"Wistful" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... of the premises proved no less fascinating; there was the neatest of clothes-yards, a vegetable garden, and a small garage, after which Anne regarded the silent cottage with wistful eyes. ...
— American Cookery - November, 1921 • Various
... and a girl, two gorgeously bedizened little beings who were trundled along the sidewalk in a black, highly varnished baby-wagon which was reputed by the dealer who sold it to Gregory to have belonged to an English nobleman. Wilbur more than once detected Selma looking at the babies with a wistful glance. She was really admiring their clothes, yet the thought of how prettily she would have been able to dress a baby of her own was at times so pathetic as to bring tears to her eyes, and cause her to deplore her own lack of ...
— Unleavened Bread • Robert Grant
... curtains, which have been drawn aside, letting the golden light of the picture blaze upon the one who looks; then upon a little ledge below, looking out from the heavens, are two little cherubs—known to all the world. They look wistful, wise, roguish, and beautiful, with fat little arms resting comfortably upon the ledge. Raphael is said to have found his models for these little angels in the street, leaning wistfully upon the ledge of a baker's window, looking at the good things to ...
— Pictures Every Child Should Know • Dolores Bacon
... slaughter, silent as a sheep before her shearers. For he has pourtrayed the majestic figure seated in passive endurance, with eyes blindfolded but yet wide open behind the bandage, all-seeing, wistful, sad, and patient, while around are fragments of rods, and smiting hands, and a cruel face blowing spittle on the unshrinking cheeks. He seems to be saying: 'These things hast thou done, and I kept silence.' 'Thou couldest have no power at all ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Isaiah and Jeremiah • Alexander Maclaren
... "Booming Nugget," Kate would ride through the bush and come out on the track just opposite; then, bending down from her horse, she would peer eagerly into the tin to see if a letter had been left there for her. Generally there was not. So, with a sad, wistful look in her blue eyes, she would drop her own tenderly-worded letter ...
— The Ebbing Of The Tide - South Sea Stories - 1896 • Louis Becke
... the chariot In mimic contest scoured the palace courts: Yet in mid-play the boy would oft-times pause, Letting the deer pass free; would oft-times yield His half-won race because the laboring steeds Fetched painful breath; or if his princely mates Saddened to lose, or if some wistful dream Swept o'er his thoughts. And ever with the years Waxed this compassionateness of our Lord, Even as a great tree grows from two soft leaves To spread its shade afar; but hardly yet Knew the young child of sorrow, pain, or tears, Save as strange names ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 2 • Charles Dudley Warner
... her little brother very dearly, but Paul, in the constant companionship of his father, grew up without boys or play. His face was old and wistful, and he had an old-fashioned way of sitting, brooding in his little arm-chair beside his father, looking into the fire. He used to ask strange, wise questions, and the only time he seemed childlike at all was when he was with Florence. He was never ...
— Tales from Dickens • Charles Dickens and Hallie Erminie Rives
... suddenly, wondering and wistful. "Oh, have you?" she returned sympathetically. "But it is only like the devil, grandpa," she added hopefully, "and you know there ...
— Jewel - A Chapter In Her Life • Clara Louise Burnham
... unmistakably English. Jennie saw his closely-cropped auburn head, and, as it raised until it overtopped her own, the girl, terrified as she was, could not but admire the sweeping blonde moustache that overshadowed a smile, half-wistful, half-humorous, which lighted up his handsome face. The ribbon of some order was worn athwart his breast; otherwise he wore court dress, which well became ...
— Jennie Baxter, Journalist • Robert Barr
... shaking down a fortune from the green ivy-bushes that hung at the vintners' doors, the western continent, at which he had already cast wistful glances, remained the treasure-house of Spain. His unfortunate but indomitable half-brother, Sir Humphrey Gilbert, recalled it to his memory. The name of Gilbert deserves to be better remembered than it is; and America, ...
— Raleigh • Edmund Gosse
... they; what do you mean? Don't joke, please, because every true word you say is of value to me, you see," he said, in an almost beseeching tone, with a wistful expression in ...
— Through Finland in Carts • Ethel Brilliana Alec-Tweedie
... Solomon presented to Hiram twenty inland cities which he had conquered, Hiram expressed great dissatisfaction, and called the territory by the opprobrious name of Cabul. The Tyrian had perhaps cast a wistful eye on the noble bay and harbor of Acco, or Ptolemais, which the prudent Hebrew either would not, or could not—since it was part of the promised land—dissever from his dominions. So strict was the confederacy, ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 1 • Various
... looking down the alleyway after the retreating figure. From somewhere in the distance came the rumble of an elevated train. It drowned out the pound of the man's speeding footsteps; it died away itself—and now there was no other sound. A pucker, strangely wistful, curiously perturbed, came and furrowed her forehead into little wrinkles, and then she turned and walked slowly on along the ...
