"Verbal" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... d'Arblay.) November, 1796. . . .The "Monthly Review" has come in to-day, and it does not satisfy me, or raise my spirits, or anything but my indignation. James has read the remarks in it on "Camilla," and we are all dissatisfied. Perhaps a few of the verbal criticisms may be worth your attention in the second edition; but these have been picked out and displayed with no friendly view, and without necessity, in a work of such length and intrinsic ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 3 • Madame D'Arblay
... about electricity; no one would dare to publish an article on botany which showed that the writer did not know which end of a plant grew in the earth. Yet our modern world is full of books about Success and successful people which literally contain no kind of idea, and scarcely any kind of verbal sense. ...
— All Things Considered • G. K. Chesterton
... you ever call me 'my lordship' again, I shall say something!"' That hand-grip, indeed, as Wills remarks, was eminently characteristic. It was like the squeeze of a vice, and often conveyed the intimation of a feeling which shrank from verbal expression. ...
— The Life of Sir James Fitzjames Stephen, Bart., K.C.S.I. - A Judge of the High Court of Justice • Sir Leslie Stephen
... embryology, and of larval history receive, it is argued, an explanation on the view that the successive stages of development are, on the whole, records of adult stages of structure which the species has passed through in its evolution. Whether this statement will bear a critical verbal examination I will not now pause to inquire, for it is more important to determine whether any independent facts can be alleged in favour of the theory. If it could be shown, as was stated to be the case by L. Agassiz, that ancient and extinct forms of life present features of structure ...
— Darwin and Modern Science • A.C. Seward and Others
... failure, my good father urged me to turn to the law, thinking that as a chamber counsel my intellectual attainments (and I had worked hard for many years) might yet be available to society and to myself, though on the "silent system:" but alas! verbal explanations are as necessary in a room as at the bar; I soon perceived that all could not be done on paper, and as I thoroughly hated law I speedily turned to other sorts of literature, in especial the fixing of my own rhymed or rhythmed thoughts ...
— My Life as an Author • Martin Farquhar Tupper
... is the verbal basis of the power of the courts, and particularly of the Supreme Court, to review the legislation of any State, with reference to the Constitution, to acts of Congress, or to treaties of the United States. Nor can there be much ...
— John Marshall and the Constitution - A Chronicle of the Supreme Court, Volume 16 In The - Chronicles Of America Series • Edward S. Corwin
... bravery. Theirs is a lonely life, and very often a lonely death. One cycle messenger lay upon the ground, badly wounded. He stopped a passing officer and delivered his message, together with some verbal instructions. These were coherently given, but he swooned almost before the words ...
— World's War Events, Vol. I • Various
... of pictorial art before the fifteenth century—is the ocular record of dress, architecture, implements of peace and war, incidents of daily life, etc., for which no Encyclopdia Britannica of verbal explanation could ever be more than the poorest makeshift. As we say, this same happy anachronism is common to other schools of illumination, and we cannot fail to notice it from Byzantium to Britain, ...
— Illuminated Manuscripts • John W. Bradley
... had forgotten to cover them up. The moment mentioned my name, she started back as if I had frightened her—pulled her sleeves down in a hurry—and hid the objects of my admiration as an act of homage to myself! Her verbal ...
— The Guilty River • Wilkie Collins
... rummaging an old trunk—it seems a century ago that I did it—caused me to smile sympathetically at Toddie, to his apparent great delight. How delightful it is to strike a sympathetic chord in child-nature, thought I; how quickly the infant eye comprehends the look which precedes the verbal expression of an idea! Dear Toddie! for years we might sit at one table, careless of each other's words, but the casual mention of one of thy delights has suddenly brought our souls into that sweetest of all human communions—that one which doubtless bound the Master ...
— Helen's Babies • John Habberton
... I am wet and dirty." "Oh, do go, sir!" they all exclaimed. "It may better our situation, and we may have our parole." "On your account I will accept the invitation," said I. As I had no writing implements I sent a verbal answer in the affirmative, and made myself as much an Adonis as I was able. At the appointed hour the same servant and two gendarmes made their appearance, and from the gaol to the general's house I appeared, to judge by the people staring at me, to be the ...
— A Sailor of King George • Frederick Hoffman
... gods summon me—[Greek: ou] is not the right word. It is, however, almost impossible to write Greek verses which shall be liable to no verbal objections; and the fluent movement of these verses sufficiently argues the off-hand ease with which Lord Wellesley must have read Greek, writing it so elegantly and with so little ...
— The Notebook of an English Opium-Eater • Thomas de Quincey
... particular ingredients. We have words, always either too few or too many; words which are for ever emancipating themselves from our control and becoming masters instead of slaves, so that our ideas, which ought to be formed by independent cerebration, are half derived from mere verbal symbols, which become a kind of intellectual pepsine that weakens the strongest systems. So when we speak of a man being "proud," that miserable expression is apt to engross and dominate us, conjuring up an image which excludes certain others: that of ...
— Fountains In The Sand - Rambles Among The Oases Of Tunisia • Norman Douglas
... Theaetetus, Plato remarks that precision in the use of terms, though sometimes pedantic, is sometimes necessary. Here he makes the opposite reflection, that there may be a philosophical disregard of words. The evil of mere verbal oppositions, the requirement of an impossible accuracy in the use of terms, the error of supposing that philosophy was to be found in language, the danger of word-catching, have frequently been discussed by him ...
— Statesman • Plato
... porch, hoping for her appearance, was quite astounded at the apparition of Yuba Bill as a pedestrian, dusty and thirsty, making for his usual refreshment. Jeff brought out the bottle, but could not refrain from mixing his verbal astonishment with the conventional cocktail. Bill, partaking of his liquor and becoming once more a speaking animal, slowly drew off his heavy, baggy driving gloves. No one had ever seen Bill without them—he was currently believed to sleep in them—and ...
— Jeff Briggs's Love Story • Bret Harte
... have heard; certainly he has not studied the MS. Had he done so he would not assign (on grounds like those of Homeric critics) this verse to Hogg and that to Scott. He would know that Scott did not interpolate a single stanza; that spelling, punctuation, and some slight verbal corrections, with an admirable emendation, were the sum of his industry: that he did not even excise two stanzas of, at ...
