"Unbidden" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... well-fitting or ill-fitting we do not know, though we may easily guess. But we do know that it had been crowded into a small carpet-bag and came out a mass of wrinkles. And during the speech the collar or lappel annoyed both speaker and audience by persisting in rising up unbidden. ...
— The Life of Abraham Lincoln • Henry Ketcham
... one that shares our lot. It was the dead of night, and now no more The camp fires shone, when Ajax took his sword, Uncalled, and was in act to leave the tent, And I reproved him. "Ajax," I exclaimed, "What errand is it upon which you go Unbidden, summoned by no messenger, No trumpet call; the host is all asleep?" Brief was his answer in a well-known strain: "Peace, woman; silence best beseems thy sex." I said no more. He sallied forth alone. What may have there befallen I cannot say. Back to the tent ...
— Specimens of Greek Tragedy - Aeschylus and Sophocles • Goldwin Smith
... lady looked unsatisfied, and some unpronounced words agitated her lips, as Constance entered unbidden, but most welcome. She knelt by her mother's side, and took the hand so feebly but affectionately extended towards her. The fearful change that had occurred during her short absence was but too visible. The breath that touched her cheek was cold as the morning mist. The sufferer ...
— The Buccaneer - A Tale • Mrs. S. C. Hall
... the child spent the long warm days of summer under the trees of the park, or driving in the quiet lanes. Guests were unbidden, and his pen was idle. All that was human in him had gone out to Blanche. He loved her, and she was a perpetual delight to him. The rest of the world received the large measure of his indifference. There was no further change in her, ...
— The Bell in the Fog and Other Stories • Gertrude Atherton
... individuality and deadly concreteness,—nay, even a vindictive aggressiveness, which have both fascinated and terrorized the imagination of the race in all ages. From the days of "the angel of the pestilence" to the coming of the famine and the fever as unbidden guests into the tent of Minnehaha; from "the pestilence that walketh in darkness" to the plague that still "stalks abroad" in even the prosaic columns of our daily press, there has been an irresistible ...
— Preventable Diseases • Woods Hutchinson
... what he should whip his boy with. What was used to whip boys? Rods? Canes? No, that would be too brutal. A timber switch, then? And he, John Meredith, must hie him to the woods and cut one. It was an abominable thought. Then a picture presented itself unbidden to his mind. He saw Mrs. Carr's wizened, nut-cracker little face at the appearance of that reviving eel—he saw her sailing witch-like over the buggy wheels. Before he could prevent himself the minister laughed. Then he was angry with himself and angrier still with Carl. ...
— Rainbow Valley • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... whose bow atoned for a great deal, Mattie walked slowly away, leaving Mark greatly relieved. Aunt Betsy was as much as he cared to have on his hands at once, and as he led her up the steps, he began to wonder more and more what his mother would say to his bringing that stranger into her house, unbidden ...
— Family Pride - Or, Purified by Suffering • Mary J. Holmes
... and without the cheerful abandonment of former years. They both, as it were, groped their way carefully in each other's minds, and each vaguely felt that there was something in the other's thought which it was not well to touch unbidden. Bertha saw that all her fears for him had been groundless, and his very appearance lifted the whole weight of responsibility from her breast; and still, did she rejoice at her deliverance from her burden? Ah, no; in this moment she knew that that which ...
— A Good-For-Nothing - 1876 • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen
... athwart the bard, and drew me near, That it might stand more aptly for my view. There in the self-same marble were engrav'd The cart and kine, drawing the sacred ark, That from unbidden office awes mankind. Before it came much people; and the whole Parted in seven quires. One sense cried, "Nay," Another, "Yes, they sing." Like doubt arose Betwixt the eye and smell, from the curl'd fume Of incense breathing ...
— The Divine Comedy, Complete - The Vision of Paradise, Purgatory and Hell • Dante Alighieri
... had been chosen. But the age in which he lived was nothing if not critical and argumentative. The time had long gone by when Dante's massive cathedral, Boccaccio's pleasure domes, Boiardo's and Ariosto's palaces of enchantment, arose as though unbidden and unreasoned from the maker's brain. It was now impossible to take a step in poetry or art without a theory; and, what was worse, that theory had to be exposed for dissertation and discussion. Therefore Tasso, though by genius the most spontaneous of men, commenced the great work of his ...
— Renaissance in Italy, Volumes 1 and 2 - The Catholic Reaction • John Addington Symonds
... herself upon a block of wood outside the kitchen door, and was sobbing silently. In the meantime, Ephraim, unable to find a word of solace for his sister, went and stood at the street door, so that no unbidden guest should come to disturb his father's slumbers. It was mid-day; from the church hard by streamed the peasants and their wives in their Sunday attire, and many bestowed a friendly smile upon the well-known youth. But he could only nod his head in return, ...
— Stories by Foreign Authors: German (V.2) • Various
... heed the words they say, The lights grow far away and dim, Amid the laughing men and maids My eyes unbidden seek ...
— Helen of Troy and Other Poems • Sara Teasdale
... smiling to me as she did so; her left hand lingered fondly for a moment on her father's grey locks, then she sat down unbidden to the piano. My own face was partially shaded by the window curtain, so that I could study that of my fair cousin as she played without appearing rude. Was she beautiful? that was the question ...
— Fifty-Two Stories For Girls • Various
... he cried in a husky voice, wiping away a tear that sprang unbidden to his eye, with the characteristic ready emotional sympathy of ...
— Bob Strong's Holidays - Adrift in the Channel • John Conroy Hutcheson
... and understand,"—my voice broke and tears came, unbidden tears which I did not even desire to conceal—and in that moment the spirit of my wife came near to me, and soul looked into the eyes of soul, with a perfect and bewildering joy, the ...
— The Altar Fire • Arthur Christopher Benson
... for an unbidden tear moistened her eyelid as she heard her mother speak so harshly of her lover. Gertrude, however, took up the cudgels for him, ...
— The Three Clerks • Anthony Trollope
... for words. He stammered,—a promise made to an enemy struggling for supremacy. And the words seem to come unbidden: ...
— The White Desert • Courtney Ryley Cooper
... Unbidden still the awful slope Walling us in we climb to gain Assurance of the shining plain That faith has certified ...
— Shapes of Clay • Ambrose Bierce
... relentlessly persecuting their enemies, but they were all attributed to the presence of an invisible being, whether spectre or demon, who by some supernatural means had been made to enter the patient, or who, unbidden, had by malice or necessity taken up his abode within him. It was needful, after expelling the intruder, to re-establish the health of the sufferer by means of fresh remedies. The study of simples and other materiae medicae would furnish these; Thot had revealed ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 1 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... was read and adopted members crowded around Mr. Daugherty and congratulated him. These expressions of good will were too much for Mr. Daugherty's composure, and tears came unbidden to his eyes. He felt the stigma placed upon his good name by the insinuations of the Democratic newspapers very keenly, although not one member of the ...
— Recollections of Forty Years in the House, Senate and Cabinet - An Autobiography. • John Sherman
... feet of his dead grandson, with his gray head stricken to the dust with late repentance. And yet he was her father! She stooped over him now and wiped the death dews from his brow; and at that moment another scene rose unbidden to her mind. ...
