"Hysterics" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... "can't you manage to be sensible for a minute? If you go on in this way you will soon get hysterical, and I don't think my treatment for hysterics would appeal to ...
— The Keeper of the Door • Ethel M. Dell
... acquainted with his compact, and its probable consequences, raised such a storm about his ears, as made him wish almost that his seven years were expired. She screamed, she scolded, she swore, she wept, she went into such fits of hysterics, that poor Gambouge, who had completely knocked under to her, was worn out of his life. He was allowed no rest, night or day: he moped about his fine house, solitary and wretched, and cursed his stars that he ever had ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray
... everyone, yourself included, has become of late," said he. "I was telling you that I cannot in the least understand Lizabetha Prokofievna's ideas and agitations. She is in hysterics up there, and moans and says that we have been 'shamed and disgraced.' How? Why? When? By whom? I confess that I am very much to blame myself; I do not conceal the fact; but the conduct, the outrageous behaviour of this woman, must really be kept within limits, by the police if necessary, and ...
— The Idiot • (AKA Feodor Dostoevsky) Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... silly now, Ro. It's a big disappointment, and I'm sorry for you, but it's not a bit of use working yourself into hysterics. Face the thing ...
— Tom and Some Other Girls - A Public School Story • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... ah, life is half and half, Now bright and joyous as a song of Herrick's, Then chill and bare as funeral-minded Blair; As fickle as a female in hysterics. ...
— The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... and came down and discovered this garden spot. Poor old Mason! With his money pots and his struggling love for beauty and simplicity, he is sore distressed. He wanted to build a cabin on the dunes and live here summers, but Madam and the girls almost had hysterics. They have just built a gingerbread affair at Magnolia, and so Mason added a den to the structure. A huge room overlooking the sea! It has space left on the wall for a big picture, and Mason gave me an order. 'Go down to that heaven-preserved spot,' he said, 'get the spirit of the place, ...
— Janet of the Dunes • Harriet T. Comstock
... not even in Sada Yacco and the Japanese. They could outdo Sarah in a death-scene, but not Aguglia in the scene in which she betrays her secret. Done by anyone else, it would have been an imitation of a woman in hysterics, a thing meaningless and disgusting. Done by her, it was the visible contest between will and desire, a battle, a shipwreck, in which you watch helplessly from the shore every plank as the sea tears if off and swallows it. "I ...
— Plays, Acting and Music - A Book Of Theory • Arthur Symons
... said Dick, with an originality of simile which he cultivates. "When we see that we're frightening anything we slow down, slip out the clutch, and glide so stealthily by that the creature gets no excuse for hysterics. I used to think before you taught me to drive, and I had the experience and the responsibility myself, that you wasted time grovelling to animal prejudices; but I've changed my mind. I've learned there's no fun to be got out of pig-selfishness on the road, ...
— The Car of Destiny • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... and realize his position. Never, in a brilliant and uninterrupted career of three hundred years, had he been so grossly insulted. He thought of the Dowager Duchess, whom he had frightened into a fit as she stood before the glass in her lace and diamonds; of the four housemaids, who had gone into hysterics when he merely grinned at them through the curtains on one of the spare bedrooms; of the rector of the parish, whose candle he had blown out as he was coming late one night from the library, and who had been under the care of Sir William Gull ever since, ...
— The Canterville Ghost • Oscar Wilde
... the poor woman went into hysterics, bewailing that she should have lived to see the object of her affection the victim of a malady so grievous as to require a Greek name. When she became calmer I explained to her that the malady was by no means fatal, and that it yielded readily ...
— The Love Affairs of a Bibliomaniac • Eugene Field
... and the door locked as usual. Then I half dressed and went out on to the landing, my hilarity better under control, and proceeded to go downstairs. I wished to record my sensations. I stuffed a handkerchief into my mouth so as not to scream aloud and communicate my hysterics ...
— Three John Silence Stories • Algernon Blackwood
... the same old thing, he went on, only worse and worse. Molly had been ill again, and the doctor ordered medicine he couldn't buy. Yes, he had tried to take the diamond from her, but she flew into hysterics at the mere mention of selling it. Once he had dragged it off her finger, and had given it back again because her wildness frightened him, "Why on earth did you ever let her have it?" he ...
— The Deliverance; A Romance of the Virginia Tobacco Fields • Ellen Glasgow
... steam as from a huge brazen tea-urn. The greatest power in nature and art combined, it yet glided over dangerous heights in the sight of people looking up from fields and roads, as smoothly and unreally as a light miniature plaything. Now, the engine shrieked in hysterics of such intensity, that it seemed desirable that the men who had her in charge should hold her feet, slap her hands, and bring her to; now, burrowed into tunnels with a stubborn and undemonstrative ...
