"Harsh" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... her book, Kelly wandered back to the cab and took Clay's vacant control seat. The snow had started falling again and in the mid-morning light it tended to soften the harsh, utilitarian landscape of the broad thruway stretching ahead to infinity and spreading out in a mile of speeding traffic ...
— Code Three • Rick Raphael
... five hundred pounds. Spicer then offered Fitzgerald a release from the debt, provided he would sail with him; and he exacted as a further condition that he should not return and take a farewell of his wife. To these harsh terms Fitzgerald, being without means of liquidating the debt, consented, ...
— Poor Jack • Frederick Marryat
... the management of a dramatic scene, an episode. When it comes to rendering a piece of action Balzac's art is not particularly felicitous, and if we only became acquainted with his people while they are talking and acting, I think they might often seem rather heavy and wooden, harsh of speech and gesture. Balzac's general knowledge of them, and his power of offering an impression of what he knows—these are so great that his people are alive before they begin to act, alive with an energy ...
— The Craft of Fiction • Percy Lubbock
... paused, startled by the sound of voices. Near at hand two persons were talking. One voice, hoarse, harsh, suppressed, was that of a man. The other was ...
— Frank Merriwell's Son - A Chip Off the Old Block • Burt L. Standish
... I had undertaken for her a sacred task: to carry out her wishes regarding her son. I knew how she would have acted. It might—would—have been to her a struggle of inclination and duty; and duty would have won. And so I carried out my duty, though I tell you it was a harsh and bitter task to me at the time. But I may tell you that I have since been glad when I think of the result. I tried, as you may perhaps remember, to carry out your wishes in another way, but your letter ...
— The Lady of the Shroud • Bram Stoker
... and those of the Oratory, being what I most read, had made me half a Jansenist, and, notwithstanding all my confidence, their harsh theology sometimes alarmed me. A dread of hell, which till then I had never much apprehended, by little and little disturbed my security, and had not Madam de Warrens tranquillized my soul, would ...
— The Confessions of J. J. Rousseau, Complete • Jean Jacques Rousseau
... necessary to obtain a pension. There were the superintendents, the supervisors, the special teachers, the principals—petty officers of a petty tyranny in which too often seethed gossip, scandal, intrigue. There were the "soft places"; the deceitful, the easy, the harsh principals; the teachers' institutes to which the poor teacher was forced to pay her scanty dollars. There were bulletins, rules, counter-rules. As she talked, Sommers caught the atmosphere of the great engine ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick
... with all I can, O my son." But when the Maghrabi saw that Alaeddin kept silence and made him no reply, he knew that the lad wanted none other occupation than a scapegrace-life, so he said to him, "O son of my brother, let not my words seem hard and harsh to thee, for, if despite all I say, thou still dislike to learn a craft, I will open thee a merchant's store[FN78] furnished with costliest stuffs and thou shalt become famous amongst the folk and take and give and buy and ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton
... other man who has ever lived; and as God makes the wrath of man to praise him, and restrains the remainder, so he raised up Luther as an instrument adapted to his age and the circumstances of the times. But Luther's character in some of its features was harsh, rugged, and unlovely; and in these it was not founded ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 121, November, 1867 • Various
... I hear it now—wild voices in the night, A rush of feet, a dog's harsh bark, a torch's flaring light, And wandering gusts of dampness, and round us far and nigh, A throbbing boom of water like a ...
— Poems Teachers Ask For • Various
... voice was growing fainter and hoarser while she was drifting along the line of the Mohawk Valley. She turned south, following the Hudson at no great height. Sometimes she appeared to be choking, the labored inhalations harsh and prolonged, ...
— The Good Neighbors • Edgar Pangborn
... rightly, Sir," said Mr Milton. "This nation is not given over to slavery and vice. We tasted indeed the fruits of liberty before they had well ripened. Their flavour was harsh and bitter; and we turned from them with loathing to the sweeter poisons of servitude. This is but for a time. England is sleeping on the lap of Dalilah, traitorously chained, but not yet shorn of strength. Let the cry be once heard—the Philistines be upon thee; and at once that sleep ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 1 (of 4) - Contibutions to Knight's Quarterly Magazine] • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... perhaps, a secret communication. The upper part of the wall is gone, but what remains is about ten feet high and nine feet thick. Swallows build their nests in the roof of the cavern, and the spot is noisy with the harsh cries of countless jackdaws. These sagacious birds can doubtless tell many stories of the English which they ...
— Wanderings by southern waters, eastern Aquitaine • Edward Harrison Barker
... concluded to stop there and ask his way. As he approached the cellar, he heard what seemed to be cries of distress. They grew more distinct, and accompanying them were the dull sounds of blows and the harsh accents of a man's ...
— Tin-Types Taken in the Streets of New York • Lemuel Ely Quigg
... ought to get up and go out, but he could not bring himself to do so. His self-love, his very physical strength, rebelled against so tame a surrender. One thought he gathered in from swaying vacuity—that the timid little creature whom he had patronized would not find the harsh courage to refuse him point-blank if he charged her straightly with the question, and ...
— Mary, Mary • James Stephens
... several chambers, decorated with much cost and barbarous splendour. The wainscot of one of the principal saloons is inlaid with mother-of-pearl, ebony, coral, and ivory; but the workmanship seems harsh and ungraceful. The ceiling is plastered with massive gilding, the effect of which is rather cumbrous than ornamental; "not graced with elegancy, but daubed with cost." Pillars, of a composition to resemble the richest ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, Issue 267, August 4, 1827 • Various
... estimable women, without acknowledging how harsh and unjust are often the sweeping censures pronounced on those who are termed old maids?—a class in whose breasts the affections instinct in woman, not being exercised by conjugal or maternal ties, expand into some other channel; and, if denied some dear object on which ...
