"Startled" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... on the mosses, the letter in her hand, and her face, as she turned to me, was rather startled; but when she saw me she laughed, and said in the sweetest voice I ever heard: "Are you so ...
— Laddie • Gene Stratton Porter
... sudden and ghastly stillness, as, mute and breathless, they toiled up the hillside, gaining on their victim at every stride. The patter of the horsehoofs and the rattle of rolling flints died away above. Lancelot looked up, startled at the silence; laughed aloud, he knew not why, and sat, regardless of his pawing and straining horse, still staring at ...
— Yeast: A Problem • Charles Kingsley
... a pretty air of pride in her lover, and a gentle lift of her head. He made no reply, and she turned her eyes from the fire to his face to see why he was silent so long. He was pale with a strange gray pallor, and he met her gaze with a startled, alarmed look. It was the look of a man who blanches and shrinks before some sudden great temptation. She misread the look, taking it for unwillingness to ...
— Round Anvil Rock - A Romance • Nancy Huston Banks
... Then, startled by her own thought, so vivid had it been, she looked around as if in fear it was ...
— A Face Illumined • E. P. Roe
... this. You should never have come into the underworld again. I begged, I implored you not to do so. And now you are in danger to-night. I can only hope and pray that this will reach you in time, and—" He read on, in a startled way now, to the end; then read the note over again more slowly, this time muttering snatches of it aloud: "... Chicago ... Slimmy Jack and Malay ... Birdie Lee ... released from Sing Sing to-day ... triangular scar ...
— The Further Adventures of Jimmie Dale • Frank L. Packard
... Sir Egrimond Thynne, an eminent serjeant at law, who drew the writing; and his clerk was to sit up all night to engross it; as he was writing, he perceived a shadow on the parchment, from the candle; he looked up, and there appeared a hand, which immediately vanished; he was startled at it, but thought it might be only his fancy, being sleepy; so he writ on; by and by a fine white hand interposed between the writing and the candle (he could discern it was a woman's hand) but vanished as before; I have forgot, it appeared a third time. But ...
— Miscellanies upon Various Subjects • John Aubrey
... road had opened his eyes. He looked at Madame Francois with a startled air, but did not move. She herself now thought that he must ...
— The Fat and the Thin • Emile Zola
... startled by strange noises in the negro quarter. These are not the usual sounds consequent on the uprising of their fellow-slaves—a chorus of voices, in jest and jocund laughter. On the contrary, it is a din of serious tone, with ...
— The Death Shot - A Story Retold • Mayne Reid
... Sabbath-morning's vision dwelt with me, and the voice that speaketh, filling the soul "as a sea-shell is with murmuring," said, "Your finger will awaken him." And I looked down at my two passive hands, and asked, "Which one of them?" And the murmuring voice startled me with the answer, "Two are required,—one of reconciliation, the other of forgiveness." Whereupon I lifted up the ten that Nature gave, and said, "Take them all, if ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 61, November, 1862 • Various
... kisses, the widow dropped her head resignedly on his shoulder, and so they floated down the current, loving "not wisely, but too well." On and on they floated, entirely oblivious of time, when they were suddenly startled by a wild halloo. The widow started up with a scream, and Simon grasped the oars as soon as possible. Just in front of them, seated on his horse, and with his revolver ready cocked in his hand, sat the deputy sheriff of Montgomery. "Simon Suggs," said he, "jist you git out of that thar boat and ...
— The Expressman and the Detective • Allan Pinkerton
... passed in this way; on the morning of the sixth, we were startled by the comtesse, who, in manifest terror came to us holding her child, which was screaming as if suffering acute pain: its eyes were bloodshot and gleamed with an unnatural brilliancy, its pulse rapid, and head so hot that it almost burned me to feel of it. Presently ...
— The International Magazine, Volume 2, No. 2, January, 1851 • Various
... Kentucky. Already familiar, by his own peculiar intuition, with the Indian character, we see him casting his keen and searching glance around, as the ancient woods rung with the first strokes of his axe, and pausing from time to time to see if the echoes have startled the red men, or the wild beasts from their lair. We trace him through all the succeeding explorations of the Bloody Ground, and of Tennessee, until so many immigrants have followed in his steps, that he finds his privacy too strongly pressed upon; until he finds ...
— The First White Man of the West • Timothy Flint
... one change of which Ross was not aware but which might have startled both Ashe and McNeil. Ross Murdock had indeed died under that blow which had left him unconscious beside the river. The young man whom Frigga had drawn back to sense and a slow recovery was Rossa of the Beaker people. This same Rossa nursed a hot desire for vengeance against those who ...
— The Time Traders • Andre Norton
... made. Sometimes he looked at David and smiled happily and then for a long time he appeared to forget the boy's existence. More and more every day now his mind turned back again to the dreams that had filled his mind when he had first come out of the city to live on the land. One afternoon he startled David by letting his dreams take entire possession of him. With the boy as a witness, he went through a ceremony and brought about an accident that nearly destroyed the companionship that ...
— Winesburg, Ohio • Sherwood Anderson
... formed a carpet from the loom of nature; and each walk had its horizon in the distance, consisting of about a hand-breadth of sky, apparent through the interlacing of the branches of the trees. At the end of almost every walk, evidently in great tribulation and uneasiness, the startled deer were seen hurrying to and fro, first stopping for a moment in the middle of the path, and then raising their heads they fled with the speed of an arrow or bounded into the depths of the forest, where they disappeared from view; now and then a rabbit, of philosophical ...
— Ten Years Later • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... attractions with her haughty brow and lip, as if they were a badge or livery she hated. So unmatched were they, and opposed, so forced and linked together by a chain which adverse hazard and mischance had forged: that fancy might have imagined the pictures on the walls around them, startled by the unnatural conjunction, and observant of it in their several expressions. Grim knights and warriors looked scowling on them. A churchman, with his hand upraised, denounced the mockery of such ...
— Dombey and Son • Charles Dickens
... of the doorbell caused her to break off abruptly the sentence she had begun. With that curious intuition which sometimes manifests itself unbidden, she was seized with the startled conviction that the bell had conveyed the news of an arrival important to herself. Listening with an anxiety she could not yet understand, she heard a man's deep tones raised in inquiry. Then came the lighter voice of the maid who had answered ...
— Grace Harlowe's Golden Summer • Jessie Graham Flower
... itself; and few among the persons composing the array had ever given themselves much if any trouble, in ascertaining the nice, and with them entirely metaphysical distinction, between the mine and thine of the matter. The proposition, therefore, startled none, and prudence having long since withdrawn from their counsels, not a dissenting voice was heard to the suggestion of a union between the two parties for the purpose of common defence. The terms, recognising all of both sides, as upon an equal footing in the profits ...
— Guy Rivers: A Tale of Georgia • William Gilmore Simms
... Constance, startled, and almost frightened by this wild burst of feeling, endeavored to soothe her; but the storm was too fierce to own the power of her gentle persuasions, and raged on for its ...
— The Allen House - or Twenty Years Ago and Now • T. S. Arthur
... Sam began; but at a sound from a source invisible to him he paused. "What's that?" he said, somewhat startled. ...
— Penrod and Sam • Booth Tarkington
... the heart at present to give more than the briefest answers to the queries which you so earnestly put to me. No doubt you were startled to find, from the French papers that reached you from Tahiti, and on no less authority than that of the "Apostolic Letter of the Pope," and Cardinal Wiseman's "Pastoral," that this enlightened country was once more, or was on the eve of becoming, a ...
