"Inexpressibly" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... action, perfect, and lasting. That the exterior flesh may be yet more beautiful; that the shape may be finer, and the motions graceful. These are the soberest words I can find, purposely chosen; for I am so rapt in the beauty of the human form, and so earnestly, so inexpressibly, prayerful to see that form perfect, that my full thought is not to be written. Unable to express it fully, I have considered it best to put it in the simplest manner of words. I believe in the human form; let me find something, some method, ...
— The Story of My Heart • Richard Jefferies
... of what Jacob Rigg had seen and heard threw me into a state of mind extremely unsatisfactory. To be in eager search of some unknown person who had injured me inexpressibly, without any longing for revenge on my part, but simply with a view to justice—this was a very different thing from feeling that an unknown person was in quest of me, with the horrible purpose of destroying me to insure his own ...
— Erema - My Father's Sin • R. D. Blackmore
... and the sea is in no extraordinary state of agitation: so the sound is low and distant just at this period. But when storms are at their height, when the ocean hurls mountain after mountain of water on the cliffs, then the noise is terrific; the roaring heard down here in the mine is so inexpressibly fierce and awful that the boldest men at work are afraid to continue their labor; all ascend to the surface to breathe the upper air and stand on the firm earth; dreading, though no such catastrophe has ever happened yet, that the sea will break in on them if they remain ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 1, April, 1851 • Various
... not until one is tied to a locality that its defects become apparent. A street that interests the mind by some charm of populous vivacity when it is traversed at random and without object, becomes inexpressibly wearisome when it is the thoroughfare of daily duty. My daily duty took me through a long stretch of Oxford Street, which is a street not altogether destitute of some real claim to gaiety and dignity. ...
— The Quest of the Simple Life • William J. Dawson
... Virgin was inexpressibly grieved at hearing of the fresh pang inflicted on the loving heart of her Divine Son, the pang of hearing himself denied by that disciple who had first acknowledged him as the Son of the Living God; she was unable to ...
— The Dolorous Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ • Anna Catherine Emmerich
... pulled into a bustling station, in which the multitudinous noises were thrown back again from the arched iron roof. The relentless haste of all the people was inexpressibly cruel to the man who looked from the window wondering whither he would go, and if, among all the thousands that made up that vast and throbbing city, he would ...
— A Mountain Woman and Others • (AKA Elia Wilkinson) Elia W. Peattie
... they?) was a flower of the great Democracy, and that it was impossible to have had an origin less distinguished than Tarrant himself. His birth, in some unheard-of place in Pennsylvania, was quite inexpressibly low, and Olive would have been much disappointed if it had been wanting in this defect. She liked to think that Verena, in her childhood, had known almost the extremity of poverty, and there was a kind of ferocity ...
— The Bostonians, Vol. I (of II) • Henry James
... low tone in one of the window recesses, but I heard what they said; and when Mrs. Linwood afterwards told me that Meg the Dauntless had gone off with the doctor in high glee, I was inexpressibly relieved, for I had conceived an unconquerable terror of her. There was other company in the house, as Edith had prophesied, but in a mansion so large and so admirably arranged, an invalid might be kept perfectly quiet without interfering with ...
— Ernest Linwood - or, The Inner Life of the Author • Caroline Lee Hentz
... of this reserved life of Charlotte Bronte. Are they dull and commonplace? Some of them are indeed inexpressibly sad. Tragedy is beneath all the bitter chronicle. The sadness of her days can be appreciated by all who read her books. Through all her stories there is an intense note, especially in treating the pathos of existence, that is ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 6 • Various
... stepped backward, in half courtesy and half astonishment, she was, for the moment, disconcerted. He was tall, finely formed, and dark-bearded. Above cheeks a little hollowed by care and ill-health shone a pair of hazel eyes, very large, very gentle, but inexpressibly sad and mournful. This was certainly not the kind of man Miss Milly had expected to see; yet, after her first embarrassment had passed, the very circumstance, oddly enough, added to her indignation, and stung her wounded pride still more deeply. Nevertheless, ...
— Tales of the Argonauts • Bret Harte
... Inexpressibly shocked and alarmed, Gram could hardly trust the evidence of her senses. She stared helplessly, at first, then all in a tremble, snatched up the bottle, smelled of it, then ...
— When Life Was Young - At the Old Farm in Maine • C. A. Stephens
... to move about the room, as a man disturbed in his mind usually does. She sat calm and expectant, watching him, a faint smile on her lips, a kindness and a gentleness in her face that made it inexpressibly sweet. ...
— The Imaginary Marriage • Henry St. John Cooper
... calling in old Sally to witness the spectacle before they went; and so she and Aunt Becky had another little sportive battle—they never met, and seldom parted, without one. How was it that when gay little Lily provoked these little mimic skirmishes Aunt Becky would look for a second or two an inexpressibly soft and loving look upon her, and become quite girlish and tender? I think there is a way to every heart, and some few have the gift to ...
— The House by the Church-Yard • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... of this loneliness, this exquisite unhappiness. But these great hearts had had the consolation of setting down their moods in beautiful words, words that lived and spoke. His own strange fever burned inexpressibly inside him. Was he the only one who felt the challenge offered by the maddening fertility and foison of the hot sun-dazzled earth? Life, he realized, was too amazing to be frittered out in this aimless sickness of heart. There were truths and wonders to be grasped, if he could only throw ...
