"Strain" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... of the Bill, but he wished to give his view of the existing state of things. He did so. It was charged with gloomy apprehensions. He agreed with Sir Robert Peel, that the finances would not bear the strain a loan of L16,000,000 would put upon them.[210] Six hundred thousand persons were receiving wages on the public works in Ireland, representing, he would say, 3,000,000 of the population. There were 100,000 in the Workhouses; and, taking with these the thousands subsisting by private charity, ...
— The History of the Great Irish Famine of 1847 (3rd ed.) (1902) - With Notices Of Earlier Irish Famines • John O'Rourke
... was to conceive a physical theory of electricity and magnetism, by which electrified and magnetized bodies could act upon each other by means of the stress or strain of some medium, which existed in the space surrounding these bodies. Now Faraday looked upon electro-static and magnetic induction as always taking place along curved lines. These lines may be conceived as atoms or molecules starting from the poles of a magnet, and ...
— Aether and Gravitation • William George Hooper
... right spirit, humble yet manful.—A young man of purpose and some talent, with considerable ambition, who is diligently seeking a place in the world, writes me from Detroit to-day, in this strain: "True it is, I have determined to pass the winter either in New York or Washington, probably the latter place. But, my dear sir, my hope of doing anything for myself in this world is the faintest possible, and I begin to fatigue with ...
— Personal Memoirs Of A Residence Of Thirty Years With The Indian Tribes On The American Frontiers • Henry Rowe Schoolcraft
... June, while arrangements for a big military offensive were being made, and were causing Kerensky and the other Socialist Ministers to strain every nerve, Lenine, Trotzky, Kamenev, Zinoviev, and other leaders of the Bolsheviki were as strenuously engaged in denouncing the offensive and trying to make it impossible. Whatever gift or genius ...
— Bolshevism - The Enemy of Political and Industrial Democracy • John Spargo
... of a Hereford heifer, which seemed to be, after repeated trials, sterile with one particular and far from impotent bull, but not with another bull. But it is too long a story—it is to attempt to make two strains, both fertile, and yet sterile when one of one strain is crossed with one of the other strain. But the difficulty...would be beyond calculation. As far as I see, Tegetmeier's plan would simply test whether two existing breeds are now in any slight degree sterile; which has already been largely tested: not ...
— More Letters of Charles Darwin - Volume I (of II) • Charles Darwin
... rather bear a thing in solitude and silence. I have no self-pity, and it is humiliating and weakening to be pitied. Yet of course Maud knows that I am unhappy; and the wretchedness of it is that it has introduced a strain into our relations which I have never felt before. I sit reading, trying to pass the hours, trying to stifle thought. I look up and see her eyes fixed on me full of compassion and love—and I do not want compassion. Maud knows it, divines it all; but she can no more keep her ...
— The Altar Fire • Arthur Christopher Benson
... was raised into a sort of a fury upon it, and in the first heat of that, a remonstrance was sent about the kingdom for hands, representing to the King, the necessity for a present sitting of the parliament, which was drawn in so high a strain, as if they had resolved to pursue the effects of it by an armed force. It was signed by a great majority of the members of parliament; and the ferment in men's spirits was raised so high, that few thought it could have been long curbed, without breaking ...
— The Jacobite Rebellions (1689-1746) - (Bell's Scottish History Source Books.) • James Pringle Thomson
... enthusiasm, and genuine exuberance of spirit. There is nothing counterfeit about the Irishman in his play. His one keen desire is to win, be the contest what it may; and towards the achievement of that end he will strain nerve and muscle even to the point of utter exhaustion. And how the onlookers applaud at the spectacle of a desperately contested race, whether between horses, men, motorcars, bicycles, or boats, or of a match between football, hurling, or cricket teams! It matters not which horse, man, car, cycle, ...
— The Glories of Ireland • Edited by Joseph Dunn and P.J. Lennox
... for giving up Bayamo is that there is so much sickness among the troops in Santiago that they are not equal to the strain of checking the activity of the ...
— The Great Round World and What Is Going On In It, Vol. 1, No. 38, July 29, 1897 - A Weekly Magazine for Boys and Girls • Various
... cup, Squire Bozard, who came with many other neighbours to view the corpse and offer sympathy with my father in his loss, told him at the same time that he took it ill that I should woo his daughter against his wish, and that if I continued in this course it would strain their ancient friendship. Thus I was hit on every side; by sorrow for my mother whom I had loved tenderly, by longing for my dear whom I might not see, by self-reproach because I had let the Spaniard go when I held him fast, and by the anger of my father and my brother. Indeed ...
— Montezuma's Daughter • H. Rider Haggard
... stubbornly. Then he remembered his axe. Crawling as far as the trap would permit, he stretched himself at full length upon the snow and reached desperately. The instrument which would have been his salvation was six inches out of reach. Moreover, the strain upon his foot was so unbearable that he was obliged to draw back in order ...
— Followers of the Trail • Zoe Meyer
... that it was all very well to speak in this strain, but as no man is a prince except in his own country, it seemed idle to expect mercy or pity. Omar was in prison for some unknown offence, and I was held captive with a well-remembered threat from Kouaga that my life ...
— The Great White Queen - A Tale of Treasure and Treason • William Le Queux
... of resemblance to Rome are the towers and cupolas that rise above a sea of houses, and the winding river; to find yet more would be a serious strain on the imagination. But there is a deeper resemblance, and this perchance is what Rodin meant when he described Prague as "the Rome of the North." I say "perchance," because Rodin never gave any closer reason for ...
