"Spell" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... on his back, his eyes directed stiffly upward. He could not move them, but out of the corners he vaguely sensed the other figures around him. Helpless, every one! And who knew if they would ever come out of the spell! Victory ...
— Astounding Stories, February, 1931 • Various
... spoken with a growl he was not at all cross. That was just his way. He was really most jolly, though he had a very wise look on his plush face, as though always thinking of hard examples to solve and hard words to spell. But though he was wise, and growled when he talked, the Plush Bear was ...
— The Story of a Plush Bear • Laura Lee Hope
... him into the land of Egypt and took refuge in a lake there, called Lake Karun, whither he pursued them, but could not prevail over them, by reason of their stealing into that lake, which was guarded by a spell.' "—And Shahrazad perceived the dawn of day and ceased ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 6 • Richard F. Burton
... also from eight to 20 subordinate words taken from textbook or composition exercises.... Frequent supplementary dictation, word-building and phonic exercises should be given. Spell much orally.... Teach a little daily, test thoroughly, drill intensively, and follow ...
— What the Schools Teach and Might Teach • John Franklin Bobbitt
... some of the men pushed on with the freshest of the animals, leaving Stapylton and the remainder of the party to spell for a while, and bring the knocked-up beasts ...
— The History of Australian Exploration from 1788 to 1888 • Ernest Favenc
... of accepted fame. One is too eccentric, obscure, and subtle, another too local and equal, a third too sketchy, this one too unreal, that one far too real, too obvious, too prosaic, to win and to hold the great public by their spell. Critics praise them, friends utter rhapsodies, good judges enjoy them—but their fame is partial, local, sectional, compared to the fame ...
— Studies in Early Victorian Literature • Frederic Harrison
... in his mistress's disfavour ever since the other night that he come in thither fuddled, when we were there. But I did make them friends by my buffoonery, and bringing up a way of spelling their names, and making Theophila spell Lamton, which The. would have to be the name of Mr. Eden's mistress, and mighty merry we were till late, and then I by coach home, and so to bed, my wife being ill of those, but well enough pleased with ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys
... know, I hated it most awfully. I wanted to be let alone and to work out my own theory of things. If you'd said a word—if you'd tried to influence me—the spell would have been broken. But just because the actual you kept apart and didn't meddle or pry, the other, the you in my heart, seemed to get a tighter hold on me. I don't know how to tell you,—it's all mixed up in my head—but old things you'd said and done kept coming back to me, crowding between ...
— Sanctuary • Edith Wharton
... Magician, "when I have brought you here only for your own advantage. Under this stone there is hidden a treasure which will make you richer than the richest monarch in the world. You alone may touch it. If I assist you in any way the spell will be broken, but if you obey me faithfully, we shall both be rich for the rest of our lives. Come, take hold of the brass ring and lift ...
— Favorite Fairy Tales • Logan Marshall
... the most ignorant and most stupid. I do not pretend to be a scholar, a divine, a philosopher, a saint. I am a very weak, foolish, insufficient personage; sitting on the lowest form in Thy great school- house, which is the whole world; and trying to spell out the mere letters of Thy alphabet, in hope that hereafter I may be able to make out whole words, and whole sentences, of Thy commandments, and having learnt them, do them. For if Thou wilt but teach me Thy statutes, O Lord, ...
— Westminster Sermons - with a Preface • Charles Kingsley
... sick-bed, shrank to a desolating insufficiency. Surely she was worthy—had, anyway, once been worthy—of better things than that? The lavender dress, notwithstanding its still radiantly uncrumpled condition, came near losing its spell. No longer did she trust in it as in shining armour. Her humour soured. She instinctively inclined to revenge herself upon the nearest sentient object available—namely to stick ...
— Deadham Hard • Lucas Malet
... strings which were securely bound to a flat plate on the outside. This plate was formerly of shell, or later of metal. To this hair string was ascribed certain magic powers, especially in love affairs, and the possession of it was a potent spell. ...
— Contribution to Passamaquoddy Folk-Lore • J. Walter Fewkes
... with the President, but for the major reason that "independent of that, as myself an affectionate child of our Alma Mater, I would not be present to witness her disgrace in conferring her highest literary honors upon a barbarian who could not write a sentence of grammar and hardly could spell his own name." "A Doctorate of Laws," he said, "for which an apology was necessary, was a cheap honor and ... a sycophantic compliment." After the deed (p. 242) was done, he used to amuse himself by speaking of "Doctor Andrew Jackson." ...
— John Quincy Adams - American Statesmen Series • John. T. Morse
... The spell lasted six months, but it broke at last. Thais suddenly felt that her heart was empty and lonely. Lollius no longer seemed the same to ...
— Thais • Anatole France
... held its rule, Where sickness breathed its spell of pain; By famed Bethesda's mystic pool; And by the darkened gate of Nain. He soothed the mourner's troubled breast, He raised the contrite, sinner's head, And on the loved ones' lowly rest, The light of better life ...
— Hymns for Christian Devotion - Especially Adapted to the Universalist Denomination • J.G. Adams
... of his face. The matted hair fell once more over his drooping brow and repulsive countenance, from which the light faded the moment he ceased to speak. Again the silence was profound. The Indians sat spell-bound, charmed by the mournful music of the prophet's voice and awed by the dread vision he had revealed. All the superstition within them was aroused. When Tohomish took his seat, every Indian was ...
