"Unexceptionable" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... are tolerably numerous, a thoroughly unexceptionable white is still a desideratum—one combining the perfect opacity or body of white lead with the perfect permanency of zinc white. The nearest approach to it that has yet been made, is Chinese white, which possesses in a great measure the property ...
— Field's Chromatography - or Treatise on Colours and Pigments as Used by Artists • George Field
... petitions from the Liverpool and Bristol merchants; and in view of Sir Robert's own notorious excesses with the bottle a temperance Bill from his hands may well have roused Fielding's ironic laughter. The authorship of the satire is unknown; but the moral appears to have been unexceptionable, as Queen Gin, in the final scene, "drinks a great quantity of liquor and at ...
— Henry Fielding: A Memoir • G. M. Godden
... of the females was strictly unexceptionable. They were modest, distant, and silent. They never uttered a word during the day. At night they would occupy themselves in procuring wood, which they carried to the lodge, and then, restoring the ...
— The Indian Fairy Book - From the Original Legends • Cornelius Mathews
... my dear, for your behaviour is generally graceful, and unexceptionable; only the other night it was very rough and uncouth. I expected you to put your finger in your mouth the next thing, and stand as if you had never seen anybody. And Daisy Randolph! the heiress of ...
— Melbourne House • Elizabeth Wetherell
... friendly connoisseurs—to come before the great public, if at all, only after being launched by great hostesses at small parties; to which end he had provided himself with unimpeachable introductions to unexceptionable ladies from irresistible personalities—a German Grand Duke, a Bulgarian Ambassador, Countesses, both French and Italian, and even a Belgian princess. But to his boundless amazement—for he had always ...
— Ghetto Comedies • Israel Zangwill
... inflexible resolve, very effective, and garnished with a fierce dyed mustache, and a somewhat palpable wig to match. His style of dress was what, in an inferior man, one would have called 'dandified.' An unexceptionable surtout, opened to display a white waistcoat with sundry chains, and the extremities terminated, respectively, in patent leather and primrose kid. During the discussion he alternately fondled a neat riding-whip and aired a snowy pocket-handkerchief. Those who know him give him credit for ...
— The International Weekly Miscellany, Volume I. No. 9. - Of Literature, Art, and Science, August 26, 1850 • Various
... mine. However, I do pray that they may be content with these endless miseries of ours; among which, after all, there is no discredit for any wrong thing done—sorrow is the beginning and end, sorrow that punishment is most severe when our conduct has been most unexceptionable. As to my daughter and yours and my young Cicero, why should I recommend them to you, my dear brother? Rather I grieve that their orphan state will cause you no less sorrow than it does me. Yet as long as you are uncondemned they will not be ...
— The Letters of Cicero, Volume 1 - The Whole Extant Correspodence in Chronological Order • Marcus Tullius Cicero
... of my moral feelings, and my unrelaxed solicitude for the maintenance of the right principles of conduct, I find I can read without tears of the retired Colonels who forge cheques, and the ladies of unexceptionable position who are caught pilfering furs in shops. Somehow the sudden lapses of respected people, odd indecorums, backbitings, bigamies, embezzlements, and attempted chastities—the surprising leaps they make now and then out of propriety into the police-courts—somehow ...
— More Trivia • Logan Pearsall Smith
... who did not live with her, those who knew her but partially, and especially the majority of foreigners, prejudiced by infamous libels, may imagine I have thought it my duty to sacrifice truth on the altar of gratitude. Fortunately I can invoke unexceptionable witnesses; they will declare whether what I assert that I have seen and heard appears to them ...
— Memoirs Of The Court Of Marie Antoinette, Queen Of France, Complete • Madame Campan
... council.[14] The clause began: "Born and educated in this country, I glory in the name of Britain" [sic], and went on to express the king's confidence in the loyalty of his people and his desire to promote their welfare.[15] The words were unexceptionable, but the absolute command to insert them in the speech for which the ministers, not the king, were responsible, was unwise. The use of the word Britain was attributed to the Scotsman Bute. In later life the king declared that he had written the clause without ...
— The Political History of England - Vol. X. • William Hunt
... her, astray, was to keep watch and ward over the affairs of the occupants of neighboring flats, and see that they conducted themselves with the propriety becoming the neighbors of so very genteel and unexceptionable a person as Miss Betsey Kling. In pursuit of this occupation she was addicted to sudden and silent appearances, much after the manner of materialized spirits, at windows opening into the hall, and doors carelessly left ajar. She was, however, afflicted ...
— Wired Love - A Romance of Dots and Dashes • Ella Cheever Thayer
... the fashionable statement of all those who oppose him (the old Locofocos as well as the new), that he has no principles, and that the Whig party have abandoned their principles by adopting him as their candidate. He maintained that General Taylor occupied a high and unexceptionable Whig ground, and took for his first instance and proof of this his statement in the Allison letter—with regard to the Bank, Tariff, Rivers and Harbors, etc.—that the will of the people should produce its own results, ...
— McClure's Magazine, Vol. VI., No. 6, May, 1896 • Various
... them the subject of a dissertation. He repeats all the observations of Ferdinando, and supports his own assertions by the experience of his father, a physician at Lecce, whose testimony, as an eye-witness, may be admitted as unexceptionable. ...
— The Black Death, and The Dancing Mania • Justus Friedrich Karl Hecker
... the act for which he had been tried was in itself doubtful; of the evidences which appeared against him, the character of the man was not unexceptionable, that of the woman notoriously infamous; she whose testimony chiefly influenced the jury to condemn him afterwards retracted her assertions. He always himself denied that he was drunk, as had been ...
