"Waif" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... madam and gentlemen,' said Mr. Micawber, 'you will do me the favour to submit yourselves, for the moment, to the direction of one who, however unworthy to be regarded in any other light but as a Waif and Stray upon the shore of human nature, is still your fellow-man, though crushed out of his original form by individual errors, and the accumulative force of a combination ...
— David Copperfield • Charles Dickens
... the anger of their tortured souls. And his last misery lay in this: that he himself could find no day in his life to admire, no one past dream to cherish, no inmost corner of his heart to love. The lowest tramp, the least-heeded waif of the night, might have some ultimate pride, but he himself had nothing, nothing whatever. He was a dream-pauper, an ...
— The Ghost Ship • Richard Middleton
... perhaps unreasonably, irritated. Known in the neighborhood as open-handed and kindly, it had sometimes happened, but generally only in wintry weather, that he had come home to find some poor waif lying in wait for him. Man, woman or child who had wandered in, maybe, before the big door downstairs was closed, or who, if still blessed with some outer semblance of gentility, had managed cunningly to get past the Cerberus ...
— Defenders of Democracy • Militia of Mercy
... one of the walks of the cemetery; for all his song, no blue-water sailor-man, but a boisterous denizen of the great river, a raftsman or a keel-boatman, who had somehow found himself in the burial ground and now was beating aimlessly about. How this rollicking waif of the grog shop came to wander so far from the convivial haunts of his kind and to choose this spot for a ramble, can only be explained ...
— The Strollers • Frederic S. Isham
... had so much to say to each other that it was not possible to say it all at one time, and so it was agreed that the next night Dick should make a visit to the store and keep Mr. Hobbs company. The plan pleased Dick well enough. He had been a street waif nearly all his life, but he had never been a bad boy, and he had always had a private yearning for a more respectable kind of existence. Since he had been in business for himself, he had made enough money to enable him to sleep under a roof instead ...
— Little Lord Fauntleroy • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... love that filled his heart looked out of his grave deep eyes, which never wandered from the face so dear to him, and moved his lips in an inaudible prayer for the peace and welfare of the lonely waif whom Providence or fate had brought into his path, to evoke all the tenderness latent in ...
— Vashti - or, Until Death Us Do Part • Augusta J. Evans Wilson
... north—between the Mackenzie and the Bay," where Snowdrift, waif of the Arctic, Indian bred, bearing a false but heavy burden of shame, and Carter Brent, Southerner, find their great happiness among the ...
— The Man in the Twilight • Ridgwell Cullum
... off through the open door, and the Editor stood for a moment looking regretfully after him. He liked his little protege ever since that unfortunate child—a waif from a Chinese wash-house—was impounded by some indignant miners for bringing home a highly imperfect and insufficient washing, and kept as hostage for a more proper return of the garments. Unfortunately, ...
— Under the Redwoods • Bret Harte
... Jack and you and the rest, he called me a little fool and bade me understand that he had not poisoned me as he was paid to do because it was to his advantage to keep me alive. Courtiers would not assassinate a stray waif, he said; there was wealth for the court's ward somewhere; and when I was restored, I was to remember who had slaved for me. Indeed, indeed, I think that he would have married me, but that he feared it would bar him from any property as ...
— Heralds of Empire - Being the Story of One Ramsay Stanhope, Lieutenant to Pierre Radisson in the Northern Fur Trade • Agnes C. Laut
... a waif on the ocean of commerce—the jetsam and flotsam, of which the law must direct the disposal. The heirs, as they have been called, may come in to the wreck that lies on the shores of time, after the soul has gone to eternity—but law must decide whether these wreckers are entitled to the cargo,—to ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 20, July, 1891 • Various
... know. We've never learned anything conclusive. Sometimes I'm sure he is. Then again I doubt it. I think HE really believes he is—bless his heart! At all events, one thing is sure: he has good blood in him from somewhere. Jamie's no ordinary waif of the streets, you know, with his talents; and the wonderful way he has responded to teaching ...
— Pollyanna Grows Up • Eleanor H. Porter
... third solution that was to satisfy my emotional nature and at the same time give me a reason for existence. I would adopt a little waif as my child, a French or Belgian waif, and I would bring up this child to be a useful and happy man or woman. I would love it, care for it, teach it, and with this responsibility and soulagement, I would be able to endure the loneliness of the long years stretching before me. I would find ...
— Possessed • Cleveland Moffett
... a poor, little human waif, which has floated to our door on a sea of trouble and misfortune, sister," observed Mr. Morris. "If opportunity is the gate of duty, then we owe it to this little girl, and to the Great Father who sent her to our doors, to relieve her wants, and if needs ...
— Jessie Carlton - The Story of a Girl who Fought with Little Impulse, the - Wizard, and Conquered Him • Francis Forrester
... could right well fit you. We have here at this instant moment a small maid of twelve years, that my Lady the Prioress were well fain to put with such as you be, and she bade me give heed to the same. 'Tis a waif that Anthony, our goatherd, found in the forest, with her mother, that was frozen to death in an hard winter; but the child abode, and was saved. Truly, for cunning there is little in her; but for meekness and readiness to do your will, ...