— From a Terrace in Prague • Lieut.-Col. B. Granville Baker
... a social strain," he said. "May I break the ice by talking about the weather?—which, by the way, has already broken the ice. I know that breaking the ice might be a rather melancholy metaphor in ...
— The Man Who Knew Too Much • G.K. Chesterton
... she concluded, glanced up wistfully to see how her companion received her story, but she could learn nothing from the detective's inscrutable face. Colwyn, on his part, was thinking rapidly. He believed that the innkeeper's daughter, yielding to the strain of a secret too heavy to be borne alone, had this time told him the truth, but, as he ran over the main points of her narrative in his mind, he could not see that it shed any additional light on the murder. The only new fact that she had revealed was that she and Penreath ...
— The Shrieking Pit • Arthur J. Rees
... At once the strain of the nest-eggs would be reduced from half to a quarter. Mrs. Wilkins was prepared to fling her entire egg into the adventure, but she realized that if it were to cost even sixpence over her ninety pounds her ...
— The Enchanted April • Elizabeth von Arnim
... I find, myself, nothing conclusive in these speculations. But what is certain, and to my mind much more important, is the fact that military preparations evoke counter-preparations, until at last the strain becomes unbearable. By 1913 it was already terrific. The Germans knew well that by January 1917 the French and Russian preparations would have reached their culminating point. But those preparations were themselves almost unendurable to ...
— The European Anarchy • G. Lowes Dickinson
... the absence of polished floors, carpets should be covered with linen crash, tightly and securely laid, in order to stand the strain of dancing. ...
— The Book of Good Manners • W. C. Green
... strain of their experiences made it easy for them to get to sleep as soon as they were lying down, and both were still sleepy when a knock at the door awakened them, It was quite dark, and the moon was shining. Outside they ...
— The Camp Fire Girls on the Farm - Or, Bessie King's New Chum • Jane L. Stewart
... of the World (1764). His recognition that tragedy was not his forte and his self-criticism in THE COVENT GARDEN THEATRE, where he exhorts the audience to "explode" him when he is dull, reveal the comic spirit operative in his sometimes cantankerous personality. It is that strain, here seen in genesis, which develops ...
— The Covent Garden Theatre, or Pasquin Turn'd Drawcansir • Charles Macklin
... privation of sleep and food in order to find time and means for reading; and my health began to mend from the very first day. But the thought of my mother haunted me; and Mackaye seemed in no hurry to let me escape from it, for he insisted on my writing to her in a penitent strain, informing her of my whereabouts, and offering to return home if she should wish it. With feelings strangely mingled between the desire of seeing her again and the dread of returning to the old drudgery of ...
— Alton Locke, Tailor And Poet • Rev. Charles Kingsley et al
... much from the sympathetic centers, without the balance from the voluntary mode. And we live far, far too much from the upper sympathetic center and voluntary center, in an endless objective curiosity. Sight is the least sensual of all the senses. And we strain ourselves to see, see, see—everything, everything through the eye, in one mode of objective curiosity. There is nothing inside us, we stare endlessly at the outside. So our eyes begin to fail; to retaliate on us. We go short-sighted, almost ...
— Fantasia of the Unconscious • D. H. Lawrence
... and basked in the heat, the mountaineer, Reed, came again to Colonel Winchester. Dick, who was standing by, observed his air of deep satisfaction, and he wondered again at the curious mixture of mountain character, its strong religious strain, mingled with its merciless hatred of a foe. He knew that much of Reed's great content came from his slaying of the two traitors, but he did not feel that he had a right, at such a time, to question the man's motives ...
— The Tree of Appomattox • Joseph A. Altsheler
... said he, "between a privateer an' a pirate that it is a great strain on a common mind to keep them separate; but a commission from the king is better than a commission from the de'il, an' we'll hope there won't be much o' a war after ...
— Kate Bonnet - The Romance of a Pirate's Daughter • Frank R. Stockton
... not to ring the gong until he had received personal orders to do so from the President; a permanent telephone connection was established with the office in which the bankers were conferring, and amid a horrible suspense the outcome of their conference was awaited. For twenty minutes this strain continued. It was a quarter before ten and only fifteen minutes remained in which to act. Meanwhile the brokers were fast assembling upon the board room floor, orders were piling in upon them to ...
— The New York Stock Exchange in the Crisis of 1914 • Henry George Stebbins Noble
... untarnished,—types of thought whose sharp edges were unworn by repeated impressions. In reading Hakluyt's Voyages, we are almost startled now and then to find that even common sailors could not tell the story of their wanderings without rising to an almost Odyssean strain, and habitually used a diction that we should be glad to buy back from desuetude at any cost. Those who look upon language only as anatomists of its structure, or who regard it as only a means of conveying abstract truth ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, Issue 15, January, 1859 • Various
... one—describes simply the matter of fact. One hears—one does not seek; one takes—one does not ask who gives: a thought suddenly flashes up like lightning, it comes with necessity, unhesitatingly—I have never had any choice in the matter. There is an ecstasy such that the immense strain of it is sometimes relaxed by a flood of tears, along with which one's steps either rush or involuntarily lag, alternately. There is the feeling that one is completely out of hand, with the very distinct consciousness of an endless number of fine thrills and quiverings to the very toes;—there ...
