"Vaguely" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... burial, there came three letters to Spring Bank, one to Mrs. Worthington from Murdock, as he now chose to be called, saying that though he had looked, and was still looking everywhere for the missing Adah, he could only trace her, and that but vaguely, to the Greenbush depot, where he lost sight of her entirely, no one after that having seen a person bearing the least resemblance to her. After a consultation with the doctor, he had advertised for her, and he inclosed a copy of ...
— Bad Hugh • Mary Jane Holmes
... "Yes," said Ethne, vaguely. She had barely listened to his words. "Yes, I see." Then in a definite voice, which showed that she had regained all her ...
— The Four Feathers • A. E. W. Mason
... personae introduced in the Tatler do not occupy a very prominent place in the development of the work. Isaac Bickerstaff himself, an old man of sixty-four, "a philosopher, an humourist, an astrologer, and a censor," is rather vaguely sketched, and his familiar, Pacolet, is made use of chiefly in the earlier numbers. The occasional references to Bickerstaff's half-sister, Jenny Distaff,[13] and her husband, Tanquillus, and to his three nephews and their conduct in the presence of ...
— The Tatler, Volume 1, 1899 • George A. Aitken
... paused once or twice to look around her; she was vaguely touched and charmed by the still ...
— Temporal Power • Marie Corelli
... beyond the narrow range of the northern states. The nationality of certain travellers, the protection accorded by England to the Porte, the British victories in India had all been vaguely rumoured even in the heart of Africa, and the name of Englishman, was familiar without any particular meaning being attached to it. According to the English consul, the route from Tripoli to Bornou ...
— Celebrated Travels and Travellers - Part III. The Great Explorers of the Nineteenth Century • Jules Verne
... Justice and the Government business had gone elsewhere. Well, he will 'put on some extra work to keep hold of the wolf's ears which he has held so long.' Coleridge, I may add, still took an interest in Fitzjames's codification schemes, and they even agreed, or rather vaguely proposed, to act the parts of 'Moses and Aaron,' Fitzjames inspiring measures of which Coleridge was to take charge in the House of Lords. This dream, however, vanished ...
— The Life of Sir James Fitzjames Stephen, Bart., K.C.S.I. - A Judge of the High Court of Justice • Sir Leslie Stephen
... Lucile answered, vaguely. "Come on upstairs and get your things off," she added, guiding her guest past ...
— Lucile Triumphant • Elizabeth M. Duffield
... by withholding any vision from Trafford until he was finally isolated from Marjorie, and even from any physical contact with the movement of what we call reality, by illness and fever. Only then, indeed, did he touch the vital issues. I find the statement of this ultimate thing, vaguely phrased in Trafford's semi-delirium, presenting another expression of the thought quoted from The New Machiavelli; the conception of humanity as an instrument. "Something trying to exist," he says, ...
— H. G. Wells • J. D. Beresford
... too apt to hide ourselves in the crowd, and let all the messages of God's love, the warnings of His providences, as well as the teachings and invitations and pleadings of His gospel, fly over our heads as if they were meant vaguely for anybody. But they are all intended for thee, as directly as if thou, and thou only, wert in the world. I beseech you, lay this to heart, that although no audible sounds may rend the silent heavens, nor any blaze may blind thine eye, yet that as really, though not in the same ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture: The Acts • Alexander Maclaren
... case. When Mr. Darwin said it was "conceivable that a naturalist might" arrive at the theory of descent, straightforward readers took him to mean that though this was conceivable, it had never, to Mr. Darwin's knowledge, been done. If we had a notion that we had already vaguely heard of the theory that men and the lower animals were descended from common ancestors, we must have been wrong; it was not this that we had heard of, but something else, which, though doubtless a little like it, was all ...
— Luck or Cunning? • Samuel Butler
... cattle were to be put on the new range for the winter. Our silent partner was rapidly awakening to the importance of his usefulness in securing future contracts with the War and Indian departments, and vaguely outlining the future, we separated to three points ...
— Reed Anthony, Cowman • Andy Adams
... thought. The very words in which the accumulated traditions of his community are conveyed to each individual are themselves charged with the complex symbolism that has slowly developed during the ages, and tinges the whole of his thoughts with their subtle and, to most men, vaguely appreciated shades of meaning.[9] During this process of acquiring the fruits of his community's beliefs and experiences every individual accepts without question a vast number of apparently simple customs and ideas. He is apt to regard ...
— The Evolution of the Dragon • G. Elliot Smith
... sentiment in children, because there is no ruin; nothing has gone to decay about them yet,—not a leaf or a twig. Until he is well into his teens, and sometimes later, a boy is like a bean-pod before the fruit has developed,—indefinite, succulent, rich in possibilities which are only vaguely outlined. He is a pericarp merely. How rudimental are all his ideas! I knew a boy who began his school composition on swallows by saying there were two kinds of ...
— Birds and Poets • John Burroughs
... archly but also in the way that always made him vaguely uneasy, made him feel like one facing a mystery which should be explored cautiously. "It is graceful," he admitted, with a smile since he could not venture ...
— The Grain Of Dust - A Novel • David Graham Phillips
... Sloat, and the direful consequences; of his double absences the very nights on which Fred had made his visits; of the suspicions that resulted, the accusations, and his refusal to explain and clear her name. Mrs. Maynard felt vaguely relieved to see how slight an impression the young man had made on her daughter's heart. Alice seemed but little surprised to hear of the engagement to Nina Beaubien, of her rush to his rescue, and their romantic parting. The tragedy of his death hushed all further ...
