"Calibre" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... tongue and confessed the same religion, all they felt and thought was grounded on views, as widely dissimilar as though the two men had been born in different spheres. When two opponents of such different calibre meet, there is a great clatter of arms but no bloody wounds are dealt and neither ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... undistinguished. Among these sons are to be found much greater names (Goethe, Bach, Kant, Bismarck, Wagner, etc.) than are to be found among the sons of young and more distinguished fathers, for here there is only one name (Frederick the Great) of the same calibre. The elderly fathers belonged to large cities and were mostly married to wives very much younger than themselves. Vaerting notes that the most eminent geniuses have most frequently been the sons of fathers who were not engaged in intellectual ...
— Essays in War-Time - Further Studies In The Task Of Social Hygiene • Havelock Ellis
... of Rasputin's conversation with the Tsar, the Church of Russia had been swept clean of all its loyal adherents, and in their places—even in the bishoprics of Kazan, Tver and Odessa—were appointed alcoholic rascals of the same calibre as Rasputin himself. ...
— The Minister of Evil - The Secret History of Rasputin's Betrayal of Russia • William Le Queux
... author of a very different calibre, the venerable Beda; concerning whom we must remember that he stands in contrast to Gildas from being Anglo-Saxon rather than British. Now, his history is Ecclesiastical and not Civil; so that ethnological questions make no part ...
— The Ethnology of the British Islands • Robert Gordon Latham
... I threw myself down on the bed and wrapped myself up in my blankets, boots, mud, lice and all. I hadn't been asleep long before the Huns started "hating" the chateau. They have put over twenty-five large calibre shells into my place, the grounds and the house. They are still at it. Every time a shell bursts it makes a hole big enough to bury five horses, and it shakes the foundations all round. The shells are bigger than usual. The smoke and earth are blown up ...
— "Crumps", The Plain Story of a Canadian Who Went • Louis Keene
... thought they would not only be discouraged but frightened. They had run away from us, in the temple; and despite the proverb concerning those who fight and run, to fight another day, it was probable that men of their calibre would see the wisdom of abandoning the chase. They had shown themselves cowards, Anthony thought, whatever their object had been in attacking Miss O'Brien and Miss Gilder: and though we must be on the watch during the rest of the trip, his idea was that the men had retreated ...
— It Happened in Egypt • C. N. Williamson & A. M. Williamson
... Agatha. "The male of the species, when he is a man of Robert's attainments and calibre, can be swerved from pursuit of the female he covets, ...
— A Daughter of the Land • Gene Stratton-Porter
... do not hear of any Irish news this morning; if there is any, I will add it before I close this letter. I entirely agree with you in thinking the situation of Irish Secretary to be in rank and estimation much below Tom's calibre. In point of real utility and scope for displaying the powers of his mind, God knows it is difficult, extensive, and important enough for the talents of the greatest man this country ever saw. It is, however, as you will have learnt by my note of ...
— Memoirs of the Court and Cabinets of George the Third, Volume 2 (of 2) - From the Original Family Documents • The Duke of Buckingham
... engaging at ranges at which the fire could not be returned. Whilst the method of defence was apparent, the problem of supplying suitable guns in sufficient numbers was a very different matter. It involved arming all our merchant ships with guns of 4-inch calibre and above. In January, 1917, only some 1,400 British ships had been so armed ...
— The Crisis of the Naval War • John Rushworth Jellicoe
... premature, and yet retaining his hold over a people whose paramount political preoccupation was their national unity. The crisis of 1908-9 brought him into close relations with the government of the Greek kingdom; and the king, who had gauged his calibre, now took the patriotic step of calling in the man who had expelled his son from Krete, to put his own house in order. It speaks much for both men that they worked together in harmony from the beginning. Upon the royal invitation Venezelos exchanged ...
— The Balkans - A History Of Bulgaria—Serbia—Greece—Rumania—Turkey • Nevill Forbes, Arnold J. Toynbee, D. Mitrany, D.G. Hogarth
... directions were followed scrupulously; the song "Come, thou Monarch of the Vine," was sung to music in the drinking scene on board Pompey's galley, and there were the appointed flourishes of trumpets and drums. The acting was competent, though not of the highest calibre, but a satisfactory level was evenly maintained throughout the cast. There were no conspicuous deflections from the adequate standard. The character of whom I have the most distinct recollection was Enobarbus, the level-headed and straight-hitting critic of ...
— Shakespeare and the Modern Stage - with Other Essays • Sir Sidney Lee
... yet done with its joke. When fall came on and the heroes returned to Forty Mile and to Circle City, they listened calmly to the up-river tales of Siwash discoveries and loafers' prospects, and shook their heads. They judged by the calibre of the men interested, and branded it a bunco game. But glowing reports continued to trickle down the Yukon, and a few of the old-timers went up to see. They looked over the ground—the unlikeliest place for ...
— Revolution and Other Essays • Jack London
... captains were then ordered to march their companies to their respective quarters, and make up their powder and ball into cartridges, with the greatest possible despatch. As there were scarcely two muskets in a company of equal calibre, it was necessary to reduce the size of the balls for many of them; and as but a small proportion of the men had cartridge-boxes, the remainder made use of ...
— The Yankee Tea-party - Or, Boston in 1773 • Henry C. Watson
... longer, for he is met by the unanswerable argument that their opponents are ready to concede more. I own I was alarmed, and my mind misgave me when I heard of the extreme satisfaction of Althorp and Co.; and I always dreaded that Wharncliffe, however honest and well-meaning, had not calibre enough to conduct such a negotiation, and might be misled by his vanity. He bustles about the town, chatting away to all the people he meets, and I fear is both ignorant himself of what he is about and involuntarily ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William IV, Vol. II • Charles C. F. Greville
... good deal of valuable information in the course of his career as a waiter; and to him information meant money, and money meant power and a recognized place in society. The diplomatic shrewdness which enabled him to estimate the moral calibre of a patron served him equally well in estimating the value of an investment. He had a hundred subterranean channels of information, and his judgment as to the soundness or unsoundness of a financial enterprise was almost unerring. His little secret transactions on the ...