— The White Rose of Langley - A Story of the Olden Time • Emily Sarah Holt
... somehow got separated, at which time the mustang had been shut up for four days in the cellar of a ruined convent with no other food than stones and mortar! How Twidget came by his name is not clear. Perhaps it was some waif of ...
— The Rifle Rangers • Captain Mayne Reid
... odd of me, I must confess, to talk in this way, and to receive all those tender allusions from a gentleman about whom I had spoken and felt so sharply only the evening before. But Bartram was abominably lonely. A civilised person was a valuable waif or stray in that region of the picturesque and the brutal; and to my lady reader especially, because she will probably be hardest upon me, I put it—can you not recollect any such folly in your own ...
— Uncle Silas - A Tale of Bartram-Haugh • J.S. Le Fanu
... Waif of God! Die Thou for me this night, and give me to look upon the countenance ...
— Tales of the Chesapeake • George Alfred Townsend
... his fist at it, and vowing he'd set a keg of giant powder under the thing and blow it clean to blue blazes, Guy Little ran a loving hand over it, stroked its mane, so to speak, whispered in its ear, and set the engine purring. Old Man Packard nodded; they two, big-bodied millionaire and dwarfed waif, ...
— Man to Man • Jackson Gregory
... little cemetery, but the coffin then was borne upon the shoulders of four persons of her own sex. Now and again fatigue brought the bearers to a standstill; then they would change shoulders by changing places. And the white coffin, moving up and down as a waif on the swell of the sea, passed on towards the glowing west, where presently the purple-tinted wings of evening ...
— Two Summers in Guyenne • Edward Harrison Barker
... not know who he was nor whence he came—he had just wandered from door to door since early childhood, seeking shelter with kindly mountaineers who gladly fathered and mothered this waif about whom there was such a mystery—a charming waif, by the way, who could play the banjo better that ...
— The Harbor • Ernest Poole
... light of dawn brought sober reflections. What interest could he have in the young girl other than to help her escape from the savage Cochise? She was a waif, of unknown parentage. Mentally she was little more than a child, and all her conscious experience had been confined to the environment ...
— Bloom of Cactus • Robert Ames Bennet
... a pair of brogans which had plainly seen service where coal was shovelled, a thin leather belt, and a very dirty cloth cap. My underclothing and socks, however, were new and warm, but of the sort that any American waif, down in his luck, could acquire in the ordinary course ...
— The People of the Abyss • Jack London
... shut it again. She understood that it would be a waste of breath to say anything more. If Miss Salome had made up her mind to put this freckled, determined-looking waif, dropped on her doorstep from heaven knew where, into Johnny's room, that was ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1902 to 1903 • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... the church; and he said to the bystanders that he was well, and had never been ill: he, the heavily afflicted, the waif cast forth upon the world, remembered nothing of his sufferings. And the Lord our Creator is wise and full of ...
— What the Moon Saw: and Other Tales • Hans Christian Andersen
... years that endure not Whose tide shall endure till we die And know what the seasons assure not, If death be or life be a lie, Sways hither the spirit and thither, A waif in the swing of the sea Whose wrecks are of memories that wither ...
— Astrophel and Other Poems - Taken from The Collected Poetical Works of Algernon Charles - Swinburne, Vol. VI • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... us are very anxious to learn the authorship of the following poem, which is to be found in so many scrap-books, and which ever and anon appears as a newspaper waif: ...
— Eugene Field, A Study In Heredity And Contradictions - Vol. I • Slason Thompson
... little waif, And said, "What dost thou here?" "Sapristi, Citizen captain! I'm a Communist, ...
— Pike County Ballads and Other Poems • John Hay
... earnestly for a sign,—that it would lighten in some particular region of the heavens, or that I might find a bunch of grapes in the path, when I went forth in the morning. But no sign was given, and I was left a waif stranded upon the ...
— Memoirs of Margaret Fuller Ossoli, Vol. I • Margaret Fuller Ossoli
... shake my faith in him, Diana; it is not to be shaken. He has told me a little about the past, though I can see that it pains him very much to speak of it. He has told me of his friendless youth, spent amongst unprincipled people, and what a mere waif and stray he was until he met me. And I am to be his pole-star, dear, to guide him in the right path. Do you know, Di, I cannot picture to myself anything sweeter than that—to be a good influence for the person one loves. Valentine says his whole nature has undergone a change ...
— Birds of Prey • M. E. Braddon
... glance, inspired by fond imaginings that the pinto might have stopped to graze, Sundown stalked down the road. Waif of chance and devotee of the goddess "Maybeso," he rose sublimely superior to the predicament in which he found himself. "The only reason I'm goin' east is because I ain't goin' west," he told himself, ignoring, ...
