"Catastrophe" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... guests forget their wonted smiles; only occasionally did the mask of cheerfulness fall from many a face, discovering serious, anxious features, and suspicious, lurking glances. Every one felt that a catastrophe was impending, but, as no one could know its result in advance, all wished to keep as clear of it as possible, and seem perfectly unconscious and unaffected by these things. As they could not foresee which party would triumph, they found it advisable to join neither while ...
— The Daughter of an Empress • Louise Muhlbach
... characteristic vacillation by the adherents on whom he counted, the delinquent had fled to the camp of the rival tribe, with whom he had already been in secret negotiation. This much Mukair Ibn Zarrarah's spies had ascertained, but not in time to prevent the catastrophe that followed. Plans thought to be known only to the Sheik and his son had been disclosed to the marauding Chief, who had long sought an opportunity of aiming an effectual blow at his hated rival, and on one of Omar's ...
— The Shadow of the East • E. M. Hull
... Aramaic word meaning zealot. Hence Luke translates it for Gentile readers. He was one of the fanatical sect who would not have anything to do with Rome, and who played such a terrible part in the final catastrophe of Israel. The baser elements were purged out of his fiery enthusiasm when he became Christ's man. The hallowing and curbing of earthly passion, the ennobling of enthusiasm, are achieved when the pure flame of love to Christ ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - St. Mark • Alexander Maclaren
... canvass to get the feet in; so he turned the legs up in such a manner, as to give the child the appearance of being in great danger of sliding into the water. We greatly offended the painter by advising him to drive a couple of stakes into the bank to prevent such a catastrophe. Another artist, engaged in painting a full-length portrait, found, when he had got his picture nearly finished, that his canvass was at least four inches too short. "What shall I do," said the painter to a friend, "I have not room for the feet." "Cover them up with green grass," was the reply. ...
— Anecdotes of Painters, Engravers, Sculptors and Architects, and Curiosities of Art, (Vol. 2 of 3) • Shearjashub Spooner
... knowledge of this latest disaster spread with amazing rapidity. Up from the saloon came a rush of stewards and others. Overborne in the panic-stricken flight, Gray, Tollemache, Christobal, the French Count and the head steward, not knowing what new catastrophe threatened, brought Mr. Somerville and the almost inanimate women with them, leaving to their fate those who, like Boyle, were unable to move. Some of the mob rushed up the bridge companion; others ...
— The Captain of the Kansas • Louis Tracy
... that there was a section of the extreme Liberals who would not be deeply mortified if the government were overthrown. All efforts, therefore, political and social, and particularly the latter, in which the Whigs excelled, were to be made to prevent or to retard the catastrophe. ...
— Endymion • Benjamin Disraeli
... letter by telling her of the catastrophe, with the usual amount of epithets. It was very terrible, awful, shocking—the saddest thing that had ever happened! The poor widow was in a desperate state, and all the Claverings were nearly beside themselves. But when this had been duly said, he allowed himself ...
— The Claverings • Anthony Trollope
... to it. In the first place, history teaches us that whenever civilized man comes in contact with a savage race, the latter almost inevitably begins to decrease, and to approach by more or less gradual steps towards extinction. Whether this catastrophe is the result of political, moral, or physical causes, the ablest writers have not been able to decide; and most men seem willing to content themselves with the belief that the event is in accordance with ...
— Discoveries in Australia, Volume 2 • John Lort Stokes
... courteous to knock at Miss Gascoigne's door, and ask if she too were ready, when she heard a loud outcry in the nursery above. This, alas! was no novelty. More than once Christian had rushed wildly up stairs, expecting some dreadful catastrophe, but it was only the usual warfare between Phillis and the children, especially Arthur, who was no longer a baby to be petted and scolded, or a little girl to be cowed into obedience, but a big boy to be ruled, if at all, vi et armis—as Mrs. Grey had more ...
— Christian's Mistake • Dinah Maria Mulock Craik
... some measure of dismay, as he thus presented to her the worst aspect of the catastrophe. But Chris remained serene. She was rapidly ...
— The Rocks of Valpre • Ethel May Dell
... Carr as we had arranged, and we had a very pleasant evening. Poor Carr, who had seen the papers, had hardly expected that I should turn up, knowing the catastrophe of the previous night had taken place at the house I was going to, and was much relieved to hear that my sister had moved, and had thus been spared all the horror of ...
— The Danvers Jewels, and Sir Charles Danvers • Mary Cholmondeley
... 'Sir, the thing is absolutely, insuperably, and forever impossible. Not the archangel Gabriel, nor his multipotent adversary, durst attempt any such thing!' From that quarter, then, nothing could be expected; but the intervention of other parties averted a catastrophe melancholy to contemplate—restoring to us a vast body of literature, unique in character and supreme in kind. We do not pretend that De Quincey has yet been awarded by any very general suffrage the foremost position among modern litterateurs; we expect ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol. 5, No. 6, June, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... examples in the 'Observations' are taken from incidents and movements in which Spragge was the chief actor. One long observation is directed to precautions to be taken by flag officers in shifting their flags in action, so as to prevent a recurrence of the catastrophe which cost Spragge his life. Indeed, with the exception of Jordan, Spragge is the only English admiral mentioned. Dartmouth was present at all the actions quoted, and succeeded in constituting himself a sufficient authority on naval affairs to be appointed in 1683 to command the ...
— Fighting Instructions, 1530-1816 - Publications Of The Navy Records Society Vol. XXIX. • Julian S. Corbett
... it the back wash, yet we may have had a tidal wave of our own; for, though we had no knowledge of the frightful catastrophe at Java, still there had been for days several submarine earthquakes all about us, sending fountains of water, steam bubbles, and mud from the ...
— The Grain Ship • Morgan Robertson
... both saw, outside the window, what we thought was an Antiopa. We rushed out, and when we came back we found that the cat. . . . Dear me; I was quite overcome. . . . But that summer I caught the one you have seen in Switzerland; and as my dear friend was no more and nobody else knew of the catastrophe, I thought there would be no harm in merely restoring a specimen to my ...
— The Book-Hunter at Home • P. B. M. Allan
... pale from the very contemplation of such a catastrophe, such an unprecedented haegira of dames! It is as if from every gay watering place, some softly tinkling bell should summon the fair mermaids. Beplaided and betrowsered, with their little gypsy hats, would they float ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. III, No IV, April 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... forest of Bondy, who have just heard that the provost-marshal has been discharged.' Voltaire and Condorcet were not more dismayed by the fall of the minister, than by the insensate delight which greeted the catastrophe. 'This event,' wrote Condorcet, 'has changed all nature in my eyes. I have no longer the same pleasure in looking at those fair landscapes over which he would have shed happiness and contentment. The sight of the gaiety of the people wrings my heart. They dance and sport, as if they had lost nothing. ...
