"Unlucky" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... shoulder one another as they stoop and with both hands grab up as many snakes as they can hold in their fingers, and suddenly separating, turn and face towards the edge of the rock, running with all their might, thrusting the snakes into the faces of any unlucky tourist or visitor who ...
— The High Calling • Charles M. Sheldon
... Yuletide from the cave in the Horselberg, which is the scene of Tannhauser's adventure with Venus in Wagner's opera, and Holda is the mother of many of the uncanny creatures which strike terror to the souls of the unlucky huntsmen who ...
— A Book of Operas - Their Histories, Their Plots, and Their Music • Henry Edward Krehbiel
... crack, a flap, a rattle; and blank dismay! An unlucky shot had cut the foremast in two, and all forward was a ...
— The Junior Classics • Various
... territory, with feudal rights and privileges, was offered to any man settling a colony of fifty persons. The disputes which soon arose between these powerful vassals and the sovereign Company had for one effect the recall of Peter Minuit from his position of governor. Never again was the unlucky colony to have so competent and worthy a head as this discarded elder of the church. Nevertheless the scheme was ...
— A History of American Christianity • Leonard Woolsey Bacon
... time, though Lincoln played an active local part in the campaigns of the Whig party, concern us little. The Whigs, to whom he did subordinate service, were, as has been said, an unlucky party. In 1840, in the reaction which extreme commercial depression created against the previously omnipotent Democrats, the Whig candidate for the Presidency was successful. This was General Harrison, a respected soldier of the last war, who was glorified as a sort of Cincinnatus and elected ...
— Abraham Lincoln • Lord Charnwood
... to Catiline, he had already sent the poniard to the house of Cicero, and a brief letter indicating all that he had learned from Volero. This he had done in the interval between the Campus and his unlucky visit to the house of Catiline, whom he then little deemed to be the man of whom he was ...
— The Roman Traitor (Vol. 1 of 2) • Henry William Herbert
... nine-tenths of such men do make, a grand crash, and his name comes out in the third or fourth class, or he get "gulfed" altogether—it is two to one but his friends and his tutor look upon him, and talk of him, as rather an ill-used individual. He was "unlucky in his examination"—"the essay did not suit him"—they were "quite surprised at his failure"—"his health was not good the last term or two"—"he was too nervous." These are cases which have occurred ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 58, Number 358, August 1845 • Various
... unhappy Flybekins could not retrieve the blunder they had committed, and prudently resigned all their ambitious schemes. So they returned to Devonshire with the unlucky fire-escapes, sincerely regretting they had ever been tempted to purchase them. But, although the disaster had got wind, and with various versions had reached even into Devonshire, they were much consoled by the ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 20, No. - 580, Supplemental Number • Various
... got the money and redeemed his girl, then he said to me, "I have got about $700, so let us go up and play single- handed." We went up, and I soon got that money. He said, "In all my poker playing, I never played so unlucky in my life." He went to my partner and borrowed $1,000 more on the girl, and I took that in. He then went to Captain Keys, and tried to borrow the money to redeem his girl again, but the Captain would not loan it to him. He found a man ...
— Forty Years a Gambler on the Mississippi • George H. Devol
... of his ill success never for a moment occurred to the mind of Jacob. He considered himself an "unlucky dog." ...
— Graham's Magazine, Vol. XXXII No. 4, April 1848 • Various
... forbidden liquors, which you make out of durra and dates;" and turning to me, he demanded "whether he was not right?" The poor chief appeared to be much vexed that he was unable to reply to this accusation, and remained silent. The soldier, not content with humbling the unlucky Malek, pursued his advantage without mercy. "Come," said he to the chief, "I do not believe that you know any thing about your religion, and I will soon make you sensible of it" He then asked the chief how many ...
— A Narrative of the Expedition to Dongola and Sennaar • George Bethune English
... in consequence whenever he became puzzled about facts that were being read to him or that he heard he would instantly appeal to Van, whom he was sure could right every sort of dilemma that might arise. But too often the unlucky Van was forced to blush and falter that he would have to look it up; and when he did so he frequently learned something himself. For Tim never forgot. No sooner would Van be inside the gate than the shrill little voice would pipe: "And did ...
— The Story of Sugar • Sara Ware Bassett
... her with foot and hand, In every thing that she could dee, Till once, in an unlucky time, She threw her ...
— Ballads of Mystery and Miracle and Fyttes of Mirth - Popular Ballads of the Olden Times - Second Series • Frank Sidgwick
... get their rents in somehow, of course,' Lord Exmoor assented, sympathetically; 'and I know all you men who are unlucky enough to own property in Ireland have a lot of trouble about it nowadays. Upon my word, what with Fenians, and what with Nihilists, and what with Communards, I really don't know what the world ...
— Philistia • Grant Allen
... before had he heard the Virginian tell a humorous anecdote, and he was not a little surprised as well as pleased, for it showed that Jack, who had grumbled a great deal during the unlucky and unpleasant cruise down the coast, was in better spirits now they were at last in the waters ...
— Frank Merriwell's Cruise • Burt L. Standish
... was weak and naturally unlucky, and so he got married three times inside of a year. He was convicted and sentenced for four years. He seemed greatly relieved. As the expiration of his term grew near, he wrote from the penitentiary to his lawyer, with ...
— Jokes For All Occasions - Selected and Edited by One of America's Foremost Public Speakers • Anonymous
... only for a few moments, little opportunity is afforded of seeing the interior of the towns, or of visiting most of the places at which we touch. At such times all is hurry and confusion; suddenly the bell rings, the planks are withdrawn, and the unlucky stranger who has loitered on board for a few moments is obliged to proceed with us to ...
— A Visit to the Holy Land • Ida Pfeiffer
... took a human shape; at others its form took that of some animal fancied to foreshadow the character of the man to whom it belonged. Thus it becomes a bear, a wolf, an ox, and even a fox, in men. The fylgjur of women were fond of taking the shape of swans. To see one's own fylgja was unlucky, and often a sign that a man was "fey," or death-doomed. So, when Thord Freedmanson tells Njal that he sees the goat wallowing in its gore in the "town" of Bergthorsknoll, the foresighted man tells him that he has seen his own fylgja, and ...
— The story of Burnt Njal - From the Icelandic of the Njals Saga • Anonymous
... possessing the Evil Eye. As long ago as the ninth century, in the year 842, Erchempert, a frate of the celebrated convent of Monte Cassino, writes,—"I knew formerly Messer Landulf, Bishop of Capua, a man of singular prudence, who was wont to say, 'Whenever I meet a monk, something unlucky always happens to me during the day.'" And to this day, there are many persons, who, if they meet a monk or priest, on first going out in the morning, will not proceed upon their errand or business until they have returned to ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 32, June, 1860 • Various
... am a little out of sorts," he said. "I was thinking, perhaps, how different it might have been, if it hadn't been for that unlucky shell." ...