— Where the Blue Begins • Christopher Morley
... His realm is very extensive. No man has the power (had he only the will) of depicting the simplicity of every-day life and objects with more grace or comprehensiveness. There are some touches in his 'Village Blacksmith' inexpressibly beautiful, and worthy of ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, June 1844 - Volume 23, Number 6 • Various
... molten mass of burnished silver, and its light fell over forest and valley, range and peak. The trees on the slopes stood out like lacework, but far down in the valley the light seemed to shimmer like waves on a sea of silver mist. It was all inexpressibly cold, and of a loneliness that was uncanny. Nothing stirred, not a twig, not a blade of grass. It seemed to Dick that if even a leaf fell on the far side of the mountain he could hear it. It was a great, ...
— The Last of the Chiefs - A Story of the Great Sioux War • Joseph Altsheler
... lands which may lie to the south will never be explored. Thick fogs, snow storms, intense cold, and every thing besides, that can render navigation dangerous, must be encountered; all which difficulties are greatly heightened by the inexpressibly horrid aspect of the country. It is a country doomed by nature never once to feet the warmth of the sun's rays, but to lie buried in everlasting snow and ice. Whatever ports there may be on the coast, they are almost entirely covered with frozen snow ...
— Narrative of the Voyages Round The World, • A. Kippis
... out of a barrel; and, like the self-same warrior, he possessed a sovereign contempt for the sovereign people, and an iron aspect which was enough of itself to make the very bowels of his adversaries quake with terror and dismay. All this martial excellency of appearance was inexpressibly heightened by an accidental advantage with which I am surprised that neither Homer nor Virgil have graced any of their heroes. This was nothing less than a wooden leg, which was the only prize he had gained in bravely fighting the battles of his country, but of which he ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 8 • Charles H. Sylvester
... to her in his quiet, even, matter-of-fact way, that to the disturbed girl was inexpressibly soothing, his belief that her uncle was on an exploration trip for oil and might easily find a month's accumulation of mail awaiting ...
— Betty Gordon in Washington • Alice B. Emerson
... thing he must do, of course, was to define the problem. He defined it in terms of mathematics. Granted that he had not the place to himself; granted that the old house had inexpressibly caught and engaged his spirit; granted that, by virtue of the common denominator of the place, this unknown co-tenant stood in some relation to himself: what next? Clearly, the nature of the other numerator must ...
— Widdershins • Oliver Onions
... should thus dare to sit in judgment on the divine administration, and pronounce that needless which God has declared indispensable, and call that folly which God esteems the highest wisdom, is not merely presumptuous;—it is inexpressibly impious. ...
— The National Preacher, Vol. 2 No. 7 Dec. 1827 • Aaron W. Leland and Elihu W. Baldwin
... and was standing rigid and motionless in the center of the illuminated roadway, staring like one bereft of sense. His face in the moonlight showed a pallor and fixity inexpressibly distressing. I pulled gently at his sleeve, but he had forgotten my existence. Presently he began to retire backward, step by step, never for an instant removing his eyes from what he saw, or thought he saw. I turned half round to follow, but stood irresolute. I do ...
— Can Such Things Be? • Ambrose Bierce
... the Pomegranate is another work by Botticelli which belongs in this class of pictures. It is a tondo in the Uffizi, showing the figures in half length. The Virgin, encircled by angels, holds the child half reclining on her lap. Her face is inexpressibly sad, and the child shares her mood, as he raises his little hand to bless the spectator. Two angels bear the Virgin's flowers, roses and lilies; two others hold books. They bend towards the queen as the petals ...
— The Madonna in Art • Estelle M. Hurll
... "Jane" in her wedding dress, and it was a bright face that looked out at the world from the heavy gold frame, a sweet girlish face, which seemed to ask a question with its eager eyes. And there below, in the black draped coffin, was the answer—the same face, only a few years older, but tired, so inexpressibly tired, cold and silent; its light gone out—the power gone off. Jane had been given her answer. And upstairs Jane's baby ...
— In Times Like These • Nellie L. McClung
... but the whining grew louder and more ferocious, increasing to such an extent that Inmutanka became alarmed and went to the door. When he pulled back the flap yet farther the howling seemed very near and inexpressibly fierce. ...
— The Great Sioux Trail - A Story of Mountain and Plain • Joseph Altsheler
... said the king, gently nodding to her; "but the swoon had not dispelled the smile from your lips, nor the expression of rapturous joy from your features. You lay there as if overwhelmed with joy and fascinated by your ecstatic bliss. Knowing that you were inexpressibly happy, I felt no ...
— LOUISA OF PRUSSIA AND HER TIMES • Louise Muhlbach
... to authority till they become really good; nor will they ever be very good till they see their leaders such." To which Arminius replies, in his thoughtful manner: "Yes, that is what makes your Lord C——s so inexpressibly precious!" A certain Lord C——, be it observed, having figured very ...
— Matthew Arnold • G. W. E. Russell
... attack a live bishop in that fashion? I am quite ashamed of you! Have you no reverence for fine lawn sleeves? By Jove, you seem to have done it well. If any one were to ridicule any belief of the bishop's, would he not blandly shrug his shoulders and be inexpressibly shocked? I am very, very sorry to hear that you are not well; but am not surprised after all your self-imposed labour. I hope you will soon have an outing, and that ...
— More Letters of Charles Darwin - Volume I (of II) • Charles Darwin
... and do look now, upon death as no more than the passage to a better life. Yet why do tears blind my eyes? Why should the children lose a mother's love? Why must you, my husband, experience such a heavy and unlooked-for blow? Why must I die when your love was making life so inexpressibly happy for me? ...
