"Harsh" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... demonstrative manners than his quiet partner. He who entered second was shorter and stronger-built, and had evidently seen a longer term of life. His hair, plentifully streaked with grey, was thinned to slight baldness on the summit of the head; his features, otherwise rather strong and harsh, wore an expression of benevolence which redeemed them; his eyes, dark grey, were sharp and piercing. When he took off his hat, he carefully drew forth and put on a black skull-cap, which gave him a semi-priestly appearance. ...
— Robin Tremain - A Story of the Marian Persecution • Emily Sarah Holt
... search of Claude, who had agreed to meet him at the Exhibition in Trafalgar Square. Thither Stangrave rolled away in his cab, his heart full of many thoughts. Marie's words about him, though harsh and exaggerated, were on the whole true. She had fascinated him utterly. To marry her was now the one object of his life: she had awakened in him, as he had confessed, noble desires to be useful: but the discovery that he ...
— Two Years Ago, Volume I • Charles Kingsley
... share in making the home atmosphere, their mission being to soften harsh angles and outlines and warm cold, stiff plainness into comfort. Window curtains act as an equalizer in bringing the very best out of both light and dark rooms, serving at the same time as a partial background for their ...
— The Complete Home • Various
... the busy street, hoping to catch a glimpse of her who once had made his world. But his watch was in vain, and now he had sat down to write, throwing aside sheet after sheet, as he thought its beginning too cold, too harsh, or too affectionate. He was about making up his mind not to write at all, but to let matters take their course, when a knock at his mother's door, and the announcement that a lady wished to ...
— 'Lena Rivers • Mary J. Holmes
... came under the sway of various empires including the Roman, Byzantine, Arab, Persian, and Ottoman. During World War I in the western portion of Armenia, Ottoman Turkey instituted a policy of forced resettlement coupled with other harsh practices that resulted in an estimated 1 million Armenian deaths. The eastern area of Armenia was ceded by the Ottomans to Russia in 1828; this portion declared its independence in 1918, but was ...
— The 2007 CIA World Factbook • United States
... looked down as calmly as they had looked on the night of the ball, when George had waited by the shrubbery listening to the wailing of the music and thinking long thoughts. From the dark meadows by the brook came the cry of a corncrake, its harsh note softened ...
— A Damsel in Distress • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
... success, if he will be frank with himself, must admit that there has been a big element of fortune in the success. Fortune favored me, whereas her hand was heavy against Billy O'Neill. All his life he had to strive hard to wring his bread from harsh surroundings and a reluctant fate; if fate had been but a little kinder, I believe he would have had a great political career; and he would have done good service for the country in any position in which he might have ...
— Theodore Roosevelt - An Autobiography by Theodore Roosevelt • Theodore Roosevelt
... conflict. The oft-repeated judgment that the first scene of King Lear is absurdly improbable, and that no sane man would think of dividing his kingdom among his daughters in proportion to the strength of their several protestations of love, is much too harsh and is based upon a strange misunderstanding. This scene acts effectively, and to imagination the story is not at all incredible. It is merely strange, like so many of the stories on which our romantic dramas ...
— Shakespearean Tragedy - Lectures on Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, Macbeth • A. C. Bradley
... sent broad uncertain shafts of light, fainter or brighter, across the bed, so that the dying man's face seemed to wear a different look at every moment. The bitter wind whistled through the crannies of the ill-fitting casements; there was a smothered sound of snow lashing the windows. The harsh contrast of these sights and sounds with the scenes which Don Juan had just quitted was so sudden that he could not help shuddering. He turned cold as he came towards the bed; the lamp flared in a sudden vehement gust of wind and lighted up his father's ...
— The Elixir of Life • Honore de Balzac
... a private interview, which I readily granted; and then with tears, and groans, and lamentations, told me that her husband's fate rested in my hands, and that if I wished to kill her I could by pursuing a harsh course. I begged her to explain, but she threw herself upon her knees and vowed that she would never rise until I had promised to do as she wished. I declined to make a profession that I did not understand, and ...
— The Gold Hunter's Adventures - Or, Life in Australia • William H. Thomes
... romantic method, Let bloody steel a while be sheathed, And all those harsh and rugged sounds Of bastinadoes, cuts, and wounds, Exchang'd to Love's more gentle stile, 5 To let our reader breathe a while; In which, that we may be as brief as Is possible, by way of preface, Is't not enough to make one strange, That some men's ...
— Hudibras • Samuel Butler
... palely at the faces of those they love between the bars, wishing to cheer them, but appalled and made giddy by the abject and sordid horror of the solid fact, those who stare back at them and try to smile feel the grating of the wheels of life on the harsh bottom of things. But a man's manhood must not give way; there must be no triumph over him of these assaults and underminings of the enemy. Soul gazes at soul; but the talk is superficial and trivial. He is drowning in the ...
— The Subterranean Brotherhood • Julian Hawthorne
... dislike to be harsh with you, but if you don't put up your hat and get at that bundle of mail I shall be compelled to consider discharging you. ...
— The Making of Bobby Burnit - Being a Record of the Adventures of a Live American Young Man • George Randolph Chester
... with a sneer, "you do yourself an injustice," and then his voice grew harsh, his face brutal. "What ...
— Witness For The Defense • A.E.W. Mason
... the sand-glass!—Disturb me not—let me pass quietly—I do not ask this so much for my sake as for your own. I would have you think of me, sometimes, Mowbray, after I am gone, and without the bitter reflections which the recollection of harsh usage will assuredly bring with it. Pity me, were it but for your own sake.—I have deserved nothing but compassion at your hand—There are but two of us on earth, why should we ...
— St. Ronan's Well • Sir Walter Scott
... He, therefore, as soon as Kenton was brought into the village, began to give vent to a portion of his spleen by cuffing and kicking the prisoner, whom he eventually knocked down. He knew that Kenton had come from Kentucky; and this harsh treatment was bestowed in part, it is thought, to frighten the prisoner into answers of such questions as he might wish to ask him. He then inquired how many men there were in Kentucky. Kenton could not answer this ...
