"In vain" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... thousand four hundred and fifty pounds in his pocket, and the second part of his great complex scheme boiling and bubbling in his massive head. There he sat silent as the grave, his hat drawn over his powerful brows that were knitted all the journey by one who never knitted them in vain. ...
— It Is Never Too Late to Mend • Charles Reade
... silent followed between the two; Blunt striving to draw his knife, and Myles, with the energy of despair, holding him tightly by the wrist. It was in vain the elder lad writhed and twisted; he was strong enough to overbear Myles, but still was not able to clutch the ...
— Men of Iron • Ernie Howard Pyle
... over sin and darkness, and the Saloon and the Canteen, the licensed houses of shame, monument of woman's degradation, the unjust monopoly, the high fence separating the few enormously rich from the masses of the suffering, starving poor, will all have to fall. Christ did not die in vain," sez I, "nor the blood of the martyrs has not been in vain. The Lord has promised and he ...
— Around the World with Josiah Allen's Wife • Marietta Holley
... not a grief the heart can bear But love can soothe its pain; There's not a sorrow or a care It smiles upon in vain. And She sends forth its brightest rays Where darkest woes depress, Where long wept Suffering silent prays— ...
— The Humourous Story of Farmer Bumpkin's Lawsuit • Richard Harris
... present day there is much gossip among the Canons about a certain hidden treasure of this Abbot Thomas, for which those of Steinfeld have often made search, though hitherto in vain. The story is that Thomas, while yet in the vigour of life, concealed a very large quantity of gold somewhere in the monastery. He was often asked where it was, and always answered, with a laugh: 'Job, John, and Zechariah will tell either you or your ...
— Ghost Stories of an Antiquary • Montague Rhodes James
... was instituted. Men and boys were out in search for the boy, calling and shooting their guns far and near, but not a trace of him anywhere could be found. Our parents were almost distracted with anxiety and fear about their boy, and they continued the search three days in vain. On the fourth day, one of our cousins, whose name was Oge-maw-we-ne-ne, came to a very deep gully between two hills. He went up to the top of the highest hill in order to be heard a long distance. When he reached the top, he began to halloo as loud as he could, calling the child ...
— History of the Ottawa and Chippewa Indians of Michigan • Andrew J. Blackbird
... exactions made by the Exchequer. But the bill which he promoted was sent up to the Lords in spite of this, and at the close of Elizabeth's reign the storm of popular indignation which had been roused by the growing grievance nerved the Commons, in 1601, to a decisive struggle. It was in vain that the ministers opposed a bill for the Abolition of Monopolies, and after four days of vehement debate the tact of Elizabeth taught her to give way. She acted with her usual ability, declared ...
— History of the English People, Volume V (of 8) - Puritan England, 1603-1660 • John Richard Green
... were gone. Leaning from the window, 'Lena tried to catch another glimpse of him, but in vain. He was gone—she would never see him again, she thought; and then she fell into a reverie concerning his home, his mother, his sisters, if he had any, and finally ended by wishing that she were his ...
— 'Lena Rivers • Mary J. Holmes
... wedded: know too that my Queen In childing died; but not, as you believe, With her, the son she died in giving life to. For, as the hour of birth was on the stroke, Her brain conceiving with her womb, she dream'd A serpent tore her entrail. And too surely (For evil omen seldom speaks in vain) The man-child breaking from that living tomb That makes our birth the antitype of death, Man-grateful, for the life she gave him paid By killing her: and with such circumstance As suited such unnatural tragedy; ...
— Life Is A Dream • Pedro Calderon de la Barca
... it had the capacity of doing much execution in its recoil. Justus had had the election so greatly at heart; he had struggled, and planned, and managed with such preternatural activity and tact and energy from the first, that it would smite him hard to know that it was all in vain. And then his vicarious ambitions, his pride, his pleasure, in the elevation of "Fambly"! Walter cast about futilely for an assurance that he might have the satisfaction of reducing all this. He knew that Justus, in his ...
— The Mystery of Witch-Face Mountain and Other Stories • Charles Egbert Craddock
... that the labors of Ned Clinton were not entirely in vain, even though they were not encouraging. The boat was certainly progressing, and the height of the pole above the water showed that the depth was less by a few inches ...
— The Wilderness Fugitives • Edward S. Ellis
... was in vain for them to sacrifice and offer gifts, seeing that they were hateful to the Gods, who are not, like vile usurers, to be gained over by bribes. And it is foolish for us to boast that we are superior to the Lacedaemonians by reason of ...
