"Talent" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... tell you about the beginnings of his fortune. In the first place, honor to talent! Our friend is not a 'chap,' as Finot describes him, but a gentleman in the English sense, who knows the cards and knows the game; whom, moreover, the gallery respects. Rastignac has quite as much intelligence ...
— The Firm of Nucingen • Honore de Balzac
... "A very remarkable talent. I am positive of it," he went on. "Jewel," for here the child entered the room, "play the Spring Song for your ...
— Jewel's Story Book • Clara Louise Burnham
... Monthly Magazine. He continued his literary activity until his death, but his later stories were less striking than the earlier ones. He died at Reigate on the 3rd of January 1882 and was buried at Kensal Green. Ainsworth had a lively talent for plot, and his books have many attractive qualities. The glorification of Dick Turpin in Rookwood, and of Jack Sheppard in the novel that bears his name, caused considerable outcry among straitlaced elders. In his later novels Ainsworth confined himself to heroes less open to criticism. ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... making the most of the kind of atmosphere which a lay-figure and an easel create; and if at times she found the illusion hard to maintain, and lost courage to the extent of almost wishing that Herbert could paint, she promptly overcame such moments of weakness by calling in some fresh talent, some extraneous re-enforcement of the "artistic" impression. It was in quest of such aid that she had seized on Westall, coaxing him, somewhat to his wife's surprise, into a flattered participation in her fraud. ...
— The Descent of Man and Other Stories • Edith Wharton
... enlightening us; and the less we understood, the more gallantly, the more copiously, and with still the more explanatory gestures, Mapiao returned to the assault. We could see his vanity was on the rack; being come to a place where that fine jewel of his conversational talent could earn him no respect; and he had times of despair when he desisted from the endeavour, and instants of irritation when he regarded us with unconcealed contempt. Yet for me, as the practitioner of some kindred mystery to his own, ...
— In the South Seas • Robert Louis Stevenson
... and humility arise not from these qualities alone of the mind, which, according to the vulgar systems of ethicks, have been comprehended as parts of moral duty, but from any other that has a connexion with pleasure and uneasiness. Nothing flatters our vanity more than the talent of pleasing by our wit, good humour, or any other accomplishment; and nothing gives us a more sensible mortification than a disappointment in any attempt of that nature. No one has ever been able to tell what wit is, and to-shew why such a system of thought must ...
— A Treatise of Human Nature • David Hume
... yield. Marius and Cinna entered the gates, and again the streets ran blood; for every one who had given Marius cause to hate or fear him was hunted to the death without mercy, and with no respect to rank, talent, or former friendship. Cinna and Marius named themselves consuls for the year 86 without the form of election, [Footnote: See note on page 64.] but the firm constitution of the old hero was completely undermined by his sufferings and fatigues, and he succumbed to an attack of ...
— The Story of Rome From the Earliest Times to the End of the Republic • Arthur Gilman
... This so-called talent of hers led her into trouble on more than one occasion. I remember in her senior year at college she fell under the spell of a short, fat, greasy spook-reader with a strictly phony accent and all but gave her eye teeth away, until ...
— Each Man Kills • Victoria Glad
... universities, but finally settled at Athens, where she remained until the death of her companion, and attained to a great proficiency in the learning common to the time. After this she proceeded to Rome, and having by the talent she displayed in several disputes obtained the reputation of a learned divine, was, on the death of Leo IV., elected to fill the pontifical chair. This position she held for upwards of two years, but soon after the expiration of that time was delivered of a child ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 81, May 17, 1851 • Various
... took a lesson in music or painting. She was a real musician, and had a real talent for the piano. Prudhon and Isabey, who taught her drawing and painting, praised her talents. As Lamartine says: "When she entered her own rooms or the solitude of the gardens, she was once more a German woman. ...
— The Happy Days of the Empress Marie Louise • Imbert De Saint-Amand
... way of enlivening my spirits, I went to the Comedie, where they were playing Bajazet, one of Racine's excellent pieces. I was particularly struck by the charm and beauty, no less than the originality and talent, of the actress who took the part of Roxane. She expressed with a delightful naturalness the passion animating that character, and I shuddered as I heard her declaim in accents that were harmonious and ...
— The Merrie Tales Of Jacques Tournebroche - 1909 • Anatole France
... withdrawn with the consent of all parties, I should be glad. But when I look at the arguments against the title of these women to sit amongst us, I can not but consider them frivolous and groundless. The simple question before us is, whether these ladies, taking into account their credentials, the talent they have displayed, the sufferings they have endured, the journey they have undertaken, should be acknowledged by us, in virtue of these high titles, or should be shut ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume I • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage
... familiar to all the Elizabethan world. These allusions are certainly no proof 'of trained scholarship or scientific education.' In five years of contact with the stage, with wits, with writers for the stage, with older plays, with patrons of the stage, with Templars, and so on, a man of talent could easily pick up the 'general information'—now caviare to the general—which a genius like Shakespeare ...
— The Valet's Tragedy and Other Stories • Andrew Lang
... has been said, it would seem my friend, General Schenck, had found a disturbing element in the Secession ladies of Baltimore, and in some way suffered from it. His description of them, and the emphasis with which he had dwelt upon their remarkable talent for mischief in general, I accepted as a warning, and ...
— Between the Lines - Secret Service Stories Told Fifty Years After • Henry Bascom Smith
... drawings may be truthfully said to illustrate the writer's ideas—a quality that seldom resides in illustrations.... All are faithfully presented as only one who has known them intimately could present them.... Mr. Boyd's talent for black-and-white work has ...
— A Versailles Christmas-Tide • Mary Stuart Boyd
... Hebrew characters within and without. The lady pressed it reverentially to her lips, and then resumed her seat, with the sacred roll laid across her knees. Abishai regarded with respect, almost amounting to awe, a woman to whom had been given the talent, wisdom, and courage to transcribe so large a portion of the oracles of God. He felt as Barak may have done towards Deborah, and stood leaning against the wall, listening with respectful attention to the words ...
— Hebrew Heroes - A Tale Founded on Jewish History • AKA A.L.O.E. A.L.O.E., Charlotte Maria Tucker
... to gain credit for himself by forcing a boy along his own line, but should consider the special talent of each boy, and the way in which he can gain most success. Too often the teacher, thinking only of his own subject, forgets that the boy has to learn many subjects. The one on which most stress should ...
— Education as Service • J. Krishnamurti
... most intelligent and efficient officers. Mr. William E. Chandler, though only twenty-nine years of age, was appointed First Assistant Secretary in March, 1865, and exhibited great aptitude, discrimination, and ability in his position. He developed an admirable talent for details, a quick insight into the most difficult problems that came before the Department, and at all times an honorable devotion to public duty. The Bureau of Internal Revenue, the most important of the Treasury Department, was under the ...
— Twenty Years of Congress, Volume 2 (of 2) • James Gillespie Blaine
... quarrels with it. We respect an owl or a raven, though we mayn't love him, while he sticks to his croak or to-whoo. 'Tisn't pleasant, but quite natural and unaffected, and we acquiesce. All we ask of these gentlemanlike birds is, that they mistake not their talent—affect not music; or if they do, that they treat not us to their ...
