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More "Coincidence" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... in Paris, where we stopped for a while after we crossed, before we came here. I was so surprised when I saw him at our hotel the very day after we arrived! It seemed such a coincidence, that our only acquaintance over on this side should arrive at the same place ...
— My Friend the Chauffeur • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... from the ceiling slowly; perhaps it was coincidence that they rested on the place on the mantelshelf where Cynthia's ...
— The Second Honeymoon • Ruby M. Ayres
... inclined to regard varicella as a very attenuated form of smallpox, hence the name "chicken pox," by which it is popularly known. This opinion is based merely on the analogy between the two types of skin eruptions and the coincidence sometimes observed between two epidemics of smallpox and chicken pox. But the theory falls on considering that, on the one hand, chicken pox offers no safeguard against infection by smallpox and does not prevent the effects of vaccination, and, on the other hand the disease may occur in children ...
— The Eugenic Marriage, Volume IV. (of IV.) - A Personal Guide to the New Science of Better Living and Better Babies • Grant Hague
... period has itself three stages, in which Fetishism, Polytheism, and Monotheism successively prevail. The chief social characteristics of the Polytheistic period are the institution of slavery and the coincidence or "confusion" of the spiritual and temporal powers. It has two stages: the theocratic, represented by Egypt, and the military, represented by Rome, between which Greece stands in a ...
— The Idea of Progress - An Inquiry Into Its Origin And Growth • J. B. Bury
... McComas: I desire to consider your feelings in every possible way: but I warn you that if you stretch the long arm of coincidence to the length of telling me that Mr. Crampton of this town is my father, I shall decline to entertain the information ...
— You Never Can Tell • [George] Bernard Shaw
... O. Watts, of St. Paul's Episcopal Church, was the first president of this, the first Young Men's Christian Association of the United States. It is a strange coincidence, easily understood by the Christian, that on the twenty-fifth of November, one month previous, without any knowledge on the part of Boston, the first Young Men's Christian Association of America had been organized at ...
— The Bay State Monthly - Volume 1, Issue 4 - April, 1884 • Various
... the remarkable coincidence—which seemed to prove beyond doubt that there still existed some connexion between the family of Quodling and the titled house which he had heard of from Greenacre—he stood in the entrance passage, and looked out for five minutes through the glass ...
— The Town Traveller • George Gissing
... unmeasured denunciation those responsible for that judicious act; and Webster was bitter when Taylor and Scott were nominated in the first instance, but came, after a time, grandly out of the clouds. It is an interesting coincidence that Webster when Secretary of State was a candidate for the Presidential nomination against his chief, President Fillmore, and died, on the 24th of October, 1852, a few months after Scott's triumph at Baltimore and a few days before the popular election of Pierce. The enduring ...
— McClure's Magazine, January, 1896, Vol. VI. No. 2 • Various
... strikingly suggestive of the Elephant Mound of Wisconsin, with the peculiarities of which the sculptor, whether ancient or modern, might almost be supposed to have been acquainted. It certainly must be looked upon as a curious coincidence that carvings found at a point so remote from the Elephant Mound, and presumably the work of other hands, should so closely copy the imperfections of ...
— Animal Carvings from Mounds of the Mississippi Valley • Henry W. Henshaw
... coincidence, my good fellow. I was coming down, and I telegraphed Miss Cavendish to that effect. When you brought her message to the office you received mine, which must have been delayed. It ...
— Victor's Triumph - Sequel to A Beautiful Fiend • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... and muttering slowly to himself, "Tut! but a chance coincidence,—a haphazard allusion to a fact which he ...
— A Strange Story, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... unite in the formation of separate churches, under their own pastors. Prominent among these was the Reverend Mr. Myles, who preached in various places with great success, until the year 1649, when we find him pastor of a church which he organized in Swansea, in South Wales. It is a singular coincidence that Mr. Myles's pastorate at Swansea, and the separation of the members from the Rehoboth church, a part of whom aided in establishing the church in Swanzey, Massachusetts, occurred ...
— Bay State Monthly, Volume I, No. 2, February, 1884 - A Massachusetts Magazine • Various
... British Museum, he says, does not possess a copy; probably there are not six in the world. I never saw it, nor heard of it till now; just twenty-nine years after the publication of my Proverbial Philosophy. It is a curious coincidence that the headings of this Wits' Miscellany are similar to my own; as Of so and so throughout; I first wrote On so and so; but did not like the sound, and remembering it would be De in Latin, altered it to Of. The treatment also of the subjects has some apparent similitude; ...
— My Life as an Author • Martin Farquhar Tupper
... is a language of flowery metaphors. It means, I suppose, that when you touch the drums they bite. In journeying from one spot to another they always leave misfortune behind, as I understand it. Just coincidence; but you couldn't drive that into an Oriental skull. This is what makes the study of precious stones so interesting. There is always some enchantment, some evil spell. To handle the drums is to invite a minor accident. Call it twaddle; probably is; and yet I have reason to believe that there's something ...
— The Drums Of Jeopardy • Harold MacGrath
... the anniversary of Pio Nono's return to Rome from Gaeta, that refuge of destitute sovereigns. It is also, by a strange coincidence, the anniversary of the day on which his Holiness and General Goyon narrowly escaped being killed by the falling of a scaffold, from which they were inspecting the repairs at the church of St Agnese. ...
— Rome in 1860 • Edward Dicey
... which was obligingly snapped by Captain Triplett, the entire party was listening to the thrilling cry of the fatu-liva bird. Captain Triplett had just requested the group to "listen to the little birdie" when the distant wood-notes were heard, the coincidence falling in most happily with the photographer's attempts to secure the absolute attention ...
— The Cruise of the Kawa • Walter E. Traprock
... of the two reversible photographs is as great as the last and the subject as picturesque though it be discovered that the first is the second placed on end. It is able to satisfy us not only because of the happy coincidence that the leaves upon the bridge represent bark texture and the subdued light upon its near end creates the rotundity of the trunk or that a distant tree serves as the horizontal margin of a pool, but because its light and shade is conceived upon the terms of balance expressing ...
— Pictorial Composition and the Critical Judgment of Pictures • Henry Rankin Poore
... no reply. The suggestion of poisoning was a welcome one. It was preferable to the sinister hintings of the brown man. But even if it had been poisoned it was a very singular coincidence, unless indeed the Burmese had himself poisoned it He tried to think whether it could have been possible for his visitor ...
— The Skipper's Wooing, and The Brown Man's Servant • W. W. Jacobs
... contemplated the possibility of a second marriage, and that if the would-be bridegroom is not in his first youth—why, she is prepared to make the best of it. In this connection it is perhaps not uninstructive to note that Signor Odoardo is in comfortable circumstances, and is himself a widower. What a coincidence! ...
— Stories by Foreign Authors: Italian • Various
... phratries as are spread over wide areas should in the main follow the lines of linguistic or cultural areas. Our knowledge of these is hardly sufficient to enable us to say at present how far the presumption of coincidence is fulfilled; but it is certain that in more than one large area the facts are as Mr Lang's theory requires them ...
— Kinship Organisations and Group Marriage in Australia • Northcote W. Thomas
... wait ten minutes. At last he came, but as he neared her seat, Rachel felt like sinking into the earth with mortification when she recognized in the wearer a stalwart negro. She hoped that it was a mere chance coincidence, but he approached her, and raising his hat ...
— Jack's Ward • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... others in the shade: that a crowned head and a portier, the very top of an empire and the very bottom of it, should pass the very same criticism and deliver the very same verdict upon a book of mine—and almost in the same hour and the same breath—is a coincidence which out-coincidences any coincidence which I could have imagined with such powers of imagination as I have been favored with; and I have not been accustomed to regard them as being small or of an inferior quality. It is always ...
— Chapters from My Autobiography • Mark Twain
... certain measure, they remind one of Figs. 4 and 5, Pl 11, of Witham's "Internal Structure of Fossil Vegetables," and which were drawn from specimens of cannel coal derived likewise from Lancashire, but which are not so highly magnified. There is an interesting fact to note in this coincidence, and that is that this structure, which is so difficult to explain in its details, is not accidental, but a consequence of the nature of the materials that served to produce the coal of this region. In the midst of a ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 481, March 21, 1885 • Various
... remarkable coincidence it was on this very evening that Iris first made the acquaintance of her pupil, Mr. Arnold Arbuthnot. These coincidences, I believe, happen oftener in real life than they do even on the stage, where people are ...
— In Luck at Last • Walter Besant
... never come alone, this was followed by my supersession, as literary agent of "Scribner's," by Mr. Gosse, who had been making a visit to New York. It was in curious coincidence with these disasters that I addressed (with a letter of introduction from Madame Bodichon, who always was the kindest of friends to me) a distinguished lady member of the staff of an evening paper, with a request to help me to get work on it, and was told distinctly that ...
— The Autobiography of a Journalist, Volume II • William James Stillman
... left town, I easily found the direction he had taken; and, after waiting several days to prevent any suspicious coincidence in the time of our departure, I one night, soon after midnight, crept from my bed and followed him. I overtook him at a village some twenty miles distant, where he was remaining a day or two, and easily ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 58, August, 1862 • Various
... disclosure of bygone events or emotions. We are, indeed, afforded brief glimpses into the past both of Stensgaard and of Stockmann; but the glimpses are incidental and inessential. It is certainly no mere coincidence that if one were asked to pick out the pieces of thinnest texture in all Ibsen's mature work, one would certainly select these two plays. Far be it from me to disparage An Enemy of the People; as a work of art it is incomparably ...
— Play-Making - A Manual of Craftsmanship • William Archer
... By a coincidence which afforded more pleasure to my fellow-voyagers than to me, one of the two boats reserved for the use of the Conversation Club was named the Sarah, the other rejoicing in the inappropriate name of Firefly. I was, of course, voted to a place of honour ...
— Tom, Dick and Harry • Talbot Baines Reed
... their unfortunate coincidence with those of Lord Byron, I have before adverted. Like his noble friend, ardent in the pursuit of Truth, he, like him too, unluckily lost his way in seeking her,—"the light that led astray" being by both friends ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. II - With His Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore
... Enriquez's usual light-hearted levity, but the fact that he should have TELEGRAPHED it to me struck me uneasily. That I should have received it at the hotel where his wife and Professor Dobbs were both staying, and where I had had such a singular experience, seemed to me more than a mere coincidence. An instinct that the message was something personal to Enriquez and myself kept me from imparting it to Mrs. Saltillo. After worrying half the night in our bizarre camp in the redwoods, in the midst of a restless festivity which was scarcely the repose I had been ...
— Stories in Light and Shadow • Bret Harte
... in the Mosaic narrative five points which correspond in order and character to five points in the Geological record; and with reference to two, at least, of these points, we cannot imagine any cause for the coincidence in the shape of a fortunate conjecture, because, so far as we can tell, there was nothing apparent on the face of the earth to suggest to the mind of the writer the long past existence of such a state of things as has been revealed to us by the discovery of the ...
— The Story of Creation as told by Theology and by Science • T. S. Ackland
... advice, in fact, corresponded to an inward thirst, and had, moreover, a coincidence to back it. In one of the Manchester papers two or three mornings before he had seen the advertisement of a farm to let, which had set vibrating all his passion for and memory of the moorland. It was a farm ...
