"Absent" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... here, sir?" a voice broke into my thoughts, and I saw that the little man had cleared a place for me next his own, which was in a corner facing the engine. Thanking him absent-mindedly, I sat down, and began to observe my travelling companions for the ...
— The Powers and Maxine • Charles Norris Williamson
... circumstances. It might excite feeling against us. It is a very bad case. But we will pull through, I hope. We generally do. Give the case wholly into my hands. We'll postpone, I think. I shall have to make an affidavit that there are important witnesses absent, or something of the sort. But we'll have the case postponed. There's some popular feeling against you, and juries go as the newspapers do. Now, I see but one way, and that is to postpone until the feeling dies down. Then ...
— The Mystery of Metropolisville • Edward Eggleston
... He was absent for more than six weeks, during which he wrote frequently from various out-of-the-way places on the Rhine. On returning, he found Cecily in London, very anxious about the child, and herself looking very ill. He, on the other hand, was robust and in excellent ...
— The Emancipated • George Gissing
... and Persian character of his laws too well to disobey them. When Mittie went out, making a demure curtsey at the door, she lingered a little longer than usual, supposing he would release Helen from her prison house; but Master Hightower was one of the most absent men in the world, and he had forgotten the little prisoner ...
— Helen and Arthur - or, Miss Thusa's Spinning Wheel • Caroline Lee Hentz
... emphasis on the virginal significance of the hymen; and a recent book from a prominent publisher goes so far as to try to frighten girls into remaining chaste by stating that a physician could discover if they have been unchaste. This is far from being always true, for the structure may be congenitally absent, may sometimes remain after sexual union, or may be accidentally destroyed in childhood; and reliable physicians have stated that proving unchastity by the hymen is by no means easy. Hence, the less said about the ancient belief, the better for young women. The truth is that the hymen is a ...
— Sex-education - A series of lectures concerning knowledge of sex in its - relation to human life • Maurice Alpheus Bigelow
... theaters; but he had such a way of staring at the ceiling, avoiding the gaze of people, and hurrying away to escape introductions, that finally she was glad to leave him at home. Many brilliant social functions were given at his home, but he was always absent. ...
— The Hindered Hand - or, The Reign of the Repressionist • Sutton E. Griggs
... straight to the ball-room and dance in," he said. "No one will have missed us long. We've only been absent about a quarter ...
— Innocent - Her Fancy and His Fact • Marie Corelli
... I.), before a Company's dinner, the names of the livery were called, and notice taken of the absent. Then prayer was said, every one kneeling, after which the names of benefactors and their "charitable and godly devices" were read, also the ordinances, and the orders for the grammar-school in St. Laurence Pountney. ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... That urbane gentleman was smoking his reportorial corn-cob in the rear of Lamson's store. Except for Lamson's clerk, who had seized the rare opportunity to delve uninterruptedly into the mysteries of the latest "Nick Carter," the store was empty. The usual habitues were absent. ...
— Anderson Crow, Detective • George Barr McCutcheon
... was contemplating a theatrical trust on the Continent, planning a model music-hall in Paris.... There were Jimmy's successes, his ambitions.... Amid all this news, to which Lily listened, sometimes absent-mindedly, sometimes with interest, among these adventures dating from everywhere—names which she greeted like old acquaintances, with a little nod: "Denver? Yes, I know; a big flat stage. Mexico? I remember!"—among all those tales, Lily pricked her ears when she ...
— The Bill-Toppers • Andre Castaigne
... agreed promptly. "I wouldn't steal anything. Yet it's no worse, morally, to steal a million dollars from a great bank than it is to steal a suit of clothes from a house whose occupants are absent. All theft is theft. There are no degrees of theft. The small boy who would steal a nickel or a dime from his mother would steal a million dollars from a stranger if he had the chance and the nerve to commit the crime. All tramps, sooner or later, become petty thieves. ...
— The High School Boys' Training Hike • H. Irving Hancock
... the Donna Maria was said to have been composed of two hundred and forty souls; but there were some sick in the hospital at Macao, and a few absent on leave and duty. They had, however, some Chinese on board, not mustered as the crew, carpenters, and other artisans, and some prisoners from a French bark, the "Chili." I consider the number killed by this catastrophe may be fairly set down ...
— Kathay: A Cruise in the China Seas • W. Hastings Macaulay
... as senseless as a bolster.—Still, as this was no new thing with him, it might have passed; for James Hound, the senior officer, was in the practice, when Robin was in that state, of reading the proclamations himself.—On this occasion, however, James happened to be absent on some hue and cry quest, and another of the officers (I forget which) was appointed to perform for him. Robin, accustomed to James, no sooner heard the other man begin to read, than he began to curse and swear at him as an incapable ...
— The Provost • John Galt
... young lathe operator reported to Beggs. He was able to run Fanning's machine while the latter temporarily filled the shoes of the absent Schuyler. ...
— How To Write Special Feature Articles • Willard Grosvenor Bleyer
... long past midnight when a tremendous noise told that the absent ones had returned. All rushed to the kitchen, where Jingle's voice was heard crying: "Cricket dinner—glorious party—capital songs—very good—wine ma'am—wine!" Mr. Pickwick, Snodgrass and Winkle went to bed, but the talkative Jingle remained with the ladies and before they retired ...
