| Shadowy clouds completely obscured the moon, leaving a meager handful of stars to vainly attempt to provide light. |
| He also butted his head vainly against the British and by 1949 he was despised at home and abroad as an ineffectual playboy. |
| The gods are dispassionate, jealous, vainly superior, and sometimes unfair and bitter. |
| The taxi driver took a look around, tried vainly to make peace, did not like what he was seeing, leapt back in his taxi, and skedaddled. |
| I felt my anger rising and tried vainly to quench it, the flames tickling me, begging to be let loose upon the man I now hated most. |
| Instead, you stand meekly, wearing your most hopeful expression, vainly attempting to read the seating plan upside down. |