— The Lazy Tour of Two Idle Apprentices • Charles Dickens
... about it, sir," responded Burr. "I hold neither you nor your daughter in any blame." Then he offered his arm to his mother, and the three went out and down-stairs, and the black woman clapped to the chamber door with a great jar upon her mistress, whose calm of obstinacy had broken into wailing hysterics which betokened no less stanchness. Parson Fair, Burr Gordon, and his mother, at the foot of the stairs among the curious wedding-guests, looked for ...
— Madelon - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... kerchief came down from his face with a jerk. What decent old gentleman could sleep in such a racket! Mynheer van Gleck regarded his children with astonishment. The baby even showed symptoms of hysterics. It was high time to attend to business. Mevrouw suggested that, if they wished to see the good St. Nicholas, they should sing the same loving invitation that had ...
— Christmas - Its Origin, Celebration and Significance as Related in Prose and Verse • Various
... she had escorted her visiter to the door, and then returning to her rocking-chair, she indulged in a fit of weeping that looked very much like hysterics. Her most prominent thought was, "If I had only given the party ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 3. March 1848 • Various
... I am now, I hope," Lovell answered, "but I shall never be the man I was. I have seen—God grant that I may some day forget what I have seen! No wonder that my nerves have gone! I saw a Russian correspondent, a strong brutal-looking man, go off into hysterics; I saw another run amuck through the camp, shooting right and left, and, finally, blow his own brains out. Many a night I sobbed myself to sleep. The men who live through tragedies, Aynesworth, age fast. I expect that I shall ...
— The Malefactor • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... Olivo came soon after. The first said that the convulsions were caused by hysterics, but the doctor said no, and prescribed rest and cold baths. I said nothing, but I could not refrain from laughing at them, for I knew, or rather guessed, that Bettina's sickness was the result of her nocturnal employment, or of the fright ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... Gobler!' cried Mrs. Bloss, with a proper approximation to hysterics; 'I think the house is on fire, or else there's thieves in it. I have heard the ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens
... Mary had enough to do in looking after them. Now I think of it, Lucy was to be with us this very day; so you are in luck, Adair; though we must break the news to her gently, or we shall be sending her into hysterics, and doing all sorts of mischief. As you, Murray, I am pretty sure, are eager to see your wife, we'll let you go on first, for, as she expects you, it won't have the ...
— The Three Commanders • W.H.G. Kingston
... Aus." As we were standing in three sides of a square it was an order to make every one face the commandant with a martial air. The net result of this "Double Dutch" was that everyone broke into an amused smile, which increased almost to hysterics when we caught sight of the recipient of this honour. The commandant was a tall, doddery, antediluvian Prussian colonel, with long grey moustaches, the very image of the Monkey Brand advertisement, only perhaps not quite so good looking. Why he did not fall over his trailing scabbard in every step ...
— 'Brother Bosch', an Airman's Escape from Germany • Gerald Featherstone Knight
... ebullition of superstition is easily quieted by a little good news." "Your majesty has been following the new fashion," said he, aloud; "you have been consulting the fortune-tellers. I presume you have visited the nun who is subject to pious hysterics; and Father Gassner, I see, has been visiting your majesty, for I met him as I was coming to the palace. I could not help laughing as I saw his ...
— Joseph II. and His Court • L. Muhlbach
... to the strange figure of the poor lady, had almost thrown Miss Stewart into hysterics; for the princess of Babylon, after this accident, was quite flat on one side, and immoderately protuberant on the other. All those who had before suppressed their inclinations to laugh, now gave themselves free scope, when they ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... are wakefulness, restless nights, headache, indolence, melancholy, indisposition to study, forgetfulness, despondency, weakness in the back and private organs, no confidence in one's own abilities, a desire for seclusion from society; whites, hysterics, and inability to look any one in the face. Sometimes the muscles are relaxed, limbs tremble, the skin is sallow and dry, with pain ...
— Treatise on the Diseases of Women • Lydia E. Pinkham
... in our day our physicians and surgeons work a thousand miracles—prodigies which would have ranked as miracles fifty years ago—and they have so greatly extended their domination over disease that we feel so well protected that we are able to look with a good deal of composure and absence of hysterics upon the claims of new competitors ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... It seemed that the little, shifty, rat-faced man had been possessed of a small handbag which the negro porter had failed to put off the train; and which was of tremendous importance. At the discovery it was lacking my new friend went into hysterics. He ran a few feet after the disappearing train; he called upon high heaven to destroy utterly the race of negro porters; he threatened terrible reprisals against a delinquent railroad company; he seized upon a bewildered ...
— The Killer • Stewart Edward White
... was crowded to-night, which delighted me. It is pleasant to see malicious and evil actions produce such a result. I was very nervous and excited, and nearly went into hysterics over one small incident of the evening. At the close of the first separation scene—the play was "Venice Preserved"—when Jaffier is carried out by the nape of the neck by Pierre, and Belvidera extracted on the other side in the arms (and iron ones they were) of ...
