"Can't" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... said Viner, "where is this Dr. Martincole? Look here: this is a well-furnished room; those pictures are good; there are many valuable things here; yet the man who practises here is only in attendance for an hour or two in an afternoon, and once a week for rather longer in the evening. He can't earn much here; certainly an East End doctor could not afford to buy things like this or that. Do you know what I think? I think this man is some West End man, who for purposes of his own has this place ...
— The Middle of Things • J. S. Fletcher
... think Phoebe and bride will ever rhyme together, Major?" asked David in a tone of deepest depression. "I can't seem to ...
— Andrew the Glad • Maria Thompson Daviess
... them, the men that placed him here, Are scandals to the times, Are at a loss to find his guilt, And can't commit his crimes." ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 54, November 9, 1850 • Various
... confess (Individual) that I am tempted to leave you by the side of the stream, to swim it if you can, to drown if you can't, or to go back home and be eaten out with your desire for the ulterior shore, while I digress upon that word Pontifex, which, note you, is not only a name over a shop as "Henry Pontifex, Italian Warehouseman," or "Pontifex Brothers, Barbers," but a true key-word breeding ...
— On Something • H. Belloc
... to emphasize a vow she threw one arm around her lover's neck and drew his face to hers so that she could kiss it,—a maneuver she executed at some risk to their safety. "Oh, Archie, I love you so—I can't give you up!" she whispered by ...
— Clark's Field • Robert Herrick
... little writing to do before Dick comes in; can't I give you a book while I am busy? I have a number of ...
— The Spectacle Man - A Story of the Missing Bridge • Mary F. Leonard
... "Can't I help you, Billy?" the lad asked again, as he saw the foreman had not appeared to hear ...
— The Boy from the Ranch - Or Roy Bradner's City Experiences • Frank V. Webster
... Call'd on Saint Peter, call'd on all the Saints That know the Secrets both of Heaven and Earth, And can reveal what Gods themselves can do: I've us'd the Arts of our most holy Mother, Which I receiv'd when I forsook the World, And gave myself to Holiness and Heaven; But can't obtain the Secret of your Dream, Till I first know the Secrets of your Heart, Or what you hope or wish to be effected. 'Tis on these Terms we learn the Will of God, What Good or Ill awaits on Kings or Kingdoms; And without this, St. Peter's ...
— Ponteach - The Savages of America • Robert Rogers
... ain't he? Ma said she heard he kept a horse and lived right in the village too, not as how he needed to keep one to get anywhere, either. That's what I call luxury—a horse to ride around with. And then Mr. What's-his-name? I can't remember. Oh, yes, Spafford. He's good, and everybody says he won't make a bit of fuss if Kate does go around and have a good time. He'll just let her do as she pleases. Only old Grandma Doolittle says she doesn't believe it. She thinks every man, no matter how good he is, wants to manage his ...
— Marcia Schuyler • Grace Livingston Hill Lutz
... when I spoke as though I had faith," Nikolay Vsyevolodovitch pronounced very earnestly. "But I must tell you, this repetition of my ideas in the past makes a very disagreeable impression on me. Can't ...
— The Possessed - or, The Devils • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... night at the theater. It may be important. I'd have to see your nephew, in order to find out if it is. I can't ...
— The Breaking Point • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... Fritz," said I, "I am reminded of a situation in one of our English plays—The Critic—have you heard of it? Or, if you like, of two men, each covering the other with a revolver. For I can't expose Michael ...
— The Prisoner of Zenda • Anthony Hope
... "I can't help it," she said, calmly, when Judith remonstrated. "It's just my way. I have a horror of keeping any one waiting. Habitual disregard of punctuality in the keeping of an engagement or a promise is a sort of dishonesty, in my opinion. I ...
— Mildred's Inheritance - Just Her Way; Ann's Own Way • Annie Fellows Johnston
... what I can't understand is this: Dad's heart is set on this marriage. He wants to get me out of the way." Then as Mrs. Milo's expression changed from a gratified beam to a stare of horror, "Oh, don't be shocked; he has his good reasons. But as I'm going, why can't he make a ...
— Apron-Strings • Eleanor Gates
... ought to conceal nothing from children under the pretext that they are little and that at their age they should remain ignorant of certain things. What a sad and unfortunate idea! And how clearly the children themselves perceive that their parents take them for babies who can't understand anything, when really they understand everything! Great folks don't know that in even the most difficult affairs a child is able to give advice that is of the utmost importance. O God! when this pretty little bird stares at you with a ...
