"Sobbing" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... in the boat-house more than a minute when it struck me that the sound of my own quick breathing was very strangely echoed by something beneath me. I listened intently for a moment, and heard a low, thick, sobbing breath that seemed to come from the ground under the seat which I was occupying. My nerves are not easily shaken by trifles, but on this occasion I started to my feet in a fright—called out—received no answer—summoned ...
— The Woman in White • Wilkie Collins
... me to the good God: alas! and my heart thinks of a mortal! I never could be like the others.—I cannot forget," and she broke completely down, sobbing again and again. In a little while he spoke, hoping to ...
— The Young Seigneur - Or, Nation-Making • Wilfrid Chateauclair
... and they noticed with increased alarm the thickening of the storm. Whirlwinds of snow beat in their faces. Jimmy Grayson once heard the big, burly man by his side say, in a kind of sobbing whisper, "Oh, my little girl!" and he felt a catch ...
— The Candidate - A Political Romance • Joseph Alexander Altsheler
... us. But the more I talked, the more he looked at me with the big, big tears in his eyes. It touched my heart. I had restrained my tears for a quarter of an hour; I ended by doing as he did. When I left him he was sobbing; and I said to myself, furious at my stupidity, 'If this is the way I cheer and console him, it is hardly worth while to go and see him; I, who promised myself to make him laugh! It is astonishing ...
— The Mysteries of Paris V2 • Eugene Sue
... itself through the splashes of redder soil and the sunburn of years. Suddenly she threw herself forward, calling on God to strike her dead, and fell quite weak and helpless, with her face on the master's desk, crying and sobbing as ...
— The Luck of Roaring Camp and Other Tales • Bret Harte
... birds of the air Fell to sighing and sobbing When they heard the bell toll For poor ...
— Pinafore Palace • Various
... had freed themselves of heavy armour, and left behind their lances; and they now marched with a very good spirit in the frozen snow, and under the exhilarating lustre of the moon. The descent into the dingle, where a stream strained sobbing through the snow and ice, was effected with silence and order; and on the farther side, being then within a short half-mile of where Dick had seen the glimmer of the fire, the party halted to breathe ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 8 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... wouldn't, or couldn't hush. The word "kidnapped" upset any composure she may have had left, and she burst into hysterical sobbing. ...
— Patty and Azalea • Carolyn Wells
... vessel. Whether she plunged into the stream, or flowed away with it, they knew not; her disappearance was like both and neither. Soon, however, she was completely lost sight of in the Danube; only a few little waves kept whispering, as if sobbing, round the boat, and they almost seemed to be saying: "Oh woe, woe! oh remain true! ...
— Undine - I • Friedrich de la Motte Fouque
... and after this the solemn bass figure. The close is mysterious but piercing in its sobbing, ...
— Edward MacDowell • John F. Porte
... quiet would soon restore her, at my earnest request he retired. In a short time I was able, with bathing her head in cold water, and constantly soothing her with low murmuring tones of endearment, to see her sobbing herself into a troubled sleep, and as I looked on her beautiful face, pale as marble, and the black hair wetted and matted back from her fine brow, I felt that I saw a double victim to the cruel indifference of others, and ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 5 November 1848 • Various
... agitated. She was, in fact, sobbing; and a Pomeranian dog which she carried in her arms was whimpering excitedly as if in sympathy with its mistress. Cleggett, soul of chivalry that he was, born cavalier of beauty in distress, removed his hat and advanced to ...
— The Cruise of the Jasper B. • Don Marquis
... to Dain in wild alarm. "No! Kill me! Then perhaps he will let you go. You do not know the mind of a white man. He would rather see me dead than standing where I am. Forgive me, your slave, but you must not." She fell at his feet sobbing violently and ...
— Almayer's Folly - A Story of an Eastern River • Joseph Conrad
... numb. My eyes swam in tears. Before me lay my old gray-haired father sobbing like a child. In his horny hands he clutched the buffalo-robe, and with his teeth he was gnawing off the edges. Chewing the dry stiff hair and buffalo-skin, my father's eyes sought my hands. Upon seeing them ...
— American Indian stories • Zitkala-Sa
... that night before going to bed, and mother came and stayed with me. I am sure she did not sleep, for as often as I dropped off from sheer exhaustion, I was wakened by her sobbing. Then I, too, would cry. I tried to be brave, but my wounds hurt me so, and my head ached. I seemed to be thinking all the time of father. My poor father! I felt sorry for him, and kept wondering where he was. All through the night it ...
— Stories Worth Rereading • Various
... half-sobbing, "you are a king among men!" little dreaming of the amount of truth there was in ...
— L. P. M. - The End of the Great War • J. Stewart Barney
... Defiantly she touched the nearest image, with formal ancient gestures, and you could see the black stone Schamir taking on the colors of an opal. Under her touch the clay image which had the look of Alianora shivered, and drew sobbing breath. The image rose, a living creature that was far more beautiful than human kind, and it regarded Manuel scornfully. Then it passed limping from the enclosure: and ...
— Figures of Earth • James Branch Cabell
... silent power of this scene; the eyes of the singers filled with tears, and they could only continue their chant in soft, broken, sobbing tones, but Benda was not angry; he dared not look at them, lest they might see that his own stern eyes were ...
— Frederick The Great and His Family • L. Muhlbach
... knew it, Van!" said the girl in a sudden outburst of sobbing, and she tried to rise upon her pillow. Agony, which she had fought down wildly, seized her in a spasm. She ...
— The Furnace of Gold • Philip Verrill Mighels
... said Clemence, as Mrs. Deane appeared in the doorway, "Come to me Ruth, you have lost your mother, but you have found a sister," and she clasped the sobbing little ...
