"Empty-handed" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the passing of a body by the swish of the foliage. Val lay, face down, on the platform and reached for a stick of wood lying on the ground below. Somehow he did not like to think of being caught empty-handed ...
— Ralestone Luck • Andre Norton
... other high officers of state whom we knew were present, and, of course, the Professor, Merna, Eleeta, and Siloni, as well as many others whom we had come to regard as personal friends; and they did not allow us to depart empty-handed. ...
— To Mars via The Moon - An Astronomical Story • Mark Wicks
... swinging from a string, and I had a mind to light its rope wick and search through the chests for a weapon; but I did not want to remain too long below, although I could not bring myself to leave empty-handed the only ...
— The Devil's Admiral • Frederick Ferdinand Moore
... been quite right when she had told Ruth that poverty lay before them. She had come back quite empty-handed, and it was necessary to find some work at once which would at least provide them with daily bread. Ruth, looking out over the fields where already the barley was being cut, made up her mind to go and work there. The poor were always ...
— The Babe in the Bulrushes • Amy Steedman
... fox which was passing by had pulled my head out of the water, and was tearing at my brains. I stole cautiously up to him, and gave him such a kick that he uttered a loud scream, and let fall a parchment on which was written, "The cake is mine, and the beardless one goes empty-handed."' ...
— The Violet Fairy Book • Various
... Add this too, that we come not empty-handed. At Donauwert[600:2] it was reported to us, A Swedish caravan was on its way 5 Transporting a rich cargo of provision, Almost six hundred waggons. This my Croats Plunged down upon and seized, this weighty prize!—— We bring ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... who had expected to have the pillage of the city, when they came to Rome empty-handed, railed against Camillus among their fellow-citizens, as a hater of the people, and one that grudged all advantage to the poor. Afterwards, when the tribunes of the people again brought their motion for dividing the city to the vote, Camillus appeared ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... the inexorable French king to make full restitution to Sweden, the treaty between the two northern powers being signed at Lund on the 26th of September. Freely had she spent her blood and her treasure, only to emerge from the five years' contest exhausted and empty-handed. ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 8, Slice 2 - "Demijohn" to "Destructor" • Various
... meaning by the last word a man who always went in for every prize, and always won it. And Tell would say, "Yes, truly am I a pot-hunter, for I hunt to fill the family pot." And so he did. He never came home empty-handed from the chase. Sometimes it was a chamois that he brought back, and then the family had it roasted on the first day, cold on the next four, and minced on the sixth, with sippets of toast round the edge of the dish. Sometimes it was only a bird (as ...
— William Tell Told Again • P. G. Wodehouse
... Legislatures and the National Capitol were crowded with railroad men and manufacturers and contractors. The iniquity became so great that sometimes reformers and philanthropists have been laughed out of Harrisburg, and Albany, and Trenton, and Washington, because they came empty-handed. "You vote for this bill, and I'll vote for that bill." "You favour that monopoly of a moneyed institution, and I'll favour the other monopoly of another institution." And here is a bill that is going to be very hard to get through the Legislature, and some friends met together at ...
— T. De Witt Talmage - As I Knew Him • T. De Witt Talmage
... afterward, about 5:00 a. m., we were alarmed by the sound of musketry near the river bank. We deployed and advanced to what seemed to be a small party from a gunboat. They had killed two Scots who had mistaken them for a supply boat from Beresnik and gone to meet them empty-handed. The Bolo had regained his boat after a little firing between him and the second platoon which was at the upper end of the village. We were trying to locate oars for the clumsy Russian barzhaks on the bank, intending to cross to the island where the gunboat ...
— The History of the American Expedition Fighting the Bolsheviki - Campaigning in North Russia 1918-1919 • Joel R. Moore
... One-Eye had not come empty-handed. He had cigars for Big Tom, a paper bag of pears for every one, and a carefully wrapped box tied with glistening string which turned out to be candy. As a chorus of delight greeted all these gifts, he became by turns the leathery saffron which, for him, was paleness, and the dark reddish-purple ...
— The Rich Little Poor Boy • Eleanor Gates
... deep on the ground already, and was still falling heavily. Beth put on her things and stole out, her idea being to gather sticks to make a fire for the old lady; but after a weary trudge she was obliged to return empty-handed, wet, weary, and disheartened. The sticks were deep down under the snow; there ...
— The Beth Book - Being a Study of the Life of Elizabeth Caldwell Maclure, a Woman of Genius • Sarah Grand
... she bustled in to see her one morning, and sat down by the window, pushing back the curtain so that she could look out into the street and nod to passers as she talked. "There's no end going on. Dear me, it's a shame to come to you empty-handed, Phebe. I had two or three rosebuds for you,—beauties they were too,—but the fact is I gave them away piecemeal as I came along, and I haven't one left. It seemed as if I met every man there was this morning. How soon do you think you'll be ...
