"Listless" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... wearily up from the corral. The boy had gone without sleep or rest until his eyes were heavy and his movements listless. Like the women of Palomitas he also had worked overtime at the call of Tula, and Kit wondered at the concerted activity—no one had held back ...
— The Treasure Trail - A Romance of the Land of Gold and Sunshine • Marah Ellis Ryan
... now—like a battered hulk seems he, Cast high on a foreign strand, Though he feels "in port," as it need must be, And the stay of a daughter's hand— Yet ever the round of the listless hours,— His pipe, in the languid air— The grass, the trees, and the garden flowers, And the ...
— Green Fields and Running Brooks, and Other Poems • James Whitcomb Riley
... The listless figure in the saddle made no reply, seemed bereft of any volition of its own. As Ramorez put up his hands to help her, she came down stiffly and stood stiffly, looking about her. Kendric, to see better, came on emerging from the shadows and stood, leaning against the wall, ...
— Daughter of the Sun - A Tale of Adventure • Jackson Gregory
... spectators in the arduous work of hauling the cobbles one by one on to the steep bank of shingle. A tackle hooked to one of the baulks of timber forming the staith was being hauled at by five women and two men! Two others were in a listless fashion leaning their shoulders against the boat itself. With the last 'Heave-ho!' at the shortened tackle the women laid hold of the nets, and with casual male assistance laid them out on the shingle, removed any fragments of fish, and generally ...
— Yorkshire Painted And Described • Gordon Home
... of making wild attempts to rush out again, and struggling ineffectually with those that held me back—of raving wildly; then of long and dreamless slumbers, when I had become exhausted, and the sharp agony was past; of rousing myself to go about in a listless, apathetic way, waiting with dulled sense for lists of killed and wounded; of the doctor bringing the paper to me and saying, with his face all light: 'He is not dead; you will find his name among the wounded;' of finding ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 2, August, 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... fit himself to the work of any time; and so he will. But it is not necessarily to the first thing that offers. There is always latent in civilized society a certain amount of what may be called Sir Philip Sidney genius, which will seem elegant and listless and aimless enough until the congenial chance appears. A plant may grow in a cellar; but it will flower only under the due sun and warmth. Sir Philip Sidney was but a lovely possibility, until he went to be ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 8, No. 46, August, 1861 • Various
... listless, limp. It dances not. As deep the sea breathes from a gentle breast As any bride who dreams at love's behest, And wakes and sighs, then casts with dreams her lot. Sails hang upon the masts—useless-forgot— Like folded standards ...
— Sonnets from the Crimea • Adam Mickiewicz
... man's voice, laughing. The door of the express office banged. George Willard arose and crossing the room fumbled for the doorknob. Sometimes he knocked against a chair, making it scrape along the floor. By the window sat the sick woman, perfectly still, listless. Her long hands, white and bloodless, could be seen drooping over the ends of the arms of the chair. "I think you had better be out among the boys. You are too much indoors," she said, striving to relieve the embarrassment of the departure. "I thought ...
— Winesburg, Ohio • Sherwood Anderson
... listless answer. "I presume likely you mean the news about the appropriation, and the editorial dig at yours truly? Yes, I've seen it. They don't bother me much. I've got more important things on my ...
— Cy Whittaker's Place • Joseph C. Lincoln
... little manse she crept, sinking into the first easy chair that presented itself. With slow listless fingers she removed her wraps, dropping them on the floor beside her,—laboriously unbuttoned and removed her shoes, and in the same lifeless manner loosened her dress and took the pins from her hair. Then, holding her ...
— Sunny Slopes • Ethel Hueston
... the showmen made their appeal were all so much better, evidently, than the showmen supposed; the showmen themselves appeared harmless enough, and one could not say that there was personally any harm in the living picture; rather she looked listless and dull, but as to the face ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... Miss Holbrook, falling back into her old listless attitude. Then, with some asperity: "Dear me, David! Did n't I tell you not to be remembering that ...
— Just David • Eleanor H. Porter
... of little, self-conceited biographers. In short, the whole scene is dashed off in the first style of art; the subject and humour are all over English—true to nature, and so forcible as to seize on the attention of the most listless beholder. ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 12, No. 336 Saturday, October 18, 1828 • Various
... awkward wonder for a time As there she listless lay and sang my rhyme, Wrapped up in fabrics of an Indian clime She seemed a Bird of Paradise Languid from ...
— My Beautiful Lady. Nelly Dale • Thomas Woolner
... dune, Where nature was quiescent in the glimmering Noonday sun of early June,— The Placid sea lay shimmering In a mist of blue, From which the sky now drew Its wealth of hue and colour; One heard but the deep breathing of the ocean, As it breathed along the shore in even motion. Among the pines and listless of the scene, Atthis and Alcaeus lay, Within the heart of each a hunger For the unknown gift of life. Here from day to day They met and dreamed away The soft unfloding days of spring,— Now turning to ...
— ANTHOLOGY OF MASSACHUSETTS POETS • WILLIAM STANLEY BRAITHWAITE
... ten days after this that he stopped me in one of my eternal listless promenades and invited me ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 20 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... had become insane through a cruel disappointment in love,—her lover having wantonly, and without offering a pretext, broken off the engagement just before the wedding day,—and had been sent to a lunatic asylum. I found her at home, a wretched shadow of her old self, listless, and in a settled melancholy, which the doctors said was incurable. She had in fact been discharged from the asylum as a hopeless lunatic, though the violent phase of the insanity had passed. It occurred to me that ...
— The Autobiography of a Journalist, Volume I • Stillman, William James
... character all over the town. I was quite astonished to find myself accosted in quite a respectful manner, to which I was not accustomed; but in the pious state of mind I was in, this confirmed me in the belief that my idea of taking the cowl had been a Divine inspiration. Nevertheless, I felt listless and weary, but I looked upon that as the inevitable consequence of so complete a change of life, and thought it would disappear when I ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... between Lewes and the coast line to the south-east (with the exception of one symmetrical hillock just out of the town). Among them curls the lazy Ouse; just beneath you Lewes sleeps, red-roofed as an Italian town, sending up no hum of activity, listless and immovable save for a few spirals of silent smoke. The surrounding hills are very fine: Firle Beacon in the far east; Mount Caburn, a noble cone, in the near east; Mount Harry to the west, on whose slopes Henry III., ...
— Highways & Byways in Sussex • E.V. Lucas
... apparent that the convention could not longer survive. The listless delegates, the absence of enthusiasm, and the uncrowded galleries, showed that all hope of a nomination was abandoned, especially since the friends of Douglas, who could prevent the selection of another, declared that the Illinoisan would ...
— A Political History of the State of New York, Volumes 1-3 • DeAlva Stanwood Alexander
... down, he looked at the Professor, who quietly took up the skull and pointed to the fracture, endeavoring by his conversation to strike a word or keynote by which some recollection would be started; but he was mute and soon again became listless. ...
— The Wonder Island Boys: The Mysteries of the Caverns • Roger Thompson Finlay
... promotes faith on the part of those participating as few other things can. Too frequently we content ourselves with the routine of commonplace "talk." There is no enthusiasm in mere routine as there is none in listless listening to generalities. Our effort should be to make our classes intellectual social ...
— Principles of Teaching • Adam S. Bennion
... Bell, I was sure of it—I couldn't tell you, but I was sure you must see!" Her pen was thrown aside and she drooped in her chair, her hands listless ...
— The Seeker • Harry Leon Wilson
... her hand into Denise's, began to sing. At the first note Madame Laurin, who had been gazing out of the window with a rather listless smile, turned quickly and looked at Little Joyce with amazed eyes. Delight followed amazement, and when Little Joyce had finished, the great Madame rose impulsively, her face and eyes glowing, stepped swiftly to Little Joyce and took the thin dark ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1909 to 1922 • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... was the edict by which the most beautiful works of nature were to be regulated, who are only truly charming when they make us feel and feel themselves. 'Listlessness, listlessness, listlessness;' for when you choose not to be listless, the contrast is so striking that the triumph must ...
— The Voyage of Captain Popanilla • Benjamin Disraeli
... smoothed it out, examined (grinning) its daily meed of comics, read every word on the "Sports Page," ploughed through the weekly vaudeville charts, scanned the advertisements, and at length reviewed the news columns with a listless eye. ...
— The Day of Days - An Extravaganza • Louis Joseph Vance
... virtue of some mysterious harmonies it is 'the image of God,' and must, we feel, enclose the God-like; so I suppose I felt, for though I wished to think her stupid, I could not. She was not exactly languid, but a grave and listless beauty, and a splendid ...
— Wylder's Hand • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... of her dress, speech, and bearing averred that Edith Dexter was no humble scion of proletariat. Her polished yet reserved manners bespoke high birth and aristocratic associations; but something in the composed, sad countenance, in the listless drooping of the pretty head, hinted that she had long since spilt the rosy sparkling foam of her cup of life, and was ...
— Vashti - or, Until Death Us Do Part • Augusta J. Evans Wilson
... belonged to some fair being. Though suffering from the agony of his wound, there was something so attractive in this discovery, that the eyes of the invalid were immediately turned upon the window, or rather grating, from which the flag was suspended, and his countenance changed at once, from the listless apathy of pain to an expression of eager interest. A young girl was in the window, leaning her forehead against the reja, or grating, and looking down with more of painful interest than curiosity upon the pale face ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 3 September 1848 • Various
... sublime inspiration that Dubufe painted the accessory panels in monotone. In that on the right, a dismal sky, filled with rolling clouds and sad presaging ravens flying, over-shadows the outcast, seated on a rock in an attitude of listless dejection, with the swine feeding at his feet. In the panel on the left he is seen in the close embrace of his merciful parent. His head is bowed in humility, and, in an agony of remorse and shame, while the old house-dog sniffs at him for an obtrusive ...
— The Aldine, Vol. 5, No. 1., January, 1872 - A Typographic Art Journal • Various
... afternoon was rather a failure. The Park had that peculiar bleakness that foreruns the first promise of spring. The children, that six weeks before were playing in the snow and six weeks later would be searching the turf for dandelions, were in the listless between seasons state of comparative inactivity. There was a deceptive balminess in the air that seemed merely to ...
— Turn About Eleanor • Ethel M. Kelley
... use. The guests read steadily through the current batch of magazines, and fell back gradually, on the "Badminton Library" and bound volumes of PUNCH. Lady Blemley made periodic visits to the pantry, returning each time with an expression of listless depression which ...
— The Chronicles of Clovis • Saki
... put out of one's head; disconcert, discompose; put out, confuse, perplex, bewilder, moider[obs3], fluster, muddle, dazzle; throw a sop to Cerberus. Adj. inattentive; unobservant, unmindful, heedless, unthinking, unheeding, undiscerning[obs3]; inadvertent; mindless, regardless, respectless[obs3], listless &c. (indifferent) 866; blind, deaf; bird- witted; hand over head; cursory, percursory[obs3]; giddy-brained, scatter- brained, hare-brained; unreflective, unreflecting[obs3], ecervele [French]; offhand; dizzy, muzzy[obs3], brainsick[obs3]; ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... he remembered, Blake first complained. It was at the practice, and Diemann had given him a shot about his listless ...
— Stanford Stories - Tales of a Young University • Charles K. Field
... the listless baronet his directions, observing: 'It's odd, she never will come alone since ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... in the hall; and the party sail, arm-in-arm, into the drawing-room, and forthwith fall to lively remarks on that neutral ground of conversation, the weather. Mr. Verdant Green is there, dressed with elaborate magnificence; but he continues in a state of listless apathy, and is indifferent to the "lively" rattle of the balloon-like Miss Waters, until John the footman (who is suffering from influenza) rouses him into animation by the magic talisman "Bister, Bissis, an' the Biss "Oneywoods;" when he beams through his spectacles in the most ...
— The Adventures of Mr. Verdant Green • Cuthbert Bede
... from him during his absence and were, accordingly, unable to tell when he expected to get back. Since his return from India Gwen had given evidence of a reviving interest in life, but now that he was again away, she relapsed into her old listless condition, from which we found it impossible to arouse her. Alice, who did her utmost to please her, was at her wit's end. She could never tell which of two alternatives Gwen preferred, since that young lady would invariably ...
— The Darrow Enigma • Melvin L. Severy
... exhausted, feeble, languid, wearied, faded, half-hearted, listless, worn, faint-hearted, ill-defined, purposeless, worn down, ...
— English Synonyms and Antonyms - With Notes on the Correct Use of Prepositions • James Champlin Fernald
... great! it seems to include God! If you knew what he knows about death you would clap your listless hands. But why should I seek in vain to comfort you? You must be made miserable, that you may wake from your sleep to know that you need God. If you do not find him, endless life with the living whom you bemoan would become and remain ...
— Unspoken Sermons - Series I., II., and II. • George MacDonald
... impending storm, they hung down their heads in a listless manner, and sighed heavily, a circumstance that to our minds presaged calamity, and which, I may add, was altogether unlike the usual indication of fatigue in animals which have travelled a great distance. Had the tornado burst upon us, instead of passing off as it did, it is very doubtful whether ...
— An Englishman's Travels in America - His Observations Of Life And Manners In The Free And Slave States • John Benwell
... out. A procession slowly wended its way up the street, led by the marshal, astride a piebald horse bearing the crude brand of the CG. Three men followed him and numerous dogs of several colors, sizes, and ages roamed at will, in a listless, bored way, between the horse and the men. The dust arose sluggishly and slowly dissipated in the hot, shimmering air, and a fly buzzed with wearying persistence against the dirty glass in the ...
— Bar-20 Days • Clarence E. Mulford
... significance. In a word, he was an artist in travel, wishing to provide them with delicious memories, while they were English and omnivorous of facts and scenes. When he learnt from various rebuffs that they would not confide themselves to him, he lost all pleasure in the tour. It was a listless and disgusted upper servant, most unlike the man I knew, whom I found in gorgeous raiment sitting by the cook's fire in the gardens of Damascus, which were then a ...
— Oriental Encounters - Palestine and Syria, 1894-6 • Marmaduke Pickthall
... officer in the corps of Engineers, was the first cousin of the two girls who have been speaking, and was nephew and heir presumptive to the squire. His father, Colonel Dale, and his mother, Lady Fanny Dale, were still living at Torquay—an effete, invalid, listless couple, pretty well dead to all the world beyond the region of the Torquay card-tables. He it was who had made for himself quite a career in the Nineteenth Dragoons. This he did by eloping with the penniless daughter of that impoverished earl, the Lord De Guest. After ...
— The Small House at Allington • Anthony Trollope
... Hall, where some of the best orators from France, America, and England were present. There were six natives from India on the platform who, not understanding anything that was said, naturally remained listless throughout the proceedings. But the moment O'Connell began to speak they were all attention, bending forward and closely watching every movement. One could almost tell what he said from the play of his expressive features, his wonderful gestures, and the pose of his whole body. When he finished, ...
— Eighty Years And More; Reminiscences 1815-1897 • Elizabeth Cady Stanton
... strange it was, to find, in every stagnant town, this same Heart beating with the same monotonous pulsation, the centre of the same torpid, listless system, I came out by another door, and was suddenly scared to death by a blast from the shrillest trumpet that ever was blown. Immediately, came tearing round the corner, an equestrian company from Paris: marshalling themselves under the walls of the church, and flouting, with their horses' ...
— Pictures from Italy • Charles Dickens
... twenty hours out of the twenty-four, would enervate even a man trained to sedentary habits; and the abundant rations of hot food, consumed with the morbid appetite of men who had no other amusement, rendered them heavy and listless. In our regiment, at least, it was absolutely necessary to cut down the rations of certain articles, as for instance of coffee, and to prevent their too frequent use. The cooks told us that it was not an uncommon thing for a man to consume from four to six quarts ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. III, No. V, May, 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... while Oowikapun was pondering over the words of Astumastao, and thinking of the risks she and her companions were about to run, and the dangers they would have to encounter in their great undertaking, and contrasting it with the listless, aimless life he had lately been leading, suddenly there came to him, as a revelation, a noble resolve which took such possession of him and so inspired him that he appeared ...
— Oowikapun - How the Gospel Reached the Nelson River Indians • Egerton Ryerson Young
... the sun's position either from day to day, or from month to month; for the stars, being hardly visible at the actual rising and setting of the sun, the idea of the sun's conjunction with certain stars could not suggest itself to a listless observer. The moon, on the contrary, progressing from night to night, and coming successively in contact with certain stars, was like the finger of a clock, moving round a circle, and coming in contact with one figure after another on the dial-plate of the ...
— India: What can it teach us? - A Course of Lectures Delivered before the University Of Cambridge • F. Max Mueller
... with Little for not appreciating her sacrifice, she was quite as angry with Coventry and Jael for being the causes of that unappreciated sacrifice. So then she was irritable and cross. But she could not be that long: so she fell into a languid, listless state: and then she let herself drift. She never sent Jael to ...
— Put Yourself in His Place • Charles Reade
... thefts and murders increased with astounding rapidity. The police, collected in augmented proportions, lost its head and was swept off its feet. But it must also be said that, having gorged itself with plentiful bribes, it resembled a sated python, willy-nilly drowsy and listless. People were killed for anything and nothing, just so. It happened that men would walk up to a person in broad daylight somewhere on an unfrequented street and ask: "What's your name?" "Fedorov." "Aha, Federov? Then take this!" and they would slit his belly with a knife. They ...
— Yama (The Pit) • Alexandra Kuprin
... Barbara alone with the dancer. Barbara noticed how tired Nur-el-Din was looking. Heir pretty, childish ways seemed to have evaporated with her high spirits. Her face was heavy and listless. There were lines round heir eyes, and her mouth ...
— Okewood of the Secret Service • Valentine Williams
... infected by our gloom, Yon little mourner sits and sighs, His playthings, scatter'd round the room, No more attract his listless eyes. Nutting, his infant task, he plies, On moves with soft and stealthy tread, And call'd, in tone subdued replies, As if he feard to wake ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 14, Issue 405, December 19, 1829 • Various
... sober Evening sheds Her dusky mantle o'er the grassy meads: Nor yet the pale stars trembled thro' the trees, Nor sparkling quiver'd on the inconstant seas; Nor yet the moon illumed the solemn scene: The fields were silent, and the heavens serene. The sheep had sought the fold; nor yet arose Night's listless bird from her dull day's repose. When in a vale with shadowy firs replete, Whose broad boughs rustled thro' the dark retreat, Beneath a pine that sunk to slow decay, Unseen, Gustavus pass'd the hours away. From earliest morn, ere day's third glass was run, } The chief had mused, nor mark'd the rising ...
— Gustavus Vasa - and other poems • W. S. Walker
... this mixed multitude were asleep; some were looking with dull listless eyes at the still scene, or at any accidental movements which might vary it. They saw a figure coming nearer and nearer and wildly passing by. Just then Agellius was diverted from his painful meditations by hearing one of these fellows say to another, as he roused from a sort of doze, "That's ...
— Callista • John Henry Cardinal Newman
... man blessed Beltane, and turning, forthwith set out upon his way, and his staff tapped loud upon the forest-road. Right joyfully Beltane strode on again, his mind ever busied with thought of his father; but Roger's step was listless and heavy, so that Beltane must needs turn to look on him, and straightway marvelled to see how he hung his head, and that his ruddy cheek was grown wondrous pale ...
— Beltane The Smith • Jeffery Farnol
... 30. I have been so lazy and negligent these last four days, that I could not write to MD. My head is not in order, and yet it is not absolutely ill, but giddyish, and makes me listless; I walk every day, and hope I shall grow better. I wish I were with MD; I long for spring and good weather, and then I will come over. My riding in Ireland keeps me well. I am very temperate, and eat of the easiest meats as I am directed, and hope the malignity ...
— Selected English Letters (XV - XIX Centuries) • Various
... years ago had shown a kindly interest in my Fliegender Hollander, and was courteously received by him. This man, who in his earlier writings and musical criticisms had seemed to me filled with a fire of energy, now struck me as extraordinarily limp and listless when I saw him by the side of his young wife, who was radiantly and bewitchingly beautiful. From his conversation I soon learned that he also had abandoned even the remotest hope of success for any efforts directed towards the object so dear to ...
— My Life, Volume I • Richard Wagner
... examiner's watchfulness; the hushed silence that reigned around, only broken by the scribbling sound of busy workers and the listless shuffling of the feet of others, who, having, as they sanguinely thought, completely mastered their tasks, had nothing further to occupy their time until "the gaudy pageant" should be "o'er"—the whole thing, really, was school all ...
— She and I, Volume 2 - A Love Story. A Life History. • John Conroy Hutcheson
... two years of this listless, solitary life, Crockett, without any assigned reason, probably influenced only by that vagrancy of spirit which had taken entire possession of the man, made another move. Abandoning his crumbling shanty ...
— David Crockett: His Life and Adventures • John S. C. Abbott
... with a mirthless laugh. She had been listless and pale for several days, and did not seem ...
— The Beloved Woman • Kathleen Norris
... the surroundings. It was Saturday, and the little two-wheeled carts, drawn by a steer or a mule; the pigs sleeping in the shadow of the old wooden market-house; the lean and sallow pinelanders and listless negroes dozing on the curbstone, were all objects of novel interest to the boy, as was manifest by the light in his eager eyes and an occasional exclamation, which in a clear childish treble, came from his ...
— The Colonel's Dream • Charles W. Chesnutt
... flower, and findeth its fragrance at last to be a deadly poison, if he escape from its contact, placeth no more flowers in his bosom. In vain they woo him with their beauteous eyes and breath of perfume. He heeds them not, or, at best, plucks them disdainfully, to gaze upon in listless indifference for a moment, and then cast them behind him, to be ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 5. May 1848 • Various
... took his rifle and ventured out alone—the others were too listless to stop him—and before the noon hour he found a buffalo bull, some outcast from the herd which had gone southward, struggling in the snow. The bull was old and lean, and it took two bullets to bring him down, but his death meant their ...
— The Young Trailers - A Story of Early Kentucky • Joseph A. Altsheler
... that did at first thy spirit move To ask it to his praise, that he might be Thy God, and that he might delight in thee. If I should here particulars relate, Methinks it could not but much animate Thy heart, though very listless to inquire How thou mayst that enjoy, which all desire That love themselves and future happiness; But O, I cannot fully it express: The promise is so open and so free, In all respects, to those that humble be, That want they cannot what for them is good; But there 'tis, and confirmed is with blood, ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... as beautiful as ever, but with tired lines under her full dark eyes. She sank into a low chair with listless grace. ...
— The Yellow Crayon • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... not unto themselves, but unto us they did minister." Witness those holy men of God as they "inquired and searched diligently" concerning revelations given them for generations that were yet unborn. Contrast their holy zeal with the listless unconcern with which the favored ones of later ages treat this gift of heaven. What a rebuke to the ease-loving, world-loving indifference which is content to declare that ...
— The Great Controversy Between Christ and Satan • Ellen G. White
... slaveholding Barbadoes. Enterprise, public and personal, has long been a stranger to the island. Internal improvements, such as the laying and repairing of roads, the erection of bridges, building wharves, piers, &c., were either wholly neglected, or conducted in such a listless manner as to be a burlesque on the name of business. It was a standing task, requiring the combined energy of the island, to repair the damages of one hurricane before another came. The following circumstance was told us, by one of the shrewdest observers of men and things ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... third to the left again, and so on, until the action gains due intensity, when all suddenly stop at the same moment. The excitement which this dance produces in the savage is very remarkable. However listless the individual may be, lying perhaps, as usual, half asleep, set him to this, and he is fired with sudden energy, every nerve is strung to such a degree, that he is hardly to be known as the same person, ...
— Australia, its history and present condition • William Pridden
... a few months I grew so listless and homesick, that my mistress said she would keep me no longer; and though I went away as poor as I came, I was still too glad to go back to the old village again, and see dear mother, if it were but for a day. I knew she would share her crust ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray
... fell on her father's face, the gladness in her own was somewhat dimmed. What was making that loved face so care- worn, the mind so listless, the attitude so weary? But she was young; the spirits of youth never flow long in one direction. The repartee, brilliant and at the same time with every sting withdrawn, flashed up and down the table like so many fireflies ...
— The Man on the Box • Harold MacGrath
... a feeling not the less cherished because it arose from a petty source, in obtaining for my equipages, my mansion, my banquets, the celebrity which is given no less to magnificence than to fame: now I grew indifferent alike to the signs of pomp, and to the baubles of taste; praise fell upon a listless ear, and (rare pitch of satiety!) the pleasures that are the offspring of our foibles delighted me no more. I had early learned from Bolingbroke a love for the converse of men, eminent, whether for wisdom or for wit: the graceful ...
— Devereux, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... had sunk; the night had all but fallen; the men were all on board; Amyas in command of one canoe, Cary of the other. The Indians were grouped on the bank, watching the party with their listless stare, and with them the young guide, who preferred remaining among the Indians, and was made supremely happy by the present of Spanish sword and an English axe; while, in the midst, the old hermit, with tears in his eyes, prayed God's ...
— Westward Ho! • Charles Kingsley
... responded, with a listless smile of irony; "but I am afraid twelve good men in a box—the jury, you know—would not be so incredulous. May I ask why you refuse to accept my plea of guilty? Not ...
— The Woman's Way • Charles Garvice
... naughty mamma, and you don't love me." Her heart sank within her; but she patiently went again and again over yesterday's ground. Willy cried. He ate very little breakfast. He stood at the window in a listless attitude of discouraged misery, which she said cut her to the heart. Once in a while he would ask for some plaything which he did not usually have. She gave him whatever he asked for; but he could not play. She kept up an appearance of being busy with ...
— Bits About Home Matters • Helen Hunt Jackson
... thing as cant. It is possible for flippant pretenders to acquire a peculiar phraseology, and use it with a painful dexterity; and it is also possible for genuine Christians to subside into a state of mind so listless or secular, that their talk on religious topics will have the inane and heartless sound of the tinkling cymbal. But as there is an experimental religion, so is it possible for those who have felt religion in its vitality to exchange their thoughts regarding it, and to relate ...
— Life of Bunyan • Rev. James Hamilton
... enigmatic picture! Yet, indeed, In current Gallic light not hard to read. Woman, with angel-wings, and mournful face, What are the plans those listless fingers trace? What are the visions those fixed eyes survey? The War-dog fierce lies couchant in your way. The instruments of Art are scattered round. Mistress of charm in form, in tint, in sound, Of engineering might, mechanic skill, That checks ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 104, April 29, 1893 • Various
... manners was his distinguishing outward peculiarity; and this seems to characterize his nation,—whether learned from him, or whether an inborn national peculiarity, I do not know. He went through great trials most creditably, but he was no martyr. He constantly complained that his teachings fell on listless ears, which made him sad and discouraged; but he never flagged in his labors to improve his generation. He had no egotism, but great self-respect, reminding us of Michael Angelo. He was humble but full of dignity, serene though distressed, cheerful but not hilarious. ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume I • John Lord
... look, the old woman went out of the prison, up through the rugged quarries, where a gang of men were at work, dragging their weary limbs from stone to stone, with the listless, haggard effort of forced labor. Some of these men looked up, as she passed them, and watched her ...
— The Old Countess; or, The Two Proposals • Ann S. Stephens
... and his own good sword Ungrasp'd by the nerveless hand of its lord; His steed pac'd on with solemn tread, 'Neath the listless weight of the mighty deed. But each warrior's heart beat high, As he mark'd the beacon's wavering flash, And heard the Moorish cymbal clash, For he knew that the Cid ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 472 - Vol. XVII. No. 472., Saturday, January 22, 1831 • Various
... that implores thy aid; Let all behold; and thou, imperious Jove, On me direct thy lightning from above: Now all its force the poison doth assume, And my burnt entrails with its flame consume. Crest-fallen, unembraced I now let fall Listless, those hands that lately conquer'd all; When the Nemaean lion own'd their force, And he indignant fell a breathless corse: The serpent slew, of the Lernean lake, As did the Hydra of its force partake: By this, too, fell ...
— The Academic Questions • M. T. Cicero
... the good seed in his parish, it began to spring into vegetation, sudden and beautiful as that which answers the patient watching of the husbandman. Many a hard, worldly-hearted man—many a sleepy, inattentive hearer—many a listless, idle young person, began to give ear to words that had long fallen unheeded. A neighboring minister, who had been sent for to see and rejoice in these results, describes the scene, when, on entering the little church, he found an anxious, crowded auditory assembled ...
— The May Flower, and Miscellaneous Writings • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... his burden, he tried to distract himself by fancying how the discovery of their absence would be made. He heard the listless, half-querulous discussion about the locality that regularly pervaded the nightly camp. He heard the discontented voice of Jake Silsbee as he halted beside the wagon, and said, "Come out o' that now, you two, and mighty ...
— A Waif of the Plains • Bret Harte
... account from their countryman, Dion Chrysostom. With their wealth, they had those vices which usually follow or cause the loss of national independence. They were eager for nothing but food and horse-races. They were grave and quiet in their sacrifices and listless in business, but in the theatre or in the stadium men, women, and children were alike heated into passion, and overcome with eagerness and warmth of feeling. A scurrilous song or a horse-race would so rouse them into a quarrel that they ...
— History Of Egypt From 330 B.C. To The Present Time, Volume 11 (of 12) • S. Rappoport
... thing in not calling in some accredited wearer of the cloth; but Mary did not think of that. She went on her way of innocence, delightfully content. And all those days, Johnnie Veasey, as soon as he came out of his fever, lay there and watched her with eyes full of a listless wonder. He was still in that borderland of helplessness where the unusual seems only a part of the new condition of things. Neighbors called, and Mary refused them entrance, with a finality which ...
— Tiverton Tales • Alice Brown
... August shimmered over the land, and still, to every inquiry at the door or telephone, the quiet young woman in blue and white said: "No change." Allison was listless and apathetic, yet comparatively free ...
— Old Rose and Silver • Myrtle Reed
... without rest or pause, in a career of conquest that has few parallels in the history of Oriental nations. In the subsequent period, this spirit is less marked; but, at all times, a certain vigor and activity has characterized the race, distinguishing it in a very marked way from the dreamy and listless Hindus upon the one hand, and the apathetic ...
— The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 5. (of 7): Persia • George Rawlinson
... when the sun sank ruddy and the breeze blew soft, we turned again to Brading harbour, and, just perhaps because we had come safely once before, there was listless incaution now, as if Bembridge reef could not be cruel on such ...
— The Voyage Alone in the Yawl "Rob Roy" • John MacGregor
... to be deserted when he dismounted in front of the City Hotel. He did not go inside the building, merely looking in through one of the windows, and seeing a few men in there, playing cards in a listless manner. He did ...
— Square Deal Sanderson • Charles Alden Seltzer
... a devotion worthy of the beloved Neander. In the railroad car, the stage, the counting-room, the workshop, the parlor, and the peasant-hut, Rationalism was found still lingering with a strong, though relaxing grasp. The evangelical churches were attended by only a few listless hearers. His prayer to God was, "May the American Church never be reduced to this sad fate." The history of that movement, resulting in such actual disaster to some lands and threatened ruin to others, took a deep hold upon his mind; and if he has failed in any respect to trace it with ...
— History of Rationalism Embracing a Survey of the Present State of Protestant Theology • John F. Hurst
... in spite of her masculine air. Her features were regular, the nose straight and delicate, the mouth resolute, the brow broad, and the eyes intensely blue, perhaps tender, when not flashing with anger, and altogether without the listless expression he had marked in other mountain women, and which, he had noticed, deadened into pathetic hopelessness later in life. Her figure was erect, and her manner, despite its roughness, savored of something high-born. Where could she have got that bearing? ...
— A Mountain Europa • John Fox Jr.
... Tom," greeted Mr. Damon, but the tone was so listless, and his friend's manner so gloomy that the young inventor ...
— Tom Swift and his Photo Telephone • Victor Appleton
... terrace on which the town is built. The steep hillside abuts boldly on the salt marsh. One of the cemetery-paths runs along the brink of the hill; and here, on a wooden bench under a clump of red cedars, Putnam would sit for hours enjoying the listless mood of convalescence. Where the will remains passive, the mind, like an idle weathercock, turns to every puff of suggestion, and the senses, born new from sickness, have the freshness and delicacy of a child's. It soothed ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 26, October, 1880 • Various
... hidden Spirit shall inquire thy Fate, Haply some hoary-headed Swain may say, 'Oft have we seen him at the Peep of Dawn 'Brushing with hasty Steps the Dews away 'To meet the Sun upon the upland Lawn. 'There at the Foot of yonder nodding Beech 'That wreathes its old fantastic Roots so high, 'His listless Length at Noontide wou'd he stretch, 'And pore upon the Brook that babbles by. 'Hard by yon Wood, now frowning as in Scorn, 'Mutt'ring his wayward Fancies he wou'd rove, 'Now drooping, woeful wan, like one forlorn, 'Or craz'd with Care, or cross'd in hopeless Love. 'One Morn I miss'd ...
— An Elegy Wrote in a Country Church Yard (1751) and The Eton College Manuscript • Thomas Gray
... pockets, and sauntered across the deck. Then he took a stroll up the one side and down the other. As he lounged along it was very evident that he was tired of the voyage, even before it began. Judging from his listless manner nothing on earth could arouse the interest of the young man. The gong sounded faintly in the inner depths of the ship somewhere announcing dinner. Then, as the steward appeared up the companion way, the sonorous whang, ...
— In a Steamer Chair And Other Stories • Robert Barr
... Krishnas. A 1,000 Vasudevas and hundreds of Phalgunas, I shall, single-handed, slay. Hold thy tongue, O thou that art born in a sinful country. Hear from me, O Shalya, the sayings, already passed into proverbs, that men, young and old, and women, and persons arrived in course of their listless wanderings, generally utter, as if those sayings formed part of their studies, about the wicked Madrakas. Brahmanas also duly narrated the same things formerly in the courts of kings. Listening to those sayings attentively, O fool, thou mayst forgive or rejoin. The Madraka is ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown
... their days, and who seek by slander and treachery to console themselves for the loss of pleasures which they can no longer enjoy. Resist that inclination which seems to impel you to gloomy meditation, solitude, and melancholy. Devotion is only suited to inert and listless souls, while yours is formed for action. You should pursue the course I recommend for the sake of your husband, whose happiness depends upon you; you owe it to the children, who will soon, undoubtedly, need all your care and all your instructions for the ...
— Letters to Eugenia - or, a Preservative Against Religious Prejudices • Baron d'Holbach
... admiral, finding her dull and listless, said, "Why don't you go and talk to the Sister? She amuses you. I'll join you when ...
— A Terrible Temptation - A Story of To-Day • Charles Reade
... it out in exile, was a source of some annoyance, but doubtless also helped to keep alive his hope of a return to his country and his home. We have no details of his life in exile. We only know enough to show that it was one of no listless indolence, no craven depression, and no vain repining. Clarendon died, as he had lived, with energy unconquered, with hope unabated, still clinging to all that made human life more noble in action, more stately in its ordering, more ...
— The Life of Edward Earl of Clarendon V2 • Henry Craik
... yet I found a clearer proof of the slavery in which the man held them in the perfect indifference with which they regarded my arrival—though a guest with two servants must have been a rarity in such a place—and the listless way in which they set about attending to my wants. Keenly remembering that not long before this my enemies had striven to prejudice me in the King's eyes by alleging that, though I filled his coffers, I was ...
— From the Memoirs of a Minister of France • Stanley Weyman
... lay down 'n' rest, dearie," he urged, anxiously. He took the things from her and laid them back, one by one, in the lower drawer of the high, glass-knobbed bureau whence she had taken them. The thin stuff of the little, listless sleeves and yellowed skirts clung to his roughened fingers; he freed ...
— Life at High Tide - Harper's Novelettes • Various
... describe to you, my dear Beatus, the whole tragi-comedy of my journey. I was still weak and listless, as you know, when I left Basle, not having come to terms with the climate, after skulking at home so long, and occupied in uninterrupted labors at that. The river voyage was not unpleasant, but that around midday the heat of the sun was somewhat trying. We had a meal at Breisach, ...
— Erasmus and the Age of Reformation • Johan Huizinga
... a listless parasite? Even if she wishes merely to be a queen of society, would she not be more queenly if she knew the trials and afflictions of others, and, better still, knew how to help them? Would she be less a queen if she were not dependent upon some ...
— An American Suffragette • Isaac N. Stevens
... a dozen fiacres were ranged in a melancholy line, the wretched horses dozing as they stood, the drivers huddled into their fur capes and numbed by the clinging cold. Everywhere was darkness and chill and the listless misery of a winter dawn, when vitality is at its lowest ebb and the passions of man are sunk ...
— Max • Katherine Cecil Thurston
... to my room. The drizzle and the monotony of a dreary, eventless Southern town had made me tired and listless. I remember that just before I went to bed I mentally disposed of the mysterious dollar bill (which might have formed the clew to a tremendously fine detective story of San Francisco) by saying to myself sleepily: ...
— Strictly Business • O. Henry
... acting in behalf of friend will achieve vicariously. And yet, albeit to try and tend a tree for the sake of its fruit is not uncommon, this copious mine of wealth—this friend—attracts only a lazy and listless attention on the part of more than ...
— The Memorabilia - Recollections of Socrates • Xenophon
... stop, so he swung himself on to the platform. The car was full and he did not go inside. He saw the figure his eye was following take a seat high up, and turn the child so that it might get the air from the window. He could see the poor, little pinched face, utterly listless and wan, and by reason of its sickness totally bereft of the beauty that belongs to plump, round, rosy babyhood. And yet the child had wonderful eyes—strange, large eyes of a clear, golden-brown color—the like of which he had seen once only before. Memories, speculations ...
— A Beautiful Alien • Julia Magruder
... ostensibly reading when Marguerite was announced, for an open book lay on a table beside her; but it seemed to the visitor that mayhap the young girl's thoughts had played truant from her work, for her pose was listless and apathetic, and there was a look of grave trouble upon the ...
— El Dorado • Baroness Orczy
... in a few lines, although we do not hesitate to say, that a more amusing book upon abstruse subjects has scarcely ever met our attention. It is literally filled with facts and closely-packed inquiries, and these are so attractively arranged as to amuse a listless reader. ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 19, Issue 551, June 9, 1832 • Various
... year, I'd say. Well, I just heard Medcroft say that she wasn't his child. Whose is it?" She stood there like an accusing angel. He started violently, and his jaw dropped; an expression of alarmed protest leaped into his listless eyes. ...
— The Husbands of Edith • George Barr McCutcheon
... that he has acted exactly as I expected," was her listless reply, and, within five minutes, the small cavalcade started. Mrs. Haxton elected to ride a Somali pony. She mounted unaided, forced the rather unruly animal to canter to the head of the caravan, and thus deliberately hid ...
— The Wheel O' Fortune • Louis Tracy
... been noted, the complexion of the man at our right is singularly pallid; the eyes mournfully listless; the skin of his knuckles drawn into the wrinkles of wasting tissues. He wears a scholar's cap and gown; the latter of some chocolate-brown pile, richly patterned, and lined with brown fur. He holds his gloves in his right hand and leans this arm on a closed ...
— Holbein • Beatrice Fortescue
... of yonder nodding beech That wreathes its old fantastic roots so high, His listless length at noontide would he stretch, And pore upon the ...
— Book of English Verse • Bulchevy
... were now turned to the legislative halls, in which public affairs were discussed, particularly to the House of Commons, supposed to represent the nation. He would have seen five or six hundred men, in plain attire, with their hats on, listless and inattentive, except when one of their leaders was making a telling speech against some measure proposed by the opposite party,—and nearly all measures were party measures. Who were these favored representatives? Nearly all of them were the ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume IX • John Lord
... feast, and afterwards we sought our state barge and the perils of the return journey. The newly married couple came down to see us off, still bearing themselves with a preoccupied and listless air. The orchestra remained until the next day, and we threaded the water lanes in quiet, emerging at last on the full-breasted river. The home journey consumed only three hours, and was comparatively uneventful. ...
— A Woman's Impression of the Philippines • Mary Helen Fee
... pleasure in the maxims of the old, by which they are drawn to the pursuit of excellence. Nor do I perceive that you find my society less pleasant than I do yours. But this is enough to show you how, so far from being listless and sluggish, old age is even a busy time, always doing and attempting something, of course of the same nature as each man's taste had been in the previous part of his life. Nay, do not some even add to their stock of learning? We see Solon, for instance, ...
— Treatises on Friendship and Old Age • Marcus Tullius Cicero
... She has dark hair, nearly black, and brown eyes with a sort of tawny light in them,—large eyes which gleam out on you just when you are not expecting it, for she generally looks down. Amelia appears more listless and affected than ever by the side of her, and Charlotte's hoydenish romping seems ...
— Out in the Forty-Five - Duncan Keith's Vow • Emily Sarah Holt
... then the bitterness of his defeat, and she made no comment. She was tired of the fight. A compromise with Carey or a sale of the water right was their only hope, and when Bob spoke of compromise she was too listless to dissuade him. Since that eventful night when he had first ridden into San Pasqual she had been more or less of a stormy petrel; woe and death and suffering had followed his coming, and if Donnaville was to be purchased at such a price, the ...
— The Long Chance • Peter B. Kyne
... female is seeking consolation from the sacred book, beside whom sits her father—a grand figure, in whose countenance is a fixed intensity of worldly care, that alone seems to keep life within his listless body, next him is a young mother, with her dying child, and close behind him a maiden, hiding her face, whose eye alone is seen, distended and in vacant gaze. We feel that this is a family group, perhaps the broken remnant of a family, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 54, No. 334, August 1843 • Various
... she said, indicating with a slight revealing gesture the swarming, dowdy, listless occupants of the crowded trench. "How patient they are, how resigned to the dreadful life they drag on here from day to day, full of the horror and the pain and the suffering that you say is inevitable. Why ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves
... UNDER TREATMENT. Under our peculiar and improved system of treatment, gradual improvement in the patient's condition will be manifested. The eye becomes more brilliant and sparkling, the patient is less morose, his digestion improves, he is less listless and despondent, takes more interest in business and other affairs, his sleep is less disturbed and more refreshing, the strength improves, and, if the sexual organs had become wasted in size, weak in function, and flaccid and soft, they begin, by ...
— The People's Common Sense Medical Adviser in Plain English • R. V. Pierce
... But such is not the case. The men are absolutely starving. Many of the infantrymen are so weak that they can barely stagger along under the weight of their soldierly equipment. They are worn to shadows, and move with weary, listless footsteps on the march. People high up in authority may deny this, but he who denies it sullies the truth. This is what the soldiers get to eat, what they have been getting to eat for a long time past, and ...
— Campaign Pictures of the War in South Africa (1899-1900) - Letters from the Front • A. G. Hales
... array of phrase, Artfully sought and ordered though it be, Which the cold rhymer lays Upon his page with languid industry, Can wake the listless pulse to livelier speed, Or fill with sudden tears ...
— Poetical Works of William Cullen Bryant - Household Edition • William Cullen Bryant
... beach the listless sea made a sound like a rattle, very gently and continuously shaken by a very tired baby. Nothing was doing. The air was a little too chilly for pleasure boating. Tony had gone to 'put away up over' the after-dinner ...
— A Poor Man's House • Stephen Sydney Reynolds
... now, where circling hills looked down, With cannon grimly planted, O'er listless camp and silent ...
— Choice Specimens of American Literature, And Literary Reader - Being Selections from the Chief American Writers • Benj. N. Martin
... over again he recounted her words, lingering especially upon the sweetness of her voice and the searching quality of that last look she had given him. He unsaddled his horse mechanically, and went about his cabin duties with listless deftness. ...
— They of the High Trails • Hamlin Garland
... about Tara, who was almost well again, to all appearances, and lay contentedly in the den all day, having apparently forgotten, not only her illness, but its causes, and her puppies. She was rather listless and lackadaisical, but seemed to be well content so that she could lie within sight of the Master and dream. And now the Master was chatting with the sheep-dog foster, after having had a good look at Finn, and before shutting ...
— Finn The Wolfhound • A. J. Dawson
... great cushioned chair by the fender An old man sits dreaming to-night, His withered hands, licked by the tender Warm rays of the red anthracite, Are folded before him, all listless; His dim eyes are fixed on the blaze, While over him sweeps the ...
— The Kingdom of Love - and Other Poems • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... dust-coloured neck, that gave her a sort of bygone appearance, the look of an old photograph? Her manners took me farther back in the century even than the photograph did; she seemed to have come out of the pages of some trite and uninteresting novel, a rather listless book written at the end of the eighteenth century, before the art of novel-writing had been found out. She listened, and her listening was in itself a politeness, and she never lost her politeness, though she seldom understood what I said. When I finished ...
— Memoirs of My Dead Life • George Moore
... blanched cheek, the withered hands, and emaciated frame, and the listless life, have other sources than the ordinary illnesses of all ...
— Searchlights on Health: Light on Dark Corners • B.G. Jefferis
... with amazement the presence of a real king, and an orderly government. In 1422 King Henry died; a few weeks later Charles VI. died also, and the face of affairs began to change, although, at the first, Charles VII. the "Well-served," the lazy, listless prince, seemed to have little heart for the perils and efforts of his position. He was proclaimed King at Mehun, in Berri, for the true France for the time lay on that side of the Loire, and the Regent Bedford, who took the reins at Paris, was a vigorous and powerful prince, who was ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... together, the grand barouche rolling in the Park, or stopping at the principal shops. Little Rosey bloomed in millinery, and was still the smiling little pet of her father-in-law, and poor Clive, in the midst of all these splendours, was gaunt, and sad, and silent; listless at most times, bitter and savage at others, pleased only when he was out of the society which bored him, and in the company of George and J. J., the simple friends ...
— The Newcomes • William Makepeace Thackeray
... temptations. Two things are pernicious to Man, the lack of occupation and the lack of restraint; neither inactivity nor omnipotence are in harmony with his nature. The absolute prince who is all-powerful, like the listless aristocracy with nothing to do, in the end become useless and mischievous.—In grasping all powers the king insensibly took upon himself all functions; an immense undertaking and one surpassing human strength. For it is the Monarchy, ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 1 (of 6) - The Ancient Regime • Hippolyte A. Taine
... "In listless quietude of mind I yield to all The change of cloud and wave and wind; And passive, on the flood reclined, I wander with the waves, and with them ...
— The Bay State Monthly, Volume 1, Issue 5, May, 1884 - A Massachusetts Magazine • Various
... for him, he did n't appear to know that it was. Indeed, he seems somewhat listless of late, except when the conversation falls upon one of those larger topics that specially interest him, and then he grows excited, speaks loud and fast, sometimes almost savagely,—and, I have noticed once or twice, presses his left hand to his right side, as if ...
— The Professor at the Breakfast Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes (Sr.)
... with a dull, listless air. He had not the slightest forewarning of the great jolt that was soon to come to himself and his comrades out of ...
— The Motor Boat Club and The Wireless - The Dot, Dash and Dare Cruise • H. Irving Hancock
... children's pursuits and amusements, and giving them perfect liberty at whatever age they wish to claim it. But these very peaceful relations between parents and children are no doubt, in a great measure, due to the listless and apathetic character of the race, which never leads the younger members into serious opposition to the elders; while the harsher discipline of the Papuans may be chiefly due to that greater vigour and energy of mind which always, sooner or later, leads to the rebellion ...
— The Malay Archipelago - Volume II. (of II.) • Alfred Russel Wallace
... a listless way, with tips of fingers pointing toward floor for two first lines, and let the fingers gently swing. Near the close of the verse make the fingers still and rigid and hold them ...
— Christmas Entertainments • Alice Maude Kellogg
... more power. His hearers had often been pleased and touched before; now they were stirred, and made uncomfortable. Their responsibilities, as each one the keeper of his brother's soul, were solemnly laid before them. The listless, contented indifference to the sins and sorrows of their fellow-men was rudely shaken. Their satisfaction in their own safety was attacked. As clearly as words could put it, they were told that not one of them could go to heaven alone; that ...
— Brought Home • Hesba Stretton
... to herself compelled to admit, since first he began to come within sight of manhood; but she had always looked to the time when growing sense would make him cast aside young-mannish ways; and this was the outcome of her cares and hopes and prayers for him! Her husband went about listless and sullen. He wrote no more. How could one thus disgraced in his family presume to teach the world anything! How could he ever hold up his head as one that had served his generation, when this was the kind of man he was to leave behind him for the life of the next! Cornelius's very being cast ...
— Weighed and Wanting • George MacDonald
... and white-lined of sea-urchin, knew What her eyes sought as often children know Of grief or sin they could not name or think of Yet sooth or shrink from, so I saw and longed To heal her tender wound and yet said naught. The energy of bygone joy and pain Had left her listless figure charged with magic That caught and held my idleness near hers. Resentful of her power, my spirit chafed Against its own deep pity, as though it were Raised ghost and she the witch had bid it haunt me. What's more I knew this ...
— Miscellany of Poetry - 1919 • Various
... days that followed she moved, pale and listless, oppressed by her sense of loss and desolation, a desolation which at last she sought to mitigate by writing to him to Valladolid, whither he had repaired. Of all those letters only ...
— The Historical Nights Entertainment, Second Series • Rafael Sabatini
... next day: The scene is as in previous Act. It is now in the forenoon. Maire Hourican is seated at the fire in a listless attitude. Anne is busy at the dresser. ...
— Three Plays • Padraic Colum
... Improvement Club, promised the requisite political "pull." If McTeague had shown a certain energy in the matter the attempt might have been successful; but he was too stupid, or of late had become too listless to exert himself greatly, and the affair resulted only in a ...
— McTeague • Frank Norris
... affairs at Clairville was much as described; Pauline, during her long, dreary convalescence, gave no sign of temper or of suffering, but had apparently changed to a listless, weak, silent creature, occupied almost altogether with her own thoughts, by turns ignoring and passively tolerating her sister-in-law and the child. The latter grew brighter and stronger every day, and Dr. Renaud was of the opinion that she would live ...
— Ringfield - A Novel • Susie Frances Harrison
... about in the world and mixed with clever people, but all the time they were thinking of their own affairs. As if a man's soul were not too small to begin with, they have dwarfed and narrowed theirs by a life of all work and no play; until here they are at forty, with a listless attention, a mind vacant of all material of amusement, and not one thought to rub against another, while they wait for the train. Before he was breeched, he might have clambered on the boxes; when he was twenty, he would have stared at the girls; ...
— Virginibus Puerisque • Robert Louis Stevenson
... dress considerably improved by a plentiful application of spring water, with a quantum sufficit of soap. The whole scene was depressing; for it argued, at the first glance, at least a stagnation of industry, and perhaps of intellect. Even curiosity, the busiest passion of the idle, seemed of a listless cast in the village of Tully-Veolan: the curs aforesaid alone showed any part of its activity; with the villagers it was passive. They stood, and gazed at the handsome young officer and his attendant, but without any of those quick motions and eager looks that indicate the earnestness with ...
— Waverley, Or 'Tis Sixty Years Hence, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... foot to land; he buried himself in the fastnesses of the Rockies; he made a long, aimless sea-voyage. Her image accompanied him everywhere. Between him and all he saw hovered her faultless face; her red mouth smiled at him; her white arms enticed him. His own face became worn and his step listless. He grew silent and gloomy. "He is madder than the old colonel, his father, was," his ...
— Shapes that Haunt the Dusk • Various |
