"Eleventh hour" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... of Satan, and by a strange contrast, they at the same time record that of faithful souls, who, upheld by its strength, never swerved from their allegiance to God. They tell of saintly penitents, dating their first correspondence with its inspirations from the eleventh hour, and of docile hearts, obedient from earliest childhood to its voice. They show us, side by side, profaned temples re-consecrated, and holy sanctuaries never sullied; scentless flowers restored to fragrance, and garlands of purity from which not a blossom or even a leaf had ever fallen. ...
— The Life of the Venerable Mother Mary of the Incarnation • "A Religious of the Ursuline Community"
... the good of all, and as he valued his soul's health, to detail the particulars of his crime, but his eye fell. That dark enemy, who takes care to leave in the heart just hope enough to keep despair alive, tongue-tied him, and he would not—even now, at the eleventh hour—give up the vain imagination that the case of his companion might yet be confounded with his, to the escape of both—and vain it was. It had not been felt advisable so far to make him acquainted with the truth, that this had already been sifted and decided; and I judged this to be the ...
— Tales from Blackwood, Volume 7 • Various
... offered up her power, her imperious creative instinct, to the Lares and Penates; those greedy little godlets whom there was no appeasing while an inch of one remained that they could tear to pieces. She clenched her hands, in agony. The whole being recoiled now, at the eleventh hour, as a fierce wild creature that one tries to bury alive. She looked back along the line of the past and saw, with too clear eyes, the whole insidious process, so stealthy that she had hardly detected it, at the time. She remembered those afternoons at the Priory, when ...
— The Daughters of Danaus • Mona Caird
... now seated beside Estridge, who had coolly and cleverly taken his sporting chance in remaining till the eleventh hour and the fifty-ninth minute in the service of his country. Then, as the twelfth hour began to strike, he bluffed ...
— The Crimson Tide • Robert W. Chambers
... Up to almost the eleventh hour the Committee stage of the Coal Commission Bill in the Commons was not encouraging. The Labour representatives moved amendment after amendment, designed either to wreck the measure or to make the Commission a mere registration-office to approve ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 156., March 5, 1919 • Various
... Iberian amalgamation, and suggested Dom Luis of Portugal or his father Dom Ferdinand, the former regent. The candidature of Prince Leopold of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen, who was a Roman Catholic, was looked upon with a certain amount of favour, but at the eleventh hour Napoleon III. made this scheme a pretext for the quarrel with Prussia which led to the fateful war of 1870 and 1871. Eventually, almost two years after the outbreak of the Revolution, Amadeo of Savoy was chosen by the Cortes at Madrid ...
— Spanish Life in Town and Country • L. Higgin and Eugene E. Street
... their low plane of evolution and attempt to give them an enlightenment for which the stronger races have prepared themselves by ages of growth." There is in this utterance a tinge of the feeling which actuated the laborers who had borne the heat and burden of the day when they objected to the eleventh hour intruders being received on equal terms with themselves. One answer suffices for both: "Other men have labored, and ye are entered into their labors." It is true that the Negro misses evolution and his adjustment to ...
— Twentieth Century Negro Literature - Or, A Cyclopedia of Thought on the Vital Topics Relating - to the American Negro • Various
... extreme point of saying that an "amicable separation" should be arranged, maintaining, what is indisputable, that the claims of humanity should supersede the claims of possession. With Russell himself declaring till the eleventh hour that responsible government was out of the question because it meant "separation," they were quite justified in demanding that separation, if indeed inevitable, should come about by agreement, not as the possible result of a fratricidal war. For such a war, though Russell could not see it until Durham ...
— The Framework of Home Rule • Erskine Childers
... twelve years old, was abundantly able to take care of herself. She was not at all timid, though she was not aggressive either, and she had a quaint way of expressing herself that would have interested almost any one. But it was the frank good-nature with which she accepted her eleventh hour invitation that appealed most to Eleanor, newly alive to the charm that lies in courageously making the best of a bad matter. For half an hour Eleanor devoted herself to finding out something about Miss Carlson and ...
— Betty Wales, Sophomore • Margaret Warde
... and stared with wide, straining eyes as the flames rolled onward, every minute drawing nearer to the landing. The fire now raged behind them, as it was raging on the mainland. But still they looked shoreward. Even at the eleventh hour John might arrive. What he would do if he did come they had not reasoned out. Neither did they realise that nowhere on that lake could anything live, ringed in by such a fiery furnace. They imagined that out upon the water they would find refuge from the flames, so John with the boat ...
— Jess of the Rebel Trail • H. A. Cody
... me, very good," he said, fervently. "His habit is to move in mystery, yet sometimes he permits us to think we see and understand him. I am old, dear, and must go; but now, in this eleventh hour, when my hope was beginning to die, he sends me this one with a promise, and I am lifted up. I see the way to a great part in a circumstance itself so great that it shall be as a new birth to the whole world. And I see a reason for the gift of my great ...
— Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ • Lew Wallace
... have I waited for this confession? Night after night I have said to myself, 'Surely Grace will come and tell me that she feels herself in the wrong!' But no such words came. At last I ceased to hope for them; and now at this eleventh hour you can hardly expect me to show much ...
— Not Like Other Girls • Rosa N. Carey
... legal voters filed within a specified time. The effort to secure these names lagged and without doubt would have been given up had it not been for Frank E. Mace, former State Forest Commissioner, who organized committees all over the State at the eleventh hour and petitions bearing 12,000 signatures were filed July 3, within 90 days after the Legislature adjourned, as required. As there was doubt about the constitutionality of this referendum, the State Supreme Court, on July 9, 1919, was requested by ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume VI • Various
... earth but this thing. It's really too late now. Don't you see you've defeated your own object? You mustn't ask me to throw up the sponge to your sudden intuition of danger sprung on me at the eleventh hour. I won the toss, and can't take my orders from you, ...
— The Grey Room • Eden Phillpotts
... Though the naval expedition was in preparation, he still hesitated over issuing orders to sail. The reply to the Thoughts had not committed him to any specific line of conduct. What was it that kept him wavering at this eleventh hour? Again, that impenetrable taciturnity which always shrouded his progress toward a conclusion, forbids dogmatic assertion. But two things are obvious: his position as a minority president, of which he was perhaps unduly conscious, caused him to delay, and to delay again and again, seeking definite ...
— Lincoln • Nathaniel Wright Stephenson
... stuck in my memory ever since. Thank Heaven! the eleventh hour must have struck long ago, and Hortense and her friend must be fast asleep and well out of the cold by now—they need walk those evil ...
— The Martian • George Du Maurier
... went in advance. By this change he sought to transfer the responsibility to us. Finally he rode up to us and said in a whisper, "We will camp here." The whole expression of the old man's face was that of ghastly terror. I was much annoyed, for I thought that, at the eleventh hour, his fear had overcome his desire to gratify us. Just then a Mexican lad on horseback approached; we were all mounted. I asked the lad, "Is there a lake near by?" He replied, "Yes, a half a mile off." The old Indian said, speaking ...
— The Religious Life of the Zuni Child - Bureau of American Ethnology • (Mrs.) Tilly E. (Matilda Coxe Evans) Stevenson
... Naval Brigade reads like a fairy story. Ladysmith on the point of exhaustion, with all its troops engaged and no big guns wherewith to meet the terrific assaults of the six-inch cannon on Pepworth Hill, was almost in despair. At the eleventh hour up came the Naval Brigade under Captain the Hon. Hedworth Lambton of H.M.S. Powerful with 280 Bluejackets, two 4.7 guns, and four twelve-and-a-half-pounders. Then the affair was done. It was just one, ...