— From the Ranks • Charles King
... considerable time before the War—I spent a few weeks in Venice in lodgings that looked out on an old Venetian garden. At the end of the garden there was a rustic temple, and on its pediment stood some naked, decayed, gesticulating statues—heathen gods and goddesses I vaguely thought them—and above, among the yellowing trees, I could see the belfry of a small convent—a convent of Nuns vowed to contemplation, who were immured there for life, and never went outside ...
— More Trivia • Logan Pearsall Smith
... and descended to the bowlder-strewn bed of the creek which led into a tremendous gorge. We felt very small and helpless as our eyes traveled up the well-nigh vertical walls to the ragged edge of the chasm a thousand feet above us. The mightiness of it all was vaguely depressing, and it was with a distinct feeling of relief that we saw the canyon widen suddenly into a gigantic amphitheater. In its very center, rising from a ragged granite pedestal, a pinnacle of rock, crowned by a tiny temple, shot into the ...
— Across Mongolian Plains - A Naturalist's Account of China's 'Great Northwest' • Roy Chapman Andrews
... always known vaguely that there was something between Mary Champion and my Uncle Luke, and that explained to some extent her influence with my grandparents. She brought into their shut-up lives, indeed, the open air and the ways of other folk, without which I think we should have all grown too strange and odd and ...
— The Story of Bawn • Katharine Tynan
... Barry opened the front door again, and they stepped out to the porch. "Altogether," he said vaguely, snapping dead twigs from the heavy unpruned growth of the rose vines, "altogether, I wouldn't go into it without ten thousand. Five for the new presses, say, and four to Rogers for the business and good-will, and something to run on—although," ...
— The Rich Mrs. Burgoyne • Kathleen Norris
... dreary state of mind which precedes a great change, when all preparations are complete, and there is nothing left to be done but to ponder on the coming parting. She could not rest anywhere, or compose herself to anything; but wandered about the house, thinking of that last day at Oldchurch, and vaguely speculating when or what the next change would be. She passed into the drawing-room, where Christal was amusing Mrs. Rothesay with her foreign ditties; and then she went to Mr. Vanbrugh's studio to have a last talk about ...
— Olive - A Novel • Dinah Maria Craik, (AKA Dinah Maria Mulock)
... discontent. For X.—no Mr. was necessary in that little round-table club—certainly was unwell. Of this there could be no doubt, and such a condition of body was little short of an abuse of the privileges of the place. But since he could give no real explanation of his feelings, and only sighed vaguely when engaged in the daily preprandial game of billiards at the club, it was thought best to ignore his new departure, and to leave the ...
— From Jungle to Java - The Trivial Impressions of a Short Excursion to Netherlands India • Arthur Keyser
... Jordan wondered vaguely if the Jewish cobbler had an enemy among the shortwood gatherers. If so, and the man could be found, it would ...
— Rose O'Paradise • Grace Miller White
... Suddenly he saw before him a strange moving object which he took to be some large animal—a dog, a pig—he could not name it; perhaps it was a bear. He had seen pictures of bears, but knew of nothing to their discredit and had vaguely wished to meet one. But something in form or movement of this object—something in the awkwardness of its approach—told him that it was not a bear, and curiosity was stayed by fear. He stood still and as it came slowly on gained courage every moment, for he saw ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce, Vol. II: In the Midst of Life: Tales of Soldiers and Civilians • Ambrose Bierce
... villages and little cities on the outskirts of civilization, he finds Pesth very impressive. The Hungarian shepherds and the boatmen who ply between the capital and tiny forts below fancy that it is the end of the world. They have vaguely heard of Vienna, but their patriotism is so intense and their round of life so circumscribed that they never succeed in forming a definite idea of its proportions or its location. Communication between the two chief towns of the Austria-Hungarian ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, December 1878 • Various
... They spoke to me subsequently, and I bravely threw at them a Chinese phrase or two; but when the conversation got above my head, I told them, quietly but determinedly, that I could not understand, my English speech seemed vaguely to indicate a sudden collapse of the acquaintance, the opening of a gulf between us, destined to widen to the whole length and breadth of Yang-kai, swallowing up their erstwhile confidences. One ...
— Across China on Foot • Edwin Dingle
... average man accepts the universe with a less wholesale and indiscriminate appreciation, yet he does feel vaguely assured that the nature of things is ordered, harmonious, dependable, and regular, that affairs are, cosmically speaking, in a sound state. He feels a vast and comfortable solidity about the frame of things in which his life is set; he can depend on the familiar risings and settings of the sun, ...
— Human Traits and their Social Significance • Irwin Edman
... Whatever relates to a province or to the rural districts, to the bourgeoisie or to the shop,[3236] to the army or to a soldier, to the clergy or to convents, to justice or to the police, to business or to housekeeping remains vaguely in my mind or is falsified; to clear up any point I am obliged to recur to that marvelous Voltaire who, on laying aside the great classic coat, finds plenty of elbow room and tells all. On the organs of society of vital importance, on ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 1 (of 6) - The Ancient Regime • Hippolyte A. Taine
... to find ourselves in the midst of a labyrinth of isles most wonderful to behold, vaguely guessing which, out of so many, can be Labuan. The rattling of the chain through the hawse, decides it. A small settlement over which England's flag keeps guard, lies before us. This is the town of Victoria. This small ...
