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More "Nervousness" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the strength of his lungs, would seem a victim to consumption. His eye is as black as Erebus, and has the most mocking, lying-in-wait expression conceivable. His mouth is alive with a kind of impatient nervousness, and when he has burst forth with a particularly successful cataract of expression, it assumes a curl of triumphant scorn that would be worthy of Mephistopheles. A thick, heavy mass of jet-black ringlets ...
— Little Memoirs of the Nineteenth Century • George Paston
... complexes may creep into the stupor. Raecke's stupor, like Ganser's twilight syndrome, frequently develops in criminals immediately after arrest or as a result of great physical or psychic exertion. Sometimes the stupor is preceded by convulsions, at other times by a prodromal stage of general nervousness. In still other cases, unpleasant delusions and elementary hallucinations precede the stupor, which may follow immediately after this prodromal state or may be again preceded by a short attack of mania with clouded consciousness. ...
— Studies in Forensic Psychiatry • Bernard Glueck
... women talked together for some time in whispers, Jane bringing a chair to place opposite her mother's. They sat knee to knee, and now and then Jane shed a tear from pure nervousness. She was so appalled by the fear of making a mistake which, being revealed by some chance, would bring confusion upon and pain ...
— Emily Fox-Seton - Being The Making of a Marchioness and The Methods of Lady Walderhurst • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... door behind him made Selwyn start as if struck; gave evidence of strain and nervousness of which he was unconscious, and, jumping up, he went toward the door and opened it. In the hall Bettina and Jimmy Gibbons were standing. The latter was twisting his cap round and round in his hand, his big, brown eyes looking first at Bettina and then at me and then ...
— People Like That • Kate Langley Bosher
... occur once (the first time) and fail to recur the following month or for a number of months. This need cause no alarm as long as the general health remains good. It will come again in its own time. Nervousness may cause a suspension of menstruation. This is quite common in school girls who are driven too hard at school, whose sleep is interfered with, whose appetite is poor and who are allowed too many social indiscretions, as parties, dances, etc., where ...
— The Eugenic Marriage, Vol 2 (of 4) - A Personal Guide to the New Science of Better Living and Better Babies • W. Grant Hague
... me!" exclaimed the girls, huddling up closer to Miss Salisbury's knees. Miss Anstice paced back and forth; it was too late to stop the story now, and her nervousness could only be ...
— Five Little Peppers at School • Margaret Sidney
... the least. Clerval said that if I could have put on the appearance of nervousness the empress, who is kindness itself, would ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... scream, a sob, almost a groan, broke from the Princess, and she clung to her son as though she sought protection from that bloodthirsty Seventh Regiment. Prince Michael, fumbling with an eyeglass, dropped it in sheer nervousness. Alec, throwing an arm round his mother, recalled the hoarse yelling of the newsboys on the boulevards. Was it this latest doom of a monarchy that they were bawling so lustily? He glanced at his father, and the ...
— A Son of the Immortals • Louis Tracy
... answer to your generous offer, Billy Harvey, is—" Mr. Goodloe paused and looked at me, and Jessie giggled with nervousness—"the same that I made to your offer about the ...
— The Heart's Kingdom • Maria Thompson Daviess
... have piled up grassy sods into a sort of pedestal for the singers to stand on. They lead Beckmesser to this. He stumbles in going, and can hardly from nervousness keep his balance on the none too secure elevation. The common people begin to titter. Murmurs fly from one to the other: "What? That one? That is one of the suitors? Why, he can't even walk!... Keep quiet! He is an eminent master! He is the town-clerk.... Lord, what a muff! He is ...
— The Wagnerian Romances • Gertrude Hall
... now, you are to blame," said the Powers-that-Be severely, and I, personally, felt the responsibility of so momentous an event, and awaited with no little nervousness the signal which would tell us to sever the ropes, for it was important that the two fastenings should be cut at exactly the same moment to avoid a strain on the cable. "Now!" called the cable expert. It was a thrilling ...
— A Woman's Journey through the Philippines - On a Cable Ship that Linked Together the Strange Lands Seen En Route • Florence Kimball Russel
... of nervousness and anxiety that had followed the first shot had passed, and the boys were as eager to see the affair to an end as if they had been spectators at a play. They did not yet seem to feel themselves a part of the drama that might so easily ...
— A Voyage with Captain Dynamite • Charles Edward Rich
... in a manner quite different from the style in which it was treated at the Harp. Here no voice was raised in its favor—no word of justification advanced in its behalf. Still, although its importance was ignored ostensibly, there were a nervousness and misgiving about some of those who conversed upon it, which showed that they were ill at ease. There seemed, in addition, to be some vague sense of insecurity preying upon them, which could only ...
— Ridgeway - An Historical Romance of the Fenian Invasion of Canada • Scian Dubh
... returned, and the fly hired on her account, though not by her husband, at the Crown Hotel, Shottsford-Forum, had been paid for and dismissed. The long drive had somewhat revived her, her illness being a feverish intermittent nervousness which had more to do with mind than body, and she walked about her sitting-room in something of a hopeful mood. Mrs. Melbury had told her as soon as she arrived that her husband had returned from London. He had gone out, she said, to ...
— The Woodlanders • Thomas Hardy
... only too well today by those who seek to know, that back of all such physical conditions as nervousness, prostration, temporary insanity, nervous disorders, pains resembling rheumatism, hay fever, heart troubles, mental symptoms, nervous chills, morbid forebodings and mild mania, there lurks the abnormal activity of the psychic or "thought body" caused by thoughts and feelings ...
— Freedom Talks No. II • Julia Seton, M.D.
... compact that it was impossible to make his way through it. He saw himself forced to remain where he was and to submit, even to the end, to Stephane's amiable soliloquy. So he pretended not to hear him, and concealed his impatience as well as he could; but his nervousness betrayed him in spite of himself, and to the great diversion of Stephane, who maliciously enjoyed his own success. Fortunately for Gilbert, when Judas had stopped singing, the procession resumed its march towards a second station at the other end of the village, and this caused ...
— Stories of Modern French Novels • Julian Hawthorne
... of the man who had resigned closed half way upon encountering the blushing eavesdropper. The Panama Line operator moved uncertainly toward a vacant chair. Unaware of the curious stares addressed at him Moore went to the outer door. A wave of exquisite nervousness rippled through the silence of the static-room as ...
— Peter the Brazen - A Mystery Story of Modern China • George F. Worts
... so well, for all his shyness and nervousness. He seemed to gather something of the great man's soul as he played before him at the ...
— The Shagganappi • E. Pauline Johnson
... Hunt Cup for last year, and that you ought to keep an eye on him for the Ayrshire Handicap. But I have remarked that horses are not like men; they do not always run almost equally well, though the conditions of the race seem similar. No doubt this is owing to the nervousness of the animal, who may be discouraged by the noise, the smell of ...
— Punch Volume 102, May 28, 1892 - or the London Charivari • Various
... the Laurels again that evening after supper. And, while Mrs. Purcell affected to doze, and Susie, as confidante, held Kate and Eliza well in play, he found another moment. With a solemnity impaired by extreme nervousness, he asked Miss Purcell if she would accept a copy of Browning's Poems, which he had ventured to order for her from town. He hadn't brought it with him, because he wished to multiply pretexts for calling; besides, as he said, he didn't know whether ...
— The Judgment of Eve • May Sinclair
... it began. At first it was little more than a sense of nervousness. Before I had been content to sit in my chair and doze. Now, in spite of myself, I found myself pacing the floor, back and forth like a caged animal. I could have sworn, at the time, that some sinister presence ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science September 1930 • Various
... at his very worst for Edward's benefit was not apparent, except that complete silence acts on the nerves, and nervousness brings ...
— Gone to Earth • Mary Webb
... the midwife and the Marchioness de Bouille. This was the Marquis de Saint-Maixent, who gave his orders, encouraged his people, watched over every point of his plot, himself a prey to the agonies of nervousness which accompany the preparations for ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... great notion of carrying out orders, and a certain zest in the mere act of obedience. Three days before I had been as nervous as a kitten because I was alone and it was 'up to me,' as Americans say, to decide on the next step. But now that I was only one wheel in a great machine of defence my nervousness seemed to have fled. I was well aware that the mission I was bound on was full of risk; but, to my surprise, I felt no fear. Indeed, I had much the same feeling as a boy on a Saturday's holiday who has planned a big expedition. ...
— Prester John • John Buchan
... luncheon, and got into a large chestnut tree near the house by climbing on top of the hen house. We had always before had the farmer's boy to do the climbing into the upper branches, and I confess to a certain nervousness, especially as Tish, when far above the ground, decided to take off her dress skirt, which was her second best tailor-made, and climb ...
— More Tish • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... deal of amusement and consumed a great deal of time. Kilian and young Lowder went a mile and a half to get a man to play for them. When he came, he had to be instructed as to the style of music to be furnished, and the rasping and scraping of that miserable instrument put me beside myself with nervousness. Then the "ball-room" had to be aired and lighted; then the negro's music was found to be incompatible with modern movements; even a waltz was proved impossible, and nobody would consent to remember a quadrille but Richard. So they had ...
— Richard Vandermarck • Miriam Coles Harris
... with the Claiborne family, and A.O. almost prayed that Jimmy would make his visit in her absence. On her return she had so much to tell that she did not mention his name, and A.O. hoped that he was forgotten. All Monday afternoon she went around in a flutter of nervousness, "feeling in her bones" that Jimmy would be there that night, and afraid that Elise would find some way in which to carry out her threat of seeing him at all hazards. One of the ways she had suggested trying, was to sound ...
— The Little Colonel's Chum: Mary Ware • Annie Fellows Johnston
... by the demon of nervousness to be glad of the magnetic influences of a friend's company in a public promenade, or of a horse beneath him in passing through a churchyard, will have some faint idea of how utterly exposed and defenceless ...
— The Portent & Other Stories • George MacDonald
... peculiar effect: the unsteady voice touched her breast to a kindred fluttering, and her throat grew parched and so irritated that a violent fit of coughing could not be restrained, and this, with the nervousness and alarm which his appearance had thronged upon her, drove her to a very fever of distress. But she could not take her eyes away from him, and she wondered and was afraid of what he might say. She knew there were a great many things ...
— Mary, Mary • James Stephens
... return journey to London when a meek knock and an apologetic cough reached his ears. He turned and saw Tufnell standing at the half-open door. The face of the old butler wore a look of mingled determination and nervousness—the expression of a timid man who had braced himself to a bold course of action after much ...
— The Hand in the Dark • Arthur J. Rees
... Frank without a sign of nervousness in his voice. He turned slowly, and aimed his revolver at the ground ...
— The Boy Allies Under Two Flags • Ensign Robert L. Drake
... ridiculous canard originate?" demanded a pompous and elderly gentleman as he tugged at his closely cropped mustache with a nervousness belying his scepticism. His ...
