"Reft" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... parley with a shade within, Dearer to him than life itself had been, Sweeter than sunlight on Illyrian sea, Or bloom of myrtle, or murmur of laden bee, Whom lately from his unconsenting breast The Fates, at some capricious blind behest, Intolerably had reft—Eurydice, Dear to the sunlight as Illyrian sea, Sweet as the murmur of bees, or myrtle bloom— And uncompanioned led her ...
— Artemis to Actaeon and Other Worlds • Edith Wharton
... in Edinburgh principallie, thought that thei could do no wrong to no Scottishe man; for a certane French man delivred a coulvering to George Tod, Scottisman, to be stocked, who bringing it throwght the streat, ane other French man clamed it, and wold have reft it from the said George; but he resisted, alledgeing that the Frenche man did wronge. And so begane parties to assemble, asweall to the Scottishman, as to the French; so that two of the French men war stryckin doune, and the rest chassed from the Croce to Nudrye's Wynd head.[558] ...
— The Works of John Knox, Vol. 1 (of 6) • John Knox
... shrilly that even Slivers started. She was pointing stiffly. The men all stared at the storm of dust. For one brief second the swirling clouds were reft, revealing, far out eastward, in the dead-land of white, a small dark object—the form of ...
— Life at High Tide - Harper's Novelettes • Various
... Gylfi, Rich in stored up treasure, The land she joined to Denmark. Four heads and eight eyes bearing, While hot sweat trickled down them, The oxen dragged the reft mass That ...
— Myths of the Norsemen - From the Eddas and Sagas • H. A. Guerber
... hope and helpe was reft, His death gaue manumition to his soule, Misfortune smyld, and euen then shee left The mournfull Ocean, mourner for this dole; Away shee flyes, for all was now bereft, Both hopes and helpe, for life to win deaths gole; Yet Grinuile vnamaz'd with constant faith, Laughing ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, and Discoveries of The English Nation, v. 7 - England's Naval Exploits Against Spain • Richard Hakluyt
... who of late, while he watched the stars on their Libyan passage, had slipped from the stern and fallen amid the waves. To him, when he first knew the melancholy form in that depth of shade, he thus opens speech: 'What god, O Palinurus, reft thee from us and sank thee amid the seas? forth and tell. For in this single answer Apollo deceived me, never found false before, when he prophesied thee safety on ocean and arrival on the Ausonian coasts. See, ...
— The Aeneid of Virgil • Virgil
... cause; And there it is;—(breaks the sword)—take it—and with it all Th' allegiance that I owe to France; ay take it; And with it, take the hope I breathe o'er it: That so, before Colonna's host, your arms Lie crush'd and sullied with dishonour's stain; So, reft in sunder by contending factions, Be your Italian provinces; so torn By discord and dissension this vast empire; So broken and disjoin'd your subjects' loves; So fallen your ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 19. Issue 539 - 24 Mar 1832 • Various
... Barbarian, that if only for a while Fate has reft power from my hands. Oh! this is the bitterest drop in all my cup, that I who for a score of years ruled the world must live to suffer the ...
— The Wanderer's Necklace • H. Rider Haggard
... the girl, who was kneeling, consoling the dog, who, reft 'tween pride and pain, showed a lamentable countenance. Suddenly she looked up ...
— The Hawk of Egypt • Joan Conquest
... wite ow in ower blodletunge{;} [&] halde ow i swuch reste{;} [/] [gh]e longe reft{er} mahen i godes seruise e monluker swinken {110} ant alswa hwen [gh]e fele eani secnesse. Muchel sotschipe hit is leosen for an dei{;} tene oer tweolue. Vessche ow hwer{}se neod is as ofte as [gh]e ...
— Selections from early Middle English, 1130-1250 - Part I: Texts • Various
... world that she had left— The meads from her so lately reft— Poor infant Proserpine! A fabled land they lay above, A paradise of sunny ...
— The Poetical Works of George MacDonald in Two Volumes, Volume I • George MacDonald
... so sharp a sword, And a knife with a golden heft: “King Sigfred be God’s grace with thee, For here thy life was reft! ...
— King Diderik - and the fight between the Lion and Dragon and other ballads - - - Translator: George Borrow • Thomas J. Wise
... very true, my sovereign King, My skill may weel be doubted; But facts are chiels that winna ding, An' downa be disputed: Your royal nest, beneath your wing, Is e'en right reft and clouted, And now the third part o' the string, An' less, will gang aboot it Than did ...
— Poems And Songs Of Robert Burns • Robert Burns
... woe is me—I would that I had ne'er to Susa gone, To ask that fatal boon of thee, Hystaspes' generous son. Oh, deadly fight! oh, woeful sight! to greet a monarch's eyes! All desolate—my native land, reft of ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 54, No. 338, December 1843 • Various
... some beetling cliff—where the mad waves Rush echoing thro' the high-arched caves below, I view some love-reft fair Whose sighing warms the air, Gaze anxious on the ocean as it raves And call on thee-alone, of power to sooth ...
— Zophiel - A Poem • Maria Gowen Brooks
... Giselher, the young king, ran to them, and Gernot, his brother, who cried quickly, when he saw not King Gunther with Siegfried, "Thou art welcome, Sir Siegfried. Tell me, now, what thou hast done with my brother the king. If the strength of Brunhild hath reft him from us, a bitter ...
— The Fall of the Niebelungs • Unknown
... so! And do not, pray thee, rise to go! I am bewilder'd with my woe; But hear me fairly to the end, I will not pain thee, nor offend. O no! I would thy favour win; For, when I die, as next of kin, So 'reft am I of human ties, It is thy place to close ...
— The Lay of Marie • Matilda Betham
... the human countenance—a despair that sought no sympathy, a sorrow that separated the sufferer from the outer world. Never had he seen a face so beautiful, even in despair. He could have fancied it the face of Andromache, when all that made her world had been reft from her; or of Antigone, when the dread fiat had gone forth—that funeral rites or sepulture for the last accursed scion of an accursed race there ...
