"Breathless" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... breathless, deafened and wounded by the shook of the waves, emerged from the little lake and stretched themselves on the sand, where they rested for ...
— A Romance of the West Indies • Eugene Sue
... the ways of Ferne House. Upon the uppermost step she paused a moment, and he, lifting his eyes, saw above him her mantled figure, her outstretched arms with the lily of her body in between, the gold star swimming above her forehead. One breathless moment thus, then she turned, and folding her mantle about her, passed from her lover's sight towards the ...
— Sir Mortimer • Mary Johnston
... cold, treacherous sea, he took two or three forward steps, fell, then rose and strove to struggle on. But a little hollow in the path let him down into the flood to his waist. The spray flew into his eyes and mouth, and breathless and bewildered he fell again, this time to disappear under the foam-flecked water. He struggled up to air and life at last, with many gasps for breath, and once more clutched at the rocks behind him. It all seemed like the ...
— Culm Rock - The Story of a Year: What it Brought and What it Taught • Glance Gaylord
... and more desolate than that which he has seen already; yet his imagination is paralysed, and can suggest no fancy or vision of anything to surpass the reality which he had just witnessed. Awed and breathless he advances; when lo! the light of the afternoon sun welcomes him as he leaves the tunnel, and behold a smiling valley—a babbling brook, a village with tall belfries, and meadows of brilliant green—these are the things which greet him, and he smiles to himself as the terror ...
— Erewhon • Samuel Butler
... comfortably in the newspapers. Blanka, however, took so much to heart the disappointment of her pious wishes, and came so near the point of tear-letting, that the advocate felt obliged to sally forth in person to see what he could do to console her. In less than an hour he was back again, breathless and exultant. He ran up-stairs with the agility of a much younger and less corpulent man, and hastened to the princess's room, regardless of the fact that she was at the ...
— Manasseh - A Romance of Transylvania • Maurus Jokai
... storm: he reels to and fro like a drunken man; he staggers under the weight of his own purposes and the suggestions of others; he stands at bay with his situation; and from the superstitious awe and breathless suspense into which the communications of the Weird Sisters throw him, is hurried on with daring impatience to verify their predictions, and with impious and bloody hand to tear aside the veil which hides the uncertainty of the future. He is not equal to the struggle with fate and ...
— Hazlitt on English Literature - An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature • Jacob Zeitlin
... in stupefaction at the junction of the country road and the turnpike, helplessly watching the flight of their idol from the Herd of the Lost. When Dylks vanished in the dusk of the forest, and the last of those who had followed him came lagging breathless back, and dropped from their hands the broken stone which they had unconsciously brought with them, the Little Flock involuntarily raised their hymn, as if it had been a song of triumph; an inglorious triumph, but an omen of final victory, and of the descent of the ...
— The Leatherwood God • William Dean Howells
... of insolent idleness, of genius, of learning, of happiness and of misery; of far-reaching enterprise, of political glory and shame, of science and art; here human life was to reach its intensest, most breathless, relentless and insatiable expression; here was to stand a city whose arms should reach westward over a continent, and eastward round the world; here were to thunder the streets and tower the buildings and reek the chimneys and arch ...
— The History of the United States from 1492 to 1910, Volume 1 • Julian Hawthorne
... quite different from what she had anticipated. She had looked forward to such a moment with a secret misgiving. The abstract person of her thoughts had always inspired her with a painful shyness and an indefinite, breathless fear. But the lover who was here now in the flesh by her side inspired none of these feelings. On the contrary, she felt easy and natural and quite at home with him. There was nothing alarming about his flushed face and laughing eyes. She was not at all ...
— Barlasch of the Guard • H. S. Merriman
... communications with him from the mainland. From the 1st of January 1380 till the 21st of June the Venetians pressed the blockade ever closer, grappling their foemen in a grip that if relaxed one moment would have hurled him at their throats. The long and breathless struggle ended in the capitulation at Chioggia of what remained of Doria's forty-eight galleys and ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece • John Addington Symonds
... Amid the others' breathless interest, Walter related the adventures of the night. When the captain learned of Charley's accident, he brought out the brandy bottle and insisted on his drinking what remained of the liquor. His wound was then bathed, ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... started with a sudden bound, And flung the reins and chariot to the ground: 370 The studded harness from their necks they broke, Here fell a wheel, and here a silver spoke, Here were the beam and axle torn away; And, scattered o'er the earth, the shining fragments lay. The breathless Phaeton, with flaming hair, Shot from the chariot, like a falling star, That in a summer's evening from the top Of heaven drops down, or seems at least to drop; Till on the Po his blasted corpse was hurled, Far from his country, in the western ...
— The Poetical Works of Addison; Gay's Fables; and Somerville's Chase • Joseph Addison, John Gay, William Sommerville
... its joys and its dangers. Suddenly they heard a crackling sound in the cane-brake near them; then came from a greater distance the bay of bloodhounds. There was no mistaking these sounds; and for an hour they listened in almost breathless anxiety to these appalling ...
— Watch and Wait - or The Young Fugitives • Oliver Optic
... water, when the gates are opened. A quarter of an hour in advance of the appointed time, about 15,000 persons had assembled upon the circular terrace, facing this magnificent fountain, and were waiting with breathless anxiety to see old Neptune take his turn. We had seen the wonders and beauties presented by the other fountains as they shot their silvery columns, and clouds of vapor high into the air, or spanned their pyramidal basins with ...
