"Computation" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... blindfolded. They are fed unread into the computer, together with instructions to multiply, subtract, extract roots, et cetera, which are similarly chosen at random and not known to anyone. Once in twenty times or so, Schweeringen predicts the result of this meaningless computation before the computer has made it. This is incredible! The odds are trillions to one against it! Since nobody knows the sums or instructions given to the computer, it cannot be mind-reading in any form. It must be pure precognition. Do you wish to ...
— The Leader • William Fitzgerald Jenkins (AKA Murray Leinster)
... and an acre of the same land lying in common, without any husbandry upon it, and he will find, that the improvement of labour makes the far greater part of the value. I think it will be but a very modest computation to say, that of the products of the earth useful to the life of man nine tenths are the effects of labour: nay, if we will rightly estimate things as they come to our use, and cast up the several expences about them, what in them is purely owing to nature, and what to labour, we shall find, that ...
— Two Treatises of Government • John Locke
... in a business point of view; because, when the price, or rate, is agreed on, nothing remains but to count the pages. Whether the publisher or the writer is benefited by this plan of computation, in a literary point of view, may, ...
— Gifts of Genius - A Miscellany of Prose and Poetry by American Authors • Various
... was introduced into Great Britain in 1752. Owing to a slight error in the calendar, the year had, in the course of centuries, been gradually losing, so that in 1752 it was eleven days short of what the true computation would make it. Pope Gregory corrected the error in 1582, and his calendar was adopted in nearly every country of Europe except Great Britain and Russia, both of which regarded the change as a "popish ...
— The Leading Facts of English History • D.H. Montgomery
... that we were driven directly upon it and immediately split. Six of the crew, of whom 15 I was one, having let down the boat into the sea, made a shift to get clear of the ship and the rock. We rowed, by my computation, about three leagues, till we were able to work no longer, being already spent with labor while we were in the ship. We therefore trusted ourselves to the mercy of the waves, and in about half an hour the boat was overset by a sudden ...
— Story Hour Readings: Seventh Year • E.C. Hartwell
... 6,945,000 men, who, with their families, might amount to twenty millions of souls; and the total number of freemen was about double that of the citizens.[18] In one family alone, in the time of Pliny, there were 4116 slaves.[19] But take the number of slaves, according to Gibbon's computation, at only half the entire population, what a prodigious abstraction must this multitude of slaves have made from the physical and moral strength of the empire! Half the people requiring food, needing restraint, incapable of trust, and yet adding nothing to the muster-roll of the legions, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 350, December 1844 • Various
... known a mud-dauber to make a mistake in her computation, although I have endeavored to puzzle this little arithmetician time and again. If a wad of paper be placed in a cell after two or three spiders have been deposited, thus partially filling it, the insect knows at once that something is wrong, and will proceed to ...
— The Dawn of Reason - or, Mental Traits in the Lower Animals • James Weir
... the ground that he had held all day. In the afternoon he had once more driven back the head of the enemy's columns, inflicting a further loss of 3,200 killed and wounded at the lowest computation; but the enemy's camp-fires can still be plainly made out with a field-glass, in the same position as the night before. This is scarcely to be called success, although it is certainly ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. XXII (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... showing industry and diligence, but no learning whatever. The early myths were somewhat indistinctly treated. [21] His account of the Trojan immigration seems to have been the basis of that of Virgil, though the latter refashioned it in several points. [22] His computation of dates, though apparently exact, betrays a mind indifferent to the importance of chronology. The fragments of the next two books are more copious. He tells us that Gaul, then as now, pursued with the greatest zeal military glory and eloquence in debate. [23] ...
— A History of Roman Literature - From the Earliest Period to the Death of Marcus Aurelius • Charles Thomas Cruttwell
... wards and the duchy of Lancaster, (which amounted to about one hundred and twenty thousand pounds,) was one hundred and eighty-eight thousand one hundred and ninety-seven pounds: the crown lands seem to be comprehended in this computation. ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part D. - From Elizabeth to James I. • David Hume
... as a general thing, commanded by brave and experienced officers. It has, however, been asserted by some that there were not more than one thousand British engaged at Ridgeway; but we fear that this is under the mark, and are inclined to believe, that, at an honest computation, their force amounted to between thirteen and fourteen hundred. This we give on what we consider to be reliable authority, and can, at once, presume that the division under Col. Booker stood something more than three to one against the invaders, as the handful under the gallant O'Neill did ...
— Ridgeway - An Historical Romance of the Fenian Invasion of Canada • Scian Dubh
... Imperialists, 3,695 common soldiers, and 469 officers. There was found in the camp 164 pieces of cannon, and a prodigious quantity of powder, bullets, bombs, grenades, and various military equipments and stores; and the booty in other articles was great and rich beyond computation. ...
— Biographical Memorials of James Oglethorpe • Thaddeus Mason Harris
... Falls on the 4th of August, 1889, burned most of the business portion of the city. Four hundred and fifty houses of brick, stone, and wood were destroyed, entailing a loss, according to the computation of the local agent of R.G. Dun & ...
— Oregon, Washington and Alaska; Sights and Scenes for the Tourist • E. L. Lomax
... from salt should be excluded from the computation of the payment to be made to the Porte from the surplus revenues of Cyprus, under Article III of the Convention of 4th ...
— Cyprus, as I Saw it in 1879 • Sir Samuel W. Baker
... assume a little higher ground, and after repeating a few verses of the Koran, and gabbling a little Arabic, asked the Lion what he considered to be the difference between the Hegira and the Christian era, adding that he thought the general computation was in error by about one year; and being a particularly modest person, chiefly, he believes, owing to his having been at school in Ireland, absolutely blushed at finding that the Lion returned not a word in answer. "What a wonderful individual I am seated by," thought he, "to whom Arabic ...
— The Romany Rye - A Sequel to 'Lavengro' • George Borrow
... to his office well pleased. A careful computation showed that Medland was supported now by a steady majority of not more than eight: Coxon's defection could not fail to leave him in a minority; for, although Coxon was a young man, and, as yet, of no great independent ...