— Lives of the Poets: Addison, Savage, and Swift • Samuel Johnson
... "In every way unexceptionable. I can speak of him with the utmost confidence. He is right in all respects—right as to the business quality, right as to character, and right as to associations. You could not have ...
— After a Shadow, and Other Stories • T. S. Arthur
... experiment of friction of a fluid is dependent on no hypothesis, and appears to be wholly unexceptionable, it was used by Mr. Joule repeatedly in modified forms. The stirring of mercury, of oil, and of water with a paddle, which was turned by a falling weight, was compared, and solid friction, the friction of iron on iron under ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 363, December 16, 1882 • Various
... however, he presents all lovers of Scotland with the completest details of every Highland sport, on all of which he is an unexceptionable authority; and with what many will value even more, a series of life-like sketches of the rarer and more interesting animals of the country. He has thus brought up to the present level of knowledge the history of all the scarce birds and beasts of Scotland.... Henceforth ...
— Scotch Loch-Fishing • AKA Black Palmer, William Senior
... papers," she answered crossly one day, in reply to some unexceptionable and uninteresting comment of his upon such history as was just then in the raw ...
— The Farringdons • Ellen Thorneycroft Fowler
... James I. in Scotland has even extorted praise from one of his bitterest calumniators; for Mrs. Macaulay has said—"His conduct, when King of Scotland, was in many points unexceptionable."] ...
— Literary Character of Men of Genius - Drawn from Their Own Feelings and Confessions • Isaac D'Israeli
... appalled at this demonstration—a demonstration which never could have occurred without the provocation of the grossest injustice. The boys were well disciplined, and the order of the Institute was generally unexceptionable. Such a flurry had never before been known, and it was evident that the students intended to take the law into their own hands. They acted upon the impulse of the moment, and I judged that at least one half of them ...
— Breaking Away - or The Fortunes of a Student • Oliver Optic
... at last what Bayford esteemed a compliment, she had commissioned her London aunts to send her what she called 'an unexceptionable garment,' and so well did they fulfil their orders, that not only did her little son scream, 'Mamma, pretty, pretty!' and Gilbert stand transfixed with admiration, but it called forth Mr. Kendal's first personal remark, ...
— The Young Step-Mother • Charlotte M. Yonge
... truth, Mehevi was indebted to the excellence of his viands for the honour of my repeated visits—a matter which cannot appear singular, when it is borne in mind that bachelors, all the world over, are famous for serving up unexceptionable repasts. ...
— Typee - A Romance of the South Sea • Herman Melville
... distinguished Miss Calthorpe at nineteen. She was small and slim, with a delicate complexion. She had large soft eyes of a limpid innocent azure, regular features, rosebud lips, hands after Velasquez, and an unexceptionable taste in dress, the selection of which formed one of the most onerous occupations of her life. To attire herself becomingly, and to give the Squire the dinners he best liked, in an order of succession so dexterously arranged as never to provoke ...
— Vixen, Volume I. • M. E. Braddon
... confirmed lunacy—all these were as well known in their outward symptoms eighteen hundred years ago as they are to-day. Persons could not be afflicted with such maladies in a corner. The neighbors must have known then, as they do now, the particulars of such cases, and have been unexceptionable witnesses to their reality. Persons may feign blindness and other infirmities among strangers, but no man can pass himself off as palsied, deaf and dumb, blind, (especially blind from birth,) halt, withered, in his own community. The reality of the maladies then ...
— Companion to the Bible • E. P. Barrows
... madam?" returned Ruthven. "There is but one, I know; but that one is unexceptionable: it is the precipitate marriage of the widow of the assassinated with the chief assassin, and the letters which have been handed over to us by James Balfour, which prove that the guilty persons had united ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... of God could not be expected to crown with success the arms of such unhallowed men as their opponents in faith on this question, refused to march until their small band was purified by expelling the unclean, and introducing others whose tenets were unexceptionable. ...
— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 1 (of 5) • John Marshall
... cattle—in other words, whether Christians or cattle will pay more rent and taxes. I omit all higher considerations, because some of the most philanthropic and enlightened defenders of the present land system have defended it on this low ground. In order to make the test complete and unexceptionable, I have selected a comparatively poor district for tillage, and one of the richest I could find for grazing, giving all possible natural advantages to Scullyism. But the test would not be fair unless the occupiers ...
— The Land-War In Ireland (1870) - A History For The Times • James Godkin
... amongst the equestrians, the most ill-favoured little pony, its rider equipped in a straw-bonnet, with a shawl pinned across the saddle, will unblushingly thrust itself into companionship with a handsome English horse, whose owner is graced by the most unexceptionable habit and other appliances. Even the very donkeys walk along with dignified resolution, as if determined to ruffle it with the best, and not yield an inch of their prerogative. In fact, they evidently know their own value, and remember that not one of ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 431 - Volume 17, New Series, April 3, 1852 • Various
... thought the speaker had(8) before in his mind." This simple definition of a name, as a word (or set of words) serving the double purpose of a mark to recall to ourselves the likeness of a former thought, and a sign to make it known to others, appears unexceptionable. Names, indeed, do much more than this; but whatever else they do, grows out of, and is the result of this: as will appear ...
— A System Of Logic, Ratiocinative And Inductive • John Stuart Mill
... may command and receive every reasonable comfort and attention. Religious services are well attended, and numerous schools established, in which the children are making encouraging progress. The flowers and fruits of most parts of Europe flourish here, and the climate is unexceptionable. There are a great many missionaries in Graham's Town; and on the whole it may be safely averred, that the general intelligence of the inhabitants is not a whit inferior to that of the middle and lower classes of any country in the ...