— Alcibiades II • An Imitator of Plato
... during the night Donaster attempted in vain to wrest the secret from Eben, and his failure made him angry. Lack of sleep, his wet clothes, and the stubbornness of the boy annoyed him. But he could do nothing, so at length, giving up in despair, he went down into the cabin, and lighted a fire in the little stove, for he was very chilly. ...
— Jess of the Rebel Trail • H. A. Cody
... But little Meta watched in vain. Dr. May always came with either Richard or the groom, to drive him, and if Meta met him and hoped he would bring Flora next time, he only answered that Flora would like it very much, and he hoped soon to ...
— The Daisy Chain, or Aspirations • Charlotte Yonge
... the engine, and, judging the probable direction and distance to which a man might be thrown in such an accident, went to a certain spot and sought carefully around it in all directions. For some time he sought in vain, and was on the point of giving up in despair, when he observed a cap lying on the ground. Going up to it, he saw the form of a man half-concealed by a mass of rubbish. He stooped, and, raising the head a little, tried to make out the features, ...
— The Iron Horse • R.M. Ballantyne
... because I love thee, I obtain From that same love this vindicating grace, To live on still in love, and yet in vain, To bless thee, yet renounce thee to ...
— We Two • Edna Lyall
... monuments have been reared and nails driven into emblems marked DIE GROSSE ZEIT. I have often wondered just what thoughts these monuments will arouse in the German's mind if his country is finally beaten and all his bloodshed and food deprivation will have been in vain. ...
— The Land of Deepening Shadow - Germany-at-War • D. Thomas Curtin
... position, long held, in which he had placed himself; but he moved no more than if he had been set in stone. Neither hunger, which was slight, nor thirst, at times troublesome, disturbed his watch. But it was in vain. ...
— Laramie Holds the Range • Frank H. Spearman
... story on their stones, and by the shape of arch and design of window, by porch and doorway, tower and buttress you can read the history of the building and tell its age and the dates of its additions and alterations. Inscriptions, monuments, and brasses help to fill in the details; but all would be in vain if we had no documentary evidence, no deeds and charters, registers and wills, to help us to build up the history of each town and monastery, castle and manor. Even after the most careful searches ...
— Vanishing England • P. H. Ditchfield
... ajar to clear the room; an evil-disposed gust blew in, wafting the thin drapery within reach of the light, and when Merry threw open the door proudly thinking to display her success, she was horrified to find the room in a blaze, and half her labor all in vain. ...
— Jack and Jill • Louisa May Alcott
... is not found; Unit and universe are round. In vain produced, all rays return; Evil will bless and ice ...
— Four-Dimensional Vistas • Claude Fayette Bragdon
... whom we first met at football, and to follow the profound thoughts of those who always dived deeper, even in the river, than our efforts could attain. There is a certain governor, of whom we personally can remember only, that he found the Fresh Pond heronry, which we sought in vain; and in memory the august sheriff of a neighboring county still skates in victorious pursuit of us, (fit emblem of swift-footed justice!) on the black ice of the same lovely lake. Our imagination crowns the Cambridge poet, and ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 5, March, 1858 • Various
... In vain the aged boatman strains, His heaving sides reveal his pains; The angry water gains apace Both of his sides and half his base, Till, as he sits, he seems to lose ...
— Moonbeams From the Larger Lunacy • Stephen Leacock
... be a great and powerful goddess, but in vain we offer up to her our devotions and our sacrifices if your Highness's governor, who has usurped the priesthood, must, by an unparalleled ambition and avarice, wholly ...
— A Tale of a Tub • Jonathan Swift
... In vain I sought the red brother on my saunterings through California. In San Francisco I once thought I had him treed. On Pacific Street, a block ahead of me, I saw a group of pedestrians, wrapped in loose flowing garments of many colors. Even at that ...
— Roughing it De Luxe • Irvin S. Cobb
... aware that a similar right has been claimed—but claimed in vain—by courts of justice in other countries; but in America it is recognized by all the authorities; and not a party, nor so much as an individual, is found to contest it. This fact can only be explained by the principles of the American constitution. In France ...
— American Institutions and Their Influence • Alexis de Tocqueville et al
... obtained permission to attempt the capture of the escaped prisoner, Bute; but the murderer had disappeared, leaving no clew. Brandt learned that the slums of large cities and several mining camps had been searched in vain, also that the trains running east had been carefully watched. We need not try to follow his processes of thought, nor seek to learn how he soon came to the conclusion that his man was at some distant mining station working ...
