"Soil" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... sovereign, is built on a small elevation, on the banks of the Mosqua, over which there are several bridges; the castle and all the houses of the city being built of wood, which is procured from several thick forests near the place. The soil of this country is fertile, and produces abundance of corn of all kinds, which sell here much cheaper than with us; The country abounds in cattle and swine, and with incredible numbers of poultry, ducks, geese, and hares; but they have no venison, either because there are no ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. II • Robert Kerr
... old man! then still thy farms restored, Enough for thee, shall bless thy frugal board. What tho' rough stones the naked soil o'erspread, Or marshy bulrush rear its wat'ry head, No foreign food thy teeming ewes shall fear, No touch contagious spread its influence here. Happy old man! here 'mid th' accustom'd streams And sacred springs, you'll shun ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson - Volume IV [The Rambler and The Adventurer] • Samuel Johnson
... occupied the Country previous to the Hindus—Manners—Magars—Gurungs—Jariyas—Newars—Murmis— Kiratas—Limbus—Lapchas—Bhotiyas CHAPTER SECOND. Nature of the Country. Division into four regions from their relative 61 elevatiom—First, or Plain Region, or Tariyani—Soil—Productions, Animal and Vegetable—Cultivation—Climate—Rivers—Second, or Hilly Region—Productions—Minerals—Forests—Birds—Vallies called Dun—Cultivation—Climate—Third, or Mountainous Region—Elevation—Climate—Diseases—Cultivation—Pasture— Sheep and Cattle—Minerals—Spontaneous ...
— An Account of The Kingdom of Nepal • Fancis Buchanan Hamilton
... dropped a piece of money, or an ear-ring perhaps, in their hurry—just something to show us what had actually been here," said Cicely, grubbing about in the loose soil. ...
— The Manor House School • Angela Brazil
... Yorktown was formed on an elevated platform, nearly level, on the bank of the river, and of a sandy soil. On the right of the position, extended from the river, a ravine of about forty feet in depth, and more than one hundred yards in breadth; the center was formed by a horn-work of entrenchments; and an extensive redoubt beyond ...
— An Historical Account of the Settlements of Scotch Highlanders in America • J. P. MacLean
... the Dignity of the Farmer Of Buying a Farm Of the Duties of the Owner Of Laying out the Farm Of Stocking the Farm Of the Duties of the Overseer Of the Duties of the Housekeeper Of the Hands Of Draining Of Preparing the Seed Bed Of Manure Of Soil Improvement Of Forage Crops Of Planting Of Pastures Of Feeding Live Stock Of the Care of Live Stock Of Cakes ...
— Roman Farm Management - The Treatises Of Cato And Varro • Marcus Porcius Cato
... passed this way but a short while ago," he murmured, "but they were carrying a heavy burden: there are two kinds of footmarks, made by two kinds of shoes, and the heels have made much deeper marks in the soil than have the tips—yes, these men bore a ...
— Messengers of Evil - Being a Further Account of the Lures and Devices of Fantomas • Pierre Souvestre
... years, this program has consisted largely of payments to farmers for application of fertilizer and other approved soil management practices. I am convinced that farmers generally are now fully alert to the benefits, both immediate and long-term, which they derive from the practices encouraged by this program. I believe, therefore, that this subsidization ...
— State of the Union Addresses of Harry S. Truman • Harry S. Truman
... profit, or through fear of the world's disfavor; no slander of even an enemy; no coloring or perversion of the sayings or acts of other men; no insincere speech and argument for any purpose, or under any pretext, must soil his fair escutcheon. Out of the Chapter, as well as in it, he must speak the Truth, and all the Truth, no more and no less; or else ...
— Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry • Albert Pike
... of the noblest kind our own soil breeds; Stout are our men, and warlike are our steeds; Rome (tho' her eagle thro' the world had flown) Cou'd never make this ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) - Volume II • Theophilus Cibber
... perhaps fifty miles its greatest length, and thirty its greatest breadth; two elevated rocky barriers, meeting at an angle; three prominent mountains, commanding the plain,—Parnes, Pentelicus, and Hymettus; an unsatisfactory soil; some streams, not always full;—such is about the report which the agent of a London company would have made of Attica. He would report that the climate was mild; the hills were limestone; there was plenty ...
— Harvard Classics Volume 28 - Essays English and American • Various
... Countrymen! as I live, I will not buy a pin out of your walls for this; Nay, you shall cozen me, and I'le thank you; and send you Brawn and Bacon, and soil you every long vacation a brace of foremen, that at Michaelmas shall come up fat ...
— Philaster - Love Lies a Bleeding • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher
... rest turn to gaze after the fine-looking, lithe and active black, who stalked on, haughty of mien, without even seeming to give a thought to the English intruders upon his soil. ...
— Dead Man's Land - Being the Voyage to Zimbambangwe of certain and uncertain • George Manville Fenn
... the hated Sassenachs—that's what he calls you English—and he urges the fellows at home in the old country to fight for their rights. But since he made his fortune and became an American citizen the devil a foot has he ever put on Irish soil. He's always going, but he hasn't go there yet. And as for living there? Oh, no, America is good enough for him, because his interests are there. I want to live in Ireland because my heart is there. ...
— Defenders of Democracy • Militia of Mercy
... pragmatist talks of opinions, it is opinions as they thus concretely and livingly and interactingly and correlatively exist that he has in mind; and when the anti-pragmatist tries to floor him because the word 'opinion' can also be taken abstractly and as if it had no environment, he simply ignores the soil out of which the whole discussion grows. His weapons cut the air and strike no blow. No one gets wounded in the war against caricatures of belief and skeletons of opinion of which the German onslaughts upon 'relativismus' consists. Refuse to use the ...
— The Meaning of Truth • William James
... in some cases, be made by voluntary enlistment; but in most civilized countries, it has been found necessary to fill and recruit the army by conscription, thus forcibly endangering the lives of a portion of the citizens, in order to avert from the soil and the homes of the people at large the worse calamities of invasion, devastation, and conquest. So far as this is necessary, it is undoubtedly right, and the lives thus sacrificed are justly due to the safety and well-being of the ...
