"Untoward" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... manager, who had set his heart upon getting up the piece, was at his wits' end, and had bent his footsteps towards the main guard, to advise with me as to what should be done in this untoward emergency. I endeavoured to console him as well as I could, and suggested, that if the worst came to the worst, the part might be read. But, lugubriously shaking his caput, Fred declared that would never ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various
... visit to Ireland in 1885 was an important incident in the public life of the Prince of Wales. It was seventeen years since he and the Princess had visited that much-troubled country and many untoward events had occurred since then. The proposal for another visit was not popular with a section of the Irish press and politicians, but when it was evident that the generous instincts of the Irish people were going to make the occasion a demonstration of kindly feeling, if not of loyalty after the ...
— The Life of King Edward VII - with a sketch of the career of King George V • J. Castell Hopkins
... it a part of his duty to console and soothe the ruffled feelings of his zealous and fluent parishioner, and to Virginia's pride his offer of escort to Willow Bluff was ample reparation for the untoward interruption of her oratory. She delivered into his hands, with sensitive upward glance, the receptacle containing her manuscript, and set a brisk pace, at which she insured the passing of the other guests along the road, making visible her ...
— Hepsey Burke • Frank Noyes Westcott
... intellectual journal into discredit by a feeble attempt at a good-natured criticism or a generous sentiment, would that be the fitting occasion to throw off the mask, and parade myself to a mocking world as the imbecile violator of an established system? Should I not, in a moment so untoward, more than ever desire to merge my insignificant unit in the mysterious importance which the smallest Singular obtains when he makes himself a Plural, and speaks not as 'I,' but as 'We'? We are ...
— Kenelm Chillingly, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... me to go on to the fort, but this I refused to do. I might be three or four days reaching it, or longer, should any untoward circumstance occur, and he might be dead before I returned. This event made me feel very much out of spirits. I was anxious if possible to procure better food than the wolf's flesh afforded, so taking my spear I went out to try to kill ...
— Snow Shoes and Canoes - The Early Days of a Fur-Trader in the Hudson Bay Territory • William H. G. Kingston
... sometimes have just strength enough to bring himself home, and giving up the ghost at the rookery, will hang dangling "all abroad" on a bough like a thief on a gibbet; an awful warning to his friends, and an object of great commiseration to the squire. But, maugre all these untoward incidents, the rooks have, upon the whole, a happy holiday life of it. When their young are reared, and fairly launched upon their native element, the air, the cares of the old folks seem over, and they resume all their aristocratical dignity ...
— Bracebridge Hall • Washington Irving
... behaved to her husband exactly as if nothing untoward had happened. She kissed and was kissed. She exhibited sweetness without gaiety, and a general curiosity without interest. She said not a word concerning the visit of Sissie and Ozzie. She expressed the hope ...
— Mr. Prohack • E. Arnold Bennett
... have termed themselves saints—what shift God may make of them in heaven, I know not (He can do much)—but if I may speak unfeignedly, they are so unmortified and untrue of word and deed that they are found untoward members for a true Commonwealth and ...
— Spiritual Reformers in the 16th & 17th Centuries • Rufus M. Jones
... Bathing here has a drawback. I refer, of course, to the Under Tow, which has caused some Untoward accidents. Those who have experienced it, say it is impossible to keep your Feet when caught by the Under Tow. Presence of mind is indispensable in such a case, but, unfortunately, timid swimmers are too apt to lose their Heads as well as their feet. Some of the lady visitors ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 22, August 27, 1870 • Various
... as they fancied, by any. Margaret's head still ached, as the paleness of her complexion, and her silence might have testified; but she was resolved to throw herself into the breach, if there was any long untoward pause, rather than that her father's friend, pupil, and guest should have cause to think himself in any way neglected. But the conversation went on; and Margaret drew into a corner, near her mother, with her work, ...
— North and South • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... to bed and passed an interminable night in tossing to and fro, and bewailing the untoward fate of the two children. Dawn came at last, though it had seemed as if it never would break again, and, for the first time for many a year, the first gleam of sunlight saw her dressed and downstairs. ...
— Julia And Her Romeo: A Chronicle Of Castle Barfield - From "Schwartz" by David Christie Murray • David Christie Murray
... were as uneventful as La Fosseuse's life," answered Genestas, "I should still be glad to know about it; I should like to know the untoward events that could bring a man of your calibre ...
— The Country Doctor • Honore de Balzac
... poverty had hitherto impelled him to observe, and very frequently had little reunions at his own house, when wit and jollity reigned supreme-dampened a little, of course, by the occasional remembrance of the untoward and melancholy fate which impended over the nephew of the late lamented bosom friend ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 5 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... episode, for the reason that rumours of the performance on the Joy Wheel had impaired the spell of eloquence and partially emptied the hall. And this was the more disappointing in that the police had been sure that nothing untoward would occur. It seemed also that the police were on the ...