— Taken Alive • E. P. Roe
... down to his Latin exercise, and, in encouraging and assisting him, Lady Annabel, a proficient in Italian, began herself to learn the ancient language of the Romans. With such a charming mistress even these Latin exercises were achieved. In vain Cadurcis, after turning leaf over leaf, would look round with a piteous air to his fair assistant, 'O Lady Annabel, I am sure the word is not in the dictionary;' Lady Annabel was in a moment at his ...
— Venetia • Benjamin Disraeli
... time to establish the utility of NOTES AND QUERIES, we may confidently point to the Index as a proof that the Literary Inquirer, be his particular branch of Study what it may, will not search in vain in our pages for valuable Notes and ...
— Notes & Queries, No. 36. Saturday, July 6, 1850 • Various
... beautiful things in her life, and had been quite confident that the man must give at least two guineas for the screens. They try at other shops in the interior of London, with faint sickening hopes. "Don't want 'em," says one. "Be off," says another fiercely. Three-and-sixpence has been spent in vain—the screens retire to Miss Clapp's bedroom, who persists in ...
— Vanity Fair • William Makepeace Thackeray
... until 1531, though its inability to preserve domestic peace discredited it, and in its later years it enjoyed little authority. Left to themselves, many of the princes espoused Protestantism. In vain Charles V combated the new religious movement. In vain he proscribed it in several Diets after that of Worms. In vain he assailed its upholders in several military campaigns, such as those against the Schmalkaldic League, ...
— A Political and Social History of Modern Europe V.1. • Carlton J. H. Hayes
... the infinite blessing of the friendship of Christ. It is possible for us to be near to Christ through all our life, with his grace flowing about us like an ocean, and yet to have a heart that remains unblessed by divine love. We may make God's love in vain, wasted, as sunshine is wasted that falls upon desert sands, so far as we are concerned. The love that we do not requite with love, that does not get into our heart to warm, soften, and enrich it, and to mellow and bless our life, is love poured out in vain. It is made in vain by our unbelief. ...
— Personal Friendships of Jesus • J. R. Miller
... year he published a novel; it failed completely, and the same result awaited a similar experiment five years later. He wrote a drama of modern life, and for some years strove to get it acted, but in vain; finally it appeared 'for the closet'—giving Clement Fadge such an opportunity as he seldom enjoyed. The one noteworthy thing about these productions, and about others of equally mistaken direction, was the sincerity of their workmanship. Had Yule been content to manufacture a novel or a play ...
— New Grub Street • George Gissing
... us. At every second step, he will find the growing charm dispelled by the voice and personal intrusion of some ruffian or party of carousing blackguards. He will seek privacy amid the densest foliage, all in vain. Here are the very nooks where the unwashed most abound—here are the temples most desecrate. With sickness of the heart the wanderer will flee back to the polluted Paris as to a less odious because less incongruous sink of pollution. But if ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 1 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... Siren grows tired and destroys them. Other men wed Art, and from the union beget them fair, lovely, ay, immortal children, as Raphael did. Some again, confounding Art with their own inordinate vanity, grow stern and harsh with making sacrifices to the stone idol, grinding down their own hearts in vain experimenting after properer pigments, whereby themselves may attain to a chill and profitless immortality. But there are others still, who, elevating Art into a grand divinity, bow down and worship it, devote their lives to its priesthood, and, as a reward, only ask the god to reveal to them once ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 32, June, 1860 • Various
... The surgeon Mannouri was still more unsuitable, for he was a nephew of Memin de Silly, and brother of the nun who had offered the most determined opposition to Grandier's demand for sequestration of the possessed sisters, during the second series of exorcisms. In vain did the mother and brother of the accused present petitions setting forth the incapacity of the doctors and the hatred of Grandier professed by the apothecary; they could not, even at their own expense, obtain certified copies of any of these petitions, although they had witnesses ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - URBAIN GRANDIER—1634 • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... Remonstrances were in vain. With a grim, resolute face, Dean Ritchie took up his post at the entrance to the academy, pacing up and down and waiting for his chance to have another interview ...
— The Boys of Bellwood School • Frank V. Webster
... child's education as mechanical work which is bungled and ineffective. Taking advantage of his natural aptitudes, his interest should be developed and extended in every way possible. Tasks which are accomplished without enthusiasm are labour expended in vain, because the knowledge so acquired is not assimilated and adds nothing to the child's mental growth. There should be no sharp differentiation ...
— The Nervous Child • Hector Charles Cameron
... few moments he could not believe the truth. He frantically searched his clothing over and over again, but in vain. The explanation was as clear as noonday. In the bottom of his right-hand pocket was a gaping rent, through which he pushed two fingers and disgustedly spread them apart like a fan. He turned the cloth wrong side out and the dreadful yawn ...
