"Syren" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... mean it, Betsy? Are yer relentin'? Are yer goin' ter say the 'appy word as splices us from keel to topsail? Yer ain 't jest a cruel syren are yer, wavin' me on, hopin' I 'll smash meself? Are yer winkin' at me like ol' Flint's lantern—me thinkin' it 's love I see, shinin' ...
— Wappin' Wharf - A Frightful Comedy of Pirates • Charles S. Brooks
... her rocking on the water, Under the glossy umbrage of her hair, Like pearly Amphitrite's fairest daughter, Naiad, or Nereid,—or Syren fair, Mislodging music in her pitiless breast, A nightingale within a ...
— The Poetical Works of Thomas Hood • Thomas Hood
... one of his finest, awkwardest, most disconcerting slows. The cautious batsman was proof against its syren-like allurements, and stepped back to block what any one else would have stepped forward to slog. The ball broke up sharp against his bat, and Grandcourt began to breathe again as they saw ...
— Follow My leader - The Boys of Templeton • Talbot Baines Reed
... of July we arrived at Malta, where we were detained by contrary gales until the 21st, when we left it, and arrived in sight of Tripoli the 25th, and were joined by the Syren, Argus, Vixen and Scourge. Our squadron now consisted of the Constitution, three brigs, three schooners, two bombs, and six gun-boats, our whole number of men one thousand and sixty. I proceeded to make the necessary arrangements for an attack on Tripoli, a city well walled, ...
— The Medallic History of the United States of America 1776-1876 • J. F. Loubat
... his friend to emigrate and speak to more appreciative audiences in the States; but the London lectures, which had, with the remittances from over sea, practically saved Carlyle from ruin or from exile, had made him decide "to turn his back to the treacherous Syren"—the temptation to sink into oratory. Mr. Froude's explanation and defence of this decision may be clenched by a reference to the warning his master had received. He had announced himself as a preacher and a prophet, and been taken at his word; but similarly had Edward Irving, who for a season ...
— Thomas Carlyle - Biography • John Nichol
... the sound of shouting from the men on board the Ida, ragged cheers. The steamer's syren shrieked. Mr. Donovan stood on the bridge, the rope which controlled the syren in his hand. The Queen waved to him. Five revolver shots rang out in ...
— The Island Mystery • George A. Birmingham
... a summer night, the melodies which float upon the air from the open balconies above him. A vague sense of unknown sweetness comes upon him, mingled with an irritating feeling of envy that some favoured son of Fortune should be able to stand over the shoulders of that singing syren, while he can only listen with intrusive ears from the street below. And so he lingers and is envious, and for a moment curses his fate,—not knowing how weary may be the youth who stands, how false the girl who sings. ...
— Lady Anna • Anthony Trollope
... known grounds should become exhausted, and in 1788 Messrs. Enderby's ship, the EMILIA, first ventured round Cape Horn, as the pioneer of a greater trade than ever. The way once pointed out, other ships were not slow to follow, until, in 1819, the British whale-ship SYREN opened up the till then unexplored tract of ocean in the western part of the North Pacific, afterwards familiarly known as the "Coast of Japan." From these teeming waters alone, for many years an average annual catch of 40,000 barrels ...
— The Cruise of the Cachalot - Round the World After Sperm Whales • Frank T. Bullen
... was a loud shout, followed by a yell, the report of a revolver, succeeded by the deep booming roar of a fog-syren which had been set going by the funnel, and then as Fitz Burnett felt that the crash was upon them, the roar of the fog-horn was behind, for the Teal had as nearly as possible scraped past the gunboat's stern, and was flying onward ...
— Fitz the Filibuster • George Manville Fenn
... tears, her smiles, her every look's a net. Her voice is like a Syren's of the land; And bloody hearts lie ...
— The Works Of John Dryden, Volume 4 (of 18) - Almanzor And Almahide, Marriage-a-la-Mode, The Assignation • John Dryden
... escape from drowning on that very spot, would never have been induced to again commit himself to the surface of the deep, had he not been fully convinced that the deep had now subsided into a shallow. With his breast fortified by this resolution, he therefore fell a victim to the syren tongue of ...
— The Adventures of Mr. Verdant Green • Cuthbert Bede
... that she put on the same air for whomsoever she chose to charm; but it had a power which he could not resist all the same. "But perhaps you don't care to be taken into my confidence," she added, smiling, too, as if willing to admit all he could allege as to her syren graces. She had a delightful air of being in the joke which entirely ...
— Sir Tom • Mrs. Oliphant
... of the lake steamers, decks and rigging outlined in quivering points of light, came the inspiriting strains of a band. Snatches of song drifted across the water, and now and again the melancholy long-drawn hoot of a syren pierced the air. ...
— The Vision of Desire • Margaret Pedler
... sound reached me, except the mournful muffled hooting of a steamer's syren at intervals; no doubt some wretched collier, nosing her way at half-speed through the fog, in momentary ...
— Adventures in Many Lands • Various
... wounded's stifling breath, The tyrant's plume in dust lies low— Th' oppressed has triumphed o'er his foe. But ah! the lull in the furious blast May whisper not of ruin past; It may tell of the tempest hurrying on, To complete the work the blast begun. With the voice of a Syren, it may whisp'ringly tell Of a moment of hope in the deluge of rain; And the shout of the free heart may rapt'rously swell, While the tyrant is gath'ring his power again. Though the balm of the leech may soften the smart, It never can turn ...
— Autographs for Freedom, Volume 2 (of 2) (1854) • Various
... to diversify frequently her character, and the spirit of her character. Twenty times a day would she change her dress, her appearance, and even her manner of walking and speaking; passing from gayety to gravity, from songs and smiles to love and sentiment. With syren-like voice, and a heart as light as the bird of the air, she would invent a thousand graceful blandishments for the amusement of her royal lover. Her beauty, which was marvelous, served her well ...
— International Miscellany of Literature, Art and Science, Vol. 1, - No. 3, Oct. 1, 1850 • Various
... I been infatuated! What syren spell has been on me!" Such were the words that fell from his lips, marking ...
— Heart-Histories and Life-Pictures • T. S. Arthur
... changing into the likeness of an old fisherman. The deluded merchant, after seeking her awhile, is obliged to set sail and depart without his ware. She returns home to find her lover Petulius being tempted by a 'syren,' who is evidently a mermaid with looking-glass and comb and scaly tail, disporting herself by the shore—the scene being laid, by the way, on the coast of Arcadia. Protea at once changes her disguise to the ghost of Ulysses, and is in time to warn her lover ...
— Pastoral Poetry and Pastoral Drama - A Literary Inquiry, with Special Reference to the Pre-Restoration - Stage in England • Walter W. Greg
... so did she, the wonder of the east, At least, if it be wondrous faire at all, That staines the morning, in her purple nest, With guilt-downe curled Tresses, rosy drest, Reflecting in a cornet wise, admire, To euery eye whom vertue might appall. And Syren loue, inchant ...
— Seven Minor Epics of the English Renaissance (1596-1624) • Dunstan Gale
... they told the Syren Tales (All ears were open then!) And the harps were afire with plucked desire For the white ash oars again— For oars and sail, and the open sea, High prow against pure blue, The good sea spray on eye and lip, The thrumming hemp, the rise and dip, The plunge and the roll of a driven ship ...
