"Amateur" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... in art, music, literature, and, above all, acting. Sir Claude was really rather magnificent in other than American eyes. There was something of the Renascence Prince about his omnivorous culture and restless publicity—, he was not only a great amateur, but an ardent one. There was in him none of that antiquarian frivolity that we convey by the ...
— The Wisdom of Father Brown • G. K. Chesterton
... for ten minutes, and then pinned on a hair-net, with the result that she looked a veritable little Puritan; and between these extremes ranged a variety of effects, only possible of achievement to an amateur with ...
— Betty Trevor • Mrs. G. de Horne Vaizey
... some good-natured monk gave her leave and accompanied her—generally Augustinians, who were more of country squires than ecclesiastics. Watch needed no leash—he kept close to his master, except when occasionally tempted to a little amateur shepherding, from which Hal could easily call him off. The great stag-hounds evidently despised him, and the curs of the waggon hated him, and snarled whenever he came near them, but the Prioress respected him, and could well believe that the hermit King had loved him. ...
— The Herd Boy and His Hermit • Charlotte M. Yonge
... brook and began to come up, I saw that their leader was young Lord Strepp himself, and Jem whispered that the horsemen behind him were the very men he had encountered on the road between London and Maidstone. The cavalry were well in advance, and it seemed that the amateur infantry took less and less pleasure in their excursion the nearer they drew to the gloomy old house, so much so that Lord Strepp turned back among them and appeared to be urging them to make haste. However, their slow progress may be explained by the fact that a certain number of them ...
— The O'Ruddy - A Romance • Stephen Crane
... admitted, "but did you ever hear what you could do with a microphone, a rheostat, and a small transformer coil if you attached them properly to a direct-current electric lighting circuit? No? Well, an amateur with a little knowledge of electricity could do it. The thing is easily constructed, and the result ...
— Guy Garrick • Arthur B. Reeve
... was imprisoned for his papistical designs and seditious preaching. During his confinement he proved himself to be a great amateur of controversy. He said, "he felt like a bear tied to a stake, and wanted somebody to bait him." A kind office, zealously undertaken by the learned Usher, then a young man. He engaged to dispute with him once a week ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli
... London and New York, an amateur burglary adventure and a love story. Dramatized under the title of "A Gentleman of Leisure," it furnishes hours of laughter ...
— The Harbor • Ernest Poole
... right still holding the tips of the tails, as if to restrain their impatience; when, giving his arm and body a full swing, embracing three-fourths of the circle, he inflicted a tremendous stroke on the back of the unfortunate culprit. This specimen seemed to satisfy the amateur captain, who nodded approbation to the inquiring look of the amateur boatswain. The poor man lost his respiration from the force of the blow; and the tails of the cat coming from an opposite direction to the first four dozen, cut the flesh ...
— Frank Mildmay • Captain Frederick Marryat
... situation is not caught and gripped, while the melancholy squalor of the original narrative is only too faithfully reproduced. The Werner of 1821, with all its shortcomings, is the production of a playwright. The Werner of 1815 is the attempt of a highly gifted amateur. ...
— The Works of Lord Byron - Poetry, Volume V. • Lord Byron
... said the skipper; "only don't get within shot. I don't want to have to turn amateur doctor again on your behalf. I am clever enough at cuts and bruises, and I dare say if I were hard put to it I could manage to mend a broken leg or arm, but I wouldn't undertake to be hunting you all over to find where a rifle-bullet had gone. Accidents are my line, not wounds received ...
— Fitz the Filibuster • George Manville Fenn
... my own part, I must confess I am more interested in the library. It will be most gratifying to see all our books ranged on shelves, classified and catalogued at last. It is a good little library as amateur libraries go. The others speak again and again of my foresight during those early months in taking care of the books. We have many fine books—what people call solid reading—and a really extraordinary collection of dictionaries. You see, many scholars travel in the Orient, and they feel ...
— Angel Island • Inez Haynes Gillmore
... endowment or any pressure from public opinion would ever induce the Catholic hierarchy to undertake to turn out students who would make a respectable figure among the scientific graduates of other universities, or even hold their own among the common run of amateur readers of Huxley and Darwin and Tyndall. There is no excuse for any misunderstanding as regards the policy of the church on this point. She has never given the slightest encouragement or sanction to the idea which ...
— Reflections and Comments 1865-1895 • Edwin Lawrence Godkin
... '87 furnished us with a long series of cases of greater or less interest, of which I retain the records. Among my headings under this one twelve months I find an account of the adventure of the Paradol Chamber, of the Amateur Mendicant Society, who held a luxurious club in the lower vault of a furniture warehouse, of the facts connected with the loss of the British barque "Sophy Anderson", of the singular adventures of the Grice Patersons in the island of Uffa, and finally of the Camberwell poisoning ...
— The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes • Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
... the scandalous letter which it was disgraceful to the government to recognize was a professional interviewer or only a malicious amateur, or whether he was a paid "spotter," sent by some jealous official to report on the foreign ministers as is sometimes done in the case of conductors of city horsecars, or whether the dying miscreant before mentioned told the truth, cannot be ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... Sheepshead Bay, a place celebrated for the size of its mosquitoes and the number of its amateur fishermen, recommends the following as a very good mixture for anointing the face and ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 344, August 5, 1882 • Various
... Scrobby and Scrobby's history in regard to the tenement at Rufford. As he could not get Goarly's case why should he not make something of the case against Goarly? That detective was merely eking out his time and having an idle week among the public-houses. If he could set himself up as an amateur detective he thought that he might perhaps get to the bottom of it all. It is not a bad thing to be concerned on the same side with a lord when the lord is in earnest. Lord Rufford was very angry about the poison in the covert and would ...
— The American Senator • Anthony Trollope
... that I have only once appeared in theatricals, and that was in high comedy as a member of the Dublin Amateur Theatrical Society. The play was "She Stoops to Conquer," and I took the part of—think!—Mrs. Hardcastle. I was only seventeen, and very small for my age, so I owe any success I may have made to the costumier and wig-maker. The ...
— The Confessions of a Caricaturist, Vol. 1 (of 2) • Harry Furniss
... absolutely of no importance to a good judge, though possibly what is known as the peach fawn is the favourite among amateur fanciers. Red fawns, blue or slate coloured, black, brindled of various shades, and these colours intermingled with white, are most to be met with, however. In some quarters the idea is prevalent that Whippets are delicate in their constitution, but this is a popular ...
— Dogs and All About Them • Robert Leighton
... for half a dozen lines, and "loses itself in the sands," like the River Rhine, without coming to any particular point or conclusion. How much more lively is the Oxford couplet on the King, who, being bored by some amateur theatricals, twice or thrice made as if he would leave the hall, where men failed ...
— Oxford • Andrew Lang
... "Only an amateur, I never had a lesson in my life. Mr. Escott would think nothing of it, I am sure. But I wish he'd come in ...
— Spring Days • George Moore
... up a new exercise requiring considerable exertion, precautions should be observed to prevent an overstrain of the heart. The heart of the amateur athlete, bicyclist, or mountain climber is frequently injured by attempting more than the previous training warrants. The new work should be taken up gradually, and feats requiring a large outlay of physical energy should be attempted only after ...