— Childhood • Leo Tolstoy
... knew that, when her triumphal task was done, her end must be approaching. Her aspirations pointed only to a place which seemed to her more than usually full of natural piety, as one in which it would give her pleasure to die. And she uttered, between smiles and tears, as a wish that inexpressibly fascinated her heart, and yet was half-fantastic, a broken prayer that God would return her to the solitudes from which he had drawn her, and suffer her to become a shepherdess once more. It was a natural prayer, because nature has laid a necessity upon every human heart to seek for rest and ...
— Journeys Through Bookland - Volume Four • Charles H. Sylvester
... was that he should at least consent to a form of marriage with Caroline, in consideration of her love; a form which need not be a legal union, but one which would satisfy her sick and enfeebled soul. Such things have been done, and the sentiment of feeling herself his would inexpressibly comfort her mind, I am sure. Then, if she is taken from us, I should not have lost the power of becoming his lawful wife at some future day, if it indeed should be deemed expedient; if, on the other hand, she ...
— A Changed Man and Other Tales • Thomas Hardy
... Katy's was the smallest of the bedrooms, but she liked it best of all for the reason that its one big window opened on an iron balcony over which grew a Banksia rose-vine with a stem as thick as her wrist. It was covered just now with masses of tiny white blossoms, whose fragrance was inexpressibly delicious and made every breath drawn in their neighborhood a delight. The sun streamed in on all sides of the little apartment, which filled a narrowing angle at the union of three streets; and from one window and another, glimpses could be caught ...
— What Katy Did Next • Susan Coolidge
... and a slight fog hung about, making the air damp and heavy. Owen had gone to town immediately after lunch; and Toni was inexpressibly relieved ...
— The Making of a Soul • Kathlyn Rhodes
... worked, the weary brain ached and burned with heavy thoughts, vain longings, and feverish fancies, till things about her sometimes seemed as strange and spectral as the phantoms that had haunted her half-delirious sleep. Inexpressibly wretched were the dreary days, the restless nights, with only pain and labor for companions. The world looked very dark to her, life seemed an utter failure, God a delusion, and the long, lonely years before her ...
— Work: A Story of Experience • Louisa May Alcott
... of trees considering the ease with which they may be cultivated, is a strong evidence of the extreme laziness of the Affghans, who appear to me remarkably low in the scale of civilization; and in personal habits, very generally inexpressibly filthy. ...
— Journals of Travels in Assam, Burma, Bhootan, Afghanistan and The - Neighbouring Countries • William Griffith
... own side of the little bridge which led from one garden to the other, he put his arm round her to embrace her and kiss her, as he had often done at that spot. It had become a habit with them to say their evening farewells there, and the secluded little nook amongst the shrubs was inexpressibly dear to Lily. But on the present occasion she made an effort to avoid his caress. She turned from him—very slightly, but it was enough, and he felt it. "Are you angry with me?" he said. "Oh, no! Adolphus; how can I be angry with you?" And then she turned to him and gave ...
— The Small House at Allington • Anthony Trollope
... my nephew—a round-cheeked, blue-eyed rogue who takes my thumb in all his fingers when we go walking. His jumpers are slack behind and they wag from side to side in an inexpressibly funny manner, but this I am led to believe springs not from any special genius but is common to all children. It is only recently that he learned to walk, for although he was forward with his teeth and their early sprouting ran ...
— Chimney-Pot Papers • Charles S. Brooks
... so he rose and went out on the porch, where he spread his rug before the open door; but it was long ere he could sleep—there was an unwonted feeling at his heart, something like happiness, yet inexpressibly sad; and, buried in deep reverie, he lay with his eyes fixed on the dark blue starry vault above him till past midnight. Suddenly he thought he heard the report of some fire-arms at a great distance, and at the same moment two stars sank beneath ...
— The Continental Classics, Volume XVIII., Mystery Tales • Various
... "we respect more the virtue of a beggar than the grandeur of a sovereign. What if I be greater than the kings of the earth, and higher than many of the countless potentates of heaven? As my wonderful master deigned to humble himself so inexpressibly as to wear one of your bodies, and to live among you, and to die for your salvation, how should I presume to be dissatisfied with my duty in serving you, and the vilest of the human race, since ye are so high in favour with my master? Come out, spirit, and free ...
— The Sleeping Bard - or, Visions of the World, Death, and Hell • Ellis Wynne
... make Herculaneums and Pompeiis of so many smiling households. Breakfast, dinner, and tea came up with illusive regularity, and were all the most perfect of their kind; and we laughed and feasted in our vain security. We had out from the city to banquet with us the friends we loved, and we were inexpressibly proud before them of the Help, who first wrought miracles of cookery in our honor, and then appeared in a clean white apron, and the glossiest black hair, to wait upon the table. She was young, and certainly very pretty; she was as gay as a lark, and was courted by a young man whose clothes ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume I. (of X.) • Various
... Planks, he thought, inexpressibly startled, and flinging back his head. At his feet a man went sliding over, open-eyed, on his back, straining with uplifted arms for nothing: and another came bounding like a detached stone with his head between his legs and his hands clenched. His pigtail whipped in the air; he made ...
— Typhoon • Joseph Conrad
... covered with remains of masonry, and with a fort in the midst. On this was mounted the French banner, but likewise drooping; and all around it lay the ships with furled sails and trailing ensigns, giving them an inexpressibly mysterious look of woe, like living creatures with folded wings and vailed crests, lying on the face of the waters in a silent sleep of sorrow. There was an awe of suspense that kept each one on the deck silent, unable to utter the conjecture that ...