— Under Wellington's Command - A Tale of the Peninsular War • G. A. Henty
... shift to shoot a moorfowl i' the drift." He was uncommonly well made. I never saw a limb, loins, and shoulders so framed for immoderate strength. And, as Tom Purdie observed, "Faith, an he hadna' been crippled he wud ha'e been an unlucky chap." ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 576 - Vol. 20 No. 576., Saturday, November 17, 1832 • Various
... without comment, and it was regarded as a 91 fatal omen that Vitellius took office as high priest, and issued his encyclical on public worship on the 18th of July, which, as the anniversary of the disasters on the Cremera and the Allia,[432] had long been considered an unlucky day. But his ignorance of all civil and religious precedent was only equalled by the incapacity of his freedmen and friends. He seemed to live in a society of drunkards. However, at the consular elections he canvassed for his candidates like a common citizen.[433] ...
— Tacitus: The Histories, Volumes I and II • Caius Cornelius Tacitus
... his better half was in a bad temper. "How is it," she snapped, "that you're so unlucky at the races, and yet you ...
— Best Short Stories • Various
... groaning about the war, goes on to speak with delight of the martial ardour displayed by the only son left to him, a boy of five. Marthereau shakes his weary head, his fine eyes shining like those of a puzzled and thoughtful hound. He sighs, saying: "Oh, we're none of us so bad, but we're unlucky, poor devils all of us. But we're too stupid, we're ...
— The Forerunners • Romain Rolland
... were many who were ready to side with him, but his unlucky conclusion turned these possible friends into enemies. Even Mistress Fitzwalter ...
— Robin Hood • Paul Creswick
... head-gear and with many-coloured trappings, whilst on the harness itself appears in more than one place the little brazen hand, which is supposed to ensure the steed's safety from the dangers of any chance jettatore, the unlucky wight endowed with the Evil Eye. Nor is the swarthy picturesque ruffian who acts as our driver unprovided with a talisman in case of emergency, for we observe hanging from his heavy silver watch-chain the long twisted horn ...
— The Naples Riviera • Herbert M. Vaughan
... decidedly uncertain—the little happenings of each day gradually grow to have a peculiar significance of their own, and finally a brand-new set of superstitions is formed and half jokingly believed in by every one concerned. In this way an expedition comes to be regarded as lucky or unlucky, or lucky on certain days, or at certain hours of the day, or at certain periods of the moon. The wide reaches of the African veldt have something ...
— Stories from Everybody's Magazine • 1910 issues of Everybody's Magazine
... the Thirty Years' War (1618-1648) was as auspicious to the Hohenzollerns as it was unlucky for the Habsburgs. On the eve of the contest, propitious marriage alliances bestowed two important legacies upon the family—the duchy of Cleves [Footnote: Though the alliance between Brandenburg and Cleves dated from 1614, ...
— A Political and Social History of Modern Europe V.1. • Carlton J. H. Hayes
... "a very unlucky accident must have occurred here. Some one of us must have slipped the box into his pocket unconsciously, mistaking it for his own. I will take the lead in searching mine, if the rest of ...
— Twilight Stories • Various
... an unlucky accident had received his death's wound, heu me miserum exclamat, miserable man that I am, (instead of other devotions) he cries out, shall I die before I see my sweetheart Rhodanthe? Sic amor mortem, (saith mine author) aut quicquid humanitus accidit, ...
— The Anatomy of Melancholy • Democritus Junior
... the followers of Monet, Manet, Degas, and Whistler, talked as if the end of the world had arrived. Art is a serious affair in Paris. However, after Cezanne appeared the paintings of that half-crazy, unlucky genius, Vincent van Gogh, and of the gifted, brutal Gauguin. And in the face of such offerings Cezanne may yet, by reason of his moderation, achieve the unhappy fate of becoming a classic. He is certainly as ...
— Promenades of an Impressionist • James Huneker
... "That is unlucky, because you will be expected to shine without any obstructing fog to-day in the Rucellai Gardens. I take it for granted ...
— Romola • George Eliot
... flared. Suddenly his troubled mind was clarified, as though Oldham's menace had acted as a chemical reagent to precipitate all his doubts. Whatever the incidental hardships, right must prevail. And, as always, in the uprooting of evil, some unlucky innocent must suffer. It is the hardship of life, inevitable, not to be blinked at if a man is to be a man, and do a man's part. He leaned forward with so swift a movement that Oldham involuntarily ...
— The Rules of the Game • Stewart Edward White
... what he said about you havin' 'em all bluffed in San Berdoo! Grabbed you with a bunch uh moonshiners, and you fightin' the saps harder'n any of 'em—and then, by heck, you slips the noose an' leaves 'em thinkin' you're honest but unlucky. ...
— The Trail of the White Mule • B. M. Bower
... merrily with Mary and Morton,—who, by good luck, had brought round his presents late, and was staying to tie on glass balls and apples,—had given himself a deep and dangerous wound with the point of the unlucky knife, and had lost a great deal of blood before the hemorrhage could be controlled. Just before I entered, the stick tourniquet which Morton had improvised had slipped in poor Mary's unpractised hand, at the moment he was about to secure the bleeding ...
— The Man Without a Country and Other Tales • Edward E. Hale
... with the screech owl referring to death, it is interesting to note that among the Nahuas the owl is considered of unlucky augury and is usually found in the "House of Death" and "of Drought", as contrasted with the turkey, considered as a bird of good fortune, and found ...
— Animal Figures in the Maya Codices • Alfred M. Tozzer and Glover M. Allen
... council advised him by all means to make himself master of some good walled town; as well to make his men find the sweetness of rich spoils, and to allure to him all loose and lost people, by like hopes of booty as to be a sure retreat to his forces in case they should have any ill day or unlucky chance of the field. Wherefore they took heart to them and went on, and besieged the city of Exeter, the principal town for strength and wealth in ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 8 - The Later Renaissance: From Gutenberg To The Reformation • Editor-in-Chief: Rossiter Johnson
... had been denominated "shiftless and slack-twisted" by all who ever had any dealings with him in his unlucky, aimless life—one of those improvident, easygoing souls who sit contentedly down to breakfast with a very faint idea where their dinner ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1896 to 1901 • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... is a breach of etiquette. It is impossible to be polite without cultivating a good memory. The absent or self- absorbed person who forgets the names of his next-door neighbors, recalls unlucky topics, confuses the personal relationships of his personal friends, speaks of the dead as if they were still living, talks of peole in their hearing, and commits a hundred such blunders without any malevolent intention, is sure to make enemies for himself, and to wound the feelings ...
— Frost's Laws and By-Laws of American Society • Sarah Annie Frost
... 'How unlucky you are,' said Gudu, snatching the leaves; 'no sooner had you gone than ever so many people arrived, and washed their hands, as you see, and ate your portion.' But, though Isuro knew better than to believe him, he said nothing, ...
