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Deviation   Listen
noun
deviation  n.  
1.
The act of deviating; a wandering from the way; variation from the common way, from an established rule, etc.; departure, as from the right course or the path of duty.
2.
The state or result of having deviated; a transgression; an act of sin; an error; an offense.
3.
(Com.) The voluntary and unnecessary departure of a ship from, or delay in, the regular and usual course of the specific voyage insured, thus releasing the underwriters from their responsibility.
4.
(Statistics, Physics) The difference between an expected value of an observation or measurement and the actual value.
Deviation of a falling body (Physics), that deviation from a strictly vertical line of descent which occurs in a body falling freely, in consequence of the rotation of the earth.
Deviation of the compass, the angle which the needle of a ship's compass makes with the magnetic meridian by reason of the magnetism of the iron parts of the ship.
Deviation of the line of the vertical, the difference between the actual direction of a plumb line and the direction it would have if the earth were a perfect ellipsoid and homogeneous, caused by the attraction of a mountain, or irregularities in the earth's density.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Deviation" Quotes from Famous Books



... taken with the historical facts will be excused, if I have succeeded in my attempt; and, if not, it is better that my failure should appear in the effusions of fancy, than in the delineation of truth. Some deviation from the real catastrophe of the conspiracy (according to which the count actually perished [A] when his schemes were nearly ripe for execution) was rendered necessary by the nature of the drama, which does not allow the interposition either ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller

... acceptance or retention of office. His support, too, of the Ministry of Mr. Addington, which was as virtually pledged against the Catholics as that which now succeeded to power, sufficiently shows the secondary station that this great question occupied in his mind; nor can such a deviation from the usual tone of his political feelings be otherwise accounted for, than by supposing that he was aware of the existence of a strong indisposition to the measure in that quarter, by whose views and wishes his public conduct ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Rt. Hon. Richard Brinsley Sheridan Vol 2 • Thomas Moore

... the greatest general resemblance of the names is to be found, as is shown by the comparative tables below. Judged by the standard of resemblance the Oolawunga of the north-west, on the Victoria River, have preserved the names nearest their original forms. Judged by the standard of least deviation from the common stock of names and basing the comparison, not on resemblances but on differences, the Koorangie of the upper waters of the same river take the first place, with the Oolawunga not far behind. In each case the ...
— Kinship Organisations and Group Marriage in Australia • Northcote W. Thomas

... understanding with his body which way they were to go; one, the right one, being evidently inclined to lurch off to the side, while the left one went stamp, stamp, stamp, as if equally determined to resist any deviation. ...
— Mr. Sponge's Sporting Tour • R. S. Surtees

... she could not consent even to a temporary separation from me, but that there was no need of this, the motion of the carriage did her good, and the distance was too trifling to be considered. We could dispatch messengers to Adrian, to inform him of our deviation from the original plan. She spoke with vivacity, and drew a picture after her own dear heart, of the pleasure we should bestow upon Lucy, and declared, if I went, she must accompany me, and that she should very much dislike to entrust the charge of rescuing them to others, who might ...
— The Last Man • Mary Shelley

... those States, and the report of the commissioners, communicated to Congress with my message of the 31st January, 1807, having been duly considered, I have approved of the route therein proposed for the said road as far as Brownsville, with a single deviation, since located, which carries ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 3 (of 4) of Volume 1: Thomas Jefferson • Edited by James D. Richardson

... veered sharply to the left, but to the right another branch ran on at a lesser deviation from the general direction, so that appeared more like the main canyon than the lefthand branch. The Sagoths were now not over two hundred and fifty yards behind us, and I saw that it was hopeless for us to expect to escape other ...
— At the Earth's Core • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... clearer indeed than the attitude of recognising perfectly what a world of trouble The Coxon Fund would in future save us, and of yet liking better to face a continuance of that trouble than see, and in fact contribute to, a deviation from attainable bliss in the life of two other persons in whom I was deeply interested? Suddenly, at the end of twenty minutes, there was projected across this clearness the image of a massive middle-aged man seated on a bench under a tree, ...
— The Coxon Fund • Henry James

... cabin," continued the missionary. "He is alone, collected, thoughtful, and tranquil, his eye fixed upon a chart. Now he observes the position of the sun, and marks the meridian; then he examines the compass, and notes the polary deviation. On all sides are sextants, quadrants, and chronometers. He quietly issues an order, which is echoed and repeated above, and thus augments the ...
— Willis the Pilot • Paul Adrien

... at the same reckless pace, regardless alike of the dirt and wet which flew about his head, the profound darkness of the night, and the probability of encountering some desperate characters abroad. At every turn and angle, even where a deviation from the direct course might have been least expected, and could not possibly be seen until he was close upon it, he guided the bridle with an unerring hand, and kept the middle of the road. Thus he sped ...
— Barnaby Rudge • Charles Dickens

... shortcomings would lead to his dismissal from the Cabinet. Whatever Mr. Buchanan's faults as an Executive may have been, his honor in all transactions, both personal and public, was unquestionable, and he was the last man to tolerate the slightest deviation from ...
— Twenty Years of Congress, Vol. 1 (of 2) • James Gillespie Blaine

... crossed the magnetic line of no variation, and Columbus was astonished to see that the compass-needle, instead of pointing a little to the right of the pole-star, began to sway toward the left, and next day this deviation increased. It was impossible to hide such a fact from the sharp eyes of the pilots, and all were seized with alarm at the suspicion that this witch instrument was beginning to play them some foul trick in punishment of their temerity; but Columbus was ...
— The Discovery of America Vol. 1 (of 2) - with some account of Ancient America and the Spanish Conquest • John Fiske

