"Cunning" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... moment—, the sum of them would not come within measurable distance of Alexander's cleverness. You are to set your imagination to work and conceive a temperament curiously compounded of falsehood, trickery, perjury, cunning; it is versatile, audacious, adventurous, yet dogged in execution; it is plausible enough to inspire confidence; it can assume the mask of virtue, and seem to eschew what it most desires. I suppose no one ever left him after a first interview without the impression ...
— Works, V2 • Lucian of Samosata
... a bend in the road about a quarter of a mile ahead of us, and we waited expectantly, while Whistling Jim, with a cunning for which I did not give him credit, pretended to be fixing his saddle-girth. As we waited a top-buggy rounded the bend in the road and came bowling toward us. It was surprising to see a buggy, but I was more surprised when its occupant ...
— A Little Union Scout • Joel Chandler Harris
... Every noble and every mean and every mixed exhibition of character,—every act of munificence and of baseness,—every narrative of thrilling or romantic interest,—every instance and example of popular delusion, humbug, man-worship, breach of trust, domestic infelicity, and of cunning or astounding depravity and hypocrisy,—every religious, social, and political excitement,—every panic,—and every accident even, from carelessness or want of skill,—each and all these have their exact parallels, generally within the same year of time in Great ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, Issue 49, November, 1861 • Various
... knowing that he could not go back to Hitachi without bearing some reply, resolved to obtain one by cunning. ...
— Kokoro - Japanese Inner Life Hints • Lafcadio Hearn
... would needs discover The way to new Elysium, but she, Whose only dower was her chastity, Having striv'n in vain was now about to cry And crave the help of shepherds that were nigh. Herewith he stayed his fury, and began To give her leave to rise. Away she ran; After went Mercury who used such cunning As she, to hear his tale, left off her running. Maids are not won by brutish force and might, But speeches full of pleasure, and delight. And, knowing Hermes courted her, was glad That she such loveliness and beauty had As could provoke his liking, yet was mute And neither would ...
— Hero and Leander • Christopher Marlowe
... eyes the old honesty, the fearless straightforwardness—and an appeal too, not humble, but still eager and downright. Ismail's fury was great, for the blue devils had him by the heels that day; but on the instant he saw the eyes of Sadik the Mouffetish, and their cunning, cruelty, and soulless depravity, their present search for a victim to his master's bad temper, acted at once on Ismail's sense of humour. He saw that Sadik half suspected something, he saw that ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... arrangement Wyllard made with Gregory would, perhaps, give Edmonds a claim upon the Range if Gregory borrowed any money in his name. I almost think that's what he's scheming for. The man's cunning enough for anything. I ...
— Hawtrey's Deputy • Harold Bindloss
... political conviction and even that information on which conviction must be based. It must remain a faction—strong enough in every community to control on the slightest division of the whites. Under that division it becomes the prey of the cunning and unscrupulous of both parties. Its credulity is imposed upon, its patience inflamed, its cupidity tempted, its impulses misdirected—and even its superstition made to play its part in a campaign in which every interest of society is jeopardized and every ...
— The Art of Public Speaking • Dale Carnagey (AKA Dale Carnegie) and J. Berg Esenwein
... of. We say with propriety that a bird let loose has power and liberty to fly; but not that the bird's power of flying has a power and liberty of flying. To be free is the property of an agent, who is possest of powers and faculties, as much as to be cunning, valiant, bountiful, or zealous. But these qualities are the properties of men or persons and not the ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. IX (of X) - America - I • Various
... know them all. I know of only half a dozen. They have been here at the house a number of times. The man who seems to dominate them all is a man known as 'Gunpowder' Gerry, a powerful, cunning, sly-eyed fellow about 45 years old. He is the business agent of the union and runs everything, although few persons know it. In some mysterious way he has got a very strong hold on Dave and can make him do ...
— Campfire Girls in the Allegheny Mountains - or, A Christmas Success against Odds • Stella M. Francis
... p. 356, the celebrated paper called "Memorandum of a Prussian Statesman, 1822," which at the same time recommends a systematic underhand rivalry with Austria, in preparation for an ultimate breach. Few State-papers exhibit more candid and cynical cunning. ...
— History of Modern Europe 1792-1878 • C. A. Fyffe
... likee your church," he answered coolly. "Pisplykal church heap lot better; smell good, sound good." He paused, then added, with a cunning twinkle in his little dark eyes, "Make heap washee for washee-shop." And, turning on his heel, he marched off towards the kitchen, with the air of a man who ...
— In Blue Creek Canon • Anna Chapin Ray
... and he has nothing in the least elegant in his manner." The moral attributes of this ugly little fellow were only less attractive than his physical imperfections. "He has a turn for gallantry, but Nature has denied him the proper gifts; he is fond of play, but his cunning always renders him suspected." He was at this time thirty-two years of age, and, as the phrase goes, a man of pleasure, but his militant prowess had hitherto been more conspicuous in the courts of Venus than in the field of Mars. The man was typical of his day and generation: should you ...