— The Orange Fairy Book • Various
... declared itself in his speech. He could win the liking and confidence of any ordinary man of business in ten minutes. It happened, fortunately, that the firm of Quodling needed just such a representative. As Gammon knew, they had been unlucky in their town traveller of late, and they looked just now more to the "address," the personal qualities, of an applicant for the position, than to his actual acquaintance with their business, which was greatly ...
— The Town Traveller • George Gissing
... his brother, Dr. Kinsolving nearly trod on a rattlesnake, "the same snake in every particular with the one I had had in my mind's eye". This would be very well, but Dr. Kinsolving's brother, who helped to kill the unlucky serpent, says "he had a single rattle". The letters of these gentlemen were written without communication to each other. If Mr. Kinsolving is right, the real snake with one rattle was not the dream snake with ...
— The Book of Dreams and Ghosts • Andrew Lang
... might be the general turn of political sentiment, both sides felt a patriotic pride in the success of the American arms. Hence, it is probable, the temper of the crowd assembled to do dishonor to the unlucky general. While the Republicans were indignant at a supposed needless national disaster, the Federalists could scarcely rejoice at it; and thus the moderation of the latter tended to restrain the former from the display of any actually violent demonstration. ...
— Old New England Traits • Anonymous
... (Who did with weeping eyes these discords see, And fears the omen may unlucky be,) Prepares a zambra to be danced this night. In hope soft pleasures may ...
— The Works Of John Dryden, Volume 4 (of 18) - Almanzor And Almahide, Marriage-a-la-Mode, The Assignation • John Dryden
... had lately married. On the 30th October, 1844, he was wedded to a young girl of Carpentras, Marie Villard, and already a child was born. His parents, always unlucky, met nowhere with any success. By dint of many wanderings they had finally become stranded at Pierrelatte, the chief town of the canton of La Drme, sheltered by the great rock which has given the place ...
— Fabre, Poet of Science • Dr. G.V. (C.V.) Legros
... suspicious of anyone living abroad. If you had been able to advertise from a rectory in Lincolnshire, or even an obscure street at the west end of London, they'd have thought better of you. But Boulogne, Calais, Dieppe, they all hint at impecuniosity and enforced exile. It's very unlucky.' ...
— The Golden Calf • M. E. Braddon
... it was for this reason, more than for any other, that Mr. The Englishman took it extremely ill that Corporal Theophile should be so devoted to little Bebelle, the child at the Barber's shop. In an unlucky moment he had chanced to say to himself, "Why, confound the fellow, he is not her father!" There was a sharp sting in the speech which ran into him suddenly, and put him in a worse mood. So he had National Participled the unconscious Corporal with most ...
— Somebody's Luggage • Charles Dickens
... when he went out and bought a red pot for the unlucky pansy, which, after its travels and its night in brown paper, looked as disconsolate as Mary herself. "I know it'll die right away," she muttered as she set it on the window-sill. "Oh, dear, there's mother calling. ...
— Nine Little Goslings • Susan Coolidge
... easy to tell the whole story, from its beginning to its unlucky end. During its progress the cobbler listened with the deepest attention, gave now a nod, and now a shake of the head or a muttered "Humph!" and when it was finished he fingered his cheek thoughtfully, ...
— White Lilac; or the Queen of the May • Amy Walton
... you will see that Jane Hatfield had but little to do with Lester's conversion. The next morning after the occurrence of the wonderful phantom in the clouds, Murray left his home, and soon after enlisted in the army under General Montgomery. He was in the unlucky expedition ...
— The Old Bell Of Independence; Or, Philadelphia In 1776 • Henry C. Watson
... Langton's extremity faded out of his mind as he hurried back to his class-room, leaving that unlucky small boy still in ...
— The Giant's Robe • F. Anstey
... saw were of the florid periwig architecture—I mean of that pompous cauliflower kind of ornament which was the fashion in Louis the Fifteenth's time, at which unlucky period a building mania seems to have seized upon many of the monarchs of Europe, and innumerable public edifices were erected. It seems to me to have been the period in all history when society ...
— Notes on a Journey from Cornhill to Grand Cairo • William Makepeace Thackeray
... diversified by long and short syllables, a circumstance that qualifies them for the melody of Hexameter verse: ours are extremely ill qualified for that service, because they super-abound in short syllables. Secondly, the bulk of our monosyllables are arbitrary with regard to length, which is an unlucky circumstance in Hexameter. * * * In Latin and Greek Hexameter invariable sounds direct and ascertain the melody. English Hexameter would be destitute of melody, unless by artful pronunciation; because of necessity the bulk of its sounds must ...
— Legends of the Northwest • Hanford Lennox Gordon
... voyage. He mentions goats also on the island in abundance, but says the Dutch were unable to catch them, and at a loss how to get at their bodies when shot; but they were frightened from this sport by an unlucky accident which happened to the steward of one of the ships, soon after their arrival, who, rambling one evening in the mountains, fell suddenly from the top of a rock and was dashed to pieces. They found here the remains of a wreck, supposed by them to ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 11 • Robert Kerr
... come into Pharsalia, and both encamped there, Pompey's thoughts ran the same way as they had done before, against fighting, and the more because of some unlucky presages, and a vision he had in a dream. But those who were about him were so confident of success, that Domitius, and Spinther, and Scipio, as if they had already conquered, quarreled which should succeed ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... word or two, before you go. I have done the State some service, and they know it; No more of that.—I pray you in your letters, When you shall these unlucky deeds relate, Speak of me as I am; nothing extenuate, Nor set down aught in malice; then must you speak Of one that loved not wisely, but too well; Of one not easily jealous, but being wrought Perplexed in the extreme; of one whose hand, Like the base Indian, ...
— The Man Shakespeare • Frank Harris
... "That 'unlucky' poem to my poor Mary has been the cause of some animadversion from 'ladies in years'. I have not printed it in this collection in consequence of my being pronounced a most 'profligate sinner', in ...
— Byron's Poetical Works, Vol. 1 • Byron
... had come from Louisbourg with supplies and that other ships were on their way with the design of re-establishing the fort at the mouth of the river and so frustrating a similar design on the part of the English. The story seemed so plausible that an unlucky Acadian went on board the ship to pilot her to her anchorage, but no sooner was he on board than the captain hoisted his own proper flag and discharged his artillery upon the people collected on shore. Belliveau and the people who ...
— Glimpses of the Past - History of the River St. John, A.D. 1604-1784 • W. O. Raymond
... two unlucky words get much more hold in the language, we shall soon have our philosophers refusing to call their dinner "dinner," but speaking of it always as their ...
