"Positively" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... "Liberty of Labor" M. Dunoyer has positively accepted this principle by distinguishing four great classes of industry, which he arranges according to the order of their development,—that is, from the least ...
— The Philosophy of Misery • Joseph-Pierre Proudhon
... cloisters still unclosed, and passed in. Gloomy and sombre were they at that evening hour. So sombre that, in proceeding along the west quadrangle, the two young men positively started, when some dark figure glided from within a niche, and stood in ...
— The Channings • Mrs. Henry Wood
... chase, has, to his surprise and alarm, found two tier of guns opposed to him instead of one. He halts—suspends his clamorous yelping, and, in fine, ingloriously retreats to his master, with, all the dishonourable marks of positively declining ...
— Waverley Volume XII • Sir Walter Scott
... the seeking of worth-while truth, are ever profitable employments, paying present and future dividends, and meanwhile those acts positively divert the ...
— Evening Round Up - More Good Stuff Like Pep • William Crosbie Hunter
... not the only one who has been guessing. Our rivals are positively nervous over the movements of this show. They think we are going to jump into the Mississippi River, or something of ...
— The Circus Boys On the Mississippi • Edgar B. P. Darlington
... the time not positively occupied in mastication he employed in looking first at Quizzle, the interlocutor, and then at Governor ...
— Around The Tea-Table • T. De Witt Talmage
... Hepworth, as he stirred his tea. "That is, I've heard of her. My friend, down in Virginia, who knows Miss Farley, has sent me another of her sketches, and it proves more positively than ever that the girl has real genius. But, Patty, I want you to give up this scheme of yours to help her. It was good of your father to make the offer he did, but I don't want you racing around to these dreadful places looking for work. I'm going to get some other ...
— Patty's Success • Carolyn Wells
... all true original thinkers or "feelers" must experience, but partly also by an acquired habit of juggling with words which is but natural in a philologist endowed with a vigorous imagination. Unamuno revels in words. He positively enjoys stretching them beyond their usual meaning, twisting them, composing, opposing, and transposing them in all sorts of possible ways. This game—not wholly unrewarded now and then by striking intellectual finds—seems to ...
— Tragic Sense Of Life • Miguel de Unamuno
... was positively brilliant," replied Joyce. "I thought we were all at The Beeches, and Allison, and Kitty, and all of us were ...
— The Little Colonel: Maid of Honor • Annie Fellows Johnston
... "I'm ashamed, positively ashamed," Jimmy admitted, blushing ingenuously. "But I am delighted—simply delighted to see you and Christine again—I suppose it is Christine," ...
— The Second Honeymoon • Ruby M. Ayres
... stay at home, that is a good thing. Everybody loved the White Pig before she had been here two days, and my children are very fond of the Ducklings. I like to have them together, too, for after I had told them positively that my Chickens could not go in swimming, they stopped teasing and ...
— Among the Farmyard People • Clara Dillingham Pierson
... a hard year's work, he has always found the cosiest of nooks, the cheapest houses, the best of landladies, the finest views, and the best dinners. But with the other the case is indeed altered. He has always been robbed; he has positively seen nothing; his landlady was a harpy, his bedroom was unhealthy, and the mutton was so tough that he could not get his ...
— How to Succeed - or, Stepping-Stones to Fame and Fortune • Orison Swett Marden
... many pretty little houses in Priorsford, and so many kind and forthcoming landladies, it was bad luck that she should choose Hillview and Bella Bathgate. Bella is almost like a stage-caricature of a Scotswoman, so dour she is and uncompromising and she positively glories in the drab ugliness of her rooms. Ugliness means to Bella respectability; any ...
— Penny Plain • Anna Buchan (writing as O. Douglas)
... all your experience) the circumstances have fatally misled you in this case. Mind! I am in possession of no private information. I am as absolutely shut out of my daughter's confidence as you are. My one reason for speaking positively, is the reason you have heard already. ...
— The Moonstone • Wilkie Collins
... laid their patient on the vehicle, they were preparing to retire with it into the rear, when Thaddeus petitioned the prince to grant him permission to take the command of the guard which was appointed to attend his grandfather. His highness consented; but Sobieski positively refused. ...
— Thaddeus of Warsaw • Jane Porter
... But what is new now-a-days? Sally Shrimp has had hers done in emerald, and I know Mrs. Croesus will have crimson for hers, and those people who sits next us in church (I wonder who they are; it's very unpleasant to sit next to people you don't know; and, positively, that girl, the dark-haired one with large eyes, carries the same muff she did last year; it's big enough for a family) have a kind of brown morocco binding. I must tell you one reason why I fixed upon the pale-blue. ...
— The Potiphar Papers • George William Curtis
... you, then," said the aged monarch, "to give it up to him; for if he has the steady will, and has positively resolved to find it, he will work until he has drained the last drop of water from the Tigris, rather than deviate a ...
— Childhood's Favorites and Fairy Stories - The Young Folks Treasury, Volume 1 • Various
... be immediately removed from his present sphere of life and be brought up as a gentleman, and that he always bear the name of Pip. Now, you are to understand that the name of the person who is your liberal benefactor remains a profound secret until the person chooses to reveal it, and you are most positively prohibited from making any inquiry on this head. If you have a suspicion, keep it in your ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol III • Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds.
... you be suddenly restored to sight and behold the long, lank, bony creature I know as Edith Hastings— low forehead, turned-up nose, coarse, black hair, all falling out, black eyes, yellowish black skin, not a particle of red in it—the fever took that away and has not brought it back. Positively, Richard, I'm growing horridly ugly. Even my hair, which I'll confess I did use to think was splendid, is as rough as a chestnut burr. Feel for yourself if you don't believe me," and she laid his hand upon her hair, which, though beautiful and abundant, still was quite uneven and had ...
— Darkness and Daylight • Mary J. Holmes
... this year; I found it by a cave on the Ness. And though these are rather the last than the first, yet I knew you'd like them, Eddy, so I hunted for them everywhere. And how much better you're looking too; such shining eyes, and, yes! I positively declare, quite a ruddy cheek like your old one. You'll soon be out ...