— Tales from Dickens • Charles Dickens and Hallie Erminie Rives
... the pity. But I have told you the reason of my forsaking it. Frequently, when I went to the church door, I found it barred, and the priest absent; what was I to do? My heart was bursting for want of some religious help and comfort; what could I do! as good Master Rees Pritchard observes in ...
— Lavengro - The Scholar, The Gypsy, The Priest • George Borrow
... think they start off for the day's work at 8, but it is generally quite 10 o'clock before all the brown-hooded ambulances with their red crosses have moved out of the yard. We do not as a rule meet again till dinner-time, and even then many of the party are absent. They come in at all times, very dirty and hungry, and the greeting is always the same, "Did you get many?"—i.e., "Have you picked up ...
— My War Experiences in Two Continents • Sarah Macnaughtan
... Sharnall was walking by the riverside, Mr Westray was with the masons on the roof of the transept; only Anastasia Joliffe was at Bellevue Lodge when the front-door-bell rang. When her aunt was at home, Anastasia was not allowed to "wait on the gentlemen," nor to answer the bell; but her aunt being absent, and there being no one else in the house, she duly opened one leaf of the great front-door, and found a gentleman standing on the semicircular flight of steps outside. That he was a gentleman she knew at a glance, for she had a flair for such useless distinctions, though the genus was not ...
— The Nebuly Coat • John Meade Falkner
... of the Oboz silenced her. She remained, with wide-open staring eyes, her hand at her breast, watching, saying absent-mindedly to the children: "Now Katya.... Now ...
— The Dark Forest • Hugh Walpole
... he asserted in a firm, measured voice. "I am going. Where's my hat?" And again he started in search of his absent headgear. ...
— Baby Mine • Margaret Mayo
... sitting on her trunk in an attitude either of thoughtful discontent or absent-mindedness. The towel was still folded over the waterjug that was full of water, and the soap, untouched and dry, was lying beside the empty basin; but one would have thought that the young woman had used half the contents of the bottles of perfume. The eau de cologne, however, had ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant
... erect as ever, and moved about the grounds with that same haughty air of perfect supremacy, as of one who was monarch of all he surveyed in the county of Surrey. But Elma could see, for all that, that he was absent-minded and self-contained; he answered all questions in a distant, unthinking way; some inner trouble was undoubtedly consuming him. His eyes were all for the two Warings. They glanced nervously right and left every minute in haste, but returned after each excursion ...
— What's Bred In the Bone • Grant Allen
... mean Mr. Heigham, I shall leave you to consider whether that term is not more applicable to the person who does his best to outrage an unprotected woman, and take advantage of the absent, than to the gentleman against whom you have used it;" and, darting on him one glance of supreme contempt, she swept ...
— Dawn • H. Rider Haggard
... with the equine head listened with an air of respectful obedience, while her faint smile expressed the cunning of a Norman peasant who had been five years in Paris already and was hardened to service, and well knew what was done with children when the master and mistress were absent. ...
— Fruitfulness - Fecondite • Emile Zola
... Sisters in Unity, when startled by Miss Whitney's screams. He also stated that having gone to bed very late, he had slept heavily and had not been awakened until aroused at seven o'clock by the cook. His bedroom was across the hall from the other servants. He had not realized that Julie Genet was absent until Mrs. Whitney rang for her; he had supposed the maid was upstairs waiting upon either her or Miss Whitney. No, Julie was not quarrelsome; she was quiet, deeply engrossed in her own affairs, and spent much of her time sewing in Miss Whitney's sitting-room. ...
— I Spy • Natalie Sumner Lincoln
... moment; then, thinking it was absent-mindedness on the part of her host, burst into a merry laugh. 'You've only just given me apple-tart, Mr Howroyd. I haven't come to the ...
— Sarah's School Friend • May Baldwin
... salt sea-wave, Sought vainly for her absent ones: The Father-Badger, writhing in a cave, Shrieked out ' Return, my sons! You shalt have buns,' he shrieked,' if you'll behave! Yea, buns, and ...
— Sylvie and Bruno • Lewis Carroll
... mother out of bondage. What difference did it make that he wasn't trekking through darkest Africa or being hunted by the jungle in India, so long as mother was out of bondage? He even took his allegiance to Anne rather lightly, those first years, he was so absent-minded about everything but hypnotising mother into thinking she was going to be very happy and live a long time doing it. And that was the part of his life when there seemed to be a great deal of it, and if he didn't have a thing now there would be ...
— Old Crow • Alice Brown
... ordering a painting,'" said Penelope, recalling her father's talk, with an effect of dreamy absent-mindedness. "'You give the painter money enough, and he can afford to paint you a first-class picture. Give an architect money enough, and he'll give you a first-class house, ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... Staubach still trusted her niece. She trusted Linda perhaps the more at this time from a feeling that she had exacted so much from the girl. When, therefore, Linda kissed her and went out, she had no suspicion on her mind; nor was any aroused till the usual dinner-hour was passed, and Linda was still absent. When Tetchen at one o'clock said something of her wonder that the fraulein had not returned, Madame Staubach had suggested that she might be with her friend Herr Molk. Tetchen knew what was the warmth of that friendship, ...
