"Grasping" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... to the nation a hope, at which many of their best men seem eagerly grasping, of getting rid of the colored people abroad—they conduce more and more, as this hope prevails, to keep out of mind the superior, unalterable, and immediate duty of righting them ...
— Thoughts on African Colonization • William Lloyd Garrison
... them. As a rule a sudden exclamation, "I'm hit!" "My God!" "Damn it!" They look as if staggering from the blow of a fist rather than that from a tiny pencil of lead—then a sudden paleness, perhaps a grasping of the hands occasionally as if to hold on to something, when the bottom seems to be falling out of all things stable, but generally no sign of aught else than the dulling of death—dulling to sleep—a drunken sleep—drunken ...
— Impressions of a War Correspondent • George Lynch
... driver: so called because this constellation seems to follow the Great Bear as the driver follows his oxen. Bootis is represented as grasping in his right hand a sickle and in his left a club, and is fabled to have been Icarius, who was transported to heaven because he was a great cultivator of the vine; for when Bootes rises the works of ploughing and cultivation ...
— The Ruins • C. F. [Constantin Francois de] Volney
... "Marie," said the king, grasping the hand of his wife with unwonted eagerness, and pressing it tenderly to his lips, "Marie, I thank you in the name of all my subjects. You have acted this hour not only as a queen, but as ...
— Marie Antoinette And Her Son • Louise Muhlbach
... without a smile on his countenance, sitting still, and pushing his hands up his coat sleeves until they reached the elbows; he seemed as if clutching at and grasping something. ...
— Skipper Worse • Alexander Lange Kielland
... listened. She spoke of the mysteries of that unseen nature; how man is watched and ringed round with hosts who war upon him, who wither up his joys by their breath; she spoke of the gnomes who rise up in the woodland paths with damp arms grasping ...
— AE in the Irish Theosophist • George William Russell
... 'Sylvie!' said he, grasping her tight. 'Listen to me. He didn't love yo' as I did. He had loved other women. I, yo'—yo' alone. He loved other girls before yo', and had left off loving 'em. I—I wish God would free my heart from the pang; but it will go on till I die, whether yo' love me or not. And then—where was I? ...
— Sylvia's Lovers, Vol. III • Elizabeth Gaskell
... The subtle and criminal part of Benjamin's mind began to see that the affair would place his landlord and mortgagee in his power, and relieve him for evermore from financial pressure. To his peculiar conscience it was justifiable to overreach his grasping creditor, a right and proper thing to upset the shrewd Varnhagen's plans: a thought of the proposed breach of the law, statutory and moral, did not ...
— The Tale of Timber Town • Alfred Grace
... doorway, holding a silver-banded malacca walking-stick that he had taken from the hall-stand. He was grasping it in his left hand, below the band, with the crook out, holding it at his side as though it were a sword in a scabbard, which was exactly what that walking-stick was. Albert looked at him, and then back at Colonel Hampton. Then, ...
— Dearest • Henry Beam Piper
... a critic, "to realise the image, and the monstrous absurdity of a man's grasping the skies and hanging habitually suspended there, while he contemptuously bids earth roll, warns you that no genuine feeling could have suggested so unnatural a conception." [WESTMINSTER REVIEW, No. cxxxi., p. 27]. It is obvious that if Young had imagined the position ...
— The Principles of Success in Literature • George Henry Lewes
... dirt up with its fore-feet, thus bending the general forward almost to its neck; but his head was thrown back, and his look more keenly piercing than I ever before saw it. He glanced to the right and left, and then fixed his eyes intently on the enemy's advancing column, at the same time grasping the reins with both his hands, and pressing the horse firmly with his knees; his body thus seemed to deal with the animal, while his mind was intent on the enemy, and his aspect was one of searching intenseness, beyond the power of words to describe; for a while he looked, and then galloped to ...
— Heads and Tales • Various
... she reached up to a shelf of tin-ware. Grasping a good-sized pail, she pulled it from its place in such a hurry that half a dozen milk-pans were dragged off with it. Clattering like crazy things they whirled to ...
— Harper's Young People, October 12, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... Its outstretched wings were about eight feet across, and it fastened its sharp claws upon him. Seizing it by the throat, he struggled violently. His companions, awakened by the noise, quickly came to his rescue, grasping him just as he was in danger of being dragged off the raft, and in another moment Bearwarden's knife had ...
— A Journey in Other Worlds - A Romance of the Future • John Jacob Astor
... of the world: Pius VII, tossed like a helpless cork on the waves of the Revolution; Leo XII and Pius VIII, the associates of the Holy Alliance; Gregory XVI, eating sweetmeats or mumbling his breviary while young Italy sweated blood; Pius IX, grasping eagerly his tatters of sovereignty; Leo XIII, the unsuccessful diplomatist; Pius X, the medieval monk. They saw their Church shrink decade by decade, and they witnessed the prosperity of all that they denounced. Benedict XV came to save ...
— The War and the Churches • Joseph McCabe
... conscience into a callous nullity. Between old days and new he finds but slight difference. Rises and panics prevail now as then. The "margin," beloved of the wily broker, first lures and then robs the trustful buyer. "Pools," open and secret, grasping and malicious, may wreak at any hour disasters on the unwary. "Points" are given by one operator to another with the same mendacious glibness as of yore. The market is now dull with the torpor of a sleeping cobra, now aflame, ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 24, November, 1891 • Various
... ravenousness &c adj.; venality, avidity, cupidity; acquisitiveness (acquisition) 775; desire &c 865. [greed for money or material things] greed, greediness, avarice, avidity, rapacity, extortion. selfishness &c 943; auri sacra fames [Lat.]. grasping, craving, canine appetite, rapacity. V. covet, crave (desire) 865; grasp; exact, extort. Adj. greedy, avaricious, covetous, acquisitive, grasping; rapacious; lickerish^. greedy as a hog; overeager; voracious; ravenous, ravenous as a wolf; openmouthed, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... boat had drifted once more across the schooner's bows. I pulled it round until its nose touched the anchor chain, and made the painter fast. Then slipping my hand up the chain, I stood with my shoeless feet upon the gunwale by the bows. Still grasping the chain, I sprang and swung myself out to the jib-boom that, with the cant of the vessel, was not far above the water: then pressed my left foot in between the stay and the brace, while I hung for a ...
— Dead Man's Rock • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... contain himself no longer, but sank, half fainting, into a seat. Albert, with his eyes closed, was standing grasping the window-curtains. The count was erect and triumphant, like ...
— The Count of Monte Cristo • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... fretting and puzzling because help seems to be out of human power, such a mind which is befogged and begrimed by the agitation of its own dust is not a cause in itself—it is an effect. The cause is the reaching and grasping, the unreasonable insistence on its own way of kicking, dust-raising self-will at ...