— Modern Painters, Volume IV (of V) • John Ruskin
... impute rather to the carelessness of his temper than to any want of generosity; but perhaps she derived it from the latter motive. Certain it is that she hated him very bitterly on that account, and resolved to take every opportunity of injuring him with her mistress. It was therefore highly unlucky for her, that she had gone to the very same town and inn whence Jones had started, and still more unlucky was she in having stumbled on the same guide, and on this accidental discovery which ...
— The History of Tom Jones, a foundling • Henry Fielding
... aided Cassius. But Cleopatra protested loudly to me and others that Serapion had acted against her will. Yet Charmion told me that, as with Allienus, it was because of a prophecy of Dioscorides the unlucky that the Queen herself had secretly ordered Serapion so to do. Still, this did not save Serapion, for to prove to Antony that she was innocent she dragged the General from the sanctuary and slew him. Woe be to those ...
— Cleopatra • H. Rider Haggard
... (whose tremendous travels are forthcoming with due decorations, graphical, topographical, typographical) deposed, on Sir John Carr's unlucky suit, that Mr. Dubois's satire prevented his purchase of 'The Stranger' in Ireland.—Oh, fie, my lord! has your lordship no more feeling for a fellow-tourist?—but "two of a trade," they say, etc. [George Annesley, Viscount Valentia ...
— Byron's Poetical Works, Vol. 1 • Byron
... at home, and had promised to send it to the patient immediately. In the absorbing interest of making his preparations for leaving England, it had remained forgotten in his pocket for nearly two days. The one means of setting this unlucky error right, without further delay, was to deliver his prescription himself, and to break through his own rules for the second time by attending to a case of illness—purely as an ...
— Heart and Science - A Story of the Present Time • Wilkie Collins
... this disappointment, and thought myself the most unfortunate creature in the world because my son missed of such a good post as he was to have had in this ship; I was continually fretting about it and fancied that so bad a setting out was a sign the poor boy would be unlucky all his life. How different things turn out from what we expect! Had not this misfortune, as I thought it, happened, he would now have been at the bottom of the sea, and my poor heart would have been broken. Well, to be sure God is very kind! I hope my boy will always be thankful ...
— A Description of Millenium Hall • Sarah Scott
... should like to take. I should like to sit up in the branches, and shake down fruit into the laps of some people who never would know where it came from, and wouldn't take it if they did; though they couldn't reach a single bough to pick for themselves. I mean nice, unlucky people; people who always have a hard time, and need to have a good one; and are obliged in many things to pretend they do. There are a good many who are willing and anxious to help the very poor, but I think there's a ...
— The Other Girls • Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney
... a general use of the wooden swords and stuffed clubs, and in a moment the two unlucky students were surrounded, and blows fell thick and fast. Poole yelled like a wild Indian, but Merwell set his teeth and said nothing, only striking back with his fists when he got the chance. Dave took no part in the onslaught, nor did Ben and Phil. As soon as he saw a chance Nat Poole ran ...
— Dave Porter in the Far North - or, The Pluck of an American Schoolboy • Edward Stratemeyer
... He carried it loose in his mackinaw pocket—a camper, mind you. He had a wad big enough to pay off the national debt, and I knew it would tumble out and it did. Skinny's one of those poor little codgers that's always unlucky. He happened to be there. He happened to have a key. He happened to go to the house-boat. I got hold of his tracks just because I didn't want him to come to any harm while he was all worked up. The reason I didn't say anything about where he went was, because there are a whole lot of ...
— Roy Blakeley's Adventures in Camp • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... get my twenty-four pound howitzer in a good position I will make the place so hot in a dozen hours that the blackguards will curse their unlucky stars that caused them to unlimber for action in such an owl's nest as that," put in another of the party, an artillery officer, ...
— Vellenaux - A Novel • Edmund William Forrest
... Lambton, and Sefton were shut out, and afterwards received the inquiries of their friends whether it was not from scruples of conscience, and being unable to make up their minds, that they had abstained from voting. The party is certainly unlucky; for on a preceding night, Lord Carhampton and Luke White paired off and went comfortably to bed, without finding out that they were on the same side. We now, I trust, are rid of the Queen's business, though I still fear we must have one night on the Milan Commission; but ...
— Memoirs of the Court of George IV. 1820-1830 (Vol 1) - From the Original Family Documents • Duke of Buckingham and Chandos
... professed to predict from the stars such things as the changes of the weather, high winds and storms, great heats, the appearance of comets, eclipses, earthquakes, and the like. They published lists of luck and unlucky days, and tables showing what aspect of the heavens portended good or evil to particular countries. Curiously enough, it appears that they regarded their art as locally limited to the regions inhabited ...
— The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 4. (of 7): Babylon • George Rawlinson
... prowling dogs and coyotes could not reach them. The hunters each had a post on which to hang his bow and flint head arrows. (Good hunters never laid their arrows on the ground, as it was considered unlucky to the hunter who let his arrows touch the earth after they had been out of the quiver). They were all perfectly happy, until one day the older brother surprised them all by saying: "We have a plentiful supply of meat on hand at present to last us for a week or so. I am going ...
— Myths and Legends of the Sioux • Marie L. McLaughlin
... up that stump?" demanded Step-hen; while Thad and Allan were examining the remains of the once proud tree, as if to decide what ought to be done, in order to rescue the unlucky scout. ...
— The Boy Scouts' First Camp Fire - or, Scouting with the Silver Fox Patrol • Herbert Carter
... quiet and keep still, I will," said Preston. "Let only your eye wink or your mouth move to smile—and you are an unlucky prince! I ...
— Melbourne House, Volume 2 • Susan Warner
... One unlucky day, fording a narrow creek with steep banks, they had safely got across, when they encountered a slippery incline up which the oxen could not climb; it was "as slippery as a glare of ice," Charlie said, ...
— The Boy Settlers - A Story of Early Times in Kansas • Noah Brooks
... "A most unlucky man art thou," said he, "that now the trial should not be, as ready as all things were thereto, nor will it be easy to deal ...
— The Story of Grettir The Strong • Translated by Eirikr Magnusson and William Morris
... often is the case at Court) of much envy, and, after the envy, of endless persecution, since Bramante, the architect, who was much loved by the Pope, made him change his mind as to the monument by telling him, as is said by the vulgar, that it is unlucky to build one's tomb in one's lifetime. Fear as well as envy stimulated Bramante, for the judgment of Michael Angelo had exposed many of his errors. Bramante, as every one knows, was given to all kinds of pleasures ...
— Michael Angelo Buonarroti • Charles Holroyd
... of editors, and adhere to the old copies, is unable to restrain the rage of emendation, though his ardour is ill seconded by his skill. Every cold empirick, when his heart is expanded by a successful experiment, swells into a theorist, and the laborious collator at some unlucky moment ...