— Trial of Mary Blandy • William Roughead
... "If you cultivated people a little more and your flowers a little less, you would know that the dowry and the hopes you have sown, and watered, and tilled, and weeded are on the point of being gathered now by cunning hands." ...
— The Collection of Antiquities • Honore de Balzac
... from filth and ordure, By often brusshing and much diligence, Full goodly bounde in pleasant coverture, Of Damas, Sattin, or els of Velvet pure: I keepe them sure, fearing least they should be lost, For in them is the cunning wherein I ...
— Chips From A German Workshop. Vol. III. • F. Max Mueller
... whereon George Squires ducked his head, and was rebuked by the prosecuting counsel, Mr. Davy, who said 'It does not look well.' It was hardly the demeanour of conscious innocence. But Pratt would not swear to him. Mary Squires told Pratt that she would consult 'a cunning-man about the lost pony,' and Mr. Nares foolishly asked why a cunning woman should consult a cunning man? 'One black fellow will often tell you that he can and does something magical, whilst all the time he is perfectly aware that he cannot, and yet firmly ...
— Historical Mysteries • Andrew Lang
... so considered," said Nofuhl; "their commercial honor was a jest. They were sharper than the Turks. Prosperity was their god, with cunning and invention for his prophets. Their restless activity no Persian can comprehend. This vast country was alive with noisy industries, the nervous Mehrikans darting with inconceivable rapidity from ...
— The Last American - A Fragment from The Journal of KHAN-LI, Prince of - Dimph-Yoo-Chur and Admiral in the Persian Navy • J. A. Mitchell
... summoned Hernan Pereira and Henri Marais to accompany them to a lonely spot at a distance, where they thought that their deliberations would not be overheard. In this, however, they were mistaken, having forgotten the fox-like cunning of the Hottentot, Hans. Hans had heard me sentenced, and probably enough feared that he who also had committed the crime of escaping from Dingaan, might be called on to share that sentence. Also he wished to know the secret ...
— Marie - An Episode in The Life of the late Allan Quatermain • H. Rider Haggard
... seemed to have got over her excitement. She was very pleasant with him,—too pleasant, Dick thought. It was not Elsie's way to come out of a fit of anger so easily as that. She had contrived some way of letting off her spite; that was certain. Dick was pretty cunning, as old Sophy had said, and, whether or not he had any means of knowing Elsie's private intentions, watched her closely, and was on his guard ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... of their interiors, and are heard speaking and seen acting, they appear foolish; for from their evil lusts they burst forth into all sorts of abominations, into contempt of others, ridicule and blasphemy, hatred and revenge; they plot intrigues, some with a cunning and malice that can scarcely be believed to be possible in any man. For they are then in a state of freedom to act in harmony with the thoughts of their will, since they are separated from the outward conditions ...
— Heaven and its Wonders and Hell • Emanuel Swedenborg
... Dennis and Maisie were in the stable-yard. Tom was there, pumping water into a pail, and Jacko the raven was there, stalking about with gravity, and uttering a deep croak now and then. Jacko was not a nice character, and more feared than liked by most people. He was a thief and a bully, and so cunning that it was impossible to be up to all his tricks. In mischief he delighted, and nothing pleased him more than to frighten and tease helpless things, yet, with all these bad qualities, he had been allowed to march about for many years, unreproved, in Aunt Katharine's stable-yard. Maisie had been ...
— Black, White and Gray - A Story of Three Homes • Amy Walton
... is worth fighting; he is cunning of fence, is learned (and I cannot conceal my opinion that Mr. Donnelly and Judge Holmes were rather ignorant). He is not over "the threshold of Eld" (as were Judge Webb and Lord Penzance when they took up Shakespearean criticism). His knowledge of Elizabethan literature is vastly superior to ...
— Shakespeare, Bacon and the Great Unknown • Andrew Lang
... and learning. And let the conclusion of this little tale (i.e. the story of Ailill Aulom son of Mug Nuadat, the beginning of which was contained in the book which Finn returns) be written for me accurately by thee, O cunning Aed, thou man of the sparkling intellect. May it be long before we are without thee. My desire is that thou shouldst always be with us. And let macLonan's Songbook be given to me, that I may understand the sense of the poems that are in it. Et ...
— The Ancient Irish Epic Tale Tain Bo Cualnge • Unknown
... explained the business. The Commandant, without any more to do, takes the back of his sword and belabours Mohammed till he cries for mercy. Then the people beg the Rais to desist, and say, "Mohammed is a marabout and must not be beaten." Mohammed was very cunning, and always took care to repeat aloud a prayer when we started afresh from any station, and so gained the esteem of the more pious. Said rode the rest ...