— Nerves and Common Sense • Annie Payson Call
... a door, and Emil leaped to the crook of his arm, where he nestled, one hand securely grasping a ...
— The Wrong Twin • Harry Leon Wilson
... slept cannot be told; he was awakened by a tight hand grasping his throat, and a fierce voice whispering into his ear something which he rightly understood to be an admonition, a warning ...
— Bones - Being Further Adventures in Mr. Commissioner Sanders' Country • Edgar Wallace
... be men's or children's, are little. In this great universe of ours man is a mere insect, an ant, in his intellect, as compared with the boundless world about him, as measured by the intelligence capable of grasping the ...
— Christmas - Its Origin, Celebration and Significance as Related in Prose and Verse • Various
... one loves him," he continued. "Do you know, in my trouble I've had more out of nigger Jim's affection than I've ever had in my life. Then there's Rockwell, Osterhaut and Jowett, and there's your father. It was worth while living to feel the real thing." His hands went out as though grasping something good and comforting. "I don't suppose every man needs to be struck as hard as I've been to learn what's what, but I've learned it. I give you my word ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... make my heart glow as warmly as did the remark of an old friend not long ago. We had been separated for years, and at our reunion spent the first hour in talking of old times, etc. Suddenly, my friend turned to me, and grasping my hand exclaimed: ...
— The Secret of a Happy Home (1896) • Marion Harland
... dear, this pining solicitude continued after a reconciliation with relations as unworthy as implacable; whose wills are governed by an all-grasping brother, who finds his account in keeping the breach open? On this over-solicitude it is now plain to me, that the vilest of men built all his schemes. He saw that you thirsted after it beyond all reason for hope. ...
— Clarissa, Volume 7 • Samuel Richardson
... moments Peggy stood and stared, her mind not capable of grasping this astounding situation. "No, he ain't nudder!" she presently exclaimed with an air of relief. "Mahs' Junius done tole him dat ef he want dat gate open he better git down and open it hese'f. Dat's right Mahs' Junius! Stick up ...
— The Late Mrs. Null • Frank Richard Stockton
... met on this trip to London was a remote relative of theirs, a nephew of old Chuzzlewit's, named Jonas. Jonas's father was eighty years old and a miser, and the son, too, was so mean and grasping that he often used to wish his father were dead so he would have ...
— Tales from Dickens • Charles Dickens and Hallie Erminie Rives
... he gave the best of work, and made the lowest of charges. In no other way was he for much good. And yet I would rather be that drunken cobbler than many a "fair professor," as Bunyan calls him. A grasping merchant ranks infinitely lower than such a drunken cobbler. Thank God, the Son of Man is the judge, and to him will we plead the cause of such—yea, and of worse than they—for He will do right. It may be well for drunkards that they ...
— Sir Gibbie • George MacDonald
... grasping the hand she had given him with unconscious force. She had looked up startled, her lip trembling like a child's. Then she dropped her head against the arm of her chair, as though she could ...
— Marcella • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... not in quest of a fortune, but of a livelihood. He had been recommended by his father to seek a cousin of his, John Fox of Colebrook, and place himself under his guardianship. He visited Mr. Fox, but found him so mean and grasping that he left him after a brief stay, preparing to face the world without assistance. Mr. Fox, who had two children, Joel and Sally, was greatly disappointed, as he bad hoped to get control of the boy's slender property, and convert it to his own use. He pursued Harry, ...
— In A New World - or, Among The Gold Fields Of Australia • Horatio Alger
... smirking face, a blow that sent him crashing into the bottles behind him. He recovered in an instant, and the doctor's quick eye caught the flash of a knife in his hand as he came over the bar at him. With a swift blow the doctor knocked the knife from his hand, and, grasping him by the coat collar, he dragged him to the back door, and then, raising him on the toe of his boot, landed him in the middle of the mud-puddle that had been left by ...
— The Second Chance • Nellie L. McClung
... eyes, staring, unearthly yellow in the lantern light. Within two yards of Clay, who stood helpless with fear and uncertainty, it crouched to spring, growling and snapping at its own sides, and Helen screamed again as she saw Travis's quick, lithe figure spring forward and, grasping the dog by the throat from behind, fling himself with crushing force on the brute, ...
— The Bishop of Cottontown - A Story of the Southern Cotton Mills • John Trotwood Moore
... gives me an uncomfortable thrill. Yet here was the heiress of these shadows on the wall, gay, talkative, bustling, active; with a word of caution, or a word of advice to all; polite, attentive, agreeable to her guests, quarreling and exacting with her servants, grasping and avaricious with all; singing a piece from "Norma" in a voice, about the size of a thread No. 150, that showed traces of former excellence; or cheapening a bushel of corn meal with equal volubility. What a character! Full of little secrets and ...
— A Confederate Girl's Diary • Sarah Morgan Dawson
... been arranged between the landlord and Don Quixote that the watch over the armor should take place in the courtyard of the inn. Don Quixote placed his corselet and helmet by the side of a well from which the carriers drew water, and, grasping his lance, commenced to march up and down before it like a sentinel on duty; and as the hours wore by and the march continued, the landlord called other persons to watch the performance, explaining that the man was mad, and telling of ...
— The Story of Don Quixote • Arvid Paulson, Clayton Edwards, and Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... caps. I went into the burning guard-house. A savage fellow offered me a great tin pail, containing about two gallons of wine, which he offered me to drink. I was very thirsty, but I had a scruple against plunder. Grasping his sword, he cried, "Buvez, citoyen; c'est du vin royal." Not wishing to have a duel a l'outrance with a fellow-patriot, and, as I said, being thirsty, I took a good long pull. We mutually winked and smiled. He took a pull also to my health and Liberty. ...
— Memoirs • Charles Godfrey Leland
... his companion's tone, the younger lad looked up and, grasping his crutch, limped to the door. He took a glance at the sky and whistled in a low and ...
— The Boy with the U. S. Weather Men • Francis William Rolt-Wheeler
... them, boys!" A strength supernatural thrilled through my veins at that delicious music: by one tremendous effort, I wrested the post from its foundation, five feet in the ground. I could not release my hands from the fetters, it is true; but, grasping the beam tightly, I sprung forward—with one blow I levelled the five executioners in the midst of the fire, their fall upsetting the scalding oil-can; with the next, I swept the bearers of Bobbachy's palanquin off their legs; with ...
— Burlesques • William Makepeace Thackeray
... of the pot, as if meaning to assist him in carrying it up; but on reaching the top of the bank he, in the same jocose way, held it fast, until a gin said something to him, upon which he relinquished the pot and seized the kettle with his left hand, and at the same time grasping his waddy or club in his right he immediately struck Joseph Jones senseless to the ground by a violent blow on the forehead. On seeing this the sailor Jones fired and wounded, in the thigh or groin, ...
