"Illegible" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... Examination of the Shelley MSS. in the Bodleian, p. 19. At the words "And monophalmic (sic) Polyphemes who haunt the pine-hills, flocked," the writing becomes illegible and the stanza is left incomplete. Mr Forman explains the breaking-off in ...
— Robert Browning • C. H. Herford
... neighbours. The newspapers and the reviews blew my trumpet assiduously. My name was carved upon the plinth of a marble statue, that my fellow-citizens set up in honour of my many virtues,'—and the name was illegible centuries before the statue was burned in ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture: Romans Corinthians (To II Corinthians, Chap. V) • Alexander Maclaren
... difficulty will be found in making titles of books that consist of a single word, look well. Thus if you have "CORIOLANUS" to place on a back which is not more than 5/8-inch wide, if it is put across as one word, as at fig. 95 (1), it will be illegible from the smallness of the type, and will tell merely as a gold line at a little distance. If a reasonably large type is used, the word must be broken up somewhat, as at (2), which is perhaps better, ...
— Bookbinding, and the Care of Books - A handbook for Amateurs, Bookbinders & Librarians • Douglas Cockerell
... regular work like a man. She was entirely unfitted for her sex's sphere. She was neither uncertain, coy nor hard to please, and altogether too stimulating and aggressive for any gentleman's hours of ease. Her cookery would have been about as sketchy as her handwriting, which was generally quite illegible, and she would have made, I feel sure, a shocking bad nurse. Yet you mustn't imagine she was an inelegant or unbeautiful woman, and she is inconceivable to me in high collars or any sort of masculine garment. But her soul was bony, and at the ...
— The New Machiavelli • Herbert George Wells
... packages and 4 cases of medicines are ship'd on Board the Sloop Called the Two Brothers Saml West Master. On Account and [illegible word] of Mr. Oliver Smith of Boston Apothecary and to him consigned. The cases are unmarked being ship'd at ...
— Old English Patent Medicines in America • George B. Griffenhagen
... others, and too, by and by, on those I am looking for. These can go into it, meantime. It will be a good riddance, at any rate, a fine clearance, yes, indeed! To the fire, to the fire with them all, even to the smallest scrap of paper, even to the most illegible scrawl, if we wish to be certain of destroying ...
— Doctor Pascal • Emile Zola
... was so abominably defaced by blotting and blurring that it was entirely illegible. It must have come all the way by water. By the aid of chemicals and photography, however, I have made it out. But you forgot to inclose the ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce, Volume 8 - Epigrams, On With the Dance, Negligible Tales • Ambrose Bierce
... Pickwick recoiled upon the head of its calumnious author. The seventeen learned societies unanimously voted the presumptuous Blotton an ignorant meddler, and forthwith set to work upon more treatises than ever. And to this day the stone remains, an illegible monument of Mr. Pickwick's greatness, and a lasting trophy to the littleness ...
— The Pickwick Papers • Charles Dickens
... speech (k). The omission of (i) might be due to the state of the MS.: the words of the song may have been left out of the dialogue, as appearing on a separate page with the musical notes, or may have been inserted in such an illegible way as ...
— Shakespearean Tragedy - Lectures on Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, Macbeth • A. C. Bradley
... of the letter, except four or five lines which (with his name) were so much blotted, apparently with tears, that they were illegible. ...
— Nature and Art • Mrs. Inchbald
... translation, into Scottish verse, of Virgil's 'Aeneid,' which, considering the age, is an extraordinary performance. It occupied him only sixteen months. The multitude of obsolete terms, however, in which it abounds, renders it now, as a whole, illegible. After passing through various subordinate offices, such as the 'Provostship' of St Giles's, Edinburgh, and the 'Abbotship' of Arbroath, he was at length appointed Bishop of Dunkeld. Dunkeld was not then the paradise it has become, but Birnam hill and the other ...
— Specimens with Memoirs of the Less-known British Poets, Complete • George Gilfillan
... the departed. Their task was streneous, roads were almost impossible to travel and those brave men soon sacrificed their lives for the good of suffering humanity." Dr. Buckner described several of the old doctors as "Striding [TR: illegible handwritten word above 'striding'] a horse and setting out through all ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States - From Interviews with Former Slaves: Indiana Narratives • Works Projects Administration
... skirting patch of grass. Wild flowers grow in abundance on this spot, and it lies high and airy, with a distant river stealing steadily away to the ocean, like a man's life. To gain the milestone here, which the moss, primroses, violets, bluebells and wild roses would soon render illegible but for peering travellers pushing them aside with their sticks, you must come up a steep hill, come which way you may. So, all the tramps with carts or caravans—the gipsy tramp, the show tramp, the Cheap Jack—find it impossible to resist the temptations of the place, and all turn the horse ...
— Dickens-Land • J. A. Nicklin
... respecting the site of vortigern's castle or city. Usher places it at Gwent, Monmouthshire, which name, he ways, was taken from Caer-Went, near Chepstow. This appears to agree with Geoffrey's account, {illegible} See Usher's Britan. Eccles. cap. v. p.23. According to others, supposed to be the city from the ruins of which arose the castle of Gurthrenion, in Radnorshire, Camden's Britannia, p.479. Whitaker, however, says that Cair Guorthegirn ...
— History Of The Britons (Historia Brittonum) • Nennius
... morning." In a moment it flashed upon her that Dan had read the letter, and was waiting now to see the effect of the shock upon her. She immediately, but involuntarily, set herself to baffle his cruel curiosity. With a calm, illegible face she read the letter from beginning to end, folded it, and put it back in its envelope deliberately, then took up another which had also ...
— The Beth Book - Being a Study of the Life of Elizabeth Caldwell Maclure, a Woman of Genius • Sarah Grand
... Nukhashi and another whose name is now illegible, apparently take a higher rank than their neighbours. Nukhashi is often named in these tablets as well as in Egyptian inscriptions, and it must have been situated on the north-east slope of the Lebanon range. We have also letters from the towns of Biruta (Beyrout), Hashab, Hazi, Kumidi, Kadesh ...
— The Tell El Amarna Period • Carl Niebuhr
... this volume with an attention she would not have given it in any other house. On the fly leaf was written in pencil, in Ware's rough, uneven hand, an inscription which covered the page, with the last words cramped in the lower corner. These were almost illegible, but Sylvia felt her way through them slowly, and then turned to the middle of the book quickly with an uncomfortable sense of having read a private memorandum of the minister's. The margins of his ...
— A Hoosier Chronicle • Meredith Nicholson
... This was my daily dilemma: Speak out and protest, and be removed or imprisoned—hold silence and [Transcriber's note: illegible word] the coward, and remain in the work. And ...