— Travels in the Great Desert of Sahara, in the Years of 1845 and 1846 • James Richardson
... majestic, snow-crowned head high into the heavens, its serrated slopes softened by a purple haze, its soaring crest limned in blazing glory by the sun. The bay beneath them was like a huge silver shield, flat-rolled and glittering, inlaid with master cunning between wooded hills that swept away into mysterious distances, there to rise skyward in an ever-changing, ever-charming confusion. It reflected fairy-like islands, overgrown till they bowed to their mirrored ...
— The Silver Horde • Rex Beach
... their own. Close observation of young children in their games, especially when unsupervised, shows us self supreme. According to temperament, the child either pushes his way savagely to the goal or furtively seeks to win by cunning and craft. He must win, regardless of the process. How many of these unsupervised games end in "I sha'n't play," in angry bursts of tears, or even in blows! How many fail upon close scrutiny to show some less assertive child, who never ...
— Vocational Guidance for Girls • Marguerite Stockman Dickson
... a "woman-emperor." To emancipate herself from the rigorous laws of the terem, to force the "twenty-seven locks" of the song, to raise the fata that covered her face, to appear in public and meet the looks of men, needed energy, cunning, and patience that could wait and be content to proceed by successive efforts. Sophia's first step was to appear at Feodor's funeral, though it was not the custom for any but the widow and the heir to be present. There her litter encountered that of Natalia Narychkine, ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 12 • Editor-In-Chief Rossiter Johnson
... nests, as the little bird is very cunning, and, unlike the simple P. humii, is very careful indeed how it approaches its nest when an ...
— The Nests and Eggs of Indian Birds, Volume 1 • Allan O. Hume
... some of short and dark sentences, some of exactness of method, all of positive affirmation, without disclosing the true motives and proofs of their opinions, or free confessing their ignorance or doubts, except it be now and then for a grace, and in cunning to win the more credit in the rest, and not in good faith. That although men be free from these errors and incumbrances in the will and affection, yet it is not a thing so easy as is conceived to convey the conceit ...
— Valerius Terminus: of the Interpretation of Nature • Sir Francis Bacon
... sentence, Defoe catches for us the whole soul and character of the situation. It seems very simple, but it sums up marvellously an exact observation and knowledge of the arts of the gipsy child-stealer, of her cunning flattery and brassy boldness, and we can see the simple little girl running back to the house to tell the nurse that a fine lady was kissing the child, and had told her to tell where they were and she ...
— The Life, Adventures & Piracies of the Famous Captain Singleton • Daniel Defoe
... minutes of dead silence now followed, at the end of which there arose, among the more distant huts, outcries and sounds of commotion, and presently the chief and his party reappeared, leading forth ten old and grizzled men of most villainously cunning and repulsive appearance, whose hands were bound behind them. These were brought to the front and ranged in line by ...
— With Airship and Submarine - A Tale of Adventure • Harry Collingwood
... and answered the prayer. Word came that a huge bear had been seen in the forest stretching towards Juriewetz. The sorrowing Prince pricked up his ears, threw down his whip, and ordered a chase. Sasha, the broad-shouldered, the cunning, the ready, the untiring companion of his master, secretly ordered a cask of vodki to follow the crowd of hunters and serfs. There was a steel-bright sky, a low, yellow sun, and a brisk easterly wind from the heights of the Ural. As the crisp ...
— Beauty and The Beast, and Tales From Home • Bayard Taylor
... and heir, How to live take thou no care: By nature thou hast cunning shifts, Which I'll increase with other gifts. Wish what thou wilt, thou shalt it have; And for to vex both fool and knave, Thou hast the power to change thy shape, To horse, to hog, to dog, to ape. Transformed thus, by any means See none thou harm'st but knaves and queans; But love thou those that ...
— The Sources and Analogues of 'A Midsummer-night's Dream' • Compiled by Frank Sidgwick
... killing within near degrees, the criminal is hung up, apparently by the heels, with a live wolf (he having acted as a wolf which will slay its fellows). Cunning avoidance of the ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")
... unhesitatingly. "I have! I believe him to have been poisoned—in a most subtle and cunning fashion. And"—here Dr. Mirandolet cast a side-glance at the knot of men behind him—"I shall be intensely surprised if that opinion is not corroborated. But—I shall be ten thousand times more surprised if there is any expert ...
— The Orange-Yellow Diamond • J. S. Fletcher
... contemporary life, except Henry Esmond and its sequel, The Virginians, which, though not precisely historical fictions, introduced historical figures, such as Washington and the Earl of Peterborough. Their period of action was the 18th century, and the dialogue was a cunning imitation of the language of that time. Thackeray was strongly {276} attracted by the 18th century. His literary teachers were Addison, Swift, Steele, Gay, Johnson, Richardson, Goldsmith, Fielding, Smollett, and Sterne, and his special ...
