"Level best" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... represent, the match game must be won; hence he surrenders his personal glory to the common good. He does more. Under the excitement of the contest and with the consequent strengthening of the team spirit, he encourages the very boy, who would otherwise have been only his personal rival, to do his level best, forgetting utterly any mean individual comparisons and all anti-social self-consciousness, in what he has enthusiastically accepted as ...
— The Minister and the Boy • Allan Hoben
... nethermost deck of the first machine jogged forward its flyboard with sllt the first batch of quirefolded papers. Sllt. Almost human the way it sllt to call attention. Doing its level best to speak. That door too sllt creaking, asking to be shut. Everything speaks in ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce
... mattock and began to dig. His level best fell so far short of what he felt capable of doing and desired to accomplish that the following day he put two more men on the job. Then the earth did fly, and so soon as the required space was excavated the walls were lined ...
— The Harvester • Gene Stratton Porter
... week, straight. And he said to tell you he would add a hundred every week that you deliver the goods. That is giving a tremendously square deal, in my opinion. But it's the boss's way, to make it worth a man's while to do his level best." ...
— The Thunder Bird • B. M. Bower
... that he had found "Mr. Washington" a hard nut to crack, but he would do his level best, he said, "to strike at Washington while he ...
— Hero Stories from American History - For Elementary Schools • Albert F. Blaisdell
... ceaseless shoo-ing made the lady mad, And she called out the best three knights she had, And charged them, "Charge him! Drive him from the wall! If he keeps on, we'll have no flies at all!" And out they came. Each did his level best; SIR PELLEAS soon killed one and slew ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 11, June 11, 1870 • Various
... However, I won't bother you with those. I expect they're pretty crude, after all. Besides, my preparations were all knocked on the head. I saw Camilla Payne again in Hugo's. She had stopped typewriting, and was a milliner there. I tried my level best to strike up an intimacy with her, but I failed. She wouldn't have it. The fact is, I was too rich and showy. And I had a reputation behind me which, possibly—well, you're aware of all that, Polycarp. In about a fortnight I worshipped her—yes, I did actually ...
— Hugo - A Fantasia on Modern Themes • Arnold Bennett
... will do his level best to give us the slip, see if he don't," remarked Skimmy. "Four thousand boomers wouldn't make him their leader ...
— The Boy Land Boomer - Dick Arbuckle's Adventures in Oklahoma • Ralph Bonehill
... he will not tell you. But you will know it later. Hugh Henfrey is a fine manly fellow, Miss Ranscomb. That is why I have done my level best ...
— Mademoiselle of Monte Carlo • William Le Queux
... and they know from their cradles what it is that they have in the backs of their heads. We are not going to beat them driving them to Mexico or to Canada, or letting them monopolize China. That is merely temporizing. That is giving them fertile soil on which to take the best of their own and the level best of ours, and by amalgamating the two, build higher than we ever have. There is just one way in all this world that we can beat Eastern civilization and all that it intends to do to us eventually. The white man ...
— Her Father's Daughter • Gene Stratton-Porter
... lots of comfort, really, to a strugglin' mortal's breast In the sayin', if it's truthful, of "I done my level best"; It seems ter me that's all there is: jest do your duty right, No matter if yer rule a land or if yer tend a light. My lot is humble, but I've kept that lamp a-burnin' clear, And so, I reckon, when I die I'll know which course ter steer; The waves may roar around me and ...
— Cape Cod Ballads, and Other Verse • Joseph C. Lincoln
... Estelle would refuse," said Win slowly. "She's foolishly proud. She thinks, Mother, that you pay more than the house is worth and so she does her level best to make it up to us in ...
— The Spanish Chest • Edna A. Brown
... constitutionally of course, which, under the leadership of the Mayor of San Fernando, has continued up to now, culminating at last in the Reform movement which Mr. Froude decries, and which his pupil, Mr. S. H. Gatty, is, from what has appeared in the Trinidad papers, doing his "level best" ...