... counsel, the promoters eventually decided to "take the bend," and Parliamentary power was sought for this deviation of the original scheme. It was opposed by the Great Western Railway as inimical to their project of carrying a line from Bala to Barmouth and so forming a connection with the Welsh Coast, and their antagonism was only ...
— The Story of the Cambrian - A Biography of a Railway • C. P. Gasquoine

... that it has passed through them into Clement of Rome. It might perhaps be suggested that Clement was possibly quoting the earlier document, the original of our Synoptics, but this suggestion seems to be excluded both by his further deviation from the LXX in [Greek: apestin], and also by the phenomena of the last quotation we have been discussing, which are certainly of a secondary character. Altogether I cannot but regard this passage as the strongest evidence we possess for the use of the Synoptic Gospels by Clement; ...
— The Gospels in the Second Century - An Examination of the Critical Part of a Work - Entitled 'Supernatural Religion' • William Sanday

... that most tragic of all love-stories from a different angle. By complicating the plot through the introduction of the second Isolde, jealousy became the secondary, though hardly less powerful theme. This deviation from the comparatively simple plot of the German story is of course more difficult of comprehension upon the stage. It is not easy to convince an audience that jealousy of Isolde White-hand, whom Tristan ...
— The German Classics, v. 20 - Masterpieces of German Literature • Various

... circumstance for him, for Frank, I mean, that he should have attached himself to a girl of such steadiness of character and good judgment as I have always given her credit for—and still am disposed to give her credit for, in spite of this one great deviation from the strict rule of right. And how much may be said in her situation for ...
— Persuasion • Jane Austen

... heading straight to the west, with a slight deviation to the south-west, Columbus sailed thirty-three successive days without seeing anything but sea and sky. His companions began to murmur in secret, for at first they concealed their discontent, but soon, openly, desiring to get rid of their leader, ...
— De Orbe Novo, Volume 1 (of 2) - The Eight Decades of Peter Martyr D'Anghera • Trans. by Francis Augustus MacNutt

... a new orbit or in its course of deviation from the old orbit to the new, the planet can never go back to any point in its old orbit, as the various orbits lying in different planes ...
— Five Years Of Theosophy • Various

... been asserted that in their occupations "elephants are to a surprising extent the creatures of habit,"[1] that their movements are altogether mechanical, and that "they are annoyed by any deviation from their accustomed practice, and resent any constrained departure from the regularity of their course." So far as my own observation goes, this is incorrect; and I am assured by officers of experience, that in regard to changing his treatment, his hours, or his occupation, ...
— Sketches of the Natural History of Ceylon • J. Emerson Tennent

... oriental fictions and allegorical imagery, and, perhaps, while he was intent upon description, he did not sufficiently cultivate sentiment. His poems are the productions of a mind not deficient in fire, nor unfurnished with knowledge either of books or life, but somewhat obstructed in its progress by deviation in ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D. in Nine Volumes - Volume the Eighth: The Lives of the Poets, Volume II • Samuel Johnson

... temperaments or mixtures, or through the prevalence of some noxious spirit, and is harsh, difficult to cure, and baneful. Another kind of madness is not uninspired or from within, but an afflatus from without, a deviation from sober reason, originated and set in motion by some higher power, the ordinary characteristic of which is called enthusiasm. For, as one full of breath is called [Greek: empnoos], and as one full of sense is called [Greek: emphron], so the name enthusiasm is given to ...
— Plutarch's Morals • Plutarch

... notwithstanding the result of these enquiries, the uncommon form of this habit appears to me a sufficient proof of its European origin, especially when added to another circumstance, that it is a singular deviation from the general resemblance in dress, which prevails amongst all the branches of this tribe, dispersed through the South Sea. We were driven indeed, by this conclusion, to a supposition of the shipwreck of some Buccaneer, or Spanish ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 17 • Robert Kerr

... the affection of a worthy man, and rise to a station where she is beheld with respect, and cheerfully received into all companies. What then is the moral you would inculcate? Would you wish us to think that a deviation from virtue, if covered by art and hypocrisy, is not an object of detestation, but on the contrary shall raise us to fame and honour? while the hapless girl who falls a victim to her too great sensibility, shall be loaded with ignominy and shame?" No, my fair querist, I ...
— Charlotte Temple • Susanna Rowson

... of this proof of the occurrence of dancing individuals among common mice, Saint Loup believes that the race of dancers has resulted from the inheritance and accentuation of an "accidental" deviation from the usual mode of behavior. It is scarcely necessary to say that this opinion would be of far greater weight had he observed, instead of postulating, the inheritance of the peculiarities of movement ...
— The Dancing Mouse - A Study in Animal Behavior • Robert M. Yerkes

... truth in the saying," agreed the Minor Poet, "but only because it is the exception; and Nature invariably puts forth all her powers to counteract the result of deviation from her laws. Were it the rule, then the bad mother would be the good mother and the good mother the ...
— Tea-table Talk • Jerome K. Jerome

... find it out, for he knew it of old, and so troubled himself very little as he plodded on under the hot afternoon sun, now on firm ground, now making some wide deviation so as to avoid a pool of black water. Then there were treacherous morass-like pieces of dark mire thinly covered with a scum-like growth, here green, there bleached in the ...
— Dick o' the Fens - A Tale of the Great East Swamp • George Manville Fenn