— The Youthful Wanderer - An Account of a Tour through England, France, Belgium, Holland, Germany • George H. Heffner
... in one of the leading hotels, which seemed very splendid to her and that night she saw Franklin on the stage as one of "the three Dromios" in a farce called "Incog," a piece which made her laugh till she was almost breathless. ...
— A Daughter of the Middle Border • Hamlin Garland
... men or boys are the worse for playing games; it is the applause of the mob that turns their heads. But I am afraid I am not logical enough to say that I would forbid boys to watch matches against another school; the emotions that lead to the "breathless hush in the Close" are so compounded of patriotism and jealousy for the honour of the school, that they are far from ignoble. But I would not have boys compelled to watch the games against clubs and other non-school teams. Above all, if they watch, they must have a run or ...
— Cambridge Essays on Education • Various
... as they could and found that General Jackson had moved his headquarters to the little village of Port Republic. They found him and told him the news as he was mounting his horse, but at the same time an excited and breathless messenger came galloping up from another direction. The vanguard of Shields had already routed his pickets, and the second Northern army was pressing forward in ...
— The Scouts of Stonewall • Joseph A. Altsheler
... tissue-paper, with a paint-brush, the addresses of the shops where we shall without fail meet with what we require,—away we go, full of hope, only to encounter some fresh mystification, till our breathless ...
— Madame Chrysantheme • Pierre Loti
... mother's heart, She, blushing, said no word to break my trance, For I was breathless; and, with lips apart, Felt my breast pant and all my pulses dance, And strove to move, but could not for the weight Of unbelieving joy, so ...
— Poems by Jean Ingelow, In Two Volumes, Volume I. • Jean Ingelow
... grandfather settled there, and made it her home whenever she became tired of travelling. She lived in state, with many servants and dependents, wearing silk dresses on week days, and setting silver plate before the meanest guest. The women of Polotzk were breathless over her wardrobe, counting up how many pairs of embroidered boots she had, at fifteen rubles a pair. And Hode's manners were as much a subject of gossip as her clothes, for she had picked up strange ways in her travels Although she was so pious that she was never ...
— The Promised Land • Mary Antin
... arms, but he had no authority, in the absence of Hawley, to set them in motion. Messengers, however, were sent off on horseback at once to Callendar House, and the general presently galloped up in breathless haste, and putting himself at the head of his three regiments of dragoons, started for Falkirk Muir, which he hoped to gain before the Highlanders could take possession of it. He ordered the infantry to follow as fast as possible. A storm of wind and rain ...
— Bonnie Prince Charlie - A Tale of Fontenoy and Culloden • G. A. Henty
... be quite clear to the inquiring mind why the desperate difficulties of sainthood can be truthfully viewed in the light of a breathless adventure. Learn, then, the great secret. The love of God in the heart is the magical light which touches the dreariness and hardship of self-thwarting with a splendor of sublime Romance. You cannot have holiness without love. Holiness can be either greater nor less than the ...
— For Greater Things: The story of Saint Stanislaus Kostka • William T. Kane, S.J.
... her down the dangerous slope. On she rushed, jumping from rock to rock, waving her hand in wild glee when the moon shone out, singing and shouting with merry scorn at my desperate efforts to reach her. It was a mad chase, but only on the plain below could I come up with her. There, breathless and eager, I unfolded to her my plan of education. I only went as far as this: I was willing to send her to school, to give her opportunities of seeing the world, to provide for her whole future. I left the story of my love to come afterward. She laughed me to scorn. As well talk ...
— Castle Nowhere • Constance Fenimore Woolson
... the alarm. Their horses were white with foam; their heads hung down, and their sides went in and out. I pitied the poor things. Mother jumped on her pony, and rode out among the men. She wanted to go with them, but they wouldn't let her. I was scared almost breathless." ...
— Cavanaugh: Forest Ranger - A Romance of the Mountain West • Hamlin Garland
... ankle-deep in a loose deposit of ashes and pumice-stone that yielded to my tread and slid away under me to such an extent as to make progress almost impossible. But I was determined not to be beaten; and at length, after a full hour's violent exertion, I found myself, breathless and with my clothing saturated with perspiration, standing, as I had expected, on the lip of the crater of an extinct volcano. The crater was almost mathematically circular in shape, of about a quarter of a mile in internal diameter, and fully five hundred feet deep; ...
— Overdue - The Story of a Missing Ship • Harry Collingwood
... a tale of romance! How learned you all this, Angelique?" exclaimed Amelie, who had listened with breathless attention to ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... Breathless I looked at them, and my dog forgot to be cold. High on his haunches, with lifted forepaw and sharp-cocked ears, he ...
