"Can" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... your favors of October the 8th and 26th. That of August the 25th was duly received, nor can I recollect by what accident I was prevented from acknowledging it in mine of September the 28th. It has been the source of my subsistence hitherto, and must continue to be so, till I receive letters on the affairs of money from America. Van Staphorsts and Willinks have answered my drafts. ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... the truck. Pelham is about to lose its most useless recruit. I must tuck these priceless pages in my money belt. Wish I had a picture of Polly. Well, here's to the High Adventure, but there's something about that Submarine Provoker I can't quite get used to. It seems just a trifle one sided. However, that is in the lap of the gods. Instead of a camp I will soon have the vast expanses of the ocean in which to demonstrate my tremendous inability to emulate the example of ...
— Biltmore Oswald - The Diary of a Hapless Recruit • J. Thorne Smith, Jr.
... each day I find more to make me like you than I did the day before; at first I felt most inimical; now I only wonder how you can be leagued with ...
— The Children of the New Forest • Captain Marryat
... often ransacked the accounts of antiquity, I do not find any ancient eunuch to whom I can compare him. There were indeed among the ancients some, though very few, faithful and economical, but still they were stained by some vice or other; and among the chief faults which they had either by nature or habit, they were apt to be either rapacious or else ...
— The Roman History of Ammianus Marcellinus • Ammianus Marcellinus
... to surrender. You and your gang have murdered nearly all my men here in cold blood. I can do nothing more, and ...
— A Lieutenant at Eighteen • Oliver Optic
... "I don't think I shall," he answered testily, as Aunt Pike went out of the room. "I hate mystery. Why can't we speak out and have it over? I am ...
— Kitty Trenire • Mabel Quiller-Couch
... it, and to collect from his command not less than twenty-five thousand men. To this I will add five thousand from Missouri. With this force he is to commence operations against Mobile as soon as he can. It will be impossible for him to commence ...
— The Memoirs of General W. T. Sherman, Complete • William T. Sherman
... rescript to Statilius Severus in the following terms: 'The privilege allowed to soldiers of having their wills upheld, in whatever manner they are made, must be understood to be limited by the necessity of first proving that a will has been made at all; for a will can be made without writing even by civilians. Accordingly, with reference to the inheritance which is the subject of the action before you, if it can be shown that the soldier who left it, did in the presence of ...
— The Institutes of Justinian • Caesar Flavius Justinian
... my friend," the Governor continued. "The newspaper says he's to be buried in the Potter's Field this afternoon, and it will only set us back a day in our plans. I can imagine how desperately forlorn the thing will be. Some parson will say a perfunctory prayer for a poor devil he believes to have gone straight to the fiery pit and they'll bury him in a pauper's grave. There will be the usual morbidly curious crowd hanging round, wagging their heads ...
— Blacksheep! Blacksheep! • Meredith Nicholson
... "Taua and Tino-rau can guide us," Karara reminded him. "Throw out the rope, Ross. What is above water will ...
— Key Out of Time • Andre Alice Norton
... heavens is thine. What is in the waters is thine. Thou art the Lord of Truth, the hater of sinners, whom thou overthrowest in their sins. The Goddesses of Truth are with thee; they never leave thee. No sinful man can approach thee in the place where thou art. Whatsoever appertaineth to life and to death belongeth to thee, and to thee ...
— The Literature of the Ancient Egyptians • E. A. Wallis Budge
... round drops run trickling down his sides, With sweat and blood distained. Look back and view The strange confusion of the vale below, Where sour vexation reigns; see yon poor jade, In vain the impatient rider frets and swears, With galling spurs harrows his mangled sides; He can no more: his stiff unpliant limbs 120 Rooted in earth, unmoved and fixed he stands, For every cruel curse returns a groan, And sobs, and faints, and dies. Who without grief Can view that pampered steed, his master's joy, His minion, and his daily ...
— The Poetical Works of Addison; Gay's Fables; and Somerville's Chase • Joseph Addison, John Gay, William Sommerville
... entered upon a new phase lately. I suppose it cannot be helped, it is merely the turning on of the wheel of time. We cannot stay the wheel, still less turn it back. All we can do is to adjust ourselves to the ...
— Five Nights • Victoria Cross
... worse than the futilities of the Baconians; at any rate, they are based on the same resolute omission, and build on it a wilder fantasy. They omit to consider what poetry is. Those who think Bacon wrote Hamlet, and those who think several poets wrote the Iliad, can make out a deal of ingenious evidence for their doctrines. But it is all useless, because the first assumption in each case is unthinkable. It is psychologically impossible that the mind of Bacon should have produced Hamlet; but the impossibility ...
— The Epic - An Essay • Lascelles Abercrombie
... "I can't allow you to shoot him, Viola. You will have to shoot me first. My God, child,—do you want to have a ...
— Viola Gwyn • George Barr McCutcheon
... upon the eleventh census for facts to establish his conclusion, and since the accuracy of this census is widely controverted, we may fairly call upon him to prove his document before it can be admitted in evidence. ...
— A Review of Hoffman's Race Traits and Tendencies of the American Negro - The American Negro Academy. Occasional Papers No. 1 • Kelly Miller
... Asylum stands on a bright and breezy hill; those glazed corridors are pleasant to walk in, in bad weather. But there are iron bars to all the windows. When it is fair, some of us can stroll outside that very high fence. But I never see much life in those groups I sometimes meet;—and then the careful man watches them so closely! How I remember that sad company I used to pass ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes
... Run as fast as you can and take two notes, one to Zemlianika at the hospital, the other to my wife. [To Khlestakov.] May I take the liberty of asking you to permit me to write a line to my wife to tell her to make ready to receive our ...
— The Inspector-General • Nicolay Gogol
... young man," she said. "You're doing enough! You can't deny it! For pity's sake, wait till you know her better before you try ...
