. Now and then a sudden quiver passed across the throng, as wind blows through the corn. Here and there men and women knelt, but for the most part they stood steadfast, motionless, staring in front of them. He looked at them ...
— The Secret City • Hugh Walpole
... near her, and she could hear their voices indistinctly. She did not try to hear what they said, she was too tired to think. She snuggled closer in the soft pillows and sighed contentedly, but before long a voice near her separated itself from ...
— Lucia Rudini - Somewhere in Italy • Martha Trent
... evil look on his handsome face, 'he speaks too indistinctly for us to guess what he means; what are you afraid of? I will join you in Melbourne in two or three weeks, and then ...
— Madame Midas • Fergus Hume
... littered with scraps of lumber, tool boxes, empty nail kegs, and shavings. The long, gloomy gallery was empty when Bannon and Hilda stepped into it, excepting a group of men at the farther end, installing the rollers for the belt conveyor—they could be seen indistinctly against a light in the ...
— Calumet "K" • Samuel Merwin and Henry Kitchell Webster
... to him by saying, "What?" or, worse still, "Eh?" Often enough the reason that he does so is not that the child is deaf, nor that he is particularly slow to understand, but simply that he himself speaks so indistinctly that no matter what he says to the grown-up people around him, they bend over him and themselves ...
— The Nervous Child • Hector Charles Cameron
... luminous apparition disappeared, I became aware of a sense of dryness, and, in fact, regained my waking faculties. As I was now wide awake, my memory retained a portion of the ideas (indistinctly) ...
— The Physiology of Taste • Brillat Savarin
... they were yet regarding the paintings, it seemed as if the figures began to move, and a faint sound of warlike tumult arose from the cloth, with the clash of cymbal and bray of trumpet, the neigh of steed and shout of army; but all was heard indistinctly, as if afar off, or in a reverie or dream. The more they gazed, the plainer became the motion, and the louder the noise; and the linen cloth rolled forth, and amplified and spread out, as it were, a mighty banner, and filled the hall, and mingled with the air, ...
— Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, March 1844 - Volume 23, Number 3 • Various
... not mistaken; and I was quickly by his side, when I found that he had on the cap and cloak of an officer. The other person who followed close behind him was, I guessed from his uniform, which I could but indistinctly see, Antonio. ...
— In New Granada - Heroes and Patriots • W.H.G. Kingston
... inside the little house; then the door opened and in the light that streamed from within he was indistinctly visible to Nan as she stood ...
— Kindred of the Dust • Peter B. Kyne
... known before, my mother died when I was a very little child, scarcely three years old. I remember her but very indistinctly. The woman who is now my father's wife, was his housekeeper in my mother's life-time. She, of course, came from the common walks of life, her father being a very poor butcher. How she ever became my father's wife, I do not know; but my old nurse ...
— Leah Mordecai • Mrs. Belle Kendrick Abbott
... dozing; Zoya had poked her head out of window and was staring at the road. It occurred to Elena at last that she had not spoken to Insarov for more than an hour. She turned to him with a trifling question; he at once answered her, delighted. Dim sounds began stirring indistinctly in the air, as though thousands of voices were talking in the distance; Moscow was coming to meet them. Lights twinkled afar off; they grew more and more frequent; at last there was the grating of the cobbles under their wheels. ...
— On the Eve • Ivan Turgenev
... o'clock at night the haziness cleared away, and in about half an hour afterwards a light was seen. It was imagined to be the light at the mouth of the Christiansand Fiord, the name of which, amidst the bustle and joyousness of the moment, I could but indistinctly learn, and cannot now remember. As midnight approached, our old friend the fog gathered density, and effectually deprived us of the slightest glimpse of the light; and we retired to rest ill at ease, plunged into the vale of anxiety in the same ratio as we had been ...
— A Yacht Voyage to Norway, Denmark, and Sweden - 2nd edition • W. A. Ross
... the prince, his words coming more and more rapidly and indistinctly. "You thought!... Rascals! Blackguards!... I'll teach you to think!" and lifting his stick he swung it and would have hit Alpatych, the overseer, had not the latter instinctively avoided the blow. "Thought... Blackguards..." shouted the ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy
... past the churchyard, with its marble slabs indistinctly outlined in the darkness, like a phantom graveyard, as immaterial and ghostlike itself as the spirits of the earliest settlers at rest there beneath the sod. This was the last indication of the presence of the town, the final impression ...
— The Strollers • Frederic S. Isham
... that we had to cope in 1817, when we discussed the electoral system of France. We saw the most legitimate principles and the most jealous interests of the new state of society indistinctly menaced by a violent reaction. We felt the spirit of revolution spring up and ferment around us, arming itself, according to old practice, with noble incentives, to cover the march and prepare the triumph of the most injurious passions. By instinct ...
— Memoirs To Illustrate The History Of My Time - Volume 1 • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... He told her indistinctly that she always was a good girl; she never had a whipping from the day her mother died. She turned away impatiently; then cried out ...
— Men, Women, and Ghosts • Elizabeth Stuart Phelps
... isosyllabic rules of the Welsh englyn, is infinitely more complicated but we believe our readers will agree that the spirit has been well caught. Perhaps it should be added that the effect is greatly increased if Owen's verse be spoken somewhat slowly and indistinctly in a tone suggestive of ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce
... her as his father had visited his mother." But while he thus stood in suspense, Amine's eyes were turned upon him: she beheld him, but a thick cloud now obscured the moon's disc, and the dim light gave to his form, indistinctly seen, an unearthly and shadowy appearance. She recognised her husband; but having no reason to expect his return, she recognised him as an inhabitant of the world of spirits. She started, parted the hair away from her forehead with both hands, and again ...