— The Ivory Trail • Talbot Mundy
... found them, and made preparations for a grand sacrifice to the fairies, for their protection and guidance. They were about to immolate a turtle-dove, but the Princess saved its life, and let it fly. At this moment a syren issued from the water, and said, "Cease your anxiety, let your vessel go where it will; land where it stops." The vessel now sailed more quickly. Suddenly they came in sight of a city so beautiful that they were anxious their vessel ...
— The Song of Sixpence - Picture Book • Walter Crane
... it] here are songs and dances, poetry and music—hark! how sweetly one guinea rhymes to another—and how they dance to the music of their own chink. This buys all t'other—and this thou shalt have; this, and all that I am worth, for the purchase of thy love. Say, is it mine then, ha? Speak, Syren—Oons, why do I look on her! Yet I must. Speak, dear angel, devil, saint, witch; do not rack me ...
— The Comedies of William Congreve - Volume 1 [of 2] • William Congreve
... that type of character which every age has reproduced, varying externally with climates and conditions, but materially the same from fabled Circe down to Lola Montes, or some less famous syren whose subjects are not kings. The same passions that in ancient days broke out in heaven-defying crimes; the same power of beauty, intellect, or subtlety; the same untamable spirit and lack of moral sentiment are the attributes of all; ...
— Moods • Louisa May Alcott
... with such expostulations as these: Why, dear Sir, will you give such offence? How much would it be for your comfort and interest in the world if you would but be a little more complying, and give way in some particular points and phrases. O what a syren's song! May the Lord enable every faithful servant to reply, "Get thee ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... have said, profanation."—"What is it I hear? You talk in the language of romance; and from the housekeeper to the head of the house, you're all stark staring mad. Nephew, I wish, for thy own credit, thou wert—But what signifies wishing?—I hope you'll not bring your syren ...
— Pamela (Vol. II.) • Samuel Richardson
... struggle begins between the two. Kirke strives with all her arts and blandishments to enchain him, to keep him. Odysseus resists; he has gained the victory over himself, he is no longer in the power of the syren; his will is inflexible. All in vain does she strive to charm him by the delights of her garden; the songs and dances of her maidens; her sweetest caresses. He turns from her with loathing, he curses her. At last Kirke's love turns to fierce hatred; she changes her garden into a desert; she calls ...
— The Standard Operaglass - Detailed Plots of One Hundred and Fifty-one Celebrated Operas • Charles Annesley
... were the ideas that involuntarily rushed upon the mind of Charlotte as she perused the fatal note, yet after a few hours had elapsed, the syren Hope again took possession of her bosom, and she flattered herself she could, on a second perusal, discover an air of tenderness in the few lines he had left, which at first had escaped ...
— Charlotte Temple • Susanna Rowson
... noise of quarrel, the noise of fist on face, My country's songs, guitars, and gramophones, The noise of boot on stone, The noise of women bargaining their flesh, The noise of singers in the ships, Sounds of threat and sounds of fear, Blasts of hammer and steel and iron, The scream of syren, the wail of hooter, The clangour of angry bells, The boom of guns, the clatter of factories, The panic of feet, ...
— Song Book of Quong Lee of Limehouse • Thomas Burke
... Again, sweet syren, breathe again That deep, pathetic, powerful strain; Whose melting tones, of tender woe, Fall soft as evening's summer dew, That bathes the pinks and harebells blue, Which in the vales of ...
— Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, Vol. II (of 3) • Walter Scott
... undeniably smart audience—all smoking. The stage was open to the dark blue sky, which was sprinkled with stars. Right above them clanged a temple gong; from far down the river came the hoot of a steamer's syren, and during intervals the soft humming of the wind among the labyrinth of shrines—a complete contrast in every respect was this Eastern scene to the last play he had witnessed ...
— The Road to Mandalay - A Tale of Burma • B. M. Croker
... Desidiae valedixi; syrenis istius cantibus surdam posthac aurem obversurus.—I bid farewell to Sloth, being resolved henceforth not to listen to her syren strains.' ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 1 • Boswell, Edited by Birkbeck Hill
... his waistcoat pocket. Drunken as the youth was at that time, and dull as he was at all others, he was not without the instinctive penetration with which all human bipeds watch over their individual goods and chattels. He sprung aside from the endearments of the syren, grasped her arm, and in a voice of querulous indignation, ...
— Pelham, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... themselves up to day-dreams of shifting glory, in which the things of earth and the joys and passions of men reappeared, but transformed by the magic influence of the drug, made monstrous or fairylike, intensified or turned to voluptuous languors, through which the Ouled Nail floated like a syren, promising ecstasies unknown even in Baghdad, where the pale Circassian lifts her lustrous eyes, in which the palms were heavy with dates of solid gold, and the streams ...
— The Garden Of Allah • Robert Hichens
... and take up the "piti," with the skill of a musician; and as readily fall into the sympathetic melodies of "Oh no we never mention her," or the "Light Guitar." But to atone for these vulgarisms, who that has heard the syren strains of Stephens or Paton, or the Anglo-Italian style of Braham, but has envied them the pleasurable monopoly of delighting thousands, and sending them home with the favourite air still echoing in their ears, and lulling them to soft slumbers! Who is there ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 12, Issue 330, September 6, 1828 • Various
... "Ah, beauty, syren, faire enchanting good, Sweet silent rhetorique of perswading eyes, Dumb eloquence, whose power doth move the blood More than the words or wisedome ...
— The Works of Christopher Marlowe, Vol. 3 (of 3) • Christopher Marlowe
... empire of the heart With sovereign sway o'er sea and land extended, Whose peerless, haunting charms, and syren art, Won from the imperial Caesar conquests splendid; Rome sent her thousands forth, and foreign powers, Poured in thy woman's hand an empire's treasures; Was Fate beside thee in those gorgeous hours When monarchs knelt, slaves ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII No. 6 June 1848 • Various
... had come to seem to him far more even than Oswyn, about whom there would always lurk something shadowy and unreal, a last link with the living; when the tide was nearly out, so that the stillness was not even broken by the long, lugubrious syren of a passing steamer, his isolation was borne in upon him with something of the sting ...
— A Comedy of Masks - A Novel • Ernest Dowson and Arthur Moore
... Harlot is Carrest, Who plays the Tyrant in his Am'rous Breast; The Charming Syren touches e'ery String, To keep his busie Fancy on the Wing; All by her whiles, she binds her Captive fast, Sooths him at first, and bubbles him at last. To feed her Pride, clandestine means he'll take, Rob Friends, ...
— The Fifteen Comforts of Matrimony: Responses from Men • Various
... Colton's other vices, and becoming involved, he cut the Gordian knot of debt in 1828 by absconding; his living was then seized and given to another. He fled to America, and from there returned to that syren city, Paris, where he is said in two years to have won no less than L25,000. The miserable man died by his own hand at Fontainebleau, in 1832. In the "Lacon" is the subjoined passage, that seems almost prophetic of the miserable ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... shone as if in each a soul were imprisoned, and voluptuously rustled the silk that clung to the fair slim forms of its bearers in an undulating caress. Subtle perfumes emanated from the hair and the hands of syren women, commingling with the soft plump scent of their flesh. Fragrant tapers, burning in precious crystal globules stained with exquisite colours, sprinkled their shimmering light over the fashionable assemblage and lent a false radiance to the faces ...
