"Conjecture" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... be very much," Leibowitz said. "Not these days. I've often told Emily—that's my wife, Mr. Malone—that I could hide a TV circuit under her lipstick. Not that there would be any use in it—but the techniques are there, Mr. Malone. And if your conjecture is ...
— Out Like a Light • Gordon Randall Garrett
... despotism of emperors. What is true is that the pope and the emperor contended for the mastery, and the masses gave it to the pope. What the popes did with it we know. That is history. What the emperors would have done with it is matter for conjecture. It is very probable that they would have abused the power as badly as the popes did, but conjectural history ...
— Folkways - A Study of the Sociological Importance of Usages, Manners, Customs, Mores, and Morals • William Graham Sumner
... only increase the dissatisfaction by disappointing. Some advantage gained may put off clamour for some months: but I think, the longer it is suspended, the more terrible it will be; and how the war should end but in ruin, I am not wise enough to conjecture. France suspends the blow, to make it more inevitable. She has suffered us to undo ourselves: will she allow us time to recover? We have begged her indulgence in the first: will ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole - Volume II • Horace Walpole
... the hour of adjournment, made his argument on the following day, when the consideration of the question was resumed. In answer to the objection that negro voting would "lead to the amalgamation of the races or social equality," he said: "On this subject there is nothing left to conjecture, and no ground for alarm. Negro suffrage has been very extensively tried in this country, and we are able to appeal to facts. Negroes had the right to vote in all the Colonies save one, under the Articles of ...
— History of the Thirty-Ninth Congress of the United States • Wiliam H. Barnes
... If a conjecture may be hazarded, the decision will probably depend mainly on one consideration, viz., which of the two systems is consistent with the greatest amount of human liberty and spontaneity. It is yet to be ascertained whether the communistic scheme would be consistent with that multiform development ...
— Principles Of Political Economy • John Stuart Mill
... had begun its infancy. Homer is the boundary which is insurmountably opposed to our further retrospection, and Homer is already the beginning of perfection in Greek letters. Of earlier periods we can but conjecture that there must have been such, bearing a character analogous to the relics of those nations whose fabulous history is better known to us. Northern literature can hardly be said to have had an existence till within the last hundred years. Before that time we must look for all phases of ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2, No. 2, August, 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... of King Roderick, in that dark and doleful day of Spain. Whether he went down amidst the storm of battle, and atoned for his sins and errors by a patriot grave, or whether he survived to repent of them in hermit exile, must remain matter of conjecture and dispute. The learned Archbishop Rodrigo, who has recorded the events of this disastrous field, affirms that Roderick fell beneath the vengeful blade of the traitor Julian, and thus expiated with his blood his crime against the hapless Florinda; but the archbishop stands alone ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, May 1844 - Volume 23, Number 5 • Various
... time, must be to ascertain of how many persons that community then consisted. Unfortunately the population of England in 1685, cannot be ascertained with perfect accuracy. For no great state had then adopted the wise course of periodically numbering the people. All men were left to conjecture for themselves; and, as they generally conjectured without examining facts, and under the influence of strong passions and prejudices, their guesses were often ludicrously absurd. Even intelligent Londoners ordinarily talked of London as containing several millions of souls. It was confidently asserted ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 1 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... truth, I should have thought that any girl, be her station what it might, faced with the alternative of Smugg and Joe, would have chosen Joe. In my opinion, Pyrrha was merely amusing herself with Smugg, and I was rather comforted by this reversal of the ordinary roles. Still, I could not rest in conjecture, and my curiosity led me up to Dill's little farm on the afternoon of the day of Joe's sudden appearance. The others let me go alone. Directly after dinner Smugg went to his bedroom, and the other three had gone off to play lawn tennis at the vicar's. I lit ...
— Frivolous Cupid • Anthony Hope
... life does not comprise either the custom or a reason for it, we may assume that fosterage was a consequence of the clan system, and that its practice strengthened the ties of kinship and sympathy. This conjecture is corroborated by the numerous instances in history and in story of fosterage affection proving, when tested, stronger than the natural affection of relatives by birth. What is more, long after ...
— The Glories of Ireland • Edited by Joseph Dunn and P.J. Lennox
... lovedest, turnedest, is [say has] now become a dissyllable, lovedst, turnedst."—Lowth's Gram., p. 45; Hiley's, 45; Churchill's, 104. See also Priestley's Gram., p. 114; and Coar's, p. 102. This latter doctrine, with all its vouchers, still needs confirmation. What is it but an idle conjecture? If it were true, a few quotations might easily prove it; but when, and by whom, have any such words as lovedest, turnedest, ever been used? For aught I see, the simple st is as complete and as old a termination for the second person singular of an English verb, as est; indeed, ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... country was ever known of the fate of Lucy Brandon; and as her circle of acquaintances was narrow, and interest in her fate existed vividly in none save a few humble breasts, conjecture was never keenly awakened, and soon cooled into forgetfulness. If it favoured, after the lapse of years, any one notion more than another, it was that she had perished among the victims ...
— Paul Clifford, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... was the king's dangerous rival. The crown was not secure upon his head so long as the Howards lived. And who could conjecture whether in time to come, when Henry closed his eyes, the exultant love of the people might not call to the throne the Duke of Norfolk, or his noble son, the Earl of Surrey, instead of the rightful heir—instead of the little boy Edward, ...
— Henry VIII And His Court • Louise Muhlbach
... gone; and the underwood of the forest came up to the walls, and must have darkened the windows. It was about seven o'clock—not late to my London notions—but, after knocking for some time at the door and receiving no reply, I was driven to conjecture that the occupant of the house was gone to bed. So I betook myself to the nearest church I had seen, three miles back on the road I had come, sure that close to that I should find an inn of some kind; and early the next morning I set off back to Coldholme, by a field-path which my host ...
— Curious, if True - Strange Tales • Elizabeth Gaskell
... with his royal master. This conference lasted so long, that many of the courtiers supposed his mission in Greece related to matters of more political importance than the purchase of pictures and statues; and this conjecture was afterward confirmed by the favours ...
