"Rare" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... eager to visit Gore House, and there they received all the notable men of the time. The improvidence of Lady Blessington, however, was in no respect diminished. She lived upon her jointure, recklessly spending capital as well as interest, and gathering under her roof a rare museum of artistic works, from jewels and curios up to magnificent ...
— Famous Affinities of History, Vol 1-4, Complete - The Romance of Devotion • Lyndon Orr
... into the room. "Ye still carry your head on a stiff neck," said he, deliberately examining Sophia. Then with great care he put out his long thin arm and took her hand. "Well, I'm rare and glad to ...
— The Old Wives' Tale • Arnold Bennett
... fiercely. "How should I suspect? What do you mean? I was only wondering if indeed she possessed one of those rare minds, sufficient for their own happiness, and living an inner life of which the world knows nothing, and which, even if it knew, it ...
— The Mystery of a Turkish Bath • E.M. Gollan (AKA Rita)
... much of her childish successes in reciting poetry. It was not often that she visited a theatre (her father had always refused to let her go with any one save himself or Sidney), but on the rare occasions when her wish was gratified, she had watched each actress with devouring interest, with burning envy, and had said to herself, 'Couldn't I soon learn to do as well as that? Can't I see where it might be made more lifelike? Why should it be impossible ...
— The Nether World • George Gissing
... stripling appear'd in a moment. Aye, and the weaker sex, as people commonly call it, Show'd itself brave and daring, with presence of mind all-unwonted. Let me now, in the first place, describe a deed of rare merit By a high-spirited girl accomplish'd, an excellent maiden, Who in the great farmhouse remain'd behind with the servants, When the whole of the men had departed, to fight with the strangers. Well, there fell on the court a troop of vagabond scoundrels, ...
— The Poems of Goethe • Goethe
... waved them in a curious manner, extending at the same time its umbrella-formed crest, while it bowed its head slightly forward and then raised it again. I knew at once the curious creature to be the rare umbrella-bird (Cephalopterus ornatus). The bird was continuing its flute-like performance, when Duppo, advancing slowly and lifting his blow-pipe, sent forth with unerring aim a tiny dart, which pierced the bird's neck. Much to my sorrow, the note ceased; but yet the ...
— On the Banks of the Amazon • W.H.G. Kingston
... always had a sad, grave aspect, and it was often hard for him to throw off this seriousness and to put on his harlequin's mask. Upon religious matters he was always reticent, but reverent. Only upon rare occasions would he discuss serious subjects at all, and only with a chosen few. In one letter which has been published he departs from his ...
— Home Life of Great Authors • Hattie Tyng Griswold
... and falsehood are associated with fortune-telling. An instance in exemplification is within our recollection. Not far from the junction of the Gadie and Urie with the Don, in Aberdeenshire, dwelt a rich farmer. His only daughter possessed rare natural charms, gifts, and graces. She could spin, sew, manage the dairy, sing with a voice equal to that of the mavis or blackbird, while her heart was as tender as that of any other sighing maiden. Two lovers sought her hand—one rich, the other poor. ...
— The Mysteries of All Nations • James Grant
... Very rare are instances where the state makes special provision for the care of, or extends special poor relief to, any of its deaf population. The chief example seems to be the action of some of the New England states with their so-called ...
— The Deaf - Their Position in Society and the Provision for Their - Education in the United States • Harry Best
... bringing him gifts and servants and eunuchs. Now he loved science and geometry, and one festival-day as he sat on his kingly throne there came in to him three wise men, cunning artificers and past masters in all manner of craft and inventions, skilled in making things curious and rare, such as confound the wit; and versed in the knowledge of occult truths and perfect in mysteries and subtleties. And they were of three different tongues and countries, the first a Hindi or Indian,[FN3] the second a Roumi or Greek and the third a Farsi or Persian. The Indian came ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton
... by raising the outer part of the eyebrows. This accomplishment is very rare; but, then, ...
— Delsarte System of Oratory • Various
... child, but on reaching her room she stood a few moments irresolutely, then went to a drawer, took out an old faded picture-case and opened it. From it Zell smiled out upon her, a little, dimpled baby. Then, as if by a sudden impulse rare to her, she pressed her lips against the unconscious face, and threw herself into her low chair, sobbing so violently that ...
— What Can She Do? • Edward Payson Roe
... Cyclops drank, and was mightily pleased, and said: 'Give me again to drink, and tell me thy name, stranger, and I will give thee a gift such as a host should give. In good truth this is a rare liquor. We, too, have vines, but they bear not wine like this, which, indeed, must be such as the ...
— The Story Of The Odyssey • The Rev. Alfred J. Church
... worthless objects he frequently brings together into odd little museums. He loves them precisely because they are insignificant. His whole life has been a silent protest against the arrogance of success, of high merit, of rare value. His heart is always on the side of the Untermensch, a name given by the Germans, a learned people, to what we call ...
— The Patient Observer - And His Friends • Simeon Strunsky
... fight was not quite such a rare occurrence at Melchester School as it would be to-day. Jack threw off his ...
— Soldiers of the Queen • Harold Avery
... giving it to him after the performance. But Buck's wife fooled the whole town and almost put the gossips out of business by keeping Buck straight for a year. She allowed that what he'd been craving all the time was a home and family, and that his rare-ups came from not having 'em. Then, like most reformers, she overdid it—went and had twins. Buck thought he owned the town, of course, and that would have been all right if he hadn't included the saloons ...
