"Dextrous" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... observed men longe, before he receaved any about his person, and did not love strangers, nor very confident men. He was a patient hearer of causes, which he frequently accustomed himselfe to, at the Councell Board, and judged very well, and was dextrous in the mediatinge parte, so that he often putt an end to causes by perswasion, which the stubbornesse of mens humours made delatory in courts of justice. He was very fearelesse in his person, but not enterpryzinge, and had an excellent understandinge, but was not confident enough ...
— Characters from 17th Century Histories and Chronicles • Various
... sturdy man in a jumper and overalls, his face smeared with grime, peered cautiously around a bulkhead, and seeing nobody, stepped quickly to the side of the vessel, bearing a limp and spineless figure in a black frock and silk hat. With a dextrous movement, he cast the thing forth, and as it went flopping through the air and slapped the water, from somewhere arose the voice of Mr. Breckenridge Endicott crying, ...
— The Strange Adventures of Mr. Middleton • Wardon Allan Curtis
... her creel, with a little seaweed to keep them alive. Then, having found a shallower pool of water, she stepped in with some hesitation, for the cold plunge of her feet took her breath away, and began to fish on her own account. She was dextrous and artful, with the light hand and the hunter's instinct, which are indispensable. At almost every dip she caught up some prawns, beguiled and surprised by her ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume VIII. • Guy de Maupassant
... on each side, to keep them steady. A raft, of greater breadth than the canoe, extends over about half the length; and upon this is fixed a shed or hut, thatched with palm leaves. These people, in short, appeared to be dextrous sailors and formidable warriors; and to be as much at ease in the water, ...
— A Voyage to Terra Australis • Matthew Flinders
... the weakest side," cried Christison, attacking the other men, who now, drawing their swords, attempted to defend themselves. The old officer, a dextrous swordsman, disarmed the first, sending his weapon flying to the other side of the street. The next he attacked, giving him a severe wound on the arm. Young Wenlock, who, according to the fashion of the times, ...
— A True Hero - A Story of the Days of William Penn • W.H.G. Kingston
... perseverance of Holland, nor the activity of France, nor the dextrous and firm sagacity of English enterprise, ever carried this most perilous mode of hardy industry to the extent to which it has been pushed by these people [Americans]; a people who are still, as it were, but in the gristle, ...
— English: Composition and Literature • W. F. (William Franklin) Webster
... the king of men. Trembling at his guilty frenzy—yet to please him still intent. Nala, 'reft of all his treasures—when the noble woman saw, Thus addressed she Vrihatsena,—her old faithful slave and nurse, Friendly in all business dextrous—most devoted, wise in speech: "Vrihatsena, go, the council—as at Nala's call convene, Say what he hath lost of treasure—and what treasure yet remains." Then did all that reverend council—Nala's summons as they heard, "Our own fate is now ...
— Nala and Damayanti and Other Poems • Henry Hart Milman
... a longe, when his adversary left an opening which appeared absolutely beyond defence. It was a quick, dextrous, vicious thrust. The blade leaped toward Father Beret's heart with a twinkle ...
— Alice of Old Vincennes • Maurice Thompson
... different points these animals, instead of separating or running away, huddle closer together and several are generally killed; but if the wound is not mortal they become enraged and dart in the most furious manner at the hunters, who must be very dextrous to evade them. They can defend themselves by their powerful horns against the wolves and bears which, as the Indians say, ...
— The Journey to the Polar Sea • John Franklin
... or dextrous enough to catch the knife-wielder's wrist and to wrench it far to one side, as it whizzed downward. With his other hand he had groped for the ...
— Black Caesar's Clan • Albert Payson Terhune
... lib. XVIII, chap. 4, remarks: "Some there are that grovel before rich men, old men or young, childless or unmarried, or even wives and children, for the purpose of so influencing their wishes and them by deft and dextrous finesse." ...
— The Satyricon, Complete • Petronius Arbiter
... imagination is vigorous, the composition dextrous and clever, as in the St. Jerome of the Brera Gallery, the Diogenes of the Pitti, and the pictures of the Guadagni palace. All are rendered valueless by coarseness of feeling and habitual non-reference ...
— Modern Painters Volume II (of V) • John Ruskin
... industry, in making it fine and in tying it, often times, in lengths of not more than two or three inches. They give a very dextrous turn of the hand and the finest of these threads are used in some of the fabrics which they weave. I often wondered how they could prepare these delicate, strong, linen-like threads that are as ...
— An Ohio Woman in the Philippines • Emily Bronson Conger
... sallies, and confiding demeanour were irresistible: it was only when at a distance, while still renewed tales of his errors were poured into his royal friend's ear, that he lost his influence. The queen's dextrous management was employed to prolong these absences, and gather together accusations. At length the king was brought to see in him a source of perpetual disquiet, knowing that he should pay for the short-lived pleasure of his society by tedious homilies, and more painful narrations ...
