"Formidable" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... a deep cleft in the formidable cliffs, somewhere between Cape Race to the southward and St. John's to the northward, hides the little hamlet of Chance Along. As to its geographical position, this is sufficient. In the green sea in front of the cleft, and almost closing the mouth of it, lie a number of great boulders, as if the ...
— The Harbor Master • Theodore Goodridge Roberts
... gratify his ambition and his hatred at the same time! He did not actually plan anything of the kind, or say to himself that he would pick a quarrel. The idea was merely a fancy, a daydream. Man or boy must be bold as well as bad deliberately to form a scheme for bringing about an encounter with a formidable enemy, and Saurin was not particularly bold, certainly not rashly so, and Crawley would be likely to prove a very awkward customer. Instructors of any sort, whether they are professors of mathematics, or Hebrew, or of dancing, or boxing, have this in common, that they are sure to take a special ...
— Dr. Jolliffe's Boys • Lewis Hough
... the seven principal steps of Masonry; I have penetrated into the bowels of the earth, and among the ancient ruins of Enoch found the most grand and precious treasures of the Masons. I have seen, contemplated, and admired the great, mysterious, and formidable name engraved on the triangle; I have broken the pillar of beauty, and thrown down the ...
— The Mysteries of Free Masonry - Containing All the Degrees of the Order Conferred in a Master's Lodge • William Morgan
... discouraging. The elements of the old factions were dormant, but still smouldering. Throughout Henry's reign a White Rose agitation had been secretly fermenting; without open success, and without chance of success so long as Henry lived, but formidable in a high degree if opportunity to strike should offer itself. Richard de la Pole, the representative of this party, had been killed at Pavia, but his loss had rather strengthened their cause than weakened it, for by his long exile he was ...
— The Reign of Henry the Eighth, Volume 1 (of 3) • James Anthony Froude
... damage sustained by the potatoe crop here and in Ireland, full of matter calculated to enlighten our first-rate reformers who seem profoundly ignorant that superstition is the bane of intellect, and most formidable of all the obstacles which stand between the people and their rights. One paragraph is so peculiarly significant of the miserable condition to which Romanism and Protestantism have reduced a peasantry ...
— Superstition Unveiled • Charles Southwell
... in sight of the editor's humble roof he had mocked himself to his guest for his trepidations, and Harte with burlesque magnanimity had consented to be for that occasion only something less formidable than he had loomed afar. He accepted with joy the theory of passing a week in the home of virtuous poverty, and the week began as delightfully as it went on. From first to last Cambridge amused him as much as it charmed him by that air of academic distinction which was stranger to ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... to be captured and devoured, as when a carnivorous animal which has hitherto preyed on antelopes is obliged from their decreasing numbers to attack buffaloes, it is only the strongest who can hold,—those with most powerful claws, and formidable canine teeth, that can struggle with and overcome such an animal. Natural selection immediately comes into play, and by its action these organs gradually become adapted to their new requirements. But man, under similar circumstances, ...
— Contributions to the Theory of Natural Selection - A Series of Essays • Alfred Russel Wallace
... which latter the natives were now storing in little granaries, mounted on four posts, men, women, and children being all equally busy. The quantity of gigantic nettles (Urtica heterophylla) on the skirts of these maize fields is quite wonderful: their long white stings look most formidable, but though they sting virulently, the pain only lasts half an hour or so. These, however, with leeches, mosquitos, peepsas, and ticks, sometimes keep the traveller in a ...
— Himalayan Journals (Complete) • J. D. Hooker
... disarmed of his most formidable weapon, but he continued to fight. Larner felt the spikes on the monster's legs tear ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science April 1930 • Various
... but the light was exceedingly faint and languid; the buildings all around us tottered; and though we stood upon open ground, yet, as the area was narrow and confined, we could not remain without certain and formidable peril, and we therefore resolved to quit the town. The people followed us in a panic of alarm, and, as to a mind distracted with terror every suggestion seems more prudent than its own, pressed in great crowds about us in ...
— Complete Story of the San Francisco Horror • Richard Linthicum
... among its trees, presented a barrier, on either side of which the current swept with speed and fury, though, as it seemed, entirely unopposed by rocks. In such a current, as Roland thought, there was nothing unusually formidable; a daring swimmer might easily make his way to the island opposite, where, if difficulties were presented by the second channel, he might as easily find shelter from enemies firing on him from the banks. He gazed again on the island, which, ...
— Nick of the Woods • Robert M. Bird
... intended to make a forced march, keeping by the sea-road. A strong advance guard would press forward and occupy the formidable position of Mathia in the rear of the hills. With the main body he intended to seize some heights a few miles behind Torres Vedras, and to cut the road between that place and Montechique, on the direct road to Lisbon, and so interpose between Junot and the capital. ...
— With Moore At Corunna • G. A. Henty
... course, seen Bishop Watson's Apology for the Bible. It is a complete confutation of Paine; but that was no difficult matter. The most formidable Infidel is Lessing, the author of "Emilia Galotti";—I ought to have written, "was", for he is dead. His book is not yet translated, and is entitled, in German, "Fragments of an Anonymous Author". It unites the wit of Voltaire with the subtlety of Hume and the profound erudition ...
— Biographia Epistolaris, Volume 1. • Coleridge, ed. Turnbull
... engaged us was the killing of the boom for Judge David Davis, of the Supreme Court, which was assuming definite and formidable proportions. The preceding winter it had been incubating at Washington under the ministration of some of the most astute politicians of the time, mainly, ...
— Marse Henry, Complete - An Autobiography • Henry Watterson
... visitors; he is far too ailing for much fatigue and exertion; but surely you and Alwyn can entertain your friends in your own rooms," and, though Greta hesitated and looked rather alarmed at the idea of opposing her formidable father-in-law-elect, she was soon brought to acknowledge that society would be good ...
— Doctor Luttrell's First Patient • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... him in a disagreeably sharp and suspicious manner, and wondered whether it was possible he might be accused of forgery and given in charge to a policeman. The papers consisted of some dividend-warrants payable to bearer, and an endorsed cheque, and the clerk examined them with a most formidable and inquisitorial frown. Then he asked Austin what his name was, and where he lived; and Austin blushed and stammered to such an extent and made such confused replies that the clerk looked more suspiciously at him ...