— In Eastern Seas - The Commission of H.M.S. 'Iron Duke,' flag-ship in China, 1878-83 • J. J. Smith
... MORALITY's firm attitude, in face of this demonstration. Had capitulated to Irish at first sound of TIM's low voice; quite a different thing with inconsiderable people like the Scotch or Welsh. Almost haughtily protested against possibility of alteration. "Members," he said, vaguely remembering copy-book heading, "are made for business, not business for Members." That settled it. Motion for Adjournment carried; Young GOSSET, with his beaver up, advanced to remove Mace, and House ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 99., Dec. 20, 1890 • Various
... that a considerable part of the berg was still holding together, and was wallowing in the sea in consequence of its equilibrium being disturbed by the first crash, and was still keeping the waters moving. I could indeed vaguely see this remaining fragment, swaying to right and left, and I could also perceive that, with every roll, fresh masses were breaking off, with loud reports, like the crash of artillery. I could, however, discover nothing of the ship ...
— Cast Away in the Cold - An Old Man's Story of a Young Man's Adventures, as Related by Captain John Hardy, Mariner • Isaac I. Hayes
... Unless the story could be contradicted, and it never was, Pope was himself the thief. The sheets common to the two volumes had been traced to his possession. Nor was there a word in the P. T. narrative to diminish the force of these presumptions. Indeed it was curiously inconsistent, for it vaguely accused Curll of stealing the letters himself, whilst in the same breath it told how he had bought them from P. T. In fact, P. T. was beginning to resolve himself into thin air, like the phantom in the Dunciad. As ...
— Alexander Pope - English Men of Letters Series • Leslie Stephen
... yet another box. He unrolled cables. He selected machines whose flickering lights seemed to bespeak eagerness to be of use. He coupled them to the newly unboxed machines, whose lights were vaguely steady. ...
— The Machine That Saved The World • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... machine higher than one's own. Low and far within the German lines are several enemy planes, a dull white in appearance, resembling sand flies against the mottled earth. High above them one glimpses the mosquito-like forms of two Fokkers. Away off to one side white shrapnel puffs are vaguely visible, perhaps directed against a German crossing the lines. We approach the enemy machines ahead, only to find them slanting at a rapid rate into their own country. High above them lurks a protection plane. The man doing the "ceiling ...
— Flying for France • James R. McConnell
... supposed Greenton was a village with a population of at least three or four thousand and was wondering vaguely at the absence of lights and other signs of human habitation. Surely, I thought, all the people cannot be abed and asleep at half past ten o'clock: perhaps I am in the business section of the ...
— Miss Mehetabel's Son • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... of a morally degraded race, had about him something of true dignity; something of sincerity, in a warped, twisted way. There were times when he seemed to sense vaguely, gropingly, wonderingly, that he might have ...
— The Airlords of Han • Philip Francis Nowlan
... vaguely, as though to indicate the American Republic, and Stukely agreed with him. They were also right as far as they went, for Hawtrey undoubtedly possessed a grace of manner which, however, somehow failed to reach distinction. It was, perhaps, just a little too apparent, and lacked ...
— Hawtrey's Deputy • Harold Bindloss
... conflicts between them, and within groups themselves. Within even so small a community as a college class, cliques may form; and so in a country, attachment to the smaller group may inhibit attachment to the larger. An individual may be vaguely patriotic, but instinctively aroused more by his own economic or local or racial group than by the country as a whole. A man may at heart be more devoted to his town or home than to the United States. (Not infrequently ...
— Human Traits and their Social Significance • Irwin Edman
... "day unto day uttereth speech, and night unto night showeth knowledge;" to whom "the heavens declare the glory of God," and who hears God's voice in nature and sees the goodness of his hand in all creation,—finds no difficulty in drawing to God in prayer. If you allow your mind to wander vaguely about upon the vanities of the world, you will find prayer a difficult and rather an unpleasant task. Learn, therefore, I beseech you, to stay your mind upon the Lord, and great will be the peace and quietness of your soul. Precious moments spent in idle chit-chat ...
— Food for the Lambs; or, Helps for Young Christians • Charles Ebert Orr
... ye are they of whom I said, other sheep I have which are not of this fold; them also I must bring, and they shall hear my voice; and there shall be one fold, and one shepherd."[879] The Jews had vaguely understood Christ's reference to other sheep as meaning in some obscure way, the Gentile nations; and because of their unbelief and consequent inability to rightly comprehend, Jesus had withheld any plainer exposition of His meaning, for so, He informed the Nephites, had the Father directed. ...
— Jesus the Christ - A Study of the Messiah and His Mission According to Holy - Scriptures Both Ancient and Modern • James Edward Talmage
... There was something vaguely kindly about the man's manner, and Frank understood that he knew very tolerably where the truth lay, but wished to prevent further disturbance. He gulped down his fury. It was no good saying anything; but the dense of the injustice of the universe was very ...
— None Other Gods • Robert Hugh Benson
... of the Smithers faction and the Lunk faction in the First Apostolic Church, otherwise known as the Holy Rollers, and great events that had been happening in the world outside were of no concern to him. Peter knew vaguely that on the other side of the world half a dozen mighty nations were locked together in a grip of death; the whole earth was shaken with their struggles, and Peter had felt a bit of the trembling now and then. But Peter did not know that his own country had anything ...
— 100%: The Story of a Patriot • Upton Sinclair
... beautiful,—if Envy's self could have found aught else to sneer at,—he might have felt his affection heightened by the prettiness of this mimic hand, now vaguely portrayed, now lost, now stealing forth again and glimmering to and fro with every pulse of emotion that throbbed within her heart; but, seeing her otherwise so perfect, he found this one defect grow more and more intolerable with every moment of their united lives. It was ...
