"Act" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... said to himself, but in so low a whisper that only I heard it. "You grant then that I can, by an act of free choice, move this cup," suiting the action to the word, "this way or ...
— Sylvie and Bruno • Lewis Carroll
... us: "That, about 1804, pipe-tiles made tapering, with one end entering the other, and two inches in the smallest point, were laid down in the park now possessed by Sir Thomas Whichcote, Aswarby, Lincolnshire, and that they still act well." ...
— Farm drainage • Henry Flagg French
... hatred, all those members who embraced any pursuit that might tend to alienate them from their particular modes of discipline. The Quakers have, therefore, the honour of having been the first to allow, by a public act, that their conception of the religious duties of man was liable to the errors of the human judgment, and was not to be maintained on the presumption of being actually according to the will of God. There is something ...
— The Life, Studies, And Works Of Benjamin West, Esq. • John Galt
... farther hurt: which thing is necessarily to be collected out of that, that hath bin before mentioned. [Sidenote: Westrerne winds disperse the ice.] And I am able to reckon vp a great many of our countnmen who in the very act of hunting, wandring somewhat farre from the shoare (the ice being dispersed by westerne winds) & for the space of many leagues resting vpon the ice, being chased with the violence of the tempest, & some whole daies & nights ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques and Discoveries - of the English Nation, v. 1, Northern Europe • Richard Hakluyt
... directly there was a splash, a hideous head appeared on the bank, the wretched hen uttered a cackling shriek and leaped up to the full extent of the tether, a loud snapping noise was heard. They had just a rapid view of a huge scaly, dripping body in the act of turning, a great undulating tail waved in the air—there was a loud splash; and, thrilling with excitement, Ned saw the slack coils of rope running out, and that the ...
— The Rajah of Dah • George Manville Fenn
... but it is not the whole truth. In the United Kingdom, the people as such cannot commonly act upon the Ministry as such. But mediately, though not immediately, they gain the end: for they can work upon that which works upon the Ministry, namely, on the House of Commons. Firstly, they have not renounced, like the American people, the exercise ...
— Prose Masterpieces from Modern Essayists • James Anthony Froude, Edward A. Freeman, William Ewart Gladstone, John Henry Newman and Leslie Steph
... useful and happy people who are not very well versed even in the rule of three. A man may not know a word of Latin, or what is meant by "the moon's terminator," or how much sodium is in Arcturus, and yet be constantly diffusing pleasure. But no man can be agreeable without courtesy, and every separate act of incivility creates its little, or large, and ever enlarging circle of displeasure ...
— St. Nicholas, Vol. 5, No. 2, December, 1877 • Various
... But in this one act all his fury pass'd; And turning softly from the dead child there, Suffering none to touch it where it lay, He sat him down in awful calmness nigh, And gazed forth blankly like a sculptured face; And when we fain would pass to take ...
— Poems • Walter R. Cassels
... keeper lay there under his eyes sleeping in the sweet faith that it was safe with him. A little later his fingers tingled with an odd thrill as he took his automatic out of his pack, loaded it carefully, and placed it in his pocket where it could be easily reached. The act was a declaration of something ultimately definite. He stretched himself out near the fire and went to sleep with the force of this declaration ...
— The Courage of Marge O'Doone • James Oliver Curwood
... it is cleverly done, but because it reminded me of something"—here she lowered her voice still more—"that pleased me, though probably it would seem less flattering to the daughter of Archias, who perhaps is better suited to act as guide to the blind. How bewildered you look! Eternal gods! Many things are forgotten after long months have passed, but it will be easy for me to sharpen your memory. 'At the time Hermon had just finished the Demeter,' the spider ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... enabling act of the General Assembly at Columbus, Ohio, May 24, 1907, establishing the synod of Canadian, to consist of the colored Presbyterian ministers and churches in the states of Arkansas ...
— The Choctaw Freedmen - and The Story of Oak Hill Industrial Academy • Robert Elliott Flickinger
... a horrible nightmare dream, from which she was powerless to arouse herself; in which she was compelled to act a painful part, until some merciful influence from without should ...
— The Lost Lady of Lone • E.D.E.N. Southworth
... neck excitedly that he might better see what made it act so, he caught sight of the real moon and instantly subsided into the meekest pussy that ever roamed a roof. "I—I don't understand December ...