— The World of Waters - A Peaceful Progress o'er the Unpathed Sea • Mrs. David Osborne
... they had diverging lines of operation. Napoleon's idea was to strike suddenly at their point of junction before they could concentrate, push in between them, drive them apart, and then defeat each separately. The plan was unexceptionable, resembling that of his first campaign in 1796, and the opening moves were successfully carried out. Napoleon left Paris on June 12th, his army being then echeloned between Paris and the Belgian frontier, ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 2 of 8 • Various
... about children George Cruikshank makes bright with illustrations—there is one published by the ingenious and opulent Mr. Tegg. It is entitled "Mirth and Morality," the mirth being, for the most part, on the side of the designer—the morality, unexceptionable certainly, the author's capital. Here are then, to these moralities, a smiling train of mirths supplied by George Cruikshank. See yonder little fellows butterfly-hunting across a common! Such a light, brisk, airy, gentleman-like drawing was never made ...
— George Cruikshank • William Makepeace Thackeray
... was divided into four districts, over each of which was placed a watch consisting of three persons, one principal and two subordinate watchmen. These, being selected from among those convicts whose conduct and character had been unexceptionable since their landing, were vested with authority to patrol at all hours in the night, to visit such places as might be deemed requisite for the discovery of any felony, trespass, or misdemeanor, and to secure for examination all persons that might appear to be concerned therein; ...
— An Account of the English Colony in New South Wales, Vol. 1 • David Collins
... telling a facetious story—well, in a busy, broad-minded town of thirty thousand inhabitants, such proclivities are no bar whatever to perfect esteem. But—how is one to phrase it without wronging Daniel Povey? He was entirely moral; his views were unexceptionable. The truth is that, for the ruling classes of Bursley, Daniel Povey was just a little too fanatical a worshipper of the god Pan. He was one of the remnant who had kept alive the great Pan tradition from the days of the Regency through the vast, arid Victorian ...
— The Old Wives' Tale • Arnold Bennett
... and the word struck like a blow upon her nerves of hearing,—"here is the article. Isn't that unexceptionable now?" ...
— The House in Town • Susan Warner
... she had better, much better, go to her humdrum Aunt Margaret's, as she always does—she is a fixture in Grosvenor-square. These stationary good people, these zoophite friends, are sometimes very convenient; and Mrs. Margaret Delacour is the most unexceptionable zoophite in the creation. She has, it is true, an antipathy to me, because I'm of such a different nature from herself; but then her antipathy does not extend to my offspring: she is kind beyond measure ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. III - Belinda • Maria Edgeworth
... his family, the important services of his ancestors, and the multitudes he has, by power, engaged in his interest, to screen him from condign punishment; my whole safety depends upon myself; which renders it the more indispensibly necessary for me, to take care that my conduct be clear and unexceptionable. Besides, I am well aware, my country men, that the eye of the public is upon me; and that, though the impartial, who prefer the real advantage of the commonwealth to all other considerations, favour my pretensions, the Patricians want nothing so much as an occasion against me. It is, therefore, ...
— The Young Gentleman and Lady's Monitor, and English Teacher's Assistant • John Hamilton Moore
... 2s. 6d. 22. Ivo and Verena; or, the Snowdrop; a Norwegian Tale. 1s. 6d.; or cloth, 2s. 23. Edward Trueman; or, False Impressions. Cloth, 1s. 24. Fables, Stories, and Allegories, 18mo. 2s. 6d. cloth, with numerous Cuts.—It has been attempted in this Volume to give an unexceptionable Collection of Fabulous Pieces, divested of the usual vulgarities, which may serve as a Reading Book for Schools, and take the place of some objectionable publications of a similar kind. 25. A Companion for the Penitent and for those Troubled in Mind. By the Rev. JOHN ...
— Australia, its history and present condition • William Pridden
... shut his eyes and waxed up his ears to many small things that he knew would have irritated him if he had attended to them; and, in his solitary rides, he forced himself to dwell on the positive advantages that had accrued to him and his through his marriage. He had obtained an unexceptionable chaperone, if not a tender mother, for his little girl; a skilful manager of his formerly disorderly household; a woman who was graceful and pleasant to look at for the head of his table. Moreover, Cynthia reckoned for something in the favourable side ...
— Wives and Daughters • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... the fact. But in the earlier centuries no such reproach rested upon us. Although perhaps, then as now, the Scotch intelligence had a special leaning towards philosophy, there was still many a learned Scot whose reputation was in all the universities, whose Latinity was unexceptionable, and his erudition immense, and to whom verses were addressed and books dedicated in every centre of letters. One of the most distinguished of these scholars was George Buchanan, and there could be no better type of the man of letters of his time, in whom the ...
— Royal Edinburgh - Her Saints, Kings, Prophets and Poets • Margaret Oliphant
... Hadger says, "but it wouldn't do, notwithstanding (no one can be more liberal than myself on the subject of enlightening our negro property!) the Tract Society exhibits such an unexceptionable regard to the requirements ...
— Justice in the By-Ways - A Tale of Life • F. Colburn Adams
... be innocent, if she should be wronged after all, ha? I don't know what to think, and I promise you, her education has been unexceptionable. I may say it, for I chiefly made it my own care to initiate her very infancy in the rudiments of virtue, and to impress upon her tender years a young odium and aversion to the very sight of men; ay, friend, she ...
— The Way of the World • William Congreve
... behalf. The worst case of all is when such men happen to be of a rank and position which of itself neither gives them, nor excludes them from, what is considered the best society; when their admission to it depends mainly on what is thought of them personally—and however unexceptionable their breeding and habits, their being identified with opinions and public conduct unacceptable to those who give the tone to society would operate as an effectual exclusion. Many a woman flatters herself ...