— The House of the Vampire • George Sylvester Viereck
... guileless her nature, A thousand fond voices pronounce her divine; So witchingly pretty, so modestly witty, That sweet is thy thraldom, fair Flower of the Tyne! Thine aspect so noble, yet sweetly inviting, The loves and the graces thy temples entwine; In manners the saint and the syren uniting, Bloom on, dear Louisa, the ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volumes I-VI. - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... may, perhaps, be permitted to doubt the truth of the legend, oft repeated on temperance platforms, of the working man, returning homewards from his toil, struggling past nineteen inns and succumbing to the syren charms of the twentieth. We may fear lest the gathering together of large numbers of men in a few public-houses may not increase rather than diminish their thirst and the love of good fellowship which in some mysterious way is stimulated ...
— Vanishing England • P. H. Ditchfield
... whom chance may bring To this sequester'd spot, If then the plaintive Syren sing, Oh! softly tread beneath her bower, And think of heaven's disposing power, Of man's ...
— Poetical Works of Akenside - [Edited by George Gilfillan] • Mark Akenside
... distant past, when the ancestral stock, disembarking from the rude canoes at nightfall, sought an evening meal on the edge of the palm-forest, bowed beneath the weight of green and yellow nuts a hundred feet overhead. What wonder if in lands of perpetual summer the syren song of some "long bright river" should lure the storm-tossed mariners from the perilous seas to the comparative security of inland life! The stern environment of Northern poverty stands out in terrible contrast with the teeming ...
— Through the Malay Archipelago • Emily Richings
... cou'd not live? On whose lips your very being hangs? Whom you so love, as I cou'd you." Her words were attended with such a grace at their delivery, and the sweet sound so, charm'd the yielding air, you wou'd have sworne some syren had been breathing melodies. Thus rapt with every thing so amazing, and fancying a glory shin'd in every part, I ventur'd to enquire what name the goddess own'd? "My maid, I perceive," said she, "has not inform'd you, I am call'd Circe; I would not have you believe tho, I bear that name, that I ...
— The Satyricon • Petronius Arbiter
... ballads, not one of them later than 1700, and some of them a hundred years older. I wheedled an old woman out of these, who loved them better than her psalm-book. Tobacco, sir, snuff, and the Complete Syren, were the equivalent! For that mutilated copy of the Complaynt of Scotland I sat out the drinking of two dozen bottles of strong ale with the late learned proprietor, who in gratitude bequeathed it to me by his last ...
— The Book-Hunter - A New Edition, with a Memoir of the Author • John Hill Burton
... blissfully, If Heaven so sweet a death for me design!" But the rapt sense, by such enchantment bound, And the strong will, thus listening to possess Heaven's joys on earth, my spirit's flight delay. And thus I live; and thus drawn out and wound Is my life's thread, in dreamy blessedness, By this sole syren from the realms ...
— The Sonnets, Triumphs, and Other Poems of Petrarch • Petrarch
... pain. It also appeared to him that he was experiencing an altogether unpleasant degree of warmth; while he seemed to hear, ringing in his ears like the echo of something listened to ages ago, the sound of what very strongly resembled a steamer's syren. Added to this, he was conscious that there were many people quite close to him, groaning in varying degrees of agony; and finally, as his faculties resumed their normal condition, he began to realise that he was in a ...
— A Chinese Command - A Story of Adventure in Eastern Seas • Harry Collingwood
... still industriously blowing long blasts to windward when, ruthlessly cutting into one of these, there suddenly came—from apparently close at hand, on the port bow—the loud discordant yell of a steam syren; and the next instant three lights—red, green, and white, arranged in the form of an isosceles triangle—broke upon Leslie's gaze with startling suddenness through the dense fog, broad on the port bow of ...
— Dick Leslie's Luck - A Story of Shipwreck and Adventure • Harry Collingwood
... Are scatterd with the winds that issu'd from thee, Which, like the infectious yawning of a hill, Belching forth death inevitable, Has distroyd freindship and nature in me. Thou canst not poyson worse: I can feed now, Feed and nere burst with mallice. Sing, Syren, sing And swell me with revenge sweet as the straines Falls from the Thrasian lyre; charme each sence With musick of Revenge, let Innocence In softest tunes like the expiring Swann Dy singing ...
— A Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. II • Various
... but the little boat had not yet appeared in sight again. There was no danger that Tom would think of fatigue while he could sit looking in the face of his syren, listening to her low, sweet songs; nor was there the slightest possibility of her ever remembering that the strongest muscles must at last feel a little need of relaxation. Just as long as it pleased her to float over the sunlit waters, carolling her pretty melodies or talking gay nonsense to ...
— A Noble Woman • Ann S. Stephens
... duke of Norfolk had not acquired, even from the severe admonition of a long imprisonment, resolution sufficient to turn a deaf ear to the enchantments of this syren. His situation was indeed perplexing: He had entered into the most serious engagements with his sovereign to abstain from all further intercourse with the queen of Scots: at the same time the right of Elizabeth to interdict him an alliance so flattering to his vanity might plausibly ...
— Memoirs of the Court of Queen Elizabeth • Lucy Aikin
... turmoil from the harbour reached him where he sat. He listened dully to the hooting of a syren—that of some vessel coming ...
— Brood of the Witch-Queen • Sax Rohmer
... happiness to his bosom companion?" These few questions would often dissolve the spell. If you marry one, such as I describe above, he may continue through the bridal month this delicious repast, but amid growing cares, when busy and anxious, you shall soon find that the syren voice is hushed. It will be you, who must then speak sweet words. To you, will he turn for those kind attentions, which the habit of being caressed and complimented, and never forgetting yourself, will have miserably prepared ...
— The Young Maiden • A. B. (Artemas Bowers) Muzzey
... wickedest of creatures; Oh, gaze not on the Syren's fatal features, More baneful than the ...
— Turandot: The Chinese Sphinx • Johann Christoph Friedrich von Schiller
... line 192. Scott writes:—'Were accuracy of any consequence in a fictitious narrative, this castellan's name ought to have been William; for William Heron of Ford was husband to the famous Lady Ford, whose syren charms are said to have cost our James IV so dear. Moreover, the said William Heron was, at the time supposed, a prisoner in Scotland, being surrendered by Henry VIII, on account of his share in the slaughter of Sir Robert Ker of Cessford. His wife, represented ...
— Marmion • Sir Walter Scott
... I believe thee, could I think thee true, In triumph would I bear thee back to Troy, Though Greece could rally all her shattered troops, And stand embattled to oppose my way. But, oh, thou syren, I will stop my ears To thy enchanting notes; the winds shall bear Upon their wings thy ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Vol. 6 (of 18) - Limberham; Oedipus; Troilus and Cressida; The Spanish Friar • John Dryden
... leaf home, he rusheth to the sea foam, Long, long the fairies' chief home, when the summer nights are cool, And the blue sea, like a syren, with its waves the steed environ, Which hiss like furnace iron when plunged within a pool, Then along among the islands where the water nymphs bear rule, Through ...