— Clemence - The Schoolmistress of Waveland • Retta Babcock
... felt a wound, even if he had not dealt it; it seemed to her that a mask had suddenly fallen from his face. He had wished to get away from her; he had been angry and cruel, and said strange things, with strange looks. She was smothered and stunned; she buried her head in the cushions, sobbing and talking to herself. But at last she raised herself, with the fear that either her father or Mrs. Penniman would come in; and then she sat there, staring before her, while the room grew darker. She said to herself that perhaps he would come back to tell her he had ...
— Washington Square • Henry James
... nurse was often roused at dead of night by her sobbing: "Oh, James, that you should be in the same town with me, and never come near to see me die! And I love you,—I love you so ...
— Old Kaskaskia • Mary Hartwell Catherwood
... still roaring, but his mother dragged him into the kitchen. Here she sat down in a rocker and attempted to pull him into her lap, but he would have none of her. He threw himself sobbing on the floor and Mrs. Moore sat looking ...
— The Forbidden Trail • Honore Willsie
... looming and silent, and a little way off the new fence where the man lay. An odd sound startled him, though he knew it was no Indians at this hour, and he looked down into a little dry ditch. It was the boy, hidden away flat on his stomach among the stones, sobbing. ...
— Red Men and White • Owen Wister
... sobbing, half in eagerness, half in genuine distress. "There's such dreadful news! There's a man come in from Captain Terry's troop, and they've had a terrible fight, and Mr. McLean an' lots of 'em are killed. It's all true, just as ...
— 'Laramie;' - or, The Queen of Bedlam. • Charles King
... him, and by that time he had covered half the distance to his sister. Those rifle-shots came faintly to Esteban's ears; he scarcely heard them; he merely lowered his head and rode straight at that black- visaged colonel, sobbing and ...
— Rainbow's End • Rex Beach
... virgins wreathe it in their hair, and, if they die, it is strewed over their graves. So, I can't help loving it better than any thing. But, since you say it makes you sick, I won't love it, or gather it any more.' Then her words became almost inarticulate from sobbing, as she added,—'Why should I wear it now? I belong to a ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 19, No. - 537, March 10, 1832 • Various
... / and Helmnot with warriors all Mourned there together / that he in death must fall. For sobbing might not further / question Hildebrand. He spake: "Now do, ye warriors, / according to ...
— The Nibelungenlied - Translated into Rhymed English Verse in the Metre of the Original • trans. by George Henry Needler
... which grated slightly on the sensitive nerves of the many to whom Ireland's emancipation—with all the sobbing centuries which lie behind it—is a fanaticism, a faith, a great creed; but the point to be really considered is whether this was the tone to adopt for the purpose of carrying out the desired end. ...
— Sketches In The House (1893) • T. P. O'Connor
... words, and with many a little half-sobbing sigh and one or two scalding tears, hastily brushed away, Elsie told the whole painful story, secure of warm sympathy from the kind heart to which she ...
— Elsie's Girlhood • Martha Finley
... was half sobbing. There were great tears rolling down her face; she could hardly bear to hear him or to look at him, his face was ...
— Lover or Friend • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... and I lay where I fell, sobbing with weakness, looking out through the side window ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, May, 1930 • Various
... course he was convinced it 'wouldn't do'; Sir Lakshman ... my position ... and so on. I said I proposed to make it do—and the eyebrow twitched worse than ever. So I mildly reminded him that he had not held Aruna sobbing in his arms, and he didn't happen to be a mother! Which was unanswerable.—And, my dear Roy, I had a hectic week of it, manipulating Sir Lakshman and Aruna and the honourable grandmother—strictly unseen! I'm sure she's anti-English. I've got at all the other ...
— Far to Seek - A Romance of England and India • Maud Diver
... down entirely and, flinging himself into a chair, laid his face on the table, sobbing like a girl. Rose had never seen a man cry before, and it was so unlike a woman's gentler grief that it moved her very much. Putting by her own anguish, she tried to comfort his and, going to him, lifted up his head and made ...
— Rose in Bloom - A Sequel to "Eight Cousins" • Louisa May Alcott
... unusual height; and through all the topmost branches there ran a low, mournful sound, as if every tree was whispering about them, and lamenting over them. Even the little brook, which in the sunshine rippled so merrily along the borders of the wood, seemed to be sobbing like a grieved and tired child in the night-time. Strange rustlings on every side, and sudden groanings of the withered boughs in some of the pines, made them start in fear; and once, in a little ...
— Fern's Hollow • Hesba Stretton
... square. It would be Soho Square, but whether he was on the south or east of it he could not tell, and consequently he was at a loss to know which way to turn. A great silence had fallen over everything, and only the sobbing nostrils of the cab-horses seemed to be audible ...
— The Eternal City • Hall Caine
... last and confined myself to the first topic. 'Lay aside pepper, and brandy and water, and baume de vie. Prevent the evil instead of curing it. A single mutton chop, a glass of toast and water'—here she cried and I stopped; but she began sobbing, and I was weak enough to allow two glasses of sherry—on ...
— Sydney Smith • George W. E. Russell
... cleared the way through the crowd for his young companion, and conducted him within a few yards of the spot where William Tell stood, than the urchin drew his hand away from his new friend, and running to his father, flung his little arms about his knees, sobbing, "Father, dear father, pray forgive me this once, and I will never disobey ...
— Heroes Every Child Should Know • Hamilton Wright Mabie
... sat on the floor near the stove with the yarn in her hands, sobbing, and continually bowing down, uttering at each bow a gasping sound. But nothing was so terrible to Yakov as the potato in the blood, on which he was afraid of stepping, and there was something else terrible which weighed upon him ...