— The House by the Church-Yard • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... even in the time of the Romans: how important and lucrative an object it was considered, may be collected from the attention that was paid to the breed of sheep; a ram, according to Strabo, having been sold for a talent, or nearly 200l. Horace incidentally gives evidence of the commercial wealth of Spain in his time, when he considers the master of a Spanish trading vessel and a person of ...
— Robert Kerr's General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 18 • William Stevenson
... famous Italian milliner, who, by way of vindicating to all customers her familiarity with Paris fashions, adopted a French title, and called herself the Demoiselle Grifoni. She was a wizen little woman with a mischievous face, a quick tongue, a nimble foot, a talent for business, and an uncertain disposition. Rumor hinted that she was immensely rich, and scandal suggested that she would ...
— After Dark • Wilkie Collins
... Its scope will be enlarged by articles relating to our public defences, Army and Navy, gunboats, railroads, canals, finance, and currency. The cause of gradual emancipation and colonization will be cordially sustained. The literary character of the Magazine will be improved, and nothing which talent, money, and industry combined ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2 No 4, October, 1862 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... of yours was a classic, Torchy; the true Chesterfield spirit, if not the form. I am tempted to utilize your talent for that sort of thing once more. What do ...
— Torchy, Private Sec. • Sewell Ford
... hand; one consulted the public. Literature to them was sold. They were not deeply concerned about absolute standards of right and wrong, about works of imagination which justify an entire civilization, about the problem of tradition and the individual talent. Accordingly, they explained satire, with the only vocabulary they had, as the expression of ingratitude, purely personal malice, and demonic pride, the product of a diseased heart and ...
— Two Poems Against Pope - One Epistle to Mr. A. Pope and the Blatant Beast • Leonard Welsted
... having a natural turn for them, learn them easily and enjoy them much. They ought, therefore, to be cultivated by all such persons. My objection is solely to the practice of rendering them the main substance of the education bestowed on young men who have no taste or talent for them, and whose pursuits in life will not render ...
— Practical Essays • Alexander Bain
... all the original colonies, we find this to be the case. But, as Americans, we must reject both what our fathers brought and what they found. Two thousand specimens of the American talent for nomenclature, then, we can exhibit. Walk up, gentlemen! Here you have the top-crest of the great wave of civilization. Hero is a people, emancipated from Old-World trammels, setting the world a lesson. What is the result? With the grand divisions of our land we have not had much to ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 30, April, 1860 • Various
... the conclusion that I overrated my powers, as amateurs will, you know, and that I have never really possessed any special talent in that direction. I think I shall take up golf instead, ...
— The Prophet of Berkeley Square • Robert Hichens
... things, but yet treat them with that sort of Respect which flows from the Heart and the Understanding, but is exerted in no Professions or Compliments. This Puppy, to imitate this Excellence, or avoid the contrary Fault of being troublesome in Complaisance, takes upon him to try his Talent upon me, insomuch that he contradicts me upon all Occasions, and one day told me I lied. If I had stuck him with my Bodkin, and behaved my self like a Man, since he won't treat me as a Woman, I ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... a manuscript journal, kept by Morrison, the boatswain's mate, who was tried and convicted as one of the mutineers, but received the king's pardon, the conduct of Bligh appears in a very unfavourable point of view. This Morrison was a person, from talent and education, far above the situation he held in the Bounty; he had previously served in the navy as midshipman, and, after his pardon, was appointed gunner of the Blenheim, in which he perished with Sir Thomas Troubridge. In comparing this journal with other ...
— The Eventful History Of The Mutiny And Piratical Seizure - Of H.M.S. Bounty: Its Cause And Consequences • Sir John Barrow
... books in which never boy before took interest—histories, theological works, and, in preference, parliamentary speeches of the great orators, which he would afterwards rewrite from memory. At a very early age he showed a great passion for poetry and was a great reader of Shakespeare. His talent for reading passages of Shakespeare aloud was such that at the school at Liverpool, where he was educated, his schoolmaster, George Gill, used to make him read aloud before all the boys. This caused him great nervous agony, he says, and he suffered horribly. ...
— McClure's Magazine December, 1895 • Edited by Ida M. Tarbell
... people called Friends did not like the making of pictures, as I said. But they thought that Benny West had a talent that he ought to use. So he went to Phil-a-del-phi-a to study his art. After a while he sailed away to It-a-ly to see the pictures that great ...
— Stories of Great Americans for Little Americans • Edward Eggleston
... of humour is purely natural, so is humour itself, neither is it a talent confined to men of wit, or learning; for we observe it sometimes among common servants, and the meanest of the people, while the very owners are often ignorant of the gift ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D. D., Volume IX; • Jonathan Swift
... the Fulton newspaper, however, spoke of us with respect. Let him be honored. He condemned the mob, opposed amalgamation, but described the parties thus,—"Miss King, a young lady of talent, education, and unblemished character," and myself, "a gentleman, a scholar, and a Christian, and a citizen against whose character nothing ...
— The American Prejudice Against Color - An Authentic Narrative, Showing How Easily The Nation Got - Into An Uproar. • William G. Allen
... study. Under such a giant impulse our society could not but advance with enormous strides in all that pertains to true civilization, since thinkers would then be the rule instead of the exception, and talent almost universal, which is now, like angels' visits, comparatively 'few and far between.' This is no Utopian vision: it is a reality within the scope of human exertion and the capacity of our people of to-day, if men would but exert themselves to such an end, and properly apply the energy and ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 6, No 2, August, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... of more than ordinary business ability, and has, throughout his long commercial life, so directed his talent as to preserve an unsullied character, and enjoy the unlimited confidence of his fellow citizens, in addition to a handsome competence. Speculations were always avoided by him, because he believed that, in a young and healthy country like this, men may ...
— Cleveland Past and Present - Its Representative Men, etc. • Maurice Joblin
... an innocent one, and one, therefore, that is being made to suffer a grievous wrong. I wish to say so here publicly; I wish, too, to say publicly that I mean to see that you have at your disposal the best legal talent procurable." ...
— The Paternoster Ruby • Charles Edmonds Walk
... Gordon, the rival in beauty and talent to Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire, was born in Wigtonshire, in Scotland. Her father, Sir William Maxwell of Monreith (anciently Mureith), represented one of the numerous families who branched off from the original stock—Herbert ...
— Beaux and Belles of England • Mary Robinson
... attain a laudable object or ambition, and allows of no permanent rebuffs, but comes back at it, again and again—the result is absolutely certain and he need have no worry as to the ultimate success, because it is up to him to use and develop his talent, but the result is with his Creator who first gave him his talent to work on and first prompted his ambition for the materially hidden but ultimate good of the Universe—then I agree ...
— The Spoilers of the Valley • Robert Watson
... politicians. So lately as the early part of the year 1848, their opinions were generally accepted throughout Italy. They were, at that time, also the most powerful party. Their numbers, authority and talent, gave them a decided superiority, whilst the Republicans were still a weak minority. In a few months, to all appearance, everything was completely changed. Talent, respectability, authority, and influence, were still on the side ...
— Pius IX. And His Time • The Rev. AEneas MacDonell
... with talents. "God hath given to thee one portion above thy brethren." What use do you make of the talent ...