— Short-Stories • Various
... It had vaguely defined itself in Karl's mind, on first seeing the storks above him in the air; but when the lustre of metal flashed before his eyes, and he perceived that yellow band encircling the shank of the bird, the scheme became more ...
— The Cliff Climbers - A Sequel to "The Plant Hunters" • Captain Mayne Reid
... cult of the natives are as simple as their dress. The houses are scattered and hidden in the bush, grouped vaguely around the gamal, which stands alone on a bare square. No statues stand there, nor tall, upright drums; only a few small drums lie in a ...
— Two Years with the Natives in the Western Pacific • Felix Speiser
... early recollections was that of sitting on his father's knees in the library, and listening with enthralled attention to the Tale of Troy, with marvellous illustrations among the glowing coals in the fireplace; with, below all, the vaguely heard accompaniment—from the neighbouring room where Mrs. Browning sat "in her chief happiness, her hour of darkness and solitude and music"—of a wild Gaelic lament, with its insistent falling cadences. A story concerning ...
— Life of Robert Browning • William Sharp
... between two mountains of flesh. A woman—more unwieldy, more shapeless, more oppressive even than the girl—waddled across the veranda floor. What she said Elliott really didn't know; afterward phrases of pleasure came back to her vaguely. She distinctly remembered the creaking of the rocking-chair when the woman sat down and her own frightened feeling lest some vital part should give way ...
— The Camerons of Highboro • Beth B. Gilchrist
... the manner of its delivery fantastic, yet there was something vaguely formidable in the stranger's tone, as if a great person had spoken, one absolutely sure of himself and of his power ...
— Through the Wall • Cleveland Moffett
... died of mortification—of shame and anger that we had been so outwitted. For myself I did not at once grasp the position. I did not understand. I could not disentangle myself in a moment from the belief in which I had entered the house—that it was Louis de Pavannes' house. But I seemed vaguely to suspect that Bezers had swept him aside and taken his place. My first impulse therefore—obeyed on the instant—was to stride to the Vidame's side and grasp his arm. "What have you done?" I cried, my voice sounding hoarsely even ...
— The House of the Wolf - A Romance • Stanley Weyman
... but I really couldn't get to Ostend. You didn't have any trouble getting the right train and all that, did you?" he asked, vaguely feeling for the hand which ...
— Castle Craneycrow • George Barr McCutcheon
... get to work and finish it. But it was finished. Vaguely he remembered dismissing ...
— Futurist Stories • Margery Verner Reed
... them had ever seen a man before, other than Tarzan, and so they wondered vaguely what strange manner of creature it might be that ...
— Tarzan of the Apes • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... however, after all, the one bad drop in his cup; so that, for the rest, his high-water mark might well have been, that evening at Gloriani's studio, the approach of his odd and charming applicant, vaguely introduced at the latter's very own request by their hostess, who, with an honest, helpless, genial gesture, washed her fat begemmed hands of the name and identity of either, but left the fresh, fair, ever so habitually assured, yet ever so easily awkward Englishman with his plea to ...
— The Finer Grain • Henry James
... he is talking about himself. From Otis Yeere's lips Mrs. Hauksbee, before long, learned everything that she wished to know about the subject of her experiment: learned what manner of life he had led in what she vaguely called 'those awful cholera districts'; learned, too, but this knowledge came later, what manner of life he had purposed to lead and what dreams he had dreamed in the year of grace '77, before the reality had knocked the ...
— Under the Deodars • Rudyard Kipling
... It crossed my brain with instantaneous conviction that this amazing glare was the physical effect of being shot, and that the bullets had pierced my brain or heart, and caused this frightful sense of all-pervading flame. Vaguely I remembered having read or having been told that such was the result produced on the nervous system of a victim to death from firearms. "It is over," I said, "that was the bullets." But presently there forced ...
— Dreams and Dream Stories • Anna (Bonus) Kingsford
... be a little over-tired,' said Miss Mildmay vaguely. She had not specially noticed Frances's expression. 'I wonder,' she went on, 'I wonder if those Harpers are any relation to the Elvedons? I can't quite remember what Miss Scarlett said about them. It was their mother she was interested in, though—not their ...
— Robin Redbreast - A Story for Girls • Mary Louisa Molesworth
... I could do that much, I think.' His tone and manner intimated vaguely how much more he could have done, and his disappointment at the facility of his task. 'But,' he added prudently, 'it's a job as ain't s' easy as ...
— Julia And Her Romeo: A Chronicle Of Castle Barfield - From "Schwartz" by David Christie Murray • David Christie Murray
... by a tidal river; and, perhaps, nothing may remain outwardly to show the curious traveller where the ancient city stood. The pristine abode of man upon the earth, may again be thickly peopled, and civilization may have rolled back to the south, its ancient source. Then may history or tradition vaguely tell of powerful nations who once flourished in the north; their very existence doubted, perhaps, by all, and by many disbelieved. Some day, perchance, one whom accident or curiosity may have brought to the shores of ancient Britain, may wend ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 327 - Vol. 53, January, 1843 • Various
... authority can be most easily established in connection with great liberality of indulgence. At any rate, it will be very evident, on reflection, that the two principles do not stand at all in opposition to each other, as is often vaguely supposed. Children may be greatly indulged, and yet perfectly governed. On the other hand, they may be continually checked and thwarted, and their lives made miserable by a continued succession of vexations, restrictions, and refusals, and yet not ...
