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More "Topic" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... talked about the claim, Winthrop, Collie's prospects, and their favorite topic, the Rose Girl. They were speaking of her when she appeared at the ...
— Overland Red - A Romance of the Moonstone Canon Trail • Henry Herbert Knibbs
... less, but his body fattened. In a word, the good gentleman's palate came to vie with his intellect. Less often was he engaged upon some dark saying of Isidore of Seville. Rather, even if his favorite topic astrology were uppermost about the table, his eye travelled to the pantry on every change of dishes. His fingers, too, came to curl most delicately on his fork. He used it like an epicure, poking his viands apart ...
— There's Pippins And Cheese To Come • Charles S. Brooks
... corner, and on that table, she had written nearly all her works. Now and then she would rise and leave the room, perhaps to procure a toy for one of the children, to mount the ladder and bring down a book that could explain or illustrate some topic on which some one was conversing; immediately she would resume her pen, and continue to write as if the thought had been unbroken for an instant. I expressed to Mrs. Edgeworth surprise at this faculty, so opposed to my own habit. "Maria," she said, "was always the same; her mind was ...
— The Life and Letters of Maria Edgeworth, Vol. 2 • Maria Edgeworth
... consequences of his chemical inquiries as if he were living in the middle ages. However, I was far too anxious to see the charming brown eyes again to ask questions which would be sure to keep them cast down. So I changed the topic to chemistry in general; and, to the doctor's evident astonishment and pleasure, told him of my own early studies ...
— A Rogue's Life • Wilkie Collins
... inwardly shivering; the tips of her fingers felt like ice. She pulled off her loose gloves, and held a pair of white hands blazing with jewels to the flame. She must force herself to talk, and to keep the poor woman off the topic of her son; but she, who was considered ready-tongued and ready-witted, sat dumb, she had ...
— A Sheaf of Corn • Mary E. Mann
... which, we will venture to say, was unparalleled. It is within the writer's recollection, how, in the obscure mountain-town where she spent her early days, Lord Byron's separation from his wife was, for a season, the all-engrossing topic. ...
— Lady Byron Vindicated • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... reaction against the purely chronological treatment of history, there is now a marked tendency in the direction of a purely topical handling of the subject. The topical method, however, may also be pushed too far. Each successive stage of any topic can be understood only in relation to the forces of the time. For that reason, the best results are reached when there is a combination of the chronological and the topical methods. It is therefore suggested ...
— History of the United States • Charles A. Beard and Mary R. Beard
... a kind of necessary thrift, for they that have but a little ought to make as much of it as they can. His prologue, which is commonly none of his own, is always better than his play, like a piece of cloth that's fine in the beginning and coarse afterwards; though it has but one topic, and that's the same that is used by malefactors, when they are to be tried, to except against as many of the jury ...
— Character Writings of the 17th Century • Various
... now, you were the sole topic of conversation at lunch. How foolish of me to have let you slip my memory. Where ...
— I'll Leave It To You - A Light Comedy In Three Acts • Noel Coward
... time to sail over in our ship 'The Research,' than the boundless ocean, which occupies two thirds of our world; it will, under these circumstances, be advisable to illustrate our subject largely, and to lose no opportunity of extending it for our benefit. We need not fear to exhaust the topic; for do not the vast waters encompass the globe; and can we contemplate these great works of our Creator, without having our hearts filled with wonder and admiration? This, my children, will lead us to the right source; ...
— The World of Waters - A Peaceful Progress o'er the Unpathed Sea • Mrs. David Osborne
... movements of especial historical interest. It was "the era of good feeling." The times were placid, and party animosities had nearly subsided. The opening of the slavery discussions resulted in the Missouri Compromise of 1820, and the irritations of that great topic were allayed for the time. Like all his predecessors after Washington, Monroe had been successively a diplomatist and Secretary of State, and the presidency seemed to fall to him as a matter of course. He was ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XII • John Lord
... greatly daring, find it rather hard and scratchy? To him its resting-place seemed too delicate a spot to be used as a general store. Madame frowned at the allusion to so intimate a topic, and Rust, terrified, implored her pardon, which was ...
— The Lost Naval Papers • Bennet Copplestone
... the same time, Sir Clarence was entirely and justly convinced that his title was good. The history of the illegitimate son was familiar to him, and to the rest of the family, in all its details. It was not, of course, an ordinary topic of conversation, but it was an acknowledged piece of family history. Sir John had been wild in his youth, and had made a good many loose connections before acceding to the baronetcy—his father, Sir Charles, the same who ate the venison pasty, ...
— Archibald Malmaison • Julian Hawthorne
... it is said, the vast collection of all known traditional Scottish and English Ballads, with all accessible variants, a work of great labour and research, and a distinguished honour to American scholarship. We are not told, however, that he had written a general study of the topic, with his conclusions as to the evolution and diffusion of the Ballads: as to the influences which directed the selection of certain themes of Marchen for poetic treatment, and the processes by which identical ballads were distributed throughout ...
— A Collection of Ballads • Andrew Lang
... so seriously, that workmen were employed in making wooden ladders; but having always looked upon it as a wild and extravagant fancy of priests and old women, I constantly argued against it whenever they spoke of it, and it was continually the topic ...
— The Campaign of 1760 in Canada - A Narrative Attributed to Chevalier Johnstone • Chevalier Johnstone
... von Sternburg are well known. When in the year 1908, after this gentleman's decease, I assumed his post at Washington, Mr. Roosevelt invited me to the White House on the evening after my first audience, to a private interview, in which every topic of the day was discussed. Invitations of this kind were of frequent occurrence during the last two months of Roosevelt's administration, which, at the time of my entering office, was already drawing to its ...
— My Three Years in America • Johann Heinrich Andreas Hermann Albrecht Graf von Bernstorff
... time of the most sorrowful reaction the political condition of Germany was so wretched that any discussion concerning it was gladly avoided. I do not remember having attended a single debate on that topic in the circles of the students with which ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... in all this stuff I have written anything like those feelings which one should send my old adventuring friend, that is gone to wander among Tartars, and may never come again? I don't, but your going away, and all about you, is a threadbare topic. I have worn it out with thinking, it has come to me when I have been dull with anything, till my sadness has seemed more to have come from it than to have introduced it. I want you, you don't know how much; but if I had you here in my European garret, we should but talk over such stuff as I have ...
— The Best Letters of Charles Lamb • Charles Lamb
... employment of the names of scientific conceptions which pervades the preacher's utterance, brings me back to the proper topic of the present essay. It is the use of the word "law" as if it denoted a thing—as if a "law of nature," as science understands it, were a being endowed with certain powers, in virtue of which the phenomena expressed by that law are brought about. The preacher ...
— Collected Essays, Volume V - Science and Christian Tradition: Essays • T. H. Huxley
... are we going to start, Miss Eleanor?" asked Dolly, who felt that it was time to change the topic of conversation. Dolly was usually willing enough to talk about herself, but she preferred ...
— The Camp Fire Girls on the March - Bessie King's Test of Friendship • Jane L. Stewart
... and displayed more right feeling, in the five minutes I listened, than one is apt to meet with, on the same subjects, in a year, in the salons of Paris. I was the more struck by this circumstance, in consequence of the manner in which the same topic had been broached, quite lately, in ...
— A Residence in France - With An Excursion Up The Rhine, And A Second Visit To Switzerland • J. Fenimore Cooper
... you may be sure, was the general topic of conversation all over Scotland several weeks before it came off, and on the Friday evening, when the Americans arrived and put up at the Express Hotel, Glasgow, the excitement was great. The preparations ...
— Scottish Football Reminiscences and Sketches • David Drummond Bone
... indulged with his majesty's pardon. This affair was now swelled up into such a faction as divided the greater part of the kingdom, including the rich as well as the poor, the high as well as the humble. Pamphlets and pasquinades were published on both sides of the dispute, which became the general topic of conversation in all assemblies, and people of all ranks espoused one or other party with as much warmth and animosity as had ever inflamed the whigs and tories, even at the most rancorous period of their opposition. Subscriptions were opened, and large sums levied, on one side, to prosecute ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... Walking," shards and crystals from all the others I have mentioned. Michael Fairless, Vachel Lindsay, and Frank Sidgwick have place in it. On my private shelf stands "Journeys to Bagdad" by Mr. Charles Brooks, who has good pleasantry to utter on this topic; and a manly little volume, "Walking as Education," by the Rev. A.N. Cooper, "the walking parson," published in England in 1910. On that same shelf there will soon stand a volume of delicious essays ...
— Shandygaff • Christopher Morley
... the railway was to be built in the spring caused a great stir in the village. The strangers who went about buying land from the peasants were the sole topic of conversation at the spinning-wheels on winter evenings. One poor peasant had sold his barren gravel hill, and had been able to purchase ten acres of the best land ...
— Selected Polish Tales • Various
... have you got out from the library now, Missy?" asked father. It was an abrupt change of topic, but Missy was glad of the chance to turn from Aunt Nettie's ...
— Missy • Dana Gatlin
... spare himself in his reflections on what had been amiss in his own conduct. "There was nothing of which he was so ashamed, as he was of the vast expense he had made in the building of his house." He could only excuse, but not justify it. This is an old topic of accusation, to which we have already alluded, but we may revert to it once again. Since the Restoration, Clarendon had commanded little leisure to find a suitable house, and had moved frequently from one to another. At first he had resided ...
— The Life of Edward Earl of Clarendon V2 • Henry Craik
... me the freshest town gossip. That's the stage-driver's right divine always. I was eager to hear of everybody and in this forty miles' ride I was completely informed. The story rambled somewhat aimlessly from topic to topic, but ...
— The Price of the Prairie - A Story of Kansas • Margaret Hill McCarter
... not by any means occupy the whole of Big Tom's life. He was also engaged in "lawin'." He had a long-time feud with a neighbor about a piece of land and alleged trespass, and they'd been "lawin'" for years, with no definite result; but as a topic of conversation it was as fully illustrative of frontier ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... picked up behind any barn where hostlers, exercise boys, and apprentice jockeys congregate. Tongues are loosened at such a gathering, and the carefully guarded secrets of trainers and owners are in danger, for the one absorbing topic of conversation is ...
— Old Man Curry - Race Track Stories • Charles E. (Charles Emmett) Van Loan
... milkstand settled more firmly into its place. When the blacksmith got started on his favorite topic there was no knowing when he might stop. He had visited the Toronto Exhibition and Niagara Falls one autumn, and ever since had lived in the afterglow of that achievement. Not the most astounding phenomena that the milkstand could produce, either in song or story, but he could far surpass from ...
— Treasure Valley • Marian Keith
... Sara was able to introduce the topic of Tim's profession, but she contrived it one afternoon when she and Elisabeth were sitting together awaiting the return of ...
— The Hermit of Far End • Margaret Pedler
... mentioned as connected with him, Wundt, Weber, Fechner and Scheibner, three (all except Weber) are decidedly of the opinion that his mental condition was not normal. The opinion of Wundt, as of a man whose profession would not permit him to speak hastily upon this topic, I would regard as of special value; but if we rule that out upon the ground that Wundt was not impressed by the investigation, and might naturally be inclined to underrate Zoellner, who was, we have left the opinions of Fechner and Scheibner, ...
— Preliminary Report of the Commission Appointed by the University • The Seybert Commission
... influence in the establishment of this new species of monarchy, and that the example of her sister's marriage with Philip may have contributed to the resolution taken by the nobles. The actions of our illustrious queen were a common topic of conversation between the old tyrant and ...
— The History of Sumatra - Containing An Account Of The Government, Laws, Customs And - Manners Of The Native Inhabitants • William Marsden
... hastily thrown together in explanation of the vote above recited. They make no pretension to a full argument of the topic. I hope that in a short time I shall get leisure sufficient to present to our opponents, unless some one does it for me, a full statement of the reasons which have ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... concealed themselves in a swamp about a mile distant. A road bordered the margin of their sanctuary so closely, that they distinctly overheard a conversation between three ladies who passed. The chasing of a negro boy by a Yankee was the topic of ...
— Sword and Pen - Ventures and Adventures of Willard Glazier • John Algernon Owens
... apologies with a manner becoming the possible descendant of a king toward a lady of distinction, and my Aunt was pleased to pass over my recent lapse from respect. She now broached her favorite topic, which I need scarcely tell you is genealogy, beginning with ...
— Lady Baltimore • Owen Wister
... The American Cyclopaedia and Thomas's Dictionary of Biography are exceedingly serviceable in preparing essays and furnishing anecdotes. With a little effort a poem, a good prose selection, or a composition on some historical topic may be offered by the class each day to enliven ...
— A Brief History of the United States • Barnes & Co.
... in Arabia, attempts to show that totemism existed in the Semitic races. The topic ...
— Myth, Ritual, and Religion, Vol. 1 • Andrew Lang
... with a sort of wonder, not unmixed with disgust. Perhaps she might have shown her disapprobation had she not been thankful to have the conversation diverted from the dangerous topic; besides, the cruel words were still rankling in her heart, and woven in with Rose's chatter she heard continually, "whose audacity outweighed her modesty." For the first time she fully understood why her father had so reluctantly ...
— We Two • Edna Lyall
... military biography or a pioneer adventure taken from Canadian or United States sources respectively. In the case of the former, the feeling of patriotism associated with the lesson problem will give it a value for the pupils entirely absent from the other topic. The extent to which the pupil feels such a value in the lesson topic will in most cases also measure the degree of control he obtains over ...
— Ontario Normal School Manuals: Science of Education • Ontario Ministry of Education
... was drawing harmony, and some discord, from it and rolling his eyes soulfully. In the ecstasy of the moment he had forgotten his recent fright. Tom and the Mystery Man were engaged in conversation, Hippy now and then interjecting a question, for the topic under discussion was the tract of land owned by Hippy, though not since Emma's remark had any reference been made to Hippy's ownership of it. The guest's talk was largely about the lay of the land ...
— Grace Harlowe's Overland Riders Among the Kentucky Mountaineers • Jessie Graham Flower
... fault, of damaging a word by wrong use, might come under the general head of 'Abuse of words'. This is a wide and popular topic, as may be seen by the constant small rain of private protests in the correspondence columns of the newspapers. The committee of the S.P.E. would be glad to meet the public taste by expert treatment of offending words if members ...
— Society for Pure English, Tract 3 (1920) - A Few Practical Suggestions • Society for Pure English
... was going to insinuate a joke of the sort; but perceiving that his sly preparatory glance was not pleasantly responded to, and that the stalworth nymph was quite in earnest, he went off to another topic. ...
— The House by the Church-Yard • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... wonderful speech was the principal topic of conversation in every quarter of Paris, exciting comment of the most animated description. Of course, the workmen and their friends were delighted with it, and could not find words strong enough to adequately ...
— Edmond Dantes • Edmund Flagg
... said; "Miss Smith says we are to have a real Debating Club, with officers and regular club nights, and all sorts of interesting subjects. Won't it be fun? And what do you suppose the first topic is ...
— Ten American Girls From History • Kate Dickinson Sweetser
... The whole topic of the "provinces" of the arts becomes hopelessly academic and sterile if one fails to keep his eye upon the individual artist, whose free choice of a subject is conditioned solely by his own artistic interest in rendering such aspects of any theme as his own medium of expression will allow ...
— A Study of Poetry • Bliss Perry
... very earnest conversation with her, to judge from his attitude," said Charlie. "Probably inquiring into the market-price of steers—or some absorbing topic of that sort." ...
— Charlie to the Rescue • R.M. Ballantyne
... floor, and pointed out Oscar's room. I found him walking backwards and forwards restlessly. The first words he said alluded to his brother's letter. I had arranged not to disturb him by any reference to that painful matter until the next morning; and I tried to change the topic. It was useless. There was an anxiety in his mind which was not to be dismissed at will. He insisted on my instantly setting ...
— Poor Miss Finch • Wilkie Collins
... The topic of most frequent discussion was the prospect of an exchange of prisoners. Our would-be German conversationalists never forgot to ask, "Haben Sie etwas gehoerten von Auswechseln der Gefangenen?" ("Have you heard anything of exchange of prisoners?") It was hard to believe that our government ...
— Lights and Shadows in Confederate Prisons - A Personal Experience, 1864-5 • Homer B. Sprague
... trials, has proved to me that the only way of getting sitters who persist in assuming a set look to resume their habitual expression, is to lead them into talking about some subject in which they are greatly interested. If I can only beguile them into speaking earnestly, no matter on what topic, I am sure of recovering their natural expression; sure of seeing all the little precious everyday peculiarities of the man or woman peep out, one after another, quite unawares. The long, maundering stories about nothing, the wearisome recitals of petty grievances, the local anecdotes unrelieved ...
— After Dark • Wilkie Collins
... The same topic, so closely connected with the prosperity of our beloved church, is to engage our attention on the present occasion, in reply to an interesting, christian, and gentlemanly pamphlet, from the pen of the Rev. ...
— American Lutheranism Vindicated; or, Examination of the Lutheran Symbols, on Certain Disputed Topics • Samuel Simon Schmucker
... excite our notice and surprise that the number of clergymen both in America and Great Britain who thrust forward their evidence on this medical topic was singularly large in proportion to that of the members of the medical profession. Whole pages are contributed by such worthies as the Rev. Dr. Trotter of Hans Place, the Rear. Waring Willett, Chaplain to the Earl of Dunmore, ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... it is logically or morally defective) are couched, as a rule, in a forcible and cogent form;[12] and he has a striking power of close, sustained, and at the same time lucid argumentation. His matter is commonly disposed with such skill that each topic occurs where it will tell most powerfully; and while one portion of a speech affords relief to another (where relief is needed, and particularly in the longer orations) all alike bear on the main issue or ...
— The Public Orations of Demosthenes, volume 1 • Demosthenes
... country with the full conviction that nobody, not even those most intimate with me, even suspected the fact of Lord Glenfallen's having made me a formal proposal. This was to me a very serious subject of self gratulation, for, besides my instinctive dread of becoming the topic of the speculations of gossip, I felt that if the situation which I occupied in relation to him were made publicly known, I should stand committed in a manner which would scarcely leave me the power of retraction. The period at which ...