— Philothea - A Grecian Romance • Lydia Maria Child
... watch him, for the two men whom he had overheard in the dark house on the Boulevard Froissart were active and resourceful rascals, he had no doubt. Whether they would be able to make anything of the cigarette case he had stupidly left behind he could not conjecture; but the importance of recovering the packet he had cut from Chauvenet's coat was not a trifle that rogues of their caliber would ignore. There was, the purser said, a sick man in the second cabin, who had kept close to his berth. The steward believed ...
— The Port of Missing Men • Meredith Nicholson
... to be carried or what was to be his fate Ernest could not conjecture, nor did he speculate much. It was enough for him to know that he was in the power of one of the ...
— The Young Bank Messenger • Horatio Alger
... 'healthy, very good-looking, and one might make oath, a true-hearted creature. But there is withal a timidity, a frightenedness in her manner at times which, if I may hazard a perhaps uncharitable conjecture, speaks ill for that smart husband ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 438 - Volume 17, New Series, May 22, 1852 • Various
... untrustworthiness—especially when we are dealing with conditions and phenomena where mal-observation is possible; but I do not think that any negative conclusion can be drawn from this. The case is still an open one; nothing is proved, one way or the other, and, in such work as ours, proof—and not mere conjecture—must be forthcoming. Very true it is that proof of the sort desired is often impossible; but it is obtained sometimes. If a medium be caught masquerading in a white muslin "robe" and a mask, we are doubtless within our rights in saying that the medium ...
— The Problems of Psychical Research - Experiments and Theories in the Realm of the Supernormal • Hereward Carrington
... own country; and many of these excrements upon a strict view appearing copple crowned, with a point like a cone or pyramid, are easily distinguished from the Hibernian, which lie much flatter, and with lest continuity. I communicated this conjecture to an eminent physician, who is well versed in such profound speculations; and at my request was pleased to make trial with each of his fingers, by thrusting them into the anus of several persons ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Vol. VII - Historical and Political Tracts—Irish • Jonathan Swift
... anxious grew, The voice still seem'd to vibrate on his ear. Nor durst he hope the hermit's tale untrue; For man he seem'd to love, and Heaven to fear; And none speaks false, where there is none to hear. "Yet, can man's gentle heart become so fell? No more in vain conjecture let me wear My hours away, but seek the hermit's cell; 'Tis he my doubt can ...
— The Poetical Works of Beattie, Blair, and Falconer - With Lives, Critical Dissertations, and Explanatory Notes • Rev. George Gilfillan [Ed.]
... threshold of the palace, which arose no doubt from the fear, only too well founded, of seeing his desire to march on Paris thwarted by his lieutenants. It is only since, that reflecting on the events of that time, I am enabled to conjecture as to the struggles which passed in the soul of the Emperor; for then, as during my entire period of service, I would not have dared to think of going outside the limits of my ordinary duties ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... From the use of the word daric I conjecture that Leonora's ancestress lived under the Persian ...
— HE • Andrew Lang
... the whole affair. But the habits of a lifetime are not parted with so easily; and when the Chief Inspector observed—evidently with the idea of goading him on—"This seems to be mainly a matter of conjecture, Gryce," his old self reasserted itself, and he ...
— The Mystery of the Hasty Arrow • Anna Katharine Green
... is Redbud, my young friend? I should conjecture that she was a young lady, from the name.—Stay, is there not a Miss Redbud Summers, daughter of ...
— The Last of the Foresters • John Esten Cooke
... interference of those institutions, on the inferior animals. To a large proportion of this class it is, in their youth, one of the most vivid exhilarations to witness the terrors and anguish of living beings. In many parts of the country it would be no improbable conjecture in explanation of a savage yell heard at a distance, that a company of rationals may be witnessing the writhings, agonies, and cries, of some animal struggling for escape or for life, while it is suffering the infliction, ...
— An Essay on the Evils of Popular Ignorance • John Foster
... of State has discovered an old statute among the laws of the empire, resulting from a treaty between the Emperor Charlemagne and Governor Roberts which expressly provides for the north gate of the Capital grounds being kept open, but this is merely a conjecture. ...
— Rolling Stones • O. Henry
... said he succinctly. It was like a bomb, and a bomb is the very last thing in succinctness. It comes to the point without palaver or conjecture, and it reduces havoc ...
— A Fool and His Money • George Barr McCutcheon
... finally settled herself. Then she began to prepare her palette in the deepest silence. Sitting there, she could hear, distinctly, a sound which had strongly excited her curiosity the evening before, and had whirled her young imagination across vast fields of conjecture. She recognized the firm and regular breathing of a man whom she had just seen asleep. Her curiosity was satisfied beyond her expectations, but at the same time she felt saddled by an immense responsibility. Through the opening ...
— Vendetta • Honore de Balzac
... he looked keenly at the woman from the Lodge. "I wonder what else you have known?" he thought. But he did not voice the conjecture. Deryck Brand rarely asked questions of a third person. His patients never had to find out that his knowledge of them came through the gossip or the breach of ...
— The Mistress of Shenstone • Florence L. Barclay
... written merely from motives of humanity and zeal for the Prince's service, yet she expressed so anxious a wish that she should not be known to have interfered, that the Chevalier was induced to suspect the deep interest which she took in Waverley's safety. This conjecture, which was well founded, led, however, to false inferences. For the emotion which Edward displayed on approaching Flora and Rose at the ball of Holyrood was placed by the Chevalier to the account of the latter; and he concluded that the Baron's views about the ...
— Waverley, Or 'Tis Sixty Years Hence, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... answered the doctor, calmly pressing the blotting-paper over the address he had just written. "Valentine is one of those people who defy all conjecture. No one can say what he will do, or what he won't. A man who cannot resist an application for shelter and supper from any stray cur who wags his tail at him in the street; a man who blindly believes in the troubles of begging-letter impostors; ...
— Hide and Seek • Wilkie Collins
... be consistent. Mr. Barbe, a recent Ruthven apologist, says that the theory of an accidental origin of 'the struggle between James and Ruthven may possibly contain a fairly accurate conjecture.' {94} But Mr. Barbe also argues that James had invented the pot of gold story before he left Falkland; that, if James was guilty, 'the pretext had been framed'—the myth of the treasure had been concocted—'long before their meeting in Falkland, and was held ...
— James VI and the Gowrie Mystery • Andrew Lang
... a heavy task," I finally remarked, "and you offer very little assistance in the way of conjecture. Yet ...