— The Bridge of the Gods - A Romance of Indian Oregon. 19th Edition. • Frederic Homer Balch
... he. 'Only I've been practisin' a considerable spell. So long. Come in again some time when it's dark and the respectable element ...
— The Depot Master • Joseph C. Lincoln
... was never any stated time for meals in the Harrison establishment. Mr. Harrison "got a bite" when he felt hungry, and if John Henry were around at the time, he came in for a share, but if he were not, he had to wait until Mr. Harrison's next hungry spell. John Henry mournfully averred that he would have starved to death if it wasn't that he got home on Sundays and got a good filling up, and that his mother always gave him a basket of "grub" to take back with him on ...
— Anne Of Avonlea • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... oppressed him. He used to say of John Foster, that this deep and intense, but sometimes narrow and grim thinker, had, in his study of the disease of the race, been, as it were, fascinated by its awful spell, so as almost to forget the remedy. This was not the case with himself. As you know, no man held more firmly to the objective reality of his religion—that it was founded upon fact. It was not the pole-star he lost sight of, or the compass he mistrusted; it was the seaworthiness ...
— Spare Hours • John Brown
... from thy slumbers. The rosy cheeked dawn is beginning to break, The dream-spell no longer thy spirit encumbers. Gone is its power, ...
— Representative Plays by American Dramatists: 1856-1911: Rip van - Winkle • Charles Burke
... understanding unless you are good enough to be perfectly calm. I repeat, my cousin Captain Beauchamp is more or less at variance with his family, owing to these doctrines of yours, and your extraordinary Michael-Scott-the-wizard kind of spell you seem to have cast upon his common sense as a man of the world. You have him, as you say. I do not dispute it. I have no, doubt you have him fast. But here is a case demanding a certain respect for decency. Pray, if I may ask you, be still, ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... spoken during all this time. Both felt the magic of the place so strong upon them that speech seemed profanation. The flight of the little birds, however, loosened the spell. Hildegarde spoke, but softly, almost under her breath. "Captain! Do you see the lizard? Look at him, on the log there! The greenness of him! soul ...
— Hildegarde's Neighbors • Laura E. Richards
... spirit to fight fiercely in defence of his own property, but has lost all desire to despoil and wrong his neighbours. It was for this reason that Numa encouraged agriculture among the Romans, as a spell to charm away war, and loved the art more because of its influence on men's minds than because of the wealth which it produced. He divided the whole country into districts, which he called pagi, and appointed a head man for ...
— Plutarch's Lives, Volume I (of 4) • Plutarch
... him at last in a low, tense whisper, and, as if the sound broke some spell that had been holding both the man and woman motionless, Elisabeth stepped across the ...
— The Hermit of Far End • Margaret Pedler
... this time, as if for a breathing spell. Then the solitary crow came skimming down the field again without warning. The flock surrounded him on the moment, with the evident intention of hindering his flight as much as possible. They flapped their wings in his face; they ...
— Ways of Wood Folk • William J. Long
... by a great deal. I could see that the general condition of her health was perfect, a great charm in itself to me; but she had been bearing acute pain for over twenty-eight hours, and she was becoming exhausted. A shudder ran through me at the thought of that long spell ...
— The Doctor's Dilemma • Hesba Stretton
... religious calm, Mrs. Grantham presented an image of resignation, so perfect, so superhuman, that the disposition to a violent ebullition of grief, which at first manifested itself in the youths, gave place to a certain mysterious awe, that chained them almost spell-bound at the foot of her bed. A strict observer of the ordinances of her religion, she had had every preparation made for her reception of the sacrament, the administering of which was only deferred until the arrival of her children. This duty being now performed, with the imposing ...
— The Canadian Brothers - or The Prophecy Fulfilled • John Richardson
... the news they tell? A battle won: our eyes are dim, And sad forbodings press the heart Anxious, awaiting news from him. Hour drags on hour: fond heart, be still, Shall evil tidings break the spell? A word at last!—they found him dead; He fought in the advance, ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. III, No IV, April 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... heaven in a celestial chariot, revelling in my pride, I did not think of anything else, I used to exact tribute from Brahmarshis, Devas, Yakshas, Gandharvas, Rakshasas, Pannagas and all other dwellers of the three worlds. O lord of earth, such was the spell of my eyes, that on whatever creature, I fixed them, I instantly destroyed his power. Thousands of Brahmarshis used to draw my chariot. The delinquency, O king, was the cause of my fall from my ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 1 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... stamp out my passional nature, and was beginning to succeed when a strange thing happened to me last autumn. One night, as I lay in bed, I felt an influence so powerful that a man seemed present with me. I crimsoned with shame and wonder. I remember that I lay upon my back, and marveled when the spell had passed. The influence, I was assured, came from a priest whom I believed in and admired above everyone in the world. I had never dreamed of love in connection with him, because I always thought ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 1 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... he was not over fond of study when he first began to attend school; but when his mamma explained to him that in order to become a useful member of society, as his father was, he must learn to read, write and spell, which were the first steps toward acquiring a good education, he made it a duty to learn every lesson thoroughly, so that by the time he was sixteen years old he was ...
— Bertie and the Gardeners - or, The Way to be Happy • Madeline Leslie
... black head scornfully. "Oh, dear, no," she answered. "It is only that I have to live with her now, while I am under the enchantment. Some day, when the wicked spell is broken, I shall go away, perhaps to a wonderful castle. My name is Titania. I think it means that I am ...