— Critical Miscellanies (Vol. 2 of 3) - Turgot • John Morley
... to her friend to help, and she was not backward; but in spite of her twenty years her astonishment at the catastrophe was great. ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... trial embraced a period of five and twenty years, during which the policy of the Union in its relations with Europe constituted the principal basis of our own political divisions, and the most arduous part of the action of the Federal Government. With the catastrophe in which the wars of the French Revolution terminated, and our own subsequent peace with Great Britain, this baneful weed of party strife was uprooted. From that time no difference of principle, connected with the theory of government, or with our ...
— Life and Public Services of John Quincy Adams - Sixth President of the Unied States • William H. Seward
... astound us here, where green hills slope to lawns or peer at a peaceful sea; but there among the flames of those dreadful peaks the Sun seemed not the giver of joy and colour and life, but only a catastrophe huger than everlasting war, a centre of hideous violence and ruin and anger and terror. There came by mountains of copper burning everlasting, hurling up to unthinkable heights their mass of emerald flame. And mountains of iron raged by and mountains of ...
— Don Rodriguez - Chronicles of Shadow Valley • Edward John Moreton Drax Plunkett, Baron, Dunsany
... they were angry because she had cheated them out of five months' gossip, and that if her mother could have had her way, she would have sent the news to the Herald and had it inserted under the head of "Awful Catastrophe!" Thus Mrs. Carter was exonerated from all blame; but many a wise old lady shook her head, saying, "How strange that so fine a woman as Mrs. Carter should have such a reprobate of ...
— Homestead on the Hillside • Mary Jane Holmes
... for this tragedy. It was probably accidental, as the Earl was a favourer of the reformed religion, and not likely to meet with treachery in England. The Irish annalists do not even allude to the catastrophe; the Four Masters merely observe, that "he would have been lamented, were it not that he had greatly injured the Church by advice of ...
— An Illustrated History of Ireland from AD 400 to 1800 • Mary Frances Cusack
... way by the sirens of administration, which never fail to swallow them up like quicksand—like a serpent, who charms and fascinates, bewitches and enchants with his eye the unwary bird; witness the fatal catastrophe of Rehoboam, who rejected the counsel of the wise and experienced, and gave up all to the advice and guidance of young, unskilful and wicked counsellors. Had he listen'd to you, my Lord, had he followed your ...
— The Fall of British Tyranny - American Liberty Triumphant • John Leacock
... plunged a knife into his breast; the blade broke; he shattered the bottle at his side and swallowed the fragments, and then fell bleeding and exhausted on the straw. If left long alone, life would have ebbed away; but, probably in anticipation of such a catastrophe, the officer ere many hours revisited the cell to put chains upon the prisoner. Discovering his condition, a surgeon was called, remedies were applied, and two Austrian sentinels carried Foresti into the presence of the judge. It was scarcely dawn; the venerable ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 25, November, 1859 • Various
... the beaver has a tolerably idle life; but as in most districts the levels of rivers and lakes are apt to sink at various seasons if left to themselves,—whenever an emigrant party of beavers have fixed on a new locality, they set to work to dam up the stream or outlet of the lake, to prevent a catastrophe which might bring ruin and destruction on their new colony. In Nova Scotia, as well as in other parts of North America, large level spaces are found covered with a rich alluvial soil, from which spring up waving fields of wild grass. From this the human settler draws ...
— The Western World - Picturesque Sketches of Nature and Natural History in North - and South America • W.H.G. Kingston
... she had attempted to drag me out of the room. She had seen all that had passed in the bed-chamber; and she had run out to take me back with her, and show me the wonderful sight of Lucilla with the bandage off her eyes. If I had been wise enough to listen to Jicks, I might have prevented the catastrophe that had happened. I might have met Lucilla in the corridor, and have forced her back into her own room and turned the ...
— Poor Miss Finch • Wilkie Collins
... be. A catastrophe more vital than war threatened Switzerland—the world—wide revelation of a secret which, exposed, would throw all civilisation into righteous fury and the ...
— In Secret • Robert W. Chambers
... in one's coffin! Oh, it was an indignity too terrible for contemplation; and every time they were away from Jerrem she would beset Reuben with entreaties and questions as to what could be done to avoid the catastrophe. ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XXVI., December, 1880. • Various
... explained how Lady CALLENDER obtained the prussic acid, nor why she had selected that particular moment for its use. I ought to add, that CASANUOVA left England before the inquest, and has never returned. On the mystery of the final catastrophe the manuscript throws no light. It ends abruptly. But the whole tone of it leads me to believe, that in some unexplained manner Sir CHARLES himself had been instrumental in causing his wife's death. But you, no doubt, know, and could tell ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Volume 102, Jan. 2, 1892 • Various
... those people set the fire? It would be a catastrophe if the plane burned just at this particular time, wouldn't it? ...
— The Radio Boys with the Revenue Guards • Gerald Breckenridge
... no one might suspect her of corresponding with an author. After reading the first four volumes of 'Clarissa' (which were separately published), she wrote under a feigned name to beg the author to alter the impending catastrophe. She spoke as the mouthpiece of a 'multitude of admirers' who desired to see Lovelace reformed and married to Clarissa. 'Sure you will think it worth your while, sir, to save his soul!' she exclaims. Richardson was too good an artist to spoil his tragedy; and was rewarded by an account ...
— Hours in a Library, Volume I. (of III.) • Leslie Stephen
... capitulate to the invading Hittites and see the end of the kingdom of Mitani. The great "love" of this king for Egypt was not, therefore, called forth merely by the glitter of gold, but also by dire political necessity. The catastrophe occurred some few decades after the correspondence comes to an end for us. Mitani vanished from the states of Western Asia and gave place to small Aramaic kingdoms, while the eastern boundary, together with Ninua, was seized by Assyria as the first step to her ...
— The Tell El Amarna Period • Carl Niebuhr
... is the conduct and disposition of the whole piece, which, by the order and harmony of its parts, and the happy connection of its incidents and intrigues, holds the mind of the spectator in suspense till the catastrophe, and then restores him his tranquillity, and dismisses ...