— The Phantom Ship • Captain Frederick Marryat
... arises in the palace; Hippolytus is heard indistinctly uttering angry words. He and the Nurse come forth; in spite of her appeal for silence, he denounces her for tempting him. When she reminds him of his oath of secrecy, he answers "My tongue has sworn, but not ...
— Authors of Greece • T. W. Lumb
... Insensate save of a dull, crushed ache in my heart, Careless whither the steamer is going, Conscious only as in a dream of the wet and the dark And of a form that looms and fades indistinctly Everywhere out of ...
— Songs from Vagabondia • Bliss Carman and Richard Hovey
... his hold and dropped down on the path at her feet. Mr. Crayshaw, feeling, perhaps, that he would gain nothing by stopping to scold, and just a little afraid of being seized by the other leg, muttered something indistinctly and walked into the house, limping a little, for Godfrey's feet and fingers had left their mark. Angel stooped down and laid her hand on the little boy's shoulder, and he caught hold of her dress and ...
— Two Maiden Aunts • Mary H. Debenham
... fired. Before the flash and the fumes had blinded me I, too, had seen indistinctly something low and prone gliding around the corner of the entrance. That was all we could make out of it, for as you can imagine the light was almost non-existent. The thing glided steadily, untouched or unmindful of the shots we threw at it. When it came to the ...
— The Killer • Stewart Edward White
... the women's apartments; she even forgot Satish Babu, who remained lingering behind. Indistinctly, and dreading the ...
— The Poison Tree - A Tale of Hindu Life in Bengal • Bankim Chandra Chatterjee
... ground for it. He sought to be in advance, and to avoid the uninteresting position of a mere follower; but soon he began to see glimpses of the great Democratic ox-goad waving in his face, and to hear indistinctly a voice saying, "Back! Back, sir! Back a little!" He shakes his head, and bats his eyes, and blunders back to his position of March, 1847; but still the goad waves, and the voice grows more distinct and sharper still, "Back, ...
— The Papers And Writings Of Abraham Lincoln, Complete - Constitutional Edition • Abraham Lincoln
... so unaccountable, and rendered by the interruption quite unfit to pursue my occupation further, I deliberately undressed, said my prayers, put out my candle, and went to bed. It was a bright starlight night, and the two windows of my chamber made objects within indistinctly visible. No sooner had I laid my head upon the pillow, than through a door at the foot of my bed appeared a slowly moving figure, turning the corner of the bed and approaching the side of it upon which I lay. I could distinctly see its outlines, and it seemed to me apparelled like a monk, ...
— Old New England Traits • Anonymous
... now low in the sky, and gleams with an uncertain light through the curtains of the litera, Don Rafael can only trace indistinctly the features of Gertrudis. This half-obscurity, however, favours the young girl, concealing at the same time her happiness and confusion, both of which are betraying themselves in full blush upon her cheeks, hitherto so wan ...
— The Tiger Hunter • Mayne Reid
... misunderstanding. The death of the Vicar must be associated with no more serious sign of distress in Maggie than in others. She must be above suspicion. For one acute moment, as he read her thoughts and as the profound sacrificial tragedy of her entire existence loomed less indistinctly than usual before him, Edwin ceased to think about himself ...
— Clayhanger • Arnold Bennett
... first hour of their progress the land to windward merely presented the appearance of a black blur, indistinctly seen under the star-spangled indigo of the night sky; but by the end of that time something in the nature of outline began to reveal itself, while, half an hour later, a long tongue of land became distinctly visible broad on their weather bow, with ...
— Two Gallant Sons of Devon - A Tale of the Days of Queen Bess • Harry Collingwood
... word was said during the meal concerning Captain March. Mrs. Dalziel inquired about him; Tony with his mouth full answered indistinctly and hurriedly that he was "getting along all right"—as well as anybody could expect; and Milly viperishly turned the subject to ...
— Secret History Revealed By Lady Peggy O'Malley • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... he started his horse slowly, and the cab went by the constable, whose lamp showed the interior very indistinctly, the cab window being drawn up, and then the sight and sound of the vehicle died out in the fog, and all was once ...
— The Bag of Diamonds • George Manville Fenn
... horses took on new energy, and plunged desperately through the frozen snow which one moment supported their weight and the next splintered in broken ice-cakes beneath them. Slowly the mole grew until in the gathering shadows it took on indistinctly the shape of a building, and just as the rising moon crested the ridge of the Pembina hills the travellers swung up at the door. Arthurs had carried the key of the padlock in his hand for the last mile; everybody was out of the sleighs in a moment, and the next they were stamping ...
— The Homesteaders - A Novel of the Canadian West • Robert J. C. Stead
... on which he acts, and cannot bear with equanimity censure which is pointed and personal. At present I am not sure if this sensitiveness is beneficial. As the exact position of the Bank of England in the Money Market is indistinctly seen, there is no standard to which a Bank governor can appeal. He is always in fear that 'something may be said;' but not quite knowing on what side that 'something' may be, his fear is but an indifferent guide ...
— Lombard Street: A Description of the Money Market • Walter Bagehot
... day of February, 1795, Gen. Marion died at his house in St. John's parish. As his fame is yet but indistinctly known, and much of that through the medium of fable, the present attempt has been made to arrest its progress, to do honour to his memory, and to ...