— Charlotte's Inheritance • M. E. Braddon
... the still midnight—hark'—that startling sound Tells of deed of blood! a soldier's hand With aim too true himself hath reft of life! * * * Beneath that roof For many days none had heard sounds of gladness. He was distressed—each fond retainer then Softened his voice to whispers—each pale face Did but reflect the sadness fixed in his: Save where the two—two fair and lovely ones, Too young for guilt ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 19. No. 534 - 18 Feb 1832 • Various
... old woman had scanned Shibli Bagarag, she called to him, 'O thou! what is it with thee, that thou rollest as one reft ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... wild by the blows, returned them with their hunting-crops and walking-canes. And then, as half the crowd strained to the left and half to the right to avoid the pressure from behind, the vast mass was suddenly reft in twain, and through the gap surged the rough fellows from behind, all armed with loaded sticks and yelling for "Fair play and Gloucester!" Their determined rush carried the prize-fighters before them, the inner ropes snapped like threads, and in an instant the ring was a swirling,' ...
— Rodney Stone • Arthur Conan Doyle
... noted, a road along which the Romans were marching—and drive off the flocks and herds into the woods before the Roman advance. He made no attempt to attack the legions, but if any foragers were bold enough to follow up the booty thus reft from them, he was upon them in a moment. Such serious loss was thus inflicted that Caesar had to forbid any such excursions, and to content himself with laying waste the fields and farms in immediate ...
— Early Britain—Roman Britain • Edward Conybeare
... if they wrong her honour, The proudest of them shall well hear of it. Time hath not yet so dried this blood of mine, Nor age so eat up my invention, Nor fortune made such havoc of my means, Nor my bad life reft me so much of friends, But they shall find, awak'd in such a kind, Both strength of limb, and policy of mind, Ability in means, and choice of friends, To quit ...
— Much Ado About Nothing • William Shakespeare [Knight edition]
... theatre. The "Belle Sauvage," says Mr. Collier, was a favourite place for these performances. There was also a school of defence, or fencing school, here in Queen Elizabeth's time; so many a hot Tybalt and fiery Mercutio have here crossed rapiers, and many a silk button has been reft from gay doublets by the quick passadoes of the young swordsmen who ruffled it in the Strand. This quondam inn was also the place where Banks, the showman (so often mentioned by Nash and others in Elizabethan pamphlets and lampoons), exhibited his wonderful trained horse ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... this cruel sentence, 'Reft of sense she stood, and rack'd with anguish: In the court she heard the horses stamping, And in fear that it was Asan coming, Fled towards the tower, to ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLV. July, 1844. Vol. LVI. • Various
... fierce servant, full of kingly awe And high disdaine, whenas his soveraine Dame So rudely handled by her foe he sawe, With gaping jawes full greedy at him came, And ramping on his shield, did weene the same 365 Have reft away with his sharpe rending clawes: But he was stout, and lust did now inflame His corage more, that from his griping pawes He hath his shield redeem'd, and foorth his ...
— Spenser's The Faerie Queene, Book I • Edmund Spenser
... herself as the messenger from Heaven, the angel of the realm of France. Possibly the illusion, so cruelly reft from her, returned at last to enfold her in its beneficent veil. At any rate, she appears to have been crushed; all that remained to her was an infinite horror of ...
— The Life of Joan of Arc, Vol. 1 and 2 (of 2) • Anatole France
... foremost of ages called the Kirta is said to set in" (ibid., p. 228). "The King must be skilful in smiting" (ibid., p. 174). "Fierceness and ambition are the qualities of the King" (ibid., p. 59). "The King who is mild is regarded as the worst of his kind, like an elephant that is reft of fierceness" (ibid., p. 171). Indeed, failure to treat subjects with rigour is visited with penalties as tremendous as failure to protect them. "They forget their own position and most truly transcend it. They disclose the secret counsels ...
— Indian Unrest • Valentine Chirol
... I see her sitting bowed and black, Stricken and seared with slavery's mortal scars, Reft of her children, lonely, anguished, yet Still ...
— The Book of American Negro Poetry • Edited by James Weldon Johnson
... sleep if the wind will let him; but such fearsome visions I have had of late, that I ha' been just nigh 'reft o' my wits. Wilt be a queen or a queen-mother, Marian? Something spake to me after this fashion; but I was weary with watching. The spirit passed from me, ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 2 (of 2) • John Roby
... loss of lover sped I sight; * Nor life enjoying neither life's delight: My case is one whose cure is all unknown; * Can any cure the sick but doctor wight? O who hast reft my sleep-joys, leaving me * To ask the breeze that blew from that fair site,— Blew from my lover's land (the land that owns * Those charms so sore a grief in soul excite), 'O breeze, that visitest her land, perhaps * Breathing her scent, thou mayst ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 8 • Richard F. Burton
... handsome suitors vainly, decked in gem and burnished gold, Reft of diadem and necklace, fell ...
— Maha-bharata - The Epic of Ancient India Condensed into English Verse • Anonymous
... the road that ran to the quay a terrible streak of lightning reft the dark sky, and the wild crash of thunder that followed drowned even the roaring ...
— The Tidal Wave and Other Stories • Ethel May Dell
... she went with me, pouring still with patient spirit Balm upon my wounded feelings, peace upon my burning soul; So that though man's love was reft me, 'twas the better to inherit That which far transcends man's favour,—sentience of ...
— Eidolon - The Course of a Soul and Other Poems • Walter R. Cassels
... on the lads an' the land I hae left, An' how love has been lifted, an' friendship been reft; How the hinnie o' hope has been jumbled wi' ga', Then I sigh for the lads an' the land ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volume V. - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... refused, 480 Sad they and suppliant, whose own hands their very bosoms bruised, While fixed, averse, the Goddess kept her eyes upon the ground. Thrice had Achilles Hector dragged the walls of Troy around, And o'er his body, reft of soul, was chaffering now for gold. Deep groaned AEneas from his heart in such wise to behold The car, the spoils, the very corpse of him, his fellow dead, To see the hands of Priam there all weaponless ...
— The AEneids of Virgil - Done into English Verse • Virgil
... what science, 1255 What wratthe of iuste cause have ye to me? What gilt of me, what fel experience Hath fro me raft, allas! Thyn advertence? O trust, O feyth, O depe aseuraunce, Who hath me reft Criseyde, ...
— Troilus and Criseyde • Geoffrey Chaucer
... and cushions soft Those patches somewhat screen; Still, thy poor arms—reft of paint's charms Are scarce fit ...