— Half a Hero - A Novel • Anthony Hope
... ignorance, poverty, and crime the price must be paid; and, if it has not been paid with the very heart of the nation, it must be paid with the proudest and bluest blood of her sons and with treasure that is beyond computation. From this spectacle I pray God that America will learn a lesson in respect to the ten ...
— The Future of the American Negro • Booker T. Washington
... very moderate computation, Ward argued, 'five times the amount of a man's natural life might qualify a person endowed with extraordinary genius to have some faint notion (though even this we doubt) on which side truth lies.' It was not that he had the slightest doubt of Dr. Arnold's ...
— Eminent Victorians • Lytton Strachey
... French, in killed and wounded, was terrible. Their ships were crowded with land-troops, who only served to swell the carnage: their killed alone is estimated at 3000 men, and their wounded at double that number; so that, taking the prisoners on board the captured ships into computation, they must have sustained a loss of nearly 12,000 men. On the side of the British the loss, in killed, was less, than two hundred and fifty, and in wounded about 700. By the victory Jamaica was saved, and the dominion of the ocean recovered, and the intelligence ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... how easy a thing it is for a small body of soldiers to overrun a populous and powerful country. The British did not, after Sir Henry Clinton's return to New York, exceed THREE THOUSAND MEN; and South Carolina alone, at the lowest computation, must have contained FIFTY THOUSAND! and yet this host of poor honest men were made to tremble before that handful of ruffians, as a flock of sheep before the wolf, or a household of little children ...
— The Life of General Francis Marion • Mason Locke Weems
... A simple arithmetical computation will abundantly satisfy any person who is acquainted with the composition of the atmosphere, the influence of respiration upon its fitness to sustain animal life, and the quantity of air that enters the lungs at each inspiration, that a school-room ...
— Popular Education - For the use of Parents and Teachers, and for Young Persons of Both Sexes • Ira Mayhew
... fifes and drums, trumpets, and clarions, hoping to catch us as Moss caught his mare. By the conjecture of seventy-eight standards which we told, we guessed their number to be two and forty thousand, at a modest computation. ...
— Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais
... conviction, hardly venturing to make itself a thought, "In the long run it pays," it was but little to his discredit, since he could scarcely have descended from a line of shrewd, far-sighted Anglo-Saxon forefathers without making some such computation. ...
— The Street Called Straight • Basil King
... of Scotch-Irish brawn, moral, mental and muscular, being farther supplemented by three hundred passengers and servants in the ship Walworth from the same port for South Carolina. The cash value to the country of immigrants was ascertainable by a much less circuitous computation then than now; many of them being indentured for a term of years at an annual rate that left a very fair sum for interest and sinking fund on the one thousand dollars it is the practice of our political economist of to-day to clap on each head that files into Castle Garden. ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science - February, 1876, Vol. XVII, No. 98. • Various
... moment, Mr. Tanter," he said. "It's time to feed the daily tax computation from Finance. We have to start a little earlier on that these days—the ...
— Two Plus Two Makes Crazy • Walt Sheldon
... pendulum lost two minutes, twenty-eight seconds at Cayenne, which proved that the momentum was less at this place than at Paris. From this fact, Newton and Huyghens deduced the flatness of the Globe at the Poles. Shortly afterwards, however, the computation of a terrestrial degree given by Abbe Picard, and the determination of the Meridional arc, arrived at by the Cassinis, father and son, led scientific men to an entirety different result, and induced them ...
— Celebrated Travels and Travellers - Part 2. The Great Navigators of the Eighteenth Century • Jules Verne
... Church saw her full triumph, when the nonconforming ministers, to the number, it was said, of some two thousand, were ejected from their livings. [Footnote: The number was variously reckoned; a more moderate computation was 1200. Mr. Bates's careful calculations (Declaration of Indulgence, Appendix II.) give 450 as the number of ministers ejected between May, 1660, and August, 1662, and 1800 as ejected on the latter date.] The triumph was bought at ...
— The Life of Edward Earl of Clarendon V2 • Henry Craik
... appear in arrear of that point by an amount equal to the angle GEC, the supplement of AEC. This, however, is contrary to experience, since the angle GEC would be very sensible, and about 33 degrees. Now according to our computation, which is given in the Treatise on the causes of the phenomena of Saturn, the distance BA between the Earth and the Sun is about twelve thousand diameters of the Earth, and hence four hundred times greater than BC the distance of the Moon, which is 30 diameters. Then the angle ...
— Treatise on Light • Christiaan Huygens
... your own heart; try to make your life an exposition of your faith; let profession and practice go hand in hand; ask God's special guidance in the difficult position in which you are placed, and your influence for good in Mrs. Murray's family may be beyond all computation." Laying his hands on her head, he continued tremulously: "O my God! if it be thy will, make her the instrument of rescuing, ere it be indeed too late. Help me to teach her aright; and let her pure life atone for all the inconsistencies and ...
— St. Elmo • Augusta J. Evans
... population of Holland is fixed on a moderate computation at 50,000 persons. For this number of persons the barge represents the only fixed home, and the year passes in ceaseless movement across the inland waters of the country or on the great German river, excepting for the brief ...
— Dutch Life in Town and Country • P. M. Hough
... fossils have since been dug up from these deposits in the Rocky Mountains is beyond computation. My prophecy of hundreds of tons has been fulfilled; and they are preserved in ...
— Dinosaurs - With Special Reference to the American Museum Collections • William Diller Matthew
... critic writes: "A novel and marked event occurred at this theatre on this evening (18th of February, 1811), which should be considered as a black epocha for ever by the loyal adherents to wit and the Muses. As the Mussulmen date their computation of years from the flight of Mahomet, so should the hordes of folly commence their triumphant register from the open flight of common-sense on this memorable night, when a whole troop of horses made their first appearance in ...
— A Book of the Play - Studies and Illustrations of Histrionic Story, Life, and Character • Dutton Cook
... her scientific discovery, vanished completely when Peggy removed the rain-coat and the heavy veil which had obscured her charms. Peggy's make-up was very successful in effacing every suggestion of youth and girlish prettiness. Artistically designed wrinkles made her look seventy-five at the least computation, and suggested in addition, a quarrelsome disposition. Rosetta Muriel took one look, and ...