— Sundown Slim • Henry Hubert Knibbs
... and father both to her. Mingled with Hester's love for Debby was an inexpressible gratitude. Hester realized how much Debby had done and was doing for her. But it was not the dainty dresses and good home that touched her most. Debby Alden had given the waif her mother's name, and Hester never wrote in her big angular hand, Hester Palmer Alden, without feeling a glow of pride. She had a name of which to be proud, a name which Debby Alden had ...
— Hester's Counterpart - A Story of Boarding School Life • Jean K. Baird
... bequeathed to his son, Baron Achille Paganini. And as if mystery should still enshroud his memory and this, true to his nature, should be carried out in his last will, there are those who maintain that Achille Paganini was not his son at all—only a waif he had adopted. Yet Achille always stoutly maintained the distinction—but what boots it, since he could ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great - Volume 14 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Musicians • Elbert Hubbard
... thought; "I am condemned to float here below, like a waif which no one wants; no shore is henceforward accessible, for if the world refuses me, I disgust God. Ah! Lord, remember the garden of Gethsemani, the tragic defection of the Father whom Thou didst implore in unspeakable ...
— En Route • J.-K. (Joris-Karl) Huysmans
... of Brammo Bay, and having philandered with them for a while, cynically abandoned them with a bump on the mainland beach, and only once has he sent a punt in return—a poor, soiled, tar-besmirched, disorderly waif that was reported to ...
— The Confessions of a Beachcomber • E J Banfield
... less rapacious had watched the growth of the Mounds in years bygone, and had vigilantly sifted the dust of which they were composed. No valuables turned up. How should there be any, seeing that the old hard jailer of Harmony Jail had coined every waif and ...
— Our Mutual Friend • Charles Dickens
... a physician, who learned that the girl had been a waif and had been taken in charge by a Protestant clergyman when she was nine years old and brought up as his servant. This clergyman had for years been in the habit of walking up and down a passage of his house into which the kitchen door opened ...
— The Trained Memory • Warren Hilton
... sea was majestic, there was less apprehension of danger. There the Spray rode, now like a bird on the crest of a wave, and now like a waif deep down in the hollow between seas; and so she drove on. Whole days passed, counted as other days, but with ...
— Sailing Alone Around The World • Joshua Slocum
... exquisitely simple and truthful books that win and charm the reader, and I did not put it down until I had finished it—honest! And I am sure that every one, young or old, who reads will be proud and happy to make the acquaintance of the delicious waif. ...
— The Little Colonel's Christmas Vacation • Annie Fellows Johnston
... reappeared with a very unpromising looking boy whom we recognized as a street waif that had been taken into what some one called our "raggedy school" a few years before. He was a glum looking boy—a boy without a smile. There was a set expression on his face which might be interpreted as "life is not worth living," or, which ...
— The Chinese Boy and Girl • Isaac Taylor Headland
... dwellers in those solitary little islands. The narrow belts of sea, which divide their ocean-girded homes, have constantly to be ferried across, and many a boat which has gone out manned with a gallant crew has never returned or sent a waif to ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, May, 1878, No. 7. - Scribner's Illustrated • Various
... But now more humbly and with the aid of an Amanuensis. First one word about page 2. My wife protests against the Waif-woman and I am instructed to report the same ...
— Vailima Letters • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Young Doctor. Yet his feet were laggard, for he was not so sure that there would be another home for Jean Jacques with his grandchild as its star. He was thinking of Norah, to whom a waif of the prairie had made home what home should be ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... stately slow-moving swell which followed her. The vast blue-black dome of the heavens above was devoid of the faintest trace of cloud, and the countless stars which spangled the immeasurable vault beamed down upon the tiny waif with a soft and mellow splendour which was repeated in the dark bosom of the scarcely ruffled ocean, where the reflected starbeams mingled, far down in its mysterious depths, with occasional faint gleams and flashes ...
— The Pirate Island - A Story of the South Pacific • Harry Collingwood
... resulted, partly from want of opportunity, and partly from want of ambition in herself, that Bessie Fairfax remained a rustic little maid, without the least tincture of modern accomplishments. Still, the doctor's wife did not forget that her dear drudge and helpful right hand was a waif of old gentry, whose restoration the chapter of accidents might bring about any day. Nor did she suffer Bessie to forget it, though Bessie was mighty indifferent, and cared as little for her gentle ...
— The Vicissitudes of Bessie Fairfax • Harriet Parr
... behind. 'I did not show you this, for fear it would anger you, but—but there must have been a child on board after all.' He held a little box of toys, carefully packed as if by a mother's hand,—common toys, for she was only the captain's wife, and the schooner a small one; the little waif had floated ashore by itself, and Fog had seen and ...
— Castle Nowhere • Constance Fenimore Woolson
... vagrant from Heaven! It wandered away from the fold, And its weakness and danger endowed it With value more precious than gold. Oh happy the day when it came, And my heart learned its beautiful name! Oh happy the hour when I fed This waif of the angels with bread! And the lamb that the Shepherd had missed Was ...
