"Abominable" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... winding stair slippery with filth, to the room. It was separated from the rest of the garret by slats, through which we could see the dirty linen. It was lighted by a little window like a lozenge in the roof. Even if I had not been so miserable I should have thought it abominable. There was only one chair and a straw mattress on the floor and one single coverlet for us both. The servant stood staring at us at the door, as if she expected thanks or compliments. I took off my knapsack, sad enough as you can imagine, ...
— Waterloo - A sequel to The Conscript of 1813 • Emile Erckmann
... more comfortable in this monastery with my daughter, than in this place of abominable wickedness. You can inherit from your wench. Ha, ha! The fine lady ...
— Droll Stories, Volume 3 • Honore de Balzac
... has many ways of attack; sometimes he comes openly, sometimes craftily, sometimes he tempts you, sometimes he frightens you, but whether he comes in a pleasing or a frightful form, be sure, if you saw him himself with your eyes, he would always be hateful, monstrous, and abominable. Therefore he keeps himself out of sight. But be sure he is all this; and, as believing it, take the whole armour of God, that you may be able to stand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand. Quit you like ...
— Parochial and Plain Sermons, Vol. VIII (of 8) • John Henry Newman
... absence the sultana had, in order to prevent confusion, commanded to be kept secret, hoping for his speedy return. The vizier instantly summoning his guards seized the villanous cook, and proceeding to his house, released the sultan from his confinement. The house was razed to the ground, and the abominable owner, with his guilty family, put to death. The sultan exultingly felt the use of having learnt a useful art, which had been the ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Complete • Anonymous
... Agriculture, still too backward in methods and variety, gradually improved, gaining marked impetus and direction from the agricultural colleges planted in the several States by the aid of United States funds conveyed under the "Morrill" acts. The abominable system of store credit kept the majority of farmers, black and white, in servitude, but was giving way, partly to regular bank credit—a great improvement—and partly ...
— History of the United States, Volume 5 • E. Benjamin Andrews
... you a most abominable scrawl on Friday, and think myself justified in boring you with a few ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Volume III (of 3), 1854-1861 • Queen of Great Britain Victoria
... in this hospitable house was simple: apricots, fresh, or dried and stewed with honey; zho's milk, curds and cheese, sour cream, peas, beans, balls of barley dough, barley porridge, and 'broth of abominable things.' Chang, a dirty-looking beer made from barley, was offered with each meal, and tea frequently, but I took my own 'on the sly.' I have mentioned a churn as part of the 'plenishings' of the living-room. In Tibet the churn is used for making tea! I give the recipe. 'For six persons. Boil ...
— Among the Tibetans • Isabella L. Bird (Mrs Bishop)
... worst of the abominable dogkennels called houses was the group known as the Cite des Kroumirs, in the 13th arrondissement, which, by a strange irony, was built on land belonging to the Department of Public Assistance, which was let out by that body to a rich ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 401, September 8, 1883 • Various
... little doubt as to the use that was made of the ludicrous inquiry by Lowe. It must have been handed over to the army of loathsome libellers—men and women who were willing to do the dirtiest of all work, that of writing and speaking lies (some abominable in their character) of a defenceless man, in order that their vindictiveness should be completely satisfied. Vast sums were annually expended for no other purpose than to put their afflicted prisoner through the torture of a ...
— The Tragedy of St. Helena • Walter Runciman
... why? Why, it stands to reason—don't it, Mr. Orkins?—it ain't the dorg you're payin' for, but your feelins as these 'ere wagabonds is tradin' on, Mr. Orkins; that's where it is. O sir, it's abominable, as I tells 'em, ...
— The Reminiscences Of Sir Henry Hawkins (Baron Brampton) • Henry Hawkins Brampton
... same time conquerors and conquered. If good is the stronger, what is there to prevent evil from being completely annihilated? But if that be the case, the very utterance of which is impious, I ask myself how it is that they themselves are not filled with horror to think that they have imagined such abominable blasphemies. ...
— The World's Great Sermons, Volume I - Basil to Calvin • Various
... political adventurers equally unscrupulous. A full half of the taxes wrung from them was stolen. Their public lands, millions of square miles, were parceled out among banded conspirators. Their roads and the streets of their cities were nearly impassable. Their public buildings, conceived in abominable taste and representing enormous sums of money, which never were used in their construction, began to tumble about the ears of the workmen before they were completed. The most delicate and important functions ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce • Ambrose Bierce
... was the word that no man could rely on. But, among competing improbabilities, the story which was written on the night of August 5, and to which he adhered under Bruce's cross-examination, is infinitely the least improbable. The Master of Gray, an abominable character, not in Scotland when the events occurred, reported, not from Scotland, that Lennox had said that, if put on his oath, 'he could not say whether the practice proceeded from Gowrie or ...