— Peggy Raymond's Vacation - or Friendly Terrace Transplanted • Harriet L. (Harriet Lummis) Smith
... not exactly to these tributes of the press that one reverts in noting that THE CORDS OF VANITY, on its publication eleven years ago, promptly became a book which there were—almost—none to praise and very few to love. After all, its author's computation of that former audience of his—his actual individual voluntary readers of a decade ago—appears to be but slightly and pardonably exaggerated on the more modest side of the fact. If there were a Cabell Club of membership determined ...
— The Cords of Vanity • James Branch Cabell et al
... period of a year and a half, it came again, and raged for another year as furiously as before. The losses were frightful. Of the armed men of the state nearly five thousand were swept away. Of the poorer people the loss was beyond computation. Nothing the human enemy was capable of could have done so much to ruin Athens as this frightful visitation, and to the end of the war that ...
— Historic Tales, vol 10 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... about an hour later,—at 'one of the night,' according to the old Roman computation of time,—he attends at the recitation of the rosary, or evening prayers, by his private chaplain, and he requires his immediate attendants to assist also. He then retires to his room, where ...
— Ave Roma Immortalis, Vol. 2 - Studies from the Chronicles of Rome • Francis Marion Crawford
... increases the difficulty of this general computation is that great changes have taken place in the well-being of the particular households. Some have greatly prospered, while others have become impoverished. That is one of the most characteristic consequences of the Emancipation. In the old times the general economic ...
— Russia • Donald Mackenzie Wallace
... convulsions continued, and they remained during this condition so abstracted from every earthly thought that they stayed two and sometimes three days and nights together in the chapels, agitated all the time by spasmodic movements, and taking neither repose nor nourishment. According to a moderate computation, 4,000 people were, within a very short time, affected with ...
— The Black Death, and The Dancing Mania • Justus Friedrich Karl Hecker
... of energy, the atoms, we have, on the lowest computation, at least 600 million billion in the cortex of the ...
— Communism and Christianism - Analyzed and Contrasted from the Marxian and Darwinian Points of View • William Montgomery Brown
... When to enlarge we shall succeed, In course of time (the whole extent Will not five centuries exceed By computation) it is like Our roads transformed the eye will strike; Highways all Russia will unite And form a network left and right; On iron bridges we shall gaze Which o'er the waters boldly leap, Mountains we'll level and through deep Streams excavate subaqueous ways, And Christian folk ...
— Eugene Oneguine [Onegin] - A Romance of Russian Life in Verse • Aleksandr Sergeevich Pushkin
... matter of every affair which His Majesty caused me to follow out, if any official obstructed me in truth I overthrew his opposition. I neither resisted his order, nor hesitated, but I carried it out in very truth. In making any computation which he ordered, I made no mistake. I did not set one thing in the place of another. I did not increase the flame of his wrath in its strength. I did not filch property from an inheritance. Moreover, as concerning all that His Majesty commanded to set before him in respect of the royal household ...
— The Literature of the Ancient Egyptians • E. A. Wallis Budge
... distance from the "nut," N, to the bridge, B, has been determined, the first fret is to be placed at 1/18 of that distance from the nut, the distance from the first to the second is to be 1/18 of the remainder, and so on. To determine these distances by computation, then, is a simple enough arithmetical exercise; but it is exceedingly tedious, since the denominators of the fractions involved increase with great rapidity; being successive powers of the comparatively large number 18, they soon ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 794, March 21, 1891 • Various
... the obvious reason, that the powers of money have varied in different directions with regard to different objects, and in different degrees where the direction has on the whole continued the same, but because the very objects to be taken into computation are so indeterminate, and vary so much, not only as regards century and century, kingdom and kingdom, but also, even in the same century and the same kingdom, as regards rank and rank. That which is a mere necessary to one, ...
— Biographical Essays • Thomas de Quincey
... York and southward it hatches, as a rule, five or six broods in a season, with from four to six young in a brood. Assuming the average annual product of a pair to be twenty-four young, of which half are females and half males, and assuming further, for the sake of computation, that all live, together with their offspring, it will be seen that in ten years the progeny of a single pair ...
— The Handy Cyclopedia of Things Worth Knowing - A Manual of Ready Reference • Joseph Triemens
... city, from Dujaileh Redoubt, rising up like a green promontory. From Townshend's first battle there to the day when the 7th Division occupied the lines of Suwada, Kut cost us not less in battle casualties than sixty thousand men. One makes no computation of the dead in the old cholera camps by Abu Roman, or in a score of cemeteries from Sannaiyat and Es-Sinn to Bombay, who perished in ...
— The Leicestershires beyond Baghdad • Edward John Thompson
... condensed into an ocean of fire, whose billows heaved their lurid bosoms and reared their ashy crests without a check, while their burning spray illuminated its track around the sable vault. During periods which stagger computation, this molten world was gradually cooled down; constant rivers wrung from the densely swathing vapor poured over the heated mass and at last submerged its crust in an immense sea. Then, for unknown ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger
... near to the altar. He places them as he did the alms, humbly, as an offering, and so much of each as he judges approximately sufficient for the communion of himself and the people. But if he should afterwards find his computation excessive—as the offering the alms and elements together is not directly connected with consecration—he is not under obligation to consecrate all that he has offered. He may, therefore, if he should think the entire contents of the Flagon likely to be required for Communion, ...
— Ritual Conformity - Interpretations of the Rubrics of the Prayer-Book • Unknown
... day to accomplish anything, and Schofield himself has stated that his action was based on a cool calculation, made from his intimate knowledge of Hood's character, who had been deficient in mathematics as a cadet, and could make no accurate computation of the time required to overcome difficulties; that Hood, marching by a muddy country road, would arrive in front of Spring Hill tired, sleepy, and so much later than he had calculated, that he would defer all action until next morning. Between "shortly after daylight," ...
— The Battle of Spring Hill, Tennessee - read after the stated meeting held February 2d, 1907 • John K. Shellenberger
... doubt but a saving of eight shillings per chaldron will, on the completion of the work, be effected—a most material object for the poor, and the general benefit of commerce. The rule by which this computation is made, compared with others we have seen, is very much on the safe side, but should a trifling mistake occur, we confidently believe that the decrease in the price of this article will very much enhance its ...