— The Mistress of the Manse • J. G. Holland
... upon your way. You may see from afar off what it will come to in the end—the weather-beaten red-nosed vagabond, consumed by a fever of the feet, cut off from all near touch of human sympathy, a waif, an Ishmael, and an outcast. And yet it will seem well—and yet, in the air of the forest, this will seem the best—to break all the network bound about your feet by birth and old companionship and loyal love, and bear your shovelful of phosphates to and fro, in town country, until the hour of ...
— Essays of Travel • Robert Louis Stevenson
... government. The more and more avowed materialistic theories revolted his shrewd and sensible mind; without caring to go to the bottom of his thought and contemplate its consequences, he clung to the notion of Providence as to a waif in the great shipwreck of positive creeds; ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume VI. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... had become exquisitely tender, and his lips, as he whispered the heavenly words, were quite close to her ear. He, a great gentleman, loved the miserable little waif whose kindred consisted of a blind father and two half-starved little brothers, and whose only home was this miserable hovel, whence milor's graciousness and ...
— The League of the Scarlet Pimpernel • Baroness Orczy
... go away, when there came forth a man from under the earth and followed me, crying out and saying, "Who and whence art thou, and what caused thee to come hither?" "O my lord," answered I, "I am in very sooth a waif, a stranger, and was left to drown with sundry others by the ship we voyaged in; but Allah graciously sent me a wooden tub, so I saved myself thereon, and it floated with me till the waves cast ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 2 • Charles Dudley Warner
... made my way down the southern declivity of the mountain for a short distance. Again my ear was greeted with that loud, ringing chirp, and now the bird uttering it obligingly alighted on a stone not too far away to be seen distinctly through my binocular. Who was the little waif that had chosen this sky-invading summit for its summer habitat? At first I mistook it for a horned lark, and felt so sure my decision was correct that I did not look at the bird as searchingly as I should have done, thereby learning a valuable lesson in thoroughness. The ...
— Birds of the Rockies • Leander Sylvester Keyser
... He became a waif and stray, austerely, from conviction, as others do through drink, from vice, from some weakness of character—with deliberation, as others do in despair. This, stripped of its facts, had been Heyst's ...
— Victory • Joseph Conrad
... attend him home and see the child, after which I should be better able to give him advice. Accordingly we went together to his house, which I recollect was the very one you described as having visited in your search in William street. There I found the little waif, a bright eyed boy of some three or four years of age, though his cheeks were pale and thin, as if he had already known some suffering. He wore around his neck the coral beads you have in your hand, which seemed to me at the time to have been left in ...
— The Lost Hunter - A Tale of Early Times • John Turvill Adams
... ancestors, he was only one of the rank and file of Americans, whose names are seldom seen in print, but who, after all, go to make up the true history of our glorious republic. Fernando's adventures, with those of Morgianna, the mysterious waif of the sea, form the ...
— Sustained honor - The Age of Liberty Established • John R. Musick,
... the exemplary old lady plucked a little waif of down from her bombazine dress, and snapped it away jauntily upon the air,—even as, throughout her life, she had snapped from her the temptations of the world. And when, in his Scripture reading that very night, the Doctor came upon the passage "Wo unto you, Pharisees!" ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 103, May, 1866 • Various
... a park. The gas-lamps shed a yellow glow on the trees, making circles of feeble light on the walks, and the shadows lay deep on the ground. Most of the benches were vacant; but here and there a waif or a belated homegoer sat in drowsy isolation. The stars were too dim even from this vantage-ground to afford Keith much satisfaction. His thoughts flew back to the mountains and the great blue canopy ...
— Gordon Keith • Thomas Nelson Page
... Curtis, gently drawing the waif to her side, "you are far too little to be running away from home. You may stay here to-night, then to-morrow we will see what we can do for you. I won't trouble you with her to-night, Philip," she added, turning to ...
— Madge Morton's Victory • Amy D.V. Chalmers
... afraid to touch it, and afraid almost to move. He felt very close to her, very sure that she was living with him, withdrawn secretly from the rest into the strange world that he had discovered. He was happy. And happiness like this was new to him and terrifying. He was like a waif from the streets, pale and gaunt and young, with dazzled eyes gazing for the first ...
— The Dark House • I. A. R. Wylie
... gowd and gear, Wi' thee I ne'er gat nane; I got thee as a waif woman, I'll leave thee as ...
— Ballad Book • Katherine Lee Bates (ed.)
... way to reach a case like this, and there is, I am sure. From what you say, it is more than probable that this poor little waif may have drifted out of some pleasant home, where love would bless it with the tenderest care, into this hell of neglect and cruelty. It should be rescued on the instant. It is my duty—it is yours—to see that it is done, and that without delay. I will go at once to the mayor and state the case. ...