— A Sketch of the Life of Brig. Gen. Francis Marion • William Dobein James
... indistinctly see the face of the man, half hidden in his bed of fresh leaves. Not far from the hut was a covered fire where, cooking slowly, after the fashion of buccaneers, was a year-old boar. The stove or gridiron was formed by four forks driven into the earth, on which were hung cross-pieces, ...
— A Romance of the West Indies • Eugene Sue
... for Christmas cards at the newspaper counter one night (the popular remark of customers at this period was "Ain't the evenings drawing in something awful!") when a man rushed in and looked around in a dazed, frightened manner. He muttered indistinctly some explanation, and was going off, when Gertie ...
— Love at Paddington • W. Pett Ridge
... last, that he expressed the wish; when he could only put his hand upon it, and very indistinctly say to me "your mother." A moment before, I thought him wandering in his mind, as he had been for many hours—I think he had no consciousness of pain in his short illness—when I saw him turn himself in his bed and try ...
— Little Dorrit • Charles Dickens
... Sir Leicester indistinctly answers, "Officer. The best you can, the best you can!" and Mr. Bucket, with a nod and a sagacious crook of the forefinger, slips down into the hall, where the voices quickly die away. He is not long in returning; a few paces ahead of Mercury and a brother deity ...
— Bleak House • Charles Dickens
... the eye, are all calculated to awaken a train of sad and serious contemplation. The ripple of the water against the boat, as its keel cleaves through the stream—the darkling current hurrying by—the indistinctly-seen craft, of all forms and all sizes, hovering around, and making their way in ghost-like silence, or warning each other of their approach by cries, that, heard from afar, have something doleful in their note—the solemn ...
— Jack Sheppard - A Romance • William Harrison Ainsworth
... on. It might have flamed violently, had his tenant made any further attempt to change his purpose. She had not. She had left the room meekly, with the same curt, awkward bow that marked her entrance. He recalled her manner very indistinctly; for a feeling, like a mist, began to gather in his mind, and make the ...
— The Ghost • William. D. O'Connor
... to as marking the south-east angle of the lake, I again saw; but so indistinctly, though the atmosphere was very clear, that I imagined it to be at least forty miles distant. It is due east of my station on Observatory Hill. I further draw my conclusions from the fact, that all the hills on the country are much about the same ...
— What Led To The Discovery of the Source Of The Nile • John Hanning Speke
... and then he went on half aloud, but indistinctly, repeating the problem in Euclid over which ...
— Burr Junior • G. Manville Fenn
... singular noise. A shriek followed from within the room. In a panic, Israel fled up the dark stairs, and near the top, in his eagerness, stumbled and fell back to the last step with a rolling din, which, reverberated by the arch overhead, smote through and through the wall, dying away at last indistinctly, like low muffled thunder among the clefts of deep hills. When raising himself instantly, not seriously bruised by his fall, Israel instantly listened, the echoing sounds of his descent were mingled with added shrieks from within the room. They seemed some nervous female's, ...
— Israel Potter • Herman Melville
... first been a tree on the bank, and then, as it were, fell into the water, to float there for a generation, the most proper vessel for the lake. I remember that when I first looked into these depths there were many large trunks to be seen indistinctly lying on the bottom, which had either been blown over formerly, or left on the ice at the last cutting, when wood was cheaper; but now ...
— Walden, and On The Duty Of Civil Disobedience • Henry David Thoreau
... when I first saw her. Her features and her expression were but indistinctly visible to me. I could just vaguely perceive that she was young and beautiful; but, beyond this, though I might imagine much, I ...
— Basil • Wilkie Collins
... Beauclerc. Lady Blanche then murmured some few words indistinctly, in a very sweet voice, but showed no indication of feeling, except, as Helen gave one glance, she thought she saw a slight colour, like the inside of a shell, delicately beautiful; but it might be only the reflection from the crimson silk curtain near ...
— Helen • Maria Edgeworth
... the voyage is very indistinctly described. From the lat. of 27 deg.S. where Cabral is said to have fallen in with the eastern coast of Africa, to Sofala, in lat. 19 deg.S. the coast stretches out nearly five degrees to the east, to Capes Corientes and St Sebastian, with many rivers, the great bays of Delogoa and Asnea, and ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. II • Robert Kerr
... the church of Notre Dame were wide open. Within, as we looked over the shoulders of the townspeople who, like us, had come to see what the bells meant by their ringing, within the church there was a rich and sombre dusk; out of this dusk, indistinctly at first, lit by the tremulous flicker of a myriad of candles, came a line of white-veiled heads; then another of young boys, with faces as pale as the nosegays adorning their brand-new black coats; next the scarlet-robed choristers, singing, and behind them still others swinging incense ...
— In and Out of Three Normady Inns • Anna Bowman Dodd
... for Snowball to make use of at that moment; for the orb of day was still darkly obscured by the fog; and for the same reason, the outlines of the island,—or whatever they were taking for one,—could be traced only very indistinctly. ...
— The Ocean Waifs - A Story of Adventure on Land and Sea • Mayne Reid
... the woman who had saved him, heard a low tapping at the door. It might be an enemy, and she advanced, and opened it with caution. A figure, seen indistinctly in the darkness, stood ...
— From Canal Boy to President - Or The Boyhood and Manhood of James A. Garfield • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... to the bed, you remember, Anne?" Croisette went on. "You were next to her. She saw you indistinctly, and took you for her sister. And then I sprang from ...
