"Gasp" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... indifferent, though from the fact that we were to sell the stock I inferred that it was unfavorable. The public took the 50,000 shares at between 32 and 36, much as an elephant takes in water after a thirsty tramp across sandy deserts—the shares were just sucked in without a gulp or a gasp. I did not know until long afterward that the purchasers were the English holders who had contributed the greater part of the 50,000 shares to meet our option—in other words, were buying back from us their own stock at more than twice the price we were to pay them for it, and that their eagerness ...
— Frenzied Finance - Vol. 1: The Crime of Amalgamated • Thomas W. Lawson
... came back, and Sam raced off to get some water, which he brought in a tin can he had discovered lying handy. The water was dashed over Toni's face, and presently he gave a little gasp. ...
— The Rover Boys in the Jungle • Arthur M. Winfield
... After the first gasp of a surprise that was really too over-powering for a cry, she was never in doubt of the nature of her danger. She defended herself in the full, clear knowledge of it, from the force of instinct which is the true source of every great display of energy, and with a determination ...
— Victory • Joseph Conrad
... as fat as a stage financier, paused here to gasp; for the utterance of this string of banalities, this rigmarole of commonplaces, had left him breathless. He was very much dissatisfied with his performance; and ready to curse his barren imagination. He longed to hit upon swelling phrases and natural and touching gestures, but in ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - LA CONSTANTIN—1660 • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... with unbated zeal, That horseman plied the scourge and steel; 115 For jaded now, and spent with toil, Embossed with foam, and dark with soil, While every gasp with sobs he drew, The laboring stag strained full in view. Two dogs of black Saint Hubert's breed, 120 Unmatched for courage, breath, and speed, Fast on his flying traces came, And all but won that desperate game; For, scarce a spear's length from his haunch, ...
— Lady of the Lake • Sir Walter Scott
... was drawing him to itself with a magnetic force. He who, for a year, had thought of her scarcely at all, now thought of nothing else. The last incident in her life, the face white with its intolerable pain of confession, the gasp for breath, the sudden fall, the quiet funeral, his own responsibility for this tragic death—he lived it all over and over again in an instant of time as grief, regret, remorse, successively swept his heart. Tying his horse outside the lonely burying ground, he threaded his way ...
— The Redemption of David Corson • Charles Frederic Goss
... dear; I will see that you see." Olimpia must know more exactly than this, and so she told the Mosca. He could deny her nothing; so as they rode between the grey swamps of the lagoon, he poured out his understanding in his own fashion. His oaths made her gasp, but the facts atoned for that. By the bones of God, but he served a great lord of that city—Guarino Guarini by name, whose blade was the longest, the oftenest out, and the cleanest cutter, as himself was the lightest heart, and most trenchant carver of men in Borso's fief. The good captain ...
— Little Novels of Italy • Maurice Henry Hewlett
... half proud of all this press of business, but he did not look as though it agreed with him. His face was pale, and when at last he threw down his hammer it was with a gasp of exhaustion. The day was very hot, and he had been at work before the dawn. It was no wonder, perhaps, that he looked wan and weary, yet the master passing by paused and cast an uneasy glance at him. For it ...
— The Sign Of The Red Cross • Evelyn Everett-Green
... fell away harmless, while always the relentless point drove him back and back. Forced to the rail, he stood his ground desperately, pale and glistening with the sweat of a man in the fear of death. Then his sword flew up, the pirate captain stabbed him through the throat and with a dying gasp the limp body ...
— The Black Buccaneer • Stephen W. Meader
... him with a little gasp of surprise. "Mr. Lindsay!" Sudden tears filmed her eyes. She forgot that she had left him with the promise never again to speak to him. She was in a far country, and he was ...
— The Big-Town Round-Up • William MacLeod Raine
... Rockpoint bully behind the ear, and Crosby let out a wild yell of pain, broken by a gasp for air, as he went under the bosom of ...
— The Young Oarsmen of Lakeview • Ralph Bonehill
... she emprace him Oontil he nearly bust. "Potz-blitz!" gasp out der Breitmann, "She is a squeezer - yust!" De damé she vas vealty, Likewise an orphan too, Mit a castel und a titel, So ...
— The Breitmann Ballads • Charles G. Leland
... wish to pass through the village, and turned down a side road, which would lead her to where she could cross the marshes, and come upon lonely places. The more lonely, the better. Every few moments she caught her breath with a hard short gasp. The slow rain fell upon her, big round, crystal drops hung on the hedgerows, and dripped upon the grass banks below them; the trees, wreathed with mist, were like waiting ghosts as she passed them by; Childe Harold's hoof upon the road, made ...
— The Shuttle • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... strong smell of cologne in the air. I was very weak; my head felt queer and light, and although I was not crying, something seemed to grab me inside and shake me every little while—a short, sharp shake that made me gasp. Before I could open my eyes I heard ...
— When Grandmamma Was New - The Story of a Virginia Childhood • Marion Harland
... in a city so strange and beautiful that she gave a gasp of surprise. The high marble wall extended all around the place and shut out all the rest of the world. And here were marble houses of curious forms, most of them resembling overturned kettles but with delicate slender spires and minarets running far up into the sky. ...
— The Emerald City of Oz • L. Frank Baum
... which little trouble was experienced, and then the two were forced to cough and gasp until they almost sank to the ground from exhaustion. Occasionally the vapor would lift, and, floating away, leave the air below comparatively pure, and then the black and blue atmosphere, heavy with impurities, would descend and wrap them ...