— Austin and His Friends • Frederic H. Balfour
... had been light, prevented her from entering the harbour. As she passed by, however, the number of guns seen from her sides showed that she would be a formidable antagonist, and that she could scarcely be prevented, with a favourable breeze, from entering the harbour. The whole of the morning the party were kept in anxious expectation of what would occur, the pirate being seen to tack every now and then to keep her position off the land. At ...
— A True Hero - A Story of the Days of William Penn • W.H.G. Kingston
... and made a formidable pause on this adverb, "if it is the manners of your side of the family to come and insult people in their own houses, I am glad I belong ...
— The Nebuly Coat • John Meade Falkner
... uttered by a man who did not once see him before Waterloo, who was driven from Paris by him, and strove to discourage his supporters. Still less can we accept the following melodramatic description, by Thiebault, of Napoleon's appearance on Sunday, June 11th: "His look, once so formidable and piercing, had lost its strength and even its steadiness: his face had lost all expression and all its force: his mouth, compressed, had none of its former witchery: and his gait was as perplexed as his demeanour and gestures were undecided: the ordinary pallor of his skin was ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose
... demanded the god-born Gudmund: "Who is the chieftain that commands the fleet, and that formidable force ...
— The Elder Eddas of Saemund Sigfusson; and the Younger Eddas of Snorre Sturleson • Saemund Sigfusson and Snorre Sturleson
... setting of the sun a bountiful repast, consisting of an innumerable number of rather formidable looking chunks of boiled fresh beef, and abundance of bread and succotash, was brought into the council house. The manner of saying grace on this occasion was indeed peculiar. A kettle being brought, hot and smoking from the fire, and placed in the center of the council house, ...
— Legends, Traditions, and Laws of the Iroquois, or Six Nations, and History of the Tuscarora Indians • Elias Johnson
... was a somewhat formidable business. Dining with the van der Luydens was at best no light matter, and dining there with a Duke who was their cousin was almost a religious solemnity. It pleased Archer to think that only an old New Yorker could perceive the shade of difference (to New York) ...
— The Age of Innocence • Edith Wharton
... at the cold meat in silent calculation of the quantity that would be left for dinner next day, and put back a slice he had cut for himself, in order that the visitor's encroachments might be less formidable in their effects. ...
— The Life And Adventures Of Nicholas Nickleby • Charles Dickens
... when he grinned, tickled his temples. He was short-breathed, asthmatic and possessed a tempestuous temper. The big curved sword at his side flipped the ground when he strode to and fro, as was his custom while agitated, though during his calmer moods, the formidable weapon swung fairly ...
— Up the Forked River - Or, Adventures in South America • Edward Sylvester Ellis
... of nature would be, I should say, into things which he can eat and things which can eat him: including, of course, his most formidable enemy, and most savoury food—his fellow-man. In finding out what he can eat, we must remember, he will have gone through much experience which will have inspired him with a serious respect for the hidden ...
— Scientific Essays and Lectures • Charles Kingsley
... some surprise, at the formidable array of men upon the deck of the Zanthe, and then, after a few words in Spanish to his boat's crew, followed the captain and ...
— The Three Brides, Love in a Cottage, and Other Tales • Francis A. Durivage
... by the Baptist church," "the street by Dr. Fenton's," "the street going out to Judge Hollis's," or "the street where Mr. Moseley used to live." In the heart of the town was the square, with the gray, weather-beaten court-house, the new and formidable jail, ...
— Sandy • Alice Hegan Rice
... gone again, and already half-way to the Farallone, before Herrick turned and went unwillingly up the pier. From the crown of the beach, the figure-head confronted him with what seemed irony, her helmeted head tossed back, her formidable arm apparently hurling something, whether shell or missile, in the direction of the anchored schooner. She seemed a defiant deity from the island, coming forth to its threshold with a rush as of one about to fly, and perpetuated ...
— The Ebb-Tide - A Trio And Quartette • Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne
... seemed like a man without hope, but there were no indications of a lack of fidelity to the country. Aside from the circumstance that he was a native of Virginia and that Virginia was engaged in the Rebellion, it was too much to expect that at his age he could cope with so formidable a movement as the rebellion of eleven States. While I was in Washington I presented to General Scott a young man, Henry S. Briggs, a son of ex-Governor Briggs, whom General Scott had known when Governor Briggs was in Congress. Young Briggs was a lieutenant ...
— Reminiscences of Sixty Years in Public Affairs, Vol. 1 • George Boutwell
... drove household-treasurers mad, and often left poet and machinist whistling for pay, may be gathered from the fact that a masque sometimes cost as much as two thousand pounds in the mechanical getting-up, a sum far more formidable in the days of exclusively hard money than in these of paper currency. Scott has described, for the benefit of the general reader, one such pageant among the "princely pleasures of Kenilworth"; while Milton, in his "Masque performed at Ludlow Castle," presents ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 10, August, 1858 • Various
... gave way, and fled in all directions; Claverhouse, burning with revenge for his defeat at Drumclog, made a terrible slaughter of the unresisting fugitives. One of my ancestors brought from the battlefield the remnant of the standard; a formidable musquet— "Gun Bothwell" we afterwards called it; an Andrea Ferrara; and a powder-horn. I still preserve these ...
— James Nasmyth's Autobiography • James Nasmyth
... by both France and Spain; but to Great Britain it was doubly ominous. Not only had she lost a reserved market, singly the most valuable she possessed, but she had released, however unwillingly, a formidable and recognized rival for the carrying trade, the palladium of her naval strength. The market she was not without hopes of regaining, by a compulsion which, though less direct, would be in effect as real as ...
— Sea Power in its Relations to the War of 1812 - Volume 1 • Alfred Thayer Mahan
... erect again in time to catch the captain's cutlass on his belaying pin, which it struck with such force as to be shivered to splinters. Ere the captain had time to spring back, a half swing from Joe's formidable weapon caught him on the neck, and he fell like a ...
— Humphrey Bold - A Story of the Times of Benbow • Herbert Strang
... had been received by the elder and more influential portions of the school. He had dreaded unspeakably the first occasion when it would be necessary to meet them again, but he felt that Mr Paton's countenance and kindness had paved the way for him, and smoothed his most formidable trial. It had been beyond his warmest hopes that he should be able to face them so. He had never dared to expect this open proof, that the person who had suffered chiefly from this act would also be the first to show that he had not cast him off as helpless or worthless, but was ready ...