— Poems • Denis Florence MacCarthy
... deeper, and on silver wings The twilight flutters like a weary gull Toward some sea-island, lost and beautiful, Where a sea-syren sings. ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 3 (of 4) • Various
... dialectic of Plato which gave the death-blow to polytheism. "Plato, the poet-philosopher, sacrificed Homer himself to monotheism. We may measure the energy of his conviction by the greatness of the sacrifice. He could not pardon the syren whose songs had fascinated Greece, the fresh brilliant poetry that had inspired its religion. He crowned it with flowers, but banished it, because it had lowered the religious ideal of conscience." He ...
— Christianity and Greek Philosophy • Benjamin Franklin Cocker
... wide world," I exclaimed, quite unintentionally quoting Tom Moore; "there never has been, nor can ever be again, so charming a creature. No nymph, or sylph, or winged Ariel, or syren with song and mirror, was ever so fascinating—no daughter of Eve ...
— Blackwoods Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 365, March, 1846 • Various
... the wind some lawyer tries, Mysterious skins of parchment meet our eyes; On speeds the smiling suit—"Pleas of our Lord The King" shine sable on the wide record; Nods the prunella'd bar, attorneys smile, And syren jurors flatter to beguile; Till stript—nonsuited—he is doom'd to toss In legal shipwreck and redeemless loss! Lucky if, like Ulysses, he can keep His head above the waters of ...
— Rejected Addresses: or, The New Theatrum Poetarum • James and Horace Smith
... ah! that Truth some holy spell might lend To lure thy Wanderer from the Syren's power; Then bid your souls inseparably blend Like two bright dew-drops meeting in a ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... they talk of their inner feelings like the heroines of third-rate novels, send the object of their affections cigars and stockings knitted by their own fair hands, and implore him to be faithful, and not forget, in the toils of some French syren, poor Gretchen. But what is more strange is that in the pocket of each corpse a reply is found which he has forgotten to post. In this reply the warrior tells a fearful tale of his own sufferings, and says that victory is impossible, ...
— Diary of the Besieged Resident in Paris • Henry Labouchere
... oh! never more to me, that hour shall bring its rapture and its bliss! No more, no more, oh! never more for me, shall Flavour sit upon her thousand thrones, and, like a syren with a sunny smile, win to renewed excesses, each more sweet! My feasting days are over: me no more the charms of fish, or flesh, still less of fowl, can make the fool of that they made before. The fricandeau is like a dream of early love; the fricassee, with which I have so often ...
— The Young Duke • Benjamin Disraeli
... "Syren!" thought Lady Sara, withdrawing her large dark eyes from her face, and turning them full of dissolving languor upon Thaddeus; "here are all thy charms directed!" then drawing a sigh, so deep that it made her neighbor start, ...
— Thaddeus of Warsaw • Jane Porter
... they are brothers' children, you know: the voice in all that connexion is remarkable. Pendennyss, though a degree further off in blood, possesses it; and Lady Harriet, you perceive, has the same characteristic; there has been some syren in the family, in ...
— Precaution • James Fenimore Cooper
... war on Lombardy; But to deliver from rapacious hands The Church's head and limbs, already free, So slowly he performs the king's commands. Next, overrun by him the kingdom see, And his strong arms against the city turned, Wherein the Syren's body lies inurned. ...
— Orlando Furioso • Lodovico Ariosto
... instant ardour hail'd. The syren Pleasure caroll'd and prevail'd; Soon the deep dell appear'd, and the clear brow Of ULEY BURY [A] smil'd o'er all below, [Footnote A: Bury, or Burg, the Saxon name for a hill, particularly for one wholly or partially formed by art.] Mansion, and flock, and circling woods that hung Round the ...
— The Banks of Wye • Robert Bloomfield
... syren of the stage, Charmer of an idle age, Empty warbler, breathing lyre, Wanton gale of fond desire, Bane of every manly art, Sweet enfeebler of the heart; O! too pleasing is thy strain, Hence, to southern climes again, Tuneful ...
— History of English Humour, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange
... had Mr. Head a little recovered himself, than we find him cheated again by the syren alurements of pleasure and poetry, in the latter of which, however, it does not appear he made any proficiency. He failed a second time, in the world, and having recourse to his pen, wrote the first part of the English Rogue, which ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) - Vol. III • Theophilus Cibber
... Phillips heard that Johnson had outbidden him, he described the offer as 'monstrous,' and that it was 'inspired by a spirit of revenge.' He would not, he declared, increase his offer, but a little later he writes from Bridge Street to Sydney Owenson as his 'dear, bewitching, and deluding Syren,' and promises the L300. A few months later he gave her a hundred pounds for a slight volume of poems, which certainly never paid for its publication, although Scott and Moore and many another were making much money out of poetry in those days. In any case Phillips did not accept Miss ...
— George Borrow and His Circle - Wherein May Be Found Many Hitherto Unpublished Letters Of - Borrow And His Friends • Clement King Shorter
... of the Poem Expostulations of M. Dumon Jasmin's Defence of the Gascon Dialect Jasmin and Dante 'Franconnette' dedicated to Toulouse Outline of the Story Marshal Montluc Huguenots Castle of Estellac Marcel and Pascal The Buscou 'The Syren with a Heart of Ice' The Sorcerer Franconnette accursed Festival on Easter Morning The Crown Piece Storm at Notre Dame The Villagers determine to burn Franconnette Her Deliverance ...
— Jasmin: Barber, Poet, Philanthropist • Samuel Smiles
... and his voice went through the babel of sound like the shriek of a syren through mist. "What sort," he repeated, as men paused in their clamour, startled by the voice. "Let the trap hold ...
— Colonial Born - A tale of the Queensland bush • G. Firth Scott
... suppos'd infinite That from this point will rise eternally. Fame growes in going; in the scapes of vertue Excuses damne her: they be fires in cities 65 Enrag'd with those winds that lesse lights extinguish. Come syren, sing, and dash against my rocks Thy ruffin gally rig'd with quench for lust: Sing, and put all the nets into thy voice With which thou drew'st into thy strumpets lap 70 The spawne of Venus, and in which ye danc'd; That, in thy laps steed, I may digge his tombe, ...
— Bussy D'Ambois and The Revenge of Bussy D'Ambois • George Chapman
... read in one of her favourite novelettes of a heroine who had never appreciated the goodness and worth of the man to whom she was married until another woman—a "syren" she had been called in the story—had stolen him from her, and with a wild flight of sentimental imagination she already saw herself nicely fitted ...
— The Beggar Man • Ruby Mildred Ayres
... deterred also by a conviction that Violet, if driven to reply in writing, would undoubtedly reply by a refusal. Fifty times he rode again in his imagination his ride in Saulsby Wood, and he told himself as often that the syren's answer to him,—her no, no, no,—had been, of all possible answers, the most indefinite and provoking. The tone of her voice as she galloped away from him, the bearing of her countenance when he rejoined her, her manner to him when he saw her start from the Castle in the morning, ...
— Phineas Finn - The Irish Member • Anthony Trollope
... in his feet" must have led him "who knows how," for ere long he found himself seated on a log beside Bluebell. I cannot tell what spell that syren had used to attract his footsteps so unerringly, for, little accustomed as he was to resist female influence, in thought at least Du Meresq was ...
