"Absorbed" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... not the word. There may be those who are stimulated to achievement by being in love, though I doubt it. At any rate, I was not one of them. My love for her absorbed my thoughts, and paralyzed my courage. Of the qualities that have contributed to what success I may have had, I put in the first rank a disposition to see the gloomiest side of the future. But it has not helped to make my life happier, invaluable though it has been in preventing ...
— The Plum Tree • David Graham Phillips
... away, and bring me something different." The news agent returned with a volume made up of cartoons and other illustrations from Puck, and soon the Irishman was shaking his sides over the adventures of Brudder Sunrise Waterbury and similar fictitious characters. So absorbed was he in this trivial literature that he failed to notice the entrance of an old man, respectably dressed who took a seat on the opposite side of the aisle, and was preparing to smoke his three inches of clay. He was aroused by ...
— Two Knapsacks - A Novel of Canadian Summer Life • John Campbell
... some predominant power, which fixed character and bound them to a class. Thence he drew his line of imitation and personified the central form of the class to which his object belonged, and to which the rest of its qualities administered, without being absorbed; agility was not suffered to destroy firmness, solidity, or weight; nor strength and weight agility; elegance did not degenerate to effeminacy, nor grandeur swell to hugeness." [Footnote: Fuseli, ...
— The Old Roman World • John Lord
... kingdom. Let each one in Christ's strength do his duty, and he will leave the world better than he found it; and in the present age, as in the times of old, Gnosticism and heathenism will retire before Christianity; the false will be dissipated, the good be absorbed, by the beams of ...
— History of Free Thought in Reference to The Christian Religion • Adam Storey Farrar
... riches and make a parade of their insensibility. The smile that stole over Gillette's lips filled the garret with golden light, and rivaled the brightness of the sun in heaven. The sun, moreover, does not always shine in heaven, whereas Gillette was always in the garret, absorbed in her passion, occupied by Poussin's happiness and sorrow, consoling the genius which found an outlet in ...
— The Unknown Masterpiece - 1845 • Honore De Balzac
... vaguely understood his mood. He was glad to see us but he was absorbed in something else, something of more importance, at the moment, than the chatter of the family. My uncles who came in a few moments later drew my attention and the white-haired ...
— A Son of the Middle Border • Hamlin Garland
... deeper work of grace needed within me. My parents both professed entire sanctification at the time of the conversion of the four oldest children, which included myself, but my life was much occupied in securing an education, and having but limited opportunities I was absorbed mostly with my studies, then afterward became engaged in educational work for a number of years. It needed no arguments to prove that my parents possessed a deeper spiritual life than I did, and although the doctrine of sanctification was not so clearly ...
— Sanctification • J. W. Byers
... have liked to ask many things of her companion but his attention was completely absorbed by the animals he drove. Also talking was wellnigh impossible during that wild progress, for though the horses presently sobered down somewhat, the roughness of the way was such that most of the time her thoughts were concentrated upon maintaining her seat. She clung to her perch with both hands, ...
— The Top of the World • Ethel M. Dell
... settlers. The offenders who were transported in the past century to America, were sent to communities the bulk of whose population were men of thrift and probity; the children of improvidence were dropped in by driblets amongst the mass of a population already formed, and were absorbed and assimilated as they were dropped in. They were scattered and separated from each other; some acquired habits of honest industry, and all, if not reformed by their punishment, were not certain to be demoralized by it. In New South Wales, on the contrary, ...
— A Source Book Of Australian History • Compiled by Gwendolen H. Swinburne
... bade him retrick his beams, and take the light and the splendour of his sun elsewhere. The light and the splendour of his sun had all passed from him. She had absorbed them altogether. He, while he had been boasting to himself of his power and his manliness, in that he would certainly overcome all the barriers, had found himself to be weak as water in her hands. She, in her soft feminine tones, had told him what duty had required of ...
— Marion Fay • Anthony Trollope
... at him with eyes which strove to see two men in one, when he turned from the window. Absorbed in thought, she had forgotten her occupation, and stood, the towel suspended in her half-dried hands. Before she knew what he was doing he was at her side; he bade the woman hold the bowl, and he rinsed his hands. Then he turned, and without ...
— Count Hannibal - A Romance of the Court of France • Stanley J. Weyman
... not, however, in the blue state in which one is accustomed to see indigo, but as a colourless substance, which continues white only so long as the tissue of the leaf remains perfect: when this is by any means destroyed, oxygen is absorbed from the atmosphere, and the principle becomes blue. The best indigo is so light as to swim upon water, but the commercial article seldom contains more than 50 per cent. of blue colouring matter or true indigo, the remainder consisting of either ...
— Field's Chromatography - or Treatise on Colours and Pigments as Used by Artists • George Field
... history. But the more limited theme must not be put aside. For it can in no way be conducive to historical knowledge to regard as indifferent the peculiar character of the expression of Christian faith as dogma, and allow the history of dogma to be absorbed in a general history of the various conceptions of Christianity. Such a "liberal" view would not agree either with the teaching of history or with the actual situation of the Protestant Churches of the present day: for it is, above all, of crucial ...
— History of Dogma, Volume 1 (of 7) • Adolph Harnack
... absorbed in what he was looking at, did not answer, but gravely touched Tyltyl's ...
— The Blue Bird for Children - The Wonderful Adventures of Tyltyl and Mytyl in Search of Happiness • Georgette Leblanc
... such cunning efficacies of poetry, that breaches of local and chronological succession either pass without notice, or are noticed only for the gain of truth and nature that is made through them. For the laws of sense hold only as the thoughts are absorbed in what is sensuous and definite; and the very point was, to lift the mind above this by working on its imaginative forces, and penetrating it with the light of relations more inward ...
— Shakespeare: His Life, Art, And Characters, Volume I. • H. N. Hudson
... our newly-arrived and self-invited guest took my sister Florrie in tow, and, having convoyed her safely to a chair, brought himself to an anchor alongside her, playing the agreeable so effectively that he quite absorbed Miss Florrie's attention during the meal. On the departure of the ladies, the object of his visit came out. He had, in just recognition of his services, been appointed to the command of a new frigate, named the "Astarte," which was then fitting- out at Portsmouth for the West India ...
— Under the Meteor Flag - Log of a Midshipman during the French Revolutionary War • Harry Collingwood
... for flesh differs in species from any of its elements. And thus Christ would be of the same nature neither with His Father nor with His Mother. Thirdly, because there can be no mingling of things widely apart; for the species of one of them is absorbed, e.g. if we were to put a drop of water in a flagon of wine. And hence, since the Divine Nature infinitely exceeds the human nature, there could be no mixture, but the ...
— Summa Theologica, Part III (Tertia Pars) - From the Complete American Edition • Thomas Aquinas
... down, however; Sophia was sent to a convent, and Galitzin banished before Peter could be said to rule. He did not care at first for State affairs, being absorbed by youthful pleasures which he shared with companions from the stables and the streets. He drilled soldiers, forming pleasure regiments, and had hours of delight sailing an old boat which he found one day, for this aroused a new enthusiasm. ...
— Heroes of Modern Europe • Alice Birkhead
... no answer, and he moved on to the next door, calling again softly, while all the spoilers seemed absorbed in the fire and the combat. "Master Michael! ...
— The Armourer's Prentices • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... this reunion the confession which had never passed her lips in the hours of familiar tete-a-tete, or in the moments of extreme peril which they had endured together, forced its way irresistibly from her heart—the confession of a love which had long absorbed her whole life. ...