— The Witness • Grace Livingston Hill Lutz
... violins, flutes, cornets, and big drum; but even of these familiar instruments the voices are not always recognized. As for the rest of the harmonious fraternity, few give heed to them, even while enjoying the music which they produce; yet with a few words of direction anybody can study the instruments of the band at an orchestral concert. Let him first recognize the fact that to the mind of a composer an orchestra always presents itself as a combination of four groups of instruments—choirs, let us call them, with unwilling apology ...
— How to Listen to Music, 7th ed. - Hints and Suggestions to Untaught Lovers of the Art • Henry Edward Krehbiel
... without our inheritance from the forefathers who were the puppets of the cosmic process; the society which renounces it must be destroyed from without. Still less can we de with too much of it; the society in which it dominates must be ...
— Evolution and Ethics and Other Essays • Thomas H. Huxley
... there, rising sheer out of the clear and tranquil waters of the moat. The hall is entered by two bridges, each ending in a drawbridge, which is kept in full working order, and both drawbridges are, and have been for some hundreds of years, hauled up at ten o'clock every night, when the house can only be approached from the park ...
— What to See in England • Gordon Home
... possible, gentle sir, that the nauseous and idle reading of books of chivalry can have had such an effect on your worship as to upset your reason so that you fancy yourself enchanted, and the like, all as far from the truth as falsehood itself is? How can there be any human understanding ...
— Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... how important it was for each crew member to be able to depend on his unit mate. "You see," he said, "in space there isn't much time for individual heroics. Too many things can happen too fast for it to ...
— Treachery in Outer Space • Carey Rockwell and Louis Glanzman
... so dense that I can see nothing in the front, ... but we are moving. Smith drops; Lewis falls to the rear; the ranks are thinning; elbows touch no longer ... our pace quickens ... a horrid impatience seizes me ... through the smoke I see the cannons ... faster, faster ... I see the rebel line—a tempest breaks ...
— Who Goes There? • Blackwood Ketcham Benson
... relation is I have discussed at considerable length in the "History of the Aesopic Fable," which forms the introductory volume to my edition of Caxton's Esope (London, D. Nutt, "Bibliothque de Carabas," 1889). In this place I can only roughly summarise my results. I conjecture that a collection of fables existed in India before Buddha and independently of the Jatakas, and connected with the name of Kasyapa, who was afterwards made ...
— Indian Fairy Tales • Collected by Joseph Jacobs
... "Sorry I can't bury you old man," was Billy's parting comment, as he climbed over the breastwork and melted into ...
— The Mucker • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... whose grace doth all the world embrace; * Thine ears have heard, Thine eyes have seen my case! Privation and distress have dealt me heavy blows; * The woes that weary me no utterance can trace. I am like one athirst who eyes the landscape's eye, * Yet may not drink a draught of streams that rail and race. My flesh would tempt me by the sight of savoury food * Whose joys shall pass away and ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton
... friend having already bought three, we thought it best to withdraw ourselves from further temptation, and set out to join the camp at Cossimabad, 16 miles distant, still passing through richly cultivated country, which was as pretty as a dead level ever can be. ...
— A Journey to Katmandu • Laurence Oliphant
... competed with Simonides on that occasion. As to the authorship of the two epigrams extant under his name there is much difference of opinion. Bergk does not come to any definite conclusion. Perhaps all that can be said is that they do not seem unworthy of him, and that they certainly have the style and tone of the best period. It was not till the decline of literature that the epoch of forgeries began. It is, however, ...
— Select Epigrams from the Greek Anthology • J. W. Mackail
... daughter! Well, what is she to me? My faith is given to another. But why feel this strange interest? Yet, after all, it is probably nothing but what any one would naturally feel in the surprise occasioned on beholding such qualities in such a place and person. No, no, it can be nothing more; and I will whistle it to ...
— Gaut Gurley • D. P. Thompson
... 'Can Lance and Bernard settle that? I want you a moment, Fulbert. Not to confront the Rectory again,' he added, smiling. 'It was a horrid bore for you, but ...
— The Pillars of the House, V1 • Charlotte M. Yonge
... made with me at Fort Laramie, they were to feed me fifty-five years, and they have not fulfilled it. You must be a man of influence, as you sent for us from all parts of the country, and I wish you would help us as much as you can. In the Fort Rice treaty the Government promised to give us good ...
— The Vanishing Race • Dr. Joseph Kossuth Dixon
... understood as a declaration of a design upon his life: for I have reason to conclude, that he who would get me into his power without my consent, would use me as he pleased when he had got me there, and destroy me too when he had a fancy to it; for no body can desire to have me in his absolute power, unless it be to compel me by force to that which is against the right of my freedom, i.e. make me a slave. To be free from such force is the only security of my preservation; ...
— Two Treatises of Government • John Locke
... speaking to Don Juan, "remain here. If I escape, I shall gallop direct to this point. If I lose my horse, you shall see me afoot all the same. For such a short stretch I can run like a deer: I shall not be overtaken. When I return I shall ...
— The White Chief - A Legend of Northern Mexico • Mayne Reid
... with which they treated the subject people, the fraud and embezzlement that were openly practiced, are merely excusable on account of the fact that Germany was, notwithstanding the peace, still in a state of war. The decree of the imperial diet can scarcely be regarded as the ignominious close of a good old time, but rather as a violent but beneficial incisure in an old and rankling sore. With the petty states, a mass of vanity and pedantry disappeared on the one side, pusillanimity and servility on the other; the ideas of the ...
— Germany from the Earliest Period Vol. 4 • Wolfgang Menzel, Trans. Mrs. George Horrocks
... be restored to him. After some months' confinement, he is called into the Hall of Justice, and asked if he knows why he is in prison; they advise him earnestly to confess and to conceal nothing, as it is the only way by which he can obtain his liberty. He declares his ignorance, and being sent for several times, persists in it. The period of the Auto da Fe, or Act of Faith, which takes place every two or three years (that is, the public execution of ...
— The Phantom Ship • Captain Frederick Marryat
... foot, Faint and fainter sounds the flute, Rarer songs of gods; and still Somewhere on the sunny hill, Or along the winding stream, Through the willows, flits a dream; Flits but shows a smiling face, Flees, but with so quaint a grace, None can choose to stay at home, All must ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 14 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... can't talk about it yet. I will tell you now why I joined you. I thought I would like to go to France—with you. I thought I might be ...