— Cast Adrift • T. S. Arthur
... your silly pride if you want to! If I thought you didn't care, that you were just trying to carry on the ghastly game they call flirtation up here, I wouldn't be so angry with you. I'm not Willa Murdaugh down inside of me, and you know it!—I'm just Gentleman Geoff's Billie, a waif raised by the greatest-hearted man that ever lived, but I've got some pride myself. I don't want any man who hasn't s-spunk enough to ...
— The Fifth Ace • Douglas Grant
... waif when the tale opens, but the way in which he takes hold of life; the nature friendships he forms; and his love-story with "The Angel" are full ...
— Tess of the Storm Country • Grace Miller White
... wings and happy smiling of familiar faces! The panorama concludes with vision of sleeping waif, upon love-beleaguered cot, illumined by mystic halo, and some high-browed watchers, gazing from child to maiden, uttering strangely significant speech about "one of the ...
— Oswald Langdon - or, Pierre and Paul Lanier. A Romance of 1894-1898 • Carson Jay Lee
... and had in time grown so fond of her that she could not bear the thought of parting. Hence, after the first unsuccessful effort, no further attempt had been made to discover the parentage of the little waif. She called herself Daisy, in her lisping fashion, and her lovely disposition had won for her the poetical title of "Daisy ...
— Idle Hour Stories • Eugenia Dunlap Potts
... amazement, when the steward had cleared the table, this hoary old relic of man-killing and man-driving days, battered waif of the sea that he was, carried in from his room a most splendid collection of phonograph records. These, and the machine, he placed on the table. The big doors were opened, making the dining-room ...
— The Mutiny of the Elsinore • Jack London
... this success, the fishermen seized the boat as a waif, and towed it into their own fleet, filling the air with cries of triumph. Curiosity led a few to enter the hearse-like canopy, whence they immediately reissued ...
— The Bravo • J. Fenimore Cooper
... spelling through the pages of the Gull's Hornbook. From this course of idle dissipation he was saved by the interposition of an Ayrshire neighbour of the family, the Earl of Eglintoun, though were we to credit the account of the waif himself the Earl 'insisted that young Boswell should have an apartment in his house.' Certain it is that by his lordship he was taken to Newmarket and introduced to the members of the Jockey Club. He would appear to have fancied himself ...
— James Boswell - Famous Scots Series • William Keith Leask
... "St. Bennets Askew," which stood in the midst of the University, near Sorbonne, where the Rue des Ecoles crosses the Rue St. Jacques to-day. Hither, to his house in the cloister, he brought the boy, a waif whom he had found much at the time when Willoughby capitulated and the French recaptured the city. He had him taught, he designed him for the University, he sheltered him in his vagaries, he gave ...
— Avril - Being Essays on the Poetry of the French Renaissance • H. Belloc
... to thee in verses such as burn The heart; reproach therein was none nor yet unright; Yet with perfidiousness (sure Fortune's self as thou Ne'er so perfidious was) my love thou didst requite And deemedst me a waif, a homeless good-for-nought, A slave-begotten brat, ...
— Tales from the Arabic Volumes 1-3 • John Payne
... cared, was of less than no account; it made a small paragraph in the newspapers—it had caused some little commotion on the pier—just a little hurry at the work-house, and then it was forgotten. What was such a little waif and stray—such a small, fair, tender little creature ...
— The Tragedy of the Chain Pier - Everyday Life Library No. 3 • Charlotte M. Braeme
... not allow her father or her brothers to touch her, and when her mother tried to comfort her, she said "Go away, ma. Don't touch me!" Finally I went to her, and she caught my hand in hers and pressed it, and after I had got her to her feet—the poor ragged waif, as limpsey as a rag, and wearing the patched remnants of the calico dress I had bought for her on the way into Iowa the spring before—she broke down and cried on my shoulder. She sobbed out that I was the only ...
— Vandemark's Folly • Herbert Quick
... Court of Chancery in the Island of Barbadoes, a sinecure done by deputy, Surveyor of the Crown Lands, and Paymaster to the Board of Works. The wits of White's added the title of 'Receiver-General of Waif and Stray Jokes.' It is said that his hostility to Sheridan arose from the latter having lost him the office in the Works in 1782, when Burke's Bill for reducing the Civil List came into operation; ...
— The Wits and Beaux of Society - Volume 2 • Grace & Philip Wharton
... herself about that, however, for her mind was still full of what she had seen and heard in the church; and she walked on silently, till presently Madame, with some natural curiosity as to this small waif and stray she had picked up, said, "Are you staying at the ...
— My Little Lady • Eleanor Frances Poynter
... and the little waif safely tucked away in the crib that had sheltered Lucy in the old days, the neighbors began to flock in; Uncle ...
— The Tides of Barnegat • F. Hopkinson Smith
... although the bas-relief was so far advanced that the model was hardly needed. She had even set herself, by those unobtrusive ways at the command of gracious women, to win the girl's confidence, not so much for the sake of hearing her story as to give the waif so strangely cast in her path the feeling that the friendship she so sorely needed was within her reach. It had resulted, however, in her hearing Ninitta's history. Many women have no idea of returning ...
