"Overpowering" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... was at breakfast when they burst in on him, and took him away. They had hard work overpowering him, I'll wager, for he could put up a pretty good fight. And the broken furniture is evidence of that. Then the spies, after tying him up, or putting him in a carriage, searched the house for incriminating papers. That's as plain as the nose on your ...
— Tom Swift and his Air Glider - or, Seeking the Platinum Treasure • Victor Appleton
... his voice choked. The air about them was close and damp, with an overpowering earthy smell. He ...
— Astounding Stories, April, 1931 • Various
... short silence, during which every one ruminated over what had passed, until the summer day's drowsiness became too overpowering, and the minister and the sheriff, who were both accustomed to take an after-dinner nap, proposed that every one should seek a shady place and ...
— The Visionary - Pictures From Nordland • Jonas Lie
... a curious sense of possession coming over her, it struck her that she might now touch him; she put out her hand and lightly touched his cheek. His fingers followed where hers had been, and the touch of his hand upon his face brought back the overpowering sense of unreality. This body of his was unreal; the whole world ...
— The Voyage Out • Virginia Woolf
... she loved him; she loved him enough to be willing to die for him. But why? But how? She could not tell, she never would know; simply from her whole heart came the cry that she did indeed love him. The light had come to her at last; this new, overpowering joy overwhelmed her like the most ardent ...
— The Dream • Emile Zola
... strain upon the muscles in jumping from crag to boulder, and wriggling round projections, took an enormous deal out of them, and they were often glad to cower in the shadow formed by one rock overhanging and resting on another; the shelter induced the peculiarly strong and overpowering inclination to sleep, which too much sun sometimes causes. This sleep is curative of what may be incipient sunstroke: in its first gentle touches, it caused the dream to flit over the boiling brain, that they had become lunatics and had been sworn in as members of the Alpine ...
— A Popular Account of Dr. Livingstone's Expedition to the Zambesi and Its Tributaries • David Livingstone
... hurt him badly. It was quite a minute before he spoke again, and when he did speak you felt that he had yielded, in spite of himself, to an overpowering curiosity. He must—he seemed to be saying to himself—sift ...
— The Belfry • May Sinclair
... difference, it seemed. Silence or words must simply fall without effect on the rock bottom of despair. The young man halted, as if dismayed, before this overpowering inertia of hopelessness; he drew ...
— The Lifted Bandage • Mary Raymond Shipman Andrews
... refreshment of a pipe; but, as a kind of compensation, he is not obliged to wear his dress suit when he is gardening! The joint wages are L50, with all found except clothes and beer; and the lucky recipients of this overpowering guerdon must be members ...
— Collections and Recollections • George William Erskine Russell
... mules, we started up a beautiful gazelle. At last, about noon, hot, hungry, and thirsty, we reached a swift stream, roaring at the bottom of a deep ravine, through a bed of gorgeous foliage. The odor of the wild grape-blossoms, which came up to us, as we rode along the edge, was overpowering in its sweetness. An old bridge of two arches crossed the stream. There was a pile of rocks against the central pier, and there we sat and took breakfast in the shade of the maples, while the cold green waters foamed at our feet. By all the Naiads and Tritons, what a joy there is ...
— The Lands of the Saracen - Pictures of Palestine, Asia Minor, Sicily, and Spain • Bayard Taylor
... the spirit of aloofness and reserve which informs such creations as the Madonna of Castelfranco and the Madonna with St. Francis and St. Roch of the Prado Museum. Later on, we have, leaving farther and farther behind the Giorgionesque ideal, the overpowering force and majesty of the Assunta, the true passion going hand-in-hand with beauty of the Louvre Entombment, the rhetorical passion and scenic magnificence ...
— The Earlier Work of Titian • Claude Phillips
... delighted in afterdinner controversies, and in bringing the light troops of his wit to bear upon the unwieldy masses of lore and logic opposed to him by polemical Brahmans who, out of respect for his father, did not lay an action against him for overpowering them in theological disputation.[FN139] In the strange city to which he had removed no one knew the son of Vishnu Swami, and no one cared to invite him to the house. Once he attempted his usual trick upon a knot of sages who, sitting round a tank, were recreating ...
— Vikram and the Vampire • Sir Richard F. Burton
... scarcely time to look about him, and none to speak to any one, he fell to work. It was a sweltering day in July, and the place ran with steaming hot blood—one waded in it on the floor. The stench was almost overpowering, but to Jurgis it was nothing. His whole soul was dancing with joy—he was at work at last! He was at work and earning money! All day long he was figuring to himself. He was paid the fabulous sum of seventeen ...
— The Jungle • Upton Sinclair
... right appreciation of those points, in the judicious direction which by that means has been given to the forces from the very first, and in the resolution required to sacrifice the unimportant to the advantage of the important—that is, to keep the forces concentrated in an overpowering mass. In this, Frederick the Great ...