— Life & Times of Col. Daniel Boone • Cecil B. Harley
... Fenius Rufus draws no gain nor advantage from his office of superintendent of the stores (XIV. 51), and is held in general esteem for his course of life (XIV. 51.—XV. 50); but he is described as immeasurably severe (XV. 58), harsh towards his associates (ib.), and wanting in spirit (XV. 61). Sylla's innocence is ascribed to despicable pusillanimity and cowardice (XIII. 47). Corbulo, though he took "the shortest route," and "sped his march day and night without intermission" (XV. 12), ...
— Tacitus and Bracciolini - The Annals Forged in the XVth Century • John Wilson Ross
... was harsh, the words were spoken with a rough accent, unlike the gentler tones of Wendot and Griffeth. The child uttered a little cry and shrank back away from the grip of the strong hand, and might have ...
— The Lord of Dynevor • Evelyn Everett-Green
... now a step-mother, So harsh she is of mood, And she upon me Runes has cast For a maid I ne'er ...
— Young Swaigder, or The Force of Runes - and Other Ballads • Anonymous
... Czechoslovakia fell within the Soviet sphere of influence. In 1968, an invasion by Warsaw Pact troops ended the efforts of the country's leaders to liberalize party rule and create "socialism with a human face." Anti-Soviet demonstrations the following year ushered in a period of harsh repression. With the collapse of Soviet authority in 1989, Czechoslovakia regained its freedom through a peaceful "Velvet Revolution." On 1 January 1993, the country underwent a "velvet divorce" ...
— The 2001 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... The harsh roar of the city came in through the open window, continuously beating upon Bibbs's ear until he began to distinguish a pulsation in it—a broken and irregular cadence. It seemed to him that it was like a titanic voice, discordant, hoarse, rustily metallic—the voice ...
— The Turmoil - A Novel • Booth Tarkington
... He can paint an empty room traversed by a gleam of moonlight and set one to thinking a half day on such an apparently barren theme. He may suggest the erotic, but never the lascivious. A thinker doubled by an artist he is the one man north who recalls the harsh but pregnant truths ...
— Ivory Apes and Peacocks • James Huneker
... what she said, understood that she had gone, but still continued to repeat, in a harsh voice, the words, "She will not come! ...
— Jack - 1877 • Alphonse Daudet
... subordinate clause of his proposition; but it is fairly merited by such as are cruel to brutes. People do not, I am sure, regard the comfort of brutes as they should. There are, here and there, noble exceptions; but horses labor faithfully for us, and very often the only reward they get is harsh treatment and scanty feeding. The Lord has graciously given to man the supremacy over the brute creation. But man should not show his supremacy by acting the part of a tyrant; but, like a wise ruler, 'do justice and love mercy.' Whatever else may be brought against me ...
— Life and Labors of Elder John Kline, the Martyr Missionary - Collated from his Diary by Benjamin Funk • John Kline
... discourage vices; but literal conveyance of lofty qualities, can it effect that? Can it create opulence of soul in a sterile nature? Can it cause a thin soil to do the work of a deep one? We have seen harsh natures mellowed, violent natures chastened, rough ones refined; but who has seen an essentially mean nature made large-hearted, self-forgetful, fertile of grandest faiths and greatest deeds? Who has beheld a Thersites transformed into ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 84, October, 1864 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... was so used!' she sobbed. 'There never was anything so harsh and unjustifiable, so disgracefully violent and cruel! Dear, kind, quiet little Amy, too, what would she feel if she could know that she had been innocently the means of exposing me to such treatment! But I'll never tell her! No, good darling, ...
— Little Dorrit • Charles Dickens
... to ruin me with the public, having banished all scruples, I joyfully determined to abandon my destiny to all the impulses of glory. I said to my friends that the whole Court was witness of the harsh treatment I had met with for above a year in the King's palace, and I added: "The public is engaged to defend my honour, but the public being now about to be sacrificed, I am obliged to defend it against oppression. Our circumstances are not so bad ...
— The Memoirs of Cardinal de Retz, Complete • Jean Francois Paul de Gondi, Cardinal de Retz
... power, does it not exist only in our idea; all its beauty, is it not the creation of our excited fancy? And then the sweetest of superstitions ends. The long delusion bursts, and we are left like men upon a heath when fairies vanish; cold and dreary, gloomy, bitter, harsh, existence ...
— The Young Duke • Benjamin Disraeli
... trembled to tell me!—knew that each attack must be more severe than the one before; that each day the disease would stride forward a slow inch, no more, and no human skill might advance it or hold it back." His harsh voice sank a note lower. "At such times, when that grip closes upon me, I know not what I do. Rather, I know, yet am powerless to act otherwise. I tell thee, Livinius, I have had slaves flogged, ay, tortured, before my eyes, to see if by chance I might find suffering greater than mine ...
— Nicanor - Teller of Tales - A Story of Roman Britain • C. Bryson Taylor
... not monsieur drink with us?" he demanded in a harsh voice, thrusting his face toward Chester. "Can it be ...
— The Boy Allies in the Trenches - Midst Shot and Shell Along the Aisne • Clair Wallace Hayes
... its tone, both of heart-wholeness, boldness, and affection, by the harsh times and harsh measures that have passed over every district, even the most favored; or why all these emigrations, and why all these parish-unions? What, then, is not the English peasant what he was? If I went among them where I used to go, should I not find ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 4, September, 1850 • Various
... was in 1481, and meantime Botticelli had produced the wayward Primavera, and the more stern and harsh S. Augustine in the church of Ognissanti. Of his frescoes in the Pope's chapel nearly all have survived, including Moses slaying the Egyptian, The Temptation, and The Destruction of Korah's Company, besides such of the heads ...
— Six Centuries of Painting • Randall Davies
... expected to see. On the wall opposite the mirror, just a pace or two behind where I had been standing, hung a portrait. And such a portrait!—Bronzino never painted a grander one. Against a background of harsh, dark blue, there stands out the figure of the Duchess (for it is Medea, the real Medea, a thousand times more real, individual, and powerful than in the other portraits), seated stiffly in a high-backed chair, sustained, as it were, almost rigid, by the stiff brocade of ...
— Hauntings • Vernon Lee
... more. While Austin was patient, it was plain to be seen that he would not stand to be trampled on. Thinking it all over, he decided to send a letter to his brother-in-law that would bring the boy home if he were there. It was not to be a harsh or authoritative letter, but an appeal for the children. He knew Austin would come home if he ...