— The Ancient History of the Egyptians, Carthaginians, Assyrians, • Charles Rollin
... attacks; for in the early part of the fifteenth century, we find the then abbot of Derry negotiating a peace between the English and O'Donnell. But in its subsequent annals nothing more than the mere date of an inmate's death meets us till we come to the great catastrophe, which ended at once the monastery and order of Columba. Cox thus tells the story: "Colonel Saintlow succeeded Randolph in the command of the garrison and lived as quietly as could be desired, for the rebels were so daunted by the former defeat that they did not dare to ...
— Donahoe's Magazine, Volume 15, No. 2, February 1886 • Various
... and consequently, owing to difference of character, would be less relished by the same circles in England. I suspect the author to be a great admirer of Chateaubriand's "Atala," whose death is brought to mind by the catastrophe of Elode's. Here, however, the similitude ends. There is nothing to be said respecting the comparative features of Charles the Bold and Chactas, except that the Indian possessed those qualities of the heart which ...
— Personal Memoirs Of A Residence Of Thirty Years With The Indian Tribes On The American Frontiers • Henry Rowe Schoolcraft
... expression of his haggard face. It was only natural that he should keenly feel his responsibility for the accident, but this did not quite seem to account for the man's condition. He looked absolutely unnerved, like one who had barely escaped from some appalling catastrophe. ...
— The Long Portage • Harold Bindloss
... partly prompted by the thought of the new helve I already had in store, awaiting just such a catastrophe. Having come somewhat painfully by that helve, I really wanted to see ...
— Adventures In Contentment • David Grayson
... the Examiner, "has overthrown the Holy Alliance of Southern Germany. Lola Montez, whose affecting testimony during the trial of those who killed Dujarier in a duel cannot but be remembered, was driven by that catastrophe to seek her fortunes in other realms. Chance brought her to Munich, the Sovereign of which capital has divided his time between poetry and the ...
— The Magnificent Montez - From Courtesan to Convert • Horace Wyndham
... on, to turn into a deserted street,—a street where the doors of the stores had been left open and the owners gone. Everywhere it was the same; it was as if Ohadi suddenly had been struck by some catastrophe which had wiped out the whole population. Only now and then a human being appeared, a few persons left behind at the banks, but that was about all. Then from far away, up the street leading from Kentucky Gulch, came the sound of cheering and shouting. Soon a crowd appeared, led by gesticulating, ...
— The Cross-Cut • Courtney Ryley Cooper
... into a deep swoon, and she was carried from the carriage to a sofa in the drawing-room. Neither Miss Agnes nor Mr. Wyllys was at home; they had gone to their afflicted neighbours the Hubbards. An express had brought a report of the melancholy catastrophe, not half an hour after Elinor had left Wyllys-Roof in the morning; the lifeless body of our poor young friend, Charlie, was to reach Longbridge that afternoon, and Hubert de Vaux had come to request Miss Agnes to break the sad truth to the bereaved mother and ...
— Elinor Wyllys - Vol. I • Susan Fenimore Cooper
... side, in order to compel the apparition to repeat them. He found a comforting reassurance in asserting his command over his own shadow. He was temporizing, making, with unconscious prudence, a dilatory opposition to an impending catastrophe. He felt that invisible forces of evil were closing in upon him, and he parleyed for time with ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce, Vol. II: In the Midst of Life: Tales of Soldiers and Civilians • Ambrose Bierce
... untrained as it was, sufficed to communicate abundance of the feeling to others. Perhaps more than abundance: to judge from our individual impression, the perusal of the Robbers produces an effect powerful even to pain; we are absolutely wounded by the catastrophe; our minds are darkened and distressed, as if we had witnessed the execution of a criminal. It is in vain that we rebel against the inconsistencies and crudities of the work: its faults are redeemed by the living energy that pervades it. We may exclaim against ...
— The Life of Friedrich Schiller - Comprehending an Examination of His Works • Thomas Carlyle
... and trowels even beginning to work on the foundations, when, one sad December night, a terrible gale arose. All through the hours of darkness it roared and shrieked across the British Isles, working havoc upon sea and land, but, when morning came at last, few were prepared for the appalling catastrophe it had caused. Sweeping up the Firth of Tay, it had torn away a portion of the great railway bridge that crossed the inlet, and hurled it into the water. A train was passing over at the time, and plunged into the abyss with all its ...
— Chatterbox, 1906 • Various
... this evil to come. He had a blank helpless feeling, a dismal sense of his own weakness, which for the moment mastered him. Against any ordinary calamity he would have held himself bravely enough, with the natural strength of an ardent hopeful character; but against this mysterious catastrophe courage and manhood could avail nothing. She was gone, the fragile helpless creature he had pledged himself to protect; gone from all who knew her, leaving not the faintest clue to her fate. Could he doubt that this energetic warm-hearted girl was right, and that some foul deed had been ...
— Fenton's Quest • M. E. Braddon
... Edwin, his excitement was, on balance, pleasurable. In truth, he could not kill in his mind the hope that the floor would yield. The greatness of the resulting catastrophe fascinated him. He knew that he should be disappointed if the catastrophe did not occur. That it would mean ruinous damage to the extent of hundreds of pounds, and enormous worry, did not influence him. His reason did not influence him, nor his personal danger. He saw a large hook in the wall ...
— Clayhanger • Arnold Bennett
... The catastrophe of having the mug drained dry at one pull by the stranger in cinder gray was effectually guarded against this time by Mrs. Fennel. She poured out his allowance in a small cup, keeping the large one at a discreet distance from him. When he had tossed off his portion the shepherd renewed ...
— Stories by English Authors: England • Various
... he was questioning me; and judge of my confusion when I saw on the cover the word "Memoirs," written in my best round-hand. I, myself, had provided material to Justice—important details which the suddenness of our catastrophe had prevented me from saving from the police search of ...
— The Nabob • Alphonse Daudet
... ways of Chance—Destiny, call it what you will—brought about the greatest catastrophe that had so far obtained in the Guernsey ranks. Major Davey moved his party over an area—at about 11 in the morning of a warm, sunny Sunday—coming in for a spell of shelling extraordinary in intensity. A labour unit retired because of the exigencies of the precarious situation. ...
— Norman Ten Hundred - A Record of the 1st (Service) Bn. Royal Guernsey Light Infantry • A. Stanley Blicq
... catastrophe, our young hero ran immediately and ordered the horses: his majesty mounted, or rather was mounted, and they proceeded to one of the prettiest farms in the Black Islands. As they rode to it, he seemed pleased by Harry's ...