— Woman's Endurance • A.D.L.
... (1897), 48. The same year in these acc'ts we find three conduit wardens mentioned. These are to have "the assistance of William Ellis plomer [plumber]." Of them it is also determined that they "do kepe an alle for the comodetie of the [Transcriber's note: WORD ILLEGIBLE] dytts in the sayd Towne to be kept abowts the tyme of Shrofftyde," [Transcriber's note: WORD(S) ILLEGIBLE] just ...
— The Elizabethan Parish in its Ecclesiastical and Financial Aspects • Sedley Lynch Ware
... but myself can succeed in arranging them. For instance, in the score of the concerto, the piano part, according to my usual custom, was not yet written down; so, owing to my hurry, you will receive it in my own very illegible writing. In order that the works may follow as nearly as possible in their proper order, I have marked the numbers to be placed ...
— Beethoven's Letters 1790-1826, Volume 1 of 2 • Lady Wallace
... again attempt this impossible theme? While reflecting on my debt to thee, my heart becomes too big for its mansion. My hand falters, and the characters it traces run into an illegible scrawl. ...
— Jane Talbot • Charles Brockden Brown
... his boots, which he had just taken off; and before he had finished it, had walked across the room and laid hold of the railway book in use at Carlingford, all the time reading and re-reading the important little epistle. It was not so neat inside as out, and blurred and blotted, and slightly illegible; and this is ...
— The Perpetual Curate • Mrs [Margaret] Oliphant
... that was quite a different thing," Lady Anne said, "from having them in her album; so Mr. Harrington must be so very good." I did not understand the particular use of copying in my illegible hand what could be so much better read in print; but it was all-sufficient that her ladyship chose it. When I had copied the verses I must, Lady Anne said, read the lines, and admire them. But I had read them ...
— Tales & Novels, Vol. IX - [Contents: Harrington; Thoughts on Bores; Ormond] • Maria Edgeworth
... sketches,—this would be as exciting, one might suppose, as to sit through a play one knows by heart at Drury Lane or the Theatre Francais, and might furnish occupation enough to the curious idler who was only in search of entertainment. The mechanical obstacles of half-illegible manuscript, of antiquated forms of speech, to say nothing of the intentional obscurities of diplomatic correspondence, stand, however, in the way of all but the resolute and unwearied scholar. These ...
— Memoir of John Lothrop Motley, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... contents. But in a certain wastebasket I found a mass of wet and pulp-like paper. It had been cut up, macerated, perhaps chewed; perhaps it had been also soaked with water. There was a wash-basin with running water in this room. The ink had run, and of course was illegible. The thing was so unusual that I at once assumed that this was the remains of the note in question. Under ordinary circumstances it would be utterly valueless as a clue to anything. But to-day science is not ready to let anything pass ...
— Master Tales of Mystery, Volume 3 • Collected and Arranged by Francis J. Reynolds
... little woman has crept up to Ted's elbow with an illegible bill. Rose has spoken slowly to give her time to get there—it is always so much better to choose your own most effective background for really ...
— Young People's Pride • Stephen Vincent Benet
... led him to think that all the true things had been said, and one could do no better than hunt them up again for new uses. Our business was, like Old Mortality, to clear out and cut afresh inscriptions that had been made illegible by time and storm. At least this delivered him from the senseless vanity of originality and personal appropriation. We feel sure that if he found that a thought which he had believed to be new had been expressed in literature before, he would have been pleased ...
— Critical Miscellanies (Vol. 3 of 3) - Essay 5: On Pattison's Memoirs • John Morley
... Market-Deeping. And I can show you a few verses at once.' Which saying, he left the room, returning in a few minutes with a queer bundle of odd-sized scraps of paper, tied round with a thick rope, and scribbled over, in an almost illegible manner, in all directions. At the top of the bundle was a poem, beginning, 'My love, thou art a nosegay sweet,' which Mr. Drury had no sooner deciphered, than he shook Clare warmly ...
— The Life of John Clare • Frederick Martin
... in the splendid (illegible) affair, and he was buried twice, then caught by the stifling gases, his mask having been torn off. He insisted upon remaining at his post, in spite of the fact that he was spitting blood. Fortunately a lieutenant passed by and saw him. He gave orders to have him carried ...
— The Living Present • Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton
... of roads where we turned to the left towards Wick. The first part of our walk was through the Parish of Canisbay, in the ancient records of which some reference is made to the more recent representatives of the Groat family, but as these were made two hundred years ago, they were now almost illegible. Our road lay through a wild moorland district with a few farms and cottages here and there, mainly occupied by fishermen. There were no fences to the fields or roads, and no bushes or trees, and the cattle were either herded ...
— From John O'Groats to Land's End • Robert Naylor and John Naylor
... hundred closely printed pages. No paltry little anecdote or incident, germane or not, is too contemptible for him. The identity of some obscure school, the mastership of which Johnson never held, is argued about until one is weary of the thing. The illegible note, written for his own eye alone, is construed in a dozen ways, and judgment delivered as though the fate of empires hung thereon. The smug complaisance with which he cites some prayer or comment to illustrate his idol's religious orthodoxy would have angered me once—did anger me once—but ...
— An Ocean Tramp • William McFee
... his pen, looked quizzically at the last illegible lines slanting up the paper, and realized that he was hungry. His untasted tea and anchovy toast still stood in the fender where the scout had put ...
— Kathleen • Christopher Morley
... and in places is almost illegible, as might be expected," said Alf. "Let me see. 'Coast of Labrador, (something illegible here), 1611. This day the mutineers took possess ... (can't make out what follows), and put Captain Hudson, with his son, myself, the carpenter, and five sick men into ...
— The Giant of the North - Pokings Round the Pole • R.M. Ballantyne
... map, or at least what they at once accepted as a map, though in reality it was more of a crude diagram of straight and crooked lines, with here and there a partly obliterated word to give it meaning. In several places there were mere evidences of words, now entirely illegible. But what first held the attention of Rod and his companions were several lines in writing under the rough sketch on the bark, still quite plain, which formed the names of three men. Roderick ...
— The Wolf Hunters - A Tale of Adventure in the Wilderness • James Oliver Curwood
... service being read by one of the lieutenants. The colours of the ship and boats were struck half-mast, and three volleys of musketry fired over the graves. The journals—not a word of which was, as I have said, rendered illegible—were carefully forwarded to England, and, like voices from the grave, have undoubtedly instigated many to aid those who seek to spread the truth of the gospel among the savage ...