— Wee Wifie • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... mermaid—the hope of the blue cotton—reasserted themselves, and the little sharp face relaxed. She began to amuse herself with hunting the spiders and beetles which ran across the rocky roof above her head, or crept in and out of the crevices of stone, wondering, no doubt, at this unbidden and tormenting daylight. She caught one or two small blackbeetles in a dirty rag of a handkerchief—for she would not touch them if she could help it—and then it delighted her to push aside the curtain, stretch her hand out into the void darkness, and ...
— The History of David Grieve • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... really questioned the finality of her decree, he sensed it meant parting for ever. And yet, with that spring of eternal hope which animates all living souls, unbidden arguings and possibilities rose in his enfeebled brain, and deepened his unrest. Thus his progress towards convalescence was ...
— Three Weeks • Elinor Glyn
... of government or separate possession of women and children; for all men rose again from the earth, having no memory of the past. And although they had nothing of this sort, the earth gave them fruits in abundance, which grew on trees and shrubs unbidden, and were not planted by the hand of man. And they dwelt naked, and mostly in the open air, for the temperature of their seasons was mild; and they had no beds, but lay on soft couches of grass, which grew plentifully out of the ...
— Statesman • Plato
... glad—I'm glad!" said Beth, winking back a bit of suspicious moisture that came unbidden in her eyes as she looked on this weather-beaten, hardship-beaten old figure, still sturdily ready for the fates. "I'm sure you all deserve it! I'm sure ...
— The Furnace of Gold • Philip Verrill Mighels
... in the same attitude. I sharply bade him close the door, and he did so. Then he stepped forward, tossed the reeking scalps on the table, and with a shaking hand helped himself, unbidden, to a stiff ...
— The Cryptogram - A Story of Northwest Canada • William Murray Graydon
... But as she spoke a strange strangled little sob had crept unbidden into her throat, ...
— The Captives • Hugh Walpole
... fair share of the applause bestowed on his friend, and he was not jealous that he did not gain more. No one listened more attentively than did Ellis, for he had declined to speak, though urged by Ernest to do so, and tears rushed unbidden into his eyes at the success which Bracebridge ...
— Ernest Bracebridge - School Days • William H. G. Kingston
... "It came unbidden and I pass it on for what it's worth." As Dave turned away he added, hastily, "It's about a skeleton in the chaparral, and ...
— Heart of the Sunset • Rex Beach
... Of Science, still From all men deeply hidden! Who takes no thought, To him 'tis brought, 'Tis given unsought, unbidden! ...
— Faust • Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
... youth's golden prime, When my own spirit too was growing, When from my heart th' unbidden rhyme Gush'd forth, a fount for ever flowing; Then shadowy mist the world conceal'd, And every bud sweet promise made, Of wonders yet to be reveal'd, As through the vales, with blooms inlaid, Culling a thousand flowers I stray'd. Naught had I, yet a rich profusion! ...
— Faust Part 1 • Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
... have lessoned us; There sups to-night on earth No madder crew of wastrels than This fellowship of mirth.... (Of mirth ... drink, fools!—nor let it flag Lest from the outer mist Creep in that other company Unbidden ...
— Dreams and Dust • Don Marquis
... is free from rules and conventions, unpremeditated, yet all art. It is "Like an unbodied joy whose race is just begun." "What thou art we know not," yet thou art like a poet hidden singing hymns unbidden; like a high-born maiden soothing her love-laden soul in secret; like a hidden glowworm scattering its hues unbeholden; like a rose embowered in its leaves making faint the thieving winds with its heavy scent. Its music surpasses the ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 10 - The Guide • Charles Herbert Sylvester
... kind of book that one desires to read aloud to all the family. Its captivating stories, humorous often, pathetic at times, will brighten one's face into a broad smile or bring the tear unbidden. The stories are the windows that Dr. Goss opens upon the practical themes that brighten every page of this winsome book. It will drive away the "blues" and make a cross and glum person look pleasant ...
— What a Young Woman Ought to Know • Mary Wood-Allen
... him were dull and her face was slumped, as though the soul had gone from it. A tremor was visible in her hands, and the color was gone from her drooping lips. She stared at him for a moment, stupidly, then irritation came into her voice, as he sat unbidden in a porch chair near her. "I didn't tell you to ...
— In the Heart of a Fool • William Allen White
... solar day While unsubstantial dreams before thee weave A foamy dance, and fluttering fancies play About thy palace in the silver ray Of some far, moony globe. But when the hour, The long-expected comes, the ivory gates Open on noiseless hinge before thy bower Unbidden, and the jewelled chariot waits With magic steeds. Thou from the fronting rim Bending to urge them, whilst thy sea-dark hair Falls in ambrosial ripples o'er each limb, With beautiful pale arms, untrammelled, bare For horsemanship, to those twin chargers fleet Dost ...
— Spirits in Bondage • (AKA Clive Hamilton) C. S. Lewis
... in vain for what often rushes into my head unbidden—little traits and sayings which recall his looks, manner, tone, and gestures; and I have always continued to think that a crisis of life was arrived, in which a new career of fame was opened to him, and that had he been permitted to start upon it, he would have obliterated ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott, Volume V (of 10) • John Gibson Lockhart
... tenor: key—O, something modern!—seven sharps." And he made a business-like signature across the staves, and then paused and browsed for a while on the handle of his pen. Melody, with no better inspiration than a sheet of paper, is not usually found to spring unbidden in the mind of the amateur; nor is the key of seven sharps a place of much repose to the untried. He cast away that sheet. "It will help to build up the character of Jimson," Gideon remarked, and again waited on the muse, in various ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 7 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... lone he went, Gnawing his beard in dreariment, Lo! from a thicket hidden, Lovely as flower In April hour, Steps forth a form unbidden. ...
— Songs of Childhood • Walter de la Mare
... eddy of dead leaves a grouse bursts up, and darts away like a blunt arrow, flint-tipped, gray-feathered, among the startled birch stems. As you follow softly to rout him out again, and to thrill and be startled by his unexpected rush, something of the Indian has come unbidden into your cautious tread. All regret for the wilderness is vanished; you are simply glad that so much wildness still remains to speak eloquently ...
— Secret of the Woods • William J. Long
... his lord;—he knew, and strove to meet; In vain he strove to crawl and kiss his feet; Yet (all he could) his tail, his ears, his eyes, Salute his master and confess his joys. Soft pity touch'd the mighty master's soul: Adown his cheek a tear unbidden stole; Stole unperceived: he turn'd his head, and dried The ...
— The Book of the Epic • Helene A. Guerber
... me." The words came almost unbidden. It was an impulse to which he responded because he could not help it. "Play for me," ...
— The Music Master - Novelized from the Play • Charles Klein
... hawks themselves were more interesting than their unbidden guests. Ismaques, honest fellow that he is, mates for life, and comes back to the same nest year after year. The only exception to this rule that I know is in the case of a fishhawk, whom I knew well as a boy, and who lost his mate one summer by an accident. The accident came from a gun in the ...
— Wood Folk at School • William J. Long
... movements had a lithe grace that was irresistibly fascinating to the eye. Slight though he was, he might have been a young god descending on a shaft of sunshine from Olympus. But the thought that darted all unbidden through Anne's mind was of something far different. She banished it on the instant with startled precipitancy; but it left a scar behind that burned like the sudden searing of a hot iron. "I beheld Satan as lightning fall ...
