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More "Disaster" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... its profound reaction, too. Market Street and the Valley, each in its own way, felt the dreaded turmoil coming, knew what commercial disaster the struggle meant, but Market Street was timid and powerless and panic-stricken. Yet life went on. In the Valley there were births and deaths and marriages, and on the hill in Harvey, Mrs. Bedelia ...
— In the Heart of a Fool • William Allen White
... swarthy cheeks had fallen in, and her eyes shone wildly from sunken, darkened sockets. Her frightened glances were continually turned upon Sadie. There is surely some wrecker angel which can only gather her best treasures in moments of disaster. For here were all these worldlings going to their doom, and already frivolity and selfishness had passed away from them, and each was thinking and grieving only for the other. Sadie thought of her aunt, her aunt thought ...
— The Tragedy of The Korosko • Arthur Conan Doyle
... signal failure of Italian opera at the Metropolitan Opera House during the first season of its existence. As Mr. Abbey lost over a quarter of a million dollars by this disaster, no other manager could be found willing to take his place and risk another fortune. Since Mr. Abbey's company included several of the most popular artists—Nilsson, Sembrich, Scalchi, Campanini, Del Puente, etc., and his repertory embraced ...
— Chopin and Other Musical Essays • Henry T. Finck
... the city from the hotel in a depressed frame of mind,—not so much crushed by approaching disaster as numbed. She had something of the famous "artistic temperament," which is fervid and buoyant in creation, but apt to lose interest and become cold when the gauzy fabric of fancy's weaving fails to work ...
— One Woman's Life • Robert Herrick
... and "lucky" run, in which not a hand could be spared to carry the news home, for these fishermen learn to look almost with contempt upon death and disaster. Many a poor fellow with a broken limb must go days, even weeks, before he can reach a physician; and the friends on shore are left as long ...
— Sara, a Princess • Fannie E. Newberry
... worry and a trace of panic. He hesitantly reached out to touch the immobile figure of Sam Atkins, who sat with closed eyes and imperceptible breath. Fenwick sensed disaster. He arrested the motion ...
— The Great Gray Plague • Raymond F. Jones
... be some men who were not dexterous on horseback, and some unsound horses, and that it seemed a mistake to pick out fifteen of the best; for, if Atahualpa should attack them, their numbers were insufficient for defence, and any reverse might lead to a great disaster. He therefore ordered me to follow with other twenty horsemen, and to act according ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 9 • Various
... firing had ceased. Suddenly through the air rang the shrill whistle of an engine, and at the sound every one gave a sigh of relief. It was the armoured train, and all was well. Another whistle, and round a sharp curve steamed the engine—but, alas! without the trucks. It was evident that a disaster had occurred, although particulars were not received until late in the afternoon; while it was weeks later before the list of casualties could be ascertained. Luckily this mishap occurred when the situation had in other respects improved. The Army ...
— The Second Battalion Royal Dublin Fusiliers in the South African War - With a Description of the Operations in the Aden Hinterland • Cecil Francis Romer and Arthur Edward Mainwaring
... to Malacca was marked by disaster. A junk, which now was bought to replace the Indian vessel, was wrecked, and the crew, who had taken refuge on a small island, was attacked by pirates. The pirates, however, were worsted and their craft was captured. Serrao, who had been in command of the junk, sailed in the pirate vessel ...
— Essays on early ornithology and kindred subjects • James R. McClymont
... section at the rear of Brandeis' Bazaar. He and Sadie and Aloysius were winding up toy bears, and clowns, and engines, and carriages, and sending them madly racing across the floor. Sometimes their careening career was threatened with disaster in the form of a clump of brooms or a stack of galvanized pails. But Schabelitz would scramble forward with a shout and rescue them just before the crash came, and set them deftly off again in the ...
— Fanny Herself • Edna Ferber
... been expected with great impatience by his family the day he departed with the stranger; but now he was quite given over, and it was no longer doubted but some disaster had befallen him. His wife, children, and servants, were in the greatest alarm, and lamenting him. When he arrived, their joy was excessive; yet they were troubled to see that he was so much altered in the short interval, that he was hardly to ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments vol. 2 • Anon.
... he's used to them about. No, he's had an accident, I think." Peter's eyes were anxious and his voice told of a fear of some real disaster. ...
— The Come Back • Carolyn Wells
... is a tale of disaster which has few parallels in history. A perilous passage over Lake Ontario in a ten-ton vessel brought them to Niagara. Above the falls they built The Griffin, a schooner of forty-five tons, to carry the necessities of the Mississippi settlement westward by way of the Great Lakes. This ...
— Old Quebec - The Fortress of New France • Sir Gilbert Parker and Claude Glennon Bryan
... long time, poor things, you were to tarry; Your oracle is silent; none can tell On whom his astrologic mantle fell; For he, when sick, refused the doctor's aid, And only to his pills devotion paid, Yet it was surely a most sad disaster, The saucy pills at last should kill ...
— History of English Humour, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange
... very interested, each after his own manner, in the comradeship of the featherhood he imagined to be uttering distressful cries. A few, like the chickadees, quivered their wings, opened their little mouths, fluttered down tiny but aggressive against the disaster. Others hopped here and there restlessly, uttering plaintive, low-toned cheeps. The shyest contented themselves by a discreet, silent, and distant sympathy. Three or four freebooting Jays, attracted not so much ...
— The Riverman • Stewart Edward White
... very forefront of Gaulish history marked by a great disaster. There, on a little height at the junction of the Yevre and the Auron, the gallant Bituriges had their capital, Avaricum. In six campaigns Caesar had, as he believed, broken the neck of all resistance, and Gaul was under the iron heel of Rome. "My aunt Julia," said Caesar, "is, maternally, ...
— In Troubadour-Land - A Ramble in Provence and Languedoc • S. Baring-Gould
... Southern infantry, outflanked and roughly handled, was falling back in confusion upon the town; and although Lee had assembled a group of batteries in the centre, and regiments were hurrying from the left, disaster seemed imminent. But strong assistance was at hand. A.P. Hill, who had forded the Potomac and crossed the Antietam by the lower bridge, after a forced march of seventeen miles in eight hours from Harper's Ferry,* ...
— Stonewall Jackson And The American Civil War • G. F. R. Henderson
... await the morning, rejoicing no less than Balak's messengers at God's consent to his journey to Balak, and still hoping that he might succeed in bringing disaster upon Israel. In his haste to set out, he himself saddled his ass although he did not lack servants, whereupon God said: "O thou villain, their ancestor Abraham forestalled thee, for he too rose up early in the morning and in person saddled his ass to lead Isaac to ...
— THE LEGENDS OF THE JEWS VOLUME III BIBLE TIMES AND CHARACTERS - FROM THE EXODUS TO THE DEATH OF MOSES • BY LOUIS GINZBERG
... this head; the people of the Islands, whether civilized or uncivilized, have not yet gone far enough to proceed alone. To drop the work now, nay, to lessen it, would merely be inviting a return to former evil conditions. No greater disaster could befall these highlanders to-day than a change entailing a diminution of the interest and sympathy felt for them at the seat of government. It is best to be plain about this matter: the Filipinos of the lowlands dislike ...
— The Head Hunters of Northern Luzon From Ifugao to Kalinga • Cornelis De Witt Willcox
... The disaster which swept over all Ireland through the final success of the treachery of Crowe raged soon after in Ballybay. The town had been reduced by successive misfortunes to a condition so abject that one calamity was sufficient ...
— Donahoe's Magazine, Volume 15, No. 1, January 1886 • Various
... has befallen us as a nation. He proceeds to warn us that if the desire for legislative innovation be allowed to grow upon us at its present pace—pace assumed to be very headlong indeed—the chances are that our luck will not last. We shall have a disaster like Sedan, or the loss of Alsace Lorraine (p. 151). This is a curiously narrow reading of contemporary history. Did Austria lose Sadowa, or was the French Empire ruined at Sedan, in consequence of ...
— Studies in Literature • John Morley
... wine each on Sunday, and on Sunday only, the very day when we want to have all our faculties awake; and some do literally go to sleep during the sermon, and look rather silly when they wake. I, however, have not fallen into this disaster. ...
— Life and Letters of Lord Macaulay • George Otto Trevelyan
... helm. The look-out shouted a warning, and I raised my arm in calm acknowledgement. A cry came from the lighter, and I remember I was just thinking 'What the dickens'll happen to her?' when the end came; a euthanasia so mild and gradual (for the sands are fringed with mud) that the disaster was on us before I was aware of it. There was just the tiniest premonitory shuddering as our keel clove the buttery medium, a cascade of ripples from either beam, and the wheel jammed to rigidity in my hands, as the tug nestled up to ...
— Riddle of the Sands • Erskine Childers
... change content thee?—Death, whither hath he taken thee? To a world, do I think, that rights the disaster of this? ...
— Poems of To-Day: an Anthology • Various
... when put to the test, survive a change of fortune, as a Roman arch survives the luxury of departed empire. Only his collar, large V-shaped front, and wristbands, which bore the ineffaceable signs of cheap laundering, reflected the shadow of impending disaster. ...
— The Old Wives' Tale • Arnold Bennett
... force; secondly, the extreme deficiency of men in the English fleet; and thirdly, the cowardice or disaffection of several of Blake's captains at a critical moment in the battle. Notwithstanding this disaster, not a whisper was heard against the admiral either in the Council of State or in the city; his offer to resign was flatteringly rejected; and he soon found, that the 'misfortune which might have ruined another man, had given him strength and influence ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 439 - Volume 17, New Series, May 29, 1852 • Various
... sit there and ask that question without choking? Ever since that two-legged disaster was hired to sweep up, everybody in the psycho-research division has suffered from one accident after another; even you haven't remained unscathed. Why within the month he arrived we lost the plaque we had won two years running for our unmarred safety ...
— I Was a Teen-Age Secret Weapon • Richard Sabia
... course every one knew of my disaster and what came of it; but that a young girl should taunt me with it, and for no reason, seemed incredible. No one ever spoke of it to me, not even Mistress Ferguson, whose daily food was. the saying of things no one else dared to say. I rode on ...
— Hugh Wynne, Free Quaker • S. Weir Mitchell
... the disaster, above the huge pile of dead and dying, above all this unfortunate heroism, appears disgrace. ...
— The History of a Crime - The Testimony of an Eye-Witness • Victor Hugo
... not stop there, he did not expect Starratt to take his word for anything. He reached for a pencil and pad and he went into a mathematic demonstration to show just how near the edge of financial disaster the firm of Ford, Wetherbee & Co. had been pushed. Starratt could not doubt the figures, and yet his eyes traveled instinctively to the bag of golf sticks in a convenient corner. Somehow, nothing in either Ford's argument or his sleek presence irritated Starratt so much as these ...
— Broken to the Plow • Charles Caldwell Dobie
... keep ourselves always in possession of a stated sum of money to commence a field of disaster—this sum to be independent even of the closed doors of a bank which might prevent leaving for a field on ...
— A Story of the Red Cross - Glimpses of Field Work • Clara Barton
... life shall dwindle to their essential insignificance before those of the gentle life, we shall all see in Charles Eliot Norton the eminent scholar who left the quiet of his books to become our chief citizen at the moment when he warned his countrymen of the ignominy and disaster of ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... myself from the disaster of beliefs through these magical books, and am free once more as in my early childhood to indulge myself in the iridescent idea of ...
— Adventures in the Arts - Informal Chapters on Painters, Vaudeville, and Poets • Marsden Hartley
... glory and my guide! Fair source of mental peace, whate'er betide! 230 Safe in thy shelter, let disaster roll Eternal hurricanes around my soul: My soul serene amidst the storms shall reign, And smile to see ...
— Poetical Works of Johnson, Parnell, Gray, and Smollett - With Memoirs, Critical Dissertations, and Explanatory Notes • Samuel Johnson, Thomas Parnell, Thomas Gray, and Tobias Smollett
... smack, laden with oranges, stranded on the sands near by. In these shallow waters only a flat-bottomed lifeboat of a simplified type can be kept, and to launch it during such a storm was to face an almost certain disaster. And yet the men went out, fought for hours against the wind, and the boat capsized twice. One man was drowned, the others were cast ashore. One of these last, a refined coastguard, was found next ...
— Mutual Aid • P. Kropotkin
... and the preservation of their constitutional rights. There was diversity of opinion with regard to the merits of the measures referred to, but the disagreement no longer followed the usual lines of party division. They who saw in those measures the forerunner of disaster to the South had no settled policy beyond a convention, the object of which should be to devise new and more effectual guarantees against the perils of usurpation. They were unjustly charged with a desire to destroy the Union—a ...
— The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government • Jefferson Davis
... disaster that ever befell the race of Diarmid, as the Campbells were called in the Highlands; it being generally remarked that they were as fortunate in the issue of their undertakings, as they were sagacious in planning, and courageous ...
— A Legend of Montrose • Sir Walter Scott
... of course, denied it all, and a ruthless reconstruction of the tricks took place. The Major, still busy with red-currant fool, was the last to grasp the disaster, and then instantly deplored the unsportsmanlike ...
— Miss Mapp • Edward Frederic Benson
... answered. "You see, there was a great disaster once, which was blamed on me, and in order to atone for it, I promised to send a kinsman redeemer before anything so devastating happened again, and I believe you ...
— The Revolutions of Time • Jonathan Dunn
... agitation. I have analyzed some of the provisions of the present Bill, which independent writers consider to be hopelessly unworkable; and lastly I have stated why in my opinion Home Rule in any form must be fraught with disaster not only to Ireland but also to ...
— Is Ulster Right? • Anonymous
... is thus pleasantly told by Waterton: "The cormorant was once a wool merchant. He entered into partnership with the Bramble and the bat, and they freighted a large ship with wool; she was wrecked, and the firm became bankrupt. Since that disaster the bat skulks about till midnight to avoid his creditors, the cormorant is for ever diving into the deep to discover its foundered vessel, while the Bramble seizes hold of every passing sheep to make up his loss ...
— The plant-lore & garden-craft of Shakespeare • Henry Nicholson Ellacombe
... give an idea of the great difficulties the soldiers had to face, and examples of their heroic behavior under trying circumstances, let us relate the disaster of Vop. ...
— Napoleon's Campaign in Russia Anno 1812 • Achilles Rose
... the snapping asunder of the thick masses of foliage that the creepers have woven amongst the branches. The turmoil is indescribable. Reptiles, birds, squirrels, insects frightened at the unexpected disaster are moving wildly about in search of shelter, filling the air with ...
— My Friends the Savages - Notes and Observations of a Perak settler (Malay Peninsula) • Giovanni Battista Cerruti
... one word, from me, the right moment, would have checked him on the dangerous path! When I saw 'Sanctuary,' why had I not the courage to tell him what I thought? No, I became the accomplice of his suicide, and I, alone, am the cause of this wretched disaster.—Before long he will be rich. Can you imagine N. F. rich? I ...
— Will Warburton • George Gissing
... Nor has the strain died out, as is demonstrated in the present generation by many of Dr. Grenfell's cousins, among them General Francis Wallace Grenfell, Lord Kilvey, and by Dr. Grenfell himself on the Labrador in the fight against disease and disaster and distress along a stormy and ...