— Old Gorgon Graham - More Letters from a Self-Made Merchant to His Son • George Horace Lorimer
... the papal jurisdiction; but none had suffered more vitally than those of the monastic establishments. These establishments had been injured, not by fines and exactions,—for oppression of this kind had been terminated by the statutes of provisors,—but because, except at rare and remote intervals, they had been left to themselves, without interference and without surveillance. They were deprived of those salutary checks which all human institutions require if they are to be saved from sliding into corruption. The religious houses, almost ...
— History of England from the Fall of Wolsey to the Death of Elizabeth. Vol. II. • James Anthony Froude
... sweet pale Hexagons, O rare pale Hexagons, What lit your eyes with tearful power, Like moonlight on a falling shower? Why sent you, loves, so full and free, Your ...
— The Sunbridge Girls at Six Star Ranch • Eleanor H. (Eleanor Hodgman) Porter
... others it is admitted upon examination that the requirements of law have not been complied with; in some cases, even, such certificates have been matter of purchase. These are not isolated cases, arising at rare intervals, but of common occurrence, and which are reported from all quarters of the globe. Such occurrences can not, and do not, fail to reflect upon the Government and injure all honest citizens. Such a fraud being discovered, however, there is no practicable means within the control of the ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents: Ulysses S. Grant • James D. Richardson
... unusual degree of spiritual elevation of character, and whether called to labour abroad or at home, are desirous of an entire and incessant self-devotement to Jesus Christ. These instances are indeed rare, and can scarcely be estimated by ordinary rules, but they were not unprecedented in the primitive age of Christianity. Dorcas might possibly be a woman of this extraordinary character. Her works were at least ...
— Female Scripture Biographies, Vol. II • Francis Augustus Cox
... impressions of thick stems, showing cellular structure. In one place we saw the cast of small waves on the sand. To-night Bill has got a specimen of limestone with archeo-cyathus—the trouble is one cannot imagine where the stone comes from; it is evidently rare, as few specimens occur in the moraine. There is a good deal of pure white quartz. Altogether we have had a most interesting afternoon, and the relief of being out of the wind and in a warmer temperature is inexpressible. I hope and trust we shall all buck up again now ...
— Scott's Last Expedition Volume I • Captain R. F. Scott
... her home to his father's house, and the old Rajah and Ranee wondered much at this jungle lady, when they saw her rare beauty, her modest, gentle ways and her queenly grace. Then the young Rajah told them how she was a persecuted Princess, and asked their leave to marry her; and because her loving goodness had won all hearts, they ...
— Tales of Wonder Every Child Should Know • Various
... there wasn't a mornin'— barring Sundays in course—as yer wouldn't hear that theer blessed gun a-firin' for a court-martial, sir, j'est the same as ye heerd j'est now, sir, yezsir! Ah, them was fine times, they was, for the watermen on Hardway; for they usest to make a rare harvest a-taking off witnesses and prisoners' 'friends,' as they calls 'em, and lawyers and noospaper chaps to the flagship, they did. The old chaps called the signal gun 'old Fitzblazes's Eight o'clock Gun,' sir. They ...
— Crown and Anchor - Under the Pen'ant • John Conroy Hutcheson
... rare time at Cambridge. What delight it was in those cold mornings to take a bracing walk into the country, and looking back over miles of level land, to behold the chapel of King's College, and the tower of St. Mary's church, ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol 2, No 6, December 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... them agreeable. I am clearly of opinion that no one ought to give any entertainment that has not the means of making it pass off as a matter-of-course thing, and without effort. I have certainly seen a few fussy dinners here, but they are surprisingly rare. At home, we have plenty of people who know that a party that has a laboured air is inherently vulgar, but how few are there that know how to treat a brilliant entertainment as a mere matter of course! ...
— Recollections of Europe • J. Fenimore Cooper
... bronzed and lanky man arose with a smile of rare contentment, threw overboard his cigarette, and approaching the boiler-room hatch, called loudly: "Come out of that," and the President of the Federation of Fresh Water Firemen dragged himself wearily out into the flickering lights. He was black and drenched ...
— Pardners • Rex Beach
... of rare zeal and courage would have attempted so apparently hopeless a task as that which Mr. Craig undertook. Both the men whom he had to manage—the Terry Alts who had murdered their master's steward—and their surroundings were as little calculated to give confidence ...
— "In Darkest England and The Way Out" • General William Booth
... commanded a merchant ship after the war, retired and bought a farm near Stockbridge, Mass. He followed the sea over forty years. In appearance he was very tall, erect, robust, and of rare physical power and endurance. He had remarkably small hands and feet, a high and fair forehead, his hair was very black, a tangle of luxuriant curls, and his eyes were clear hazel. He died in his 79th year, in 1844, leaving a large family ...
— American Prisoners of the Revolution • Danske Dandridge
... peaks, fresh and ready for the day's work of warming the air of Ule, and encouraging the trees of Ule to bear fruit and the buds of Ule to spread into flowers? And every evening did they not see him, tired and faint, sink to rest amid the western peaks? The rare strangers who came now and then to the city and heard this story, were apt to smile unbelievingly and ask laughingly how, after laying his head among the pillows on the western side of the plain, the sun was able to wake up on the ...
— The Flamp, The Ameliorator, and The Schoolboy's Apprentice • E. V. Lucas
... English shilling, or a sixpence, being quite a stranger among us. Pieces of eight, or dollars, are our commonest coin, it is true, but we make good use of the half-joe in all heavy transactions. I have seen two or three Bank of England notes in my day, but they are of very rare occurrence in the colonies. There have been colony bills among us, but they are not favourites, most of our transactions being carried on by means of the Spanish gold and Spanish silver, that find their way up from ...