— The Millionaire Baby • Anna Katharine Green
... which he may fairly be called the founder, was kept up till the decay of Rome by a large and powerful minority of Latin writers. What results it might have produced, if allowed unchecked scope, can only be matter for conjecture; in the main current of Latin literature the Greek influence was, on the whole, triumphant; Cato's was the losing side (if one may so adapt the famous line of Lucan), and the men ...
— Latin Literature • J. W. Mackail
... at the hour prefixed, in order to make some promised domestic arrangements for the day, they had taken it for granted that she must have met with me at some distance from home—and that either the extreme beauty of the day had beguiled her of all petty household recollections, or (as a conjecture more in harmony with past experiences) that my impatience and solicitations had persuaded her to lay aside her own plans for the moment at the risk of some little domestic inconvenience. Now, however, in a single instant vanished every mode of accounting for ...
— Narrative And Miscellaneous Papers • Thomas De Quincey
... might have dallied still longer is mere conjecture, when a letter marked "haste" was delivered by an orderly dragoon, and in half an hour the "leathern conveniency" was ...
— International Weekly Miscellany, Vol. 1, No. 5, July 29, 1850 • Various
... solar atmosphere determine the movements of the rotation and revolution of the planets and satellites? If these bodies had penetrated very deeply into this atmosphere, its resistance would have caused them to fall into the sun. We can therefore conjecture that the planets were formed at their successive limits by the condensation of a zone of vapors which the sun, on cooling, left behind, in ...
— A History of Science, Volume 3(of 5) • Henry Smith Williams
... his conjecture. Archie had once, when wandering among the hills, shot at a wild cat and wounded it, and had followed it to the cave to which it had fled, and seeing it an advantageous place of concealment had, when he determined to harry the district of the Kerrs, fixed upon it as the hiding place for his band. ...
— In Freedom's Cause • G. A. Henty
... now Santa Cruz), and to the lesser Caribbee Islands; and lastly to the continent of South America.* (* Rochefort, Hist. des Antilles volume 1 pages 326 to 353; Garcia page 322; Robertson book 3 note 69. The conjecture of Father Gili that the Caribs of the continent may have come from the islands at the time of the first conquest of the Spaniards (Saggio volume 3 page 204), is at variance with all the statements of the early historians.) It is supposed that this event took place ...
— Equinoctial Regions of America V3 • Alexander von Humboldt
... important matters. Who was he? What was he? His name and calling were poor replies to those questions. Was he naturally cold and unimpressible at heart? or had some fierce passion, some terrible sorrow, ravaged the life within him, and left it dead for ever after? Impossible to conjecture! There was the impenetrable face before you, wholly inexpressive—so inexpressive that it did not even look vacant—a mystery for your eyes and your mind to dwell on—hiding something; but whether vice or virtue you ...
— Basil • Wilkie Collins
... evidence of mental activity, and, consequently, we are forced to conclude that it is of mental rather than of physical origin. Just what it means psychically it is impossible to state without much more extended observations. We conjecture tentatively, however, that the retention of fixed positions is in part merely a phenomenon of perseveration, and in part an acceptance of what the patient takes to be a command from the examiner, and sometimes a ...
— Benign Stupors - A Study of a New Manic-Depressive Reaction Type • August Hoch
... now seen by the London "Gazette," what changes have really been made at court; but, at the same time, I believe you have seen that there must be more, before a Ministry can be settled; what those will be, God knows. Were I to conjecture, I should say that the whole will centre, before it is long, in Mr. Pitt and Co., the present being an heterogeneous jumble of youth and caducity, which cannot ...
— The PG Edition of Chesterfield's Letters to His Son • The Earl of Chesterfield
... readied another stream which ran into the main river. Here our companions placed themselves before us, and signified that we must go no further. I could only conjecture that they looked upon it as the border of their territory, and were afraid that should we pass it we should attempt to make our escape. I saw them looking out eagerly over the country beyond the stream, ...
— In the Wilds of Africa • W.H.G. Kingston
... and rang like a cheer. The gathering broke into little, excited, chattering groups, sure symptom of the success of a meeting. Much conjecture was expressed and not a little cynicism. "Compared to us Ishmael would be a society favorite if Surtaine carries this through," said one. "It means suspension in six months," prophesied Shearson. But most of the men were excitedly enthusiastic. Your newspaper man ...
— The Clarion • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... position, and the work began in earnest. At the depth of twenty feet they came upon gravel, a result which greatly raised their spirits, as its character was precisely similar to that in the bed of the stream, and showed that Frank's conjecture was a correct one, and that the river had at one time flowed along the foot ...
— Captain Bayley's Heir: - A Tale of the Gold Fields of California • G. A. Henty
... and paled at that piece of news, and the reason of her summons no longer asked conjecture. It was an easy thing for me, knowing what I knew, to fill in the details which the courier omitted in ignorance ...
— The Shame of Motley • Raphael Sabatini
... moth; for that scorched creature gave up the ghost, and uttered not a groan: These vain pretenders are ignorant of him they seek after; for of him that knew him we never heard again:—O thou! who towerest above the flights of conjecture, opinion, and comprehension; whatever has been reported of thee we have heard and read; the congregation is dismissed, and life drawn to a close; and we still rest at ...
— A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers • Henry David Thoreau
... the strokes against the fallen trunk. She was several times on the eve of rising up, but was as often withheld by some mysterious impulse. She endeavored to reflect calmly, but still she could not, by any mode of conjecture, realize the probability of her foes having returned and traced her thither. Yet an undefinable fear still possessed her, and she endeavored with patience to await the pleasure of her friends. But when the chief seated himself in her vicinity, ...
— Thrilling Adventures by Land and Sea • James O. Brayman
... dignity in its original setting that only the master-hand of the Tuscan author could impart. The scene of the novel of Guiscard and Ghismonda is laid, as we have said, at this very spot, and as the hero, the heroine and the villain of the tale have Norman names, we may be allowed to conjecture that this graceful story, which Boccaccio puts into the mouth of the lady Fiammetta, was founded upon some actual but half-forgotten family scandal in the annals of the mighty but self-made ...