— Penny of Top Hill Trail • Belle Kanaris Maniates
... I was another Maurice. And this woman—I tell you she knows men. She don't care whether a man is rich or poor, tall or short, thin or fat, so long as she likes him. And I tell you she loves Maurice—as well as she can love—and she's not a good enough woman—there it is. And they're all saying you're likely to marry Withrow. Wait now. Withrow, I'm telling you, isn't fit to wash the gurry off Maurice's jack-boots. I'm a careless man, Miss Foster, and in my life I've done things I wish now I hadn't, but I draw ...
— The Seiners • James B. (James Brendan) Connolly
... BOYS.—We want the girls to rival the boys in all that is good, and refined, and ennobling. We want them to rival the boys, as they well can, in learning, in understanding, in virtues; in all noble qualities of mind and heart, but not in any of those things that have caused them, justly or unjustly, to be described as savages. We want {28} the girls to be gentle—not weak, but ...
— Searchlights on Health: Light on Dark Corners • B.G. Jefferis
... not," he answered. "Were they starving, they might do so; but only the younger animals, which would have been prevented by their elders from joining in the feast, may possibly follow us. If they do, we can keep them at a distance, for they are more easily frightened ...
— Afar in the Forest • W.H.G. Kingston
... because I threw the pieces of rock at him," thought I; "he would not leave me for that." I remained for two or three hours, watching for him, but it was all in vain; there was no seal—no Nero. My heart sank at the idea of the animal having deserted me, and for the first time in my life, as far as I can recollect, I burst into a flood of tears. For the first time in my life, I may say, I felt truly miserable—my whole heart and affections were set upon this animal, the companion and friend of my solitude, and I felt as if existence were ...
— The Little Savage • Captain Frederick Marryat
... grants upon condition that one hundred guineas ready money should be paid to each of his soldiers and sailors. Every corps in its turn was admitted gratis to witness this exhibition of the end of all their labours; and you can form no idea what effect it produced, though you are not a stranger to our fickle and inconsiderate character. Ballads, with the same predictions and the same promises, were written and distributed among the soldiers, and sung ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... have succeeded in this respect better than any other dynasty known to history. Germany without doubt is the most uniformly prosperous and civilized country in the world. And therein lies the danger, as no sane and prosperous business can afford to stand still. Neither can a solvent virile nation such as Germany, mark time. For this reason: Two things must happen in the near future. Germany must expand peacefully in Europe, to the northeast and west; or there will ...
— The Secrets of the German War Office • Dr. Armgaard Karl Graves
... Justice (ensures that the treaties are interpreted and applied correctly) - 25 Justices (one from each member state) appointed for a six-year term; note - for the sake of efficiency, the court can sit with 11 justices known as the "Grand Chamber"; Court of First Instance - 25 justices appointed for a ...
— The 2004 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency
... speak of a great person of quality, whose name I have forgot, that lived next door to my Lord ——'s when you was his valet? pray who was she? I suppose a foreigner, by the name you called her." "Really, my lady," replied he, "I do not know who she was; all I can say of her is, that she kept the greatest company, and was a beautiful woman, by report, but I never saw her; she was called the Lady Roxana, was a very good mistress, but her character was not so good as to private life ...
— The Fortunate Mistress (Parts 1 and 2) • Daniel Defoe
... go down town to some manager with your play, and get some paper, the kind I like; and then, after lunch, we'll begin turning it into a novel, from your copy. It will be so easy for you that you can dictate, and I'll do the writing, and we'll work it up together. Shall ...
— The Story of a Play - A Novel • W. D. Howells
... Alexander.—I can't deny that my passions were sometimes so violent as to deprive me for a while of the use of my reason; especially when the pride of such amazing successes, the servitude of the Persians, and barbarian flattery had intoxicated ...
— Dialogues of the Dead • Lord Lyttelton
... world must by this time be weary—which yet has, and always will have, extraordinary fascination for minds of a certain sort—of which my own is one: it is the question of the freedom of the will:—how far is the will free? or how far can it be called free, consistently with the notion of a God ...
— Donal Grant • George MacDonald
... to ask her! O, Fannie, Fannie, if you'd only refuse to say yes, and give me three years to show what I can do! But he's going to ask her before that sun goes down, and what's she going ...
— John March, Southerner • George W. Cable
... but to Dante's "Inferno" can we liken this steamboat-cabin, with its double row of pits, and its dismal captives? What are these sighs, groans, and despairing noises, but the alti guai rehearsed by the poet? Its fiends are the stewards who ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, No. 19, May, 1859 • Various
... hope, and I don't see myself how anybody can presume to have any. It's all conjecture about a future life. How does anybody know? Nobody has ever come back ...
— The Guinea Stamp - A Tale of Modern Glasgow • Annie S. Swan
... as I hate it now. I have always shirked the sight of anything in pain from my childhood onwards. Yet the fact is that not only did I nothing to interfere in what I saw going on, but that I was deeply interested and absorbed in it. I can only explain that to myself now, by supposing that I knew then, that the creature in front of me was not of my own kind, and was not, in fact, outraging any law of its own being. Is not that possible? May I not have collected unawares ...
— Lore of Proserpine • Maurice Hewlett
... "O, we can get wood enough in New York," said Marco. "The carmen bring it along every morning. We might have such a fire-place down in the basement, or in that little room in the stable, and then I would go and ...
— Forests of Maine - Marco Paul's Adventures in Pursuit of Knowledge • Jacob S. Abbott
... also be referred accounts in which the variation of a small circumstance may have transformed some extraordinary appearance, or some critical coincidence of events, into a miracle; stories, in a word, which may be resolved into exaggeration. The miracles of the Gospel can by no possibility be explained away in this manner. Total fiction will account for anything; but no stretch of exaggeration that has any parallel in other histories, no force of fancy upon real circumstances, could produce ...