— Gentle Measures in the Management and Training of the Young • Jacob Abbott
... rail, instantly alert to learn the meaning of this strange apparition. An instant told me this was no deceit. The strange craft swept past, so far out that those on board no doubt believed themselves beyond sight from the shore, heading apparently for a point of land, which I vaguely remembered as jutting out to the northward. Even my eyes, accustomed to the darkness, and strained to the utmost, could detect scarcely more than the faintest shadow gliding silently by, yet sufficient to recognize the outlines of a small ...
— Wolves of the Sea • Randall Parrish
... Idea—the Deity of the Ages—to be spoken of as a mere unfeared Reality! And even as the vaguely formed thought sprang in his brain he started once more, suddenly confronted by the meaning his sense of shock implied. What had all the sermons of all the centuries been preaching but that it was Reality? What had all the infidels of every age contended but that ...
— The Dawn of a To-morrow • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... large new window, around which the old rose-bush has been trained and now is blooming, I could look across to her window where the white curtains hang, and feel that behind them sat, shy and gentle, the wood-pigeon for whom through Mays gone by I have been vaguely waiting! ...
— A Kentucky Cardinal • James Lane Allen
... Roland vaguely understood that she was warning him, but against what particular form of danger he could not define. Resolved to reassure her, he nodded his head in a ...
— The Four Canadian Highwaymen • Joseph Edmund Collins
... regret had turned his brain, very certainly, for it seemed the door had opened and Dame Melicent herself had come, warily, into the panelled gloomy room. It seemed that Melicent paused in the convulsive brilliancy of the firelight, and stayed thus with vaguely troubled eyes like those of a child newly ...
— Domnei • James Branch Cabell et al
... selected a topic, you should first of all think it through. In doing this, arrange your ideas as consistently and logically as you can, and test them with your reason. Then set them forth in language which shall be lucid and exact. Tolerate no slipshod diction, no vaguely rendered general meanings. Send every sentence, every word like a skilful drop-kick—straight above the crossbar. When you have done your best with the topic, lay it by for a space. Time is a great revealer of hidden defects, and you ...
— The Century Vocabulary Builder • Creever & Bachelor
... be warned by the trouble of the Millions, and because the Master Monstruwacan called vaguely with his brain-elements; so that I went ever more warily, and did look all ways. And lo! sudden I to stare above me into the night; and there to be a pale circle, very quiet and steadfast that did go alway over the twain of us. And I saw that this ...
— The Night Land • William Hope Hodgson
... abruptly, vaguely conscious that this somewhat felicitous ending to the tragedy, as an object lesson to Hunch, left much to ...
— Diane of the Green Van • Leona Dalrymple
... dimly lighted by the waning moon and dotted at long intervals by tiny electric fires, Stuyvesant went over in mind other little things that had come to his ears, for many men were of a mind with regard to Billy Ray's daughter, and the young officer found himself vaguely weighing the reasons why he should now cease to play the moth,—why he should be winging his flight away from the flame and utterly ignoring the fact that his feet, as though from force of habit, were bearing him steadily towards ...
— Ray's Daughter - A Story of Manila • Charles King
... certainly," he answered vaguely; "but there's no hurry, Eloise," he added, in the kindest tone he had ever used toward her. "Some evening we will go over the affairs, and I will show you where your mother stands financially, and we will try to make some plan ...
— Jewel - A Chapter In Her Life • Clara Louise Burnham
... v.), used affectedly, like "humour," in many senses, often very vaguely and freely ridiculed by Jonson; humour, disposition, whims, ...
— Epicoene - Or, The Silent Woman • Ben Jonson
... took the offered chair and exchanged a few words with Claire as she gathered together her possessions, but the subtle change persisted. Claire felt vaguely disturbed, but the next half-hour passed so pleasantly that she had no time to puzzle over the explanation. Captain Fanshawe never left her side; they sat together on the same sofa which Great-aunt Jane had ...
— The Independence of Claire • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... time she had entertained at table a man in outdoor working attire; Prescott, out of deference to his guests, had made some preparation for the meals they shared. Still, the simple dress became him; he was, as she vaguely thought of it, admirable, in a way. His hands and wrists were well-shaped, though scarred and roughened by the rasp of the hot straw. The warmth of the sun seemed to cling to his brown face; a joyous vitality emanated from him, and he ...
— Prescott of Saskatchewan • Harold Bindloss
... phyllomania has been vaguely applied both to the production of an unwonted number of leaves and to their development in unusual situations. Under the present heading the latter class of cases are alone included. The extraordinary tendency in some Begonias to develop leaves or leafy excrescences from their surfaces ...
— Vegetable Teratology - An Account of the Principal Deviations from the Usual Construction of Plants • Maxwell T. Masters
... make, he had not yet decided. Although he knew the Suttons very well, he felt that it would look a little strange if he suddenly walked into their house unannounced; and he had been afraid of wiring or telephoning from London in case he should alarm Joan. He felt vaguely that something would turn up which would give him the excuse he needed; but in the meantime his brain was in an incoherent condition. Only one thought rose dominantly above all the others, and it ...
— Mufti • H. C. (Herman Cyril) McNeile
... ever since thought that there was a very important region to the north and west that might be conquered, they made no great effort to gain it. Csar was now to win imperishable laurels by effecting what had been before only vaguely dreamed of. He first made himself master of the country of the Helvetii (modern Switzerland), defeated the Germans under their famous general Ariovistus, and subjected the Belgian confederacy. The frightful carnage involved in these campaigns cannot ...