— Eric • Frederic William Farrar
... before him so vividly that he shall know it as if he had lived there from childhood; while another, employing the same materials, the same verdure, the same water, and the same flowers, committing no inaccuracy, introducing nothing which can be positively pronounced superfluous, omitting nothing which can be positively pronounced necessary, shall produce no more effect than an advertisement of a capital residence and a desirable pleasure-ground. To take another example: ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 2 (of 4) - Contributions To The Edinburgh Review • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... it must be insane. But a very little consideration will show how vain it is to attempt to make such a division. That nature makes no leaps, but passes from one complexion to its opposite by a gradation so gentle that one shades imperceptibly into another and no one can fix positively the point of transition, is a sufficiently trite observation. Nowhere is this more true than in respect of sanity and insanity; it is unavoidable, therefore, that doubts, disputes and perplexities should arise ...
— Studies in Forensic Psychiatry • Bernard Glueck
... and sent them home. He made so many fine promises that hope temporarily revived, and a new loan was raised. But the Parlement of Paris, which together with the other Parlements had been restored early in the reign of Louis XVI, soon saw through the artifices of the suave minister, and positively refused to register further loans or taxes. Encouraged by popular approval, the Parlement went on to draw up a declaration of rights, and to assert that subsidies could constitutionally be granted only by the nation's ...
— A Political and Social History of Modern Europe V.1. • Carlton J. H. Hayes
... said she, "I am a prisoner. I sprained my ankle the very day I saw you; and I am positively forbidden to walk. But where is ...
— Louis' School Days - A Story for Boys • E. J. May
... in American hotels. The daily charge is strictly an inclusive one, comprising meals, attendance, and everything but alcoholic drinks. There are positively no extras, and you depart in peace, not having to "remember" waiter, chambermaid, ...
— The Truth About America • Edward Money
... addressing each god by name, he declares: "I have not been idle. I have not boasted. I have not stolen. I have not counterfeited, nor killed sacred beasts, nor blasphemed, nor refused to hear the truth, nor despised God in my heart." According to some texts, he declares, positively, that he has loved God, that he has given bread to the hungry, water to the thirsty, garments to the naked, and an asylum to ...
— Ten Great Religions - An Essay in Comparative Theology • James Freeman Clarke
... such as that could not possibly proceed from wine. Derues tried to persuade him that the smell came from drains under the cellar, the pipe of which could be seen. It appeared to satisfy him, and he again took hold of the chest, but immediately let it go again, and said positively that he could not execute Derues' orders, being convinced that the chest must contain a decomposing corpse. Then Derues threw himself at the man's feet and acknowledged that it was the dead body of a woman who had unfortunately lodged in his house, and who had ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - DERUES • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... temper at times," insisted Algy. "Why, he seemed positively annoyed because I had obeyed the social instinct and had gone away to meet old friends of ...
— Uncle Sam's Boys as Sergeants - or, Handling Their First Real Commands • H. Irving Hancock
... darling, no; his touch, his breath, are contamination; his very look is pollution, and shall never rest upon you again if I can prevent it. Remember you are never to hold any communication with him again—by word, letter, or in any other way; I positively forbid it; you must never look at him, or intentionally allow him a sight of your face. I must go now, and send him away." He held her to his heart as he spoke; his tone was affectionate, but very firm, ...
— Elsie's Girlhood • Martha Finley
... scream with delight. After that came his lecture. The first sentence captured the audience. From that moment to the end it was either in a roar of laughter or half breathless by his beautiful descriptive passages. People were positively ill for days, laughing ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... begun, it is no less difficult to decide whether a forced march shall be made to get as much the start of the enemy as possible,—since this hurried movement might sometimes cause the destruction of the army, and might, in other circumstances, be its salvation. All that can be positively asserted on this subject is that, in general, with an army of considerable magnitude, it is best to retreat slowly, by short marches, with a well-arranged rear-guard of sufficient strength to hold the heads of the enemy's columns ...
— The Art of War • Baron Henri de Jomini
... anything very flagrant send it to me marked. I have no confidence in myself; I feel such an ass. What have I been doing? As near as I can calculate, nothing. And yet I have worked all this month from three to five hours a day, that is to say, from one to three hours more than my doctor allows me; positively ...
— The Letters of Robert Louis Stevenson - Volume 1 • Robert Louis Stevenson
... content with the splendor of sound, and unwilling so to stir his imagination as to flash some new revelation on it. As if Hamlet should never be mentioned in the play, without some such epithet as "the hesitating Dane."...... But think how the Myriad-minded One positively tumbles over himself in hurling and fountaining up new revelatory figures and epithets about everything: how he could not afford to repeat himself, because there were not enough hours in the day, days in the year, nor years in one human lifetime, in which to ...
— The Crest-Wave of Evolution • Kenneth Morris
... best of his belief, it was the evening of the murder. Afterwards he attempts to speak positively, from recollecting that he mentioned the circumstance to William Peirce, as he went to the Mineral Spring on Fast-day. Last Monday morning he told Colonel Putnam he could not fix the time. This witness stands in a much worse plight than either of the others. It is difficult to reconcile ...
— The Great Speeches and Orations of Daniel Webster • Daniel Webster
... was positively gray with sorrow and fear. She looked at me with a strange sort of unsympathizing hardness in her eyes. She had never loved me. I knew what she thought. She was saying to herself: "Why not this one ...
— Saxe Holm's Stories • Helen Hunt Jackson
... and if you now change your intentions towards me, it is only what I expect. Bluebell and I were married hastily at Liverpool, she is my best excuse for that. Afterwards, when I came to 'The Towers,' I meant to have told you, but—don't you recollect?—you positively refused to hear what I had to say. Of course ...
— Bluebell - A Novel • Mrs. George Croft Huddleston
... left the hotel and drove to the place of embarkation. My trunk, valise, and sundry boxes had gone in the forenoon, so that my only remaining effects were a satchel, a bundle of newspapers, a dog, and a bouquet. The weight of these combined articles was of little consequence, but I positively declare that I never handled a more inconvenient lot of baggage. While I was descending a perpendicular ladder to a small boat, some one abruptly asked if that lot of baggage had been cleared at the custom house. Think of walking through a custom house with my portable property! Happily ...