— The Hero of Hill House • Mable Hale
... by the Cold and Moist: The Bitter and Stomachical, with the Sub-acid and gentler Herbs: The Mordicant and pungent, and such as repress or discuss Flatulency (revive the Spirits, and aid Concoction;) with such as abate, and take off the keenness, mollify and reconcile the more harsh and churlish: The mild and insipid, animated with piquant and brisk: The Astringent and Binders, with such as are Laxative and Deobstruct: The over-sluggish, raw, and unactive, with those that are Eupeptic, and promote Concoction: There are ...
— Acetaria: A Discourse of Sallets • John Evelyn
... whose business it was to dress and prepare dead bodies for burial. The original ground of the transaction appears to have been sentimental: 'He was my friend,' says the murderous doctor; 'he was dear to me,' in speaking of the pollinctor. But the law, gentlemen, is stern and harsh: the law will not hear of these tender motives: to sustain a contract of this nature in law, it is essential that a 'consideration' should be given. Now what was the consideration? For thus far all is on the side of the pollinctor: he will ...
— Miscellaneous Essays • Thomas de Quincey
... undiscriminating, inhuman, and unjust as a punishment, let us in all fairness lay aside the attitude of mind which has so hindered and defeated our efforts to deal with it as an arch enemy to human health, happiness, and effectiveness. In the face of all our harsh traditions it takes a good deal of breadth of view to look on the disease impersonally, rather than in the light of one or two contemptible examples of it whom we may happen to know. But, after all, to ...
— The Third Great Plague - A Discussion of Syphilis for Everyday People • John H. Stokes
... heard thereat,—bearing a curious lock Some chance had shown me fashioned faultily, Whereof Life held content the useless key, And great coarse hinges, thick and rough with rust, Whose sudden voice across a silence must, I knew, be harsh and horrible to hear,— A strange door, ugly like a dwarf.—So near I came I felt upon my feet the chill Of acid wind creeping across the sill. So stood longtime, till over me at last Came weariness, and all ...
— Renascence and Other Poems • Edna St. Vincent Millay
... no longing poisons their repose; they are not weary, and the wicked trouble them no more. Their cheerfulness is no less perfect than their serenity; like the shades of Hellas, they have drunk Lethean waters from the river of content, and all remembrance of things sad or harsh has vanished from their minds. The quietude of holiness expressed in this ideal region was a legacy to Perugino from earlier Umbrian masters; but his technical supremacy in fresco-painting and in oils, his correct drawing within certain limits, ...
— Renaissance in Italy Vol. 3 - The Fine Arts • John Addington Symonds
... the square Tom Curtis's attention was arrested sharply. He heard the shrill, harsh protest from an automobile horn, then a cry of terror from a girl's throat. Her cry was taken up by half a dozen voices. There was no need to ask questions. He knew what had happened. An automobile had run down ...
— Madge Morton's Secret • Amy D. V. Chalmers
... speak in no unkind sense) an extremely selfish view of the case. You ought to do something to help those who are not so fortunate as yourselves. There is an unwillingness on the part of our people, harsh as it may be, for you free colored people to remain with us. Now, if you could give a start to the white people, you would open a wide door for many to be made free. If we deal with those who are not free ...
— The Papers And Writings Of Abraham Lincoln, Complete - Constitutional Edition • Abraham Lincoln
... has his aspect nothing of severe, But such a face as promised him sincere. Nothing reserved or sullen was to see, But sweet regards, and pleasing sanctity, Mild was his accent, and his action free. With eloquence innate his tongue was arm'd, Though harsh the precept, yet the preacher charm'd; For, letting down the golden chain from high, He drew his audience upwards to the sky. He taught the Gospel rather than the law, And forced himself to drive, ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. III - Belinda • Maria Edgeworth
... On hearing this harsh reply, the mother could not say a word. She called her second daughter, and explained her wishes to her; but the younger daughter refused, just as her sister had refused, and she made fun of ...
— Filipino Popular Tales • Dean S. Fansler
... this little volume, I have been obliged to use language that seems harsh, I beg my readers to remember that it was in defence of the character of the people under my spiritual charge and of my own. The Marshpees have been reviled and misrepresented in the public prints, as much more indolent, ignorant, and degraded than they really are, ...
— Indian Nullification of the Unconstitutional Laws of Massachusetts - Relative to the Marshpee Tribe: or, The Pretended Riot Explained • William Apes
... cases I have cited, and the conclusions drawn from them, are brought into a very narrow compass. I will only add, that it would sound extremely harsh to say, that a court of criminal jurisdiction, founded in immemorial usage, and held in judgment of law before the King himself, can in any event whatever be under an utter incapacity of proceeding to trial and judgment, either of condemnation or acquittal, the ultimate ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. XI. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... foolish as to cry so? I never knew how weak I could be until these last few days. But we must be strong, Frisk—we must be strong, and not care for this old place, and the beautiful park, and all the—oh, why will those bells ring? and what are they ringing for? And there is the dinner-bell, too, harsh as my lot. And I must try to be dutiful, and show a bold face and good courage to the world, who will pity me, or rejoice over me, and say that I wanted something to pull down my pride. And so, perhaps, I do; but this shall ...
— Gladys, the Reaper • Anne Beale
... Nicholas. The church-bell began to ring at four-thirty in the morning, and from the length of time it continued to ring I judged that it takes the Swiss sinner a good while to get the invitation through his head. Most church-bells in the world are of poor quality, and have a harsh and rasping sound which upsets the temper and produces much sin, but the St. Nicholas bell is a good deal the worst one that has been contrived yet, and is peculiarly maddening in its operation. Still, it may have its right and its excuse ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... seems to be of a jealous nature," I said, "one who will make a harsh husband for ...
— Moon of Israel • H. Rider Haggard
... Liberator contained an Address to the Public, which sounded the keynote of Garrison's career. "I shall contend for the immediate enfranchisement of our slave population—I will be as harsh as truth and as uncompromising as justice on this subject—I do not wish to think, or speak, or write with moderation—I am in earnest—I will not equivocate—I will not retreat a single inch, and I ...