— South Africa and the Transvaal War, Vol. 2 (of 6) - From the Commencement of the War to the Battle of Colenso, - 15th Dec. 1899 • Louis Creswicke
... the day was far spent, was to have her ten shillings. "What, have you forgotten your New Testaments?" Priscilla cried, when more murmurs greeted this announcement. "Don't you remember the people who came at the eleventh hour to labour in the vineyard and got just the same as the others? Why should I try to improve on parables?" And there was something about Priscilla, an air, an authority, that twisted the women of Symford into ...
— The Princess Priscilla's Fortnight • Elizabeth von Arnim
... Nashville, and the whole State of Tennessee having fallen into their hands, victory was again to perch upon their banners, for Buell's army, by forced marches, had come to Grant's assistance at the eleventh hour. ...
— "Co. Aytch" - Maury Grays, First Tennessee Regiment - or, A Side Show of the Big Show • Sam R. Watkins
... their education, and of such, small hope of reformation could be formed. But if Eustace were alive, the good seed had been sown in his heart, and he could not but hope, that he would at last, if not even till the eleventh hour, be ...
— The Loyalists, Vol. 1-3 - An Historical Novel • Jane West
... had been threatened with a nervous breakdown and President Walker had at the eleventh hour been able to procure a substitute. The wise President understood very well that there was a cure to his nervous breakdown, but that it had to be taken on the other side of the Atlantic; so she was delighted to hasten his departure. Edwin had telegraphed Kent of ...
— Molly Brown's Orchard Home • Nell Speed
... Abbate, the appearance of the brothers Ricardi on the scene, were arousing his suspicions. Was it not possible that Lorenzi might be a party to the intrigue? Or Marcolina? Or even Amalia? For a moment it flashed through his mind that his enemies might be at work upon some scheme of the eleventh hour to make his return to Venice difficult or impossible. But a moment's reflection convinced him the notion was absurd—were it only because he no longer had any enemies. He was merely an old fellow in reduced circumstances. Who was likely to take any trouble to hinder ...
— Casanova's Homecoming • Arthur Schnitzler
... Philippa sat with her father, in the silent upper chamber. At first Henry Roberts, listening—listening—for the Voice, thought, rapturously, that at the eleventh hour he was to win a soul—the most precious soul in his world!—to his faith. But when, after a while, he questioned her, he saw that this was not so; she stayed away from other churches, but not because she cared for his church. This troubled him, for the faith he had outgrown was better ...
— The Voice • Margaret Deland
... overwhelming. If Lord Dreever's statement was correct and Jimmy had really succeeded in winning Molly's affection, this would indeed be a rescue at the eleventh hour. It was with a Nunc-Dimittis air that he felt for his cigar-case, and extended it toward the detective. A cigar from his own private case was with him a mark of supreme favor and good-will, a sort of accolade which he bestowed only upon ...
— The Intrusion of Jimmy • P. G. Wodehouse
... Gray to send for you at the eleventh hour," said Grace in a puzzled tone. "No wonder you were late. What did she ...
— Grace Harlowe's Junior Year at High School - Or, Fast Friends in the Sororities • Jessie Graham Flower
... political nature, there is no great fear of that. First of all, Prague is not a town where politics are at all agitated; these topics are very rarely touched upon; besides, Albert is clever, and it is not at the eleventh hour that anybody in three months will make him imbibe political principles. Perhaps you will turn in your mind what you think on the subject, and communicate me the ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Volume 1 (of 3), 1837-1843) • Queen Victoria
... in vain. And if there be any here so forlorn that they have no friend to care for them, never forget the Father whose arms are always open to receive, forgive, and comfort His prodigal sons, even at the eleventh hour.' There the little sermon ended; but the preacher of it felt that her few hearty words had not been uttered in vain, for one boy's head was down, and several faces wore the softened look which told that a tender ...
— Jo's Boys • Louisa May Alcott
... Aristarchus of our own days, now dead—thought very highly of them and gave them to me, some years ago, with several variations which had been added by an anonymous hand, then still in the land of the living. I have added to the first verse two of these, which, as I learned at the eleventh hour, were composed by Herr H. L. von Held, who is now dead, and of whom further particulars may be learned from Varnhagen's 'Biographisclaen Denkmalen'. Vol. VII. I think the reader will thank me for directing his attention to these charming lines and to the genius displayed in the moral application ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... too late? Won't you listen to reason even at the eleventh hour? It is the greatest folly to enter into this engagement. Never were two people more unsuited to each other! You will regret it all your life. My poor, dear child, you ...
— Sisters Three • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... employment. And may it not offend your Highness, for one so ill-read as myself in aught that is good or godly, to remind you that the Bible somewhere tells of those who were received into pardon and glory at the eleventh hour. As to myself, could your Highness make me what my heart has so panted after, but as vainly as the carrion-crow might seek to be the gallant falcon of the chase—could you give me a well-proportioned figure—make me one who could repel an injury or protect a friend—stretch out this dwarfish ...
— The Buccaneer - A Tale • Mrs. S. C. Hall
... others standing idle in the market-place, and said unto them, Go ye also into the vineyard: and they went their way. And he went out about the sixth and ninth hour, and did likewise. And about the eleventh hour he went out, and found others standing idle, and saith unto them, Why stand ye here all the day idle? They say unto him, Because no man hath hired us. He saith unto them, Go ye also into the vineyard; and whatsoever is right, that shall ...
— Stories for the Young - Or, Cheap Repository Tracts: Entertaining, Moral, and Religious. Vol. VI. • Hannah More
... more clue to his resorts or his friends—if, indeed, he had any in London—than he had after their memorable first meeting in San Francisco. He might, indeed, be the dupe of an impostor, who, at the eleventh hour, had turned craven and fled. He might be, in the captain's indifference, a mere instrument set aside at his pleasure. Yet he could take advantage of Miss Eversleigh's letter and seek her, and confess everything, and ask her advice. ...
— Trent's Trust and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... everybody was busy writing despatches! This is indeed our whole situation expressed in a trivial incident; all the plenipotentiaries are trying to save their positions and their careers by violent despatch-writing at the eleventh hour. They know perfectly well that it is they alone who are responsible for the present impasse, and that even if they come out alive they are all hopelessly compromised. Young O—— told me that in their Legation they were actually antedating their despatches so as to be on the safe side! This ...
— Indiscreet Letters From Peking • B. L. Putman Weale
... private expedition to make excavations among the ruined cities of Central America is, it seems, about to sail from Liverpool. The draughtsman who had been already appointed to accompany it has lost heart, and withdrawn at the eleventh hour, and Walter is to fill his place. He is to be engaged for six months certain, from the time of the landing in Honduras, and for a year afterwards, if the excavations are successful, and if the funds hold out. His letter ends with a promise to write ...
— The Woman in White • Wilkie Collins
... with pallid face and almost wild look to say that she was dead, we were stunned. I really think we were almost as much shocked as though we had not heard of her illness; for we felt that, at the eleventh hour, some favourable turn must take place. I think we expected a miracle to be performed, so certain were we, or wished and tried to be, ...
— Words of Cheer for the Tempted, the Toiling, and the Sorrowing • T. S. Arthur
... influential member of the adoption party, was, when Sunday came, absent upon his sacred work. The occasion was seized for a ballot. The senate was a tie, but the Governor threw the casting vote for a convention. This was called as soon as possible, and on May 29, 1790, Rhode Island, too, at the eleventh hour, made the National Constitution her own. Not only had a MORE PERFECT UNION been formed at last, but it included all the ...
— History of the United States, Volume 2 (of 6) • E. Benjamin Andrews
... course I can only bid your ladyship farewell," said the offended Major, with a ceremonious bow. Then turning to me: "Good-bye, my dear Miss Janet, for the present. Even at this, the eleventh hour, I must intercede with Lady Chillington to grant you permission to come and spend part of next week with us ...