— Overland through Asia; Pictures of Siberian, Chinese, and Tartar - Life • Thomas Wallace Knox
... terrible duty now lying in her path. Before she could give her consent to Felix marrying Alice, she must ascertain positively if her husband was dead. Should it be so, her secret was safe, and would die with her. Nobody need ever know of this fraud, so successfully carried out. But if not? Then she knew in herself that her lips could never confess the sin in which she had shared; and nothing would ...
— Cobwebs and Cables • Hesba Stretton
... and the change in the appearance of the running water about the place more surprising. The Pointe Mulatre River suddenly began to run volcanic mud and water; then the mud predominated, and almost buried the stream under its weight, and the odor of sulphur in the air became positively oppressive. Soon the fish in the water—brochet, camoo, meye, crocro, mullet, down to the eel, the crawfish, the loche, the tetar, and the dormer—died, and were thrown on the banks. The mud carried down by the river has formed a bank at the month which nearly dams up the ...
— The Antediluvian World • Ignatius Donnelly
... Hawles, another of the managers, follows the steps of his brethren, positively affirming the doctrine of non-resistance to government to be the general moral, religious, and political rule for the subject, and justifying the Revolution on the same principle with Mr. Burke,—that is, as an exception from necessity. Indeed, he carries the doctrine on ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. IV. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... whence we derive our analogies in dealing with the vegetation of this early period, contribute but little, if at all, to the support of animal life. The ferns and their allies remain untouched by the grazing animals. Our native club mosses, though once used in medicine, are positively deleterious; the horse tails, though harmless, so abound in silex, which wraps them round with a cuticle of stone, that they are rarely cropped by cattle; while the thickets of fern which cover our hill-sides, and seem so temptingly rich and green in their season, scarce ...
— The Testimony of the Rocks - or, Geology in Its Bearings on the Two Theologies, Natural and Revealed • Hugh Miller
... was really worried about his heart. I said no—for fifteen minutes, then we arranged to be married secretly. When it was all over, I was frightened and ran away. You're such a deep, desperate, unforgiving person, Norvin. I—I think it was positively horrid of you." ...
— The Net • Rex Beach
... then told me that my father, he believed, had drawn the worst side of the picture; and that he had urged him to exert every means in his power to reclaim me to obedience: That Beauman was to follow me in a few months, and that, if I still refused to yield him my hand, my father positively and solemnly declared that he would discard me forever, and strenuously enjoined it upon him to do the same. "I well know my brother's temper, continued my uncle; the case is difficult, but something must be done. I will immediately write to your ...
— Alonzo and Melissa - The Unfeeling Father • Daniel Jackson, Jr.
... their disciples believe that in the next world the souls of the uninitiated should roll in mire and dirt, and with difficulty reach their destined mansion. Hence, Plato introduces Socrates as observing that "the sages who introduced the Teletae had positively affirmed that whatever soul should arrive in the infernal mansions unhouselled and unannealed should lie there immersed in mire and filth."—"And as to a future state," says Aristides, "the initiated shall not roll in mire and grope in darkness, a fate which awaits the unholy and ...
— Mysticism and its Results - Being an Inquiry into the Uses and Abuses of Secrecy • John Delafield
... down on a rock, just where the sea ran in and formed a fine spouting horn. Compared with the plain, dull sand-beach of the rest of the coast, this grandeur was as refreshing as a great rock in a weary land. It was almost the first time that I had been positively alone— free from the sense that human beings were at my elbow, if not talking with me— since I had left home. My better nature returned strong upon me. Everything was in accordance with my state of feeling, and I experienced a glow ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana
... could perfectly understand her husband's wish for the event; she didn't, to be just, see how he COULD like her to be with her cousin. Ralph never said a word against him, but Osmond's sore, mute protest was none the less founded. If he should positively interpose, if he should put forth his authority, she would have to decide, and that wouldn't be easy. The prospect made her heart beat and her cheeks burn, as I say, in advance; there were moments when, in her wish to avoid an open rupture, she found herself ...
— The Portrait of a Lady - Volume 2 (of 2) • Henry James
... dead," he said positively, in his natural voice; and such was the vast relief of the other two that they were in no way startled by the sound. Instantly all three drew long breaths; the tension was relaxed; and Van Emmon's curiosity found a harsh ...
— The Lord of Death and the Queen of Life • Homer Eon Flint
... leading figure in a small group of men of whom— and of whom only—it is positively known that immense numbers of their countrymen did not want any of them ...
— The Devil's Dictionary • Ambrose Bierce
... knew positively that the numbers would not turn up, I should feel perfectly secure, and could realize on the bonds at any time," he thought. "I will wait awhile, and I ...
— Struggling Upward - or Luke Larkin's Luck • Horatio Alger
... to-night the contessina must positively be at the door of the staircase by which you entered yesterday. Positively—do you understand? She will then choose for herself between what she is suffering now and flight with me. If she chooses to fly, my mules and my countryman will be ...
— A Roman Singer • F. Marion Crawford
... said the King. "Oh, no, it must not be. I positively can not consent to it. He is a priest and a cardinal. We shall be excommunicated. But if there be any other means, I am very willing. Thou mayest speak of it to thy friends; and I on my side ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... Dick, 'I think you misinterpret my position. I am young Mr. Naseby of Naseby House. My acquaintance with Mr. Van Tromp is really very slender; I am only afraid that Miss Van Tromp has exaggerated our intimacy in her own imagination. I know positively nothing of his private affairs, and do not care to know. I met him casually in Paris - ...
— Tales and Fantasies • Robert Louis Stevenson
... very inception of his rule, Sir James Brooke laid down and strictly adhered to the principle of associating the natives with himself and his European assistants in the government of the country, and of respecting and maintaining whatever was not positively objectionable in the laws and customs of the people. And this policy has been as faithfully followed by the present Rajah.[213] The Raj of which Sir James Brooke became the absolute ruler in the way described in Chapter II. was a country in which ...