— The House of the Wolf - A Romance • Stanley Weyman
... along the river road, her vigilant eye kept her aware of a small boat, which, soon after her starting back from Marietta, she had seen glide out of the mouth of the Muskingum and drift down the Ohio, hugging close to the north shore. Indistinctly, through the mist, she could make out the shape of a man rowing the boat. Whenever she quickened the pace of her horse, the man plied his oars rapidly; whenever she slackened reins, the man slowed up; he kept opposite her and was watching her. ...
— A Dream of Empire - Or, The House of Blennerhassett • William Henry Venable
... on Saturday nights and Sundays. One Sunday—it was the coldest day that winter—I went to Falmouth and visited a drinking place kept by one McPhillipps. While there I drank eleven glasses of whisky. At nine o'clock in the evening, I can indistinctly remember, I mounted my horse and started home, and from that moment until the next day I knew nothing whatever that took place. From the way I was bruised and battered I judge that I must have struck almost every fence corner between McPhillipps' place and home. My legs were in a woful ...
— Fifteen Years in Hell • Luther Benson
... as he fixed his thoughts successfully on outward and physical things, the world wherein he now walked grew dim: he missed the path, stumbled, saw trees and flowers indistinctly, failed to hear properly the call of birds and wind, to feel the touch of sun; and, most unwelcome of all,—was aware that his leader left him, dwindling in size, dropping away somehow among shadows ...
— The Centaur • Algernon Blackwood
... acute rhombohedra and are usually optically uniaxial. The species prochlorite and corundophilite also occur as more or less distinct six-sided plates. These four better crystallized species are grouped together by G. Tschermak as orthochlorites, the finely scaly and indistinctly fibrous forms being grouped by the same author ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 3 - "Chitral" to "Cincinnati" • Various
... mile or more to the southward a spreading dust-cloud hugged the earth, through which, indistinctly, Stratton could make out the moving figures of men and cattle. The two spurred forward, reaching the wide opening in the fence ahead of the vanguard of steers. Passing through, they circled to the right to avoid turning ...
— Shoe-Bar Stratton • Joseph Bushnell Ames
... at the door of the cell now—the key was being turned in the lock, and when the door opened, Adam saw indistinctly that there were several faces there. He was too agitated to see more—even to see that Mr. Irwine's face was one of them. He felt that the last preparations were beginning, and he could stay no longer. Room was silently made for him to depart, and he went to his chamber in loneliness, leaving ...
— Adam Bede • George Eliot
... afternoon of an intensely cold day, which caused the spray to congeal as it dashed against the bulwarks and cordage of the vessel, that we descried with great pleasure looming indistinctly in the distance, the shores of Sandy Hook, a desolate-looking island, near the coast of New Jersey, about seven miles south of Long Island Sound. This the captain informed me was formerly a peninsula, but the isthmus was broken through by the sea in 1767, ...
— An Englishman's Travels in America - His Observations Of Life And Manners In The Free And Slave States • John Benwell
... bed, the skins they used for saddles their pillows, and the star-gemmed canopy above their only covering. At dawn they were again on their march, and as they proceeded the objects they had seen the night before faint and indistinctly, became more clearly defined, having the appearance of uneven bodies, scattered over a considerable extent of territory. In a few hours, they came to them and found, instead of a forest, a singular mass of rocks, sometimes rising ...
— The American Family Robinson - or, The Adventures of a Family lost in the Great Desert of the West • D. W. Belisle
... indistinctly heard. It is Corkey crying to Lockwin to climb up the steps to the hurricane deck. Indeed it is a clever riddance of that uncomfortable man. Ouf! that brutal sneeze, that jargon, that tobacco, that quaking of head and hesitancy ...
— David Lockwin—The People's Idol • John McGovern
... first time something learned by heart speak not always indistinctly, but, on account of the incomplete practicability of the motor-paths, slowly, monotonously, without modulation. Sounds and syllables do not yet follow one another quickly, although they are already formed correctly. The syllables belonging to ...
— The Mind of the Child, Part II • W. Preyer
... as a speculative Radical, has his own notions about human dignity; that the Zaehdarm palaces and courtesies have not made him forgetful of the Futteral cottages. On the blank cover of Heuschrecke's Tract we find the following indistinctly engrossed: ...
— Sartor Resartus, and On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and the Heroic in History • Thomas Carlyle
... face. Do I still dream, or is this actually one of 'le mie prigioni'? I rub my eyes for a third time, and look about the semi-darkened vault. Somebody is snoring. I gaze in the direction whence the sound proceeds, and observe indistinctly an object huddled together in a corner. So, this is no dream, after all; and that heap of sleeping humanity is not Napoleon, but my companion, Nicasio ...
— The Pearl of the Antilles, or An Artist in Cuba • Walter Goodman
... etc. For "zamin" with the acc. see Ibn Jubair ed. by Wright, 77, 2. I may say on this occasion, that my impression of the Montague MS. is, that it is a blundering copy of a valuable though perhaps indistinctly written original.—ST.] ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton
... about there in Christiania," he says in a published letter to Bjoernson, "as a young student, undeveloped, dim, and unclear—a kind of poetic visionary, a Nordland twilight nature—which after a fashion espied what was abroad in the age, but indistinctly in the dusk, as through a water telescope—when I met a young, clear, full-born force, pregnant with the nation's new day, the blue steel-flash of determination in his eyes and the happily found national form—pugnacious to the very point of his pen. ...
