"Dully" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... in front of his captor, by little-known hill paths the judge had been borne swiftly through the night. The long, melancholy wail of a whaup, the eerie hoot of an owl, at times smote dully on his ear; but to all his entreaties and his questions no human voice made answer; in stony silence his abductor rode steadily on. Over hill and dale, over rough ground and smooth, splashing through marshy soil where the hoofs of the heavily laden horse ...
— Stories of the Border Marches • John Lang and Jean Lang
... moment, when he had the desire to strike the man before him, it was impossible for him not to admire the stone-like invulnerability of Kedsty. He had never heard of another man calling Kedsty a scoundrel or dishonest. And yet, except that his faced burned more dully red, the Inspector was as impassively calm as ever. Even Kent's intimation that he was playing a game, and his direct accusation that he was keeping Marette Radisson in hiding at his bungalow, seemed to have no disturbing effect on him. For a space he looked ...
— The Valley of Silent Men • James Oliver Curwood
... morning passed, somewhat dully for Win, who still felt unfit to study or even to occupy himself with a book, and lay upon the couch while his mother ...
— The Spanish Chest • Edna A. Brown
... hammer had stopped tapping and her eyes were closed. She was asleep. The girl next to her, evidently her elder sister, seeing the foreman approach, pinched the child sharply. She opened her eyes and dully began her tapping. As I left this room of darkness my eyes were wet ...
— The Menorah Journal, Volume 1, 1915 • Various
... of Lord Dreever's philosophical remarks. There was something of a cloud on his brain. To judge from his lordship's words, things had been happening behind his back; and the idea of Molly's deceiving him was too strange to be assimilated in an instant. He looked at the valet dully. ...
— The Intrusion of Jimmy • P. G. Wodehouse
... The pianoforte glimmers dully with its black, bent, glossy side; the yellow, old, time-eaten, broken, gap-toothed keys glisten faintly. The stagnant, motionless air still retains yesterday's odour; it smells of perfumes, tobacco, the sour dampness of a ...
— Yama (The Pit) • Alexandra Kuprin
... in the valley below me. I had never before looked down upon clouds. I thought of the cloud that had covered me in the valley below, and dully watched the clouds ...
— The University of Hard Knocks • Ralph Parlette
... making our last bed like our first; nor much unlike the urns of our nativity while we lay in the nether part of the earth,|| and inward vault of our microcosm. Many urns are red, these but of a black colour somewhat smooth, and dully sounding, ...
— Religio Medici, Hydriotaphia, and the Letter to a Friend • Sir Thomas Browne
... used to oppression—that is, he either oppresses or is oppressed—and he is dully callous to death. So the villages were not much surprised at Kettle's descents upon them, and usually surrendered to him passively on the mere prestige of his name. They were pleasantly disappointed that he omitted the usual ...
— A Master of Fortune • Cutcliffe Hyne
... and again was still. It was that Washington girl then. She answered dully, groping for words, for ...
— The Quest of the Silver Fleece - A Novel • W. E. B. Du Bois
... spirit and some learning; what do you think of commencing author like me? You have read in books, no doubt, of men of genius starving at the trade; at present I'll show you forty very dull fellows about town that live by it in opulence. All honest, jog-trot men, who go on smoothly and dully, and write history and politics, and are praised: men, sir, who, had they been bred cobblers, would all their lives only have mended shoes, but never made them." "Finding" (says George) "that there is no great degree of gentility affixed to the character of an usher, ...
— Oliver Goldsmith • Washington Irving
... of time, to influence me, was the New Testament, and in particular the Gospel according to St. Matthew. I believe it would startle and move any one if they could make a certain effort of imagination and read it freshly like a book, not droningly and dully like a portion of the Bible. Any one would then be able to see in it those truths which we are all courteously supposed to know and all modestly refrain from applying. But upon this subject it is perhaps better to ...
— The Art of Writing and Other Essays • Robert Louis Stevenson
... if I rest," I thought, and meanwhile drifted out until the roar of the breakers came but dully to my ears—out where the water was ...
— The Junior Classics Volume 8 - Animal and Nature Stories • Selected and arranged by William Patten
... dully, evenly, and he still stared at the coffee-pot with that gimlet gaze of his that made Billy Louise want to scream. "I see a whole lot that I'd been shutting my eyes to. Why don't ...
— The Ranch at the Wolverine • B. M. Bower
... be some faithful men remaining even in an age of general apostasy, and on making my way to the door of the dwelling (which lay in the roof of the temple) I gave the call, and presently it was opened to me. The man who stood before me, peering dully through the gloom, had at least remained constant to his vows, and I made the salutation before him with a ...
— The Lost Continent • C. J. Cutcliffe Hyne
... afterwards. That would be the best thing for him. Had he not said the last time he was drunk and was crying so bitterly, "I don't suit this place. When my Sophia is a widow, will she love me more than she does now?" Yes, she would. He was quite right, and he had felt it dully in his intoxication. A monument should be erected to his memory, as beautiful a cross as could be ordered in Gradewitz, or even in Gnesen. If only he would depart, it only he would depart and ...
— Absolution • Clara Viebig
... sun beat down on him, and set a-glitter the currents in the Rhone. The ceaseless, laughing stream of citizens passed him by. Presently youth's need of action brought him half-unconsciously to an erect position. He glanced dully this way and that, and then slowly moved along the bridge towards the Villeneuve bank. Girls bare-headed, arm-in-arm, looked up at him and laughed, he was so long and lean and comical with his ugly lugubrious face and the little straw ...
— The Mountebank • William J. Locke
... surge of sound—"London, Paris, and Berlin have fallen to the enemy." The words thudded in the pilot's ear-phones. "San Francisco is being attacked. Communication with New Orleans has failed. The enemy are in sight of Buenos Aires—" The general broke off, and Allan sensed dully that there was other news, news that he dared not give ...