— Records of a Girlhood • Frances Anne Kemble
... had a good, hearty spell of wholesome crying; no hysterics, mind you, but floods of tears; and now she is sound asleep with her head on the altar railing, in the chapel. I locked her up there, and here is the key. When she wakes, I want her brought up here, put in that room yonder, and left entirely ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... June before she began to get better, or would give Lionel leave to depart. Jan, plain-speaking, truth-telling Jan, had at length quietly told his mother that there was nothing the matter with her but "vexing and temper." Lady Verner went into hysterics at Jan's unfilial conduct; but, certain it was, from that very time she began to amend. July came in, and Lionel was permitted to fix ...
— Verner's Pride • Mrs. Henry Wood
... point of accusing, first, his wife and then his step-son of having taken it with a view to a private sale. So began an exceedingly acrimonious and emotional discussion, which ended for Mrs. Cave in a peculiar nervous condition midway between hysterics and amuck, and caused the step-son to be half-an-hour late at the furniture establishment in the afternoon. Mr. Cave took refuge from his wife's emotions ...
— Tales of Space and Time • Herbert George Wells
... lighted no candle, but sat down just as she was, put her head on the table, and sobbed as if her heart would break. She was very seldom overcome by emotion of this kind, and used to be proud that she had never once in her life fainted, and was not given to hysterics. Checked at last by a deadly shivering which came over her, she took off her wet garments, threw them over a chair, and crept into bed, revolving in her mind the explanation which she could give to her husband. When she saw him, and he inquired about her clothes, she offered ...
— The Revolution in Tanner's Lane • Mark Rutherford
... person!'—if he could have seen her at this moment turning her back on comfort. 'The moment I get there,' she mused, 'I shall let mother know; she can come out to-morrow, and see for herself. I can't have hysterics about my disappearance, and all that. They must get used to the idea that I mean to be in touch with things. I can't be stopped by ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... as good as his word, but the high-strung, sensitive child, so soon as she was in her mother's embrace, went from one fit of hysterics to another, crying:— ...
— The Reminiscences of an Irish Land Agent • S.M. Hussey
... their superlatives, their laboured philosophy, their lyrics, hysterics, and prophecies, are singularly unconvincing. The manner in which the simple question, "How do you propose to fit actual human nature into your scheme?" is answered by the Socialists, proves that they find that question unanswerable. History teaches us that revolutions based on plunder, ...
— British Socialism - An Examination of Its Doctrines, Policy, Aims and Practical Proposals • J. Ellis Barker
... first swift, all-seeing glance about the room reassured him. No hysterics here. These people brought race and breeding even into the presence of death. Whatever emotions had torn them when Nita Selim's body was discovered were almost unguessable now. A stout, short woman of about thirty was tapping a foot nervously, as she talked to the man who ...
— Murder at Bridge • Anne Austin
... girls can stand without showing it than because of its prompting them to ribald Terpsichorean evolutions. The world outside the swell set hears occasionally of some girl who patronizes the punch bowl until she falls into hysterics, but as a rule the up-to-date St. Louis girl can "carry a load" with ...
— Volume 10 of Brann The Iconoclast • William Cowper Brann
... she had not the least idea of it, and all at once I would see her grow pale and moist, and sigh, and move round uneasily, and turn towards Elsie, and perhaps get up and go to her, or else have slight spasmodic movements that looked like hysterics;—do you believe in the evil ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 6, No. 34, August, 1860 • Various
... will happen now?" she said, her voice faltering, her eyes filling, and seemingly on the very verge of hysterics. "What if Blackadder should find that I ...
— The Passenger from Calais • Arthur Griffiths
... alleged to have been bewitched had performed the usual contortions, the accused were swiftly convicted. Francis Nourse and his wife, Rebecca, had a controversy about the occupation of a farm with a family named Endicott. The Endicott children went into hysterics and charged that Rebecca Nourse had bewitched them. Although as good and pure a woman as there was in the colour, Rebecca was convicted, hanged on Witches' Hill, and her body cast into a pit designed for those who should meet her fate. Mr. Parris, the ...
— The Land We Live In - The Story of Our Country • Henry Mann
... and vanished. It quite paralysed me, my lord, and while I stood there wondering whether I was bitten, a mouse jumped out of the kitchenmaid's hair. She had been laughing at their dress, my lord, but now she's screaming in hysterics." ...
— The Ivory Child • H. Rider Haggard
... if he listened to another remark of such a nature his brain would snap and he would instantly be taken with a tearing fit of hysterics. He therefore turned round and slowly ascended ...