— The Prince and the Page • Charlotte M. Yonge
... After inexpressibly long waiting Phormio came, then Hermippus, to tell all they knew. Leonidas had perished gloriously. His name was with the immortals, but the mountain wall of Hellas had been unlocked. No Spartan army was in Boeotia. ...
— A Victor of Salamis • William Stearns Davis
... gently into a chair, and kneeling beside him drew his arm around her, resting her head against his in a fashion inexpressibly tender. The natural dignity that was hers set a high value on such sweet familiarities: and if Desmond submitted to them in silence, it was because the man in him was too deeply ...
— The Great Amulet • Maud Diver
... satisfied, Thurston—more than satisfied, I am inexpressibly happy now. Yes, though you are going away; for, see! the pain of parting for a few months, is lost in the joy of knowing that we are united, though separated—and in anticipating the time not long hence, when we shall meet again. ...
— The Missing Bride • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... tiresome journey Merrit found something inexpressibly charming in the quiet, picturesque place, and in the silent young girl who sat so demurely in the shadow. He tactfully ignored her timidity by talking cheerful nonsense about impersonal things, treating her as a bashful child who wanted to ...
— Little Sister Snow • Frances Little
... all, for rational beings! Who on earth could believe that the religion these people use to render your life so absolutely miserable is meant for the same thing as the one that makes my poor dear brother Ronald so perfectly and inexpressibly serene and happy? The formalism of lower natures, like your father's, has turned it into a machine for crushing all the spontaneity out of your existence. What a regime for a high-spirited girl like you to be ...
— Philistia • Grant Allen
... of this life of toil and self-denial, so different from his own selfish and idle career, was inexpressibly mortifying to Paul; but he felt that he was called upon to ...
— Caught In The Net • Emile Gaboriau
... from plain and simple living. He sits with bowed head, lost in thought, his long life passing in review before his mind's eye. His message is spoken, his race is run; he is weary of life and longs to die. There is something inexpressibly moving in his ...
— Michelangelo - A Collection Of Fifteen Pictures And A Portrait Of The - Master, With Introduction And Interpretation • Estelle M. Hurll
... "I want to be shown. I am fond of exhibitions of sleight-of-hand and jugglery. But the priestly thaumaturgy that claims to transform a biscuit into the flesh of a man dead some two thousand years, and a bit of grape juice into his blood, irritates me inexpressibly! And so does the jugglery by which your Protestant fellows, Hitt, attempt to reconcile their opposite beliefs. Why, what difference can it possibly make to the Almighty whether we miserable little beings down here are baptised with water, milk, or kerosene, or whether we are immersed, sprinkled, ...
— Carmen Ariza • Charles Francis Stocking
... All through the inexpressibly tedious and quite unnecessary call of Dr. Stirling—(Why had he chosen to call just then? Neither of them was ill)—Sophia had held that telegram concealed in her hand and its information concealed in her heart. She had kept her head up, offering a calm front to the world. She had given ...
— The Old Wives' Tale • Arnold Bennett
... in the house but the servants. The place looked dull, empty, inexpressibly miserable to me; the distant roll of carriages along the surrounding streets had a heavy boding sound; the opening and shutting of doors in the domestic offices below, startled and irritated me; the London air seemed denser to breathe ...
— Basil • Wilkie Collins
... poor little homesick Lloyd, was the only consolation left the broken heart. And he did not want to live in Baltimore, and longed to return to Newburyport. So, mindful of her child's happiness, and all unmindful of her own, she sent him from her to Newburyport, which he loved inexpressibly. He was now in his eleventh year. Very happy he was to see once more the streets and landmarks of the old town—the river, and the old house where he was born, and the church next door and the school-house across ...
— William Lloyd Garrison - The Abolitionist • Archibald H. Grimke
... and incomprehensible title gave it a distinct personality in my eyes and a mysterious attraction. I had not then read any real novels. I had heard it said that George Sand was a typical novelist. That prepared me in advance to imagine that Francois le Champi contained something inexpressibly delicious. The course of the narrative, where it tended to arouse curiosity or melt to pity, certain modes of expression which disturb or sadden the reader, and which, with a little experience, he may recognise ...
— Swann's Way - (vol. 1 of Remembrance of Things Past) • Marcel Proust
... with his wife and children, inexpressibly glad to exchange the atmosphere of the Crescent for that of the Cross. Ted Flaggan was installed as butler to the family, and remained in that position for many years. It is supposed by some of his descendants that he would have continued in it to the ...
— The Pirate City - An Algerine Tale • R.M. Ballantyne
... philosophical subjects, which lasted frequently till morning, in which my father was a lively partaker, and assistant of my brother William by contriving self-made instruments." She adds that she often kept herself awake in order to listen to their animating remarks, feeling inexpressibly happy in their happiness,—an indication of that devoted and unselfish affection which afterwards consecrated her whole life. But, generally, their conversation branched out into philosophical subjects; and ...
— The Story of the Herschels • Anonymous
... the eternal presence of the highest good, and, as a necessary attendant, the most perfect, consummate, durable bliss and felicity, springing from the presence of that Being in whom all possible Beatitude is inexpressibly present, and that in the highest perfection: On the contrary, to conceive of a sublime fallen Arch-angel, attended with an innumerable host of degenerate, rebel Seraphs or Angels cast out of Heaven together; all guilty of inexpressible ...