— Sir Walter Scott and the Border Minstrelsy • Andrew Lang
... told a tale in plain words, as a special correspondent who knows how to make a verbal precis should tell it. The men listened ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... Bollygolla camp the messenger-boy returned without a scalp, and with a verbal message to the effect that the King could neither read ...
— The Swoop! or How Clarence Saved England - A Tale of the Great Invasion • P. G. Wodehouse
... the verbal proposition that animals form a single series, was forced by his vast acquaintance with the details of zoology to limit the assertion to such a series as may be formed out of the abstractions constituted by the common characters of each group. [Footnote: "Il s'agit donc de prouver ...
— Darwiniana • Thomas Henry Huxley
... coincidence that, in the same treatise, 151 b, occurs another practical riddle, how to drink up the ocean, which occurs in several variants of the Clever Lass. But there is no evidence of any story connection between the two riddles in Plutarch, and one can easily imagine this sort of verbal amusement spreading from the ...
— Europa's Fairy Book • Joseph Jacobs
... upon, no Vows or Protestations can be depended upon; but as soon as a Man believes, that there is a Power somewhere, that will certainly punish him, if he forswears himself; as soon, I say, as a Man believes this, we have Reason to trust to his Oath; at least, it is a better Test than any other Verbal Assurance. But what this same Person believes further, concerning the Nature and the Essence of that Power he swears by, the Worship it requires, or whether he conceives it in the singular or plural Number, may be very ...
— An Enquiry into the Origin of Honour, and the Usefulness of Christianity in War • Bernard Mandeville
... Boards has occasion to draw "money on account," an "imprest," addressed to the pay-master under that Board, is issued for the required sum; but when the final payment is made upon the "closing of the account," the "debenture" takes the place of the "imprest." Out of what verbal raw material are these words manufactured? I know of no other use of the word "imprest" as a substantive; and though we see "debenture" often enough in railway reports, I cannot perceive the analogy between its ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 33, June 15, 1850 • Various
... straightway for Liege, with this missive; and had duly presented it there, I guess on the 7th,—with notice that he would wait forty-eight hours, and then return with what answer or no-answer there might be. Getting no written answer, or distinct verbal one; getting only some vague mumblement as good as none, Rambonet had disappeared from Liege on the 9th; and was home at Moyland when Voltaire arrived that Sunday evening,—just walking about to come to heat again, after reporting ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XI. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... 47), and of some of the choruses, were of his authorship. He enjoyed what he called "stringing words together," and most of his verses were written off-hand, with a facility which betrayed the marked gift for verbal expression which is apparent in his often admirably stated lectures. But his especial reason for writing the words for his songs was his difficulty hi finding texts which quite suited him. Many poems which he would have ...
— Edward MacDowell • Lawrence Gilman
... to verbal speech, because it is material; wherefore, when I conversed with them without intermediate spirits, I could only do so by a kind of active thought. Their memory, because it is a memory of things, not of purely material images, brings nearer to the thought its ...
— Earths In Our Solar System Which Are Called Planets, and Earths In The Starry Heaven Their Inhabitants, And The Spirits And Angels There • Emanuel Swedenborg
... frozen with confusion. They retired crestfallen to their respective parlors, and sported their oaks. The resources of repartee were dried up for the moment. Relatives are unduly handicapped in these verbal duels; especially relatives with the same mother ...
— Children of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... your expressed desire to leave immediately to the captain of your boat. He only returns a verbal acquiescence but I assure you that he will leave nothing undone to facilitate your ...
— An African Adventure • Isaac F. Marcosson
... going concerns." She chuckled at this and repeated it in a subterranean rumble: "A going concern—my sakes, yes! It moved so fast you could see it go, and now it's went." Noisily she relished this bit of verbal finesse; then permitted her fancy again to trifle with it. "Yes, sir; this here ...
— Somewhere in Red Gap • Harry Leon Wilson
... of their voyage was such that white men might have deemed verbal intercourse an occasional necessity, as their route lay through much rugged and wild scenery, where the streams up which they had to force their way were in some places obstructed by rapids and shallows, and a mistake on their part might have ...
— The Walrus Hunters - A Romance of the Realms of Ice • R.M. Ballantyne
... is called Secession, nor does Order lose its divine precedence in human affairs because a knave may nickname it Coercion. Secession means chaos, and Coercion the exercise of legitimate authority. You cannot dignify the one nor degrade the other by any verbal charlatanism. The best testimony to the virtue of coercion is the fact that no wrongdoer ever thought well of it. The thief in jail, the mob-leader in the hands of the police, and the murderer on the drop will be unanimous in favor of this new heresy of the unconstitutionality of ...
— The Writings of James Russell Lowell in Prose and Poetry, Volume V - Political Essays • James Russell Lowell
... has not only forfeited the confidence of the good people of this Colony, but that he may be justly esteemed an enemy to America; and that as well his excuse published in his Proclamation of the fourth instant, as his verbal answer to the address presented him on that occasion by the city of Williamsburgh, are unsatisfactory and evasive, and reflect, in our opinion, great dishonour on the General Assembly and inhabitants of this Colony, as from the latter a suspicion may be easily deduced, that the Representatives ...
— History and Comprehensive Description of Loudoun County, Virginia • James W. Head
... of his efforts to get himself released, and the unequal contest between his "scrupulousness," and Elizabeth's astute, unfathomable diplomacy was still to be waged for many months. Her request to be allowed to send a verbal message to the Council by one of her servants was indeed declined, but she received permission to commit her petition to paper. On the 20th September, Sir Henry wrote ...
— Studies from Court and Cloister • J.M. Stone
... At least in their devotional and moral import. I suggest this qualification in deference to M. Le Roy's interesting theory of dogma, viz., that the verbal or intellectual definition of a dogma may be changed without changing the dogma itself (as a sentence might be translated into a new language without altering the meaning) provided the suggested conduct and feeling in the presence of the mystery remained the same. Thus the definition of transubstantiation ...