— The Naples Riviera • Herbert M. Vaughan
... is not inferior in truth and glory to Titian, greatest of the Venetian colorists: as in his portraits of Leo X., Julius, and some parts of his frescos. But for the most part, though he had the genius for everything, for color as well as form, yet one may conjecture he found color in its greatest excellence too laborious for the careful elaboration which can alone produce great results, too costly of time and toil, the sacrifice too great of the greater to the less. Allston was apparently never weary of the labor which ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 88, February, 1865 • Various
... and if he now received the credit for that man's misdeeds he had himself alone to thank. Obviously a mistake had been made, but it seemed to him that Everard had intended it to be made, had even worked to bring it about. What his object had been Bernard could not bring to conjecture. But his instinctive, inborn hatred of all underhand dealings made him resent his brother's behaviour with all the force at his command. He was too angry to attempt to unravel the mystery, and he did not broach the subject to Tommy who ...
— The Lamp in the Desert • Ethel M. Dell
... avoid these—truth compels me to state—Mr. Bradford took an ignominious flight, for, saying that he must hasten upstairs to dress for dinner, he put aside the detaining arms which would have kept him till conjecture was satisfied, and once more assuring his little girls that he had absolutely nothing to do with the box of bonbons and its valuable contents, and congratulating Bessie that her heart's desire was attained, he hurried away to his own room. Here he found Mrs. Bradford, ...
— Bessie Bradford's Prize • Joanna H. Mathews
... Britain, and every wound inflicted by Hezekiah needed no repeating. But on reaching Cambridge, the regulars, greatly to their comfort, missed the old man and his horse. They comforted themselves by the conjecture that he had, at length, paid the forfeit of his temerity, and that his steed had gone home with a bloody bridle and an empty saddle. Not so.—Hezekiah had only lingered for a moment to aid in a plot which had been laid by Amni Cutter, for taking the baggage-waggons ...
— The Yankee Tea-party - Or, Boston in 1773 • Henry C. Watson
... Segontiaci, Ancalites, Bibroci, and Cassi were less considerable, and must evidently have been situated on the marches between their larger neighbours. The name of the Cassi may still, perhaps, cling to their old home, in the Cashio Hundred and Cassiobury, near Watford; while conjecture finds traces of the Ancalites in Henley, and of the Bibroci in Bray, on either ...
— Early Britain—Roman Britain • Edward Conybeare
... our knowledge of the love-business between Perion and Melicent. For at this point, as abruptly as it began, the one existing chronicle of their adventures makes conclusion, like a bit of interrupted music, and thereby affords conjecture no inconsiderable bounds wherein to exercise itself. Yet, in view of the fact that deductions as to what befell these lovers afterward can at best result in free-handed theorising, it seems more profitable in this place to speak ...
— Domnei • James Branch Cabell et al
... to maintain. But perhaps this was premature: the omnipotent Miss Power's character—practical or ideal, politic or impulsive—he as yet knew nothing of; and giving over reasoning from insufficient data he lapsed into mere conjecture. ...
— A Laodicean • Thomas Hardy
... HANSARD of this Session; all is conjecture and tobacco-smoke. What we know is, not the least effect, except an internal trouble, was produced on the royal mind by the St.-Mary-Axe Discovery. Some Question there might well be, inarticulately as yet, of Grumkow's fidelity, at least of his discretion; seeds ...
— History of Friedrich II of Prussia V 7 • Thomas Carlyle
... that Torksey is the Tiovulfingacester of Venerable Bede; but Smith, the learned editor of the Cambridge edition of Bede, inclines to the opinion that Southwell is the town indicated by the pious and industrious monastic. The passage in Bede leaves every thing to conjecture: he simply relates that a truth-speaking presbyter and abbot of Pearteneu, (most likely, Partney, near Horncastle, in Lincolnshire,) named Deda, said that an old man had told him, that he, with a great multitude, ...
— The Baron's Yule Feast: A Christmas Rhyme • Thomas Cooper
... the natural slope of the material. Just what pressures develop on the sides of the structures in these deep trenches after pulling the top sheeting (the bottom sheeting being left in place) is, of course, a matter of conjecture. There can be no doubt that there is an arching of the material, as suggested by the author. How much this may be assisted by the practical non-disturbance of the virgin material is, of course, indeterminate. That substructures ...
— Pressure, Resistance, and Stability of Earth • J. C. Meem
... actual amount of Mr. Hope-Scott's charities during his life it would be very hard to conjecture; but this much I can state, on the testimony of one who knew the fact from his own personal knowledge, that in twelve or thirteen years (from 1859 or thereabouts) he gave away, in charity of some form or other, not less than 40,000l. It is right to observe that, quite towards the close, ...
— Memoirs of James Robert Hope-Scott, Volume 2 • Robert Ornsby
... for a moment afraid to move lest they should tumble into darkness. But sending the light about, and feeling with hands and feet, they soon came to an idea of the place they were in. It was a little gallery, with arches on one side opening into a larger place, the character of which they could only conjecture, for nearly all they could determine was, that it went below and rose above where they stood. On the other side was a plain wall, such as they had had on ...
— Donal Grant • George MacDonald
... said; "there are at least no signs of any vessel in distress; if any such were near, she would undoubtedly be firing signal-guns. So I think we may hope my conjecture that our boys are safe ...
— Elsie at Nantucket • Martha Finley
... National collection, one in the possession of Mr. H. J. B. Clements, and another in the British Museum. Eleven of these golden balls were found in 1834 at Carrick-on-Shannon.[21] There has been much conjecture as to the use these balls were put to, and it has been suggested that as their large size would render them inconvenient as personal ornaments, they were probably used to decorate a horse. If so they may have been attached to the bridle like the ...
— The Bronze Age in Ireland • George Coffey
... emerged suddenly from a mental voyage of recollection and conjecture. "Now one understands why Lady Fox-Wilton—stupid woman!—has never seemed to care a rap for her. It must indeed be annoying to have to mother a child so much ...
— The Case of Richard Meynell • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... Easter, and much amusement, and profit also, were derived from the quaint observances of Hock Monday and Tuesday. The meaning of the word and the origin of the custom have been the subjects of much conjecture; but the festival is supposed to be held in remembrance of the victory of our Saxon forefathers over the Danes in the time of Ethelred. The custom was that on Hock Monday the men should go out into the streets and roads with cords, and stop and bind all the ...