— The White Moll • Frank L. Packard
... come to the high road now, and as they stopped to let a drove of cattle pass, she turned and met the Doctor's wistful eyes with a flash of ...
— The Argosy - Vol. 51, No. 6, June, 1891 • Various
... however, that there was something ambiguous and wistful in the State man's attitude, and I thought I understood. When a country sends a spy to do some dirty job, they disown him officially if he is caught. Except for that U-2 fiasco some years ago, when the U.S. broke all the unwritten rules and made jackasses of us before the ...
— Revenge • Arthur Porges
... honor me so far," he said, with the wistful smile of one who feels that chance has penned him in a corner, "I must needs obey." And with the word he began to unroll the parchment carefully. As he did so something moved me to look round, and I saw that Madonna Beatrice had entered the great hall and had come to a halt, ...
— The God of Love • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... eyes, extremely wistful and youthful in expression. "I do not believe I care about either the use or the beauty," he said, plaintively. "I only care that I am hungry and ...
— Max • Katherine Cecil Thurston
... grassless, earthen ring Where Madame, with a faith unwavering Planted a wistful garden ...
— Greenwich Village • Anna Alice Chapin
... gently distressed. At times she almost thought Uncle Joseph inclined to be coarse. She looked across the lawn with a rather wistful expression, eminently suited to dark blue eyes. The young men below were still glancing up in her direction, but she did not seem to see them. At this moment Wanda and Martin returned to their box. Wanda was preoccupied, and sat down without noticing the new-comers. Several ...
— The Vultures • Henry Seton Merriman
... about the house, ignoring the Indian woman's inquiring, wistful eyes, cursing to himself as he wandered through the corrals and stables, hating with a personal hatred everything which belonged to Ralston: his gentle-eyed brown mare; his expensive Navajo saddle-blanket; his single-rigged ...
— 'Me-Smith' • Caroline Lockhart
... had a quiet dinner-party, to which Mary came down in her frock of filmy black, which made a delightful setting for her fair paleness. At these dinners she encountered famous men and women, and looked at them from afar off with wistful interest. In the drawing-room afterwards she saw Lady Agatha the centre of a brilliant group. Someone said of her that she was likely to be the spoilt child of politics, since she could be audacious with even ...
— Mary Gray • Katharine Tynan
... them, what the Lees prized most in life, a liberal education. She saw her mother, thin, fair, tall, with the golden hair that would fade but would never turn gray, the blue child-like eyes, the wistful mouth. ...
— Holiday Stories for Young People • Various
... few guineas apiece. Then to book, as it were, such an order gave salt to his evening, and if the evening meant contact with some of his own exquisite work, a word of admiration was taken with that wistful gratitude that it is now almost unbearable ...
— The Beggar's Opera - to which is prefixed the Musick to each Song • John Gay
... Caroline turned a wild, wistful look on the woman as she said this; then she moved a step toward her, and the tones of her voice, as they came through her white lips, were mournful and stormy, like ...
— The Old Countess; or, The Two Proposals • Ann S. Stephens
... whether Balzac, in spite of his brave words, realised that Madame Hanska no longer cared for him. When he wrote that he was sure that none of these deferments proceeded from want of love, did he pen these words with a wistful attempt to prove to himself that the fact was as he stated? After eighteen months in the same house with Madame Hanska, could he really believe that only material difficulties kept her apart from him? ...
— Honore de Balzac, His Life and Writings • Mary F. Sandars
... to the wistful liberalism of Earth label us conformists if they will. I say to you that until Mars is won for humanity, we cannot afford the luxury ...
— Rebels of the Red Planet • Charles Louis Fontenay
... anybody who had chanced to peep through the skylight. The spectacle of five men (for the presence of the indefatigable secretary was an indispensable part of the proceedings) all solemnly drinking tea, while a deer-hound kept a wistful eye on the sugar-basin, was unusual, and perhaps a little grotesque—to all save the participants. Seated at his easel in the characteristic position represented in our sketch, Mr. Furniss would ...
— The Confessions of a Caricaturist, Vol. 1 (of 2) • Harry Furniss
... his own. It was all the garret he had. He dug into it and at length resurrected the photograph of a woman whose face was both roguish and beautiful. He sat on the floor a la Turk and studied the face, his own tender and wistful. No resemblance to Kitty except in the eyes. How often he had gone to her with the question burning his lips, only to carry it away unspoken! He turned over the photograph and read: "To the nicest man I know. With love from Molly." ...