— Satanstoe • James Fenimore Cooper
... Every effect of the inventions must be set down ultimately not to them, but to their causes; and their causes were mental. Casually I have said as much, in remarking several times that they took place by a happy chance, or by a stroke of insight on the part of some rare genius, or by the reaction of some mediocre person's intelligent volition against some extraordinary experience which made the idea of the invention so obtrusively evident that even a mind not unusually gifted could scarcely ...
— Is civilization a disease? • Stanton Coit
... Only I want them to be happy," she said a little sadly. "Love is such a rare thing—love like theirs. And it's hard that Magda should lose the beauty and happiness of it all because of mistakes she made before she found ...
— The Lamp of Fate • Margaret Pedler
... subjects, all of which he utilised when he came to write his Notes and Terminal Essay to The Arabian Nights, particularly the articles on Al Islam and woman. Then, too, when at Bombay and other large towns he used to ransack the bazaars for rare books and manuscripts, whether ancient or contemporaneous. Still, the most valuable portion of his knowledge ...
— The Life of Sir Richard Burton • Thomas Wright
... are numerous, but only a few of these are habitually observed. Paper, wooden, tin, crystal, silver and golden are the favorite ones, the others being so rare as to hardly merit ...
— Social Life - or, The Manners and Customs of Polite Society • Maud C. Cooke
... parts, and the bad name that has been bestowed upon it, are the disadvantages under which the goldfield labours. Nevertheless two batteries are working at the present day, and a good find by some old fossicker is not so rare. ...
— Spinifex and Sand - Five Years' Pioneering and Exploration in Western Australia • David W Carnegie
... one of the rare instances in our years together, he claimed that he did not feel like getting up. But there were four important conferences that day to attend to, besides his work at college. He dressed, ate breakfast, then ...
— An American Idyll - The Life of Carleton H. Parker • Cornelia Stratton Parker
... are sold at Pararuma in pretty little cages made of the footstalks of palm-leaves. These birds are infinitely more rare on the banks of the Orinoco, and in the north and west of equinoctial America, than in French Guiana. They have hitherto been found only near the Mission of Encaramada, and in the Raudales or cataracts of Maypures. I say expressly ...
— Equinoctial Regions of America V2 • Alexander von Humboldt
... as growing 'in hills and valleys, likewise in woods, and other such places as be something shadowie; they prosper well in gardens, the red everywhere; the other two, white and green, more rare, and are not to be founde save only in gardens.' Shakspeare speaks of this fruit. We find the Bishop of Ely, when conversing with the Archbishop of Canterbury on the change of conduct manifested by the young King Henry V., on his coming ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 462 - Volume 18, New Series, November 6, 1852 • Various
... found them, so strikingly individual, and partly for this very reason so interesting. Indeed, it is curious to observe how varied and how utterly different maybe the non-essentials, moral and mental, of the beings to whom God has given the rare gift of power to look into the secrets He has scattered around us in plant and earth and animal life. Consistently with various grades of competence for investigation, the man may be social, or may flee his fellows; may be witty, or incapable of seeing the broadest fun; a poet, or almost ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 15, - No. 87, March, 1875 • Various
... the new comer cannot easily reconcile himself to the reflection that the earth is hollow beneath his feet. Still less agreeable is it to be awakened in the night by the incessant hammering of the Indian miners. Luckily earthquakes are of rare occurrence in those parts: it would require no very violent shock to bury the whole city in ...
— Travels in Peru, on the Coast, in the Sierra, Across the Cordilleras and the Andes, into the Primeval Forests • J. J. von Tschudi
... their instruction. It was this same bishop who published in Mexico in 1556, a catechism of Christian Doctrine in the Utlateca tongue, commonly called Quiche, a little book which has become extremely rare ...
— Bartholomew de Las Casas; his life, apostolate, and writings • Francis Augustus MacNutt
... among each race. But what success had they? The Chaldaean astronomers made a few discoveries concerning the motions of the heavenly bodies, which, rudimentary as they were, still prove them to have been men of rare intellect. For a great and a patient genius must he have been, who first distinguished the planets from the fixed stars, or worked out the earliest astronomical calculation. But they seem to have been crushed, as it were, by their own discoveries. They stopped ...
— Scientific Essays and Lectures • Charles Kingsley
... continually enlivened the scene. One of these (Gauche Brothers, of Dallas) was of rare excellence, rendering "Bonnie Blue Flag," "Dixie," and an exquisite nocturne, "The Soldier's Dream" (composed for this occasion by the leader of this band), with so much expression and skill as to elicit great applause. The speaker's ...
— Memories - A Record of Personal Experience and Adventure During Four Years of War • Fannie A. (Mrs.) Beers
... of the lawn, near the door of the Palais, some ghostly roses are growing on a ghostly tree. Your guide, M. P——, pauses to tell you their names and kind. It seems that they are rare. ...
— A Journal of Impressions in Belgium • May Sinclair
... are some crimes of such enormity that absolution for them can only be granted by the Pope himself, who delegates his power to the Grand Penitentiary, and he receives such confessions in the chair in which he was seated to-day. They are, however, very rare; but this evening, after he had finished touching the people, a man, dressed like a peasant in a loose brown frock, worsted stockings, and brogues, apparently of the lowest order, dark, ill-looking, and squalid, approached the Confessional ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William - IV, Volume 1 (of 3) • Charles C. F. Greville
... part dealt in by fools. They suggested that there may be many things and forces above us and around us, invisible as an electric current, intangible as light, yet existent and capable of manifestation under certain rare ...