— The Village Pulpit, Volume II. Trinity to Advent • S. Baring-Gould
... intends that he shall be trained to follow in his footsteps. The boy has a dislike for that calling or profession,—a dislike that was born with him and which nothing can remove. His taste runs in a wholly different channel; whatever talent he has lies there. While it may be convenient for him to step into his parent's shoes, yet he should never be forced to do so, but be allowed to select that for which he has an ability and toward which he is drawn. Parents make such ...
— The Jungle Fugitives • Edward S. Ellis
... seems indeed to have a turn for this species of Nursery Tales and prattling Lullabies; and, if he will studiously cultivate his talent, he need not despair of figuring in a conspicuous corner of Mr NEWBERY's shop window: unless indeed Mrs. TRIMMER should think fit to proscribe those empty levities and idle superstitions, by which the World has ...
— An English Garner - Critical Essays & Literary Fragments • Edited by Professor Arber and Thomas Seccombe
... Ireland, he at last left for America again, and plunged into a new, interesting, and vigorous life, one that suited well his energetic nature. He found work on the great railway that was being built across the plains to the Pacific Coast. He started as an engineer's assistant, but soon his talent for managing men caused his employers to put him in charge of gangs of workmen who were often difficult and lawless. He did not object; indeed he liked the new job better than that he began with. He was more ...
— The Eye of Dread • Payne Erskine
... Churches have not done what they might in drawing out this talent in women, and using it for the good of the world. Indeed, while quoting and straining the writings of the apostles to suit their own narrow views, those who have given tone to the various branches of the Christian Church, and virtually fixed the position ...
— Woman: Man's Equal • Thomas Webster
... town of Issus; he describes Armenia Minor as a very unhealthy place, the inhabitants of which, though once valiant, are now cowardly and wretched, their only talent seeming to lie in their capacity for drinking to excess. From Armenia Minor he went to Turcomania, whose inhabitants, though somewhat of savages, are clever in cultivating pastures and breeding horses and mules; and the townspeople excel in the manufacture of carpets and silk. Armenia Proper, ...
— Celebrated Travels and Travellers - Part I. The Exploration of the World • Jules Verne
... was "desolated" to hear that Barbara's visit was really drawing to a close, and assured her aunt that a few more months would make Barbara a "perfect speaker; for I have never known one of your nation of such talent ...
— Barbara in Brittany • E. A. Gillie
... by the honorable gentleman on the character of the State of South Carolina, for her Revolutionary and other merits, meets my hearty concurrence. I shall not acknowledge that the honorable member goes before me in regard for whatever of distinguished talent, or distinguished character, South Carolina has produced. I claim part of the honor, I partake in the pride, of her great names. I claim them for countrymen, one and all,—the Laurenses, the Rutledges, the Pinckneys, the Sumters, the Marions,—Americans ...
— The American Union Speaker • John D. Philbrick
... proposed to a thriving weekly paper, the "Saturday Post," to send letters of travel, which might even be made into a book later on. George Reese, owner of the "Post," agreed to pay five dollars each for the letters, which speaks well for his faith in Samuel Clemens's talent, five dollars being good pay for that time and place—more than the letters were worth, judged by present standards. The first was dated Cincinnati, November 14, 1856, and was certainly not promising ...
— The Boys' Life of Mark Twain • Albert Bigelow Paine
... don't mean that Myra was merely flippant and worthless. Not at all. She was a girl with any amount of talent. You should have heard her recite "The Raven," at the Methodist Social! Simply genius! And when she acted Portia in the Trial Scene of the Merchant of Venice at the High School concert, everybody in Mariposa admitted that you couldn't have told ...
— Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town • Stephen Leacock
... then her heart burnt within her as she thought of the succulent, comfortable meals which Sylvia provided every day—nay, three times a day—for the household in the market-place, at the head of which Philip ought to have been; but his place knew him not. For Sylvia had inherited her mother's talent for housekeeping, and on her, in Alice's decrepitude and Hester's other occupations in the shop, devolved the cares of due provision ...
— Sylvia's Lovers, Vol. III • Elizabeth Gaskell
... they also had an eye to a comely young man; but the cunning Lydia they kissed and embraced, and called "dear" with much zeal. Mrs. Vrain, on her part, darted from one to the other like a bird, pecking the red apples of their cheeks, and cast an arch glance at Lucian to see if he admired her talent for manoeuvering. Then cake and wine, port and sherry, were produced in the style of early Victorian hospitality, from which epoch Mrs. Pegall dated, and all went merry as a marriage bell, while Lydia laid her plans to ...
— The Silent House • Fergus Hume
... "A man of talent and reputation, if he allows himself to be peevish and censorious, scares young people, makes them think evil of virtue, and frightens them with the idea of an excessive reform and a tiresome strictness of ...
— Three French Moralists and The Gallantry of France • Edmund Gosse
... never been anybody but you in the world for me—never a ghost of a woman, never even a friend since my mother died and yours. Between that time and the night I first saw you at Lady Cray's concert, I can scarcely be said to have lived at all. I fed on scraps of remembrance. You see I have no talent for making new friends, but oh, such a genius for fidelity to old ones! I was waiting for Mimsey to come back again, I suppose, the one survivor to me of that sweet time, and when she came at last I was too stupid to recognize her. She suddenly blazed and ...
— Peter Ibbetson • George du Marier et al
... would have thee? unless 'twere an oysterwoman to propagate young fry for Billingsgate—thy talent will never recommend thee to ...
— The Comedies of William Congreve - Volume 1 [of 2] • William Congreve
... language as well; he was indeed one of those who have improved it, but he could never have himself arrived at the degree of perfection in which he found it, had he not derived assistance from others, and made himself intimately acquainted with our purest national works of talent. Thus, he could never have been so ignorant as he is said to have been of ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 19, - Issue 552, June 16, 1832 • Various
... Anne of Bohemia, wife of Richard II., he eulogizes the sex and paints the most exalted sentiments of the heart. He not only had great vividness in the description of his characters, but doubtless great dramatic talent, which his age did not call out. His descriptions of nature are very fresh and beautiful, indicating a great love of nature,—flowers, trees, birds, lawns, gardens, waterfalls, falcons, dogs, horses, with whom he almost talked. He had a great sense of the ridiculous; hence his humor ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume VI • John Lord
... and having no candid construction to expect from his laughing companions, he bursts at once, and with all his might, into the most unweighed and preposterous fictions, determined to put to proof on this occasion his boasted talent of swearing truth out of England. He tried it here, to its utmost extent, and was unfortunately routed on his own ground; which indeed, with such a mine beneath his feet, could not be otherwise. But without this, he ...
— Eighteenth Century Essays on Shakespeare • D. Nichol Smith
... Temple, gave a breakfast at his chambers in Fig Tree Court, when Mr. Warrington read part of his play, and the gentlemen present pronounced that it had uncommon merit. Even the learned Mr. Johnson, who was invited, was good enough to say that the piece had showed talent. It warred against the unities, to be sure; but these had been violated by other authors, and Mr. Warrington might sacrifice them as well as another. There was in Mr. W.'s tragedy a something which reminded him both of Coriolanus and Othello. "And two very good things too, sir!" the author pleaded. ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... copies of them: at present, though they have no more than those I have mentioned, yet, by several impressions, they have multiplied them into many thousands. If any man was to go among them that had some extraordinary talent, or that by much travelling had observed the customs of many nations (which made us to be so well received), he would receive a hearty welcome, for they are very desirous to know the state of the whole world. Very few go ...
