"Plain" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... impressions on two or three points. Nothing has struck me more than the admirable and convincing manner in which you treat Java. To allude to a very trifling point, it is capital about the unadorned head of the Argus pheasant.[102] How plain a thing is, when it is once pointed out! What a wonderful case is that of Celebes! I am glad that you have slightly modified your views with respect to Africa,[103] and this leads me to say that I cannot swallow the so-called continent of Lemuria, i.e. the direct ...
— Alfred Russel Wallace: Letters and Reminiscences, Vol. 1 (of 2) • James Marchant
... piteous sigh, and everything seemed to swing round him, while an intense desire came to rash wildly out of the house and hurry away anywhere—to woods, or out on some vast plain, where he would be alone to think, if it were possible, and get rid of the violent throbbing in ...
— The Queen's Scarlet - The Adventures and Misadventures of Sir Richard Frayne • George Manville Fenn
... clean and shining, even to the quarried floor, that it was difficult to believe in the mud and dirt of the streets without. Mrs Blossom herself looked fresh and comely, like a countrywoman; but there was a sad expression on her round face, plain enough to be seen when she ...
— Little Meg's Children • Hesba Stretton
... which when it began, only extended from the Atlantic to the Mississippi, but now reaches to the Pacific, may yet expand, North and South, until it covers the whole Continent, and becomes one vast ocean-bound Confederacy. Then, my friends, the path of duty, of honor, of patriotism, is plain. There are a few simple principles to be preserved. Bear in mind the dividing line between State rights and Federal authority; let us maintain the great principles of Popular Sovereignty, of State rights and of the Federal Union as the Constitution ...
— The Great Conspiracy, Complete • John Alexander Logan
... the popilation shoutin' at?" For the tramp of the engine's horses, heard plain enough on the main road, came to an end abruptly, and sounds ensued—men's shouts, women's cries—not reconcilable with the mere stoppage of a fire-engine by unexpected narrows or an ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan
... Are these the admired lady-wits, that having so good a plain song, can run no better division upon it? All her jests are of the stamp March was fifteen years ago. Is this the comet, monsieur Fastidious, that ...
— Every Man Out Of His Humour • Ben Jonson
... glow was plain above the horizon, now. It was so close they could make out its form against the background of stars. O'Brine was decelerating and Rip was certain he was watching his screens for a sign of the enemy. He would see ...
— Rip Foster Rides the Gray Planet • Blake Savage
... Nethercoats, nothing further would have been demanded from him on that subject. But he had foolishly presumed that the question had been based on special information as to his client's visit to London, and he had told the plain truth in a very ...
— Can You Forgive Her? • Anthony Trollope
... Byron sang of waltzing. Let us forgive and—remembering his poor foot—pity him. Yet the opinions of famous persons possess an interest that is akin, in the minds of many plain folk, to weight. Let us, then, incline an ear to another: "Laura was fond of waltzing, as every brisk and innocent young girl should be," wrote he than who none has written more nobly in our time—he who "could appreciate good women and describe them; and ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce, Volume 8 - Epigrams, On With the Dance, Negligible Tales • Ambrose Bierce
... I feel prompted to say. I have always regarded it as my office to address myself to plain men, and in clear and unambiguous terms. It has been my lot to have occasional intercourse with some of those who consider themselves as profound, who deliver their oracles in obscure phraseology, and who make it their ...
— Thoughts on Man - His Nature, Productions and Discoveries, Interspersed with - Some Particulars Respecting the Author • William Godwin
... probably all right in the Orient, where it is hot and the grease does not get a chance to solidify. She thinks that Tufik is probably a good cook in his own country. But Aggie says that a good many things in the Bible that she never understood are made plain to her if that is what they ate in Biblical times—some of the things they saw in visions, and all that. She dropped asleep on Tish's lounge and distinctly saw Tufik murdering Hannah by forcing one of his cakes ...
— Tish, The Chronicle of Her Escapades and Excursions • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... the same foundation, under the features of an organism, you may range whatever you please. I will take the fist thing that comes into my head. Let us suppose it to be a forest,—the manner in which it sows itself in the plain, and spreads abroad. 1. Beginning with a small aggregate, it increases imperceptibly in mass, and so forth. Exactly the same thing takes place in the fields, when they gradually seed themselves down, and bring forth a forest. 2. ...
— What To Do? - thoughts evoked by the census of Moscow • Count Lyof N. Tolstoi
... route was the road leading to the Rockbridge Baths. A year previous to this time, he would sometimes go as far as the Baths and return in an afternoon, a trip of twenty miles. A part of this road led through a dense forest. One afternoon, as he told the story himself, he met a plain old soldier in the midst of these woods, who, recognising the General, reined in ...
— Recollections and Letters of General Robert E. Lee • Captain Robert E. Lee, His Son
... youngest, was married to Mr. Thomas Foster, a weaver, in Spitalfields, and had seven children, who are all dead; and she, herself, is aged about sixty, and weak and infirm. She seemeth to be a good, plain, sensible woman, and has confirmed several particulars related above, and informed me of some others, which she had often heard from her mother." These the doctor enumerates, and then adds, "In all probability, Milton's whole family will be extinct with her, and he can live only in his ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson in Nine Volumes - Volume V: Miscellaneous Pieces • Samuel Johnson
... entered, a look in which a faint wonder was mingled with a pleasant hereditary habit of welcome. A cover was already laid for the chance comer, and as I took possession of it in response to her invitation, I felt again that terrible shyness—that burning physical embarrassment of the plain man in unfamiliar surroundings. So had I felt on the morning when I had stood in the kitchen, with my basket on my arm, and declined the plum cake for which my mouth watered. In the road with Sally I had appeared to share, as she had said, something ...
— The Romance of a Plain Man • Ellen Glasgow
... plain soda. And if you've no objection we will thresh this matter out at once as I have to be off in ten minutes. I suppose you took in what ...
— The Keeper of the Door • Ethel M. Dell
... ships, and all who remained were leaden-hearted; there was one who felt the rage of war insatiate in his bowels: Menelaus, yellow-haired King of the Argives. He, indeed, rested not day or night, but knew the fever fretting at his members, and the burning in his heart. And when he scanned the windy plain about the city, and the desolation of it; and when he saw the huts of the Achaeans, and the furrows where the chariots ploughed along the lines, and the charred places of camp-fires, smoke-blackened trees, and puddled waters of Scamander, and corn-lands ...
— The Ruinous Face • Maurice Hewlett
... severing Macedonia from the Slavic State of Bulgaria there is little reason to doubt; that, having so severed it, he did ill in leaving it without a European guarantee for good government, every successive year made more plain; the wisdom of his treatment of Bulgaria itself must, in the light of subsequent events, remain matter for controversy. It may fairly be said that in dealing with Bulgaria English statesmen were, on the whole, dealing with the unknown. Nevertheless, had ...
— History of Modern Europe 1792-1878 • C. A. Fyffe
... strides of the tall, slender man brought him rapidly nearer, his face came into plain view. A refined, handsome face, dark and serious. He had dark-brown eyes—and Miss Hastings did not like brown eyes in a man. She thought that men should have gray or blue or greenish eyes, and if they were cruel in their love of power she ...
— The Conflict • David Graham Phillips
... forty days are fully gone. Send a raven I will anon; If aught were earth, tree, or stone, Be dry in any place. And if this fowl come not again It is a sign, sooth to say, That dry it is on hill or plain, And ...
— Everyman and Other Old Religious Plays, with an Introduction • Anonymous
... and advice of the detective. He was forced to disclose his most secret thoughts, as it were, to confess himself; and his heart beat fast. The door opposite the staircase on the third story was not like other doors; it was of plain oak, thick, without mouldings, and fastened with iron bars. It would have looked like a prison door had not its sombreness been lightened by a heavily colored engraving of a cock crowing, with the ...
— The Mystery of Orcival • Emile Gaboriau
... tell or write what was said, and we know only enough to feel that the great soldier's words were worthy both of his genius and of the occasion. He had treated the German nobility with haughtiness; this plain scholar he treated as an equal. Speaking of the ancients, and defending the Caesars against Tacitus, he discussed the rise of Christianity and emphasized the value of all religions in conserving morals. The poet replied, ...
— The Life of Napoleon Bonaparte - Vol. III. (of IV.) • William Milligan Sloane
... version has "An horse." In the first Lesson for the 19th Sunday after Trinity, Dan. iii. 4., "An herald," and 27., "An hair of their head," occur; and in the next chapter (iv. 13.), "An holy one." It is plain from these instances (and doubtless many others may be found), that the use of "an" before h, in the Bible or Prayer Book, can afford no test whatever whether the h ought to be ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 208, October 22, 1853 • Various
... morning a plain, simple equipage stood at the gate of the new park in Potsdam. The king and the Marquis D'Argens entered the carriage alone. Frederick refused all other attendance; even his servants were ...
— Berlin and Sans-Souci • Louise Muhlbach
... ancient representative of this class is the extraordinary genus Archaeopteryx from the upper Jurassic of Bavaria, which, though an unmistakable bird, retains so many reptilian structures and characteristics as to make its derivation plain. Not to linger over anatomical minutiae, it may suffice to mention the absence of a horny beak, which is replaced by numerous true teeth, and the long lizard-like tail, which is made up of numerous distinct vertebrae, each with a pair of quill-like feathers ...
— Darwin and Modern Science • A.C. Seward and Others
... years old, and it is time you began to think of serious things. It is plain that you have not yet considered what faculty you will follow in the University, and to which branch of the service you will devote yourself. You cannot well go into the army, because you have no great fortune, and yet, for the sake ...
— The Precipice • Ivan Goncharov
... not come here," said Onslow, at the Surry County meeting, "as the Lord Lieutenant and Custos Rotulorum of the county, but I come here as a plain country gentleman." The fact is, that he came there as what he was, and as no other, and consequently he came as one of the beings I have been describing. If it be the character of a gentleman to be fed by the public, as a pauper is by the parish, Onslow has a fair claim to the title; and ...
— The Writings Of Thomas Paine, Complete - With Index to Volumes I - IV • Thomas Paine
... maxims require to be applied with the utmost caution, even in the territory to which they belong, because one consideration may be so easily outweighed by another. Here, however, its application is altogether out of the question. The prophets, as the instruments of the Spirit, spoke pure and plain truth without any regard to persons. Whether Hosea was a native of Judah or of Israel, he would express himself in the same way concerning the inhabitants of Judah. He would severely rebuke their sins, and at the same time readily acknowledge, as he does, their advantages,—for "Salvation ...
— Christology of the Old Testament: And a Commentary on the Messianic Predictions, v. 1 • Ernst Wilhelm Hengstenberg
... then, exactly what he would have to say to Mr. Guiseley, and what Mr. Guiseley would have to say to him. He thought, if the young man were really going down for good, as he had understood this morning, it was only his plain duty to say a few tactful words about responsibility and steadiness. That ridiculous auction ...
— None Other Gods • Robert Hugh Benson
... motionless in the direction whither he was about to go, and that in an instant, is of common necessity a rude treatment, very dangerous to him who experiences it, and under some conceivable circumstances hopelessly fatal. Still the fatality—in plain words, the death of the aggressor—is not directly willed. It is neither intended as an end, nor chosen as a means to an end. It is not welcomed as an end and desirable consummation: on the contrary, it is put up with most reluctantly as ...
— Moral Philosophy • Joseph Rickaby, S. J.
... the impulsive seaman, at the same time giving his oar a pull that well-nigh spun the boat round. "And, to say wots the plain truth, d'ye see, I'm not sorry to ha done with your schooner, for, although she is as tight a little craft as any man could wish for to go to sea in, I can't say much for the crew,—saving your presence, Dick"—(he added, glancing over his shoulder ...
— Gascoyne, the Sandal-Wood Trader • R.M. Ballantyne
... colder. The strong gusts were now fusing into a steady wind. The day, which had not been bright at any time, was turning darker. The sun was gone and in the far north banks of mists and vapor were gathering. A dreary moaning came over the plain. ...
— The Texan Scouts - A Story of the Alamo and Goliad • Joseph A. Altsheler
... same.— His farther arts, inventions, and intrepidity. She puts home questions to him. 'Ungenerous and ungrateful she calls him. He knows not the value of the heart he had insulted. He had a plain path before him, after he had tricked her out of her father's house! But that now her mind was raised above fortune, and above him.' His ...
— Clarissa, Volume 5 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson
... horrors grinning at her among the spaces of black gloom into which her spirit had sunk; had he been a fancy-sick poet, a pale-blooded creature given to blue devils and nightmare conjecture, he might have come somewhere near an understanding. But being plain Mark King, a straightforward, healthy, and unjaundiced man, his comprehension found never a clue to a condition which in Gloria was hardly other than an inevitable result of all ...
— The Everlasting Whisper • Jackson Gregory
... thing is certain," said my wife,—"that, though I have had an antiquated, plain house, and plain furniture, and plain dress, and not the beginning of a thing such as many of my neighbors have possessed, I have spent more money than many of them for real comforts. While I had young children, I kept more and better servants than many women who wore Cashmere ...
— Household Papers and Stories • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... to the angels of the God for whom they fought. This is a token, not only of their faith, but of the trackless country where they harboured. M. de Caladon, taking a stroll one fine day, walked without warning into their midst, as he might have walked into "a flock of sheep in a plain," and found some asleep and some awake and psalm-singing. A traitor had need of no recommendation to insinuate himself among their ranks, beyond "his faculty of singing psalms"; and even the prophet Salomon "took him into a particular friendship." ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 1 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... volcanoes; ground rises to the east Tristan da Cunha: sheer cliffs line the coastline of the nearly circular island; the flanks of the central volcanic peak are deeply dissected; narrow coastal plain lies between The Peak and ...
— The 2007 CIA World Factbook • United States
... "She must be plain," Elfrida thought, "if he has to dwell upon her eyebrows. And how old?" she asked again. "Much ...
— A Daughter of To-Day • Sara Jeannette Duncan (aka Mrs. Everard Cotes)
... which all the nameless victims of the street fights were thrown in a horrible medley. This blood-stained bit of earth surrounds a circular border of flowers, in whose centre, above a low mound covered with stone slabs, rises a plain iron cross. Rudolf entered the sinister circle and paused beside it. Very peculiar emotions stole over him. It seemed as though he were standing within a cabalistic line which divided him from the world and life. The air within the magic circle appeared more chill than without. ...
— How Women Love - (Soul Analysis) • Max Simon Nordau
... spirit translated the homely English country, so deeply reposeful in its spirit, into an image of dull unrest. If only those broken, stupid lines could have been smoothed out into the grandeur of a plain, Hadria thought that it would have comforted her, as if a song had moved across it with the long-stretching winds. As it was, to look from her window only meant to find repeated the trivialities of life, more picturesque indeed, but still trivialities. It was the estimable ...
— The Daughters of Danaus • Mona Caird
... his eyes. The landscape then makes upon me the impression as if a child had drawn it, or a savage, who had no notion about drawing. Flat fallow-land, wet meadows, huts with their rectangular outline, the straight poplars around country-seats on the distant horizon, a broad, flat plain, finished off with a belt of woods,—that "ten miles of nothing," as the Germans call it; all this reminds me of a first attempt at drawing landscape. There is scarcely enough for a background. From ...
— Without Dogma • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... the steepness of its declivity; the vicinity of either summits likewise perpetually covered with show; the expansion, position, and elevation of the plains from which the snow mountain rises as an isolated peak or as a portion of a chain; whether this plain be part of the sea-coast, or of the interior of a continent; whether it be covered with wood or waving grass; and whether, finally, it consist of a dry and rocky soil, or of a ...
— COSMOS: A Sketch of the Physical Description of the Universe, Vol. 1 • Alexander von Humboldt
... it fell calm, and they had to take to the oars. The sun was intensely hot, the water a sheet of glass reflecting back upon them the ball of fire overhead. Now and again a cats-paw would ripple across the plain of water, but there were no clouds, there was no sight of land. They kept on pulling. For three, for four days—a week—for ten days—they tugged at the oars, except when a favouring breeze came. The water was reduced to a few pints, the food to a few days' half-rations. Their limbs were cramped ...
— "The Gallant, Good Riou", and Jack Renton - 1901 • Louis Becke
... of 1 egg and 1 teaspoonful of vanilla; knead this as you would bread for 10 or 15 minutes. If the cocoanut is a large or a dry one, about 1/2 pound more sugar will be required. Shape the mixture into small balls, press halves of English walnut meats into each ball, or have them plain, if preferred. Stand aside in a cool place a half hour. Melt a half cake of Baker's unsweetened chocolate, add a half teaspoonful of paraffin, roll the small balls in this chocolate mixture until thoroughly coated. Place on waxed paper to dry. ...
— Mary at the Farm and Book of Recipes Compiled during Her Visit - among the "Pennsylvania Germans" • Edith M. Thomas
... but Hiram Tinch could see no merit in the work. He swore at Archie again, and gave him a supper of mush and milk. Mrs. Tinch sat by, and Archie could see that she did not approve of his treatment. The poor woman seemed afraid to speak, almost, but it was plain that she had a good heart. So when Archie heard a noise in his garret room that night, he was not surprised to see Mrs. Tinch at the window, placing some doughnuts and sandwiches there for ...
— The Adventures of a Boy Reporter • Harry Steele Morrison
... cards and women. In the mind of a real libertine, like M. Bayle for example, truth has to meet more formidable and malicious adversaries. But, my dear boy, I give you a character sketch instead of the plain narrative you wish to ...
— The Queen Pedauque • Anatole France
... ridges enter on one side of the impression and flow or tend to flow out the other with a rise or wave in the center. The plain arch is the most simple of all fingerprint patterns, and it is easily distinguished. Figures 107 to 118 are examples of the plain arch. It will be noted that there may be various ridge formations such as ending ridges, bifurcations, ...
— The Science of Fingerprints - Classification and Uses • Federal Bureau of Investigation
... resumed with plain effort: "It seemed for a while that the baby would give its mother what distraction she sought so persistently away from home; but its influence did not last and she soon grew as restless as before. Finally there was nothing that united us except the child. I can't really say that ...
— At Fault • Kate Chopin
... and the Doctor of Physic and Self were aboard the Swede taking a social Glass with him, our rascally crew took it into their heads to Mutiny, their Grievance being that the vessel was a Contraband, and ought to be made a Prize of. The plain truth was, that the Rogues thirsted for Plunder. The Boatswain was one of the Mutineers. Him we caused to receive Four Dozen from the hands of his own Mates, and well laid on; about a dozen of the rest we put in Irons, after having Drubbed 'em soundly, and ...