... ascertained that the steamer had broken the shaft of her propeller, thus rendering the all-important screw useless. This necessitated the hoisting of her sails, and a monotonous voyage to her destination, a return to San Francisco, or a long deviation ...
— Adrift on the Pacific • Edward S. Ellis

... and others, who first adopted this species of writing, have pursued in their undertaking, is set down as a rule for the conduct of their followers; which, whoever is bold enough to transgress, is accused of a deviation from the original design, and a breach ...
— Parodies of Ballad Criticism (1711-1787) • William Wagstaffe

... applied every night over the stomach and right side; and, with little deviation from this plan, she continued to the end of the year, improving in her general health, but the hepatic affection yet remaining. It was then determined to try the effects of electricity, and gentle shocks were passed through the body daily, and as nearly ...
— An Account of the Foxglove and some of its Medical Uses - With Practical Remarks on Dropsy and Other Diseases • William Withering

... good-nights, and the withdrawal of Ninnis and Harris to the Bachelor's Quarters. Finally, her husband came to his dressing-room—not along the front veranda, as would have been usual, but by the back one, through the bathroom. Even this deviation from habit seemed significant of his mood—he would not pass her window. He moved about for a time as if he were busy packing. Then came silence. She imagined him on the edge of the camp bed, so seldom used, smoking ...
— Lady Bridget in the Never-Never Land • Rosa Praed

... of some favourite plant, will find, contrary to his expectation, that the slip grows up a little different from the primitive stock—that it produces flowers of a different colour or make, or some deviation in one way or another. This is what is ...
— The Perpetuation Of Living Beings, Hereditary Transmission And Variation • Thomas H. Huxley

... The sole deviation from history which may be considered as essentially interfering with the truth of the situation, is the entire omission of the character of Guy de Thouars, so that Constance is incorrectly represented as in a state of widowhood, at a period when, in point ...
— Characteristics of Women - Moral, Poetical, and Historical • Anna Jameson

... representation of this species of Ranunculus, we have made a slight deviation from the strict letter of our plan, as expressed in the title page, which confines us to the figuring of foreign plants only; we have thought, however, that it would not be inconsistent with the spirit of the Flower-Garden ...
— The Botanical Magazine, Vol. 6 - Or, Flower-Garden Displayed • William Curtis

... the actual trajectory of the ship; the navigation computer compared the actual trajectory with the trajectory set in before take-off; when a deviation from the pre-set trajectory occurred, the autopilot steered the ship back to the proper trajectory. As the computer on the ground obtained better velocity and position information about the missile from the ground radar, it sent course corrections to the ship, ...
— Pushbutton War • Joseph P. Martino

... diet. The only result of this plan is, to cause an unnatural fullness in the system, which places the nurse on the brink of disease, and retards rather than increases the food of the infant. More will be gained by the observance of the ordinary laws of health, than by any foolish deviation, founded on ignorance." ...
— The American Woman's Home • Catherine E. Beecher and Harriet Beecher Stowe

... deviation from the usual natural economy of Loranthus, is observed in a species (L. floribunda) described and figured by M. Labillardiere, which is found on the shores of King George's Sound, where, in no way recognising the dependent habits ...
— Narrative of a Survey of the Intertropical and Western Coasts of Australia] [Volume 2 of 2] • Phillip Parker King

... maintaining the same velocity with which she had started out. Several times, as the days wore on, she came within the zone of attraction of various gigantic suns, but the pilot had learned his lesson. He kept a vigilant eye upon the bar, and at the first sign of a deviation from the perpendicular he steered away, far from the source of the attraction. Not content with these precautions, the man at the board would, from time to time, shut off the power, to make sure that the space-car ...
— The Skylark of Space • Edward Elmer Smith and Lee Hawkins Garby

... they had no difficulty whatever. Although the surface of the water was of inky blackness, from the shadowing trees above, and the huge trunks standing out of it now and then forced them into an occasional deviation, they advanced without any ...
— The Castaways • Captain Mayne Reid

... vicinity to the former planet in August, 1835, offered the first convenient opportunity of placing that body in the astronomical balance. Its weight or mass had previously been assumed, not ascertained; and the comparatively slight deviation from its regular course impressed upon the comet by its attractive power showed that it had been assumed nearly twice too great.[244] That fundamental datum of planetary astronomy—the mass of Jupiter—was corrected by similar means; and it was reassuring to find the correction in satisfactory ...
— A Popular History of Astronomy During the Nineteenth Century - Fourth Edition • Agnes M. (Agnes Mary) Clerke

... there, nor in the mountains of Alabama, whence he professed to come. Acquainted only with a narrow region, the poor fellow did not know that every Southern district has its own dialect, and that the travelled ear of a close observer can detect the slightest deviation from its customary phrases. But he was not alone in this ignorance. Almost every Northern writer who has undertaken to describe Southern life has fallen into the same error. Even Olmstead, who has caught the idioms wonderfully, confounds the dialects ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 96, October 1865 • Various

... By making this deviation from the former route, the problem of a new road to Oregon and California, in a climate more genial, might be solved; and a better knowledge obtained of an important river, and the country it drained, while the great object of the expedition would find its point of commencement at the termination ...
— The Exploring Expedition to the Rocky Mountains, Oregon and California • Brevet Col. J.C. Fremont