— Tales & Novels, Vol. IX - [Contents: Harrington; Thoughts on Bores; Ormond] • Maria Edgeworth
... by telling him that a man was sometimes lucky in forgetting to write a letter, for he seldom knew what it contained until it appeared again some day to confront him with an indiscreet word or expression; and then he told a humorous story of a sad catastrophe that happened in a family, which was ascribed to something that came in a letter—a catastrophe so far beyond the region of possibility that it set us all laughing, and Mr. Chase lost his anxious look. That ...
— The Every-day Life of Abraham Lincoln • Francis Fisher Browne
... at a catastrophe," said she, "but he can't carry on the blank verse proper to the ...
— A Noble Woman • Ann S. Stephens
... Instead of abating, the wind seemed momentarily to increase in violence, and the balloon made increasingly heavier weather of it. It was only a matter of time when the wind would rip it to pieces, and this catastrophe was not long in coming. There was a sound of ripping cloth, and the next moment the balloon began to drop rapidly. This left its passengers no alternative but to take to their parachutes, as to remain longer with ...
— Army Boys on German Soil • Homer Randall
... possibility that progress and human life should some day end together. If the present equilibrium of forces were eternal all adaptations to it would have already taken place and, while no essential catastrophe would need to be dreaded, no essential improvement could be hoped for in all eternity. I am not sure that a humanity such as we know, were it destined to exist for ever, would offer a more exhilarating prospect than a humanity having indefinite ...
— The Life of Reason • George Santayana
... around, and in a few seconds the mainsail came down with a bang and was secured by the others. The jib was still up, and this drew just sufficiently to send them forward slowly, to the spot where the catastrophe had occurred. ...
— The Rover Boys on the Farm - or Last Days at Putnam Hall • Arthur M. Winfield (AKA Edward Stratemeyer)
... aggrandizements, and his Philippics are perhaps the most brilliant of his orations. But the cause which he advocated was unfortunate; the battle of Cheronaea, 338 B.C., put an end to the independence of Greece, and Philip of Macedon was all-powerful. For this catastrophe Demosthenes was somewhat responsible, but as his motives were conceded to be pure and his patriotism lofty, he retained the confidence of his countrymen. Accused by Aeschines, he delivered his famous Oration on the Crown. Afterward, during the supremacy of Alexander, Demosthenes ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume I • John Lord
... charge of highway robbery, which bore a singular resemblance to the final catastrophe in Queensland, he resisted to the utmost, and showed that his experience in the Supreme Court at Dunedin had not been lost on him. At half-past six one evening in a suburb of Melbourne an elderly gentleman found himself confronted by a bearded man, wearing a ...
— A Book of Remarkable Criminals • H. B. Irving
... projecting point, and overturned it. Only three persons, besides himself, escaped: the rest were all lost. The wretch fled instantly, and was never taken; he was condemned to death, and hung in effigy; and since then an annual procession takes place on the banks of the Drot, where the catastrophe occurred, and solemn service is ...
— Barn and the Pyrenees - A Legendary Tour to the Country of Henri Quatre • Louisa Stuart Costello
... and onward it would sweep, with the steady gait of destiny, until the continents would melt with fervent heat, the atmosphere glare with the ominous conflagration, and all living creatures, in land and sea and air, perish in one universal catastrophe." ...
— The Case of Summerfield • William Henry Rhodes
... could give the alarm, a terrible catastrophe would occur. He realized this, and made the supreme effort of his life to avert it. But fate was against him. In his mad haste to leap down the stair-way to give warning, his foot slipped, and he fell headlong to the floor of the lower deck, his temple, coming in contact with ...
— Kidnapped at the Altar - or, The Romance of that Saucy Jessie Bain • Laura Jean Libbey
... much, begging your honour's pardon, that your lordship stinks." "Put him into the carriage," cried Mr. Godfrey, "and drive him home." Lord Martin, now first recovered his tongue, and wiping away the mud from his eyes, "And so it was you, sir, I suppose," cried he, "to whom I am obliged for this catastrophe. But pox take me, if you shall not hear of it. Ten thousand curses on my wayward fate! The devil take it! Death and damnation!" During this soliloquy, the servants were employed in placing their lord in the chariot. The coachman mounted the box, and ...
— Damon and Delia - A Tale • William Godwin
... such a catastrophe—martial law, military dictatorship, self-perpetuating monarchy, divine authority, are more than likely to heap fuel on the flames of rebellion and lead ...
— Civilization and Beyond - Learning From History • Scott Nearing
... same moment some fishermen on the sands below, who had seen the impending catastrophe, rushed up the bank, headed the maddened horses and ...
— Ishmael - In the Depths • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... bedside and listened to the hysterical lamentation in which Louise gave her own—the true—account of the catastrophe. It was all her fault, and upon her let all the blame fall. She would humble herself to Mr. Higgins and get him to pay for the furniture destroyed. If Mrs. Mumford would but forgive her! And so on, as her poor body agonised, and ...
— The Paying Guest • George Gissing
... 1712-1732) not more than eight or nine of Shakspeare's plays were acted, whereas Garrick annually gave the public seventeen or eighteen. Romeo and Juliet had lain neglected near 80 years, when in 1748-9 Garrick brought it out, or rather a hash of it. 'Otway had made some alteration in the catastrophe, which Mr. Garrick greatly improved by the addition of a scene, which was written with a spirit not unworthy of Shakespeare himself.' Ib. p. 125. Murphy (Life of Garrick, p. 100), writing of this alteration, says:—'The catastrophe, as it now ...
— Life Of Johnson, Volume 5 • Boswell
... wonder that men looked blankly into each other's eyes, and asked themselves and each other how such an unheard-of catastrophe had come about, and what was going to happen next? The first and universal feeling was one of amazement, which amounted almost to mental paralysis, and then came a sickening sense of insecurity. For two generations the Fleet had been trusted implicitly, and ...
— The World Peril of 1910 • George Griffith
... delusions are to last for ever, whether this policy is to be the perpetual policy of England, whether these results are to go on gathering and gathering until there come, as come there must inevitably, some dreadful catastrophe on ...
— Selected Speeches on British Foreign Policy 1738-1914 • Edgar Jones
... to; for the entrance of the footman with coffee made denial indecent at the moment, if not impossible. That deus ex machina from below the stage retired, unconscious of the imminent catastrophe he had averted. But he had brought into the little drama a certain prosaic element. Coffee and romantic passion do ...