— A Manual of Moral Philosophy • Andrew Preston Peabody
... of life into these amiable brethren of wood and field. Because, by a stroke here and a touch there, you have conveyed into their quaint antics the illumination of your own inimitable humor, which is as true to our sun and soil as it is to the spirit and essence ...
— Uncle Remus • Joel Chandler Harris
... fruit which salvage soil hath bred; Which being through long wars left almost waste, With brutish ...
— Spenser - (English Men of Letters Series) • R. W. Church
... forming a sort of hedge on either side of the way. The branches met overhead, veiling the path in semi-obscurity, and so completely intercepting all but an occasional ray of the sun that the ground appeared to be in a perpetual state of dampness, the clayey soil being in consequence so much cut up, notwithstanding the small amount of traffic which seemed to pass over it, that it had become almost impracticable for foot-passengers. Here and there an old ...
— Under the Meteor Flag - Log of a Midshipman during the French Revolutionary War • Harry Collingwood
... digging away the foundations of the tomb." Hence the "great stone" which was set shows that "the tomb could not be opened except by the help of many hands. Again, if He had been buried in the earth, they might have said: They dug up the soil and stole Him away," as Augustine observes [*Cf. Catena Aurea]. Hilary (Comment. in Matth. cap. xxxiii) gives the mystical interpretation, saying that "by the teaching of the apostles, Christ is borne into the stony heart ...
— Summa Theologica, Part III (Tertia Pars) - From the Complete American Edition • Thomas Aquinas
... the American mind even for the most characteristic features of English life was a matter I meanwhile failed to get to the bottom of. The roots of it are indeed so deeply buried in the soil of our early culture that, without some great upheaval of feeling, we are at a loss to say exactly when and where and how it begins. It makes an American's enjoyment of England an emotion more searching than ...
— A Passionate Pilgrim • Henry James
... it come? From all nautical peoples. Not from the Hebrew race. To them the possession of the soil was a fixed idea. The sea itself had nothing wherewith to tempt them; they were not adventurers or colonizers; they had none of that accommodating temper as to creed, customs, and diet, which is the necessary characteristic of the sailor. But the nations ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 12, October, 1858 • Various
... possession of whose city, on account of its exceeding beauty, even gods are said to have contended: which is of such antiquity, that she is said to have bred her citizens within herself, and the same soil is termed at once their mother, their nurse, and their country: whose importance and influence is such that the name of Greece, though it has lost much of its weight and power, still holds its place by virtue of the renown ...
— Cicero - Ancient Classics for English Readers • Rev. W. Lucas Collins
... had been thrown on the ground, in a corner of the room, the bed was overturned and broken, all the straw had been torn from the mattress, and the wife and sons of the dead man, armed with pickaxes and spades, were wildly overturning the beaten soil that formed the floor of the hovel. They ...
— The Honor of the Name • Emile Gaboriau
... how to triumph over its enemies, even when superior forces oppose it; you it was, in short, who with intrepid valour co-operated in re-establishing a liberty which, torn from the ancient children of the soil, was converted by their oppressors into a hard and shameful tyranny. History has already consecrated her pages to you: she will record to posterity your heroic deeds, and congress has already busied itself in rewarding ...
— Life in Mexico • Frances Calderon De La Barca
... Jennings, began with Perry, according to his constant maxim, by examining the soil; that is, studying his temper, in order to consult the bias of his disposition, which was strangely perverted by the absurd discipline he had undergone. He found him in a state of sullen insensibility, which the child had gradually contracted ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett
... opened up, belching forth great dragons that destroyed the people. And indeed it was all like the vast crater of an extinct volcano, for hot springs bubbled forth and a grey ash cropped up through the shallow soil. ...
— The Trail of '98 - A Northland Romance • Robert W. Service
... steps backward toward the bullberry bushes near the camp. On the back trail I came upon some distinct and obvious footprints in a dusty place, but so deeply interested was I in hidden signs, the slight but tell-tale disturbances of leaf and soil, that I once passed these plainly marked tracks with only a glance and would have done so the second time had not their marked peculiarities ...
— The Black Wolf Pack • Dan Beard
... the world in their hands. The Portuguese were the first Europeans to understand that the ocean is not a limit, but the universal waterway that unites mankind. Shut in by Spain, they could not extend on land, and had no opening but the Atlantic. Their arid soil gave little scope to the territorial magnate, who was excluded from politics by the growing absolutism of the dynasty, and the government found it well to employ at a distance forces that might ...
— Lectures on Modern history • Baron John Emerich Edward Dalberg Acton
... history and less war have been accustomed to attribute Byron's lingering at Cephalonia to indolence and indecision; they write as if he ought on landing on Greek soil to have put himself at the head of an army and stormed Constantinople. Those who know more, confess that the delay was deliberate, and that it was judicious. The Hellenic uprising was animated by the spirit of a "lion ...
— Byron • John Nichol
... at the drawing (Fig. 28), of a burrow, with its side galleries, of the Andrena vicina, reveals the economy of one of our most common forms. Quite early in spring, when the sun and vernal breezes have dried up the soil, and the fields exchange their rusty hues for the rich green verdure of May, our Andrena, tired of its idle life among the blossoms of the willow, the wild cherry, and garden flowers, suddenly becomes remarkably industrious, and wields its spade-like jaws and busy feet ...
— Our Common Insects - A Popular Account of the Insects of Our Fields, Forests, - Gardens and Houses • Alpheus Spring Packard
... flowers, and every inducement offered, to engage the young ladies in this pursuit. No father, who wishes to have his daughters grow up to be healthful women, can take a surer method to secure this end. Let him set apart a portion of his yard and garden, for fruits and flowers, and see that the soil is well prepared and dug over, and all the rest may be committed to the care of the children. These would need to be provided with a light hoe and rake, a dibble, or garden trowel, a watering-pot, and means and opportunities ...