— The Eclipse of Faith - Or, A Visit To A Religious Sceptic • Henry Rogers
... it with a sign, "Enough!" An owl hooted far away, exulting in the delight of deep gloom in dense foliage; overhead lizards ran in the attap thatch, calling softly; the dry leaves of the roof rustled; the rumour of mingled voices grew louder suddenly. After a circular and startled glance, as of a man waking up abruptly to the sense of danger, he would throw himself back, and under the downward gaze of the old sorcerer take up, wide-eyed, the slender thread of his dream. They watched his moods; the swelling rumour of animated talk subsided like a wave on a sloping beach. ...
— Tales of Unrest • Joseph Conrad
... not wholly gratuitous. I thought it did seem strange to him: that a needless constraint was put upon him by excessive consideration for my feelings. I desired to set him at his ease as he had set me at mine. On the contrary, he seemed quite startled by ...
— Dead Men Tell No Tales • E. W. Hornung
... to the tower of the church, Up the wooden stairs, with stealthy tread, To the belfry-chamber overhead, And startled the pigeons from their perch On the sombre rafters, that round him made Masses and moving shapes of shade— Up the light ladder, slender and tall, To the highest window in the wall, Where he paused to listen and look down A moment on the roofs of the quiet town, ...
— The Universal Reciter - 81 Choice Pieces of Rare Poetical Gems • Various
... side, like a comb, fastened to the stern, but projecting outwards, forwards and slightly upwards, the teeth increasing in length towards its far end, and as they sweep the surface of the water the startled prawns, shut in by the bank on one side, in their efforts to avoid the teeth of the comb, jump into the ...
— British Borneo - Sketches of Brunai, Sarawak, Labuan, and North Borneo • W. H. Treacher
... met my brother. At a crest of the road we met face to face, with the moon across our foreheads. We had never met till now, nor even heard of one another; at least he had never heard of me. He started back as if at his own ghost; but I had nothing to be startled at, in this world ...
— Erema - My Father's Sin • R. D. Blackmore
... welcoming an invading army appeals strongly to me. The hostile General would be amazed by the ease with which he got his forces in, but he would be more startled by the difficulty he would find if he tried to get them out. If they once learned the advantages of our liberties they would find it hard not to get away, but to go away. I restrain my temper with difficulty when I contemplate the foolishness of the people ...
— The New York Times Current History of the European War, Vol. 1, January 9, 1915 - What Americans Say to Europe • Various
... for a moment and watched the unloading. The cargo crew, used to working in spacesuits, had one truck already half full. The replacements, unused to spacesuits and, in addition, awed and a bit startled by the bleakness of this satellite, were moving awkwardly ...
— They Also Serve • Donald E. Westlake
... Turenne was startled by the shout of stern exultation with which his English allies advanced to the combat, and expressed the delight of a true soldier when he learned that it was ever the fashion of Cromwell's pikemen to rejoice greatly when they beheld the ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 11 • Various
... dismissed for aught I knew, and left me sitting there with her beside me. But I was startled into the proprieties as we stood up to sing the concluding hymn. I was standing stock-still beside her, not listening to the words at all, but with a pleasant sense of everything being very comfortable, and an old-fashioned swell of harmony on the air, when suddenly the book dropped from Bessie's ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XII, No. 29. August, 1873. • Various
... REV. S. [rising, startled out of his professional manner into real force and sincerity] Frank, once and for all, it's out of the question. Mrs Warren will tell you that it's not to be ...
— Mrs. Warren's Profession • George Bernard Shaw
... Addison had always prided himself on being free from all superstition. But I saw that he was startled; and he admitted afterwards that he, too, had remembered about that rainbow in the morning, and had also thought of the comet that had appeared a few years before and that many people believed to presage the ...
— A Busy Year at the Old Squire's • Charles Asbury Stephens
... the same figure that I had just been attributing to my fancy. I will admit that I felt more than startled; I was quite a bit frightened. I was convinced now that it was no mere imaginary thing. It was a human figure. And yet, with the flicker of the moonlight and the shadows chasing over it, I was unable to say more than that. Then, ...
— The Ghost Pirates • William Hope Hodgson
... follows us from youth to age better than literature could have done; he had exceeded all the poets, not by any single phrase—it was more his attitude of mind towards death (towards my death) that had startled me—and as I walked along the shore I tried to remember his words. They were simple enough, no doubt, so simple that I could not remember them, only that he had reminded me that Michael Malia, that was the mason's name, had known me ...
— Memoirs of My Dead Life • George Moore
... room in a much easier frame of mind than he came into it, the Senator sat down heavily on the bed. He was puffing at his cigar and thinking intently, when he caught sight of the white, startled face of his daughter in the mirror of the bureau across the room. Whirling about, he found her standing in the doorway looking at him. Rexhill had never before been physically conscious of the fact that he had a spine, but in that moment ...
— Hidden Gold • Wilder Anthony
... a series of tows, each of these being a rope-bound fleet, averaging perhaps fifty canal-boats and barges, propelled by a powerful steamer intercalated near the centre. The traveller new to Hudson River scenery will be startled, any summer day on which he may choose to take a steamboat trip to Albany, by the apparition, at distances varying from one to three miles all the way, of floating islands, settled by a large commercial population, who like their dinner ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 87, January, 1865 • Various
... A fair, warm day, towards noon. The Master and others went ashore to the general meeting. The plantation was startled this morning by a visit from an Indian who spoke some English and bade "Welcome." He is from Monhiggon, an island to the eastward some days' sail, near where Sir Ferdinando Gorges had a settlement. He was friendly, and having had much intercourse with Englishmen ...
— The Mayflower and Her Log, Complete • Azel Ames
... was a burst of startled yells and cries, following directly upon the reports of several muskets, and what seemed to be quite a crowd of the retreating blacks came rushing along the path right upon where the Seafowl's men were making ...
— Hunting the Skipper - The Cruise of the "Seafowl" Sloop • George Manville Fenn
... had hitherto, regardless of the well-known effect of time, kept staring at heads on the level which Bobby's had reached when he left home. She now looked up with a startled expression. ...
— Dusty Diamonds Cut and Polished - A Tale of City Arab Life and Adventure • R.M. Ballantyne
... it," Mary Louise went on, flinging back her head, "every stick, every stone of it. That half mile of turf down Blue Bottle Lane! I'd give ten years of my life to gallop the rest of it through country like that." And then, as though startled, she bit her ...
— Stubble • George Looms
... to whom I might tell my story that he might mock me, I mocked myself—with a laugh that startled passers-by and which, coupled with the crazy pace at which I dashed into Blois, caused them, I doubt not, to think me mad. Nor were they wrong, for mad indeed ...
— The Suitors of Yvonne • Raphael Sabatini
... moment the blow fell. Some one seemed to rise up before them, out of the ground, out of the vacancy, forming before his horror-stricken eyes. And then there rose that cry which everybody could hear—which paralysed the bridal procession and brought the clergyman startled out of the vestry, and thrilled the careless lookers-on. "He has a wife living. She is living, and she is here!" Had he heard these words before in a dream? Had he known all along that he would hear them, ...
— A Country Gentleman and his Family • Mrs. (Margaret) Oliphant
... startled emotions behind a glass of madeira, into which she coughed, chokingly. Molly, the maid, stopped short in her passage from the kitchen door to the table, and nearly dropped the pudding she was carrying. Elizabeth concealed her feelings, and told herself that ...