— The Lion's Share • E. Arnold Bennett
... the temper which we are examining; and it will be seen that only the last is quite peculiar to mountain and marsh districts, although there is a somewhat greater probability that the others also may be developed among hills more than in plains. When, by untoward accident, all are associated, and the conditions described under the fifth head are very distinct, the result is even sublime in its painfulness. Of places subjected to such evil influence, none ...
— Modern Painters, Volume IV (of V) • John Ruskin
... believe Lord Beauchamp will be closed with, being only for a Marquisate for Lord Hertford, and the sole question now being the time of doing it. Upon the whole, I am far from thinking that we end the session at all weaker than we began it, notwithstanding some untoward circumstances which occurred. Our foreign politics are going on, in my apprehension, as successfully as possible. The French were beginning to cabal against us at Berlin, but the signature of the Treaty has completely overthrown them there. They were at the same time giving ...
— Memoirs of the Courts and Cabinets of George the Third - From the Original Family Documents, Volume 1 (of 2) • The Duke of Buckingham and Chandos
... he and Winnie had enjoyed a long and loving talk on the way home, and throughout the evening there had been no untoward incident to mar his pleasure. He had noticed Donald Pike's absence, and had been glad of it, but he merely supposed Pike kept away because of the row of the previous evening. If there are such things as ...
— Frank Merriwell's Reward • Burt L. Standish
... time to cool before meeting him, but this summons was imperative, and, besides, he knew the danger of failing to provide a safety-valve in the shape of a listener, before the Count could blow off the first ebullitions of rage over Mdlle. Selpdorf's untoward speech. If pent up within his own breast, there was no knowing in how disastrous a manner Sagan's ill-humour might explode. Defeat meant much to Elmur, his reputation was at stake. Other men had undertaken this same mission—to ...
— A Modern Mercenary • Kate Prichard and Hesketh Vernon Hesketh-Prichard
... Ministers deserve no credit for hitting on this critical device? Was it no just cause of congratulation, to be able to find such a person amongst the ranks of their own immediate and most distinguished supporters? We are now, happily, at perfect peace with America; and, notwithstanding some present untoward appearances, trust that both countries will soon reap the advantages of it. Of what real value that peace may be, however, with reference to their extensive commercial relations with us, is another question, dependent entirely on the character which they may vindicate to themselves ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 327 - Vol. 53, January, 1843 • Various
... the Nepalese and Bhotanese. He then dwelt upon Campbell's invariable kindness and good feeling, and his exertions for the benefit of their country, and for the cementing of friendship, and hoped he would not let these untoward events induce an opposite course in future but that he would continue to exert his influence with the ...
— Himalayan Journals (Complete) • J. D. Hooker
... preceding that ill-omened day, a few moments after Frantz had stealthily left his room on Rue de Braque, the illustrious Delobelle returned home, with downcast face and that air of lassitude and disillusionment with which he always met untoward events. ...
— Fromont and Risler, Complete • Alphonse Daudet
... passion to approve; More brave for this, that he hath much to love:— 'Tis, finally, the Man who lifted high, Conspicuous object in a Nation's eye, Or left unthought-of in obscurity,— Who, with a toward or untoward lot, Prosperous or adverse, to his wish or not— Plays, in the many games of life, that one Where what he most doth value must be won: Whom neither shape of danger can dismay, Nor thought of tender happiness betray; Who, not content that former worth stand fast, Looks forward, persevering ...
— Poems Teachers Ask For • Various
... temperament, I felt; he could steer down rapids like a red Indian, shoot dangerous bridges and whirlpools better than any white man I ever saw in a canoe. He was a grand fellow for an adventurous trip, a tower of strength when untoward things happened. I looked at his strong face and light curly hair as he staggered along under his pile of driftwood (twice the size of mine!), and I experienced a feeling of relief. Yes, I was distinctly glad just then that the ...
— The Willows • Algernon Blackwood
... than any man. William Bankes also a great deal. I myself recollect more of his oddities than of his academical qualities, for we lived most together at a very idle period of my life. When I went up to Trinity, in 1805, at the age of seventeen and a half, I was miserable and untoward to a degree. I was wretched at leaving Harrow, to which I had become attached during the two last years of my stay there; wretched at going to Cambridge instead of Oxford (there were no rooms Vacant at Christ-church); wretched from some private domestic ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. I. (of VI.) - With his Letters and Journals. • Thomas Moore
... disadvantages of emigration is the separation of friends for ever. Time and distance no doubt gradually obliterate from our mind the most endearing recollections; but, under untoward circumstances, which will at times cross the path of every mortal in the most favourable situations, the emigrant's, and particularly the female emigrant's, breast must be "stung with the thoughts of home," on comparing the many ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 583 - Volume 20, Number 583, Saturday, December 29, 1832 • Various
... patience, the greatest tact. His triumph was the more meritorious, because he came completely unprepared for this adventure, which interfered with his intended proposal. The first time that he had felt sufficient courage to speak, fortune seemed to declare against him, for this untoward event had quite upset ...