— St. Winifred's - The World of School • Frederic W. Farrar
... and Paris were not long in understanding what war meant in Germany's mind, France and Paris were not long in accounting for the danger they had passed through on account of the German spy system, on account of the formidable web of espionage the German agents had woven around ...
— Fighting France • Stephane Lauzanne
... to pass other laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of representation in the legislature—a right inestimable to them, formidable ...
— The Handy Cyclopedia of Things Worth Knowing - A Manual of Ready Reference • Joseph Triemens
... be made, while considering the subject in connection with the region now under advisement, in respect to the formidable affection known as morbus coxarius, or hip-joint disease; and leaving the detail of other lesions to take their place under other heads, that relating to the shoulder, for instance, we turn to the hip joint and its ailments as the chief subject ...
— Special Report on Diseases of the Horse • United States Department of Agriculture
... pen, ink, and paper, and proceeded to indite a formidable document to the effect that "Josiah Bartlett, able seaman," was to ship aboard the catboat Mary Ellen for a term of two months. Wages, five ...
— Cap'n Eri • Joseph Crosby Lincoln
... to those who had served with me, and also to the English. After they had captured me in the way which I described to you the other night, they kept a very good guard over me at Oporto, and I promise you that they did not give such a formidable opponent a chance of slipping through their fingers. It was on the 10th of August that I was escorted on board the transport which was to take us to England, and behold me before the end of the month in the great prison which had been built ...
— The Exploits Of Brigadier Gerard • Arthur Conan Doyle
... not only to facilitate their progress through different countries and quarters of the globe; but to unite their force, if necessary, and thereby enable them to make a more formidable resistance when opposed; and likewise, to carry any plan they might have formed, more regularly ...
— A Historical Survey of the Customs, Habits, & Present State of the Gypsies • John Hoyland
... the perfecting of such endowments, however modest, as their ancestors have transmitted and peace has encouraged, with ambitions and hopes and dreams, that resent however sub-consciously the constant snarling of death at their heels. All the forces of mind and body and spirit become formidable in a reckless hatred of the gross injustice of a fate that individually not one ...
— The Sisters-In-Law • Gertrude Atherton
... post to assist friendly vessels in distress. Past the islet the great fleet swept in four successive divisions driven by the measured stroke of tens of thousands of oars. On the left of the leading line was the Phoenician fleet led by the tributary kings of Tyre and Sidon, a formidable squadron, for these war galleys were manned by real seamen, bold sailors who knew not only the ways of the land-locked Mediterranean, but had ventured into the outer ocean. On the right were the ships of the Greek cities of Ionia, the long ...
— Famous Sea Fights - From Salamis to Tsu-Shima • John Richard Hale
... to discover myself to them, and learn something of their condition; immediately I marched toward them, my man Friday at a good distance behind me, as formidable for his arms as I, but not making quite so staring a specter-like figure as I did. I came as near them undiscovered as I could, and then, before any of them saw me, I called aloud to them in Spanish, ...
— The Elson Readers, Book 5 • William H. Elson and Christine M. Keck
... diversion in favour of Limerick, but was repulsed at Castleishen, by "the flying camp" of Lord Broghill. The besiegers were thus not only delivered of a danger, but reinforced by native troops—if the "Undertakers" could be properly called so—which made them the most formidable army that had ever surrounded an Irish city. From early summer till the last week of October, the main force of the English and Anglo-Irish, supplied with every species of arm then invented, assailed the walls of Limerick. The plague, which during these ...
— A Popular History of Ireland - From the earliest period to the emancipation of the Catholics • Thomas D'Arcy McGee
... families were prostrated by the fever in the labourers' cottages, and it was creeping into the better sort of houses. Mr Walcot had requested Hope to visit some of his patients with him: and what he had seen had convinced him that the disease was of a most formidable character, and that a great mortality must be expected in Deerbrook. Walcot appeared to be doing his duty with more energy than might have been expected: and it seemed as if whatever talent he had, was exercised in his profession. Hope's opinion of ...
— Deerbrook • Harriet Martineau
... engages men in trials of mutual attachment and courage. What threatened to ruin and overset every good disposition in the human breast, what seemed to banish justice from the societies of men, tends to unite the species in clans and fraternities; formidable indeed, and hostile to one another, but, in the domestic society of each, faithful, disinterested, and generous. Frequent dangers, and the experience of fidelity and valour, awaken the love of those virtues, render them a subject of admiration, and ...
— An Essay on the History of Civil Society, Eighth Edition • Adam Ferguson, L.L.D.
... proposed to build a wharf. The evening was soon there, and the boys, too, upon their rogues' errand. They surveyed the pile of stones, and found it ample for their purpose, though it appeared to be a formidable piece ...
— From Boyhood to Manhood • William M. Thayer
... lies in his hair; and that, conscious of this, and recollecting the fate of the son of Manoah, he suffers not the nigh approaches of any deceitful Delilah. They say he is like the Comet, which, about fifteen months ago, appeared so formidable in the Russian hemisphere; and which, exhibiting a small watery body, but a most enormous train, dismayed the Northern and Eastern ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XXI. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... dreaming that the stranger would think of standing through so narrow and rocky a pass. He did not know his man, however, who was Raoul Yvard; and who had come this way from Bastia, in the hope of escaping any further collision with his formidable foe. He had seen the frigate's lofty sails above the rock as soon as it was light; and, being under no hallucination on the subject of her existence, he knew her at a glance. His first order was to haul everything as flat as possible; ...
— The Wing-and-Wing - Le Feu-Follet • J. Fenimore Cooper
... Stories," but both Miss Blandy and Mr. Ford, her counsel, took great exception to this at the trial. Pamphlets, as we shall presently see, poured from the press, and even before she appeared at the bar the first instalments of a formidable library of Blandyana, had ...
— Trial of Mary Blandy • William Roughead
... glaring about like a caged tiger, while three currents of humanity separated and flowed toward the three ferry exits. It was a moment of longing for the quiet of his ancient hills, where nothing more formidable than blood enemies existed to disquiet and perplex a man's philosophy. Those were things he understood—and even enemies at home did not laugh at a man's peculiarities. For the first time in his life, Samson felt a tremor of something like terror, terror of a great, vague thing, too ...