— The Argosy - Vol. 51, No. 2, February, 1891 • Various
... and being anxious to commence the projected campaign with the least possible delay, Henry named the 5th of May as the day on which the ceremony was to be performed; but having learnt from a private despatch that the Archduke had resolved at the eleventh hour not to incur the hazard of a war with France upon so frivolous a pretext as the forcible retention of a Princess, who moreover, remained under his charge against her own free will, and that Madame de ...
— The Life of Marie de Medicis, Vol. 2 (of 3) • Julia Pardoe
... master! Walkyn, methinks, is not a jovial soul, lord, and when he smileth it behoveth others to frown and—beware. So prithee eat hearty, lord, for, in a while the sun will stand above yon whin-bush, and then 'twill be the eleventh hour, and at the eleventh hour must I wash thy hurt and be-plaster ...
— Beltane The Smith • Jeffery Farnol
... its effect upon Lane was, however, little short of exhilarating. It brought him sympathy, understanding, and a fair measure of support from people who, not until the eleventh hour, had really comprehended their own danger and it inspired him to redouble his efforts to organize a ...
— The American Indian as Participant in the Civil War • Annie Heloise Abel
... "At the eleventh hour, when I had begun to despair of his recovery, the doctor reported the patient restored to his senses. I then told him, Doctor Benoit, that the very moment Evan Lamotte was able to listen, and to talk rationally, I must see him. That ...
— The Diamond Coterie • Lawrence L. Lynch
... he said, "the relief boat you so thoughtfully sent for is on her way here. She should reach the rock at almost any minute now. In fact, I fancy we've little time to waste if we want to avoid a brush. It would be a pity to be nabbed now at the eleventh hour. ...
— A Rock in the Baltic • Robert Barr
... that came to him at the eleventh hour. This man was idle all the day long. He had a whole gospel day to come in, and he played it all away save only the last hour thereof. But at last, at the eleventh hour, he came, and goes into the vineyard to work with the rest of the labourers, that had borne the burden and heat of the day. Well, ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... conciliating; and yet I began to be sorry for this man, hired spy as I knew him to be. It seemed to me less than decent that he should have been brought up in the expectation of this great inheritance, and now, at the eleventh hour, be tumbled forth out of the house door and left to himself, his poverty and his debts—those debts of which I had so ungallantly reminded him so short a time before. And we were scarce left alone ere I made haste to hang out a flag ...
— St Ives • Robert Louis Stevenson
... who gazed on the Medusa's head, and felt, without a struggle, the human being gradually harden to the statue. It was not frenzy, it was not idiocy,—it was an abstraction, an apathy, a sleep in waking. Only as the night advanced towards the eleventh hour—the hour in which Glyndon had concluded his tale—she grew visibly uneasy, anxious, and perturbed. Then her lips muttered; her hands writhed; she looked round with a look of unspeakable appeal for succour, for protection, and suddenly, as the clock struck, fell with a shriek to the ground, ...
— Zanoni • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... refusal at the eleventh hour was very annoying. I was not expected alone, but alone I should have to go. There was no alternative, and the absence of the doyenne must explain itself ...
— The Sunny Side of Diplomatic Life, 1875-1912 • Lillie DeHegermann-Lindencrone
... least as true to-day as when they were written: "We ought not to presume to legislate for a nation in whose feelings and affections, wants and interests, opinions and prejudices, we have no sympathy." Are "The Incompatibles" to be always incompatible, or can we now, even at the eleventh hour, make some effort to understand the working of ...
— Prime Ministers and Some Others - A Book of Reminiscences • George W. E. Russell
... the sun also get into the trunk or box. Then repack neatly. This will prevent mould and dampness, and be the means of discovering lost articles. Finally be sure to go over with care your "check list" or inventory the day before camp breaks. This will prevent rushing around excitedly at the eleventh hour, hunting lost articles. ...
— Camping For Boys • H.W. Gibson
... related that when some of Johnson's friends desired that Dr. Warren should be called in, he said they might call in whom they pleased; and when Warren was called, at his going away Johnson said, 'You have come in at the eleventh hour, but you shall be paid the same with your fellow-labourers. Francis, put into Dr. Warren's coach a copy of the English Poets.' CROKER. Dr. Warren ten years later attended Boswell in his last illness. Letters of Boswell, p. 355. He was the great-grandfather ...
— Life Of Johnson, Volume 4 (of 6) • Boswell
... placed in open carriages by their dragomans, and driven in a long procession to the Seraglio to see the Sultan's treasures. Those of them who had waited two weeks for this chance looked aggrieved at the more fortunate who had come at the eleventh hour on the last night's steamer, and seemed to think these latter had attained the privilege without sufficient effort. The ministers of the different legations—as is the harmless custom of such gentlemen—had ...
— The Princess Aline • Richard Harding Davis
... a man who has redeemed a failing reputation and shed luster upon a dimmed escutcheon, by a single just deed done at the eleventh hour. ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... the Great War, 1914-1918. It is simple in form, but very solemn in outline, and you could not help knowing that it meant something to do with the dead. On Armistice Day, each November 11—for you know that the Great War ended at the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month—there is a solemn service here, and during the two minutes' silence, after the strokes of Big Ben have begun to sound, thousands of people stand bareheaded and ...
— The Children's Book of London • Geraldine Edith Mitton
... it was not until the eleventh hour that he had succeeded in obtaining positive proof of the truth of the report, though he had found less cause to doubt it each time he made fresh inquiries. In the end he had been driven to the necessity ...
— Vagabondia - 1884 • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... mountain. The failure of the Italians to achieve what here upon the ground appears so simple, delivered Italy hand-bound to strangers. Had they but succeeded in arresting Charles and destroying his forces at Fornovo, it is just possible that then—even then, at the eleventh hour—Italy might have gained the sense of national coherence, or at least have proved herself capable of holding by her leagues the foreigner at bay. As it was, the battle of Fornovo, in spite of Venetian bonfires and Mantuan Madonnas of Victory, ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Second Series • John Addington Symonds
... At the eleventh hour, William bethought himself of an invincible fighting man, Otto von Bismarck, widely known for ...
— Blood and Iron - Origin of German Empire As Revealed by Character of Its - Founder, Bismarck • John Hubert Greusel
... repentance is seldom genuine, yet, as Mr. Jay remarks, genuine repentance is never too late. God can pardon the sins of a century as easily as those of a day. Our friend was the means, in the hand of God, of leading many, when worn by sickness and at the eleventh hour of life, to the Lamb of God. His carefully kept diary records many such instances. We give one. He says, 'I remember one Sunday coming from Hessle with the Rev. C. Jones. Our "hearts burned within us as we talked by the ...
— The Hero of the Humber - or the History of the Late Mr. John Ellerthorpe • Henry Woodcock
... afterwards how she had ever brought herself to accomplish it. It was so hard—so hideously hard—to face him, this man who loved her so overwhelmingly, and tell him that he had failed to win her love in return. And at the eleventh hour—to treat him thus! If he had taken her by the throat and wrung her neck, she would have considered him justified ...
— Greatheart • Ethel M. Dell
... severe things sometimes if he thinks he ought to. He has made me so ashamed of my ignorance that I am resolved to stay here for another term at least, and study as hard as I can. I have not begun yet, as it is not worth while at the eleventh hour of this term; but when I return in January I will set to work in earnest. So you may see that his influence over me is an entirely good one. I will tell you all about him when we meet; for I have no time to say anything now, as the girls ...