— A Voyage round the World - A book for boys • W.H.G. Kingston
... fourteen inches high, on a base of ebony and pearl: it is wrought out of block silver in the Genoese method, and is designed in deep panels divided by wreathed columns: these panels are covered with inscriptions, seemingly of names and dates, most of them illegible—'Robillard Puyraveau du Guesclin, 1602,' being the earliest we could make out. We found several varieties, or, as Perry says, 'classes,' of porcelain—beautiful plates of Sevres, painted in the most charming designs by masters to us ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 20, August 1877 • Various
... bowed profoundly, and left the room in order to give the necessary orders for his immediate departure; while his royal guest seized a pen, and with a trembling hand, and in almost illegible characters, wrote ...
— The Life of Marie de Medicis, Vol. 3 (of 3) • Julia Pardoe
... a seminary, a gentleman inquired of him how many Scotch boys were in attendance. 'Saxtain or savantain,' was the reply. 'Enough,' says the gentleman, sotto voce, to corrupt a whole school.' As regards calligraphy, Chalmers wrote the most illegible hand in Scotland. He could not even read it himself, and was frequently obliged to call his wife and daughters to his aid. Many of his discourses, when intended for the press, were copied by them. His manuscript, ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. I., No. IV., April, 1862 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... they were affected by undue influence, or that other voters were led by like influence to refrain from voting, can such a function be valid under the Constitution of the United States? There is no question were of throwing out particular votes for vices inherent in themselves, such as that they were illegible, or were cast by disqualified persons, and the like; but the question is of rejecting the votes of a certain number—say a thousand voters—either because they were unduly influenced, or because another thousand, who might have voted, were, by ...
— The Electoral Votes of 1876 - Who Should Count Them, What Should Be Counted, and the Remedy for a Wrong Count • David Dudley Field
... the inky sheet were scrawled a few almost illegible lines, "My darlingest St. Elspeth, I have neerly squalled my heyes out because St. John says your Angle Baby has flewn back to Heaven and I wanted it to stay. But I am glad you have got another twin so the little crib St. ...
— Heart of Gold • Ruth Alberta Brown
... more than over the wine glasses, that Boswell made his notes. I have seen Boswell's signature after wine—on the minutes of a meeting of The Club—and he was in no condition then for the taking of notes. Even the signature is almost illegible.) But it is fitting that Gilbert, who loved all sorts of men so much, should be kept alive for the future by all sorts of men. From the focussing of many views from many angles this picture has been composed, but they are all views of one man, and the picture will show, I think, a ...
— Gilbert Keith Chesterton • Maisie Ward
... there have been; although my principal endeavor shall be to strive, in these beginnings, that all shall be restored to its former condition. [In the margin: "Examined January 25, 34. Write to the new governor that we have heard of the lack of wood and of the other things that are [word illegible in MS.; necessary?] in the magazines, so that everything may be provided as is expected from his care ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, Volume XXIV, 1630-34 • Various
... dissenting interest, had taken the precaution to get them snugly housed in a tavern, where an unbounded supply of gratuitous Ferntosh deprived us of the benefit of their experience. We, however, allotted them twenty shares a-piece. Sir Polloxfen Tremens sent a handsome, though rather illegible letter of apology, dated from an island in Lochlomond, where he was said to be ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 58, Number 360, October 1845 • Various
... Miss Brown. She was filling out the monthly report cards and was not likely to detect him, but he held the note underneath his desk as he opened it, nevertheless. It was from Silvey and ran in nearly illegible figures: ...
— A Son of the City - A Story of Boy Life • Herman Gastrell Seely
... inclination, the gallant Major handed me out of the cab in a quiet corner of a narrow street, then paid the driver with less fuss than usual, and led me into a queer little place marked in almost illegible letters, "Little England Polygon." "You have the card, my dear?" he whispered; "keep it till I call you in. But be ready to produce it in a moment. For the rest, I leave you to your own wit. Jack is ...
— Erema - My Father's Sin • R. D. Blackmore
... "I must likewise be sensible that although I am an American citizen that it is likewise believed there [in America] that I am become a citizen of France, and that in consequence this latter character has so far [illegible] the former as to weaken if not destroy any claim you might have to interpose in my behalf." I am sorry I cannot add any new arguments to those I have already advanced on this part of the subject. But I cannot help asking myself, and ...
— The Writings Of Thomas Paine, Complete - With Index to Volumes I - IV • Thomas Paine
... learnt at Court, for his daughter had been conveyed abroad. This afterwards appeared to be the truth, as there came from France, after an interval of several years, a letter in her hand. It was written in trembling characters, and almost illegible. Little could be made out save that she often thought of home and her old dear pleasant room, - and that she had dreamt her father was dead and had not blessed her, - and that ...
— Master Humphrey's Clock • Charles Dickens
... known to the general public, is much valued by students of American history. With the exception of one word, to which he called my attention, Dr. Toner has given as exact a reproduction of the Rules, in their present damaged condition, as can be made in print. The illegible parts are precisely indicated, without any conjectural insertions, and young Washington's spelling and punctuation subjected ...
— George Washington's Rules of Civility - Traced to their Sources and Restored by Moncure D. Conway • Moncure D. Conway
... promised to observe her wishes. "It's not banking etiquette, Miss Fraser, but that doesn't matter in North Queensland. We do many things that we ought not to do, and if Smith draws a cheque you may be sure that I will refuse to pay it as 'signature illegible'—as it is sure to be. But I'll lend him a few pounds if he breaks out again, and is laid up in this abode of sin, so that he may get home again to your ...
— Tom Gerrard - 1904 • Louis Becke
... came to the bank, and on the stack of firewood found a flat piece of board with some faded pencil-writing on it. When deciphered it said: 'Wood for you. Hurry up. Approach cautiously.' There was a signature, but it was illegible—not Kurtz—a much longer word. 'Hurry up.' Where? Up the river? 'Approach cautiously.' We had not done so. But the warning could not have been meant for the place where it could be only found after approach. Something was wrong ...
— Heart of Darkness • Joseph Conrad
... age. The sheets were covered with runes of lingua antiqua arranged in regular rows, inscribed by hand with a carbon-based ink which has persisted remarkably well despite the degenerative processes of time. Although much of the manuscript is illegible, sufficient remains to settle for all time the Dannar-Marraket Controversy and lend important corroborating evidence to the ...
— The Issahar Artifacts • Jesse Franklin Bone
... balloon letter, dated November 30, giving, it is presumed, an account of the military operations on that day, suffered so much in transitu, that it is illegible.] ...