— Adrift on an Ice-Pan • Wilfred T. Grenfell
... for Somers, here," he ordered. "There's been a great disaster. Let no one speak to him." And then the young vice-president went out to meet ...
— The Midnight Passenger • Richard Henry Savage
... upon Fischelowitz had laid a curse upon it, whereby it was destined to breed dissension and strife wherever it remained and to the direct injury of whomsoever chanced to possess it for the time being. It had been the cause of serious disaster to the porter in the first instance, it had next represented to Fischelowitz a dead loss in money of fifty marks, it had become a thorn in the side to Akulina, it had led to one of the most violent quarrels she had ever engaged ...
— A Cigarette-Maker's Romance • F. Marion Crawford
... time of the transportation of Aladdin's palace, the princess's father had been inconsolable for the loss of her. He could take no rest, and instead of avoiding what might continue his affliction he indulged it without restraint. Before the disaster he used to go every morning into his closet to please himself with viewing the palace; he went now many times in the day to renew his tears, and plunge himself into the deepest melancholy, by the idea of no more seeing that which once gave him so much pleasure, ...
— Types of Children's Literature • Edited by Walter Barnes
... uncertain rumours, which gave an account of the arrival of three or four canoes at some islands a long way to-leeward, with a handful of half-starved warriors on board. It is supposed that all the rest perished at sea. This disaster had rendered Waally unpopular among the friends of those who were lost; and that unpopularity was heightened by the want of success in the expedition itself. Success is all in all, with the common mind; and we daily see the vulgar shouting at the heels of those whom they are ready to crucify at ...
— The Crater • James Fenimore Cooper
... should migrate from the Princess's to the Lyceum and appear there three times a week as Othello with the Lyceum company and its manager to support him, I cannot be sure that Booth's pride was not more hurt by this magnificent hospitality than it ever could have been by disaster. It is always more difficult to receive ...
— The Story of My Life - Recollections and Reflections • Ellen Terry
... the executions had been almost exclusively of a political character. The Girondins were fighting their last upon the bloody arena of the Revolution. One by one they fell still fighting, still preaching moderation, still foretelling disaster and appealing to that people, whom they had roused from one slavery, in order to throw it headlong under a tyrannical yoke more brutish, more absolute ...
— I Will Repay • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... that they are unable to put in the six harps of old or the four drums with which Meyerbeer got such surprising effects in Robert and Le Prophete. I believe, however, that recent improvements have averted this disaster in a certain measure, and that there is now a place for the drums. But we shall never hear the six ...
— Musical Memories • Camille Saint-Saens
... it was a fight not to be won. The spring of 1882 saw his resignation—on May 2d—followed on May 6th by the Phoenix Park murders and the long and gradual disintegration of the powerful Ministry of 1880, culminating in the Home Rule disaster of 1886. Mr. Churchill in the Life of his father, Lord Randolph, says of Mr. Forster's resignation, "he passed out of the Ministry to become during the rest of Parliament one of its most dangerous and vigilant opponents." The physical change, ...
— A Writer's Recollections (In Two Volumes), Volume I • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... victory of Charlemagne won? Near the sources of the Lippe, just where, more than seven centuries before, the German Arminius (Herman) had destroyed the legions of Varus, and whither Germanicus had come to avenge the disaster of Varus. This ground belonged to Saxon territory; and this idol, called Irminsul, which was thrown down by Charlemagne, was probably a monument raised in honor of Arminius (Hermann-Seule, or Herman's pillar), whose name it called to mind. The patriotic and hereditary pride of the ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 4 • Various
... we were prisoners for nearly a week. It was not quite cholera but close enough to it to scare us all to death. Both Eve and the apple were young and green, and the combination worked disaster. When the doctor arrived, he shipped Eve off to the inspection hospital, while we were locked up, guarded by five small policemen, and hardly allowed to open our mouths for fear we would swallow a germ. We were fumigated ...
— Lady of the Decoration • Frances Little
... Italy, Marcellus was sent with an army to Sicily: but when the disaster at Cannae took place, where many thousand Romans perished, and only a few fugitives collected at Canusium, it was expected that Hannibal would at once march to attack Rome, as he had cut off the greater part of the army. Marcellus at once sent ...
— Plutarch's Lives, Volume II • Aubrey Stewart & George Long
... got on shore with much difficulty. On this occasion he tied a quantity of rich jewels, which he used to wear like other great lords for no use, in a handkerchief round his arm, but they were all lost. On account of this disaster to the fleet, the council of war was of opinion that the siege ought to be immediately raised. The marquis was not called to this council; but it has been said that, if present, he would have declared for continuing ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. IV. • Robert Kerr
... not to last long. An event had happened immediately after his release from prison which could not but influence his fate. This was the burning of Rome—an appalling disaster, the glare of which even at this distance makes the heart shudder. It was probably a mad freak of the malicious monster who then wore the imperial purple. But Nero saw fit to attribute it to the Christians, and instantly the most atrocious persecution broke out against ...
— The Life of St. Paul • James Stalker
... it was raging here. For the last fortnight they have been leaving in crowds from the West End, and many of the citizens are also beginning to move. They frighten themselves like a parcel of children. The comet seemed to many a sign of great disaster." ...
— When London Burned • G. A. Henty
... and stood peering gloomily into the dark waters, that reflected the exact shade of his own mind. Appreciating better than his youthful companions the full extent of the disaster that had befallen them, he could not, for the time being, summon up his usual fortitude or see any hopeful prospect. Now that the spies knew that they were discovered, he felt sure that they would never risk the sending of another wireless ...
— The Secret Wireless - or, The Spy Hunt of the Camp Brady Patrol • Lewis E. Theiss
... balloon was wanted for the fete at Versailles. The king had demanded an ascent for the 19th, a week after the disaster at the Faubourg St. Antoine. Already the possibility of a man going up with the balloon was discussed, and people indulged in visions of splendid aerial trips; but the king would not hear of the proposal. Balloons were novelties, not offering sufficient security, and he was unwilling that any ...
— Wonderful Balloon Ascents - or, the Conquest of the Skies • Fulgence Marion
... of H. Loudon Dodd held the first rank in our collegiate gazette, and I and Billson (once more thrown upon the world) were competing for the same clerkship. The present object takes the present eye. My disaster, for the moment, was the more conspicuous; and it was I that got the situation. So you see, even in Muskegon Commercial College, there were lessons ...
— The Wrecker • Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne
... that suffering handful who were then in arms near Bothwel: he sent his son who was in the action. He himself hastening forward as soon as possible to their assistance, and not knowing of their disaster, was met near the place by a party of English dragoons who were in quest of the sufferers, and, like another valiant champion of Christ, he refused to surrender or comply with their demand, and so they killed him straight out upon the spot[165]; his son being out of the way, and ...
— Biographia Scoticana (Scots Worthies) • John Howie
... take flight along with bodily ills. We should be trained, too, not to dwell upon anticipated troubles, but to use our minds and bodies in an earnest, honest endeavor to avert threatened disaster. We should not brood over possible failure, for in the great realm of the supremacy of mind or spirit the thought of failure should ...
— Philip Dru: Administrator • Edward Mandell House
... gallant Henri de Navarre. The body was received by Marie de Medici in tears, and the Ducs de Guise and d'Epernon clattered out the courtyard on horseback to spread the false news that the king had suffered no harm. Fearing the results of too precipitate publishing of the disaster no ...
— Royal Palaces and Parks of France • Milburg Francisco Mansfield
... his mind to live in. But his body was in no state to carry him about to make discoveries. He must care for that in the first place. After some inquiries and wandering about, he at last made his way into Bank St. and found an eating-house, very near the scene of his morning's disaster. Winthrop had very few shillings to be extravagant with; he laid down two of them in exchange for a small mutton chop and some bread; and then, somewhat heartened, set out upon his travels again, crossing ...
— Hills of the Shatemuc • Susan Warner
... criminally, remiss as a nation in not preparing ourselves, and if, with the lessons taught the world by the dreadful tragedies of the last twelve months, we continue with soft complacency to stand helpless and naked before the world, we shall excite only contempt and derision if and when disaster ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 5, August, 1915 • Various
... never questioned its complete mastery; but as he pondered over his fall he knew that it was his brain that had ridden him to it. He no longer trusted its workings. It had proved rebel and brought him to disaster. ...
— The Parts Men Play • Arthur Beverley Baxter
... more than fourteen years had elapsed since Antioch was ruined by an earthquake; [6212] but the queen of the East, the new Theopolis, had been raised from the ground by the liberality of Justinian; and the increasing greatness of the buildings and the people already erased the memory of this recent disaster. On one side, the city was defended by the mountain, on the other by the River Orontes; but the most accessible part was commanded by a superior eminence: the proper remedies were rejected, from the despicable fear of discovering ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 4 • Edward Gibbon
... terrible disaster, if a few people go away infected. There are plenty who take the other view—a majority of Greeks, the body and dregs of the people, and the barbarians ...
— Works, V3 • Lucian of Samosata
... to pay a visit to the barn, to watch the preparations for providing for the stock. Even the animals seemed uneasy, as though they sensed some impending disaster. The horses, always nervous, were doubly so, and moved restlessly about, with pricked-up ears, and startled neighs. The ...
— The Moving Picture Girls Snowbound - Or, The Proof on the Film • Laura Lee Hope
... and Don. They pollute the bay of St. Andrews and swell the waters of the Cam, and have somehow crept overland into Birmingham. The stream of german idealism has been diffused over the academical world of Great Britain. The disaster is universal.' ...
— A Pluralistic Universe - Hibbert Lectures at Manchester College on the - Present Situation in Philosophy • William James
... rumour, that had somehow crept to the confines of civilisation. In my saner balanced moments it was possible to disbelieve it, but if you have ever suffered from delirium you will know what raging torments of agony I went through in the nights, how my brain fought and refought that rumoured disaster." ...
— When William Came • Saki
... heart of a big city, with a loss of two hundred and ninety million dollars, and then to have it spring up in a marvellously short time—not only as good as new, but infinitely better; so much better that the disaster proved to be an untold blessing to ...
— Samantha at the World's Fair • Marietta Holley
... to Vienna, on our right, with orders to cross sharply to its left, upon Fairfax Court House, the following (Wednesday) morning. Miles's Division follows the turnpike road to Annandale, and then moves, by the Braddock road,—along which Braddock, a century before, had marched his doomed army to disaster,—upon Fairfax Court House, then known to be held by Bonham's Rebel Brigade of South Carolinians. Hunter follows Miles, to Annandale, and thence advances direct upon Fairfax, by the turnpike road—McDowell's ...
— The Great Conspiracy, Complete • John Alexander Logan
... enchantments." It is plain therefore that Balak did not rely singly upon the eloquence and fervour of Balaam to pour out vituperations upon the people of Israel, but that it was expected that the prophet should use incantations and certain mystical rites, upon which the efficacy of his foretelling disaster to the enemy ...
— Lives of the Necromancers • William Godwin
... lucky star" to describe a person who seems always to be fortunate. But the same metaphor is contained in single words. We speak of an unfortunate enterprise as "ill-starred," and the metaphor is clear. But when the newspapers speak of a railway "disaster," very few people realize that they are speaking the language of the mediaeval astrologers, men who studied the fortunes of nations and individuals from the stars. Disaster literally means such a misfortune as would be caused by adverse ...
— Stories That Words Tell Us • Elizabeth O'Neill
... and I sank down on a chair, half stupefied by this new disaster. It would be necessary to stay where we were until Minima recovered; yet I had no means to pay these people for the trouble we should give them, and the expense we should be to them. Monsieur le Cure had all the appearance of a poor parish ...
— The Doctor's Dilemma • Hesba Stretton
... cry at the disaster that has befallen you in the loss of the book. My brother Charles says the only thing the friend could do on such an occasion was to shoot himself, and wishes to know if he have done so. Such mischance might well quicken one's ...
— The Correspondence of Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson, - 1834-1872, Vol. I • Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson
... in accordance with public ordinances, which, having definite limits set them, are not likely to pass beyond these so as to endanger the commonwealth. For proof of which I am content to rest on this old example of Coriolanus, since all may see what a disaster it would have been for Rome had he been violently put to death by the people. For, as between citizen and citizen, a wrong would have been done affording ground for fear, fear would have sought defence, defence have led to faction, faction ...
— Discourses on the First Decade of Titus Livius • Niccolo Machiavelli
... now he was also eloquent. The lecture was a remarkable effort: you'll find the gist of it in Chapter VII of "The Arrival of the Fittest." Archie sat at my side in a white rage; he was too clever not to measure the extent of the disaster. And I was almost as indignant as he when we went to see Dredge ...
— Tales Of Men And Ghosts • Edith Wharton
... Edmund, had it not been for the bravery shown by the northern men, under the young squire Oswald and his captain, Alwyn. So furiously did the Welsh assail us, in rear, that we should have suffered heavily, indeed, even if we had not met with a grave disaster; had it not been that this band covered our rear, while we charged forward, fighting so stoutly that the spot where they posted themselves was thickly covered with dead. I found time to look round, now and then, for they made but a poor resistance to our ...
— Both Sides the Border - A Tale of Hotspur and Glendower • G. A. Henty
... soon came up thick and rainy with a strong wind. We continued sailing east by south. Calculated the distance 56 miles. We kept a good lookout, for my reckoning upon the one chart was out and differed from the other 32 miles. The Lord protects us from disaster, and will guide us further, as ...
— Journal of Jasper Danckaerts, 1679-1680 • Jasper Danckaerts
... that they do not always know how to manage it, and so it occasionally runs away with them and leaves them struggling in the ditch, from which they emerge sorry sights, or laughable, according to the view of the bystander and the extent of the disaster. And yet, in spite of mishaps, let the truth stand that those who travel fast and go far, go by Love's Parcel-Post, concerning which there is no limit to the size of ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Vol. 13 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Lovers • Elbert Hubbard
... some disaster. The text contains a favourite incident in folklore; the first instance, I believe, being that of Polycrates of Samos according to Herodotus (lib. iii. 41-42). The theory is supported after a fashion by experience amongst all versed in that melancholy wisdom the "knowledge of the ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton
... go to the island next day, but down below Fula, watching the fish playing in the clear water, and the lizards and birds on the rocky high banks; but on my next journey round to the factories I got into another and a worse disaster. I went off there early one morning; and thinking the only trouble lay in getting back up the Ogowe, and having developed a theory that this might be minimised by keeping very close to the island bank, I never gave a thought to dangers attributive to going down river; so, having by ...
— Travels in West Africa • Mary H. Kingsley
... preceding year, the seventh of my life, had been weighted for us with comprehensive disaster. I have not yet mentioned that, at the beginning of my Mother's fatal illness, misfortune came upon her brothers. I have never known the particulars of their ruin, but, I believe in consequence of A.'s unsuccessful speculations, and of the fact that E. had allowed the use of his ...
— Father and Son • Edmund Gosse
... impossibles, men uncontrolled and uncontrollable, of every nation and with every dialect of the civilized world—and of uncivilized worlds also;—the most cosmopolitan of all American towns, the one fullest of the joy of living, the one least fearful of future disaster, "serene, indifferent to fate," thus her own poets have styled her, and on no other city since the world began has fate, unmalicious, mechanical and elemental, wrought such a terrible havoc. In a day this city has vanished; the shock of a mighty earthquake forgotten ...