— The Knave of Diamonds • Ethel May Dell
... Shakspeare has peopled this portion of the Isle; of Lear and Cordelia, of Edgar, Gloster, and Kent; of that night of horrors upon the stormy heath, and that scene of unutterable tenderness and heart-break on the sands of Dover. Unbidden, as we gaze over the fair and varied prospect, the words of the same great dramatist rise to our lips, in his appropriation of the sentiments and language of the ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, April 1844 - Volume 23, Number 4 • Various
... [goes on]. Deep wisdom's power Has, to this hour, From all the world been hidden! Whoso thinks not, To him 'tis brought, To him it comes unbidden. ...
— Faust • Goethe
... happiest moments of the happiest and best minds. We are aware of evanescent visitations of thought and feeling sometimes associated with place or person, sometimes regarding our own mind alone, and always arising unforeseen and departing unbidden, but elevating and delightful beyond all expression: so that even in the desire and regret they leave, there cannot but be pleasure, participating as it does in the nature of its object. It is as it were the interpenetration of a diviner nature through our own; but its footsteps ...
— English Critical Essays - Nineteenth Century • Various
... but exchanged no sort of greeting, as Bartley, unbidden, took a chair on the opposite side of the stove; the Squire did not put down the ...
— A Modern Instance • William Dean Howells
... entering, seemed changed and strange to him! The sun was already up when he turned into the palace gate and entered the public durbar hall. It was full; a chamberlain came across and asked him why he sat unbidden in the king's presence. 'But I ...
— The Orange Fairy Book • Various
... look, my heart sank, and the tears sprang unbidden to my eyes. Whose was the sword? For whose sake was her life so lonely and secluded? For whom was she waiting? Surely here, if one could but read it aright, lay the secret of her strange and sudden journeys—here I touched unawares upon the mystery ...
— In the Days of My Youth • Amelia Ann Blandford Edwards
... lives I do!" he cried. "You shall quit the Palais Royal this very night, M. de Luynes, and if ever I find you unbidden within half a mile of it, I will do that which out of a misguided sense of compassion I do not do now—I will have you flung into an oubliette of the Bastille, where better men than you have rotted before to-day. Per Dio! do you think ...
— The Suitors of Yvonne • Raphael Sabatini
... the green valleys and hoary hills of old England. The trapper, beyond the Rocky Mountains, has left his lonely tent, and is unroofing the houses in London with the more than Mephistopheles at my elbow. And, perhaps, in some well-lighted hall, the unbidden tear steals from the father's eye, as the exquisite sketch of the poor schoolmaster and his little scholar brings back the form of that gifted boy, whose "little hand" worked its wonders under his guidance, and who, in the dawning ...
— Modern Eloquence: Vol III, After-Dinner Speeches P-Z • Various
... unfasten Maud's strap, to lift her out, and carry her down the steps and up the steps, she would miss Cecil. The thought came to her unbidden as the train thundered in, and hastily pushing the wheel chair into a corner by the booking office window, she bade the child look through and see all the lovely big trains, till Gertrude came back in a minute. ...
— The Girls of St. Olave's • Mabel Mackintosh
... having been released, he was directed to capture in succession two or three more of the flock, which underwent similar treatment. The sagacious animal had now become initiated into the mysteries of his master's vocation, for off he set unbidden through the flock, and picked out with unerring precision those sheep which were affected with maggots in their skin, and held them down until the arrival of his master; who was thus, by the extraordinary instinct of Ladie, saved a world of trouble, while the operation of clipping ...
— Anecdotes of Dogs • Edward Jesse
... state and ceremonial. He was attended by his wives and the girls of his harem, who, as was customary, waited on him at table and discharged the other menial offices about his person. A body of Indian nobles were stationed in the antechamber, but never entered the presence unbidden; and when they did enter it, they submitted to the same humiliating ceremonies imposed on the greatest of his subjects. The service of his table was gold and silver plate. His dress, which he often changed, was composed ...
— The History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William H. Prescott
... of fear on his face giving away to an expression of demoniac rage, drew a revolver and aimed it straight at Fleck. Jane, who unbidden had followed the raiders as they entered and now was standing wide-eyed in the doorway watching the spectacle, was the only one to see that just as old Otto pulled the trigger his nephew, whether by accident or design, she could not tell, jostled his arm, sending the ...
— The Apartment Next Door • William Andrew Johnston
... away with me. But I didn't doubt for a second. I rose from my seat, and in a tremulous voice called Jane into the room. Without one word I laid both pictures down before her together. Jane glanced first at the one, then turned quickly to the other. A sharp little cry broke from her lips all unbidden. She saw it as fast and as instinctively as I ...
— Recalled to Life • Grant Allen
... fancy that as I re-read Ivanhoe and my heart leaps to my mouth when the knights clash at Ashby, the propulsive power of that leap had its origin in the emotions of 1870 rather than those of 1914. And when some of Dickens' pathos—that death-bed of Paul Dombey for instance—brings the tears again unbidden to my eyes, I suspect, though I scarcely dare to put my suspicion into words, that the salt in those tears is of the vintage of 1875. I am reading Arnold Bennett now and loving him very dearly when he is at his ...
— A Librarian's Open Shelf • Arthur E. Bostwick
... lord," answered I, "to see your wealth; but I am not inquisitive to explore, unbidden, the ...
— Eastern Tales by Many Story Tellers • Various
... dressed"? Beautiful in form, deft and graceful in expression, with not a word too much or one that bears not its part in the total effect, there is yet about the lyrics of Jonson a certain stiffness and formality, a suspicion that they were not quite spontaneous and unbidden, but that they were carved, so to speak, with disproportionate labour by a potent man of letters whose habitual thought is on greater things. It is for these reasons that Jonson is even better in the epigram and in occasional verse where rhetorical finish and pointed wit less interfere with ...
— The Poetaster - Or, His Arraignment • Ben Jonson
... who shall describe the tumult of his soul—the regret, the hungering over her in her sorrow, the wild unbidden hopes and his shame of them? Careful of what his burning eyes might reveal, he hardly dared raise them from the ground; and yet to keep them long from her face was an utter impossibility. The whispered comments of the young men behind him, their admiration, and astonishment drove him to desperation. ...
— The Light of Scarthey • Egerton Castle
... suddenly upward; but into the dark eyes unbidden came a sudden film and mist. Her father's health had been too far undermined, and he had been unable to withstand the shock of the operation, and he had died in the hospital. There weren't any relatives, except ...
— The White Moll • Frank L. Packard
... with trembling limbs and a beating heart that she stood before Ahasuerus; and, by entering his presence unbidden, she made her ...
— Notable Women of Olden Time • Anonymous
... upon your demd countenance,' said Mr Mantalini, seating himself unbidden, and arranging his hair and whiskers. 'You look quite ...
— The Life And Adventures Of Nicholas Nickleby • Charles Dickens
... they reveal the wonderful fertility, resource, and fancy of the poet, they do not indicate that in outward semblance, surroundings or history their author was either fortunate or happy; and as we read them, sometimes we may feel that we are entering the poet's heart-home unbidden and unannounced. But if we have come there when it is all unswept and ungarnished, may we not the more certainly ...