— The Widow Lerouge - The Lerouge Case • Emile Gaboriau
... am troubled that it is more by chance, and something of my own prudence, than by justice; and am not satisfied to be out of the protection of the laws, and under any other safeguard than theirs. As matters stand, I live, above one half, by the favour of others, which is an untoward obligation. I do not like to owe my safety either to the generosity or affection of great persons, who allow me my legality and my liberty, or to the obliging manners of my predecessors, or my own: for what if I were another kind of man? If my ...
— The Essays of Montaigne, Complete • Michel de Montaigne
... vision could vex or that knowledge could numb, That sweets to the mouth in the belly are bitter, and tart, and untoward, Then, on some dim-coloured scene should my briefly raised curtain have lowered, Then might the Voice that is law have said "Cease!" and the ...
— Poems of the Past and the Present • Thomas Hardy
... the engine-room and the Quinn would shoot forward at a rate that fairly lifted the rowboat out of the water, while Dan, kneeling astern, oar in hand, muscles tense, and mind alert, was ready to do anything that lay in his skill to prevent an untoward accident. ...
— Dan Merrithew • Lawrence Perry
... A second time, untoward nature recalled me from the sleep of death. I found myself stretched upon the bed. When I had power to look up, I remembered only that I had cause to fear. My distempered fancy fashioned to itself no distinguishable image. ...
— Stories by Modern American Authors • Julian Hawthorne
... them, the Rishi Dadhichi became filled with grief and wrath, and said, "This is neither a Sacrifice nor a meritorious rite of religion, since Rudra is not adored in it. Ye are certainly exposing yourselves to death and chains. Alas, how untoward is the course of time. Stupefied by error you do not behold that destruction awaits you. A terrible calamity stands at your door in course of this great Sacrifice. Ye are blind to it!" Having said these words, that great Yogin saw into the ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown
... off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call. And with many other words," besides those which are recorded, "did he testify" to the truth about the Lord Jesus being Messiah, the King; and with such force did he "exhort, saying, Save yourselves from this untoward generation," that three thousand "gladly received his word and were baptized" (Acts ii. 38-41), as subjects of "The Kingdom ...
— The Kingdom of Heaven; What is it? • Edward Burbidge
... did the return visit of the President to London. On the surface all was peace and goodwill, but under the surface seethed plot and counterplot, and behind the scenes two great governments were extremely anxious, and high officials in the Secret Service spent sleepless nights. As no 'untoward incident' had happened, the vigilance of the authorities on both sides of the Channel relaxed at the very moment when, if they had known their adversaries, it should have been redoubled. Always beware of the anarchist when he has been good: look out ...
— The Triumphs of Eugene Valmont • Robert Barr
... we bend to our noble task of purifying politics, in the interest of good government I wish to say a word of the untoward events of last evening. If my memory serves me the disasters which overtook the Majority of this honourable body always befell when it was the Minority's deal. It is my solemn conviction, Mr. Chairman, and to its affirmation I pledge my life, my fortune, ...
— Fantastic Fables • Ambrose Bierce
... deadly purposes rather than himself tomorrow. What he knew Kaid did not know. He had not meant to act yet; but new facts faced him, and he must make one struggle for his life. But as he went towards Mizraim's quarters he saw no sure escape from the stage of those untoward events, save by the exit which is for all in ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... nothing in his "Story" to illustrate this period of his personal history, nor the strife and division which followed the consummation of the union of the British and Canadian Conferences. These untoward events are, however, fully described in the "Epochs of Canadian Methodism," pages 247-311: They arose chiefly out of the differences which disturbed the British and Canadian Methodist Societies in Kingston and other places, and the separation in the Societies generally, caused by the ...
— The Story of My Life - Being Reminiscences of Sixty Years' Public Service in Canada • Egerton Ryerson
... being responded. Turned away perforce by wars with Austria, Russia, Prussia, and Spain, it swung round towards Egypt and India on the first chance of European peace, only to be driven back by some untoward shock nearer home. In 1803 he counted on the speedy opening of a campaign on the Ganges. In 1811 he proposes that the tricolour shall once more wave on the citadel of Cairo, and threaten India from the shores of the Red Sea. But a ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose
... disappointments. I am armour-proof against old discouragements. I forgive, or overcome in fancy, old adversaries. I play over again for love, as the gamesters phrase it, games, for which I once paid so dear. I would scarce now have any of those untoward accidents and events of my life reversed. I would no more alter them than the incidents of some well-contrived novel. Methinks, it is better that I should have pined away seven of my goldenest years, when I was thrall ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Volume 2 • Charles Lamb
... hate in a few moments; but he had never questioned her. It was a subject neither of them could have approached, and Darius was far too happy in his marriage to risk endangering that happiness by any untoward discovery. Nehushta's grief and anger had been so genuine when she told him of Zoroaster's treachery that it had never occurred to him that he might be injuring the latter in marrying the princess, ...