— The Drums Of Jeopardy • Harold MacGrath
... dismissed, each seized his basket, containing his provisions, or ran home to get his meal with his parents: I found myself sitting in the school-room tete-a-tete with Mr O'Gallagher, and feeling very well inclined for my dinner I cast a wistful eye at my basket, but I said nothing; Mr O'Gallagher, who appeared to have been in ...
— Percival Keene • Frederick Marryat
... know. Luckily I have a little money; I found it inside my vest. I suppose I must have put it there before——' and then he became silent, while the strange, wistful look in his eyes ...
— "The Pomp of Yesterday" • Joseph Hocking
... and evening is drowned in electric lights; Arm-in-arm, they wander under the trees Everywhere meeting others, wandering arm-in-arm In the same wistful wonder, ...
— A Woman of Thirty • Marjorie Allen Seiffert
... a wistful eye toward the border of the frogpond, where the big greenbacks could be seen, sitting partly in the water, and ...
— The Boy Scouts on Belgian Battlefields • Lieut. Howard Payson
... felt there was a lapse in our lives. I never loved her more. There was never a time when she was so truly my wife and yet in our combined lives there was something lacking. After a while I began to notice a wistful expression in her eyes. It always ...
— One Way Out - A Middle-class New-Englander Emigrates to America • William Carleton
... followed were troubled days and they brought to Conscience's cheeks an accentuated pallor. Under her eyes were smudges that made them seem very large and wistful. The minister was once more in his arm chair, a little more broken, a little more fiercely uncompromising of aspect, but the one normal solution of such a spent and burdensome life: the solution of death, stood off from him. Upon his daughter, whose lips were sealed ...
— The Tyranny of Weakness • Charles Neville Buck
... a cursed scrape have I got myself!" thought the major, as he walked by the side of his companion, ever and anon casting wistful glances over his shoulder. "I am fairly caught on the horns of a dilemma. I instinctively feel that Disbrowe is dogging us. What will become of me? The moment this harebrained coxcomb enters the house, I will see whether a light ...
— Old Saint Paul's - A Tale of the Plague and the Fire • William Harrison Ainsworth
... on Miss Barrington's face, which was still almost beautiful as well as patient, became a trifle wistful. ...
— Winston of the Prairie • Harold Bindloss
... me," she said with a wistful smile of acknowledgment. As he flung himself into the seat, his hand eagerly sought hers, his courtly reserve ...
— Beverly of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... been to Italy the year before and did nothing but boast of it all day. So the two girls arm in arm started for the moors. Nelly Reeves was a tall good looking girl, slightly pretty, but with none of the wistful beauty about her that was so clearly stamped on all Beatrice Langton's features. She had black hair and what she considered beautiful eyes, though they really were small and vacant ...
— Daisy Ashford: Her Book • Daisy Ashford
... in a snowdrift," said one. "The irascible old white-haired gentleman in the Pullman smoker; the good-natured travelling salesman; the wistful young widow in the day coach, with her six-year-old blue-eyed little daughter. A coal-black Pullman porter who braves the shrieking gale to bring in a tree from the copse along the track. Red-headed brakeman (kiddies of his own at home), frostbitten by ...
— Plum Pudding - Of Divers Ingredients, Discreetly Blended & Seasoned • Christopher Morley
... and on the gratitude derived both from favours conferred and from those to come.[8] There may then at all events be some hope that the Egyptian will hesitate before he throws in his lot with any future Arabi The Berberine dweller on the banks of the Nile may, perhaps, cast no wistful glances back to the time when, albeit he or his progenitors were oppressed, the oppression came from the hand of a co-religionist. Even the Central African savage may eventually learn to chant a hymn in honour of Astraea Redux, ...
— Political and Literary essays, 1908-1913 • Evelyn Baring
... said the strangest thing," Mollie continued, suddenly earnest. "You know how she adores Paul. Well, I caught her looking at him with the most wistful expression, and when I asked her what the matter was she looked up at me and I saw there were tears ...
— The Outdoor Girls at Bluff Point - Or a Wreck and a Rescue • Laura Lee Hope
... her fine, lustrous eyes to mine, but this time they were wistful and penetrating; then, taking my hand impulsively, she led me to a bench that stood a ...
— The Doctor's Daughter • "Vera"
... is rapid, full of fun, and takes the reader not only to many interesting places in Central America, but in the country as well, where Peggy attends a school for girls. The incidents are cleverly brought out, and Peggy in her wistful way, proves in her many adventures to be a brave girl and an endearing heroine to ...
— The Curlytops and Their Pets - or Uncle Toby's Strange Collection • Howard R. Garis
... whiteness of skin and perfect regularity of feature is sometimes a little cold; but Helene was flushed with her walk in the warm night, her lips were scarlet; and if her grey eyes were strangely sad and wistful, they were also so beautiful in size, shape, and expression that Angelot felt he could gaze for ever ...