— Life's Enthusiasms • David Starr Jordan
... thus Llewelyn secured his virtual triumph. Though fear of the progress of the lord of Gwynedd filled every marcher with alarm, yet the dread of the power of Edward was even more nearly present before them. The marcher lords deliberately stood aside, and the result was inevitable disaster. Edward found that the territories handed over to him by his father had to be conquered before they could be administered, and Henry III.'s methods of government made it a hopeless business to find either the men or the ...
— The History of England - From the Accession of Henry III. to the Death of Edward III. (1216-1377) • T.F. Tout
... the wisdom of this selection, for his first war party resulted in disaster. Starting with about eighty warriors on a raid into the Utah country to steal horses, he led his unlucky band into an ambush, and barely twenty of them escaped; their leader ...
— Seven and Nine years Among the Camanches and Apaches - An Autobiography • Edwin Eastman
... its failures, to do as it did, under the impression, apparently, that we must succeed better than it did, following in its footsteps though we know they led to ruin once, and, because the way was pleasant, being surprised to find that it must end again in disaster—it is this abandonment of all hope of finding new and efficacious remedies for the old diseases of society that has checked our progress for hundreds of years, and will keep the world in some respects just as it was at the time of the Crucifixion. For my own part, I cannot see that history does ...
— Ideala • Sarah Grand
... affections, is, after the mind whose authority and direction it is made to obey, man's noblest faculty; but it may, in the event of its contemning reason's dictates, become the source and fountain-head of inordinate lust and an instrument of much moral disaster and ruin. When the intelligence becomes powerless to command and to say what and when and how the affections shall disport themselves, then man becomes a slave to his heart and is led like an ass by the nose hither and thither; and when nature thus runs unrestrained ...
— Explanation of Catholic Morals - A Concise, Reasoned, and Popular Exposition of Catholic Morals • John H. Stapleton
... keeping pace with the wreck. As they ran, these people shouted at one another and gesticulated wildly. Their faces were white, their words were meaningless, for it was a spectacle tense with imminent disaster that they beheld; it turned them ...
— The Winds of Chance • Rex Beach
... the best tea-set and dislocated her own collar-bone; while Julian's hand was severely cut and Curly's right eye was black and blue. Tiny had fortunately escaped without injury, and it was she, therefore, who was sent to Margaret with a modified version of the disaster. ...
— A True Friend - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... one close look at Grim's face, and knew he had made his mind up what to do; but all the men were shouting different advice and it was a question whether he would be able to get control before a disaster happened. I said nothing and did nothing but kept fairly close to him. Narayan Singh found his proper place alongside me, with the halter of Ayisha's camel in his hand; and ...
— The Lion of Petra • Talbot Mundy
... dispiritedly to and fro in the little enclosure, gloomily and obstinately waiting for the disaster that his seaman's sense of impending trouble scented. Hiram Look was frankly and joyously enjoying a scene that revived ...
— The Skipper and the Skipped - Being the Shore Log of Cap'n Aaron Sproul • Holman Day
... movement of the head, not once only, but continually repeated, and at regular intervals, as if she were making a stern and solemn protest against some action that developed itself before her eyes, and were foreboding terrible disaster, if it should be persisted in. Of course, it was nothing more than a paralytic or nervous affection; yet one might fancy that it had its origin in some unspeakable wrong, perpetrated half a lifetime ago in this old gentlewoman's presence, either against herself or somebody whom she loved ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 09, No. 51, January, 1862 • Various
... to run like wildfire through the vast crowd. Everybody repeated them, some with a growing delight, others with a sense of impending disaster to the wild hopes they had been so ardently cherishing; all according to the viewpoint they held. Scranton's register was rising, while Allandale visitors began to feel something was on the verge of happening to crush the budding paean of victory that was ready to bubble ...
— The Chums of Scranton High on the Cinder Path • Donald Ferguson
... now all the advantage of position which had previously been on the side of the Scots, might have defended the bridge, or in good order have given him battle on the other side. The sight, however, of the terrible disaster which had befallen nearly half their number before their eyes, without their being able to render them the slightest assistance, had completely demoralized them, and as soon as the Scotch were seen to be crossing the bridge they fled in terror. A hot pursuit was kept up by the fleet footed ...
— In Freedom's Cause • G. A. Henty
... a big, loosely-made man, an easy going man with a kind heart who would have come to financial disaster long ago only for his ...
— The Ghost Girl • H. De Vere Stacpoole
... assistance. Foy was instantly killed. Stephens was severely wounded, but escaped, to die five days afterward. The survivors returned to the camp of Captain Sublette, bringing tidings of this new disaster. That hardy leader, as soon as he could bear the journey, set out on his return to St. Louis, accompanied by Campbell. As they had a number of pack-horses richly laden with peltries to convoy, they chose a different route through the mountains, out of the way, ...
— The Adventures of Captain Bonneville - Digested From His Journal • Washington Irving
... have been lamed in kindred fashions, the terrible misadventure of Richard Strauss remains deeply affecting. However far the millions of bright spirits who have died a living death have fallen, their fall has been no farther than this man's. There can be no doubt of the completeness of Strauss's disaster. It is a long while since he has been much besides a bore to his once fervent admirers, an object of hatred to thousands of honest, idealistic musicians. He has completely, in his fifty-sixth year, lost the position of leadership, of eminence that once he had. ...
— Musical Portraits - Interpretations of Twenty Modern Composers • Paul Rosenfeld
... executive branch of the Government can intervene, none of the powers with which it is invested will be withheld when their exercise is deemed necessary to maintain our national credit or avert financial disaster. ...
— United States Presidents' Inaugural Speeches - From Washington to George W. Bush • Various
... ambition—an ambition justified by his talent and training. He had come with the expectation of a Congressional career as successful as that already achieved in his editorial life. But he met a defeat which hardly fell short of a disaster. He had made a good reply to Mr. Stevens, had indeed gained much credit by it, and when he returned home for the holidays he had reason to believe that he had made a brilliant beginning in the parliamentary ...
— Twenty Years of Congress, Volume 2 (of 2) • James Gillespie Blaine
... not," said the Countess, "how that disaster befell me.—Margaret, I would have held out that island against the knaves as long as the sea continued to flow around it. Till the shoals which surround it had become safe anchorage—till its precipices had melted ...
— Peveril of the Peak • Sir Walter Scott
... often at the last instant the cup is dashed from the lips! This joyful chance was destined to change suddenly to unexpected and grotesque disaster—disaster so strange and so complete that through all his life Nigel flushed crimson when he thought of it. He was busily stripping his hunting-costume, and with feverish haste he had doffed boots, hat, hose, doublet and cloak, so that nothing remained save a pink jupon and pair of silken ...
— Sir Nigel • Arthur Conan Doyle
... should at all times be prepared to render to them. You have done nobly. I congratulate you upon your success; and I thank you for the zeal with which you have discharged your several duties. Nothing so much as the dependence of one seaman upon another, in the hour of shipwreck and disaster, unites the seamen of all nations in one fraternity. Young gentlemen, you have done something for your ship, and something for your country; for every true American feels proud and happy when he learns ...
— Dikes and Ditches - Young America in Holland and Belguim • Oliver Optic
... outbreaks of the Mattmark See that have from time to time devastated the valley of Saas. {196} It is probable that the chapels were decided upon in consequence of some grace shown by the miraculous picture of the Virgin, which had mitigated a disaster occurring so soon after the anniversary of her own Nativity. Tabachetti, arriving at this juncture, may have offered to undertake them if the Saas people would give him an asylum. Here, at any rate, I suppose him to have stayed till some time in 1590, probably the second half of it; his design of ...
— The Humour of Homer and Other Essays • Samuel Butler
... it, he should emerge from disaster, he should ascend again into the sunlight, he should let the bitter water drip from his garments and his hair, he was saved, he ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... will discover in us. You have no doubt read that incident of the sergeant who, in a moment of panic, fled, was placed under arrest and sentenced to be shot. Before the sentence was ratified by the Commander-in-Chief, there came a moment of extreme peril to the line, when irretrievable disaster was imminent and every man who could fill a gap was needed. The condemned man was called out to face the enemy, and, even in the midst of brave men, fought with a bravery that singled him out for the Victoria Cross. Tell me—which ...
— Pebbles on the Shore • Alpha of the Plough (Alfred George Gardiner)
... foreign to Gillmore's whole habits and temperament, and he never could galvanize himself into caring for it. His strong point, after all, was in dealing with metal rather than with men, white or black. And as (since the disaster at Olustee) he can hardly be charged with any squeamish unwillingness to throw upon others the chief responsibility of any seeming failures of his own, it is perhaps fortunate that in this book he is able to keep chiefly upon the ground where he ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 91, May, 1865 • Various
... who now give up the harvest for lost. Formerly the unskilful mechanician who was responsible for the failure would have been clapped into gaol; but nowadays he is thought sufficiently punished by the storm of public indignation and the loss of his pay. The disaster is announced by placards posted about the streets in the evening; and next morning the newspapers are ...
— Balder The Beautiful, Vol. I. • Sir James George Frazer
... Triple Alliance, Italy, was brought into trouble by the policy of extravagant expansion, pursued especially under the leadership of Crispi. But the disastrous defeat by the Abyssinians at Adowa, in 1896, gave pause to the plans of such statesmen. Spain also suffered disaster in this period, first through the outbreak of revolt in Cuba, and then through the loss of the remnant of her once splendid colonial empire in consequence of the war with ...
— Outline of Universal History • George Park Fisher
... investment in other sectors will remain poor, however, because of the small size of the economy, its technological backwardness, its remoteness, its landlocked geographic location, and its susceptibility to natural disaster. The international community's role of funding more than 60% of Nepal's development budget and more than 28% of total budgetary expenditures will likely continue as a major ingredient ...
— The 2003 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency
... good lady, pray let me know who you are, and what has brought you to this desolate city? In requital I will tell you who I am, what happened to me, why the inhabitants of this city are reduced to the state you see them in, and why I alone am safe and sound in the midst of such a terrible disaster. I told him in few words from whence I came, what made me undertake the voyage, and how I safely arrived at this port, after twenty days sailing; and when I had done, prayed him to perform his promise, and told him how much I was struck by the frightful desolation which I had seen in all places ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Volume 1 • Anonymous
... c. 13, sect. 5. "But the Egyptian false prophet brought a yet heavier disaster upon the Jews; for this impostor, coming into the country, and gaining the reputation of a prophet, gathered together thirty thousand men, who were deceived by him. Having brought them round out of the wilderness, ...
— Evidences of Christianity • William Paley
... folly; to misuse it, disaster. For it is safe to utilize this god-energy only in its own proper sphere. Enthusiasm moves the human vessel. To let it move the rudder, too, is criminal negligence. Brahms once made a remark somewhat to this effect: The reason why there is so much bad music in the world is ...
— The Joyful Heart • Robert Haven Schauffler
... determined character, triumphed; and the outbreak at Birmingham was the first consequence of those reckless councils that were destined in the course of the ensuing years to inflict on the working classes of this country so much suffering and disaster. ...
— Sybil - or the Two Nations • Benjamin Disraeli
... was most urgent in his protests against so suicidal a policy), would instantly have relaxed the sinews of war.[473] A petty act of treachery served to open his eyes, and to prevent the Protestants from involving themselves in more serious disaster; for the Count de Brissac took advantage of a three days' armistice to fall unexpectedly upon an outpost of the prince's army and gain an advantage, which was duly magnified by report at Paris into a brilliant victory.[474] Unabashed by this incident, Catharine soon after renewed ...
— History of the Rise of the Huguenots - Volume 2 • Henry Baird
... topics in this English case. Ashe had no sooner slipped into his seat than he began to banter Cliffe upon a letter of a supporter which had appeared in that morning's Times. It was written by Lord S., who had played the part of public "fool" for half a generation. To be praised by him was disaster, and Cliffe's flush showed at once that the letter had caused him acute annoyance. He and Ashe fell upon the writer, vying with each other in anecdotes that left ...
— The Marriage of William Ashe • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... at the Maison Pierre when somebody tapped me on the shoulder-blade, and I found Rocky standing beside me, with a sort of mixed expression of wistfulness and apoplexy on his face. How the chappie had contrived to wear my evening clothes so many times without disaster was a mystery to me. He confided later that early in the proceedings he had slit the waistcoat up the back and that that ...
— My Man Jeeves • P. G. Wodehouse
... barrels with duck-shot, and then jumped into our saddles and rode for it. Unfortunately, we had been foolish enough to go out without our revolvers. They pressed us hard, but I was never in fear of their actually catching us; my only alarm was that one of us might repeat my disaster of the armadillo hole. So I only tried to hold my own thirty or forty yards ahead. I made sure that one or other of you would see us coming, and I should have shouted loudly enough, I can tell you, to warn you as I came up. Besides, I knew that at the worst the arms were hanging above the ...
— On the Pampas • G. A. Henty
... freely; and the printer was emptying the vials of his wrath upon the public in general, because all wanted their printing done at the same instant; while the boy, with a comical look of fear upon his ink-stained face, was dodging here and there, striving as best he could to avoid the threatening disaster. ...
— That Printer of Udell's • Harold Bell Wright
... those whose brains are active, speedily brings nervous disaster, and the consciousness, from being the active superintendent of the body, becomes inert, and the body drifts like a boat without a pilot. Lack of sleep to those whose work is muscular means a numbness in the nerve cells which guide those muscles, so that they disobey the will or act unreasonably ...
— Rural Hygiene • Henry N. Ogden
... first home-bound vessel and be taken into Frisco. I've my insurance to collect (Wilbur had given her the 'Letty's' papers) and the disaster ...
— Moran of the Lady Letty • Frank Norris
... that he had no more worlds to conquer; but I would create new. Archimedes might desiderate a place to stand on before he could bring his lever into play; I would move the world, self-poised. If Halicarnassus fancied that I was cut up, dispersed, and annihilated by one disaster, he should weep tears of blood to see me rise, Phoenix-like, from the ashes of my dead hopes, to a newer and more glorious life. Here, having exhausted my classics, I took a long sweep down to modern times, and vowed in my heart never to ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 55, May, 1862 • Various
... said Miss Wardour; "you have your faithful attendant ready to repair such a disaster when it happens, and when you appear with it as restored to its original splendour, I will carry on ...
— The Antiquary, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... stationed in huge elephant dugouts about four hundred yards behind the front-line trench-they were in reserve. Occasionally I would stop in their dugout and have a confab with my former mates. Although we tried to be jolly, still, there was a lurking feeling of impending disaster. Each man was wondering, if, after the slogan, "Over the top with the best of luck," had been sounded, would he still be alive or would he be lying "somewhere in France." In an old dilapidated house, the walls of which ...
— Over The Top • Arthur Guy Empey
... the officers of the British ship "Agamemnon" and the American ship "Niagara" alike. And in 1866 it feasted the distinguished and persevering American citizen whose pluck and courage, with reference to this cable, no disaster and no ...
— Modern Eloquence: Vol II, After-Dinner Speeches E-O • Various
... horseman descended the hill and Raymond recognised him. It was Neddy Motyer. His horse was lame and he walked beside it. Raymond smiled to himself, for Neddy, though a zealous follower of hounds, lacked judgment and often met with disaster. ...