— James VI and the Gowrie Mystery • Andrew Lang
... for Teddy. What could a boy like that possibly be to me? Why, of course I love Rowley dearly—more than I could tell you; and to think I should risk it all in this stupid way. Oh! it's my abominable vanity; that's what it is. Aunt Jane always said it would be my ruin, and so it will be—after this, you see, Rowley will believe anything of me? Oh, Bella, what shall ...
— Tales from Many Sources - Vol. V • Various
... thou lean sow, famine-stricken and most impure,... thou wrinkled beast, thou mangy beast, thou beast of all beasts the most beastly,... thou mad spirit,... thou bestial and foolish drunkard,... most greedy wolf,... most abominable whisperer,... thou sooty spirit from Tartarus!... I cast thee down, O Tartarean boor, into the infernal kitchen!... Loathsome cobbler,... dingy collier,... filthy sow (scrofa stercorata),... perfidious boar,... envious crocodile,... malodorous drudge,... wounded basilisk,... ...
— History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom • Andrew Dickson White
... far-reaching, sir," continued the lieutenant, "and I promise you full protection for all that you do. Why, surely, man, you will be able to cultivate your plantation far more peacefully and with greater satisfaction with the river cleared of this abominable traffic." ...
— Hunting the Skipper - The Cruise of the "Seafowl" Sloop • George Manville Fenn
... us beggars!" he shouted, in a scornful tone. "The joke is a good one. Let us accept the name; we will contend with the abominable Inquisition till compelled to wear the beggar's ...
— The Golden Grasshopper - A story of the days of Sir Thomas Gresham • W.H.G. Kingston
... my soul, Jerry, I am tired to death. Seven times have I been backward and forward to that abominable privateer, and now my tea is ready, and I am ordered to go again ...
— The King's Own • Captain Frederick Marryat
... yearning impatience; it was, indeed, my first letter. I opened it, but I discovered not a single written word, nothing but a Copenhagen newspaper, containing a lampoon upon me, and that was sent to me all that distance with postage unpaid, probably by the anonymous writer himself. This abominable malice wounded me deeply. I have never discovered who the author was, perhaps he was one of those who afterwards called me friend, and pressed my hand. Some men have base thoughts: ...
— The True Story of My Life • Hans Christian Andersen
... you're the poorest companion for a holiday!" cried Michael. "If that's all you know of brandy, you shall have no more of it; and while I finish the flask, you may as well begin business. Come to think of it," he broke off, "I have made an abominable error: you should have ordered the cart before you were disguised. Why, Pitman, what the devil's the use of you? why couldn't you have reminded me ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 7 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Lady Ella to acquiesce in the proposals of the leading Princhester photographer. She had always helped where she could in her husband's public work, and she had been popular upon her own merits in Wealdstone. The portrait was abominable enough in itself; it dwelt on her chin, doubled her age, and denied her gentleness, but it was a mere starting-point for the subtle extravagance of The Snicker's poisonous gift.... The thing came upon the bishop suddenly from the book-stall ...
— Soul of a Bishop • H. G. Wells
... Mesty, if I can help it. Oh, dear, how abominable a midshipman's berth is after a long run on shore! I positively must go on deck and look at the shore, if I can do ...
— Mr. Midshipman Easy • Captain Frederick Marryat
... all ballatry, that the lethargy is incurable: nay, some of the Stationers, that had the selling of the First Part of this Poem, because it went not so fast away in the sale, as some of their beastly and abominable trash, (a shame both to our language and nation) have either despitefully left out, or at least carelessly neglected the Epistles to the Readers, and so have cozened the buyers with unperfected books; which these that have undertaken the Second Part, have been forced to amend in the First, for ...
— Minor Poems of Michael Drayton • Michael Drayton
... corner of antiquity to the level of his own intelligence!—when, for example, he discovers in Pythagoras a colleague who is as enthusiastic as himself in arguing about politics. Another racks his brains as to why OEdipus was condemned by fate to perform such abominable deeds—killing his father, marrying his mother. Where lies the blame! Where the poetic justice! Suddenly it occurs to him: OEdipus was a passionate fellow, lacking all Christian gentleness—he even fell into an unbecoming rage when Tiresias called him a monster ...
— On the Future of our Educational Institutions • Friedrich Nietzsche
... once visited thy Hammam and thou entreatedst me with honour and accomplishedst all my needs and I had great pleasure of thee: moreover, thou swarest that thou wouldst take no pay of me, and I love thee with a great love. So tell me how the case standeth between thee and the King and what abominable deed thou hast done with him that he is wroth with thee and hath commanded me that thou shouldst die this foul death." Answered Abu Sir, "I have done nothing, nor weet I of any crime I have committed against him which meriteth this!"—And Shahrazad perceived the dawn of day and ceased ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 9 • Richard F. Burton
... suggestive of crime. All and everything that is city fell violently upon his mind, jarring it, and flashing over his brow all the horror of delirium. His pace quickened, and he longed for wings to rise out of the abominable labyrinth. ...