— Essays on Russian Novelists • William Lyon Phelps
... see if I can't fetch the fellow with my old gun," cried Uncle Walter. "I reckon I can reach him. I've picked bears out of taller trees ...
— Summerfield - or, Life on a Farm • Day Kellogg Lee
... I can't accept your offer, even though I appreciate it and thank you from the bottom of my heart. Truth is, I gotta get busy. I've heard there's a stage goin' out to the north to-night, and I gotta make it. By the way, did Hiram speak to you about advancin' him what ...
— The She Boss - A Western Story • Arthur Preston Hankins
... other white people would serve him in the same manner. One day he said to me, very movingly, 'Sometimes when a white man take away my fish I go to my maser, and he get me my right; and when my maser by strength take away my fishes, what me must do? I can't go to any body to be righted; then' said the poor man, looking up above 'I must look up to God Mighty in the top for right.' This artless tale moved me much, and I could not help feeling the just cause Moses had in redressing his brother against the Egyptian. I exhorted the man to look up ...
— The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, Or Gustavus Vassa, The African - Written By Himself • Olaudah Equiano
... "you've got to brace. A little more of this and we can't pull out. I tell you you're a championship team. We had that pennant cinched. A few cuts and sprains and hard luck—and you all quit! You lay down! I've been patient. I've plugged for you. Never a man have I fined or thrown down. But now I'm at the end of my string. I'm out to fine you ...
— The Redheaded Outfield and Other Baseball Stories • Zane Grey
... he said, earnestly, "there are some things that I can't permit, you know. My office must not be made a starting-place for one of your lawless adventures. You met Miss Fern here. Now, I protest against your going to her house, pretending that you are interested in that novel, when your real purpose ...
— A Black Adonis • Linn Boyd Porter
... accusin' at paw and maw. "Oh, they've been roastin' me, have they?" she demands. "Well, I can't help it. What they want to know is how much I'm gettin' so I'll have to give up more. But it don't work. See! I pay my board—good board, at that—and I'm not goin' to have paw snoopin' around my place tryin' to queer me. Let him get out and rustle ...
— Torchy and Vee • Sewell Ford
... mail-bags that came lumbering over us and about us; and as the dust rose from the tumult, we would all sneeze in chorus, and the majority of us would grumble, and probably say some hasty thing, like: "Take your elbow out of my ribs!—can't ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... Louis and New Orleans. I can't just figure out yet what he is doing up here. I asked him flat out, but he only laughed, and he isn't the sort of man you get very friendly with, some say he has Indian blood in him, so I dropped it. He and the Judge seem pretty thick, and they may ...
— The Devil's Own - A Romance of the Black Hawk War • Randall Parrish
... "You can't do that with 'Thalia," Lewis explained, patiently, "because it would make her unhappy. She takes everything so dreadfully hard; she feels things more than ...
— The Way to Peace • Margaret Deland
... "And I can't," the Colonel said regretfully. "I must go down to Balham and see poor Carlo Mallini I hear he's ...
— The Avenger • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... the fellows, pocketing his V, and giving the other to his companion—'we can't exactly let you go, but if you tip us over and run for it, perhaps we shan't be able to ...
— City Crimes - or Life in New York and Boston • Greenhorn
... if they never hit a man, this handful of sailors have been the saving of Ladysmith. You don't know, till you have tried it, what a worm you feel when the enemy is plugging shell into you and you can't possibly plug back. Even though they spared their shell, it made all the world of difference to know that the sailors could reach the big guns if they ever became unbearable. It makes all the difference to the Boers, too, I suspect; for as sure as Lady Anne ...
— From Capetown to Ladysmith - An Unfinished Record of the South African War • G. W. Steevens
... all, if you have such a fancy for her, I haven't really married her; one can't really consider ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... get them, this Company will go over and fight for Germany," said the Captain. "The country isn't worth fighting for if it can't ...
— "Contemptible" • "Casualty"
... can't be helped. But I must try my best and make it real—each spike, as I see it—the dead gray ones on the ground and the live green ones on the tree, and the baby ones and the old gray-pointed ones, which have seen their best days and will presently ...
— Lying Prophets • Eden Phillpotts
... wife, beat him!" Akim kept repeating in a tearful voice, trying helplessly and in vain to get up. "Murderer, robber.... She is not enough for you, you want to take my house, too, and everything.... But no, stop a bit ... that can't be.... I'll go myself, I'll speak myself ... how ... why should she sell it? Wait a bit, ...