— Ilka on the Hill-Top and Other Stories • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen
... Harold armed them all with guns and knives. Himself and Disco carried Enfield rifles; besides which, Harold took with him a spare rifle of heavy calibre, carrying large balls, mingled with tin to harden them. This latter was intended for large game. Landing near the East Luavo mouth of the Zambesi, our hero was fortunate enough to procure two serviceable ...
— Black Ivory • R.M. Ballantyne
... right heavy calibre to our artillery, And never goes a Prussian over to the enemy, For 't is cursed bad money that the Swedes have to pay; Is there any better coin of the Austrian?—who ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 57, July, 1862 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... the evidence I could get on that subject. I made myself familiar with the Rev. Alexander Keith of Mayfair, who helped to bring clandestine marriages into vogue amongst the swells, and with Dr. Gaynham—agreeably nicknamed Bishop of Hell—and more of the same calibre; and the result of my investigations convinced me that in those days a hare-brained young reprobate must have found it rather more difficult to avoid matrimony than to achieve it. He might be married when he was tipsy; he might be married when he was comatose from the effects of a stand-up fight ...
— Birds of Prey • M. E. Braddon
... should only get into trenches that might be costly or impossible to hold, and so it would be for the Germans on our side. But there is a kind of etiquette observed; loud vulgar talking on either side of the four-metre gap leads at once to bomb throwing. And meanwhile on both sides guns of various calibre keep up an intermittent fire, the German guns register—I think that is the right term—on the cross of Arras cathedral, the British guns search lovingly for the German batteries. As one walks about the silent ...
— War and the Future • H. G. Wells
... ingenious men, the real business-men of the House. Another class, perfectly distinct, is that of the matter-of-fact men, largely recruited from among opulent merchants, bankers sent from country constituencies, and others of that calibre, who are formidable on every question of figures, are terrible on tariffs, and evidently think, that there is no book of wisdom on earth but a ledger. Then come the country gentlemen, generally an excellent and honest race, but to whom a life in London, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 61, No. 378, April, 1847 • Various
... his waist-belt there was a revolver-pouch which Durham, on removal, found to contain a revolver of heavy calibre loaded ...
— The Rider of Waroona • Firth Scott
... this powerful arm soon convinced the Sikh army that they had met with a foe they little expected; and their whole force was driven from position after position with great slaughter, and the loss of seventeen pieces of artillery, some of them of heavy calibre; our infantry using that never-failing weapon the bayonet, whenever the enemy stood. Night only saved them from worse disaster; for this stout conflict was maintained during an hour and a half of dim ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 367, May 1846 • Various
... with the utmost consideration—I am not able to tell you exactly what brand of gun he may be. It is evident from his conservative use of black powder, and the old-gentlemanly staidness of his movements, that he is an elderly gun. His calibre appears to be six inches. From the plunging nature of his fire, some have conjectured him a sort of howitzer, but it is next to certain he is one of the sixteen 15-cm. Creusot guns bought for the forts of Pretoria and Johannesburg. Anyhow, he conducted his enforced ...
— From Capetown to Ladysmith - An Unfinished Record of the South African War • G. W. Steevens
... it might contain. It stopped, however, at the door before his purpose could be fully explained. A moment after Mr. Pleydell called out, 'Here's our Liddesdale friend, I protest, with a strapping young fellow of the same calibre.' His voice arrested Dinmont, who recognised him with equal surprise and pleasure. 'Od, if it's your honour we'll a' be as right and tight as thack ...
— Guy Mannering, or The Astrologer, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... acquire psychological control over the minds of any persons—not his associates—beneath his own calibre of mind. He must be able to still a crying infant, subdue fierce animals or angry men, and by will, transfer his thought without speech or outward sign to any person of a mental calibre below himself; he must be enabled to summon to his presence elementary ...
— Buchanan's Journal of Man, January 1888 - Volume 1, Number 12 • Various
... one of the rare men who, in our day, unite a noble character with great talent, had already obtained, not all the popularity his works deserve, but a respectful esteem to which souls of his own calibre could add nothing. His reputation will certainly increase; but in the eyes of connoisseurs it had already attained its full development. He is one of those authors who, sooner or later, are put in their right place, and never lose it. A poor nobleman, ...
— The Secrets of the Princesse de Cadignan • Honore de Balzac
... Scythians, Cimmerians, Chaldae, and the industrious tribes of the Chalybes and the White Syrians—and, always victorious, appeared at last on the right hank of the Halys; but having reached it, he found himself face to face with foes of quite a different calibre from those with whom he had hitherto to deal. Lydia had increased both in wealth and in vigour since the days when her king Ardys informed his ally Assur-bani-pal that he had avenged the death of his father and driven the Cimmerians from the ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 8 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... burrowed for a moment, presently emerging with a box. This he carried gingerly to a convenient rock and opened. First he lifted out some soft padding. A small tin box honey-combed inside came to light. With infinite precaution Barnett picked out an object that looked like a 22- calibre short cartridge, wadded some cotton batten in his hand, set the thing in the wadding, laid it on the rock, carefully returned the small box to the large box and the large box to the boat, took up ...
