"Faltering" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... The faltering sunbeam fades and goes; The night-bird whistles in the brake; The willows quake; Utter darkness walls; the wind Sighs no more. Yet it seems the silence yearns But to catch thy fleeting foot; Yet the wandering glowworm ...
— Collected Poems 1901-1918 in Two Volumes - Volume I. • Walter de la Mare
... still ten minutes of the two hours left when the mother-subs broke water and started crawling inland, swiftly, surely, without faltering in the slightest as they changed their element from ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science April 1930 • Various
... faltering step, toward the other room, inwardly afraid. Another hand met hers, with a reassuring clasp. "One step more, Rose. Now then, forward, march, all ...
— Old Rose and Silver • Myrtle Reed
... And I am the brother whom you have heard of, sir; and who was left for dead in Mr. Braddock's action; and came to life again after eighteen months amongst the French; and live to thank God and thank you for your kindness to my Harry," continued the lad with a faltering voice. ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... had turned back to the desk and did not see Nancy's half-extended hand, or hear her faltering voice. Her hand dropped to her side, and, choking back a sob, she followed Senator Warren and Baker out ...
— The Lost Despatch • Natalie Sumner Lincoln
... with her anguish, and replied, (but with a faltering voice) "I expected as much, ...
— A Simple Story • Mrs. Inchbald
... and, coming toward Marsa to thank her, her sunburnt skin glowing a deeper red, the poor woman, with tears in her tired eyes, and a wan smile upon her pale lips, touched, surprised, happy in the pleasure of her children, murmured, faltering and confused: ...
— Prince Zilah, Complete • Jules Claretie
... Dervishes is long and winding. To Mrs. Greyne it seemed endless. As she threaded it with faltering step, gripped by the feverish hand of Abdallah Jack, who now began to display a strange and terrible excitement, she became a centre of curiosity. Unwashed Arabs, rakish Zouaves in blue and red, wandering Jews of various nationalities, unveiled ...
— The Mission Of Mr. Eustace Greyne - 1905 • Robert Hichens
... the little creatures had been, and how they had held out. On and on they had gone, stopping to rest only for a short time. Little Mary now was too weak to walk alone. The other two held her up between them or carried her on their backs. Troloo had gone on without faltering as yet, but now they reached some hard, stony ground, and after going backwards and forwards several times he shook his head and said that he could not find the track of the children. They must go ...
— Taking Tales - Instructive and Entertaining Reading • W.H.G. Kingston
... industry in recent years. Tourism, export-oriented manufacturing, and offshore banking activity have assumed larger roles. Most food is imported. The government has undertaken a program designed to revitalize the faltering sugar sector. It is also working to improve revenue collection in order to better fund social programs. In 1997 some leaders in Nevis were urging separation from Saint Kitts on the basis that Nevis was paying far more in taxes than it was receiving ...
— The 2000 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... gentlemen bearing long sticks. Behind them come the princesses, bowing on each hand. The princess of Wales advances first, with a naive, faltering, hesitating step, a strange and quite delicious blending of timidity and child-like confidence in her manner. Then come, walking by twos, some daughters of the queen. Then approaches the princess of Teck ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XII. No. 30. September, 1873 • Various
... back of his sheep," said the parson, watching intently. "Strange thing they don't break!" But they didn't. There was no waiting, no coaxing; it was drive and devilry all through. He brought his sheep along at a terrific rate, never missing a turn, never faltering, never running out. And the crowd applauded, for the crowd loves a dashing display. While little M'Adam, hopping agilely about, his face ablaze with excitement, handled dog and sheep with a masterly precision that compelled the admiration even of ...
— Bob, Son of Battle • Alfred Ollivant
... Atom Smasher," Jim repeated. "In these wings I'll be taken for Atlantean. I'll—bring it back." He spoke with faltering conviction. And yet there was nothing else to do. Everything depended upon his being able to bring back the Atom Smasher and take Lucille and her ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, May, 1930 • Various
... instantly white as a sheet, her body trembling like an aspen, her quivering lips faltering forth words she could ...
— Beth Norvell - A Romance of the West • Randall Parrish
... minute we could have had the illusion that he had stolen away, unheard, on the thick mats. But I don't think that either of us was deceived. The voice returned, stammering words without connection, pausing and faltering, till suddenly steadied it soared into impassioned entreaty, sank to low, harsh tones, voluble, lofty sometimes and sometimes abject. When it paused it left us looking profoundly at ...
— The Arrow of Gold - a story between two notes • Joseph Conrad
... stranger looked at her, and asked in a faltering voice, "Are you an angel?" still ...
— A Little Pilgrim • Mrs. Oliphant
... papers are accepted by the Judge when the padre makes ready for his departure. The priest, with faltering voice, says early mass, with a few attendants. Delivering up the keys of the sacristy, chapel, and his home to the Judge, he ...
— The Little Lady of Lagunitas • Richard Henry Savage
... as Don Antonio withdrew, Monteblanco requested to speak with his daughter in his apartment. The trembling girl obeyed with a faltering step, looking like a criminal about to receive the sentence that is to seal her fate. The duenna remained somewhat surprised at this mysterious transaction, in which her family counsel and approbation had been so unceremoniously dispensed ...
— Gomez Arias - The Moors of the Alpujarras, A Spanish Historical Romance. • Joaquin Telesforo de Trueba y Cosio
... King, arising, speaketh: 'Guide him to his seat of glory, To the mansion he hath gained.' Then, as magic fell amid them, Every voice is mute and silent, Every sound subdued resideth, Every strain on faltering pinion From its gaysome course alighteth; Still and peaceful is the white throng, Calmness, as in death, prevaileth. Now he sits enthroned amid them, And again the strains are wakened, Mighty as ...
— A Leaf from the Old Forest • J. D. Cossar
... armour-bearer thrust his sword Hilt-deep into his heart. "Better to die "By friendly hand," he cried, "than owe my death "To yonder hated victors. Quick! Thy sword! "Thrust deep and quickly!" But the faltering hand That held the sword fell nerveless. "Mighty King! "I dare not!" spake the trembling armourer. "Then by my own I die," exclaimed the King. And as he spake he poised the glittering blade Point upward from the earth, and moaning fell Upon the thirsty ...
— The Death of Saul and other Eisteddfod Prize Poems and Miscellaneous Verses • J. C. Manning
... the queen, with a faltering voice, "because, in the midst of such a crowd as this, I feared some ...