— Evidences of Christianity • William Paley
... this unfortunate event to his wife, instead of becoming depressed, she exclaimed joyfully, "Oh, then, you can write your book!" and a little later, pulling open a drawer, showed him a considerable sum of money that she had been saving all unknown to him. Thus it became possible for him to devote himself to the work that proved to be his masterpiece, The Scarlet Letter, ...
— Journeys Through Bookland - Volume Four • Charles H. Sylvester
... we add to this the favor which the new employing class, the industrial masters, were able to extort from the governing class, because of their power over foreign trade and domestic finance, we can understand the compulsory laws at length declaring against ...
— The Armies of Labor - Volume 40 in The Chronicles Of America Series • Samuel P. Orth
... is come for me to strick the blow, will you healp me, according to your promis. I recived a letter from a frend in Washington last night and he says that my wife is in the city of Baltimore, and she will come away if she can find a frend to healp hir, so I thought I would writ to you as you are acquanted with foulks theare to howm you can trust with such matthas. I could write to Mr Noah davis in Baltimore, who is well acquanted with my wife, but I do not think that he is a trew frend, and I could writ to Mr Samual ...
— The Underground Railroad • William Still
... the world, or will exist. To untold ages, what we have been and said will affect all other beings for good or ill. We may be forgiven for having missed our opportunities, or started streams of poison instead of life; but the ill effect can never be undone. ...
— John the Baptist • F. B. Meyer
... go with me," he said, "because although you know a thing, you don't speak of it, and although you see a thing, you can appear blind." ...
— Simon Dale • Anthony Hope
... matter-of-fact voice, "I'm going after it. But now I tell you one thing frankly, it's life or death, and if you move your head it may mean death at once. That iron's lying against the big carotid artery. If it hasn't broken the artery wall, there's a ghost of a chance we can get it out safely, in which case you would probably pull through. I've got to open the neck and reach in. I'll do it as fast as I can. Now, I'm not going to think of you, and, gad!—if you can help it—please don't ...
— The Way of a Man • Emerson Hough
... time, however, it pleased God to abate the fever, and he was enabled to get up, to the great joy of his parents; but how can we express the feelings of Frederick on this happy occasion! That task must be left for those who may have unfortunately been in a similar situation; his joy now was undoubtedly as great ...
— The Looking-Glass for the Mind - or Intellectual Mirror • M. Berquin
... daresay, in the midst of their toiling and moiling, and scrubbing and scraping, and starving and begging, do do each other kindly turns, and put bread in each other's mouths now and then, because they can scratch each other's eyes out, and call each other hussies in the streets, any minute they like, in the most open manner. But in Society women's entire life is a struggle for precedence, precedence in everything—beauty, money, rank, success, dress, everything. We have to smother ...
— Wisdom, Wit, and Pathos of Ouida - Selected from the Works of Ouida • Ouida
... "To Hyrum Adams' outfit? Why, they're Mormons and good Mormons, and why should I not be made over? I'm under their teachings; I am Edna, already; it's time Daniel had a wife—or two, for replenishing Utah. Rachael calls me 'sister,' and I can't resent it. Good at heart as she is, even she is convinced. Why," and she laughed mirthlessly, "I may be sealed to Hyrum himself, if nothing worse is in store. Then I'll be assured of ...
— Desert Dust • Edwin L. Sabin
... laughing, for he has an infinite deal of wit. If you did but see how he rolls his stockings! He has a thousand pretty fancies, and I am sure, if you saw him, you would like him, he is a very good scholar, and can talk Latin as fast as English. I wish you could but see him dance. Now you must understand poor Mr. Shapely has no estate; but how can he help that, you know? And yet my friends are so unreasonable as to be always ...
— The Art Of Writing & Speaking The English Language - Word-Study and Composition & Rhetoric • Sherwin Cody
... believe that I have as high a spirit as the average man, and as solid a resolution; but when one has been dragged through the Valley of Humiliation, and plunged, again and again, into the Waters of Bitterness and Privation, a man can be constrained to a course of action of which, in his happier moments, he would have deemed himself incapable. I know this of my ...
— The Beetle - A Mystery • Richard Marsh
... king. Does that sound foolishness to you? Anyhow, it's fair that I should tell you, though you count me a fool. This—this kingship—this dream of the night—is my life. It is the very core of me. Much more than you are. More than anything else can be. I mean to be a king in this earth. KING. I'm not mad.... I see the world staggering from misery to misery and there is little wisdom, less rule, folly, prejudice, limitation, the good things come ...
— The Research Magnificent • H. G. Wells
... the same air and soil Sweet elixirs and colors and becomes arbutus? And both flourish? You may blame Spoon River for what it is, But whom do you blame for the will in you That feeds itself and makes you dock-weed, Jimpson, dandelion or mullen And which can never use any soil or air So as to make ...
— Spoon River Anthology • Edgar Lee Masters
... kerchief thou gavest me, containing fifty dinars, I wrapped up and cast into this chest; so now take thine own, for it returns to thee, and this day thou art become of high estate. Fortune and Fate afflicted thee so that thou didst lose thy right hand for my sake; and I can never requite thee; nay, although I gave my life 'twere but little and I should still remain thy debtor." Then she added, "Take charge of thy property."; so I transferred the contents of her chest to my chest, and added my wealth to her wealth which I had given her, and my heart was eased and ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton
... was presented for presents, the father telling Maka he called the child after him, because he was his friend when we were here last. We have now the open country before us, and expect no trouble in getting along. The natives are all unsettled at present, and every man we meet is armed. I can see the country better to- day than when here last week. Marivaeanumu is on a rise near the hills of Eikiri and north-north-west from Sogeri. The latter district is in a valley between the Owen Stanley Range and ...
— Adventures in New Guinea • James Chalmers
... state, but are driven out; new gods are appointed, naturally enough, after the image of the birds, as those of men bore a resemblance to man. Olympus is walled up against the old gods, so that no odour of sacrifices can reach them; in their emergency, they send an embassy, consisting of the voracious Hercules, Neptune, who swears according to the common formula, by Neptune, and a Thracian god, who is not very familiar with Greek, but speaks a sort ...