— Beatrice • H. Rider Haggard
... party, and some punk, probably an addict himself, had trapped her in order to finance his own habit. They talk about cures, but people on the inside know that permanent escape from the trap is as rare as portraits of Trotsky in Russia. Or integrity ...
— Revenge • Arthur Porges
... of the landmarks of history. More than a magnificent poem, more than the beginning of a language and the opening of a national literature, more than the inspirer of art and the glory of a great people, it is one of those rare and solemn monuments of the mind's power which measure and test what it can reach to, which rise up ineffaceably and forever as time goes on marking out its advance by grander divisions than its centuries, and adopted as epochs by the consent of all who come after. It stands ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... funeral ballad by Henry S. Washburn, composed in 1846 and entitled "The Burial of Mrs. Judson." It is rare now in sheet-music form but the American Vocalist, to be found in the stores of most great music publishers and dealers, preserves the full ...
— The Story of the Hymns and Tunes • Theron Brown and Hezekiah Butterworth
... By some rare chance the rolling man struck the twisted little cedar that tried to keep its dying hold on the scanty soil half way up the rise. Caught by the seat of his stout trousers on one of the scrubby tree's broken branches, the unfortunate one was suspended in midair, ...
— The Saddle Boys of the Rockies - Lost on Thunder Mountain • James Carson
... the stomach. All at once he became hopelessly empty and friendless, and he felt his knees urging him to sit down. He next became conscious that the shoulders of Mr. Burns were shaking a bit, as if he had encountered a piece of rare humor. After an instant, when Anderson made no move to go, the man at the desk wheeled about, exposing a bloated countenance purple ...
— Laughing Bill Hyde and Other Stories • Rex Beach
... live as it were in a tavern, careless of what the bill is which we run up, but dreading the day of reckoning, which the pistol of our adversary may bring at once. Thus duelling may be considered as a necessary evil, arising out of our wickedness; a crime in itself rare in occurrence, but which prevents others of equal magnitude from occurring every day; and until the world is reformed, nothing can prevent it. Men will ever be governed by the estimation of the world: and until the whole world decide against duelling—until it has become ...
— Newton Forster - The Merchant Service • Captain Frederick Marryat
... though," said the shoe man, "you strike a fellow that will take a thing of this sort good-naturedly, but they are rare. I once had a customer down in Missouri who got a little behind with the house. The credit man wrote him just about the same sort of a letter that your man received, but my friend, instead of getting mad, wrote back a letter to the ...
— Tales of the Road • Charles N. Crewdson
... are by no means rare, but treatises dealing with external plumbing work are sufficiently scarce to ensure for Mr. Hart's new publication a hearty ...
— The Dyeing of Cotton Fabrics - A Practical Handbook for the Dyer and Student • Franklin Beech
... Crown Prince drove the French through Floing, and as the ground between this village and Sedan is an undulating open plain, everywhere visible, there was then offered a rare opportunity for seeing the final conflict preceding the surrender. Presently up out of the little valley where Floing is located came the Germans, deploying just on the rim of the plateau a very heavy skirmish-line, supported by a line of battle at close distance. ...
— The Memoirs of General P. H. Sheridan, Complete • General Philip Henry Sheridan
... love all tales of valiant men, Of women good and fair: If I were rich and strong, ah, then I would do something rare! ...
— The Poetical Works of George MacDonald in Two Volumes, Volume I • George MacDonald
... excessively thin, keen-faced man whose curiously wide-open eyes met mine smilingly, whose gray suit spoke Stein-Bloch, whose felt was a Boss raw-edge unmistakably of a kind that only Philadelphia can produce. At the height of the season such visitors are not rare, but this one had an odd personality, and moreover his keen gaze was raking the place from ceiling ...
— The Quest of the Sacred Slipper • Sax Rohmer
... will be completed. They will go on all night, and we may expect no rest until the work is done. In an hour's time I shall sally out from the passage into the wood and beat up their camp. Expecting no attack from the rear, we shall do them rare damage ere they can gather to oppose us. As soon as they do so we shall be off again, and, scattering in various directions, gather again in the wood ...
— In Freedom's Cause • G. A. Henty
... and pale, and at this moment her two soft blue eyes were fixed on the clock, which seemed to her to go very slowly this day, and with a slight accent of impatience, which was very rare with her, she asked, "Isn't ...
— Heidi • Johanna Spyri
... around it. This may explain the very rapid diminution of the polar ice-caps in the summer of either, but especially of the Southern hemisphere; and also the occasional appearance of large dark spots in their midst, where the shallow snow has probably been swept away by the rare storms of this planet from an extensive land surface. It is supposed that no inconsiderable part of the ice and snow immediately surrounding the poles covers land; but, though balloon parties have of late occasionally reached the poles, they have never ventured to remain there long enough to ...
— Across the Zodiac • Percy Greg
... were secretly meeting must be beautiful. She was as keen for that as he was. So it became a veritable treasure-trove, more distinguished in furnishings than some of the rooms of his own home. He began to gather here some rare examples of altar cloths, rugs, and tapestries of the Middle Ages. He bought furniture after the Georgian theory—a combination of Chippendale, Sheraton, and Heppelwhite modified by the Italian Renaissance and the French Louis. He learned of handsome examples of porcelain, statuary, Greek ...
— The Financier • Theodore Dreiser
... and hell fire, and the like; and I canna stomach it. What for shall they go and say as all the poor old wimmin i' tha parish is gone to the deil 'cause they picks up a stick or tew i' hedge, or likes to mumble a charm or tew o'er their churnin'? Them old wimmin be rare an' good i' ither things. When I broke my ankle three years agone, old Dame Stuckley kem o'er, i' tha hail and the snaw, a matter of five mile and more, and she turned o' eighty; and she nursed me, and tidied the place, and did all as was wanted to be done, 'cause Avice was away, working somewhere's; ...