— Knock, Knock, Knock and Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... ANYthing in any number of years,—you haven't the head to do it; and though you had fine motives, strong enough to make you burn yourself in a slow fire, if only first you could paint a picture, you can't paint one, nor half an inch of one; you haven't the hand to ...
— Sesame and Lilies • John Ruskin
... "I can't hurt you, even if I wished to do so. You are not a hare any longer, if you ever were one, but only the shadow ...
— The Mahatma and the Hare • H. Rider Haggard
... a prison exactly," the man replied, "except that she can't get free from it without the permission of them that put her there. She got in with some people who are now in custody, and as she will be an important witness, she will be, perhaps, detained there until the case comes before the magistrates; ...
— Little Folks (December 1884) - A Magazine for the Young • Various
... one of her shoes were found in the wood in the mouths of two lionesses' cubs whom KING PADELLA and a royal hunting party shot—for he was King now, and reigned over Crim Tartary. 'So the poor little Princess is done for,' said he; 'well, what's done can't be helped. Gentlemen, let us go to luncheon!' And one of the courtiers took up the shoe and put it in his pocket. And there was an end ...
— The Rose and the Ring • William Makepeace Thackeray
... the young Mexican, lifting his slender hand to his mouth. "I fear it is not good breeding, but I can't ...
— Frank Merriwell's Pursuit - How to Win • Burt L. Standish
... how God understands, you would need to be as wise as he is; so it is no use trying. You see you can't quite understand me, though I have a real meaning in ...
— David Elginbrod • George MacDonald
... Miles, and at one time fancied it would be a prettyish sort of an idee; but it won't stand logarithms, at all. You may build a room that shall have its cabin look, but you can't build one that'll have a cabin natur' You may get carlins, and transoms, and lockers and bulkheads all right; but where are you to get your motion? What's a cabin without motion? It would soon be like the sea in the calm latitudes, offensive ...
— Miles Wallingford - Sequel to "Afloat and Ashore" • James Fenimore Cooper
... "I can't get interested in Mediaeval History." This illustrates a kind of complaint frequently made by college students. It is our purpose in this chapter to show the fallacy of this; to prove that interest may be developed in an "uninteresting" subject; and ...
— How to Use Your Mind • Harry D. Kitson
... man And choirs repeat the chant, While unco' guid with unction urge Repression of the joys that surge, And jail for those who can't. The poor deluded duds forget That something drew the sting When Adam tiptoed to his fall, And made it hardly hurt at all. Of Mother ...
— The Eye of Zeitoon • Talbot Mundy
... and I can't bear to think of his being hanged! It quite breaks my heart to think that I was compelled to bring him ...
— Capitola's Peril - A Sequel to 'The Hidden Hand' • Mrs. E.D.E.N. Southworth
... a stick in his left hand and thumps the floor with it, saying, "He can do little who can't do this." Then he hands the stick to another player, who will most probably use his right hand when holding the stick and thumping the ground. If he does he is told he has failed in the simple task, and the stick is handed to another. The game ...
— Games For All Occasions • Mary E. Blain
... borrow your own illustration, you can't be far from shore yet. Why not return? You have seemed ...
— An Original Belle • E. P. Roe
... but effectually manipulated, swelled with gratified vanity and said, "You are quite right; you can't do this sort of thing yourself; you want ...
— The Woman-Hater • Charles Reade
... here, and we feel it more because it is so damp. I can't tell you how thankful I am to be able to get socks and warm things for the men. We can send things to the first dressing station by the ambulances, and from there they go to the trenches at once. Mrs. D——'s socks came ...
— 'My Beloved Poilus' • Anonymous
... Barrington. I know what a man's made of, and what a man can do. And I know what he can't do. I'm not bad at the outside skirmishing. I'm worth me salt. I say that with a just reliance on me own powers. But Phinny is a different sort of man. Phinny can stick to a desk from twelve to seven, and wish to come back again after dinner. He's had money left him, too, ...
— Phineas Redux • Anthony Trollope
... fit of humility this boy has got, that he can't do anything to-day. Unless, however, it be ...
— The Billow and the Rock • Harriet Martineau
... gone and put yourself THERE?" inquired the boatswain. "Though there is a notice to tell you NOT to sit there, it is there that you must go and sit! Can't you read?" ...