— The Idler in France • Marguerite Gardiner
... was unbounded. Of all the masters, Mr Forder was the one he would least have chosen to take up an affair of this kind. He was harsh, unsympathetic, hasty. And of all persons to prime the master in the circumstances of the case, Dangle was the ...
— The Cock-House at Fellsgarth • Talbot Baines Reed
... Carlo. And Mary knew that she was stared at and talked about, and liked it as a child likes to be looked at when walking out with a splendid new doll. She had no idea that any one could say unkind things of her, or that there was anything in her conduct to call for harsh comments. It was so delightful to be winning every day at roulette, and spending the easily gained money in amusing ways, that Mary thought every one who came near her must be almost as much pleased with ...
— The Guests Of Hercules • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... Quade's voice was harsh, deep, and quivering. "I want this woman. I may be a fool, but I'm going to have her. I might get her alone, but we've always done things together—an' so I made you that proposition. It ain't a hard job. It's one of the easiest ...
— The Hunted Woman • James Oliver Curwood
... more luxuriously in her chair, then started forward, as the door opened with a bang, and a harsh ...
— The Fortunes of the Farrells • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... was nine o'clock in the morning, April 19th—the harsh sounds from a "condou's" horn (a kind of ruminating animal among the African deer) burst forth, and the drum was heard. The halt was going ...
— Dick Sand - A Captain at Fifteen • Jules Verne
... the Bishop in a complexity of appeal. The soft speech of Wenceslas, so full of a double entendu, so markedly in contrast with the Bishop's harsh but at least sincere tirade, left no doubt in his mind that he was now the victim of a plot, whose ramifications extended back to the confused circumstances of his early life, and the doubtful purposes of his uncle and his influence upon the sacerdotal directors in Rome. And he saw himself ...
— Carmen Ariza • Charles Francis Stocking
... I wish to recall the image of him such as he appeared in past years; now, how has the baneful use of opium thrown a dark cloud over you and your prospects! I would not say any thing needlessly harsh or unkind, but I must be faithful. It is the irresistible voice of conscience. Others may still flatter you, and hang upon your words, but I have another, though a less gracious duty to perform. I see a brother sinning a sin unto death, ...
— The Opium Habit • Horace B. Day
... upon, he swore he would lock her in the tower until she consented to their espousal. Then he thought of Janet's words as he left her but a short time before: "I would vouch for her innocence with my life! Be not harsh with her, my lord!" and he ground his teeth in rage for his espionage of her. Then he thought of the king and what if she came under his eye,—"Ah, 'sdeath! 'twould make me mad!" and he laid spur to his horse and galloped on with hot curses in ...
— Mistress Penwick • Dutton Payne
... these connections. Moreover, he is a constant attendant upon the sessions of the Senate, and one of the most alert of its members. Apparently, often, he is impulsive and explosive, and occasionally under the excitement of debate says what seems to be a harsh thing. If, however, his manner is indicative of feeling, such a feeling, like a passing summer cloud, is soon dissipated, and almost immediately gives way to the sunshine of his really genial and lovable nature. Senator Gallinger as a member of the House and Senate has given the American ...
— Fifty Years of Public Service • Shelby M. Cullom
... defeated, though it took him longer to rise this time than before. He was wary, too, and plainly disliked the idea of coming in contact with those sturdy arms of Hugh Morgan. Seeing that Nick did not mean to attack him, but had commenced to say harsh things in the endeavor to force his rival to assume the aggressive, in hopes that the advantage would fall to his share, Hugh lost ...
— The Chums of Scranton High - Hugh Morgan's Uphill Fight • Donald Ferguson
... a very happy, very placid expression on her face. Every harsh line seemed softened, and a pleased smile played about her lips. Her dress was one of those simple, fresh, clean muslin gowns, with knots of ribbon about it, which make a plain woman almost pretty, and a pretty woman bewitching. Her dark hair looked less prim ...
— The Doctor's Dilemma • Hesba Stretton
... water-spirits on the banks of two rivers, at the same hour, and that afterwards the question of her lying-in would be resolved. The oracle added that I must perform three expiatory sacrifices to Saturn, on account of my too harsh treatment of the false Querilinthos, and that Semiramis need not take part in these ceremonies, though she herself must perform the ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... they would allow its adoption. In 1577 the German government officially prohibited the use of indigo, denouncing it as that pernicious, deceitful and corrosive substance, the Devil's dye. It had, indeed, a worse fate in England, where hard names were supplemented by harsh acts, for in 1581 it was not only pronounced anathema maranatha by act of Parliament, but the people were authorized to institute search for it in their neighbors' dye-houses, and were empowered to destroy it wherever found. Not more than two hundred years have passed ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, April, 1876. • Various
... shoulder and narrowly missed pinning him to the earth; Fangs fled howling from the presence of the enraged [v]thane. Gurth's heart swelled within him, for he felt this attempted slaughter of his faithful beast in a degree much deeper than the harsh treatment he had himself received. Having in vain raised his hand to his eyes, he said to Wamba, the jester, who, seeing his master's ill humor, had prudently retreated to the rear, "I pray thee, do me the kindness to wipe my eyes with the skirt of thy mantle; the dust offends ...
— The Literary World Seventh Reader • Various
... vanished, and Dulaq found himself standing on an immense and totally barren plain. Not a tree, not a blade of grass; nothing but bare, rocky ground stretching in all directions to the horizon and disturbingly harsh yellow sky. He looked down and at his feet saw the weapon ...