— Utopia • Thomas More
... talent possessed by our divine Caesar?" asked Petronius, smiling. "He would appear in the Olympic games, as a poet, with his 'Burning of Troy'; as a charioteer, as a musician, as an athlete,—nay, even as a dancer, and would receive in every case all the ...
— Quo Vadis - A Narrative of the Time of Nero • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... extend to the professors and practisers of Art. Surveying the past, one cannot but note that often patronage and public favour have been strangely perverted—now cruelly withheld, now recklessly bestowed. Here genius, or a measure of talent nearly amounting to genius, has languished neglected and suffering—here charlatanry has prospered triumphantly. Something of this kind may be happening now amongst us, or may occur again by and by. Acquaintance with the past history ...
— Art in England - Notes and Studies • Dutton Cook
... suggested that Lamb should write her epitaph, for in his next letter he says:—"I have ventured upon some lines, which combine my old acrostic talent (which you first found out) with my new profession of epitaphmonger. As you did not please to say, when you would die, I have left a blank space for the date. May kind heaven be a long ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb IV - Poems and Plays • Charles and Mary Lamb
... year of his term, and he wished to prove to the Colonial Office that "his talent" had not been laid up in a napkin, but that he had left the colony with an excess of income over expenditure. To obtain this income he fished up all the oysters, ruined the fishery in consequence; and from that day to the present time ...
— Eight Years' Wandering in Ceylon • Samuel White Baker
... call, Captain Hocken, the style of the approach. Style, sir, has been defined by my brother, Mr Joshua Benny—You may have heard of him, by the way, as being prominently connected with the London press. . . . No? A man of remarkable talent, though I say it. They tell me that for lightness of touch in a Descriptive Middle, it would be hard to find his match in Fleet Street. . . . As I was saying, sir, my brother Joshua has defined style as the art of speaking or writing ...
— Hocken and Hunken • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... everything which comes under the head of artistic products is the result of domestic industry. The beauty and simplicity of many of these things is surprising, and yet they have required neither unusual talent or careful training. They are simply the result of the habit of production, and their value is in the personal expression we find in them. They have always this advantage over mechanical manufacture, and can be ...
— How to make rugs • Candace Wheeler
... delighted, and sometimes surprised, those who heard her; a readiness and fluency that are seldom equalled. Learn, then, from her, my friends, to exercise your faculties, whatever they may be. In this way only can you improve, or even retain them. If you have but one talent of any sort, it may not, with impunity to itself—it may not, without sin to you—be wrapped in a napkin. And sigh not for higher powers or opportunities, until you have fully and faithfully exercised and improved such as you have. ...
— The Ladies' Vase - Polite Manual for Young Ladies • An American Lady
... serve, when all that we design Is but to gratify an itching ear, And give the day to a musician's praise. Remember Handel! who, that was not born Deaf as the dead to harmony, forgets, Or can, the more than Homer of his age? Yes—we remember him; and, while we praise A talent so divine, remember too That His most holy Book from whom it came Was never meant, was never used before To buckram out the memory of a man. But hush!—the muse perhaps is too severe, And with a gravity beyond the size ...
— The Task and Other Poems • William Cowper
... know," said Queenie Crood determinedly, "is that I've got a natural talent for acting. And I'd get on—if only I could get away from this place. I will get away!—if only somebody would give me a bit of advice about going to London and getting—you know—getting put in the way of it. I don't care how hard the life is, nor how hard I'd ...
— In the Mayor's Parlour • J. S. (Joseph Smith) Fletcher
... great natural facility, and when the fact is once recognized that beauty—like education—can dignify any circumstances, from the narrowest to the most opulent, it becomes one of the objects of life to secure it. How this is done depends upon the talent and cultivation of the family, and this is often ...
— Principles of Home Decoration - With Practical Examples • Candace Wheeler
... was the 'sand magazine'; Fraser's nearer approach to possibility of life was the 'mud magazine'; a piece of road near by that marked some failed enterprise was 'the grave of the last sixpence.' When too much praise of any genius annoyed him, he professed hugely to admire the talent shown by his pig. He had spent much time and contrivance in confining the poor beast to one enclosure in his Pen; but pig, by great strokes of judgment, had found out how to let a board down, and had foiled him. For all that, ...
— The Correspondence of Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson, - 1834-1872, Vol. I • Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson
... think you do, Bob. Mr. Tulloch certainly intimated, to me, that you had a remarkable talent that way, if in no other. Besides, your face tells its own story. Pickle is marked upon it, as plainly ...
— Held Fast For England - A Tale of the Siege of Gibraltar (1779-83) • G. A. Henty
... occurred in innumerable instances as regards Australia. The men going thither must in general be shepherds or their masters; and to be either to any purpose, they must go far into the bush. For this they required a talent for constructing huts for themselves and servants, and hurdles for the cattle, and consequently tools to assist them; but they often went without either tools or talents, and so had to pay extravagantly for very common services. They may have had common ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 424, New Series, February 14, 1852 • Various
... oppressed his spirits so that when he sould have risen he was found dead in very truth. As also 3ly of a certain Italian painter who being to draw our Saviour as he was upon the Cross in his greatest torment and agony (he caused a comoedian whose main talent was to represent sorrow to the life), he caused one come and sit doune before him and feigne one of the dolfullest countenances that he could that he might draw Christ of him; but he tuise sticked it, wt which being angred he drew out a knife and stobbed the ...
— Publications of the Scottish History Society, Vol. 36 • Sir John Lauder
... ready to echo her delight. Housekeeping and homemaking, in all its ways, was her lovable talent. It was really Antonia who saw all the plans and the desires of the Senora thoroughly carried out. It was her clever fingers and natural taste which gave to every room that air of comfort and ...
— Remember the Alamo • Amelia E. Barr
... beyond the Chickahominy and its swamps, beyond forest and farm land, lay Richmond under the stars. Eastwardly, within and without its girdling earthworks, that brilliant and histrionic general, John Bankhead Magruder, El Capitan Colorado, with a lisping tongue, a blade like Bayard's, and a talent for drama and strategy, kept General McClellan under the impression, confirmed by the whole Pinkerton force, that "at least eighty thousand men" had remained to guard Richmond, when Lee with "at least eighty thousand men" had crossed the Chickahominy. Richmond knew better, but Richmond was stoically ...
— The Long Roll • Mary Johnston
... young fellow, only fourteen years of age, went to Magdalen College at Oxford, and in the same year displayed his budding talent by writing The Age of Sesostris, Conqueror of Asia, which work he burnt ...