— The Strange Adventures of Captain Dangerous, Vol. 3 of 3 • George Augustus Sala
... "It is plain that you are in training for a poet," said Helen Heath, laughing, to Mr. Raleigh. "Well, when will you take us? Are the lilies in bloom? Shall we go ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 6, No. 37, November, 1860 • Various
... pursue a mutual interest with a man than to slump down without noticing him into being an altruist with him. Any man can be a selfish man in a perfectly plain way and any man can be an altruist—if he does not notice people enough, but it takes all the brains a man has and all the religion he has to pursue with the fear of God and the love of one's kind, a mutual ...
— The Ghost in the White House • Gerald Stanley Lee
... which is a flash of intuition, an epitome of all the fables. Before leaving the Spaniards we must look at the most pleasing of all Ribera's works,—the Ladder-Dream of Jacob. The patriarch lies stretched on the open plain in the deep sleep of the weary. To the right in a broad shaft of cloudy gold the angels are ascending and descending. The picture is remarkable for its mingling the merits of Ribera's first and second manner. It is a Caravaggio in its strength and breadth of light and shade, ...
— Castilian Days • John Hay
... has come over you? You never used to be disagreeable. It's a good thing the child is amiable. It's the only thing left for a plain girl to be." ...
— Jewel - A Chapter In Her Life • Clara Louise Burnham
... ordnance which would have effectually prevented the entrance of a hostile fleet. This passed, she stood on up the extensive lagoon, towards the further end of which, on the northern shore, could be seen the city of Kingston, a wide plain extending for a considerable distance inland, backed by a series of irregular mountains rising one beyond another, hills piled upon hills of various elevations, with picturesque valleys, dark chasms, and numerous trees. Far off, ...
— The Missing Ship - The Log of the "Ouzel" Galley • W. H. G. Kingston
... worked in silence; then, her task finished, she looked about the bare little room in plain disgust. ...
— Pollyanna • Eleanor H. Porter
... understand. Sons and daughters of evil, when we see that we have sinned, we must be brave enough to assist in our own punishment. God's mercy enables me tranquilly to suffer the penalty which his justice awards me. My path is very plain. Please God, I shall ...
— Trumps • George William Curtis
... by the old Roman emperors the "eye of all the East," rises from the midst of orchards and gardens, flowering vines, green meadows, and waving palms; the mountains of Lebanon look down upon it from the west, and far to the east stretches the dry and sandy plain of the great Syrian desert. Full of wealth and plenty, deemed a paradise by Saracens and Christians alike, the beautiful city offered to the eager crusading host ...
— Historic Boys - Their Endeavours, Their Achievements, and Their Times • Elbridge Streeter Brooks
... these gloomy omens, the defenders awaited the onset of the allies at Montreuil, Romainville Pantin, and on the northern plain (March 30th). At some points French valour held up successfully against the dense masses; but in the afternoon Marmont, seeing his thin lines overlapped, and in imminent danger of being cut off at Belleville, sent out a request for a truce, as Joseph ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose
... plain, pathetic, and truthful recital of the "Short View of the State of Ireland"—a pamphlet of but a few pages and yet terribly effective. As an historical document it takes rank with the experiences of the clergymen, Skelton and Jackson, as well as the more dispassionate writings of contemporary historians. ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Vol. VII - Historical and Political Tracts—Irish • Jonathan Swift
... possible; and the force of the united league must have been considerable. Might not an actual conquest be effected, and the half-starved nomads of Marmarica and the Cyrenaica become the lords and masters of the rich plain, so long coveted, which adjoined upon ...
— Ancient Egypt • George Rawlinson
... of his breeding Jan was, as a matter of fact, unique among hounds. Apart from this, no hound of his size or splendid development had ever before been seen upon Regina station platform. The people of the West are a forthright, plain-spoken, and enterprising folk, and before he left the station Captain Arnutt was offered fifty dollars for Jan. Nothing damped by the captain's smiling refusal of his offer, ...
— Jan - A Dog and a Romance • A. J. Dawson
... seeking shelter in the lee of the rocks, others pushing right and left in search of the path, or of some hospitable habitation. Giustiniani wandered for more than an hour, until he descended towards the plain, and, attracted by a light, succeeded at length in reaching a little cottage having a garden planted with trees. The lightning had now begun to play, and shewed him the white walls of the cottage streaming ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 445 - Volume 18, New Series, July 10, 1852 • Various
... notwithstanding her plain, inconspicuous clothes, commanded attention. Francis Ledsam was a little puzzled. Small things meant much to him in life, and he had been looking forward almost with the zest of a schoolboy to that hour of relaxation at his club. He was impatient of ...
— The Evil Shepherd • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... vessel, but it was too dark. They could not even hear the plash of a paddle, but they knew that some boat—that of friend or foe—was slowly coming toward the ship, for the flashing of the paddles in the phosphorescent water grew more plain. ...
— The Adventures of Don Lavington - Nolens Volens • George Manville Fenn
... her part, only too glad to be left unnoticed, looked shyly out of the corners of her eyes at them. They seemed to her inexpressibly stylish; for their tailor-made suits, though almost as plain as her own dress and jacket of blue alpaca, had that perfect fit and finish which makes the simplest dress seem all that can be desired. There was a knowing look to each little detail, from the slender silver bangles which appeared beneath the loose wrinkled wrists of their very long gloves ...
— A Little Country Girl • Susan Coolidge
... like delicate human emotions, will wake and stir, and the white mists of maidenliness will be warmed with heavenly radiance. But after sunrise comes the day—the long prosaic day of duty and denial, of work and its rewards, of sober, plain realities. Why should the night of mystery and beauty hasten towards the common light? Her being thrilled under the first faint approaches of the dawn, and yet—yet a little longer, oh, ardent, impetuous, all-conquering Sun! It seemed as though the girl's very soul were pleading. The rich-hued, ...
— An Algonquin Maiden - A Romance of the Early Days of Upper Canada • G. Mercer Adam
... You attacked a new sophistry, but there is a newer sophistry still, and uncommonly difficult it is to deal with. Mr. Peak, I have a plain word to say to you. More than a year ago you asked me for my goodwill, to aid you in getting a social position. Say what you like, I see now that you dealt with me dishonestly. I can no longer be your friend ...
— Born in Exile • George Gissing
... the eastern end of the Valley was a rough plain, composed entirely of loaf sugar covered with boulders of rock candy which were piled up in great masses reaching nearly to the foot of the mountains, containing many ...
— The Surprising Adventures of the Magical Monarch of Mo and His People • L. Frank Baum
... value of the part within on a mileage basis, unless there be special circumstances which distinguish between conditions in the several States.[558] But no property of an interstate carrier can be taken into account unless it can be seen in some plain and fairly intelligible way that it adds to the value of the road and the rights exercised in the State.[559] Also, a State property tax on railroads, which is measured by gross earnings apportioned to mileage, is not unconstitutional in the absence of proof that it exceeds what would be legitimate ...
— The Constitution of the United States of America: Analysis and Interpretation • Edward Corwin
... ship, which had gained four or five miles during the lull, was now in plain view again, nearly straight ahead. Her deep lading was telling against her now. The handicap of sail area being overcome, the black pirate's shallow draft and long lines gave her the advantage. Every buccaneer in the crew was howling with excitement as the race went on. The long main boom of the ...
— The Black Buccaneer • Stephen W. Meader
... lace. Even in the heavy atmosphere of the shop's rear, though they appeared somewhat dingy and tarnished, they had their undeniable charm, and I thought with pity of the hands that had to sew on plain serge suits. ...
— The Woman Who Toils - Being the Experiences of Two Gentlewomen as Factory Girls • Mrs. John Van Vorst and Marie Van Vorst
... spires and domes That rise in beauty on its farther bank, While busy multitudes glide up and down With lightly dipping oars and swelling sails. And pilgrims countless as those shining waves, From far and near, from mountain, hill and plain, With dust and travel-stained, foot-sore, heart-sick, Here came to bathe within the sacred stream, Here came to die upon its sacred banks, Seeking to wash the stains of guilt away, Seeking to lay their galling ...
— The Dawn and the Day • Henry Thayer Niles
... answered Beulah. She ill brooked Harriet's plain speech, but remembrances of past affection checked the severe rebuke which more than once ...
— Beulah • Augusta J. Evans
... ever a sense as of something a little out of place. A form of literature so very innocent and primitive looks a little over-written in Lord Lytton's conscious and highly-coloured style. It may be bad taste, but sometimes we should prefer a few sentences of plain prose narration, and a little Bewick by way of tail-piece. So that it is not among those fables that conform most nearly to the old model, but one had nearly said among those that most widely differ from it, that ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. XXII (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... up in Darewell. There were several, in different parts of the town, and so he could not decide where he was. Then, as he listened, he could hear the sound of running water, and he knew he must be near the river. All at once the locality became plain to him. He was in a new house, one of several in a row, on a street ...
— Frank Roscoe's Secret • Allen Chapman
... though compositions still came from his pen, though he had not yet given up hope in himself—'You shall have plenty of music from me; I will give you no cause to complain,' he had remarked to an English publisher shortly before this time—it was plain to those nearest to him that the inexorable finger of death was pointing the way ...
— Story-Lives of Great Musicians • Francis Jameson Rowbotham
... law of the Yukon, and ever she makes it plain: "Send not your foolish and feeble; send me your strong and your sane — Strong for the red rage of battle; sane for I harry them sore; Send me men girt for the combat, men who are grit to the core; Swift as the ...
— The Spell of the Yukon • Robert Service
... to secure its protection there, or rather to protect it south of the line of 36 deg. 30'. Will you do it? Are you going to do it? If you intend to recognize our property south of this line, write it down so plain that my constituents can understand it—so that they will not be cheated. If you intend to do nothing, let us know it at once. We will then know what to expect, and how ...
— A Report of the Debates and Proceedings in the Secret Sessions of the Conference Convention • Lucius Eugene Chittenden
... I know, are more defective or fallacious than these. They are liable to more objections than it is worth while to specify. Suffice it to observe, that they divide certain accented syllables into long and short, and say nothing of the unaccented; whereas it is plain, and acknowledged even by Murray and Sheridan themselves, that in "ant, bonnet, hunger" and the like, the unaccented syllables are the only short ones: the rest can ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... reason why—" But my duty was plain; the audience were already assembling; the early ones in their ...
— Forty Minutes Late - 1909 • F. Hopkinson Smith
... February, 1704, when Major Hertel de Rouville, with upwards of three hundred and forty French and Indians, arrived at a pine bluff overlooking Deerfield meadow, about two miles north of the village—a locality now known as Petty's Plain. Here he halted, to await the appropriate hour for an attack, and it was not until early morning that, leaving their packs upon the spot, his men started forward for their terrible work of destruction. Rouville took great pains not to alarm ...
— The Romance of Old New England Rooftrees • Mary Caroline Crawford
... Liao Tung, or "East of the River Liao," which was then inhabited by Corean tribes, was, if known by tradition at all, certainly only in communication with the remote Chinese colony, or vassal state, in possession of the Peking plain: on the other hand, this vassal state itself (if it had records of its own at all), for the three centuries previous to 842 B.C., had no political relations with the federated Chinese princes, and nothing is known of its internal doings, or of its immediate relations ...
— Ancient China Simplified • Edward Harper Parker
... no time in secretly writing the history of the affair to Sir Hugo, making it plain that but for Deronda's generous devotion he could hardly have failed to win the prize he ...
— Daniel Deronda • George Eliot
... Ginny, with her characteristic bluntness. "I just wanted to amuse the others and make them think I was awfully clever and that was plain outright conceit and selfishness. I guess that's the way I do most things. Well, I've learned a lesson. And there isn't anything I wouldn't do for you, Jerry Travis. If I don't play better basketball Friday night than I ever have in my life, ...
— Highacres • Jane Abbott
... surroundings here, this man, and the voice that was gloatingly pronouncing the death sentence upon the man who had come unbidden into her life, and into her heart, the man she loved. Yes, she understood! Danglar's words had been plain enough. The Adventurer had been trapped—not through Danglar's cunning, or lack of cunning on the Adventurer's own part, but through force of circumstances that had caused him to fling all thought of self-consideration to the winds in an effort to save another's life. Her hands, hidden ...
— The White Moll • Frank L. Packard
... their spoons to their lips, five or six people in plain clothes, and several police officers in uniform, pushed into the room, with a commissary of ...
— Bohemians of the Latin Quarter • Henry Murger
... a tall, dark, fresh-coloured man with sharp grey eyes, his companion had the appearance of an ordinary constable in plain clothes. ...
— A Queen's Error • Henry Curties
... "anger," and the like; and every teacher, who has had much experience in looking over examination papers, will admit that this is a danger to which beginners are very liable. Again, there is the temptation to shrink with a senseless fear from using a plain word twice in the same page, and often from using a plain word at all. This unmanly dread of simplicity, and of what is called "tautology," gives rise to a patchwork made up of scraps of poetic quotations, unmeaning periphrases, and would-be humorous circumlocutions,—a style of all styles ...
— How to Write Clearly - Rules and Exercises on English Composition • Edwin A. Abbott
... bit and plan the dedication; not have a formal service. So then, Billy, you can have your fox-trotting and a good time to all of you, bless you, my children." As he spoke he smiled at the entire group with the most delightful interest and pleasure. He was dressed in a straight black coat with a plain silk vest cut around a white collar that buttoned in the back, and his dull gold mane was brushed down sleek and close to his beautiful head. Not a flash of expression in his strong face showed that he felt any ...
— The Heart's Kingdom • Maria Thompson Daviess
... lines of attack, each deadly. But there are folk whose mental equipment renders them incapable of understanding plain English. Now, my friend Tomlinson will show you what I mean. I'll ask him a simple question, and he will give you a perfect example of a direct answer. Tomlinson, can you tell me what the extrados ...
— The Strange Case of Mortimer Fenley • Louis Tracy
... friends in one voice. "Thank you, my boys. Now, I know why you came here, and that one of you came to earn his feathers by killing an enemy, before he would marry; the girl he is to marry is my granddaughter, as I am the father of the great Medicine Man. In the morning there will pass by in plain sight of here a large party. They will chase the buffalo over on that flat. After they have passed an old man leading a black horse and riding a white one will come by on the trail left by the hunting party. He will be driving about ...
— Myths and Legends of the Sioux • Marie L. McLaughlin
... grade containing this utility, instead of a lower grade of the same thing. In doing this, they forego the purchase of something else altogether, or content themselves with a lower grade of that other commodity. If jeweled watch cases should become cheaper, some persons would substitute them for plain cases and would forego buying, say, pictures which were just within their purchase limit, or would content themselves with cheaper pictures. This taking of one thing within the margin of consumption and discarding others is far less frequently done than is the taking of a lower ...
— Essentials of Economic Theory - As Applied to Modern Problems of Industry and Public Policy • John Bates Clark
... door. In a moment a girl opened it. She had a cigarette in her hand, her face was pale under a mass of reddish-chestnut hair, her eyes very large, a pale brown, as large as the eyes of women in those paintings of Artemisias and Berenikes found in tombs in the Fayum. She wore a plain ...
— Three Soldiers • John Dos Passos
... may lay your soul on't. But, for my part, though I am a plain fellow, yet I scorn to be tricked into paradise; I would he should know it. The truth on't is, an't like you, his reverence bought of me the flower of all the market: these—these are but dogs-meat to them; and a round price ...
— The Works Of John Dryden, Vol. 7 (of 18) - The Duke of Guise; Albion and Albanius; Don Sebastian • John Dryden
... was twenty years old the Ancient One took him up on the battlements, and giving him a strong glass told him to look down upon the capital city on the plain and see what was ...
— The Land of the Blue Flower • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... some rich kind of custard or cream placed in little round pieces of pastry, or we can have a so-called cheese-cake baked in a pie-dish, the edges only of which are lined with puff paste. We can also have cheese-cakes very rich and cheese-cakes very plain. The origin of the name cheese-cake is that originally they were made from curds used in making cheese. Probably most people consider that the cheese-cakes made from curds are superior, and in the North of ...
— Cassell's Vegetarian Cookery - A Manual Of Cheap And Wholesome Diet • A. G. Payne
... over a monotonous plain covered with grass, rank, high, and silky-looking, blown before the breeze into long, shiny waves. The sky was blue above, and the grass a brownish green beneath; wild pigeons and turkeys flew over our heads; the horizontal line had not a single ...
— The Englishwoman in America • Isabella Lucy Bird
... house cannot be built without an architect," answered Contini, laughing, "and it has always been plain to me that there can be no architects without houses to build. But as for any especial credit to me, I refute the charge indignantly. I except the matter of the turret, which is evidently what has attracted the buyer. I always thought it would. You would never have thought of a turret, ...
— Don Orsino • F. Marion Crawford
... did not waken you to tell you that. I have a message for you, Baas, from Mameena, wife of Saduko, whom I met about four hours ago upon the plain yonder." ...
— Child of Storm • H. Rider Haggard
... do right, and most particularly so in all cases with women. I want at this particular time, more than anything else, to do right with you; and if I knew it would be doing right, as I rather suspect it would, to let you alone, I would do it. And for the purpose of making the matter as plain as possible, I now say that you can now drop the subject, dismiss your thoughts (if you ever had any) from me forever, and leave this letter unanswered, without calling forth one accusing murmur from me. And I will even go further, and say that if it will add anything to your comfort or peace ...
— A Short Life of Abraham Lincoln - Condensed from Nicolay & Hay's Abraham Lincoln: A History • John G. Nicolay
... read it as a plain intimation that Rojdestvensky intended to put his fate to the test at Tsu-shima, since, had it been his purpose to make for Tsugaru or Soya, he must have retained the services of these auxiliary ships ...
— Famous Sea Fights - From Salamis to Tsu-Shima • John Richard Hale
... it, because the gummy coating is lacking, as is the twisted and tubular structure, throughout the length of the spokes and throughout the extent of the auxiliary spiral. These pieces, together with the rest of the framework, are made of plain, straight, solid thread. ...
— The Wonders of Instinct • J. H. Fabre
... river AEsarus flowed through the heart of the city at its prime. I looked over the plain, and yonder, towards the distant railway station, I descried a green track, the course of the all but stagnant and wholly pestilential stream, still called Esaro. Near its marshy mouth are wide orange orchards. Could one but see ...
— By the Ionian Sea - Notes of a Ramble in Southern Italy • George Gissing
... the party to whom such service or labor may be due" from being carried into effect. But these acts of State legislation, although they may cause embarrassment and create expense, can not derogate either from the duty or the authority of Congress to carry out fully and fairly the plain and imperative constitutional provision for the delivery of persons bound to labor in one State and escaping into another to the party to whom such labor may be due. It is quite clear that by the resolution of Congress ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents, Volume - V, Part 1; Presidents Taylor and Fillmore • James D. Richardson
... his somewhat searching examination, and even offered to withdraw his name, that Shock decided to cast to the winds all his preconceived notions of what constituted fitness for enrollment in the Church of the living God, and proceeded to ask Ike some plain, common sense questions. ...
— The Prospector - A Tale of the Crow's Nest Pass • Ralph Connor |