— The Coming Conquest of England • August Niemann
... put all the love and assurance in his voice he was capable of, apparently trying to dispel her fears. He would warble and warble, and make those pretty wing gestures over and over, saying so plainly: "It is all right, my dear, the man is harmless—absorbed there in his newspaper. Go in, go in, and keep warm our precious eggs!" How long she hesitated! But as night grew near she grew more and more anxious, and he more and more eloquent. Finally she alighted upon the edge of the overhanging roof and peered down ...
— Under the Maples • John Burroughs
... with a soft slouched hat; threw the end of his cloak over his shoulder again; and walked out into the side gallery on which the door opened, without taking any further notice of Signor Cavalletto. As to that little man himself, his whole attention had become absorbed in getting near the door and looking out at it. Precisely as a beast might approach the opened gate of his den and eye the freedom beyond, he passed those few moments in watching and peering, until the door was closed ...
— Little Dorrit • Charles Dickens
... from time to time, of the points on which it was most desirable to insist, and on the relative positions which they should occupy in his lecture, the memory of Amelius became more and more absorbed in recalling the scenes in which his early life had ...
— The Fallen Leaves • Wilkie Collins
... the attempt on the king's life was the result of insanity, and a disturbed imagination. Several instances of a disordered mind had before been observed in his conduct, and the detestation justly due to the enormity of his crime ought now to have been absorbed in the consideration of his misfortune, the greatest that can befal ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... a full view of the room, to which the Parrs had shown their indifference by turning their backs, Mrs. Parr being absorbed in her own excited comments upon the scene in the opera house, while her husband was earnestly employed in the business which had brought him to that place. In fact, he had pleasantly occupied the major ...
— The Mayor of Warwick • Herbert M. Hopkins
... he once went into a Viennese restaurant, and, instead of giving an order, began to write a score on the back of the bill-of-fare, absorbed and unconscious of time and place. At last he asked how much he owed. "You owe nothing, sir," said the waiter. "What! do you think I have not dined?" "Most assuredly." "Very well, then, give me something." "What do ...
— The Great German Composers • George T. Ferris
... the second. Sometimes, when the deceased was a chief distinguished for bravery and wisdom, his corpse would be exposed on a high platform in front of his house and left there to rot, while his relatives sat around and inhaled the stench, conceiving that with it they absorbed the courage and skill of the departed worthy. Some of them would even anoint their bodies with the drippings from the putrefying corpse for the same purpose. The women also made fires that the ghost might ...
— The Belief in Immortality and the Worship of the Dead, Volume I (of 3) • Sir James George Frazer
... time the wife of one of my neighbors, with whom I had contracted a very strict friendship, fell sick and died. I went to see and comfort him in his affliction, and, finding him absorbed in sorrow, I said to him as soon as I saw him, "God preserve you and grant you a long life." "Alas!" replied he, "how do you think I should obtain the favor you wish me? I have not above an hour to live, for I must be buried this day with my wife. This is a law in this ...
— The Junior Classics, V5 • Edited by William Patten
... a multitude of cares, Perplexing, profitless affairs, Absorbed the hours, it seems That on the golden steps of thought I mounted heavenward, and ...
— Poems - Vol. IV • Hattie Howard
... complete rupture of my home ties, I began some desultory globe trotting. I knocked about in out-of-the-way corners, where I observed and absorbed all sorts of things which became very useful in my subsequent career. A native, and by that I mean an inhabitant, of non-European countries always fascinated me, and I soon learned the way of disarming their suspicion and winning their ...
— The Secrets of the German War Office • Dr. Armgaard Karl Graves
... where was young Vavasour, as usual, making conversation to Mrs. Rolleston, who was at once bored and disproving. Cecil shook hands pleasantly enough, but Bluebell, not even looking at him, extended a lifeless hand in passing, and, picking up some work, appeared absorbed ...
— Bluebell - A Novel • Mrs. George Croft Huddleston
... days after this that the strange and wonderful thing happened. St. Francis was kneeling, absorbed in prayer, when suddenly a wonderful Form came towards him, and stood on a stone a little above him. Bright and shining was the Form, with the most beautiful, beautiful face; and His arms were stretched out upon a cross, and feet joined together. ...
— Stories of the Saints by Candle-Light • Vera C. Barclay
... as much as the rest of the crew on board the galleon in which he sailed. All were so absorbed by their own suffering and misery that none paid any attention to the idiot boy in their midst. He worked at such work as there was to do: assisted to haul on the ropes, to throw the dead overboard, and to do what could be done for the sick and wounded. Like all ...
— By England's Aid or The Freeing of the Netherlands (1585-1604) • G.A. Henty
... different, something trivial and ridiculous that he was ashamed of directly he had said it. Fernanda watched him attentively, regaining the calmness and self-possession that he was rapidly losing. She seemed absorbed in the conversation, describing her travelling impressions with naturalness, and expressing her opinions with unconcern, as if there had been nothing between them but an old and tranquil friendship. Finally, availing ...
— The Grandee • Armando Palacio Valds
... as it can be," responded Constance, gloomily. "It won't bear discussion; I mentioned it to you, Mr. Belknap, in order to show you how entirely absorbed Mr. Lamotte will of necessity be in his own affairs when he reaches home, and that we will be obliged to move in this ...
— The Diamond Coterie • Lawrence L. Lynch
... if not very original as a comic designer, possessed nevertheless a keen sense of humour. One of his pictures (engraved by H. Rolls), entitled Time and Tide Wait for no Man, represents an artist, sketching by the sea-shore, so absorbed in the contemplation of nature that he remains unconscious of the fast inflowing tide, and deaf to the warnings of the fisherman who is seen hailing him from ...
— English Caricaturists and Graphic Humourists of the Nineteenth Century. - How they Illustrated and Interpreted their Times. • Graham Everitt
... difference being accounted for by the rain which is required to wet the surfaces before any flow off can take place, in addition to the rain-water collected in tanks for domestic use, rain required to fill up gullies the water level of which has been lowered by evaporation, and rain-water absorbed in ...
— The Sewerage of Sea Coast Towns • Henry C. Adams
... must live strictly according to it. Only thus, said they, could everything be done at its proper time. Others declared that it was impossible to decide beforehand the right time for every action; but that, not letting oneself be absorbed in idle pastimes, one should always attend to all that was going on, and then do what was most needful. Others, again, said that however attentive the King might be to what was going on, it was impossible for one man to decide correctly the right time for every action, but that he should ...
— What Men Live By and Other Tales • Leo Tolstoy
... of the condition of Motherhood, and of those womanly virtues and graces, which make the Home the cornerstone of the Nation. For it is not with modern Americans, as it was with the old Greek and Roman world. They put the family below the State, and the citizen absorbed the man. On the contrary, we know, that just as the Family principle is strong the heart of the Nation is sound. "Give me one domestic grace," said a famous leader of men, "and I will turn it into a hundred ...
— The Measure of a Man • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
... side and exciting his pride and ambition, Louvois had little by little absorbed all the functions of prime minister without bearing the title. Colbert alone resisted him, and he, weary of the struggle, was about to succumb before long (1683), driven to desperation by the burdens that the wars and the king's luxury caused ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume V. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... was news, indeed. She was lots old older than Gerard —forty years old, if a day—and a chronic invalid. I don't know exactly what was the matter with her, but she had a bad complexion, and used to stick pretty tight is the house, and was always absorbed in church work. She had snappy black eyes, and Gerard couldn't call his soul his own. They kept house together, you know, and had been orphans ever since they ...