— The Call of the Cumberlands • Charles Neville Buck
... opportunities of observing the sinister influences at work in American affairs, beneath the attractive exterior. Quebec rallied to a man, and the latent military strength of the province was developed under efficient leaders to a formidable degree. Invaders would have met with a warm reception in this quarter. Manitoba and the whole North-west were up and ready, prepared to fight, more to preserve their own independence, however, than the integrity ...
— The Dominion in 1983 • Ralph Centennius
... sparrow"; and they have to set a net to catch him. Then the Chorus of Wasps, representing Philocleon''s fellow 'dicasts,' appear on the scene to rescue him. A battle royal takes place on the stage; the Wasps, with their formidable stings, trying to storm the house, while the son and his retainers defend their position with desperate courage. Finally the assailants are repulsed, and father and son agree upon a compromise. Bdelycleon promises, on condition ...
— The Eleven Comedies - Vol. I • Aristophanes et al
... falls to my lot to write of the foundation of that most chivalrous brotherhood of the Rose, which after a few years made itself not only famous in its native country of Devon, but formidable, as will be related hereafter, both in Ireland and in the Netherlands, in the Spanish Main and the heart of South America. And if this chapter shall seem to any Quixotic and fantastical, let them recollect that the generation who spoke and acted ...
— Westward Ho! • Charles Kingsley
... in deep and troubled thought. This nephew of his turned out to be a decidedly formidable opponent. How ...
— Tom, The Bootblack - or, The Road to Success • Horatio Alger
... fire. The insurgents taken with arms in their hands were carried to the Champ de Mars, and there shot by judgment of court martial. Most of the political prisoners arrested were discharged after a few days, some of the more formidable only ...
— The International Monthly Magazine - Volume V - No II • Various
... of those times is shown in the absence of any reliable accounts of the Holy Wars, written by journalists on the field. There was no daily press, and the mail communications were very unreliable. Down to the nineteenth century, Xenophon had no formidable competitors for the honors which ...
— Camp-Fire and Cotton-Field • Thomas W. Knox
... his blandest smile, Benjamin asked one of these formidable mercenaries whether Mr. Crookenden was within. He was ushered immediately into the presence of that great personage, before whom the conducting clerk was but as a crushed worm; and there, with a self-possession truly remarkable, the goldsmith seated ...
— The Tale of Timber Town • Alfred Grace
... detail the life and death of the hero of the poem, and we shall only throw together, in these short preliminary remarks, the few quotations and notes appended by the Russian poet to his work. These will not be found of any very formidable extent; and as the poem itself is not of a considerable length, we trust that the various passages, which these quotations are adduced to illustrate, will be sufficiently perceptible, without our submitting to the necessity of appending them in the form of marginal annotations or foot-notes, a ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 58, Number 358, August 1845 • Various
... may be to give it internal institutions like those of Sparta or Venice; placing it in a naturally strong situation, and so fortifying it that none can expect to get the better of it easily, yet, at the same time, not making it so great as to be formidable to its neighbours; since by taking these precautions, it might long enjoy its independence. For there are two causes which lead to wars being made against a republic; one, your desire to be its master, the other the ...
— Discourses on the First Decade of Titus Livius • Niccolo Machiavelli
... think, since the rise of the new Progressive party. For that party will be able to do in the South what the Republican Party has proved itself incapable of doing, namely, of attracting to itself Southern white men in sufficient numbers to make of it a formidable party of opposition in Southern affairs. It will not encounter the ancient distrust, the inveterate hatred and contempt which the Republican Party arouses in those states, and which have paralyzed its usefulness and reduced it as a party of opposition ...
— The Ballotless Victim of One-Party Governments - The American Negro Academy, Occasional Papers No. 16 • Archibald H. Grimke
... Rappahannock, and though his forces were only a little more than half as strong, there was no uneasiness at Confederate headquarters. On the 12th of December Burnside crossed the Rappahannock and attacked Lee, who held the formidable hills on the southern bank of that stream. Another bloody battle ensued. After a vain and hopeless sacrifice of 12,000 men, Burnside withdrew to the northern bank of the river. The active fighting of 1862 had come to a close. In northern Mississippi Grant and Sherman were blocked; at Murfreesboro, ...
— Expansion and Conflict • William E. Dodd
... strips of bark, and the sharp edges protected by a covering of fur. A wound with such a spear must be mortal; and it was very fortunate for Mr. Montgomery that his was not inflicted with one of these truly formidable weapons. Their hatchets were also made of the same stone, the edges of which are ground so sharp that a few blows serve to chop off the branch ...
— Narrative of a Survey of the Intertropical and Western Coasts of Australia] [Volume 2 of 2] • Phillip Parker King
... not evil, you need not fear daylight; so come again to-morrow and state your business then. Now, begone with you out of the house." The man heaved a deep and painful sigh, and fixing Martiniere with a formidable look, grasped his stiletto. She silently commended her soul to Heaven, but manfully stood her ground, and boldly met the man's gaze, at the same time drawing herself closer to the door, for through it the man would have to go to get to her mistress's chamber. "Let me go to your ...
— Weird Tales, Vol. II. • E. T. A. Hoffmann
... your pupil sometimes[1009]: his mind is as exalted as his stature[1010]. I am half afraid of him; but he is no less amiable than formidable. He will, if the forwardness of his spring be not blasted, be a credit to you, and to the University. He brings some of my plays[1011] with him, which he has my permission to shew you, on condition you will hide them from every ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 1 • Boswell, Edited by Birkbeck Hill
... banker of at least a dozen grandiose programs of purification in the seventies and eighties. In Comstock he found precisely the sort of field agent that he was looking for, and the two presently constituted the most formidable team of professional reformers that ...
— A Book of Prefaces • H. L. Mencken
... inclining, were very curiously and truly his enemies, and he had been longing for a great while to get them out of the way of his ambitions and his purposes, yet could find no ready means to compass their destruction. But of late he had found a new enemy in the person of my friend Dante, and a formidable enemy for all his seeming insignificance; and if Simone sought to crush Dante, I cannot blame him for the attempt, however much I may rejoice ...
— The God of Love • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... This formidable advance is preceded by swarms of tirailleurs, who tread down the high wheat, exposing their own men ...