— Marzio's Crucifix and Zoroaster • F. Marion Crawford
... changed his lot for worse, Let him betimes the untoward choice reverse: For still, when all is said, the rule stands fast, That each man's shoe be made on his ...
— The Satires, Epistles, and Art of Poetry • Horace
... situated. O Fancy, I have watched you, criticized you even severely, brought my feelings to the light of judgment, and still have found them rational, and such as any man might have expected to be inspired with by a woman like you! So there is nothing hurried, secret, or untoward in my desire to do this. ...
— Under the Greenwood Tree • Thomas Hardy
... thanks and acknowledgments—and the superstitious dread which at first bad undoubtedly seized the company passed away quickly—the talking, the merriment, and laughter were resumed, and soon it seemed as though the untoward circumstance were entirely forgotten. Only Guido Ferrari seemed still somewhat disturbed in his mind—but even his uneasiness dissipated itself by degrees, and heated by the quantity of wine he had taken, ...
— Vendetta - A Story of One Forgotten • Marie Corelli
... all his troubles, Ascyltos commenced to nod, and the maid, whom he had slighted, and of course insulted, smeared lampblack all over his face, and painted his lips and shoulders with vermillion, while he drowsed. Completely exhausted by so many untoward adventures, I, too, was enjoying the shortest of naps, the whole household, within and without, was doing the same, some were lying here and there asleep at our feet, others leaned against the walls, and some even slept head to head upon the threshold itself; the lamps, ...
— The Satyricon, Complete • Petronius Arbiter
... any of the cowboys, who took turns staying awake during the night, report any untoward occurrences. But in spite of that fact when Bud went to the grub box to get out some bacon he found, stuck in a pack, a folded brown paper, like the one on which the other warning was written. And this message was of like import ...
— The Boy Ranchers in Death Valley - or Diamond X and the Poison Mystery • Willard F. Baker
... continued, with a sigh, "and for a time every thing was happy, though the political affairs were so untoward, and cost much suffering and danger. The young wife only admired her husband's determined will, his audacity, his ambition after leadership and power. But in the midst of all this, as time went on, he began to grow jealous of the cousin Konrad; ...
— Sunrise • William Black
... have only commenced. Many rows, from the operations of the "cut-worm," and from multitudinous causes unknown, have to be replanted, and an unusually late frost may destroy all his labors, and compel him to commence again. But, if no untoward accident occurs, in two weeks after the "scraping," another hoeing takes place, at which time the plow throws the furrow on to the roots of the now strengthening plant, and the increasing heat of the sun also justifying ...
— Camp-Fire and Cotton-Field • Thomas W. Knox
... the memory of the shock with which he realized that she was, unknown to herself, already in the throes of a romantic attachment for Wilson; and, long, long after, when he had gone down to the depths with her and saved her by his steady hand, with something of mirth for the untoward happening that ...
— K • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... have received your two affectionate letters. The enclosed was intended to have been sent by the stage which I met on my way up; but, by untoward accidents (needless to detail), yet lies by me. My disorder has left me almost since I ...
— Memoirs of Aaron Burr, Complete • Matthew L. Davis
... untoward news as if a flock of angels, ringing joy bells, had just brought him the gladdest tidings in history. After ...
— From a Bench in Our Square • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... that short time. Tomorrow morning I will myself go with you, and we can then wander further abroad. I have promised your good father to look after you, you know; and it will be but a bad beginning if you meet with any untoward adventure upon this the first day of ...
— By England's Aid or The Freeing of the Netherlands (1585-1604) • G.A. Henty
... he was not judicious in his behaviour to James. At all times he had been an advocate of war rather than peace, even when peace was obviously needful. Spain, too, was written upon his heart, as Calais had been on Mary's, and even at this untoward juncture he must needs thrust his enmity on unwilling ears. It is hardly conceivable that he should not know that James was deeply involved with promises to the Catholics; and though the King had said, in the face of his welcome to England, ...
— Raleigh • Edmund Gosse
... friend Sir Sidney; complaint of ill health; firm attachment to the royal family at Palermo; fearful apprehensions for a beloved son-in-law, whom he had brought tenderly up with all the anticipatory hopes of the fondest paternal affection, and for whose future conduct he seems, by some untoward circumstances, to have been now filled with all a feeling father's anxieties and alarms; and, lastly, as the consequence of defeated expectations, a desponding willingness to relinquish even life, from an experienced conviction that it affords no ...