— Two Ghostly Mysteries - A Chapter in the History of a Tyrone Family; and The Murdered Cousin • Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu
... slenderly connected with Birmingham, are yet made to rise out of it; the one out of Birmingham's own relation to the topic concerned, (viz., Travelling,) and the other (viz., My Brother) out of its relation to all possible times in my earlier life, and, therefore, why not to all possible places? Any where introduced, the chapter was ...
— Autobiographic Sketches • Thomas de Quincey
... commonplace. Jerry Foster was to sleep more than once in this tiny new world of Winslow's creating, this diminutive meteor, inside which they lived and moved and thought and talked. The fact of their new existence soon ceased as a topic of wonder. ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, June, 1930 • Various
... summoned Congress in 1811 war was the main topic of debate. Yet all he had to say about the Navy was contained in twenty-seven lukewarm words. Congress followed the presidential lead. The momentous naval vote of 1812 provided for an expenditure of six hundred thousand dollars, which ...
— The War With the United States - A Chronicle of 1812 - Volume 14 (of 32) in the series Chronicles of Canada • William Wood
... discovered, three topics of conversation: one was their hostess' novel and this was only discussed when Lady Luncon was herself somewhere at hand—the second topic concerned the books of somebody who had, most unjustly it appeared, been banned by the libraries for impropriety, and here opinions were divided as to whether the author would gain by the advertisement or lose by loss of library circulation. Thirdly, there was a new young man ...
— Fortitude • Hugh Walpole
... been declared. America is in it at last. I came home to-day feeling disheartened and sad. War was the topic everywhere I went. Papers, bulletin-boards flaunted the words, "The world must be made safe for democracy." People on the streets and in cars spoke about it, newsboys yelled till they ...
— Patchwork - A Story of 'The Plain People' • Anna Balmer Myers
... little of life, but that little she had well marked, and her observation had taught her, that among fashionable people, public places seemed a never-failing source of conversation and entertainment: upon this topic, therefore, she hoped for better success; and as to those who have spent more time in the country than in London, no place of amusement is so interesting as a theatre, she opened the subject she had so happily suggested, by an ...
— Cecilia Volume 1 • Frances Burney
... power to suppress them. I think that we need not dwell upon the simple facts; they will at once suggest to you all that is necessary to know. I shall select for illustration only one less familiar topic, that of ...
— Books and Habits from the Lectures of Lafcadio Hearn • Lafcadio Hearn
... with taste. The Senores de Quinones brought her up with every indulgence like an adopted child. This had been for some time the favourite topic of gossip in Lancia. The cost of her little hats was guessed at with the greatest interest; the number of her toys was commented upon, and calculations were made as to what her marriage dot would be. But such remarks ended by getting stale. ...
— The Grandee • Armando Palacio Valds
... to his great relief, were they launched on a topic of mutual interest. He told her about Bob's tricks, and of the whirl and his scheme to overcome it; and she agreed that horses had to be handled with a certain rational severity, no matter how much one loved them. There was her Mab, which she had for eight years and which ...
— Burning Daylight • Jack London
... way, we might recommend it as remarkably convenient at such times, to prevent the pain of a total discomfiture, it being more pleasant to slip quietly and unseen from your pedestal to some perfectly remote topic, than to allow yourself to be hurled roughly therefrom by the rude hand of a more sound ...
— Louis' School Days - A Story for Boys • E. J. May
... or penetration, or sly-pussness, or something of that sort to her young friend. But with an implied claim to rights of insight, on her own account, from seniority. Sally is froissee at this, but not beyond jerking the topic into ...
— Somehow Good • William de Morgan
... if you don't agree," trying desperately to divert him from the topic she knew he meant to pursue. For in the past two days he had been so busy helping O'Halloran that he had not even had a glimpse of her. As a consequence of which each felt half-dubious of the other's love, ...
— Bucky O'Connor • William MacLeod Raine
... nineteen years ago, and I write from memory of a night long to be remembered. Around many a Grand Army Camp-fire in the last fifteen years this bivouac has been made the topic of an evening's talk. It was attended with no particular hardship. The weather was such as is met with in these latitudes, not cold, not hot, and though a thick vapory cloud hid the full round moon from ...
— The Black Phalanx - African American soldiers in the War of Independence, the - War of 1812, and the Civil War • Joseph T. Wilson
... He did not go up to the farm. She, however, was very much the same with him, and he did not feel embarrassed in her presence. One evening she was alone when he accompanied her. They began by talking books: it was their unfailing topic. Mrs. Morel had said that his and Miriam's affair was like a fire fed on books—if there were no more volumes it would die out. Miriam, for her part, boasted that she could read him like a book, could place her finger any minute on the chapter and the line. He, easily taken in, believed that Miriam ...
— Sons and Lovers • David Herbert Lawrence
... was engaged in denouncing the vices and pettiness of modern woman—upper-class modern woman—of whom he knew nothing at all, a topic that appealed to an East End congregation. He showed how worthless was this luxurious stamp of females, what a deal they thought of dress and of other more evil delights. He compared them to the Florentines whom Savonarola ...
— Smith and the Pharaohs, and Other Tales • Henry Rider Haggard
... was greeted with shouts of laughter, and then the boys in the handsome clubroom of the Black Bear Patrol, in the city of New York, settled down to a serious discussion of the topic of the evening. There were seven present, Ned Nestor and Jimmie McGraw, of the Wolf Patrol; George Tolford, Harry Stevens, Glen Howard, and Jack Bosworth, of the famous Black Bear Patrol; and Peter Fenton, of the Panther Patrol. They ranged in age from thirteen ...
— Boy Scouts in the Canal Zone - The Plot Against Uncle Sam • G. Harvey Ralphson
... a low whistle of surprise, and stared at Seymour, as though expecting him to say more, but if such was his expectation, he was doomed to disappointment, for Seymour having delivered in these few words the full extent of his information on the topic under discussion, closed his lips and turned his attention ...
— Hollowmell - or, A Schoolgirl's Mission • E.R. Burden
... poll, the only way of enabling the third estate to turn its numbers to account. But he spoke as comptroller-general and as a man of caution. His speech, which lasted three hours, was a lengthened budget; and when, after tiring the assembly, he touched on the topic of interest, he spoke undecidedly, in order to avoid committing himself either with the court ...
— History of the French Revolution from 1789 to 1814 • F. A. M. Mignet
... indeed a topic on which she could dilate. The Rembrandt, it appeared, had come into Mr. Fontage's possession many years ago, while the young couple were on their wedding-tour, and under circumstances so romantic that she made no excuse for relating them in all their parenthetic ...
— Crucial Instances • Edith Wharton
... III' without delay. Subsequently both were published anonymously in the same year (1597) as they had 'been publikely acted by the right Honorable the Lorde Chamberlaine his servants;' but the deposition scene in 'Richard II,' which dealt with a topic distasteful to the Queen, was omitted from the early impressions. Prose is avoided throughout the play, a certain sign of early work. The piece was probably composed very early in 1593. Marlowe's tempestuous vein is less apparent in 'Richard II' than in 'Richard III.' But if ...
— A Life of William Shakespeare - with portraits and facsimiles • Sidney Lee
... me?" he inquired, as he came. "Don't let me interrupt, I beg. I know I'm an edifying topic, ...
— The Swindler and Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell
... topic in house-building on which I would add a few words. The difficulty of procuring and keeping good servants, which must long be one of our chief domestic troubles, warns us so to arrange our houses that we shall need as ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 85, November, 1864 • Various
... the wood-work of the curtain opposite it to be turned and levelled slantwise at this invulnerable knight. Denys and his Englishman went to dinner. These two worthies being eternally on the watch for one another had made a sort of distant acquaintance, and conversed by signs, especially on a topic that in peace or war maintains the same importance. Sometimes Denys would put a piece of bread on the top of his mantelet, and then the archer would hang something of the kind out by a string; or the order of invitation would be reversed. Anyway, they always managed ...
— The Cloister and the Hearth • Charles Reade
... Emporium itself, as it is the fashion to call the confused and tasteless collection of flaring red brick houses, marten-box churches, and colossal taverns, that stands on the island of Manhattan; the discussion of marriages being a topic of never- ending interest in that well regulated social organization, after the subjects of dollars, lots, and wines, have been duly exhausted. Sir George Templemore was transformed into the Honourable Lord George Templemore, and Paul's relationship to Lady ...
— Home as Found • James Fenimore Cooper
... of talk just now about cooking; in a lesser degree it takes its place as a popular topic with ceramics, modern antiques, and household art. The fact of it being in a mild way fashionable may do a little good to the eating world in general. And it may make it more easy to convince young women of refined proclivities that the art of cooking is not ...
— Culture and Cooking - Art in the Kitchen • Catherine Owen
... the parent of one's enchantress, and made a well-meant if not novel remark on the state of the weather. Mr. Whedell mildly disputed his proposition (whatever it was)—for Mr. W. was always disputatious on that subject—and then passed to the consideration of national politics. "The one topic natually suggests the other," said Mr. Whedell, "for they are equally variable." This was one of the father's few standard jokes; and Maltboy always laughed at it with the heartiness of a future son-in-law. They then grappled with the great ...
— Round the Block • John Bell Bouton
... the newspapers bore a conspicuous part, and though, as might be expected, they did not all take the same views, yet they rendered good service to the glorious cause. But this tempting subject has carried us away into a rather lengthy digression from our immediate topic. To return, therefore: ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol. 6, No. 1, July, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various
... a murmur in the village streets, a novel and dominant topic in the public-houses, and here and there a messenger, or even an eye-witness of the later occurrences, caused a whirl of excitement, a shouting, and a running to and fro; but for the most part the daily routine of working, eating, ...
— The War of the Worlds • H. G. Wells
... usual, far from the others, and at the opposite side of the water. Our fire place was made outside of the trees, on the banks. Brown had shot six Leptotarsis Eytoni, (whistling ducks) and four teals, which gave us a good dinner; during which, the principal topic of conversation was our probable distance from the sea coast, as it was here that we first found broken sea shells, of the genus Cytherea. After dinner, Messrs. Roper and Calvert retired to their tent, and Mr. Gilbert, John, ...
— Journal of an Overland Expedition in Australia • Ludwig Leichhardt
... steam-boats which plied up and down the Ohio. Each had his favorite boat, and boasted of her speed and excellence. Every one of them envied those happy fellows whose lot it was to "run on the river" as cabin-boys. Boats were a common topic of conversation—their build, their engines, their speed, their officers, their mishaps, and all the ...
— The Hoosier School-boy • Edward Eggleston
... murder of William of Orange, in 1584, and extend only to the assassination of Henry HI. of France, in 1589. These five years, however, are crowded with individuals and events of special importance, and the historian has shed new light on every topic he has touched. The determination of Philip II. to put down the revolt of the Netherlands was part of an extensive scheme, which involved the conquest of England and France, the extermination of Protestantism, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 7, Issue 41, March, 1861 • Various
... our doctrine cease here; they urge every topic of accusation and abuse to render it an object of hatred or suspicion. They call it novel, and of recent origin,—they cavil at it as doubtful and uncertain,—they inquire by what miracles it is confirmed,—they ask whether it is right for it to be received contrary to the consent of so ...
— Prefaces and Prologues to Famous Books - with Introductions, Notes and Illustrations • Charles W. Eliot
... could have called Polly bewitching. Her age must really have been quite thirty-five. I dislike dwelling on this topic, but she was short, dumpy, wore blue spectacles, a green umbrella, a red and black shawl, worsted mittens and uncompromising boots. She had also the ringlets and other attractions with which French Art adorns ...
— HE • Andrew Lang
... personal kindliness of the press to the utmost. He did not mind making himself ridiculous or becoming a joke in the good cause, as he called it. He joined in the applause when a humorist at the club feigned to drop dead from his chair at Fulkerson's introduction of the topic, and he went on talking that first number into the surviving spectators. He stood treat upon all occasions, and he lunched attaches of the press at all hours. He especially befriended the correspondents of the newspapers of other cities, for, as he explained to March, those fellows could ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... too absolutely when he said that 'he only knew nothing,' yet a tinge of the same spirit,—a deep conviction of the profound ignorance of the human mind, even at its best—has ever been a characteristic of the most comprehensive genius. It has been a topic on which it has been fond of mournfully dilating. It is thus with Socrates, with Plato, with Bacon (even amidst all his magnificent aspirations and bold predictions), with Newton, with Pascal, and especially with Butler, in whom, if in any, the sentiment is carried to excess. We ...
— Reason and Faith; Their Claims and Conflicts • Henry Rogers
... enumerated. Nevertheless, time went on; a kind of intimacy, as we have said, grew up between these two cultivated minds, which had as wide a field as the whole sphere of human thought and study to meet upon; they discussed every topic of ethics and religion, of public affairs, and private character; they talked much, on both sides, of matters that seemed personal to themselves; and yet no secret, such as the physician fancied must exist there, ever stole out ...
— The Scarlet Letter • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... have always been a favorite topic for the speculation of those philosophers who derive a large part of national character from geographical conditions. A land that needed reclaiming from the sea by hard labor, a country situated at those two great outlets of European commerce, the mouths of the ...
— The Age of the Reformation • Preserved Smith
... Cuba formed a prominent topic in my last annual message. They remain in an uneasy condition, and a feeling of alarm and irritation on the part of the Cuban authorities appears to exist. This feeling has interfered with the regular commercial intercourse between the United ...
— State of the Union Addresses of Millard Fillmore • Millard Fillmore
... civilization of the remaining islands in this important Archipelago. To this sketch, a number of other details and essential illustrations, no doubt, are wanting; and possibly, I may be accused of some inaccuracies, in discussing a topic, with which I candidly avow I cannot be considered altogether familiar. The plan and success of the enterprise must, however, greatly depend on military skill and talent; but as I have attempted no more than fairly to trace the general outline of the plan, and ...
— The Former Philippines thru Foreign Eyes • Fedor Jagor; Tomas de Comyn; Chas. Wilkes; Rudolf Virchow.
... not fail to mention the chief thing For which all saints should meet on Sabbath day; But first my Muse would boldly spread her wing, For she could always on this subject stay. Your kind indulgence, reader, I would pray, As this sweet topic is most dear to me. Most gracious Savior, who for me didst pay Thy precious blood upon the cursed tree, That I might be redeemed from ...
— The Emigrant Mechanic and Other Tales In Verse - Together With Numerous Songs Upon Canadian Subjects • Thomas Cowherd
... the teacher's asking a prescribed set of routine questions, the pupil may be encouraged to ask his on. Thus in undertaking the examination of a given topic—say, the Battle of Hastings (SS69-75), the issue of the Great Charter (SS195-202), or "The Industrial Revolution" and Watt's invention of an improved Steam Engine (S563)—there are five inquiries which naturally arise and which ...
— The Leading Facts of English History • D.H. Montgomery
... clearly visible was that I had failed, after the first two or three words, in fixing his attention. The only chance of recalling him to himself appeared to lie in changing the subject. I tried a new topic immediately. ...
— The Moonstone • Wilkie Collins
... never do. Like most young girls, she was generally rather silent when not interested in the discussions of her elders. But now she never let conversation drop. The incidents of the croquet-party furnished a safe topic. Colonel Rolleston thought the gentle dissipation had made his daughter quite lively. Afterwards she took refuge at the piano, which was imprudent, for music only too surely touches the chord of feeling, and every piece was associated ...
— Bluebell - A Novel • Mrs. George Croft Huddleston
... remain free or be opened to settlement by slave-owners. Another presidential election was at hand. For fully ten years there had been ever-increasing excitement over the question of the limitation or the extension of slavery. This had clearly become the topic of supreme interest throughout the country, and yet the two leading parties avoided the issue. Their own membership was divided. Northern Democrats, many of them, were decidedly opposed to slavery extension. Southern Whigs with equal intensity favored ...
— The Anti-Slavery Crusade - Volume 28 In The Chronicles Of America Series • Jesse Macy
... because the topic came up—well, then, I shall not say anything. I am not the man to say things for nothing. You had yourself brought up the question that the King never showed himself; and I only remarked that it was not for nothing that the King shut himself ...
— The King of the Dark Chamber • Rabindranath Tagore (trans.)
... and he rode forward to Sherman's headquarters at Gaylesville. I had gone up from my own headquarters to make some report to Sherman, and was with him when Schofield arrived. Our greeting was a warm one. The present situation and what had occurred since the parting at Atlanta was of course the first topic of conversation, and I had the keen pleasure of hearing Sherman praise the handling of the corps during the past months in much stronger terms than he had used to me alone. Then followed the forecast of the future. Sherman put strongly his belief ...
— Military Reminiscences of the Civil War V2 • Jacob Dolson Cox
... were seriously enhanced by the conduct of Mr. Clay. Seeking nothing so eagerly as an opportunity to harass the government, he could have found none more to his taste than this question of South American recognition. His enthusiastic and rhetorical temperament rejoiced in such a topic for his luxuriant oratory, and he lauded freedom and abused the administration with a force of expression far from gratifying to the responsible heads of ...
— John Quincy Adams - American Statesmen Series • John. T. Morse
... furnish a frequent topic. He gives accounts of the health of his wife he announces the birth of his children. In after years he sends the news when his daughter is betrothed and when she is married, and tells of the doings ...
— Roman life in the days of Cicero • Alfred J[ohn] Church
... elements of a novel except the plot. The author has no story to tell. His aim is to amuse the reader by odd and whimsical remarks on every subject and on every personage whose peculiarities promise material for humor and satire. Sterne is perpetually digressing, moralizing commenting on every trivial topic which enters into his story, until the story itself is completely lost, if, indeed, it can be said ever to have been begun. The absence of arrangement is so marked that it is very difficult to turn to a passage which in a previous perusal has struck the eye. The eccentricity and whimsicality ...
— A History of English Prose Fiction • Bayard Tuckerman
... find it a good idea to take up some craze or topic of the moment. 'The Drama on Crutches' I wrote when the craze first arose amongst the aristocracy for going on the stage. One of the sketches which you will find outlined in that little notebook is entitled, 'Is Music a Failure?' and I endeavoured to answer the question by showing ...