— Only an Incident • Grace Denio Litchfield
... wet sail up the coast with the wind ahead, and Carroll was quite content when, on reaching Comox, Vane announced his intention of stopping there until the mail came in. Immediately after its arrival, Carroll went ashore, and came back empty-handed. ...
— Vane of the Timberlands • Harold Bindloss
... with me in vain and finally went away empty-handed. But he did not abandon hope. Four successive attempts were made to get the jewel away from me. Twice my apartments at the Nineveh Hotel were rifled; once my dressing-room at the theatre was entered and searched whilst I was on the stage. But I wore the jewel day and night ...
— Okewood of the Secret Service • Valentine Williams
... result was, however, as she hoped: I generally brought home a little money, which kept us for a time from starvation or the hospital; but this life became so odious to me, that at last, one day, instead of repeating my accustomed phrase, I sat on a doorstep all the time, and returned in the evening empty-handed. My mother beat me so that the next day I fell ill; then my poor father, deprived of all resources, was obliged to go to the ...
— The Queen's Necklace • Alexandre Dumas pere
... cut swung Ray, walking strong and free, the ache in his throat not so painful as before. The dog would be on guard, and the boy was empty-handed. ...
— The Spinner's Book of Fiction • Various
... detective, had been engaged in an implacable conflict amidst interesting and picturesque surroundings. Arsene Lupin, the eccentric gentleman who operates only in the chateaux and salons, and who, one night, entered the residence of Baron Schormann, but emerged empty-handed, leaving, however, his card on which he had scribbled these words: "Arsene Lupin, gentleman-burglar, will return when the furniture is genuine." Arsene Lupin, the man of a thousand disguises: in turn a chauffer, detective, bookmaker, Russian physician, ...
— The Extraordinary Adventures of Arsene Lupin, Gentleman-Burglar • Maurice Leblanc
... Chang brought in supper, Anarky walked by his side in solemn state, empty-handed, dignified, watchful. He appeared totally unconscious of his escort, and I made no remark; but Mr. Smith sent him into the hall on an errand, and during his absence Anarky rose to explain: "Which you see ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 22. July, 1878. • Various
... hand across his eyes out of respect to my father, who was of higher rank than he, and speaking softly. "They are thy dead wife's relatives, and are of good blood. And thou hast shamed them—and thyself as well—by sending them away empty-handed." ...
— A Memory Of The Southern Seas - 1904 • Louis Becke
... the worship of the Gods to cease within these walls. Well, he's gone!—he's gone! and indeed he is better with Osiris, for his life was a sore burden to him. And hark thou, Harmachis: he hath not left thee empty-handed; for, so soon as the plot failed, he gathered all his wealth, and it is large, and hid it—where, I can show thee—and it is thine ...
— Cleopatra • H. Rider Haggard
... sacrifice of life, and the sacrifice and libation of death. The Philippians offered as their sacrifice their faith, and all the works which flow therefrom. Is that our idea of life? Is it our idea of faith? We have no gifts to bring, we come empty-handed unless we carry in our hands the offering of our faith, which includes the surrender of our will, and the giving away of our hearts, and is essentially laying hold of Christ's sacrifice. When we come empty, needy, sinful, but cleaving wholly to that perfect sacrifice of the Great Priest, ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... faith of a partner named MacDonald, whom he had imprudently received into his confidence, and intrusted with a considerable sum of money, rendered totally insolvent. He absconded, of course—not empty-handed, if it be true, as stated in an advertisement for his apprehension, that he had in his possession sums to the amount of L1000 sterling, obtained from several noblemen and gentlemen under pretence of purchasing cows ...
— Rob Roy, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... engineer; Philippe, the architect; Honore, whom we dubbed "Deshonore," because he used always to return empty-handed when we went hunting together. Gone, ...
— With Those Who Wait • Frances Wilson Huard
... with haggard face and set lips, gazing up the ravine, for, although he scarcely fancied that either of the others had expected anything else, he shrank from going back as empty-handed as when he had left them. The light was getting very dim, but he could still see the ice fringe upon the pool in front of him, and a mass of rock that rose black against the creeping dusk not very far away. ...
— Hawtrey's Deputy • Harold Bindloss
... to the filthy alley— 'Twas a cold, raw Christmas eve— And the bakers' shops were open, Tempting a man to thieve: But I clenched my fists together, Holding my head awry, So I came to her empty-handed And mournfully ...