— The Mystery • Stewart Edward White and Samuel Hopkins Adams
... best troops opposite our positions west of the village of Guzow, against the trenches of the second army at a point where an army corps of veterans have turned their position into an earthen fortress. Here within the last few days the Germans have brought up guns of all but the largest calibre and generally displayed considerable increases in their artillery. Here also their infantry attacks, those tragic and wasteful assaults in force which send so many thousand German corpses down the ...
— The New York Times Current History: the European War, February, 1915 • Various
... customs in every country in the world; Leland Summers, an international mechanical engineer and an expert in manufacturing, chemicals, and steel; James C. Pennie, the international patent lawyer; Frederick Neilson and Chandler Anderson, authorities on international law; and various others of equal calibre. ...
— Woodrow Wilson as I Know Him • Joseph P. Tumulty
... in a camp a mile in length, and half a mile in breadth, with the village of Ferozeshah in the centre. They numbered nearly 60,000 men, and 108 pieces of cannon of heavy calibre in fixed batteries. ...
— Our Soldiers - Gallant Deeds of the British Army during Victoria's Reign • W.H.G. Kingston
... combination in all other branches of low-class labour can proceed at the same pace. The public and localized character of the competition for casual dock labour rendered effective combination here possible, in spite of the low intellectual and moral calibre of the average labourer. It is the absence of such public and localized competition which is the kernel of the difficulty in most "sweating" trades. It may be safely said that the measure of progress in organization of low class labour will be the comparative ...
— Problems of Poverty • John A. Hobson
... at this period, as samples of a state of things which is now past and gone. The morality of some of them might be questioned in these days of advanced ideas on civilization, but, under the guidance of a man of Dr. Smith's mental calibre, their effect was the rearing of a generation of manly youths, capable of much intellectual, as well as physical, activity ...
— A History of Horncastle - from the earliest period to the present time • James Conway Walter
... to a riddling fire of cross-questions. Mocket, on his coign of vantage, was caught again by the more apparent drama, and looked and listened greedily. Eaton at last retired, much damaged, and Commodore Truxtun was sworn. This was a man of different calibre, and from side to side of the long room occurred a subtle intensification of respect, interest, and attention. On went the examination, this time favourable, on the whole, to Burr. "The prisoner frequently, in conversation with me, mentioned the subject of speculations in western lands, ...
— Lewis Rand • Mary Johnston
... "I had a very clear presentiment of all that as soon as I looked at the murderer. Do you remember the man's amazing impudence as long as he thought he could not be convicted of the crime? And then, when he found that the calibre of his gun betrayed him, how abject, how painfully humble, he became! Evidently such a man is ...
— The Clique of Gold • Emile Gaboriau
... which Hank Brown had shot on these slopes. But Hank was no longer in the mood for recounting his adventures. Hank was congratulating himself upon selling that rifle, which had lately shown a tendency to jam if he worked the lever too fast; and was trying to decide just what make and calibre of rifle he would buy with the money now in his pocket; and he was grinning in his sleeve at the ease with which he had "stung" this young tenderfoot, who was unsuspectingly going up against a proposition which Hank, with all his love for the wild, ...
— The Lookout Man • B. M. Bower
... mounted, in barbette, four 8-inch columbiads and one 24-pounder gun; the upper water battery carried sixteen 24-pounders, the lower one one 8-inch columbiad, one 7-inch rifle, six 42-pounders, nine 32-pounders, and four 24-pounders. Besides these, there were seven mortars, one of 13-inch calibre, five of 10-inch, and one of 8-inch. Forty-two of the guns could be brought to bear upon the fleet ascending ...
— History of the Nineteenth Army Corps • Richard Biddle Irwin
... river-men to the tyranny of her tongue and stick, and came on to where the red light of the forge showed through the smithy window. As he neared the door, he heard a voice singularly sweet, and another of commoner calibre was joining in ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... advice as to their reconstruction, and making translations from foreign works—all this in addition to his own original contributions, in which he carried out the principle which he constantly laid down for his collaborators, that literary graces must be set aside, and that the mental calibre of those for whom the books were primarily intended must be constantly borne in mind. He attained a splendid fulfilment of his own theories, employing the moujik's expressive vernacular in portraying his homely wisdom, religious faith, and goodness ...
— The Forged Coupon and Other Stories • Leo Tolstoy
... palpable interest. I beg also attention to Dr. Hodgson's little book, 'Lectures on the Education of Girls, and Employment of Women;' and not only to the text, but to the valuable notes and references which accompany them. Or if any one wish to ascertain the temper, as well as the intellectual calibre of the ladies who are foremost in this movement, let them read, as specimens of two different styles, the Introduction to 'Woman's Work, and Woman's Culture,' by Mrs. Butler, and the article on 'Female Suffrage,' by Miss Wedgewood, at p. 247. I only ask that these two articles ...
— Women and Politics • Charles Kingsley
... companion, Captain Granville and Grantham entered the piazza, leading to the officers' rooms, several of which were completely pierced with twenty-four pound shot, known at once as coming from the centre battery, which alone mounted guns of that calibre. After surveying the interior a few moments, they passed into a small passage communicating with the room in question. On opening the door, all were painfully struck by the sight which presented itself. Numerous ...
— The Canadian Brothers - or The Prophecy Fulfilled • John Richardson
... noise they made was so blood-curdling. One could cope with the ordinary ones, but frankly, these were beastly. Luckily they only went over about every tenth. It was something quite new getting shells of this calibre from such a short range, and "side-ways," too, as someone expressed it; quite a different sensation from on top. The noise was deafening; and then one struck the bank our camp was built on. We had no dug-out and seemingly were just waiting to be potted at. We got the cars ready in case ...