— The Dynasts - An Epic-Drama Of The War With Napoleon, In Three Parts, - Nineteen Acts, And One Hundred And Thirty Scenes • Thomas Hardy
... much heart, much force, much firmness left. Ravengar's eyes, at once empty and significant, blank and yet formidable, startled him. He had the revolver and the handcuffs in his pocket, but he could not have used them. Ravengar's eyes, so fiendish and so ineffably sad, melted his spine. Ravengar stepped forward and ...
— Hugo - A Fantasia on Modern Themes • Arnold Bennett
... graduated at the Naval Academy, he had been made a midshipman on board "The Formidable," and there he was still. A younger man had recently been wrongly promoted over him; and he had asked for leave of absence to appeal to the secretary of the navy. He felt quite sure of the justice of his claims; but he also knew that strong ...
— The Clique of Gold • Emile Gaboriau
... was heard in camp, men of the various transport lines and base units lined up to watch the battalion come in. For the rumour had run that they had had a bad go, that they had beaten back no less than three rather formidable raids of the enemy and had been badly cut up. More than that, by reason of the lack of reinforcements, they had had to do a double tour, so that they were returning from an experience of thirteen days, in what was indeed the veritable ...
— The Sky Pilot in No Man's Land • Ralph Connor
... gas. Production from the Caspian oil and gas field has been in decline for several years, but the November 1994 ratification of the $7.5 billion oil deal with a consortium of Western companies should generate the funds needed to spur future industrial development. Azerbaijan shares all the formidable problems of the ex-Soviet republics in making the transition from a command to a market economy, but its considerable energy resources brighten its long-term prospects. Baku has only recently begun making progress on economic reform, and old economic ties and structures are slowly ...
— The 1997 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... it likely that this Bull Sternford was going to yield for a business proposition in this fashion at the request of a formidable rival? Was he going to change all his plans at the bidding of the Skandinavia, and seize the first boat to come and tell them he was prepared to fall for any plans they might design to beat him? Not likely. No. It was the girl he had fallen for. He had changed ...
— The Man in the Twilight • Ridgwell Cullum
... advice the truth has been carefully concealed from you up to this day. By my advice the trap into which you have walked was set for you (you know why, now, as well as I do) in this place. There was but one certain way of shaking the devilish self-control which has hitherto made you a formidable man. That way has been tried, and (look at me as you may) that way has succeeded. The last thing that remains to be done," concluded Bintrey, producing two little slips of manuscript from his despatch-box, "is to set your niece free. You have attempted ...
— No Thoroughfare • Charles Dickens and Wilkie Collins
... We found the description to be in no wise exaggerated; it presented a most forbidding appearance, and yields only to the state of the Niger near Boossa in difficulty and danger. On our arrival at this formidable place, we discovered a range of black rocks running directly across the stream, and the water, finding only one narrow passage, rushed through it with great impetuosity, over-turning and carrying away everything ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. XIX. No. 542, Saturday, April 14, 1832 • Various
... bravery and various success against the pope's legates and Simon earl of Montfort, a bigoted catholic nobleman. Unable to subdue the earl of Thoulouse openly, the king of France, and queen mother, and three archbishops, raised another formidable army, and had the art to persuade the earl of Thoulouse to come to a conference, when he was treacherously seized upon, made a prisoner, forced to appear bare-footed and bare-headed before his enemies, and compelled to subscribe an abject recantation. This was followed by a severe ...
— Fox's Book of Martyrs - Or A History of the Lives, Sufferings, and Triumphant - Deaths of the Primitive Protestant Martyrs • John Fox
... The Germans are a formidable enemy, well trained, long prepared, and brave. Their soldiers are carrying on the contest with skill and valor. Nevertheless they are fighting to win anyhow, regardless of all the rules of fair play, and there is evidence that they do not hesitate ...
— The New York Times Current History of the European War, Vol 1, Issue 4, January 23, 1915 • Various
... and made Alexander the master of western Asia. But degenerate as the Persians became, they rallied under succeeding dynasties, and in Artaxerxes II. and Chosroes the Romans found, in their declining glories, their most formidable enemies. ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume I • John Lord
... them. It does not seem likely that Chile would give up a battle-ship just now, as the relations between that country and the Argentine Republic are very strained. There is no doubt, however, but that Spain is increasing the efficiency of her navy, which is beginning to assume very formidable proportions. ...
— The Great Round World and What Is Going On In It, Vol. 2, No. 11, March 17, 1898 - A Weekly Magazine for Boys and Girls • Various
... arisen in the north, and became so threatening that General Gonzalez Salas, Madero's War Minister, felt called upon to resign his portfolio to take the field against Orozco. General Salas, after organizing a fairly formidable-looking force of 3,500 regulars and three batteries of field artillery at Torreon, rushed into the fray, only to suffer a disgraceful defeat in his first battle at Rellano, in Chihuahua, not far from Torreon. General Salas took his defeat so much to heart that he committed suicide ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 21 - The Recent Days (1910-1914) • Charles F. Horne, Editor
... unfortunate than his predecessor, as the Indians boldly advanced to meet him on the way, attacked his encampment, and put his troops to a total rout, in which the greater part were cut off and destroyed. In 1794, however, a much more formidable expedition, under General Wayne, entered the Indian territory; the warriors gradually retired as the Americans advanced, but at length imprudently determined on making a stand. In the battle which ensued, the Indians were so completely discomfited, ...
— The Life and Correspondence of Sir Isaac Brock • Ferdinand Brock Tupper
... serrated trail of the escaped python. It led across the depot grounds and away down a smaller street in the direction of the little canon, as predicted by her. A stillness and lack of excitement in the neighbourhood encouraged the hope that, as yet, the inhabitants were unaware that so formidable a guest traversed their highways. The heat had driven them indoors, whence outdrifted occasional shrill laughs, or the depressing whine of a maltreated concertina. In the shade a few Mexican children, like vivified stolid idols in clay, stared from their play, vision-struck and silent, ...
— Heart of the West • O. Henry
... disease that has been creeping stealthily along for months. All his physicians agree that he must give up his business and try the effect of a year's rest. Dr. Elliott proposes his going to Europe, which seems to me about as formidable as going to the next world. Aunty makes the best she can of it, but she says the thought of being separated from Uncle a whole year is dreadful I pray for her day and night, that this wild project may be given up. Why, he would be on the ocean ever so many weeks, exposed to all the discomforts of ...