... making her his wife; that with respect to his inconstant disposition, which estranged him from her, she ought to bear it with patience, until it pleased heaven to produce a change in his conduct; that the frailties on his part, which might to her appear injurious, would never justify in her the least deviation from her duty; and, as resentment was still less allowable, she ought to endeavour to regain him by a conduct entirely opposite to his own. In vain was it, as we have said before, that she had long resisted Love and his ...
— The Memoirs of Count Grammont, Complete • Anthony Hamilton

... chosen better adapted to public convenience. Such errors of the press as have been discovered in it are here rectified: in other respects it is faithfully followed, except that in one instance an accident of little moment has occasioned a slight deviation from the strict chronological arrangement, and that, on the other hand, a speech of conspicuous excellence, on his declining the poll at Bristol, in 1780, is here, for the first time, inserted in its ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. I. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... the priests and prelates to whom he delegated authority. They were taught that the pope was their earthly mediator, and that none could approach God except through him; and further, that he stood in the place of God to them, and was therefore to be implicitly obeyed. A deviation from his requirements was sufficient cause for the severest punishment to be visited upon the bodies and souls of the offenders. Thus the minds of the people were turned away from God to fallible, erring, and cruel men, nay, more, to the prince of darkness himself, ...
— The Great Controversy Between Christ and Satan • Ellen G. White

... reproof were more aimed at than truth. The case of the Empress Cartismandua shows the nice feeling of the Britons as to the propriety of female conduct. The respect of the Germans for their females, and the severity with which they visited a deviation from virtue, have been described; and the further testimony of Tacitus may be adduced, who says that but very few of the greatest dignity chose to have more than one wife, and when they did it was merely for the honor of alliance. ...
— Bundling; Its Origin, Progress and Decline in America • Henry Reed Stiles

... by some marvellous ship." Very fully and wonderfully and beautifully the creature without reason or understanding obeyed its creator, for the very heavy unwieldy rock floated buoyantly and without deviation, so that in a short time they beheld it in their rear with the bell upon it. And when his people saw this wondrous thing it filled them with love for God and reverence for their master. Declan thereupon ...
— Lives of SS. Declan and Mochuda • Anonymous

... deviations occur on particular points. At the very beginning, the LXX., adhering more closely to the Hebrew text, have: [Greek: kai estai meta tauta]; whereas Peter says: [Greek: kai estai en tais eschatais hemerais.] The reason of this deviation is, that the Apostle intends to determine, by this deviation, the expression, which in itself is wider and more indefinite, in such a manner that the period to which the prophecy specially refers, and hence also ...
— Christology of the Old Testament: And a Commentary on the Messianic Predictions, v. 1 • Ernst Wilhelm Hengstenberg

... the patience of men under such conditions, sooner or later they get on each other's nerves. Therefore that system of relationships is best which is least artificial and most relaxing to the spirit of the natural man. But to construe this as a deviation from the standards of discipline is to mistake the shadow for ...
— The Armed Forces Officer - Department of the Army Pamphlet 600-2 • U. S. Department of Defense

... rise. Although she tilted abruptly, the image of the tramp steamer still remained upon the object bowl. By an ingenious arrangement, the lenses were constructed to compensate for any deviation of the tube of the periscope from the vertical. The lads could see the bows of the U-boat shaking clear of the water, throwing cascades of foam off on either side as the passing craft forged ahead at at least ...
— The Submarine Hunters - A Story of the Naval Patrol Work in the Great War • Percy F. Westerman

... He uses two wheels; the tracing-point, halfway between them, is guided along the curve, the line joining the wheels being kept normal to the curve. This is pretty easily done by eye; a constant deviation of 8 deg. from this direction produces an error of only 1%. The sum of the two readings gives the length. E. Fleischhauer uses three, five or more wheels arranged symmetrically round a tracer whose point is guided along the curve; the planes of the wheels all pass through ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 4 - "Bulgaria" to "Calgary" • Various

... might not have influenced Pierce, in whose name the patent of the Pilgrims had been issued—and whether both together might not have seduced Capt. Jones, are further considerations to be weighed, in solving the problem of a deviation from the intended voyage of the MAYFLOWER." Although not aware of these suggestions, either of Mr. Davis or of Dr. Neill, till his own labors had satisfied him of Gorges's guilt, and his conclusions were formed, the ...
— The Mayflower and Her Log, Complete • Azel Ames

... little joker," said Burkett. "About two points deviation by local attraction will ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day

... and more especially the extreme class of Dissenters, lay great stress upon the declarations occasionally made by criminals from the condemned cell or the scaffold, that to Sabbath-breaking they attribute their first deviation from the path of rectitude; and they point to these statements, as an incontestable proof of the evil consequences which await a departure from that strict and rigid observance of the Sabbath, which they uphold. I cannot help thinking that in this, as ...
— Sunday Under Three Heads • Charles Dickens

... villages, again disappear, and do not approach it till the Cobalt bluffs, about forty-four miles from the villages, and then from those bluffs to the Yellowstone river, a distance of about one thousand miles, they follow the banks of the river with scarcely any deviation. ...
— History of the Expedition under the Command of Captains Lewis and Clark, Vol. I. • Meriwether Lewis and William Clark

... follow the other three horses towards the left, so that the furrow-slice at its end would slightly deviate from the straight line. When the horses were all turned, the second furrow-slice would follow the error in the first, and the same deviation would occur at each end of the ploughing, gradually becoming more and more pronounced, until the curved form of each ridge became apparent. Lord Avebury says that when the driver, walking on the near side, reached the end of each furrow, he found it easier to turn the team by pulling ...
— Grain and Chaff from an English Manor • Arthur H. Savory

