"Ago" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... daughter!" he said, without looking up. "This is the twentieth day of the fourth month. To-day, five years ago, my Rachel, thy mother, fell down and died. They brought me home broken as thou seest me, and we found her dead of grief. Oh, to me she was a cluster of camphire in the vineyards of En-Gedi! I have gathered my myrrh with ...
— Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ • Lew Wallace
... she thought of the meeting with Antony, now close at hand; for Charmian had gone with the Nubian to invite him to join her again. They had started several hours ago, and she awaited their return with increasing impatience. She had summoned him for their last mutual battle. That he would come she did not doubt. But could she succeed in rekindling his courage? Two persons so closely allied should sink ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... fallen victims on the same day to the plague, the only pestilence that had visited this bright coast within the memory of man. This had happened eight years ago. ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... hour ago," Maria explained, "and Zerkow wasn't in bed; maybe he hadn't come to bed at all. He was down on his knees by the sink, and he'd pried up some boards off the floor and was digging there. He had his dark-lantern. He was digging with that knife, I guess, and all the time he kept mumbling to himself, ...
— McTeague • Frank Norris
... in the statement made by one of his best friends, Professor Weber,[6] who, some ten years ago, when reproving Professor Whitney for the acrimony of his ...
— Chips from a German Workshop - Volume IV - Essays chiefly on the Science of Language • Max Muller
... the world, far and near, heerd o' King O'Toole—well, well, but the darkness of mankind is ontellible! Well, sir, you must know, as you didn't hear it afore, that there was a king, called King O'Toole, who was a fine ould king in the ould ancient times, long ago; and it was him that owned the churches in the early days. The king, you see, was the right sort; he was the rale boy, and loved sport as he loved his life, and huntin' in partic'lar; and from the risin' o' the sun, up he got, and away he wint over the mountains beyant ...
— Children's Literature - A Textbook of Sources for Teachers and Teacher-Training Classes • Charles Madison Curry
... which made me anxious to know who was living in this house, and here to-day that dream has again come back to my memory!" The priest laughed, and said, "A strange dream! even were you to obtain your wish it might not gratify you. The late Lord Azechi Dainagon died long ago, and perhaps you know nothing about him. Well! his widow is my sister, and since her husband's death her health has not been satisfactory, so lately she has ...
— Japanese Literature - Including Selections from Genji Monogatari and Classical - Poetry and Drama of Japan • Various
... illustrator is even more rare than the cat painters. Thousands of readers recall those wonderfully lifelike cats and kittens which were a feature of the St. Nicholas a few years ago, accompanied by "nonsense rhymes" or "jingles." They were the work of Joseph G. Francis, of Brookline, Mass., and brought him no little fame. He was, and is still, a broker on State Street, Boston, and in his busy life these inimitable cat ...
— Concerning Cats - My Own and Some Others • Helen M. Winslow
... was only a few days ago that you told me you had done all you were going to do about Blackford; you gave me to understand that you washed your hands of him. You're nervous and excited,—very unnecessarily excited,—and I insist that you go back to bed. I'll call ...
— A Hoosier Chronicle • Meredith Nicholson
... for judging you, sir, without knowing all the facts. But this volume was published over a year ago. My boy never heard these chapel talks. I take it that there has been nothing said about betting here ...
— The High Calling • Charles M. Sheldon
... brought here by a constable this afternoon ... helpless ... intoxication.... Did your wife ... is she addicted to drink?' I may have nodded. 'There was a pawnticket in the name of Freydon.... She passed away less than an hour ago.... The condition ... heart undoubtedly accelerated ... alcoholism ... a very short time, in any case.... Medically, an inquest would be quite unnecessary, but.... Will you come ...
— The Record of Nicholas Freydon - An Autobiography • A. J. (Alec John) Dawson
... the habbey uppards of a hour ago," the footman answered, with supreme hauteur; "but he left a message for you, in case you was to come. The period of his habsence is huncertain, and if you wants to kermoonicate with him, you was to please to wait till ...
— Henry Dunbar - A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... the English are still a very serious people, not disposed to laugh nearly so much as are the men of the more sympathetic Latin races. You will remember perhaps Lord Chesterfield's saying that since he became a man no man had ever seen him laugh. I remember about twenty years ago that there was published by some Englishman a very learned and very interesting little book, called "The Philosophy of Laughter," in which it was gravely asserted that all laughter was foolish. I must acknowledge, however, that no book ...
— Books and Habits from the Lectures of Lafcadio Hearn • Lafcadio Hearn
... that, last Sunday, in the ring? I'm sorry Mopsa breaks so fast; I said her face would never last, Corinna with that youthful air, Is thirty, and a bit to spare. Her fondness for a certain earl Began, when I was but a girl. Phyllis, who but a month ago Was married to the Tunbridge beau, I saw coquetting t'other night In public ...
— The Battle of the Books - and Other Short Pieces • Jonathan Swift
... little more than marking time, but now that at last days of peace have come again, we feel that the future holds prospects of great promise to us. For one reason or another the men whose names were known ten or fifteen years ago seem to have dropped out and their places are being filled by new blood, men with high ideals and aspirations, who are not content merely with reproducing, by means of their cameras, pretty scenes and places, but who believe that photography is capable of much more—of showing not only the ...
— Pictorial Photography in America 1920 • Pictorial Photographers of America
... to Africa—that was three years ago. Word came that he was drowned off the coast of Madagascar, but there is nothing sure, and the woman would not believe that he was dead unless she saw him so or some one she could trust had seen him buried. Yet people call her a widow—who wears no mourning" ...