— Diary of the Besieged Resident in Paris • Henry Labouchere
... more of his capable associates to provide prefaces, which are naturally of a laudatory character, and always couched in highly-polished and obscure terms, the difficulty of the text being often aggravated by a fanciful and almost illegible script. Prefaces written by emperors, many examples of which may be seen, are of course highly esteemed, and are generally printed in coloured ink. The next section may comprise biographical notices of eminent ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 2 - "Chicago, University of" to "Chiton" • Various
... to the sitting-room, upon a cry from Minette, she found Netta in a swoon. The letter was tightly clasped in her hand, the envelope was on the floor. She ventured to look at the address and postmark. The former was to Mrs Mills, the latter some illegible place in America. She wanted no more information, and asked for none. She brought poor Netta to herself with difficulty, and let her put the letter in its envelope, and both in her bosom, without a question. Netta lay on the sofa, with her eyes closed, and said not a word. ...
— Gladys, the Reaper • Anne Beale
... upon the perpendicular face of the rock, probably two hundred feet above the river, and in a place where there is no apparent possibility for mortal man to arrive. They are composed of the initials of two persons, together with characters and drawings, some of which are illegible from the river. The first consists of the letters 'J. W. H.,' quite well done in dark blue or green paint. The next is 'A. L. S.,' done in red, and also a trefoil leaf of clover in green, beside ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, February 1844 - Volume 23, Number 2 • Various
... the moonlight. He gave a start and, with a muttered ejaculation, darted forward and picked off a small piece of paper from the dripping keel. It separated in his hand and a part of it escaped him, but the rest he managed to keep by secreting it in his palm, where it still clung, wet and possibly illegible, when he came upon Mr. Grey again in ...
— The Woman in the Alcove • Anna Katharine Green
... until their tasks were done. This explains the whole succession of cyclometers, and all the heroes of the Budget. Some of this correspondence is very recent; it is much blotted, and we are not quite sure of its meaning: it is full of figurative allusions to driving something illegible down a steep into the sea. It looks like a humble petition to be allowed some diversion in the intervals of transmigration; and the ...
— A Budget of Paradoxes, Volume I (of II) • Augustus De Morgan
... taken the precaution to get them snugly housed in a tavern, where an unbounded supply of gratuitous Ferintosh deprived us of the benefit of their experience. We, however, allotted them twenty shares apiece. Sir Polloxfen Tremens sent a handsome, though rather illegible, letter of apology, dated from an island in Loch Lomond, where he was said to be detained on ...
— Stories by English Authors: Scotland • Various
... (except its tower of 1377) in 1851-52 by Hardwick, and its interest has been totally destroyed, its monuments huddled away anywhere, for the most part close under the roof, where their inscriptions are of course wholly illegible!... ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume I. - Great Britain and Ireland • Various
... the devil, to ruin the fruit of his work, employed two very malicious frauds, by first drenching the manuscript in the kennel, reducing it to a most pitiable state, and rendering some parts altogether illegible, and then obliging the printers to commit such numerous blunders, never before equalled in so small a work. To combat this double machination of Satan, he was obliged carefully to reperuse the work, and to form this singular list of the blunders of printers working under ...
— Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 475 - Vol. XVII, No. 475. Saturday, February 5, 1831 • Various
... another scrap of paper in this all but illegible handwriting, written about this time, and which gives some idea of the sources of their ...
— Stories of Achievement, Volume IV (of 6) - Authors and Journalists • Various
... him, nor delighted by art which does not touch him; and for the writer to imply that he furnishes arguments, but does not pretend to furnish brains to understand the arguments, is arrogance. What Goethe says about the most legible handwriting being illegible in the twilight, is doubtless true; and should be oftener borne in mind by frivolous objectors, who declare they do not understand this or do not admire that, as if their want of taste and understanding were rather creditable than otherwise, and were decisive ...
— The Principles of Success in Literature • George Henry Lewes
... at great length, quite ungrudgingly; but his constant writing told on his script. Ten years ago it was a very distinctive, artistic, finely formed hand, very much like my father's, but latterly it grew cramped and even illegible, though it always had a peculiar character, and, as is often the case with very marked hand-writings, it tended to be unconsciously imitated by ...
— Hugh - Memoirs of a Brother • Arthur Christopher Benson
... sometime officer of the regiment Carignan, formerly stationed in New France; with him a lady recently from Montreal, known very well to Lieutenant de Ligny and his family; and to be in his care en voyage to France; the name of said lady illegible upon the records, the spelling apparently not having suited the clerk who wrote it, and then forgot it in the press of ...
— The Mississippi Bubble • Emerson Hough
... disturb him. But he continued perfectly motionless;—Arthur advanced still closer;—one hand grasped the cross, the other held a small crucifix, which he always wore suspended from his neck. A glow of [Transcriber's Note: Word illegible in original] rested on his pale features; his eyes were closed, and a triumphant smile lingered on his parted lips. Arthur started, and his blood chilled as he gazed at him; he touched his hand,—it was cold and stiff;—he pressed his fingers on his heart,—it had ceased to beat!—Father Gilbert ...
— The Rivals of Acadia - An Old Story of the New World • Harriet Vaughan Cheney
... twenty lines, which might have been poetry, or perhaps a prose eulogy, or perhaps the simple record of the buried person's life; but all this, having been done in fainter and smaller letters, was now so far worn away as to be illegible; nor had they ever been deep enough to be made living in moss, like the rest of ...
— Doctor Grimshawe's Secret - A Romance • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... is based on a facsimile edition made from a single copy of the 1592 original. In some places, text is illegible or missing. ...
— Hypnerotomachia - The Strife of Loue in a Dreame • Francesco Colonna
... said that his plans had changed, that he was going to take the train with a friend he had seen on board, and asked to have his money back. It was given to him, at his request, in twenty-five bank notes of the thousand dollar denomination. He signed for them, writing your name, excusing an almost illegible signature by the need of haste and by a finger tied up as though it were badly hurt. So much for what the cashier of the Merchants' and Citizens' Bank of ...
— The Short Cut • Jackson Gregory
... expected to be a draft for ten thousand dollars in favor of the owners of the ship on his agent in New York. He handed to the captain the result of his efforts. It was a piece of paper covered with writing that was totally illegible. ...
— Famous Americans of Recent Times • James Parton
... "is an opportunity of using some of this elaborately monogrammed paper which poor darling papa got for me, because I wanted to see how they could work my unpromising 'Z' into a respectable cipher. They have made it utterly illegible, and I believe that is the great point to ...