— The Story of Rome From the Earliest Times to the End of the Republic • Arthur Gilman
... that John was very like a spoiled child, and she resented his evident wish to monopolise her society. She left the room to get ready for the walk, vaguely wishing that he had ...
— A Tale of a Lonely Parish • F. Marion Crawford
... a London journalist. He has a little cottage about a mile over there"—Mr. Britling pointed vaguely—"and he comes down for the week-ends. And Rendezvous has found out he isn't fit. And everybody ought to be fit. That is the beginning and end of life for Rendezvous. Fitness. An almost mineral quality, an insatiable activity of body, great mental simplicity. So he takes possession of ...
— Mr. Britling Sees It Through • H. G. Wells
... it can be induced to help man and does not want to thwart him. And here they were perfectly right. We are at last learning the way by which this may be done, and now see clearly what the Hindus only vaguely felt, that the heart of the river is right enough—that once it is tamed and trained it can bring ...
— The Heart of Nature - or, The Quest for Natural Beauty • Francis Younghusband
... a prickly fir-tree at the end of the lawn. Jim stood in the background vaguely staring. The bicycle lamp sent a beam of strong white light deep into the uncanny foliage, heads clustered and hands worked. The night above was silent, dim. There was no wind. In the near distance they could hear the panting of some engine ...
— Aaron's Rod • D. H. Lawrence
... You may talk vaguely about driving a coach-and-six up a good old flight of stairs, or through a bad young Act of Parliament; but I mean to say you might have got a hearse up that staircase, and taken it broadwise, with the splinter-bar[258-8] ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 6 • Charles H. Sylvester
... repeated vaguely; "yes, that's the idea. Let's go home. I want to go to bed. Hello, Dolly! where did you come from? Say, Dolly, let me tell you—listen here—come down here close; you mustn't mind me; you know I'm a ...
— Vandover and the Brute • Frank Norris
... house of Atherton. The more I thought about the house, the portrait, the whole case, the more unable was I to get out of my head a feeling that though I had not been in such a position before, I had at least read or heard something of which it vaguely reminded me. ...
— The War Terror • Arthur B. Reeve
... after the disappearance of the moon Blyth was able, or fancied he was able, still to distinguish the canvas of the chase looming up vaguely like a dark shapeless shadow upon the horizon; but either the sky grew darker in that quarter or the weather thickened, for he was soon obliged to admit that he could see it no longer. But that circumstance gave him not the least concern; he had set his course by a star, and ...
— The Missing Merchantman • Harry Collingwood
... we spend more of it on personal interests than our own share, we are stealing. This sounds strange doctrine; we prefer making vague acknowledgments, and shrink from pursuing them into detail. We say vaguely, that in all we do we should consecrate ourselves to God, and our own lips condemn us; for which among us cares to learn the way to do it? The devoir of a knight was understood in the courts of chivalry; ...
— Short Studies on Great Subjects • James Anthony Froude
... one hand. Those days of steady practise had not been in vain, for as he went off his mule he had snatched at his saddle-gun and dragged it from its scabbard. And now he lay and waited, listening to the running of his mules and the frenzied barking of his dog; and it came to him vaguely that several shots had been fired, and some from the east bank of the wash. But the man who had hit him had fired from the west and Wunpost crept down ...
— Wunpost • Dane Coolidge
... And Christine, failing to draw from him any answer to her questions, at last became silent also. She looked at him anxiously; was it the approach of some serious illness, had he inhaled some bad air whilst standing midway across the bridge yonder? His eyes stared vaguely into space, his face flushed as if with some inner straining. One would have thought it the mute travail of germination, as if something were springing ...
— His Masterpiece • Emile Zola
... built, powerful man on the outskirts, but some distance away, singing in a deep rolling voice, but something vaguely familiar in the figure drew his glance again. He looked long and well and then began to edge quietly toward the singer, who was clothed in the faded butternut uniform that so many of ...
— The Shades of the Wilderness • Joseph A. Altsheler
... were glad to show themselves on a public platform without being the puppets or the opponents of their bishops, Irish Protestants, who were irritated at the desertion of the Irish Church, a number of well-meaning people who were attracted by the opportunity of talking eloquently and vaguely about nothing in particular. This Academic scheme of Home Rule found an admirable exponent in Mr. Butt, an able lawyer of ...
— The Quarterly Review, Volume 162, No. 324, April, 1886 • Various
... and your man there; carry him into the ranch. I'll bate back those blackguards yet," muttered Feeny, as he took a quick snap shot at some dim object flitting across the plain and sent another into the darkness, aiming vaguely where he could hear the thud of horses' hoofs. For a moment, running from point to point after each discharge, he kept up a rapid fusillade, under cover of which the hapless paymaster was borne swiftly away around ...
— Foes in Ambush • Charles King
... she felt something like a pin prick her wrist; and she wondered vaguely what brooch had become unfastened. But she gave it scant attention for the big blade was threatening her from a new direction. She leaped to meet it, and for the next minute was kept turning, twisting, dodging, ...
— The Ward of King Canute • Ottilie A. Liljencrantz
... brows tangled in thought. To acknowledge that he had been outwitted had been galling, but to let this English creature of pipe and monocle indicate, in the presence of his own underlings, the precise means of his discomfiture was bitter indeed. At last his lips mumbled vaguely. ...
— The Secret Witness • George Gibbs
... he entertained no suspicions, for a moment. The letter, like the photograph, was no longer a valued possession. Yet he wondered where it could have gone. Vaguely uncertain, after all, as to whether he had left it here or not, his eye was suddenly caught by the slightest movement in the world, reflected in the mirror of the bureau. The movement was up at the transom, above a door that led to the next ...