— The Spinners • Eden Phillpotts
... that I met disaster face to face in so strange a way that it needs a whole letter ...
— Everyman's Land • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... which gave Congress the means to do whatever was "necessary and proper" to carry out the powers expressly granted to it. Nothing now can prevent Congress, should it choose to do so, from issuing paper money of any description whatever, even if of absolutely no value. The disaster that might be brought upon the country by a rising tide of repudiation among debtors, taking its effect through a facile and plastic Congress (as in the case of the silver coinage in 1878), is appalling ...
— Principles Of Political Economy • John Stuart Mill
... the drums of the Old Guard in the midst of disaster, had in it something touching and horrible. I sobbed like a child;—Buche hurried me along, but I cried, "Jean, leave me—we are lost, everything ...
— Waterloo - A sequel to The Conscript of 1813 • Emile Erckmann
... too shocked and dismayed to speak, and in that instant of terror every sad and gruesome disaster, that had befallen unprotected travellers in a strange land, passed in rapid review before our minds. We turned to the guide for help, but he who had been so voluble and instructive in botanical lore, in several languages, now held his ...
— In Chteau Land • Anne Hollingsworth Wharton
... storm which was raging about him. The cold-blooded, conservative New England Senator was as greatly amazed at the serenity of the clear-headed Western Congressman as he was distressed at the impending disaster. He went to Mr. Foster and talked very discouragingly respecting the situation. He said that the Senate was growing impatient at the dilatory conduct of the House, and would probably, at the earliest convenience, ...
— History of the Negro Race in America from 1619 to 1880. Vol. 2 (of 2) - Negroes as Slaves, as Soldiers, and as Citizens • George Washington Williams
... papers which are published on shipboard. Every ship in this part of the ocean equipped with the Marconi system, for example, is in communication on an average with four vessels supplied with instruments of the same system every twenty-four hours. In case of danger or disaster signals going out over the sea speedily can bring succour, as clearly was demonstrated in the case of the collision between the White Star steamship Republic and the steamship Florida on January 26, 1909. Here wireless danger messages were sent out as long as the Republic ...
— The Story Of Electricity • John Munro
... chap over there—the tall fellow in grey?" Trent had been one of the picnic party which had ended in disaster; and although a good-hearted boy was thrilled with the importance of his own position. "Know who it is? Well, it's that chap Anstice—you remember, the fellow who shot that girl up in the hills when they were in a ...
— Afterwards • Kathlyn Rhodes
... feudalism, which was nothing if not militant. Indeed, every act of this brief reign was a protest against the purposes and ideals of his father, King John, who was the embodiment of the ancient spirit. It was a needed breathing-spell between a half-century of disaster behind and another half-century of ...
— A Short History of France • Mary Platt Parmele
... erected to a literary man—a graceful Gothic spire, towering two hundred feet into the sky. The city is full of his memories. Here are many of the places he celebrated in his stories, his haunts for years, and the house where he retired after financial disaster to face a self-chosen battle with a gigantic debt which he might easily have evaded by a mere figment ...
— British Highways And Byways From A Motor Car - Being A Record Of A Five Thousand Mile Tour In England, - Wales And Scotland • Thomas D. Murphy
... you have appointed the cardinals. I believe that it would honour God and profit us more if you would take heed always to appoint virtuous men. If the contrary is done, it will be a great insult to God, and disaster to Holy Church. Let us not wonder later if God sends us His disciplines and scourges; for the thing is just. I beg you to do what you have to do manfully and in the fear ...
— Letters of Catherine Benincasa • Catherine Benincasa
... and came to inspect, or advise, or jeer at us. The kindest of them wished us well; the other sort told us "it would serve us right"; but not one of our callers had any encouragement to offer. Many were the stories of disaster and death with which they entertained us. One story in particular, as it seems never to have reached print—though unquestionably true—ought to be set ...
— Through the Grand Canyon from Wyoming to Mexico • E. L. Kolb
... not allow itself to be daunted by this fresh disaster. The great banks re-opened their doors, declaring that they would meet demands partly in bullion and partly in paper money guaranteed by the State: The Stock Exchange and the Trade Exchange, in spite of the complete cessation of business, ...
— Penguin Island • Anatole France
... again in the dismal little old drawing-room dealt him a terrible blow. He saw, only too vividly, the picture of his suave, exquisite uncle, standing out against this muddled, confused background, in the midst of decoration which was one long disaster and furniture that was one desperate failure. To think that the owner of Selsey House had spent hours here! The ...
— Love's Shadow • Ada Leverson
... it at once break up and disunite; the barbarians entered on all sides from without, the provinces ceased to oppose any resistance from within; the cities to evince any regard for the general welfare; and, as in the disaster of a shipwreck, every one looked out for his individual safety. Thus, on the dissolution of the empire, the same general state of society presented itself as in its cradle. The imperial authority sunk into the ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 350, December 1844 • Various
... they drank it in silence, each one's brain busy with the disaster from the standpoint of his own resulting ruin. Susan glanced furtively at each face in turn. She could not think of her own fate, there was such despair in the faces of these others. Mabel looked like an old woman. ...
— Susan Lenox: Her Fall and Rise • David Graham Phillips
... of our Jurisprudence, and of every Law which is inherently just. I use these words deliberately—"eternally firm and unchangeable." A long and deep study of these principles, and some experience of the grief and disaster caused by any grave departure from them, have convinced me that these principles are founded on the highest ethics,—the ...
— Native Races and the War • Josephine Elizabeth Butler
... expected such a disaster, and was so frightened that the more he tried to recall the word "Sesame," the more confused his mind became. It was as if he had never heard the word at all. He threw down the bags in his hands, and walked wildly up and down, without a thought ...
— Short Stories Old and New • Selected and Edited by C. Alphonso Smith
... This disaster did seem to have fallen out, and he had meant at once to offer himself to the lady as her supporter and advocate, able to bring about all her son could desire; though he owned that his hopes would have been higher if the survivor had been the gentle, friendly Friedmund, ...
— The Dove in the Eagle's Nest • Charlotte M. Yonge
... country in his front. Some Frenchmen go farther still, and vow that in Spain they were never beaten at all; indeed, if you read in the Biographie des Hommes du Jour, article "Soult," you will fancy that, with the exception of the disaster at Vittoria, the campaigns in Spain and Portugal were a series of triumphs. Only, by looking at a map, it is observable that Vimeiro is a mortal long way from Toulouse, where, at the end of certain years of victories, we somehow find the honest Marshal. And what then?—he went to Toulouse ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray
... in the outer part of a bay, the southern head of which bore South 22 degrees East, and which, from the loss and perplexity we met with in it, was afterwards called Disaster Bay, and its south extreme, off which is a small rocky island, ...
— Narrative of a Survey of the Intertropical and Western Coasts of Australia] [Volume 2 of 2] • Phillip Parker King
... unable to mount his horse, was borne about on a litter, and in the midst of peril and disaster, gave his orders with coolness and judgment. Seeing to what disadvantage his troops fought with a concealed enemy, he ordered Colonel Darke, with his regiment of regulars, to rouse the Indians from their covert ...
— An account of Sa-Go-Ye-Wat-Ha - Red Jacket and his people, 1750-1830 • John Niles Hubbard
... after his disaster, Never again forsook his master, Convinc'd he'd better let him mount. Than travel ...
— Cole's Funny Picture Book No. 1 • Edward William Cole
... see nothing more of Hungerford till we finally dismiss the drama, I should like to say that this voyage of his to the West Indies made his fortune—that is, it gave him command of one of the finest ships in the English merchant service. In a storm a disaster occurred to his vessel, his captain was washed overboard, and he was obliged to take command. His skill, fortitude, and great manliness, under tragical circumstances, sent his name booming round the world; and, coupled, as it was, with ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... however, to have something on his mind; and at last stammeringly asked his uncle if this disaster would not prove a serious loss. His fears, however, were set at rest by Mr Inglis, who smiled, and told him that it would have been, but for the exercise of prudence ...
— Hollowdell Grange - Holiday Hours in a Country Home • George Manville Fenn
... themselves. Nipponese writers of to-day explain most of them by the word shinkei—"nerves"; the working of a guilty conscience moulding succeeding events, and interpreting the results to the subsequent disaster involved. The explanation is somewhat at variance with the native Shinto[u] doctrine of the moral perfection of the Nipponese, and its maxim—follow the dictates of one's heart; but that ...
— The Yotsuya Kwaidan or O'Iwa Inari - Tales of the Tokugawa, Volume 1 (of 2) • James S. De Benneville
... heavens on earth cause double springs: Place me where Neptune's quire of Syrens sings, Or where, made hoarse through cold, he leaves to roar: Me place where Fortune doth her darlings crown, A wonder or a spark in Envy's eye, Or late outrageous fates upon me frown, And pity wailing, see disaster'd me. Affection's print my mind so deep doth prove, I may forget myself, but ...
— The Sonnets, Triumphs, and Other Poems of Petrarch • Petrarch
... into bitter reproaches; he called the Birds, who had upset him, silly high-flying fools, who set themselves above the whole world, and overturned all rule and order. His anger was not to be softened, until his future father-in-law promised that, to prevent the recurrence of any similar disaster, he would allow nothing flying to enter his kingdom, ...
— The King of Root Valley - and his curious daughter • R. Reinick
... greatest works in Arrowfield. Everything was in such a state of confusion that our entrance was not opposed; and in a few minutes we saw by the light of flaring gas-jets, and of a fire that had begun to blaze, one of the most terrible scenes of disaster I had ever witnessed. ...
— Patience Wins - War in the Works • George Manville Fenn
... kingdom? Ere the fight was fought We joined not either army — shall we now Make Magnus friend whom all the world deserts? And fling a challenge to the conquering chief And all his proud successes? Fair is help Lent in disaster, yet reserved for those Whom fortune favours. Faith her friends ...
— Pharsalia; Dramatic Episodes of the Civil Wars • Lucan
... and a snare. If we wish to keep up true independence and true self-respect in ourselves and our children, we should be careful to keep up respect for our forefathers. A shallow, sneering generation, which laughs at those who have gone before it, is ripe for disaster and slavery. We are not bound, of course—as those old Rechabites considered themselves bound—to do in everything exactly what our forefathers did. For we are not under the law, but under grace; and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is ...
— Discipline and Other Sermons • Charles Kingsley
... coolly waits, picks out the "good one," and swats the pill over left-field fence! Or when Hindenburg's hordes are pouring into the Marne wedge, almost to the gates of Paris, Foch calmly waits—and prays while he waits—then at the crucial moment hurls those chafing reserves against them, turns disaster into victory and enshrines the names of Chateau-Thierry, Belleau Wood, and the American Marines in song and ...
— "Say Fellows—" - Fifty Practical Talks with Boys on Life's Big Issues • Wade C. Smith
... are the "eagles" mentioned? The silence is rendered more impressive by the occasional "shrill cry" of the eagles, and the "wings" of the eagles hovering above are an omen of the coming disaster which is to overtake "the gilded eagles of ...
— Ontario Teachers' Manuals: Literature • Ontario Ministry of Education
... the gathering twilight the passengers of both diligences grouped themselves, and made merry over the common disaster. As the conductor and the drivers brought off the luggage our spirits rose with the arrival of each trunk, and we were pleased or not as we found it soaked or dry. We applauded and admired the greater sufferers among us: a lady who opened ...
— Italian Journeys • William Dean Howells
... distilled "from the hearts of wild-cats and the tongues of women,—it made him so fierce and so foolish;" nor could it, on the other hand, be questioned that many a sad and gloomy reminiscence, the recollection of wrong, of defeat, of disaster, of the loss of friends and of country, was mingled in the joy of the debauch. From their lurking-place near the village, the three friends could hear many a wild whoop, now fierce and startling, now plaintive and ...
— Nick of the Woods • Robert M. Bird
... some time together, in such a manner that my honest friend might have thought himself at one of his silent meetings, the Quaker began to be moved by some spirit or other, probably that of curiosity, and said, "Friend, I perceive some sad disaster hath befallen thee; but pray be of comfort. Perhaps thou hast lost a friend. If so, thou must consider we are all mortal. And why shouldst thou grieve, when thou knowest thy grief will do thy friend no good? We are all ...
— The History of Tom Jones, a foundling • Henry Fielding
... [wrote Lucina],—"I beg you to accept my sympathy in the disaster which has befallen your property, and I implore you not to be disheartened, and not to consider me unmaidenly for signing myself your ever faithful and constant friend, through all the ...
— Jerome, A Poor Man - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... an opportunity for distinguishing himself—and he succeeded! for that same evening he was accused of trying to poison the whole conclave, and was obliged to leave Rome and Italy without waiting to pack up. This disaster was the last straw. Now," and Gambara put his finger to his ...
— Gambara • Honore de Balzac
... a precious stone, I have sought to point out the fact that a determination based solely upon color is very likely to be wrong. So many mineral species are found in so many different colors that to attempt to identify any mineral species by color alone is usually to invite disaster. The emerald, alone among gems, has, when of fine color, a hue that is not approached by any other species. The color of the grass in the springtime fitly describes it. Yet even here the art of man has so closely counterfeited in glass the green of the emerald that ...
— A Text-Book of Precious Stones for Jewelers and the Gem-Loving Public • Frank Bertram Wade
... sprinkling of bonfires where stumps were all ablaze, fallen tangles of brush were smoldering, and dead trees flared like giant torches or sent down great blazing branches. She might get through without disaster, but it would be by a miracle of good luck. Even a man would hesitate to attempt the feat of working his ...
— The Lookout Man • B. M. Bower
... as he thus calmly exculpated himself from the penalty for future disaster, indicated quite clearly that Cappy Ricks, in such a contingency, might look to the man higher up—on the bridge, ...
— Cappy Ricks Retires • Peter B. Kyne
... settlers seemed imminent, the engineer sent for Abe Lee, while Texas, Pat and Pablo were instructed by Mr. Worth to be ready at an hour's notice to move the entire working force of the district to the scene of the expected disaster. ...
— The Winning of Barbara Worth • Harold B Wright
... coaster on the Mediterranean was in stress of storm. The Italian seamen have their own ideas of behavior under disaster, and fell on their knees to invoke the interposition of the usual stronghold—the Madonna—of which there was a statue in wood. But, many and genuine as were the invocations, all were unanswered. The gale continued, and more and more damage was done the upper ...
— The Lincoln Story Book • Henry L. Williams
... history which cannot be understood, and yet it is essential to our welfare as a maritime people that we should understand it thoroughly. Our failure to understand it has more than once brought us, if not to the verge of destruction, at any rate within a short distance of serious disaster. ...
— Sea-Power and Other Studies • Admiral Sir Cyprian Bridge
... up—and held. "You know—Jove! this is serious—no nonsense in it!" as Jim had whispered hurriedly with a troubled concerned face on the threshold of his house. I don't know so much about nonsense, but there was nothing light-hearted in their romance: they came together under the shadow of a life's disaster, like knight and maiden meeting to exchange vows amongst haunted ruins. The starlight was good enough for that story, a light so faint and remote that it cannot resolve shadows into shapes, and ...