— The Bishop and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... thus sobbing and crying, lo and behold! a beautiful pomelo tree grew up out of the grave, covered with fresh ripe pomeloes, and the children satisfied their hunger by eating some of the fruit, and every day after this, instead of trying to ...
— Indian Fairy Tales • Collected by Joseph Jacobs
... spoke she sank sobbing, no longer on to his breast, no longer with her arms clasped round his neck, ...
— Wife in Name Only • Charlotte M. Braeme (Bertha M. Clay)
... dwindling, but she was unsuspicious, and only wondered that her recovery was so slow. Once, as she was watching, in a half-declining position, the setting sun, and talking of the happy days to come, I could contain myself no longer, but burst forth into a frenzy of sobbing. ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. I. February, 1862, No. II. - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... her, he begged to kiss her hand. She gave it, and asked him to pray to God for her. "Ah yes," he cried, sobbing, "with all my heart." She then fastened her dress as best she could with her hands tied, and when the gaoler had gone and she was alone ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - THE MARQUISE DE BRINVILLIERS • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... and broken in hope—not from poverty, for that she could bear, but from the consciousness of undeserved neglect, and unmerited unkindness—it is easy to see how much of it is assumed. A momentary pause succeeds; the girl breaks suddenly from her sister and throws herself, sobbing, on her mother's neck. The father steps hastily forward, and takes her husband's hand. Friends crowd round to offer their hearty congratulations, and happiness ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens
... nerves had been affected; he had lived all his life in these surroundings and knew no fear of man or beast. And now, this splendid type of manhood, free and unbound in his thoughts and unprejudiced by superstition, broke down completely and hid his face in his hands, sobbing like a child in a dark room afraid of ghosts. He had been called to this spot three times without knowing the cause, and now, the mysterious force attracting him, as a magnet does a piece of iron, he was unable to move. Helpless as a ...
— In The Amazon Jungle - Adventures In Remote Parts Of The Upper Amazon River, Including A - Sojourn Among Cannibal Indians • Algot Lange
... last for a long country walk, and give rise to protracted conversation? Does hallucination explain the story of Christ eating and drinking before His disciples? The uncertain twilight of the garden might have begotten such an airy phantom in the brain of a single sobbing woman; but the appearances to be explained are so numerous, so varied in character, embrace so many details, appeal to so many of the senses—to the ear and hand as well as to the eye—were spread over so long a period, and were simultaneously shared by so large a number, ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - St. Matthew Chaps. IX to XXVIII • Alexander Maclaren
... night shall fall,—till the stars are faint in the morning,— Yea, till the sun himself be faint in that glory and brightness, Faint in the light which shall dawn in mercy for penitent sinners." Kneeling, he led them in prayer; and the quick and sobbing responses Spake how their souls were moved with the might and the grace of the Spirit. Then while the converts recounted how God had chastened and saved them,— Children, whose golden locks yet shone with the lingering effulgence Of the touches of Him ...
— Poems • William D. Howells
... no son, her daughter no husband, their children no father." The admiral replying, "they must look upon him as their father and their friend," the youngest boy, about six years of age, seized him by the hand, and sobbing exclaimed, "Then you shall be my father." Mr. Watson was so affected with this pathetic address, that the tears trickled down his cheeks, while he assured them they might depend upon his ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... it passes very offensively into the vulgar waltz. She submits altogether. It is Jules Favre sobbing on Bismarck's bosom and surrendering every thing.... But at this point Augustin too grows fierce; hoarse sounds are heard; there is a suggestion of countless gallons of beer, of a frenzy of self-glorification, demands for millions, for fine cigars, champagne, ...
— The Possessed - or, The Devils • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... into a fit of hysterical weeping, cowering under that kindly touch as if it had been a mountain to crush her, rocking herself to and fro, sobbing out wildly, "I wish I was dead! ...
— M. or N. "Similia similibus curantur." • G.J. Whyte-Melville
... did not stay, but left them together, the younger woman sobbing on the breast of the older, who bent over and stroked ...
— Nancy McVeigh of the Monk Road • R. Henry Mainer
... Allah: an thou take them not I will send them by other than thyself." Presently King Yusuf set apart for the Caliph great store of gifts, and when the handmaidens heard of that they wept with sore weeping. Ibrahim, hearing their wailing, found it hard to bear, and he also shed tears for the sobbing and crying of them; and presently he exclaimed, "Allah upon thee, O Yusuf leave these ten handmaidens by thee and I will be thy ward with the Prince of True Believers." But Yusuf answered, "Now by the might of Him ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton
... have been here twenty years, and I have seen many desperate men; but I never saw any despair like this young man's. He had jumped up as soon as I turned my back, and he was walking up and down, sobbing aloud. He looked as pale as death; and the big tears were running ...
— Within an Inch of His Life • Emile Gaboriau
... loudly in groups on the footpath or lurching homeward with uneven steps. Jonah was explaining that he must see Clara all the way home on account of the lateness of the hour, when he was astonished to hear someone sobbing in the monumental mason's yard as if his heart would break. He turned and looked. The headstones and white marble crosses stood in rows with a faint resemblance to a graveyard; the moonlight fell clear and cold on these monuments awaiting ...
— Jonah • Louis Stone
... own torch out of their hands; with hardly an outward change—as in a processional relief on a sarcophagus—the bridal train turns and moves to the grave with funeral lights flaring through the darkness and sobbing voices and ...
— Select Epigrams from the Greek Anthology • J. W. Mackail
... nothing in Dan's life had ever moved him so much as when Mrs. Owen, standing beside Sylvia and representing in her gaunt figure the whole world of love and kindness, bent down at the very end and kissed the sobbing girl ...
— A Hoosier Chronicle • Meredith Nicholson
... you'll wake up Bobby," she advised the sobbing Esther. "Come on, I'll go back with you. Don't make ...