— Through Russia • Maxim Gorky
... You are interfering with my duty. Can't you see that I must teach the boy to make you a better return for your kindness than lying to hide ...
— The Dreamer - A Romantic Rendering of the Life-Story of Edgar Allan Poe • Mary Newton Stanard
... Faraday, was never a mathematician, and has had little personal use for arithmetic beyond that which is called "mental." He said once to a friend: "I can always hire some mathematicians, but they can't hire me." His father, by-the-way, always encouraged these literary tastes, and paid him a small sum for each new book mastered. It will be noted that fiction makes no showing in the list; but it was not altogether excluded from the home ...
— Edison, His Life and Inventions • Frank Lewis Dyer and Thomas Commerford Martin
... doubt she thought a lot of Bud, but when a woman has fourteen it sort of unsettles her mind so that she can't focus her affections or play any favorites. And so when Bud's clothes were found at the swimming hole one day, and no Bud inside them, she didn't take on up to the expectations of the neighbors who had brought the news, and who were ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume V. (of X.) • Various
... ours. Which allegations or inferences I rebutted with emphasis. "But, I confess, though I employed all my rhetoric, his mind did not seem to alter; and it will be a miracle if he change on this head." Alas, General! Can't be ...
— History Of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. VIII. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... A great rolling sea, dashing high up against the reeling ship's high tetering side, stove in the boat's bottom at the stern, and left it again, all dripping through like a sieve. Bad work, bad work! Mr. Starbuck, said Stubb, regarding the wreck, but the sea will have its way. Stubb, for one, can't fight it. You see, Mr. Starbuck, a wave has such a great long start before it leaps, all round the world it runs, and then comes the spring! But as for me, all the start I have to meet it, is just across the deck here. But ...
— Moby-Dick • Melville
... of killing, or sacking farms and houses to satisfy their greed. They knew all the woods and by-ways so well that no one could catch them. After a time they began to build themselves huts where they could sleep, and also hide the treasure they had plundered from rich men. You can't imagine any wicked or horrible thing they did not do. And, of course, they forgot God entirely, though once they had been Christian children and had been brought up to know and love God. Nine years passed like this, and ...
— Stories of the Saints by Candle-Light • Vera C. Barclay
... one's thoughts can never get away from it. [Vehemently; clenching her hands together.] No, I can't understand how such a thing—how anything so horrible can come upon one single family! And then—that it should be our family! So old a family as ours! Think of its ...
— John Gabriel Borkman • Henrik Ibsen
... very large temple, yet such is its grace, its exquisite proportions, its unapproachable charm—it never occurs to the beholder that it is of such great size. It is neither big nor little, nor heavy nor light—it is simply perfect. You can't tell why it is perfect, and you don't want to. You stand and look at the gem through the great gateway which serves as a frame for the picture, for the Taj is directly in front of the arch, probably five hundred yards distant. A narrow walk, lined on both sides with the choicest Indian plants, ...
— Round the World • Andrew Carnegie
... Lofty has her jewels, So have I; She wears hers upon her bosom, Inside I. She will leave hers at Death's portals, By and by; I shall bear the treasures with me When I die— For I have love, and she has gold; She counts her wealth, mine can't be told. ...
— Poems with Power to Strengthen the Soul • Various
... for you cannot be interrupted at this distance that I write to you, though I have nothing to say, for 'tis a bad time for small news; and when emperors and czarinas are dying all up and down Europe, one can't pretend to tell you of anything that happens within our sphere. Not but that we have our accidents too. If you have had a great wind in England, we have had a great water at Florence. We have been trying to set out every ...
— Selected English Letters (XV - XIX Centuries) • Various
... wasted; but the women made a great show of cleaning up Number Five, while they sighed and looked sad and told one another of the good hard times they had at home getting ready for Passover. Really, hard as it is, when one is used to it from childhood, it seems part of the holiday, and can't be left out. To sit down and wait for supper as on other nights seemed like breaking one of the laws. So they tried ...
— From Plotzk to Boston • Mary Antin
... Highness is the clever villain that we know him to be, I think we may safely trust him to arrange for your temporary disappearance from the scene. And whatever he does it will be easy for you to play the part of the passive victim for the time being. He can't injure or kill you, for if it came to extremities you have the means of giving his people such a fright as would probably drive them out of their senses, just as I could if their master got troublesome. Really, from a certain point of view, ...