— An Unsocial Socialist • George Bernard Shaw
... struck from thy body. Here, therefore, at the last altar of refuge, I meet thee, according to the vow of the immortal Constantine, for the purpose of demanding whether thou hast any thing to allege why this doom should not be executed? Even at this eleventh hour, thy tongue is unloosed to speak with freedom what may concern thy life. All is prepared in this world and in the next. Look forward beyond yon archway—the block is fixed. Look behind thee, thou seest the axe already sharpened—thy place for good ...
— Waverley Volume XII • Sir Walter Scott
... kindly to many of the women, she read to them aloud the parable of the Lord of the vineyard, in the 20th chapter of Matthew, making a few simple comments about Christ coming, and being ready to save sinners even at the eleventh hour, so wonderful was His pity and mercy. A few of the listeners asked who Jesus Christ was, so ignorant they were; others feared that their time of salvation ...
— Excellent Women • Various
... be assumed that the Chows bore all their afflictions like lambs. They had methods of their own of getting even, and were efficient tent thieves, and peculiarly expert in the art of rifling tips, although this was not proved against them until the eleventh hour. They fought back on occasions, and one morning a big Californian was found near their claims, beaten almost to death. Evidently the digger had deserved his fate, and had been caught stealing wash-dirt from Sin Fat's tips; but his denials were readily and gladly accepted by the whites, ...
— In the Roaring Fifties • Edward Dyson
... remembered how a few minutes ago his rival had offered him this year's Whitaker, keeping for himself last year's almanack. Looked at from the point of view of Emmett who really believed that something might be gained at this eleventh hour from a study of the more recent volume, it had been a fine piece of self-denial. It showed that Emmett had Christian talents which surely ought not to be wasted because he ...
— The Altar Steps • Compton MacKenzie
... the line deeply pondering the startling report of the good Colonel. We had been hearing various rumors that the enemy was frantically suing for peace; all these we had set down as but propaganda. If the end were in sight, why this terrific eleventh hour barrage? ...
— The Greater Love • George T. McCarthy
... more than had ever entered into my calculations or found room in my hopes. By a brisk appeal to them, it almost seemed that I might work my salvation in this eleventh hour. ...
— The Shame of Motley • Raphael Sabatini
... the hands of Commandant Potgieter, who, siding with Prinsloo on the question of a surrender, had it destroyed whilst Prinsloo's was forwarded. This settled the whole affair. The positions were evacuated, and in part occupied by the enemy. Still, at the eleventh hour, there was a possibility of escape. The long trail of waggons would have been captured, but most, if not all, the burghers could have found their way out. But no, they were to be duped by a set of unscrupulous officers. They were told they could get all they desired, except their ...
— In the Shadow of Death • P. H. Kritzinger and R. D. McDonald
... thought savagely. "We could have spared him perfectly. What business has he turning up at the eleventh hour? He didn't cross the ocean with her. He didn't suspect her unforgivably. He didn't help her, and disguise himself as a chauffeur for her, and wing Schwartzmann, and bruise up the other chaps and send them rolling ...
— The Firefly Of France • Marion Polk Angellotti
... eleventh hour, the long-looked-for succors were come. Ribaut had been commissioned to sail with seven ships for Florida. A disorderly concourse of disbanded soldiers, mixed with artisans and their families, and young nobles weary of a two-years' peace, were mustered at the port of Dieppe, and embarked, to ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 12, August, 1863, No. 70 - A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics • Various
... One acquaintance we have made lately, whom we like so much, that we have been vociferously abusing the system of faire part in this city, since, owing to the mistake of a servant, we have until now been deprived of the pleasure of knowing her. The mistake is rectified at the eleventh hour. The lady is the Seora de G—-z P—-a, one of the most accomplished and well-informed women in Mexico; and though our friendship has been short, I ...
— Life in Mexico • Frances Calderon de la Barca
... state of his mind, had not struck him yet—the idea that the outcast of the streets might, by the barest conceivable possibility, be identified with the lost daughter—would, in one way or another, be almost infallibly suggested to Amelius; and, at the eleventh hour, the conspiracy would be foiled. If, on the other hand, the American's fatal advice was followed, the next morning's post might bring a letter from Jervy to Mrs. Farnaby—with this disastrous result. At the first words spoken ...
— The Fallen Leaves • Wilkie Collins
... wagons, with a large number of horses.[205] Braddock, grateful to his benefactor, and enraged at everybody else, pronounced him "Almost the only instance of ability and honesty I have known in these provinces."[206] More wagons and more horses gradually arrived, and at the eleventh hour the march began. ...
— Montcalm and Wolfe • Francis Parkman
... At the eleventh hour, the long looked for succors were come. Ribaut had been commissioned to sail with seven ships for Florida. A disorderly concourse of disbanded soldiers, mixed with artisans and their families, and young nobles weary of a two years' peace, were ...
— Pioneers Of France In The New World • Francis Parkman, Jr.
... when the time of separation arrived, and made no exception to their rule on the present occasion, a suitable gloom was the keynote of the gathering. Mr. Jackson seemed to bear the parting with fortitude, as did Mike's Uncle John (providentially roped in at the eleventh hour on his way to Scotland, in time to come down with a handsome tip). To their coarse-fibred minds there was nothing pathetic or tragic about the affair at all. (At the very moment when the train began to glide out of ...
— Mike • P. G. Wodehouse
... asserted that those who refused to believe these exalted things concerning her, will be in the state of the unbelieving Jews, who rejected the counsel of God against themselves; and she told her hearers that was the eleventh hour, and the last call of mercy that ever should be granted them; for she heard an inquiry in heaven, saying, "Who will go and preach to a dying world?" or words to that import; and she said she answered, "Here am I—send me;" and that she left the realms ...
— The Book of Religions • John Hayward
... cannot say how Raffles obtained all this information. I only know that it proved correct in each particular. I was not indeed deeply interested before the event, since Raffles assured me that it was "a one-man job," and naturally intended to be the one man himself. It was only at the eleventh hour that our positions were inverted by the wholly unexpected selection of Raffles for the English team in the Second ...
— A Thief in the Night • E. W. Hornung
... the man had represented that he was a friend of the late John Millinborn, but was anxious to get to Canada. He had produced excellent credentials, and Dr. van Heerden, in a spirit of generosity, offered to assist him. At the eleventh hour, however, he was struck with the likeness the man bore to the published description of the missing man in the Millinborn case, and was on the point of telegraphing to the authorities at Liverpool, when he discovered that Jackson ...
— The Green Rust • Edgar Wallace
... into agonized sobbing, yet she kept her face upraised to his. Instinctively she knew that in that eleventh hour she must offer all ...
— The Safety Curtain, and Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell
... recantations of their proselytes. They rejoiced, but with no ungenerous joy, when their principles of trade, of jurisprudence, of foreign policy, of religious liberty, became the principles of the Administration. They were content that he who came into fellowship with them at the eleventh hour should have a far larger share of the reward than those who had borne the burthen and heat of the day. In the year 1828, a single division in this House changed the whole policy of the Government with respect to the ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 4 (of 4) - Lord Macaulay's Speeches • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... cannot possibly disappoint her. I can speak feelingly as to the annoyance (for I have known it by my own experience) when after inviting a number of my friends to meet some strangers, the strangers have sent an excuse almost at the eleventh hour. I think no inducements, however strong, could tempt me to do ...
— The Best American Humorous Short Stories • Various
... days of Sir G. Grey, no Governor but yourself has grasped the native question here at all, and I feel confident that had your full authority been retained, and not harshly wrested from you, even at the eleventh hour initiatory steps of a reformatory nature with respect to the natives would have been taken, which it is the duty of Britain to follow while she holds ...