— Testimony of the Sonnets as to the Authorship of the Shakespearean Plays and Poems • Jesse Johnson
... sorts of unbidden guests invade the house in multitudes. Two varieties of mosquitoes do their utmost to make life unpleasant, and these have learned the wisdom of not approaching a lamp too closely; but hosts of curious and harmless things cannot be prevented from seeking ...
— Glimpses of an Unfamiliar Japan • Lafcadio Hearn
... the record of the best and happiest moments of the happiest and best minds. We are aware of evanescent visitations of thought and feeling, sometimes associated with place and person, sometimes regarding our own mind alone, and always arising unforeseen, and departing unbidden, but elevating stud delightful beyond all expression. Poets are not only subject to these experiences, as spirits of the most refined organization, but they can color all they combine with the evanescent lines ...
— Ancient and Modern Celebrated Freethinkers - Reprinted From an English Work, Entitled "Half-Hours With - The Freethinkers." • Charles Bradlaugh, A. Collins, and J. Watts
... the small bees and flies, show a reddish tint on the ovaries which deepens as the fruit forms; and Ludwig states that this is not only to increase the conspicuousness of the shrubs, but to entice unbidden guests away from the younger flowers. Who will tell us why the old bark should loosen every year and the thin layers separate into not nine, but dozens ...
— Wild Flowers, An Aid to Knowledge of Our Wild Flowers and - Their Insect Visitors - - Title: Nature's Garden • Neltje Blanchan
... times in the fever of heat and work and weariness had Hardy cursed them, his tongue seeking unbidden the wickedest words of the range; how many times had he cursed Jim Swope, and Jasper Swope, the Mexicans, and all who had rushed in to help accomplish their ruin. And as the sun beat down and no clouds came into the sky he cursed himself, blindly, for all that ...
— Hidden Water • Dane Coolidge
... fixes the mind on those sensations or impressions of most worth, pushing the others into the background. Past impressions, memory-pictures, linger in the brain, and these, bidden or unbidden, crowd with the others. To know the relation of all these, to distinguish present impressions from memories, realities from dreams,—this is mental sanity. The sane brain performs its appointed task. The mind ...
— The Call of the Twentieth Century • David Starr Jordan
... the fact that consumption was rapidly carrying him to the grave. The philanthropist inquired into his history. When he spoke to the prisoner of his mother, he observed that his chin quivered, and that tears came unbidden ...
— The Bobbin Boy - or, How Nat Got His learning • William M. Thayer
... spring upon the deer, un- dimmed, the hen will nestle over her chickens, we shall love, we shall hate, but it will be like music, sheer utterance, issuing straight out of the unknown, the lightning and the rainbow appearing in us unbidden, unchecked, like ambassadors. ...
— Look! We Have Come Through! • D. H. Lawrence
... said Michael looking at his unbidden guest doubtfully. "Well, we'll see. I'm afraid you'll be disappointed. It's very informal. Sometimes we don't get beyond the first step in a lesson. Sometimes I have to stop ...
— Lo, Michael! • Grace Livingston Hill
... giving undue weight to the considerations I had presented to you. So I sought the judgment of others—all of them men of large distinction whom you know, or at least have confidence in, and without dissent I found them saying, voluntarily and unbidden, what I had said to you—that for me to undertake this work of arousing the best patriotic feeling of America, on a salary, would make seriously against the success of the work and against my own value in it, or in anything ...
— The Letters of Franklin K. Lane • Franklin K. Lane
... gentlemen should be dressed in bags. Mrs. Knox contrived to come with the President, and to follow him and Mrs. Washington to their destination, and she had the design of forcing an invitation from the President to a seat on the sofa. She mounted up the steps after them unbidden, but unfortunately the wicked sofa was so short, that when the President and Mrs. Washington were seated, there was not room for a third person; she was obliged therefore to descend in the face of the company, and to sit where she ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... paused for rhythmical expression, while I felt that all I wanted was to see the church full of upturned faces, instead of the emptiness of the silent pews. And as though in a dream the solitude became peopled, and I saw the listening faces and the eager eyes, and as the sentences came unbidden from my lips, and my own tones echoed back to me from the pillars of the ancient church, I knew of a verity that the gift of speech was mine, and that if ever—and it seemed then so impossible—if ...
— Autobiographical Sketches • Annie Besant
... livery at once, as to be steering in this uncertain manner, between the Coquette and the land, like a protested note sent from endorser to endorser, to be paid," commenced Alderman Van Beverout, uncasing himself in the great cabin with the coolest deliberation, while his niece sunk into a chair unbidden, her two attendants standing near in submissive silence. "Here is Alida, who has insisted on paying so unseasonable a visit, and, what is worse still, on dragging me in her train, though I am past the day of following a woman about, merely because she happens to have a pretty face. ...
— The Water-Witch or, The Skimmer of the Seas • James Fenimore Cooper
... had been a camera, Theron snapped a shutter down upon this odd, unbidden idea, and ...
— The Damnation of Theron Ware • Harold Frederic
... head, and held the cool cloth to the face and wiped the parched lips, and rubbed the feverish hands, while Guy stood, looking on, bewildered and confounded, and utterly unable to say a word or utter a protest to this angel, as it seemed to him, who had come unbidden to his aid, forgetful of the risk she ran and the danger she incurred. Once as she turned her beautiful face to him and he saw how wondrously fair and lovely it was, lovely with a different expression from any he had ever seen there, it came over ...
— Miss McDonald • Mary J. Holmes
... had clung to me—and I had held her. A brief flash of something, from her eyes to mine—from mine back to hers. The poets write that love can be born of such a glance. The first meeting, across all the barriers of which love springs unsought, unbidden—defiant, sometimes. And the troubadours of old would sing: "A fleeting glance; a touch; two wildly beating hearts—and love ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, March 1930 • Various
... vividly how, just after we got clear of the town, we were turning down a lane between hedgerows wonderfully like one of our own country roads, when something—I could not tell what—gripped my heart and sent a lump into my throat. Tears sprang unbidden to my eyes, and I trembled from head to foot with emotion. Whatever could it be? Bewildered for the moment, I looked around, and saw a hedge laden with white hawthorn blossom, the sweet English "may." Every Londoner knows how strongly that beautiful scent appeals to him, even ...
— The Cruise of the Cachalot - Round the World After Sperm Whales • Frank T. Bullen
... grafts artificial—among the resources which have most enriched and diversified both flowers and fruits. The dodders and mistletoes rob juices from the stem and branches of their unfortunate hosts; more numerous still are the unbidden guests that fasten themselves upon the roots of their prey. The broom-rape, a comparatively recent immigrant from Europe, lays hold of the roots of thyme in preference to other place of entertainment; the Yellow Rattle, the Lousewort, and many more attach themselves ...
— Little Masterpieces of Science: - The Naturalist as Interpreter and Seer • Various
... but why being free are we so fettered? And here slips in the unbidden guest of the theory. Andrea has chosen earthly love; Lucrezia is all in all; and he has reached absolute ...