— Madge Morton's Victory • Amy D.V. Chalmers
... better go down to D—— and take possession of it. This letter, touching upon a long train of associations and recollections, awoke an intense longing in me to revisit the home of my childhood, and meet those phantom shapes that had woven that spell in those dreaming years, which I sometimes thought I felt even now. So I obtained a short leave of absence, and started the next morning in the coach ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 30, April, 1860 • Various
... between her and Richard have been already recounted. Having closed the casement and drawn the curtain before it, Mother Demdike traced a circle on the floor, muttered a spell, and then, waving her staff over Alizon, restored her power of ...
— The Lancashire Witches - A Romance of Pendle Forest • William Harrison Ainsworth
... human, more passionate, and more sympathetic, than the Medea of Mr. Morris. I could almost wish that he had closely followed that classical original, the first true love story in literature. In the same way I prefer Apollonius's spell for soothing the dragon, as much terser and more somniferous than the spell put by Mr. Morris into the lips of Medea. Scholars will find it pleasant to compare these passages of the Alexandrine and of the London poets. As a brick out of the vast palace of "Jason" we may select the song ...
— Adventures among Books • Andrew Lang
... struck, my Sultana," said Milo anxiously, and Dolores shook off the spell and approached the great bed. Red Jabez closed his eyes as she leaned over him, and his lips now alone gave evidence of life. The girl, reared among the wildest of desolate isolation, knowing no softening ties of family, ...
— The Pirate Woman • Aylward Edward Dingle
... up the liveliness of a correspondence. But now it hurts one's dignity to be talking of English and French armies, at the first period of our history in which the tables are turned. After having learnt to spell out of the reigns of Edward the Third and Harry the Fifth, and begun lisping with Agincourt and Cressy, one uses one's self but awkwardly to the sounds of Tournay and Fontenoy. I don't like foreseeing the time so near, when all the young orators in Parliament will be ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 1 • Horace Walpole
... droned into the stillness, and at the west there was oath and whispered comment where the Bois-Brules camped together. Not wholly under the spell of mystery were these half-breeds, but restless and suspicious under the conflicting promptings of their mixed blood. Slower than the Indians were they to obey the mandate of silence and peace that the Spirits of Dreams might descend upon the forest, but at last they were quiet, ...
— The Maid of the Whispering Hills • Vingie E. Roe
... I'm staying here for a spell now:—kind of seeing to things. My name isn't Polly. It's Mrs. Mary Grundy, and somehow folks have got to nicknaming me Polly, but it'll look more mannerly in you to call me Mrs. Grundy; but what am I thinking of? The folks must have their ...
— The English Orphans • Mary Jane Holmes
... said a fourth, who was lifting up a crowbar to discharge upon his head. "Hold!" said a tall swarthy youth, who had already warded off several blows from him, "hold, will you? don't you see, if you kill him he can't undo the spell. Make him first reverse it all; make him take the curse off us. Bring him along; take him to Astarte, Hercules, or old Saturn. We'll broil him on a gridiron till he turns all these canes into vines, and makes olive berries of the pebbles, and turns the ...
— Callista • John Henry Cardinal Newman
... I ain't feeling as chipper as usual." "Chipper" was bad enough, but "ain't" was unendurable! They rebuked him for that and he put in another irrelevant plea: "I had a kind of sick spell at the store. I ...
— In a Little Town • Rupert Hughes
... the chin, was clasped to the steel busk in my stays. In this constrained state I, and most of the younger girls, had to prepare our lessons. The chief thing I had to do was to learn by heart a page of Johnson's dictionary, not only to spell the words, give their parts of speech and meaning, but as an exercise of memory to remember their order of succession. Besides I had to learn the first principles of writing, and the rudiments of French and English grammar. The method of teaching was extremely tedious and ...
— Personal Recollections, from Early Life to Old Age, of Mary Somerville • Mary Somerville
... day's walk have graduated from a high-school? How many of the great ladies who rule New York society possess more than a common school education, outside of the tricks they've learned after they put on long frocks? Not many, let me tell you, Simmy. Four-fifths of them can't spell Connecticut, and they don't know how many e's there are in 'separate.' I graduated from a high school in Philadelphia, and my mother did the same thing before me. I also played on the basket-ball team, if that means anything to you. My ...
— From the Housetops • George Barr McCutcheon
... though these limbs just crawl around That once would scarcely touch the ground, And alcohol upsets my liver, Still, in a punt or lithe canoe I can revive my vernal heyday, Pretend the sky's ethereal blue, The golden kingcups' cheery hue, Spell my, ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 159, July 28th, 1920 • Various
... fails to descend on years that are far removed from it, if the mind has partaken in innocent mirth while it was its season and its duty to enjoy it. Parties of young and old passed the canonico and his attendant with mute respect, bowing and bare-headed; for that ebony staff threw its spell over the tongue, which the frank and hearty salutation of the bearer was inadequate to break. Simplizio, once or twice, attempted to call back an intimate of the same age with himself; but the utmost he could obtain was a riveritissimo! and a genuflexion to the rider. It is reported ...
— Imaginary Conversations and Poems - A Selection • Walter Savage Landor
... first entering it, I was placed at the bottom of the lowest class; but even that was a position beyond my previous attainments. Unable to spell the words which formed the lesson, I used, when they came down to me from the boy above, to say just what he did, not being far enough advanced to insinuate a blunder of my own. But in the course of ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 89, March, 1865 • Various
... yet, von Ruhle," he remarked. "Nevertheless it is advisable to fix our bearings while twilight lasts. A light might spell disaster." ...