— On War • Carl von Clausewitz
... blue ribbon cutting across his chest, came de Mersch with her upon his arm. De Mersch himself hardly counted. He had a way of glowing, but he paled ineffectual fires beside her maenadic glow. There was something overpowering in the sight of her, in the fire of her eyes, in the glow of her coils of hair, in the poise of her head. She wore some kind of early nineteenth-century dress, sweeping low from the waist with a tenderness of fold that affected one with delicate ...
— The Inheritors • Joseph Conrad
... the whole party having reassembled, they set out to recross the swamp, intending, when they should get into the woods, to build a hut of leaves and branches, kindle a fire, and pass the night there as well as they could. But an overpowering torpor had now begun to seize hold upon some of the party, and it was with the greatest difficulty the others could prevent the drowsy ones from lying down to sleep in the snow. This almost irresistible ...
— The Cannibal Islands - Captain Cook's Adventure in the South Seas • R.M. Ballantyne
... inquire what General Taylor was waiting for; the curt reply "for General Santa Anna to surrender;" the junction, by this ruse, of the Mexican cavalry in our rear with their main army; the concentrated charge upon the American line; the overpowering of the battery of O'Brien; the fearful crisis; the reinforcement of Captain Bragg "by Major Bliss and I;" the "little more grape, Captain Bragg;" the terrific carnage; the pause, the advance, the disorder, and the retreat; the too eager pursuit of ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 3, August, 1850. • Various
... taken literally Monsieur Sautelle was then and there, for with an overpowering sob she swayed forward, flung both arms about the dismayed man's neck and burying her face against his immaculate collar, gurgled: "Oh, I love! I do love! Thou ...
— A Dixie School Girl • Gabrielle E. Jackson
... alone left her true value. Had the Church controlled her, the Virgin would perhaps have remained prostrate at the foot of the Cross. Dragged by a Byzantine Court, backed by popular insistence and impelled by overpowering self-interest, the Church accepted the Virgin throned and crowned, seated by Christ, the Judge throned and crowned; but even this did not wholly satisfy the French of the thirteenth century who seemed bent on absorbing Christ in His Mother, and making ...
— Mont-Saint-Michel and Chartres • Henry Adams
... which he had espoused there seemed no good reason to doubt, but it was evident to those who were brought into intimate relations with him that the fiery zeal which he displayed was made up at least as much of hatred of his foes as of any overpowering enthusiasm for Reform. Another quality which seriously interfered with his usefulness was his exceeding want of discretion. He seemed to be utterly incapable of keeping his own counsel, and a secret once told to him was a secret ...
— The Story of the Upper Canada Rebellion, Volume 1 • John Charles Dent
... function, pregnancy, etc. These are frequently of a serious character, and require careful watching, especially as they may lead to derangement of the mind. Thus, a lady, Mrs. X, was at one time under my professional care, who, at the beginning of her first pregnancy, acquired an overpowering aversion to a half-breed Indian woman who was employed in the house as a servant. Whenever this woman came near her she was at once seized with violent trembling, which ended in a few minutes with vomiting and great ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 358, November 11, 1882 • Various
... we went to the Minster, and to her it was an overpowering pleasure; not for its own imposing and impressive grandeur only, but because it brought to her susceptible nature a vital and overwhelming sense of omnipotence. She said, while gazing at the structure, 'If finite power can do this, what is the . . . ?' and here emotion stayed her speech, ...
— The Life of Charlotte Bronte • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... the greatest of men were granted but a lesser oblivion than the least. And in that overpowering thought there was a strange comfort, the comfort of misery finding ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1920 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... home. How far it seemed, and how impassable the gulf now between the "castle" with its refined ways, between her in her dainty girlhood and me sitting there, numbed with the cold that was slowly stealing away my senses with my courage. There was warmth and cheer where she was. Here—— An overpowering sense of desolation came upon me. I hitched a little nearer the edge. What if——? Would they miss me or long at home if no word came from me? Perhaps they might never hear. What was the use of keeping it up any longer with, God help us, everything against ...
— Stories of Achievement, Volume IV (of 6) - Authors and Journalists • Various
... every degree of grace vouchsafed to her. This last manifestation of God's mercy disposed her to meditate deeply and earnestly on the designs of Providence in her regard. She seemed now to discern, in a clear and overpowering manner, the nature of the particular judgment which she had been about to undergo, the amount of responsibility incurred by every grace conferred on her soul, the severe account which would be demanded of every talent committed to her charge; and at the sight ...
— The Life of St. Frances of Rome, and Others • Georgiana Fullerton
... placed a console, supporting a huge Bible and Prayer-book, bound alike in purple velvet, emblazoned with central suns of gold—an arch-hypocrisy that was not lost on its object. Freshly-gathered flowers were heaped in the vases of the floral stands, filling the close, cool room with an overpowering fragrance. The carpet of crimson and white seemed to the eye what it afterward proved to the foot—thick, soft, and elastic; and harmonized well with the ...