— Thus Spake Zarathustra - A Book for All and None • Friedrich Nietzsche
... rules to give translation light: His own example is a flame so bright, That he who but arrives to copy well Unguided will advance, unknowing will excel. Scarce his own Horace could such rules ordain, Or his own Virgil sing a nobler strain. 40 How much in him may rising Ireland boast— How much in gaining him has Britain lost! Their island in revenge has ours reclaim'd; The more instructed we, the more we still are shamed. 'Tis well ...
— The Poetical Works of John Dryden, Vol II - With Life, Critical Dissertation, and Explanatory Notes • John Dryden
... off and are carried by water or wind.—Some trees and shrubs among the willows are called snap-willows, because their branches are very brittle; on the least strain from wind, rain, sleet, or snow, the smaller branches snap off near the larger branches or the main trunk, and fall to the ground. At first thought this brittleness of the wood might seem to be a serious defect in the structure of the tree or shrub, ...
— Seed Dispersal • William J. Beal
... atmosphere, cleared by the storm of the preceding afternoon, had a smack of autumn in it. It was one of those delicious, yet distracting, days when the sea calls, and when whosoever loves seafaring grows restless, must seek movement, seek the open, strain his eyes towards the margin of the land—be the coast-line never so far distant—tormented by desire for sight of the blue water, and the strong and naked joys of the mighty ridge and furrow where go ...
— The History of Sir Richard Calmady - A Romance • Lucas Malet
... somewhat refreshed by her night's rest, yet too languid and feeble to leave her room, and her day was spent reclining upon a couch, with her daughter by her side. Dr. Conly made an early call, prescribed, talked to her and Eva in a cheerful strain, saying he hoped that rest and a change of weather would soon bring her at least a measure of relief and strength; but in reply to the anxious questioning of Mr. and Mrs. Leland, he acknowledged that he found her far gone in consumption, and did not think she could ...
— Elsie at Home • Martha Finley
... the news. 'We shall be married directly,' she continued with that strange absence of shame or pretence which always marked her, 'and then it'll be all right, and nobody'll be able to say a word in the future.' She went on in this strain for a long while, until Madame de Kries at last insisted on her calming herself, and proposed to accompany her to her own house. At this point I made my excuses and retired, the Imp following me to the door and asking me, as I ...
— Tristram of Blent - An Episode in the Story of an Ancient House • Anthony Hope
... against thee for battle. They should, however, be vanquished by thee. That foremost of men, Phalguna, had been thus addressed by king Yudhishthira the just, of great soul. He, therefore, began to reflect in this strain. 'Even thus was I commissioned by my brother. Warriors advancing against me should not be slain. I must act in such a way as not to falsify the words of king Yudhishthira the just.' Having arrived at this conclusion, Phalguna, that foremost ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 4 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... said to Bradley. "There will be no trouble, even if it was put up in a hurry, and in spite of the strain that will be ...
— The Face And The Mask • Robert Barr
... appreciated the absolute necessity for continual advance and adaptation, and that you are labouring with such zeal to keep the complicated machinery of the General Post Office up to date and equal to the immense and ever increasing strain it has to bear, whilst the Council think it only right to acknowledge the marked and unvarying urbanity with which, at all times, you and your officials receive and discuss any suggestions for the improvement of the services, emanating from ...
— The King's Post • R. C. Tombs
... touched his lute again.— It was more than a Sultan's crown, When the lady checked her bridle rein, And lit from her palfrey down:— What would you give for such a strain, Rees, ...
— International Miscellany of Literature, Art and Science, Vol. 1, - No. 3, Oct. 1, 1850 • Various
... ministry barely survived the strain of carrying Catholic emancipation. The year 1830 found Sir Robert Peel—the elder baronet having died—the leader of the opposition. In this character he led his party against the Reform Bills of 1831-32. Their weak points were mercilessly laid bare, ...
— Ten Englishmen of the Nineteenth Century • James Richard Joy
... a FIT person might have been sufficiently flattering: to state that he was the most fit, was a little hard upon the rest of the Society; but to resolve that he was "BY FAR THE MOST FIT" was only consistent with that strain of compliment in which his supporters indulge, and was a eulogy, by no means unique in its kind, I believe, even ...
— Decline of Science in England • Charles Babbage
... said as he arrived: "I couldn't come last evening; they made it impossible; they were all there and we were up till three o'clock this morning." He looked as if he had been through terrible things, and it wasn't simply the strain of his attention to so much business in America. What passed next she couldn't remember afterwards; it seemed but a few seconds before he said to her slowly, holding her hand—before this he had pressed his lips to hers silently—"Is it true, Francie, what they say (and they ...
— The Reverberator • Henry James
... is a kind of fossil poetry, until experience makes those dry bones live! Words are mere faded metaphors, pressed like dried flowers in old and musty volumes, until a blow upon our heads, a pang in our hearts, a strain on our nerves, the whisper of a maid, the voice of a little child, turns them into living blossoms ...
— The Redemption of David Corson • Charles Frederic Goss
... let us go a little farther in this study. When you listen to an eminent orator, you have but little idea whether he is nervous or not, but little idea whether he is undergoing a severe strain or not; for you have never been in his place, ...