— The Launch Boys' Adventures in Northern Waters • Edward S. Ellis
... by the hair, tore the clothes from his back, and fell to beating and kicking him, so that it seemed to him as if all the world were upon him. He cried out:—"Pity, for God's sake," and defended himself as best he could: all in vain, however; the press became thicker and thicker moment by moment. Which Stecchi and Marchese observing began to say one to the other that 'twas a bad business; yet, being apprehensive on their own account, they did not venture to come to his assistance, ...
— The Decameron, Volume I • Giovanni Boccaccio
... fought against one of the former, whose name is lost, but who had triumphed six times in different combats. He has been less fortunate in this battle. Nepimus has struck him in the leg, the thigh, and the left arm; his blood runs, and in vain he implores mercy from the spectators. As the trident with which Nepimus is armed is not a weapon calculated to inflict speedy and certain death, the secutor Hyppolitus performs this last office to his comrade. The condemned wretch bends the knee, presents ...
— Museum of Antiquity - A Description of Ancient Life • L. W. Yaggy
... Bertrand himself felt an adoration for her surpassing ordinary human passion. When he reached the summit of a happiness to which in his wildest dreams he had never dared to aspire, the young count nearly lost his reason. In vain had his father, Charles of Artois (who was Count of Aire, a direct descendant of Philip the Bold, and one of the regents of the kingdom), attempted by severe admonitions to stop him while yet on the brink of the precipice: Bertrand would listen to nothing but his ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - JOAN OF NAPLES—1343-1382 • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... mental culture far above what we should expect to find in the chief of a tribe of Florida Indians. The chivalric spirit of De Soto compelled him to admire the heroism it displayed. He consequently redoubled his efforts to gain the friendship of the chief, but all in vain. For twenty days De Soto remained in this encampment, recruiting his troops and making arrangements for a farther advance. The Indians made constant warfare upon him, lurking in the thickets which densely surrounded his camp. No Spaniard could wander one hundred steps ...
— Ferdinand De Soto, The Discoverer of the Mississippi - American Pioneers and Patriots • John S. C. Abbott
... It was in vain that I endeavoured by hard work and a strict attention to the laird's affairs to direct my mind into some more healthy channel. Do what I would, on land or on the water, I would still find myself puzzling over this one question, until it obtained such a hold upon me that I felt ...
— The Mystery of Cloomber • Arthur Conan Doyle
... In vain he tries to compose himself, by shaping conjectures based on natural causes. Even these could not much benefit him; for, whether Clancy be dead or still living—whether he has walked away from the ground, or been carried from it a corpse—to him, Darke, ...
— The Death Shot - A Story Retold • Mayne Reid
... the air? Hence did malicious tongues the scandal bear? Gush'd 'neath this sacred dome the prurient flood Of filth and venom, from that viper brood, Which o'er the land hath spread its noisome stain, While shudd'ring virtue weeps, but weeps in vain? And (O shame's nauseous dregs!) did noble lips Here taste that stream with epicurean sips? And mitred heads, as o'er its scum they bent, Snuff the rank steam, and chuckle at the scent?— My soul is sick!—I turn with ...
— The Ghost of Chatham; A Vision - Dedicated to the House of Peers • Anonymous
... this study on of Mr. Fuller to his quality as an artist rather than to his character as a man, but shall have written in vain if some hint has not been given of the loveliness of his disposition, the modesty of his spirit, the chaste force of his mind. A man inevitably paints as he himself is, and shows his nature in his works: Fuller's pictures are founded upon ...
— The Bay State Monthly, Volume I. No. VI. June, 1884 - A Massachusetts Magazine • Various
... the party beheld a curious thing. Chris' pony had reached the edge of the grass and had stopped so suddenly as to nearly throw its rider over its head. In vain did the little negro apply whip and spur. Not a step further would the animal budge. They saw Chris at last throw the reins over the pony's head and leaping from his saddle plunge into the grass. Only the top of his head was visible but they could trace his progress by that ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... the Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquities of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me, and showing mercy unto thousands of them that love me and keep my commandments. Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain. Keep the Sabbath day to sanctify it, as the Lord thy God hath commanded thee. Six days thou shalt labor and do all thy work, but the seventh ...
— The Christian Foundation, May, 1880
... morning. But an unexpected obstacle occurred, which made us fear that I should still be retained as a prisoner. The avaricious jailers, unwilling to lose their prey, insisted, that as my name was not included in the order, I should not go. In vain I urged that I was not sent there as a prisoner, and that they had no authority over me—they still determined I should not go, and forbade the villagers from letting me a cart. Mr. Judson was then taken out of prison, ...