— The History of David Grieve • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... circumstances did not permit of his having been invited, his coming uninvited is shown to have been due to chance. I do not think the authoress thought all this out, but attribute the strangeness of the coincidence to unconscious cerebration ...
— The Odyssey • Homer
... few lines in the cab, and sent off the packet, registered, in time I hoped, to catch the post—but after all, it didn't. Coming out from the post office, there was Godensky again, in his motor-brougham. That could have been no coincidence. A horrid certainty sprang to life in me that he'd followed my cab from the Foreign Office, to see where I would go. Why couldn't I have thought of that danger? I have always thought of things, and guarded against them; yet this time, this time of ...
— The Powers and Maxine • Charles Norris Williamson
... who had been so mysteriously recalled to his recollection, and giving December 19 as the date of death. More than sixty years later we find him, in his autobiography commenting on the experience anew, granting that it was a strange coincidence but refusing to admit that it was anything more than the coincidence of ...
— Historic Ghosts and Ghost Hunters • H. Addington Bruce
... before. She checked them with all her might, but remembering how little it had helped her then, her powers of resistance gave way, she was almost sobbing when the very word was used in the song. The coincidence was too superb, it swept all emotion aside, she could have laughed aloud instead. She was sure of everything, everything now. It thus happened that the last line in its literal sense, in its jubilant sympathy, came to ...
— The Bridal March; One Day • Bjornstjerne Bjornson
... had to do her utmost to amuse him. She caught up something bright to hold before him, and was surprised to see it was a coral cross, which Violet, in changing her dress, had laid for a moment on the dressing-table. The coincidence was strange, thought Theodora. ...
— Heartsease - or Brother's Wife • Charlotte M. Yonge
... by coincidence happened besides, namely that there was a sacred enclosure of the Eleusinian Demeter close by the side of both the battle-fields; for not only in the Plataian land did the fight take place close by the side of the temple of Demeter, as I have before said, but also in Mycale it was to be so likewise. ...
— The History Of Herodotus - Volume 2 (of 2) • Herodotus
... naturalist, might commit. Oiseau de Nazaret is simply a corruption of oiseau de nausee—the original French name of the dodo, a literal translation of the original Dutch walghvogel. It is a curious coincidence, that as the bird of Nazareth has been found in books only, so the island of Nazareth has been found only on paper. At first, it appeared quite a respectable island; as maritime discovery progressed, it degenerated to a reef, and from that ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 440 - Volume 17, New Series, June 5, 1852 • Various
... the biggest one he ever saw, but I took very little notice of the ship until in tacking across her wake, I noticed her name in gold letters across the stern—'Duncan McDonald.' Now that is my own name, and was my father's; and try as I would, I could not account for this name as a coincidence, common as the name might be in the highlands of the home of my ancestors; and before the staunch little steamer had gotten a mile away, I ordered the boat to follow her. I intended to go aboard and learn, if possible, something of ...
— Danger Signals • John A. Hill and Jasper Ewing Brady
... that sin exists, notwithstanding this perfect coincidence between the will of God and the conduct of his creatures, it will follow, most conclusively, that God is the author of sin. He has decreed and brings to pass all the sensations, perceptions, emotions, inclinations, volitions, and overt actions, of the whole human race. Various attempts have ...
— The Calvinistic Doctrine of Predestination Examined and Refuted • Francis Hodgson
... excuse that the writer did not deliberately select the time of publication, but that the Transvaal Government in its wisdom chose to impose silence for three years, and that the project with which their action had interfered was resumed at the earliest possible moment. The coincidence of another crisis with the date of emancipation may be an unlucky coincidence, or it may be a result. But there is neither necessity nor intention to offer excuses. The responsibility is accepted and the answer is that ...
— The Transvaal from Within - A Private Record of Public Affairs • J. P. Fitzpatrick
... curious coincidence that Maitland should within a few years have had two sovereigns as passengers,—one the central figure of modern European history, the other the good-natured elderly buffoon who in this country is chiefly remembered as the husband of the friend of Lady Hamilton. ...
— The Surrender of Napoleon • Sir Frederick Lewis Maitland
... he said, "I believe that she has reasons for desiring her present whereabouts to remain unknown. I should perhaps not have mentioned her name at all. It was, I fancy, indiscreet of me. The coincidence of hearing you mention the name of the place where I believe she resided surprised my question. With your permission we will ...
— The Yellow Crayon • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... alas I it was of a much more fleshly kind. This Miss Nancy, who seemed to me almost divine, was the daughter of a rich merchant. I said that I wanted to make her father's acquaintance, and she replied that her father proposed coming to call on me that very day. I was delighted to hear of the coincidence, and gave order that he should be shewn in ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... belief that they will thus be protected from contagious and other diseases, and in these practices protective fumigation originated. That such different nations should have had the same idea of fixing the purification by fire on St. John's Day is a remarkable coincidence, which perhaps can be accounted for only by its ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... invariably ran back again and Beverly would do likewise when she got ready. She was probably with some friend in the neighborhood. She was in the habit of forming friendships with all sorts and conditions of people. That her horse was also gone might be a mere coincidence, or else she was trying to frighten them all, and would come riding back by sundown. She was capable of almost any insubordination, and rising at dawn and riding off somewhere was merely ...
— A Dixie School Girl • Gabrielle E. Jackson
... the next day the removal of the three prisoners became known to everybody. Master Raymond wondered when he heard it, whether it was a check-mate to the plan of escape, with which the magistrates, in some way had become acquainted; or whether it was a mere chance coincidence. Finally he satisfied himself that it was the latter—though no doubt suggested by the rather loose threats of ...
— Dulcibel - A Tale of Old Salem • Henry Peterson
... the Gothic princes who expressed, in writing, the manners and customs of his people; and the composition of the Burgundian laws was a measure of policy rather than of justice; to alleviate the yoke, and regain the affections, of their Gallic subjects. [68] Thus, by a singular coincidence, the Germans framed their artless institutions, at a time when the elaborate system of Roman jurisprudence was finally consummated. In the Salic laws, and the Pandects of Justinian, we may compare the first rudiments, and the full maturity, ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 3 • Edward Gibbon
... just wondering," Jack returned ambiguously. "If you hadn't happened along—say, how did you happen to come? Was that another sample of my fool's luck?" Since the coincidence had not struck him before, one might guess that he was accustomed to having Dade at his elbow when he was ...
— The Gringos • B. M. Bower
... going to the Ruins of Karnstein?" he said. "Yes, it is a lucky coincidence; do you know I was going to ask you to bring me there to inspect them. I have a special object in exploring. There is a ruined chapel, ain't there, with a great many tombs of that ...
— Carmilla • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... By an unhappy coincidence, the Emperor had come to Fontainebleau, and had decided to conduct manoeuvres for several hours, under a blazing sun. My poor brother, compelled to run without rest, his arm dragged down by the weight of his heavy musket, was overcome by the heat and his wound re-opened! He should have fallen ...
— The Memoirs of General the Baron de Marbot, Translated by - Oliver C. Colt • Baron de Marbot
... that there are many of that kind need not be doubted. For example: Is not the rule, Si inoequalibus aequalia addas, omnia erunt inaequalia, an axiom as well of justice as of the mathematics? and is there not a true coincidence between commutative and distributive justice, and arithmetical and geometrical proportion? Is not that other rule, Quae in eodem tertio conveniunt, et inter se conveniunt, a rule taken from the mathematics, but so potent in logic as all syllogisms ...
— The Advancement of Learning • Francis Bacon
... I was struck with the coincidence of the compliment of Alexander at the theater and this frightful nightmare, especially as the Emperor was not subject to disturbances of this kind. I do not know whether his Majesty related his dream to the Emperor ...
— The Private Life of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Constant
... this coincidence was accepted as certainly more than an accident by the old-fashioned astronomers, who want rigid proof for every new theory. But the last doubts have long vanished, and a connection has been further traced between violent outbursts ...
— History of Astronomy • George Forbes
... some disused scaffolding in a lonely place, when a beam on which they were standing gave way under their feet. Both fell, the elder a little before the younger. But just in time the elder managed to clutch another beam and hold fast to it. By a providential coincidence, his brother, catching wildly at anything within his reach, seized his legs, and the two hung suspended thus, with all the weight on the elder boy's arms. Before long, the strain became too great, and he called ...
— Chatterbox, 1905. • Various
... ministry which would necessarily assume full responsibility for the action of the lieutenant-governor under the circumstances, and after some delay the new ministry went to the country and were sustained by a large majority. It is an interesting coincidence that the lieutenant-governor who dismissed the Mercier government and the prime minister who assumed full responsibility for the dismissal of the Mercier administration, were respectively attorney-general ...
— Canada under British Rule 1760-1900 • John G. Bourinot
... develops on its surface a pellicle or "skin." The cause of this change in taste is not well known. Usually it has been explained as being produced by changes in the nitrogenous elements in the milk, particularly in the albumen. Thoerner[133] has pointed out the coincidence that exists between the appearance of a cooked taste and the loss of certain gases that are expelled by heating. He finds that the milk heated in closed vessels from which the gas cannot escape has a much less pronounced cooked flavor ...
— Outlines of Dairy Bacteriology, 8th edition - A Concise Manual for the Use of Students in Dairying • H. L. Russell
... By a happy coincidence, when the callers had taken their departure, another visitor arrived—F., the very man ...
— The Petticoat Commando - Boer Women in Secret Service • Johanna Brandt
... plowed a pocket-book and $30 in greenbacks under, and by a singular coincidence the next spring it was plowed out, and, though rotten clear through, was sent to the Treasury, where it was discovered that the bills were on a Michigan National Bank, whither they ...
— Remarks • Bill Nye
... dismissal due to some offence of which he had unwittingly been guilty; but his neighbour at table relieved his fears by explaining that the Admiral was merely directing the immediate departure of one of the vessels of his squadron, which, by a strange coincidence, bore the same name as ...
— The Letter-Bag of Lady Elizabeth Spencer-Stanhope v. I. • A. M. W. Stirling (compiler)
... as the Algonquin which abounds in labials, but more so than the Winnebago, which is the most harsh and guttural language in America. The Narcotah sounds to an English ear, like the Chinese, and both in this, and in other respects, the Sioux are thought to present many points of coincidence. It is certain that their manners and customs differ essentially from those of any other tribe, and their physiognomy, as well as their language, and opinions, mark them a distinct race of people. Their sacrifices and ...
— Great Indian Chief of the West - Or, Life and Adventures of Black Hawk • Benjamin Drake
... the summer months. The clerk knew very well that this "PERHAPS" meant "CERTAINLY," but as he thought he could make more out of a tenant like the prince, he felt justified in speaking vaguely about the present inhabitant's intentions. "This is quite a coincidence," thought he, and when the subject of price was mentioned, he made a gesture with his hand, as if to waive away a question ...