— The Subjection of Women • John Stuart Mill
... the English army, a blond, silent man of forty, with kind eyes and a delightfully modulated voice. He had a comfortable private income, a "place" in Oxfordshire, an uncle, young and healthy to be sure, but still a lord, and an older sister who had married a lord, so that his credentials were unexceptionable, and Mrs. Toland was nearly as happy as ...
— The Story Of Julia Page - Works of Kathleen Norris, Volume V. • Kathleen Norris
... lamb, and two of blue cotton for a bottle of ghee. Amongst them was the first really pretty face seen by me in the Somali country. The head was well formed, and gracefully placed upon a long thin neck and narrow shoulders; the hair, brow, and nose were unexceptionable, there was an arch look in the eyes of jet and pearl, and a suspicion of African protuberance about the lips, which gave the countenance an exceeding naivete. Her skin was a warm, rich nut-brown, an especial charm in these regions, and ...
— First footsteps in East Africa • Richard F. Burton
... crowning contribution to the cause of knowledge, we are the more ready to believe that it actually is all that it claims to be. The American edition by J.B. Lippincott & Co., of Philadelphia, is published in numbers simultaneously with the Edinburgh and London edition, and in an unexceptionable style of typography. Its low price brings it within the reach of almost every reader. Indeed, when we consider the size of the volumes, the number of illustrations and maps, the mechanical execution, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, Issue 45, July, 1861 • Various
... had been at first treated with great coolness by Mr Combermere; the latter gentleman did not like strangers, and always looked on a moustache with suspicion. But Mr Newton was so deferential, so unexceptionable in deportment, and prudent in his general sentiments, warmly advocating Mr Combermere's political opinions, that he had at last won the good opinion even of the father of the family. Besides, he paid no particular attention to the Misses Combermere: there was no danger of his making ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 441 - Volume 17, New Series, June 12, 1852 • Various
... constitutions of government or systems of society, whatever could wound the sensibility of any mortal, except a pagan, a republican, or a dissenter, has been unrelentingly blotted out, and its place supplied by unexceptionable verses in his lordship's later style. You may judge how much of the poem remains as hitherto published. The result is not so good as might be wished; in plain terms, it is a very sad affair indeed; for, though the torches kindled in ...
— P.'s Correspondence (From "Mosses From An Old Manse") • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... how such an article was manufactured, he replied, 'Of course.' Just as he said the word, there came tripping up, from her seat at the stern of the vessel, a young lady in a puce-coloured silk cloak, and boots of the same; with long black ringlets, large black eyes, brief petticoats, and unexceptionable ankles. ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens
... of his son's success, and did his best to stimulate it by lavish expenditure at the Christopher, whenever he could manage to run down to Eton. But this practice, though sufficiently unexceptionable to the boys, was not held in equal delight by the masters. To tell the truth, neither Sir Roger nor his son were favourites with these stern custodians. At last it was felt necessary to get rid of them both; and Louis was not ...
— Doctor Thorne • Anthony Trollope
... detain you," he said. "Your name has been mentioned to me, Mr. Heseltine-Wrigge, as a financier likely to have a large sum of money at his disposal. I have a scheme which needs money. Providing the security is unexceptionable, are you in a position to ...
— Peter Ruff and the Double Four • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... broad stairway leading to a hall over the "corridor" and to the drawing-rooms over the store. They liked it! Aurora would find out at once what sort of an establishment was likely to be opened below, and if that proved unexceptionable she would lease the ...
— The Grandissimes • George Washington Cable
... admitted Chase, somewhat grudgingly. He, himself, was decidedly slender of limb much to his regret. Also, in spite of incessant motoring, his face was not that of unexceptionable health. "You look as rugged as a rock. Never thought you were cut out for an athlete, either, when ...
— Strawberry Acres • Grace S. Richmond
... the combination of cook and butler which took him into its ideal keeping to the unknown, unheard, and unseen German baron who had the dining-room floor, and was represented through his open door by his breakfast-trays and his perfectly valeted clothes. The valeting in that house was unexceptionable, and the service at table was of a dress-coated decorum worthy of finer dinners than were ever eaten there. The service throughout was of a gravity never relaxed, except in the intimate moments of bringing the bath in the morning, when the news of the day before ...
— London Films • W.D. Howells
... hemispheres, Galle deduced a solar parallax of 8.87".[778] At Mauritius in 1874, Lord Lindsay and Sir David Gill applied the "diurnal method" to Juno, then conveniently situated for the purpose; and the continued use of similar occasions affords an unexceptionable means for improving knowledge of the sun's distance. They frequently recur; they need no elaborate preparation; a single astronomer armed with a heliometer can do all the requisite work. Dr. Gill, however, organized a more complex plan ...
— A Popular History of Astronomy During the Nineteenth Century - Fourth Edition • Agnes M. (Agnes Mary) Clerke
... curl his long body up among my luggage, and listened to the crew, who had rolled together at the bottom of the boat, snore as peacefully as if they slept between fair linen sheets, in the purest of calico night-gear, and the most unexceptionable of nightcaps, until somehow I fell into a ...
— Wonderful Adventures of Mrs. Seacole in Many Lands • Mary Seacole
... in unexceptionable livery opened the door. Mr. Myrtle was engaged, but on Hiram's sending in his name, he was ushered into the front parlor, and requested to sit, and informed that Mr. Myrtle would see him in a few minutes. This gave Hiram time to look ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. IV. October, 1863, No. IV. - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various
... born at Hampton, N. Y., Feb. 15, 1782. He is a farmer, of common school education, and possesses strong intellectual and colloquial powers. He is a man of unexceptionable character, is a member of the Baptist church, in good standing, and has a license to preach the gospel. For the last fifteen years, he has almost exclusively devoted himself to investigating Scripture prophecies, ...