— Mike Fletcher - A Novel • George (George Augustus) Moore
... their own convents; and this important manifesto closed by soliciting the interposition of the papal see to prevent the ruin, by purifying an order which had given scandal to Christianity, by offences against the public and private peace of society, equally unexampled, habitual, and abominable. In 1758, the representation to the pope was renewed, with additional proofs that the order had determined to usurp every function, and thwart every act of the civil government; that the confessors of the royal family, though dismissed, continued to conspire; that they resisted ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLV. July, 1844. Vol. LVI. • Various
... were no clothes there. "How? There are no clothes?" Don Rocco ordered him to stand on guard before the entrance of the house and went down to look for them himself, in his shirt. Half-way down the stairs he stopped and sniffed. What an abominable odor of pipe was this? Don Rocco, with darkened brow, went on. He went directly to the sitting-room, looked, searched; there was nothing. He returned to the kitchen, his heart beating. A horrid smell, but no clothes. Yes, under the table there was a little ...
— Stories by Foreign Authors: Italian • Various
... doing love God. 'Tis in loving the divine in Man, in me, in you, that we rise to the love of our Maker. And in giving your proofs of the true religion, you speak of the surprising measures of the Christian Faith, enjoining man to acknowledge himself vile, base, abominable, and obliging him at the same time to aspire towards a resemblance of his Maker. Now, I see in this a foreshadowing of the theory of evolution, nay a divine warrant for it. Nor is it the Christian ...
— The Book of Khalid • Ameen Rihani
... busy enough seeing that they did their work well. When things ran smoothly I'd take out a book and study. At night I'd stand before my tent and declaim. I could not read at night. If I lighted a lantern the tent would become alive with abominable insects. So I'd declaim, merely to hear the sound of my voice. Afterward I learned that the coolies looked upon me as a holy man. They believed I was nightly offering prayers to one of my gods. Perhaps I was; the god of reason. In the mornings I used to have to shake my boots. ...
— Parrot & Co. • Harold MacGrath
... but if any reliance can be placed on the reports of our legislative committees, frauds like those alluded to have been carried to a stupendous length. If we mistake not, a bill has been introduced into Congress for the condign punishment of the wretches guilty of these abominable crimes. The offences which have filled Forts Lafayette and Warren with their inmates are venial, compared with the guilt of the man who is willing to fatten on the sufferings of the country and the health and lives of its patriotic defenders. But the evil, enormous as it is, admits ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IX., March, 1862., No. LIII. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics, • Various
... with hundreds of nerves and arteries and forming an impure mansion of nine doors, comprehending also what is for his own good, what those divers combinations are which are productive of good, beholding the abominable conduct of creatures whose natures are characterised by Darkness or Passion or Goodness, O chief of Bharata's race—conduct that is reprehended, in view of its incapacity to acquire Emancipation, ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown
... representative Labour and the Army, because Parliament can only remedy grievances, and that not before years of delay and agitation elapse. Even then the grievances are not dealt with on their merits; for under our party system, which is the most abominable engine for the perversion and final destruction of all political conscience ever devized by man, the House of Commons never votes on any question but whether the Government shall remain in office or give ...
— New York Times, Current History, Vol 1, Issue 1 - From the Beginning to March, 1915 With Index • Various
... consciously, I believe, but still with a contemptible condescension, not of manner but of heart, so delicately refined by the innate sophistry of my selfishness, that the better nature in me called it only fatherly friendship, and did not recognize it as that abominable thing so favoured of all those that especially worship themselves. But I abuse my fault instead of ...
— Annals of a Quiet Neighbourhood • George MacDonald
... give the following narrative in the words of an intimate friend of one of the cases in question: "My attention was first drawn to the study of inversion—though I then regarded all forms of it as depraving and abominable—at a public school, where in our dormitory a boy of 15 initiated his select friends into the secrets of mutual masturbation, which he had learned from his brother, a midshipman. I gave no heed to this at the time, though I remembered it in after-years ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 2 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... reply, a panel in the wainscot slid back and the bald head of a friar peered into the room. "Son Adam," said the holy man, "I crave your company an instant, oro vestrem aurem;" and with this abominable piece of ...
— The Last Of The Barons, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... inn (where the flies set an example of attentiveness the waiters did not follow), pretending to eat macaroni hard as walking-sticks and veal reduced to chiffons, I feared the courage of our employers would fail. They could never, in all their well-ordered American lives, have known anything so abominable as this experience into which we had lured them, promising a pilgrimage of pleasure. But the charmingly dressed beings, who looked like birds of paradise alighted by mistake in a pigsty, made sport of the squalor which we had expected to evoke ...
— My Friend the Chauffeur • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... latter-day prophet so greatly in mere anticipation has partially come to pass. "La Bible Amusante" has had an extensive sale in France, and the infectious irreverence has extended itself to England. Notwithstanding that Mr. G. R. Sims, when he saw the first numbers of that abominable publication, piously turned up the whites of his eyes, and declared his opinion that no English Freethinker, however extreme, would think of reproducing or imitating them, there were found persons so utterly abandoned as not to scruple at this unparalleled profanity. Several of the French drawings ...