— Fox's Book of Martyrs - Or A History of the Lives, Sufferings, and Triumphant - Deaths of the Primitive Protestant Martyrs • John Fox
... a cold-blooded atrocity in the spirit of these remarks for which examples will be sought in vain, except among the doctors of the free-trade school. Naturalists have learned to look with philosophical indifference upon the agonies of a rabbit or a mouse expiring in an exhausted receiver, but it requires long teaching from the economists ...
— The trade, domestic and foreign • Henry Charles Carey
... was in vain that he spurred and lashed. The horse stood rooted to the ground, his ears thrown back, his nostrils dilated, his sides panting, his legs firmly planted in an attitude ...
— The Man-Wolf and Other Tales • Emile Erckmann and Alexandre Chatrian
... fairly started than her chariot would be thrown off the track, so to speak, by the stupidity of those thrice accursed musicians. Each time, Marija would emit a howl and fly at them, shaking her fists in their faces, stamping upon the floor, purple and incoherent with rage. In vain the frightened Tamoszius would attempt to speak, to plead the limitations of the flesh; in vain would the puffing and breathless ponas Jokubas insist, in vain would Teta Elzbieta implore. "Szalin!" Marija would scream. "Palauk! isz kelio! What are you paid for, children ...
— The Jungle • Upton Sinclair
... neglect;—the ordinary fate of his class of projectors. Elizabeth performed a more laudable part in lending her support to the enterprise of that able and spirited navigator Martin Frobisher, who had long been soliciting in vain among the merchants the means of attempting a northwest passage to the Indies, and was finally supplied by the queen with two small vessels. With these he set sail in June 1576, and though unsuccessful in the prime object of his voyage, extended considerably the previous acquaintance of navigators ...
— Memoirs of the Court of Queen Elizabeth • Lucy Aikin
... endeavored to bring the native mind under the dominion of a system of religion more favorable to the aims of the autocrat; a superior civilization has held out to the comparatively rude barbarians, its hands full of gifts dazzling and fatal to liberty; but hitherto mostly, if not all, in vain. The inhabitants of the upper and more inaccessible mountains have held their independence above all price, fighting for their homes as the mountaineer only will; and the chieftains who have been tempted by preferment in the Russian ...
— Life of Schamyl - And Narrative of the Circassian War of Independence Against Russia • John Milton Mackie
... right intention one is master of the ideal of life. If circumstances favor, he becomes conscious that life is no longer master of him, but that he is the master of life. This sense of power and freedom is noble; in vain does the shadow of Calamity intrude upon it; the visions of youth become a part of creations of the world; the dream of the architect is a mansion now; of the scientist, a road, a railway over rivers and mountains; of ...
— True to His Home - A Tale of the Boyhood of Franklin • Hezekiah Butterworth
... young monk came with his basket, no line was dropped from above. He waited and then called aloud, but all in vain. ...
— Little Journeys To The Homes Of Great Teachers • Elbert Hubbard
... and I sometimes agreed between ourselves to compel her to readiness by standing by, to help her in her preparations; but in vain. She must write a letter or finish a story before making her toilet. Why not accomplish the toilet first, to be sure of it—any time remaining, for the other purposes? She didn't like to do so. No philosopher could tell why. ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, V. 5, April 1878 - Scribner's Illustrated • Various
... sorrows gloomed that parting day, That called them from their native walks away; When the poor exiles, every pleasure past, 365 Hung round the bowers, and fondly looked their last, And took a long farewell, and wished in vain For seats like these beyond the western main, And shuddering still to face the distant deep, Returned and wept, and still returned to weep. 370 The good old sire the first prepared to go To new found worlds, and wept for others' woe; But for himself, in conscious virtue brave, He only wished for ...
— Selections from Five English Poets • Various
... It is in vain that Miss GLADYS COOPER, over her petit dejeuner, preserves a natural demeanour, even to the point of talking with her mouth full; the light humour of the First Act declines to the verge of buffoonery. The ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 150, February 2, 1916 • Various
... no people, and would not go; she would stay with "My Lady"—she would stay for ever with "My Lady." It was confusing, but the girl stayed, worshipping the ground "My Lady" walked on. In vain My Lady educated her. Out of hearing, she proudly told whoever would listen that she was "My Lady's slave." It was an Egyptian paradox; it was in line with everything else in the country, part of ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... or wrong, these men among On women do complain; Affirming this, how that it is A labour spent in vain To love them wele; for never a dele They love a man again: For let a man do what he can, Their favour to attain, Yet, if a new to them pursue, Their first true lover than Laboureth for naught; and from her thought He is ...