— A Treatise on Domestic Economy - For the Use of Young Ladies at Home and at School • Catherine Esther Beecher
... it was before Von Weber's body at last reached the Fatherland. The agonies of homesickness he had endured seemed to haunt even the cold clay. In 1841, a writer made an ardent appeal for the restoration of this glory of German song, to the German soil. The idea became a crusade. But it was not until 1844, and then chiefly by the aid of Wagner, then conductor in Dresden, and a close friend of Caroline and her children, that success was attained. The younger son, Alexander, had already ...
— The Love Affairs of Great Musicians, Volume 1 • Rupert Hughes
... great truth. We can plant or weed up, in the garden of our minds, whatever we will; we can "have it sterile with idleness," or fertilize it with industry, and it must ever be remembered that the more fertile the soil the more evil weeds will grow apace if we water and tend them. Our jealous worries are the poisonous weeds of life's garden and should be rooted out instanter, and kept out, until not a sign of them ...
— Quit Your Worrying! • George Wharton James
... soil and face of the country, its growth and vegetable productions, especially those not of the ...
— History of the Expedition under the Command of Captains Lewis and Clark, Vol. I. • Meriwether Lewis and William Clark
... More than once in the world's history the external semblances of such and such a society have been the same as those which have just been reviewed here, but it is mere semblance. In India, for example, foreign invasions and the influx and establishment of different races upon the same soil have occurred over and over again; but with what result? The permanence of caste has not been touched; and society has kept its divisions into distinct and almost changeless classes. After India take China. There too history exhibits conquests ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume II. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... first productions of every kind, out of which those who followed him have but selected some particular plants, each according to his fancy, to cultivate and beautify. If some things are too luxuriant it is owing to the richness of the soil; and if others are not arrived to perfection or maturity, it is only because they are overrun and oppressed by those ...
— The Iliad of Homer • Homer
... chanced to pass near a little village buried in the heart of the jungle. A man working on the small patch of cleared soil in which he and his fellows grew their scanty crops saw them, recognised Badshah and his male rider, and ran away shouting to the hamlet. Then out of it swarmed men, women, and children, the last naked, while only miserable rags clothed the skinny frames of their elders. All prostrated ...
— The Elephant God • Gordon Casserly
... obligations exist, in the Independence of the nation which was accomplished, in the government of the people which is established, in the institutions and laws, the arts, improvements, liberty and happiness which are enjoyed. The sword was beaten into the ploughshare, to cultivate the soil which its temper had previously defended, and the hill-tops shall now echo to the sea shore the gratulations of the independent proprietors of the land, to the common benefactor of all ranks and classes ...
— Memoirs of General Lafayette • Lafayette
... plastic, and year by year is undergoing metamorphic changes. The solidest rocks are day by day disintegrated slowly, but none the less surely, by wind and rain and frost, by mechanical attrition and chemical decomposition, to form the pulverized earth and clay. This soil is being swept away by perennial showers, and carried off to the oceans. The oceans themselves beat on their shores, and eat insidiously into the structure of sands and rocks. Everywhere, slowly but surely, the surface of the land is being worn away; its substance is being carried ...
— A History of Science, Volume 3(of 5) • Henry Smith Williams
... word of thanks for the money, Peter knocked the mould off his heavy boots, striking one against the other clumsily, and shuffled away across the bare soil. But when he had gone twenty yards he stopped, and came back slowly. "Good-bye, sir," he said with a rueful smile, ...
— The House with the Green Shutters • George Douglas Brown
... continued, as she paused, "when crowns, titles, swords, rifles and dreadnaughts shall be known only by history. When the earth and the fulness thereof shall belong to all Earth's people; and when its soil need be no longer fertilized with human blood, its crops no longer be brought forth watered ...
— The Air Trust • George Allan England
... against being handed over with the land to their traditional enemies. Were they serfs or subjects? has been asked on their behalf. Had Holland the right, the power, over freemen born, to say to them, 'You are our subjects, on our soil, and we have transferred the soil and with it your allegiance to England, whose sovereignty you will not be free to repudiate.' The Dutch colonist said 'No.' The English Government and the laws of the ...
— The Transvaal from Within - A Private Record of Public Affairs • J. P. Fitzpatrick
... learnt to breathe freer since I have been on English soil,' said Esclairmonde, smiling; 'but where I may rest ...
— The Caged Lion • Charlotte M. Yonge
... must be on the lowlands, seek a sandy or gravelly soil; and avoid those built over clay beds, or even where clay bottom is found under the sand or loam. In the last case, if drainage is understood, pipes may be so arranged as to secure against any standing water; but, unless this is done, the clammy moisture on walls, and ...
— The Easiest Way in Housekeeping and Cooking - Adapted to Domestic Use or Study in Classes • Helen Campbell
... of France, which have developed blight, transferred to California, take on fresh life and flourish. Those of the latter State, which show symptoms of exhausted life, renew their productiveness when in the soil of Europe. The same result relating to coffee is hoped for in Ceylon: with an exchange of seed, plentiful crops are confidently anticipated, a matter in which commerce ...
— Due West - or Round the World in Ten Months • Maturin Murray Ballou
... made upon this bastard neither parent nor anyone else is there to defend it. The husbandman will not seriously incline to sow his seed in such a hot-bed or garden of Adonis; he will rather sow in the natural soil of the human soul which has depth of earth; and he will anticipate the inner growth of the mind, by writing only, if at all, as a remedy against old age. The natural process will be far nobler, and will bring forth fruit in the minds of others as ...
— Phaedrus • Plato
... equally well known to be a kind of monarch in Hungary. Whatever novelist shall write the "Troubles of rank and riches," should take the prince for his hero. He has eight or nine princely mansions scattered over the empire, and in each of them it is expected, by his subjects of the soil, that his highness ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 327 - Vol. 53, January, 1843 • Various
... zone, running parallel with this, known as the Arable Steppes, which nearly resembles the American prairies, is almost as remarkable as the Black Lands. Its soil, although fertile, has to be renewed. But an amazing vegetation covers this great area in summer with an ocean of verdure six or eight feet high, in which men and cattle may hide as in a forest. It is these two zones in the heart of Russia that have fed millions of people for centuries, ...