— Lord Jim • Joseph Conrad
... itself under the pressure of so calamitous a disaster is, that it was not the effect either of treachery or wilful neglect, as will appear by the following official statement ...
— Thrilling Narratives of Mutiny, Murder and Piracy • Anonymous
... speeding over the water, but now on the ocean, and going northward, Philadelphia being their present destination. It had grown cloudy and by bedtime a steady rain was falling, but unaccompanied by much wind, so that no one felt any apprehension of shipwreck or other marine disaster, ...
— Elsie's Vacation and After Events • Martha Finley
... wreck, traversed the beach for some extent on both sides, and collected all the particulars that are now likely to be obtained, relative to the closing scenes of this terrible disaster. The sand is strewn for a distance of three or four miles with fragments of planks, spars, boxes, and the merchandise with which the vessel was laden. With the exception of a piece of her broadside, which floated to the shore intact, ...
— At Home And Abroad - Or, Things And Thoughts In America and Europe • Margaret Fuller Ossoli
... Piso, a most honourable man, and one which has been deservedly praised by you O Pansa, not only in this order, but also in the assembly of the people. He said, that he would depart from Italy, and leave his household gods and his native home, if (but might the gods avert such a disaster!) Antonius ...
— The Orations of Marcus Tullius Cicero, Volume 4 • Cicero
... with their tale of disaster, the ire of Mr. Young was raised. It is a comment upon the number of men then roving the wilderness, that Mr. Young was in a short time enabled to organize another party of forty men, to resume the enterprise. It ...
— Christopher Carson • John S. C. Abbott
... Vicky Van's house with a terrible feeling of impending disaster, that might be worse ...
— Vicky Van • Carolyn Wells
... to count the cost, no time to evolve a plan of escape that admitted no form of disaster. Artemisia besought him not to leave her for a moment, and accordingly he remained by her, laughing, poking fun, and making reckless gibes at her fears. Sesostris went about his simple household duties with a long face, and now and then a tear trickled down his ...
— A Friend of Caesar - A Tale of the Fall of the Roman Republic. Time, 50-47 B.C. • William Stearns Davis
... they understood. Uttering a shout the jacks burst out through the narrow doorway, and ran for the river, followed by the Overland girls on flying feet, and meeting Joe Shafto on the way to the scene of the disaster. ...
— Grace Harlowe's Overland Riders in the Great North Woods • Jessie Graham Flower
... above the weakness of seeking to establish a sequence of cause and effect between the disaster and the atrocity. But I am detailing a chain of facts, and wish not to leave even a possible link imperfect. On the day succeeding the fire, I visited the ruins. The walls with one exception had fallen in. This exception was found in a compartment wall, not very thick, which stood about the ...
— Lords of the Housetops - Thirteen Cat Tales • Various
... her term of service there had been without real intimates, so that now none was ready to mourn over her fate. Even the two room-mates had felt some slight offense, since they sensed the superiority of her, though vaguely. Now, they found a smug satisfaction in the fact of her disaster as emphasizing very pleasurably their own ...
— Within the Law - From the Play of Bayard Veiller • Marvin Dana
... British connexion and of British rule. The statesman who can suggest practical means for carrying out this intellectual conversion will certainly have saved England and India much unhappiness and disaster. ...
— Indian Unrest • Valentine Chirol
... itself, but the sticks were tough and the ropes which held them sound, and with increased speed the brig flew before the gale. Two of the best hands were at the wheel, for any carelessness in steering might in an instant have produced a serious disaster. The effects of the additional sail were satisfactory, as the stranger was no longer gaining on us, as she had hitherto done. Still, as I felt the violent blows given by the seas, now on one quarter, now on the other, the brig now pitching ...
— The Two Supercargoes - Adventures in Savage Africa • W.H.G. Kingston
... 1808 he had formed with the Ballantynes a publishing house that, as a result of poor management, failed completely in 1813. Scott bore the trouble with admirable coolness, and by means of good management averted further disaster and made arrangements for the continued publication ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 6 • Charles H. Sylvester
... Kew's mother, Lady Walham, and her second son were staying at Hombourg, when the Earl's disaster occurred. They had proposed to come to Baden to see Kew's new bride, and to welcome her; but the presence of her mother-in-law deterred Lady Walham, who gave up her heart's wish in bitterness of spirit, knowing very well that a meeting between ...
— The Newcomes • William Makepeace Thackeray
... arrived at; but it is ordered sometimes by fate, that such as die infants, are after death to attend mankind to the end of that stamen of being in themselves, which was broke off by sickness or any other disaster. These are proper guardians to men, as being sensible of the infirmity of their state. You are philosopher enough to know, that the difference of men's understanding proceeds only from the various dispositions of their organs; ...
— The Tatler, Volume 1, 1899 • George A. Aitken
... the fire which burned the camp of an army had been kindled merely to gratify the revenge, or favour the escape of an individual. Shaking, therefore, from his kingly spirit the thrill of superstitious awe that the greatness of the disaster, when associated with the name of a sorcerer, at first occasioned, he resolved to make advantage out of misfortune itself. The excitement, the wrath of the troops, produced the temper most ...
— Leila or, The Siege of Granada, Book IV. • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... fortune, and the disaster which befell the blinded soldier has given to the service of the blind world generally the affection and sympathy which Mr. Richard King so abundantly possesses. Your reading of this book—and if you have only borrowed it I hope that these words may induce you to buy a copy—will ...
— Over the Fireside with Silent Friends • Richard King
... the composure he could; and the girl began to hope she should remain undiscovered, and most likely she would have been so lucky, had not the Genius of Disaster, with aspect malign, waved her sable wand, and called her chosen servant, Handy Andy, to her aid. He, her faithful and unfailing minister, obeyed the call, and at that critical juncture of time gave a ...
— Handy Andy, Volume One - A Tale of Irish Life, in Two Volumes • Samuel Lover
... influence upon all about him. His voice had the same sort of influence upon them as the drum and fife on a soldier's march: it quickened their movements. We were often called in by our neighbour manufacturers to repair a breakdown of their engines. That was always a sad disaster, as all hands were idle until the repair was effected. Archy was in his glory on such occasions. By his ready zeal and energy he soon got over the difficulty, repaired the engines, and set the people to work again. He became quite ...
— James Nasmyth's Autobiography • James Nasmyth
... his despoiled glass as calmly as Diogenes might have viewed a similar disaster from his tub. Monsieur's philosophy was grounded upon common sense. He knew that the frame was valuable. He knew also that I had saved enough to pay for the accident. I knew it, too, and was well aware ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XI., February, 1863, No. LXIV. • Various
... interview was over! All that followed counted not in the least. She had meant to induce him to offer to defray the whole of her expenses in Llandudno—no doubt in the form of a loan; and she had failed. She had intended him to repair the disaster caused by her chronic extravagance. And he had ...
— The Card, A Story Of Adventure In The Five Towns • Arnold Bennett
... work, for Ouiot speaks through you.' And, a few days later, after the burial of the dead, she told the chief men of the tribe what I had seen. And then ended my happiness: from that day I lived a life of sorrow, for the burden I had to bear was a heavy one: not only when I foretold disaster and suffering to our people, but when I had joyful news for them, even then the dread of knowing the future was terrible. Sometimes a half-year would pass without communication from above, and I would begin to hope that the awful gift was taken ...
— Old Mission Stories of California • Charles Franklin Carter
... how Lilly, an opponent of the king, made his so-called prophecy of the disaster of the king and his army. At the same time another celebrated astrologer and rival of Lilly, George Wharton, also made some predictions about the outcome of the eventful march from Oxford. Wharton, unlike Lilly, ...
— A History of Science, Volume 2(of 5) • Henry Smith Williams
... least, the matter was not by any means to be regarded as anything but a serious proposition. The lad had quickly formulated a plan of escape. The very daring of his intended action was its best guarantee of success. Failure meant disaster, but Jimmie was prepared to risk all ...
— Boy Scouts in the North Sea - The Mystery of a Sub • G. Harvey Ralphson
... to him that happens to most of us at one time or another. Just as the hunting man, sooner or later, is pretty sure to be laid up with a broken collar-bone, so in the career of life must be encountered that inevitable disaster which results in a wounded spirit and a sore heart. The collar-bone, we all know, is a six weeks' job; but injuries of a tenderer nature take far longer to heal. Nevertheless, the cure of these, too, is but a question ...
— M. or N. "Similia similibus curantur." • G.J. Whyte-Melville
... one thought and saw it stand quite clear before her eyes. She found difficulty in clothing it in words, but its meaning perhaps was this: That cedar stood in their life for something friendly; its downfall meant disaster; a sense of some protective influence about the cottage, and about her husband ...
— The Man Whom the Trees Loved • Algernon Blackwood
... would get another strike. Just as we reached a point almost opposite the school of tuna they headed across our bow, so that it seemed inevitable we must either run them down or run too close. My spirit sank to zero. Something presaged bad luck. I sensed disaster. I fought the feeling, but it persisted. Captain Dan swore. My brother shouted warnings from over us where he sat on top. But we ran right into the leaders. The school sank. I ...
— Tales of Fishes • Zane Grey
... conquer fate, nor of men who are unbent and undaunted by fate, but of men who are conquered and undone. Each protagonist is a new Prometheus, with a sardonic ignominy piled upon his helplessness. Each goes down a Greek route to defeat and disaster, leaving nothing behind him save an unanswered question. I can scarcely recall an exception. Kurtz, Lord Jim, Razumov, Nostromo, Captain Whalley, Yanko Goorall, Verloc, Heyst, Gaspar Ruiz, Almayer: one and all they are destroyed and made a mock of by the blind, incomprehensible ...
— A Book of Prefaces • H. L. Mencken
... to leave the ship; the yard-tackles to be cut, to prevent the boats from being hoisted out; and the firemen only to take the necessary measures for extinguishing the fire. The captain, who was undressed in his cabin at the time of the disaster, received an immediate report of it from an officer, and hastened to the quarter-deck. The flames were rising in volumes from the main hatchway, but the Admiral was calmly giving his orders from the gangway, ...
— The Life of Admiral Viscount Exmouth • Edward Osler
... hurt., mischief, nuisance; machinations of the devil, Pandora's box, ills that flesh is heir to. blow, buffet, stroke, scratch, bruise, wound, gash, mutilation; mortal blow, wound; immedicabile vulnus[Lat]; damage, loss &c. (deterioration) 659. disadvantage, prejudice, drawback. disaster, accident, casualty; mishap &c. (misfortune) 735; bad job, devil to pay; calamity, bale, catastrophe, tragedy; ruin &c. (destruction) 162; adversity &c. 735. mental suffering &c. 828. * demon &v[Evil spirit]. 980. bane &c. 663[Cause of evil]. badness &c. 649[Production of evil]; painfulness ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... towards the High Street without knowing or caring whither I went. Having reached the street just named, I proceeded downwards, still heedless of my way, until I found myself in the Saltmarket, the scene of my late disaster. ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, XXII • various
... in the swamp basin than it has contained these many years, if ever. As a result, I believe the sloping mud basin began to slip toward the dam. Oh, very gradually! Probably not stirring for weeks at a time. Just a yielding here, a parting there, until the cloudburst precipitated the disaster. You had, my dear Roger, a miniature landslide, which would account for sounds of shifting mud and water in your lake, and for the shocks or trembling of your house when the earth ...
— The Thing from the Lake • Eleanor M. Ingram
... the crime in shame! For Madame Raquin, there was such a fathomless depth in this thought, that she could neither reason it out, nor grasp it clearly. She experienced but one sensation, that of a horrible disaster; it seemed to her that she was falling into a dark, cold hole. ...
— Therese Raquin • Emile Zola
... what sincerity he gives it. Ere they commenced sipping, the good dame brought pilot bread and set it before them; and while she returned to preparing her supper the wrecker draws his wooden seat by their side, and with ears attentive listens to the passenger as he recites the disaster. ...
— Our World, or, The Slaveholders Daughter • F. Colburn Adams
... never has life brought me such a full measure of finer feelings; never have I been able to record such freshness of sensibility, such security of conscience. So those are the blessings arising out of the thing which my reasonable human foresight envisaged as disaster. And thus continues the lesson of Providence which, upsetting all my fears, makes good arise out ...
— Letters of a Soldier - 1914-1915 • Anonymous
... at the door of some other, and throw my arms about the pale, sad figure, grown ten years older in a few months; telling him that the popular verdict is unjust, that there are many who know that he is not to blame for the disaster, that sooner or later the excitement will subside, and the victims of the first rash judgment be restored to honor; that his name is still dear and respected, that he must not despond, that he must take heart ...
— Stories by Foreign Authors: Italian • Various
... stopped short, and its boy and girl occupants were hurtled, like projectiles, into the storm center of disaster. ...
— The Girl Aviators' Sky Cruise • Margaret Burnham
... went entirely mad, for from the very edge of disaster, the tide of battle was turned into the enemy's territory. Before the Sunrise rooters had time to cease rejoicing, however, the invincible quarterback was away again, and with two guards and a center on top of Burleigh, ...
— A Master's Degree • Margaret Hill McCarter
... to take his daughter back to England. That calm old calculating machine was more deranged and shocked by the catastrophe than I should have thought it possible he would have been by any earthly disaster. He was getting older now, and more broken, it is true, and so, perhaps, was more accessible to the weakness of sympathy. At all events, nothing could be kinder and more considerate than ...
— Guy Livingstone; - or, 'Thorough' • George A. Lawrence
... that it requires a period of from ten to fourteen days for the complete relief of this inflammation. During that period, the blood-vessels are fully employed absorbing the products of the inflammation, and any attempt to interfere with this necessary process of nature can end only in disaster or in a prolongation of the difficulty. This is the law of pathology, unalterable and not to be evaded. Physicians at times resort to soothing and astringent applications in an emergency, to carry the artist through a performance; but the lack of edge to ...
— The Voice - Its Production, Care and Preservation • Frank E. Miller
... promote the establishment of substantial autonomy and self- government in Kosovo; to perform basic civilian administrative functions; to support the reconstruction of key infrastructure and humanitarian and disaster relief ...
— The 2001 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... time she mounts her Pegasus disaster follows for home duties are neglected. Learning of one of these lapses, her elder sister comes home. Betty storms and refuses to share the honors until she remembers that this means long hours free to devote to her beloved pen. She finally ...
— The Camp Fire Girls in the Mountains - or Bessie King's Strange Adventure • Jane L. Stewart
... Waihee, the path of his journey was marked afterward by leanness and famine. But a king must be fed, and it is not good to anger a king. So, like warning in advance of disaster, Waihee heard of his coming, and all food- getters of field and pond and mountain and sea were busied with getting food for the feast. And behold, everything was got, from the choicest of royal taro to sugar-cane joints for the roasting, from opihis to limu, ...
— On the Makaloa Mat/Island Tales • Jack London
... was mythology. A malformed foetus, as the readers of Winthrop's Journal may remember, was enough to scare the colonists from their propriety, and suggest the gravest fears of portended disaster. The student of the seventeenth century opened his Licetus and saw figures of a lion with the head of a woman, and a man with the head of an elephant. He had offered to his gaze, as born of a human mother, the effigy of a winged cherub, a pterocephalous specimen, ...