— Physiology and Hygiene for Secondary Schools • Francis M. Walters, A.M.
... and the garrison knew no better soldier, no more intelligent, temperate, trustworthy non-commissioned officer, than Sergeant O'Grady. In some way or other the story of the treatment resorted to by his amateur medical officer had leaked out. Whether faulty in theory or not, it was crowned with the verdict of success in practice; and, with the strong sense of humor which pervades all organizations wherein the Celt is represented ...
— Starlight Ranch - and Other Stories of Army Life on the Frontier • Charles King
... boy of eighteen, constituted the breath of his nostrils, the one spring from which he drew his love of life and his desire to live. Immaculate in his dress, adequately cultivated and intellectual in his speech, and carefully punctilious in the adoption of such amateur pursuits as would be likely to give him the stamp of artistic connoisseurship, he had until now employed his ample income principally in furnishing his extensive wardrobe, in collecting old books and prints, and in giving his chambers that appearance of outre refinement, which was calculated ...
— Too Old for Dolls - A Novel • Anthony Mario Ludovici
... proceeds the author of "The Amateur Detective," —"to tell you the whole truth, I have been playing the detective with you by order of Mr. DIBBLE, and hope you will ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 2., No. 32, November 5, 1870 • Various
... sort of tramp. Had he been a poor man he might have been a more successful artist. But he had a small fortune of his own and, lacking the spur of necessity, or of disquieting ambition, he remained little more than a clever amateur. Once in a while he painted a picture which showed what he could do; but for the rest, he was satisfied to wander over the world, light-hearted and content. We knew that the Story Girl was thought to resemble him strongly in appearance and temperament, but she had far ...
— The Story Girl • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... notice of the shabby rascal whom he held in awe. "Rather warm this room for a court of justice. I hope Frank's witness is not fat," said Jack, putting himself up against the wall, and lifting languidly his glass to his eye—which byplay was somewhat startling, but totally incomprehensible, to the amateur judges, who looked upon him ...
— The Perpetual Curate • Mrs [Margaret] Oliphant
... moment. Then, with a grunt of rage, he began removing his outer garments. Down came a twine, to the lower end of which the boy made fast his garments, one after another. His money and valuables went up in the pockets, for the sharp eyes of the mulatto could not have been eluded by any amateur slight-of-hand. ...
— The Submarine Boys and the Middies • Victor G. Durham
... amateur philosopher and amuse myself detecting essence beneath semblance and tracing the same principle running through things the outward aspect of which is widely different. I have studied the Dhobie in this spirit and find him to be nothing else than an example ...
— Behind the Bungalow • EHA
... We played progressive euchre for a silly prize, and we all got shuffled up wrong and had to stay so. Then the major did amateur conjuring till we nearly died. I was thankful to sneak out-of-doors and smoke a cigar under the starlight. I walked up and down, consigning Jones to—well, where I thought he belonged. I thought of the time I had wasted over the fellow—the good money—the hopes—I was savage with disappointment, ...
— The Motormaniacs • Lloyd Osbourne
... making up a little group, which we call 'The Coterie,' to have a few dancing parties and amateur concerts, and the like, in the big hotel dining room, during the winter. We've a notion that the young people of Cairo ought to know each other better. Our idea is to promote social intercourse and so we're all chipping in to pay the cost, which ...
— A Captain in the Ranks - A Romance of Affairs • George Cary Eggleston
... by satellite, Autodin with standard remote terminal, digital telephone switch, Military Affiliated Radio System (MARS station), UHF/VHF air-ground radio, a link to the Pacific Consolidated Telecommunications Network (PCTN) satellite, and amateur radio ...
— The 1996 CIA Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... in to swell this Bohemian circle. Some had brought bottles. There was a painter who had been "hung," a Mus Bac., an ex-champion amateur pugilist, a silver-tongued orator, a man who had "suped" for Mansfield, and half a dozen others. The little cabin was crowded, the air hazy with smoke, the conversation animated. But mostly it was a monologue ...
— The Trail of '98 - A Northland Romance • Robert W. Service
... well-fed, well-groomed clubmen and brokers in the crowd, a politician or two, a popular comedian with his manager, amateur boxers from the athletic clubs, and quiet, close-mouthed sporting men from every city in the country. Their names if printed in the papers would have been as familiar as the types of ...
— Short Stories for English Courses • Various (Rosa M. R. Mikels ed.)
... growing short. Madge had been under the water as long as was safe for any amateur diver. The captain was a man to be obeyed, as she knew instinctively. She gave one more dig into the mud about her iron treasure. It now became plain, both to her and to Captain Jules, that she had found an old iron ...
— Madge Morton's Victory • Amy D.V. Chalmers
... and seventeenth centuries amateur dramatic productions called masques were presented. Sometimes even nobles and members of the royal family took part. These plays were accompanied by music, dancing, and spectacular effects. The literary character of the masque developed into the compositions of ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 10 - The Guide • Charles Herbert Sylvester
... decay. Long before this period, however, the nursery artist has marked them for his own, and with crimson lake and Prussian blue stained their pictures in all too permanent pigments, that in some cases resist every chemical the amateur applies with the vain hope of effacing the ...
— Children's Books and Their Illustrators • Gleeson White
... No detail that will help the student has been omitted and the small size of the volume, about the length and width of the hand, makes it convenient to carry. An ideal volume for expert naturalist or amateur for field work or ...
— The Bird Book • Chester A. Reed
... pull the Reverend Egerton out of a hole in the ice at Christmas? You close beggar, why couldn't you tell people? And Jack Egerton's your minister! Well, Jupiter, wouldn't that drive anyone to drink! You'll know all about Miss Weir-Huntley, then. She's had me doing amateur detective work for nearly a week, running down a glorious hero by the name of Neil. I didn't know you had to travel incog. Come along here; you may be a questionable character, for all I know, but she thinks you're Neptune's own son. There she is, under the lamps, ...
— Duncan Polite - The Watchman of Glenoro • Marian Keith
... C.J. Holmes as well as the large Piranesi etching of an imaginary prison, which latter particularly interested him because it happened to be an impression between two "states"—a detail which none but a true amateur could savour. The prison depicted was a terrible place of torment, but it was beautiful, and the view of it made Mr. Prohack fancy, very absurdly, that he too was in prison, just as securely as if he had been bolted and locked therein. His eye ranged ...
— Mr. Prohack • E. Arnold Bennett
... and while the assistant departed in search of the robe, Ford was left alone in a small room hung with full-length mirrors and shelves, and packed with the uniforms that Clarkson rents for Covent Garden balls and amateur theatricals. While waiting, Ford gratified a long, secretly cherished desire to behold himself as a military man, by trying on all the uniforms on the lower shelves; and as a result, when the assistant returned, instead of finding a young American in English clothes and ...
— The Red Cross Girl • Richard Harding Davis
... work, especially his noted "Practica Musicae," from which Hawkins quotes copiously, was later than his residence at Mantua, but his studies at that court at least betoken the existence of a congenial atmosphere, and we may be assured that such an enlightened amateur as Ludovico did not neglect opportunities to acquaint himself with the ...