— Wisdom, Wit, and Pathos of Ouida - Selected from the Works of Ouida • Ouida
... carnivorous appetite, it turned its bold gold gaze on Nicolete. No need to transfigure her! But, heavens! how grandly her young face took the great kiss of the god! Then it fell for a tender moment on the jaundiced page of my old Boccaccio,—a rare edition, which I had taken from my knapsack to indulge myself with the appreciation of a connoisseur. Next minute "the unobstructed beam" was shining right into the knapsack itself, for all the world like one of those little demon electric lights with which the dentist ...
— The Quest of the Golden Girl • Richard le Gallienne
... could hardly be blamed for entertaining this thought. It came as naturally as breathing because Sam Chipfellow was one of those rare individuals—a scientist who had made money; all kinds of money; more money than almost anybody. And after all, his relatives were no different than those of any other rich man. ...
— Mr. Chipfellow's Jackpot • Dick Purcell
... as young and fair As aught of mortal birth; And form so soft, and charms so rare, Too soon returned to Earth![ar] Though Earth received them in her bed, And o'er the spot the crowd may tread[as] In carelessness or mirth, There is an eye which could not brook A moment on ...
— The Works Of Lord Byron, Vol. 3 (of 7) • Lord Byron
... time; then, again, there were days in which it exceeded the powers of human endurance to remain more than a few minutes removed to any distance from heat artificially procured. On the whole, however, it was found that the comparatively moderate weather predominated; and it was rare indeed that all the people did not pursue their avocations and amusements outside, at what was called the middle of ...
— The Sea Lions - The Lost Sealers • James Fenimore Cooper
... would have raised villas of the prettiest forms, and with most commanding views. Yet there is nothing to be mentioned in the same breath with the country about Rodwell in Glocestershire. Nor are the trees of the same bulk and luxuriant foliage as are those in our own country. A fine oak is as rare as an uncut Wynkyn de Worde:[95] but creeping rivulets, rich coppice wood, avenues of elms and limes, and meadows begemmed with butter-cups—these are the characteristics of the country through which we were ...
— A Bibliographical, Antiquarian and Picturesque Tour in France and Germany, Volume One • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... more than a great house, it was a home, a northern liberty hall, surrounded by woods and big breezy moors. There was something for every one in this broad domain. A fine library full of rare editions of rare books, a museum of natural history specimens, a gallery of antiquities, a lake on which to skate or row, preserves in which to shoot, a grand ball-room with an old-world polished floor, a long corridor full ...
— Fifty-Two Stories For Girls • Various
... of impersonation failed to embarrass in prospect. A natural linguist, Lanyard's three years within the German lines had put a rare finish upon his mastery of German. More than this, he was well versed in the workings of the Prussian spy system. As Dr. Paul Rodiek, Wilhelmstrasse Agent Number 27, he was safe as long as he found no acquaintance of ...
— The False Faces • Vance, Louis Joseph
... who chanced also to be the lady whom he loved and desired to make his wife, but who, as he thought, cared nothing for him; and a priest who was enamoured platonically of the same lady, and yet wished, with rare self-sacrifice, to bring about her union with another man. Here were materials enough for a romance, leaving the journey and the fabled treasure out of it; only then the scene should ...
— The People Of The Mist • H. Rider Haggard
... from the high interior; frequent blizzards form near the foot of the plateau; cyclonic storms form over the ocean and move clockwise along the coast; volcanism on Deception Island and isolated areas of West Antarctica; other seismic activity rare and weak; large icebergs may calve from ...
— The 2003 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency
... Dalmatian, who was insensible to my beauty. It is certain that I have lived amongst enchanted things, and that I was exposed to the greatest perils, for men have been strangled by the embraces of a bronze statue. Yet it would be a pity to destroy valuable works made with rare skill, and to burn my carpets and tapestry would be a great loss. The beautiful colours of some of them are truly wonderful, and they cost much money to those who gave them to me. I also possess cups, statues, and pictures of great price. I do not think they ought to perish. But you know ...
— Thais • Anatole France
... her son with a seriousness of purpose which runs through all his work. From his earliest years he was trained for music, as a matter of course, and showed marked precocity as a pianist, though it soon became evident that he also was endowed with rare creative gifts. The young student made such progress under Marxsen, a famous teacher of the period, that at the age of fifteen he gave a public concert, on the program of which stood some original pieces of his own. The next few years were ...
— Music: An Art and a Language • Walter Raymond Spalding
... attractive object whereby the glance from his eye is arrested, and either the misfortune does not happen at all, or the force of the evil influence is expended elsewhere. Therefore, it is as well always to carry some charm against the evil eye. All over Italy, but especially in the south, it is rare to meet a man who does not carry a charm, either on his watch-chain or in his pocket, or on a string or a chain round his neck under his clothes, and he usually carries more than one. Women, of course, always wear them, which may be because a woman likes to surround herself with pretty things, ...
— Diversions in Sicily • H. Festing Jones
... things; and the products of the islands themselves, of which mention has been made [In the margin: "In number 15"]. But the bulk of the commerce is reduced to the silk and cotton textiles; for there is but little else that is rare or elegant, or that has much export. From the skeined silk, and the silk thread, and trama are manufactured in Nueva Espaa velvets, veils, headdresses, passementeries, and many taffetas, which were taken to Per when there ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 (Vol 27 of 55) • Various
... to Tindouf, had nearly poisoned him by giving him bread to eat when he was faint with hunger. These true Bedouins live on milk and cheese, with an occasional piece of camel or goat flesh, and a rare taste of mutton. When Salam's friend came starving to Cape Juby, Sidi Mackenzie had given him bread. The hungry man ate some and at once became violently ill, his stomach could not endure such ...