— Audrey Craven • May Sinclair
... bleeds to death, so might Tusk have slept into eternity, were it not for that mysterious spark of something which the most crass of men possess to mark them human. Thus it was that later in the night he awoke with a feeling of terrible fear, of the presence of some awful catastrophe; and sat up, looking about him through the dark, shivering. He did not comprehend that an alert subconscious mind might be giving the alarm, touching him upon the shoulder and guiding his hand to the bleeding wound; but, once he knew there was a bleeding wound, ...
— Sunlight Patch • Credo Fitch Harris
... in his hand, scrutinizing it with impassive face. Was this a piece of unparalleled good fortune, or simply a trick of the fates to tempt him on to catastrophe? With that wonderful swiftness of thought which was part of his mental equipment he balanced the chances—and took ...
— A Lost Leader • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... this catastrophe caused Alexander the greatest dismay. He immediately despatched a chamberlain to Marino, where Cardinal Ascanio was to be found in the headquarters of the Colonna, and who, on his urgent request, had returned November 2d, and had had an interview with King Charles. He complained to the cardinal ...
— Lucretia Borgia - According to Original Documents and Correspondence of Her Day • Ferdinand Gregorovius
... sufficient reinforcements should be sent out to defend the whole colony. In the long telegraphic despatch addressed on 6th September, 1899, by the Governor, Sir Walter Hely-Hutchinson, to the Colonial Office, it was urged that: "In the opinion of the Ministers, such a catastrophe as the seizure of Laing's Nek, and the destruction of the northern portion of the railway ... would have a most demoralising effect on the natives and the loyal Europeans in the colony, and would afford great encouragement to the Boers and their sympathisers." The announcement ...
— History of the War in South Africa 1899-1902 v. 1 (of 4) - Compiled by Direction of His Majesty's Government • Frederick Maurice
... the scene which Thomas Batchgrew now saw and the scene which had met Rachel in the night was so violent as to seem nearly incredible. Not a sign of the catastrophe remained, except in Mrs. Maldon's face, and in some invalid gear on the dressing-table, for Rachel had gradually got the room into order. She had even closed and locked ...
— The Price of Love • Arnold Bennett
... impressed. He and all the other officers of the Kandarian defense forces had searched desperately for something that could be done to avert the catastrophe before them. They'd failed to find even the promise of a hope. He couldn't be encouraged by the confidence of a total stranger,—and a civilian to boot. He'd taken refuge ...
— Talents, Incorporated • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... the catastrophe matches the natural obscurity of our fate that even the best representative of the race is liable to lose his detachment. It is very obvious that on the arrival of the gentlemanly Mr. Jones, the single-minded Ricardo and the faithful Pedro, Heyst, ...
— Notes on My Books • Joseph Conrad
... in the higher region of the camp or court that has not some indirect influence upon the intrigues of Lorenzo and Elvira; and the part which the gallant is called upon to act in the revolution that winds up the tragic interest, while it is highly in character, serves to bring the catastrophe of both parts of the play under the eye of the spectator, at one and ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... attempt to negotiate for help, by the union of the Greek and Latin Churches. The agreement come to at Florence was not ratified at home; the attempt was resented, and led to an explosion of feeling that made even subjugation by the Turk seem for the moment less intolerable, and that hastened the catastrophe by making Western Christians slow to sacrifice themselves for their implacable brethren in the East. Offers of help were made, conditional on acceptance of the Florentine decree, and were rejected with patriotic and theological disdain. A small force of papal ...
— Lectures on Modern history • Baron John Emerich Edward Dalberg Acton
... quality of these studies, which, with one exception, are concerned with some or other aspect of the world-struggle. In "War and Literature," a paper dated during the black days of October, 1914, the author attempts to realise what will be the probable literary effect of the catastrophe by recounting the various ways in which French writers suffered from that of 1870. An interesting prediction, too, as recalling what many of us believed at the beginning of the war, is this about the future of English letters: "What we must really face is the fact that this harvest of volumes ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 150, May 10, 1916 • Various
... not anticipate the catastrophe. The play, reader, is extant in choice English, and you will employ a spare half-crown not injudiciously ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 12, No. 72, October, 1863 • Various
... the scene of the disaster not more than a dozen people were present, and they did not display any intense affliction at the catastrophe. Five or six were smoking and lounging about, discussing the probabilities of the miners being alive, yet showing no great inclination to commence work and put all doubts ...
— The Gold Hunter's Adventures - Or, Life in Australia • William H. Thomes
... that Miss Fraenkel interposed, all unconsciously, and became the cause of our presence at a most singular catastrophe, the collapse of the aeroplane in the snow. For had we not gone out that night to visit Miss Fraenkel and with her see the New Year safely born, we should have had no vivid memory of that terrible descent, nor understood how Fate had woven our neighbours' destinies, ...
— Aliens • William McFee
... the deer, however, that we are concerned. It is out of the question for any thinking man who takes the slightest interest in these creatures to stand passively by and permit them to be exterminated. To prevent such a catastrophe proper measures must be taken. The hunting community increases with as great rapidity as that with which game decreases. Where one man hunted twenty-five years ago, a score hunt for big game to-day. Unfortunately it has become the fashion. It is a diversion involving no danger and, ...
— American Big Game in Its Haunts • Various
... everything except what was on their bodies when the catastrophe occurred. Their horses were gone, and they hadn't a gun between them; nothing but two revolvers, and about a ...
— The Huge Hunter - Or, the Steam Man of the Prairies • Edward S. Ellis
... return of Christ and the total ruin of the pagan world, with the inauguration of the kingdom of the saints, at the end of the first generation. The catastrophe did not come to pass, but Christian thought profited so greatly from the apocalyptic myth that certain contemporary scholars maintain that the whole preaching of Christ referred solely to this one point. The hopes which Luther and Calvin had formed of the religious exaltation of Europe were by no ...
— Introduction to the Science of Sociology • Robert E. Park
... for a heavy rain, when, instead, to their great consternation, the camp was inundated by "a high ridge of water over which came the sea current combing down like water over a mill-dam." The canoes were almost capsized, but this catastrophe was averted by rapid and good management. Even in the darkness, in the face of a danger unexpected and unknown, the trappers never for an instant lost their coolness and quick judgment, which was so often their salvation. ...
— The Romance of the Colorado River • Frederick S. Dellenbaugh
... authorities, that, when fairy stories, or balls, or rolls of thread, stopped of their own accord—as I do not—it presaged some great catastrophe near at hand. The precedent holds good in this case. When I have remembered the short time I have before me to spend in this land of mighty interests, and the poor opportunity I can at best have ...