— The History of the Devil - As Well Ancient as Modern: In Two Parts • Daniel Defoe
... further depressed by the fear that he was also comparing her with Mollie, to her own disadvantage; but there was no hint of such a thought in his look or manner. The dark eyes met hers with sympathetic understanding. At every point he deferred to her opinion with a subtle flattery which was inexpressibly soothing to ...
— The Fortunes of the Farrells • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... Inexpressibly dear as she was to him, he offered her his arm with the most reserved air, as he added, correctingly, "I will take you, at any ...
— The Woodlanders • Thomas Hardy
... Lewis of France. This expedition raised his Majesty's spirits for more than one reason. Not only would it take him for some months out of a country he detested, and back to his beloved Holland—the very flatness of which was inexpressibly dear to his recollection, though he had left it but a month or two—but the prospect of this year's campaign had awakened quite an extraordinary enthusiasm in England. For the first time since Henry the Eighth had laid siege to Boulogne, an English army commanded by an English ...
— The Blue Pavilions • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... that wintry afternoon the place looked inexpressibly dismal and neglected. Years ago it had, no doubt, been the residence of some well-to-do county family; but in these twentieth-century post-war days, having been empty for nearly ten years, it had gone ...
— The Doctor of Pimlico - Being the Disclosure of a Great Crime • William Le Queux
... Roman Little Pedlington. Thomas Carlyle may have had this passage in mind when he gave to the same thought a grander form in Sartor Resartus: "May we not say that the hour of spiritual enfranchisement is even this? When your ideal world, wherein the whole man has been dimly struggling and inexpressibly languishing to work, becomes revealed and thrown open, and you discover with amazement enough, like the Lothario in Wilhelm Meister, that your America is here or nowhere. The situation that has not its duty, its ...
— A Defence of Poesie and Poems • Philip Sidney
... be buried, were it not that my heart is set on winning out with those boys," said Mr. Minturn. "There is material for fine men in them, but there is also depravity that would shock you inexpressibly, instilled by ignorant, malicious servants. I wish Leslie Winton ...
— Michael O'Halloran • Gene Stratton-Porter
... And as it blew, the clouds lessened, and the circle of fog which had surrounded them was every moment removed to a greater distance, while the view over the water grew wider and clearer. All this was inexpressibly delightful to Zac, who, as it were, with one bound passed from the depths of despondency up to joyousness ...
— The Lily and the Cross - A Tale of Acadia • James De Mille
... looked upon as their chief by those unfortunate creatures who were of his gang, possibly he put on this ferocity in his manner in order to support his authority, and preserve that respect and superiority of which these wretches are observed to be inexpressibly fond. ...
— Lives Of The Most Remarkable Criminals Who have been Condemned and Executed for Murder, the Highway, Housebreaking, Street Robberies, Coining or other offences • Arthur L. Hayward
... feeling—that, as Leighton said, "every picture is a subject thrown away." But he has his joy none the less; it is in the pursuit and in the dream of capturing something illusive, mysterious, and inexpressibly beautiful. ...
— Afoot in England • W.H. Hudson
... was inexpressibly weary, felt that her father was exceeding the bounds of necessary hospitality. She felt, too, that the length of Dalton's first call was inexcusable. But she did not go to bed. As long as Becky was there, she should stay to chaperon her. With a sense of martyrdom upon ...
— The Trumpeter Swan • Temple Bailey
... unfriended, how could he find them? Was not his brother Henry studying law at Jefferson, and were they not all proud of him, and did not everybody expect great things of him? But Henry was different from him. Dr. Lyman believed in him; Judge Markham spoke with respect of him. Julia Markham—how inexpressibly lovely and radiant and distant and inaccessible she appeared! And then he felt sore, as if her father had dealt him a blow, and he thought of his sending him away the year before, and wished he had explained. No matter. How he writhed again and ...
— Bart Ridgeley - A Story of Northern Ohio • A. G. Riddle
... happy: and hundreds will then be happy of consequence. Inexpressibly so, I am sure, ...
— Clarissa, Volume 7 • Samuel Richardson
... lofty oaks, the outcry was more inexpressibly hellish, because overhead the wind rustled the sweet green leaves, crickets were chirping, and the scent of flowering fields of buckwheat was in ...
— Other Main-Travelled Roads • Hamlin Garland
... An inexpressibly greater and more distressing problem lay beyond that, as to the ultimate fate of the two families turned back, as may be said, on the threshold of success. The action of Kenton and Boone told their anxiety to place them on the same side of the Ohio ...
— The Phantom of the River • Edward S. Ellis
... distant, instead of advancing to within eight yards of the victims. The harrowing scene rent Brock's heart. That the men who had fought so bravely under him at Egmont and laughed at the carnage at Copenhagen should end their lives in this manner was inexpressibly sad. After reading the account of the execution of their comrades to the men on parade at Fort George, Brock added, "Since I have had the honour to wear the British uniform I have never felt grief like this." The prisoners publicly declared that had they continued under our hero's command they would ...
— The Story of Isaac Brock - Hero, Defender and Saviour of Upper Canada, 1812 • Walter R. Nursey
... sweet pleasure in thus being waited on by the child. Many months had passed since she had looked on one united to her by the ties of blood; and now her heart was full as she gazed on the children of her brother. There was something inexpressibly grateful to her in the look of content that was coming into the grave, wistful eyes of the little lad, and in the caressing touch of Lily's hand. In the interest with which she watched the little ...