— A Bundle of Ballads • Various
... among the powerful daimyos of the empire. To bring this about by force was impossible. To discover among the princes a willingness to give up their hereditary privileges and come down to the position of a powerless aristocracy was something for which we have hitherto looked in vain. ...
— Japan • David Murray
... for the public interest and public opinion.' Before the Chancellor, as well as the High Court, all the objections made by Governor McNutt and Senator Davis were earnestly pressed by the Attorney-General of the State and associate counsel, but in vain; the decision of the Chancellor was against the State, and it was unanimously affirmed by the High Court. This case will be found reported by the State reporter, Johnson v. The State, April term, 1853. (3 ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 2, August, 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... entreaties of the Elders and nobles, Dick and Grosvenor presented themselves at the palace to bid Her Majesty farewell, she promptly ordered the arrest of the pair, and gave them their choice of being confined close prisoners, or pledging their word of honour to abandon their intention! It was in vain that the culprits pleaded, argued, and drew the most harrowing pictures of what must inevitably happen if they were not allowed to proceed to the front and personally supervise operations. The Queen turned a deaf ear to all that they said; positively ...
— The Adventures of Dick Maitland - A Tale of Unknown Africa • Harry Collingwood
... searched in vain for that rarest of all English heraldry books (though not properly English, for it is in the Latin tongue), the 'De Studio Militari, Libri Quatuor' of Master Nicholas Upton. It was edited by Sir Edward Bysshe, and printed ...
— The Book-Hunter at Home • P. B. M. Allan
... era, which beheld the appearance of both of these religious teachers and leaders. He was a trained administrator with long experience when he urged upon his prince the necessity of reform, and advocated a policy of union throughout the States. His exhortations were in vain, and so far ill-timed that he was obliged to resign the service of one prince after another. In his day the authority of the Chow emperor had been reduced to the lowest point. Each prince was unto himself the supreme authority. ...
— China • Demetrius Charles Boulger
... In vain they seize his slippery tail And try to pull him back; It makes their little cheeks turn pale To hear his ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 159, October 6, 1920 • Various
... join them, wherefore they were to entertain no fear at all. The tulisanes would be pardoned and have a third part of the booty assigned to them. The signal was to have been a cannon-shot, but having waited for it in vain the tulisanes, thinking themselves deceived, separated, some going back to their homes, some returning to the mountains vowing vengeance on the Spaniard, who had thus failed twice to keep his word. Then they, the robbers caught, ...
— The Reign of Greed - Complete English Version of 'El Filibusterismo' • Jose Rizal
... and cattle, were descending the Ohio; that Kentucky's population was multiplying by thousands, and that the restless swarm of settlers and land hunters, if not driven back, would soon fill the whole earth. Driven as they were by rage and fear, all attempts at treaty with these savages were in vain. The Miamis, the Potawatomi and the Shawnees lifted the hatchet, and rushed to the attack of both ...
— The Land of the Miamis • Elmore Barce
... known. Take that simple rule, you young people; strive to spread the influence of a godly example among all about you: do what you can, in a way consistent with your position in life, and in a way consistent altogether with modesty, humility, and a deep devotion to God, and you will not labour in vain. We are guilty of sins of omission, ...
— The Wesleyan Methodist Pulpit in Malvern • Knowles King
... write French and nearly speak it, while her sister could only read it. She could play difficult pieces from sight, which it took her sister a morning's pains to practise. She could fill in and finish a drawing, while her sister was still struggling, and struggling in vain, with the first ...
— The Three Clerks • Anthony Trollope
... in vain are your wit and letters, 'Gainst me nor weapons nor arts prevail. I freedom give to the slave in fetters,— His ruler's will I in irons nail. I lead the battle— And armies tumble, Like slaughtered cattle, ...
— The Angel of Death • Johan Olof Wallin
... a man leaned against a section of the old wall that edged the lake—the figure of a man who prayed with all his soul that his vigil might be in vain. If she ...
— Jane Cable • George Barr McCutcheon
... defensive works erected during the contest shows it must have been long and obstinate, and that the nation which could thus resist the attack of the northern hordes must have been strong in numbers and fertile in resources. But resistance proved in vain; they were compelled at last, according to the tradition, to leave the graves of their ancestors and flee southward in search of a ...
— The Problem of Ohio Mounds • Cyrus Thomas
... the doctor was also trying hard to master the tongue; and at the same time we attempted to make the chiefs understand the object of our visit, but it was labour in vain. The blacks were thoroughly puzzled, and I think our way of pointing at ourselves and then away into the bush only made them think that ...