— Some Forerunners of Italian Opera • William James Henderson
... the tavern and would have called herself,—the unchanging, seemingly immortal Miranda, who cared for the guests as if she were their nursing mother, and pressed the specially favorite delicacies on their attention as a connoisseur calls the wandering eyes of an amateur to the beauties of a picture. Who that has ever been at the old ...
— A Mortal Antipathy • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... more make men temperate than it can make them cleanly or courteous. If Parliament could work miracles of this sort, it would make one really in love with constitutional government. But what a crotchety thing all this amateur lawmaking is! Why did it not occur to this well-intentioned gentleman to inquire how it is that drunkenness is unknown, or nearly unknown, in what are called the better classes? How is it that the orgies our grandfathers ...
— Cornelius O'Dowd Upon Men And Women And Other Things In General - Originally Published In Blackwood's Magazine - 1864 • Charles Lever
... unquestioned mastery of the technique of polar travel, his general reputation for honesty and caution in advancing opinions. By all the lessons that history teaches, Peary's word should have had precedence over Cook's, for Peary was a specialist, while Cook was only an amateur. And yet the general public discounted entirely those lessons, and trusted rather the novice, with what results it is now unnecessary to review,—and in nine cases out of ten, the results will be ...
— Craftsmanship in Teaching • William Chandler Bagley
... night when Geoffrey Thurston met Captain Franklin, who held certain sporting rights in the vicinity, at the place agreed upon. The captain had brought with him several amateur assistants and stablehands besides two stalwart keepers. ...
— Thurston of Orchard Valley • Harold Bindloss
... couple of kicks on the nose that settled him. A loud yell from the other two boys was the first thing that assured Guy of his victory. They came running over and found him standing like the hunter in an amateur photograph, holding his bow in one hand and the big Woodchuck by the ...
— Two Little Savages • Ernest Thompson Seton
... and the Painter played their parts neither better nor worse than amateur actors in general; and the best that could be said of them was, that they seemed more than half ashamed of their exotic dresses, ...
— St. Ronan's Well • Sir Walter Scott
... it was formally declared in the House of Commons that the losses to American privateers amounted to seven hundred and thirty-three ships, of a value of over $11,000,000. Mr. Maclay estimates from this that "our amateur man-of-war's men averaged more than four prizes each," while some took twenty and one ship twenty-eight in a single cruise. Nearly eleven hundred prisoners were taken with the captured ships. While there are no complete figures for the whole period of the war obtainable, it is not to be believed ...
— American Merchant Ships and Sailors • Willis J. Abbot
... interested as an amateur pecan grower, and I would like to ask what varieties will be of most profit, commercially, that can be grown with a reasonable hope of success in ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Report of the Proceedings at the Fourteenth Annual Meeting • Various
... on a summer night from North Woolwich, and on this occasion Coxwell was accompanied by two friends, one being Henry Youens, who subsequently became a professional balloonist of considerable repute, and who at this time was an ardent amateur. It was half an hour before midnight when the party took their places, and, getting smartly away from the crowd in the gala grounds, shot over the river, and shortly were over the town of Greenwich with the lights of London well ahead. ...
— The Dominion of the Air • J. M. Bacon
... and are not always rightly informed. They confuse one with a flood of scientific terms describing minute anatomical parts and fail to explain the simple yet absolutely essential points over which an amateur has trouble, wheat often only ...
— Moths of the Limberlost • Gene Stratton-Porter
... rational in the cultivated middle class. People in the provinces were not above enjoying amateur music and recitation, and the fashion of singing songs at table, which was going out of vogue in Paris, still held its own in smaller places. A literary flavor, which has now disappeared, pervaded ...
— The Eve of the French Revolution • Edward J. Lowell
... repining or repenting. Here was I, Hugo Gottfried, the son of the Red Axe, at the inner port of a treasonable society. It was certainly a curious position; but even thus early I had begun to consider myself a sort of amateur of strange situations, and I admit that I found a certain stimulus in the thought that in an hour I might have ceased to be heir to the office of Hereditary Justicer of the ...
— Red Axe • Samuel Rutherford Crockett
... with in secluded and mountainous districts. You would wonder that they have not been extirpated long ago—being such large creatures, easily discovered and easily tracked; besides, it is always an ambition with the settlers and amateur-hunters to kill them. Moreover, but two cubs are produced at a litter, and that only happens once a-year. The fact is, that during winter, when the snow is on the ground and the bear might be easily tracked and destroyed, he does not show himself, but lies torpid ...
— The Boy Hunters • Captain Mayne Reid
... courteous" and "the reproof valiant." The plot was as thin as a wafer, but as it is, no doubt, generally known, I need not further refer to it. Mrs. LANGTRY was a most graceful and pleasing Rosalind. She acted with an earnestness worthy of a better cause, and afforded not a trace of the amateur. Of Miss VIOLET ARMBRUSTER as Hymen, I might say, with a friend who spent several hours in ...
— Punch, or, the London Charivari, Volume 98, March 8, 1890. • Various
... seated himself beside her. He was struck by the singular dexterity with which she worked. Although everything about her bespoke the great lady, she showed the dexterity of a workwoman; for every one can see at a glance, by certain manipulations, the work of a workman or an amateur. ...
— The Brotherhood of Consolation • Honore de Balzac
... brandy," said Max, bethinking himself of a certain silver flask in his suitcase, a prize as it happened, won as an amateur of la boxe. ...
— A Soldier of the Legion • C. N. Williamson
... them. "A velvet jacket won't do, either, unless you're a travelling Englishman. Three pairs of summer pantaloons are all very well in their way; but they're out of season, and stripes are not the thing for evening wear any more. Beautiful bath gown, but more adapted for amateur dramatics than for a musicale. Two waistcoats and a Norfolk jacket mean well, but are not adapted to the purpose. Exemplary light overcoat, but still not quite the thing. Double-breasted reefer and Canada homespun trousers; admirably fitted ...
— Evening Dress - Farce • W. D. Howells
... could paint that smile of hers, Brandy, you'd make Romney look like an amateur. Most wonderful smile. It's a splendid idea. Let her laugh in your face, as you say; then paint like the devil while she's doing it, and your reputation ...
— The Hollow of Her Hand • George Barr McCutcheon
... mild, so that it does not pain you when at rest, then the bandage should be removed every day, and the joint gently rubbed and massaged, and the bandage replaced again. Should there be any one in reach who understands massage, a thorough massaging right after the accident is quite helpful; but no amateur had better attempt it, as unskilled rubbing and stretching are likely to do more ...
— A Handbook of Health • Woods Hutchinson
... a great actor? I say a great actor, because (I am sure) no amateur ever fancied himself a small one. Is it not always to have the best parts in the best plays; to be the central figure of every group; to feel that attention is arrested the moment you come on the stage; and (more exquisite satisfaction still) to be aware ...