— Comic Bible Sketches - Reprinted from "The Freethinker" • George W. Foote
... go home, home, home!" she kept repeating to herself. "I never will see one of those girls again. Oh, dear, dear! If I only hadn't gone on that sleigh-ride; that abominable Mamie Smythe is always getting the girls in trouble: I perfectly detest her. What will ...
— Miss Ashton's New Pupil - A School Girl's Story • Mrs. S. S. Robbins
... of your taste for the country, Mademoiselle, in the most abominable weather, is only equalled by the persistence of your severity towards me. I have written to you from Paris, I have written from Versailles, with equal success—not a word of answer! Whether you want to imitate, or to pay court to our amie [the Prince] I know not, but would gladly know, that I may ...
— Pickle the Spy • Andrew Lang
... I came to do it. I wouldn't have believed I could do it. I've never thought that I had much courage—physical courage; but when I felt my watch was gone, a sort of frenzy came over me. I wasn't hurt; and for the first time in my life I realised what an abominable outrage theft was. The thought that at six o'clock in the evening, in the very heart of a great city like Boston, an inoffensive citizen could be assaulted and robbed, made me furious. I didn't call out. I simply buttoned my coat tight round me and ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... music. At the best of times she had little love of the art, but now, sick with disappointment, and weary from a long railway journey, to spell through the rhythm of the My Queen Waltz and the jangle of L'Esprit Francais was to her an odious and, when the object of it was considered, an abominable duty to perform. She had to keep her whole attention fixed on the page before her, but when she raised her eyes the picture she saw engraved itself on her mind. It was a long time before she could forget Olive's blond, cameo-like profile seen leaning over the old beau's fat shoulder. Mrs. ...
— Muslin • George Moore
... daughter goes in trouble. I should—she has. Fancy you not seeing that—why, Fanny Dover would have told you that much in a moment. But now you will have to thank my mother for teaching me Attention, the parent of Memory. Pray, sir, who were the witnesses to that abominable marriage of hers?" ...
— The Woman-Hater • Charles Reade
... Christian, although as yet he did not confess it; but he was also the most miserable man among the nation of the Sons of Fire. The iniquities of his past life had become abominable to him; but he had committed them in ignorance, and he understood that they were not beyond forgiveness. Yet high above them all towered one colossal crime which, as he believed, could never be pardoned to him in this world or the next. He was the treacherous murderer of the Messenger ...
— The Wizard • H. Rider Haggard
... ideal of lascivious grace, Marino counterposes extravagant forms of ugliness. He loves to describe the loathsome incantations of witches. He shows Falserina prowling among corpses on a battle-field, and injecting the congealed veins of her resuscitated victim with abominable juices. He crowds the Cave of Jealousy with monsters horrible to sight and sense; depicts the brutality of brigands; paints hideous portraits of eunuchs, deformed hags, unnameable abortions. He gloats over cruelty, and revels ...
— Renaissance in Italy, Volumes 1 and 2 - The Catholic Reaction • John Addington Symonds
... who knew her, could treat her in this abominable way, when she had committed no fault except the very human one of desiring to be the arbiter of her own fate, she surely owed no further obedience to them. So she waited calmly for a fresh turn ...
— The Point of View • Elinor Glyn
... writing down such an extravagance, such an ungainly absurdity, (oh, I shall abuse it just as I shall choose!) can it be 'to your surprise?' can it? Ought you to say such things, when in the first place they are unfit in themselves and inapplicable, and in the second place, abominable in my eyes? The qualification for Hanwell Asylum is different peradventure from what you take it to be—we had better not examine it too nearly. You never will say such words again? It is your promise to me? Not those words—and not any in ...
— The Letters of Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett, Vol. 1 (of 2) 1845-1846 • Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett
... Minister Sahib, in similar attire, patronized Vauxhall, Cremorne, and other places of fashionable resort usually frequented by such fast men as they showed themselves to be. Like Jung, he used to say he could not bear the abominable screeching at the Opera, and consequently never made his appearance until the commencement of the ballet, which was much more in ...
— A Journey to Katmandu • Laurence Oliphant
... not or would not touch the abominable brown bread, and, while waiting for the girls to serve the eggs or chops or whatever there was for supper, passed the time in trying to make out the meaning of the chatter and laughter that filled the room with merriment. ...
— My Friends at Brook Farm • John Van Der Zee Sears
... he said merrily, "I deserve that you should leave me to rot in this abominable cage. They haven't got me yet, little woman, you know; I am not yet dead—only d—d sleepy at times. But I'll cheat them even now, ...