— The Three Musketeers • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... conversion of some to the faith. Moreover it was a good thing that there should be a few of the faithful in the emperor's household, that they might defend the rest of the faithful. Thus the Blessed Sebastian encouraged those whom he saw faltering under torture, and, the while, remained hidden under the military cloak in the palace ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas
... gone, peeped into the books and nick-nacks that were lying about, and had a particular interest in some delicate paper-matches on the chimney-piece; wondering who could have made them. That would have been worth seeing. The faltering hand with which she tied those flowers together; with which, almost blushing at her own fair self as imaged in the glass, she arranged them in her breast, and looking at them with her head aside, now half resolved to take them ...
— Life And Adventures Of Martin Chuzzlewit • Charles Dickens
... very well as an exhibition of spirit on Mother Carey's part, but it had been a very hard week. Gilbert was sulky; Peter had had a touch of tonsillitis; Nancy was faltering at the dishwashing and wishing she were a boy; Julia was a perfect barnacle; Kathleen had an aching tooth, and there being no dentist in the village, Was applying Popham remedies,—clove-chewing, roasted raisins, and disfiguring bread ...
— Mother Carey's Chickens • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... with the best traditions of British and Indian Regiments. Whilst regretting deeply the casualties necessarily incurred in the attainment of our object, the series of stinging blows dealt to the enemy, his severe losses which are out of all proportion to the size of his force and his obviously faltering spirit afford ample proof to all ranks that their sacrifices have not been made in vain. My thanks too are due to Major-General MacMunn, to the Director and their assistants and to all ranks of the Administrative Services and ...
— With a Highland Regiment in Mesopotamia - 1916—1917 • Anonymous
... loitering figure drew, With naked bosom red from fight, With ruthless fingers clutching tight A dagger stained by murderous hue, Till now, in one great lurch, he threw His whole frame forward, aiming quick A deadly, inexorable blow, That, weakly faltering, missed its mark, And left the assassin breathing thick, Levelled by nerveless overthrow, There near the Greek chief, ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 26, August, 1880 - of Popular Literature and Science • Various
... solicitude on hearing my intelligence. He could not keep his chair one moment at a time, but walked about the floor trembling. He called his servant, and directed him, in a faltering voice, to go to my brother's house and ...
— Jane Talbot • Charles Brockden Brown
... was not a part of some dreadful nightmare, Seth descended the iron ladder to the foot of the tower, dragged his faltering feet to the door, and slowly swung it open. The ...
— The Woman-Haters • Joseph C. Lincoln
... to many another parent, though his gallant boy was not often out of his thoughts. He and Tom seldom, as was once their wont, talked over their adventures and battles, for Jack and his doings was the theme on which, when together, they loved to speak, in subdued tones though, and often with faltering voices and tears springing unexpectedly to ...
— Washed Ashore - The Tower of Stormount Bay • W.H.G. Kingston
... think I knew you," she said, faltering, "but I don't. Why don't you despise hypocrisy and double-dealing ...
— The Quickening • Francis Lynde
... festive few on board the Jane Moseley—no wonder I felt myself darkly, deeply, desperately blue. I thought I would go on deck. I clung to my companion with an ardor which would have been flattering had it been voluntary. My faltering steps were guided to a seat just within the guards. I sat there thinking that I had never nursed a dear gazelle, so I could not be quite sure whether it would have died or not, but I thought it would. I mused on the changing fortunes of this ...
— The Wit of Women - Fourth Edition • Kate Sanborn
... heart of a superior as that, on giving an order, he sees his subordinate salute, say "Yes sir," then about face and proceed to carry it out to the hilt, without faltering or looking back. This is the kind of man that a commander will choose to have with him every time, and that he will ...
— The Armed Forces Officer - Department of the Army Pamphlet 600-2 • U. S. Department of Defense
... little boy, in a sweet though faltering voice, "they call me Ilbrahim, and my home ...
— Twice Told Tales • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... saying to each other that when the crisis came the heart would fail. There was no vitality to sustain life. But they did not dare tell the Harvester. Day and night he sat beside the maple bed or stretched sleeping a few minutes on the couch while the Girl slept; and with faith never faltering and courage unequalled, he warned them to have their remedies ...
— The Harvester • Gene Stratton Porter
... was not so spry as he had once been. There were only a few black hairs left among the many gray ones. His limbs were shaky and his steps faltering. He was "no good for work any more," he said; but there were two things that he kept on doing right along: he seemed to be always smiling and he seemed to be always praising the Lord. "Happy John," people called ...
— Heart Talks • Charles Wesley Naylor
... POWHATAN. [With a faltering voice.] Think not, white men, that Powhatan wants the knowledge to prize your friendship. Powhatan has seen three generations pass away; and his locks of age do not float upon ...
— The Indian Princess - La Belle Sauvage • James Nelson Barker
... feeble-minded, frail; timid, wimpish, wimpy &c. 860; cowardly &c. 862; dough-faced [U.S.]; facile; pliant &c. (soft) 324; unable to say "no", easy-going revocable, reversible. Adv. irresolutely &c. adj.; irresolved[obs3], irresolvedly[obs3]; in faltering accents; off and on; from pillar to post; seesaw &c. 314. Int. "how happy could I be ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... They were more than half disposed to pronounce the Colonists unworthy to defend that liberty which they gloried in with so much complacency. But it deserves to be noted here especially that there was no sign of faltering on the part of the people, no disposition to submit to the invading force. The success of the enemy did but nerve our fathers to more vigorous resolves to maintain the cause of liberty even ...
— Life And Times Of Washington, Volume 2 • John Frederick Schroeder and Benson John Lossing
... the credit of having put down the rebels with a strong hand. There were but few troops in the city at the time of the outbreak, and as the insurgents, who were composed of the Turkish and Arab population, were in league with the Aneyzehs of the Desert, the least faltering or delay would have led to a universal massacre of the Christians. Fortunately, the troops were divided into two portions, one occupying the barracks on a hill north of the city, and the other, a mere corporal's guard of a ...
— The Lands of the Saracen - Pictures of Palestine, Asia Minor, Sicily, and Spain • Bayard Taylor
... Venice, about stars, dark waters and dark palaces, heat, and the sound of music, and of gondoliers calling over the lagoons to their comrades. It was an exquisite voice; not large, but flexible and very warm. The pianoforte accompaniment was rather uneasy and faltering. Now and then, when it became blurred and wavering, the voice was abruptly hard and decisive, once even piercing and almost shrewish. Then the pianist, as if attacked by fear, played louder and hurried the tempo, the little dark woman smiled mischievously, ...
— The Woman With The Fan • Robert Hichens
... who had paused, confused and faltering in the doorway, in her dismay at seeing me engaged in this inspection instead of in replacing the rug as I had proposed, now advanced a step, so that our glances met as I looked ...