— Fanny Goes to War • Pat Beauchamp
... Peter noted, and was now glad to perceive; for, in addition to the favor that Margery had found in his eyes, that wary chief had certain very serious misgivings on the subject of the prudence of attempting to deal harshly with a medicine man of Boden's calibre. Touching the whiskey-spring he had been doubtful, from the first; even Crowsfeather's account of the wonderful glass through which that chief had looked, and seen men reduced to children and then converted into giants, had failed to conquer his scepticism; but he was not altogether proof ...
— Oak Openings • James Fenimore Cooper
... business that we now propose to ourselves, of arguing against the Academicians, appears to some philosophers, and those, too, men of no ordinary calibre, to be a thing that ought not to be done at all; and they think that there is no sense at all in, and no method of disputing with men who approve of nothing; and they blame Antipater, the Stoic, who was very fond of doing so, and say that there is no need of ...
— The Academic Questions • M. T. Cicero
... to march on the 9th of February for Ayer Dikit. It now consists of Lieutenant Dare, Mr. Alexander, surgeon, seventy sepoys, including officers, twenty-seven lascars and Bengal convicts, and eleven of the bugis-guard. Left the old mortar and took with us one of smaller calibre. ...
— The History of Sumatra - Containing An Account Of The Government, Laws, Customs And - Manners Of The Native Inhabitants • William Marsden
... rifle is not advised. The only animals that can be classed as dangerous are the jaguar and white-jawed peccary, and a 30-30 or 44 calibre is heavy enough for such game. The 44-calibre Winchester or Remington carbine is the arm generally used throughout South America, and 44 calibre is the only ammunition that one can depend upon securing in the field. Every man has his own preference for an arm. However, there is no ...
— Through the Brazilian Wilderness • Theodore Roosevelt
... men armed with Kentucky rifles, which were not only muzzle-loaders, but of small calibre and less effective than the ordinary .32 calibre rifle of to-day, were hunting deer on the divide between Volcano and Shirttail Canyons in Placer county. In the heavy timber on the slope they encountered a large Grizzly coming up out of Volcano Canyon. The bear was a hundred ...
— Bears I Have Met—and Others • Allen Kelly
... the most useful, and sensible members of society, the men who are depended upon most in emergencies, the men of backbone and stamina, the bone and sinew of their communities; the men who can always be relied upon, who are healthiest and happiest, are, as a rule, of ordinary mental calibre and medium capacity. But with persistent and untiring industry, these are they, after all, who carry the burdens and reap the prizes of life. It is the men and women who keep everlastingly at it, who do not believe themselves geniuses, but who know that if they ever accomplish ...
— How to Succeed - or, Stepping-Stones to Fame and Fortune • Orison Swett Marden
... man's fortunes had not been such as this. And then there came home to him a feeling that were they so, it would be his duty to make up for Mary's sake what was wanting,—since he had discovered of what calibre was ...
— An Old Man's Love • Anthony Trollope
... the blackened object whom he had helped to drive back into the cabin a foe of a calibre suited to his size, and one whom he could tackle, Bob Howlett shouted to his men—"Cut 'em down if they resist," and then to Mark. "Now you slave-catching dog, surrender, or this goes through you like ...
— The Black Bar • George Manville Fenn
... examination revealed the fact that the measure is one in every way worthy of support. (Pretty thin!) It cannot be denied that this desertion has had a damaging effect. Jex and Fluke have returned to their iniquitous allegiance, with six or eight others of lesser calibre, and it is reported and believed that Tubbs and Huffy are ready to go back. It is feared that the University swindle is stronger to-day than it ...
— The Gilded Age, Part 5. • Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) and Charles Dudley Warner
... four men, the kapala seated himself on the stump of a tree. The hair was first cut away above the ears, a long board was placed upright behind and against his right ear, and the operator adjusted his tool—an empty rifle cartridge of small calibre, which was encased in the end of a small piece of wood. After having carefully ascertained that all was in order he struck the tool, using a loose axe-head with sure hand, two or three times. The supporting board was ...
— Through Central Borneo: - An Account of Two Years' Travel in the Land of Head-Hunters - Between the Years 1913 and 1917 • Carl Lumholtz
... from the country were to stand in a city street before the window of a shop, gazing into it with open mouth, he would do more in five or six minutes to measure the power and calibre of the passing men and women than almost any device that could be arranged. Ninety-five out of a hundred of them, probably, would smile a superior smile at him and hurry on. Out of the remaining five, four would look again ...
— The Lost Art of Reading • Gerald Stanley Lee
... moment it seemed to Stanhope that he must dare everything and take her. After all, she was intelligent: she could be educated. She was beautiful, youthful; and what a love she poured out at his feet!—different in calibre, in nature, different, from its root up, from any love he could hope to find again—a love that asked absolutely nothing for itself, not even the right to live, and yet would give its all unquestioningly, unsparingly. ...
— Six Women • Victoria Cross
... drained his glass. "Didn't he wing one of you down in Victoria the other day? Your bushranger is bound to come to it sooner or later. He may much prefer not to shoot; but he has only to get up against a man of his own calibre, as resolute and as well armed as himself, to have no choice in the matter. Poor old Duncan was the very type; he would never have given way. In fact, we found him with his own revolver fast in his hand, and a finger frozen to the trigger, but not ...
— Stingaree • E. W. (Ernest William) Hornung
... else's money, shrewdly enough not to be found out. I thought about it day and night. My mind was fertile in expedients, and I formed a hundred projects, each more practicable than the others. I should frighten you if I were to tell you half of what I imagined in those days. If many thieves of my calibre existed, you'd have to blot the word 'property' out of the dictionary. Precautions, as well as safes, would be useless. Happily for men ...