— Brief History of English and American Literature • Henry A. Beers
... vexed, as the goat dexterously managed to preserve the same distance between them by shifting round in a sidling fashion as he and Eric advanced. "I tell you what, laddie, you go round one way, and I shall take the reverse direction. By that means we will circumvent the cunning old gentleman." ...
— Fritz and Eric - The Brother Crusoes • John Conroy Hutcheson
... though many things seemed to be granted, yet that was denyed, without which Religion and the Union betwixt the Kingdoms could not have been secured: And it is probable, that such a way may be assayed again, and prosecuted with very much cunning and skill to deceive and insnare the simple. It doth therefore concerne all ranks and conditions of persons to be the more warie and circumspect, especially in that which concerns the National Covenant, and the Solemn League and Covenant, that ...
— The Acts Of The General Assemblies of the Church of Scotland
... intellect &c. 450; nous[Fr], parts, sagacity, mother wit, wit, esprit, gumption, quick parts, grasp of intellect; acuteness &c adj.; acumen, subtlety, penetration, perspicacy[obs3], perspicacity; discernment, due sense of, good judgment; discrimination &c 465; cunning &c. 702; refinement &c (taste) 850. head, brains, headpiece, upper story, long head; eagle eye, eagle- glance; eye of a lynx, eye of a hawk. wisdom, sapience, sense; good sense, common sense, horse sense [U.S.], plain sense; rationality, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... phrase proved a cunning one. The few likely buyers who had been attracted to the catasta by the youthful appearance of the girl—hoping to find willingness, even if skill were ...
— "Unto Caesar" • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... model of a travelling green-grocer's shop, well stocked with all the fruits and vegetables of the season; and he himself is a model of a coster, clean shaved, clean shod, and trimly dressed, with a flower in his button-hole, an everlasting smile upon his face, and the nattiest of neck-ties. The cunning rogue pretends to be smitten with Betty, and most likely does the same with all the other Bettys of the neighbourhood, to all of whom he chatters incessantly of everything and everybody—save and except of the wife ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 448 - Volume 18, New Series, July 31, 1852 • Various
... a ring or a starbright sphere, With craft of delight and with cunning of sound unsought, That the heart of the hearer may smile if to pleasure his ear ...
— A Century of Roundels • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... our day; but the change that we ourselves are soon to undergo will be the greatest of all. We have seen our bairns grow to manhood—we have seen the beauty of youth pass away—we have felt our backs become unable for the burthen, and our right hand forget its cunning.—Our eyes have become dim, and our heads grey—we are now tottering with short and feckless steps towards the grave; and some, that should have been here this day, are bed-rid, lying, as it were, at the gates ...
— The Annals of the Parish • John Galt
... thoughts and old hopes that taunted him,—trifles, too, that he would not have heeded at another time. Pike came in on business, a bunch of bills in his hand. A wily, keen eye he had, looking over them,—a lean face, emphasized only by cunning. No wonder Dr. Knowles cursed him for a "slippery customer," and was cheated by him the next hour. While he and Holmes were counting out the bills, a little white-headed girl crept shyly in at the door, and came up to the table,—oddly dressed, in a frock fastened with ...
— Margret Howth, A Story of To-day • Rebecca Harding Davis
... had gathered in a bare roosting tree on an opposite hillside, and the immense tails of the cock-birds swept the evening sky. Owen would have certainly compared it to a picture by Honderhoker. The ducks clambered out of the water, keeping their cunning black eyes fixed on the loitering children whom the nursemaid was urging to return home. In Kensington Gardens, the glades were green and gold, and for some little while Evelyn watched the delicate spectacle of the fading light, and insensibly she began to feel that a life of spiritual ...
— Evelyn Innes • George Moore
... in my narrative than I have hitherto been going, and must omit some of my wakings and sleepings and hunts for rats and searches for more palatable food. The rats, after I had killed four or five, had become cautious. They are at all times cunning fellows, and must have discovered my mode of trapping them. The ship all this time was gliding on with tolerable smoothness, and on some occasions, by putting my ear down to the planks, I could hear the rippling of the water. At other times, ...
— Dick Cheveley - His Adventures and Misadventures • W. H. G. Kingston
... her pretty head, and took little pieces of Mr. Wood's shirt sleeve in her mouth, keeping her cunning brown eye on him as if to see how far she could go. But she did not bite him. I think she loved him, for when he left her she whinnied shrilly, and he had to go back and stroke ...