— Essays on Scandinavian Literature • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen
... been lodged in the common jail of this county, who says his name is JUPITER. He has lost all his front teeth above and below—speaks very indistinctly, is very lame, so that he ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... words, as the captain sighted the slowly-moving objects just indistinctly seen, but they were enough to send a ...
— Blue Jackets - The Log of the Teaser • George Manville Fenn
... fig. 143 represent? 931. Why can we see objects at the side as well as in front of the eye, without turning the body? What is the effect when the eye is fixed on an object that is indistinctly seen? ...
— A Treatise on Anatomy, Physiology, and Hygiene (Revised Edition) • Calvin Cutter
... exasperated me still more. I was so much excited, that I no longer recognized my own voice, raised to an extraordinary pitch, and the last words I screamed at him—I can't remember what unjust and mad remark it was—seemed to buzz indistinctly in my ears. For a moment, I thought Monsieur Petitbry's assault with violence was an accomplished fact. Pallid, with set teeth Henri made two steps ...
— Artists' Wives • Alphonse Daudet
... this man, as well as in two of the young gentlemen who returned after dark, and of whom we were anxious to make inquiries respecting Pearson. When I sent for them into my cabin, they looked wild, spoke thick and indistinctly, and it was impossible to draw from them a rational answer to any of our questions. After being on board for a short time, the mental faculties appeared gradually to return with the returning circulation, ...
— Three Voyages for the Discovery of a Northwest Passage from the • Sir William Edward Parry
... Elbe had been formerly, as Tacitus observes, well known to the Romans by the victories of Drusus, Tiberius, and Domitius; but afterwards, when the increasing power of the Germans kept the Roman arms at a distance, it was only indistinctly heard of. Hence its source was probably inaccurately laid down in the Roman geographical tables. Perhaps, however, the Hermunduri, when they had served in the army of Maroboduus, received lands in that part of Bohemia ...
— The Germany and the Agricola of Tacitus • Tacitus
... him, he perceived that he lay in a cabin of some sort, very richly furnished, but lit by a light so dim that he could only make out objects in it very indistinctly. There was no port-hole or sky-light of any description in the apartment, which led him to the conclusion that he must be in some room far away below the water-line. This impression was heightened by the fact that exterior noises came to his ...
— Across the Spanish Main - A Tale of the Sea in the Days of Queen Bess • Harry Collingwood
... Bonci. They belonged to the peasant class, and were poor, even among the Papal peasantry. The family consisted of the father and mother, and of their son and daughter, both grown up. Between the father and son there had long been ill-blood. The cause of this want of family harmony is but indistinctly stated, but apparently it was due to the irregular habits of the son, and to the severity of the father; while all this domestic misery was rendered doubly bitter by the almost abject want of the household. On the night of November the 9th, 1856, Venanzio Bonci, ...
— Rome in 1860 • Edward Dicey
... extreme; he opened the window, and, enveloping himself in his great silk robe, placed a heavy candlestick upon the table and desired to be left alone. His window looked out upon the plain, which the moon, in her first quarter, indistinctly lighted; the sky was charged with thick clouds, and all things disposed the mind to melancholy. Although Bassompierre had nothing of the dreamer in his character, the tone which the conversation had taken at dinner returned to his memory, and he reconsidered ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... in bed about an hour, and sleep had not yet approached his couch, when he felt that the pallet on which he lay was sinking below him, and that he was in the act of descending along with it he knew not whither. The sound of ropes and pullies was also indistinctly heard, though every caution had been taken to make them run smooth; and the traveller, by feeling around him, became sensible that he and the bed on which he lay had been spread upon a large trapdoor, which was capable of being let down into the vaults, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 13, - Issue 373, Supplementary Number • Various
... was a shallow, stony river, but deep enough at one point for gingerly swimming. Stefan seemed never to have been cool through the summer except when he was squatting or paddling in this hole. He remembered only indistinctly the boys with whom he bathed; he had no friends among them. But there had been a little girl with starched white skirts, huge blue bows over blue eyes, and yellow hair, whom he had admired to adoration. She wanted desperately to bathe in the hole, and he demanded of her mother that ...
— The Nest Builder • Beatrice Forbes-Robertson Hale
... windows; and the cold damp light seemed to moisten the walls. Not a sound came from outside save the monotonous plashing of the rain. The sparrows were doubtless crouching for shelter under the tiles, and the rowan-tree's deserted branches showed but indistinctly in the veiling, drenching downpour. Five o'clock struck, grated out, stroke by stroke, from the wheezy chest of the old clock; and then the silence fell again, seeming to grow yet deeper, dimmer, and more despairing. The priest's painting work, as yet scarcely dry, gave to the ...
— Abbe Mouret's Transgression - La Faute De L'abbe Mouret • Emile Zola
... while and prayed, and I devoutly respected her devotions. The moon had begun to shine in upon one side of each of the three windows, and make a misty clearness in the room, by which I saw her indistinctly. When she re-arose she made the sign ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume XXI • Robert Louis Stevenson
... from his pocket, he was in the act of thrusting its wedgelike flat point in beneath the framework of the casement when there was a step behind him, and as he turned sharply, it was to face a tall, thin, rough-looking figure, very indistinctly seen as it stood close to him, and the word "Halloo!" was whispered hoarsely ...
— The Vast Abyss - The Story of Tom Blount, his Uncles and his Cousin Sam • George Manville Fenn
... for she was shown at once into the private office of the senior partner. The clerk who ushered her in pronounced her name indistinctly, and the elderly man who rose from his chair at her entrance looked at ...