— The Cryptogram - A Novel • James De Mille
... lives. In the last letter of his which I have seen, written, indeed, when writing had become difficult for him, he says that he is 'as happy as any man can be,' and had nothing to complain of—except, indeed, his illegible handwriting. This is only a repetition of previous statements at every period of his life. When he speaks of the twenty-five years of long struggle, which had enabled him to rise from the bar to the bench, he adds that they were most happy years, and that he only wishes that they could ...
— The Life of Sir James Fitzjames Stephen, Bart., K.C.S.I. - A Judge of the High Court of Justice • Sir Leslie Stephen
... hiding-place. As he did so, he threw out a ball of paper rolled closely together, which the sharp-sighted Prieme instantly picked up and unfolded. It was a fragment of a written sheet, partly burned, and in several places quite illegible. ...
— The Young Carpenters of Freiberg - A Tale of the Thirty Years' War • Anonymous
... original, and might be exhibited to the Lord Provost and bailies at the annual examination. It is said now that no school of any name in the land would condescend to teach writing, and that boys coming from such high places can compass their own signatures with difficulty, and are quite illegible after a gentlemanly fashion; but it was otherwise in one old grammar school. So famous was the caligraphy produced at the Seminary that Muirtown bankers, lawyers, and other great personages used to drop in of an afternoon, and having snuffed with ...
— Young Barbarians • Ian Maclaren
... without being good are very tolerable. The subject is Telemachus being knighted by Minerva in some gardens, the name of which escapes me. In short, where the Roman ladies repaired on one single night. What shall I say to you? I have Romans, and Roman ladies [here occurs an illegible word], and the whole train. Madam Magloire has cleaned it all off; this summer she is going to have some small injuries repaired, and the whole revarnished, and my chamber will be a regular museum. She has also ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... quamvis improbus annis, Atque mero fervens, cavet hunc, quem coccina lae [Transcriber's note: remainder of word illegible] Vitari jubet, et comitum longissimus ordo, Multum praeterca ...
— Dr. Johnson's Works: Life, Poems, and Tales, Volume 1 - The Works Of Samuel Johnson, Ll.D., In Nine Volumes • Samuel Johnson
... to deepen towards evening, the track became quite illegible, and when I found myself at this romantically situated cabin, I was thankful to find that they could give me shelter. The scene was a solemn one, and reminded me of a description in Whittier's Snow-Bound. All the stock came round the cabin with mute appeals for shelter. ...
— A Lady's Life in the Rocky Mountains • Isabella L. Bird
... looked up while he did so: he continued to form awkward, illegible characters upon the paper before him, as if his very life depended on being able to write ...
— The Bronze Eagle - A Story of the Hundred Days • Emmuska Orczy, Baroness Orczy
... the present reprint is based on the original manuscript in Swift's handwriting; but as this was found to be somewhat illegible, it has been collated with the text given in vol. viii. of the quarto edition of Swift's ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Vol. VII - Historical and Political Tracts—Irish • Jonathan Swift
... were subdued by his astonishment, and, turning to the stranger, who remained standing on the same spot, he asked the reason of such an outrage on humanity. The stranger, slowly turning round, and disclosing a countenance which—(Here the manuscript was illegible for a few lines), said in English—(A long hiatus followed here, and the next passage that was legible, though it proved to be a continuation of the narrative, was but ...
— The Lock and Key Library • Julian Hawthorne, Ed.
... I doubt not for Torizi, in accordance with the G. Text ("le peuple de la cite que sunt apeles Tauriz"), with the Latin, and with Ramusio. All that he means to say is that the people are called Tabrizis. Not recondite information, but 'tis his way. Just so he tells us in ch[*illegible*]u that the people of Hermenia are called Hermins, and elsewhere that the people of Tebet are called Tebet. So Hayton thinks it not inappropriate to say that the people of Catay are called Cataini, that the people of Corasmia are called Corasmins, ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo Volume 1 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa
... SPECIAL INSTRUCTION [illegible] Room, place date of shipment and registry number; Shipping Room, above date of this invoice; then return it to person whose name is checked in column at right. After this checked name has been initialled, invoice should ...
— Federal Bureau of Investigation FOIA Documents - Unidentified Flying Objects • United States Federal Bureau of Investigation
... Some entries were missing from this index. For completeness they have been added and marked with an asterisk. Some parts of the Table of Contents were illegible, and a few missing page numbers have been replaced ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, Nov 1877-Nov 1878 - No 1, Nov 1877 • Various
... the gross than he has heretofore received, or in exchange for something of a different, perhaps of a sentimental nature? ... Please pardon this typewritten note, but my own hand, unlike your copper-plate, is absolutely illegible. I have been raised ...
— The Letters of Franklin K. Lane • Franklin K. Lane
... displays at night three red balls on a blue ground, once bore also, inscribed in graceful waves, the words 'Money advanced on plate, jewels, wearing apparel, and every description of property,' but a few illegible hieroglyphics are all that now remain to attest the fact. The plate and jewels would seem to have disappeared, together with the announcement, for the articles of stock, which are displayed in some profusion in the window, do not include any very valuable luxuries of either kind. ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens
... will forgive a dying man. If you will come back and let all be as it used to be, I will make any apology you may require. If I go, she will be so very friendless; and I have looked to you to care for her ever since you first—" Then came some illegible and incoherent writing, ending with, "From my deathbed I adjure you to stand her friend; I will beg pardon ...
— A Dark Night's Work • Elizabeth Gaskell
... but still distinguishable outline of a pencil caricature he had made there thirty years before. If the wall had been whitewashed in the meantime, the lime had scaled down to the original plaster. Only the name, which had been written underneath, was illegible, though he could reconstruct with his mind's eye and the aid of a few shadowy strokes—"Bill Fetters, Sneak"—in angular letters ...
— The Colonel's Dream • Charles W. Chesnutt
... paper sewn up in my boot, your majesty; but it was read over to me several times, in case either water or wear should render it illegible." ...
— Saint Bartholomew's Eve - A Tale of the Huguenot WarS • G. A. Henty
... half illegible through the fading of the ink. It might be—it probably was—a statement of Captain Reid's imperiousness in trifles, very much exaggerated by the narrator, who had written it while fresh and warm from the scene of altercation. Some sailors being aloft in the main-topsail rigging, the captain ...
— North and South • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... 1695, is the following note: "March 23, 1779, a marriage was attempted to be solemnized; but the intended bridegroom, to the great surprise of the congregation assembled, remaining away, the ceremony, &c. . . ." The rest is illegible. ...