— Three Expeditions into the Interior of Eastern Australia, Vol 1 (of 2) • Thomas Mitchell
... full of fine shavings, but grasping something his hand had come in contact with and had clutched ...
— Andy the Acrobat • Peter T. Harkness
... was notified that the President-elect was in the Blue Room awaiting his arrival. Alone, unaided, grasping his old blackthorn stick, the faithful companion of many months, his "third leg," as he playfully called it, slowly he made his way to the elevator and in a few seconds he was standing in the Blue Room meeting ...
— Woodrow Wilson as I Know Him • Joseph P. Tumulty
... short of that with which they would have pressed through a dangerous breach; nor did either of the four take time to survey the lodgment he had made, until the whole party was standing in array, with hands grasping the handles of their pistols, or seeking as it were instinctively ...
— The Wept of Wish-Ton-Wish • James Fenimore Cooper
... a pause of astonishment). This was the intention? For this thou hast summoned me? (Grasping his sword as if to defend himself.) ...
— Egmont - A Tragedy In Five Acts • Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
... it to reach the window. There she watched the figure of Grant crossing the moonlit square. Then turning back into the half-lit room, she ran to the small dressing-glass placed at an angle on a toilet table against the wall. With her palms grasping her knees she stooped down suddenly and contemplated the mirror. It showed what no one but Clementina had ever seen,—and she herself only at rare intervals,—the laughing eyes and soul of ...
— A First Family of Tasajara • Bret Harte
... did, and, after sharing amongst them the jewels and gold they found in the castle, each man went his way. The two brothers remained together, the elder tightly grasping the ointment which had brought ...
— The Pink Fairy Book • Various
... a stone, that you do not know what love is?" she cried, grasping his hand in hers and looking with ...
— The Witch of Prague • F. Marion Crawford
... Dresden Codex the elephant-headed god is represented in one place grasping a serpent, in another issuing from a serpent's mouth, and again as an actual serpent (Fig. 13). Turning next to the attributes of these American gods we find that they reproduce with amazing precision ...
— The Evolution of the Dragon • G. Elliot Smith
... first time that night, the terror that had paralysed my muscles and my will lifted its unholy spell from my soul. With a loud cry I stretched out my arms to seize the big Indian by the throat, and, grasping only air, tumbled forward unconscious upon ...
— The Empty House And Other Ghost Stories • Algernon Blackwood
... cried the fireman, and reached out his arms for her just as she fell back fainting. Grasping her firmly, the brave man dragged her out of the window, and began his perilous descent. When about half way down, the ladder fell, but its burden was expected, and mattress and bed-clothing saved them from what might have been worse. As it was, the fireman escaped with ...
— The Right Knock - A Story • Helen Van-Anderson
... up to him, and grasping the Maronite by the beard muttered in Arabic: "Thou dog! Go confess thy sins! For by the Holy Cross thou assuredly hast not ...
— By Advice of Counsel • Arthur Train
... levy but his house, McCook advised him to get his neighbors together, to pick up the house, and carry it on to another vacant lot, belonging to a non-resident, so that even the house could not be taken in execution. Thus the grasping landlord, though successful in his judgment, failed in the execution, and our client was ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan
... the important function of this clock toward his fellow-citizens, old Zeb Curry, the chief engineer and a stickler for being on time, was most meticulous in his whistle-blowing. With a sage and prophetic eye fixed upon the face of the clock, and a particularly greasy hand grasping the whistle-cord, Zeb would wait until the clock registered exactly six-fifty-nine and a half—whereupon the seven o'clock whistle would commence blowing, to cease instantly upon the stroke of the hour. It was old Zeb's pride and boast that with a single ...
— The Valley of the Giants • Peter B. Kyne
... scared into fits, almost," John cried, as Ree climbed down. "Why, how cold you are!" he exclaimed, grasping his friend's hand. "And your teeth are chattering! How did it happen any ...
— Far Past the Frontier • James A. Braden
... to his left arm and grasping her firmly, Monte-Cristo advanced to the side of the Alcyon. Pausing there for an instant, he said, ...
— Edmond Dantes • Edmund Flagg
... amused him. Certain names are the source of perennial laughter, in which their inhabitants join doubtfully, as persons not sure whether to be proud or angry. They generally end in an apology, while the public, grasping vaguely at the purpose of such a place, settle on it every good tale that is going about the world unprovided for and fatherless. So a name comes to be bathed in the ridiculous, and a mere reference to it passes for a stroke of ...
— Kate Carnegie and Those Ministers • Ian Maclaren
... machine tolerably fairly and propel it and steer it, then comes your next task—how to mount it. You do it in this way: you hop along behind it on your right foot, resting the other on the mounting-peg, and grasping the tiller with your hands. At the word, you rise on the peg, stiffen your left leg, hang your other one around in the air in a general in indefinite way, lean your stomach against the rear of the saddle, ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... clean full it is," answered the quartermaster, as he gave her an extra spoke of the wheel, while the Captain and the first lieutenant stood together close by the weather bulwarks watching her behaviour, the latter grasping ...
— A Middy of the King - A Romance of the Old British Navy • Harry Collingwood
... admitted, smiling. Little Felix Babylon seemed to brace himself for the grasping of ...
— The Grand Babylon Hotel • Arnold Bennett
... Pennsylvania were undertaking canal systems which were certain in the long run to destroy the advantages of Baltimore. In desperation, her far-sighted and courageous merchants inaugurated the plan of a railroad across the mountains to the Ohio, grasping the idea that as the canal had shown its superiority over the turnpike, so this new device would win the day over the canal. In 1827 and 1828 charters for the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad were granted by Maryland, ...
— Rise of the New West, 1819-1829 - Volume 14 in the series American Nation: A History • Frederick Jackson Turner
... mediator between God and men— Reached down the hand of sympathetic love To meet the grasp of lost Humanity; And this man, kneeling, has the Lord in him, And comes to mediate 'twixt Christ and me, "Tempted, but sinless;"—one hand grasping mine, The ...
— Bitter-Sweet • J. G. Holland
... "tuned up," we went down to the drawing-room, where I paid my respects to the host and hostess, who stood at the end of a beautiful room. As I approached the lady greeted me with a charming smile, extending her gloved hand almost on a direct line with her face, grasping it firmly, not shaking it, saying, "Very kind of you, ——. Delighted, I am sure. General"—turning to her husband—"you know the ——, of course," and the general shook my hand as he would a pump-handle, and whispered, "Our minister ...
— As A Chinaman Saw Us - Passages from his Letters to a Friend at Home • Anonymous
... Godin. I have seen these arms blazoned variously. Mr. Godin Shiffner bears them quarterly with his own coat of Shiffner, and blazons them thus:—Party per fess, azure and gules, a barr or; in chief, a dexter and sinister hand grasping a ...