— The Millionaire Baby • Anna Katharine Green
... ordinary sensitiveness of nerves. Combative, masterful, with narrow and concentrated purpose, he pursues the game of politics—not without affliction, but with persistent tenacity and a courage that have rarely shown any signs of faltering or failing. ...
— Sketches In The House (1893) • T. P. O'Connor
... might have done if Lady Barbara had torn her with wild horses must remain uncertain. It is quite certain that the mere fixing of those great dark eyes was sufficient to cut off Pa—at its first syllable, and turn it into a faltering "my uncle;" and that, though Kate's heart was very sore and angry, she never, except once or twice when the word slipped out by chance, incurred the penalty, though she would have respected herself more if she had been brave enough to bear something for the sake of showing ...
— Countess Kate • Charlotte M. Yonge
... the Baroness with faltering breath. "Did you leave me anything but my music? Have you not raged like a tiger? But it is not true," she exclaimed, "you are not so vicious, otherwise I myself would be a lie in the presence of the Eternal Judge, and that I had borne children ...
— The Goose Man • Jacob Wassermann
... him as he sat behind his desk of a morning after prayers, his horn spectacles perched on his high nose and his quill over his ear, and his ink-powder and pewter stand beside him. His face would grow more serious as I scanned my Virgil in a faltering voice, and as he descanted on a passage my eye would wander out over the green trees and fields to the glistening water. What cared I for "Arma virumque" at such a time? I was watching Nebo a-fishing beyond the point, and as he ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... whisper, "I have always wanted to tell you that I think it is so brave and so grand of you to go, and, ... oh, I hope you'll come back safe," she ended, faltering, and Gavin still stood unable to speak and looked at her as if he could never take ...
— In Orchard Glen • Marian Keith
... one, and along the headlands and the valleys one shadow went before us, and one shadow followed us, till the grave gaped hungry and terrible, and I was alone. Faltering in fear, but lingering in love, I knelt by the deathbed—it was the middle night, and the first moans of the autumn came down from the hills, for the frost specks glinted on her golden robes, and the wind blew chill in her bosom. Heaven was full of stars, and ...
— Friends and Neighbors - or Two Ways of Living in the World • Anonymous
... dark days, while the President yet hovered between life and death. At last the light was stilled in the kindly eyes and the breath went from the lips that even in mortal agony uttered no words save of forgiveness to his murderer, of love for his friends, and of faltering trust in the will of the Most High. Such a death, crowning the glory of such a life, leaves us with infinite sorrow, but with such pride in what he had accomplished and in his own personal character, that we feel the blow not as struck at him, but as struck at the Nation ...
— State of the Union Addresses of Theodore Roosevelt • Theodore Roosevelt
... and privations by land and water, in the woods, and swamps of North Carolina and Virginia, were before him, as his experience in traveling proved. But the hope of final victory and his daily sufferings before he started, kept him from faltering, even when starvation and death seemed to be staring him in the face. For several months he was living in dens and caves of ...
— The Underground Railroad • William Still
... reaching the castle and blushed; Candide blushed also; she wished him good morrow in a faltering tone, and Candide spoke to her without knowing what he said. The next day after dinner, as they went from table, Cunegonde and Candide found themselves behind a screen; Cunegonde let fall her handkerchief, Candide ...
— Candide • Voltaire
... glasses on the little table beside her; the candle burned down in the socket, and overlooked; the tightly corked phials of useless drugs; the strong odour of mustard from the saucer in which a plaster had been mixed—these things struck upon her faltering consciousness with a shock of horrible reality. The odour of the mustard was more real than the breathing of the body ...
— The Voice of the People • Ellen Glasgow
... "So he is like that," was her thought, as she turned a friendly glance on him; "so you are like that," he too was thinking. And so he was not very much surprised when she informed him, not without a little faltering, however, that she had long wished to say something to him, but she was ...
— A House of Gentlefolk • Ivan Turgenev
... I know not if I dare," said the Young stranger, faltering; "yet the humanity with which you have spoken to me emboldens—Lady! dare I ...
— The Castle of Otranto • Horace Walpole
... answer, given with faltering voice, was the old, simple one: "I have promised him, Adam. I love him." Tears trembled on ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science February 1930 • Various
... of a few minutes before oozed away as every street corner brought him nearer his destination, and when at last the stately front of Saint Nathaniel's loomed before him, he wished his journey could never end. He gazed with faltering heart up at the ward windows, as if he could read his fate there. The place seemed deserted. A few street boys were playing on the pavement, and at the door of the in-patients' ward a little cluster ...
— Reginald Cruden - A Tale of City Life • Talbot Baines Reed
... think I have," he answered, giving me a look that somehow broke down the barriers of ice between us and made my next words come in a faltering tone: ...
— The Mill Mystery • Anna Katharine Green
... in her body felt that momentary pressure of his hand, with the exquisite susceptibility which accompanies the first faltering advance on the way to health. She looked at his changing color, she listened to his hesitating words, with every sensitive perception of her sex and age quickened to seize intuitively on the truth. In the moment when he looked away from her, she gently took her hand ...
— No Name • Wilkie Collins
... man an intellectual one, as his skill at repartee, and praises the literary crack shot, and defines manliness to be readiness, as he does in this last volume and in the preceding one, I am filled with a perverse envy of all the confused and stammering heroes of history. Is Washington faltering out a few broken and ungrammatical sentences, in reply to the vote of thanks of the Virginia legislature, less manly than the glib tongue in the court-room or in the club that can hit the mark every time? The test of a wit or of a scholar is one thing; the test of a man, I take it, is quite ...
— Birds and Poets • John Burroughs
... and that waif of the world—the world of the stage—in which men and women were only grown-up children, and bad grown-up children at that —it was not to be endured. One thing was sure, the man should come to the Manor Cartier no more. He would see to that to-morrow. There would be no faltering or paltering on his part. His home had been shaken to its foundations once, and he was determined that it should not fall about his ears a second time. An Englishman, an actor, a Protestant, and a renegade lawyer! It was not to ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... the shock of explosion, felt the iron wrist tremble, grow limp and lift away. He wheeled around to find Terry shaking his head, uncertain, faltering. ...
— Terry - A Tale of the Hill People • Charles Goff Thomson
... (perhaps) before we were born, when (as is conceivable) we lived with them in Plato's Realm of Ideas. In France, instead of calling a man a miser, they call him an Harpagon. We know Rosalind as we know our sweetest summer love; Hamlet is our elder brother, and understands our own wavering and faltering. ...