— The Emigrant Mechanic and Other Tales In Verse - Together With Numerous Songs Upon Canadian Subjects • Thomas Cowherd
... hast us of much riches reft, Tell us at least what hast thou with it done? What has become of him whose flower here left Is but the shadow of his likeness gone? Scarce like the shadow of that which he was, Nought like, but that he ...
— Penshurst Castle - In the Days of Sir Philip Sidney • Emma Marshall
... his honest labor to the comfort of his fellow men, and to the aggregate wealth of the nation, he finds himself suddenly in the clutches of the law for trespassing on the public domain. The proceeds of his long winter's work are reft from him, and exposed to public sale for the benefit of his paternal government . . . and the object of this oppression and wrong is further harassed by vexatious law proceedings ...
— The Frontier in American History • Frederick Jackson Turner
... But when the flames have done their work, I would fain go to God bearing with me your forgiveness. But if this be too much to hope—why, then, Martin, I will beseech God to pluck you forth of this place of horror and to give you back to England, to happiness, to honour and all that I reft from you—" ...
— Martin Conisby's Vengeance • Jeffery Farnol
... gifted practitioner. A roll-top desk was partly broken open, but not rifled, the American boltlocks having defied the clumsy efforts of the thief, Koets, the Dutch dispensarist, who had cleared out of Gueldersdorp, under cover of the previous night, crossing, with the portable property reft from the accursed Englander, the barbed-wire fence that formed the line of demarcation between the British Imperial Forces and the Army of the United Republics. He had meant to wait yet another day, and take many things more, but the coming of those ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves
... that his heart should thrill To waking and waking's pain? Lying so peacefully, placidly still. With the old, sweet smile on his quiet face, Dead to the sting of a heart's disgrace.... How should I wish him a lesser grace, How should I strive with a wiser Will? Yet how can the heart that is reft divine Death's mystical, measureless charity? The cry of the stricken king is mine: "Would I ...
— The Path of Dreams - Poems • Leigh Gordon Giltner
... Reft of a carriage, life is poor: A well-conducted set Needs ready money to procure Their butler and Debrett. The country totters to its fall, Disgraced to all intents, Unless you instantly recall ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, VOL. 100. Feb. 28, 1891 • Various
... doubtful business. Funds had to be collected to buy instruments. Musicians who could play the instruments had to be picked out from among the men, and nobody knew how to find them. Hardly anybody stayed long in these base camps, and a good musician might at any moment be reft away and sent ...
— A Padre in France • George A. Birmingham
... night of Christmas." It was at Christmas-time that the Danish boy acquired his supernatural strength by giving back to the elf-maiden the horn he had taken from her. The Halsteengaard horn and the golden beaker of Aagerup were both reft from the trolls on Christmas Eve, and the horn of Wexioe on Christmas morning. The night of St. John's Day is mentioned as the time when the horn now at Arendal was obtained. The saint here referred to is probably St. John the Evangelist, whose ...
— The Science of Fairy Tales - An Inquiry into Fairy Mythology • Edwin Sidney Hartland
... the peat-fire. He sighed now and then with infinite despondency. Once or twice he pshawed his melancholy vapours, gave a pace back and forward on the oaken floor, with a bent head, a bereaved countenance, and sat down again, indulging in the passionate void that comes to a bosom reft of its joys, its hopes and loves, and only mournful recollection left. A done man! Not an old man; not even an elderly, but a done man none the less, with the heart out of him, and all ...
— Doom Castle • Neil Munro
... have shared the same fate, had it not been for an angel of a young woman, daughter of the gentleman of the house. This charming girl was engaged to be married to Crookshanks. Waked by the firing and horrid din of battle in the piazza, she was at first almost 'reft of her senses by the fright. But the moment she heard her lover's voice, all her terrors vanished, and instead of hiding herself under the bedclothes, she rushed into the piazza amidst the mortal fray, with no armor but her love, no covering ...
— The Life of General Francis Marion • Mason Locke Weems
... unity, But pleasing to th' infernal empery, 330 Under whose ensigns Wars and Discords fight, Since an even number you may disunite In two parts equal, naught in middle left To reunite each part from other reft; And five they hold in most especial prize,[102] Since 'tis the first odd number that doth rise From the two foremost numbers' unity, That odd and even are; which are two and three; For one no number is; but thence doth flow The powerful race of number. Next, ...
— The Works of Christopher Marlowe, Vol. 3 (of 3) • Christopher Marlowe
... just before the war, and one of the men in it reminded me of this man. But the dancing was the least part of it. It was neither sound nor movement nor scent that wrought the spell, but something far more potent. In an instant I found myself reft away from the present with its dull dangers, and looking at a world all young and fresh and beautiful. The gaudy drop-scene had vanished. It was a window I was looking from, and I was gazing at the finest landscape on earth, lit by the pure ...
— Greenmantle • John Buchan
... again his difficulties were greater than those of Chatham. Indeed, they were enhanced by the triumphs of Chatham. Where now could he deal the most telling blow? Not against Canada; for his father had reft that prize. The French settlements in the East Indies were of small account. It was in Hayti, Martinique, and Guadeloupe that French commerce could be ruined. At them, therefore, he struck. But in so doing he reopened the old disputes with Spain. In vain did he seek to avert bickerings ...
— William Pitt and the Great War • John Holland Rose
... Well, you can understand me. I want my brother. He has been basely reft from me. Tell me where he is, and I will forgive all. Restore him to me, and I will bless you and yours." And Philip fell on his knees and grasped the train of her gown. "I know nothing of your brother, Mr. Morton," cried Mrs. Beaufort, surprised and alarmed. ...
— Night and Morning, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... friend; but when Richard III. offered L1000 reward to any one who would deliver up the duke, Banastar betrayed him to John Mitton, sheriff of Shropshire, and he was conveyed to Salisbury, where he was beheaded. The ghost of the duke prayed that Banastar's eldest son, "reft of his wits might end his life in a pigstye;" that his second son might "be drowned in a dyke" containing less than "half a foot of water;" that his only daughter might be a leper; and that Banastar himself might "live in death and ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama, Vol 1 - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook • The Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D.
... had to Asturias march'd Beneath Count Julian's banner.... To revenge His quarrel, twice that number left their bones, Slain in unnatural battle, on the field Of Xeres, where the sceptre from the Goths By righteous Heaven was reft." ...