— Prefaces and Prologues to Famous Books - with Introductions, Notes and Illustrations • Charles W. Eliot
... Marquis of Argyle changed colour, and stepped back two paces, laying, however, his hand on his sword, while several of his clan, with ready devotion, threw themselves betwixt him and the apprehended vengeance of the prisoner. But the Highland guards were too strong to be shaken off, and the unlucky Captain, after having had his offensive weapons taken from him, was dragged off and conducted through several gloomy passages to a small side-door grated with iron, within which was another of wood. These were opened by a grim old Highlander ...
— A Legend of Montrose • Sir Walter Scott
... In fact, Gerald's rather under a cloud just now. I may as well tell you this, because you are sure to hear of it sooner or later. He has been extravagant and, so he assures us, extraordinarily unlucky." ...
— Vane of the Timberlands • Harold Bindloss
... of such an accident to provide a spare one it was by no means irremediable; the other boat was all ready for launching within half an hour, for by not allowing the men to remain in a state of inactivity, and by treating the matter lightly, I hoped to prevent their being dispirited by this unlucky circumstance. ...
— Journals Of Two Expeditions Of Discovery In North-West And Western Australia, Vol. 1 (of 2) • George Grey
... removing much of this discrepancy in fortune. Again, a disaster which destroys a single individual may alter the whole course of a survivor's career. But the devotees of the Goddess of Luck do not mean this at all. They hold that some men are born lucky and others unlucky, as though some Fortune presided at their birth; and that, irrespective of all merits, success goes to those on whom Fortune smiles and defeat to those on whom she frowns. Or at least luck is regarded as a kind of attribute ...
— Success (Second Edition) • Max Aitken Beaverbrook
... the establishment, is well posted up. Every herdsman as he comes in at night tells what animals he has seen through the day, and thus at the batan you hear where tiger, and pig, and deer are to be met with; where an unlucky cow has been killed; in what ravine is the thickest jungle; where the path is free from clay, or quicksand; what fords are safest; and, in short, you get complete information on every point connected with the jungle and ...
— Sport and Work on the Nepaul Frontier - Twelve Years Sporting Reminiscences of an Indigo Planter • James Inglis
... was busy drawing his pen through the entries relating to that unlucky second mate and making a note ...
— Chance - A Tale in Two Parts • Joseph Conrad
... Landor.—(Aside. Unlucky! some good-natured friend has sent him that suppressed pamphlet.) Yes, Mr. North; a poetical manifesto of mine with that title ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - April 1843 • Various
... wife, therefore I took him in: my wife gave us a dish of fish, and I presented humpback with some, which he ate, without taking notice of a bone. He fell down dead before us, and after having in vain essayed to help him, in the trouble and fear occasioned by such an unlucky accident, we carried the corpse out, and dexterously lodged him with the Jewish doctor. The Jewish doctor put him into the chamber of the purveyor, and the purveyor carried him out into the street, where it was believed the merchant had killed him. ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Complete • Anonymous
... feathery frost-work grew more and more exquisitely delicate and beautiful, and yet it was proving to be as evanescent as a dream, for in all sunny place it was already vanishing. They had scarcely passed beyond the second summit when Burt uttered an exclamation of regretful disgust. "By all that's unlucky," he cried, "if there isn't an eagle sitting on yonder ledge! I could kill him with bird-shot, and I haven't even ...
— Nature's Serial Story • E. P. Roe
... had possessed one common peculiarity which betrayed them as belonging to that large and unhappy class we term lunatics, and their mental disorder was revealed in a clear, glittering glance, cold and keen as a steel blade. The moment that unlucky assertion had escaped me, I saw my companions stare at each other and then at me, and in the eyes of all four of them I clearly discerned and recognised the same cold, keen, and gloomy expression. I felt a shock of ...
— Dr. Dumany's Wife • Mr Jkai
... ever been the queerest mixture of weakness and strength, and have paid heavily for the weakness. As a child I used to suffer tortures of shyness, and if my shoe-lace was untied would feel shamefacedly that every eye was fixed on the unlucky string; as a girl I would shrink away from strangers and think myself unwanted and unliked, so that I was full of eager gratitude to any one who noticed me kindly, as the young mistress of a house I was afraid of my ...
— The Varieties of Religious Experience • William James
... are much given to soothsaying, and have lucky and unlucky days. They worship the sun moon and stars, the fire, cows, and the first thing they meet on going out of a morning, believing every manner of vanity. The devil is often in them, but they say it is one of their gods or pagods, as they call him. But whosoever or whatsoever it may be, it constrains ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. II • Robert Kerr
... not familiar with the place as John was; and he had the shyness of a plain man at the sight of the inside of a great house. Besides, he was under fear of being recognized as a follower of Christ and apprehended. Now also the unlucky blow he had made at Malchus at the gate of Gethsemane had to be paid for, because it greatly increased his ...
— The Trial and Death of Jesus Christ - A Devotional History of our Lord's Passion • James Stalker
... speeding along through the clear cold moonlight to Dover, realising for the first time, as he leant back alone in his compartment, the full meaning of the news which had hurried him off. All his tender affection for his sister, and all his stifling sense of something unlucky and untoward in his own life, which had been so strong in him during the past two months, combined to rouse in him the blackest fears, the most hopeless despondency. Marie dead,—what would the world hold for him! Books, thought, ideas—were they enough? Could a man live by them ...
— Miss Bretherton • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... other hand with a gesture of half-ironical protest. "Ah!" he exclaimed, "I am afraid that any poor efforts of mine in that direction were due to the most flagrant compulsion." He paused. "Whatever else you are unlucky in, Mr. Lyndon," he added smilingly, "you can at least be ...
— A Rogue by Compulsion • Victor Bridges
... of, we had been teased by a visit from Mrs. Bonithorne, who, professing great sorrow for our loss, and her own loss of one whom she called her oldest friend, soon fell to talking of Andrew, and how his unlucky doings were all owing to our good aunt's foolishness in entertaining so pestilent a heretic as James Westrop under ...
— Andrew Golding - A Tale of the Great Plague • Anne E. Keeling
... imperceptibly, muttering to himself, "Alack, his wits are flown again!—it was ill wisdom to lead him on to strain them" —then he deftly turned the talk to other matters, with the purpose of sweeping the unlucky seal out of Tom's thoughts—a ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... rounds of the house with one of the Madam's pistols in his belt, taking some comfort in the dramatization of his unlucky role, when breathless yells were heard approaching, and a small Ethiopian made his appearance over the back fence, yelling for help and the ...
— Kildares of Storm • Eleanor Mercein Kelly
... wonderfully revived powers, they proved, as might have been expected, lamentably deficient, and the tones she produced were compared to those of a penny trumpet. Curiosity was so little excited that the concert was ill attended ... and Madame Mara was heard no more. I was not so lucky (or so unlucky) as to hear these her last notes, as it was early in the winter, and I was not in town. She returned to Russia, and was a great sufferer by the burning of Moscow. After that she lived at Mitlau, or some other town near the Baltic, where she died at a great ...