— Linda Tressel • Anthony Trollope
... elevation, but to original irregularities at the bottom of the sea. Of this fact, at Quail Island, there was clear evidence in the calcareous deposit being in one part of much greater than the average thickness, and in another part being entirely absent; in this latter case, the modern basaltic lavas rested directly on those ...
— Volcanic Islands • Charles Darwin
... will respect none of your race. I tell you your father fears me. I tell you that my last words to him ring in his ears! My wrongs! Arthur Beaufort, when you are absent I seek to forget them; in your abhorred presence ...
— Night and Morning, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... under her, and lifting her head, drew it against his breast, holding it there tightly, but not speaking. He had no comfort to give, no assuring word to offer. Not a ray of light had yet come in through the veil of mystery that hung so darkly over the fate of their absent boy. Many minutes passed ere the silence was broken. In that time the mother's heart had grown calmer. She was turning, in her weakness and despair, with religious trust, to the only One who was able to sustain her in this great ...
— Danger - or Wounded in the House of a Friend • T. S. Arthur
... Not within the memory of the oldest inhabitant had any funeral been so largely or honourably attended. Truly it spelled excellent advertisement—and this although two persons, calculated mightily to have heightened interest and brought up dramatic and emotional values, were absent from the scene. ...
— Deadham Hard • Lucas Malet
... have led my father into the college, there to enjoy for twelve months that preparation for euthanasia which no cares for this world would be allowed to disturb. All the existing ideas of the grave would be absent. There would be no further struggles to prolong the time of misery which nature had herself produced. That temptation to the young to begrudge to the old the costly comforts which they could not earn would be no longer fostered. It would be a pride for the young ...
— The Fixed Period • Anthony Trollope
... Osmond was absent nearly half an hour, and, when he returned, brought on his shoulders a huge bundle of straw. "What is this for?" exclaimed Richard. "I wanted my supper, and you ...
— The Little Duke - Richard the Fearless • Charlotte M. Yonge
... nearly obliterated. Of the thousand men and over who had marched from Meridian Hill only four hundred were found ten days after the battle. Elisha Boone had hurried at once to Washington, charged by all the fathers, mothers, brothers, and sisters of the regiment to make swift report of the absent darlings. Kate was besieged in the grand house with tearful watchers, waiting in agonizing impatience for the fatal finality. Olympia, to spare her mother the distress of the vague responses her telegrams brought from Washington, spent most of the time at the Boones', where, thanks to the ...
— The Iron Game - A Tale of the War • Henry Francis Keenan
... with sunshine. There was hardly a suspicion of frost in the air and the snowy setting considered so essential to a successful Thanksgiving Day was entirely absent. ...
— Grace Harlowe's Fourth Year at Overton College • Jessie Graham Flower
... it," sighed Hamlet, whose royal frontispiece had received severe damage—"I am on the bills to play twice this afternoon and once this evening, and my being absent will cause me to be forfeited, if not discharged. D——n those college students! What the devil became of them? They all ...
— My Life: or the Adventures of Geo. Thompson - Being the Auto-Biography of an Author. Written by Himself. • George Thompson
... the following resolution. Here is a distinguished man, both for family and for his own merits, Svein Ulfson, who has entered into my service, and given me promise of fidelity. Now, as ye know, the Danes have this summer become my men, so that when I am absent from the country it is without a head; and it is not unknown to you how it is ravaged by the people of Vindland, Kurland, and others from the Baltic, as well as by Saxons. Therefore I promised them a chief who could defend and rule their land; and I know no man better ...
— Heimskringla - The Chronicle of the Kings of Norway • Snorri Sturluson
... reasons will withhold me from concurring with this. I cannot but be of opinion, that the question ought to be postponed to another day, in which the house may be fuller, our deliberations be assisted by the wisdom and experience of more than thirty lords, who are now absent, and the subjects of inquiry, of which many are new and unexpected, may be more accurately considered; nor can I prevail upon myself to return to general declarations any other ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, Vol. 11. - Parlimentary Debates II. • Samuel Johnson
... scene of some tenderness and passion, and given and received caresses; I had thrust her from me with violence; I had called aloud upon her in the night from the one room to the other: she had passed hours of wakefulness and weeping; and it is not to be supposed I had been absent from her pillow thoughts. Upon the back of this, to be awaked with unaccustomed formality, under the name of Miss Drummond, and to be thenceforth used with a great deal of distance and respect, led her entirely ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 11 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... in the throne room was vastly different than when he had first visited it. The Zara sat curled as before, a golden bowl of incense burning at either side of the throne. The men-at-arms were absent and, instead, there were dozens of handmaidens, white-skinned and seductive as their queen, reclining on luxurious cushions that were arranged in a semicircle before the dais. It was a scene of Oriental splendor. A stage ...
— The Copper-Clad World • Harl Vincent
... can I. 'Tis the fashion to be absent—that's the way I forgot your little bill. There, run along. [Exit JOHN.] I've the whirl of Bobby's chaise in my head still. Cursed fatiguing, posting all night, through Cornish roads, to obey the summons of friendship! Convenient, in some respects, for all that. If all loungers, ...