— Destiny • Charles Neville Buck
... sentences amplifying his thesis, apparently engrossed in his subject, saw Paula make the aside, although no word of it reached his ears, saw her increasing nervousness, saw the silent sympathy of Graham, and wondered what had been the few words she uttered, while to the listening table he ...
— The Little Lady of the Big House • Jack London
... this mawnin'," replied the nearest bartender, smiling. He showed a little nervousness with his hands, otherwise he was composed, and his offer to treat expressed his sentiment. Pan took the bottle with his left hand, poured out some liquor, set the bottle down, and lifted the glass. He had his drink. His ...
— Valley of Wild Horses • Zane Grey
... In her nervousness and embarrassment Pollyanna did not notice that she had given the young man the old name of his boyhood. Mrs. Chilton, however, evidently did notice it. With palpable reluctance she turned and inclined ...
— Pollyanna Grows Up • Eleanor H. Porter
... nervousness increased. His chances were better, but she could hear the awful words of Kate Ransom swearing away his life. Their echoes rang in her soul until she could ...
— The One Woman • Thomas Dixon
... and continued his business correspondence with the noble family and the solicitors. Thus engaged, he heard footsteps outside, footsteps on the gravel, footsteps on the doorstop. He got up, not without the slightest show of nervousness, and opened the door. Lord Harry was right. There stood the woman who had been his first nurse—the woman who overheard and watched—the woman who suspected. The suspicion and the intention of watching ...
— Blind Love • Wilkie Collins
... rudely disturbed. Of a sudden, one of our young officers rushed through the door of our shelter. Poor laddie, he was very young and his anxiety exceeded even his nervousness. Nervousness is very natural, I can assure you. It is natural in a private; it is more so in the officer who feels responsibility for the ...
— Private Peat • Harold R. Peat
... in which she spoke served to reassure Fan; and knowing that she could do better, and getting over her nervousness, she began again, and this time Miss Starbrow let ...
— Fan • Henry Harford
... does no mischief. The Duke after the duel sent Lord Melville to the Duke of Montrose with a message that his son-in-law had behaved very much like a gentleman. The women, particularly of course Lady Jersey, have been very ridiculous, affecting nervousness and fine feeling, though they never heard of the business till some hours after it was over. Mrs. Arbuthnot was not so foolish but made very light of it all, which was in better sense and ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William - IV, Volume 1 (of 3) • Charles C. F. Greville
... they are as a rule taken at meal times, which mitigates the effects of the caffein, they are recognized by every one as tending to produce sleeplessness, and often indigestion, stomach disorders, and a condition which, for lack of a better term, is described as nervousness.... The excessive drinking of tea and coffee is acknowledged to be injurious by ...
— All About Coffee • William H. Ukers
... the door. Her master's callers were usually cheerful Bohemians, who chatted at sight. Then she caught Grant's eye, and went out, banging the door in sheer nervousness. ...
— The Postmaster's Daughter • Louis Tracy
... best—it was a weak attempt—to explain the nervousness of the veteran servants and their display of violence. Her arrival made it likely that we should soon know more about the "parties" whose visits and inquiries had so alarmed Antoine and his comrades. Now ...
— Lady Larkspur • Meredith Nicholson
... walking excitedly about. She would talk rapidly one moment, and then relapse into a sudden chilled silence in which she seemed to hear nothing. Once or twice she laughed a hard, unnatural laugh of pure nervousness. ...
— Dr. Heidenhoff's Process • Edward Bellamy
... for home. My mother seemed then to feel that she was out of the reach of the enemy who had persecuted her for so many years. She overcame her nervousness, and her strength increased every day. I had purchased a rocking-chair in Liverpool for her use on the hurricane deck, and every pleasant day we sat together there. On these days my mother told me what she had suffered. I had not permitted her ...
— Seek and Find - or The Adventures of a Smart Boy • Oliver Optic
... friend." And that "You were!" awoke My sense, and nervousness found voice and spoke Of what he had been, ...
— Poems New and Old • John Freeman
... over La Grivotte, who was now shivering with intense fever, again attacked by her horrible cough. Meanwhile the other female pilgrims were tidying themselves. The ten women at the far end were fastening their fichus and tying their cap strings, with a kind of modest nervousness displayed on their mournfully ugly faces. And Elise Rouquet, all attention, with her face close to her pocket glass, did not cease examining her nose, mouth, and cheeks, admiring herself with the thought that she was really ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... seventh or eighth day after the placing of the lady Madeline within the donjon, that I experienced the full power of such feelings. Sleep came not near my couch—while the hours waned and waned away. I struggled to reason off the nervousness which had dominion over me. I endeavored to believe that much, if not all of what I felt, was due to the bewildering influence of the gloomy furniture of the room—of the dark and tattered draperies, which, tortured ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 2 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... was no one in it now but Mary, the chambermaid, who said it was soon to be occupied by a sick gentleman, adding that she believed he had the consumption, and hoped his cough would not fret Miss Bigelow. Ethie hoped so too. Nervousness, and, indeed, diseases of all kinds, seemed to develop rapidly at Clifton, where one has nothing to do but to watch each new symptom, and report to physician or nurse, and Ethie was not an exception. ...
— Ethelyn's Mistake • Mary Jane Holmes
... torn between emotions, and his face worked with unwonted nervousness as he struggled with them. That Bradshaw should have sold the farm for half the price he had stipulated seemed incredible. It was robbery; it was a breach of trust of the most despicable nature. On the other ...
— The Homesteaders - A Novel of the Canadian West • Robert J. C. Stead
... had been an invalid, nervous, fretful and impatient. No one but Constance could suit him. Not even his wife. Her gentle hand, only, could soothe his suffering. Her soft, loving tones alone would quiet his paroxysm of nervousness. ...
— The Rector of St. Mark's • Mary J. Holmes
... proceedings suited Mr. Peaslee well. In his nervousness and abstraction he had backed up to the rusty, empty iron stove at the end of the room, and stood there, with spread coat-tails, listening intently. On hearing the amount of bail, he gave a sigh of relief. His incautious offer had ...
— The Calico Cat • Charles Miner Thompson
... seeking revenge, and cowardice is so mean a thing itself, that it always keeps the meanest kind of company in the breasts of boys or men who harbor it. Boys are apt to make mistakes about cowardice, however, and men too for that matter, confounding it with timidity and nervousness, and imagining that the ability to face unknown danger boldly is courage. There could be no greater mistake than this, and it is worth while to correct it. The bravest man I ever knew was so timid that he shrunk from a shower bath and ...
— Captain Sam - The Boy Scouts of 1814 • George Cary Eggleston
... corner of Mrs. Burton's dressing table was a silver mounted pistol. This had been Captain Burton's parting gift to his wife before his own departure for Europe a few weeks before. Vera distinctly remembered her own and Mrs. Burton's nervousness over the gift and Captain Burton's annoyance. They were about to make their home in a devastated country recently occupied by the enemy and yet were afraid of so simple a method of self-protection! Vera had shared in Captain Burton's lecture and ...
— The Campfire Girls on the Field of Honor • Margaret Vandercook
... to add further to my anxieties, a drizzling rain came driving down upon us, thickening the atmosphere to such an extent that it became impossible to see anything beyond a ship's length distant; and, after driving along through this at a speed of about five knots for the next four hours, my nervousness became so great that I gave orders to bring the ship to the wind and heave her to, determining to await the return of daylight before attempting any ...
— Overdue - The Story of a Missing Ship • Harry Collingwood
... room an overwhelming nervousness assailed her. How was she going to tell her of the wonderful event that had taken place in the last half-hour? On the other hand, how could she possibly suppress so tremendous a matter? And again, the disquieting question arose; could she be ill—really ...
— Greatheart • Ethel M. Dell
... turning round to kill his new assailant, and the griffin, taking advantage of the opportunity, caught the serpent by the throat with both claws, and fairly strangled him. As soon as the griffin had recovered from the nervousness of the conflict, he heaped all manner of caresses on the dog for saving his life. The dog told him the whole story, and the griffin then explained that the dead snake was the king of the serpents, who had the power ...
— The Pilgrims Of The Rhine • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... and don't give way to nervousness! Your mother's condition is constantly improving, though of course it is not so apparent to you as to me. What has been done with the ...
— Vashti - or, Until Death Us Do Part • Augusta J. Evans Wilson
... only did Stanton's nervousness break forth suddenly into one wild, uproarious laugh that seemed to light up the whole dark, ominous room as though the gray, sulky, smoldering hearth-fire itself had exploded into iridescent flame. Chasing close behind the musical contagion of his deep guffaws followed ...
— Molly Make-Believe • Eleanor Hallowell Abbott
... silence. Saton felt that he was expected to go. Yet there was something in her manner which he could not altogether understand, some nervousness, which seemed absolutely foreign to her usual demeanour. He ...
— The Moving Finger • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... vehement language the occurrences at Zabern. The Chancellor replied in defence of the government. Unfortunately he had that morning received family news of a most unpleasant character, which added to his nervousness. He spoke with a low voice and looked like a downhearted and sick man. It was whispered afterwards in the lobbies that he had forgotten the most important part of his speech. The unfavourable impression which he made was increased by von Falkenhayn, appearing for ...
— My Four Years in Germany • James W. Gerard
... lamp towards him and looked around with a nervousness wholly unfamiliar. Then he opened the pocket-book, drew out the roll of bank-notes and counted them. It was curious that he felt no surprise at their value. Bank-notes for five hundred pounds are not exactly common, and yet he proceeded ...
— Havoc • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... and by a few words included him in the conversation. She was as entertaining as usual and rather more talkative after he came. Yet he thought that under her ease of manner he detected a current of nervousness that made him the more anxious to carry out the purpose with which he had come ...
— The Bay State Monthly, Volume 3, No. 3 • Various
... system, and that even transitory or emotional states of the latter affect the former, there can be no doubt. It is so familiar a fact, that instances need hardly be cited to prove it. Hence we are told, that tobacco, by deranging the one, disorders the other,—that nervousness, or morbid irritability of the nerves, palpitations and tremulousness, are soon followed by emaciation and dyspepsia, or more or less inability ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 6, No. 34, August, 1860 • Various
... tried to shake off an unaccustomed feeling of nervousness: she was trembling from head to foot. A wild, unconquerable desire seized her to see her husband again, at once, if only he had not ...
— The Scarlet Pimpernel • Baroness Orczy
... there he explained to me the snowy wake of the torpedo, a white path across the water; the mechanism by which it is kept true to its course; the detonator that explodes it. From nervousness I shifted to enthusiasm. I wanted to see the white wake. I wanted to see the Channel boat dodge it. My sporting blood was up. I was willing to take a chance. I felt that if there was a difficulty this man would escape it. ...