— The Mummy and Miss Nitocris - A Phantasy of the Fourth Dimension • George Griffith
... persuasion on the part of Mary, Marion Lawrence, or the Loan Fund Committee en masse, could induce Madeline to change her mind. "Why, I can't be on a committee," she said. "I get around to recitations and meals and class meetings, and that's all I can possibly manage. You don't realize that I'd never had to be on time for anything in all my life till I came here, except for trains sometimes,—and you can generally count on their being ...
— Betty Wales, Sophomore • Margaret Warde
... so pleasant and so very engrossing," she murmured, busying herself with a sketch of Otto as he rowed gently towards one of the smaller islets. "I can't tell you how much I delight—turn your head a little more to the left—so—and do keep your nose ...
— The Island Queen • R.M. Ballantyne
... frowned: "If your attachment to your husband makes you say I haven't any chance—but it can't ...
— The Iron Woman • Margaret Deland
... indeed, Elizabeth's imprisonment of the Queen of Scots may be considered as one), and that the most solid justification for it was necessity. To quote the language of Lord Eldon, "I believe it will turn out that, if you can't make this a casus exceptionis or omissus in the law of nations, founded upon necessity, you will not really know what to say upon it. Salus Reipublicae suprema lex, as to one state; Salus omnium Rerumpublicarum ...
— The Constitutional History of England From 1760 to 1860 • Charles Duke Yonge
... "What! can't swim?" he exclaimed, running down the bank to the edge of the water. Baptiste was before him, however. In a moment he plunged in up to the neck, stretched forth his arm, grasped Hugh by the hair, and dragged ...
— The Young Fur Traders • R.M. Ballantyne
... the people in a body To the Town Hall came flocking: ''Tis clear', cried they, 'our Mayor's a noddy; And as for our Corporation—shocking To think we buy gowns lined with ermine For dolts that can't or won't determine What's best to rid us of our vermin! You hope, because you're old and obese, To find in the furry civic robe ease? Rouse up, Sirs! Give your brains a racking To find the remedy we're lacking, Or, sure as fate, we'll ...
— English Critical Essays - Nineteenth Century • Various
... they do," said the land-owner, suppressing a yawn. "But we can't send them this wood, you know, or even get it down Oil Creek, where there ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 90, April, 1865 • Various
... "I thought your manners were not quite those of a peasant girl; if your mother was in service, that's another thing. Come, take a cup of coffee with me. Prepare the coffee-pot and make haste before the others come; I can't ask every one, ...
— The Little Russian Servant • Henri Greville
... "That is the voluntary system. But these fellows can't drop out. There's no bottom to the Catholic Church. Everything that's in, stays in. If you don't mind my saying so—of course I view you all impartially from the outside—but it seems logical to me that a church should exist ...
— The Damnation of Theron Ware • Harold Frederic
... "That is a question you will have to decide for yourself," she said demurely. "You can't ...
— The Silver Butterfly • Mrs. Wilson Woodrow
... "You can't avoid doing so," replied Madame de Camps. "In the first place, Nais will chatter about it. Besides, Monsieur de Sallenauve addresses you in a most respectful manner, and there is nothing in the letter to feed ...
— The Deputy of Arcis • Honore de Balzac
... said Sheldon, "not different at all, only wider and more free. Do you not see that at present it is an elegant monopoly, belonging to a few select persons, who have been refined and civilised up to a certain point? The difficulty is that we can't reach that point all at once—why, it has taken you thirty or forty centuries to reach it!—and at present we can't get further than the municipal art-gallery, and lectures on the ethical outlook of Browning. But that is not what ...
— Beside Still Waters • Arthur Christopher Benson
... it said. "I'm to greet you kindly from my sweetheart, and here's a little loaf for you. She took it from the kitchen. There's plenty of bread there, and you must be hungry. You can't possibly get into the palace, for you are barefooted, and the guards in silver and the lackeys in gold would not allow it. But don't cry; you shall go up. My sweetheart knows a little back staircase that leads ...
— Journeys Through Bookland V2 • Charles H. Sylvester
... minute," Joe replied. "Let's see if we can't find out which way the current sets in ...
— The Boys of Crawford's Basin - The Story of a Mountain Ranch in the Early Days of Colorado • Sidford F. Hamp
... we had a music-teacher of our own: can't your German be made of any practical account? Or is he only to be looked at and revered ...