— Sea and Shore - A Sequel to "Miriam's Memoirs" • Mrs. Catharine A. Warfield
... reaction from the passive state in which Mave had left her, was, to a temperament like her's, perfectly overwhelming. Her pulse beat high, her cheek burned, and her eye flashed with more than its usual fire and overpowering brilliancy, and, with the exception of one impression alone, all her thoughts were so rapid and indistinct as to resemble the careering clouds which fly in tumult and confusion along the troubled sky, with nothing stationary but the sun far above, and which, in this case, ...
— The Black Prophet: A Tale Of Irish Famine • William Carleton
... minutes' rest the party advanced, and soon joined their friends, who saluted them with loud acclamations. The victory had been a complete one. The whole of the spare ammunition and stores had fallen into the hands of the victors, upon overpowering the rear-guard, had cut the traces and carried off the horses. The column had made a sturdy resistance at this point, and although the desperate onslaughts of the scythe-armed Poles had several times broken ...
— Jack Archer • G. A. Henty
... next moment he was himself on the ground. As soon as he had fired, Almira seized him by the collar, and like lightning pulled him down. He tried to rise, but soon felt that he had to do with an overpowering adversary who was not to be trifled with. Not that Almira had hurt him, but she held him by the collar, and would not allow ...
— Timar's Two Worlds • Mr Jkai
... the night wonderfully light, but Craven paid no attention to the beauty of the scene or to the gaily lit villas. Atherton's invitation had been curiously hard to decline and even now an almost overpowering desire came over him to bid his men retrace their steps to the harbour. Then hard on the heels of that desire came thoughts that softened the hard lines that had gathered about his mouth. He pitched his cigarette away as ...
— The Shadow of the East • E. M. Hull
... me?' said Cecily, hurrying out her words, as if overpowering one of her wills. 'You will, I know! I have promised my father and uncle to have nothing to do with him. Do not let me be taken by surprise. Give me notice, that I may get Aunt Holmby ...
— Hopes and Fears - scenes from the life of a spinster • Charlotte M. Yonge
... forcing a passage into a castle or fortified town was by climbing over the walls by means of ladders, and overpowering the garrison upon the top of them by main force, as represented in the engraving. Sometimes, it is true, the besiegers of a castle undermined the walls, so as to make them fall in and thus open a breach. At the present day, mines dug in this way are blown up ...
— Richard II - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... well that the formation of the volunteers in respective States and by the Governors of such States raises a great difficulty in organizing and preparing reserves. But talent and genius reveal themselves by overpowering difficulties considered to be insurmountable. And Halleck is a man both ...
— Diary from November 12, 1862, to October 18, 1863 • Adam Gurowski
... There was something overpowering to these two children who looked, too awed to cheer, in this formidable figure in the barbaric dress, the gorgeous climax of a gorgeous pageant. Apart from the physical splendour, this solitary glittering creature represented so much—it was the incarnate genius of the laughing, brutal, ...
— By What Authority? • Robert Hugh Benson
... the material or business point of view his need of a son and heir had grown great of late. He had never contemplated the non-existence of one, just as he had never contemplated the non-existence of Elizabeth. He had counted, it is true, on overpowering the alert senses of one who had known the pinch of poverty with superabundant evidence of the fortune that was his. He had noted the havoc wrought to great fortunes by children brought up to regard great wealth as the natural standard of life; he meant to avoid that error, and in the unnatural ...
— Christopher Hibbault, Roadmaker • Marguerite Bryant
... regular volleys, and Jack was in the act of using his rifle, when he became conscious of a shock and swaying movement, like the commencement of a Rugby scrimmage. He turned, and saw in a moment what had happened: by sheer weight of numbers, the overpowering rush of Arabs had forced back the thin line of "Heavies," and a fierce hand-to-hand fight was in progress. What had been the interior of the square was now covered with a confused mass of struggling combatants, dimly ...
— Soldiers of the Queen • Harold Avery
... be crucified, he simply gave way, through fear, to the clamour of an enraged populace. Nevertheless he stands convicted by after-ages of the vilest act that any judge has ever committed. Wrong-doing is not to be palliated by ascribing it to the overpowering force of temptation. The claims of conscience are paramount, and no inducements, however plausible, can justify ...
— Men of the Bible; Some Lesser-Known Characters • George Milligan, J. G. Greenhough, Alfred Rowland, Walter F.
... S. What is this fairy form I see before me? MR. W. Oh horrible!—She's going to adore me! This last catastrophe is overpowering! LADY S. Why do you glare at one with visage lowering? For pity's sake recoil not thus from me! MR. W. My lady leave me—this ...