— The Idler, Volume III., Issue XIII., February 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly. Edited By Jerome K. Jerome & Robert Barr • Various
... manifested not the slightest desire to learn anything about me or my mission to Berlin. You may be sure that I, for my part, did nothing to enlighten him. It was not, indeed, in my power to do so. Yet the young man's reserve was so marked that I was convinced he had his orders to avoid the topic. ...
— The Man with the Clubfoot • Valentine Williams
... this unsafe topic, are Lord Alvanley's description of a man who "muddled away his fortune in paying his tradesmen's bills"; Lord Orford's definition of timber, "an excrescence on the face of the earth, placed there by ...
— The Jest Book - The Choicest Anecdotes and Sayings • Mark Lemon
... cutting her father's hair in the kitchen (for she was a clever hand with the scissors and comb), as though nothing had occurred—Skipper Tommy Lovejoy meanwhile with spirit engaging the old man in a discussion of the unfailing topic; this being the attitude of the Lord God Almighty towards the wretched sons of men, whether ...
— Doctor Luke of the Labrador • Norman Duncan
... the place? This was the burden of every song. The attack—always imminent, always postponed—was the one topic of conversation wherever soldiers met ...
— The Thin Red Line; and Blue Blood • Arthur Griffiths
... soon passed, and they were chatting freely in a short time. Their conversation drifted from topic to topic, and Frank was delighted to find his fair companion wondrously well informed on subjects such as are given little attention by most young girls. She could even talk politics rationally, and she rather worsted Frank on a ...
— Frank Merriwell's Bravery • Burt L. Standish
... l. 3. —on high the welcome clouds appeared. The beauty of nature after the rainy season has refreshed the earth, is a favourite topic in Indian poetry. The Cloud Messenger, so gracefully translated by Mr. Wilson, is full of allusions to the grateful progress of the cloud, welcomed as it passes along by the joy of animate and inanimate beings. Quote 61-70, 131-142. ...
— Nala and Damayanti and Other Poems • Henry Hart Milman
... partially through the half-transparent cloud, it dissolved in an instant the half-formed ice of her husband's manner. By mutual consent the subject of the fancy ball seemed left in abeyance, and while in every circle, for miles round, it formed the central topic, in ours it was the theme forbid. Thence we tried to infer that it was a matter abandoned, and that Emily's better judgment, if not her good feeling, had determined her to give up her own liking, on ...
— The Wedding Guest • T.S. Arthur
... it would seem, might with least danger postpone answering each other's missives, since their common topic of interest is always with them, and the billet-doux, after having been carried in the bosom a week, is as fresh as when taken from the post-office. What need for "sweet sixteen" to consume the very night of its reception ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. II, No. 8, June 1858 • Various
... an appearance what I have said, and what I have further to say, on this topic, will have from me: But am I not bringing virtue to the touchstone, with a view to exalt it, if it come out to be proof?—'Avaunt then, for one moment, all consideration that may arise from a weakness which some would miscall gratitude; and is ...
— Clarissa, Volume 3 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson
... king on my knees that he will permit me to come sometimes to pay my court to him, for I had rather die than be two months without seeing him." A court-preacher, preaching one day before the king on the familiar topic, dwelt upon it: "We shall all die, all, all!" A sudden and involuntary movement of the monarch reminded him that he had touched upon a theme displeasing to royalty. In his dismay and confusion he hastened to qualify his assertion: "Yes, ...
— Paris from the Earliest Period to the Present Day; Volume 1 • William Walton
... been most admirably treated in another volume of this series, but a reference must be made to it as affecting our topic, English Embroidery, as costume has played no little part in ...
— Chats on Old Lace and Needlework • Emily Leigh Lowes
... of a sweet suggestion here and there, love-making crossed the topic. It appeared that General Pierson had finally been attacked, on the question of his resistance to every endeavour to restore Wilfrid to his rank, by Count Lenkenstein, and had barely spoken the ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... in the politics of the time as in everything else, and he and William Pressley had been discussing this subject at the moment of Ruth's appearance, which had interrupted their conversation. Philip Alston had forgotten the unfinished topic, but William Pressley had not. He, also, had been pleased to look on for a while at the girl's radiant delight; and he, also, had enjoyed the charming scene. But there was a lull now, and he at once turned back to the matter in which he was most deeply interested. Ambition for political ...
— Round Anvil Rock - A Romance • Nancy Huston Banks
... upon Zuleika with a gaze of bewildering intensity, Annunziata stood as if anxious to speak to her of some very important topic. ...
— Monte-Cristo's Daughter • Edmund Flagg
... to General Sheridan's headquarters, after a visit with old friends at Hays City, I noticed several scouts in a little group engaged in conversation on some important topic. Upon inquiry I learned that General Sheridan wanted a dispatch sent to Fort Dodge, a distance of ...
— An Autobiography of Buffalo Bill (Colonel W. F. Cody) • Buffalo Bill (William Frederick Cody)
... Radical candidate, and never with such acrimony as in Mrs. Mumbray's drawing-room when Serena was present. One afternoon he stood up, tea-cup in hand, and, as his habit was, delivered a set harangue on the burning topic. ...
— Denzil Quarrier • George Gissing
... milk, and sugar, and she passed the cup to the engineer with a smile. Each of the men admired her coolness, but Tollemache, who had been quietly scrutinizing the nearer hills, gave painful emphasis to this gruesome topic ...
— The Captain of the Kansas • Louis Tracy
... had a lot of trouble with economics—it has been a theme more fraught for them with danger than theology. How Californians make their money and how they spend it is a topic which in handling requires great subtlety of intellect, a fine delicacy of expression and much ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 9 - Subtitle: Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Reformers • Elbert Hubbard
... brother's angling excursions became more frequent—but he seldom returned with a full basket. He often spoke to me of Helen, but I always replied carelessly, and changed the topic of conversation to something else, yet when alone, I was in continual torment from my thoughts. I endeavored to console myself with the reflection that Helen's love was plighted to me, and that she ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 4 October 1848 • Various
... appear it was suppressed at the request of the French ambassador. Several speeches, and even a whole scene seem to have been transplanted to the "Duke of Guise," which were afterwards replaced, when the Revolution rendered the "Massacre of Paris," again a popular topic. There were, among others, the description of the meeting of Alva and the queen mother at Bayonne; the sentiments expressed concerning the assassination of Caesar, and especially the whole quarrelling ...
— The Works Of John Dryden, Vol. 7 (of 18) - The Duke of Guise; Albion and Albanius; Don Sebastian • John Dryden
... the Boar's Head was the property of Sir John Fastolfe prompts the question, what relation had he to the Sir John Falstaff of Shakespeare's plays? This has been a topic of large discussion for many years. There are so many touches of character and definite incidents which apply in common to the two knights that the poet has been assumed to have had the historic Fastolfe ever in view when drawing the portrait of his Falstaff. The historian ...
— Inns and Taverns of Old London • Henry C. Shelley
... Further, the Philosopher says (Topic. ii, 7): "If we be moved, what is in us is moved." But fate is a "disposition inherent to changeable things," as Boethius says (De Consol. iv). Therefore ...
— Summa Theologica, Part I (Prima Pars) - From the Complete American Edition • Thomas Aquinas
... Universities through Public Schools of two grades, we touch the foundation of the whole edifice—the Elementary Schools. On this all-important topic, he wrote in 1868: "About popular education I have here but a very few words to say. People are at last beginning to see in what condition this really is amongst us. Obligatory instruction is talked of. But what is the capital difficulty in the way of obligatory instruction, or indeed ...
— Matthew Arnold • G. W. E. Russell
... him to practice all kinds of bowing with celerity. Without the Tourte bow, Paganini and the modern school of virtuosos, which has followed so splendidly from his example, would have been impossible. To many of our readers an amplification of this topic may be of interest. While the left hand of the violin-player fixes the tone, and thereby does that which for the pianist is already done by the mechanism of the instrument, and while the correctness of his intonation depends on the proficiency of the left hand, ...
— Great Violinists And Pianists • George T. Ferris
... had been of late so abstracted from the daily affairs of the world, and so absorbed in his own special studies, that it was difficult to engage his attention upon any ordinary, mundane topic. Curious to know what it was that had drawn him so far out of himself, I opened the gate softly, and walking quietly round the laurel bushes, found him sitting, to my astonishment, with none other than the very man who was occupying my thoughts, Ram ...
— The Mystery of Cloomber • Arthur Conan Doyle
... including one topic that will soon be dealt with, we may conclude as follows: Germany showed that she did not want England's friendship, save in so far as it would help her to oppose the Monroe Doctrine or supply her with money to finish the Bagdad Railway. For ...
— The Development of the European Nations, 1870-1914 (5th ed.) • John Holland Rose
... Senora bade Felipe good-night, she did not go to bed. After closing her door, she sat down to think what should be done about Ramona. It had been a hard task she had set herself, talking all the evening with Felipe without alluding to the topic uppermost in her mind. But Felipe was still nervous and irritable. She would not spoil his night's rest, she thought, by talking of disagreeable things. Moreover, she was not clear in her own mind ...
— Ramona • Helen Hunt Jackson
... twenty's ordinary lad's love. Despite the control and restraint of forty years, he could no more mask his soul with his face than could Lee Barton, of equal years, fail to read that soul through so transparent a face. And often, to other women, talking, when the topic of Sonny came up, Lee Barton heard Ida express her fondness for Sonny, or her almost too-eloquent appreciation of his polo-playing, his work in the world, and his general all-rightness ...
— On the Makaloa Mat/Island Tales • Jack London
... inextricably was the magician caught, and the more firm and inexorable was his purpose. Perceiving however that he had little to hope from the most skilful detail of the pleas of passion, he turned the attention of the shepherdess to a different topic. "Behold Imogen," cried he, "the richness of the landscape on our right hand! The spot in my eye is farthest from the castle, and divided from the rest of the prospect with a tall hedge of poplars and alders. It is full of the finest grass, and its soil is rich and luxuriant. It ...
— Imogen - A Pastoral Romance • William Godwin
... he had the best intellectual equipment of any man in England since Francis Bacon's time. Once Coleridge, having forgotten the subject of his lecture, was startled by the announcement that he would speak on a difficult topic, entirely different from the one he had in mind; but he was equal to the emergency and delivered ...
— Halleck's New English Literature • Reuben P. Halleck
... of Lord Sherbrooke; and yet he could not find in his heart to aid, in the slightest degree, in forwarding a scheme which could end in nothing but misery to the sweet and innocent girl beside him. He changed the topic at once, then, and exerted himself to draw her mind away from the matter on which they ...
— The King's Highway • G. P. R. James
... said Packard afterward. "I think Roosevelt started it, as he and I were agreed the smaller ranches were losing enough cattle and horses to make the difference between profit and loss. It was a constant topic of conversation among the recognized law-and-order men and all of us agreed the thieves must be checked. I don't even remember how the decision came about to hold the meeting. It was decided to hold it, however, and I gave the notice wide publicity in the Bad Lands Cowboy. ...
— Roosevelt in the Bad Lands • Hermann Hagedorn
... talk about her any more if she bores you. I thought, and hoped, that she might interest you. That's the reason I started her as a topic of conversation. As she doesn't, I'll drop her again, at once. But what am I to do? I began this evening with a literary allusion, and found that you'd never heard of Longfellow's 'Village Blacksmith.' That wasn't a very encouraging start, you'll ...
— The Simpkins Plot • George A. Birmingham
... persuading the natives to part with them. Shandon wanted also to engage Hans Christian, the clever dog-driver, who made one of the party of Captain McClintock's expedition; but, unfortunately, Hans was at that time in Southern Greenland. Then came the grand question, the topic of the day, was there in Uppernawik a European waiting for the passage of the Forward? Did the governor know if any foreigner, an Englishman probably, had settled in those countries? To what epoch could he trace his last relations with whale or other ships? To these questions ...
— The English at the North Pole - Part I of the Adventures of Captain Hatteras • Jules Verne
... him as I spoke, with a smile on my lips and my hand on the back of my chair. But the jest I had expected in reply did not come. Something in my tone or choice of topic jarred upon him, and his answer was a simple wave of his hand toward Ambrose, who at once relieved me of my bouquet, placing it in a tall glass at the ...
— The House in the Mist • Anna Katharine Green
... of that glowing and perhaps slightly over gorgeous coloring which he laid on with a liberal hand. His completed histories, in their order, are the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella, 1837; the Conquest of Mexico, 1843—a topic which Irving had relinquished to him; and the Conquest of Peru, 1847. Prescott was fortunate in being born to leisure and fortune, but he had difficulties of {505} another kind to overcome. He was nearly blind, ...
— Brief History of English and American Literature • Henry A. Beers
... fire at Valpinson had been a godsend to the good people of Sauveterre. They had henceforth an inexhaustible topic of discussion, ever new and ever rich in unexpected conjectures,—the Boiscoran case. When people met in the streets, ...
— Within an Inch of His Life • Emile Gaboriau
... felt by our citizens of all classes throughout the Union for the total discharge of the public debt will apologize for the earnestness with which I deem it my duty to urge this topic upon the consideration of Congress—of recommending to them again the observance of the strictest economy in the application of the public funds. The depression upon the receipts of the revenue which had commenced ...
— State of the Union Addresses of John Quincy Adams • John Quincy Adams
... nervous manner, the critic did not confine himself to his topic, but touched on a number of significant peripheral subjects. He showed the virtue of concrete and specific imagery at a time when most poets sought the sanctuary of abstractions and universals; commented cogently on the styles of Chaucer, Spenser, and ...
— A Full Enquiry into the Nature of the Pastoral (1717) • Thomas Purney
... another topic; I find all this letter will be detached scraps; I can't at all contrive to hide the seams: but I don't care. I began my letter merely to tell you of the earthquake, and I don't pique myself upon doing any more than telling you what ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole - Volume I • Horace Walpole
... Sums of money, etc. 85. Syllabication: a Position of hyphen; b Division between syllables; c Monosyllabic words not divided; d One consonant between syllables; e Two consonants between syllables; f Prefixes and suffixes; g Short words; h Misleading division 86. Outlines: a Topic Outline; b Sentence Outline; c Paragraph Outline; d Indention; e Parallel form; f Faulty coordination; g Too detailed subordination 87. Letters: a Heading; b Inside address and greeting; c Body, Language; d Close; ...
— The Century Handbook of Writing • Garland Greever
... and the conversation never swerved from the entertaining subject of reform. Mr. Mix was insufferably bored, and cumulatively restless, but he was convinced that he was making headway, so that he kept his mind relentlessly on the topic, and dispensed honey by the shovelful. When he prepared to leave, he tested out his conviction, and reminded her gently: "Now, ...
— Rope • Holworthy Hall
... allusion made by James to the alliance; and the occasion did not strike the marquis as particularly appropriate to such a topic. He however replied in a whisper that he was rejoiced to hear this language from the king, having always believed that there would be no hesitation on his part between King Henry and the monarch of Spain, who, as he was aware, had made a similar proposition. James, ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... approved. Our design was approved and permission was granted. Soon after a gentleman of Merton College, who was one of our little company, now consisting of five persons, acquainted us that he had been much rallied the day before for being a member of the Holy Club, and that it was become a common topic of mirth at his college, where they had found out several of our customs, to which we were ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol X • Various
... end of October. Don Santiago de los Santos, better known as Captain Tiago, was giving a dinner; and though, contrary to custom, he had not announced it until that very afternoon, it had become before evening the sole topic of conversation, not only at Binondo, but in the other suburbs of Manila, and even in the city itself. Captain Tiago passed for the most lavish of entertainers, and it was well known that the doors of his home, like those of his country, were closed ...
— An Eagle Flight - A Filipino Novel Adapted from Noli Me Tangere • Jose Rizal
... English culture and endeavour, cramps the free flight of Thought,—that this, not Philosophy of Clothes, but recognition even that we have no such Philosophy, stands here for the first time published in our language. What English intellect could have chosen such a topic, or by chance stumbled on it? But for that same unshackled, and even sequestered condition of the German Learned, which permits and induces them to fish in all manner of waters, with all manner of nets, it seems probable ...
— Sartor Resartus, and On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and the Heroic in History • Thomas Carlyle
... spirits and expectation, so long wrought up to the meeting; and she was at least equally restless for the appearance of Robert, wanting to hear more from him, and above all certain that all her dreary cravings and vacancy would be appeased by one dialogue with him, on whatever topic it might be. She wished that she had obeyed that morning bell at St. Wulstan's. It would have disposed of half-an-hour, and she would have met him. 'For shame,' quoth the haughty spirit, 'now that has come into my head, I can't go ...
— Hopes and Fears - scenes from the life of a spinster • Charlotte M. Yonge
... man for his position," said Mr. Moggridge, started on what was now his favourite topic. "He'll be a great man some ...
— The Romance of Zion Chapel [3d ed.] • Richard Le Gallienne
... of the Forum with the confident expectation that the article on "What Negro Supremacy Means," by Senator Wade Hampton, would furnish some well-considered and statesmanlike views on that important topic. We expected to find a fair, if not an encouraging, statement of the changes that twenty years have wrought in the educational and property qualifications of the Negro. But we confess our utter disappointment, in finding that Senator Wade devotes ...
— The American Missionary, Volume XLII. No. 7. July 1888 • Various
... gives an account of the canon in both Testaments. Articles and essays upon the subject there are; but their standpoint is usually apologetic not scientific, traditional rather than impartial, unreasonably conservative without being critical. The topic is weighty, involving the consideration of great questions, such as the inspiration, authenticity, authority, and age of the Scriptures. The author has tried to handle it fairly, founding his statements on such evidence as seemed convincing, and condensing them into a moderate compass. ...
— The Canon of the Bible • Samuel Davidson
... Commons by Sir William, who was snubbed by the Home Secretary, who was cheered by Disraeli. This was intolerable, and accordingly next day, being, as good luck would have it, a Friday, when, as all men and members know, 'it is in the power of any member to bring forward any topic he may choose,' Sir William naturally chose the topic nearest to his heart, and 'said a few ...