— The Merry-Go-Round • Carl Van Vechten
... way in the usual No Thoroughfares of speech, and Podsnap and Twemlow say Hear hear! and sometimes, when he can't by any means back himself out of some very unlucky No Thoroughfare, 'He-a-a-r He-a-a-r!' with an air of facetious conviction, as if the ingenuity of the thing gave them a sensation of exquisite pleasure. But Veneering makes two remarkably good points; so good, that they are supposed to have been suggested to him by the legal gentleman in ...
— Our Mutual Friend • Charles Dickens
... Hebrides, it is stated that, according to tradition, no one was ever born there who was not from birth insane, or who did not become so before death. "In the last generation, three persons had the misfortune for the first time to see the light of day on this unlucky spot, and all three were mad. Of one of them, who is remembered by the name of Wild Murdoch, many strange stories are told. It is said that his friends used to tie a rope round his body, make it fast to the stern of the ...
— Chapters in the History of the Insane in the British Isles • Daniel Hack Tuke
... mate is worse," Frank said, "you have no right to refuse my offer. I cannot help feeling that you are doing badly; in that case, why should you not let me lend you a hand? There's no disgrace in being unlucky. Here men are unlucky one week, and make a rich strike on the week following, and then they can lend a hand to others, just as a hand may have been lent to them when they wanted it. I think by your accent that ...
— Captain Bayley's Heir: - A Tale of the Gold Fields of California • G. A. Henty
... compelled, reluctantly of course, to alter the books. At last a day comes when we find that millions are gone, and the bomb-shell bursts. Does it follow from this that a man is dishonest? Not the least in the world: he is simply unlucky." ...
— Other People's Money • Emile Gaboriau
... have been a delicate genius in poetry. The airs demanded so many stanzas; but they gave his imagination leave to be away, and they depressed and even confused his metrical play, hurting thus the two vital spots of poetry. Many of the stanzas for music make an unlucky repeating pattern with the poor variety that a repeating wall-paper does not attempt. And yet Campion began again and again with the onset of a true poet. Take, for example, the poem beginning with the vitality of this line, "touching ...
— Flower of the Mind • Alice Meynell
... present carries with him more vital energy than his predecessors, is more athletic in his struggles with the unlucky wights he visits, and can coerce mortals to do his will by the laying on of hands as well as by the look or word. He speaks with more emphasis and authority, as well as with more human naturalness, than the earlier ghosts. He has not only all the force he possessed in life, ...
— Famous Modern Ghost Stories • Various
... other traders. But the individual trader, who fights for existence against unfair odds, is to be pitied whether his shop has plate glass or a barn door to it; and he is the more to be pitied when he is sober, intelligent, proud, sensitive, and unlucky. ...
— It Is Never Too Late to Mend • Charles Reade
... effect of some agitation. She has been overwrought lately. The truth is, Ladislaw, I am an unlucky devil. We have gone through several rounds of purgatory since you left, and I have lately got on to a worse ledge of it than ever. I suppose you are only just come down—you look rather battered—you have not been long enough in ...
— Middlemarch • George Eliot
... aid of a treatise or two," he will make "a consummate naval commander," although he has "never been at sea in the whole course of his life," and at length thrust into a canoe, with some fresh water, bread, fruit, dried fish, and a basket of alligator pears. "Unhappy Popanilla! and all from that unlucky lock of hair!" His fright is ludicrously sketched. "Poor fellow! how could he know better? He certainly had enjoyed a seat at the Admiralty Board of Fantaisie, but then he was a lay-lord." Among his discoveries, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 12, - Issue 322, July 12, 1828 • Various
... Cabineau Camp, of unlucky reputation, there was a young ox of splendid build, but of a ...
— Earth's Enigmas - A Volume of Stories • Charles G. D. Roberts
... Miss Lou knows him a little bit, for I saw him take off his hat to her the other day; and she can introduce him. He makes twelve. I don't believe we'd better have any more. I'd like to ask Mr. Saunders, that keeps the fruit store down on the corner; but they say thirteen is unlucky, so perhaps twelve ...
— In Blue Creek Canon • Anna Chapin Ray
... by some unlucky turn of Fortune's wheel all the native hunters of Asia will obtain rifles; and when they do, we soon will see the end ...
— Our Vanishing Wild Life - Its Extermination and Preservation • William T. Hornaday
... and looking at Orion with unmistakable displeasure, "Orion will give up his berth to you, Zebedee. He seems so very sure that the schooner is unlucky. I came down from Boston in her, and I saw nothing ...
— Sheila of Big Wreck Cove - A Story of Cape Cod • James A. Cooper
... standing on tables and on brackets, for Wallenstein, although in most respects of a clear and commanding intellect, was a slave to superstition. He was always accompanied by an astrologer, who read for him the course of events from the movements of the stars, who indicated the lucky and unlucky days, and the hours at which it was not propitious to transact important business. Hence it was that he placed so great an importance on the exact observance of the hour by ...
— The Lion of the North • G.A. Henty
... had before experienced. What could it proceed from?—not from the burned cottage—he had smelt that smell before—indeed this was by no means the first accident of the kind which had occurred through the negligence of this unlucky young firebrand. Much less did it resemble that of any known herb, weed or flower. A premonitory moistening at the same time overflowed his nether lip. He knew not what to think. He next stooped down to feel the pig, if there were any signs of life in it. He burned ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Vol. V (of X) - Great Britain and Ireland III • Various
... know the rules," said the cat. "I've got to go round and round the circle, in the direction that you are looking, and eat every thirteenth mouse, but I must keep the white mouse for a tit-bit at the finish. Thirteen is an unlucky number, but I will do my best to ...
— Amusements in Mathematics • Henry Ernest Dudeney
... It would be senseless folly on their part to begrudge him his adventitious eminence and refuse to esteem him of more consequence than their uninitiated selves. Yet when people, ignoring the natural causes of all that is called artificial, think that but for an unlucky chance they, too, might have enjoyed the advantages which raise other men above them, they sometimes affect not to recognise actual distinctions and abilities, or study enviously the means of annulling them. So long, however, as by the operation of any causes whatever some real competence accrues ...
— The Life of Reason • George Santayana
... lest you should run into a mistake and think we have quarrelled, I assure you we are perfect friends; we think, wish and judge alike, but what avails it? We are both miserable. He has not differed with my mother, but she loves him not, because she esteems him the unlucky cause of a deep melancholy in a beloved child. For his own sake it is that I cease writing, because it is now his ...
— Hetty Wesley • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... know whether he had any words with his wife about her masquerade of that unlucky evening. On the whole I decidedly think not. Oke was with every one a diffident and reserved man, and most of all so with his wife; besides, I can fancy that he would experience a positive impossibility of putting into words any ...