— Bluebell - A Novel • Mrs. George Croft Huddleston
... with Algebra and Euclid, and took up plane trigonometry; but I devoted most of my time to electricity and magnetism. I constructed various scientific apparatus—a syren, telephones, microphones, an Edison's megaphone, as well as an electrometer, and a machine for covering electric wire with cotton or silk. A friend having lent me a work on artificial memory, I began ...
— Men of Invention and Industry • Samuel Smiles
... will be no fishing in the case," said the naughty little Syren, who felt all the time a secret satisfaction in the consciousness that it was she who had made the temptation irresistible, then adding, to pacify Henrietta and her own feelings of compunction, "Aunt ...
— Henrietta's Wish • Charlotte M. Yonge
... whilst she was yet a child called her Milto. Her lips were red, teeth whiter than snow, small insteps, such as of those women whom Homer calls {greek text: lisphurous}. Her voice sweet and smooth, that whosoever heard her might justly say he heard the voice of a Syren. She was averse from womanish curiosity in dressing: such things are to be supplied by wealth. She being poor, and bred up under a poor father, used nothing superfluous or extravagant to advantage her beauty. ...
— Miscellanies upon Various Subjects • John Aubrey
... an azure sky. The roar of traffic turned into booming of the sea. There was a whistling among cordage, and the floor swayed to and fro. He saw a sailor touch his cap and pocket the two-franc piece. The syren hooted—ominous sound that had started him on many a journey of adventure—and the roar of London became mere insignificant clatter ...
— Four Weird Tales • Algernon Blackwood
... breaking. Brings life to the heart it shines o'er, And, in mine, a new feeling of happiness waking, Made light what was darkness before. But mute is the Day's sunny glory, While thine hath a voice, on whose breath, More sweet than the Syren's sweet story, My hopes hang, through life and ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al
... For, as they chaunced to breathe on neighbouring hill, The freshness of this valley smote their eye, And drew them ever and anon more nigh, Till clustering round th' enchanter false they hung, Ymolten with his syren melody. While o'er th' enfeebling lute his hand he flung, And to the trembling chords these ...
— English Poets of the Eighteenth Century • Selected and Edited with an Introduction by Ernest Bernbaum
... man to do any thing; so I was compelled, somewhat at the expense of my reputation for gallantry, to assure them both, that if Ulysses of old, among his various arts and accomplishments, had piqued himself upon his tandem-driving, his vanity would have stopped his ears effectually, and the Syren might have sung herself hoarse before he would have ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 363, January, 1846 • Various
... sight, Nor one which angels view with more delight, Than youthful soldiers of Immanuel's cross, In life's glad morning counting all as loss, Since they have proved a dying Saviour's love, And placed their treasures and their hearts above. Let pleasure woo them with her syren voice, They heed her not—they've made a nobler choice; Let others walk the shining path of fame, They dare to suffer poverty and shame, And turning from the world's enchanted bowers, To consecrate their youth and all their powers To Him they serve, and even here they find More real ...
— Canadian Wild Flowers • Helen M. Johnson
... girl, I have indeed brought you to Cliffmore. I was obliged to come here on a little business trip to look after some of my property, and I took you for sweet company, and because I thought we'd give two very dear people who live at the 'Syren's Cave,' a ...
— Princess Polly's Gay Winter • Amy Brooks
... crystal brows there's nought within; They are but empty cells for pride; He who the Syren's hair would win Is mostly strangled in ...
— The Golden Treasury - Of the Best Songs and Lyrical Poems in the English Language • Various
... us of this visit to the South—a shell picked up, according to its inscription, on one of the Syren Isles, October 4, 1844; but many of its reminiscences are embodied in that vivid and charming picture 'The Englishman in Italy', which appeared in the 'Bells and Pomegranates' number for the following year. Naples always ...
— Life and Letters of Robert Browning • Mrs. Sutherland Orr
... older and feebler. And did he communicate his views of Mackarel Lane? I saw him regarding, me as a species of mermaid or syren, evidently thinking it a great shame that I have not a burnt face. If he had only known ...
— The Clever Woman of the Family • Charlotte M. Yonge
... of this nature, shun the company of wicked and vicious associates, and strive with all your power to resist the tempter in whatever form he may approach you. It is not force he employs to drag you down to the plane of the convict, but he causes the sweet song of the syren to ring in your ear, and in this manner allures you away from the right, and gently leads you down the pathway that ends in a felon cell, disgrace ...
— The Twin Hells • John N. Reynolds
... Frontispiece of Fog-Syren, and 203 other Woodcuts and Diagrams in the Text. Crown 8vo., ...
— Twentieth Century Inventions - A Forecast • George Sutherland
... my dear Miss Falkner, it is not quite so vulnerable. A lovely face and graceful form alone, will never win it: even with the addition of such a syren's voice as Miss Willoughby possesses; she sings, not only ...
— A Book For The Young • Sarah French
... than thirty-six of them waiting to be "hooked." The first place to which she went on this errand was Baden, where, according to Ferdinand Bac, she "bewitched the future Emperor William I. The Prince, however, being warned of her syren spell, ...
— The Magnificent Montez - From Courtesan to Convert • Horace Wyndham
... recognised, Fairer-than-a-Fairy now drew out her third present, and on opening the crystal scent-bottle a little syren flew out, who silenced the violins and then sang close to the Prince's ear the story of all his lady love had suffered in her search for him. She added some gentle reproaches to her tale, but before she had ...
— The Yellow Fairy Book • Leonora Blanche Alleyne Lang
... Syren! Syren! Yet grant that all the love she boasts were true, Has she not ruined you? I still urge that, The ...
— All for Love • John Dryden
... then—O hear the Sea-maid's airy shell, Listen, O listen! 'tis the Syren sings, The spirit of the deep—Parthenope— She who did once i' the dreamy days of old Sport on these golden sands beneath the moon, Or pour'd the ravishing music of her song Over the silent waters; and bequeath'd To all these sunny capes and dazzling shores Her own immortal beauty, ...
— The Diary of an Ennuyee • Anna Brownell Jameson
... this latter age; SYDNEY, the blasing-starre of England's glory; SYDNEY, the wonder of the wise and sage; SYDNEY, the subject of true vertues story: This syren, starre, this wonder, and this subject, Is dumbe, dim, gone, ...
— The Affectionate Shepherd • Richard Barnfield
... of inaction was ended. Captain Charles Douglas, H.M.S. Syren, who was cruising off Cape Race, received information that a squadron of four French ships of the line, having some 1500 picked troops on board, had made a descent on Newfoundland, and had captured St. John's, ...
— The Life of Captain James Cook • Arthur Kitson
... immediately in the wake of the German army, and taken by and large they must have been retiring in good order, for they left little behind. Our first night we spent at the village of Syren, eight kilometres from the capital of the Duchy. Billeting was not so easy now, for we were ordered to treat the inhabitants as neutrals, and when they objected we couldn't handle the situation as we did later ...
— War in the Garden of Eden • Kermit Roosevelt
... child of genius in his hour of sore need, when temptations gathered thick around his pathway and there was no one to steer him into safer waters; no one to restrain his feet from their first blind steps toward that Disaster to which ruinous companionship invited him, with syren voice? ...
— The Dreamer - A Romantic Rendering of the Life-Story of Edgar Allan Poe • Mary Newton Stanard
... starboard end of the bridge. This he hurled far into the sea. As it fell the attached rope dragged with it the signal, which so soon as it reaches water bursts into smoke and flame—signal by day and night. This done, and it had all been done in a couple of seconds, he worked the electric switch of the syren, which screamed out quickly once, twice, thrice. This is the dread sound which means 'man overboard,' and draws to his post every man on the ship, waking ...
— The Man • Bram Stoker
... from all this, and in an instant seemingly arm himself with the thunderbolts of Jove, which he would dash with appalling sound among his antagonists, or at principles he opposed, and yet with such a charm, with such a manner, that these very daughters of the sunny South who had listened to his syren-song so admiringly, would now stare, and wonder, and pallor, and yet listen, even as one gazes over the precipice, and is fascinated at ...
— The International Weekly Miscellany, Volume I. No. 9. - Of Literature, Art, and Science, August 26, 1850 • Various
... Syren of sullen moods and fading hues, Yet haply not incapable of joy, Sweet Autumn! I thee hail With welcome ...
— Life and Remains of John Clare - "The Northamptonshire Peasant Poet" • J. L. Cherry
... the Syren sings her song, To old Ocean's sons and daughters; And the mermaids dance along, To the ...
— Mazelli, and Other Poems • George W. Sands
... flowed on with me, like a smooth stream with a swimmer who glides down the current. All memory of the past, all thought of the future, all sense of the falseness and hopelessness of my own position, lay hushed within me into deceitful rest. Lulled by the Syren-song that my own heart sung to me, with eyes shut to all sight, and ears closed to all sound of danger, I drifted nearer and nearer to the fatal rocks. The warning that aroused me at last, and startled me into sudden, self-accusing consciousness ...
— The Woman in White • Wilkie Collins
... the bower, The spells of Circe, and her magic power; His dreadful journey to the realms beneath, To seek Tiresias in the vales of death; How in the doleful mansions lie survey'd His royal mother, pale Anticlea's shade; And friends in battle slain, heroic ghosts! Then how, unharm'd, he pass'd the Syren-coasts, The justling rocks where fierce Charybdis raves, And howling Scylla whirls her thunderous waves, The cave of death! How his companions slay The oxen sacred to the god of day. Till Jove in wrath the rattling tempest guides, And whelms ...
— The Odyssey of Homer • Homer, translated by Alexander Pope
... when my winding way Led through the thickets to a sheltered vale, Where the fair syren sat; a smooth clear bay Skirted with woods appeared, where many a sail Went shining o'er the watery surface still, Lessening at last in the gray ocean flood; And yonder, half-way up the fronting hill, Peeping from forth the trees, a cottage ...
— The Poetical Works of William Lisle Bowles, Vol. 1 • William Lisle Bowles
... would certainly be invigorating, but for fear I had not heard or understood him clearly I had him to repeat it. In fact, so timely was it that I felt as if I could have listened all night, so much like the voice of a syren was it at that moment. I said "Yes! Yes!!" But just then I thought of my friend and companion, my next Color Captain, John W. Watts, who was just ahead of me and marching under the same difficulties as myself. I told the man I had a friend ...
— History of Kershaw's Brigade • D. Augustus Dickert
... not made for murder, yet a glance May murderous prove; and beauty may entrance, More than a syren's or a serpent's eye. And there are moments when a smother'd sigh May hint at comfort and a murmur'd "No" Give signs of "Yes," and Misery's overflow Make tears more precious than we care to tell, Though, one by one, our hopes ...
— A Lover's Litanies • Eric Mackay
... to tell you something when the charms of this Syren made me half-delirious and of course I forgot all else in life—I always do so. Well, as we leave in a few days for the delectable Dolonites, we are making our rounds of P. P. C.'s,—that we are revisiting every nook and corner in the lagoon so dear to us. We invariably ...
— The Spinner's Book of Fiction • Various
... restful in the sound of his strong, good-natured voice, with its slightly protective intonation. They sat there until the luncheon gong rang, and then they rose and walked for a time together. The sun had come out, and the grey sea was changing into blue. The decks were dry. The syren had ceased to blow. The motion of the ship had become soothing, and the spray, which leaped now into the air, sparkled in ...
— The Governors • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... an insiduous foe, silent in its progress, sapping first the secret springs of life, but yet diffusing hopefulness, ever whispering in syren voice, of coming health and happiness, often adding a deeper crimson to the cheek and a brighter ...
— Withered Leaves from Memory's Garland • Abigail Stanley Hanna
... be made on what is required to perfect Man, and place him in that superior position for which he was designed, than by the interpretation of Bacon upon the legends of the Syren coast "When the wise Ulysses passed," says he, "he caused his mariners to stop their ears, with wax, knowing there was in them no power to resist the lure of that voluptuous song. But he, the much experienced man, who wished to be experienced in all, and use all to the service of ...
— Woman in the Ninteenth Century - and Kindred Papers Relating to the Sphere, Condition - and Duties, of Woman. • Margaret Fuller Ossoli
... fortunately, was clear and calm. At noon Gissing blew the syren, fired a rocket from the bridge, and swung the engine telegraph to STOP. The ship's orchestra, by his orders, struck up a rollicking air. Quickly and without confusion, amid cries of Women and children first! the passengers filed to their allotted places. The crew and officers ...
— Where the Blue Begins • Christopher Morley
... captured a few weeks before from the enemy, and manned her with seventy volunteers, chiefly from his own crew. He sailed from Syracuse on the 3d of February, 1804, accompanied by the United States brig Syren, Lieutenant Stewart, who was to aid with his boats, and to receive the crew of the ketch, in case it should be found expedient to use her as ...
— Thrilling Stories Of The Ocean • Marmaduke Park
... that she doth me fly, Or was I hatched in the river Nile? Or doth my Chloris stand in doubt that I With syren songs do seek her to beguile? If any one of these she can object 'Gainst me, which chaste affected love protest, Then might my fortunes by her frowns be checked, And blameless she from scandal free might rest. But seeing I am no hideous monster born, But have that shape which ...
— Elizabethan Sonnet Cycles - Idea, by Michael Drayton; Fidessa, by Bartholomew Griffin; Chloris, by William Smith • Michael Drayton, Bartholomew Griffin, and William Smith
... with her, and came within earshot of her syren, which was sending frightened useless blares across the churning waters, there was no being blind to the true facts any longer. This was no cargo boat, but a passenger liner; outward bound, too, and populous. And as they came still nearer, they saw her after-decks ...
— A Master of Fortune • Cutcliffe Hyne
... to pray. Here at a pine-press'd hill's embroider'd base I stood, and hail'd the Genius of the place. Then was it doom'd by fate, my idle heart, Soften'd by Nature, gave access to Art; The Muse approach'd, her syren-song I heard, Her magic felt, and all her charms revered: E'er since she rules in absolute control, And Mira only dearer to my soul. Ah! tell me not these empty joys to fly, If they deceive, I would deluded die; To the fond themes my ...