— The Idiot • (AKA Feodor Dostoevsky) Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... indigenous, and is an article of religious belief. "To the common people in India the spots look like a hare, i.e. Chandras, the god of the moon, carries a hare (sasa), hence the moon is called Sasin or Sasanka, hare mark or spot." [75] Max Mueller also writes, "As a curious coincidence it may be mentioned that in Sanskrit the moon is called Sasanka,i.e. 'having the marks of a hare,' the black marks in the moon being taken for the likeness of the hare." [76] This allusion to the sacred language ...
— Moon Lore • Timothy Harley
... neighbourhood, anticipating no difficulty in getting a patent from the Plymouth Company, which was anxious to obtain settlers. For five weeks they stayed in the ship while little parties were exploring the coast and deciding upon the best site for a town. It was purely a coincidence that the spot which they chose had already received from John Smith the name of Plymouth, the beautiful port in Devonshire from which the Mayflower had sailed. [Sidenote: ...
— The Beginnings of New England - Or the Puritan Theocracy in its Relations to Civil and Religious Liberty • John Fiske
... an odd coincidence, while this chapter was being written a letter came to Miss Anthony from Dean M. Jenkins, of Detroit, which said: "Enclosed please find my check to help on the good work to which you have devoted your life. You see I have almost pardoned you for saying, ...
— The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 1 of 2) • Ida Husted Harper
... remember as a pendant—but one so much more grave that we hesitate to cite it, though the coincidence is curious—the pause made by Dante in the beginning of the Inferno, which resembles so exactly the pause in Scott's career. The great Florentine had written seven cantos of his wonderful poem when the rush of his affairs carried ...
— Royal Edinburgh - Her Saints, Kings, Prophets and Poets • Margaret Oliphant
... of course, be a mere coincidence, or it may point to some nervousness which would indicate that he had reason to apprehend danger. Had you noticed anything unusual in his ...
— The Valley of Fear • Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
... lieutenant, who was on his knees sighting a gun, when a shot entered the port, split the quoin, drove a great piece of metal against his breast, and stretched him dead upon the deck without breaking his skin. By a singular coincidence, fifteen minutes later a shot from one of the "Saratoga's" guns struck the muzzle of a twenty-four on the "Confiance," and, dismounting it, hurled it against Capt. Downie's groin, killing him instantly without breaking the skin; a black mark about the size ...
— The Naval History of the United States - Volume 2 (of 2) • Willis J. Abbot
... "It's a queer coincidence, by the way, that you should have known Adrian Borlsover and that you should have received a blessing at his hand. Has ...
— Masterpieces of Mystery, Vol. 1 (of 4) - Ghost Stories • Various
... he continued, 'all things are arranged, and but for the unfortunate coincidence of this person's poverty and of her father's cupidity, the details of the wedding ceremony would undoubtedly now be in a very advanced condition. Upon these entrancing and well-discussed plans, however, the shadow of the grasping and commonplace ...
— The Wallet of Kai Lung • Ernest Bramah
... to take the auspices. Two delightful letters from you delivered at the same time! For which I do not know what I am to pay you by way of reward for good news. That I owe you for them I candidly confess. But observe the coincidence. I had just made my way from Antium on to the via Appia at Three Taverns,[226] on the very day of the Cerealia (18th April), when my friend Curio meets me on his way from Rome. At the same place and the same moment comes a slave from you ...
— The Letters of Cicero, Volume 1 - The Whole Extant Correspodence in Chronological Order • Marcus Tullius Cicero
... met people from home—the McGanums. They laughed, shook hands repeatedly, and exclaimed, "Well, this is quite a coincidence!" They asked when the McGanums had come down, and begged for news of the town they had left two days before. Whatever the McGanums were at home, here they stood out as so superior to all the undistinguishable strangers absurdly hurrying past that the Kennicotts held them ...
— Main Street • Sinclair Lewis
... said, 'is not an expected pleasure, and is all the greater on that account. By a curious coincidence I find we are ...
— An Old Meerschaum - From Coals Of Fire And Other Stories, Volume II. (of III.) • David Christie Murray
... it being the habit of most people to denounce as heresy or ridicule as madness things too high for their sight or too deep for their comprehension. As these people would say, "oddly enough," or "by an extraordinary coincidence," this very letter was from Miss Ercildoune,—a letter which she wrote as she purposed, and as she well knew how to write, in behalf of Sallie. It was ostensibly on quite another theme; asking some information in regard to a comrade, but so cunningly ...
— What Answer? • Anna E. Dickinson
... Northern Buddhist literature—embracing both the "Romantic Legend"[82] and the "Lalita Vistara"—many incidents of Buddha's childhood are given which show a seeming coincidence with the life of Christ. It is claimed that his birth was heralded by angelic hosts, that an aged sage received him into his arms and blessed him, that he was taken to the temple for consecration, that a jealous ruler ...
— Oriental Religions and Christianity • Frank F. Ellinwood
... not aware whether the coincidence in time of the Icelandic eruptions, and of the peculiar appearance of the sun, described by Gilbert White, has yet been noticed; but this coincidence may very well be taken as some little evidence towards explaining the connection between ...
— The Storm-Cloud of the Nineteenth Century - Two Lectures delivered at the London Institution February - 4th and 11th, 1884 • John Ruskin
... hearing that they were still idolaters, with a deep sigh, 'What a pity that such a beauteous frontispiece should possess a mind so void of internal grace.' The name of their nation being mentioned to be Angles, his ear caught the verbal coincidence—the benevolent wish for their improvement darted into his mind, and he expressed his own feelings, and excited those of his auditors, by remarking—'It suits them well: they have angel faces, and ought to be the co-heirs of ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 17, - Issue 479, March 5, 1831 • Various
... swept analytically over Mike the Angel's face. "You want a drink? I snuck a spot o' brandy aboard, and just by purty ole coincidence, there's a bottle right over there in the speaker housing." Without waiting for an answer, he turned away from Mike and walked toward the cabinet that held the intercom speaker. Meantime, ...
— Unwise Child • Gordon Randall Garrett
... of the unknown sorcerer and of Prelati, both getting dangerously wounded in an empty room, under identical circumstances—I tell you, it's a remarkable coincidence," said Durtal ...
— La-bas • J. K. Huysmans
... coming right!—and next year they would all dance at Fontenoy with light hearts, at Unity's wedding. It had begun to come right the evening of the day that she had met Ludwell Cary in the cedar wood. She wondered, slightly, at that coincidence, and then ...
— Lewis Rand • Mary Johnston
... not wrong; she came into the parlor by one door as he entered it by the other. The coincidence was auspicious, and he warmly pressed his suit, pouring into Pauline's ears such a confused account of his feelings and his affairs as only love ...
— Winter Evening Tales • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
... which Coronado had invented to forestall suspicions at the hacienda. It was surely a wonderful coincidence of lying, and shows how great minds work alike. Vexed and angry as the nephew was, he could ...
— Overland • John William De Forest
... chief assistant, Auguste Chouteau, born at New Orleans in 1739, lived one hundred years, not dying till 1839. There are many people in St. Louis who remember him. A very remarkable coincidence was, that his brother, Pierre Chouteau, born in New Orleans in 1749, died in St. Louis in 1849, having also lived just one hundred years. Both of these brothers were identified with St. Louis from the beginning, where they lived in affluence and honor for seventy years, ...
— Captains of Industry - or, Men of Business Who Did Something Besides Making Money • James Parton
... Strange coincidence! If I had been Mr. Victor Hugo, my dear, or a poet of any note, I would, in a few hours, have made an impromptu concerning that Lafayette-crowned pump, and compared its lot now to the fortune of its patron some fifty ...
— The Second Funeral of Napoleon • William Makepeace Thackeray (AKA "Michael Angelo Titmarch")
... Faraday. There is, then, an intangible but none the less potent web of association between the scientific work of Rumford and some of the most important researches that were conducted at the Royal Institution long years after his death; and one is led to feel that it was not merely a coincidence that some of Faraday's most important labors should have served to place on a firm footing the thesis for which Rumford battled; and that Tyndall should have been the first in his "beautiful book" called Heat, a Mode of Motion, to give wide popular announcement to the fact that at last the scientific ...
— A History of Science, Volume 5(of 5) - Aspects Of Recent Science • Henry Smith Williams
... determined. The bamboo is filled with water while in the vertical position. It is then tilted till it points towards a certain star, when of course some water escapes. After it has been restored to the vertical, the level of the surface of the remaining water is noted. The coincidence of this level with the mark mentioned above indicates that the time for sowing ...
— The Pagan Tribes of Borneo • Charles Hose and William McDougall
... the name of the son and heir. I was about to remark that he is a baronet and that it is a singular coincidence that he should also have been here in America while his mother was stricken with paralysis. It is strange, too, that his first name should be the same as ...
— Virgie's Inheritance • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... details because of a curious coincidence. I said to Jack—I was steering—that I had had since dawn a feeling that some calamity was about to happen. Now this was, as I recall it, a notion quite new to me, and far more like Jack himself. He laughed and said it was the east wind. Then after a pause he added: "I was trying to recall ...
— Hugh Wynne, Free Quaker • S. Weir Mitchell
... "Master, what a coincidence! Are these newly decorated walls really ancient with memories?" I looked around my simply furnished ...
— Autobiography of a YOGI • Paramhansa Yogananda
... railway depot, or in Cincinnati to a music hall, or in Pittsburgh to building a church or another rolling mill. Every community has its social idiosyncrasies, but it struck us as rather an amusing coincidence that while we had recently greeted no less a man than Potter Palmer, Esq., behind the counter in Chicago as "mine host of the Garter," we should so soon have found ourselves in the keeping of Senator Sharon, lessee of the Palace. ...
— Round the World • Andrew Carnegie
... a strange coincidence, but the officer of the day happened to have been promoted from the ranks, had served his three years as an enlisted man, and then passed a stiff examination for a commission. One could see by his walk that he had no sympathy for the mother's ...
— Army Letters from an Officer's Wife, 1871-1888 • Frances M.A. Roe
... appear childish, she bowed ever so slightly. When he was safely past, she could not resist giving a furtive look behind her, and at precisely the same moment, he turned, too. In spite of her trouble, Ephic found the coincidence droll; she tittered, and he saw it, although she immediately laid the back of her hand on her lips. It was not in him to let this pass unnoticed. With a few quick steps, he was at ...
— Maurice Guest • Henry Handel Richardson
... new world whose treasures were now opening to them. In conclusion, he admitted in their full extent the reasons which had been given by the noble lords for their several resignations, and the statements which they had made in accounting for that remarkable coincidence; but he could not help expressing his surprise that government had been able to go on so long, being conducted, as it now appeared, by ministers who did not think proper to communicate with one another upon the most important ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... come round to the summer season again, and it happened, by mere accident, that the day appointed for the marriage was the anniversary of that on which Mendez had been robbed and wounded. Nobody, however, appears to have thought of this coincidence, till Mendez himself, observing the day of the month, requested that the ceremony might be postponed till the day after: 'Because,' said he, 'I have business which will take me to Aquila on the 7th, so the marriage had better take place on the 8th.' ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 419, New Series, January 10, 1852 • Various
... lowering of the ocean, on which the present West Indian Islands were mountains, rising high above the level and fertile plains that are now covered by the sea? Obscurely the accounts of it have come down to us from the dim past, but there is a remarkable coincidence between the traditions that have been handed down on the two sides of ...