— El Dorado • Baroness Orczy
... night. It had been raining for thirty-six hours, and as we stepped into the unlighted hut, my muchacho and I, right away the floor grew sticky and slimy with the mud on our feet, and as we groped about blindly, we seemed ankle-deep in something greasy and abominable like gore. After a while the boy got a torch outside, and as he flared it I caught sight of Miller on his cot, backed up into one corner. He was sitting upright, staring straight ahead and a little down, as if in careful consideration. As I stepped toward him the ...
— The Spinner's Book of Fiction • Various
... was echoed by Joseph, who thought the joke capital. The ladies only smiled a little. They thought poor Rebecca suffered too much. She would have liked to choke old Sedley, but she swallowed her mortification as well as she had the abominable curry before it, and as soon as she could speak, said, with a comical, good-humoured air, "I ought to have remembered the pepper which the Princess of Persia puts in the cream-tarts in the Arabian Nights. Do you put cayenne into ...
— Vanity Fair • William Makepeace Thackeray
... and are sensible of a colder nip in the January night-air as we emerge from it into the neighboring streets. But even there, though the racket gradually becomes less as we leave the piazza behind us, there is in every street the braying of those abominable tin trumpets, and we shall probably turn wearily in our beds at three or four in the morning and thank Heaven that the Befana visits us but ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, April, 1876. • Various
... revolutionary committees. Poor liberty, thou art not in this world!... The abuse of power preached and practised by the revolutionaries revolted Christophe and Olivier. They had little regard for the blacklegs who refuse to suffer for the common cause. But it seemed abominable to them that the others should claim the right to use force against them.—And yet it is necessary to take sides. Nowadays the choice in fact lies not between imperialism and liberty, but between one imperialism and ...
— Jean-Christophe Journey's End • Romain Rolland
... accuser of the British army. He who sits in that box accuses the whole British army in India. He has declared them to be so tainted with peculation, from head to foot, as to have been induced to commit the most wicked perjuries, for the purpose of bearing one another out in their abominable peculations. In this unnatural state of things, and whilst there is not one military man on these stations of whom Mr. Hastings does not give this abominably flagitious character, yet every one of them have joined to give him the benefit of their testimony for his honorable ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. XI. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... Paranoya? Have you ever been there? Have you the remotest idea what sort of life a King of Paranoya leads? I have tried it, and I can assure you that a coal-heaver is happy by comparison. In the first place, the climate of the country is abominable. I always had a cold in the head. Secondly, there is a small but energetic section of the populace whose sole recreation it seems to be to use their monarch as a target for bombs. They are not very good bombs, it is true, but one in, say, ten explodes, and ...
— A Man of Means • P. G. Wodehouse and C. H. Bovill
... mounted, ride their horse to death. 'Tis beauty, that doth oft make women proud; But, God he knows, thy share thereof is small. 'Tis virtue that doth make them most admired; The contrary doth make thee wondered at. 'Tis government that makes them seem divine, The want thereof makes thee abominable. ...
— Characteristics of Women - Moral, Poetical, and Historical • Anna Jameson
... taunt—as though I were the common interrogation mark, the abuser of hospitality, the abominable Paul Pry. But I held my ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... unto you all my servants the prophets, rising early and sending them, saying, Oh, do not this abominable thing ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Isaiah and Jeremiah • Alexander Maclaren
... absolutely the most damnably mischievous thing I have seen for years, and this abominable sheet is featuring it on the Women's Page. They will all read it—and be infected. Women are such utterly unreasonable ...
— Purple Springs • Nellie L. McClung
... and Solomon truly had many wives and concubines, which thing was abominable before me, saith the Lord. ... Wherefore hearken to the word of the Lord: There shall not any man among you have save it be one wife, and concubines he shall have none; for I, the Lord God, delight in ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, No. 19, May, 1859 • Various
... sins, such as incendiarism, theft, adultery, witchcraft, and so forth, were expected to contribute 28 ngugas, or a little over 2. The money thus collected was taken into the interior of the country and expended in the purchase of two sickly persons "to be offered as a sacrifice for all these abominable crimes—one for the land and one for the river." A man from a neighbouring town was hired to put them to death. On the twenty-seventh of February 1858 the Rev. J. C. Taylor witnessed the sacrifice ...
— The Golden Bough - A study of magic and religion • Sir James George Frazer
... reckless men would assuredly have called in the nearest clergyman, and have married your large family on the spot. GENERAL: I thank you for your proffered solace, but it is unavailing. I assure you, Frederic, that such is the anguish and remorse I feel at the abominable falsehood by which I escaped these easily deluded pirates, that I would go to their simple-minded chief this very night and confess all, did I not fear that the consequences would be most disastrous to myself. ...
— The Complete Plays of Gilbert and Sullivan - The 14 Gilbert And Sullivan Plays • William Schwenk Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan
... One of those throbbing, abominable silences whose every second makes a situation worse and ...