— A Manual of the Art of Fiction • Clayton Hamilton
... borders of broad shields, the hero Suibhne was filled and intoxicated with horror, panic, and imbecility; his feet trembled as if incessantly shaken by the force of a stream; the inlets of his hearing were expanded and quickened by the horrors of lunacy; his speech became faltering from the giddiness of imbecility; his very soul fluttered with hallucinations, and with many and various phantasms. He might be compared to a salmon in a weir, or to a bird after being caught in the ...
— The International Monthly Magazine - Volume V - No II • Various
... the jealous wall, are niches where the faltering replies of the accused were heard and noted down. Many of them had been brought out of the very cell we had just looked into, so awfully; along the same stone passage. We had trodden in their ...
— Pictures from Italy • Charles Dickens
... name the day for your going?" he asked presently, little anticipating another "Yes": but it came: and her rather faltering manner showed her to be conscious too that the word was getting to be ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... nothing from outside to inform him as to his conduct and its results. At the bottom of his heart and in the depths of his conscience he knew that he had made a dreadful mistake. He did not flinch. He went on in his new path without apparent faltering. His speech on the compromise measures went farther than that of the 7th of March. But if we study his speeches and letters between 1850 and the day of his death, we can detect changes in them, which show plainly enough that the writer was not at ease, that ...
— Daniel Webster • Henry Cabot Lodge
... sat silent for a considerable time, and at length answered, in rather a faltering voice, "I was not prepared for this; you have frequently surprised me by your knowledge of things which I should never have expected any person of your appearance to be acquainted with, but that you should be aware of my name is a circumstance ...
— Isopel Berners - The History of certain doings in a Staffordshire Dingle, July, 1825 • George Borrow
... errors and degradations, has never ceased to grasp the central fact of Eternity. The impalpable air teems with Divinity. Watchful eyes and clutching hands surround the pilgrim's path, and unseen spirits dog faltering footsteps as they stumble through the snares and pitfalls of earthly life. In the rude tribes of the Tengger, hereditary faith reflects the uncompromising features of local environment. The lotus-eating races of the tropical lowlands, with their ...
— Through the Malay Archipelago • Emily Richings
... hungry dog driven from a bone, the crowd at length agreed to this disposal of Skoonly; and the wretched man, with much faltering and many terrified glances around the enclosing circle of grim faces, told how, for a thousand dollars in gold-dust, he had agreed to help Quinley and Ugger out with his testimony, if they needed it; how he and the two scoundrels ...
— The Cave of Gold - A Tale of California in '49 • Everett McNeil
... the first to appear from Grundtvig's pen, was written in the fall of 1810 when its author was still battling with despair and his mind faltering on the brink of insanity. Against this background the hymn appears like a ray of sunlight breaking through a clouded sky. And as such it must undoubtedly have come to its author. As an indication of Grundtvig's simple trust in ...
— Hymns and Hymnwriters of Denmark • Jens Christian Aaberg
... for me. You might guess. But I'll tell you. Liosha again was right. . . . If you want me still, I will marry you. Not quite yet; but, say, in six months' time. You are a great-hearted, loyal man"—she continued bravely, faltering under his gaze—"and I will learn to love you and will devote my life to making ...
— Jaffery • William J. Locke
... an angel might have been excused for faltering. "Glegg means that you don't count as a grown-up at a children's party," he explained naively, regarding the Skipper's Missus through ...
— A Tall Ship - On Other Naval Occasions • Sir Lewis Anselm da Costa Ritchie
... its immeasurable action, the education of business, of which the fruits were all around them. Yet prodigious was the interest, for prodigious truly—it seemed to loom before Mark—must have been the system. "To 'take' it?" he echoed; and then, though faltering ...
— The Finer Grain • Henry James
... person. It touched even him, and he was not readily touched by anything; it made him loth to say the word that would drive all that sweet expression so quickly and completely away. It must be said, however; the increasing light warned him he must not tarry, but it was with a hesitating and almost faltering ...
— The Wide, Wide World • Susan Warner
... moaned before with grief." Cellini displayed in this incident his belief in the great principle that the artist should find pleasure in his work in order to impart to that work a really satisfactory quality, and did exactly the right thing at the right minute; instead of trusting to a faltering effort in a disheartened man, he cheered the old bronze founder up to such a pitch that after a day or two the work was completed with triumph and joy ...
— Arts and Crafts in the Middle Ages • Julia De Wolf Addison
... wanting to prove the accuracy of my calculations. Look here, Marguerite," and he rose from the table with weak and faltering steps, and drew back a curtain which was drawn across a corner of the small room. There she saw a small clock of exquisite manufacture, a complicated mass of machinery—so complicated that it would have looked like fabled labor to have even put it into motion, or regulated it when in ...
— International Weekly Miscellany, Vol. 1, No. 2, July 8, 1850 • Various
... the faltering arms. The protecting cap was dashed from the poisoned arrow and the notched base of the shaft flew to its position in the string. There was the twang of the bow and the deadly missile whined through the air. A hoarse scream rang out; the points of greenish fire were gone; a heavy ...
— The Black Phantom • Leo Edward Miller
... sounds of silvan war Disturbed the heights of Uam-Var, 75 And roused the cavern, where, 'tis told, A giant made his den of old; For ere that steep ascent was won, High in his pathway hung the sun, And many a gallant, stayed perforce, 80 Was fain to breathe his faltering horse, And of the trackers of the deer, Scarce half the lessening pack was near; So shrewdly on the mountain side, Had the bold burst their mettle ...
— Lady of the Lake • Sir Walter Scott
... the executioner and attendants. The vaulted roof condensed the voice of the tortured man, and an aperture on one side gave it freedom to ascend into the room above, where the judicial listeners waited for the faltering words which succeeded the agonising screams of their victim. So much we know and still see, but worse horrors were dreamily spoken of by the old Nuernbergers; there was a tradition of a certain something that not only destroyed life, but annihilated the body of the person sacrificed. ...
— Rambles of an Archaeologist Among Old Books and in Old Places • Frederick William Fairholt
... the rabid dog sprang forward, its mouth wide open. Without faltering, Dave made a thrust that jammed the pole hard into the ...
— The High School Boys' Canoe Club • H. Irving Hancock
... visit here?" said I, with a voice faltering and uncertain enough to have awakened suspicion in a more ...
— Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon, Volume 2 (of 2) • Charles Lever
... below. His first lieutenant was mortally hurt and in the critical moments the ship was left in charge of the second lieutenant. In this gallant manner did Perry and Barclay, both heirs of the bulldog Anglo-Saxon strain, wage their bloody duel without faltering and thus did the British sailor keep his honor ...