— Treatise on the Diseases of Women • Lydia E. Pinkham
... performed his task, went forward again to assist the rest, while the mate and Gerald took the helm. The sail was at length set, and the men came down off the yard. The mate kept an anxious eye on the canvas, doubting much whether it would stand the tremendous strain put on it—he expected every moment to see it blown away from the bolt-ropes—but it was stout and new. He had little fear of the rigging, for every inch of it he had himself assisted in turning in and setting up, and not a strand had parted—all was thoroughly served. He now summoned ...
— The Missing Ship - The Log of the "Ouzel" Galley • W. H. G. Kingston
... queen; But, like some insignificant ocean wave, They are passed over, mayhap never seen. But when I myself address good Royals, And send them verses from my fertile brain, See how they thank me very much for my flowing strain! ...
— Nights in London • Thomas Burke
... this well-chosen plateau, the cable never lies at depths that could cause a break. The Nautilus followed it to its lowest reaches, located 4,431 meters down, and even there it rested without any stress or strain. Then we returned to the locality where the 1863 accident ...
— 20000 Leagues Under the Seas • Jules Verne
... of time given, has parted with all its juices, and is therefore useless as food. If wanted for hashes or croquettes, the portion needed should be taken out as soon as tender, and a pint of the stock with it, to use as gravy. Strain, when done, into a stone pot or crock kept for the purpose, and, when cold, remove the cake of fat which will rise to the top. This fat, melted and strained, serves for many purposes better than lard. If the stock is to be kept several days, leave the fat on till ready ...
— The Easiest Way in Housekeeping and Cooking - Adapted to Domestic Use or Study in Classes • Helen Campbell
... would sail out on the lake, drop anchor and dine in the cool breeze, and after cigars and coffee would sail on again, singing songs that carried us back to days of yore and bringing a sad yet sweet strain into thoughts and voices as we glided ...
— Life and sport in China - Second Edition • Oliver G. Ready
... is written in the form of instructions to the hero for the politest disposal of his time; and in a strain of polished irony allots the follies of his day to their proper hours. The poet's apparent seriousness never fails him, but he does not suffer his irony to become a burden to the reader, relieving it constantly with pictures, episodes, ...
— Modern Italian Poets • W. D. Howells
... would not care even if Gabriella were to tell her the truth. And if she had only been honest! If she had only refused to lie because custom exacted that a wife should be willing to lie in defense of her husband. Some obscure strain of dogmatic piety struggled in the convulsed depths of her being, as if she had been suddenly brought up against the vein of iron in her soul—against the moral law, stripped bare of clustering delusions, ...
— Life and Gabriella - The Story of a Woman's Courage • Ellen Glasgow
... joint Bangladesh-India boundary inspection in 2005 revealed 92 pillars are missing; dispute with India over New Moore/South Talpatty/Purbasha Island in the Bay of Bengal deters maritime boundary delimitation; Burmese Muslim refugees strain Bangladesh's ...
— The 2005 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency
... connection with the Scotch and Gurkha troops with which it was brigaded. The Afghans knew this, and knew too, after their first tentative shots, that they were dealing with a raw regiment. Thereafter they devoted themselves to the task of keeping the Fore and Aft on the strain. Not for anything would they have taken equal liberties with a seasoned corps—with the wicked little Gurkhas, whose delight it was to lie out in the open on a dark night and stalk their stalkers—with the terrible, big men dressed in women's ...
— Indian Tales • Rudyard Kipling
... Looking down into the mainhold, which was well lighted up, you saw the men cutting the lashings to release the cable, as, gradually unfolding its serpentine coils from the cone in the centre, it was dragged rapidly upwards by the strain of its vast weight, and rushed through the rings to the vessel's stern. There the speed was moderated, before it plunged from the taffrail into the depths beneath, by the slow revolutions of a large wheel, round which the cable ...
— Rambles in the Islands of Corsica and Sardinia - with Notices of their History, Antiquities, and Present Condition. • Thomas Forester
... estimate of her table-manners in the matter of talking with her mouth full, for to speak in Italian was equivalent to whispering, since the purport of what she said could not be understood by anybody except him.... Then also, the sensation of dining with a countess produced a slight feeling of strain, which, in addition to the correct behaviour which Mr. Wyse's presence always induced, almost congealed correctness into stiffness. But as dinner went on her evident enjoyment of herself made itself felt, and her eccentricities, though carefully observed and noted by Miss Mapp, were ...
— Miss Mapp • Edward Frederic Benson
... that circle) have lived in the country from the beginning of the press of work, the suffering time, not until the end of the season of toil (for in September sowing is still in progress, as well as the digging of potatoes), but until the strain of work has relaxed a little. During the whole of their residence in the country, all around them and beside them, that summer toil of the peasantry has been going on, of whose fatigues, no matter how much we may have heard, no matter how much ...
— The Moscow Census - From "What to do?" • Lyof N. Tolstoi
... majestic figure, and beautiful hair, which was dressed without powder. She also had great power of conversation, was frank, outspoken, and amusing, but without much tact. The Princess wrote to her sometimes four times a day, always in the strain of humility, and seemed utterly dependent upon her. Anne was averse to reading, spending her time at cards and frivolous pleasures. She was fond of etiquette, and exacting in trifles. She was praised for her piety, which would appear however ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume VII • John Lord
... the Big Business Man. "The smallest one on this side is Loto; I can see him. And Jack is leading. It's all right; they're safe. Thank God for that; they're safe, thank God!" The fervent relief in his voice showed what a strain he had ...