— Morocco • S.L. Bensusan
... manner or bearing that I am tempted to tell him it is no use before he utters a note. Yet it would not do to refuse a hearing to all these misfits, for there is always the chance of encountering the unknown genius, however rare a bird he ...
— Caruso and Tetrazzini on the Art of Singing • Enrico Caruso and Luisa Tetrazzini
... objects themselves, will on such an occasion excite in us a spark of that enthusiasm which animates all his descriptions. What a beautiful portico! we catch ourselves saying con amore for the hundredth time—and who will gainsay us?—with its thirty columns of different coloured granites and rare marbles, cipolino, porta santa, occhio di pavone (vide Corsi); its busts, its ornamented tazzas, its statues, and many other et coeteras too numerous to catalogue. Among the statues, our eye soon singles out the queenly figure of Agrippina seated in her marble chair. Stateliness and high ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, Number 385. November, 1847. • Various
... way back to London a sum in simple proportion, set by Joe, helped to exercise the minds of the crew in the rare intervals which the new mate allowed them for relaxation: "If Ben was bad on the fust v'y'ge, and much wuss on the second, wot 'ud he be like on the tenth?" All agreed that the answer would require a lot of working. They tarred the rigging, ...
— A Master Of Craft • W. W. Jacobs
... purchased the isle of Crete. The whole trade of the eastern Roman empire was thus at once transferred to the Venetians; two branches of which particularly attracted their attention,—the silk trade and that with India. The richest and most rare kinds of silk were manufactured at Constantinople; and to carry on this trade, many Venetians settled themselves in the city, and they soon extended it very considerably, and introduced the manufacture itself into Venice, with so much success, that the ...
— Robert Kerr's General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 18 • William Stevenson
... are arranged in such a way as to illustrate all the common and many of the rare cardiac lesions, and the accompanying descriptive text constitutes a fairly continuous ...
— The Elements of Bacteriological Technique • John William Henry Eyre
... catcalling epistle." But she had too much sense not to know that it was better to be hissed and cat-called by her Daddy, than by a whole sea of heads in the pit of Drury Lane Theatre: and she had too good a heart not to be grateful for so rare an act of friendship. She returned an answer, which shows how well she deserved to have a judicious, faithful, and affectionate adviser. "I intend," she wrote, "to console myself for your censure by this greatest proof I have ever received of the sincerity, candour, and, let me add, esteem, of my ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 2 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... was the period in which expectation passed into fulfilment, when development, long arrested by unpropitious circumstances, resumed its outward progress under the benign influence of a favoring environment, and the bud, whose rare promise had long been noted by a few discerning eyes, unfolded into the brilliant flower, destined in the magnificence of its maturity to draw the attention of a world. To the fulness of his glorious course these three years were what the days of early manhood ...
— The Life of Nelson, Vol. I (of 2) - The Embodiment of the Sea Power of Great Britain • A. T. (Alfred Thayer) Mahan
... even, it may not be said that his action is the direct expression of any particular one of the independent powers which are granted to him specifically by the Constitution. Instances wherein the President has felt and fulfilled such a duty have not been rare in our history, though, being for the public benefit and approved by all, his acts have seldom been ...
— The Constitution of the United States of America: Analysis and Interpretation • Edward Corwin
... shamed him that a character so associated with his own should triumphantly succeed in just skulking, should to the end not risk the open; so that the drop of this danger was, on the spot, a great lift of the whole situation. Yet with another rare shift of the same subtlety he was already trying to measure by how much more he himself might now be in peril of fear; so rejoicing that he could, in another form, actively inspire that fear, and simultaneously quaking for the form in which ...
— The Jolly Corner • Henry James
... reproach of Dr. Biron's too ready inclination to exhibit his patients as so many rare and curious wild animals, and it stung him all the more because he was convinced that Mme. Rambert was perfectly sane. He pretended not to hear what she said, giving some order to the attendant, Berthe, who was standing ...
— Fantomas • Pierre Souvestre
... and aides which certain of his subjects declared could be given only when requested orally by their sovereign lord. Thus, in 1444, it was Count Charles and the duchess who appeared in Holland to ask an aide.[1] In the following year, Charles accompanied his father when Philip made one of his rare visits—there were only three between 1428 ...
— Charles the Bold - Last Duke Of Burgundy, 1433-1477 • Ruth Putnam
... that," said the queen. "I will have her despoiled to-morrow of her rare jewels and her beautiful robes. I will order my servants to seize her and carry her back to the farm which she shall ...
— Old French Fairy Tales • Comtesse de Segur
... "She's rare gentry, is Miss Tennant," he remarked with conviction, and then slouched off to drink himself blind at "The Jolly Sailorman." Black Brady was, after all, only an inexplicable bundle of good and bad impulses—very much like ...
— The Hermit of Far End • Margaret Pedler
... their wilderness, because they felt uneasy without the rustling of the trees above their heads; therefore the inhabitants of Przasnysz brought their famous beer, their flour ground in wind mills or water mills built on the river Wengierka, salt which was very rare in the wilderness, iron, leather and other fruits of human industry, taking in exchange skins, costly furs, dried mushrooms, nuts, herbs, good in case of sickness, or clods of amber which were plentiful among the Kurpie. Therefore round the prince's court there was the noise of a continual ...