— The Poetry Of Robert Browning • Stopford A. Brooke
... composure. The boys around me had endured all that we suffered with stoical firmness. Groans from pain-racked bodies could not be repressed, and bitter curses and maledictions against the Rebels leaped unbidden to the lips at the slightest occasion, but there was no murmuring or whining. There was not a day—hardly an hour—in which one did not see such exhibitions of manly fortitude as made him proud of belonging to a race of which every individual ...
— Andersonville, complete • John McElroy
... presided in state, and hurried into the kitchen. The young man gazed after her, looked swiftly about the room and backed away towards the door; then his strong jaw closed down, he smiled grimly to himself and sat down unbidden at a table. The table was mahogany and, in a case against the wall, there was a scant display of cut glass; but the linen was worn thin and the expensive velvet carpet had been ruined by hob-nailed boots. Heavy workingmen's dishes lay on the tables, the plating was worn from the ...
— Shadow Mountain • Dane Coolidge
... flight! And now, that the first assault is over, Mark, and we may hope to meet the wiles of the enemy by some prudence of our own, thou mayst go forth to thy father. It would have been tempting Providence too rashly, hadst thou rushed, unbidden and uninformed, into the first hurry of the danger. Come hither, child, and receive the blessing and prayers of thy mother: after which thou shalt, with better trust in Providence, place thy young person among the combatants, in the hope of victory. Remember that thou art now of an age ...
— The Wept of Wish-Ton-Wish • James Fenimore Cooper
... land where skies bend blue and all nature seems to smile; where mosses veil the infirmities of decrepit oaks and vines spring unbidden from the ground to hide the scars of grey old walls; where the grape-vine staggers from tree to tree as though drunk with the purple juice of its own luscious fruit; where flowers lie at your plate on a winter's day and the humblest ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Report of the Proceedings at the Eleventh Annual Meeting - Washington, D. C. October 7 AND 8, 1920 • Various
... entrance seemed to create a temporary diversion from the legitimate business of the evening. The tattooed women and shaven-headed men stared in open-mouthed astonishment at the pale-faced guests who had come unbidden to the marriage-feast, having on no wedding garments. Our faces were undeniably dirty, our blue hunting-shirts and buckskin trousers bore the marks of two months' rough travel, in numerous rips, tears, and tatters, which were ...
— Tent Life in Siberia • George Kennan
... she had worked herself into a nervous fever. Dr. Mylechreest came to see her, unbidden of the family. He was one of those tall, bashful men who, in their eagerness to be gone, seem always to have urgent business somewhere else. After a single glance at her and a few muttered syllables, he went off ...
— The Manxman - A Novel - 1895 • Hall Caine
... towards home. Her limbs were very stiff, and every now and then she had to choke down an unbidden sob. Her pupils had been long returned from church, and had busied themselves in preparing tea—an occupation which had probably made them feel the time ...
— Ruth • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... past gallantries, and it served in a subtle way to herald the coming of a person whose appearance suggested knowledge of the gay world. Not uncurious to steal a glance at the strange visitor, a woman, tastefully arrayed in sable robes, entered unannounced from a cozy side-room. An unbidden blush betokened her surprise and emotion. Burr blenched slightly, but neither the red signal nor its effect was observed by Mrs. Smith, who, glad to shift the task of entertaining Colonel Burr, introduced him to ...
— A Dream of Empire - Or, The House of Blennerhassett • William Henry Venable
... a memorable day at each of the houses when the sturdy little fellow made his way, unbidden and unattended, to pay his first call, and ever afterward (though they would not admit it, even to themselves) the grandfathers watched for his coming, and vied with each other in trying to win the highest place ...
— Good Cheer Stories Every Child Should Know • Various
... paled and flushed many times while she was undoing this, for many hopes were centered in it, and tears rose unbidden to her eyes when at last it was laid out on the bed ...
— Virgie's Inheritance • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... of anger mingled with an apprehension lest some harm should have been done to his craft, the owner of the ARROW went carefully over it. He could find nothing wrong. The engine was all right and all that appeared to have been accomplished by the unbidden visitor was the opening of the locked forward compartment. That this had been done by one of the many keys on Andy Foger's ...
— Tom Swift and his Motor-boat - or, The Rivals of Lake Carlopa • Victor Appleton
... rushed to his eyes, as he kissed his wife and children before he turned from his door for the last time for months, and perhaps forever. The nature of the pioneer was as gentle and affectionate as it was firm and persevering. He had power, however, to send back the unbidden gush to its source, and forcibly to withdraw his mind ...
— The First White Man of the West • Timothy Flint
... not seek—whate'er befall— Him who unbidden comes to all. A grewsome guest, a lean-jawed wight— God send he do not come to-night! But if he do, to claim his own, He shall not find me lying prone; But blithely, bravely, sitting up, And raising high the stirrup-cup. Then if you find a pipe unfilled, An empty chair, the brown ale spilled; ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume X (of X) • Various
... No massive gate impedes; the wave, in vain, Might strive against the air to break or fall; And, at the portal of that strange domain, A clear, bright curtain seemed, or crystal wall. The spirits pass its bounds, but would not far Tread its slant pavement, like unbidden guest; The while, on either side, a bower of spar Gave invitation for a moment's rest. And, deep in either bower, a little throne Looked so fantastic, it were hard to know If busy nature fashioned it alone, Or found some curious artist ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 2 August 1848 • Various
... executed portrait in oils of a little child, most likely Miss Harman in her infancy. Ah, yes, but baby Angus at home was more beautiful. A portrait of him would attract more admiration than did that of the proud daughter of all this wealth. Tears started unbidden to the poor perplexed mother's eyes. It was hard to sit quiet with this burning pain at her heart. Just then the door was opened and an elderly gentleman with silver hair came in. He bowed, distantly ...
— How It All Came Round • L. T. Meade
... was dispelled by sight of the ruins of St. Dunstan's monastery appearing above a low wall. In front of the broken arches and tottering walls grew some apple trees so old and worn that no blossom decked their gnarled branches. Unbidden tears glistened in ...
— Cynthia's Chauffeur • Louis Tracy
... those Pharisees were made, much to his own edification. Easter week came. In Denmark it is, or was, custom to go to communion once a year, on Holy Thursday, if at no other season, and, I might add, rarely at any other. On Wednesday night, the deacon appeared, unbidden, at my uncle's door, craving an interview. If a spectre had suddenly walked in, I do not suppose he could have lost his wits more completely. He recovered them with an effort, and bidding his guest welcome, led him courteously ...
— The Making of an American • Jacob A. Riis
... that those who had stared at her sourly or scornfully, or with malicious amusement or some stirrings of pity, drew their breath and gave ground a little. Where was the shrinking, frightened, unbidden guest of a moment before, with downcast eyes and burning cheeks? Here was a proud and easy and radiant lady, with witching eyes and a wonderful smile. "I am only Audrey, your Excellency," she said, ...
— Audrey • Mary Johnston
... awaiting the coming of Esperance. But he pretended not to have seen the carriage and continued to gaze up at the stars. Esperance trembled and her lips were icy cold. Albert had also seen the Duke, and was not deceived by his attitude. He had resolved to be calm, but a sullen, unbidden ...