— The Motormaniacs • Lloyd Osbourne
... give you news of Budapest. As elsewhere, I am absorbed here in the most difficult of tasks—to put up with myself. Happily I receive plenty of help; noble friendships and dear and beautiful memories light up the path which I still have to follow ...
— Letters of Franz Liszt, Volume 2: "From Rome to the End" • Franz Liszt; letters collected by La Mara and translated
... till just at the dividing portal between the lounge and the ballroom the Princess turned and looked back at him with a smile. Over all the intervening heads their eyes met in one flash of mutual comprehension! then, as the fair face vanished like a light absorbed into the lights beyond it, Gervase, left alone, dropped heavily into a chair and stared vaguely at the elaborate pattern of the thick carpet at his feet. Passing his hand across his forehead he withdrew it, wet with ...
— Ziska - The Problem of a Wicked Soul • Marie Corelli
... Morestal was too much absorbed in the discussion of his favourite ideas to take the least interest in the man's troubles; and the farmer's presence, on the contrary, seemed to him an excellent reason for returning to the subject in hand. They had other ...
— The Frontier • Maurice LeBlanc
... Gospel and the Credo, and watched the movements of the priest. Meanwhile, the old, the young, the beggar women in rags, the mothers in high caps, the strong young fellows with tufts of fair down on their faces, were all praying, absorbed in the same deep joy, and saw the body of the Infant Christ shining, like a sun, upon the straw of a stable. This faith on the part of others touched Bouvard in spite of his reason, and Pecuchet in spite of the ...
— Bouvard and Pecuchet - A Tragi-comic Novel of Bourgeois Life • Gustave Flaubert
... but he was absorbed in looking out of the car window at the landscape which he did not and ...
— The Dream Doctor • Arthur B. Reeve
... conditions under which sleeping together is prejudicial to the health. A certain amount of fresh air during the night is required by every one. Re-breathed air is poisonous. During sleep constant exhalations take place from the lungs and from the skin, which are injurious if absorbed. A room twelve feet square is too small for two persons, unless it is so thoroughly ventilated that there is a constant change of air. In fact, a sleeping apartment for two persons should contain an air-space of at least twenty-four ...
— The Physical Life of Woman: - Advice to the Maiden, Wife and Mother • Dr. George H Napheys
... mother were too much engrossed in themselves to know anything about it—perhaps she, too, was too excited to notice. Yet, surely in that awful moment she would turn to Will for comfort, and when she saw him absorbed in me, forgetting her very existence, she ...
— The Heart of Una Sackville • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... I had been too absorbed. All had vanished now from me, except the fervent beauty of the ...
— Five Nights • Victoria Cross
... told you," Ormond was saying, "that the contributions many of you so generously made to the Institute were needed for and being absorbed by vital research. Tonight I had intended to give you a first inkling of what that research was accomplishing." He tapped the suitcase on the table before him. "In there is an instrument of the kind I have mentioned. ...
— Ham Sandwich • James H. Schmitz
... vivid imagination you have! Every evening at about this time the literary light goes off for a long tramp by himself, and often doesn't come back till all our lights are out, except the one we leave burning for him. He is absolutely absorbed in his work. We really see nothing at all of him ...
— Under the Country Sky • Grace S. Richmond
... was Sally's opinion: and such, one feels, will be the verdict of history. His best friend, anxious to make out a case for him, could not have denied that he fired the first gun of the campaign. But we must be just. The fault was really Sally's. Absorbed in the scene which had just concluded and acutely inquisitive as to why the shadowy Scrymgeour had seen fit to dispense with the red-haired young man's services, she had thrice in succession helped the poodle out of his turn. The third occasion ...
— The Adventures of Sally • P. G. Wodehouse
... the solitude of Mount Slemish, absorbed in prayer and in guarding his flock, the saintly shepherd had no opportunity of making any acquaintance whilst in slavery. "After I had come to Ireland I was daily attending sheep, and I frequently prayed during the day, and the love of God and His faith and fear increased in me more and more, ...
— Bolougne-Sur-Mer - St. Patrick's Native Town • Reverend William Canon Fleming
... cards. Harry, who had never seen a firework beyond an exhibition of a dozen squibs at Williamsburg on the fifth of November (which he thought a sublime display), would have liked the Vauxhall, but yielded to his guest's preference for piquet; and they were very soon absorbed in that game. ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... thereafter? Well, he had seen no more of Nina. When Miss Cunyngham had come behind the scenes, he had forgotten all about Nina. And then suddenly he remembered that he must have been standing close by the prompter's box, absorbed in talking to Miss Cunyngham, when Nina would have to come up to go on the stage. Had she passed them? Had she suspected? Had she, in her proud and petted way, resented this intimacy, and resolved to throw back to him the harmless little gifts he had bestowed on her? Poor Nina! she had always ...
— Prince Fortunatus • William Black
... was then again in power, on the subject, and the proposal was received by him with much apparent sincerity. But a disastrous series of public events about the same time commenced: the attention of the Minister was absorbed in the immediate peril of the state; and he fell a victim to his anxieties, without having had it in his power to further ...
— The Life, Studies, And Works Of Benjamin West, Esq. • John Galt
... laughing and blushing together. Didn't she know what he was going to say? Didn't she guess what this serious something must be? To prolong the delicious suspense before hearing it, she pretended to be absorbed in the things about her. She looked aside at the sea, and up at the banks, and down at the little dubbs of salt water as she skipped across them, crying out at sight of the sea-holly, the anemone, and the sea-mouse shining like fire, but still holding ...
— The Manxman - A Novel - 1895 • Hall Caine
... intends close application to the ministry, to scientific or literary pursuits, where great demands are made upon the brain, must restrain this passion. The supplies for the brain and nervous system are absorbed, and the seed diverted through sexual excesses in the marriage relationship, by fornication, or by any other form of immorality, the man's power must decline: that to this very cause may be attributed the failure and breakdown of so ...
— Searchlights on Health - The Science of Eugenics • B. G. Jefferis and J. L. Nichols
... so much absorbed in his anxious quest that he did not observe his own success; he did not hear, he did not see the ironical exclamations of admiration, the genuine appreciation, the biting gibes, the soft invitations of some of the masks. Though he was so handsome as ...
— Scenes from a Courtesan's Life • Honore de Balzac
... darken steadily except as renewed gleams were shot through it by a light that was infernal. Any kindly man or woman would have smiled appreciatively to see the handsome father and beautiful daughter apparently as absorbed in each other's plans and interests as a young couple seeking the home in which their future life would centre. Who would dream that on this sunny morning, and in a prosaic street-car, the actors of a sad, sad tragedy were ...
— Without a Home • E. P. Roe
... soon as the troops were refreshed, he ordered my brother, colonel H. Horry, who led the advance, to remount, and push after the enemy with all speed. We followed close in the rear. For an hour the general did not open his mouth, but rode on like one absorbed in thought. At length heaving a deep sigh, he said, "Well, I suppose I feel now very much as I should feel, were I in pursuit of a ...
— The Life of General Francis Marion • Mason Locke Weems
... pacing under the damp gleam of the riding-light, paid but little heed to the hullabaloo. He was too thoroughly absorbed in his own troubles to feel special interest in what his neighbors were doing. He did not even note that a fog-sodden breeze had begun to puff spasmodically from the east and that the mists were ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day
... his own heavy heart. Soon, however, the question what to do with himself pressed him again for an answer. How entirely alone he felt! Of all the thousands of people passing by him, not one with a familiar face. Every one seemed absorbed in himself, and took no more notice of our country lad than if he had been a portion of the cold inanimate granite against which he stood. Herbert felt this keenly, for in the country it was so different. There every one ...