— The Fight for a Free Sea: A Chronicle of the War of 1812 - The Chronicles of America Series, Volume 17 • Ralph D. Paine
... croud, fearful of a relapse on my own part and on hers, but keeping her in sight, and presenting myself to her view, till I was rouzed by an apparent motion of the aunt to rise. I then advanced, but still in an ague fit of apprehension. I attempted to bow, and in a faltering and feeble voice pronounced her name, 'hoped she was well, ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft
... and sell my estate to some man I know something of,' he articulated, not without faltering, 'or perhaps the peasants themselves will want to ...
— The Torrents of Spring • Ivan Turgenev
... about the street, While children tell their tale of woe To every passer-by they meet, In faltering accents, faint and low. ...
— The Poets and Poetry of Cecil County, Maryland • Various
... are all beside you Urging and beckoning on, Watching lest aught betide you Till the safe near goal is won, Guiding the faltering footsteps That tremble and fear to fall— How will it be, my darling, With the last sad ...
— Our Boys - Entertaining Stories by Popular Authors • Various
... motionless, uncovered, suffering for the death of him who in life fought against his freedom. I see him, when the mould is heaped and the great drama of his life is closed, turn away and with downcast eyes and uncertain step start out into new and strange fields, faltering, struggling, but moving on, until his shambling figure is lost in the light of this better and brighter day. And from the grave comes a voice saying, "Follow him! put your arms about him in his need, even as he put his about me. Be his friend as ...
— Modern Eloquence: Vol II, After-Dinner Speeches E-O • Various
... continued Titmouse, in a faltering tone, and with a depressed look—"That was what I wanted to know myself; for they said I'd better go back!! So I said, 'Gents,' said I, 'I'll be—— if I'll go back to the shop any more;' and I snapped ...
— Ten Thousand a-Year. Volume 1. • Samuel Warren
... loveliness which is the creation of the sthetic human spirit; that flowering of directed energy which we know as civilisation; that manifold and mutual service which we call progress—all stand mutilated and faltering. As though, on a pilgrimage to the dreamed-of Mecca, water had failed, and by the wayside countless muffled forms sat waiting for rain; so will the long road ...
— Another Sheaf • John Galsworthy
... can relish love no more, Nor flattering hopes that tell me hearts are true, Nor the revel's loud uproar, Nor fresh-wreathed flowerets, bathed in vernal dew. Ah! but why, my Ligurine, Steal trickling tear-drops down my wasted cheek? Wherefore halts this tongue of mine, So eloquent once, so faltering now and weak? Now I hold you in my chain, And clasp you close, all in a nightly dream; Now, still dreaming, o'er the plain I chase you; now, ah ...
— Odes and Carmen Saeculare of Horace • Horace
... for a sign from the heavens. Could one intimation be vouchsafed him, how it would confirm his faltering faith! Jubal Kennedy was of the temperament impervious to spiritual subtleties, fain to reach conclusions with the line and rule of mathematical demonstration. Thus, all unreceptive, he looked through the mountain gap, as through some stupendous gateway, on the splendors of ...
— The Christmas Miracle - 1911 • Charles Egbert Craddock (AKA Mary Noailles Murfree)
... returning from school and meeting his faltering feet in the lane, would toss him up on his shoulder and canter him ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1917 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... for whom her reverence was almost like that for her God thus distrustful, thus lowly, she could not but feel that her too calm repose might, after all, be the shallow, treacherous calm of an ignorant, ill-grounded spirit, and therefore, with a deep blush and a faltering voice, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 22, Aug., 1859 • Various
... day my loved one leaves me, and my heart Is heavy with its grief: the streams of sorrow, Choked at the source, repress my faltering voice. I have no words to speak; mine eyes are dimmed By the dark shadows of the thoughts that rise Within my soul. If such the force of grief In an old hermit parted from his nursling, What anguish must the stricken parent feel Bereft forever of an ...
— Life and Literature - Over two thousand extracts from ancient and modern writers, - and classified in alphabetical order • J. Purver Richardson
... surface behind, the painted panels of the last barrier to his escape, of which the key was in his pocket. The indistinctness mocked him even while he stared, affected him as somehow shrouding or challenging certitude, so that after faltering an instant on his step he let himself go with the sense that here was at last something to meet, to touch, to take, to know—something all unnatural and dreadful, but to advance upon which was the condition for him either of liberation or of supreme defeat. ...
— The Jolly Corner • Henry James
... huge trunks many a vine, Had bade its graceful tendrils twine; The blossoming grape and jessamine pale, Loading with sweets the summer gale. Not long with hasty step he trod The narrow path and flowery sod, Ere gently o'er the sere leaves' bed A maiden passed with faltering tread. ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII No. 6 June 1848 • Various
... wife advanced hesitatingly from the crowd of spectators. Their glance rested inquiringly now on Undine, now on the beautiful girl who was said to be their daughter "It is she," said the delighted benefactress, in a faltering tone, and the two old people hung round the neck of their recovered child, weeping and ...
— Undine - I • Friedrich de la Motte Fouque
... civilization he seems to sink and pine away beneath it. It has been so with the Mexicans. Under the Spanish domination their numbers have silently melted away. Their energies are broken. They no longer tread their mountain plains with the conscious independence of their ancestors. In their faltering step and meek and melancholy aspect we read the sad characters of the conquered race.... Their civilization was of the hardy character which belongs to the wilderness. The fierce virtues of the Aztec were all ...
— The Story of Extinct Civilizations of the West • Robert E. Anderson
... poet he had "gone with the wind." Now it was for him to be true in his fashion. A man may falter for weeks and weeks, consciously, subconsciously, even in his dreams, till there comes that moment when the only thing impossible is to go on faltering. The black cap, the little driven grey man looking up at it with a ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... recoiled, as death claimed a high victim. Once more the band of true-hearts slightly quickened their pace towards the temple, now nigh at hand. Yet those lessened numbers never once betrayed fear, or doubt, or faltering. Grimly true to their trust, they fell back in the best of order, fighting as they moved, beating back the heathen hosts, as though each man was a god, and their strong arms a wall ...
— The Lost City • Joseph E. Badger, Jr.
... halters—the rest slopping along through the yellow mud on foot—literally—for few of them had shoes; they were on their way to protect Davis and join Johnston, now that Lee was no more. There was no murmuring, no faltering, and it touched Richard Hunt to observe that they were now more prompt to obedience, when it was optional with them whether they should go or stay, than they had ever been in the proudest days of ...