— Angelot - A Story of the First Empire • Eleanor Price
... and her face grew sad, while Thurston rebelled against an instinctive conviction that she knew a wistful expression was becoming to her and was calculated to appeal ...
— Thurston of Orchard Valley • Harold Bindloss
... the station to bid him farewell. He had lost courage, poor David; perhaps he had not very much to start with, and things had gone hard with him for a long time. He knew he should never see these faces again, this homely, friendly place. He gazed about with wistful eyes, noting every spot in the bare little station. He had known it all by heart, ever since he was a child, for his father had been station-master. He could have built the whole thing over, with his eyes shut, he thought, and now he should never ...
— "Some Say" - Neighbours in Cyrus • Laura Elizabeth Howe Richards
... (Veglia). The whole district had, at the last census, 19,562 inhabitants whose ordinary language was Serbo-Croat, and 1544 who commonly spoke Italian. Of these latter the capital, likewise called Krk, contained 1494, and only 644 who gave themselves out as Slavs. The town, with its tortuous, rather wistful streets, was the residence of the Venetian officials, and five or six of those old families remain. The rest of the 1494 are nearly all Italianized Slavs, who under Austria used to call themselves either Austrians of Italian tongue or else Istrians. However, if they wish to be Italians now, there ...
— The Birth of Yugoslavia, Volume 2 • Henry Baerlein
... A long, sharp, wistful survey did Mr. Dummie Dunnaker cast around him before he rejoined. All seemed safe and convenient for confidential communication. The supine features of Mrs. Lobkins were hushed in a drowsy stupor; even the gray cat that lay by the fire was curled in the embrace ...
— Paul Clifford, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... day, I know not how it happened, some word of jealous misery escaped me, and Rachel grew very white and silent, and there was a long pause of days before either of us addressed the other again; but Rachel's look and manner was altered to me from that moment. A long, tender, wistful gaze followed me about. She did not venture to dispute Grace Tyrrell's possession of me, but it made her uneasy. She was observant and sad, patient and kind, while my manner to her was often irritable and repellent. One night she stole into my room ...
— The Late Miss Hollingford • Rosa Mulholland
... man discovered the hat before I did, stooped, took it up, extended it to me with the profound bow of the old school, while the other hand, clenched and quivering, was pressed into the hollow of his cheek, and his eyes met mine with wistful mute entreaty. The instinct of my profession seized me at once. I could never behold suffering without forgetting all else in the desire ...
— A Strange Story, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... smiled. Gordon remembered long afterwards, with shame for his Speech, how wistful ...
— Gordon Keith • Thomas Nelson Page
... steaming down she went to land, almost directly opposite Virgin Bay, against the island of Ometepec. Day after day she lay there immovable, with her white side gleaming dimly across the water, and far out of the reach of us wistful filibusters;—for although there was a small brig of General Walker's floating beside the pier which ran out into the lake, yet it was out of repair; and, in any state, the wind blew too strongly and constantly from the northeast for a sail vessel to make the island, which lay almost in its ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 26, December, 1859 • Various
... of purpose in the blue eyes raised to his, such wistful curves to the sensitive little lips, that Jonathan Green for the first time felt the ...
— Teddy's Button • Amy Le Feuvre
... the smoking amateurs made way for him with great parade, and pushed back with equal unkindness the young and wistful throng who still hovered round ...
— Tancred - Or, The New Crusade • Benjamin Disraeli
... each other it seemed for a moment that each instinctively recognized this kinship. Then into the dark eyes of the stranger—as when he had watched the cowboy at the Burnt Ranch—there came that look of wistful admiration ...
— When A Man's A Man • Harold Bell Wright
... For wistful mother-eyes are blurred With sudden mists, as lingerers stay, And the old dusts are roused and stirred By the warm tear-drops ...
— Verses • Susan Coolidge
... notwithstanding his deformity, was powerfully built, and of a countenance which, marked as it was with the drawn pathetic look of long-continued physical suffering, was undeniably handsome. His large brown eyes, like those of a faithful dog, followed every movement of Lotys with anxious and wistful affection, and Leroy, noticing this, began to wonder whether she was his wife or daughter? Or was she related in either of these ways to Sergius Thord? His reflections were interrupted by a slight touch from Max Graub who was seated ...
— Temporal Power • Marie Corelli
... of it, Max, we've got two already," Steve remarked as he took both the prizes in his hand, and surveyed them with that wistful look in his eyes; for, as he had more than once admitted, pearls always had a peculiar fascination ...