— The Dueling Machine • Benjamin William Bova
... not be at all displeasing, is proved by many of the old Scotch tunes, which are built on the same system. An excellent illustration of its rhythmic structure, frequent iterations, and melodic character may be found in our own familiar tune, "There is a happy land, far, far away." The harsh quality that Europeans often find in Chinese performances is undoubtedly not a necessary adjunct, as the same criticism may be made upon many of our own ...
— Woman's Work in Music • Arthur Elson
... considered Winslow an unattractive man, of a harsh visage, but now, as he looked at his little son, she ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume VI. (of X.) • Various
... continued, not waiting for his reply, "that you will not quarrel with my father. He is the best father in the world. My mother died when I was a child, and since then he has been father and mother and the whole world to me. I could never forgive myself if you exchanged a harsh word ...
— Southern Lights and Shadows • Edited by William Dean Howells & Henry Mills Alden
... Sir, I must leave it (so seems it to be destined) to your justice, to treat me as you shall think I deserve: but, if your future behaviour to them is not governed by that harsh-sounding implacableness, which you charge upon some of their tempers, the splendour of your family, and the excellent character of some of them (of all indeed, unless your own conscience furnishes you with one only exception) will, on better consideration, do every thing with them: ...
— Clarissa, Volume 4 (of 9) - History Of A Young Lady • Samuel Richardson
... vapours was the man {179d} accustomed to armies, High minded, bitter handed leader of the forces; {179e} He was expert, and ardent, and stately, Though at the social banquet he was not harsh. {180a} They {180b} removed and possessed his valuable treasures, And not the image of a thing for the benefit of the region ...
— Y Gododin - A Poem on the Battle of Cattraeth • Aneurin
... superstition call us the hardest names they can think of, and they keep doing it all the time; very well, if they like to descend to that level, let them do it, but I will not so undignify myself as to follow them. I cannot call them harsh names; the most I can do is to indicate them by terms reflecting my disapproval; and this ...
— Is Shakespeare Dead? - from my Autobiography • Mark Twain
... mother had gone off shopping to buy linen for the house at Cushendhu, poplin for dresses, delft from Holland for the kitchen and glass from Waterford for the sideboard in the dining-room. And because he was to go to the boarding-school that night and thereafter would be harsh discipline, and because his Uncle Robin had known he was on the point of crying, he had been allowed to wander around Belfast by himself for a few hours with a silver shilling in his pocket. And wee Shane ...
— The Wind Bloweth • Brian Oswald Donn-Byrne
... (Aside.) She doesn't know how she flicked me on the raw. (Aloud, bending over chair.) I didn't mean to be harsh, dear—I didn't really. You can stay here as long as you please, and do what you please. Don't cry like that. You'll make yourself sick. (Aside.) What on earth has come over her? (Aloud.) Darling, what's the ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... sound of approaching footsteps upon the shell path leading to the back of the house, and by the harsh voice of ...
— Prisoners of Hope - A Tale of Colonial Virginia • Mary Johnston
... stars, whose mirth The saddest soul on earth That ever soared and sang found strong to bless, Lightening his life's harsh load of heaviness With comfort sown like seed In dream though not in deed On sprinkled wastes of darkling thought divine, Let all your lights now shine With all as glorious gladness on his eyes For whom indeed and not ...
— Studies in Song • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... Is there no significance in putting on record that your first impression was to a certain effect and your next to a certain other, perhaps completely opposite one? If any proceeding of yours could go near to deserve that harsh word 'impertinent' which you have twice, in speech and writing, been pleased to apply to your observations on me; certainly this does go as near as can be—as there is but one step to take from Southampton pier to New York quay, for travellers Westward. Now will you lay this ...
— The Letters of Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett, Vol. 1 (of 2) 1845-1846 • Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett
... smoke. The snake's head, however (which was the only one now left), was twice as fierce and venomous as ever before. It belched forth shoots of fire five hundred yards long, and emitted hisses so loud, so harsh, and so ear-piercing, that King Iobates heard them, fifty miles off, and trembled till the ...
— My First Cruise - and Other stories • W.H.G. Kingston
... although they are neither harsh nor hard in manner, nor yet unloving in nature, the habitual first impulse seems to be to refuse: they appear to have a singular obtuseness to the fact that it is, or can be, of any consequence to a child whether it does or ...
— Bits About Home Matters • Helen Hunt Jackson
... he bleeds, an eagle in high skies, Has earth beneath his wings: from reddened eve He views the rosy dawn. In vain they weave The fatal web below while far he flies. But when the arrow strikes him, there's a change. He moves but in the track of his spent pain, Whose red drops are the links of a harsh chain, Binding him to the ground, with narrow range. A subtle serpent then has Love become. I had the eagle in my bosom erst: Henceforward with the serpent I am cursed. I can interpret where the mouth is dumb. Speak, and I see the ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... pretended to get his living like the other fishermen in the neighbourhood; but he was often idle for a week at a time, and still more often, absent. I have seen him count over gold and jewels with old Andrinetta on his return from some expedition. To me he was harsh and cruel. I hated him, and he knew that I hated him. He ordered me to call him father, and I was more than once savagely beaten by him because I refused to do so. Under such treatment, in such a wretched home, deprived ...
— Run to Earth - A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... roadway dart the snake, Frightening, like arrow loosed from string, The horses. I, for friendship's sake, Watching each wing, Ere to his haunt, the stagnant marsh, The harbinger of tempest flies, Will call the raven, croaking harsh, From eastern skies. Farewell!—and wheresoe'er you go, My Galatea, think of me: Let lefthand pie and roving crow Still leave you free. But mark with what a front of fear Orion lowers. Ah! well I know How Hadria glooms, ...