— The Continental Dragoon - A Love Story of Philipse Manor-House in 1778 • Robert Neilson Stephens
... and enemies. On the day after his speech came the report of it in the newspapers; on the next day the leading articles, in which the world was told what it was that the Prime Minister had really said. Then, on the following day, the startled parsons, and the startled squires and farmers, and, above all, the startled peers and members of the Lower House, whose duty it was to vote as he should lead them, were all agog. Could it be that the newspapers ...
— Phineas Redux • Anthony Trollope
... last, under the pressure of poverty, toil, and intemperance, his reason gave way, and he was by a stratagem removed to an asylum. Here, when he found himself and became aware of his situation, he uttered a dismal shriek, and cast a wild and startled look around his cell. The history of his confinement was very similar to that of Nat Lee and Christopher Smart. For instance, a story is told of him which is an exact duplicate of one recorded of Lee. He was writing by the light of the moon, when a thin cloud crossed its disk. 'Jupiter, ...
— Specimens with Memoirs of the Less-known British Poets, Complete • George Gilfillan
... the hatch. He heard the soft tinkle of a radar signal and his heart skipped a beat. He had stumbled onto the astrogation and radar bridge. Wondering if he should burst into the room and attempt to overpower the men on duty, or wait for a better chance later, he was suddenly startled by a sharp voice in back ...
— On the Trail of the Space Pirates • Carey Rockwell
... quickly handed. The officer had ordered topgallant-yards to be sent down, and topgallant-masts struck, when a vivid flash of forked lightning darted close ahead, across the ship's course, followed by a terrific crash of thunder, which startled all on board. Many thought the electric fluid had struck the ship. The captain sprang on deck. He was just in time to see the ship taken aback by the long threatening gale, which came down with greater fury from its continued delay. Stern first she drove, the ...
— Ronald Morton, or the Fire Ships - A Story of the Last Naval War • W.H.G. Kingston
... life in the light of eternity. I can conceive of no other adequate critical formula. This applies to painting, sculpture, literature and music. Such too is the art of life,—the exhibition to God and man of life in the light of eternity. I have been startled to find a kinship between Wordsworth and Millet. I found it today in a stooped old man who was traveling the roads with a walking stick and a heavy bundle of driftwood. He was worthy of a great painter or a great ...
— The Forgotten Threshold • Arthur Middleton
... nightfall when something on the indicator-board for the robot sentries went off like a startled rattlesnake. Everybody, talking idly or concentrating on writing up the day's observations, stiffened. Luis Gofredo, dozing in a chair, was on his feet instantly and crossing the hut to the instruments. His second-in-command, who had been playing chess ...
— Naudsonce • H. Beam Piper
... related,—'the hair of my flesh stood up.' But I did not quite lose my self-possession. As the figure came nearer, I instantly threw off the bedclothes and jumped towards it into the middle of the room,—and it was gone! Though startled enough at so strange an occurrence, I reflected that it must be an illusion produced by some casual disorder of the natural faculties, and returned to bed and slept as usual until morning. But the next day I was much more disturbed in recalling the several circumstances ...
— Old New England Traits • Anonymous
... said Wunpost grimly and stood with his back to the wall. There was something in the wind, he could guess that already, and he waited to see what would happen. But if Eells had been startled his nerve had returned, and he proceeded with ...
— Wunpost • Dane Coolidge
... girl away from Leonard. He is just come to the state when it all turns on getting him off to sleep quietly, and not disturbing him, and she is too excited and restless to do anything with her; she has startled him twice already, and then gets upset—tired out, poor thing! and will end in being hysterical if she does not get fed and rested, and then we shall be done for! Now I want you to take charge of her. See, ...
— The Trial - or, More Links of the Daisy Chain • Charlotte M. Yonge
... hill, therefore, I pressed into the pine forest, as far as I could, and then halted. On the following morning we crossed the plains more to the north than we had before done. About 11 a.m. we struck a creek, and startled a native dog in its bed which ran along the bank. In following this animal we stumbled on a pool of water, and stopped to breakfast. Wishing to examine the country there as far to the north as possible on my way ...
— Expedition into Central Australia • Charles Sturt
... himself that horrid sight—a naked, human heart. Had Allcraft and Bellamy, during one of their early interviews, suddenly stripped, and favoured each other with reciprocal glances—one or both would have been slightly startled by the unexpected exhibition. Planner had always looked upon Mr Bellamy as a very great man indeed—had contemplated him with that exact admixture of awe and admiration, that was pleasing and acceptable to the subject ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 54, No. 338, December 1843 • Various
... wharf, intending to go to sleep. The tides sweep through Carquinez Straits as in a mill-race, and the full ebb was on when I stumbled overboard. There was nobody on the wharf, nobody on the sloop. I was borne away by the current. I was not startled. I thought the misadventure delightful. I was a good swimmer, and in my inflamed condition the contact of the water with my skin soothed ...
— John Barleycorn • Jack London
... over him, and her tears slowly formed and trickled down on his hand. Then all at once old Caroline's accusation against Cissie flashed on Peter's mind. She had stolen that dinner in the turkey roaster, after all. It so startled him that he sat up straight. Cissie also sat up. She stopped crying, and sat looking into ...
— Birthright - A Novel • T.S. Stribling
... fighting. . . . A strong piquet was turned out regularly about an hour before daybreak. On one occasion the men had been standing silently under arms for some time, and shivering in the cold morning air, when they were startled by a solemn request for 'more pork.' The officer in command of the piquet, who had only very recently arrived in the country, ordered no talking in the ranks, which was immediately replied to by another demand, distinctly enunciated, for 'more pork.' So malaprop a ...
— A Dictionary of Austral English • Edward Morris
... accompaniment to the bloody drama in the clouds. Watching keenly, I gradually began to picture to myself the sensation of walking unseen to the murderous fowl and suddenly clasping his smooth back with both hands. How startled he would be! But in truth the thought was only a continuation of another that had been floating through my mind while the hawk was wheeling. Unconsciously I had been mumbling to ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 10 • Various
... a jay screamed at me, as only a jay can. There are times when I am intensely in sympathy with the feeling expressed in this ear-splitting sound, inarticulate but human. It is at the same time warning and execration, the startled solitary's outburst of uncontrolled rage at the abhorred sight of a fellow-being in ...
— Afoot in England • W.H. Hudson
... desirous to prevent mischief, I made the signal for the boats to come on board, and at the same time, to intimidate the Indians, I fired a nine-pounder over their heads. As soon as the cutter began to stand towards the ship, the Indians in their canoes, though they had been startled by the thunder of our nine-pounder, endeavoured to cut her off. The boat, however, sailing faster than the canoes could paddle, soon got clear of those that were about her; but some others, that were full of men, way-laid her in her course, ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 12 • Robert Kerr
... north—namely, the Duchess of Northumberland. We have already referred to some of the members of this ancient family, and their baronial residence, Alnwick Castle. In the midst of the congratulations and honours which were heaped upon her, the humble lighthouse maiden was startled, as well as gratified, to receive an invitation from Her Grace to visit her. It is not difficult to imagine the flutter of excitement which this caused, nor to picture Grace, with glowing cheeks and bright eyes, as ...
