"Witching" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... still shall last the dreadful chase, Till time itself shall have an end; By day, they scour earth's caverned space; At midnight's witching ...
— Hero Tales and Legends of the Rhine • Lewis Spence
... passions swell For Estelle! How I love my actions tell Thee, Estelle: That I love thy smiling face, And thy captivating grace— Love thy dreamy 'witching eyes More than planets ...
— The Sylvan Cabin - A Centenary Ode on the Birth of Lincoln and Other Verse • Edward Smyth Jones
... turned away To gaze upon a poet's home; 'Twas near the close of that bright day, And golden sunlight on it shone; Perfume of flowers, and birds' songs low A witching spell about ...
— Within the Golden Gate - A Souvenir of San Fransisco Bay • Laura Young Pinney
... through the clustering group, continued his course until he reached the cab-stand near the Marble Arch, when he engaged a vehicle and ordered to be driven to Leicester Square. That quarter of the town exhibits an animated scene toward the witching hour; many lights and much population, illuminated coffee-houses, the stir of a large theatre, bands of music in the open air, and other sounds, most of them gay, and some festive. The stranger, whose ...
— Lothair • Benjamin Disraeli
... wi' toil an' pain, May plunge an' plunge the kirn in vain; For oh! the yellow treasure's ta'en By witching skill; An' dawtet, twal-pint Hawkie's gaen As ...
— The Mysteries of All Nations • James Grant
... Louise! In woody wold She met a huntsman fair and bold; His baldrick was of silk and gold, And many a witching tale he ...
— The Fair Maid of Perth • Sir Walter Scott
... had so madly loved. The music gave life and being to these memories, and its glamour brought back the dead from her grave! He remembered how he had asked her if she loved him, and how, avoiding the words so difficult to speak, she had answered with the witching tones of her violin. Oh, that heavenly evening hour upon the balcony! She had said, "Love has its own language: come and listen." And Christina said SHE HAD NOT LOVED! He could not, would ...
— Joseph II. and His Court • L. Muhlbach
... the abolition of those social, if unsalubrious, repasts. I wonder at such regrets no longer, if I cannot share them. There is surely an hilarious informality about these media-nochi that attaches to no antecedent feast; the freedom of a picnic, without its manifold inconveniences: as the witching hour draws nearer, the "brightest eyes that ever have shone" glitter yet more gloriously, till in their nearer and dearer splendor a Chaldean would forget the stars; and the "sweetest lips that ever were kissed" sip the ...
— Border and Bastille • George A. Lawrence
... heard stories of mummies that rose from their sleep of centuries to tell the fate of some one when it was hanging in the balance, of mummies that groaned and gurgled and fought for breath, frantically beating with their swathed hands in the witching hours of the night. And I knew that the lure of these mummies was so strong for some people that they were drawn irresistibly to look upon and confer with them. Was this a case for the oculists, the spiritualists, the Egyptologists, or for ...
— The Dream Doctor • Arthur B. Reeve
... for a moment, and then continued, "Well, my attentive friend, 'the witching hour' approaches. We lost too much time in discussion this evening—What! only ten o'clock?" he said, looking at his watch. "Well, I am at a good resting-place in the story, anyway, as you will to-morrow evening admit. Why, if I started you up into those mountains ...
— A Strange Discovery • Charles Romyn Dake
... cloth'd; The stagnant pools frequenting: or describe Thy daughter's change, on waving pinions borne; Who lengthen'd age obtain'd, on lofty towers Safe dwelling: or of Nais, who the youths With magic works, and potent witching words To silent fishes turn'd; till she the same Vile transformation suffer'd: or the tree, Which once in clusters white its berries bore, Now blood besprinkled, growing black. This tale Most novel, pleas'd ...
— The Metamorphoses of Publius Ovidus Naso in English blank verse Vols. I & II • Ovid
... affair of this kind—smiled upon the willing and ready-looking fellow; not exactly at him, but as it were in his direction, you know; and he caught the faint glint of sunshine on her lips, and then—but in the witching hour when the twilight and sunlight kiss and part, after the smile and look of recognition everyone knows ...
— Fair to Look Upon • Mary Belle Freeley
... of space Is hid that beauteous, witching face? Where shines that star, which, boding ills, My trembling heart ...
— The Exemplary Novels of Cervantes • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... The witching hour of twilight was chosen for this crude but solemn trial, and at the time appointed a large crowd was gathered in the great courtyard of Haddon in obedience to a mandate of the King of the Peak, which ...
— Heiress of Haddon • William E. Doubleday
... one of the most beautiful, serene, witching places that ever was seen. High overhead are ranges of green rustling arches; through which the sun's rays come down to you in sparkles. You seem to be wandering through illimitable halls of pillars; everywhere you catch glimpses of stately aisles, intersecting each ...