— Betty Gordon at Boarding School - The Treasure of Indian Chasm • Alice Emerson
... despair and agony, poised the tuck and cast it at her javelin-fashion. The woman, cooler than he in both senses of the term, dodged it easily. How she had contrived to pin him in such a helpless manner, I could not imagine. The motive was obvious. A little girl lay writhing and sobbing on the floor amid the fragments of a broken mug and a scattering ...
— The Yeoman Adventurer • George W. Gough
... here faltered. He turned away and seemed to wrestle with a tempest of suppressed sobbing. A moment more, he looked heavenward and pointed ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 52, February, 1862 • Various
... a bunk in one of the two little forward cabins next the stable, shivering and sobbing, a pitiful picture of misery, I suppose, as any one ever saw. I began bawling as soon as the captain commenced putting arnica on my back—partly because it smarted so, and partly because he was so very gentle about it; although all the time he was swearing at John Rucker and wishing ...
— Vandemark's Folly • Herbert Quick
... haue her out, and faineth her selfe to weepe, yet in the end, two women get her out, and lead her towards the church, her face being couered close, because of her dissimulation, that it should not be openly perceiued: for she maketh a great noise, as though she were sobbing and weeping, vntil she come at the Church, and then her face is vncouered. The man commeth after among other of his friends, and they cary with them to the church a great pot of wine or mead: then the priest coupleth them together much after our order, ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, • Richard Hakluyt
... confidence. Her mother had no reproaches, no sarcasms, no outbursts of grief. She addressed herself to the support and the comforting of her daughter, but with so evident a hopelessness and an expectation of bitter things to come that the girl burst out sobbing afresh. ...
— The Mystery of Witch-Face Mountain and Other Stories • Charles Egbert Craddock
... was mumbling some words in a low voice, two or three dirty choristers, in soiled surplices, were charting the prayers for the dead, with an absent and sullen air, round a plain deal coffin, followed only by a sobbing old man and a child, miserably clad. The beadle and the sacristan, very much displeased at being disturbed for so wretched a funeral, had not deigned to put on their liveries, but, yawning with impatience, waited for the end of the ceremony, so useless to the interests of the establishment. At ...
— The Wandering Jew, Complete • Eugene Sue
... not in the highest possible spirits. Elsie was so angry at being robbed of her food and of her money, that she dwelt more upon this grievance than the wretched discomfort they were enduring, until she heard a faint sound of sobbing emerging from the sack in ...
— Little Folks - A Magazine for the Young (Date of issue unknown) • Various
... little disturbed; and it was with a look of something very like consternation that he glanced at Madame d'Argeles, who had reseated herself and was now sobbing violently, with her face hidden on the arm of her chair. "What prevents her?" he thought. "Why this sudden terror now that her brother is dead? Is she unwilling to confess that she is a Chalusse? She must make up her mind to it, however, if she ...
— The Count's Millions - Volume 1 (of 2) • Emile Gaboriau
... Stop it!" cried Tee, and a brilliant burst of light like a thousand sky-rockets seemed to go off in his head. He shrieked like an animal in agony, then fell back sobbing, bathed in perspiration. ...
— Faithfully Yours • Lou Tabakow
... to rhyme with lemon!" gurgled Addie, almost sobbing with mirth as she followed, holding Merle's arm. "The Cuckoo will cause me to break a blood-vessel some day. It hurts me most dreadfully to laugh. I've got a stitch in my side. Oh dear! I wonder whatever she'll go and ...
— For the Sake of the School • Angela Brazil
... evenly poised Isabel, was on the floor at her cousin's knees, burying her face in Flavia's pale-yellow dress and sobbing in ...
— From the Car Behind • Eleanor M. Ingram
... another key. Two children were being as miserable and unhappy as they knew how. As they came close to the leafy screen that protected Rosanna and Helen, the girls were able to see as well as hear the sobbing pair. ...
— The Girl Scouts at Home - or Rosanna's Beautiful Day • Katherine Keene Galt
... wind-harp's wilding tones Sobbing a requiem o'er their bones; "The golden-globed skies shall perish," The harper harps as ...
— Song-waves • Theodore H. Rand
... disgraced man, but richly dressed, and attended by a noble retinue. He was received with unqualified favour and distinction, and as he beheld tears in the benign eyes of Isabella, he threw himself on his knees, and for some time could not utter a word for the violence of his tears and sobbing. Enabled to speak, he defended himself fully; indeed, the imputations of his enemies had been his ...
— Notable Voyagers - From Columbus to Nordenskiold • W.H.G. Kingston and Henry Frith
... She hurried into the work-room. Miss Faithful lay on the floor quite insensible. It was some time before her sister's anxious exertions were rewarded by signs of returning animation. When at last she opened her eyes, she burst into a fit of hysterical sobbing and crying. ...
— Not Pretty, But Precious • John Hay, et al.
... wine," she said to Korableva, wiping her tears with the sleeve of her shirt and sobbing from time ...
— The Awakening - The Resurrection • Leo Nikoleyevich Tolstoy
... perhaps, from a sense of the ignominious character in which he appeared as from more private considerations, still there was nothing to denote either the abjectness of fear or the consciousness of merited disgrace. Once or twice a low sobbing, that proceeded at intervals from one of the barrack windows, caught his ear, and he turned his glance in that direction with a restless anxiety, which he exerted himself in the instant afterwards to repress; but this was the only mark of emotion ...
— Wacousta: A Tale of the Pontiac Conspiracy (Complete) • John Richardson
... forest rang another shot, echoed by a sobbing cry, and the fellow pitched headlong across Barry, dead, his pistol exploding harmlessly, his throat pouring out his life. And Bill Blunt, following up that shot, came upon Natalie Sheldon, fainting ...