— Kings, Queens And Pawns - An American Woman at the Front • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... Cora wrote, sealed, and directed a note to Laura. In it she recounted what Pryor had told her of Corliss; begged Laura and her parents not to think her heartless in not preparing them for this abrupt marriage. She was in such a state of nervousness, she wrote, that explanations would have caused a breakdown. The marriage was a sensible one; she had long contemplated it as a possibility; and, after thinking it over thoroughly, she had decided it was the only thing to do. She ...
— The Flirt • Booth Tarkington
... they are expensive to pick as there is much shifting of heavy ladders, and the work was done by men. In Kent, I believe, women are employed at cherry-picking, ascending forty-round ladders in a gale of wind without a sign of nervousness, but with a man in attendance to pack the fruit and shift the ladders when required. I found Liverpool the best market for cherries, where they were bought by the large steamship companies for the Transatlantic liners, and where they were in demand for the seaside and holiday places ...
— Grain and Chaff from an English Manor • Arthur H. Savory
... first few weeks in the hospital were not so bad; but when the actual racking pain was over, and nothing remained but that halting of the physical machinery to which we never give a thought during perfect action—the weakness hanging leaden weights to every limb, the unwonted nervousness and irritability, the apparently causeless necessity for inaction—he was anything but a resigned man. Captain George, getting his furlough and carrying him off, was blessed from the deepest heart of the ward nurses. He had a kind of feeling that this his first illness was a matter in which the universe ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol 6, No 5, November 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... to their minds that such conduct is characteristic of them. Nervous and apprehensive parents who are distressed when the child refuses to eat or to sleep, and who worry all day long over possible sources of danger to him, are forced to watch their child acquire a reputation for nervousness, which, as always, is passively accepted and consistently acted up to. Differences in type, determined by hereditary factors, no doubt, exist and are often strongly marked. Yet it is not untrue to say that variations in children, dependent upon ...
— The Nervous Child • Hector Charles Cameron
... is the——I mean, he is a friend of the family, and he has been good to my mother," Jervis went on, a curious air of constraint showing itself in him, which might have been due to nervousness, although he was not wont to be troubled in that fashion. "Cousin Samuel died in February, and affairs have been at sixes and sevens since, ...
— A Countess from Canada - A Story of Life in the Backwoods • Bessie Marchant
... gradations of snobbism—the people to know socially, the people to know in a business way, the people to know in ways religious and philanthropic, the people to know for the fun to be got out of them, the people to pride oneself on not knowing at all; the nervousness, the hysteria about preserving these disgusting gradations. All this, I say, was an undreamed-of mystery to me who gave and took liking in the sensible, self-respecting American fashion. So I didn't understand why Sam, as I almost dragged ...
— The Deluge • David Graham Phillips
... rose, moved his chair nearer to Hamilton's, and sat down close to his friend's side. All nervousness had left him. He was again cool, scientific, professional; but with it all there was the deep sympathy and ...
— Many Kingdoms • Elizabeth Jordan
... from Noah's ark; she bought toys and games and a huge sand-box—and for a nominal fee, a mother could leave her angel child or squalling brat, as the case might be, in charge of a kindergarten assistant, and watch the feature film without nervousness or bad conscience. There was no profit in it, as a department, but it was good ...
— Rope • Holworthy Hall
... of his biographers have contrasted his subsequent reputation for cowardice, his slinking away out of street-quarrels, his refusing to fight the Duke of Buckingham, &c. This diversity at different periods may perhaps be accounted for on the ground of the nervousness which continued dissipation produces, and perhaps from his poetical temperament. A poet, we are persuaded, is often the bravest, and often the most pusillanimous of men. Byron was unquestionably in general a brave, almost a pugnacious man; and yet he confesses that at certain times, ...
— Specimens with Memoirs of the Less-known British Poets, Complete • George Gilfillan
... to her own room, thoroughly chilled and shivering with nervousness. It was an hour or more before she felt herself growing drowsy, but at last she dropped asleep and slept heavily until long past ...
— The Governess • Julie M. Lippmann
... left all alone for the discharge of a somewhat novel duty, seemed at first to feel his responsibility: perhaps a feeling allied to nervousness in the human being. But he was a knowing little fellow too; and resolved to proceed in the most alluring as well as discreet way to his task. Being fully acquainted with the position of the rose-leaf, ...
— The Story of a Dewdrop • J. R. Macduff
... cannot take hold. For nine days they fast, partaking of no food, and only of herb drinks prepared by our wise ones. They have many sweat baths and get the harmful fluids out of their blood. They have absolutely no fear of the snakes, and convey to them no nervousness or anger. Just before the dance they have a big drink of the herb brew, and they are painted thickly with an ointment that contains herbs that kill snake poison. Then after the dance, the emetic. ...
— I Married a Ranger • Dama Margaret Smith
... later, they crept across the open space and huddled against the vine-covered facade of Green Fancy. Barnes was singularly composed and free from nervousness, despite the fact that his whole being tingled with excitement. What was to transpire within the next few minutes? What was to be the end of this daring exploit? Was he to see her, to touch her hand, to carry her off into that dungeon-like forest,—and ...
— Green Fancy • George Barr McCutcheon
... more winning trait was one attaching to the corners of her mouth. Before she made a remark these often twitched gently: not backwards and forwards, the index of nervousness; not down upon the jaw, the sign of determination; but palpably upwards, in precisely the curve adopted to represent mirth in the broad caricatures of schoolboys. Only this element in her face was expressive of anything within the woman, ...
— A Pair of Blue Eyes • Thomas Hardy
... the scene at the door with unseeing eyes. A terrified nervousness that he tried to beat off had come over him. It was useless to repeat to himself again and again that he didn't give a damn; the prospect of being brought up alone before all those officers, of being cross-questioned by those curt voices, frightened him. He ...
— Three Soldiers • John Dos Passos
... window, overwhelmed by the violence of perfumes. He put very few questions to the patient whom he had known for many years. He felt his pulse and attentively studied the urine where certain white spots revealed one of the determining causes of nervousness. He wrote a prescription and left without saying more than that he would ...
— Against The Grain • Joris-Karl Huysmans
... me alone for a while, will you?" He slammed the study door shut, warning himself to display less nervousness in the future as he listened to her pacing ...
— The Junkmakers • Albert R. Teichner
... permitted them to do so. But the attempt evidently did not appeal to Vitgeft, for the Tsarevich suddenly starboarded her helm and led away from us in a north-westerly direction, while Togo, perhaps afraid that this was the preliminary to a retreat on the part of the Russian fleet, feigned a nervousness that he certainly did not feel, and shifted his helm, heading South-South-West, at the same time forming his battleships in line abreast. The result was that, for a time, the two fleets were actually steaming away ...
— Under the Ensign of the Rising Sun - A Story of the Russo-Japanese War • Harry Collingwood
... revealed the hollowness of his pretensions. Only that morning the wife of a labourer had called and asked him to hurry the mending of a pair of boots. She was a voluble woman, and having overcome her preliminary nervousness more than hinted that if he gave less time to the law and more to his trade it would be better ...
— Odd Craft, Complete • W.W. Jacobs
... referring to a man wise in his own conceit, to the effect that "what that fellow does not know is torn out." So I, quoting my juniors, begin my talk with the sentence—for the raciness of which I apologize—"What American women do not know about nervousness ...
— The Secret of a Happy Home (1896) • Marion Harland
... him quickly. Her intuition told her he was jealous, and she saw he was angry. She wanted to shout at him, "Go find Lawrence!" and she was surprised at the sudden panicky nervousness that seized her. But she rose calmly and crossed to the fireplace, saying as she sat down, "No, thank you; I think he is able to take care ...
— Claire - The Blind Love of a Blind Hero, By a Blind Author • Leslie Burton Blades
... voyage, and had always ended them with the assertion that she wouldn't pay duty either! Just what she meant to do she did not know, but she went with her husband to the field of combat, and was soon hotly engaged with three officers, who, seeing her nervousness and hearing her excited voice, scented mischief, of course, and notwithstanding that she declared she was Mrs. Rossiter-Browne, of Ridgeville, a church member in good standing, and asked if they thought she would do a thing she believed was wrong, they answered that her idea of wrong and ...
— Bessie's Fortune - A Novel • Mary J. Holmes
... furtively across the room to where his old friend sat. There was a flush in Oliver's face as he followed the Doctor with his eyes; he was breathing hard, Wraysford could see, and the corners of his mouth were working with more than ordinary nervousness. ...
— The Fifth Form at Saint Dominic's - A School Story • Talbot Baines Reed
... and usually irregular beating of the heart. It may be due to a variety of causes, both functional and organic. It may occur as a result of indigestion, fright, increased nervousness, sudden excitement, excessive speeding, etc. (See "Thumps," ...
— Special Report on Diseases of the Horse • United States Department of Agriculture
... so helpless with nervousness that he could scarcely speak, and his hands trembled when they stood up together and he laid his arm ...
— In Connection with the De Willoughby Claim • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... till the close of the war I rode him almost continuously, in every campaign and battle in which I took part, without once finding him overcome by fatigue, though on many occasions his strength was severely tested by long marches and short rations. I never observed in him any vicious habit; a nervousness and restlessness and switch of the tail, when everything about him was in repose, being the only indication that he might be untrustworthy. No one but a novice could be deceived by this, however, for the intelligence evinced in every feature, and his thoroughbred appearance, ...
— The Memoirs of General Philip H. Sheridan, Vol. I., Part 2 • P. H. Sheridan
... sat pouring out her husband's tea, her habitual nervousness showed itself in the restless movements of her unoccupied hand, and the sudden start with which she would greet the slightest unexpected sound, or the knocking of a customer on the little counter. From where she sat she could ...
— Adrien Leroy • Charles Garvice
... people. It is not only nervousness, it is also a kind of wickedness. Such people come to no good. I have three of them now in my mind as I write. ...
— The Path to Rome • Hilaire Belloc
... Jack Chase, out of a polite nervousness touching myself, as a newly-elected member of the club, would frequently endeavour to excuse to me the vulgarity of Shanks. One day he wound up his remarks by the philosophic reflection—"But, White-Jacket, my dear fellow, what ...
— White Jacket - or, the World on a Man-of-War • Herman Melville
... declined; my sensitiveness amounted to nervousness; I had half a mind to run away and leave the show entirely to Hipp. But when I saw that child of the Mayflower stolidly, shrewdly going about his business, working the wires like an old operator, making the largest amount of thunder from so small a cloud, ...
— Campaigns of a Non-Combatant, - and His Romaunt Abroad During the War • George Alfred Townsend
... himself to a bold decision, pushes open the door and walks in. He stands there, casts a shy glance at ANNA, whose brilliant clothes, and, to him, high-toned appearance awe him terribly. He looks about him with pitiful nervousness as if to avoid the appraising look with which she takes in his face, his clothes, etc—his voice seeming to plead for ...