— The Pagan Tribes of Borneo • Charles Hose and William McDougall
... unanimously of opinion that TWO of the counts were bad, or insufficient in law—and two only—which were the SIXTH and SEVENTH counts. They hold positively and explicitly, that the remaining ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 349, November, 1844 • Various
... with different departments, who have in many instances fraudulently increased their amounts, and drawn fourfold the money actually due from the city. Thus it appears in the accounts that hundreds of thousands of dollars have been paid to private parties who positively deny the receipt of the money, or any knowledge whatever of the false bills representing the large sums paid to them. These investigations compel the belief that not only the most reckless extravagance, ...
— Lights and Shadows of New York Life - or, the Sights and Sensations of the Great City • James D. McCabe
... "don't say you can't come, for we simply won't let you off. It's a construction car ride. Meet at the Main Street corner at four—right after Lab., if you have it. It's positively the last ride of the season and an awfully jolly crowd's going,—Betty and Jean and Kate Denise and the three B's, and Katherine Kittredge and Nita Reese,— oh, the whole sophomore push, you know. Now, say you'll come, and give me twenty ...
— Betty Wales, Sophomore • Margaret Warde
... Alderman Cute, was addressed to a great man in the great district of the town. The greatest district of the town. It must have been the greatest district of the town, because it was commonly called 'the world' by its inhabitants. The letter positively seemed heavier in Toby's hand, than another letter. Not because the Alderman had sealed it with a very large coat of arms and no end of wax, but because of the weighty name on the superscription, and the ponderous amount of gold and silver ...
— The Chimes • Charles Dickens
... said to date from about the year 1835. Leroux claimed that he invented it, in opposition to the term "individualism," but at that period it had become so necessary and so obvious a term that it is difficult to say positively by ...
— The Task of Social Hygiene • Havelock Ellis
... moves round them, he will find that nearly every quarter of an hour a new set of cleavages becomes visible, not confused and orderless, but a series of lines inclining in some one definite direction, and that so positively, that if he had only seen the aiguille at that moment, he would assuredly have supposed its internal structure to be altogether regulated by the lines of bed or cleavage then in sight. Let him, however, ...
— Modern Painters, Volume IV (of V) • John Ruskin
... y Melibea, (Alcala, 1586,) Introd.—Nothing is positively ascertained respecting the authorship of the first act of the Celestina. Some impute it to Juan de Mena; others with more probability to Rodrigo Cota el Tio, of Toledo, a person who, although literally nothing is known of him, has in ...
— The History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella The Catholic, V2 • William H. Prescott
... are certain exceptions; for both Greece and Italy occasionally appropriated each other's traditions, by substituting the names of one language for those of the other. Thus it would not be safe to affirm positively that the story of Portumnus and Matuta is of Latin origin, since Greece lays an equal claim to it under the names of Leucothoe and Palaemon, while, probably, Cadmus originally introduced it from Phoenicia, under the names of Ino ...
— The Metamorphoses of Ovid - Literally Translated into English Prose, with Copious Notes - and Explanations • Publius Ovidius Naso
... hadn't dreamed that another such woman as yourself existed in the world, and it gives me a kind of bigamous feeling which I can't say I find altogether unpleasant.' 'Then I'll keep the thing,' says she, very positively, 'until the owner turns up and redeems it;' which he never did, being, as I discovered, a strolling portrait painter very much down on his luck. So there the mystery remained. But (as I was telling you), though a first-rate manager, my poor dear wife had a number of romantic ...
— Sir John Constantine • Prosper Paleologus Constantine
... positively convinced that one could do no more than discover the circumstances of some commonplace, vulgar broil, that he began to wonder if it would not be wise to renounce his search and take a nap, while awaiting the coming ...
— Monsieur Lecoq • Emile Gaboriau
... gateways, had an imposing effect. Forwards, we looked over a valley, which so resembled a lake, the hills projecting above the glittering white vapour having the appearance of islands scattered over its surface, that at the first glance I was positively deceived; and all my topographical knowledge, which I had conned on the map the night before, completely put to the rout. As the day advanced, this white mist sank gradually to the earth, like a veil dropped from ...
— The Diary of an Ennuyee • Anna Brownell Jameson
... before all human eyes an impenetrable veil which obscures all future events. No man without prophetic vision bestowed by Him who "sees the end from the beginning," can know what is to be, and no expression can be made, no words employed which will positively declare a future action. We may see a present condition of things, and from it argue what is to be, or take place hereafter; but all that knowledge is drawn from the past and deduced from a review of the present relation ...
— Lectures on Language - As Particularly Connected with English Grammar. • William S. Balch
... "I positively refuse to do that," he said. "I will not think about it, or say one word about it. I will not even refer to any future settlement of that question. The plan I present rests entirely upon ...
— The Adventures of Captain Horn • Frank Richard Stockton
... dear, long twigs. Well ... I was thinking the birds will come and visit me, as they are used to, and they will be sure to bring earth with them, so that there will always be more of it as my hole becomes deeper by degrees. And plenty of withered leaves fall on my poor maimed top. I also positively believe that I have an earth-worm up there. How he got there, I don't know: perhaps a bird dropped him out of his beak. But he draws the leaves down into the earth and eats them and turns them into mould. So I say, like the elder-bush, ...
— The Old Willow Tree and Other Stories • Carl Ewald
... He had actually positively disliked this beautiful creature all the winter! He was astonished at his own bad taste. Before him stood his wife on the kitchen hearth, her figure rendered shapeless by her advanced state of pregnancy. And he had once thought her prettier ...
— 'Jena' or 'Sedan'? • Franz Beyerlein
... as if to make the case as striking as possible, this sessile cirripede was a Chthamalus, a very common, large, and ubiquitous genus, of which not one specimen has as yet been found even in any tertiary stratum. Hence we now positively know that sessile cirripedes existed during the secondary period; and these cirripedes might have been the progenitors of our many ...
— On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection • Charles Darwin
... enjoying the scene for him. It was indeed a painful ordeal to Norman himself, who could, at the moment, scarcely feel pleasure in his restoration, excepting for the sake of his father, Harry, and his sisters. To find the head-master making apologies to him was positively painful and embarrassing, and his countenance would have been fitter for a culprit receiving a lecture. It was pleasanter when the two other masters shook hands with him, Mr. Harrison with a free confession ...
