"Witching" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... like a wreath of diamonds in the moon's silvery rays: in the brawling mountain torrent, or the gentle brook—meandering peacefully through verdant meadows, in the mighty cataract or the feathery cascade, in the downy snowflake, or the iridescent icicle—in each and all of its many witching forms it is beautiful beyond compare. But its claims to our admiration rest not alone upon its ever varying beauty. When consumed with thirst, what beverage can equal a draught of pure, cold water? In sickness its value is simply incalculable especially in fevers; in fact, the famous lines ...
— The Royal Road to Health • Chas. A. Tyrrell
... to the care of the sentinel on guard at the house opposite, he joined them, and was soon striding along, at a tremendous pace, toward the great cathedral. Ere he reached it, its long-tongued clock tolled twelve, and all the other churches, one after another, took up the sound, and the witching hour of midnight rang and rerang from end to end of London town. As if by magic, a thousand forked tongues of fire shot up at once into the blind, black night, turning almost in an instant the darkened face of the heavens to an inflamed, glowing ...
— The Midnight Queen • May Agnes Fleming
... in me. My wrongs might slumber till that last assize, when the pitying eyes of Christ sum up the record, but hers—have made a hungry panther of my soul. Come, memory, unlock your treasure house, uncoil your spells, chant all your witching strains, and let us see whether the towers of Notre Dame will not tremble and dissolve as ...
— Infelice • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson
... however, regard the power as unholy or disreputable. Another informant mentions a belief that children born between midnight and one o'clock will be second-sighted. People attempt to hasten or delay the birth, so as to avoid the witching hour; clearly then they regard the second sight as an unenviable accomplishment. 'It is certane' says Kirk, 'he sie more fatall and fearfull things, than he do gladsome.' For the physical condition of the seer, Kirk describes it as 'a rapture, transport, and sort of ...
— Cock Lane and Common-Sense • Andrew Lang
... so sweet as thine; Wider our view, but not so sanely sure; For we are troubled by the witching lure Of Science, with her lightning on the mist; Science that clears, Yet never quite discloses what she wist, And leaves us half with doubts and ...
— Lundy's Lane and Other Poems • Duncan Campbell Scott
... bark of trees, With bodkin wrote, apparently at ease. But Cupid drew her thoughts to higher things, Than merely graving what from fancy springs. Her lover and the place, at once assured, That such a secret would be well secured; A tempting bait, which made her, with regret, Resist the witching ...
— The Tales and Novels, Complete • Jean de La Fontaine
... the river's slippery edge, Witching to deeper calm the drowsy tide, Whispers and leans the breeze-entangling sedge; 115 Through emerald glooms the lingering waters slide, Or, sometimes wavering, throw back the sun, And the stiff banks in eddies melt and run Of dimpling light, and with the ...
— The Vision of Sir Launfal - And Other Poems • James Russell Lowell
... Ptolemy plant a ghost just once more for her. You know you made him take a reef in the flapping of ghostly garments. Can't we resurrect the specter and restore the wails just for tonight, and bring her over here at the witching hour?" ...
— Our Next-Door Neighbors • Belle Kanaris Maniates
... seek The velvet down that spreads his cheek; And there, if art so far can go, The ingenuous blush of boyhood show. While, for his mouth—but no,—in vain Would words its witching charm explain. Make it the very seat, the throne, That Eloquence would claim her own; And let the lips, though silent, wear A life-look, as ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al
... turned away To gaze upon a poet's home; 'Twas near the close of that bright day, And golden sunlight on it shone; Perfume of flowers, and birds' songs low A witching spell about us throw. ...
— Within the Golden Gate - A Souvenir of San Fransisco Bay • Laura Young Pinney
... fire, grew more fierce by feeding, till he was well-nigh beside himself. Presently, out comes Moll from her state room, all glowing with exercise, flushed with pleasure, a rich colour in her cheek, and wild fire in her eyes, looking more witching than any siren. Swiftly she crosses the hall, and runs up the stairs to gain her chamber and reclothe herself, but half way up Dawson stops her, and clasping her about, cries hoarsely in ...
— A Set of Rogues • Frank Barrett
... In woody wold She met a huntsman fair and bold; His baldrick was of silk and gold, And many a witching tale he told To ...
— The Fair Maid of Perth • Sir Walter Scott
... poop the Reverend Mr Smythe and "Joe" Jellaby, who had contrived to secure sufficient snoozing, during the odd moments when he was off duty since the morning, to make up for the sleep he had lost by going to the admiral's ball and there meeting the witching houri of his dreams, "that chawming gurl," who had subsequently prevented him from taking his proper rest when he came aboard in the small hours of ...
— Crown and Anchor - Under the Pen'ant • John Conroy Hutcheson
... fashioned forth his face!" He's monarch of the fair, wherever they may be; For, lo, they're all become the liegemen of his grace. The water of his mouth is liquid honey-dew And 'twixt his lips for teeth fine pearls do interlace. Perfect in every trait of beauty and unique, His witching loveliness distracts the human race. Beauty itself hath writ these words upon his cheek, "Except this youth there's none that's fair in ...
— The Book Of The Thousand Nights And One Night, Volume III • Anonymous
... set in, and the witching hour—the keystone of night's black arch, twelve o'clock—was approaching. To go to bed on such an occasion, would have been held no better than for a jolly toper to shirk his bicker, a lover to eschew the trysting thorn, or a warrior to fly the scene of his country's ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland Volume 17 • Alexander Leighton
... the grand sweeping staircases—up and up, to the very top of the house—to the lofty, lonely battlements. Cloudless spread the wide night sky; countless and brilliant shone the stars; peaceful and majestic slept, the purple sea; spotless white gleamed the snowy earth. A weird, witching scene. ...