— Notes & Queries,No. 31., Saturday, June 1, 1850 • Various
... Covent Garden (which had been closed for the war) was missing, the boxes held their modicum of brilliantly dressed women; and through the audience there was a considerable sprinkling of soldiers, mostly from the British Dominions and America, grasping hungrily at one of the few war-time London theatrical productions that did not engender a deep and lasting melancholy—to say nothing of a deep and lasting doubt of English ...
— The Parts Men Play • Arthur Beverley Baxter
... he half raised himself, grasping the sofa with his knotted hands. He slid down, half crawling and half falling, into the corner, where he crouched, breathless and shuddering; so he was when Helen ...
— King Midas • Upton Sinclair
... [Grasping his hand] My dear chap, certainly. Go and interview this blighter, and then bring him round here. You can do that for one. I'd very much like to see him, as a ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... War—under the guidance of a man whose whole character displayed the most prominent features of soldiership. From that moment, the republic bore the sole impress of war. France had placed at her head the most impetuous, subtle, ferocious, and all-grasping, of the monarchs of mankind. She instantly took the shape which, like the magicians of old commanding their familiar spirits, the great magician of our age commanded her to assume. Peace—the rights of man—the mutual ties of nations—the freedom of the serf and ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, No. 382, October 1847 • Various
... care of her. At this instant I saw one of the oars from the boat floating a little way from us and managed to secure it, holding Mona with one arm and swimming with the other. I now helped my companion to half support herself by grasping the oar, while for the rest she was induced to throw an arm over my shoulder. In this way I was left free to make what progress I could through the water, and I lost no time in swimming toward the shore, since there was no hope of our being able ...
— Daybreak: A Romance of an Old World • James Cowan
... but one part of this great subject, that the apostles absolutely command a slave to give obedience to his master in nil things, "as to the Lord." It is in vain to deny, that the most grasping of slave-owners asks nothing more of abolitionists than that they would all adopt Paul's creed; viz., acknowledge the full authority of owners of slaves, tell them that they are responsible to God alone, and charge them to use ...
— Phases of Faith - Passages from the History of My Creed • Francis William Newman
... the pleasure of seeing a monkey try to learn music, but at the present moment, when I laugh much less than I did in those careless days, I never think of that monkey without a smile; the semi-man began by grasping the instrument with his fist and by sniffing at it as if he were tasting the flavor of an apple. The snort from his nostrils probably produced a dull harmonious sound in the sonorous wood and then the ...
— Analytical Studies • Honore de Balzac
... controlled by the Negro tells its own story. The Sermon on the Mount is taking a hold of the Negro as never before. If I should offer an adverse criticism on the Negro's religion, it would be that, as he understands it, he has a surplus of religion. But he is surely grasping the idea that God is a Spirit, and "they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth." There are to be found among the Negroes those whose words are as good as gold. The true significance of morality is being better understood and practiced by the Negro. The newspaper ...
— Twentieth Century Negro Literature - Or, A Cyclopedia of Thought on the Vital Topics Relating - to the American Negro • Various
... the King's Bench related to the privileges of peerage. The tribunal before which the appeal must come was the House of Peers. On such an occasion the court could not be certain of the support even of the most courtly nobles. There was little doubt that the sentence would be annulled, and that, by grasping at too much, the government would lose all. James was therefore disposed to a compromise. Devonshire was informed that, if he would give a bond for the whole fine, and thus preclude himself from the advantage which he might derive from a writ of error, he should be ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 2 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... Temptation. Eve reclines upon the ground, and shows Adam the fruit which she has plucked. Adam stands grasping the tree with his left hand, and raises his right to gather for himself. The serpent, who looks down upon Eve, has the face and body of a woman. The forms in this group are fine; Adam's is remarkable for its symmetry and grace; but Eve's face is ignoble. Indeed, Holbein, like Rembrandt, seems to ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, Issue 17, March, 1859 • Various
... like to choke with laughter at the lad's demeanour—his companion's hand stole to his sword hilt, which the youth observing, dealt him a blow across the wrist, which made him incapable of grasping it, while his companion's mirth was only increased ...
— Quentin Durward • Sir Walter Scott
... picture by Carlo Crivelli, in which the Virgin is seated on a throne, adorned, in the artist's usual style, with rich festoons of fruit and flowers. She is most sumptuously crowned and apparelled; and the beautiful Child on her knee, grasping her hand as if to support himself, with the most naive and graceful action bends forward and looks dawn benignly on the worshippers supposed to be ...
— Legends of the Madonna • Mrs. Jameson
... with many relatives, some of whom were well-to-do but grasping, recently sought the services of his lawyer to draw up his will. When, after much labor, the document was completed, ...
— More Toasts • Marion Dix Mosher
... 3: The gift of understanding is related to both kinds of knowledge, viz. speculative and practical, not as to the judgment, but as to apprehension, by grasping what is ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas
... the Gordian knot by stepping straight to where Harkness lies, grasping the collar of his coat, and rudely arousing him out of his slumber, by a jerk that brings him erect upon his feet. Then, without waiting word of remonstrance from the astonished man, Sime hisses into ...
— The Death Shot - A Story Retold • Mayne Reid
... god overtook Syrinx and stretched out his arms to her, she vanished like a mist, and he found himself grasping a cluster of ...
— Old Greek Folk Stories Told Anew • Josephine Preston Peabody
... is decidedly circumscribed and is beginning to be sufficiently distant from us to allow of our grasping the principal lines even ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... bourgeois it has an especial inherent value, the value of a god, and makes the bourgeois the mean, low money-grabber that he is. The working-man who knows nothing of this feeling of reverence for money is therefore less grasping than the bourgeois, whose whole activity is for the purpose of gain, who sees in the accumulations of his money-bags the end and aim of life. Hence the workman is much less prejudiced, has a clearer eye for facts as they are than the bourgeois, and ...
— The Condition of the Working-Class in England in 1844 - with a Preface written in 1892 • Frederick Engels
... up to the hilt. Thus wounded the shark quitted his prey, and turned on the boy, who again and again attacked him with the sabre, but the struggle was too unequal; ropes were quickly thrown from the deck to the father and son; each succeeded in grasping one, and loud rose the cry of joy, "They are saved!" Not so! The shark, enraged at seeing that he was about to be altogether disappointed of his prey, made one desperate spring, and tore asunder the body of the noble-hearted little boy, while his ...
— Thrilling Stories Of The Ocean • Marmaduke Park
... at one another, but although they made no sign they knew what the wrong was. But they smiled at Mattie in the most friendly way, Nora grasping ...
— Ethel Hollister's Second Summer as a Campfire Girl • Irene Elliott Benson
... Word, Archibald. Let it be as Salome's child has spoken," said Cuthbert Kaye, grasping ...