— In the Name of the Bodleian and Other Essays • Augustine Birrell
... idiomatic, but by sheer determination to force a way through linguistic obstacles, he talked with a haphazard fluency which was amusing enough. No false modesty imposed a check upon his eloquence. It was to the general table that he addressed himself on the topic that had arisen; in an English dress his speech ...
— The Emancipated • George Gissing
... to talk with Miss Mavis because she was attractive, but I had been rather conscious of the absence of a good topic, not feeling at liberty to revert to Mr. Porterfield. She hadn't encouraged me, when I spoke to her as we were leaving Boston, to go on with the history of my acquaintance with this gentleman; and yet now, unexpectedly, ...
— The Patagonia • Henry James
... laughs outright, and says, "Poor Matilda! the man never dreamed of her." This is becoming uncomfortable. The major must ask his intentions. It is certainly one or the other; but then, we have a right to know which. Such was a very condensed view of Mrs. Dalrymple's reflections on this important topic,—a view taken with her usual ...
— Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon, Volume 1 (of 2) • Charles Lever
... Fill the time with bright, sparkling conversation, but do not talk business or discuss neighborhood gossip. Do not let the food upon the table furnish the theme of conversation; neither praise nor apology are in good taste. Parents who make their food thus an especial topic of conversation are instilling into their children's minds a notion that eating is the best part of life, whereas it is only a means to a higher end, and should be so considered. Of all family gatherings the meals should be the ...
— Science in the Kitchen. • Mrs. E. E. Kellogg
... simultaneously; while there was a general exclamation of surprise, from the officers round—for the courageous deed of the Barclays, in making their way through the enemy's lines, had been a general topic of conversation, and all Paris was familiar ...
— The Young Franc Tireurs - And Their Adventures in the Franco-Prussian War • G. A. Henty
... Read this selection again and again until you understand it clearly and appreciate its rare charm. Study each paragraph separately, observing how the topic of each is developed. Select the expressions which are the most pleasing to you. Tell why ...
— Eighth Reader • James Baldwin
... do not let us talk of them—" he broke off with a light gesture dismissing as it were an unpleasant topic. "Since you are happy," he concluded, looking at ...
— The Velvet Glove • Henry Seton Merriman
... menu card before his face. He was curious to hear the topic of their conversation. When he did so—the words were clear and distinct, as Baxter and Jimmie sat down at a table behind him—his heart bounded ...
— Traffic in Souls - A Novel of Crime and Its Cure • Eustace Hale Ball
... according to the ancient custom of Poictesme, is crying, 'Oy Dieus! Oy Dieus, de l'alba tantost ve!' But for all that, my mouth will resolutely discourse of the last Parisian flounces, or of your unfathomable eyes, or of Monsieur de Voltaire's new tragedy of Oreste,—or, in fine, of any topic you ...
— Gallantry - Dizain des Fetes Galantes • James Branch Cabell
... quite unconscious of it, some of the fault was his mother's for she kept the topic of his departure to the Crowninshields' ever ...
— Walter and the Wireless • Sara Ware Bassett
... said he, "are so good, that I cannot help lending you my assistance to carry them into execution," and gave the beggar a shilling. The other returned a suitable compliment, and extolled the benevolence of Harley. They kept walking together, and benevolence grew the topic of discourse. ...
— The Man of Feeling • Henry Mackenzie
... suddenly altering her course on her own account, and with a wild plunge settling down, and making THAT voyage with a crew of dead discoverers. Now, too, one recalls an almost universal tendency on the part of passengers to stumble, at some time or other in the day, on the topic of a certain large steamer making this same run, which was lost at sea, and never heard of more. Everybody has seemed under a spell, compelling approach to the threshold of the grim subject, stoppage, discomfiture, and ...
— The Uncommercial Traveller • Charles Dickens
... persons such a phrase as "He did not prove the very thing with which he started," or, "The whole of his case rested upon a pure assumption," two peculiarities which may be found by the curious in the works of Euclid. It is astonishing, again, how constantly one hears rationalists arguing upon some deep topic, apparently without troubling about the deep assumptions involved, having lost their sense, as it were, of the real colour and character of a man's assumption. For instance, two men will argue about whether patriotism is a good thing and never discover ...
— Varied Types • G. K. Chesterton
... whole of the dinner the conversation was kept up at the other end of the table by Lizzie talking to Augusta across her lover. This was done in such a manner as to seem to include Lord Fawn in every topic discussed. Parliament, India, the Sawab, Ireland, the special privileges of the House of Lords, the ease of a bachelor life, and the delight of having at his elbow just such a rural retreat as Fawn Court,—these were the fruitful themes of Lizzie's eloquence. Augusta did her ...
— The Eustace Diamonds • Anthony Trollope
... the topic, and began to speak of the march past. "I want to see Lord Starcross," he added. "I have no idea ...
— Derrick Vaughan—Novelist • Edna Lyall
... all that was claimed, a distinct race, with characteristics more nearly allied to the Ethiopian and the Mongolian than to the surrounding red races. As I figured this out somewhat slowly, De Noyan busted himself with the meal, and, thus engrossed, apparently forgot the topic of our conversation. ...
— Prisoners of Chance - The Story of What Befell Geoffrey Benteen, Borderman, - through His Love for a Lady of France • Randall Parrish
... two months, M. Decazes handled all these points with much ability and address; determined, but not impatient, persevering, yet not obstinate, changing his topic according to the tempers he encountered, and day by day bringing before these wavering minds the facts and arguments best adapted to convince them. Without taking his principal friends unconnected with the Cabinet into the full and daily confidence of his labours, ...
— Memoirs To Illustrate The History Of My Time - Volume 1 • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... usual, excessively urbane to Urquhart when they met, and himself opened the topic of the Norwegian jaunt. Urquhart took up the ball. "I think you might come. Your wife and boy will love it, and you'll kindle at their joy. 'They for life only, you for life in them,' to flout the bard. ...
— Love and Lucy • Maurice Henry Hewlett
... like to be forestalled. Do you find in all this stuff I have written anything like those feelings which one should send my old adventuring friend, that is gone to wander among Tartars, and may never come again? I don't, but your going away, and all about you, is a threadbare topic. I have worn it out with thinking, it has come to me when I have been dull with anything, till my sadness has seemed more to have come from it than to have introduced it. I want you, you don't know how much; but if I had you here in my European ...
— The Best Letters of Charles Lamb • Charles Lamb
... cares and the shadows of sorrows; to have neither too much nor too little sunshine and rain, that is, to be properly fed; and to have good seed to put into the ground, that is, to engage the mind with a topic which it will expand and reproduce. After all these things have been secured, it is only a sort of barbaric husbandry that we have practised. The common and rude experience of men, laboring without thinking about their labor, teaches these things, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 121, November, 1867 • Various
... fact she took all hearts by storm. Not a man in the Kaipara who would not have laid down and died for her. Not a bachelor among us who would not have felt exalted to the seventh heaven if he could have won her for his wife. But I dare say no more on this topic, and no more about the dear little beauty either, lest the too fortunate and ever-to-be envied gentleman, who now calls himself her husband, should come ...
— Brighter Britain! (Volume 1 of 2) - or Settler and Maori in Northern New Zealand • William Delisle Hay
... great relief, were they launched on a topic of mutual interest. He told her about Bob's tricks, and of the whirl and his scheme to overcome it; and she agreed that horses had to be handled with a certain rational severity, no matter how much one loved ...
— Burning Daylight • Jack London
... he strained his ears for further sounds of her voice, he did not hear her. What he did hear presently was the voice of the young man, and having learned long before to discriminate between different shades of the human voice, he knew from its low and tense quality that the topic was a vital one. He listened sharply, heedful of any least change of intonation that might be interpreted as a climax. But instead he was relieved presently to hear the voice of his mistress again, breaking in upon the low, constrained tones ...
— Bred of the Desert - A Horse and a Romance • Marcus Horton
... heart's content of their diversions, if they chanced to stumble upon any point of science or literature, they profited by the occasion, without, however, lingering too long over one and the same subject, but flitting from one topic to another like bees that meet as they go with different sorts of flowers. Envy, malignity, or cabal had no voice amongst them; they adored the works of the ancients, refused not the moderns the praises which ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume V. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... in which the reporter of the Golden Era, at San Francisco, California, endeavoured to inform the San Franciscan public of the character of "The Babes in the Wood" lecture. It is, as the reader will perceive, a burlesque on the way in which Artemus himself dealt with the topic he had chosen; while it also notes one or two of the salient features of my ...
— The Complete Works of Artemus Ward, Part 1 • Charles Farrar Browne
... the respect due to the rank which the crown has been pleased to bestow upon us. The people of Pennsylvania, in ordinary times, are so lightly taxed, that they hardly know that they are taxed. What fools you are to be agitating this dangerous topic of American taxation. It is beneath the dignity of the Assembly to make trouble about such small sums of money. We do not deny that you have been at some expense in pacifying the Indians, but that is no affair of ours. We already give the province ...
— Benjamin Franklin, A Picture of the Struggles of Our Infant Nation One Hundred Years Ago - American Pioneers and Patriots Series • John S. C. Abbott
... great delight, another hunt was proposed, and it furnished a topic for conversation during dinner and part of the evening. By ten o'clock, as usual, all had retired to their rooms, except Roland, who was in that of ...
— The Companions of Jehu • Alexandre Dumas
... the live-stock show for the general public, as well as the stock breeder, has been emphasized in every department. The increased cost of living being a dominating topic for both producer and consumer, much attention has been centered on meat-producing animals. Liberal provision has been made in the prize list for fat classes in ...
— The Jewel City • Ben Macomber
... was in her heart to say. She might touch on the subject of Damaris' personal appearance again; which, by literally taking her breath away, had contributed to her general undoing.—On second thoughts, however, she decided it would be politic to avoid that particular topic, since Damaris was evidently a little shy in respect of her own beauty.—Henrietta smiled to herself.—That is a form of shyness exceedingly ...
— Deadham Hard • Lucas Malet
... is less conspicuous in relation to the economic theory of land than in other problems of political economy, but the reader must not understand me from this to say, that he has not very largely contributed to the elucidation of this topic. He has indeed done so, though not, as is commonly supposed, by setting aside principles established by his predecessors, but, as his manner was, while accepting those principles, by introducing a new premise into the argument. The new premise introduced in this case was the influence ...
— John Stuart Mill; His Life and Works • Herbert Spencer, Henry Fawcett, Frederic Harrison and Other
... Charles Davis arrive in Seattle?" I asked, changing the topic in acknowledgment of his right to ...
— The Mutiny of the Elsinore • Jack London
... Socialist, because I don't believe in a universal outward prosperity. I mean, I don't want it; I should have no use for it. I'm holding no brief for the rich; I've nothing to say about them just now; and anyhow you and I have no concern with them." Rodney pulled himself back from the edge of a topic on which he was apt to become readily vehement. "But Socialism isn't the way out for them any more than it's the way out for the poor; it's got, I believe, to be by individual renunciation that their salvation will come; by their giving up, and stripping ...
— The Lee Shore • Rose Macaulay
... but most temperate regard smiled into her eyes, chatted easily on any topic suggested, and appeared entirely satisfied; but was all the while conscious of a growing need which, denied, would impoverish his life, making it, brief even as he deemed it to be, an intolerable burden. But on this ...
— His Sombre Rivals • E. P. Roe
... under arms, and my sympathy desired to keep its cornucopia replenished and ready for outpouring. At last, and after a little inward struggle, which I saw and respected, he one day launched into the topic. It was introduced delicately; anonymously ...
— Villette • Charlotte Bronte
... they are recommended to us by some peculiar feature or obvious distinction. Only young ladies from the boarding-school, or milliners' girls, read all the new novels that come out. It must be spoken of or against; the writer's name must be well known or a great secret; it must be a topic of discourse and a mark for criticism—that is, it must be likely to bring us into notice in some way—or we take no notice of it. There is a mutual and tacit understanding on this head. We can no more read all the new books that appear, than we can read all the old ones ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, Issue 267, August 4, 1827 • Various
... permitted to enlarge somewhat on this topic? There is, as you are aware, a demand just now for philosophies of History. The general spread of Inductive Science has awakened this appetite; the admirable contemporary French historians have quickened it by feeding it; till, the more order and sequence we find in the facts of ...
— The Roman and the Teuton - A Series of Lectures delivered before the University of Cambridge • Charles Kingsley
... a fellow's a sneak and a cad he's sure to be uncomfortable among a lot of gentlemen," said Horncastle, by way of enlarging on the interesting topic. ...
— My Friend Smith - A Story of School and City Life • Talbot Baines Reed
... camp. Mr. Phillips's was, as usual, far from the others, and at the opposite side of the water. Our fire place was made outside of the trees, on the banks. Brown had shot six Leptotarsis Eytoni, (whistling ducks) and four teals, which gave us a good dinner; during which, the principal topic of conversation was our probable distance from the sea coast, as it was here that we first found broken sea shells, of the genus Cytherea. After dinner, Messrs. Roper and Calvert retired to their tent, and Mr. Gilbert, John, and Brown, were platting ...
— Journal of an Overland Expedition in Australia • Ludwig Leichhardt
... Malone recognized, was firmly closed. He cleared his throat and started up another topic. "Let's talk about these energy bursts," he said. "Do you still pick ...
— Occasion for Disaster • Gordon Randall Garrett
... met before this, and have much to tell one another; Treaty of Seville by no means their only topic. Nay the flood of cordiality went at length so far, that at last Friedrich Wilhelm, the conscientious King, came upon the most intimate topics: Gravenitz; the Word of God; scandal to the Protestant Religion: ...
— History of Friedrich II of Prussia V 7 • Thomas Carlyle
... and drinking wine or beer, and hearing their opinions on the politics of the day, and of their country. Now, my experience tells me that in country taverns in France, and Germany, and Belgium, and Switzerland, and Austria, the main topic of discussion is—the Parsons. I have not been much about in this way in England, but I have an idea that it is pretty nearly the same here. What I have heard often said is this, "Nothing easier than to preach!" "Ah! they are ...
— The Village Pulpit, Volume II. Trinity to Advent • S. Baring-Gould
... unreservedly on the subject of French and Russian intrigues, he expressed great interest in the opinions formed by the public of the different countries on the Herzegovinian and Montenegrin question. The principal topic of conversation, however, was the campaign then about to be opened against the Herzegovinian rebels, and the preparations which he had made for ...
— Herzegovina - Or, Omer Pacha and the Christian Rebels • George Arbuthnot
... matters not), I again repeat, find out or guess at what moment he is likely to be passive—by this I mean easy and careless; then, with the most fervent prayer or yearning of your entire heart, mind, soul, and strength, desire he may think of you. And if you wish him to think on any particular topic in relation to you, it is necessary for you to press your hands, when operating on him, on such mental faculties of your head as you wish him to exercise towards you. This demands a meager knowledge ...
— The Ladies Book of Useful Information - Compiled from many sources • Anonymous
... arguments, the result of previous thought, being already prepared, she wrote before her excitement had time to cool. As she explains in the Advertisement to her "Letter" to Burke, the "Reflections" had first engaged her attention as the transient topic of the day. Commenting upon it as she read, her remarks increased to such an extent that she decided to publish them as a short "Vindication of ...
— Mary Wollstonecraft • Elizabeth Robins Pennell
... that, in the effort to establish friendly relations with a poor man, often the greatest lack is a common topic. Here is at least one topic that rich and poor have in common. Here it will be found too that they have many grievances in common, and what makes a better beginning for a friendly relation than a common grievance? Another ...
— Friendly Visiting among the Poor - A Handbook for Charity Workers • Mary Ellen Richmond
... find listed in our catalogue books on every topic: Poetry, Fiction, Romance, Travel, Adventure, Humor, Science, History, Religion, Biography, Drama, etc., besides Dictionaries and Manuals, Bibles, Recitation and Hand Books, Sets, Octavos, Presentation Books and Juvenile and ...
— The Drummer Boy • John Trowbridge
... The memory of what he had so evidently wished her to infer regarding his reasons for this new departure came to her in an instant and brought a little wonderment as to the possible outcome of it. Turn which way she would, and propose what topic she might, he seemed bound to use it as a vehicle of his undisguised admiration. She had wished to consider him as a friend, because he had been a friend to her adored brother when that brother needed one, and while she had written him a dozen chatty ...
— Uncle Terry - A Story of the Maine Coast • Charles Clark Munn
... Hobson; "it's a very handsome young gentleman, with as fine a person, and as genteel a way of behaviour, and withal, as pretty a manner of dressing himself, and that, as any lady need desire. He has no great head for business, as I am told, but the ladies don't stand much upon that topic, being they know nothing ...
— Cecilia vol. 3 - Memoirs of an Heiress • Frances (Fanny) Burney (Madame d'Arblay)
... sleepy little town, dozing amid parched wheat fields. The paint was off it; nothing much more exciting than a crop failure ever happened there. The main topic of conversation was the weather and, as Mark Twain said, everybody talked about it, but nothing was done. Within sixty days this soporific village became a roaring bedlam; every town lot was leased, derricks rose out of chicken runs, boilers panted ...
— Flowing Gold • Rex Beach
... lot of trouble with economics—it has been a theme more fraught for them with danger than theology. How Californians make their money and how they spend it is a topic which in handling requires great subtlety of intellect, a fine delicacy of expression and much ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 9 - Subtitle: Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Reformers • Elbert Hubbard
... friends and sympathizers to be on the lookout for opposition. Every fresh arrival of free-State men angered yet more the Borderers who were gathered there to hinder and, if possible, prevent further immigration. Mr. Bryant chafed under the necessity of keeping his voice hushed on the topic that engaged all his thoughts; and Oscar and Sandy were ready to fight their way across the river; at least ...
— The Boy Settlers - A Story of Early Times in Kansas • Noah Brooks
... subject. His "Spain in America," his third published book, is the book of a scholar. While the conditions of his narrative allowed only forty-six pages to the story of Columbus, he had undoubtedly material enough well arranged and digested to fill the volume on this topic alone. I desire to quote a signal example ...