— The Daisy Chain, or Aspirations • Charlotte Yonge
... circled around at a considerable distance, examining the number and shape of our footprints in order to make sure that no deception was being practiced upon them. When we approached the purpose of the interview, namely, to request permission to visit their houses, they positively refused to allow it, telling us that they were on guard against three warrior chiefs of the upper Slug who had recently procured guns and who had threatened to attack them. Upon questioning my companions as to the likely location ...
— The Manbos of Mindano - Memoirs of the National Academy of Sciences, Volume XXIII, First Memoir • John M. Garvan
... required a maximum of wealth with a minimum of personal repulsiveness. He therefore 'took a sight of the lady' (it does not appear that he talked with her) before he committed himself irrevocably by a proposal. The sight having been taken, as he did not dislike her (mind, he did not positively like her) he made the old man a visit. Loving money, and believing in it, this 'old man' wished to secure as much of it as possible for his only child; and therefore looking keenly at the youthful admirer of a usurer's heiress, "asked him what estate his father intended ...
— A Book About Lawyers • John Cordy Jeaffreson
... and then become muddled, stick or falter—notoriously so in the fourth act—and finally conclude in a way that is either forced or unsatisfactory or else long foreseen by every one. Sometimes, too, the end is positively revolting, as in Lessing's Emilia Galotti, which sends the spectators home in ...
— The Art of Literature • Arthur Schopenhauer
... discount any bills, on which the great manufacturers and merchants dismissed their workmen, to the number of many thousands, who inflamed the public discontent, and united to oppose the military and the execution of the decrees. He said positively that we should not take any part, and that no other Government ought or could. He does not like the Duke of Orleans, and thinks his proclamation mean and shabby, but owned that under all circumstances his election to the Crown would probably be the best thing that could happen. The Duke of Chartres ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William IV, Vol. II • Charles C. F. Greville
... persons in Europe knew it, that the bargain of Plombieres was on the principle of give-and-take. How Mazzini was for many years better informed than any cabinet in Europe, remains a secret. 'I know positively,' he wrote on the 4th of January 1859, 'that the idea of the war is only to hand over a zone of Lombardy to Piedmont, and the cession of Savoy and Nice to France: the peace, upon the offer of which ...
— The Liberation of Italy • Countess Evelyn Martinengo-Cesaresco
... say it is! Positively nothing could be simpler unless it be the stark simplicity of the mind of an author who figures that when the Atlantic Ocean starts boring its way through a crack in a sea wall you can stop it by plugging the hole on the inner ...
— A Plea for Old Cap Collier • Irvin S. Cobb
... Tom, because we have no means of knowing how they got the money. Some of them are often supplied with larger amounts than seem to be good for them. Unless you know positively, don't start the snowball rolling downhill, because it keeps on growing larger every time some one tells ...
— The Banner Boy Scouts Snowbound - A Tour on Skates and Iceboats • George A. Warren
... conversation, consisting of little else than civilities, I endeavoured to procure the permission of the President for our naturalist and mineralogist to make a journey into the Cordilleras, which he, however, politely but positively refused, on the ground that the Chilians were at war with the people in the mountains. I afterwards learnt from Mendiburu, that this was merely a pretence, as the President had already succeeded in establishing peace and an amicable league with the Araucanians. A small military escort would ...
— A New Voyage Round the World in the Years 1823, 24, 25, and 26. Vol. 1 • Otto von Kotzebue
... talk only just this once, and I will sail positively on the 6th of July, and stay away until I return from ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... to a sudden pause; and as she looked into his vigilant face, in which she was not sure there was not a hovering derision, she could not continue. She felt that she ought to gather courage from the fact that he had not started, or done anything positively disagreeable when she had asked for a consultation; but she could not, and it did not avail her to reflect that she was rendering herself liable to all conceivable misconstruction, —that she was behaving childishly, with every appearance ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... beatifically and gave an extra touch to the dainty tray. Nan from her chair scowled darkly upon the whole performance. Delia had deserted her cause; had gone over bodily to the enemy—that was plain. But she needn't flaunt her defection in Nan's very face. Why, it was positively disgraceful the way Delia fetched and carried for this person already, and looked, all the while, as if she could hardly keep from dancing for very joy at the privilege. Well, this governess needn't think that Nan was the kind to be won over ...
— The Governess • Julie M. Lippmann
... such an uncomfortable ride home: for she said she had a fourth place in her carriage, and asked me if I would accept it; and positively, at two o'clock in the morning, there was I, after setting the ladies and my Lord down, driven to Salisbury Square in a great thundering carriage, with flaming lamps and two tall footmen, who nearly knocked the ...
— The History of Samuel Titmarsh - and the Great Hoggarty Diamond • William Makepeace Thackeray
... restricted in extent. Motley declares of the Seven United Provinces that they 'commanded the ocean,'[40] and that it would be difficult to exaggerate the naval power of the young Commonwealth. Even in the days of Spain's greatness English seamen positively declined to admit that she was stronger than England on the sea; and the story of the Armada justified their view. Our first two Dutch wars were, therefore, contests between the two foremost naval states of the world for what was primarily a maritime object. The identity ...
— Sea-Power and Other Studies • Admiral Sir Cyprian Bridge
... preparations. To-day terminal services in large cities can better be performed by electricity, and not only is there economy in their operation, but the absence of dirt, smoke and noise is in accord with public sentiment if not positively demanded by statute or ordinance. Suburban service can be worked much more economically and effectively by trains of motor cars, and time table and schedule are not limited by the number of available ...
— The Story Of Electricity • John Munro
... thing by itself, something of which if it were not, nothing else in literature could precisely supply the want. And he will decide further that while the best of them are remarkably good of their kind, few of them can be called positively bad in it. And yet again, if he has been fortunately gifted by nature with that appreciation of form which saves the critic from mere prejudice and crotchet, from mere partiality, he will, I believe, go further still, and say that while owing something to spirit, they owe most to form itself, ...
— The Flourishing of Romance and the Rise of Allegory - (Periods of European Literature, vol. II) • George Saintsbury
... instrument upon the approaching boat, I saw that, as Simpson had informed me, there were only five men in her, who, as the look-out man had observed, were pulling as though for their lives. The boat, although a heavy one, was positively foaming through the water, and the long, stout ash oars, which the men were labouring at, bent and sprang almost to breaking point ...