... the relaxation after his heavy work. He did not go down to lock the shop until bed-time, when he was shutting up the house, the barn, and the corn-crib for the night. In the interval the shop stood deserted and open, and this fact was the basis of Ab's opportunity. To-night there seemed to be no deviation from this custom. He ascertained that his father was smoking his pipe on the porch. Then he went down the road and sat on the log near the shop to wait for the other boys who were to share the risks and profits ...
— The Young Mountaineers - Short Stories • Charles Egbert Craddock

... the pamphlet and giving the following passages in a free translation from the German translation which appeared in the above quoted number of the Democrat, I may be excused by those who have the French pamphlet at hand, if they should find any deviation from it. Monsieur Belly writes besides ...
— Secret Enemies of True Republicanism • Andrew B. Smolnikar

... always something of serenity in her air, of state in her mien, of refined propriety in her language, which precluded deviation into the ardent, the excited, the eager: something which chastened the pleasure of those who looked on her and listened to her, by a controlling sense of awe; and such was my feeling now: but as to Helen Burns, I was ...
— Jane Eyre - an Autobiography • Charlotte Bronte

... his remark. Possibly in her indignation she had said what first came into her mind, though it didn't seem like her. Miss Pritchard sighed, for she had worshipped at the shrine of truth all her life, and strive as she would, she couldn't but feel a deviation from ...
— Elsie Marley, Honey • Joslyn Gray

... extent of the prerogative—This system possible in America because no powerful executive authority is required—What circumstances are favorable to the elective system—Why the election of the President does not cause a deviation from the principles of the Government—Influence of the election of the President ...
— Democracy In America, Volume 1 (of 2) • Alexis de Tocqueville

... zero point at the greatest possible resistance of the selenium, which corresponds with absolute darkness. The greatest effect of the light would be to annul the resistance of the selenium. Consequently, the cylinder must be withdrawn from the circuit to represent this effect; and the maximum deviation of the galvanometer is then to be observed, and marked 100. By dividing the range of the galvanometer thus obtained into 100 equal parts, the requisite actinometric scale will be established. In practice, the Clamond battery is used to supply the ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 484, April 11, 1885 • Various

... responsibility for what has been done. But also tell Gordon that this is China, not Europe. I wished to save the lives of the Wangs, and at first thought that I could do so, but they came with their heads unshaved, they used defiant language, and proposed a deviation from the convention, and I saw that it would not be safe to show mercy to these rebels. Therefore what was done was inevitable. But Gordon had no part in it, and whatever he demands to clear ...
— The Life of Gordon, Volume I • Demetrius Charles Boulger

... enjoyment of it solely until my final hour. But the world would be neither so well instructed, nor so candidly disposed, as to believe me uninfluenced by sinister motives, in case any circumstance should render a deviation from the line of conduct I ...
— Washington and the American Republic, Vol. 3. • Benson J. Lossing

... the rule is the same as in dialogue, though it does not admit of the same palpable deviation from correct construction. The story of any incident, to be realistic, will admit neither of sesquipedalian grandeur nor of grotesque images. The one gives an idea of romance and the other of burlesque, to neither of which is truth supposed ...
— Thackeray • Anthony Trollope

... she had been his uncle's true and simple friend! He adopted the resolution, thanking her for one recognized fact:—he hated marriage, and would by this time have been in the yoke, but for the agreeable deviation of his path to her society. Since his visit to Copsley, moreover, Lady Dunstane's idolizing, of her friend had influenced him. Reflecting on it, he recovered from the shock which ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... the style. If I could see any way of getting rid of the objection, without rewriting it entirely, I would make some sacrifices. But when I wrote John Woodvil, I never proposed to myself any distinct deviation from common English. I had been newly initiated in the writings of our elder dramatists: Beaumont and Fletcher, and Massinger, were then a first love; and from what I was so freshly conversant in, what wonder if my language imperceptibly ...
— The Works of Charles Lamb in Four Volumes, Volume 4 • Charles Lamb

... happened to every man; but every man would not have continued free from pain on such an occasion. Why then is that rather a misfortune than this a good fortune? And dost thou in all cases call that a man's misfortune which is not a deviation from man's nature? And does a thing seem to thee to be a deviation from man's nature, when it is not contrary to the will of man's nature? Well, thou knowest the will of nature. Will then this which has happened ...
— The Thoughts Of The Emperor Marcus Aurelius Antoninus • Marcus Aurelius

... kindliness to rescue him from what she termed "shipwreck with that disastrous Republican crew." He had obtained greater ascendency over her than she liked; yet she would have forgiven it, as well as her consequent slight deviation from direct allegiance to her masters in various cities, but for Carlo's commanding personal coolness. She who had tamed a madman by her beauty, was outraged, and not unnaturally, by the ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... have seemed a natural circumstance, as most men with banking accounts take their cheque-books with them when going on a journey. But Cargrim knew that the bishop usually preferred to fill his pockets with loose cash when absent for a short time, and this deviation from his ordinary ...
— The Bishop's Secret • Fergus Hume

... the foot of a huge pine where the undergrowth would cloak him. Twenty yards below ran the creek-bed road, returning from its long horseshoe deviation. When he had taken his position, his faded butternut clothing matched the earth as inconspicuously as a quail matches dead leaves, and he settled himself to wait. Slowly and with infinite caution, his intended victim stole down, guarding ...
— The Call of the Cumberlands • Charles Neville Buck