— New Faces • Myra Kelly
... relations, and friends joyfully accompanying them; and, when the pile of this hellish sacrifice begins to burn, all the assembled multitude shout and make a noise, that the screams of the tortured living victims may not be heard. This abominable custom is not very much unlike the custom of the Ammonites, who made their children pass through the fire to Moloch, during which they caused certain tabrets or drums to sound, whence the place was called Tophet, signifying a tabret. There is one sect among ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume IX. • Robert Kerr
... Turbulent, this is really abominable it is all your own doing—and if I was Miss Burney I would not bear it!" and much more, till he fairly gave her to understand she had nothing to do with ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madam D'Arblay Volume 2 • Madame D'Arblay
... abominable an act has excited here extreme abhorrence and execration, and all you have already done has elevated the character of our ...
— The Medallic History of the United States of America 1776-1876 • J. F. Loubat
... uncritical. Look at that baby, like a thousand other babies you see every day. It has not a single idiosyncrasy on which anyone above the intellectual level of a cretin could hang an affection. Its porcine eyes twinkle dimly through rolls of fat; it splutters and puffs, and its habits are simply abominable. What a gross home for that life's star, which hath had elsewhere its setting and cometh from afar! The star is quenched in fat; it has exchanged the music of the spheres for a hideous caterwauling! Yet Mrs. Smith loves that child, ...
— Twenty-One Days in India; and, the Teapot Series • George Robert Aberigh-Mackay
... 'Who told you this abominable thing? I suppose she who did it; and then she boasted about it into the bargain. Why didn't you turn her out of the house?' 'How could I?' said Berlioz in broken tones, 'I love her'" ...
— Musicians of To-Day • Romain Rolland
... succession, laden with booty, and the men besmeared with blood! Two hundred and fifty women and several children, were made prisoners, and sent on board different vessels. They were unable to escape with the men, owing to that abominable practice of cramping their feet; several of them were not able to move without assistance. In fact, they might all be said to totter, rather than walk. Twenty of these poor women were sent on board the vessel I was in; they were hauled on board by the hair, and treated in a most savage manner. ...
— The Pirates Own Book • Charles Ellms
... by Mr. Brimberly began to dream, a very evil dream wherein it seemed that for many desperate deeds and crime abominable he was chained and shackled in a dock, and the judge, donning the black cap, sentenced him to be shorn of those adornments, his whiskers. In his dream it seemed that there and then the executioner advanced to his fell work—a bony ...
— The Definite Object - A Romance of New York • Jeffery Farnol
... "I—" here a small wave, noticing that his mouth was open, stepped in. "I wish," he resumed warmly, "as I said in me letter, to have nothing to do with you. I consider that ye've behaved in a manner that can only be described as abominable, and I will thank you to leave ...
— Love Among the Chickens • P. G. Wodehouse
... this abominable attempt against Wully's reputation and life. Jo and his partisans got equally angry, and it was a wise suggestion of ...
— Wild Animals I Have Known • Ernest Thompson Seton
... shaking, upon my hands and knees, and did near totter to my face thrice, so weak gone was I in that moment of terror; and I did have a wickedness of forgetting in that time; for I bared not mine arm, to have the Capsule to a readiness for my death, if that did need to be; and this was an abominable foolishness, and I do shake now when I think upon it; for Death is but a little matter by the side of Destruction; though, in truth, dreadful enough for all. Yet, as it did chance, no harm came to me, and I gat away, as that some wondrous power did cast ...
— The Night Land • William Hope Hodgson
... other. 'But I am quite fond of the Czar, if pity is akin to love. No; but you can't turn round without finding some policeman or other at your elbow—look at them, abominable ironmongery!—ready to put ...
— The Trespasser • D.H. Lawrence
... that the good Doctor was guilty of a certain amount of weakness in listening patiently to all this rant. Not that the rant was very blamable in a lad of eighteen; for have we not all, while we are going through our course of Shelley, talked very much the same abominable stuff, and thought ourselves the grandest fellows upon earth on account of that very length of ear which was patent to all the world save our precious selves; blinded by our self-conceit, and wondering in wrath why everybody was laughing at us? But the truth is, the Doctor was easy ...
— Two Years Ago, Volume I • Charles Kingsley
... Assembly's work which still waited full Parliamentary sanction. All the 58, however, subscribed to that main portion of the Testimony which consisted in an enumeration, and condemnation of certain "abominable errors, damnable heresies, and horrid blasphemies." Among the seventeen members of Assembly so subscribing were Dr. Lazarus Seaman of Allhallows, Bread Street (Milton's native parish), then Prolocutor of the London Provincial Synod; Dr. Gouge of Blackfriars, ex-Prolocutor of ...
— The Life of John Milton Vol. 3 1643-1649 • David Masson
... hidden behind the bushes? Was it a new bird with this unbird-like cry? I was startled. But my friend was smiling at my dismay. She pointed to the crotch of a tree, and there a saucy gray squirrel lay sprawled out flat, uttering his sentiments in this abominable parody on the human baby cry. I believe the first squirrel learned it from some deserted infant, and handed it down as a choice joke upon us all. At any rate this performer was not suffering as his tones would indicate; for seeing that he had an audience more interested than he desired, ...