— An Unpardonable Liar • Gilbert Parker
... "Snob".—I think that Snob is not an archaism, and that it cannot be found in any book printed fifty years ago. I am aware that in the north of England shoe-makers are still sometimes called Snobs; but the word is not in Brockett's Glossary of North Country Words, which is against its being a genuine bit of ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 16, February 16, 1850 • Various
... appointed by me several days ago, has made a critical examination of the stranded vessels, both with a view of reporting upon the result of our fire and the military features involved, and of reporting upon the chance of saving any of them, and ...
— The Boys of '98 • James Otis
... she supposed he might, and then she cuffed young Ted's ears for making a noise while 'e was eating, and then cuffed 'im agin for saying that he'd finished 'is supper five minutes ago. ...
— Captains All and Others • W.W. Jacobs
... who spoke some time ago, and whose abilities and qualities are such, that I cannot but esteem and admire him, even when conviction obliges me to oppose him, has proposed a case in which he seems to imagine that a murderer might secure himself from punishment, by ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, Vol. 11. - Parlimentary Debates II. • Samuel Johnson
... her tears: the neighbours round Called her "the lady of the happy marriage." She died long since, I doubt not.' Forward stepped A slight, pale maid, the daughter of a bard, And answered thus: 'Two months ago she died.' Then Cuthbert: 'Tell me, maiden, of her death; And see you be not chary of your words, For well I loved that woman.' Tears unfelt Fast streaming down her pallid cheek, the maid Replied—yet often paused: 'A sad, sweet ...
— Legends of the Saxon Saints • Aubrey de Vere
... had thirty years ago concerning the coup of Brumaire. It was regarded as a crime committed by the ambition of a man who was supported by his army. As a matter of fact the army played no part whatever in the affair. The little body of men who expelled the ...
— The Psychology of Revolution • Gustave le Bon
... At the top are larger statues of horses, standing on lofty pedestals, with men by the side of them, holding them by the bridles. These are ancient statues. They were found buried up in rubbish in an obscure quarter of Rome, about two hundred years ago. Beyond, you see other groups of colossal statuary raised on lofty pedestals in various parts of the great square which forms the ...
— Rollo in Rome • Jacob Abbott
... announced the shipowner's son. "Don't you remember me? You used to think the world and all of me some years ago, when you lived ...
— Dave Porter At Bear Camp - The Wild Man of Mirror Lake • Edward Stratemeyer
... more ago, in a small settlement on the banks of the Connecticut,—which means the Long River of Pines,—there lived a little girl called Matty Kilburn. On a hill stood the fort where the people ran for protection in any danger, ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. V, August, 1878, No 10. - Scribner's Illustrated • Various
... championship of his friends, and the commendations of Mason, the friend of Gray, we infer that Whitehead was not destitute of fine social qualities. His verse, which is of the only type current a century ago, is elegantly smooth, and wearisomely tame,—nowhere rising into striking or original beauties. Among his merits as a poet modesty was not. His "Charge to the Poets," published in 1762, drew upon ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 11, September, 1858 • Various
... 89, 17-19) of the upheaval of islands of eruption: "The heaving of the earth does not cease till the wind [(Greek word)] which occasions the shocks has made its escape into the crust of the earth. It is not long ago since this actually happened at Heraclea in Pontus, and a similar event formerly occurred at Hiera, one of the Aeolian Islands. A portion of the earth swelled up, and with loud noise rose into the form of a hill, till the mighty urging blast [(Greek word)] found an outlet, ...
— COSMOS: A Sketch of the Physical Description of the Universe, Vol. 1 • Alexander von Humboldt
... some period of time not yet fully past, as this week, this year. As to the completeness of the action, there is no difference; for what has been done to-day, is as completely done, as what was achieved a year ago. Hence it is obvious that the term Imperfect has no other applicability to the English tense so called, than what it may have derived from the participle in ing, which we use in translating the Latin imperfect tense: as, Dormiebam, I was sleeping; ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... artifice, seeming to express a most lively contentment during the very days when he had decided to leave and was asking himself where he should next abide. One of his delights was to return to a house which he had quitted years ago, to behold the excitement and bustle occasioned by his appearance, and play the good-natured autocrat over grovelling dependents. In every case, save the two already mentioned, he had parted with his landlady on terms of friendliness, never vouchsafing a reason for ...
— Victorian Short Stories of Troubled Marriages • Rudyard Kipling, Ella D'Arcy, Arthur Morrison, Arthur Conan Doyle,
... yet forgotten the first apiary I saw, where I learned to love the bees. It was many years ago, in a large village of Dutch Flanders, the sweet and pleasant country whose love for brilliant colour rivals that of Zealand even, the concave mirror of Holland; a country that gladly spreads out before us, as so many pretty, thoughtful toys, her illuminated gables, and waggons, and towers; ...
— The Life of the Bee • Maurice Maeterlinck
... we succeed," said the tall Cointet. "Old Sechard was here only a day or two ago; he came to ask us some questions as to paper-making. The old miser has got wind of his son's invention; he wants to turn it to his own account, so there is some hope of a partnership. You are with the ...
— Eve and David • Honore de Balzac
... Shenac for a month's visit when they went home. They succeeded too, though Shenac declared and believed it to be impossible that she should leave home, even up to the day before they went. The change did her a great deal of good. She came back much more like the Shenac of two years ago than she had seemed for a long time; and, as spring drew on, she could look forward to the labours of another summer without the miserable misgivings that had so vexed her in the fall. Indeed, now that Hamish was well, whether Dan came home or not, she felt sure of success, ...
— Shenac's Work at Home • Margaret Murray Robertson
... the place I was speaking of," said Flemming, as the boatmen rested on their oars. "The melancholy and singular event it commemorates happened more than two centuries ago. There was a bridal party here upon the ice one winter; and in the midst of the dance the ice broke, and the whole merry company were drowned together, except the fiddlers, who ...