— Native Races and the War • Josephine Elizabeth Butler
... not try to conceal it from you. It was my intention this morning to see you and Julie safe on the Lyons train, but John and I have beheld signs, not military, perhaps, but of the soul, and we are firm in the belief that at the eleventh hour we shall be saved. The German ...
— The Forest of Swords - A Story of Paris and the Marne • Joseph A. Altsheler
... little jiujitsu for every contingency as even a fellow on the broad of his back could administer a nasty kick if you didn't look out. Highly providential was the appearance on the scene of Corny Kelleher when Stephen was blissfully unconscious but for that man in the gap turning up at the eleventh hour the finis might have been that he might have been a candidate for the accident ward or, failing that, the bridewell and an appearance in the court next day before Mr Tobias or, he being the solicitor rather, old ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce
... me continue my exhortation to you. Be more free in making use of this water; it is the wholesomest water in the world; you may take it at the third, sixth, ninth, or eleventh hour, but to take it in the morning of your age is best (Matt 20:3-6). For then diseases have not got so great a head as when they are of long continuance, consequently they will be removed with far more ease; besides, those that thus do will receive endless life, ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... anger that the night must be so long a-coming; and, glancing up, I cursed the sun that it must needs shine and the gladsome day that it was not grim night. And presently to anger was added a growing fear lest mine enemy might (by some hap) elude me at the eleventh hour—might, even now, be slipping from my reach. Now at this a sweat brake out on me, and leaping to my feet I was minded to seek him out and end the matter there and then. "Why wait for to-night?" I asked myself. "Surely in the gladsome ...
— Black Bartlemy's Treasure • Jeffrey Farnol
... had been interposed since the Romans ascended the breach, many of the seditious were so pressed by the famine, upon the present failure of their ravages, that they got together, and made an attack on those Roman guards that were upon the Mount of Olives, and this about the eleventh hour of the day, as supposing, first, that they would not expect such an onset, and, in the next place, that they were then taking care of their bodies, and that therefore they should easily beat them. But the Romans were apprized of their coming to attack them ...
— The Wars of the Jews or History of the Destruction of Jerusalem • Flavius Josephus
... see something now! I see! it was for this that I was preserved: I to be a sort of new-fangled Adam—and this little creature to be my Eve! That is it! The White does not admit defeat: he would recommence the Race again! At the last, the eleventh hour—in spite of all—he would turn defeat into victory, and ...
— The Purple Cloud • M.P. Shiel
... is grand sport. My job was something much more tricky. I had to get plain proof that my man was a spy in the dockyard, to keep him playing on my line to the very last minute, but to make dead certain of stopping him at the fifty-fifth second of the eleventh hour." ...
— The Lost Naval Papers • Bennet Copplestone
... now about to go to "see to things," taking Bertie, his right-hand boy, with him, but leaving Nellie with me. Bertie had expressed himself quite agreeable to the arrangement, but at the eleventh hour refused to go without Nellie; and Nellie, preferring the now fascinating homestead to the company of her lord and master, refused to go with him, and Mac was at his ...
— We of the Never-Never • Jeanie "Mrs. Aeneas" Gunn
... resolved to give success to the pale rose. That which Edward had won he was resolved to increase, and his dispositions were of the highest military excellence; but it is asserted that he would have been beaten, because of the superiority of the enemy in men, but for the coming up, at the eleventh hour, of the Duke of Norfolk, who was the Joseph Johnston of 1461, doing for Edward what the Secessionist Johnston did for Beauregard in 1861. The Lancastrians then gave way, and retreated, at first in orderly fashion, but finally falling into a panic, when they were cut down by thousands. They lost ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 55, May, 1862 • Various
... yearning for her society, was somewhat singular. But Diana's nature had been ennobled and fortified by the mental struggle and the impalpable sacrifice of the last few months, and she was in nowise disposed to repel any affectionate feeling of her father's even at this eleventh hour. ...
— Charlotte's Inheritance • M. E. Braddon
... been hardly dealt with, most severely sentenced; but in his own eyes he was an almost innocent man—the victim of an infamous conspiracy, in which she who, was his nearest and dearest had treacherously joined. After flattering him with false hopes, she had deserted him at the eleventh hour, and in a manner even more atrocious than the desertion itself. He knew, of course, that it was mainly owing to her evidence, to which he had looked for his preservation, that his ruin had been so complete and overwhelming; but what he hated her worst for was for that smile she had bestowed ...
— Bred in the Bone • James Payn
... reconsideration of the surprising verdict. Something had happened during the day to alter the friendly attitude of the banks; they were now politely reluctant, as one of the agents expressed it, which really meant that opposition to the loan had appeared from some unexpected source, as a sort of eleventh hour obstacle. The heads of the two banks had as much as said that negotiations were at an end, that was the long and short of it; it really didn't matter what was back of their sudden change of front, the fact still remained that the transaction was as "dead ...
— The Prince of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... there had been nothing wrong in the relations between Warren and Mrs. Lawrence up to that night. But we are pretty sure that they met at the station to go away together. What is more reasonable than to presume that she lost her nerve at the eleventh hour: that, unhappy as she was at home, she was unable to take the step which would forever ...
— Midnight • Octavus Roy Cohen
... throughout the island, and establishing a line of steamboats. Such was the gigantic enterprise to which he has harnessed himself. He has sunk a large amount of money in it, and the new-comer, the laborer of the eleventh hour, will reap ...
— The Nabob, Volume 1 (of 2) • Alphonse Daudet
... a chill of fear creeping into her heart lest even at this eleventh hour something was coming to stand between ...
— A Countess from Canada - A Story of Life in the Backwoods • Bessie Marchant
... voice, "that perhaps the tale would come more intelligibly from me. Believe me that he has served you to the best of his ability. Unfortunately for the success of your choice plan of murder, I had news of it at the eleventh hour, and with a party of musketeers I was able to surprise and destroy your cut-throats in Mr. Newlington's garden. You see, my lord, I was to have been one of the victims myself, and I resented the attentions that were intended me. I had no knowledge that Sir Rowland had contrived to ...
— Mistress Wilding • Rafael Sabatini
... that it will please you, Jessie, I can not withstand your entreaties," he returned, thoughtfully. "Still, I have the hope that you may change your mind at the eleventh hour, and be ready to go with me," he added, laughingly. "I have a few letters to write, and will see you after I finish them. Remember it is not every night that one can hear Patti;" and with a few more pleasant ...
— Pretty Madcap Dorothy - How She Won a Lover • Laura Jean Libbey
... find; but owing to the desire conceived later on by Pope Leo XIII. that an undertaking of such importance should be carried out by an ecclesiastic of the Roman Catholic Church, Lagarde's hopes were dashed at the eleventh hour, and Monsignor Ciasca, to whom the task was confided, accomplished all that can reasonably be expected from pious ...
— The Sceptics of the Old Testament: Job - Koheleth - Agur • Emile Joseph Dillon
... regular naval officers," said Kennon bitterly, "instead of being kept in the mud forts on the creeks in Virginia, and in the woods of Carolina cutting timbers to build ironclads, been sent to command these vessels, even at the eleventh hour, they would have proved ...
— Admiral Farragut • A. T. Mahan
... camel would already be over-weighted by the mess box and X.'s valise—with its extra blanket and extravagant under-clothing. Great would be the searchings of heart. Still everything always came right in the end—the Brigade sent us some "buckshee" camels at the eleventh hour, or at worst we got permission to send some stuff by train, when it could be delivered in due course somewhere within reach. Something always did have to go by train anyway, for we had now a second blanket per man, and there were not enough camels to carry these, so that round about ...