— In Camp on the Big Sunflower • Lawrence J. Leslie
... now I understood the wistful look that sometimes followed me, as I went out, after a brief pause beside his bed, or merely a passing nod, while busied with those who seemed to need me more than he, because more urgent in their demands; now I knew that to him, as to so many, I was the poor ...
— Hospital Sketches • Louisa May Alcott
... was seen in every city in Europe at different intervals. Charitable people gave him alms, but he never begged. He would enter a town, take his station near a church and wait until the bells rang for matins or vespers, then take up his staff and, sighing deeply, move off. People noting the wistful look in his eyes would ask ...
— ZigZag Journeys in Northern Lands; - The Rhine to the Arctic • Hezekiah Butterworth
... lost the note of half-wistful confidence on which their talk of the previous day had closed, and she looked at him with a kind of pale hostility. Her tone made it evident that his task would be difficult, but it did not shake his resolve to go on. He sat down, and mechanically she followed ...
— The Reef • Edith Wharton
... face. The freckles lay thick on the small unimportant nose and clashed painfully against the roots of the amazing hair. They crowded out the flaxen eyebrows altogether. And yet he was pretty in a wistful, whimsical sort of way. He made Robert want to laugh. Someone close to Robert did titter, and muttered, "Go it, Carrots!" and Robert saw that the boy had heard and was horribly frightened. He winced and faltered, and Robert poked out ...
— The Dark House • I. A. R. Wylie
... when she had watched in silence the girl's sweet face, and noticed its half-sad, half-wistful expression, 'what is the matter with you? You are fretting about something. Tell me what it is. Do you not wish to go to Troon with us, or would you rather go to Bourhill? Do tell us what you would like ...
— The Guinea Stamp - A Tale of Modern Glasgow • Annie S. Swan
... wagging tail; I miss the plaintive, pleading wail; I miss the wistful, loving glance; ...
— The Dog's Book of Verse • Various
... picture. Christian, sitting apart, with the gulf of shining mahogany between, bridged it often with her wistful eyes, but she ...
— Christian's Mistake • Dinah Maria Mulock Craik
... a sofa drawn towards the hearth. Archie had thrown his travelling cloak of black fox over her, and her white, flower-like face, surrounded by the black fur, had a singularly pathetic beauty. She opened her large blue eyes as Madame approached and looked at her with wistful entreaty; and Madame, in spite of all her pre-arrangements of conduct, was unable at that hour not to answer the appeal for affection she saw in them. She stooped and kissed the childlike little woman, and Archie watched this token ...
— A Knight of the Nets • Amelia E. Barr
... of white hands holding something before him tremble a little, and he looked up. The spiritual face of Lois was looking at his with wistful apprehension and interest. If ever his pulse beat out of time it was now—for in that exchange of glances he felt what she did not understand—that ...
— Tales of the Chesapeake • George Alfred Townsend
... dog profited. Shep had been giving her such unremitting attention, his wistful brown eyes following each forkful as it went from plate to mouth, that Janet's consciousness of her selfish situation kept bearing in upon her till now every bean carried reproach with it. Thinking to ...
— The Wrong Woman • Charles D. Stewart
... she found herself disinclined for any further exertion, and just sat, reclining upon pale pink satin cushions, her slender hands folded upon her lap, her large, dark luminous eyes and delicate, refined features all set in a wistful sadness. ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand
... at Esther with wistful eyes. Why was it that people never fell in love with the right people? he asked himself vaguely. He could have ...
— The Phantom Lover • Ruby M. Ayres
... I don't get enough of it," said Maggie. She found herself looking back to the Chapel services with wistful regret. What had there been there that was not here? Here everything was ordered, arranged, in decent sequence, in regular symmetry and progression. And yet no one seemed to Maggie to listen to what they were saying, and no one thought ...
— The Captives • Hugh Walpole
... the other, and searched the face of Thurston with his keen eyes. It came to Phil that they were also a bit wistful, but he went ...
— The Lure of the Dim Trails • by (AKA B. M. Sinclair) B. M. Bower
... into her room alone; she threw open the small casements, and stood there looking out with a somewhat vague and distant look. There was no mischief now in those dark and tender eyes; there was rather an anxious and wistful questioning. And her heart seemed to go out from her to implore these gentle winds, and the soft colors of the sea, and the dreamy stillness of the woods, that now they should, if ever that was possible ...
— The Galaxy - Vol. 23, No. 1 • Various
... tall stout man in black is the door-keeper. 'Any room?' 'Not an inch—two or three dozen gentlemen waiting down-stairs on the chance of somebody's going out.' Pull out your purse—'Are you quite sure there's no room?'—'I'll go and look,' replies the door-keeper, with a wistful glance at your purse, 'but I'm afraid there's not.' He returns, and with real feeling assures you that it is morally impossible to get near the gallery. It is of no use waiting. When you are refused admission ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens
... prevailing fashion, and a whimsical twist about the corners of the mouth which showed its possessor to be rich in humour. And yet it was a sad face—in some indefinite way it suggested patience and expectancy. Just now the eyes were wistful, questioning. ...