— Winds Of Doctrine - Studies in Contemporary Opinion • George Santayana
... be passed over with but a word, in order that the weight of the criticism may be concentrated on the point then under consideration. As a pupil advances, he is more and more competent to appreciate and to form good paragraphs and well-turned sentences, and to single out from the multitude of verbal signs the word that exactly presents his thought. The appreciation and the use of the stronger as well as the finer and more delicate forms of language come only with much reading and writing; ...
— English: Composition and Literature • W. F. (William Franklin) Webster
... she was quite convinced that she was right herself, because he had been so vacillating in his conduct about Colonel Osborne. But Trevelyan was equally sure that justice was on his side. Emily must have known his real wishes about Colonel Osborne; but when she had found that he had rescinded his verbal orders about the admission of the man to the house,—which he had done to save himself and her from slander and gossip,—she had taken advantage of this and had thrown herself more entirely than ever into the intimacy of which he disapproved! ...
— He Knew He Was Right • Anthony Trollope
... the obstructions through which the fleet must pass, decided that the risk of collision with the hulks on either side, or between the columns themselves, would be too great if he adhered to his written programme; and he accordingly gave a verbal order that the right column should weigh first, and be followed closely by the other under his own guidance. To facilitate the departure and avoid confusion, the ships of the right shifted their berth after dark to the east side of the river, anchoring in the order ...
— Admiral Farragut • A. T. Mahan
... suddenly and sharply, but he made no verbal protest. Only in the silence that followed there was something passionate, something which she never remembered to have encountered before in ...
— The Rocks of Valpre • Ethel May Dell
... are one or two slight verbal differences between Milton's original draft, here translated, and the official copy as actually delivered to the Duke, and as printed by Morland. Thus, in the first sentence, instead of "Redditae sunt nobis e Geneva, necnon ex Delphinatu ...
— The Life of John Milton, Volume 5 (of 7), 1654-1660 • David Masson
... and his subordinates that theory is indispensable. It is of still higher value for producing a similar solidarity between him and his superiors at the Council table at home. How often have officers dumbly acquiesced in ill-advised operations simply for lack of the mental power and verbal apparatus to convince an impatient Minister where the errors of his plan lay? How often, moreover, have statesmen and officers, even in the most harmonious conference, been unable to decide on a coherent plan of war from inability ...
— Some Principles of Maritime Strategy • Julian Stafford Corbett
... for a moment imagine it possible, that he could base such a criticism, so announced, upon no better foundation than that mere verbal transposition of the ...
— Notes & Queries 1849.12.15 • Various
... to happen—the good old way will be stuck to: there'll be a public meeting: with music, and prayer, and a wearying report, and a verbal description of the marvels the blind can do, and 17 speeches—then the call upon all present who are still alive, to contribute. This hoary program was invented in the idiot asylum, and will never be changed. Its function is to breed hostility to ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... long verbal tug of war between these two good men, in which I could discern that my father's refusal was solely based upon his love for me and his apprehension for my safety. The tug of words, like a tug of war at an athletic meeting, was a long one, first one gained an advantage only to lose it to his ...
— Jethou - or Crusoe Life in the Channel Isles • E. R. Suffling
... was to render the words more audible, and to secure by the elevations and pauses greater facility of understanding the poetry. For the choral songs are, and ever must have been, the most difficult part of the tragedy; there occur in them the most involved verbal compounds, the newest expressions, the boldest images, the most recondite allusions. Is it credible that the poets would, one and all, have been thus prodigal of the stores of art and genius, if they had known that in the representation the whole must have been lost to the audience,—at a time ...
— Shakespeare, Ben Jonson, Beaumont and Fletcher • S. T. Coleridge
... and over as she held it down out of the wind by the dim glow lamp. She wanted to ask questions. She wondered what was expected of her. She wondered again as to what was expected of the entire invasion and why the women had been brought along. But her questions did not find verbal expression, for she had schooled ...
— In the Clutch of the War-God • Milo Hastings
... evidently the common messenger of all, who, whilst the guests called him behind his back "Headless Seppl," had managed to fulfill two dozen verbal commissions to everybody's satisfaction. This was the landlord, whom we had pictured lying in a drunken lethargy in some hay barn after the bout of the night before. How we had maligned an evidently simple, honest soul, who had been toiling from early morning, and who, having discharged the orders ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XII, No. 28. July, 1873. • Various
... or in the form of verbal or written messages. Verbal messages should not be used unless ...
— Infantry Drill Regulations, United States Army, 1911 - Corrected to April 15, 1917 (Changes Nos. 1 to 19) • United States War Department
... with a few verbal alterations, as it was delivered, for the reason that in that form its true spirit can best be understood. Due allowance will therefore be made for its style, which is that of a ...
— The Relations of the Federal Government to Slavery - Delivered at Fort Wayne, Ind., October 30th 1860 • Joseph Ketchum Edgerton
... have no occasion to urge its acceptance of so-called dialect, for dialect IS in Literature, and HAS been there since the beginning of all written thought and utterance. Strictly speaking, as well as paradoxically, all verbal expression is more or less dialectic, however grammatical. While usage establishes grammar, it no less establishes so-called dialect. Therefore we may as rightfully refer to ...
— Complete Works of James Whitcomb Riley • James Whitcomb Riley
... this time; begged him to excuse their having sent a verbal message the day before, being tired out after their journey. Geissler was polite in return, and said he too was tired out after his journey, or he would have come. Well, and then, to get to business; Would Geissler sell the ...
— Growth of the Soil • Knut Hamsun
... the three first Gospels in this section shows a degree of similarity, often verbal, which is best accounted for by supposing that a common (oral?) 'Gospel,' which had become traditionally fixed by frequent and long repetition, underlies them all. Mark's account is briefest, and grasps with sure ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - St. Mark • Alexander Maclaren
... another moment Sylvie had lifted him upon the broad back of the gentle beast, and seated herself behind him, pillion-fashion. Bruno took a good handful of mane in each hand, and made believe to guide this new kind of steed. "Gee-up!', seemed quite sufficient by way of verbal direction: the lion at once broke into an easy canter, and we soon found ourselves in the depths of the forest. I say 'we,' for I am certain that I accompanied them though how I managed to keep up with a cantering lion I am wholly ...