— When the Sleepers Woke • Arthur Leo Zagat
... and drew her closer, without answering, until her eyes also were able to look around the sharp edge of rock. Far away, it seemed a long distance up that narrow tunnel, a lantern glowed dully, the light so dim and flickering as to scarcely reveal even its immediate surroundings; yet from that distance, her eyes accustomed to the dense gloom, she could distinguish enough to quicken her breathing and cause her to clutch ...
— The Strange Case of Cavendish • Randall Parrish
... came in, administered stimulant, and whispered to Buntingford to let her rest a little. He sat there beside her motionless, for half an hour or more, unconscious of the passage of time, his thoughts searching the past, and then again grappling dully with the extraordinary, the incredible statement that he possessed a son—a living but, apparently, an idiot son. The light began to fail, and Miss Alcott slipped in noiselessly again to light a small ...
— Helena • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... shivered with cold and then said, dully at first, but with a growing cheerfulness that made Gorgo's blood run cold: "Did I say 'nothingness'? Did I speak of the great void, my child? You are quick of hearing. Nothingness—well, you have learnt to think; are you capable of defining the meaning of the ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... whole audience, including the gunner, gave a sigh of content; and after that they went to hear it time after time. Well, the beauty of that song, and of all art, is the 'Key of Heaven' itself. For Heaven is a state of being of which we all dream, however dully, in which all have the power of communication with each other; in which all are aware of the universal, possessed by it and a part of it, all members of one body, all notes in one tune, and therefore all the more intensely themselves, ...
— Recent Developments in European Thought • Various
... brought in food. Fabia made Ovid eat some bread and fruit. The evening wore on. The December moon was mounting the sky. Voices and footsteps of passers-by were vaguely heard. In the distance a dog barked incessantly. Lights were lit, but the usual decorum of the house was broken. The fire died dully upon the hearth. The children were brought into the room, looking pale and worn with the unwonted hour. Midnight came and went. All sounds of the city died away. Even the dog ceased his howling. They were alone with ...
— Roads from Rome • Anne C. E. Allinson
... shut, but the light shone dully through the red blinds which were drawn across the windows. They were like two huge eyes bleared with strong drink, and as a late comer pushed open the door at intervals and disappeared within, a watcher might ...
— Princess Maritza • Percy Brebner
... "He wondered dully if he'd died, And so, become a Christ; 'Perhaps,' he thought, 'all men are Christs When they ...
— Giant Hours With Poet Preachers • William L. Stidger
... at her dully. Her perspicacity disconcerted him. He had expected to bolster up the ruins of his honor by her delighted acquiescence. He had not known till now how much he had been counting on the justification of her relief. It was a proof, however, of the degree to which ...
— The Street Called Straight • Basil King
... would each and all gradually pass into her's and Bunting's possession, honestly earned by them no doubt but unattainable—in act unearnable—excepting in connection with the present owner of those dully shining ...
— The Lodger • Marie Belloc Lowndes
... observation he had aroused no interest. He had minded his business, paid his way, taken his turn in camp at greenhorn jobs, accounted for his presence on the ground of seeking health, and that was all. Life went on as usual, sluggishly and dully—but on. ...
— Joyce of the North Woods • Harriet T. Comstock
... it. He saw the dust, too—a mass of fine particles, glinting dully yellow amidst the brownish interior. Gee whiz! And the other ...
— Gold Seekers of '49 • Edwin L. Sabin
... something gave way within him like a lump melting in his throat. The air cleared and became radiant with dawn, and turning over on his face he began to sob dully into the pillow. ...
— Tales of the Jazz Age • F. Scott Fitzgerald
... moment, then flicked the horses into a swift trot. She must get him home. Perhaps he was going to be ill. The boy did not move or look up for miles. When the horses splashed through the ford at Elm Creek, he roused himself and looked dully at Jane. ...
— Chicken Little Jane on the Big John • Lily Munsell Ritchie
... vapor. Up, up, they came, like dream men, their eyes weird and unreal. Cursing the treachery of their late host, Nelson and Alden watched dozens upon dozens of hoplites come swarming up the stairs in solid, dully-gleaming ranks. Apparently intent to take them prisoners, the foremost Atlanteans made a rush, giving the American time to ...
— Astounding Stories, March, 1931 • Various
... an hour, the monotonous voice of the reader went dully on. Fenton drew out his tablets and amused himself and Miss Dimmont by drawing caricatures of the company, ending with a sketch of a handsome old dowager, who went so soundly to sleep that her jaw fell. Over this his companion laughed ...
— The Philistines • Arlo Bates
... will be the Collector," he said, and nodded many times, at first as if proud of his sagacity, but afterwards dully—as though his interest had died out and he would have ceased nodding but had forgotten the way. "Yes; my gran'-darter told me. She's in service at the Bowling Green, Port Nassau; but walks over on Lord's Days to cheer up her ...
— Lady Good-for-Nothing • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... never for a moment disturbed his clammy self-complacency. Perhaps no baser or more squalid soul ever wore a crown; yet no doubt ever crept into his mind that he was God's chosen and anointed. His pale eyes, staring dully from his pale face, saw in the royal prerogative the only visible witness of God's will in the domain of England; the atmosphere of him was corruption and death. But from 1685 to 1688 this man was ...
— The History of the United States from 1492 to 1910, Volume 1 • Julian Hawthorne
... of iron that led past tiers of cells, through the tombs, into the prisoner's dock. Isaac dully remembered the huge coils of steam-pipe that curled up the side of the wall. He thought of pythons. As he passed by, the prisoners awaiting sentence held the rods of their doors in their hands, like monkeys, and swore, and laughed, and shot questions ...
— McClure's Magazine, January, 1896, Vol. VI. No. 2 • Various
... is it?" Rosina asked dully. She felt that she ought to try and make an effort to interest herself in the lives of others, even if her own had ...