— The Boy Broker - Among the Kings of Wall Street • Frank A. Munsey
... great change. He looked worn and thinner; and the set expression of the somewhat stern features gave a grim hardness not natural to their lines. With scarcely a glance around, he returned the general salutations, sat down absently and was soon absorbed in conversation with General Cooper, who had recently resigned the adjutant-generalship of the United States army and accepted a similar post and a ...
— Four Years in Rebel Capitals - An Inside View of Life in the Southern Confederacy from Birth to Death • T. C. DeLeon
... revealing expression of the old man's face and the motions of his body. He noticed that the tight grip of the hand on the little statue of the riverman had made the fingers pale. He realized how absorbed was the lumber-king, who had given him more confidence than he had given to anyone else in the world. As near as he could come to anyone, he had come to John Grier. There had been differences between them, but he, Tarboe, fought ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... the scene rested the tired woman. She stood absorbed, without noticing that the door behind her was opened swiftly and that some one came in. It was only when the baby, wakening, sat up in bed and asked with wide, wondering eyes, "Who is that?" that ...
— Children of the Tenements • Jacob A. Riis
... destroying agent begins to absorb the tooth at the point, irregularly, causing the sharpness described. Now, because no tartar is found upon the tooth, does that argue that it has never been there? Not at all; the loosened tooth shows simply that it has been there and has been absorbed. The speaker has never seen a tooth in that condition on the point of which he could not show patches or specks; we may not see the tartar, but it certainly once existed there, and has accomplished ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 358, November 11, 1882 • Various
... when the curtain rose once more. The music and the action of the piece engrossed the attention of Violet; to Bernard they were God-sent helps. His mind could range back over the past without restraint, while outwardly he appeared absorbed in the play. ...
— Up in Ardmuirland • Michael Barrett
... family by surprise, for not even old Vingo was to be seen about the premises. Noiselessly he opened the door,—his mother was sitting with her face from him, engaged with her sewing, and at her feet sat the Sea-flower, so absorbed, reading his last letter, that she was not aware of his presence till he threw his arms about his mother's neck, and sobbed like a child. As he turned to his sister he faltered; what a change had been wrought in her in three years! The child, whose ...
— Natalie - A Gem Among the Sea-Weeds • Ferna Vale
... declared could not be excelled, were all discussed with great cheerfulness. My father, as was his custom, drew his chair aside after supper, and engaged two of his guests in religious conversation, while the doctor and the parson got into a corner, and soon became deeply absorbed in a question of law, which they ...
— The Life and Adventures of Maj. Roger Sherman Potter • "Pheleg Van Trusedale"
... de St. Cyr have a species of magnetism about them. It is difficult to retain one's self-respect before them,—for no other reason than that one is, at the moment, absorbed into their individuality, and thinks and acts with them. Delphine must have had a strong will, and perpetual antagonism did not weaken it. As for me, Madame had, doubtless, reasons of her own for tearing aside these customary bands ...
— Atlantic Monthly Vol. 3, No. 16, February, 1859 • Various
... of operations, young Escombe's first feeling was one of gratification, for he was just then engaged upon an exceptionally difficult task which he was most anxious to complete without being interfered with. So absorbed was the lad in his work that he had not much thought to spare for speculation as to the reason for so unusual a piece of good luck, although it is true that, as the afternoon wore on, he did once or twice permit himself to wonder whether "perchance" ...
— Harry Escombe - A Tale of Adventure in Peru • Harry Collingwood
... it, compared with the study of animals, a dull science. But as Long Arrow began taking up the various things in his collection and explaining their qualities to us, I became more and more fascinated. And before he had done I was completely absorbed by the wonders of the Vegetable Kingdom which ...
— The Voyages of Doctor Dolittle • Hugh Lofting
... at me, count, look at me," said the prince, endeavoring to direct upon himself the attention of the count, who was completely absorbed in ...
— Ten Years Later • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... around waiting for some clue to this mysterious, unnatural conduct of the family. They were all absorbed in plans for spending this birthday—Marcia's birthday, but no reference whatever was made to what she liked; no one consulted her as to what she wanted to do, or to have done. The boys were going skating in the forenoon; the little girls were to invite four of their friends to help ...
— Christmas Stories And Legends • Various
... constructive civilization. Instinctively he reached out to modify his surroundings. A house, then a picket fence, split from the living trees; an irrigation ditch; a garden spot; fruit trees; vines over the porch; better stables; more fences; the gradual shaping from the wilderness of a home—these absorbed his surplus. As a matter of business he worked with pick and shovel until he had proved the Honey-bug hopeless, then he started a store on credit. Therein he sold everything from hats to 42 calibre whiskey. To it ...
— The Killer • Stewart Edward White
... lack of confidence among the people touching our financial processes. There is certainly not enough silver now in circulation to cause uneasiness, and the whole amount coined and now on hand might after a time be absorbed by the people without apprehension; but it is the ceaseless stream that threatens to overflow the land which causes ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 3 (of 3) of Volume 8: Grover Cleveland, First Term. • Grover Cleveland
... he can manage them. He has no private likes or dislikes; he does not conceal personal enmity under the disguise of moral or political principle: such meannesses, into which men too often fall unintentionally, are absorbed in the consciousness of his mission, and in his love for his country and for mankind. He will sometimes ask himself what the next generation will say of him; not because he is careful of posthumous fame, but because he knows that the result of his life as a whole will ...
— Gorgias • Plato
... it." His religion, I urged, denied all sense to the process of history. "There may be process in matter," he replied, "but there is none in God." I protested that I loved individual souls, and did not want them absorbed in Parabrahma. He laughed his good cheery laugh, out of his black beard, but it was clear that he held me to be a child, imprisoned in the Ego. I felt like that, and I hugged my Ego; so presently he ministered to it with sweetmeats. ...
— Appearances - Being Notes of Travel • Goldsworthy Lowes Dickinson
... Then, becoming absorbed in the play, I forgot him and his companion of the doubloons for a while, and when I looked for them again, they had vanished. However, a letter in my mail next morning told me that the observation had not been all on my side. My eyes had not deceived me. It was my friend—and, ...
— Pieces of Eight • Richard le Gallienne
... can be absorbed in bickerings over miserable disputes of this kind can have but little sympathy with the old evangelical doctrine of the "open Bible," or anything but a grave misgiving of the results of diligent reading of the Bible, without the help of ecclesiastical spectacles, by the ...
— Collected Essays, Volume V - Science and Christian Tradition: Essays • T. H. Huxley
... silence, the poets on the top shelf, by the side of her edition of Scott's novels, and the miscellaneous authors below. She touched each book tenderly, as though it were an old and dear friend, opening one occasionally to glance at a favourite passage; and she became so absorbed in her occupation that she ...
— The New Girl at St. Chad's - A Story of School Life • Angela Brazil
... intercepting the thermal rays from the cube, one face of the pile being deprived of the heat thus intercepted, a difference of temperature between its two faces would instantly set in, and the result would be declared by the galvanometer. The quantity absorbed by the oxygen under those circumstances was too feeble to affect the galvanometer; the gas, in fact, proved perfectly transparent to the rays of heat. It had but a feeble power of radiation: it had an ...