— The Pagans • Arlo Bates
... jolly they seem together; it's good to see! Why can't I have something like that? I, a waif and a stray! I'd never leave such a woman! I'd always have my arms round her, and there'd be no mistake about my loving the little devil! I've never had any luck with women! They don't like ginger hair— women don't. No. She's a woman with fancies, she is! She's a sly little devil! She wants ...
— Creatures That Once Were Men • Maxim Gorky
... manfulness And steersman through the surf of battle, time Gaped as a gulf between us: sire and son We might be: now I bid thee hold thy peace, Lest all these memories perish, and their death Give life more strong than theirs to wrath, and leave thee Shelterless as a waif of the air when storm Drives bird and beast to deathward. What I bade thee I bid thee do, and ...
— Rosamund, Queen of the Lombards • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... pleasure. There had been a little boy before Starr came to their home, but he had only lived a few weeks. The memory of that golden, fuzzy head, the little appealing fingers, the great blue eyes of his son still lingered bitterly in the father's heart. When he first looked upon this waif the fancy seized him that, perhaps his own boy would have been like this had he lived, and a strange and unexpected tenderness entered his heart for Mikky. He kept going to the little invalid's room night after night, ...
— Lo, Michael! • Grace Livingston Hill
... the window and turned to the slender shrinking figure at her side, drawing back the heavy hood that shielded the girl's face to look into the features of the little foreign waif she had taken ...
— Eve to the Rescue • Ethel Hueston
... should have heard her laugh As each man from his scanty store shook out a generous half. To kiss the little mouth stooped down a score of grimy men, Until the sergeant's husky voice said,"'Tention squad!" and then We gave her escort, till good-night the pretty waif we bid, And watched her toddle out of sight—or else 'twas tears that hid Her tiny form—nor turned about a man, nor spoke a word, Till after awhile a far, hoarse shout upon the wind we heard! We sent it back, then cast sad eyes upon the scene around; A baby's hand ...
— Poems Teachers Ask For, Book Two • Various
... silly, triumphant laugh, and thrust the child forward against the carriage step. The poor waif, drenched, dazed, tottering without his crutch, caught at the plated handle for support. Honoria gazed down on him with eyes which took slow and pitiless account of the deformed little ...
— The Ship of Stars • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... weakness. Must she cease to know the self-respect which comes of conscious perseverance in a noble effort? Must she stand self-condemned, an ignoble nature, incapable of anything good and great—and that, after all her ambitions? Was she a mere waif, at the mercy of the currents of sense? Never before had she felt this condemnation of her own spirit. She had suffered beyond utterance, but ever with a support which kept her from the last despair; of her anguish ...
— A Life's Morning • George Gissing
... wanderer upon the earth am I, The waif of nature—like uprooted weed Borne by the stream, or like a shaken reed, A frail dependent of the fickle sky. Far, far away, are all my natural kin; The mother that erewhile hath hush'd my cry, Almost hath grown a mere fond memory. Where is my sister's smile? ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 2, May, 1851 • Various
... as desolate as any waif in all that great city. He had been cared for all his life, and now that he was suddenly thrown upon his own resources, he felt helpless, like a rudderless bark on ...
— Two Boys and a Fortune • Matthew White, Jr.
... monkey. The wretched mite from the jungle was encased in a heavy woolen straight-jacket, and there was a strap around its loins to which a stout cord was attached, running to the Root of All Evil. The pavement was hot, but there with its bare and tender feet on the hot concrete, the sad-eyed little waif painfully moved about, peering far up into the faces of passers-by for sympathy, but all the time furtively and shrinkingly watching its tormentor. Every now and then the hairy old tramp would jerk the monkey's cord, each time giving the frail creature a violent bodily ...
— The Minds and Manners of Wild Animals • William T. Hornaday
... loveliness has been shown forth in the delineation of the Babe of Bethlehem. The influence of such art has made itself felt upon all child pictures. It matters not whether the subject be a prince or a street-waif; the true artist sees in him something which is lovable and winning, and transfers it to his canvas for ...
— Child-life in Art • Estelle M. Hurll
... man's wife, whom Meriem had christened "My Dear" from having first heard her thus addressed by Bwana, took not only a deep interest in the little jungle waif because of her forlorn and friendless state, but grew to love her as well for her sunny disposition and natural charm of temperament. And Meriem, similarly impressed by little attributes in the gentle, cultured woman, reciprocated the other's regard ...
— The Son of Tarzan • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... I'd not exchange my picture For the choicest gem of art; Yet I must not claim it wholly; It is only mine in part; For 'tis one of nature's sketches— A waif from that Great Hand Which hath filled our earth with models ...
— Happy Days for Boys and Girls • Various
... true love is! And do you know that she is not really my niece—only a poor waif that ...