— A Woman's Will • Anne Warner
... earlier books. Frankly I confess myself bewildered and unable to follow this excursion into the region of metaphysics; indeed I felt as if I had fallen into the hands of a guide whose language I could only dimly and dully understand. All of which may be almost entirely my fault, so I suggest that you should sample Michael for yourselves and see what you can make of him. Miss JOHNSTON shouldered an unnecessarily heavy burden when she decided to tell the ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 159, August 18th, 1920 • Various
... dully, "I'm most awfully sorry. I had never dreamed of this. I was good pals with Yae because of you. I never dreamed of making love to her. You know how I love my wife. She must have been mad to think of me like that. Besides," he added ...
— Kimono • John Paris
... a chair, his hands bound to the arms with strips of cloth. For a moment everything about seemed tinged with yellow, the various objects in sight vague and shapeless. It hurt him to move his head, and his mind functioned dully. He could not think, or bring back to memory a recollection of what had occurred. Yet slowly the mist cleared and the objects about him assumed natural form. He was in a room of some size—not the one in which he had been attacked he felt sure—fitted up with a long table, ...
— The Case and The Girl • Randall Parrish
... soul, the watcher left To brood the nearness of his own decay, Dully remarking the slow shameless theft Of the old holiness from day to day, How youth grows tarnished, wisdom changes false,— Till one bends near ...
— The Five Books of Youth • Robert Hillyer
... instant the Young Electrician's sleepy eyes stared dully into the Girl's excited face. Then he stumbled up a bit awkwardly and reached out for all his ...
— The Indiscreet Letter • Eleanor Hallowell Abbott
... Philippa, wondering dully how he could take any interest in anything more in life, knowing all that had ...
— Flip's "Islands of Providence" • Annie Fellows Johnston
... Leech but now. He was, in all things essential, Dickens's contemporary. And accordingly the married woman and her child are humiliated by his pencil; not grossly, but commonly. For him she is moderately and dully ridiculous. What delights him as humorous is that her husband—himself wearisome enough to die of—is weary of her, finds the time long, and tries to escape her. It amuses him that she should furtively spend money over her own dowdiness, ...
— The Rhythm of Life • Alice Meynell
... concerned in the want or weakness of any, or all of the foregoing faculties, an exact observation of their several ways of faultering would no doubt discover. For those who either perceive but dully, or retain the ideas that come into their minds but ill, who cannot readily excite or compound them, will have little matter to think on. Those who cannot distinguish, compare, and abstract, would hardly be able to understand and make use of ...
— An Essay Concerning Humane Understanding, Volume I. - MDCXC, Based on the 2nd Edition, Books I. and II. (of 4) • John Locke
... Chancellor in brisk speech that led to one or two interludes of angry interruption across the Table. When he made an end of speaking, debate relapsed into former condition of languor. Talk dully kept up ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, July 1, 1914 • Various
... lifted themselves to look dully round, there, like a white cloud of hope, came life pressing gloriously towards me—a pyramid of snowy canvas, dazzling in the sunshine, the upper courses of a ...
— Carette of Sark • John Oxenham
... pillage, the news of which would flash throughout the civilised world, causing surprise and horror, but which it would be powerless to prevent. By this time the stores which had burned so brilliantly on the previous night were dully glowing heaps of ashes. The tom-toms had ceased their hollow-sounding monotones so suggestive of disorder and rapine, and the wild yelpings of the fiend-like crew had given place to the desultory howling of some coyotes and timber-wolves that had ventured right up to the outskirts of the village, ...
— The Rising of the Red Man - A Romance of the Louis Riel Rebellion • John Mackie
... diverted an elder to hear him, so slim and simple, discoursing so sweetly and reasonably on a theme on which few of us at the fag end of our days are ever able to utter one sensible syllable, but Lancelot always seemed to me wise beyond his time, so I listened, although dully enough and I fear sullenly. He slipped his hand into his breast and drew forth a small object which he held shut in his hand while he ...
— Marjorie • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... rather dully. Rain was falling from early morning; Lemm wore a scowl, and kept more and more tightly compressing his lips, as though he had taken an oath never to open them again. When he went to his room, Lavretsky took up to bed with him a whole bundle of French newspapers, which had ...
— A House of Gentlefolk • Ivan Turgenev
... ever homely wits. I rather would entreat thy company To see the wonders of the world abroad, Than living dully, sluggardis'd at home, Wear out thy youth ...
— Frank Fairlegh - Scenes From The Life Of A Private Pupil • Frank E. Smedley
... that, is it?" said Kirk dully. He felt curiously indisposed to fight. A listlessness had gripped him. He was even a little sorry for Bailey. He saw his point of ...
— The Coming of Bill • P. G. Wodehouse
... raised herself, quitting his support. "I've promised not to tell anyone," she said dully. ...
— The Keeper of the Door • Ethel M. Dell
... so tired that words were too much trouble to shape. He nodded dully. Pryor had been right about Hannibal. The big mule had not only taken his own passage across the Tennessee as a matter-of-course proceeding, but had shouldered and urged along three horses as he went. And twice since then Drew had ...
— Ride Proud, Rebel! • Andre Alice Norton
... Dully he stared at the thing on the ground at his feet. There was a movement in the scrub and Alice Marcum stood beside him. He glanced into her face. And as her eyes strayed from the sprawling figure to meet his, Endicott ...
— The Texan - A Story of the Cattle Country • James B. Hendryx
... with courts and bus'ness tir'd, Caring for nothing, but what ease requir'd; Too dully serious for the muses sport, And from the critics safe arriv'd in port; I little thought of launching forth agen, Amidst advent'rous rovers of the pen; And after so much undeserv'd success, Thus hazarding ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) - Vol. III • Theophilus Cibber
... mattress, stuffed with the husks and leaves of maize, lay all that the fever had left of Marcello Consalvi, shivering under a tattered brown blanket. There was little more than the shadow of the boy, and his blue eyes stared dully up at the girl's face. But there was life in him still, thanks to her, and though there was no expression in his gaze, his lips smiled faintly, and ...