— John Bull - The Englishman's Fireside: A Comedy, in Five Acts • George Colman
... when he got back to camp, that his three chums were still absent. He placed the basket of food where they could see it, and then, putting on his best clothes, and making a bundle of some underwear and other of his possessions he started off through the woods, ...
— Frank Roscoe's Secret • Allen Chapman
... collected not indeed the best characters in Dickens, but certainly the best characters in Our Mutual Friend. Certainly one exception must be made. Fledgeby is unaccountably absent. There was really no reason why he should not have been present at a dinner-party given by the Veneerings and including the Lammles. His money was at least more genuine than theirs. If he had been present the party would really have included all that is important in Our Mutual ...
— Appreciations and Criticisms of the Works of Charles Dickens • G. K. Chesterton
... it. A representative of any other race on earth would have employed the third person singular when referring to the absent Murphy; only an Irishman would have said "that fella," and only a certain kind of Irishman could have managed to inject into such simple words such a note of scorn supernal. Cappy Ricks got the message—just ...
— Cappy Ricks Retires • Peter B. Kyne
... been absent for some days. She went to meet Albert. To-day I visited her: she rose to receive me, and I ...
— The Sorrows of Young Werther • J.W. von Goethe
... True, my lord, and never My fruitlesse love shall let your serious honour; 135 Yet, sweet lord, do no stay; you know my soule Is so long time with out me, and I dead, As you are absent. ...
— Bussy D'Ambois and The Revenge of Bussy D'Ambois • George Chapman
... and cheerful a companion. As for him, he was determined to profit by this last opportunity. If the Strict rules of honor demanded that Mr. Roscorla should have fair play, or if Wenna wished him to absent himself—which was of more consequence than Mr. Roscorla's interest—he would make his visits few and formal, but in the mean time, at least, they would have this one pleasant afternoon together. Sometimes, it is true, he rebelled ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 15, - No. 87, March, 1875 • Various
... time during the evening that one might absent himself from the general assembly if he chose although none of the boys was ...
— The Hilltop Boys - A Story of School Life • Cyril Burleigh
... sister's repetitions and the rising discontent and agitations of the children, came in to over-cloud the whole business in a mist of sick impatience and disgust. Return to Australia was never out of Susan's mind, never absent from her pertinacious foolish lips. Little Freddy harped upon it all day long, and so did his brother and sister. Nettie said nothing, but retired with exasperated weariness upon her own thoughts—sometimes thinking, tired of the conflict, why not give in to them? why not complete the ...
— The Doctor's Family • Mrs. (Margaret) Oliphant
... Bees.—Translator's Note.) and the Megachiles. (Or Leaf-cutting Bees. Cf. Chapter 8 of the present volume.—Translator's Note.) I failed in the case of the Osmiae, the Chalicodomae and the Anthophorae. Is the organ really absent? Or was there want of skill on my part? I lean towards want of skill and admit that all the game-hunting and honey-gathering Hymenoptera possess a seminal receptacle, which can be recognized by its contents, a quantity of spiral spermatozoids whirling ...
— Bramble-bees and Others • J. Henri Fabre
... the tone which made the young man at once assure himself that he had better go back to Brussels. He had even been a favorite with Mrs. Mountjoy. In his days of love-making poor Mountjoy had been absent, declared no longer to have a chance of Tretton, and Harry had been—the very evil one himself. Mrs. Mountjoy had been assured by the Brussels Mountjoy that, with the view of getting well rid of the evil one, she had better take poor Anderson to her bosom. She ...
— Mr. Scarborough's Family • Anthony Trollope
... fate Mockingly styled him husband and me wife, Himself this way at least pronounced divorce, Blotted the marriage bond: this blood of mine Flies forth exultingly at any door, Washes the parchment white, and thanks the blow We shall not meet in this world nor the next, But where will God be absent? In His face Is light, but in His shadow healing too: Let Guido touch the shadow and be healed! And as my presence was importunate,— My earthly good, temptation and a snare,— Nothing about me but drew somehow down His hate upon me,—somewhat so excused Therefore, since ...
— The Poetry Of Robert Browning • Stopford A. Brooke
... of all conspiracies! They move on many springs; if one but fail, The restiff machine stops. In an ill hour he's absent; 'Tis the first time, and sure will be the last, That e'er a Mufti was not in the way, When tumults and rebellion should be broached. Stay by me; thou art resolute and faithful; I have employment worthy of thy ...
— The Works Of John Dryden, Vol. 7 (of 18) - The Duke of Guise; Albion and Albanius; Don Sebastian • John Dryden
... stung him, and he had felt obliged frankly to acknowledge to the neighbouring thanes that he had been sent down on account of a quarrel with a Norman page; but chiefly because it showed the kindly interest that Harold felt in him, and that although absent he ...
— Wulf the Saxon - A Story of the Norman Conquest • G. A. Henty
... to be absent for little more than two weeks, but the time went by, the weeks passed into months, and ...
— Olaf the Glorious - A Story of the Viking Age • Robert Leighton
... in an apparently absent-minded way to these depositions, or rather these scandals, carefully examined the wall and the gate. He now ...