— Speeches: Literary and Social • Charles Dickens
... poet; that being, perhaps, the most exciting epoch in any life. Coming into school one morning, he showed Paul his first attempt at verse-writing, which Hayne describes as "a ballad of stirring adventures and sanguinary catastrophe," which he thought wonderful, the youthful author, of course, sharing that conviction. Convictions are easy at thirteen, even when one has not the glamour of the sea and the romance of old Charleston to prepare ...
— Literary Hearthstones of Dixie • La Salle Corbell Pickett
... "that, when we began with one of these works, we were conscious that we never knew how to leave off. The Porteous mob is rather heavily described, and the whole part of George Robertson, or Staunton, is extravagant and displeasing. The final catastrophe is needlessly improbable and startling." The critic felt that he must be critical, but his praise of Effie and Jeanie Deans obviously comes from his heart. Jeanie's character "is superior to anything we can recollect in the history of invention . . . a remarkable triumph ...
— The Heart of Mid-Lothian, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... "Close upon the catastrophe followed a torpor, which lasted he did not know how long, and which wrapped in a thick fog all the succeeding events. For some time he can hardly be said to have had any conscious history. He awoke to life and torture when half-way across the sea towards ...
— Adela Cathcart - Volume II • George MacDonald
... crowns from Chesnel at one time and another, the better to hide the sources on which he was drawing. He wrote lying letters to his poor father and aunt, who lived on, happy and deceived, like most happy people under the sun. The insidious current of life in Paris was bringing a dreadful catastrophe upon the great and noble house; and only one person was in the secret of it. This was du Croisier. He rubbed his hands gleefully as he went past in the dark and looked in at the Antiquities. He had good ...
— The Collection of Antiquities • Honore de Balzac
... yes, I do really. In a catastrophe of this kind all kinds of ideas come into the mind, very absurd ones some of them," and he laughed ...
— The Master Detective - Being Some Further Investigations of Christopher Quarles • Percy James Brebner
... they found that the story of the Baxters' fate had preceded them. Many folks were inclined to think that the wrongdoers deserved the catastrophe which had overtaken them. As nothing was heard of either father or son for a long while, it was presumed that both were dead beyond ...
— The Rover Boys out West • Arthur M. Winfield
... this catastrophe may be imagined, but hardly described. The seamen who had debated as to casting them adrift to perish, wept as they pulled towards the shore. Philip was overcome, he covered his face, and remained, for some time, without giving directions, ...
— The Phantom Ship • Captain Frederick Marryat
... the strong current produced by the indraught of the Irish Channel drifted these ships out of their course, and was the cause of the catastrophe. ...
— A Yacht Voyage Round England • W.H.G. Kingston
... a catastrophe were accomplished we, too, must suffer being in such close proximity to it, we waited breathlessly, unable to escape from the vicinity ...
— The Great White Queen - A Tale of Treasure and Treason • William Le Queux
... being either overawed by the Emperor or menaced by his Protestant adversaries. Soon, however, the case was altered by the manifest collapse of the latter, notwithstanding their expectations of support from England, Denmark, and France, long before their final catastrophe in the battle of Muhlberg, April 24, 1547. The Emperor would not hear of the removal of the council to Lucca, Ferrara, or any other Italian town, and in consequence the plan of campaign at Trent was modified, in order at all events to make the breach with the Protestants impassable. The debates ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 9 • Various
... held the office in the shire of—at the time of this catastrophe, was well born and well educated; and, though somewhat pedantic and professional in his habits, he enjoyed general respect as an active and intelligent magistrate. His first employment was to examine all witnesses whose evidence could throw ...
— Guy Mannering • Sir Walter Scott
... day just such a catastrophe had occurred when he had been working; vividly he recalled how all the men had been forced to ...
— The Story of Glass • Sara Ware Bassett
... was keenly alive to what she must do. There was no time lost in bewailing the catastrophe, or wondering about the identity ...
— Wyn's Camping Days - or, The Outing of the Go-Ahead Club • Amy Bell Marlowe
... a direct result of this case a more determined stand was taken at the North against slavery; the Anti-Slavery Republican party was strengthened, and their candidate for President, Abraham Lincoln, elected in 1861, and the catastrophe of civil ...
— Government and Administration of the United States • Westel W. Willoughby and William F. Willoughby
... Claude. But if all her work had been useless? If all the ingenuity of herself and Alston should be of no avail? If the opera should never be produced, or should be produced and fail? Perhaps for the first time she strongly and deliberately imagined that catastrophe. For so long now had the opera been the thing that ruled in her life with Claude, for so long had everything centered round it, been subservient to it, that Charmian could scarcely conceive of life without it. She would be quite alone with Claude. Now they ...
— The Way of Ambition • Robert Hichens
... away on them, heedless of the crowd of soldiers of all arms crowding back to the rear. Generals and Colonels were helplessly carried away. Units were disbanded, and the army became a mere mob. It was readily to be seen that catastrophe ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 4, July, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... One of them, more courageous, inspired them with the sufficient resolution, and, continuing, they discovered the father almost at the last extremity. They reached him presently, took good care of him, and helped him with what they were carrying. With that he came to himself and recounted his catastrophe. They marveled greatly at so extraordinary an event, which they regarded only as a prodigy never before seen. In this manner did they continue with the conversion of those infidels, until they obtained a good foundation in the village of Masinloc. It was a very suitable location, as it was the ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, Volume XXI, 1624 • Various
... Europe might have been spared the misery and bloodshed of the next few years. But, for the moment, her strength and resources were exhausted, nor was it until months had elapsed that other nations, or even France herself, became aware of the magnitude of the catastrophe which had overtaken Napoleon's host. That he was able to rally himself after it, to carry the French people with him, to enforce a new conscription, and to assume the aggressive in the campaign ...
— The Political History of England - Vol XI - From Addington's Administration to the close of William - IV.'s Reign (1801-1837) • George Brodrick
... of Yezd, and exercise an influence on public opinion considerably wider than the boundaries of their sect. As for actual Missionary work of Christianization going beyond this point, the difficulties encountered and the risks of a catastrophe are too great at present for any sensible man ...