— The Prophet of Berkeley Square • Robert Hichens
... No tears now, no hysterics; just steady, unbelieving expectancy. "I can't believe it—won't. You're playing ...
— The Dominant Dollar • Will Lillibridge
... o 'clock that night some one took him home from the Essex Club, and Martha was in hysterics until the doctor, summoned with haste and vehemence, assured her that her ...
— Her Weight in Gold • George Barr McCutcheon
... carpenter for a moulding board, and, placing it on a chair on the back veranda, I knelt on the floor with a shawl over my head to keep the rain off and made up the loaves. In making the dough I was successful, but the attempt to bake it almost sent me into hysterics. With an umbrella over my head I ran to the kitchen, but found, to my dismay, that all the wood was soaked, and the wind drove the smoke back into the stove, which thereupon belched forth acrid clouds from every ...
— The Life of Mrs. Robert Louis Stevenson • Nellie Van de Grift Sanchez
... order that the people hereabout should not know anything about his dark readings, he ordered 'em direct from London, and not from the Sherton book-seller. The parcel was delivered by mistake at the pa'son's, and he wasn't at home; so his wife opened it, and went into hysterics when she read 'em, thinking her husband had turned heathen, and 'twould be the ruin of the children. But when he came he said he knew no more about 'em than she; and found they were this Mr. Fitzpier's ...
— The Woodlanders • Thomas Hardy
... declared Gila. "He's a fanatic! One of the worst kind. He's a fake! He's uncanny! The idea of daring to talk about God that way as if He was always around every where! I think it's awful! I should think he'd have everybody in hysterics!" ...
— The Witness • Grace Livingston Hill Lutz
... ready to fall into hysterics. She controlled herself with a supreme power, and hastened to touch ...
— The Peterkin Papers • Lucretia P Hale
... self-possessed, and their first care was to see that all the four ladies were safe. They had Hermione and her mother with them, and, taking the direction of the fountain, they found Chrysophrasia upon the bench where I had left her, in a violent fit of hysterics. ...
— Paul Patoff • F. Marion Crawford
... Tom was frightened, and crept under a stone; which made the two crabs who lived there very angry, and frightened their friend the butter-fish into flapping hysterics: but he would not ...
— The Water-Babies - A Fairy Tale for a Land-Baby • Charles Kingsley
... no need to tell of the congratulations showered upon me; My hand was wrung by my kind neighbors until it tingled with numbness. Mistress Vetch fell into hysterics—mercilessly ignored by Mr. Pinhorn. And as for Captain Galsworthy, he seemed incapable of doing anything but repeat his question, chuckling aloud "Can anyone tell me why 'tis called ...
— Humphrey Bold - A Story of the Times of Benbow • Herbert Strang
... neighboring drug-store; one of the bystanders volunteered to drive the carriage to its destination, and took his seat on the box; the owner droned out his thanks from the inside of the carriage, in a fat, wheezy voice, mingled with the sobs of a woman in partial hysterics; and the equipage rolled away almost as suddenly as it had come—perhaps not five minutes having been consumed ...
— Shoulder-Straps - A Novel of New York and the Army, 1862 • Henry Morford
... impression news like this makes upon every one; I had an illustration in Pani Celina, to whom we had to tell the truth. She fainted twice, and then went off into hysterics; which almost drove me frantic, because I thought she would be heard all over the house. And yet she was not fond of her son-in-law; but she too, I suppose, was mostly afraid for Aniela. I am strenuously opposed to the doctor's advice, and do ...
— Without Dogma • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... farewell of his wife and children—Fussie, perhaps excited by his run over the bridge from New York, suddenly bounded on to the stage! The good children who were playing Princess Mary and Prince Henry didn't even smile; the audience remained solemn, but Henry and I nearly went into hysterics. Fussie knew directly that he had done wrong. He lay down on his stomach, then rolled over on his back, whimpering an apology—while carpenters kept on whistling and calling to him from the wings. The children took him up to the window at the back of the scene, and he stayed ...
— The Story of My Life - Recollections and Reflections • Ellen Terry
... other of the deeds of Ogla-Moga—of how he imprisoned three estimable old ladies in the elevator, and before they were released had frightened them into hysterics; of how he at first took the milkman to be a brother Indian, and regularly for a time answered his morning howl with a terrifying war-whoop; of how he kept the house in turmoil by ringing an electric bell wherever he could find one, in doing ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 3 • Various
... and then she went into hysterics, adding to the excitement and giving Mulligan a bad five minutes while he fought to keep ...
— The Diamond Cross Mystery - Being a Somewhat Different Detective Story • Chester K. Steele
... this is funny?" he exclaimed, as soon as he could speak. "This is the funniest thing I ever heard of. Excuse the hysterics, Miss Phipps, but it certainly is. For the past month Williams and I, through this fellow Pulcifer down here, have been working heaven and earth to get the six hundred and fifty shares of that stock we supposed you and Hallett owned. And all the time it was locked ...