— The Girl in the Golden Atom • Raymond King Cummings
... cannot slaughter tire?— For a new victim calls again. The bard is ready; hark, his pensive lyre Awakes its last, its parting strain. ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 58, Number 358, August 1845 • Various
... standing, with a stunned look on his white face, behind the stretcher. His eyes were on his sister's hair, but he did not dare to let there wander to her face, for fear of what he should see there. Nellie was moving all the time—now to the fence to strain her eyes down the road, where the evening shadows lay heavily, now to fling herself face downward behind the hut and say, "Make her better, God! God, make her better, make her better! Oh! CAN'T ...
— Seven Little Australians • Ethel Sybil Turner
... to the strains of a hymn which floated out from the high, narrow windows. She remembered how, from without, she had joined in the hymn, singing with all her small might; and suddenly the association brought back to her a more recent event and a more beautiful strain of music. Half in reverie, half in conscious pleasure in the exercise of a facile organ, she began ...
— The Stolen Singer • Martha Idell Fletcher Bellinger
... Sense the Garden does comply; None courts or flatters, as it does the Eye: When the great Hebrew King did almost strain The wond'rous Treasures of his Wealth and Brain, His Royal Southern Guest to entertain; Though she on Silver Floors did tread, With bright Assyrian Carpets on them spread, To hide the Metals Poverty: Though she look'd up to Roofs of Gold, And nought around her could behold But Silk ...
— Sylva, Vol. 1 (of 2) - Or A Discourse of Forest Trees • John Evelyn
... care. There was neither tower nor bell, the usual accompaniments of a chapel, which Stanley had at first imagined it; and he stood gazing on it more and more bewildered. At that moment, a female voice of singular and thrilling beauty sounded from within. It was evidently a hymn she chanted, for the strain was slow and solemn, but though words were distinctly intelligible, their language was entirely unknown. The young man listened at first, conscious only of increasing wonderment, which was quickly succeeded by a thrill of hope, so strange, so engrossing, that he stood, outwardly ...
— The Vale of Cedars • Grace Aguilar
... expected that this manner of treating the samurai would obtain universal approval. Already, too, the strain of constructive statesmanship had developed friction among the progressist leaders who had easily marched abreast for destructive purposes. They differed about the subject of a national assembly, some being inclined to attach more practical importance than others ...
— A History of the Japanese People - From the Earliest Times to the End of the Meiji Era • Frank Brinkley and Dairoku Kikuchi
... who suffer most from low wages are probably the teachers in our primary schools. They start usually on a salary of about three hundred and fifty dollars a year. For this each teacher performs all the minute labour and bears all the nervous strain of instructing sixty pupils six and a half hours a day and of correcting dozens of papers far into the night. And when crime increases or the pupils are not universally successful in business, the school teacher has the added pleasure of getting blamed for it, being told that she ought to ...
— A Short History of Women's Rights • Eugene A. Hecker
... in the fact that there are apparently now no true representatives of the Celtic race from whom to establish a criterion. The peoples that have longest preserved dialects of the Celtic languages appear from anthropometric researches to contain a dominant strain of a different race, perhaps that of the pre-Indo-European inhabitants of Western Europe. It may be, therefore, that what Arnoldians now refer to the "Celts" is after all not Celtic. At best it is unsafe to search for racial traits in the work of genius; in this ...
— Vergil - A Biography • Tenney Frank
... foresaw the coming strain; a law was passed immediately increasing the numbers of men to be trained to arms within its boundaries, and ultimately increasing that number so largely as to give to Germany alone a very heavy preponderance—a preponderance of something like thirty per cent.—over ...
— A General Sketch of the European War - The First Phase • Hilaire Belloc
... there creeps upon me a nameless, tingling sense of being haunted. But no! these gracious, silent, waving, weaving shapes are not of the Shadowy Folk, for whose coming the white fires were kindled: a strain of song, full of sweet, clear quavering, like the call of a bird, gushes from some girlish mouth, and fifty soft voices ...
— Glimpses of an Unfamiliar Japan - First Series • Lafcadio Hearn
... on and the boys relaxed in their seats. They were still under the nervous strain of the stirring scene in which they had been the chief actors. Tom's breath was coming fast ...
— Bert Wilson in the Rockies • J. W. Duffield
... She finds what pity 'tis she e'er had known, Since for no Crime, nor Pleasure of her own, Reveals it to him, knowing not at first, What might the Cause be—tho' she fear'd the worst. He strives to pacifie her twenty ways Blushes—or wou'd do if he'd any Grace. Tells Her the truth in Penetential strain, And vows he'll never do the like again, She weeps, forgives him all—but must endure, The manner, and the Charges of a Cure; Where One in twenty scarce so perfect be, But that they leave ...
— The Fifteen Comforts of Matrimony: Responses from Men • Various
... patient has the shock of operation alone to recover from, without the cardiac depression resulting from the anaesthetic during the operation, the patient, unless of a very apathetic temperament, is in that state of severe nervous strain, when any unexpected movement or remark, or sight of a soiled instrument, may produce an alarming or fatal syncope. The earliest local anaesthetic was cold, produced by a mixture of ice and salt. In place of this cumbersome ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... president but, in our thinking, we can watch his progress, in one-day intervals, from his initial experience in school to his assumption of the duties pertaining to the presidency of the bank. In thus tracing his progress there is no strain or stress in our thinking nor does the element of improbability obtrude itself. We think along a straight and level road where no hills arise to obstruct the view. Each succeeding day marks an inch or so of progress toward the goal. But should we set the responsibilities of the bank president over ...