— The Baronet's Bride • May Agnes Fleming
... voluntary motion. Not thus, after all, would life be given. Perhaps a corpse would be re-animated; galvanism had given token of such things: perhaps the component parts of a creature might be manufactured, brought together, and endued with vital warmth. Night waned upon this talk; and even the witching hour had gone by, before we retired to rest. When I placed my head upon my pillow, I did not sleep, nor could I be said to think. My imagination, unbidden, possessed and guided me, gifting the successive images that arose in my mind with a vividness far beyond the usual ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 1, April, 1851 • Various
... endeavours. Occasionally, too, I have beheld a man bestriding a horse in that peculiar fashion which may be described as his being on the outside of the animal, slipping away over the hot stones, possibly at a trot, and fancying ivthough with many suspicions to the contrary; that he is witching the world with noble horsemanship. What a pity that such poor fellows will persist in aiming at what they cannot achieve! What mortification and disappointment they must often know! The horse backs on to the pavement, into a plate-glass window, just as Maria, ...
— The Recreations of A Country Parson • A. K. H. Boyd
... in her witching dark eye, There's a love in her tresses at play, Yet her love would be worth not a sigh, If from thee she could lure me ...
— Pipe and Pouch - The Smoker's Own Book of Poetry • Various
... Lunda boys were to run across to Boden on the evening of the following day, to carry out the mysterious plans of Tom and Yaspard. They were to wait at the geo for Yaspard and his chums, and the mighty deed was to be done at the witching hour of night. So they planned, and put aside with unwonted impatience the Doctor's declaration that there was going to be unsettled weather, and that they must not count upon being able to carry out their scheme in such an ...
— Viking Boys • Jessie Margaret Edmondston Saxby
... got in the front row of spectators, while behind us the crowd packed as closely as matches in a box. The champagne I had taken had again aroused in me that vivid sense of joy and strength and colour. Again the lights were effulgent, the music witching, the women divine. As I swayed a little I clutched unsteadily at the Youth. He ...
— The Trail of '98 - A Northland Romance • Robert W. Service
... her hand—so marvelous was the fascination of that little creature's countenance. It was a face to attract, to charm, to delight, to draw you in, and rivet your whole attention, until you became absorbed and lost in the study of its mysterious spell—a witching face, whose nameless charm it were impossible to tell, I might describe the fine dark Jewish features, the glorious eyes, the brilliant complexion, and the fall of long, glossy, black ringlets that veiled ...
— The Missing Bride • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... Aymer de Valence held an interview with the old sexton; and who now, drawing into a separate corner some of the straggling parties whom he had collected and brought to the church, kept on the alert, and appeared ready for an attack as well at mid-day as at the witching hour of midnight. This was the more necessary, as the eye of Sir John de Walton seemed busied in searching from one place to another, as if unable to find the object he was in quest of, which the reader ...
— Waverley Volume XII • Sir Walter Scott
... received with politeness. My family, in all its branches, came into her Grace's quick recollection; and I was thus indebted to my adventure, not only for an introduction to one of the most elegant women of her time—to the goddess of fashion in her temple, the Circe of high life, at the "witching hour," but of being most "graciously" received; and even hearing a panegyric on my chivalry, from the Marechal, smilingly echoed by lips which seemed ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 54, No. 335, September 1843 • Various
... the dreadful chase Till time itself shall have an end; By day they scour earth's cavern'd space, At midnight's witching hour, ascend. ...
— The Book of Hallowe'en • Ruth Edna Kelley
... they had gone through; but, feeling a calm on their spirits, succeeding the rude interruption produced by Dutton's brutality, they walked out on the cliff, to enjoy the cool air, and the bland scenery of the head-land, at that witching hour. ...
— The Two Admirals • J. Fenimore Cooper
... joy, my lord the Duke rose and made as though he were departing; whereupon the false image vanished, and I beheld Ann giving her hand with a witching smile to Junker Henning, that he might help her ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... can from a pillow part And by a touch, of cunning art Adorn the casket of the heart, Where every grace, Half hidden by its witching fold, Seeks to betray a charm untold— How envies each admirer ...
— Cap and Gown - A Treasury of College Verse • Selected by Frederic Knowles
... but that was not the price of her hand. Nothing less than had been promised would answer now; and when she stole out to meet Jeff she told him so. Under the witching moonlight he began to manifest tendencies to sentiment and tenderness. Her response was prompt: "Go 'long! what dese common niggah ways got ter do wid a 'liance? Yer show me de gole in dat box—dat's de bargain. Den ...
— Taken Alive • E. P. Roe
... threw up his window and leant out into the night, and watched the light clouds swimming over the moon, and the silver mist folding the water-meadows and willows in its soft cool mantle. His thoughts were such as will occur to any reader who has passed the witching age of twenty; and the scent of the heliotrope-bed in the flower-garden below, seemed to rise very strongly on the ...
— Tom Brown at Oxford • Thomas Hughes
... From morn to eve; unmindful of her form, Unmindful of the happy dress that stole The wishes of the youth, when every maid With envy pined. Hence, finally, by night The village matron, round the blazing hearth, Suspends the infant audience with her tales, Breathing astonishment! of witching rhymes, And evil spirits; of the death-bed call Of him who robb'd the widow, and devour'd 260 The orphan's portion; of unquiet souls Risen from the grave to ease the heavy guilt Of deeds in life conceal'd; of shapes that walk At dead of night, and clank ...