— Lectures on Dramatic Art and Literature • August Wilhelm Schlegel
... respect to the one term during which he was a member of the Massachusetts House of Representatives, I can recall only one thing, to which he often and laughingly alluded. Motley, as the Chairman of the Committee on Education, made, as he thought, a most masterly report. It was very elaborate, and, as he supposed, unanswerable; but Boutwell, ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... she can be, but I wish she didn't look so discontented all the time. Why, she hasn't smiled once ...
— Peggy Stewart at School • Gabrielle E. Jackson
... of my life, for the first time in the twenty-odd years of your existence. Once as a child you saw me, and you have doubtless heard my name from your mother's people from time to time; but I can scarcely hope that any knowledge of my private life has come to you. It will be easy, then, for you to pardon an old man for giving you, in this fashion, the confidence he has never been able to bestow ...
— The Stolen Singer • Martha Idell Fletcher Bellinger
... Pursuit ends where the real story is just beginning! Disregarding other powers, when men can move instantly over any distance by simple desire, it's the beginning of a life and culture totally unrelated to anything we know. What will it be like? Where should houses be built—and will they ...
— Pursuit • Lester del Rey
... way to fancies," he said. "Just commit yourself to our Blessed Lord. This man can ...
— Lord of the World • Robert Hugh Benson
... as 1 to 3 of the shortest continental form. In the mode of narration, I am vain enough to flatter myself that the reader will find little reason to hesitate between us. Mine at least, weary nobody; which is more than can be always said ...
— Narrative And Miscellaneous Papers • Thomas De Quincey
... that," said he, sinking into the chair by which he stood. "During the two years and a half that I have inhabited this house, that man has never before been away for a single night. You can't imagine the relief ...
— Humorous Ghost Stories • Dorothy Scarborough
... he was calling. "We are going to the Hermitage woods for chinquapins, and you must come too. Uncle Billy is going for a load of pine-tags, and we can ride in his wagon, so it ...
— The Dreamer - A Romantic Rendering of the Life-Story of Edgar Allan Poe • Mary Newton Stanard
... if it goes on like this till morning I shall make a good thing of it. I wants it bad enough, for I am in arrears a bit with my rent. The war has made everything so terrible dear that it is as much as a poor man can do to ...
— One of the 28th • G. A. Henty
... little better than a murderer, and that she thinks it a great pity that Dr. Dave ever let me step into his shoes. She even told me that the Methodist doctor over the harbor was to be preferred before me. With Miss Cornelia the force of condemnation can no further go." ...
— Anne's House of Dreams • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... stay where I am, and make the best of it, I suppose... but... but" - her voice broke a little - "I'm a positive fool about Dudley. I can't bear to ...
— Winding Paths • Gertrude Page
... be an ass over it," he commented. "Best I can do, I presume, is to go along and explain to her my view of what ...
— Out of the Primitive • Robert Ames Bennet
... baby it was at first. Those who see it now,—in the prime of its manhood, wielding its giant strength with such ease, accomplishing all but miraculous work with so great speed, regularity, and certainty, and with so little fuss,—can hardly believe what a cross-grained little stupid thing it was in those early days, or what tremendous difficulties it ...
— Post Haste • R.M. Ballantyne
... Kirke with a sudden livening, "an you always do as well for us all, we can forgive you, Pierre! The courtiers have cried her up and cried her up, till your pretty savage of the north sea is like to become the first lady of the land! Sir John comes home with your letter to me—boy, the smelling-salts!—so!—and I say to him, 'Sir John, ...
— Heralds of Empire - Being the Story of One Ramsay Stanhope, Lieutenant to Pierre Radisson in the Northern Fur Trade • Agnes C. Laut
... seized with an anxious desire to "try the unknown ways of peregrination—to pass over the huge wastes of ocean to the ends of the earth." To this erratic propensity he owed all the fame which a place in the Romish calendar and the authorship of an indifferent book can confer. In Jerusalem he saw all that Arculfus saw, and nothing more; but he had previously visited the Tomb of the Seven Sleepers, and the cave in which St. John wrote ...
— Palestine or the Holy Land - From the Earliest Period to the Present Time • Michael Russell
... time," said Mr. Cathro, grimly, "I can wait," and this had such a helpful effect that Tommy was able presently to speak up for his misdeeds. They consisted of some letters written at home but brought to the school for private reading, and the Dominie got a nasty jar when he saw that they ...
— Sentimental Tommy - The Story of His Boyhood • J. M. Barrie
... seat, Craig," he said, speaking with a faint accent barely perceptible. "The second chair will be found the more comfortable. Now we can talk easily. May I offer you ...
— Gordon Craig - Soldier of Fortune • Randall Parrish
... a new conception of beauty that makes it difficult to picture Rome. Modern ink has acquired Nero's blush; it comes very readily, yet, however sensitive a writer may be, once Roman history is before him, he may violate it if he choose; he may even give it a child, but never can he make it immaculate. He may skip, indeed, if he wish; and it is because he has skipped so often that one fancies that Augustus was all right. The rain of fire which fell on the cities that mirrored their towers in the Bitter Sea, might just as well have ...
— Imperial Purple • Edgar Saltus
... the doctor turned abruptly from his long examination of his patient, and gave the guests the first attention he had vouchsafed them. The truth was this man had had some unfortunate experiences with district visitors, and had perhaps an unreasonable prejudice against them as a class. "I can't help it, ma'am," he said to Mrs. Saunders, when she was taking him to task one day. "There are exceptions, of course, at least we will hope there are; but if you had seen some of my specimens, you would be the first to wish an infusion of common sense could be introduced among them. As a ...
— Ester Ried Yet Speaking • Isabella Alden
... for this country explicitly take into account the effects of excess mortality due to AIDS; this can result in lower life expectancy, higher infant mortality and death rates, lower population and growth rates, and changes in the distribution of population by age and sex than would otherwise be expected ...