— The Mystery of Orcival • Emile Gaboriau
... long absent. He saw the cattle ranging as before, although not exactly in the same spot, in the finest country yet discovered in New South Wales, and ascended a hill which from every point of view had appeared the highest ...
— An Account of the English Colony in New South Wales, Vol. 1 • David Collins
... sensibility. This predisposition was further deepened by the application in early youth of mental influences specially calculated to heighten juvenile sensibility. Corrective discipline from circumstance and from formal instruction was wholly absent, and thus the particular excess in his temperament became ever more and more exaggerated, and encroached at a rate of geometrical progression upon all the rest of his impulses and faculties; these, if he had ...
— Rousseau - Volumes I. and II. • John Morley
... one of his fits of frenzy (to which x. 10 also shows him to have been subject) he threw his javelin at David, who was seeking to drive away the evil spirit by his playing (xix. 8-10). David agreed with Jonathan that it was advisable for him to absent himself, but this only confirmed the king's suspicions, which prompted him to destroy the priests of Nob, because their head had provided David with food and consulted the oracle for him (xxi 2-7, xxii. 6-23). The ...
— Prolegomena to the History of Israel • Julius Wellhausen
... the spring of 1681. Father Xavier had been absent nearly two years. Father Ignatius missed him sadly—all the life and fire seemed to have gone out of the mission. Even Marie moved about her work in a listless, languid way, which contrasted markedly with her once lithe and ...
— The Galaxy - Vol. 23, No. 1 • Various
... material step which was taken was communicated to the President, and his directions obtained upon it. While the chief magistrate remained at the seat of government, these communications were verbal; when absent, ...
— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 4 (of 5) • John Marshall
... of the bazaar began somewhat to divert the current of the ladies' thoughts, and Ethel found herself walking day after day to Cocksmoor, unmolested by further reports of Mrs. Ledwich's proceedings. Richard was absent, preparing for ordination, but Norman had just returned home for the Long Vacation, and, rather than lose the chance of a conversation with her, had joined her and Mary in ...
— The Daisy Chain, or Aspirations • Charlotte Yonge
... of the book is concerned, as already stated, with the development of the understanding. Here it is noticed that memory and recognition of the mother's voice occurs as early as the second month; at four months the child cried for his absent nurse; and at eighteen months he knew if one of ten toy animals were removed. In Preyer's opinion—and we think there can be no question of its accuracy—the intelligence of a child before it can speak a word is in advance of that of the most intelligent animal. He gives numerous examples ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 358, November 11, 1882 • Various
... is still in possession of the Admiralty, though in some unexplained manner it was absent for some years, and was only recovered by the exertions of Mr. W. ...
— Captain Cook's Journal During the First Voyage Round the World • James Cook
... drawn "his" money, he took it to Mme. de Maufrigneuse. She locked up the banknotes in her desk, and proposed to bid the world farewell by going to the Opera to see it for the last time. Victurnien was thoughtful, absent, and uneasy. He was beginning to reflect. He thought that his seat in the Duchess' box might cost him dear; that perhaps, when he had put the three hundred thousand francs in safety, it would be better to travel ...
— The Collection of Antiquities • Honore de Balzac
... Prince Perviz, "it is not proper that you, who are the head of our family, should be absent. I desire my sister should join with me to oblige you to abandon your design, and allow me to undertake it. I hope to acquit myself as well as you, and it will be a more regular proceeding." "I am persuaded of your goodwill, brother," replied Prince Bahman, "and ...
— The Arabian Nights - Their Best-known Tales • Unknown
... In her own absent-mindedness, or in a moment of confusion and weariness, she had either accidentally destroyed it, or she had removed it from its customary place to a safer spot and forgotten ...
— The Wall Between • Sara Ware Bassett
... Delarey, who was absent at Kimberley, P. Cronje was in chief command of the Boer forces. His Head-Quarters were at Brown's Drift on the Modder, six miles from the key of the position on Magersfontein. The sound of the bombardment notified him that an infantry attack was ...
— A Handbook of the Boer War • Gale and Polden, Limited
... appealed. 'But not a one of them believed it, though you dub me Lutheran.... See you, do I not govern now the chief Papist of you all? Would that be if they believed me filthy in my living. Have I not governed in the house of the Howards, the lord of it being absent? Would that have been if they had believed it of me?... And then....' He turned again upon the printer. 'For the sake of your men ... for the sake of the New Learning, which God prosper, I ...
— The Fifth Queen • Ford Madox Ford
... came while General Sherman was absent with three brigades, and no men are left to move ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan
... talk, and the anger of customers whom she had offended; and at the same time it could be seen that the secret sale of vodka was already going on in the shop. The deaf man sat in the shop, too, or walked about the street bare-headed, with his hands in his pockets looking absent-mindedly now at the huts, now at the sky overhead. Six times a day they had tea; four times a day they sat down to meals; and in the evening they counted over their takings, put them down, went to bed, and ...
— The Witch and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... with dread to the distant cries of news-venders, fearing, as the words gradually became distinguishable, to hear that our secret was a secret no longer. I was bound to show myself, and yet shrank from all gatherings of men. I transacted my business with an absent mind and a face of such superhuman innocence that, had anyone been watching me, he must at once have suspected something wrong. I was incapable of adding up a row of figures, and Jones became most ...