— Obiter Dicta • Augustine Birrell
... draw attention. There'll already be a few thousand amateur detectives looking out for the man who left the French maid dead in Eastbourne Terrace, and a few hundred amateur criminologists racking their brains for a plausible theory of the whole thing. Oh, yes, it's a good thing to arouse public interest, Allerdyke. All that's wanted now is a rousing ...
— The Rayner-Slade Amalgamation • J. S. Fletcher
... "that is if there is any chance of making money out of it, which there ought to be here, as this marble looks almost as good as that of Carrara. But flint instruments are more my line, that is in an ignorant and amateur way, as I think they are in yours, for I saw some in your room. Tell me, what do you think of this. Is it a scraper?" and I produced a stone out of my pocket which I had found a ...
— Finished • H. Rider Haggard
... sadly. Helen, who, unlike her friend, had not had the advantage of a distinguished career upon the amateur dramatic stage, turned away and held a ...
— The Zeppelin's Passenger • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... of nuts in North Dakota has hardly been considered as a possibility even by the average amateur up to the present time. Nevertheless, evidence is gradually accumulating that some varieties of nuts can be grown as an addition to the home orchard in nearly all ...
— Northern Nut Growers Report of the Proceedings at the Twenty-First Annual Meeting • Northern Nut Growers Association
... got along nicely together. They leased a theatre in the town for the whole winter and sublet it for short periods to a Little Russian theatrical company, to a conjuror and to the local amateur players. ...
— Best Russian Short Stories • Various
... He laid before his silent auditors another drawer which contained a sheet of card-board on which was a fairly good pastel of an Arab in a burnouse. It had the weak and false drawing which would result in the attempt of an amateur to copy an engraving in color. "This came in broad daylight while I held the clean card-board on ...
— The Tyranny of the Dark • Hamlin Garland
... the metropolis the old humour broke out at the representation of the inimitable Scaramouch of the Italian theatre. The irresistible passion drove him from his law studies, and cast young Pocquelin among a company of amateur actors, whose fame soon enabled them not to play gratuitously. Pocquelin was the manager and the modeller, for under his studious eye this company were induced to imitate Nature with the simplicity the poet ...
— Literary Character of Men of Genius - Drawn from Their Own Feelings and Confessions • Isaac D'Israeli
... dissolved, and a great buzz of chatter, virulent yet oddly subdued, hummed through the chaotic ballroom. Feverish youths swore they would kill Perry or Jumbo or themselves or some one, and the Baptis' preacheh was besieged by a tempestuous covey of clamorous amateur lawyers, asking questions, making threats, demanding precedents, ordering the bonds annulled, and especially trying to ferret out any hint of prearrangement in what ...
— Tales of the Jazz Age • F. Scott Fitzgerald
... sparsely covered with black hairs, except on the first large segment nearest the thorax. On this segment they are more dense and of the same tawny color as those on the thorax. But it is particularly from the character of the head that the amateur observer of the perforators may soon learn to distinguish between a Xylocopa and a Bombus as they work among the flowers. It is also interesting to know that the Xylocopas are not so inclined to sting as the humble bees, and the males, of course, being ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 841, February 13, 1892 • Various
... in the world?" And not waiting for an answer the older man continued as he held his cigar at arm's length and looked between his elevated feet at the landscape: "'Stay me with flagons, comfort me with apples, for I am sick of love.' Great old lover—Solomon. Rather out of the amateur class—with his thousand wives and concubines; perhaps a virtuous man withal, but hardly a fanatic on the subject; and when he said he was sick of love—probably somewhere in his fifties,—Solomon voiced a profound man's truth. Most of us are. Speaking generally of love, my boy, I am with Solomon. ...
— In the Heart of a Fool • William Allen White
... will be always recognized by this sign—that when most enthusiastic for the whole, he preserves a coolness, a patience defying all obstacles, as regards details. Moreover, in order not to do any injury to perfection, he would rather renounce the enjoyment given by the completion. For the simple amateur, it is the difficulty of means that disgusts him and turns him from his aim; his dreams would be to have no more trouble in producing than he had in ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... emerged from it, they were greeted with a cheer, hoarse and half human, by a band of light amateur mountebanks of both sexes who were huddled in a doorway. Within a quarter of an hour Audrey and Miss Ingate, after astounding struggles in a dressing-room in which Nick alone saved their lives and reputations, appeared in Japanese disguise according ...
— The Lion's Share • E. Arnold Bennett
... good enough for anybody. The elementary processes of printing are indeed so simple that they might have justified Dogberry in adding typography to the accomplishments of the "reading and writing that come by nature." With this delusion comes the desire for amateur performance. Men who would not undertake to make a coat or a pair of shoes are confident of their ability to make or to direct the making of ...
— The Building of a Book • Various
... been thought worth while to describe the process of making stopcocks, thermometers, vacuum tubes, etc., as such things can be purchased more cheaply and of much better quality than any amateur can make unless he is willing to spend a very large amount of time in practice. For similar reasons the manipulation of quartz glass has ...
— Laboratory Manual of Glass-Blowing • Francis C. Frary
... as indeed every spring, there was a flower show in London at the Temple Gardens. The things exhibited were principally bulb flowers, ixias, iris, narcissus and the like; the event was interesting to growers, both professional and amateur. Joost Van Heigen came over from Holland to attend; he was sent by his father in a purely business capacity, but of course he was expected, and himself expected, to enjoy it, too; there would be many novelties exhibited and many beautiful flowers in which he would ...
— The Good Comrade • Una L. Silberrad
... lacks the nice imagination of a WELLS to carry it off. Also he fails to deal with the humour of the position, whether in the madhouse, the court of justice, the manager's office or the palace, an elementary mistake which the most amateur conjurer will always avoid. It is rather the author's misfortune than his fault that his incidental picture of war, introduced only as a new field of operation for his prodigy, is rendered almost fatuous by the actual conditions ...
— Punch or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, September 23, 1914 • Various
... too confoundedly smart. Mark my words, you'll die young. Yes; I have the wire. Here it is. Look at it. You are right; something happened to it, and I've been tearing myself to pieces, ever since, to find out who it was. I've got all my amateur sleuths working on the case, this very minute, to find out who the scoundrel is who cut the wire. Have you any idea about it? But there's no use in ...
— The Circus Boys on the Flying Rings • Edgar B. P. Darlington
... dispatch. I rather think she could repair one also. I have still in my possession a small box of her making, which, for execution and durability, I will match against the performance of any rival amateur of the opposite sex. In spite, however, of such freaks, and as if to make amends for them, Miss Jess possessed one of the softest and most impressionable hearts which ever fell to the lot of a mature maiden of forty-five. She had suffered from no less than six different attachments ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 2, May, 1851 • Various
... influence upon intelligence of a college education. It is possible, nay, it is common, to go through college and come out in any real sense uneducated. But it is not possible to pass through college, even as a professional amateur in athletics or as an inveterate flapper, without rubbing off the insulation here and there, without knowing what thought is stirring, what emotions are poignant, what ideas are dominant among the fraction of humanity that leads us. Refined homes may not be better or happier ...