— The Anti-Slavery Crusade - Volume 28 In The Chronicles Of America Series • Jesse Macy
... Irish fiddler or piper or singer learns from the older ones, that the oldest ones of all learned, they say, from the fairies. And under all the music, whether grave or gay, there went a strain of grief, sometimes almost harsh and sometimes scarcely heard, and as the fairies listened to it they grew pale at the thought that now they were to go away from all that they had known, to find something which they did not know. While they were thinking of this the music changed again. It was a soft murmur, like the ...
— Fairies and Folk of Ireland • William Henry Frost
... breast, and his head was protected by a flat green cloth cap, ornamented with a pheasant's tail. Under his right arm he carried a crossbow; a long silver-tipped horn was slung in his baldric; and he was armed with a short hanger, or wood-knife. His features were harsh and prominent; and he had black beetling brows, a large coarse mouth, and dark eyes, lighted up with a very ...
— Windsor Castle • William Harrison Ainsworth
... and the calm, unruffled blue ones met in a glance of implacable antagonism. Not in the least impressed Philip replaced his sombrero and spoke to his horse. Fish crows flew overhead with croaks of harsh derision. ...
— Diane of the Green Van • Leona Dalrymple
... curses of Captain Swope! God keep me from ever hearing their like again. They sounded worse than harsh, or vile, they sounded inhuman. The words came soft and melodious from his lips, but they were forked with poison and viciousness. As we of the foc'sle listened to him curse the helmsman, that first morning out, each man felt fear's icy finger touch the pit of his stomach. The captain's words horrified ...
— The Blood Ship • Norman Springer
... unwilling to say much about my early life. I have lived so long in a family where there is never a harsh word spoken, and where no one thinks of ill-treating anybody or anything; that it seems almost wrong even to think or speak of such a matter as hurting ...
— Beautiful Joe • Marshall Saunders
... even a pardonable accident, but will hide it, until it is found out. In common with many other non-European races, an act of generosity or a voluntary concession of justice is regarded as a sign of weakness. Hence it is that the experienced European is often compelled to be more harsh ...
— The Philippine Islands • John Foreman
... caught himself back the next moment. He flung away from Ahmed Ismail with a harsh ...
— The Broken Road • A. E. W. Mason
... of 754 and 815, both of which promulgated harsh decrees against images and neither of which is recognized by the Latin Church, and the synod of 842, which repudiated the synod of 815, approved the second council of Nicaea, and restored the images, are all adequately ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 7, Slice 2 - "Constantine Pavlovich" to "Convention" • Various
... be unaware, my good fellow," said the solicitor, covering a large hole in the leg of his trousers with his hand, "of the very dangerous situation in which you have placed yourselves. We have no desire to be harsh with you—" ...
— Lady of the Barge and Others, Entire Collection • W.W. Jacobs
... That, mortified beyond measure at my silent contempt, he had tried every means of ascertaining the cause of my coldness, but I had never vouchsafed an answer, but had left him to feel the full force of my harsh treatment without one word of explanation. That when he was paroled, he had hoped that I would see him to tell him wherein he had forfeited my esteem; but I had not invited him to call, and mortified and repulsed as he ...
— A Confederate Girl's Diary • Sarah Morgan Dawson
... 173; wind up &c (strengthen) 159. strike home, into home, hard home; make an impression. Adj. strong, energetic, forcible, active; intense, deep-dyed, severe, keen, vivid, sharp, acute, incisive, trenchant, brisk. rousing, irritation; poignant; virulent, caustic, corrosive, mordant, harsh, stringent; double-edged, double-shotted^, double- distilled; drastic, escharotic^; racy &c (pungent) 392. potent &c (powerful) 157; radioactive. Adv. strongly &c adj.; fortiter in re [Lat.]; with telling effect. Phr. the steam is up; vires acquirit eundo [Lat.]; the race by vigor not ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... A harsh voice startled me. It was Jock, gazing viciously up at me and talking guttural English now. His face was still framed in the circle of the torch, and as I looked at it now I realised that the truth had actually been written there all the time for a closely ...
— The Man From the Clouds • J. Storer Clouston
... to be discovered why she spoke in lowered tones, but Irene's voice sounded almost harsh ...
— The Argonauts • Eliza Orzeszko (AKA Orzeszkowa)
... were, what are called 'good likenesses,' so far as outline and detail were concerned; but to me they always seemed to lack one great essential of a true portrait,—the informing spirit of the man within. This I find in Marshall's portrait. The old harsh lines and unmistakable mouth are there, without flattery or compromise; but over all and through all the pathetic sadness, the wise simplicity and tender humanity of the man are visible. It is the face of the speaker at Gettysburg, and the ...
— Authors and Friends • Annie Fields
... On their march they heard of the fatal battle, and saw one of the enemy; who mistaking Piomingo's party for some of his own comrades, made up to them. He discovered the mistake when it was too late to rectify it. Piomingo accosted him in harsh tones, saying—"Rascal, you have been killing the whites," and immediately ordered two of his warriors to expand his arms, and a third to shoot him. This was done ...
— Chronicles of Border Warfare • Alexander Scott Withers
... honester nature, rules in his stead. The individual who answers to timocracy has some noticeable qualities. He is described as ill educated, but, like the Spartan, a lover of literature; and although he is a harsh master to his servants he has no natural superiority over them. His character is based upon a reaction against the circumstances of his father, who in a troubled city has retired from politics; and his mother, who is dissatisfied at her own position, ...
— The Republic • Plato
... circumstance; my heart, careless and wayworn as it is, gushes with the recollection. Her death was an event that perhaps gave a turn to all my after fortunes. With her died all that made home attractive, for my father was harsh, as I have before said, and had never treated me with kindness. Not that he exerted any unusual severity towards me, but it was his way. I do not complain of him. In fact, I have never been of a complaining disposition. I seem born to be buffeted by friends and fortune, and nature ...
— Tales of a Traveller • Washington Irving
... outgrew these idols, they passed to her because Amy would have nothing old or ugly. Beth cherished them all the more tenderly for that very reason, and set up a hospital for infirm dolls. No pins were ever stuck into their cotton vitals, no harsh words or blows were ever given them, no neglect ever saddened the heart of the most repulsive, but all were fed and clothed, nursed and caressed with an affection which never failed. One forlorn fragment of dollanity had belonged to Jo and, having ...