— Grace Darling - Heroine of the Farne Islands • Eva Hope
... that anyone could genuinely be behind them, but the rear one whirled and snapped a startled shot into the darkened corridor, and the other leaped sidewise down from the doorway, drawing his gun with blurred speed, and leveling on Bryce as his feet left contact with the sill. He was falling slowly, almost floating, and it ...
— The Man Who Staked the Stars • Charles Dye
... that I feel to Almighty God who has inspired both your heart and your head in the composition of "Uncle Tom's Cabin." None but a Christian believer could have produced such a book as yours, which has absolutely startled the whole world, and impressed many thousands by revelations of cruelty and sin that give us an idea of what would be the uncontrolled dominion of Satan on ...
— The Life of Harriet Beecher Stowe • Charles Edward Stowe
... were so startled by the entrance of the excited man with his cry of "Fire!" that the young inventor nearly dropped the tank of liquid extinguisher he was helping to hoist into the aeroplane. Then, as he caught sight ...
— Tom Swift among the Fire Fighters - or, Battling with Flames from the Air • Victor Appleton
... Don was startled. The question was both unexpected and pointed. He met her eyes—brown eyes and very direct. The conventional explanation that he had ready about not caring for much in the middle of the ...
— The Wall Street Girl • Frederick Orin Bartlett
... TV swelled on, the screen presenting that same scene of the beach of shells. As it did so Sutter uttered a startled exclamation. ...
— Made in Tanganyika • Carl Richard Jacobi
... I hope, nay I feel confident, that you will interpret this note in th' real sense—namely, as a proof of the esteem and respect which I entertain toward you both. Looking in the Times this morning I was startled by an advertisement of PETER BELL—a Lyrical Ballad—with a very significant motto from one of our Comedies of Charles the IInd's reign, tho' what it signifies I wish to ascertain. Peter Bell is a Poem of Mr. ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Vol. 5 • Edited by E. V. Lucas
... There was an agonising pressure on my senses, of sound, light, perfume. I thought it was these things that gave the pain, while from my heart, which seemed perfectly still, came forth at intervals the repetition "I will get over it, I will get over it." John found me out, and said, quite startled, "What is the matter with you, Margery?" I complained of "my head," and drew back within the shelter of a curtain. "Margery, my dearest, you are ill," he said, and then the flood-gates of bitterness opened in my heart. How long was he going to act a cruel lie to me? I said, "I am ill; ...
— The Late Miss Hollingford • Rosa Mulholland
... concluded, uttered a shuddering sigh, that startled Emily, who, looking up, perceived the eyes of Agnes fixed on hers, after which the sister rose, took her hand, gazed earnestly upon her countenance, for some moments, in silence, and ...
— The Mysteries of Udolpho • Ann Radcliffe
... midnight, and there was a foot-fall in the cloister. I was startled by it out of an entire forgetfulness of all around me, for I was lying on my bed in the monastery cell, with my hands clasped over my eyes, as I had thrown myself down on coming in; and, with a strange contrariety, my mind, broken rudely from its hope, ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol. XXXII No. 2. February 1848 • Various
... in the room I could not have been more startled than I was by the abrupt utterance of such language in a planter's house, in his very presence, and by his slave. The Colonel, however, expressed no surprise and no disapprobation. It was evidently no new ...
— Among the Pines - or, South in Secession Time • James R. Gilmore
... son, as though startled, moved slowly away down the deck into the further darkness, and Dr. Stahl tightened his grip of the Irishman's arm with a force that almost made him cry out. A gleam of light from the opened port-hole had fallen about them before they moved. Quite clearly it revealed ...
— The Centaur • Algernon Blackwood
... penetrating, so significant in the tones of Julie's voice, in her accent, in the glance that went with the words, that Victor, startled out of his indifference, stared ...
— A Woman of Thirty • Honore de Balzac
... like a startled bird from out The heather at the huntsman's shout In swift and blust'ring flight At noon The sun rolled in a cloudy swoon Dimly, and over the rolling deep Gust followed gust with shadowy sweep; And waves that streamed their snowy locks Were tossing high ...
— Elves and Heroes • Donald A. MacKenzie
... of joy at this happy issue of my hopes had to be confined to a smile—in which for a startled instant Violet had seemed to sense the triumph. It was still on my lips as with a general movement we rose from the table about which we had been grouped during the absorbing business of drawing up the contract. Cookie had been clamoring for us to leave, that he might spread the table ...
— Spanish Doubloons • Camilla Kenyon
... that Jerry, although timid, was cowardly. On the contrary, he was bold as a lion. He could not control his sensitively-strung nervous system, but instead of running away, like the coward, he was prone to rush furiously at whatever startled him, and grapple ...
— The Settler and the Savage • R.M. Ballantyne
... Oogahnahbayah, a small eagle-hawk, flying over, they would say, 'He eats the emu eggs.' He flies over where the emu is sitting on her eggs and makes a noise hoping to frighten the bird off; having done so, he will drop a stone on the eggs. If the emu is not startled off the nest, the hawk will fly on, alight at some distance, and walk up like a black fellow, still with the stone in his beak, to the nest; off the emu will go, then the hawk bangs the eggs with the stone until he breaks them. He throws the stone on one side, has a feed ...
— The Euahlayi Tribe - A Study of Aboriginal Life in Australia • K. Langloh Parker
... ever after a sense of tremendous power and passion. But her most noticeable feature was her mouth, which was somewhat too large for beauty, and was always moving nervously. When she spoke, her voice startled you with its depth, which was a kind of soft hoarseness, but capable of every shade of colour. There was a playful and impetuous raillery in nearly all she said, and everything seemed to be expressed by mind and body at the same time. She ...
— The Christian - A Story • Hall Caine
... and his very gait was full of purpose and energy. "I speak in parable," said the teacher, "but that old gentleman is always in a state of alarm, and he seems to find satisfaction in predicting evil, and especially of Mr. Franklin. The time was when the young printer avoided him—he was startled, I fancy, whenever he heard the cane on the pavement; he must have felt the force of the suggestion that Calamity was after him. Now he has become prosperous, and the condition is changed. Calamity flees from him. See, my boys, ...
— True to His Home - A Tale of the Boyhood of Franklin • Hezekiah Butterworth
... thus fast because of that subterfuge of Mugwump? Alas for that conscientiousness of which she had once been proud! Was it the measure of her degradation she read on Rosalie's startled face—Rosalie's face of stricken incredulity and amaze? But no; Rosalie's transfixed gaze was not on Emily Louise—it passed ...
— Emmy Lou - Her Book and Heart • George Madden Martin
... and strange as he spoke. It did not seem a boy's face turned to the fire, but that of an effeminate young man in some great suffering, as he said again, in a voice which startled him and made ...
— In Honour's Cause - A Tale of the Days of George the First • George Manville Fenn
... o'clock, saying he wished to speak to me. I went to his room, and without any warning he began at once, "You never show me my boy now, Sophy; he must be grown a big child, and I should like to see him." Much startled by so unexpected a remark, I replied that the child was at Royston under the care of Mrs. Temple, but that I knew that if it pleased him to see Edward she would be glad to bring him down to Worth. He seemed gratified with this idea, and ...
— The Lost Stradivarius • John Meade Falkner
... at the dawn of a new era in learning, and the slow, plodding, laborious scribes of the monasteries were startled by the appearance of an invention with which their poor pens had no power to compete. The year 1472 was the last of the parchment literature of the monks, and the first in the English annals of printed learning; but we must not forget that the monks with all their sloth ...