— The Orphans of Glen Elder • Margaret Murray Robertson
... half a year or a year to Tatiana Markovna's distant estate, where she would gradually win back her peace of mind or at any rate forget, if it was true, as Raisky said, that time extinguishes all impressions. "I see," thought Vera, "that Grandmother suffers inexpressibly. Grief has changed her altogether; her figure is bowed and her face more deeply furrowed. Perhaps she is only sparing me now because her heart has opened itself to pity. She cannot bear to punish me, now that I am ill and repentant." Vera had lost her pride, her self-respect ...
— The Precipice • Ivan Goncharov
... There was nothing in the street. The tower of the cathedral was almost hidden by the storm and the twilight and the gaunt ruins of the houses, covered now with snow, looked inexpressibly dreary and lonely. The dismal spectacle without heightened the bright gladness within, where he and Julie had sat face to face, only a narrow table between, and Antoine ...
— The Hosts of the Air • Joseph A. Altsheler
... listened to his offer, and assented with evident pleasure. There was not a happier woman that night in all Yerbury than Miss Barry. The care and desire of her life had been justly crowned. Her good-night kiss to Sylvie was inexpressibly sweet. ...
— Hope Mills - or Between Friend and Sweetheart • Amanda M. Douglas
... "you had so little confidence in me that you would not write me of your difficulties! I was inexpressibly shocked to learn that your mother suffered want. I supposed her family would look out for you both—she had two brothers living the last I knew. At the time of your father's death I was extremely hard up myself ...
— Chicken Little Jane • Lily Munsell Ritchie
... can be fairly compared only with pioneer life on the extreme frontiers of the British Empire. From a similar cause we may omit from the comparison a great part of the Southern States, where we do not find a homogeneous mass of white civilisation, but a state of society inexpressibly complicated by the presence of an inferior race. To compare the Southerner with the Englishman we should need to observe the latter as he exists in, say, one of our African colonies. Speaking, then, with these reservations, I should feel inclined to say that ...
— The Land of Contrasts - A Briton's View of His American Kin • James Fullarton Muirhead
... man leaned his elbows on the table, and rested his head on his hands. All this shocked him inexpressibly—shocked him almost to the point of physical illness. Strong as he was he could have fainted, just then, had he yielded by ever so little. And this was the boy whom they had so longed for then! The child on whom they had set such fond hopes, who was to be the pride of his ...
— The History of Sir Richard Calmady - A Romance • Lucas Malet
... inexpressibly hot and stuffy. Hardly a breath of outside air came in through the narrow window, which only gave on the bedroom beyond. An evil-smelling oil-lamp swung from the low ceiling and shed its feeble light on the upturned face of ...
— The League of the Scarlet Pimpernel • Baroness Orczy
... life ran counter to the fondest wishes and prayers of his mother's heart, he one day asked her the strange question, whether she really believed that he ever would be converted to God. And her answer, inexpressibly touching and instructive, as being the answer of assured faith, which could see as yet no signs of the coming of what ...
— The Wonders of Prayer - A Record of Well Authenticated and Wonderful Answers to Prayer • Various
... adopted by the boy, and as much sympathy exists between them as is possible in view of the different aspects which the world necessarily presents to youth and age. In such cases, no doubt, could the series of persons constituting the individual be brought together, a scene of inexpressibly tender ...
— Miss Ludington's Sister • Edward Bellamy
... herself, "I'm to leave; that's flat." However, she led the way down a passage, and opened the door of a pleasant little room in a square turret; a large bay window occupied one whole side of the room, and made it inexpressibly bright and cheerful, though rather hot and stuffy; a clear coal fire burned ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 101, March, 1866 • Various
... hundred various coloured wings sprung from her arms, and her feet seemed to be shod with sandals of rubies; around which numerous cherubs entwined themselves. The perfume that arose from the flapping of her wings was inexpressibly grateful; and the soft silvery voices of these cherubic attendants had an ...
— Bibliomania; or Book-Madness - A Bibliographical Romance • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... wrong, contain the very keynote and central idea of the men whom he is holding up to admiration, and as we think, of Mysticism itself. There is, for instance, a paragraph attributed to Ruysbroek, in p. 275, vol. i., which, whether true or false—and we believe it to be essentially true—is so inexpressibly important, both in the subject which it treats, and in the way in which it treats it, that twenty pages of comment on it would not have been misdevoted. Yet it is passed by without ...
— Literary and General Lectures and Essays • Charles Kingsley
... whose names spoke of English summer, storms and terrible cold began to set in. The verses that Gardiner wrote in his diary during this frightful period are inexpressibly touching in the wondrous strength of their faith ...
— Pioneers and Founders - or, Recent Workers in the Mission field • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... I felt inexpressibly relieved to know that I had only been listening to the harmless vagaries of a madman instead of the genuine experiences ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... remark that Barboza, although almost as famous for his decimas as for his sanguinary duels, was not what one would call a musical person. His singing voice was inexpressibly harsh, like that, for example, of the carrion crow when that bird is most vocal in its love season and makes the woods resound with its prolonged grating metallic calls. The interesting point was that his songs were his own composition and were recitals of his strange adventures, ...
— Far Away and Long Ago • W. H. Hudson
... her husband. The Greek's face, palely lighted by a thoughtful smile, vanished in sudden darkness. Laodice saw instead an image of a strong intent face, brightening under the sunrise, saw it relax, soften, grow inexpressibly kind, then pass, as a tender memory taking ...