— The Works of Lord Byron - Poetry, Volume V. • Lord Byron
... you of my death. I will come myself, and you shall see me die, and feast your eyes on the spectacle. Yet, O ye gods, who look down on mortal woes, observe my fate! I ask but this: let me be remembered in coming ages, and add those years to my fame which you have reft from my life. Thus he said, and, turning his pale face and weeping eyes towards her mansion, he fastened a rope to the gatepost, on which he had often hung garlands, and putting his head into the noose, he murmured, 'This garland at least will please you, cruel girl!' ...
— Bulfinch's Mythology • Thomas Bulfinch
... lesser woe, Was carried with more speed before the winde, And in our sight they three were taken vp By Fishermen of Corinth, as we thought. At length another ship had seiz'd on vs, And knowing whom it was their hap to saue, Gaue healthfull welcome to their ship-wrackt guests, And would haue reft the Fishers of their prey, Had not their backe beene very slow of saile; And therefore homeward did they bend their course. Thus haue you heard me seuer'd from my blisse, That by misfortunes was my life prolong'd, To tell sad ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare
... her arms aloft, in a movement of sweet, wild abandon, and, as if in response to an incantation, the sky was reft asunder and the moon rushed forth, free for the moment of the clutching clouds, fugitive, headlong, a shining Maenad of the heavens, surrounded by the rush and whirl that had whelmed earth and its waters and was hurrying them to an unknown, ...
— Success - A Novel • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... Helen's face so mild, And in her bashful mien, The winning softness of the child, The blushes of fifteen. The witching smile, when prone to go, Arrests me, bids me stay; Nor joy, nor comfort can I know, When 'reft of ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volume II. - The Songs of Scotland of the past half century • Various
... Adj. disjoined &c v.; discontinuous &c 70; multipartite^, abstract; disjunctive; secant; isolated &c v.; insular, separate, disparate, discrete, apart, asunder, far between, loose, free; unattached, unannexed, unassociated, unconnected; distinct; adrift; straggling; rift, reft^. [capable of being cut] scissile [Chem], divisible, discerptible^, partible, separable. Adv. separately &c adj.; one by one, severally, apart; adrift, asunder, in twain; in ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... in dreams, I thought it sweet to die, And reft of this gross vision, see at last, As the large soul, quit of the body can, Another ...
— Stories in Verse • Henry Abbey
... with the Crown. In seizing on the control of the Church through his organized prelacy James held himself to have seized the control of the forces which acted through the Church, and to have won back that mastery of his realm which the Reformation had reft from the Scottish kings. ...
— History of the English People, Volume V (of 8) - Puritan England, 1603-1660 • John Richard Green
... our hearthstones, our cherished ones there, Our wives and our children, now reft of our care: Farewell, everloved of our souls—nevermore, Shall we look on your faces—our lifetime ...
— Lays of Ancient Virginia, and Other Poems • James Avis Bartley
... your countless years; You break, with a rainbow of glory, through the spray of your glittering tears. Is your song a song of gladness? a paean of joyous might? Or a wail of discordant sadness for the wrongs you never can right? For the empty seat by the ingle? for children 'reft of their sire? For the bride sitting sad, and single, and pale, by the flickering fire? For your ravenous pools of suction? for your shattering billow swell? For your ceaseless work of destruction? for your ...
— Poems • Adam Lindsay Gordon
... same moment he Is as softly moved—"no rose Would he pluck before the storm Reft ...
— Atta Troll • Heinrich Heine
... head, and frowned in absolute shame and despair, already perceiving how matters must go, and feeling as if the hope of her brother's vindication were slipping away—reft from her by Rachel's folly. Colin gave an indignant sigh, and whispering to her, "Come out when Lady Temple does, I will meet you," he made ...
— The Clever Woman of the Family • Charlotte M. Yonge
... beastly, Billy, you can picture something worse— There's the wrecking of an empire, and its broken people's curse; There are nations reft of freedom, and of hope and kindly mirth, And the shadow of an evil black upon the ...
— 'Hello, Soldier!' - Khaki Verse • Edward Dyson
... were, full Of holy divination in their dreams, Then in a vision did I seem to view A golden-feather'd eagle in the sky, With open wings, and hov'ring for descent, And I was in that place, methought, from whence Young Ganymede, from his associates 'reft, Was snatch'd aloft to the high consistory. "Perhaps," thought I within me, "here alone He strikes his quarry, and elsewhere disdains To pounce upon the prey." Therewith, it seem'd, A little wheeling in his airy tour Terrible ...
— The Divine Comedy, Complete - The Vision of Paradise, Purgatory and Hell • Dante Alighieri
... were accompanied by action of the most swift and singular kind. Mr. Strelley saw two porters scramble after his portmanteaux, had his valise reft from his hand, and that hand firmly grasped before he could frame his reply. The vehemence of this large perspiring sage caused the struggle between pride and civility to be short; such faint protests as he had at command passed unheeded in the bustle and could not ...
— The Fool Errant • Maurice Hewlett
... is in failure, in distress, When, reft of all, it stands alone, And not in what men call success, The noble, valiant ...
— Hymns, Songs, and Fables, for Young People • Eliza Lee Follen
... from pursuers, always retreating, always looking back in fear. Poverty would be his close companion; makeshifts, struggles, tricks of deceit, the occupation of his days. The effort of new endeavor rose before him like a mountain to be climbed and for which he had not the strength; the ease he was reft of, a paradise only valued now it was lost. Hate of those who had brought him so low surged in him, dominating even his misery. He set his teeth, looking up at the graying sky, feeling the poison pressing at his ...
— Treasure and Trouble Therewith - A Tale of California • Geraldine Bonner
... the tangled web is reft, The kid-gloved villain scowls and sneers, And hapless innocence is left With no ...
— Songs Of The Road • Arthur Conan Doyle
... I do not fear,— Speak to me, raise me from my life's long dream. "The whole night through thou liest here Beside the well that waters Lethe's stream, And still thou dost not drink; O Man make haste; Ere long the dawn will pour adown the waste, And show thee, reft from the embrace of night, The barren world, barren of revelry. Happy art thou, O Man, happily free, Who wilt never see A thousand ages shed their life and light As petals fall at eventide. Thou shalt not see the radiant ...