— Richard Vandermarck • Miriam Coles Harris
... as he lay on the grass; "this is out of all calculation. But it was entirely owing to the saddle. You can't but acknowledge, that if I had kept my seat, the beautiful lady would have been mine. But thus it is when ...
— Stories from the Italian Poets: With Lives of the Writers, Vol. 2 • Leigh Hunt
... for a certainty that Jacob Herapath had a transaction of some sort with one Luigi Dimambro, on November 12th, and that it resulted in his handing, or sending, the said Luigi a cheque for three thousand guineas. Let's see if we can't find some trace of it, or some mention of it, or of previous dealings with Dimambro, amongst Jacob's papers. I suppose we can get access to everything here at the house, and down at the office, too, can't we? The probability is that the transaction ...
— The Herapath Property • J. S. Fletcher
... common than a Traveller's beginning the Account of his Voyages with one of his own Family; in which, if he can't boast Antiquity, he is sure to make it up with the Probity of his Ancestors. As it can no way interest my Reader, I shall decline following a Method, which I can't but think ridiculous, as unnecessary. I shall only say, that by the Death of my Father and Mother, which happen'd ...
— A Voyage to Cacklogallinia - With a Description of the Religion, Policy, Customs and Manners of That Country • Captain Samuel Brunt
... cooking of the accursed English. It seemed to annoy him particularly that I should have joined their party. 'If you knew what you were doing, thirty thousand millions of pigs! you would keep yourself to yourself! The horses can't drag the cart; the roads are all ruts and swamps. No longer ago than last night the Colonel and I had to march half the way—thunder of God!—half the way to the knees in mud—and I with this infernal cold—and the danger of ...
— St Ives • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Warwickshire. I know I'm changing for the bad here. I live like a dam' beach-comber. I only get a screw of three hundred francs a month, and that all goes for us two, with medicines and doctors. She'd go to Atuona if I'd go; but I can't make a living there, and I'm rotten enough now without living off her people in the cannibal group. She's skin and bones ...
— Mystic Isles of the South Seas. • Frederick O'Brien
... hand," Miss Morel began one morning, as they stepped out on the promenade deck for their constitutional. "You know, I think people at home don't understand at all. They are so absorbed with their little parish affairs that they can't appreciate this wonderful work that is being done ...
— John Wesley, Jr. - The Story of an Experiment • Dan B. Brummitt
... way of saying that I'm boring you, eh? I can't help it. I shall be just the same to my dying day. The wound is too ...
— The Frontier • Maurice LeBlanc
... and no; he is queer and he isn't queer. He has plenty of book learning and plenty of money, and a fool can't get much of either. Folks say he has every kind of ...
— A Dream of Empire - Or, The House of Blennerhassett • William Henry Venable
... of a minute, "so wur his mare. I mind me I wur behind his mare about five years ago last Michaelmas, and I wur well-nigh perished. I wur a- goin' to give her a poke with my stick, and old Bartlett says, 'Doan't hit her, doan't hit her; yer can't alter her.'" ...
— Catharine Furze • Mark Rutherford
... indeed! I only wish you had it to bear. I tell you it can't be borne! Water, water, for the love of heaven! carry me to the river and throw me in. My eyes are put out; they burn like balls ...
— Elsie's Motherhood • Martha Finley
... "If you can't be original yourself," said the Colonel kindly, "the next best thing is to quote from those ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Oct. 10, 1917 • Various
... cried the young lieutenant in command. "Can't you see him, Van? Oh, hang it, lad, look! We mustn't let the poor beggar drown, even if ...
— The Black Bar • George Manville Fenn
... seminary as unfit for the service. He declined to encourage them in their views. Still they came in increasing numbers. Finally he asked them, "What shall I do with you? Where shall I send you? I don't know; I can do nothing for you." Their reply was, "Only pray with us; that can do no harm; if we can't go we must even stay. But if it is God's work, and his holy will that we go, he will open the door in ...
— History of Rationalism Embracing a Survey of the Present State of Protestant Theology • John F. Hurst
... "You can't, of course; but you will have to accept my assurance that I am honest. I promise to fulfill my part of the bargain—literally to the letter. You may verify and find that the series is complete. Your attorneys, to ...
— Out of the Ashes • Ethel Watts Mumford
... it can't be done at once. We must plan. I need help. There are Lassiter and Jane to get out of Surprise Valley. Give me time, dear—give me time. It'll be a hard job. And we must plan so we can positively get away. ...