— The Little Shepherd of Kingdom Come • John Fox
... this ominous preliminary had entirely disconcerted, approached the vases with faltering footsteps, and was ready to sink with terror when he heard the groans of Soliman. As he proceeded, a voice from the livid lips of ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 4 • Charles Dudley Warner
... the starless night of death Our being's brief eclipse, When faltering heart and failing breath Have ...
— The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... keeping. She need but declare it, and his picture would blossom forth in all the papers of the big cities. How Grace would shrink from him, if she knew the truth—how that magnificent figure would turn its back upon him—and those scornful, imperious, never- faltering eyes... ...
— Fran • John Breckenridge Ellis
... is so nearly impeccable that we are perplexed to understand how so exquisite an ear as was Dekker's at its best can have been tolerant of such discord or insensible to such collapse as so often disappoints or shocks us in the hastier and cruder passages of his faltering and fluctuating verse. The prayer for a soldier going to battle and his thanksgiving after victory are as noble in the dignity of their devotion as the prayers for a woman in travail and "for them that visit ...
— The Age of Shakespeare • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... quivered round the building in a ghostly whisper. Then Thurston came to the Master and gave him his arm and led him to the reading-desk. The old man seemed for a moment as though he would fall, then, holding to the front of the desk, he spoke in a very weak and faltering voice. Maggie could not catch many of his words: "My children—only a little time—Our preparation now is finished ... God has promised ... Not the least of these His little ones shall perish ... Let us not fear but be ready to meet Him as our Friend ... ...
— The Captives • Hugh Walpole
... the drawing-room?" said Ursula, faltering, for she was appalled by the idea of explanations. What had she to explain, as yet? Mr. May shook his head, with that ...
— Phoebe, Junior • Mrs [Margaret] Oliphant
... serious accidents took place. What wonderful creatures horses are! Those who were on that trek could not fail to realise it, if they had never done so before! As time went on and the goal was still not reached, it seemed that they must drop at any minute, but still they kept on, never faltering! A few dropped out, it is true, but they were a very small percentage of the whole. What courage and endurance they showed, to carry a weight of (say) 18 stone, 50 miles in 24 hours over the worst ...
— Through Palestine with the 20th Machine Gun Squadron • Unknown
... read Littleton in the original. To acquire this singular language—a dead tongue that cannot be said to have ever lived—was the first object of the law-student. He worked at it in his chamber, and with faltering and uncertain accents essayed to speak it at the periodic mootings in which he was required to take part before he could be called to the bar, and also after he had become an utter-barrister. In his 'Autobiography,' Sir ...
— A Book About Lawyers • John Cordy Jeaffreson
... humble pie? There was something almost pathetic in the attitude of the big soldier as he came to the darkened room and stood before his junior and subordinate, but the latter had stilled the broken, clumsy, faltering words with which this strong, masterful man was striving to make amend for bitter wrong. "I won't listen to more, Captain Wren," he said. "You had reasons I never dreamed of—then. Our eyes have been opened" (one of his was still closed). ...
— An Apache Princess - A Tale of the Indian Frontier • Charles King
... I had better write," said Maggie, faltering again. "I have to go to St. Ogg's sometimes, and I can put ...
— The Mill on the Floss • George Eliot
... admired how Cutts the singer, after he had worked us all up to patriotic enthusiasm, by describing the way in which the brave Abercrombie received his death-wound, or made us join him in tears, which he shed liberally himself, as in faltering accents he told how autumn's falling leaf "proclaimed the old man he must die"—how Cutts the singer became at once Cutts the landlord, and, before the applause which we were making with our fists on his table, in compliment to his heart-stirring melody, had died away,—was ...
— The History of Pendennis • William Makepeace Thackeray
... academic technique of high merit that lacks just that one quality which, for want of a better word, we call "culture." In the designs by Louisa, Marchioness of Waterford, one encounters genius with absolutely faltering technique; and many who know how rare is the slightest touch of genius, forgive the equally important mastery of material which must accompany it to produce work of ...
— Children's Books and Their Illustrators • Gleeson White
... Venus. No emotion has hurried the painter's hand or confused his eye this time. In vain she wears such sadness in her eyes, such pensive dignity of attitude, such a wistful smile on her lips. He knows them, now, for false lights on the wrecker's coast. No faltering; no turning back. He can even fit a new head-dress on the lovely hair, and add the puffed sleeves below the short ones. He is a painter now; not a lover. And lest there should be one doubt as to his purpose, he flings a heap of gold where "Cupid's" little ...
— Holbein • Beatrice Fortescue
... up listlessly without taking her arms from the tub, as Mary made her faltering inquiry for the old lady who made lace, and answered in some foreign tongue. Then she bent again to her rubbing, in stolid indifference to the stranger who had made a sudden descent on her home. Mary was too inexperienced to know that one cause ...
— Mary Ware's Promised Land • Annie Fellows Johnston
... scourge and the rack, recanted, or promised a recantation, a large proportion immediately on being released from the sufferings which had overcome them, abjured their retractions, re-professed with redoubled energy the faith of Christ, and met without faltering the hideous death to which they were immediately hurried. Such is their uniform history in whatever age they fell, or to whatever nation or rank they belonged."—Exp. of ...
— A Brief Commentary on the Apocalypse • Sylvester Bliss
... received news that sentence of execution has been passed upon him. Recovering from the first effects of his surprise, he took Waldemar Fitzurse and De Bracy aside, and put the billet into their hands successively. "It means," he added, in a faltering voice, "that my brother Richard has obtained ...
— Ivanhoe - A Romance • Walter Scott
... were vain." With that his father said, "Whatever of blessing Thou reserv'st for me, God! if Thou wilt not give to both, give here: Bless him with both Thy hands"; and laid his own On Japhet's head. Then Japhet looked on him, Made quiet by content, and answered low, With faltering laughter, glad and reverent: "Sir, You are my father?" "Ay," quoth he, "I am! Kiss me, my son; and let me hear my name, My much desired name, from ...
— Poems by Jean Ingelow, In Two Volumes, Volume II. • Jean Ingelow
... without further preliminary, substituting a blank phrasing for uncomprehended words; but the melody swept without faltering to its conclusion. Janin answered irritably, disturbed ...
— The Happy End • Joseph Hergesheimer
... bare fraction of a second Jenkins hesitated, as one might do who was loath to bring trouble upon another. Then he replied, in faltering tones: ...