— A Millionaire of Yesterday • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... beside the fireplace. There he used to sit, gazing with a somewhat dim serenity of aspect at the figures that came and went; amid the rustle of papers, the administering of oaths, the discussion of business, and the casual talk of the office; all which sounds and circumstances seemed but indistinctly to impress his senses, and hardly to make their way into his inner sphere of contemplation. His countenance, in this repose, was mild and kindly. If his notice was sought, an expression of courtesy and interest gleamed out upon his features; proving that there was light within him, and ...
— The Scarlet Letter • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... his solitary house. The rain had ceased. A cold wind dispersed the clouds and scattered them behind the mountains; the sky became clear with the pale blue of autumn days, and a few stars appeared like diamonds in the horizon. The trees, mountains, streams and verdure-clad valley shone indistinctly under the clearness of the twilight. The count again put his horse to a gallop and quickly descended the hill which hid Lancia from view. The wind affected his senses and whistled in his ears producing a sweet intoxication that dissipated the black clouds of his imagination. Along the muddy road ...
— The Grandee • Armando Palacio Valds
... into the night astern. He knew that men hear indistinctly over the noise of a gasoline-engine, but he had ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day
... indistinctly formulated by the most advanced thinkers of the age, and only gradually developed by practice into actuality, was a vast one. It involved the embitterment of national jealousies, the accentuation of national characteristics, and the complication of antagonistic principles regarding secular ...
— Renaissance in Italy, Volumes 1 and 2 - The Catholic Reaction • John Addington Symonds
... I didn't like to ask him. He asked to be introduced to me," said Mrs. Penniman, with a certain grandeur; "but you know how indistinctly Jefferson speaks." Jefferson was Mr. Almond. "Catherine, dear, what was ...
— Washington Square • Henry James
... slopes in fair perspective; its northern shore, from Nettlestone Point to Egypt, bounding the view. On Lucy's right lay the entrance to Southampton Water, with the further shore, about Stone Point and the mouth of the Beaulieu River, indistinctly seen through the quivering golden haze; whilst on the left, across the water, Southsea Castle stood boldly forward upon its low projecting point, a watchful sentinel over the magnificent anchorage of Spithead. Inland ...
— The Voyage of the Aurora • Harry Collingwood
... listlessly at her side. She resembled a statue of darkness seated on a milestone. In her attitude there was an air of stern determination and the necessary patience to wait there forever. The passers-by, the carriages, the street—she saw them all indistinctly and as if they were far away. The tow-horse, waiting to assist in drawing the omnibuses up the hill,—a white horse, he was,—stood in front of her, worn out and motionless, sleeping on his feet, with ...
— Germinie Lacerteux • Edmond and Jules de Goncourt
... artist must be in the throes of a bewildering nightmare in order to be blind to all this, and like a ghost, diffidently and in a quavering voice, he goes on repeating beautiful words which he declares descend to him from higher spheres, but whose sound he can hear only very indistinctly. The artist who happens to be moulded according to the modern pattern, however, regards the dreamy gropings and hesitating speech of his nobler colleague with contempt, and leads forth the whole brawling ...
— Thoughts out of Season (Part One) • Friedrich Nietzsche
... stupid indifference; above whom are several figures, mostly of the lower grade, in the various stages of infection or recovery. They are sitting before the window of a house, through the panes of which we see indistinctly one raving, while from the same house a dead body is being let down from above, and in the background are the dead-cart and the carriers. At the feet of the figures by the house lie others, in all the langour of disease and feverish watchfulness. Among these persons are various shades ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 54, No. 334, August 1843 • Various
... sweating gold was only one of the many fables got up to make the Jews odious and afford a pretext for plundering them. As for the sound like a woman laughing and crying, I never said it was a woman's voice; for, in the first place, I could only hear indistinctly; and, secondly, he may have an organ, or some queer instrument or other, with what they call the voce umana stop. If he moves his bed round to get out of draughts, or for any such reason, there is nothing very frightful in that simple operation. Most of our foolish conceits ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 21, July, 1859 • Various
... they returned to the side of the hall. Out of the haze he heard words, and knew indistinctly that ...
— The Cross-Cut • Courtney Ryley Cooper
... proceeded across the shell-swept battlefield. The cannonade made an infernal noise now and it seemed as if bedlam had been let loose. Closer and closer they came to their goal. Indistinctly outlined against the night they could see the pile of earth thrown up in front of ...
— Fighting in France • Ross Kay
... exactly what was happening, before taking the leap. The unfortunate man sank, upon striking the water; but presently the man beside me sang out "There he is!" pointing at the same time down at the water about thirty feet from our bows; and, peering down, I at length caught sight, indistinctly, of what looked like a human form, twisting and writhing a few feet below the surface. I instantly dived, and the next moment found myself within arm's reach of the man, whom I seized by the hair and dragged to the surface, when ...
— The Castaways • Harry Collingwood
... stiff fibres being thrust through them. The whole forms a very light and graceful fabric. Within this nest were four beautiful and highly polished eggs of a deep brick-red colour, darkest at the larger end, faint specks and blotches of a deeper colour being indistinctly discernible beneath the surface of the shell, which shines as if it had been varnished. The nest is not closed above, but is open and deeply cup-shaped. This was taken in the ...
— The Nests and Eggs of Indian Birds, Volume 1 • Allan O. Hume
... after that came very indistinctly to Chester Lawrence. He heard the words, but was aware only of a peculiar feeling, a dim perception of where he was and what he was hearing. There seemed to him to be a genuine feeling in the voice that uttered those beautiful words of scripture. ...