— A History of Horncastle - from the earliest period to the present time • James Conway Walter
... writer—I would lay down my pen, and watch my child-wife trying to be good. First of all, she would bring out the immense account-book, and lay it down upon the table, with a deep sigh. Then she would open it at the place where Jip had made it illegible last night, and call Jip up, to look at his misdeeds. This would occasion a diversion in Jip's favour, and some inking of his nose, perhaps, as a penalty. Then she would tell Jip to lie down on the table instantly, 'like a lion'—which was one ...
— David Copperfield • Charles Dickens
... that he had found his mother in a dying condition, and was watching at her bedside. He did not intend to write again, but Emma's letters were so persistent that, despite his resolution, he did despatch two other notes, each more hasty and illegible and more distracted in tenor than the previous one. In fact the last had no ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 1, July, 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... waited until he had made his stiff-necked exit. Then he took the two dollars, and, putting the money into an envelope, indorsed it in his illegible hand. He heard his brother's step on the stairs, and Dr. Ed made haste to put away the last vestiges of ...
— K • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... those who have written upon the subject in the English or Latin language. For to read the originals aright needs many years of labour, the Irish tongue presenting at different epochs the characteristics of distinct languages, while the peculiarities of ancient caligraphy, in the defaced and illegible manuscripts, form of themselves quite a large department of study. Stated succinctly, the mythological record of the bards, with ...
— Early Bardic Literature, Ireland • Standish O'Grady
... Sex. Roscio and pro Murena are only known from an ancient and illegible MS. discovered by Poggio at Cluny, No. 496 in the old catalogue, and now lost. The most faithful transcript was made in France (Paris, Lat. 14,749) before the MS. passed into Poggio's hand by a writer who carefully ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 3 - "Chitral" to "Cincinnati" • Various
... any form of far-reaching and original enterprise, the kind of opportunity which a man requires is not an opportunity of exerting his own faculties in isolation, like a sorter who is specially expert in deciphering illegible addresses. It is an opportunity of directing the efforts of a large number of other men. Apart from the case of craftsmanship and artistic production, all the higher industrial efforts are reducible to a control of others, and can be made only by men who have the ...
— A Critical Examination of Socialism • William Hurrell Mallock
... Eustace so confused, that he was quite helpless without Harold's explanations, and rather rough directions what he was to do. How like themselves their writing was! Eustace's neat and clerkly, but weak and illegible; and Harold's as distinct, and almost as large, as a schoolboy's copy, but with square-turned joints and strength of limb ...
— My Young Alcides - A Faded Photograph • Charlotte M. Yonge
... the writing," I mused, and then began to look at the postmarks as if a letter were something of very uncommon occurrence. I could make nothing of the illegible smear in the corner, however, and so opened it, and ...
— Weapons of Mystery • Joseph Hocking
... following two paragraphs are for the most part illegible. I have reproduced below as much of the text as can ...
— Minnie's Sacrifice • Frances Ellen Watkins Harper
... large and strongly built, dressed in the uniform of an ensign of our navy. Surely a strange visitor to these shores! There was no mark of identification upon him except a cigarette case graven with an undecipherable monogram in Tiffany's most illegible style of arrow-headed inscription. This I buried with him, and staked the grave with a headboard. An officer and a gentleman, a youth of friendly ways and kindly living, if one may judge by the face of the dead; and he comes by the same end to the same goal as Handy Solomon. Why not? And why ...
— The Mystery • Stewart Edward White and Samuel Hopkins Adams
... the darkness, and there was nothing for it but to return. In my room I opened the packet with nervous haste. The letter, or rather note, consisted of only a few words, and had no signature. I gazed at the writing curiously, it was cramped, partly illegible, and in a man's hand. By supplying a letter here and there I managed to piece together the ...
— My Sword's My Fortune - A Story of Old France • Herbert Hayens
... hard to read—especially if it is a palimpsest. Indeed, many are illegible to their owners. Nevertheless, That the woman should not know her own heart (as so often happens) terrifies the woman as much as it ...
— Hints for Lovers • Arnold Haultain
... dial so much defaced that one could not tell the time of day; and when it struck, it was with noticeably disproportionate deliberation, as if it wished to correct any mistake into which the family might have fallen by reason of its illegible dial. ...
— Main-Travelled Roads • Hamlin Garland
... was illegible in more places than one. With pains and care they made out the address at the beginning, and here and there some fragments of the lines that followed. It began: "Dear Mr. Brinkworth." Then the writing got, little by little, worse and worse. To the eyes of the strangers who looked ...
— Man and Wife • Wilkie Collins
... Priscilla, for your great kindness. I return the ninth volume of [illegible], with the four succeeding ones, all that I have; probably all that are yet published. You shall have the rest when I get them. Tell dear Mr. George (I must not call him Vert-Vert) that I have recollected the name of the author ...
— Our Village • Mary Russell Mitford
... confess themselves guilty of an offense, of which they said, "if not absolutely, yet next to impossible to convict them," was acted upon, and some relaxation made in the rule before adopted; but a part of the record is so worn as to be illegible. ...
— Bundling; Its Origin, Progress and Decline in America • Henry Reed Stiles
... indeed a strange jumble of prince and pauper, friend and foe, patriot and adventurer. And the face that drew my gaze oftenest was one as still and illegible now as it was on the morning of January 11, four years later, when I bowed ...
— Dross • Henry Seton Merriman
... extreme importance of such men as Cohn [illegible] and Carter having observed apparent cases of heterogenesis. At present I should prefer any mad hypothesis, such as that every disintegrated molecule of the lowest forms can reproduce the parent-form, and that the molecules are universally distributed, and that they ...
— Alfred Russel Wallace: Letters and Reminiscences, Vol. 1 (of 2) • James Marchant
... Squire, and I thought I might write something on these lines. But my mind soon went miching as our people (and Shakespeare) would say, and broke through the English hedges into the unbounded wonder-world. Yet it did not quite run out of reach of human types, for having found some almost illegible notes, I see that at the first appearance of Manannan I had put in brackets the initials "G.B.S." And looking now at the story of that Great Jester, in the history of the ancient gods, I see that for all his quips and ...
— Three Wonder Plays • Lady I. A. Gregory
... transcript of this document furnished us from the Sevilla archives, this word is written teatinos ("Theatins")—apparently the copyist's conjecture for an illegible or badly-written word in the original MS. But the Theatins had no establishments in the Philippines; and the mention of Chirino in the second of these letters (next following this one) of Benavides proves ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898: Volume XII, 1601-1604 • Edited by Blair and Robertson
... carry everything they possess about their persons. Peter remembered the ragged wallet of the Bermudian. What if after all these years of hardship the paper had been worn so that it was entirely illegible, or indeed that in Kennedy's many wanderings it had been lost? Either of these theories was plausible, but none provoked a decision. So after awhile Peter went indoors and opening all the windows and doors to cleanse the air, sat in the big chair and bundling himself in a ...