— The Knights of the Cross • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... my Mexican hat," she answered, touching the big sombrero, woven from the finest Panama grass, which she was wearing, "and the necklace is made of little gold Aztec idols that were found in a grave. They are very rare; a gentleman gave them to me, and afterwards I was horrified to find that he had paid an awful lot for them, L200, I believe. Do you understand about the Aztec gods? If not I will explain them all to you. This big one in the middle ...
— Love Eternal • H. Rider Haggard
... hall it was, and a rare company of heroes was there; and all listened eagerly as Frithiof told his story, and wherefore ...
— Young Folks Treasury, Volume 2 (of 12) • Various
... dog having bitten a piece out of a gentleman's leg, the tender dame, in a great fright, cried out, 'Won't it make him sick?'" In the most attractive accounts we possess of Walpole in his old age, we see him seated at the breakfast-table, drinking tea out of "most rare and precious ancient porcelain of Japan," and sharing the loaf and butter with Tonton (now grown almost too fat to move, and spread on a sofa beside him), and afterwards going to the window with a basin of bread and milk to throw to ...
— The Art of Letters • Robert Lynd
... furnished elaborately; some rare Japanese ivories adorned the desk top. A Chinese vase, close by, was filled with fresh-cut flowers. Around the walls were handsome oil paintings. Beautiful Oriental rugs covered the floor. There hung a tapestry from some old French convent; yonder ...
— Traffic in Souls - A Novel of Crime and Its Cure • Eustace Hale Ball
... gallop over the ground with the prints trailing fifty yards behind them. In the frenzied frolic that had seized hold of them they forgot their slain comrades, still unburied. They whoop, shout, and laugh till the cliffs, in wild, unwonted echo, send back the sound of their demoniac mirth. A riot rare as ...
— The Lone Ranche • Captain Mayne Reid
... after time, he further expounded to his young attendants, how extremely honourable and extremely pure were the two words representing woman, that they are more valuable and precious than the auspicious animal, the felicitous bird, rare flowers and uncommon plants. 'You may not' (he was wont to say), 'on any account heedlessly utter them, you set of foul mouths and filthy tongues! these two words are of the utmost import! Whenever you have ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... and cowboys and such-like honourable things, and not young English gentlemen; we never felt the strain of "Onward Christian soldiers," nor were swayed by any premature piety in the cold oak pew of our Sunday devotions. All that was good. We spent our rare pennies in the uncensored reading matter of the village dame's shop, on the Boys of England, and honest penny dreadfuls—ripping stuff, stuff that anticipated Haggard and Stevenson, badly printed and queerly illustrated, and very very good for us. On our half-holidays we were allowed ...
— Tono Bungay • H. G. Wells
... A rare combination of natural qualities causes men to develop greatness. Education and training make them greater; nevertheless, men with fewer natural qualities often succeed, with education and training, when those more richly endowed ...
— Henry Ossian Flipper, The Colored Cadet at West Point • Henry Ossian Flipper
... of verse used are the elegiac distich (most frequent), scazons, and hendecasyllabics. In vi. 65 he apologizes for using the pure hexameter, which is found only four times. Other metres are extremely rare. ...
— The Student's Companion to Latin Authors • George Middleton
... necessarily rare and transient, or we shall miss their genuine efficacy. We must work in comparative shadow, without the immediate sight of these realities; and only in the place of our rest,—rest for higher efforts and a new career,—only there may ...
— The Crown of Thorns - A Token for the Sorrowing • E. H. Chapin
... The rare foresight which had made him the millionaire that he was, warned Sir Lemuel Levison that the mining company in which he had invested his ward's fortune was on the eve of an explosion. As no one else ...
— The Lost Lady of Lone • E.D.E.N. Southworth
... perplexed, consults his wife, who suggests that he should promise Ailbe to both. On the appointed day, the warriors of the two countries come to fetch the dog of renown, and a grand banquet is served them by Mac Datho, the principal dish of which is a rare kind of pig—"three hundred cows had fed him for seven years." Scarcely are the guests seated, when ...
— A Literary History of the English People - From the Origins to the Renaissance • Jean Jules Jusserand
... Secretary, who had patiently taken tickets for the play for his chief's daughters, drew the line when he was told to take the chief's razors to be ground. But such assertions of independence are extremely rare, and as a rule the Private Secretary is the most cheerful and the ...
— Collections and Recollections • George William Erskine Russell
... recollection that I hardly think I could forget it." Another recorded instance is that of a person entering a foreign library for the first time. Passing to the department of ancient books, he said that he had a dim idea that a certain rare book was to be found on such a shelf, in such a corner, describing at the same time certain peculiarities of the volume. A search failed to discover the volume in the stated place, but investigation showed that it was in another place in the library, and an old assistant stated ...
— Reincarnation and the Law of Karma - A Study of the Old-New World-Doctrine of Rebirth, and Spiritual Cause and Effect • William Walker Atkinson
... success under these conditions as forcible and convincing speakers. But the grand eloquence of modern times is distinguished by the bursts of feeling, of imagery or of invective, joined with convincing argument. This combination is rare, and whenever we find a man who possesses it we may be sure that, in greater or less degree, he is one of the great masters of eloquence as we understand it. The names of those who in debate or to a jury have been in every-day practice strong and effective speakers, ...
— Daniel Webster • Henry Cabot Lodge
... of the bivouacs, was sufficient to set fire to a castle or a whole village, and to cause the deaths of many unfortunate soldiers who had taken refuge in them. In other respects, these disorders were very rare in Lithuania. ...