— Odes and Carmen Saeculare of Horace • Horace
... took hours of time, and meanwhile, only half revived, Nanette had been gently, pityingly borne away to a sorrowing woman's home, for at last it was found, through the thick and lustrous hair, that she, too, had been struck a harsh and cruel blow; that one reason, probably, why she had been able to oppose no stouter resistance to so slender a girl as Esther Dade was that she was already half dazed through the stroke of some blunt, heavy weapon, wielded probably by him she ...
— A Daughter of the Sioux - A Tale of the Indian frontier • Charles King
... the villagers, but at the same time a source of added income. It meant money for them, for it afforded a constant and ever-open market for their farm products and the output of their home industry. But every now and then a scream or a harsh laugh would ring out from behind those barred windows, and those in the village who could hear, would shiver and cross themselves. Shepherd Janci had little fear of the big house. His little hut cowered close by the high iron gates, and ...
— The Case of The Pool of Blood in the Pastor's Study • Grace Isabel Colbron and Augusta Groner
... relaxed a little from the stretching strain. And, meanwhile, as she sat watching the face on the pillow, grieving for the waning life, now and then she raised her eyes to the other face on the opposite side of the bed, and told herself that Fate, harsh as it was, was yet not altogether unpitying. Although wounded and worn and sick at heart, Weldon was ...
— On the Firing Line • Anna Chapin Ray and Hamilton Brock Fuller
... and mulattoes that Louis XIV issued his celebrated Code Noir, which was notable in compelling bachelor masters, fathers of slave children, to marry their concubines. Children followed the condition of the mother as to slavery or freedom; they could have no property; harsh punishments were provided for, but families could not be separated by sale except in the case of grown children; emancipation with full civil rights was made possible for any slave twenty years of age or more. When Louisiana was ...
— The Negro • W.E.B. Du Bois
... in an attitude of sullen resignation, holding the straining sail by a stout rope twisted round his arm. Neither of them spoke a word till within a short distance of the beach, when the man at the look-out arose, tall and gaunt, and stretched out his hands to the inhospitable-looking coast with a harsh, exulting laugh. ...
— Madame Midas • Fergus Hume
... exulting in his new-found faculties, he is walking yonder among the multitude, carrying upon his shoulders the couch which has so long borne his weary, helpless frame. See, one with frowning countenance and harsh words arrests his steps, and wholly unmindful of the joy which lights his pale face, reproves him with severe and bitter words: "It is the Sabbath day. It is not lawful for thee to carry thy bed." The command indeed is, "Thus saith the Lord, take heed ...
— Mrs Whittelsey's Magazine for Mothers and Daughters - Volume 3 • Various
... if you be an Irish Protestant, and entertain harsh prejudices against your Catholic countrymen, study the works and life of Grattan—learn from him—for none can teach you better how to purify your nature from bigotry. Learn from him to look upon all your countrymen ...
— Thomas Davis, Selections from his Prose and Poetry • Thomas Davis
... were an enemy. You had betrayed the trust of one of our members. The prompt delivery of that packet meant the salvation of thousands of lives. It meant a cessation of this ghastly world tragedy. We were harsh, perhaps, but we ...
— The Devil's Paw • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... stories which are told of him turn upon this point in his character; and though they may not be strictly true, they illustrate the stern virtues for which he was celebrated among the Corsicans, and show what kind of men this harsh and gloomy nation loved to celebrate as heroes. This is not the place either to criticise these legends or to recount them at full length. The most famous and the most characteristic may, however, be briefly told. On one ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece • John Addington Symonds
... rude grasp from somewhere is laid upon me, pressing upon my face. Instantly the air grows gloomy, gray, and the ocean rocks menacingly, while the great bells grow harsh and strident, as they hint of a dark fate. I clasp my hands appealingly to the heavens; I moan and struggle with the unknown grasp; then there is peace and the sweet ...
— Violets and Other Tales • Alice Ruth Moore
... was arrested, Peter was taken to the orphan asylum, and there was another "Old Man," and the same harsh lesson of subservience to be learned. Peter had run away from the asylum; and then had come Pericles Priam with his Pain Paralyzer, and Peter had studied his whims and served his interests. When Pericles had ...
— 100%: The Story of a Patriot • Upton Sinclair
... face of Trenchard; he was not asleep, but was leaning on his elbow staring in front of him. I could see the old woman with her red handkerchief kneeling in front of her lamp and her prayer came like the turning of a wheel, harsh and incessant. The cradle creaked, in the air was the heavy smell, and suddenly, beyond the window, a cock crowed. These things were real. But also I seemed to be in some place much vaster than the stuffy kitchen of the night before. ...
— The Dark Forest • Hugh Walpole
... of a very solid wood. Philosophic formulas are sometimes the envelope, the outside shell, as it were, of knowledge; but it may also happen that they only show empty ideas, and contain no other substance than their own harsh terminology. To demonstrate the rose by the ferule may seem a very scientific proceeding to vulgar pedants; for my part it is not to my taste; and without being unjust to the rare qualities of Raff's talent, which I have long truly appreciated, ...
— Letters of Franz Liszt, Volume 1, "From Paris to Rome: - Years of Travel as a Virtuoso" • Franz Liszt; Letters assembled by La Mara and translated
... but not before lunch," he said, quietly. His voice and manner were those of an educated man. The quality of his tone was slightly harsh. ...
— The Girl in the Mirror • Elizabeth Garver Jordan
... woman and her husband replied by a deprecating gesture of horror which caused the unknown lady to blush, either for her harsh suspicion or from the relief of ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 3 • Various
... in. He stood by the doorway, looking at her and smiling. "Why this harsh treatment?" he said. ...
— Mary Olivier: A Life • May Sinclair
... him? Is this delicate enough for my baby's body? Nothing harsh shall touch my darling; he must have the best, and the best is not good enough for him. We will buy the most beautiful things in ...