— The Life of the Right Honourable Horatio Lord Viscount Nelson, Vol. II (of 2) • James Harrison
... Signor Malipizzo argued, with his usual penetration, that Muhlen had intended to return to his quarters as he had always done of late. The ANIMUS REVERTENDI was abundantly proven by the sleeve-links and loose cash. He had not returned. Ergo, something untoward had happened. Untoward things may be divided, for the sake of convenience, into two ...
— South Wind • Norman Douglas
... there to try and settle the questions at issue. Failing to do so, they attacked the port, which, however, was so well defended, that they were compelled to retire, leaving several of their number behind, whose heads were stuck upon poles on the shore. In consequence of this untoward event, all intercourse with the English ceased for eight years. Before that time the government had commenced a cruel persecution of the Christian natives, and numbers were put to death. The effect, however, was very different from what was expected. Attention was drawn ...
— A Voyage round the World - A book for boys • W.H.G. Kingston
... VendOme: "It is true that I have experienced a trial within the last fortnight, and I am far from having taken it as I ought, allowing myself to give way to an oppression of the heart caused by the blackenings, the contradictions, and the pains of irresolution, and the fear of doing something untoward in a matter of extreme importance to the State. As for what you say to me about my indecision, it is true that I myself reproach myself for it, and I pray God every day to give me, together with wisdom and prudence, strength and courage to carry out what I believe to ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume VI. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... hath attended thy enterprise? Gramercy, girl! what is it? Thou art disheveled and as excited as though some untoward accident had befallen thee. What said the ...
— In Doublet and Hose - A Story for Girls • Lucy Foster Madison
... truth, and thenceforth the name of Luzenstein became abhorred throughout all Rhineland, while the brave Italian was honoured by knighthood, and arrangements were made for his speedy union with Eugenia. But, alas! the fates were untoward; for the 'Secret Tribunal,' having been baulked again and again, began to direct their schemes against the sculptor instead of his patron; and one evening, as Rafaello was walking with his beloved ...
— Hero Tales and Legends of the Rhine • Lewis Spence
... success and example of liberal government have had a salutary influence upon the rest of the world in evoking wholesome competition and emulation. But another and very untoward effect is that widespread and deep-rooted envy and jealousy have also been aroused, which on occasion are apt to develop into pretexts for actual hostility, or hostile partisanship as ...
— Origin of the Anglo-Boer War Revealed (2nd ed.) - The Conspiracy of the 19th Century Unmasked • C. H. Thomas
... fluctuating determination of the young, went to bed that night fully resolved that he would not quit a good job just because untoward circumstance compelled him to herd with a bunch of brainless clowns. He, who had a definite aim in life, would not permit that aim to be turned aside because various and sundry roughneck punchers thought it was funny to go around ...
— Skyrider • B. M. Bower
... claim of a divine mission and military success so high that it may be doubted whether the 10,000 men, of which the Hicks force consisted when the irregulars raised by the Governor-General had joined it at Duem, would have sufficed to overcome him even if they had been ably led, and escaped all the untoward circumstances that first retarded their progress and then sealed their fate. The plan of campaign was based on a misconception of the Mahdi's power, and was carried out with utter disregard of prudence and of ...
— The Life of Gordon, Volume II • Demetrius Charles Boulger
... him. His next step was to write a note to the Rev. Mr. B——, desiring his immediate attendance, and, also, one to Williams, informing him of his arrival. Anxiously, and with a nervous fear lest some untoward circumstance might prevent the marriage he was about effecting with a silly heiress, did the young man await the response to these notes, and great was his relief, when informed, after the lapse of an hour, that the Reverend gentleman, whose attendance ...
— Heart-Histories and Life-Pictures • T. S. Arthur
... individual ministers. 'Between the two extreme tendencies Prince Carol had to strive constantly to preserve unity of direction, he himself being the only stable element in that ever unstable country.' It was not without many untoward incidents that he succeeded. His person was the subject of more than one unscrupulous attack by politicians in opposition, who did not hesitate to exploit the German origin and the German sympathies of the prince in order to inflame the masses. These internal conflicts entered ...
— The Balkans - A History Of Bulgaria—Serbia—Greece—Rumania—Turkey • Nevill Forbes, Arnold J. Toynbee, D. Mitrany, D.G. Hogarth
... correspondingly unlucky. (It may be said, in a parenthesis, that the fast phrase, "over the left," so prevalent during the past few years, to indicate the reverse of what has just been spoken, has its derivation from the impression that such an untoward sinister glance may neutralize all effort and bring notable misfortune.) Of a hundred men interrogated on this point, ninety-five will assert that they hold no such superstition, and that they have never even ...