— Medical Essays • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... and his movements had the deliberate quiet of purpose. Another instant and Nikolaieff would have been gladdened and scandalized by something much more spectacular than a pogrom. The leading istvostchik, still pointing and bellowing, was inviting disaster; when from behind him, ploughing through the onlookers', came the overdue policeman, ...
— Those Who Smiled - And Eleven Other Stories • Perceval Gibbon
... and Dee and Don. They pollute the bay of St. Andrews and swell the waters of the Cam, and have somehow crept overland into Birmingham. The stream of german idealism has been diffused over the academical world of Great Britain. The disaster is universal.' ...
— A Pluralistic Universe - Hibbert Lectures at Manchester College on the - Present Situation in Philosophy • William James
... the fifteenth century destroyed the work of the monks in their fields and gardens, but the Abbey itself was spared; and the great disaster did not come until a century later, when the image-breakers, who had begun their work amongst the Gothic arches of Antwerp, spread over West Flanders, and descended upon Coxyde. The Abbey was attacked, and the monks fled ...
— Bruges and West Flanders • George W. T. Omond
... had not stopped to ask any questions as to the particulars of their disaster, but as we went along the mate gave us some of the details. From the way he spoke, I saw that, though a very quiet, well-disposed young man, he was not one formed to command his fellow-men. He told us that his name was ...
— Captain Mugford - Our Salt and Fresh Water Tutors • W.H.G. Kingston
... a penny a head. It's not easy to see How it's done for the price of a bun or a scone. When the Mistress and Cook find it hard to agree, And the former of these is provokingly prone With the latter to pick a most terrible bone, When it seems that disaster must follow perforce, Oh! whisper them this in a Hart rending tone— It costs just exactly ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 103, November 5, 1892 • Various
... after the disaster at Majuba Hill, "equal rights" were a golden dream which only the most optimistic ever hoped to see realized. From then onwards, as old colonists have so often told me, the Boers brought up the younger generation in the belief that the "Roinek"[1] was a coward, and in consequence their arrogance ...
— South African Memories - Social, Warlike & Sporting From Diaries Written At The Time • Lady Sarah Wilson
... the fact that the interior of the island is known to be immensely rich in natural resources. In the native states Dutch authority is little more than nominal, the repeated attempts which have been made to subjugate them invariably having met with discouragement and not infrequently with disaster. Hence the island is still without railways, though it is being slowly opened up by means of roads, some of which are practicable for motor-cars. Most of the roads in the Celebes were originally built by ...
— Where the Strange Trails Go Down • E. Alexander Powell
... one side of the platoon, so that his form might not be crushed by the advance of horses' feet. The troopers had seen the fall of the lieutenant, and naturally enough, supposing that he was killed, were excited to new fury by the disaster, and rushed upon the enemy, who were crowding them on both sides. They fought with an impetuosity which the enemy could not withstand, and a large portion of the latter justified their record for that day by ...
— A Lieutenant at Eighteen • Oliver Optic
... it was not till the time of Caracalla that it was restored to its former political privileges. It had scarcely begun to recover its former position when, through the capricious resentment of Gallienus, the inhabitants were once more put to the sword and the town was pillaged. From this disaster the inhabitants recovered so far as to be able to give an effectual check to an invasion of the Goths in the reign of Claudius II., and the fortifications were greatly strengthened during the civil wars which followed ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 4 - "Bulgaria" to "Calgary" • Various
... preservation of their constitutional rights. There was diversity of opinion with regard to the merits of the measures referred to, but the disagreement no longer followed the usual lines of party division. They who saw in those measures the forerunner of disaster to the South had no settled policy beyond a convention, the object of which should be to devise new and more effectual guarantees against the perils of usurpation. They were unjustly charged with a desire to destroy the Union—a feeling entertained by few, very few, ...
— The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government • Jefferson Davis
... seemed to him like a dream that he had dreamt long ago and forgotten. It was a curious sense of unreality that impressed him most, that feeling of "This cannot really have happened to me ..." that everyone knows in the first moment of disaster. It was this sensation, not any temporising or actual disbelief, that kept him still motionless, staring. Polkinghorne began to feel the proprieties ...
— Secret Bread • F. Tennyson Jesse
... Gilson, the mystic; Henri of Liege; the son of Ysaye, they were all clear to us. There was a splendid fat doctor who felt physical fear, but never shirked his job. He used to go and hide behind the barn, with his pipe, till there was work for him. His wasn't the fear that spreads disaster through a crowd. He was fat and funny. A fat man is comfortable to have around, at any time, even when he is unhappy. No one lost respect for this man. Every one enjoyed ...
— Golden Lads • Arthur Gleason and Helen Hayes Gleason
... but twenty-five, sees the need for a navy, and in 875 gathers a small fleet to meet the ships of the enemy, wins one prize, and puts the rest to flight. The chroniclers now relate that he fell into disaster and became a fugitive in Selwood Forest, while Guthrum and his host were left free to ravage. From this period date the legends of the King's visit in disguise to the hut of the neat-herd, and his burning the bread he was set to watch; his penetrating into ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 1 • Charles Dudley Warner
... the idol that the Saxons called Irminsul." And in what place was this first victory of Charlemagne won? Near the sources of the Lippe, just where, more than seven centuries before, the German Arminius (Herman) had destroyed the legions of Varus, and whither Germanicus had come to avenge the disaster of Varus. This ground belonged to Saxon territory; and this idol, called Irminsul, which was thrown down by Charlemagne, was probably a monument raised in honor of Arminius (Hermann-Seule, or Herman's pillar), whose name it called ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 4 • Various
... the ghost) eats thee, and I shall slay thee"; and if he kills him, he cries to the ghost, "Thine is this man, Siria, and do thou give me supernatural power!" No prudent Melanesian would attempt to commit manslaughter without a ghost as an accomplice; to do so would be to court disaster, for the slain man's ghost would have power over the slayer; therefore before he imbrues his hands in blood he deems it desirable to secure the assistance of a valiant ghost who can, if need be, overcome the ghost of his victim in single combat. If ...
— The Belief in Immortality and the Worship of the Dead, Volume I (of 3) • Sir James George Frazer
... claim of the party to whom the service is due. In view of the interests to be reconciled this clause was undoubtedly necessary to union.[163] If the free States were to become a place of refuge for escaping slaves it meant disaster for the States in which the institution of slavery existed and they insisted upon this as a self-protective measure. The constitution recognized the right of each State to preserve the integrity of its own domestic institutions. ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 2, 1917 • Various
... southern hearts—a cargo amounting by this time to 39 wounded persons and 22 dead bodies. And with these she delivered a list of 96 missing persons that had drowned or otherwise perished at the scene of the disaster. ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... still full of the Union disaster, two horsemen came riding up to the tavern oak. Their horses were dripping wet. They had come up the trail from the southwest, where the draws were barely fordable. Strangers excited no comment in a town on the frontier. The trail was always full of them coming ...
— The Price of the Prairie - A Story of Kansas • Margaret Hill McCarter
... and the General made a speech—I did not hear it—in which he told us that there had been a great Russian success, and that in the battle of the morrow a victory for us would smash the Germans once and for all. But our captain was more pessimistic. He thought we should suffer a great disaster. Doubting, we snuggled down in the straw, ...
— Adventures of a Despatch Rider • W. H. L. Watson
... held his paddle poised as if ready to thrust it into the swirling water at a second's notice, to stay the progress of the canoe as it lunged toward a threatening rock, or glided too near a roaring whirlpool, where disaster was certain ...
— Canoe Mates in Canada - Three Boys Afloat on the Saskatchewan • St. George Rathborne
... still near my heart, and with the knowledge in my mind that every fruitless minute spent there would be full of weariness and doubt to her, I was as effectually stopped by this trumpery overturn as if it had been the most serious disaster in the world. My cigar was smoked out, and, after a long pause, I lit another. Sometimes the mere act of listening as intently as I did made me imagine noises in my neighborhood, and I called out frequently on ...
— In Direst Peril • David Christie Murray
... its crowning point—to push forward is victory, to halt is disaster. But the Association feels the pressure of the hard times. It owes a debt of nearly $100,000, and needs four times as much to sustain the work now in hand. Nevertheless, there is no cause for discouragement in all this. There is vast wealth in the nation, and a large share of it is in the hands ...
— The American Missionary - Volume 50, No. 1, January, 1896 • Various
... was fought about the summer solstice, the moon being at full, the very same day in which the sad disaster of the Fabii had happened, when three hundred of that name were at one time cut off ...
— The Boys' and Girls' Plutarch - Being Parts of The "Lives" of Plutarch • Plutarch
... exclaimed, with justice: "By what right is the nation accused of want of devotion and energy towards the Emperor Napoleon? It has followed him to the burning sands of Egypt, and the icy deserts of Moscow; in fifty battle-fields, in disaster as well as in triumph, in the course of ten years, three millions of Frenchmen have perished in his service. We have done ...
— Memoirs To Illustrate The History Of My Time - Volume 1 • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... before been on board an Indiaman. Everything about her seemed grand and ponderous, and gave me the idea of strength and stability. If she was to meet with any disaster, it would not be for want of being well found. The captain remembered my brother, and was very civil to me; and several other people knew my family, so that I spent a most pleasant evening on board, in the society of the nabobs and military officers, and the ladies who had ...
— James Braithwaite, the Supercargo - The Story of his Adventures Ashore and Afloat • W.H.G. Kingston
... if, from the bench, he might not succor the deserving litigant or the penitent offender without violation to the given principles of the law, which, aiming ever for the greater good to the greater number, threatened present disaster for one deserving, he very often privily would busy himself in the matter. This, then, was why they had that ...
— Sundry Accounts • Irvin S. Cobb
... proceeded at a snail's pace, keeping always on the inside of the road and only a few inches from the wall or bank. Once he lost his way and his front wheel struck a small stump, but they were going too slowly for disaster. Another time he failed to follow the turn of the road and found himself in a rough cart track. They backed with difficulty and got right once more. At the fourth turn they came suddenly upon a huge car which had left the road as they had done and was standing amongst the pine trees, ...
— Mr. Grex of Monte Carlo • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... mate from their midst. The occurrence was so totally unexpected that it in a measure sobered the mutineers, who regarded each other with some such expression as that of a group of school-boys terrified at the sudden occurrence of some disaster, the result of their own mischievous acts, and each anxious to shift the blame and responsibility from his own shoulders to ...
— The Voyage of the Aurora • Harry Collingwood
... transport the troops nor equip them completely, but the raising of an enormous number of fresh forces, partially trained, it is true, but of excellent fighting caliber, made possible the maneuvers of Foch that brought disaster to German arms. When once these armies arrived in numbers on the battle-line in France, the realization of the inexhaustible man-power of America did more than anything else to revive the spirit of the Allies ...
— Woodrow Wilson and the World War - A Chronicle of Our Own Times. • Charles Seymour
... or ship or anything she might have run into?" asked the young skipper, whose tanned face had grown pale as he listened to this tale of sudden disaster. ...
— Under the Great Bear • Kirk Munroe
... columns any hint of the preceding day's events in Yonkers, which, if known, must for ever upset the wagon theory? No, that secret was still my secret, only shared by the doctor, who, so far as I understood him, had no intention of breaking his self-imposed silence till his fears of some disaster to the little one had received confirmation. I had therefore several hours before me yet ...
— The Millionaire Baby • Anna Katharine Green
... be constantly ready for doing prodigies—to repair the country's omissions. All the country cares for is to hope Dick Turpin may get to York. Our men are good beasts; they give the best in 'em, and drop. More's the scandal to a country that has grand material and overtasks it. A blazing disaster ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... fortune; lives which have passed through five-and-thirty years of their allotted span without much sorrow, without sharp thorns in the flesh, without those carking, gnawing trials of mind and body which Time stores up for all humanity—such feel disaster when it does reach them with a bitterness unknown by those who have been in misery's school from youth. Poverty does not bite the poor as it bites him who has known riches and afterwards fights destitution; feeble physical circumstances do not ...
— Children of the Mist • Eden Phillpotts
... thrust their pink blossoms through the covering of snow and cheered the beauty-loving people to much silent endurance. The plum tree was almost an object of worship in this part of the Empire. It stood for bravery and loyalty in the face of disaster, but as one tottering old woman put it, as she went down on her knees begging food for her grandbabies, "The Ume Ke makes me suffer great shame for my weakness. It gives joy to weary eyes, courage to fainting heart, but no food for babies." In ...
— The House of the Misty Star - A Romance of Youth and Hope and Love in Old Japan • Fannie Caldwell Macaulay
... may learn the purpose of its erection, from maternal lips, and that weary and withered age may behold it, and be solaced by the recollections which it suggests. We wish that labor may look up here, and be proud in the midst of its toil. We wish that in those days of disaster, which, as they come upon all nations, must be expected to come upon us also, desponding patriotism may turn its eyes hitherward, and be assured that the foundations of our national power are still strong. We wish that this column, rising ...
— Choice Specimens of American Literature, And Literary Reader - Being Selections from the Chief American Writers • Benj. N. Martin
... As soon as disaster befalls a man, all seem to understand his worth. So the parish took upon themselves to rebuild Lars Hogstad's houses, larger and handsomer than any others in the valley. Again he became chairman, but with Canute Aakre at his side, and from that day ...
— Stories by Foreign Authors • Various
... can teach you how those who would do the most for the Dominion need live to-day. He is also, and I am glad of it, one of us, for traditions do not wholly lose their force and we know that blood will tell. That this year has not ended in disaster irretrievable is due to our ...
— Winston of the Prairie • Harold Bindloss
... hopes for the morrow, rather than with reference to the mean facts of the day. One of these towns, which when twenty-four hours old boasted of six saloons, a "court-house," and an "opera house," was overwhelmed by early disaster. The third day of its life a whirlwind came along and took off the opera house and half the saloons; and the following evening lawless men nearly finished the work of the elements. The riders of a huge trail-outfit from Texas, to their glad surprise discovered the town and abandoned themselves ...
— Hunting the Grisly and Other Sketches • Theodore Roosevelt
... the place where the cyclone had struck the ship, lay the great island of Borneo. They knew it to be the nearest land, and for this had they been directing the boat's course ever since their disaster. The tarpaulin now promised to bring them nearer to it in one night, than their oars had done with days of ...
— The Castaways • Captain Mayne Reid
... this occasion. A butcher of Rouen was the only person on board who escaped [c]. He clung to the mast, and was taken up next morning by fishermen. Fitz-Stephens also took hold of the mast, but being informed by the butcher that Prince William had perished, he said that he would not survive the disaster; and he threw himself headlong into the sea [d]. Henry entertained hopes for three days, that his son had put into some distant port of England; but when certain intelligence of the calamity was brought him, he fainted away; and it was remarked, that ...
— The History of England, Volume I • David Hume
... Boeij and Emeloort, for the purpose of making search for the crew of the lost ship de Vergulden Draecq, and of ascertaining whether they were still alive. The said ships returned to this place on the 19th of April following, after exploring the coast about the place of the disaster each of them for herself, since they had got separated; having in different places sent manned boats ashore, and fired many cannon shots time after time both by day and night, without, however, discovering any Netherlanders or any traces of the wreck, excepting a ...