— Poetical Works of Akenside - [Edited by George Gilfillan] • Mark Akenside
... eloquent disdain, the ardor of battle with the thunder of artillery, the hut of the peasant with its pastoral pleasures, and the assemblage of the noble, the distinguished, the beautiful, with the nameless fascinations of feminine loveliness, the witching caprices of conscious power,—while through all and above all glows the memory of the glorious past and mournful present of his beloved country. The book, in fact, opens a vista into modes of life, manners of being, and trains of thought little known ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. III, No. V, May, 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... away from him; she stood just in front of him, looking into his face with the witching eyes he knew ...
— The Second Honeymoon • Ruby M. Ayres
... Graydon went in search of Stella, but she was nowhere to be found, nor had the warm evening lured Mrs. Wildmere from her room. He had learned that Arnault was still at the house, and he inferred, from the surpassing beauty of the moonlit evening, that his rival would not let such witching hours pass without an effort to turn them to account. With a frown he retreated from the music, dancing, and gayety of a full house, and went up to Mrs. ...
— A Young Girl's Wooing • E. P. Roe
... still new to her dignities, Eliza O'Neill was beginning to prattle in the most charming brogue ever heard across the Irish Channel, and to grow through beautiful childhood to witching girlhood. The daughter of a strolling actor who led his company of buskers through every county in Ireland from Cork to Donegal, the love of things theatrical was in her veins; and while she was still playing with her dolls she was impersonating the Duke ...
— Love Romances of the Aristocracy • Thornton Hall
... And grace her delicate feet; then for her robe The tissue, pure as Etna's snow that lies Nearest the sun-light as the wreathy mist At summer dawn—so playful let it float About her airy limbs. A girdle next, Purple with gold embroidered o'er, to bind With witching grace the tunic that confines Her bosom's swelling charms: of silk the mantle, Gorgeous with like empurpled hues, and fixed With clasp of gold—remember, too, the bracelets To gird her beauteous arms; nor ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... her, whose smiles shed light on My weary lot last year at Brighton, I talk of happiness and marriage, St. George's and a travelling carriage. I trifle with my rosy fetters, I rave about her 'witching letters, And swear my heart shall do no treason Before the closing of the season. Thus I whisper in the ear Of Louisa Windermere— If she cares for what I say, She's ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 13 Issue 364 - 4 Apr 1829 • Various
... voluptuousnesss; but the heart of Inez turned with distaste from this idle mockery. The tears would rush into her eyes, as her thoughts reverted from this scene of profligate splendour, to the humble but virtuous home from whence she had been betrayed; or if the witching power of music ever soothed her into a tender reverie, it was to dwell with fondness on the image of Antonio. But if Don Ambrosio, deceived by this transient calm, should attempt at such time to whisper his passion, she would start as from a dream, and recoil from him with ...
— Bracebridge Hall, or The Humorists • Washington Irving
... By the witching amorous sweetness and the blackness of thine eyes, By the tender flexile softness in thy slender waist that lies, By the graces and the languor of thy body and thy shape, By the fount of wine and honey from thy coral lips that rise, ...
— The Book Of The Thousand Nights And One Night, Volume II • Anonymous
... the undergrowth that were like the lanterns of the fairies a line came into his mind that he liked and repeated several times, rather whimsically pleased with himself for having found it at exactly the right moment. It was "the witching hour of night." ...
— Who Cares? • Cosmo Hamilton
... Everything abstract is ultimately of practical use, and even the most immediately utilitarian has an abstract principle at its core. We are too prone to regard the present age of the world as preeminently practical, much as a middle-aged man laments the witching fancies of his boyhood. But, and there is more in the parallel than analogy, if the man be truly imaginative he is none the less so at forty-five than he was at twenty, if his imagination have taken on a more critical form; for this latter half of the nineteenth century ...
— The Soul of the Far East • Percival Lowell
... been most fortunate in pleasing all her friends, both as to the fact and as to the time and manner of telling. Do you remember a conversation we had standing upon the hearth in my room one night, between eleven and twelve, the witching hour, and what you asked me about Captain Beaufort? The secret had then been confided to me; and I hope you will do me the justice to acknowledge that, open-hearted and open-mouthed as I am, I can keep a ...
— The Life and Letters of Maria Edgeworth, Vol. 2 • Maria Edgeworth
... to song And merry dance; and these in turn were chased By legends strange, and wild, unearthly tales Of elves, and gnomes, and fairy sprites, that haunt The woods and caves; where they do sleep all day, And then come forth i' the witching hour of night, To dance by moonlight on the green thick sward. The speaker was an aged villager, In whom his oft-told tale awoke no fears, Such as he filled his gaping listeners with. Nor ever was ...
— Poems • Frances Anne Butler
... band, Belladonna, lily white, These made up the fairy-land Where I wandered all last night; Ruled in all its rosy glow By a merry Queen, you know Jolly, dancing, laughing, witching, Veuve Cliquot. ...
— Point Lace and Diamonds • George A. Baker, Jr.
... first voyage up the river brings us more delicately and gracefully down from these mountains to the Hudson—the level highway to the sea. "Of all the scenery of the Hudson, the Kaatskill Mountains had the most witching effect on my boyish imagination. Never shall I forget the effect upon me of my first view of them, predominating over a wide extent of country—part wild, woody and rugged; part softened away into all the graces of cultivation. As we slowly floated along, I lay on the deck and watched them through ...
— The Hudson - Three Centuries of History, Romance and Invention • Wallace Bruce
... and brave baroness! I often thought of you during those months in the Annexe. You will come again, you say, to Tahiti, bathe again in its witching waters, and let the spell of its sweetness bind you again to its soil. Maybe, but baroness, you will never again be as you were, flinging all body and soul into the fire of passion, and yearning for motherhood! Such times can ...