— A Short History of Russia • Mary Platt Parmele
... results from uncontrolled cutting of trees for fuel; overgrazing; soil exhaustion; soil erosion; ...
— The 1999 CIA Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... predicted fate. "O my friends," said the youthful Sultan, "the rose cannot blossom without the thorn, nor life be unchequered by the frowns of fate. Grieve not, then, that trials await me, since the spirit of prudence and virtue blossoms fairest in a rugged soil." ...
— Eastern Tales by Many Story Tellers • Various
... nomadic peoples, who have a small trade in horses, arms, opium, wool and dates; but the cultivation of land is necessarily much neglected except for the supply of local needs. In many parts it is almost impossible, as for five or six winter months the soil is buried in snow, and the heat of the summer is unbearable. There seem to be no intermediate seasons. The people live mostly on the caravan traffic from Bagdad to various trading centres of Persia, and they manufacture coarse cloths, rugs and earthenware of comparatively ...
— Across Coveted Lands - or a Journey from Flushing (Holland) to Calcutta Overland • Arnold Henry Savage Landor
... was hustled out, protesting but not convinced. It is seldom the better side of human nature that lawyers see; nor is an attorney's office, or a barrister's chamber, the soil in which a luxuriant crop of confidence is grown. In common with many persons of warm feelings, but narrow education, Mr. Fishwick was ready to believe on the smallest evidence—or on no evidence at all—that the rich and powerful were leagued against his client; that ...
— The Castle Inn • Stanley John Weyman
... look upon himself as making a garden, wherein our Lord may take His delight, but in a soil unfruitful, and abounding in weeds. His Majesty roots up the weeds, and has to plant good herbs. Let us, then, take for granted that this is already done when a soul is determined to give itself to prayer, and has begun the practice ...
— The Life of St. Teresa of Jesus • Teresa of Avila
... carriage, filled with blankets and clothes for distribution, down to Irish Row, where the warm-hearted recipients blessed their "Lady bountiful" in terms more voluble and noisy than refined. Still, however unpromising, the soil bore good fruit. Homes grew more civilized, men, women, and children more respectable and quiet, while everywhere the impress of a woman's benevolent ...
— Elizabeth Fry • Mrs. E. R. Pitman
... Forefathers set foot on Plymouth soil on the 21st of December, according to the revised calendar. But the Mayflower herself did not enter the ...
— Old Plymouth Trails • Winthrop Packard
... right to exact tribute from Livonia. This province was a vast pasture on the Baltic, containing about seventeen thousand square miles, and inhabited by about five hundred thousand poor herdsmen and tillers of the soil. ...
— The Empire of Austria; Its Rise and Present Power • John S. C. Abbott
... commenced its embarkation more than a fortnight before the ratification, as a sort of overt proof of the good will of the French emperor to his new ally and recent enemy. In less than three months, on the 5th of July, the whole of the French army had abandoned the soil of Russia, On the 8th of August the last French soldier left Constantinople on the homeward voyage. The British army was more easily removed from its smaller number and its greater ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... the prisoners alive. But at this point we must stop. The details of what happened around those fires that night are not for the ordinary reader. It suffices to say that the darkest deed ever done on the soil of what is now the ...
— The Scouts of the Valley • Joseph A. Altsheler
... been long in use among the common people. Spirits were at first only imported from foreign countries, and were, by consequence, too dear for the luxuries of the vulgar. In time it was discovered, that it was practicable to draw from grain, and other products of our own soil, such liquors as, though not equally pleasing to elegant palates with those of other nations, resembled them, at least in their inebriating quality, and might be afforded at an easy rate, and ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, Vol. 11. - Parlimentary Debates II. • Samuel Johnson
... of the political game, with a son of the soil on the one side, and a "kid glove" politician on the other. A pretty girl, interested in both men, is ...
— The Adventures of Bobby Orde • Stewart Edward White
... with curious toil Her subterranean bed, Thinks not she plows a human soil, And mines among ...
— The Recreations of A Country Parson • A. K. H. Boyd
... suspense concerning its raw, multicoloured, and undisciplined army. Every few days arose rumours of a great battle fought on Virginia soil, corroborated by extras, denied next morning. During the last half of July such reports had been current daily, tightening the tension, frightening parents, wives, and sweethearts. Recent armed affrays had been called battles; the dead zouaves at Big Bethel, a ...
— Ailsa Paige • Robert W. Chambers
... the bank; and the farmer was there at the counter, pushing his notes across grudgingly—as does the man of all nations who has wrung his hard living out of the soil. "I hate these no-ates," he was saying. "They do-an't seem like money. But I doubt ...
— The Privet Hedge • J. E. Buckrose
... for her morning sup Of Heav'nly Vintage from the soil looks up, Do you devoutly do the like, till Heav'n To Earth ...
— Persian Literature, Volume 1,Comprising The Shah Nameh, The - Rubaiyat, The Divan, and The Gulistan • Anonymous
... progress. With perfect grace it sweeps onward, though less aspiring. Then fluttering imperceptibly, it points downward and with ever-increasing speed, approaches the earth, where, with a deep sigh, it sinks in the soil, quivers with spent energy, ...
— Hunting with the Bow and Arrow • Saxton Pope
... I yonder yet should move For thee my mortal feet."—"Oh!" she replied, "This is so strange a thing, it is great sign That God doth love thee. Therefore with thy prayer Sometime assist me: and by that I crave, Which most thou covetest, that if thy feet E'er tread on Tuscan soil, thou save my fame Amongst my kindred. Them shalt thou behold With that vain multitude, who set their hope On Telamone's haven, there to fail Confounded, more shall when the fancied stream They sought of Dian call'd: but they who lead Their navies, more ...