— Definitions • Henry Seidel Canby
... public, the basis of its appeal is always the same. And when the Junior Leagues—the various charity organizations and the social and college clubs of our cities stage a performance that shall appeal to the interest of their public, and consequently gather in the shekels to their coffers, these amateur organizations turn naturally to music and dance and spectacle as the mediums with the widest appeal; an appeal to both ...
— The Art of Stage Dancing - The Story of a Beautiful and Profitable Profession • Ned Wayburn
... succeed where he, with his anxious well- meant overtures, had so signally failed. He brought her a large yellow dahlia, which she grasped tightly in one hand and regarded with a stare of benevolent boredom, such as one might bestow on amateur classical dancing performed in aid of a deserving charity. Then he turned shyly to the group perched on the wall and asked with affected carelessness, "Do you like flowers?" Three solemn nods rewarded ...
— The Toys of Peace • Saki
... amusing comments on characteristic failings of the last decade ... are supposed to be the weekly budgets of news written by a young girl in Boston to a dear friend in Venice.... 'Emergency lectures,' fashionable religion, amateur cooking, horse-car politeness, servants, summer hotels, symphony concerts, and other Boston topics are wittily touched upon, and the frailty of human nature, especially of feminine human nature, is most mercilessly ...
— A Romantic Young Lady • Robert Grant
... not abdicate all of its old-time functions as a social center. A few years ago in attending a rural community conference at the University of Illinois I was interested to hear a farm woman, a graduate of that university, tell how she and her neighbors had held amateur dramatic entertainments on their front verandas during the summer. The young people took the parts and the audience sat on the lawn, and thus many families were brought under the influence of the better homes who would not have thought of visiting them. ...
— The Farmer and His Community • Dwight Sanderson
... an amateur of pinks: the season of flowering had come, and suggestions were made as to whether these two could not visit each other. We introduced the matter, and persisted in it; till at last Von Reineck resolved to go out with us one Sunday ...
— Autobiography • Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
... stanzas referred to in it were written "twenty-three years ago." Thus, then, we have the two facts established, that the opium-taking habit had its origin in a bodily ailment, and that at some time in 1803 that habit had become confirmed. The disastrous experiment in amateur therapeutics, which was the means of implanting it, could not have taken place, according to the autobiographical note, until at least six months after Coleridge's arrival at Keswick, and perhaps not for some months later yet. At any rate, it seems tolerably certain that it was not till the ...
— English Men of Letters: Coleridge • H. D. Traill
... little soiree twice or thrice during the season. Fifty or sixty people, as many as her rooms will conveniently hold, are invited. The mistress of the house provides something in the way of some good amateur music, a charade or two acted in almost professional style, a bit of declamation, or possibly the presence of some literary or artistic lion. Everybody comes, and everybody tries to make himself or herself as agreeable as possible. ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science Volume 15, No. 89, May, 1875 • Various
... knowledge of chemistry no trouble about "setting up" his batteries, the difficulties of securing apparatus were chiefly those connected with the circuits and the instruments. American youths to-day are given, if of a mechanical turn of mind, to amateur telegraphy or telephony, but seldom, if ever, have to make any part of the system constructed. In Edison's boyish days it was quite different, and telegraphic supplies were hard to obtain. But he and his "chum" had a line between their homes, built of common stove-pipe wire. The insulators ...
— Edison, His Life and Inventions • Frank Lewis Dyer and Thomas Commerford Martin
... heads that Jacob Desmalter manufactured by the gross in 1806, covering them with a silken green stuff bearing a design of white geometric circles. Above this piece of furniture hung a portrait of Bridau, done in pastel by the hand of an amateur, which at once attracted the eye. Though art might have something to say against it, no one could fail to recognize the firmness of the noble and obscure citizen upon that brow. The serenity of the eyes, gentle, yet proud, was well given; the sagacious mind, to which ...
— The Celibates - Includes: Pierrette, The Vicar of Tours, and The Two Brothers • Honore de Balzac
... see, John. On Monday and Thursday mornings Clara Thompson and her sister come here, and we read French, German, and Italian together; and on Monday evening we meet at Clara's mother's to practise for the amateur concert. On Tuesday morning I have promised to help poor ...
— True to his Colours - The Life that Wears Best • Theodore P. Wilson
... "An amateur only," said Pringle modestly. "I never take money for it." He put by a wisp of his frosted hair, the better to scrutinize, with insulting slowness, the sheriff's savage face. "Your ears are very large!" he murmured ...
— The Desire of the Moth; and The Come On • Eugene Manlove Rhodes
... form only the main outline of a story with a vast amount of collateral interest. It is to these collateral issues that the amateur in prophecy must give his attention. It is here that the German will be induced by his Government to see his compensations. He will be consoled for the restoration of Serbia by the prospect of future conflicts between Italian and Jugoslav that will let ...
— What is Coming? • H. G. Wells
... the remains of the temple itself, the colossal column discovered November 7, 1875, in the Conservatori garden, is not the only one saved from the wreck. Flaminio Vacca, the sculptor and amateur-archaeologist of the sixteenth century, says: "Upon the Tarpeian Rock, behind the Palazzo de' Conservatori, several pillars of Pentelic marble (marmo statuale) were lately found. Their capitals are so enormous that out of ...
— Pagan and Christian Rome • Rodolfo Lanciani
... pity, perhaps, for the blank despair that settled down on the two young faces he explained: "Nothing goes in the circus business but novelty. The public is tired out with ventriloquism. No mystery about it now—kind of thing, too, that a clever amateur ...
— Una Of The Hill Country - 1911 • Charles Egbert Craddock (AKA Mary Noailles Murfree)
... were large, and at Westover—where he had one of the finest private libraries in America—he exercised a baronial hospitality, blending the usual profusion of plantation life with the elegance of a traveled scholar and "picked man of countries." Colonel Byrd was rather an amateur in literature. His History of the Dividing Line is written with a jocularity which rises occasionally into real humor, and which gives to the painful journey through the wilderness the air of a holiday expedition. Similar in ...
— Brief History of English and American Literature • Henry A. Beers
... engagement the next day. It was the general opinion that if Beauregard meant to fight he would have made a stand at some of the excellent points of vantage that had been encountered in the day's march. Jack smiled wisely over these amateur guesses, and quite abashed the rest when ...
— The Iron Game - A Tale of the War • Henry Francis Keenan
... old pine, he sat down upon the sand and bent forward to unlace his shoes. His attention, however, was suddenly arrested by the sound of violin music to his left. That it was no amateur who was playing he was well aware, but one skilled in the art. At any time such music would have appealed to him, but on an evening like this, and amid such surroundings, the effect was greatly enhanced. For a few minutes ...
— The Unknown Wrestler • H. A. (Hiram Alfred) Cody
... "and their claws will be cut. They have escaped for a long time, so ingenious have their methods been. But I have accumulated a mass of evidence, and have several names known to the police. Yes, and several names of people not known. There are about twenty thieves, professional and amateur, connected with this matter. It is a big affair. But I'll get the yacht, and then Denham. That will be the means of laying ...