— Mystic Isles of the South Seas. • Frederick O'Brien
... Claire! Never was contrast more perfect. A scarf, like scarlet flame, flung about her shoulders, set off the richness of her clear brunette skin, through which the crimson blood flamed in cheek and lip. Eyes, now black, now gray, changing, flashing, witching eyes: gray in quiet moments, darkening with mirth or sadness, anger or pain; hair black and silky, rippling to the rounded, supple waist in glossy waves. Not so tall as Madeline, and rounded and dimpled ...
— Madeline Payne, the Detective's Daughter • Lawrence L. Lynch
... the old grey house on the cliff—the home of Essec Powell, the preacher. In vain he sought for any sign of the girl whose acquaintance he had made so unexpectedly, and he was almost tempted to believe that she was no other than a creature of his own imagination, born of the witching moonlight hour, and absorbed again into the passing shadows of night. But could he have seen through the walls of that old grey house, even now at that early hour, he would have understood what kept the preacher's niece so busily engaged that neither on the shore nor on the ...
— By Berwen Banks • Allen Raine
... man with winsome witching art, Who touches at his will the kindly human heart, 'Till it throbs with joy like pain and tears begin to start; He so tenderly touched ours With his melting magic powers, Made feelings which he felt within ...
— Verses and Rhymes by the way • Nora Pembroke
... to tinkle the herd to rest; they have all paced across the heath. Is not this the witching time of night? The waters murmur, and fall with more than mortal music, and spirits of peace walk abroad to calm the agitated breast. Eternity is in these moments. Worldly cares melt into the airy stuff that dreams are made of, ...
— Letters written during a short residence in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark • Mary Wollstonecraft
... some stirrings of pity, drew their breath and gave ground a little. Where was the shrinking, frightened, unbidden guest of a moment before, with downcast eyes and burning cheeks? Here was a proud and easy and radiant lady, with witching eyes and a wonderful smile. "I am only Audrey, your Excellency," she said, and curtsied as she spoke. "My other name lies buried in a valley amongst far-off mountains." She slightly turned, and addressed herself to a portly, velvet-clad gentleman, of a very authoritative air, who, arriving late, ...
— Audrey • Mary Johnston
... with terrors of the tempest, blasts Of demon-armies clouding all the wind, With thunder, and with blinding lightning flung In jagged javelins of purple wrath From splitting skies; sometimes with wiles and words Fair-sounding, 'mid hushed leaves and softened airs From shapes of witching beauty; wanton songs, Whispers of love; sometimes with royal allures Of proffered rule; sometimes with mocking doubts, Making truth vain. But whether these befell Without and visible, or whether Buddh Strove with fell spirits ...
— The Light of Asia • Sir Edwin Arnold
... looking into a mirror to discover the particular masculine face which would fill their live's mirrors, though, unhappily some of the potency of the charm was lost because it could not be done upon the witching stroke of midnight. ...
— Peggy Stewart at School • Gabrielle E. Jackson
... streams, The streams in sunbeams flashing, The murm'ring streams, the gentle streams, The streams down mountains dashing, Have been the theme Of poets' dream, And, in wild witching story, Have been renowned for love's fond scenes, Or some great ...
— War Poetry of the South • Various
... wine I never see The frowning face of my enemy; Drink freely of the grape, and nought Can give the soul one mournful thought; Wine is a bride of witching power, And wisdom is her marriage dower; Wine can the purest joy impart, Wine inspires the saddest heart; Wine gives cowards valour's rage, Wine gives youth to tottering age; Wine gives vigour to the weak, And crimson ...
— Persian Literature, Volume 1,Comprising The Shah Nameh, The - Rubaiyat, The Divan, and The Gulistan • Anonymous
... it not. Doubt nothing that gives promise of a care. Right handsome dames there are in Lancashire, Whence called their women, witches!—witching things! I know a dozen families in which You'd meet a courtesy worthy of a bow. I'll give you letters ...
— The Love-Chase • James Sheridan Knowles
... out of the gate before Congdon broke forth in open praise of her. "When Mart dies, what a witching ...
— Money Magic - A Novel • Hamlin Garland
... herself down by its bubbling jets and fountains as she had done before, but not thoughtlessly. The spirit of Aphiz seemed to her to be ever by her side, and she would talk to him as though he was actually present, in soft and tender whispers, and sing the songs of their native valley with low and witching cadence; and thus she was partially happy, for the soul is where it loves, rather than where it lives. From childhood she had been taught to believe the Swedenborgian doctrine, of the presence of the spirits ...
— The Circassian Slave; or, The Sultan's Favorite - A Story of Constantinople and the Caucasus • Lieutenant Maturin Murray
... lost sight of herself. As they walked towards the tea-tent, through the throng of clergymen and parasols and tanned men with field-glasses, and young bloods and pretty girls, she noted uneasily that his eyes wandered from her to these types of English beauty, these flower-faces under witching hats. Indeed, he had led her out of the way to plough past a row of open carriages. "The shortest cut," he said, "is ...
— The Grey Wig: Stories and Novelettes • Israel Zangwill
... Cortona lies the large weedy water of Lake Thrasymene, turned into a witching word for ever by Hannibal's recorded victory over Rome. Dim as such records have become to us and remote such realities, he is yet a passionless pilgrim who does n't, as he passes, of a heavy summer's day, feel the air and the light and the very faintness of ...