— Hyperion • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
... and try make myself useful and cheerful and contented, as it ain't never no use crying for spilt milk; and, then, I reckon as I can't get any of my money out'n that man—Lord! why, he's gambled it all away long a-merry-ago! I'll just go back to Wild Cats', and open a miners' boarding house! The boys won't let me want! And I s'pose by the time I make another pile my rascal will be coming back to me, to get hold of it! For that's the way they all do! But just let him, that's all! The boys would give him ...
— Her Mother's Secret • Emma D. E. N. Southworth
... assuming a negligent attitude. His forehead was red. "Nope," he said. No one had seen him. "She saw me this morning," he thought, and the red of his forehead came down to his cheeks. "It's getting worse; a regular habit. Let me see—two, three; it began three weeks ago——" ...
— The Trimming of Goosie • James Hopper
... with the shadow of her scruple, to explain. "We're many of us, we're most of us—as you long ago saw and showed you felt—extraordinary now. We can't help it. It isn't really our fault. There's so much else that's extraordinary that if we're in it all so much we must naturally be." It was all obviously clearer to her than ever yet, and her sense of it found ...
— The Awkward Age • Henry James
... obtaining an enormously valuable strategic point in the rich province of Shangtung aroused the cupidity of rival nations, and they threw off all pretense to decency in their scramble for further territories. Russian statesmen had long ago seen that the Pacific Ocean was to be the arena of world events of colossal significance to the race. We have noted in a former chapter how she had already extended her territory till she touched the Pacific Ocean on the far ...
— An Inevitable Awakening • ARTHUR JUDSON BROWN
... a "permission" about three weeks ago and had beautiful visions of peace and content for a week, but was called back immediately at the beginning of this horrible attack. Things look bad, and in a few days we are ...
— America's War for Humanity • Thomas Herbert Russell
... greater than Havana," he began. "It is on the south-west coast of Luzon, 650 miles from Hong-Kong, which is a run of about forty-seven hours for the ship. It is located on both sides of the little river Pasig, which is the outlet of Lake Bahia, or the Lake of the Bay. When I was here many years ago, I spoke Spanish enough to get along; but I shall leave the language now to the professor and Mr. Belgrave, for ...
— Four Young Explorers - Sight-Seeing in the Tropics • Oliver Optic
... coax him out of it, he said it was for my good, and he wanted to see after his business in Peru. I put him in mind how dear granny had begged him to stay at home; but he told me I knew nothing about it, and that he would have gone long ago if I had not been an obstinate girl, and had known how to play my cards. I said something about going home, but that made him more furious than ever. But, after all, it is not fair to tell all about the last few months. Dr. ...
— Dynevor Terrace (Vol. II) • Charlotte M. Yonge
... not say all this to him, all this and more? Did you not drive him from your presence and employ with bitter scorn, when two weeks ago he ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 2 August 1848 • Various
... the light of the stars shining in through that wonderful plate glass skylight of yours, Mr. Spencer," he went on. "A few moments ago when the moon shone through I could hear it, like the rumble of a passing cart. I knew it was the moon both because I could see that it must be shining in and because I recognised the sound. The sun would thunder like a passing express-train ...
— The Dream Doctor • Arthur B. Reeve
... enmity between the Bonny and the New Calabar people, arising principally out of their rivalship in the trade with foreign vessels. A short time ago, they had a fight on board an English ship, under the ...
— A Voyage Round the World, Vol. I (of ?) • James Holman
... of a little while ago dissolved, the ease which followed her descent from the witness-chair vanished. She plucked at her dark vestments with trembling hands, her lips half open, her burning eyes on Joe's unmoved face. If he should tell before all these ...
— The Bondboy • George W. (George Washington) Ogden
... playing was related to me by a gentleman at the little village of Inkpen, near the Beacon, in Berkshire. He told me that when it happened, a good many years ago, he sent an account of it to the "Field." His gamekeeper took him one day "to see a strange thing," to a spot in the woods where a fox had a litter of four cubs, near a long, smooth, green slope. A little distance ...
— A Shepherd's Life • W. H. Hudson
... soon monopolize a large extent of country, to the extinction of other plants, as they have done in parts of the American prairies, and as they did in Australia, till a most stringent Act of Parliament was passed about twenty years ago, imposing heavy penalties upon all who neglected to destroy the Thistles on their land. For these reasons we cannot admit the Thistle into the garden, at least not our native Thistles; but there are some foreigners which may well be admitted. There are the handsome ...
— The plant-lore & garden-craft of Shakespeare • Henry Nicholson Ellacombe
... all this, it is a difficult and critical situation. Still, by almost universal admission it has lost the tension that strained India two or three months ago, and public feeling is tranquillised, certainly beyond any expectation that either I or the Viceroy ventured ...
— Indian speeches (1907-1909) • John Morley (AKA Viscount Morley)
... Yes; and I had seen no fire except of my own kindling since the night that Inyati had died . . . months months surely it must have been years ago? ...
— A Rip Van Winkle Of The Kalahari - Seven Tales of South-West Africa • Frederick Cornell
... distinction between myself and the Dean, lies one reason which prompted the present writing. A second purpose of this paper is, to make the reader acquainted circumstantially with three memorable cases of murder, which long ago the voice of amateurs has crowned with laurel, but especially with the two earliest of the three, viz., the immortal Williams' murders of 1812. The act and the actor are each separately in the highest degree interesting; and, as forty-two ...
— The Notebook of an English Opium-Eater • Thomas de Quincey
... you were a traitor five minutes ago, and I make you the savior of your country. Now, go quickly, for I am in a hurry. The ...
— The Forty-Five Guardsmen • Alexandre Dumas
... arrived in town five or six days ago. I had just taken a lodging in the verge of the court, and had writ my dear Amelia word where she might find me, when she had settled her affairs in the best manner she could. That very evening, as I was returning ...