— Lore of Proserpine • Maurice Hewlett
... softened to the sight; And on the western hills its faintest ray Kissed the yet ruddy streaks of parted day. The stars were few, and, twinkling, dimly shone, For the bright moon in beauty reigned alone. One cloud lay sleeping 'neath the breathless sky, Bathed in the limpid light; while, as the sigh Of secret love, silent as shadows glide, The soft wind played among the leafy pride Of the green trees, and scarce the aspen shook; A babbling voice was heard from every brook, ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume XXIV. • Revised by Alexander Leighton
... coaches were shouting at them, a tug was taking a couple of deal-loaded barges to a woodwharf with much puffing and whistling, and bathers, sheltered by the eyot willows, were keeping up loud and breathless conversations. "Not exactly the kind of surroundings the fishermen seeks," you will say; but, apparently, London fish get used to noise. Our boat was what I, speaking unprofessionally, should call a small sea-boat, but I believe she was built years ago at Strand-on-the-Green, the ...
— The Naturalist on the Thames • C. J. Cornish
... that effect to the garrison of Vera Cruz, by the same dispatches in which he informed them of his safe arrival in the capital. But scarcely had his messenger been gone half an hour, when he returned breathless with terror, and covered with wounds. "The city," he said, "was all in arms! The drawbridges were raised, and the enemy would soon be upon them!" He spoke truth. It was not long before a hoarse, sullen sound became audible, like that of the roaring of ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol XII. - Modern History • Arthur Mee
... to remember the forced march he made to the Stony village. The light was faint, and the low ground streaked with haze, as they floundered through the muskeg, sinking deep in the softer spots and splashing through shallow pools. When they reached the first hill bench he was hot and breathless, and their path led sharply upward over banks of ragged stones which had a trick of slipping down when they trod on them. It was worse where the stones were large and they stumbled into the hollows between. Then they struggled through short pine-scrub, crawled ...
— The Intriguers • Harold Bindloss
... at such a pace, as to press the little Prince into a breathless trot by his side; but he, too, was all eagerness, and scorned to complain. They proceeded without interruption to the court of the palace. Edward, leading the way, hastened to his mother's apartments. He threw open the door, looked in, and, saying ...
— The Lances of Lynwood • Charlotte M. Yonge
... Coddington had no intention of leaving Milburn she ceased to remonstrate further and Peter settled down to work and to keep as comfortable as he could during the hot weather. What a haven his home, with its green lawns and wide verandas, became, after those long, breathless hours in the tannery! Never before had he half appreciated his surroundings. Most of the houses where the men at the factory lived were huddled closely in that dingy part of the town where Nat Jackson's rooms were, and Peter soon discovered that after supper ...
— The Story of Leather • Sara Ware Bassett
... until they halted, breathless and exhausted, that he discovered that he had been twice wounded; for in the wild excitement of the fight he had been unconscious of pain. A bullet had passed through the fleshy part of his left arm, while another had cut a clean ...
— In Times of Peril • G. A. Henty
... never be remedied." Then her voice sank so low that he could scarcely catch the breathless words. ...
— Ashton-Kirk, Investigator • John T. McIntyre
... the "two nice men" who had dragged her to the walk were police officers, and thinking again of the subpoena, the frightened woman who had escaped such peril, followed up the two flights of stairs and into Wilford's office, where she sank breathless into a chair, while Mark, not in the least surprised, greeted her cordially, and very soon succeeded in getting her quiet, bowing so graciously to Mattie when introduced that the poor girl dreamed of him for many a night, and by day built castles of what might have been had ...
— Family Pride - Or, Purified by Suffering • Mary J. Holmes
... withdrawing in high indignation from his vantage-point when something occurred of a startling enough nature to hold him where he was in almost breathless expectation. ...
— Initials Only • Anna Katharine Green
... discovery that her friends had once kept a preserve of tadpoles to watch them turn into frogs, was so delightful as entirely to dissipate all remaining thoughts of thunder, and leave Kate free for almost breathless amazement at the glittering domes of glass, looking like enormous bubbles ...
— Countess Kate • Charlotte M. Yonge
... not answer; but the two women drew closer together and held each other in their arms, as if their proximity afforded protection. Thus they lay in breathless fear for some minutes, while Andy began to be influenced by a vision, in which the duel, and the chase, and the thrashing were all enacted over again, and soon an odd word began to escape from the dream. "Gi' me the pist'l, ...
— Handy Andy, Volume One - A Tale of Irish Life, in Two Volumes • Samuel Lover
... polished, dark wood beneath their feet, and upon the rugs that had come from Spain along with the paintings upon the walls. They looked, and craned, and murmured comments until the senora appeared, a little breathless and warm from her last conference with Margarita in the kitchen, and turned ...
— The Gringos • B. M. Bower
... a red-faced lawyer, almost breathless with his hurry, "more money is needed in the second ward; our committees are doing a great work there. What shall I put you down for? Fifty dollars? If we carry the election, your property will rise twenty per cent. Let me see; you are in ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier
... crutch tapped laboriously up the steps, and she stood before Mr. Brimberly's imposing figure mute, breathless, and trembling a little. ...
— The Definite Object - A Romance of New York • Jeffery Farnol
... in the Marquis' eyes, and his hands lifted. Their glances met for a breathless moment, and his eyes were tender, and her eyes were resolute, but ...
— Gallantry - Dizain des Fetes Galantes • James Branch Cabell
... But a deep mutual distrust which had been many years growing, and which had been carefully nursed by the arts of France, made a treaty impossible. Neither side would place confidence in the other. The whole nation now looked with breathless anxiety to the House of Lords. The assemblage of peers was large. The King himself was present. The debate was long, earnest, and occasionally furious. Some hands were laid on the pommels of swords in a manner which revived the ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 1 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... run after all," she cried. "That's what I get for making love to a tree." She flew along the path by the fence and reached the small station before the trolley slowed down for the stop. Breathless but triumphant she stood, large basket in one hand, buttermilk cooler ...