— The Submarine Hunters - A Story of the Naval Patrol Work in the Great War • Percy F. Westerman
... Lord Newhaven arrived. I found him on the lawn when I strolled up, after a spell of letter-writing, about four o'clock. Lawn-tennis was the order of the day, and we ...
— Comedies of Courtship • Anthony Hope
... unnatural silence until they had gone, but he went on waiting for some moments longer as though he would give anyone else an opportunity of leaving the church if they desired to do so. No one stirred. The look which he turned upon them from the pulpit seemed like a spell which held them to their seats. Then his lips opened, and they heard his voice, tinged with ...
— The Missionary • George Griffith
... relieved from the pressure of want, her thoughts soar into a world which is as unknown to her as heaven is to us, and in regard to which her longings are apt to be infinitely stronger than are ours for heaven. Her education has been much better than that of the man. She can read, whereas he can only spell words from a book. She can write a letter after her fashion, whereas he can barely spell words out on a paper. Her tongue is more glib, and her intellect sharper. But her ignorance as to the reality of things is much more gross than his. By such contact as he has with men in markets, ...
— The Way We Live Now • Anthony Trollope
... face and her voice, when she sang, were luring to the lovers of beauty. When she sang she often expressed for them the under-thoughts and under-feelings of secretly romantic, secretly wistful men and women, and drew them to her as if by a spell. But her talk and manner in conversation were so unlike her singing, so little accorded with the look that often came into her eyes while she sang, that she was a perpetual puzzle to such elderly men as Sir Donald Ulford, to such young ...
— The Woman With The Fan • Robert Hichens
... to live with Mr. and Mrs. Auld, she very kindly commenced to teach me the A, B, C. After I had learned this, she assisted me in learning to spell words of three or four letters. Just at this point of my progress, Mr. Auld found out what was going on, and at once forbade Mrs. Auld to instruct me further, telling her, among other things, that it was unlawful, as well as unsafe, to teach a slave to read. To use his own words, ...
— The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass - An American Slave • Frederick Douglass
... them it is a mere patriotic effort not to be made if it involved any self-denial. Swadeshi, as defined here, is a religious discipline to be undergone in utter disregard of the physical discomfort it may cause to individuals. Under its spell the deprivation of a pin or a needle, because these are not manufactured in India, need cause no terror. A Swadeshist will learn to do without hundreds of things which today he considers necessary. Moreover, those who dismiss Swadeshi from their minds by ...
— Third class in Indian railways • Mahatma Gandhi
... the unlucky idea of slipping the watch into his boot; but before it had reached its destination, the official slapped his hand against the other's hip, and said jeeringly: "Something seems to trouble you here." To everybody's amazement, Wilfred was seized with a fainting spell and dropped upon a bench pale as death. Without further ceremony, Madoc, the Chief of Police, pulled up his trousers' leg and drew out the watch with a burst of evil laughter. He had no sooner ...
— The Dean's Watch - 1897 • Erckmann-Chatrian
... If it were not that I have it and cannot help it, and am bound to spend it, I would not trouble myself about any scheme to which it was necessary. I sometimes feel as if it was a devil, restrained a little by being spell-bound in mental discs. I know the feeling is wrong and faithless; for money is God's as certainly as the earth in which the crops grow, though he does not care so ...
— Weighed and Wanting • George MacDonald
... seldom degenerating into mawkishness. But at his best how rich and genial is the humour, how tender often the pathos. And when all deductions are made, he had the laughter and tears of the English-speaking world at command for a full generation while he lived, and that his spell still works is proved by a ...
— A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature • John W. Cousin
... the heathen Chinee," he whispered. So we felt our way to the door and tapped three times, very softly, on the centre panel. To the Oriental mind those taps spell bribery, ...
— Bunch Grass - A Chronicle of Life on a Cattle Ranch • Horace Annesley Vachell
... Lilith slept, lest I might mar Her dreams, from our green couch I rose, and far Passed silent. Know I not the spell that draws My feet unwilling, Edenward. Its laws I may not brave to rend my foe. Nor there The Angel pass, unseen. The night so fair, As prone among the glistening leaves I lay, On Adam shone. Not sad, as on a day Erstwhile he seemed. ...
— Lilith - The Legend of the First Woman • Ada Langworthy Collier
... press that it leads and moulds public opinion, and undoubtedly journalism (like the theatre) is at least as much the cause as the effect of the depravity of public taste. Enterprising stage-managers have before now proved that Shakespeare does not spell ruin, and there are admirable journals in the United States which have shown themselves to be valuable properties without undue pandering to the frivolous or vicious side of ...
— The Land of Contrasts - A Briton's View of His American Kin • James Fullarton Muirhead
... you to be so frank about what you think came over us. I can discuss nothing, admit nothing; but you always did reason more clearly than I. Still, whatever spell it was that menaced us I know very well could not have threatened you seriously; I know it because you reason about it so logically. So it could have been nothing serious. Love alone is serious; and it sometimes comes slowly, sometimes ...
— The Younger Set • Robert W. Chambers
... win, to fascinate, to melt, And by its spell of undefined control Magnetic draw the secrets ...