— The Naturalist in Nicaragua • Thomas Belt
... His manner when he appears at our board meetings is quiet and not unpleasant. Marian, it appears, met him at Towers Cottage the year before last, and had some scientific lessons from him. He was quite unknown then. It was rather a curious coincidence. I did not know of it until about a month ago, when he read a paper at the Society of Arts on his invention. I attended the meeting with Marian; and when it was over, I introduced him to her, and was surprised to learn that they knew one ...
— The Irrational Knot - Being the Second Novel of His Nonage • George Bernard Shaw
... Narada, that royal sage after duly worshipping him, and taking his permission, repaired to the city of Varanasi, and having reached there, that famous prince did as he had been told, and remembering the words of Narada, he placed a corpse at the gate of the city. And by coincidence, that Brahmana also entered the gate of the city at the same time. Then on beholding the corpse, he suddenly turned away. And on seeing him turn back, that prince, the son of Avikshit followed his footsteps with his hands clasped together, and with the object of receiving instruction ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 4 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... By a curious coincidence, two books relating to vivisection were published in America at almost the same time. One, under the above title, was a collection of essays and contributions to various periodicals from the pen of Dr. William W. Keen, which have appeared during the ...
— An Ethical Problem - Or, Sidelights upon Scientific Experimentation on Man and Animals • Albert Leffingwell
... ready we got under way solemnly, our camels rising and sniffing the breeze with a superior air, as who should say, 'I happen to be going where you happen to be going; but don't for a moment suppose I do it to please you. It is mere coincidence. You are bound for Wadi Bou: I have business of my own which chances to take ...
— Miss Cayley's Adventures • Grant Allen
... then you say, "Well, this is the most remarkable coincidence I ever heard of. I didn't get my own watch from the fellow, but I got yours, Mr. Bemis;" and then you hand it over to him and say, "Sorry I had to break the chain in getting it from him," and then everybody laughs again, ...
— The Garotters • William D. Howells
... the incident, when his roommate came in a little later, and they were discussing the queer coincidence, ...
— Andy at Yale - The Great Quadrangle Mystery • Roy Eliot Stokes
... vacillate coincidence publicity license tenacity crescent prejudice scenery condescend effervesce proboscis scintillate ...
— The Art Of Writing & Speaking The English Language - Word-Study and Composition & Rhetoric • Sherwin Cody
... ticklish night. The few wild Yanks who roamed the dark, without pass, had all the room and road. There was a particularly good mission at once found for this American company on another front, whether by design or by coincidence. A board of officers whitewashed the Canadian flyers of the Royal Air Force ...
— The History of the American Expedition Fighting the Bolsheviki - Campaigning in North Russia 1918-1919 • Joel R. Moore
... region of the heavens between Cepheus and Cassiopeia. Sir J. Herschel remarks, that, 'from the imperfect account we have of the places of the two earlier, as compared with that of the last, which was well determined, as well as from the tolerably near coincidence of the intervals of their appearance, we may suspect them, with Goodricke, to be one and the same star, with a period of 312 or perhaps of 156 years.' The latter period may very reasonably be rejected, as one can perceive no reason why the intermediate ...
— Myths and Marvels of Astronomy • Richard A. Proctor
... interesting coincidence there was living in Norwich at the moment when Borrow was about to leave it, a man who had long identified himself with good causes in Russia, and had lived in that country for a considerable period of his life. John Venning[99] was born in Totnes in 1776, and he is buried in the Rosary ...
— George Borrow and His Circle - Wherein May Be Found Many Hitherto Unpublished Letters Of - Borrow And His Friends • Clement King Shorter
... modern had met for the first time and as irreconcilable enemies in the cloisters of Pisa; and the modern had triumphed in the great mediaeval fresco of the Triumph of Death. By a strange coincidence, by a sublime jest of accident, the antique and the modern were destined to meet again, and this time indissolubly united, in a painting representing the Resurrection. Yes, Signorelli's fresco in Orvieto Cathedral is indeed ...
— Euphorion - Being Studies of the Antique and the Mediaeval in the - Renaissance - Vol. I • Vernon Lee
... affairs, to the revenue and expenditures, and to the military force of the Union by land and sea. A coordinate department of the judiciary has expounded the Constitution and the laws, settling in harmonious coincidence with the legislative will numerous weighty questions of construction which the imperfection of human language had rendered unavoidable. The year of jubilee since the first formation of our Union has just elapsed; that of the ...
— U.S. Presidential Inaugural Addresses • Various
... beautiful specimen of the florist's art. As I noted how the main bunch of roses and lilies was connected by long satin ribbons to the lesser clusters which hung from it, I recalled with conceivable horror the use to which a similar ribbon had been put in the room below. In the shudder called up by this coincidence I forgot to speculate how a bouquet carried by the bride could have found its way back to this upstairs room when, as all accounts agree, she had fled from the parlor below without speaking or staying foot the moment ...
— The Filigree Ball • Anna Katharine Green
... refrained from speaking of the blazing eyes and made my way to the bathroom wondering if some chance reflection might not have deceived me and the presence of a woman's footmarks at the same spot be no more than a singular coincidence. Even so the mystery of their ...
— The Green Eyes of Bast • Sax Rohmer
... tenth of the golden spoil being reserved for the Delphian shrine, and wrought into a golden tripod, which was placed on a column formed of three twisted bronze serpents. This defeat was the salvation of Greece. No Persian army ever again set foot on European soil. And, by a striking coincidence, on the same day that the battle of Plataea was fought, the Grecian fleet won a brilliant victory at Mycale, in Asia Minor, and freed the Ionian cities from Persian rule. In Greece, Thebes was punished for aiding the Persians. Byzantium (now Constantinople) was captured by Pausanias, ...
— Historic Tales, vol 10 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... gunwale, and, as decently as was possible, laid the remains of what had once been a big, strong man in the bottom of the boat. A flag was then taken from the locker and covered over him, just as, by a strange coincidence, and very faintly heard, came ...
— The Black Bar • George Manville Fenn
... reservoir into which flowed all the streams of public and private benefaction throughout the empire. Some of the statements, through credulity, and others, in the desire of exciting admiration, may be greatly exaggerated; but, in the coincidence of contemporary testimony, it is not easy to determine the exact line which should mark the measure of our skepticism. Certain it is, that the glowing picture I have given is warranted by those who saw these buildings in their pride, or shortly after they had ...
— History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William Hickling Prescott
... clear of the words which I should have liked her to write to me, from fear lest, by first selecting them myself, I should be excluding just those identical words,—the dearest, the most desired—from the field of possible events. Even if, by an almost impossible coincidence, it had been precisely the letter of my invention that Gilberte had addressed to me of her own accord, recognising my own work in it I should not have had the impression that I was receiving something that had not originated in myself, something ...
— Swann's Way - (vol. 1 of Remembrance of Things Past) • Marcel Proust
... of individual fighting, and its introduction has waited so long the establishment of some high compelling power—for the influence of the Religion of Peace has in this matter been less than nil—that it is evident that only the coincidence of very powerful and peculiar factors could have brought the question into the region of practical politics in our own time. There are several such factors, most of which have been developing during a long period, but none have been clearly ...
— The Task of Social Hygiene • Havelock Ellis
... observations that hour of the night at which the Milky Way skirts our horizon. This is nearly the case in the evenings of May and June, though the coincidence with the horizon can never be exact except to observers stationed near the tropics. Using the figure of the grindstone, we at its centre will then have its circumference around our horizon, while the axis will be nearly ...
— Side-lights on Astronomy and Kindred Fields of Popular Science • Simon Newcomb
... a matter which seems almost more than a coincidence, and one which has been too often remarked to be ignored, and that is, that in the midst of ruins which are almost totally destroyed the figure of Christ in some niche often remains untouched. I have seen it myself, and many writers have commented on the fact. Sometimes it ...
— My War Experiences in Two Continents • Sarah Macnaughtan
... deuce does she sign herself "Yours, Rosa?" She's not mine, and I don't want her; it seems funny to me that I once thought of her vaguely in that sort of way. Now, I feel rather disturbed that she is coming here, though I don't quite see why I should worry, and yet I wonder if it is a coincidence her coming ...
— The Diary of a U-boat Commander • Anon
... meanwhile, recovered so far as to pace the floor. "I'm goin' to pack up and light out for home!" he declared, over and over. And even oftener he read and reread the card to make sure of the actuality of that fatal coincidence, ...
— Ramsey Milholland • Booth Tarkington
... friendship. He accepted it as a gift from the gods. Maybe somewhere in his inner consciousness, barely articulate even to his own heart, he dreamt of it as a foundation to something further. Yet for the present, the foundation sufficed. Death-letters—he laughed joyously at the coincidence—had laid the first stone, and each day placed others in firm and secure position round it. The building was largely unconscious. It is the way with true friendship. The life, also, conduced to it. There are fewer barriers of convention ...
— Antony Gray,—Gardener • Leslie Moore
... intrigue and Bolshevist propaganda upon the Italian situation. Bolshevist envoys had been received with open arms at Turin, and Orlando, then Minister of the Interior, had refrained on principle from hampering their activities. More singular was the coincidence of Von Buelow's offensive with a Parliamentary crisis which precipitated the fall ...
— A Short History of the Great War • A.F. Pollard
... prospective host into the cab. Was it altogether a coincidence, I wondered, that we were bound for the same restaurant whither the man and the girl had preceded us a few ...
— The Master Mummer • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... has been his good fortune to win high commendation for the few works he has published. He made his studies in composition under the late Heinrich Dorn, the same who was the master of Schumann in composition—though this may be no more than a coincidence. Mr. Liebling, although born in Berlin, has resided in the United States for nearly thirty years. He is essentially American. The two Romances represent the most serious side of his work, in addition to which I have put ...
— The Masters and their Music - A series of illustrative programs with biographical, - esthetical, and critical annotations • W. S. B. Mathews
... called the Villa of Marcus Arius Diomedes, on the strength of a tomb discovered about the same period immediately opposite to it, bearing that name. No other tomb had then been discovered so near it, and on this coincidence of situation a conclusion was drawn that this must have been a family sepulchre, attached to the house, and, by consequence, that the house itself belonged to Diomedes. The conjecture at the outset rested but on ...
— Museum of Antiquity - A Description of Ancient Life • L. W. Yaggy
... to be overcome in forming a Canal between Panama, and the nearest point of the opposite coast, which is the Gulph of San Blas (likewise called the Bay of Mandingo), render it expedient to select a position west of that line, and the happy coincidence of two navigable rivers, traversing the low lands to the west of Porto Bello, the one falling into the Atlantic, and the other into the Pacific Ocean, which may either form part of the navigation, or be used to feed the Canal, ...
— A Succinct View of the Importance and Practicability of Forming a Ship Canal across the Isthmus of Panama • H. R. Hill
... Miss Mapp," he said in his high falsetto. "Blow me, if it isn't our mutual friend Miss Mapp. What a 'strordinary coincidence." ...
— Miss Mapp • Edward Frederic Benson
... for /me,/ and I sensed a strange secret service intrigue around me. Then, in an instant this impression, which had got the better of my common sense, gave way. Evidently a pure coincidence. Still I was left with the vague apprehension that they were going to notice that I /knew,/ and were ...