— The Comings of Cousin Ann • Emma Speed Sampson
... as Grisell walked away as fast as her weakness allowed, and found her sitting breathless at the third step on ...
— Grisly Grisell • Charlotte M. Yonge
... off to one side. In the scramble after it two opposing centres grabbed it at once, and each claimed precedence. The game stopped while Miss Andrews and the line-men came up to hear the evidence. There was a breathless moment of indecision. Then Miss Andrews took the ball and tossed up between the two contestants. But neither of them got it. Instead, T. Reed, slipping in between them, jumped for it again, and quick as a flash ...
— Betty Wales Freshman • Edith K. Dunton
... boast that Harry's smile would melt even his great-uncle, Cyrus, and she watched him with breathless rapture as he turned now in his high chair and tested the effect of this magic charm on his father. His baby mouth broadened deliciously, showing two rows of small irregular teeth; his blue eyes shone until they seemed full of sparkles; his roguish, ...
— Virginia • Ellen Glasgow
... a white column, half breathless with fear, She crept to conceal herself there: That instant the moon o'er a dark cloud shone clear, And she saw in the moon-light two ruffians appear, And between them ...
— Apparitions; or, The Mystery of Ghosts, Hobgoblins, and Haunted Houses Developed • Joseph Taylor
... and minds as a master upon the keys of a piano; to convince their understandings by the logic, and to thrill their feelings by the art of the orator; to see every eye watching his face, and every ear intent on the words that drop from his lips; to see indifference changed to breathless interest, and aversion to rapturous enthusiasm; to hear thunders of applause at the close of every period; to see the whole assembly animated by the feelings which in him are burning and struggling ...
— The Training of a Public Speaker • Grenville Kleiser
... thick clump of galley-proofs fastened by a clip at the left hand top corner, which he deposited on Doria's lap. She closed her eyes and her eyelids fluttered as she fingered the precious thing. For a moment we thought she was going to faint. There was breathless silence. Even Susan, who had been left out in the cold, let the black kitten leap from her knee, and aware that something out of the ordinary was happening, fixed her wondering eyes on Doria. Her mother and I wondered even more than Susan, for we had more reason. Of what ...
— Jaffery • William J. Locke
... just bound to see you, an' I've been to your house so often the soldiers laugh at me. Those young men haven't any sense of decency or respect, but I'll teach 'em, and you see they'll sing another song. Where can we sit down?" continued the lady, her words chasing each other's heels in her breathless haste. "These lazy, worthless Spanish officers take every seat along here. Why, here! your carriage will do, an' I've got a thousand things to say!" ("Heaven be merciful," groaned Stuyvesant to himself.) "I saw you driving, and I told my cabman to catch you if he had ...
— Ray's Daughter - A Story of Manila • Charles King
... sitting by the fire, mostly alone for a good while, "the room that had once been Marquis d'Argens's" (who is now dead, and buried far away, good old soul);—when, at last, about half-past 4, Catt came jumping in, breathless with joy; snatched me up: "His Majesty wants to speak with you this very moment!" Zimmermann's self shall ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XXI. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... named the sum. He smiled inwardly. Here was one of those Americans who would make him breathless before sundown. The booming voice and the energetic movements spoke plainly ...
— The Ragged Edge • Harold MacGrath
... perfect race of ministers to explain it, God has never done much but creep around and try to catch us disobeying it. From college I went to New York, to the Columbia Law School. And for four years I lived. Oh, I won't rhapsodize about New York. It was dirty and noisy and breathless and ghastly expensive. But compared with the moldy academy in which I had been smothered——! I went to symphonies twice a week. I saw Irving and Terry and Duse and Bernhardt, from the top gallery. I walked in Gramercy Park. ...
— Main Street • Sinclair Lewis
... way home from the last dancing lesson; and well-hardened clay resists ordinary cleaning methods, and demands edged tools. The luncheon bell rang loudly before Cecilia had finished. She gave the shoes a final hurried rub, and then fell to cleansing her hands; arriving in the dining-room, pink and breathless, some minutes later, to find a dreary piece of tepid mutton rapidly congealing on ...
— Back To Billabong • Mary Grant Bruce
... house and up the stairs and shut herself in the library, breathless, panic-stricken. He was going to confess! How awful! How awful! How could she ever go through with it? Why, why, hadn't she spoken at ...
— The Sisters-In-Law • Gertrude Atherton
... her burden upon the bed, she beamed acknowledgment of Sally's breathless thanks and made off briskly, to return much too soon to suit one who would have been glad of longer grace in which to become more intimately acquainted with this new donation of ...
— Nobody • Louis Joseph Vance
... Cadiz was prompt and so was Enoch. For a long hour the two sat in the breathless heat of the July night while the Mexican answered Enoch's terse questions with a flow of dramatic speech, accentuated by wild gestures. Shortly after eleven-thirty Jonas appeared in the doorway with ...