— A Middy in Command - A Tale of the Slave Squadron • Harry Collingwood
... the dressing-table and examined her face in a hand-mirror with assiduous care. Yes, crow's feet—three of them at each eye, and two tiny wrinkles leading into her dimples. She was positively haggard to-night. It did not do for the woman of thirty to cry. Her hair—another gray one—she plucked it out viciously. She would not grow old. Age was a disease which could be prevented by the use of proper ...
— Madcap • George Gibbs
... tied the poor creature, and taking up the fatal knife, was going to plunge it into my son's throat, when turning his eyes bathed with tears, in a languishing manner, towards me, he affected me so much that I had not strength to kill him. I let the knife fall, and told my wife positively that I would have another calf to sacrifice, and not that. She used all her endeavours to persuade me to change my resolution; but I continued firm, and pacified her a little, by promising that I would sacrifice him against the ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments vol. 1 • Anon.
... of work in any kind of costume; but soon Linda realized that Donald Whiting was not paying any particular attention either to her or to her occupation. He was leaning forward, gazing at the car with positively an enraptured expression on ...
— Her Father's Daughter • Gene Stratton-Porter
... see, I have to take him to bed with me. He insists on it, which is all very well," continued Corona, nodding sagely, "but one can't allow it in the same clothes day and night. It's like what Uncle Copas says of Brother Plant's linen; it positively isn't sanitary." ...
— Brother Copas • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... returned the other positively. "Tha 're too closely bunched up. I reckon it 'll be Black Kettle's ...
— Molly McDonald - A Tale of the Old Frontier • Randall Parrish
... Mr. Davies's mother, Agatha," Mrs. Cranston had said. "I haven't time for both, but I'll take care of Miss Quimby." Just what might be the tone and tenor of that young lady's letters to her prostrate lover Mrs. Cranston could not positively say, as no one saw them but himself, but she was ready to hazard a something more than mere conjecture when Miss Quimby took to writing to her as well. As was her wont when moved, Mrs. Margaret unbosomed herself to her lord. ...
— Under Fire • Charles King
... speech I have ever heard, as I am now by your words, by which I learn something that I never heard or guessed. You know my simplicity, youth, and innocence, and you say that it is not possible at my age to avoid committing such a fault, and that you are sure and know positively that when you are away I shall not be able to preserve our marriage vow in its integrity. That speech greatly vexed my heart, and made me tremble, and I do not know how I can reply to your arguments. You have deprived me of the reply I should have made, ...
— One Hundred Merrie And Delightsome Stories - Les Cent Nouvelles Nouvelles • Various
... There is a tendency here to say Bernstorff went too far. But this is all for the public, von Jagow told a correspondent so to-day; but, of course, he did not know about the note of Austria to Servia either! The Marine people are positively raging. The paper which Reventlow writes for, the Tages Zeitung, was suppressed yesterday; I hear on account of an article on this Arabic settlement, but ...
— Face to Face with Kaiserism • James W. Gerard
... party, for I know she is an orphan and friendless, and I do try and be charitable towards all poor and worthy persons. And then too, Will, you know how I have been bothered about a teacher, and she suited the place so well, I think it was positively ungrateful in her to act ...
— Clemence - The Schoolmistress of Waveland • Retta Babcock
... are, Hiram," said Uncle Sebastian positively. "Don't tell me that. Ye c'n tell yerself ye don't keer, Hiram, but ye're lyin' to yerself. It ain't in human nature not to keer what folks thinks about a fella. Gosh! where'd we be if ...
— The She Boss - A Western Story • Arthur Preston Hankins
... given by Moses, positively forbade usury or interest, and this prohibition was so repeated that there was no mistaking the meaning. Ex. 22:25: "If thou lend money to any of my people that is poor by thee, thou shalt not be to him as a usurer, neither shalt thou lay upon ...
— Usury - A Scriptural, Ethical and Economic View • Calvin Elliott
... necessitate or justify his action in marching to Savannah and quitting his own theater of operations before his adversary there had been disposed of. The plan above suggested would have negatived even more positively the boast and promise of the Confederate chief that Sherman should be driven out of Georgia. The fact that Sherman personally, with an army about as large as, or larger than, Hood's, could and did remain quietly at Atlanta while one of ...
— Forty-Six Years in the Army • John M. Schofield
... get a chop, either. I know only flashy people, of course." He looked up at his host with such a grave and candid expression that Eastman decided there couldn't be anything very crooked about the fellow. His smooth cheeks were positively cherubic. ...
— A Collection of Stories, Reviews and Essays • Willa Cather
... which was the airiest secret that the mystic Swinnerton had left behind him. And, besides, these old ladies had always liked the manners of Dr. Dolliver, and used to speak of his gentle courtesy behind the counter as having positively been something to admire; though of later years, an unrefined, and almost rustic simplicity, such as belonged to his humble ancestors, appeared to have taken possession of him, as it often does of prettily mannered men ...
— The Dolliver Romance • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... with gray you get gray. But if you put pink with gray you get rose-color. Perhaps you didn't know that before, Sophie, but now you do. And you'll know also that when I dare wear a blue gown I am feeling positively infantile." ...
— Glory of Youth • Temple Bailey
... hour we entered the gulf a perceptible change had taken place in all on board. The captain, a man of grave, quiet manners, grew quite talkative. My husband was more than usually animated, and even the thoughtful young Scotchman became positively an entertaining person. The crew displayed the most lively zeal in the performance of their duty, and the goldfinch sung cheerily from dawn till sunset. As for me Hope was busy in my heart, chasing ...
— The Backwoods of Canada • Catharine Parr Traill
... advent of the brother of the reigning King of SIAM threatens to cause embarrassment in some English houses where HIS HIGHNESS might expect to be received. JEAMES has positively declined to throw open a door and announce, "Prince DAMRONG!" "Such langwidge," he says, "is unbecoming and beneath Me—leastways unless it is ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 101, September 26, 1891 • Various
... against the bars of the cage, and looked in my face with a touch of delight while I stroked his muzzle. I have two or three times found a lion who recognised the same language, and the expression of his eyes, for an instant, seemed positively human." ...