— Fragments of science, V. 1-2 • John Tyndall
... being at first, perhaps, rather imprudent than criminal, he at last too often becomes one of the hardiest and most determined violators of the laws of society. By the ruin of the smuggler, his capital, which had before been employed in maintaining productive labour, is absorbed either in the revenue of the state, or in that of the revenue officer; and is employed in maintaining unproductive, to the diminution of the general capital of the society, and of the useful industry which it ...
— An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations • Adam Smith
... severally kept their right hands on their hearts, without once regarding anything around them; they had all the livid paleness of death; their eyes, deep sunk in their sockets, resembled those phosphoric meteors that glimmer by night in places of interment. Some stalked slowly on, absorbed in profound reverie; some, shrieking with agony, ran furiously about, like tigers wounded with poisoned arrows; whilst others, grinding their teeth in rage, foamed along, more frantic than the wildest maniac. They all avoided each other, and though surrounded by a multitude ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 4 • Charles Dudley Warner
... noise of the squadrons, which shook the ground like thunder, the enemy, surprised, scarcely had time to form in line of battle. One man, however, had recognized the king—the infamous Wieduwillst. Charming was alone; wholly absorbed in his vengeance, he saw nothing but the page whom he was pursuing. The traitor threw himself on the prince, sword in hand, and would have slain him at one stroke had not Tonto, plunging his spurs into the flanks of his horse, made the animal rear ...
— Laboulaye's Fairy Book • Various
... of being absorbed, Jed sank into black silence. If Marg wanted him and old Greyson was helping her, there was no hope! Blood and desire would conquer every time; every mountaineer ...
— The Man Thou Gavest • Harriet T. Comstock
... into a tank, the only difference being that from the roof all the water is always delivered, except a small proportion that evaporates at the beginning of a rain in summer. From the surface of a watershed, on the contrary, a large amount, and in some cases all of a stream, will be absorbed by the ground and by the vegetation and will never be delivered into the stream which drains an area. On large streams it is fair to assume that, on the average, only one half of the rainfall on the area will reach the stream, while with sandy soils this may be as small as 20 per cent. ...
— Rural Hygiene • Henry N. Ogden
... social stimuli mechanisms already organized, whether instincts, habits, or sentiments. The other differences between imitation and suggestion grow out of this fundamental distinction. In imitation attention is alert, now on the copy and now on the response. In suggestion the attention is either absorbed in, or distracted from, the stimulus. In imitation the individual is self conscious; the subject in suggestion is unconscious of his behavior. In imitation the activity tends to reproduce the copy; in suggestion the response may be like or ...
— Introduction to the Science of Sociology • Robert E. Park
... obtaining a seat in the Senate; and thus, of the 52 members of the federal Senate, 26 are owners of slaves, and as effectively representatives of that interest as the 88 members elected by them to the House.'—'By this process it is that all political power in the States is absorbed and engrossed by the owners of slaves, and the overruling policy of the States is shaped to strengthen and consolidate their domination. The legislative, executive, and judicial authorities are all in their hands—the preservation, propagation, and perpetuation of the black code ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... of proof-reader ere six months had passed. And hour by hour, day by day, week by week, the strange influence which she had exerted on her employer, from the first moment of their meeting, grew and strengthened, until he realised with a sudden terror that his whole being was becoming absorbed by an intense passion ...
— An Ambitious Man • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... Although we had some heavy showers at the lagoon, we have not passed a single water-course, except the one we crossed a few miles before we made this range, nor did we see a drop of surface water: it seems to be all absorbed the moment that it falls. Descended the north-north-east side of the range, and at a mile and a half found some rain water in a creek, coming from the range. Camped. Wind ...
— Explorations in Australia, The Journals of John McDouall Stuart • John McDouall Stuart
... that climbed the southern wall of the cottage, Mrs. Bittacy with her knitting watched them, calling from time to time insignificant messages of counsel and advice. The messages passed, of course, unheeded. Mostly, indeed, they were unheard, for the workers were too absorbed. She warned her husband not to get too hot, Alice not to tear her dress, Stephen not to strain his back with pulling. Her mind hovered between the homeopathic medicine-chest upstairs and her anxiety ...
— The Man Whom the Trees Loved • Algernon Blackwood
... progress towards convalescence, the attention of the household became increasingly absorbed by the astounding fact of Pixie's projected engagement. Bridgie, detained at home by malapropos ailments on the part of the children, wrote urgent letters by daily posts, contradicting herself on every point saving one alone—the advisability of delay. ...
— The Love Affairs of Pixie • Mrs George de Horne Vaizey
... aqueduct. They have also built some excellent roads through the surrounding hills. Here, as in Mesopotamia, one was struck by the permanent nature of the improvements that are being made. Even to people absorbed in their own jealousies and rivalries the advantages that they were deriving from their liberation from Turkish rule ...
— War in the Garden of Eden • Kermit Roosevelt
... was, however, maintained only with difficulty against the melodramas, musical farces, and spectacles that absorbed the theaters. Yet from 1844 to 1862, Samuel Phelps, at Sadler's Wells, presented thirty-one of the plays. Since then the stage has hardly seen an equally important revival; but the great traditions of acting have been carried on by many eminent ...
— The Facts About Shakespeare • William Allan Nielson
... was furious again. He perfectly saw the humour of the situation, but it was not the kind of humour that induced rollicking laughter. He was furious, and employed the language of fury, when it is not overheard. Absorbed by his craft of painting, as in the old Continental days, he had long since ceased to read the newspapers, and though he had not forgotten his bequest to the nation, he had never thought of it as taking architectural shape. He was not aware of his cousin Duncan's activities ...
— Buried Alive: A Tale of These Days • Arnold Bennett
... silence until they reached the stage door. Beatrice was thinking of her companion as she had seen him so often, poring over his plans, busy with ruler and india-rubber, absolutely absorbed in the interest of his task. She remembered the first time he had talked about this scheme of his, how his whole face had changed, the almost passionate interest with which he had worked the thing out even to its smallest details. She realized ...
— The Tempting of Tavernake • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... from his youth, as it were, at thirty-two, to find his place in the city, to create his little world. And for the first time since he had entered Chicago, seven months before, the city wore a face of strangeness, of complete indifference. It hummed on, like a self-absorbed machine: all he had to do was not to get caught in it, involved, wrecked. For nearly a year he had been a part of it; and yet busy as he had been in the hospital, he had not sought to place himself strongly. He had gone in and out, here and there, for amusement, but he had returned ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick
... its natural result. Two friends of Franklin lent him what capital he needed; he bought out Meredith and had the whole business for himself. His zeal increased; he won good friends, gave general satisfaction, and absorbed all the best business ...
— Benjamin Franklin • John Torrey Morse, Jr.
... things. The fact is, I am pining for opportunity to give battle to BALFOUR in the matter of his Government of Ireland. You remember I tabled notice of a Motion on the matter as soon as the House met in November. Then I was so anxious, so absorbed in the subject, that I forgot all about it till Brer FOX and Brer RABBIT appeared on the scene, and bid against each other for precedence. Thereupon I pulled my Resolution out of pigeon-hole; reminded ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 100. February 21, 1891 • Various
... in the Value of Silver.—Absorbed in the greenback controversy, the people apparently did not appreciate, at the time, the significance of the "demonetization" of silver; but within a few years several events united in making it the center of a political storm. Germany, ...
— History of the United States • Charles A. Beard and Mary R. Beard
... my feet, and beg me to take her into my favor. Then will I, to impress her with a proper respect for my person, draw up my leg, and spurn her from me with my foot in such a manner that she shall fall down several paces from the sofa." Alnasker was entirely absorbed with his ideas, and could not forbear acting with his foot what he had in his thoughts; so that, striking his basket of brittle ware, which was the foundation of all his grand hopes, he kicked ...