— Woman in the Ninteenth Century - and Kindred Papers Relating to the Sphere, Condition - and Duties, of Woman. • Margaret Fuller Ossoli
... the wind caught him up and buoyed him from stride to stride, and the cowpunchers with hungry, burning eyes watched without a word until the grey and the chestnut blurred on the horizon and dipped out of view together. The spell was broken in the same instant by a stream of profanity floating up from the rear. It was Lew Hervey approaching ...
— Alcatraz • Max Brand
... the command of Sir Arthur Wellesley, subsequently duke of Wellington, landed in Portugal and proceeded to cooperate with Portuguese and Spanish against the French. It was the beginning of the so-called Peninsular War, which, with little interruption, was to last until 1813 and to spell the first ...
— A Political and Social History of Modern Europe V.1. • Carlton J. H. Hayes
... that Florence had left her alone—with her playing with adultery. I suppose it was; though she was such a child that one has the impression that she would hardly have known how to spell such a word. No, it was just submissiveness—to the importunities, to the tempestuous forces that pushed that miserable fellow on to ruin. And I do not suppose that Florence really made much difference. If it had not been for her that Ashburnham left his allegiance for Mrs Maidan, then it would ...
— The Good Soldier • Ford Madox Ford
... for the old string to part its last fibre, that held the mirror tilting from the wall,—or was it the crash of a completed spell? ...
— Real Folks • Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney
... ma'am, that little thing was that contented by the end of the week that I could leave the windows open an' nary a wing's stroke away would it go? That was in December, 'fore it got to be known that I kep' a bird in my room. That mild spell we had 'fore Christmas it did fly away one morning, but at sundown there it was back again; an' when it came on to snow that night I felt same's I used to 'tween voyages, when I could hear how the ocean'd get lashed to a fury, an' ...
— The Spinner's Book of Fiction • Various
... happiness, of which he had almost come to despair. The latter, in consequence, laboriously sketching every object that came in his way: the other, in one or two rapid lines, which operate, as it were, like a magician's spell, presenting to the fancy just that picture, which was wanted to put the reader's mind in unison with the writer's. We would quote, as an instance, the description of Evening in the Fourth Book of ...
— English Critical Essays - Nineteenth Century • Various
... is an affliction which befalls the fortunate and prosperous in their prosperity. It is the demons who are irritated by human luck and prosperity who inflict calamity, pain, and loss, at the height of good luck. The jettatura is a spell of evil cast either voluntarily or involuntarily by persons who have the gift of the evil eye and can cast evil spells, perhaps unconsciously and involuntarily. It follows from the notion of the evil eye that men should never admire, ...
— Folkways - A Study of the Sociological Importance of Usages, Manners, Customs, Mores, and Morals • William Graham Sumner
... floods; the city of the Pharaohs came in sight, dazzlingly bright with the myriads of flames which had been kindled in honor of the goddess Neith, and when at last the gigantic temple of Ptah appeared, the most ancient building of the most ancient land, the spell broke, their tongues were loosed, and they burst out into loud ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... dark sky produced an effect surpassing the dreams of imagination. Shadows and high-lights of striking contrasts or of elusive colors greeted the visitor on every hand. Individual isolated effects of light were to be found here and there. Fire hissed from the mouths of serpents and cast the spell of mobile light over the composite Spanish-Gothic-Oriental setting. A colored beam of a search-light played here and there. Mysterious vapors rising from caldrons were in reality illuminated steam. Symbolic fountain ...
— Artificial Light - Its Influence upon Civilization • M. Luckiesh
... God of glory; I pray to the gracious Lord; I pray to the high and holy Heavenly Father; I pray to the earth and all of the heavens, And to the true and virtuous virgin Saint Mary, 35 And to the high hall of Heaven and its power, That with God's blessing I may unbind this spell With my open teeth, and through trusty thought May awaken the growth for our worldly advantage, May fill these fields by fast belief, 40 May improve this planting, for the prophet saith That he hath honors on earth whose alms are free, Who ...
— Old English Poems - Translated into the Original Meter Together with Short Selections from Old English Prose • Various
... proportion to its strategic importance. It was like sunshine breaking through a fog. Such rejoicing had been unknown, even in the decisive moments of the War of the Revolution. It served to show how deep-seated had been the American conviction that Britain's mastery of the sea was like a spell which could not ...
— The Fight for a Free Sea: A Chronicle of the War of 1812 - The Chronicles of America Series, Volume 17 • Ralph D. Paine
... I'm fifteen now, and old enough to earn my own living. You have come to stay a spell, haven't you?" asked Phebe, looking up at her guest and wondering how life could be dull to a girl who wore a silk frock, a daintily frilled apron, a pretty locket, and had her hair tied up with a ...
— Eight Cousins • Louisa M. Alcott
... a man in a maze, unrecognizable to himself, half unconscious, half heedless of the fact that the garments of his carefully cultivated antagonism to the world and to his fellows had slipped very easily from his unresisting shoulders. The glory of a perfect English midsummer lay like a golden spell upon the land. The moors were purple with heather, touched here and there with the fire of the flaming gorse, the wind blew always from the west, the gardens were ablaze with slowly bursting rhododendrons. Every gleam of coloring, every ...
— The Malefactor • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... he said to himself, "very much a virgin," and he found himself giggling softly, notwithstanding the twinges of pain from his legs. He felt suddenly as if his spirit had awakened from a long torpor. The spell of dejection that had deadened him for months had slipped off. He was free. The thought came to him gleefully, that as long as he stayed in that cot in the hospital no one would shout orders at him. No one would tell him to clean his rifle. ...