— Old English Sports • Peter Hampson Ditchfield
... Bible Advocate and yourself are aiming at the one object, viz. the abolition of God's holy Sabbath, and the treading down God's truth seeking children; he is approbating and upholding you in your disguise; we are therefore left to conjecture. From some marks which I have seen under your two coverings, I am very strongly inclined to believe that your real name is Jacob Weston of New Ipswich, N. H. If I am wrong, then what I am about to state will not apply to Barnabas. If I am right in the real character, then ...
— A Vindication of the Seventh-Day Sabbath • Joseph Bates
... celebrate this double marriage, and as yet only one of the brides appearing, there was much of wondering and conjecture, but they mostly thought that Ganymede was making a jest ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles Lamb and Mary Lamb
... lapse of a few moments, again devoted to much apparent deep thought and conjecture, the Governor once ...
— Wacousta: A Tale of the Pontiac Conspiracy (Complete) • John Richardson
... girl watched them in the changing lights and her active mind formed many a conjecture ...
— Tharon of Lost Valley • Vingie E. Roe
... article, the latter seeks to identify Rajamora or Soliman with the Raxobago of San Agustin, and declares that Rajamatanda and Lacandola are identical. The confusion existing in later writers regarding these names is lacking in Morga, and Rizal's conjecture appears correct. ...
— History of the Philippine Islands Vols 1 and 2 • Antonio de Morga
... was ignorant of the true cause of the lengthened day, and that he and the whole host with him thought that the sun moved round the earth every day, and that on that particular occasion it stood still for a time, thus causing the light to remain longer; and I would say, that they did not conjecture that, from the amount of snow in the air (see Josh. x:11), the refraction may have been greater than usual, or that there may have been some other cause which we will not now ...
— A Theologico-Political Treatise [Part I] • Benedict de Spinoza
... silence, and, I hope, gave the speaker an unforgetable lesson as to the duty of not speaking lightly in matters affecting female reputation. He collapsed; and I do not recollect that he ventured any comment upon a letter of the next morning which proved his conjecture to be correct. The principle ...
— The Life of Sir James Fitzjames Stephen, Bart., K.C.S.I. - A Judge of the High Court of Justice • Sir Leslie Stephen
... be sure, the text had cryptic subintentions; but these were as far as may be from any that Peter was in a position to conjecture. How could he guess, for instance, that the letter was an instrument, and he the victim, of a Popish machination? How could he guess that its writer knew as well as he did who was the author of "A ...
— The Cardinal's Snuff-Box • Henry Harland
... purchase it by yielding national powers. From this it might be understood in what light she would view an attempt to abridge one of her favorite prerogatives. If left to herself, she may probably put a stop to the evil. As one ground for this conjecture, he took notice of the sect of which he said was a respectable class of people, who carryed their ethics beyond the mere equality of men, extending their humanity to the claims of the ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 3, 1918 • Various
... have seen you before this, but the extreme coldness of the weather is a sufficient apology. I cannot yet give any certain account of Bess, or form a rational conjecture with respect to the termination of her disorder. She has not had a violent fit of frenzy since I saw you, but her mind is in a most unsettled state, and attending to the constant fluctuation of it is far more harassing than the watching ...
— Mary Wollstonecraft • Elizabeth Robins Pennell
... inquirer after, and a good judge in such things, nor any of the late writers produce any thing upon which I can safely rely; yet what beginning this kind of Poetry {14} had, I think I can pretty well conjecture: for tis likely that first Shepherds us'd Songs to recreate themselves in their leisure hours whilst they fed their Sheep; and that each man, as his wit served, accommodated his Songs to his present Circumstances: to this Solitude invited, ...
— De Carmine Pastorali (1684) • Rene Rapin
... present, however, I believe that conservatism is advisable, and that great harm may be done by misrepresentation. Sound growth of a northern nut industry will be built upon facts and honest experience and not on conjecture, hearsay, or even on enthusiasm, however necessary this may be. I believe that we should encourage people to plant nuts for pleasure, plant nuts as a hobby, plant them for shade and for posterity, but under present ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Report of the Proceedings at the Fifteenth Annual Meeting • Various
... corroborative evidence that cannot be here quoted, to prove that the splendid personage presented is a Neapolitan nobleman of the highest rank, Giovan Francesco Acquaviva, Duke of Atri. There is the more reason to accept his conjecture since it helps us to cope with certain difficulties presented by the picture itself. It may be conceded at the outset that there are disturbing elements in it, well calculated to give pause to the student of Titian. The handsome patrician, a little too proud of his ...
— The Later works of Titian • Claude Phillips
... fact itself of the existence of individual wills, having in any degree individual or personal interests as they must, and the impossibility of devising any social order or government that will give to the individual an ideal freedom, if such a conception be indeed possible at all. We may conjecture at least that in a world in which every trace of an economic motive had been removed, if this were possible, there would still be slavery of some kind, and the inexorable logic of individuality would in the end produce conflict ...
— The Psychology of Nations - A Contribution to the Philosophy of History • G.E. Partridge
... a possible explanation of his knowledge of it by suggesting that he had 'come in upon them'; that is, upon the Council in their deliberations. But probably the rendering preferred in the text is preferable, and we are left to conjecture his source of information, as almost everything else about him. But it is more profitable to note how God works out His purposes and delivers His servants by 'natural' means, which yet are as truly divine working as was the sending of the ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture: The Acts • Alexander Maclaren
... almost unthinkable that Jack should have no other reason for his hatred. Yet she could not bring herself even to consider the possibility that the reason was the one he had advanced. She came again to the dead end of conjecture. She could believe in Jack's judgment up to a point—beyond that she ...
— The Angel of Terror • Edgar Wallace
... occurred at that time in which the hand of God afterwards appeared very plain, though it then seemed very dark to us. Dr. Black fell from his camel in the midst of the sandy desert, and none of all our company could conjecture what bearing on the object of our Mission this sad occurrence could have. Is it a frown on our undertaking? or can it really be a movement of his kind, guiding hand? We often spoke of it: in our visit to Galilee we thought that we saw some ...
— The Biography of Robert Murray M'Cheyne • Andrew A. Bonar
... The foreman, a young German, cut me off unceremoniously by asking to see my working-card; and when I looked at him blankly, for I hadn't a ghost of an idea what he meant, he strode away in disgust, leaving me to conjecture as to his meaning. ...