— The Book of Religions • John Hayward
... in which I am called upon to carry out the principle of self-government and popular sovereignty in the Territories?" It is no answer, he argued, that the constitution is unobjectionable. "You have no right to force an unexceptionable constitution on a people." The pro-slavery clause was not the offense in the constitution, to his mind. "If Kansas wants a slave-State constitution she has a right to it, if she wants a free-State constitution she has a right ...
— Stephen A. Douglas - A Study in American Politics • Allen Johnson
... would embarrass any reader in his teens; though a boy that could generate such a poem as that, might well be believed the father of other giants whom he chose to disown. It is a masterpiece in its kind, almost unexceptionable in all its parts. The subject is supposed to have been suggested by the fate of Sir Baldwin Fulford, a zealous Lancastrian, beheaded at Bristol in 1461, the first year of the reign of Edward IV., who, it is believed, was actually ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXXII. - June, 1843.,Vol. LIII. • Various
... compliments. The church found itself rich enough to increase its minister's stipend; and when Theophil took Mr. Moggridge back to supper, another surprise awaited him, in the form of a suspicious-looking letter, which, being opened, revealed a quite unexceptionable L50 note, enclosed in a sheet of note-paper, on which was written—"From ...
— The Romance of Zion Chapel [3d ed.] • Richard Le Gallienne
... Priapus, Proserpina, Bacchus, Attis, Adonis, Silenus, and the Satyrs, were all one, and the[949] same. Nobody had examined the theology of the antients more deeply than Porphyry. He was a determined Pagan, and his evidence in this point is unexceptionable. The titles of Orus and Osiris being given to Dionusus, caused him in time to partake of the same worship which was paid to the great luminary; and as he had also many other titles, from them sprung a multiplicity of Deities. [950]Morichum Siculi Bacchum ...
— A New System; or, an Analysis of Antient Mythology. Volume I. • Jacob Bryant
... those softer feelings which nature had implanted deep in the bosom of Mr. Tracy Tupman, and which now appeared destined to centre in one lovely object. The young ladies were pretty, their manners winning, their dispositions unexceptionable; but there was a dignity in the air, a touch-me-not-ishness in the walk, a majesty in the eye, of the spinster aunt, to which, at their time of life, they could lay no claim, which distinguished her from any female on whom Mr. Tupman had ever gazed. That there ...
— The Pickwick Papers • Charles Dickens
... to his countrymen in the season, ministering, not injudiciously, to their myriad whims and necessities. Among his multifarious functions, perhaps the most respectable and permanent was that of clerk to the English chapel. He was by no means a very religious man, nor were his morals quite unexceptionable, but he had completely identified himself with the fortunes and interests of that modest building. A sneer at its capabilities or a doubt as to its prospects would exasperate him at any time far more than a direct insult to himself (to be sure there was little self-respect left ...
— Sword and Gown - A Novel • George A. Lawrence
... perhaps repeat again, an assertion I have already advanced, and of whose truth I every day receive fresh conviction, which is, that if ever child received a reasonable and virtuous education, it was myself. Born in a family of unexceptionable morals, every lesson I received was replete with maxims of prudence and virtue. My father (though fond of gallantry) not only possessed distinguished probity, but much religion; in the world he appeared a man of pleasure, in his family ...
— The Confessions of J. J. Rousseau, Complete • Jean Jacques Rousseau
... an irreproachable repose of manner. There are no improper wrinkles in your cravat; your shirt-bosom does not bulge; the trowsers are accurate about your admirable boot. But you look very stiff and brittle. You are a little bullied by your unexceptionable shirt-collar, which interdicts perfect freedom of movement in your head. You are elegant, undoubtedly, but it seems as if you might break and fall to pieces, like a porcelain vase, if you were ...
— Prue and I • George William Curtis
... in brief, an indispensable and unexceptionable farm and home companion for the people ...
— Prairie Farmer, Vol. 56: No. 1, January 5, 1884. - A Weekly Journal for the Farm, Orchard and Fireside • Various
... She means to take advantage of you, and bring forward her girl, and make a grand coup. That is what she means—I know that sort of person. It is just the greatest luck in the world for them to get hold of some one that is so unexceptionable and so unsuspicious ...
— Sir Tom • Mrs. Oliphant
... and instantly fired." Upon this, says Capt. Preston, "a general attack was made upon the men": So that there was no general attack, according to his account, till after the firing; which agrees with Mr. Bridgham and other unexceptionable witnesses in court, who declared, that "there was no danger to the soldiers from any thing they saw " — " no molestation, nor any thing which they thought could produce firing": Indeed, one of the witnesses ...
— The Writings of Samuel Adams, volume II (1770 - 1773) - collected and edited by Harry Alonso Cushing • Samuel Adams
... made a very good exchange broker. He seemed to be fond of mercantile life, establishing manufactories, and letting out money on bond and mortgage. When the queen was greatly pressed for funds he would sometimes accept her paper, always taking care to obtain the most unexceptionable security. He engaged in a partnership with two very efficient men for farming the revenues of Saxony. He even entered into a contract to supply the Prussian army with forage, when that army was ...
— The Empire of Austria; Its Rise and Present Power • John S. C. Abbott
... and esteemed these estimable ladies, and though, in many respects, opposed to boarding-schools in general, yet, as there seemed, at present, no other means for the girls to acquire an education, but by sending them from home, they thought that a more unexceptionable place could not be provided for them ...