— Gold Out of Celebes • Aylward Edward Dingle
... time he sat quietly beside the couch where lay the long and slender form, and he was thinking things over. The room was veiled in a half twilight, partly the effect of closing day and partly that of drawn shades. The deep and sobbing breaths continued until suddenly Burns's hand was laid firmly upon the hand which clutched a handkerchief wet with many tears. He spoke now in a new tone, one she had never before heard from ...
— Red Pepper's Patients - With an Account of Anne Linton's Case in Particular • Grace S. Richmond
... for you and will do nothing but pray for you until you get back." They did not enjoy the entertainment much because they thought all the time of the fact that Mother was praying for them. The evening passed. The next day my grandparents heard sobbing and crying in the daughter's room, and they went in and found her praying for the salvation of God, and her daughter Phoebe said, "I wish you would go to the barn and to the waggon-house for Jehiel and David (the brothers) are under powerful conviction of sin." My grandparent went to ...
— T. De Witt Talmage - As I Knew Him • T. De Witt Talmage
... Mrs. Warren was convulsively sobbing and ruining the complexion she had just made up, before she changed out of her descente de lit: "Why not stop here, dearie? Don't laugh! There's lots that do and never suspect for one minute it ain't like any other hotel; though from all I see and hear, all hotels ...
— Mrs. Warren's Daughter - A Story of the Woman's Movement • Sir Harry Johnston
... She went among them sobbing with ecstasy, and her tears splashed their hands like holy water. It was all outrageously illegal, and sentimental, and harmful to the sanctity of the law. And yet, is it entirely desirable that men should ever grow unmindful of ...
— In a Little Town • Rupert Hughes
... knocking the weathercock off, until they both got into such good spirits with the wind and the height, that I thought they would never come down. Another night, they turned out again, and had a chimney-cowl off. Another night, they cut a sobbing and gulping water-pipe away. Another night, they found out something else. On several occasions, they both, in the coolest manner, simultaneously dropped out of their respective bedroom windows, hand over hand by their counterpanes, to "overhaul" ...
— The Lock and Key Library • Julian Hawthorne, Ed.
... exerted his utmost eloquence to turn the master from his cruel purpose. The wife and children wept and entreated also; but it was all in vain. He replied to their expostulations by ridicule, and proceeded to hurry his victim off to prison. The children clung round Friend Hopper's knees, crying and sobbing, and begging that he would not let those men take away their father. But the fact that the poor fellow had acknowledged himself a slave rendered resistance hopeless. He was taken before a magistrate, ...
— Isaac T. Hopper • L. Maria Child
... of the women behind were sobbing now. A third was lying back, half unconscious. Rochester had risen to his feet. The faces of all of them seemed suddenly to reflect a ...
— The Moving Finger • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... Saty!" But Satan never heard. On he fled, across the crisp fields, leaped the fence and struck the road, lickety-split! for home, while Dinnie dropped sobbing in the snow. ...
— Christmas Eve on Lonesome and Other Stories • John Fox, Jr.
... this passage laid solemnly on his heart, 'To-day, if ye will hear His voice, harden not your hearts.' Then some converted stone-diggers pleaded for a blessing. The answer of four years' prayers came, and the feeble infant wail was heard from one after another amid weeping and sobbing. Surely the angelic host had songs of praise while, in that holy stillness, these young men had a sight of themselves. Oh, pray on that our faith waver not, for we believe we shall ...
— God's Answers - A Record Of Miss Annie Macpherson's Work at the - Home of Industry, Spitalfields, London, and in Canada • Clara M. S. Lowe
... door swung on its heavy hinges, and the wife and mother lay sobbing in the arms of the ...
— The Clansman - An Historical Romance of the Ku Klux Klan • Thomas Dixon
... from her hands, coolly extracted bills to the amount of two hundred and fifty dollars, returned the book, and whipped out his handkerchief. As the Jew entered he beheld a man leaning against his counter holding a wad of greenbacks in his hand and sobbing violently. ...
— Tin-Types Taken in the Streets of New York • Lemuel Ely Quigg
... that she was being cruelly hurt, and thwarted, and disappointed; that she was being curbed and punished by forces too strong for her to cope with. And I pictured her, all reserve gone at last, a tortured child—just sobbing. It seemed to me that I must go to her or die. And indeed I went a little way toward their hotel. Then I thought, perhaps her sobs would move him to a change of heart. Perhaps he will weaken, and let her go. Upon the strength of this thought ...
— We Three • Gouverneur Morris
... to Lalun's door I stumbled over a man at the threshold. He was sobbing hysterically and his arms flapped like the wings of a goose. It was Wali Dad, Agnostic and Unbeliever, shoeless, turbanless, and frothing at the mouth, the flesh on his chest bruised and bleeding from the vehemence with which he had smitten himself. A broken torch-handle lay by his ...
— Soldiers Three • Rudyard Kipling
... but he is drawn roughly down by the grass rope. He tries to tear it asunder, in vain; Angelo had taken care of that. At last, hoarse and weary, Gigi subsided into terrible sobs, that heave his little breast. Sobbing thus, with pouting lips and heavy eyes, he waits ...
— The Italians • Frances Elliot
... are not suited to heavy grades and slippery footing. Bill was sobbing with agony when he conquered the last rise and collapsed upon his face. He feared he was dying, every cough threatened a hemorrhage; but when his breath came more easily and he missed the familiar taste of blood in his mouth he rose and tottered about ...
— Laughing Bill Hyde and Other Stories • Rex Beach
... motioned with his hand several times to silence them, but he could not restrain them! Every moment the noise increased, because children here and there began to cry on the porches, and finally, at the very side of the princess, a youthful, sobbing, female voice ...