— Amelia (Complete) • Henry Fielding
... out yesterday for Mount Vernon, according to an arrangement of some time ago. General Knox is setting out for Massachusetts, and I am thinking to go to Virginia in some days. When and where we shall re-assemble, will depend on the ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... Many years ago diplomatic intervention became necessary to the protection of the interests in the American claim of Alsop and Company against the Government of Chile. The Government of Chile had frequently admitted ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... governed by Orsino, a duke noble in nature as well as dignity. Viola said, she had heard her father speak of Orsino, and that he was unmarried then. 'And he is so now,' said the captain; 'or was so very lately, for, but a month ago, I went from here, and then it was the general talk (as you know what great ones do, the people will prattle of) that Orsino sought the love of fair Olivia, a virtuous maid, the daughter of a count who died twelve ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles and Mary Lamb
... that you will remember and pity me, and I dare hope that you will assist me; what other hope have I? Pardon my manner of writing, I am so bewildered. A month ago my dear mother was deprived of the use of her limbs. She is already better, and in another month would I am sure be able to travel, in the way you were so kind as to say you would arrange for us. But now everybody is gone—everybody—as they went ...
— The Last Man • Mary Shelley
... history of the 'Home-wreck,' whose effects I witnessed in my visit to Coote-down. Since then, however, things have materially changed. A very short time ago, I received notice that the heroine of the above events had sunk into the grave, leaving most of her property to my cousin and fascinating cicerone, who is now happily married. By this time the estate has resumed its former fertility, and the house ...
— Tales for Young and Old • Various
... 1862.—Just as I was rising this morning I received intelligence that poor Quthray, the young cannibal chief, was dying. I have frequently visited him during his illness, and was with him for a long time a few nights ago. As he has long and earnestly desired baptism, and expressed in such clear terms his repentance for his sins, and his faith in the Saviour of sinners, I told him that I would myself baptize him before he died, unless a minister ...
— Metlakahtla and the North Pacific Mission • Eugene Stock
... I was talking a bit ago like some old woman, I suppose. Well, part of a soldier's duty is to take care. Steady you, sir, and don't splash the water up like that," the old soldier continued softly to the pony whose head he held. "It's all very nice for you, and I dare say the water feels nice ...
— Marcus: the Young Centurion • George Manville Fenn
... would fain know upon what account you can imagine that wine is cold. Then, said I, do you believe this to be my opinion? Yes, said he, whose else? And I replied: I remember a good while ago I met with a discourse of Aristotle's upon this very question. And Epicurus, in his Banquet, hath a long discourse, the sum of which is that wine of itself is not hot, but that it contains some atoms that cause heat, and others that cause cold; ...
— Essays and Miscellanies - The Complete Works Volume 3 • Plutarch
... ribbon—and—though mind you, mater, this is not to be put about yet in case it doesn't come off—but there's a strong rumour round here that the Governor's to have a division! Haig was awfully delighted at the way he handled that business about a month ago—I mean when we downed your old friend Van Drissel. Hope you are not running any more refugees, eh, what? Now be at the station to meet us, and if you like to kiss Hawke, you may. He's saved my life more ...
— With Haig on the Somme • D. H. Parry
... nothing happened; although if you could have seen the two maiden sisters at church on a Sunday morning, you would have noticed that after the benediction they seemed to be praying very earnestly indeed—even as Sarah prayed in the temple so many years ago. There was this curious difference, however: Sarah had prayed for herself, but these two innocent spinsters ...
— Mary Minds Her Business • George Weston
... rock, and above that, where the tubes opened, the great expanse that no living being had seen for eight years, the vast, endless ruin that had once been Man's home, the place where he had lived, eight years ago. ...
— The Defenders • Philip K. Dick
... was a plain vineyard when it came into my hands not two years ago, and it is, with a small expense, turned into a garden that (apart from the advantage of the climate) I like better than that of Kensington. The Italian vineyards are not planted like those in France, but in clumps, fastened to trees planted in equal ranks ...
— Lady Mary Wortley Montague - Her Life and Letters (1689-1762) • Lewis Melville
... the copy of the "Anecdotes" presented by her to Sir James Fellowes in 1816 is:—"I heard these verses sung at Mr. Thomas's by three voices not three weeks ago." ...
— Autobiography, Letters and Literary Remains of Mrs. Piozzi (Thrale) (2nd ed.) (2 vols.) • Mrs. Hester Lynch Piozzi
... answered. 'The owner did come here once, some twenty years ago. But he was so scared by the sight of this adders' nest that he has never turned up since. The real master is the caretaker, that old oddity, Jeanbernat, who has managed to find quarters in a lodge where the stones still hang together. There it is, ...
— Abbe Mouret's Transgression - La Faute De L'abbe Mouret • Emile Zola
... fo' year ago, mother she went back to France, t'her folks there; she never could stan' this country—an' lef' us boys to manage the place. Hec, he took charge the firs' year an' run it in debt. Placide an' me ...
— At Fault • Kate Chopin
... you would have done long ago if you had been a good soldier, but I reckon he's coming without waiting to be called," observed Dixon, as an imperious knock, followed by the command to "open up here, immediately," was heard at the trapdoor. "Now, Rodney, don't let's have any more ...
— True To His Colors • Harry Castlemon
... breeches, and blue stockings. This too was the aera of black silk breeches; an extraordinary novelty against which "some frowsy people attempted to raise up worsted in emulation." A satirical writer has described a buck about forty years ago;[67] one could hardly have suspected such a gentleman to have been one of our contemporaries. "A coat of light green, with sleeves too small for the arms, and buttons too big for the sleeves; a pair of Manchester ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli
... counted for the 'South' in the division that impends, for where is the heart in St. Louis bold enough, or the hand strong enough, to resist the swelling tide of pro-slavery fanaticism that was about to engulf the State? Years ago, when it was but a ripple on the surface, it had overborne Benton, with all his fame of thirty years' growth. What leader of slighter mold and lesser fame could now resist the coming shock? In tracing the origin and growth of rebellion in Missouri, it is interesting to gather up all the ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. I., No. IV., April, 1862 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... 'said' beknow: The wine of day-dawn drunk with joyous throng * From house of Reason garreth Grief to go: The man of Kays aye loved his wine right well * And from his lips made honey'd verse to flow; And in like guise[FN285] came Isa singing sweet * For such was custom of the long-ago. ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton
... said Cricket, blushing and apologising. "It was as much as three years ago. I haven't answered your question yet, Eunice. I b'lieve I don't want to be a pig, after all, for in the fall the farmer has a teakettle, and sells his pigs, and I'd have to go to the butcher and be killed, and be ...