— Shoulder-Straps - A Novel of New York and the Army, 1862 • Henry Morford
... trattling, so chiding, so boying? So jesting, so wresting, so mocking, so mowing? So nipping, so tripping, so cocking, so crowing? So knappish, so snappish, so elvish, so froward? So crabbed, so wrabbed, so stiff, so untoward? In play or in pastime so jocund, so merry? In work or in labour so dead or so weary? O, that I had his ear between my teeth now, I should shake him, even as a dog that lulleth a sow. But in faith, if ever I ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. II • Robert Dodsley
... must have been, judging by her public avowal of the parricide. It is surprising, therefore—and one must bow down before the judgment of God when He leaves mankind to himself—that a mind evidently of some grandeur, professing fearlessness in the most untoward and unexpected events, an immovable firmness and a resolution to await and to endure death if so it must be, should yet be so criminal as she was proved to be by the parricide to which she confessed ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - THE MARQUISE DE BRINVILLIERS • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... and though the magnificent ice-cave, so well known to travelers for its azure tints, was inaccessible, they could look into the vault and see that the habitual bed of the torrent was dry. The journey was accomplished in a week without any untoward accident. ...
— Louis Agassiz: His Life and Correspondence • Louis Agassiz
... and confident predictions; but no expression of hope had thereby been kindled for an instant on his pale, dejected face. The ominous premonition which had come upon him at the moment of that first overpowering realization of his danger continued to gain strength with every successive stroke of untoward Fate, until it had become the ruling idea of his mind, in which there grew up the sort of desperate impatience with which we long for any end we know to be inevitable. The waters of his life had been so mingled with gall, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, No. 48, October, 1861 • Various
... or transgressed; and they had real, soothing, comforting talks just often enough to be tantalizing, and yet to convince him that all the other unsatisfactory meetings and partings were either his own fault, or that of some untoward circumstance. ...
— Dynevor Terrace (Vol. II) • Charlotte M. Yonge
... of the season a rather untoward event occurred at Miss G.'s lodgings. An elderly lady took one of the flats for a month. She had with her an attendant of about thirty. Before long Miss G. observed that they were not on very good terms, and ...
— The Argosy - Vol. 51, No. 1, January, 1891 • Various
... artificial diet are very liable to indigestion and bowel complaints; indeed none more so: and it is from these affections that so many of these infants perish. When, then, it is absolutely necessary from untoward circumstances to have recourse to this mode of nourishing the child, the rules and regulations laid down in the section on "Artificial Feeding" must be most strictly followed out, if the parent would hope to avoid disease ...
— The Maternal Management of Children, in Health and Disease. • Thomas Bull, M.D.
... and purposes. And all this we had to do without any official safeguard, while entirely in their power, and while known to be their earnest and active enemies. One false step, one unguarded word, one untoward event would have consigned us to ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 86, December, 1864 • Various
... vanity of age untoward! Ever spleeny, ever froward! Why these bolts and massy chains, Squint suspicions, jealous pains? Why, thy toilsome journey o'er, Lay'st thou up an useless store? Hope, along with Time is flown; Nor canst thou reap the field thou'st sown. Hast thou a son? In ...
— The Works of William Hogarth: In a Series of Engravings - With Descriptions, and a Comment on Their Moral Tendency • John Trusler
... sprung. By the sire exhaled from dung: Think on every vice in both, Look on him, and see their growth. View him on the mother's side,[2] Fill'd with falsehood, spleen, and pride; Positive and overbearing, Changing still, and still adhering; Spiteful, peevish, rude, untoward, Fierce in tongue, in heart a coward; When his friends he most is hard on, Cringing comes to beg their pardon; Reputation ever tearing, Ever dearest friendship swearing; Judgment weak, and passion strong, ...
— Poems (Volume II.) • Jonathan Swift
... decided by Lancelot that the first thing to do was to prevent the pirates from landing. If they succeeded by untoward chance in effecting a landing, then all of us who were lucky enough to be left alive were to retreat with all speed to the stronghold and fasten ourselves in there. To this end the gate was left open, and in the charge of two men, whose duty it would be to swing it ...
— Marjorie • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... all untoward; let us leave him. Tho' he may think that he is bound to rail, We are not bound to hear him. ...
— Andre • William Dunlap
... there was Uncle John; and he was crying too, and his voice was breaking as he said something. What was it he was saying?—that it was not forgetfulness, it was not neglect of her, that had made him fail to meet her at the station, but an untoward accident to the streetcar he was in that had delayed him. And what was that Aunt Kate was saying? That they did care for her, that they did want her, and that they had set the telegraphic wires all over the country to hunt for her and bring her ...
— A Flock of Girls and Boys • Nora Perry
... bowl which she filled from a saucepan simmering on the stove, and then, without taking any notice of her visitors, she returned to the invalid. Slowly and with delicate care she made him swallow the soup by spoonfuls. Julien, notwithstanding the feeling of ill-humor caused by the untoward happenings of the evening, could not help admiring the almost maternal tenderness with which the young girl proceeded in this slow and difficult operation. When the bowl was empty she returned to the stove, and at last bethought ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... role of princess, she was again the Aileen Armagh of old—the child on the vaudeville stage, dancing the coon dance with such vigor and abandonment that once, when Aileen was nearly sixteen, Octavius, being witness to this flaunting performance, took her severely to task for such untoward actions now that she was grown up. He told her frankly that if Romanzo Caukins was led astray in the future it would be through her carryings-on; at which Aileen looked so dumbfoundered that Octavius at once perceived his mistake, and retreated weakly from his ...