— History of the Expedition to Russia - Undertaken by the Emperor Napoleon in the Year 1812 • Count Philip de Segur
... the draft power of mules, in comparison with horses, there are various opinions; and yet it is one which ought to be easily settled. I have tested mules to the very utmost of their strength, and it was very rare to find a pair that could draw thirty hundred weight a single year, without being used up completely. Now, it is well known that in the northern and western States you can find any number of pairs of horses ...
— The Mule - A Treatise On The Breeding, Training, - And Uses To Which He May Be Put • Harvey Riley
... reasons for adopting the coursed arrangement, which we shall notice hereafter, are so weighty, that they would alone be almost sufficient to enforce it; and the constructive ones will apply universally, except in the rare cases in which the choice of perfect or imperfect material is entirely open to us, or where the general system of the decoration of the building requires absolute ...
— The Stones of Venice, Volume I (of 3) • John Ruskin
... of her rare Yorkshire visits trouble began again. Lilia confided to a friend that she liked a Mr. Kingcroft extremely, but that she was not exactly engaged to him. The news came round to Mrs. Herriton, who at once wrote, begging for information, and pointing ...
— Where Angels Fear to Tread • E. M. Forster
... that the Roman Christians are [Greek: apodiulismenoi apo pantos allotrion chromatos] (Rom. inscr.); he uses this expression of no others. Similar remarks are not quite rare at a later period; see, for instance, the oft-repeated eulogy that no heresy ever arose in Rome. At a time when this city had long employed the standard of the apostolic rule of faith with complete confidence, namely, at the beginning of the 3rd century, ...
— History of Dogma, Volume 2 (of 7) • Adolph Harnack
... the quarrel, before that bloody bout of Cain and Abel (Gal 5:17). The light and the darkness struggled together, and nothing could divide or part them but God. Darkness is at implacable enmity with light in the creation of the world; and so it is in that rare work of regeneration, the flesh lusteth against the spirit, and the spirit against the flesh; as Peter saith, Fleshly lusts, they war against the soul. This every Christian feels, and also that which I mentioned before, ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... result of the events narrated, many mothers ordered their sons immediately to leave off their studies and devote themselves to idleness or to agriculture. When the examinations came, suspensions were plentiful, and he was a rare exception who finished the course, if he had belonged to the famous association, to which no one paid any more attention. Pecson, Tadeo, and Juanito Pelaez were all alike suspended—the first receiving his dismissal with his foolish grin and declaring his intention ...
— The Reign of Greed - Complete English Version of 'El Filibusterismo' • Jose Rizal
... refutation of the claim that prostitution would become a very rare thing under Socialism, the national conspirators must confess that the same argument they have for years been using to further the interests of their cause, can with telling effect ...
— The Red Conspiracy • Joseph J. Mereto
... with that rare smile which brightened his dark face like a ray of stray sunshine. "We'll hang round these diggins a few days. First off, we'll take in the lay of the land. You go down stream a ways an' scout round some, while ...
— The Spirit of the Border - A Romance of the Early Settlers in the Ohio Valley • Zane Grey
... married at church, very early in the evening, Elsie acting as first bridesmaid. Returning to the house the bridal party were ushered into the drawing-room, which they found richly ornamented with evergreens and flowers. In the centre rose a pyramid of rare and beautiful blossoms, filling the air with their delicious perfume. Above that was a wide arch of evergreens bearing the monograms of Mr. and Mrs. Ferris, placed between the dates of their marriage and ...
— Elsie's Girlhood • Martha Finley
... declare Why conquered I the grave?" I cried. "What rare, Conspicuous virtues won this boon for me?" "You've been revived," he said, "to hear ...
— Black Beetles in Amber • Ambrose Bierce
... Clark Murray has had the rare good fortune of first presenting this singularly vivid book in an English translation as pure and lively as if it were an original, and an original by a classic ...
— The Busted Ex-Texan and Other Stories • W. H. H. Murray
... Trinacria of the ancients. Perhaps, after all, this delay which so vexes me (bear in mind, I am no longer in the Orient!) may be meant solely for my good. At least, Mr. Winthrop, our Consul here, who has been exceedingly kind and courteous to me, thinks it a rare good fortune that I shall see the ...
— The Lands of the Saracen - Pictures of Palestine, Asia Minor, Sicily, and Spain • Bayard Taylor
... then there is that one thing that I don't know. It is foolish in me to be dallying with such a mess, which I thought was a piece of quackery, while that strange visitor bade me do it,—and yet, what a strength has come from it! He said it was a rare cordial, and, methinks, it has brightened up my weary life all day, so that Pansie has found me the fitter playmate. And then the dose—it is so absurdly small! I will ...
— The Dolliver Romance • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... At the Reviews the King inspects strictly one regiment after another: it is he that selects the very Corporals and Sergeants, much more the Upper Officers; nominating for vacancies what Cadets are to fill them,—all of whom are Nobles." Yes, with rare exceptions, all. Friedrich, democratic as his temper was, is very strict on this point; "because," says he repeatedly, "Nobles have honor; a Noble that misbehaves, or flinches in the moment of crisis, can find no refuge ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XXI. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... R. Murchison points out, are by no means rare in the Lower Ludlow rock. These fossils, of which six extinct genera are now known in the Ludlow series, represented by 18 species, remind us of various living forms now found in our British seas, both of the ...
— The Student's Elements of Geology • Sir Charles Lyell
... It is but rare indeed that any country or age produces a Demosthenes, a Pitt, a Thomson, or a Brougham; and such persons have hitherto been considered as gifts of Nature, rather than the legitimate production of educational exercises. But this we conceive to be a mistake. They may perhaps have been ...
— A Practical Enquiry into the Philosophy of Education • James Gall |