— East of the Shadows • Mrs. Hubert Barclay
... moving in the profound stillness of the air; and a whole assembly of birds kept up a low-toned conversation in the bushes, as if the day were hardly bright enough to warrant a full chorus of concerted song. It was a tender, wistful kind of day, such as comes sometimes in the fall of the year, before the advent of frost. And a certain affinity with the day was visible in the face of the girl who had walked down to the riverside. There was no melancholy in her expression: ...
— Name and Fame - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... something magnetic in his gaze, for she raised her white lids just then, and met the earnest, wistful look ...
— Virgie's Inheritance • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... her to go on singing, and moved to Sophy's door. It was fastened, but before she could call, it was thrown violently back, and Sophy stood straight up before her, striving for her usual rigidity, but shaking from head to foot; and though there were no signs of tears, she looked with wistful terror at her step-mother's face, and her lips moved as ...
— The Young Step-Mother • Charlotte M. Yonge
... as their talk went on. He grew deeply interested in unfolding the wonders of the heavens to her; and, as he studied her pure profile in the moonlight with eager, searching, wistful gaze, her beauty impressed him more and more. In the East the man had a friend, an artist. He thought how wonderful a theme for a painting this scene would make. The girl in picturesque hat of soft felt, riding with careless ease and grace; horse, maiden, plain, bathed ...
— The Girl from Montana • Grace Livingston Hill
... He lifted it when he heard that soft friendly voice, and there was a wistful something in his face which made one think that there had been music in it for him and that he would like to hear it again. When he raised his hands Joan laid her sword to his bonds, but the officer said ...
— Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc - Volume 1 (of 2) • Mark Twain
... out in reality to her as sometimes it had opened out to her in wistful dreams. And she quailed before it. She dropped her eyes from his. She became ...
— Love and Mr. Lewisham • H. G. Wells
... himself in a position to watch all my motions at dinner. Being alone, and either reading or thinking, at first I did not observe him; but as soon as I did, and noticed that he pursued each rising and descent of my fork as the poet 'with wistful eyes pursues the setting sun,' that unconsciously he mimicked and rehearsed all the notes and appoggiaturas that make up the successive bars in the music of eating one's dinner, I was compelled to rise, and say, 'My good fellow, I can't stand this; will you do me ...
— The Posthumous Works of Thomas De Quincey, Vol. II (2 vols) • Thomas De Quincey
... limped with aching legs down the slope. The trainmen were already pulling the smouldering, evil-smelling waste from the box, and after watching a minute he loitered along the track beside the car. Several of the shades were raised and the sight of the gleaming white napery and silver brought a wistful gleam to his eyes. But there was worse to come. At the last table a belated diner was still eating. He was a large man with a double chin, under which he had tucked a corner of his napkin. He ate leisurely, but ...
— The Lilac Girl • Ralph Henry Barbour
... her pleading, wistful eyes, spoke day after day of Julia, of her dutiful love toward her, and her growing love for me, I drifted, almost without an effort of my own volition, into an engagement with her. You see there was no counter-balance. I was acquainted with every girl on the island ...
— The Doctor's Dilemma • Hesba Stretton
... she had left Stafford, his words of passionate love had haunted her. They sang in her ears even as she spoke to her father or Jessie, or the dogs who followed her about with wistful eyes as if they were asking her what ailed her, and as ...
— At Love's Cost • Charles Garvice
... conception of the Fountain of Youth. (p. 53.) The beautiful central figure is a girl child standing without self-consciousness by blooming primroses. Modeled faintly on the pedestal are the parents, from whose upturned faces and uplifted hands the primroses seem to spring. In the friezes, wistful old people are borne onward to Destiny in boats manned by joyous chubby children, unconscious of their priceless gift of youth to which their elders look back with so ...
— The Jewel City • Ben Macomber
... his subject than in the exercise of his own power of refinement. Where another man's art is personal, as with Velasquez or Frans Hals, Whistler's art becomes egotistical. He does not say, "Lo, how mysterious is this dusk river-side, how tenderly serene this mother, how wistful and mighty is this prophet-seer!" He exclaims rather, "Note how subtly I, Whistler, have seen. Rejoice with me in my powers of vision and of execution." There is no single method of seeing, no one formula of expression ...