— Three Soldiers • John Dos Passos
... service read her prayers out of a tiny little prayer hook bound in red velvet. This little book was a matter of great concern among several old peasants, one of whom, unable to contain himself any longer, asked of his neighbour: "What is she doing? Lord have mercy on us! Is she casting a spell?" The sweet scent of the flowers, which filled the whole church, mingled with the smell of the peasant's coats, tarred boots and shoes, the whole being drowned by the ...
— Virgin Soil • Ivan S. Turgenev
... slowly dissolved to air. Then, and not until then, was the icy spell that bound all Claudia's faculties loosened. She uttered piercing shriek upon shriek that startled all the sleepers in the house, and brought them rushing into her room. Katie and Sally being the nearest, were the first ...
— Self-Raised • Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte Southworth
... straight at us, with the finger of the marksman pressing the trigger. The first proof the pursuers received that they were within sight of the youth they were seeking was of that nature. Both stood for a second or more unable to stir. But their training prevented the spell lasting more ...
— The Lost Trail - I • Edward S. Ellis
... now to move, remained where he was, transfixed. That sinister word "ill" held him like a spell. Eustace Hignett was ill! He had thought all along that the fellow was sickening for ...
— The Girl on the Boat • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
... boy was ordered up again, to remain till sunset. "I would have called him down," muttered Mr W—-, whose temper had been soured from long disappointment; "but since he's a lord, he shall have a good spell of it before he quits the service; and then we shall not have his recommendation to others in his own rank to come into it, and interfere with ...
— Newton Forster - The Merchant Service • Captain Frederick Marryat
... wandered quite away with this talkative baby, until she found herself suddenly cast out of Dottie's magic province as she stood beyond the trees that edged the first field not far from the fence of the Harmon garden. And that which had broken the spell was the appearance of Alec Trenholme. He came right up to her, as if he had something of importance to say, but either shyness or a difficulty in introducing his subject made him hesitate. Something in his look ...
— What Necessity Knows • Lily Dougall
... cloud. The charming old town was in its normal state of provincial apathy: few soldiers were about, and here at last civilian life again predominated. After a few days on the edge of the war, in that intermediate region under its solemn spell, there is something strangely lowering to the mood in the first sight of a busy unconscious community. One looks instinctively, in the eyes of the passers by, for a reflection of that other vision, and feels diminished by contact with people going ...
— Fighting France - From Dunkerque to Belport • Edith Wharton
... was not sure that he did, but the minister went on to make that meaning clear. "It is the multitude that with us is educated. Go into their houses, sir, and see how they thumb their books. Look at the domestic correspondence of our helps and servants, and see how they write and spell. We haven't got the mountains, sir, but our table-lands are the highest on which the bright sun of our Almighty God has as yet shone with its illuminating splendour in this improving world of ours! It is because we are a young people, sir,—with nothing ...
— He Knew He Was Right • Anthony Trollope
... was an old English verb in common use in Shakspeare's time; and Malicho, or Malhecho, misdeed, he has borrowed from the Spanish. Many stray words of Spanish and Italian were then affectedly used in common conversation, as we have seen French used in more recent times. The Quarto spell the word Mallicho. Our ancestors were not particular in orthography, and often spelt according to ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 72, March 15, 1851 • Various
... I ought to have it given me. I ought to have ... oh, nothing very much, perhaps ... a little gladness ... a glad memory ... the thought that my life will not have been entirely wasted.... The thought that I too shall have had my spell of love.... But that short spell I ask for ... I beg for it, I ...
— The Frontier • Maurice LeBlanc
... cheek crumpled against her hand, looking out over this, her mind hardly stirring. There still lay three one-hundred-dollar bills, crisply warm, against her bosom, and during the long arid spell that followed her first stroke of good fortune they were to her like a sedative touch, pressing down a more and more frequently recurring rise ...
— Star-Dust • Fannie Hurst
... what they had all day been busy upon. In a faith, sincere but half-suspicious, he would fain have those Powers at least not against him. His own nearer household gods were all around his bed. The spell of his religion as a part of the very essence of home, its intimacy, its dignity and security, was forcible at that moment; only, it seemed to involve ...
— Marius the Epicurean, Volume One • Walter Horatio Pater
... press? Did I not see all, even to the humiliation of Simone? It needed no very keen vision to divine the beginning of many things, love and hate and grave adventures. So when a new and nameless poet filled the air of Florence with his sweetness it did not take me long to spell ...
— The God of Love • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... the same operation. But Medea prepared her caldron for him in a very different way. She put in only water and a few simple herbs. In the night she with the sisters entered the bed-chamber of the old king, while he and his guards slept soundly under the influence of a spell cast upon them by Medea. The daughters stood by the bedside with their weapons drawn, but hesitated to strike, till Medea chid their irresolution. Then, turning away their faces and giving random blows, they smote him with their weapons. He, starting from his sleep, cried out, ...