— The Book of the Cat • Mabel Humphrey and Elizabeth Fearne Bonsall
... idea. The primitive Romans were infected by the example of the Etruscans and Greeks; in the mad abuse of prosperity and power, every pleasure that is innocent was deemed insipid; and the Scatinian law, which had been extorted by an act of violence, was insensibly abolished by the lapse of time ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 4 • Various
... interest, he was too scrupulous to act, even through momentary policy, distinctly against his conscience. When he gave way, it was with reluctance, and often with an avowal, more or less express, that he only complied with necessity against conviction. His ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... Lions, near Rouen, in Normandy. Stephen, ignoring the oath of fealty to the daughter of his benefactor, hastened to England, and, notwithstanding some opposition, with the help of his clerical brother and other functionaries had himself proclaimed and crowned king. This act involved England in years of civil war, anarchy, and wretchedness, which ended only with the accession as Henry II of Empress Matilda's son, Henry ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 5 • Various
... remained, and even pressed harder, when the more immediately engrossing care was removed. In spite of Mr. Shubrick's lecture about casting off care, Dolly found it difficult to act upon the truth she knew. Her little fund of money was much reduced; she could not help asking herself how they were going to live? Would her father, as soon as he was strong enough, go back to his ...
— The End of a Coil • Susan Warner
... right actions and "no" to wrong ones. No matter whether we heed it or not, no power can change its decision one iota. Through health, through disease, through prosperity and adversity, this faithful servant stands behind us in the shadow of ourselves, never intruding, but weighing every act we perform, every word we utter, pronouncing ...
— Architects of Fate - or, Steps to Success and Power • Orison Swett Marden
... operations for the sake of Prussia, and discord will prevent them from acting. If Germany had been united, and acted with one will, I could not have taken from her a single village or fortress. Fortunately, however, the people do not act unanimously; wherever ten Germans are assembled, there are also ten separate interests at war among them, and this fact has delivered the country into my hands. Let us, therefore, profit by this national peculiarity; let us stir ...
— NAPOLEON AND BLUCHER • L. Muhlbach
... was mad. I said to myself that no man in his senses could behave as I was behaving. And when I got to Southampton I said I would go right back. And yet I couldn't help getting into the special for London. And when I got to London I said I would act sensible and go back. But I met young Burgess, and the next thing I knew I was at Euston. And here I am pretending that it's my new London branch that brings me over, and doing business I don't want to do in Knype and Cauldon and Bursley. And ...
— Leonora • Arnold Bennett
... being divided into male and female; and the magnetic desire or impulse which puts male apart from female, in a negative or sundering magnetism, but which also draws male and female together in a long and infinitely varied approach towards the critical act of coition. Sex without the consummating act of coition is never quite sex, in human relationships: just as a eunuch is never quite a man. That is to say, the act of coition is ...
— Fantasia of the Unconscious • D. H. Lawrence
... you ever get them?" asked Elizabeth. To her, such an act was more than merely hazardous. It ...
— Elizabeth Hobart at Exeter Hall • Jean K. Baird
... first resurrection Christ exercises His power; when, as we shall presently see, those only, whose love and conduct after conversion have caused Him to deem them worthy, will come forth from the dead, to form the complete church and to act as ...
— Studies in Prophecy • Arno C. Gaebelein
... moved to the right in a violent manner, it will return none the less energetically to the left; for the longer a vibration has been, the greater play the contrary vibration has. In order to hasten the action of this pendulum I am about to attach to it—to act as extra balance-weight—a little anguish which I ought to ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... the same little bottle-green coat with large white-metal buttons, and a black stock that accentuated his cold stingy face, lighted up by gray-blue eyes as keen and passionless as a cat's. Being very gentle, as men are who act on a fixed plan of conduct, he seemed to make his wife happy by never contradicting her; he allowed her to do the talking, and was satisfied to move with the ...
— The Muse of the Department • Honore de Balzac
... had returned from Norway, and was traveling through Sweden, he took on himself to act as ambassador, and sued successfully for Hythin's daughter, whom he had once rescued from a monster, to be the wife of Halfdan, he being still unwedded. Meantime his wife Frogertha bore a son FRODE, who afterwards ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")
... it had not been for this man; for all the rest of the ship's load jumped into the boats and rowed away to save themselves. He helped me to come ashore, after I had become exhausted by swimming. He is ill and near to death, because he risked his life to save mine. Is not that a heaven-inspired act?" ...
— The Stolen Singer • Martha Idell Fletcher Bellinger
... by one of those fortunate mistakes in international law which endear brave men to the nations in whose interest they are committed. When she arrived here the government was obliged to disavow the act. The question then was, as we had her by mistake, what we should do with her. At that moment the National Sailors' Fair was in full blast at Boston, and I offered my suggestion in answer in the following article, which was published November 19, 1864, in the "Boatswain's ...
— If, Yes and Perhaps - Four Possibilities and Six Exaggerations with Some Bits of Fact • Edward Everett Hale
... our relations and our homes. We will not, however, relinquish the service of thee, nor that of my sister nor the son of my sister; and by Allah, O King of the age, to quit you is not pleasant to my heart; but how can we act, when we have been reared in the sea, and the land is not agreeable to us?" So when the king heard his words, he rose upon his feet, and bade farewell to Saleh of the Sea and his mother and the daughters of his uncle, ...