— The Inferno • Henri Barbusse
... Schenk in a voice which positively trembled with vexation, "General, I assure you that it is a pure coincidence. Never before has the firm been robbed, and how or why it should happen now I do not know. But it shall be fully investigated and I will leave no stone unturned to recover possession of the valuables—be assured ...
— Two Daring Young Patriots - or, Outwitting the Huns • W. P. Shervill
... remembered the room that was his prison. He had been taken there as a sightseer when a child. It was in the Beauchamp Tower; and—strange coincidence—there was the bear and ragged staff of Warwick, still visible, cut deep into the old ...
— The King's Men - A Tale of To-morrow • Robert Grant, John Boyle O'Reilly, J. S. Dale, and John T.
... The coincidence is not accidental. Magna Carta was wrested from a king humiliated by his submission to the Pope, and the University Charter was given to redress an act of violence on the part of the Oxford citizens, who had been stimulated in their attack on the 'clerks' ...
— The Oxford Degree Ceremony • Joseph Wells
... of suspicion? Mr. Furnival's law chambers were in Old Square, Lincoln's Inn, close to Chancery Lane, and Lady Mason had made her appointment with her son within five minutes' walk of that locality. And was it not in itself a strange coincidence that Lady Mason, who came to town so seldom, should now do so on the very day of Mr. Furnival's sudden return? She felt sure that they were to meet on the morrow, but yet she could not declare even to herself that it ...
— Orley Farm • Anthony Trollope
... more than three hundred, and the last more than four hundred miles, in length.* And these lines, though broken by numerous irregularities, especially on the north-west coast, are yet sufficiently distinct to indicate a probable connexion with the geological structure of the country; since the coincidence of similar ranges of coast with the direction of the strata, is a fact of very frequent occurrence in other parts of the globe.** And it is observable that considerable uniformity exists in the specimens, from the different places in this quarter of New Holland which ...
— Narrative of a Survey of the Intertropical and Western Coasts of Australia] [Volume 2 of 2] • Phillip Parker King
... sentiment of Scotland easily favoured that doctrine of Divine displeasure which seemed probable to Reid and his friends. In our day, however, we are less certain of being able to interpret the "judgments of God"; and if we regard it as a remarkable coincidence, it is as far as we may safely go. Coincidences of some kind are a ...
— An Ethical Problem - Or, Sidelights upon Scientific Experimentation on Man and Animals • Albert Leffingwell
... seemed to take fresh courage at the question, and we could see that he was anxious for us to answer in the affirmative. Had we done so, the commissioner would have been staggered with the coincidence, and our dismissal ...
— The Gold Hunter's Adventures - Or, Life in Australia • William H. Thomes
... deaths of those criminals called tyrants and revolutionaries, and the deaths of those revolutionaries called criminals. It is to something of all this that Victor Hugo wishes to open men's eyes in "Les Miserables"; and this moral lesson is worked out in masterly coincidence with the artistic effect. The deadly weight of civilisation to those who are below presses sensibly on our shoulders as we read. A sort of mocking indignation grows upon us as we find Society rejecting, again ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 3 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... celebrated Sabine city, Cures, from which the united Romans and Sabines called themselves Quirites. He was the son of Pomponius, an honourable citizen, and was the youngest of four brothers. By a miraculous coincidence he was born on the very day on which Romulus founded Rome; that is, the tenth day before the Calends of May. His naturally good disposition had been so educated by sorrow and philosophic pursuits, that he rose superior not merely to commonplace vices, but even to the worship of brute force, ...
— Plutarch's Lives, Volume I (of 4) • Plutarch
... "So you tried not to, of course. And anytime you did it again, or thought you did, you blamed it on coincidence. Or luck." ...
— The Sound of Silence • Barbara Constant
... This had brought her into contact with a few of the more favoured sisters, and among them she had recognised in Sister Mary of the Crucifix the daughter of the nobleman who had been her aunt's landlord at Treviso. Fulvia's name was not unknown to the handsome nun, and the coincidence was enough to draw them together in a community where such trivial affinities must replace the ties of nature. Fulvia soon learned that Mary of the Crucifix was the spoiled darling of the convent. Her beauty and spirit, as much perhaps as her family connections, ...
— The Valley of Decision • Edith Wharton
... touch on the strange happenings of coincidence. Circumstantial evidence convicts many offenders, but it has hanged many an innocent man before to-day. I could tell you a very remarkable case in ...
— The Albert Gate Mystery - Being Further Adventures of Reginald Brett, Barrister Detective • Louis Tracy
... these migratory little creatures, which may be termed domestic grasshoppers, are very capricious and uncertain, as are their departures; and it is, I should think, for this reason, that they are believed to be cognizant of the ongoings of human life. We can easily suppose, for instance, that the coincidence of their disappearance from a family, and the occurrence of a death in that family, frequently multiplied as such coincidences must be in the country at large, might occasion the people, who are naturally credulous, to associate the one event with the other; ...
— Phil Purcel, The Pig-Driver; The Geography Of An Irish Oath; The Lianhan Shee • William Carleton
... even allowing the centre of perception to be double, I can see no good reason for supposing this indefinite lengthening of the time, nor any analogy that bears it out. It seems to me most likely that the coincidence of circumstances is very partial, but that we take this partial resemblance for identity, as we occasionally do resemblances of persons. A momentary posture of circumstances is so far like some preceding one that we accept it as exactly the same, just as we accost a stranger occasionally, ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes
... elevation. Such words executed themselves. To connect, though but for denial or for mockery, the ideas of Jesus and the Messiah, furnished an augury that eventually they would be found to coincide, and to have their coincidence admitted. It was an argumentum ad hominem, and drawn ...
— Narrative And Miscellaneous Papers • Thomas De Quincey
... never to pass her house in Delamere Terrace." Although not prone to superstition, he had noted in July 1863 a dream of Miss Barrett in which she imagined herself asking her dead sister Elizabeth, "When shall I be with you?" and received the answer, "Dearest, in five years." "Only a coincidence," he adds in a letter to Miss Blagden, "but noticeable." That summer, after wanderings in France, Browning and his sister settled at Audierne, on the extreme westerly point of Brittany, "a delightful, quite ...
— Robert Browning • Edward Dowden
... series of accidents, by which the doom of some lovely or aspiring spirit comes upon it by the slow drift of misfortune. Tess, Grace, Eustacia, Jude—it is clear enough to what joys and sorrows their natures make them liable. But the master prepares for them trivial error, unhappy coincidence, unnecessary misfortune, until it is not surprising if the analytic mind insists that he is laboring some thesis of pessimism to be worked ...
— Definitions • Henry Seidel Canby
... day when the decree was passed, and reached Brundisium on the morrow. It happened to be the day on which the foundation of the colony was celebrated, and also the birthday of Tullia, who had come so far to meet her father. The coincidence was observed by the towns-people with delight. On the eighth the welcome news came from Rome, and Cicero set out for the capital. "All along my road the cities of Italy kept the day of my arrival as a holiday; the ways were crowded with the ...
— Roman life in the days of Cicero • Alfred J[ohn] Church
... thrilling day in the forest near Wabinosh House when he had stopped to look at Minnetaki's footprints in the soft earth through which she had been driven by her Woonga abductors, and he remembered, too, that she was the only person at the Post who wore heels on her moccasins. It was a queer coincidence! Could Minnetaki have been here? Had she made that footprint in the snow? Impossible, declared the young hunter's better sense. And yet his blood ran a little faster as he touched the delicate impression ...
— The Wolf Hunters - A Tale of Adventure in the Wilderness • James Oliver Curwood
... me it was just a coincidence. Timmy hadn't seen that problem before and it should have been miles over his head anyway, yet he gave it a quick glance, spotted the error, changed the limits of an integration and put Jerry on the right track. ...
— The Short Life • Francis Donovan
... no coincidence is more impressive in the late experience of a Union soldier in Virginia than the associations then and there awakened by the recurrence of the anniversary of the birth of her noblest son and ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol IV, Issue VI, December 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various
... who, exasperated by everlasting injustice, were always ready for revolt? It was not seen in the districts where wealth and enjoyment reigned. It would there have seemed purposeless, degrading and truly monstrous. And it was a tragical and terrible coincidence that the bomb-thrower, driven mad by want, should be guillotined there, in the very centre ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... than ever now to say what I was trying to say, and she gave me small opportunity. "Why? Why?" she resumed, and suddenly her voice took on a gravity which her mischievous eyes belied. "My dear Page, do you believe in the instrumentality of coincidence?" ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 6, July 1905 • Various
... "Coincidence. No doubt there are bluffs on the coast of Africa that look something like a man's head, and plenty of people who speak bastard Arabic. Also, I believe that there are lots of swamps. Another thing is, Leo, and I am sorry to say it, but ...
— She • H. Rider Haggard
... is such knowledge of future events is a fact and not a theory. Experience testifies to the fact that there are certain people who are able to foretell the future, not as a matter of accident or through a chance coincidence, but as a regular thing. Diviners these are called, or fortune tellers. This power is even better authenticated in prophecy, which no one denies. We can also cite many instances of dreams, in which a person sees a future event with all its particulars, ...
— A History of Mediaeval Jewish Philosophy • Isaac Husik
... the windows of the Maypole Inn, gave such of its frequenters as chanced to be there at the moment an undeniable reason for prolonging their stay, and caused the landlord to prophesy that the night would certainly clear at eleven o'clock precisely,—which by a remarkable coincidence was the hour at which ...
— Barnaby Rudge • Charles Dickens
... opinion concerning the literary acquisitions of our immortal Dramatist; and remember how I congratulated myself on my coincidence with the last and best of his Editors. I told you, however, that his small Latin and less Greek would still be litigated, and you see very assuredly that I was not mistaken. The trumpet hath been sounded against "the darling project of representing ...
— Eighteenth Century Essays on Shakespeare • D. Nichol Smith
... convinced Hone does not seem to us in itself as very convincing. Hone's recognition of the room was but some confused memory of an analogous place. Knots are not uncommon in deal shutters, and the discovery of the knot in the particular place was a mere coincidence. But, considering that Hone was a self-educated man, and, like many sceptics, was incredulous only with regard to Christianity, and even believed he once saw an apparition in Ludgate Hill, who can ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... singular coincidence people managed to confound my fate with that of a certain M. de la Vaquerie, who had also made a dismal failure with a drama, Les Funerailles de l'Honeur. His friends gave a banquet, to which I was invited, and we were ...
— My Life, Volume II • Richard Wagner
... disputes, to confound accent with quantity in our language.[489] This charge, however, there is reason to believe, is sometimes, if not in most cases, made on grounds rather fanciful than real; for some have evidently mistaken the notion of concurrence or coincidence for that of identity. But, to affirm that the stress which we call accent, coincides always and only with long quantity, does not necessarily make accent and quantity to be one and the same thing. The greater force or loudness which causes the accented syllable to occupy more time than any ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... for our observations that hour of the night at which the Milky Way skirts our horizon. This is nearly the case in the evenings of May and June, though the coincidence with the horizon can never be exact except to observers stationed near the tropics. Using the figure of the grindstone, we at its centre will then have its circumference around our horizon, while the axis will be nearly vertical. The points in which the latter intersects the celestial sphere ...