— Little Women • Louisa May Alcott
... exercise in transporting the property of others through the mountains, for if by any mischance the things were to get lost or wet or broken, or damaged in any other way, they would be required to make good the loss. This custom, as applied in some cases, may seem somewhat harsh, but it must be remembered that Manboland is a land where the law of vengeance prevails, and that no opportunity to wreak vengeance must be given. Such opportunities would occur if anyone were permitted to attribute a loss or other accident ...
— The Manbos of Mindano - Memoirs of the National Academy of Sciences, Volume XXIII, First Memoir • John M. Garvan
... of the stunted trees on the hill shiver. It reddened his cheeks, and made his skin tingle, and set his blood racing. The red roofs of the town below were smiling under the brilliant, cold sun. The air was strong and harsh. The frozen earth seemed to rejoice in bitter gladness. And Christophe's heart was like that. ...
— Jean-Christophe, Vol. I • Romain Rolland
... practice. 'Oh, a table-spoonful of somebody's sauce will do for the flavouring,' and in goes the sauce, and the flavouring is supposed to be complete. People who eat their chops, and steaks, and fish, and game, after having smothered the natural flavour with the same harsh condiment, may be satisfied with a cuisine of this sort, but to an unvitiated palate the ...
— The Cook's Decameron: A Study in Taste: - Containing Over Two Hundred Recipes For Italian Dishes • Mrs. W. G. Waters
... dragging themselves to some tangle in order to escape the wolves or bears and lynxes, and whose last glances reveal things creeping towards them or great birds waiting to peck their eyes out. Man is seldom as cruel as nature proves to be, for it is everywhere harsh and brutal. Little dramas are constantly taking place under this very moss we tread, and those dear little black-headed birds, over there in the bushes, are killing all day long. You and I realize that the killing is the least part of the sport, but we wanted meat ...
— Sweetapple Cove • George van Schaick
... realized why these matters stirred her so profoundly, and she stopped short and gasped with the shock of it. It did not matter that she thwarted her father's will; it would not matter if she should be discovered and punished as only these harsh characters could punish. For the brave bearing, the brave jest, the jaunty facing of death, the tender, low voice, the gay song, the aurora-lit moment of his summons—all these had at last their triumph. She knew that she ...
— Conjuror's House - A Romance of the Free Forest • Stewart Edward White
... been very often to blame; but I here solemnly declare that I never did anything purposely to offend you, but mostly, all I could to oblige you—and I can safely declare that I never bore you above a quarter of an hour's resentment for anything you might say to me which I thought harsh. ...
— Nature and Art • Mrs. Inchbald
... Montrose the king's commission to be captain-general of Scotland. Lord Ogilvy, who was again taken prisoner, would have undergone the same fate, had not his sister found means to procure his escape by changing clothes with him. For this instance of courage and dexterity, she met with harsh usage. The clergy solicited the parliament that more royalists might be executed; but ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part E. - From Charles I. to Cromwell • David Hume
... his innocence. But I will cease to murmur and complain, since it is for him that I suffer, and he is not dead. O Ganem!" added she, in a transport of affection and joy, "my dear son Ganem! is possible that you are still alive? I am no longer concerned for the loss of my fortune; and how harsh and unjust soever the caliph's orders may be, I forgive him, provided heaven has preserved my son. I am only concerned for my daughter; her sufferings alone afflict me; yet I believe her to be so good a sister as to follow ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments vol. 1 • Anon.
... very grave now, and the gravity, the assurance, and, with them, the sweetness, of this young girl were charming and perplexing to Sir Basil. Girls so assured he had found harsh, disagreeable and, almost always, ugly; they had been the sort of girl one avoided. And girls so lovely had usually been coy and foolish. This girl walked like a queen, looked at one like a philosopher, smiled at one like an angel. He fixed his mind on her ...
— A Fountain Sealed • Anne Douglas Sedgwick
... belonged to one of them; but so long as he believes in Christ, he is a member of the Holy Catholic Church. And schism is more likely to be charged against those who violate the spirit of Christian charity in making harsh and false statements against their fellow-members in the Body of Christ. Let us not retaliate, lest we also commit that sin. We can afford to wait. Five minutes in heaven, or ...
— Love to the Uttermost - Expositions of John XIII.-XXI. • F. B. Meyer
... Brunetiere's "Epoques du theatre francais;" Weiss, "Le Theatre et les moeurs;" Matthews, "French Dramatists," p.78; Wells, "Modern French Literature," p. 353. Lanson, "Litterature francaise," p.966, is perhaps unduly harsh. For contemporary criticism of Scribe see Sainte-Beuve, "Portraits contemporains," ii., ...
— Bataille De Dames • Eugene Scribe and Ernest Legouve
... on the divan and lay there in sullen defiance. "Now we're alone—you and I. What are you going to do about it?" was her harsh challenge. ...
— Possessed • Cleveland Moffett
... breaking camp. By the time the canoes were loaded the mists had lifted and the river lay open and empty before them. In the bush around and beyond, gloom still lay thick and the forest life yelped, howled, clattered, and wailed. But out on the water it was broad day, and far overhead sounded the harsh cries of unseen parrots flying two by two in the sunlight above the matted branches. The world of the pathless tropic wilderness, ever dying, ever living, was about its daily business. The five ...
— The Pathless Trail • Arthur O. (Arthur Olney) Friel
... of the fountain, and the occasional harsh scream of the peacock, all was at peace, as if by contrast with the tumult that raged in Valentina's soul. Then another sound broke the stillness—a soft step, crunching the gravel of the walk. She turned, and behind her stood the magnificent Gonzaga, a smile that ...
— Love-at-Arms • Raphael Sabatini
... in some Latin writer—the story of a man who was crushed to a jelly by the mere repeated touch of many thousand hands. His murderers were not harsh, but an infinite repetition of the gentlest handling meant death. I do not suppose that I was very brutally manhandled in the cave. I was trussed up tight and carried out to the open, and left in the care of the guards. But when my senses returned I felt as if I ...
— Prester John • John Buchan
... of it by no means be entrusted to a man of letters; for either he will sacrifice to the turn of a phrase the proper terms which the seaman and man of learning would prefer, but which to him will appear harsh and barbarous; or, rejecting all the nautical and astronomical details, and endeavouring to make a pleasing romance, he will for want of the knowledge his education has not allowed him to acquire, commit mistakes which may ...