— Inebriety and the Candidate • George Crabbe
... as blow the gales, On the roses in the south. O mine to guide thee far From ruddy coral bar, From horizon to horizon thou shalt glimmer like a star; Thou shalt lean upon my breast, And I shall rest, And murmur in thy sails, Such fond tales, That thy finest cords Will, syren-like, chant back my mellow words With such renew'd enchantment unto me That I shall be, By my own ...
— Old Spookses' Pass • Isabella Valancy Crawford
... to enchant you more, view everywhere [ye About the roof a Syren in a sphere, As we think, singing to the din Of many a warbling cherubin: List, oh list! how Even heaven gives up his soul between you now, [ye Mark how thousand Cupids fly To light their Tapers at the Bride's ...
— The Hesperides & Noble Numbers: Vol. 1 and 2 • Robert Herrick
... Rattler made a rattling voyage of it, and did some service; how much does not appear. But this is not all. In 1819, the same house fitted out a discovery whale ship of their own, to go on a tasting cruise to the remote waters of Japan. That ship—well called the "Syren"—made a noble experimental cruise; and it was thus that the great Japanese Whaling Ground first became generally known. The Syren in this famous voyage was commanded by ...
— Moby Dick; or The Whale • Herman Melville
... where are they? Those golden times by memory cherished? O, Syren, sing no more that lay, Or sing till I ...
— Victorian Songs - Lyrics of the Affections and Nature • Various
... ship, the junior member, gave three defiant shrieks with her syren and slid under the surface with her colours flying. For over two hours the others manoeuvred to get one on each side of the submarines to enable them to get the few shells remaining in their magazines home on the target, but so great was ...
— Submarine Warfare of To-day • Charles W. Domville-Fife
... Bastille were constantly filled, during the syren reign of la Pompadour over the gloomy affections ...
— The Stranger in France • John Carr
... to my great woe. Stay, stay thy weary course, and let me lead, A happy wooer, to the flowery mead Where all that beauty snar'd me."—"Cruel god, Desist! or my offended mistress' nod Will stagnate all thy fountains:—tease me not With syren words—Ah, have I really got Such power to madden thee? And is it true— Away, away, or I shall dearly rue 960 My very thoughts: in mercy then away, Kindest Alpheus, for should I obey My own dear ...
— Endymion - A Poetic Romance • John Keats
... look in the fair face of their stepmother without crying aloud for fear; and how at last he discovered, to his horror and dismay, that he had wedded a fearful creature, half wolf, half woman, combining the seductions of the syren with the cruel voracity of the brute. There was something about Maud Bruce to remind one of that horrible myth, even now, now at her gentlest and softest, while she clung round a sorrowing father, by ...
— M. or N. "Similia similibus curantur." • G.J. Whyte-Melville
... admit abnormality has always had a strong attraction for me, and originality is at least not commonplace. (The syren of a steamer is heard.) What ...
— The Road to Damascus - A Trilogy • August Strindberg
... years of our friendship. The look and the tone of her voice moved me. I expressed my sympathy and my readiness to do anything in my power to snatch the infatuated boy from the claw and fang of the syren and hale him to the forgiving feet of Maisie Ellerton. Indeed, such a chivalrous adventure had vaguely passed through my mind during my exalted mood at Murglebed-on-Sea. But then I knew little beyond the fact that Dale was fluttering ...
— Simon the Jester • William J. Locke
... her brother, and then embarked with her niece and Puccia in a boat. But when they were some way out at sea, whilst the sailors were asleep, she threw Marziella into the water; and just as the poor girl was on the point of being drowned there came a most beautiful syren, who took her in her arms and ...
— Stories from Pentamerone • Giambattista Basile
... academician of the Institute, there is sometimes a rich pouting sound, a sort of velvety and oily intonation, that distinguishes the speech of the women of high birth such as I never heard in any other country. It is not to be defined: but whoso has drunk in the golden tones of such a syren, will know what I mean. Moonlight! yes, 'tis a pleasing word, by its signification and its associated ideas, if not by its own innate harmony: yes; I have learned the full influence and sweetness of moonlight, whether in the summer woodland or in the wintry cloister; true, there is ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 61, No. 378, April, 1847 • Various
... knights errant, in the times of Merlin and the good King Arthur, who, while ranging the world in quest of adventures, were bewitched by lovely wood fairies or were lulled into delicious slumber by some syren's song, or were shut up in pleasant durance in enchanted castles. Accounts of similar character are found, even in the pages of grave chroniclers of modern date, to say nothing of what books of fiction tell, and what we observe with our own eyes, in the ...
— Adele Dubois - A Story of the Lovely Miramichi Valley in New Brunswick • Mrs. William T. Savage
... Ah! beauty Syren, fair inchanting good, Sweet silent rhetoric of persuading eyes; Dumb eloquence whose power doth move the blood, More than the words or wisdom of the wife; Still harmony whose diapason lies, Within a brow; the key which passions move, ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) - Volume I. • Theophilus Cibber
... and will, sir. Since you provoke me with your impudence, And laughter of your light land-syren here, Your ...
— Volpone; Or, The Fox • Ben Jonson
... whom she soon discovered was well able to form one—accompanied by an assurance that the dream of fame which her wild imagination had formed should certainly be realized, gave him a large power over her confidence. Her passion was sway—the sway of mind over mind—of genius over sympathy—of the syren Genius over the subject Love. It was this passion which had made her proud, which had filled her mind with visions, and yielded to her a world by itself, and like no other, filled with all forms of worship and attraction; chivalrous faith, unflagging zeal, generous confidence, ...
— Charlemont • W. Gilmore Simms
... relief to the colony. The Recollect villages and missions being in the very midst of the Moro territory are the worst afflicted by that scourge. Their pitiful petitions for aid fall on deaf ears, for at Manila, self interest rules, and trade is the syren of the hour, not religion. The Recollects, too, are not without their martyrs for the faith as the result of Moro persecutions, while others succumb to the hardships ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 - Volume 41 of 55, 1691-1700 • Various
... charms of wit and fancy, long The muse has pleas'd us with her syren song; But weak of reason, and deprav'd of mind, Too oft on vile, ignoble themes we find The wanton muse her sacred art debase, Forgetful of her birth, and heavenly race; Too oft her flatt'ring songs to sin intice, And in false colours deck delusive vice; Too oft she condescends, ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) - Vol. IV • Theophilus Cibber
... break the spell that fascinates you. Merlin will emancipate himself from Vivien, before she learn his secret, and dance with it down the wood, leaving him dishonoured and ashamed. But, within an hour, the Syren is again singing her dulcet notes, and drawing the ship closer and closer to the rocks, with their black teeth, waiting to grind it to splinters. Oh that there might come to you the voice that spoke with such power to Augustine, and that like him you might now and here yield yourself ...
— John the Baptist • F. B. Meyer
... dark on thy soft hand I hung, And heard the tempting syren in thy tongue, What flames, what darts, what anguish I endured! But when the candle entered ...
— The Humourous Poetry of the English Language • James Parton
... calmed down somewhat. We were about to surface and give her the gun, when luckily Alten took a good sweep round with the skyscraper and discovered one of those wretched little airships about a mile away, coming towards the steamer, which was wailing piteously, on her syren. ...