— The City of Delight - A Love Drama of the Siege and Fall of Jerusalem • Elizabeth Miller
... Breens were the only Catholics in the party, and prayers were said regularly every night and morning in their little cabin, Mr. Breen reading by the light of a small pine torch, which I held, kneeling by his side. There was something inexpressibly comforting to me in this simple service, and one night when we had all gone to bed, huddled together to keep from freezing, and I felt it would not be long before we would all go to sleep never to wake again in this world, all at once I found myself ...
— Ten American Girls From History • Kate Dickinson Sweetser
... setting sun sank slowly behind the distant western hills, the colour of the Prairie changed from glaring yellow to a golden hue, mantled with a purple flush inexpressibly lovely. The animals of the waste began to appear. Shy lynxes [3] and jackals fattened by many sheep's tails [4], warned my companions that fierce beasts were nigh, ominous anecdotes were whispered, ...
— First footsteps in East Africa • Richard F. Burton
... would. One day when she was not present, Henry took sugar from her prized and precious old English sugar-bowl, which was an heirloom in the family—and he managed to break the bowl. It was the first time I had ever had a chance to tell anything on him, and I was inexpressibly glad. I told him I was going to tell on him, but he was not disturbed. When my mother came in and saw the bowl lying on the floor in fragments, she was speechless for a minute. I allowed that silence to work; I judged it would increase the effect. I was waiting for her ...
— Chapters from My Autobiography • Mark Twain
... the traveller in the Hungarian plain with the fair presentment of a lake fringed with forest-trees; but the semblance fades into nothingness, and he finds himself still in an endless waste, "without a mark, without a bound." Dreary, inexpressibly dreary to all save those who are born within its limits; for, strange to say, they love their level plain as well, every bit as well, as the mountaineer ...
— Round About the Carpathians • Andrew F. Crosse
... be! One could undergo any thing to see it!" Such would be the probable exclamation of more than one reader looking over some landscape annual, embellished with perhaps a view of the celebrated temple and its surrounding scenery; but find yourself at any of the inexpressibly horrid inns of Alcamo or Calatafrini, (and these are the two principal stations between Palermo and Segeste—one with its 12,000, the other with its 18,000 inhabitants;) let us walk you down the main street ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLV. July, 1844. Vol. LVI. • Various
... arguments except the trees and the hedgerows seemed flawless. The level road, the gentle breeze in the orchards on either side, the scent of the grass, and the busy chirping of the birds coincided with the main point of his argument that England was most inexpressibly Anglican and that Roman Catholicism was most unmistakably not. His arguments were really hasty foot-notes to his convictions; if each one had separately been proved wrong, that would have had no influence on the point of view he had reached. ...
— The Altar Steps • Compton MacKenzie
... taciturn Scotchman, moved in this way, had an extraordinary effect on Hodder himself, and his own emotion was so inexpressibly stirred that he kept silence a moment to control it. This proof of the truth of his theory in regard ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... and repeats to her the saying, "More precious in a woman is a virtuous heart than a face of beauty." But I say she is our butterfly, she brings the joys of summer. One must not expect a lace kerchief to hold tears, and she fulfills her woman's destiny. Chih-peh, thy brother, is inexpressibly happy. He adores his pretty blossom. He follows her with eyes worship, and when she is in disgrace with thine August Mother, he is desolate. When needs be she is sent to her apartment, he wanders round and round the ...
— My Lady of the Chinese Courtyard • Elizabeth Cooper
... lively skunks, and the skunk is an animal whose terrific offensive powers necessitate extreme caution in approaching him. Should a young dog unwarily attempt to tackle a skunk, he had to be rigorously quarantined for a fortnight, for otherwise the inexpressibly sickening odour was unendurable. ...
— Here, There And Everywhere • Lord Frederic Hamilton
... She felt as if a strange glow were dawning in her brain, a kind of mental radiance, inexpressibly wonderful, absorbing her pain as mist is absorbed by the sun. Gradually it grew and spread till the pain was all gone, swamped, forgotten, in this curious flood of warmth and ecstasy. It was the most marvellous sensation she had ...
— The Keeper of the Door • Ethel M. Dell
... were concerned; and therewith we parted upon the very best of terms, the king according me full permission to go where I pleased in his country, remain in it as long as I chose, and kill all the game that I had a mind to, while I made His Majesty inexpressibly proud and happy by presenting him with a burning-glass and showing him how to kindle a fire by its means. Then, my ceremonial visit being at an end, I returned to the wagon, ordered the oxen to be ...
— Through Veld and Forest - An African Story • Harry Collingwood
... forgotten, it continued to be totally unknown that he had contemporaries as inexpressibly superior to the dramatic writers that have appeared since, as these contemporaries were themselves below the almighty master of scenic composition. It was the fashion to say, that Shakespear existed alone in a barbarous age, and that all his imputed crudities, and ...
— Thoughts on Man - His Nature, Productions and Discoveries, Interspersed with - Some Particulars Respecting the Author • William Godwin
... at me like that," exclaims he, inexpressibly shocked—this sudden and complete abandonment of herself to her fear has horrified him. "I never meant it. I but suggested a possibility. The child shall stay with you. Do you hear me, Isabel! The child is yours! When I go, I ...
— April's Lady - A Novel • Margaret Wolfe Hungerford
... I was shocked—inexpressibly shocked. True, it was joy to know she would live; but to think of that noble instrument of grace and joy and melody silenced forever! It was like the funeral of an angel! God, in the infinite diversity of his creation, makes so few such voices—so few such marvelous adjustments of those vibrating ...