— The Vagrant Duke • George Gibbs
... of this letter was almost illegible; and there were mistakes in spelling in well-nigh every line; still, its meaning was clear and exact, and could not fail to ...
— Monsieur Lecoq • Emile Gaboriau
... of this experiment is when we use a coin from which the inscription has been either wholly obliterated, or obliterated in such a degree as to be illegible. When such a coin is laid upon the red hot iron, the letters and figures become oxidated, and the film of oxide radiating more powerfully than the rest of the coin will be more luminous than the rest of the coin, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. - Volume 20, No. 567, Saturday, September 22, 1832. • Various
... seems she has been quite ill with weeping for Molly; and, indeed, her dear scrawl was so illegible that I could hardly read it. Rene says she was nearly as much upset by the joy as by the grief. Mr. Landale was not at home; he had ridden to meet Tanty at Liverpool, for the dear old lady has been summoned back in hot haste with ...
— The Light of Scarthey • Egerton Castle
... to pieces with age, and almost illegible in places, is headed, "An ABSTRACT of the Pay due the Officers and Privates of the Company of Riflemen belonging to Captain Abraham Shepherd, being part of a Battalion raised by Colonel Hugh Stevenson, deceased, ...
— American Prisoners of the Revolution • Danske Dandridge
... becomes an established hand in the eighth century, and lasts until the twelfth. Examples occur in Ewald and Loewe, Exempla Scriptur Visigotic, Heidelberg, 1883. It was at first very rude and illegible, but afterwards became even handsome. A fine example exists in the British Museum (Palograph. Soc., pl. 48). Its characteristic letters are ...
— Illuminated Manuscripts • John W. Bradley
... a scrap of newspaper, crumpled and spattered with blood, and, as Houston smoothed it out, he read on the margin, in characters wavering and almost illegible, written with a trembling hand, but still Morgan's writing, "Send to the camp for Houston, he's ...
— The Award of Justice - Told in the Rockies • A. Maynard Barbour
... "Pader rollers" stayed busy all the time trying to find slaves off their plantations without passes. Marriages were performed by having the couple jump the broom. If the [TR: 'couple' deleted, handwritten words above illegible] belonged to different masters oftentimes one master would purchase the other; but should neither wish to sell the man would then have to get passes to visit his wife on her plantation. "Dey would leave the plantation on Saturday afternoons and on Sunday afternoon ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves: Volume IV, Georgia Narratives, Part 1 • Works Projects Administration
... was on a torn piece of brown wrapping paper, and the words, in pencil, were scrawled in hurried, broken sentences. And standing there, fighting for a grip upon himself, Jimmie Dale read the message——almost illegible! in places—and then, as though a strange incredulity, a strange inability to grasp and understand its import fully, were prompting him, he read it again, murmuring ...
— The Further Adventures of Jimmie Dale • Frank L. Packard
... to ruin the fruit of this work, employed two very malicious frauds: the first before it was printed, by drenching the MS. in a kennel, and having reduced it to a most pitiable state, rendered several parts illegible: the second, in obliging the printers to commit such numerous blunders, never yet equalled in so small a work. To combat this double machination of Satan he was obliged carefully to re-peruse the work, ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli
... mile and a half from the land, and two or three cables length from a shoal to the southward, which became dry at low water. Our latitude here was 10 deg. 30' from bearings, and longitude by time-keeper 142(? illegible in book) 181/2' east; but I was altogether at a loss to know what islands these were, under which we had anchored. Supposing the flat-topped island to have been the easternmost York Isle, the land we had in ...
— A Voyage to Terra Australis Volume 2 • Matthew Flinders
... through the veins, and as I noticed this change, the hand moved gropingly towards the pencil held out by Dr Hodgson, and finally grasped it. The latter's long practice and infinite patience were invaluable in making out the often rather illegible script. The hospitality he gave to all attempts at definite communications, however vague and shadowy at first; the infinite patience with which he repeated again and again a question not fully comprehended—all this, combined with intelligent criticism, alert, dispassionate judgment and ...
— Seen and Unseen • E. Katharine Bates
... still shown, together with his kitchen and the altar at which he once ministered. In the graveyard of one of the churches is a curious stone cross, of considerable size, evidently monumental, though the inscription has been so defaced as to be illegible. On the front of the cross there is a deep indentation much resembling that made by the hoof of a cow in soft earth, the bottom of the indentation being deepest at the sides and somewhat ridged in the middle. Concerning this cross and the depression in its face, the following legend was related ...
— Irish Wonders • D. R. McAnally, Jr.
... family had counted a martyr to their faith before they were known as Puritans. The record was obscure in some points; but the portrait, marked "Ann Holyoake, burned by ye bloudy Papists, ano 15.." (figures illegible), was still hanging against the panel over the fireplace in the west parlor at The Poplars. The following words were yet legible on the canvas: "Thou hast made a covenant O Lord with mee ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... but once. He seemed to be looking afar, beyond the Temple and its terraces, beyond the horizon itself. But the accusers were impatient. He bent forward and with a finger wrote on the ground. The letters were illegible, perhaps, yet the symbol of obliteration was in that dust which the morrow would disperse. Again he wrote, but the charge was repeated, louder, more ...
— Mary Magdalen • Edgar Saltus
... the most beautiful thoughts in the world upon hinges of [illegible]; and his songs are destined to roll over bright lips enough to form a [sonnet? illegible]. His sentiments are simple, honest, truthful, and familiar; his language is pure and eminently musical, and he is prodigally full of ...
— Poems • George P. Morris
... elephant for a pet. The good folks, not without some motive, as the great Indian ruler conceived, other than mere love for him, had been sending him presents. Samuel Rogers, who wrote the neatest of hands, records that Clive wrote the worst and certainly the most illegible of scrawls. Instead of "elephant," as they read it, their liberal ...
— Heads and Tales • Various
... proceeded to read it in bed. As a matter of fact he found that there was not very much to read, for the reason that most of the closely-written volume had been so damaged by water, that the pencilled writing had run and become utterly illegible. The centre pages, however, not having been soaked, could still be deciphered, at any rate in part, also there was a large manuscript map, executed in ink, apparently at a later date, on the back of which was written: ...
— The Yellow God - An Idol of Africa • H. Rider Haggard
... cannot leave her alone with him, can I? I (here there are three lines of illegible writing)... so I will think again and again of that last time when we sat together and all the good things that she said. What greatness of soul, what goodness, what splendour! And perhaps after all I am a fortunate man to be allowed to be faithful to so fine ...