— Whosoever Shall Offend • F. Marion Crawford
... broad wooden pedestal, arose higher than a tall man, holding lamps of silver on sliding arms, half-a-dozen or more in number, and all burning. The light was clear, bringing into view the panelling on the walls, the cornice with its row of gilded balls, and the dome dully tinted with ...
— Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ • Lew Wallace
... his mind to the pain stabbing through his weary feet, to the constriction of his throat, to the ache of his body so sorely and so long punished. When, had matters been different, he might have cried out: 'God, for a drink!' he now muttered dully, 'God, put him into my two ...
— The Desert Valley • Jackson Gregory
... himself in, he slightly raised the roof and then sat down before the car which was rapidly taking on shape and assuming that individuality and appearance of sentient life which hitherto he had only seen in dreams. But his eye, which had never failed to kindle at this sight before, shone dully in the semi-gloom. The air-car could wait; he would first have his hour in this solitude of his own making. The gaze he dreaded, the words from which he shrank could not penetrate here. He might even shout her name aloud, and only ...
— Initials Only • Anna Katharine Green
... right and left of the boat, the motionless, melancholy, black hulls of ships emerged from the equally black water. A light moved to and fro on one; someone was walking with a lantern. The sea, caressing their sides, seemed to dully implore them while they responded by a cold, rumbling echo, as though they were ...
— Twenty-six and One and Other Stories • Maksim Gorky
... their actions. If the damned lack of organization, that we all are suffering from, can be noticed in our present life—it is ideally clearly seen in the Ekaterinburg circles. The Princess G. and others are of the same sort; dully thinking, believing in and hoping for marvels and miracles, trying to look busy and tired. They gossip about each other, they are ready to sink each other in a spoonful of water. Now what is their plan? They haven't any,—at ...
— Rescuing the Czar - Two authentic Diaries arranged and translated • James P. Smythe
... have thrown it all away in the balance. If these things were known, I would be ruined." He spoke dully ...
— The Purchase Price • Emerson Hough
... felt the perspiration stand out as he gazed dully at the swaying figure of Jerry which was slowly vanishing above him. However, there was no use speculating, he considered. Little by little the form of Jerry merged into the flickering lights and shadows overhead; staring ...
— The Pirate Shark • Elliott Whitney
... a war," said Shandor dully, "and he was all by himself. Nobody else wanted to stop it, nobody that mattered, at any rate. Only the people didn't want war, and who ever listens to them? Ingersoll got the people behind him, so they gave him a couple of Nobel Peace Prizes, and made him Secretary ...
— Bear Trap • Alan Edward Nourse
... bone where he had hidden it. Yet it did not look half as inviting as it had when he covered it with dirt a few days before. He stared at it dully. Then he put it back in its hole and pawed ...
— The Tale of Old Dog Spot • Arthur Scott Bailey
... I said, dully. "Well, you've taken my last holiday from me. I'll write to her tonight, telling her ...
— Not George Washington - An Autobiographical Novel • P. G. Wodehouse
... and turned her face away; they were both silent. Then she said, dully, that she never heard any news. "Mr. Raynor sends me my accounts every three months, but he ...
— The Awakening of Helena Richie • Margaret Deland
... so ominous that she hastily did as he bid, wondering dully whether at last her day ...
— Tabitha at Ivy Hall • Ruth Alberta Brown
... overturned; some books thudded dully upon the rug. Arthur leaned with his hands tense upon the desk. Paul sustained the look, his eyes sad and his face pale ...
— Parrot & Co. • Harold MacGrath
... other man, dashing his hand from his eyes; "I am weak and half starved. It would be better for all concerned if I blew out my brains. The twentieth, the twentieth!" he repeated, dully. "Curse her!" he burst forth; "as there's a God above us, I'll have revenge. Aye, I'll return to the chateau, Madame, that I will, but at the head of ten thousand men!... The twentieth! She will never forgive me; she will think I, too, deserted ...
— The Puppet Crown • Harold MacGrath
... and the dripping jungle began to steam. Palm leaves were constructed into hats to guard against sunstroke. Toward sunset they drew near the danger point. What was that monotonous sound dully vibrating through the jungle? Anxiously all eyes turned ...
— The Adventures of Piang the Moro Jungle Boy - A Book for Young and Old • Florence Partello Stuart
... changed. Afternoon school was over, and I had just finished the last weary line in the long imposition set by Mrs. Handsomebody. I stretched my cramped limbs, and wondered dully where my brothers were. My depression was increased by the fact that the freshly-donned trousers were brown tweed, while my ...
— Explorers of the Dawn • Mazo de la Roche
... up the gorge, a great stir of air that swayed the trees, and filled the ravine with a sound like the sea. Rand listened dully, staring down the steeps of pine and hemlock, giant trees that had dwelt there long. A desolation came upon him. The air appeared to darken and grow cold, the wind passed, and the gorge lay very still. Rand bowed himself together, and at last, with a dull and heavy throb, his heart spoke. "What ...
— Lewis Rand • Mary Johnston
... time the pen moved his hand awakened, and began to work languidly. When he went home at night he lay down at once and stared for hours at a fly on the wall or a crack on the ceiling. When his wife spoke to him he heard her speaking as from a great distance, and he answered her dully as though he was replying through a cloud. He only wanted to be let alone, to be allowed to stare at the fly on the wall, or the crack ...