— The Five Books of Youth • Robert Hillyer
... mighty two-edged sweep. A duke was he, rich, powerful—and yet Fate had on him a heavy burden set, For, while a youth, as he did hunt the boar, The savage beast his goodly steed did gore, And as the young duke thus defenceless lay, With cruel tusk had reft his looks away, Had marred his comely features and so mauled him That, 'hind his back, "The ...
— The Geste of Duke Jocelyn • Jeffery Farnol
... went footing slow, His Mantle hairy, and his Bonnet sedge, Inwrought with figures dim, and on the edge Like to that sanguine flower inscrib'd with woe. Ah; Who hath reft (quoth he) my dearest pledge? Last came, and last did go, The Pilot of the Galilean lake, Two massy Keyes he bore of metals twain, 110 (The Golden opes, the Iron shuts amain) He shook his Miter'd locks, and stern bespake, How well could I have spar'd ...
— The Poetical Works of John Milton • John Milton
... joy and my comfort wast thou 'neath the sun, Dark gloom, now I'm reft of thee, filleth my mind; I shall know no more happiness now thou art gone, O my Mary, of ...
— Targum • George Borrow
... Love! The sea-breeze moans Through yon reft house! O'er rolling stones In bold ambitious sweep The onward-surging tides supply The silence of the cloudless sky 35 ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... the peasant has shot away his last arrow, and the wolf has reft the last lamb from the fold, then is there peace between them. But 'tis a strange friendship. Well well; let that pass. It is fitting, as I said, that the harness hang bright in the hall; for you know the old saw: "Call none a man but the knightly man." Now there ...
— Henrik Ibsen's Prose Dramas Vol III. • Henrik Ibsen
... lustre so lately there. The clayey, sluggish white of death was already on his cheek; his lip, convulsively compressed, and the left hand tightly clenched, as if the soul had not been thus violently reft from the body, without a strong: pang of mortal agony. His right hand had stiffened round the hilt of his unsheathed sword, for the murderous blow had been dealt from behind, and with such fatal aim, that death must have ...
— The Vale of Cedars • Grace Aguilar
... now an all unwished-for gift I rue, A fatal ray of knowledge shed to mar My radiant star-crown grown oracular, For I must speak and give an answer true. An end of silence and of quiet days, The Lover with two words my counsel prays; And when my secret from my heart is reft, When all my silver petals scattered lie, I am the only flower neglected left, Cast down and trodden under ...
— Lost Illusions • Honore De Balzac
... said or did That was not rightly said and justly done. No idle word he spake, even in free speech; Patient and lordly; generous to bestow Beyond all givers; scorning to be base, Yea, even in secret—such Nishadha was. Alas! when, day and night, I think of him, How is my heart consumed, reft of its joy!" So meditating, like one torn by thoughts, She mounted to the palace-roof to see; And thence, in the mid-court, the car beheld Arriving. Rituparna and Vahuka She saw, with Vrishni's son, descend and loose The panting horses, wheeling back the car. Then Rituparna, alighting, ...
— Hindu Literature • Epiphanius Wilson
... well, my father. Go then, for having proceeded to salute[34] thy sister, whose breast I first sucked, Jocasta I mean, deprived of my mother, and reft from her, an orphan, I will depart and save my life. But haste, go, let not ...
— The Tragedies of Euripides, Volume I. • Euripides
... 'reft of breath, Thou ne'er shalt feel the stroke of death; The heroes' happy isles shall be The bright abode allotted thee. * * * * * While freedom's name is understood You shall delight the wise and good; You dared to set your country free, ...
— Mosaics of Grecian History • Marcius Willson and Robert Pierpont Willson
... is thy soul like mountain tide, That, swelled by winter storm and shower, Rolls down in turbulence of power, A torrent fierce and wide; Reft of these aids, a rill obscure, Shrinking unnoticed, mean and poor, Whose channel shows displayed The wrecks of its impetuous course, But not one symptom of the force By which these wrecks ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott, Volume V (of 10) • John Gibson Lockhart
... thee. Our enemies Laugh loudly, and she maddens in her joy, Our mother most unmotherly, of whom Thy secret missives ofttimes told me, thou Wouldst be the punisher. But that fair hope The hapless Genius of thy lot and mine Hath reft away, and gives thee thus to me,— For thy loved form thy dust and fruitless shade O bitterness! O piteous sight! Woe! woe! Oh! sent on thy dire journey, dearest one, How thou hast ruined me! Thou hast indeed, Dear brother! Then receive me to thyself, Hide me in this thy covering, there to ...
— The Seven Plays in English Verse • Sophocles
... have I been reft of sense, By gazing on their excellence, But meeting Mopsa in my way, And looking on her face of clay, Been healed, and cured, and made as sound, As though I ne'er had had a wound? And when in tables of my heart, Love wrought such things as bred my smart, Mopsa would come, with face ...
— A Defence of Poesie and Poems • Philip Sidney
... mutabile semper foemina." Passion on the other hand is the mainspring of modern poetry, and it is difficult for us to realize the superior beauty of the calmer and vaster ideal of the poets of old. The figure of Dido, whirled hither and thither by the storms of warring emotions, reft even of her queenly dignity by the despair of her love, degraded by jealousy and disappointment to a very scold, is to the calm, serene figure of AEneas as modern sculpture, the sculpture of emotion, is to the sculpture of classic ...
— Stray Studies from England and Italy • John Richard Green
... day he lived to see Unbroken, but by one misfortune dire, When fate had reft his mutual heart—but she Was gone-and Gertrude climbed a widowed father's ...
— The Spy • James Fenimore Cooper
... their watery way, And, 'O my sire!' did Ellen say, 'Why urge thy chase so far astray? And why so late returned? And why '— The rest was in her speaking eye. 'My child, the chase I follow far, 'Tis mimicry of noble war; And with that gallant pastime reft Were all of Douglas I have left. I met young Malcolm as I strayed Far eastward, in Glenfinlas' shade Nor strayed I safe, for all around Hunters and horsemen scoured the ground. This youth, though ...
— The Lady of the Lake • Sir Walter Scott
... eloquence, And all the shows o' the world, are frail and vain To weep a loss that turns their light to shade. It is a woe "too deep for tears," when all Is reft at once, when some surpassing spirit, Whose light adorned the world around it, leaves Those who remain behind nor sobs nor groans, The passionate tumult of a clinging hope; But pale despair and cold tranquillity, Nature's vast frame, the web of human ...