— Omoo: Adventures in the South Seas • Herman Melville
... felt conscious had often, since he first met this fair daughter of the wilds, been lurking within. But, though he thus resolved and reasoned the intruding feeling into nothing, yet he felt he would not like to have Avis Gurley know how often the sparkling countenance and witching smile of this new and beautiful face had been found mingling themselves with the previously exclusive images of his dreams. But, if they did so before this second interview, would they do it less now? His head resolutely answered, "Yes, less, till they ...
— Gaut Gurley • D. P. Thompson
... receptacle for such a mind. A face all softness, seemed and was the index to a heart all pity. Taller than her compeers,—in all she said or did, a native dignity and a witching grace were exquisitely blended. She was one not easily seen without admiration; but when known, clung Cydippe-like to the heart's mirror, an image over which neither time ...
— A Love Story • A Bushman
... it not. Doubt nothing that gives promise of a care. Right handsome dames there are in Lancashire, Whence called their women, witches!—witching things! I know a dozen families in which You'd meet a courtesy worthy of a bow. I'll ...
— The Love-Chase • James Sheridan Knowles
... after all, would life be given. Perhaps a corpse would be re-animated; galvanism had given token of such things: perhaps the component parts of a creature might be manufactured, brought together, and endued with vital warmth. Night waned upon this talk; and even the witching hour had gone by, before we retired to rest. When I placed my head upon my pillow, I did not sleep, nor could I be said to think. My imagination, unbidden, possessed and guided me, gifting the successive images that arose in my mind with a vividness far beyond the usual bounds ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 1, April, 1851 • Various
... purpose. What would become then of the unfortunate people on board? Poor Dr Cuff! I thought of him more than any one. He was a friend in whom I could place perfect confidence, and had so often been my companion that I thought more of his fate than of that of anybody else on board. While I stood witching the far-distant conflagration, I felt a stronger puff of wind on my cheek than had for some time been blowing. It rapidly increased, but it blew off the land. After I had waited some time till I thought I ought to go back to assist Tommy in keeping up the fire, ...
— My First Voyage to Southern Seas • W.H.G. Kingston
... has ceased to tinkle the herd to rest; they have all paced across the heath. Is not this the witching time of night? The waters murmur, and fall with more than mortal music, and spirits of peace walk abroad to calm the agitated breast. Eternity is in these moments; worldly cares melt into the airy stuff that dreams are made of; and reveries, mild and enchanting as the first hopes of love, or the ...
— Mary Wollstonecraft • Elizabeth Robins Pennell
... of these Thomas mistakes was with "The Witching Hour." It was about the only time that he permitted his own decision to be swayed by outside influence, and it ...
— Charles Frohman: Manager and Man • Isaac Frederick Marcosson and Daniel Frohman
... now the very witching time of night, When churchyards yawn, and hell itself breathes out Contagion to this world: Now could I drink hot blood, And do such bitter business[106] as the day Would quake to look on. Soft! now to my mother. O, heart, lose not thy nature; let not ever The soul of Nero enter ...
— Hamlet • William Shakespeare
... break the stilly night's repose. The seamen list once more, As from her bower, There fall those witching sounds they've heard before, In days long gone, from Ragnor's lofty tower. When hearts with voices blend what ...
— Rowena & Harold - A Romance in Rhyme of an Olden Time, of Hastyngs and Normanhurst • Wm. Stephen Pryer
... and hollows of the sand-dunes, to the right the rocky shore with its inky shadows and its crystalline coves. Rilla and her partner swung in among the dancers; she drew a long breath of delight; what witching music Ned Burr of the Upper Glen was coaxing from his fiddle—it was really like the magical pipes of the old tale which compelled all who heard them to dance. How cool and fresh the gulf breeze blew; how white and wonderful ...
— Rilla of Ingleside • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... farms in the new colony, and soon fell captive to the charms of the Cree girls. Now and again the history of the simple-hearted Scots was repeated; and a coureur was presently seen to bring a shy, witching Saulteux maiden from the tents of the Jumping Indians. But the French, it must be said, were not so dilettante in their taste for beauty as were their Scottish brethren; yet, as a rule, their wives ...
— The Story of Louis Riel: The Rebel Chief • Joseph Edmund Collins
... witching hour of night. Luna illumines my chamber, and falls upon my sleepless pillow. By her light I am inditing these words to thee, my Algernon. My brave and beautiful, my soul's lord! when shall the time come when the tedious night shall not separate us, nor the blessed day? Twelve! one! two! I have heard ...
— Memoirs of Mr. Charles J. Yellowplush - The Yellowplush Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray
... descried, The Sultan's daughter, witching fair; Love's high control was not denied— He sought to gain the beauty rare. Before the Sultan lowly bent His mother, and the jewels spread; The Prince, astonished, gave consent, ...