— Report of the Knaresbrough Rail-way Committee • Knaresbrough Rail-way Committee
... Mop's great strength will probably be in arithmetic, and the science of numbers is the root of all wisdom. Besides, every man, high and low, wants to make a fortune, and associations connected with addition and multiplication are always pleasing. Who, then, is the sage at computation most universally known? Unquestionably Cocker! He must take to that, Cocker, ...
— What Will He Do With It, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... ask her but about her having received the cheque from Miss Mohun and forwarded it to Flinders, though she could not answer for the date without a public computation back from Christmas Day, and forward from St. Thomas's. ...
— The Two Sides of the Shield • Charlotte M. Yonge
... Persia. But Bagdad will serve: For surely, Reader, you have not forgotten that it was in Bagdad in the surprising reign of Haroun-al-Raschid that Sinbad the Sailor lived! Nor can it have escaped you that scarce a mule's back distance—such was the method of computation in those golden days—lived that prince of ...
— Journeys to Bagdad • Charles S. Brooks
... made three additions in between seven and eight minutes, with but one place wrong in the three. With four of the observers the binary notation required nearly double the time. These observers were all well practiced in computation. Their best record, five minutes eighteen seconds, was made by one whose best record was two minutes forty seconds in ordinary figures. The author's own best results were two minutes thirty-eight seconds binary, and three minutes twenty-three seconds usual. ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 421, January 26, 1884 • Various
... by an attendant, who accepted the fee and directed me to enter the rooms of this mysterious person quietly; and if I found him employed, by no means to disturb him, but merely to await his pleasure; that he was frequently conversing with unseen beings, or deep in some astrological computation, and at such times it was not ...
— The Lock and Key Library/Real Life #2 • Julian Hawthorne
... Bunyan preached in London, if there were but one day's notice given, there would be more people come together to hear him preach than the meeting-house would hold. I have seen to hear him preach, by my computation, about twelve hundred at a morning lecture, by seven o'clock, on a working day, in the dark winter time. I also computed about three thousand that came to hear him one Lord's-day, at London, at a ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... books. Secondly, it may be expedient to introduce here and there, by way of exception, a single movable shelf; and this, I believe, will be found to afford a margin sufficient to meet occasional imperfections in the computation of sizes. Subject to these remarks, I have considerable confidence in the ...
— On Books and the Housing of Them • William Ewart Gladstone
... 25th, as in going completely round the world in the same course with the sun, that luminary had risen once seldomer to them than to those who remained stationary, so that they had lost a day in their computation. ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume X • Robert Kerr
... whilst Bombay placed all the presents upon the ground before the throne. As no greetings were exchanged, and all at first remained as silent as death, I commenced, after asking about his health, by saying I had journeyed six long years (by the African computation of five months in the year) for the pleasure of this meeting, coming by Karague instead of by the Nile, because the "Wanya Beri" (Bari people at Gondokoro) had defeated the projects of all former attempts ...
— The Discovery of the Source of the Nile • John Hanning Speke
... himself of the brief interval in his work of blood, to celebrate a new marriage. In the deep corruption of the Tartar race, polygamy is comparatively a point of virtue: Attila's wives were beyond computation. Zingis, after him, had as many as five hundred; another of the Tartar leaders, whose name I forget, had three hundred. Attila, on the evening of his new nuptials, drank to excess, and was carried to his room. There he was found in the morning, bathed and suffocated in his blood. An ...
— Historical Sketches, Volume I (of 3) • John Henry Newman
... to inquire what was accepted, the policy that stands out with the greatest clearness is that of economy in public expenditure with reduction and reform of taxation. The principle involved in this effort is that of conservation. The resources of this country are almost beyond computation. No mind can comprehend them. But the cost of our combined governments is likewise almost beyond definition. Not only those who are now making their tax returns, but those who meet the enhanced ...
— United States Presidents' Inaugural Speeches - From Washington to George W. Bush • Various
... Rome was founded on the day of the Palilia, the 11th of the Calends of May, in the first year of the 7th Olympiad, and 751 B.C. This is two years short of Varro's computation.] ...
— The History of Rome, Books 01 to 08 • Titus Livius
... my own and other trades, with many gentlemen both of city and country, and also with great numbers of farmers, cottagers, and labourers, who all agree that two shillings in change for every family would be more than necessary in all dealings. Now by the largest computation (even before that grievous discouragement of agriculture, which hath so much lessened our numbers) the souls in this kingdom are computed to be one million and a half, which, allowing but six to a family, makes two ...
— Political Pamphlets • George Saintsbury
... of the court at the Old Bailey whereby all such criminals as are condemned to die for smaller crimes may, instead of transportation, be ordered a year's work on the highways; others, instead of whippings, a proportioned time, and the like; which would, by a moderate computation, provide us generally a supply of 200 workmen, and coming in as fast as they go off; and let the overseers alone to make ...
— An Essay Upon Projects • Daniel Defoe
... chamber revealed a new chamber secreted with art, or ostentatiously displayed; the gold and silver, the various wardrobes and precious furniture, surpassed (says Abulfeda) the estimate of fancy or numbers, and another historian defines the untold and almost infinite mass by the fabulous computation of thousands of thousands of pieces of gold."—Gibbon's ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments • Anonymous
... exulted in their good fortune in having found so good a friend as his lordship; nor were they wanting in very warm expressions of gratitude towards Mrs. Ellison. After which they began to lay down schemes of living when Booth should have his commission of captain; and, after the exactest computation, concluded that, with economy, they should be able to save at least fifty pounds a-year out of their income in order to ...
— Amelia (Complete) • Henry Fielding
... with phrases, carefully furnished with catastrophes, amply clothed with original humour, rich in diurnal and nocturnal effects, nor lacking that plot which the human race has woven each minute, each hour, each week, month, and year of the great ecclesiastical computation, commenced at a time when the sun could scarcely see, and the moon waited to be shown her way. These seventy subjects, which he gives you leave to call bad subjects, full of tricks and impudence, lust, lies, jokes, jests, and ribaldry, joined to the two portions here given, ...