— The Divine Comedy, Complete - The Vision of Paradise, Purgatory and Hell • Dante Alighieri
... ruins of cliff-wall. Yet from time to time, as he rested, he saw the massive red walls growing higher and wilder, more looming and broken. He made note of the fact that he was turning and climbing. The sage and thickets of oak and brakes of alder gave place to pinyon pine growing out of rocky soil. Suddenly a low, dull murmur assailed his ears. At first he thought it was thunder, then the slipping of a weathered slope of rock. But it was incessant, and as he progressed it filled out deeper and from a murmur changed into ...
— Riders of the Purple Sage • Zane Grey
... the poor man dried his tears, that he told his wife to check her sobs, his children to come with him, and that he stood erect upon the soil with the power of a bull. He said to the rich: "Thou who oppressest me, thou art only man," and to the priest: "Thou who hast consoled me, thou hast lied." That was just what the antagonists of Christ desired. Perhaps they thought this was the way to achieve ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... (Saxicolae), on their first arrival on our shores, before they had alighted; and he has several times noticed little cakes of earth attached to their feet. Many facts could be given showing how generally soil is charged with seeds. For instance, Professor Newton sent me the leg of a red-legged partridge (Caccabis rufa) which had been wounded and could not fly, with a ball of hard earth adhering to it, and weighing six and a half ounces. The earth ...
— On the Origin of Species - 6th Edition • Charles Darwin
... believe that another such growth on the soil of Ohio deformed the face of nature and darkened the ...
— The Lincoln Story Book • Henry L. Williams
... dressmakers, stitching slops at racing speed for the warehouses. A few of the better sort, marked out by their face and figure, found their way to the tea-rooms and restaurants. But the Duchess had encouraged her daughter's belief that she was too fine a lady to soil her hands with work, and she strummed idly on the dilapidated piano while her mother roughened her fine hands with washing and scrubbing. This was in the early days, when Dad, threatened with starvation, had passed the hotels at a run to avoid temptation, for which he made amends by drinking ...
— Jonah • Louis Stone
... and destructive concussions which sometimes are produced at great depths beneath the surface of the soil, would seem to indicate that no force but that of electricity is adequate to account for the almost instantaneous desolation of wide tracts of the earth's surface. But we do not mean to say that the action of the terral ...
— Outlines of a Mechanical Theory of Storms - Containing the True Law of Lunar Influence • T. Bassnett
... which scarcely a shrub is to be seen; but a thick coat of grass covers it throughout its entire extent, with the exception of a few spots where the hollowness of the ground has collected a little moisture, or the meandering of some small stream or rivulet enriches the soil, and covers its banks with verdant ...
— Hudson Bay • R.M. Ballantyne
... River Euphrates in Assyria, and, after passing over some uninhabited country, they suddenly and unexpectedly threw their forces into the land of the so-called Commagenae. This was the first invasion made by the Persians from this point into Roman soil, as far as we know from tradition or by any other means, and it paralyzed all the Romans with fear by its unexpectedness. And when this news came to the knowledge of Belisarius, at first he was at a loss, but afterwards ...
— History of the Wars, Books I and II (of 8) - The Persian War • Procopius
... o'clock they had crossed the Black Mountains covered with pines and cedars, and the "Albatross" was over the appropriately named Bad Lands of Nebraska—a chaos of ochre-colored hills, of mountainous fragments fallen on the soil and broken in their fall. At a distance these blocks take the most fantastic shapes. Here and there amid this enormous game of knucklebones there could be traced the imaginary ruins of medieval cities with forts and dungeons, pepper-box turrets, ...
— Rubur the Conqueror • Jules Verne
... swift chariot, doth everything in order set. Unto this seat when thou art brought, thy country, which thou didst forget, Thou then wilt challenge to thyself, saying: 'This is the glorious land Where I was born, and in this soil my feet for evermore shall stand. Whence if thou pleasest to behold the earthly night which thou hast left, Those tyrants which the people fear will seem of their true ...
— The Theological Tractates and The Consolation of Philosophy • Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius
... it. As there is always more wretchedness below than there is brotherhood above, all was given away, so to speak, before it was received. It was like water on dry soil; no matter how much money he received, he never had ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... Boulogne. Of course, these new-comers are all accounted for as the produce of seeds brought by the German army. They will gradually die out; and yet some few may remain as permanent conquerors of the soil, since among the flora of Paris is still reckoned one plant whose seed was brought into France by some ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science - Vol. XI, No. 27, June, 1873 • Various
... had broken up sooner than he expected, so my father saw no reason why he should not grant my request, and let me have a canter on English soil, for on a day of truce we could cross the Border if we chose without the risk of being taken prisoners by Lord Scroope's men, and marched off to Carlisle Castle, while the English had a like privilege, and could ride ...
— Tales From Scottish Ballads • Elizabeth W. Grierson
... house. Objections to trees. Space between houses. Composition of soils. Cancer and soil conditions. Topography. Effects of cultivation. Made ground. Water in soil. ...
— Rural Hygiene • Henry N. Ogden
... world, and was consequently unable to join the adventurous party, but have learned the whole particulars from the mouth of an intimate friend, who formed a portion of it, and who obliged me with the tie of a cravat of one of the extraordinary inhabitants of the soil. His relation is to ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, No. - 287, December 15, 1827 • Various
... slice of Pedro's dried-apple pie when we git back, to make up for workin' you Sunday." The pinto tossed a pink muzzle and his master reached to pat the dusty, sweat-streaked neck. Alkali rose about them in clouds. Grit's trail, though blurred in the soft soil, was plain enough. The two riders went silently on at a steady walking gait. Talk in the saddle with men who make range-riding a business comes ...
— Rimrock Trail • J. Allan Dunn
... infinite toil, they crossed the weary leagues, lying at night with a single skin between them and the soil, for they travelled light; and Wyllard was limping painfully with his boots worn off his feet, when at length one morning they came into sight of a low promontory which rose against a stretch of grey, lifeless sea. His heart throbbed ...