— The 2005 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency
... was likely for that reason to appeal to the practical, material-minded Roman. Josephus corroborates what Seneca had grudgingly remarked, that the Jews understood their laws; and it is this, he says, which made such a wonderful accord among us, to which no other nation can show a parallel. The eloquent insistence on the harmony uniting the Jewish people is another proof that Josephus is here reproducing the ideas of others, for it is in complete and glaring contrast with what he had repeatedly written in his Antiquities and his ...
— Josephus • Norman Bentwich
... man," said Lady Garnett; "he is almost as limited as his mamma, and he takes himself more seriously. When he is with his sister one can tolerate ...
— A Comedy of Masks - A Novel • Ernest Dowson and Arthur Moore
... that I saw a woman who is under sentence of death for having poisoned her sister. She appeared to me to be insane; but it is said that it is a frequent attempt of the prisoners to sham madness, in order to get to Bedlam, from which they can get out when cured. One woman deceived all the medical people, clergyman, jailer, and turnkeys, was removed to Bedlam as incurably mad, and from Bedlam made her escape. I saw a girl of about eighteen, who had been educated at ...
— The Life and Letters of Maria Edgeworth, Vol. 2 • Maria Edgeworth
... Marguerite in Faust with the Chicago Opera Company, Monday evening, February 4, 1918, at the Lexington Theatre, New York. She sang with some art and style; her tone was still pure and her wonderful enunciation still remained a feature of her performance but scarcely a shadow of the beautiful voice I can remember so well was left. As if to atone for vocal deficiencies the singer made histrionic efforts such as she had never deemed necessary during the height of her career. Her meeting with Faust in the Kermesse scene was accomplished with modesty that almost became fright. ...
— The Merry-Go-Round • Carl Van Vechten
... to work here to solve the problem before them. The life of ease and the life of toil are seen side by side, and all the brighter influences of the one brought to bear on the other. The tall factory chimneys are unsightly here as elsewhere, and nothing can be uglier than the steam tramways, noisily running through the streets. But close to the factories and workshops are the cheerful villas and gardens of their owners, whilst near at hand the workmen's dwellings offer an exterior equally attractive. These cits ouvrires form indeed a ...
— In the Heart of the Vosges - And Other Sketches by a "Devious Traveller" • Matilda Betham-Edwards
... Semi-Weekly Earthquake evidently labor under a misapprehension with regard to the Ballyhack railroad. It is not the object of the company to leave Buzzardville off to one side. On the contrary, they consider it one of the most important points along the line, and consequently can have no desire to slight it. The gentlemen of the Earthquake will, of course, take pleasure ...
— Editorial Wild Oats • Mark Twain
... no harm in trying. If I can persuade him, will you promise to be civil to him, and not ...
— A Maid of the Silver Sea • John Oxenham
... go in when no one sees. The table isn't locked, I know, because I opened it once. You can get and bring it to me ...
— The Golden Scarecrow • Hugh Walpole
... then laughed. 'Nobody will see what you do in such a crowd—I should think,' she said. 'But you know one can't be rude—to an old old man. If others kneel, I suppose we must kneel. Does it do anyone harm to be blessed by an ...
— Eleanor • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... are alike in that they can both be cracked, and different in that the joke can be cracked again.—William ...
— Toaster's Handbook - Jokes, Stories, and Quotations • Peggy Edmund & Harold W. Williams, compilers
... cutaneous foulnesses, weakly constitutions, and bad digestions; vapors, melancholy, and almost all nervous distempers whatsoever. And what a plentiful source of miseries the last are, the afflicted best can tell. And scarce any one chronical distemper whatever, but has some degree of this evil faithfully attending it. The reason why the scurvy is peculiar to this country and so fruitful of miseries, is, that it is produced by causes mostly ...
— Vegetable Diet: As Sanctioned by Medical Men, and by Experience in All Ages • William Andrus Alcott
... Stampa's, that emporium of all good condiments, where Adrianople tongues, Yorkshire bacon, Scotch whisky, French cogniac, Scotch ale, London porter, English cheese, and Havannah segars may be obtained for "a consideration." In fact, no shop can be supplied with a greater variety of articles, nor in any city upon the surface of the globe are luxuries, whether foreign or domestic, to be obtained more plentifully than in Stamboul. Returning to Guiseppino, we dined at the Europa, ...
— Journal of a Visit to Constantinople and Some of the Greek Islands in the Spring and Summer of 1833 • John Auldjo
... so," Vashti nodded. "I dare say now," she went on, after seeming to muse for a moment, "you are one of those strong-minded men who find it hard to understand how sensible people can worry over what ...
— Major Vigoureux • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... the development of Jefferson's political ideas. His public acts and declarations foreshadowed the policies of his most worthy successors. The essentials of the Monroe Doctrine, of the emancipation of slaves, as well as of the doctrine of State rights and of American expansion, can all be traced back to him. Thus he has come to be venerated by one of the two great political parties of America as "The ...
— A History of the Nineteenth Century, Year by Year - Volume Two (of Three) • Edwin Emerson
... the night complaining of an attack of indigestion, I hope," said Ulyth, joining Addie and Gertie at the lake-side. "How much can a dog ...
— For the Sake of the School • Angela Brazil
... one face of Farley, one face of Knight, one face (but what a one it is!) of Liston; but Munden has none that you can properly pin down, and call his. When you think he has exhausted his battery of looks, in unaccountable warfare with your gravity, suddenly he sprouts out an entirely new set of features, like Hydra. He is not one, but legion. Not so much ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Volume 2 • Charles Lamb
... he said, "your time has got value. You're wanted, Gorman, and that's a fact. The cause of Ireland is a sacred trust and I'm not speaking against it; but if a subscription to the party funds would set you free for a month——Now can another patriot be hired at a reasonable salary to take your place? If he can, you name the figure and I'll write the cheque. The fact is, it'll be a mighty convenient thing to me if you'll take hold of things here. Daisy's dead set on unearthing mysteries. I don't say there ...