— Sylvie and Bruno • Lewis Carroll
... verbal reply to the warning of the Norseman, but his right arm which held the steering oar grew rigid, and he did ...
— Steve Young • George Manville Fenn
... speak in England, and in the language of the Greeks, there are identical verbal roots, or elements entering into the composition of words. That fact remains unintelligible so long as we suppose English and Greek to be independently created tongues; but when it is shown that both languages are descended from one original, the Sanscrit, we give an explanation ...
— Lectures and Essays • T.H. Huxley
... were either executed or left to linger out a miserable existence in their dungeons till death released them. The grand master and a few other brethren of the highest rank were thus kept in prison for five years. They were then taken to Notre Dame in Paris, and required to give verbal assent to the confessions which had been extorted from them under torture. But the grand master, James de Molay, the grand preceptor, and some others seized the opportunity of declaring their innocence, ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... written promise." (Titmouse looked eagerly about for writing materials.) "No, not now, but in a day or two's time. I confess, my dear Mr. Titmouse, if I might have decided on the matter, I should have been satisfied with your verbal promise; but I must say, Mr. Quirk's gray hairs seem to have made him quite—eh! you understand? Don't you ...
— Ten Thousand a-Year. Volume 1. • Samuel Warren
... the European territory subject to the yoke of the Sultan, with the exception of Roumelia and Constantinople. A partition of the liberated territory between France and Russia, as well as the establishment of the Napoleonic house in Spain, probably formed the subject rather of a verbal understanding than of any written ...
— History of Modern Europe 1792-1878 • C. A. Fyffe
... waited for more—her face and figure one fervent note of interrogation. She had tact enough to realise that she could not press verbal inquiry further. ...
— Captain Desmond, V.C. • Maud Diver
... These should be of such a character as to allow a water-way of at least thirty feet, but bridges of simple construction could be used, stone of any kind being difficult to obtain. The soil is sandy and easily worked, but will make a substantial road-bed. Having received your verbal orders to run a rapid line from a point west of here on the North Fork, where that valley makes its deflection to the South, eastward to the three hundred and eighty-fifth mile post, I provided myself with ten days' supplies and rations, and on Wednesday, the sixteenth, moved up the ...
— The Story of the First Trans-Continental Railroad - Its Projectors, Construction and History • W. F. Bailey
... hurling stones. This legend was probably founded upon the fact, that Rebecca had attended on the wounded Ivanhoe when in the castle of Torquilstone. But it was the more difficult to dispute the accuracy of the witness, as, in order to produce real evidence in support of his verbal testimony, he drew from his pouch the very bolt-head, which, according to his story, had been miraculously extracted from the wound; and as the iron weighed a full ounce, it completely confirmed the tale, ...
— Ivanhoe - A Romance • Walter Scott
... the question, 'Where are the troops?' to which Mr. Lace replied, 'What troops do you mean? We know nothing about troops.' It did not occur to Mr. Lace or to anyone else that he could have meant 'troops' from Johannesburg. With the receipt of Dr. Jameson's verbal reply to the British Agent's despatch-carrier the business was concluded, and the escort from the Boer lines insisted on leaving, taking with them Mr. Lace and the despatch-rider. He offered ...
— The Transvaal from Within - A Private Record of Public Affairs • J. P. Fitzpatrick
... fathers when they speak of the adoration of the sacrament, Antonius de Dominis showeth more copiously.(774) And thus we have suffered the impetuous current of the Doctor's audacious promises, backed with a verbal discourse to go softly by us. Quid dignum tanto tulit hic ...
— The Works of Mr. George Gillespie (Vol. 1 of 2) • George Gillespie
... exercising his discretion freely. That he would act in this affair according to his own free will, and would choose Quintus Fabius Maximus, whom he would prove to be the first man in the Roman state, even in the judgment of Hannibal. After a long verbal dispute, his colleague giving up the point, Quintus Fabius Maximus, the consul, was chosen, by Sempronius, chief of the senate. Another senate was then chosen, and eight names were passed over; among which was that of Lucius Caecilius Metellus, disrespected as the adviser of the abandonment ...
— History of Rome, Vol III • Titus Livius
... of the company was to be diverted, something drastic must be done. A mere verbal attempt to change the conversation would be useless. ...
— Something New • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
... inspiration that causes him to doubt his sanity. Not merely is his mind vacant when the spirit of poetry is about to come upon him, but he is deprived of his judgment, so that he does not understand his own experiences during ecstasy. The idea of verbal inspiration, which used to be so popular in Biblical criticism, has been applied to the works of all poets. [Footnote: See Kathrina, by J. G. Holland, where the heroine maintains that the inspiration of modern poets is similar to that of the ...
— The Poet's Poet • Elizabeth Atkins
... "Waiting." Five songs are grouped into opus 12, and they reach a much higher finish and a better tendency to make excursions into other keys. They also show two of Harris' mannerisms, a constant repetition of verbal phrases and a fondness for writing close, unbroken chords, in triplets or quartoles. "A Melody" is beautiful; "Butterflies and Buttercups" is the perfection of grace; "I Know not if Moonlight or Starlight" is a fine rapture, and "A Disappointment" ...
— Contemporary American Composers • Rupert Hughes
... on the MS. of the Narrative are among the papers at Lindores. They consist chiefly of verbal criticisms on Sir Frederick's original rough draft. Unfortunately it is no longer in existence, and most of Sir Walter's notes cannot be followed without it. A few of his comments are printed as footnotes, in square brackets, and a portion ...
— The Surrender of Napoleon • Sir Frederick Lewis Maitland
... was a verbal one and delivered by a slender "snip of a boy" scarcely out of his teens, so it received scant attention from Old Put, who went on with his plans, while Colonel Hamilton mounted a fresh horse and posted off to Albany, where he had also great difficulty ...