— Cricket at the Seashore • Elizabeth Westyn Timlow
... something incomprehensible about a pilgrimage. "Sooner or later," I say, "you will have to believe there are two of us with the same thumb-mark. I won't trouble you with any apparent nonsense about other planets and so forth again. Here I am. If I was in Norway a few days ago, you ought to be able to trace my journey hither. And ...
— A Modern Utopia • H. G. Wells
... neighbours, the delight of the old 'mater,' the intelligence—"A ten-pound rise all at once from Antrobus, mater. Whad d'yer think of that?" or again, the first whispering of love, dainty and witty and tender, to the girl he served a few days ago with sateen, or a gallant rescue of generalised beauty in distress from ...
— The Wheels of Chance - A Bicycling Idyll • H. G. Wells
... lagoon-channels round mountainous islands have not in every instance been long ago filled up with coral and sediment; but it is more easily accounted for than appears at first sight. In cases like that of Hogoleu and the Gambier Islands, where a few small peaks rise out of a great lagoon, the conditions scarcely differ from those of an atoll, and I have already ...
— Coral Reefs • Charles Darwin
... automobile, made inexpensive enough for families of average income and provided with that great innovation, the self-starter, changed it all. This was not so very long ago. Approximately with the World War came the moderate-priced car that need not be cranked by hand. Driving it was no longer a sporting male occupation too often marred by broken arms and sprained wrists, the painful outcome of hand-cranking when the motor "back-fired." ...
— If You're Going to Live in the Country • Thomas H. Ormsbee and Richmond Huntley
... Monniera, Rumex, Dentella, three or four Cyperaceae, Ammannia, Crotalaria on sand banks, Triga in woods and Bauhinia, Dioscoria, a pretty herbaceous perennial Ardisia, etc. We have not made two miles since breakfasting at Teiyet, about four hours ago. Convolvulus pileatus and dwarf bamboo are common on the low hills. The Lagerstraemia has petals none, or ...
— Journals of Travels in Assam, Burma, Bhootan, Afghanistan and The - Neighbouring Countries • William Griffith
... of the Crimea, I expect. They used this kind of thing sixty years ago. It's a muzzle ...
— On Land And Sea At The Dardanelles • Thomas Charles Bridges
... know, not a fortnight ago, How they bragg'd of a Western Wonder? When a hundred and ten slew five thousand men, With the help ...
— Poetical Works of Edmund Waller and Sir John Denham • Edmund Waller; John Denham
... that served King George—yet I turned on Walter Butler as a Mohawk might turn upon a Delaware, scornfully questioning his credentials, demanding his right to speak as one who had heard the roll-call of those Immortals who founded the "Great Peace" three hundred years ago. ...
— The Reckoning • Robert W. Chambers
... roots are reached by it, Time, getting at him who says, "This I will do today but this other act I will do tomorrow" sweeps him away. Time sweeps away one and men exclaim, "I saw him a little while ago. How has he died?" Wealth, comforts, rank, prosperity, all fall a prey to Time. Approaching every living creature, Time snatches away his life. All things that proudly raise their heads high are destined to fall down. ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown
... Maria Theresa the elder of them, born 1717,—the prettiest little maiden in the world;—no son to inherit Kaiser Karl. Under which circumstances Kaiser Karl produced now, in the Year 1724, a Document which he had executed privately as long ago as 1713, only his Privy Councillors and other Official witnesses knowing of it then; [19th April, 1713 (Stenzel, iii. 5222).] and solemnly publishes it to the world, as a thing all men are to take notice of. All men had notice enough of this Imperial bit ...
— History Of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Volume V. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... generally an abominable sham that I have often amused myself by diabolically devising plans for its destruction. On this occasion I very nearly came to grief myself. The same thing happened to me some time ago—about forty years, I should say,—and I perceive that it has not been forgotten. It may amuse you to look at this paper, which I chance to have with me. Good-morning. I leave for St. ...
— A Roman Singer • F. Marion Crawford
... assumes his people to believe, that the Hollenzollern monarch is specially chosen by Heaven to guide and govern a folk entrusted to him as the talent was entrusted to the steward in Scripture. Until 1848, a little over sixty years ago, the Emperor (at that time only King of Prussia) was an absolute, or almost absolute, monarch, supported by soldiers and police, and his wishes were practically law to the folk. In that year, however, owing to the influence of the French Revolution, ...
— William of Germany • Stanley Shaw
... happy life mine has been, to be sure, up to a few short months ago—hardly ever an ache or a pain!—my only real griefs, my dear mother's death ten years back, and my father's in 1870. Yes, I have warmed both hands at the fire of life, and even burnt my fingers now and ...
— The Martian • George Du Maurier
... death overtook Sir Hervey two winters ago in Rome, Wark had become so essential a part of Vida's little entourage, that one of the excuses offered by that lady for not going to live with her half-sister in London had been—'Wark doesn't always get on with other servants.' For several years Miss Levering's ...