— Anna Christie • Eugene O'Neill
... downs him. Shore, that felon Yuba begins to assoome in my apprehensions the stern teachers of a whipsaw. At last I'm preyed on to that degree I'm desperate; an' I makes up my mind to invade Tucson, cross up with Yuba an' let him come a runnin'. The nervousness of extreme yooth doubtless is what goads ...
— Wolfville Nights • Alfred Lewis
... always were a Calamity Jane. If we'd left you down with the rattle-snake we wouldn't have been so hoo-dooed!" cried Eleanor, in her nervousness. ...
— Polly of Pebbly Pit • Lillian Elizabeth Roy
... bountiful meal, even for the healthy man's appetite that he possessed. It did not please his palate any better than his aunt's excellent dinners, but he felt there were intricacies and embellishments in some of these unknown dishes that her best skill had never compassed. He began with some nervousness, but Joyce's simple, homelike manner soon dispelled it, and they ended over the fruit and coffee in most friendly converse, he telling, she hearing, many particulars of the Hapgood family, that ...
— Joyce's Investments - A Story for Girls • Fannie E. Newberry
... of a quiet evening at Fox-How; and since then she had seen many and various people in London: but the physical sensations produced by shyness were still the same; and on the following day she laboured under severe headache. I had several opportunities of perceiving how this nervousness was ingrained in her constitution, and how acutely she suffered in striving to overcome it. One evening we had, among other guests, two sisters who sang Scottish ballads exquisitely. Miss Bronte had been sitting quiet and ...
— The Life of Charlotte Bronte • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... that the electrician seemed a trifle embarrassed when Miss Preston came into the room, but as the young lady was not embarrassed in the least, and had apparently forgotten the mistaken-identity incident, his nervousness soon wore off. ...
— Cap'n Eri • Joseph Crosby Lincoln
... nervous. It was the nervousness of cold apprehension, not simply that which had become indigenous to his high-strung make-up. He was, in his way, afraid; afraid that he'd again come up with ...
— The Women-Stealers of Thrayx • Fox B. Holden
... his nervousness by placing a small gilded chair for Diane to sit on. He himself took a chair a few feet away, seating himself sidewise, with his elbow supported on the back, in an easy attitude of attention. Marion Grimston withdrew to the more distant part of the room, where, with her hands ...
— The Inner Shrine • Basil King
... silence. Nellie coloured, and in her nervousness, down went all her pretty flowers on to the floor. But Jack came to the rescue, and blurted out the whole ...
— Chatterbox, 1905. • Various
... give way. Keble and Froude advocated their continuance strongly, and were angry with me for consenting to stop them. Mr. Palmer shared the anxiety of his own friends; and, kind as were his thoughts of us, he still not unnaturally felt, for reasons of his own, some fidget and nervousness at the course which his Oriel friends were taking. Froude, for whom he had a real liking, took a high tone in his project of measures for dealing with bishops and clergy, which must have shocked and scandalised him considerably. As for ...
— Apologia pro Vita Sua • John Henry Newman
... her, asking him to meet her again within an hour or two, amid the palms. She did not suggest his riding thither with her. The note was brief, a mere line, and, study it as he would, he found nothing in it to indicate what her attitude was toward him, therefore it did not allay his nervousness in the least as to how she would meet him. But with the passage of the storm his nerves had recovered their normal tone, and with the brilliance and freshness of the morning much ...
— The Black Pearl • Mrs. Wilson Woodrow
... began, neither man showing a sign of nervousness, though Shon was very pale. The game was to finish for ten points. Men crowded about the tables silent but keenly excited; cigars were chewed instead of smoked, and liquor was left undrunk. At the first deal Pierre made a march, securing two. At ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... one to examine his ears, and should neither hold them absolutely still nor keep them constantly moving. Still ears may indicate deafness; restless ones, poor eyesight or nervousness. ...
— Pratt's Practical Pointers on the Care of Livestock and Poultry • Pratt Food Co.
... piano and began mechanically to play scales, but the somnolent monotony of the tones only added to her nervousness. Later she played some of Chopin's Nocturnes, lingered over those mysterious tones that seemed like strains from another world, full of tears, pain, cries of anguish, and bleak despair; the radiance ...
— The Comedienne • Wladyslaw Reymont
... this responsibility and the newness of his position made Jack Dudley more wakeful than he could have been under any other circumstances. To these causes, also, was due a suspicious nervousness which made him see danger where it did not exist. The rustling of a falling leaf caused him to start and glance furtively to one side, and at a soft stir of the leaves under a breath of wind, or a slight movement ...
— Two Boys in Wyoming - A Tale of Adventure (Northwest Series, No. 3) • Edward S. Ellis
... immediately stopped working, and he could not be induced to make any choices until Doctor Hamilton had left the room. This well indicates his sensitiveness to his surroundings, and his inclination to timidity or nervousness even in the presence of conditions ...
— The Mental Life of Monkeys and Apes - A Study of Ideational Behavior • Robert M. Yerkes
... frightened now. He did not say a word in reply, but used his brush with more energy, and now and then rapped the counter with the back of it; and these, Bud thought, were unmistakable signs of timidity or, at least, nervousness. ...
— True To His Colors • Harry Castlemon
... that a seasoned old sergeant noticed a young soldier fresh from home visibly affected by the nearness of the coming fight. His face was pale, his teeth chattering, and his knees tried to touch each other. It was sheer nervousness, but the sergeant thought it ...
— Best Short Stories • Various
... trace of nervousness in her own tone. "And you talk—well, imperially! Aren't you afraid to ...
— The Fruit of the Tree • Edith Wharton
... and the single coy statement that she just knew he never could guess who she was but she recognized him perfectly. He starts looking around for Ted. There he is, scanning the clown's parade with the eyes of an anxious hawk, disgruntled nervousness plain in every line of his body. Then Oliver remembers that he saw a slim Chinese girl in loose blue silks go off the floor ten minutes or so ago with a tall musketeer. He goes over and touches Ted on a particolored arm—the latter is dressed as a red ...
— Young People's Pride • Stephen Vincent Benet
... though with a little nervousness. "Be just a wee bit careful with the flashlight—about turning it toward the window, I mean—and read in your nice low voice. I always like poetry best when it's almost whispered. I think it sounds more ...
— Gentle Julia • Booth Tarkington
... friendly admonition he could perceive, that early as it was, his brother was not exactly in a state of perfect sobriety. His remonstrances were very unpalatable to Art, and as a consciousness of his conduct, added to the nervousness produced by drink, had both combined to produce irritability of temper, he addressed himself more harshly to his brother than he had ever done in his life before. Frank, for the sake of peace, gave up the task, although he saw clearly enough that the christening was likely to terminate, at ...
— Phelim O'toole's Courtship and Other Stories • William Carleton
... face toward us at the mention of our names, my unpleasant feelings of nervousness vanished. She was such a little woman—slightly deformed, too—with a pale, sickly-looking face, and large, clear eyes, that seemed to attract sympathy at once, for they seemed to say to one, "I am only a timid, simple little creature. ...
— Esther - A Book for Girls • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... diffidence, want of confidence; apprehensiveness, fearfulness &c. adj.; solicitude, anxiety, care, apprehension, misgiving; feeze [obs3][U.S.]; mistrust &c. (doubt) 485; suspicion, qualm; hesitation &c. (irresolution) 605. nervousness, restlessness &c. adj.; inquietude, disquietude, worry, concern; batophobia[obs3]; heartquake[obs3]; flutter, trepidation, fear and trembling, perturbation, tremor, quivering, shaking, trembling, throbbing ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... door of the bedroom, where he conferred in a low tone with the midwife and the Marchioness de Bouille. This was the Marquis de Saint-Maixent, who gave his orders, encouraged his people, watched over every point of his plot, himself a prey to the agonies of nervousness which accompany the ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... children, and may be found in nursing children. They may cause excessive appetite, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, or abdominal pain or sometimes anemia. The knowledge of the presence of this worm may cause great nervousness or depression. The presence of the segment in the stools proves ...
— Mother's Remedies - Over One Thousand Tried and Tested Remedies from Mothers - of the United States and Canada • T. J. Ritter
... moment's silence. Saton felt that he was expected to go. Yet there was something in her manner which he could not altogether understand, some nervousness, which seemed absolutely foreign to her usual demeanour. He took ...
— The Moving Finger • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... moments of her own cook. The one seemed made of whalebone, the other of dough. My aunt was nervous, partly through the intrinsic difficulty of handling the lady and partly because of her passionate desire to watch Beatrice and me, and her nervousness took a common form with her, a wider clumsiness of gesture and an exacerbation of her habitual oddity of phrase which did much to deepen the pink perplexity of the lady of title. For instance, I heard my aunt admit that one of the Stuart Durgan ladies did look a bit "balmy ...
— Tono Bungay • H. G. Wells
... to conceal their nervousness, pleaded bodily fatigue, while Anthony also declared that he had enjoyed himself sufficiently for one night and intended to go home and to bed. "That episode rather got on my nerves," ...
— The Ne'er-Do-Well • Rex Beach
... in a voice pitched high with nervousness. "I'll tell you right this minute, Aunt Debby, I will ...
— Hester's Counterpart - A Story of Boarding School Life • Jean K. Baird
... even keel. Soon after my first talk the kind doctor came to me with words of approval. As in many other of my enterprises, I had gone about it at once and without second thought. "Man, man," said he, "great nervousness is only a sign of brain, and the more brain a man has the longer it takes him to get over the affliction; but," he added reflectively, "you will get over it." However, in my own behalf I think it only fair to say that I am not yet ...
— Sailing Alone Around The World • Joshua Slocum
... His nervousness about this disclosure irritated him profoundly; she had no business to make him feel like that—a wife and a husband being one person. She had not looked at him once since they sat down; and he wondered what on earth she had been thinking about all ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... right, I reckon," he said, half aloud; and he raised it above his head to hurl it away, but checked it in mid-air. For a moment he looked at the colorless liquid, then, with quick nervousness, pulled the cork of sassafras leaves, gulped down the pale moonshine, and dashed the bottle against the trunk of a beech. The fiery stuff does its work in a hurry. He was thirsty when he reached the mouth of a brook that tumbled down the ...
— A Cumberland Vendetta • John Fox, Jr.
... made her feel awkward and uncomfortable, and when she saw one of the clerks looking up at her and tittering she blushed and nearly cried through sheer embarrassment. To add to her nervousness she soon noticed that two men, who were standing in one of the aisles, were watching her every movement for some reason or other. She was thankful when the checks and goods began to come up. It was a relief to keep her eyes on the ...
— For Gold or Soul? - The Story of a Great Department Store • Lurana W. Sheldon
... of a calamity that is about to fall upon us, knowing all the future as it does, necessarily knows that the calamity is already accomplished. As our conscious and unconscious lives blend in it, it distresses itself and flutters around our overconfident ignorance. It tries to inform us, through nervousness, through pity, so as to mitigate the lightning cruelty of the blow. It speaks all the words that can prepare us for its coming, define it and identify it; but it is unable to say those which would prevent it from coming, seeing ...