— Caesar's Column • Ignatius Donnelly
... that he was sulking—the mere fact that he was entertaining her cheaply, by 'bus and music-hall instead of taxi and theatre, pointed to his displeasure. She wondered if he was enjoying this queer show, which struck her alternately as inexpressibly beautiful and inexpressibly vulgar. The lovely ladies like big handsome barmaids, who sang serious songs in evening dress and diamonds, apparently in the vicinity of Clapham High Street or the Monument, were merely incomprehensible. She could not understand what they were doing. The comedians she ...
— Joanna Godden • Sheila Kaye-Smith
... among the trees of their master. Amy soon joined them, and Haldane saw that her eyes had the same appealing and indescribable expression, both of sadness and terror, reminding one of some timid and beautiful animal that had been brought to bay by an enemy that was feared inexpressibly, but from which there seemed ...
— A Knight Of The Nineteenth Century • E. P. Roe
... you to do. I speak solely as to the expediency of the measure. From what I have stated—from my situation in life—from my character—you may easily imagine that all my prejudices are enlisted on the other side of the question. But I must here confess that I see something inexpressibly touching in the devotion which that young Greek girl displayed, during the whole of George's illness. But putting this on one side, and considering the affair as one of mere expediency, I think you will finally agree with me, that however desperate the remedy, some such must be ...
— A Love Story • A Bushman
... emotions as they approached him and took his hand. Indeed, he was so eager to meet them, that he very generally first seized them, and clung to them with all the affection of a brother. The scene was inexpressibly affecting. There was not a heart untouched—not a cheek unmoistened by the falling tear. To weep then was not weakness; it was proof of gratitude and of a generous feeling, which is an honor to ...
— Memoirs of General Lafayette • Lafayette
... pause, to Zarah inexpressibly awful; then Antiochus Epiphanes, he who had looked on the dying agonies of Solomona and her sons, said in his stern voice of command, "I am not wont to bid thrice, and woe to those who presume to neglect my bidding. Throw incense ...
— Hebrew Heroes - A Tale Founded on Jewish History • AKA A.L.O.E. A.L.O.E., Charlotte Maria Tucker
... about human character set forth in his Logic applied to the case in which the old metaphysical notion of innate and indelible differences is still nearly as strong as ever it was, and in which its moral and social consequences are so inexpressibly disastrous, so superlatively powerful in keeping the ordinary level of the aims and achievements of life low and meagre. The accurate and unanswerable reasoning no less than the noble elevation of this great argument; the sagacity of a hundred of its maxims on individual conduct and character, ...
— Critical Miscellanies, Vol. 3 (of 3) - Essay 2: The Death of Mr Mill - Essay 3: Mr Mill's Autobiography • John Morley
... to hasten for professional assistance for what he considered a very bad case, when Dig, catching sight of him, relieved him inexpressibly by dropping at once into his ordinary sane manner, and saying, with a ...
— The Master of the Shell • Talbot Baines Reed
... flowers beneath her feet, and at last sank down at the foot of a willow, whose long, drooping branches trailed nearly to the mossy sward beneath. She buried her head in her hands, and her thoughts went back over the past. The retrospection was inexpressibly wonderful. ...
— Clemence - The Schoolmistress of Waveland • Retta Babcock
... speaking, we had time to examine him. His appearance was inexpressibly shocking. Dirty, with a ragged six weeks' growth of dark hair upon his face, out at heel and elbows, shirtless and shiftless, he seemed to have reached the nadir of misery and poverty. Obviously one of the "broken brigade," he had seemingly lost everything except ...
— Bunch Grass - A Chronicle of Life on a Cattle Ranch • Horace Annesley Vachell
... did not surprise me at all. Rather, I felt it was something I had always known, yet something inexpressibly flat and disillusioning. 'Of course!' I said to myself, or thought, or whatever may have been my mode of cognition—'Of course! That is it, and that is all! Souls are indeed immortal—why should we ever have imagined ...
— The Meaning of Good—A Dialogue • G. Lowes Dickinson
... have been more widely different than the effect produced upon Kate and myself. To me the whole affair was inexpressibly mysterious and ludicrous, notwithstanding the insolence of the police, and, as it seemed to me, their amazing stupidity. Poor Kate was the wrathfullest woman I ever saw, while her obstinate refusal to answer any questions about herself only increased the ferocity of the men, ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 22. July, 1878. • Various
... an' hadn't fur to trabble on de road anyways, an' de Lawd would pervide, an' ef He didn't we could scratch grabble some ways. An' dat boy, dat young Marse David, he tole me everbody ought to gib dey las' cent fo' Unc' Sam an' de sojers. So"—Aunt Basha's high, inexpressibly sweet laughter of pure glee filled the room—"so I thes up'n handed over my ...
— Joy in the Morning • Mary Raymond Shipman Andrews
... wanted to do something to stop me from ruining the company, and when I replied to the effect that one hundred cars a day was only a trifle and that I hoped before long to make a thousand a day, they were inexpressibly shocked and I understand seriously contemplated court action. If I had followed the general opinion of my associates I should have kept the business about as it was, put our funds into a fine administration building, tried to ...
— My Life and Work • Henry Ford
... cannot tell, but I awoke in a shivering fit from a dream of terror, and found myself in the dark. I hastily undressed myself, got into bed, and shrunk beneath the bed clothes, as if escaping from Satan, whom imagination once more placed at my elbow, in forms inexpressibly horrid. ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft
... some of the overhead lullabies have touched me inexpressibly. They beat upon my ear like the musical reveries of future mother hood—they betoken in Georgiana's maidenhood the ...
— Aftermath • James Lane Allen |