— Percy Bysshe Shelley • John Addington Symonds
... earthly to celestial love! O reft from me and from my clinging grasp, And circled straightway by the close, warm clasp Of seraph bosoms ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 454 - Volume 18, New Series, September 11, 1852 • Various
... some fragments of the ancient Catholic families of Ireland; but, alas! what VERY fragments! They linger like the remnants of her aboriginal forests, reft indeed of their strength and greatness, but proud even in decay. Every winter thins their ranks, and strews the ground with the wreck of their loftiest branches; they are at best but tolerated in the land which gave them birth—objects of curiosity, perhaps of pity, ...
— The Purcell Papers - Volume I. (of III.) • Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu
... terrible thing, my friend, to be thus reft of all you hold dearest in life. If I had seen her touched by the hand of disease, and watched the rose fading from her cheek, leaf after leaf falling away, until death claimed at last his victim, I could have borne ...
— Lizzy Glenn - or, The Trials of a Seamstress • T. S. Arthur
... father, "by what art do they thus spirit out of life the solid body? What death do they command that leaves no traces? that this material structure, these strong arms, this skeleton that can resist the grave for centuries, should be thus reft in a moment from the world of sense? A horror dwells in that thought more awful ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 5 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... against thy wrong, Who hast reft me of my love, my wife, And art not satiate yet with strife, But needs wilt hold me lingering long. No strength since then has kept me strong: But what could hurt thee in her ...
— A Channel Passage and Other Poems - Taken from The Collected Poetical Works of Algernon Charles - Swinburne—Vol VI • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... now to my matter retourne agayn And tu begyn new where I left. whan al the goddis had done her besy payne. The way to contryue how it shuld be reft Of his lyf Attropos had no cause eft To co{m}pleyn than Phebus stert vpon her fete / And sayd I pray you let me speke ...
— The Assemble of Goddes • Anonymous
... night when his spirit was by treachery and violence reft from his body, there was no rest ...
— Stories of the Border Marches • John Lang and Jean Lang
... slain! My Lady Lingua dead? O heavens unjust! Can you behold this fact, this bloody fact, And shower not fire upon the murderer? Ah, peerless Lingua! mistress of heavenly words, Sweet tongue of eloquence, the life of fame, Heart's dear enchantress! What disaster, fates, Hath reft this jewel from our commonwealth? Gustus, the ruby that adorns the ring, Lo, here defect, how shalt thou lead thy days, Wanting the sweet companion of thy life, But in dark sorrow and dull melancholy? But stay, who's this? inhuman wretch! Bloodthirsty ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. IX • Various
... Now reft of all, faint, feeble, prest with age, We mark her feelings in the last great stage; The feverish hopes, the fears, the cares of life, No more oppress her with torturing strife; The chivalrous spirit of her early day Has passed with beauty and with youth away. As oft the traveller who beholds ...
— Alvira: the Heroine of Vesuvius • A. J. O'Reilly
... with curses dark, That sunk so low that sacred head of thine. Next Camus, reverend sire, went footing slow, His mantle hairy, and his bonnet sedge, Inwrought with figures dim, and on the edge, Like to that sanguine flower inscribed with woe. "Ah! who hath reft," quoth he, "my dearest pledge?" Last came, and last did go, The pilot of the Galilean lake, Two massy keys he bore, of metals twain (The golden opes, the iron shuts amain). He shook his mitred locks, and stern bespake: ...
— Verses and Translations • C. S. C.
... worthy, all over the waves' cup. The King the full mighty cring'd under the shield; Into grasp of the Franks the King's life was gotten 1210 With the gear of the breast and the ring altogether; It was worser war-wolves then reft gear from the slain After the war-shearing; there the Geats' war-folk Held the house of the dead men. The Hall took the voices; Spake out then Wealhtheow; before the host said she: Brook thou this ...
— The Tale of Beowulf - Sometime King of the Folk of the Weder Geats • Anonymous
... that the holding of this stone, reft from our crown, had something to do with the hold of these English upon our fair domains ...
— The King's Esquires - The Jewel of France • George Manville Fenn
... that he now so reluctantly witnessed differed from the brutal revels in the convent of Santa Maria—each alike in its motive, though so differing in the manner—equally callous and equally selfish, coining horror into enjoyment. The fair Mariana, whose partner had been reft from her, as the Queen had related, was in no mind to lose the new one she had gained. She pressed upon him from time to time the wine-flask and the fruits; and in those unmeaning courtesies her hand gently lingered upon his. At length, the ...
— Rienzi • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... reverence of men to be; And that quaint interest which prompts the sage The silent fathoms of the past to gauge Shall keep alive our own past memory, Making all great of ours—the garb we wear— Our voiceless cities, reft of roof and spire— The very skull whence now the eye of fire Glances bright sign of what the soul can dare. So shall our annals make an envied lore, And men will say, 'Thus did ...
— Thoughts, Moods and Ideals: Crimes of Leisure • W.D. Lighthall
... cried, "hear me, in justice. I am here in this man's custody by mere force, reft from mine own people. Since that day I had never pity, countenance, nor comfort from the face of man—but from him only—Richard Shelton—whom they now accuse and labour to undo. My lord, if he was yesternight ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 8 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... man's passions still are made. The music of their motion as they pranced Lulled me to flawless ease as of a God; Never upon me pain or pleasure chanced; Unknown the dew of bliss, or fate's hard rod. Thus dreamed I ... But I know our mother Earth Waits to give back the peace she reft at birth. ...
— Songs, Sonnets & Miscellaneous Poems • Thomas Runciman
... sparkling bowl, The rich repast prepare; Reft of a crown, he yet may share the feast: Close by the regal chair Fell Thirst and Famine scowl{25} A baleful smile upon their baffled guest. Heard ye the din of battle{26} bray, Lance to lance, and horse to horse? Long years of havoc urge their destined course, And ...
— Six Centuries of English Poetry - Tennyson to Chaucer • James Baldwin
... 'Tis there, shrunk 'gainst two rows of dead pale pearls, and cold and colorless as lip of statue carved of marble. Was it the form whose perfect outline stamped it with divinity? It's there, but 'reft of all its winsome roundness, and stiffening in the chill of death. It makes me cold to look upon its rigidness. But just this hour the breath went out; was't that I loved? 'Twas this I clasped and kissed. What is it that we've christened love, that glamours ...