— The Crock of Gold • James Stephens
... brought the last word. He read it calmly upon the train, wondering at himself that there was such a thing as calm left to him. A man, looking over his shoulder, commented on the news lightly. Drennen didn't answer. He was visualising the final episode dully; the great, masterful body of his own father in the Paris morgue, the ignominious grave, ...
— Wolf Breed • Jackson Gregory
... help me," she answered dully, "please take the dog away. He is tearing my heart-strings. Poor little ...
— The Captain of the Kansas • Louis Tracy
... white sheet. Finally, from far off, mingling with the skirling pipes of the wind came a different, human sound. And, presently, when the call—if call it was—was repeated, the man sat up and looked dully around. But he made no effort to reply. He waited, listening stupidly, and the cry did not reach him again. Then, his glance falling to the woman, a ray of intelligence leaped in his eyes. He rose on his knees and ...
— The Rim of the Desert • Ada Woodruff Anderson
... carefully out of sight; there was no outward sign of irreverence or inattention in their demeanour, but Miss Briskett felt, that every single woman of them was absorbed—utterly, consumedly absorbed—in casting sly glances at that distracting white vision in the easy chair; at the dully glowing hair, the floating folds of white, the tiny, extended feet. She might have read a page of the dictionary, and they would not have noticed; even Heap, who was old enough to know better, was edging sideways in her chair, to get ...
— Flaming June • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... the evening sky, Vy[vs]ehrad looks very imposing; it is at its best by winter twilight, when the heavy mass is dully reflected on the surface of the frozen river. Then you may gain some idea of what this rugged promontory stands for in the life-history of a race that has passed through great tribulation. Two Gothic spires point to the skies, ...
— From a Terrace in Prague • Lieut.-Col. B. Granville Baker
... noise sounded like the beating of some one's heart, she thought dully; she found ...
— The Phantom Lover • Ruby M. Ayres
... aren't hurt, are you? You must get up—it's no use. We're doing our best—you must do yours. When things are like this, we have to put up with what we get. (GERALD rises slowly and faces the mob. They roar dully.) You ask why the clerks didn't get this increase? Wait! Wait! Do you still wish for ...
— Touch and Go • D. H. Lawrence
... Dully he felt the beat of rocks. Then it flashed upon him that the dead man was sinking like a weighted thing. He freed himself. Fiercely he struggled to bring himself to the surface. It seemed an eternity before he rose to the top. He opened his mouth and drew a great gulp of ...
— The Hunted Woman • James Oliver Curwood
... from below. A bell jangled madly. The crackle of pistol-fire punched dully through the ...
— The Flying Legion • George Allan England
... still frightened and Spain still undecided. Winter was no obstacle to them; peace and delay were for cowards: they must invade Italy and seize Rome: haste was the safest course in civil war, where action is better than deliberation. Vitellius was dully apathetic, anticipating his high station by indulging in idle luxury and lavish entertainments. At midday he would be drunk and drowsy with over-eating. However, such was the zeal of the soldiers that they even did the general's duties, and behaved exactly as if ...
— Tacitus: The Histories, Volumes I and II • Caius Cornelius Tacitus
... old men, moving their feet quite briskly, leaped like a whirlwind to one side, almost upon the musicians' heads, and, suddenly, retreating, squatted down and drummed the hard earth vigorously with their silver heels. The earth hummed dully all about, and afar the air resounded with national dance tunes beaten by the clanging ...
— Taras Bulba and Other Tales • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol
... attacking those of his host; he even admitted, a little listlessly, that if the Power fell upon him, if he himself spoke in a strange tongue, then perhaps he would believe—"that is, if I could be sure I was not out of my mind at the time," he qualified, dully. Philippa took no part in the discussion; it would not have been thought becoming in her to do so; but indeed, she hardly heard what the two men were saying. She helped old Hannah carry away the dishes, and then sat ...
— The Voice • Margaret Deland
... be men will honor me — The wistful ones and wise, Who know the ruth of victory, The joy of sacrifice. I may be rich, I may be gay, But all the crowns grow old — The laurel withers and the bay And dully ...
— The Second Book of Modern Verse • Jessie B. Rittenhouse
... beast, yet still incline my mind thither. And unless Thou, having made me see my infirmity didst speedily admonish me either through the sight itself by some contemplation to rise towards Thee, or altogether to despise and pass it by, I dully stand fixed therein. What, when sitting at home, a lizard catching flies, or a spider entangling them rushing into her nets, oft-times takes my attention? Is the thing different, because they are but small creatures? I go on from them to praise Thee the wonderful Creator and Orderer ...
— The Confessions of Saint Augustine • Saint Augustine
... heart in that express car back to the corn belt. My poor parent, when I again met him, unwrapped me very tenderly, and sat for a long time turning me through very dully. I stayed on his desk for several days, and then fared forth again on my quest, valued this trip ...
— Walking-Stick Papers • Robert Cortes Holliday
... of the pyre, David crawled to the edge and glanced over. Far down, on the slope at the foot of the scarp, was a tiny figure dancing and bellowing with rage. The Scientist had returned and discovered the ruins of his blind. David watched him dully. No need to worry about him any more. How harmless he looked now, even ...
— David and the Phoenix • Edward Ormondroyd
... the ever-present molder and decay. This office, he could easily see, had been both spacious and luxurious, but now it offered a sorry spectacle. In the dust over by a window something glittered dully. ...
— Darkness and Dawn • George Allan England
... no longer "mad on theirselves," but "mit kind feelings." The work of the preceding term was laid in neat and docketed piles upon the low book-case. The children were enjoined to keep clean and entire. And Teacher, a nervous and unsmiling Teacher, waited dully. ...
— Little Citizens • Myra Kelly
... in suspense. Moya was disappointed in her expectation of sharing in whatever the letter from Fort Lemhi might contain. Christine was in bed with a headache, her mother dully gave out, with no apparent expectation that any one would accept this excuse for the girl's complete withdrawal. The letter, she told Moya, was from Banks Bowen. "There was nothing in it of consequence—to us," she added, and Moya took the words ...