— Beautiful Joe • Marshall Saunders
... countrymen are the most difficult subjects to deal with, and flogging only hardens them; if I had to deal with them I should be far more disposed to look for a cure from the contempt and raillery of their shipmates. Besides, the rogues are so cunning that they frequently succeed in shifting the blame on to other shoulders; and when one man gets punished for another's offences we know that the tendency is to make him sullen and discontented. I could name at least a dozen ...
— The Rover's Secret - A Tale of the Pirate Cays and Lagoons of Cuba • Harry Collingwood
... the native associations formed in Calcutta will be of little use. Either the members will be sleeping at the moment of outbreak, or will be separated from their arms. We are noble in our carelessness; our enemy is base, but his baseness, always in alliance with cunning and vigilance, tells cruelly ...
— The Uncollected Writings of Thomas de Quincey—Vol. 1 - With a Preface and Annotations by James Hogg • Thomas de Quincey
... English interior for that which you call the comfortable, the jolly, you others. Thy friends are the jollity itself, Hawkehurst. And our acting charades, when that we all talked at once, and with a such emphasis on the word we would make to know. Was it not that our spectators were cunning to divine the words? And your friend Lawsley—it is a mixture of Got and Sanson. It is a true genius. Think, then, Diane, while we were amusing ourselves, our girls were at the midnight mass at the Sacre Coeur? Dear pious children, their innocent prayers ...
— Charlotte's Inheritance • M. E. Braddon
... made of deerskin, dyed by a strange process which turned it white, and doctored by some cunning medicine. It is like a perfect parchment, and shows no decay. It has a centre-pole of excellent fir, and from its peak flies a strip of snake-skin, dyed a red which never fades. For the greater part of the year the plateau whereon the ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... you mair afore you're done wi' him," the atheist said maliciously. "I ken the ways o' thae ministers preaching for kirks. Oh, they're cunning. You was a' pleased that Mr. Dishart spoke about looms and webs, but, lathies, it was a trick. Ilka ane o' thae young ministers has a sermon about looms for weaving congregations, and a second about beating swords into ploughshares for country ...
— The Little Minister • J.M. Barrie
... out. For, you see, I thought his honour was home again, after we had been beaten, and there was no more to be done for my lady. We had contrived to find an English ship to take him home, and he had gone back, as I thought, Mademoiselle. Well, a prisoner becomes cunning, and besides, I had been in prison before; I managed to make up a letter, and as I knew already some English, I ended by persuading a man to carry it to Pulwick for me. It was a long way, and I had no money, ...
— The Light of Scarthey • Egerton Castle
... he decided hotly, it was not to be endured; he would bear it no longer, he would make his escape. But he knew that this move, which could be conceived in a moment's desperation, could only be carried to success with great strategy, secrecy, and careful cunning. So he fell back upon his pillow and closed his eyes, as though he were asleep, and then opening them again, turned cautiously, and spied upon his keeper. As usual, his keeper sat at the foot of the cot turning the pages of a huge paper filled ...
— The Lion and the Unicorn and Other Stories • Richard Harding Davis
... and built other towns outside of Ah-wah'-nee, and became a great nation. They learned wisdom by experience and by observing how the Great Spirit taught the animals and insects to live, and they believed that their children could absorb the cunning of the wild creatures. And so the young son of their chieftain was made to sleep in the skins of the beaver and coyote, that he might grow wise in building, and keen of scent in following game. On some days he was fed with la-pe'-si ...
— Indians of the Yosemite Valley and Vicinity - Their History, Customs and Traditions • Galen Clark
... same evanescent frescoes, under foot the same scagliola volutes, unrolled themselves interminably. Ebony cabinets, with inlay of precious marbles in cunning perspective, alternated down the room with the tarnished efflorescence of gilt consoles supporting Chinese monsters; and from the chimney-panel a gentleman in the Spanish habit ...
— Crucial Instances • Edith Wharton
... for the sake of their shells; these are made into boxes, which, filled with sweet-smelling roots, the women hang around their persons. When older it is used as food, and the shell converted into a rude basin to hold food or water. It owes its continuance neither to speed nor cunning. Its color, yellow and dark brown, is well adapted, by its similarity to the surrounding grass and brushwood, to render it indistinguishable; and, though it makes an awkward attempt to run on the approach of man, its trust is in its bony covering, from which even the teeth of a hyaena ...
— Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa - Journeys and Researches in South Africa • David Livingstone
... Superintendent Sanders put our old friend Constable Pennycuick, who had unearthed O'Brien in the Yukon, on the trail of Cashel. Every detachment of the Police was put on the scent. In a while a man, answering Cashel's description, stole a diamond ring up in the edge of the mountains and, despite great cunning, was arrested by Constable Blyth at Anthracite. He was wearing some clothes like Belt's and had the diamond ring. Then Constable Pennycuick, hearing that Cashel had been staying at a half-breed camp near Calgary, went there and got some ...