— The Fifth Battalion Highland Light Infantry in the War 1914-1918 • F.L. Morrison
... Napoleon, the distribution of the eagles. We have done our possible and impossible to get tickets, because I had taken strongly into my head to want to go, and because Robert, who didn't care for it himself, cared for it for me; but here's the eleventh hour and our prospects remain gloomy. We did not apply sufficiently soon, I am afraid, and the name of the applicants has been legion. It will be a grand sight, and full of significances. Nevertheless, ...
— The Letters of Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Volume II • Elizabeth Barrett Browning
... almost the most interesting of all. News from yourself at first hand; a momentary glimpse into the actual Household at Concord, face to face, as in years of old! True, I get vague news of you from time to time; but what are these in comparison?—If you will, at the eleventh hour, turn over a new leaf, and write me Letters again,—but I doubt you won't. And yet were it not worth while, think you? [Greek]— will be here anon.—My kindest regards to your wife. Adieu, ...
— The Correspondence of Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1834-1872, Vol II. • Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson
... from what it would have been if you had begun when young to trust and love Him. Think of the difficulty of rooting out habits and memories. Think of the horrid familiarity with evil. Think of the painful contrition for wasted years, which must be theirs who are hired at the eleventh hour, after standing all the ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... of the House (Sir C. Grogram, Devonport) said that...." The words came haltingly to my ears as the man's voice followed the jerks of the little instrument "... the Government obviously could not ... alter its policy at ... eleventh hour ... at dictates of ... quite irresponsible person in one of ...
— The Inheritors • Joseph Conrad
... effectiveness as the moral guides of nations. In those fateful years between 1908 and 1914, during which we now see so plainly the preparation for this world-tragedy, they might have done much. They did nothing. They might have seen, at least at the eleventh hour, the iniquity of sustaining the military system, and have cast the whole of their massive influence on the side of the promoters of arbitration. I do not mean that any man should advocate disarmament, or less effective armament, in England while ...
— The War and the Churches • Joseph McCabe
... the politicians had their way and Castelnau, Joffre's second in command, came over to their view and set out for Verdun to organize the defence for the position at the eleventh hour. He had with him Petain, the man who had commanded the French army in the Battle of Champagne and henceforth commanded the army that was hurried to the Verdun sector. France now took up definitely the gage of battle as Germany had laid it down. Verdun now became a ...
— They Shall Not Pass • Frank H. Simonds
... plenty of money. "She must never know," he told himself, "that he had so riotously squandered the vast inheritance that had been left him, and he was standing on the verge of ruin." A marriage with the wealthy heiress would save him at the eleventh hour. "I will trust you, Pluma," he continued. "I know, you will keep ...
— Daisy Brooks - A Perilous Love • Laura Jean Libbey
... consort—and Fujiwara Nakanari looked for the post of prime minister. They persuaded the ex-Emperor to intimate a desire of reascending the throne. Saga acquiesced and would have handed over the sceptre, but at the eleventh hour, Heijo's conscientious scruples, or his prudence, caused a delay, whereupon Kusu and her brother, becoming desperate, publicly proclaimed that Heijo wished to transfer the capital to Nara. Before they could consummate ...
— A History of the Japanese People - From the Earliest Times to the End of the Meiji Era • Frank Brinkley and Dairoku Kikuchi
... "Mr Clinch," (I now knew he addressed the first lieutenant of the flagship)—"Mr Clinch, it is not too late to prevent unpleasant consequences; I ask you again, at the eleventh hour, ...
— Tom Cringle's Log • Michael Scott
... answer full of courage, which helped him greatly. Yet as the day drew near he felt himself clinging desperately to his post, and hoping against hope, even at the eleventh hour, to see some ...
— The Master of the Shell • Talbot Baines Reed
... had reached Bellecour in the eleventh hour, to claim the attention of the assailants. But the peasants, as we have seen, were by no means disposed to submit to interference, and this they signified by the menacing front they showed the military, abandoning ...
— The Trampling of the Lilies • Rafael Sabatini
... Suddenly the watchman's horn is heard in the distance. Every one rushes off, and the street is left to the quiet moonlight and the quaint old watchman, who paces up the street solemnly proclaiming the eleventh hour. ...
— The Opera - A Sketch of the Development of Opera. With full Descriptions - of all Works in the Modern Repertory • R.A. Streatfeild
... been counselled by me this would not have been. Now it is too late, but not too late to save your soul. Away then with this obstinacy—this hardness of heart; call upon the blessed Saviour, that He may receive your spirit—call upon His wounds for mercy. It is the eleventh hour, but not too late. Amine," continued the old man, with tears, "I implore, I conjure you. At least, may this load of trouble be ...
— The Phantom Ship • Captain Frederick Marryat
... the events narrated, often wondering over the strangeness of the scene of long ago, I am truly glad at the eleventh hour to find the solution of the problem in moods, rather than in a snobbish pride unbefitting the greatness of ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, August, 1885 • Various
... fear, discontent, or any of the passions that debase; a life so honest and composed; a soul like an ancient violin, so subdued to harmony, responding to a touch in music—as in that dining-room, with Mr. Hunter chatting at the eleventh hour, under the shadow of ...
— Essays of Robert Louis Stevenson • Robert Louis Stevenson
... of persons who, under the law, were qualified for registry was about exhausted; and because of the expense I did not feel warranted in keeping up the boards longer, as I said, "to suit new issues coming in at the eleventh hour," which would but open a "broad macadamized road for ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan
... you're going to write on or anything that you're going to say?" asked Betty, who always wrote her papers as soon as they were assigned, to get them off her mind, and who longed to know the secret of waiting serenely until the eleventh hour. ...
— Betty Wales Freshman • Edith K. Dunton
... still delayed by the two stouts. I have just attempted to chat over the affair with JESSIMINA and Madame MANKLETOW, and ascertain whether the former will not accept myself at the eleventh hour as payment in full of all damages, costs, &c. Mrs M. replies that the jurymen are notoriously in favour of her daughter, and that she would as soon see her in gates of grave as the bride of a black man. On closer approach to JESSIMINA, ...
— Baboo Jabberjee, B.A. • F. Anstey
... her—the fear of her sin. Make her dread to keep the accursed thing within her soul. Make her feel the presence of the living God, who beholds all the past, to whom the darkness is as noonday; who is waiting now, at the eleventh hour, for her to turn to him, and confess her sin, and cry for mercy—now, before the night of death comes, and the moment of pardon is for ever fled, ...
— Adam Bede • George Eliot
... occur, after accepting an invitation, that, by one of the sorrowful happenings so often marring our best laid plans, we are prevented from fulfilling our promise, let the regret sent be prompt, that your hostess, especially if the entertainment be a dinner or luncheon may possibly, even at the eleventh hour, be able to supply the vacancy. Make it explanatory as well, that she may feel positive that no mere whim has caused the disarrangement ...
— Social Life - or, The Manners and Customs of Polite Society • Maud C. Cooke
... not spoken, the mystery of Clear's death would never have been solved," said Diana, "although she only confessed at the eleventh hour, ...
— The Silent House • Fergus Hume
... desperate bid for neutrality at the last moment, to show that the German Government had counted on the neutrality of this country and had been deeply disappointed. If these outbursts and attempts at the eleventh hour to bargain for our neutrality were genuine efforts to keep the peace between Great Britain and Germany, it is our belief that their origin must be found in the highest authority in the German Empire, whom we believe, in spite of petty signs of spitefulness exhibited since the war broke out, to ...
— Why We Are At War (2nd Edition, revised) • Members of the Oxford Faculty of Modern History
... phases of the contest; the freshness of the dogs, the stamina of the men, the possibility of accidents; for a broken harness, a refractory leader, an error in judgment, may mean overwhelming defeat at the eleventh hour. ...