— Chips from a German Workshop - Volume IV - Essays chiefly on the Science of Language • Max Muller
... essentially absorbed. It couldn't be a mistake. The monkeys knew. He himself knew from days and nights with the big cats. There was no cough just like that. It was in a different direction from before, back toward the city this time, but as before, muffled and close down to the riverbed. . . . Nothing ...
— Son of Power • Will Levington Comfort and Zamin Ki Dost
... search for a general point of view. After a time he finds one, and then for a while he is absorbed in testing it, in trying to satisfy himself whether it is true. But after many experiments or investigations, all have come out one way, and his theory is confirmed and settled in his mind; he knows in advance that the ...
— Modern Eloquence: Vol II, After-Dinner Speeches E-O • Various
... said, had a new scheme on hand for the employment of the returning volunteers whose places in business had been filled up in their absence. She was absorbed in this undertaking, but when not too busy was ...
— The Reflections of Ambrosine - A Novel • Elinor Glyn
... he was on the point of entering the cottage did Anthony notice the artist. Seated upon the traditional camp-stool, the latter was sketching busily some twenty-five paces away. Apparently absorbed in his work, he never so much as threw the newcomers a glance, and Lyveden was more than half minded to let him be. Patch, however, thought differently. Even as his master turned to the door, there was a low growl, and a moment later the Sealyham was baying the intruder as if he ...
— Anthony Lyveden • Dornford Yates
... fail even to see it. It could and did fail in imagining a mind so absorbed in the contemplation of Infinite Greatness that its own pin-point littleness became an axiom: rather it seemed an affectation—none the less an affectation and much the less pardonable because the laughter was directed against others ...
— Gilbert Keith Chesterton • Maisie Ward
... on his haunches, watched the departing cavalcade, and industriously absorbed much of the fat pork. "I can carry it better in my stomach," he reasoned philosophically. "But who would have thought old Shag had it in ...
— The Outcasts • W. A. Fraser
... straight through the gathering gloom, which seemed to open out to receive him, and then closed in behind, so that after the first glance backward the boy made no other, for tent-cloth, packs, saddles, and the horses and mules had been absorbed by ...
— The Peril Finders • George Manville Fenn
... few cases the sensitive laminae in the immediate neighbourhood are found to be enlarged, but in the majority of cases atrophy is the condition to be observed. Not only are the sensitive structures found to be shrunken and absorbed, but the atrophy and absorption extends even to the bone itself (see Fig. 133). This latter is a result of the continued pressure of the horny growth, in a well-marked case ending in a sharply-defined groove in the os pedis in which the keraphyllocele rests. ...
— Diseases of the Horse's Foot • Harry Caulton Reeks
... Black Belt. No ordinary political organization could have welded the blacks into a solid party. The Freedmen's Bureau, which had much influence over the Negroes, was too weak in numbers to control the Negroes in politics. The League finally absorbed the personnel of the Bureau and turned its prestige and its organization ...
— The Sequel of Appomattox - A Chronicle of the Reunion of the States, Volume 32 In The - Chronicles Of America Series • Walter Lynwood Fleming
... point Mrs. Transley arose, and the men moved out into the living-room to chat on less contentious subjects. After a time the women joined them, and Grant presently found himself absorbed in conversation with the old rancher's wife. Zen seemed to pay but little attention to him, and for the first time he began to realize what consummate actresses women are. Had Transley been the most suspicious of husbands—and in reality his domestic vision was ...
— Dennison Grant - A Novel of To-day • Robert Stead
... to themselves, their one daughter continuing meanwhile in London after her first husband's decease, and then younger son also mainly residing there for his law-studies. What though the son so domiciled with them was plowing up to manhood, still without a profession, still absorbed in books and poetry, doing exactly as he liked, and in fact more the ruler of them than they were of him? Who could interfere with such a son, and why had God given them abundance but that such a son might have the leisure he desired? All in all, one cannot doubt that those ...
— The Life of John Milton Vol. 3 1643-1649 • David Masson
... Eaton had ever felt against his chief came trooping to his mind. He was domineering. He did ride rough-shod over his allies' opinions and follow the course he had himself mapped out. All the glory of the victory he absorbed as his due. In the popular opinion, Eaton was as a farthing-candle to a great electric search-light ...
— Ridgway of Montana - (Story of To-Day, in Which the Hero Is Also the Villain) • William MacLeod Raine
... marks out a fundamental contrast of parts in the future organism. From the mucous layer, or endoderm, is developed the apparatus of nutrition; while from the serous layer, or ectoderm, is developed the apparatus of external action. Out of the one arise the organs by which food is prepared and absorbed, oxygen imbibed, and blood purified; while out of the other arise the nervous, muscular, and osseous systems, by the combined actions of which the movements of the body as a whole are effected. Though ...
— Essays: Scientific, Political, & Speculative, Vol. I • Herbert Spencer
... the Pope from Italy; the rebellion of the Tuscan cities, headed by Florence, against his authority; and at a later time the great Schism, which broke forth under Urban VI. During her last five years she was absorbed in ecclesiastical affairs. In certain of her immediate aims she succeeded, in others she failed. It would be hard to say whether her success or her failure involved the greater tragedy. For behind all these aims was a larger ideal that was not to be realised—the dream, entertained ...
— Letters of Catherine Benincasa • Catherine Benincasa
... I had a car of my own. I wished I had my dear old Dinah, on whose back I had been wont to roam the country-side. So long as Charmion and the garden had absorbed my attention I had been contented enough, but now an overwhelming restlessness seized me. I was tired of the slow movement of my own feet. I longed to move quickly, to feel the refreshing rush of air on my cheeks once more. I wished the woman-hating, unappreciative ...
— The Lady of the Basement Flat • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... were Austrian and Russian. It appeared to be empty when I entered, but on looking around, I saw an old gray-headed soldier kneeling at one side. His head was bowed over his hands, and he seemed perfectly absorbed in his thoughts. Perhaps the very tattered banners which hung down motionless above his head, he might have assisted in conquering. I looked a moment on those eloquent trophies, and ...
— Views a-foot • J. Bayard Taylor
... and stood looking at him; and she thought of all they two had done and suffered together. Her eyes absorbed him, devoured him. The time flew by unheeded. It was so sweet to be able to set her face from its restraint, and let all its sunshine beam on him; and, even when she retired at last, those light hazel eyes, that could ...
— Foul Play • Charles Reade
... to Mercier, under what varieties of figure this great business of dancing goes on. 'The women,' says he, 'are Nymphs, Sultanas; sometimes Minervas, Junos, even Dianas. In light-unerring gyrations they swim there; with such earnestness of purpose; with perfect silence, so absorbed are they. What is singular,' continues he, 'the onlookers are as it were mingled with the dancers; form as it were a circumambient element round the different contre-dances, yet without deranging them. It is rare, in fact, that a Sultana in such ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle
... was but one division in the House of Commons. Such an inaction gives little scope for the historian; but it fell in with the temper of the nation at large. It was popular with the class which commonly presses for political activity. The energy of the trading class was absorbed for the time in the rapid extension of commerce and accumulation of wealth. So long as the country was justly and temperately governed the merchant and shopkeeper were content to leave government in the hands that held it. All they asked was to be let alone to enjoy their new freedom ...