— Poems Teachers Ask For, Book Two • Various
... flush of sunset had died out of the sky, and twilight was deepening rapidly, when Mr. Mortimer came strolling back. Apparently—since he came empty-handed—his search for a saucepan had been unsuccessful. Yet patently the disappointment had not affected his spirits, for at sight of Old Jubilee still cropping in the dusk he stood still and gave utterance ...
— True Tilda • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... not so bad," remarked Tom, as the game was placed in their bags. "Even if we don't get any more we won't have to go home empty-handed." ...
— The Rover Boys on the Farm - or Last Days at Putnam Hall • Arthur M. Winfield (AKA Edward Stratemeyer)
... fair wind for the passage. Your Highnesses are as much lords of this country as of Xerez or Toledo; your ships if they should go there, go to your own house. From there they will take gold; in other lands to have what there is in them, they will have to take it by force or retire empty-handed, and on the land they will have to trust their persons in the hands ...
— The Northmen, Columbus and Cabot, 985-1503 • Various
... looked at her admiringly, "Am I worth looking at?" she said; and it gave her some pleasure to think that she had it still in her power to destroy a thing of value. She was savagely ashamed of going to death empty-handed. By-and-by, great fatigue stiffened her limbs, and she sat down from pure want of rest. The luxury of rest and soothing languor kept hard thoughts away. She felt as if floating, for a space. The fear of the streets left her. But when necessity for rest had gone, ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... person pleasing." Mr. Prosper, as he said this, thought of the kiss which had been bestowed upon him. "Her wit is vivacious, and I think that upon the whole she will be desirable as a companion. She will not come to this house empty-handed; but of her pecuniary affairs you already know so much that I need, perhaps, tell you nothing farther. But though I am exceedingly desirous to make this lady my wife, and am, I may say, warmly attached to her, there ...
— Mr. Scarborough's Family • Anthony Trollope
... she'll have you. But you mustn't let Mountfield. Don't think of that, my boy. We'll square it somehow, between us. My girl won't come to you empty-handed, you know, and as long as the settlements are all right you can keep her a bit short for a year or two; tell her to go easy in the house. She's a good girl, and she'll do her best. No occasion to let down the stables, and you must keep a good head of game. We'll make that all right, ...
— The Squire's Daughter - Being the First Book in the Chronicles of the Clintons • Archibald Marshall
... proper for a Brahmana?' And the Brahmana said, 'O king of kings, sent unto thee by Seduka, I come before thee for this.' The king said, 'I will give thee now whatever tribute may come to me before the morning expire. How indeed, can I send away the man empty-handed who hath been whipped by me.' And having said this the king gave unto that Brahmana the entire proceeds of that day and that was more than the value ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 1 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... of Kingsley that he never wrote an ungenerous word of the country which sent him away empty-handed from the store of its riches. Not even a suggestion of the fruitless toil and the disillusionment which he shared with scores of other amateur diggers during the first two years of his colonial life finds ...
— Australian Writers • Desmond Byrne
... up as in a slaughter-house, a strong, biting land wind sprang up, their ice-floe parted from the land ice and drifted away from the island. Dark-green water and white foaming surge yawned behind them. There was no time to think. They were drifting out to sea as fast as they could. But to go back empty-handed would have been too vexatious; so they cut off a quarter of a hide and dragged it with some lumps of blubber to the kayaks. They reached the land in safety, dead tired after an adventurous row, and sought the shelter ...
— From Pole to Pole - A Book for Young People • Sven Anders Hedin
... proved, merely a pawn in the Cardinal's deep game. It was a Spanish alliance that he sought for his young King; and when, at the eleventh hour, an ambassador came hurriedly to Lyons to offer the Infanta's hand, the Savoy Duke and his sister, the Princess, had perforce to return to Italy "empty-handed." ...
— Love affairs of the Courts of Europe • Thornton Hall
... room. Honeycutt was near the bunk, groping for his shotgun. He started guiltily, veiled his eyes, and returned empty-handed ...
— The Everlasting Whisper • Jackson Gregory
... Noormahal, they were all one with himself. As to bringing any presents hereafter to procure his favour, I might be easy on that score, as it was merely a needless ceremony, for I should be always welcome to come to him empty-handed, and he would hear me, as it was not my fault, and he would see me righted at all times. That he would return me some things to enable me to go to his son, and he would pay the merchants for such things as ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume IX. • Robert Kerr
... direction, they generally go against the wind. They would thus have the wind with them when they returned home heavily laden, and with these little navigators the difference is an important one. With a full cargo, a stiff head- wind is a great hindrance, but fresh and empty-handed, they can face it with more ease. Virgil says bees bear gravel-stones as ballast, but their only ballast is their honey-bag. Hence, when I go bee-hunting, I prefer to get to windward of the woods in which the swarm is ...
— The Writings of John Burroughs • John Burroughs
... could shoot them. "Bang, bang" went that gun below him again. With a roar of wings, Dusky and his flock were in the air and away. That hunter stood up and said things, and they were not nice things. He knew that those Ducks would not come back again that night, and that once more he must go home empty-handed. But first he would find out who that other hunter was and what luck he had had, so he tramped down the shore to where that gun had seemed to be. He found the blind of Farmer Brown's boy, but there was no one there. You see, as soon as he had fired his gun the last time, Farmer Brown's boy ...
— Blacky the Crow • Thornton W. Burgess
... we might just as well be carrying something with us as go down to the catamaran empty-handed. If you and Simpson will lay hold of that case of ammunition, I will bring along half a dozen rifles, and we shall then be quite as well armed as there will be any need for us to be. We may not want them, but, on the other hand, we may, and if we should ...
— Dick Leslie's Luck - A Story of Shipwreck and Adventure • Harry Collingwood
... Mary would not go empty-handed to Ralph at her marriage. Her "hope chest" in the attic was full to overflowing, and quite unique in itself, as it consisted of an old, in fact ancient, wooden dough-tray used in times past by Aunt Sarah's grandmother. Beside it stood a sewing table, consisting of three discarded broom handles supporting ...
— Mary at the Farm and Book of Recipes Compiled during Her Visit - among the "Pennsylvania Germans" • Edith M. Thomas
... gathered courage and decided to postpone my career as a hunter no longer. Bears were the objectives of my hunting expeditions, but they always succeeded in eluding me. Many times in stalking them I came upon fresh tracks showing they had broken into flight at my approach. One day I turned homeward, empty-handed, and learned later I had been within gunshot of one ...
— A Mountain Boyhood • Joe Mills
... only rails," they certainly were the most famous ones he or anybody else ever split. This was the last work he did for his father, for in the summer of that year (1830) he exercised the right of majority and started out to shift for himself. When he left his home to start life for himself, he went empty-handed. He was already some months over twenty-one years of age, but he had nothing in the world, not even a suit of respectable clothes; and one of the first pieces of work he did was "to split four hundred rails for every yard of brown jeans dyed with white walnut bark that would be necessary ...
— McClure's Magazine December, 1895 • Edited by Ida M. Tarbell
... Jasper had a team of mules he had swapped for a yoke of oxen, and he had a cookstove that he had bought with his own savings. A step stove it was, two caps below and two higher up. The Burwells had seen to it that their daughter did not go empty-handed to her man. She had a flock tick, quilts, coverlids, and a cow. But, old Granny Withers, a midwife from Caney Creek, sitting in the chimney corner sucking her pipe the night of the wedding, vowed that all would not be well with the pair. Hadn't a bat flitted into ...
— Blue Ridge Country • Jean Thomas
... narrow frame of his window, the master, with eyes of approval, could see the servant dexterously load himself with a well-balanced pile of parcels, disappearing to return after intervals empty-handed, within the field of view, and select another burden, now heavier now ...
— The Light of Scarthey • Egerton Castle
... But it does not prompt many other words. It is best expressed in few. What goes without saying is better than what is said. Not much can be added to the old English word "Good-by." You are not sending me away empty-handed or alone. I go freighted and laden with happy memories—inexhaustible and unalloyed—of England, its warm-hearted people, and their measureless kindness. Spirits more than twain will cross with me, messengers of your good-will. Happy the nation that can thus speed its parting guest! Fortunate ...
— Modern Eloquence: Vol III, After-Dinner Speeches P-Z • Various
... felt ashamed that I could make no return. My men explained the total expenditure of our means, and the Libontese answered gracefully, "It does not matter; you have opened a path for us, and we shall have sleep." Strangers came flocking from a distance, and seldom empty-handed. Their presents ...
— Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa - Journeys and Researches in South Africa • David Livingstone
... far; but painful difficulties still remained, the story of which she herself has also told us. {61} While eager to be admitted to the full privileges of her vocation, she did not wish to enter Port Royal empty-handed. She thought herself free to endow it with the share of her father’s fortune which had fallen to her, and seems not to have doubted her brother’s and sister’s concurrence in this act of liberality. But they, on the contrary, were both for a time deeply offended that she ...
— Pascal • John Tulloch
... 'but—which?' This steadied me a little, Bev, so I took a fresh grip and began again: 'Sir,' says I, 'beauty in itself is a poor thing at best—' 'Therefore,' says my Roman (quick as a flash, my dear fellow) 'therefore it is just as well that beauty should not come—entirely empty-handed!' 'Sir,' says I—(calmly, you'll understand, Bev, but with just sufficient firmness to let him see that, after all, he was only a father) 'Sir,' says I, 'beauty is a transient thing at best, unless backed up by virtue, honor, wisdom, courage, truth, purity, ...
— The Amateur Gentleman • Jeffery Farnol et al
... all kneeling, were the hag, Standing Buffalo and Brown Mink. The chief held the match; the old woman, a knife; the girl was empty-handed. But she was not ill—not wasted—not dying! She was full-figured. Her face was round. Her cheeks and lips were as bright as the dab of paint at the part in her hair—as crimson with ...
— The Plow-Woman • Eleanor Gates
... last, I was off the sea, nor had I returned thence empty-handed. There lay the schooner, clear at last from buccaneers and ready for our own men to board and get to sea again. I had nothing nearer my fancy than to get home to the stockade and boast of my achievements. ...
— Treasure Island • Robert Louis Stevenson
... pencilled note and slowly twisted it in his fingers. It was too dark to read, but in its soldierly brevity he almost knew it by heart. "The major sent Donovan with half the escort back to the Gila on an Apache scare this morning. They will probably return your way, empty-handed. Signal if they have passed. Latham knows your code and we have a good glass. Send man to Ceralvo's with orders for them to join at once if they haven't come, and flag or torch when they pass you. It's my belief they've gone there." This was signed by Feeny, and over and again ...
— Foes in Ambush • Charles King
... will do otherwise; but further than that, he has no present intention to proceed. Parleys and civilities! Captain Ludlow, we must speak the man fair, or he will leave us to get over the inlet and back to the Lust in Rust, as we may; and that, too, as empty-handed as we came. Remember our stipulations, without observing which I shall withdraw from ...
— The Water-Witch or, The Skimmer of the Seas • James Fenimore Cooper
... we carrying over from this year? Lay this to heart as certain, that we enter on no new year—or new day—empty-handed, but always 'bearing our sheaves with us.' 'Be not deceived! God is not mocked. Whatsoever a man soweth, ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus and Numbers • Alexander Maclaren
... one should never enter your Curia empty-handed, we have sent our Count, the Illustrious Sigismer, with certain persons to administer the oath to you. If you have any requests to make to us which shall be for the common benefit of the Republic, make them through him, and they ...
— The Letters of Cassiodorus - Being A Condensed Translation Of The Variae Epistolae Of - Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator • Cassiodorus (AKA Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator)
... his grandfather, his two big fists suddenly clinched and lifted threateningly; "you're a howlin' young ass! That's what for a man you've turned out to be, Stephen Packard. Come here empty-handed an' try to buck me, would you? Me who has busted better men than you all my life, me who has got my hooks in you deep already, me who ain't no pulin' ol' dodderin' softy to turn over to a lazy, shiftless vagabond all I've piled up year after year. Buck me, would ...
— Man to Man • Jackson Gregory
... he'd only got hold of half of it—half the gospel of the empty-handed. The point is to lose and laugh." For a moment Rodney had a vision of Peter standing bare-headed in the dust and smiling. "To drop all the trappings and still find life jolly—just because it is life, not because of what it brings. ...
— The Lee Shore • Rose Macaulay
... came to this farm, I came empty-handed. I was the veritable pattern of the city-made failure. I believed that life had nothing more in store for me. I was worn out physically, mentally and, indeed, morally. I had diligently planned for Success; and I had reaped defeat. I ...
— Adventures In Contentment • David Grayson
... the whole expenditure on the way hither, and they remark gratefully: 'It does not matter, you have opened a path for us, and we shall have sleep.' Strangers from a distance come flocking to see me, and seldom come empty-handed. I distribute all presents ...
— The Personal Life Of David Livingstone • William Garden Blaikie
... morning, or at a week-day market, that a hundred men would be required next morning to carry charcoal for the government. As a matter of fact, he required only twenty, but he knew that many would come to him to beg off, and as none would come empty-handed, his profit on the transaction was considerable. Another illustration was given Mr. Cousins by the British Consul. It was customary to send up mails from the coast by government runners, but English ideas being adverse to demanding unrequited service, the Consul ...
— Shadow and Light - An Autobiography with Reminiscences of the Last and Present Century • Mifflin Wistar Gibbs
... is too humble but that the Prince will stop and speak to him, and ask him how the world is using him. The man rarely goes empty-handed away. In these latter days the Prince is not so open-handed as formerly, neither does he make so free with his presence, but still it is no difficult thing for any of his subjects to obtain an audience. He will stop a man at haphazard on the road ...
— The Land of the Black Mountain - The Adventures of Two Englishmen in Montenegro • Reginald Wyon
... ladies set out upon their rounds. Berenice did not go empty-handed. Hampers of food and bundles of clothing filled up every available space in the carriage. It was a very pleasant drive. To every cottage that the countess entered she ...
— Self-Raised • Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte Southworth
... in which she was conscious of something militant, something of the quiet power of the man who does not go home empty-handed. In his leaving the city Saturday, she perceived one who wishes to avoid the appearance of evil, and is content to leave his movements ...
— Fate Knocks at the Door - A Novel • Will Levington Comfort
... v.; imperfect &c 651; ill-furnished, ill-provided, ill- stored, ill-off. slack, at a low ebb; empty, vacant, bare; short of, out of, destitute of, devoid of, bereft of &c 789; denuded of; dry, drained. unprovided, unsupplied^, unfurnished; unreplenished, unfed^; unstored^, untreasured^; empty-handed. meager, poor, thin, scrimp, sparing, spare, stinted; starved, starving; halfstarved, famine-stricken, famished; jejune. scant &c (small) 32; scarce; not to be had, not to be had for love or money, not to be had at any price; scurvy; stingy &c 819; at the end ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... and to Texas, where Salcedo, Captain-General of the Internal Provinces of Mexico, waited for overt aggressions from land-hungry American frontiersmen. All these Spanish agents knew that Monroe had left Madrid empty-handed yet still asserting claims that were ill-disguised threats; but none of them knew whether the impending blow would fall upon West Florida or Texas. Then, too, right under their eyes was the Mexican Association, formed ...
— Jefferson and his Colleagues - A Chronicle of the Virginia Dynasty, Volume 15 In The - Chronicles Of America Series • Allen Johnson
... pathless, Under snow-encumber'd branches, Homeward hurried Hiawatha, Empty-handed, heavy-hearted, Heard Nokomis moaning, wailing; "Wahonowin! Wahonowin! Would that I had perish'd for you, Would that I were dead as you are! Wahonowin! Wahonowin!" And he rush'd into the wigwam, Saw ...
— The Canadian Elocutionist • Anna Kelsey Howard
... instruments. Where the moon's rays splashed across the bare right forearm of Bull, he sent a bullet that slashed through the great muscles. The revolver dropped from the nerveless hand of the giant, but Bull never paused. On he came, empty-handed, but with power of death, as the little man well knew, in the fingers of his extended left hand. He came with a snarl, a savage intake of breath, as he felt the hot slash of Pete's bullet. But Reeve, standing erect like some ...
— Bull Hunter • Max Brand
... paused for a gossip with the customs officer and a quartermaster at the head of the gang-plank, Captain Duncan little dreamed that his casual glance was resting on his steward for the last time. He watched him go down the gang-plank empty-handed, with no dog at his heels, and stroll off along the wharf ...
— Michael, Brother of Jerry • Jack London
... told me with regard to his experiences among the Mashona, and the advice that he had given me; and I finally determined that my most prudent course would be to send Piet into the country absolutely empty-handed, with a message to the effect that I desired the permission of the king to cross his borders, traverse the country, and visit him at his Place, hunting and trading with his people on the way. I was at first somewhat undecided as to whether or not ...
— Through Veld and Forest - An African Story • Harry Collingwood
... see them, as she always was, and no less the bottle of beautiful cream, the basket full of fresh lettuces, and the bunch of Mariposa lilies which they had brought. Clover never went into St. Helen's empty-handed. ...
— In the High Valley - Being the fifth and last volume of the Katy Did series • Susan Coolidge
... more requisition than in procuring a successful chase to the hunters,—a point of vital interest, since on it hung the lives of the whole party. They often, however, returned empty-handed; and, for one, two, or three successive days, no other food could be had than the bark of trees or scraps of leather. So long as tobacco lasted, they found solace in their pipes, which seldom left their lips. "Unhappy infidels," ...
— The Jesuits in North America in the Seventeenth Century • Francis Parkman
... the minds of some of the younger officers, and on the night of the 6th-7th Captain Nelson and Lieutenant Smith, with a few picked men, made a raid on the house. However, they found nobody but womenfolk, and returned empty-handed. ...
— The Second Battalion Royal Dublin Fusiliers in the South African War - With a Description of the Operations in the Aden Hinterland • Cecil Francis Romer and Arthur Edward Mainwaring
... The king put at his command ships and men, and young William Phipps—now Commander Phipps—went to the white reef in the blue Bahama Sea and searched the long sea wall for treasures faithfully, but in vain. He was compelled to return to England as empty-handed ...
— True to His Home - A Tale of the Boyhood of Franklin • Hezekiah Butterworth
... rode on their tethers, nodding and twisting like so many big iridescent bubbles; and half a block away, at the edge of the lot, a balloon vender, whose entire stock had been disposed of in one splendid transaction, now stood, empty-handed but full-pocketed, marveling at the stroke of luck that enabled him to take an afternoon off and rest ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1917 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... boys got home everybody had something to show but Danny. Tommy had his mouse's nest; Patsey had the hawk's nest; Bugsey had a fungus. Danny was the only empty-handed one, but Pearlie cheered him up wonderfully by predicting that he would get the very first wood-tick when the ...
— The Second Chance • Nellie L. McClung
... conjectured that the action of the British Minister had been inspired by Jules Favre, who, he thought, was trying to draw the Germans into negotiations through the medium of a third party only for purposes of delay. So the next morning Lord Lyons's secretary, Mr. Edward Malet, returned to Paris empty-handed, except that he bore a communication positively declining mediation; which message, however, led no doubt to an interview between Bismarck and Favre a couple ...
— The Memoirs of General Philip H. Sheridan, Vol. II., Part 6 • P. H. Sheridan
... they would welcome us if we went to them empty-handed?" asked Farmer. "No, no, that will never do. If we join the Spaniards we must take the ship with us to ensure a welcome; and I'm half inclined to think that will be the best thing we can do. But not now; that must be thought over at leisure. Meanwhile, what is to be done in the present ...
— The Rover's Secret - A Tale of the Pirate Cays and Lagoons of Cuba • Harry Collingwood
... certain number of foragers. These, starting off in the morning empty-handed and on foot, would return at night riding or driving beasts laden with spoils. "Here would be a silver-mounted family carriage drawn by a jackass and a cow, loaded inside and out with everything the country produced, vegetable and animal, dead and alive. There would ...
— History of the United States, Volume 4 • E. Benjamin Andrews
... she had now but six or seven days' supply of coal—a small reserve in case of emergency, and hardly sufficient to enable her to cruise a few days on the other side, and, if possible, not go quite "empty-handed" into port. ...
— The Cruise of the Alabama and the Sumter • Raphael Semmes
... winter wore away, and Cartier prepared to return home. He had found neither gold nor a passage to India, but he would not go empty-handed. Donnaconna and nine of his warriors were lured into the fort as his guests, overwhelmed by sturdy sailors, and carried on board the vessels. Then, having raised over the scene of this cruel treachery the symbol of the Prince of Peace, he set sail ...
— French Pathfinders in North America • William Henry Johnson
... why this has happened? Do you know why I am going away as empty-handed as I came? It is because I have ...
— The Mystics - A Novel • Katherine Cecil Thurston
... and down in a more secluded place, in quest of their mustangs, which had been left grazing upon the rich, succulent grass, beside a running stream of mountain water. All were in high spirits, and our hero was as buoyant and cheerful as the others, when they saw their friend returning empty-handed. ...
— Through Apache Lands • R. H. Jayne
... or the child): "Thou art my love, my glad Easter day, the summer-joy of my heart, my sweet hour; thou art the love which my young heart alone worships, and for the sake of which it has scorned earthly love. Give me a guerdon, then, my heart's delight, and let me not go away from thee empty-handed." ...
— The Evolution of Love • Emil Lucka
... quite brief,' I replied, 'our Lord wished to show himself to His disciples in all His glory.' 'Very well,' he said, 'here is a little image in memory of me.' I fell at his feet. 'I thank you, your Holiness....' I did not go away from him empty-handed." ...
— Virgin Soil • Ivan S. Turgenev
... could he face her? Fate had been against him, it was true, but he was in no mood to make excuses for himself. He had failed. That was the beginning and the end of it. He had set out to bring back wealth and comfort to her, and he was returning empty-handed. ...
— The Coming of Bill • P. G. Wodehouse
... stood in need of comforts, which he was not ready to supply; no sick man or woman languished for want of his assistance; and not even a beggar, unless a known impostor, went empty-handed from the Hall. Like the village pastor described in Goldsmith's poem ...
— McGuffey's Fifth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... them. Throughout the town are uproars, against the city rises the turreted circumvallation,[118] and man is slain by man with the spear. And the cries of children at the breast all bloody resound, and there is rapine sister of pell-mell confusion. Pillager meets pillager, and the empty-handed shouts to the empty-handed, wishing to have a partner, greedy for a portion that shall be neither less nor equal. What of these things can speech picture? Fruits of every possible kind strewn[119] upon the ground occasion sorrow, and dismal is the face of the stewards. ...
— Prometheus Bound and Seven Against Thebes • Aeschylus
... an opportunity given me for obtaining what I needed for the famishing mother and child, I felt such impatience with the fact and so much anxiety as to the condition of those I had left behind me that I questioned whether it would not be better for me to return to them empty-handed than to leave them so long without the comfort of my presence, when the fascination of the scene again seized me and I found myself lingering to mark its conclusion with an avidity which can only be explained by my sudden and ...
— The House in the Mist • Anna Katharine Green
... Empty-handed shalt thou not fare. Here in the cove my two long-ships are lying, with all the wealth I have won in my viking- ventures. There are many costly gifts from outland kings, good weapons by the chestful, and other priceless chattels. Take thou one of the ships; choose which thou wilt, and it ...
— The Vikings of Helgeland - The Prose Dramas Of Henrik Ibsen, Vol. III. • Henrik Ibsen
... One night, Crockett returned empty-handed. He had killed nothing, and he was very hungry. But there was a sick man in his mess, who was suffering far more than he. Crockett, with his invariable unselfishness and generosity, forgot his own hunger in his ...
— David Crockett: His Life and Adventures • John S. C. Abbott
... trunks on the top of it, and that reminded him that they had asked him to come down and see them off when the steamer left that afternoon. So he waved his hand when they passed, and bowed to them, and cried, "See you later," before he counted the consequences. He did not wish to arrive empty-handed, so he stopped in at a florist's and got a big basket of flowers and another of fruit, and piled them into ...
— Van Bibber and Others • Richard Harding Davis
... had certainly been told that the season was a very bad one, and that most of the sloops that go every summer to kill sea-horses (i.e., walrus) at Spitzbergen, being unable to reach the land., had returned empty-handed; but as three weeks of better weather had intervened since their discomfiture, I had quite reassured myself with the hope, that in the meantime the advance of the season might have opened for us a ...
— Letters From High Latitudes • The Marquess of Dufferin (Lord Dufferin)
... more anxious to be actively employed, by what he had seen of the stern morality of the old gentleman's character. Whenever the Dodger or Charley Bates came home at night, empty-handed, he would expatiate with great vehemence on the misery of idle and lazy habits; and would enforce upon them the necessity of an active life, by sending them supperless to bed. On one occasion, indeed, he even went so far as to knock them both down ...
— Oliver Twist • Charles Dickens
... intervention? They were feted in Holland; France gave them a rapturous welcome. They wished to come to Berlin, where the German people would have crowned them with flowers. But when they asked me to receive them—I refused. The agitation immediately died away, and the delegation returned empty-handed. Was that, I ask, the ...
— William of Germany • Stanley Shaw
... unloaded, as I had only two of my double-barrelled No. 10 rifles out that day, but the chase was so exciting that I could not help following empty-handed, in the hope that some gun-bearer might put one of V.'s spare guns in my hand. A large elephant and her young one, who was about three feet and a half high, were retreating up the rugged side of the mountain, and the mother, instead of protecting ...
— The Rifle and The Hound in Ceylon • Samuel White Baker
... the couple of men gossiping together at their heads.... He determined to see Mistress Manners again alone presently, when she should be recovered, and have a word with her in private. She would forgive him, perhaps, when she saw him ride off empty-handed, as he ...
— Come Rack! Come Rope! • Robert Hugh Benson
... the cloak-robber in reply. "They say that the mistress of the hacienda has escaped by a window. Her husband says she is absent. I don't care whether it's true or not. All I know is, that we can see nothing of her without; and we should have returned empty-handed, if good fortune hadn't thrown into our hands this gentleman here. I have no doubt he is a royalist spy, since he wanted to pass himself off for ...
— The Tiger Hunter • Mayne Reid
... about his tables, I have seen him generously distributing his wealth, And his meadhorns filled with generous liquors. I never returned empty-handed from the North. The bards prophesy that he shall have the government and sovereign power; Every prediction is at last ...
— Mediaeval Wales - Chiefly in the Twelfth and Thirteenth Centuries: Six Popular Lectures • A. G. Little
... poured Suddenly, dreadfully, on to my heart and spirit? Why is it I, of all the world I only Who must so love against nature? I knew Always, that not like harbour for a boat, Not a smooth safety, Love would take my soul; But like going naked and empty-handed Into the glitter and hiss of a wild sword-play, I should fall in love, and in fear and danger: But a danger of white light, a fear of sharpness Keen and close to my heart, not as it proves,— My heart hit by a great ...
— Emblems Of Love • Lascelles Abercrombie
... with his gun every sunny afternoon, and shot a brace or two of pheasants, without disturbing the rest; for he took no dog with him to run and yelp, but a little boy, who quietly tapped the hedgerows and walked the sunny banks and shaws. They never came home empty-handed. ...
— A Terrible Temptation - A Story of To-Day • Charles Reade
... no admiration in her eyes. And yet there was an expression in them that had not been in them since his departure. There was hope in her eyes, and something akin to joy in her whole attitude. James was riding empty-handed! ...
— The Twins of Suffering Creek • Ridgwell Cullum |