— Story of Chester Lawrence • Nephi Anderson
... to feel spiteful just then; he had a vague idea that Crawley wanted to shake hands, and that it would be "bad form" to hold back, so he put his right hand out and murmured something indistinctly. ...
— Dr. Jolliffe's Boys • Lewis Hough
... swift eye had seen I leave the reader to guess. She suppressed the scream that rose to her lips, but the effort cost her dear. Soon the left hand of the hermit began to swim indistinctly before her gloating eyes; and with a deep sigh her head drooped, and she ...
— The Cloister and the Hearth • Charles Reade
... substance which is pure light, free from all division and distinction, there cannot belong two modes of being, and hence obscuration and light cannot abide in it together.—Let us then say that Brahman, which is homogeneous being, intelligence, bliss, has its nature obscured by avidya, and hence is seen indistinctly as it were.—But how, we ask, are we to conceive the distinctness or indistinctness of that whose nature is pure light? When an object of light which has parts and distinguishing attributes appears in ...
— The Vedanta-Sutras with the Commentary by Ramanuja - Sacred Books of the East, Volume 48 • Trans. George Thibaut
... nearest of which, when the sun is nigh its meridian, fling a broad shadow upon the face of the pool; through yon vista you catch a glimpse of the ancient brick of an old English hall. It has a stately look, that old building, indistinctly seen, as it is, among those umbrageous trees; you might almost suppose it an earl's home; and such it was, or rather upon its site stood an earl's home, in days of old, for there some old Kemp, some Sigurd, or Thorkild, roaming in quest of ...
— Lavengro - The Scholar, The Gypsy, The Priest • George Borrow
... "Historiographer of Brandenburg," devoted wholly to the study of Friedrich for five-and-twenty years past, and for above a dozen years busily engaged in editing the OEuvres de Frederic,—has, besides that Lebensgeschichte just cited, three or four smaller Books, of indistinctly different titles, on the same subject. A meritoriously exact man; acquainted with the outer details of Friedrich's Biography (had he any way of arranging, organizing or setting them forth) as few men ever were or will ...
— History Of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Volume IV. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—Friedrich's Apprenticeship, First Stage—1713-1728 • Thomas Carlyle
... Dick knelt at the door and applied his ear to the keyhole. At first he could hear only indistinctly, but gradually he caught the drift of the conversation between the rascally brokers and the former ...
— The Rover Boys in New York • Arthur M. Winfield
... natural tendency to "baby-talk" which is too often encouraged and aided by the habit of parents in REPEATING THE BABY-TALK. In no case, should defective utterances be repeated, no matter how "cute" the utterance may seem at the time. Many speak indistinctly throughout their entire life simply because of the habit of their parents in repeating baby-talk, thus confirming ...
— Stammering, Its Cause and Cure • Benjamin Nathaniel Bogue
... had lately asserted its ancient powers in the trial of the less dangerous Cagliostro. All was in vain; not a trace of him could be discovered. I was not alone, Adela." Here Glyndon paused a moment, as if embarrassed; for in his recital, I need scarcely say that he had only indistinctly alluded to Fillide, whom the reader may surmise to be his companion. "I was not alone, but the associate of my wanderings was not one in whom my soul could confide,—faithful and affectionate, but without education, without faculties to comprehend me, with natural instincts ...
— Zanoni • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... on either foot, and scratched his head vigorously, while his facial expression was something too comical for description. Finally, through a series of embarrassed chuckles and gurgles, he rippled into a broad guffaw, articulating indistinctly between its paroxysms, "Bress de Lord, ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 20, August 1877 • Various
... voice. "You see I always have the extra saddle, the extra railway ticket, the extra what-ever-it-is. And—and—" Caressingly a little gold-tipped hand reached out through the shadows and patted something indistinctly metallic. "My mother's memory? My father's revolver?" she drawled. "Why, what better company could any girl have? Indiscreet?" Slowly the tip of her little nose tilted up into the light. "Why, down in the Transvaal—two years ago," she explained painstakingly, "why, down ...
— Little Eve Edgarton • Eleanor Hallowell Abbott
... like a bird in its nest, murmured indistinctly, her eyelids quivered a second, then the blue eyes opened wide, and directly ...
— The Unseen Bridgegroom - or, Wedded For a Week • May Agnes Fleming
... the table, muttering indistinctly, and Dick followed her. Willie slipped from his chair, crawled under the table, and by stealthily sticking a pin into Uncle Israel's ankle, produced a violent disturbance, during which the pain-killer was badly spilled. When the air finally cleared, there was no one in the room ...
— At the Sign of the Jack O'Lantern • Myrtle Reed
... of following too far, by the time they were five leagues from Toulon, they were recalled, about three quarters of an hour past three, by their signal-post from the hill, and all stood in again. At six, the rear-admiral saw our fleet to leeward, and joined them at half-past nine. They had heard, indistinctly, the firing: and the Leviathan was, in consequence, detached toward Toulon; but had not proceeded far, before our ships were perceived on their return. This trivial affair was magnified, by the French admiral, Latouche ...
— The Life of the Right Honourable Horatio Lord Viscount Nelson, Vol. II (of 2) • James Harrison
... for Draxy. Nearly all night she had lain awake, thinking how terrible it would be to her to hear her husband's beloved words indistinctly and ineffectively read by Deacon Swift's cracked and feeble voice. Almost she regretted having given her consent. At last the thought flashed into her mind, "Why should I not read it myself? I know I could be heard in every ...