— Flamsted quarries • Mary E. Waller
... outgoing of the heart, a longing to help and comfort, such as had inspired Nan Vanburgh months before, but after which she herself had striven in vain. This was evidently a meeting of old lovers parted by some untoward fate. Ah, poor soul, and it had come too late! Youth and health, and joy and beauty, had all paid toll to the long years as they passed. How shocked and pained the General must be, to meet his love in such a sadly different guise! It was not possible he ...
— Betty Trevor • Mrs. G. de Horne Vaizey
... the line halted as the leaders heard some sound that roused their suspicions, and several times Sandy and Nails dropped back. But nothing untoward occurred, and late in the afternoon they descended into the valley that was the headquarters ...
— Comrades of the Saddle - The Young Rough Riders of the Plains • Frank V. Webster
... untoward series of industrial dislocations which have—let us be courageous and admit it boldly—throttled the business life of our fair city these past days, there has been a great deal of loose talk about scientific ...
— Babbitt • Sinclair Lewis
... Island, giving the Liberals a popular majority, returned three Conservatives to one Liberal. Ontario cast 217,000 Conservative and 213,000 Liberal votes and returned forty-eight Conservatives and thirty-eight Liberals. An untoward incident of the elections was the defeat of Mr R. L. Borden in Halifax. The leader of the Opposition had won universal respect, {246} and it was to the satisfaction of opponents as well as followers that another seat was shortly found ...
— The Day of Sir Wilfrid Laurier - A Chronicle of Our Own Time • Oscar D. Skelton
... roughed out, and its decoration had not been begun. The skilful hand that should have finished it had perhaps to grasp sword or spear in the last vain attempt to repel the assault of the invader, and we can only wonder over his half-done work, and imagine what untoward fate befell the worker, and for what unknown master, if he survived the sack, he may have exercised the skill that once gratified the refined taste of his ...
— The Sea-Kings of Crete • James Baikie
... week Phineas, buoyed up by the sympathy of his friends, and in some measure supported by the excitement of the occasion, carried himself well, and bore bravely the terrible misfortune to which he had been subjected by untoward circumstances. But when the magistrate fully committed him, giving the first public decision on the matter from the bench, declaring to the world at large that on the evidence as given, prima facie, he; Phineas Finn, must be regarded ...
— Phineas Redux • Anthony Trollope
... glance at the man who, but for the untoward arrival of Gledware, would have won from him his share of the booty. But his voice was smooth and pleasant as he resumed: "Yes, pard, the kid must die. We couldn't do nothing with her, and if we left her on some door-step, she's sure old enough, and ...
— Lahoma • John Breckenridge Ellis
... places hedgerows & tall trees even within a few yards of the beach. Particularly Hithe stands on an eminence cover'd with wood. I shall confess we had fires of a night (ay, & a day too) several times even in June: but don't go & take advantage of this, for it was the most untoward year ...
— A Letter Book - Selected with an Introduction on the History and Art of Letter-Writing • George Saintsbury
... crop) grown in successive years on the same soil, and though I consider the crop an indifferent one, I don't think the failure ought in any degree to be attributed to the over-cropping, but to the wetness and coldness of the season, as well as other untoward circumstances hereafter to ...
— Essays in Natural History and Agriculture • Thomas Garnett
... deemed it necessary to retire across Berwick's Bay, was not interrupted in his movement. With his forces well in hand, Mouton would have defeated Weitzel and retained possession of the Lafourche country. The causes of his failure to concentrate have been pointed out. Information of these untoward events reached me on the road from the north, and I arrived at Berwick's ...
— Destruction and Reconstruction: - Personal Experiences of the Late War • Richard Taylor
... still unfrightened, unsuspicious of the untoward. The Risaldar's arrival on the scene had quite restored her confidence and she felt content to ride with him to Jundhra ...
— Told in the East • Talbot Mundy
... the bullet in the lung, bearing in mind the infrequency of untoward symptoms, the latter should be watched for prior ...
— Surgical Experiences in South Africa, 1899-1900 • George Henry Makins
... to be pretty sensible that this way of proceeding had a very unpromising and untoward look; for which reason he next declared that he reserved his defence for fear of a legal prosecution, and that some time or other he would give a large and liberal explanation to the Court of Directors, to whom he was answerable for ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. X. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... German line budge one inch in three months' strenuous fighting; and the salient created by that campaign between the coast and the Lys melted like wax in the furnace of the German offensive ten months later. Plumer's success might, however, have led to better things but for the untoward circumstances which hampered the Flanders campaign from the start. One of these was its initial delay; seven weeks elapsed before the conquest of the ridge was followed up, and the causes are still obscure. Probably they were political. Belgium, notwithstanding ...
— A Short History of the Great War • A.F. Pollard
... He no longer evinced the bustling confidence and buoyancy which once characterized him. Command seemed to have lost its charms for him, or rather, he gave way to the most abject despondency, decrying the whole enterprise, magnifying every untoward circumstance, and ...
— Astoria - Or, Anecdotes Of An Enterprise Beyond The Rocky Mountains • Washington Irving
... would look again to make quite sure that he had not been wrong. The conductor was not there. He must be ill. There was a stirring behind the curtain, and a sound of voices and hurried footsteps. Was there an accident, some untoward misfortune? Silence again. The conductor was at his post. Everything seemed ready at last.... They did not begin! What was happening? He boiled over with impatience. Then the bell rang. His heart thumped away. ...
— Jean-Christophe, Vol. I • Romain Rolland
... whom she immediately selected as a probable mistress, and I saw her several times vainly try to repress a grimace of disdain and wrath. It was my first impulse to follow Prudence into the kitchen, after the ladies had gone to their rooms, and make a clean breast of the untoward tidings, but I lacked the moral courage and contented myself with an inward show of strength. Why should I pander to this woman's caprices? Was I not master in my own house? Should I not do as I pleased? I would punish her with the severity ...
— The Romance of an Old Fool • Roswell Field
... having taken too much time, blank documents were passed about for all to write upon whatever they imagined to the disadvantage of the Jesuits. By an untoward chance, a bundle of these, sent to the agent of the Bishop in Spain, was taken on the voyage by an English corsair. The worthy pirate (no doubt a Protestant) was, if we can believe the Jesuits, extremely scandalized at the bad ...
— A Vanished Arcadia, • R. B. Cunninghame Graham
... soever he might make. And equally unthinking as this popular manifestation of early hero-worship, was the clamor that later floated into Richmond on every wind, blaming the government—and especially its head—for every untoward detail of the facile descent ...
— Four Years in Rebel Capitals - An Inside View of Life in the Southern Confederacy from Birth to Death • T. C. DeLeon
... by Greece, the Serbs must not act aggressively against the still neutral Bulgars. Nor do I think that, seeing how contradictory and inconclusive the information was upon which they were relying, they were to blame for maintaining an attitude which in the event had untoward consequences. ...
— Experiences of a Dug-out, 1914-1918 • Charles Edward Callwell
... Corny," she answered,—I believe she now used this familiar name simply to show how completely she had forgotten the little spleen she had certainly felt at my untoward exhibition in the street.—"You must ask forgiveness of those who possess the right to pardon. If Corny Littlepage chooses to slide down hill, like a boy, what right has Anneke Mordaunt ...
— Satanstoe • James Fenimore Cooper
... doubt, too natural, too artless, to hide my childish joy at the change: a change, in the real truth, for much the worse, since I must have much better become the neat easy simplicity of my rustic dress than the awkward, untoward, tawdry finery that I could not ...
— Memoirs Of Fanny Hill - A New and Genuine Edition from the Original Text (London, 1749) • John Cleland
... beautiful in sky and atmosphere. It would have been as mild and gracious as a windless June day had not the Turk, nervous lest these dogs of Christians should celebrate their festival with any untoward activity, opened at daylight a ...
— Tell England - A Study in a Generation • Ernest Raymond
... the girl's she waited with extreme fear her husband's return. Though blinded by her pious zeal, she could not hide from herself, that Dagobert would have good reason to be angry; and then this poor mother had also, under these untoward circumstances, to tell ...
— The Wandering Jew, Complete • Eugene Sue
... alone, with a very red face, and then Diana swept in on her father's arm. She did not faint, and nothing untoward occurred to interrupt the ceremony. Feasting and merry-making followed; then, as the evening waned, Fred and Diana drove away through the moonlight to their new home, and Gilbert walked ...
— Anne Of The Island • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... part, in a certain sense, the property of all who would follow in his footsteps, becoming for them an inspiring example; its history, with all its experiences of hope and fear, its occasional failures but frequent successes, its struggles when environed by poverty or other untoward circumstances, and its final triumph over all obstacles, serving as a guide, a beacon indeed, to illumine their pathway as they climb the same difficult but ...
— Music and Some Highly Musical People • James M. Trotter
... reappeared, endued with grace which Athena gave him, he marvelled at the untoward heart which the gods had given his wife and bade his nurse lay him his bed. Penelope caught up his words quickly; the bed was to be laid outside the chamber which he himself had made. The words filled Odysseus ...
— Authors of Greece • T. W. Lumb |