— TITLE • AUTHOR
... a ward of the key in the fact that only one in every thousand of our population can spell. Then they are infinitely more interested in religion and caste questions than in any sort of politics. When the business of mere existence is over, their minds are occupied by a series of interests, pleasures, rituals, superstitions, and the like, based ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... impress the idea, that what naturally seems to us the strange and uncouth spelling of former times, was not a proof of the gross, untaught ignorance which it would now indicate. The purpose of the writer in those days was, not to spell accurately words which there was no strict rule for spelling, but to note down words in such a way as to enable those who had not heard them to reproduce them, and to impart their sense through the eye to those who should only see them. One ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 460 - Volume 18, New Series, October 23, 1852 • Various
... sight beyond the mountains these sounds of bird-life gradually died away. Under the great pines the evening was still with the silence of primeval desolation. The sense of sadness and loneliness, the melancholy of the wilderness, came over me like a spell. Every slight noise made my pulses throb as I lay motionless on the rock gazing intently into the gathering gloom. I began to fear that it would grow too dark to shoot before ...
— Hunting the Grisly and Other Sketches • Theodore Roosevelt
... vital glow of her youth and beauty; each breath they drew increased their wonder, till the whole rosy universe seemed thrilling and singing at their feet, and they two, love-crowned, alone, saw Time and Eternity flowing like a golden tide under the spell ...
— Iole • Robert W. Chambers
... the genius of the species out of the question, his intelligent comprehension of the "composition of the next generation" is nevertheless devoutly believed in. Even Nietzsche, that arch-individualist, was completely under the spell of this dogma, as is proved by many of his utterances, for instance, by the well-known socialistic definition of marriage as "the will of twain to create that which is higher than its creators," and also by his theory that man is not ...
— The Evolution of Love • Emil Lucka
... Barry fearing that the incident of the cat might throw a ridiculous light upon the evil spirits, resolved to awake once more a salutary terror by announcing that he was going to burn the flowers through which the second spell had been made to work. Producing a bunch of white roses, already faded, he ordered a lighted brazier to be brought. He then threw the flowers on the glowing charcoal, and to the general astonishment they were consumed without any visible effect: ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... when the lust of sway Had lost its quickening spell, Cast crowns for rosaries away, An ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole, V4 • Horace Walpole
... instead of putting their horses into a gallop and dashing forward to certain victory, the pace gradually slackened; in vain did their officers use every effort to urge the men on—in vain did the spirit-stirring trumpet sound the charge—the troopers were spell-bound by the demon of fear; the trot became a walk, then a halt; and then, forgetful of their duty, their honor, and their officers, they ...
— A Peep into Toorkisthhan • Rollo Burslem
... the well. He now reported that the ship had sprang a leak; the pumps must be manned; the demand on the energies of the crew was increased. Still they worked cheerfully. Even some of the wounded insisted on coming up to take their spell at the pumps. ...
— Ronald Morton, or the Fire Ships - A Story of the Last Naval War • W.H.G. Kingston
... Lois in a spell of wonderment. The scolding was not severe, but it was generally followed by some sort of punishment. A clean pinafore, too! To be set on a high stool and study a Psalm, or be relegated to bread and water, and, oh! she was suddenly hungry. Down in the orchard were delicious ...
— A Little Girl in Old Philadelphia • Amanda Minnie Douglas
... don't know a thousand times more than her mother, and wouldn't attempt to teach law to her father if he was a judge in the Supreme Court. Yet, it's a shocking truth, the little upstarts don't know how to read like Christians, or spell half their words. The tip-top fashionable school-marms here are quite above teaching such common things as reading and spelling, and turn up their noses at any study that hasn't some "ology" or "phy" ...
— Phemie Frost's Experiences • Ann S. Stephens
... a leaf appears, each branchlet ending in a long thorn projecting beyond the flowers at right angles to the stem. From the conspicuous blackness of its rind at the time of flowering, the tree is named Blackthorn, and the spell of harsh unkindly cold weather which prevails about then goes by the name ...
— Herbal Simples Approved for Modern Uses of Cure • William Thomas Fernie
... what the poet meant, ran yet an indubitable vein of awful truth, whether fully intended by the writer or not mattered little to such a reader as Donal—when, lifting his eyes, he saw lady Arctura standing before him with a strange listening look. A spell seemed upon her; her face was white, her lips white and a ...
— Donal Grant • George MacDonald
... DESPAIR, each dashed out in four lines, of which every word is like inspiration. Beautiful as Spenser is, and sometimes sublime, yet he redoubles his touches too much, and often introduces some coarse feature or expression, which destroys the spell. Spenser, indeed, has other merits of splendid and inexhaustible invention, which render it impossible to put Collins on a par with him: but we must not estimate merit by mere quantity: if a poet produces but one short piece, which is perfect, he must be placed according ...
— The Poetical Works of William Collins - With a Memoir • William Collins
... without being able to do otherwise he began to live over again the delightful days he had spent afield by writing of them. He was like an exile dreaming of his native land. Nature has a trick of casting a spell over those who spend their days with her so that when the day is gone only the memories of the delights of it remain and these become ever more beautiful and highly coloured with time. To the homesick young man, shut up in the vault ...
— My Boyhood • John Burroughs
... produced great exhilaration among the English and Burgundians. Had a great victory been won, the effect could not have been greater. It broke the spell. The Maid was human, like other women; and her late successes were attributed not to her inspiration, but to demoniacal enchantments. She was looked upon as a witch or as a sorceress, and was now guarded with especial care for fear of a rescue, and sent to a ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume VII • John Lord
... enough to drop the final and essential "a" of the name of the great city, and spell the word "Vijayanagar," as it is usually pronounced by the English. The name is composed of two words, VIJAYA, "victory," and NAGARA, "city," all the "a's" to be pronounced short, like the "u" in "sun," or the ...