— Galusha the Magnificent • Joseph C. Lincoln
... and went off into hysterics. Mrs Lascelles and Cecilia went to her assistance; but the latter had not forgotten the very different behaviour of Jack Pickersgill, and his polite manners, when he boarded the vessel. She did not, therefore, believe what the maid had reported, but still her anxiety and ...
— Peter Simple and The Three Cutters, Vol. 1-2 • Frederick Marryat
... a moment's silence. Sydney Barnes had evidently said nothing as to his brother's tragic end. Wrayson could see, too, that the girl was on the brink of hysterics, and ...
— The Avenger • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... not answer. He caught hold of the back of a chair, and, without warning, went into an amazing fit of hysterics. It is terrible to see a strong man overtaken with hysteria. Then it struck me that we had fought for Fleete's soul with the Silver Man in that room, and had disgraced ourselves as Englishmen for ever, and I laughed and gasped and gurgled ...
— Life's Handicap • Rudyard Kipling
... up to see if Aleck was comin', but he wasn't. Sam, bein' so heavy, had stopped quicker an' hit in shallow water near the shore, but, as luck would have it, the bottom was soft an' he had come down feet foremost, an' a broken leg an' some bad bruises were all he could boast of. Lizzie was in hysterics, but seemed to be unhurt. Dan an' I got 'em out on the shore, an' left 'em cryin' side by side, an' scrambled up the bank to find Aleck. He had aimed too low an' hit the wall, an' was stunned, an' apparently, for the time, dead as a herrin' on the farther ...
— Keeping up with Lizzie • Irving Bacheller
... here late last night. Anne is worn out, and has had hysterics, which returned on my arrival. Her broken accents were like those of a child, the language, as well as the tones, broken, but in the most gentle voice of submission. "Poor mama—never return again—gone forever—a better place." Then, when ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Vol. V (of X) - Great Britain and Ireland III • Various
... Jack quietly, 'I am quite sane. No doubt it would simplify your course of action very much if I were not, but as a matter of fact my mind was never clearer. My father and mother will tell you that I was never given to hysterics, and I am no great ...
— "The Pomp of Yesterday" • Joseph Hocking
... confusion may be better imagined than described. Questions in frightened voices filled the air against this background of suppressed weeping. Briefly—Joan's silk tent had been torn, and the girl was in a state bordering upon hysterics. Somewhat reassured by our noisy presence, however,—for she was plucky at heart,—she pulled herself together and tried to explain what had happened; and her broken words, told there on the edge of night and morning upon this wild island ridge, were ...
— Three More John Silence Stories • Algernon Blackwood
... understand himself, but he was just the least bit offended, regardless of his relief. You simply couldn't tell from one minute to the next what a woman was going to do. By all precedent, Anna should have been enjoying hysterics, which Henry ...
— Rope • Holworthy Hall
... was silly of her to lose her temper," replied Maisie. "She stalked out of the room like a queen of tragedy. Miss Maitland can't bear girls who give way to their impulses; she despises what she calls 'early Victorian hysterics', and I ...
— The New Girl at St. Chad's - A Story of School Life • Angela Brazil
... Oh, there would be a scene, a few hysterics perhaps, and there the matter would be at an end. A wife can't afford to be so punctilious as a maiden fancy free. She has herself too much ...
— The Guinea Stamp - A Tale of Modern Glasgow • Annie S. Swan
... his right mind is deeply moved by such a spectacle, also he is frightened because he dreads a scene. Now most people would rather walk ten miles in their dress shoes than have to deal with a young lady in hysterics, however modified. Putting the peculiar circumstances of the case aside, Geoffrey was no exception to this rule. It was all very well to cross spears with Beatrice, who had quite an equal wit, and was very capable ...
— Beatrice • H. Rider Haggard
... this hurried avowal of my love for you, let me hope for a response,' and just then the infernal lights were turned on, and there I was holding the widow's hand and she nestling on my shoulder, and the two girls in hysterics on the other side. You see, I never knew that they were shoved down on their bench every time, just as I was, and of course when I got back to where I was I'd just skipped one of them each time! Yes, sir! I had made that proposal in THREE sections—a ...
— New Burlesques • Bret Harte
... of this on the woman was unpleasant. She stared about her for a moment, and, exclaiming, "I come,—I am coming, Alfy!" fell in hysterics on the floor. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 105, July 1866 • Various
... "No useless questions or hysterics; no scene. Strong! Gad, but she's strong! She realized she was safe and I was with her again; that sufficed. Was there ever another woman like her since ...
— Darkness and Dawn • George Allan England
... my dear; it was impossible to lie. I've lit the kitchen fire, for poor cook is in hysterics, and Maria is ...