— Aladdin or The Wonderful Lamp • Anonymous
... the hand of destiny—through a veil. He offered himself to Miss Dale last night, about between the witching hours of twelve ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... rising up from his "wallowing in the mire," and supposes that he shall soon regain his primitive condition of temperance. But the sin is strong; for the appetite that feeds it is in his blood. Temptation with its witching solicitation comes before the will,—the weak, self-enslaved will. He aspires to resist, but will not; the spirit would soar, but the flesh will creep; the spirit has the wish, but the flesh has the will; the man longs to be sober, ...
— Sermons to the Natural Man • William G.T. Shedd
... Woe for the 'witching look of that fair face! The port where ease with dignity combined! Woe for those accents' that each savage mind To softness tuned, to noblest thoughts the base! And the sweet smile, from whence the dart I trace, Which now leaves death my only hope behind! Exalted soul, most fit on thrones to 've ...
— Song and Legend From the Middle Ages • William D. McClintock and Porter Lander McClintock
... me Aid to stay the witching tone, Art to pain the beauteous picture Ere its impress swift has flown. * * ...
— Debris - Selections from Poems • Madge Morris
... flutter that night. Chapman's house was brilliantly lighted, and carriages began to arrive and set down their gaily-attired occupants ere St. Paul's clock had struck nine. Then there was such a tripping of delicately turned little feet, such a flashing of underskirts, such a witching of perfumed silks and satins, such a display of white arms and white shoulders, as each bevy of beauties vaulted up the steps and were bowed into the house by the polite Mr. Bowles. Bowles felt himself an important element ...
— The Von Toodleburgs - Or, The History of a Very Distinguished Family • F. Colburn Adams
... velvet bed, and had to be examined and sighed over; and Abbie's diamond pin in the jewel-case also demanded attention—then there were some blue and gold volumes to be peeped at, and Longfellow received more than a peep; then, most witching of all, "Say and Seal," in two volumes—the very books Sadie had borrowed once, and returned, before Ester had a chance to discover how Faith managed about the ring. Longfellow and the Bible slid on the table together, and ...
— Ester Ried • Pansy (aka. Isabella M. Alden)
... ethereal light shimmers like a bridal veil adorning a wood nymph. It lays its gentle touch on the waterfall, transforming it into a torrent of molten silver, and causing each drop to glisten like topaz under its witching light. ...
— Byways Around San Francisco Bay • William E. Hutchinson
... to my great joy, my lord the Duke rose and made as though he were departing; whereupon the false image vanished, and I beheld Ann giving her hand with a witching smile to Junker Henning, that he might ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... wind, With thunder, and with blinding lightning flung In jagged javelins of purple wrath From splitting skies; sometimes with wiles and words Fair-sounding, 'mid hushed leaves and softened airs From shapes of witching beauty; wanton songs, Whispers of love; sometimes with royal allures Of proffered rule; sometimes with mocking doubts, Making truth vain. But whether these befell Without and visible, or whether Buddh Strove with fell spirits ...
— The Light of Asia • Sir Edwin Arnold
... Derby was still new to her dignities, Eliza O'Neill was beginning to prattle in the most charming brogue ever heard across the Irish Channel, and to grow through beautiful childhood to witching girlhood. The daughter of a strolling actor who led his company of buskers through every county in Ireland from Cork to Donegal, the love of things theatrical was in her veins; and while she was still playing with her dolls she was impersonating ...
— Love Romances of the Aristocracy • Thornton Hall
... darling's portrait As his sweet eyes searched my face— Hair of gold and eyes of azure, Form of childish, witching grace. ...
— Poems Teachers Ask For, Book Two • Various
... you will," she said feverishly. "You will take me there. We will go there instead of where you said—instead of the green waters." Her eyes were wild and witching. ...
— Merely Mary Ann • Israel Zangwill
... whom flattery of this sort rather angered than soothed, "I have much yet to prepare. I leave your Highness to fairer homage and more witching counsels than mine." So saying, he kissed the king's hand, and was retiring, when he remembered his kinsman, whose humble interests in the midst of more exciting topics he had hitherto forgotten, and added, "May I ...
— The Last Of The Barons, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... oversea, and the strange tongues and the hermit peoples. Learn before you die to follow the Piper's Son, and though your old bones bleach among grey rocks, what matter if you have had your bellyful of life and come to your heart's desire?" And the tune fell low and witching, bringing tears to the eyes and joy to the heart; and the man knew (though no one told him) that this was the first part of the Rime, the Song of the Open Road, the Lilt of the Adventurer, which shall be now and ever and ...
— The Moon Endureth—Tales and Fancies • John Buchan
... permanent and magnified Earl's Court Exhibition, summer Blackpool and August-Bank-Holiday-Hampstead-Heath, which New York supports for its beguilement. In this domain of switchbacks and chutes, merry-go-rounds and shooting-galleries, dancing-halls and witching waves, vociferous and crowded and lit by a million lamps, I came suddenly upon the Pig Slide and had a new conception of what quadrupeds ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 159, August 4th, 1920 • Various
... with tender Silvery light Luna peeps the clouds between, And 'spite of dark disastrous night The radiant sun is also seen When the wavelets murmuring flow When oak and ivy clinging grow, Then, O then, in that witching hour Let us meet in ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VIII • Various
... dusk, twilight, eleventh hour; sunset, sundown; going down of the sun, cock-shut, dewy eve, gloaming, bedtime. afternoon, postmeridian, p.m. autumn, fall, fall of the leaf; autumnal equinox; Indian summer, St. Luke's summer, St. Martin's summer. midnight; dead of night, witching hour, witching hour of night, witching time of night; winter; killing time. Adj. vespertine, autumnal, nocturnal. Phr. midnight, the outpost of advancing day [Longfellow]; sable-vested Night [Milton]; this gorgeous arch with golden ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... cat-bird first, with witching low song, eying me closely with that calm, dark eye of his, the while he poured ...
— Little Brothers of the Air • Olive Thorne Miller
... one I'd rather have," said Big Bill, honestly, and so Father Neptune strode majestically to his seat at the head of the table, and at his right sat primly, fluttering Aunt Adelaide, instead of the witching sprite he had ...
— Patty's Butterfly Days • Carolyn Wells
... who are fond of bed-reading Trollope should ever be a favourite, and it is no small compliment to say this, for small is the noble army of authors who have given us books which can enchant in the witching hour between waking and slumber. It is probable that all lovers of letters have their favourite bed-books. Thackeray has charmingly told us of his. Of the few novels that can really be enjoyed when the reader is settling down for slumber almost all have been set forth by writers who—consciously ...
— The Three Clerks • Anthony Trollope
... to disguise his love of the good things of this world under the semblance of a sanctified exterior. The friar and Matilda had often sung duets together, and had been accustomed to the baron's chiming in with a stormy capriccio, which was usually charmed into silence by some sudden turn in the witching melodies of Matilda. They had therefore naturally calculated, as far as their wild spirits calculated at all, on the same effects from the same causes. But the circumstances of the preceding day had made an essential alteration in the case. The baron knew well, from the intelligence ...
— Maid Marian • Thomas Love Peacock
... streams, The streams in sunbeams flashing, The murm'ring streams, the gentle streams, The streams down mountains dashing, Have been the theme Of poets' dream, And, in wild witching story, Have been renowned for love's fond scenes, Or some great ...
— War Poetry of the South • Various
... what her witching, luring face promised, she must be very pretty by this time, notwithstanding the peculiar color of her hair—for, between ourselves, if she had been a tradesman's daughter, instead of a young lady of high birth, they would have called ...
— The Wandering Jew, Complete • Eugene Sue
... you'm minded to talk wi' a lonely man an' share his fire, sit ye down an' welcome. Though being of a nat'rally enquiring turn o' mind, I'd like to know what you've been a-doing or who, to be hiding in this wood at this witching ...
— Peregrine's Progress • Jeffery Farnol
... an April sun; When, amid the mirth that salutes the ear, One tone is gone we had used to hear, One form is missed in that happy train, That will never exult in its sports again; We feel that death has indeed passed o'er, And a blank is left, to be filled no more. But though the world and its witching smile, That cheats the heart of its woes awhile, Would prove in its time of deepest need But the frail support of a broken reed, Religion's beam has the magic power To chase the cloud from its darkest hour, To turn the soul from its idols here, And ...
— Heart Utterances at Various Periods of a Chequered Life. • Eliza Paul Kirkbride Gurney
... who had contrived to secure sufficient snoozing, during the odd moments when he was off duty since the morning, to make up for the sleep he had lost by going to the admiral's ball and there meeting the witching houri of his dreams, "that chawming gurl," who had subsequently prevented him from taking his proper rest when he came aboard in the small hours of the ...
— Crown and Anchor - Under the Pen'ant • John Conroy Hutcheson
... careful for the state; Therefore, to your most grave determination I yield myself in all things; and demand What punishment your wisdom shall think meet T' inflict upon those damnable contrivers, Who shall, with potions, charms, and witching drugs, Practise against ...
— Jane Shore - A Tragedy • Nicholas Rowe
... looking into a mirror to discover the particular masculine face which would fill their live's mirrors, though, unhappily some of the potency of the charm was lost because it could not be done upon the witching stroke of midnight. ...
— Peggy Stewart at School • Gabrielle E. Jackson
... the flame. But the more watchful felt that the flame was rather in herself, that she bore about her an impure and scorching heat. The fiery dart with which Satan had pierced her was still there, and, as through a baleful lamp, shot forth a wild, but fearfully witching sheen. Shrinking from her, you would yet stand still, with a strange trouble filling your ...