— "Old Put" The Patriot • Frederick A. Ober
... him as mental discipline and a school of style. This man, who had risen from the dregs of the people, whose whole education had been won by his own efforts, haphazard, so that there were great gaps in it, had acquired a gift of verbal expression, a mastery of thought over form, such as ten years of a university education cannot give to the young bourgeois. He attributed it all to Olivier. And yet others had helped him more effectively. But from Olivier came the ...
— Jean-Christophe Journey's End • Romain Rolland
... gives an opportunity for training in verbal expression. Every person needs to be able to express himself easily and forcibly in writing. But this requires much practice, and there is no better practice than in formulating in writing the thoughts of the ...
— The Recitation • George Herbert Betts
... parting shot Captain Blyth again raised his cap politely, and stepped down out of the rigging on to a hen-coop, and from thence to the poop; and so the little verbal sparring match between the rival skippers ended, each flattering himself that he had had the best of it, and that he had come out well in the eyes of the little audience before which he had ...
— The Missing Merchantman • Harry Collingwood
... on verbal bombast, had found some difficulty in maintaining her expression of uplifted approbation while Mr. Potts's rhetoric rolled; her willingness that Mr. Potts should serve the cause did not blind her to his inadequacy unless kept under the most careful ...
— A Fountain Sealed • Anne Douglas Sedgwick
... the bulk of mediaeval Latin literature. Excepted divisions. Comic Latin literature. Examples of its verbal influence. The value of burlesque. Hymns. The Dies Irae. The rhythm of Bernard. Literary perfection of the Hymns. Scholastic Philosophy. Its influence on phrase and method. ...
— The Flourishing of Romance and the Rise of Allegory - (Periods of European Literature, vol. II) • George Saintsbury
... is the surest thing I know may be true. But the attempt to conceive what it is leads me into mere verbal subtleties. I have champed up all that chaff about the ego and the non-ego, noumena and phenomena, and all the rest of it, too often not to know that in attempting even to think of these questions, the human intellect flounders at once out ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... to some great man, and receives his compliments in return. He appeals to some great name, and the Under-graduates of the two Universities look up to him as an oracle of wisdom. He throws the weight of his verbal criticism and puny discoveries in black-letter reading into the gap, that is supposed to be making in the Constitution by Whigs and Radicals, whom he qualifies without mercy as dunces and miscreants; and so entitles himself to the protection of Church and State. The character ...
— The Spirit of the Age - Contemporary Portraits • William Hazlitt
... and as fierce as they, Venus steps in, and without thought or stay Invades her son; her old disgrace is cast Into the bill, when Mars and she made fast In their embraces were expos'd to all The scene of gods, stark naked in their fall. Nor serves a verbal penance, but with haste From her fair brow—O happy flow'rs so plac'd!— She tears a rosy garland, and with this Whips the untoward boy; they gently kiss His snowy skin, but she with angry haste Doubles her strength, until bedew'd at last With a thin bloody sweat, their ...
— Poems of Henry Vaughan, Silurist, Volume II • Henry Vaughan
... verbal reply; but there was a nervous flutter in the poor, wan fingers, as she still plied the needles, and two large tears rolled silently down her checks and fell upon the white kerchief she ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 8, No. 50, December, 1861 • Various
... their work even in small details was illustrated to-day by the Government's informing us that a German handy man, whom the German Ambassador left at his Embassy, with the English Government's consent, is a spy—that he sends verbal messages to Germany by women who are permitted to go home, and that they have found letters written by him sewed in some of these women's undergarments! This man has been at work there every day under the two very good men whom I have put ...
— The Life and Letters of Walter H. Page, Volume I • Burton J. Hendrick
... the same grammatical rules. A correct style in singing consists in the careful observance of the principles of Technique; a perfect Diction; the appropriate Colouring of each sentiment expressed; attention to the musical and poetic Accents; judicious and effective Phrasing (whether musical or verbal), so that the meaning of both composer and poet may be placed in the ...
— Style in Singing • W. E. Haslam
... with the representative of his country four months had passed and Billy still held his job. But each month the number of francs he was able to wrest from President Hamilcar dwindled, and were won only after verbal conflicts that each month increased ...
— Somewhere in France • Richard Harding Davis
... proceeded from the upper room of the tower. The words, "It is lovely!" were still on the lips of the youthful Gertrude, who saw all the beauty of the picture her aunt had essayed to describe, without descending to the humble employment of verbal criticism. But her voice became hushed, and her attitude ...
— The Red Rover • James Fenimore Cooper
... think that many a man falls into the practice against his will. When he thinks that he is reasoning he is really disputing, just because he cannot define and divide, and so know that of which he is speaking; and he will pursue a merely verbal opposition in the spirit of contention and ...
— The Republic • Plato
... gentleman to whom Jeff had reference were named Polk, but in speaking of white persons for whom he had a high regard Jeff always, wherever possible within the limitations of our speech, tacked on that final s. It was in the nature of a delicate verbal compliment, implying that the person referred to was worthy of ...
— The Escape of Mr. Trimm - His Plight and other Plights • Irvin S. Cobb
... the flow of ideas may take different forms. The imagery may take any form but is usually visual, auditory, motor, or verbal. ...
— The Science of Human Nature - A Psychology for Beginners • William Henry Pyle
... getting herself and the box silently out of the room, but the butler passing her on the back stairs was startled by a verbal shower that was not in the least intended for him. It was as if a watering cart had suddenly and unexpectedly turned on its ...
— A Romance of Billy-Goat Hill • Alice Hegan Rice
... not, sir," said Buck, and he swung himself along to overtake the waggon, giving his big whip a crack or two and his span of bullocks a few verbal admonitions ...
— Dead Man's Land - Being the Voyage to Zimbambangwe of certain and uncertain • George Manville Fenn
... other single volume in the language. It is impossible, without cumbering the volume, to give suitable credit to the authors and persons consulted. Suffice it to say, the author has carefully studied all the works mentioned in this volume, and availed himself of a great variety of verbal suggestions, by scientific and practical men. If this work shall, in any good degree, serve the purpose for which it is intended, it will amply reward the author for an amount of labor, experiment, observation, and study, ...