— Married Life - The True Romance • May Edginton
... should not be severely censured for having done no more than to kill his nephew. Men of large and charitable minds will take all the circumstances of John's case into the account, and not allow their judgment of his conduct to be harsh. What better can a man ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XI., February, 1863, No. LXIV. • Various
... Joan? were they let into the secret?" asked Adam; and the sound of his harsh voice grated even on Zebedee's ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 26, October, 1880 • Various
... the disappearance of the subcutaneous fat, the skin is smooth and thin, and may be abnormally dry. The hair is harsh, dry, and easily shed. The nails become brittle and furrowed, or thick and curved, and the ends of the fingers become club-shaped. Skin eruptions, especially in the form of blisters, occur, or there may be actual ulcers of the skin, especially ...
— Manual of Surgery - Volume First: General Surgery. Sixth Edition. • Alexis Thomson and Alexander Miles
... these, above name and out of definition, the halo of saintship, the glory of genius, the crown of heroism. Of such a man, one's eyes might be filled, and one might say, 'Let him not speak, lest some harsh tone or imperfect speech should pierce the vision with sharp discord, as a rude and sudden sound ends a soft dream.' Yet he was a man who, when he raised his hand to lead, led millions like children; ...
— Via Crucis • F. Marion Crawford
... agriculture the Negro has always held, and is yet holding, an important place; in fact, far more, as a rule, than has been accredited to him. Lest our judgment be too harsh in this particular, I have thought it wise to briefly scan the beginning and development of agriculture in the United States. In 1492 the first settlers found the Indians carrying on agriculture in a crude and limited way, by the women; ...
— Twentieth Century Negro Literature - Or, A Cyclopedia of Thought on the Vital Topics Relating - to the American Negro • Various
... trembled as the song came to an end, and Christine, with a swift, impulsive movement, put her elbows on the keys of the piano, making a harsh discord of sound, and dropped her face in her hands. She remained so, without moving, for several minutes, while Noel, thrilling in all his senses to the power of that subtly sweet song, kept also profoundly still. He felt it was his ...
— A Beautiful Alien • Julia Magruder
... a hoarse, harsh voice, with more growls and snarls. "I smell straw, and I'm a Hip-po-gy-raf who loves straw and eats all he can find. I want to eat this straw! Where ...
— The Tin Woodman of Oz • L. Frank Baum
... the fairest of all I ever knew." When he had delivered his message, the Queen, who was kind and sensible, said to him courteously: "Friend, since thou hast thrown thyself upon my mercy, thy confinement shall be less harsh; for I have no desire to seek thy harm. But tell me now, so help thee God, what is thy name?" And he replies: "Lady, my name is Yder, son of Nut." And they knew that he told the truth. Then the Queen arose, and going before the King, ...
— Four Arthurian Romances - "Erec et Enide", "Cliges", "Yvain", and "Lancelot" • Chretien de Troyes
... silence was broken by a loud and terrified cry, followed by a harsh laugh. Then there was a rush of feet towards the door, and, jumping to the ground, I groped for the tinder-box and procured a light. Running to the landing and holding up the candle, I was just in time to behold a most ...
— My Sword's My Fortune - A Story of Old France • Herbert Hayens
... this book is not better than its substantial merits deserve. The style is generally clumsy, often obscure, and not unseldom harsh and inflated. Take an instance or two, picked out absolutely at random.—"The disaffected, who held throughout the contest the seaboard of the State in abeyance, driven forth, would have felt in their wanderings there would be no parley with them." p. l27. Again, "It became the policy ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 4, February, 1858 • Various
... for a few moments. Then James spoke. But it was not the voice of James. It was not that cheery and hearty voice which had just been filling the shop with mirth. It was a voice harsh, forced, mechanical,—the voice of a man ...
— By The Sea - 1887 • Heman White Chaplin
... and, according to tradition, while the members of the Assembly stood around the table taking a farewell look at the charter, one of the largest members of the house fell on the governor's breast and wept so copiously on his shirt-frill that harsh words were used by his Excellency; a general quarrel ensued, the lights went out, and when they were relighted ...
— Comic History of the United States • Bill Nye
... great authority on Japan, quotes some of these instances, and they seem to us rather absurd. He says: "One of the paragons had a cruel stepmother who was very fond of fish. Never grumbling at her harsh treatment of him, he lay down naked on the frozen surface of the lake. The warmth of his body melted a hole in the ice, at which two carp came up to breathe. These he caught and set before his stepmother. Another paragon, though of tender years and having ...
— Peeps at Many Lands: Japan • John Finnemore
... with heartfelt gratitude I pay this slight tribute to your memory. But for your gentle love and kind teachings, I might have become as cold and tyrannical as your harsh lord—as selfish and ...
— The Monctons: A Novel, Volume I • Susanna Moodie
... then, he did not know that he conquered. He still believed, as he turned at last and faced his friend, that his mind was yet to make up, and his whisper was harsh and broken. ...
— Come Rack! Come Rope! • Robert Hugh Benson
... having left the Essington as Forbes was being brought on board. Forbes afterwards retired to Williamstown, Victoria, where he spent the rest of his life as a fisherman, and it is said that he never quite recovered from the effects of his harsh bondage. ...
— The Logbooks of the Lady Nelson - With The Journal Of Her First Commander Lieutenant James Grant, R.N • Ida Lee
... to the surprise and terror of the Curlytops, a strange voice, somewhere downstairs in their house, exclaimed in a harsh whisper: ...