— Across Coveted Lands - or a Journey from Flushing (Holland) to Calcutta Overland • Arnold Henry Savage Landor
... than Mac for the night to come, for I was very anxious about Clarian, dreading lest some catastrophe was about to overtake him,—and the thought was by no means pleasant. For, as Mac had said, the lad was a protg of mine; he had been given into my charge by his sweet lady-mother; he had looked up ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 32, June, 1860 • Various
... south-west of China. This legend may be interpreted as indicating that the non-Chinese races in the south-west have come to their present seats by migration from Central China in remote antiquity. During Yau's reign a catastrophe reminding one of the biblical deluge threatened the Chinese world. The emperor held his minister of works, Kun, responsible for this misfortune, probably an inundation of the Yellow river such as has been witnessed ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 2 - "Chicago, University of" to "Chiton" • Various
... of interesting incidents, one of which was, that when a party of wounded Englishmen came to a station where she was tending the Belgian wounded, every wounded Belgian gave up his bed to accommodate an English soldier. The idea of a German occupation of English soil, she said, was the idea of a catastrophe that was unspeakable. People read things in the papers and thought they were exaggerated, but she had seen them, and she would show photographs of ruined Belgium which would convince them of what the Germans were now doing in the name of God. However unprepared we were for war, ...
— My War Experiences in Two Continents • Sarah Macnaughtan
... catastrophe her lordly lover was of course the most sedulous of attendants. In truth he was so, though when we last met him and his bride together he had made himself very disagreeable. Rachel had then answered him in such language as to make her think it impossible that he should not quarrel with ...
— The Landleaguers • Anthony Trollope
... that he could expect would be a great hissing and fizzling at all the joints of his machine; and it would be only by means of such a degree of looseness in the joints as would allow of the escape of the imprisoned force in this way that could prevent the repression ending in a frightful catastrophe. ...
— Gentle Measures in the Management and Training of the Young • Jacob Abbott
... health of mind was concerned, itself grievously inopportune, the catastrophe could not have happened at a more opportune moment. Trading upon the heels of his encounter with Valerie, it made a terrific counter-irritant to the violent inflammation which that meeting had set up. Yet if the back of the sickness was broken, ...
— Anthony Lyveden • Dornford Yates
... and convincing terms in which the eye-witness describes the manner in which they stayed their hand whenever it could have slain, and the silent struggle which the Moderates of Chinese politics must have waged to avert the catastrophe by merely gaining time and allowing the Desperates to dash themselves to pieces when the inevitable swing of the pendulum took place. Finally, it will not escape notice that many remarks borne out all through the narrative tend to show that British diplomacy in the Far East was at one ...
— Indiscreet Letters From Peking • B. L. Putman Weale
... character from great cataclysms in which whole territories and populations perished, to comparatively unimportant landslips such as occur on our own coasts to-day. When the destruction was once inaugurated by the first great catastrophe there was no intermission of the minor landslips which continued slowly but steadily to eat away the continent. Four of the great catastrophes stand out above the rest in magnitude. The first took place in the Miocene age, about 800,000 years ago. The second, which was of minor importance, ...
— The Story of Atlantis and the Lost Lemuria • W. Scott-Elliot
... character, no longer exist in the memory of man—they died with them who were contemporaneous with the happening of them.[10] On one occasion however, such was the extent of savage duplicity, and such, and so full of horror, the catastrophe resulting from misplaced confidence, that the events which marked it, still live in the recollection of the descendants of some of those, who suffered on the ...
— Chronicles of Border Warfare • Alexander Scott Withers
... always must be, overwhelmingly against him. Without interference from any one he had already formulated plans for quietly putting Monty in his rightful position, and making over to him his share in the Bekwando Syndicate. But to arrange this without catastrophe would need skill and tact; interference from any outside source would be fatal, and Francis meant to interfere—nothing would stop him. Trent walked backwards and forwards with knitted brows, glancing every now and then at ...
— A Millionaire of Yesterday • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... grave danger. Blue Bonnet felt a swift overpowering fear; the half-broken colts were as apt to plunge backward as to advance if they felt the whip, and that meant a plunge down the steep bank. She looked about her helplessly. Sarah, with a faint shriek, shut her eyes and prepared for the catastrophe. ...
— Blue Bonnet's Ranch Party • C. E. Jacobs
... that picture is the only thing I clearly remember during those earlier days. I have no recollection of the disaster, which, at four years old, altered my life. The catastrophe, as others have described it, was that we three boys were riding cock- horse on the balusters of the second floor of our house in Montagu Place, Russell Square, when we indulged in a general melee, which resulted in all tumbling over into the vestibule ...
— Chantry House • Charlotte M. Yonge
... ground, we prefer a simple and natural, to an artificial and affected style; a regular and well-connected story, to loose and scattered narratives; a catastrophe which is tender and pathetic, to one which leaves us ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... appartient a la terre, support impassible de l'homme, et il resemble a toutes les plaines. La nuit pourtant une espece de brume visionnaire s'en degage, et si quelque voyageur s'y promene, s'il regarde, s'il ecoute, s'il reve comme Virgile dans les funestes plaines de Philippes, l'hallucination de la catastrophe le saisit. L'effrayant 18 juin revit; la fausse colline-monument s'efface, ce lion quelconque se dissipe, le champ de bataille reprend sa realite; des lignes d'infanterie ondulent dans la plaine, des galops furieux traversent l'horizon; le ...
— Ponkapog Papers • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... conciliatory, or it may be insulting and calculated to invite resistance. A magazine may be dangerous in itself, for an accidental spark or an unintended friction of apparently harmless substances may cause it to explode; but, at the same time, the catastrophe may be brought on by the wilful folly of those whose duty it is to provide the necessary precautions against danger. The North has unquestionably been right in the contest on slavery, as to all the moral and economical aspects ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol 2, No 6, December 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... ambling withal for a certain time, and then of breaking into a headlong gallop—bolting free—plunging to catastrophe or liberty. Kate went her busy ways for a fortnight, somewhat chastened in spirit, secretly a little ashamed, and altogether very determined to make such a useful person of herself that she could forget her apparent lack of attractions (for she told herself mercilessly that if ...
— The Precipice • Elia Wilkinson Peattie
... favour, they would gratefully repay his care with sweet fruit. But there is yet one thing to be told, which, though it may not be regarded as germane to the mighty event of the Reformation, grew so plainly out of the signal catastrophe related in the foregoing chapter, that it were to neglect the instruction mercifully intended were I not to describe all its circumstances and particularities ...
— Ringan Gilhaize - or The Covenanters • John Galt
... behoved him to set some altered course of life before him. He could not shoot his rival or knock him over the head, nor could he carry off his girl, as used to be done in rougher times. There was nothing now for a man in such a catastrophe as this but submission. But he might submit and shake off his burden, or submit and carry it hopelessly. He told himself that he would do the latter. She had been his goddess, and he would not now worship at another shrine. And then ideas came into his head,—not ...