— When Winter Comes to Main Street • Grant Martin Overton
... of the musician is not one of mere talent, or of a certain sensual refinement and dexterity. It involves deep systematic study, closely akin to that of the severer sciences. It has a sequence and logic of its own, and excellence in it is unattainable without good sense and strong intellect. It involves great ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, Number 361, November, 1845. • Various
... upon by the artifices of his servant: although I have smelt out this too, that they are about that, {and} are secretly planning it among them. Syrus is {always} whispering with that {servant} of yours;[57] they impart their plans to the young men; and it were better for you to lose a talent this way, than a mina the other. The money is not the question now, but this— in what way we can supply it to the young man with the least danger. For if he once knows the state of your feelings, that you would sooner part with your life, and sooner with ...
— The Comedies of Terence - Literally Translated into English Prose, with Notes • Publius Terentius Afer, (AKA) Terence
... and wise Will hold his subjects all of consequence, And know in each what talent lies. There's nothing useless to a ...
— The Talking Beasts • Various
... was not fair to expect him to feel how very much he was her inferior in talent, and all the elegancies of mind. The very want of such equality might prevent his perception of it; but he must know that in fortune and consequence she was greatly his superior. He must know that the Woodhouses had been settled for several generations at Hartfield, the younger branch ...
— Persuasion • Jane Austen
... for the Temple; for each he set aside a thousand talents of gold, which he refined in a crucible until they were reduced to the weight of one talent. ...
— Hebraic Literature; Translations from the Talmud, Midrashim and - Kabbala • Various
... from depreni. Take notice of observi. Take off (undress) senvestigi, senvestigxi. Take part partopreni. Take place (happen) okazi. Take refuge rifugxi. Take snuff flari tabakon. Take supper noktomangxi. Taking (attractive) cxarmeta, beleta. Tale rakonto, fabelo. Talent talento. Talented lerta, klera. Talisman talismano. Talk paroli. Talk foolishly paroli sensence. Tall granda. Tallow sebo. Tally egali, kunegali. Talmud Talmudo. Talon ungego. Tame malsovagxigi, kvietigi. [Error in book: kiretigi] ...
— English-Esperanto Dictionary • John Charles O'Connor and Charles Frederic Hayes
... was talent; the subject-matter was Genius; and Genius had evolved an Idea which no one had ever thought of before—something brand new under the sun. It goes without saying that the Idea symbolized a great Truth. One department, the more impersonal, of Bennington's ...
— The Claim Jumpers • Stewart Edward White
... is tired of Netherglen," said Kitty. ("Nobody knows anything about the story of the two Brian Luttrells, then!" Percival reflected, with surprise. "Elizabeth has a talent for silence when she chooses.") Kitty went on carelessly, "Netherglen is damp in this weather. I don't think I should care to live there." Then she blushed a little, as though some new thought ...
— Under False Pretences - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... necessity. But when a choice of soldiers had to be made, he was always counted among the best, and his name called among the first. Although he had not much strength, he had agility, cleverness, a quick eye, caution, and a talent for strategy. He played his game himself, not liking to receive any suggestions from his chiefs, intending to follow his own ideas. The battle once begun, he invariably attacked the strongest enemy and pursued those comrades who occupied the highest rank. With the marvelous ...
— Georges Guynemer - Knight of the Air • Henry Bordeaux
... me!—whether he has the presumption to suppose I could ever allow him to betray what he cared for me. I believe I should rather admire his impudence! It is pleasant to be cared for, even by an inferior; and, after all, this Mr. Ryfe is not without his good points. He has plenty of talent and energy, and I should think audacity. By his own account he sticks at nothing, when he means winning, and he certainly means to win for me if he can. I never saw anybody so eager, so much in earnest. Perhaps he thinks that if he could come to me and say, 'There, ...
— M. or N. "Similia similibus curantur." • G.J. Whyte-Melville
... officers and administrators, these priests of the different gods, and the domestics who were often the most powerful of all, looked to the hand of the king himself and depended upon no other master. Courage and military talent must have been the surest roads to advancement, but sometimes, as under the Arab caliphs and the Ottoman sultans, the caprice of the sovereign would lead him to raise a man from the lowest ranks to the highest dignities of the state. The regime of Assyria may be described ...
— A History of Art in Chaldaea & Assyria, v. 1 • Georges Perrot
... War intervening, she is left almost doubly widowed. I feel that I have not quite done justice to Miss VAUGHAN'S book, but, on the other hand, I am sure that she has not quite done justice to her unquestionable talent. ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Volume 152, March 21, 1917 • Various
... terrace in front of Hauberk Hall, which the LARKSPURS have taken for the Summer. TIME—An August afternoon. Miss STELLA LARKSPUR—a young lady with great energy and a talent for organisation—has insisted upon all the Guests taking part in ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 103, September 10, 1892 • Various
... a classic for children. There, for a short time, came Major Andre, betrothed to Honora Sneyd, but destined to die so tragically in the American War of Independence. It is to Miss Seward's malicious talent as a letter writer that we owe the exceedingly picturesque account of Day's efforts to obtain a wife upon a particular pattern, his selection of Sabrina Sidney, whom he prepared for that high destiny ...
— Immortal Memories • Clement Shorter
... under her plate, crumpled her napkin, folded her arms on the table, and regarded the boy across the way with what our best talent calls a long, level look. It was so long and so level that even the airiness of the buoyant youngster at whom it was directed began to lessen perceptibly, long before Emma began ...
— Roast Beef, Medium • Edna Ferber
... kept the sun from him in the old yew-shaded garden, and he jestingly proposed to marry her, that she might take care of him, a change came over the girl, who began to develope the talent for intrigue in which she afterward became so successful. And as a preliminary step she made herself so necessary to Archie that his life without her would hardly have been endurable, and of his own ...
— Bessie's Fortune - A Novel • Mary J. Holmes
... current speech be true, she has great talent," persisted the visitor. "One can see genius burning like a soft light behind her face. I hear everywhere of ...
— The Dragon Painter • Mary McNeil Fenollosa
... gone for the benefit of the waters, at the early age of forty-eight years.[6] In his youth he was a midshipman in the navy, and in that capacity had made a voyage to India, which was then considered a great undertaking. As he was possessed of much activity of mind and considerable talent, his death was an irreparable loss to his children, who were of an age to require all the care and counsels of a father; the eldest, John, having only completed his seventeenth year. They were left in independent, ...
— The Life and Correspondence of Sir Isaac Brock • Ferdinand Brock Tupper
... and literature sent out a few suckers into it, there would have been no place in it for John Tuke. For, more than liking his trade, being indeed fond of it, he would not work for the booksellers, but used his talent to the satisfaction of known customers, of whom he had now not a few, for his reputation had spread beyond the near neighbourhood. But while he worked cheaper, quality considered, than many binders, even carefully superintending that most ...
— There & Back • George MacDonald
... Empereurs et Princes, Ducs et Contes et Barons et Chevaliers et Vavasseurs et Bourgeois, et tous les preudommes de cestui monde qui avez talent de vous deliter en rommans, si prenez cestui (livre) et le faites lire de chief en chief, si orrez toutes les grans aventure qui advindrent entre les Chevaliers errans du temps au Roy Uter Pendragon, jusques a le temps au Roy Artus son fils, et des ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo Volume 1 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa
... and delightful young gentleman from America. I was charmed with him, and rather surprised to learn that he wrote the poems which were so much admired last season, also that he is the son of a rich tailor. How odd these Americans are, with their money, and talent, ...