... long been recognised that whenever woman does show a deviation from standards she is apt to deviate far and erratically. So far, however, she has shown no marked tendency so to deviate in the arts and a very slight one in the sciences. There have been lately some marked instances ...
— A Librarian's Open Shelf • Arthur E. Bostwick

... woodmen who fell the mountain pines and float the timber rafts down to the Danube. The steeps are marked with white lines, where the trees have been rolled, or rather thrown from the summit. Often they descend several miles over rooks and precipices, where the least deviation from the track would dash them in a thousand pieces. This generally takes place in the winter when the sides are covered with snow and ice. It must be a dangerous business, for there are many crosses by the way-side where the pictures represent persons accidentally killed by the ...
— Views a-foot • J. Bayard Taylor

... country for his studio, and no hampering, sordid cares to distract him. The light of genius in such an obscure world was unrecognised. Being beyond comprehension, it existed as the coldest commonplace. Not one of his fellows was equipped mentally to register the deviation from the frowsy norm of the camp exemplified in him; and if the camp never produced another artist the default would occasion exactly ...
— My Tropic Isle • E J Banfield

... that mysterious instinct which all our modern science leaves unexplained. After a turn or two far up in the clear sky, the bird gets its bearings and darts off on its five-hundred-mile journey across unknown seas to an unseen land—a voyage that no deviation or loitering will lengthen, and only fatigue or accident interrupt, until ...
— The Ways of Men • Eliot Gregory

... present day. The poet expressly mentions that other herdsmen drove their flocks into the city at sunset,—a custom which still prevails throughout Greece during the winter, and that was the season in which Ulysses visited Eumaeus. Yet Homer accounts for this deviation from the prevailing custom, by observing that he had retired from the city to avoid the suitors of Penelope. These trifling occurrences afford a strong presumption that the Ithaca of Homer was something more than the creature of his own fancy, ...
— The Works Of Lord Byron, Letters and Journals, Vol. 1 • Lord Byron, Edited by Rowland E. Prothero

... almost every nation in Europe, Africa, and America, who create a frightful confusion of tongues. A particular part of the quay is appropriated to each description of craft, and a penalty is enforced for any deviation from port regulations. The upper part is occupied with flat-boats, arks, peeroges, rafts, keel-boats, canoes, and steam-boats; and below these are stationed schooners, cutters, brigs, ships, &c., in regular succession. The levee is almost constantly filled with merchandize; and the scene of ...
— A Ramble of Six Thousand Miles through the United States of America • S. A. Ferrall

... the immediate experience of unity and self-completeness; and unity for a living being CAN only be equilibrium. Now it appears that an authoritative definition of the general nature of an organism makes it "so built, whether on mechanical principles or not, that every deviation from the equilibrium point sets up a tendency to return to it." Equilibrium, in greater or less excursions from the centre, is thus the ultimate nature of organic life. The perfect equilibrium, that is, equilibrium with heightened tone, will then ...
— The Psychology of Beauty • Ethel D. Puffer

... corrupted; but between the most dissimilar branches, an eminent sameness of many radical words is apparent; and in some very distant from each other, in point of situation: As, for instance, the Philippines and Madagascar, the deviation of the words is scarcely more than is observed in the dialects of neighbouring provinces of the ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 15 (of 18) • Robert Kerr

... appear to be a very small step, just as the first slight deviation in a railroad track is scarcely a finger's breadth, but in time changes the course of the train to an entirely different part of the world. The formation of an idea, such as to be, or to become, or to take a still simpler one, such as four or eight, appears to us to ...
— The Silesian Horseherd - Questions of the Hour • Friedrich Max Mueller

... form of disease fully developed,—or, at least, of a tendency to it that may or may not be developed. The range within which it operates is supposed to be the narrow limits covered by a single specific affection. Daily experience, however, shows that the deviation from the primitive type is limited only by some conditions of structure. Any pathological result may be expected, not incompatible with the structure of the organ. And thus it is that the cerebral affection which fell upon the parent is represented in ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 10, Number 59, September, 1862 • Various

... be the duty of the husband to adhere strictly to his marriage vow: if his breach of that vow be naturally attended with the fatal consequences above described: how much more imperative is the duty on the wife to avoid, even the semblance of a deviation from that vow! If the man's misconduct, in this respect, bring shame on so many innocent parties, what shame, what dishonour, what misery follow such misconduct in the wife! Her parents, those of her husband, all her relations, ...
— Advice to Young Men • William Cobbett

... trade in the South Seas is all in one direction, from north to south, or the direct reverse, with very little deviation to the eastward or westward, it is in the power, of two or three cruisers, properly stationed on different parts of this track, to possess themselves of every ship that puts to sea. This, however, can only be the case so long as they continue concealed from the neighbouring ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 11 • Robert Kerr

... the invariability and permanence of species, he says: "The entire variation from the original type which any given kind of change can produce may usually be effected in a brief period of time, after which no further deviation can be obtained by continuing to alter the circumstances, though ever so gradually, indefinite divergence either in the way of improvement or deterioration being prevented, and the least possible excess beyond the defined limits being fatal ...
— Darwinism (1889) • Alfred Russel Wallace

... same scene, a notable deviation from the saga is the conversation between Regin and Sigurd concerning the relations that shall be between them after the slaying of Fafnir. Here Morris impresses the lesson of Regin's greed, taking the un-Icelandic device of preaching ...
— The Influence of Old Norse Literature on English Literature • Conrad Hjalmar Nordby