— Little Brothers of the Air • Olive Thorne Miller
... denominated "Peggy's leg," of the "crackers"—that is, a confection resembling dog biscuit sown with caraway seeds—and, above all, of the "crubeens," which, being interpreted, means "pigs' feet," slightly salted, boiled, cold, wholly abominable. Here also is the three-card trick, demonstrated by a man with the incongruous accent of Whitechapel and a defiant eye, that even through the glaze of the second stage of drunkenness held the audience and yet was 'ware of the disposition of the nine of hearts. Here is the drinking booth, and here ...
— All on the Irish Shore - Irish Sketches • E. Somerville and Martin Ross
... thou can'st C, Mind what I have to say to thee, Thy Strumpet Wh—re abominable, Which thou didst kiss upon a Table, Has made thy ...
— The Merry-Thought: or the Glass-Window and Bog-House Miscellany. Part 1 • Samuel Johnson [AKA Hurlo Thrumbo]
... the adepts in the science to visit him at Champtoce. The messengers he despatched on this mission were two of his most needy and unprincipled dependants, Gilles de Sille and Roger de Bricqueville. The latter, the obsequious panderer to his most secret and abominable pleasures, he had intrusted with the education of his motherless daughter, a child but five years of age, with permission, that he might marry her at the proper time to any person he chose, or to himself if he liked it better. This man entered into ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions - Vol. I • Charles Mackay
... fallen at Salem, Governor Phips took their advice whether or not to proceed. Cotton Mather indited the reply. It thankfully acknowledges "the success which the merciful God has given to the sedulous and assiduous endeavors of our honorable rulers to defeat the abominable witch crafts which have been committed in the country, humbly praying that the discovery of those mysterious and mischievous wickednesses may be perfected. It is pleasant to note, after all, the ...
— History of the United States, Vol. I (of VI) • E. Benjamin Andrews
... he had seen a humorous element in his two abominable bargains; but in the grim presence of his own past things looked differently. The terrible eyes of the high-born woman he had loved and betrayed long ago, when he was still called an honourable gentleman, were upon him now, and he feared her as he had assuredly never feared any man ...
— Stradella • F(rancis) Marion Crawford
... off smiling, and her pretty, childlike eyes became her abominable monkey's eyes again, and then the answer was, suddenly to pull up her petticoats and to show us the lower part of her person. Yes, the magistrate had been quite right. That old woman had been a Cleopatra, a Diana, a Ninon de L'Enclos, and ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume II (of 8) • Guy de Maupassant
... rumpus which prompts a Parisian shopkeeper to take down his shutters on a day of barricade-fighting to get a good view of the corpses of the slain. When Florent returned from Cayenne, Gavard opined that he had got hold of a splendid chance for some abominable trick, and bestowed much thought upon the question of how he might best vent his spleen on the Emperor and Ministers and everyone in office, down to the ...
— The Fat and the Thin • Emile Zola
... drinkable water, which they did not drink without improving it with a few drops of rum. As to dessert, the mango was there with its juicy fruit, which the parrots did not allow to be picked without protesting with their abominable cries. ...
— Dick Sand - A Captain at Fifteen • Jules Verne
... there the orderly tasks, the masterly discipline, the unwearied superintendence and the incessant toil to produce accomplishment of voice; and afterward do not be surprised that the pulpit, the senate, the bar, and the chair of the medical professorship are filled with such abominable drawlers, mouthers, mumblers, clutterers, squeakers, chanters, and mongers in monotony; nor that the schools of singing are constantly sending abroad those great instances of vocal wonder, who draw forth the intelligent curiosity and produce the ...
— The American Union Speaker • John D. Philbrick
... materialistic, they were there reclothed in an abstract and dogmatic idealism—in fact, Marxism in Russia was transformed into a religion. The highly contestable laws of material economics, which usually reduce the chief preoccupations of life to a miserable question of wages or an abominable class-war, there gained the status of a veritable Messianic campaign, and the triumphant revolution, imbued with these dogmas, strove to bring the German paradox to an end, even against the sacred interests of patriotism. The falling away of the working-classes and of the soldiers, which so disconcerted ...
— Modern Saints and Seers • Jean Finot
... issued a proclamation beginning with the declaration, "I have not altered my views on the subject of stealing," reciting rumors of a secret band of desperadoes bound by oath to self-protection, and pledging pardon to any one who would give him any information about "such abominable characters." This exhibition of the heads of a church solemnly protesting that they were opposed to thieving ...