— The Mystery of Orcival • Emile Gaboriau
... origin that its flag-officers are far from possessing either the spirit of resource, or the cleverness and diplomacy for which the commanding generals of the German army are so distinguished. They are men who, officially, intellectually, and socially, are of an inferior calibre, the majority of them being of plebeian birth. The emperor held, therefore, that it was all-important that Germany's squadron in the far Orient should be, at that particular juncture, under the command of an officer such as Prince Henry, who, by reason of his ...
— The Secret Memoirs of the Courts of Europe: William II, Germany; Francis Joseph, Austria-Hungary, Volume I. (of 2) • Mme. La Marquise de Fontenoy
... just now the torpedo-makers are in the lead. For this reason a battleship needs other protection than that imparted by its cellular subdivision. This is given by its "torpedo defense battery" of minor guns of about 5-inch calibre. ...
— The Navy as a Fighting Machine • Bradley A. Fiske
... of that—there was a time when I could teach, and teach with pleasure.' He paused. Rose could have scourged herself for the tremor she felt creeping over her. Why should it be to her so new and strange a thing that a man, especially a man of these years and this calibre, should confide in her, should speak to her intimately of himself? After all, she said to herself angrily, with a terrified sense of importance, she was a child no longer, though her mother and ...
— Robert Elsmere • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... first real naval battle experienced by us—the bombardment of Santiago being of an entirely different calibre—and it needed only the grewsome setting of surgeons and wounded and blood to make ...
— A Gunner Aboard the "Yankee" • Russell Doubleday
... had been engaged to sing. By the time Beatrix was back in town once more, he had started upon what was destined to be a triumphal progress through New England. To some men, the mere professional success would have been enough in itself; but Thayer was of too large calibre to find a steady diet of applause and adjectives, both in the superlative degree of comparison, either a satisfactory or a stimulating meal. Often and often, as he bowed across the footlights preparatory to shouldering and lugging off his ponderous wreath of laurels, he would have given all ...
— The Dominant Strain • Anna Chapin Ray
... brutality in him, greatly feared, by many women, and he had been heard many a time scoffingly to say that only would he bring home a wife when he had found a woman possessed of gold sufficient to fill a chest so large that ten of his men might not be able to carry it into his castle. Brides of this calibre did not then grow in profusion on either side of the Border, and had he continued to live uninterruptedly in his own country, no doubt Bryan de Blenkinsopp might have remained to the end unmarried. But: "When I said I would die a bachelor, ...
— Stories of the Border Marches • John Lang and Jean Lang
... o'clock, and the bank is in full blast. Up to this hour the players in one thin row around the tables were staking only a few dollars at a time—as skirmishers in advance of the main army, firing stray shots from pieces of light calibre. Now the heavy artillery has come up, the ranks are filled, and the files become doubled around the different tables—two circles of players, in places three, engaging in the game. And instead of silver dollars, gold eagles and ...
— The Flag of Distress - A Story of the South Sea • Mayne Reid
... invariably harassed all roads of communication, and dropped innumerable shells of large calibre into the stricken (p. 029) city; and we made a habit of sitting at the entrance to the little shack, used as the officers' mess, smoking our evening pipes, interested spectators, while the shells screamed overhead, ...
— Three years in France with the Guns: - Being Episodes in the life of a Field Battery • C. A. Rose
... was not lessened when his eyes fell upon a sheath knife and huge revolver in the stranger's belt. Involuntarily Rutherford's hand went to his hip pocket, where reposed a dainty, pearl-handled Smith and Wesson, 38-calibre, but he immediately regretted the movement, for the blue-black eyes watching him scintillated for a moment with a cold, steel-like glitter, and the lips under the heavy, black beard curled with a smile of fine scorn, that made our young hero ...
— The Award of Justice - Told in the Rockies • A. Maynard Barbour
... This was the muse and genius that ruled his opinions, conversation, studies, work, and course of life. This made him a searching judge of men. At first glance he measured his companion, and, though insensible to some fine traits of culture, could very well report his weight and calibre. And this made the impression of genius which his ...
— Excursions • Henry D. Thoreau
... mediocrity with which our public service is stocked. But as long as this process is continued, the real power in the administration of the affairs of the Empire will remain virtually in the hands of a few able individuals of the wrong calibre. There will be a dummy Prime Minister, and a dummy Cabinet; but the wires will be worked by the self-made man who must place himself first and his country second, with consequences usually ...
— The Curse of Education • Harold E. Gorst
... her part, preferring to carry out her plans without any aid or advice. Mademoiselle Diana was shrewd and practical, and not likely to err from want of judgment. The frank and open expression of her features concealed a mind of superior calibre, and one which well knew how to weigh the advantages of social rank and position. She affected a sudden sympathy with the poor, and visited them constantly, and might be frequently met in the lanes carrying soup and other comforts to them. Her father declared, with a laugh, that she ought to ...
— The Champdoce Mystery • Emile Gaboriau
... to Hebblethwaite, and I have been to Scotland Yard," Norgate told him firmly, "and all that I have got for my pains has been a snub. They won't believe in German spies. Mr. Wyatt, you are a man of a little different temperament and calibre from those others. I tell you that all of them in the Cabinet have their heads thrust deep down into the sand. They won't listen to me. They wouldn't believe a word of what I am saying to you, but ...
— The Double Traitor • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... they can fire those forty per minute, each one takes a lot out of the big fellow's life. Unlike the guns of smaller calibre, they cannot be used over and over again. They are too powerful to be used in actual trench warfare, but let a fortress, or a mountain that has perversely got in the way of operations, loom up ahead, and down it goes! ...