... revelation declared one Supreme Being to be the sole object of religious veneration, and prescribed the form of worship most acceptable to him, whoever admitted the truth of it held, of consequence, every other system of religion, as a deviation from what was established by divine authority, to be false and impious. Hence arose the zeal of the first converts to the Christian faith in propagating its doctrines, and the ardor with which they labored to overturn every other form of worship. They employed, however, for this ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 9 • Various

... and distinctly morbid and pseudophobiac, regarding every deviation from scrupulously literal truth as alike heinous; and many systematized palliatives and casuistic word-splittings, methods of whispering or silently interpolating the words "not," "perhaps," or "I think," sometimes said over hundreds of times to neutralize the guilt of intended ...
— Youth: Its Education, Regimen, and Hygiene • G. Stanley Hall

... have remarked that, if thou foundest ingenuity in my writings, thou must have discovered in them some deviation from the plain, homely truths of ...
— Imaginary Conversations and Poems - A Selection • Walter Savage Landor

... very remote period, brought in a bill for prohibiting the use of letters to their slaves, and forbidding them the privilege of being taught to read!—This was a deliberate attempt to enslave the minds of those unfortunate objects, whose persons they already held in arbitrary subjection:—Detestable deviation from the becoming rectitude ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Vol. I. Jan. 1916 • Various

... truthful in intention. He was determined he would never lie to Rachel. He implied an intrigue with a married woman, a deviation not only from morality, but from honor. More he did not say. But as he looked at her strained face it seemed to him that she expected something more. A dreadful silence fell between them when he had finished. Had she then no word for him. Her eyes—mute, imploring, dark ...
— Red Pottage • Mary Cholmondeley

... Rope. And this acts as a Warning as to what will happen to 'em next time. On this occasion the Chief Magistrates attend in their Robes. But though Strict, they are mighty Just in administering their Laws, and will not permit the least deviation or aggravation of the Sentence meted out. I did hear of one jocular Rogue, that was condemned, for the murder of half-a-dozen women and children, to have his Head severed from the Trunk at one stroke of ...
— The Strange Adventures of Captain Dangerous, Vol. 3 of 3 • George Augustus Sala

... work is inevitably composed of those materials which a journal supplies; but wherever reflections could be introduced without fastidiousness and parade, he has not scrupled to indulge them, in common with every other deviation which the strictness of narrative ...
— A Complete Account of the Settlement at Port Jackson • Watkin Tench

... indubitable that offspring tend to resemble the parental organism, but it is equally true that the similarity attained never amounts to identity either in form or in structure. There is always a certain amount of deviation, not only from the precise characters of a single parent, but when, as in most animals and many plants, the sexes are lodged in distinct individuals, from an exact mean between the two parents. And indeed, on general principles, this slight deviation seems as intelligible ...
— Darwiniana • Thomas Henry Huxley

... darkness among the interlacing telegraph wires, and just at the edge of the shining haze, on a sort of pigeon-trap, forty feet above ground, sat a Japanese fireman, wrapped up in his cloak, keeping watch against fires. He looked unpleasantly like a Bulgarian atrocity or a Burmese 'deviation from the laws of humanity,' being very still and all huddled up in his roost. That was a superb picture and it arranged itself to admiration. Now, disregarding these things and others—wonders and miracles all—men are content to ...
— Letters of Travel (1892-1913) • Rudyard Kipling

... to the orders and directions of the board, and the conditions by them agreed to; as the Rajah, who complained of the insufficiency of the robes, did make no complaint of the insufficiency of the instruments, or of any deviation in them from those he had formerly received from the Vizier. But a copy or duplicate of the said deeds or instruments were in some manner surreptitiously disposed of, and withheld from the records of the Company, and never were transmitted ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. VIII. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... varies with the state of the air and of surrounding objects. If the air is perfectly pure, and if no objects surround the sounding body, the angle of uncertainty will be less than under any other circumstances, as the sound suffers neither deviation nor reflection. If the sounding body is encircled with objects which reflect sound, the echoes arrive at the ear, at short distances, nearly at the same time with the direct sound; and as they form a single sound, the angle of uncertainty must then be much greater, for the sound really arrives ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 484 - Vol. 17, No. 484, Saturday, April 9, 1831 • Various

... Erskine took as a valuable concession; for from the frame of mind and bias of that learned man on political subjects, he was certainly not a friend to popular liberty, while Lord Chesterfield, I believe, acted without deviation upon Whig principles, and was a constant advocate for the freedom of the press. From Dr. Johnson, however, it was most important, as it had the effect of an unwilling admission, and if Lord Kenyon was ...
— A Sketch of the Life of the late Henry Cooper - Barrister-at-Law, of the Norfolk Circuit; as also, of his Father • William Cooper

... men what passes in their minds when they are thinking, and I could never find any man who could think for two minutes together. Everybody has seemed to admit that it was a perpetual deviation from a particular path, and a perpetual return to it; which, imperfect as the operation is, is the only method in which we can operate with our minds to carry on ...
— Pearls of Thought • Maturin M. Ballou

... call themselves Christians merely because they were baptized and still receive the sacrament once a year, but those whose lives are shaped and regulated by the teachings of Christ), I say, cannot view the marriage relation otherwise than as a deviation from the doctrine of Christ,—as a sin. This is clearly laid down in Matt. v. 28, and the ceremony called Christian marriage does not alter its character one jot. A Christian will never, therefore, desire marriage, ...
— The Kreutzer Sonata and Other Stories • Leo Tolstoy