— The Complete Plays of Gilbert and Sullivan - The 14 Gilbert And Sullivan Plays • William Schwenk Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan
... wings may be stabled nearly two hundred horses. The Grand Ecuries at Chantilly are assuredly one of the finest examples extant of that luxuriant art of the eighteenth century French builder. Luxurious, excessively ornate and overpowering it is, and, for that reason, open to question. The work of the period knew not the discreet middle road. It was of Chantilly that it was said that the live stock was better lodged than its masters. The architect of this portion of the chateau was Jean ...
— Royal Palaces and Parks of France • Milburg Francisco Mansfield
... lost her honour; yet, for William, what would not Agnes forfeit? The dignity, the peace, the serenity, the innocence of her own mind, love soon encouraged her to fancy she could easily forego; and this same overpowering influence at times so forcibly possessed her, that she even felt a momentary transport in the contemplation "of so precious a sacrifice to him." But then she loved her parents, and their happiness she could not ...
— Nature and Art • Mrs. Inchbald
... of our love was now darkened by this tremendous cloud that lowered before us. The shock of this discovery was overpowering, and some time elapsed before I could rally from it. Though Almah's love was sweet beyond expression, and though as the time passed I saw that every jom she regained more and more of her former health and strength, still ...
— A Strange Manuscript Found in a Copper Cylinder • James De Mille
... these vapour-baths are often constructed on the banks of a river, throw themselves from the land into the water; or sometimes, by way of variety, plunge into snow, and roll themselves therein. This violent exercise and sudden transition of temperature is almost overpowering to persons unhabituated to the custom, and will oftentimes produce fainting,—though the patient, on recovering, finds himself refreshed, and experiences a delightful sense of mental, as well as bodily, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 579 - Volume 20, No. 579, December 8, 1832 • Various
... broken-hearted, Barbara sat in the dining-room. The air was heavy with the overpowering scent of tuberoses. From the room beyond came the solemn words of the burial service: "I am the resurrection and the life. He that believeth on me, though he were dead, yet ...
— Flower of the Dusk • Myrtle Reed
... the first time his thick lips had fallen agape. He did not seem to breathe. At the end of the thirty seconds his hand unclenched from about the whip and the club and they fell into the snow. Slowly, his eyes still fixed on the snare as if it held for him an overpowering fascination, he advanced a step, and then another, until he reached out and took from Philip the thing which he held. He uttered no word. But from his eyes there disappeared the greenish fire. The lines in his heavy face softened and his thick lips ...
— The Golden Snare • James Oliver Curwood
... night our thoughts follow the bent that is most natural to them; and as man is both an immortal and a sinful being, the consequences both of his immortality and his sinfulness will sometimes be made to stand out in overpowering light, when the busy pursuits of day are not able to turn the soul from wandering towards eternity-(Cheever). Bunyan profited much by dreams and visions. "Even in my childhood the Lord did scare and affright me with fearful dreams, and did terrify me with dreadful visions." That is a striking ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... no farther. The door opened at that instant and Miss Grace Gee Carrington entered. She was a very tall woman with grayish hair, eyeglasses, and a sallow complexion. Her dignity of carriage and stern manner were quite overpowering. ...
— The Girls of Central High Aiding the Red Cross - Or Amateur Theatricals for a Worthy Cause • Gertrude W. Morrison
... only make matters worse. He was the plank she clung to in the shipwreck of all her convictions. She could not tell how or why, but the conviction was overpowering that she could not give him up. Happen what might happen, she must see him. If Owen were to go for a sea voyage.... In three or four months she would have acquired that something which he could give her and which was necessary to complete ...
— Evelyn Innes • George Moore
... permitted, I should have retained my perch till daylight, but with the consciousness of escape from the jaws of the ferocious brute came a sense of overpowering weakness which almost palsied me, and made my descent from the tree both difficult and dangerous. Incredible as it may seem, I lay down in my old bed, and was soon lost in a slumber so profound that I did not awake until ...
— Thirty-Seven Days of Peril - from Scribner's Monthly Vol III Nov. 1871 • Truman Everts
... strain of six dreadful days and six appalling nights seemed suddenly to culminate in a fit of overpowering restlessness. Worn out though she was (or all the more because of that, perhaps) she could not go "home" to Columbus Avenue, where the "L" that Sadie said should be spelled with an "H" ...
— Winnie Childs - The Shop Girl • C. N. Williamson
... capacity of everlasting improvement: and especially when I look at Jesus, the conqueror of death, the heir of immortality, who has gone as the forerunner of mankind into the mansions of light and purity, I can and do admit the almost overpowering thought of the everlasting life, growth, ...
— Choice Specimens of American Literature, And Literary Reader - Being Selections from the Chief American Writers • Benj. N. Martin
... a returning thrill of the old wound,—one of those overpowering moments when some turn in life brings back anew a great anguish. She would find unexpectedly in a book a mark that he had placed there,—or a turn in conversation would bring back a tone of his ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 24, Oct. 1859 • Various
... could share my dissatisfaction in seeing our ambassadors at Court balls and diplomatic receptions in deacons' suits of modest black, without even a medal or decoration of any kind, except perhaps that gorgeous and overpowering insignia known as the Loyal Legion button, while every little twopenny kingdom of a mile square sends a representative in a uniform as brilliant as a peony ...