— Through Forest and Fire - Wild-Woods Series No. 1 • Edward Ellis
... permitted to climb—a circumstance which had naturally impressed itself on his childish memory. I told him that I had heard that long after the difficulties of the first marquis—who lent one hundred thousand pounds to George the Magnificent when that glorious prince was at the last gasp for L s. d.—had compelled him to part with his large estates; in the county Down, he had retained possession of this mansion, and that it had even descended to the last marquis, whose wild career concluded when he was only six-and-twenty; ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 11, - No. 22, January, 1873 • Various
... into the water the empty box she is carrying, thinking to excuse herself to her mistress for her ointment by saying that she was so unlucky as to let the box fall into the water for, when her palfrey stumbled under her, the box slipped from her gasp, and she came near falling in too, which would have been still worse luck. It is her intention to invent this story when she comes into her mistress' presence. Together they held their way until they came to the town, where the lady detained my lord Yvain and asked her damsel in private for her ...
— Four Arthurian Romances - "Erec et Enide", "Cliges", "Yvain", and "Lancelot" • Chretien de Troyes
... work, they sat on the grass waiting for Pinocchio to give his last gasp. But after three hours the Marionette's eyes were still open, his mouth still shut and his legs ...
— The Adventures of Pinocchio • C. Collodi—Pseudonym of Carlo Lorenzini
... he answered, the look of trouble deepening in his eyes, but his lips were smiling. He had a quaint sense of humour, and at his last gasp would have noted the ridiculous thing. And surely it was a droll malignity of Fate to bring him here to her whom, in this moment of all moments in his life, he wished far away. Fate meant to try him to the uttermost. This hurdle of trial was ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... off with a gasp of astonishment and terror, for above the rank growth of Indian celery in front of the lonely grave-house door, there was a sudden, unmistakable flutter of white. So thoroughly had the little fellow lost himself in the weird mysteries of his own creating ...
— Where the Sun Swings North • Barrett Willoughby
... and one Pan 60 Ready to twitch the Nymph's last garment off, And Moses with the tables deg. ... but I know deg.62 Ye mark me not! What do they whisper thee, Child of my bowels, Anselm? Ah, ye hope To revel down my villas while I gasp Bricked o'er with beggar's mouldy travertine Which Gandolf from his tomb-top chuckles at! Nay, boys, ye love me—all of jasper, then! 'Tis jasper ye stand pledged to, lest I grieve My bath must needs be left behind, alas! 70 One block, pure green ...
— Browning's Shorter Poems • Robert Browning
... hearts of the deceivers, as inseparable from their guilt. What gift in the wide world would tempt them to exchange places with the wretched creatures? What a thorny road of perdition must their way of life be! How they must whiten and gasp, and what poignant pangs must thrill them through and through when they remembered ...
— Summerfield - or, Life on a Farm • Day Kellogg Lee
... my God, and my God heard my prayer In the strength of my need, in the gasp of my breath— And show'd me a crag that rose up from the lair, And I clung to it, nimbly—and baffled the death! And, safe in the perils around me, behold On the spikes of the coral the goblet ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. III • Kuno Francke (Editor-in-Chief)
... jingle for their afternoon's ride with Miss Platt, the governess, strolled down into the town to do some light shopping; and, happening to pass the photographer's window, came to a standstill with a little gasp. ...
— The White Wolf and Other Fireside Tales • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... away by the universal desire to see, had perched himself on an unopened case of dried figs. His tall figure now towered far above the throng, and he set his teeth as he heard the old woman, almost speechless with delight, gasp out: ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... her part, gave a little gasp when told of the end of Locke's slayer; then, looking up, and seeing the parlour-maid standing open-mouthed, with a sauce-boat balanced on a tray at a most dangerous angle, she felt it was ...
— People of Position • Stanley Portal Hyatt
... her wing; for stormier days had brought With darker passions deeper tides of thought. The camp's harsh tumult and the conflict's glow, The thrill of triumph and the gasp of woe, The tender parting and the glad return, The festal banquet and the funeral urn, And all the drama which at once uprears Its spectral shadows through the clash of spears, From camp and field to echoing verse transferred, ...
— The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... the matter, dear father?' asked she. But the king could not tell her; and only managed to gasp out: 'My shoe! my shoe!' While the sailors stood round staring, thinking that his majesty ...
— The Orange Fairy Book • Various
... word—after his first gasp of amazement—Neale turned and walked out of the room, and out of the church. It was a hot Sunday and the walks were bathed in sunshine. Neale involuntarily took the path across the Parade in the direction of the old ...
— The Corner House Girls at School • Grace Brooks Hill
... blending:—vain The struggle; vain, against the coiling strain And gripe, and deepening of the dragon's grasp, The old man's clench; the long envenom'd chain Rivets the living links,—the enormous asp Enforces pang on pang, and stifles gasp on gasp." ...
— Fair Italy, the Riviera and Monte Carlo • W. Cope Devereux
... Then they were taught how to strangle a person with the sacred choke-cloth, but were not allowed to perform officially with it until after long practice. No half-educated strangler could choke a man to death quickly enough to keep him from uttering a sound—a muffled scream, gurgle, gasp, moan, or something of the sort; but the expert's work was instantaneous: the cloth was whipped around the victim's neck, there was a sudden twist, and the head fell silently forward, the eyes starting from the ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... paints admirably the temper of the citizens at the time. Its founder, Prior Norman, built church and cloister and bought books and vestments in so liberal a fashion that no money remained to buy bread. The canons were at their last gasp when the city-folk, looking into the refectory as they passed round the cloister in their usual Sunday procession, saw the tables laid but not a single loaf on them. "Here is a fine set out," said the citizens; "but where ...
— History of the English People, Volume I (of 8) - Early England, 449-1071; Foreign Kings, 1071-1204; The Charter, 1204-1216 • John Richard Green
... make that two hundred two hundred and fifty, or even more, without the slightest hope that it would ever be redeemed at its nominal value, it would still buy everything that was to be sold,—provisions, goods, houses, lands, even hard money itself. Down to its last gasp there were speculations afoot to take advantage of the differences in the degree of its worthlessness at different places, and buy it up in one place to sell it at another,—to buy it in Philadelphia at two hundred and twenty-five for one, and sell it in Boston at seventy-five for one. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 85, November, 1864 • Various
... makes you say that? If he didn't—who did?" Jim blurted out the question in a gasp, as though fairly forcing utterance of the words. Murphy flicked a sidelong look at him and then bent his absent gaze ...