— The Reconstructed School • Francis B. Pearson
... word she had uttered. Her voice was like a strain of woods music. At the sound of it Sam looked up from his flour. He quickly ...
— The Huntress • Hulbert Footner
... great anxiety of his army. He implored the doctor to "patch him up sufficiently for the work in hand; after that nothing mattered." Chronic gravel and rheumatism, with a sharp low fever, aggravated by a mental strain of the severest kind, all preying on a sickly frame, were what the indomitable spirit there imprisoned had to wrestle with. On the 6th, however, Wolfe struggled up, and during that day and the next superintended the march of his picked ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, v. 13 • Various
... Baptist bred, and then thy strain Immaculate was free from sinful stain." The Laureat, ...
— The Dramatic Works of John Dryden Vol. I. - With a Life of the Author • Sir Walter Scott
... considered as useful; therefore the sooner I get to a very humble cottage the better, and make room for a sounder man to serve the state." His first letter to Lady Nelson was written under the same opinion, but in a more cheerful strain. "It was the chance of war," said he, "and I have great reason to be thankful: and I know it will add much to your pleasure to find that Josiah, under God's providence, was principally instrumental in saving my life. I shall not be surprised if I am neglected and forgotten: probably I shall no ...
— The Life of Horatio Lord Nelson • Robert Southey
... Frontenac, he went his own unheeding way until a letter came from Colbert in this strain: "Your assembling of the inhabitants to take the oath of fidelity, and your division of them into three estates, may have had a good effect for the moment; but it is well for you to observe that you are always to follow, in the government of Canada, the forms in use here; and since our ...
— Old Quebec - The Fortress of New France • Sir Gilbert Parker and Claude Glennon Bryan
... it would "pay" for her to visit those countries assured her they offered a great field to female enterprise. Isabel did him justice, but she wondered what his purpose was and what he expected to gain even by proving the superior strain of his sincerity. If he expected to melt her by showing what a good fellow he was, he might spare himself the trouble. She knew the superior strain of everything about him, and nothing he could now ...
— The Portrait of a Lady - Volume 1 (of 2) • Henry James
... warm his hands Outside in the rain. As for Death, he understands, And he will come again. Therefore, till your wits are clear, Flourish and be quiet—here. But a devil at each ear Will be a strain? ...
— The Man Against the Sky • Edwin Arlington Robinson
... in fact nothing more to say about the Leibnitz Excerpt, was in no breathless haste to obey his summons; he sat almost two months before answering anything. Did then write however, in a friendly strain to Maupertuis (December 10th, 1751). [—Maupertuisiana,—No. iv. 132.] Almost on which same day, as it chanced, the ACADEMIE, after two months' dignified waiting, had in brief terms repeated its order on Konig. ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XVI. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—The Ten Years of Peace.—1746-1756. • Thomas Carlyle
... democratic conditions of pioneer life, the inner, spiritual problems of that amazing creed were intensified. "Fallen" human nature remained the same, whether in the crowded cosmopolitan streets of Holland and London, or upon the desolate shores of Cape Cod. But the moral strain of the old insoluble conflict between "fixed fate" and "free will" was heightened by the physical loneliness of the colonists. Each soul must fight its own unaided, unending battle. In that moral solitude, ...
— The American Spirit in Literature, - A Chronicle of Great Interpreters, Volume 34 in The - Chronicles Of America Series • Bliss Perry
... adjusts its speed to the load. It is used almost altogether in street cars. It can be used in stump pulling, or derrick work, such as using a hay fork. It must always be operated under load, otherwise, it would increase in speed until it tore itself to pieces through mechanical strain. The ingenious farmer who puts together an electric plow, with the mains following behind on a reel, will ...
— Electricity for the farm - Light, heat and power by inexpensive methods from the water - wheel or farm engine • Frederick Irving Anderson
... the medium. "Not generally quite so much so," he said; "the strain on her vitality is always very trying, but it is especially so when a new spirit materializes, as to-night. Out of her being, somehow, and just how, I know no better than you, is woven the veil of seeming flesh, yes, and even the clothing which ...
— Miss Ludington's Sister • Edward Bellamy
... wavelets appeared, and soon they increased to waves with frothy crests; and the schooner sprung forward, the canvas swelling, the braces tautening, and the masts and spars cracking with the additional strain put on them. For some time, though she still continued to fire, scarcely a shot from the man-of-war had come up to us, as we had still further increased our distance from her. She, however, now felt the advantage of the stronger breeze, and our pace became ...
— A Voyage round the World - A book for boys • W.H.G. Kingston
... of faith who are behind the Bible pages with making clear to themselves but a small part of God's Self-disclosure to them. And when they came to wreak thought upon expression, so clear and well-trained a mind as Paul's cannot adequately utter what he feels and thinks. His sentences strain and sometimes break; he ends with such expressions as "the love of Christ which passeth ...