— The Arabian Nights - Their Best-known Tales • Unknown
... place in less time than it could be breathlessly told,—and even as she who had risked her life to save the King's, sank bleeding to the ground, the police seized the assassin red-handed in his mad and criminal act, and wrenched the murderous weapon from his hand. He was a mere lad of eighteen or twenty, and seemed dazed, submitting to be bound and handcuffed without a word. The King, perfectly tranquil and unhurt, bared his head to the wild ...
— Temporal Power • Marie Corelli
... their virulence, or by the earnestness of political friends. A member of the Senate having asked him how the interdiction of commerce by our vessels with the British colonies could be counteracted, "My opinion is," he replied, "that there should be an act of Congress totally interdicting the trade with all her colonies, both in the West Indies and North America; but the same act should provide for reopening the trade, upon terms of reciprocity, whenever Great Britain should be disposed to assent ...
— Memoir of the Life of John Quincy Adams. • Josiah Quincy
... of Lucullus suggests that he was less inhuman than the churl of Arden. It does not appear that he had a single friend, nor that he wished for one. His lavishness was indiscriminate except in that he entertained only the rich. One would have liked to dine with him, but not even in the act of digestion could one have felt that he had a heart. One would have acknowledged that in all the material resources of his art he was a master, and also that he practised his art for sheer love of it, wishing to be ...
— And Even Now - Essays • Max Beerbohm
... little, or nothing. Yet some faces show The last act of a tragedy in their regard: Though the first scenes be wanting, it yet is not hard To divine, more or less, what the plot may have been, And what sort of actors have pass'd o'er the scene. And whenever I gaze on the face of Lucile, With its pensive and passionless languor, I feel That some ...
— Lucile • Owen Meredith
... be sincere in his assurance that he must prevail against M. de La Tour d'Azyr? To her in her limited knowledge, her mind filled with her uncle's contrary conviction, it seemed that Andre-Louis was only acting; he would act a ...
— Scaramouche - A Romance of the French Revolution • Rafael Sabatini
... the national welfare on the battlefield, to be utilised for the greater works of peace which await us? Are we to recognise the right to be idle as well as the right to work? Is there to be a kind of second Thellusson Act, directed against accumulations of leisure? Or are we to attempt the discovery of some great principle of Conservation of Spiritual Energy, by the application of which these men may make a contribution worthy of themselves to the national life and ...
— Cambridge Essays on Education • Various
... that Cheyenne had not been mixed up in it, especially as that man Sears had been killed. But now that he had been killed, people would talk less about her brother. It really had seemed an act of Providence that Cheyenne had had nothing to do with the shooting. Of course, Mr. Bartley knew about the trouble that her brother had had—and why ...
— Partners of Chance • Henry Herbert Knibbs
... letter, I have been appointed to act in the capacity of supervisor here, and I assure you, what with the load of business, and what with that business being new to me, I could scarcely have commanded ten minutes to have spoken to you, had you been in town, much less to have written ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham
... is continually supported by his providence.... When all is seen to be the result of law, the idea of an Almighty author becomes irresistible, for the creation of a law for an endless series of phenomena—an act of intelligence above all else we can conceive—could have no other imaginable source, and tells, moreover, as powerfully for a sustaining ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 108, October, 1866 • Various
... several political groups act as de facto parties: Bedouins, merchants, Sunni and Shi'a activists, and secular leftists ...
— The 2003 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency
... Blackburn's at eight o'clock, and went up to his study to unpack. This was always his first act on coming back to school. He liked to start the term with all his books in their shelves, and all his pictures and photographs in their proper places on the first day. Some of the studies looked like lumber-rooms till near the end of the ...
— The Head of Kay's • P. G. Wodehouse
... locum tenens. Then, suddenly, he had changed his manner and had sat down, laughing, and drawn Rosalie to his knee and kissed her—yes, he had kissed her and told her not to look like a little fool or act like one. Nothing unpleasant would happen if she behaved herself. Betty had improved her greatly, and she had grown young and pretty again. She looked quite like a child sometimes, now that her bones were covered and ...
— The Shuttle • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... the question how his subordinates must act if, on coming near the enemy, Johnston should claim a new armistice. He shared the War Department opinion that the negotiation was not sincere on the part of the Confederates, but was a ruse to gain time for Davis's escape with the imaginary "plunder." A pretended armistice ...
— Military Reminiscences of the Civil War V2 • Jacob Dolson Cox
... Harleston, solved the remainder of the mystery. But with Harleston's entry the affair assumed quite a different aspect; and it is no reflection on you, Marston, that your expedition to his apartment didn't succeed; though somewhat later Crenshaw did act as a semi-reasonable man, and secured the letter—only to foozle again like an imbecile. The play in the hotel last night, as schemed by us, should have gone through and eliminated Clephane and Harleston for ...
— The Cab of the Sleeping Horse • John Reed Scott
... apparent, that, to keep the colony alive and maintain a basis for those discoveries on which his heart was bent, was impossible without a change of system. De Monts, engrossed with the cares of his government, placed all in the hands of his associate; and Champlain, fully empowered to act as he should judge expedient, set out for Paris. On the way, Fortune, at one stroke, wellnigh crushed him and New France together; for his horse fell on him, and he narrowly escaped with life. When he was partially recovered, he resumed his journey, pondering on means ...