— The Vast Abyss - The Story of Tom Blount, his Uncles and his Cousin Sam • George Manville Fenn
... As long as woman are willing to marry their daughters to reformed rakes, providing they have money and social position, [xxviii] so long shall we have a double standard. So long as young society women go into hysterics over pedigreed dogs and horses and then marry men reeking in filthy unfitness for parenthood, mothers cannot expect any other standard of morals. So long as one marriage in twelve ends in divorce, the ethics of the female need enlightenment. We shall not get another standard of morals until ...
— The Eugenic Marriage, Volume I. (of IV.) - A Personal Guide to the New Science of Better Living and Better Babies • W. Grant Hague, M.D.
... up to a thousand, but once I nearly let the cat out by saying nine hundred and fifty, nine hundred and fifty-one, when my father stopped for breath. He gave me a look, I can tell you, but I don't think he saw what I was after. Maud was seized with hysterics. But he isn't a bad sort of parent, as they go; he fusses, but he lets one do as one wants. I suppose I oughtn't to give my people away; but I never can see why one shouldn't talk about one's people ...
— Watersprings • Arthur Christopher Benson
... dissolved in proof spirit before the oil is added. One part of this salt, and three parts of extract of belladonna, mixed and spread upon leather, makes an excellent plaster for relieving rheumatic pains. As a local stimulant it is well known, as regards its effects in hysterics, faintness, and lassitude, when applied to the nose, as common ...
— Enquire Within Upon Everything - The Great Victorian Domestic Standby • Anonymous
... to post a letter to you. Coming back I peep in at the window and behold baby Dock in his high-chair weeping lustily, whilst baby Cowen has crept out of his chair, toddled to the wall and is reaching for his bottle! Betwixt the hysterics of the one babe and the bottle of t'other I am well-nigh exhausted. Come back and take care of your ...
— Eugene Field, A Study In Heredity And Contradictions - Vol. I • Slason Thompson
... he asked how I was getting on. Once I had fever and nearly died, yet this knowledge that my face was everything was implanted in me so that my fear lest he should think me ugly when I recovered terrified me into hysterics. I dream still that I am in that fever and all my fears return. He did think me ugly when he saw me next. I remember the incident so well still. I had run to him, and he was lifting me up to kiss me when he saw that my face had changed. 'What a cruel disappointment,' he said, ...
— The Little Minister • J.M. Barrie
... and overpowered Ryder. She threw her apron over her head, and went off in hysterics, and betrayed her lawless attachment to every woman in the kitchen,—she who was so clever ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 104, June, 1866 • Various
... of a store for men, a set of violent purple wool underwear, and barely escaped hysterics at the thought of Mr. Moses Feldt in such a garb. They giggled idiotically at the spectacle of a countryman fearfully making the sharp descent from the top of a lurching omnibus. And then, when they had reached the place of Mrs. Condon's ...
— Linda Condon • Joseph Hergesheimer
... touched, found the whole population prostrate with influenza. Lewis and Clarke, the first explorers of the Rocky Mountains, found Indian warriors ill with fever and dysentery, rheumatism and paralysis, and Indian women in hysterics. "The tooth-ache," said Roger Williams of the New England tribes, "is the only paine which will force their stoute hearts to cry"; even the Indian women, he says, never cry as he has heard "some of their men in this paine"; but ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 7, No. 39, January, 1861 • Various
... two policemen their terror became wild. And yet they both said afterwards that they could hardly help laughing out loud. The pink muslin was draggled and besmeared with harbour mud, and torn half out of the gathers. Its owner was in a state of rage, terror, and hysterics. The commotion was fearful. It was very strange she did not seem to have the faintest suspicion of any of our party. She was sure the men were drunk because they carried her so unsteadily. She was positive they ...
— Interludes - being Two Essays, a Story, and Some Verses • Horace Smith
... that is an ungenerous and superficial view, especially as we have never seen the same people courting hysterics before," she said; but she did not speak as if she cared much which ...
— What Necessity Knows • Lily Dougall
... minutes. When she came to her senses, she dragged herself, terrified, from the room and up to the housekeeper's apartments, where, being an excitable and nervous creature, she only screamed "Murder!" and immediately fell in a fit of hysterics that lasted three-quarters of an hour. When at last she came to herself, she told her story, and, the hall-porter having been summoned, Rameau's rooms ...
— Martin Hewitt, Investigator • Arthur Morrison
... less before Chaine's Christ than before the back view of the nude woman, who seemed to them very comical indeed. The 'Lady in White' also stupefied people and drew them together; folks nudged each other and went into hysterics almost; there was always a grinning group in front of it. Each canvas thus had its particular kind of success; people hailed each other from a distance to point out something funny, and witticisms flew from mouth to mouth; to such a degree indeed that, ...