— Side-lights on Astronomy and Kindred Fields of Popular Science • Simon Newcomb
... at home. While Derues, alias Desportes, alias Mme. de Lamotte, was masquerading in Lyons, events had been moving swiftly and unfavourably in Paris. Sick with misgiving and anxiety, M. de Lamotte had come there to find, if possible, his wife and child. By a strange coincidence he alighted at an inn in the Rue de la Mortellerie, only a few yards from the wine-cellar in which the corpse of his ill-fated wife lay buried. He lost no time in putting his case before the Lieutenant of Police, who placed the affair ...
— A Book of Remarkable Criminals • H. B. Irving
... each other, the exact spots where such a party had been overthrown and such another victorious; every village had its sure traditions printed on the minds of its inhabitants, and, by consulting the annals of the nation, the coincidence was often remarkable. How is it, therefore, that they were so universally at fault with respect to the Danes? A partial explanation has been given which is in itself a proof of the tenacity of Irish memory. It is known that the Tuatha de Danaan were ...
— Irish Race in the Past and the Present • Aug. J. Thebaud
... they met people from home—the McGanums. They laughed, shook hands repeatedly, and exclaimed, "Well, this is quite a coincidence!" They asked when the McGanums had come down, and begged for news of the town they had left two days before. Whatever the McGanums were at home, here they stood out as so superior to all the undistinguishable strangers absurdly hurrying past that the ...
— Main Street • Sinclair Lewis
... of Athens were for the most part small and mean; that the streets were crooked and narrow; that the upper stories projected over the roadway; and that staircases, balustrades, and doors that opened outwards, obstructed it;—a remarkable coincidence of description. I do not doubt at all, though history is silent, that that roadway was jolting to carriages, and all but impassable; and that it was traversed by drains, as freely as any Turkish town now. Athens seems in these respects to have been below the average cities of its time. "A ...
— Harvard Classics Volume 28 - Essays English and American • Various
... South, but had little of that far South about him save the dress he wore. He was too cold, too precise, too free from sudden emotion to be of the Gulf Coast State that sent him to the capital. Prescott often reflected upon the odd coincidence that the opposing Presidents, Lincoln and Davis, should have been produced by the same State, Kentucky, and that the President of the South should be Northern in manner and the President of the North Southern ...
— Before the Dawn - A Story of the Fall of Richmond • Joseph Alexander Altsheler
... in his four black steeds, and the whole cavalcade came to a pause in front of the contorted iron balustrade that fenced the province-house from the public street. It was an awkward coincidence that the bell of the Old South was just then tolling for a funeral; so that, instead of a gladsome peal with which it was customary to announce the arrival of distinguished strangers, Lady Eleanore Rochcliffe was ...
— Twice Told Tales • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... exception was the "Little Alicia," and it was the coincidence of the name, rather than the eloquence of its impoverished owner, that first attracted Ford. From first to last he did not know the exact location of the mine. It was somewhere in the hills back of Copah, and Grigsby, the prospector who had discovered and ...
— Empire Builders • Francis Lynde
... not much attend to what his friend said, his attention being attracted to the tone—to something in the tone of the young lady, and also to her coincidence in his remark that the name appealed to some early recollection. He had been taxing his memory, to tell him when and how the name had become familiar to him; and he now remembered that it had occurred ...
— Doctor Grimshawe's Secret - A Romance • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... Graves and Greaves. The name Woodruff, Woodroffe is too common to be referred to the plant woodruff, and the fact that the male and female of a species of sand-piper are called the ruff and reeve suggests that Woodruff may have some relation to wood-reeve. It is at any rate a curious coincidence that the German name for the plant is Waldmeister, wood-master. Another official surname especially connected with country life is Pinder, also found as Pinner, Pender, Penner, Ponder and Poynder, the man in charge of the pound or ...
— The Romance of Names • Ernest Weekley
... singular," he continued, bending forward confidentially. "Since the arrival of these two ladies several strangers have been observed about the place, some of whom have endeavoured to procure lodgings. They spoke French, but they were not Frenchmen or Englishmen. True, this may be a coincidence, but one can never tell. ...
— The Avenger • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... This farther coincidence of opinion not only induced me to persevere in my plan, but afforded me a degree of grateful satisfaction, and ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft
... commands passed unheeded. The people were thronging up the street, elbowing each other, treading on each other's toes, yelling, booing, forgetful of all save the strange coincidence that, on this evening of all others, the banquet in honor of Clive, the Indian hero, had been interrupted by the sudden appearance of a live Indian in ...
— In Clive's Command - A Story of the Fight for India • Herbert Strang
... at least a rather curious coincidence, which used to be regarded as proving that the play was not written till after the Summer of 1594. I refer to Titania's superb description, in ii. 1, of the strange misbehaviour of the weather, which she ascribes to the fairy bickerings. I can quote ...
— Shakespeare: His Life, Art, And Characters, Volume I. • H. N. Hudson
... has been praised also by Johnson for the happy coincidence and coalition of the tragic and comic plots, and Sir Walter Scott said of it, in his edition of Dryden's ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... strange coincidence. The ladies of Rome frequently go to the church of the Capuchins, as Corona had done, to seek the aid and counsel of Padre Filippo, but Corona had never met Donna Tullia there. Madame Mayer did not profess to be very devout. As a matter of fact, she had not found it convenient ...
— Saracinesca • F. Marion Crawford
... of St. Catherine for the Capuchin Church of Cadiz, Murillo fell from the scaffold, and soon died from his injuries: he was buried in the Church of Sta. Cruz, and it is a sad coincidence that this church and that of San Juan, at Madrid, in which Velasquez was interred, were both destroyed by the French ...
— A History of Art for Beginners and Students: Painting, Sculpture, Architecture - Painting • Clara Erskine Clement
... agreement among themselves as to the terms to be imposed on Germany were so great that it was almost exactly four months before the terms of peace were laid before the delegates from Germany. A singular coincidence is to be noticed. It was almost four years to a day from the sinking of the Lusitania. That act of piracy was one of the acts that roused America and led to our intervention. The sinking of the ship ...
— Kelly Miller's History of the World War for Human Rights • Kelly Miller
... upon a small islet, whence, after many months of hardship and privation, the skipper had been rescued by a sandal-wood trader and conveyed to Singapore. He there joined the barque, homeward bound, the hospitable skipper gladly offering him a passage home, and, by a singular coincidence, had arrived in the river only an hour or two ahead of his own ship. He was full of pride and delight at the way in which Ned had outwitted the pirates at last and run away with the ship; and could find no words in which to express ...
— The Missing Merchantman • Harry Collingwood
... do agree on some point, it is only to tell us that human reason, of which God is the author, is depraved; but what is the purport of this coincidence in their opinions, if it be not to tax the Deity with imbecility, injustice, and malignity? For why should God, in creating a reasonable being, not have given him an understanding which nothing could corrupt? They reply to us by saying "that the reason ...
— Letters to Eugenia - or, a Preservative Against Religious Prejudices • Baron d'Holbach
... "A strange coincidence, indeed!" said the captain, with a laugh. "That is precisely my situation." He bent his head a little closer. "I am on duty this morning," he added. "Secret work ...
— The Cryptogram - A Story of Northwest Canada • William Murray Graydon
... find in a Sandwich Island paper which some friend has sent me from that tranquil far-off retreat. The coincidence between my own experience and that here set down by the late Mr. Benton is so remarkable that I cannot forbear publishing and commenting upon the paragraph. The Sandwich Island ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... and then on comparing the numbers on the coupons the old man discovered that by a coincidence his berth adjoined the one which had been ...
— The Golden Face - A Great 'Crook' Romance • William Le Queux
... Jack. He realized that by a strange coincidence his falling bomb and that of the other rear plane had exploded simultaneously, making the ground vibrate, and completely destroying anything that had been ...
— Air Service Boys Flying for Victory - or, Bombing the Last German Stronghold • Charles Amory Beach
... cara diva, keep up your music, exercise your voice, practise. I am enchanted with the coincidence of employments and hours by which, though separated by the Alps, we live by precisely the same rule. The thought charms me and gives me courage. The first time I undertook to plead here—I forget to tell you this—I fancied that you were listening to me, and ...
— Albert Savarus • Honore de Balzac
... with such a trivial matter it would not have purred so civilly at parting, and I should not have known how to justify myself by explaining that the church of St. Magnus was more illustriously connected with America through that coincidence ...
— London Films • W.D. Howells
... Baroness had too vivid a recollection of their last (and only) visit to England since their marriage. By a curious coincidence that also was three ...
— Count Bunker • J. Storer Clouston
... I think of it again, I believe my brother did say she was 'devilish old'—a strange coincidence. Still she is a fine model of a boat. What d' ...
— Stories by English Authors: The Sea • Various
... By a singular coincidence they adopted precisely the same device as the more militant French Protestants laid before Calvin in August 1559-March 1560. The Scots and the Protestant French represented that they were illegally repressed by foreigners: ...
— John Knox and the Reformation • Andrew Lang
... long a secret in resentment for the ungrateful return to his former services, the incorrigible wickedness of the Queen, and even the blind uxorious confidence of Cymbeline, are all so many lines of the same story, tending to the same point. The effect of this coincidence is rather felt than observed; and as the impression exists unconsciously in the mind of the reader, so it probably arose in the same manner in the mind of the author, not from design, but from the force of natural association, a particular ...
— Characters of Shakespeare's Plays • William Hazlitt
... and gazing silently at the stone-breakers. Although he took no notice of my presence, I now began to wonder whether he had deliberately followed me from Broughton, or whether his presence in this shady part of the road was merely a chance coincidence. It was quite possible that he had hidden himself while I was in the coffee-shop, watched me from its door, and set forth in my wake. If this were the case, his purpose seemed scarcely doubtful, for he had certainly seen me receive the money for my ...
— Chatterbox, 1905. • Various
... itself three stages, in which Fetishism, Polytheism, and Monotheism successively prevail. The chief social characteristics of the Polytheistic period are the institution of slavery and the coincidence or "confusion" of the spiritual and temporal powers. It has two stages: the theocratic, represented by Egypt, and the military, represented by Rome, between which Greece stands in a rather embarrassing ...
— The Idea of Progress - An Inquiry Into Its Origin And Growth • J. B. Bury
... outposts. Wagon Hill West was held by two squadrons, about 70 men, of Natal troopers—the Imperial Light Horse; Wagon Hill proper by a half-battalion of infantry. It happened, however, by fortunate coincidence, that it had been decided {p.240} to mount that night a naval gun upon Wagon Hill West. This, with an escort of engineer troops, a half company of infantry, and some seamen—in all sixty rifles—had reached ...