— Historical Essays • James Ford Rhodes
... entertain the hope of plunder and booty, they would constantly pour upon them their worthless population. They, therefore, destroyed their farms and their bridges; and collecting their horses and cattle, they retreated upon the Red River among their own people. The Cherokee campaign is a topic of much boasting among the Texians, as they say they expelled the Indians from their country; but a fact, which they are not anxious to publish, is, that for every Cherokee killed, ...
— Travels and Adventures of Monsieur Violet • Captain Marryat
... foolish business of Sheil and Hill has been the sole topic of discussion, to the unspeakable disgust of every sensible person in and out of the House. All feel the embarrassment, the ridicule, the disgrace of such an occupation, and the members of Parliament are provoked that the affair was not strangled at the outset. ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William IV, Vol. III • Charles C. F. Greville
... behaviour and discreet conduct, his general knowledge of letters and quick memory, soon contracted a great familiarity with him. Conversing one day with the archbishop about ancient histories and unknown events, on which topic he most frequently heard him with pleasure, it happened that when the subject of their discourse was the incarnation of our Lord, he said, amongst other things, "Before Christ assumed human nature, the demons had great power over mankind, ...
— The Itinerary of Archibishop Baldwin through Wales • Giraldus Cambrensis
... is now nineteen years ago, and I write from memory of a night long to be remembered. Around many a Grand Army Camp-fire in the last fifteen years this bivouac has been made the topic of an evening's talk. It was attended with no particular hardship. The weather was such as is met with in these latitudes, not cold, not hot, and though a thick vapory cloud hid the full round moon from early eventide until the last regiment filed into the woods, yet there was a halo ...
— The Black Phalanx - African American soldiers in the War of Independence, the - War of 1812, and the Civil War • Joseph T. Wilson
... in return for this. Public matters, the fear of war, the arming of all nations, make me sick at heart. How wonderful and admirable the conduct of that poor friendless little Bulgaria has been. Then Ireland, oh me! but on that topic I won't ...
— Lady John Russell • Desmond MacCarthy and Agatha Russell
... appointment of the above illustrious individual to the head of our naval administration is a gratulatory topic for every Englishman; and we doubt not the measure will contribute as largely to individual honour, as it will to the national welfare. In the abstract, nations resemble large families, of which kings are fathers or guardians; and ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - No. 291 - Supplement to Vol 10 • Various
... some uncalled-for bitterness in this; but the poor fellow can't be contented, with his lonesome and aimless life. "We're not talking about me, Jim. You're the topic. Stick to your text, and preach away: my soul is not so immersed in oil that I can't listen. But I don't blame you for going back on the law; a beast of a business, I always thought it. Why didn't you go for ...
— A Pessimist - In Theory and Practice • Robert Timsol
... any personal topic and talked about Canadian farming, sitting silent when he could, while Muriel gazed about with pleasurable curiosity. It is never quite dark on those wide levels in summertime, and, for there was no moon, the prairie stretched away before them shadowy, ...
— Prescott of Saskatchewan • Harold Bindloss
... fire fajrprenilo. Tongue lango. Tonic fortigilo. Tonic accent tonakcento. Tonnage enhavebleco. Tonsure tonsuro. Too (much) tro. Tool ilo. Tooth dento. Toothless sendenta. Top (summit) supro. Top (peak) pinto. Top (of head) verto. Topaz topazo. Topic subjekto. Topmost plejsupra. Topography topografio. Topple fali. Topsy-turvy, to turn renversi. Topsy-turvy renversita—ite. Toque cxapo. Torch torcxo. Toreador toreadoro. Torment turmenti. Torment turmento—ado. Torpedo ...
— English-Esperanto Dictionary • John Charles O'Connor and Charles Frederic Hayes
... story. What was the topic of conversation? What stand did the poet's friend take regarding poetry? Why turn to Greece in considering the arts? What limitations of the painter's art are pointed out by the poet? What is his ...
— Matthew Arnold's Sohrab and Rustum and Other Poems • Matthew Arnold
... the banner gold county of the State. Most of us forget everything but the gold," replied Brown, smiling inwardly, to think how easily this remark would lead up to the desired topic. ...
— Forty-one Thieves - A Tale of California • Angelo Hall
... Leaving the topic of general endowments to take up those sources of revenue destined to defray particular forms of expenditure, we find that Permanent Parish Endowments in lands, goods or money devoted to the defraying of Specific Parish Administrative Burdens or Utilities were very ...
— The Elizabethan Parish in its Ecclesiastical and Financial Aspects • Sedley Lynch Ware
... London, 1738. The author takes for his text 1 Peter ii, 45, and under ten heads considers the Congregational church as the true Scriptural church, its rights, privileges, etc. Under topic four, "The Charter of this House," he says: "The charter of this house exempts all its inhabitants from obeying the whole ceremonial law:... from the doctrines of men in matters of faith,... from man's commands in the worship of God. Man can ...
— The Development of Religious Liberty in Connecticut • M. Louise Greene, Ph. D.
... and his name often occurs in reports of debates and committees. He spoke on the infesting of the country by pretended soldiers and sailors, on the cognate subject of sturdy vagabonds and beggars, on the fruitful topic of the Queen's debts. He took part in the burning controversy whether the Lords were entitled to receive, seated, Members sent by the Lower House to confer on a Bill, instead of coming down to the bar. He was being consulted by the Privy ...
— Sir Walter Ralegh - A Biography • William Stebbing
... Max—as cordial as you please. When I say I have just read of your arrival, I mean that twenty minutes have elapsed by the clock. These have been spent in conversation with my excellent friend Mr. Sloane—we having taken the liberty of making you the topic. I haven't time to say more about Frederick Sloane than that he is very anxious to make your acquaintance, and that, if your time is not otherwise engaged, he would like you very much to spend a month with him. He is an excellent host, or I shouldn't be here myself. It appears ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 5 • Various
... prevailed amongst the inhabitants of the town. The common topic of all their conversation was the conflagration at the Kamionka estate. The whole house was reduced to ashes; nearly all the outbuildings had been burned down; the barns and ricks with all the year's harvest had been devoured by ...
— An Obscure Apostle - A Dramatic Story • Eliza Orzeszko
... point the historical balance of a certain detail seemed open to contention. Accompany me, therefore, to my own severe retreat, where this necessarily flat and unentertaining topic can be looked at from ...
— Kai Lung's Golden Hours • Ernest Bramah
... Wellington, Charlotte's hero, was sure to come off conqueror. When the argument got warm I had sometimes to come in as arbitrator." Long before Maria Bronte died, at the age of eleven, her father used to say he could converse with her on any topic with as much freedom and pleasure ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol IX. • Edited by Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton
... this cheerful topic Kit entered upon with the written note from Perez to the general. He had no liking for his task, as his eyes rested on Dona Jocasta, beautiful, resigned and detached from the scene about her. He remembered what Rotil had said scoffingly of saints lifted from shrines—a man never ...
— The Treasure Trail - A Romance of the Land of Gold and Sunshine • Marah Ellis Ryan
... morning for Homburg. There, in inmost circles, he forgot his children. He visited in several of the great houses of the Continent until November; then returned to London to find his book the literary topic of the day. His secretary handed him the reviews; and for once in a way he read the finalities of the nameless. He found himself hailed as a genius, and compared in astonished phrases to the prodigiously ...
— The Bell in the Fog and Other Stories • Gertrude Atherton
... alarming her by any needless allusion to Doctor Allday or to Miss Jethro, he answered her inquiries (so far as he was himself concerned) without reserve. Her curiosity once satisfied, she showed no disposition to pursue the topic. She pointed to Miss Ladd's cat, fast asleep by the side of ...
— I Say No • Wilkie Collins
... undefined anticipation of radical changes, of new scenes, and great doings, seemed to have possessed every one, and the common drudgery of the vessel appeared contemptible. Here was a new vein opened; a grand theme of conversation, and a topic for all sorts of discussions. National feeling was wrought up. Jokes were cracked upon the only Frenchman in the ship, and comparisons made between "old horse" and "soup meagre," ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana
... have stirred in every member of the group; they have felt the pull of the same desires and interests; they have put themselves in motion toward the same goal; they have greeted one another in similar fashion, and they find satisfaction in talking together on a common topic; but they do not constitute a permanent or organized group, and once separated they may ...
— Society - Its Origin and Development • Henry Kalloch Rowe
... considered as a means to the end of securing white supremacy in the State. The following week the Athenaeum, the finest lecture hall in New Orleans, was crowded with men and women from all classes of society anxious to hear more on this daily topic of discussion, as presented by Mrs. Chapman Catt, Miss Clay and Miss Frances A. Griffin of Alabama. Seats were reserved for the members of the Constitutional Convention, who responded almost unanimously to ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume IV • Various
... his return to New York from San Francisco, he concluded his engagements and sailed for Liverpool by the Cunard steamship Scotia. By this time the attentions bestowed upon Montgomery by Mrs. R. had become more than a topic of comment with observers beyond the pale of the social set of which she had been a prime factor. It was reported that they were engaged to be married, and that his return to England was for the purpose of completing arrangements in that behalf. At all events she accompanied him as a fellow-passenger ...
— The Truth About America • Edward Money
... obituaries of well-known men, stories of their rise to prominence, pictures of them and their families, accounts of great discoveries, inventions, and disasters, and facts on every conceivable newspaper topic,—all ready for hasty reference or use. If the President of the United States were to drop dead from apoplexy, the papers would have on the streets in a quarter of an hour's time columns of stories giving his whole ...
— News Writing - The Gathering , Handling and Writing of News Stories • M. Lyle Spencer
... colonies[426] was too little considered until the commencement of the last war. The reduction of Cape Breton by the people of New England was an acquisition so unexpected and fortunate, that America became, on that remarkable event, a more general topic of conversation. Mr. Shirley, the governor of Massachusetts Bay, was the principal projector of that glorious enterprise; an enterprise which reduced to the obedience of his Britannic majesty the Dunkirk of North America. Of such consequence to the French was the possession ...
— The Conquest of Canada (Vol. 1 of 2) • George Warburton
... florid countenance had taken on a mild glow of animation during his narrative. It relapsed into lethargy at the advent of this new topic. ...
— The Market-Place • Harold Frederic
... him to unleash the topic of the day, but he didn't seem to want to get going. Conversation languished. He stared straight ahead of him in a glassy ...
— Death At The Excelsior • P. G. Wodehouse
... I meant Amy—for bringing up such a topic as alligators at this moment, when we can't move. And the ugly creatures always come out on a sand bar ...
— The Outdoor Girls in Florida - Or, Wintering in the Sunny South • Laura Lee Hope
... were even more densely thronged than they had been the night before. Thousands and thousands of people paraded up and down—war the sole topic of ...
— The boy Allies at Liege • Clair W. Hayes
... rustle of dresses and say, "I am so delighted... Mamma's health... and Countess Apraksina..." and then, again rustling, pass into the anteroom, put on cloaks or mantles, and drive away. The conversation was on the chief topic of the day: the illness of the wealthy and celebrated beau of Catherine's day, Count Bezukhov, and about his illegitimate son Pierre, the one who had behaved so improperly ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy
... ambassador plenipotentiary of the Queen of Great Britain to the court of Madrid. This event seemed to give great satisfaction to the Spanish court and people, and her Iberian majesty, on the assembling of the cortes, made the matter a prominent topic in her address; but little interest was taken in Great Britain in connection ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... Ward at one end of the table and Burleigh at the other, who finally started the topic of Miss Madison's intended salon, not only that those unacquainted with her ambition might be enlightened, but that the great intention should receive a concrete form without further delay. A half-hour later, when ...
— Senator North • Gertrude Atherton
... latter part of the last century. This is the much vaunted philologico-chronological proof that the manuscript readings in that folio are of very recent origin. Dr. Ingleby devotes twenty pages to this single topic. Never was labor more entirely wasted. For the result of it all is the establishment of these facts in regard to "cheer":—that shouts of encouragement and applause were called "cheers" as early, at least, as 1675, and that in the middle of the century 1500, if not before, "to cheer" ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, No. 47, September, 1861 • Various
... to find those so lately strangers conversing in the low and earnest tones which betoken confidence, while the lofty expression on the countenance of the one, and the moist eyes and flushed cheeks of the other, showed that their topic was ...
— Evenings at Donaldson Manor - Or, The Christmas Guest • Maria J. McIntosh
... now that he was on the right track; he was riding the wave of the future. It will be sufficient here merely to allude to that well established topic of English literary history, the rise of the ballad during the eighteenth century—in A Collection of Old Ballads (1723-1725), in Ramsay's Evergreen and Tea-Table, in Percy's Reliques, and in all the opinions, the critiques, the imitations, ...
— Parodies of Ballad Criticism (1711-1787) • William Wagstaffe
... became, and the longer and more rapid were his strides up and down the length of his spacious sitting-room. This was his only outward sign of agitation. When thinking deeply on any all-absorbing topic, he could not remain still. He felt obliged to cast away physical as well as mental restriction on the play of his imagination, and he would at times pace back and forth during unrecorded hours in the solitude of his apartments, finally awakening to a sense of his surroundings ...
— The Albert Gate Mystery - Being Further Adventures of Reginald Brett, Barrister Detective • Louis Tracy
... childish figure, glowing face, and sublime confidence affected her with a sense of something strange and remote. Yet the conversation interested her greatly. People are very foolish who restrain spiritual confidences; no topic is so universally and permanently interesting as religious experience. Elizabeth felt its charm at once. She loved God, but loved him, as it were, afar off; she almost feared to speak to him. She had never dared ...
— The Hallam Succession • Amelia Edith Barr
... had fed and succoured her; and, as this is a true chronicle, it must be stated that the very first use Mrs. Star made of her convalescence was, to kick her nurse on the leg, break her halter into fragments, and gallop off to the hills with a loud neigh of defiance. Whenever the topic of feminine ingratitude came on the carpet at that station, this, which Star had done, used always to be told as an instance ...
— Station Amusements • Lady Barker
... supplied with all his comforts. He passed most of the day sitting at the door of his house, which looked upon the anchorage, exchanging a few words with every one that passed by, but invariably upon one and the same topic—his sloop. If she was at anchor—"There she is," he would say, pointing to her with the stem of his pipe. If she was away, she had sailed on such a day;—he expected her back at such a time. It was a fair wind—it was a foul wind for his sloop. All his ideas were engrossed by this one darling object, ...
— Newton Forster - The Merchant Service • Captain Frederick Marryat
... Anguttara, classify the Buddha's utterances under various headings and presuppose older documents which they sometimes quote[606]. The Samyutta consists of a great number of suttas, mostly short, combined in groups treating of a single subject which may be either a person or a topic. The Anguttara, which is a still longer collection, is arranged in numerical groups, a method of classification dear to the Hindus who delight in such computations as the four meditations, the eightfold path, the ten fetters. It takes such religious topics as can be counted in this ...
— Hinduism and Buddhism, Vol I. (of 3) - An Historical Sketch • Charles Eliot
... various ships exchanged visits. The Emden was practically the sole topic of their conversation. The Russian commander had just returned aboard his own ship after a visit to Lord Hastings. There came a call from ...
— The Boy Allies Under Two Flags • Ensign Robert L. Drake
... Doctor's dinner-party was not quite so ponderous and learned as usual, for the incidents of the day formed the main topic of conversation. The Doctor was in high good-humour, and naturally felt rather proud of his pupils. They had distinguished themselves, and in so doing had distinguished him and his school, and the consequence was that the masters readily ...
— Glyn Severn's Schooldays • George Manville Fenn
... not speaking of the regular advertising columns. What I want to see are paragraphs concerning you mixed up with the news of the day, information about you and your habits, interviews with you, letters from you on every conceivable topic—— ...
— The Big Drum - A Comedy in Four Acts • Arthur Pinero
... Incident to the above topic mention has been made of the brisk morning walk before breakfast. This has a most salutary tonic effect besides the influence that it exerts upon the bowel movements. Not the least important result of this morning exercise ...
— The Biology, Physiology and Sociology of Reproduction - Also Sexual Hygiene with Special Reference to the Male • Winfield S. Hall
... with the Survey and Lands Department is the topic of exploration. So soon as possible after my first arrival, I took upon myself to send Mr. John Forrest overland to Adelaide, along the shores of the Great Bight, nearly on the line of Mr. Eyre's route in 1841. I did this before the introduction of representative government, and it is right to ...
— Explorations in Australia • John Forrest
... the most sorrowful reaction the political condition of Germany was so wretched that any discussion concerning it was gladly avoided. I do not remember having attended a single debate on that topic in the circles of the students with which I ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... withal such a patronizing air, that the shortsighted Ella felt rather overawed, particularly when she spoke of her "uncle in India," with whom she was "such a favorite." During their stay, servants were introduced as a topic of conversation, and on that subject Eugenia was quite as much at home as Mrs. Hastings, descanting at large upon the many annoyances one was compelled to endure, both from the "ignorance and impertinence ...
— Dora Deane • Mary J. Holmes
... charming photographs; the task remaining for Mr. DARYL KLEIN, Lieutenant in the Chinese Labour Corps, of so conveying the atmosphere as to absorb the reader's attention, was not achieved. On the two main aspects of the topic, the origin in China and the result in France, he makes no serious attempt. I got no clear impression of the coolie at home or of why he took to being an ally, and I was left with but the vaguest conception of the unit in France, since the narrative ended at the disembarcation. Lastly, I have with ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, February 18th, 1920 • Various
... dinners given by Cambaceres and others, which were a general topic of conversation at the time, and who knew the ingenious calculation which was observed in the invitation of the guests, must be convinced of the vast influence of a good dinner in political affairs. As to Cambaceres, he did not believe that a good government could exist without good dinners; ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... good woman was my Welsh cousin, and her children were my Welsh nephews. My niece Jeanneton was not pretty; but she appeared to be a good girl. I continued my conversation with the mother, but I changed the topic. ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... animal," continued the doctor, who was evidently discoursing upon a favorite topic. "It was the one that came suddenly upon More while he was resting with Almah after his flight with the run-away bird. That I take to be the Megalosaurus. This animal was a monster of tremendous size and strength. Cuvier thought that it might have been seventy feet in length. ...