— Lewie - Or, The Bended Twig • Cousin Cicely
... his Elements de Litterature, but lately published in the Encyclopaedie, and commencing the Memoires d'un pere, pour servir d l'instruction de ses enfants. Thomas was editing his Eloges, sometimes full of eloquence, often subtle and delicate, always long, unexceptionable, and wearisome. His noble character had won him the sincere esteem and affection of Madame Necker. She, laboriously anxious about the duties politeness requires from the mistress of a house, went so far as to write down in her tablets "To recompliment ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume VI. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... able to help his mother. On the contrary, grown men, with men's callings, as they were, they found themselves under the necessity of taking help from her. There were also other daughters besides Hester married to men in professions as unexceptionable as those of their brothers-in-law, but neither were they in circumstances which could make them feel justified in granting the smallest subsidy to Mrs. Jennings. Only Hester toiled for her mother at every ...
— A Houseful of Girls • Sarah Tytler
... the women themselves. The wisest men can hardly guard themselves against the fears of superstition; poor silly women therefore in this case must needs be unexceptionable witnesses, and fit to be admitted into the number of the chosen witnesses to attest this fact. One part of the account given of them is very rational, that they were surprised and frightened beyond measure; and I leave it to your Lordship and the court to judge, how well qualified ...
— The Trial of the Witnessses of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ • Thomas Sherlock
... so it starts: "Adieu, grand crushers of Kings; arrogant wind-bags, Turpin, Broglio, Soubise,—Hildburghausen with the gray beard, foolish still as when your beard was black in the Turk-War time:—brisk journey to you all!" That is the first stanza; unexceptionable, had we room. The second stanza is,—with the veils partially lifted; with probably "MOISE" put into the first blank, and into the third something ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XVIII. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—Seven-Years War Rises to a Height.—1757-1759. • Thomas Carlyle
... applicant was made. A woman must be mature in years, plain almost to homeliness in dress, and by no means liberally endowed with personal attractions, if she hoped to meet the approval of Miss Dix. Good health and an unexceptionable moral character were always insisted on. As the war progressed, the applications were numerous, and the need of this kind of service great, but the rigid scrutiny first adopted by Miss Dix continued, and many were rejected who did not in all respects ...
— Woman's Work in the Civil War - A Record of Heroism, Patriotism, and Patience • Linus Pierpont Brockett
... well directed, may eventually make of him one of our leading authors of fiction. Just now, however, we must protest against his taste in subject and technique. His models are obviously not of the classical order, and his ideas of probability are far from unexceptionable. In developing the power of narration, it is generally best, as one of our leading amateurs lately reiterated, to discard the thought of elaborate plots and thrilling climaxes, and to begin instead with the plain and simple description of actual incidents with which the author ...
— Writings in the United Amateur, 1915-1922 • Howard Phillips Lovecraft
... attention comforts me. And if I die, I have a child to close my eyes and take care of my remains. His dutiful behavior toward me, and his diligence and fidelity in business, are both pleasing and useful to me. His conduct, as my private secretary, has been unexceptionable; and I am confident the Congress will never think of ...
— Benjamin Franklin, A Picture of the Struggles of Our Infant Nation One Hundred Years Ago - American Pioneers and Patriots Series • John S. C. Abbott
... city in the land that has been the subject of a full, accurate, and interesting history. The History of New York, by Martha J. Lamb, is not so full as might have been wished, but is otherwise unexceptionable. New York is fortunate in having the most graphic and humorous history of its early days that any city in the world ever had, but nobody except Diedrich Knickerbocker himself ever claimed a great amount of accuracy and truthfulness ...
— The Bay State Monthly, Volume 1, Issue 5, May, 1884 - A Massachusetts Magazine • Various
... last man," said Signor Fortini musingly to himself, "that I could have suspected of such a thing! The man who has the highest reputation in the city for sound judgment and unexceptionable conduct, to turn out the greatest fool! An old ass! How little be dreams of what he is bringing upon himself. Let alone the terrible fall, the disgrace,—in every way, disgrace and contempt and ridicule! It seems ...
— A Siren • Thomas Adolphus Trollope
... nothing could be better; but what, by all that was constitutional, did it mean?—or rather, how did it mean that he, the high and independent one, was to do it? Point by point its sentiments were unexceptionable; but what it actually pointed to he did not know. "Add luster?" Why, yes, certainly. But was not that what he was already doing day by day on the continuous deposit system, even as the oyster within its shell deposits luster upon the pearls ...
— King John of Jingalo - The Story of a Monarch in Difficulties • Laurence Housman
... kept, and the denoument admirably managed. The fatal want of moral courage, the suffering caused by mental weakness, the strength of love, the sustaining power of intellect, are portrayed with ability in the book before us. The moral is unexceptionable throughout. ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 5, May, 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... with little black eyes like coals of fire, a tight ulster, like a riding habit, and a small billycock hat, rather dismayed those who still held that bonnets ought to be the Sunday gear of all beyond childhood; but the mother, in rich black silk, was unexceptionable. ...
— More Bywords • Charlotte M. Yonge
... representation of wolves as vegetation-spirits, as Mannhardt proposed (see my Roman Festivals, p. 316 foll.). This view has the advantage of making the rite a simple and practical one, such as would be natural to primitive Latins; and the etymology is apparently unexceptionable, though it will doubtless be criticised, as in fact ...
— The Religious Experience of the Roman People - From the Earliest Times to the Age of Augustus • W. Warde Fowler
... The sullen face which he most assuredly will put upon it may be placed equally to the account of the bride you offer to him as of her from whom you wish to separate him. I would beg of you a more positive test! Propose to him some perfectly unexceptionable woman. Then, if he consents, let Secretary Worm break stones on the highway ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... dear, that I was so much surprised and disgusted at these appearances against a conduct till then unexceptionable, that I was resolved to make myself as easy as I could, and wait till you should think fit to write to me. But I could rein-in my impatience but for a few days; and on the 20th of June I wrote a sharp letter to you; which I ...