— An Old-fashioned Girl • Louisa May Alcott
... these eminently respectable gentlemen who have brought before the public the necessity of commemorating two great poets are on the lookout for talent of the kind that Keats and Shelley exhibited? How many of them, if they came across a latter-day young poet, indolent, unconventional, crude, fantastic, would encourage him to be true to his ideas ...
— The Silent Isle • Arthur Christopher Benson
... State, where the opportunities for the development of their genius were not favorable, and those of exercising it still less so. I expressed them, therefore, with great hesitation; but whatever be their degree of talent it is no measure of their rights. Because Sir Isaac Newton was superior to others in understanding, he was not therefore lord of the person or property of others. On this subject they are gaining daily in the opinions of nations, and hopeful advances ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 3, 1918 • Various
... testimony of M. Esquirol, whose talent, general accuracy, and extensive experience give great weight to all his well-considered opinions, quoted, also, and confirmed by the Physician Extraordinary to the Queen in Scotland, and consulting Physician to the King ...
— Popular Education - For the use of Parents and Teachers, and for Young Persons of Both Sexes • Ira Mayhew
... entirely with the Squire, to whom he had become a factotum, and whom he particularly delighted by jumping with his humour in respect to old times, and by having a scrap of an old song to suit every occasion. We had presently a specimen of his last-mentioned talent; for no sooner was supper removed, and spiced wines and other beverages peculiar to the season introduced, than Master Simon was called on for a good old Christmas song. He bethought himself for a moment, and then, with a sparkle of the eye, and a voice that ...
— Old Christmas From the Sketch Book of Washington Irving • Washington Irving
... and more frequent, in official language, and in writings of all sorts, of the erroneous expression applied science. The abandonment of scientific careers by men capable of pursuing them with distinction, was recently deplored in the presence of a minister of the greatest talent. The statesman endeavoured to show that we ought not to be surprised at this result, because in our day the reign of theoretic science yielded place to that of applied science. Nothing could be more erroneous than this opinion, nothing, I venture ...
— Six Lectures on Light - Delivered In The United States In 1872-1873 • John Tyndall
... two thoughts. "Undoubtedly the one before you is entitled by public examination to the degree 'Recognised Talent,' which may, as a meritorious distinction, be held equal to your title of a warrior clad in armour. Yet, if it is so held, that would rightly be this person's official name ...
— The Mirror of Kong Ho • Ernest Bramah
... old self again, simple, friendly, contented. Theobald was in one of his self-satisfied moods. Perhaps he enjoyed the triumph of his position in regard to Hadria. At any rate, he seemed to pounce on the new-comer as a foil to his own brilliancy. Joseph had no talent to oppose to it, but he had a simple dignity, the offspring of a kind and generous nature, which made Professor Theobald's conduct towards him appear contemptible. Professor Fortescue shifted uncomfortably in his chair. Hadria tried to change the topic; ...
— The Daughters of Danaus • Mona Caird
... he was more fond of society than might have been expected from his studious habits. His habitual cheerfulness and gaiety, and his affability and frankness of manner, rendered him an universal favourite among his friends. Without any of the pedantry of exclusive talent, and without any of that ostentation which often marks the man of limited though profound acquirements, Galileo never conversed upon scientific or philosophical subjects except among those who were capable of ...
— The Martyrs of Science, or, The lives of Galileo, Tycho Brahe, and Kepler • David Brewster
... expression to indicate the incompatibility of the alternatives, since the same form is employed when the alternatives are palpably compatible. When, for instance, we say, 'A successful student must be either talented or industrious,' we do not at all mean to assert the positive incompatibility of talent and industry in a successful student, but only the incompatibility of their negatives—in other words, that, if both are absent, no student can be successful. Similarly, when it is said, 'Either your ...
— Deductive Logic • St. George Stock
... such a conclusion, so long as they were under a delusion as to the age of the world, and the date of the first creation of animate beings. However fantastical some theories of the sixteenth century may now appear to us,—however unworthy of men of great talent and sound judgment,—we may rest assured that, if the same misconception now prevailed in regard to the memorials of human transactions, it would give rise to a similar train of absurdities. Let us imagine, for example, that Champollion, ...
— The Harvard Classics Volume 38 - Scientific Papers (Physiology, Medicine, Surgery, Geology) • Various
... she saw him on arriving—a very small, fair-haired boy, dressed in "a full suit of what used to be called pepper-and-salt cloth." He soon settled down in his new home, "a very quiet little personage, very good-tempered, and very much in awe of his aunt," with a fame among his cousins for his talent for making paper boxes one within another. His bed was in an attic, next door to his big cousin Marten's room. Marten had a shelf full of books, which Henry used to carry off to his own domain and read over and over again. From these books he ...
— The Fairchild Family • Mary Martha Sherwood
... successive levels to which she descended. Under the plea that the hardly-earned sum I gave to her maintenance apart from me was not sufficient, she utilized her undoubted beauty and more doubtful talent in amateur entertainments—and, finally, on the stage. She was openly accompanied by her lover, who acted as her agent, in the hope of goading me to a divorce. Suddenly she disappeared. I thought she had forgotten me. I ...
— The Crusade of the Excelsior • Bret Harte
... unquestionably the best Letter Founder. His son, M. Amb. Firmin Didot; who has for a long time past cut the punches for his father, exhibits proof of a talent worthy, ...
— A Bibliographical, Antiquarian and Picturesque Tour in France and Germany, Volume Two • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... were hung with clever brutalities of the usual kind. Piers glanced from them to Miss Bonnicastle, speculating curiously about her. He had no active dislike for this young woman, and felt a certain respect for her talent, but he thought, as before, how impossible it would be ever to regard her as anything but an abnormality. She was not ill-looking, but seemed to have no single characteristic of her sex ...
— The Crown of Life • George Gissing
... what the countess says?" exclaimed the queen, affecting to whisper to him; "she will not allow of any spiritual agency in my wonderfully-awakened talent. If you can contradict her, do; for I want very much to believe in fairies, magicians, and all ...
— The Scottish Chiefs • Miss Jane Porter
... beginning in the old college days when the older man discovered that the younger could be manipulated, by flattery and cheap tricks, into abject servitude. Larry was not as keen-witted as Maclin, but he had a superficial cleverness; a lack of moral fibre and a certain talent that, properly controlled, offered no ...
— At the Crossroads • Harriet T. Comstock
... invincible irony with which she rebukes the self-esteem and baffles the ambitions of mortals, she discounted her gift by the bestowal of frank distrust of the sea. He was so impelled to the exercise of the one talent that during youth and manhood his chief occupation and never-ending delight lay therein. That which his right hand had found to do he did with all his might, his frail craft being the admiration of all, while the confidence with which others managed them ...
— Tropic Days • E. J. Banfield
... in the world, with no fortune but my own talent, and even that I was beginning to doubt, because it brought no money. For a year I had worked and hoped, with a brave spirit; had written my life into poems and tales; tried a play; turned critic and reviewed books; offered my pen and ...
— Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag, Vol. 5 - Jimmy's Cruise in the Pinafore, Etc. • Louisa M. Alcott
... my light is spent Ere half my days, in this dark world and wide, And that one talent, which is death to hide, Lodged with me useless, though my soul more bent To serve therewith my Maker, and present My true account, lest he, returning, chide; Doth God exact day labor, light denied? I fondly ask. But Patience, ...
— Composition-Rhetoric • Stratton D. Brooks
... brilliant endowments and such exemplary conduct should debase himself to enter the service of another if he were not actuated by secret motives; and these, you further conclude, must necessarily be of a suspicious character. But where is the novelty of a man of talent and of merit endeavoring to win favor with a prince who has the power of establishing his fortune? Is there anything derogatory in serving the prince? and has not Biondello clearly shown that his devotion is purely ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... and Nancy and her friends stood together at the head of the stairs while the white-coated intern from the hospital rolled his great bulk upon a fragile-looking stretcher, and with the assistance of all the male talent in the establishment, managed to head him down the stairs, and so on across the court ...
— Outside Inn • Ethel M. Kelley
... employing Forethought as the preparation for, and impulse to, Self-Suggestion, we shall greatly aid the success of the latter, because the former insures attention and interest. Forethought may be brief, but it should always be energetic. By cultivating it we acquire the enviable talent of those men who take in everything at a glance, and act promptly, like a NAPOLEON. This power is universally believed to be entirely innate or a gift; but it can be induced or developed in all minds in proportion to the will ...
— The Mystic Will • Charles Godfrey Leland
... previously we had laid the foundations of what we hoped would be a widespread national movement for the regeneration of the working classes. The founder of that movement was the late Mr P.J. Neilan, of Kanturk, a man of eminent talent and of a great heart that throbbed with sympathy for the sufferings of the workers. I was then a schoolboy, with a youthful yearning of my own towards the poor and the needy, and I joined the new movement. Two ...
— Ireland Since Parnell • Daniel Desmond Sheehan
... talk of democracy in Australia, we are far from realizing a truly democratic ideal. A State in a pure democracy draws no nice and invidious distinctions between man and man. She disclaims the right of favouring either property, education, talent, or virtue. She conceives that all alike have an interest in good government, and that all who form the community, of full age and untainted by crime, should have a right to their share in the representation. She allows education to exert its legitimate power through the press; talent in every ...
— An Autobiography • Catherine Helen Spence
... much time and talent to the diffusion of sound physiological information and the general improvement of the race, and whose opportunities of observation have been very extensive, expressly states, that dyspepsy and madness prevail more extensively in ...
— Popular Education - For the use of Parents and Teachers, and for Young Persons of Both Sexes • Ira Mayhew
... are bold enough to try now and then to quell the stormy sea of my passions. You do it with a grace, so I submit. And now my hand is raised to strike a wretch who mocks at me; he is a painter, of some talent, so, of course, you take him under your protection. Then, in a moment, your inventive genius devises a praying sister. Well, there is in that something which might indeed mollify me. But you would betray Bassianus ten times over to save an artist. ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... women who have battled most nobly against this corroding innovation are apt to succumb to its insidious influence; even the anti-suffragist, home-loving, God-fearing, modest and retiring as is her nature, has developed a talent for political intrigue that has led to the downfall of more than one of the best laid plans ...
— An American Suffragette • Isaac N. Stevens
... can find no others. It seems to me that our novelists are at the present moment affected by the same wave which seems to be passing over the whole of our national life; we have in every department a large number of almost first-rate people, men of talent and ability; but very few geniuses, very few people of undisputed pre-eminence. In literature this is particularly the case; poets, historians, essayists, dramatists, novelists; there are so many that reach a high level of accomplishment, ...
— The Upton Letters • Arthur Christopher Benson
... made himself so dangerously conspicuous by his resistance to the insolent assumption of the cardinal-legate. This eminent juris-consult had succeeded Pomponne de Bellievre as first president of the Parliament of Paris. He had been distinguished for talent, learning, and eloquence as an advocate; and was the author of several important legal works. His ambition to fill the place of first president had caused him to remain in Paris after its revolt against Henry III. He was no Leaguer; and, since his open defiance ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... was a very ordinary young man; bush life is a wonderful leveller, and he had known no other. His father had been a man of education and talent, drawn from a profession in his earlier manhood to the goldfields, who remained a miner and a poor man to the day of his death. His wife was not able to induce their sons to aspire to anything ...
— The Gold-Stealers - A Story of Waddy • Edward Dyson
... men and youths should be on my side and I likewise invite the bald(6) to give me their votes; for, if I triumph, everyone will say, both at table and at festivals, "Carry this to the bald man, give these cakes to the bald one, do not grudge the poet whose talent shines as bright as his own bare skull the ...
— Peace • Aristophanes
... compare the Welsh memorial lines with the English, which in their Gemeinheit of style are truly Germanic, we shall get a clear sense of what that Celtic talent for style I have been speaking ...
— Selections from the Prose Works of Matthew Arnold • Matthew Arnold
... the state; he is shot in the act, and nailed, wide-extended in cruel spread-eagle, on the barn-door. Others again call him dull and shortsighted—nay, go the length of asserting that he is stupid—as stupid as an owl. Why, our excellent fellow, when you have the tithe of the talent of the common owl, and know half as well how to use it, you ...
— Recreations of Christopher North, Volume 2 • John Wilson
... little enough money by his strange talent; such checks were few and far between. The owners of fine or interesting trees who cared to have them painted singly were rare indeed, and the "studies" that he made for his own delight he also kept for his own delight. Even ...
— The Man Whom the Trees Loved • Algernon Blackwood
... willing to come forward and do them. We can ask some of the upper class girls to help. Beatrice Alden sings; so does Frances Marlton. Mabel Ashe can do almost any kind of fancy dancing. There is plenty of talent in college. The junior glee club will sing ...
— Grace Harlowe's Second Year at Overton College • Jessie Graham Flower
... this first part of the parable is the immense magnitude of every man's transgressions against God. Numismatists and arithmeticians may jangle about the precise amount represented by the thousand talents. It differs according to the talent which is taken as the basis of the calculation. There were several talents in use in the currency of ancient days. But the very point of the expression is not the specification of an exact amount, but ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - St. Matthew Chaps. IX to XXVIII • Alexander Maclaren
... Cooper Institute. At this meeting it was resolved to compel an exposure of the frauds practised upon the people, and to punish the guilty parties; and committees were appointed, money subscribed, and the best legal talent in the city retained for that purpose. A reform movement to carry the November elections in the interest of the citizens and tax-payers was inaugurated, and the power of the courts was invoked to put a stop to the further ...
— Lights and Shadows of New York Life - or, the Sights and Sensations of the Great City • James D. McCabe
... in love with the Richtung (tendency) of our modern novelists. There is abundance of talent; but writing a pretty, graceful, touching, yet pleasing story is the last thing our writers nowadays think of. Their novels are party pamphlets on political or social questions, like Sybil, or Alton Locke, or Mary Barton, or Uncle Tom; or they are the most minute and painful dissections ...
— Reviews • Oscar Wilde
... he refused this great sum, and gave the painting to his native city. Nikias seems to have greatly exalted and respected his art, for he contended that painters should not fritter away time and talent on insignificant subjects, but ought rather to choose some grand event, such as a battle or a sea-fight. His figures of women and his pictures of animals, especially those of dogs, were much praised. ...