— History of the English People, Volume VII (of 8) - The Revolution, 1683-1760; Modern England, 1760-1767 • John Richard Green
... In her absorbed search for nuts, Annie had approached the trunk of the tree, and was stooping almost at Gregory's feet without noticing him. Suddenly she turned up a burr whose appearance so interested her that she stood up to examine it, and then became ...
— Opening a Chestnut Burr • Edward Payson Roe
... the ledger with his head down, the very picture of a faithful servant absorbed in his ...
— A Perilous Secret • Charles Reade
... battle, used up in merciless slavery, or driven off to alien wilds. Already the Portuguese had commenced to import negroes from their West African possessions, both for themselves and for trade with the Spaniards, who had none. Brazil prospered beyond expectation and absorbed all the blacks that Portuguese shipping could supply. The Spaniards had no spare tonnage at ...
— Elizabethan Sea Dogs • William Wood
... of Mme. Lebrun, is, in her position of mistress of a salon, essentially the impersonation of a foible peculiar to the present day; she typifies the class of women who, in Paris, are absolutely absorbed by the thought of their salons, for whom to receive is to live, and who are ready to expire at the notion of any celebrity not being a frequenter of their tea-table. Mme. Nodier's—and here, as with Mme. Gerard, we must substitute the ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 10, August, 1858 • Various
... beginning of his course used to receive from God twice every day, morning and evening, for ten years, an outpouring of grace like this, which lasted about as long as it would take to say the "Vigils of the Dead" twice over.[40] At these times he was so entirely absorbed in God, the eternal Wisdom, that he would not speak of it. Sometimes he would converse with God as with a friend, not with the mouth, but mentally; at other times he would utter piteous sighs to Him; at other times he would weep ...
— Light, Life, and Love • W. R. Inge
... guided her here was right; the slight gossip of her fellow-passengers was right; this was the clergyman's daughter, whose praise filled all mouths. This was the unknown girl the stranger was seeking, but who in her turn perhaps had been seeking Low—the girl who absorbed his fancy—the secret of his absences, his preoccupation, his coldness! This was the girl whom to see, perhaps in his arms, she was now periling her liberty and her life unknown to him! A slight odor, some faint perfume of its ...
— Frontier Stories • Bret Harte
... every inhabitant of every village prostrates himself in the public square, and the holy invocation, "Oh, the gem in the Lotus!" goes murmuring over hill and valley, like the sound of many bees. It is no unmeaning phrase, but an utterance of ardent desire to be absorbed into that Brahma whose emblem is the sacred flower. The mystic formula or "mani" is imprinted on the pavement of the streets, it floats on flags from the temples, and the wealthy Buddhists maintain sculptor-missionaries, Old Mortalities of the water-lily, who, wandering ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 11, September, 1858 • Various
... cozened him off to Carrick, to sign the estate away; accusing him of conspiracy with the attorney, to rob him, his father; wondering why he wouldn't come to dinner, &c.: to all which Feemy made no reply; she never noticed his grumblings; she sat absorbed in her own thoughts, meditating what she would say to Ussher, till she heard his horse's feet at the head of the avenue, and then she jumped up to meet ...
— The Macdermots of Ballycloran • Anthony Trollope
... altar for six months. In the seventh month he was admonished by God to obey no longer so unjust and irregular a sentence pronounced without any authority and without grounds. He accordingly said mass again, and with such raptures of devotion, as obliged him to continue long absorbed in ecstasy. He passed seven years in Sitria, in his cell, in strict silence, but his example did the office of his tongue and moved many to penance. In bis old age, instead of relaxing, he increased his austerities and fasts. He had three hair-shirts which he now and then changed. ...
— The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints - January, February, March • Alban Butler
... humidity. In like manner certain fish lacking fins and scales were prohibited on account of their excessive moisture; such as eels and the like. They were, however, allowed to eat ruminants and animals with a divided hoof, because in such animals the humors are well absorbed, and their nature well balanced: for neither are they too moist, as is indicated by the hoof; nor are they too earthy, which is shown by their having not a flat but a cloven hoof. Of fishes they were allowed to partake of the drier kinds, of which the fins and scales are an indication, ...
— Summa Theologica, Part I-II (Pars Prima Secundae) - From the Complete American Edition • Saint Thomas Aquinas
... few seconds Barbican was profoundly absorbed in his problem, while M'Nicholl was watching out of the window, and Ardan was busily employed ...
— All Around the Moon • Jules Verne
... certainly related to stamp-paper and parchment; for no other subject, even from the mouth of his patron, and he once more an efficient one, could have arrested so deeply the Bailie's reverent and absorbed attention. ...
— Waverley, Or 'Tis Sixty Years Hence, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... alike agreed with Beric's reasoning; the former, indeed, himself took but comparatively little interest in what passed around him. The latter was, on the other hand, absorbed in the politics of the hour. She was connected with many noble families, and knew that a member of these might fall at any moment under Nero's displeasure. To have a friend, then, high in the favour of ...
— Beric the Briton - A Story of the Roman Invasion • G. A. Henty
... and Fletcher Christian, and the piratical crew that he had carried off with him in that ship, had long ceased to occupy a thought in the public mind. Throughout the whole of that eventful period, the attention of all Europe had been absorbed in the contemplation of 'enterprises of great pith and moment,'—of the revolutions of empires—the bustle and business of warlike preparations—the movements of hostile armies—battles by sea and land, and of all 'the pomp and circumstance of glorious war.' ...
— The Eventful History Of The Mutiny And Piratical Seizure - Of H.M.S. Bounty: Its Cause And Consequences • Sir John Barrow
... reaction, all mixing of different kinds of molecules is excluded; moreover, the circumstance that the respective substances are considered at very low temperatures reduces the quantities of energy absorbed as kinetic energy by their molecules to the ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 1 - "Chtelet" to "Chicago" • Various
... but few, since most of the necessary instruction he imparted in person, and, without pedantic terminology and inflated diction and views, could so transmit to his listeners the inmost spirit of a lesson that even the youngest present absorbed its essential elements. Also, of studies he selected none but those which may help a boy to become a good citizen; and therefore most of the lectures which he delivered consisted of discourses on what may be awaiting a youth, ...
— Dead Souls • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol
... the party returned to the business of the evening and were soon absorbed in the pages of McLean's collection. He had many a question to answer, and was kept from the seat he longed to take, by Nellie Bayard's side. Where three or four women are gathered together over an album of photographs or a scrap-book of which he is the owner, no man need ...
— 'Laramie;' - or, The Queen of Bedlam. • Charles King
... brother George by his heterodoxy, he was by nature deeply religious. He tried in his letters to recover Thelwall from his "atheism," though he heartily approved a sentiment expressed by the latter: "He who thinks and feels will be virtuous; and he who is absorbed in self will be vicious, whatever may be his speculative opinions." Godwin's system of "Justice," with its soulless logic, he abhorred. He preached often in Unitarian churches. To young Hazlitt, who heard him preach ...
— Coleridge's Ancient Mariner and Select Poems • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... behind Bruslart, but he did not turn as the curtains parted. He knew the woman was hidden in that room, she had gone there when Latour was announced; he knew that she must have overheard the conversation, that she would ask questions, but for the moment he was absorbed in Latour's news. That Rouzet had failed to reach Beauvais was a disaster he had not ...
— The Light That Lures • Percy Brebner
... loosened so that every bit of moisture will be absorbed into the subsoil. Suppose it does mean letting the land lie idle every other year, alternating the fields," I contended. "There is plenty of cheap land here. It will be a way to utilize waste space." Farmers in other arid regions, ...