— A Coin of Edward VII - A Detective Story • Fergus Hume
... revenged herself on Nature by making hideous caricatures of Nature's face; she did not draw in milk-and-water colors, and she did not strum. She had none of the exasperating talents, the ludicrous ambitions of the amateur; she was altogether innocent of ...
— The Return of the Prodigal • May Sinclair
... lop a branch. Such are the dead wood of your life. Cut it away and cast it into the oven of oblivion. Don't fear to hurt it. These people care as little for you, as you for them. All they want is board and lodging, and if you give in to them, you may be an amateur ...
— Prose Fancies • Richard Le Gallienne
... been for many years great favourites with gardeners, both amateur and professional. About two hundred years ago the mania for these plants amounted almost to a national calamity in Holland, and scores of acres are now entirely devoted to their culture. For our own part, we scarcely consider the tulip as in any way justifying the praise which is lavished ...
— Little Folks (October 1884) - A Magazine for the Young • Various
... of making beautiful these tarts. I rather pride myself upon them, since they have been enthusiastically praised by folk who have eaten all around the world, and set above the best of French confections by a man ten years resident in Paris, whose wife is held to be the most skilled amateur cook in New York. ...
— Dishes & Beverages of the Old South • Martha McCulloch Williams
... morning to the office of Charlton Moore and let me examine that note which Mr. Lawton presumably gave two years ago. Afterward, I have four little amateur detectives of mine to interview—then I think we'll be able to proceed ...
— The Crevice • William John Burns and Isabel Ostrander
... of good ready made clothes and it is also an age of clever amateur dressmaking. With excellent patterns which may be easily handled there is no reason why the woman who can sew should not make her own clothes, and have smart clothes at a reasonable price—that is, provided she has the time to ...
— Armour's Monthly Cook Book, Volume 2, No. 12, October 1913 - A Monthly Magazine of Household Interest • Various
... brass hinges. The whole settlement turned out, Iosefo outdoing himself, and the king butting in with an address, and everything shipshape and Bristol fashion, as sailors say. We didn't have no flowers, and the whole business was sort of home-made and amateur, but Sarah made up for the lack of them by pegging out the grave with little poles, and streamers which gave quite a gay look to it, and fluttered in the wind, ...
— Wild Justice: Stories of the South Seas • Lloyd Osbourne
... left a diminutive elderly gentleman in the act of contemplating the fragment of a statue in a posterior position, and which certainly exhibited somewhat of a ludicrous appearance; on the right, the exquisite Jasper pointed out, with the self-sufficiency of an amateur, the masculine symmetry of a Colossian statue to his Aunt of antiquated virginity, whose maiden purity recoiling from the view of nudation, seemed to say, "Jaz, wrap an apron round him!" while in ...
— Real Life In London, Volumes I. and II. • Pierce Egan
... concerned in the series of plays for which the theatre was being made ready; and the girls not merely heard them rehearse their respective parts, but with scissors and needles helped to make costumes for the amateur actors. ...
— Janice Meredith • Paul Leicester Ford
... girdle-cakes were a somewhat delicate topic, claims to be a successful amateur of them herself. John, having been given always to understand that the talent for them was exceedingly rare, and one usually hereditary, respectfully doubts Anne's capabilities, deferentially suggesting that she is thinking of scones. Anne indignantly repudiates the insinuation, ...
— John Ingerfield and Other Stories • Jerome K. Jerome
... was no cause for fear: he spoke learnedly and at enormous length of geographical conditions and means of transport, of victualling, of guns and bayonets, of morale—he had allowed himself an hour and a half. How the King must have felt under this harangue, any expert who has had to listen to an amateur laying down the law to him on his own subject may imagine. On finding his military arguments fruitless, M. Venizelos shifted his ground; though, the military habit being too strong, he {54} could not get away from military phraseology: "I was then obliged," he tells us, "to bring ...
— Greece and the Allies 1914-1922 • G. F. Abbott
... I sent it to the press at Pisa. In a few days you will receive the bill of lading.' Nothing is known as to the sketch which Shelley thus sent. It cannot, I presume, have been his own production, nor yet Severn's: possibly it was supplied by Lieutenant Williams, who had some aptitude as an amateur artist. ...
— Adonais • Shelley
... never plead a case before my father," "Nor I before my son," said two distinguished lawyers. "If mamma is in the room, I shall never be able to get through my part," said a young amateur actor. ...
— Brave Men and Women - Their Struggles, Failures, And Triumphs • O.E. Fuller
... means. Poor Simcox kept begging us to think. My wife went over our visitors' book—we've kept one of those silly things for years—but there wasn't a name in it which we couldn't account for. I got out all the old albums of snapshots and amateur photos in the house. You know the way those things accumulate; groups of all sorts. But we couldn't find the girl. And yet both my wife and I were sure we'd met her. Then one morning Simcox burst into my wife's little sitting-room—a place none of the convalescents have ...
— Our Casualty And Other Stories - 1918 • James Owen Hannay, AKA George A. Birmingham
... we had an arduous piece of work to perform. The khafilah was in motion fourteen entire hours, over heavy sand, with the hot wind breathing fiercely upon it. No amateur walking was indulged in. Every one kept sullenly to his camel; and those who were obliged to advance on foot dragged slowly along, seeming every moment as if they were about to abandon all exertion in despair, and lie down to perish. Our course ...
— Narrative of a Mission to Central Africa Performed in the Years 1850-51, Volume 1 • James Richardson
... felt the same, so that your article seemed familiar to me. It was conceived on sleepless nights, with a throbbing heart, in ecstasy and suppressed enthusiasm. And that proud suppressed enthusiasm in young people is dangerous! I jeered at you then, but let me tell you that, as a literary amateur, I am awfully fond of such first essays, full of the heat of youth. There is a mistiness and a chord vibrating in the mist. Your article is absurd and fantastic, but there's a transparent sincerity, a ...
— Crime and Punishment • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... boiling caldrons of metal, laired by day in dens of drunkenness and infamy; breathing from infancy to death an air saturated with fog and grease and soot, vileness for soul and body. What do you make of a case like that, amateur psychologist? You call it an altogether serious thing to be alive: to these men it is a drunken jest, a joke,—horrible to angels perhaps, to them commonplace enough. My fancy about the river was an idle one: it is no type of such a life. What if it be ...
— Life in the Iron-Mills • Rebecca Harding Davis
... the bright particular 'star' round which the lesser lights will all revolve. Such being the case, I do not consider that I am rating my services too highly when I name two hundred guineas as the lowest sum for which I am willing to play the part of James Jasmin, footman, spy and amateur detective." ...
— The Argosy - Vol. 51, No. 6, June, 1891 • Various
... my bedroom. Do you suppose that this opinion that husbands have of their wives, the parts they give them, is not a singular vexation for us? Our petty troubles are always pregnant with greater ones. My Adolphe needed a lesson. You know the Vicomte de Lustrac, a desperate amateur of women and music, an epicure, one of those ex-beaux of the Empire, who live upon their earlier successes, and who cultivate themselves with excessive care, in order to ...