— La Sorciere: The Witch of the Middle Ages • Jules Michelet
... January 8, with three craftsmen of the town, I painted a pack of cards. They were for a senator, in a hurry. I the diamonds. My queen came forth with eyes like spring violets, hair a golden brown, and witching smile. My fellow-craftsmen saw her, and put their arms round my neck and hailed me master. Oh, noble Germans! No jealousy of a brother-workman: no sour looks at a stranger; and would have me spend Sunday with them after matins; and the merchant paid me so richly as I ...
— The Cloister and the Hearth • Charles Reade
... not please, Gentlemen, Like Etty, Mulready, Maclise; Throbbing romance has waned and wanned; No wizard wields the witching pen Of Bulwer, ...
— Late Lyrics and Earlier • Thomas Hardy
... ages. But poor people are now living in the palaces of noblemen and merchants. These new inhabitants have walled up the fair arched windows and slender portals of the ancient dwellers, spoiling the beauty of the streets without materially changing the architectural masses. In that witching hour when the Italian sunset has faded, and a solemn grey replaces the glowing tones of daffodil and rose, it is not difficult, here dreaming by oneself alone, to picture the old noble life—the ladies moving along those open loggias, the ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Second Series • John Addington Symonds
... hung over the wily singer, and beat the measure as she sang. He pressed closer, and whispered praises in her ear. The courtiers broke in applause, the ladies whispered, and looked wise. The witching dame, not satisfied to win a King, threw her glances at Lord Marmion. The glances were significant, familiar, and told of confidences long and old between the English lord and his countrywoman, guests of a Scotch King, on the eve of a great conflict ...
— The Prose Marmion - A Tale of the Scottish Border • Sara D. Jenkins
... first impression was rather embarrassing. Somehow he felt almost irresistibly invited to laugh, though he had never been much given to risibility. The blending, or rather the juxtaposition, of extremes—a face, a form immediately witching, and a costume odd to grotesquery—had made an assault upon his comprehension at once so sudden and so direct that his dignity came near being disastrously broken up. A splendidly beautiful child comically clad would have ...
— Alice of Old Vincennes • Maurice Thompson
... the dreadful chase Till time itself shall have an end; By day they scour earth's cavern'd space, At midnight's witching hour, ascend. ...
— The Book of Hallowe'en • Ruth Edna Kelley
... the responsive chord when the two minds are in harmony. A man who tries to propose when a servant is expected to arrive with a scuttle of coals, or when the children are just tumbling in from school, is not likely to meet with much {47} favour. We cannot all have the momentous question put in the witching hour of moonlight, or in the suggestive stillness of a summer's eve, but the tactful man will know when to speak, and how to turn dull prose into the ...
— The Etiquette of Engagement and Marriage • G. R. M. Devereux
... Here witching Zi-na-ki[6] oft drag within The waves unwilling Zi-si;[7] here the din Of roars of sullen storms is never known When tempests make the mighty waters groan; Nor sound of strife is heard, but rippling rills, Or softest note ...
— Babylonian and Assyrian Literature • Anonymous
... letter, or if we may draw an inference from her wearing it about her person (probably that she might be able to refresh her memory with its information concerning her cousin), the epistle was either very difficult of comprehension, or it had some witching spell which drew her eyes irresistibly ...
— Fairy Fingers - A Novel • Anna Cora Mowatt Ritchie
... more! Witching dancer be gone! For my heart's a still shore in the hugeness of dawn, And some answer is thrilling, is trembling for me In the eerie still brightness of heaven and sea, And the little ripples whisper, "What thing ...
— Perpetual Light • William Rose Benet
... malicious amusement or some stirrings of pity, drew their breath and gave ground a little. Where was the shrinking, frightened, unbidden guest of a moment before, with downcast eyes and burning cheeks? Here was a proud and easy and radiant lady, with witching eyes and a wonderful smile. "I am only Audrey, your Excellency," she said, and curtsied as she spoke. "My other name lies buried in a valley amongst far-off mountains." She slightly turned, and addressed herself to a portly, velvet-clad gentleman, of a very authoritative air, who, arriving ...
— Audrey • Mary Johnston
... days on end. No bones were broken; the gentleman resigned the position at her behest, and she would genially dance with him the same night. Malice and heartburning were out of the question with a lissom, winsome, witching fairy like this, who played with her life as a child does with soap-bubbles, and who was as elusory and irresponsible as a summer-day rainbow. But one season at Mussoorie Miss Priest contracted an engagement somewhat less evanescent. Mussoorie ...
— Camps, Quarters, and Casual Places • Archibald Forbes
... With every note that sinks and swells, Sadly and slow The warm tears flow In pensive pleasure more than woe, As Mem'ry wakes her witching spells, 'Neath your soft chime, sweet ...
— Poems of the Heart and Home • Mrs. J.C. Yule (Pamela S. Vining)
... exciting scenes they had gone through; but, feeling a calm on their spirits, succeeding the rude interruption produced by Dutton's brutality, they walked out on the cliff, to enjoy the cool air, and the bland scenery of the head-land, at that witching hour. ...
— The Two Admirals • J. Fenimore Cooper
... at leap-frog, or gathered dandelions for our tame rabbits; and, at its western extremity, were still extant the reliques of the deal-seat, at which we used to assemble on autumn evenings to have our round of stories. Many a witching tale and wondrous tradition hath there been told; many a marvel of "figures that visited the glimpses of the moon;" many a recital of heroic and chivalrous enterprise, accomplished ere warriors dwindled away to the ...
— The Life of Mansie Wauch - Tailor in Dalkeith, written by himself • David Macbeth Moir
... place in which Sir Aymer de Valence held an interview with the old sexton; and who now, drawing into a separate corner some of the straggling parties whom he had collected and brought to the church, kept on the alert, and appeared ready for an attack as well at mid-day as at the witching hour of midnight. This was the more necessary, as the eye of Sir John de Walton seemed busied in searching from one place to another, as if unable to find the object he was in quest of, which the reader will easily understand to be the Lady Augusta de Berkely, of whom he had lost sight in ...
— Waverley Volume XII • Sir Walter Scott
... Joe Marion, his pal, by his side, his brow was wrinkled in thought. He was reviewing the events of the previous night. At 1:00 a.m., the witching hour when the crooked ones, the mean ones, come creeping forth like ghosts to carry on doubtful conversations by radio, a strange thing had happened. A message had gone crashing out through space. Wave lengths 1200 meters long sped it on its way. There was power ...
— Curlie Carson Listens In • Roy J. Snell
... By the witching amorous sweetness and the blackness of thine eyes, By the tender flexile softness in thy slender waist that lies, By the graces and the languor of thy body and thy shape, By the fount of wine and honey from thy coral lips that rise, O my hope, to see thine image in my dreams ...
— The Book Of The Thousand Nights And One Night, Volume II • Anonymous
... "the witching hour of noon" that the broad and splendid artery of commerce, to wit, the Euston Road, became, for the nonce, a scene of unwonted, and ever-increasing excitement. Old Plu[1] had promised, as per Admiral FITZROY'S patent hocus-pocusser, to give us a taste of his quality; ...
— Punch, Vol. 99., July 26, 1890. • Various
... flutter about the morning's rosy veil. My design was to reach the abbey of Conques before evening, but instead of going directly towards it over the hills, I preferred to keep as long as possible in the valley of the Lot, which is here of such witching loveliness. As there was a road on the river-bank for many miles, I could follow this fancy, and yet feel the comfort of walking on good ground. Although the season was getting late, I found the valley below Entraygues very rich in ...
— Wanderings by southern waters, eastern Aquitaine • Edward Harrison Barker
... composed]. 'Tis that enamoured nightingale Who thus gives me the reply:— To his partner in the vale Listening on a bough hard by Warbling thus his tuneful wail. Cease, sweet nightingale, nor show By thy softly witching strain Trilling forth thy bliss and woe, How a man might feel love's pain, When a bird can feel his so. No: it was that wanton vine That in fond pursuit has sought The tall tree it doth entwine, Till the green weight it hath brought Makes the noble trunk decline. ...
— The Wonder-Working Magician • Pedro Calderon de la Barca
... to the Dryad's Bubble, where they sat down and talked for a delightful last half hour. Mrs. Morgan wanted to know how the Haunted Wood came by its name, and laughed until she cried when she heard the story and Anne's dramatic account of a certain memorable walk through it at the witching ...
— Anne Of Avonlea • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... see. There was a witching mingling of the frank, the childlike, and the womanly, in her troubled face; frankness that would not deny the truth that her monitor seemed to have read, a childlike simplicity of shame that he should have divined it, and a womanly self-respect that owned it had nothing to be ashamed of. These were ...
— Hills of the Shatemuc • Susan Warner
... pretty well inclined for a lark, you may guess. There are no lamps in the streets of Kingston, and as all the decent part of the community are in their cavies by half— past nine in the evening, and as it was now "the witching time o' night," there was not a soul in the streets that we saw, except a solitary town guard now and then, lurking about some dark corner under the piazzas. These same streets, which were wide and comfortable enough ...
— Tom Cringle's Log • Michael Scott
... when the cheery blaze was crackling in the witching hour of yarn telling, the seasoned habitues of the camp would direct the eye of the newcomer to a little glint of light high up upon the mountain, and edify him with dark tales of a lonesome draft dodger who had challenged that tangled profusion of tree and ...
— Tom Slade on Mystery Trail • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... witching art, Who touches at his will the kindly human heart, 'Till it throbs with joy like pain and tears begin to start; He so tenderly touched ours With his melting magic powers, Made feelings which he felt within our bosoms spring, Where he wished for Scotia's ...
