"Rapidity" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... a cessation of growth for a short time. Later, at about twelve years, girls take on a particularly rapid growth, and decidedly exceed boys of the same age in weight, and sometimes in height also. At fifteen or sixteen years the rapidity of growth in girls, both in weight and height, will be greatly diminished, while boys of this age will often begin to develop very rapidly, and will soon materially exceed the other sex in ...
— The Mother and Her Child • William S. Sadler
... surface-feeding fish with an ivory-white spot on the top of its head, which he had found at Vehar in the stream below the bund. It took him some time to identify these particular fishes (Haplochilus lineatus), and in the meantime he dubbed them "Scooties" from the lightning rapidity of their movements, and in his own admirable manner made himself a sharer of their joys and sorrows, their cares and interests. With these he stocked the ornamental fountains of Bombay to keep them from becoming breeding-grounds for mosquitoes, and they are ...
— Concerning Animals and Other Matters • E.H. Aitken, (AKA Edward Hamilton)
... rate from 3 P. M., until about 7:30 P. M., when there was a sudden rise of four feet in as many seconds. (Hundreds of people, undoubtedly, were killed and drowned during those four seconds.) I was standing at my front door, which was partly open, watching the water, which was flowing with great rapidity from east to west. The water at this time was about eight inches deep in my residence, and the sudden rise of four feet brought it to my neck before I could change my position. The tide rose in the next hour nearly five feet additional, making ...
— The Boy with the U. S. Weather Men • Francis William Rolt-Wheeler
... twisted—they heaved their great frames against each other—they struggled—their action became rapid—they swayed each other this way and that—their eyes like fire—their teeth locked, and their nostrils dilated. Sometimes they twined about each other like serpents, and twirled round with such rapidity, that it was impossible to distinguish them—sometimes, when a pull of more than ordinary power took place, they seemed to cling together almost without motion, bending down until their heads nearly touched the ground, their cracking joints seeming to stretch by the effort, and the muscles of their ...
— The Station; The Party Fight And Funeral; The Lough Derg Pilgrim • William Carleton
... pretty a young man should be employed in such an errand." She accompanied these words with so tender an accent and so wanton a leer, that Fireblood, who was no backward youth, began to take her by the hand, and proceeded so warmly, that, to imitate his actions with the rapidity of our narration, he in a few minutes ravished this fair creature, or at least would have ravished her, if she had not, by a timely compliance, ...
— The History of the Life of the Late Mr. Jonathan Wild the Great • Henry Fielding
... fact, in a short time, completely "used up," and then he determined upon returning to England, and finding out the dear object of his attachment at once. This resolution was no sooner taken, than his health and spirits returned to him, and with what rapidity he could, he now made his way to ...
— Varney the Vampire - Or the Feast of Blood • Thomas Preskett Prest
... and down one side of the room whilst the old professor was talking. I observed that he was smoking with extraordinary rapidity. It was evident that he shared our host's liking for ...
— The Return of Sherlock Holmes • Arthur Conan Doyle
... McGuire Ellis late in the afternoon of the day after the Willard party. Fascinated, he had watched that expert journalist go through page after page of copy, with what seemed superhuman rapidity and address, distribute the finished product variously upon hooks, boxes, and copy-boys, and, the immediate task being finished, lapse upon his desk and fall asleep. Meantime, the owner himself faced the unpleasant prospect of being smothered under the downfall of ...
— The Clarion • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... that they were attended to before she would go on. She looked into the saw-mill itself in the by-going, and made sure that Rob McTurk was in due attendance on the whirling machinery which was turning off the spools, as it seemed to me, with the rapidity of light. She inquired as to ...
— The Dew of Their Youth • S. R. Crockett
... hands. Why did he not kill himself at once? Why impose on himself this hour of waiting, of anguish and torture? He could not have told. He began again to think over the events of his life, reflecting on the headlong rapidity of the occurrences which had brought him to that wretched room. How time had passed! It seemed but yesterday that he first began to borrow. It does little good, however, to a man who has fallen to the bottom of the abyss, to know the causes ...
— The Mystery of Orcival • Emile Gaboriau
... the news got about—which it did with astounding rapidity—the entire town was in a fit of merriment over the latest exploit of the wily Langford and the discomfiture of DeRue Hannington; and early the following morning, when the local police magistrate was still negotiating his matutinal egg, the little Courtroom ...
— The Spoilers of the Valley • Robert Watson
... translated into Latin by Pessuri, a Dominican monk of Bologna. Copies of the original manuscript, though written in the Venetian dialect, which is extremely different from the Tuscan or pure Italian, were multiplied with great rapidity in all parts of Italy, and even made their way into France and Germany. From one or more of these, corrupted by the carelessness or ignorance of transcribers, some of whom may have abridged the work, ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 1 • Robert Kerr
... and macrame, to confuse the movements of the two. As soon as you realize that the upward drawing of the needle and the downward pressure of the stuff with the thimble must be simultaneous, you will find that you can work with great rapidity and with admirable results. Thread with a very strong twist, which the hook will not split, is the only suitable kind for tambouring. Of the D.M.C materials, Fil d'Alsace[A] and Fil a dentelle[A] are the ...
— Encyclopedia of Needlework • Therese de Dillmont
... he could be checked, Tom stepped to the opening, and with the rapidity born of habit lifted himself out, and then holding on by the sill, lowered his legs into the ...
— The Vast Abyss - The Story of Tom Blount, his Uncles and his Cousin Sam • George Manville Fenn
... shading them occasionally from the worst heat, are more than equal to anything a hothouse in England can produce. An idea may be formed of the really marvellous fertility of the soil and climate by the rapidity with which seeds develop. I remember one summer, when some of the new gardens were being laid out in the Buen Retiro, a grand concert and evening fete was to be given as the opening function. On the evening before this entertainment was to take place we happened to be near, and strolled in ...
— Spanish Life in Town and Country • L. Higgin and Eugene E. Street
... credit for the success of his newspaper on the men who worked under him, listened to John's story with interest. It was John's first meeting with the "chief," for whom even Brennan, with all his skepticism, had a profound respect and the rapidity with which the publisher gave his decision ...
— Spring Street - A Story of Los Angeles • James H. Richardson
... encountered a great multitude, now headed for purposes of peace by Walter Gerard. His mind inflamed by the accounts he had received, and hating at all times any popular demonstration, his lordship resolved without inquiry or preparation immediately to disperse them. The Riot Act was read with the rapidity with which grace is sometimes said at the head of a public table—a ceremony of which none but the performer and his immediate friends are conscious. The people were fired on and sabred. The indignant spirit of Gerard resisted; he struck ...
— Sybil - or the Two Nations • Benjamin Disraeli
... not yet paid for their claims. And so the Organic Act of 1838 continued to serve the people of Iowa as the code of fundamental law. Robert Lucas was disappointed, but he had to admit that the Territory went on increasing in population and wealth with phenomenal rapidity, notwithstanding the "facts" in the history of the Old Northwest. Not even the "imperfect conditions of Territorial government" seemed to affect in the slightest degree the economic prosperity and improvement ...
— History of the Constitutions of Iowa • Benjamin F. Shambaugh
... was resolved should be forced as rapidly as possible. A forlorn hope of thirty brave fellows were ordered to explore the dangerous pass: and Marion, though but a young lieutenant, had the honor to be appointed their leader. At the head of his command he advanced with rapidity, while the army moved on to support him. But scarcely had they entered the gloomy defile, when, from behind the rocks and trees, a sheet of fire suddenly blazed forth, which killed twenty-one of his men! With the remainder, he faced about and pushed back with all ...
— The Life of General Francis Marion • Mason Locke Weems
... vestry during the service, writing out notes on the inside of envelopes torn open, with the stump of a pencil which would only make marks at a certain angle. The service proceeded with a shocking rapidity, and when he got to the pulpit, spread out his envelopes, and addressed himself to the consideration of the blessings of the Harvest, he found on drawing to an end that he had only consumed about four minutes. He went through the whole again, slightly varying the phraseology, and ...
— Hugh - Memoirs of a Brother • Arthur Christopher Benson
... same way at any kind of discomfort. It begins before the end of the first year to croon when it is contented. As it grows older it begins to make different sounds when it experiences different emotions. And with remarkable rapidity its repertoire of articulatory ...
— Human Traits and their Social Significance • Irwin Edman
... sentiment which forms the groundwork of the drama, nothing in fact can equal the power of the picture, but its inexpressible sweetness and its perfect grace: the passion which has taken possession of Juliet's whole soul, has the force, the rapidity, the resistless violence of the torrent: but she is herself as "moving delicate," as fair, as soft, as flexible as the willow that bends over it, whose light leaves tremble even with the motion of the ...
— Characteristics of Women - Moral, Poetical, and Historical • Anna Jameson
... feverish haste and in unbroken silence, every moment flashing quick glances at the figure of the lookout who stood on the crest above, half dimmed in the shadow of a willow clump. Judging by their rapidity and ...
— The Spoilers • Rex Beach
... once the pride of the seas in all the great ocean highways of commerce. To my mind, few more important subjects so imperatively demand its intelligent consideration. The United States has progressed with marvelous rapidity in every field of enterprise and endeavor until we have become foremost in nearly all the great lines of inland trade, commerce, and industry. Yet, while this is true, our American merchant marine has been steadily ...
— Messages and Papers of William McKinley V.2. • William McKinley
... pup, ranging in the bushes, growled savagely. Momentarily the ranger lifted his eyes, letting his axe head sink to the ground. Something moved under it, and at the same instant a hideous head reared itself above the leaves and struck with lightning-like rapidity, hitting the ranger just above the wrist-bone. With a startled exclamation the ranger drew up his arm. As he did so, a huge rattler glided away ...
— The Young Wireless Operator—As a Fire Patrol - The Story of a Young Wireless Amateur Who Made Good as a Fire Patrol • Lewis E. Theiss
... game begins in the melancholy evening. The ball, thrown with much strength, flies, strikes the wall in great, quick blows, then rebounds, and traverses the air with the rapidity ...
— Ramuntcho • Pierre Loti
... not less than five waterfalls, one of which was rather steep, and was running at the rate of ten or twelve miles an hour. Above this part the water was about fifteen yards from side to side, and came down with some rapidity, a fall of rain having swollen the stream. Their navigation was here so intricate, lying between large pieces of rock that had been borne down by torrents, and some stumps of trees which they could not always see, that (after having ...
— An Account of the English Colony in New South Wales, Vol. 1 • David Collins
... months the little force moved about in Catalonia, the rapidity of its marches baffling the attempts of the archduke's forces to interfere with its operations. These were principally directed against various small fortresses, held by partisans of Charles. Several ...
— In the Irish Brigade - A Tale of War in Flanders and Spain • G. A. Henty
... dealing with a boy now, however, but with the strongest man in Hillcrest. Tom knew this, but in his rage he had thrown reason to the wind. With lightning rapidity Captain Josh reached up, caught Tom by the arm, and in a twinkling brought him sprawling upon the side of the road. With an ugly oath, the teamster tried to regain his feet, but he was helpless in the grip of the captain's powerful arm. He writhed and cursed, but all in vain, and ...
— Rod of the Lone Patrol • H. A. Cody
... is like this," he said, mumbling rapidly, and scribbling a series of figures and letters which the pupil was expected to follow with intelligent interest. But the rapidity of the processes quite dazed Margaret: a result not unusual when the teacher understands his topic so well, and so much as a matter of course that he cannot make allowance for the benighted darkness ...
— The Mark Of Cain • Andrew Lang
... like that of Newera Ellia, even twelve months make a great change in the appearance of a new settlement; plants and shrubs spring up with wonderful rapidity, and a garden of one year's growth, without attendance, ...
— Eight Years' Wandering in Ceylon • Samuel White Baker
... plunderers. After his arrival at Me[vs]ica the trouble was brought to an end. Nor was it long before the Serbian troops, riding up through their own country at a rate which no one had foreseen, crossed the Danube and occupied the Banat, in conjunction with the French. The rapidity of this advance astounded the Roumanians; they gaped like Lavengro when he wondered how the stones ever came to Stonehenge.... When the Serbian commandant at Ver[vs]ac invited these enterprising Roumanian officers to an interview he was asked ...
— The Birth of Yugoslavia, Volume 2 • Henry Baerlein
... long-drawn 'ca-awk' he flew to find his mate, for it would soon be time to repair the nest in the limes. The butterflies came again and the year was completed, yet it seemed but a few days to the squire. Perhaps if he lived for a thousand years, after a while he would wonder at the rapidity with which ...
— Field and Hedgerow • Richard Jefferies
... but without apparent haste. The success of their efforts depended upon rapidity of execution, that and the most exact care for the detail of their organization. Provided these things were held foremost in their minds there was small enough chance of interruption. Had not the train, with ...
— The Law-Breakers • Ridgwell Cullum
... were not, like the religion itself, in the main Arabic in origin. "Primitive Arabian art itself is quite negligible. When the new strength of the followers of the Prophet was consolidated with great rapidity into a rich and powerful empire, it took over the arts and artists of the conquered lands, extending from North Africa to Persia" (p. 158); and it is known how this influence spread as far west as Spain and as far east as Indonesia. "The Pharos at Alexandria, the ...
— The Evolution of the Dragon • G. Elliot Smith
... But the spirit of the two crews had changed. The French were discouraged by their failure, and the British were exultant over their success. Consequently the guns of the English ship were fired with far more rapidity and precision than those of the French. Several of the port-holes of the French ship were knocked into one, and when at last her mainmast, which had been hit several times, fell over her side, her flag was run down amidst tremendous cheering from ...
— By Conduct and Courage • G. A. Henty
... this movement can be better explained than by supposing that all those of the luminous bodies which are liquid, such as flames, and apparently the sun and the stars, are composed of particles which float in a much more subtle medium which agitates them with great rapidity, and makes them strike against the particles of the ether which surrounds them, and which are much smaller than they. But I hold also that in luminous solids such as charcoal or metal made red hot in the fire, this same movement is caused by the violent ...
— Treatise on Light • Christiaan Huygens
... with astonishing rapidity. The recruits were not fighting men in a military sense, but their hearts were true and they hungered for the chance to stamp out the evil that lay at their feet. By the close of the second day nearly three thousand men were encamped above the city. Late ...
— Truxton King - A Story of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... Government-industry cooperation, a strong work ethic, mastery of high technology, and a comparatively small defense allocation (roughly 1% of GDP) have helped Japan advance with extraordinary rapidity to the rank of second most powerful economy in the world. Industry, the most important sector of the economy, is heavily dependent on imported raw materials and fuels. Usually self-sufficient in rice, Japan must import about 50% of its requirements of other grain and fodder crops. Japan ...
— The 1995 CIA World Factbook • United States Central Intelligence Agency
... still raining Tuesday morning, and camp was not moved till afternoon, when we crossed the river. Though smooth here, it flowed with fearful rapidity, and in midstream carried the canoe, as if it had been a feather, at locomotive speed. Three-quarters of a mile above where we crossed the course of the river bent away to the east, and we could see the water leaping and tossing in a wild rapid as it came round ...
— A Woman's Way Through Unknown Labrador • Mina Benson Hubbard (Mrs. Leonidas Hubbard, Junior)
... traversing, rapidity is only a secondary consideration, the remarkable fact being in the endurance of fatigue and the continuity of the exercise. William Gale walked 1500 miles in a thousand consecutive hours, and then ...
— Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine • George M. Gould
... considered the most valuable. These are principally charts, maps, grants, and papal bulls, all relating to early English history. Several of the presses were then removed bodily, but as the fire spread with alarming rapidity, and there was a delay in the arrival of the engines, it was discovered none too soon, that the backs of some of the presses were on fire. Then the books were seized and thrown out of windows, after which they ...
— Studies from Court and Cloister • J.M. Stone
... could have been more acceptable in his eyes than this addition to the circle below-stairs. Capua's hat was in his hand at once, and bows and curtsies and articulations and gesticulations followed with such confusing rapidity, that, when the mutually pleased pair turned in company toward the kitchens, a scrap of white paper, that had fluttered down in the disorder, was suffered to remain unnoticed on the floor. The courier had lost his despatch. Coming ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 6, No. 37, November, 1860 • Various
... And with the rapidity of lightning, in the silence which followed, he went back to his original criticism of himself, that he was a fool. Naturally she would request him to leave. She ...
— The Grim Smile of the Five Towns • Arnold Bennett
... growth, although that does not appear to be very much greater than in the oak. Some cedars, which have been planted in a soil well adapted to them, at Lord Carnarvon's, at Highclere, have grown with extraordinary rapidity. Of the cedars planted in the royal garden at Chelsea, in 1683, two had, in eighty-three years, acquired a circumference of more than twelve feet, at two feet from the ground, while their branches increased over a circular space forty feet ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. - Volume XIII, No. 369, Saturday, May 9, 1829. • Various
... points, and bring us, gaping, to a standstill. The shutters of the two windows were suddenly closed before our eyes with a clap that came sharply on the wind. Then, in a twinkling, one window flew open again and a man, seemingly naked, bounded from it, fled with inconceivable rapidity across the front of the house and vanished through the other window, which opened to receive him. He had scarcely gained that shelter before a coal-black figure followed him, leaping out of the one window and in at the other with the same astonishing swiftness—a swiftness which was so great ...
— From the Memoirs of a Minister of France • Stanley Weyman
... young companions in the labyrinth and mazes of the castle gardens at hide-and-seek, or similar games of activity, she became animated with the same supernatural alertness which was supposed to inspire her in the dance. She appeared amongst her companions, and vanished from them with a degree of rapidity which was inconceivable; and hedges, treillage, or such like obstructions, were surmounted by her in a manner which the most vigilant eye could not detect; for, after being observed on the other side of the barrier at one instant, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume XIII, No. 370, Saturday, May 16, 1829. • Various
... and a small body of the rioters cut off from The Warren beckoned to their pals, they forced into a very remarkable postchaise Dolly Varden and Emma Haredale, and bore them away with all possible rapidity; one of their company driving, and the rest running beside the chaise, climbing up behind, sitting on the top, lighting the way with their torches, etc. etc. If you can express the women inside without showing them—as by a fluttering veil, a delicate arm, or so forth ...
— The Letters of Charles Dickens - Vol. 1 (of 3), 1833-1856 • Charles Dickens
... real beginning of it to Doctor Harpe, whose intelligence enabled her to realize to the utmost the position in which she now had irrevocably placed herself. She turned abruptly and walked to her office with a nervous rapidity ...
— The Lady Doc • Caroline Lockhart
... in the ward by the contest was prodigious, and the victory of this lad was as incomprehensible to the others as to Kobylin himself. The rapidity with which the blows were delivered, and the ease with which Godfrey had evaded the rushes of his opponent, seemed to them, as to him, almost magical, and from that moment they regarded Godfrey as ...
— Condemned as a Nihilist - A Story of Escape from Siberia • George Alfred Henty
... and crinoline, for whom a carriage and pair of horses is always waiting immediately after dinner, whose fathers' pockets are bursting with dollars, it is a very gay place. Dancing and flirtations come as a matter of course, and matrimony follows after with only too great rapidity. But the place was not very gay ...
— The Courtship of Susan Bell • Anthony Trollope
... Rae, how very clever of you to discover that!" replied Miss Brodie, smiling sweetly into Mr. Rae's radiant face. "And how very sweet of you—ah, I beg your pardon; that is—" The disconcerting rapidity with which Mr. Rae's smile gave place to an appearance of grave, of even severe solemnity, threw Miss Brodie quite "out of her stride," as Martin said afterward, and left her floundering in a hopeless attempt to complete ...
— Corporal Cameron • Ralph Connor
... Further, Augustine says (De Divin. Daemon. iii), that "the demons' rapidity of movement enables them to tell things unknown to us." But agility of movement would be useless in that respect unless their knowledge was impeded by local distance; which, therefore, is a much greater hindrance ...
— Summa Theologica, Part I (Prima Pars) - From the Complete American Edition • Thomas Aquinas
... passed, with terrible rapidity through his brain—chimeras which were hard facts; rapidity, which was ...
— The Man Who Laughs • Victor Hugo
... words, but also that he was known among the natives as one white man not an animal-killer. His name Son of Power had followed him to Hurda; word about him had travelled with mysterious rapidity. To his amazement Skag found that the people of Hurda knew something of the story of the tiger-pit and his part in delivering the Grass Jungle people from the toils and tributes of the great snake. . . . He was not ...
— Son of Power • Will Levington Comfort and Zamin Ki Dost
... But during a flood it becomes converted into a raging torrent, and you can hear its roar a mile off. Within about five hours the water in it had risen not less than twenty feet! This will give you an idea of the tremendous force and rapidity of the rainfall in this country. Of course the damage done was great, in MacCullum's as in Deep Creek. A heavy timber bridge had been carried quite away, not a trace of it remaining. Many miners' huts in the low ground had been washed away; while ...
— A Boy's Voyage Round the World • The Son of Samuel Smiles
... the winter of 18—, there was a heavy rain, accompanied by high winds, which swelled the waters of the Sandy river to an amazing height, and every moving thing upon its surface was borne away with the rapidity of lightning. Standing upon its margin was Frank Somers, his eyes fixed with intense interest upon a frail raft that was plunging and heaving among the boiling waves. Upon it stood a man about the middle ...
— Withered Leaves from Memory's Garland • Abigail Stanley Hanna
... into his seat in the corner, striving to hide his bedraggled apparel. He tucked a paper napkin into the front of his waistcoat, and so hid the hideous color scheme of the gaudy shirt, the stripes of which had spread with wondrous rapidity. Then he buttoned his coat tightly to hide the ruined waistcoat; but the coat was tight anyway, and the ducking had done it ...
— The Girls of Central High on Lake Luna - or, The Crew That Won • Gertrude W. Morrison
... character, had exhausted for the time the resources of the Government as regarded transport and supplies. Promptitude of advance on the part of the force to which had been assigned the line of invasion by the Khyber-Jellalabad route, was of scarcely less moment than the rapidity of the stroke which Roberts was commissioned to deliver. The former's was a treble duty. One of its tasks was to open up and maintain Roberts' communications with India, so that the closing of the Shutargurdan should not leave him isolated. Another duty resting on the ...
— The Afghan Wars 1839-42 and 1878-80 • Archibald Forbes
... will be regarded by him who receives it, when it is altogether neglected by him who gives it. We do not defend Buckingham; but what was his guilt to Bacon's? Buckingham was young, ignorant, thoughtless, dizzy with the rapidity of his ascent and the height of his position. That he should be eager to serve his relations, his flatterers, his mistresses, that he should not fully apprehend the immense importance of a pure administration of justice, that he should ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 2 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... paying well at Dover, we set out yesterday morning in the Express coach, a noble carriage, drawn by four English horses, such as no prince need be ashamed of. With four persons within, four in front, and four behind, we dashed on with the rapidity of lightning, through this inexpressibly beautiful country: meadows of the loveliest green, gardens blooming with flowers, and every building displaying a neatness and elegance which form a striking contrast to the dirt of France. The majestic river, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 17, No. 477, Saturday, February 19, 1831 • Various
... hour before high water. It is obvious that if sewage is discharged about two hours after high water the current will be nearing its maximum speed, but it will only have about three hours to run before it turns; so that, although the sewage may be removed with the maximum rapidity from the vicinity of the sea outfall, it will not be carried to any very great distance, and, of course, the greater the distance it is carried the more it will be diffused. It must be remembered that the foregoing data are only applicable to the locality they relate to, ...
— The Sewerage of Sea Coast Towns • Henry C. Adams
... an earthquake shock through the earth takes place with wonderful rapidity. The elastic wave varies in velocity from 800 to 1,000 feet per second in sand or clay to three miles per second ...
— Complete Story of the San Francisco Horror • Richard Linthicum
... also many Pisachas, O master, of diverse forms and all daubed with fragrant powders of diverse hues, and dancing with joyous hearts in accompaniment with instruments of different kinds made of brass. Surrounded by these who move with electric rapidity in the mazes of the dance or refrain at times altogether from forward or backward or transverse motion of every kind, Mahadeva dwells there. That delightful spot on the mountains, we have heard, is the favourite abode of the great Deity. It ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 4 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... not be co-extensive with space, it must at all events extend as far as the most distant visible stars. In fact it is the vehicle of their light, and without it they could not be seen. This all-pervading substance takes up their molecular tremors, and conveys them with inconceivable rapidity to our organs of vision. It is the transported shiver of bodies countless millions of miles distant, which translates itself in human consciousness into the splendour of the ...
— Fragments of science, V. 1-2 • John Tyndall
... a Moscow paper in 1880, and after some difficulty he secured a position connected with several of the smaller periodicals, for which, during his student years, he poured forth a succession of short stories and sketches of Russian life with incredible rapidity. He wrote, he tells us, during every spare minute, in crowded rooms where there was "no light and less air," and never spent more than a day on any one story. He also wrote at this time a very stirring blood-and-thunder ...
— Swan Song • Anton Checkov
... carelessness where before had been art, precision, and cleanliness. To-day Paris streets are clean. There is even more evidence of rebuilding and of modern conveniences. Motor street-sweepers whirl through the squares, not singly but in pairs and more extended series, and they move with automobile rapidity, quickly cleansing ...
— The Audacious War • Clarence W. Barron
... terrific delivery of an American professional pitcher, the average cricketer is compelled to acknowledge the wide difference existing between the two positions. Then again, the quick handling of a batted or thrown ball, that it may be returned with all accuracy and lightning like rapidity to the waiting basemen are points which our cricketers are deficient in, when compared with the American professional ball player. It can be seen at a glance that the game is prolific of opportunities ...
— Spalding's Baseball Guide and Official League Book for 1889 • edited by Henry Chadwick
... tongue began to play in and out of its mouth with great rapidity. Apparently it was so confused or dazed that it could not see clearly and was feeling for the antagonist that was so near. The decisive moment had arrived. A massive forefoot bristling with claws an ...
— The Black Phantom • Leo Edward Miller
... a window, gazing vaguely out into the moist blue obscurity. Sidsall, she realized, was maturing with a disconcerting rapidity. Depths were opening in the girl's being at which she, her mother, could only guess. It was exactly as if a crystal through and through which she had gazed had suddenly been veiled by rosy clouds. ...
— Java Head • Joseph Hergesheimer
... the canoes were side by side, and with astonishing rapidity the luggage of the Landers found its way into those of their opponents. This mode of proceeding was not relished by them at all, and Richard Lander's gun being loaded with two balls and four slugs, he took deliberate aim at the leader, and ...
— Lander's Travels - The Travels of Richard Lander into the Interior of Africa • Robert Huish
... shut up his books with a sigh—for, like most books, though full of generalities, they did not tell him much—and went to bed. Before he had been asleep very long, however, the surgery bell was violently rung, and, having dressed himself with the rapidity characteristic of doctors and schoolboys, he descended to find a frightened footman waiting outside, from whom he gathered that something dreadful had happened to Lady Bellamy, who had been found lying apparently dead ...
— Dawn • H. Rider Haggard
... work. The water tore through the nostril-pipe, boring a hole with such rapidity that the tall beam dropped into the socket with startling suddenness. Still breathing torrents, the pipe was withdrawn: the clutching sand seized, grappled the stake. ...
— Lippincott's Magazine Of Popular Literature And Science, No. 23, February, 1873, Vol. XI. • Various
... to the opening between the rocks, where, upon seeing that there was open country beyond, the Indian at once crouched and approached cautiously, dropping flat upon the earth next moment, and crawling over the ground with a rapidity that astonished his companion, who was watching his face directly after, to try and read therefrom whether he belonged to the band of Indians in the open ...
— The Silver Canyon - A Tale of the Western Plains • George Manville Fenn
... consolation in Charley's rapid progress towards health. He was gaining with astonishing rapidity and bid fair to be completely ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... for exertion being over, his spirits fell with the rapidity of a spring too highly wound up, which snaps and runs down to immobility. He entered his tent and threw himself on the bed, from which he did not raise ...
— Thaddeus of Warsaw • Jane Porter
... to return to-morrow. By emphasizing the impression of an annoyance of to-day we are making it possible to suffer beyond expression from annoyances to come; and the annoyances, the pains, the disagreeable feelings will find their old brain-grooves with remarkable rapidity when given the ghost ...
— As a Matter of Course • Annie Payson Call
... I feel on touching a cold body, is in proportion to the rapidity with which my hand yields its heat ...
— Conversations on Chemistry, V. 1-2 • Jane Marcet
... Doonas where the river rushes over huge mountain-rocks, affording a passage which the more daring only will make; for the current—narrowed to a boat's breadth—rushes along with such frightful rapidity, that the deviation of a few inches ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors - Vol. II Great Britain And Ireland, Part Two • Francis W. Halsey
... her door and then sat at the window lost in thought. When once the idea of suicide has entered the mind it is apt to grow with startling rapidity. She reviewed the whole position; she went over all the arguments and searched the moral horizon for some feasible avenue of escape. But she could find none that would save Geoffrey, except this. Yes, she would do it, as many another wretched woman had done before her, ...
— Beatrice • H. Rider Haggard
... when you came to me and started to grow out of your clothes with such alarming rapidity. When your white satin, long-waisted frock grew too small for you, you said, for you did not like giving it up, 'I can really get into it if I hold myself in like this. And anyhow ...
— Love of Brothers • Katharine Tynan
... and after he went away I continued my studies in the evenings when other boys were at play, so that I quickly mastered all those necessary preliminaries. I consequently got over them at school with a rapidity which astonished the master, and with no little pride I heard the inspector, a naval captain, remark, "First-rate boy—beats his brother—be a master in ...
— The Two Whalers - Adventures in the Pacific • W.H.G. Kingston
... we met with another and larger branch of the same stream, and at the end of an hour and a quarter reached the Nahr el Kebir (the ancient Eleutherus), near a ruined bridge. This is a large torrent, dangerous at this period of the year from its rapidity. The Hamah caravans have been known to remain encamped on its banks for weeks together, without being able to cross it. On the opposite side stands a Khan, called Ayash, with the tomb of the ...
— Travels in Syria and the Holy Land • John Burckhardt
... intelligence which is now brought down almost to the hour of the morning on which it is circulated. The Times Newspaper, which was the first to adopt this astonishing invention, is still printed by it with a rapidity which is scarcely conceivable.[10-*] An inspection of it cannot fail to gratify every intelligent observer. Its use has now ...
— The Author's Printing and Publishing Assistant • Frederick Saunders
... forty-nine guns, Captain Dacres, by the American frigate Constitution, fifty-five guns, Captain Isaac Hull, made British contempt give place to surprise. In this naval battle the Americans proved their superiority in rapidity and accuracy of fire, and it is perhaps needless to say that they showed themselves fully the equals of the British in bravery. It is pleasant to read in the official report of Captain Dacres the following tribute to his generous foe: "I feel it ...
— The Land We Live In - The Story of Our Country • Henry Mann
... latest frightfulness, retaliation by Prussian myrmidons, abductions, murders, and I don't know what besides—and you will have some faint idea of the tumultuous episodes of The Men Who Wrought (CHAPMAN AND HALL). To say that the story moves is vastly to understate its headlong rapidity of action. And, while I hardly fancy that the characters themselves will carry overwhelming conviction, there remains, in the theory of the submersible liner and application to political facts, enough genuine wisdom to lift the tale out of the company of six-shilling shockers. To this extent at ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 150, May 10, 1916 • Various
... requires, however, to be administered at the proper moment, and it was in the discovery of the right moment that he showed especial skill, noting most carefully the slightest symptom of disorder or undue rapidity of the pulse. It chanced that once, when he was returning to town from his country house, he observed an enormous funeral procession in the suburbs of the city. A huge multitude of men who had come out to ...
— The Apologia and Florida of Apuleius of Madaura • Lucius Apuleius
... are: the subject of the picture, the lens and its aperture, the rapidity of the plate, and last, but not by any means least, the quality of the light by which the work ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 492, June 6, 1885 • Various
... of such apparently unwieldy bulk as an elephant could possibly have distorted himself as many did. Some curled their trunks about till they looked like huge writhing snakes. One kept curling up his proboscis and letting it fly open again with the greatest rapidity. It was almost harrowing to our feelings to see the whole ground below us covered with such huge, struggling, writhing masses. I made a remark to that ...
— My First Voyage to Southern Seas • W.H.G. Kingston
... In the rapidity and scope of intellectual and material progress, the age of Elizabeth is unequaled in English history. The nation seemed to pass from the darkness of night into a sunshine which would never end. Freed from the trammels which had hitherto ...
— A History of English Prose Fiction • Bayard Tuckerman
... be no operating room connected with this ward, and the operations, however painful or dreadful, were of necessity performed in the ward itself. The scenes presented were enough to appal the stoutest nerves. The men exhausted by marching and by a long journey after their wounds, died with great rapidity—in one day forty-eight were carried out dead—many reaching the hospital only in time ...
— Woman's Work in the Civil War - A Record of Heroism, Patriotism, and Patience • Linus Pierpont Brockett
... and their bronze vessels among the reeds in the Ancre; one could hardly believe one was in France. And where was one? Surely in a place and seeing a life that never existed before, and never will again. The rapidity with which these Indians (they were a cleaning-up party) changed the whole face of Thiepval and that part of the Ancre ...
— An Onlooker in France 1917-1919 • William Orpen
... beings as they have usually been represented. In their own arts they are admirable. A cap being fixed at thirty yards distance, they transfixed it with a spear, delivered by the throwing-stick with the rapidity of an arrow from the bow of a practised archer. In tracking animals or men they show most wonderful sagacity; and I heard of several of their remarks which manifested considerable acuteness. They will not, however, cultivate the ground, or build houses and remain stationary, or even take ...
— The Voyage of the Beagle • Charles Darwin
... concave face of a coming wave. On its summit a white edging arose with the aspect of a lace frill; it broadened, and fell over the front with a terrible concussion. Then all before them was a sheet of whiteness, which spread with amazing rapidity, till they found themselves standing in the midst of it, as in a field of snow. Both felt an insidious chill encircling their ankles, and they rapidly ran ...
— The Hand of Ethelberta • Thomas Hardy
... through the country. Southern excitement became intense, amounted almost to panic. The activity of the anti-slavery press, the stream of anti-slavery publications, which had, indeed, increased with singular rapidity, was exaggerated by the Southern imagination, struck it with a sort of terror. There were meetings held in many parts of the South, tremendous scenes enacted there. In Charleston, South Carolina, the post-office was broken ...
— William Lloyd Garrison - The Abolitionist • Archibald H. Grimke
... eyes to a certain softness, of which they are very capable, and your face to smiles, which become it more than most faces I know. Give all your motions, too, an air of 'douceur', which is directly the reverse of their present celerity and rapidity. I wish you would adopt a little of 'l'air du Couvent' (you very well know what I mean) to a certain degree; it has something extremely engaging; there is a mixture of benevolence, affection, and unction in it; it is frequently really sincere, but ...
— The PG Edition of Chesterfield's Letters to His Son • The Earl of Chesterfield
... after the day's work, sitting "on the high stone of the kitchen hearth, where round logs of green oak were blazing," he would evoke, in his picturesque and figurative language, the memories of an old campaigner, he charmed all the household and the evening seemed to pass with strange rapidity. ...
— Fabre, Poet of Science • Dr. G.V. (C.V.) Legros
... lightning, and the death-bolts had come from they knew not where. With almost the rapidity of thought the rifles were again loaded and the whole united band rushed forward upon the Indians who were now flying wildly in all directions. Instinct taught them to perform all sorts of gyrations ...
— Christopher Carson • John S. C. Abbott
... universally provided with a man having exactly his attainments and no others. In less than a month he was installed in a responsible position as their foreign correspondent and in receipt of a very respectable salary. The rapidity of phrasing in this movement was abnormal—prestissimo, in fact, if we indulge our musical vocabulary. But the instrumentation would have seemed less surprising to Sally had she known the lengths her mother had gone in the proffer of a substantial guarantee ...
— Somehow Good • William de Morgan
... know until I read this book on divorce that he so little understood newspapers and their writers. Commenting on the fact that the Press is sensible enough to use divorce as a news item, he says: 'The newspapers are full of an astonishing hilarity about the rapidity with which hundreds of thousands of human families are being broken up by the lawyers; and about the undisguised haste of the "hustling" judges who carry on the work.' I wonder if Mr. Chesterton ever reads the leaders of certain papers, ...
— Gilbert Keith Chesterton • Patrick Braybrooke
... a faint, fan-shaped aurora above a dun rampart of clouds. His love of nature was no less keen than his appreciation of people and events. The mathematician and the poet held alternate sway over him. This di-psychic quality was evidenced by the rapidity with which the expression of his eye would frequently change from cold calculation to a certain rapt observation, as if he looked up from a complicated problem to contemplate a glimpse of blue distance. Thus it was that he appreciated ...
— The Mayor of Warwick • Herbert M. Hopkins
... of the rural districts of the United States where money does not circulate with great rapidity services are paid for "in kind." Farmers, for example, will give potatoes, eggs, etc., in payment for debts. A young surgeon who had occasion to operate in one of these districts hopefully approached the husband of the patient and asked for his fee, which amounted to $100. ...
— Jokes For All Occasions - Selected and Edited by One of America's Foremost Public Speakers • Anonymous
... them and offers to give me her right-hand-reliable, Jane McElroy, who cared for me when a baby, to stay here with the Infant. The second letter was from Maria Maxwell, a distant cousin of Bart's. She has also heard of our intended vacation,—indeed the rapidity with which the news travels and the interest it causes are good proofs of our stay-at-home tendencies and the general sobriety of our six ...
— The Garden, You, and I • Mabel Osgood Wright
... curiosity of the English chevaliers was partly gratified in beholding the Hippogriff at rest, and Rogero, to renew their surprise and delight, remounted the animal, and, slapping spurs to his sides, made him launch into the air with the rapidity of a meteor, and directed his flight still westwardly, till he came within sight of the coasts of Ireland. Here he descried what seemed to be a fair damsel, alone, fast chained to a rock which projected into the sea. What was his astonishment when, drawing ...
— Bulfinch's Mythology • Thomas Bulfinch
... to his feet with rapidity, and, in great excitement, dropped his head and began hunting. In a minute a mottled pebble seemed to get up under his nose and run. He snapped at it, and it fell upon the grass, stretching out slowly ...
— The Way of the Wild • F. St. Mars
... silent a second or two, then he sprang up so that his chair fell over: "Perhaps Alphonse imagined that he could do it better? Did he not know which of them was really the man of business?" And now the words streamed out with that incredible rapidity of which the French language is capable when it is ...
— Stories by Foreign Authors • Various
... wild asses passed us during the march towards evening; they were on their way from the desert to the Atbara river, some miles distant upon the west. Veritable thunder we now heard for the first time in Africa, and a cloud rose with great rapidity from the horizon. A cloud was a wonder that we had not enjoyed for months, but as this increased both in size and density, accompanied by a gust of cool wind, we were led to expect a still greater wonder—RAIN! Hardly had we halted for the night, when down it came in torrents, accompanied by a heavy ...
— The Nile Tributaries of Abyssinia • Samuel W. Baker
... works with amazing rapidity, but it is impossible to see the direction it will take. There are little insects known to our childish days as skip-jacks. Scratch them with the end of a piece of grass, and they reward you for your pains—they will jump—bound with one spasmodic leap and ...
— Sally Bishop - A Romance • E. Temple Thurston
... that the Church was in considerable danger, for these religious enthusiasts gained more credit among the people, and operated more strongly on their minds than the priests from whom they so entirely withdrew that they even absolved each other. Their strength grew with such rapidity, and their numbers increased to such an extent daily, that the State and the Church were forced to combine for their suppression. Degeneracy, however, soon crept in, crimes were committed, and they went beyond their strength in attempting the performance of miracles. One of the ...
— Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine • George M. Gould
... me with her out of this desert island. And after having passed the night in this condition, the bird really flew away next morning, as soon as it was day, and carried me so high that I could not see the earth. Then she descended all of a sudden, with so much rapidity that I lost my senses; but when the roc was settled, and I found myself upon the ground, I speedily untied the knot, and had scarcely done so when the bird, having taken up a serpent of a monstrous length in her ...
— Fairy Tales From The Arabian Nights • E. Dixon
... graceful; her address, mien, and smile were in perfect accordance with the goodness of her heart. Madame Sophie was remarkably ugly; never did I behold a person with so unprepossessing an appearance; she walked with the greatest rapidity; and, in order to recognise the people who placed themselves along her path without looking at them, she acquired the habit of leering on one side, like a hare. This Princess was so exceedingly diffident ...
— Memoirs Of The Court Of Marie Antoinette, Queen Of France, Complete • Madame Campan
... were crowds of people standing at the docks. The flyman took out the luggage and was on the point of leaving, when I asked him whether he had taken out all the luggage, which I had not been able to count, because of the pressure of people, and the rapidity with which the packages were taken to the vessel. His reply was, Yes. But all at once, by the good hand of God, I remembered the hind boot, and I asked him to open it. The man, somewhat confused, opened it, and in it were five or six carpet bags. This thing ...
— A Narrative of some of the Lord's Dealings with George Mueller - Written by Himself. Second Part • George Mueller
... sat still for some minutes, Martha gazing into vacancy, Jane lying back in her chair, her eyes closed. One emotion after another coursed through her with lightning rapidity—indignation at the charge, horror at the thought that any of her friends might believe it, followed by a shivering fear that her father's good name, for all her care and suffering, might be ...
— The Tides of Barnegat • F. Hopkinson Smith
... are an angel!' and turning his back to the house, papa bolted the muffin with grateful rapidity, inquiring with a laugh, 'Do you think those rogues will keep it up in this vigorous ...
— Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag • Louisa M. Alcott
... men and white men constantly upon his track. His every move was rapidly reported to our ever-watchful enemies. But, quick as the enemy undoubtedly were in all their movements, General Rundle nullified their efforts by his rapidity. So terribly hard did he work his men that they nicknamed him "Rundle, the Tramp." How the men stood it I cannot understand. I know of no other men in all the world who would have gone on as they did, obeying orders without a murmur ...
— Campaign Pictures of the War in South Africa (1899-1900) - Letters from the Front • A. G. Hales
... reports of disaster and wilful acts followed with increasing rapidity. The sinking of American vessels disclosed a ruthlessness of method that was gravely condemned in President Wilson's message of armed-neutrality, only to be followed by acts of more wilful import—finally ...
— The Delta of the Triple Elevens - The History of Battery D, 311th Field Artillery US Army, - American Expeditionary Forces • William Elmer Bachman
... whatever on the wild rabbit. Bumper could hear him scurrying away in the bushes. Then all was quiet. For a long time Bumper watched and waited. Once he caught a glimpse of his cousin on the right of the rock, then on the left, then behind, and again in front. The amazing rapidity with which the wild rabbit ...
— Bumper, The White Rabbit • George Ethelbert Walsh
... readiness, Carson set out with his followers for their hunting-grounds. Their pace was one of so much rapidity, that after one day's march they discovered signs of the buffalo. On the following morning immense herds were in sight. A suitable place for a camp was soon selected, and everything which could impede their work well stowed away. The best marksmen were selected for hunters, and the remainder ...
— The Life and Adventures of Kit Carson, the Nestor of the Rocky Mountains, from Facts Narrated by Himself • De Witt C. Peters
... exultation from the defenders, as the fire spread with ever-increasing rapidity; flakes of fire, driven by a strong wind, started the flames in a score of places, far ahead of the main conflagration and, in half an hour, only red embers and flickering timbers showed where Johore had stood. Beyond, ...
— At the Point of the Bayonet - A Tale of the Mahratta War • G. A. Henty
... rapidity and vigour of these two poems will save them from death; the splendid qualities of direct narration, constructive skill, dignity and poetical power will always make Homer a name to love. Those who know no Greek and therefore fear that they may lose some of the ...
— Authors of Greece • T. W. Lumb
... impress of the country through which it passes: and if there are many characteristics in common between a French Jew and a German Jew, there are many more different characteristics derived from their new country, of which with incredible rapidity they assimilate the habits of mind: more the habits than the mind, indeed. But habit, which is a second nature to all men, is in most of them all the nature that they have, and the result is that the majority of the autochthonous citizens of any country have very little ...
— Jean-Christophe, Vol. I • Romain Rolland
... obliged the Germans to quit Alsace. In order to free themselves from Frederick, the French instigated the Swedes to invade Pomerania and Altmark, which they attacked in December, 1674, with 16,000 men. Frederick hastened to his dominions, and proceeding with great rapidity and secrecy at the head of only 5,000 men, he totally defeated 11,000 Swedes at Fehrbellin in 1675, and freed his dominions from the enemy. Following up his successes, he took Stettin. In January, 1679, he crossed the Frische Haff and the Gulf of Courland with ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 3 of 8 • Various
... Africa. But here to day, within striking distance of a mobile enemy whom we wish to circumvent, every private soldier has canvas shelter, and the other arrangements are on an equally elaborate scale. The consequence is that roads are crowded, drifts are blocked, marching troops are delayed, and all rapidity of movement is out of the question. Meanwhile, the enemy completes the fortification of his positions, and the cost of capturing them rises. It is a poor economy to let a soldier live well for three days at the price of ...
— London to Ladysmith via Pretoria • Winston Spencer Churchill
... scattered over a very wide surface of country, were so much divided by origin, by language, and religion, that, without the support of her Asiatic arm, she could not, according to the general opinion, have stood at all. The rapidity of her descent, it is true, had been arrested by the energy of her Sultans during the first twenty years of the nineteenth century. But for the last thirty of the eighteenth she had made a headlong progress downwards. So utterly, also, were the tables turned, that, whereas in ...
— Memorials and Other Papers • Thomas de Quincey
... shame lingered as the younger sister followed with a spirited vivace. Her hollow-cheeked pallor remained unstained, but her thin lips were set and her hard eyes were harder. She played with determined nonchalance and an extraordinarily facile rapidity, and Miriam's uneasiness changed insensibly to the conviction that these girls were learning in Germany not to be ashamed of "playing with expression." All the things she had heard Mr. Strood—who had, as the school prospectus declared, been "educated in Leipzig"—preach and implore, "style," ...
— Pointed Roofs - Pilgrimage, Volume 1 • Dorothy Richardson
... Life-guardsman, and the little sandy, freckled, sun-dried engineer; and thus two courtships had to be carried on in the two rooms, only supplemented by the narrow parallelogram of a garden! For Ferdinand Travis was back again, rather amused at the family astonishment at the rapidity of his journey to America, which to his Transatlantic notions of travel was as nothing, and indeed had been chiefly performed in a big steamer, where he could smoke to ...
— The Pillars of the House, V1 • Charlotte M. Yonge
... now broken up into shreds. The azure depths beyond had assumed the appearance of a blue tunic bespattered with white, and the clouds suggested the idea of a celestial shepherd, driving myriads of sheep to the pasture. Children alone can dry up their tears with the rapidity of Nature in the tropics; perhaps we may have already made the remark, and must, therefore, beg pardon for repeating ...
— Willis the Pilot • Paul Adrien
... waste, were the sight the Poles beheld each day, while the homeless peasants crowded into Kosciuszko's camp to tell him their piteous stories. Then Denisov retreated so swiftly towards the Prussian frontier that Kosciuszko, either through the enemy's rapidity, or because he was detained by the civil affairs of the government with which his hands were just then full, and by the no less arduous task of organizing the war in the provinces, was not able to overtake him. At this moment the Rising promised well. The ...
— Kosciuszko - A Biography • Monica Mary Gardner
... settlers, principally in Upper Canada, the United Empire Loyalists, whose ideas of government were so different from those of the Lower Canadians that the separation of Upper and Lower Canada by the Constitutional Act of 1791 became necessary. These dates, so close together, emphasize the rapidity with which events moved in that period, as well as the sequence of cause and effect. We think also of the dates of Cartier's voyages, 1534, 1535, and 1541, merely to raise the question as to why so much time elapsed between the second and ...
— Ontario Teachers' Manuals: History • Ontario Ministry of Education
... observations which have been made on the different materials which compose the terrestrial globe, on the elevations, the depressions, and the unevennesses of its form, on the movement of the seas, on the trending of mountains, on the position of quarries, on the rapidity and effects of the currents of the sea—this is nature on the ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume VI. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... road, sixty-two miles in length, was built of stone at a cost of $465,000 and was completed in two years. Never before had such a sum been invested in internal improvement in the United States. The rapidity with which the undertaking was carried through and the profits which accrued from the investment were alike astonishing. The subscription books were opened at eleven o'clock one morning and by midnight 2226 shares had been subscribed, each purchaser paying ...
— The Paths of Inland Commerce - A Chronicle of Trail, Road, and Waterway, Volume 21 in The - Chronicles of America Series • Archer B. Hulbert |