— Bibliomania in the Middle Ages • Frederick Somner Merryweather
... to animals are far more common than is generally known. I have seen quails killed by flying against our house when suddenly startled. Some birds get entangled in hairs of their own nests and die. Once I found a poor snipe in our meadow that was unable to fly on account of difficult egg-birth. Pitying the poor mother, I picked her up out of the grass and helped her as gently as I could, and as soon ...
— The Story of My Boyhood and Youth • John Muir
... companion, he had until this moment, taken no note of things without, nor did his eyes rest now upon any familiar scene. They were swiftly, and noiselessly, passing blocks of respectable residences, none of these particularly distinguished. Her sudden invitation rather startled him. ...
— The Case and The Girl • Randall Parrish
... moment, as slowly it subsided, and sank. Then once more arose, and silently gleamed. It seemed not a whale; and yet is this Moby Dick? thought Daggoo. Again the phantom went down, but on re-appearing once more, with a stiletto-like cry that startled every man from his nod, the negro yelled out—"There! there again! there she breaches! right ahead! The White ...
— Moby Dick; or The Whale • Herman Melville
... from the cellar, the bell was ringing furiously, and flocks of startled birds were flying out of the chestnut-trees. It was for dinner. All the guests were in the garden. Oscar introduced me in his off-hand way, and I offered my arm to the mistress of the house to ...
— Monsieur, Madame and Bebe, Complete • Gustave Droz
... and stick and set out alone, I knew not whither. It chanced to be a glorious morning: a warm wind and deep blue sky, the first green of spring abroad, and multitudes of birds singing. I lunched on beef and beer in a little public-house near Elham, and startled the landlord by remarking apropos of the weather, "A man who leaves the world when days of this sort ...
— The First Men In The Moon • H. G. Wells
... mansion and these rooms, where everything had an aroma of staleness and mediocrity, the spectacle offered by these two beings, cast away, as it were, on a rock far from the world and the ideas which are life, startled Augustine; she could here contemplate the sequel of the scene of which the first part had struck her at the house of Lebas—a life of stir without movement, a mechanical and instinctive existence like that of the ...
— At the Sign of the Cat and Racket • Honore de Balzac
... was followed in 1821 by the publication of Benjamin Lundy's "Genius of Universal Emancipation." In 1831 the uprising of slaves in Southampton County, Virginia, under the lead of Nat. Turner, had startled the country and invited attention to the question of slavery. In the same year Garrison had established "The Liberator," and in 1835 was mobbed in Boston, and dragged through its streets with a rope about his neck. In 1837 Lovejoy had been murdered in Alton, Illinois, ...
— Political Recollections - 1840 to 1872 • George W. Julian
... the conversation with Father Johannes, he startled the monks by announcing to them that he was going to leave them ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 09, No. 51, January, 1862 • Various
... encouragement when I thought of the future. No words can describe the hold that first fancy had now taken of me—with time and solitude and suffering to help it. My mother, with all her interest in the match, was startled by the unexpected success of her own project. She had written to tell Mr. Blanchard of my illness, but had received no reply. She now offered to write again, if I would promise not to leave her before my recovery was ...
— Armadale • Wilkie Collins
... plough, turning over the shoulder a countenance of dark beauty; grave, shy girls, pail in hand, at the milking-bars in dawn or dusk; young mothers in the doorway, looking out, babe on hip; big-eyed, bare-footed mountain children clinging hand in hand by the roadside, or clustered like startled little partridges in the shelter of the dooryard; knitters in the sun and grandams by the hearth; tellers and treasurers all of tales and legends couched in racy old Elizabethan English; I ...
— Judith of the Cumberlands • Alice MacGowan
... Startled, we gazed at Spion Kop's top—only five hundred yards away, but invisible, covered by the thick mist as with a veil. The enemy were there, we knew it; they could not see us as yet, but the mist would soon clear away, ...
— With Steyn and De Wet • Philip Pienaar
... and he did it beautifully—so well that I was almost startled by its exactitude and the way in which a few pieces ...
— Glyn Severn's Schooldays • George Manville Fenn
... own room, trying to learn a lesson for the next day, but finding great difficulty in fixing her thoughts upon it, when she was startled by the sudden entrance of Aunt Chloe, who, with her apron to ...
— Elsie Dinsmore • Martha Finley
... words the prince threw down his cards and began to walk up and down the room. I was rather startled, but I got up and stood by the fire, waiting for the king. But after I had waited thus for half an hour a chamberlain came from the palace, and announced that his majesty could not do himself the honour of supping ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... life. I remember now that a sudden impulse seemed given to my arm as if some one had struck it a blow. Then a sound which it had never before been my misfortune to hear—and I pray God I may never hear it again—startled me to an agonized sense of the disaster I had wrought. Too well I knew the meaning of the lapping, hissing, sucking noise that instantly smote our ears. I had made a deep cut across the jugular vein, the wound gaping widely in consequence of the tension ...
— Danger - or Wounded in the House of a Friend • T. S. Arthur
... and happy in having discovered that the wave-curves over a rock were like the curves of some shells. My pupil will soon learn, as she did, that a good opera-glass is indispensable. Let any one who has not tried it look with such a glass at sunset-decked water in motion. I am sure they will be startled by its beauty, and this especially if the surface be seen from a boat, because merely to look down on water is to make no acquaintance with its loveliness. A scroll of paper to limit the view and cut out side-lights also intensifies color. The materials my pupil is to use are words, ...
— Doctor and Patient • S. Weir Mitchell
... into it, with the ZX-1 yawing as she was, and the need for haste desperate. Chris's hands were glued to the stick: his nerves were as tight as violin strings. Then, when only ten feet from the rack clamp, he gave a startled jump of uncomprehending amazement. ...
— Raiders Invisible • Desmond Winter Hall
... home," said Mrs. Grant. "You can take her in your arms and carry her about the house, talking softly to her, so that she may feel that you will be good to her. It is fortunate that it is growing dark. She can see better in the twilight, and is not so easily startled." ...
— Friends and Helpers • Sarah J. Eddy
... love; And soon a well-known face my notice drew, Sicilia's king, to whose sagacious view The scenes of deep futurity display'd Their birth, through coming Time's disclosing shade. There my Colonna, too, with glad surprise, 'Mid the pale group, assail'd my startled eyes. His noble soul was all alive to fame, Yet holy friendship mix'd her softer claim, Which in his bosom fix'd her lasting throne, With Charity, that makes the wants of ...
— The Sonnets, Triumphs, and Other Poems of Petrarch • Petrarch
... pebbles skipping over the wavelets; and the sound of their laughter many a time echoed along the Loch's green waters and up the hills, till the does peered and wondered from among the heather, and the heron, startled at his fishing, flew upwards croaking, with flapping wings. Happy were those days for Deirdre, and with utter sadness she looked back to them afterwards, when the doom foretold had fallen upon her. Happy ...
— Ireland, Historic and Picturesque • Charles Johnston
... a little startled by the suddenness of the proposal, but answered quickly, 'I shall be so much obliged! Will you think it rude if I ask you to ride him ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 118, August, 1867 • Various
... usual effect of such coincidences. The mind struggles to establish a connection—a sequence of cause and effect—and, being unable to do so, suffers a species of temporary paralysis. But, when I recovered from this stupor, there dawned upon me gradually a conviction which startled me even far more than the coincidence. I began distinctly, positively, to remember that there had been no drawing on the parchment when I made my sketch of the scarabaeus. I became perfectly certain of this; for I ...