— The Last Man • Mary Shelley
... office inferior only to that of the Adelantado; the brothers of Columbus were highly unpopular; he imagined it possible to ruin them, both with the colonists and with the government at home, and by dextrous cunning and bustling activity to work his way into the command of the colony. The vigorous and somewhat austere character of the Adelantado for some time kept him in awe; but when he was absent from the settlement, Roldan was able to carry on his machinations ...
— The Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus (Vol. II) • Washington Irving
... top of its head. Having done this he remained motionless, his victim seeming to be literally paralyzed, and there was nothing for the boatman to do but pull in on the float, disengage his animated fishhook by a dextrous pressure on the sucker after both had been drawn aboard, and send the ...
— The Search for the Silver City - A Tale of Adventure in Yucatan • James Otis
... relation to understand what dextrous physicians the natives of Louisiana are. I have seen them perform surprising cures on Frenchmen; on two especially, who had put themselves under the hands of a French surgeon {44} settled at this post. Both patients were about to undergo the grand cure; and after having been ...
— History of Louisisana • Le Page Du Pratz
... going up and down between the dish of beans and his mouth with mechanical regularity. At the bean dish, he covered the long blade with a ruddy heap. Then balancing it all nicely, he swung it ceiling-ward, met it half-way by a quick duck of the mouse-covered head, and swept it clean with a dextrous, all-enveloping movement. ...
— The Rich Little Poor Boy • Eleanor Gates
... perpetually on the watch to catch up or to disguise an author's words, to swell out his defects, and pick up his blunders—to amuse the public! King was a wit, who lived on the highway of literature, appropriating, for his own purpose, the property of the most eminent passengers, by a dextrous mode no other had hit on. What an important lesson the labours of King offer to real genius! Their temporary humour lost with their prototypes becomes like a paralytic limb, which, refusing to do its office, impedes the action of ...
— Calamities and Quarrels of Authors • Isaac D'Israeli
... life of any blacksmith, especially a rural one, would afford materials for a highly poetical history. I do not speak unadvisedly, having the honour to be free of the forge, and therefore fully competent to give an opinion as to what might be made out of the forge by some dextrous hand. Certainly, the strangest and most entertaining life ever written is that of a blacksmith of the olden north, a certain Volundr, or Velint, {65b} who lived in woods and thickets, made keen swords,—so keen, indeed, that if placed by a running stream, they would fairly divide ...
— Isopel Berners - The History of certain doings in a Staffordshire Dingle, July, 1825 • George Borrow
... Ingenious! dextrous! Daya, come in aid. It was from you I learnt he was a prisoner; Doubtless you know still more about ...
— Nathan the Wise • Gotthold Ephraim Lessing
... quickly regained his feet, but the rider lay still, the blood pulsing from his throat and staining the yellow sand. With dextrous fingers Tahn-te removed the helmet and breastplate that the position of the body might be eased. With sinew of deer from his pouch, and a bone awl of needle-like sharpness, he drew together the edges of the wound, then turning to where the ...
— The Flute of the Gods • Marah Ellis Ryan
... others who affect to be called Thucydideans,—a strange and novel race of Triflers! For those who attach themselves to Lysias, have a real Pleader for their pattern;—not indeed a stately, and striking Pleader, but yet a dextrous and very elegant one, who might appear in ...
— Cicero's Brutus or History of Famous Orators; also His Orator, or Accomplished Speaker. • Marcus Tullius Cicero
... penetration, judgment, and accuracy, that the reader finds, in every page, some reason to persuade him that they cannot possibly be the work of a child, but of a man long accustomed to these studies, enlightened by reflection, and dextrous, by long practice, in the use of books. Yet, that it is the performance of a boy thus young, is not only proved by the testimony of his father, but by the concurrent evidence of Mr. le Maitre, his associate in the church of Schwabach, who not only ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, Vol. 6 - Reviews, Political Tracts, and Lives of Eminent Persons • Samuel Johnson
... came with drinks. Most of the men, in order to prepare for the game, removed their coats and cuffs and drew up the sleeves of their shirts. The electric globes shed a blinding light upon the table. The sound of clinking chips arose; the elected banker spun the cards, careless and dextrous." ...
— A Collection of Stories, Reviews and Essays • Willa Cather
... indeed that the remarkable capacity of the dancer for the execution of quick, graceful, dextrous, bizarre, and oft-repeated movements has not been utilized in America as it has in Japan. The mice are inexhaustible sources of amusement as well as invaluable material for studies in animal ...
— The Dancing Mouse - A Study in Animal Behavior • Robert M. Yerkes |