— Fenton's Quest • M. E. Braddon
... folks on their different ways, With their different griefs an' pleasures, But the home they knew, when their years were few, Is the dearest of all their treasures. An' the richest man to the poorest waif Right under the skin is brother When they stand an' sigh, with a tear-dimmed eye, At a thought of the ...
— A Heap o' Livin' • Edgar A. Guest
... depths of her rags, a waif, a martyr—smiled. She must have a divine heart to be so tired and yet smile. She loved the sky, the light, which the unformed little being would love some day. She loved the chilly dawn, the sultry noontime, the dreamy evening. The ...
— The Inferno • Henri Barbusse
... idle and strangely empty, and yet hard to understand. She would have been much surprised if she could have guessed how much its emptiness interested other people in Rome; how the dowagers chattered about her over their tea, abusing her mother and all her relations for abandoning her like a waif; how the men reasoned about Baron Volterra's deep-laid schemes, trying to make out that his semi- adoption of Sabina, as they called it, must certainly bode ruin to some one, since he had never in his life done anything without a financial object; how the young girls unanimously declared ...
— The Heart of Rome • Francis Marion Crawford
... red ribbon knotted about its neck, and vicious, amber-colored eyes that were a perpetual challenge, had fled from the tender mercies of Dick to the city of refuge under Beryl's cot; and community of suffering had kindled an attachment that now prompted the lesser waif to spring into the girl's folded arms, and rub its head against her shoulder. Mechanically Beryl's hand stroked the creature's ear, while it purred softly under the caress; but suddenly its back curved into an arch, the tail ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... would be promptly and reverently deposited among the other Vestiges of Creation, in the Royal Cabinet. In the course of years, some historian would probably have occasion to turn over these curiosities, and would presently light on the scorched but still legible waif. "Why," says he, in astonishment, "I thought the earth was burnt on the 15th of May! To be sure, it was in the night, and nobody saw it go, [think of that, conceited Worldling!] but it was missed by somebody the day after. ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 5, April 30, 1870 • Various
... in a horrified tone, "Good God!" Then in a moment, turning almost fiercely to the priest, "Why did she give away her child and let it be thought a foundling? For if the story is true she has been little better than a waif, a foundling ...
— A Little Girl in Old Detroit • Amanda Minnie Douglas
... up too, at that, and looked at his watch quickly. "Not late yet, but I'll walk along. Where are you going, waif? Aren't you ...
— The Militants - Stories of Some Parsons, Soldiers, and Other Fighters in the World • Mary Raymond Shipman Andrews
... "are no longer a waif. These things are passing for you. You cannot carry with you to the new world the things which belong to ...
— The Lighted Way • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... the Anniversary of Eddy's Death. Extracts from her Journal. Little Susy's Six Teachers. The Teachers' Meeting. A New York Waif. Summer in the Country. Letters. Little Susy's Little Servants. Extracts from her Journal. ...
— The Life and Letters of Elizabeth Prentiss • George L. Prentiss
... man respect himself? To this poor waif of a soldier of fortune we may seem respectable gentlemen; but to ourselves, what are we unless a pasteboard portico and a deliquium ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 7 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... thing had crept into her blood like poison. Life was once more a dreary, profitless struggle. All the wonderful dreams, which had made existence seem almost like a fairy-tale for this last week, had faded away. She was once more a mournful little waif among ...
— Havoc • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... mine, and mingles into one mass floating timbers, loosened earth, rubbish, and soft and fallen rock. By the mining laws of Mexico, the title to a mine is lost by abandoning and ceasing to work it. It becomes a waif open to the enterprise of any one who may "re-denounce" it. The title to the soil in Mexico, as in California, carries no title to the gold and silver mineral that may be contained in the land. The precious metals are not only regarded in law as treasure-trove, but they ...
— Mexico and its Religion • Robert A. Wilson
... hesitating footsteps and turned towards the bridge. He was followed almost immediately by Hiram Da Souza, who, curiously enough, seemed to have been on the platform when the train came in and to have been much interested in this shabby, lonely old man, who carried himself like a waif stranded in an unknown land. Da Souza was gorgeous in frock coat and silk hat, a carnation in his buttonhole, a diamond in his black satin tie, yet he was not altogether happy. This little man hobbling along in front represented fate to ...
— A Millionaire of Yesterday • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... Dr. Carey has gone West for a vacation and John Jacobs is raising cain over at Wykerton because a hired hand, just a waif of an orphan boy, got drunk in Hans Wyker's joint and fell into Big Wolf and was drowned. Funny thing about it was that Darley Champers came out against Wyker for the first time. It may go hard with the old Dutchman yet. Jim Shirley isn't very well, ...
— Winning the Wilderness • Margaret Hill McCarter
... from here. You must have them loaded up early.' The young man went away wondering what sort of broken-down waif this might be who talked like a gentleman and consorted with Greek muleteers. Dick felt unhappy. To outface an English officer is no small thing, but the bluff loses relish when one plays it from the utter dark, and stumbles up and down ...