— Debris - Selections from Poems • Madge Morris
... inlet. He knew the mountain valleys of the Cumberland, and had wandered, sometimes footsore and hungry, under the giant ramparts of the Selkirks and the Rockies, but he had never seen a fairer spot than the reft in the hills which sheltered Savine's villa, and was known by its Indian name, "The Place of ...
— Thurston of Orchard Valley • Harold Bindloss
... to flatter, left of all his store! No fool to laugh at, which he valued more. There reft of health, of fortune, friends, And fame, this lord ...
— Love Romances of the Aristocracy • Thornton Hall
... And this reft house is that, the which he built, Lamented Jack! and here his malt he pil'd, Cautious in vain! these rats, that squeak so wild, Squeak not unconscious of their father's guilt. Did he not see her gleaming thro' the glade! Belike 'twas she, the maiden all forlorn. What the she milk no cow with ...
— Biographia Literaria • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... the fellest strife, There lay in the moonlight clear The good Earl Douglas, reft of life By a ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VII. • Various
... of Aristotle and of Plato woke again to life beneath the shadow of the mighty dome with which Brunelleschi had just crowned the City by the Arno. All the restless energy which Florence had so long thrown into the cause of liberty she flung, now that her liberty was reft from her, into the cause of letters. The galleys of her merchants brought back manuscripts from the East as the most precious portion of their freight. In the palaces of her nobles fragments of classic sculpture ranged themselves beneath the frescoes of Ghirlandajo. ...
— History of the English People, Volume III (of 8) - The Parliament, 1399-1461; The Monarchy 1461-1540 • John Richard Green
... could desire; but often in the five years did she remember the woodman's hut on the bank of the great blue river where she had spent her childhood; often she thought of her father living there alone, reft of his little daughter, the one comfort of his life. Then would the Prince come with his kind love, and quite drive away such sad thoughts. As the years went by she thought less of her former life; indeed it was so different from the present that she persuaded herself that she had died in her ...
— Seven Little People and their Friends • Horace Elisha Scudder
... melancholy cloud. One human glance of grief upon the grave Of all that Fortune gave The loiterer takes—then turns him to depart, And grasps the wanderer's staff and mans his heart: Whatever else the element bereaves One blessing more than all it reft—it leaves The face that he loves!—He counts them o'er, See—not one look is missing from ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. III • Kuno Francke (Editor-in-Chief)
... fancy I can see Thee amid the daffodils. Golden wealth thy basket fills; Golden blossoms at thy breast; Golden hair that shames the West; Golden sunlight round thy head! Ah! the golden years have fled; Thee have reft, and me have left Here alone, ...
— Primavera - Poems by Four Authors • Stephen Phillips, Laurence Binyon, Manmohan Ghose and Arthur Shearly Cripps
... blood of this Black Knight. And for this carried they off the body piecemeal and the head, for that they well knew you were wounded; and of the head shall I have right sore need, for thereby shall a castle be yielded up to me that was reft from me by treason, so I may find the knight that I go seek, through whom it ought to be yielded ...
— High History of the Holy Graal • Unknown
... she up, And slowly, slowly left him, And, sighing, said she could not stay, Since death of life had reft him. ...
— Types of Children's Literature • Edited by Walter Barnes
... our interest in them could not be taken away, wherein we trust in regard of severall of them, called home by death, your bounty will super-adde some able men of your own that may help to lay the foundation of Gods house, according to the Pattern. But for these so unjustly reft from us, not only our necessity, but equity pleads, that either you would send them all over, which were a Work to be parallelled to the glories of the Primitive times, or at least that ye would declare them ...
— The Acts Of The General Assemblies of the Church of Scotland
... I greatly fear, she was no that innocent as your leddyship thinks, puir bairn! Nae that I would say onything about it, only it's weel kenned noo. Puir Ailsie! she lost her innocence before she lost her life, me leddy. And I greatly misdoubt, he that reft her of the ane reft her of the ither!" sobbed the dame, as she assisted Claudia to put on ...
— Self-Raised • Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte Southworth
... peoples each in turn awake From virtue, as a man from his brief love, And, roughly shaken, face the useless truth; No answer to brute fact has e'er been found. Slaves of your slaves, caged in your furnished rooms, Ushered to meals when reft of appetite— Though hungry, bound to wait a stated hour— Your dearest contemplation broken off By the appointed summons to your bath; Racked with more thought for those whom you may flog Than for those dear; obsessed by your possessions With a dull round of stale ...
— Georgian Poetry 1911-12 • Various
... bows her head, the new-sprung flower to smell, Comparing it to her Adonis' breath; 1172 And says within her bosom it shall dwell, Since he himself is reft from her by death: She drops the stalk, and in the breach appears Green dropping sap, which she compares ...
— Venus and Adonis • William Shakespeare
... all things are cheaper in the country, since they have to be carried from the country into the town, and many necessaries may be had for the asking. Persuaded by these arguments, I went to this place, and I was not altogether deceived, seeing that I recovered my health, and the son—who was to be reft from me later on by the ...
— Jerome Cardan - A Biographical Study • William George Waters
... which did thy sounds approve, Which wont in such harmonious strains to flow, Is reft from Earth to tune those spheres above, What art thou but a ...
— The Golden Treasury - Of the Best Songs and Lyrical Poems in the English Language • Various
... field of battle, such grief hath been ours that one cannot gladden us by giving the sovereignty of even the three worlds. Alas, having slain, for the sake of the earth, such lords of earth as deserved not to be slain by us, we are bearing the weight of existence, deprived of friends and reft of the very objects of life. Like a pack of dogs fighting one another for a piece of meat, a great disaster has overtaken us! That piece of meat is no longer dear to us. On the other hand, it shall be thrown aside. They that have been slain should not ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown
... forth. And men, unholy in deed and thought, take pleasure in envy and malice. And, O sinless one, the earth then becometh full of sin and immorality. And, O lord of the earth, he that becometh virtuous at such periods doth not live long. Indeed, the earth becometh reft of virtue in every shape. And, O tiger among men, the merchants and traders then full of guile, sell large quantities of articles with false weights and measures. And they that are virtuous do not prosper; while they that are sinful proper exceedingly. ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa Bk. 3 Pt. 2 • Translated by Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... overcoat—it was invalidish; he would not wear his new yellow boots and keep his feet dry, except on Sundays: 'Ils sont bons!' he would say. And before he would profane their goodness, his old worn-out shoes had to be reft from him. He would not admit that he was ill, that he was cold, that he was—anything. But at night, a 'Power' would be awakened by groans, and, hurrying to his room, find him huddled nose to knees, moaning. And ...