— Bunyip Land - A Story of Adventure in New Guinea • George Manville Fenn
... have been transacted within three years and a half, by a lawyer who, besides being young and incompetent, was also extremely lazy, and greatly preferred to go off to the woods and hunt for deer while his clients were left to hunt in vain for him, it becomes an interesting question just how much legal business we ought to expect to be done by a young lawyer who was not incompetent, was not lazy, and had no inordinate fondness for deer-hunting. It happens that young Thomas ...
— Patrick Henry • Moses Coit Tyler
... began to think the nuns must have forgotten her existence, and to look about for some means of reminding them of it. There were no bells in sitting-rooms at that time, except in the form of a little hand-bell on a table, and for this last Dorothy searched in vain. Then she tried to go out into the passage, in the hope of seeing somebody; but she was terrified to find herself locked in. She did not know what to do. The window was barred with an iron grating; ...
— The King's Daughters • Emily Sarah Holt
... Tyburn for devalising a gentleman at Roehampton. Great interest was made to save him, his very prosecutor (who knew not at the first his assailant, or that he had been driven to the road by hard times) heading the signatures to a petition for him. But 'twas all in vain. He made a beautiful end of it in a fine white nightcap fringed; and his funeral was attended by some of the most eminent swordsmen in town, who had a gallant set-to afterwards for the benefit of his widow. 'Tis sad to think of the numbers of brave men that I have known, and how ...
— The Strange Adventures of Captain Dangerous, Vol. 3 of 3 • George Augustus Sala
... the morning alone, and did not return at the usual time to dinner. We wondered at this, for Peterkin was always very punctual at the dinner-hour. As supper-time drew near, we began to be anxious about him, and at length sallied forth to search the woods. For a long time we sought in vain, but a little before dark we came upon the tracks of the hogs, which we followed up until we came to the brow of a rather steep bank or precipice. Looking over this, we beheld Peterkin lying in a state of insensibility at the foot, with his cheek resting ...
— The Coral Island - A Tale Of The Pacific Ocean • R. M. Ballantyne
... took up the newspaper and tried to read. But his eyes wandered in vain over the lines: ...
— The Torrents of Spring • Ivan Turgenev
... ladies were so much dressed, that Miss Mirvan and I could do nothing but look at them. Mrs. Mirvan met several of her friends. No wonder, for I never saw so many people assembled together before. I looked about for some of my acquaintance, but in vain; for I saw not one person that I knew, which is very odd, for all the ...
— Evelina • Fanny Burney
... practice of tight-reining the heads of wretched horses needed any exaggeration, its superlative absurdity was evidenced in the horses which I saw labouring up this hill. Nature, which does nothing in vain, had a final purpose in giving motion to the vertebrae that join the head of an animal to the trunk. The moving head is, in truth, one of the extremities of that compound animal lever, whose fulcrum is the centre of gravity. The latter point is disturbed in its inertia, ...
— A Morning's Walk from London to Kew • Richard Phillips
... with a note of nervousness in it, which Nat recognised at once. He turned with a sudden desire to see the speaker's face. Here was one who felt as he did, one who could understand him, but his eyes sought in vain among the ...
— The Laird's Luck • Arthur Quiller-Couch
... Zangueber, which being agreed to, he and Caraccioli took Leave of the Queen and her Brother, and would have left their Wives on the Island, but they could by no Means be induced to the Separation; it was in vain to urge the Shortness of the Time they were to Cruize; they answer'd it was farther than Mohila they intended to go, and if they were miserable in that short Absence, they could never support a longer; and if they would ...
— Of Captain Mission • Daniel Defoe
... writing his proposal. He was not assisted in the effort by any sight of his mistress. It was evident Cornelia was not in her home, and he looked in vain for any shadow of the sweet face that he was certain would have made his words come easily. Finally, after many trials, he desisted with the following, though it was the least affective of any form he ...
— The Maid of Maiden Lane • Amelia E. Barr
... has taken all the cities of Almagreb; that he has subdued the powerful tribes of the east and west; that he has everywhere substituted despotism for liberty and independence?" The aged Zagut spoke in vain: he was even accused of being a secret partisan of the Christian; and the embassy ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 5 • Various
... very natural and proper feeling of admiration for the new clothes and hat which he had purchased out of the money advanced by Jack Meredith for the outfit of the expedition. In reality the man was waiting for the visitor to throw away his cigar before crossing the threshold. But he waited in vain, and Durnovo stood, cigar in mouth, in the dining-room until ...
— With Edged Tools • Henry Seton Merriman
... spread it with power until the Saints were again become a purified people. But he would have been the prophet, seer, and revelator, to whom the truth was given, and so his suffering would not have been in vain; perhaps that suffering had been ordained to the end that his vision should ...