— The Light That Failed • Rudyard Kipling
... get him back to his mother?" I pleaded, but as I spoke I allowed the little fingers to slip from mine and I pushed the waif towards Charlotte with the greatest confidence, which evidently communicated itself to both him and the dog, for they left me simultaneously and went towards the ...
— The Heart's Kingdom • Maria Thompson Daviess
... Carmen, as one makes a dash at some waif drifting astern. "What a fearful thing it would be to fall overboard there—in the midst of those horrid creatures! One wouldn't have the slightest chance of being saved. Only to think how little space ...
— The Flag of Distress - A Story of the South Sea • Mayne Reid
... if from all eternity he had loved this helpless little waif of Time, with its small, thin, blue-gray, gin-drugged face; this tiny life, so hopeless, so miserable, yet so uncomplaining: the thing that was, was the thing for it to bear; it had come into the world to bear it! Ready to die, even Death ...
— A Rough Shaking • George MacDonald
... drifted to the great North-west where all the rovers go. "He's gone so long," the old man said, "he's dropped right out of mind, But if you'd write a line to him I'd take it very kind; He's shearing here and fencing there, a kind of waif and stray, He's droving now with Conroy's sheep along the Castlereagh. The sheep are travelling for the grass, and travelling very slow; They may be at Mundooran now, or past the Overflow, Or tramping down the black soil ...
— An Anthology of Australian Verse • Bertram Stevens
... inspiration—a cheer for those who stop a moment to refresh themselves from her little cup, and hurry on about their own near and dear affairs, in which she has no share?... He stands in a big, bright garden and commands the spiritual mother to remain a waif out on the dusty highway. 'How much better off you are out there!' he says. 'You can show people the Gate, and keep them from going the wrong way, on the long empty road. Nothing can hurt you, but yourself. It is very foolish of you to ...
— Fate Knocks at the Door - A Novel • Will Levington Comfort
... good-naturedly suffered our conversation to subside into silence. The window next him was open. He threw his cup out of it; and did the same kind office for mine, and finally the little tray flew after, and I heard it clank on the road; a valuable waif, no doubt, for some early ...
— The Room in the Dragon Volant • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... her eyes, seeking to comprehend. God knows, at that moment I pitied the poor dumb waif, alone in all the whole round earth with me. The candle-flame, moved by the wind like a slow-painting brush, flickered upon her face, ...
— The Purple Cloud • M.P. Shiel
... incident did not damage his credit with her. However, after the little waif had been sufficiently petted and praised to gratify Master Marmaduke's paternal feelings, they came home, and, instead of holding their tongues, began to tell all our people what a dear little child Marmaduke had, ...
— The Irrational Knot - Being the Second Novel of His Nonage • George Bernard Shaw
... his knees the atheist lifted his eyes to the heavens, and with his feeble voice and the fervor born of helplessness, prayed to the God that he denied. He begged for the life of the waif in his care—for the safety of the mother, so needful to the little one—and for courage and strength to do his part and bring them together. But beyond the appeal for help in the service of others, not one word or expressed thought of his ...
— The Wreck of the Titan - or, Futility • Morgan Robertson
... is bent to flight, but she is 'affear'd of her own feet.' She is well enough educated to know that he who smiles at her is no mortal, but Bacchus himself, the very lord of Naxos. He stands before her, the divine debauchee racemiferis frontem circumdatus uvis; and all around her, a waif on his territory, are the symbols of his majesty and his power. It is in his honour that the ivy trails down the cliff, and are not the yews and the firs and the fig-trees that overshadow the cliff's edge all sacred to him? and the vines beyond, are they not all his? His ...
— Yet Again • Max Beerbohm
... shrubbery back to his own study, where, with a little sigh, he put away his chess-men, and heartily hoped that it might not be his favorite adversary who was coming before him to be sent to jail. For although the good rector had a warm regard, and even affection, for Robin Lyth, as a waif cast into his care, and then a pupil wonderfully apt (which breeds love in the teacher), and after that a most gallant and highly distinguished young parishioner—with all this it was a difficulty ...
— Mary Anerley • R. D. Blackmore
... children was a little waif, called Dick Kowley, afterward known as "Sumter Dick." He had been abandoned by his mother, and thus thrown out on the world. For a time he was sent, after his arrival in New York, to the house of ...
— Reminiscences of Forts Sumter and Moultrie in 1860-'61 • Abner Doubleday
... you be so good as to assist me in shepherding this obstinate little waif? It has been running hither and thither for nearly half an hour, taking every direction but the right one. If you will either walk on and lower the bars for me or drive this lamb while I go forward, you will greatly oblige me. Pardon me,—you look distressed. Something ...
— Vashti - or, Until Death Us Do Part • Augusta J. Evans Wilson
... has not fallen in love with me. She may fancy me her property—a private waif and stray. Better send for the Coast-guard officer, and let him claim me as belonging to the Admiralty, as flotsom, jetsom, and lagend; for I was ...
— Two Years Ago, Volume I • Charles Kingsley |