— With Links of Steel • Nicholas Carter
... the chords of our appetite with preliminary savors, as a musician acquaints his touch with the keys of an unfamiliar piano before breaking into brilliant and triumphant execution. Within a week she had mastered her instrument; and thereafter there was no faltering in her performances, which she varied constantly, through inspiration or from suggestion. She was so quick to receive new ideas in her art, that, when the Roman statuary who stayed a few weeks with us explained ...
— Suburban Sketches • W.D. Howells
... humble stone which told of a young man who had died at twenty-three years old, fifty-five years ago, when she heard a faltering step approaching, and looking round saw a feeble woman bent with the weight of years, who tottered to the foot of that same grave and asked her to read the writing on the stone. The old woman thanked her when she had done, saying that ...
— The Old Curiosity Shop • Charles Dickens
... and in another moment Susie would have told the truth, but before the words came faltering out ...
— Troublesome Comforts - A Story for Children • Geraldine Glasgow
... will remember,' she said faltering, reddening, her womanliness forcing the words out of her, 'that you have friends: ...
— Robert Elsmere • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... we made the exchange," she replied, in such a faltering, undecided voice that I doubted, and yet could not bring myself to believe that she was not telling ...
— The Passenger from Calais • Arthur Griffiths
... bitter disillusionment and of her own unmerited and eternal disgrace was intolerably real in spite of the fact that she knew it to be untrue, for our imaginations are far more ancient and more irresistible than our late and faltering reliance on the truth; the heavens and hells we fancy have more weight with our credulities than any facts we encounter. We can dodge the facts or close our eyes to them, but we cannot escape our dreams, whether our eyes ...
— The Cup of Fury - A Novel of Cities and Shipyards • Rupert Hughes
... May war and storm scatter them as the chaff! My liege, my royal master," continued the earl, in a deep, low, faltering voice, "why knew I not thy holy and princely heart before? Why stood so many between Warwick's devotion and a king so worthy to command it? How poor, beside thy great-hearted fortitude and thy Christian ...
— The Last Of The Barons, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... ascent from ground which made starting difficult even in daylight. Purely by instinct and his recollection of the aspect of things the night before, he had to clear telegraph wires and a railway bridge, neither of which he could possibly see at that hour. His engine, too, was faltering, and it was obvious to those who witnessed his start that its note was ...
— A History of Aeronautics • E. Charles Vivian
... Philemon began a faltering explanation and self-exculpation, but he was cut short by his superior saying sharply: "Tush, sir, such language will not make us deal the more gently with your cribs; so if you 'd ...
— Janice Meredith • Paul Leicester Ford
... humiliation. If the Austrians had joined as they promised with 100,000 men, the march upon the capital would have been conceivable with energetic commanders. And the king could justly say that he had favoured spirited schemes, and had been baffled by the faltering commander-in-chief. He attempted, by throwing out hints of neutrality, to escape without further loss. Dumouriez calculated that every attack would weld the allies more closely together, and refrained from ...
— Lectures on the French Revolution • John Emerich Edward Dalberg-Acton
... planted on their feet. What have I done? What am I fit to do? Nearly twenty-six and I'm still playing games like a schoolboy!... What's my father saying? 'We count it death to falter not to die' ... I've been faltering—and before I know anything about it I shall be thirty—half-time.... This can't go on. This waiting for Joan is faltering. If she's not coming to me I must go to her. If it's not coming right it ...
— Who Cares? • Cosmo Hamilton
... was brought in a sedan chair through the hall. Not a hat moved as he passed; and many voices cried out "Popish dog." He came into Court pale and trembling, with eyes fixed on the ground, and gave his evidence in a faltering voice. He swore that the Bishops had informed him of their intention to present a petition to the King, and that they had been admitted into the royal closet for that purpose. This circumstance, coupled with the circumstance that, after ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 2 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... Faltering and undecided still, the Jew went on. "Very scarce, you know. Ten francs a day, I think, would not be ...
— Off on a Comet • Jules Verne
... deluge raging Flung its flanks, and shook the staging, Priesthood, cowering from the brim, Chanted thus its faltering hymn. ...
— Fringilla: Some Tales In Verse • Richard Doddridge Blackmore
... With faltering steps, Isaac pushes on, and discerns a house. No one is there, but he knows there must be white men not far away. With quickened pulse, he turns back to the dying boy, awakens him from sleep, rubs his eyes, bathes his temples, ...
— Harper's Young People, August 3, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... at Mansfeld. Though both diligent and quick, he found the crabbed Latin primer, itself written in abstract Latin, very difficult, and was flogged fourteen times in one morning by {63} brutal masters for faltering in a declension. When he returned home he found his mother bending under a load of wood she had gathered in the forest. Both she and his father were severe with the children, whipping them for slight faults ...
— The Age of the Reformation • Preserved Smith
... I saw something sweep across her face. Her eyes darkened. Her face paled. The thin curved nostrils whitened at the edges. I paused, astonished at the tempest I had aroused by my faltering stupidities. Why could I not take ...
— Bog-Myrtle and Peat - Tales Chiefly Of Galloway Gathered From The Years 1889 To 1895 • S.R. Crockett
... met at the Taku forts, near the mouth of the Pei-ho, had a bit of iron tonic in his veins. His sentences were shorter, less faltering and more frequent. He knew things that he had formerly held tentatively. His conceptions (during night-talks) were called in quickly from the dream-borders, and given the garb and weight of matter. The stamina of decision had hardened. ...
— Fate Knocks at the Door - A Novel • Will Levington Comfort
... he stole out of the house, and walked the three miles to the country cemetery where his mother slept beside his father. He sat beside her last bed, and remembered the cold hand that had crept into his, the faltering whisper that prayed him to take his chance when it came, and ...
— The Purple Heights • Marie Conway Oemler
... an appealing glance. 'You will not betray me?' it said. I answered, mutely, 'Not for worlds,' with a faltering pair ...
— Miss Cayley's Adventures • Grant Allen
... successes had been the means, on more than one occasion, of extending his means of disgraceful enjoyment. At least, however, his career lay on the verge of a precipice; for playing at a stake beyond the limit of his fortune, a single faltering step might at any hour precipitate him into an abyss of shame and ruin. Amelia was often tempted to doubt whether she had more cause to dread that intoxication of triumph, which induced him to still further ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 19. Issue 548 - 26 May 1832 • Various
... the room, as though she had interrupted a religious office; and she stood still in the solemn hush, her lips parted, her bosom heaving. The opposite door was ajar, and from within came a kind of sobbing moan, and a low, feeble, faltering ...