— Short Stories for English Courses • Various (Rosa M. R. Mikels ed.)
... I vrom dark bank-sheaedes Turn'd up the west hill road, Where all the green grass bleaedes Under the zunlight glow'd. Startled I met, as the zunbeams play'd Light, wi' a zunsmote maid, Come vor my day's last zight, Zun-brighten'd maid ...
— Poems of Rural Life in the Dorset Dialect • William Barnes
... few moments and then Madame Boleski swept onwards. She was quite stately and graceful and had a well-poised head. Amaryllis turned to the Russian and was startled by the expression of fierce, sardonic ...
— The Price of Things • Elinor Glyn
... house, he climbed down from his steed, roused the gray-headed doorkeeper, old Skaats, who, like his lineal descendant and faithful representative, the venerable crier of our court, was nodding at his post, rattled at the door of the council chamber, and startled the members as they were dozing over a plan for ...
— Knickerbocker's History of New York, Complete • Washington Irving
... Trinity Church walk, just as I quitted the Wall Street crossing, whom should I come plump upon in turning, but Rupert Hardinge? He was walking down the street in some little haste, and was evidently much surprised, perhaps I might say startled, at seeing me. Nevertheless, Rupert was not easily disconcerted, and his manner at once became warm, if not entirely free from embarrassment. He was in deep mourning; though otherwise dressed in the ...
— Afloat And Ashore • James Fenimore Cooper
... and tender in confiding artlessness, and, while gleeful and triumphant in beautiful youth, gently touched with an intuitive pitying sense of the thorny aspects of this troubled world. The giving of the flowers completely bewitched her auditors. The startled yet proud endurance of the king's anger was in an equal degree captivating. Seldom has the stage displayed that rarest of all combinations, the passionate heart of a woman with the lovely simplicity of a child. Nothing could be more beautiful than ...
— Shadows of the Stage • William Winter
... detonated within, and white splinters flew from a spot in the door covered a moment before by the sergeant's broad breast. With a startled oath Slavin flung up his gun, as if to fire back; but Yorke clutched his arm and arrested ...
— The Luck of the Mounted - A Tale of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police • Ralph S. Kendall
... jerk, very comical to see. She laughed at it, when other people did; if it vexed her at all, she never showed it. She had turned back her calico sun-bonnet, and stood looking up at Mrs. Howth and Joel, laughing as they talked with her. The face would have startled you on so old and stunted a body. It was a child's face, quick, eager, with that pitiful beauty you always see in deformed people. Her eyes, I think, were the kindliest, the hopefullest I ever saw. Nothing but the livid thickness of her skin betrayed the fact that set Lois apart ...
— Margret Howth, A Story of To-day • Rebecca Harding Davis
... they were startled by the sound of breaking twigs, as if some one were slowly approaching; whispering ...
— The Golden Dream - Adventures in the Far West • R.M. Ballantyne
... to his feet. His own reflection in the looking-glass startled him. His hair was crumpled, his tie undone, the marks of his night of agony were all too apparent. He felt himself at ...
— The Tempting of Tavernake • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... matter continued, nevertheless, in the same state of provoking uncertainty for another six years. The third period of the perihelion passage had then passed, and nothing had been seen of the missing luminary. But on the night of November 27, 1872, night-watchers were startled by a sudden and a very magnificent display of falling stars or meteors, of which there had been no previous forecast, and Professor Klinkerflues, of Berlin, having carefully noted the common radiant point ...
— Ragnarok: The Age of Fire and Gravel • Ignatius Donnelly
... I can't believe it!" said Emily, as she put down the paper, looking rather startled, for she DID believe it, and felt as if she had suddenly looked into a fellow-creature's heart. "I thought her just an ordinary girl, and here she is a poet, writing verses that make me want to cry! I don't suppose they ARE very ...
— A Garland for Girls • Louisa May Alcott
... afraid I have startled you," Conolly went on, politely. "I found the gate unlocked, and thought it would be an unnecessary waste of time to ring the bell. You have a charming little ...
— The Irrational Knot - Being the Second Novel of His Nonage • George Bernard Shaw
... doorway while they spoke, and at this point some missile hurtled past their faces and thudded heavily against the planking of the door, where it burst with all the enthusiasm of a hand-grenade. Startled, they sprang back; then, recovering from the shock, they discovered themselves quite uninjured in body if somewhat damaged in raiment. They were liberally bespattered from head to foot with the lifeblood ...
— The Monk of Hambleton • Armstrong Livingston
... You startled me every now and then from my reverie by the robust voice, in which you asked the country people (by no means prodigal of their answers)—"If there was any trout fishing in those streams?"—and our dinner at Luss set us up for the rest of our day's march. ...
— Liber Amoris, or, The New Pygmalion • William Hazlitt
... the front door opened below, a rush of cold wind, and her father's voice speaking to Mrs. Bretton in the hall, startled her at last. She sprang up: she was ...
— Villette • Charlotte Bronte
... How was I startled at the cruel feast, By death's rude hands in horrid manner drest; Such grief as sure no hapless woman knew, When thy pale image lay before my view. Thy father's heir in beauteous form arrayed Like flowers in spring, and fair, like them to fade; Leaving behind ...
— Travels in England and Fragmenta Regalia • Paul Hentzner and Sir Robert Naunton
... it. I can spot a man of birth from a man of mere exterior polish any day, anywhere. Talk as much nonsense as you like about all men being born free and equal—they're not. They're born with natural inequalities in their very nerve and muscle. When I was an undergraduate, I startled one of the tutors of that time by beginning my English essay once, "All men are by nature born free and unequal." I stick to it still; it's the truth. They say it takes three generations to make a gentleman; ...
— Philistia • Grant Allen
... haze seemed to have lifted to a higher altitude, interposing, as it were, a curtain between earth and sun. The light became subdued and unnatural. Halos appeared about the sun, with sun-dogs at opposite sides of the circle. The superstitious were startled, in the time of the full moon, at four shafts of light, which could be seen emanating from it, giving an eerie effect as of a cross over the ...
— Roosevelt in the Bad Lands • Hermann Hagedorn
... came downstairs, Ruth was startled at the change in her. The quick, light step was slow and heavy, the broad, straight shoulders drooped a little, and her face, while still dimpled and fair, was subtly different. Behind her deep, violet eyes lay ...
— Lavender and Old Lace • Myrtle Reed
... real thing did, too! And it startled me. How did I know what it might have been? It might have been ...
— The Gay Rebellion • Robert W. Chambers
... I was startled at his argument, and could by no means think it convincing. Had not his own father complied with the requisition of government[943], (as to which he once observed to me, when I pressed him upon it, 'That, Sir, he was to settle with himself,') ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 2 • Boswell, Edited by Birkbeck Hill
... rifle cracked from Bill-Man's barricade, and there was a sharp spat and thud on the chest of Ounenk. He swayed backward and came forward again, a look of startled surprise on his face. He gasped, and his lips writhed in a grim smile. There was a shrinking together of the shoulders and a bending of the knees. He shook himself, as might a drowsing man, and straightened up. But the shrinking ...