— Reels and Spindles - A Story of Mill Life • Evelyn Raymond
... coarse, and rather grasping in his dealings with those who employed him, not so much because he was naturally mean, but because he was always determined that well-dressed folk should not "put on him." Nevertheless, he was in his way sympathetic and even tender, particularly ...
— Miriam's Schooling and Other Papers - Gideon; Samuel; Saul; Miriam's Schooling; and Michael Trevanion • Mark Rutherford
... "That's a good one. Here, do it now." He drew a gun from its holster and grasping it by the barrel, extended the butt toward the girl. She shrank into the doorway still clutching the lamb. The man returned the gun to its place and leaned forward in the saddle, "If you'll be reasonable—listen: ...
— Prairie Flowers • James B. Hendryx
... and Sardinia and Corsica were now formed into a Roman province, governed, like Sicily, by a Praetor sent annually from Rome (B.C. 238). This act of robbery added fresh fuel to the implacable animosity of Hamilcar against the grasping Republic. He now departed for Spain, where for many years he steadily worked to lay the foundation of a new empire, which might not only compensate for the loss of Sicily and Sardinia, but enable him at some time to renew ...
— A Smaller History of Rome • William Smith and Eugene Lawrence
... bowed. 'You are in this kingdom without my consent, my good man. For whom are you working here, you whose ancestors from father to son have been devoted in heart to the house of Medici? Listen to me! You dive into so many purses that by this time, if you are grasping men, you have piled up gold. You are too shrewd and cautious to cast yourselves imprudently into criminal actions; but, nevertheless, you are not here in this kitchen without a purpose. Yes, you have some secret scheme, you who are satisfied neither by gold ...
— Catherine de' Medici • Honore de Balzac
... war, had been recruited by fresh emigration, when one Samuel Argall arrived at Jamestown, captain of an illicit trading-vessel. He was a man of ability and force,—one of those compounds of craft and daring in which the age was fruitful; for the rest, unscrupulous and grasping. In the spring of 1613 he achieved a characteristic exploit,—the abduction of Pocahontas, that most interesting of young squaws, or, to borrow the style of the day, of Indian princesses. Sailing up the Potomac he lured her on board ...
— Pioneers Of France In The New World • Francis Parkman, Jr.
... more convinced that man is a dangerous creature; and that power, whether vested in many or a few, is ever grasping, and, like the grave, cries, "Give, give!" The great fish swallow up the small; and he who is most strenuous for the rights of the people, when vested with power, is as eager after the prerogatives of government. You tell me of degrees of perfection to which human nature ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 1 • Charles Dudley Warner
... there was no reason therefore why he should kill me. While I was talking he again drove his rifle against me, and I, having grasped it firmly, a very animated argument took place, for he strongly resented my grasping his gun. Outstretching my hand I asked "Tommy" to help me up, and this he did. I afterwards learned that the name of my assailant was Patrick, and that he belonged to the ...
— My Reminiscences of the Anglo-Boer War • Ben Viljoen
... his friend a few celebrities. One, with the badge of the Legion of Honor upon his coat, which looked as if it had come from the stall of an old-clothes man, was Forgerol, the great geologist, the most grasping of scientific men; Forgerol, rich from his twenty fat sinecures, for whom one of his confreres composed this epitaph in advance: "Here lies Forgerol, in the only ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... his; I in one degree, Mr. Longman in another, Mrs. Jervis in another—But from a man of his high temper and manner of education, I knew I could never hope for it, so would not lose every thing, by grasping at too much. ...
— Pamela (Vol. II.) • Samuel Richardson
... Dickey, be careful, if you must fight. Take deliberate aim and don't lose your nerve," cried Quentin, grasping him by the arms. "You are as ...
— Castle Craneycrow • George Barr McCutcheon
... Grasping the leather handle of his now red-hot rod, the Professor deftly opened the gate of Finn's cage, far enough to admit of his own swift entrance; the gate being instantly slammed to behind him by Sam, and bolted. ...
— Finn The Wolfhound • A. J. Dawson
... a good hoss doctor, Swanson," replied the Doctor, grasping the offered hand and giving it a hearty shake. "Good hoss doctors ...
— Jim Cummings • Frank Pinkerton
... his near connection, already a sufferer under a severe reverse of fortune. However, he did but justify the saying of Plato, that the only certain way to be truly rich is not to have more property, but fewer desires. For whoever is always grasping at more avows that he is still in want, and must be poor in the ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... ingratitude of the French in not recognising his amiable qualities. It was his habit to remind them that but for his clemency in carrying out the instructions of Bathurst and those who acted with him, their condition could be made unendurable. He was incapable of grasping the lofty personality of ...
— The Tragedy of St. Helena • Walter Runciman
... modified. In the case of the water-ouzel, the acutest observer, by examining its dead body, would never have suspected its sub-aquatic habits; yet this bird, which is allied to the thrush family, subsists by diving,—using its wings under water and grasping stones with its feet. All the members of the great order of Hymenopterous insects are terrestrial, excepting the genus Proctotrupes, which Sir John Lubbock has discovered to be aquatic in its habits; it often ...
— On the Origin of Species - 6th Edition • Charles Darwin
... strange mixture of good and bad qualities. He seemed to be made up altogether of opposites. He was very bitter against any one who had offended him, yet he was not permanently vindictive. He was grasping in business, yet he was not ungenerous. He was a most implacable enemy, yes he was capable of warm and most disinterested friendship. He could descend to trickery in dealing, yet as a magistrate he had a high and most inflexible ideal of honour, honesty, and rectitude. He could be coarse ...
— Personal Recollections of Birmingham and Birmingham Men • E. Edwards
... surface of our globe was fairly showered with it, productive fields were, in some cases, almost smothered under a metallic coating, the air was filled with shining dust, until finally famine and pestilence joined hands with financial disaster to punish the grasping world. ...
— The Moon Metal • Garrett P. Serviss
... their concord would have rendered formidable. The necessity of military operations required their absence from Paris; but they preferred rather to there exhibit themselves to their mistresses, decked out in a general's uniform, and grasping the truncheon of command. No greater harmony existed between the Prince de Conti and Madame de Longueville than when La Rochefoucauld severed them. At Bordeaux they favoured opposite parties, and contributed to augment the discord prevailing, and to weaken the party of the Princes by dividing ...
— Political Women, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Sutherland Menzies
... problem of labor versus capital. He was to learn through years of heart breaking endeavor that neither capital nor labor has use for a dreamer of dreams no matter how practical the dreams may be, unless the dreamer is selfish enough, is grasping and ruthless enough to trample over other ...
— The Forbidden Trail • Honore Willsie
... which Xenophon elsewhere gives us as philosophic memorabilia, that the episode of Abradates and Panthea (especially the behaviour of Panthea after the death of her beloved hero, and the incident of the dead man's hand coming away on Cyrus grasping it) exceeds for pathos everything in Grecian literature, always excepting the Greek drama, and comes nearest of anything, throughout Pagan literature, to the impassioned simplicity of Scripture, in its tale of Joseph ...