— Hauntings • Vernon Lee
... be advisable for any man, who from an unlucky choice of a profession, which it is too late to change for another, should find his temper souring, to endeavour to counteract that misfortune, by filling his private chamber with amiable, pleasurable sights and sounds. In summer time, an Aeolian ...
— White Jacket - or, the World on a Man-of-War • Herman Melville
... pretty bluff, where it might have seen the boats pass; or, better still, upon the mall in some garrison village, where it could have had the pleasure of listening twice a week to military music. But, no! it was written in the book of fate that this unlucky sycamore should lose its bark every summer, as a serpent changes its skin, and should scatter the ground with its dead leaves at the first frost, in the playground of the Batifol institution, which was a place without ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... dined with her, and told her the news (which Sir W. Pen told me to-day) that express is come from my Lord with letters, that by a great storm and tempest the mole of Argier is broken down, and many of their ships sunk into the mole. So that God Almighty hath now ended that unlucky business for us; which is very good news. After dinner to the office, where we staid late, and so I home, and late writing letters to my father and Dr. Fairebrother, and an angry letter to my brother John for not writing to me, and so ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys
... The unlucky stone had come from Conrad. Forgetful of his assumed character, he had joined in the hue and cry against a dog whose character and service should have been sufficiently known to him, at least, to prove his protection, and had given; the crudest blow of all. It has been already seen that ...
— The Headsman - The Abbaye des Vignerons • James Fenimore Cooper
... not so unlucky," said he, "for I have stout Douglas shoes to tramp in, and my faithful dog, Benjamin, to ...
— The 1926 Tatler • Various
... are occasions, dear B-, there are occasions when even Wordsworth is reasonable. Even Stamboul, it is said, shall have an end, and the most unlucky blunders must come to a conclusion. Here is ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 5 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... before delivery, and completed them during his first two years of office. His theories, as well as his words, were often, according to the same authority, extemporised. Brown found that he could not improve what he had written under 'very powerful excitement.' Moreover, he had an unlucky belief that he was a poet. From 1814 till 1819 he brought out yearly what he supposed to be a poem. These productions, the Paradise of Coquets and the rest, are in the old-fashioned taste, and ...
— The English Utilitarians, Volume II (of 3) - James Mill • Leslie Stephen
... unlucky fourteenth century a marked religious revival extended over Europe. Perhaps men's sufferings had caused it. Many sects of reformers appeared, protesting sometimes against the discipline, sometimes the doctrines, of the ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... at my panting steed. "It is cursed unlucky you should be so badly mounted, and we shall have a pelting ...
— Pelham, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... the festivals, is that which is held in the end of December. It is called the feast of Pongul, and is a season of rejoicing for two reasons: the first is, because the month of December, every day of which is unlucky, is about to end; and the other is, because it is to be followed by a month, every day of which is fortunate. For the purpose of preventing the evil effects of this month, the women every morning scour a place about two feet square before the door of ...
— Dr. Scudder's Tales for Little Readers, About the Heathen. • Dr. John Scudder
... of the paper as it was taken from the floor. It was well she did not also see the quick look the lady gave her as she turned the letter and found a red stamp sticking to the under side, for this unlucky little witness ...
— Jack and Jill • Louisa May Alcott
... her of it," Maude had striven to keep its possession a secret from every one, first from the nuns, and then from Ursula Drew. Strange to say, she had succeeded until that morning. It was to her a priceless treasure—all the more inestimable because she could not read a word of it. But on that unlucky morning, Parnel had caught a glimpse of the precious parcel, always hidden in Maude's bosom, and had immediately endeavoured to snatch it from her. Contriving to elude her grasp, yet fearful of its repetition, Maude rushed out of the kitchen door, and finding that her tormentor followed, ...
— The White Rose of Langley - A Story of the Olden Time • Emily Sarah Holt
... child, I don't ask your cousin to write for me to-day, as she is in great trouble. Her father died suddenly two days ago. It appears that his whole fortune has been lost through unlucky gambling last winter in Paris. So his house and furniture will have to be sold. Nobody in the place was expecting this. I think, dear child, that this will pain you as much as ...
— An Iceland Fisherman • Pierre Loti
... felt more reverence for the meanest woman we met in the street than he did for his grandest friend in society; but, nevertheless, his splendid courtesy illuminated the slightest social duty, whereas I stood rayless beside him. He had been unlucky where his mother was concerned: she was a weak woman to begin with, had never loved her husband, and had left him for another man, whom she married after the disgrace and sorrow she caused had killed her boy's father. Harry never spoke of this, ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 22. October, 1878. • Various
... "Alas!" cried the queen, "this bodes no good. Yet I do entreat you to tell me the worst." The more unwilling the fairies seemed to speak, the greater desire the queen felt to know what was the matter; so at length the principal fairy said: "We are afraid, Madam, that Rosetta will prove unlucky to her brothers, and that they will die in some adventure on her account. That is all that we are able to foresee about your pretty little girl." They then departed, and left the ...
— Bo-Peep Story Books • Anonymous
... ignorant of the fate which may await us, we are occasionally oppressed by a thousand melancholy apprehensions. I might, indeed, have boasted of my fortitude, and have made myself an heroine on paper at as small an expence of words as it has cost me to record my cowardice: but I am of an unlucky conformation, and think either too much or too little (I know not which) for a female philosopher; besides, philosophy is getting into such ill repute, that not possessing the reality, the name of ...
— A Residence in France During the Years 1792, 1793, 1794 and 1795, • An English Lady
... endowments; in him they place the greatest confidence, and follow him to war without envy or murmur. As this warrior arrives at honour and distinction by the general consent; so, when chosen, he must be very circumspect in his conduct, and gentle in the exercise of his power. By the first unlucky or unpopular step he forfeits the goodwill and confidence of his countrymen, upon which all his power is founded. Besides the head warrior, they have judges and conjurers, whom they call Beloved Men, who have great weight among them; ...
— An Historical Account Of The Rise And Progress Of The Colonies Of South Carolina And Georgia, Volume 1 • Alexander Hewatt
... him. He had neatly mounted it on wheels, that its completeness might do him the greater credit with the consul when he should show it him, but the carriage had been broken in his pocket, on the way home, by an unlucky thrust from the burden of a porter, and the poor toy lay there disabled, as if to dramatize that premature ...
— A Foregone Conclusion • W. D. Howells
... had one great superstition—to wit, Cracks! For some now inexplicable reason they thought it unlucky to step on cracks; and they made daily and hourly spectacles of themselves in the streets by the eccentric irregularity of their gait. Now they would take long strides, like a pair of ostriches, and now short, quick steps, like a couple of robins; now they would hop on both feet, ...
— A Boy I Knew and Four Dogs • Laurence Hutton
... at which they would be back, proceeded through the woods in different directions. At the appointed time, Josiah went to the camp, and after waiting there in vain for the arrival of his brother, and becoming uneasy lest [206] some unlucky accident had befallen him, he set out in search of him. Unable to see or hear anything of him he returned home, and prevailed on several of his neighbors to aid in endeavouring to ascertain his fate. Their search was likewise unavailing; but in the following March, he was found by ...