— Pioneers Of France In The New World • Francis Parkman, Jr.
... the infinitive mood, a participle with its adjuncts, a member of a sentence, or a whole proposition, forming the subject of discourse, or the object of a verb or preposition, and being the name of an act or circumstance, is, in construction, regarded as a noun; and is usually called, 'a substantive phrase:' as, 'To play, is pleasant.'—'That he is an expert dancer, is no recommendation.'—'Let your motto be, Honesty is ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... act before fighting the duel with Hamilton, was writing to his daughter—a happy, gay, care-free letter, giving no hint of what was impending. To her husband he wrote in a different strain, begging him to keep the event from her as long as possible, to make her happy ...
— Threads of Grey and Gold • Myrtle Reed
... abode? The verb is singular, because 'cottage' and 'safe abode' convey one idea: see Comus's words, l. 320. Notice also that the past tense is used as referring to the past act of telling. ...
— Milton's Comus • John Milton
... I went myself to complain of the absurdity of an Act of Council which I thought might be advantageously amended by the aid of a little light which ...
— The Bushman - Life in a New Country • Edward Wilson Landor
... ten arise from want of "a proper understanding." The reader may say that in recommending those fire-and-water folks, landlords and tenants, and masters and servants, and those half-agreeable persons, lodging-house keepers and lodgers—to purchase such books, we advise every man to act with an attorney at his elbow. We can but ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 17, - Issue 479, March 5, 1831 • Various
... sworst, is sworne against thy selfe, And may not be performed by thy selfe, For that which thou hast sworne to doe amisse, Is not amisse when it is truely done: And being not done, where doing tends to ill, The truth is then most done not doing it: The better Act of purposes mistooke, Is to mistake again, though indirect, Yet indirection thereby growes direct, And falshood, falshood cures, as fire cooles fire Within the scorched veines of one new burn'd: It is religion that doth make vowes kept, But thou hast sworne against religion: ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare
... Establishment, deceased, after eating the bread of the Church all his life, has at length avowed himself the subject and slave of an Italian Bishop. Disappointment in the schools is said to have been the determining cause of this infatuated act. It is reported that legal measures are in progress for directing the penalties of the Statute of Praemunire against all the seceders; and a proposition is on foot for petitioning her Majesty to assign the sum thereby realized by the Government to the erection of a 'Martyrs' ...
— Loss and Gain - The Story of a Convert • John Henry Newman
... forget; So long as Faith with Freedom reigns, And loyal Hope survives, And gracious Charity remains To leaven lowly lives; While there is one untrodden tract For Intellect or Will, And men are free to think and act ...
— Lyra Heroica - A Book of Verse for Boys • Various
... as possible we moved out. The ammunition which we had captured with the two guns was exhausted, and being very short of horses, I ordered the guns spiked and the carriages destroyed. I had ordered the Seventy-third Indiana (Colonel Hathaway) to act as rear guard, and I remained in the rear in person, for the purpose of being at hand in case the enemy should attempt to press us as we were moving out. We had but fairly got under way when I received information ...
— The Battle of Atlanta - and Other Campaigns, Addresses, Etc. • Grenville M. Dodge
... north shore of the bay, and with a chorus of enthusiastic cheers we dropped anchor in two fathoms of soft mud. We felt called upon to sing such songs as marines are wont to sing upon the conclusion of a voyage, and I believe our deck presented a tableau not less picturesque than that in the last act of "Black-eyed Susan." Susan alone was wanting to perfect ...
— In the Footprints of the Padres • Charles Warren Stoddard
... there is no longer the same reason; heretofore the poorer people were more numerous, and from want of commerce, their means of getting a livelihood more difficult; therefore the supporting them was an act of great benevolence; now that the poor can find maintenance for themselves, and their labour is wanted, a general undiscerning hospitality tends to ill, by withdrawing them from their work to idleness and drunkenness. Then, formerly rents ...
— Life Of Johnson, Volume 4 (of 6) • Boswell
... she marks her image full exprest, But chief in Bayes's monster-breeding breast; Bayes, form'd by Nature's Stage and Town to bless, And act, and be, a coxcomb with success. Dulness with transport eyes the lively Dunce, Remembering she herself was Pertness once. Now (Shame to Fortune!) an ill run at play Blank'd his bold visage, and a thin third day; Swearing ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 58, Number 358, August 1845 • Various
... that the understanding is the receptacle of wisdom, but few see that the will is the receptacle of love. This is because the will does not act at all by itself, but only through the understanding; also because the love of the will, in passing over into the wisdom of the understanding, is first changed into affection, and thus passes over; and affection is not perceived except by something pleasant in thinking, speaking, and acting, ...