— Land of the Burnt Thigh • Edith Eudora Kohl
... absorbed in a discomfort, half moral, half superstitious, and nothing else reached the slow brain—which was besides preoccupied by Jim Wigson's suggestion. After a bit he picked up his stick and went on again. David, eagerly watching, ...
— The History of David Grieve • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... of placing the instruction of men's minds in the hands of those mainly absorbed in saving men's souls. Nothing could be more in accordance with the idea recently put forth by sundry ecclesiastics, Catholic and Protestant, that the Church alone is empowered to promulgate scientific ...
— History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom • Andrew Dickson White
... writers, more especially Irenaeus, on these eschatological subjects. This is speaking testimony to the debt of Irenaeus. Literary property was not an idea recognized by early Christian writers. They were too much absorbed in their subject to concern themselves with their obligations to others, or with the obligations of others to them. Plagiarism was not a crime, where they had all literary things in common. Hippolytus, in his chief work, tacitly borrows whole paragraphs, and ...
— Essays on "Supernatural Religion" • Joseph B. Lightfoot
... once, so that in many fine houses in New York the custom of announcing the name has become a necessary fashion. It is impossible to attempt to be polite without cultivating a good memory. The absent or self-absorbed person who forgets names and faces, who recalls unlucky topics, confuses relationships, speaks of the dead as if they were living, or talks about an unlucky adventure in the family, who plunges into personalities, who metaphorically treads on a person's toes, will ...
— Manners and Social Usages • Mrs. John M. E. W. Sherwood
... of this experience. With Scott it was the old associations of places, with du Maurier the associations of "old times," of personal memory. This was the frame of mind the interpretation of which absorbed him in his literary art, distinguishing it, except in his early Cornhill work, from his ...
— George Du Maurier, the Satirist of the Victorians • T. Martin Wood
... is popular, even to no greater extent than this, it behooves every individual, if he values the power delegated to him and would retain it, to use it, otherwise it is by degrees and insensibly lost; and once absorbed into the hands of the few, it is not easily, if ...
— Zenobia - or, The Fall of Palmyra • William Ware
... the streets, for the toilers had all been absorbed since break of day by the huge smoke-spouting monster, which sucked in the manhood of the town, to belch it forth weary and work-stained every night. Little groups of children straggled to school, or loitered to peep through the single, front windows at the big, gilt-edged Bibles, ...
— Round the Red Lamp - Being Facts and Fancies of Medical Life • Arthur Conan Doyle
... straight out to India on her marriage, and except by some few friends who had known us both intimately, I seldom heard her mentioned. And time passed. I cannot say I had exactly forgotten her, but she was not much or often in my thoughts. I was a busy and much-absorbed man, and life had proved a serious matter to me. Now and then some passing resemblance would recall her to my mind—once especially when I had been asked to look in to see the young wife of one of my cousins in her ...
— Four Ghost Stories • Mrs. Molesworth
... collected by G.F. Black and edited by Northcote W. Thomas (London, 1903), pp. 203 sq. A similar celebration, known as Up-helly-a, takes place at Lerwick on the 29th of January, twenty-four days after Old Christmas. See The Scapegoat, pp. 167-169. Perhaps the popular festival of Up-helly-a has absorbed some of the features of ...
— Balder The Beautiful, Vol. I. • Sir James George Frazer
... expressions that are apt to fall from those who are sure of obedience. When the boat had brought up to her grapnel, he sunk back at his length on the cushioned seats of the barge, and drawing his hat over his eyes in a listless manner, he continued for many minutes apparently absorbed in thoughts altogether foreign to his present situation. Occasionally he rose, and would first bend his looks in quest of his companions on the shore, and then, turning his expressive eyes toward the ocean, the abstracted and vacant air, that ...
— The Pilot • J. Fenimore Cooper
... seven years for Norway also, which was blockaded by the English fleet and suffered sorely for lack of the necessaries of life. But the nations sense of independence grew, and when the Peace of Kiel in January, 1814, separated Norway from Denmark, Norway refused to be absorbed by Sweden, and through a representative assembly at Eidsvold declared its independence, adopted a Constitution on May 17, 1814, and chose as King, Prince Christian Frederik, the later King Christian VIII of Denmark. The Swedish Crown Prince Karl Johan led an invasion of Norway in July, ...
— Poems and Songs • Bjornstjerne Bjornson
... screamed. But as he looked up, he saw, descending the hill and sauntering toward him, his sister and Josie Manning, absorbed ...
— Donald and Dorothy • Mary Mapes Dodge
... from the black veil, against which the rays of the caldron fell blunt, and absorbed into Dark. "Behind us, the light of the circle is extinct; but there, we are guarded from all save the brutal and soulless destroyers. But, before!— but, before!—see, two of the lamps have died out!—see the blank of the gap in the ring! ...
— The Lock and Key Library • Julian Hawthorne, Ed.
... only that one of them, usually a woman, might now and then be observed putting down a five-franc with a simpering air, just to see what the passion of gambling really was. Those who were taking their pleasure at a higher strength, and were absorbed in play, showed very distant varieties of European type: Livonian and Spanish, Graeco-Italian and miscellaneous German, English aristocratic and English plebeian. Here certainly was a striking admission of human equality. The white bejewelled fingers of an English ...
— Daniel Deronda • George Eliot
... Broadway, I reached that portion of it frequented by stock and real-estate brokers. Here crowds of gentlemanly-looking men, dressed mostly in black, and of busy mien, crowded the thoroughfare with scrip in hand. Each appeared intensely absorbed in business, and as I gazed on the assemblage, I could discover unmistakable symptoms of great excitement and mental anxiety, the proportion of rueful countenances being much greater than is usually ...
— An Englishman's Travels in America - His Observations Of Life And Manners In The Free And Slave States • John Benwell
... over the Casino de Venise in High Holborn. Nor did morning produce any change for the better, for Sir Harry and all the captains came down in their usual flashy broken-down player-looking attire, their whole thoughts being absorbed in arranging for a pool at billiards, in which the ladies took part. So with billiards, brandy, and ''baccy,'—''baccy,' brandy, and billiards, varied with an occasional stroll about the grounds, the non-sporting inmates ...
— Mr. Sponge's Sporting Tour • R. S. Surtees
... hours' rest." It is consequently of great value in digestive and intestinal troubles. But it should be unpolished, otherwise it is an ill-balanced, deficient food. It should likewise be boiled in only just enough soft water to be absorbed during the cooking. One cup of rice should be put on in a double saucepan with three cups of cold water and tightly covered. When the water is all absorbed the ...
— Food Remedies - Facts About Foods And Their Medicinal Uses • Florence Daniel
... corner of it, dropped his hat on the floor, buried his chin in his stock, vented his usual pet phrase on such occasions, 'It's a fine day,' and resigned himself moodily to social misery. If the talk did not suit him, he bore it a certain time, silent, self-absorbed, as a man condemned to death, then suddenly, with a brusque 'Well, good morning,' shuffled to the door and blundered his way out, audibly cursing himself for his folly in voluntarily making himself the laughing-stock of an idiot's critical servants. It must have been hard to bear with such a man, ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... the centers from which civilization grows and expands. Historically, a number of cities or city-states have competed for survival and supremacy. One by one they have dropped out of the race or have been out-classed, defeated and/or absorbed by the victors in the competitive struggle. One location proved to be more advantageous than others. The inhabitants of one locality were more skillful, more far sighted than those of rival localities. Many competed. Eventually one ...
— Civilization and Beyond - Learning From History • Scott Nearing |