— The Unknown Guest • Maurice Maeterlinck
... not without a little feeling of nervousness and apprehension that the three friends and their chums made their preparations. But it was an apprehension of failure rather than fear. They wanted to succeed, to get results, and they were afraid they might fail. They were not afraid, personally. Still ...
— Ned, Bob and Jerry on the Firing Line - The Motor Boys Fighting for Uncle Sam • Clarence Young
... booksellers. The truth I take to be that Murray was pushed in the change of Editor (which was really become necessary) probably by Gifford, Canning, Ellis, etc.; and when he had fixed with Lockhart by their advice his constitutional nervousness made him delay entering upon a full explanation with Coleridge. But it is all settled now—I hope Lockhart will be able to mitigate their High Church bigotry. It is not for the present day, savouring too much ...
— The Journal of Sir Walter Scott - From the Original Manuscript at Abbotsford • Walter Scott
... conversing with our ambassador, Mr. Stuart, Baron Budberg excused Oubril's conduct on the ground of his nervousness under the threats of the French plenipotentiary, General Clarke, who scarcely let him speak, and darkly hinted at many other changes that must ensue if Russia did not make peace; Switzerland was to ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose
... recently "over there," had proposed to, and been accepted by his dusky sweetheart. During the marriage ceremony he showed such signs of nervousness that the minister, noticing it, whispered to him, in a voice which could have been heard ...
— More Toasts • Marion Dix Mosher
... the dustpan, and marched to the stove to throw her booty in. Nobody marked her save Rosie, whose playthings were endangered; but Enoch's very obtuseness to the situation was what stayed her hand. She carried the dustpan away into a closet, and came back, to gather up her tins. A cold rage of nervousness beset her, so overpowering that she herself was ...
— Tiverton Tales • Alice Brown
... than usual, and he went to bed to sleep, throwing himself down with a coarse wholesome scorn of his nervousness. ...
— Our Mr. Wrenn - The Romantic Adventures of a Gentle Man • Sinclair Lewis
... have been so disturbed—he, who had always been so brave, and who had jested with Death. Thus, only on Tuesday morning, when all together they had attached explosive projectiles to their belts, which several hours later were to tear them into pieces, Tanya Kovalchuk's hands had trembled with nervousness, and it had become necessary to put her aside, while Vasily jested, made merry, turned about, and was even so reckless ...
— The Seven who were Hanged • Leonid Andreyev
... day he arrived. He knew, of course, that an army officer was in the house, and Mrs. Porterfield had told us of his coming, so the meeting was not unexpected. Still, when we went down to dinner that night I was almost shivering from nervousness, although the air was excessively warm. I was so afraid of something unpleasant coming up, for although Mrs. Porterfield and her daughter were women of culture and refinement, they were also rebels to the very quick, and never ...
— Army Letters from an Officer's Wife, 1871-1888 • Frances M.A. Roe
... was sure the old fellow was frightened now. He did not say a word in reply, but used his brush with more energy, and now and then rapped the counter with the back of it; and these, Bud thought, were unmistakable signs of timidity or, at least, nervousness. ...
— True To His Colors • Harry Castlemon
... a time, but at length the flames caught, and a crimson glow slowly made its way round the circle of fuel. The captive soon felt the scorching heat. He was tied in such a way that he could move his body, and he involuntarily shifted his position to escape the pain,—an evidence of nervousness that afforded the highest delight to his tormentors, who expressed their exultation in yells, dances, and wild gesticulations. The last hour of the brave soldier seemed at hand. He strove to bring resolution to his aid, and to fix his thoughts on a happier state of existence beyond ...
— Historic Tales, Vol. 1 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... you think he will? How glad that would make me! It would pay for all the dreadful fright I have had," Lulu said, her tones tremulous with joy, as, but a moment ago, they had been with nervousness and fright. ...
— Elsie at Nantucket • Martha Finley
... directed his ship. His face was placid: his bearing steady and confident. This in itself was sufficient earnest that the cruiser was in ticklish case. For it was an axiom of the men who sailed under Parkinson that the calmer that nervous man grew, the more cause was there for nervousness on the ...
— The Mystery • Stewart Edward White and Samuel Hopkins Adams
... made an excuse and got away. His decision was made. There was no more combat within him. But his heart was heavy, was sick, and he felt an acute and frightful nervousness, such as he could imagine being experienced by a man under sentence of death, who is not told on what day the sentence will be carried out. Apprehension fell over him like an icy rain in the ...
— Bella Donna - A Novel • Robert Hichens
... moment, true to time and note, Dennis's rich, powerful tenor voice startled and then entranced them all. He sung the entire passage through with only such mistakes as resulted from his nervousness and embarrassment. ...
— Barriers Burned Away • E. P. Roe
... of the ministry and the constitution of a government of national defense made it apparent that something very important must have taken place. The alarms and tears of Dona Luisa increased his nervousness. The good lady was no longer returning from the churches, cheered and strengthened. Her confidential talks with her sister were filling her with a terror that she tried in vain to communicate to her husband. "All ...
— The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... christened 'Slave's' morality.... Look at Dostoievsky's face: half the face of a Russian peasant, half the physiognomy of a criminal, flat nose, little penetrating eyes, under lids trembling with nervousness, the forehead large and well-shaped, the expressive mouth telling of tortures without count, of unfathomable melancholy, of morbid desires, endless compassion, passionate envy. An epileptic genius whose ...
— Ivory Apes and Peacocks • James Huneker
... carried on under circumstances of personal exposure and inconvenience, which nothing but a frame of iron could have supported. They atone also, in part, for that disappointment sustained in early life by the speculative habits of one partner, and the constitutional nervousness of another, which eventually occasioned my separation from the Calder Iron Works, and lost me the possession of extensive tracts of Black Band iron-stone, which I had secured while the value of the discovery was ...
— Industrial Biography - Iron Workers and Tool Makers • Samuel Smiles
... impatience, and in the centre of the writing-table a cup with a bacchanal painted in red on a black ground, of which Julien was very proud, contained the remains of about thirty cigarettes, thrown aside almost as soon as lighted. Their paper ends had been gnawed with a nervousness which betrayed the young man's condition, while he repeated, in a tone so sad that it ...
— Cosmopolis, Complete • Paul Bourget
... in her nature as ever was Percival Elster—yielded to the prayer of the surgeon, and said she would do what she could. But she had never shown more nervousness over anything than she was showing as she gave ...
— Elster's Folly • Mrs. Henry Wood
... further strands, all round: and the endless restless nervous drift of a north Italian crowd, so nervous, so twitchy; nervous and twitchy as the slipping past of the little yellow tram-cars; it all affected him with a sense of strangeness, nervousness, and approaching winter. It struck him the people were afraid of themselves: afraid of their own souls, and that which was in their ...
— Aaron's Rod • D. H. Lawrence
... children. After this one of the Indians from Belleville delivered a pathetic parting address; they then all shook hands, exhorting one another to cleave to Jesus. This Indian appeared to me to be one of the most heavenly minded men I ever saw, not an able speaker but with a peculiar nervousness in his words, spoken with energy and pathos ...
— The Story of My Life - Being Reminiscences of Sixty Years' Public Service in Canada • Egerton Ryerson
... cried, brightening up, but with a feeling of nervousness and excitement making my heart beat more ...
— Burr Junior • G. Manville Fenn
... for which many able men have to wait long years, and he knew it, and meant to make the most of it. Naturally a brilliant speaker, Geoffrey was not, as so many good speakers are, subject to fits of nervousness, and he was, moreover, thoroughly master of his case. In five minutes judge, jury and counsel were all listening to him with attention; in ten they were absorbed in the lucid and succinct statement of the facts which he was unfolding ...
— Beatrice • H. Rider Haggard
... to make known his art to Mr. Joseph Anderson of Piccadilly, and his prime minister, the well-known George Rice—tamed for them a black horse that had been returned by Sir Matthew White Ridley, as unridable from vice and nervousness. The next step was an introduction to Messrs. Tattersall of Hyde Park, whose reputation for honour and integrity in most difficult transactions is world wide and nearly a century old. Introduced at Hyde Park Corner with the strongest recommendations and certificates from such authorities ...
— A New Illustrated Edition of J. S. Rarey's Art of Taming Horses • J. S. Rarey
... the water basin. As to talking, parrots will pick up far more readily any words they hear by accident than any that you set yourself to teach them. They will also get by heart in this way a few bars of a whistled tune. When parrots are apparently spiteful it often proceeds much more from nervousness than from vice. If frightened they will peck anything near them. It is important to have a thick baize cover for your parrot's cage, and to put this over it directly ...
— What Shall We Do Now?: Five Hundred Games and Pastimes • Dorothy Canfield Fisher
... very likely it was only her nervousness. But she thought she world feel safer if Washington would let her take one of his pistols. Washington brought her one of his revolvers, and instructed her in the art of ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... him and let him off his thrashings. Poor Mumford! he dismally went about under the protection of young Alfred, a fourth-form boy—not one soul did he know in that rattling London ballroom; his young face—as white as the large white tie, donned two hours since at the Tavistock with such nervousness and beating of heart! ...
— The Newcomes • William Makepeace Thackeray
... shaking so that it was with great difficulty that she managed the bag's clasp, she opened the receptacle, and, with accelerating nervousness which made her feel and fumble, took from it a small box—a jeweler's box. Slowly she returned to him, her feet dragging as if weighted; slowly, as she stood before him, drooping, frightened, she took off the cover of the little box, her heart hammering till it seemed as if it must ...
— The Old Flute-Player - A Romance of To-day • Edward Marshall and Charles T. Dazey
... eyes all the time, and listening to their talk. Being hungry himself he could not help feeling for them, and not thinking that it would hurt him to be cut up in pieces and devoured, he had begun to wish that they would really begin on him. He was both amused and annoyed at their nervousness, and at last opening wide his eyes very suddenly he cried, "Feel ...
— A Little Boy Lost • Hudson, W. H.
... entirely unruffled. He came from under the tiger with a broad grin on his handsome face, nor could I perceive that a muscle trembled or that his voice showed the least indication of nervousness or excitement. ...
— The Lost Continent • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... that slow head-ball of his, and finds it lifted genially over the leg-boundary, is well worth seeing. I remember in one school match, the last man, unfortunately on the opposite side, did this three times in one over, ultimately retiring to a fluky catch in the slips with forty-one to his name. Nervousness at cricket is a curious thing. As the author of Willow the King, himself a county cricketer, has said, it is not the fear of getting out that causes funk. It is a sort of intangible je ne sais quoi. I trust I make myself clear. Some batsmen ...
— Tales of St. Austin's • P. G. Wodehouse
... from a portfolio a letter, and put it into the Jew's hand. He now had got over that strange embarrassment with which his habitual nervousness had marked his first address, and spoke largely, and with ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 55, No. 343, May 1844 • Various
... across that inlet soon?" suggested George, showing just the slightest sign of nervousness, ...