— Louisiana Lou • William West Winter
... across the glade parted and the animal halted with a surprised snuff—one might almost say gasp of astonishment. The crash in the bushes betrayed that the creature had flung itself half around in its contemplated flight; then it hesitated; the flaming torch spurred its curiosity and, there being no movement in the glade, except of the shadows caused by the dancing flame from the ...
— With Ethan Allen at Ticonderoga • W. Bert Foster
... use of talking, my dear, what's the use! Now, I've been bustling about, bustling about for you, Agrafena Kondratyevna; trudging, trudging over the pavement, and at last I've grubbed up a suitable man: you'll gasp for joy, my jewels, for ...
— Plays • Alexander Ostrovsky
... obstruction and stumbled. He threw up his arms, as one will instinctively do, and for a single second was off his guard, though he recovered with incredible quickness. Any spectator of the strange combat would have given a gasp of terror, for the instant the stumble took place, the Sauk bounded forward with upraised knife and brought it down with a sweep like that of ...
— Camp-fire and Wigwam • Edward Sylvester Ellis
... him, and he'll never do it again. Think of the shame to Christa and me if he was hanged. And I've striven so to keep us respectable—Bart, you know I have. There's no shame in the world like your father being——" (there was a nervous gasp in her throat before she could go on)—"and he'd be awfully frightened. Oh, you don't know how frightened he'd be! If I thought they were going to do that to him, it would just kill me. I'll do anything; I wouldn't ...
— The Zeit-Geist • Lily Dougall
... as thickly peopled. All up the hills that hem the city in, these houses swarm; and the mites inside were lolling out of the windows, and drying their ragged clothes on poles, and crawling in and out at the doors, and coming out to pant and gasp upon the pavement, and creeping in and out among huge piles and bales of fusty, musty, stifling goods; and living, or rather not dying till their time should come, in an exhausted receiver. Every manufacturing town, melted into one, would hardly convey an impression of Lyons as ...
— Pictures from Italy • Charles Dickens
... forsook her; she was tortured with dissolving heats or frozen with icy blasts; her face contracted, growing small and pinched; her voice was hoarse and sharp,—every tone cut like a knife,—the notes became heavy to lift,—withheld by some hostile pressure,—impossible. One gasp, a convulsive effort, and there was ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 31, May, 1860 • Various
... halted me. My buck, now scarcely fifteen feet from me, began to shake and struggle. He raised his head, uttering a choking gasp. I heard the flutter of blood in his throat. He raised himself on his front feet and lifted his head high, higher, until his nose pointed skyward and his antlers lay back upon his shoulders. Then a strong convulsion ...
— Tales of lonely trails • Zane Grey
... trenches were entered and a hand-to-hand conflict ensued. With my field-glass I could see the fierce expressions of the men as they drove their reeking bayonets right through their enemies, and the appalling gasp and glare of eye in those whose mortal career had been thus suddenly brought to a close. Yells of fury, shouts, curses, clubbed rifles, battered skulls, unearthly shrieks, smoke and blood—who can imagine or describe such ...
— In the Track of the Troops • R.M. Ballantyne
... that the time to act was now or never, and that even if he ran he could hardly save himself, he advanced to Tom's side. The smoke was choking and stifling them, and the flames, coming from beneath the auto truck, made them gasp for breath. ...
— Tom Swift and his Giant Cannon - or, The Longest Shots on Record • Victor Appleton
... the novelist whose study of regeneration, "Twice-Born Men" has made the religious world fairly gasp at its startling revelations of the almost overlooked proofs of the power of conversion to be found among the lowest humanity. His latest work is a brilliant study of modern life which will maintain ...
— A Girl's Student Days and After • Jeannette Marks
... with a long gasp, the spray from a turbulent wave came dashing across the bows into her face, and as once the blood of Cecile de Savenaye had been roused by the call of the wild waters to leave safety and children and seek ...
— The Light of Scarthey • Egerton Castle
... saw that from its bow a very faint radiant beam was streaming. Beside me I heard Grantline gasp, "Gregg, am I crazy or is that bow beacon like the light-beam planted in Greater ...
— Wandl the Invader • Raymond King Cummings
... little children brought To a father his war-gear with eager haste; And now his heart was wrung to hear their sobs, And now he smiled on those small ministers, And stronger waxed his heart's resolve to fight To the last gasp for these, the near and dear. Yonder again, with hands that had not lost Old cunning, a grey father for the fray Girded a son, and murmured once and again: "Dear boy, yield thou to no man in the war!" And showed his son the old scars ...
— The Fall of Troy • Smyrnaeus Quintus
... in my room, of course; but was so deeply absorbed in his discoveries that he never noticed me in the doorway. I stepped into the room and startled him nearly into a fit. He sat down on the ground with a gasp. His eyes opened, and his mouth followed suit. I knew what was coming, and fled, followed by a long, dry howl which reached the servants' quarters far more quickly than any command of mine had ever done. In ten seconds Imam ...
— Short Stories and Selections for Use in the Secondary Schools • Emilie Kip Baker
... enjoying this opportunity of studying the features of the fine old hall, and making a note of them for future use. "What a magnificent old place!" he said to himself. "Trelawney says the man is at his last gasp, and will positively have to turn out before long. Poor beggar! I pity him. It must be heartbreaking to leave an old place like this, where one's ancestors have lived for generations, where every stone has its history, and the ...
— Pixie O'Shaughnessy • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... sudden intensity of the girl's sharp gasp when I said this, and marvelled too, how she, who had always been so mannish, nestled close to me and allowed her head to sink down on my shoulder. I pitied the strong-willed, self-reliant nature which had given way under some strain of which I had yet to be told. So I stooped ...
— The Crack of Doom • Robert Cromie
... leader, six or eight of the men snatched out pistols and fired at random into the woods. The cry of a panther, drawn out, long, full of ferocity and woe, plaintive on its last note, like the haunting lament of a woman, was their answer. He heard a gasp of fear from the men, but the leader, of stauncher stuff, cowed them with ...
— The Sun Of Quebec - A Story of a Great Crisis • Joseph A. Altsheler
... all day, and the relief of learning that Vincent himself had bought her, and that she was now installed as a house servant at the Orangery, but a few miles away, was quite overpowering, and for some minutes he could only gasp out his joy and thankfulness. He could hope now that when better times came he might be able to steal away some night and meet her, and that some day or other, though how he could not see, they might be reunited. The Jacksons remained in ignorance that their former ...
— With Lee in Virginia - A Story of the American Civil War • G. A. Henty
... all that himself, and when he looked at Dave's sturdy neck, and gigantic shoulders, he knew further that if the mountaineer got him in his grasp he would have to gasp "enough" in a hurry, or be saved by Budd ...
— The Trail of the Lonesome Pine • John Fox, Jr.
... this busy time, was the rub; however, for such means as he was capable of using, an invention like his could not long be at a loss. In short, he went to Marion, with a doleful face, and in piteous accents, stated that his father, an excellent old man as ever son was blessed with, was at his last gasp, and only wanted to ...
— The Life of General Francis Marion • Mason Locke Weems
... contemptuously. But as the street-door clanged on the form of the angry manager, the colour faded from the old man's face. Exhausted by the excitement he had gone through, he sank on a chair, and, with one quick gasp as ...
— What Will He Do With It, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... we laughed some more, until the tears ran down our cheeks, and we had to hold our poor weak sides. Pretty soon we fetched up with a gasp. ...
— Arizona Nights • Stewart Edward White
... gasp of surprise. It had not occurred to anybody in the crowd—that simple trick of inquiring about somebody who wasn't ten thousand miles away. The magician was hit hard; it was an emergency that had never happened in his experience before, and it corked him; he didn't know ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... instant there was complete silence. The company was evidently making sure that it had understood his speech correctly. Then Miss Newbury gave a gasp, and Henry Lawford, with a certain stern dignity that he knew ...
— The Law-Breakers and Other Stories • Robert Grant
... Weller the elder gave vent to an extraordinary sound, which, being neither a groan, nor a grunt, nor a gasp, nor a growl, seemed to partake in some degree of the ...
— The Pickwick Papers • Charles Dickens
... vasty gasp came from the audience, as from five hundred bathers in a wholly unexpected surf. This gasp was punctuated irregularly, over the auditorium, by imperfectly subdued screams both of dismay and incredulous joy, ...
— Penrod • Booth Tarkington
... its shoulder, indeed, in the effort—which she resisted—to claim priority, was the thought of the dear man with the blue eyes about to be a guest, once again, under this roof. This gave her a little thrill, a little gasp, wrapping her away to the borders of sad inattention to Louisa Taylor's somewhat academic discourse.—The girl's English was altogether too grammatical for entire good-breeding. In that how very far away from Carteret's!—Damaris ...
— Deadham Hard • Lucas Malet
... With a gasp she sprang up, and the next moment was running wildly away, away, down the forest path, heedless of the rough ground, of the stones and roots that tore her bare feet, running like a mad creature, ...
— The Swindler and Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell
... that the doctor is not more particular about his linen—the fools! But to return to my gentle crocodile. I was shown upstairs to the sick room, and there, sir, I saw the unfortunate girl, speechless, at the last gasp absolutely. The Killanmaul dandy had left her to die—absolutely given her up; and then, indeed, I'm sent for! Well, I was in a rage, and was rushing out of the house, when the crocodile way-laid ...
— Handy Andy, Volume One - A Tale of Irish Life, in Two Volumes • Samuel Lover
... of embrace, while she gave a kind of gasp of "Welcome, sir," and glanced somewhat reproachfully at Stephen for not having given her more warning. The cause of her dismay was plain as the Captain, giving her no time to precede him, strode into ...
— The Armourer's Prentices • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... long—it was like the shiver and gasp of one plunged suddenly into icy water. The fugitives were rallied, and brought back to their weapons, and to replying in kind; and having no longer to shoot with care, the rabble fusing into a compact target, especially on the outer edge of the ditch, not a shaft, or bolt, or stone, or ball from ...
— The Prince of India - Or - Why Constantinople Fell - Volume 2 • Lew. Wallace
... Belisaire, and he was the eldest of a large family, and spent the summer wandering from town to town.—A violent thunder-clap shook the house, the rain fell in torrents, and the noise was terrific. At that moment some one knocked. Jack turned pale. "They have come!" he said with a gasp. ...
— Jack - 1877 • Alphonse Daudet
... she rushed down the long avenue where, overhead, the rooks were calling, as though she could only be saved by the clean night air beyond the house. She was shocked; she believed that Christabel was mad; the thought of that warm room where the cat listened, made her gasp, and her horror extended to Francis Sales himself. The place felt wicked, but the clear road stretching before her, the pale evening sky and the sound of her own feet tapping the ...
— THE MISSES MALLETT • E. H. YOUNG
... of her window, and gave a gasp of delight as she saw the shimmering, rime-covered trees, with the sunshine striking full upon them and bringing out sparks of light from every branch and twig. Whatever sounds there were in the streets ...
— The Governess • Julie M. Lippmann
... presence in the other cellar; but that did not explain the shock her advent had given him. For a moment he seemed to have been reduced to imbecility. He opened his mouth as if to shout, or perhaps only to gasp. At any rate, it was somebody else who shouted. This somebody else was the heroic comrade whom I had detected swallowing a piece of paper. With laudable presence of mind he let out ...
— A Set of Six • Joseph Conrad
... made the youth gasp. But he set his teeth hard and looked down for Coulter. Presently he saw the other cadet bob upward. Then a hand came up and was waved frantically. Jack tried his best to reach that hand, but could not. Then Coulter commenced ...
— The Mystery at Putnam Hall - The School Chums' Strange Discovery • Arthur M. Winfield
... first-named had munchers of the star-like (removable) variety. No. 2, unfortunately, struck out in his sleep, awakening the other to the fact that his teeth were promenading about at the top of his throat. He struggled to a sitting posture with a gasp, felt frenziedly for his "adjustables" and looked round upon the mixture of dirty, frowsy figures. He stirred Nobby into wakefulness by the simple expedient of tickling him beneath the chin with a grimy big toe protruding ...
— Norman Ten Hundred - A Record of the 1st (Service) Bn. Royal Guernsey Light Infantry • A. Stanley Blicq
... of masterly placidity changed before her sister Caroline's announcement and her sister Rebecca Ann's gasp of ...
— Stories by Modern American Authors • Julian Hawthorne
... sings the prophetic voice; into its Convention sounding-board. The old song this: but to-day, O Heavens! has the sounding-board ceased to act? There is not resonance in this Convention; there is, so to speak, a gasp of silence; nay a certain grating of one knows not what!—Lecointre, our old Draper of Versailles, in these questionable circumstances, sees nothing he can do so safe as rise, 'insidiously' or not insidiously, ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle
... middle-aged women and say, "Catch me bringing you here again, Elspeth. It's a nice thing to have your dinner with every Tom, Dick and Harry in the street watching every mouthful you take," and because young men would as constantly have turned to young women with the gasp, "I'm sure I saw father passing," it would have been a failure. But here it was a success. The sight was like loud, frivolous music. And on the other side there was a theatre with steps leading up to a glittering bow-front, and a dark wall ...
— The Judge • Rebecca West
... gesture, which arrested those who were now hurrying to take a part in the scene. All, natives as well as ourselves, stood as motionless as stone. Her face was pale and her eyes were wonderful to look upon. With a gasp of thankfulness, I noticed that the blood on her breast was but a narrow streak Juba, staring at her, slowly withdrew his foot from his prostrate opponent, and Ingra first sat up, and then got upon his ...
— A Columbus of Space • Garrett P. Serviss
... breath, this time with a gasp, but he was forced to be silent. It would be a strange man indeed who could enter into an argument to prove his wife inferior to himself. He might be thoroughly convinced of this; might even have taken it for granted that others realized the fact, but he could hardly have the face to bring ...
— The Gentle Art of Cooking Wives • Elizabeth Strong Worthington
... nothing but a rope. The towhead was a rattling big distance off, away out there in the middle of the river, but I didn't lose no time; and when I struck the raft at last I was so fagged I would a just laid down to blow and gasp if I could afforded it. But I didn't. As I sprung ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... gasp of Juli's breath and said, "Damn it, no. The first move you make—" I couldn't finish. Rindy was in his hands, and when I knew Rakhal, he hadn't been given to making idle threats. We all three knew what Rakhal might ...
— The Door Through Space • Marion Zimmer Bradley
... hundred miles away. The youngest brings three stones of a grape, one of which put into the mouth of a person who is dying restores him to life. They at once test the telescope by wishing to see the princess, and they find her dying—at the last gasp indeed. By means of the carpet they reach the palace m time to save her life with one of the grape-stones. Each claims the victory. Her father, almost at his wits' end to decide the question, decrees that they shall shoot with the crossbow, ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton
... By the three kings! I have seen a man gasp out his last breath for less. Had you gone through the pain and unease that I have done to earn these things you would be at more care. I swear by my ten finger-bones that there is not one of them that hath not cost its weight in French blood! Four—an incense-boat, a ...
— The White Company • Arthur Conan Doyle
... the savages, though I were sure they would feast upon me when they had taken me, than those who would perhaps glut their rage upon me by inhuman tortures and barbarities; that in the case of the savages, I always resolved to die fighting to the last gasp, and why should I not do so now? Whenever these thoughts prevailed, I was sure to put myself into a kind of fever with the agitation of a supposed fight; my blood would boil, and my eyes sparkle, as if I was engaged, and I always resolved to take no quarter at their hands; but even at ...
— The Further Adventures of Robinson Crusoe • Daniel Defoe
... had to urine and salt water, which only increased the wants; half a hogshead of vinegar indeed floated up, of which each had half a wine glass; it afforded a momentary relief, but soon left us again in the same state of dreadful thirst. Almost at the last gasp, every one was dying with misery, and the ship, now one third shattered away from the stern, scarcely afforded a grasp to hold by, to the exhausted ...
— Thrilling Narratives of Mutiny, Murder and Piracy • Anonymous
... of the hot winds and deepening shadows of the coming storm. And all the time, in spite of Jim's comforting words, an anxiety grew and grew. The miles seemed endless, the heavens darkened, and the wind suddenly gave a gasp and died away, leaving a ...
— Winning the Wilderness • Margaret Hill McCarter
... Spad (I was always flying tired old avions in those days, the discards of older pilots) began to show signs of fatigue. The pressure went down. Neither motor nor hand pump would function, the engine began to gasp, and, although I instantly switched on to my reserve tank, it expired with shuddering coughs. The propeller, after making a few spins in the reverse direction, ...
— High Adventure - A Narrative of Air Fighting in France • James Norman Hall
... to take his cup from Vanderbank, whose hand, however, dealt with him on the question of his sitting down again. Mr. Longdon, resisting, kept erect with a low gasp that his host only was near enough to catch. This suddenly appeared to confirm an impression gathered by Vanderbank in their contact, a strange sense that his visitor was so agitated as to be trembling in every limb. It brought to his own lips a kind of ejaculation—"I SAY!" But even as he spoke ...
— The Awkward Age • Henry James
... dressings and equipment to pack, and were all just about at our last gasp from want of food and sleep, when a very kind Polish lady came and carried princess, we two Sisters, and Colonel S. off to her house, where she had prepared bedrooms for us. I never looked forward to anything so much in my life as I did to my bed that night. Our hostess simply ...
— Field Hospital and Flying Column - Being the Journal of an English Nursing Sister in Belgium & Russia • Violetta Thurstan
... Carroway's eldest son began to gasp, with his mouth full of crying; "and I borrowed Butcher Hewson's pony, and he's going to charge five shillings ...
— Mary Anerley • R. D. Blackmore
... a person like me?" a Russian workman complained in a letter which Pravda published on its front page. "So much money is spent on sputniks it makes people gasp. If there were no sputniks the Government could cut the cost of cloth for an overcoat in half and put a few electric flatirons in the stores. Rockets, rockets, rockets. Who needs ...
— The Practical Values of Space Exploration • Committee on Science and Astronautics
... five long years of an exile imprisonment on the barren isle of St. Helena, I heard his last gasp, "Head of the Army!" ...
— Shakspere, Personal Recollections • John A. Joyce
... they are but a few of the vital actions constantly taking place—are the instant result of one gasp of life-giving air. No subject can be fraught with greater interest than watching the first spark of life, as it courses with electric speed "through all the gates and alleys" of the soft, insensate body of the infant. The effect ...
— The Book of Household Management • Mrs. Isabella Beeton
... the 'boards that signify the world'. The performances, to be sure, were French and Italian operas, wherein the ballet-master, the machinist and the decorator vied with one another for the production of amazing spectacular effects. People went to stare and gasp—the language was of no importance. It was not exactly dramatic art, but from the boy's point of view it was no doubt magnificent. At any rate it made him at home in the dream-world of the imagination, filled his mind with grandiose pictures and gave ...
— The Life and Works of Friedrich Schiller • Calvin Thomas
... an overjoyed gasp found herself in her mother's arms. She pressed closer while the three laughed, and when the other two ceased she still mirthfully clung in that impregnable sanctuary. Suddenly she hearkened, tossed her curls, and stood very straight. ...
— Gideon's Band - A Tale of the Mississippi • George W. Cable
... forlorn roustabout could not be coherent. He continued to gasp and splutter out excited adjectives, ...
— Bart Stirling's Road to Success - Or; The Young Express Agent • Allen Chapman
... choking me? What was it that sent what blood I had left gushing up in a dizzy cloud over my eyes, so that I could only gasp out once the one word "Lizzy!" as I started to my feet, and stood staring at her in a helpless, half-blind fashion; for it seemed as though I had been mistaken, and that it was possible after all that ...
— Begumbagh - A Tale of the Indian Mutiny • George Manville Fenn
... recalled the long years that it had taken to earn the three dollars for Sandy's venture and she gave a little gasp. ...
— A Son of the Hills • Harriet T. Comstock
... weak, wicked face, even then flushed with liquor! Johnny had seen it too often thus. But never before as a thief's face! He gave a little gasp, and fell back upon that strange reserve of apathy and reticence in which children are apt to hide their emotions from us at such a moment. He watched impassively the two other men who followed his brother out to give him a small bag and some ...
— Openings in the Old Trail • Bret Harte
... so rapidly that the heat of it, penetrating to the prison of the boys, was almost unbearable. The smoke, too, made their eyes smart and burn, and it choked them, causing them to gasp and cough. ...
— The Khaki Boys Over the Top - Doing and Daring for Uncle Sam • Gordon Bates
... disappeared together beneath the surface, to rise together, a second later, the stallion still pawing the air with fore-hoofs the size of dinner plates, the rider still clinging to the sleek, satin- coated muscles. Graham thought, with a gasp, what might have happened had the stallion turned over. A chance blow from any one of those four enormous floundering hoofs could have put out and quenched forever the light and sparkle of that superb, ...
— The Little Lady of the Big House • Jack London
... Always a hushed gasp of admiration greets their entrance,—an admiration mixed with a shudder of awe. Again the standard bearer, with his whizzer or thunder-maker, leads, followed by the asperger, and we hear the sound of thunder, as the whizzer (sometimes called the bull-roarer) is whirled rapidly ...
— The Unwritten Literature of the Hopi • Hattie Greene Lockett
... he was obliged to clench his teeth together, to prevent them from chattering audibly; he glanced wildly round him as if seeking for some means of escape; and, after two or three ineffectual efforts to speak, he managed to gasp out brokenly through his clenched teeth ...
— The Voyage of the Aurora • Harry Collingwood
... that I am at my last gasp, Diana," he said with dignity, on one of these occasions; "or that I need to be talked to by my own daughter as if I were on my deathbed. I can show you men some years my senior driving their phaetons-and-pairs in that Park. The Gospel is all very well in its place—during Sunday-morning ...
— Charlotte's Inheritance • M. E. Braddon
... At these words a gasp of astonishment went up from those who stood within hearing, expecting as they did to see them rewarded by instant death. ...
— The Wizard • H. Rider Haggard
... sight! What a miracle! What a transformation in my whole destiny! I had already begun to look upon myself as a vassal of Proserpine, a bondsman of Hades, and now I could only gasp in impotent amazement at the suddenness of the change; words fail me to express fittingly the astounding metamorphosis. For the bodies of my butchered victims were nothing more nor less than three ...
— Library of the World's Best Mystery and Detective Stories • Edited by Julian Hawthorne
... "you are very kind, but we must be getting on our way. I will carry Joan," he added, with a tired little gasp, looking apprehensively up the long stretch of rough ground rising right in front, and the now gloomy hilltop, above which heavy black clouds hung, like the curtain of night about to descend and smother them in its ...
— Two Little Travellers - A Story for Girls • Frances Browne Arthur
... and his wife Geertruyt van Erp, by Hals, in one of the cabinets, are painted with such consummate artistry that you gasp. The thin paint, every stroke of which sings out, sets you to thinking of John Sargent and how he has caught the trick of brush-work—at a slower tempo. But not even Sargent could have produced the collar and cuffs. A Whistler, a full-length, in another gallery, looks like an unsubstantial wraith ...
— Promenades of an Impressionist • James Huneker
... astonished to find how near they were to the "top" of the ocean, for they had not ascended through the water very long when suddenly her head popped into the air, and she gave a gasp of surprise to find herself looking at the clear sky for the first time since she had started upon this adventure by ...
— The Sea Fairies • L. Frank Baum
... hydrogen in its place, and the air would quickly suffocate us. That changing of the dark venous blood in our lungs into the bright, red, arterial blood would instantly cease. Fancy the sensation of inhaling an odorless, non-poisonous atmosphere that would make one gasp for breath! We should be quickly poisoned by the waste of our own bodies. All things that live must have oxygen, and all things that burn must have oxygen. Oxygen does not burn, ...
— The Breath of Life • John Burroughs
... a dainty thumb and finger gave a sharp click that went straight through Eunice's brain, and made her gasp out a frightened "Oh!" ...
— Raspberry Jam • Carolyn Wells
... the bits of bric-a-brac, the dusty manuscripts, the dull red hangings, not quite understanding the fox in his hole. You will gratefully catch the sounds from the mound below our feet, and when you say good-by and drop swiftly down those long stories you will gasp a little sigh of relief. You will pull down your veil and drive off to an afternoon tea, feeling that things as they are are very nice, and that a little Chicago mud is worth all the clay of the studios. And I? I shall take the roses out of the vase and throw them away. I shall say, ...
— Literary Love-Letters and Other Stories • Robert Herrick
... reached him about this time strengthened him in this resolution: this was the death of Ferdinand. The old king had caught a severe cold and cough on his return from the hunting field, and in two days he was at his last gasp. On the 25th of January, 1494, he passed away, at the age of seventy, after a thirty-six years' reign, leaving the throne to his elder son, Alfonso, who was immediately chosen ...
— The Borgias - Celebrated Crimes • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... close-fitting transparent cap that covered, but could not hide, the waves of dark crisp hair. When Cecily discovered that a string of pearls was clasped round the other little girl's neck, she gave a long gasp of delight, a gasp that ended in an irrepressible sigh. For, a moment later, this dazzling vision, with its dancing eyes, delicate features, and glowing cheeks, was lost to sight. All through the remainder of the service it stayed hidden in the ...
— A Book of Quaker Saints • Lucy Violet Hodgkin
... accidentally, and in that event nothing could save him from a fall to the bottom of the ravine. For a while, they watched his tense figure moving futilely; and then Batley, standing most precariously poised, bent his arm and seized one of Lisle's feet. He spoke in a breathless gasp as he thrust it upward; Lisle's legs swung free and he disappeared beyond the edge. The two below were conscious of a vast relief. It was tempered, however, by the knowledge that they must shortly emulate ...
— The Long Portage • Harold Bindloss
... off his guard. With a gasp that was a kind of groan he dropped into a chair, the surface of his mind strewn with the wreckage of the lying excuses he had ...
— The Cost • David Graham Phillips
... once). No, no! Let me out—I am innocent! (He gives a gasp of relief as he realises the situation.) Free! It is true, then! I have escaped! I dreamed that I was back in prison again! (He shudders and helps himself to a large whisky-and-soda, which he swallows at a gulp.) That's better! Now I feel a new man—the man I was three years ago. ...
— Happy Days • Alan Alexander Milne
... in idleness, is the condition of wealthy people:—creatures of prey? horrible thought! yet allied to his Idea, it seemed. Yes, but these good caged beasts here set them an example, in not troubling relatives and friends when they come to the gasp! Mrs. Burman's invitation loomed as monstrous—a final act of her cruelty. His skin pricked with dews. He thought of Nataly beside him, jumping the ditch with him, as a relief—if she insisted on doing it. He hoped she would not, for the ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... For I shall leave no golden hopes behind, No idol-love to pine because I die, No friends to wait my coming or to mourn. They wait my coming in the world beyond; And wait not long, for I am almost there. 'Tis but a gasp, and I shall pass the bound 'Twixt life and death—through death to life again— Where sorrow cometh never. Pangs and pains Of flesh or spirit will not pierce me there; And two will greet me from the jasper walls— God's angels—with a song of holy peace, ...
— The Feast of the Virgins and Other Poems • H. L. Gordon
... at my daughter, opened his mouth with a gasp of alarm and stupefaction, and then fell ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant
... her, she was literally speechless, for the moment. At last she just found voice to gasp out:—"Oh, Daverill, you can't mean it! Give it me back—oh, give it me back! Will you give it me back for money?... Oh, how can you ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan
... his suffering, and went on composing with undiminished fire to the last, he was truly brave. Nothing could clog that aerial lightness. "Pouvez-vous siffler?" his doctor asked him one day, when he was almost at his last gasp;— "siffler," as every one knows, has the double meaning of to whistle and to hiss:—"Helas! non," was his whispered answer; "pas meme une comedie de M. Scribe!" M. Scribe[150] is, or was, the favorite ...
— Selections from the Prose Works of Matthew Arnold • Matthew Arnold
... he had sought refuge, shook him as she would shake a toy dog, until his teeth rattled, and then flung him out of the door leading into the back shed. It was done so expeditiously that I could only gasp. ...
— My Lady of the North • Randall Parrish
... struck by a spent bullet. I remember the sudden pallor, the half gasp, and the expression of pain that followed. Then the man uttered a cry. The same expression crossed the captain's face, but there was no gasp and no cry; only a straightening of the lips and a tightening-up of the iron jaw. ...
— The Veiled Lady - and Other Men and Women • F. Hopkinson Smith
... gasp, just as if she had fallen into a bath tub full of cold water. Bert quickly glanced at his friend Billy. Nell had hurried over to the other side of the room to stop Flossie from pulling a pile of dusty magazines from a shelf ...
— Bobbsey Twins in Washington • Laura Lee Hope
... conviction to his suspicions. She knew that she alone stood between him and his finding Marta talking to Brown headquarters. As she was in a state of astonishment, why, astonishment was her cue. She appeared positively speechless from it except for the emission of another horrified gasp. Time! time! She must hold him until Marta left ...
— The Last Shot • Frederick Palmer
... gasp above the sound of his own hard breathing, and saw Holly's face poked a little forward, very pale, with ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... it is again, that the Lord doth tell Sardis, that those among them that stood it out to the last gasp, in the faith and love of the gospel, should not be blotted out of the book of life; but they, with the work of God on their soul, and their labour for God in this world; should be confessed before his Father, and ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... which he held burned out and scorched the flesh of his fingers. His jaw dropped, his eyes widened. He opened his lips and tried to speak, but closed them again without having uttered a sound save a choking gasp. He tried again, feeling an urge for speech—something, anything, to make him believe that he was here, alive—that the horror within the cab was real. This time he uttered ...
— Midnight • Octavus Roy Cohen
... A gasp of wonder and astonishment rose from all those who witnessed the extraordinary sight, and then somebody cried, 'The prophecy! the prophecy! He has shattered the sacred stone!' and at once ...
— Allan Quatermain • by H. Rider Haggard
... which had arrived in the second communication. She glanced at it, askance. Then she took it with a little gasp. ...
— The Lock And Key Library - Classic Mystery And Detective Stories, Modern English • Various
... still more surprising on her or not. But she looked so uncomfortable already, so totally without the least clue to his mysterious words, so unconscious of anything stranger about him than his shirt-sleeves and loss of weight, that he only uttered something between a gasp and a sigh, and, turning away from her, took up his brushes to ...
— The Prodigal Father • J. Storer Clouston
... started to run in to our trench, and a terrific fusillade was opened on to them, the bullets kicking up the dust all round them as they ran. One poor fellow was dropped, but the other managed to reach our trench and fall into it. He too was badly hit, but just had the strength to gasp out that except himself and the man who had started with him, all the guard on Waschout Hill had been killed or wounded, and that the Boers were gradually working their way up to the ...
— The Defence of Duffer's Drift • Ernest Dunlop Swinton
... was already in leaping range; but the tiger had learned, in many experiences, always to make sure. Still she crouched—a single instant in which the trotting native came two paces nearer. Then the man drew up with a gasp of fright. ...
— O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1921 • Various
... it, and then asked me to help him turn over towards the wall. I did so, and I saw him remain so, his arm bent, and his head in his hand, like a man who is thinking profoundly. But about a quarter of an hour later, all of a sudden, I thought I heard him gasp. I came up softly on tiptoe, and looked. I was mistaken; the lieutenant was not gasping, he was crying like a baby; and what I had heard were sobs. Ah, commandant! I felt as if somebody had kicked me in the stomach. Because, ...
— The Clique of Gold • Emile Gaboriau
... Barouche, then he suddenly closed on it tight. He closed on it till he felt it crunching in his own and saw that the face of Barode Barouche was like that of one in a chair of torture. He squeezed, till from Barouche's lips came a gasp of agony, and then ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... the electric light burning in the hall. She went up the staircase and in the library she found Sir Horace, who was lying on the floor at the point of death. She tried to lift him to a sitting position, but with a convulsive gasp he died ...
— The Hampstead Mystery • John R. Watson
... late! The needle point of the jet-headed hatpin entered exactly at the outer corner of his right eye and passed backward for nearly its full length into his brain—smoothly, painlessly, swiftly. He gave a little surprised gasp, almost like a sob, and lolled his head back against the chair rest, like a man who has grown suddenly tired. The hand that held the champagne glass relaxed naturally and the glass turned over on its side with a small tinkling sound and spilled its ...
— The Escape of Mr. Trimm - His Plight and other Plights • Irvin S. Cobb
... a water-tight compartment," he replied. "It is a process of regimentation like the old Germany that will soon merge into a new Internationalism. What seems to be at this moment an orgy of Nationalism in South Africa or elsewhere is merely its death gasp. The New World will be a world of individualism ...
— An African Adventure • Isaac F. Marcosson
... and hearty adaptation of the principles of art which are illustrated in all other departments. There is nothing in Millais's or Hunt's paintings more purely pre-Raphaelite than Rachel's acting in the last scenes of "Adrienne Lecouvreur". It is the perfection of detail. It was studied, gasp by gasp, and groan by groan, in the hospital wards of Paris, where men were dying in agony. It is terrible, but it is true. We have seen a crowded theatre hanging in a suspense almost suffocating over that fearful scene. Men grew pale, women ...
— Literary and Social Essays • George William Curtis
... dawn of a May morning when John Barclay clutched his bedfellow and whispered, "Bob, Bob—look, look." When the awakened one saw nothing, John tried to scream, but could only gasp, "Don't you see Ellen—there—there by the table?" But whatever it was that startled him fluttered away on a beam of sunrise, and Bob Hendricks rose with the frightened boy, and went to ...
— A Certain Rich Man • William Allen White
... thoroughly finished off, externally and internally, so far as floors and doors and windows and staircases go, but of course entirely unfurnished. One of these is selected and hired (at a cost that would make some people gasp) for the determined evening. An upholsterer is turned in to put up temporary mirrors, chandeliers and curtains, and lay down temporary carpets; a florist, following, covers bare mantelpieces with captivating layers of cut-roses, ferns and mosses, ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 12, No. 32, November, 1873 • Various |