— As Seen By Me • Lilian Bell
... career, was soon terminated. In 1799, the revolutionary army of France made themselves masters of the whole territory of the United States; and established The Batavian Republic. It was successively governed, but always under the overpowering controul of France, by a Convention, a Directory, and a Consul, with the appellation of Grand Pensionary. In 1806, even these forms of her antient government were abolished; Napoleon sending Louis, one of his brothers, to reign over the United Provinces, with the title and powers of royalty; but ...
— The Life of Hugo Grotius • Charles Butler
... like many others, had been a zealous partisan of the new order of things, and had expressed herself with great indiscretion in the presence of the Queen. But the Duchess was brought to her senses when she saw herself, and all the mad, democratical nobility, under the overpowering weight of Jacobinism, deprived of every privileged prerogative and levelled and stripped of ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... of deputies with whom Monsieur Bayou was dining were assembled at the great hotel, at the corner of Place Mont Archer, at Cap Francais. Languidly, though gladly, did the guests, especially those from the country, enter the hotel, overpowering as was the heat of the roads and the streets. In the roads, the sand lay so deep, that the progress of horsemen was necessarily slow, while the sun seemed to shed down a deluge of flame. In the streets, there was the shelter of the piazzas; but their pillars, if accidentally ...
— The Hour and the Man - An Historical Romance • Harriet Martineau
... so suddenly that the plane gave a violent jerk and quivered in every fiber. He thought for a moment they were going to fall, and the sickening sensation at his heart was overpowering. But the trusty Arrow ceased quivering, and then rose swiftly at an ...
— The Forest of Swords - A Story of Paris and the Marne • Joseph A. Altsheler
... thought-waves of the world which had been thought by men of all times who thought and acted out the Dreams of Power. These clouds settled down upon Him like a heavy fog, and their vibrations were almost overpowering. And also came the hosts of the disembodied souls of those who while living had sought or gained power. And each strove to beat into His brain the Desire of Power. Never in the history of man have the Powers of Darkness so gathered together for attack upon ...
— Mystic Christianity • Yogi Ramacharaka
... Benevolence and sympathy with others, and a great personal charm of manner, were common to the two. Charles Darwin possessed, in the highest degree, that "vividness of imagination" of which he speaks as strongly characteristic of Erasmus, and as leading "to his overpowering tendency to theorise and generalise." This tendency, in the case of Charles Darwin, was fully kept in check by the determination to test his theories to the utmost. Erasmus had a strong love of all kinds of mechanism, for which Charles Darwin had no taste. Neither had Charles Darwin the literary ...
— The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, Volume I • Francis Darwin
... across Fred Elkin's somewhat mean and cruel face while Furneaux rated him in this extraordinary manner. Surprise, wrath, even fear, had their phases. But, dominating all other sensations, was an overpowering indignation at the implied hopelessness of his pursuit of ...
— The Postmaster's Daughter • Louis Tracy
... disappointed at not being able to enter Rome by daylight, so that she might clasp her hands and cry aloud, half-stifled with the overpowering emotions of the moment, 'Roma! Roma! the eternal city, bursts upon my view!' That was the proper thing to do, and it was a blow to make so commonplace and ignoble an entry into the city ...
— Shawl-Straps - A Second Series of Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag • Louisa M. Alcott
... suddenly almost unable to contain an overpowering gaiety. She clapped her hands with childish glee. Raoul stared at her ...
— The Phantom of the Opera • Gaston Leroux
... have, at times, and have had for years, strange glimpses of the magnificence and wondrousness of the universe; startling views of the awful grandeur and movements of its huge orbs, and of the terrible working of its great forces, and an overpowering sight and sense of the presence and power of the living God in all, which I never had in my earlier days. And I have often had, and still have, at times, strange feelings of the fact and mystery of existence: of my own ...
— Modern Skepticism: A Journey Through the Land of Doubt and Back Again - A Life Story • Joseph Barker
... will also understand why that one word comprises, to my thinking, all the discomforts short of absolute physical torture that can be condensed into the human lot. Condensed, did I say? If it were a condensed agony, I could endure it. One great, stunning, overpowering blow is undoubtedly terrible, but you rally all your fortitude to meet and resist it, and when it is over it is over and the recuperative forces go to work; but a trouble that worries and baffles and pricks and rasps you, that penetrates ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 57, July, 1862 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... Federal programme; well conceived and backed by every appliance of means, men and material. To meet it we had but a small numerical force to defend an extensive and varied tract; and at the Capital grave fears began to prevail that the overpowering numbers and points of attack would crush the little armies we could ...
