"Retrace" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the Jews, "that God Jehovah has permitted one of our pursuers to escape. God's judgments, like His mercies, are full and complete. Will Apleon, the Traitor to his covenant-word, ever know the fate of our pursuers? I believe not, unless anyone of us here retrace his steps to Jerusalem to tell him, and that would mean public torture and death to ...
— The Mark of the Beast • Sidney Watson
... canoe than it became dark. I took the precaution to mark the way I advanced, that I might at all events retrace my steps to sleep in the canoe. I was obliged to advance cautiously, and to consider every step I took, so as not to lose the pathway. I had marked the direction by the stars, as I left the canoe, and they assisted to guide me. I at ...
— Mark Seaworth • William H.G. Kingston
... the best way possible. For by this means you will learn not to lose a single moment when time is more precious; whereas, if you begin to act before you know what ought to be done, you act at random. Liable to deceive yourself, you will have to retrace your steps, and will be farther from your object than if you had been less in haste to reach it. Do not then act like a miser, who, in order to lose nothing, loses a great deal. At the earlier age sacrifice time which you will recover ...
— Emile - or, Concerning Education; Extracts • Jean Jacques Rousseau
... slipped it into her pocket. Quite close by was a little broken square of wood. Betty, hating herself for doing so, dropped it into the hollow of the tree. The bit of wood would satisfy the girls, for Sibyl had said that Betty had doubtless found some wood. Having done this, she set off to retrace her steps again, going now in the direction of the deserted gardens and the patch of common. She had no spade with her, but that did not matter. She went to the corner where the heather was growing. Very carefully working round a piece with her fingers, she loosened the roots; they had gone deep ...
— Betty Vivian - A Story of Haddo Court School • L. T. Meade
... We had then to retrace our four-mile walk to "Huna Inn," but the miles seemed rather longer, as Mrs. Mackenzie could only walk in a leisurely manner and we were feeling very hungry. We whiled away the time by talking about the ...
— From John O'Groats to Land's End • Robert Naylor and John Naylor
... of their logic by larger lessons learnt from human life or from their own heart. But generally speaking, the young man has no such distrust. His teacher has appealed to Nature, and to Nature he shall go. The teacher becomes frightened, struggles to retrace his steps, and speaks of 'an infinitely wise and beneficent Being'; but the ...
— Essays on "Supernatural Religion" • Joseph B. Lightfoot
... made a dash to retrace his steps, but the warrior was too quick for him. He had taken his second step only, when his captor grasped the ankle of the foot that was rising from the ground, and drew backward with such force that ...
— Camp-fire and Wigwam • Edward Sylvester Ellis
... make a cut that should have saved us ten or fifteen miles between two rivers, we fell shoulder-deep into a bog and only escaped after an hour's struggle during which we all but lost two porters. We had to retrace our steps and follow the Greek's route, only to have the mortification of seeing Fred and our column of supplies coming over the top of a rise not ...
— The Ivory Trail • Talbot Mundy
... in the country, when I had just left her, a forgotten glove caused me to retrace my steps to get it. I perceived the beauty in the distance, regarding herself in a mirror, and I noticed, to my great astonishment, that she was picturing herself to herself in all the phases in which, during our conversation, I had seen ...
— A Selection from the Comedies of Marivaux • Pierre Carlet de Chamblain de Marivaux
... I retrace my steps towards the west in the direction of the hypostyle, traversing again the avenue of monstrous splendours, imprisoned and, as it were, dwarfed between the rows of sovereign stones. There are obelisks ...
— Egypt (La Mort De Philae) • Pierre Loti
... forced to retrace their painful way through the bushes to reach a place as distant from the point of pursuit as possible. A half-mile or more from their starting-place they found themselves in a running stream. Jones examined it in both directions, and bade Dick enter it and follow in the ...
— The Iron Game - A Tale of the War • Henry Francis Keenan
... passed out, wishing him good night. He did not reply to it, but banged the gate on their heels, locked it, and turned to retrace his steps through the cloisters. The college boys, who had hidden themselves from his view, ...
— The Channings • Mrs. Henry Wood
... closed, ay, before it began, a great victory was gained, which merits special mention here. Let us retrace ...
— The Red Man's Revenge - A Tale of The Red River Flood • R.M. Ballantyne
... pursue his walk much farther; but now, soon facing about, began, with a quickened step and a look of increasing uneasiness, to retrace his ...
— The Rangers - [Subtitle: The Tory's Daughter] • D. P. Thompson
... fascinating to aunt Hitty that she walked quite half a mile beyond Croft's, and was obliged to retrace her steps. She conceived bands of black alpaca for the sleeves and hats of the pallbearers, and a festoon of the same over the front gate, if there should be any left over. She planned the singing by the choir. There had been no real choir-singing at any funeral in Edgewood since the Rev. Joshua ...
— The Village Watch-Tower • (AKA Kate Douglas Riggs) Kate Douglas Wiggin
... divide him from other men; there are moments when he even doubts the value of those words. Those are the moments when wisdom flowers and sends forth blossom. Thought may sometimes deceive; and the thinker who goes astray must often retrace his footsteps to the spot whence those who think not have never moved away, where they still remain faithfully seated round the silent, essential truth. They are the guardians of the watch-fires of the tribe; ...
— Wisdom and Destiny • Maurice Maeterlinck
... throughout between the mental and the physical intoxication; and it continues most strikingly, even when we consider both in their most favourable points of view, by supposing the victim to self-indulgence at last willing to retrace her steps. This fearful advantage is granted to our spiritual enemy by wilful indulgence in sin; that it is only when trying to adopt or resume a life of sobriety and self-denial that we become exposed to the severest temporal punishments of self-indulgence. As long as a course of ...