... restrained by the necessity of faithfully following, on green parchment, the designs imagined and traced by another person, there is always, even in copying an outline, an individuality, an imperceptible deviation to the right or to the left, above or below the tracing, which impresses on the design the accent of strength or weakness, of indecision or determination."[369] I would add, of intelligence or stupidity; ...
— Needlework As Art • Marian Alford

... operations, commercially as well as industrially, is the grading of cotton, which takes place as a rule at the compress point under the supervision of the buyer, who employs experts for this purpose. Cotton mills as a rule operate on certain specified grades of cotton, and any deviation from this grade means either a readjustment of machinery or disgruntled and dissatisfied employes, or, perhaps, an inability to fill an order for cloth of certain types. The manufacturer will usually refuse to accept any grades save those he has specifically commissioned the buyer ...
— The Fabric of Civilization - A Short Survey of the Cotton Industry in the United States • Anonymous

... with a system of beliefs and dogmas, which lead, he says, to the philosophy of Heraclitus. In strange contradiction to his assertion of the impossibility of all knowledge, he advocates a theory that the original substance is air,[1] which is most certainly a dogma, although indeed a deviation from the teachings of Heraclitus, of which Sextus seemed unconscious, as he says, [Greek: to te on kata ton Herakleiton aer estin, hos physin ho Ainesidemos]. Aenesidemus dogmatised also regarding number and time and unity ...
— Sextus Empiricus and Greek Scepticism • Mary Mills Patrick

... last place, to consider our behaviour to our inferiors, in which condescension can never be too strongly recommended; for, as a deviation on this side is much more innocent than on the other, so the pride of man renders us much less liable to it. For, besides that we are apt to overrate our own perfections, and undervalue the qualifications of our neighbours, we likewise ...
— Miscellanies, Volume 2 (from Works, Volume 12) • Henry Fielding

... he must have known, that little offences may always entail dire evils. Measured by their possibility to work havoc with lives, there are no small sins. The man who enters carelessly upon a trivial deviation is therefore as much to be held responsible as he that walks deliberately into the blackest crime. Not to know this, is not to have studied life; and not to have studied life is, in a person of mature years, a ...
— Philip Winwood • Robert Neilson Stephens

... breeze, he gazed in this direction,—sweeping with his eye an arc of the horizon sufficiently large to allow for any deviation which the swimmers might have made ...
— The Ocean Waifs - A Story of Adventure on Land and Sea • Mayne Reid

... unsatisfied with the legitimate use of their own capital and the exercise of their lawful privileges, they raise by large loans additional means for every variety of speculation. The disasters attendant on this deviation from the former course of business in this country are now shared alike by banks and individuals to an extent of which there is perhaps no previous example in the annals of our country. So long as a willingness of the foreign ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 2 (of 2) of Volume 3: Martin Van Buren • James D. Richardson

... may be perceived to force its way in, through doors or crevices, on opposite sides of the house. As the general winds are caused by the DIRECT influence of the sun's rays upon the atmosphere, that particular deviation of the current distinguished by the name of land and sea breezes is caused by the influence of his REFLECTED rays, returned from the earth or sea on which they strike. The surface of the earth is more suddenly heated by the rays of the sun than that of the sea, from ...
— The History of Sumatra - Containing An Account Of The Government, Laws, Customs And - Manners Of The Native Inhabitants • William Marsden

... to the preceding calculations, in cases where ground plates for lightning rods and not for telegraphs are concerned. Between the two ground plates of a telegraph line there is generally a distance such that the curves of the current undergo no deviation in the vicinity of one of the electrodes (the only part important for integrations) through the influence of the other. But it might be admitted that such would prove the case with a lightning rod in a storm, at the ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 441, June 14, 1884. • Various

... establishment of any note has its methods and customs as regards orthography, the use of capitals and of punctuation. As a rule it is best to leave doubtful points to the printer. Any little deviation desired may be easily remedied ...
— Up To Date Business - Home Study Circle Library Series (Volume II.) • Various

... of the prisoners condemned to three months imprisonment; and actually so far worked upon the feelings of the chief himself, that he turned to the foreman of the jury, and said, 'that although it was a great deviation from his habitual practice, if at this pressing season their prospects were involved to the extent the learned counsel had pictured, why then, that he would so far bend his practice on this occasion, and they should be dismissed.' ...
— The Confessions of Harry Lorrequer, Complete • Charles James Lever (1806-1872)

... the one thing utterly unexpected and flagrantly impossible. One of those meetings so astounding in the fact that the deviation of a single minute, of half a minute, of what one has been doing previously would have prevented it; and out of it one of those frightful things that ought to come with premonition, by hints, by stages, but that come careering headlong as ...
— If Winter Comes • A.S.M. Hutchinson

... square, filled with regiments, their helmets, swords, and gold embroideries glittering in the May sun. Officers, mounted on richly caparisoned steeds, drew up in the centre, or galloped along the front of the lines, censuring with a thundering invective any deviation or irregularity. In the rear of the troops stood the equipages of the distinguished spectators on the one side, while on the other the people in compact masses swayed to and fro, gayly passing judgment upon the different regiments and their generals. The people—that means ...
— Old Fritz and the New Era • Louise Muhlbach



Words linked to "Deviation" :   discrepancy, driftage, erroneousness, difference, turning, fluctuation, inflection, irregularity, mean deviation from the mean, departure, divergence, variance, flexion, deflexion, diversion, digression, statistic, red herring, flection, standard deviation



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