— The Enchanted Canyon • Honore Willsie Morrow
... that Patsy had still one hundred and twenty pounds in the bank. Ten pounds had been taken out for—I needn't trouble you with further details. Sufficient has been said to enable you to understand how affecting it was to meet this old man in the red and yellow woods, at the end of a breathless autumn day, trying to fell a young larch. He talked so rapidly, and one story flowed so easily into another, that it was a long time before I could get in a word. At last I was able to get out of him that the Colonel had ...
— The Lake • George Moore
... the old cracked door-bell was violently rung. Corentine had just gone out, so he went to the door, where, to his astonishment, he was confronted by Baron Huchenard and Bos the dealer in manuscripts. Bos dashed into the study wildly waving his arms, while breathless ejaculations flew out of his red tangle of beard and hair: 'Forged! The documents are forged! I can prove it! I ...
— The Immortal - Or, One Of The "Forty." (L'immortel) - 1877 • Alphonse Daudet
... that." He was almost breathless. "Solid bed of bituminous! Clear down to China! Don't breathe a word yet, ...
— Colonel Carter of Cartersville • F. Hopkinson Smith
... won through. It must have been still partly frozen, and perhaps we were only on the edge of it. I only know that as we scrambled up on solid ground, plastered and breathless, I looked at the wintry sun, the waste, and the tall hill tow'ring to the right of us, and thought it a strange ...
— The Splendid Spur • Arthur T. Quiller Couch
... missed a sensation. Two friends of mine were climbing at midnight the steep hill to the village, when from beneath a dark arch there dashed down towards them two breathless carabinieri, their cloaks flapping in the moonlight like the wings of the demon-bats of pantomime. "Is it your way that the murdered man lies?" they panted. "Murdered man!" At once a hundred shadowy reminiscences stirred in my friends' minds: Prosper Merimee's novels, stories of ...
— Without Prejudice • Israel Zangwill
... was breathless with interest now, "I have been told about that, but I don't like it. It seems to me that if a man is the king, he ought to have all the money and give it to the people when they need it. They ought to ask him for it, not he ...
— Ten Boys from History • Kate Dickinson Sweetser
... thought crossed his mind, he turned back into Sixth Avenue. A hatless, breathless young person, running down the snowy street collided with him. As he began to apologize, he awoke to the startling fact that it ...
— The Voice on the Wire • Eustace Hale Ball
... at once moved to table the motion to reconsider. Mr. Stiles's motion was lost by 57 yeas to 111 nays. This was in the nature of a test-vote, and the result, when announced, was listened to, with breathless attention, by the crowded House and galleries. It was too close for either side to be satisfied; but it showed a gain to the friends of the Amendment; that was something. How the final vote would ...
— The Great Conspiracy, Complete • John Alexander Logan
... aeroplane rose gently from the field. A wild shout of applause came from the people below us, at the heroism of the man who dared to fly this new and apparently fated machine. It was succeeded by a breathless, deathly calm, as if after the first burst of enthusiasm the crowd had suddenly realised the danger of the intrepid aviator. Would Norton add a third to the fatalities of ...
— The Silent Bullet • Arthur B. Reeve
... remote; and Ranny, in the window seat, was silent, listening with an inscrutable intentness to the three voices that ran on. He marveled at the way they kept it up. When his mother's light soprano broke, breathless for a moment, on a top note, Mrs. Randall's rich, guttural contralto came to its support, Mr. Randall supplying a running accompaniment of bass. And now they burst, all three of them, into anecdote and reminiscence, illustrating what they were all agreed ...
— The Combined Maze • May Sinclair
... pray God for him.' Ralegh thanked him, and grieved that he had no better return to make for his good will than 'this,' said he, as he threw him his lace cap, 'which you need, my friend, now more than I.' Being pressed on by the crowd, he was breathless and faint when he mounted the scaffold; but he saluted with a cheerful countenance those of his acquaintance whom he saw. Lords Arundel, Doncaster, Northampton, formerly Compton, and Oxford—son of Sir Walter's enemy—stood in Sir Randolph Carew's, or Crues's, balcony. Other Lords, Sheffield ...
— Sir Walter Ralegh - A Biography • William Stebbing
... and adventure is piled upon adventure, and at the end the reader, be he boy or man, will have experienced breathless enjoyment in this romantic story describing many adventures in the Rockies and ...
— Dick, Marjorie and Fidge - A Search for the Wonderful Dodo • G. E. Farrow
... running at her swiftest along the water-side toward the creek and the Sending Boat. As is aforesaid she was as fleet-foot as a deer, so but in a little space of time she had come to the creek, and leapt into the boat, panting and breathless. She turned and looked hastily along the path her feet had just worn, and deemed she saw a fluttering and flashing coming along it, but some way off; yet was not sure, for her eyes were dizzy with the swiftness of her flight and the hot sun and the hurry ...
— The Water of the Wondrous Isles • William Morris
... which the pearl had been taken, and was glad to be informed as to its weight and purity. It was pleasant to Colin to see—as he so often did—the success of the pearl-hunters. But while the boy was examining the stone, a loud knock at the door, was heard, and a neighbor came in, breathless and excited. ...