— The Part Borne by the Dutch in the Discovery of Australia 1606-1765 • J. E. Heeres
... I dare undertake. I have told two at the same time, but invariably they clashed and disaster resulted. There! I trust you to make use of the money as you think best. But enough! What do women know of business? It is a mysterious word to them. Now— piquet!" He dragged Norvin to a seat at a table, then trotted away in search ...
— The Net • Rex Beach
... enterprise, who lived about 325 feet above this mill and about 650 feet from the south abutment, heard nothing of it, the wind having carried the noise in an opposite direction. It was not until morning that they learned of the destruction of their work and the extent of the disaster. ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 458, October 11, 1884 • Various
... traditions is leading us towards grave dangers, intensifies. In South Africa the Boers taught us in blood and bitterness the obvious fact that barbed wire had its military uses, and over the high passes on the way to Lhassa (though, luckily, it led to no disaster) there was not a rifle in condition to use because we had not thought to take glycerine. The perpetual novelty of modern conditions demands an imaginative alertness we eliminate. I do not believe that the Army Council or anyone in authority ...
— An Englishman Looks at the World • H. G. Wells
... Marsh dared trust himself to meet the other's eyes as the helpless chief disappeared down the hillside, while Barney entered into an exhaustive treatise on the symptoms of cholera and the liability of the most robust to meet sudden disaster in this malarious upland, circumvailated by ages of decaying matter in the damp swamps on every hand. But when, an hour later, Company K's whole street was aroused by peal on peal of Abderian laughter, Jack and Nick were found helpless in their bunks, ...
— The Iron Game - A Tale of the War • Henry Francis Keenan
... of these four years is ever truthfully written," Mr. Foley continued, "the world will be amazed at the calm indifference of the people threatened day by day with national disaster. We who have been behind the scenes have kept a stiff upper lip before the world, but I tell you frankly, Mr. Maraton, that no Cabinet who ever undertook the government of this country has gone through what we have gone through. Three times we have ...
— A People's Man • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... that presents itself under the pressure of so calamitous a disaster is, that it was not the effect either of treachery or wilful neglect, as will appear by the following official statement of ...
— Thrilling Narratives of Mutiny, Murder and Piracy • Anonymous
... law forbids a trespass upon its bastard prerogatives; and as a consequence, relatives intermarry, until their descendants have degenerated into complete physical and mental imbecility. Such nepotism as this is replete with untold disaster both in the family and in the state. Too many in our democratic country ape this, look to rank, and are blind to all things else. The fruits of this are seen in that codfish aristocracy which floats with self-inflated importance ...
— The Christian Home • Samuel Philips
... which, by the by, has become almost as rare an animal on the western continent as the mastodon or mammoth. As soon as he comes up with the elk, he leaps upon him, and fastens upon his neck, about which he twists his long tail, and then cuts his jugular. The elk has no means of shunning this disaster, but by flying to the water the moment he is seized by this dangerous enemy. The carcajou, who cannot endure the water, quits his hold immediately; but, if the water happen to be at too great a distance, ...
— Traditions of the North American Indians, Vol. 3 (of 3) • James Athearn Jones
... renewed my acquaintance with M. de Gauffecourt, from whom I had some money to receive. I had passed through Nion without going to see my father: not that this was a matter of indifference to me, but because I was unwilling to appear before my mother-in-law, after the disaster which had befallen me, certain of being condemned by her without being heard. The bookseller, Du Villard, an old friend of my father's, reproached me severely with this neglect. I gave him my reasons for it, and to repair my ...
— The Confessions of J. J. Rousseau, Complete • Jean Jacques Rousseau
... time, a wind having arisen, misfortune was heaped upon misfortune, and, in consequence of the fall of timbers upon the kitchen fires, flames burst forth: the fire lasted several days, causing much suffering to the few survivors of this horrible disaster. Not more than 600, besides 25 nobles, escaped, and it was a sad sight to see these people, most of them injured, wandering about almost beside themselves with despair, in the ruined streets, imploring ...
— The Shores of the Adriatic - The Austrian Side, The Kuestenlande, Istria, and Dalmatia • F. Hamilton Jackson
... newsboard the heading, "PEACE RUMOURED." Before I realised what had happened I was crying. I was furious with disappointment. If the war should end before I got there—! On buying a paper I assured myself that such a disaster was quite improbable. I breathed again. Then the reproachful memory came of another occasion when I had been scared by a headline, "Boulogne Has Fallen." I had been scared lest I might be needed at that time; now I was panic-stricken ...
— The Glory of the Trenches • Coningsby Dawson
... the evening, being then within a league of the island, I found the point of the rocks which occasioned this disaster stretching out, as is described before, to the southward, and casting off the current more southerly, had, of course, made another eddy to the north; and this I found very strong, but not directly setting the way my course lay, which was due west, but almost ...
— Robinson Crusoe • Daniel Defoe
... effect which a sudden shock is apt to have, of inducing a sense of curious unreality. I neither read nor slept, nor even thought coherently. I was just aware of disaster and fear. I was alone in my compartment. Sometimes we passed through great, silent, deserted stations, or stopped outside a junction for an express to pass. At one or two places there was a crowd of people, ...
— Hugh - Memoirs of a Brother • Arthur Christopher Benson
... down to B Battery's waggon line to secure something like a night's rest—although I might say that after the spring of 1917 the Boche night-bombers saw to it that our waggon lines were no longer the havens of peace they used to be. Disaster followed. The Boche drenched the battery position with gas. Captain Denny, who had come up from the waggon line to relieve the major, was caught while working out the night-firing programme. Overbury, young Bushman, and another officer were also gassed; ...
— Pushed and the Return Push • George Herbert Fosdike Nichols, (AKA Quex)
... to the old ninth corps, under Burnside, in the present organization of the Army of the Potomac. While that noble army was fighting the battles of the Wilderness, this division was holding the fords of the Rapid Ann. When Grant swung his base away from the river, after the disaster to his right wing, and moved upon Lee's flank, the ninth corps, with its negro division, held an honorable post in the marching column; and at Spottsylvania Court House the correspondents tell us how, with the war cry of Fort Pillow in their mouths, ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 6, No 2, August, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... in speaking of a king, to be told that he is but wax in the hands of Diane and the Cardinal of Lorraine," said Lydia; "that was at the time of the disaster of St. Quentin, was ...
— In Chteau Land • Anne Hollingsworth Wharton
... there was an overwhelming disaster. The French and Spanish forces, commanded by the redoubtable Berwick, completely defeated the combined English, Dutch, and Portuguese troops under Galway, at Almanza. So great a misfortune was this that Galway declared that Spain would have to be evacuated by the Allies. The cause of the ...
— With Marlborough to Malplaquet • Herbert Strang and Richard Stead
... hear of but one; that's a apparition which enlists the attentions of Peets and Old Man Enright a lot. It's a spectre that takes to ha'ntin' about one of Enright's Bar-B-8 sign-camps, an' scarin' up the cattle an' drivin' 'em over a precipice, an' all to Enright's disaster an' loss. Nacherally, Enright don't like this spectral play; an' him an' Peets lays for the wraith with rifles, busts its knee some, an' Peets ampytates its laig. Then they throws it loose; allowin' that ...
— Wolfville Nights • Alfred Lewis
... certain families, is the traditional herald of a death or of an imminent catastrophe. We find the celebrated vision which the painter Segantini had thirteen days before his decease, every detail of which remained in his mind and was represented in his last picture, Death. We find the Messina disaster dearly foreseen, twice over, by a little girl who perished under the ruins of the ill-fated city; and we read of a dream which, three months before the French invasion of Russia, foretold to Countess Toutschkoff ...
— The Unknown Guest • Maurice Maeterlinck
... was in his mouth as he rushed over to the ticker. It did not take him long to grasp the immensity of the disaster. Gardner had bought in at 108 3/4, and that very action seemed to put new life into the stock. Just as it was on the point of breaking for lack of support along came this sensational order for ten thousand shares; and there could be but ...
— Brewster's Millions • George Barr McCutcheon
... Ito's disaster kept him back for an hour, and I sat meanwhile on a rice sack in the hamlet of Katakado, a collection of steep-roofed houses huddled together in a height above the Agano. It was one mob of pack-horses, over 200 of them, biting, squealing, ...
— Unbeaten Tracks in Japan • Isabella L. Bird
... reward, his rider should give him a few pats on the neck and speak encouragingly to him, and she will doubtless find that he will make a bolder effort to obey her voice when he again finds himself confronted with a similar difficulty; because he will associate his first escape from apparent disaster with her voice, and will in time have such confidence in her guidance that a word from her will be quite sufficient to assure him that all is well. When riding bad horses at my husband's breaking classes abroad, I found it best not to speak to them; for a bond of friendship ...
— The Horsewoman - A Practical Guide to Side-Saddle Riding, 2nd. Ed. • Alice M. Hayes
... sorry to confess, for truth's sake, that she did not think the Queen could have heard of the loss of the pig fund, and that it was more likely to be from someone who wished to make up for the disaster—who could it be? She looked at the round stamp upon the green-lettered paper, and read "Portsmouth." Could it be from Papa? Then she looked at the cover; but it was not a bit like the Captain's writing; it was pretty, ...
— The Stokesley Secret • Charlotte M. Yonge
... They were promises of a further sensation," I argued. "The triumphant and gleeful declarations of the mad but mysterious assassin. No. Promise me, Edwards, that you will postpone this projected step of yours, which can, in any case, even though my love be innocent, only result in dire disaster." ...
— The Sign of Silence • William Le Queux
... other canoes, appalled by the disaster, and busy, too, in picking up the derelicts, hung back. Henry and Shif'less Sol took advantage of the opportunity, and sent bullet after bullet among them, aiming more particularly at the light ...
— The Free Rangers - A Story of the Early Days Along the Mississippi • Joseph A. Altsheler
... creature living Would do it, and prove, through every disaster, So fond, so faithful, and so forgiving, To such a miserable, thankless master. No, Sir! see him wag his tail and grin— By George! it makes my old eyes water— That is, there's something in this gin That chokes ...
— Poems Teachers Ask For, Book Two • Various
... suspicion, and that in time to intercept the suddenness of the murder. Now, for the sake of the dramatic effect, this interception ought more often to have been introduced, else the murders are but so many blind surprises as if in sleep.] charges some disaster of his own upon having neglected such an omen of the morning. The same belief operated in Pagan Italy. The same omen announced to Lord Lindsay's Arab attendants in the desert the approach of some disaster, which partially happened in the morning. And a Highlander of the 42d ...
— Narrative And Miscellaneous Papers • Thomas De Quincey
... the wealth of disaster. He had always regarded his father as an exceptionally acute man of business. And now.... The letters of which his sister Kate wrote had never reached him. The mail service was wretched, he knew; but it seemed incredible that such important letters ...
— A Man of Two Countries • Alice Harriman
... the mother mourn! Well might the father look as if years of care had been added to his life that day! For a disaster like this happening in any household—especially a household where love is recognized as a tangible truth, neither to be laughed at, passed carelessly over, nor lectured down—makes the family cease to ...
— John Halifax, Gentleman • Dinah Maria Mulock Craik
... had an opportunity for distinguishing himself—and he succeeded! for that same evening he was accused of trying to poison the whole conclave, and was obliged to leave Rome and Italy without waiting to pack up. This disaster was the last straw. Now," and Gambara put his finger to his forehead ...
— Gambara • Honore de Balzac
... ship. The tide-rip was mistaken for earthquake; and when the lurid glare of volcanic smoke came through the fog, the sailors huddled panic-stricken below-decks and refused to obey orders. Every man became his own master; and if that ever works well on land, it means disaster at sea. Thus it has almost always been with the inefficient and the misfits who have gone out in ships—land-lubbers trying to be navigators. Just when Bering's crew should have braced themselves to resist the greatest stress, they collapsed and huddled together with ...
— Pioneers of the Pacific Coast - A Chronicle of Sea Rovers and Fur Hunters • Agnes C. Laut
... followers across the bridge. Here the English, who still outnumbered his army, and who had now all the advantage of position which had previously been on the side of the Scots, might have defended the bridge, or in good order have given him battle on the other side. The sight, however, of the terrible disaster which had befallen nearly half their number before their eyes, without their being able to render them the slightest assistance, had completely demoralized them, and as soon as the Scotch were seen to be ...
— In Freedom's Cause • G. A. Henty
... form a labyrinth, difficult to pass even to those familiar with the country. The Masurian region is a great trap for any commander who has not had unlimited acquaintance with the place. Causeways, filled with great care, and railroads permit an orderly advance, but in a confused retreat disaster at ...
— History of the World War - An Authentic Narrative of the World's Greatest War • Francis A. March and Richard J. Beamish
... the commander of the vessel beyond the power of earthly foes. One of the larger ropes of the vessel snapt, and the heavy block attached to it swung against the captain with such violence as to kill him on the spot. The momentary confusion which followed the disaster distracted the attention of the steersman, and a heavy sea was shipped, by which the captain's body was swept overboard. No attempt was made to lower a boat or check the ship. Even the unskilled emigrants understood that no boat could ...
— The Island Queen • R.M. Ballantyne
... remembered how Peter the Hermit had led the vast advance-guard of the First Crusade to sudden and miserable destruction before the main force could be organized; he had seen enough on that afternoon to prove to him that the air was laden with such disaster, of which the responsibility would surely be heaped upon himself. He regretted not the thoughts he had preached, but the fact of having yielded to preach at all to such men and at such a time. He had begun ...
— Via Crucis • F. Marion Crawford
... brains for that way of preventing it, but in vain. She could devise no plan. The more she considered the matter, the worse it grew. She could not bear to be associated in Antony's mind with disaster; she desired most keenly to stand for everything that was pleasant and delightful in his life. She would not let her brute of a husband spoil both their lives. He had ...
— The Loudwater Mystery • Edgar Jepson
... and become fitted for political freedom; when, like all other evils that afflict the earth, pauperism, and bondage or abject dependence, shall cease and disappear. But it does not preach revolution to those who are fond of kings, nor rebellion that can end only in disaster and defeat, or in substituting one tyrant for another, or a multitude of despots ...
— Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry • Albert Pike
... anybody," he said, morosely. "Somebody ought to take a snap-shot of the scene of our disaster. If you don't want the canoe, I'll ...
— A Young Man in a Hurry - and Other Short Stories • Robert W. Chambers
... with war. Thus the matter could neither be dropped altogether, nor brought to a conclusion. Besides, other wars were threatening either at the moment, as from the Aequans and Volscians, who remained inactive no longer than was necessary, to allow the recent smart of their late disaster to pass away, or at no distant date, as it was evident that the Sabines, ever hostile, and all Etruria would soon begin to stir up war: but the Veientines, a constant rather than a formidable enemy, kept their minds in a state of perpetual uneasiness by petty ...
— Roman History, Books I-III • Titus Livius
... were invested in the combined American industries at vastly inflated values, that the few had all the real money, and that any attempt upon the people's part to regulate and control the new system of robbery, would be fraught with unparalleled disaster—not to the "System," but ...
— Friday, the Thirteenth • Thomas W. Lawson
... to Zeppelins seemed to show that the risks were great. The experts who were consulted pointed out that the only way to test the value of the larger type of airship was to build such airships ourselves, that Germany had patiently persevered in her airship policy in the face of disaster and loss, and that if we were to succeed with airships it would be necessary to warn the public that heavy losses, in the initial stage, were unavoidable. Opinion in this island, it is right to remember, was strong against the airship, or gas-bag, ...