— The Island Mystery • George A. Birmingham
... lifteth his eyes, and he sees her silent and pale, But fair as Odin's Choosers in the slain kings' wakening dale, But sweet as the mid-fell's dawning ere the grass beginneth to move; And he knows in an instant of time that she stands 'twixt death and love, And that no man, none of the Gods can help her, none of the days, If he turn his face from her sorrow, and wend on his lonely ways. But she sees the change in his eyen, and her queenly grief is stirred, And the shame in her bosom riseth at the long ...
— The Story of Sigurd the Volsung and the Fall of the Niblungs • William Morris
... I even startled myself, with distinctions that to this hour strike me as profoundly just, and as undeniably novel. Two out of many I will here repeat; and with the more confidence, that in these two I can be sure of repeating the exact thoughts; whereas, in very many other cases, it would not be so certain that they might not have been insensibly modified by cross-lights or ...
— Memorials and Other Papers • Thomas de Quincey
... The king longs for Moor, and you will be as safe with us, as if you were in Abraham's lap. We have plenty for you to do. You come to me as opportunely, as if you had dropped from the skies. I was just going to write to Venice for an assistant. Holy Jacob! You can't stay so, but thanks to the Madonna and Moor, you are not poor. We have ample means, my young sir. Donna Sophonisba gave me a hundred zechins for you; they are lying in yonder chest, and thank Heaven, haven't grown impatient by waiting. They are at your disposal. Your master, my master, ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... water's edge. Nothing one sees, perhaps, is so eloquent of the change that has taken place in the life and fabric of our navy. If you are an enlisted man, here in this commodious group of buildings you can get a good shore meal and entertain your friends among the Allies, you may sleep in a real bed, instead of a hammock, you may play pool, or see a moving-picture show, or witness a vaudeville worthy of professionals, like that recently given ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... mind never seems able to grasp, are instinctively known by the man in the street in Europe. Every one has learned the gambits: they do not have to be explained, nor their importance demonstrated. The American can profitably study those maps so liberally displayed in shop windows, as I studied them for hours in default of anything better to do in the drifting days of early May. The maps will show at a glance that Italy's northern frontiers are so ingeniously drawn—by her hereditary ...
— The World Decision • Robert Herrick
... are many opinions to be examined, many proposals to be balanced, and many objections to be answered. But with much more difficulty must any important resolution be formed, where it must be the joint act of the whole assembly, where every individual has a negative voice, and unanimity alone can make a decision obligatory. Wherever this is the form of government, the state lies at the mercy of every man who has a vote in its councils; and the corruption or folly or obstinacy of one may retard or ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, Vol. 11. - Parlimentary Debates II. • Samuel Johnson
... the key for Mr. Jones. Jake, you and your father can go with the men, and, Mr. Jones, perhaps you had better wait with us, for we have a little matter of importance to settle, and ...
— The Galaxy, Volume 23, No. 2, February, 1877 • Various
... native will hear of it. I confess I am anxious about his situation. The man has a family, and in these troublesome times, I wish he were at home to mind his trade and his fireside, for I think he has travelled more than his fortune can well bear. Present my respects to Madam and the virgin muse. I got many little pieces addressed to me while near the Court, but I made ...
— The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Vol. IX • Various
... provide this machine for the moral destruction of her unfortunate youth. If this be the real and true condition of affairs, what can be done to change them? I would suggest the erection, at once, of a reformatory. Classify the prisoners. Let those who are in for the first offense be separated from those who are professional and debased ...
— The Twin Hells • John N. Reynolds
... shall never do it again," said John Starkweather)—"when you commiserate me, therefore, and advise me to rise, you must give me really good reasons for changing my occupation and becoming a millionnaire. You must prove to me that I can be more independent, more honest, more useful as a millionnaire, and that I shall ...
— Adventures In Contentment • David Grayson
... The colonel told his story so impressively, with such self-possession and dignity, that no one had the courage to interrupt him. Only the clerk, infected by his example, decided to break in with a story of his own: "There are some who get so used to it that they can take 40 drops. I have a relative—," but the colonel would not stand the interruption, and went on to relate what effects the opium ...
— Resurrection • Count Leo Tolstoy
... intend to prevent us from crossing the river," said General Bisson, with a contemptuous shrug. "They have taken position in front of the bridge of Laditch, and so closely that I can see nothing of it," replied Lieutenant-Colonel von Wreden. Suddenly he uttered a cry of surprise, and looked steadfastly toward the extremity of the valley, where the rocks jutted out again into it, ...
— Andreas Hofer • Lousia Muhlbach
... my uncle, "but this is no a very chanty kind of a proceeding, and I'm bound to be prepared. And now that we understand each other, ye'll can name ...
— Kidnapped • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Fleda, guarding well her own composure; "you know he has had a great deal to spend upon the farm, and paying men, and all, and it is no wonder that he should be a little short just now now, cheer up! we can get along with ...
— Queechy, Volume I • Elizabeth Wetherell
... Pacific. Yet, in this decomposition of the State into its natural units—in this resolving of society into its constituent elements—may be laid the sole true, natural, lasting basis of the universal republic, the primary principle of which can be no ...
— Direct Legislation by the Citizenship through the Initiative and Referendum • James W. Sullivan
... house is shut up. Home ... the refuge from all terrifying things—darkness, night, fear, things unknown. No enemy can pass the threshold.... The fire flares. A golden duck turns slowly on the spit; a delicious smell of fat and of crisping flesh scents the room. The joy of eating, incomparable delight, a religious enthusiasm, thrills of joy! The body is too languid with the ...
— Jean-Christophe, Vol. I • Romain Rolland
... see, for your wife's sake, your name can't be hung on a woman of that kind,' said Redworth. 'I'll call here the day ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... there's that between us that can never let us be friends. I'm goin' to get level with you some day. But just now, as you said, we can let things bide. I say you're honest in this thing, and if you choose to be honest with me I'll be honest ...
— The Night Riders - A Romance of Early Montana • Ridgwell Cullum
... course he should pursue. If Helena wondered not, she grieved when she found it was his intention to leave her. He ordered her to go home to his mother. When Helena heard this unkind command, she replied: 'Sir, I can nothing say to this, but that I am your most obedient servant, and shall ever with true observance seek to eke out that desert, wherein my homely stars have failed to equal my great fortunes.' But this humble speech of Helena's ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles and Mary Lamb
... I am convinced that forces of men can never come at the bold robber. I must needs go alone. But do you hold your men in readiness at Barnesdale, and when you hear a blast from this silver bugle, come quickly, for I shall have the sly Robin within ...