— The Curlytops and Their Pets - or Uncle Toby's Strange Collection • Howard R. Garis
... though the Jew blocked the whole Breadth of the lane, slow-hobbling. So they went, That ancient first; and in soft discontent, After him Ali—noting how the sun Flared nigh, and fearing prayer might be begun; Yet no command upraising, no harsh cry To stand aside;—because the dignity Of silver hairs is much, and morning praise Was precious to the Jew, too. Thus their ways Wended the pair; Great Ali, sad and slow, Following the greybeard, while the East, a-glow, Blazed with bright spears of gold athwart the blue, And the Muezzin's ...
— Indian Poetry • Edwin Arnold
... this small grave were her fragile bones to rest for twenty-four months under three feet of Christian law. Interest tempered the fright which Romulus and Moses felt when from the forward carriage came the sound of rasping oboes, belly-less fiddles, brazen tom-toms, and harsh cymbals, playing a dirge for little Wang Tai; playing less for godly protection of her tiny soul than for its exemption from the ...
— The Ape, the Idiot & Other People • W. C. Morrow
... moon-tide horrors hung, And night's dark pencil dim'd the tints of spring; The boding minstrel now harsh omens sung, And the bat ...
— Poetic Sketches • Thomas Gent
... motion; for the first time she conceived a fear of her husband. Presently she heard a harsh female voice in the hall, and then a joyous exclamation from Poole himself. Recovered by these unexpected sounds, she went mechanically forth into the passage, just in time to see the hems of a dark-grey ...
— What Will He Do With It, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... instant Josephine's hand fluttered to his own, and held it back, and the dark glow of her eyes said: "Don't kill." Here there were no big-eyed moose-birds, none of the mellow throat sounds of the brush sparrow, no harsh janglings of the gaudily coloured jays. In the timber fell the soft footpads of creatures with claw and fang, marauders and outlaws of darkness. Light, sunshine, everything that loved the openness of day were beyond. For more than an hour they had driven their canoes steadily on, when, ...
— God's Country—And the Woman • James Oliver Curwood
... This, however harsh it may appear, and however inconsistent with that delicacy with which the debates of this august assembly have generally been carried on, must surely be pardoned on this occasion, if for no other reason, at least for this, that it is not easy to forbear ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, Vol. 11. - Parlimentary Debates II. • Samuel Johnson
... fool!" the Directeur bellowed furiously—and the Surveillant remarked pacifyingly: "He loves his comrade too much, that's all."—"But his comrade is a traitor and a villain!" objected the Fiend, at the top of his harsh voice—"Comprenez-vous; votre ami est UN SALOP!" he snarled ...
— The Enormous Room • Edward Estlin Cummings
... good deal more than that to kill a fifteen-year-old princess," said Trannel, and he gave a harsh laugh. "She married Saxe- Wolfenhutten." Boyne was silent. "Now, I don't want you to speak of this till after I leave Scheveningen—especially to Miss Lottie. You know how girls are, and I think Miss Lottie is waiting to get a bind on me, anyway. If she heard how I was cut out of my chance with ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... demeanor, though devoid of all prudery, and of the obscene abuse, so frequently heard from the lips of common women in Bengal, they appear to have no knowledge. They are delicately sensitive under harsh language of any kind, and never use it to others; and since their adoption of clothing they are careful to drape themselves decently, as well as gracefully; but they throw all this aside during the magh feast. Their nature appears to undergo a temporary change. ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 1 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... Nature of the Thing it self, why it should be in far higher Esteem than any other. The Passion it has to struggle with, is the most violent and stubborn, and consequently the hardest to be conquer'd, the Fear of Death: The least Conflict with it is harsh Work, and a difficult Task; and it is in Regard to this, that Cicero, in his Offices, calls Modesty, Justice and Temperance, the softer and easier Virtues. Qui virtutibus bis lenioribus erit ornatus, modestia, justitia temperantia, &c. Justice and Temperance require Professors as grave ...
— An Enquiry into the Origin of Honour, and the Usefulness of Christianity in War • Bernard Mandeville
... proved rainy and rough; the toil was certain, the reward unsure; when to his sorrow, the laird of Doonholm—a generous Ferguson,—died: the strict terms of the lease, as well as the rent, were exacted by a harsh factor, and with his wife and children, he was obliged, after a losing struggle of six years, to relinquish the farm, and seek shelter on the grounds of Lochlea, some ten miles off, in the parish of Tarbolton. When, in after-days, men's characters were in the hands of his eldest son, the ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham
... to Scythia's stormy shore The drum's harsh music, and the cannon's roar; Let grim Bellona haunt the lawless plain, Where Tartar clans, and grizly Cossacks reign; Let the steel'd Turk be deaf to Matrons cries, See virgins ravish'd, with relentless eyes, To death, ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753),Vol. V. • Theophilus Cibber
... Montagu, on the trial of Lewis, was represented as harsh and captious; but was explained by subsequent disclosures. A clever barrister, who secretly advised the accused and framed his defence, went into the judge's room, before the sitting of the court, and in conversing with Montagu intimated the very ...
— The History of Tasmania, Volume I (of 2) • John West
... his parents and sole heir to the kingdom, should learn to obey. She had coolly informed her godson, moreover, that if he did not obey her willingly, it would certainly be the worse for him; since learn he must, by harsh means, if no others ...
— Prince Vance - The Story of a Prince with a Court in His Box • Eleanor Putnam
... not extend to ourselves the forbearance due to erring humanity. This puts us too much on a level with the rest—is that not often the reason of our harsh self-judgments?" ...
— The Daughters of Danaus • Mona Caird
... Jukes, raising a weary, discouraged voice above the harsh buzz of the Nan-Shan's friction winches. All of them were hard at work, snatching slings of cargo, high up, to the end of long derricks, only, as it seemed, to let them rip down recklessly by the run. The cargo chains groaned in the gins, ...