— Policing the Plains - Being the Real-Life Record of the Famous North-West Mounted Police • R.G. MacBeth
... bony wrists with bracelets. But the attention of the Princess was riveted by his eyes. They were small and bright, and squinted horribly—so horribly, that it was impossible to tell at what he was looking. These eyes gave to his face an expression of diabolic and ruthless vigilance and cunning. He seemed at the same time to be seeing everything and to be ...
— The Princess And The Jewel Doctor - 1905 • Robert Hichens
... lifted a pair of laughing eyes, wonderfully like his mother's, into his father's face. Mrs. Fortescue, at first as demure as any C. O.'s wife in the world, suddenly smiled the radiant smile that began with her eyes and ended with her lips. The woman's cunning was too much for the man's strength. Colonel Fortescue put his arm around his wife, as she laid the baby's rose-leaf face against his father's bronzed cheek. Husband and wife looked into each other's eyes and ...
— Betty at Fort Blizzard • Molly Elliot Seawell
... phase of it, was over almost before it was begun. It all was one more repetition of border history. Almost never did the Indians make a successful attack on a trading post, rarely on an emigrant train in full corral. The cunning of the Crow partisan in driving in a prisoner as a fence had brought him close, yes—too close. But the ...
— The Covered Wagon • Emerson Hough
... This was the cunning work of months—nay, years; And, meantime, Edward sank from bad to worse. But he had conquered. Wine was on his board, Without my protest—with a glass for me! His boon companions came and went, and made My home their rendezvous with my consent. The doughty oath that ...
— Bitter-Sweet • J. G. Holland
... a knowledge of the nature of fire, water, earth, stones, heights, depths, &c., and of the effects which result from their operation. The ignorance and inexperience of the young are here plainly distinguishable from the cunning and sagacity of the old, who have learned, by long observation, to avoid what hurt them, and to pursue what gave ease or pleasure. A horse, that has been accustomed to the field, becomes acquainted with the proper height which ...
— An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding • David Hume et al
... domineering strength, and how the objections of her parents to this coarse and common man had forced her into a clandestine intimacy that ended in her complete subjection to him. She remembered the birth of an infant whose concealment from her parents and friends was compassed by his low cunning; she remembered the late atonement of marriage preferred by the man she had already begun to loathe and fear, and who she now believed was eager only for her inheritance. She remembered her abject compliance through the greater fear of the world, the stormy scenes that ...
— The Three Partners • Bret Harte
... influence of a slightly freshening breeze, soon joined company with the brig, from which a boat then put off, bringing on board the barque a tall handsome man, whose features were, however, spoiled by the expression of cunning and cruelty legibly imprinted on them. He said a few words to the Spaniard in charge, glanced round the deck at the helpless prisoners, made a jesting remark or two, at which of course everybody dutifully laughed, gave ...
— The Voyage of the Aurora • Harry Collingwood
... to turn you back. Spurling's a hard-pressed man and he's dangerous. You can judge of what he is capable by what has just happened. He's cunning and, in his way, he's brave; he wouldn't scruple to take your life. Your best policy is to wait—either here or at God's Voice, as you think best. The ice will soon be unsafe to travel; already a mile from here, where the river flows rapidly round from the south-west, the part on ...
— Murder Point - A Tale of Keewatin • Coningsby Dawson
... amount of gold and silver, some of it exquisitely wrought by cunning artificers into the forms of beautiful and unknown plants and animals. There was no possible doubt as to {66} the truth of their golden dreams. The empire of Peru in all its magnificence lay ...
— South American Fights and Fighters - And Other Tales of Adventure • Cyrus Townsend Brady
... of work. There seemed to be nothing to do on the farm. The chickens were quite happy, and only asked to be let alone and allowed to have their meals at regular intervals. And every day one or more of their number would vanish into the kitchen, and Mrs. Beale would serve up the corpse in some cunning disguise, and we would try to delude ourselves into the idea that it ...
— Love Among the Chickens - A Story of the Haps and Mishaps on an English Chicken Farm • P. G. Wodehouse
... great command over language are obliged to make one word do duty for a dozen; and that, if his wife was defective at one point, there were in her whole regions of unexplored excellence, of faculties never encouraged, and an affection to which he offered no response.' There is more philosophy in the cunning way in which those happy lovers in the lane accommodate their strides to the comfort of each other than we have been accustomed to suspect. It is done very easily; it is done almost unconsciously; but they must be very careful to go on doing it long after they have left the leafy ...
— Mushrooms on the Moor • Frank Boreham
... not so unfair to honest men as to give wisdom to the cunning. Rarely does reason prevail against passion in such a mind as Severne's. It ended, as might have been expected, in his going down ...