— A Husband by Proxy • Jack Steele
... ponderous person vaguely suggesting the great Heman, admitted that the weather was fine, patronizing it as he did so. The clerk continued the conversation. Captain Cy waited. ...
— Cy Whittaker's Place • Joseph C. Lincoln
... eschewed. I brought the Snark to Hawaii, but the conditions favoured me. The sun was in northern declination and nearly overhead. The legitimate "chronometer-sight" method of ascertaining the longitude I had not heard of—yes, I had heard of it. My first captain mentioned it vaguely, but after one or two attempts at practice of it he mentioned it ...
— The Cruise of the Snark • Jack London
... replied Riddell, who at that moment was dodging vaguely in front of Miss Stringer as she stood solemnly waiting to get past him to ...
— The Willoughby Captains • Talbot Baines Reed
... and Charlie had drawn off a little from the "Bertha Millner's" crew. The latter squatted in a line along the shore—silent, reserved, looking vaguely seaward through the night. Moran ...
— Moran of the Lady Letty • Frank Norris
... a trout brook, and its tiny murmur a loud brawl, we began to peer anxiously through the trees for a glimpse of the lake, or for some conformation of the land that would indicate its proximity. An object which we vaguely discerned in looking under the near trees and over the more distant ones proved, on further inspection, to be a patch of plowed ground. Presently we made out a burnt fallow near it. This was a wet blanket to our enthusiasm. No lake, no sport, no trout for ...
— Wake-Robin • John Burroughs
... and driven him thus far, like the gad-fly in the Greek legends, giving him no rest in mind or body, seemed all of a sudden not to be satisfied, but to shrivel up and pall. "Why should I go on? It's no use," he thought, and threw himself at full length on the turf, and looked vaguely and listlessly at all the well-known objects. There were a few of the town boys playing cricket, their wicket pitched on the best piece in the middle of the big-side ground—a sin about equal to sacrilege in the ...
— Tom Brown's Schooldays • Thomas Hughes
... the taxi turned to the right into Fifth Avenue, and rushed toward Central Park. A mountain of lights towered up on the left where the Plaza invaded the starless sky. The dark spaces of the Park showed vaguely on the right, as the cab swung round. In front gleamed the golden and sleepless eyes of the Broadway district. The sharp frosty air quivered with a thousand noises. Motors hurried by in an unending procession, little gleaming worlds, each holding its group of strangers, gazing, ...
— The Way of Ambition • Robert Hichens
... Lilly had discovered so many wonderful things (upon supposition) that we contented ourselves with thanking her for some large and useful shells which would serve for many purposes. The boys had been so intent on manufacturing fishing lines that they had spent their time wandering vaguely about, hoping fishing lines would fall from the skies for them, but as no such thing happened, they had pulled long hairy lines from the cactuses, and they had also brought in their pockets a fruit like an apple outside, but it was full of an insipid kind of custard. ...
— Yr Ynys Unyg - The Lonely Island • Julia de Winton
... little pond with a dark lantern fastened to an upright stick just in front of me in the canoe. In the shadow of the shores all was black as Egypt; but out in the middle the outlines of the pond could be followed vaguely by the heavy cloud of woods against the lighter sky. The stillness was intense; every slightest sound,—the creak of a bough or the ripple of a passing musquash, the plunk of a water drop into the lake or the snap of a rotten twig, broken by the weight of clinging mist,—came ...
— Secret of the Woods • William J. Long
... interest in Boccaccio's narrative, like the interest in Giotto's painting, is centred first of all in the element of action, and secondly in the element of character. But his stories are all foreground. When the scene is out of doors, it is set vaguely in a conventional landscape: when it is indoors, it is set vaguely in a conventional palace. Because of this, his narrative is lacking in visual appeal. Most of his novelle read like summaries of novels,—setting forth an abstract synopsis of the action rather ...
— A Manual of the Art of Fiction • Clayton Hamilton
... wonderful thing, which not even Miss Lady herself could understand. She ceased to fear! She found herself wondering at the meaning of the word "depend." In spite of herself, in spite of all the evidence in her hands to the contrary, she felt herself growing vaguely sure that she could depend upon this man. Gradually the night lost its terrors. The whispers of the leaves grew kindly and not ominous. The fire seemed to her a reviving flame ...
— The Law of the Land • Emerson Hough
... work there. He returned to Philadelphia, working for a time on the Ledger and North American. Finally he went back to New York. There are no letters of this period. His second experience in New York appears not to have been recorded, and in later years was only vaguely remembered. It was late in the summer of 1854 when he finally set out on his return to the West. His 'Wanderjahr' had lasted nearly ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... background Rebecca was only vaguely conscious of a group of ladies in dresses of comparatively sober pattern and color; but seated upon a luxurious cushioned bench just in front of the others, one of her sex struck Rebecca at once as the very centre and climax of the magnificence that ...
— The Panchronicon • Harold Steele Mackaye
... I turned them in my mind—and always with the sound of the preacher's voice in my ears—the resonance of the words conveying an indescribable fire of inspiration. Vaguely and yet with certainty I knew the preacher spoke out of some unfathomable emotion which I did not understand—which I did not care to understand. Since then I have thought what those words must ...
— Adventures In Contentment • David Grayson
... had weighed an ounce heavier? Then he would never have known anything about it. The result would simply have been, as it was meant to be, that the Templetons were out when he called. There would have been a change of subject in their rooms when his name was mentioned, other people would have vaguely gathered that Mr. Morris Assheton's name was not productive of animated conversation; their gatherings would have spread further, while he himself, ignorant of all cause, would have ...