— Italian Hours • Henry James
... witching the world—witching, in its more solemn sense; for though her smile was exquisite, she might have sat for the picture of a Sybil or a Pythoness. The stage had never seen her equal, and will probably never see ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXXII. - June, 1843.,Vol. LIII. • Various
... fair! I am sad to say That young men now and then betray: Thy lover, I wis, has thy trust betray'd, For he presently woos a witching maid: Her eyes are blue, and, I tell thee this, She has tempting lips that he fain would kiss; But courage, my child, thou mayst yet discover A clue to the heart of ...
— London Lyrics • Frederick Locker
... Nature holds her court of love, And for her client waits. Then, lady, wake—in beauty rise! 'Tis now the promised hour, When torches kindle in the skies To light thee to thy bower. The day we dedicate to care— To love the witching night; For all that's beautiful and fair In hours like these unite. E'en thus the sweets to flowerets given— The moonlight on the tree— And all the bliss of earth and heaven— Are mingled, love, in thee. Then, lady, wake—in beauty rise! 'Tis now the promised hour, ...
— Poems • George P. Morris
... "I had just received the note when you arrived, and I would not answer it until I had consulted my guardian. He is very stern with me, messieurs," turning to us with a witching smile that I could see pleased ...
— The Rose of Old St. Louis • Mary Dillon
... Beverley saw it in actual life the first impression was rather embarrassing. Somehow he felt almost irresistibly invited to laugh, though he had never been much given to risibility. The blending, or rather the juxtaposition, of extremes—a face, a form immediately witching, and a costume odd to grotesquery—had made an assault upon his comprehension at once so sudden and so direct that his dignity came near being disastrously broken up. A splendidly beautiful child comically clad would have made much the same ...
— Alice of Old Vincennes • Maurice Thompson
... rock so pitifully dwindled of late years. No matter what he facts are. Sing 'of "The Little Old Red Schoolhouse On the Hill" and in everybody's heart a chord trembles in unison. As we hear its witching strains, we are all lodge brethren, from Maine to California and far across the Western Sea; we are all lodge brethren, and the air is "Auld Lang Syne," and we are clasping hands across, knitted together into one living solidarity; and this, if we but sensed it, is the real ...
— Back Home • Eugene Wood
... could not choose but hear. Mr. Kipling, in agreement with an earlier prophet, once identified rebellion with the sin of witchcraft, and about Tolstoy there was certainly a witching power, a magic or demonic attraction, that gave the hearer no peace. Perhaps more even than from his imaginative strength, it arose from his whole-hearted sincerity, always looking reality straight in the face, always refusing compromise, never hesitating to follow ...
— Essays in Rebellion • Henry W. Nevinson
... noticed as Betty Cunningham had passed; it was that amid the wreck of her beauty one feature still remained as strangely witching as ever. The soft eyes had not lost their delicacy of hue, nor had the evil passions of her soul deprived them of their gentle look. Those who mentioned her, and she was not an uncommon topic among the men of the town, still spoke of Betty's ...
— Donahoe's Magazine, Volume 15, No. 1, January 1886 • Various
... heart to a rival suitor. The wedding day was fixed, but the prospect of her marriage was a terrible trouble to Eustace, and threatened to mar the happiness of his life. Having, however, in his youth perfected himself in the black art, he drew a magic circle, at the witching hour of night, and summoned the Evil One to a consultation. The meeting came off, at which the usual bargain was quickly struck, the soul of Eustace being bartered for the coveted body of the beautiful young lady. The compact, it was arranged, should close at her death, ...
— Strange Pages from Family Papers • T. F. Thiselton Dyer
... duke was particularly mentioned, which alone appalled the heart of Brooks'. The matter was put before Neuchatel, as he entered the club, to which he had been recently elected with acclamation. "So you are a little frightened," he said, with a peculiarly witching smile which he had, half mockery and half good nature; as much as to say, "I will do what you wish, but I see through you and everybody else." "So you are a little frightened. Well; we City men must see ...
— Endymion • Benjamin Disraeli
... countra wives, wi' toil an' pain, May plunge an' plunge the kirn in vain; For oh! the yellow treasure's ta'en By witching skill; An' dawtet, twal-pint Hawkie's gaen As yell's ...
— The Mysteries of All Nations • James Grant
... occupied by fame This day; and watching, witching, condescending To the consumers of fish, fowl, and game, And dignity with courtesy so blending, As all must blend whose part it is to aim (Especially as the sixth year is ending) At their lord's, son's, or similar ...
— Don Juan • Lord Byron
... rash witching goes muffled rumour mine dark silent unfortunate richmond existing great hotly brute select mooted parlous ...
— Whirligigs • O. Henry
... composed]. 'Tis that enamoured nightingale Who thus gives me the reply:— To his partner in the vale Listening on a bough hard by Warbling thus his tuneful wail. Cease, sweet nightingale, nor show By thy softly witching strain Trilling forth thy bliss and woe, How a man might feel love's pain, When a bird can feel his so. No: it was that wanton vine That in fond pursuit has sought The tall tree it doth entwine, Till the green weight it hath brought Makes the noble trunk decline. Green entwining boughs that hold ...
— The Wonder-Working Magician • Pedro Calderon de la Barca
... sackcloth, since he, no less than Cynthia, recognized that a dangerous acquaintance was drawing to an end. So Dale's coat imposed a shield, as it were, between the two, but the man drove with little heed to the witching scenery that Dorset unfolded at each turn of the road, and the woman sat distrait, ...
— Cynthia's Chauffeur • Louis Tracy
... the clock in the stable tower crept from hour to hour, the bell telling off the half-hours. She neither saw nor heard. Then came the twelve long deliberate strokes announcing the witching hour. At the first stroke Beverly started into life. By the time the last had sounded the pretty pink dinner gown she had been wearing lay in a tumbled heap upon the bed where she had ...