— Children of the Frost • Jack London
... man went to bed early and slept soundly upon their sponge-covered couches. The little girl never wakened until long after the sun was shining down through the glass roof of her room, and when she opened her eyes she was startled to find a number of big, small and middle-sized fishes staring at her through the glass. "That's one bad thing 'bout this mermaid palace," she said to herself. "It's too public. Ever'thing in the sea can look ...
— The Sea Fairies • L. Frank Baum
... comical objects, whose purpose he could not divine, stuck about among stones and gravel. He ruminated over these awhile, and at last inquisitively snouted one dish that stood alone, like a small monument. Down went the strange thing and smashed. The pig thought this was singular, and was somewhat startled. Still, he resolved to persevere in his investigations. He inserted his nose into a long, hollow thing that lay there, but could not get it out of the jug again. In his horror and fright at such an extraordinary ...
— Brighter Britain! (Volume 1 of 2) - or Settler and Maori in Northern New Zealand • William Delisle Hay
... regular come-and-go and lay motionless in her lap. She did not speak, and Mrs. Tell, who had expected her to laugh at her little speech, was startled by her silence. Presently Katherine rose, with a sort of queenliness which became her very well. "I am tired to-night," she said, quite ignoring her sister-in-law's remark. "In this hot weather one begins to pine for the country. Jamie has looked pale to-day. By-the-way, I shall ...
— A Vanished Hand • Sarah Doudney
... ironically frowned down upon gilded balconies and nude plaster women who supported them, robustly voluptuous creatures who faded into foliage below the waist, like plump nymphs escaping the rude pursuit of gods. Their bareness and boldness startled the convent-bred girl, even horrified her. She was the last to leave the omnibus, and then, instead of pushing in with her fellow-passengers to secure a room before others could snap up everything, she lingered ...
— The Guests Of Hercules • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... heard the impatient and authoritative tones of little Pansie,— Queen Pansie, as she might fairly have been styled, in reference to her position in the household,—calling amain for grandpapa and breakfast. He was startled into such perilous activity by the summons, that his heels slid on the stairs, the slippers were shuffled off his feet, and he saved himself from a tumble only by quickening his pace, and coming down ...
— The Dolliver Romance • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... the main road we were somewhat startled to see a railway train quite near the abbey ruins, and the thought of home, sweet home, accentuated by the rainy weather, came so strongly upon us that we asked ourselves the question, "Shall we give in and go home!" We were only the ...
— From John O'Groats to Land's End • Robert Naylor and John Naylor
... flame-pennons droop and flap And belly and tug as a flag in the wind; Like a locust shrills the imprisoned sap, Hunted to death in its galleries blind; 220 And swift little troops of silent sparks, Now pausing, now scattering away as in fear, Go threading the soot-forest's tangled darks Like herds of startled deer. ...
— The Vision of Sir Launfal - And Other Poems • James Russell Lowell
... then not a word had been spoken. I let him finish and then politely requested him, as I was not a Serb and consequently did not understand his lingo, to translate it into a civilized language, preferably German or French. He seemed somewhat startled and gave me to understand that he was led to believe I was a Serb. I used some very forcible German and French, both of which he was able to understand, pointing out to him that someone, somewhere, made a thundering big blunder which somehow would have to be paid for. He was clearly ...
— The Secrets of the German War Office • Dr. Armgaard Karl Graves
... found at last, an ancient, mysterious place, with a very curious window, carved to look as if the shutters were half open, and from behind one peeped a man's head, from the other a woman's, both so life-like that it quite startled the strangers. Murray informed the observers that these servants are supposed to be looking anxiously for their master's return, Jacques having suddenly disappeared, after lending much money to the king, who took that mediaeval way ...
— Shawl-Straps - A Second Series of Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag • Louisa M. Alcott
... his household were startled from sleep by the sudden ringing of the alarm-bells, and a negro servant, Pompey, who had been for many years in their service, was sent down into the town, which lay a quarter of a mile from the house, to find out what was the news. He returned ...
— True to the Old Flag - A Tale of the American War of Independence • G. A. Henty
... hark! a still small voice Steals on the ear, to say, Jehovah's choice Is ever with the soft, meek, tender soul; By soft, meek, tender ways He loves to draw The sinner, startled by His ways of awe: Here is our Lord, and ...
— The Christian Year • Rev. John Keble
... I shall henceforth call him by his true name) at the breakfast-table. A superb equipage of silver and china was before him. He was startled at my entrance. The change in my dress seemed for a moment to have deceived him. His eye was frequently fixed upon me with unusual steadfastness. At these times there was inquietude ...
— Arthur Mervyn - Or, Memoirs of the Year 1793 • Charles Brockden Brown
... from the grass got up, and so, With a caw and flap, away they went; When the grey mare made up her mind to go At the tail of the bounds on a breast-high scent, The best of the startled rooks might fail To match her flight over post ...
— The Vagabond and Other Poems from Punch • R. C. Lehmann
... late that night that a startled knocking came at the door of Elmdene. Laura had been in her room all day, and Robert was moodily smoking his pipe by the fire, when this harsh and sudden summons broke in upon his thoughts. There in the porch was Jones, the stout head-butler of the Hall, ...
— The Doings Of Raffles Haw • Arthur Conan Doyle
... he was sorrowful and yearned for a sympathy such as only women can give or feel. He now began to avoid, his cousin. But this only made matters worse, for, naturally enough, the more he avoided her, the more she cast herself in his way. He marveled at this at first; and next it startled him. The girl haunted him; she hunted him; she happened upon him at all times and in all places, in the night as well as in the day. She seemed singularly anxious. There was ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... coming suddenly upon her, must have startled the nervous child with a shock of pain quite apart from any thought of the consequences of her fault; and it was with hands that trembled violently that the book was hidden and the scattered contents of the chest were gathered together again. Then she ...
— Christie Redfern's Troubles • Margaret Robertson
... had shaken their heads over the unsuccessful story of "Morton's Hope" were startled by the appearance of this manly and scholarly essay. This young man, it seemed, had been studying,—studying with careful accuracy, with broad purpose. He could paint a character with the ruddy life-blood coloring it as warmly as it ...
— Memoir of John Lothrop Motley, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... said the startled Ebbo, "that he has got up amongst those rocks where the dead chamois rolled down last summer; then, as Christina uttered a faint cry of terror, Heinz added, "Fear not, lady, those are not the jodeln of ...
— The Dove in the Eagle's Nest • Charlotte M. Yonge
... governed by friends of Mazzini; and statesmen who recoiled from the temerities of Peel have doubled the electoral constituency of England. If the philosopher who proclaimed the law that democratic progress is constant and irrepressible had lived to see old age, he would have been startled by the fulfilment of his prophecy. Throughout these years of revolutionary change Sir Thomas Erskine May has been more closely and constantly connected with the centre of public affairs than any other Englishman, and his place, during most of the time, has been at ...
— The History of Freedom • John Emerich Edward Dalberg-Acton
... Daisy was startled, and turned to the creature who had spoken to see if she had heard and understood aright. No doubt of it. Molly was not looking at her, but her face was ungenial; and as Daisy hesitated she made a little gesture of dismissal with her hands. Daisy moved a step or two off, afraid of another shower ...
— Melbourne House, Volume 2 • Susan Warner
... flushed and startled in their bearing; getting at one another's meaning through endless half-heard, half-spoken phrases, repeating, making perplexing breaks and new departures—a wonderful talk, in which she awakened from the ignorance of all her life. ...