— A History of Art for Beginners and Students: Painting, Sculpture, Architecture - Painting • Clara Erskine Clement
... him in the night, when he dreamed constantly that he was married—to whom scarcely mattered; he saw himself coming out of a church a married man, and the fright woke him up. But with the daylight came again his talent for dodging thoughts that were lying in wait, and he yielded as recklessly as before to every sentimental impulse. As illustration, take his humourous passage with Mrs. Jerry. Geraldine Something was her name, but her friends ...
— Tommy and Grizel • J.M. Barrie
... a lady's part in the next play we give," said Gladys. "Such talent shouldn't be wasted on a ...
— The Campfire Girls on Ellen's Isle - The Trail of the Seven Cedars • Hildegard G. Frey
... Archonte; said to possess considerable talent, and he exercises a very considerable influence. His brother was formerly a deputy ...
— The Life of Thomas, Lord Cochrane, Tenth Earl of Dundonald, G.C.B., Admiral of the Red, Rear-Admiral of the Fleet, Etc., Etc. • Thomas Cochrane, Earl of Dundonald
... waiting in the courts, or on circuit, without business, without notice. He thought his merit would never make its way, and was provoked by seeing two or three stupid fellows pushed on by solicitors, or helped up by judges.—He had so much knowledge, talent, and eloquence, that he must in time have made a great figure, and would, undoubtedly, have risen to the first dignities, had he persevered; but he sacrificed himself to pique and impatience. He quitted the bar, and the very summer after he had left it, the illness of a senior counsel ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. VII - Patronage • Maria Edgeworth
... subject of music, he could find an opportunity to say with a conscious-modest air, "MY instrument is the 'cello." That was quite enough self-assertion for him, . . and if any one ever urged him to display his talent, he would elude the request with such charming grace and diffidence, that many people imagined he must really be a great musical genius who only lacked the necessary insolence and aplomb to make ...
— Ardath - The Story of a Dead Self • Marie Corelli
... leading Virginia law-makers and statesmen, had already, in great measure, pointed the way to the Indian policy to be pursued by Washington and his successors. No state, either under the old confederation or the new constitution, presented such a formidable array of talent and statecraft as Virginia. Washington, Jefferson, John Marshall, and Madison, stood pre-eminent, but there was also Edmund Randolph, Patrick Henry, James Monroe, George Mason, William ...
— The Land of the Miamis • Elmore Barce
... marriage, I had tried to launch into literature, and even sent a thing to a journal—a story, if I'm not mistaken; but in a little time I received a polite letter from the editor, in which, among other things, I was told that he could not deny I had intelligence, but he was obliged to say I had no talent, and talent alone was what was needed in literature. To add to this, it came to my knowledge that a young man, on a visit from Moscow—a most good-natured youth too—had referred to me at an evening party at the governor's as a shallow person, antiquated and behind the times. ...
— A Sportsman's Sketches - Volume II • Ivan Turgenev
... zealously, and at first he managed somehow to secure enough food for his little family. He developed a real talent for discovering vegetables and fruits. He stole, he begged, and he found food where there was none. One day the soldiers seized him and put him to work on the fortifications along with a gang of other men who appeared strong ...
— Rainbow's End • Rex Beach
... a life of able, honest, unselfish, heroic labour. The colony was still small in numbers, the acres subdued and brought into cultivation were few, and the aggregate yearly products were meagre. But it is to be observed that the productiveness of capital and labour and talent, two hundred and seventy years ago, cannot well be compared with the standards of to-day. Moreover, the results of Champlain's career are insignificant rather in appearance than in reality. The work ...
— The Makers of Canada: Champlain • N. E. Dionne
... will make known and facilitate all the commercial navigation, with the favour of God, by shorter routes. I offer much, well do I see it, but I trust in almighty God with whose favour, I believe I can do what I say in your royal service. The talent which God has given me leads me to aspire to the accomplishment of these achievements, and does not demand of me a strict account, and I believe that I shall comply with what will be required, for never did I so wish to achieve anything. Your Majesty sees and does not ...
— History of the Incas • Pedro Sarmiento de Gamboa
... poor Lady Mabel, and in doing so did arrive at something near the truth in his inward delineation of the two characters. Lady Mabel with all her grace, with all her beauty, with all her talent, was a creature of efforts, or, as it might be called, a manufactured article. She strove to be graceful, to be lovely, to be agreeable and clever. Isabel was all this and infinitely more without any struggle. When he was most fond of Mabel, most anxious ...
— The Duke's Children • Anthony Trollope
... tendencies he has built what both his friends and his enemies expected him to build. Mr. Churchill came to Liberalism from the same fold as Gladstone, and for the same reason—that it presented the one field of work open to a political talent of a high stamp, and to a wide and eager outlook on the future of our social order. Liberalism and Mr. Churchill have both had good reason to congratulate themselves on that choice, and the party which failed to draw him into a disastrous and reactionary ...
— Liberalism and the Social Problem • Winston Spencer Churchill
... chosen ministers of reconciliation and peace, these male laymen called by their brethren to their high places in this General Conference, whose names at home are the synonym of chivalrous goodness—surely all these of rank and talent and authority, whose able and eloquent words have been ringing through the arches and dome of this temple of music on the wrong side of the question, are but simply acting the parts assigned them. In the final scene they will join hands around the eligible ...
— Samantha Among the Brethren, Complete • Josiah Allen's Wife (Marietta Holley)
... my savings profitably. Real estate is low; bonds and mortgages are as cheap as dirt. Some day people will be cheerful once more, and these good things will multiply and yield fourfold. Yea, I will not bury my talent in a napkin." ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick
... prisoner ultimately unaccounted for was Captain Brabazon, Deputy-Assistant Quarter-Master-General of Artillery, an officer whose finished talent and skill in drawing had often been of the greatest service in taking sketches of the country for the military operations. His body was never found; but it was believed that he had been beheaded by order of a Chinese General ...
— Letters and Journals of James, Eighth Earl of Elgin • James, Eighth Earl of Elgin
... returned from their venturesome pilgrimage, the first glimpse of home that greeted them was likely to be the beacon-light in the tower where the master sat poring over problems of Archimedes or watching the stars. For Henry, whose motto was "Talent de bien faire," or (in the old French usage) "Desire[381] to do well," was wont to throw himself whole-hearted into whatever he undertook, and the study of astronomy and mathematics he pursued so zealously as to reach a foremost place among the experts of his time. With such tastes and such ambition, ...
— The Discovery of America Vol. 1 (of 2) - with some account of Ancient America and the Spanish Conquest • John Fiske
... upsetting yours is "duly to hand," as you'd probably phrase it yourself. What are you for, my dear man, except to take trouble off the shoulders of others on to your own? I ask you that! You like it. You thrive on it. With your uncanny talent for character reading, you should never have expected anything of me but the unexpected. And the whole embroglio is your fault, if you come to look at it between the eyes. I ought never to have come back from Siberia four ...
— The Lightning Conductor Discovers America • C. N. (Charles Norris) Williamson and A. M. (Alice Muriel) |