— His Masterpiece • Emile Zola
... the window of Madame Ypsilante's room, saved that lady from hysterics by announcing that the ...
— The Island Mystery • George A. Birmingham
... "Dear lady, I've set my heart on staging a little climax; don't spoil it. To-morrow morning at eleven o'clock we'll have all the explanations. Now, Bob, what happened to you? I hear you nearly frightened your aunts into hysterics, to say nothing of Betty, whom I found tearing around Flame City hunting ...
— Betty Gordon in the Land of Oil - The Farm That Was Worth a Fortune • Alice B. Emerson
... was read to the end, looked uneasily in each other's faces. The ladies screamed, sobbed, and were carried off in hysterics. There was yet time to turn back; and had the Reformation been, as he pretended, the true concern of the Duke of Northumberland, he would have brought Mary back himself, bound by conditions which, in her present danger, she would ...
— The Reign of Mary Tudor • James Anthony Froude
... upon one of these occasions that that friendly cat came waving his tail and supplicating for Pain-Killer—which he got—and then went into those hysterics which ended with his colliding with all the furniture in the room and finally going out of the open window and carrying the flower-pots with him, just in time for my mother to arrive and look over her glasses in petrified astonishment and say, ...
— Chapters from My Autobiography • Mark Twain
... water, they will become habitually cold, and make one more or less delicate and nervous. On the other hand, by rubbing the feet often in cold water, they will become permanently warm. A cold foot-bath will stop a violent fit of hysterics. Cold feet ...
— The Recreations of A Country Parson • A. K. H. Boyd
... of the journey threw Madame Benet into hysterics. She asked only to rest, she begged for an opiate to make her sleep. She begged also that they would leave the door open, so that when she dreamed she was still in the hands of the Germans, and woke in terror, the sound of the dear French voices and the sight of the beloved ...
— Somewhere in France • Richard Harding Davis
... pure than the lungs or the stomach. "Unto the pure all things are pure," may have been written especially for our times, when there is such a vast amount of mock modesty; when so much pretense of virtue covers such a world of iniquity and vice. The young lady who goes into a spasm of virtuous hysterics upon hearing the word "leg," is perhaps just the one who at home riots her imagination in voluptuous French novels, if she commits no grosser breach of chastity. The parents who are the most opposed to imparting information to the young are often those who ...
— Plain Facts for Old and Young • John Harvey Kellogg
... 'But he's one of the gentlemen that's been coming to see me about the advertisement and he won't marry me unless I give him the $2,000. His name is William Wilkinson.' And then she goes off again in the agitations and hysterics of romance. ...
— The Gentle Grafter • O. Henry
... deeply into her heart. At this unexpected intimation she felt the blood rush through her veins in a wild untameable manner. In all her trials—and they had been many—in all her illnesses—not a few—she had never fainted, never fallen into that symptom of weak-mindedness, a fit of hysterics; but now she sat without power of speech, looking at Mr. Cramp's ...
— Turns of Fortune - And Other Tales • Mrs. S. C. Hall
... Mrs. Ogilvie to herself, "what an awful evening I am likely to have! When the silly child really finds out that her father has gone, she will burst into hysterics, or do something else absurd. I really wish it had been my luck to marry a husband with a grain of sense. I wonder if I had better tell her now. No, I really cannot. Miss Winstead must do it. Miss Winstead has been having a nice holiday, with no fuss or worry of any sort, and ...
— Daddy's Girl • L. T. Meade
... the girl, kneeling down, was questioned by the bishop, but I could not make out the dialogue, which was carried on in a low voice. She then passed into the convent by a side door, and her mother, quite exhausted and nearly in hysterics, was supported through the crowd to a place beside us, in front of the grating. The music struck up; the curtain was again drawn aside. The scene was as striking here as in the convent of the Santa Teresa, but not so lugubrious. The nuns, all ranged around, and carrying lighted tapers ...
— Life in Mexico • Frances Calderon de la Barca
... gnomes couldn't make any more till the next day. So she set out to return to the city, with all the court following her diamond chariot, and I can tell you she felt pretty gloomy. She told the Grand Vizier that now she didn't see any end to the trouble, and she was just going into hysterics when a barefooted boy came along driving his cow home from the pasture. The fairy godmother didn't mind it much, for she was in her chariot; but the court ladies were on foot, and they began to scream, ...
— Christmas Every Day and Other Stories • W. D. Howells
... so frightened that she was threatened with hysterics. She almost fought Elsie, who was seeking to ...