— The Rainbow Trail • Zane Grey
... One of these, whose eldest brother had just succeeded to an earldom, said one day to a railway manager: "I like railways—they just suit young fellows like me with 'nothing per annum paid quarterly.' You know we can't afford to post, and it used to be deuced annoying to me, as I was jogging along on the box-seat of the stage-coach, to see the little Earl go by drawn by his four posters, and just look up at me and give ...
— Lives of the Engineers - The Locomotive. George and Robert Stephenson • Samuel Smiles
... there, we can't have him; but hurry up, Uncle Job, and come over and tell us if he isn't there," said the soldier, as he hurried away as rapidly as he came, evidently believing that hope was a panacea ...
— Stand By The Union - SERIES: The Blue and the Gray—Afloat • Oliver Optic
... Can't say exactly; but I reckon we can reach the valley by sunrise, and not overwork our horses. They're ...
— The Talking Leaves - An Indian Story • William O. Stoddard
... knows, dey was borned and bred in dat same county. Pa, he was sold away from Ma when I was still a baby. Ma's job was to weave all de cloth for de white folks. I have wore many a dress made out of de homespun what she wove. Dere was 17 of us chillun, and I can't 'member de names of but two of 'em now—dey was John and Sarah. John was Ma's onliest son; all de rest of de other ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves: Volume IV, Georgia Narratives, Part 1 • Works Projects Administration
... word; find the letters that compose it, and it opens at once. The moment I heard the Gaelic, I knew I had discovered the cypher—I tried it and succeeded. Tell you what, Pilot, love and skill laugh at locks, for them that can't be opened can be picked. The mechanism of the human heart, when you thoroughly understand it, is, like all the other works of nature, very beautiful, very wonderful, but very simple. When it does not work well, the fault is not in the machinery, but ...
— Nature and Human Nature • Thomas Chandler Haliburton
... another window again. Outside there comes along the 'Flying Post.' I place myself in front near the driver. I was soon requested to pay, but I have only three heller with me. So the conductor says to me, 'Well, if you can't pay, then you must put up with our sweaty feet.' Now, as if by command, all the passengers in the coach drew off a shoe and each held a sweaty foot in front of ...
— Hidden Symbolism of Alchemy and the Occult Arts • Herbert Silberer
... dropped his hand. "You're a wicked, unappreciative boy," she declared. "I don't know whether to ask you to my house or not. But you may make yourself useful in this house, at least. Run along over to that corner and see if you can't get me a cup ...
— Bertram Cope's Year • Henry Blake Fuller
... Irvine, and let it be marked against me, and then you will be sure of your money then-for it is entirely out of my power to pay you any other way just now. I beg that you will comply with my request, as I can't ...
— Second Shetland Truck System Report • William Guthrie
... blackbirds whistling ever since?" said Guido; "and there was such a big black one up in our cherry tree this morning, and I shot my arrow at him and very nearly hit him. Besides, there is a blackbird whistling now—you listen. There, he's somewhere in the copse. Why can't you listen to ...
— The Open Air • Richard Jefferies
... and can't tell tales no more nor Mr. Beauclerc, and Dr. Sturk's a dead man too, you may say; and I think he knew—that is—brought to mind somewhat. He lay, you see, on the night Mr. Beauclerc lost his life, in a sort of a dressing-room, off ...
— The House by the Church-Yard • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... never write with pleasure to myself, nor with purpose of getting praise to myself. I hate writing, and know that what I do does not deserve high praise, as literature; but I write to tell truths which I can't help crying out about, and I DO enjoy being ...
— The Early Life of Mark Rutherford • Mark Rutherford
... shipment of the fourteenth instant to hand, and in reply will say we ain't satisfied with nothing but style forty-one-fifty. Our Miss Kenny is a perfect thirty-six, and she can't breathe in them Empires style 3022, in sizes 36, 38 or 40. What is the matter with you, anyway? We are returning them via Eagle Dispatch. We are yours truly, The Boston ...
— Potash & Perlmutter - Their Copartnership Ventures and Adventures • Montague Glass
... than one grudge. It is said that Thomas Campbell, twenty years after the appearance of his best-known poem, was one day introduced as "the author of 'The Pleasures of Hope.'" "Confound 'The Pleasures of Hope,'" he protested; "can't I write anything else?" So, however much I may prefer my later work, more carefully wrought in respect of thought, structure, and style, this initial novel, the favorite of the larger public, has ...