— Chronicles of Border Warfare • Alexander Scott Withers
... had got round again to the unlucky baker's, the mob had been swollen to a size which even the area of the Forum would not contain, and it filled the adjacent streets. And by the same time it had come home to its leaders, and, indeed, to ...
— Callista • John Henry Cardinal Newman
... rejoined Mr. Talbot. "But he was brought down by successive failures, and some unlucky investments, as we merchants often are, ...
— A Romance of the Republic • Lydia Maria Francis Child
... The old Fairy fancied she was slighted, and muttered some threats between her teeth. One of the young fairies who sat by her overheard how she grumbled; and, judging that she might give the little Princess some unlucky gift, went, as soon as they rose from table, and hid herself behind the hangings, that she might speak last, and repair, as much as she could, the evil which the ...
— The Blue Fairy Book • Various
... going to get all right again and see the war through, if I didn't get an unlucky ball; but it's all over now. I've seen 'em, ...
— The Kopje Garrison - A Story of the Boer War • George Manville Fenn
... "O Heavens! How unlucky I am to be so clumsy and to express so ill what I think!" cried Germain. "Marie, you don't love me. That is the long and short of it. You find me too simple and too dull. If you loved me at all, you would not see my faults so clearly. But you ...
— The Devil's Pool • George Sand
... her sallow skin. "It is not well bred of you to refer to the misfortunes of my family," she said; "my mother and brother were unlucky. They were innocent of this charge of coining, brought ...
— The Secret Passage • Fergus Hume
... the extra six months' delay,' she went on, 'but I don't like the idea of postponing the wedding. There is something unlucky about it.' ...
— Our Elizabeth - A Humour Novel • Florence A. Kilpatrick
... so very unlucky?" I asked with frank incredulity. Mr. Burns turned his eyes away from me. No, the late captain was not an unlucky man. One couldn't say that. But he had not seemed to want to make ...
— The Shadow-Line - A Confession • Joseph Conrad
... acknowledging in Congress the honour which had been done him in selecting him to so important a trust, on the execution of which the future of his country in a great measure depended, Washington said: "I beg it may be remembered, lest some unlucky event should happen unfavourable to my reputation, that I this day declare, with the utmost sincerity, I do not think myself equal to the command I am ...
— Character • Samuel Smiles
... two severed heads, and a dead body, the rule of Brandeis came to a sudden end. We shall see him a while longer fighting for existence in a losing battle; but his government—take it for all in all, the most promising that has ever been in these unlucky islands—was from that ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 17 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... a press-gossip. For example the appearance of a policeman while a burglar is drilling a safe is considered distinctly unlucky. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 156., March 5, 1919 • Various
... befell, she was, if not quite right, at least not quite wrong. For when we went into the cabin, we and our unlucky yellow flower were flown at by another brown lady, in another gorgeous turban, who had become on the voyage a friend and an intimate; for she was the nurse of the baby who had been the light of the eyes of the whole quarter-deck ever since we left Southampton—God bless it, and ...
— At Last • Charles Kingsley
... plainly perceived in the events of real life; when any thing takes place of such a nature as we should call, in a fiction, merely improbable, because there are many chances against it, we call it a lucky or unlucky accident, a singular coincidence, something very extraordinary, odd, curious, etc.; whereas any thing which, in a fiction, would be called unnatural, when it actually occurs (and such things do occur), is still called unnatural, inexplicable, unaccountable, inconceivable, etc., ...
— Famous Reviews • Editor: R. Brimley Johnson
... and said: "Few words are best; and whereas I wot not if my words will avail thee aught, and since they will save our lives, I will tell thee truly. We are men of the Burg whom these green-coated thieves drave out of the Burg on an unlucky day. Well, some of us, of whom I was one, fetched a compass and crossed the water that runneth through Upmeads by the Red Bridge, and so gat us into the Wood Debateable through the Uplands. There we struck a bargain with the main band of strong-thieves of the wood, that we and they together ...
— The Well at the World's End • William Morris
... SHADOWS: misfortunes due to being born under an unlucky star; house of life is also ...
— The English Mail-Coach and Joan of Arc • Thomas de Quincey
... cannibals, their superstition prompts them to many acts of cruelty; for instance, one half of the infant population is murdered by the misfortune of being born on an unlucky day; and, to prove the truth of the dogma, they are deliberately killed. One mode of perpetrating this unnatural deed, is by taking the infant to a retired spot in the neighborhood of the village, digging a grave ...
— The World of Waters - A Peaceful Progress o'er the Unpathed Sea • Mrs. David Osborne
... you should have seen that kid when he drew number three! All the fellows began kidding him and saying he was unlucky. Then came Connie, and he drew three, and then Wig and, oh, boy, I just can't tell you about it. Each fellow stood there staring at his little slip and I drew ...
— Roy Blakeley's Camp on Wheels • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... ever would have been, considering the embarrassments thrown in the way by the guardians of the temples, who seemed disposed to secrete the treasures, rather than despoil these sacred depositories to satisfy the cupidity of the strangers. It was unlucky, too, for the Indian monarch, that much of the gold, and that of the best quality, consisted of flat plates or tiles, which, however valuable, lay in a compact form that did little towards swelling the heap. But an immense amount had been already realized, and it would have been a ...
— History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William Hickling Prescott
... is due to Comte to say that he did not expect to see his dictatorial republic transformed into a dynastic empire, and, next, that he did expect from the Man of December freedom of the press and of public meeting. His later hero was the Emperor Nicholas, 'the only statesman in Christendom,'—as unlucky a judgment as that which placed Dr. Francia in ...
— Critical Miscellanies (Vol. 3 of 3) - Essay 10: Auguste Comte • John Morley
... length we got; when (as Fate wou'd have it) an unlucky Shot struck both the Captain and Lieutenant dead. Then we began to fear, and all our noble ...
— The City Bride (1696) - Or The Merry Cuckold • Joseph Harris
... came to terms with Godefroid who would not take the rooms unless he could have them by the single month and furnished. These miserable rooms of students and unlucky authors were rented furnished or unfurnished as the case might be. The vast garret which extended over the whole building was filled with such furniture. But Monsieur Bernard, she said, had furnished his ...
— The Brotherhood of Consolation • Honore de Balzac
... the third Terentia withdrew at the end of her term and did not marry, nor did the only Licinia who ever completed her service. But Appellasia married and so did Quetonia and Seppia. Others have married after their service, though it is thought unlucky. The right to leave the order implies the right to marry after leaving. The right to leave implies the right to mean to leave, to plan to leave, to look forward to leaving and marrying. You have that right, like any other Vestal. ...
— The Unwilling Vestal • Edward Lucas White |