— Clarissa, Volume 6 (of 9) - The History Of A Young Lady • Samuel Richardson
... young man of unexceptionable character, and of a disposition mild, serious and benignant: his principles and blameless conduct obtained the universal esteem of the world, but his manners, which were rather too precise, joined to an uncommon gravity of countenance and demeanour, made his society rather permitted as a duty, ...
— Cecilia Volume 1 • Frances Burney
... dream, with every winning grace of manner and amiable charm of purity. She is the finest character and the fairest face beyond all compare in the gallery; and the scenes in which she figures are the most able, the most moving, and the most unexceptionable in every point of view, of all that our ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol III, Issue VI, June, 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... comes, Mr Pigeon, let me introduce our other guests— Senor Don Bruno, who is on your right side, and Monsieur de Querkerie, whom you will find on your left. Manners makes the man, and as their manners are unexceptionable, I hope that you will consider them as men, and treat them, as men should men, ...
— The Three Midshipmen • W.H.G. Kingston
... dark-brown chevelure, with a natural curl, is now represented by a few dozen perfectly white hairs, and its place—a smooth, bald, pink head—knows it no more. But let us forget these mortifications. It was then rich, thick, and dark-brown. I was making a very careful toilet. I took my unexceptionable hat from its case, and placed it lightly on my wise head, as nearly as memory and practice enabled me to do so, at that very slight inclination which the immortal person I have mentioned was wont to give to his. A pair of light French gloves and a rather club-like ...
— The Room in the Dragon Volant • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... expression of Eusebius, was involved in the shades of infernal darkness, the auspicious rays of celestial light warmed and illuminated the provinces of the West. The piety of Constantine was admitted as an unexceptionable proof of the justice of his arms; and his use of victory confirmed the opinion of the Christians, that their hero was inspired, and conducted, by the Lord of Hosts. The conquest of Italy produced a general edict of toleration; and as soon as the defeat ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon
... of the writings of Mr. Tickell, a man of a very elegant genius: As there appears no great invention in his works, if he cannot be placed in the first rank of Poets; yet from the beauty of his numbers, and the real poetry which enriched his imagination, he has, at least, an unexceptionable claim to ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753),Vol. V. • Theophilus Cibber
... not disagreeable to Sir Thomas and the other honest gentlemen my neighbors, who have all promised me these five years to procure an ordination for a son of mine, who is now near thirty, hath an infinite stock of learning, and is, I thank Heaven, of an unexceptionable life; tho, as he was never at a university, the bishop refuses to ordain him. Too much care can not indeed be taken in admitting any to the sacred office; tho I hope he will never act so as to be a disgrace to any order, but will ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. IV (of X)—Great Britain and Ireland II • Various
... clear type and good paper, and the binding is unexceptionable.... May be selected as the most desirable cheap edition of the immortal 'Papers' that has ever ...
— Lover or Friend • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... were the Forty-second and Seventy-first. In Stewart's Highlanders, vol. i., p. 354, as quoted in the Memoir of General Graham, the following passage appears: "On the 10th April, 1776, the Forty-second Regiment being reviewed by Sir Adolphus Oughton, was reported complete, and so unexceptionable that none were rejected. Hostilities having commenced in America, every exertion was made to teach the recruits the use of the firelock, for which purpose they were drilled even by candle-light. New arms and accoutrements were supplied to the men; and the colonel of the regiment, at his own ...
— The Campaign of 1776 around New York and Brooklyn • Henry P. Johnston
... this is an exceptional case; but it illustrates a curious thing about boys—I mentioned it the other day—which is, their extraordinary willingness and even anxiety to be thought worse than they are. Even boys of unexceptionable principle will talk as if they were not only not particular, but positively vicious. They don't like aspersions on their moral character to be made by others, but they rejoice to blacken themselves; and not even the most virtuous boys can bear to be accused of virtue, or thought to be what is ...
— The Upton Letters • Arthur Christopher Benson
... way," the Abbot was pleased to explain, "you will be quite safe from my sister, who is a woman of the most unexceptionable morals, and at the same time you will not expose our excellent Bishop to the charge of having been a party to a grave infraction of ecclesiastical discipline.—My only condition," he added with a truly paternal smile, ...
— The Valley of Decision • Edith Wharton
... not consist in freshness of complexion so much as in fine features, which are often full of character and lighted up by eyes as brilliant as they are soft. Their figures are good, and their feet and ankles quite unexceptionable, being generally very much more neatly turned than those of my ...
— Recollections of Manilla and the Philippines - During 1848, 1849 and 1850 • Robert Mac Micking
... and other like places at which the price of admission was never more than $1, and was generally 50 cents, he gave to multitudes who would otherwise have had no such opportunity that education in art which is to be had only from the performances of a great artist. In purity of style he was unexceptionable. He lacked only a little higher finish, a little more brilliancy of voice and impressiveness of manner to take a position among tenors of the very first rank. Of these, however, there are never two in the world at the same time, scarcely two in the same generation; and so Salvi ...
— Chapters of Opera • Henry Edward Krehbiel
... public whose impatience keeps the poets and players under such strict discipline, has, however, patience enough to listen to the prolix unfolding of what ought to be sensibly developed before their eyes. It is allowed that an exposition is seldom unexceptionable; that in their speeches the persons generally begin farther back than they naturally ought, and that they tell one another what they must both have known before, &c. If the affair is complicated, these expositions ...