— Laperouse • Ernest Scott
... going to presume," said Rosalind, "to say anything unkind—anything harsh of your wife: I know I have not the right, and I know that you would—very properly—resent it. So don't be afraid. But I only want to remind you that Lady Alice is not even where she was when, as an over-sensitive, ...
— Brooke's Daughter - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... longer to rise this time than before. He was wary, too, and plainly disliked the idea of coming in contact with those sturdy arms of Hugh Morgan. Seeing that Nick did not mean to attack him, but had commenced to say harsh things in the endeavor to force his rival to assume the aggressive, in hopes that the advantage would fall to his share, Hugh lost no time in ...
— The Chums of Scranton High - Hugh Morgan's Uphill Fight • Donald Ferguson
... cousin had failed her, for he was down at the stables, making arrangements for the care of his bays and his carriage. Thus from very idleness she fell to nursing her small spite against the man whose voice had made such harsh discord with the honeyed chorus of flattery to which she was accustomed. She wished that he would appear, and that in some way she might show how little she cared for him or his opinion; but as he did ...
— A Face Illumined • E. P. Roe
... a-head of us, and so near, that we could hardly swing clear of each other. The prince sent an apology for coming back, but we now saw that he was forced to do as the Dutch thought proper. On the 31st, several harsh dealings and discourtesies passed between us and the Dutch. The 1st of April, 1613, the Dutch mustered about 120 men ashore, gathered from their ships and forts, and every morning and evening relieved ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. VIII. • Robert Kerr
... true. God help me!" The Elder's words came with surprising calm, but his tone was harsh and hard. "So it is as I was warned. It is hard to believe that my little Beth has proven untrue to me." He was breathing hard. Pointing his stick in the direction of the minister, he finished with savage calm, "My little girl here alone, and with a man ...
— Captain Pott's Minister • Francis L. Cooper
... her hair, rumpled by the white sunbonnet she had worn, was abundant, and her dark eyes and the outlines of her face had not changed. She would always be handsome without regard to age or locality. Nor had the harshness of the wilderness made harsh the soft Southern ...
— Winning the Wilderness • Margaret Hill McCarter
... The Commentator has enabled us to supply the ellipsis, but he does not fully explain the author's meaning. It would seem, that in those primitive times, it was considered harsh or inexpedient to harass a defendant, or accused person with two legal proceedings, of any sort, at the same time. The sentence will, however, bear the sense, that no stranger or intervener shall be permitted to come in and interrupt the ...
— Hindu Law and Judicature - from the Dharma-Sastra of Yajnavalkya • Yajnavalkya
... me of sardines in a box. With a blazing splinter of fat pine for torch, we made our inspection. Their broad dark faces, wide flat noses, thick lips and projecting jaws, their coarse clothing, their filthiness, their harsh and guttural speech, profoundly impressed me and I resolved to penetrate into their country and see them in their homes, ...
— In Indian Mexico (1908) • Frederick Starr
... this subdued spirit and a greater readiness to obey, his harsh guardians relaxed so far as to yield to the persuasions of the good watchman, and suffered him to go on Sunday afternoons to church and Sabbath school, as well as sometimes to spend the evening ...
— Watch—Work—Wait - Or, The Orphan's Victory • Sarah A. Myers
... horned species being especially destructive. Instances were given in which these freebooters had killed every chicken upon a farm. As they hunt only at night, they are hard to capture. Their notes and natures are said to be in keeping with their deeds of darkness; for their cry is wild, harsh, and unearthly, while in temper they are cowardly, savage, and untamable, showing no affection even for each other. A female has been known to kill and ...
— Driven Back to Eden • E. P. Roe
... he comes into the dressing ward, Gregoire is pale and perspiring. His harsh tawny beard quivers, hair by hair. I divine all this, and say a few words of encouragement ...
— The New Book Of Martyrs • Georges Duhamel
... thing, the vagrant, was alone understood. A suspicious appearance, that indescribable something which all understand and none can define, was sufficient reason that society should take a man by the collar. "Where do you live? How do you get your living?" And if he could not answer, harsh penalties awaited him. Iron and fire were in the code: the law practised the ...
— The Man Who Laughs • Victor Hugo
... vulgar, to be sure, but he never stands in my way, and I never stand in his; and, as you say, he's free about money. But still, darling, sometimes it seems to me such a weary thing to live without sympathy of soul! A marriage without congeniality, mon Dieu, what is it? And then the harsh, cold laws of human society prevent any relief. They forbid natures that are made for each other from being to each other ...
— Pink and White Tyranny - A Society Novel • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... rarest quality. Far on in middle age, when men begin to lie down with the bestial goddesses, Comfort and Respectability, the strings of his nature still sounded as high a note as a young man's. He loved the harsh voice of duty like a call to battle. He loved courage, enterprise, brave natures, a brave word, an ugly virtue; everything that lifts us above the table where we eat or the bed we sleep upon. This with no touch ...
— Memoir of Fleeming Jenkin • Robert Louis Stevenson
... wished to maintain the middle course of the established church as it had been under Elizabeth. He was even less inclined to harsh treatment of the Roman Catholics. On the other hand, the tide of Puritan feeling appealing for greater strictness and earnestness in the church and a more democratic form of church government was rising higher and higher, ...
— An Introduction to the Industrial and Social History of England • Edward Potts Cheyney
... moon-tide horrors hung, And night's dark pencil dim'd the tints of spring; The boding minstrel now harsh omens sung, And the bat spread ...
— Poetic Sketches • Thomas Gent
... a lack of sensation due to the death of nerves. In dry gangrene the skin is leathery and harsh, while in moist gangrene the tissues are soft, wrinkled, and friable; the hair is disturbed, and the skin is usually moist and soapy and sometimes covered with blebs. The tissue surrounding the moist gangrenous patch is usually inflamed, swollen, and hot, but this is less noticeable in ...
— Special Report on Diseases of the Horse • United States Department of Agriculture
... fire and ice was to be created, and to sustain itself in a harsh world, he had never taken the time to think out; but he was content to hold his view without analysing it, since he knew it was that of all the carefully-brushed, white-waistcoated, button-hole-flowered gentlemen who succeeded each other in the club box, exchanged friendly greetings with him, and ...