— The Lions of the Lord - A Tale of the Old West • Harry Leon Wilson
... have taken my father and mother, and all our people, to be their slaves," he added, trying in vain ...
— Rinkitink in Oz • L. Frank Baum
... these fish, let me say, that often, marking through clear spaces of water—temporarily made so by the concentric dartings of the fish above the surface—certain larger and less unwary wights, which swam slow and deep; our anglers would cautiously essay to drop their lines down to these last. But in vain; there was no passing the uppermost zone. No sooner did the hook touch the sea, than a hundred infatuates contended for the honor of capture. Poor fish of Rodondo! in your victimized confidence, you are of the number of those who inconsiderately ...
— The Piazza Tales • Herman Melville
... Against this "wedge" King David would have sent his men-at-arms, but the half-naked men of Galloway demanded their right to lead the attack. "No one of these in armour will go further to-day than I will," cried a chieftain of the highlands, and the king yielded. But their fierce attack was in vain against the "iron wall"; they only shattered themselves. David's son Henry made a gallant though badly executed attempt to turn the fortunes of the day, but this failed also, and the Scottish army was obliged to withdraw defeated to ...
— The History of England From the Norman Conquest - to the Death of John (1066-1216) • George Burton Adams
... had some hand in the arrest and imprisonment of Servetus, he was unwilling that he should be burnt at all. "I desire," says he, "that the severity of the punishment should be remitted." "We endeavoured to commute the kind of death, but in vain." "By wishing to mitigate the severity of the punishment," says Farel to Calvin, "you discharge the office of a friend towards your greatest enemy." "That Calvin was the instigator of the magistrates that Servetus might be burned," says Turritine, "historians neither ...
— Fox's Book of Martyrs - Or A History of the Lives, Sufferings, and Triumphant - Deaths of the Primitive Protestant Martyrs • John Fox
... the amount. All arguments and entreaties, however, were lost on the noble invalid. Even the appeal of the old gentleman who, for more than half a century, had managed the estate so advantageously for the successive owners of that splendid property, was made in vain. 'You never refused me anything before,' urged the dean, 'and I go away in very bad spirits.' What a wonderful history lies in this episode of Irish landlordism. Here is an unmarried nobleman whose income from investments in British and French securities is said to exceed ...
— The Land-War In Ireland (1870) - A History For The Times • James Godkin
... earnest festal spirit, knowing well that the Christmas which I have celebrated will be my last. If our strivings are to result in anything, if the cause of mankind is to succeed in our fatherland, if all is not to be forgotten, all our enthusiasm spent in vain, the evil doer, the traitor, the corrupter of youth must die. Until I have executed this, I have no peace; and what can comfort me until I know that I have with upright will set my life at stake? O God, I pray ...
— A History of the Nineteenth Century, Year by Year - Volume Two (of Three) • Edwin Emerson
... man at once. Had he not seen the face, the figure and attitude alone were sufficient to tell him that this was Timmendiquas, the great White Lightning of the Wyandots, returning from the East, where he had helped the Indians in vain, but at the head of a great force, once more ...
— The Border Watch - A Story of the Great Chief's Last Stand • Joseph A. Altsheler
... in vain next day that her mother remonstrated against her going out, pleading her white, haggard face and the rawness of the day. Daisy was not to be detained at home, and before ten o'clock she was down on Broadway, and the dolly ...
— Miss McDonald • Mary J. Holmes
... cows, and perhaps some flagrant instance of injustice to rich wives by tyrant husbands near the capital. But the great occasion and immediate cause, without which this generation might have pleaded for it in vain, was the perception of the justice of it by Governor Hubbard, and his open advocacy of it in his message. Lawyers have one answer for all reforms regarding property or civil contracts—they are impossible. But here was undeniably the best lawyer in the State who said, and threw ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume III (of III) • Various
... seemed suddenly to press upon her heart, as if some terrible disaster were near. Hers was not a mind to be easily disturbed by such things, and she was not naturally of a superstitious nature. She tried to shake off the feeling, but all in vain. What was the cause of it? she asked herself over and ...
— Under Sealed Orders • H. A. Cody
... Believe, you shall not long attend in vain: To-morrow's dawn shall cover all the plain; Bright arms shall flash upon you from afar, A wood of lances, and a moving war. But I, unhappy, in my bonds, must yet Be only pleased to hear of your defeat, And ...
— The Works Of John Dryden, Volume 4 (of 18) - Almanzor And Almahide, Marriage-a-la-Mode, The Assignation • John Dryden |