— Baldy of Nome • Esther Birdsall Darling
... have to split the money. Aunt Emily's will left the money to my father, or, failing him, his 'offspring.' I thought that meant me, but apparently there are a crowd of us. I call it rotten work, springing unexpected offspring on a fellow at the eleventh hour like this." ...
— My Man Jeeves • P. G. Wodehouse
... to go about the place expecting her to be engaged to him? Eustace Hignett, no doubt, looked upon the poor girl as utterly heartless. Marlowe regarded her behaviour as thoroughly sensible. She had made a mistake, and, realising this at the eleventh hour, she had had the force of character to correct it. He was sorry for poor old Eustace, but he really could not permit the suggestion that Wilhelmina Bennett—her friends called her Billie—had not behaved in a perfectly splendid way throughout. It was women like Wilhelmina ...
— Three Men and a Maid • P. G. Wodehouse
... brief colloquy, one phrase in particular stuck in his mind. "He was reckoned too risky after that." Was that, he wondered, what the Prime Minister was thinking about him now; had he, indeed, proved himself too risky for future use? If so there would be no yielding at the eleventh hour; and perhaps it was as well that to-morrow would see him harnessed to the royal ...
— King John of Jingalo - The Story of a Monarch in Difficulties • Laurence Housman
... jolly that walk along the sands by Poole Harbour to Studland and over the hills to Swanage. But think of the Lake District ... and North Wales ... and Devon ... and Cornwall ... and ... I do not so much make decisions as drift into them or fall into them. I am what you might call an Eleventh Hour Man. I take a header just as the clock is about to ...
— Pebbles on the Shore • Alpha of the Plough (Alfred George Gardiner)
... but I should like to see the man, woman or child in this town, or any other, that can bear more than I can. I always was independent, thank the Lord. After living without the help of man this long, I hope I can get along without it at the eleventh hour. As to its being a money concern, I don't believe a word of it, and I wouldn't walk across the room, if it just concerned myself alone; but when I see the name of my poor, dead brother, I feel a command on me, just as if I saw it printed on tablets of ...
— Helen and Arthur - or, Miss Thusa's Spinning Wheel • Caroline Lee Hentz
... the Austrian Ambassador at Berlin and four replies from that official, but not a letter or telegram passing between Berchtold and von Bethmann-Hollweg or between the German and Austrian Kaisers. The Austrian Red Book gives additional evidence that at the eleventh hour, and shortly before Germany issued its ultimatum to Russia, Austria did finally agree to discuss the Servian question with Russia; but the information, which Germany presumably gave to its ally of its intention to send the ultimatum to Russia, is carefully withheld. Notwithstanding this ...
— The Evidence in the Case • James M. Beck
... Mrs. Haddo said, "Fanny, a fresh bedroom has been prepared for you, and I shall be glad if you will go and spend the rest of this day there. I do not feel capable of speaking to you at present. As to you, Sibyl, your conduct has been bad enough; but at the eleventh hour—and, we may hope, in time—you have made restitution. You may, therefore, rejoin the ...
— Betty Vivian - A Story of Haddo Court School • L. T. Meade
... one career in which men seldom recover from their mistakes. I hope that even at the eleventh hour you will relent. It will be a grief to all of us to see you slip ...
— Nobody's Man • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... is," said Paul, "what do you wish me to do? Shall I resign, now at the eleventh hour? If I do, it will be a sign of weakness. It will be a confession that every word in this circular is true. It will proclaim the fact that I am afraid to face ...
— The Day of Judgment • Joseph Hocking
... but plainly evident pride came into Mr. Ward's open and ruddy countenance as he mentioned the great man's name. It was only the week before that he had received his first dinner invitation from the Everards. It came at the eleventh hour and did not include his wife, but he was dazzled by it still. "You know what he's doing? Closing his house, practically, for all three days of the fair, and sending all the help on the place over there—two touring cars ...
— The Wishing Moon • Louise Elizabeth Dutton
... cabinet at Vienna that if Charles were left to lead them in accordance with his own designs they would surely be victorious. Had he and his Army of the Rhine been in Italy from the outset, they thought, the result might have been different. Perhaps they were right; but his tardy arrival at the eleventh hour was destined to avail nothing. The Aulic Council ordered him into Friuli, a district of the Italian Alps on the borders of Venice, where another army—the sixth within a year—was to assemble for the protection of the Austrian frontier ...
— The Life of Napoleon Bonaparte - Vol. I. (of IV.) • William Milligan Sloane
... her legs and declare herself to be the perpetrator of such villany. Her mother, as she knew well, would always have preferred that her elder daughter should be the bride; but her mother was not the woman to have the hardihood, now, in the eleventh hour, to favour such an intrigue. Let her wish be what it might, she would not be strong enough to carry through the accomplishment of it. They would all know that that threat of hers of setting Exeter on fire would be carried out after some fashion that would not be inadequate ...
— He Knew He Was Right • Anthony Trollope
... lift his finger in this enterprise, and whatsoever is wise and manful in England will rally round him. If the faculty and heart for it be in him, he, strangely and almost tragically if we look upon his history, is to have leave to try it; he now, at the eleventh hour, has the opportunity for such a feat in reform as has not, in these late generations, been attempted by all our ...
— Latter-Day Pamphlets • Thomas Carlyle
... It was annoying this man cropping up like this at the eleventh hour. Nothing, he felt sure, would come of his interference, but it might disturb Margaret and the general harmony ...
— Pearl of Pearl Island • John Oxenham
... of a trick is this, standing up here at the eleventh hour and putting the knife into your ...
— The Ramrodders - A Novel • Holman Day
... will remove the fact in the mind of others, putting a desirable impression in the place of an unfavorable one. Have the courage to adhere to the first resolution when you can not change it for a better, and abandon it at the eleventh hour upon conviction. ...
— The Jericho Road • W. Bion Adkins
... the letter about the eleventh hour of the day, immediately sends a messenger to the Bellovaci, to M. Crassus, questor there, whose winter-quarters were twenty-five miles distant from him. He orders the legion to set forward in the middle of the night ...
— "De Bello Gallico" and Other Commentaries • Caius Julius Caesar
... into the Po," he said, "but I will not stop it." Had he wished, he could not have stopped the current of popular excitement at the point it had reached. It was the knowledge of this, joined to the threatened destruction of all his hopes, that well-nigh overpowered him when—at the eleventh hour—in spite of engagements and treaties, Napoleon seemed to have suddenly decided not to go to war. Prince Bismarck once declared that he had never found it possible to tell in advance whether his plans would ...
— Cavour • Countess Evelyn Martinengo-Cesaresco
... chant.) "And it came to pass at the eleventh hour that this poor soul repented." It knocked at the gates, but they were shut—tight as a plaster—a great, burning plaster. They had pasted our marriage certificate all across the door, and it was made of red-hot iron—people really ought to ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... hard measure: the Quakers are indulged with the liberty denied to us. They are; and dearly have they earned it. You have come in (as a sect, at least) in the cool of the evening, at the eleventh hour. The Quaker character was hardened in the fires of persecution in the seventeenth century,—not quite to the stake and fagot, but little short of that: they grew up and thrived against noisome prisons, cruel beatings, whippings, stockings. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 12, No. 72, October, 1863 • Various
... were great, the evil of civil war obvious, the advantages even of victory doubtful. The former errors of the King might be imputed to youth, to the pressure of circumstances, to the influence of evil counsel, to the undefined state of the law. We firmly believe that if, even at this eleventh hour, Charles had acted fairly towards his people, if he had even acted fairly towards his own partisans, the House of Commons would have given him a fair chance of retrieving the public confidence. Such was the opinion of Clarendon. He distinctly states ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 1 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... Vineyard" He taught that the subjects of His Kingdom must not grudge one against another, if a rebel or one who has been neglecting his duty all his life turns and is accepted at the last. The King cannot do otherwise than what is right. "At the eleventh hour" a labourer may be taken on, and receive his reward. And, on the other hand, one who might have been first in the Kingdom of glory and reward may fall away through an evil spirit of self-glorification, and become last of all (S. Matt. ...