— Angelic Wisdom Concerning the Divine Love and the Divine Wisdom • Emanuel Swedenborg
... thought of the scene of their parting, the more sickening became the conviction that her anger at his use of an ugly word was merely a subterfuge to break their engagement. The perfidy and cruelty of such an act was too hideous for belief—yet if the thing were possible! He had left her to struggle alone with the first great temptation of life, and he began to feel that it was cowardly. He should have stood his ground and ...
— The Root of Evil • Thomas Dixon
... Convention Parliament, which had carried out the first steps in the Restoration settlement. Its zeal might even have been deemed embarrassing, and Clarendon was chiefly urgent that a permanent settlement should be provided for, by confirming the Act of Indemnity and Oblivion, before the Royalists devised new means of reaping fresh spoils of conquest. Another Act which he pressed forward was that bringing back the bishops to the House of Lords. It was, to his mind, a ...
— The Life of Edward Earl of Clarendon V2 • Henry Craik
... hardened his heart. And now—a week later—as he rode down from the Crow's Nest, he chuckled to himself over the satisfactory way in which Lenox was playing into his hands by adopting an attitude that would plainly act as a foil to his own deferentially persistent courtship; a metaphorical walking round the walls of Jericho, that must end in capitulation, soon ...
— The Great Amulet • Maud Diver
... this to acquaint you, that he has given all the Profits which shall arise to-morrow Night by his Play to the use of the poor Charity-Children of this Parish. I have been informed, Sir, that in Holland all Persons who set up any Show, or act any Stage-Play, be the Actors either of Wood and Wire, or Flesh and Blood, are obliged to pay out of their Gain such a Proportion to the honest and industrious Poor in the Neighbourhood: By this means they make Diversion and Pleasure pay a ...
— The Spectator, Volume 2. • Addison and Steele
... Thyself shall see the act: For as thou urgest justice, be assur'd Thou shalt have ...
— The Canadian Elocutionist • Anna Kelsey Howard
... chosen temporary President by acclamation and unanimously. As proceedings went on it was thought best not to have any division or question as to a permanent Chairman and it was at the proper time ordered, also without objection, that I should act as permanent President. ...
— Autobiography of Seventy Years, Vol. 1-2 • George Hoar
... one's mind to these two complementary exaggerations, matter and memory, and to see in more detail the use that Bergson makes of them in explaining the actual facts, will be to examine his theory of sensible perception, since it is just in the act of sensible perception that memory comes in ...
— The Misuse of Mind • Karin Stephen
... the Crimes Act every person, male or female (including a boy under 14 years of age), may be convicted and sentenced to seven years imprisonment for an indecent assault on a female. Under section 154 a male may be sentenced ...
— Report of the Special Committee on Moral Delinquency in Children and Adolescents - The Mazengarb Report (1954) • Oswald Chettle Mazengarb et al.
... anything were done to prevent my marriage now, I would simply await another and more favorable opportunity; my mind is made up. I love the girl with all my heart, and she, no other, shall be my wife. If you refuse to act for me, well and good; I ...
— A Mad Love • Bertha M. Clay
... two villages there was formed a confraternity, which, besides other works of piety and devotion, practices two that act as a preservative against the two great evils of idolatry and intoxication—which, as we have already stated, were customary in cases of sickness or death—since in this confraternity are the people who are most prominent, most Christian, and most trustworthy ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, - Volume XIII., 1604-1605 • Ed. by Blair and Robertson
... concurrence of Adams. While Jefferson left the cabinet to become in nominal retirement the leader of the opposition. Adams continued, as vice-president, to give Washington's administration the benefit of his deciding vote. It was only by this means that a neutrality act was carried through the senate, and that the progress was stopped of certain resolutions which had previously passed in the House of Representatives, embodying restrictive measures against Great ...
— Hidden Treasures - Why Some Succeed While Others Fail • Harry A. Lewis
... trusted with what must for ever remain a dead secret, namely, that Sabina had spent the night in Malipieri's rooms; for that would be the plain fact to-morrow morning. What had happened to Sassi and Masin was a mystery, but it was inconceivable that either of them should have been free to act during the past eight or nine hours and should have made no effort to save the two persons to whom they were respectively devoted as to no one ...
— The Heart of Rome • Francis Marion Crawford
... space through which we move, are all peopled by lurking circumstances, which pick us out from among the crowd. The least study of their habits will quickly convince us that these strange daughters of hazard, who should be blind and deaf as their father, by no means act in his irresponsible fashion. They are well aware of what they are doing, and rarely make a mistake. With inexplicable certainty do they move to the passer-by whom they have been sent to confront, ...
— The Buried Temple • Maurice Maeterlinck
... act strictly to these habits—ever remembering that he hath no profits by his pains whom Providence doth not prosper—and success will attend ...