— Frank Merriwell's Son - A Chip Off the Old Block • Burt L. Standish
... heard the old skipper trying to comfort the girl, his voice low and broken by sobs. She had recovered consciousness and Mayo was a bit sorry; in her swoon she had not realized their plight; he feared hysterics and other feminine demonstrations, and he knew that he needed ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day
... tears began to drip faster and the sobs came one upon another until she was choked by them and she began to make a noise. She sobbed and cried more convulsively, until she began to scream and went into something like hysterics. She dropped down on her face and rolled over and over, clutching at her breast and her sides and throwing out her arms. The people of the house had gone to the sociable and she was alone, so no one heard or came near her. She shrieked ...
— In Connection with the De Willoughby Claim • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... catoptrics, commons, conics, credentials, delicates, dioptrics, economics, ethics, extraordinaries, filings, fives, freshes, glanders, gnomonics, goods, hermeneutics, hustings, hydrodynamics, hydrostatics, hydraulics, hysterics, inwards, leavings, magnetics, mathematics, measles, mechanics, mnemonics, merils, metaphysics, middlings, movables, mumps, nuptials, optics, phonics, phonetics, physics,[146] pneumatics, poetics, politics, riches, rickets, settlings, shatters, skimmings, ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... relieved, Lord Hartledon jumped into a fly and was driven home. The countess-dowager embraced him and fell into hysterics. ...
— Elster's Folly • Mrs. Henry Wood
... from the back and stood behind the tree which Duke had pointed out. A stage hand or somethin' who seemed to be sufferin' from hysterics told us not to let Duke see us till we entered the scene, because it was considered bad luck to walk ...
— Kid Scanlan • H. C. Witwer
... fled to her room. She felt that the proper course for her at this juncture was a fit of violent hysterics; but a prompt douche from the water pitcher, administered by the unsympathetic Jane, effectually checked the first symptoms. "Was ever ...
— He Fell in Love with His Wife • Edward P. Roe
... cocked her head in the direction of the rear compartment. Faint sounds coming through the door indicated that Halet had regained consciousness and was having hysterics. ...
— Novice • James H. Schmitz
... sent Mary home in the afternoon, had vainly striven to make Ave rest or take food; the attempt had brought on such choking, that she could only desist, and wait for the crisis. The attack was worse than any ordinary hysterics, almost amounting to convulsions; and all that could be done was to prevent her from hurting herself, and try to believe Dr. May's assurance that there was no real cause for alarm, and that the paroxysms ...
— The Trial - or, More Links of the Daisy Chain • Charlotte M. Yonge
... interrupted when a visitor is announced. That upon these occasions the mourners are inspired to give loud expression to their grief. That the women shriek, rave, and occasionally vary their proceedings by swooning and going into hysterics. I observe that the new arrival is seized and surrounded as I had been and conducted into the chamber of death, where some of the mourners give vent to their sorrow by clasping the clerical-looking clothes or embracing the borrowed ...
— The Pearl of the Antilles, or An Artist in Cuba • Walter Goodman
... I say? I didn't want any more faintin' spells or hysterics, either. I said we weren't thinkin' of offerin' charity and if it would please her to have us run an expense book we'd do it, of course. She asked what the doctor said about her condition. I told her he said she must keep absolutely ...
— Kent Knowles: Quahaug • Joseph C. Lincoln
... broad-browed and broad-bosomed, strong and calm—calm because strong—swaying her vain brats by unruffled love, not by fear; by wise giving, not by privation; by caresses and gentle precepts, not by cuffs and scoldings and hysterics—why, then she shall better justify our memories and the name we have given her. It is well that our New England mothers had a different climate in their hearts from that which beat at their windows. I know one Yankee boy who never could quite understand ...
— The California Birthday Book • Various
... all she had suffered, she could not now bring herself into tune with the commonplace intercourse of life. Not that her friends utterly failed to lure her into it. She might well have been the victim of hysterics, but she was only distrait, pensive and gently smiling, with the smile of a good heart. Smiling with her had ever taken the place of conversation. It was an apology for not speaking when she could not speak ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... of Denoisel. She only remembered the commencement of the attack that she had had in his presence, that terrible moment which had been followed by her fall and a fit of hysterics. She had had a sensation of being suffocated by her brother's blood, and she knew that a cry had come to her lips. She did not know whether she had spoken, whether her secret had escaped her while she was unconscious. Had she told Denoisel that she had killed Henri, that it was she who ...
— Rene Mauperin • Edmond de Goncourt and Jules de Goncourt
... the old nobleman and Don Julius Caesar of Austria exceedingly angry. Get before me, Don Fadrique! I am afraid of the terror of the Moors,—and no shame to me either! A poor dwarf, against a man who tears armies to shreds,—and sends scullery maids into hysterics! What is a poor crippled jester compared with a powerful scullery maid or an army of heathen Moriscoes? Give me that sword, Fadrique, or I am ...
— In The Palace Of The King - A Love Story Of Old Madrid • F. Marion Crawford |