— A Man of Mark • Anthony Hope
... Permission to absent himself from Saturday night to Tuesday morning had to be obtained from the city authorities. They objected at first, but finally accorded their consent. With his uncle, the matter was quickly settled. Messer Hugolin did not approve of holidays for apprentices, ...
— The Doomsman • Van Tassel Sutphen
... be getting cool. In that famed Pentecost-Night of the Fourth of August, when new Faith rose suddenly into miraculous fire, and old Feudality was burnt up, men remarked that Mirabeau took no hand in it; that, in fact, he luckily happened to be absent. But did he not defend the Veto, nay Veto Absolu; and tell vehement Barnave that six hundred irresponsible senators would make of all tyrannies the insupportablest? Again, how anxious was he that the King's Ministers should have seat and ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle
... his men arrived at the Ohio on the tenth of April," said the courier, "and we set to work at once to throw up the fort. We made good progress, but on the morning of the seventeenth, while Captain Trent and thirty of the men were absent, leaving Lieutenant Ward in command, the river was suddenly covered with canoes crowded with French and Indians. There were at least eight hundred of them, and they had a dozen pieces of artillery. We had no ...
— A Soldier of Virginia • Burton Egbert Stevenson
... that the sooner he and the audience understand the situation the better). I sigh for another, my lord, who is absent. ...
— Happy Days • Alan Alexander Milne
... generally begin, at the beginning and at the end. Protoplasm was a name that produced at first a soothing effect on the inquisitive mind, but when it was asked, whence that power of development, possessed by the Protoplasm which begins as a Moneres and ends as Homo, but entirely absent in other Protoplasm, which resists all mechanical manipulation, and never enters upon organic growth, it was seen that the problem of development had not been solved, but only shifted, and that, instead of simple Protoplasm, very peculiar kinds of Protoplasm were ...
— Chips from a German Workshop - Volume IV - Essays chiefly on the Science of Language • Max Muller
... me yet? Though I was lonely, almost a recluse while you were absent, the pure feeling which from our childhood united me with you has grown greater with your destiny! When these eyes, which with such rapture look on you again, shall be closed forever; when this heart which only beats for God, for my father and for you shall be reduced to dust, ...
— The Resources of Quinola • Honore de Balzac
... had been absent from Lutha for a number of years as military attache to the Luthanian legation at a foreign court. He had known nothing of the true condition at home until his return, when he saw such scoundrels as Coblich, Maenck, ...
— The Mad King • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... Sidney, Jim found McCarthy absent, at North Platte, due to return the next day. Coming to the station the next morning, Jim found the express reported three hours late, and returned to his room in the railway House, fifty yards north of the depot. He doffed ...
— The Red-Blooded Heroes of the Frontier • Edgar Beecher Bronson
... group), man alone has a perfect brain. By this we mean the physiologically and structurally perfect brain. It is present even in the lowest man—present in the negro or the Australian Bushman as in the civilized American; and absent in all living beings below man—absent in the ape or the elephant as truly as in the lowest mammals, the kangaroo or the duckbill. Its sign is language, capacity of progress, culture. All healthy human brains are structurally perfect; the highest brute brains are structurally ...
— Evolution - An Investigation and a Critique • Theodore Graebner
... established by circumstantial evidence. This is the law, and cannot now be departed from. I do not presume to explain its wisdom. Chief- Justice Johnson has observed, in the leading case, that it may have its probable foundation in the idea that where direct proof is absent as to both the fact of the death and of criminal violence capable of producing death, no evidence can rise to the degree of moral certainty that the individual is dead by criminal intervention, or even lead by direct inference to this result; and that, where the fact of death is not certainly ascertained, ...
— Stories by Modern American Authors • Julian Hawthorne
... his head. It had never occurred to him in all those absent years that the child was being abused. How simply she had told her ...
— Rose O'Paradise • Grace Miller White
... days followed days and resembled one another. Camille did not once absent himself from his office. His mother and wife hardly ever left the shop. Therese, residing in damp obscurity, in gloomy, crushing silence, saw life expand before her in all its nakedness, each night bringing the same cold couch, and each morn ...
— Therese Raquin • Emile Zola
... back where she had found it, and walked slowly out of the shop. Her feet still lagged when she turned towards the tenement. What mattered it if Aunt Jane should return and find her absent? What mattered anything now? Then came a sudden daring temptation. The road was free—and she was there! Why not keep on to the hospital? She looked down—her skirts were inches above her knees! If only Aunt Jane had not insisted that she wear Sophia's petticoats, to match the length ...
— Polly of the Hospital Staff • Emma C. Dowd
... Plutonian hill dialect he'd heard once, this being the hideous little Martian's amazing talent—an instinctive grasp of all tongues. His lingual talents were a tremendous asset to Mike but at times they drove him crazy because Nicko might absent-mindedly use several different tongues during a conversation; some of which he could not classify himself, having forgotten ...
— Before Egypt • E. K. Jarvis
... Hester's were laughed at by most of the girls, but Dora Russell gave her an approving nod, and Cecil, looking paler than ever, dropped suddenly into her seat, and no longer tried to defend her absent friend. ...