— The Uncollected Writings of Thomas de Quincey—Vol. 1 - With a Preface and Annotations by James Hogg • Thomas de Quincey
... Hugh, grasping at the subject as if it were the proverbial straw. "How I love kids! How many ...
— Nedra • George Barr McCutcheon
... eve of being cruelly crushed for ever, when Mr. Grant noticed the impending calamity. He had no time to warn her, for she had already passed the point at which her powers of muscular endurance terminated; so grasping the chair, he suddenly withdrew it with such force that the baby rolled off upon the floor like a hedgehog, straightened out flat, and gave vent to an outrageous roar, while its horror-struck mother came to the ground with a sound resembling the ...
— The Young Fur Traders • R.M. Ballantyne
... with them at all. After that point, they must be gently and firmly stopped, or else they might become tiresome, and that would be bad both for them and for you. Especially with a husband like Winn, who seemed incapable of grasping fine shades, and far too capable of dealing roughly and brutally with whatever he did grasp. There had been a dress, for instance, that he simply refused to let Estelle wear—remarking that it was a bit too thick—though that was really the last ...
— The Dark Tower • Phyllis Bottome
... he came back, the passengers flocked around him, grasping his hands and blessing him as the preserver of their money, if not of their lives. After that Arthur was a lion, whom all people in the valley wished to see and talk with, and with whom the landlord bore as he had never borne with a guest before, for Arthur ...
— Tracy Park • Mary Jane Holmes
... now no time, and my terror was redoubled when I saw the rose-coloured lady making signs to my blushing Pierrette, who remained as if rooted to the spot, grasping my hand tightly. I pulled off my cap, and ...
— The Strand Magazine, Volume V, Issue 29, May 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various
... maintained, with a king and ministry ardently desirous of redeeming her glory, succouring her allies, and promoting her true interest, a shameful dislike to the service everywhere prevailed, and few seemed affected with any other zeal than that of aspiring to the highest posts, and grasping the largest salaries. The censure levelled at the commander in America was founded on mistake; the inactivity of that noble lord was not more disappointing to the ministry than disagreeable to his own inclination. He used his ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... departing from his revered father-in-law, and he uttered not a word. After an afflicting pause, the young man said, "Dear sir, you sent for me; I believe, and I hope, that you have some commands; I shall hold them most sacred." Grasping his hand, Addison softly replied, "I sent for you, that you might see in what peace a Christian can die." He spoke ...
— Cato - A Tragedy, in Five Acts • Joseph Addison
... his head, as the misdirected sweetmeat approaches; he has an apt remark prompt for the occasion. As he nears too the favoured inamorato, for whom he well knows his mistress' sweetest smile is reserved—who already with his right hand grasping the sugared favours, is prepared to lavish his whole store on this one venture—how arch his look—how roguish his eye—as he turns towards his donna, and speaks as plainly as words could do, "See! there he is, ...
— A Love Story • A Bushman
... Grasping my hand, which lay outside the coverlet, he pressed it gently, and, kneeling down, gave thanks to God for this ...
— My Sword's My Fortune - A Story of Old France • Herbert Hayens
... she said, shedding back the clustering curls from her pallid face, and grasping the chair to steady herself and keep from falling. "I am not here to frighten you, I've come to do you good—to set you free. Oh, Arthur, you do not know how terribly you have been wronged, and I did not know it, either, till a few days ago. She never received ...
— The Rector of St. Mark's • Mary J. Holmes
... tidings of our arrival spread abroad, a great number of Acadian exiles flocked to our camp to greet and welcome us. Ah! petiots, how can I describe our joy and rapture, when we recognized countenances familiar to us. Grasping their hands, with hearts too full for utterance, we wept like children. Many a sorrowing heart revived to love and happiness on that day. Many a wife pressed to her bosom a long lost husband. Many a fond parent clasped in rapturous ...
— Acadian Reminiscences - The True Story of Evangeline • Felix Voorhies
... Alighieri is grand by his lights, not by his shadows; by his human affections, not by his infernal. As the minutest sands are the labours of some profound sea, or the spoils of some vast mountain, in like manner his horrid wastes and wearying minutenesses are the chafings of a turbulent spirit, grasping the loftiest things and penetrating the deepest, and moving and moaning on the earth ...
— Imaginary Conversations and Poems - A Selection • Walter Savage Landor
... exclaimed, grasping his hand, "I gave you up for lost many months ago, and we have all mourned for you deeply. Where have you been? what have you been doing? what on earth have you done to yourself? and where did you get this ...
— With Cochrane the Dauntless • George Alfred Henty
... it,' said Guy, grasping the back of a chair. 'Tell me, Markham. Is it really so? Am I cleared? Has Mr. Edmonstone a right to ...
— The Heir of Redclyffe • Charlotte M. Yonge
... again Miss Arabella read the letter, trying to convince her dazed senses that it was real. When she had succeeded in grasping something of the joyous truth she arose dizzily and went to the dresser drawer. Very carefully she took out the roll of blue silk, and laying the letter between its shining folds, she sat down and ...
— Treasure Valley • Marian Keith
... their perusal, and dines in their honour when they are dead. But it goes on its way immovable, grinding the poor, enslaving the slave, admiring hideousness, adulating vulgarity for its wealth and insignificance for its pedigree. Grasping, pleasure-seeking, indifferent to reason, and enamoured of the lie, so it goes on, and the masters of the word might just as well have hushed their sweet or thunderous voices. For, though they speak with the tongue of men and angels, ...
— Essays in Rebellion • Henry W. Nevinson
... was bent on Ted's destruction, and seemed about to accomplish it, when Stella galloped to his side, and, grasping his hand, held ...
— Ted Strong's Motor Car • Edward C. Taylor
... swing, And burning for a rival, beats the air. Where is his match? Not one of all will dare To don the gloves. So, deeming none can stand Against him, flushed with triumph, then and there Before AEneas, grasping in his hand The heifer's horns, he cries in ...
— The Aeneid of Virgil - Translated into English Verse by E. Fairfax Taylor • Virgil
... that time and since have found a difficulty in grasping the precise cause of the war that followed. Of those who were inclined to sympathise with the North, some regarded the war as being simply about slavery, and, while unhesitatingly opposed to slavery, wondered whether it was right to make war upon it; others, regarding it as a war for the ...
— Abraham Lincoln • Lord Charnwood
... of this stage whisper in a rather tremulous anxiety to catch a glimpse of her aunt before she moved. Claire had to acknowledge that at a distance her aunt gave a wonderful illusion of arrested youth as she stood with one hand grasping the collar of her gorgeous mandarin coat. But Claire was more interested in the turquoise pendants than in her aunt. She had never seen the jewels before, but she had heard about them almost from the time she ...