— The Boy With the U. S. Fisheries • Francis Rolt-Wheeler
... captain's benefaction, when he observed to us that it was a pity to lose the boat which was left on shore, as well as the other brass guns, and proposed making the attempt to bring off both. Five or six of us stripped, and lowering ourselves into the water, very gently swam ashore, in a breathless kind of silence, that would have done honour to a Pawnee Loup Indian. The water was very cold, and at first almost took away my respiration. We landed under the battery, and having first secured our ...
— Frank Mildmay • Captain Frederick Marryat
... eloquence is so widely known, and so justly appreciated, that we need not refer to it here. We will only say that he surpassed himself in this charge, which, for more than an hour, held the large assembly in anxious and breathless suspense, and caused all hearts to vibrate with the ...
— Within an Inch of His Life • Emile Gaboriau
... sun was setting, Lionel and Sophy came in sight,—above their heads, the western clouds bathed in gold and purple. Sophy, perceiving George, bounded forwards, and reached his side, breathless. ...
— What Will He Do With It, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... account for a writer's work and influence. The third thing to note is Macaulay's enthusiasm for his subject,—an enthusiasm which is often partisan, but which we gladly share for the moment as we follow the breathless narrative. Macaulay generally makes a hero of his man, shows him battling against odds, and the heroic side of our own nature awakens and responds to the author's plea. The fourth, and perhaps most characteristic thing ...
— English Literature - Its History and Its Significance for the Life of the English Speaking World • William J. Long
... had just closed behind those whom he was following. Here he was compelled to pause, in the hope that the partition might not be so thick as completely to intercept the sounds of the voices in the chamber; but after listening with breathless attention for a few minutes, he could not catch even the murmuring of a whisper. It now struck him that Nisida and her companion might have passed on into a room more remote than the one to which that door had admitted them; and he resolved to follow on. ...
— Wagner, the Wehr-Wolf • George W. M. Reynolds
... was going on across the river, but the sudden and complete stillness following the firing was very mysterious. While speculating among ourselves as to what it meant, a half-naked infantryman came almost breathless into our midst and announced that both brigades had been captured, he having escaped by swimming the river. One of our lieutenants refused to believe his statement and did the worthy fellow cruel injustice in accusing him ...
— The Story of a Cannoneer Under Stonewall Jackson • Edward A. Moore
... be glad with me. Not the sun or the summer alone, but every hour and season yields its tribute of delight; for every hour and change corresponds to and authorizes a different state of the mind, from breathless noon to grimmest midnight. Nature is a setting that fits equally well a comic or a mourning piece. In good health, the air is a cordial of incredible virtue. Crossing a bare common, in snow puddles, ...
— Nature • Ralph Waldo Emerson
... responsibility, of oblivion of the claims of the millions of native inhabitants of Africa who are God's creatures and the redeemed of Christ as much as we,—of ambitions and aims purely worldly, of a breathless race among nations for present ...
— Native Races and the War • Josephine Elizabeth Butler
... follow Jones. He slipped into the thorny brake and, flat on his stomach, wormed his way like a snake far into the thickly interlaced web of branches. Rude and Adams crawled after him. Words were superfluous. Quiet, breathless, with beating hearts, the hunters pressed close to the dry grass. A long, low, steady rumble filled the air, and increased in volume till it became a roar. Moments, endless moments, passed. The roar filled out like a flood slowly released from its confines to sweep down ...
— The Last of the Plainsmen • Zane Grey
... of the heart are the issues of life, and within, it is life's well-spring. Death is but a little narrow gate, in a dark rough pass among the mountains, where each must go alone, one by one, in solemn silence, for the avalanches hanging overhead; one by one, in breathless caution, for there is but barely a footing; one by one, for none can help his brother on the track: the steady eye of faith, the firm foot of righteousness, the staff of hope to comfort and support—these be the only helps. And each one carries with him, as his sole possession ...
— The Complete Prose Works of Martin Farquhar Tupper • Martin Farquhar Tupper
... brain was working this way and that, searching for light. In a moment he knew what he would do. He dashed down the familiar steep stairs; in four minutes more he had raced across the street to the rectory, and brought up, breathless, in ...
— August First • Mary Raymond Shipman Andrews and Roy Irving Murray
... on his accepting, invited a lot of friends, holding out hopes that Liszt would play. She pushed the piano into the middle of the room—no one could have possibly failed to see it. Every one was on the qui vive when Liszt arrived, and breathless with anticipation. Liszt, who had had many surprises of this sort, I imagine, saw the situation at a glance. After several people had been presented to him, Liszt, with his most captivating smile, said to ...
— The Sunny Side of Diplomatic Life, 1875-1912 • Lillie DeHegermann-Lindencrone
... and biscuits notwithstanding; we shall not be in the field before ten o'clock, do our best for it. Now, Jem," he continued, as that worthy, followed by David Seers and the Captain made their appearance, hot and breathless, but in high spirits at the glorious termination of the morning's sport—"Now, Jem, you and the Captain must look out a good strong pole, and tie that fellow's legs, and carry him between you as far as Blain's house—you can come up with ...
— Warwick Woodlands - Things as they Were There Twenty Years Ago • Henry William Herbert (AKA Frank Forester)
... John, who have been eagerly running, arrive breathless, with John in the lead. Gazing reverently, intently, in through the opening John sees, not a body, but on the spot where the body had been laid, the linen wrappings lying, held up in the shape of a body by Nicodemus' abundant and heavy ointments just as when they held the ...