— The Kingdom of Heaven; What is it? • Edward Burbidge
... line! You spoke of the eleventh hour, Mr. Hickson. If we are at all near the eleventh, I must be on my way to make my bow to Lady Wilts; or is it Lady Denewdney's ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... plan had not been successful, after all; it had failed ignominiously at the eleventh hour. A great deal of effort had been expended in the private office of this director and that, and a futile attempt made to bring four or five of them together at the office of the bank itself, that the matter might be ...
— Under the Skylights • Henry Blake Fuller
... car, was driven back to New York. On the way he invented a story to explain why, at the eleventh hour, he had jilted Aline Proctor; but when his thoughts reverted to the young man he had seen working with his sleeves rolled up he decided it would be safer to let Miss Proctor tell of the broken engagement ...
— The Lost Road • Richard Harding Davis
... they have taught; and happily, as none can know when he shall die, so none can make sure that he too shall not live long beyond the grave; for the life after death is like money before it—no one can be sure that it may not fall to him or her even at the eleventh hour. Money and immortality come in such odd unaccountable ways that no one is cut off from hope. We may not have made either of them for ourselves, but yet another may give them to us in virtue of his or her love, which shall illumine us for ever, ...
— Essays on Life, Art and Science • Samuel Butler
... at least, where the individuals deplored the want of time for repentance and good works, I well remember that no arguments tended to soothe their troubled minds but those which went directly to assure them of the freeness and fulness of that grace which is not refused, even in the eleventh hour, to the very chief of sinners. And if any of those to whom I now allude have been spared to read this record of their feelings in the prospect of death, it will be well for them to keep solemnly in mind the ...
— The Loss of the Kent, East Indiaman, in the Bay of Biscay - Narrated in a Letter to a Friend • Duncan McGregor
... Methodists, whose leader, Egerton Ryerson, had quarreled with Mackenzie, resulted in the overwhelming defeat of the Reformers. The sting of defeat, the failure of the Family Compact to carry out their eleventh hour promises of reform, and the passing of Lord John Russell's reactionary resolutions convinced a section of the Reform party, in Upper Canada as well as in Lower Canada, that an appeal to force was the ...
— The Canadian Dominion - A Chronicle of our Northern Neighbor • Oscar D. Skelton
... Katherine, both shall have a bridal favour. We will confer with each. When the golden sand runs out at the eleventh hour, the dial will be alone and in shadow; for if it please thee, we must be wed secretly and in haste. I noticed but awhile ago how beautiful the dial was. So the sands shall give us the hour, the dial the altar, and the nightingale ...
— Mistress Penwick • Dutton Payne
... thought of his position; her own father would not see her married because he had no invitation. He must invent some story to get in, but he must attract no attention. No one who knew of his association with the family must see him. He dare not risk a public expose at the eleventh hour. No, her happiness must not be clouded even for a moment! But he must get in; he made up his ...
— The Music Master - Novelized from the Play • Charles Klein
... grant he may indeed find mercy, and be enabled to lay hold upon Christ to the saving of his soul, even at this eleventh hour!" ejaculated the pastor. "A death-bed repentance is poor ground for hope. I have seen many of them in my fifty years ministry, but of all those who recovered from what had seemed mortal illness, but one held ...
— Elsie's Motherhood • Martha Finley
... place, can you ever forgive me? for God alone knows that I am penitent if there ever was one in the world. I can hardly hope to be forgiven, for my sins are almost beyond redemption, but God will forgive at the eleventh hour, and I want to be forgiven and reform. I will reform. I have seen enough, and now I want to settle down and live a virtuous and respectable life the rest of my days and die a happy death, for I have spent many an hour of late in deep thought, and it is not ...
— Danger! A True History of a Great City's Wiles and Temptations • William Howe
... eyes. Once more the wide lane opened magically for him—but again Judge Maynard's measured progress was momentarily barred. Curiosity may have prompted it, and then again it may have been that he was betrayed by the very fury of his desperate, eleventh hour effort to assert his right to the center of that stage—the right of long-established precedent—yet even those two long files of old men gasped aloud their dismay at his temerity when Old Jerry thrust his way forward and planted himself for a ...
— Once to Every Man • Larry Evans
... "and also with your effort to secure a chairman of the committee who favors the movement and is able to present it with intelligence and ability." Speaker Reed closed his letter by saying, "When the eleventh hour comes, we all shall flock in, clamorous for pennies." Words of encouragement were received from many others, and Senator and ex-Governor Francis E. Warren, of Wyoming, wrote: "I am always in harness for woman suffrage ...
— The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 2 of 2) • Ida Husted Harper
... its tombstones in the uncertain light, was all that remained to represent those "great men of the burgh," who, according to the poet, used to "pop in on its card and dancing assemblies, about the eleventh hour, resplendent in top-boots and scarlet vests," or of its "suppression-of-vice sisterhood of moral old maids," who kept all their neighbors right by the terror of their tongues. I was somewhat in a ...
— The Cruise of the Betsey • Hugh Miller
... to deny your crime, but confess it, and implore your Maker's pardon, even at this the eleventh hour. In my Bible, this morning, I found a paper, written by the spirit of him you murdered here last night, and charging you with the ...
— The International Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 1, August 1850 - of Literature, Science and Art. • Various
... powerful instrument in his policy was encouraging and bringing round him, as dependents and followers, the members of the mendicant orders—the labourers called to the vineyard in the eleventh hour, as he calls them. These he set to cater for him, and he triumphantly asks, "Among so many of the keenest hunters, what leveret could lie hid? What fry could evade the hook, the net, or the trawl of these men? From the body of divine law down to the latest controversial tract of the ...
— The Book-Hunter - A New Edition, with a Memoir of the Author • John Hill Burton
... way to the place of punishment Reynard tried to think of some plan by means of which he could save himself even at the eleventh hour; and knowing that some scheme would occur to him if he could only gain a little time, he humbly implored permission to make a public confession of his manifold sins ere he paid the penalty of his crimes. Anxious ...
— Legends of the Middle Ages - Narrated with Special Reference to Literature and Art • H.A. Guerber
... insufferable and I thought with joy of the morrow, of the deck of the steamer, the freshening breeze, the sense of getting out to sea. I was even glad of what I had learned in the afternoon at the office of the company—that at the eleventh hour an old ship with a lower standard of speed had been put on in place of the vessel in which I had taken my passage. America was roasting, England might very well be stuffy, and a slow passage (which at that season of the year would probably also be a fine one) was a guarantee of ten or twelve ...
— The Patagonia • Henry James
... labourers at the eleventh hour;—what does that teach you?—It teaches us, that God at various seasons calls people to his church.—It teaches us, that we ought never to despair, but bear in mind the language of Jesus to the repentant ...
— A Practical Enquiry into the Philosophy of Education • James Gall
... last—the letter he wrote to encourage me, when I hesitated as the terrible time came nearer and nearer; the letter that revived me when my resolution failed at the eleventh hour. I read on, line after line, till I ...
— Armadale • Wilkie Collins
... hideous union, to point out to her all the horrors to which she is hastening; rashly, it may be, and without due reflection. To entreat her, at least, to pause. She can have had no counsellor for her good. Perhaps even I may move her so far yet, though it is the eleventh hour, and she upon the very brink ...
— The Life And Adventures Of Nicholas Nickleby • Charles Dickens |