— The Blotting Book • E. F. Benson
... then picture, however vaguely and uncertainly, the growth of a ballad. It is well known that the folklores of the various races of the world exhibit common features, and that the beliefs, superstitions, tales, even conventionalities of expression, of one race, are found ...
— Ballads of Romance and Chivalry - Popular Ballads of the Olden Times - First Series • Frank Sidgwick
... in the NW. corner of Africa, three times the size of Great Britain, its coast-line stretching from Algeria to Cape Nun, and its inland confines being vaguely determined by the French hinterlands. Two-thirds of the country is desert; much of the remainder is poor pasture land; the Atlas Mountains stretch from SW. to NE., but there are some expanses of level fertile country; on the seaboard the climate is delightful, with abundance of rain ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood
... walked upon air, with their heads in the clouds. They were but vaguely conscious of their surroundings; they saw all things dimly, as through a veil; they were steeped in dreams, often they did not hear when they were spoken to; they often did not understand when they heard; they answered confusedly or at random; Sally sold molasses by weight, sugar ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... know you. I have met you somewhere," he said, putting his hand vaguely to his head. "You—you remember me, do ...
— Darkwater - Voices From Within The Veil • W. E. B. Du Bois
... the means by which the soul learns in a direct manner the will and the teaching and the mind of Christ, and it is by this means she gains such wisdom as it is God's will she shall have. The soul seeks this telepathy during the second stage, vaguely, not knowing or understanding the mode of it, receiving it rarely and with ...
— The Romance of the Soul • Lilian Staveley
... know," answered the young man vaguely. But Mrs. Saddletree kept him to point, partly out of real interest, partly ...
— The Heart of Mid-Lothian, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... refuge; horses and cattle were driven to the best hiding-places that could be found; the silver plate and the little gold that remained among the people were buried under woodpiles or deserted houses. The negroes awaited with stolid curiosity the approach of the "Yankees," who were by this time vaguely recognized as the "deliverers"; while the poor whites were thankful that their poverty for once proved ...
— Expansion and Conflict • William E. Dodd
... it was composed had a very curiously symmetrical appearance, and the longer he gazed at it the more convinced did he become that the slab was not nature's handiwork at all, but that of man. In a moment all sorts of legends vaguely flashed through his mind, and, knowing that this tunnel had been originally used by the Incas and had not been opened since, he began to wonder whether the curious circumstance was worth investigating. He soon decided that ...
— Under the Chilian Flag - A Tale of War between Chili and Peru • Harry Collingwood
... the dull glimmer of a lantern, turned low, being borne toward them by an unseen hand. Then the figure of the girl appeared, and soon the lantern's rays lighted up vaguely ...
— The Rival Campers Ashore - The Mystery of the Mill • Ruel Perley Smith
... mirrored. He had hitherto in life known nothing that was old except a few statues and pictures; but here everything was old, was immemorial, and nothing so much so as the very freshness itself. Vaguely to have supposed there were such nooks in the world had done little enough, he now saw, to temper the glare of their opposites. It was the fine touches that counted, and these had to be seen ...
— Some Short Stories • Henry James
... Ben stared vaguely from earth to sky, and was about to give it up, when a buttercup fell at his feet, and he caught sight of Miss Celia smiling at him from behind her brother, who did not ...
— Under the Lilacs • Louisa May Alcott
... of the present day, which leads to the introduction of vaguely comprehended scientific views into general conversation, also gives rise, under various forms, to the expression of alarm at the supposed danger of a collision between the celestial bodies, or of disturbance in the climatic ...
— COSMOS: A Sketch of the Physical Description of the Universe, Vol. 1 • Alexander von Humboldt
... Probably even the few men who had known Flamel since his youth could have given no good reason for the vague mistrust that he inspired. Some people are judged by their actions, others by their ideas; and perhaps the shortest way of defining Flamel is to say that his well-known leniency of view was vaguely divined to include himself. Simple minds may have resented the discovery that his opinions were based on his perceptions; but there was certainly no more definite charge against him than that implied in the doubt as to how he would behave in an emergency, and ...
— The Touchstone • Edith Wharton
... something wrong in the text here, as the subterfuge was distinctively a patrician one, and the commons had nothing to gain and all to lose by it. If Livy means that the commons provoked war by giving cause for the patricians to seek refuge in it, he certainly puts it very vaguely.—D. O.] ...
— Roman History, Books I-III • Titus Livius
... hour; as if nothing special, for it or the world, were passing! It tolled One when the firing began; and is now pointing towards Five, and still the firing slakes not.—Far down, in their vaults, the seven Prisoners hear muffled din as of earthquakes; their Turnkeys answer vaguely. ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle
... Elizabeth smiles vaguely. Her smile is her only beauty. It lights up her stern face, and makes Eleanor forget that she ...
— When the Birds Begin to Sing • Winifred Graham
... warmth, subtlety, and considerable humour. Smiles and thoughts lie hidden within many of its pregnant lines. One of the biographer's very strangest suggestions is never made concrete at all, so far as I can discern. The figure of the literary discoverer of the South Seas emerges perhaps a bit vaguely, his head in the clouds, but there is no reason to believe that Melville's head was anywhere else when he was alive. Hawthorne is at last described pretty accurately and not too flatteringly. The Scarlet Letter was published in 1850; ...
— When Winter Comes to Main Street • Grant Martin Overton |