— The Gate of Appreciation - Studies in the Relation of Art to Life • Carleton Noyes
... took the photographs from an envelope, and handed them to Aunt Faith. They were passed from hand to hand, with gentle comments, and some tear-dimmed eyes gazed on the pictured faces,—a resolute, grave young soldier, with earnest eyes, and a little, delicate, wistful maiden, as fair ...
— The Old Stone House • Anne March
... marked them, and the hand of man had branded them. Here and there was a touch of gray in their hair, and about the mouth of each were lines which in such silent moments as this one gave an expression of infinite and wistful yearning. ...
— Riders of the Silences • John Frederick
... objective picture of a paradise in the heavens or of an underworld inhabited by spirits of the dead got mixed up with that of a land of origin on earth, an earthly paradise called Hawaiki or Bulotu or "the lost land of Kane"—a land about which clustered those same wistful longings which men of other races have pictured in their visions of an earthly paradise—the "talking tree of knowledge," the well of life, and plenty without labor.[3] "Thus they dwelt at Paliuli," says Haleole of the ...
— The Hawaiian Romance Of Laieikawai • Anonymous
... faint conception. She rather fancied herself preferred because, as she supposed, her mother had very likely been Aunt Edith's favourite sister. Little notion therefore had Lettice of the network of feeling behind the earnest, wistful eyes, as the aunt laid a hand on each shoulder ...
— It Might Have Been - The Story of the Gunpowder Plot • Emily Sarah Holt
... I detected the disposition on her part to repel any advances. She gave him no opportunity to be with her alone, and if by chance this happened, her sweet voice would call "Emily, come in this way, we are lonely without you," and her eyes would turn on me when I entered with a sort of wistful glance. It always reminded me of a child looking confidently into the eyes of its mother, expecting the help it was sure to find. I hardly enjoyed this, for I knew Mr. Benton thought me old enough ...
— The Harvest of Years • Martha Lewis Beckwith Ewell
... of men, of tall and compact mould and hardy sinew, was Robert Burns; nor is it possible to imagine any thing more animated than the appearance of those stalwart sons of the soil, as they lingered for a moment before the platform, and looked with wistful eyes at the sons of the Poet, if haply they might trace in their lineaments some resemblance to the features of him whom, from their infancy, they had learned to love. Then came the Freemasons, and King Crispin with his train, and ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 347, September, 1844 • Various
... wistful look as of one from home; and often he would sit musing in the cloister and scarce give heed to ...
— The Gathering of Brother Hilarius • Michael Fairless
... aware from an early date that, in an unobtrusive way, Hilda Wade was watching Sebastian, watching him quietly, with those wistful, earnest eyes, as a cat watches a mouse-hole; watching him with mute inquiry, as if she expected each moment to see him do something different from what the rest of us expected of him. Slowly I gathered that Hilda Wade, in the most literal sense, had come to Nathaniel's, as ...
— Hilda Wade - A Woman With Tenacity Of Purpose • Grant Allen
... inscription on the stick above more like an affecting epitaph than ever. Much of this gentleness may have been that apology for his great strength, common with large men; but his face was distinctly amiable, and his very light blue eyes were at times wistful and doglike in their kindliness. I was soon to learn, however, that placability was not ...
— Stories in Light and Shadow • Bret Harte
... into the vague, purple shadows of coming dusk. They stood silent, for the most part, and let them go without the usual facetious advice to "Be good to yourselves," and the hackneyed admonition to Chip to keep out of jail if he could. There must have been something very wistful in their faces, for the Little Doctor smiled bravely down upon then from the buggy seat, and lifted up the Kid for a four-toothed smile and an ecstatic "Bye!" accompanied by a vigorous flopping of ...
— Flying U Ranch • B. M. Bower
... rebuke her—nay, to declare her unworthy of him. The thought of those two years—two years without a word—came upon Kitty and left her sober, filled with misgivings for the future. She cast about for some excuse, some reason for delay, and still those masterful eyes were fixed upon her—sad, wistful, yet steadfast; and like a child she ...
— Hidden Water • Dane Coolidge
... brown-haired girl who rose to greet him. Miss Maitland clearly was surprised—and a little frightened—by this unexpected visit. Her glance strayed from the visitor to a silver-framed photograph on the mantelpiece and back again to Dr. Lepardo in a curiously wistful way. ...
— The Sins of Severac Bablon • Sax Rohmer
... of wistful Jocko Still was with his ancient flame In the nutgroves of Morocco; Or if not it's ...
— Fly Leaves • C. S. Calverley
... only after suffering. The sunlight in them is the gracious, sweet, kindly sunlight that falls only between nights of pain. The bright and chivalric passages of "Boris," the music called forth by the memories of feudal Russia, and the glory of the Czars, give a deeper, stranger, even more wistful tone to the great gray pile of which they are a part. "Khovanchtchina" is never so much the tragedy, the monument to beings and cultures superseded and cast aside in the relentless march of life, as in the scene ...