— A Strange Manuscript Found in a Copper Cylinder • James De Mille
... subterraneous Patmos to talk to me, ordered his servant to pile on a few more mattresses, and then retreated. Anything so dull as existence here it is difficult to imagine. Before the day is out one gets sick and tired of the one single topic of conversation. We are like the people at Cremorne waiting for the fireworks to begin; and I really do believe that if this continues much longer, the most cowardly will welcome the bombs as a relief from the oppressive ennui. Few regiments are seen now during the day marching through ...
— Diary of the Besieged Resident in Paris • Henry Labouchere
... talk with Roger and of her own strenuous desire to help; but she did not tell what she had said to him at the last. There was something here which she could not understand. Mary persistently refused to talk about him. Even now she shifted the topic. ...
— Contrary Mary • Temple Bailey
... Hegel's pages on this topic I found, however, that Mr. Lathrop had imputed to him a theory—my theory—which that philosopher would have doubtless repudiated emphatically. What Hegel does is simply to call attention to the fact that in the literature of the ancient Greeks and Romans love is depicted only ...
— Primitive Love and Love-Stories • Henry Theophilus Finck
... so much in its symbolical suggestion as in its form and construction—a model of which was brought to London by Judah Templo in the reign of Charles II.[125] It was much the same on the Continent, but so far from being a new topic of study and discussion, we may trace this interest in the Temple all through the Middle Ages. Nor was it peculiar to the Cabalists, at least not to such a degree that they must needs be brought in to account for the Biblical imagery and symbolism in Masonry. Indeed, it might with more ...
— The Builders - A Story and Study of Masonry • Joseph Fort Newton
... sensible smile. Mrs. Batjer accompanied her suggestions nearly always with a slight sniff and cough. Berenice could see that the mere fact of this conversation made a slight difference. In Mrs. Batjer's world poverty was a dangerous topic. The mere odor of it suggested a kind of horror—perhaps the equivalent of error or sin. Others, Berenice now suspected, would ...
— The Titan • Theodore Dreiser
... great originality in my views. My efforts have been to collect the scattered rays of light, and to bring them to bear upon one interesting topic. The present is the child of the past. The ideas of bygone races affect the practices of living people. We form but parts of a whole; we are influenced by those who preceded us, and we shall influence those who come after ...
— Landholding In England • Joseph Fisher
... authorities are entirely disagreed on the matter. Dr. Mackey admits that "the origin and source whence first sprang the institution of Freemasonry has given rise to more difference of opinion and discussion among masonic scholars than any other topic in the literature of the institution."[266] Nor is this ignorance maintained merely in books for the general public, since in those specially addressed to the Craft and at discussions in lodges the same diversity of opinion prevails, and no decisive conclusions appear to be reached. ...
— Secret Societies And Subversive Movements • Nesta H. Webster
... the provisions to Foka, and reminded him of the refreshments which must be ready for the priests, she took up her knitting and seated herself by my side again. The conversation reverted to the old topic, and we once more mourned and shed tears together. These talks with Natalia I repeated every day, for her quiet tears and words of devotion brought me relief and comfort. Soon, however, a parting came. Three days after the funeral we returned ...
— Childhood • Leo Tolstoy
... those of Damascus: Moawiyah was a usurper, Yezid a tyrant, and Ali alone is the lawful successor of the prophet." A prudent explanation restored his tranquillity; and he passed to a more familiar topic of conversation. "What is your age?" said he to the cadhi. "Fifty years."—"It would be the age of my eldest son: you see me here (continued Timour) a poor lame, decrepit mortal. Yet by my arm has the Almighty been pleased to subdue the kingdoms ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 6 • Edward Gibbon
... largesse could be distributed. Hats were mentioned and dresses, and the new house somewhere—a space-embracing-somewhere, beyond surmise, beyond geography. They walked onwards for a long time, so long that at last a familiar feeling stole upon the youth. The word "food" seemed suddenly a topic worthy of the most spirited conversation. His spirits arose. He was no longer solid, space belonged to him also, it was in him and of him, and so there was a song in his heart. He was hungry and the friend of man ...
— Mary, Mary • James Stephens
... a topic of conversation in the study morning after morning when the rector was not present—a peculiar form of conversation when Distin was there—which was not regularly, for the accident on the river served as an excuse for several long stays in bed—but a free and unfettered form when ...
— The Weathercock - Being the Adventures of a Boy with a Bias • George Manville Fenn
... aware of the quizzical expression on my face and began to be embarrassed. Then she stopped and laughed. "Well," she said, "I did not know that I was paying so much attention to my sleep." She was bright enough to see the point at once, gave up her preoccupation in the all-absorbing topic and promptly forgot to have any trouble with so natural a function ...
— Outwitting Our Nerves - A Primer of Psychotherapy • Josephine A. Jackson and Helen M. Salisbury
... recurred to his letters, which were a larger pack than usual this morning, chatting all the time with Wealdon and me on the tremendous topic, and tossing aside every letter that did not bear on ...
— Wylder's Hand • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... London, and close every club from Charing Cross to Hyde Park Corner. We should all have been immortal in paragraphs without number. Coroners, surgeons, poets, and special juries, would have made their reputation out of us; and for a month of hot weather, we should have been a refreshing topic in the mouths of mankind. But it was otherwise decreed: the shell dropped within a foot of the steamer, and we were quittes pour ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 61, No. 378, April, 1847 • Various
... carefully avoided any personal topic and talked about Canadian farming, sitting silent when he could, while Muriel gazed about with pleasurable curiosity. It is never quite dark on those wide levels in summertime, and, for there was no moon, the prairie stretched away before them shadowy, silent, and mysterious. ...
— Prescott of Saskatchewan • Harold Bindloss
... to talk to her of the country, for here she had touched on a topic which was dear to him. He knew all about the birds and beasts, the forests and the meadows, and being unused to the art of hypocritical interest, he took for real sympathy the lady's vapid exclamations of enthusiasm, with which she broke in now and ...
— The Nest of the Sparrowhawk • Baroness Orczy
... has said, that ignorance is the softest pillow on which a man can rest his head. I am sure it is true as to every thing political, and shall endeavor to estrange myself to every thing of that character. I indulge myself on one political topic only, that is, in declaring to my countrymen the shameless corruption of a portion of the Representatives in the first and second Congresses, and their implicit devotion to the treasury. I think I do good in ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... and consequently having completed their education, it was now their duty, as members of society, to instruct and not to study; and on all occasions they seized opportunities of assisting the spread of knowledge. The voices of boys lecturing upon every lecturable topic, resounded in every part of the island. Their tones were so shrill, their manners so presuming, their knowledge so crude, and their general demeanour so completely unamiable, that it was impossible to hear them without the greatest, delight, advantage, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 12, - Issue 322, July 12, 1828 • Various
... Maurice launched out into his usual topic—convict discipline. It was pleasant for him to get a listener; for his wife, cold and unsympathetic, tacitly declined to enter into his schemes for the subduing of the refractory villains. "You insisted on coming here," she would say. "I did not wish to come. I don't like to talk of these ...
— For the Term of His Natural Life • Marcus Clarke
... prayse you Great Prince, but having begun; where shall I make an end? since there remains not a Topic through all that kind, but one might write Decads of it, without offending the truth, were it as secure of your modesty; since I am as well to consider what your ears can suffer, as what is owing to your Virtues: On what heads shall I extend then ...
— An Apologie for the Royal Party (1659); and A Panegyric to Charles the Second (1661) • John Evelyn
... the night held so much of appeal to me that I felt annoyed at the current of my thoughts being turned back to the topic. ...
— The Motor Pirate • George Sidney Paternoster
... a pasture and she had hastily climbed a fence. I get a good many suggestions first and last. I was once taken to a Turkish bath for no other reason—as I was afterwards told—than that it might supply me with a topic. Odd books have been put in my way. A basket of school readers was once lodged with me, with a request that I direct my attention to the absurd selection of the poems. I have been urged to go against car conductors and customs men. On one occasion I received a paper of tombstone ...
— There's Pippins And Cheese To Come • Charles S. Brooks
... tower smouldered the whole of the next day; though the walls still stood, gaunt and grim, windowless and gutted by the fire. But the building was covered by insurance, and even the loss of the tapestries seemed more than compensated by the fact that an absorbing topic of general interest had been provided in a ...
— Peter and Jane - or The Missing Heir • S. (Sarah) Macnaughtan
... astonishing than the absence of opposition and panic. It is that no one, whether friend or foe, has paid the least attention to the subject. In ordinary society it has been impossible to turn the conversation that way. Any topic in the world—but pre-eminently Rations,—seemed more vital and more pressing. "The Reform Bill? What Bill is that? Tell me, do you find it very difficult to get sugar?" "The Speaker's Conference? Haven't heard about it. I'm sure James Lowther won't allow them to ...
— Prime Ministers and Some Others - A Book of Reminiscences • George W. E. Russell
... in discussing the topic with Olympia—seemed made for such a climate, rather than made by it. They would have been out of place in the bleak autumn blasts, and wan, colorless seasons of Acredale, where the sun, bleary and dim, furtively skirted the low horizon from November until April, as if ashamed to be identified with ...
— The Iron Game - A Tale of the War • Henry Francis Keenan
... de Vergennes, as a particular favor, that he would permit me to wait on him some day that week. He did so, and I went to Versailles the Friday following, (the 9th of December.) M. de Reyneval was with the Count. Our conversation began with the usual topic; that the trade of the United States had not yet learned the way to France, but continued to centre in England, though no longer obliged by law to go there. I observed, that the real cause of this was to be found in the difference of the commercial arrangements in the two ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... breakfast, there was but one topic of conversation. Indeed, little else had been talked of for days but the Schuyler case and all ...
— Vicky Van • Carolyn Wells
... belief, since but for the shedding of that wine and its sudden effect upon him, it is likely we had witnessed a shedding of blood. Thus, was the ill-timed pleasantry of my feather-brained La Fosse tided over in comparative safety. But the topic being raised was not so easily abandoned. Mademoiselle de Lavedan grew to be openly discussed, and even the Count's courtship of her came to be hinted at, at first vaguely, then pointedly, with a lack of delicacy for which I can but blame the wine with ...
— Bardelys the Magnificent • Rafael Sabatini
... origins of the belief in spirits. Chapters ix.-xvii., again, criticise the current anthropological theory as to how, the notion of spirit once attained, man arrived at the idea of a Supreme Being. These two branches of the topic are treated in most modern works concerned with the Origins of Religion, such as Mr. Tyler's "Primitive Culture," Mr. Herbert Spencer's "Principles of Sociology," Mr. Jevons's "Introduction to the History of Religion," ...
— The Making of Religion • Andrew Lang
... fire, which is the chief of destroyers when it escapes bounds, or is misused; but, in its right place and function, is among the most indispensable of blessings. But to enlarge upon this thought would carry us too far from the immediate topic; nor is it desirable to follow with the feeble flight of our imagination the heaven-embracing orbit of this theme. A hint is all that can be given, which each must follow out for himself. We have only attempted to indicate what regions await the genius of the new Columbus; nor does the conjecture ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 19, June, 1891 • Various
... that I had given the information. He transferred the information to the captain, and presently the steward came and beckoned me to follow him down to his cabin, remarking that nobody would see me. I saw the captain, and told him what I knew of the matter. The robbery continued to be the sole topic of talk the rest of the journey. Clearing the coast of Fife, we soon came in sight of Edinburgh, and, sailing up the Forth, we finally landed at Leith. It was Sunday afternoon, and there were large numbers of people about to watch us land. The majority of the people ran for the first pier, ...
— Adventures and Recollections • Bill o'th' Hoylus End
... cause domestic service in America has had less of mutual kindliness than in old countries. Its terms have been so ill understood and defined that both parties have assumed the defensive; and a common topic of conversation in American female society has often been the general servile war which in one form or another was going on in their different families,—a war as interminable as would be a struggle between aristocracy and common people, undefined by any bill of rights or constitution, and ...
— Household Papers and Stories • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... Next became the topic of eulogium the gallantry of those who had been worsted in all but their honor, and all spoke with admiration of the devotedness of the two unfortunate officers who had perished in the trenches— a subject which, ...
— The Canadian Brothers - or The Prophecy Fulfilled • John Richardson
... great wants across the top of a page, as suggested in the fifth topic on page 6, and arrange the list of organizations suggested in the last question above in the proper columns according to ...
— Community Civics and Rural Life • Arthur W. Dunn
... account of the topic under discussion. That the highest Self only can be the eater referred to is moreover evident from the passage (Ka. Up. I, 2, 18), ('The knowing Self is not born, it dies not'), which shows that the highest Self is the general topic. ...
— The Vedanta-Sutras with the Commentary by Sankaracarya - Sacred Books of the East, Volume 1 • George Thibaut
... Ball.' Even famous shipowners were celebrated in song, as witness 'Mr. John Tapscott,' in 'We're all bound to go.' (5) Love affairs, in which 'Lizer Lee' and other damsels constantly figured, were an endless topic. (6) But chiefly did Jack sing of affairs connected with his ship. He never sang of 'the rolling main,' 'the foaming billows,' 'the storm clouds,' etc. These are the stock-in-trade of the landsman; they were too real for the sailor ...
— The Shanty Book, Part I, Sailor Shanties • Richard Runciman Terry
... school unearthing problems relating to the chemistry of food for her class the next day. If, on the other hand, you go into a classroom you will find the shop is brought into the classroom just as the classroom has been brought into the shop. For instance, in a certain English class the topic assigned for papers was "a model house" instead of "bravery" or "the increase of crime in cities," or "the landing of the Pilgrims." The boys of the class had prepared papers on the architecture and construction of a model house, while ...
— Booker T. Washington - Builder of a Civilization • Emmett J. Scott and Lyman Beecher Stowe
... college was a great deal more cordial after the Rotunda meeting than it had ever been before. For a while the battle which had been fought at their doors superseded the remoter South African warfare as a topic of conversation among the students. Their sympathies were with Augusta Goold. Even members of the divinity classes suffered themselves to be lured from their habitual worship of respectability so far as to ...
— Hyacinth - 1906 • George A. Birmingham
... told in Samarinda," I remarked carelessly, by way of introducing the topic in which I was most interested, "that some of the native girls here in Bali ...
— Where the Strange Trails Go Down • E. Alexander Powell
... found myself brought face to face with the strange phenomenon of demon possession. There is so much to be said on this interesting topic, that it will require a chapter under its own heading to note even a portion of what has come under my personal notice. For the first time I heard, often in the midnight stillness, the high-pitched voice, intoning the magic incantations whereby some young woman yielded herself to be the medium ...
— The Fulfilment of a Dream of Pastor Hsi's - The Story of the Work in Hwochow • A. Mildred Cable
... share the general satisfaction, and give praise to those good and able men, Mr. Tuke, Dr. Hitch, Dr. Corsellis, Dr. Conolly, Dr. de Vitre, Dr. Charlesworth and many more, who had brought all their high moral and intellectual qualities to bear on this topic, and had laboured to make rational and humane treatment to be the rule and principle of the ...
— Chapters in the History of the Insane in the British Isles • Daniel Hack Tuke
... be rather alarmed at a lawyer beginning this topic, and will expect to hear pages of "Starkie on Libel," or to have all the perorations of Erskine's speeches recited to you. For one terrible moment I feel I have you in my power; but I scorn to take advantage of the position. ...
— Interludes - being Two Essays, a Story, and Some Verses • Horace Smith
... rather a noisy meal, and Sarah's best attempt at ham and eggs, vanished in the most practical appreciation, that five young college students can show when hungry. They discussed the recent topic of Sleepy Cottage over their cold apple pie and strawberries and cream, and they all decided that it was the most romantic thing in the world, that they should be just brought to the gates of the prison wherein pined a ...
— Honor Edgeworth • Vera
... stage in Italy takes precedence of the dramatic, and in the large cities, Milan, Venice, Genoa, Florence, Rome and Naples, the production of a new opera is considered a national event, forming for many days previous to its production the chief topic of conversation in salons and caffes. No such enthusiasm is manifested in regard to the first representation of a new play; and although the house may be crowded and the author called before the curtain, he may deem himself happy if his drama is ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science Vol. XV., No. 85. January, 1875. • Various
... reasserted Grindley junior. "I am—" Grindley junior was about to add "well educated"; but divining that education was a topic not pleasing at the moment to the ears of Helvetia Appleyard, had tact enough to substitute "not a fool. I can earn my own living; and I should like to ...
— Tommy and Co. • Jerome K. Jerome
... religious dogmas. Paine's merit was that he had attacked paper money. To Cobbett, as to Paine, it seemed that English banknotes were going the way of French assignats and the provincial currency of the Americans. This became one main topic of his tirades, and represented, as he said, the 'Alpha and Omega' of English politics. The theory was simple. The whole borough-mongering system depended upon the inflated currency. Prick that bubble and the ...
— The English Utilitarians, Volume II (of 3) - James Mill • Leslie Stephen
... him now, she thought, with equanimity—nay, rather wished to do so, to make sure that she had not been guilty of weakness in regard to him. She looked up, but was glad to see her aunt still engaged in conversation with the Bishop on a topic which Amelie knew was dear to them both,—the care of the souls and bodies of the poor, in particular those for whom the Lady de Tilly felt herself responsible to ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... He promptly changed the topic, and began to speak of the march past. "I want to see Lord Starcross," he added. "I have no idea what a ...
— Derrick Vaughan—Novelist • Edna Lyall
... religious criticism, and express particular anxiety to keep their journals free of everything 'strictly theological.' Their notion is, that newspaper writers should endeavour to keep clear of so 'awful' a topic. And yet seldom does a day pass in which this self-imposed editorial rule is not violated—a fact significant, as any fact can be of connection between religion ...
— Superstition Unveiled • Charles Southwell
... son. Pity from a girl when you want something else from her is like apple pie minus the apple. It's pretty dry fodder. But say," Elijah abruptly changed the topic of talk, "What about Walter Douglas? He's a likely fellow, isn't he? Bound to ...