— The Desert and The Sown • Mary Hallock Foote
... at the hospital in the night, with his friends looking on, is powerfully and minutely described. The fat, stupid priest goes through the last ceremonies, and is dully amazed at the contempt he receives ...
— Essays on Russian Novelists • William Lyon Phelps
... still, his eyes travelling dully over the group of us, as if he expected somewhere to find help. At the same time he was not in the least thinking of us. He looked straight at me for a full minute before he ...
— Helmet of Navarre • Bertha Runkle
... surrounded and suffocated him. It seemed indeed some demon tree of the swamps; a vegetable serpent that fed on men. Even the hideous farce in the fancy of digesting a whole man with the exception of his hat, seemed only to simplify the nightmare. And he found himself gazing dully at one leaf of the tree, which happened to be turned toward him, so that the odd markings, which had partly made the legend, really looked a little like the eye in a peacock's feather. It was as if the sleeping tree had opened ...
— The Trees of Pride • G.K. Chesterton
... affairs it happened once that, as I was leaning out of my window gazing dully into vacancy, the lady's-maid from the castle came tripping across the road. When she saw me she came and stood just outside the window. "His Grace returned from his travels yesterday," she remarked, hurriedly. "Indeed!" I said, surprised, for I had taken ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries: - Masterpieces of German Literature Translated into English, Volume 5. • Various
... evenly blended, nicely adjusted deformity. There was a fox-like cunning in the face and the sharp little eyes, and also alertness and malice. And yet, this vile bit of human rubbish seemed to bear a sort of remote and ill-defined resemblance to me! It was dully perceptible in the mean form, the countenance, and even the clothes, gestures, manner, and attitudes of the creature. He was a farfetched, dim suggestion of a burlesque upon me, a caricature of me in little. One thing about him struck me forcibly and ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... He was wondering dully whether any of these men had ever felt the same degree of desperate anxiety about the future as he ...
— People of Position • Stanley Portal Hyatt
... takes hard knocks. Strong psalmic chanting, like to nasal cocks, They join to thunderings of their hearty thwacks. But naughtiness, with hoggery, not lacks When Peace another door in them unlocks, Where conscience shows the eyeing of an ox Grown dully apprehensive of an Axe. Graceless they are when gone to frivolousness, Fearing the God they flout, the God they glut. They need their pious exercises less Than schooling in the Pleasures: fair belief That ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... the following day Winona Penniman, a copy of the Advance before her, sat at the Penniman luncheon table staring dully into a dish of cold rice pudding. She had read again and again the unbelievable item. At length she snapped her head, as Spike Brennon would when now and again a clean blow reached his jaw, pushed the untouched dessert from her with a gesture of repugnance, and went aloft ...
— The Wrong Twin • Harry Leon Wilson
... the head at so long a breathing;I warrant thee, Claudio, the time shall not go dully by us; I will, in the interim, undertake one of Hercules' labours; which is, to bring signior Benedick and the lady Beatrice into a mountain of affection, the one with the other. I would fain have it a match; ...
— Much Ado About Nothing • William Shakespeare [Knight edition]
... but Heaven has sent this way A nymph, fair, kind, poetical, and gay; And what is more (tho' I express it dully), A noble, wise, right honourable cully: A soldier worthy of the name he bears, As brave and senseless ...
— Lady Mary Wortley Montague - Her Life and Letters (1689-1762) • Lewis Melville
... Dully at the leaden sky Staring, and with idle eye Measuring the listless plain, I began to think again. Many things I thought of then, Battle, and the loves of men, Cities entered, oceans crossed, Knowledge gained ...
— Last Poems • A. E. Housman
... cry had died away on the surrounding sea the red light ceased to revolve. It was still, glaring dully. Then, as the boat touched the beach beneath the tower, Fion commanded Bechunach to throw his knotted cord ...
— Edmund Dulac's Fairy-Book - Fairy Tales of the Allied Nations • Edmund Dulac
... again behind him, just balking a blundering charge from the young man in the billycock. The young man threw himself impatiently on a hall chair. Flambeau looked at a Persian illumination on the wall; Father Brown, who seemed in a sort of daze, dully eyed the door. In about four minutes the door was opened again. Atkinson was quicker this time. He sprang forward, held the door open for an instant, and called out: "Oh, I ...
— The Innocence of Father Brown • G. K. Chesterton
... candlestick of prodigious stature, and a thin Italian cabinet surmounted by an urn whose unexposed contents might readily have suggested something more sinister than the dust of antiquity. The door to the library was open. Fitful red shadows flashed dully from the fireplace across the room, creeping out into the hall and then darting back again as if afraid to venture. The waning sunlight struggled through a curtained window at the top of the stairs. There was dusk in the house. Evening ...
— From the Housetops • George Barr McCutcheon
... knowing what this remark meant, and caring less, answered with a cold stare, though inwardly he cursed the man for his fatuous impertinence. That done, he relapsed dully into his own thoughts, which were all of the house he had scurried from, terrified by Peter's cry, half an ...
— Captivating Mary Carstairs • Henry Sydnor Harrison
... odor wound up in wavering purple spirals of smoke. On each side of Hrihor were five under-priests, eyes stiffly on their superior's impassive face. The soldiers had retreated from the altar and now were massed in the rear of the Temple, their spear blades glittering dully above ...
— Astounding Stories, July, 1931 • Various
... the mettlesome team swung across, and during the first few minutes the cold struck through them with a sting like the thrust of steel. A half-moon hung low above it, coppery red with frost, and there was no sound but the crunch beneath the runners, and the beat of hoofs that rang dully through the silence like ...