— Motor Boat Boys Down the Coast - or Through Storm and Stress to Florida • Louis Arundel
... mother was affecting. Her fingers twitched with nervousness. Her eyes strayed twenty times in five minutes toward the door behind which her daughter slept. Every little while she would tip-toe to it and listen breathlessly. In whispers Jeff told them the story, answering a hundred eager ...
— The Vision Spendid • William MacLeod Raine
... and destroys the best. He was determined to attach himself as closely as the old Man of the Sea attached himself to Es-Sindibad, in order that the lie might be unmasked. Mrs. Irvin's palpable embarrassment and nervousness he ascribed to her ...
— Dope • Sax Rohmer
... thick-fingered, patted hers a hundred times as it lay upon the blankets, until she got nervous over his nervousness. ...
— The Sagebrusher - A Story of the West • Emerson Hough
... that he possessed. It did not please his palate any better than his aunt's excellent dinners, but he felt there were intricacies and embellishments in some of these unknown dishes that her best skill had never compassed. He began with some nervousness, but Joyce's simple, homelike manner soon dispelled it, and they ended over the fruit and coffee in most friendly converse, he telling, she hearing, many particulars of the Hapgood family, that were ...
— Joyce's Investments - A Story for Girls • Fannie E. Newberry
... undressing, I found that I had left my match-box on the studio table, and thought I would return for it. I remember now what a mental struggle I went through before I made up my mind to go without a candle. I glanced at my friend's face, partly to see if he noticed any indication of nervousness in my expression, and partly because I was conscious of a kind of psychological sympathy between us. But fear that he would laugh at me made me effectually conceal my feelings, and I went out of the room without speaking. As I walked across the non-resonant, carpeted stone ...
— Shapes that Haunt the Dusk • Various
... Madame de Rhona boxed my ears or not, I can't remember, but I think it is very likely she did, for she was very quick-tempered. In later years I have not suffered from the fearsome malady, but even now, after fifty years of stage-life, I never play a new part without being overcome by a terrible nervousness and a torturing dread of forgetting my lines. Every nerve in my body seems to be dancing an independent jig on ...
— The Story of My Life - Recollections and Reflections • Ellen Terry
... Crevel, taking Adeline by the arm and showing her that she was shaking with nervousness. "Come, madame," he added respectfully, "compose yourself; I am going to the Bank ...
— Poor Relations • Honore de Balzac
... when she was not abusing Fate she was generally reproaching her partner. Eve was always her partner; and to-night she devoutly hoped that her employer would elect to rest. She always played badly with Mrs. Rastall-Retford, through sheer nervousness. Once she had revoked, and there had been a terrible moment and much ...
— Death At The Excelsior • P. G. Wodehouse
... fear or nervousness. Nonchalantly he said that he had not expected them to be disturbed, but that he knew a ...
— Ten American Girls From History • Kate Dickinson Sweetser
... round one corner, a policeman round another, excellent appetites, and temperature normal—you hear—normal from year's end to year's end. And you say, Absurd! Absurd be—exploded! Absurd! My dear boys, what can you expect from a man who out of sheer nervousness had just flung overboard a pair of new shoes! Now I think of it, it is amazing I did not shed tears. I am, upon the whole, proud of my fortitude. I was cut to the quick at the idea of having lost the inestimable ...
— Heart of Darkness • Joseph Conrad
... been very unwell since I saw you. A sad depression of spirits, a most unaccountable nervousness; from which I have been partially relieved by an odd accident. You knew Dick Hopkins, the swearing scullion of Caius? This fellow, by industry and agility, has thrust himself into the important ...
— The Best Letters of Charles Lamb • Charles Lamb
... conventionality permeated the room like a fog. He plumbed it in vain for the wonder and the magic that ought to have been the inescapable aura of Uncle Hugh's girl. Was this the mighty ocean, was this all? She was a little nervous, too. That was a pity. Nervousness in social relations was one of the numerous things ...
— O Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1919 • Various
... plans, front elevations, and so on, could be laid down. Altogether, with this circle of science to study, the future farmer had very hard work to face. Such exhaustive mental labour induced a certain nervousness that could only be allayed by relaxation. The bicycle afforded a grateful change. Mounted upon the slender, swift-revolving wheel, Mr. Phillip in the cool of the evening, after the long day of study, sometimes proceeded to stretch his limbs. ...
— Hodge and His Masters • Richard Jefferies
... her person and manners was frank and girlish, and yet she was certainly recalling to his mind things that he had been struggling all the afternoon to forget. Already he began to feel the clouds of nervousness and depression stealing down upon him. He struck the table with his clenched fist. He would have none of it. Outside was the delicious sunshine, through the open window stole in the perfume of the roses which covered the ...
— The Avenger • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... the pallor quite left him, and the fighting fire blazed in his eyes, he stood lion-like, his feet spread apart as if to meet a shock, his tawny head thrown back, and there was about him a hair-trigger sensitiveness, in spite of his bulk, a nervousness of hand and coldness of glance which characterizes the gun-fighter. Buck Daniels stepped closer, without a word, but one felt that he also had walked into the alliance. As Barry watched them the yellow which swirled in his eyes ...
— The Seventh Man • Max Brand
... was a tall, perfectly formed woman of baffling age, but with the impression of both youth and maturity which was very fascinating. She was calmer now, and although she seemed to be of anything but a hysterical nature, it was quite evident that her nervousness was due to much more than the shock of the recent tragic event, great as that must have been. It may have been that I recalled the words of the note, "Dr. Ross has told me the nature of your illness," but I fancied that she had been suffering from ...
— The Dream Doctor • Arthur B. Reeve
... more infectious than that species of nervousness which shows itself in superstitious fears. I began—although I could not bring myself to admit anything the least like it—to partake insensibly, but strongly of the peculiar feelings with which my wife, and indeed my whole ...
— J. S. Le Fanu's Ghostly Tales, Volume 4 • Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu
... a girl with headaches, a youth with inflamed eyes, and a farm-labourer incapacitated by varicose veins. In each case Coue stated that autosuggestion should bring complete relief. Then it was the turn of a business man who complained of nervousness, lack of self-confidence ...
— The Practice of Autosuggestion • C. Harry Brooks
... to be still in an extreme state of nervousness, starting from time to time, and gazing furtively about him, with little frightened, darting glances to the right and the left. I hoped that his daughter was right in naming the fifth of October as the turning point of his complaint, for ...
— The Mystery of Cloomber • Arthur Conan Doyle
... The state of nervousness of the older man was painfully perceptible. Added to his general weakness, which made the mere fact of seeing some one unexpectedly a sudden shock to him, he had besides at that moment an additional and very definite reason for uneasiness in the thing which he held in his hand. He endeavoured, ...
— The Arbiter - A Novel • Lady F. E. E. Bell
... of the window, saw them at last arrive at the gate, and her heart almost stood still with excitement and nervousness. "Why, it might be five and twenty years ago, and Thomas be bringing in Lizzie herself!" she gasped. Her face flushed, tears suddenly brimmed over and down her cheeks. She longed to run down the garden and take ...
— The Story of Jessie • Mabel Quiller-Couch
... learn that sickness touches Him. She had been an invalid for twelve years. How many sleepless nights, what loss of appetite, what nervousness, what unrest, what pain of body, the world knew not. But when she came up and put her finger on Christ's garment, all her suffering thrilled through the heart of ...
— Around The Tea-Table • T. De Witt Talmage
... machine set at the higher rate of speed from $8 to $11. They stop for 10 minutes in the morning, and clean the machines and clear away the litter around them. The sewing and stooping are monotonous, and the work on bonus here is apt to cause nervousness, because of uncertainty occasioned by frequent ...
— Making Both Ends Meet • Sue Ainslie Clark and Edith Wyatt
... you often, Lucy, that I've been desperately in love with you for more years than I can remember,' he said, flushing with nervousness. ...
— The Explorer • W. Somerset Maugham
... the key in the lock, and in the agony of the same dry-fingered nervousness rubbed his hand back and forth across his dry lips. "Don't let 'em ...
— Every Soul Hath Its Song • Fannie Hurst
... seem to show any sign of nervousness or caution; and Owen looked in vain to see the suspected thief glance suspiciously around, as though to observe whether his comrades were all sound asleep at ...
— In Camp on the Big Sunflower • Lawrence J. Leslie
... ominously, "that you have been away for two hours; and that I have gone through agonies of nervousness for fear Jim Wilson would come down and think I came here ...
— When a Man Marries • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... after having formally received the bride from her mother, whose strength barely permitted her to rise and go through that part of the ceremony, proceeded to place the ring upon the finger of his wife, it fell, either from nervousness or accident upon the matted floor. Quick as thought, Waunangee, who had now his whole attention bent upon the passing scene, stooped, picked it up, and attempted to place it on the finger, still extended, for which it ...
— Hardscrabble - The Fall of Chicago: A Tale of Indian Warfare • John Richardson
... from well, nervous, etc., and that Mrs. Stannard is such a blessing to her,—so constantly with her. I wish there were something more definite. She writes three pages for the purpose of telling me not to be anxious, and the very nervousness and tremulous style give ...
— Marion's Faith. • Charles King
... telling how long this pleasing quietude might have lasted, if it had not been for an immense bug that sailed in at the window, close to Kittie's nose, and began to bump gayly around the room, while both girls flew up, in feminine nervousness, and opened fire upon him, with any objects they ...
— Six Girls - A Home Story • Fannie Belle Irving
... and the three walked on together, Gethin much resenting Will's bad temper, and endeavouring to make up for his brother's somewhat silent and pre-occupied manner by keeping up the conversation himself. But a little constraint fell upon them all, Gethin chafing at the girl's apparent nervousness, and his brother's silence; Morva fearful of offending Will, and disturbed at her own pleasure at meeting Gethin. When they reached the town she bade ...
— Garthowen - A Story of a Welsh Homestead • Allen Raine
... severity towards him. Monsieur was a kind husband, however, and a wise man in many things. He had studied much in his youth, chiefly medical works, of which he had quite a collection. He could not understand the whimsical nervousness of women, but, when so slight a thing as a child's illness appeared to be the cause of it, could unhesitatingly undertake to remove the difficulty. He had prescribed attentively for the two children who died before Jacques, thereby rendering them comfortable and quiet, and saving ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XI., February, 1863, No. LXIV. • Various
... as he was bid, and got through it pretty well. He had now quite recovered his ordinary bearing, and spoke out clearly and without nervousness. He afterwards won several places by answering questions, and at the end of the lesson was marked about half-way up the form. The boys' numbers were then taken down in the weekly register, and they went back to ...
— Eric • Frederic William Farrar
... blushed as she bent her fair ringlets over her knitting. How her heart beat as Joseph appeared—Joseph, puffing from the staircase in shining creaking boots—Joseph, in a new waistcoat, red with heat and nervousness, and blushing behind his wadded neckcloth. It was a nervous moment for all; and as for Amelia, I think she was more frightened than even the ...