— A World of Girls - The Story of a School • L. T. Meade
... too heavy and boggy to permit us to start yesterday; besides, three horses were absent, and could not be found. Last night, Mr. Roper brought in three ducks and a pigeon, and was joyfully welcomed by all hands. Charley had been insolent several times, when I sent him out after the cattle, and, this morning, he even threatened to shoot Mr. Gilbert. I immediately dismissed ...
— Journal of an Overland Expedition in Australia • Ludwig Leichhardt
... such cases), huffed out of the room. Then Mr. Pole, in an abruptly serious way, bashfully entreated the ladies to be civil to Martha, who had the best heart in the world. It sounded as if he were going to say more. After a pause, he added emphatically, "Do!" and went. He was many days absent: nor did he speak to Adela of the money she had asked for when he returned. Adela had not the courage ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... prosperity of a nation more efficaciously asserted than by the measure of how far forward may have progressed the tribute of its solicitude for that proliferent continuance which of evils the original if it be absent when fortunately present constitutes the certain sign of omnipotent nature's incorrupted benefaction. For who is there who anything of some significance has apprehended but is conscious that that exterior splendour may be the surface of a ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce
... and in the evening again returned to regale myself with corn, as I had done the night before. The great abundance with which I was surrounded, strongly tempted me to continue where I was; but then the thoughts of my absent brother embittered all my peace, and the advice of my mother came so much across my mind, that I determined before the next morning I would again venture forth and seek my fortune and my brother. Accordingly, after having eaten a very hearty meal, I left ...
— The Life and Perambulations of a Mouse • Dorothy Kilner
... to set up his own fireside. He saw that fireside made perfect by a pair of slate-colored eyes, which breakfast opposite him, follow him as he starts for his work, and greet him on his return. A pair of eyes to love when present, and think of when absent. Heigho! How many firesides and homes have been built ...
— The Honorable Peter Stirling and What People Thought of Him • Paul Leicester Ford
... her at Lady Holland's in 1870, and mutual liking ripened rapidly into close friendship. During her residences in England few days passed in which he did not present himself at her drawing-room in Claridge's Hotel: when absent in Russia or on the Continent, she received from him weekly letters, though he used to complain that writing to a lady through the poste restante was like trying to kiss a nun through a double grating. These letters, all faithfully preserved, I have been privileged to see; they ...
— Biographical Study of A. W. Kinglake • Rev. W. Tuckwell
... opinions about the war. There are many cases of mothers compelling their sons to volunteer and other cases of fathers insisting upon being taken because their sons are at the front. The prefect of Friuli told me that nearly all the 24,000 men in his province who were absent abroad when the war broke out returned home to fight before they were recalled. The south and the island areas warm for war as the north, and the regiments of Naples and of Sicily have done very well indeed in the field. Some people think ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume V (of 8) • Francis J. (Francis Joseph) Reynolds, Allen L. (Allen Leon)
... there was the pile of bushes through which he had looked while watching the trail, and the print of his body in the sand. A fire was speedily lighted on the summit, and kept burning brightly to guide the absent troopers to the captured camp. That little beacon shining through the darkness must have been a welcome sight to their eyes, for it told of the complete success of their companions and of the rest and water that were to ...
— George at the Fort - Life Among the Soldiers • Harry Castlemon
... after shape of misery before her, always ending in her being dragged back again to her old life of terror, and stupor, and fevered despair. Her husband had so long overshadowed her life that her imagination could not keep hold of a condition in which that great dread was absent; and even his absence—what was it? only a dreary vacant flat, where there was nothing to strive ...
— Scenes of Clerical Life • George Eliot
... would stir up the committee to take some steps to ascertain if Mr. Wright was moving in his duty, I contented myself with writing to the Magnetic Observatory, to learn from Professor Neumayer what was going on. He being absent on scientific tours, I received answers from his locum tenens, to the effect that within a month certain information was expected. The committee I did not trouble, as their Honorary Secretary had deigned no reply to letters ...
— Successful Exploration Through the Interior of Australia • William John Wills
... now absent on this desperate business; sent, by my officiousness, to encounter a ...
— Anna St. Ives • Thomas Holcroft
... written is, I am informed, to give me, as an untried hand, the benefit of your advice, in case I want it (which I venture to think I shall not) at any stage of my proceedings. As the extraordinary circumstances of the case on which I am now engaged make it impossible for me to absent myself from the place where the robbery was committed, until I have made some progress towards discovering the thief, I am necessarily precluded from consulting you personally. Hence the necessity of my writing down the various details, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 6, April, 1858 • Various
... night, when he is asleep; and in the day when he is absent: and I am happy when I can, unobserved, steal this poor relief. I believe already I have shed as many tears as would drown my baby. How many more I may have to shed, God only knows! For, O Madam, after all my fortitude, and my recollection, to fall from so ...
— Pamela (Vol. II.) • Samuel Richardson
... quite still while Jane was absent in search of the man. She held her basket on her knee, her hand resting on it. Her kindly, slow-working mind was wakening to strange thoughts. To her they seemed inhuman and uncanny. Was it because good, faithful, ignorant Jane had been rather nervous about Ameerah that she ...