— Hawtrey's Deputy • Harold Bindloss
... island, Newman observed that he thought it must be the crater of an extinct volcano, and that even the lapse of ages had allowed scarcely soil enough to collect on it, to permit of more than the scanty ...
— Old Jack • W.H.G. Kingston
... enormous oak, as if for the purpose of supporting the roof; it stands at a short distance from the entrance, and gives a certain air of wildness and singularity to that part of the cavern which is visible, which it would otherwise not possess. The floor is exceedingly slippery, consisting of soil which the continual drippings from the roof have saturated, so that no slight precaution is necessary for him who treads it. It is very dangerous to enter this place without a guide well acquainted with it, as, besides the black pit at the extremity, holes which have never been fathomed present themselves ...
— The Bible in Spain • George Borrow
... from the waters of the Thames, in the heart of the City, and grudged by modern economy as cumberers of the soil of Mammon, may be remarked an abortive little dingy cupola, surmounting two large round eyes which have evidently stared over the adjacent roofs ever since the Fire that began at ...
— Hopes and Fears - scenes from the life of a spinster • Charlotte M. Yonge
... were the days to which these anecdotes have carried me back. The dark guesses of some zealous Quidnunc met with so congenial a soil in the grave alarm of a titled Dogberry of our neighbourhood, that a spy was actually sent down from the government pour surveillance of myself and friend. There must have been not only abundance, but variety of these "honourable men" at the disposal of Ministers: ...
— Biographia Literaria • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... which extends from the Coquet to the Tees, about fifty miles from north to south, the surface of the soil exhibits the signs of extensive underground workings. As you pass through the country at night, the earth looks as if it were bursting with fire at many points; the blaze of coke-ovens, iron-furnaces, and coal-heaps reddening the sky to such a distance that the horizon ...
— Lives of the Engineers - The Locomotive. George and Robert Stephenson • Samuel Smiles
... soil, it appeared to me that the lands in native woods were considered as belonging to the king or (where the government was not monarchical) to the state. When any individual of free condition had the means ...
— Life and Travels of Mungo Park in Central Africa • Mungo Park
... considerable share for himself. But no! The idea of deriving any profit whatever from this affair inspired him with a feeling of disgust—honor triumphed over his naturally crafty and avaricious nature. It seemed to him that any money made in this way would soil his fingers; for he realized there must be some deep villainy under all this plotting and planning; he was sure of it, since Coralth was mixed up in the affair. "I will serve my guv'nor for nothing," he decided. "When a man is avenged, ...
— The Count's Millions - Volume 1 (of 2) • Emile Gaboriau
... thinner every day. You know what my income is; we could not change things much for the better by taking other rooms and moving to another part of the city, and we might find that we had changed for the worse. I propose that we go to the country and get our living out of the soil." ...
— Driven Back to Eden • E. P. Roe
... of the Industrial Canal one of the largest in the United States, but its construction solved a soil problem that was thought impossible. That of the Panama Canal is simple in comparison. The design is unique in many respects. The lock is a monument to the power of Man over the forces of Nature, and to the progress of a community ...
— The Industrial Canal and Inner Harbor of New Orleans • Thomas Ewing Dabney
... chance the rolling man struck the twisted little cedar that tried to keep its dying hold on the scanty soil half way up the rise. Caught by the seat of his stout trousers on one of the scrubby tree's broken branches, the unfortunate one was suspended in midair, kicking, floundering and yelling ...
— The Saddle Boys of the Rockies - Lost on Thunder Mountain • James Carson
... just at the crown, the hill was at its steepest, the boys stopped in amazement. Here was a trail with a vengeance! The roadside grass gave way to a sandy patch twenty yards long, and the patch was scored with long, dragging marks. Then Dick-pointed with his staff. There in the soft soil was the impression of a hand, and dark ...
— The Wolf Patrol - A Tale of Baden-Powell's Boy Scouts • John Finnemore
... and philosophers, as well as epic and dramatic heroes, from the artistic point of view; for those who act, as well as those who create and think, have, in those beautiful days of Greece, this plastic character. They are great and free, and have grown up on the soil of their own individuality, creating themselves out of themselves, and moulding themselves to what they were, and willed to be. The age of Pericles was rich in such characters; Pericles himself, Pheidias, Plato, above all Sophocles, Thucydides also, Xenophon ...
— The Renaissance - Studies in Art and Poetry • Walter Pater
... came lilting along with his tail up. "Ho! ho! That is your game, is it?" said he to himself, when he saw the trail of the Crocodile in the sandy soil. So he stood outside, and said aloud, "Bless my stars! What has happened? I don't half like to go in, for whenever I come home my wife ...
— The Junior Classics, Volume 1 • Willam Patten
... by the last Congress several cases have arisen in relation to works for the improvement of harbors which involve questions as to the right of soil and jurisdiction, and have threatened conflict between the authority of the State and General Governments. The right to construct a breakwater, jetty, or dam would seem necessarily to carry with it the power to protect and preserve such constructions. ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 3 (of 4) of Volume 5: Franklin Pierce • James D. Richardson
... delivered by Lord Mansfield, C.J., after some delay, and with evident reluctance.' The passage about the air of England that Campbell puts into Mansfield's mouth is found in Mr. Hargrave's argument on May 14, 1772, where he speaks of England as 'a soil whose air is deemed too pure for slaves to breathe in.' Lofft's Reports, p. 2. Mr. Dunning replied:—'Let me take notice, neither the air of England is too pure for a slave to breathe in, nor the laws of England have rejected servitude.' Ib. p. 12. Serjeant Davy rejoined:—'It ...
— The Life Of Johnson, Volume 3 of 6 • Boswell
... whole fabric of revolution. Dumouriez, beaten at Nerwinde by the prince of Saxe-Coburg, abandoned not only his last year's conquest, but fled from his own army to pass the remainder of his life on a foreign soil, and leave his reputation a doubtful legacy to history. Belgium, once again in the possession of Austria, was placed under the government of the archduke Charles, the emperor's brother, who was destined to a very brief continuance in this ...