— The War in the Air; Vol. 1 - The Part played in the Great War by the Royal Air Force • Walter Raleigh
... feelings less praiseworthy. France was our old enemy. It was against France that the most glorious battles recorded in our annals had been fought. The conquest of France had been twice effected by the Plantagenets. The loss of France had been long remembered as a great national disaster. The title of King of France was still borne by our sovereigns. The lilies of France still appeared, mingled with our own lions, on the shield of the House of Stuart. In the sixteenth century the dread inspired ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 1 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... investment interest. Prospects for foreign trade or investment in other sectors will remain poor, however, because of the small size of the economy, its technological backwardness, its remoteness, its landlocked geographic location, and its susceptibility to natural disaster. The international community's role of funding more than 60% of Nepal's development budget and more than 28% of total budgetary expenditures will likely continue as a major ...
— The 1999 CIA Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... I lay in bed, that we were acting foolishly; for an ancient shepherd had dropped in and taken supper with us, and foretold a heavy fall and great disaster to live stock. He said that he had known a frost beginning, just as this had done, with a black east wind, after days of raw cold fog, and then on the third night of the frost, at this very time of year (to wit on the ...
— Lorna Doone - A Romance of Exmoor • R. D. Blackmore
... of a couple of miles through narrow country lanes brought us to a park gate, which was opened for us by an old lodge-keeper, whose haggard face bore the reflection of some great disaster. The avenue ran through a noble park, between lines of ancient elms, and ended in a low, widespread house, pillared in front after the fashion of Palladio. The central part was evidently of a great age and shrouded in ivy, but the large windows showed that modern changes had ...
— The Return of Sherlock Holmes • Arthur Conan Doyle
... which threaten us in this life pass us by. So it was with the impending disaster of piling ice near the submarine. ...
— Lost In The Air • Roy J. Snell
... comte. There was perhaps a redeeming gallantry in the spirit which determined the Comte de Chelincourt to incur the risk of passing so near six vessels with only two, that might throw a veil over the indiscretion; more especially as his own fleet was near enough to support him in the event of any disaster, and it was certainly possible that the loss of a material spar on board either of his foes, might induce the capture of the vessel. At all events, thus reasoned M. de Chelincourt; who continued boldly on, with his larboard tacks aboard, always hugging the wind, even after the Temeraire ...
— The Two Admirals • J. Fenimore Cooper
... a glorious victory. At Oriskany, Herkimer, in an unlooked-for battle, won undying fame, although most of his gallant little band were slaughtered. Schuyler sent Arnold with Larned's brigade to retrieve Herkimer's disaster, which he did in an admirable manner. Gansevoort held the fort against St. Leger, but his situation was growing desperate, when one day without apparent cause the enemy fled in haste, leaving camps, baggage and artillery. This inglorious flight was brought about by a half-wined fellow, who wandered ...
— See America First • Orville O. Hiestand
... self-reproach. "While he made the attack in front, he sent some of his men to the rear of the vessel and it was quietly made off with while we were fighting." Had the disappearance of the box concerned himself alone Cleggett's sense of disaster might have been less poignant. But the thought that his own carelessness had enabled the enemy to get possession of a thing likely to involve Lady Agatha in further trouble was nearly insupportable. He gritted his teeth and clenched his hands ...
— The Cruise of the Jasper B. • Don Marquis
... must disagree with you. I am not responsible for the disaster that overtook your herd. Furthermore, doubly to assure you, write to the State Veterinary as to whether or not my ...
— The Little Lady of the Big House • Jack London
... deemed expedient that Her Highness should withdraw to Aumale, under the plea of ill-health, and thence proceed to England; and it was also by way of Aumale that she as secretly returned, after the fatal disaster of the stoppage, to discourage the impression of her ever having ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... Had she been alone in the world, she would not have grieved much over the catastrophe, but she was sadly affected by the thought that her son's future was, perhaps, irrevocably blighted, and that, in any case, this disaster would condemn him to enter life through the cramped ...
— The Count's Millions - Volume 1 (of 2) • Emile Gaboriau
... and the superiority of the goose-quill over the sword, there is no achievement of human genius on which a country so prides itself as on success in war, no disgrace over which it broods so inconsolably as military disaster. ...
— The Writings of James Russell Lowell in Prose and Poetry, Volume V - Political Essays • James Russell Lowell
... a bath-room for Madame la Marechale d'Ancre, and mourned over this chamber having been burnt at the time of the marechal's disaster. ...
— Ten Years Later - Chapters 1-104 • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... Now I shall tell you. Oh! what a bad woman she was! Impossible to keep her in the albergo. 'Please go away, Letterio; I am very sorry; you and your wife also.' And went away, to his home in Messina and his wife also. In the winter was coming the disaster, the terremoto, the earthquake, and the city was finished to be consumed and the train was bringing the fugitives all day and all night. I was down to the station, Brancaccia was making ready the beds, Carmelo was driving them up and was bringing more and then more—broken people, ...
— Castellinaria - and Other Sicilian Diversions • Henry Festing Jones
... pay." Sailing as his consort was the Cinque Ports, whose master was Alexander Selkirk, the original of Robinson Crusoe. This voyage, fully recounted in Dampier's book, is a long tale of adventure, hardship, and disaster, and the explorer eventually returned to England a beggar. However, his travels made a great stir, and he was allowed to kiss the Queen's hand and to have the honour of relating his adventures ...
— The Pirates' Who's Who - Giving Particulars Of The Lives and Deaths Of The Pirates And Buccaneers • Philip Gosse
... around Elmvale were searched and the last body brought to light, little was said about the cause of the disaster. But the following evening Whistler and his chums were called to the office of the sheriff of the county to tell what they knew about the stranger, Blake, who had disappeared just ...
— Navy Boys Behind the Big Guns - Sinking the German U-Boats • Halsey Davidson
... thoughts, interesting thoughts? He was a man with a temper; tenacious, faithful. Women would have felt, "Here is law. Here is order. Therefore we must cherish this man. He is on the Bridge at night," and, handing him his cup, or whatever it might be, would run on to visions of shipwreck and disaster, in which all the passengers come tumbling from their cabins, and there is the captain, buttoned in his pea-jacket, matched with the storm, vanquished by it but by none other. "Yet I have a soul," Mrs. Jarvis would bethink her, as Captain Barfoot suddenly blew his nose in a great red ...
— Jacob's Room • Virginia Woolf
... although the benefits of this action were partially defeated by continued world overproduction. Incident to this action the failure of a large number of farmers and of country banks was averted which could quite possibly have spread into a major disaster. The banks in the South have cooperated with the Farm Board in creation of a pool for the better marketing of accumulated cotton. Growers have been materially assisted by this action. Constant effort has ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... along the coast of Mexico, now under the French flag, when he found an opportunity for traffic with the natives, colonists or savages; now under the English flag, when he wished to exercise his trade of corsair, an easy profession, for since the disaster of Vigo, the Spanish had abandoned their transatlantic ...
— The Solitary of Juan Fernandez, or The Real Robinson Crusoe • Joseph Xavier Saintine
... need to answer, and indeed the girl could not utter a word, so intense was her misery, so overpowering her assurance of impending disaster. ...
— The Mayor of Warwick • Herbert M. Hopkins
... patient over to the silent shore. And have we not just read of the actions of the Queen's galleys and their brave crews in the Chinese waters? Men not more worthy of human renown and honor to-day in their victory, than last year in their glorious hour of disaster. So with stout hearts may we ply the oar, messmates all, till the voyage is over, and the ...
— Roundabout Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray
... patience of fatigue and privation, with which he had inspired his followers. It is surprising, however, how often they extricated him from his difficulties; and even in his last expedition against Russia, which terminated in the disaster of Pultowa, he would, to all appearance, have proved successful, if the Tartar chief, Mazeppa, had proved faithful to his engagement. Like Hannibal, his heroic qualities had inspired a multifarious army—colluvies omnium gentium—with one homogeneous spirit, rendered them subject to his discipline, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 364, February 1846 • Various
... Such ludicrous contradictions only help to destroy the case against trusting a free Ireland to give religion its legitimate, and no more than legitimate, position in the State. Ireland is intensely religious, and it would be a disaster of the first magnitude if the Roman Catholic masses were to lose faith in their Church. The preservation of that faith depends on the ...
— The Framework of Home Rule • Erskine Childers
... Dnieper, cross the latter at Rassasna, and ascend quickly to Smolensk. He reckoned upon finding the town without defence, and then by a sudden movement taking the Russian in flank, and so at last inflicting upon his enemies a great military disaster. The movements of the French army were to be concealed from the enemy behind the forests abounding everywhere. It was important to conceal our march from the Russians, who were about to form their junction ...
— Worlds Best Histories - France Vol 7 • M. Guizot and Madame Guizot De Witt
... Melville's students in St. Andrews. In Sedan, an Aberdonian was Principal, and another fellow-countryman filled the Chair of Philosophy. In this retired frontier town of France, the scene in our own day of the crowning disaster to her army which gave the finishing stroke to the Napoleonic dynasty, Melville spent the remainder of his days; and from it he passed away to the land ...
— Andrew Melville - Famous Scots Series • William Morison
... breeze; for the continued excitement of the last three days had left a fever on his brain which made him restless and confused. He longed for repose, but he knew that for him there was no rest. He had his forebodings—he perceived in the vista of futurity a long-continued chain of danger and disaster, even to death; yet he beheld it without emotion and without dread. He felt as if it were only three days that he had begun to exist; he was melancholy, but not unhappy. His thoughts were constantly recurring to the fatal letter—its strange supernatural disappearance seemed pointedly ...
— The Phantom Ship • Frederick Marryat
... attacked, and several persons had been murdered. A massacre had been perpetrated in the city of Cahors, not far distant from them. In both cases the entire authority of parliament had been exerted to shield the guilty. The Huguenots, therefore, resolved to forestall disaster by throwing Toulouse into the hands of Conde, and succeeded so far as to introduce some companies of soldiers within the walls and to seize the "hotel de ville." They had, however, miscalculated their strength. The Roman Catholics were more numerous, ...
— History of the Rise of the Huguenots - Volume 2 • Henry Baird
... feelings of the boys as they went on their mission. Here was mute evidence that others of the ill-fated ship had met disaster. They had often speculated on the fate of their companions. How many had been left ...
— The Wonder Island Boys: Exploring the Island • Roger Thompson Finlay
... whom his father was a faithful friend, without compromising his religious principles and practice. Friedrich was born at Brandenburg on February 12, 1777, was educated by good parents at home, served in the Prussian army through disaster and success, took an enthusiastic part in the rising of his country against Napoleon, inditing as many battle-songs as Korner. When victory was achieved, he dedicated his sword in the church of Neunhausen where his estate ...
— Undine - I • Friedrich de la Motte Fouque
... near Brussels where Napoleon met defeat. So complete and so decisive was the disaster that Waterloo has come ...
— Elson Grammer School Literature, Book Four. • William H. Elson and Christine Keck
... weariness, and always the sense of there being so little time. Rumors raced along the lines, five thousand, ten thousand blue bellies on the march, drawing in from every garrison in the blue grass. And those who had been hunted along the Ohio roads a year before were haunted by that old memory of disaster. ...
— Ride Proud, Rebel! • Andre Alice Norton
... aunt to uncle and me aside, smiling in pity, "how slight an impression disaster makes on their minds!" and ...
— The Flower of the Chapdelaines • George W. Cable
... Gothic kingdom was a disaster for Italy. Immediately after the death of Justinian the country was overrun anew, by the Lombards, the last of the great German peoples to establish themselves within the bounds of the former Empire. They were a savage race, a considerable ...
— An Introduction to the History of Western Europe • James Harvey Robinson
... after Toby had started to run away the proprietor of the circus drove up to the scene of disaster, and, after seeing that the wagon was being rapidly fixed up so that it could be hauled to the next town, he ordered that search should be made for the monkeys. It was very important that they should be captured at once, and he appeared ...
— Toby Tyler • James Otis
... remind me of an engagement which in the eyes of the king and your mother would be unpardonable and punishable, and of which it would be my duty to inform them. As long as you are happy—that will be as long as your love is under the protection of secrecy—I will see nothing, know nothing. But when disaster and ruin break over you, then come to me; then you, my brother, shall find in me a fond, sympathizing sister, and you, poor, wretched girl, will find a friend who will open her arms to you, and will weep with ...
— Frederick the Great and His Court • L. Muhlbach
... fought about the summer solstice, the moon being at full, the very same day in which the sad disaster of the Fabii had happened, when three hundred of that name were at one time cut off by the Tuscans. But from this second loss and defeat the day got the name of Alliensis, from the river Allia, and still retains it. The question of unlucky days, whether we should consider any to be so, and ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... a scene to surprise more than to entertain the beholder. The avalanche promised disaster to the participants in it. Tons upon tons of sand, undulating and sinuous in appearance, traveled faster and yet faster behind the old gray mare and the gray old sea captain. The smoke of the slide hid all that lay behind them, and these wreaths of sand dust threatened a higher wave ...
— Sheila of Big Wreck Cove - A Story of Cape Cod • James A. Cooper
... the other half of the problem, our failures even fail to instruct us. After each new collapse we begin our life anew, but on the old conditions; and the attempt ends as usual in the repetition—in the circumstances the inevitable repetition—of the old disaster. Natural Law, Environment, ...
— Beautiful Thoughts • Henry Drummond
... next rider to arrive at that anxious house, and he came as the messenger of disaster. He arrived between midnight and morning, his horse spur-gashed, driven to the limit, himself sunken-eyed from his anxiety and hard ...
— The Rustler of Wind River • G. W. Ogden
... unsatisfactory interview that Danny had with the Chief. "You're crazy!" was the verdict of that A. F. F. official when Danny had finished. "You're crazy, or else—or else—" His voice trailed off; his eyes were on the moving letters that flashed their message of disaster in an ever changing procession across the ...
— The Hammer of Thor • Charles Willard Diffin
... wretches were beating. The Spaniard and Friday urged, in their indignation, that we discharge our muskets at the unholy crew; but I restrained them from such an intelligible piece of violence, reflecting that the barbarous customs of these people might be regarded as their own disaster, and that I was not called upon to judge their actions, much less to execute the judgment of heaven upon them. Besides, they were in such numbers that, had we attacked, we should have been overwhelmed. So, calling for my litter, I returned to ...
— The So-called Human Race • Bert Leston Taylor
... extended her hands in deprecation and entreaty. "Alas, what must you think of me? How can I explain my humiliating myself before a stranger? Only by telling you the whole truth—the fact that I am not alone in this disaster, that I could not confess my situation to my family without ruining myself, and involving in my ruin some one who, however undeservedly, has been as dear to me as—as you ...
— Madame de Treymes • Edith Wharton
... wealthy disciple, who had given six thousand dollars for the building of the Pilgrim House, and hoped to end his days within it, retired forever after a very short sojourn, not dissuaded from the theory, but convinced that the practical application was foredoomed to disaster. And, in truth, though a manful effort was made, with good pecuniary success for a time, ten years brought the final hour of failure ...
— A Study Of Hawthorne • George Parsons Lathrop
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