— The Stars & Stripes, Vol 1, No 1, February 8, 1918, - The American Soldiers' Newspaper of World War I, 1918-1919 • American Expeditionary Forces
... expressed why it should be performed.[62] Maimonides undoubtedly looked upon this act as having a decided tendency or action in depleting the immediate vessels in the vicinity of the cut surface, and that the consequent constriction in their calibre would prevent any future haemorrhage. That this is the natural result of suction is a fact readily understood by any modern physician. The depletion of the vessel for some distance in its length, with the contraction in the ...
— History of Circumcision from the Earliest Times to the Present - Moral and Physical Reasons for its Performance • Peter Charles Remondino
... hotels, champagne, wine, and cigars. I presume they would do the same thing at the gates of the Celestial City, if they should accidentally find themselves there. It is one of the dark providences that multitudes of this calibre of mind find leisure and means to come among these scenes, while many to whom they would be an inspiration, in whose souls they would unseal ceaseless fountains of beauty, are forever excluded ...
— Sunny Memories of Foreign Lands V2 • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... whose mind opened to every passing remark, could avoid becoming a thinker, a reasoner, a tory, and a patriot. Sometimes a tough disputant crossed our threshold; one of these was Dr. Parr, and brilliant were the flashes resulting from such occasional collision with antagonists of that calibre. I am often charged with the offence of being too political in my writings: the fact is, I write as I think and feel; and what else can you expect from a child reared ...
— Personal Recollections • Charlotte Elizabeth
... second national, with perhaps little more than two months between them. It sounds terribly alarming to hear that a revolution has broken out, and pictures of the French Revolution immediately rise before one, but, fortunately, those of South American cities are not of that calibre; reports and rumours fly about of the terrible things that are going to be done, but these generally end in rumour, and after a few persons, those who have nothing to do with the movement, have been killed, probably by soldiers letting off their rifles up some ...
— Argentina From A British Point Of View • Various
... and over against a sort of rocky islet or peninsula, joined to the left bank of the river by a strip of sand. On the rock there was built a very strong castle, having a double wall and towers to protect it, but the cannons of rather poor calibre. Alongside of us lay the fleet of the pirates, composed of strange-looking vessels, having for the most part two masts, one very much in the stern, and rigged with a huge sail, the peak of which came much above the top of the mast. The prows of these vessels stretched a great way forward out of ...
— Athelstane Ford • Allen Upward
... attitude assumed towards it. But as long as the Negro prefers to construe owlish looks as wisdom, to bow down to clam like silence as profound philosophy, to stand agape over blatant mouthings as eloquence, and to measure mental calibre by bodily avoirdupois, he not only gives evidence of weakness in a lack of sound discrimination, but he subjects the entire race to consequent criticism ...
— The Educated Negro and His Mission - The American Negro Academy. Occasional Papers No. 8 • W. S. Scarborough
... hysterical temperaments operate against mental development, progress and happiness. In the human species among individuals of equal mental calibre, the sanguine individual is due to rise higher and go farther than his nervous or lymphatic rivals. A characteristic temperament may embrace the majority of a whole species, or be limited to a few individuals. Many ...
— The Minds and Manners of Wild Animals • William T. Hornaday
... twigs, and very small blood-vessels, were seen plugged up with solid and fluid carbon, and, from the appearance of the morbid structure, it was manifest, that the ulcerative process had effected a complete disorganization of the bronchial tubes of every calibre, while the smaller arterial vessels had alone suffered, leaving the larger ones entire.[11] Along the margin of the inferior lobe, indurated accumulations were felt through the pleura, and, on being laid open, they were ascertained to be impacted lobules, which resisted the knife. ...
— An Investigation into the Nature of Black Phthisis • Archibald Makellar
... the continuous flow of thought in those who live much in society, his mind has developed itself boldly, and acquired a vigour at which, perhaps, it might never have arrived, had he been compelled to live in a crowded city, chafed by the contact with minds of an inferior calibre. ...
— The Idler in France • Marguerite Gardiner
... glanced at him again. In spite of himself, respect was growing in him. He had expected to find a certain amount of eagerness and subserviency—though veiled; here was a man of different calibre than he looked for ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... so bad a cause could have been sustained with such perseverance. In spite of this desperate defence, and although the assault could only be effected in part, and with the help of cannons of heavy calibre, our brave troops with heroic courage, but at the cost of great losses, occupied a first line of houses; but as all my columns could not penetrate into the town at the same time, I ordered the suspension ...
— The Liberation of Italy • Countess Evelyn Martinengo-Cesaresco
... was forced to retire from the mouth of the River St. John he established himself at a "detroit," or "narrows," up the river, where he constructed a small battery, two guns of a calibre of 2L., and twelve swivel guns. The following summer he entertained no fears as to his security. He had made an intrenchment in a favorable situation and hoped if the English should venture an attack to have the best of it. "I have particularly recommended him," writes the governor, ...
— Glimpses of the Past - History of the River St. John, A.D. 1604-1784 • W. O. Raymond
... present and to gauge what movement of rates they will result in, is an operation requiring, first, knowledge, then judgment. The former qualification can perhaps be derived, in small degree, from study of the foregoing pages. The latter is a matter of mental calibre and experience. ...
— Elements of Foreign Exchange - A Foreign Exchange Primer • Franklin Escher
... for Henri and Jules had their duties and might not leave the regiment; yet in hundreds of hollows there was hidden the deadly French soixante-quinze—the 75-millimetre quick-firing gun, which from the commencement of this gigantic conflict has controlled and beaten German guns of a similar calibre. Yet again, behind them, were other bigger guns, splendidly dug in and hidden cleverly with straw-thatched roofs, many of them no doubt once filling the embrasures of Douaumont and other forts which in times of yore had gained for Verdun the reputation ...