— The Convert • Elizabeth Robins
... was service. There was service there since the war only every first and third Sunday and every other fifth Sunday. The Uptons and the Duvals had been vestrymen from the time they had brought the bricks over from England, generations ago. They had sat, one family in one of the front semicircular pews on one side the chancel, the other family in the other. Mrs. Upton, after the war, had her choice of the pews; for all had gone but herself, Jim, and Kitty. She had changed, the Sunday after her marriage, to ...
— "Run To Seed" - 1891 • Thomas Nelson Page
... tax. How? Every time a person buys a cigar he pays a U.S. tax. If there be a cigar factory within reach, talk with the proprietor about this matter. Look at a cigar box and a beer keg to find some evidence of the tax paid. Name some things which were taxed a few years ago but are not now. What is a custom house? A port of entry? What are they for? Name the port of entry nearest to you. What is the present income of the United States from all kinds of taxation? What is done with the money? Look up the derivation ...
— Studies in Civics • James T. McCleary
... at her as though he thought her mind was affected. She read his look, and remembering that he did not understand, told him all her father's dread story, how he had told her, not an hour ago, that if anything should happen that she did not take the veil, it would be impossible for him ...
— A Lover in Homespun - And Other Stories • F. Clifford Smith
... been so even amongst us. Many who hear me, perhaps, can recollect well that this truth was not generally admitted, even within their day. The errors of the past generation still clung to many as late as twenty years ago. Those at the North who still cling to these errors, with a zeal above knowledge, we justly denominate fanatics. All fanaticism springs from an aberration of the mind, from a defect in reasoning. It ...
— American Eloquence, Volume IV. (of 4) - Studies In American Political History (1897) • Various
... Vincent, what a perfect darling you are! Don't you perfectly dote on her girls? I fell in love with her years ago when I first met her and I've simply worshiped at her ...
— Peggy Stewart at School • Gabrielle E. Jackson
... is bad. But I do not want to know your story if you do not choose to tell it. It is easy to see that you have had a good education. Keep steady, lad, and you will get on. I might have been a quarter-master years ago if it hadn't been for that. Drink and other things have kept me down; but when I was twenty I was a smart young fellow. Ah! that ...
— The Dash for Khartoum - A Tale of Nile Expedition • George Alfred Henty
... that Burt was a man of vulgar and prosaical mind: but they will scarcely venture to pass a similar judgment on Oliver Goldsmith. Goldsmith was one of the very few Saxons who, more than a century ago, ventured to explore the Highlands. He was disgusted by the hideous wilderness, and declared that he greatly preferred the charming country round Leyden, the vast expanse of verdant meadow, and the ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 3 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... window. Outside, the ever-present Puget Sound rain drove against wall and roof and sidewalk, gathered in wet, glistening pools in the street. Through that same window she had watched Jack Fyfe walk out of her life three months ago without a backward look, sturdily, silently, uncomplaining. He hadn't whined, he wasn't whining now,—only flinging a cheerful word out of the blank spaces of his own life into the blank spaces of hers. Stella felt something warm and wet steal ...
— Big Timber - A Story of the Northwest • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... him. He could boast neither birth, nor talent, nor wit,—nor, indeed, wealth in the ordinary sense of the word. Though he had worked hard all his life at the business to which he belonged, he was a poorer man now than he had been thirty years ago. It had all gone in procuring him a seat in Parliament. And he had so much sense that he never complained. He had known what it was that he wanted, and what it was that he must pay for it. He had paid ...
— Ralph the Heir • Anthony Trollope
... interesting to note that Nikolai Sokoloff, conductor of the San Francisco Philharmonic, returning from a tour of the American and French army camps in France, some time ago, said: "My most popular number was Kreisler's Tambourin Chinois. Invariably I had to repeat that." A strong indorsement of the internationalism of Art by the actual fighter ...
— Violin Mastery - Talks with Master Violinists and Teachers • Frederick H. Martens
... give the ladies an arm, Douw?" said Sir William. "We were walking to see the lilacs I planted a year ago. We old fellows, with so much to say to each other, will lead ...
— In the Valley • Harold Frederic
... help, massed them closely together, and the town ordinances forbade scattering. So the great house, as it must have been for long, stood but a few feet from the old Haverhill and Boston road, surrounded by mighty elms, one of which measured, twenty-five years ago, "sixteen and a half feet in circumference, at one foot above the ground, well deserving of mention in the 'Autocrat's' list of famous trees." The house faces the south, and has a peculiar effect, from being two full stories high in front, and sloping ...
— Anne Bradstreet and Her Time • Helen Campbell
... A few months ago I was on the bare Hill of Allen, "wide Almhuin of Leinster," where Finn and the Fianna lived, according to the stories, although there are no earthen mounds there like those that mark the sites of old buildings ...
— Gods and Fighting Men • Lady I. A. Gregory
... his teeth almost meeting in the mouthpiece of his favourite pipe. He was unaccustomed, too, to witness this weakness on the part of other people. His looks and speech unconsciously discouraged it, so that if Cecilia had been at all that way inclined, she must long ago have been healed. Fortunately, she never had been, having too much distrust of her own feelings to give way to them completely. And Thyme, that healthy product of them both, at once younger for her age, and older, than they had ever been, with her incapacity for nonsense, her ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... this manner. Messrs. Wyatt, Pendril, and Gwilt are the solicitors of the gentleman in whose family Norah was employed. The life which you have chosen for yourself was known as long ago as December last to all the partners. You were discovered performing in public at Derby by the person who had been employed to trace you at York; and that discovery was communicated by Mr. Wyatt to Norah's employer ...
— No Name • Wilkie Collins
... Builders, but they are almost as varied as the individual explorers. Science may yet discover the key which will enable us to form a clear mental conception of the race which flourished here many years ago, and left their crumbling memorials to excite the curiosity ...