— Enquire Within Upon Everything - The Great Victorian Domestic Standby • Anonymous
... on the point of leaving my desk and compelling the impudent stranger to surrender the cipher he had surreptitiously secured, but I restrained myself and allowed him to go without suspecting my knowledge of his act. ...
— The Telegraph Messenger Boy - The Straight Road to Success • Edward S. Ellis
... necessary caution of his companions, he made quick discharges with his own rifle. The contest now grew warm and stationary. Few were injured, as both parties kept their bodies as much protected as possible by the trees; never, indeed, exposing any part of their persons except in the act of taking aim. But the chances were gradually growing unfavorable to Hawkeye and his band. The quick-sighted scout perceived his danger without knowing how to remedy it. He saw it was more dangerous to retreat than to maintain ...
— The Last of the Mohicans • James Fenimore Cooper
... "without booty, without hostages, without pledges." In 1101, when the twelvemonths' truce obtained by the clergy had expired, Murtough collected a powerful army, and devastated the north, without opposition. He demolished the palace of the Hy-Nials, called the Grianan of Aileach.[234] This was an act of revenge for a similar raid, committed a few years before, on the stronghold of the O'Briens, at Kincora, by O'Loughlin. So determined was he on devastation, that he commanded a stone to be carried away from the building in each of the sacks which had ...
— An Illustrated History of Ireland from AD 400 to 1800 • Mary Frances Cusack
... the head-piece of a robber chief under the Directory, David de la Bazoque, caught in the act of treason, and ...
— Bouvard and Pecuchet - A Tragi-comic Novel of Bourgeois Life • Gustave Flaubert
... of a hundred thousand men under the command of Bonaparte, encountering a population that was unfriendly to it, losing confidence in its allies, suffering from shortness of supplies, and compelled to act under conditions of war unlike anything that had been foreseen, the Russian army of thirty-five thousand men commanded by Kutuzov was hurriedly retreating along the Danube, stopping where overtaken by the enemy and fighting rearguard actions only as far as necessary ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy
... had the ill luck to miss martyrdom. With the best intentions to do the right thing, he always managed to do the wrong one. Moreover, nothing could get the female saint out of him. He knew, well enough, that in national emergencies he must not consider how he ought to act, as a man, but how he ought to act as a king; so he honestly tried to sink the man and be the king—but it was a failure, he only succeeded in being the female saint. He was not instant in season, but out of ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... our ministers in their attempts to bring about peace. Since Villars had introduced Chamillart to Court, he had heard it said that M. de Louvois did everybody's business as much as he could; and took it into his head that having succeeded to M. de Louvois he ought to act exactly like him. For some time past, accordingly, Chamillart, with the knowledge of the King, had sent people to Holland and elsewhere to negotiate for peace, although he had no right to do so, Torcy being the minister to whose department this ...
— The Memoirs of Louis XIV., His Court and The Regency, Complete • Duc de Saint-Simon
... themselves of it, and exchanging conversation with the highest and most respectable of the guests. At length, as if tired of what in modern phrase would have been termed lounging, he suddenly remembered that Burbage was to act Shakespeare's King Richard, at the Fortune, that afternoon, and that he could not give a stranger in London, like Lord Glenvarloch, a higher entertainment than to carry him to that exhibition; "unless, indeed," he added, in a whisper, "there is paternal interdiction of the theatre as well ...
— The Fortunes of Nigel • Sir Walter Scott
... sixty years the benefit of this equal partition. Encouraged by the ministers of the divan, who wished to elude the fanaticism of the sultan, the Christian advocates presumed to allege that this division had been an act, not of generosity, but of justice; not a concession, but a compact; and that if one half of the city had been taken by storm, the other moiety had surrendered on the faith of a sacred capitulation. The original ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 6 • Edward Gibbon
... the floor of his chamber. He was not only awake, but abnormally awake, with every nerve highly strung, and every sense at the keenest. What was he to do to gain a little sleep? It flashed across him that there was brandy in the decanter downstairs, and that a glass might act as a sedative. ...
— The Doings Of Raffles Haw • Arthur Conan Doyle
... it must be admitted that the British Army never had, as a matter of fact, for many centuries fought a battle which was finally decisive of a great European war. There lies the perennial interest of the incident, that it was the last act of that long-drawn drama, and that to the very fall of the curtain no man could tell how the play would end—"the nearest run thing that ever you saw"—that was the victor's description. It is a ...
— Through the Magic Door • Arthur Conan Doyle
... and chaperone were deemed absolutely indispensable upon any occasion, however informal, Mrs. Bonnell was always eagerly sought after by the girls to act in the former capacity and Miss Dalton the gym instructor in the latter. Miss Dalton seemed just like a girl herself, and was, in fact, not many years her pupils' senior. She was in her twenty-fourth year, but looked about nineteen, a jolly, ...