— Petty Troubles of Married Life, Second Part • Honore de Balzac
... TO CONDUCT. An amateur automobilist (English, titled) who drives his own motor-car accommodating five persons, offers to conduct two or three ladies, Americans preferred, to any picturesque centres in Europe which they may desire to visit. Car has capacity ...
— My Friend the Chauffeur • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... children. When he took up his residence as laird, most of his friends, naturally, were Spanish visitors whom he amused by building a bull-fighting ring not far from the house, importing bulls from Spain and holding amateur bull-fights on Sunday afternoons. This was a sad blow indeed to the sedate Presbyterians in the neighbourhood. His life, however, was short, and, as he left no children, the properties passed to my father, Carlos Pedro ...
— The Chronicles of a Gay Gordon • Jose Maria Gordon
... town for sale, and attracted the attention of a portly gentleman fond of shooting. This gentleman went duck shooting with Joe, and their adventures were more amusing to the boy than to the amateur sportsman. ...
— Breaking Away - or The Fortunes of a Student • Oliver Optic
... one ought to try. Wouldn't I try—couldn't I be prevailed upon to look at it as a duty? Surely the ultimate point ought to be fixed— he was worried, haunted by the question. He patronised me unblushingly, made me feel like a foolish amateur, a helpless novice, inquired into my habits of work and conveyed to me that I was utterly vieux jeu and had not had the advantage of an early training. I had not been brought up from the germ, I knew nothing ...
— Greville Fane • Henry James
... deep with one hundred big loads of manure to the acre and don't go near the patch till picking time next year. He gets a nice early crop, and if berries are a little small it pays better than any other way. Try it! I have known some fields carried to fourth crop, and amateur beds kept up for ten years. It takes lots of work to keep an old bed in good condition. J.M. Smith, of Green Bay, Wis., almost always took one crop and plowed under. If the first crop was injured by frost, he took ...
— Trees, Fruits and Flowers of Minnesota, 1916 • Various
... of mine read a pugilistic novel called "Rodney Stone" to a famous Australian prize-fighter, stretched upon a bed of mortal sickness. The dying gladiator listened with intent interest but keen, professional criticism to the combats of the novel. The reader had got to the point where the young amateur fights the brutal Berks. Berks is winded, but holds his adversary off with a stiff left arm. The amateur's second in the story, an old prize-fighter, shouts some advice to him as to how to deal with the situation. "That's right. By —- he's got him!" yelled ...
— Through the Magic Door • Arthur Conan Doyle
... a little," was the reply, with an air of modesty which Brown mistook for the bashful half-assertion of some daubing amateur. ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science Vol. XV., No. 85. January, 1875. • Various
... Beauchamp," observed the young aristocrat. "It was only to fight as an amateur. I cannot bear duelling since two seconds, whom I had chosen to arrange an affair, forced me to break the arm of one of my best friends, one whom you all know—poor ...
— The Count of Monte Cristo • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... his party were traversing the street "Les Bons Enfants" behind the theatre built by Richelieu expressly for the play of "Mirame," and in which Mazarin, who was an amateur of music, but not of literature, had introduced into France the first opera that was ever acted ...
— Twenty Years After • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... at length, in fifteen years from the Union, he directed the destinies of the Empire, as absolutely, as he had moulded the fate of Ireland. To Castlereagh and the Wellesley family, the Union was in truth, an era of honour and advancement. The sons of the spendthrift amateur, Lord Mornington, were reserved to rule India, and lead the armies of Europe; while the son of Flood's colleague in the Reform convention of 1783, was destined to give law to Christendom, ...
— A Popular History of Ireland - From the earliest period to the emancipation of the Catholics • Thomas D'Arcy McGee
... that John was a good musician. He played the piano rarely well, for an amateur, and he had a grand singing voice. And one of his fellow-officers told me that, after the fight at Beaumont-Hamul, one of the phases of the great Battle of the Somme, John's company found itself, toward ...
— A Minstrel In France • Harry Lauder
... in the extremity of need he could still fall back on his collection of rarities. The only thing was to find the right purchaser; for, if the sword of Antony had brought him so much, what would not some amateur give him for the ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... despicable life of a vagrant. There can be little doubt about the choice of most, and none about that of a real artist. Art and Religion are very much alike, and in the East, where they understand these things, there has always been a notion that religion should be an amateur affair. The pungis of India are beggars. Let artists all over the world be beggars too. Art and Religion are not professions: they are not occupations for which men can be paid. The artist and the saint do what they have to do, not to make a living, but in obedience ...
— Art • Clive Bell
... himself, seemed to have lost every bit of vim from his acting. The chorus sang "Oh, be joyful!" with dirge-like solemnity, and danced as if legs and feet were made of wood. The lovers, after the fashion of amateur actors from time immemorial, ...
— Miss Billy's Decision • Eleanor H. Porter
... that being a professional musician is next door to a crime in Lady Gertrude's eyes," observed Kitty. "She doesn't care for anyone to do more than 'play a little' in a nice, amateur, lady-like fashion!" ...
— The Moon out of Reach • Margaret Pedler
... She belonged to the aristocracy, and she was one of those amateur painters that wander about the Continent ...
— The Great Adventure • Arnold Bennett
... by strange type, striking colors, vignettes, and (at a later time) by lithograph illustrations, till a placard became a fairy-tale for the eyes, and not unfrequently a snare for the purse of the amateur. So much originality indeed was expended on placards in Paris, that one of that peculiar kind of maniacs, known as a collector, possesses ...
— Lost Illusions • Honore De Balzac
... was to the point. "The thing for your crowd to do is to quit chewing the rag and get this body down the valley and decently buried. I can't stand around here all night listening to amateur attorneys ...
— They of the High Trails • Hamlin Garland
... in their best, and adorned themselves to the utmost of their power. The boatswain, also, got them a dozen flags, which they hoisted on boathooks and other small spars; and they had on board, besides, a one-legged black fiddler, and a sort of amateur band, all of whom ...
— True Blue • W.H.G. Kingston
... residence, or, in other words, that, the 'General Table' having been dissolved, the 'College' was a mess-house for junior civilians. Later, its large hall was for many years a recognized assembly-room for amateur concerts, amateur dramatic entertainments, and other occasions of social reunion. The quaint devices on the gates are still preserved, and the name of the old 'College' still survives; but the associations have gone. Not ...
— The Story of Madras • Glyn Barlow
... nothing to say in reply, but lifted up his face and looked at Radley with the gratitude of a dog. For my part I felt a pleasing, squirmy excitement to think that we were to walk on to the Nursery field in the company of the great Middlesex amateur; and, incidentally, I took the opportunity of ...
— Tell England - A Study in a Generation • Ernest Raymond
... known to us have divined the racking anguish under which George had labored? For one, should not Elizabeth Sheridan, amateur spinster, have been all sympathy for one who was palpably more an alarmed ...
— The Sturdy Oak - A Composite Novel of American Politics by Fourteen American Authors • Samuel Merwin, et al.
... in my schoolboy days that I failed as an actor. (Artemus made many attempts as an amateur actor, but never to his own satisfaction. He was very fond of the society of actors and actresses. Their weaknesses amused him as much as their talents excited his admiration. One of his favorite sayings was that the world was made up of "men, women, and the people ...
— The Complete Works of Artemus Ward, Part 6 • Charles Farrar Browne
... Marsham, and Dr Handscombe stood on the granite wharf at Nordoe, high up among the Norwegian fiords, talking to Captain Hendal, a sturdy, elderly, ruddy-bronze giant, who acted as a sort of amateur consul and referee for shipping folk who came and went from the little hot-and-cold port, and who was now frowning heavily at ...
— Steve Young • George Manville Fenn
... were dressed up for amateur theatricals, and even denies herself the fashionable manner in which her hair is now arranged, going back to the simple style before she ...
— When the Birds Begin to Sing • Winifred Graham
... is an amateur. He may know something of statecraft and of big-game shooting; he may be able to kill a deer when he sees it and to measure it and weigh it after he has shot it; he may be able to observe carefully and accurately the actions and ...
— Revolution and Other Essays • Jack London
... company of clever people, not with that rhetorical aplomb which is considered by virtuosos as indispensable. He plays very quietly, without the daring elan which generally at once distinguishes the artist from the amateur. Nevertheless, our fine-feeling and acute-judging public recognised at once in this youth, who is a stranger and as yet unknown to fame, a true artist; and this evening afforded the unprejudiced observer the pleasing spectacle of a public which, considered as a moral person, showed itself ...
— Frederick Chopin as a Man and Musician - Volume 1-2, Complete • Frederick Niecks
... Oh, my dear, you need not be afraid of him, he is a brother of Mrs. Grinstead's, a connection of Miss Mohun's; and though he is such a musician, it is quite as an amateur. But, Lydia, I do think that if you sing your best, he may very likely be able to put you in a way to make your talent available so as to satisfy your mother, without leading to anything so undesirable and dangerous as ...
— The Long Vacation • Charlotte M. Yonge
... frowned at Lindsay in a manner which was itself a reminiscence of amateur theatricals. "Their relations!" she murmured to Dr. Livingstone. "What awful things to ...
— The Path of a Star • Mrs. Everard Cotes (AKA Sara Jeannette Duncan)
... put forward by various newspapers or private individuals, there were one or two which were feasible enough to attract the attention of the public. One which appeared in The Times, over the signature of an amateur reasoner of some celebrity at that date, attempted to deal with the matter in a critical and semi-scientific manner. An extract must suffice, although the curious can see the whole letter in the issue of the ...
— Tales of Terror and Mystery • Arthur Conan Doyle
... a quick eye, steady hand, and good judgment, to kill a partridge in November, when, with a rush of wings like an embryo whirlwind, he gets up under your feet, and brushes the dew from the underbrush with his whizzing wings. It is not every amateur that can kill woodcock in close cover, or well-grown snipe on a windy day; but there are few, who can do these things, who can kill with both barrels in their first goose-shooting. The size and number of the birds, ...
— Adrift in the Ice-Fields • Charles W. Hall
... to wear out the earlier sensibilities of adolescence. He was tired of worshipping or tyrannizing over the bistred or umbered beauties of mingled blood among whom he had been living. Even that piquant exhibition which the Rio de Mendoza presents to the amateur of breathing sculpture failed to interest him. He was thinking of a far-off village on the other side of the equator, and of the wild girl with whom he used to play and quarrel, a creature of a different ...
— Elsie Venner • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... goddess, he rushed down to his laboratory, where he knew there was a magnificent beard and moustache which he had been constructing for some amateur theatricals. With these, and a soft felt hat, he completed a disguise in which he flattered ...
— The Tinted Venus - A Farcical Romance • F. Anstey
... communication from the Record Officer now serving with the Canadian Division at the front and published in the British press on May 1, 1915. The division was commanded by a distinguished English General, but these "amateur soldiers of Canada," as the narrator describes them, were officered largely by lawyers, college professors, and business men who before the war were neither disciplined nor trained. Many striking deeds of heroism and self-sacrifice were performed ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 3, June, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... his career had Holmes helped him to attain success, his own sole reward being the intellectual joy of the problem. For this reason the affection and respect of the Scotchman for his amateur colleague were profound, and he showed them by the frankness with which he consulted Holmes in every difficulty. Mediocrity knows nothing higher than itself; but talent instantly recognizes genius, and MacDonald had talent enough for his profession ...
— The Valley of Fear • Arthur Conan Doyle
... tree has its crowd of loungers underneath. At first it was only by the road side, but now the adjoining fields too must furnish their contribution of shade. Further off yonder a company of fellows are mixing promiscuously and socially among a herd of cows; in fact there is amateur milking going on, it is evident. Do you see that farm house three-fourths of a mile over yonder, glancing white among thickly clustering trees? and that string of lads along the fence down there, on their way toward it? They are bound thither, doubtless, in search of a comfortable breakfast. But ...
— Our campaign around Gettysburg • John Lockwood
... of the fence to avoid the eyes of the audience ran Mungongo to the temporary Place of Fires. Feeling as if he were once more playing in an amateur dramatic club, Birnier stalked with portentous dignity from the hut, past the idol, and took his seat upon the enchanted place. Without the palisade and within another squatted in correct order the lines of wizards and chiefs, Zalu Zako retaining, rather ...
— Witch-Doctors • Charles Beadle
... put it down that it was her Cue to chop out the Twaddle and be a sort of Lady Emerson. Incidentally she resolved to cut out all kinds of Slang, for she got a very straight Line of Talk from an Amateur Philosopher who was in ...
— People You Know • George Ade
... in October, Frank Forester and Harry Archer were sitting at the open window of a neat country tavern, in a sequestered nook of Rockland County, looking out upon as beautiful a view as ever gladdened the eyes of wandering amateur or artist. ...
— Warwick Woodlands - Things as they Were There Twenty Years Ago • Henry William Herbert (AKA Frank Forester)
... "out East," as she quaintly calls it, and has an enormous repertoire of tasty, spicy, Eastern dishes. In the cooking of rice Louis is a master; but in the making of the accompanying curry he fades into a blundering amateur compared with Miss West. In the matter of curry she is a sheer genius. How often one's thoughts dwell ...
— The Mutiny of the Elsinore • Jack London
... foreigners, who were spending the winter in San Francisco. She could not drive, nor yacht, nor run to fires on account of the weather, but she unloosed her energies upon indoor society, and started a cotillion club, and an amateur opera company. She gave a fancy dress ball, to which all her guests were obliged to come in the costumes of Old California, and laughed for a week at the ridiculous figure which most of them cut. She also gave many ...
— The Californians • Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton
... excessive—interest. I feel that if I were to suggest any arguments bearing directly upon home rule or disestablishment, I should at once come under that damnatory epithet "academical," which so neatly cuts the ground from under the feet of the political amateur. Moreover, I recognise a good deal of justice in the implied criticism. An active politician who wishes to impress his doctrines upon his countrymen, should have a kind of knowledge to which I can make no pretension. I share the ordinary feelings of awful reverence with which the human bookworm ...
— Social Rights and Duties, Volume I (of 2) - Addresses to Ethical Societies • Sir Leslie Stephen |