— The Human Side of Animals • Royal Dixon
... stipend are various, and in speaking upon this point Father Walker desired me to note that he could only speak positively of the rules of this particular diocese, as they do not cover in their entirety the usages of other provinces, or even of other dioceses in this province of Ireland. One general and invariable rule indeed exists throughout Ireland, which ...
— Ireland Under Coercion (2nd ed.) (1 of 2) (1888) • William Henry Hurlbert
... if not even positively indispensable, to give some more general particulars about these chansons before analysing specimens or giving arguments of one or more; for they ...
— The Flourishing of Romance and the Rise of Allegory - (Periods of European Literature, vol. II) • George Saintsbury
... watched Jenny and Mr. Wren carry sticks and straws into that little hole until it seemed to him they were trying to fill the whole inside of the tree. Just watching them made Peter positively tired. Mr. Wren would stop every now and then to sing, but Jenny didn't waste a minute. In spite of that she managed to talk just ...
— The Burgess Bird Book for Children • Thornton W. Burgess
... the mind habituate itself to an unnatural state of excitement! My femme de chambre positively looked blank and disappointed this morning, when, on entering my chambre a coucher, she answered in reply to my question, whether any thing new had occurred during the night, "Non, miladi, positivement rien." Strange to say, I too felt desoeuvre by the ...
— The Idler in France • Marguerite Gardiner
... against the persons who had been engaged in this smuggling adventure. But it is here that Sir William Courtenay comes into the story. This gentleman, who had his seat at Powderham Castle, Devon, came forward and swore positively that the tubs, which the Lively was supposed to have picked up, had been seen floating off the coast. He himself was staying on a visit to Canterbury, and on that Sunday afternoon happened to be sailing about off the Kentish coast, and sighted the Lively about two o'clock. He kept her in ...
— King's Cutters and Smugglers 1700-1855 • E. Keble Chatterton
... altered his position, from looking at the window, and commenced walking away from it, Mr. Chillingworth's mind was made up. It was not Varney—of that he felt now most positively assured, and could have no doubt whatever ...
— Varney the Vampire - Or the Feast of Blood • Thomas Preskett Prest
... gentleman, taking off a white hat which was so full of papers that it would scarcely stick upon his head, 'there's not a moment to lose; I have a cab at the door. Sir Matthew Pupker takes the chair, and three members of Parliament are positively coming. I have seen two of them safely out of bed. The third, who was at Crockford's all night, has just gone home to put a clean shirt on, and take a bottle or two of soda water, and will certainly be with us, in time to address the meeting. He is a little excited by last night, but never ...
— The Life And Adventures Of Nicholas Nickleby • Charles Dickens
... said Burton amiably, "have it your own way, by all means. Henceforth and forever after, we positively decline to do our duty by you. But what is our duty to you? Answer me that, and then I ...
— Eve to the Rescue • Ethel Hueston
... we went to the castle, which stands on the rocks high above the town; but before we started to go there Jone inquired if the place was a ruin or not, and when he was told it was not, and that soldiers lived there, he said it was all right, and we went. He now says he must positively decline to visit any more houses out of repair. He is tired of them; and since he has got over his rheumatism he feels less like visiting ruins than he ever did. I tell him the ruins are not any more ...
— Pomona's Travels - A Series of Letters to the Mistress of Rudder Grange from her Former - Handmaiden • Frank R. Stockton
... daddies said plainly and positively: "Now, I can't let you go. No, Willie. That's the end of it. You can't go." Even those, I say, hoped against hope. It simply could not be that what the human heart so ardently longed for should be denied by a loving father. This ...
— Back Home • Eugene Wood
... "over the wall; you cannot help feeling the nitre. Indeed, it is very damp. Once more let me implore you to return. No? Then I must positively leave you. But I must first render you all the little attentions ...
— The Raven • Edgar Allan Poe
... slavery and hostile to the constitution. Not less distinctly does Herodotus speak, when he describes the revolution subsequently operated by Clisthenes—the latter (he tells us) found "the Athenian people excluded from everything." These passages seem positively to contradict the supposition, in itself sufficiently improbable, that Solon is the author of the peculiar democratical institutions of Athens, such as the constant and numerous dicasts for judicial trials and revision of laws. The genuine ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 1 • Various
... and merely wished to assist in the representation of a piece so new and so original as his was said to be. They all named a price which was excessively low, and assured him that they did so only for form's sake; positively refusing to accept any thing more, and leaving it to Langhetti either to take them on their own terms or to reject them. He, of course, could not reject aid so powerful ...
— Cord and Creese • James de Mille
... wrote to the Massachusetts Assembly that he had lost about eight hundred men, "more than three fourths of which were taken prisoners." He wrote the same thing to others. So Washington felt authorized to state positively that we lost in killed and wounded that day not over two hundred men and officers. "The enemy's loss in killed," he added, "we could never ascertain; but have many reasons to believe that it was pretty considerable, and exceeded ours a good deal." General ...
— The Campaign of 1776 around New York and Brooklyn • Henry P. Johnston
... quite starved and almost frozen. Indeed, had it not been for melancholy recollections of poor Ventvoegel's sad fate, and of that grim cave where he kept company with the old Dom, we should have felt positively cheerful, notwithstanding the sense of unknown dangers before us. Every mile we walked the atmosphere grew softer and balmier, and the country before us shone with a yet more luminous beauty. As for the road itself, I never ...
— King Solomon's Mines • H. Rider Haggard
... The water given to a horse merits some attention; it should not be too cold; hard water is not to be recommended; stagnant or muddy water is positively injurious; river water is the best for all purposes; and anything is preferable to spring water, which should be exposed to the sun in summer for an hour or two, and stirred up before using it; a handful of oatmeal thrown into the pail will much improve ...
— The Book of Household Management • Mrs. Isabella Beeton
... easy to talk, and I do feel grateful to Ernest for his thoughtfulness and kindness. But I am almost in rags, and need every cent of this money to make myself decent. I am positively ashamed to go anywhere, my clothes are so shabby. Besides, supposing I leave off sewing and all sorts of over-doing of a kindred nature, I must nurse baby, I suppose, and be up with him nights and others will have their cross days and their sick and father will have his. Alas, there ...