— The Blood Red Dawn • Charles Caldwell Dobie
... at any time visit the small town of Sparta, and encounter in the street a little old lady dressed in a brown cloak and hood, and firmly grasping in her right hand a faded blue cotton umbrella, they may feel quite certain that they are in the presence of Mrs. Mehitabel Payson, relict of Jeremiah ...
— Frank's Campaign - or the Farm and the Camp • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... exclaimed Reuben, coming forward and grasping his hand; "I telled Hannah to keep the tea back a spell, 'cause I knowed ...
— Self-Raised • Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte Southworth
... emulate the prowess of Hercules in resisting the attempts of monsters. He went into Gothland, and, in order to frighten people out of his path, strode on clad in goats' skins, swathed in the motley hides of beasts, and grasping in his right hand a dreadful weapon, thus feigning the attire of a giant; when he met Groa herself riding with a very small escort of women on foot, and making her way, as it chanced, to the forest-pools to bathe, she thought it was her betrothed who had hastened to meet her, and was scared with ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")
... both species of insects are very numerous in Ghadames, and there is a great number of various coloured ants. The ant got hold of the muzzle of the fly, or its neck, and there grasped it with as firm a grasp as it is possible to conceive of one animal grasping another. In vain the fly struggled and flapped its wings; over and over again the combatants rolled as these weak defences beat the air: and yet they must have had great force in them, for they flung over the ant, ...
— Travels in the Great Desert of Sahara, in the Years of 1845 and 1846 • James Richardson
... the small round seat, his hand grasping the lever by which he raised and lowered the long curved teeth of the rake that gathered up the hay and dropped it in long rows ...
— Uncle Robert's Geography (Uncle Robert's Visit, V.3) • Francis W. Parker and Nellie Lathrop Helm
... won't come back, I fear; so you must come with us, little maid, and if God wills we will carry you safely on shore," answered Adam, folding the clothes tighter round the child, and grasping her securely in his left arm as a woman carries an infant, and leaving his right one at liberty, for this he knew he should require to hold on by, until having made his way across the heaving, slippery deck, he could take the ...
— Won from the Waves • W.H.G. Kingston
... streets present a curious spectacle—everybody seems to be shaking hands with himself. A Chinaman, on meeting and saluting a friend, instead of seizing his hand, as we should, clasps his own hands together, the right hand grasping the left, which he sways up and down in ...
— In Eastern Seas - The Commission of H.M.S. 'Iron Duke,' flag-ship in China, 1878-83 • J. J. Smith
... old man, deaf to her supplication, and disregarding her menace, ordered his followers to seize the fugitive. Warrior after warrior darted up the rock, but on reaching the platform, at the moment when they were grasping to clutch the young brave, the lovers, locked in fond embrace, ...
— An account of Sa-Go-Ye-Wat-Ha - Red Jacket and his people, 1750-1830 • John Niles Hubbard
... Cliff, grasping Burke by the arm, "don't you think it looks very much as if that Captain Hagar was trying to run away with the treasure which ...
— Mrs. Cliff's Yacht • Frank R. Stockton
... in heaven or earth— It helps us know our fellow's worth; There'd be no wars or bitterness, No fear, no hate, no grasping; yes, It makes work play, and the careworn free When I appreciate ...
— It Can Be Done - Poems of Inspiration • Joseph Morris
... Bodhisattwa, and menaced him, a legion of devils assisting.' The daughters, it is related, were changed to old women, and of the battle this is written: ... 'And now the demon host waxed fiercer, and added force to force, grasping at stones they could not lift, or lifting them they could not let them go; their flying spears stuck fast in space refusing to descend; the angry thunder-drops and mighty hail, with them, were changed into five-colored lotus flowers; ...
— The Prince of India - Or - Why Constantinople Fell - Volume 2 • Lew. Wallace
... the leader, in imperfect English, grasping the hands held out in salutation, while his actions were imitated by the others ...
— Wild Western Scenes • John Beauchamp Jones
... letter as one who dreams and is but half conscious that it is a dream. He read it again and again, each time grasping bit by bit the realization of its contents and what they meant ...
— Penny of Top Hill Trail • Belle Kanaris Maniates
... itself—nay superannuated stupidity—gain with labour the dreariest glimpses of unimportant extinct human beings ... but when I begin operating: how to reduce that widespread black desert of Brandenburg sand to a small human garden! ... I have no capacity of grasping the big chaos that lies around me, and reducing it to order. Order! Reducing! It is like compelling the grave ...
— Thomas Carlyle - Biography • John Nichol
... fully known it since! For we of the eleventh century, hard- headed, close-fisted, grasping, shrewd, as we were, and as Normans are still said to be, stood more fully in the centre of the world's movement than our English descendants ever did. We were a part, and a great part, of the Church, of France, and of Europe. The Leos and Gregories of the ...
— Mont-Saint-Michel and Chartres • Henry Adams
... that it nearly vanished; literally it seemed to melt away till I could only perceive its outline. With a kind of shock I comprehended all the horror that it must feel at such a prospect as I had suggested to it, and really this grasping of the truth hurt my human pride. It had never come home to me before that the circumstances of their lives—and deaths—must cause some creatures to see us ...
— The Mahatma and the Hare • H. Rider Haggard
... coarse grass that gave the horses very little foothold. Trembling and snorting, the animals just managed to support the weight of the gun, while, straining forwards and pawing the ground, they tried to get a firmer footing. The gunners had got down, and grasping the spokes of the wheels did what ...
— 'Jena' or 'Sedan'? • Franz Beyerlein
... handling of a weapon? It is not the force of a blow, but the way in which it is geschlagen, that makes the effect. Your sword now is heavier than mine, by the look of it, and yet my blade would bite deeper. Eh? Is not that a more soldierly sport than kinderspiel such as hand-grasping ...
— Micah Clarke - His Statement as made to his three Grandchildren Joseph, - Gervas and Reuben During the Hard Winter of 1734 • Arthur Conan Doyle
... Bright, "though not so deeply as some natures would have suffered in the same circumstances. Her present situation is far from being enviable. Her father is a hard, grasping man, and he was greatly vexed that her splendid marriage turned out to be such a failure. It must be very mortifying to her to depend upon him mainly for the support of herself and son. I pitied her, and I pitied Mr. Fitzgerald too. He was selfish and dissipated, because he was brought up with ...
— A Romance of the Republic • Lydia Maria Francis Child
... and cold, There sits a grasping miser old. He has no thought save one of gain,— To grind and gather and grasp and drain. A peal of bells, a merry shout Assail his ear: he gazes out Upon a world to him all gray, And snarls, ...