— Quiet Talks on John's Gospel • S. D. Gordon
... clock struck the hour of 12, and the crowds, almost breathless, and with eyes fixed upon the flag pole, watched for developments. At the sound of the first gun from Fort Morro, Major Dean and Lieutenant Castle of General Brooke's staff hoisted the stars and stripes, while the band played the ...
— Porto Rico - Its History, Products and Possibilities... • Arthur D. Hall
... thank God!" cried Mrs. Gwynne. "And you, too, my dear son—my brave Harold!" And she turned to him as he stood, leaning breathless against the wall. ...
— Olive - A Novel • Dinah Maria Craik, (AKA Dinah Maria Mulock)
... moves with its familiar hesitation. In a moment more that shade will be down and—But no! the lifted hand falls back; the easy attitude becomes strained, fixed. He is staring now—not merely gazing out upon the wastes of sky and sea; and Roger, following the direction of his glance, stares also in breathless emotion at what those distances, but now so impenetrable, are giving to ...
— The Golden Slipper • Anna Katharine Green
... breathless and splashed with mire, King Robert rushed on till he came to the palace gates. He strode through the courtyard, thrusting aside the men-servants and pages who tried to bar his path, and hurried up the broad marble ...
— The Children's Longfellow - Told in Prose • Doris Hayman
... interest the tiger. He stopped for a few moments and looked at it. He was now near enough for us to observe him closely. We did so with breathless interest. He was a long tiger, and very thin; his flabby flanks seemed to indicate that he was hungry. Suddenly he gave a quick bound; he ceased to regard the balloon; his eyes were fixed upon ...
— John Gayther's Garden and the Stories Told Therein • Frank R. Stockton
... the air as if propelled by a spring. He landed fairly on the back of the ring horse, wavered for one breathless second, then fell into the pose ...
— The Circus Boys Across The Continent • Edgar B. P. Darlington
... mingling in one hideous clamor. The earth shook as if struck with a paralytic stroke; trees shrunk aghast, and withered at the sight; rocks burrowed in the ground like rabbits; and even Christina creek turned from its course, and ran up a hill in breathless terror!" ...
— The Quaker Colonies - A Chronicle of the Proprietors of the Delaware, Volume 8 - in The Chronicles Of America Series • Sydney G. Fisher
... to talk the crowd pressed forward, packed itself into a smaller ring. Medlied sounds of converse died into a silence, which was almost breathless. ...
— Port O' Gold • Louis John Stellman
... the bold and sarcastic visage of Rascal would ever and anon thrust itself between us. I hid my face, and fled rapidly over the plains; but the horrible vision unrelentingly pursued me, till at last I sank breathless on the ground, and bedewed it with a fresh torrent of tears—and all this for a shadow!—a shadow which one stroke of the pen would repurchase. I pondered on the singular proposal, and on my hesitation to comply with it. My mind was confused—I had lost the ...
— Peter Schlemihl etc. • Chamisso et. al.
... was intense; it was reflecting in shimmering waves from everything motionless, this breathless September day in Donaldsville, Texas. Main Street is a half-mile long, unpainted "box- houses" fringe either end and cluster unkemptly to the west, forming the "city's" thickly populated "darky town." Near the station stands the new three-story brick hotel, the pride of the metropolis. ...
— Our Nervous Friends - Illustrating the Mastery of Nervousness • Robert S. Carroll
... when the speaker finished. The strange and unexpected nature of the demand, held every one in breathless surprise. Even the armed men at the bottom of the vallon said not a word; and perceiving that, by the defection of Holt, there was almost gun for gun against them, they showed no signs of advancing to the protection of ...
— The Wild Huntress - Love in the Wilderness • Mayne Reid
... anyway. He utilized the remorse with which he was tingling to give his Judas an expression which he found novel in the treatment of that character—a look of such touching, appealing self- abhorrence that Beaton's artistic joy in it amounted to rapture; between the breathless moments when he worked in dead silence for an effect that was trying to escape him, he sang and whistled ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... ten pounds had been added to his figure, the hollows had about gone from his eyes, and a natural color had returned to his face. But the old cough remained, as was evident when he presented himself breathless at the Martels' door and ...
— Quin • Alice Hegan Rice
... we lay mutually breathless and exhausted. Then Mrs. B. rose, shook down her clothes, assisted me to rise, and taking me in her arms, and pressing me lovingly to her bosom, told me I was a dear charming fellow, and had enraptured her beyond measure. She then embraced ...
— The Romance of Lust - A classic Victorian erotic novel • Anonymous
... more near a perfect squad of pies and pans of gingerbread just going in to take the benefit of the oven's milder mood. Fleda saw all this as it were without seeing it; she stood still as a mouse and breathless till her aunt turned; and then, a spring and a half shout of joy, and she had clasped her in her arms and was crying with her whole heart. Aunt Miriam was taken all aback; she could do nothing but sit down and cry too and forget ...
— Queechy • Susan Warner
... down stairs! Everybody so breathless! Everybody so happy! Every face wearing a smile! Every tongue rippling with laughter! The big grey mansion which used to seem so chill and cold felt for the first time like a ...