— Robin Hood • J. Walker McSpadden
... have reason to believe that the Northern advance in great force will soon be made, but we wish to know, meanwhile, what is going on behind their lines, what forces are coming down from Washington, what is the state of their defenses, and any other information that you may obtain. If you can get through their lines you can bring us news which may ...
— The Guns of Bull Run - A Story of the Civil War's Eve • Joseph A. Altsheler
... indefatigable, but highly intelligent, in providing food for their young even before the young are hatched out. They do not lay their eggs on any plant at random, but will wander for miles to find a plant on which their young can feed, and they then lay their eggs on that plant. Individual plants, insects, animals, or men may be frightfully selfish in their hard struggle for existence, but the one thing in regard to which no individual is selfish is in regard to its offspring. Primitive man, utterly callous about the ...
— The Heart of Nature - or, The Quest for Natural Beauty • Francis Younghusband
... tribes, and causes a great spirit of emulation among their youth, who are, upon all occasions, from their childhood, trying their strength and skill in wrestling ... The way in which they tear their women and children from one another, though it has the appearance of the greatest brutality, can scarcely be called fighting ... On these wrestling occasions the by-standers never attempt to interfere in the contest. It sometimes happens that one of the wrestlers is superior in strength to the other, and, if a woman be the cause of the contest, the weaker is frequently unwilling ...
— Traditions of the North American Indians, Vol. 2 (of 3) • James Athearn Jones
... there is in a congregation as it rises to receive the benediction. It was no form of blessing which rung out those deep, almost sepulchral tones. But the word they uttered could not be mistaken. I can hear its prolonged, solemn vibrations as if I were standing before the clock at ...
— Over the Teacups • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... from the confinement this will occasion, and I have ordered the boatswain to pitch a tent for them on the largest of these here Tortugas; and what I want of you, is to muster food and water, and other women's knicknacks, and go ashore with them, and make them as comfortable as you can for a few days, or until we can get ...
— Jack Tier or The Florida Reef • James Fenimore Cooper
... "That I can very well, sir," he replied, "for my name is Panurge, and I was bred and born in Touraine, which is the garden of France. I have just come from Turkey, where I was taken prisoner, and my throat is so parched and my stomach so empty that if you will only put a meal before ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VII • Various
... rising star, he told himself that he was so maimed and mutilated as to be only half a man. He could not reason about it. Nature had afflicted him with a certain weakness. One man has a hump;—another can hardly see out of his imperfect eyes;—a third can barely utter a few disjointed words. It was his fate to be constructed with some weak arrangement of the blood-vessels which left him in this plight. "The whole damned thing is nothing to me," he said bursting out into absolute ...
— The Prime Minister • Anthony Trollope
... contributed to one result; but no general council closed the canon once for all, till that of Trent promulgated its decrees. This body, however, could only settle the subject for Romanists, since, while the right of private judgment is exercised, no corporation can declare some books inspired and others not, some authoritative in matters of faith, others not, without presumption. Though the present Bible canon rests upon the judgment of good and learned men of different times, it can never be finally ...
— The Canon of the Bible • Samuel Davidson
... four bunches of celery, a peck of peas, and one spring chicken. And if you won't" he added, raising his hand threateningly, "I'll go to them six councilmen, an' I'll graft 'em one at a time, an' THEN where 'll your boss grafter be? You can't help yourself." ...
— Kilo - Being the Love Story of Eliph' Hewlitt Book Agent • Ellis Parker Butler
... that we are Injins," resumed The Weasel, with an air so humble, and a voice so meek, that a stranger might have supposed he was consoling, instead of endeavoring to intimidate, the prisoner. "It is true. We are nothing but poor, ignorant Injins. We can only torment our prisoners after Injin fashion. If we were pale- faces, we might do better. We did not torment the medicine-priest. We were afraid he would laugh at our mistakes. He knew a great deal. We know but little. We do as well ...
— Oak Openings • James Fenimore Cooper
... know I am here, my dear little boy; but now, if you will show me where I can get a sheet of paper, I will just write your ...
— How It All Came Round • L. T. Meade
... along the bottoms of which mighty boulders are thickly strewn. On dizzy ledge and steep slope dense thickets of wild bamboo grow, and a few stunted trees fill some of the less deep clefts, wherever the sunshine can penetrate. Splendid as is the scenery, its gloom, its stillness, its naked crags and peaks, its dark depths that seem to cleave to the very vitals of the earth, become so oppressive, that after a few days ...
— Kafir Stories - Seven Short Stories • William Charles Scully
... single word—and some of his gestures. He had been making a good deal of noise. I wonder we didn't wake you up. How soundly you can sleep! I say, do you ...
— Victory • Joseph Conrad
... upon terms of capitulation, and also proposing an armistice until noon. General Grant replied, acknowledging the receipt of the letter, and adding: "No terms except an unconditional and immediate surrender can be accepted. I propose to move immediately upon your works." Buckner replied: "The distribution of the forces under my command, incident to an unexpected change of commanders, and the overwhelming force under your command, ...
— From Fort Henry to Corinth • Manning Ferguson Force
... proposed to him still came to the conclusion that the construction of the bill, should it become a law, would yet be a subject of much perplexity and doubt (a view of the bill entirely coincident with my own), and as I can not think it proper, in a matter of such vital interest and of such constant application, to approve a bill so liable to diversity of interpretations, and more especially as I have not had time, amid the duties constantly pressing on ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 1 (of 2) of Volume 3: Andrew Jackson (Second Term) • James D. Richardson
... cannot learn it. I am not clever or quick like the other boys. I can't put anything in my head (bursts into crying again). I have ...
— Poets and Dreamers - Studies and translations from the Irish • Lady Augusta Gregory and Others |