— The Knights of the Cross • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... behind his head with heavy blows from the hammer, he wept, his tears stifled him, they impeded his speech; he only managed to say from time to time, "I was a tree-pruner at Faverolles." Then still sobbing, he raised his right hand and lowered it gradually seven times, as though he were touching in succession seven heads of unequal heights, and from this gesture it was divined that the thing which he had done, whatever it was, he had done for the sake of clothing and ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... at the sobbing lady's side, and she leaned upon him gratefully, continuing to produce the ...
— Harlequin and Columbine • Booth Tarkington
... dying; I must go to him. But I have no money, don't put me off. My God—my God—if you—" Her plea poured out in excited, jerky sentences. But the conductor could do nothing. He must obey his instructions, or be discharged. The woman sank back sobbing, in the seat. The conductor turned back to ...
— Quiet Talks on Following the Christ • S. D. Gordon
... The weeping Diantha was sobbing less violently. Persis was sure she was giving close attention. Possibly Thad was impressed by the same view of the case, for he spoke with the aggressive confidence of one who feels that his cause ...
— Other People's Business - The Romantic Career of the Practical Miss Dale • Harriet L. Smith
... things without screaming and sobbing," said Madame Beattie briefly. "Though I sobbed a little at the time. I was a good deal unstrung from other causes. But of course I laid it before Jeff, ...
— The Prisoner • Alice Brown
... Miss Berry was sobbing softly in the arms of her niece. In my absence we had gained another adherent. Billie Blue, the cook's flunky, had ...
— The Pirate of Panama - A Tale of the Fight for Buried Treasure • William MacLeod Raine
... close to find my wound; He searched with sobbing breath; But not the smallest gateway found ...
— Our Boys - Entertaining Stories by Popular Authors • Various
... yet there are moments in his life of almost superhuman energy when the whole structure of his mind seems to give way, and the spirit appears like a child lost in a dark wood and almost paralysed with fear. Not seldom he was in his father's arms sobbing over the sufferings of humanity and the hardness of the world's heart, mingling his tears with his father's. Often in these late days he is in sore need of Mrs. Bramwell Booth's level-headed good sense to restore his exhausted emotions. And occasionally, ...
— Painted Windows - Studies in Religious Personality • Harold Begbie
... shine and shadow run Across the leaves. A bramble whips his face, The tears spring fast, and through the rainbow mist He sees a world that wavers like the flame Of a blown candle. Tears of pain and shame, And lips that once had laughed and sung and kissed Trembling in the passion of his sobbing breath! The world a candle shuddering to its death, And life a darkness, blind and utterly void Of any love or goodness: all deceit, This friendship and this God: all shams destroyed, And truth seen now. Earth ...
— The Defeat of Youth and Other Poems • Aldous Huxley
... incorrigible for two years, and my nerves and brain were hardened to suffering. It is a frightful thing to see a strong man broken. About me, at the one time, were forty strong men being broken. Ever the cry for water went up, and the place became lunatic with the crying, sobbing, babbling and raving of men ...
— The Jacket (The Star-Rover) • Jack London
... to spare. The whole affair in Mount Street had taken less than ten minutes. But the effect upon Lizzie was very severe. For a while she could not speak, and at last she burst out into hysteric tears,—not a sham fit,—but a true convulsive agony of sobbing. All the world of Mount Street, including her own servants, had heard the accusation against her. During the whole morning she had been wishing that she had never seen the diamonds; but now it was almost impossible that she should part with them. And yet they were like a load upon ...
— The Eustace Diamonds • Anthony Trollope
... paused, exhausted and broken, the sound went up of prayers and psalms; some would groan over their sins, imploring Our Lady's mercy, beating their breast and sobbing in the arms of priests who bade ...
— The Cathedral • Joris-Karl Huysmans
... going, do you hear? She leaves us, and you will come back to me, won't you? Great God, woman," he gasped out, "do you know what you have made me suffer—what you have done to this good man? Pardon, father, pardon!"—and he sank down by his father's side, sobbing with passionate emotion. The old man even now did not seem to comprehend the scene. When he heard that woman's voice in anger, a sort of stupor came ...
— The Newcomes • William Makepeace Thackeray
... their keeper. I have seen the bravest men of the army cry like children at a cut of the cane; I have seen a little ensign of fifteen call out a man of fifty from the ranks, a man who had been in a hundred battles, and he has stood presenting arms, and sobbing and howling like a baby, while the young wretch lashed him over the arms and thighs with the stick. In a day of action this man would dare anything. A button might be awry THEN and nobody touched him; but when they had made the brute ...
— Barry Lyndon • William Makepeace Thackeray
... me rose. Slowly and majestically the sail ascended, tapering upward, silvered by the moon,—the great white pinion which should bear us we knew not whither. I stopped short in my tracks, Mistress Percy drew a sobbing breath, and the minister gasped with admiration. We all three stared as though the white cloth had veritably been a monster wing endowed ...
— To Have and To Hold • Mary Johnston
... and made musical by innumerable birds. But all colour was lost in the soft and odorous darkness of the late September night, and all sounds were hushed in the deep charm of its silence, save the plashing of the water, like a voice half sobbing and half laughing under the shadows. High above the trees a dim glow of light shone through the curtained arches of the upper chamber, where the master of the house was holding ...
— The Story of the Other Wise Man • Henry Van Dyke
... and quiet, with white, vacant face and lifeless arms that hung down on either side. Water was oozing out of the clothes and dripping from the unbound hair; it had gathered already into little pools on the floor. In the darkest corner of the room a crouched-up form sat sobbing hopelessly, and by the figure on the table Aunt Janet stood, her face in shadow, since she was above the shade of the lamp, but her hands singularly white and gentle-looking as they moved about drying the dead girl's face, pushing the wet, clogged ...