— The Idol of Paris • Sarah Bernhardt
... years of residence instead of the five heretofore sufficient. Next came three alien acts, empowering the President, at his discretion, without trial or even a statement of his reasons, to banish foreigners from the land; any who should return unbidden being liable to imprisonment for three years, and cut off from the possibility of citizenship forever. A "sedition act" followed, to fine in the sum of $5,000 each and to imprison for five years any persons stirring up sedition, combining to oppose governmental ...
— History of the United States, Volume 2 (of 6) • E. Benjamin Andrews
... had come unbidden to his mind and stuck in his metaphysics like a burr. Now he remembered that the question was not entirely a new one. Fifi had once asked him who would be sorry if he died, and had answered herself by saying that she would. However, Fifi was dead, and ...
— Queed • Henry Sydnor Harrison
... might hear more distinctly the soft strains of the Beethoven Sonata which came floating up to her. As she opened the door, she heard a strange sound rising above the notes of the music; it was that, perhaps, most terrible of all sounds, the unbidden, irresistible groan, rising from a man's tortured heart; and it came ...
— The Woman's Way • Charles Garvice
... it was going to do to the unbidden, resented guest. A queer protest against its enmity, an impulse to give her a square deal, surged up in him from nowhere. After all, whatever else she might be, she was Uncle Hugh's girl. Like all the ...
— O Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1919 • Various
... clean-looking in body and soul; but the aspect of any one is in the eye of the beholder. This man, whose mind was blank except upon one theme, whose senses seemed lost except at rare times, when awakened perhaps by an effort of his will, or perhaps by an unbidden wave of psychical sympathy with some one to whom he was drawn by unseen union, awoke a certain feeling of sensational interest in most people when they approached him. The public were in the main divided into two classes in their estimate of him—those ...
— What Necessity Knows • Lily Dougall
... you tell me that I ought to know some things, though untold, you are wrong, and speak what is impossible. My imagination sits by the roadside [Greek: apedilos] like the startled sea nymph in AEschylus, but never dares to put one unsandalled foot, unbidden, on a certain tract of ground—never takes a step there unled! and never (I write the simple truth) even as the alternative of the probability of your ceasing to care for me, have I touched (untold) on the possibility of your caring more for me ... never! That you should continue ...
— The Letters of Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett, Vol. 1 (of 2) 1845-1846 • Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett
... complete his task, Pan was about to grasp his wand when the motion was arrested as the sinking beam of the sun was intercepted by a gigantic shadow, and the stranger again stood by his side. The unbidden guest uttered no word, but his manner was sufficiently expressive of wrath as he disdainfully cast on the ground a broken, withered lily, the relic of what had bloomed with such loveliness in the ...
— The Twilight of the Gods, and Other Tales • Richard Garnett
... half-jesting gallantry, "Prithee, fair woodland nymph, suffer a lone knight, who has wandered to the confines of a Paradise unawares, to bow the knee in thy service, and as atonement meet for venturing unbidden into thy hidden sanctum, to proffer thee the homage of his ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 3 September 1848 • Various
... violent struggles, when the tame ones had frequently to step across the captives, they in no instance trampled on them, or occasioned the slightest accident or annoyance. So far from this, they saw intuitively a difficulty or a danger, and addressed themselves unbidden to remove it. In tying up one of the larger elephants, he contrived before he could be hauled close up to the tree, to walk once or twice round it, carrying the rope with him; the decoy, perceiving the advantage he had thus gained over the nooser, walked up of her own accord, and pushed ...
— Sketches of the Natural History of Ceylon • J. Emerson Tennent
... servant. Veronica led them to her favourite room, then showed them their own, and went back to wait for them, while Elettra brought the tea, just as she had done of old in the Palazzo Macomer. Veronica watched her while she was arranging the tea-table. Elettra, who rarely spoke unbidden, ventured to ...
— Taquisara • F. Marion Crawford
... showering golden flowers on his path. These were the happiest moments of Brita's joyless life, and even these were not unmixed with bitterness; for into the midst of her joy would steal a shy anxious thought which was the more terrible because it came so stealthily, so soft-footed and unbidden. Had not this child been given her as a punishment for her guilt? Had she then a right to turn God's scourge into a blessing? Did she give to God "that which belongeth unto God," as long as all her hopes, her thoughts, and her whole being revolved about this one earthly thing, her son, the child ...
— Tales From Two Hemispheres • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen
... Unbidden, a word shaped in Sofia's consciousness, a French monosyllable into which the war had packed every shade and gradation of hatred and ...
— Red Masquerade • Louis Joseph Vance
... should ye not wait?" he cried. "Who, in God's name, are ye to establish yourselves unbidden in my house, dog my steps, threaten me, ruin me with my friends and neighbours, and treat me as though I were a child without will, aims, or desires of mine own? Ye have tarried for me; tarry on until doomsday. Henceforth ...
— Sea-Dogs All! - A Tale of Forest and Sea • Tom Bevan
... dimorphism in one of the commonest of moulds is given by De Bary in a paper from which we have already quoted.[D] He writes thus:—In every household there is a frequent unbidden guest, which appears particularly on preserved fruits, viz., the mould which is called Aspergillus glaucus. It shows itself to the naked eye as a woolly floccy crust over the substance, first purely white, then gradually ...
— Fungi: Their Nature and Uses • Mordecai Cubitt Cooke
... Unbidden, Breitmann pushed his hand into the cavity. His arm went down to the elbow, and he was forced to stand on tiptoe. He was pale when he withdrew his arm, but in his hand was a square metal case, about the size and shape of ...
— A Splendid Hazard • Harold MacGrath
... couch along the inner end. Here I lay in a delicious reverie for some time; during which all lovely forms, and colours, and sounds seemed to use my brain as a common hall, where they could come and go, unbidden and unexcused. I had never imagined that such capacity for simple happiness lay in me, as was now awakened by this assembly of forms and spiritual sensations, which yet were far too vague to admit of being translated into any shape common to my own and another mind. I had lain for an hour, I ...
— Phantastes - A Faerie Romance for Men and Women • George MacDonald
... possible. Although he was gone nearly an hour, he returned before McLean had been with the girls more than a quarter of that time, and changed their apprehension into wonderment and secret joy by the extreme—almost oppressive—courtesy of manner to his unbidden guest. ...
— 'Laramie;' - or, The Queen of Bedlam. • Charles King
... houses, and peeping into every nook and corner, in search of skins and eatables, and on such occasions accordingly, they conceal all they can, and make as much noise as possible, in order to frighten away their unbidden guest." —Narrative of an Expedition to the East Coast of Greenland: Capt. W. A. Graah, of the Danish Roy. Navy. ...
— Moon Lore • Timothy Harley
... be drunk!" said Doctor Geoffrey. He tried another path. A new fragrance met him, the keen, clean, cruelly sweet smell of honeysuckle. Browning was gone with the phlox and the roses; and what was this coming unbidden into his head, crisp and clean and possessing, ...
— Geoffrey Strong • Laura E. Richards
... Retriever who does not know how to bring his bird to hand without injuring it. A better knowledge of what is expected of him distinguishes our modern Retriever. He knows his duty, and is intensely eager to perform it, but he no longer rushes off unbidden at the firing of the gun. He has learned to remain at heel until he is ordered by word or gesture from his master, upon whom he relies ...