— The Prime Minister • Anthony Trollope
... catastrophe Kamensky met with," said Wolf. "A fine young man, and an only son. Especially the condition of the mother"—he went on repeating almost word for word the story of a duel of which all St. Petersburg was talking at the time. ...
— The Awakening - The Resurrection • Leo Nikoleyevich Tolstoy
... confirmed in the very bad opinion, which I was always apt to have, of the Intrigues of the Popish Clergy, and of the Confessors of Kings: He was undone by them, and was their Martyr, so that they ought to bear the chief load of all the errors of his inglorious Reign, and of its fatal Catastrophe. He had the Funeral which he himself had desired, private, and without any sort ...
— Characters from 17th Century Histories and Chronicles • Various
... before him, Sir John Monteith; the young chieftain whom he had parted with a few months ago at Douglas; and from whose fatal invitation to that castle he might date the ruin of his dearest happiness, and all the succeeding catastrophe! ...
— The Scottish Chiefs • Miss Jane Porter
... what had broken the friendship between Fanny and her worthless brother. I feared a catastrophe when Mr. Faringfield should learn of the occurrence at the tavern. But, thanks to the silence of us who were concerned, and to the character of the few gentlemen with whom he deigned to converse, it never came to his ears. Ned, restored to his senses, and fearing for his maintenance, made no attempt ...
— Philip Winwood • Robert Neilson Stephens
... Licinia thus blurted out was but a confirmation of what Dea had already feared. Every drop of blood within her seemed to turn to ice, horror gripped her heart, the oncoming catastrophe appeared suddenly before her, vivid, swift and inevitable. But she contrived to steady her voice and to appear ...
— "Unto Caesar" • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... the story. Often and often when we children were playing in the park did we wander about, trying to settle from which tree the arrow glanced, conjuring up before our eyes the whole scene—the king's anger and the archbishop's despair at the catastrophe—and feeling the while a proud personal interest in it all. Ah, what good days those were, roaming about knee-deep in heather, catching the rare moths, chasing the squirrels that whisked up the fir stems and mocked us from their high perch, searching the hollow trees for woodpeckers' nests, eating ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 26, August, 1880 - of Popular Literature and Science • Various
... miles outside the Golden Gate. Looking back from his pilot-boat a short time after, he saw the vessel stop, drift into the trough of the sea, careen to port, both bulwarks going under water, then suddenly capsize and sink. What was the cause of this sad catastrophe?—A want of ballast. ...
— Stories Worth Rereading • Various
... occurred between the interchanges of conversation was a comradeship and a sympathetic understanding which both the man and the girl would have found it difficult to define. Was he in love with her? He was shocked at the possibility of such a catastrophe overtaking him. Love had never come into his life. It was a hypothetical condition which he had never even considered. He had known men to fall in love, just as he had known men to suffer from malaria or yellow fever, without ...
— The Daffodil Mystery • Edgar Wallace
... her, and my heart stood still with the sense of threatening catastrophe as I realized the attitude of the pair. He, as every word showed, was still ignorant of Gwendolen's fate, consequently of the identity of the child who I had every reason to believe was at that very moment fluttering a few steps below in the care of the colored maid, whose voice I could faintly ...
— The Millionaire Baby • Anna Katharine Green
... experienced it, I had not taken the trouble to prevent it. My watchfulness became extreme. I scrupulously avoided positions which I found specially exposed me to the accident. My restlessness became so great that, at last I was able to awake before the catastrophe. When I was not in time to prevent it, I would jump out of bed, with naked feet on to the polished floor, and with crossed arms pray to the Saviour to preserve me from the wiles of the devil. I would then impose some ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 1 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... Company's war with the river and its repeated defeats Willard Holmes was forced to stand a mere observer, an idle looker-on. Foreseeing the catastrophe that was now upon them, he had prepared himself by careful study of every factor in the problem and by thorough knowledge of the situation to meet the crisis when it came. With every means at his command he had planned and worked that he might ...
— The Winning of Barbara Worth • Harold B Wright
... determination of the great ethical question as to the moral responsibility for the present crime against civilization. That must be determined by the facts as they have been developed, and the nations and individuals who are responsible for this world-wide catastrophe must be held to a strict accountability. The truth of history inexorably ...
— The Evidence in the Case • James M. Beck
... of all this speedily manifested themselves. The very next incident in the story was in some degree decisive of the catastrophe. Hitherto I have spoken only of preliminary matters, seemingly unconnected with each other, though leading to that state of mind in both parties which had such fatal effects. But all that remains is ...
— Caleb Williams - Things As They Are • William Godwin
... proclaimed that a stupendous catastrophe was at hand. Opening the Book of the Revelation of St. John he read, pondered, and interpreted. A divine illumination opened out to him the dark things that were written in the sacred pages. The unenlightened could make nothing ...
— The Coming of the Friars • Augustus Jessopp
... clans withdrawn to let the various contendents for that honor fight it out? Or—what was more probable and dangerous—had the aliens come to the point of view that the Queen was in the main responsible for the catastrophe and were engaged in preparing too warm a welcome for any Traders who dared ...
— Plague Ship • Andre Norton
... her way through the water, dipping her nose into the waves raised by a stiff southeaster, Eric thought of the suddenness of the catastrophe if the Coast Guard cutter, in the darkness, should strike one of those abandoned hulks, floating almost level with the water, and scarcely ...
— The Boy With the U. S. Life-Savers • Francis Rolt-Wheeler
... say, she is not tragic: she is too rational. And in her career there is no progression, no decline or degeneration. Her condition is once and for always. There is and will be no catastrophe. ...
— Eeldrop and Appleplex • T.S. Eliot
... reproaches to his country and to his country's government that must have passed through the mind of that devoted man during those months of unmerited desertion. In Gordon's letter of the fourteenth of December he said: "All is up. I expect the catastrophe in ten days' time; it would not have been so if our people had kept me better informed as ...
— Practical Argumentation • George K. Pattee
... temps find pleasure in playing thus with young hopes and hearts as carelessly as though they were mere tennis-balls, to be whacked about and rallied, and volleyed hither and yon, without regard to their constituent ingredients, and then when trouble comes, and a catastrophe is imminent, the refuge of "only a boy" is sought as though it really afforded a sufficient protection against "responsibility." The most of us would regard the hopeless infatuation of a young girl committed to our care, either as parents or as ...
— The Whole Family - A Novel by Twelve Authors • William Dean Howells, Mary E. Wilkins Freeman, Mary Heaton Vorse, Mary Stewart Cutting, Elizabeth Jo |