— The Age of Innocence • Edith Wharton
... voice was harsh from continued struggle with her complex emotions. She was past all realization of what she owed to ...
— Flamsted quarries • Mary E. Waller
... with a noise like the shrieking of iron on iron, the mantelpieces and washstands of every jerry-built house and obscene emporium of machine-made furniture are sawn out of the rock. There is no joy in this labour, and the savage, harsh yell of the machines drowns any song that of old might have lightened the toil. Blasted out of the mountains by slaves, some 13,000 of them, dragged by tortured and groaning animals, the marble that might have built a Parthenon is sold to the manufacturer to decorate the houses of ...
— Florence and Northern Tuscany with Genoa • Edward Hutton
... and Ireland eat sour grapes, the Scottish teeth must be set on edge as well as their own. An uniformity in benefits may be well—an uniformity in penal measures, towards the innocent and the guilty, in prohibitory regulations, whether necessary or not, seems harsh law, ...
— Political Pamphlets • George Saintsbury
... the injunction, "Servants, obey your masters." The word "kindness," which implies one of the noblest traits of human nature, when applied to a Negro means simply that his treatment shall not be so harsh as to cause people who are yet included in the category of decent, to wince and protest. The denial of right to the Negro has been progressive in the past forty years. First, he was denied the right to vote, ...
— Peonage - The American Negro Academy. Occasional Papers No. 15 • Lafayette M. Hershaw
... his enemies can find a fault in him. I can see daily that he tries to subdue his heart. Wherever Kunda Nandini may happen to be, from that spot, if possible, he averts his eyes; unless there is absolute necessity he does not speak her name. He is even harsh towards her; I have heard him scold her when she has committed no fault. Then why am I writing all this trash? Should a man ask this question it would be difficult to make him understand, but you being a woman will comprehend. If Kunda Nandini is in his eyes but as other women, ...
— The Poison Tree - A Tale of Hindu Life in Bengal • Bankim Chandra Chatterjee
... soul of Germany, and he will be sorrowing for his past like a converted gun-man at a camp meeting. He will be a victim of the meanness and perfidy of the British Government. I am going to have a first-class row with your Foreign Office about my passport, and I am going to speak harsh words about them up and down this metropolis. I am going to be shadowed by your sleuths at my port of embarkation, and I guess I shall run up hard against the British Legations in Scandinavia. By that time our Teutonic friends will have begun to wonder ...
— Greenmantle • John Buchan
... tears glittered on her long lashes when she at last fell into a light slumber, and the old pendulum's rusty voice croaking out: 'Give all—take no—thing' echoed hoarsely through her dreams like a harsh command which it was more or less difficult to obey. But life, as we all know, is not made up of great events so much as of irritating trifles,—poor, wretched, apparently insignificant trifles, which, nevertheless do so act upon our destinies ...
— God's Good Man • Marie Corelli
... not as soon as ever they peep out of the Ground, good Madam. There will come a Time, by the Grace of God, when you will send away your young Son from you out of Doors, to be accomplish'd with Learning and undergo harsh Discipline, and which indeed is rather the Province of the Father than of the Mother. But now its tender Age calls for Indulgence. And besides, whereas the Food, according as it is, contributes much to the Health ...
— Colloquies of Erasmus, Volume I. • Erasmus
... I cried in a loud, almost harsh voice, determined to rouse her from this horrible, unnatural silence. "What are you ...
— The Return Of The Soul - 1896 • Robert S. Hichens
... case, he naturally opposes all other religious bodies in Russia as not merely inflicting injury upon Christianity, but as tending to the political disintegration of the empire. Never, in any of our conversations, did I hear him speak a harsh word of any other church or of any religious ideas opposed to his own; but it was clear that he regarded Protestants and dissident sects generally as but agents in the progress of disintegration which, in Western Europe, seemed approaching a crisis, and that he considered the Roman ...
— Autobiography of Andrew Dickson White Volume II • Andrew Dickson White
... pure "grit." When the illustrated papers everywhere were caricaturing him, when no epithet seemed too harsh to heap upon him, when his methods were criticized by his own party, and the generals in the war were denouncing his "foolish" confidence in Grant, and delegations were waiting upon him to ask for that general's ...
— Pushing to the Front • Orison Swett Marden
... Mr. Quest, "I daresay that the step strikes you as a harsh one. To be perfectly frank with you, Mr. de la Molle, it struck me as a very harsh one; but, of course, I am only a servant, and bound to carry out my instructions. I sympathise with you very much—very ...
— Colonel Quaritch, V.C. - A Tale of Country Life • H. Rider Haggard
... humiliating for high-spirited children to be so misunderstood. Pop lacked refined tastes. It was a harsh thing to say of one's parent, but when you came right down to it ...
— In a Little Town • Rupert Hughes
... front door open?" broke in a harsh, peremptory voice from the landing. "I don't care who opened it—I want it shut, and kept shut. Where's Quinby Graham? I thought you ...
— Quin • Alice Hegan Rice
... sudden noisy brook. And once, or twice, or even three times perhaps, when some blinding daze of dizziness overwhelmed him, she climbed up with one foot into the roomy stirrup and steadied his swaying, unfeeling body against her own little harsh, reassuring, flannel-shirted breast. ...
— Little Eve Edgarton • Eleanor Hallowell Abbott
... his strength, and denounced the weakness of the habitual drunkard, but she refrained from so doing. She determined, no matter what she suffered, never to madden him by a taunt or unkind word, but to save him if possible by love and gentleness. He as yet, though harsh and peevish to others, had never spoken an unkind word to her. He had once or twice been unnecessarily severe to the children, which caused pain to her mother's heart, but she had by a quiet word thrown oil upon the troubled waters ...
— From Wealth to Poverty • Austin Potter
... their slopes occupied by clusters of huts, whose inmates had fled thither as a place of security against the ravages of the warmen who infest the plains. A number of strange birds resorted to this valley, many of whose notes were rich, full, and melodious, while others were harsh and disagreeable, but, generally speaking, the plumage was various, splendid, and beautiful. The modest partridge appeared in company with the magnificent balearic crane, with his regal crest, and delicate humming birds hopped ...