— The Young Lady's Mentor - A Guide to the Formation of Character. In a Series of Letters to Her Unknown Friends • A Lady
... Harriet's letter with a conjecture. He conjectures that she "would now gladly have retraced her steps." Which means that it is proven that she had steps to retrace—proven by the poem. Well, if the poem is better evidence than the letter, we must ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... and immediately enquired for some food, but it was impossible to obtain any there. Going out I walked through the town, in the hope of finding a place to get something. But none could be found. Feeling very tired, I began to retrace my steps, with the ...
— How I Filmed the War - A Record of the Extraordinary Experiences of the Man Who - Filmed the Great Somme Battles, etc. • Lieut. Geoffrey H. Malins
... evidence of progress. 'Vex not its ghost'; no necromancy will or should evoke the departed spirits or avail to make them utter significant speech to living men. The chain of links which once bound stage to stage of human history is somewhere for ever broken; and as we retrace, in the memory of the race or in that of individual, the Ariadne-clue which we here call 'the unity of History' it vanishes somewhere beyond our vision into the dark backward and abysm of time. True, of late Archaeology and Anthropology ...
— The Unity of Civilization • Various
... manifestation in brick and mortar of the hereditary greatness of the Blakes. To Carraway, impersonal as his interest was, the acknowledgment brought a sudden vague resentment, and for an instant he bit his lip and hung irresolute, as if more than half-inclined to retrace his steps. A slight thing decided him—the gaiety of a boy's laugh that floated from one of the lower rooms and swinging his stick briskly to add weight to his determination, he ascended the broad steps and lifted the old ...
— The Deliverance; A Romance of the Virginia Tobacco Fields • Ellen Glasgow
... the negotiation in a fair train, than Napoleon, abandoning for the moment the details of its management to inferior diplomatists, hastened to retrace his steps, and pour the full storm of his wrath on the Venetians. The Doge and the Senate, whose only hopes had rested on the successes of Austria on the Adige, heard with utter despair that the Archduke had shared the fate of Beaulieu, ...
— The History of Napoleon Buonaparte • John Gibson Lockhart
... the battle." Everything depends on a good start and the right road. To retrace one's steps is to lose not only time but confidence. "Be sure you are right then go ahead" was the motto of the famous frontiersman, Davy Crockett, and it is one that every young man can adopt ...
— How to Get on in the World - A Ladder to Practical Success • Major A.R. Calhoon
... had spent together in Heidelberg. Philip's heart sank as he thought of the lost years. He walked on mechanically, not noticing where he went, and realised suddenly, with a movement of irritation, that instead of turning down the Haymarket he had sauntered along Shaftesbury Avenue. It bored him to retrace his steps; and besides, with that news, he did not want to read, he wanted to sit alone and think. He made up his mind to go to the British Museum. Solitude was now his only luxury. Since he had been at Lynn's he had often gone there and sat in front of the groups from the Parthenon; and, ...
— Of Human Bondage • W. Somerset Maugham
... is possible to defy fate, retrace our steps, and start anew towards the goal. Occasionally we will find that we have burnt our bridges behind us; we are up against an obstacle, and there we are bound to remain helpless. And here fate appears ...
— Antony Gray,—Gardener • Leslie Moore
... cheer after cheer, and the ladies fluttered their handkerchiefs. Zulma was an exception. She had no pleasure to manifest, but the contrary. She resented the affront made to the handsome young rebel, and had immediate occasion to show her feeling. As Roderick Hardinge turned to retrace his steps toward the gate, he glanced upward at the dense line of spectators on the ramparts, and caught sight of Pauline and Zulma. He gave them both a smiling look of recognition. Pauline returned it with ardent eye and an animated face that betokened the joy and pride ...
— The Bastonnais - Tale of the American Invasion of Canada in 1775-76 • John Lesperance
... guide, however, never intended matters to go so far, and we finished at last by taking half the horses, and allowing him (the rajah's son-in-law) to descend with the rest. This being done, we had to retrace our road nearly to Senua; and a little before sunset our party crossed an awkward stream, and struck into ...
— The Expedition to Borneo of H.M.S. Dido - For the Suppression of Piracy • Henry Keppel
... for rushing onward in this career of demolition, till every vestige of gradations of rank and every restraint of religion should be swept from the land. The Girondists paused in deep embarrassment. They could not retrace their steps and try to re-establish the throne. The endeavor would not only be utterly unavailing, but would, with certainty, involve them in speedy and retrieveless ruin. They could not unite ...
— Madame Roland, Makers of History • John S. C. Abbott
... not kept up stream far enough, and that at this point was a sheer precipice some thirty feet high. We could find no crevices to help us climb down it. We tried to work along the edge till we should reach a lower place, but this utterly failed. We were obliged to retrace our steps to the open wood above the slashing. But if the downward climbing had been hard, this attempt ...
— Military Reminiscences of the Civil War V1 • Jacob Dolson Cox
... was ready we had first to find our way down from the mountain top; and now even the old borderer and the Indian confessed their inability to do aught but retrace their steps by the only route they knew: namely, by that ravine which we had twice traversed in daylight, and up which they had led the captured ...
— The Master of Appleby • Francis Lynde
... like herself. Then up again—anywhere but to the pensionnat—out to the cemetery where Martha lay—out beyond it, to the hills whence there is nothing to be seen but fields as far as the horizon. The shades of evening made her retrace her footsteps—sick for want of food, but not hungry; fatigued with long continued exercise—yet restless still, and doomed to another weary, haunted night of sleeplessness. She would thread the streets in the neighbourhood of the Rue d'Isabelle, and yet avoid it and its occupant, ...
— The Life of Charlotte Bronte - Volume 1 • Elizabeth Gaskell
... position, for you would marry into an old and most respectable family. True, you have conducted yourself shamefully toward Emma Tenant—to say nothing of Miss Burns. Let that pass. There is still opportunity to retrace. Attempt to win Miss Innis. If you do win her, what a happy home will be yours! As for Miss Thorne—Hiram, you know what she is. You despise her in your heart. Besides, she is almost twenty-nine—you but twenty-seven. Will her money compensate? ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol IV, Issue VI, December 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various
... youth; Painful was the sacrifice, but pleasant the service: a thousand objects would revive the remembrance of past occupations and occurrences; a thousand circumstances rush into her memory; her susceptible mind would often retrace the scenes once so familiar, now to be abandoned for ever; affection would often recal the names of Bethuel and Laban, and filial tenderness would weep at the thought of maternal anxiety. She was about to commit her happiness to the disposal of another—to form another connexion—to seek ...
— Female Scripture Biographies, Vol. I • Francis Augustus Cox
... go first, so as not to have to retrace his steps, Nekhludoff set off for the Senate. There he was shown into the office where he found a great many very polite and very clean officials in the midst of a magnificent apartment. Maslova's petition was received and handed on to that Wolf, to whom Nekhludoff had a letter from ...
— Resurrection • Count Leo Tolstoy
... that be?" demanded the king, opening his jaws, wide as a chasm, to swallow me. Whereupon I turned trembling to Sleep. "It was I who brought him hither," said he. "Well then, for my brother Sleep's sake," said the awful and lanky monarch, "you can retrace your steps for the nonce; but beware of me the next time." Having been for some time cramming his gluttonous maw with carrion, he caused his subjects to be called together, and moved from the altar to a very lofty and dreadful throne, to adjudge newly-arrived ...
— The Visions of the Sleeping Bard • Ellis Wynne
... the particles of air would move toward the point where they begin to rise upward in due north and south lines, according as they came from the southern or northern hemisphere, and the upper currents or counter trades would retrace their paths also parallel with the meridians or longitude lines. But because the earth revolves from west to east, the course of the trade winds is oblique to the equator, those in the northern hemisphere blowing from northeast to southwest, those in the southern ...
— Outlines of the Earth's History - A Popular Study in Physiography • Nathaniel Southgate Shaler
... bombshell playing havoc with the house of cards which had been so carefully erected. But the intrigue had gone so far, and the prizes to be won by the monarchical supporters were so great that nothing could induce them to retrace their footsteps. For a week and more a desperate struggle went on behind the scenes in the Presidential Palace, since Yuan Shih-kai was too astute a man not to understand that a most perilous situation was being rapidly created and that if things went wrong ...
— The Fight For The Republic in China • Bertram Lenox Putnam Weale
... though convinced of the justness of the views here advanced, have already trained their children in the way they should not go, but are anxious to retrace their steps as far as possible, there will here be a difficulty. "Our children," they will say, "do not, at present, relish the kind of bread you speak of; and how shall we bring them to do so? or is the thing ...
— The Young Mother - Management of Children in Regard to Health • William A. Alcott
... of Atreus, to my mind there seems, If we would 'scape from death, one only course, Home to retrace our steps: since here at once By war and pestilence our forces waste. But seek we first some prophet, or some priest, Or some wise vision-seer (since visions too From Jove proceed), who may the cause ...
— The Iliad • Homer
... their souls had rushed together from the uttermost confines of space. She had been led into his world, and he compelled to retrace his steps to almost primitive conditions in order that they might find one another and together take up the thread of their common destiny. Clearly, they were children of destiny upon whose brows God had set His seal. They realized ...
— When Dreams Come True • Ritter Brown
... from the carriage to retrace his way; but he only climbed up a ladder that grew every instant steeper; and all at once he was plunged downwards after his horse and carriage into the stream. He could swim, and as he swept down this thought came to him—that he might be able to ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... the Baroness, whose fine eyes, as she glanced at him over the big roses and geraniums, wore a conversational smile. Felix, standing on the threshold of the cottage, hesitated for a moment as to whether he should retrace his steps and enter the parlor. Then he went his way and passed into Mr. Wentworth's garden. That civilizing process to which he had suggested that Clifford should be subjected appeared to have come on of itself. Felix was very sure, at least, that ...
— The Europeans • Henry James
... four graceful boys. In the slave, Pollux at once recognized the servant of Claudius Venator, and he fancied he must have seen the masked gentlemen too before now, but he could not remember where, and did not trouble himself to retrace him in his mind. At any rate, the rider of the donkey had just heard something he did not like, for he was looking anxiously at his ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... hiding-places and lurking corners, I struck a trail well traversed by small antelope and hartebeest, which we followed. It led me into a jungle, and down a watercourse bisecting it; but, after following it for an hour, I lost it, and, in endeavouring to retrace it, lost my way. However, my pocket-compass stood me in good stead; and by it I steered for the open plain, in the centre of which stood the camp. But it was terribly hard work—this of plunging through an African jungle, ruinous to clothes, ...
— How I Found Livingstone • Sir Henry M. Stanley
... Everything in the camp was dead still. I saw evidences of war-paint and a recent war-dance that forerun an Indian attack. I estimated the strength of the enemy—possibly four hundred warriors, and noted the symbols of the Kiowa tribe. Then, thrilled with pride at my skill and success, I turned to retrace my way to my pony—and looked full into the face of an Indian brave standing motionless in my path. A breath—and two more braves evolved out of gray air, and the three stood stock-still before me. Out of the tail of my eye, I caught sight of a drawn bow on ...
— Vanguards of the Plains • Margaret McCarter
... innocence, and now pardon our love. I read your letters, from my name at the beginning, to yours at the end, and from yours back to mine, and between the lines, for any doubtful spot: and oh, rash! But I would not retrace the step for my own sake. I am certain of your love for me, though . . .' She paused: 'Yes, I am certain of it. And if I am ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... considered inconsequent I must pause to thank you—well—to thank you for having been so true a friend to me all through my life. If that life were given to me to begin again, I should like to retrace the years back to a point when—little more than a child—I yielded to influence and made a great mistake. I should like to begin my life over again from there. When you first signified your disapproval of Millicent as a wife for Jack, I confess I was a little nettled; but ...