— Dogs and All About Them • Robert Leighton
... who had refused to attend the ball because they would not allow him to call out the figures. The guesses were various; but no one thought of the possible arrival of a stranger at such an hour on such a night, until Serena suggested that it would be a good plan to open the door. Then the unbidden guest was discovered lying ...
— The Ruling Passion • Henry van Dyke
... tone well worthy of his uncle's scholar. Whether few or many were present, Rachel knew not, thought not; she was only sensible of the fulness of calm joy that made the Thanksgiving touch her heart and fill her eyes with unbidden tears, that came far more readily than ...
— The Clever Woman of the Family • Charlotte M. Yonge
... his face—the smooth-curved chin, the shrewd yet sleepy eyes, and finely-cut thin lips—a curious mixture of audacity and meekness blended upon his features. Yet this impression was but the prelude to his smile. When that first dawned, some breath of humor seeming to stir in him unbidden, the true meaning was given to his face. Each feature helped to make a smile that was the very soul's life of the man expressed. It broadened, showing brilliant teeth, and grew into a noiseless laugh; and then I saw before me Dosso's jester, the type of Shakespeare's fools, the life ...
— New Italian sketches • John Addington Symonds
... is so French, its symbolism enchants me. Auteuil is like a flower, its petals opening out to the kiss of the air, its roots feeling for way among the rich earth. Ah, the land of France, its vineyards and orchards, its earthly life! Thoughts come unbidden, my thoughts sing together, and I hardly knowing what they are singing. My thoughts are singing like the sun; do not ask me their meaning; they mean as much and as little as the sun that I am part of—the sun of France ...
— Memoirs of My Dead Life • George Moore
... sou'west, as we could see by the blackness of the horizon and the saw-edged sea-line beyond the outer headlands. During the afternoon, a ground-sea crept into the bay, silently rolling in like an unbidden unannounced guest who will not name his business. And when, at the turn of the tide, the breeze in-shore also backed to the sou'west, a busy lop was superposed on the long heaving swell.[8] About half-past seven, the Widgers were gathered ...
— A Poor Man's House • Stephen Sydney Reynolds
... some association with this particular spot, or some vague resemblance, haunts you. You cannot "place" it. One day you hit the tennis-ball at a little different angle than you planned because a queer thought came unbidden and directed your attention aside. Again, under terrific stress, with sick body and aching nerves, you go on and do your stint almost mechanically. You do not know where the strength or the skill is derived. ...
— Applied Psychology for Nurses • Mary F. Porter
... balmy power replies), Great Saturn's heir, and empress of the skies! O'er other gods I spread my easy chain; The sire of all, old Ocean, owns my reign. And his hush'd waves lie silent on the main. But how, unbidden, shall I dare to steep Jove's awful temples in the dew of sleep? Long since, too venturous, at thy bold command, On those eternal lids I laid my hand; What time, deserting Ilion's wasted plain, His conquering son, Alcides, plough'd the main. When lo! the ...
— The Iliad of Homer • Homer
... delicate vibrations of appealing harmony rose and fell—it was as if these enchanting sounds were being played or sung for me alone. In a delicious languor I drowsed, as it were, with my eyes open,—losing myself in a labyrinth of happy dreams and fancies which came to me unbidden,— till presently the music died softly away like a retreating wave and ceased altogether. I waited a few minutes—listening breathlessly lest it should begin again and I lose some note of it,—then hearing no more, I softly closed the port-hole ...
— The Life Everlasting: A Reality of Romance • Marie Corelli
... make a merry day of it. He seemed to regain all his care-free temper, but Bertha remained uneasy and at times abnormally distraught. She spoke with effort and listened badly, so busily was she wrought upon by unbidden thoughts. The question of her lover's disloyalty to Alice Heath, strange to say, had not hitherto troubled her—so selfishly, so childishly had her own relationship to him filled her mind. She now saw that Alice Heath was as deeply ...
— Money Magic - A Novel • Hamlin Garland
... velvet cap which came down over his shaggy brows. Before him stood his four well-grown, sturdy, ruddy-faced boys, awaiting his pleasure with seemly reverence, for none of them would have dared to be seated unbidden in the presence of their father. Aymon de Bayard turned to his eldest son, a big, strongly-built youth of eighteen, and asked him what career in life he would like to follow. Georges, who knew that he was heir to the domain and that he would probably not have ...
— Bayard: The Good Knight Without Fear And Without Reproach • Christopher Hare
... midst of the good time, while the fun waxed furious, the door of the hovel opened and there stood in the opening the tall, slim figure of Crow Wing. As he had come unbidden to the stump burning, so he came now unexpectedly to this frolic. The white children welcomed him boisterously, for his people had moved away from the Walloomscoik and for months he had not been seen near Bennington. But Crow Wing had evidently not come to join in the merrymaking. His face ...
— With Ethan Allen at Ticonderoga • W. Bert Foster
... tame and bloodless. In many long talks, tramping and camping, they had discussed nearly every subject under the sun; and she knew that his wrath blazed sometimes at the evils and wrongs of the world. Once she had gone unbidden to the court-house to hear him speak in a criminal case, where he had volunteered to defend an Italian railroad laborer who had been attacked by a gang of local toughs and in the ensuing fight had stabbed one of his assailants. Kirkwood was ...
— Otherwise Phyllis • Meredith Nicholson
... that you were so little edified by Johnson's Journal. It is even more ridiculous than was poor Rutty's of flatulent memory. The portion of it given us in this day's paper contains not one sentiment worth one farthing, except the last, in which he resolves to bind himself with no more unbidden obligations. Poor man! one would think that to pray for his dead wife and to pinch himself with Church fasts had been almost the whole ...
— In the Name of the Bodleian and Other Essays • Augustine Birrell
... dearly was it bought, Thus long defended and severely fought. Now pale-fac'd death sits brooding o'er the strand, And views the carnage of his ruthless hand. But why my heart this deep unbidden sigh, Why steals the tear, soft trickling from the eye? Is FREEDOM master'd by our late defeat, Or HONOUR wounded by a brave retreat? 'Tis nature dictates; and in pride's despite, I mourn my brethren slaughter'd in the fight. ...
— The Battle of Bunkers-Hill • Hugh Henry Brackenridge
... battered old hamper, in which I carry my different character make-ups, stands in my dressing room. It was John's favorite seat. Every time I look at it I have a vision of a tiny wide-eyed boy perched on the lid, watching me make ready for the stage. A lump rises, unbidden, ...
— A Minstrel In France • Harry Lauder
... eldest little sister, sir," said Fortune; "she came down here this morning quite unbidden, and she told the little one that she was her mother, and the little one smiled and ...
— A Little Mother to the Others • L. T. Meade
... impressions, unbidden, unwelcome, flooded through the eye-gate of my soul, and a thousand harsh sounds and noises came to me through my ears and echoed within me. I became aware of confused influences of all kinds striving to find some habitation in the temple of ...