— Soil Culture • J. H. Walden
... are much pickier and less flexible about spelling than humans; thus, hackers need to be very precise when talking about characters, and have developed a considerable amount of verbal shorthand for them. Every character has one or more names — some formal, some concise, some silly. Common jargon names for ASCII characters are collected here. See also individual entries for {bang}, {excl}, {open}, {ques}, {semi}, {shriek}, {splat}, {twiddle}, ...
— The Jargon File, Version 4.0.0
... and literature has been steadily growing amongst the scholars of the world, and that in the domain of philology Old Irish now ranks close to Sanscrit for its truly marvellous and complicated scheme of word-forms and inflections, and its whole verbal system. ...
— The Glories of Ireland • Edited by Joseph Dunn and P.J. Lennox
... are inseparable from each other. Matter and expression are parts of one; style is a thinking out into language. That is what I have been laying down, and this is literature; not things, but the verbal symbols of things; not on the other hand mere words; but thoughts expressed in language. Call to mind, gentlemen, the meaning of the Greek word which expresses this special prerogative of man over the feeble intelligence of the lower animals. It is called Logos; what does ...
— On the Art of Writing - Lectures delivered in the University of Cambridge 1913-1914 • Arthur Quiller-Couch
... she beats her heart, whereat it groans, That all the neighbour caves, as seeming troubled, Make verbal repetition of her moans; Passion on passion deeply is redoubled: 832 'Ay me!' she cries, and twenty times, 'Woe, woe!' And twenty echoes twenty times ...
— Venus and Adonis • William Shakespeare
... England; that they should not make slaves of the native tribes; and that they should guarantee equal treatment for all the white inhabitants of the country as respects taxation. As the whole war has risen out of Kruger's persistent refusal to keep his promises, both verbal and in writing, that he would observe this condition, I append the clause giving ...
— Native Races and the War • Josephine Elizabeth Butler
... speech delivered, we never saw an instance, when any individual present shewed signs of his being displeased, or that indicated the least inclination to dispute the declared will of a person who had a right to command. Nay, such is the force of these verbal laws, as I may call them, that I have seen one of their chiefs express his being astonished, at a person's having acted contrary to such orders, though it appeared, that the poor man could not possibly have been informed in time ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 15 (of 18) • Robert Kerr
... to acquire such a philosophy as is not barren and babbling, but solid and true; not such a one as floats upon the surface of endless verbal controversies, but one that enters into the nature of things; for he spoke good sense that said, "The philosophy of the Greeks was a mere jargon, ...
— Coleridge's Literary Remains, Volume 4. • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... the power of alienation except among themselves. These lands have been allotted from time to time to individuals, and held in severalty for cultivation; but these allotments, so to call them, are verbal, and the rights of persons to their possession are settled and adjusted by the chiefs in case of disputes. Mr. Miller wrote me from Taos, under date of December 5, 1877, that "A land-owner cannot, under any circumstance, ...
— Houses and House-Life of the American Aborigines • Lewis H. Morgan
... edition reproduces with fidelity the first issue of 1851. Occasionally a verbal alteration, introduced by the author himself into his second edition of 1872, has been adopted in this, whenever it seemed to improve the reading. In general, however, that reprint was in many respects a defective one. Not only words, but even ...
— Lavengro - The Scholar, The Gypsy, The Priest • George Borrow
... Prologue has verbal resemblances to the treatise designated Ecclesiae Regimen (the instances quoted seem to me resemblances merely of topics, and ...
— Fifteenth Century Prose and Verse • Various
... behooved us greatly to be acquainted with. Therefore I was honestly eager for my master's sake to undertake the perilous journey. But to tell the whole truth, the fact that I had not had a word from the Little Playmate, not so much as a line of script nor a verbal message since her disappearance, made me more eager to go than the high politics of a ...
— Red Axe • Samuel Rutherford Crockett
... carry you but a little way, let me recommend a practice that may be equivalent, and will perhaps more efficaciously contribute to your advancement, than even the verbal corrections of those masters themselves, could they be obtained. What I would propose is, that you should enter into a kind of competition, by painting a similar subject, and making a companion to any picture that you consider as a model. After you have finished your work, place it near the ...
— Seven Discourses on Art • Joshua Reynolds
... petrified him. He listened long after the sound of retreating footsteps had died away. There remained behind a faint sweet odor of lilac which stirred his soul and set his blood tingling. It was a beautiful face that he had seen. He was sure of that and yet he could have given no good verbal proof of it. Only the eyes and the odor of lilac remained with him and after a little the lilac drifted away. Then he went back to the log and sat down. He smiled as he thought of the joke that he had unwittingly played ...
— The Courage of Captain Plum • James Oliver Curwood
... lawyers all objected at once. The argument upon admitting to evidence this secret but authoritative report, consumed the greater part of the day; and at the end the plaintiff rested his case. Throughout the din of words, the verbal clashes, the long and wearisome citing of authorities and the brief "Overruled!" of the judge, Rimrock Jones sat sullen and downcast; and at the end he got up and went out. No one followed to cheer or console ...
— Rimrock Jones • Dane Coolidge
... he had taken out the notes and laid them on the desk before Mr. Garth. He had burst forth at once with the plain fact, feeling boyishly miserable and without verbal resources. Mrs. Garth was mutely astonished, and looked at her husband for an explanation. Caleb blushed, and after ...
— Middlemarch • George Eliot
... This verbal, annual outbreak was succeeded, as usual, by House to House mutinies on the occasion of the arrival of the weekly boxes, without the protest taking further head or front. But at the opening of the last week of ...
— The Varmint • Owen Johnson
... hardly found more than an epigram, a fugitive flash of critical insight, an apologue or pretty story charmingly told. Over all this he had cast the glittering, sparkling robe of his Celtic gaiety, verbal humour, and sensual enjoyment of living. It was all like champagne; meant to be drunk quickly; if you let it stand, you soon realised that some still wines had rarer virtues. But there was always about him the magic of a rich and puissant personality; ...