— With Edged Tools • Henry Seton Merriman
... to her out of the question to face and bear the ignominy and disgrace he had brought upon her thirteen years ago, how utterly impossible it was now. She could never retrace her steps. To confess the deception she had herself consented to, and taken part in, would be to pull down with her own hands the fair edifice of her life. The very name she had made for herself, and the broader light in which ...
— Cobwebs and Cables • Hesba Stretton
... good, reliable Indian, and on leaving Vancouver to join Colonel Wright, took his family along, to remain with relatives and friends at Fort Dalles until the return of the expedition. When Wright was compelled to retrace his steps on account of the capture of the Cascades, this family for some reason known only to Spencer, was started by him down the river to their home ...
— The Memoirs of General Philip H. Sheridan, Vol. I., Part 1 • Philip H. Sheridan
... est possible, aux prejuges. Cette difference existe egalement pour les femmes; elles sont beaucoup plus blanches que celles du sud. Les Portugais, consideres en general, sont vindicatifs bas, vains, railleurs, presomptueux a l'exces, jaloux. et ignorans. Apres avoir retrace les defauts que j'ai cru appercevoir en eux, je serois injuste si je me taisois sur leurs bonnes qualites. Ils sont attaches a leur patrie, amis genereux, fideles, sobres, charitables. Ils seroient bons Chretiens si le fanatisme ne les aveugloit pas. Ils sont ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 17, - No. 97, January, 1876 • Various
... deny it not," said Balfour; "and suppose that thy—eloquence were found equal to persuade me to retrace the steps I have taken on matured resolve,—what will be thy meed? Dost thou still hope to possess the fair-haired girl, with her wide ...
— Old Mortality, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... chastened feelings, I began to retrace my steps. My two Bapedi were in constant dread of their lives, for an old and deadly feud existed between their tribe and the Swazis. They followed me like my shadow, sometimes in a most embarrassing manner. Having been on my forward ...
— Reminiscences of a South African Pioneer • W. C. Scully
... lawful for him who rides upon an animal to pray the eighteen benedictions, and when he comes to the point when he should retrace three steps, he is to back the animal he is mounted on three steps. And so also it is lawful to pray the eighteen blessings when sitting and ...
— Hebraic Literature; Translations from the Talmud, Midrashim and - Kabbala • Various
... up, took a good look at the house, and was about to retrace his steps down the highway, when he saw the sagging front door of the old mansion slowly open. It creaked on the rusty hinges, and Mark stared with all his might as he saw a man emerge, a man who did not look like a tramp, for his clothes were of good material and cut, and fit him well. ...
— Lost on the Moon - or In Quest Of The Field of Diamonds • Roy Rockwood
... desperation determined to encounter every danger in his attempts to find and to recover his beloved wife. He went directly to the gate from which he had come out, and re-entering the city there, he began to retrace, as well as he could, the way that he had taken in coming out of the city—guiding himself as he went, by the light of the flames which rose up here and there from the ...
— Romulus, Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... trail leading through this valley until I find myself standing on the edge of the river, ruefully looking around for some avenue by which I can proceed on my way. I am in the bend of a horseshoe curve, and the only way to get out is to retrace my footsteps for several miles, which disagreeable performance I naturally feel somewhat opposed to doing. Casting about me I discover a couple of old fence-posts that have floated down from the Be-o-wa-we settlement ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle V1 • Thomas Stevens
... with his hand, to satisfy himself he was right, and then plunged the knife, as if through my body, violently through the bed-clothes, piercing even the mat which supplied, with us, the place of a mattress. Having done this, he again took up his lamp and turned round to retrace his steps, when I observed that his countenance, which was before contracted and frowning, was lighted up with a peculiar expression of satisfaction at the imaginary blow he had struck. The light of the ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 3, July, 1851 • Various
... reckless individual was exactly the man to adopt a dangerous cause, and to play a desperate game. Proscribed, hunted, surrounded by enemies, burning under the consciousness of wrong, and unable to retrace his path to a peaceable mode of life, Rob Roy was a ready ...
— Memoirs of the Jacobites of 1715 and 1745 - Volume II. • Mrs. Thomson
... treaty without an outfit clause should be suffered to exist between powers so situated, is an outrage upon all justice, all reason, all common sense. But one thing is certain, that unless we are to go further, we have gone too far, and must in mercy to hapless Africa retrace our steps. Unless we really put the traffic down with a strong hand, and instantly, we must instantly repeal the treaties that pretended to abolish it, for these exacerbate the evil a hundred fold, and are ineffectual to any one purpose but putting money into the pockets ...
— The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the - Abolition of the African Slave-Trade, by the British Parliament (1839) • Thomas Clarkson
... what in common language we call calm reflection, that men are led away, by passion, prejudice, and distorted moral habits, into courses of action which their own sober judgment would condemn;—and when a man, who has thus departed from rectitude, begins to retrace his way, the first great point is that where he pauses in his downward career, and seriously proposes to himself the question, whether the course he has followed be worthy of a moral being. I allude not here to the means by which a man is led to take this momentous step in his moral history, ...
— The Philosophy of the Moral Feelings • John Abercrombie
... the line listening to the firing and was not ordered in at all. If Custer or Merritt had been in command it would have been different. When Sheridan found that Torbert had retreated, he gave him a very peremptory order to retrace his steps and try again. Custer, followed by Lowell, was sent to the front and in the forenoon of the 24th Wickham's troopers were scattered in flight and the way opened for Torbert to carry out his instructions. Even then the ...
— Personal Recollections of a Cavalryman - With Custer's Michigan Cavalry Brigade in the Civil War • J. H. (James Harvey) Kidd
... first to take sober second thought. He began to retrace his steps toward the cabin. Common sense told him she would never be caught by that noisy crew unless she wished to be. In any case, the bread might as well ...