— Holland - The History of the Netherlands • Thomas Colley Grattan
... deserve notice. Every family has a stone building, about forty feet square, in which they place their dead, the entrance being always walled up after each deposit: this mode of interment is peculiar to Deir el Kammar, and arose probably from the difficulty of excavating graves in the rocky soil on which it is built. The tombs of the richer Christian families have a small Kubbe on their summit. The name of this town, signifying the Monastery of the Moon, originates in a convent which formerly stood here, dedicated to the Virgin, who is generally represented in ...
— Travels in Syria and the Holy Land • John Burckhardt
... In North Essex, about three miles from Colchester, and covers an area of 400 acres. It is a flat place, that before the Enclosures Acts was a heath, with good road frontages throughout, an important point where small-holdings are concerned. The soil is a medium loam over gravel, neither very good nor very bad, so far as my judgment goes, and of course capable of ...
— Regeneration • H. Rider Haggard
... Glory" was raised on Cuban soil, and the welcome sight was Deceived with rousing cheers by the marines, who ...
— The Great Round World and What Is Going On In It, Vol. 2, No. 24, June 16, 1898 - A Weekly Magazine for Boys and Girls • Various
... viewing them here and yonder, and refusing to be localized in our love toward them, have not our spirits been rebuked, have they not known fear for ourselves, have they not pensively echoed the charge of some that we have no real roots in democracy, but are as plants in pots, and not as oaks in the soil of earth? If independency is a barrier to the essence of which it is supposedly a form, if superiority shuts us off from assimilation with popular movements and delivers us over to cliques, then these churches of ours[1] will end in a record of shame and ...
— The World's Great Sermons, Volume 10 (of 10) • Various
... flat, just under a steep wall of reddish cliff. Here he and Chuck Evans unhitched and here the horses were tethered. Helen looked about her curiously, and at first her heart sank. There was nothing to greet her but rock and sweltering patches of sand and gravelly soil, and sparse, harsh brush. She turned and looked back toward the sweep of Desert Valley; there she saw green fields, trees, grazing stock. It was like the Promised Land compared with this bleak desolate spot her father had chosen. She turned to him, words of expostulation ...
— The Desert Valley • Jackson Gregory
... creation that filled the narrow green aisles, and now imparted a strange vigor and excitement to her as she walked along. Meantime her guide was not conversationally idle. Now, no doubt, she had never seen anything like this before? It was ordinary wheat, only it was grown on adobe soil—the richest in the valley. These stalks, she could see herself, were ten and twelve feet high. That was the trouble, they all ran too much to stalk, though the grain yield was "suthen' pow'ful." She could tell that to her friends, for he reckoned she was the only young lady that had ever walked ...
— A Sappho of Green Springs • Bret Harte
... happened lately in France is an example. In 1848 a pure democracy was established there. During a short time there was reason to expect a general spoliation, a national bankruptcy, a new partition of the soil, a maximum of prices, a ruinous load of taxation laid on the rich for the purpose of supporting the ...
— Heart and Soul • Victor Mapes (AKA Maveric Post)
... free heart's hope and home! By angel hands to valor given; Thy stars have lit the welkin dome, And all thy hues were born in heaven. Forever float that standard sheet! Where breathes the foe but falls before us, With Freedom's soil beneath our feet, And Freedom's ...
— Poems Teachers Ask For • Various
... laws before their high reverential name, and term themselves "most sacred majesties." But may God be blessed, there is hope for human nature; for there is a powerful, free, mighty people here on the virgin soil of America, ready to protect the laws of man and of Heaven against the execrated ...
— Select Speeches of Kossuth • Kossuth
... wife now landed, and began to examine more particularly into the state of the swamp, near their place of concealment. Just at that spot, the bank of the river was higher than in most of the low land, and was dry, with a soil that approached sand. This was the place where the few young pines had grown. The dry ground might have covered four or five acres, and so many trees having been felled, light and air were admitted, in a way to render ...
— Oak Openings • James Fenimore Cooper
... entering in of the pavilion, all stained and trodden into the soil by the feet of passers-by, lay the royal banner of the Stewarts, so placed by headstrong James Douglas the younger, in contempt of both tutor and Chancellor, who, being but cowards and murderers, had usurped the power of ...
— The Black Douglas • S. R. Crockett
... them; or who, were this not the case, would think of providing them with food? It also frequently happens that poor parents prefer to sell their children to seeing them starve.(402) Hence the strange fact that most nations have the most rigid system of slavery precisely at the time that the soil produces food most readily. We need only cite the instance of the South Sea Islands, at the time of their discovery. In many negro countries, where the people have not yet learned to use animals for transportation, the lowest ...
— Principles Of Political Economy • William Roscher
... fuel, not food, not cleaning materials, as far as possible not time. The tuechtige Hausfrau would be made miserable by having to pay and feed a woman who put on gala clothes at midday, and did no work to soil them ...
— Home Life in Germany • Mrs. Alfred Sidgwick
... upon those of the Danube or Mississippi? Civilization depends on climate and agriculture. In Egypt the harvests may ordinarily be foretold and controlled. Of few other parts of the world can the same be said. In most countries the cultivation of the soil is uncertain. From seed-time to harvest, the meteorological variations are so numerous and great, that no skill can predict the amount of yearly produce. Without any premonition, the crops may be cut off ...
— History of the Intellectual Development of Europe, Volume I (of 2) - Revised Edition • John William Draper
... the men to play tricks like that. He kept his things in good order, and he counted them, and he was responsible for them, and it wasn't right that the men should take more things than they needed when his back was turned, and just soil them and mix them up with their own, so as to make ...
— Man Overboard! • F(rancis) Marion Crawford
... air of this narrow dell, Industry has contrived to enliven its steeps with habitations, to raise water by means of a wheel, and to cover the surface of the rocks with soil. By this means large crops of oats and flax are produced, and most of the huts have gardens adjoining, which are filled with poppies, seeming to thrive in ...