— The Long Day - The Story of a New York Working Girl As Told by Herself • Dorothy Richardson
... 10,000l. executed by Sir Walter during the struggles of Constable and Co. to prevent a failure, on the transfer to him of all the copyrights of Sir Walter, including "the results of some literary exertions of the sole surviving executor," which I conjecture to mean the copyright of the admirable biography of Sir Walter Scott in ten volumes, to which I have made such a host of references—probably the most perfect specimen of a biography rich in great materials, which our language contains. And thus, nearly fifteen years after ...
— Sir Walter Scott - (English Men of Letters Series) • Richard H. Hutton
... students of mankind, when they found a myth in Hawaii corresponding to the Greek story of Orpheus and Eurydice, or an Aztec poem of tender longing in absence, or a story of the deluge, were wont to conjecture how these could have been carried over from Greek or Elizabethan or Hebraic sources, or whether they did not afford evidence of a time when all branches of the human race dwelt together with a common fund of sentiment and tradition. But ...
— Sex and Society • William I. Thomas
... now," he said, "and he sticks to his story. I fear, too, that I was wrong in my conjecture with regard to his madness. He must have had a temporary madness when he drew up and signed the false report. I suppose we ought to consider ...
— Daddy's Girl • L. T. Meade
... written, purely to amuse myself, before I was admitted to my charmer. But now I have to tell thee, that I was quite right in my conjecture, that she would set up for herself, and dismiss me: for she has declared in so many words that such was her resolution: And why? Because, to be plain with me, the more she saw of me, and of my ways, the less ...
— Clarissa, Volume 3 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson
... may be called "the dark ages" of local history, we are often compelled to be content with little more than reasonable conjecture. Still, there are generally certain surviving data, in place-names, natural features, and so forth, which enable those who can detect them, and make use of them, to piece together something like a connected outline of what we may take, with some degree of probability, as ...
— A History of Horncastle - from the earliest period to the present time • James Conway Walter
... him, and then turned to inspect its contents. He wondered from whom it would come, aware of no Scot in Stirling who would dare to write to him while that town was possessed by the enemy. But not losing a moment in conjecture, ...
— The Scottish Chiefs • Miss Jane Porter
... at it with vague yet troubled fury. Whether he detected his own presentment in Miss Mannersley's sketch, or whether he recognized it as an unknown and unfamiliar treachery in his surroundings, I could not conjecture; for the next moment the matador, taking advantage of the bull's concentration, with a complacent leer at the audience, advanced toward the paper. But at that instant a young man cleared the barrier into the arena with a single bound, shoved the matador to one side, caught up the paper, ...
— Selected Stories • Bret Harte
... for daylight, I began to reflect how this could have happened; and it occurred to me that the pirates had scuttled the bottom of the vessel to sink her; and in this conjecture I was right. ...
— Percival Keene • Frederick Marryat
... Labour's Lost is entirely a matter of conjecture. It may well have been the very earliest of Shakespeare's comedies. Most scholars agree that the characteristics of style to which we have referred, together with the great use of rime (see p. 81) and the immaturity of the play as a whole, must indicate a very early date, and therefore ...
— An Introduction to Shakespeare • H. N. MacCracken
... would be greatly frightened, for I had the old, erroneous idea that they meant serious weakness and always ascribed them to my bad habit. That my habit of masturbation had any relation to the rarity of the involuntary emissions would, of course, be a matter of pure conjecture. In passing from the discussion of personal masturbation, I wish to say that my associations with boys as a pupil and as a teacher lead me to believe that the practice is practically universal. When discussing the hygienic evils of prostitution ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 3 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... cruisers, however, having been discovered, it was put a stop to by a very ingenious method, by which several vessels were captured and an end put to that little game. Of course I can only conjecture the way in which it was done, but it seemed to me to be thus: At the extreme end of the line of blockaders lay one of them with a kedge anchor, down so close to the shore that she left but a very little space for the blockade-runner to pass between her and the beach. The captain ...
— Sketches From My Life - By The Late Admiral Hobart Pasha • Hobart Pasha
... conscious of any predisposing cause, was another question. "I reckon they're after somebody," he reflected; "likely it's me." He returned to his pocket the handkerchief with which he had been whipping away the red dust of Poker Flat from his neat boots, and quietly discharged his mind of any further conjecture. ...
— Short Stories Old and New • Selected and Edited by C. Alphonso Smith
... found by which to identify the persons whose remains were thus brought to view. But there can be no doubt that five of the bodies belonged to the five persons mentioned above. To whom the three other bodies belonged is a matter of pure conjecture. They might be the remains of three intimate friends of Theodore, viz. Athanasius, Euthemius, Timotheus, or more probably of the abbots, Sophronius (851-55), Achilles (858-63), Theodosius (863-64). Cf. ...
— Byzantine Churches in Constantinople - Their History and Architecture • Alexander Van Millingen
... from the cast of "The Merchant of Venice" was the subject of a good deal of excited conjecture during the few days that remained of the winter term. Betty explained it briefly to Barbara, who in turn confided Jean's story to the rest of her committee. All of them but Clara Ellis thought better of Jean than they ever had before for the courage ...
— Betty Wales Senior • Margaret Warde
... amid the roar of the breakers, calling our attention to a dark breach in the line of foam that stretched out before us, which he fancied to be a channel between the rocks. A few desperate strokes brought us to the spot, when, to our unspeakable joy, we found it to answer the man's conjecture; but, so narrow was the passage, that the oars on both sides of the boat struck the rocks; a minute afterwards we found ourselves becalmed and in safety. The boat being moored, and the men ordered to watch by turns, we lay ...
— Notes of a Twenty-Five Years' Service in the Hudson's Bay Territory - Volume II. (of 2) • John M'lean
... Peters had been forging cheques and he saw here what would lead to discovery. Furthermore, there was a considerable sum of money in the safe, and the quarrel between uncle and nephew to divert suspicion. This, however, was mere conjecture—that trouser-pocket photo, Dawkins," said Malcolm Sage, turning to the photographer, who handed it across ...
— Malcolm Sage, Detective • Herbert George Jenkins
... Announcement The Oxen The Tresses The Photograph On a Heath An Anniversary "By the Runic Stone" The Pink Frock Transformations In her Precincts The Last Signal The House of Silence Great Things The Chimes The Figure in the Scene "Why did I sketch" Conjecture The Blow Love the Monopolist At Middle-field Gate in February The Youth who carried a Light The Head above the Fog Overlooking the River Stour The Musical Box On Sturminster Foot-bridge Royal Sponsors Old Furniture ...