— Vanity Fair • William Makepeace Thackeray
... daunted now. While she worked at the fingers of her silk gloves, what Harriet took for nervousness ...
— K • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... more Pelle observed while he stood just inside the door upon his bare feet, not daring from sheer nervousness to raise his eyes. Then the farmer turned round in his chair, and drew him toward him by the collar. "Now let's see what you've got there under your smock, my little man!" he ...
— Pelle the Conqueror, Complete • Martin Andersen Nexo
... sped from the rifle, but either Frank's aim was bad from nervousness or the powder charge was too heavy, the ball struck the water fully a foot ...
— The Boy Aviators' Treasure Quest • Captain Wilbur Lawton
... clad only in a single shift, or muumuu, herself a grand-daughter of the sleeper, crouched beside him and with a feathered fly-flapper brushed away the flies. In her face were depicted solicitude, and nervousness, and awe, as if she attended ...
— On the Makaloa Mat/Island Tales • Jack London
... Marches" are being composed in endless procession, a younger brother is about to publish his biography, and legends are already thickly clustering about his name. He laid the Russian bugaboo before it had a chance to make its debut; there is not today the slightest nervousness about the possible coming of the Cossacks, and there will not be, so long as the Commander in Chief of all the armies in the east continues to find time to give sittings to portrait painters, pose for the moving-picture artists, autograph photographs, ...
— New York Times Current History: The European War, Vol 2, No. 1, April, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... was admirable. We cannot help wondering why so remarkable an actor should confine himself to the provincial stage. We had almost forgotten to mention that the part of The Candidate was, on this occasion, assigned to a Mr. RICHARD PATTLE, a complete novice, whose evident nervousness seriously imperilled the success of the piece. He had omitted to learn his part adequately, and the famous soliloquy, "The country has need of me," was painfully bungled. Mr. PATTLE has few qualifications ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 100, April 18, 1891 • Various
... Kelso Hunt Cup for last year, and that you ought to keep an eye on him for the Ayrshire Handicap. But I have remarked that horses are not like men; they do not always run almost equally well, though the conditions of the race seem similar. No doubt this is owing to the nervousness of the animal, who may be discouraged by the noise, the smell of bad tobacco, and ...
— Punch Volume 102, May 28, 1892 - or the London Charivari • Various
... course he makes a fine ass of himself. He has not had time to memorise the poem of the song, and with extravagant fun Wagner makes him change the poetical and serious words into words of most ludicrous significance. Walther's melody he has not got hold of at all, and in a state of intense nervousness tries to fit the words to the burlesque tune of his previous night's serenade. The accents all fall in the wrong place; and as he stumbles miserably along the crowd begins to titter. Wagner of course was parodying and satirising ...
— Richard Wagner - Composer of Operas • John F. Runciman
... illustrious Sir, excuse my awkwardness, which arises not from ignorance of the usages of polite society, but from a little surprise and nervousness, consequent on this somewhat unexpected visit. And I beseech you to reveal my indiscretion to no one, and especially not to my Wife. But before your Lordship enters into further communications, would he deign to satisfy the curiosity ...
— Flatland • Edwin A. Abbott
... On Mary, who had withdrawn to the very end of the room, this discomfort of speech had a peculiar effect: the unsteady voice touched her breast to a kindred fluttering, and her throat grew parched and so irritated that a violent fit of coughing could not be restrained, and this, with the nervousness and alarm which his appearance had thronged upon her, drove her to a very fever of distress. But she could not take her eyes away from him, and she wondered and was afraid of what he might say. She knew there were a great many things he might ...
— Mary, Mary • James Stephens
... his predecessors, but he was bound to admit that they certainly had corresponded somewhat faithfully to the description just given. The comparative cordiality of his own reception removed the slight nervousness that had been troubling him. He began to feel ...
— Something New • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
... used to be rather particular in his dress, appeared in a kind of smoking suit with a flannel collar. He spoke scarcely a word to me, but cursed the servants with a brutality which left me aghast. A wretched footman in his nervousness spilt some sauce over his sleeve. Lawson dashed the dish from his hand and volleyed abuse with a sort of epileptic fury. Also he, who had been the most abstemious of men, swallowed disgusting quantities of ...
— The Moon Endureth—Tales and Fancies • John Buchan
... more easily than can the second. The man to whom tobacco is a stimulant becomes sleepy and dull when he ceases its use, and days ensue before he brightens up on a normal plane. To the one who finds it a narcotic, the abandonment of tobacco means inviting the height of all nervousness. To George Henry tobacco had been a narcotic, and now his nerves were set on edge. He had pluck, though, and irritable and suffering, endured as well as he could. At length came, as will come eventually ...
— The Wolf's Long Howl • Stanley Waterloo
... time, Pattmore walked into the office and sat down. He wore a martyr-like expression, and, though he controlled his feelings sufficiently to appear outwardly calm, I could see that, inwardly, he was racked with fear and nervousness. ...
— The Somnambulist and the Detective - The Murderer and the Fortune Teller • Allan Pinkerton
... resumed his seat, from which he had risen quickly at her coming. Mr. Weatherley motioned to him to move up to his side. His face now was a little flushed, but his nervousness had not disappeared. He was certainly not the same man whom one met at ...
— The Lighted Way • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... had let her, but she was nervous for him every time he rode the vicious beast. No one but the Sheik could manage him, and though she knew that he had perfect mastery over the horse, she never lost the feeling of nervousness, a sensation the old Diana had never, never experienced, and she wished to-day that it had been any other horse but ...
— The Sheik - A Novel • E. M. Hull
... dignity than has been shown even by the civil population. They all seemed to lose their wits when the Germans drew near Paris; they made their preparations to depart in the most frantic haste; they were white of face and perspiring with nervousness. It is not a pleasant sight to see strong men palsied with fright, but we have seen many such these days. Not a soul remains in the British Embassy or consulate to take care of England's manifold interests. It seems strange that when thousands of British heroes of the army are dying ...
— The Note-Book of an Attache - Seven Months in the War Zone • Eric Fisher Wood
... kind—touched by her youth and innocence, by the circumstance that she was fatherless, and by the crown she must one day wear. She had to learn to conduct herself with the mingled self-respect and ease which became her station. Impulsiveness, shyness, nervousness, are more serious defects in kings and queens than in ordinary mortals. To use a homely phrase, "to have all their wits about them" is very necessary in their case. If in addition they can have all their hearts—hearts warm and considerate, nobly mindful of their own obligations and of the ...
— Life of Her Most Gracious Majesty the Queen V.1. • Sarah Tytler
... two other Diamond D men, too, were showing signs of nervousness. Had the south herd gone the ...
— Kid Wolf of Texas - A Western Story • Ward M. Stevens
... advancing a little further into the room. There was tragedy in her white face. She seemed to be shaking in every limb, but not with nervousness. Directly he looked into her eyes, he knew very well that the ...
— The Illustrious Prince • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... man's face closely. He was not bluffing. There was no sign of sweat or nervousness. He knew the situation exactly, and was prepared to deal with it. ...
— The Egyptian Cat Mystery • Harold Leland Goodwin
... at my first party, and I had committed so many blunders that the great man had roared the word "Swelled!" in a furious tone. Now, however, when the sound of a waltz, played softly on stringed instruments, fell on my ears, my nervousness departed as quickly as it had come. The big mahogany doors swung open before us, and as I passed with George, into the brilliantly lighted hall, where the perfume of roses filled the air, I managed to move, if not with grace, at least with the necessary dignity of an invited guest. The lamps, ...
— The Romance of a Plain Man • Ellen Glasgow
... military salute. I sat for a full hour smoking and thinking, occupied mainly in wondering whether I had thrown a chance away. There was nothing to be got by wasting time, and I worried myself into a state of feverish nervousness by thinking that this man Hinge was probably a true and genuine fellow, and that I had missed my chance with him. It was the clattering of a horse's hoof in the back yard of the inn that awoke me from my reverie, and looking out I saw Brunow in the act of dismounting. He waved ...
— In Direst Peril • David Christie Murray
... afraid you find this a bore,' he said, with such evident understanding of her nervousness that the tears came to ...
— Lover or Friend • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... nervous, and two or three old people who had suspected self-sufficiency took him to their hearts when the minister concluded the Lord's prayer hurriedly, having omitted two petitions. But we knew it was not nervousness which made him pause for ten seconds after praying for widows and orphans, and in the silence which fell upon us the Divine Spirit had free access. His youth commended him, since he was also modest, for every mother had come ...
— Beside the Bonnie Brier Bush • Ian Maclaren
... with a composure very different from his usual nervousness about the slightest ailment, "Now I remember, my mother died of paralysis. I wish Helen ...
— A Noble Life • Dinah Maria Mulock Craik
... always in her thoughts. He never allowed her to forget that if he were provoked he would invade England, and notwithstanding her retort that England had a long arm which he would do well to fear, her courage alternated with some nervousness at times. Elizabeth was not so much concerned about his threat of excommunication of her as the sly tricks in conjunction with the Pope in spreading the spirit of rebellion in Ireland, and in other ways conspiring against her. Her mood was at one time to defy him, and at another conciliatory and ...
— Drake, Nelson and Napoleon • Walter Runciman
... until he felt the pressure of his bones against the wood. Carlsen's attitude had had one good effect. His nervousness had disappeared, and a cold rage taken its place. He could cheerfully have attempted to throttle Carlsen without fear of his gun. For that matter, he had faced the pistol once and come off best. What a fool he had been, though, to let Carlsen ...
— A Man to His Mate • J. Allan Dunn
... to be decided by military men. But, when all is said and done, it will not be the generals who will decide this war; it will be the soldiers. And they are truly wonderful men, these French soldiers. It is their amazing calm, their total freedom from nervousness or apprehension, that impresses one the most, and the secret of this calm is confidence. They are as confident of eventual victory as they are that the sun will rise to-morrow morning. They are ...
— Italy at War and the Allies in the West • E. Alexander Powell
... of the rooms to indicate that the party to which they had been invited was to be in any respect different from the round of gaiety to which they had been devoting themselves for the greater part of the winter. Some of the guests, as they greeted their young hostess, noticed an unusual degree of nervousness in her manner, but, attributing it to the excitement of preparation and anticipation, thought no more of it, and all were ...
— Stories Worth Rereading • Various
... sisters-in-law an opportunity to talk to one another freely, but another motive was to avoid the danger of encountering the old prince, of whom he was afraid. He did not mention this to his daughter, but Natasha noticed her father's nervousness and anxiety and felt mortified by it. She blushed for him, grew still angrier at having blushed, and looked at the princess with a bold and defiant expression which said that she was not afraid of ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy
... at Tarrytown had ended my reflections, and Kennedy's —whatever they may have been. Mackay himself had met us at the station and with a few words, to cover his nervousness, had whisked us ...