— A Tramp's Sketches • Stephen Graham
... progress and industry is beneficial to birds, and promotes their comfort and multiplication, never saw the robin and the purple grakle following the plough on a summer's morning. The ploughman is not more punctually afield than his unbidden but welcome feathered attendants. They are ahead of him, perched patiently in the trees that dot fence or hedgerow. They see the team afar off, and as the gate rattles in opening for its admission the glad tidings is sent down the line in whistle or chirrup, the ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 22, August, 1878 • Various
... his righteous wrath and spoke mighty truths clothed in simple words, and as he talked the tears unbidden rolled down the Major- General's face ...
— The War Romance of the Salvation Army • Evangeline Booth and Grace Livingston Hill
... closed in death ere they beheld the horrors of those scenes to which with viewless and rapid strides we seem to hasten. Well, fellow citizens, may our hearts be wrung with sorrow on this occasion, in looking back to what we were, and forward to what we may soon be. Well may the tears unbidden start, for they are the tears that patriots shed over the departing greatness of our once united, but now ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 3 No 2, February 1863 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... Effingham folded her to his heart, the unbidden tears falling from both their eyes—"I am ...
— Home as Found • James Fenimore Cooper
... Julie's tones and involuntary gestures, that Lord Grenville stood thrilled with admiration of her. The mere shadow of a crime had been dispelled from that clear conscience. The religious sentiment enthroned on the fair forehead could not but drive away the evil thoughts that arise unbidden, engendered by our imperfect nature, thoughts which make us aware of the grandeur and the perils of ...
— A Woman of Thirty • Honore de Balzac
... to suppress my griefs I've tried, And kept within its banks the swelling tide! But all in vain: unbidden numbers flow; Spite of myself my sorrows vocal grow. This be my plea.—Nor thou, dear Shade, refuse The well-meant tribute of the willing muse, Who trembles at the greatness of its theme, And fain would say what ...
— The Poetical Works of Beattie, Blair, and Falconer - With Lives, Critical Dissertations, and Explanatory Notes • Rev. George Gilfillan [Ed.]
... imagination, got my life back into my own hands, and not merely finished the three remaining acts of the Ideal Husband, but conceived and had almost completed two other plays of a completely different type, the Florentine Tragedy and La Sainte Courtesane, when suddenly, unbidden, unwelcome, and under circumstances fatal to my happiness, you returned. The two works left then imperfect I was unable to take up again. The mood that created them I could never recover. You now, having yourself published a volume of verse, ...
— Oscar Wilde, Volume 2 (of 2) - His Life and Confessions • Frank Harris
... force of his cunning and his intelligence and who now travelled to the Austrian capital to save for his country whatever could be saved from the Napoleonic ruin. Like the gay young man of the limerick, who never knew when he was slighted, this unbidden guest came to the party and ate just as heartily as if he had been really invited. Indeed, before long, he was sitting at the head of the table entertaining everybody with his amusing stories and gaining the company's good will by the charm of ...
— The Story of Mankind • Hendrik van Loon
... his manly countenance. For one brief instant he thinks of all he leaves behind him; his dear home rises before his eyes, the voices of his loved ones thrill in his ear, and his bronzed hand is raised to dash away the tear that starts unbidden. But there must be no weakness. Rovers have their feelings, but they must subdue them when two hundred yards have to be traversed over waves that are nearly two inches high. The Rover steps into his ...
— Side Lights • James Runciman
... yet as she sat there it came over Dolly's mind, as things will, quite unbidden; it came over her to think how life would go on here, in Italy, with Christina, after she was gone. When the lovely Italian chapter of her own life was closed up and ended, when she would be far away out of sight of Vesuvius, in the fogs of London, the sun of Naples would ...
— The End of a Coil • Susan Warner
... not seem to be taking advantage of my grandfather's helpless state to return now, after he had forbidden me to enter his house? I think it would. And the more I reflect upon the subject, the surer I feel that I ought not to enter Rockhold unbidden. And—I will not." ...
— For Woman's Love • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... applicable or not in the generality of cases, it was certainly so in that of the unbidden guest whose appearance we have attempted to describe. Unlike Elwood, he had character, but all those who closely noted him were made to feel that his character was a dark ...
— Gaut Gurley • D. P. Thompson
... Virgin, absolve me of the sin—if sin it be to rush unbidden to the presence of my Judge! My burden is too ...
— The Three Brides, Love in a Cottage, and Other Tales • Francis A. Durivage
... two men were standing; Marcion, with disdainful eyes and sneering lips, taunting the unbidden guest to depart; John silent, quiet, patient, while the wondering slaves looked on in dismay. He lifted his searching gaze to the haggard ...
— The Lost Word - A Christmas Legend of Long Ago • Henry Van Dyke
... strong attachment for some young sailor, his shipmate; an attachment so devoted, as to be wholly inexplicable, unless originating in that heart-loneliness which overtakes most seamen as they grow aged; impelling them to fasten upon some chance object of regard. But however it was, my Viking, thy unbidden affection was the noblest homage ever paid me. And frankly, I am more inclined to think well of myself, as in some way deserving thy devotion, than from the rounded compliments ...
— Mardi: and A Voyage Thither, Vol. I (of 2) • Herman Melville
... mind, which passively Now renders and receives fast influencings, Holding an unremitting interchange With the clear universe of things around; 40 One legion of wild thoughts, whose wandering wings Now float above thy darkness, and now rest Where that or thou art no unbidden guest, In the still cave of the witch Poesy, Seeking among the shadows that pass by 45 Ghosts of all things that are, some shade of thee, Some phantom, some faint image; till the breast From which they fled ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley Volume I • Percy Bysshe Shelley
... trimming the little black silk bonnet I have spoken about. When it was finished she put it on, and looked at us for approbation—admiration she despised. I was full of sorrow, but, by one of those whimsical thoughts which come unbidden into our heads, in times of deepest grief, I no sooner saw the bonnet than I was reminded of a helmet; and in that hybrid bonnet, half helmet, half jockey-cap, did Miss Jenkyns attend Captain Brown's funeral, and, I believe, supported ...
— Cranford • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... few penguins were also shot, mostly Adelie penguins; these are extraordinarily amusing, and as inquisitive as an animal can be. When any of them saw us, they at once came nearer to get a better view of the unbidden guests. If they became too impertinent, we did not hesitate to take them, for their flesh, especially the liver, was excellent. The albatrosses, which had followed us through the whole of the west wind belt, had now departed, and in their place came the ...
— The South Pole, Volumes 1 and 2 • Roald Amundsen
... Richard Hobson crept along the corridor and tapped for admittance. There was no answer, and cautiously pushing open the door, he entered unbidden, but started back in horror at the sight which met his eyes. The electric lights had not been turned on, but a few tall wax tapers, in a pair of candelabra upon the mantel, were burning, and in the dim, weird light, Mrs. LaGrange, still elegantly attired for her interview ...
— That Mainwaring Affair • Maynard Barbour
... to get some writing paper on the Hamburg, and industriously set to work to caricature everybody on board. Thus, he often bestowed his company unbidden upon Frederick and Ingigerd, who had no need of anybody else in the world. That ...
— Atlantis • Gerhart Hauptmann
... dense woods are very tall and slender. I frequently pluck from these trees a perfectly mild and tamed fruit. As Palladius says, "Et injussu consternitur ubere mali": And the ground is strewn with the fruit of an unbidden apple-tree. ...
— Excursions • Henry D. Thoreau |