— Saxe Holm's Stories • Helen Hunt Jackson
... of needles under him, while his heart thumped against his ribs, and his whiskers stood out in mortal fear. There followed a weird and appalling silence, and in that stillness Peter quested vainly for the sunlight he had lost. And then, indistinctly, but bringing with it a new thrill, he heard another sound. It was a soft and distant rippling of running water. He knew that sound. It was friendly. He had played among the rocks and pebbles and sand where it was made. His courage came back, and he rose up on his legs, and made his ...
— The Country Beyond - A Romance of the Wilderness • James Oliver Curwood
... sir, it is an appeal. Monsieur is an artist, I perceive. We are here three artists benighted and without shelter, one a woman - a delicate woman - in evening dress - in an interesting situation. This will not fail to touch the woman's heart of Madame, whom I perceive indistinctly behind Monsieur her husband, and whose face speaks eloquently of a well-regulated mind. Ah! Monsieur, Madame - one generous movement, and you make three people happy! Two or three hours beside your fire - I ask it of Monsieur ...
— New Arabian Nights • Robert Louis Stevenson
... from such speculations. For a man to reach a remote posterity, it is sometimes necessary that he should throw his voice over to them in a vast arch—it must sweep a parabola—which, therefore, rises high above the heads of those next to him, and is heard by the bystanders but indistinctly, like bees swarming in the upper air before they settle on the spot fit ...
— The Notebook of an English Opium-Eater • Thomas de Quincey
... progress which encouraged them to work out a national existence, broad enough and strong enough to satisfy the ambition of a great nation a century after its birth; Clinton was satisfied to conserve what he had, unmoved by the great possibilities even then indistinctly outlined to the eye of the statesman whose vision was fixed intently upon an undivided America. But Clinton wisely conserved what was given to his keeping. As he grew older he grew more tolerant and humane, substituting ...
— A Political History of the State of New York, Volumes 1-3 • DeAlva Stanwood Alexander
... loves all epochs and phases of literature, but his passion is the Charles Lamb period and all Lamb's friends. He loves them as if they were living men; and Lamb would have loved him if he could have known him. He speaks rapidly, and rather indistinctly, and when you meet him and say Good day, and you suppose he answers with something about the weather, ten to one he's asking you what you think of Hazlitt's essays on Shakespeare, or Leigh Hunt's Italian Poets, or Lamb's roast pig, ...
— Suburban Sketches • W.D. Howells
... imposed by Augustus upon the ancient Romans, was a tax upon the transference of property from the dead to the living. Dion Cassius, { Lib. 55. See also Burman. de Vectigalibus Pop. Rom. cap. xi. and Bouchaud de l'impot du vingtieme sur les successions.} the author who writes concerning it the least indistinctly, says, that it was imposed upon all successions, legacies and donations, in case of death, except upon those to the nearest relations, and ...
— An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations • Adam Smith
... official reports of the Lords' debates a speech begins thus: "Lord —— (who was indistinctly heard)." The Commons' report might well adopt this salutary practice as a warning to Members who persistently mumble, or who address their remarks to the body of the House instead of to the SPEAKER. Ministers are the worst ...
— Punch, Volume 156, 26 March 1919 • Various
... that hope died away, I concluded she must have headache. I had one, and I thought it only natural that she should, too. The question was, what remedy should I apply? In a happy moment paregoric occurred to me. I seemed indistinctly to remember that when I was a child paregoric did the business. How fortunate one is, dear boy, in such moments as that to have the memories of his boyhood to fall back on. I got up, dressed, and went out to hunt a drug-store. Unfortunately, the only two I came across were closed. I returned ...
— Tin-Types Taken in the Streets of New York • Lemuel Ely Quigg
... agitated for a few moments; and the Table of the Law opposite, which now seemed to appertain to another dispensation, glistened indistinctly upon a vision still ...
— Two on a Tower • Thomas Hardy
... it interrupted by a call upon his attention in the appearance of two figures below, looming dim and ghostlike in the fog. Just beneath his window, they paused in their walk, and their voices came up to him first indistinctly, then with more and more clearness. The tones Flint recognized at once as belonging to Tilly Marsden and to Leonard Davitt, the young fisherman whose scarlet shirt was often to be seen on the clamming grounds, and whose rich baritone ...
— Flint - His Faults, His Friendships and His Fortunes • Maud Wilder Goodwin
... Shoots slender; internodes long, angular, usually glabrous, sometimes pubescent; diaphragms thick; tendrils intermittent, long, usually bifid. Leaves with short, broad stipules; leaf-blade medium to large, cordate, entire or indistinctly three-lobed; petiolar sinus deep, usually narrow, acute; margin with coarse angular teeth; point of leaf acuminate; upper surface light green, glossy, glabrous; glabrous or sparingly pubescent below. Clusters medium to large, loose, with ...
— Manual of American Grape-Growing • U. P. Hedrick
... the bench, and gasped, apparently unable to speak; he looked to Vanderhoek, and pointed to an instrument in the shape of a mattock—shaking his hand, and muttering indistinctly, "Haste! haste!" ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume III • Various
... put up her face; they were both smiling, both on the brink of laughter, all was so innocent and playful; and the Prince, when their lips encountered, was dumfoundered by the sudden convulsion of his being. Both drew instantly apart, and for an appreciable time sat tongue-tied. Otto was indistinctly conscious of a peril in the silence, but could find no words to utter. Suddenly the Countess seemed to awake. "As for your wife——" she began in a clear and ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 7 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson |
