"Ray" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... forth were come to open sight Of day-spring, and the Sun—who, scarce up-risen, With wheels yet hovering o'er the ocean-brim, Shot parallel to the Earth his dewy ray, Discovering in wide landskip all the east Of Paradise and Eden's ...
— The Astronomy of Milton's 'Paradise Lost' • Thomas Orchard
... the more, one ray the less, Had half impair'd the nameless grace Which waves in every raven tress, Or softly lightens o'er her face; Where thoughts serenely sweet express How pure, how dear ...
— Types of Children's Literature • Edited by Walter Barnes
... implying Life, the Rose also reflected Death, and this seemed to ray from the cruel thorns, which, as the German couplet says, remain after ...
— The Continental Monthly , Vol. 2 No. 5, November 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... and saw a thin scintillating ray of light which shifted capriciously from place to place. "It is the blade of a sword!" he said. "More—it is the blade of the enchanted sword ...
— In Brief Authority • F. Anstey
... on the last day, and sat with eyes wide open dismally surveying the prospect. But presently the next boy fidgeted, or a spider let himself down from the roof, or a bird flew past the window, or a slanting ray of sunlight revealed a multitude of dusty dancing motes, and the little lads forgot Mr. Bradbury, who had forgotten them and was busy with somebody else. It might be with the pope: Mr. Bradbury was fond of providing for the pope. Or perhaps he was wasting his energy on Percival Thorne, who sat ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, December 1878 • Various
... loss to the world if it were to perish. The twenty-ninth and thirty-first chapters are worth the whole literature of infidel philosophy a hundred times over. And many other portions of the book are 'gems of purest ray serene,' ...
— Modern Skepticism: A Journey Through the Land of Doubt and Back Again - A Life Story • Joseph Barker
... concessions." Equally deplorable, he thought, was the spirit evinced by the senator from New Hampshire who applauded that regrettable remark. "I never intend to give up the hope of saving this Union so long as there is a ray left," he cried.[925] Why try to force slavery to go where experience has demonstrated that climate is adverse and where the people do not want it? Why prohibit slavery where the government cannot ...
— Stephen A. Douglas - A Study in American Politics • Allen Johnson
... journey became an enjoyable one indeed. We reached our destination—an extensive and somewhat straggling one- storied building, with large lofty rooms shrouded in semi-darkness by the "jalousies" or Venetian shutters which are used to carefully exclude every ray of sunlight—about noon; and received a most cordial and hearty welcome from our host, a most hospitable Scotchman, and his family, and here—not to unnecessarily spin out my yarn—we spent one of the most pleasant and enjoyable weeks I had up ...
— The Rover's Secret - A Tale of the Pirate Cays and Lagoons of Cuba • Harry Collingwood
... coach, and not Rasselas could have acquitted himself more en cavalier. I forgot to mention, that not finding Johnson in his little parlour when we came in, Hannah seated herself in his great chair hoping to catch a little ray of his genius: when he heard it, he laughed heartily, and told her it was a chair on which he never sat. He said it reminded him of Boswell and himself when they stopped a night, as they imagined, where the weird sisters appeared to Macbeth. The idea so worked on their enthusiasm, ...
— Books and Authors - Curious Facts and Characteristic Sketches • Anonymous
... strength, that lures them to exertions only serving to accelerate its fearful termination. As Mr. Lacy mounted the pulpit, he breathed an ardent prayer that something in the words he was going to utter might carry a token of peace to this poor creature's breast, a ray of light to her mind. In the course of his sermon he ...
— Ellen Middleton—A Tale • Georgiana Fullerton
... lifted and leaped forward, as though in a race. From behind came the quick patter of hoofs. One of Sneed's men had evidently managed to get his horse loose from the reata. A solitary house, far out on the level, flickered past. Bartley glanced back. The house door opened. A ray of yellow light shot ...
— Partners of Chance • Henry Herbert Knibbs
... Gallia were by this time well accustomed. The sunset upon this contracted horizon was very remarkable. There was not a cloud nor a vapor to catch the tints of the declining beams; the surface of the ice did not, as a liquid sea would, reflect the last green ray of light; but the radiant orb, enlarged by the effect of refraction, its circumference sharply defined against the sky, sank abruptly, as though a trap had been opened in the ice for ...
— Off on a Comet • Jules Verne
... great Dragon-Kings,—and the Gandharvas and Garudas,—and the Gods of the Sun and the Moon and the Wind,—and the shining myriads of Brahma's heaven. And incomparably further than even the measureless circling of the glory of these, he saw —made visible by a single ray of light that shot from the forehead of the Blessed One to pierce beyond uttermost Time—the eighteen hundred thousand Buddha-fields of the Eastern Quarter with all their habitants,—and the beings in each of the Six States of Existence,—and even the shapes of the Buddhas extinct, that ...
— In Ghostly Japan • Lafcadio Hearn
... singular girl, Maud," replied the officer. "Take this and wear it for my sake," he added, unloosing a fine gold chain from his watch and tossing it around her neck, "and be punctual at that spot to-night after the last ray of twilight." ...
— The Sea-Witch - or, The African Quadroon A Story of the Slave Coast • Maturin Murray
... Cormon valued most was (without meaning any malice, although the fact certainly rests on egotism) the unspeakable satisfaction she derived from seeing herself dressed as mistress of the house to receive her guests. When she was thus under arms a ray of hope would glide into the darkness of her heart; a voice told her that nature had not so abundantly provided for her in vain, and that some man, brave and enterprising, would surely present himself. Her desire was refreshed like her person; she contemplated herself in her heavy stuffs with ...
— An Old Maid • Honore de Balzac
... inferior to the boisterous savage, or the shrewd, dignified white. But the woman perpetuated the shy, winning coyness of her red mother, and the arts, and somewhat of the refinements of her white father. The eye was not so dusk; it gleamed more: as if the ray from a star had been shot through it. There was the same olive cheek; but it was not so tawny, for the dawn of the white blood had appeared in it. She gained in symmetry too, being taller than her red mother, while she preserved the soft, ...
— The Story of Louis Riel: The Rebel Chief • Joseph Edmund Collins
... Of men and time and circumstance dost sway! The slave-cloud dwindles on this golden day, And over all the pestilent southern land, Breathless, the dark expectant millions stand, To watch the northern sun rise on its way, Cleaving the stormy distance—every ray Sword-bright, sword-sharp, in ...
— The Poets' Lincoln - Tributes in Verse to the Martyred President • Various
... so far. The peculiar sound that filled the air was the hum of the interrupter; the bulb was, of course, a Crookes tube, and the red spot inside it, the glowing red-hot disc of the anti-cathode. Clearly an X-ray photograph was being made; but of what? I strained my eyes, peering into the gloom at the foot of the gallows, but though I could make out an elongated object lying on the floor directly under the bulb, I could not resolve the dimly seen shape into anything recognisable. Presently, however, ...
— The Vanishing Man • R. Austin Freeman
... explanation of the procession. When, however, we come to apply these general principles to certain aspects of the advance in organisation we find fundamental differences of opinion among biologists, which must be noted. As Sir E. Ray Lankester recently said, it is not at all true that Darwinism is questioned in zoology to-day. It is true only that Darwin was not omniscient or infallible, and some of his ...
— The Story of Evolution • Joseph McCabe
... liked the Count of Saint-Pol; or perhaps it would be truer to say that he disliked him more than ordinary. But he belonged to, had even a tinge of, Jehane; some of her secret fragrance hung about him, he walked in some ray of her glory. It seemed to Richard, bothered, sick, fretted, a little disconcerted as he was now, that the Count of Saint-Pol had an air which none other of this people had. He greeted him therefore ...
— The Life and Death of Richard Yea-and-Nay • Maurice Hewlett
... torture; for, doubtless, perpetual imprisonment must be a torture infinitely more severe than death, because protracted through a series of years spent in misery and despair, without one glimmering ray of hope, without the most distant prospect of deliverance? Wherefore the legislature should extend its humanity to those only who are the least sensible of the benefit, because the most able to struggle under misfortune? and wherefore many valuable individuals should, ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... impenetrably black except in one spot, where he perceived an unusual glow of light. Approaching this, he discovered it to be the crystal egg, which was standing on the corner of the counter towards the window. A thin ray smote through a crack in the shutters, impinged upon the object, and seemed as it were to ...
— Tales of Space and Time • Herbert George Wells
... doesn't love the hepatica. Before the spring has really decided to come, this little flower pokes its head up and puts all else to shame. Tucked under a covering of dry leaves the blossoms wait for a ray of warm sunshine to bring them out. The last year's leaves stay on through the winter brooding over the little fresh sprouts. These embryo flowers are further protected by a fuzzy covering. This reminds ...
— The Library of Work and Play: Gardening and Farming. • Ellen Eddy Shaw
... Grizzel," he whispered, "we'll find the diamond— let my arm loose a moment." He groped round, and in another minute the stone was in his hand. He turned it over, and a pale-green ray darted out, more unearthly ...
— The Happy Adventurers • Lydia Miller Middleton
... imagination In Italy, a husband away, ze friend takes title Morales, madame, suit ze sun No intoxication of hot blood to cheer those who sat at home Not to be feared more than are the general race of bunglers Patience is the pestilence People who can lose themselves in a ray of fancy at any season Question with some whether idiots should live Rarely exacted obedience, and she was spontaneously obeyed The divine afflatus of enthusiasm buoyed her no longer Too weak to resist, to submit to an outrage quietly We are good friends till we quarrel again We ...
— Quotations from the Works of George Meredith • David Widger
... in worth serenely bright, Wisdom's strong ray, and virtue's milder light. And she who blessed the friend and graced the page of Swift, still lends her lustre to our age. Long, long protract thy light, O star benign, Whose setting beams with added ...
— Penelope's Irish Experiences • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... are to be found in every age, but how many of them shine with the distinctive ray of womanhood? These are so rare that they have a place in the pages of history. The truly emancipated woman—it was Godwin's conviction—is almost always asexual; to him, therefore, utterly repugnant. If, then, he were not content ...
— Born in Exile • George Gissing
... sentiment overpowering all considerations of local interest and attachment, is the assurance that our country will live forever, that all difficulties, however menacing, will yield to the challenge of popular intelligence and patriotism, and that the glorious record of the past is but the morning ray of our National ...
— The Land We Live In - The Story of Our Country • Henry Mann
... around the tent, as if for moral support, but didn't find any. A singular quiet had fallen on the place; a sort of disconcerting quiet. A warning ray of sense must have come into Dorgan's fuddled brain as he looked again at the old puncher, for without a word he stumbled out into ...
— Injun and Whitey to the Rescue • William S. Hart
... it is to find this monotony broken by such an instance, and although we find AElfric occasionally diverging into the paths of papistical error, he spreads a ray of light over the gloom of those Saxon days, and offers pleasing evidence that Christ never forsook his church; that even amidst the peril and darkness of those monkish ages there were some who mourned, though it might have been in a monastery, submissive ...
— Bibliomania in the Middle Ages • Frederick Somner Merryweather
... cold: he was no longer there, she had already divined it while asleep. And she was growing alarmed, still but half awake, her head heavy and her ears buzzing, when through the doorway, left ajar, she perceived a ray of light coming from the studio. She then felt reassured, she thought that in a fit of sleeplessness he had gone to fetch some book or other; but at last, as he did not return, she ended by softly rising so as to take a peep. What she beheld quite unsettled her, and kept her standing on the ...
— His Masterpiece • Emile Zola
... my memory paints is never seen to-day— The April sun of by-gone years has lost its brightest ray: A fancy-wrought piano in a quaint, antique old room, But Margaret sang her sweetest to the music ...
— The Loom of Life • Cotton Noe
... gave himself up to that. Strong in him it was, and untrammelled of that murderous despot Fear. True as a needle to the Pole went Arnaux now, no hesitation, no doubts; within one minute of leaving the coop he was speeding straight as a ray of light for the loft where he was born, the only place on earth where he could ...
— Animal Heroes • Ernest Thompson Seton
... engine to generate our current; for our near-by streams freeze solid in winter. That engine has now been running for over ten years, and has given us electricity in St. Anthony Hospital for operating and X-ray work as well as all our lighting. Until he died, it was run the greater part of the time by an Eskimo boy whom we had brought down from the North Labrador, and who was convalescing from empyema. The installation ...
— A Labrador Doctor - The Autobiography of Wilfred Thomason Grenfell • Wilfred Thomason Grenfell
... gloriously bright, and at the first ray of the sun the girls were up and dressed and ready for the fun of ...
— The Outdoor Girls at Bluff Point - Or a Wreck and a Rescue • Laura Lee Hope
... fundamental principles, had already been driven away from the portals of the public schools, and as if here also the gates were thrown open as widely as possible to the be-flattered and pampered type of our present self-styled "German culture." And if the solitary talkers caught a glimpse of a single ray of hope, it was that things would have to become still worse, that what was as yet divined only by the few would soon be clearly perceived by the many, and that then the time for honest and resolute men for the earnest ...
— On the Future of our Educational Institutions • Friedrich Nietzsche
... as he stayed away. Their circumstances were, in fact, much straitened owing to the ill success of their visit, and during the weary months of suspense and waiting they had been living upon the profits of their previous travels. They were not allowed to leave Vienna, however, without a ray of sunshine to cheer them on their homeward journey. Wolfgang had written an operetta, 'Bastien und Bastienne,' founded upon a burlesque of one of Rousseau's operas, and he had the pleasure of hearing his little work performed before a select company of connoisseurs, and of receiving ...
— Story-Lives of Great Musicians • Francis Jameson Rowbotham
... the thought of death itself did not make a deep impression. "The struggle, the gasp, as the wearied arm should attempt to resist the impetuous waves; the straining vision, that should linger on the last ray of retiring light, as the deepening veil of water would gradually conceal it for ever; and the rolling billows heaving over the sinking and dying body, which, perhaps ere life should be extinct, might become the prey of voracious inhabitants of the deep;"—these things caused scarcely a ...
— The Ocean and its Wonders • R.M. Ballantyne
... which is based upon the equidistant subdivision of the telescopic field of view. The relative depth of the stratum in all directions is measured by the greater or smaller number of stars appearing in each division. These divisions give the length of the ray of vision in the same manner as we measure the depth to which the plummet has been thrown, before it reaches the bottom, although in the case of a starry stratum there can not, correctly speaking, be any idea of depth, but merely ...
— COSMOS: A Sketch of the Physical Description of the Universe, Vol. 1 • Alexander von Humboldt
... in the light of a discovery, and wondered why people of experience had not made it before. Ah, me! we have made many discoveries since that time. Discoveries as old as they are always new. The first friendly ray of March sunlight; the first green leaf in the park; the first summer glow of June; the first dead leaf and keen blast of autumn; these, too, have wakened within us each year a new understanding of our needs and of the ideal habitation; these, too, ...
— The Van Dwellers - A Strenuous Quest for a Home • Albert Bigelow Paine
... of Niobe, clad in garments of mourning, drew near, and with loosened hair stood around their brothers. And the sight of them brought a ray of joy to Niobe's white face. She forgot her grief for a moment, and casting a scornful look to heaven, said, "Victor! No, for even in my loss I have more ...
— Myths and Legends of All Nations • Various
... read a letter of hers By the moon's cold shine, Eyeing it in the tenderest way, And edging it up to catch each ray Upon her light-penned line. I did not know what years would flow Of her life's span and mine Ere I read another letter of hers By the ...
— Late Lyrics and Earlier • Thomas Hardy
... extraordinary appearance from the downward curvature of the beak. The head is often tufted. The common colour is white, but some are coloured like wild ducks. It is an ancient breed, having been noticed in 1676. (8/3. Willughby's 'Ornithology' by Ray page 381. This breed is also figured by Albin in 1734 in his 'Nat. Hist. of Birds' volume 2 page 86.) It shows its prolonged domestication by almost incessantly laying eggs, like the fowls which are called ...
— The Variation of Animals and Plants under Domestication - Volume I • Charles Darwin
... elements. When he ventured to blink hastily, he derived some moral support from the green gleam of the starboard light shining feebly upon the flight of rain and sprays. He was actually looking at it when its ray fell upon the uprearing sea which put it out. He saw the head of the wave topple over, adding the mite of its crash to the tremendous uproar raging around him, and almost at the same instant the stanchion was wrenched away from his embracing arms. After a crushing thump on his back he found himself ...
— Typhoon • Joseph Conrad
... believe his ears about that. He could not look round, for the road had a sinuous curve just there. He whipped up his horse and glanced sideways again. And then he saw quite distinctly where a ray from his lamp leapt a low stretch of hedge, the curved back of—some big animal, he couldn't tell what, going along in quick ...
— The Food of the Gods and How It Came to Earth • H.G. Wells
... promise of perpetual joy, became a condition of unending grief. They were on the two sides of a bridgeless river, in plain sight of each other, but forever debarred from hearing the voice or pressing the land of the one beloved, doomed to perpetual toil unlit by any ray ...
— The Chinese Boy and Girl • Isaac Taylor Headland
... your shop, with false hair?'—He looked at the handkerchief, and said, 'Ay! that lady was very particular, she insisted on verifying the tint of the hair. My wife herself marked those handkerchiefs. You have there, sir, one of the finest pieces of work we have ever executed.' Before this last ray of light I might have believed something—might have taken a woman's word. I left the shop still having faith in pleasure, but where love was concerned I was as atheistical ...
— Another Study of Woman • Honore de Balzac
... your friends would willingly render, it afflicts and persecutes you with a fierceness which we might not expect to see in the fiends of hell. But still the Almighty Father of Mercies has left to us a glimmering ray of hope, which shines out like a lone star in a cloudy sky. Mankind are becoming wiser, and better—the oppressor's power is fading, and you, every day, are becoming better informed, and more numerous. Your grievances, brethren, are many. We shall not attempt, ...
— Walker's Appeal, with a Brief Sketch of His Life - And Also Garnet's Address to the Slaves of the United States of America • David Walker and Henry Highland Garnet
... the study, laughing loudly in an exaggerated way, doubtless to make the others believe that they were quite easy in mind. And one and all passed into the large dining-room where a big wood fire was burning, its gay flames shining like a ray of springtide amid the fine mahogany furniture of English make laden with silver and crystal. The room, of a soft mossy green, had an unassuming charm in the pale light, and the table which in the centre displayed the richness of its covers and ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... his chair. In his altered position, a ray of sunshine fell for the first time upon his gaunt but striking face. Lined and hardened, as though by exposure and want of personal care, there was also a lack of sensibility, an almost animal callousness, on the coldly ...
— The Malefactor • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... the finely-polished furniture. It was a great and important day for Baireuth. All felt it, and excitement and curiosity drove the inhabitants into the streets. No one cared to stay at home, or be absent at that historic hour which was to shed upon Baireuth a ray ...
— NAPOLEON AND BLUCHER • L. Muhlbach
... ramo m. branch. rpido, -a rapid, quick, swift, nimble, fleeting. raro, -a strange, unusual. rasgar tear, rend. raudal m. torrent, stream. raudo, -a rapid, swift, precipitate.. raya f. stripe, streak. rayar border upon. rayo m. ray, thunderbolt, beam, light. razn f. reason, reasoning. realidad f. reality. realizar realize, make real, bring about. rebelde adj. rebellious. rebramar bellow. recatado, -a cautious, careful, prudent. recato m. modesty, prudence, coyness. recelo m. misgiving, apprehension, ...
— El Estudiante de Salamanca and Other Selections • George Tyler Northup
... DR. RAY LYMAN WILBUR, professor of medicine, has been elected president of Leland Stanford Junior University. He will on January 1 succeed Dr John Caspar Branner, who undertook to accept the presidency for ...
— Popular Science Monthly Volume 86
... shaving-water might be dumped on his wash-stand; but devil a bit would Uncle James budge, till finally the enemy, giving in, would bring him his breakfast in bed. Then, after a leisurely cigar, he would at last rise and, having dressed himself with care, come downstairs and be the ray of sunshine ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 146, April 22, 1914 • Various
... conducted their search with greater vigilance and method. More than once he could distinguish their footsteps, as they brushed the sassafras, causing the faded leaves to rustle, and the branches to snap. At length, the pile yielded a little, a corner of a blanket fell, and a faint ray of light gleamed into the inner part of the cave. Cora folded Alice to her bosom in agony, and Duncan sprang to his feet. A shout was at that moment heard, as if issuing from the center of the rock, ...
— The Last of the Mohicans • James Fenimore Cooper
... a ray of hope shot athwart his pale and anxious face. "Nothing is talked of in Paris," continued he, "but the strange revelations connected with her arrest. It is said that she not only drew the horoscope of those who were accustomed to visit ...
— Prince Eugene and His Times • L. Muhlbach
... now. Jack, reaching over, switched on the electric sidelights outside, and also the white light at the signal masthead. Then he turned on the searchlight, sending its bright ray through the gathering darkness. ...
— The Submarine Boys' Lightning Cruise - The Young Kings of the Deep • Victor G. Durham
... no idea who his deliverer was, but he thanked him and took his hand. He was led along evil-smelling passages into which no ray of light penetrated, but which were evidently familiar to his guide. There were turnings, now to right, now to left, an opening and shutting of doors, and finally entrance into a wider space where the air ...
— The Light That Lures • Percy Brebner
... In a grotto, deep in the heart of the earth. She is seated on a rock, and all is darkness save a faint ray of light that creeps ...
— The Carved Cupboard • Amy Le Feuvre
... Augustus J. Pleasanton, of Philadelphia, made some experiments to determine whether or not rays of sunlight passing through colored glass had any therapeutic effect on animals and plants. His selection of blue glass as a medium was probably based upon the theory that the blue ray of the solar spectrum possesses superior actinic or ...
— Primitive Psycho-Therapy and Quackery • Robert Means Lawrence
... wept The soul she murdered while it slept. She felt too stunned with pain to think. She seemed to stand upon a brink; Behind her loomed the sinful past, Below her, rocks, beyond her, vast And awful darkness. Not one ray Of sun or star to show the way! She drew a long and shuddering breath; "There is no other path but death For me to tread," she sighed, "and so I will prepare my ...
— Poems of Sentiment • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... honest man, with but slightly way-ward tendencies. Whooping O'Shaughnessy! Just look! Six one-thousand-dollar bills, fifty one-hundreds—that's eleven thousand! A sheaf of fifties and twenties, swelling the total to something like twelve thousand! Hoo-ray! Again I ask, am I dreaming? Pinch me, I'll stop snoring, 'deed I will. I'll turn over, dearie, and go to sleep again! Twelve thousand plunks! Wouldn't that everlastingly unsettle you? Well, well, well! Not so bad for a moment's effort before breakfast, eh? Ain't it simply grand, Mag? ...
— The Statesmen Snowbound • Robert Fitzgerald
... that it was Jacqueline Gabrie who stood waiting admittance, she opened the door wider, as I said; and the dark solemnity of her countenance seemed to be, by so much as a single ray, enlivened for ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 6, No. 34, August, 1860 • Various
... curtains were of crimson velvet, trimmed with lace and lined with crimson silk. The canopy was composed of crimson velvet, with radiated centre of white satin enamelled with gold, forming a gold ray from which the centre of velvet diverged; a valance of crimson velvet, laced with gold, depended from the canopy, which was intersected with cornucopia, introducing the rose, thistle, and shamrock, in ...
— Life of Her Most Gracious Majesty the Queen V.1. • Sarah Tytler
... S. and S. simpering; "do you tbink so? Do you know I wrote a long letter to Mrs. Ray just before I came here, this very afternoon,—quite a long letter! I did, ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 1 • Madame D'Arblay
... had a far narrower escape than mine. Only the fact that a hummock of heathery sand intercepted the lower part of the Heat-Ray saved them. Had the elevation of the parabolic mirror been a few yards higher, none could have lived to tell the tale. They saw the flashes and the men falling and an invisible hand, as it were, lit the bushes as it hurried towards them through the twilight. Then, with a whistling note that rose ...
— The War of the Worlds • H. G. Wells
... boldness, and that lightning ray Which her sweet beauty streamed on his face, Had struck the prince with wonder and dismay, Changed his cheer, and cleared his moody grace, That had her eyes disposed their looks to play, The king had snared been in love's strong lace; But wayward beauty doth not ...
— Jerusalem Delivered • Torquato Tasso
... night was warm and sultry. Under various false pretenses, Mr. Middlerib strolled about the house until everybody else was in bed, and then he sought his room. He turned the lamp down until its feeble ray shone dimly as ...
— Masterpieces Of American Wit And Humor • Thomas L. Masson (Editor)
... ray of hope darted on the troubled mind of our gracious father, he proceeded to make such arrangements as might secure the full benefit of the advantage. His Imperial Highness would not permit the brave Varangians, whose ...
— Waverley Volume XII • Sir Walter Scott
... head upon his knees, seemed to slumber. Suddenly the loud clamour of five bells as the hour was struck made him start to his feet and look quickly about him with nervous apprehension. From the dead officer's state-room a narrow line of light from beneath the door sent an oblique ray aslant the cabin floor and crossed the convict's ...
— Rodman The Boatsteerer And Other Stories - 1898 • Louis Becke
... Ylajali. To think that I could have forgotten her the entire evening through! And light forces its way ever so faintly into my spirit again—a little ray of sunshine that makes me so blessedly warm; and gradually more sun comes, a rare, silken, balmy light that caresses me with soothing loveliness. And the sun grows stronger and stronger, burns sharply in my temples, seethes fiercely and glowingly in ...
— Hunger • Knut Hamsun
... morning. Then, left to himself, Mr. Petherick put on his hat and took a stroll in the lane. It was a perfect summer's evening, warm and star-lit; yet its peace failed to penetrate his tortured soul. A glow-worm twinkled in the grass under the hedge, but no ray of light pierced the impenetrable gloom within. He returned to his room, and, after sitting for a while at the open window, looking down on the sluggish waters of the tranquil river, he threw himself on his knees beside his bed. One by one he prayed for each ...
— A Handful of Stars - Texts That Have Moved Great Minds • Frank W. Boreham
... o'clock, when almost the last ray of hope had died out of the officers breasts, that Chief of Police Deitsch received word that Jackson had just been seen at the Palace Hotel. The chief started out and ran into a man answering Jackson's description. ...
— The Mysterious Murder of Pearl Bryan - or: the Headless Horror. • Unknown
... shame can hope to avoid coming to these places in the end. As sure as she takes the first step in sin, she will take this last one also, struggle against it as she may. This is the last depth. It has but one bright ray in all its darkness—it does not last over a few months, for death soon ends it. But, O, the horrors of such a death! No human being who has not looked on such a death-bed can imagine the horrible form ...
— Lights and Shadows of New York Life - or, the Sights and Sensations of the Great City • James D. McCabe
... not, I was so turned to stone within. They wept; and my poor little Anselm said, 'Thou lookest so, father, what aileth thee?' Yet I did not weep; nor did I answer all that day, nor the night after, until the next sun came out upon the world. When a little ray entered the woeful prison, and I discerned by their four faces my own very aspect, both my hands I bit for woe; and they, thinking I did it through desire of eating, of a sudden rose, and said, 'Father, it will be far less pain to us if thou eat of us; ...
— The Divine Comedy, Volume 1, Hell [The Inferno] • Dante Alighieri
... murmured, as a ray of light fell suddenly on the darkness of his spirit; "'contentment is better than wealth.' Dear brother! Dear old home! Sweet Ellen! Ah, why did I leave you? Too late! too late! A cup, full of the wine of life, was at my lips; but, I turned ...
— Friends and Neighbors - or Two Ways of Living in the World • Anonymous
... climbed to the top of a mountain one day To see the sun setting in glory, And I thought, as I looked at his vanishing ray, Of ...
— The Devil's Dictionary • Ambrose Bierce
... not utter a word. He retired from the bedside, and sat by the fire absorbed in grief. About eight o'clock the Physicians came again into the Room and applied blisters, and cataplasms of wheat bran, to his legs and feet: but went out (except Dr. Craik) without a ray of hope. I went out about this time, and wrote a line to Mr. Low and Mr. Peter requesting them to come with their wives (Mrs. Washington's granddaughters) as ...
— George Washington • William Roscoe Thayer
... all the way to Fairdale—please?" asked Miss Ruth, sweetly offering her hand. "I am Ruth Herbert. And this is my cousin, Ray Longstreth." ...
— The Lone Star Ranger • Zane Grey
... little strength submerged and drowned In this fierce rage that bids him seek me out And take me in the darkness of my home, And change, and fill me, as the virgin night Is changed to day, and as the moonlight sky Is emptied of her sterile ray, and filled With overflooding light that spills to earth A golden augury of later ...
— Miscellany of Poetry - 1919 • Various
... warm air of the valley. There had been no rain for three weeks, and the river was not more than half full; and it was very quiet. They camped on the bank, well away from the scattered groups of trees, that they might not lose a ray of sunshine; and Roldan and Adan forgot that they were under constant surveillance. There were no tents; they slept in the open air, the boys in the centre of a square of Indians. During the day they caught many fine salmon, and ...
— The Valiant Runaways • Gertrude Atherton
... her sitting by my bedside when I opened my eyes. Through the lowered curtains I caught a ray of sunlight, and knew ...
— Revelations of a Wife - The Story of a Honeymoon • Adele Garrison
... the boat side, quick, what change, Watch—in the water! But a second since, It laughed a ripply spread of sun and sea, Ray fused with wave, to never disunite. Now, sudden, all the surface hard and black, Lies a quenched light, dead motion: what the cause? Look up, and lo, the menace of a cloud Has solemnised the sparkling, spoiled the sport! Just so, some overshadow, some new care Stopped all the mirth and ...
— The Poetry Of Robert Browning • Stopford A. Brooke
... a flash, at last 'the place' was seen afar off. How calmly Abraham speaks to the two followers, mastering his heart's throbbing even then! 'We will worship, and come again to you'—was that a 'pious fraud' or did it not rather indicate that a ray of hope, like pale light from a shrouded sun, shone for him? He 'accounted that God was able to raise him up even from the dead.' Somehow, he knew not how, Isaac slain was still to live and inherit the promises. Anything was possible, but that God's word should fail was impossible. That ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus and Numbers • Alexander Maclaren
... drove them, and spread themselves upon the limpid water like streaming hair; sometimes at the tip of the reeds or on the leaf of a water-lily an insect with fine legs crawled or rested. The sun pierced with a ray the small blue bubbles of the waves that, breaking, followed each other; branchless old willows mirrored their grey backs in the water; beyond, all around, the meadows seemed empty. It was the dinner-hour at the farms, and the young woman and her companion heard nothing as they walked but ...
— Madame Bovary • Gustave Flaubert
... to the X-ray room and then to the operating-tent that night, and sent me off on the following afternoon to the Base with a parting injunction that I should be well advised to have my foot taken off; which, thank God, was not found ...
— The Great War As I Saw It • Frederick George Scott
... from lips all stained with sin,— Pleading for you who purer are than I! O direst judgment from the God of grace! My inmost soul doth long for His forgiveness, I yearn for sign of His compassion, Yet cannot bear His mercy in the Grail.... But now the hour is nigh! I seem to see A ray of glory fall upon the Cup! The veil is raised! The sacred stream that flows Within the crystal, gloriously shines With radiance heaven-born. But as it glows, I feel the well-spring of the blood divine Pouring ...
— Parsifal - A Drama by Wagner • Retold by Oliver Huckel
... Plymouth] and being out of sorts, is unable for the present time and place to recruit himself with Cloaths. Here (if not friendly provided) they make the next Wood their Draper's shop, where a Staffe cut out, serves them for a covering'. Ray, Prov. (1670), 225, adds, 'For we use when we walk in cuerpo to carry a staff in our hands but none when in a cloak'. N.E.D., which also quotes this passage of ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn, Vol. I (of 6) • Aphra Behn
... dear lady realise this. How could she, bright freed creature, hungering after the long withheld joyousness of existence, and overwilling to delude herself into the belief that every shadow was a ray of sunlight? She had no notion of the man's grotesque struggles to conceal the shivering sensitiveness of his roughly ...
— The Beloved Vagabond • William J. Locke
... had resided under the name of Dawson, so that Colonel Mannering's attempts to discover and trace him were unavailing. He resolved, however, that no difficulties should prevent his continuing his enterprise, while Julia left him a ray of hope. The interest he had secured in her bosom was such as she had been unable to conceal from him, and with all the courage of romantic gallantry he determined upon perseverance. But we believe the reader will be as well pleased to learn ...
— Guy Mannering • Sir Walter Scott
... quivering relics into the sod, with a fierce animal joy of conquest, and turned once more towards the hollow, for a last almost hopeless survey. Lo, his object was found! In his search for the snake, either his staff or his foot had disturbed a layer of moss in the corner; the faint ray, ere he entered the hollow, gleamed upon something white. He emerged from the cavity with a letter in his hand; he read the address, thrust it into his bosom, and as stealthily, but more rapidly, than he had come, took his ...
— Lucretia, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... &c.; though it must be admitted that latterly the balance sadly preponderated on the side of vice and corruption. If a Justinian or a Constantine appeared, his reign was but a sunbeam in the midst of the universal degeneracy; or if a ray of splendour was shed on the empire by his virtues or his victories, the transient glory was speedily dispelled by irruptions from without, or intrigue and revolt within. Gradually the work of decay proceeded, until the vast expanse of the imperial conquests ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 419, New Series, January 10, 1852 • Various
... spice of adventure, was what he longed for—as eagerly and as hopelessly as some fallen wayfarer in a desert land. His mother's flinty attitude and hostile nagging had frozen a naturally affectionate disposition, and Shafto passed several years of his youth without one single ray of woman's love, until generous Mrs. Malone had come forward and installed him in her heart. His usual routine was breakfast at eight, office at nine, lunch twelve-thirty, freedom at six, dinner at seven-thirty. On Saturday afternoons he was expected at "Monte Carlo"—to join the family at ...
— The Road to Mandalay - A Tale of Burma • B. M. Croker
... promptly fell asleep. Once during the hours of darkness he awoke with a start; from below had come the sound of a familiar voice, faint but unmistakable. Myla too had been awakened and stirred uneasily. But as the sound was not repeated the monkey again slept while the cub felt a first, faint ray of hope and happiness, for he knew that his mother had not deserted him; in fact, was even then close at hand and would come to his assistance at ...
— The Black Phantom • Leo Edward Miller
... slavery had agitated the benevolent for some years, and finding a singular apathy in ray own bosom on this important subject, I bought five hundred of each sex to stimulate my sympathies. This led me nearer to the United States of America, a country that I had endeavored to blot out of my recollection; for while thus encouraging a love for the species, I had scarcely thought it necessary ...
— The Monikins • J. Fenimore Cooper
... of burial they sometimes do not know. So many obscure soldiers have never been commemorated, who gave, like Guynemer, their hearts and their lives, who lived through the worst days of misery, of mud and horror, and upon whom not the least ray of glory has ever descended! The infantry soldier is the pariah of the war, and has a right to be sensitive. The heaviest weight of suffering caused by war has fallen upon him. Nevertheless, he had adopted Guynemer, and this was ...
— Georges Guynemer - Knight of the Air • Henry Bordeaux
... and deeper into the water. It became inky black about me, not a ray from above came down into that darkness, and the phosphorescent things grew brighter and brighter. The snaky branches of the deeper weeds flickered like the flames of spirit-lamps; but, after a time, there ...
— The Country of the Blind, And Other Stories • H. G. Wells
... play, I must have a hand in it, For won't I teach the supers how to stalk and stand in it? Tho' that blessed Shakespeare never gives a ray to them, I explain the text, and then it's clear as day to them![1] Plain as A B C is a plot historical, When I overhaul allusions allegorical! Shakespeare's not so bad; he'd have more pounds and pence in him, If actors stood aside, and let me ...
— The Story of My Life - Recollections and Reflections • Ellen Terry
... image of a thought that fares Forth from itself, and flings its ray ahead, Leaping the barriers of ephemeral cares, To where our lives are but ...
— Artemis to Actaeon and Other Worlds • Edith Wharton
... overjoyed even with this slender resource, and warmly thanked them. At once her busy little brain laid plans for invading the lair of the Frochards. And then—a most unexpected ray in the darkness—arrived at Salpetriere the quaint valet Picard and ...
— Orphans of the Storm • Henry MacMahon
... a ray of hope crept into the darkness of my heart; for when men fall they grasp at feathers. Then, I spoke for ...
— Cleopatra • H. Rider Haggard
... side AB common, and the side CB equal to NA, it follows that the angles opposite to these sides will be equal, and therefore also the angles CBA, NAB. But as CB, perpendicular to CA, marks the direction of the incident ray, so AN, perpendicular to the wave BN, marks the direction of the reflected ray; hence these rays are equally ...
— Treatise on Light • Christiaan Huygens
... thro' white curtains shot a tim'rous ray, And oped those eyes that must eclipse the day: Now lap-dogs give themselves the rousing shake, 15 And sleepless lovers, just at twelve, awake: Thrice rung the bell, the slipper knock'd the ground, And the press'd watch return'd a silver ...
— The Rape of the Lock and Other Poems • Alexander Pope
... directions. Dingy Clerkenwell and Aldersgate Street were gilded with a plentiful and radiant deposit of that precious metal of which healthy youth has such an infinite store—actual metal, not the "delusive ray" by any means, for it is the most real thing in existence, more real than the bullion forks and spoons which we buy later on, when we feel we can afford them, and far more real than the silver tea-service with which, still later, we are presented amidst ...
— Miriam's Schooling and Other Papers - Gideon; Samuel; Saul; Miriam's Schooling; and Michael Trevanion • Mark Rutherford
... incorrect, as on the 1st of that month, messengers were despatched with letters "to divers Lordis and gentilmen to cum to the Quenis tyrement." (Treasurer's Accounts.) A letter, describing her last illness, is preserved among the State Papers, vol. v. p. 193, written in December, by Ray the pursuevant, who had been sent by the Privy Council to Scotland specially to ...
— The Works of John Knox, Vol. 1 (of 6) • John Knox
... every earthly joy. Cities were bombarded, fields of grain trampled in the mire, villages burned. Famine rioted over its ghastly victims. Hospitals were filled with miserable multitudes, mutilated and with festering wounds, longing for death. Not a ray of light pierced the gloom of this dark, black night of crime and woe. And yet, undeniably, the responsibility before God must rest with the League. Henry IV. was the lawful king of France. The Catholics had risen in arms ...
— Henry IV, Makers of History • John S. C. Abbott
... beautiful is night! A dewy freshness fills the silent air; No mist obscures, nor cloud, nor speck, nor stain, Breaks the serene of heaven: In full-orb'd glory yonder moon divine Rolls through the dark-blue depths. Beneath her steady ray The desert-circle spreads, Like the round ocean, girdled with the ...
— Journeys Through Bookland V3 • Charles H. Sylvester
... patient figure, neatly dressed in homely stuffs, and indicating nothing but the dull, household virtues, that have so little in common with the received idea of heroism and greatness, unless, indeed, any ray of them should shine through the lives of the great ones of the earth, when it becomes a constellation and is tracked in Heaven straightway—this slight, small, patient figure, leaning on the man still young but worn and grey, is she, his sister, who, of all the world, went over to him in ...
— Dombey and Son • Charles Dickens
... heart, the warm breath growing ever warmer, and the clinging hands, clinging ever closer, of the child she loved. The sense of delicious languor changed to a feeling of heaviness—almost suffocation. Every golden hair of the head upon her breast pierced her like a ray of brightest sunshine. Hastily putting him from her she fled away with the wintry winds, herself as wild and swift and soulless as they. But presently coming to look for the child, and unable to find him, she realized that he was lost, and then she woke, ...
— An Algonquin Maiden - A Romance of the Early Days of Upper Canada • G. Mercer Adam
... he filled with efficiency. As inspector he was earnest, conscientious, versatile; beloved alike by teachers and pupils. The Dean of Salisbury likened his appearance to inspect the school at Kiddermaster, to the admission of a ray of light when a shutter is suddenly opened in a darkened room. All-in-all, he valued happy-appearing children, and kindly sympathetic teachers, more than excellence in grade reports. In connection with the duties of his office as commissioner, ...
— Matthew Arnold's Sohrab and Rustum and Other Poems • Matthew Arnold
... with whom I became very intimate when he was in South Africa. He always said we were related that we were "Irish cousins" but we never were quite able to define what the relationship was. Sir William and Ray, father had been great friends in ...
— Reminiscences of a South African Pioneer • W. C. Scully
... him above being only trusted," said Ermine, trying to smile. "Oh! if you knew what this ray of hope is in the dreary darkness that ...
— The Clever Woman of the Family • Charlotte M. Yonge
... charming Indian screen; A third interprets motions, looks, and eyes; At every word a reputation dies. Snuff, or the fan, supply each pause of chat, With singing, laughing, ogling, and all that. Meanwhile, declining from the noon of day, The sun obliquely shoots his burning ray; The hungry judges soon the sentence sign, And wretches hang that jurymen may dine; The merchant from th' Exchange returns in peace, And the long labours of the toilet cease. Belinda now, whom thirst of fame invites, Burns to encounter ...
— English Poets of the Eighteenth Century • Selected and Edited with an Introduction by Ernest Bernbaum |