— Lectures on Dramatic Art and Literature • August Wilhelm Schlegel
... I held it the highest vocation of the novelist to represent things as they never have been and never will be. Then, of course, I might refashion life and character entirely after my own liking; I might select the most unexceptionable type of clergyman and put my own admirable opinions into his mouth on all occasions. But it happens, on the contrary, that my strongest effort is to avoid any such arbitrary picture, and to give a faithful ...
— Adam Bede • George Eliot
... then, to make my compliments to Sir James, and tell him how much entertained I have been by your visit, and especially by your performance on the harp. You have a fine finger, Miss Keith, and your choice of a song is unexceptionable." ...
— Out in the Forty-Five - Duncan Keith's Vow • Emily Sarah Holt
... managed so naturally that no one observed it but herself. Hilland had no misgivings, and she suggested none; but whenever she was in the presence of Graham or Mrs. Mayburn, although their courtesy and kind manner were unexceptionable, she felt there was ...
— His Sombre Rivals • E. P. Roe
... stands in the new reading, triumphing over the 'tower,' and unexceptionable in every respect. Also I do hold that nobody with an ordinary understanding has the slightest pretence for attaching a charge of obscurity to this new number—there are lights enough for the critics ...
— The Letters of Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett, Vol. 1 (of 2) 1845-1846 • Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett
... that he had not had time to read it, and felt unwilling to express an opinion upon its merits. On a motion by Mr. Hussey, "that the Bill be recommitted," Mr. Fox, however, remarked, that many clauses were unexceptionable. The number of representatives, in his opinion, were not sufficient. An assembly to consist of 16 or 30 members seemed to him to give a free constitution in appearance, while, in fact, such a constitution was withheld. The ...
— The Rise of Canada, from Barbarism to Wealth and Civilisation - Volume 1 • Charles Roger
... quality. Yet one would think, that, in the present high prices of other food, you would make the most of the only thing you can put into your mouth gratis. Here is Nature constantly urging on us an unexceptionable atmosphere forty miles high,—for if a pressure of fourteen pounds to the square inch is not to be called urging, what is?—and yet we not only neglect, but resist the favor. Our children commonly learn to spell much better than they ever learn to breathe, because much more attention ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 3, No. 18, April, 1859 - [Date last updated: August 7, 2005] • Various
... without nestling about or doing something with her limbs or features, and that high breeding was only to be looked for in trim gardens, where the soul of the trees is ill at ease perhaps, but their manners are unexceptionable, and a rustling branch or leaf falling out of season is an indecorum. The real forest is hardly still except in the Indian summer; then there is death in the house, and they are waiting for the sharp shrunken months to come with white raiment ...
— Atlantic Monthly Vol. 6, No. 33, July, 1860 • Various
... the refractory magnates who obtained that charter which secured the privileges both of the Norman barons and of the Saxon yeomanry. How great a part the Roman Catholic ecclesiastics subsequently had in the abolition of villenage we learn from the unexceptionable testimony of Sir Thomas Smith, one of the ablest Protestant counsellors of Elizabeth. When the dying slaveholder asked for the last sacraments, his spiritual attendants regularly adjured him, as he ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 1 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... so long talked of, so high in interest, was actually before her—he was presented to her, and she did not think too much had been said in his praise; he was a very good looking young man; height, air, address, all were unexceptionable, and his countenance had a great deal of the spirit and liveliness of his father's; he looked quick and sensible. She felt immediately that she should like him; and there was a well-bred ease of manner, and a readiness to talk, which convinced her that he came intending to be acquainted with her, ...
— Persuasion • Jane Austen
... match: for you are a gallant gentleman, graceful in your person, easy and genteel in your deportment, and in your family, fortunes, and expectations, happy as a man can wish to be. Then the knowledge I had of you in Italy (although, give me leave to say, your conduct there was not wholly unexceptionable) convinces me that you are brave: and few gentlemen come up to you in wit and vivacity. Your education has given you great advantages; your manners are engaging, and you have travelled; and I know, if you'll excuse me, you make better observations than you are governed by. All these ...
— Clarissa, Or The History Of A Young Lady, Volume 8 • Samuel Richardson
... little later, the same spirit is exhibited by Jane Austen when Madame de Sevigne sought her: Miss Austen suppressed the story-maker, wishing to be taken first of all for what she was: a country gentlewoman of unexceptionable connections. Even Walter Scott and Byron plainly exhibit this dislike to be reckoned as paid writers, men whose support came by the pen. In short, literary professionalism reflected on gentility. We have changed all that with a vengeance ...
— Masters of the English Novel - A Study Of Principles And Personalities • Richard Burton
... had unexceptionable chances of quitting it; for Miss Halifax possessed plenty of attractions, both outwardly and inwardly, to say nothing of her not inconsiderable fortune. But she refused all offers, and to the best of our knowledge was a free-hearted ...
— John Halifax, Gentleman • Dinah Maria Mulock Craik
... mortar novel. I remember them well: their 'romantic surroundings' or 'their exclusive privilege of meeting trains upon the platform;' their accurate resemblance to 'a gentleman's own house' (with 'a reception-room 80 feet by 90 feet'); their 'douche and spray baths;' their 'unexceptionable tariff;' and even their having undergone those 'extensive alterations,' through which I also underwent something, which they did not allow for in ...
— Some Private Views • James Payn
... 1832, to Gay Lussac, who was then one of the editors of the 'Annales de Chimie,' in which he analysed the results of the Italian philosophers, pointing out their errors, and defending himself from what he regarded as imputations on his character. The style of this letter is unexceptionable, for Faraday could not write otherwise than as a gentleman; but the letter shows that had he willed it he could have hit hard. We have heard much of Faraday's gentleness and sweetness and tenderness. It is all true, but it is very incomplete. You cannot resolve a powerful nature into these ...
— Faraday As A Discoverer • John Tyndall |