— Story of the War in South Africa - 1899-1900 • Alfred T. Mahan
... make of the story than to discuss whether any kind of known Mediterranean fish could swallow a man. If we believe in miracles, the question need not trouble us. And miracle there must be, not only in the coincidence of the fish and the Prophet being in the same bit of sea at the same moment, but in his living for so long in his strange 'ark ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Ezekiel, Daniel, and the Minor Prophets. St Matthew Chapters I to VIII • Alexander Maclaren
... when he came here and made this house his headquarters. I had not met my cousin since I was a little child, and when he arrived on the scene took a great dislike to him. He began at once to pay me hateful attentions, and to question me eagerly with regard to Uncle Edward and his ways. By a curious coincidence, he had known this house before he went to India, having stayed here as a boy. He showed particular interest in the oval gallery, and encouraged Uncle Edward to talk of Siva, although he saw that the subject excited ...
— A Master of Mysteries • L. T. Meade
... slowly forward to my own position at the head of the troop, wondering at the strange coincidence which had placed Edith Brennan's name upon Colgate's lips. Her memory had been brought back to me with renewed freshness by his chance words, and so strongly did it haunt me as to be almost a visible presence. As I swung my horse ...
— My Lady of the North • Randall Parrish
... turned to the advertisement pages. She knew that life was full of what the unthinking call coincidences; but the miracle of Ashe having selected by chance the father of Aline Peters as an employer was too much of a coincidence for her. Suspicion ...
— Something New • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
... says. "By a coincidence this dog was being taken to Birmingham, packed in a hamper exactly similar to the one you put your baby in. You've got this man's bull-pup, he's got your baby; and I wouldn't like to say off-hand at this moment which of you's feeling the madder. ...
— The Observations of Henry • Jerome K. Jerome
... sage after duly worshipping him, and taking his permission, repaired to the city of Varanasi, and having reached there, that famous prince did as he had been told, and remembering the words of Narada, he placed a corpse at the gate of the city. And by coincidence, that Brahmana also entered the gate of the city at the same time. Then on beholding the corpse, he suddenly turned away. And on seeing him turn back, that prince, the son of Avikshit followed his footsteps with his hands clasped together, and with the object ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 4 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... principle 'wealth' as something distinct from the facts denoted by the man's being rich. It antedates them; the facts become only a sort of secondary coincidence with the ...
— Pragmatism - A New Name for Some Old Ways of Thinking • William James
... great rendezvous for swell invalids and nature lovers," Cologne told her, "and of course, it may be a mere coincidence. I even ...
— Dorothy Dale's Camping Days • Margaret Penrose
... know who have done the same), And have felt 'ere I see the daylight's end, Her letter must come—and her letter came. I have run indoors with the happy thought That something pleasant was going to be, And—coincidence strange!—my eye has caught The sight of the ...
— Harry • Fanny Wheeler Hart
... faces of those who passed by, afraid lest his own senses gave him false intelligence, and that he had really assumed some frightful and revolting shape. It was curious that, partly by his own fault, and largely, no doubt, through the operation of mere coincidence, he was once or twice strongly confirmed in this fantastic delusion. He came one day into a lonely and unfrequented byway, a country lane falling into ruin, but still fringed with elms that had formed an avenue leading to the old manor-house. It was now the ...
— The Hill of Dreams • Arthur Machen
... that?' said the Doctor. 'Oh! Come in, Toots; come in. Mr Dombey, Sir.' Toots bowed. 'Quite a coincidence!' said Doctor Blimber. 'Here we have the beginning and the end. Alpha and Omega ...
— Dombey and Son • Charles Dickens
... exclaimed it out aloud, so great was her astonishment. The next moment she wondered how on earth she had failed to recall this astounding coincidence before. Most likely it was due to the fact that her first impression of Lady Clifford had been overlaid by subsequent ones. What was it she had thought as she listened to the subdued, eager voice? There was no question about it—she ...
— Juggernaut • Alice Campbell
... whose formation they have contributed, might furnish satisfactory evidence as to their origin, their starting-point, and the course by which they have wandered so far from the sea. [Footnote: Forchhammer, after pointing out the coincidence between the inclined stratification of dunes and the structure of ancient tilted rocks, says: "But I am not able to point out a sandstone formation corresponding to the dunes. Probably most ancient dunes have been destroyed by submersion before the loose sand became cemented ...
— The Earth as Modified by Human Action • George P. Marsh
... have forgotten." He hummed an airy strain as he blackened the tip of his nose. "It's rather a curious coincidence, really. ...
— The Girl on the Boat • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
... island of Cuba to hunt the maroon negroes. Bryan Edwards volume 1 page 570.) Civilization, or slow national demoralization, merely prepare the way for future events; but to produce great changes in the social state there must be a coincidence of certain events, the period of the occurrence of which cannot be calculated. Such is the complication of human destiny, that the same cruelties which tarnished the conquest of America have been re-enacted before our own eyes in times which we suppose to be characterized by vast progress, information ...
— Equinoctial Regions of America V3 • Alexander von Humboldt
... the habit of conducting experiments may not be aware of the coincidence of circumstances necessary for their being managed so as to prove perfectly decisive; nor how often men engaged in professional pursuits are liable to interruptions which disappoint them almost at the ...
— The Harvard Classics Volume 38 - Scientific Papers (Physiology, Medicine, Surgery, Geology) • Various
... if addressing a meeting, "this cannot be coincidence; we are undoubtedly and unquestionably in the presence of a spirit or of several spirits. That they understand Latin, we see; and, from what they say, they may have known death. Time may show whether they have been terrestrials like ourselves. ...
— A Journey in Other Worlds - A Romance of the Future • John Jacob Astor
... do not occur when they are, and by hypothesis ought to be, expected. The explanations are found after the event, and that is regarded as causation which is really coincidence. ...
— Applied Eugenics • Paul Popenoe and Roswell Hill Johnson
... want to pry into your affairs,' I said viciously. 'I was only interested in the coincidence that we should meet here ...
— The Little Nugget • P.G. Wodehouse
... was made by them to that end. The question of the treaty ratification was warmly discussed in Washington. A week before the vote was taken it was doubtful whether the necessary two-thirds majority could be obtained. It was a remarkable coincidence that just when the Republican Party was straining every nerve to secure the two or three wavering votes, the first shots were exchanged between a native and an American outpost in the suburbs of the capital. Each side accuses the other of having precipitated hostilities. However that may be, this ...
— The Philippine Islands • John Foreman
... for his office of introduction but was stayed by the look of amusement in his friend's face, and by the amazed recognition in that of My Lady. He stepped back with an exclamation, partly of chagrin. He saw that this recognition was no coincidence, so far as the man was concerned, though the woman had been surprised in a double sense. He resented the fact that Kingsley Bey had kept this from him—he had the weakness of small-statured men and of diplomatic people who have reputations for knowing and doing. The man, all ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... many of these jewels are fetched from the mines of other poets: great as Milton's obligations, to Nature were, his obligations to books were greater. But he has made all his own by the alchemy of his genius, and borrows little but to improve. The most remarkable coincidence is with a piece certainly unknown to him—Calderon's "Magico Prodigioso," which was first acted in 1637, the year of the publication of "Comus," a great year in the history of the drama, for the "Cid" appeared in it also. The similarity ...
— Life of John Milton • Richard Garnett
... period—CHARLES FOX and WILLIAM PITT, second son of Lord Chatham.[1] Eloquence is the only one of our brilliant qualities that does not seem to have degenerated rapidly—but I shall leave debates to your nephew, now an ear-witness: I could only re-echo newspapers. Is it not another odd coincidence of events, that while the father Laurens is prisoner to Lord Cornwallis as Constable of the Tower, the son Laurens signed the capitulation by which Lord Cornwallis became prisoner? It is said too, I don't know if truly, that this capitulation and that of Saratoga were ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole - Volume II • Horace Walpole
... impending danger to Sidney obsessed him. If Carlotta would do that, what would she do when she learned of the engagement? And he had known her before. He believed she was totally unscrupulous. The odd coincidence of their ...
— K • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... Physiology," which became at once a profitable enterprise. For a time there seemed to be little hope of his escaping from the burden of this success and becoming an inventor, when, by a most happy coincidence, two of his pupils brought to him exactly the sort of stimulation and practical help that he needed and had not ...
— The History of the Telephone • Herbert N. Casson
... was much larger than this. Orm addresses it to Walter, his brother in the flesh as well as spiritually: the book seems to be written in an Anglian or East Anglian dialect, and it is at least an odd coincidence that the names Orm and Walter occur together in a Durham MS. But whoever Orm or Ormin was, he did two very remarkable things. In the first place, he broke entirely with alliteration and with any-length ...
— The Flourishing of Romance and the Rise of Allegory - (Periods of European Literature, vol. II) • George Saintsbury
... population had already tripled itself, and the increase showed no sign of ceasing. When the Thetis touched at Valparaiso, the English frigate, the Blonde, commanded by Lord Byron, grandson of the explorer of the same name, whose discoveries are narrated above, was also at anchor there. By a singular coincidence Byron had raised a monument to the memory of Cook in the island of Hawaii, at the very time when Bougainville, the son of the circumnavigator, met by Byron in the Straits of Magellan, was laying the foundation-stone ...
— Celebrated Travels and Travellers - Part III. The Great Explorers of the Nineteenth Century • Jules Verne
... who was no fool, recognized the stranger as the business manager of an insurance paper about half whose space was given to articles highly eulogistic of certain insurance companies whose advertisements, by some singular coincidence, invariably appeared further on in the publication. From the position of the two Jimmy deduced that the conversation was not likely to be terminated very soon, and dashed back to Mr. O'Connor with that intelligence. The Vice-President was still studying ...
— White Ashes • Sidney R. Kennedy and Alden C. Noble
... Harcourt's grocery at Sidon. This suggestion was the more fatefully indicated by the fact that half a dozen men were seated around a stove in the centre, more or less given up to a kind of philosophical and lazy enjoyment of their enforced idleness. And when to this was added the more surprising coincidence that the party consisted of Billings, Peters, and Wingate,—former residents of Sidon and first citizens of Tasajara,—the resemblance ...
— A First Family of Tasajara • Bret Harte
... uncomprehended forces which can be made the subject of actual experiment. Nay, more, the very fact that in this special direction experiment turns out to be possible, is in itself an augury that we are on a true scientific track; for it involves a remarkable coincidence between a theoretical conclusion ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 22, September, 1891 • Various
... Monterey, we could get no armored ship out before the two Spanish armored vessels arrived; and if they had the same speed which they maintained to Suez—ten knots—it was doubtful whether the Monterey would anticipate them. It may be mentioned here, as an interesting coincidence, that the same day that word came that Camara had started back for Spain, a telegram was also received that the Monterey had had to put back to Honolulu, for repairs to the collier which accompanied her. This, of course, was news ...
— Lessons of the war with Spain and other articles • Alfred T. Mahan
... remained silent for a moment, like a sharpshooter who deliberates before deciding in what direction he will renew his fire; then, seeming to make up his mind, he said, "Have you remarked a very singular coincidence, monseigneur?" ...
— Ten Years Later • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... with that, closing the door behind him; and we heard his step go softly down the staircase. I gazed at Simon, and he at me, with all the astonishment and awe which it was natural we should feel in presence of so remarkable a coincidence. ...
— A Gentleman of France • Stanley Weyman
... Major A—— also said that he was commanding that Battalion, and it was full of strange officers, but I expect they are doing all right. I fancy our German friends are finding the war longer than they thought. A curious coincidence is that we are opposed to the 25th German Infantry Brigade, that, of course, being our own number. So far we have not received Princess Mary's boxes. We shall get them in time, and I shall let you know later on about ...
— Letters of Lt.-Col. George Brenton Laurie • George Brenton Laurie
... pressure normal to the chord the drift proper would have been 17 X 98/.98. The travel of the centre of pressure made it necessary to put sand on the front rudder to bring the centres of gravity and pressure into coincidence, consequently the weight of the machine varied from 98 lbs. to 108 lbs. in the different tests 17 lbs., so that, although the higher wind velocity must have caused an increase in the head resistance, the tangential force still came within 1 lb. of overcoming ...
— A History of Aeronautics • E. Charles Vivian
... man's eyes, and now that he knew who he was—and had been—he determined that whatever other adventurer might set the world aflame, the Modern Skobeleff should not do it if he and his Royal ally on the Higher Plane could prevent it. His coming had been a curious coincidence, possibly a consequence of obscure causes; but, for some reason or other, he felt himself beginning to look with a more favourable eye on Commander Mark Merrill—perhaps because he was the impersonation of uncompromising hostility ...
— The Mummy and Miss Nitocris - A Phantasy of the Fourth Dimension • George Griffith
... disproportionate carving in nose, mouth and chin, accompanied by weak eyes and unexpectedness of forehead, may tend to make the Evil One but languid in his desire for the capture of its human exemplar. This may help account for the otherwise rather curious coincidence of frightful physiognomy and preternatural goodness in this world of sinful beauties[B]. Under such a theory, Mr. DIBBLE'S easy means of frightening the Arch-Tempter into immediate flight, and keeping ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 15, July 9, 1870 • Various
... fit auditors of moral philosophy," because they are not settled from the boiling heat of their affections, nor attempered with time and experience?' [And our Poet, we may remark in passing, seems to have been struck with that same observation; for by a happy coincidence, he appears to have it in his commonplace book too, and he has not only made a note of it, as this one has, but has taken the trouble to translate it into verse. He does, indeed, go a little out of his way in time, to introduce ...
— The Philosophy of the Plays of Shakspere Unfolded • Delia Bacon
... Note the titular coincidence. The disciples were called Christians first in Antioch; here we have our lieutenant of Antichrist also named from that town. The anti-Christian Germans got into Florence upon Sunday morning; the Guelphs fought on till Wednesday, which was Candlemas;—the Tower of ...
— Val d'Arno • John Ruskin
... of Ojeda himself. The following are the words of the record: "In this voyage which this said witness made, he took with him Juan de la Cosa and Morego Vespuche [Amerigo Vespucci] and other pilots." [300] Secondly, from the coincidence of many parts of the narrative of Vespucci with events in this voyage of Ojeda. Among these coincidences, one is particularly striking. Vespucci, in his letter to Lorenzo de Medici, and also in that to Rene or Soderini, says, that his ships, after leaving the coast of Terra Firma, ...
— The Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus (Vol. II) • Washington Irving
... Coincidence is odious, tells on the nerves. I never felt it more so than a week later, when I read in the 'Pioneer' the announcement of the death of my old friend Fry, Superintendent of the School of Art in Calcutta. The paragraph in which the journal dismissed poor ...
— The Pool in the Desert • Sara Jeannette Duncan
... It is a coincidence, but one significant of the nature of the pastoral tradition, if such it can be called, that had sprung up on the English stage, that the next play to claim our notice is again the work of a schoolboy. Love in its Extasy, described ...
— Pastoral Poetry and Pastoral Drama - A Literary Inquiry, with Special Reference to the Pre-Restoration - Stage in England • Walter W. Greg
... of his brother's arrival at Bussorah, of his marriage, and of the birth of his son; and when he compared them with the day of his own marriage, and the birth of his daughter at Cairo, he wondered at the exact coincidence which appeared ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Complete • Anonymous
... Robin, "I guess I won't. Let's go and have some fun. They are all that way. You can't depend on any of them. Never trust one of them. I believe that creature has been engaged as much as twice since I left. By a singular coincidence," he added, "I have been married twice myself—but, of course, that's different. I'm a man, you know, and—well, it's different. We won't dwell on it. Let's go and dance. But wait a minute first." He took a little ...
— Little Saint Elizabeth and Other Stories • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... a patronizing moralist." Moreover, the life of society depends upon the general glow of the party, rather than the prominence of an individual, so that a brilliant talker will seek to bring out "the coincidence which strengthens conviction, or the dissent which sharpens sagacity, rather than individual experiences, which ever seem to be egotistical. In agreeable society all egotism is to be crushed and crucified. Even a man who is an oracle, if wise, will suggest, rather than seem to instruct. In a ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume VII • John Lord
... that they are afterwards discovered to be no breach of the law of uniformity has no bearing at all on the Revelation to which they belong. The miracle would in that case consist in the precise coincidence in time with the purpose which they served, or in the manner and degree in which they marked out the Man who wrought them from all other men, or in the foreshadowing of events which ...
— The Relations Between Religion and Science - Eight Lectures Preached Before the University of Oxford in the Year 1884 • Frederick, Lord Bishop of Exeter
... for anniversaries. If that be so, the incidence of events has given him something to ponder over during the last three years. Three notable schemes conceived by himself and carefully designed to strengthen his position, have by a curious coincidence matured upon dates of certain interest in Transvaal history. All three have failed disastrously. The first anniversary of the Reformers' sentence day was the occasion of the Reformers giving evidence before the Industrial Commission, which so strongly justified their case. The ...
— The Transvaal from Within - A Private Record of Public Affairs • J. P. Fitzpatrick
... a book with the very interesting observations which I made in Nashville. And here I call attention to a very strange coincidence which this recalls. During the previous year I had often expressed a great desire to be in some State during its transition from Confederacy to Unionism, that I might witness the remarkable social and political paradoxes and events which would result, ...
— Memoirs • Charles Godfrey Leland
... between the orders. On the contrary, it bears the stamp of a reforming legislator like the constitutions of Lycurgus, Solon, and Zaleucus; and it has evidently been produced under Greek influence. Particular analogies may be deceptive, such as the coincidence noticed by the ancients that in Corinth also widows and orphans were charged with the provision of horses for the cavalry; but the adoption of the armour and arrangements of the Greek hoplite system was certainly no accidental coincidence. ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen
... what is the Armenian word for apricot, and whether there is any reason to believe that the Arabic words for apricot and peach, are of Armenian and Persian origin? If it is so, the resemblance of the one to praecox, and of the other to persicum, will be a curious coincidence, but hardly more curious than the resemblance of [Greek: pascha] with [Greek: pascho] which led some of the earlier fathers, who were not Hebraists, to derive [Greek: ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 56, November 23, 1850 • Various
... fairy story. Neither need it be set lightly down as a curious coincidence. I know the charm that the old man said. I cannot give it here. It will only work successfully if taught by man to woman or by woman to man; nor do I pretend to say that it will work for every one. I believe it to be a personal and wholly incomprehensible gift, but that such a gift ...
— All on the Irish Shore - Irish Sketches • E. Somerville and Martin Ross
... Bethlehem. "Zerubbabel," he says, "is rightly said to have been born at Bethlehem, because he was of the family of David which had its origin there." This is, in like manner, repeated by the Rationalistic interpreters, in order to avoid the too close coincidence of the prophecy with the actual history of Christ, e.g., by Paulus and Strauss (both, in their "Life of Jesus"), and by Hitzig. It is remarkable, however, that, in order the more securely to attain this object, some have gone so far even as to follow the example of several ...
— Christology of the Old Testament: And a Commentary on the Messianic Predictions, v. 1 • Ernst Wilhelm Hengstenberg
... the Jesuits and the religious orders of the last year had many causes, and had probably long been seething, and waiting for something to open the floodgates. That something came in the marriage of the Princess of Asturias, and the coincidence, accidental or otherwise, of the production of Galdos's play of Electra. The marriage was a love match; the two young sons of the Count of Caserta, who were nephews of the Infanta Isabel on her husband's side, had been constantly ...
— Spanish Life in Town and Country • L. Higgin and Eugene E. Street
... been following our inspection tour at shadow's-length, interrupted. I suspected that his timing was no mere coincidence. ...
— My Father, the Cat • Henry Slesar
... next day it seemed to have been worked.... Was it the prayer that did it?... Was it any one's prayer?... Was it any one's faith?... Was it—God?... Had faith and prayer and God anything to do with it?... Do things happen by coincidence and chance?... or is there a Mind that directs them?... ...
— The Street Called Straight • Basil King
... I hope not," said Lord Ashiel earnestly. "I have got her to promise to come to Scotland, and in a few days I may get some definite clue as to which of them it is. It is a very odd coincidence that both the girls bear names so much like that of my poor wife's." He paused reflectively, and then added, "In the meantime you will go on with your inquiries, will ...
— The Ashiel mystery - A Detective Story • Mrs. Charles Bryce
... others, each according to his ability. The time of this celebration of the work about the temple also fell upon the day of the king's inauguration, which the people customarily observed as a festival. The coincidence of these anniversaries made the festival ...
— The Makers and Teachers of Judaism • Charles Foster Kent
... conservatism, and an arrangement which leaves the fate of England in the hands of Englishmen may be favourable to reform, but is fatal to revolution. Has this fact arrested the attention of Gladstonians? I know not. It is an unfortunate coincidence that the least defensible portion of an indefensible policy should, while it threatens ruin to England, offer temporary salvation to the party who rally round ...
— A Leap in the Dark - A Criticism of the Principles of Home Rule as Illustrated by the - Bill of 1893 • A.V. Dicey
... his mutilated body to his lair and lie down and die." The venerable representative of compromise was making his exit from one door of the stage, the masterful representative of conscience, his entrance through the other. Was the coincidence accident or prophecy? Were the bells of destiny at the moment "ringing in the valiant man and free, the larger heart, the kindlier hand, and ringing out the darkness of the land"? Whether accident or prophecy, Sumner's entrance into the Senate was into ...
— Charles Sumner Centenary - The American Negro Academy. Occasional Papers No. 14 • Archibald H. Grimke
... difficulty. The circumstances possibly contributing are as follows: fermentation of the hay, insufficiency of water, overheated stable, a chill from exercise after the gale—I think all these may have had a bearing on the case. It can scarcely be coincidence that the two ponies which have suffered so far are those which are nearest the stove end of the stable. In future the stove will be used more sparingly, a large ventilating hole is to be made near it and an allowance of water is to be added to the snow hitherto ...
— Scott's Last Expedition Volume I • Captain R. F. Scott
... reliefs and hollows-which the foot has shaped on the inner surface of its sole. Comparing the empirical results of this examination with those based on the anatomical data above given, and finding a general coincidence in them, he constructs his last in accordance with their joint teachings. Theoretically, Mr. Plumer is on somewhat dangerous ground. If the arches of the foot are made to yield like elliptical springs, why support them? But we subject them to such unnatural conditions by pressure ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 11, Issue 67, May, 1863 • Various
... he said, following her out of the room. Through the door in the hall leading to the basement he called "Hssst!" several times, as though assisting the cat's departure, till by some strange coincidence the butler ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
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