— Dreams, Waking Thoughts, and Incidents • William Beckford
... a navew, or variety of Rape (navus), should never be sown in a rich soil, wherein it would become degenerate and lose its shape as well as its dry agreeable relish. Horace advised field-grown Turnips as preferable at a banquet to those of garden culture. They may be safely eaten when raw, having been at one time much consumed ...
— Herbal Simples Approved for Modern Uses of Cure • William Thomas Fernie
... recurred: he chewed the cud of horrid hallucinations. He told Richard he must give up going about with him: people telling of their ailments made him so uncomfortable—the birds were so noisy, pairing—the rude bare soil sickened him. ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... India Buddhists whose minds were already steeped in Brahministic philosophy and mythology, who were more given to speculation and dreaming than to self-control and moral culture, and who mourned for the dead gods of Hinduism, the soil was already prepared for a growth wholly abnormal to true Buddhism, but altogether in keeping with the older Brahministic philosophies from which these dreamers had been but partially ...
— The Religions of Japan - From the Dawn of History to the Era of Meiji • William Elliot Griffis
... the outlines of the figure to the point of disfigurement; nor was every flower that blows acceptable as an offering. The gods were jealous and nice in their tastes, pleased, only with flowers indigenous to the soil—the ilima (pl. VI), the lehua, the maile, the ie-ie, and the like (see pp. 19, 20). The ceremony was quickly accomplished. As the company knotted the garlands about head or ...
— Unwritten Literature of Hawaii - The Sacred Songs of the Hula • Nathaniel Bright Emerson
... to boast that on one side she was sprung from kings and nobles, while on the other she was a daughter of the people, able, therefore, to understand the sentiments of the aristocracy and of the children of the soil, or even ...
— Famous Affinities of History, Vol 1-4, Complete - The Romance of Devotion • Lyndon Orr
... this article he will probably be informed for the first time that he is accused of having written an immoral story. The funny part of the incident was that the letter in question closed with the following: "I will admit that I have not read any of these books. I would not soil my mind by reading them; but I think the titles are quite sufficient to lead many a weak-minded person astray." I leave the reader ...
— The Building of a Book • Various
... surging streets Marched the brown ranks of toil, The grimy legions of the shops, The tillers of the soil; White-faced militia-men looked on, And women shrank with dread; 'Twas muscle against money ...
— Successful Recitations • Various
... galanto. so : tiel, tiamaniere. "—much", tiom. soak : trempi. soap : sap'o, -umi. sober : sobra, serioza. social : sociala. society : socio, societo. socket : ingo. sod : bulo. soda : sodo. sofa : sofo, kanapo. soft : mola, delikata. soil : tero. solder : luti. soldier : soldato, militisto. sole : sola; (fish) soleo; (foot) plando; (boot) ledplando. solemn : solena. solfa : notkanti. solicitor : advokato. solid : fortika; solida, malfluida. solidarity : solidareco. ...
— The Esperanto Teacher - A Simple Course for Non-Grammarians • Helen Fryer
... to seek repose. Mr. Ainslie decided upon purchasing a lot of land, lying some two miles north of the farm occupied by Mr. Miller. Although it was covered with a dense forest, its location pleased him, and the soil was excellent, and he looked forward to the time when he might there provide a pleasant home. They arrived at R. on the first of July. There were beside Mr. Miller but three other families in the settlement; but they were all very ...
— The Path of Duty, and Other Stories • H. S. Caswell
... the way through the deep snow to where the walls did not seem to be so high. At one spot the rain had washed down part of the soil. ...
— The Bobbsey Twins - Or, Merry Days Indoors and Out • Laura Lee Hope
... voyage of 1719, in which reference is made to the abundance of gold in the soil of California. In Hakluyt's Voyages, printed in 1599-1600, will be found much earlier notices on this subject. California was first discovered in the time of the Great Marquis, as Cortes was usually called. There are accounts of these early expeditions by Francisco ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 51, October 19, 1850 • Various
... professing Christians," I said. Then they asked if I thought America would get into it, and I answered, "Most assuredly." However the majority of them said no, and they also said that our American boys would never leave American soil to fight. I told them that our boys would not only go to Europe to fight, but to almost all the Islands of the sea. Then they asked how long I thought the war was going to last, and I told them "1949." A goodly number laughed me to scorn. ...
— Personal Experiences of S. O. Susag • S. O. Susag
... mention that it is not in itself an act of war to land marines on foreign soil. It was sending ashore the bluejackets at Vera Cruz that made it an act of war. To protect American lives and property in Nicaragua a battalion of marines landed there a few years ago. They had some sharp fighting, but it was not an act of war. Do you begin to see him as a ...
— The U-boat hunters • James B. Connolly
... time may grow again; Most naked plants renew both fruit and flower; The sorest wight may find release of pain, The driest soil suck in some moist'ning shower; Times go by turns and chances change by course, From foul to fair, from better hap to worse. The sea of Fortune doth not ever flow, She draws her favors to the lowest ebb; Her time hath equal times to come and go, Her loom doth weave the fine and coarsest web; ...
— The World's Best Poetry, Volume 3 - Sorrow and Consolation • Various
... large meadows which appeared to abound in animals, though the Indians around Slave Lake are in a state of great want. About noon we passed a sulphur-stream which ran into the river; it appeared to come from a plain about fifty yards distant. There were no rocks near it and the soil through which it took its course was composed of a reddish clay. I was much galled by the strings of the snowshoes during the day and once got a severe fall occasioned by the dogs running over one of my feet and, dragging me some distance, my snowshoe ...
— The Journey to the Polar Sea • John Franklin
... them hurried out of the office and down the steps of the police-station. In the roadway stood a long grey racing-car, caked with muds—grey mud, brown mud, red mud—from end to end. It looked as if it had brought samples of the soil of ...
— Arsene Lupin • Edgar Jepson
... they seemed to strike a sandier soil, more level country—indeed, the trail was following the contour of a high ...
— The Sagebrusher - A Story of the West • Emerson Hough |