— A Dixie School Girl • Gabrielle E. Jackson
... it taught my willing tongue, The songs that Braga fram'd and sung? Who was it op'd to me the store Of dark unearthly Runic lore, And taught me to beguile my time With Denmark's aged and witching rhyme; To rest in thought in Elvir shades, And hear the song of fairy maids; Or climb the top of Dovrefeld, Where magic knights their muster held: Who was it did all this for me? O, who, ...
— The Pocket George Borrow • George Borrow
... interest. Numbers of unmarried French took up farms in the new colony, and soon fell captive to the charms of the Cree girls. Now and again the history of the simple-hearted Scots was repeated; and a coureur was presently seen to bring a shy, witching Saulteux maiden from the tents of the Jumping Indians. But the French, it must be said, were not so dilettante in their taste for beauty as were their Scottish brethren; yet, as a rule, their wives were the prettiest ...
— The Story of Louis Riel: The Rebel Chief • Joseph Edmund Collins
... a look to see. There was a witching mingling of the frank, the childlike, and the womanly, in her troubled face; frankness that would not deny the truth that her monitor seemed to have read, a childlike simplicity of shame that he should have divined it, and a womanly self-respect that owned it had nothing to be ashamed of. ...
— Hills of the Shatemuc • Susan Warner
... to remain in the witching moonlight was too strong to be resisted. His mellow tones were a music that she had never heard before, and her eyes grew lustrous with suppressed feeling, and a happiness to which she was not sure she was entitled. The spell of her beauty was on him also, and the moments ...
— Nature's Serial Story • E. P. Roe
... Camp, when the cheery blaze was crackling in the witching hour of yarn telling, the seasoned habitues of the camp would direct the eye of the newcomer to a little glint of light high up upon the mountain, and edify him with dark tales of a lonesome draft dodger who had challenged ...
— Tom Slade on Mystery Trail • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... a night to think of going to bed at once, and so, although the witching hour of nine P.M. had struck, Edward and I were still leaning out of the open window in our nightshirts, watching the play of the cedar-branch shadows on the moonlit lawn, and planning schemes of fresh devilry for the sunshiny morrow. From below, strains ...
— The Golden Age • Kenneth Grahame
... Oh, witching as its scenes, and bright As is its cloudless summer light, Be still its maids, the soul's delight Of every truthful callan'! Be health around it ever spread, To light the eye, to lift the head, And joy on every heart be shed That beats by Brig ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volume VI - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... town to become an apprentice to a milliner's trade; and stowing his clothes and a shot-bag of hard money which he was known to possess into a sailor's chest, with which, together with his gun and a Methodist preacher, he again hurried off for the asylum of his beloved. Arrived once more in the witching presence, he waited till evening (yet how he was constrained so to do is more than I can tell), and then, as we made it a duty to be gathered about him once more, the wedding ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. I., No. IV., April, 1862 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... woman sometimes takes the initiative in an affair of this kind—smiled upon the willing and ready-looking fellow; not exactly at him, but as it were in his direction, you know; and he caught the faint glint of sunshine on her lips, and then—but in the witching hour when the twilight and sunlight kiss and part, after the smile and look of ...
— Fair to Look Upon • Mary Belle Freeley
... witching she-devil, perched on the rickety table just contributed to the home, a piquant, dark-eyed, yet golden-haired, mite of eleven, calm and comparatively spruce amid the wailing ...
— Ghetto Comedies • Israel Zangwill
... merchants. These new inhabitants have walled up the fair arched windows and slender portals of the ancient dwellers, spoiling the beauty of the streets without materially changing the architectural masses. In that witching hour when the Italian sunset has faded, and a solemn grey replaces the glowing tones of daffodil and rose, it is not difficult, here dreaming by oneself alone, to picture the old noble life—the ladies moving along those open loggias, ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Complete - Series I, II, and III • John Symonds
... the flame was rather in herself, that she bore about her an impure and scorching heat. The fiery dart with which Satan had pierced her was still there, and, as through a baleful lamp, shot forth a wild, but fearfully witching sheen. Shrinking from her, you would yet stand still, with a strange trouble ...
— La Sorciere: The Witch of the Middle Ages • Jules Michelet
... there's no one I'd rather have," said Big Bill, honestly, and so Father Neptune strode majestically to his seat at the head of the table, and at his right sat primly, fluttering Aunt Adelaide, instead of the witching sprite he had ...
— Patty's Butterfly Days • Carolyn Wells
... gracious mother's wiles And dear delusive smiles! No callow fledgling of her singing brood But tastes that witching food, And hearing overhead the eagle's wing, And how the thrushes sing, Vents his exiguous chirp, and from his nest Flaps forth—we know the rest. I own the weakness of the tuneful kind,— Are not all harpers blind? I sang too early, must I sing too late? The lengthening shadows ...
— The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... porter at the station, a most awfully nice chap, put me into a sort of fly and sent me to one of the hotels—a jolly good little inn it is—and they can put me up. Then I asked for Hillview, mentioning the witching name of Miss Bella Bathgate, and they sent a boy with me to find the place. Miss Bathgate sent me on here. ...
— Penny Plain • Anna Buchan (writing as O. Douglas)
... fingers in facetious demonstration, and he trembled in painful rapture. And she played on her lute, too, on the lute he had given her of old, those slender fingers making ravishing music on the many-stringed instrument, though her pose as she played was more witching still. What a beautiful glimpse of white shoulders and dainty lace her ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... song, that the summer long Hath flowed so sweet and clear Through the cool, dim shades of our forest glades, No longer charms the ear, A witching spell, that will please as well As his glad notes, may be found In the solemn hush, or the leaves' soft rush, As ...