— With Joffre at Verdun - A Story of the Western Front • F. S. Brereton
... poems are unaware that the most learned of men and the gravest and purest livers have regularly done the same thing. But I feel sure that I shall easily obtain permission from those who know the character and calibre of the authors in whose footsteps I am treading, to stray in company with men whom it is an honour to follow, not only in their serious but in their lightest moods. I will not mention the names of those still living ...
— The Letters of the Younger Pliny - Title: The Letters of Pliny the Younger - - Series 1, Volume 1 • Pliny the Younger
... the great fact-world, above all that endlessly various plane of fruition which Nature and her infinite processes amount to, are all splendid tissue-builders; and of this tissue is formed the calibre of the individual by which his service is made effective to the world. As I have already written, one cannot shoot a forty-five consciousness through a twenty-two brain. The stirring concept cannot get through to the ...
— Child and Country - A Book of the Younger Generation • Will Levington Comfort
... and all females; with their hair braided in a style of elegance which would not have disgraced the first drawing-room in London. We quaffed coffee out of cups which were perfectly of the Brobdignagian calibre; and the bread had the lightness and sweetness of cake. Between eleven and twelve, Charles Rohfritsch (alias our valet) announced that the carriage and horses were at the door; and on springing into it, we bade adieu to the worthy landlady and her ...
— A Bibliographical, Antiquarian and Picturesque Tour in France and Germany, Volume Three • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... as La Fosseuse's life," answered Genestas, "I should still be glad to know about it; I should like to know the untoward events that could bring a man of your calibre into this canton." ...
— The Country Doctor • Honore de Balzac
... There was something about the handwriting of the former that was vaguely familiar to him even through its disguise, but Willett's scrawling superscription he had never seen. Something told him, however, that anything of which a man of Langston's calibre chose to be the bearer was entitled to consideration. He made no reply to Langston's closing words. He had fully made up his mind as to what his course should be, and what was the extent of Mira's misdoing. Just as he said to her, he blamed those who should have been her advisers and protectors far ...
— Under Fire • Charles King
... that crisis, Mike could not help feeling that if a row of this calibre did not draw Mr. Outwood from his bed, he must be an ...
— Mike • P. G. Wodehouse
... of modern Arianism in England was Whiston's friend, Dr. Samuel Clarke. It has been seen that hitherto all theologians of the highest calibre who had taken part in the Trinitarian controversy would come under the denomination of Trinitarians, if we give that term a fairly wide latitude. In 1712 Dr. Clarke, who had already won a high reputation in the field of theological literature,[437] startled the world by the publication ...
— The English Church in the Eighteenth Century • Charles J. Abbey and John H. Overton
... dead. So is George Moore, though he lingers on. So are all the Russians of the first rank; Andrieff, Gorki and their like are light cavalry. In Sudermann, Germany has a writer of short stories of very high calibre, but where is the German novelist to match Conrad? Clara Viebig? Thomas Mann? Gustav Frenssen? Arthur Schnitzler? Surely not! As for the Italians, they are either absurd tear-squeezers or more absurd harlequins. As for the Spaniards and the Scandinavians, they would pass for geniuses ...
— A Book of Prefaces • H. L. Mencken
... daily paper. Half an hour later he removed his coat and vest, and strapped a peculiarly constructed pistol holster across his shoulders, leaving the receptacle close under his left armpit. Into the holster he shoved a short-barrelled .44 calibre revolver. Putting on his clothes again, he strolled to the station and caught the five-twenty afternoon ...
— Roads of Destiny • O. Henry
... to my way of thinking, he did more. He proved that B Company cannot afford to be without a sergeant of his proved calibre." ...
— Uncle Sam's Boys as Sergeants - or, Handling Their First Real Commands • H. Irving Hancock
... Second Lieutenant of Ordnance, under orders visited Camp Hamilton, Va., and inspected the arms of the Fifty- Eighth Regiment, Pennsylvania Volunteers, stationed there. He reported: "This regiment is armed with rifle muskets, marked on the barrel, 'P. S. Justice, Philadelphia,' and vary in calibre from .65 to .70. I find many of them unserviceable and irreparable, from the fact that the principal parts are defective. Many of them are made up of parts of muskets to which the stamp of condemnation has been affixed by an inspecting officer. None of the stocks ...
— Great Fortunes from Railroads • Gustavus Myers
... not comparing them. I am not aware of there being anything in particular against Lord Cantilever,—that is against his character. But, of course, I should not dream of comparing a man of his calibre, with one of real ability, like Paul Lessingham. It would be to treat his ...
— The Beetle - A Mystery • Richard Marsh
... parties with the Main Base. Alterations in the personnel of the third party were also made, by which the Main Base would be increased in strength for scientific work, and the other party under the leadership of Wild would be composed of men of specially good sledging calibre, besides being representative of the leading branches of ...
— The Home of the Blizzard • Douglas Mawson
... poor Charles was restless to have used. I fitted him with an Epilogue of the same calibre with his Prologue, but I thought it would be going a little too far to publish mine. ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... family relations, was in its aspect outside of that small circle singularly cold and repellent. If he could ever have gathered even a small personal following his character and abilities would have insured him a brilliant and prolonged success; but, for a man of his calibre (p. 012) and influence, we shall see him as one of the most lonely and desolate of the great men of history; instinct led the public men of his time to range themselves against him rather than with him, and we shall find ...