— The Huntress • Hulbert Footner
... point. He began to fear he would never find the particular bush he sought; it seemed such a hopeless task to embark on in the dark, and alone. In order to make it more easy, he made his way to the door in the wall, and tried to retrace his steps of yesterday, as nearly as possible, but even that was more difficult than he had imagined. He thought the bush was straight ahead, and not very far off, but when he acted on this idea he found himself on the edge ...
— Paul the Courageous • Mabel Quiller-Couch
... eastward the situation of the Arab robbers became daily more dangerous; nothing was thought of but to retrace their ...
— Great African Travellers - From Mungo Park to Livingstone and Stanley • W.H.G. Kingston
... did not doubt to be the channel of the river. He had pushed on after this success, in the hope of gaining a further knowledge of the country; but another still more extensive marsh checked him, and obliged him to retrace his steps. He was no less surprised at the account I gave of the termination of the river, than I was at its so speedily re-forming, and it was determined to lose no time in the further examination ...
— Two Expeditions into the Interior of Southern Australia, Complete • Charles Sturt
... morning he awoke, a little less agitated, but still with no hope. He was able, however, to resolve upon the best course of conduct now left open to him; and he arranged immediately to retrace his steps to Ireland, as soon as he should have begged sufficient alms to speed him a mile on the road. With this intent he hastily issued forth, preferring to challenge the notice of chance passengers, even at the early hour of dawn, than to venture again, in the middle of the day, ...
— Stories by English Authors: Ireland • Various
... space he came to an angle where the cliff turned abruptly west and dwindled sharply in height. He remembered what the Major had said—the upper entrance of the cave came out on the highest crest of the hill. He turned back to retrace his painful way. The smell of dawn was in the air; the east sparkled. No sound came from the ambush all around. ...
— The Desire of the Moth; and The Come On • Eugene Manlove Rhodes
... could retrace his steps along the Holston and Tennessee Rivers perhaps he would gape, too flabbergasted to utter a word. Or he might ask in dismay, "What's become of my elbow room?" The country he once roamed with gun ...
— Blue Ridge Country • Jean Thomas
... whether he should accept an invitation to his daughter's wedding. More than a week's notice, Gabrielle believed, would inflict unnecessary cruelty and less than a week grant hardly enough time for him to retrace ...
— Cupid's Middleman • Edward B. Lent
... the khan, and the whole host, conscious of their peril, commenced a precipitate retreat, in their haste abandoning many guns and much of their baggage. The Russians pursued the foe, but were not able to overtake them, so rapidly did they retrace their steps. ...
— The Empire of Russia • John S. C. Abbott
... very young, she thought, in spite of his slightly haggard appearance. Something in his attitude reminded her of him as he had been in his Eton days—long-legged and ungainly in his short jacket. She smothered a little sigh. They had drifted such a weary way since then; too far to ever retrace their steps. ...
— The Second Honeymoon • Ruby M. Ayres
... village street the procession was obliged to turn and retrace its steps over the same ground until it reached the business part of the town, where it would turn off and pass through some ...
— The Circus Boys on the Flying Rings • Edgar B. P. Darlington
... of my book on the "Renaissance in Italy" does not pretend to retrace the history of the Italian arts, but rather to define their relation to the main movement of Renaissance culture. Keeping this, the chief object of my whole work, steadily in view, I have tried to explain the dependence of the arts on mediaeval Christianity at their commencement, ...
— Renaissance in Italy Vol. 3 - The Fine Arts • John Addington Symonds
... of Athol he was born There, on a small hereditary Farm, An unproductive slip of rugged ground, His Father dwelt; and died in poverty; While He, whose lowly fortune I retrace, The youngest of three sons, was yet a babe, A little One—unconscious of their loss. But ere he had outgrown his infant days His widowed Mother, for a second Mate, Espoused the teacher of the Village School; Who on her offspring zealously bestowed ...
— Biographia Literaria • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... be taken back to his father. Then they would be sure of receiving the money they had paid out for him. This plan was rejected, because they had accomplished a great part of their journey, and they were not inclined to retrace their steps. They therefore resolved upon carrying Joseph to Egypt and selling him there. They would rid themselves of him in this way, and also receive a great price ...
— The Legends of the Jews Volume 1 • Louis Ginzberg
... the authorities instead of as free as air. Quentin endured the expostulations of his companions and the fast-enlarging mirth of the crowd for a few moments in dumb surprise. Then he turned suddenly to retrace his steps up ...
— Castle Craneycrow • George Barr McCutcheon
... reduction of these dislocations is to make the head of the bone retrace the course it took in leaving the socket. The main obstacles to reduction being muscular contraction and the entanglement of the head with tendons, ligaments, or bony points, appropriate means must be taken to ...
— Manual of Surgery Volume Second: Extremities—Head—Neck. Sixth Edition. • Alexander Miles
... sea front and began to retrace their steps, silently at first, and then little by little falling into ordinary conversation again as though nothing ...
— The Ghost Girl • H. De Vere Stacpoole
... the occasion to stand forth as the protector of the public, and refused to register the decree. It gained the credit of compelling the regent to retrace his step, though it is more probable he yielded to the universal burst of public astonishment and reprobation. On the 27th of May the edict was revoked, and bank bills were restored to their previous value. But ...
— The Crayon Papers • Washington Irving
... that by some false step, intentional or unintentional, we have missed the right road, and gone wrong. Can we then retrace our steps? can we recover what is lost? This may be done. It is too gloomy a view ...
— The Pleasures of Life • Sir John Lubbock
... Winter to bury her dead, seeks the wine of life that brims in the chalices of Spring flowers: plucks blade and blossom, and is a child again, if Time has so dealt with him that for a little he can thus far retrace his steps; and, lastly, he turns once more to the Mother he has forgotten, to find that she has not forgotten him. The whisper of her passing in a greenwood glade is the murmur of waters invisible and of life unseen; ...