— To Love • Margaret Peterson
... again and rushing at my unseen tormentors. I heard the barking of the dogs far away, and I ran in the direction of the sound, sobbing with rage. I pulled my pistols from my pockets and spun round, firing in every direction through that wall of grey, yielding mist that gave me place but never gave ...
— Jacqueline of Golden River • H. M. Egbert
... Em, sobbing bitterly, would have followed him; but the Boer-woman prevented her by a flood of speech which convulsed the Hottentot, ...
— The Story of an African Farm • (AKA Ralph Iron) Olive Schreiner
... Sobbing, frightened almost witless, he had been floundering forward for over an hour, and had made circle after circle without knowing, when, by chance, he set foot ...
— The Flaming Jewel • Robert W. Chambers
... aghast. He stared at Haines and knew that he spoke the truth. Then his white head sank pathetically. Tears welled into the eyes of the planter, and this sturdy old fighting man dropped weakly into a chair, sobbing convulsively, broken in spirit and ...
— A Gentleman from Mississippi • Thomas A. Wise
... sobbed poor Clara; 'indeed, I could not help it. Oh, dear!' she continued, as Pedro vanished from her sight, 'now he's angry. What have I done?' She buried her face in her hands, entered the arbor, threw herself on the settee, and began sobbing with convulsive grief. Here was a situation for an unsophisticated youth like myself. Egad! my heart bounced about in my breast like a shot adrift in the cook's biggest copper. I approached the lady softly, and, grown wiser by experience, knelt before I took her hand. She started, ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 3. March 1848 • Various
... David bach! on my life and soul you do, dear David!" she replied sobbing. "'Tis a hateful hall—a horrid hall! If it were only I, your poor lost Winifred, that was to suffer, oh! how much sooner would I be carried dead into a vault, than alive, and dressed in all the finest silks of India, into that ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol 58, No. 357, July 1845 • Various
... occasion, one of the young ladies in going up stairs to the drawing-room, unfortunately met a boy of fourteen coming down, and her feelings were so violently agitated, that she stopped panting and sobbing, nor would pass on till the boy had swung himself up on the upper banisters, to leave the ...
— Domestic Manners of the Americans • Fanny Trollope
... assurances of faith in him, and of continued friendship, was such that the little man's overstrained nerves suddenly gave way. He tried to speak, failed to utter a sound, and sank down sobbing like a child. ...
— At War with Pontiac - The Totem of the Bear • Kirk Munroe and J. Finnemore
... Her sight was drowned by tears. She got up at once. She felt for her purse, found it, opened it, felt for money, found some coins, laid them down on the table, and began to walk. She was driven by fear, the fear of falling down in the sun in the sight of all men, and crying, sobbing, with her face against the ground. She heard a shout. Some one gave her a violent push, thrusting her forward. She stumbled, recovered herself. A passer-by had saved her from a tram. She did not know it. She did not look at him or thank him. ...
— A Spirit in Prison • Robert Hichens
... Tree, and the oak forest, and the flowery plain, and the river, as if she was trying to print these scenes on her memory so that they would abide there always and not fade, for she knew she would not see them any more in this life; then she turned, and went from us, sobbing bitterly. It was her birthday and mine. ...
— Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc - Volume 1 (of 2) • Mark Twain
... beside Christine. For the moment, at least, everything else in the world was forgotten between them; she was just a motherless, broken girl sobbing her heart out—just the girl he had once loved with all a boy's first ardour. He put his arms round her and drew her head down, so that it rested on his shoulder, and her face ...
— The Second Honeymoon • Ruby M. Ayres
... was sobbing convulsively, and what I have told continuously here was said by me in a far more fragmentary way between her bursts of grief. She ceased now, and looked up, with some ...
— Miriam Monfort - A Novel • Catherine A. Warfield
... She uttered a little sobbing laugh and tenderly kissed his nose. "You're a dear, sympathetic boy! Who taught you to be, I wonder? Not your master, I'm sure! He's nothing but ...
— The Odds - And Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell
... lips closed disdainfully, in his determination to remain silent, he seemed to say to the old lady, "Night has come—it is time for you to go home." And all the while they could hear Madame Chebe sobbing in the back room, as she went to ...
— Fromont and Risler, Complete • Alphonse Daudet
... through Laura. He was looking into her eyes as he had looked in those old days, when no birds of all those that sang in the groves where they walked sang a note of warning. He was wounded. He had been punished. Her strength forsook her with her rage, and she sank upon a chair, sobbing, ...
— The Gilded Age, Part 5. • Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) and Charles Dudley Warner
... poor life was past' (Here my Lady's tears dropped fast): 'I might have been with her, But she had no comforter. She might have told me much Which now I shall never know, Never never shall know.' She sat by me sobbing so, And seemed so woe-begone, 260 That I laid one hand upon Hers with a timid touch, Scarce thinking what I did, Not knowing what to say: That moment her face was hid In the pillow close by mine, Her arm was flung over me, She hugged me, sobbing so As if her ...
— Goblin Market, The Prince's Progress, and Other Poems • Christina Rossetti
... Rose came to her senses a moment later, and, trembling and sobbing uncontrolledly, stumbled through the darkness to the woodpile, and sat down on it. For a time she was powerless to move, but when, at length, she did re-enter the cabin, with an armful of wood, although her face was drawn and white, her ...
— 'Smiles' - A Rose of the Cumberlands • Eliot H. Robinson
... Bragelonne she spoke—"enfin il a fait quelquechose: c'est, ma foi! bien heureux." I am reminded of it, as I say; and the next moment, when Athos dies of his death, and my dear d'Artagnan bursts into his storm of sobbing, I can ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume 9 • Robert Louis Stevenson
... her notice. At the end of that time he was obliged to go up to London on sudden business. It made a great lull in the house; and Eleanor began to sit in her garden parlour again and dream. While dreaming one day, she heard the voice of her little sister sobbing at the door-step. She had not observed before that ...