— Typhoon • Joseph Conrad
... of the mere She glides on slanting skate; She loves in fairy curves to veer And weave her figure eight. Bright flower in fur, I would thy feet Could weave my heart and thine, my sweet, Thus into one glad life complete! Harsh winter, rage thy rudest: Freeze, freeze, thou churlish sky; Blow, arctic wind, thy shrewdest— What ...
— The Idler, Volume III., Issue XIII., February 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly. Edited By Jerome K. Jerome & Robert Barr • Various
... ex-Minister of Finance. He gives a vivid picture of the life of the different classes of priests and monks, and the corrupt state of the Tibetan hierarchy. He describes the rudimentary system of education, the harsh and haphazard administration, the brutality of punishments, the system of espionage, the free position of women and the practice of polyandry, the filthy personal habits of the people, their superstitions, their occupations, their festivals. I do not dwell upon ...
— Personality in Literature • Rolfe Arnold Scott-James
... her eyes was becoming quite red, and she raised her hand to strike me. I stepped back quickly behind my chair. Madame Deslois bumped into the chair and knocked it over, and caught at the table so as not to fall down. Her harsh voice terrified me. I wanted to leave the linen-room, but M. Alphonse had placed himself in front of the door, and I came back into the room and faced Madame Deslois across the table. She began to speak again in a strangled sort ...
— Marie Claire • Marguerite Audoux
... fit in with the exquisite melodies of the later Victorian age. But Mr. Hardy, with characteristic pertinacity, did not attempt to alter his utterance in the least, and now we can all perceive, if we take the trouble to do so, that what seemed harsh in his poetry was his peculiar and personal mode of interpreting ...
— Some Diversions of a Man of Letters • Edmund William Gosse
... sounded suddenly harsh. "Yes, indeed, we will find him!" she cried. "We will find him and bring him back—" she stopped suddenly. "We will speak of that later. And now that my clothes are dry you can help me put them on, and if you have any grub left in your pack let's ...
— The Gun-Brand • James B. Hendryx
... seven or eight years later; and by that time Charity had taken the measure of most things about her. She knew that Mrs. Royall was sad and timid and weak; she knew that lawyer Royall was harsh and violent, and still weaker. She knew that she had been christened Charity (in the white church at the other end of the village) to commemorate Mr. Royall's disinterestedness in "bringing her down," and to keep ...
— Summer • Edith Wharton
... wall-surfaces, since the four walls stand for the atmosphere of a room. Tone means quality of colour. It may be light or dark, or of any tint, or variations of tint, but the quality of it must be soft and charitable, instead of harsh and uncompromising. ...
— Principles of Home Decoration - With Practical Examples • Candace Wheeler
... in some Latin writer—the story of a man who was crushed to a jelly by the mere repeated touch of many thousand hands. His murderers were not harsh, but an infinite repetition of the gentlest handling meant death. I do not suppose that I was very brutally manhandled in the cave. I was trussed up tight and carried out to the open, and left in the care of the guards. But ...
— Prester John • John Buchan
... pressure of heavier wrongs than those threatened ones which brought on the Revolution. James II, the bigoted successor of Charles the Voluptuous, had annulled the charters of all the colonies, and sent a harsh and unprincipled soldier to take away our liberites and endanger our religion. The administration of Sir Edmund Andros lacked scarcely a single characteristic of tyranny: a Governor and Council, holding office from the King, and wholly independent of the ...
— Legends That Every Child Should Know • Hamilton Wright Mabie
... severe and ugly countenance, especially for such little boys or big men as were inclined to be idle; his voice, too, was harsh; and all his ways and customs seemed very disagreeable to our friend Daffydowndilly. The whole day long this terrible schoolmaster sat at his desk overlooking the scholars, or stalked about the school-room with a certain awful birch ...
— The Ontario Readers - Third Book • Ontario Ministry of Education
... quote here a passage from a letter of November, 1863. It was written to a friend who had lost his child: "How well I remember your feeling, when we lost Annie. It was my greatest comfort that I had never spoken a harsh word to her. Your grief has made me shed a few tears over our poor darling; but believe me that these tears have lost that unutterable bitterness of former days.") which the loss of our poor dear Annie ...
— The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, Volume II • Francis Darwin
... The harsh and swarthy face relaxed. With, a little sigh the Duc de Puysange had closed his fevered eyes. About them were a multitude of tiny lines, and of this fact he was obscurely conscious, in a wearied fashion, when he ...
— Gallantry - Dizain des Fetes Galantes • James Branch Cabell
... meet the Black and White Creeping-Warbler, whose fine strain reminds me of hair-wire. It is unquestionably the finest bird-song to be heard. Few insect strains will compare with it in this respect; while it has none of the harsh, brassy character of the latter, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 104, June, 1866 • Various
... white top-boots. The steed which carried him was of iron gray, spirited and powerful, but covered with sweat and foam. The fellow glanced fiercely and suspiciously around, and said something to the man of the tent in a harsh and rapid voice. A short and hurried conversation ensued in the strange tongue. I could not take my eyes off this new-comer. Oh, that half-jockey, half-bruiser countenance, I never forgot it! More than fifteen years afterwards ...
— Lavengro - The Scholar, The Gypsy, The Priest • George Borrow
... harsh laugh. "I should never dream of asking for any man's confession. They are all alike. And I must tell you. I cannot leave you to hear it ...
— Black Oxen • Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton
... by such harsh reflections on his friend Perry, to whom he had in fact, though unconsciously, been attributing many of his own feelings and expressions; but the soothing attentions of his daughters gradually removed the present evil, and the immediate alertness of one brother, and better ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 3 • Various
... difficulty driven by the sexton from the church ground; on the following day he was again observed lying on the grave of his master, and was a second time expelled from the premises. Notwithstanding the harsh treatment received on several succeeding days by the hands of the sexton, this little creature would persist in occupying this position, and overcame every difficulty to gain access to the spot where all he held most dear was deposited. The minister of the parish, learning the ...