— The Diary of a U-boat Commander • Anon
... was creeping up from the sea and through it there came the long call of a distant syren. The waves were no longer roaring along the shore. The sound of them came muffled and vague, and she knew that the storm ...
— The Obstacle Race • Ethel M. Dell
... traitor pines, you sang what life has found The falsest of fair tales. Earth blew a far-horn prelude all around, That native music of her forest home, While from the sea's blue fields and syren dales Shadows and light noon spectres of the foam Riding the summer gales On aery viols plucked an ...
— Poems of To-Day: an Anthology • Various
... affection? I have discovered when too late that she has flattered my fond heart with her insidious wiles. I loved her once, I despise her now. She has got rid of her child, and she is now trying to dispose of me also. Ah! the syren that she is! No longer shall I breathe her name but with feelings of hatred and disgust. Ah! that villain too, who is leading her headlong to her own ruin! I hate him also. His affection towards me as a friend and companion has only served as a mantle to cover his ...
— The Black-Sealed Letter - Or, The Misfortunes of a Canadian Cockney. • Andrew Learmont Spedon
... discern what sort of humanity our government is to learn from these syren singers. Our government also, I admit with some reason, as a step towards the proposed fraternity, is required to abjure the unjust hatred which it bears to this body, of honour and virtue. I thank God I am neither a minister nor a leader of opposition. ...
— Selections from the Speeches and Writings of Edmund Burke. • Edmund Burke
... look, and read it partially. He saw her longing gaze outwards upon the free, broad world, and thought that the syren waters, whose deadly music yet rang in her ears, were again tempting her. He called her to him, praying that his ...
— Ruth • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... in its mouth, engraved in pyrites, and mount it in a silver ring, and carry it with you, everybody will invite you to be his guest, and people will feast you much and frequently. The figure of a syren, sculptured in a jacinth, rendered the bearer invisible. A fair head, well combed, with a handsome face, engraved on a gem, gave to the bearer joy, reverence, and honour. Such were the qualities attached to ancient ...
— Rambles of an Archaeologist Among Old Books and in Old Places • Frederick William Fairholt
... (1866), is essentially a Neapolitan, and rarely remains long absent from the city, on the shore of that magical sea, where once Ulysses sailed, and where sometimes yet (near Amalfi) we may hear the Syrens sing their song. But more wonderful than the song of any Syren seems to me the Theory of Aesthetic as the Science of Expression, and that is why I have overcome the obstacles that stood between me and the giving of this theory, which in my belief is the ...
— Aesthetic as Science of Expression and General Linguistic • Benedetto Croce
... felicity, There comes an almost endless train From the deep founts of Memory, Of pleasing pictures which retain Poetic colors lich and rare. Yet fearing they might make me vain, I breathe to God this fervent prayer: Lord, shield me well, From potent spell Of syren Pleasures, and ...
— The Emigrant Mechanic and Other Tales In Verse - Together With Numerous Songs Upon Canadian Subjects • Thomas Cowherd
... serpents doe resemble thee; That daungerous eye-killing Cockatrice, Th' inchaunting Syren, which doth so entice, The weeping Crocodile; these vile pernicious three. The Basiliske his nature takes from thee, Who for my life in secret wait do'st lye, And to my heart send'st poyson from thine eye: Thus ...
— Minor Poems of Michael Drayton • Michael Drayton
... who sin? Bound in the tempter's snare, Whom syren pleasure beckons in To prisons of despair; Whose hearts, by passions torn, Are wrecked on folly's shore;— But why in sorrow should we mourn For those who ...
— Hymns for Christian Devotion - Especially Adapted to the Universalist Denomination • J.G. Adams
... crags of the sierra, on fearsome dizzy trails, in the somber shadows of virgin forests, in the rustling of wind-blown leaves (the seductive swish of elfin skirts) she heard the voices of Juno's sylvan train. Enchanted she listened to the syren's call, and ere the echo died within her ear she had devoted her talent to literature, a priestess self-ordained in Arizona's temple of ...
— Tales of Aztlan • George Hartmann
... happiness which might have accrued to him from this source was dashed by his thoughts of Marian Leslie. Why had he thrown himself in the way of that syren? Why had he left Mount Pleasant at all? He knew that on his return to Spanish Town his first work would be to visit Shandy Hall; and yet he felt that of all places in the island, Shandy Hall was the last which he ought ...
— Miss Sarah Jack, of Spanish Town, Jamaica • Anthony Trollope
... singing. It was the hymn of the Marseillaise. I went up towards the sound and found a party of young Frenchmen standing aft, waving farewells to England, as the syren hooted, above a rattle of chains and the crash of the gangway which dropped to the quayside. They had been called back to their country to defend its soil and, unlike the Englishmen drinking themselves fuddled, were ...
— The Soul of the War • Philip Gibbs
... those witching notes, The art of syren choirs; Hush the seductive voice that floats Across ...
— The Lost Stradivarius • John Meade Falkner
... cultivate the intelligence. Man, knowing he is to die, will not sacrifice the present enjoyment for a greater one in the future. The love of woman cannot die out; and it has a terrible and uncontrollable fate, increased by the refinements of civilization. Woman is the veritable syren or goddess of the young. But society can be improved; and free government is possible for States; and freedom of thought and conscience is no longer wholly utopian. Already we see that Emperors prefer to be elected by ...
— Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry • Albert Pike
... on the damp young bracken and listened to the stillness that was only pierced by the rare wail of a syren far out to sea and the steady moan of the horn from the lighthouse. He felt as dead as the world seemed, as grey, as lost to all rousing; and, ignorant of reactions, wondered why, and whether henceforth he ...
— Secret Bread • F. Tennyson Jesse
... my beloved, but I confess with a sigh that I am in doubt. I even fear for them and for ourselves. Destiny smiles before us, hope chaunts sweet music—but destiny is a sea—hope but a sea-syren; deceitful is the calm of the one, fatal are the promises of the other. All appears to aid our union—but are we yet together? I know not why, lovely Mary, but a chill penetrates my breast, amid the warm fountains of future bliss, and the idea of our meeting ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol. 53, No. 331, May, 1843 • Various
... itself from the clinging gondolas, and slowly glided out and away. And all the gondolas followed, with the soft plash of many oars, on and on, after the swinging lanterns and the syren voice. ...
— A Venetian June • Anna Fuller
... stout men were awanting for this Crusade. And he knew Sir Guy when he came to the camp yon by Tunis, and spake with him; moreover, he went in the train of him of Almayne to Viterbo, and had speech again with Sir Simon, who gave him this scroll. And if you will meet him at the Syren's Rock to-night, my Lord Richard, he will bring you to those who will conduct you to Sir Guy's brave castle, where he laughs kings and counts to scorn! We have the guard, and will see you safe past the gates ...
— The Prince and the Page • Charlotte M. Yonge
... affection." This "new affection"—the love of Christ—in its turn expelled the worldliness and unrest which existed, and gave a tone to her mental and spiritual nature, which, by steady degrees, lifted her up, and caused her to forget the syren song of earth. Not all at once,—in the story of her newborn earnestness we shall find that the habits and associations of her daily life sometimes acted as drawbacks to her progress in faith. But the seed having once taken root in that youthful heart, germinated, developed, ...
— Elizabeth Fry • Mrs. E. R. Pitman |