— Hawtrey's Deputy • Harold Bindloss
... were happy as they lay about their fires, which glowed dully in the dusk. Each was telling what he presently was going to do, when he got his pay at old St. Louis, not ...
— The Magnificent Adventure - Being the Story of the World's Greatest Exploration and - the Romance of a Very Gallant Gentleman • Emerson Hough
... few hours a great throng of people gathered around the dully smoldering mass of fire-pitted rock, the upper half of which protruded from the Earth where it had buried itself, like a huge, roughly outlined hemisphere. And then, when the crowd had assumed its greatest proportions, the meteor, with a ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, November, 1930 • Various
... remain in town over Sunday. On the street corners and in front of the newspaper offices little knots of men, wearing bits of white ribbon in their buttonholes, were idling. They were quiet, curious, dully waiting to see what this preposterous stroke might mean for them. In the heavy noonday air of the streets they moved lethargically, drifting westward to the hall where the A. R. U. committees were ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick
... Him who Counsel can bestow, Still pleas'd to teach, and yet not proud to know; Unbias'd or by Favour or by Spite; Nor dully prepossess'd, nor blindly right; Tho learn'd, well-bred; and, tho well-bred, sincere; Modestly bold, and humanely severe; Who to a Friend his Faults can sweetly show. And gladly praise the Merit of a Foe. Here, there he sits, his chearful Aid to lend; A firm, unshaken, ...
— Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin • Benjamin Franklin
... looked dully at the ground. Then his attention shifted to the man standing beside ...
— Rebel Spurs • Andre Norton
... drew near, a straggling group gathered around the strangers. They stared dully and without intelligence, and yet like animals in whom savagery is ever ready to burst restraints. The stronger men among them glowered at the intruders, turning against a strange face with the snarl they dared not ...
— The Title Market • Emily Post
... He stared dully at the footrail. For the present the desire to fly was gone. No doubt that was due to his helplessness. When he was up and about, the idea of flight would return. But how far could he fly on a few hundred? True, he might find a job somewhere; ...
— The Ragged Edge • Harold MacGrath
... arms reaching out to them in his moaning. Then, of a sudden, he gave a strange cry, as if defiance had taken the place of grief, and he hurried across the meadow and disappeared into the timber where a great lightning-riven spruce gleamed dully white through the settling ...
— The Flaming Forest • James Oliver Curwood
... apart. Bat's dropped to his side like leaden weights. "So long," he said dully, as the other took his place in the sled. Then he added, "So ...
— The Man in the Twilight • Ridgwell Cullum
... from the realms of fiction writing I looked up a little dazed. 'Lamb or 'am,' I repeated dully, 'lamorram? Er—ram, ...
— Our Elizabeth - A Humour Novel • Florence A. Kilpatrick
... Dully conscious that some one was calling, behind him, Bartley struck out, straight and clean, but he might as well have tried to stop a runaway freight with a whisk-broom. He felt the smashing impact of a blow—then suddenly he was on his back in the road—and ...
— Partners of Chance • Henry Herbert Knibbs
... glanced round his comfortable room and groaned again. "She asked me to get an estimate from Digson," he said, dully. "She knows as well as I do her sister hasn't got any money. I wrote to say that it had better be left till she comes home, as I might not know what ...
— Ship's Company, The Entire Collection • W.W. Jacobs
... still and listened. She heard nothing. Traffic seemed stopped in this region. On her left there were three steps. She went up them and was under the porch of a house. Light shone dully from within, and by it she could just make out on the door the number "8." At least it seemed to her that probably it was an "8." She hesitated, came down the steps, and walked on. It was impossible to see the names of the streets and ...
— In the Wilderness • Robert Hichens
... sheet. An enormously stout woman, clothed in a dressing-gown of black lace, was standing in the cross gallery and resisting the gentle efforts of Sylvia Manning, now attired in black, to take her away. The stout woman's face was deathly white, and her distended eyes were gazing dully at the ominous figure stretched beneath. Two podgy hands, with rings gleaming on every finger, were clutching the carved railing, and the tenacity of their grip caused the knuckles to stand out in white spots ...
— The Strange Case of Mortimer Fenley • Louis Tracy
... arrest. You can't expect the officers to run over here as freely as they used to. What do you want?" she laughed. "Do you think the colonel should parade the band and give you a serenade?" For a moment Ranson stared at her dully, and then his sense of proportion returned to him. He threw back his head ...
— Ranson's Folly • Richard Harding Davis
... paralyzed Morten. As long as he possibly could he had clung to the belief that her life might be saved; if not, it would be so unreasonably unjust; and when her hopeless condition became apparent to him, he collapsed. He did nothing, but wandered about dully, spoke to no one and ate very little. It was as though he had received a blow on the head ...
— Pelle the Conqueror, Complete • Martin Andersen Nexo
... watched him, dug into the furnace of melting iron with his pole, dully thinking only how many rails the lump would yield. It was late,—nearly Sunday morning; another hour, and the heavy work would be done,—only the furnaces to replenish and cover for the next day. The workmen were growing ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 7, Issue 42, April, 1861 • Various
... Rupert Venner hesitated in his decision; and in the next moment it was out of his power to decide. For Rufe, in desperation now, met the boarders at the rail, backed by his half-dozen crazed adherents, and murderous steel glittered dully against ...
— The Pirate Woman • Aylward Edward Dingle
... antiseptic properties of that sort of soil, mixed with the decayed bark and fibre of trees, a portion of the flesh of the hand was decomposed, and the naked bone disclosed. On the little finger something glimmered dully. ...
— Wylder's Hand • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... dully to her animated chat. He is never less urbane than when hungry, and I took pains to have his favourite soup served quite almost at once. This he fell upon. I may say that he has always a hearty manner of attacking his soup. Not ...
— Ruggles of Red Gap • Harry Leon Wilson
... himself backwards, striking her under the chin with his knee. The couch slid backwards a foot against the wall, and he was on his feet. She remained terror-stricken, shocked, looking up at the dully flushed face that glared down ...