— Moments of Vision • Thomas Hardy
... is, that their ancestors migrated to these Islands from Malesia, or the Malay Peninsula. But so many learned dissertations have emanated from distinguished men, propounding conflicting opinions on the descent of the Malays themselves, that we are still left on the field of conjecture. ...
— The Philippine Islands • John Foreman
... everywhere afoot against our national unity of counsel, our peace within and without, our industries and our commerce. Indeed, it is now evident that its spies were here even before the war began; and it is unhappily not a matter of conjecture, but a fact proved in our courts of justice, that the intrigues which have more than once come perilously near to disturbing the peace and dislocating the industries of the country, have been carried on at the instigation, with the support, and even under the personal ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume VI (of VIII) - History of the European War from Official Sources • Various
... weighing on my heart, and I could not account for it. And it was this, it was this: in passing through the hall, I had noticed something which reminded me of HIM. Not until I reached my study did I realize what it was, and I returned to the hall to verify my conjecture. Yes, I was not mistaken. It was his overcoat (everything that belonged to him, I, without realizing it, had observed with extraordinary attention). I questioned the servant. That was it. ...
— The Kreutzer Sonata and Other Stories • Leo Tolstoy
... entered. It came into their heads that he might have got down by the top of the cave; but the aperture by which it received light was so high, and the rocks so inaccessible without, that they gave up this conjecture. That he came in at the door they could not believe, however, unless he had the secret of making it open. In short, none of them could imagine which way he had entered; for they were all persuaded nobody knew ...
— The Arabian Nights - Their Best-known Tales • Unknown
... a hard conjecture that so great a man as Casaubon should misapply what Horace writ concerning ancient Rome to the ceremonies and manners of ancient Greece, I will not insist on this opinion, but rather judge in general that since all ...
— Discourses on Satire and Epic Poetry • John Dryden
... sentence is this: 'Although there be none so ignorant that doth not know, neither any so impudent that will not confesse, friendship to be the jewell of humaine joye; yet whosoever shall see this amitie grounded upon a little affection, will soone conjecture that it shall be dissolved upon a light occasion.' Others of Lyly's affectations are rhetorical questions, hosts of allusions to classical history, and literature, and an unfailing succession of similes from all the recondite ...
— A History of English Literature • Robert Huntington Fletcher
... Georgiana, Aylmer generally made minute inquiries as to her sensations and whether the confinement of the rooms and the temperature of the atmosphere agreed with her. These questions had such a particular drift that Georgiana began to conjecture that she was already subjected to certain physical influences, either breathed in with the fragrant air or taken with her food. She fancied likewise, but it might be altogether fancy, that there was a stirring up of her system—a strange, indefinite sensation creeping ...
— Mosses from an Old Manse and Other Stories • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... the true course to pursue, my friend. In that way alone you have your own life developed. If by word, look or deed he ever betrays your trust, I shall call my intuitions vain, and all my insight into human character mere idle conjecture." ...
— Dawn • Mrs. Harriet A. Adams
... those cases where the art of the reasoner should be used rather for the sifting of details than for the acquiring of fresh evidence. The tragedy has been so uncommon, so complete and of such personal importance to so many people, that we are suffering from a plethora of surmise, conjecture, and hypothesis. The difficulty is to detach the framework of fact—of absolute undeniable fact—from the embellishments of theorists and reporters. Then, having established ourselves upon this sound basis, ...
— Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes • Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
... she asked sharply. And that was all the conversation forthcoming. We began to think we might be pedlars after all. I never knew a population with so narrow a range of conjecture as the innkeepers of Pont-sur-Sambre. But manners and bearing have not a wider currency than bank-notes. You have only to get far enough out of your beat, and all your accomplished airs will go for nothing. These Hainaulters could see no difference between us and the average ...
— An Inland Voyage • Robert Louis Stevenson
... the beating of her veines, the intemperance of her heart, the sobbing sighes, and her often tossing of every side: No, no, the cunning Phisitian knew it not, but a scholler of Venus Court might easily conjecture the whole. After that she had beene long time tormented in her affliction, and was no more able to conceale her ardent desire, shee caused her sonne to be called for, (which word son she would faine put away if it were not for shame:) Then he nothing ...
— The Golden Asse • Lucius Apuleius
... officials know. It is set down as containing 76,560 square kilometres, with 302,315 inhabitants; but the last figures can be only guess-work, since regarding the unconquerable tribes of the interior, such as we are now trying to escape from, all is conjecture." ...
— The Search for the Silver City - A Tale of Adventure in Yucatan • James Otis
... presentation of the demands by Japan an Osaka newspaper published an "Extra" giving the text of the demands. The foreign and the Chinese press has since been paying considerable attention to this question and frequently publishing pro-Chinese or pro-Japanese comments in order to call forth the World's conjecture—a matter which ...
— The Fight For The Republic in China • Bertram Lenox Putnam Weale
... example helped more than anything else to develop the excellences observable in the works of Cimada Conegliano, Vincenzo Catena, Lorenzo Lotto, Palma Vecchio and Basaiti, to say nothing of his great pupils Titian and Giorgione. It is impossible to conjecture what course the genius of this younger generation would have taken without his guidance, but when we consider that in 1500 Bellini was seventy years old, and had stored within his mind the experience of his early association with his brother-in-law Andrea Mantegna in Padua, the introduction ...
— Six Centuries of Painting • Randall Davies
... themselves from that tropical sun beneath the trees. Think of living on a world where from the vertical heat of the hottest noon of the equator to the twilight of the poles is a walk of only fifty paces! What atmosphere they had, to temper and diffuse those rays, I could not then conjecture. ...
— The Brick Moon, et. al. • Edward Everett Hale
... truth of this conjecture: according to her, "ces paysannes anglaises etaient tout insupportables." What would she not give for some "bonne cuisiniere anversoise," with the high cap, short petticoat, and decent sabots proper to her class—something better, indeed, than an insolent ...