— The Food of the Gods and How It Came to Earth • H.G. Wells
... had been very subdued. The "super" thought little of the hero he was to serve, and deemed his own duties slight enough. But at night Lekain's majesty of port, and the commanding tone in which he cried, "Suivez moi!" to his squire, so startled and overcame that attendant that he suddenly let fall, with a great crash, the weapons and armour he was carrying. Something of the same kind has often happened upon our own stage. "You distressed me very much, sir," said ...
— A Book of the Play - Studies and Illustrations of Histrionic Story, Life, and Character • Dutton Cook
... He startled her by saying, with the bluntness that was curiously, but characteristically, at variance with the ...
— The Letter of the Contract • Basil King
... profited. He ought to have desisted from his project. The gentleman tells us America is obstinate; America is almost in open rebellion. I rejoice that America has resisted." (At this word the members of the House were startled as though an electric spark had darted through them all.) "I rejoice that America has resisted. If its millions of inhabitants had submitted, taxes would soon have been laid on Ireland; and if ever this nation should have a tyrant for its ...
— The Loyalists of America and Their Times, Vol. 1 of 2 - From 1620-1816 • Egerton Ryerson
... climbed to the sidewalk, with wheels bumping the curbing, trying to get out of the way of some men who were seeking to stop it. Almost before they were aware of it, horse and wagon seemed fairly on top of Merriwell and the girls. Elsie gave a startled cry, and dashed across the street, where the people were falling back out of the way, with women pulling nervously and excitedly ...
— Frank Merriwell's Reward • Burt L. Standish
... with the crimson tongues of levin-fire, and the huge leader, with a broken wing, fell on the limp body of his dead mate. Bang! growled the ponderous boat-gun, as it poured a sheet of deadly flame into the very eyes of the startled rearguard. ...
— Adrift in the Ice-Fields • Charles W. Hall
... line his prowess hath been shown, And well throughout the Surrey side his thirst for blood is known. But see, the other champion comes!'—Then rang the startled air With shouts of 'Wordsworth, Wordsworth, ho! ...
— The Bon Gaultier Ballads • William Edmonstoune Aytoun
... possess more than the normal number of senses. I have often heard people speak of their seven senses. Only a short time ago a woman speaking of a neighbour who was a great sleeper, and also of her child, said they would sleep away their seven senses. And another woman who was startled said, "You're enough to frighten me out of my seven senses." I should like to know what the two extra senses are. ...
— Weather and Folk Lore of Peterborough and District • Charles Dack
... French government bonds went down with a serious drop; England having announced soon afterward that she meant to land a great army on the shores of the Baltic, public confidence was further shaken. A year before, the French nation had been startled by the premature demand for more French youth; the new call to anticipate the conscription filled them with consternation. These were grave matters, and the roads from Paris to Osterode and Finkenstein continually resounded ...
— The Life of Napoleon Bonaparte - Vol. III. (of IV.) • William Milligan Sloane
... of one of these ladies struck Jeanne so forcibly that she made a step towards them, when a cry from the young woman near her startled every one. The same man whom Jeanne had heard speak before now called out, "But look, gentlemen, it is ...
— The Queen's Necklace • Alexandre Dumas pere
... the young Lombard King, rose to great power and fame. His beauty and renown were sung by German peasants even in the days of Charlemagne. His name "crossed the Alps and fell, with a foreboding sound, upon the startled ears of the Italians," and toward Italy he turned for conquest. From Scythia and Germany adventurous youth flocked to his standard. Many clans and various religions were represented in his ranks, but these diversities were overshadowed by a common ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 4 • Various
... green glimmer under the waving branches; the print on the grass remains where they have just finished their noon-tide meal under the green-wood tree; and the echo of their bugle-horn and twanging bows resounds through the tangled mazes of the forest, as the tall slim deer glances startled by. ...
— Lectures on the English Poets - Delivered at the Surrey Institution • William Hazlitt
... as well as in his military life. Against most of the vicissitudes of a trial he guarded by his forethought and minuteness of preparation. I was present myself, says the legal friend already referred to, when he received with great composure a communication which would have startled most men. Mr. P. had long been an inmate of his house; he had been connected with him in many respects and for many years. Colonel Burr and two other lawyers were discussing a proposed motion in a chancery suit in which P. was the plaintiff, the colonel himself having, ...
— Memoirs of Aaron Burr, Complete • Matthew L. Davis
... Ventimore, startled as he was, did not lose his self-possession. "My dear sir," he said, "I did not suppose you could have any further use for it. And, as a matter of fact, I didn't give Professor Futvoye the bottle—which is over there in the corner—but merely the stopper. I wish you wouldn't ...
— The Brass Bottle • F. Anstey
... "All correct?" The man bowed his head. "Well, I tell you, that one Christmas day," he continued, so solemnly that a hush fell on the audience—"I don't think the spirits ought to tell these things, but I am forced to say that one Christmas day a member of your family will die." A startled look passed over his face, and a shiver ran through the audience at the uncanny message. The man's name could not be learned, but on the succeeding Sunday your correspondent heard two women get up in the audience and admit that the ...
— Buchanan's Journal of Man, May 1887 - Volume 1, Number 4 • Various
... usual, I took a sharp turn and strolled away quite by myself. I heard the excited cries die away in the distance, and then for some few moments the forest silence was broken only by the rustle of the breeze through the grass, and the sudden scream of a startled jay. Doves went happily from tree to tree and I never put my gun up. I had heard a very familiar sound, and wanted to be assured that my ears were not deceived. No, I was right; I could hear the cuckoo, calling through the depth of ...
— Morocco • S.L. Bensusan
... are you, I should like to know?' and so startled was he when accosted thus abruptly, that in his fright he dropped his dear ...
— Parables from Flowers • Gertrude P. Dyer
... had time to stop here longer," she sighed, putting down her basket and patting a great beech tree. "Thank goodness the Bucks were too lazy to cut you down and the Knights too slow." The honk of an automobile horn startled her. A seven-seated passenger car was coming down the road and in the distance could be seen the ...
— The Comings of Cousin Ann • Emma Speed Sampson
... to picture the scene of the grand conflagration that now burst like the day of judgment on the startled citizens of Norfolk, Portsmouth, and all the surrounding country. Any one who has seen a ship burn, and knows how like a fiery serpent the flame leaps from pitchy deck to smoking shrouds, and writhes to their ...
— The Naval History of the United States - Volume 2 (of 2) • Willis J. Abbot
... Pausanias says that Battos, the founder of Kyrene, was dumb when he went to Africa, but that on suddenly meeting a lion the fright gave him utterance. According to Pindar the lions seem to have been still more alarmed, being startled by Battos' foreign accent.] ...
— The Extant Odes of Pindar • Pindar
... with a hoar-frost that had just been melted. I do not know that ever I saw a morning more autumnal. As I went to and fro among the graves, I saw some flowers set reverently before a recently erected tomb, and drawing near was almost startled to find they lay on the grave of a man seventy-two years old when he died. We are accustomed to strew flowers only over the young, where love has been cut short untimely, and great possibilities have been restrained by death. We strew them there in token that these possibilities, in some deeper ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. XXII (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... rumbling growl, that seemed to shudder through the wood, so startled him that it set little hammers beating all over his body. Then the wind grew angrier—not whispering secrets now, but tearing at the tree-tops and lashing the branches this way and that. And every minute ...
— Far to Seek - A Romance of England and India • Maud Diver |