— Droll Stories, Volume 2 • Honore de Balzac
... stand thereupon, and discover what is the best way; but when the discovery is well-taken, then to make progression. And to speak truly, antiquitas soeculi iuventus mundi. These times are the ancient times, when the world is ancient, and not those which we account ancient ordine retrogrado, by a computation backwards from ourselves.[1] ...
— Human Traits and their Social Significance • Irwin Edman
... people. Steam-engines, locomotives, and electric telegraphs have multiplied our transactions a hundredfold, but no adequate labour-saving machinery has been introduced into the counting-house, where the value of these transactions has to be recorded and adjusted. The simple and scientific method of computation by what is called the decimal system, is used at this moment, we are told, by more than half the human race. Not only has it been by law established in most of the countries of Europe, but throughout the great empires ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 428 - Volume 17, New Series, March 13, 1852 • Various
... country, where, to quote from Murray's valuable work on China, tea "is the national drink, which is presented on every occasion, served up at every feast, and even sold on the public roads;" we shall have a tolerably accurate result as to the total consumption in the empire. Indeed this computation falls short of the actual relative consumption in the island of Jersey, where, as we have seen, nearly five lbs. is the annual ...
— The Commercial Products of the Vegetable Kingdom • P. L. Simmonds
... how many days he thought it would take us to reach home, that I might see if his computation agreed with mine. I calculated, recollecting the distance we had come with our captors, that it would occupy us a week at least, or perhaps ten days. He was ...
— Afar in the Forest • W.H.G. Kingston
... began to be reduced to four or five; and such a litter she exhibited when in her fatting-pen. She proved, when fat, good bacon, juicy, and tender; the rind, or sward, was remarkably thin. At a moderate computation she was allowed to have been the fruitful parent of three hundred pigs: a prodigious instance of fecundity in so large a quadruped! She was killed in ...
— The Natural History of Selborne • Gilbert White
... inhabitants. The numbers that were destroyed during the Revolution, or, as the French emphatically term it, "Le regne de la Terreur," were never ascertained; but the frightful history of that bloody period would probably justify the computation at half the number of its present population, many having fallen victims to the murders that were termed "Noyades," independent of those who perished ...
— A Visit to the Monastery of La Trappe in 1817 • W.D. Fellowes
... circumference of the city has been variously estimated, some writers including in their computation a part of the suburbs; according to Pliny it was near twenty miles round the walls. In consequence of this great extent the city had more than thirty gates, of which the most remarkable were the ...
— Pinnock's Improved Edition of Dr. Goldsmith's History of Rome • Oliver Goldsmith
... advance-guard of an immeasurable field or army of floe. For there came down the northern coast, in this summer of 1864, more than a thousand miles' length, with a breadth of about a hundred miles, of floe-ice in a field almost unbroken! More than a thousand miles, by accurate computation! The courtesy of the Westerner—who, having told of seeing a flock of pigeons nine miles long, so dense as to darken the sun at noonday, and meeting objections from a skeptical Yankee, magnanimously offered, as ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 87, January, 1865 • Various
... M. AM. SOC. C. E. (by letter).—It appears to the writer that in the design of this structure two features are open to criticism. The first is that such a high structure was built of plain concrete without any reinforcement. Even if the computation of stresses did not show the necessity for steel reinforcement, some should have been embedded in the work. As a matter of fact, the writer believes that, with the present knowledge of the benefit of reinforced concrete, a structure such as this should not be built without it. This applies mainly ...
— Transactions of the American Society of Civil Engineers, Vol. LXX, Dec. 1910 - A Concrete Water Tower, Paper No. 1173 • A. Kempkey
... o'clock and none noon and making shots of the same wild kind at the other hours. The monasterial rule (which before the general introduction of clocks was commonly followed by the mediaeval public in the computation of time) divided the twenty-four hours of the day and night into seven parts (six of three hours each and one of six), the inception of which was denoted by the sound of the bells that summoned the clergy to the performance of the seven canonical offices i.e. Matins at 3 a.m., Prime ...
— The Decameron of Giovanni Boccaccio • Giovanni Boccaccio
... the government were matters of infinite computation among the leaders. The liberal whip after the election gave his own party a majority of fifteen, but the treasury whip, on the other hand, was equally confident of a majority of ten. Still all was admittedly uncertain. The prime perplexity was whether if a new administration could be ...
— The Life of William Ewart Gladstone, Vol. 1 (of 3) - 1809-1859 • John Morley
... a half-pay officer. His lady was a polite, agreeable woman. Dr Johnson said, he was glad to see that he was so well married, for he had an esteem for physicians. The doctor accompanied us to Kingsburgh, which is called a mile farther; but the computation of Sky has no ...
— The Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides with Samuel Johnson, LL.D. • James Boswell
... the number of the Fire-worshippers, nor does he tell us under what head they are comprised in his general computation. The difficulties of a religious census are very great, particularly when we have to deal with Eastern nations. About two hundred years ago, travellers estimated the Gabars (as they are called in Persia) at eighty thousand families, ...
— Chips From A German Workshop - Volume I - Essays on the Science of Religion • Friedrich Max Mueller
... in breadth; the birds were not scattered, but flying as compactly as a free movement of their wings seemed to allow; and during a full hour and a half, this stream of petrels continued to pass without interruption, at a rate little inferior to the swiftness of the pigeon. On the lowest computation, I think the number could not have been less than a hundred millions; and we were thence led to believe that there must be, in the large bight, one or more uninhabited ...
— A Source Book Of Australian History • Compiled by Gwendolen H. Swinburne
... one of the richest men in our county, but she has a fortune in her own right, over a million at the very lowest computation." ...
— Elsie's Girlhood • Martha Finley
... at first generally attributed to the Mohammedans, the argument that the period from the battle of Plassy, in 1757, to the outbreak in 1857, though an exact century according to the Hindoo calendar, is three years longer according to the Mohammedan computation, seems an almost irresistible proof that the Brahmins were its original authors. Sir John Kaye, in his "History of the Sepoy War," at the end of book iii., c. iii., prints the following note, as furnished to him by Mr. E.A. Reade, a gentleman of long experience in India: "I do not think I ever met ...