— The Necromancers • Robert Hugh Benson
... not troubled herself about Edith's presence, but the latter had also been watching her wiles—dully enough, however, until all at once a thought occurred ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand
... more. As the minutes passed, her timorous gaze continued steadfastly on the stern countenance before her. She dully expected something terrible to happen when Ed Sorenson appeared, for she knew Ed would be angry; but she had been powerless to prevent the ...
— In the Shadow of the Hills • George C. Shedd
... and for a minute the fire made the only sound in the hut. Then, "All die?" I asked dully. "There are three thousand Englishmen ...
— To Have and To Hold • Mary Johnston
... bands of purple and gleaming pink, or of grey blue—the reflection of a sky pallid and tremulous with excess of light. Or myriad hosts of microscopic creatures—the Red Sea owes to the tribe its name—the multitudinous sea dully incarnadine; or the boat rides buoyantly on the shoulders of Neptune's white horses, while funnel-shaped water spouts sway this way and that. Land is always near, and the flotsam and jetsam, do they not supply that smack of excitement—if not the boisterous ...
— The Confessions of a Beachcomber • E J Banfield
... to the dances. The books I scarcely glanced at, and what I did read seemed so silly to me! And the dances had lost their charm. I went once or twice, but the music did not awaken any emotion in me, and I sat dully in a corner watching, without any desire to join in. And this, when I was hardly past sixteen ...
— An Anarchist Woman • Hutchins Hapgood
... they were wearied also, or sharp like ferrets; oppressed, overborne, or cunning, with the cunning of those who must be cunning to live; imbruted often with the brutishness of apathy, consciousless of the dignity of manhood, only dully patient or viciously keen as the ox is or the hawk. Many sottish-looking, or if not sottish with the beery texture of those whose only recreation is to be bestially merry at the drink-shop. This ...
— The Workingman's Paradise - An Australian Labour Novel • John Miller
... a keen disappointment to him. For several days it robbed him of ambition, and he tramped along the trails and attended to his traps dully and methodically, with a heavy heart. Then he ...
— The Gaunt Gray Wolf - A Tale of Adventure With Ungava Bob • Dillon Wallace
... faint creak one of the windows swung inward. Curtain-rings clashed dully on their poles. Someone came through the portieres and paused, pulling them together behind him. The beam of an electric flash-lamp lanced the gloom and its spotlight danced erratically round ...
— The False Faces • Vance, Louis Joseph
... efforts were rewarded; the man opened his eyes and stared dully up at him. For some time he lay there motionless. Then, with a wild light of terror in his eye, he struggled to his feet and attempted to flee. His wabbly legs would not support him. He tumbled to the earth, only to try it again. ...
— The Blue Envelope • Roy J. Snell
... kind he wondered—and dully thought that he couldn't see her, of course, and then suddenly knew that he must. After all, there didn't seem to be much use in saving for the sake of saving when all the saving you could possibly ...
— Young People's Pride • Stephen Vincent Benet
... to break dully over the sullen clouds as he resumed in earnest his weary journey. Each yard of ground passed was now a battle gained—every breath drawn a sobbing groan. Hills and dales rose successively before him, clothed in the dead-white ...
— Bressant • Julian Hawthorne
... Once more he plunged down hill, seized a bucket and began the interminable passing of water. He looked about for Adrian but did not see him. He became a machine, dully, persistently, desperately ...
— Port O' Gold • Louis John Stellman
... board before him the tiny neon tube flickered dully, glowed briefly like a piece of red-hot iron, then went out. In a moment it was glowing again, and then quickly its brilliance mounted till it was a line of crimson. Morey snapped the switch from the general ...
— The Black Star Passes • John W Campbell
... man was blubbering and staring with sheeplike eyes at the lieutenant, who had seized him by the collar and was pommeling him. He drove him back into the ranks with many blows. The soldier went mechanically, dully, with his animal-like eyes upon the officer. Perhaps there was to him a divinity expressed in the voice of the other—stern, hard, with no reflection of fear in it. He tried to reload his gun, but his shaking hands prevented. The lieutenant ...
— The Red Badge of Courage - An Episode of the American Civil War • Stephen Crane
... thrust, and it found its mark even as the girl glanced slily at her victim. Maren's full mouth twitched and she looked dully away to the fort gate. Dupre gave Francette an ungallant push. "Begone!" he cried angrily; ...
— The Maid of the Whispering Hills • Vingie E. Roe
... retraced his way to the edge of the woods and sat down upon a windfall to think it all out. He blamed only himself. Her interest in him, he thought dully, had been but a friendship natural toward the friend of the one for whom she cared. Little things came back to him: her expression when she watched Terry approach, the sympathy that existed between them, little understandings which he had attributed to nothing more than longer acquaintance. ...
— Terry - A Tale of the Hill People • Charles Goff Thomson
... bagged. But the thing that marked her as having passed the line was that she no longer had reticences before her husband, and no longer worried about not having reticences. She was in a petticoat now, and corsets which bulged, and unaware of being seen in bulgy corsets. She had become so dully habituated to married life that in her full matronliness she was as sexless as an anemic nun. She was a good woman, a kind woman, a diligent woman, but no one, save perhaps Tinka her ten-year-old, was at all interested in her or entirely aware ...
— Babbitt • Sinclair Lewis
... her cry and attended to her cheeks with the powder rag. She stood by the window and looked out dully at a grey cat walking a grey fence in a grey backyard. Tomorrow would be Christmas Day, and she had only $1.87 with which to buy Jim a present. She had been saving every penny she could for months, with this result. Twenty dollars a week doesn't go ...
— Children's Literature - A Textbook of Sources for Teachers and Teacher-Training Classes • Charles Madison Curry |