— The Story of the Mormons: • William Alexander Linn
... religion and your property. For the first, my proclamation is a true picture of my mind. He that cannot, as in a glass, see my zeal for the church of England, does not deserve any farther satisfaction, for I declare him willful, abominable, and not good. Some may, perhaps, be startled, and cry, how comes this sudden change? To which I answer, I am a changling, and that's sufficient, I think. But to convince men farther, that I mean what I say, there ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) - Vol. IV • Theophilus Cibber
... find time to read with a tutor, in the midst of all his business,—and this abominable ...
— North and South • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... Prudence Crandall was driven at last to close her interesting school and send her pupils home. Then another town meeting was held, a sort of glorification, justifying themselves, and praising their Legislature for passing the law for which they asked. All this abominable outrage I well remember, and am glad to see it called up in Scribner's Magazine for December, 1880. A scathing denunciation of the outrage was published in the Boston Liberator, ...
— A Woman's Life-Work - Labors and Experiences • Laura S. Haviland
... mean large, ripe, well-cured beans. By indifferent I mean unripe and unfermented. By abominable I mean germinated, mouldy, and grubby beans. Happily, the last class is quite ...
— Cocoa and Chocolate - Their History from Plantation to Consumer • Arthur W. Knapp
... joined by the workmen at the foot of the ladder-way up the cliff. All three of the men pelted them with stones for a time, and then hurried to the cliff top and along the path towards Sidmouth, to secure assistance and a boat, and to rescue the desecrated body from the clutches of these abominable creatures. ...
— The Country of the Blind, And Other Stories • H. G. Wells
... going to the island of Mindanao. Many were killed, and the few who escaped were wounded and injured. The second point is that, in addition to what has been said about this nation, they have unchaste, shameless, and abominable ways of life and customs. Besides having enough proof and experience to be able to say this, I certify to the truth of having heard this from a religious—a man very zealous in the service of our Lord and a minister who has charge of the Sangleys at present. ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 - Volume IX, 1593-1597 • E. H. Blair
... honour of walking a polonaise with no other than the Margravine of Bayreuth, old Fritz's own sister: old Fritz's, whose hateful blue-baize livery I had worn, whose belts I had pipeclayed, and whose abominable rations of small beer and sauerkraut I ...
— Barry Lyndon • William Makepeace Thackeray
... Wine Table, the whole livelong night. Is it to be wondered that there are such vast numbers of our population who are the votaries of Vice and Dissipation? No, certainly not, and I do not believe there ever will be less of this wickedness while a man practising these abominable vices (in what is called a gentlemanly manner) is suffered to sit at the head of ...
— The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 1 of 2) • Ida Husted Harper
... let themselves go. And the Roofers, who worshiped Lily, in spite of her abominable tricks, raised their glasses to her health, crowded round her, smiled merrily at her with their white teeth, congratulated her for ...
— The Bill-Toppers • Andre Castaigne
... Parflete," he said quietly. "Don't despair. Your marriage with him may be annulled. That aspect of the question is revolting, abominable; but we are both in such a false position now that we owe it as much to other people as we do to ourselves to put everything in a true light. You are so ...
— Robert Orange - Being a Continuation of the History of Robert Orange • John Oliver Hobbes
... he teaches what is good, just, and holy; and forbids all wicked and abominable actions ...
— The Life and Most Surprising Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, of - York, Mariner (1801) • Daniel Defoe
... the treatment abominable, believed that the matter occupied the mind of the Foreign Office night and day, and would be glad personally to subscribe to any relief fund. The good man declared himself satisfied, and St. Sebastian breathed ...
— The Half-Hearted • John Buchan
... forefathers had no other books but the score and the tally, thou hast caused printing to be used, and, contrary to the king, his crown, and dignity, thou hast built a paper-mill. It will be proved to thy face that thou hast men about thee that usually talk of a noun and a verb, and such abominable words as no Christian ear can endure to hear. Thou hast appointed justices of peace, to call poor men before them about matters they were not able to answer. Moreover, thou hast put them in prison, and because they could not read, thou ...
— King Henry VI, Second Part • William Shakespeare [Rolfe edition]
... was consistent in his devotion to the interests of the freed, men, but he would have been more true to himself if he had been willing to recognize, as the more reasonable anti-slavery people did, how absurd and even abominable, were the negro governments in the southern states; but he had long since lost his good judgment, and when President Hayes removed the troops for whose maintenance he could obtain no appropriation from Congress, and the pyramid which had been so long ...
— Sketches from Concord and Appledore • Frank Preston Stearns
... with which they share their homes, the subject appeared to be a most ghastly one. I know that it represented an attempted murder first of all, and then the burial alive of the victim and his struggling from the grave; each act of the abominable drama, which was carried on in perfect silence, being rounded off and finished with a furious and most revolting dance round the supposed victim, who writhed upon the ground in the ...
— She • H. Rider Haggard
... confidence. And, if it won't disappoint you, I hope we won't have to go by Burgos, although they say the cathedral's one of the finest in the world, for if the road's as bad as rumour paints it, it must be abominable." ...
— The Car of Destiny • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson |
