"Dexterous" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... period in his life. Even the coalition-ministry of Godolphin was too Whiggish for the taste of Queen Anne; and the Tories, the favourites of the court, gained, both in parliamentary power and in popularity out of doors, by a combination of lucky accidents, dexterous management and divisions and double-dealing among their adversaries. The real failure of the prosecution of Addison's old friend Sacheverell completed the ruin of the Whigs; and in August 1710 an entire revolution ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... platform: he could repent in public. He could not only think aloud; he could "think better" aloud. And one of the turning-points of Europe had come in the hour when he avowed his conversion from the un-Christian and un-European policy into which his dexterous Oriental master, Disraeli, had dragged him; and declared that England had "put her money on the wrong horse." When he said it, he referred to the backing we gave to the Turk under a fallacious fear of Russia. But I cannot but think that if he had lived much longer, he would have ...
— The Crimes of England • G.K. Chesterton
... felicissime audax, used of Horace as a lyric poet by Quintilian, expresses, with something less than that fine critic's usual accuracy, another quality which goes far to make the merit of the Odes. Horace's use of words is, indeed, remarkably dexterous; but less so from happy daring than from the tact which perpetually poises and balances words, and counts no pains lost to find the word that is exactly right. His audacities—if one cares to call them so—in the use of epithet, in Greek constructions ...
— Latin Literature • J. W. Mackail
... gigantic game along the coast of Brazil. No sea but what is vexed by their fisheries. No climate that is not witness to their toils. Neither the perseverance of Holland, nor the activity of France, nor the dexterous and firm sagacity of English enterprise, ever carried this most perilous mode of hardy industry to the extent to which it has been pushed by this recent people; a people who are still, as it were, but in the gristle, and not yet hardened into the ...
— The American Union Speaker • John D. Philbrick
... brown paper, which they handed as it was wanted to Jenny and Julia. The big girls leaned over the table in front of iron moulds, filling them with brown paper, pasting it down, tucking it in with strong and dexterous fingers. ...
— Esther Waters • George Moore
... where the hose was fastened to the hydrant, the little pests of Metz clustered eagerly, standing on the hose pipe where the bursts were tied with string, and by dexterous pressure diverting the leaks into gay fountains that flew up and pierced the windows opposite. As the mud rolled off under the blast of the hose and left the car streaky and dripping, the little boys dipping their feet into ...
— The Happy Foreigner • Enid Bagnold
... a valve connected with a galvanized tank, with a pressure gauge on top, and pulled back a lever. Instantly, a hissing sound filled the air. Then, with a dexterous movement, Peggy threw in the spark and turned on the gasoline which the spark would ignite, thereby causing an explosion in the cylinders. But first the compressed air had started the motor turning ...
— The Girl Aviators' Sky Cruise • Margaret Burnham
... most of them were hanging to the trees as warnings. The rest delivered themselves up. In 1551, Charles V. forbade negroes, both free and slave, from carrying any kind of weapon. It was necessary subsequently to renew this ordinance, because the slaves continued to be as dexterous with the machete or the sabre as with ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 58, August, 1862 • Various
... Mr. Lindley, who had suffered himself to be impeded; and Cora quickly handed the former her parasol, lightly taking his arm. Thus the slow Richard found himself walking beside Laura in a scattered group, its detached portion consisting of his near-betrothed and Corliss; for although the dexterous pair were first to leave the church, they contrived to be passed almost at once, and, assuming the position of trailers, lagged far ...
— The Flirt • Booth Tarkington
... that what with currents and counter-currents, we shall in the end, be driven back to the land from which we launched twenty years ago. Indeed, my dear Sir, we have been but a sturdy fish on the hook of a dexterous angler who letting us flounce till we have spent Our force, brings us ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... been delighted with Mrs. Ward's article. She has swept away the greater part of Wace's sophistries as a dexterous and strong-wristed housemaid sweeps away cobwebs with her broom, and saved ...
— The Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley Volume 3 • Leonard Huxley
... to withdraw who already were somewhat uncertain as to the constitutionalism, in the Tory sense, of the course their leaders were taking. They would probably have swallowed {89} their scruples but for the message; that dexterous stroke of policy was too much for them. How can we—they probably thus reasoned with themselves—back up to the last a prince who positively refused to listen to the offer of a compromise spontaneously ...
— A History of the Four Georges, Volume II (of 4) • Justin McCarthy
... banqueting room, I had made up my mind, once for all, that neither character nor cunning can be concealed in this world; that the craftiest impostor is but a clumsier kind of clown; and that the most dexterous disguise is but a ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXXII. - June, 1843.,Vol. LIII. • Various
... no pain" does not lend itself to rapid repetition. The physical difficulties are too great; the tongue and lips become entangled in the syllables and we have to stop to restore order. Even if we were dexterous enough to articulate the words successfully, we should only meet with a new difficulty. The most emphatic word in the phrase is "pain"; involuntarily we should find ourself stressing this word with particular force, ...
— The Practice of Autosuggestion • C. Harry Brooks
... approached the tavern and saw Paul and the guard at the door, he shouted loudly to the crowd to separate, as though wishing to show Paul the blood in his favorite mare. He punched her with a little stick from which the sharp point of a nail protruded and by a dexterous movement dodged the flying hind feet that were aimed at ...
— The Story of Paul Boyton - Voyages on All the Great Rivers of the World • Paul Boyton
... Fife. The King placed himself in the centre, at the head of the choice men of Ross, Perth, Angus, Mearns, Mar, Moray, Inverness, and Caithness, where he was confronted by Haco in person, who, for the purpose of meeting the Scottish King, took post in the Norwegian centre. The High Steward, by a dexterous movement, made the enemy's left give way, and instantly, by another adroit manoeuvre, he wheeled back on the rear of Haco's centre, where he found the two warrior Kings desperately engaged. This induced Haco, after exhibiting all ...
— History Of The Mackenzies • Alexander Mackenzie
... the eldest of seven children, and he, worn out by early hardships, was unfit for labour. My father's spirit was soon irritated, but not easily broken. There was a freedom in his lease in two years more, and to weather these two years, we retrenched our expenses. We lived very poorly: I was a dexterous ploughman for my age; and the next eldest to me was a brother (Gilbert), who could drive the plough very well, and help me to thrash the corn. A novel-writer might, perhaps, have viewed these scenes with some satisfaction, but so did not I; my indignation yet boils ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham
... man. Only one, but a very formidable person. Strong as a lion—witness the blow that bent that poker! Six foot three in height, active as a squirrel, dexterous with his fingers, finally, remarkably quick-witted, for this whole ingenious story is of his concoction. Yes, Watson, we have come upon the handiwork of a very remarkable individual. And yet, in that bell-rope, he has given us a clue which should ...
— The Return of Sherlock Holmes • Arthur Conan Doyle
... its prey, the young doctor leant across the mattress. Without looking round he took up the instruments he wanted, knowing the order in which they lay. He had been excellently taught. The noiseless movements of his white fingers were marvellously dexterous—neat, rapid, and finished. The evil-looking instruments gleamed and flashed beneath the gaslight. He had a peculiar little habit of wiping each one on his shirt-sleeve before and after use, leaving a series ...
— The Slave Of The Lamp • Henry Seton Merriman
... according to the nature of the substances they are intended to triturate. In every laboratory, it is requisite to have an assortment of these utensils, of various sizes and kinds: Those of porcellain and glass can only be used for rubbing substances to powder, by a dexterous use of the pestle round the sides of the mortar, as it would be easily broken by reiterated blows ...
— Elements of Chemistry, - In a New Systematic Order, Containing all the Modern Discoveries • Antoine Lavoisier
... an aisle of the grove, the youth and his companion saw a jangling general and his staff almost ride upon a wounded man, who was crawling on his hands and knees. The general reined strongly at his charger's opened and foamy mouth and guided it with dexterous horsemanship past the man. The latter scrambled in wild and torturing haste. His strength evidently failed him as he reached a place of safety. One of his arms suddenly weakened, and he fell, sliding over upon his back. He lay ...
— The Red Badge of Courage - An Episode of the American Civil War • Stephen Crane
... blade then, she makes with it various passes in the air, very supple and dexterous, and would have me fight ...
— Martin Conisby's Vengeance • Jeffery Farnol
... mornings in the loggia reading and working. Lucy was a dexterous needle-woman, and a fine piece of embroidery had made much progress since their arrival at Torre Amiata. Secretly she wondered whether she was to finish it there. Eleanor now shrank from the least mention of change; and ...
— Eleanor • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... fibre. As the loosened head emerges from the bale-opener, Figs. 8 or 9, it is placed over the operative's arm with the ends of the head hanging, and by a sort of intuition acquired by great experience, she or he grips the correct amount of fibre between the fingers, and by a dexterous movement, and a simultaneous shake of the whole piece, the handful just comes clear of the bulk and in much less time than it takes to describe ...
— The Jute Industry: From Seed to Finished Cloth • T. Woodhouse and P. Kilgour
... theological library, there is an undoubted market for it, or some portions of it, as stocks are kept both here and abroad, although on a more restricted scale, perhaps, than formerly. It is extremely probable that, if any one who was learned enough and dexterous enough should make a decoction of all the uncountable folios which exist up and down the globe, the result might be a single volume of not very ample dimensions, affording its share of ...
— The Book-Collector • William Carew Hazlitt
... private affairs, and render to them Services of a kind that required Secrecy as well as Courage. One or two Duels in Hyde Park and behind Montagu House, in which I had the honour to be concerned as Second,—and in one of which I engaged the Second of my Patron's Adversary, and succeeded, by two dexterous side slices, in Quincing his face as neatly as a housewife would slice Fruit for a Devonshire Squab Pie,—gained me the notice of some of the Highest Nobility, to whom I was otherwise recommended by the easiness of my Manners, and the amenity of my Language. The young Earl of Modesley ...
— The Strange Adventures of Captain Dangerous, Vol. 3 of 3 • George Augustus Sala
... worth noting that the whole beauty arises from the dexterous placing of the dissyllable "graces," and the trisyllable "entangle," exactly where they ought to be among the monosyllables of the rest. The madrigals "Love guards the roses of thy lips," "My Phillis hath the morning ...
— A History of English Literature - Elizabethan Literature • George Saintsbury
... men whom he respected might possibly have brought him to retract his syllabus. But it must be remembered that he despised the Oxford dons with all his heart; and they were probably aware of this. He was a dexterous, impassioned reasoner, whom they little cared to encounter in argument on such a topic. During his short period of residence, moreover, he had not shown himself so tractable as to secure the good wishes of superiors, who prefer conformity to incommensurable genius. It ...
— Percy Bysshe Shelley • John Addington Symonds
... deep. The other division, with the baggage and artillery, crossed lower down, at Cheadle, on a hastily constructed bridge, and the two columns joined that evening at Macclesfield. Here Lord George Murray succeeded in misleading the Duke of Cumberland as to his intentions by a dexterous manoeuvre. Advancing with a portion of his force he dislodged and drove before him the Duke of Kingston and a small party of English horse posted at Congleton, and pursued them some distance along the road ...
— Bonnie Prince Charlie - A Tale of Fontenoy and Culloden • G. A. Henty
... mental power and energy, but in the one it was volcanic, and in the other it was concentrated and thoroughly under control. In discussion, the one reminded me of the self-taught, slashing swordsman; the other of the dexterous fencer, carefully trained in the use of the foils, who never launches out beyond the point at which he can quickly recover himself. As to whether M. Plehve was anything more than a bold, energetic, clever official there may be differences of opinion, but he certainly could assume the airs ...
— Russia • Donald Mackenzie Wallace
... virtues had the hardihood to say that Mr. Cheeseman here indulged in a process of high art discovered by himself. Discoursing of the weather, or the crops, or perhaps the war, and mourning the dishonesty of statesmen nowadays, by dexterous undersweep of keen steel blade, from the bottom of the round, or pat, or roll, he would have away a thin slice, and with that motion jerk it into the barrel which ...
— Springhaven - A Tale of the Great War • R. D. Blackmore
... have an appointment with Carry Fisher. Don't look so worried, you dear thing—don't think too much about the nonsense I've been talking." She was before the mirror again, adjusting her hair with a light hand, drawing down her veil, and giving a dexterous touch to her furs. "Of course, you know, it hasn't come to the employment agencies and the painted blotting-pads yet; but I'm rather hard-up just for the moment, and if I could find something to do—notes to write and visiting-lists ...
— House of Mirth • Edith Wharton
... too delicate an art for his ungainly hands. Twice the missile lodged in the rim of the shield; once it sprang beyond upon the sand. Moerocles, who followed, surpassed him. Amyntas was hardly worse. Glaucon came last, and won his victory with a dexterous grace that made all but the hottest Laconian swell the "Io! paian!" of applause. His second cast had been into the centre of the target. His third had splintered his second ...
— A Victor of Salamis • William Stearns Davis
... both.[1097] That foolish man who nourishes this tree by indulgence in the objects of the senses is destroyed by those very objects in which he indulges after the manner of a poisonous pill destroying the patient to whom it is administered.[1098] A dexterous person, however, by the aid of Yoga, forcibly teareth up and cutteth with the sword of samadhi, the far-reaching root of this tree.[1099] One who knows that the end of all acts undertaken from only the desire of ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown
... of September, the air was as mild as with us during the warmest summer nights. Round our little encampment we heard an incessant barking, as of young dogs, proceeding from a species of wolf, which abounds throughout California; it is not larger than the fox; but is so daring and dexterous, that it makes no scruple of entering human habitations in the night, and rarely fails to appropriate whatever happens to suit it. This we ourselves experienced; for our provision of meat had not been sufficiently ...
— A New Voyage Round the World, in the years 1823, 24, 25, and 26, Vol. 2 • Otto von Kotzebue
... feast to be provided on the following evening, under the trees which overshadowed the expanse in front of my house, and the whole town to be invited. The mysterious virtue of my purse, the exertions of Bendel, and the dexterous contrivances of Rascal, succeeded in doing wonders in the trifling space of time. It is really astonishing how richly and beautifully everything was arranged in so short a period. Such pomp and superfluity were exhibited there, and the richly-fanciful illuminations were so admirably ...
— Peter Schlemihl • Adelbert von Chamisso
... and New England farms and villages, suddenly leap out upon the man and his sons working in their clearings, upon the woman and her children in the hut: a whoop, a popping of musket shots and whistling of arrows, then the vicious swish and crash of the murderous tomahawk, followed by the dexterous twist of the scalping-knife, and the snatching of the tuft of hair from the bleeding skull. That is all—but, no: there still remains a baby or two who must be caught up by the leg, and have its brains dashed out on ...
— The History of the United States from 1492 to 1910, Volume 1 • Julian Hawthorne
... no breakfast, strolled down to one of the city markets. He frequently found an opportunity of stealing here, and was now in search of such a chance. He was a dexterous and experienced barrel thief, a term which it may be necessary to explain. Barrels, then, have a commercial value, and coopers will generally pay twenty-five cents for one in good condition. This is enough, in the eyes ...
— Paul the Peddler - The Fortunes of a Young Street Merchant • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... drawing, who yet, from what they picked up of either art by their own industry and intelligence, nearly doubled the happiness of their daily lives. But in vain had "the first masters" made my cousins glib in chromatic passages, and dexterous with tricks of effects in colours and crayons. They played duets after dinner, and Aunt Maria sometimes showed off the water-colour copies of their school-room days, which, indeed, they now and then recopied for bazaars; ...
— A Flat Iron for a Farthing - or Some Passages in the Life of an only Son • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... there began to appear symptoms of a pleasurable appreciation. "My goo'ness! Gun like 'iss blow a team o' steers thew a brick house! Look at 'at gun!" With his right hand he twirled it in a manner most dexterous and surprising; then suddenly he became severe. "You white boy, listen me!" he said. "Ef I went an did what I ought to did, I'd march straight out 'iss stable, git a policeman, an' tell him 'rest you an' take you off to jail. 'At's what you ...
— The Boy Scouts Book of Stories • Various
... flinty core, she talked of his and her affairs; she was interested in his commentary upon the Pandects, she was indignant at the jealousy of Dr. This, she made light of the malice of Professor That. With flying feet from table to kitchen and back, with dexterous hands at bottle, platter or napkin, she ministered to his slightest whims. She refused to allow Nonna to wait upon him; she must do everything for ...
— The Fool Errant • Maurice Hewlett
... heart, and flattered their caprice; Bestrewed with flowers the precipice's brink; Serving their passions, naught to me was sacred; Measure and weight I changed as they inclined. As much as Joad's unpliant humour pained The softness of their supercilious ear, So much I pleased them with my dexterous art; Concealing from their eyes the bitter truth; Lending convenient colour to their rage; And, lavish, above all, of wretches' blood. At length, to Baal, whom she had introduced, By Athaliah was a temple reared. Jerusalem did weep to see herself ...
— Athaliah • J. Donkersley
... with a fine commanding air in the pulpit, as if about to shoulder arms; preaches extempore; says "my brethren" more frequently in his sermons than any minister we ever heard; has a clear, keen intellect; is dexterous, courageous, impassioned, imperious; has a lofty, threepence-halfpenny majesty about him; has been a hard worker, a stiff fighter, and a stinging public lecturer. After leaving Ireland, he took a curacy in Liverpool. In 1857 he accepted a similar post at St. Peter's, Preston. Here he organised ...
— Our Churches and Chapels • Atticus
... back to my place, and sitting down by De Vic began to watch that strange game; while Mademoiselle's laughter and Madame de Lude's gibes floated across the court, and mingled with the eager applause and more dexterous criticisms of the courtiers. The light was beginning to sink, and for this reason, perhaps, no one perceived the Spaniard's pallor; but De Vic, after a rally or two, remarked that he was not playing ...
— From the Memoirs of a Minister of France • Stanley Weyman
... neat-handed, as Mr. Martindale would say, and their habit of conducting dispensing operations which involve the dexterous manipulation of very small quantities of material fit them admirably to undertake volumetric and other rapid analytical determinations. Compared with the doctor there is no doubt that in this matter ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 611, September 17, 1887 • Various
... the puritans. But upon this subject, she was as dexterous a special pleader as Neale, and as skilful in giving a false coloring to facts, as D'Aubigne. But she had the advantage of these worthies in that her declamation was quite honest: she had been taught sincerely and heartily to believe all she asserted. ...
— Western Characters - or Types of Border Life in the Western States • J. L. McConnel
... interest turning on a complicated plot worked out with dexterous craftsmanship. A capital yarn of European secret ...
— A Lost Leader • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... Hermann's strength supported the maid that hung o'er him; But, not knowing the path and the rough-hewn steps that led down it, Missed she her footing, her ankle turned, and she surely had fallen, Had not the dexterous youth his arm outstretched in an instant, And his beloved upheld. She gently sank on his shoulder; Breast was pressed against breast, and cheek against cheek. Thus he stood there Fixed as a marble statue, the force of will keeping him steadfast, Drew her not to him ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... scattered on the floor. With a zealous hand she selected all such as appeared to have made any part of the sacerdotal vestments, laying them aside as sacred from ordinary purposes, and with the rest she made, with dexterous promptness, such a bed as a weary man might willingly stretch himself on; and during the time she was preparing it, rejected, even with acrimony, any attempt which the youth made to assist her, or any entreaty which he urged, that she would accept of the place of rest for her ...
— The Abbot • Sir Walter Scott
... real people in this country, mama," said Imogen, on a graver note. "We have, I think, evolved a new standard of devotion. We don't want to have dexterous mamas throwing powder in the eyes of the men who care for us and sacrificing their very conception of right on the altar of false maternal duty. The duty we owe to any one is our truth. There is no higher duty than ...
— A Fountain Sealed • Anne Douglas Sedgwick
... whetted shafts shot by him. And then the Kauravas exclaimed.—'Excellent! Excellent!'—Indeed, Bhishma hath performed an exceedingly difficult feat inasmuch as he hath fought with Arjuna. Dhananjaya is mighty and youthful, and dexterous and swift of hand. Who else, save Bhishma, the son of Santanu, or Krishna, the son of Devaki, or the mighty son of Bharadwaja, the foremost of preceptors, is able to bear the impetus of Partha in battle? And repelling weapons with ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 2 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... special needs; but the farmer himself not only used his tools, but mended and to some extent made them; he was carpenter also, and shoemaker, and, in general, necessity had taught his hands to shape and his fingers to be dexterous. The boy made his own traps and small tools and carts, and early learned that handiness and adaptability without which he would be likely to go through life in a destitute condition. There is to be found ...
— Noah Webster - American Men of Letters • Horace E. Scudder
... sifted, dissected, and taken to pieces by two keen women, sharp by nature, and sharper now by collision of their heads. No candor, no tolerance, no allowance for human weakness, blunted the scalpel in their dexterous hands. ...
— The Woman-Hater • Charles Reade
... he soon recollected in Vafer, a clerk in one of the offices over which he had formerly presided. Vafer was invited to visit his old patron, and being by his station acquainted with the present modes of life, and by constant practice dexterous in business, entertained him with so many novelties, and so readily disentangled his affairs, that he was desired to resign his clerkship, and accept a liberal salary in the ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D, In Nine Volumes - Volume the Third: The Rambler, Vol. II • Samuel Johnson
... any time have seen how enviable its unencumbered possessor might be) if he had not at the moment felt himself under considerable pressure. Mr. Barter's fleshy and well-formed fingers were somewhat too familiar with the feel of cards. These fingers of his were peculiarly dexterous to look at, and had even an unnecessary braggadocio air of dexterity when he was engaged in his favourite occupation. Experienced people watched his shuffling and dealing with great care. In Mr. Barter's frank and engaging countenance, and in that ready smile in which the faultless ...
— Young Mr. Barter's Repentance - From "Schwartz" by David Christie Murray • David Christie Murray
... Having contrived in this dexterous way to separate Oscar and Lucilla, and to gain time for composing and fortifying his brother before they met again, Nugent opened the door for us to go out. Lucilla and I left the twins together, in the modest little room which had witnessed a scene alike memorable to all of us for its interest ...
— Poor Miss Finch • Wilkie Collins
... before Sicania, looms an island from the deep, With smoking rocks. There AEtna's caverns roar, Hewn by the Cyclop's forges from the steep. There the steel hisses and the sparks upleap, And clanging anvils, smit with dexterous aim, Groan through the cavern, as their strokes they heap, And restless in the furnace pants the flame. 'Twas Vulcan's house, the land ...
— The Aeneid of Virgil - Translated into English Verse by E. Fairfax Taylor • Virgil
... Then my quick glance sought the tiger. He was in the car, his great head and two front paws hanging over the edge; his green eyes were steadily fixed on me. Just then Irene, evidently unable to hold any longer to the ropes, gave herself a dexterous twist, and in an instant she was inside the car, her head sinking down out of sight. Oh, noble, most beloved Irene! Sooner than let herself drop and fall at my feet a mangled corpse, she would do anything. She well understood my too sensitive ...
— John Gayther's Garden and the Stories Told Therein • Frank R. Stockton
... of modern wealth, is supplied by events belonging to these eighty years themselves. I refer to the policy pursued by the trade-unions of reducing the practical efficiency of all their members alike to the level which can be reached by those of them who are least active and dexterous. Bricklayers, for example, are forbidden by the English unions to lay, in a given time, more than a certain number of bricks, though by many of them this number could be doubled, and by some trebled, with ease. Now, ...
— A Critical Examination of Socialism • William Hurrell Mallock
... distorted face—he looked like a satyr—was almost on hers. She freed herself once more with a dexterous twisting motion of her supple body, leaped to the front of the carriage and pounded on the window behind ...
— Sleeping Fires • Gertrude Atherton
... Mr. Winkle, I think?' said Jackson. Mr. Winkle faltered out a reply in the affirmative; and both gentlemen were forthwith invested with a slip of paper, and a shilling each, by the dexterous Mr. Jackson. ...
— The Pickwick Papers • Charles Dickens
... able to earn wages, and so he usually continues as he begins. Mr. C.B. Stetson has written on this subject with great force and earnestness, and it will not be amiss to quote a sentence as to the advantages enjoyed by the technically workman. He says that "it is the rude or dexterous workman, rather than the really skilled one, who is supplanted by machinery. Skilled labor requires thinking; but a machine never thinks, never judges, never discriminates. Though its employment does, indeed, enable rude laborers to do many ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 446, July 19, 1884 • Various
... satire or comedy than into any other form of writing. Here it is that the imitator has the advantage of the translator: a certain parallelism between his own time and the time of the author he imitates is postulated in the fact of his imitating at all, and if he is a dexterous writer, like Pope or Johnson, he is sure to be able to introduce a number of small equivalents, some of them perhaps actual improvements on the original, while he is at liberty to throw into the shade those points of which he despairs of being able to make anything. A translator has three ...
— The Satires, Epistles, and Art of Poetry • Horace
... winter he used both—and against very severe cold, he protected himself by one of eider-down, of which the part which covered his shoulders was not stuffed with feathers, but padded, or rather wadded closely with layers of wool. Long practice had taught him a very dexterous mode of nesting himself, as it were, in the bed-clothes. First of all, he sat down on the bedside; then with an agile motion he vaulted obliquely into his lair; next he drew one corner of the bedclothes under his left shoulder, and passing it below his ...
— Narrative And Miscellaneous Papers • Thomas De Quincey
... cards honestly, and Suzette was the first to go out; but seeing that Ralph floundered and lost continually, she gave him her attention, looking over his hand, and talking for him, and counting with so dexterous deceit that he escaped also, while ...
— Bohemian Days - Three American Tales • Geo. Alfred Townsend
... painfully, reluctantly, intermittently, with views sometimes clear, sometimes clouded, of that terribly complicated problem, the answer to which was full of such consequences to himself and to others. No one ever felt more keenly that it was no mere affair of dexterous or brilliant logic; if logic could have settled it, the question would never have arisen. But in this fevered state, with mind, soul, heart all torn and distracted by the tremendous responsibilities pressing on him, wishing above everything ...
— The Oxford Movement - Twelve Years, 1833-1845 • R.W. Church
... with those seated before him, or to hear their salutations, Yan will be absolved from the necessity of engaging in diffuse and refined conversation, and in consequence he will submit at least twice the number of persons to his dexterous energies. In that way he will secure a higher reward than this person could otherwise afford and many additional comforts will doubtless fall into the sleeve of his ...
— Kai Lung's Golden Hours • Ernest Bramah
... since I was a moderately happy man. He is a very pleasant fellow to look at, small, trim, well-appointed, courteous, friendly, with a deferential air. His eyes gleam brightly through his glasses, and he has brisk dexterous gestures. He was genial enough till he settled down upon literature, and since then what waves and storms have gone over me! I have or had a grovelling taste for books; I possess a large number, and I thought I had read them. But I feel now, not so much as if I had read the wrong ...
— The Altar Fire • Arthur Christopher Benson
... his mind to technical microscopy when he was eighteen, and a chance friendship with a Holborn microscope dealer had confirmed that bent. He had remarkably skilful fingers and a love of detailed processes, and he had become one of the most dexterous amateur makers of rock sections in the world. He spent a good deal more money and time than he could afford upon the little room at the top of the house, in producing new lapidary apparatus and new microscopic accessories and in rubbing down slices of rock to a transparent ...
— Ann Veronica • H. G. Wells
... "Purana," under the designation of Satyavrata. Captain Wilford having read the passage, transcribed it for Sir William Jones, who translated it as a curious extract; the whole was an interpolation by the dexterous introduction of a forged sheet, discoloured and prepared for the purpose of deception, and which, having served his purpose for the moment, was afterwards withdrawn. As books in India are not bound, it is not difficult to introduce loose leaves. To confirm his various impositions, this learned ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli
... I ever shall be one of those fools who would cut off his nose to spite his face, much less kill myself because a girl refused to love me. Life to me was always preferable, under any circumstances; but in this case I played the most dexterous card I had. Mary, said I sternly, if you don't give Dan up and sware to be mine, I will hang myself this night. To this she replied, hang on if you are fool enough, and continued smoking her pipe as though not the least alarmed. ...
— Narrative of the Life of J.D. Green, a Runaway Slave, from Kentucky • Jacob D. Green
... a book under one arm, a formidable appearing volume. With a dexterous flirt, he bounced it into his hand and thrust it ...
— Fire Mountain - A Thrilling Sea Story • Norman Springer
... by that lady (his sister). A boiled turkey standing by me, my master said, Cut up that turkey, Pamela, if it be not too strong work for you, that Lady Darnford may not have too much trouble. So I carved it in a trice, and helped the ladies. Miss Darnford said, I would give something to be so dexterous a carver. O madam, said I, my late good lady would always make me do these things, when she entertained her female friends, as she used ...
— Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded • Samuel Richardson
... With a dexterous movement of her fingers Carmencita fastened the buttons of her coat and pulled her hat down on her head. "I'm going back to Mother McNeil's," she said, presently, and the large and half-worn rubbers which she had tied on over her shoes were looked at speculatively. ...
— How It Happened • Kate Langley Bosher
... Austrian prisoners were very well trained and made excellent orderlies in the ward. An ex-Carlton waiter was very dexterous in sidling down the ward: on his five fingers a tray perched high, containing dressing-bowls and pots bristling with forceps, scissors, and ...
— The Luck of Thirteen - Wanderings and Flight through Montenegro and Serbia • Jan Gordon
... was kind about it. This evening she seemed to have surpassed herself, as I judged by the admiring exclamations of our younger sister Phillis—a good little maid, who stood behind my chair with combs and pins in her hand as Fatima's aide-de-camp. Finally, the dexterous fingers interwove some sprays of ivy with the hair, and added white ...
— Mrs. Overtheway's Remembrances • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... conduct of the dinner. His aim was to manage so as to be the first, a captain of the mess, and to secure for himself the thirteenth glass of the bottle of port wine. Thus he would have the command of the joint on which he operated his favourite cuts, and made rapid dexterous appropriations of gravy, which amused Pen infinitely. Poor Jack Lowton! thy pleasures in life were very harmless; an eager epicure, thy desires did not go ...
— The History of Pendennis • William Makepeace Thackeray
... was after the stubborn steer again, showing less fear than before, though he maintained a sharp lookout against a repetition of the attack. It may have been that the dexterous manner in which he had just eluded the brute gave him self-confidence, as it weakened that of the fugitive without lessening his obduracy, for he took care that the line of his flight led straight away from his ...
— The Great Cattle Trail • Edward S. Ellis
... be observed that the Imp had been alleviating the pangs of her own perplexity by a dexterous ministering to the delusions of others. Not for the world would she have contradicted Miss S.'s assertions; she would as soon have thought of giving that lady a plain and unvarnished account of the late Monsieur Zabriska's very ordinary ...
— Tristram of Blent - An Episode in the Story of an Ancient House • Anthony Hope
... greater part of those lands to the temples, and came to Bisnaga where he rested some days. And he sent to call the son of the king of Orya who was taken captive in the first fortress, and told him that as people said that he was a very active man and was very dexterous with both sword and dagger, he would be ...
— A Forgotten Empire: Vijayanagar; A Contribution to the History of India • Robert Sewell
... the body prepared them for the fatigues of war and the duties of active life. Those who occasionally mention the education or talents of Constantius, allow that he excelled in the gymnastic arts of leaping and running that he was a dexterous archer, a skilful horseman, and a master of all the different weapons used in the service either of the cavalry or of the infantry. The same assiduous cultivation was bestowed, though not perhaps with equal success, to improve the minds of the sons and nephews of Constantine. The most ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon
... his story frankly enough. He had lost himself in the streets, and was in the forbidden region before he well knew. A few kindly and dexterous questions from Father Urban led him to tell all that there was to know about himself, his parentage and his past; and the priest listened with great attention, scanning the face of the ...
— The Lost Treasure of Trevlyn - A Story of the Days of the Gunpowder Plot • Evelyn Everett-Green
... he had been the best wrestler in the Vermont village in which he was born. He was a very quiet, peaceable man, but he was accustomed to resent insult in an effective way. He wrenched himself free by a powerful effort; then, with a dexterous movement of one of his long legs, he tripped up the captain, who fell in a heap upon the deck. The shock, added to the effects of his intoxication, seemed to stupefy the captain, who remained where ...
— Facing the World • Horatio Alger
... de Paris a young man without arms, who was said to play a violin and cornet with his feet. He was able to take a kerchief from his pocket and to blow his nose; he could make a cigarette, light it, and put it in his mouth, play cards, drink from a glass, and eat with a fork by the aid of his dexterous toes. There was a creature exhibited some time since in the principal cities of France, who was called the "l'homme tronc." He was totally deprived of all his members. Curran describes a Hindoo, a ...
— Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine • George M. Gould
... was tall and majestic: he was dexterous in all warlike accomplishments; intrepid in war, affable in peace; patient and prudent in council, bold and unhesitating in action. Ambition alone led him to attack the East; and the very madness of jealousy marked his course after his success. He was filial in his affection ...
— History of Rome from the Earliest times down to 476 AD • Robert F. Pennell
... with a sardonic laugh: "you will go to such extremity in your patriotism! You will sell yourself, that Poland may be redeemed through your dishonor. I congratulate you upon your dexterous statesmanship. You sought me, I perceive, that by the magic of your intoxicating beauty, you might lure me to sacrifice the lives of my people in behalf of yours. Your love is a ...
— Joseph II. and His Court • L. Muhlbach
... we got out a great deal of ironwork, as bolts, spikes, nails, &c., all of which our artist, of whom I have spoken already, who was now grown a very dexterous smith, made us nails and hinges for our rudder, and spikes such as ...
— The Life, Adventures & Piracies of the Famous Captain Singleton • Daniel Defoe
... also, and, moreover knew some tricks of defence and assault. He freed himself by a dexterous duck of his head, and a sharp shake of his body, and stepped backward so that the office table was ...
— Lady Bridget in the Never-Never Land • Rosa Praed
... train, Cellette, tired and happy, went to sleep. Her head fell on Leighton's shoulder. With dexterous fingers he took off her hat and laid it aside, then he looked at Lewis shrewdly. But Lewis showed no signs, of jealousy. He merely laughed silently and ...
— Through stained glass • George Agnew Chamberlain
... well as what had gone before, and was ready with her magnanimity. It was this which constituted her a truly able tactician. She shifted her tack before the shout of malicious exultation and ridicule could have been raised at her discomfiture. By a dexterous sleight of hand, she shuffled her cards and altered her suit. In a moment Mrs. Spottiswoode was winking and nodding with the matrons interested in the news of the night. She arrested a good-humoured yeoman, and crossed the room on his arm, to express and receive ...
— Girlhood and Womanhood - The Story of some Fortunes and Misfortunes • Sarah Tytler
... of treachery sound like witticism; an act of infidelity seems the prompting of reason, a sacrifice to propriety; while she is never reckless, she is always lovable; she is seldom tender and never sincere; amorous by nature, prudish on principle; sprightly, prudent, dexterous though utterly thoughtless, varied as Proteus in her moods, but charming as the Graces in her manner; she attracts but she eludes. What a number of parts I have seen her play! Entre nous, what a number of ...
— Analytical Studies • Honore de Balzac
... in which men feel themselves at home. Dark shadows there are, but they hide no mysteries to appal and unman. The imagination is free to follow its own laws, and so to create what is lovely and lovable. Language is no longer a tyrant but a willing and dexterous servant, and the Greek language reflecting, as all language does, the spirit of its users, is the most perfect instrument that the human mind has ever devised for the expression of its dreams. The works which were then created have ever since haunted the mind of Europe like ...
— The Unity of Civilization • Various
... palace. You will have accomplished the thing before they know that you have undertaken it. Take two other men with you, who, as soon as you release the chains, must fling the gates together, while you relock them. Now be dexterous, and you will have performed no unimportant ...
— Prince Eugene and His Times • L. Muhlbach
... brought forward, and carefully placed on the table before the many-titled carver, amid a shower of compliments to the distinguished artificer of so fine an edible structure, from him and many others of the admiring company. The general now rose, and, intent only on a dexterous performance of the duties of his new vocation, gave a preliminary flourish of knife and fork, and dashed into the middle of the pie; when lo! through the rent thus made in the imprisoning crust, out flew half a score ...
— The Rangers - [Subtitle: The Tory's Daughter] • D. P. Thompson
... said, splintering the surviving piece of coal into indignant flame-spurting fragments with one dexterous blow, ...
— Ann Veronica • H. G. Wells
... upon his view of things and logically flowed from it, but his action by itself would give no measure at all of his inner life. With the people of The Awkward Age, on the other hand, their action fully covers their motives and sentiments—or can be made to do so, by the care of a dexterous author. ...
— The Craft of Fiction • Percy Lubbock
... was a bustling, prosperous town, with so much money in it that it seemed strange that a man with a trained brain and dexterous fingers should be starved out of it for want of employment. At his desk, Dr. Horace Wilkinson could see the never-ending double current of people which ebbed and flowed in front of his window. It was a busy street, and the air was forever filled with the dull roar of life, the grinding ...
— Round the Red Lamp - Being Facts and Fancies of Medical Life • Arthur Conan Doyle
... probability most likely to enable us to preserve and defend our religion against our common enemies; and possibly a more sure foundation this day will be laid for ruining popery and prelacy, the chief of them, than yet hath been led unto in any age. For popery hath been a religion ever dexterous in fencing and mounting itself by association and joint strength. All sorts of professors amongst them are cast into fraternities and brotherhoods; and these orders carefully united by vow one with another, and under some more general ...
— The Covenants And The Covenanters - Covenants, Sermons, and Documents of the Covenanted Reformation • Various
... being baffled. They will cut asunder the toughest argument with as much ease as Alexander did the gordian knot; they will thunder out so many rattling terms as shall fright an adversary into conviction. They are exquisitely dexterous in unfolding the most intricate mysteries; they will tell you to a tittle all the successive proceedings of Omnipotence in the creation of the universe; they will explain the precise manner of original sin being derived from our first parents; they will satisfy you in what ...
— In Praise of Folly - Illustrated with Many Curious Cuts • Desiderius Erasmus
... stepped into the wheel-house, where the water, all yellow and foaming, was pouring into two compartments set with iron gratings below, on which it rose and foamed. Seizing a long pole with prongs like walrus teeth, the miller felt below the water on the bars. "Here's one, anyway," he said, and by a dexterous haul scooped up a monster eel on to the floor. In a box which he hauled from the dam he had more, some of 5-lb. weight, which had come down with the flood—an easy and profitable fishery, for the eels can lie in the trap till he hauls them out, and sell well summer and winter. ...
— The Naturalist on the Thames • C. J. Cornish
... and laid him upon the balsam boughs on his right side. The moment the weight came upon that side a groan burst from the pallid lips. "Something wrong there," muttered the doctor, turning him slightly over. "Ah, shoulder out. I'll just settle this right now." By dexterous manipulation the dislocation was reduced, and at once the patient sank down upon the bed of boughs and lay quite still. A little further stimulation brought back the heart to a steadier beat. "Now, my ...
— The Doctor - A Tale Of The Rockies • Ralph Connor
... can?" he says. No one discovers that he has, by a very dexterous movement, slipped a set of false dice into the box, while O'Brodereque diverted attention at the moment by introducing the pony into ...
— Our World, or, The Slaveholders Daughter • F. Colburn Adams
... through the association of these words with their sacredly quiet time, or it might have been through the larger association of the words with the Redeemer's presence beside the bedridden; but here her dexterous fingers came to a stop on the lace-pillow, and clasped themselves around his neck as he bent down. There was great natural sensibility in both father and daughter, the visitor could easily see; but ...
— Mugby Junction • Charles Dickens
... despatch : ekspedi, depesxo. dessert : deserto. destine : (for), difini (por). destroy : detrui. detail : detalo. detriment : malutilo, perdo. develop : plivastigi, disvolv'-i, -igxi, (phot.) aperigi. devil : diablo, demono. devoted : sindona. devout : pia. dew : roso. dexterous : lerta. dial : ciferplato. diarrhoea : lakso. dice : ludkuboj. dictate : dikti. dictionary : vortaro. die : morti. differ : diferenci. digest : digesti. dignity : digno, rango. dine : tag', vesper', ...
— The Esperanto Teacher - A Simple Course for Non-Grammarians • Helen Fryer
... the maneuver, [Footnote: Maneuver: dexterous movement.] this time to the left. The crackling turned into a snapping, the sled pivoting and the runners slipping and grating several inches ...
— Short Stories and Selections for Use in the Secondary Schools • Emilie Kip Baker
... red-cheeked girl of eighteen, was rowing. The other, short and rather chubby, now and again lifted a pocket net of wire-screening, and, shaking a score or more of slimy, snapping creatures into one corner of it, gave a dexterous twist and neatly dropped the squirming mass ...
— The Blue Envelope • Roy J. Snell
... little in common. I was still a young man, and the Cardinal was already old. I was a staunch Anglican; he, the most devoted of Papalists. I was strongly opposed both to his Ultramontane policy and to those dexterous methods by which he was commonly supposed to promote it; and, as far as the circumstances of my life had given me any insight into the interior of Romanism, I sympathized with the great Oratorian of Birmingham ...
— Collections and Recollections • George William Erskine Russell
... country. Manufactures have been established in which the funds of the capitalist find a profitable investment, and which give employment and subsistence to a numerous and increasing body of industrious and dexterous mechanics. The laborer is rewarded by high wages in the construction of works of internal improvement, which are extending with unprecedented rapidity. Science is steadily penetrating the recesses of nature and disclosing her secrets, while the ingenuity of free minds is subjecting the elements to ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... and every boy who belonged to a corps was pretty sure to fight one or more such duels. The schlaeger is very heavy and clumsy compared with a dueling sword, and requires a very strong wrist and arm. Instead of dexterous fencing the fighting is done by downright slashing and cutting and usually ends when one or the other fighter has received a cut on the face. The duel takes place with a great deal of ceremony, each student being attended ...
— Historic Boyhoods • Rupert Sargent Holland
... another, twenty yards away, and in doing so the four were wholly exposed. It was a long shot, much too long for any of the Indians, but not too long for Henry. He fired at the leading warrior, and, before he had time to see him crashing on the ice, he was reloading his rifle with all the speed of dexterous fingers. He heard a yell of rage from the Indians, and, glancing up, saw the three dragging away the body of the fallen man. But the party on the other side, knowing that his rifle had been emptied, but not knowing with what speed he ...
— The Eyes of the Woods - A story of the Ancient Wilderness • Joseph A. Altsheler
... head against the established influences of academical and forensic celebrity. Now Scott's tastes and resources had not much in common with those who had inherited and preserved the chief authority in this provincial hierarchy of rhetoric. He was highly amused with watching their dexterous logomachies—but his delight in such displays arose mainly, I cannot doubt, from the fact of their being, both as to subject-matter and style and method, remote a Scaevolae studiis. He sat by, as he would have done at a stage-play or a fencing-match, enjoying and applauding ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott, Volume V (of 10) • John Gibson Lockhart
... he threw himself at one dexterous dive into his former seat, Mr. Brownlow returned, accompanied by Oliver, whom Mr. Grimwig received very graciously; and if the gratification of that moment had been the only reward for all her anxiety and care in Oliver's behalf, Rose Maylie would ...
— Oliver Twist • Charles Dickens
... as dexterous with his left hand as with his right, reached down as the weapon came forth from its holster and gripped the stranger's wrist. He gave a sharp wrench and the revolver clattered down on the sidewalk. And then Curly Bill, who had witnessed the incident, stepped forward and ordered the visitor ...
— When the West Was Young • Frederick R. Bechdolt
... least leave his fleece behind. See you not the gleams from his headpiece and his cuirass? I presume these betoken substantial silver, though it may be of the thinnest. There lies the silver mine I spoke of, ready to enrich the dexterous ...
— Waverley Volume XII • Sir Walter Scott
... the stake; and the worst possible person for Berwin to have in his house. Had he known of her lying and prating she would not have remained an hour under his roof; but Mrs. Kebby was cunning enough to steer clear of such a danger in the most dexterous manner. She had a firm idea that Berwin had, in her own emphatic phrase, "done something" for which he was wanted by the police, and was always on the look out to learn the secret of his isolated life, in order to betray him, or blackmail him, ...
— The Silent House • Fergus Hume
... observed about the business of the Duke of Albemarle's being to follow the Prince upon dividing the fleete, in case the enemy come out), but neither of them to be maintained in others. That the business the other night of my Lord Anglesey at the Council was happily got over for my Lord, by his dexterous silencing it, and the rest, not urging it further; forasmuch as, had the Duke of Buckingham come in time enough, and had got it by the end, he, would have toused him in it; Sir W. Coventry telling me that ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys
... water did not reach higher than our waists; here we kept our footing, notwithstanding the strength of the current, until the water was emptied out of the canoe. Belanger then held the canoe steady whilst St. Germain placed me in it and afterwards embarked himself in a very dexterous manner. It was impossible however to embark Belanger, as the canoe would have been hurried down the rapid the moment he should have raised his foot from the rock on which he stood. We were therefore compelled to leave him in his perilous situation. We had ...
— The Journey to the Polar Sea • John Franklin
... now, in all that we do, absolutely without sincerity;—absolutely, therefore, without imagination, and without virtue. Our hands are dexterous with the vile and deadly dexterity of machines; our minds filled with incoherent fragments of faith, which we cling to in cowardice, without believing, and make pictures of in vanity, without loving. False ...
— The Crown of Wild Olive • John Ruskin
... faces of female ministrants,—stricken in years, as it might seem,—so dexterous were those heavenly attendants to counterfeit kindly similitudes of earth, to greet, with terrestrial child-rites the young present, which earth had ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Volume 2 • Charles Lamb
... usually carried when about to encounter any hazardous adventure, were found in his pockets loaded. This appeared particularly strange, for he was known and dreaded by the contraband traders as a man equally fearless and dexterous in the use of his weapons, of which he had given many signal proofs. The Sheriff inquired, whether Kennedy was not in the practice of carrying any other arms? Most of Mr. Bertram's servants recollected that he generally had a couteau de chasse, or short hanger, but none such was found upon ...
— Guy Mannering • Sir Walter Scott
... Our young voyageurs needed not therefore to ply their oars, except now and then to guide the canoe; for these little vessels have no rudder, but are steered by the paddles. The skilful voyageurs can shoot them to any point they please, simply by their dexterous handling of the oars; and Basil, Lucien, and Francois, had had sufficient practice both with "skiffs" and "dug-outs" to make good oarsmen of all three. They had made many a canoe trip upon the lower Mississippi and the bayous of Louisiana; besides ...
— Popular Adventure Tales • Mayne Reid
... very civilly took his leave, fully satisfied with his merchandize, and not a little pleased with his dexterous recovery from that false step into which his opinion of the sick man's ...
— The History of Tom Jones, a foundling • Henry Fielding
... any such mad decision, but that, Henriette hoped, might be averted. What would people say? Further discussion was checked by a call from Mrs. Walker, whom Hadria had the audacity to consult on questions of education and hygiene, leading her, by dexterous generalship, almost over the same ground that she had traversed herself, inducing the unconscious lady to repeat, with amazing accuracy, Hadria's ...
— The Daughters of Danaus • Mona Caird
... not usually, in the long run, make war more inhuman. There was a great outcry in Europe when the broadsword was superseded by the rapier, and a tall man of his hands could be spitted like a cat or a rabbit by any dexterous little fellow with a trained wrist. There was a wave of indignation, which was a hundred years in passing, when musketry first came into use, and a man-at-arms of great prowess could be killed from behind a wall by one who would not have dared to meet him in open combat. But these ...
— England and the War • Walter Raleigh
... on his hook, crouched down, and cautiously drew near the bank. A dexterous flick of his rod landed the worm fairly in the middle of the run. Hardly had it hit the water before something grabbed it, and Charley drew forth a flopping fish. But it proved to be only a fingerling. In disgust Charley wet his hand and ...
— 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
... to grin. Then equally impulsively the grin soured on his lips. So they thought he was clumsy? Eh? Resentfully he stared down at his hands,—those wonderfully dexterous,—yes, ambidexterous hands that were the aching envy of all his colleagues. Interruptingly as he stared the voice of the young Wall Paper Man rose buoyantly from ...
— The White Linen Nurse • Eleanor Hallowell Abbott
... first be conquered, and his kingdom will be weak. When Ishbosheth had lost his Abner, the kingdom was made weak, nor did he sit but tottering then upon his throne. So, when Satan loseth his strong men, them that are mighty to work iniquity, and dexterous to manage others in the same, then is his kingdom weak (2 Sam 3). Therefore, I say, Christ, and doth offer mercy, in the first place, to such, the more to weaken his kingdom. Christ Jesus was glad to see Satan fall like lightning from heaven; that is, suddenly, or head-long; and it was, surely, by ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... he was himself again. All his old affection for home and family was restored, and with a loud answering shout he started to rush to their assistance. But Marguerite willed otherwise. With a dexterous movement of her feet she got in his way and tripped him, and before he had time to realize what was happening, she had flung herself on the top of him ...
— Werwolves • Elliott O'Donnell
... playwrights from the pasture of the platitudinarian. Jones and Pinero both made their first strikes, not as the artists they undoubtedly are, but as pinchbeck moralists, moaning over the sad fact that girls are seduced. Shaw, a highly dexterous dramaturgist, smothers his dramaturgy in a pifflish iconoclasm that is no more than a disguise for Puritanism. Bennett and Wells, competent novelists, turn easily from the novel to the volume of shoddy philosophizing. Kipling, with "Kim" behind him, ...
— A Book of Prefaces • H. L. Mencken
... Mr. Eliott, dexterous as ever, and fortified by the exact sciences, took refuge from the occult under his covering of profound stupidity. He had a secret understanding with Dr. Gardner on the subject. His spirit no longer searched for Dr. Gardner's across the welter of his wife's ...
— The Helpmate • May Sinclair
... the series of great men quickly to be exhibited he should FIND A NICHE for the hero of the theatre. Garrick professed to wonder by what artifice he could be introduced: but Mallet let him know that, by a dexterous anticipation, he should fix him in a conspicuous place. "Mr. Mallet," says Garrick, in his gratitude of exultation, "have you left off to write for the stage?" Mallet then confessed that he had a drama in his hands. Garrick promised to act ...
— Lives of the Poets: Gay, Thomson, Young, and Others • Samuel Johnson
... there was time in the lengthened days as the year advanced for walking, rowing, and riding or driving about the picturesque country which surrounds Homeville. He and Mr. Harum often drove together after the bank closed, or after "tea," and it was a pleasure in itself to observe David's dexterous handling of his horses, and his content and satisfaction in the enjoyment of his favorite pastime. In pursuit of business he "jogged 'round," as he said, behind the faithful Jinny, but when on pleasure bent, a pair of satin-coated trotters drew him in the latest and "slickest" ...
— David Harum - A Story of American Life • Edward Noyes Westcott
... repealed, and he soon taught sedition-mongers, Irish and English, that he did not bear this sword in vain. Though murderous threats were rife, he showed an absolute disregard for personal danger, and ruled Ireland with a strong and dexterous hand. His administration was marred by want of human sympathy, and by some failure to discriminate between crime and disorder. The fate of John Mandeville is a black blot on the record of Irish government; and ...
— Prime Ministers and Some Others - A Book of Reminiscences • George W. E. Russell
... kitchen, talking and laughing about the new housekeeper likely to come; and they, too, went off, shutting, but not locking the door. Everything favoured us. Amante had tried her ladder on one of the two previous nights, and could, by a dexterous throw from beneath, unfasten it from the hook to which it was fixed, when it had served its office; she made up a bundle of worthless old clothes in order that we might the better preserve our characters of a travelling pedlar and his wife; she stuffed a hump ...
— Curious, if True - Strange Tales • Elizabeth Gaskell
... for the door, he found himself suddenly seized in a strong grip, and, taken unawares, he was unable to cope with an assailant so dexterous, so rapid in his movements, that, before Max had time to do more than realize that he was attacked, he was forced through an open doorway and flung violently to ...
— The Wharf by the Docks - A Novel • Florence Warden
... the ordinary forms of telescopes with large lens, not with large mirror.] However, accumulating infirmities and eventually death prevented Sir William Herschel from applying his plan, which 'evinced the most profound research in optical science, and the most dexterous ingenuity in mechanical contrivance. But his son, Sir John Herschel, nursed and cradled in the observatory, and a practical astronomer from his boyhood, determined upon testing it at whatever cost. Within ...
— Myths and Marvels of Astronomy • Richard A. Proctor
... fine manners, moreover, seem to be always aware of the beauty that comes of pausing slightly upon the smaller and slighter actions, such as meaner men are apt to hurry out of the way. In a word, the workman, with his finish and accomplishment, is the dexterous provider of contemporary things; and the ready, well-appointed, and decorated life of all towns is now altogether in his hands; whereas the artist craftsman of other times made a manifestation of his means. The first hides the streams, under stress and pressure, in ...
— Essays • Alice Meynell
... she listened. The recipe of the sauce was safe indeed, but she knew by experience how wide might be the gulf between the actual work of an artist and the product of another hand guided by his counsels, let the hand be ever so dexterous, and the counsels ever so clear. "Will it be too much," she said, "to ask you to give us the ...
— The Cook's Decameron: A Study in Taste: - Containing Over Two Hundred Recipes For Italian Dishes • Mrs. W. G. Waters
... as impersonal as literature. A criticism of novels and plays written to illustrate the frontier was the line into which the discussion fell, and the girl from the city, listening with a vivid interest, was pleased to find that these two real men talked with point and a sense of dexterous turns. She felt a sort of proud proprietorship in their power, and wished that some of the tailors' models she had met in society, who held so good a conceit of themselves, might come under the spell of their strong, tolerant virility. Whatever the difference ...
— Bucky O'Connor • William MacLeod Raine
... few dexterous questions he found out all he wanted to know from Owen, as he ate and drank. In fact, it was almost a relief to Owen to dilute the horror by talking about it. Before the meal was done, if meal it could be called, Ellis knew all he ...
— The Doom of the Griffiths • Elizabeth Gaskell
... amongst more quiet and well-behaved men. Yet—what is their history? The handsome black-haired man who is now looking over my shoulder is the celebrated thief Palacio, the most expert housebreaker and dexterous swindler in Spain—in a word, the modern Guzman Dalfarache. The brawny man who sits by the brasero of charcoal is Salvador, the highwayman of Ronda, who has committed a hundred murders. A fashionably dressed man, short ...
— Letters of George Borrow - to the British and Foreign Bible Society • George Borrow
... incredibly swift. It was his duty to remove full spools and replace them by empty ones, and he did this duty for sixteen spinning frames. Seeing the "new hand's" astonishment at his deftness he became reckless and, intending an unusually dexterous movement, miscalculated his reach, and the result was a momentary ...
— Reels and Spindles - A Story of Mill Life • Evelyn Raymond
... although pressing hard upon his adversary, had generously avoided wounding him, and when at last by a dexterous movement he wrested his sword from him. Lucila's husband, surprised at the unexpected advantage, and in alarm at being thus disarmed, retreated a few steps. But Fadrique threw the weapon adroitly into the air, and catching it again near the point of ...
— The Two Captains • Friedrich de La Motte-Fouque
... are delicious eating, far surpassing those of the domestic hen. The height of laying is about the first of June, when the people of the neighborhood go to the marshes an egging, as it is so called. So abundant are the nests of this species, and so dexterous some persons at finding them, that one hundred dozen of eggs have been collected by one man in a day. At this time the crows, the minx, and the foxes, come in for their share, but, not content with the eggs, these last often seize and devour ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 5 November 1848 • Various
... ignorance or knavery has spread through the world, the one which bears the marks of the most dexterous invention, is the opinion that the system of Republicanism is only adapted to a small country, and that a Monarchy is suited, on the contrary, to those of greater extent. Such is the language of Courts, ...
— The Writings Of Thomas Paine, Complete - With Index to Volumes I - IV • Thomas Paine
... of a scientific law has never been better explained than by the writer already quoted as Mr. Buckle's dexterous apologist. A scientific law is not an ordinance, but a record. It simply professes to describe the order in which certain phenomena have been observed uniformly to recur. It differs from a legislative enactment, in that the one would be a law although it were never obeyed, whereas ...
— Old-Fashioned Ethics and Common-Sense Metaphysics - With Some of Their Applications • William Thomas Thornton
... snap of his fingers, command the four aces with a whistle, and get odd tricks. But there is a great many people in London, besides this man, famous for playing odd tricks, and yet no conjurers neither. This man would have made a great figure in the law, as he is so dexterous a conveyancer. But the law is a profession that does not want any jugglers. Nor do we need any longer to load our heads with the weight of learning, or pore {39} for years over arts and sciences, when a few months' ...
— A Lecture On Heads • Geo. Alex. Stevens
... now came from the roofs staggered the savages, most of whom fell outward, and sought cover in their usual quick and dexterous manner. Three or four, however, thought it safer to fall within the palisades, seeking safety immediately under the sides of the buildings. The view of these men, who were perfectly safe from the fire of the ...
— Wyandotte • James Fenimore Cooper
... holding his cards up in front of his eyes. He riffled the close-set edges with a dexterous thumb, took another squint, pursed his lips, said softly—"M-m—yes, I'm in," dropped two white chips onto the little pile in the centre, then, looking up, laughed ...
— Wide Courses • James Brendan Connolly
... first thing they teach the papooses in an Indian wigwam. I've got out of a Huron's thongs of raw hide before now, and it ain't very likely that a stiff stirrup leather will hold me. Put your hands out." With a few dexterous twists he loosened De Catinat's bonds, until he also was able to slip his hands free. "Now for your feet, if you'll put them up. They'll find that we are easier to ...
— The Refugees • Arthur Conan Doyle
... rail, then hired conveyances to carry him to where men and snow-ploughs were cutting a road to the imprisoned cars. Mr. Thorne joined them in their work. His strength seemed superhuman. Muscular men were amazed at his swift, dexterous movements. All day they toiled. The following night was a terrible one to the heart-sick passengers. The fires were out; not a morsel of food to eat. Ruey, chilled and weak, could not even find relief in sleep. Her fortitude nearly deserted her. The tears had their way. She lay curled in her seat, ...
— Divers Women • Pansy and Mrs. C.M. Livingston
... fall into the hands of a master who treated me with no little kindness. He frequently went fishing, and as I was dexterous in catching fish, he never went without me. One day he sent me out with a Moor to catch fish for him. Then notions of deliverance darted into my thoughts, and I prepared not for fishing, but for a voyage. When everything was ready, we sailed away to the ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol III • Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds.
... an individual of the species that sat demurely at table, taking his place with the other guests; like them he would spread out his napkin, and stick one corner of it into his button-hole just as they did, and he was exceedingly dexterous in the use of his knife, fork, and spoon. Spectators were not a little surprised to see him go to a bed made for him, tie up his head in a pocket-handkerchief, place it sideways on a pillow, tuck himself carefully in the bed-clothes, pretend to be ...
— Willis the Pilot • Paul Adrien
... had a daughter of nine years old, a child of towardly parts for her age, very dexterous at her needle, and skillful in dressing her baby.[21] Her mother and she contrived to fit up the baby's cradle for me against night; the cradle was put into a small drawer of a cabinet, and the drawer placed upon a hanging shelf for fear of the rats. This was my bed all ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 5 • Charles Sylvester
... trays so that the winds might carry away the chaff. Then they were roasted in the same trays. Burning coals and seeds were mixed in the basket trays and kept in motion by a tossing process which fanned the coals until the seeds were done; then they were separated from the coals by dexterous manipulation. Afterwards the seeds were ground on mealing-stones and molded into cakes, often huge loaves, that were stored away for use in time of need. Raspberries, chokecherries, and buffalo berries are abundant, and these fruits were gathered and mixed with the bread. Such fruit cakes ...
— Canyons of the Colorado • J. W. Powell
... case, were congenial, at least, to high judicial qualities. He despised chicanery of all kinds, and formed independent opinions upon broad grounds instead of being at the mercy of ingenious sophistry. He was free from the foibles of petty vanity upon which a dexterous counsel could play, and had the solid, downright force of mind and character which gives weight to authority of all kinds. I need not labour to prove that masculine common sense is a good judicial quality. Popular opinion, however, is apt to misconstrue broad epithets and to confound vigour with ...
— The Life of Sir James Fitzjames Stephen, Bart., K.C.S.I. - A Judge of the High Court of Justice • Sir Leslie Stephen
... the black silk bonnet carefully from the little table and Amanda shifted nervously from one foot to the other. If only Aunt Rebecca wouldn't hold the bonnet so the worm would fall to the floor! Then the woman gave the stiff headgear a dexterous turn and the squirming thing ...
— Amanda - A Daughter of the Mennonites • Anna Balmer Myers
... But for the dexterous arrangement by which Champlain managed to cook his own food, the tabagie would have been more dangerous to health than the portage. In any case, it was an ordeal that could not be avoided, for feasting meant friendly intercourse, and only through friendly ...
— The Founder of New France - A Chronicle of Champlain • Charles W. Colby
... disclaiming sympathy with extreme persons of either side. He puts his case with direct and plausible force, addressing his readers vivaciously as plain people like himself, among whom as reasonable men there cannot be two opinions. He cuts rival arguments to pieces with dexterous strokes, representing them as the confused reasoning of well-meaning but dull intellects, and dances with lively mockery on the fragments. If the authors of such arguments knew their own minds, they would be entirely on his side. He echoes ...
— Daniel Defoe • William Minto
... 'Thou shalt not kill;' we have no right to kill ourselves, or to run the risk of doing so merely for amusement or to be considered brave or dexterous." ...
— Elsie's Motherhood • Martha Finley
... feared by the army for his bravery, his rigorous discipline, and his readiness to share their toils and dangers; stern and rugged; without education, eloquence, or riches; ill-suited for shining in public assemblies, but resolute and dexterous in action; verily made to dominate the vigorous but unrefined multitude, whether in camp or city, partly by participating their feelings, partly by giving them in his own person a specimen of the deserts and sometimes ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume I. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... something like an egg, supposing both ends to be like the small one. They use a becket, in the same manner as at Tanna, in throwing the dart, which, I believe, is much used in striking fish, etc. In this they seem very dexterous; nor, indeed, do I know that they have any other method of catching large fish, for I neither saw hooks nor ...
— A Voyage Towards the South Pole and Round the World Volume 2 • James Cook
... the side of the rebel, "look here then!" With a dexterous movement and a slight struggle from the boy, he lifted the hat. A half-dozen apples, a bird's nest, two birds' eggs, and a fluttering half-fledged bird fell from it. A wave of delight and astonishment ran along the benches, a blank look of hopeless bewilderment settled upon the ...
— Colonel Starbottle's Client and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... way. He struck his hoop with a force sufficient to overthrow not only Ernest's hoop, but Ernest himself; but the young champion knew well what he was about. Instead of waiting for the blow, by a dexterous turn he brought the edge of his light hoop against the side of Blackall's, which went reeling away among the following crowd, and was instantly upset. Ernest was in time to treat another hoop of the second line in the same fashion, ...
— Ernest Bracebridge - School Days • William H. G. Kingston
... his usual magic insight, saw long ago whither our over-refined gentry were tending; and in one of his finest books he shows how a little dexterous slang may dwarf a noble deed. Nevil Beauchamp was under a tremendous fire with his men: he wanted to carry a wounded soldier out of action, but the soldier wished his adored officer to be saved. At the finish the two men arrived safely in their own lines amid the cheers of English, French, and even ...
— The Ethics of Drink and Other Social Questions - Joints In Our Social Armour • James Runciman
... the least spoiled by this change in his fortunes. He remained simple, earnest, and unaffected. He worked as hard to acquire knowledge and skill in art as he had meant to work to become a dexterous stone-cutter. ...
— Strange Stories from History for Young People • George Cary Eggleston |