— Lander's Travels - The Travels of Richard Lander into the Interior of Africa • Robert Huish
... The poor slave-woman, last night parted from her only boy, and weary with the cotton-picking,—the captive pining in his cell,—the patient wife of the drunkard, saddened by a consciousness of the growing vileness of one so dear to her once,—the delicate spirit doomed to harsh and uncongenial surroundings,—all in such hours feel the soothings of a celestial harmony, the tenderness of ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 24, Oct. 1859 • Various
... a rude grasp from somewhere is laid upon me, pressing upon my face. Instantly the air grows gloomy, gray, and the ocean rocks menacingly, while the great bells grow harsh and strident, as they hint of a dark fate. I clasp my hands appealingly to the heavens; I moan and struggle with the unknown grasp; then there is peace and the sweet content of the ...
— Violets and Other Tales • Alice Ruth Moore
... This I offer to give you is plain and simple. The other full of perplexed and intricate mazes. This is mild; that harsh. This is found by experience effectual for its purposes; the other is a new project. This is universal; the other calculated for certain Colonies only. This is immediate in its conciliatory operation; the other remote, contingent, full of hazard. Mine is what becomes the dignity of a ruling people—gratuitous, ...
— Burke's Speech on Conciliation with America • Edmund Burke
... So when to these harsh trade laws the Stamp Act was added, great indignation was aroused. Among those most earnest in opposing ...
— Stories of Later American History • Wilbur F. Gordy
... Smelters the workmen came trooping, each with his fox-terrier or his lurcher at his heels. Warped with labour and twisted by toil, bent double by week-long work in the cramped coal galleries or half-blinded with years spent in front of white-hot fluid metal, these men still gilded their harsh and hopeless lives by their devotion to sport. It was their one relief, the only thing which could distract their minds from sordid surroundings, and give them an interest beyond the blackened circle which enclosed them. Literature, art, science, all these things were beyond their horizon; ...
— The Green Flag • Arthur Conan Doyle
... clearly enough that which he would fain have denied—that Dudley was in communication with the people at the wharf, from whom he must have obtained this information. For a moment he was silent. It was not until Dudley's harsh laughter had died away, and he, rather surprised to see how quietly Max took his accusation, had wheeled round in his chair to look at ...
— The Wharf by the Docks - A Novel • Florence Warden
... hesitation. It was a sharp fantastic crisis that had popped up as if in a dream, and it had had only to last the few seconds to make him feel it as quite horrible. They were thus, on either side, TRYING the other side, and all for some reason that broke the stillness like some unprovoked harsh note. It seemed to him again, within the limit, that he had but one thing to do—to settle their common question by some sign of surprise and joy. He hereupon gave large play to these things, agitating his hat and his stick and loudly calling out—a demonstration that ...
— The Ambassadors • Henry James
... know you are," he said very quietly. "You are my wife, and the law is on my side. I don't want to be harsh or unjust, but I can force you to come away with me this moment if I choose—not that I intend to," he added, meeting her terrified eyes, "because you are going to be a sensible little girl, and we are going to be very happy together. I want to do all I can for you. I want to ...
— The Beggar Man • Ruby Mildred Ayres
... a rattlesnake—the harsh alarm that is unmistakable even when heard for the first time, and the sinuous green thing was poised in the centre of the tent, with head thrown back in the attitude to strike. It had been startled by Holden's sudden movement on ...
— The Fiery Totem - A Tale of Adventure in the Canadian North-West • Argyll Saxby
... was shut off while the Solarite shot swiftly forward toward the source of the sound. Quickly the hills grew, the blue mistiness disappearing, and the jagged mounds revealing themselves as bleak harsh rock. As they drew nearer they saw beyond the hills, intermittent flashes of brilliant light, heard shattering ...
— The Black Star Passes • John W Campbell
... spake like this man" to these poor outcasts before. If at any time they sauntered into the synagogue, and hovered for a few moments on the outskirts of the congregation, the stray words that reached their ears from the desk of the presiding scribe, were harsh supercilious denunciations of themselves and their class. Hitherto their hearts had been like clay, and the Pharisaic teaching, as far as it had reached them, had been like fire: the clay in this furnace grew aye the harder. But now a new sound from the lips ...
— The Parables of Our Lord • William Arnot
... recalled her words, but that was impossible: fain would she have stood upon form, and have kept her lover at a distance, as the custom of discreet ladies is, to frown and be perverse, and give their suitors harsh denials at first; to stand off, and affect a coyness or indifference, where they most love, that their lovers may not think them too lightly or too easily won; for the difficulty of attainment increases the value of the object. But there was no room in her case for ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles Lamb and Mary Lamb
... under the actual pressure of heavier wrongs than those threatened ones which brought on the Revolution. James II, the bigoted successor of Charles the Voluptuous, had annulled the charters of all the colonies, and sent a harsh and unprincipled soldier to take away our liberites and endanger our religion. The administration of Sir Edmund Andros lacked scarcely a single characteristic of tyranny: a Governor and Council, holding office from the King, and wholly independent of the country; laws made and taxes levied ...
— Legends That Every Child Should Know • Hamilton Wright Mabie
... gentleman, not too old yet to learn nobility, may be killed in my quarrel; while another, whom I alone of all that know him may not praise, carries his life lightly in his hand for me. And to you, my lord, I have done the wrong of dressing a harsh deed in some cloak of excuse, making you seem to serve the king in ...
— Rupert of Hentzau - From The Memoirs of Fritz Von Tarlenheim: The Sequel to - The Prisoner of Zenda • Anthony Hope
... stranger, miss—I ain't no stranger," he began, in a voice which was a curious blend of his ordinary harsh tones with a soft and quivering sympathy. "We're none of us strangers to ...
— Colonial Born - A tale of the Queensland bush • G. Firth Scott
... the Liverpool Museum. It has in its natural state an antipathy to the light, and in the open day is quite moped and inanimate. When kept in a darkened place it seems at its ease, and sometimes makes use of the note or call from which it takes its name, and which is rather plaintive than harsh. The flesh, of which I have eaten, perfectly resembles that of the common pheasant (tugang), also found in the woods, but the body is of much larger size. I have reason to believe that it is not, as supposed, a native of the North ...
— The History of Sumatra - Containing An Account Of The Government, Laws, Customs And - Manners Of The Native Inhabitants • William Marsden |