— Stepping Heavenward • Mrs. E. Prentiss
... immediately into a compact and solid body, fortified themselves as well as they could in their position, and prepared for a desperate defense. There were about ten thousand of them left, and the Persians seem to have considered them too formidable to be attacked. The Persians entered into negotiations with them, offering them certain terms on which they would be allowed to return peaceably into Greece. These negotiations were protracted from day to day for two or three weeks, the Persians treacherously ...
— Cyrus the Great - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... do with his hat, when it is not upon his head; his cane (if unfortunately he wears one) is at perpetual war with every cup of tea or coffee he drinks; destroys them first, and then accompanies them in their fall. His sword is formidable only to his own legs, which would possibly carry him fast enough out of the way of any sword but his own. His clothes fit him so ill, and constrain him so much, that he seems rather, their prisoner than their proprietor. He presents himself in company like a criminal ...
— The PG Edition of Chesterfield's Letters to His Son • The Earl of Chesterfield
... creatures, attracted doubtless by what they took to be an unknown kind of bird, swooped down towards the balloon and circled round it like so many satellites to a heavenly body. I was fearful lest they should strike at it with their long and formidable beaks, in which case all would have been soon over; either they were afraid, or they had satisfied their curiosity—at any rate, they let us alone; but they kept with us till we were well away from the capital. Strange, how completely this incident ...
— Erewhon Revisited • Samuel Butler
... the third place, we look into the Profession of Physick, we shall find a most formidable Body of Men: The Sight of them is enough to make a Man serious, for we may lay it down as a Maxim, that When a Nation abounds in Physicians, it grows thin of People. Sir William Temple is very much puzzled to find a Reason why the Northern Hive, as he calls it, does not send out such ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... more than she could earn in half a century at her wage of eighteen pounds a year, an unimaginable source of endless gratifications; and yet the mere fact that it was to stay in the house all night changed it for them into something dire and formidable, so that it inspired both of them—the ancient dame and the young girl—with naught but a mystic dread. Mr. Batchgrew eyed the affrighted creatures with satisfaction, appearing to take a perverse pleasure in thus imposing upon ...
— The Price of Love • Arnold Bennett
... are held by the Blackfeet, who, with their offshoots, the Bloods, Gros Ventres, and Piegans, are the most formidable Indians of Montana. They are polygamists, being in that respect exceptional among the Indians. But Catlin rather unsentimentally apologizes for this, on the ground that the chiefs are required to give expensive ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 106, August, 1866 • Various
... exclaimed, "The kings of Europe menace us; it behooves us to defy them; let us throw down to them the head of a king as our gage!" these detestable words, followed by so cruel a result, formed, however, a formidable stroke of policy. But the Queen! What urgent reasons of state could Danton, Collot d'Herbois, and Robespierre allege against her? What savage greatness did they discover in stirring up a whole nation to avenge their quarrel on a woman? What remained of ...
— Memoirs Of The Court Of Marie Antoinette, Queen Of France, Complete • Madame Campan
... a nebulous but none the less pernicious tradition that great literature is formidable, and presents itself as a task rather than as a privilege to the reader. Devotion to the best books has been regarded as something of a test of mental endurance, for which the recompense, if not the antidote, must be ...
— The Brownings - Their Life and Art • Lilian Whiting
... you turn the tables on me," her friend replied, and then, seeing the sjambok on the table, took it up. "What is this formidable instrument? ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... and a more formidable invasion came bursting upon Thessaly and Greece. It was, according to the unquestionably exaggerated account of the ancient historians, two hundred thousand strong, and commanded by that famous, ferocious, and insolent Brennus mentioned before. ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume I. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... bridge and arrives at the steep path which leads to the Chateau, one sees, standing upreared and bold on the moat on which it is built, a formidable wall, crowned with battered machicolations and bedecked with trees and ivy, the luxuriant growth of which covers the grey stones and sways in the wind, like an immense green veil which the recumbent giant moves dreamily across his shoulders. The grass is tall and dark, the plants are strong ...
— Over Strand and Field • Gustave Flaubert
... hurried on, none ventured to murmur. Other events arose to distract the attention of the retainers; men's minds became occupied by the stirring politics of the day; while the near approach of that formidable armada, so vainly arrogating itself a title which the very elements joined with human valor to disprove, soon interfered to weaken, if not obliterate, all remembrance of the nameless stranger who had died within ...
— Humorous Ghost Stories • Dorothy Scarborough
... and those who styled themselves Maclean were blockaded in the Islands, and almost starved for want of provisions. Reduced in strength by the battle of Inverkeithing, the clan was but ill-prepared to resist so formidable a foe as Argyle, whose men, therefore, landed without opposition, the people flying to their mountains as the enemy approached. The young chief was sent, for protection, first to the fortified island of Thernburg, and afterwards ...
— Memoirs of the Jacobites of 1715 and 1745 - Volume II. • Mrs. Thomson
... twenty and thirty feet. At irregular intervals there are towers, in one of which was a pile of antique carronades about two feet long, of equal size all the way down and bound round with iron hoops for additional strength. Much resembling old rain-pipes, they had not a very formidable appearance, and were probably more dangerous to those who fired them than ...
— Life and sport in China - Second Edition • Oliver G. Ready
... ended at Murray's, the trail was still for some distance plainly marked, and offered few difficulties. Even when it began to be less distinct she was not alarmed. Smythe had told her, and Murray had confirmed his description, that Thunder Mountain was not formidable as far as the foot of the final scarp. Seth had taught her something of the lore of trails, and she was confident that she would be able to find her way even if the underfoot marks should fail. There would be blazes ...
— The Heart of Thunder Mountain • Edfrid A. Bingham
... look at this remarkable picture a little more closely. That there exist Anabaptists in the varied hosts of the English reformers is true. The feats of the Social Democrats, however, at the recent election hardly convince us that they have very formidable multitudes behind them. Nor is it they who concern themselves with such innovations as those which Sir Henry Maine specifies. The Social Democrats, even of the least red shade, go a long way beyond and below such trifles as Suffrage ...
— Studies in Literature • John Morley
... good-sized fort, built of cotton bales and embankments, and mounting at least five heavy guns. A flag-staff rose from the center of the fort, and supported the "stars and bars," which flaunted defiantly in the breeze. This was Fort Pemberton, the only formidable fortification the rebels had between ...