— The Film Mystery • Arthur B. Reeve
... he was riding at frightful speed through woods and wilds with Mr Harrenburn, hurrying with breathless haste to avert some catastrophe that was about to happen somewhere to some one; now, that he was intently painting a picture of the corpse of a beautiful young lady—terribly oppressed by nervousness, and a fretful sense of incapacity most injurious to the success of his labours—when suddenly, O horror! he beheld the body move, then rise, in a frightful and unnatural manner, stark upright, and with opened lips, but rigidly-clenched teeth, utter shriek upon shriek as it waved its white arms, ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 454 - Volume 18, New Series, September 11, 1852 • Various
... bit of shadowing the detective did on the journey to the metropolis, so skilful that, though the merchant plainly showed by his nervousness that he thought he might have been followed, he did not, seemingly, suspect the quiet man seated not far from him, reading a little green book. The colonel had adopted a simple but ...
— The Diamond Cross Mystery - Being a Somewhat Different Detective Story • Chester K. Steele
... stopped and one after another the girls jumped to the ground they were surprised to find that their nervousness, instead of growing less, was getting worse and worse all ...
— Billie Bradley on Lighthouse Island - The Mystery of the Wreck • Janet D. Wheeler
... little faint—from nervousness. She'll be all ready in about three minutes." This announcement was Mr. Pardon's contribution to the crisis; and he added that the crowd was a lovely crowd, it was a real Boston crowd, ...
— The Bostonians, Vol. II (of II) • Henry James
... coming, was kind though not cordial. Gale's first thought, after he had thanked these good people for their hospitality, was to inquire about Mercedes. He was informed that the Spanish girl had awakened with a considerable fever and nervousness. When, however, her anxiety had been allayed and her thirst relieved, she had fallen asleep again. Mrs. Belding said the girl had suffered no great hardship, other than mental, and would very ...
— Desert Gold • Zane Grey
... charitably received. Her years of struggle, her year of mourning, had no doubt dwarfed her powers in this direction; presently her natural good taste would reassert itself. But the next effort and the next were harder to explain. It was not the note of nervousness or inexperience we saw; there was an undeniable decision, and not a token of shame. The little black winter bud grew warm-coloured above, and burst suddenly into extravagant outlines and chromatic confusion. Harringay, who is a cad, first put what we were all feeling into words. "I've ...
— Certain Personal Matters • H. G. Wells
... Her nervousness seemed to be passing off; she answered me in a sincere simplicity that would neither exaggerate ...
— The King's Mirror • Anthony Hope
... the shadow of the corridor it moved, like a drift of pallid storm-cloud, and I followed, all natural and instinctive fear or nervousness quite blotted out by the part I felt I was to play in giving rest to a tortured soul. The corridors were velvet black; but the pale figure floated before me always, an unerring guide, now but a thin mist on the utter ...
— Masterpieces of Mystery, Vol. 1 (of 4) - Ghost Stories • Various
... when your mind is disengaged, but to me cheering now as signs of the livingness of nature, even in the death of the frost. As we stood still there came up from the trees in the glen the prolonged hoot of an owl. Bagley started with alarm, being in a state of general nervousness, and not knowing what he was afraid of. But to me the sound was encouraging and pleasant, being ...
— The Open Door, and the Portrait. - Stories of the Seen and the Unseen. • Margaret O. (Wilson) Oliphant
... conversation with much byplay, even imitating the tones, the nervousness, and the sly glances of the Zanzibar spy, for nothing had ...
— In Search of the Okapi - A Story of Adventure in Central Africa • Ernest Glanville
... very foolish; it was the heat, I suppose, or the nervousness of acting before so many strangers, that has upset me. It is over now. I beg you will not remember it, Sir Adrian, or speak of ...
— The Haunted Chamber - A Novel • "The Duchess"
... almost prayed that Jimmy would make his visit in her absence. On her return she had so much to tell that she did not mention his name, and A.O. hoped that he was forgotten. All Monday afternoon she went around in a flutter of nervousness, "feeling in her bones" that Jimmy would be there that night, and afraid that Elise would find some way in which to carry out her threat of seeing him at all hazards. One of the ways she had suggested trying, was to sound a burglar or a ...
— The Little Colonel's Chum: Mary Ware • Annie Fellows Johnston
... all alone to watch over La Grivotte, who was now shivering with intense fever, again attacked by her horrible cough. Meanwhile the other female pilgrims were tidying themselves. The ten women at the far end were fastening their fichus and tying their cap strings, with a kind of modest nervousness displayed on their mournfully ugly faces. And Elise Rouquet, all attention, with her face close to her pocket glass, did not cease examining her nose, mouth, and cheeks, admiring herself with the thought that she was ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... more honorable way. He called at the Laurels again that evening after supper. And, while Mrs. Purcell affected to doze, and Susie, as confidante, held Kate and Eliza well in play, he found another moment. With a solemnity impaired by extreme nervousness, he asked Miss Purcell if she would accept a copy of Browning's Poems, which he had ventured to order for her from town. He hadn't brought it with him, because he wished to multiply pretexts for calling; besides, as he said, he didn't know whether ...
— The Judgment of Eve • May Sinclair
... confusion and horror of the surprise, he turned to the man, head ringing, eyes dilated. A single reassuring word, and he would have steadied. As for Larsen, though, he declared afterward (to others and to himself even) that he noticed no nervousness in the dog; that he was only intent on getting several ...
— O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1921 • Various
... to the roof of the fire-station. "Is it a pigeon?" he asked. I caught at the idea. "Yes, a carrier-pigeon," I murmured in reply; "they sometimes, I believe, send messages to the fire-stations in that way." Coolly as I said this, I was conscious of grasping the window-sill in pure nervousness till the scrap began to flutter back into ...
— My Lady Nicotine - A Study in Smoke • J. M. Barrie
... the nervousness helped it. Moreover, his revolting organization was gradually adapting itself somewhat to the new conditions. Sensitive and uncertain tendrils of vitality began to creep out from the roots ...
— Southern Lights and Shadows • Edited by William Dean Howells & Henry Mills Alden
... string and the previous performance instantly was repeated. The bell rang and the Germans fired violently. Dubois was delighted beyond all comprehension with his exploit, and the evident nervousness of the enemy every time the bell sounded amused ...
— Fighting in France • Ross Kay
... exclamations, murmured at intervals, and followed by chest-drawn sighs, expressed a deep preoccupation. With regard to his boots, he need have had no anxiety. They were of the shiniest patent leather, much too tight, and without a speck of dust upon them. But his nervousness infected me with a cruel dread. All those eyes were going to watch how we comported ourselves in jumping from the landing-steps into the boat! If this operation, upon a ceremonious occasion, has terrors even for a gondolier, how formidable it ought to be to me! And here is the Signora dell' Acqua's ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Complete - Series I, II, and III • John Symonds
... to the natural nervousness which besets a beginner, and to the fact that she had scarcely had time to memorize her new poem, she became confused in this particular member, and forgot her lines. With true Indian impassiveness, however, she never lost her self-control, but smilingly passed over the difficulty by substituting ...
— Flint and Feather • E. Pauline Johnson
... hearing at length arrived, and, armed with a mass of carefully selected information, I was in my seat ready to defend the originality of the Nore Napkin Ring, so to speak, to the death. In my notes before me I had the skeleton of a really fine oration, which I felt (if I mastered my normal nervousness) would bristle with epigram, and thrill with heartfelt, brain-inspired eloquence. So deeply interested was I in the matter, that I scarcely listened to my friend's opening, and only became aware of what was happening in Court ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 100, May 23, 1891 • Various
... descriptions by Glaisher, Tissandier, De Fonvielle and Dupuis-Delcour, has nothing more graphic and absorbing than some of the accounts dashed off in the white heat of enthusiasm by these and other American journalists. The nervousness and chaffing before the start; the thrill and wonder of the upward rush; the strange exhilaration coming with relivening confidence; the unspeakable loveliness and grandeur of the prospect; the thousand varied incidents ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 26, August, 1880 - of Popular Literature and Science • Various
... cleared an ample space for two. With a faint touch of nervousness Merlin glanced toward Mr. Moonlight Quill's glass partition, but the three heads were still bent earnestly over their work, and it was evident that they had not seen what had gone on in the shop. So when Caroline put ...
— Tales of the Jazz Age • F. Scott Fitzgerald
... the whole picture of nature, youth and beauty, as it was set against the pure background of the sky, Walden realised that he was expected to say something,—in fact, he had been called upon to say something every year at this time, but he had never been able to conquer the singular nervousness which always overcame him on such occasions. It is one thing to preach from a pulpit to an assembled congregation who are prepared for orthodoxy and who are ready to listen with more or less patience to the expounding of the same,— but it is quite another to speak to a number of ...
— God's Good Man • Marie Corelli
... not anticipate any serious difficulty, provided he could overcome his constitutional nervousness. In his waistcoat pocket was a brand new Yale key which, his latest employer had assured him, fitted the lock of the end door of Block A. The door between the cave of the dragon and Block A was never locked, so far as Soames was aware, ...
— The Yellow Claw • Sax Rohmer
... to set the trees back,' she answered and her fit of nervousness had passed. 'For there is a fluid in trees that runneth upward in the spring of the year ...
— The Fifth Queen • Ford Madox Ford
... moved his chair nearer to Hamilton's, and sat down close to his friend's side. All nervousness had left him. He was again cool, scientific, professional; but with it all there was the deep sympathy ...
— Many Kingdoms • Elizabeth Jordan
... N. fear, timidity, diffidence, want of confidence; apprehensiveness, fearfulness &c adj.; solicitude, anxiety, care, apprehension, misgiving; feeze [U.S.]; mistrust &c (doubt) 485; suspicion, qualm; hesitation &c (irresolution) 605. nervousness, restlessness &c adj.; inquietude, disquietude, worry, concern; batophobia^; heartquake^; flutter, trepidation, fear and trembling, perturbation, tremor, quivering, shaking, trembling, throbbing heart, palpitation, ague fit, cold sweat; abject fear &c (cowardice) 862; mortal funk, heartsinking^, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... from the sudden light of the drawing-room. She was bareheaded, and wore a long cloak of black lace over her white evening dress. Letty's flash of thought as she saw her was twofold: first, hatred of her beauty, then triumph in the evident nervousness with which ...
— Sir George Tressady, Vol. II • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... disease is Gu[n]wani[']gist[^a][)i]['], which signifies that "something is causing something to eat," or gnaw the vitals of the patient. The disease attacks only infants of tender age and the symptoms are nervousness and troubled sleep, from which the child wakes suddenly crying as if frightened. The civilized doctor would regard these as symptoms of the presence of worms, but although the Cherokee name might seem to indicate the same belief, the real ...
— The Sacred Formulas of the Cherokees • James Mooney
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