— The Constitutional History of England From 1760 to 1860 • Charles Duke Yonge
... told me. If a seraph can look more radiant with love—a flaming love, veiled with most tender, sorrowing sympathy—than he did, I am sure I cannot conceive of it, and am quite contented not to. I saw and felt in a moment how beyond computation and desert I was still rich,—richest. Father's sincerity, his childlike guilelessness, his good sense and rectitude, his unaffected piety,—all and each of his qualities made him interesting to my husband. I really do not believe any one else ever listened to ...
— Memories of Hawthorne • Rose Hawthorne Lathrop
... say in jest that he had not acted thus out of wanton passion, but in order that his race might one day rule in Lacedaemon. King Agis heard of all this from many informants, but was most convinced of its truth by a computation of the time before the birth of the child. Terrified at an earthquake, he had once quitted his wife's chamber, and for ten months afterwards had never conversed with her. As it was at the end of this period that Leotychides ...
— Plutarch's Lives, Volume I (of 4) • Plutarch
... introduces the computation of time in Russia by the Christian era, but adheres to the old style, which ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 12 • Editor-In-Chief Rossiter Johnson
... at a very considerable distance behind; although the latter, for condition (with ONE exception), has never been equalled, and perhaps will probably never be surpassed. Secondly, if it be a legitimate mode of computation—taking two books for each article, one with another, throughout the entire catalogue—it will follow that the entire library of Mr. Heber, in England, contained not fewer than one hundred and five thousand volumes. The net amount of the ...
— Bibliomania; or Book-Madness - A Bibliographical Romance • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... language, history, mathematics, geography and the like. But these were not the usual things taken from text-books. The problems in arithmetic were calculations as to the feeding value of various rations for live stock, records of laying hens and computation as to the excess of value in eggs produced over the cost of feed. Pinned to the wall were market reports on all sorts of farm products, and especially numerous were the statistics on the prices of cream and butter. There were ...
— The Brown Mouse • Herbert Quick
... In using a star, however, you do not have to consult your Nautical Almanac to get the G.M.T. and from that the declination. All you have to do is to turn to page 95 of the Nautical Almanac, on which is given the declination for every month of the year, of any star you desire. The rest of the computation is, as said before, the same as for latitude by the sun and follows the formula Lat. Dec. - Z.D. (90 deg. - true altitude). As when working latitude by the sun, you subtract the Z.D. and Dec. when of opposite name and add them ...
— Lectures in Navigation • Ernest Gallaudet Draper
... which he fancied was the real accent and phraseology. He told me he should have 250 votes on his motion. I said to him, 'They think they shall have a majority of 150.' He said, 'Then there must be 650 to divide, for at the lowest computation I shall have 250.' But at night Henry told me that the Duke, though he put a good face on it, was in fact very low, and that, from what Gosh [Arbuthnot] had said, he would certainly resign unless he carried the question by a large majority. In the morning I called on Lady Granville, who ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William IV, Vol. II • Charles C. F. Greville
... aged man Had placed his staff across the broad smooth stone That overlays the pile, and from a bag All white with flour the dole of village dames, He drew his scraps and fragments, one by one, And scann'd them with a fix'd and serious look Of idle computation. In the sun, Upon the second step of that small pile, Surrounded by those wild unpeopled hills, He sate, and eat his food in solitude; And ever, scatter'd from his palsied hand, That still attempting to prevent the waste, Was baffled still, the crumbs ...
— Lyrical Ballads with Other Poems, 1800, Vol. 2 • William Wordsworth
... of the Exhibition is a huge arena. It is faced by a mighty grandstand, seating ten thousand people. Ten thousand people were sitting: the imagination boggles at the computation of the number of those standing; they filled every foothold and clung to every step and projection. There were some—men in khaki, of course—who were risking their necks high up on the iron roof of ...
— Westward with the Prince of Wales • W. Douglas Newton
... aristocrate implied one who was an advocate for the privileges of the nobility, and a partizan of the ancient government—at present a man is an aristocrate for entertaining exactly the same principles which at that time constituted a patriot; and, I believe, the computation is moderate, when I say, that more than three parts of the nation are aristocrates. The rich, who apprehend a violation of their property, are aristocrates—the merchants, who regret the stagnation of commerce, and distrust the credit of the assignats, ...
— A Residence in France During the Years 1792, 1793, 1794 and 1795, • An English Lady
... rather self-centred and fierce, and he is still but imperfectly adapted either morally or physically to the wider social life his crowding interactions force upon him. He still learns speech and computation and civility and all the devices of this artificially extended and continually broadening tribal life with an extreme reluctance. He has to be shaped in the interests of the species, I admit, to the newer conditions; the growing social order must be protected ...
— The Passionate Friends • Herbert George Wells
... certainty at or near the time of menstruation. This is not improbable, since these monthly periods seem to referable the monthly venereal orgasm of some female quadrupeds, which become pregnant at those times only; and hence the computation of pregnancy is not often erroneous, though taken from the last menstruation. See Section ...
— Zoonomia, Vol. II - Or, the Laws of Organic Life • Erasmus Darwin
... According to a computation by a Belgian farmer, a pigeon yields about 6 lb. of dung in a year, a hen about 12 lb., a turkey or goose about 25 lb., ...
— Manures and the principles of manuring • Charles Morton Aikman
... and sweep away younger or weaker men with a remorseless hand. It is useless to oppose them. They are masters of the field in every respect, and when they combine for a common object, their resources are inexhaustible and their power beyond computation. A dozen, or even half a dozen of the great capitalists could ruin the whole street were they so disposed, and once they came near doing so. This is the secret of the cordial hatred that is felt by the majority of Wall street men for Vanderbilt, Drew, and ...
— Lights and Shadows of New York Life - or, the Sights and Sensations of the Great City • James D. McCabe
... probable by the existence of a specifically Islamic concentration on the astrolabe, and on its planetary companion instrument, the equatorium, as devices for mechanizing computation by use of geometrical analogues. The ordinary planispheric astrolabe, of course, was known in Islam from its first days until almost the present time. From the time of al-Biruni (ca. 1000)—significantly, ...