— Hopes and Fears - scenes from the life of a spinster • Charlotte M. Yonge
... little man was masterful and precise. Still he demanded all Harry's vigour and more than all, kept him struggling desperately, beset by fear on the edge of death. Harry felt himself weakening, faltering, and still the opposing blade searched his defence sharply, still the little man was an exemplar of easy precision. And yet Harry's maladroitness always sufficed to save his skin. He was puzzled, and blundered and fumbled the more. The play grew slower and slower, and he was the more ...
— The Highwayman • H.C. Bailey
... "Miss—Violet," faltering a little over the name, but not wishing to wound her again by the more formal mode of address, "I do not need to tell you, I am sure, how much pleasure it would give me to meet you now and then, but you well know that poor young men, like myself, are not often welcome in the ...
— His Heart's Queen • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... was a faltering unit against an ardent and imperative two in the council. And Beauchamp had shown her a letter of Lady Romfrey's very clearly signifying that she and her lord anticipated tidings of the union. Marrying Beauchamp was no simple adventure. ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... Miss Singleton's room knowing that I was doing wrong. I hated to go and did not take the smallest interest in the proceedings which were being enacted there." She paused again. Her voice, which had been slightly faltering, grew a little firmer. Her eyes met Miss Heath's, which were gazing at her in sorrowful and amazed surprise. Then she continued: "I did not go alone. I took another and perfectly innocent girl with me. She is a newcomer, ...
— A Sweet Girl Graduate • Mrs. L.T. Meade
... away, just here in Custom-house street." The speaker began to add a faltering enumeration of some very grave symptoms. The Doctor noticed that he was slightly deaf; he uttered his words as though he did ...
— Dr. Sevier • George W. Cable
... with the headache who furnished the first clue. Coming below after her hours of rest, she found the kitchen deserted, and all labor at a standstill. Hearing voices without she questioned the first she met and was told in faltering tones: ...
— Dorothy's Travels • Evelyn Raymond
... his eyes. But the last thousand feet broke all her resolutions. It shot up in one unbroken, dizzy ascent. She saw the Indians, like black ants, climbing and resting alternately. She took a few faltering steps, looked down and shivered. Far below was the black train of climbers, reaching away as far as the eye could see. But above—she dare not risk that awful ...
— Colorado Jim • George Goodchild
... separation. There are some people you hope are stanch, and some people you think will be stanch, if—, and then there are those, many women and a few men, whom it is impossible to think of as false or even faltering. I did not fully appreciate that quality then, for my memory was not then dotted with the graves of false friendships and littered with the rubbish of broken promises; but I did appreciate it enough ...
— The Plum Tree • David Graham Phillips
... I have been distressed in mind on account of leaving my parents. My heart melts within me when I think of my Father's faltering voice, when lying on his bed he said, "Good-bye, Egerton," and reached forth his trembling hand, saying by his countenance that he never expected to see his son a resident in his house again. He laid himself back in his bed ...
— The Story of My Life - Being Reminiscences of Sixty Years' Public Service in Canada • Egerton Ryerson
... torpedoes and lined with sharpshooters for fifty miles, dragging almost every foot of the way, and driving the enemy before them, is unsurpassed even in the brilliant naval history of this war. Many commanders would have faltered after losing two of their vessels; but there was no faltering in Macomb. It was not until all hope of land co-operation was exhausted, and until it was demonstrated that without a land support he could go no further, that he consented to retire. Throughout the whole expedition, he asked his men to encounter no danger that ...
— Reminiscences of Two Years in the United States Navy • John M. Batten
... dawn in the Jolly Peasant, and forthwith formed the nucleus of a gambling club, which was reinforced during the day by recruits coming back from the town. Members came to see whether we were still at it, members also went away, but I with the original six held out for days and nights without faltering. ...
— My Life, Volume I • Richard Wagner
... sword that was to pierce her again and again through the long months ahead. Garth Trent—the man she loved—could have no part nor lot in this splendid service of England's sons for England! The country wanted brave men now—not men who faltered when faltering ...
— The Hermit of Far End • Margaret Pedler
... frightful things," she breathed. "Tom is all right. I must make myself believe it. Now is the time to be brave; to go on steadily without faltering. Tom will come back to me. Wherever he is or whatever has happened to him, he will come back. I ...
— Grace Harlowe's Golden Summer • Jessie Graham Flower
... refreshment and a bed. He saw that his faint and worn appearance attracted the attention of the landlord and his waiters; and thinking that they might suppose him to be penniless, took out his purse, and laid it on the table. It was not that, the landlord said, in a faltering voice. If he were one of those who had suffered by the rioters, he durst not give him entertainment. He had a family of children, and had been twice warned to be careful in receiving guests. He heartily prayed his forgiveness, but what could ...
— Barnaby Rudge • Charles Dickens
... there was admiration in the steady gaze with which the Prince kept the monk in eye; the attraction was stronger—he was looking for a sign from him. He saw the tall, nervous figure cross the brook with a faltering, uncertain step, pass the remainder of the pavement, the torch in one hand, the holy symbol in the other; then it disappeared under the arch of the gate; and when it had come through, the sharp espial was ...
— The Prince of India - Or - Why Constantinople Fell - Volume 1 • Lew. Wallace
... of the institution where he was nurtured seemed standing by his side in weeds of mourning, with a countenance of sorrow. With suffused eyes, and faltering voice, he broke into an unpremeditated strain of emotion, so strong and so deep, that all who heard him were borne along with it. Heart answered to heart as he spoke, and, when he ceased, the silence and tears of the impassive ...
— The American Union Speaker • John D. Philbrick
... more than a week since Mrs. Maybright had died, and the others were accustomed to Helen's taking her place, but the scene was new to the poor, sore-hearted child who now come in. Dr. Maybright felt her faltering steps, and knew what her sudden pause on the ...
— Polly - A New-Fashioned Girl • L. T. Meade
... single rail; its four wheels revolved in a line, one behind another; and it traveled with the level, flexible equilibrium of a ship moving across a dock. It swung over the sharp curves without faltering, crossed the switch, and floated—floated is the only word for the serene and equable quality of its movement—round and round the quarter-mile circle. A workman boarded it as it passed him, and sat on the edge ...
— How To Write Special Feature Articles • Willard Grosvenor Bleyer
... whose anger is only swelled by the thousands of miles of her course from far-away Tibet. It seems as if they must instantly devour her, and that we must now go under to swell the number of their victims. But they only beat her back, for she rides gracefully, faltering timidly with frightened creaks and groans, whilst the waters shiver her frail bulwarks with their cruel message of destruction, which might mean her very death-rattle. I get landed in the stomach with the end of a gigantic bamboo boat-hook, used by one of the men standing in the bows whose duty ...
— Across China on Foot • Edwin Dingle |