— The Poetical Works of Mrs. Leprohon (Mrs. R.E. Mullins) • Rosanna Eleanor Leprohon
... wonder at such regrets no longer, if I cannot share them. There is surely an hilarious informality about these media-nochi that attaches to no antecedent feast; the freedom of a picnic, without its manifold inconveniences: as the witching hour draws nearer, the "brightest eyes that ever have shone" glitter yet more gloriously, till in their nearer and dearer splendor a Chaldean would forget the stars; and the "sweetest lips that ever were ...
— Border and Bastille • George A. Lawrence
... the zenith's golden diadem of stars— even they sport upon the same lofty concave of dewless blue, which looks through and through the lacework and everchanging drapery of their mingled hues in the most witching mazes of their nightly waltz, giving to each a definiteness that our homely Saxon tongue might fit ...
— A Walk from London to John O'Groat's • Elihu Burritt
... window—Keats' 'owl, for all his feathers, was a-cold,' I should think this was, from his shivering notes. Listen again! how old is the dead Time, whose age the distant town-clock is tolling? I don't care to count—to tell the truth, that owl makes me nervous—and if it is 'the witching time of night,' I don't ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2, No. 2, August, 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... great dread was that he might be pricked in his sleep, on which account he would sit up watching far into the morn. For, as he reasoned, not without plausibility, when could he more rationally hope for a place in Aurelia's thoughts than at that witching and suggestive period? She might surely think of him when she had nothing else to do! Had she really nothing else to do? And Otto grew sick and livid with jealousy. It of course frequently occurred to ...
— The Twilight of the Gods, and Other Tales • Richard Garnett
... At that "witching hour," if any of the Corner House girls had been awake and had looked out of the window, they would have seen that the snowman was then buried to ...
— The Corner House Girls at School • Grace Brooks Hill
... which first appeared in 1795, had a wonderful vogue, running rapidly through edition after edition. Among others to whom it appealed and who were influenced by it was Keats. Mrs. Tighe's talent drew from Moore a delicate compliment in "Tell me the witching tale again"; and in "The Grave of a Poetess" and "I stood where the life of song lay low", Mrs. Hemans ...
— The Glories of Ireland • Edited by Joseph Dunn and P.J. Lennox
... sheer witching desert for five hundred miles, and for aught I know five hundred miles after that. At the rare stations you see perhaps one corrugated-iron store, perhaps a score of little stone houses with a couple of churches. ...
— From Capetown to Ladysmith - An Unfinished Record of the South African War • G. W. Steevens
... Quinlan escaped five shots, all fired into his house. Mr. Bell, of Pegsboro, beat this record with six. He was believed to sympathise with Mr. Smith-Barry! Men with white masks pervaded the vicinity from the gentle gloaming till the witching morn, and woe to the weak among their opponents, or even among the neutrals, whom they might meet on ...
— Ireland as It Is - And as It Would be Under Home Rule • Robert John Buckley (AKA R.J.B.)
... Another witching time is the period of twelve days between Christmas and Epiphany. Hence in some parts of Silesia the people burn pine-resin all night long between Christmas and the New Year in order that the pungent smoke may drive witches and evil spirits ...
— The Golden Bough - A study of magic and religion • Sir James George Frazer
... were strange and weird—that is, wild, unnatural, and witching. They would appear in both calm ...
— Lord Dolphin • Harriet A. Cheever
... those glorious dark eyes which he had so madly loved. The music gave life and being to these memories, and its glamour brought back the dead from her grave! He remembered how he had asked her if she loved him, and how, avoiding the words so difficult to speak, she had answered with the witching tones of her violin. Oh, that heavenly evening hour upon the balcony! She had said, "Love has its own language: come and listen." And Christina said SHE HAD NOT LOVED! He could not, would ...
— Joseph II. and His Court • L. Muhlbach
... burns low, and it is past the witching hour of night. Whether sleeping or waking, God bless you and our dear mother, and all of you. Good-night—good-night. My love loads ...
— The Life and Letters of Elizabeth Prentiss • George L. Prentiss
... chance descried, The Sultan's daughter, witching fair; Love's high control was not denied— He sought to gain the beauty rare. Before the Sultan lowly bent His mother, and the jewels spread; The Prince, astonished, gave consent, ...
— Aladdin or The Wonderful Lamp • Anonymous
... innumerable punctures made by the comb-like instrument with which it was done on the inflamed muscles of his body. By dint of earnest entreaty and much song, he had prevailed on Big Chief to leave his face and hands untouched. It is doubtful if he would have succeeded in this, despite the witching power of his melodious voice, had he not at the same time offered to paint his own face in imitation of tatooing, and accomplished the feat to such perfection that his delighted master insisted on having his own painted ...
— Jarwin and Cuffy • R.M. Ballantyne
... butterfly, now half, now wholly shading her radiant face, which quickly peeps out again from behind its shelter, like the moon from out a passing cloud. This little article, always costly, sometimes very expensive, in her hand seems in its eloquence of motion almost to speak. She has a witching flirt with it that expresses scorn; a graceful wave of complacence; an abrupt closing of it that indicates vexation or anger; a gradual and cautious opening of its folds that signifies reluctant forgiveness; in short, the language of the fan in the ...