— On the Origin of Clockwork, Perpetual Motion Devices, and the Compass • Derek J. de Solla Price
... was afforded to the children by the previous work of this author, "Stories of the Gorilla Country," is beyond computation. * * * We have read every word of "Wild Life under the Equator" with the liveliest interest and satisfaction No ingenious youth of twelve in the land will find it more "awfully jolly" than did we.—N. ...
— Harper's Young People, February 3, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... self-moving number, goes forth from, and returns to God. These two acts, one of projection and the other of recall; these two forces, centrifugal and centripetal, are symbolized in the operations of addition and subtraction. Within them is embraced the whole of computation; but because every number, every aggregation of units, is also a new unit capable of being added or subtracted, there are also the operations of multiplication and division, which consists in one case of the addition of ...
— The Beautiful Necessity • Claude Fayette Bragdon
... morning of the thirteenth the wind was N.E. with fair weather and little wind, so that we ran near the land again; at noon we were in Lat. 4 deg. 25'; the wind West with a very stiff breeze, course held East by South, and by computation sailed 10 miles until the evening; in the night the wind was variable; towards daybreak it came on to rain; at 21/2 miles' distance from the low-lying land we were in 28 fathom, black sandy bottom, the ...
— The Part Borne by the Dutch in the Discovery of Australia 1606-1765 • J. E. Heeres
... wandering in the forest, you went to the billiard-room and helped yourself to liquors, or descended to the cellar and returned laden with beer or wine. The Sirons were all locked in slumber; there was none to check your inroads; only at the week's end a computation was made, the gross sum was divided, and a varying share set down to every lodger's name under the rubric: ESTRATS. Upon the more long-suffering the larger tax was levied; and your bill lengthened in a direct proportion to the easiness of your disposition. At any hour of the morning, again, you ...
— Across The Plains • Robert Louis Stevenson
... the epitaph inscribed on the tomb-stone, copied in Stow's Survey, clearly states him to be so. It is, perhaps, unnecessary to observe that the date mentioned in the extract is the old style, and, therefore, according to our present computation, he was buried ...
— Notes & Queries, No. 24. Saturday, April 13. 1850 • Various
... of words used by any writer. We must know, not the total of different words, but the proportion of different words to the whole of any writer's words. Now to furnish a list of 100 different words the English Bible requires 531 common words, Shakspeare 164, Milton 135 only. This computation is founded on the poems; it would be curious to have the same test tried upon the prose writings, though no such test can be as trustworthy as the educated ear of a listener to ...
— Milton • Mark Pattison
... almost too attenuated for computation, is here able to effect such a change in a pinch of dust that it becomes a free avenue instead of a barricade. Through that avenue a powerful blow from a local store of energy makes itself heard and felt. No device of the trigger class is comparable with this ...
— Little Masterpieces of Science: - Invention and Discovery • Various
... this increased power of production we can only speak in general terms. No one, as far as I am aware, has yet essayed to measure it. Nor have we any form of calculus or computation that can easily be applied. If we wish to compare the gross total of production effected to-day with that accomplished a hundred and fifty years ago, the means, the basis of calculation, is lacking. Vast numbers of the things produced ...
— The Unsolved Riddle of Social Justice • Stephen Leacock
... arithmetic applied to problems of the printing trade, calculation of materials, paper weights and sizes, with standard tables and rules for computation, each subject amplified with ...
— Word Study and English Grammar - A Primer of Information about Words, Their Relations and Their Uses • Frederick W. Hamilton
... averages; and I have therefore rejected most of them, except in cases of great elevation and of remarkable humidity or dryness, when the mean saturation point is an element that should not be disregarded in the computation. To these the letter B is prefixed. By far the majority of these elevations are not capable of verification within a few feet; many of them being of villages, which occupy several hundred feet of a hill slope: in such cases the introduction of the refinement of the humidity ...
— Himalayan Journals (Complete) • J. D. Hooker
... both in principall & intrest likwise, and have therin wronged me as well and as much as any of y^e partners; yet if they will not make & deliver faire & true accounts of y^e same, nor be contente to take what by computation is more then can be justly due to either, that is, to M^r. Beachamp 150^li. as by M^r. Allertons accounte, and M^r. Sherleys accounte, on oath in chancerie; and though ther might be nothing due to M^r. Sherley, yet he requirs 100^li. ...
— Bradford's History of 'Plimoth Plantation' • William Bradford
... computation according to Tom's feelings, for it seemed to him half the day must have glided by in ...
— The Vast Abyss - The Story of Tom Blount, his Uncles and his Cousin Sam • George Manville Fenn
... could be gained respecting their approach towards the sea. The navigation of every natural stream is rendered tedious, though beautiful, by its devious course, but, "what with its regular turns, and its extensive sweeps, the Murray covers treble the ground, at a moderate computation, that it would occupy in a direct course." The current became weaker, and the channel deeper, as they proceeded down the stream, and the cliffs of clay and sand were succeeded by others of a very curious formation, ...
— Australia, its history and present condition • William Pridden
... writt a good discourse of this journey, and of the feazability, and a computation of the chardge. Quaere, whether he left a copie with the R. Society. Mr. Win, mathematicall instrument maker in Chancery-lane, had all his papers, and amongst many others is ...
— The Natural History of Wiltshire • John Aubrey
... instead of less than 2,500,000 as stated, but it is sometimes still greater during a hard winter. Then, where did the writer acquire the notion that the whole of the dark areas had to be covered with water? Only the canals and trenches have to be filled, and, at the highest computation, these would cover only 2,250,000 square miles! So even accepting her average of twenty feet depth of the snow (which would give about one foot of water over the whole area of the snow-cap), there would still be sufficient water to fill every canal and trench upon our planet ...
— To Mars via The Moon - An Astronomical Story • Mark Wicks
... of leprosy in Europe pale before the numbers affected in the East. The extent of its former ravages is unknown, but it is estimated that at the present day there are over 250,000 lepers in India, and the number in China is possibly beyond computation. According to Morrow, in 1889 in the Sandwich Islands there were 1100 lepers in the settlement at Molokai. Berger states that there were 100 cases at Key West; and Blanc found 40 cases at New Orleans. Cases of leprosy are not infrequently found among the Chinese on ...
— Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine • George M. Gould
... an historical fact, which cannot be disputed; and the relation of these successive forms, as stages of evolution of the same type, is established in various cases. The biologist has no means of determining the time over which the process of evolution has extended, but accepts the computation of the physical geologist and the physicist, whatever that ...
— The Advance of Science in the Last Half-Century • T.H. (Thomas Henry) Huxley
... told that she had better not do so till an answer had come to the letter which was of course written by that day's post to Lord George. There were still ten days to the trial, and twenty days, by computation, to the great event. There were, of course, various letters written to Lord George. Lady Sarah wrote very sensibly, suggesting that he should go to Mr. Stokes, the family lawyer. Lady Susanna was full of the original sin of that unfortunate visit to the Disabilities. She ...
— Is He Popenjoy? • Anthony Trollope
... most moderate computation, the total value of these gifts could hardly be less than several hundred millions; never probably in the world's history had any treasury ...
— The Brass Bottle • F. Anstey
... gold I gave to Dromio is laid up Safe at the Centaur; and the heedful slave Is wander'd forth, in care to seek me out By computation and mine host's report. I could not speak with Dromio since at first 5 I sent him from the mart. See, here ...
— The Comedy of Errors - The Works of William Shakespeare [Cambridge Edition] [9 vols.] • William Shakespeare
... uncertainty in measures or in weights; but the above computation from Everard's experiment may be relied on, because the comparison of the foot of England with that of France was made by the joint labours of the Royal Society of London and the French Academy of Sciences: It agrees likewise ...
— Elements of Chemistry, - In a New Systematic Order, Containing all the Modern Discoveries • Antoine Lavoisier
... stockings were soon stained with the blood of her tender feet; and it was with real gratitude that she accepted the farmer's offer, to let her pass the night at his farmhouse, which was within view. Angelina Bower was, according to his computation, about four miles distant, as well, he said, as he could judge of the place she meant by her description: she had unluckily forgotten that the common name of it was Llanwaetur. At the farmer's house, she was, at first, hospitably received, ...
— Tales And Novels, Volume 1 • Maria Edgeworth
... commander was not named for the fleet, which is to sail next month for the American seas, and which I am told, will consist of twentyfive sail of the line. I have no exact account of the number of troops to be embarked, but the lowest computation makes them consist of seven thousand men. The Count de Maurepas was ill by the last ...
— The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Vol. IX • Various
... at this computation by watching the men wringing their bedding. Two men got hold of a blanket, one at each end; they twist it different ways, and the water runs out in a stream. The soldiers relapse into language. ...
— Campaign Pictures of the War in South Africa (1899-1900) - Letters from the Front • A. G. Hales
... a voyage (to say nothing of additional duties,) ordinarily doubled by means of this circuitous course? Will not the price of such American commodities be increased by these means when they arrive in Russia, at the most moderate computation, at the rate of twentyfive per cent? Will not Russia, therefore, necessarily lose at that same rate, upon all her commodities sold to Great Britain in exchange for such American commodities? And will not this ...
— The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Vol. VIII • Various
... the only regular treatise being the essay upon Ancient and Modern Usage in Reckoning, by professor De Morgan, in the Companion to the Almanack for the present year. This Essay is opposed to the idea of a "zero year," and one of the advocates of that system of computation has, therefore, undertaken a defence of the zero principle, which he pronounces, "when properly understood, is undoubtedly the most correct basis of reckoning," in a small volume entitled, An Examination of the Century Question, and in which he ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 49, Saturday, Oct. 5, 1850 • Various
... selling both teams, offering to credit me on any balance if I could give him security. I had never mentioned my land scrip to any one, and wishing to see if it had any value, I produced and tendered the certificates to the surveyor. He looked them over, made a computation, and informed me that they were worth in his county about five cents an acre, or nearly one thousand dollars. He also offered to accept them as security, assuring me that he could use some of them ...
— Reed Anthony, Cowman • Andy Adams
... moderate computation, it was many months, that Sunday, since I had left Joe and Biddy. The space interposed between myself and them partook of that expansion, and our marshes were any distance off. That I could have been ...
— Great Expectations • Charles Dickens
... at Maranham, the flagship's portion being Rs. 607.315 $000, or L.121,463 sterling, in addition to the captures made by the squadron generally—no less than one hundred and twenty enemy's ships, with Portuguese registers and crews, having been taken, the value, at a very moderate computation, amounting to upwards of 2,000,000 dollars. As officers and men were anxiously awaiting their prize money, it became my duty to the squadron to urge its stipulated distribution upon the consideration ...
— Narrative of Services in the Liberation of Chili, Peru and Brazil, - from Spanish and Portuguese Domination, Volume 2 • Thomas Cochrane, Tenth Earl of Dundonald
... with Julius Caesar came, Including all the nations of that name, Gauls, Greeks, and Lombards, and, by computation, Auxiliaries or slaves of every nation. With Hengist, Saxons; Danes with Sueno came; In search of plunder, not in search of fame. Scots, Picts, and Irish from th' Hibernian shore, And conquering William brought the Normans o'er. All these their barbarous offspring left behind, The ...
— English Poets of the Eighteenth Century • Selected and Edited with an Introduction by Ernest Bernbaum
... (Monro and others) in reference to this point have given rise to the question, "What determines the position of the obturator artery with respect to the femoral ring?" It appears to me to be one of those questions which do not admit of a precise answer by any mode of mathematical computation; and even if it did, where then ...
— Surgical Anatomy • Joseph Maclise
... subsequent history. No account assigns to the Inca dynasty more than thirteen princes before the Conquest. But this number is altogether too small to have spread over four hundred years, and would not carry back the foundations of the monarchy, on any probable computation, beyond two centuries and a half,-an antiquity not incredible in itself, and which, it may be remarked, does not precede by more than half a century the alleged foundation of the capital of Mexico. The fiction of Manco Capac and his sister-wife was ...
— History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William Hickling Prescott
... alas was no benefit, for in the day-time she should be either not seene, or not noted. Wherefore, God to comfort her up, promised, that his people the Israelites should celebrate all their feasts and holy daies by a computation of her moneths, but this being not able to content her, shee has looked very melancholy ever since; however shee hath still reserved much light ...
— The Discovery of a World in the Moone • John Wilkins |