— Emily Fox-Seton - Being The Making of a Marchioness and The Methods of Lady Walderhurst • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... of record, where may be tried actions of debt, trespass, covenant, &c. They are held on Wednesdays and Fridays for actions entered in Wood Street Compter, and every Thursday and Saturday for actions entered in the Poultry Compter. Here the testimony of an absent witness in writing is allowed ...
— London in 1731 • Don Manoel Gonzales
... thoroughly and well. When a passage interests her, or she needs to remember it for some future use, she flutters it off swiftly on the fingers of her right hand. Sometimes this finger-play is unconscious. Miss Keller talks to herself absent-mindedly in the manual alphabet. When she is walking up or down the hall or along the veranda, her hands go flying along beside her like a confusion ...
— Story of My Life • Helen Keller
... Borneo much resembles in its fauna and flora, the peacock is absent, and its place taken by the Argus pheasant. Other handsome pheasants are the Fireback and the Bulwer pheasants, the latter so named after Governor Sir HENRY BULWER who took the first specimen home in 1874. These pheasants do not rise in the jungle and are, therefore, uninteresting ...
— British Borneo - Sketches of Brunai, Sarawak, Labuan, and North Borneo • W. H. Treacher
... As soon as the British Commissioners received it in Paris, they put a copy of it into the hands of the American Commissioners. M. de Marbois was at that time only a Secretary of Legation, and wrote the letter while the Minister, M. de la Luzerne, was absent from Philadelphia, and without his knowledge. The sentiments of the letter were never avowed ...
— The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Vol. VIII • Various
... beauty that is always present to hear her-self flattered, is flattered by every one. But the absent and silent goddess, Forgetfulness, has no votaries, and is never thought of: yet we owe her much. She is the goddess of ease, though not ...
— The Writings Of Thomas Paine, Complete - With Index to Volumes I - IV • Thomas Paine
... noon before Marcia Lowe dared take Cynthia away from the shelter of the church, and when she did so she chose an hour when all but Greeley were absent from the store, and he was in ...
— A Son of the Hills • Harriet T. Comstock
... faithful and loving little soul, was extremely anxious that Daisy and the baby should show as rosy faces as possible to greet their mother's return. Hinton, who still occupied the drawing-rooms, was absent as usual for the day. Mr. Home would not come in until tea time. So Anne, putting some dinner for the children and herself, in the back of the perambulator, and the house latch-key in her pocket, started off to have what she called to Daisy, a ...
— How It All Came Round • L. T. Meade
... brewing, he was sure to put off from shore; and would be seen far out in the bay, his light skiff dancing like a feather on the waves, when sea and sky were all in a turmoil, and the stoutest ships were fain to lower their sails. Sometimes, on such occasions, he would be absent for days together. How he weathered the tempest, and how and where he subsisted, no one could divine, nor did any one venture to ask, for all had an almost superstitious awe of him. Some of the Communipaw oystermen ...
— Wolfert's Roost and Miscellanies • Washington Irving
... their own sake, and that the unattainable is not truly unattainable, when we can make the beauty of it our own. Indeed, throughout all these two volumes, though there is much practical scepticism, and much irony on abstract questions, this kindly and consolatory spirit is never absent. There is much that is cheerful and, after a sedate, fireside fashion, hopeful. No one will be discouraged by reading the book; but the ground of all this hopefulness and cheerfulness remains to the end somewhat vague. It does not seem ...
— Lay Morals • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Claire was very prettily animated, and rallied Falconer upon his absent-mindedness and told Billy tales of her English home and how her father had threatened to change the name of the Hall to Maedchenheim because there were five daughters of them. "Five girls near an age, Mr. Hill, and all poor as church mice!" she ...
— The Palace of Darkened Windows • Mary Hastings Bradley
... its mystery also. She showed in every lineament passionate concern and misery, and a deep tenderness from which the element of fear was not absent. But she, as well as he, betrayed that some misunderstanding deeper than any I had previously suspected drew its intangible veil between them and made the near proximity in which they sat at once a heart-piercing delight and an unspeakable pain. What ...
— The Golden Slipper • Anna Katharine Green
... The emperor was absent in Flanders. He was overjoyed on learning the complete success of Gasca's mission; and not less satisfied with the tidings of the treasure he had brought with him; for the exchequer, rarely filled to overflowing, had been exhausted by the recent troubles ...
— History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William Hickling Prescott
... Bensley, with a richness and a dignity, of which (to judge from some recent castings of that character) the very tradition must be worn out from the stage. No manager in those days would have dreamed of giving it to Mr. Baddeley, or Mr. Parsons: when Bensley was occasionally absent from the theatre, John Kemble thought it no derogation to succeed to the part. Malvolio is not essentially ludicrous. He becomes comic but by accident. He is cold, austere, repelling; but dignified, consistent, and, for what appears, rather of an ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Volume 2 • Charles Lamb
... be no doubt, indeed, that in the novels of this period two main features of the modern story, the word-painting of scenery and the analysis of subjective emotions, are conspicuously absent. Yet among the manifold causes to which may be ascribed the wide recent expansion of the Novel of Manners, we may well reckon the decisive impulse that it received from these famous authoresses. They were, in fact, the founders of the dominion which women bid fair to establish over ...
— Studies in Literature and History • Sir Alfred Comyn Lyall |