— Stepping Heavenward • Mrs. E. Prentiss
... the way, however, could he gain definite information that might assure him positively that the child was ahead of him. Not a single native they questioned had seen or heard of this other party, though nearly all had had direct experience with the Russian or had talked with ...
— The Beasts of Tarzan • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... "I have the best of reasons for knowing that ever since his arrival in Australia he has been shadowed. This morning he said he would only go for a short stroll before lunch, and I am positively certain, knowing my anxiety about him, he would not have remained away so long of his own accord without ...
— A Bid for Fortune - or Dr. Nikola's Vendetta • Guy Boothby
... wants; and when they desired to be made acquainted with the price of the articles, with which they were to be supplied, and proposed, that Captain Clerke should give bills to the amount on the Victualling-office in London, the major positively refused, and whenever it was afterward urged, stopped them short by saying, he was certain he could not oblige his mistress, the empress, more than in giving every assistance in his power to her good friends and allies, the English; and that ...
— Narrative of the Voyages Round The World, • A. Kippis
... brusquely, "you must not give way to despondency. I say positively, must not. You ...
— Jack Harkaway and his son's Escape From the Brigand's of Greece • Bracebridge Hemyng
... feeling of disappointment and shame, Frank took the proffered twenty-five dollars, after a long wrangle had convinced him that there was positively no more to be wrung from the pawnshop man. He left the shop with dragging feet, half inclined to go back and throw down the money with a demand for his watch. But the thought of Jardin deterred him. As he went out he could see the man leaning into the window where he rearranged the group of watches ...
— Battling the Clouds - or, For a Comrade's Honor • Captain Frank Cobb
... Froschammer, who has elevated the creative imagination to the rank of primary world-principle, asserts this positively. For him there is an objective or cosmic imagination working in nature, producing the innumerable varieties of vegetable and animal forms; transformed into subjective imagination it becomes in the human brain the source of ...
— Essay on the Creative Imagination • Th. Ribot
... To illustrate the fierce hostility of Whigs and Tories, a single anecdote will suffice. On one occasion, Horry had three men wounded near Georgetown. A surgeon of the Tories was then a prisoner in his ranks, yet he positively refused to dress the wounds, and suffered a fine youth named Kolb, to bleed to death before his eyes, from a slight injury upon ...
— The Life of Francis Marion • William Gilmore Simms
... "I positively have nothing," cried she, wearied with their importunities, "and I shan't get any winter things now till I return to town. My roquelaire does very well for ...
— Marriage • Susan Edmonstone Ferrier
... over-work herself. There is something feverish in her love of work; she can never do enough. No matter how late I go into her room at night, she is always finishing off some piece of work; and no matter how early I get up in the morning, she has already begun something new. If I had not positively forbidden it, she would keep at it even on a Sunday. It is a real source of anxiety to me, lest she should over-work ...
— Veronica And Other Friends - Two Stories For Children • Johanna (Heusser) Spyri
... Gold! Gold! I am positively blinded with the sight of gold. I'd seen every kind of decoration and furniture, I thought... but solid gold ...
— Prince Hagen • Upton Sinclair
... I am fallen that they should say that of me! I could not have been so brave for any one else, just because he was so utterly indifferent to me—if, indeed, I do not positively dislike him. It made me the more anxious that there should be fair play on each side; and I could see what fair play was. It was not fair, said she, vehemently, 'that he should stand there—sheltered, awaiting the soldiers, ...
— North and South • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... positively see the chateau," said M. Lacordaire, very impressively; and then after a pause he added, "If madame will have the complaisance to commission me to procure a carriage for this afternoon, and will allow me the honour to be her guide, I shall consider myself one of the most ...
— The Chateau of Prince Polignac • Anthony Trollope
... the mug, with a pair of eyes in it which seemed to command its whole circumference. It was impossible to drink out of the mug without being subjected to an intense gaze out of the side of these eyes; and Schwartz positively averred that once, after emptying it full of Rhenish seventeen times, he had seen them wink! When it came to the mug's turn to be made into spoons, it half broke poor little Gluck's heart; but the brothers only laughed at him, tossed the mug into the melting-pot, and staggered out to the ale-house; ...
— Stories of Childhood • Various
... waiting to be cut down for firewood! These little groves are peopled with wild pigeons and birds, which they designate here as blackbirds. These sometimes rise from the rice fields with a whirr of multitudinous wings, that is almost startling, and positively overshadow the ground beneath like ...
— Journal of a Residence on a Georgian Plantation - 1838-1839 • Frances Anne Kemble
... produced Mark's Reef, a story of the Crusoe genus, but far behind; the desert island being created 'positively for this occasion only,' and being swallowed up in the sea again when it has served Mark Woolston and the novelist's requirements. It is characterised, however, by much glowing description—especially that relating to the crater, with its noble peak, 'ever the same ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal Vol. XVII. No. 418. New Series. - January 3, 1852. • William and Robert Chambers
... Our glee was positively fiendish next day when watching Hambone wriggling uneasily in his clothes at parade. Gunboat had sent us an underground message telling us what he did, and we did not fail to recognize the symptoms at once; every moment he got a chance he was scratching himself; ...
— S.O.S. Stand to! • Reginald Grant
... twice as many petticoats as an ordinary lady does, and seldom exhibit more than their ankles. Unfortunately, municipal councillors persist in confusing decency with drapery; and both in London and the provinces certain positively edifying performances have been forbidden or withdrawn under pressure, and replaced by coarse and vicious ones. There is not the slightest reason to suppose that the Lord Chamberlain would have been any more tolerant; but this does not alter the fact that the municipal licensing authorities ...
— The Shewing-up of Blanco Posnet • George Bernard Shaw
... do so little. And there is no one here who cares to help me to any thing better. I don't know enough even to know how to improve myself. But I do want to. Will you help me, Mr. Halloway? Will you really help me?" She positively had tears shining ...
— Only an Incident • Grace Denio Litchfield |