— Four Years in Rebel Capitals - An Inside View of Life in the Southern Confederacy from Birth to Death • T. C. DeLeon
... piece of a peculiar and unprecedented plot, which was prevented from coming off by some disagreement as to terms between the principal parties concerned. For true theatrical intelligence, our columns alone are to be relied upon; bright as a column of sparkling water, overpowering as a column of English cavalry, overlooking all London at once, as the column of the Monument, but not so heavy as the column ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 1, September 25, 1841 • Various
... keen perception of outward facts and a vigorous practical judgment of men and things. And in this case of the Trial by Fire, the latter characteristics were stimulated into unusual activity by an acute physical sensitiveness which gives overpowering force to the conception of pain and destruction as a necessary sequence of facts which have already been causes of pain in our experience. The promptitude with which men will consent to touch red-hot ...
— Romola • George Eliot
... life—only it was lobster puree, and ten times better than Ellen's general run of celery puree. He winked his eye to denote his extreme satisfaction to Bessie when he thought no one was looking, but was overwhelmed with mortification when he observed that the wink had been seen by the overpowering butler, who looked sternly at him, as much as to say, "'Ow ...
— Paste Jewels • John Kendrick Bangs
... the arrival of the Afreets, who about midnight alighted, and resting themselves on the terrace above, began to inquire each other's adventures. "Since we met last," said one, "I have been rendered miserable; for a cunning Mussulmaun found out the secret of overpowering me, and has married my princess, nor can I revenge myself, for he is under the protection of a converted genie, whom the prophet has appointed to watch over him." "I," continued the other Afreet, ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Complete • Anonymous
... outgeneralled and outnumbered. Their attention was distracted by land and water, while a British detachment, ten thousand strong, crept over the ridge of hills by night, and through the Bedford Pass, overpowering the guards before their approach was suspected. At dawn they poured down upon the American troops, surprising them, not in one direction, but in flank, in rear, and in front. The green woods swarmed with redcoats, and ...
— The Conqueror • Gertrude Franklin Atherton
... overpowering Ishmael with the cordiality of his greeting, Walter drew his friend's arm within his own, and took him upon the porch in the midst of the family group, that immediately surrounded ...
— Ishmael - In the Depths • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... about to slip into some bright dress or other, which would make her doubly fair. Meanwhile from the rose of the sunset, rosy lights were stealing over the water and faintly glorifying the old house and its spreading gardens. An overpowering sense of youth—of the beauty of the world—of the mystery of the future, beat through his pulses. The coming dance became a rite of Aphrodite, towards which ...
— Helena • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... than the old grandmother and little Yssaline. But Aglavaine herself is strange: this woman who has lived and suffered; this queenly, majestic creature, calmly conscious of her beauty and her power; she whose overpowering, overwhelming love is yet deliberate and thoughtful. The complexities of real life are vaguely hinted at here: instead of Golaud, the mediaeval, tyrannous husband, we have Selysette, the meek, self-sacrificing wife; instead of the instinctive, ...
— Wisdom and Destiny • Maurice Maeterlinck
... across at the Duke. For the first time in his life, he was resentful of the Duke's great elegance and average stature, his high lineage and incomputable wealth. Hitherto, these things had been too remote for envy. But now, suddenly, they seemed near to him—nearer and more overpowering than the First in Mods had ever been. "And of course she's in ...
— Zuleika Dobson - or, An Oxford Love Story • Max Beerbohm
... thoughtful consideration—as will we in the executive branch—to the views of labor, and of management, and of the general public. In this process, it is only human that each of us should bring forward the arguments of self-interest. But if all conduct their arguments in the overpowering light of national interest—which is enlightened self-interest—we shall get the right answers. I profoundly hope that every citizen of our country will follow with understanding your progress in this work. The welfare of all of us ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... technique more Chopinesque, than this man whose orchestral work was so tremendous: so filled with the rolling grandeur, the passion, the energy, the gigantic climaxes, the seething, troubled depths, of a nature titanic in its conceptions, overpowering in ...
— The Genius • Margaret Horton Potter
... beautiful skin that put five dollars into a boy's locker. Another time I shot one that sailed over me; when he came down, there was a ruffed grouse, still living, in his claws. Another time I could not touch one that I had killed for the overpowering odor which was in his feathers, showing that Mephitis, the skunk, never loses his head when attacked. But Kookooskoos, like the fox, cares little for such weapons, and in the spring, when game is scarce, swoops for and kills a skunk wherever he finds ...
— Wilderness Ways • William J Long
... find the spot where the most brilliant temporary star on record made its appearance on November 11, 1572. Tycho Brahe studied this phenomenon during the entire period of its visibility, which lasted until March, 1574. It burst out suddenly with overpowering splendor, far outshining every fixed star, and even equaling Venus at her brightest. In a very short time it began to fade, regularly diminishing in brightness, and at the same time undergoing changes of color, ending in red, until ...
— Pleasures of the telescope • Garrett Serviss
... not forgotten that "young Obadias, David, Josias, all were pious"; that "Zaccheus he did climb the Tree our Lord to see"; and that "Vashti for Pride was set aside"; and still with many a sympathetic shudder and tingle do I recall Captivity's overpowering sense of horror, and mine, as we lingered long over the portraitures of Timothy flying from Sin, of Xerxes laid out in funeral garb, and of proud ...
— The Love Affairs of a Bibliomaniac • Eugene Field
... his eyes, and for not doing so, seemed to himself infinitely bold. A host of confused feelings bore down upon him, well-nigh blotting out the light; but, in a twinkling, all were swallowed up in an overpowering sense of gratitude, in a large, vague, happy thankfulness, which touched him almost to the point of tears. As it swelled through him and possessed him, he yearned to pour it forth, to make an offering of this gratefulness—fine tangle of her beauty and ...
— Maurice Guest • Henry Handel Richardson
... whose limits it exactly defined. Germany, so far as possible, will seek to close this war zone with mines, and will also endeavor to destroy hostile merchant vessels in every other way. While the German Government, in taking action based upon this overpowering point of view, keeps itself far removed from all intentional destruction of neutral lives and property, on the other hand, it does not fail to recognize that from the action to be taken against Great Britain dangers arise which threaten all trade ...
— New York Times Current History: The European War, Vol 2, No. 1, April, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... through lakes and lagoons at a comparatively short distance. On one of these lakes, Lake Borgne, a flotilla of light gunboats was placed for defence, under the command of Lieutenant Jones, but on December 14th an overpowering force of small British vessels dispersed the American squadron, and on the twenty-second about fifteen hundred regulars, the picked men of the British army, fresh from European victories under Wellington, contrived to find their way unperceived through the swamps and ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XII • John Lord
... the ruin of many of the ships. In the midst of the fighting on land there was a still more furious battle upon the waves. Galley after galley was driven upon the rocks, and their crews had little spirit for meeting their overpowering enemies. ...
— The Thirsty Sword • Robert Leighton
... short for by the time her article was rolled up for the post, stamped and directed, her physical powers gave way; such blank exhaustion ensuing that all she could do was to drag herself across the room, throw herself, half dressed, on the bed, draw the rezai over her, and yield to the heavy, overpowering slumber of great weariness. ...
— We Two • Edna Lyall
... these French beggars on board; and it wasn't without reason, for they were as many as we were. The very first night they were overheard by a negro who belonged to us, and had learnt French, making a plan for overpowering us, and taking possession of the vessel; so when we heard that, their doom was sealed. We mustered ourselves on the deck, put the hatches over some o' the French, seized those on deck, and—in half an hour they ...
— The Pacha of Many Tales • Frederick Marryat
... were convulsed by a feeling of horror, and Ispirizade felt his limbs turn to stone and the light of day grow dim before his eyes in the presence of that dreadful figure which regarded him and pointed at him. It was, as it were, a dumb curse—a dumb, overpowering spell, which left it to God and His destroying angels to give expression to his wishes, and read in his heart and accomplish that which he himself ...
— Halil the Pedlar - A Tale of Old Stambul • Mr Jkai
... wrapped him up in something, he didn't know what—a sense of facility, an overpowering fragrance—and they had moved together in an immense fraternity. There had been no love-making, no contact that was only personal, no vulgarity of flirtation: the hurry of the days and the sharpness with which they both tended to an outside object had made all that irrelevant. It was as ...
— The Tragic Muse • Henry James
... time she was not positively suffering from either shock or sorrow. From her personal point of view the loss of money was not of itself an overpowering calamity. It might entail the disruption of lifelong habits, but she was young enough not to be afraid of that. In spite of a way of living that might be said to have given her the best of everything, she had always known that her father's income was a small one for ...
— The Street Called Straight • Basil King
... and shaded by spreading mokaalas—a large species of acacia which forms the favourite food of the giraffe. The gaudy yellow blossoms with which these remarkable trees were covered yielded an aromatic and overpowering perfume—while small troops of striped quaggas, or wild asses, and of brindled gnoos ... enlivened ...
— South Africa and the Transvaal War, Vol. 1 (of 6) - From the Foundation of Cape Colony to the Boer Ultimatum - of 9th Oct. 1899 • Louis Creswicke
... with bayonet or with their lances. The Life Guards, according to a letter from the front, charged the German trenches the other day with bayonets. A squadron of French dragoons dismounted and crept through a wood on foot, surprising a German infantry company and overpowering them in close-quarter fight with lances ...
— The Illustrated War News, Number 15, Nov. 18, 1914 • Various
... during some intended repairs at the great house, re-conveyed it to the———. On the receipt of a note from Y- the next morning, claiming the amount of the duke's losses, he started with surprise at the immense sums, and being now perfectly recovered from the overpowering effects of the bottle, hastened with all speed to take the opinions of two well-known sporting peers, whose honour has never been questioned, Lords F-y and S-n; they, upon a review of the circumstances, ...
— The English Spy • Bernard Blackmantle
... mystical purple blossoms nearly at as great a height; while the small white stars of the jasmine glittered among its narrow dark-green leaves, and every passing breeze wafted the scent of the honeysuckle and clematis through the open windows, in puffs of overpowering fragrance. ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXXII. - June, 1843.,Vol. LIII. • Various
... not give very much thought to her cousin. In overpowering solicitude she asked herself, "Where is he whose eyes looked such strange, sweet truth into mine to-day? Are they unseeing, not because it is dark, but because the light of life ...
— Miss Lou • E. P. Roe
... improve the sunny moments under the grateful shade of our improvised wigwam, in which position we may sketch, fish, or shoot without much exertion: but despite our laudable efforts to do something useful, our pencils drop from our hands, our angling is neglected, and we surrender to the overpowering heat. ...
— The Pearl of the Antilles, or An Artist in Cuba • Walter Goodman
... answered the master, as he held out his hand to clasp that of his manager—a rare and high favour at that time. And then, suddenly, came one of those unexpected, overpowering heart-pourings, which have been said to be scarcely more under the control of the giver than of the recipient. "Hall, I could not have done this thing. How come you to have such strength and ...
— All's Well - Alice's Victory • Emily Sarah Holt
... it, for the two doors were located diagonally across from one another, and her hand, in a startled way, went suddenly to her lips, as though mechanically to help choke back and stifle the almost overpowering impulse to cry out that arose within her. Nicky Viner was not alone in there! A figure had come into her line of vision in that other room, not Nicky Viner, not any of the gang—and she stared now in incredulous amazement, scarcely able to believe ...
— The White Moll • Frank L. Packard
... flame—trumpery, yet trumpery which, thanks to the instinct of the French esprit, harmonized and did not vulgarize; a gift French instinct alone possesses. The floor was bare and well polished; the air full of tobacco smoke, wine fumes, brandy odors, and an overpowering scent of oil, garlic and pot au feu. Riotous music pealed through it, that even in its clamor kept a certain silvery ring, a certain rhythmical cadence. Pipes were smoked, barrack slang, camp slang, barriere slang, temple ...
— Under Two Flags • Ouida [Louise de la Ramee]
... processions, Vesuvian eruptions, new operas, and other advertised attractions, natural and artificial. The singing was really a success. Miss Tresilyan's magnificent voice did its duty nobly, and did no more. Without overpowering or singling itself out from the others, it lured them on to follow where they could never have gone alone: the choir was kept in perfect order without even knowing ...
— Sword and Gown - A Novel • George A. Lawrence
... then, swiftly driven forward by an overpowering impulse, I dropped on my knees and seized her hands with a convulsive grasp. "Rosa! Rosa!"—my voice nearly broke—"you must know that I love you. Say that you love me—that you would love me whether Clarenceux were dead ...
— The Ghost - A Modern Fantasy • Arnold Bennett
... is playing a kind of reveille upon a flattened kerosine oil-tin; and in the corner, with his back to the audience, an immense African—an ebony Pan blowing frenzy through his wide lips—is forcing the whole weight of his lungs into a narrow reed pipe. The noise is phenomenal, overpowering, but is plainly attractive to Sidi ears; for the room is rapidly filling, and more than one of the spectators suddenly leaps from his seat and circles round the drummers, keeping time to the rythm with queer movements of his body and ...
— By-Ways of Bombay • S. M. Edwardes, C.V.O.
... gladly at that moment of discovery have fled to her own apartment and cried for joy, but she dared not; she trembled lest his eyes, if she looked up, should discover the secret of her own. She had an overpowering consciousness that she stood upon the brink of her fate; that ere long that look of his would be followed by words—blessed, hoped-for words, from the lips of Pierre Philibert! words which would be the pledge and assurance to her of that love ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... since it is better to tell you, Sir John is very much in earnest, but his respectability is something altogether too overpowering. Of course I knew all about him years ago, and he is exactly like everybody's description of him. I am afraid, Anna, just a little afraid, that in Paris I and my friends here might seem a trifle advanced. Besides, he might hear things. That is why I ...
— Anna the Adventuress • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... more overpowering than the South wind (Ghibee,) or the East, (Shirghee), each of which is equally to be dreaded. In addition to the excessive heat and dryness of these winds, they are impregnated with sand, and the air is darkened by it, the sky appears of a dusky yellow, and the sun is barely perceptible. The ...
— Travels in the Great Desert of Sahara, in the Years of 1845 and 1846 • James Richardson
... but did not hear the minutest sound. The desire for light was overpowering. I generally did my writing in this room, and knew the exact whereabouts of everything in it. I knew that on the writing-table there was a silver box containing wax matches. It lay on the left of my desk. I moved ...
— The Return Of The Soul - 1896 • Robert S. Hichens |