— A Dixie School Girl • Gabrielle E. Jackson
... while man endures. Boswell venerates his Johnson, right truly even in the Eighteenth century. The unbelieving French believe in their Voltaire; and burst-out round him into very curious Hero-worship, in that last act of his life when they 'stifle him under roses.' It has always seemed to me extremely curious this of Voltaire. Truly, if Christianity be the highest instance of Hero-worship, then we may find here in ...
— Sartor Resartus, and On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and the Heroic in History • Thomas Carlyle
... a blood-thirsty boy. All of these preparations for battle were made without the slightest thought of the actual effect of one of his missiles should it hit his mark. His industry was inspired more by the mechanical act than by any picture of human pain that might result. Hence, when the time came for him to make use of his weapon "with deadly intent," he found himself in a hesitant frame of mind. He knew that some animal, human or otherwise, was eyeing ...
— The Radio Boys in the Thousand Islands • J. W. Duffield
... repeater opened fire, two hinds, which had got ahead of the others, ran through the pass by different tracks. One of these McGregor saw before it came up, and he rushed wildly back for his gun. It was this act that his comrades ...
— The Eagle Cliff • R.M. Ballantyne
... had three types of notes. Footnotes, marked with asterisks or numbers, were printed at the bottom of the page. Longer notes, marked with letters, were printed at the end of each Act as "Historical Notes". For this e-text the asterisked notes are printed immediately after their paragraph, while numbered footnotes are collected at the end of each scene. The Historical Notes remain in their original location, as does the Interlude between Acts IV and V (printed ...
— King Henry the Fifth - Arranged for Representation at the Princess's Theatre • William Shakespeare
... the lad's metal?" Hotspur asked, as he saw Oswald in the act of taking off his steel cap. Marsden ...
— Both Sides the Border - A Tale of Hotspur and Glendower • G. A. Henty
... would wish to see your children keeping company? Is that the sort of young person next door to whom you would wish to live? Is not such a person a curse, just because he is a person, a spiritual being with an evil spirit in him, which can harm you, and tempt you, and act on you for evil; just as if he had been a righteous person, with the holy and good Spirit in him, he would have helped you, and taught you, and worked on you for good? But so it is: we are members one of another, and if one member goes wrong, and gets ...
— Sermons for the Times • Charles Kingsley
... clean to Texas it's all one free fight? Hain't we rescued from Seward the gret leadin' featurs Thet makes it wuth while to be reasonin' creators? 50 Hain't we saved Habus Coppers, improved it in fact, By suspendin' the Unionists 'stid o' the Act? Ain't the laws free to all? Where on airth else d' ye see Every freeman improvin' his own rope an' tree? Ain't our piety sech (in our speeches an' messiges) Ez t' astonish ourselves in the bes'-composed pessiges, An' to make ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of James Russell Lowell • James Lowell
... against any remorseful prompting; but I take as a guide now, your feeling about Mrs. Davilow, which seems to me quite just. I cannot think that your husband's dues even to yourself are nullified by any act you have committed. He voluntarily entered into your life, and affected its course in what is always the most momentous way. But setting that aside, it was due from him in his position that he should provide for your mother, and he of course understood that if this will took effect she ...
— Daniel Deronda • George Eliot
... interests of a large family, withdrew on December 28, 1794, and Timothy Pickering, the postmaster-general, had been appointed in his stead January 2, 1795. The Navy Department was not as yet established (the act creating it was passed April 30, 1798), but the affairs which concerned this branch of the public service were under the direction of the secretary of war. The administration of Washington was drawing to a close. In the lately reconstructed cabinet, honest, patriotic, and thorough ...
— Albert Gallatin - American Statesmen Series, Vol. XIII • John Austin Stevens
... memorable act or accident, concerning this hauen, I cannot acquaint you, before my parting therefrom, saue onely, that Philip, Arch-duke of Austriche, during his voyage from Netherland towards Spayne (his wiues Kingdome) was weather-driuen ...
— The Survey of Cornwall • Richard Carew
... delighted. Eveline seems to be the centre of attraction with them all. I have not a word new to say. A change has come over the spirit of our notables. Samuel, the day before your letter was received, expressed his opinion, that 'it would go hard with you.' A dog when he supposes himself unnoticed in the act of stealing, looks mean, but when he is discovered in the act, he looks meaner still. And I know of no better comparison than this clique, ...
— Personal Memoirs Of A Residence Of Thirty Years With The Indian Tribes On The American Frontiers • Henry Rowe Schoolcraft
... with you?" Mr. Chippy replied. "Just let me have Chippy, Jr., or we'll come inside your house and get him. We'll make trouble for you, too. Perhaps you didn't know that kidnapping a child is a very serious act. I've already asked Solomon Owl's opinion about this matter; and he advises me to take my child away from ...
