half-pathetic

The plot of one main incident -- Della's sacrifice of her hair in order to get a Christmas present for her husband -- takes place in the short space of a few hours, and works out to a half-humorous, half-pathetic climax, when Della and

Short Stories of Various Types Various

Her face had taken on an entirely new expression, and her half-pathetic, half-roguish childishness, which she had preserved as a woman, was gone.

The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Volume 12 Various

Kano, visiting it, unperceived, next day, noted with the same curious, half-quizzical, half-pathetic look that no Buddhist kaimyo or after-name had been given to his daughter.

The Dragon Painter Mary McNeil Fenollosa

Her voice was small and deep, with a peculiar thick sweetness that suited the song, half-humorous, half-pathetic.

Tales from Many Sources Vol. V Various

The mode of the preservation of these remains is half-pathetic, half-grotesque.

The Argosy Vol. 51, No. 3, March, 1891 Various

It happened that in this wise began the curious, half-laughable, and half-pathetic little history which buried the hatreds of the Castle Barfield Capulet and

Julia And Her Romeo: A Chronicle Of Castle Barfield From "Schwartz" by David Christie Murray David Christie Murray

The whole album comprises one of MacDowell's most interesting portrayals of everyday human nature, standing quite alone in its droll half-amusing, half-pathetic mode of expression.

Edward MacDowell Porte, John F 1922

In half-humorous, half-pathetic contrast is the middle-aged romance of

Werwolves Elliott O'Donnell 1918

The whole of human kind is typified in that one half-ludicrous and half-pathetic figure, lying so helpless beside the machine which it used to control.

The Poison Belt: Being an Account of Another Amazing Adventure of Professor Challenger 1913

The whole of human kind is typified in that one half-ludicrous and half-pathetic figure, lying so helpless beside the machine which it used to control.

The Poison Belt Doyle, Arthur Conan, Sir, 1859-1930 1913