— Children of the Mist • Eden Phillpotts
... his adieux there, and began, at a brisker pace, to retrace his steps toward Gylingden; and she and Stanley, side by side, walked on ...
— Wylder's Hand • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... the vein after following it about thirty feet," Sam replied, as he walked the full length, and when on the point of turning to retrace his steps the doors were closed with a clang, while from the outside could be heard the mocking voice of Bart as he shoved the ...
— Down the Slope • James Otis
... on. At last he reached a point where, with his head scraping against the roof of the sewer, his chin was just above the surface of the stream. A few more steps would be all that he could take in this direction without drowning. Could he retrace his way against the swift current? He did not know. He was weakened from the effects of his wound, from lack of food and from the exertions of the past hour. Well, he would go on as far as he could. The river lay ahead of him somewhere. Behind ...
— The Mad King • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... and manly words. De Soto no longer cherished a doubt of his sincerity, and became also convinced that their guides were utterly unable to extricate him. Under these circumstances nothing remained but blindly to press forward or to retrace his steps. They at length found some narrow openings in the forest through which they forced their way until they arrived, just before sunset, upon the banks of a deep and rapid stream which seemed to present an ...
— Ferdinand De Soto, The Discoverer of the Mississippi - American Pioneers and Patriots • John S. C. Abbott
... crowd that congregated about us; "you cannot get in until eight o'clock." But I remembered that a silver key will open anything in Spain, and taking a mozo as a guide we hurried off as fast as the rough pavements would permit. We had to retrace the whole length of the city, but on reaching the Cathedral, found it open. The exterior is low, and quite plain, though of great extent. A Moorish gateway admitted me into the original court-yard, or haram, of the mosque, which is planted ...
— The Lands of the Saracen - Pictures of Palestine, Asia Minor, Sicily, and Spain • Bayard Taylor
... tears of mingled rage, grief, and pain might well spring from the poor boy's eyes in his utter loneliness, as he clenched his hand with powerless wrath, and regained his feet, to retrace, as best he might, his way to where his widowed mother had found a temporary shelter in a small ...
— More Bywords • Charlotte M. Yonge
... gallery, instantly caught his eye, and the old seaman had not advanced many steps towards it, before he discovered that he was approaching the very room which had so much excited his curiosity, and by the identical passage through which he had entered the abbey. To turn, and retrace his steps, was the most obvious course for any man to take who felt anxious to escape; but the sounds of high conviviality, bursting from the cheerful apartment, among which the cockswain thought he distinguished ...
— The Pilot • J. Fenimore Cooper
... had from consolation. He that outlives a wife whom he has long loved, sees himself disjoined from the only mind that has the same hopes, and fears, and interest; from the only companion with whom he has shared much good or evil; and with whom he could set his mind at liberty, to retrace the past or anticipate the future. The continuity of being is lacerated[1290]; the settled course of sentiment and action is stopped; and life stands suspended and motionless, till it is driven by external causes into a new channel. But the time ...
— The Life Of Johnson, Volume 3 of 6 • Boswell
... that Remy braved was a real one, for the traveler, after having passed the village and gone on for a quarter of a league, and seeing no one before him, made up his mind that those whom he sought had remained behind in the village. He would not retrace his steps, but lay down in a field of clover; having made his horse descend into one of those deep ditches which in Flanders serve as divisions between the properties, he was therefore able to see without being seen. This young man, as Remy knew, and Diana suspected, was Henri du ...
— The Forty-Five Guardsmen • Alexandre Dumas
... let this hereditary privilege go into abeyance), had another almost secret existence of a wholly different kind: that when he left our house in Paris, saying that he must go home to bed, he would no sooner have turned the corner than he would stop, retrace his steps, and be off to some drawing-room on whose like no stockbroker or associate of stockbrokers had ever set eyes—that would have seemed to my aunt as extraordinary as, to a woman of wider reading, the thought of being herself on terms of intimacy with Aristaeus, of knowing that he would, when ...
— Swann's Way - (vol. 1 of Remembrance of Things Past) • Marcel Proust
... the point of convergence of the two originally isolated paths of Egyptian and Babylonian civilization, and what new information the latest discoveries have communicated to us on this subject has been told in the preceding chapters. We now have to retrace our steps to the point where we left Egyptian history and resume the thread of ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, And Assyria In The Light Of Recent Discovery • L.W. King and H.R. Hall
... lord," answered Malcolm. As far as the proper quarter of the attics, he went straight as a pigeon; in that labyrinth he had to retrace his steps once or twice, but at length he stopped, and said confidently—"This is the door, ...
— Malcolm • George MacDonald
... and vegetable kingdoms must have taken place, continuously adding new characters to the already existing number. Contrasted with this method of growing differentiation, are the retrogressive modifications, which simply retrace a step, and the degressive changes in which a backward step is retraced and old characters revived. No doubt both of these methods have been operative on a large scale, but they are evidently not in the line ...
— Species and Varieties, Their Origin by Mutation • Hugo DeVries
... threat the Captain must retrace his steps and ride to the spot where the aqueduct entered the hill. How far he had proceeded Brandilancia could not guess, possibly half or three-fourths of the way. If so there was hope of reaching the opening before Radicofani, and he hurried ...
— Romance of Roman Villas - (The Renaissance) • Elizabeth W. (Elizbeth Williams) Champney
... friend could not accompany her in her walks, and wished to be alone, for a very obvious reason, she would return to her old haunts, retrace her anticipated pleasures—and wonder how they changed their colour in possession, and proved ...
— Mary - A Fiction • Mary Wollstonecraft
... the Romans again mounted their horses and turned to retrace their steps. Two Romans rode on either side of the captives, who were about fifty in number; and John gradually made his way to the front of the party, between the ...
— For the Temple - A Tale of the Fall of Jerusalem • G. A. Henty
... pursued ever farther the elusive vegetation in the joy of freedom, he presently awoke to his great distance from camp, and, indeed, from the other horses. Conscious of a sudden gripping loneliness and a certain apprehension, he began to retrace his way. As he did so, out of the silence came a nasty whirring sound, and suddenly he felt a rope settle over his head. Surprise, then anger, displaced his loneliness and apprehension; he jerked back to escape the rope. But it held fast. He braced his legs and ...
— Bred of the Desert - A Horse and a Romance • Marcus Horton
... bread stuffs for their families, their contiguity to an Indian village, and the fact that an Indian war path passed near their dwellings, soon determined them to retrace their steps.[15] Before they carried this determination into effect, the family of Files became the victims of savage cruelty. At a time when all the family were at their cabin, except an elder son, they were ...
— Chronicles of Border Warfare • Alexander Scott Withers
... said; "and many of us, ascending the hill in front, saw Jerusalem. But even then it was certain that we must again retrace our steps; and when we asked King Richard to come to the crest of the hill to see the holy city, he refused to do so, saying, 'No; those who are not worthy of conquering Jerusalem should not look at it!' This was but a short time since, and we are now retracing our steps to ...
— The Boy Knight • G.A. Henty
... unclean birds must and will assuredly be purified by fire.... Our people can take it,—they will take it.... Scott, the arch-traitor, and Lincoln, the beast, combined, cannot prevent it. The 'Illinois Ape' must retrace his journey more rapidly than he came." The abundant talk of this sort created uneasiness; and Judge Holt said that there was cause for alarm. But a committee of Congress reported that, though it was difficult to speak positively, yet they found no evidence sufficient to prove "the ...
— Abraham Lincoln, Vol. I. • John T. Morse
... decline in life. It had been no part of his plan to "go bad." There had been a time when he had been headed for success in the community. He had held men's respect, even though they had not liked him. Then, somehow, he had turned the wrong corner and been unable to retrace his steps. ...
— Gunsight Pass - How Oil Came to the Cattle Country and Brought a New West • William MacLeod Raine
... so far as it has succeeded in determining that the men should be selected for public duty, for their fitness, and for nothing else, it is surely a step in advance which no one would now propose to retrace. And yet it was simply a substitution of competition for monopoly. As it comes into wider operation, some of us begin to cry out against competition. The respectable citizen asks, What are we to do with our ...
— Social Rights and Duties, Volume I (of 2) - Addresses to Ethical Societies • Sir Leslie Stephen
... thought. 'It is so, I know. Agnes used to say so, Bob and Thirza think so. They all think me unpractical and dreamy. Is it a sin—I wonder?' There were lambs in the next field; he watched their gambollings and his heart relaxed; brushing the clover dust off his black clothes, he began to retrace his steps. The boys were playing cricket now, and he stood a few minutes watching them. He had not seen cricket played since the war began; it seemed almost otherworldly, with the click of the bats, and the shrill young 'voices, under the distant drone of that sky-hornet threshing ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... retrace the way we had come. Not that I had taken note of any particular objects in my perturbed state of mind, but judging from the general character of the streets. We called at another office or station for a minute ...
— Bleak House • Charles Dickens
... not be likely to mistake my meaning, and to suppose that I look back with any fond regret at the departure of the feudal system, or that I should wish to bring the present generation under its influence. Mankind does not so retrace its steps. But still, though the course of our race is onwards, the nature of man does not change. There is the same need for protection and countenance on the one side, and for reverence and attachment on the other, ...
— The Claims of Labour - an essay on the duties of the employers to the employed • Arthur Helps
... agreeable to the soldiers; being more than liberal in paying for all they drank. As the bugle sounded for parade, he bid our young hero "good bye for the present," and leaving the Fort, proceeded to retrace his steps towards the town, or city, ...
— Ridgeway - An Historical Romance of the Fenian Invasion of Canada • Scian Dubh
... she had probably been sheltered from their observation in one of the numerous creeks which run through the banks of the river. In this dilemma a council of war was held, and at first it was proposed to retrace their steps, till the elder of the black pilots offered to take a small canoe they had with them higher up the river, to ascertain whether or not the slaver was there. This proposal being agreed to by Lieutenant Dumaresq, the two negroes pulled away, and were soon lost in the darkness, ...
— Our Sailors - Gallant Deeds of the British Navy during Victoria's Reign • W.H.G. Kingston
... corridor, in the hope of finding some passage at the end which might lead to the offices. But when he arrived at the other extremity, he was only met by great folding-doors, which evidently communicated with the state apartments; he must retrace his steps. He did so; and when he came to the door which Madame Dalibard had entered, and which still stood ajar, he had recovered some courage, and with courage, curiosity seized him. For what purpose could the ...
— Lucretia, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... paints an object whom one loves; others, as the object one detests. The latter, to render me more odious, will probably revile my character, and, perhaps, represent me as a cowardly and despairing mistress, who has descended even to supplications!! It is my part, therefore, to retrace with a firm and vigorous hand this important epoch of my life, where my destiny, at once kind and cruel, reduced me to treat the greatest of all Kings both as my equal and as an inconstant friend, as a treacherous enemy, and as my inferior or subject. He had, at first, the ...
— The Memoirs of Madame de Montespan, Complete • Madame La Marquise De Montespan
... she begged that we might return at once; and, as our walk had already been a somewhat extended one into the still recesses of the mountain valley, I thought it just as well to follow her prudent advice and retrace our steps. For although I laughed at my wife's fears, they were really not so utterly without foundation as might at first appear, for we had recently heard of a most daring case of brigandage in the neighbourhood. As I have before remarked, there are a great many very questionable ...
— Fair Italy, the Riviera and Monte Carlo • W. Cope Devereux
... said: "I thank you, Lieutenant von Quistorp, for having joined me with your faithful men. Germany will see at least that there are still brave men who do not forsake their country, and if we sacrifice our lives for her, she will at least engrave our names on the tablets of her martyrs. We cannot retrace our steps, my friends; we must advance, though death stare us in the face. This very night we leave Arneburg, and continue our march. We may still succeed in what Doernberg and Charles have been unable to accomplish. We ...
— Napoleon and the Queen of Prussia • L. Muhlbach
... was, in the first place, to retrace his steps. Then to turn to the left. Then to go on until he found two streets meeting. Then to take the street on the right. Then to look out for the second turning on the left. Then to follow the turning until he smelled stables—and there ...
— Little Novels • Wilkie Collins
... me. No: love which, on earth, amid all the shows of it, Has ever been seen the sole good of life in it, The love, ever growing there, spite of the strife in it. Shall arise, made perfect, from death's repose of it, And I shall behold thee, face to face, O God, and in thy light retrace How in all I loved here, still wast thou! Whom pressing to, then, as I fain would now, I shall find as able to satiate The love, thy gift, as my spirit's wonder Thou art able to quicken and sublimate, With this sky of thine, that ...
— Christmas Eve • Robert Browning
... her strength failed her, and her courage—courage that she had been storing for this dread undertaking throughout the whole of that dreadful day. Now that she was there, she would have given her life to have been able to retrace her steps, to lose herself in the wild, dark ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... a moonlight walk to the Glorieta, a public promenade which they are making here, where there are some stone benches for the promenaders, close to which some public-spirited individuals had dragged the carcase of a horse, which obliged us to retrace our steps with all ...
— Life in Mexico • Frances Calderon de la Barca
... retrace our steps as far as Langton mill, and there taking the road which branches off to the right, southward, we soon arrive at Thornton. The church, dedicated to St. Wilfrid (Archbishop A.D. 709), which replaced a mean structure, built about 1730 in the ...
— Records of Woodhall Spa and Neighbourhood - Historical, Anecdotal, Physiographical, and Archaeological, with Other Matter • J. Conway Walter
... wept for thee the day I lost thee, so do I now weep that I can no longer retrace ...
— Peter Schlemihl etc. • Chamisso et. al.
... man drawing water at a well near by, were not inharmonious with the quietness and calmness of the moment, but the epoch of peace was of short duration. The Boer horsemen stemmed the retreat of the men in brown, and compelled them to retrace their steps. Another body of burghers made a wide detour north-eastward from the spruit, and, jumping from their horses, crept along under the cover of an undulation in the ground for almost a half-mile to a point which overlooked the route of ...
— With the Boer Forces • Howard C. Hillegas
... goal is something more than merely attaining justice on the Khilafat. If so, he is right. Attainment of justice is undoubtedly the corner-stone, and if I found that I was wrong in my conception of justice on this question, I hope I shall have the courage immediately to retrace my steps. But by helping the Mahomedans of India at a critical moment in their history, I want to buy their friendship. Moreover, if I can carry the Mahomedans with me I hope to wean Great Britain from ...
— Freedom's Battle - Being a Comprehensive Collection of Writings and Speeches on the Present Situation • Mahatma Gandhi
... when I retrace these moments of anguish. The point to which they are to conduct us yet remains one of the mysteries ...
— The Memoirs of Louis XV. and XVI., Volume 6 • Madame du Hausset, and of an Unknown English Girl and the Princess Lamballe
... overwhelmed with despair, will refuse to leave their shame. They cannot bear the pity or silent scorn of their former relatives and friends, and prefer to cling to their present homes. It is very hard for a fallen woman to retrace her steps, even if her friends or relatives are willing to ...
— Lights and Shadows of New York Life - or, the Sights and Sensations of the Great City • James D. McCabe
... steps I would retrace. These walls, this melancholy room, O'erpower me with a sense of gloom; The space is narrow, nothing green, No friendly tree is to be seen: And in these halls, with benches filled, distraught, Sight, hearing fail me, and the ...
— Faust Part 1 • Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
... hesitated. His precious candle was half burned out, and would not much more than serve to carry him back to the place from which he had started. Besides this, the passage before him was so small that a person entering it could by no possibility turn around if he should desire to retrace his course. It was even doubtful if he could back out after having penetrated a short distance ...
— The Copper Princess - A Story of Lake Superior Mines • Kirk Munroe
... gave up the chase. The whole neighborhood by that time was aroused, and we thought best to retrace our steps to the place whence we started. Then we took a roundabout course until we reached the railroad, along which we travelled. For a long distance there was unusual stir and commotion. Every house was lighted up; and we heard people talking and horses galloping this way and that way, with ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 100, February, 1866 • Various
... mountainous regions, infested by Rakshasas. And, O tiger among men, also this princess of high fortune, ever devoted to her lords, desireth not to return without thee. Sahadeva is always devoted to thee; he too will never retrace his steps. His disposition is known to me. O king, O mighty monarch, we are all eager to behold Savyasachin, and therefore, will we all go together. If we are unable to go over this mountain in our cars, abounding as it doth in defiles, well, we would go on foot. Trouble ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 1 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... dismay, was lost. With a sack of salt tied across his saddle, he had ridden out that morning to fill one of the salt-logs near a spring where the cattle came to drink. He had found the log, filled it, and had turned to retrace his journey when a flock of wild turkeys strung out across his course. His horse, from which the riders of the Concho had aforetime shot turkeys, broke into a kind of reminiscent lope, which quickened as the turkeys wheeled and ran swiftly through the timberland. Sundown ...
— Sundown Slim • Henry Hubert Knibbs
... A kind of shaft, floored for the most part with slippery earth, but here and there with an irregular stairway of rock; and still at the lower end of the tunnel shone a faint light. I would have given worlds by this time to retrace my steps. A slight draught, blowing up the tunnel from my companion to me, bore the odour of death upwards under my nostrils; but this, while it dizzied and sickened me, seemed to clog my feet and ...
— Poison Island • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch (Q) |