— Frank on a Gun-Boat • Harry Castlemon
... the unwieldy and formidable looking apparatus of a short time ago, experimenters are now vying with each other in making small or novel equipment. Portable sets of all sorts are being fashioned, from one which will go into an ordinary suitcase, to one so small it will easily slip into a Brownie camera. ...
— The Radio Amateur's Hand Book • A. Frederick Collins
... the military men. Most of these have equal rights, and their pretensions, their jealousies, their rivalries, could not but be fatal to our tranquillity."—"We should know how to keep them in order; and I do not see one among them whose ambition could prove formidable."—"Their ambition has not displayed itself for want of opportunity. I know but one military man, who could be placed at the head of the government with safety; this is Eugene, the prince who said, in 1814, in his memorable proclamations, that 'they alone are ...
— Memoirs of the Private Life, Return, and Reign of Napoleon in 1815, Vol. II • Pierre Antoine Edouard Fleury de Chaboulon
... woodcraft, the malicious disposition, and the poisoned arrows and good marksmanship of these forest folks make them formidable enemies, and the settled tribes hold them in dread and are glad to keep on good terms with them. Yet they find them much of a nuisance, since their dwarfish neighbors claim free access to their gardens and plantain fields, where they help themselves to fruit in return ...
— Man And His Ancestor - A Study In Evolution • Charles Morris
... sounded as if I were making my last will and testament. I had a letter with me addressed to my son which I was to drop over his battery lines in Lievin, and also a red smoke bomb but declined an invitation to take any more formidable weapon. Then I told my pilot not to be anxious about me whatever happened. I always expected to be killed at the front so never worried how or when the event was to occur. The engine was then started. ...
— The Great War As I Saw It • Frederick George Scott
... CONTRAT SOCIAL.—Once this chimera is born they welcome it as a drawing room fancy; they use the little monster as a plaything, as yet innocent and decked with ribbons like a pastoral lambkin; they never dream of its becoming a raging, formidable brute; they nourish it, and caress it, and then, opening their doors, they let it descend into the streets.—Here among the middle class which the government has rendered ill-disposed by compromising its fortunes, which the privileged ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 1 (of 6) - The Ancient Regime • Hippolyte A. Taine
... his knees. This point was no sooner settled than his Majesty declared that he would have Shaftesbury too. Temple again had recourse to entreaties and expostulations. Charles told him that the enmity of Shaftesbury would be at least as formidable as that of Halifax, and this was true; but Temple might have replied that by giving power to Halifax they gained a friend, and that by giving power to Shaftesbury they only strengthened an enemy. It was vain to argue and protest. The King only laughed and jested at ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 1 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... already by an enemy more formidable than the assemblies of the clergy of France. Cardinal Richelieu, naturally attracted towards greatness as he was at a later period towards the infant prodigy of the Pascals, had been desirous of attaching St. Cyran ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume V. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... had decided that he could not, the tempter suggested a plan which seemed so feasible and fair that the future, with a secret to guard, did not look so formidable, ...
— Tracy Park • Mary Jane Holmes
... was not having an easy time, however. Miller's strength was formidable, and Dick knew that he could not stop many straight blows from ...
— The High School Boys' Training Hike • H. Irving Hancock
... of the Uesugi power. The most devoted of his captains, Honda Tadakatsu, was established at Kawagoe. Odawara, under an O[u]kubo, as always, blocked the way from the Hakone and Ashigara passes. In the hands of Iyeyasu and his captains, the formidable garrison here established was not likely to offer opportunity of a second "Odawara conference," during which dalliance with compromise and surrender would bring sudden attack and disaster. At this period there is no sign that in his personal service Prince Iyeyasu ...
— Bakemono Yashiki (The Haunted House) - Tales of the Tokugawa, Volume 2 (of 2) • James S. De Benneville
... once more in motion, was subjected to jolts in all directions, which were very severe. At other times it rolled silently and smoothly over what seemed to be wet sand; and, as I heard the distant roar of the tide, I had little doubt that we were engaged in passing the formidable estuary which divides the ...
— Redgauntlet • Sir Walter Scott
... and it was evident that unless European Greece were subdued it would stand as a barrier between Persia and the western Mediterranean. Darius perceived the situation and prepared to destroy these Greek states before they should become too formidable. The story of this effort, ending at Salamis and Platea, and breaking for all time the power of Persia, belongs in the subsequent chapter that narrates the rise and fall of Athens as ...
— A History of Sea Power • William Oliver Stevens and Allan Westcott
... seemed almost too thick to be penetrated. I had never felt so excited. My sensations were something like those, I fancy, of a soldier going into his first battle; but from what I had heard of the gorilla, I knew him to be almost as formidable an antagonist as the best armed man. For some time as we advanced into the forest there was a perfect silence, yet we were certain that the monster could not be far off. The trees grew closer and closer together; ...
— In the Wilds of Africa • W.H.G. Kingston
... the malady had assumed so formidable an aspect that the doctor had his doubts of the patient's chance of recovery. With her husband's full approval, Stella remained night and day at her ...
— The Black Robe • Wilkie Collins
... English newspapers were regularly sent to Tadmor, and English politics were frequently discussed in the little parliament of the Community. The prospect of addressing a new audience, with their sympathies probably against him at the outset, had its terrors undoubtedly. But the more formidable consideration, to the mind of Amelius, was presented by the limits imposed on him in the matter of time. The lecture was to be succeeded (at the request of a clerical member of the Institution) by a public discussion; and the secretary's experience suggested that the lecturer would do well to reduce ...
— The Fallen Leaves • Wilkie Collins
... witnessed. As it is under the leadership of Pontiac, a man who I honestly believe would be unexcelled among the commanders of the world had he the advantages of education and environment, it is certain to prove a very formidable affair." ...
— At War with Pontiac - The Totem of the Bear • Kirk Munroe and J. Finnemore
... unfavorable of him in my book; that he had just bought it, and was going to read it that night, and if I had said anything unfair of him, he would punish me if he found me in State Street. I surveyed him from head to foot, and said to him, "Foster, you were not a formidable man when I last knew you, and I don't believe you are now." Either he was of my opinion, or thought I had spoken of him well enough, for the next (and last) time I met him he ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana
... valuable in my life out there. It hardly mattered, however, that I should confess this; I was not a young man in Harris's department. I had a department of my own; and Dora, though she frisked with me gloriously and bullied continually, must ever have been aware of the formidable fact that I joined the Service two years before Edward Harris did. The daughter of three generations of bureaucrats was not likely to forget that at one time her father had been junior to me in the same office, though in the course of time and the march of opportunity he had his own show now, ...