— The Woman-Hater • Charles Reade
... atmosphere, his style and his subject seem to become one. He moves easily and surely. Out of the splintered mass of ideas and emotions, out of the sensations, the observations and revelations of his youth, and the atmosphere familiar to him through long feeling, he builds up a subtle and cunning picture for us, a complete illusion of life more true than the reality. For what prosaic people call the reality is merely the co-ordination in their own minds of perhaps a thousandth part of aspects of the life around them; and only ...
— Amaryllis at the Fair • Richard Jefferies
... mountain city, which crouched amidst the frosty emerald peaks on the fringe of Tibet. He had felt the weight of that ominous hand on other occasions, and its movements were ever the same. Night stealth, warnings chalked on doors, the deliberate and cunning penetration of his secrets; all of these were typical machinations of the Gray Dragon, and of those who reported back to the ...
— Peter the Brazen - A Mystery Story of Modern China • George F. Worts
... breeding Ideas new from constant reading. And Henry Bishoprick, a wise man, Who acted druggist and exciseman, And seized at loaded pistol's muzzle Contrabandistas, who could puzzle An ordinary Gager's cunning When tea and whiskey they were running. And William Henry Baldwin, too, Who first appeared in public view At the old Albion, where in state, Bob Graham rules the roast of late; Son of a U.E. Loyalist, Who found his way out of the mist Republican which played such tricks With loyalty in ...
— Recollections of Bytown and Its Old Inhabitants • William Pittman Lett
... Majesty, and that within two months." Without vouching for the absolute accuracy of this intelligence, he implored the Queen to be more upon her guard than ever. "For there is no doubt," said the envoy, "that she is a chief mark to shoot at; and seeing that there were men cunning enough to inchant a man and to encourage him to kill the Prince of Orange, in the midst of Holland, and that there was a knave found desperate enough to do it, we must think hereafter that anything may be done. Therefore ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... the fact, replied the cunning jade; To burn it, quickly William seek fort aid; The tree accurst no longer shall remain; Her will the servant wish'd not to restrain, But soon some workmen brought, who felled the tree; And wondered what the fault our fair could see. Down hew ...
— The Tales and Novels, Complete • Jean de La Fontaine
... position. He was too old a fox to be taken by such childish tricks. All at once, No. 2 observed to No. 1, that the bet would not keep good, as the stakes had not been laid down, and both addressed the host at the same time, 'Not cunning enough for me,' thought Slick; and poking his left hand into the right pocket of his waistcoat, he took out his pocket-book containing the larger notes, and handed it to ...
— Monsieur Violet • Frederick Marryat
... which this example is taken, one copy is in the British Museum and another in the library collected by Henry Huth Esq. A somewhat similar ballad occurs in the Roxburgh Collection I, 42 (the chorus being almost identical), under the title of "The Cunning Northern Beggar". The complete title is A Description of Love. With certain Epigrams, Elegies, and Sonnets. And also Mast. Iohnson's Answere to Mast. Withers. With the Crie of Ludgate, and the Song of the Begger. The sixth ...
— Musa Pedestris - Three Centuries of Canting Songs - and Slang Rhymes [1536 - 1896] • John S. Farmer
... little cunning in this proposal, which indeed emanated not from any Isosceles—for no being so degraded would have angularity enough to appreciate, much less to devise, such a model of state-craft—but from an Irregular Circle ...
— Flatland • Edwin A. Abbott
... it doesn't!" declared Midget; "Uncle Steve wouldn't build me a house with a leaky roof. Did you ever see such cunning window curtains! Of course we don't need blinds, for the tree keeps the sun out. It does seem so queer to look out of the window and see only ...
— Marjorie's Vacation • Carolyn Wells
... edition of Luck, or Cunning? is a reprint of the first edition, dated 1887, but actually published in November, 1886. The only alterations of any consequence are in the Index, which has been enlarged by the incorporation of several entries made by the author in a copy ...
— Luck or Cunning? • Samuel Butler
... we are then safe. No earthly power shall part us. But I warn thee, maiden, that long years of misery and anguish will be our portion should we separate while our troth is yet unplighted. This ring," said he, drawing off his glove, "is indifferently well set. The bauble was made by a skilful and cunning workman. The pearls have the true orient tinge, and this opal hath an eye like the hue of the morning, changeable as—woman's favour. How bright at times!—warm and radiant with gladness, now dull, cold, hazy, and"——unfeeling, he would have said, but he leaned on the slender ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 2 (of 2) • John Roby
... very rapidly at any moment, and, above all, to keep very quiet. His words were wasted, as the boys would not have closed their eyes or uttered a word for the world. These little details arranged, the cunning old soldier prepared to make himself comfortable. First he gathered a few small twigs and made a very small fire. On the fire he put a battered old tin cup. Into this he poured some coffee from his canteen. From some mysterious place in his clothes he ...