— The Old Helmet, Volume I • Susan Warner
... lay there in the grass, wet-cheeked but no longer sobbing, listening to the sound and wondering that he had been able to hear it on the beach of Ringmanu. Some freak of air pressures and air currents, he reflected, had made it possible for the sound to carry so far. Such conditions might ...
— The Red One • Jack London
... I wore him clean out, and he lay down, broken-winded, broken-hearted, hungry, and thirsty. When I found he wouldn't budge, I hamstrung him, and spent the better part of the day wading into him with the hand-axe, he a-sniffing and sobbing till I worked in far enough to shut him off. Thirty feet long he was, and twenty high, and a man could sling a hammock between his tusks and sleep comfortably. Barring the fact that I had run most of the juices out of him, ...
— The Faith of Men • Jack London
... his hands and covered his eyes as if to shut out some appalling vision, and for a moment or two nothing was heard but the low sobbing of ...
— Cleek: the Man of the Forty Faces • Thomas W. Hanshew
... exclaimed taking hold of my hand in her own, and kissing me affectionately. 'I have come to take my farewell of you, my dear son, as I am ready to depart on a long journey and will not again see you on earth. Around my poor body your father, brother, sisters, and other relatives are at this very moment sobbing in tears, while in spirit I am here present with you. My time on earth is limited to seconds. My words are therefore few. My injunctions are these,—I hope you will comply with them. Repent of your wickedness and folly. Abstain from intoxicating ...
— The Black-Sealed Letter - Or, The Misfortunes of a Canadian Cockney. • Andrew Learmont Spedon
... Lonely I sat, and thought-afflicted. The sun sank low, and sinking he shed Rose and vermilion upon the waters, And the white foaming waves, Urged on by the tide, Foamed and murmured yet nearer and nearer— A curious jumble of whispering and wailing, A soft rippling laughter and sobbing and sighing, And in between all a low lullaby singing. Methought I heard ancient forgotten legends, The world-old sweet stories, Which once, as a boy, I heard from my playmates, When, of a summer's evening, We crouched down to tell stories On the stones of the doorstep, With small listening hearts, ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VI. • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... and cuffing of the deputy sheriffs. The Prophet is stripped and scourged at the pillar until he drops from exhaustion. He is dragged anew before Pilate and examined, but his only word is, "Thou hast said." The scene lasts nearly an hour. The theatre was full of sobbing women and children. At every fresh brutality I could hear the weeping spectators say, "Pobre Jesus!" "How wicked they are!" The bulk of the audience was of people who do not often go to theatres. They looked upon the revolting scene as a real and living fact. One hard-featured ...
— Castilian Days • John Hay
... the sky-encountering crests Of Sipylus, where alway floats a mist Hated of shepherds, echo back the cry. Weird marvel seems that Rock of Niobe To men that pass with feet fear-goaded: there They see the likeness of a woman bowed, In depths of anguish sobbing, and her tears Drop, as she mourns grief-stricken, endlessly. Yea, thou wouldst say that verily so it was, Viewing it from afar; but when hard by Thou standest, all the illusion vanishes; And lo, a steep-browed ...
— The Fall of Troy • Smyrnaeus Quintus
... like footsteps, sobbing, whispering, grim laughter, and shrieks were often heard about the house. On one occasion my eldest sister and a girl cousin drove over to see the family and stayed the night. They and my two younger sisters were all crowded into a huge, old-fashioned bed, and carefully drew and tucked ...
— True Irish Ghost Stories • St John D Seymour
... the square they saw Fanfar, but Fanfar did not notice these two shadows. He entered the inn and Caillette threw herself into his arms, sobbing ...
— The Son of Monte Cristo • Jules Lermina
... sobbing aloud, the unhappy creature turned away; while Rose Maylie, overpowered by this extraordinary interview, which had more the semblance of a rapid dream than an actual occurrence, sank into a chair, and endeavoured to collect her ...
— Oliver Twist • Charles Dickens
... shady depth Expel him, circling through his ev'ry shift. He sweeps the forest oft, and sobbing sees The glades mild op'ning to the golden day, Where in kind contest with his butting friends He wont to ...
— Lectures on the English Poets - Delivered at the Surrey Institution • William Hazlitt
... stormed and raged and threw caution to the winds as only tempestuous Split could, then was Sissy's attitude a marvel of disapproving rectitude. She had a great deal of dignity, had Sissy, and the picture of holiness that she presented as, with her books on her arm, she walked past the desk where the sobbing sinner's head lay with tumbled curls and bloated face, came as near as anything could to quench the passion of tears in which Split's tempers culminated. On such occasions the infuriated Split was wont, for just ...
— The Madigans • Miriam Michelson
... nearly the whole of it, in prayer and exhortation. I could plainly hear my dear girl sobbing and crying. Towards morning I heard a shout of joy, and immediately afterwards Elinor's voice, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 108, October, 1866 • Various
... himself, but he did not dare turn his head, for he could hear low, suppressed sobbing behind him. Martha, the faithful companion of his busy life, sat at the table with her face buried in her hands, the tears rolling uninterruptedly down her cheeks, while her two daughters were trying their best ...
— Banzai! • Ferdinand Heinrich Grautoff
... thought the angry girl. 'Gentian might think of her poor lonely sister. Delphinium ought by rights to be sobbing instead of laughing. We were always such friends; but there, if this goes on, Scotland won't see much more of me. I used to be all for the bonnie Highlands, but I 'm not that any more. I 'll go to cold London ...
— Hollyhock - A Spirit of Mischief • L. T. Meade |