— The Complete Poems of Paul Laurence Dunbar • Paul Laurence Dunbar
... upon the world of flesh and, with a force that shamed the strength of his words, drove home the truth that neither his praise nor his scorn could long endure. When he could again speak, he said, in his husky, rasping whisper,—while grasping the painter's hand in effusive cordiality,—"My dear fellow, I congratulate you. It is exquisite. It will create a sensation, sir, when it is exhibited. Your fame is assured. I must thank you for the honor you have done me in thus immortalizing the beauty and character of Mrs. Taine." And ...
— The Eyes of the World • Harold Bell Wright
... said Mr. Carlyle grasping his hand, in his inexpressible relief. "Little shall be ...
— East Lynne • Mrs. Henry Wood
... to the bedside, he found that the last breath had gone in the words. The thin right hand lay partly closed, as if it had been grasping a larger hand. On the face lay confidence just ruffled with apprehension: the latter melted away, and nothing remained but that awful and beautiful peace which is the farewell of the soul ...
— Robert Falconer • George MacDonald
... she would say triumphantly, "isn't that astonishing! So kyawiously frank, if you know what I mean? It's most amazing—his sense of depth, if you know what I mean? Rarely, to splash things on in that way, and to grasp it." A clawed little hand would illustrate grasping. "It's astonishing!" ...
— The Story Of Julia Page - Works of Kathleen Norris, Volume V. • Kathleen Norris
... the same time, you must be cautious, or in grasping at Asa Trenchard's solid good qualities, you may miss them, and De Boots expectations into ...
— Our American Cousin • Tom Taylor
... French think,' Lord Ormont said, grasping the stick to get conviction of thumb-strength and finger-strength from the parades advocated; 'their steel would thread the ribs of our louts before: they could raise a cry of parry; so here they 're pleased to sneer ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... may be informed of that which they never knew, or reminded of that which they may have forgotten; that the record of his accidental and forced confession in open Court of an appalling use of money in defending stolen millions and grasping after more shall be revived; that his low estimate of the honor and integrity of public men, and his essential contempt for the masses, may be contrasted with his high appreciation of the debauching power of money; that the enslavement by himself and his ...
— How Members of Congress Are Bribed • Joseph Moore
... pulled the horses well over to the side, but the braying was too much for them, and they rolled into the ditch. In a moment the old Family Coach was overturned. Mr. Burly was shot into the field across the hedge, Uncle Joshua, grasping the horn, landed in a pond, John and Aunt Penelope, Mrs. Burly and the grooms all stuck in the hedge. No one was hurt, but two of the wheels were broken to pieces and one axle was bent, and that was therefore the last of the old ...
— What Shall We Do Now?: Five Hundred Games and Pastimes • Dorothy Canfield Fisher
... in the sand near the water's edge, and, grasping their weapons firmly, they prepared to check the advance of the monster. Fortunately the spears and axes were of hard iron and fitted with strong handles which the long storage in the cavern seemed ...
— The River of Darkness - Under Africa • William Murray Graydon
... drawing his daughter's attention once more to himself. Thinking she had waited as long as was requisite for the maintenance of her dignity as a non-inquisitive person, she transferred herself lightly to the arm of her father's chair, grasping his beard in her plump, slender hand, and turned his face ...
— Bressant • Julian Hawthorne
... London magistrate, "cannot go about knocking people down and killing them every day." We agree. Once should be enough for the most grasping pedestrian. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 159, October 6, 1920 • Various
... grappled me unseen, but I held on steadfastly, since every stride carried me nearer to vengeance, that vengeance for the which I prayed and lived. So with bared head lifted exulting to the tempest and grasping the stout hedge-stake that served me for staff, I climbed the long ...
— Black Bartlemy's Treasure • Jeffrey Farnol
... Reas, eagerly grasping the ring that Sigurd took from his belt pouch; "and you may take ...
— Olaf the Glorious - A Story of the Viking Age • Robert Leighton
... unreality of religious questions! How fictitious, how unbusiness-like, how preposterous in the sight of God is this internecine sectarianism and impotent sentimentalism where there might be the triumphant march of one army under one flag! Let us learn the lesson which even the grasping, unscrupulous world has to teach,—the lesson of an absorbed and disciplined mind giving its entire sagacity to ...
— Mornings in the College Chapel - Short Addresses to Young Men on Personal Religion • Francis Greenwood Peabody
... and children tottered and swayed on shaking legs and continued to surge in, their mad eyes swimming with weakness and burning with ravenous desire. A woman, moaning, staggered past Shorty and fell with spread and grasping arms on the sled. An old man followed her, panting and gasping, with trembling hands striving to cast off the sled lashings, and get at the grub-sacks beneath. A young man, with a naked knife, tried to rush in, but was flung back by Smoke. ...
— Smoke Bellew • Jack London
... interesting:—It has been seen perched on the bar of a gate, not across, but according to its length, with the tail elevated; uttering its peculiar sounds; but when perching, as it often does, on the summit of a twig of oaken copse, it fixes upright, with the feet grasping the twig, and not sitting; just as the swift perches against a wall. One was killed in broad daylight, perched on the upper side of a sloping branch of considerable size; the head was uppermost, and it rested ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 20, - Issue 566, September 15, 1832 • Various
... remoulding society, those constitutions framed in closets, discussed in clubs, accepted and overthrown with equal demonstrations of popular zeal, and which, expressing in their terrible energy the universal dissatisfaction with past and present, the universal grasping at a brighter future, have met and answered so many grave questions,—questions neither propounded nor solved in any of the two hundred constitutions which Aristotle studied in order to prepare himself for ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 85, November, 1864 • Various
... "I know," he cried, with sudden inspiration, "I'll walk in the middle with the end of a stick in either hand and you four can take it in turns to carry the other ends." No one having anything to say against this plan they proceeded, Faith grasping one stick and Irene the other, while the baskets swung between in a fashion that would have turned the milk to butter had there been any in them to turn. Behind the trio walked Audrey and Daphne, dainty and decorous enough to give ...
— Anxious Audrey • Mabel Quiller-Couch
... to hear. But it is gentlemen who make one instrument produce the sounds of another, or, at all events, who extract from it some previously unknown effect, who carry all before them. The present phenomenon in this way is Bottesini, who, grasping a huge double-bass, the most unwieldy of instruments, tortures out of it the notes of a violin, of an oboe, and of a flute. A season or two ago, M. Vivier took all London by storm, by producing a chord upon the French horn, a feat previously considered ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 436 - Volume 17, New Series, May 8, 1852 • Various
... poverty to leave his education uncompleted, he sought the means of living in London, where, for a long time, unpatronized and obscure, he labored with dogged perseverance, until at length he won a fame which must have satisfied the most grasping ambition, but when, as he says, "most of those whom he had wished to please had sunk into the grave, and he had little to fear from censure or praise." That the reputation of his writings was above ...
— Handbook of Universal Literature - From The Best and Latest Authorities • Anne C. Lynch Botta |