— The Secret City • Hugh Walpole
... it as quickly as Mrs. Vane's illegible writing allowed him, and drew in his lips in a peculiar manner when he came to the signature. Perhaps at the same thought ...
— East Lynne • Mrs. Henry Wood
... A long-bearded man [Samson?] tearing open a lion's jaw. The inscription is illegible, and the somewhat vulgar personification appears to belong rather to Courage than Fortitude. On the Renaissance copy it is inscribed "FORTITUDO SUM VIRILIS." The Latin word has, perhaps, been received ...
— The Stones of Venice, Volume II (of 3) • John Ruskin
... number which for various reasons it was found difficult to handle or file for preservation. Many of them had been written so long ago that the ink had almost faded from the paper; others were written with lead pencil, so that in handling them the characters soon became blurred and almost illegible; a great many were written on scraps of paper of all shapes and sizes; and others again were full of omissions and doublets, due to the carelessness of the writer, while many consisted simply of the prayer, with nothing in the nature of a heading or ...
— The Sacred Formulas of the Cherokees • James Mooney
... made of the best galls—the time so spent, and the "letting of words," if I may use the phrase, has cooled our judgment and our passions together; and the first letter is torn: 't is too severe; we write a second; we blot and interline till it is nearly illegible; we begin a third; till at last we are tired out with our own angry feelings, and throw our scribbling by with a "Pshaw! what's the use of it?" or, "It's not worth my notice;" or, still better, arrive at the conclusion, that we preserve our own dignity best by writing ...
— Handy Andy, Vol. 2 - A Tale of Irish Life • Samuel Lover
... incredible, which might vanish at any moment. He himself was incredible. What had happened was incredible. The screeching voices of the children were not real voices, and the children were apparitions. The newspaper was illegible. Its messages for the most part had no meaning, and such as bore a meaning seemed to be utterly unimportant. The first reality, for George was food. He discovered that he could not eat the food—could not swallow; the nausea was acute. He drank a little coffee, and then went upstairs ...
— The Roll-Call • Arnold Bennett
... libraries that are not of recent date. No man would believe that the very earliest attempt to impress a mark of ownership upon some bucket of the Argonauts, or the rudest scrawl of Polyphemus in forging a tarry brand upon some sheep which he had stolen, could be so bad, so staggering and illegible, as are these literary inscriptions. How much better to have had a thin tablet or veneering of marble or iron adjusted to the back of the book. A stone-cutter in a rural churchyard once told me that he charged a penny ...
— The Posthumous Works of Thomas De Quincey, Vol. 1 (2 vols) • Thomas De Quincey
... will, smeared, dog-eared, perforated and blotched with hundreds of additions, deletions, accusations, conditions, warnings, advice and homely philosophy. The document was, Lou reflected, a fifty-year diary, all jammed onto two sheets—a garbled, illegible log of day after day of strife. This day, Lou would be disinherited for the eleventh time, and it would take him perhaps six months of impeccable behavior to regain the promise of a share in the estate. To say nothing of the daybed in the living ...
— The Big Trip Up Yonder • Kurt Vonnegut
... chair and was leaning over the table, completely puzzled, first by Milly's terrified expression, then by what she had written, illegibly enough, across the two sheets of foolscap. He made out: "You are only miserab ..."—the words were interspersed with really illegible scrawls—"... Go ... go ... Let me ... I want to live, I want ...
— The Invader - A Novel • Margaret L. Woods
... to air the room. Then he began to study the postmark to see where the letter came from. It was not very clear, and it took him some time to make out "Palatka, Fla." The latter baffled him, it was so illegible, but he was sure of "Palatka," and wondered where it was. Hunting up an atlas, he went patiently through State after State, till he found Palatka, on the ...
— The Cromptons • Mary J. Holmes
... the Chief Archivist, M. van den Berg, and the gentlemen connected with that institution, especially M. de Jonghe and M. Hingman, without whose aid it would have been difficult for me to decipher and to procure copies of the almost illegible ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... Mayor and the assessors then empty the urns and count the votes, the secretary drawing up a proces-verbal the while. If there are more or fewer votes than there were voters registered during the day as voting, this fact is stated and affirmed. Blank or illegible votes, votes which do not accurately give the name of the candidate voted for, or on which the voters have put their own names, are not counted as valid, but they are annexed to the proces-verbal. Votes not written on white paper, or which bear any external indication ...
— France and the Republic - A Record of Things Seen and Learned in the French Provinces - During the 'Centennial' Year 1889 • William Henry Hurlbert
... dey call dem stewards. Had colored uns too. Massa Scott had white overseers, good man though; but Massa Nottin'ham, he had big black boss on his place. [HW illegible over struck out: cain'] 'member his name. He ain' had to git no p'mission tuh come tuh our place. He jes' come an' goes when ...
— Slave Narratives: a Folk History of Slavery in the United States, From Interviews with Former Slaves - Virginia Narratives • Works Projects Administration
... (which had three other titles, three successive prefaces, and in its finished, or rather unfinished, form is the salvage of five folio volumes of MS., the rest being at best sketched and at worst illegible) contains, in what we have of it, the account of the tribulations of a young sub-lieutenant of Lancers (with a great deal of money, a cynical but rather agreeable banker-papa, an adoring mother, and the record of an expulsion from the Polytechnique for supposed Republicanism) suddenly ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 2 - To the Close of the 19th Century • George Saintsbury
... continued, during the whole of his prime, to afford most striking and irresistible proof how completely he must have submitted himself for some very considerable period to the mechanical discipline of his father's office. It spoke to months after months of this humble toil, as distinctly as the illegible scrawl of Lord Byron did to his self-mastership from the hour that he left Harrow. There are some little technical tricks, such as no gentleman who has not been subjected to a similar regimen ever can fall into, which he practised invariably ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott, Volume I (of 10) • John Gibson Lockhart
... church of the Cordeliers, where Laura is reputed to have reposed in peace. Her tomb is in a small chapel, dark, damp, and even noisome: it is indicated only by a flat unadorned stone. The inscription, which is in Gothic letters, is rendered illegible by time. The congenial nature of Francis the First of France caused the tomb to be opened, and a leaden box was found, containing some bones, and a copy of verses, the subject of which was the attachment of the two lovers. Petrarch, with all his conceits, ...
— Travels through the South of France and the Interior of Provinces of Provence and Languedoc in the Years 1807 and 1808 • Lt-Col. Pinkney |