— Some Christian Convictions - A Practical Restatement in Terms of Present-Day Thinking • Henry Sloane Coffin
... with spells of high nerve-tension and feverish excitement; or the restlessness and impatient energy which showed themselves always and everywhere, and at times drove him like a wild man into the woods, "seeking rest and finding none;" or the prophetic, not to say, the fanatical strain which breaks out in so much of his writing, especially in the Paroles d'un Croyant,—in all alike there is evident that predominance of the imaginative and emotional elements which, combined with intellectual ...
— The Faith of the Millions (2nd series) • George Tyrrell
... to wear yourself out, and to devote your entire time to such proselitizing, when you might be so much more agreeably employed? You should learn, in justice to yourself as well as to others, to be tolerant of all things; and to acknowledge that in a being of man's mingled nature a strain of respectability is apt to develop every now and then, ...
— Jurgen - A Comedy of Justice • James Branch Cabell
... but the successful results of muscular training. Fathers and mothers at home see the failures. There are households in England—miserable households, to be counted, Sir Patrick, by more than ones and twos—in which there are young men who have to thank the strain laid on their constitutions by the popular physical displays of the present time, for being broken men, and invalided men, for the ...
— Man and Wife • Wilkie Collins
... For where could a handsome young scholar not be welcome when he could touch the lute and troll a gay song? That bright face, that easy smile, that liquid voice, seemed to give life a holiday aspect; just as a strain of gay music and the hoisting of colours make the work-worn and the sad rather ashamed of showing themselves. Here was a professor likely to render the Greek classics amiable to the sons ...
— Romola • George Eliot
... sounds, the first which I can remember was the postman's horn, when I was hardly three years old. Then there were the watchmen, "who cried the hour and weather all night long." Also a coloured man who shouted, in a strange, musical strain which could be heard ...
— Memoirs • Charles Godfrey Leland
... against taxes, and tax gatherers. As a consequence of it, although the calls for money had not been greater than must be expected for the same or equivalent exigencies, yet congress had been already obliged, not only to strain the impost until it produced clamour, and would produce evasion, and war on their own citizens to collect it, but even to resort to an excise law, of odious character with the people, partial in its operation, unproductive unless enforced by arbitrary and vexatious means, ...
— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 4 (of 5) • John Marshall
... vehement, passionate, thanksgiving to God. Alternately praying, weeping, smiling, she knelt there, now and then re-reading portions of the letters, to assure herself that it was not a mere blessed dream, and at length when the strain relaxed, she dropped her head on a chair, and like a spent feeble ...
— Infelice • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson
... Alexandrina was spoken of much more frequently at the Small House. It was not a subject which Mrs Dale or Bell would have chosen for conversation; but Lily would refer to it. She would begin by doing so almost in a drolling strain, alluding to herself as a forlorn damsel in a play-book; and then she would go on to speak of his interests as a matter which was still of great moment to her. But in the course of such talking she would too often break down, showing by some sad ...
— The Small House at Allington • Anthony Trollope
... minutes through some scrubby brushwood, brought us to the base of a steep stony ridge covered with tall and thrifty hickories and a few oaks and maples intermixed, rising so steeply from the shore that it was necessary not only to strain every nerve of the leg, but to swing our bodies up from tree to tree, by dint of hand. It was indeed a hard and heavy tug; and I had pretty tough work, what between the exertion of the ascent, and the incessant fits of laughter into which I was thrown ...
— Warwick Woodlands - Things as they Were There Twenty Years Ago • Henry William Herbert (AKA Frank Forester)
... kisses they call sighs, suspiros. As night advances, the cakes grow sweeter and the dances livelier, and the pretty national dances are at last introduced; though these are never seen to such advantage as when the peasants perform them on a Saturday or Sunday evening to the monotonous strain of a viola, the musician himself taking part in the complicated dance, and all the men chanting the refrain. Nevertheless they add to the gayety of our genteel entertainment, and you may stay at the party as long as you have patience,—if till ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 6, No. 37, November, 1860 • Various
... managed to corner a horse near a fence, and had climbed upon his back. The next moment the horse got his back up and hoisted me into the air, I fell violently to the ground, striking upon my side in such a way as to severely wrench and strain my arm, from the effects of which I did not recover for some time. I abandoned the art of horsemanship for a while, and was induced after considerable persuasion to turn my attention to letters—my A, B, C's—which were taught me at the ...
— The Life of Hon. William F. Cody - Known as Buffalo Bill The Famous Hunter, Scout and Guide • William F. Cody
... plan of an oratory did not contemplate any parochial work, but you could not contemplate so many souls in want of pastors without being prompt and ready at the beck of authority to strain all your efforts in coming to their help. And this brings me to the third and the most continuous of those labours to which I have alluded. The mission in Alcester Street, its church and schools, were the first work of the Birmingham ...
— Apologia pro Vita Sua • John Henry Newman
... They were tired enough, but their eyelids felt as if they were furnished with springs which held them wide open, to stare through the open side of the barn at the glittering stars, while their ears were all on the strain to listen to the different sounds ...
— The Peril Finders • George Manville Fenn
... into the bowl of egg, a little at a time, beating all the while, and then put it in the double boiler and cook till it is as thick as cream. Take it off the fire, stir in a saltspoonful of salt and half a teaspoonful of vanilla, and set it away to cool. When it is dinner-time, strain the custard into a pretty dish and slip the whites off the top, one by one. If you like, you can dot them over with very tiny specks ...