— The Dog - A nineteenth-century dog-lovers' manual, - a combination of the essential and the esoteric. • William Youatt
... that in which natural thoughts are expressed without violence to the language. The discriminating character of ease consists principally in the diction; for all true poetry requires that the sentiments be natural. Language suffers violence by harsh or by daring figures, by transposition, by unusual acceptations of words, and by any licence, which would be avoided by a writer of prose. Where any artifice appears in the construction of the verse, that verse is no longer easy. Any epithet ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson in Nine Volumes - Volume IV: The Adventurer; The Idler • Samuel Johnson
... or external annoyances that compel the sufferer to seek medical advice and aid, and he learns that the troubles complained of are only symptoms of a chronic disease, therefore easily removed without harsh treatment while the cause ...
— Intestinal Ills • Alcinous Burton Jamison
... snow which fell, intolerably stern. I turned away. I could not see that box lowered into the merciless soil. My mother's spirit was not there—I knew that—and yet I could not bear to think of those tender lips, those loving hands going into the dark. It was a harsh bed for one ...
— A Daughter of the Middle Border • Hamlin Garland
... Masters have the following graphic entry under the year 1236: "Heavy rains, harsh weather, and much war prevailed in this year." The Annals of Kilronan also give a fearful account of the wars, the weather, and the crimes. They mention that Brian's people burned the church of Imlagh Brochada over the heads of O'Flynn's people, while it was full of women, children, ...
— An Illustrated History of Ireland from AD 400 to 1800 • Mary Frances Cusack
... deep, in flood, with clear water, as indeed are all the rivulets now; they can only be crossed by felling a tree on the bant and letting it fall across. They do not abrade their banks—vegetation protects them. I observed that the brown ibis, a noisy bird, took care to restrain his loud, harsh voice when driven from the tree in which his nest was placed, and when about a quarter of a mile off, then commenced ...
— The Last Journals of David Livingstone, in Central Africa, from 1865 to His Death, Volume I (of 2), 1866-1868 • David Livingstone
... Burke, the misery of millions unjustly subjected moved Mary more than the woes of one woman justly deprived of an ill-used liberty. Her love and sympathy for the people made her perhaps a little too harsh in her judgment of the queen. "Some hard words, some very strong epithets, are indeed used of Marie Antoinette," Mr. Kegan Paul says in his short but appreciative criticism of this book, "showing that she, who could in those matters know nothing personally, could not but depend on Paris gossip; ...
— Mary Wollstonecraft • Elizabeth Robins Pennell
... a mine sweeper of the Allies is blown up; Vice Admiral Carden, "incapacitated by illness," in words of British Admiralty, is succeeded in chief command in the Dardanelles by Vice Admiral De Robeck; Germany protests to England against promised harsh treatment of submarine crews; British and French warships again appear ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 2, May, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... Kingston. My father reared us strictly. He was harsh. I think that was because my mother died so young. Mr. Boyce—he was a gentleman in the Blues then, and very fine, much gayer than Harry and more handsome. He used to ride out to Hampton Court to an old cousin of his, who ...
— The Highwayman • H.C. Bailey
... some angry accents fell, Peevish complaint, or harsh reproof unkind, 'Twas but the error of a sickly mind And troubled thoughts, clouding the purer well, And waters clear, of Reason; and for me Let this my verse the poor atonement be— My verse, which thou to praise wert ever inclined Too highly, and with a partial eye to see ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb IV - Poems and Plays • Charles and Mary Lamb
... English Government, France at length consented to redeem the billets d'ordonnance with which her moribund administration had hopelessly flooded the country. The hand of the new government was light, the civic burden easy. The days of the corvee were now passed, and harsh impressment no longer compelled the habitant to fight on short rations and without pay. Very soon the French Canadian, as he felt the improvement in his condition, ceased to feel resentment against his ...
— Old Quebec - The Fortress of New France • Sir Gilbert Parker and Claude Glennon Bryan
... loss of time—kept him just that much longer from the alluring lands to the West. His father called often to see him, but the boy remained inexorably silent in all these meetings, and the minister went away white with pain. Even to his sister Harold was abrupt and harsh, but Jack's devotion produced in him the most exalted emotion, and he turned upon his loyal chum the whole force of his affectionate nature. He did not look up to Jack; he loved him more as a man loves his younger brother, and yet even to him he would not ...
— The Eagle's Heart • Hamlin Garland
... the play; but we shall add no more criticisms: 'the words of Mercury are harsh after ...
— Characters of Shakespeare's Plays • William Hazlitt
... presented in a man affected with tuberculosis of the lungs and larynx. The pallor of the larynx is characteristic. There is weakness of the internal thyro-arytenoid muscle on the right side, which results in imperfect tension of the vocal band on that side, so that the voice is uncertain and harsh. Such illustrations are introduced to impress the normal by contrast. The reader is strongly advised to compare these figures with others in the body of the work, especially those of ...
— Voice Production in Singing and Speaking - Based on Scientific Principles (Fourth Edition, Revised and Enlarged) • Wesley Mills
... and confusion were over, I was examined by the captain, who appeared to me to be a very rough, harsh man; indeed, before the day was over I almost repented of the step which I had taken, and when I sat down cold and wet upon some old sail at night, the thoughts of my mother, and what distress I should occasion her, ...
— Masterman Ready • Captain Marryat
... openly avow himself a convert—or pretended convert—to the Catholic religion; but he issued a Declaration of Indulgence, 1672, suspending the harsh statutes against ...
— The Leading Facts of English History • D.H. Montgomery |