— The Tale of Rusty Wren • Arthur Scott Bailey
... part of them, were required to petition them to do it. If this did not serve, then the freemen, or a majority of them, were clothed with the power to order the constables to summon the court, after which they might meet, choose a moderator, and do any act that it was lawful for the regular courts ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 11 • Various
... Southwold Bay, 1672, on board the Cambridge. Although Mr. Pepys speaks slightingly of Sir F. H. he was a man of high spirit and enterprise, and is thus eulogised by Dryden in his ANNUS MIRABILIS. "Young Hollis on a Muse by Mars begot, Born, Caesar-like, to write and act great deeds, Impatient to revenge his fatal shot, His right hand doubly to his left succeeds."] So we all down to Deptford, and pitched upon ships and set men at work: but, Lord! to see how backwardly things move at this pinch, notwithstanding that ...
— The Diary of Samuel Pepys • Samuel Pepys
... create. But still he did not see how he could have done otherwise than to destroy the children's high-power signalling device when they would have used it back on Antarctica. Yet he was not happy about the consequences of his act. ...
— Long Ago, Far Away • William Fitzgerald Jenkins AKA Murray Leinster
... Thomas availed himself of the invitation. It was sufficient to see. Such an act of cold scrutiny would hardly have been compatible with his joyous shout, "My Lord and my God." Christ's voice and form, omniscience and humility, in taking such trouble to win one to Himself—these were sufficient to convince him, and ...
— Love to the Uttermost - Expositions of John XIII.-XXI. • F. B. Meyer
... the only person who saw all this, and, after supper, he went up to the little lady, and said, 'You are an excellent friend.'—'I did my duty,' said she, and immediately put her finger on her lips to enjoin him to be silent. He, however, informed me of this act of friendship of the little heroine, who had not told me of it herself." I admired the Countess's virtue, and Madame de Pompadour said, "She is giddy and headlong; but she has more sense and more feeling than a thousand ...
— The Memoirs of Louis XV. and XVI., Volume 1 • Madame du Hausset, and of an Unknown English Girl and the Princess Lamballe
... theatre he had a mischievous impulse to test what Le Chapelier had told him of the state of public feeling in the city. They were playing "The Terrible Captain," in the last act of which the empty cowardice of the bullying braggart Rhodomont ...
— Scaramouche - A Romance of the French Revolution • Rafael Sabatini
... conflux of first-stuff Did found the multitudinous universe Of earth, and sky, and the unfathomed deeps Of ocean, and courses of the sun and moon, I'll now in order tell. For of a truth Neither by counsel did the primal germs 'Stablish themselves, as by keen act of mind, Each in its proper place; nor did they make, Forsooth, a compact how each germ should move; But, lo, because primordials of things, Many in many modes, astir by blows From immemorial aeons, in motion too By their own weights, ...
— Of The Nature of Things • [Titus Lucretius Carus] Lucretius
... conductor which is supposed to carry current back to its starting point, after it has traversed a line. It may be a wire or the grounding of the ends of a line [or] may make the earth act as a return, termed ground- or earth-return. The best distinction of a return is to so term the portion of a circuit on which ...
— The Standard Electrical Dictionary - A Popular Dictionary of Words and Terms Used in the Practice - of Electrical Engineering • T. O'Conor Slone
... of her pupils was undoubtedly modern. She would teach them certain episodes of history, explaining particularly the characters of the various personages and the motives for their actions, then, instead of a verbal or written catechism on the lesson, she would make the girls act the scene, using their own words, and trying as far as possible to reproduce the atmosphere of the period. Free criticism was allowed afterwards, and any anachronisms, such as tea in the times of Queen Elizabeth, or tobacco during the Wars of the Roses, were carefully pointed out. Most of the ...
— Monitress Merle • Angela Brazil
... changed their manner of equipping that limb of military strength. In the first Punic war, Regulus was beat as soon as the Carthaginians made choice of plains for combat, where their cavalry could act to advantage; in the second, Hannibal owed to the Numidian horse his principal victories. It was not till whole corps of them began to go over to the Romans in Italy, that the latter began to breathe. Scipio having conquered Spain, and contracted an alliance with Masinissa, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 58, Number 360, October 1845 • Various
... attacking Zulu. At him it came, striking out savagely and tearing the black man as it had torn the white. Again the kerry fell full on its jaws, and down it went backwards. Before it could rise again, or rather as it was in the act of rising, the heavy knob-stick struck it once more, and with fearful force, this time as it chanced, full on the nape of the neck, and paralysing the brute. It writhed and bit and twisted, throwing up the earth and leaves, while blow after blow was rained upon it, till at length with ...
— Black Heart and White Heart • H. Rider Haggard
... laid down her work, to look at his face. She had not expected that he would express himself in such a way. Then all at once she saw that he had meant to act in the most loyal manner possible, and she grew grave, being pleased with him as ...
— Greifenstein • F. Marion Crawford
... father's will; we can restrain The people only by unsleeping sternness. So thought Ivan, sagacious autocrat And storm-subduer; so his fierce grandson thought. No, no, kindness is lost upon the people; Act well—it thanks you not at all; extort And execute—'twill ...
— Boris Godunov - A Drama in Verse • Alexander Pushkin |