— A Little Cook Book for a Little Girl • Caroline French Benton
... that we should be punished in this awful way? And to think that the blow fell in this house? Caerlaverock—we all—thought Mr. Vennard so strange last night, and Lady Lavinia told me that Mr. Cargill was perfectly horrible. I suppose it must be the heat and the strain of the session. And that poor Lord Mulross, who was always so wise, should be stricken ...
— The Moon Endureth—Tales and Fancies • John Buchan
... ideals of social life have been interpreted in the life of either sovereign peoples or subject peoples, so, we believe, and only so, have bonds been forged that can be trusted to stand the strain which time and changing condition ...
— The War and Unity - Being Lectures Delivered At The Local Lectures Summer - Meeting Of The University Of Cambridge, 1918 • Various
... gave me a bill of exchange payable at sight in eight days on M. Genaro de Carlo. I told him that the ingredients were lead and bismuth; the first, combining with mercury, and the second giving to the whole the perfect fluidity necessary to strain it through the chamois leather. The Greek went out to try the amalgam—I do not know where, and I dined alone, but toward evening he came back, looking very disconsolate, as I ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... ceremony and the behavior of the mourners and the friends, which nothing could have alienated but the actual presence of calamity, she had a nether misery of alternating hope and fear, of anxieties continually reasoned down, and of security lost the instant it was found. The double strain told so upon her nerves, that when the rites at the grave were ended, she sent word to the clergyman and piteously begged him to ...
— The Quality of Mercy • W. D. Howells
... of the hare brained and ardent feeling which he had picked out of old ballads, or from the metrical romances, which were his sole source of information or knowledge, may have been the means of pricking him on to some of his achievements, which had often a rude strain of chivalry in them; at least, it was certain that his love to the fair Catharine had in it a delicacy such as might have become the squire of low degree, who was honoured, if song speaks truth, with the smiles ...
— The Fair Maid of Perth • Sir Walter Scott
... of a Polish mother and a French father, and these mixed strains of blood account fundamentally for the leading characteristics of his music. From the former strain came the impassioned, romantic and at times chivalrous moods, prominent in all Polish life and art; and from the latter the grace, charm and finish which we rightly associate with the French nature. For side-lights on Chopin's ...
— Music: An Art and a Language • Walter Raymond Spalding
... need to set The might that man has matched not yet Against it: he whose hand shall get Grace to release the bonds that fret My bosom and my girdlestead With little strain of strength or strife Shall bring me as from death to life And win to sister or to wife Fame that ...
— The Tale of Balen • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... other hand, I know that ideal love is a difficult thing to manage, from our point of view. It is a fearful strain to live up to it. In fact, nobody can do it. But I never could see why you had to stick to one or the other. Why can't you mix ...
— From a Girl's Point of View • Lilian Bell
... before going and said meditatively, "I should really like to be able to follow your advice, you know." His brow clouded in discontent; the one serious handicap he recognised was this arbitrary unfortunate doom of a body unequal to the necessary strain of an active life. "Anyhow I'm good for a little while?" ...
— Quisante • Anthony Hope
... to-night, And no return have I to make but prayers; May you in age be blest with such a daughter!— When from the Holy Land I had returned Sightless, and from my heritage was driven, A wretched Outcast—but this strain of thought Would lead me ...
— The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth - Volume 1 of 8 • Edited by William Knight
... at 10:25. A "voluntary" by the organist at 10:30, and by the choir at 10:32, during which time Mr. Beecher comes in, jerks his hat behind a boquet stand, and takes his seat. Leads in a prayer in so low a strain that he can not be understood at any remote place in the audience. At 10:55 he baptizes eight infants, whose names are passed to him on cards. Concludes another prayer at 11:20 and announces his text, "Christ and him crucified." I Cor. ...
— The Youthful Wanderer - An Account of a Tour through England, France, Belgium, Holland, Germany • George H. Heffner
... she swayed downward and over, and the next moment, with one hand on the ragged quartz and another gripping Grace's arm, I was struggling in the stream. Fortunately the dress fabric held, and my failing strength was equal to the strain, for I found a foothold, and crawled out upon the shingle, dragging her after me. Then rising, I lurched forward and went down headforemost with a clatter among the stones, where I lay fighting hard for breath and overcome by the revulsion of relief, though it may have been the mere ...
— Lorimer of the Northwest • Harold Bindloss
... "you strain the expressions of the law: you make it too sanguinary, and you would expose a great many in Bagdad to danger if the right of doing themselves justice was granted to all who really are, or think themselves, injured in ...
— Eastern Tales by Many Story Tellers • Various
... his re-election to the Senate; but it produced nervous irritation of the brain and spinal cord, a disorder which can only be cured under favorable conditions, and even then is likely to return if the patient is exposed to a severe mental strain. Sumner's cure by Dr. Brown-Sequard was considered a remarkable one, and has a place in the history of medicine. The effect of bromide and ergot was then unknown, and the doctor made such good use of his cauterizing- ...
— Cambridge Sketches • Frank Preston Stearns
... with her and as she stood there almost overcome with grief and shame and the strain of long suspense and apprehension, yet thinking only of their safety, the sadness of her position and her impending fate ...
— Tom Slade with the Boys Over There • Percy K. Fitzhugh
... Davis. "It's your Uncle Peter. Don't ask questions; it's none of your business who's sick. Mind you strain the milk the first thing to-morrow, and wring out the dishcloth when you're through with it. Oh, dear, to think that I should ...
— Nine Little Goslings • Susan Coolidge |