— The Hoosier Schoolmaster - A Story of Backwoods Life in Indiana • Edward Eggleston
... trying to bring the Booth business to an end so far as I am concerned, but it's like getting a wolf by the ears; you can't let him go ...
— The Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley Volume 3 • Leonard Huxley
... torment or eternal bliss. To commit sin is a terrible thing and a very serious thing. That is the reason we need to search the Scriptures to find out how to live pleasing to the Lord in this world. We can't do this within ourselves. God had a plan for us by sending Jesus Christ to die on the cross for our salvation, so through Christ we can ...
— The Key To Peace • A. Marie Miles
... "Can't you," says Josiah, "because I look so much like your old father, or because I am a Methodist, or because my wife's mother used to live neighbor to your grandmother—let me have ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume IV. (of X.) • Various
... of the arts to express one's disgust at the daily increasing hideousness of the posters with which all our towns are daubed. Still we ought to be disgusted at such horrors, and I think make up our minds never to buy any of the articles so advertised. I can't believe they can be worth much if they need all that shouting to ...
— Hopes and Fears for Art • William Morris
... announced. "Too late for the bank. I'll go to the banker's villa for our gulden. Unless the bottom drops out of the Barang, she'll be in before morning, and we can't lose ...
— Gold Out of Celebes • Aylward Edward Dingle
... his good pleasure." In the verse preceding this one the apostle tells us to "work out our salvation with fear and trembling," and then he adds for our encouragement, "God will work in you the power to will and to do that which will secure your eternal salvation." Never say, "I can't." ...
— Food for the Lambs; or, Helps for Young Christians • Charles Ebert Orr
... "I'm talking about the Colonel, and I'll tell you what I'll do. I can't give the mine to Virginia because she won't take it; but the Colonel is a gentleman. He's reasonable, Charley, and I'd get along with him fine; so come on, ...
— Shadow Mountain • Dane Coolidge
... with fat cows and milk and butter, had you behaved well. I will have my men ready to attack Fowooka to-morrow. The Turks have ten men, you have thirteen; thirteen and ten make twenty-three. You shall be carried if you can't walk, and we will give Fowooka no chance. He must be killed—only kill him, and MY BROTHER will give you half ...
— In the Heart of Africa • Samuel White Baker
... best, by putting out our legs to trip up the fellow in his flight, but all to no purpose—"abiit, evasit," &c.—why, then, I say, what's the use of any more virtue? Enough has been given to morality; now comes the turn of Taste and the Fine Arts. A sad thing it was, no doubt, very sad; but we can't mend it. Therefore let us make the best of a bad matter; and, as it is impossible to hammer anything out of it for moral purposes, let us treat it aesthetically, and see if it will turn to account in that way. Such is the ...
— Miscellaneous Essays • Thomas de Quincey
... not ashamed?" she said with considerable animation. "You know very well that I do all I can. It is not my fault that we came here. I should like to see you with two children in a place where you can't get a drop of hot water. We ought as soon as we reached Paris to have settled ourselves at once in a home; that was ...
— L'Assommoir • Emile Zola
... mercenary. A cook need never fear but that she will always be in constant employment. Ah, yes! Max O'Rell got in a home thrust when he declared that "the average woman who finds herself alone in the world could earn her living if she could cook— but she can't." ...
— The Art of Living in Australia • Philip E. Muskett (?-1909)
... music misfits the words. It's beyond the range of most voices. The harmonies are thin. No crowd in the world can sing it. What is the value or inspiration of a national song that the people can't sing?" ...
— Success - A Novel • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... case if we will produce a single authority to that effect. It were easy to produce the authority [see 1 Chitty, C.L. Indictment], but, unfortunately, the District Attorney has made a promise which he can't fulfil. The District Attorney is mistaken in this matter; at the same time, let me admit that in the management of this case he has displayed an ability beyond his years. This is the first prosecution ever ...
— Personal Memoir Of Daniel Drayton - For Four Years And Four Months A Prisoner (For Charity's Sake) In Washington Jail • Daniel Drayton
... that," said Esau. "But I don't know," he cried. "Look at this stump; why, it must be twenty or thirty feet round. And look at 'em, hundreds and thousands of 'em, all standing as close together as they can. Oh, look! look! look! Can't help it, I must shout. I don't care about the trouble or the work, or the long voyage. I'd go through it all again to come to such a place as this. Oh, I do wish mother was ...
— To The West • George Manville Fenn |