— Due South or Cuba Past and Present • Maturin M. Ballou
... Thy witching tone and air, Thine eye's beseeching earnestness May be to thee a snare. The silver stars may purely shine, The waters taintless flow: But they who kneel at woman's shrine Breathe on it as they bow. Peace may ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 1 (of 4) • Various
... sounds from below, and the wild character of the region, have produced a legend that the place is haunted by a beautiful but wicked water nymph, who lured the voyager, by her witching voice, to the rocks and the whirlpool, where his boat ...
— Down the Rhine - Young America in Germany • Oliver Optic
... evening bells! With every note that sinks and swells, Sadly and slow The warm tears flow In pensive pleasure more than woe, As Mem'ry wakes her witching spells, 'Neath your soft ...
— Poems of the Heart and Home • Mrs. J.C. Yule (Pamela S. Vining)
... to win promotion," he said to himself, rather bitterly. The picture of that winter night, the witching face of Lisbeth and her mocking laugh as she rode away, kept recurring to his mind. What a girl she had been, the best playmate even a boy might wish; always ready for a lark, daring, mischievous, with wit as keen as a blade and quick as a flash. He could not think of ...
— Rodney, the Ranger - With Daniel Morgan on Trail and Battlefield • John V. Lane
... is one of the most beautiful, serene, witching places that ever was seen. High overhead are ranges of green rustling arches; through which the sun's rays come down to you in sparkles. You seem to be wandering through illimitable halls of pillars; everywhere ...
— Omoo: Adventures in the South Seas • Herman Melville
... thou hast done to me; dost thou remember all those witching letters thou sent'st unto me to Armenia, fill'd with the praise of my beloved Sister, where thou extol'st her beauty, what had I to do with that? what could her beauty be to me? and thou didst write how well ...
— A King, and No King • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher
... vainly, to waken that sound. The day before Christmas brought trouble for Joe, A thousand times worse. 'Twas a terrible blow To hear that old Santa Claus, god of his dreams. Would not come that year with his fleet-footed teams. He'd seen them. Why, once, of a night's witching hour He saw them jump over the cross on the tower And scamper away o'er the snow-covered roofs, His heart beating time to the sound of their hoofs. Not coming this year? Santa Claus must be dead, He thought, as with sad tears he crept into ...
— A Budget of Christmas Tales by Charles Dickens and Others • Various
... witching time of night, When churchyards yawn, and Hell itself breathes out Contagion to this world. Hamlet, ...
— The World's Best Poetry — Volume 10 • Various
... suburbs, like Rusafah on the Eastern side and villages like Baturanjah, dear to the votaries of pleasure; and with the roar of a gigantic capital mingled the hum of prayer, the trilling of birds, the thrilling of harp and lute, the shrilling of pipes, the witching strains of the professional Almah, and ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 10 • Richard F. Burton
... uncommon talents—are now all under the turf." And in 1821, John Struthers, a Scottish poet little known, but of great worth and some genius, thus recurs to Currie's words:— (p. 111) Nae mair in learning Willie toils, nor Allan wakes the melting lay, Nor Rab, wi' fancy-witching wiles, beguiles the hour o' dawning day; For tho' they were na very fou, that wicked wee drap in the e'e Has done its turn; untimely now the green grass waves ...
— Robert Burns • Principal Shairp
... great metropolis ("which is American penny-a-liner for" New-York), you find the dinner postponed to three; and some gentlemen, with English education and English habits, dine in New-York at five; while others, whose business keeps them at the bank, or court, or counting-house till three, have the witching time adjourned to four. These are, however, only exceptions to the rule, and as lawyers say, exceptio probat regulam; the legitimate, healthy, fashionable hour for dining—that in which the Knickerbockers, ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 5, No. 3, March, 1852 • Various
... of its wealthy lord. It was a fair sight to see the stately mirrors which spread their shining surfaces between pillars of polished marble reflecting the gay assemblage, that, radiant with jewels, promenaded the saloon, or wreathed the dance to the witching music of the most skilful minstrels in all Tuscany. Every lattice was open, and the eye, far as it could reach, wandered through illuminated gardens, tenanted by gay groups, where the flush of the roses, the silver ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, Issue 264, July 14, 1827 • Various
... he listened, Aja's soul was filled as it were with a mingled essence of wonder and irresolution and sheeny beauty and singing sound. For the tone of her voice was like a lute, and before his eyes hovered a picture of waving arms and witching curves, out of which her dreamy eyes, from which he could not take his own, seemed as it were to speak to him of love reproachful and old regret. And all at once, with a violent effort, he roused himself as if from sleep with open eyes. And he shifted ...
— An Essence Of The Dusk, 5th Edition • F. W. Bain
... passions swell For Estelle! How I love my actions tell Thee, Estelle: That I love thy smiling face, And thy captivating grace— Love thy dreamy 'witching eyes More than planets ...
— The Sylvan Cabin - A Centenary Ode on the Birth of Lincoln and Other Verse • Edward Smyth Jones
... A cat-bird first, with witching low song, eying me closely with that calm, dark eye of his, the while he poured it out from ...
— Little Brothers of the Air • Olive Thorne Miller
... difficult to describe charm, and I shall make no attempt, except to say that my mother's spell did not consist in good looks in the ordinary sense of the word. She had a witching expression, an exceedingly graceful carriage of her head and body, and a good figure; but her face was so mobile and so entirely governed by her smile that photographs and pictures were always pronounced as "impossible" ...
— The Adventure of Living • John St. Loe Strachey
... uplift thee: not yet, Walk through some passionless years by my side, Chasing the silly sheep, snapping the lily stalk, Drawing my secrets forth, witching my soul with talk. When the sap stays, and the blossom is set, Others will take the ...
— Ionica • William Cory (AKA William Johnson) |