— The Prehistoric World - Vanished Races • E. A. Allen
... remembered, also, that the animals which the Scotch law forfeited were escheat to the king. The same thing has remained true in England until well into this century, with regard even to inanimate objects. As long ago as Bracton, /1/ in case a man was slain, the coroner was to value the object causing the death, and that was to be forfeited sa deodand "pro rege." It was to be given to God, that is to say to the Church, for the king, to be expended for the good of his ...
— The Common Law • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
... mother gave me their pictures long ago, and you remember that I once asked you for your father's likeness when I was looking for him. There were some who could aid me if they knew how he looked. Then you know my eye is rather correct, and I spent a good deal of time with the artist. Between us we ...
— Without a Home • E. P. Roe
... without the opportunity of defending himself which he would have in a court of law. "No evidence is necessarily adduced to support it," [26] and in former times, especially in the reign of Henry VIII., it was a formidable engine for perpetrating judicial murders. Bills of attainder long ago ceased to be employed in England, and the process was ...
— Civil Government in the United States Considered with - Some Reference to Its Origins • John Fiske
... sends a curious personal experience, which was shared by him with three other people. He writes as follows: "Not very long ago my wife and I were preparing to retire for the night. A niece, who was in the house, was in her bedroom and the door was open. The maid had just gone to her room. All four of us distinctly heard the heavy step of a man walking along ...
— True Irish Ghost Stories • St John D Seymour
... No Prentice, not a Foreman of a Shop, So that I want extremely new Supplies; Of my last Coxcomb, faith, these were the Prize; And by the tatter'd Ensigns you may know, These Spoils were of a Victory long ago: Who wou'd have thought such hellish Times to have seen, When I shou'd be neglected at Eighteen? That Youth and Beauty shou'd be quite undone, A Pox upon ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn, Vol. II • Aphra Behn
... tributary servitude.[643] Other cases are furnished by the Vanyambo, west of the Victoria Nyassa,[644] and the Djur, who long served the Nubians as smiths.[645] It gives us pleasure to learn that, about sixty years ago, the inferior tribes on Uvea (Tai), of the Loyalty group, revolted against the dominant tribe and nearly ...
— Folkways - A Study of the Sociological Importance of Usages, Manners, Customs, Mores, and Morals • William Graham Sumner
... trying day, Mrs. Tempest complained: in spite of the diversion to painful thought which was continually being offered by the arrival of some interesting item of the trousseau, elegant trifles, ordered ever so long ago, which kept dropping in at the last moment. Violet and her mother had not met during the day, and now night was hurrying on. The owls were hooting in the Forest. Their monotonous cry sounded every now and then through the evening silence like a prophesy of evil. In less than twelve hours ...
— Vixen, Volume II. • M. E. Braddon
... ago, in the most beautiful Garden the world has ever known, lived a man and a woman. Formed in the likeness of their Creator, they lived solely to reveal Him to His creation and to each other and thus to glorify Him every moment ...
— The Calvary Road • Roy Hession
... groups - loosely associated political rebels, armed gangs, and various government forces in Great Lakes region transcending the boundaries of Burundi, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Rwanda, and Uganda - abated substantially from a decade ago due largely to UN peacekeeping, international mediation, and efforts by local governments to create civil societies; nonetheless, 57,000 Rwandan refugees still reside in 21 African states, including Zambia, Gabon, and 20,000 who fled to Burundi in 2005 and 2006 to escape drought and recriminations ...
— The 2007 CIA World Factbook • United States
... chiefly excitement and amusement. They had not turned to it for edification or instruction, for that thrill of solemn joy which comes of vital truth profoundly seen and clearly shown. For this reason when all Europe besides turned her face to the light, some decades ago, in the pages of the great prose poets who made the age illustrious, England preferred the smoky links and dancing camp-fires which had pleased her immature fancy, and kept herself well in the twilight of the old ideal of imagination as the mother of unrealities. There could ...
— Imaginary Interviews • W. D. Howells
... connection with the back of the mouth, and that the second and third have to do with the development of a curious organ called the thymus gland. Persistent, nevertheless, these gill-slits are, recalling even in man an aquatic ancestry of many millions of years ago. ...
— The Outline of Science, Vol. 1 (of 4) - A Plain Story Simply Told • J. Arthur Thomson
... vividly I remember a squat, freckled boy who was born in the "Patch" and used to pick up coal along the railroad-tracks in Buffalo. A few months ago I had a motion to make before the Court of Appeals. That boy from the "Patch" was the judge who wrote the ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 6 - Subtitle: Little Journeys to the Homes of Eminent Artists • Elbert Hubbard
... will mention to you some two or three cases, because they are very remarkable in themselves, and also because I shall want to use them afterwards. Reaumur, a famous French naturalist, a great many years ago, in an essay which he wrote upon the art of hatching chickens,—which was indeed a very curious essay,—had occasion to speak of variations and monstrosities. One very remarkable case had come under his notice of ...
— Lectures and Essays • T.H. Huxley
... to see you again. Welcome to the ranks of the Hilltop boys. You remember me? You did me a great service a short time ago and I am not likely to forget either that or yourself. My name is Dick Percival. Shake hands, Jack, if you will let me ...
— The Hilltop Boys - A Story of School Life • Cyril Burleigh
... with the Society of Friends fifty years ago, and its discipline at that period, so different from what it is now, this incident may seem of little consequence; but it was, on the contrary, extremely serious. Jonathan Evans was the presiding elder of ...
— The Grimke Sisters - Sarah and Angelina Grimke: The First American Women Advocates of - Abolition and Woman's Rights • Catherine H. Birney
... faculties with strong drink. But he could not yield to that. Not now, with Lucy's face like a wraith floating in the starlight! He was conscious of a larger growth. He had accepted responsibilities that long ago he should have taken up. He now dreamed of love, home, children. Yet beautiful as was that dream it could not be realized in these days without the deadly spirit and violence to which he had just answered. That was the ...