— John Quincy Adams - American Statesmen Series • John. T. Morse
... usual with him. He rarely says anything in praise of any but the best work. I do not, therefore, think it likely that his words refer to the original wooden figures, two of which were preserved when the work was remodelled; these two mar the chapel now, and when all the work was of the same calibre it cannot have kindled any enthusiasm in a writer who appears to have known very fairly well which were the ...
— Ex Voto • Samuel Butler
... Portuguese had been warned of their approach, and were fully prepared to receive them; the guns mounted to the seaward were of heavy calibre and well served. The guns of the peroquas, though rendered as effectual as they could be, under the direction of Philip, were small, and did little damage to the thick stone front of the fort. After an engagement of four hours, during which the Ternate ...
— The Phantom Ship • Captain Frederick Marryat
... then seen them depicted as by those who did not know them. There were, he, however, knew, among them a few who it was probable had their own reasons for vacating the great Republic, and these were men of distinctly different calibre. One or more of them, it seemed, might have heard of his aspirations and be following him. If so, it was evident that he would be in security until he found the silver. ...
— Alton of Somasco • Harold Bindloss
... find some information about the state of the town which ought to be useful to a man of your shrewdness; it seems that the ambition of the rival candidate comes chiefly from his desire to marry a certain heiress. To one of your calibre that word is enough. The Cinq-Cygnes, the Princesse de Cadignan, and Georges de Maufrigneuse are living at Cinq-Cygne, close to Arcis; you can certainly obtain through them all ...
— The Deputy of Arcis • Honore de Balzac
... answer. One finds such a problem as this: Suppose you like a man, and suppose you think he likes you, and suppose he never says so—what ought you to do? The answers, fully accepting the serious nature of the problems, are kindly and sensible enough, almost maternal, admirably adapted to the calibre and outlook of the readers in this little world. But what a little world! So narrow, so palaeolithically ancient, so pathetically simple, so good, so sweet, so humble, so essentially and profoundly feminine! It is difficult not to drop a tear on the ...
— Impressions And Comments • Havelock Ellis
... some merchant ships of a pretty large burthen. The caracks of the channel are still larger, and these vessels have, moreover, guns of large calibre, which may be of use, either in battle, or in silencing batteries onshore; besides, they might be ready in a very short time. I would embark the soldiers, a man to every two tons, and would admit the dragoons, with their cavalry equipage only. There are many details I would ...
— Memoirs, Correspondence and Manuscripts of General Lafayette • Lafayette
... more or less success at various places, especially Sakai in Izumi and Negoro in Kii. "Small guns" (kozutsu) and "large guns" (ozutsu) are mentioned in the annals of the time, but by ozutsuwe must understand muskets of large calibre ...
— A History of the Japanese People - From the Earliest Times to the End of the Meiji Era • Frank Brinkley and Dairoku Kikuchi
... find the girl and Nature does the rest. On the second morning of their acquaintance Mortimer invited her to walk round the links with him and watch him play. He did it a little diffidently, for his golf was not of the calibre that would be likely to extort admiration from a champion. On the other hand, one should never let slip the opportunity of acquiring wrinkles on the game, and he thought that Miss Somerset, if she watched one or two of his shots, might tell him just what he ought to ...
— The Clicking of Cuthbert • P. G. Wodehouse
... these trumpets. In shape, they recall antique instruments, and the brilliancy of their tone is due partly to the calibre of their straight tubes and partly to the fact that nearly all the tones used are open—that is, natural harmonics of the fundamental tones of the tubes. There is an anachronism in the circumstance that they are provided with valves (which were not invented until some thousands of years after ...
— A Book of Operas - Their Histories, Their Plots, and Their Music • Henry Edward Krehbiel
... we could be assured that the blockhead knew that he was a blockhead: if we could be assured that now and then there penetrated into the dense skull and reached the stolid brain, even the suspicion of what his intellectual calibre really is. I greatly fear that such a suspicion never is known. If you witness the perfect confidence with which the man is ready to express his opinion upon any subject, you will be quite sure that the man has not the faintest notion of what his opinion is worth. ...
— The Recreations of A Country Parson • A. K. H. Boyd
... of his life; on the 15th of April, 1764, Madame de Pompadour had died, at the age of forty-two, of heart disease. As frivolous as she was deeply depraved and baseminded in her calculating easiness of virtue, she had more ambition than comported with her mental calibre or her force of character; she had taken it into her head to govern, by turns promoting and overthrowing the ministers, herself proffering advice to the king, sometimes to good purpose, but more often still with a levity as fatal as her obstinacy. Less clever, less ambitious, but more ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume VI. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... one-third of our usual complement of officers; I will confine myself to the number of guns, and from the ships named in your lordship's official report: and there I find, that your squadron carried one thousand and fifty-eight guns, of much greater calibre than our's; exclusive of carronnades, which did our ships so much injury; also, exclusive of your gun-brigs ...
— The Life of the Right Honourable Horatio Lord Viscount Nelson, Vol. II (of 2) • James Harrison
... miss you," said van Heerden frankly, "you were necessary to me, Milsom. You're the driving force I wanted, and the only man of my class and calibre I can ever expect to meet, one who would go ...
— The Green Rust • Edgar Wallace
... a very broad constituency. Nevertheless, he was opposed to the universal suffrage, in its wide extent, that does actually exist; as I suppose quite three-fourths of the whole population are opposed to it, in their hearts, though no political man of influence, now existing, has the moral calibre necessary to take the lead in putting it down. Dunning deferred to principles, and not to men. He well knew that an infallible whole was not to be composed of fallible parts; and while he thought majorities ought to determine many things, that there are rights and principles that are superior ...
— The Redskins; or, Indian and Injin, Volume 1. - Being the Conclusion of the Littlepage Manuscripts • James Fenimore Cooper |