— Musical Portraits - Interpretations of Twenty Modern Composers • Paul Rosenfeld
... supposed that any girl could care for a man until he had shown that he cared for her—it was the unmaidenly, impossible thing. And now—how beautiful he was, how dear! A wistful smile trembled around her lips. All that had gone before with other men suddenly became as nothing, forgotten and out of mind, and she herself made clean by this purifying fire. Even if she never had anything more in her whole life, she had this—even if she never had anything more. Yet what ...
— McClure's Magazine, Vol. XXXI, No. 3, July 1908. • Various
... sighed. For a moment her smile died out, and her wistful gaze was unconsciously turned towards the North. It only encountered the crude interior of the storage sheds where the canoes and trail gear were usually kept. One of the ...
— The Heart of Unaga • Ridgwell Cullum
... the latter, and betook himself slowly to the back fence, where he was greeted in a boisterous manner by his wistful little old dog, Duke, returning from some affair of his ...
— The Boy Scouts Book of Stories • Various
... me to ask if you had a large safety-pin." Marjorie looked a little wistful, as if she did not ...
— Stories Worth Rereading • Various
... had begged Janith to let him rent a super mech. And she had scoffed at his wastefulness. Yet, now that he remembered it again, there had been a wistful note of hope ...
— Second Sight • Basil Eugene Wells
... Her wistful blue eyes expanded. She saw her own way spreading out before her like a promised land. "I can't," she said touchingly, "decide all ...
— The Dark Tower • Phyllis Bottome
... Carlyles, when Mrs. Carlyle was alive. One evening at tea, a copper kettle, with hot water, stood on the hob. Mrs. Carlyle made a movement as if to rise, with her eye directed to the kettle; the friend, divining her wish, rose and handed her the kettle. She thanked him, and, with a pathetic and wistful gaze at Carlyle, added, "Ay, Tam, ye never ...
— Fifty Years of Railway Life in England, Scotland and Ireland • Joseph Tatlow
... A longing, wistful expression used to steal over Chingatok's face as he gazed at the southern horizon while listening to these strange rumours, and a very slight smile of incredulity had glimmered on his visage, when it was told him that one of the floating islands of these Kablunets, or white men, ...
— The Giant of the North - Pokings Round the Pole • R.M. Ballantyne
... in that expressive voice of hers. Was it merely wistful, was it really jealous, or was either element the product of my own imagination? I made answer ...
— No Hero • E.W. Hornung
... watchman looked at the conjurer as if he thought he was mad, but he followed him down to the stage in silence. When he was there the conjurer leaned forward suddenly, and his face was filled with a wistful eagerness. ...
— The Ghost Ship • Richard Middleton
... was always a little wistful when in trouble, like a small girl who can never understand why she is being punished. But just now this wistfulness irritated Billie Bradley, who was very much given to quick action herself, and she ...
— Billie Bradley on Lighthouse Island - The Mystery of the Wreck • Janet D. Wheeler
... modest little tap at the door, which opened on an outer gallery surrounding a court-yard; and an intensely shabby little man looked in, to inquire if the gentleman would have a Cicerone to show the town. His face was so very wistful and anxious, in the half-opened doorway, and there was so much poverty expressed in his faded suit and little pinched hat, and in the thread-bare worsted glove with which he held it—not expressed ...
— Pictures from Italy • Charles Dickens
... de Sautron was prepared for an outburst. But no outburst came. The Marquis turned away from him, and paced slowly to the window, his head bowed, his hands behind his back. Halted there he spoke, without turning, his voice was at once scornful and wistful. ...
— Scaramouche - A Romance of the French Revolution • Rafael Sabatini
... Edgecombe seemed fairly crazed by his joy. After so many long years of hopeless grief and wistful longing, to find his loved ones, safe and sound, far more beautiful than of yore! Surely enough to turn the gravest of men into ...
— The Lost City • Joseph E. Badger, Jr.
... see her, and met her with a blushing timidity, and piteous, wistful looks, not easy ...
— Put Yourself in His Place • Charles Reade
... on his hat and sallied forth into the streets. He eyed the houses on either hand with that melancholy and wistful interest with which, in middle life, we revisit scenes familiar to us in youth—surprised to find either so little change or so much, and recalling, by fits and snatches, old associations and past emotions. The long High Street ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 1, April, 1851 • Various
... you have changed your mind." Helen held out her hand. "Come, to please me," and there was a world of wistful appeal in her hazel eyes which Barbara was ...
— The Red Seal • Natalie Sumner Lincoln |