— Valley of Wild Horses • Zane Grey
... you, but he warned us some time ago; we had no idea it was so serious, or that it had anything to do with this. But yesterday he frightened us; he said she—. Well, you can ask him yourself. He will be here directly. (HARALD fills a glass of water and raises it to his lips, but ...
— Three Dramas - The Editor—The Bankrupt—The King • Bjornstjerne M. Bjornson
... had only been Chicago! You say he died two years ago? And your mother long ago? Where will ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick
... he cried. "See this beautiful new uniform of the finest gray, a sample of a cargo made in England and brought over five days ago on a blockade runner ...
— Before the Dawn - A Story of the Fall of Richmond • Joseph Alexander Altsheler
... of how the Romans pronounced their own language nineteen hundred years ago? How is it possible after so long an interval to reconstruct the laws of a pronunciation which prevailed at a given period of the ...
— Latin Pronunciation - A Short Exposition of the Roman Method • Harry Thurston Peck
... sunk beneath the seas, and the moon presented its luminous disk, the holy man had the chariot brought out in which he was accustomed to make excursions among the stars, the same which was employed long ago to convey Elijah up from earth. The saint made Astolpho seat himself beside him, took the reins, and giving the word to the coursers, they bore ...
— Bulfinch's Mythology • Thomas Bulfinch
... altogether a bad thing for the company, who get more or less efficient hands for nothing but a few plates of junk and duff; and every now and again find themselves better paid than by a whole family of cabin passengers. Not long ago, for instance, a packet was saved from nearly certain loss by the skill and courage of a stowaway engineer. As was no more than just, a handsome subscription rewarded him for his success; but even without such exceptional good fortune, as things stand in England and ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 2 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... has gone, as the tortoise goes, Heavy and slow; And the same rose blooms, and the same sun glows, And the same brook sings of a year ago. ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier
... mysterious reappearance of the marquis in life. But the interviewers could extract nothing from Mrs. Bower, and Logan declined to be interviewed. To paragraphists the mystery of the marquis was 'a two months' feast,' like the case of Elizabeth Canning, long ago. ...
— The Disentanglers • Andrew Lang
... desert without parallel for desolation. A frozen Sahara seen by Northern lightning and midnight suns is but a suggestion of this land. The sober Moravian missionary Crantz once only in his life rose to poetry, when more than a century ago he spoke of its scenery. Here then was the latitude of storm and fire required by Schoolcraft to produce something wilder and grander than he had ever found among Indians. And here indeed there existed all the time a cycle of mythological legends or poems such as he declared ...
— The Algonquin Legends of New England • Charles Godfrey Leland
... no doubt that the poetical version was made from the prose version, without any fresh reference to the Latin. The two are often verbally identical, with a little change in the order of words, and some necessary additions to satisfy the alliteration, or fill out the poetic rhythm. It was long ago observed by Hickes that the style of these poems differed little from prose; but it was Mr. Thomas Wright who first noticed that they were, in fact, merely a versified arrangement of the ...
— Anglo-Saxon Literature • John Earle
... books read and bringing me a piece of poetry learnt (by-the-by, I do very much wish you would all learn Wordsworth's "Ode to Duty" during the holidays)—if, instead of this, you showed me collections of wild flowers or shells. A little time ago I saw a charming book of dried flowers, collected by a set of children just out of a kindergarten. Each flower had a page to itself, with its name neatly written, and any extra local names which it happened ...
— Stray Thoughts for Girls • Lucy H. M. Soulsby
... put to him point-blank in this way, that a certain sense of relief was beginning to mingle itself with his gloom. It was shocking to realize, but—yes, he actually was feeling as if he had escaped from something which he had dreaded. Half an hour ago there had been no suspicion of such an emotion among the many which had occupied his attention, but now he perceived it clearly. Half an hour ago he had felt like Lucifer hurled from heaven. Now, though how that train of thought had started he could not have said, he was ...
— Uneasy Money • P.G. Wodehouse
... a multiplicity of "that's," they accomplished a rough draft which might be restudied and used on the morrow. "There!" said Lemoyne to the weary Cope at eleven o'clock; "it ought to have been written a month ago." ...
— Bertram Cope's Year • Henry Blake Fuller
... will not be allowed to make the songs of the people just as he pleases, or to train his choruses without regard to virtue and vice. 'Certainly not.' And yet he may do this anywhere except in Egypt; for there ages ago they discovered the great truth which I am now asserting, that the young should be educated in forms and strains of virtue. These they fixed and consecrated in their temples; and no artist or musician is allowed to deviate ...
— Laws • Plato
... waning. The mountains close at hand were a darker green. The distant ranges had assumed a rosy amethystine tint, like nothing earthly—like the mountains of a dream, perhaps. The buzzard had alighted in the top of a tree not far down the slope, a tree long ago lightning-scathed, but still rising, gaunt and scarred, above all the forest, and stretching dead stark arms to heaven. Somehow Rufe did not like the looks of it. He was aware of a revulsion of feeling, of the ebbing away of his merry spirit ...
— Down the Ravine • Charles Egbert Craddock (real name: Murfree, Mary Noailles)
... is now just thirty-seven years old. Ten years ago he was employed in the repairing works of the railway in Tiflis as a simple artisan. To-day he ranks among the leading intellects ...
— Maxim Gorki • Hans Ostwald
... tidal wave crept ahead of the moon; tidal friction came into play, and our satellite started on its long spiral journey outward from the parent globe. This must have occurred, it is computed, at least fifty-four million years ago. ...
— A Popular History of Astronomy During the Nineteenth Century - Fourth Edition • Agnes M. (Agnes Mary) Clerke
... said Jimmie Dale, still quietly. "It's yours. It's the money you planted in Klanner's trunk a couple of hours ago." ...
— The Further Adventures of Jimmie Dale • Frank L. Packard |