— Oscar Wilde, Volume 2 (of 2) - His Life and Confessions • Frank Harris
... how great improvements could be made in his machines and processes; and then I visited him, and told him what I could do for him. He furnished me with money for my work, and for securing the patents on my inventions, with the verbal promise that I should share in such profits as might accrue from their use. He was the only man who had money; he was the only man who could use the inventions; and he kept me at work, until he had secured everything that he wished for. In ...
— Sevenoaks • J. G. Holland
... he cried. "I have felt it from my boyhood, but never could state the verbal antithesis. The common criminal is a bad man, but at least he is, as it were, a conditional good man. He says that if only a certain obstacle be removed—say a wealthy uncle—he is then prepared to accept the universe and to praise God. He is a reformer, but not an anarchist. He wishes to ...
— The Man Who Was Thursday - A Nightmare • G. K. Chesterton
... a singular circumstance prolonged the glacial regime in the northern hemisphere. Modern geologists speak rather of a series of successive ice-sheets than of one definite Ice-Age. Some, indeed, speak of a series of Ice-Ages, but we need not discuss the verbal question. It is now beyond question that the ice-sheet advanced and retreated several times during the Glacial Epoch. The American and some English geologists distinguished six ice-sheets, with five intermediate periods of more temperate climate. The German and ...
— The Story of Evolution • Joseph McCabe
... Shandy's book, which was written for Tristram's instruction, and, according to Bode, was delivered for safe-keeping into Yorick's hands. Bode changes M'lle Laborde into M'lle Gillet, and Walter Shandy is her visitor, not Yorick. Bode allows himself some verbal changes and softens the bald suggestion at the end. Bode's motive for this startling change is not clear beyond question. The most plausible theory is that the open and gross suggestion of immoral relation between Yorick, the clergyman and ...
— Laurence Sterne in Germany • Harvey Waterman Thayer
... were decimated, some nearly annihilated; numbers of their officers were dead in the breach, "Those who are not mortally wounded rejoice at this great success," said an officer to the Duke; and it was a significant sentence. [Footnote: Verbal report of Colonel Combes to the ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 22, Aug., 1859 • Various
... looked across toward the Northern lines, and, civilian though he was, he knew that their tremendous infolding curve was more than twice as great as that forming the lines of the South. A singular light appeared in the Secretary's eyes as he noticed this, but he made no verbal comment, ...
— Before the Dawn - A Story of the Fall of Richmond • Joseph Alexander Altsheler
... four years' reign of that weak, bigoted, and ill-advised prince, as well as at the time of the Revolution, will easily be computed, by a recourse to a great number of histories, pamphlets, and public papers, printed in those times, and some afterwards; beside the verbal testimonies of many persons yet alive, who are old enough to have known and observed the Dissenters' conduct in that ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D. D., Volume IV: - Swift's Writings on Religion and the Church, Volume II • Jonathan Swift
... Sanscrit grammarians, an excellent study of which has recently appeared from the pen of Dr. H. C. Mueller.[6-1] In its higher forms Incorporation subordinates the nominal concepts of the phrase to those of time and relation, which are essentially verbal, and this often where the true verbal concept, that of abstract action, is lacking, and the verb itself is in reality a noun in ...
— A Record of Study in Aboriginal American Languages • Daniel G. Brinton
... 'commodity, tickling commodity', and his expression of contempt for the Archduke of Austria, who had killed his father, which begins in jest but ends in serious earnest. His conduct at the siege of Angiers shows that his resources were not confined to verbal retorts.—The same exposure of the policy of courts and camps, of kings, nobles, priests, and cardinals, takes place here as in the other plays we have gone through, and we shall not go into a ...
— Characters of Shakespeare's Plays • William Hazlitt
... I have since sought to call forth higher and more subtle passions, I doubt if I have ever excited the two elementary passions of tragedy,—namely, pity and terror,—to the same degree. In mere style, too, "Eugene Aram," in spite of certain verbal oversights, and defects in youthful taste (some of which I have endeavored to remove from the present edition), appears to me unexcelled by any of my later writings,—at least in what I have always studied as the main ...
— Eugene Aram, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... contemplated the scenes around him, it is not difficult to conceive that, to superficial observers, Lord Byron at Athens might have appeared an untouched spectator of much that throws ordinary travellers into, at least, verbal raptures. For pretenders of every sort, whether in taste or morals, he entertained, at all times, the most profound contempt; and if, frequently, his real feelings of admiration disguised themselves under an affected ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. I. (of VI.) - With his Letters and Journals. • Thomas Moore
... weeks glided away without bringing any fulfilment of Fitzgerald's promise, anxiety changed to distrust. She twice requested Tom to ask his master for the papers he had spoken of, and received a verbal answer that they would be sent as soon as they were ready. There were greater obstacles in the way than she, in her inexperience, was aware of. The laws of Georgia restrained humane impulses by forbidding the manumission of a slave. Consequently, he must either incur very undesirable ...
— A Romance of the Republic • Lydia Maria Francis Child
... thought of the pleasant family life of which I had had a glimpse. They seemed devoted to one another. They had little private jokes of their own which, unintelligible to the outsider, amused them enormously. Perhaps Charles Strickland was dull judged by a standard that demanded above all things verbal scintillation; but his intelligence was adequate to his surroundings, and that is a passport, not only to reasonable success, but still more to happiness. Mrs. Strickland was a charming woman, and she loved him. I pictured their lives, troubled by no untoward adventure, honest, decent, ...
— The Moon and Sixpence • W. Somerset Maugham
... affording just equivalents for the Greek terms, for the technical words of the Platonic philosophy, [73] which had been consecrated, by the gospel or by the church, to express the mysteries of the Christian faith; and a verbal defect might introduce into the Latin theology a long train of error or perplexity. [74] But as the western provincials had the good fortune of deriving their religion from an orthodox source, they preserved with steadiness the doctrine which they had accepted with docility; and when the Arian pestilence ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon
... not stay here another minute." She reached for her trinkets on the table and rattled them viciously. "It's too bad. With the best intentions in the world I bring two of my friends together and they fall instantly into verbal fisticuffs. Hermia, you deserve no better fate than to be locked in here with this bear of a man until ...