— The High Calling • Charles M. Sheldon
... suggestive than doctors, even when Franklin was one of them. When Paine came to America, he found the dispute with England the all-absorbing topic. The atmosphere was heavy with the approaching storm. The First Congress was in session in the autumn of that year. On the 17th of September, John Adams felt certain that the other Colonies would support Massachusetts. The Second Congress met in May, 1775. During ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 25, November, 1859 • Various
... DE SAINT-GERMAIN, the recognized leading authority on all occult subjects. A plain, practical thorough work on this all absorbing topic. Over 100 illustrations. Cloth, special cover in colors, $1.00 Paper, lithographed cover ...
— The Colossus - A Novel • Opie Read
... day. In the evening, as Harrington and myself were conversing in the library, I availed myself of a pause in the conversation to break the ice in relation to the topic which lay nearest my ...
— The Eclipse of Faith - Or, A Visit To A Religious Sceptic • Henry Rogers
... however, with unvarying tenderness, did his best in every way to calm her fears. Though no word on the subject passed between them directly, he let her feel with singular tact that he meant to keep himself under proper control. Whenever a dangerous topic cropped up in conversation, he would look across at her affectionately, with a reassuring smile. "For Cleer's sake," he murmured often, if she was close by his side; "for Cleer's sake, dearest!" and his wife, mutely grateful, knew at once what he ...
— Michael's Crag • Grant Allen
... feeling their constrained insignificance. However, in a house so full of bright-eyed children, with mothers and sisters of all ages as their confederates, the secret was soon out, and before Agricola had left his little cottage in the grove the topic of all tongues was the abysmal treachery and ingratitude of negro slaves. The whole tribe of Grandissime believed, this morning, in the doctrine ...
— The Grandissimes • George Washington Cable
... our disposal, it is impossible to satisfy the curiosity of the reader on this very curious and interesting topic. A few remarks, however, may serve to broadly indicate the chief causes of this astonishing fact, taken apart from the miraculous intervention of God ...
— Irish Race in the Past and the Present • Aug. J. Thebaud
... "that I am rather good at poisoning people's minds against their undesirable friends." She paused, debating how long it would take her to separate Mathilde from the Wayne boy; and recalling that this was no topic for an invalid, she smiled at him ...
— The Happiest Time of Their Lives • Alice Duer Miller
... one natural history topic per chapter, be it a plant, a tree or an animal. There are various perils that have to be overcome—the upas tree, an ourang-outang, a tree that drops its fruit like a heavy bomb, a python, and quite a ...
— The Castaways • Captain Mayne Reid
... neglected of late. The parcels actually did cease coming, and the two conspirators hugged themselves with delight that it had not been necessary to tell their secret so no one knew what sillies they were. By common consent they barred chain letters as a topic of conversation, and had almost forgotten the hateful packages when one morning Peace received a letter from Miss Truman, still a teacher in the Parker School, saying that she had just mailed a large box addressed ...
— Heart of Gold • Ruth Alberta Brown
... sat by the open window, the poet's own life and its prospects formed the principal topic of conversation. After years of toil in London his fortunes were beginning at length to improve. He was manager of a theatre, and was at length earning a moderate competency. He had already saved a little money, and hoped soon to buy a house at Stratford. He looked forward some ...
— A Cotswold Village • J. Arthur Gibbs
... next observation was apparently quite unconnected with the topic. "You were a raw colt when I got you, Payne, and the bit galled you now and then, but you had good hands on a bridle, and somebody who knew his business had taught you to sit a horse in the old country. Still, ...
— Winston of the Prairie • Harold Bindloss
... not our later time Yields topic meet for classic rhyme? Hast thou no elegiac verse For Brunswick's venerable hearse? What! not a line, a tear, a sigh, When valour bleeds for liberty? Oh, hero of that glorious time, When, with unrivalled light sublime - Though martial Austria, and though all The might of Russia, and the ...
— Marmion: A Tale of Flodden Field • Walter Scott
... Each topic is treated in a concise manner, the aim being to embody in each publication as completely as possible all the rudimentary information and essential facts necessary to an understanding of the subject. ...
— Punctuation - A Primer of Information about the Marks of Punctuation and - their Use Both Grammatically and Typographically • Frederick W. Hamilton
... the Bank; and what with the Bank, and what with the Treasury, we were as exclusive as the Court Circular. To mend the matter, Hamlet's aunt had the family failing of indulging in soliloquy, and held forth in a desultory manner, by herself, on every topic that was introduced. These were few enough, to be sure; but as we always fell back upon Blood, she had as wide a field for abstract ...
— David Copperfield • Charles Dickens
... suspicion of my design. To give to this a better coloring, I had contrived to have assembled a party of some eight or ten, and was solicitously careful that the introduction of cards should appear accidental, and originate in the proposal of my contemplated dupe himself. To be brief upon a vile topic, none of the low finesse was omitted, so customary upon similar occasions that it is a just matter for wonder how any are still found so besotted ...
— Selections From Poe • J. Montgomery Gambrill
... of what the actual questions were to be. But it was the merest self-deception. Each question was branded in fiery letters on his recollection, and he found that, as he read, he was skipping involuntarily every topic which he knew had not been touched on in ...
— Julian Home • Dean Frederic W. Farrar
... a remark on Virgil which Addison had given him he discovered himself. It is, indeed, not easy for any man to write upon literature or common life so as not to make himself known to those with whom he familiarly converses, and who are acquainted with his track of study, his favourite topic, his peculiar ...
— Lives of the Poets: Addison, Savage, and Swift • Samuel Johnson
... always been a favorite topic for the speculation of those philosophers who derive a large part of national character from geographical conditions. A land that needed reclaiming from the sea by hard labor, a country situated at those two great outlets ...
— The Age of the Reformation • Preserved Smith
... the individual limitations of the enthusiast. What is good for HIMSELF he too often deems is applicable to the general public, instead of wisely understanding that what is good for THEM must be good for himself. But," said the Senor lightly, "we are again transgressing. We were to choose another topic. Let it be yourself, Mr. Hurlstone. You are looking well, sir; indeed, I may say I never saw you looking so well! Let me congratulate you. Health is the right of youth. ...
— The Crusade of the Excelsior • Bret Harte
... acuteness. "No, sir, he is not well shaped; for there is not the quick transition from the thickness of the fore-part to the tenuity—the thin part—behind, which a bulldog ought to have." On the more serious topic of politics his Jacobite fulminations roused Taylor "to a pitch of bellowing." Johnson roared out that if the people of England were fairly polled (this was in 1777) the present king would be sent away to-night, and his adherents hanged ...
— Samuel Johnson • Leslie Stephen
... because he was so submissively subservient to all constituted authority. He tries to distinguish between different kinds of liberty, and the especial attention which he devotes to America shows how live a topic the great republic was at that time in the Islands. This interest is explained by the fact that an American company had just then received a grant of the northern part of Borneo, later British North Borneo, for a trading company. It was believed that the United States had designs on the Archipelago ...
— Lineage, Life, and Labors of Jose Rizal, Philippine Patriot • Austin Craig
... exactly an equal or a finished preacher for highly educated ears, but that sort of transparent candour which he has makes him very affecting when on his favourite topic, the inexhaustible love of God. His face when he quotes—"The Son of God Who loved Me and gave Himself for Me," is like a man showing the Rock he has clung to ...
— Juliana Horatia Ewing And Her Books • Horatia K. F. Eden
... Polycarp, recognises the same topic, briefly indeed, but positively and precisely. "For this cause, (i. e. having felt and handled Christ's body at his resurrection, and being convinced, as Ignatius expresses it, both by his flesh and spirit,) they (i. e. Peter, ...
— Evidences of Christianity • William Paley
... Edouard's great delight, another hunt was proposed, and it furnished a topic for conversation during dinner and part of the evening. By ten o'clock, as usual, all had retired to their rooms, except Roland, who was in that ...
— The Companions of Jehu • Alexandre Dumas
... of the Annonay and subsequent experiments in France rapidly spread all over Europe, and formed a topic of general discussion, still it was not till five months after the Montgolfiers had first publicly sent a balloon into the air that any aerostatic experiment was made in England. In November 1783 Count Francesco Zambeccari ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... the conclusion that the pleasure to be derived from sleeping on a bed of spruce or hemlock boughs has been greatly overestimated by those who have written and spoken with such enthusiasm on the topic. To me the prickly, scratchy sensation imparted by contact with the evergreen was such as to counterbalance the delights of inhaling its ...
— Fibble, D. D. • Irvin Shrewsbury Cobb
... view the higher mathematics was the most imaginative of all the sciences; one might even say that its nature made it akin to the divine. When Casanova asked for further enlightenment upon a view so novel to him, Marcolina modestly declined to continue the topic, declaring that the others at table, and above all her uncle, would much rather hear some details of a newly recovered friend's travels than ...
— Casanova's Homecoming • Arthur Schnitzler
... of music, a tempest, a topic, an issue, dies. Expire (literally, to breathe out) is a softer word for die; it is used figuratively of things that cease to exist by reaching a natural limit; as, a lease expires; the time has expired. To perish (literally, in Latin, to ...
— English Synonyms and Antonyms - With Notes on the Correct Use of Prepositions • James Champlin Fernald
... in which it does compound you may often wonder what these qualities are. She had not at any rate been successful: her lover was dead, her husband was liked and her children were pitied, for in payment for a topic London will parenthetically pity. It was thought interesting and magnanimous that Charles Tramore had not married again. The disadvantage to his children of the miserable story was thus left uncorrected, and this, rather oddly, was counted as HIS sacrifice. His mother, whose arrangements were ...
— The Chaperon • Henry James
... the post, I will say no more of him than that his bitter topic was the unreasonableness of humanity, which treated him graciously when he had a letter for it, but scowled at him when he had none, "aye implying that I ha'e a letter, but ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 4 • Charles Dudley Warner
... natural and introductory topic of conversation between us. What we severally knew of Ireland, though in different quarters,—what we both knew of Laxton, the barbaric splendor, and the civilized splendor,—had naturally an interest for us both in their contrasts (at one time so picturesque, at another so grotesque), ...
— Memorials and Other Papers • Thomas de Quincey
... proposal was not replied to by anyone. The loud shout that succeeded it sprang from a different cause; and the words that were afterwards uttered had no reference to the topic under consideration. ...
— The Ocean Waifs - A Story of Adventure on Land and Sea • Mayne Reid
... moonlight upon it, stiffened into a mask-like reticence at this touching upon the sensitive topic which threatened his ...
— The Roof Tree • Charles Neville Buck
... light remark about the pleasure of communing with Nature with a cold in her head, and the topic was dropped. ...
— Short Story Classics (American) Vol. 2 • Various
... at Anne's place in the country were spent solely in discussions of the great war. There was no other topic. The whole of the civilised world was talking of the stupendous conflict that had burst upon it like a crash out of a clear sky. George came home loaded down with the latest extras and all of the regular editions of ...
— From the Housetops • George Barr McCutcheon
... One topic that received deserved attention was the curse of deluging Africa with liquor by Christian nations, and the continued curse of the opium traffic which ...
— American Missionary, August, 1888, (Vol. XLII, No. 8) • Various
... in one respect the Bishop was a product of his age. Long previous to his day the nature of the soul had been so favourite and general a topic of discussion, that, when the students of the Italian Universities wished to know the leanings of a new Professor, they at once requested him to lecture upon the soul. About the time of Bishop Butler the question was ...
— Fragments of science, V. 1-2 • John Tyndall
... later, Rosamund returned to the topic. "N. F's picture," she wrote, "is evidently a great success—and you can imagine how I feel about it. I saw it, you remember, at an early stage, when he called it 'The Slummer,' and you remember too, the effect it had upon me. Oh, Bertha, this is nothing less ...
— Will Warburton • George Gissing
... and surprise takes possession of the European who witnesses the joy which pervades all classes of the inhabitants of Lima on the announcement of a bull-fight. For several days the event is the exclusive topic of conversation, and, strange to say, the female portion of the population takes greater interest in it than the men. Bills notifying the approaching entertainment are stuck up at the corners of the streets; and every one is anxious to obtain ...
— Travels in Peru, on the Coast, in the Sierra, Across the Cordilleras and the Andes, into the Primeval Forests • J. J. von Tschudi
... merchant vessels of this country by British cruisers, although not practiced in time of peace, and therefore not at present a productive cause of difference and irritation, has, nevertheless, hitherto been so prominent a topic of controversy and is so likely to bring on renewed contentions at the first breaking out of a European war that it has been thought the part of wisdom now to take it into serious and earnest consideration. The letter from ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents: Tyler - Section 2 (of 3) of Volume 4: John Tyler • Compiled by James D. Richardson
... Gladstone, who, having made this poet his hobby, tried to persuade himself and his readers that nearly everything relating not only to Homer, but to the characters he depicts, was next door to perfection. Confining ourselves to the topic that concerns us here, we read, in his Studies on Homer (II., 502), that "we find throughout the poems those signs of the overpowering force of conjugal attachments which ... we might expect." And in his shorter treatise on Homer he thus sums up his views as to the position and ...
— Primitive Love and Love-Stories • Henry Theophilus Finck
... present purpose to weight this address with any attempt to say what the writer means when he tells them that, "The word of God abideth in you, and ye have overcome the wicked one." I shall take the words of our text out of their context, and use them as a topic: "I have written unto you, young men, because ye are strong." Strong in what sense? How may we give the words a useful setting, as a remembrancer and a call to ...
— Men in the Making • Ambrose Shepherd
... "but only in the day time." He withdrew his hand from the lamp, and looked round, to Guest's great delight; for he was taking an evident interest in the topic his friend had started, and his eyes roved from object ...
— Witness to the Deed • George Manville Fenn
... finished with a topic or section, other members of the party may give items of interest ...
— A Little Journey to Puerto Rico - For Intermediate and Upper Grades • Marian M. George
... contrary character. But as to rakes or libertines in general, I, who know them well, must be allowed, because of the mischiefs they have always in their hearts, and too often in their power, to do your sex, to add still a few more words upon this topic. ...
— Clarissa, Volume 4 (of 9) - History Of A Young Lady • Samuel Richardson
... constitutional objection to long letters. The only lengthy epistles that ever came from him were dictated and referred to matters of business. They all have one quality in common. As soon as he had concluded the discussion of the topic in mind he would immediately tell about the fortunes of his plays. He seldom failed to make a reference to the business that Maude Adams was doing (for her immense success was very dear to his heart), and he always commented on his own strenuous ...
— Charles Frohman: Manager and Man • Isaac Frederick Marcosson and Daniel Frohman
... no merely personal matters any more. All the little things were paths to the big things. There was no way of keeping herself detached. Even the seemingly isolated topic of the recent illness of the Bishop's wife led full upon the picture of other people she had been seeing that summer who ...
— The Visioning • Susan Glaspell
... fail to produce a temporary affection at least to their constituents. There is in every breast a sensibility to marks of honor, of favor, of esteem, and of confidence, which, apart from all considerations of interest, is some pledge for grateful and benevolent returns. Ingratitude is a common topic of declamation against human nature; and it must be confessed that instances of it are but too frequent and flagrant, both in public and in private life. But the universal and extreme indignation which it inspires is itself a proof of the energy and prevalence ...
— The Federalist Papers
... subject then—to something utterly apart from the murder and its mystery. For the one topic which filled his own mind was also the very one which he could not discuss with Bent. Had Cotherstone, had Mallalieu anything to do with Kitely's death? That question was beginning to engross all his attention: he thought more about it than about his schemes for a successful ...
— The Borough Treasurer • Joseph Smith Fletcher
... the afternoon the deluge continued. Our unique topic of conversation was the marvel of how it could keep it up! We could not imagine more water falling were every stream and lake in the mountains to be lifted to the ...
— Gold • Stewart White
... while in years they still are boys and girls. They think in terms which in old England only mature men and women use. They are not afraid of anything. The forest is their home. Hard work is their pleasure. Enterprises are the topic of their conversation. The spirit of adventure is bred into their hearts. What shall we say of this peculiar and heroic generation? May the Lord keep them in piety; otherwise, we, trusting in our ...
— Three Young Pioneers - A Story of the Early Settlement of Our Country • John Theodore Mueller
... he was brought into constant intercourse with persons engaged in weaving and spinning, his inquisitive and strongly practical intelligence would in any case have been naturally led to take a keen interest in inventions which were a constant topic of conversation among the manufacturing population. The invention of the fly-shuttle by Kay of Bury had so greatly increased the demand for yarn that it became difficult to meet it merely by hand labor. A machine for carding cotton had been introduced ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, v. 13 • Various
... true," replied he; and then breaking off suddenly from the topic of conversation, remarked, "But I perceive, Mistress White, that you do not recognize your quondam friend. I hope you do not suffer prosperity to dampen your ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII No. 6 June 1848 • Various
... gentlemen engaged in a discussion, in which the others also took part, each putting in a word of his own for effect; and the conversation on this topic soon became so tedious that many went away. But a little old man, who wore at the top of his prodigiously high forehead a pair of green spectacles, asked permission to speak in order to make an ...
— Sentimental Education, Volume II - The History of a Young Man • Gustave Flaubert
... of easy and attractive lessons, containing a large amount of practice upon each topic ...
— Arbor Day Leaves • N.H. Egleston
... criticism and poetry attained a high degree of excellence, while humour was in its infancy. Comedy is said to have been produced first in Sicily by Susarion in 564 B.C., but we have only two or three lines by which to judge of his work, and they are on the old favourite topic. "A wife is an evil, but you can't live in a house without one." As it is said his wife left him, it must be considered doubtful whether this was not meant seriously. He was succeeded by Epicharmus, whose humour seems to have ...
— History of English Humour, Vol. 1 (of 2) - With an Introduction upon Ancient Humour • Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange
... jump. If they can be reflected in "pure joy" in song we may indeed be sure that the outlet they are finding is a happy one. The subject is a very important one, but it leads us far afield from the present scheme. The reader who is interested may find further treatment of this topic in the present writer's "The Hidden Self, and its ...