— Verses and Rhymes by the way • Nora Pembroke
... apparently at ease. But Cupid drew her thoughts to higher things, Than merely graving what from fancy springs. Her lover and the place, at once assured, That such a secret would be well secured; A tempting bait, which made her, with regret, Resist the witching ...
— The Tales and Novels, Complete • Jean de La Fontaine
... Tattiana thanks to all returned, But, when Oneguine's turn came round, The maiden's weary eye which yearned, Her agitation and distress Aroused in him some tenderness. He bowed to her nor silence broke, But somehow there shone in his look The witching light of sympathy; I know not if his heart felt pain Or if he meant to flirt again, From habit or maliciously, But kindness from his eye had beamed ...
— Eugene Oneguine [Onegin] - A Romance of Russian Life in Verse • Aleksandr Sergeevich Pushkin
... carrier to take in the morning, threw up his window and leant out into the night, and watched the light clouds swimming over the moon, and the silver mist folding the water-meadows and willows in its soft cool mantle. His thoughts were such as will occur to any reader who has passed the witching age of twenty; and the scent of the heliotrope-bed in the flower-garden below, seemed to rise very strongly on the ...
— Tom Brown at Oxford • Thomas Hughes
... particular attention to his remark; they were too deeply engrossed in the Senior Surgeon. And the House Surgeon, watching, saw the profile of the Youngest and Prettiest Trustee become even prettier as it blushed and turned in witching eagerness toward the man who was rising to address the meeting. The other profile had turned rigid and white ...
— The Primrose Ring • Ruth Sawyer
... sea, Low voiced, she sang. So sweet the idle song, She said, "From Paradise, forgotten long, It comes. An elfin echo that doth rise Upward from summer seas to bending skies. In coming days, from any earthly shore It shall not fail. And sweet forever more Shall make my memory. That witching strain Pale Lilith's love shall lightly breathe again. And Lilith's bitter loss and olden pain O'er every cradle wake that sweet refrain. My memory still shall bloom. It cannot die ...
— Lilith - The Legend of the First Woman • Ada Langworthy Collier
... Loses all his pretty smiles; He says they're very far away; At least a hundred miles. He looks as sober as a judge, As stately as a king, As solemn as a parson and As still as anything. And then our little Bertie, The witching willow bringing, Sends all the smiles safe home again, By waving ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, Nov 1877-Nov 1878 - No 1, Nov 1877 • Various
... were held, sometimes in the daytime and sometimes at the dead of night. Notices were sent to obnoxious persons warning them to stop certain practices. If warning failed, something more convincing was tried. Fright was the emotion most commonly stirred. A horseman, at the witching hour of midnight, would ride up to the house of some offender, lift his head gear, take off a skull, and hand it to the trembling victim with the request that he hold it for a few minutes. Frequently violence was employed either officially or unofficially by ...
— History of the United States • Charles A. Beard and Mary R. Beard
... eye, Take to itself a female form, And hover toward me from on high, As fall the leaves in Autumn storm. Her dress was like the mantle fair Which Autumn to Columbia brings, And bids the moaning forest wear, With rainbow hues of angel's wings; Her voice was like the witching strain Which laughing streamlets gayly sing When Summer o'er the ripening grain Spreads wide her ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 5 November 1848 • Various
... a Strasburg pie and dealt out its toothsome contents, and the Teutons, whose favorite tipple had been beer, kept up a fusillade of champagne corks as they filled the glasses of their fair partners. After the supper, the guests returned to the spacious parlors, where, to the witching strains of the Marine Band, the merry dancers chased the hours with flying feet until long after the midnight stars had ...
— Perley's Reminiscences, Vol. 1-2 - of Sixty Years in the National Metropolis • Benjamin Perley Poore
... in Helen's face so mild, And in her bashful mien, The winning softness of the child, The blushes of fifteen. The witching smile, when prone to go, Arrests me, bids me stay; Nor joy, nor comfort can I know, When ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volumes I-VI. - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... It was the witching time for Story-telling. "Our whole life, Travellers," said I, "is a story more or less intelligible,—generally less; but we shall read it by a clearer light when it is ended. I, for one, am so divided this night between fact and fiction, that I scarce know which is which. Shall I ...
— The Seven Poor Travellers • Charles Dickens
... Darkness; and a fresh one is opened whenever the last inheritor of an ancestral curse (details of which are explained later) has gone to close his account. The new Count de Luizzi knows what he has to do, which is to summon Satan by a certain little silver bell at the not most usual but sufficiently witching hour of two A.M., saying at the same time, "Come!" After a slightly trivial farce-overture of apparitions in various banal forms, Luizzi compels the fallen archangel to show himself in his proper shape; ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 2 - To the Close of the 19th Century • George Saintsbury
... To feast on Ireland's shore and bay; And France, thy forward knights and bold, Rough Rollo's ravens croaked them cold. Sing, sing of earth and ocean's lords, Their songs as conquering as their swords; Strains, steeped in many a strange belief, Now stern as steel, now soft as grief— Wild, witching, warlike, brief, sublime, Stamped with the image of their time; When chafed—the call is sharp and high For carnage, as the eagles cry; When pleased—the mood is meek, and mild, And gentle, as an unweaned child. Sing, ...
— Romantic Ballads - translated from the Danish; and Miscellaneous Pieces • George Borrow
... wrath, Each beneath her own dear tree Parting her hair that she may see How queens put on their sovereignty? All are come of Pan's own race, Nymphs and satyrs fill the place, Necks outstretched and ears a-twitching, That Pan may know of all this witching. Heedless stumble the goatfeet Till four-footed things retreat. Cries of Ah! and Ay! and Eh! Scare the forest birds away, And their notes that rang so clear At dawn, you now shall rarely hear: Only a robin here and there Pitches high his ...
— Georgian Poetry 1911-12 • Various
... smile the witching skies, And with a jocund train, With dancing joy-light in His eyes, God, ...
— A Cluster of Grapes - A Book of Twentieth Century Poetry • Various
... thou hast done to me; dost thou remember all those witching letters thou sent'st unto me to Armenia, fill'd with the praise of my beloved Sister, where thou extol'st her beauty, what had I to do with that? what could her beauty be to me? and thou didst write how well she lov'd me, ...
— A King, and No King • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher
... painful rapture. And she played on her lute, too, on the lute he had given her of old, those slender fingers making ravishing music on the many-stringed instrument, though her pose as she played was more witching still. What a beautiful glimpse of white shoulders and dainty lace ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... lies the large weedy water of Lake Thrasymene, turned into a witching word for ever by Hannibal's recorded victory over Rome. Dim as such records have become to us and remote such realities, he is yet a passionless pilgrim who does n't, as he passes, of a heavy summer's day, feel the air and the light and ...
— Italian Hours • Henry James
... suitor. The wedding day was fixed, but the prospect of her marriage was a terrible trouble to Eustace, and threatened to mar the happiness of his life. Having, however, in his youth perfected himself in the black art, he drew a magic circle, at the witching hour of night, and summoned the Evil One to a consultation. The meeting came off, at which the usual bargain was quickly struck, the soul of Eustace being bartered for the coveted body of the beautiful young lady. The compact, it was arranged, should close at her death, but the Evil One was ...
— Strange Pages from Family Papers • T. F. Thiselton Dyer
... daisies that popped up pertly on either side, staring at them from amidst wastes of wild hyacinths and forget-me-nots that were bluer than Nellie's witching eyes. ...
— Bob Strong's Holidays - Adrift in the Channel • John Conroy Hutcheson
... repeats the sounds from below, and the wild character of the region, have produced a legend that the place is haunted by a beautiful but wicked water nymph, who lured the voyager, by her witching voice, to the rocks and the whirlpool, where his ...
— Down the Rhine - Young America in Germany • Oliver Optic
... apple seek The velvet down that spreads his cheek; And there, if art so far can go, The ingenuous blush of boyhood show. While, for his mouth—but no,—in vain Would words its witching charm explain. Make it the very seat, the throne, That Eloquence would claim her own; And let the lips, though silent, wear A life-look, as if words ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al
... jewels in her room, and an exaggerated report of them having come to the ears of certain enterprising burglars, a little plan was arranged for obtaining them. A small boy was hidden in the house, a window was opened, and at the proper witching hour of night a stout individual crept up-stairs in his stocking-feet, and was already at Kate Vavasor's door,—when, in the dark, dressed only in his nightshirt, wholly unarmed, George Vavasor flew ...
— Can You Forgive Her? • Anthony Trollope
... impulsively, and called his name. In a flash he was up in his saddle, looking. Chapuli tossed his head and in the act caught a glimpse of the other horse—then they both stood rigid, gazing in astonishment at the living statue against the sky. At sight of that witching figure, beckoning him from the mountain top, Hardy's heart leaped within him and stopped. Once more the little hand was thrown out against the sky and a merry voice floated down to him from ...
— Hidden Water • Dane Coolidge
... calling him "my son," you can hardly recognize in his athletic form the little sailor-boy of other days; yet it is none other, although he has arrived to the dignity of captain, and as Sampson prophesied, a smarter man never sailed the ocean. But who is this witching beauty at his side, who would fain impress you with a belief that that mischief which will not remain concealed for the briefest period, is not her entire composition? Do you not mistrust? who other than Miss Winnie Santon? she who having tired of the gallants of the wild West, or rather of their ...
— Natalie - A Gem Among the Sea-Weeds • Ferna Vale |