— Madcap • George Gibbs
... to inquiries was that Mr Hope was not so well, and wished for entire quiet. Everyone was anxious. Hester was wretched, and Mrs Grey extremely restless and uneasy. She made several attempts to see him; but in no instance did she succeed. She wrote him a private note, and received only a friendly verbal answer, such as all ...
— Deerbrook • Harriet Martineau
... again. Here on this field they could regain their glory and wipe out the stain of their former disgrace.[67] Then turning to the Moesian troops, who were the chief promoters of the war,[68] he told them it was no good challenging the Vitellians with verbal threats, if they could not bear to face them and their blows. Thus he addressed each legion as he reached it. To the Third he spoke at greater length, reminding them of their victories both old and new. Had they not under Mark Antony defeated the Parthians[69] and the Armenians ...
— Tacitus: The Histories, Volumes I and II • Caius Cornelius Tacitus
... I drew the castle of Hermitage in my fashion, and sketched it so accurately that with a few verbal instructions Clerk put it into regular form, Williams[201] (the Grecian) copied over Clerk's, and his drawing was engraved as the frontispiece of the first volume of the Kelso edition, Minstrelsy of the Scottish ...
— The Journal of Sir Walter Scott - From the Original Manuscript at Abbotsford • Walter Scott
... precision and in trustworthiness, so has the former shrunk, grown vague and questionable; as the one has more and more filled the sphere of action, so has the other retreated into the region of meditation, or vanished behind the screen of mere verbal recognition. ...
— Lectures and Essays • Thomas Henry Huxley
... "Debenture."—Perhaps the following may be of some use to D.V.S. (Vol. ii., p. 40.) in his search for the verbal raw material out of which these ...
— Notes & Queries, No. 37. Saturday, July 13, 1850 • Various
... Julius, and others as associates of heretics and patrons of the detestable errors of Marcellus. A few random charges of gross immorality are added, after the Eusebian custom. They end with a new creed, the fourth of Antioch, with some verbal changes, and ...
— The Arian Controversy • H. M. Gwatkin
... deflection from the intended route, was declined in courteous terms by Marcoy through the interpretation of Pepe Garcia. Among civilized folk this urbane refusal would have sufficed, but the savages, taking such a reply as a challenge to verbal warfare, returned to the charge with increased tenacity. It were hard to say what natural logic they put in practice or what sylvan persuasions they wrought by, but their peculiar mode of stroking the white men's backs with their hands, and the softer and still softer inflections which ...
— Lippincott's Magazine Of Popular Literature And Science, No. 23, February, 1873, Vol. XI. • Various
... received his answer from Bajazet II: the reason of so long a delay was that the pope's envoy and the Neapolitan ambassador had been stopped by Gian della Rovere, the Cardinal Giuliano's brother, just as they were disembarking at Sinigaglia. They were charged with a verbal answer, which was that the sultan at this moment was busied with a triple war, first with the Sultan of Egypt, secondly with the King of Hungary, and thirdly with the Greeks of Macedonia and Epirus; and therefore he could not, with all the will in the world, help His Holiness with ...
— The Borgias - Celebrated Crimes • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... weariness returned to the king's face. He knew that all this was but a preamble to something of deeper significance. He anticipated what was forming in the other's mind, but he wished to avoid a verbal declaration. O, he knew that there was a net of intrigue enmeshing him, but it was so very fine that he could not pick up the smallest thread whereby to unravel it. Down in his soul he felt the shame of the knowledge that he dared not. A dreamer, rushing ...
— The Puppet Crown • Harold MacGrath
... mere quality of vastness, vastness, vastness, and was not permitted to invest with it any particular object. If I could have done so, the torment would have ceased. When at last I was roused from this state of suffering, I could not of course in those days (knowing no verbal metaphysics, and no metaphysics at all, except by the dreadful experience of an abstract idea)—I could not of course find words to describe the nature of my sensations, and even now I cannot explain why it is that the forced contemplation of a mere quality, distinct ...
— Eothen • A. W. Kinglake
... political, with equal ease and grace, greatly to the edification of the bystanders. The editions were chiefly American, made to sell, and thus exceedingly cheap. History and novels appeared to be the literature in demand; and Walter Scott, Byron, and Bulwer, the names most familiar in the verbal catalogue galloped over by the "learned gentleman," as ...
— Impressions of America - During The Years 1833, 1834, and 1835. In Two Volumes, Volume II. • Tyrone Power
... all the Notes, sometimes they would help us a little, and often not; some hints we had from the French, but not very many; besides we had considerable helps from other Persons far above our selves, for whose Care and Pains we shall ever acknowledge our Gratitude. A meer Verbal Translation is not to be expected, that wou'd sound so horribly, and be more obscure than the Original; but we have been faithful Observers of his Sence, and even of his Words too, not slipping any of consequence without something to answer it; ...
— Prefaces to Terence's Comedies and Plautus's Comedies (1694) • Lawrence Echard
... his pocket, gave a verbal message to the boy, and turned to his guest, without betraying the ...
— Victorian Short Stories, - Stories Of Successful Marriages • Elizabeth Gaskell, et al.
... to-night. Was that night a dream or a reality? Could I have had a short but sharp attack of brain fever? Perhaps the less I think about it the better; but it is decidedly hard to be gifted with the instincts of a poet and denied the verbal formulation. And it was the most painfully realistic, aggressively material thing, that conflict in my brain, that mortal ever experienced. That, however, may have been a mere figment of my excited imagination. But what excited my imagination? ...
— What Dreams May Come • Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton
... depositing of detritus carried down the steep side of the valley by a tributary stream and deposited in the form of a fan, when the force of the water is weakened as it enters the more level floor of the valley. To interpret this verbal description, however, the pupil must first interpret the words of the teacher as sounds, and then convert these into ideas by bringing his former knowledge to bear upon the word symbols. If we could take it for granted that the ...
— Ontario Normal School Manuals: Science of Education • Ontario Ministry of Education |