— Spirit and Music • H. Ernest Hunt
... for a less agreeable and important topic.—How came Mr. Mac-Somebody, without consulting you or me, to prefix the Address to his volume[59] of 'Dejected Addresses?' Is not this somewhat larcenous? I think the ceremony of leave might have been asked, though ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. II - With His Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore
... immure himself; his re-appearance in society, which he had forsaken for more than a year, would have produced an immense sensation, and I should have been considered the first doctor in the Philippines. One day I touched upon this delicate topic. ...
— Adventures in the Philippine Islands • Paul P. de La Gironiere
... Jack Cockrell were of some assistance in explaining the marks and bearings of the channel, and Captain Bonnet consulted them over the chart unrolled upon the cabin table. He had made up his mind to sail the brig in and risk the hazards of shoal water. When he went on deck, Jack thought of a topic as thrilling as this imminent duel between ships and ...
— Blackbeard: Buccaneer • Ralph D. Paine
... the tongue will itch with a desire to tell a secret. Miss Altifiorla's tongue did itch. But upon the whole she endured her suffering, and kept her promise. She did not say a word in Mr. Western's hearing which led to Sir Francis Geraldine as a topic of conversation. But in reward for this she exacted from Mrs. Western an undertaking to keep her at Durton Lodge for a fortnight. The bargain was not exactly struck in those words, but it was so made that Mrs. Western understood ...
— Kept in the Dark • Anthony Trollope
... circle of three assemble in their little sitting-room, after a frugal supper, tobacco is the Colonel's chief care, and becomes the first topic ...
— The Lone Ranche • Captain Mayne Reid
... ordeal. I felt miles apart from Marjorie. A great gulf filled with black-and-yellow cat lay between us. Once only the topic of the beast arose (on the subject of fish-bones) and just as I was becoming big and coarse again the maid entered with the joint. She must have heard what ...
— Punch or the London Charivari, October 20, 1920 • Various
... who had come from St. Joseph stayed over night at the hotel where I put up. He was tall of stature, with a flowing beard sprinkled with gray, and was of a remarkably dignified and impressive presence. We conversed during the evening on general topics, but no allusion was made to the one exciting topic, on which almost all seemed ...
— Personal Recollections of Pardee Butler • Pardee Butler
... provoked the Emperor to exclaim: "Ye are as false as those of Damascus: Moawiyah was a usurper, Yezid a tyrant, and Ali alone is the lawful successor of the Prophet." A prudent explanation restored his tranquillity, and he passed to a more familiar topic of conversation. "What is your age?" said he to the cadi. "Fifty years." "It would be the age of my eldest son: you see me here," continued Timur, "a poor, lame, decrepit mortal. Yet by my arms has the Almighty been pleased to ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... her last night, as you wished. She is not well. Her nerves are still in an extremely weak state," Weirmarsh said, in order to change the topic of conversation. "I think you should send her abroad out of the ...
— The Doctor of Pimlico - Being the Disclosure of a Great Crime • William Le Queux
... no peculiarity, no importunate topic; but all is duly given; no views, no curiosities; no cow-painter, no bird-fancier, no mannerist is he: he has no discoverable egotism; the great he tells greatly; the small, subordinately. He is wise without emphasis or assertion; he is strong, ...
— Elementary Guide to Literary Criticism • F. V. N. Painter
... by the knowledge that his regiment, and therefore that he, had rendered conspicuous service in the dreadful conflict—a service which had actually made them, within the last twelve hours, the foremost topic of conversation in London—so absolutely was fear swallowed up in joy—that, in the mere simplicity of her fervent nature, the poor woman threw her arms round my neck, as she thought of her son, and gave to me the kiss which ...
— The English Mail-Coach and Joan of Arc • Thomas de Quincey
... of the whole Balkan question was her final contribution to the topic, for at this moment she became completely submerged, and cut off, so to speak, from the outer world, in the lucent depths of ...
— Michael • E. F. Benson
... ladies of his harem, who in my trouble were sympathetic and tender. From that time forth the imperturbable Kralahome was ever courteous to me. Nevertheless, when from time to time I grew warm again on the irrepressible topic, he would smile slyly, tap the ashes from his pipe, and say, "Yes, sir! Never mind, sir! You not like, you can live in fish-market, sir!" The apathy and supineness of these people oppressed me intolerably. Never well practised in patience, I chafed at the ...
— The English Governess At The Siamese Court • Anna Harriette Leonowens
... until the Fastnet lighthouse showed above the horizon on the Cotopaxi's port bow that Earle reverted to the topic of his "scheme," although there had been ample opportunity for him to do so during the eastward run, he having privately so arranged matters with the purser that he and Cavendish were berthed in the same cabin during the voyage. But for reasons best ...
— In Search of El Dorado • Harry Collingwood
... politics of the time as in everything else, and he and William Pressley had been discussing this subject at the moment of Ruth's appearance, which had interrupted their conversation. Philip Alston had forgotten the unfinished topic, but William Pressley had not. He, also, had been pleased to look on for a while at the girl's radiant delight; and he, also, had enjoyed the charming scene. But there was a lull now, and he at once turned back to the matter ...
— Round Anvil Rock - A Romance • Nancy Huston Banks
... foreign to the serious topic which had just been under discussion that everyone laughed in relief of the ...
— The Round-up - A Romance of Arizona novelized from Edmund Day's melodrama • John Murray and Marion Mills Miller
... of the infant; which subject we have not yet touched upon, having confined ourselves to the influence of the maternal mind over the form and color of the unborn child. It will not be necessary to illustrate at length this branch of our topic. Instances are sufficiently common and well known. Dr. Seguin of New York, in his work on Idiocy, gives several cases in which there was reason to believe that fright, anxiety, or other emotions in the mother, ...
— The Physical Life of Woman: - Advice to the Maiden, Wife and Mother • Dr. George H Napheys
... animation prevailed in the vast white-tiled servants' hall. The tone of the conversation varied at different tables, for the servants jealously observed a strict order of precedence among themselves, but the present topic was the same at all, the recent sensational robbery from Mme. Van den Rosen and the Princess Sonia Danidoff. At one table, smaller than the rest, a party of upper servants sat, under-managers or heads ...
— Fantomas • Pierre Souvestre
... my visit as long as possible, and, while I maintained a most animated discussion with the Minister upon a topic which I knew well had never failed to interest and excite him, I kept my attention really riveted upon the letter. In this examination, I committed to memory its external appearance and arrangement ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 2 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... have all been relinquished ... she guards our coasts, she maintains our troops, she builds our forts, she spends hundreds of thousands among us yearly; and yet the paltry payment to her representative is made a topic of grumbling and popular agitation."[49] In the same spirit he fought annexation, and killed it, among his followers; and, when confederation came, he helped to make the new dominion not only Canadian, but British. In that age when British faith in the Empire ...
— British Supremacy & Canadian Self-Government - 1839-1854 • J. L. Morison
... in this book deal in like manner, from the point of view of a good-natured Tory of Queen Anne's time, with the feuds of the day between Church and Dissent. Other chapters unite with this topic a playful account of another chief political event of the time—the negotiation leading to the Act of Union between England and Scotland, which received the Royal Assent on the 6th of March, 1707; John Bull then consented to receive his "Sister Peg" into ...
— The History of John Bull • John Arbuthnot
... he seemed to Luis de Leon's retrospicient eyes.[124] Yet it is very hard to believe that Zuniga was no more than twenty-three when he took it upon himself to cast doubts on the orthodoxy of Benito Arias Montano;[125] nor is it likely that Luis de Leon would discuss so delicate a topic with the most brilliant of youths. Let it not be said that the question of Zuniga's accuracy in stating his age is relatively unimportant. It is highly relevant; for, if Zuniga were capable of making a mistake on such a point, he was manifestly more liable to error ...
— Fray Luis de Leon - A Biographical Fragment • James Fitzmaurice-Kelly
... boys at the Hampton Institute have a debating society for the purpose of encouraging each other in speaking English. The topic for the first night, over which two exercised their powers in the new language was, "Shall we allow the white men in our reservation?" There is also a debating society among the ...
— The American Missionary — Volume 38, No. 06, June, 1884 • Various
... convulsions over the presidential campaign. There were no convulsions, however, where I was. It was painfully quiet. Everywhere, all over the broad land, except behind prison walls, politics was the all-absorbing topic. As I sat there in my solitude the question came to my mind as to what part of the great political play I would be engaged in were I a free man. Some months prior to this a petition signed by 5,000 people had been forwarded to President Cleveland for my pardon. Had I secured my liberty ...
— The Twin Hells • John N. Reynolds
... because of the intense public interest in the course of affairs in Paris. Evidently the struggle had been much more savage than Ostrog had represented it. All the mechanisms were discoursing upon that topic, and the repetition of the people made the huge hive buzz with such phrases as "Lynched policemen," "Women burnt alive," "Fuzzy Wuzzy." "But does the Master allow such things?" asked a man near him. "Is this the ...
— The Sleeper Awakes - A Revised Edition of When the Sleeper Wakes • H.G. Wells
... chat drifted to the subject of assaying and refining the precious metals. That was just where one of the party, Mr. D.W. Baker, of Newark, was at home, and in the course of an impromptu lecture he told the party more about the topic under discussion, and especially the platinum branch of it, than they ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 458, October 11, 1884 • Various
... interrupted, while a look of tender pity gave new sweetness to her face. "But," with an evident wish to avoid a possibly painful topic, "one needn't be either, to take an interest in books of Science. Which contain the greatest amount of Science, do you think, the books, or ...
— Sylvie and Bruno • Lewis Carroll
... but the stranger, and the house, and her own chance of living there, all the rest of the day. In the afternoon she had occasion to pay a few bills in the town and do a little shopping when she learnt that what was a new discovery to herself had become a common topic about the streets. High-Place Hall was undergoing repair; a lady was coming there to live shortly; all the shop-people knew it, and had already discounted the chance of ...
— The Mayor of Casterbridge • Thomas Hardy
... memory; and he was not given to hypothesis and experiment. It did occur to him that he could perhaps get some help by praying for it; but as the prayers he said every evening were forms learned by heart, he rather shrank from the novelty and irregularity of introducing an extempore passage on a topic of petition for which he was not aware of any precedent. But one day, when he had broken down, for the fifth time, in the supines of the third conjugation, and Mr. Stelling, convinced that this must be carelessness, since it ...
— The Mill on the Floss • George Eliot
... should be there but the rector lying in wait for them and ready to walk up the hill by their side, and say a few kindly words at parting. Well might Mr. Verdant Green begin to regard himself as the topic of the village, and think that going to Oxford was really an affair ...
— The Adventures of Mr. Verdant Green • Cuthbert Bede
... when the world was young? 23. By what fancy does he increase our interest in the mystery of the box? 24. Class readings: Select passages to be read aloud in class. 25. Outline for testing silent reading. Tell the story briefly in your own words, using the topic headings given in the story. 26. You will enjoy seeing the pictures in the edition of The Wonder-Book that is illustrated by the well known artist, Maxfield Parrish. 27. Find in the Glossary the meaning ...
— The Elson Readers, Book 5 • William H. Elson and Christine M. Keck
... she had been taught it well. Martie, insatiable on this particular topic, sometimes questioned Pauline. She was given a meagre picture of a farmhouse on Prince Edward's Island, of a stern, exacting, loving mother who "licked" daughters and sons alike with a "trace-end" for any infractions of domestic rule. Of snows so lasting and deep that housewives buried ...
— Martie the Unconquered • Kathleen Norris
... very old now, poor lady; and the dreadfulest bore, when she gets upon Hanover and her experiences, and Queen Sophie Charlotte's, in that stupendously magnificent court under Gentleman Ernst. Shun that topic, if you love your peace of mind! [Memoires (above cited).]—She did certainly superintend the Boy Fritzkin for his first seven years; that is a glory that cannot be taken from her. And her pupil, too, we agreeably ...
— History Of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Volume IV. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—Friedrich's Apprenticeship, First Stage—1713-1728 • Thomas Carlyle
... rained all day and nothing of interest has happened. The ladies are clustered on the sheltered side of the veranda. Some are reading, others are engaged in fancy work. The leading topic of discussion is the coming of the Hardings—or rather a fruitless inquiry as to what gowns and how many Miss ...
— John Henry Smith - A Humorous Romance of Outdoor Life • Frederick Upham Adams
... last. Perhaps Bower wondered why she laughed and blushed at the recollection of her earlier determination to suppress von Eulenberg's "specimens" as a topic of conversation. Already the stiffness of their talk on board the steamship seemed to have vanished completely. It was really a pleasant way of passing the time to sit and chat in this glass palace while the train skimmed over a dull land of ...
— The Silent Barrier • Louis Tracy
... magnificent dinners given by Cambaceres and others, which were a general topic of conversation at the time, and who knew the ingenious calculation which was observed in the invitation of the guests, must be convinced of the vast influence of a good dinner in political affairs. As to Cambaceres, he ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... from cares and the shadows of sorrows; to have neither too much nor too little sunshine and rain, that is, to be properly fed; and to have good seed to put into the ground, that is, to engage the mind with a topic which it will expand and reproduce. After all these things have been secured, it is only a sort of barbaric husbandry that we have practised. The common and rude experience of men, laboring without thinking about their labor, teaches these things, and the very beginnings of the art and science of ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 121, November, 1867 • Various
... automobile, and the wireless telegraph, and we are unmoved by the spectacle of our fellow human beings in the grip of the first stages of golf fever. Far otherwise was it with the courtiers and officials about the Palace of Oom. The obsession of the King was the sole topic of conversation. ...
— The Clicking of Cuthbert • P. G. Wodehouse
... From the general of engineers he received a request for suggestions for improvements in guns; and from his work on the subject of Naval Defenses it is plain that his mind still found time to run on this favorite topic. ...
— James B. Eads • Louis How
... alike in the advances De Quincey makes to the subject, the points taken up, and the general method of treatment, from the essay on Mr. Finlay's volumes which appears in the Collected Works. It would seem as though De Quincey, in such a topic as this, found it utterly impossible to exhaust the points that had suggested themselves to him on a careful reading of such a work, in the limits of one article; and that, in this case, as in some others, he elaborated a second article, probably with a view to finding a place for it in ...
— The Posthumous Works of Thomas De Quincey, Vol. II (2 vols) • Thomas De Quincey
... amusements should be the more unbridled. You with a few servants undertook to direct and lead those dances. It is said that nothing is now talked of in Siena but your frivolity. Certain it is that here at the baths, where the concourse of ecclesiastics and laity is great, you are the topic of the day. Our displeasure is unutterable, since all this reflects dishonourably upon the sacerdotal estate and office. It will be said of us that we are enriched and promoted not to the end that we may lead blameless lives, but that we ...
— The Life of Cesare Borgia • Raphael Sabatini
... down the river, the scene we had just witnessed was the topic of every conversation: the comparison with the Olympic-Hawke collision was drawn in every little group of passengers, and it seemed to be generally agreed that this would confirm the suction theory which was so ...
— The Loss of the SS. Titanic • Lawrence Beesley
... Hume's theory. But if you repeat the same walk to-morrow, the same landscape effect will almost certainly suggest a train of ideas quite different from that of to-day. Perhaps it may begin by reminding you of landscape effects in general; then of Mr. Ruskin, who has discoursed so eloquently on that topic, and next of Mr. Ruskin's 'Stones of Venice,' from whence it is equal chances whether your thoughts radiate, on one side of the compass, to stone china, or Stoney Stratford, or Stonewall Jackson, or, on the other, to the 'Venetian ...
— Old-Fashioned Ethics and Common-Sense Metaphysics - With Some of Their Applications • William Thomas Thornton
... and heard more about Dash. In fact, I myself started one long conversation on that topic with an idle lady who really had read every word. I went on to recommend it right and left. "You must read Dash," I said ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 146, March 18, 1914 • Various
... escaping her. During the days that followed, Bela was the principal topic of conversation around the settlement. Her place became a general rendezvous for all the ...
— The Huntress • Hulbert Footner
... to introduce one of the chief topics with which I have to deal—viz. the doctrine of Design in Nature, and thus the whole question of Natural Religion in its relation to Natural Science. In handling this topic I shall endeavour to take as broad and deep a view as I can of the present standing of Natural Religion, without waiting to show step by step the ways and means by which it has been brought into this position, by ...
— Thoughts on Religion • George John Romanes
... the Saint-Savin family. Necessity and terror were the causes which led to this union. At a banquet given, two months after the marriage, to the Comte and Comtesse d'Herouville, a discussion arose on a topic which in those days of ignorance was thought amusing: namely, the legitimacy of children coming into the world ten months after the death of their fathers, or seven months ...
— The Hated Son • Honore de Balzac
... possible aid was given to the Maltese; who, it appears, had been shockingly neglected by the Neapolitan government. In a letter of the 27th, addressed to Sir William Hamilton, the indignant hero enlarges on this topic with a feeling and energy incomparably expressive of his ...
— The Life of the Right Honourable Horatio Lord Viscount Nelson, Vol. I (of 2) • James Harrison
... ill-natured; to others, the delightful laughter that ceases with youth, and in which in later years we are almost ashamed to indulge, seemed absurd, and they amused themselves at my expense. People may be bored nowadays, but none the less they expect you to treat every trivial topic with ...
— The Country Doctor • Honore de Balzac
... common topic of conversation, and different reasons were assigned to it, according to the various interests of different parties. As for my part, I am very well persuaded that fear was the only reason of his flight, and that nothing ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... tell. My life is very much the same. I have neither wife nor child. Until a man finds those, he's a most indifferent topic." ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 5, June 1905 • Various
... before it is too late, as many valuable documents bearing on the Negro are being destroyed for the reason that persons now possessing them do not know their value and the facilities for collection of such materials now afforded are inadequate. This topic was further discussed by Dr. C. V. Roman and Dr. Thomas Jesse Jones. Dr. Roman restricted his remarks largely to a definition of civilization to determine whether or not the Negro has made any contribution to it. After speaking of certain ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 2, 1917 • Various
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