— West Indian Fables by James Anthony Froude Explained by J. J. Thomas • J. J. (John Jacob) Thomas
... bare room with no furniture except a bed, a chair, a small stove, and a table. A box in the corner apparently contained a few worn garments. Some dishes and provisions were huddled on the table. The walls and floor were bare. The district nurse had done her level best to clear up, perhaps, but there had been no attempt at good cheer. A desolate place indeed to spend a weary night of suffering, even with an inch of candle sending weird ...
— The Witness • Grace Livingston Hill Lutz
... Uncle Andy presently, "if you'll try your level best to listen without interrupting, I'll ...
— Children of the Wild • Charles G. D. Roberts
... your level best, examine the work attempted, and see if it really be in the line of your bent or power of achievement. Cowper failed as a lawyer. He was so timid that he could not plead a case, but he wrote some of our finest ...
— Pushing to the Front • Orison Swett Marden
... kids" were gathered in front of little Janie's window, for she was too weak to go out with them, and Buck delivered a lesson in ethical culture. Whatever Mikky, their Prince, ordered, that must be done, and Buck was doing his level best, although for the life of him he couldn't see the sense in it. But thereafter none of "the kids" were allowed to use certain words and phrases, and swearing gradually became eliminated from their conversation. It would have been a curious ...
— Lo, Michael! • Grace Livingston Hill
... in discipline. Exact nothing less than the best in a man. Tolerate no slovenliness. Deal laziness a sharp rebuke. The great majority of your men are doing their level best. Let them know that this is what you expect, but at the same time you appreciate them ...
— The Plattsburg Manual - A Handbook for Military Training • O.O. Ellis and E.B. Garey
... the line pretty tight, Hugh. Lots of players in the baseball world try their level best to get a line on a pitcher who is going to oppose them, ...
— The Chums of Scranton High at Ice Hockey • Donald Ferguson
... few moments all hands were still, watching with intense interest the progress of the race. The commodore, in the Skylark, was evidently doing his level best, for he was running away from the Sea ...
— The Yacht Club - or The Young Boat-Builder • Oliver Optic
... explained, "there's a chance for promotion now that there never was before. New men are coming in by the hundreds, and those men have to have officers. There's really no end to the chances if you just stick to the big game and do your level best. You're sure to win something ...
— The Outdoor Girls in Army Service - Doing Their Bit for the Soldier Boys • Laura Lee Hope
... felt that stick and revolver in my hands, I was mighty glad you were around; but as soon as I had used them, I wished from the bottom of my heart that you were safe back in your own State. But since you are here, I am going to do my level best for you; and that's the reason I am going to keep your horse a little longer. If I don't give him back to you some day, you can keep mine to remember ...
— Rodney The Partisan • Harry Castlemon
... her level best but he pulls her. He harvests small sections of the gum from time to time and occasionally he stops long enough to loosen up the roots as far down as your floating ribs. But he pulls her. He spares no pains to pull that tooth. Or if he spares any you are not able subsequently ...
— Cobb's Anatomy • Irvin S. Cobb
... those fellows with Buck Lemington crowing over them, would be a bitter pill to Brad's crew. And they were really doing their level best to ...
— Fred Fenton on the Crew - or, The Young Oarsmen of Riverport School • Allen Chapman
... are disappointed, and we shall no doubt return to the matter again. But whether you concede the advance of wages or not, our members will continue to do their level best, believing that they are not only working for themselves, but helping the Government and helping our soldiers to wage this war ...
— The War on All Fronts: England's Effort - Letters to an American Friend • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... 'at wrong is right, Jes as plain as black is white: Prove when you're asleep in bed You're a-standin' on yer head, And yer train 'at's goin' West, 'S goin' East its level best; And when bees dies, it's their wings Wears out—and a thousand things! And the boys is "chips," you know; "Off the old block"—So I go To the Wigginses, 'cause—jes 'Cause I like the Wigginses— Even ef Melviney she Hardly 'pears ...
— Green Fields and Running Brooks, and Other Poems • James Whitcomb Riley
... of it too," agreed the skipper. "But I guess he's goin' to do his level best to get hold of 'em," he continued. "I reckon that Abe must ha' told him that he'd parted with his secret to me, and that I was fittin' out to go in search of them there oysters, and that's the reason why he was so all-fired ...
— Turned Adrift • Harry Collingwood |