— The Woman Thou Gavest Me - Being the Story of Mary O'Neill • Hall Caine
... the more urban promenaders who passed her. Nevertheless she had halted before Mr. Hamlin's picture, which Sophy had not yet dared to bring home and present to him, and was gazing at it with rapt and breathless attention. Suddenly she shook down her veil and entered the shop. Could the proprietor kindly tell her if that portrait was the work of ...
— A Protegee of Jack Hamlin's and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... the evening, and not without considerable anxiety and interest. Up to the close of Barnes's speech Foster had apparently taken little or no interest in the proceedings; certainly he had not joined either in the applause or in the dissent. What was he now about to do? Turning to the vicar, amidst a breathless silence throughout the hall, he said, in a firm and clear voice, "Mr Chairman, may I say a few words to this meeting?" The vicar hesitated. Was this man going to spoil all? His eye at that moment caught Thomas Bradly's. Thomas nodded to him, and then turned to Foster and said, "Get ...
— True to his Colours - The Life that Wears Best • Theodore P. Wilson
... the phlegmatic Scot, who, having rested his horses and affixed a drag to the wheel, was about to proceed, when Lady Juliana, who now began to have some vague suspicion of the truth, called to him to stop, and, almost breathless with alarm, inquired of her husband the meaning of what ...
— Marriage • Susan Edmonstone Ferrier
... above. Should the voracious creatures of the night come, they must find the treasure in impregnable security. That thought helped him to lay in the first, and the second, and then greater and greater stones. He was spent and breathless, but still he laboured. He tottered, and at times the tavern and the veld, and the waggons on it, and the flat-topped distant mountains that merged in the horizon, swung round him in a wild, mad dance. Then the warm salt taste of blood was in his mouth, and he gasped ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves
... into a smile of sunlight as though she had brought the brightness with her. But she stood poised in an attitude of arrested action—halted by the curb of anxiety. The whole vitality and clean vigor of her seemed breathless and questioning. Fear had spurred her into fleetness as she had crossed the hills, yet now she hesitated on the threshold. At first her eyes could make little of the inner murk, where both lamp and fire had guttered low and ...
— A Pagan of the Hills • Charles Neville Buck
... revolutionist listened silently, only interrupting his friend by his painful cough. They were evenings of sweet sadness that these two men spent together, one dreaming of leaving the stone prison of the Cathedral to see the world, the other returning from life wounded and breathless, content with the obscure repose of the beautiful church, and guarding with prudent silence the secret of his past. Art shone for them like the rays of the sun in the grey and monotonous ...
— The Shadow of the Cathedral • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... the time of their contact in the narrow stern sheets of the boat, was startled by the pressure of the woman's head drooping on his shoulder. He stiffened himself still more as though he had tried on the approach of a danger to conceal his life in the breathless rigidity of his body. The boat soared and descended slowly; a region of foam and reefs stretched across her course hissing like a gigantic cauldron; a strong gust of wind drove her straight at it for a moment then passed on and abandoned her to the regular ...
— The Rescue • Joseph Conrad
... suddenly interrupted by the unexpected appearance of the little Jewish tailor, who, breathless and panting, now came scrambling up on the ...
— The Burglar's Fate And The Detectives • Allan Pinkerton
... and to listen: sitting near the fire in front of her hut, surrounded by a circle of almost naked wildmen who moved, uneasy, she told quaveringly of how the booming tones had rumbled down the forested slopes, and of how ill had befallen her people both times; when she ceased, they stood breathless, their whole beings strained to catch the dread sound none but she had ever heard. Yes, she moved me, queerly ... I scarce ...
— Terry - A Tale of the Hill People • Charles Goff Thomson
... the weird wailing, the rising and falling cadences of the wind, so easily mimicked with one's mouth; and the impressive pauses and eloquent silences, and subdued utterances, toward the end of the yarn (which chain the attention of the children hand and foot, and they sit with parted lips and breathless, to be wrenched limb from limb with the sudden and ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... was farther away than it looked, but they reached it after a good sharp scamper. "And now we'll just be after eating a bit of something before we go any farther," Elsie said, dropping down on the grass, very hot and breathless. ...
— Little Folks - A Magazine for the Young (Date of issue unknown) • Various
... shows that Bellano was a man who could work on a large scale, but whose sense of fitness and harmony was weak. So also the Roccabonella fragments, in spite of a rugged, rough-hewn appearance, show an absence of ethical and intellectual qualities; while the fussy and breathless reliefs round the choir of the Santo are farcical in several respects. There was another man influenced by Donatello, who must be nameless pending further investigation: his style cannot be identified with anything on the great altar, but he was a sculptor of immense power. He made the so-called ...
— Donatello • David Lindsay, Earl of Crawford
... each other straight in the face, Mary a little breathless and wondering: "And so you'll find," Reggie repeated a little louder, and there was a look in his eyes that caused Mary to drop hers, and she ...
— The Ffolliots of Redmarley • L. Allen Harker
... of her insulting enemies;" he would never have ceased to reproach himself, if he had refused to employ the fruits of his studies in her behalf. He saw also that a generation inflamed by the passions of conflict, and looking in breathless suspense for the issue of battles, was not in a mood to attend to poetry. Nor, indeed, was he ready to write, "not having yet (this is in 1642) completed to my mind the full ...
— Milton • Mark Pattison |