— The Pool in the Desert • Sara Jeannette Duncan
... the figure is of Judge Glanvill in his robes. At his feet kneels a life-size figure of his wife. 'Her buckram waist, like armour, sleeves, ruff, and farthingale are all monstrous; and her double-linked gold chains are grand enough for the Lord Mayor. On the whole she looks so very formidable, that thus seen stationed before the Judge, she might be considered as representing Justice herself, but it would be in ...
— Devon, Its Moorlands, Streams and Coasts • Rosalind Northcote
... Javan Malays who inhabited that city. Several of his ships were equal in size to the largest Portuguese galleons, and the one destined for himself was larger than any ship then built by the Europeans. Having completed his preparations, he embarked with 12,000 men and a formidable train of artillery, and appeared suddenly before the city. Ferdinando Perez immediately embarked with 350 Portuguese and some native troops in 17 vessels, and attacked the Javan fleet, with which he had an obstinate engagement, doing considerable damage to the enemy, but night parted ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume VI - Early English Voyages Of Discovery To America • Robert Kerr
... A coarse, formidable woman strode into the waiting room on spike heels. Her shoes, stockings, trench coat, bag and overseas cap were all purple, the purple the painter called "the color ...
— 2 B R 0 2 B • Kurt Vonnegut
... past two years the United States has turned out a few formidable battleships, which it is claimed surpass the best of those of any other navy in the world. The Delaware and North Dakota each have a draft of twenty-six feet, eleven inches and a displacement of twenty thousand tons. Great interest attached to the trials of these vessels because ...
— Marvels of Modern Science • Paul Severing
... first and then Liege, rose against the new Duke of Burgundy in defence of their liberties, already ignored or threatened. The intrigues of Louis were not unconnected with these solicitations. He would undoubtedly have been very glad to have seen his most formidable enemy beset, at the very commencement of his ducal reign, by serious embarrassments, and obliged to let the king of France settle without trouble his differences with his brother Duke Charles of Berry, and with the Duke of Brittany. But the new Duke of ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume III. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... agitation has preceded us in the Shadengo Valley, a movement originated in Baltimore by seven men who had been drunkards and are now lecturing throughout the country. This is known as the 'Washington' movement, and among the most formidable leaders of the crusade is an old actor, John B. Gough. But here we are at the supervisor's office. I'll run in and get the license, if ...
— The Strollers • Frederic S. Isham
... the torch, but it was burnt nearly to the end and was in danger of going out every minute. Besides, in the sunshine it did not look half as formidable as it had in the ...
— The Rover Boys out West • Arthur M. Winfield
... philosophy, in the routine of its office practice, and to some extent in the knowledge of human nature its successful followers must command. The long rows of sheepskin-bound books in the office library were less formidable; the grind of detail was no longer an obstacle to her ambition, which nerved her onward to the higher slopes of professional occupation, for she now had reliable subordinates trained according to the MacDonald system of thoroughness to complete ...
— Cupid's Middleman • Edward B. Lent
... time was one of the most formidable and strongly situated of the northern fortresses. It stands on an almost perpendicular rock, rising one hundred feet above the River Swale, but with the exception of the Norman keep the ruins are scanty ...
— British Highways And Byways From A Motor Car - Being A Record Of A Five Thousand Mile Tour In England, - Wales And Scotland • Thomas D. Murphy
... from a sharp illness, to prove to me that he was bent on leaving Kaze the same time as myself, began eating what he called his training pills—small dried buds of roses with alternate bits of sugar-candy. Ten of these buds, he said, eaten dry, were sufficient for ordinary cases, and he gave a very formidable description of the effect likely to follow the use of the same number boiled in ...
— The Discovery of the Source of the Nile • John Hanning Speke
... the magnetic, or transmitted. No mental philosopher has yet done justice to the wondrous power of leadership, the "art Napoleon." The ancients stated it best in their proverb, that an army of stags led by a lion is more formidable than an army of lions led by a stag. It was for this reason that the Greeks used to send to Sparta, not for soldiers, but for a general. When Crillon, l'homme sans peur, defended Quilleboeuf with a handful of men against Marshal Villars, the latter represented to him, that it was madness to ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. II., November, 1858., No. XIII. • Various
... bear at her feet. Before the discovery of gold they were quite numerous. They roamed in full possession, apparently, of the country—no one to molest them or make them afraid. It was a very formidable animal, weighing from seven to eight hundred pounds. When the rainy season set in, late in the fall, and the winter months, during which the grass commenced to grow, he fed on it in the valleys and fields, ...
— The Adventures of a Forty-niner • Daniel Knower
... the police in their official capacity. He enforces his orders with his fists if necessary, and hustles refractory guests from his premises without hesitating. The "fancy" generally submit to his commands, as they know he is a formidable man when aroused. He keeps his eye on everything, and though he has a business manager, conducts the whole establishment himself. He has been in his wretched business fifteen years, and is said to be wealthy. His profits have been estimated as high as fifty thousand ...
— Lights and Shadows of New York Life - or, the Sights and Sensations of the Great City • James D. McCabe
... hair, shining dark blue eyes, and plump glowing cheeks of Lily were a contrast to the wan wasted colouring of her little cousin; but Lena was more herself now than when just awake, and let Lily lead her up and introduce her, as it might be called, to Cousin Bessie as Lily called her, a less formidable sound than "Aunt Elizabeth." They were both kissed, and she endured it. Angela was, as her brothers and sisters said, "very good," and scrupulously abstained from absorbing the child all the evening, letting Elizabeth show her pictures and tell ...
— Modern Broods • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... up and placed himself between the lamp and the door. He knew slightly the formidable official whose presence here surely indicated some serious development in what had now become a matter of urgent interest to many ...
— The Uttermost Farthing • Marie Belloc Lowndes
... details once for all," she said to Wilhelm, who had watched her proceeding with surprise, "so that we need never refer to them again. You are my husband, and must relieve me now of all my business cares. Here—" she opened the pocketbook and spread out some formidable-looking papers, with stamps and seals attached, before him: "This is my check book, here the deposit receipts for my government ...
— The Malady of the Century • Max Nordau |