— Shirley • Charlotte Bronte
... gave evidence to the effect, that Captain Bywater was tolerably drunk when they left him at eleven, but that he was upon the whole the most sober of the party and appeared quite capable of taking care of himself. They had noticed his uncongenial mood, but could afford no conjecture as to the cause. It was impossible to suspect anything in the shape of foul play. The obvious conclusion to be arrived at was that the Captain's long drinking bouts had produced their legitimate result, and that at the moment when he met his ...
— The Gerrard Street Mystery and Other Weird Tales • John Charles Dent
... also anxious to leave the city, which she knew was in a fresh ferment of gossip and conjecture on the subject of her lost husband, the deceased governor-elect. The news from the Indian Territory had renewed all the public interest in the mystery ...
— For Woman's Love • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... the mantelpiece, surmounted by a mirror in a gilt frame, the candlesticks and a clock all of crystal struck the eye with sharp brilliancy. As to the private apartment of Mademoiselle Gamard, no one had ever been permitted to look into it. Conjecture alone suggested that it was full of odds and ends, worn-out furniture, and bits of stuff and pieces dear to the hearts of ...
— The Celibates - Includes: Pierrette, The Vicar of Tours, and The Two Brothers • Honore de Balzac
... disclosing a little round aperture underneath. Archibald pushed the nail into it, thereby informing himself that the hole went straight into the wall, for a distance greater than the length of the nail; but how much greater, and what was at the end of it, he could only conjecture. ...
— Archibald Malmaison • Julian Hawthorne
... the Aesopic Fable," which forms the introductory volume to my edition of Caxton's Esope (London, D. Nutt, "Bibliothque de Carabas," 1889). In this place I can only roughly summarise my results. I conjecture that a collection of fables existed in India before Buddha and independently of the Jatakas, and connected with the name of Kasyapa, who was afterwards made by the Buddhists into the latest of the twenty-seven pre-incarnations of the Buddha. This ...
— Indian Fairy Tales • Collected by Joseph Jacobs
... Sir Henry Sidney, Lord Deputy of Ireland, and President of Wales, a person of great parts, and of no mean grace with the Queen; his mother was sister to my Lord of Leicester, from whence we may conjecture how the father stood up in the sphere of honour and employments, so that his descent was apparently noble on both sides; and for his education, it was such as travel and the University could afford none better, ...
— Travels in England and Fragmenta Regalia • Paul Hentzner and Sir Robert Naunton
... made in that way; though, as you might conjecture, they were not of the kind made in heaven, and most of them were afterwards dissolved by legislative action or decree ...
— The New Penelope and Other Stories and Poems • Frances Fuller Victor
... discernible to those on shore. One of Malbihn's blacks it was who first recognized his fellow black in the person of Baynes' companion. Then Malbihn guessed who the white man must be, though he could scarce believe his own reasoning. It seemed beyond the pale of wildest conjecture to suppose that the Hon. Morison Baynes had followed him through the jungle with but a single companion—and yet it was true. Beneath the dirt and dishevelment he recognized him at last, and in the necessity of admitting that it was ...
— The Son of Tarzan • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... love. But whom could Amelie love? There were no visitors at the Chateau des Noires-Fontaines, the political troubles had put an end to all society, and Amelie went nowhere alone. Madame de Montrevel could get no further than conjecture. Roland's return had given her a moment's hope; but this hope fled as soon as she perceived the effect which this event had ...
— The Companions of Jehu • Alexandre Dumas
... to their master's children. Epictetus, Terence, and Phoedrus, were slaves. But they were of the race of whites. It is not their condition then, but nature which has produced the distinction. Whether further observation will or will not verify the conjecture, that nature has been less bountiful to them in the endowments of the head, I believe that in those of the heart she will be found to have done ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 3, 1918 • Various
... through sleep, and glimmering out of sight, if looked upon with wide-open eyes. These were the more satisfactory specimens. There were many others which I could not comprehend in the remotest degree; not even so far as to conjecture whether they purported to represent earth, sea, or sky. In fact, I should not have known them to be pictures at all, but might have supposed that the artist had been trying his brush on the canvas, mixing up all sorts ...
— Passages From the English Notebooks, Complete • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... not even conjecture as to who it might be, because the trail would lead them to the man himself, and it mattered nothing who or what he was—there was only one course to take with an assassin. So they said nothing, but rode on with squared ...
— Hopalong Cassidy's Rustler Round-Up - Bar-20 • Clarence Edward Mulford
... whom the fortune of war had driven from his home to a lawless life in the forest. That this was Robin Hood's condition, may be inferred from the general language of the ballads; but the important question is, whether any other testimony can be found to confirm this conjecture, and to give us any definite and authentic information about the fact. This is the question which Mr Hunter has undertaken to answer. The clue which first catches his experienced eye, is the name of an English ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 452 - Volume 18, New Series, August 28, 1852 • Various
... fair swordsman, sir," Philip said; "though my arm may lack somewhat of the strength it will have, a few years later. But had it been otherwise, I should have still taken the course I have. I do not say your conjecture is a correct one, but at any rate I would prefer the most unequal fight to being seized and questioned. One can but be killed once, and it were better that it should be by a thrust in the open air than a long imprisonment, ending perhaps with death ...
— Saint Bartholomew's Eve - A Tale of the Huguenot WarS • G. A. Henty
... mentioned, might not be he that we find in the book of Chronicles (2 Chron 24:21); but one of that name that lived in the days of Christ, possibly John Baptist's father, or some other holy man. My reasons for this conjecture, are, 1. Because the murderers are convict by Christ himself: Zecharias, whom ye slew between the altar and the temple. 2. Because Christ makes a stop at the blood of Zecharias, not at the blood of John the Baptist: wherefore, if the person here mentioned were not murdered after, ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... saw one, living in the Chateau here in the greatest privacy. I and the Intendant only see her. She is beautiful and full of sorrow as the picture of the blessed Madonna. What she is, I may guess; but who she is, I cannot conjecture, and would give my little finger ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... with outstretched wings, as if about to soar at the moment of commencing hovering. The planes of the wings are then inclined, and meet the air. At the instant of stopping, the tail is depressed. It appears reasonable to conjecture that the slight soaring is to assist the tail in checking his onward course, and to gain a balance. Immediately the wings beat rapidly, somewhat as they do in ordinary flight but with a more forward motion, and somewhat as birds do when about to perch on an awkward ledge, as ...
— The Life of the Fields • Richard Jefferies |