— Tatterdemalion • John Galsworthy
... Yon island-strength is guarded well,—say, brothers, will ye go? From home and kin for many a year our steps have wander'd wide, And never may our bones be laid our fathers' graves beside. 50 No children have we to lament, no wives to wail our fall; The traitor's and the spoiler's hand have reft our hearths of all. But we have hearts, and we have arms, as strong to will and dare As when our ancient banners flew within the northern air. Come, brothers! let me name a spell shall rouse your souls ...
— The Ontario High School Reader • A.E. Marty
... pleased him to think, as he walked along the street, that every one was pointing him out as the eminent literary man who was the pride of the district, and that the whole town was ringing with that magnificent effusion. Mr. Tennyson, it is certain, felt that his crown was being reft away. But, on the other hand, there is no commoner form of morbid misery than that of the poor nervous man or woman who fancies that he or she is the subject of universal unkindly remark. You will find people, still sane for practical purposes, who think that the whole neighborhood ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 7, No. 44, June, 1861 • Various
... spring, ah happy day! Underneath a leafy spray With her sister stands my may. O sweet love! He who now is reft of thee ...
— Wine, Women, and Song - Mediaeval Latin Students' songs; Now first translated into English verse • Various
... there was no time for more ere his lips met hers in a kiss so burning, so compelling, that it reft from her all power of resistance. One glimpse she had of his eyes, and it was as if she looked into the deep, deep heart of ...
— The Top of the World • Ethel M. Dell
... rose cloud upon cloud of crimson and gold, crossed by rapid flashes of pale yellow and white lightning, which momentarily obliterated their rich colours. To the south was a great bank of black thunder-cloud crested with crimson, reft to its deepest darkness by successive flashes of forked lightning. Immediately overhead a narrow curtain of leaden clouds was driven hither and thither by uncertain winds; while below, the prairie and all ...
— A Trip to Manitoba • Mary FitzGibbon
... scrupulously withheld from the cognizance of the Houses were now absolutely forced on their attention. It was by Parliament that England was torn from the great body of Western Christendom. It was by parliamentary enactment that the English Church was reft of its older liberties and made absolutely subservient to the Crown. It was a parliamentary statute that defined the very faith and religion of the land. The vastest confiscation of landed property ...
— History of the English People - Volume 4 (of 8) • John Richard Green
... fall, why what hope is there even for such remnants of his kingdom as still remain faithful south of the Loire? The English will have them all. Already they call our King in mockery 'the King of Bourges;' soon even that small domain will be reft away, and then what will remain for him or for us? If the visions of the maiden had been true, why doth not the Lord strike now, before Salisbury of England can invest the city? If Orleans ...
— A Heroine of France • Evelyn Everett-Green
... and down the back of it, they swept, stirrup by stirrup and neck by neck, while the roar of the hoofs reft the silence of the prairie like the roll of musketry. Behind came the wagons, lurching up the slope, and the blood surged to the brave young faces as the night wind smote them and fanned into brightness the ...
— Winston of the Prairie • Harold Bindloss
... if men forebore the shout, Yet the din of steel and iron in the grey clouds rang about; But how to tell of King Volsung, and the valour of his folk! Three times the wood of battle before their edges broke; And the shield-wall, sorely dwindled and reft of the ruddy gold, Against the drift of the war-blast for the fourth time yet did hold. But men's shields were waxen heavy with the weight of shafts they bore, And the fifth time many a champion cast ...
— The Story of Sigurd the Volsung and the Fall of the Niblungs • William Morris
... the avid greed Of pirate fathers, smocked as Grace, Sent Judas missioners to read Christ's Word to many a feebler race — False priests of Truth who made their tryst At Mammon's shrine, and reft or slew — Some hands you taught to pray to Christ Have prayed His ...
— An Anthology of Australian Verse • Bertram Stevens
... What stamps the wrinkle deeper on the brow? To view each loved one blotted from Life's page, And be alone on earth, as I am now. Before the Chastener humbly let me bow, O'er Hearts divided and o'er Hopes destroyed: Roll on, vain days! full reckless may ye flow, Since Time hath reft whate'er my soul enjoyed,[gf] And with the ills of ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 2 • George Gordon Byron
... the storm has reft us But the brave and kindly clay ('Tis but dust where Lander left us, And ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 96, October 1865 • Various
... continent, sweeps over the scorched and cracking plains, to lick up their streams and wither the herbage in its path, until it meets the waters of the great south bay; but in its passage across the straits it is reft of its fire, and sinks, exhausted with its journey, at the feet of ...
— For the Term of His Natural Life • Marcus Clarke
... ye essay to prove 'Tis my concern, not yours. But yet, how vain To speak of wrong, or plead the cause of truth Before the unjust. Can ye not understand God in his wisdom hath afflicted me? Ilis hand hath reft away my crown and stripp'd Me of my glory. Kindred blood vouchsafes No aid or solace in my deep distress. Estrang'd and far away, like statues cold Brethren and kinsfolk stand. Familiar friends Frown on me as a stranger. They who dwell In my own house and eat my bread, ...
— Man of Uz, and Other Poems • Lydia Howard Sigourney
... worth the time, woe worth the day, That reft us of thee, Tabitha! For we have lost, with thee, the meal, The bits, the morsels, and the deal Of gentle paste and yielding dough, That thou on widows did bestow. CHOR. All's gone, and death hath taken Away from us Our maundy; ...
— A Selection From The Lyrical Poems Of Robert Herrick • Robert Herrick
... loved and fair, The whelmed beneath the tide,— The broken harps around whose strings The dull sea-monsters glide! Mother and nursling sweet, Reft from the household throng; There's bitter weeping in the nest Where breathed ...
— The American Union Speaker • John D. Philbrick
... in with the 'elfin grey' who might have been an 'earthly knight'; and he tells her how, as a youth, he had been reft ...
— The Balladists - Famous Scots Series • John Geddie |