— A Forgotten Empire: Vijayanagar; A Contribution to the History of India • Robert Sewell
... in bad weather. Of course, if you prefer it, we can put off our start till this puff of wind has blown itself out. It may have dropped before morning. It may last some little time. I don't think myself that it will drop, for the glass has fallen, and I am afraid we may have a spell ...
— Among Malay Pirates - And Other Tales Of Adventure And Peril • G. A. Henty
... was a wild Welshman from a land where the tribes lived in caves and wore leather skirts and wooden shoes, and that I had had my first introduction to a pants-wearing people when I came to America. They said that I had not yet learned to speak English, could not spell my own name, and was unable to ...
— The Iron Puddler • James J. Davis
... the panther, and the words, as if they had broken a hideous spell that had held the Russian, galvanized him into sudden action. With a scream he turned ...
— The Beasts of Tarzan • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... Wakefield. "Not a shilling!" was the reply. "Not a shilling!" reiterated his astonished acquaintance. "Why, didn't you go there to star?"—"Yes," replied Mathews, with mirthful mournfulness; "but they spell it with a ve ...
— The Jest Book - The Choicest Anecdotes and Sayings • Mark Lemon
... scribe the exact reading of the plates, even to spelling, in which Smith was woefully deficient. Martin Harris was permitted to be in the room with the scribe, and would try the knowledge of Smith, as he told me, saying that Smith could not spell the word February, when his eyes were off the spectacles through which he pretended to work. This ignorance of Smith was proof positive to him that Smith was dependent on the spectacles for the contents ...
— The Story of the Mormons: • William Alexander Linn
... to pass from one boat to the other, as they lay there. Each had a canopy top, and curtains that could be dropped, and buttoned, during a wet spell, or if the owner chose to sleep aboard; but on this occasion Paul had believed it best that these latter should remain up, so as to allow of free observation ...
— The Banner Boy Scouts Afloat • George A. Warren
... Prussian military machine, of a reactionary bureaucracy, and of a Prussian feudal Junkerthum; how behind that military machine and that feudal Junkerthum there were even more formidable moral and spiritual forces at work; how the whole German nation were under the spell of a false political creed; how the Universities, the Churches, the Press, were all possessed with the same exclusive nationalism; and how, being misled by its spiritual leaders, the whole nation was honestly and intensely convinced that in the near future the German Empire must ...
— German Problems and Personalities • Charles Sarolea
... waters, the canoe of the offender would instantly sink. A story is told of an Englishwoman, in the early days of the first settlers, who had occasion to cross this lake with a party of Indians, who, before embarking, warned her most impressively of the spell. It was a silent, breathless day, and the canoe shot over the smooth surface of the lake like an arrow. About a mile from the shore, near the center of the lake, the woman, willing to convince the savages of the weakness of their superstition, uttered a loud cry. The countenances ...
— Saratoga and How to See It • R. F. Dearborn
... take his life, Unless the mystery he would disclose, Which he reluctantly through terror chose. Then having bound the friar hand and foot, And in another room his lady put, He sallied forth his hapless lot to tell, And to the mayor exposed the wily spell; The corporation next; then up and down, The secret he divulged throughout ...
— The Tales and Novels, Complete • Jean de La Fontaine
... is part dog, part wolf and all brute, living in the frozen north; he gradually comes under the spell of man's companionship, and surrenders all at the last in a fight with a bull dog. Thereafter he is man's ...
— Whispering Smith • Frank H. Spearman
... thought as quickly as Marcia, he too felt some instinct of fear lest by an unfortunate word they should break the spell of Joe Carbrook's interest in the "Big Idea," and promptly the four were deep in a ...
— John Wesley, Jr. - The Story of an Experiment • Dan B. Brummitt
... child on some long winter's night Affrighted clinging to its Grandam's knees With eager wond'ring and perturb'd delight Listens strange tales of fearful dark decrees Mutter'd to wretch by necromantic spell; Or of those hags, who at the witching time Of murky midnight ride the air sublime, And mingle foul embrace with fiends of Hell: Cold Horror drinks its blood! Anon the tear More gentle starts, to hear the Beldame tell Of pretty babes, that lov'd ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb IV - Poems and Plays • Charles and Mary Lamb
... and the character of those present, of whom Grandier, in outward seeming at least, was the least amazed of any, although he had the most reason. The devils continued their accusations, citing the places, the days, and the hours of their intercourse with him; the first spell he cast on them, his scandalous behaviour, his insensibility, his abjurations of God and the faith. To all this he calmly returned that these accusations were calumnies, and all the more unjust considering his profession; that he renounced Satan and all his fiends, having neither knowledge nor ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - URBAIN GRANDIER—1634 • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... saw the boys off to Centauri I had a dizzy spell and only with the greatest effort hid my distress until the long train of ships had risen out of sight. Then I lay down in the Visitors Lounge from where I could not be moved for several hours. ...
— Man Made • Albert R. Teichner
... not expecting so fierce a criticism of your own book from one of your own reviewers, I suspect. Ah, but your "Three Commands" have laid me under a spell. I cannot say anything about them without saying too much; and I am ...
— The Jessica Letters: An Editor's Romance • Paul Elmer More
... mission, mountain sentinel, To my lone heart thou art a power and spell; A lesson grave, of life, that teacheth me To love the ...
— Poems • Mary Baker Eddy |