— Detailed Minutiae of Soldier life in the Army of Northern Virginia, 1861-1865 • Carlton McCarthy
... quarrel, the elder killed the younger, and called the city after himself, Roma. Romulus, to increase the number of the people, founded an asylum on the Capitoline Hill, which gave welcome to robbers and fugitives of all kinds. There was a lack of women; but, by a cunning trick, the Romans seized on a large number of Sabine women, who had been decoyed to Rome, with their fathers and brothers, to see the games. The angry Sabines invaded Rome. Tarpeia, the daughter of the Roman captain, left open for them a gate into the Capitoline citadel, and so they won the Capitol. ...
— Outline of Universal History • George Park Fisher
... day brought the rich man almost in a state of distraction; but his chief and mastering terror was lest the mother of the already dead infant should hear, in her then precarious state, of what had happened. The tidings, he was sure, would kill her. Seeing this, the cunning husband of the nurse suggested that, for the present, his—the cunning one's—child might be taken to the lady as her own, and that the truth could be revealed when she was strong enough to bear it. The rich man fell into the artful trap, and that which the husband of the nurse had speculated upon, ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 438 - Volume 17, New Series, May 22, 1852 • Various
... Jack; "are these your tricks upon travellers? But I hope to prove as cunning as you." Then getting out of bed, he groped about the room, and at last found a large thick billet of wood; he laid it in his own place in the bed, and then hid himself in a dark corner of the room. In the middle of the night ...
— Fairy Tales Every Child Should Know • Various
... may be seen what effects the education of children has produced; for if they are fond of fighting and quarrelling, here it will be apparent; if they are artful, here they will seek to practice their cunning; and this will give the master an opportunity of applying the proper remedy; whereas, if they are kept in school (which they must be, if there be no play-ground), these evil inclinations will not manifest themselves until they go into the street, and consequently, ...
— The Infant System - For Developing the Intellectual and Moral Powers of all Children, - from One to Seven years of Age • Samuel Wilderspin
... and came upon other men working round our lines in small bands, and exchanged shots with them. All were Boxers in this new uniform; but although we tried to entice them on and corner them in houses, they were too cunning for us, and broke back each time. In the end we had so stirred up this hornet's nest that the scattered firing became more and more persistent, and stern orders came for us to ...
— Indiscreet Letters From Peking • B. L. Putman Weale
... you do?" cried Faith, cunning culprit that she was, taking the "bull by the horns," and holding out her hand. "I wish you a Happy New Year! Good morning, father, and mother! A Happy New Year! I'm sorry ...
— Faith Gartney's Girlhood • Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney
... very well for Charles to believe that the world was governed by magic. Art is magic, but she ought to have known that it is a magic which operates only among a very few, and that the many who are moved only by cunning are always taking advantage of them.... Poor Charles! Betrayed at every turn by his own simplicity, betrayed even by her ...
— Mummery - A Tale of Three Idealists • Gilbert Cannan
... been so much in the bright old lady's confidence if I could have possibly declined it. It gave me the most inconsistent opinions of her. At one time I thought she was a story-teller, and at another time that she was the pink of truth. Now I suspected that she was very cunning, next moment I believed her honest Welsh heart to be perfectly innocent and simple. And after all, what did it matter to me, and why did it matter to me? Why could not I, going up to bed with my basket of keys, stop ...
— Bleak House • Charles Dickens
... He did not care. A long chase had whetted him, and he had waited so long that he was willing to wait another year, and if need were two or three, for his royal quarry. He knew it must be his at last, and he loved it the more for the speed and strength and cunning with which it defied him. It had a secret lair he could never discover; but one day that secret too should be his own. Meanwhile his blood was heated, and the Red Hunter dreamed of the hart ...
— Martin Pippin in the Apple Orchard • Eleanor Farjeon
... accompanied by de Lorche who is a powerful lord and related to the prince. Ah, I did not want to set out for this place. But he commanded me to go. I heard him once say to the old lord of Spychow: 'It is to be regretted that you are not cunning, for I shall get nothing by craft, and with them that is a necessary thing. O Uncle Macko! he would be useful here;' and for that reason he dispatched me. But as for Jurandowna, even you, sir, will not find her, for probably she is already in the other world, and where ...
— The Knights of the Cross • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... are thy feet in sandals, O prince's daughter! Thy rounded thighs are like jewels, The work of the hands of a cunning workman. Thy navel is like a rounded goblet Wherein no mingled wine is wanting; Thy belly is like a heap of wheat Set about with lilies. Thy two breasts are like two fawns They are twins of a roe. Thy neck is like the tower of ivory; Thine eyes as the pools ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 4 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... bread, strewed ashes and sand over it, rubbed all smooth, and was plunged in my copy of Montaigne when he entered. This time he went straight to the window, looked at it, tried the stanchions, and then, with an amused attempt at being cunning and hiding his own vigilance, he asked me, with laborious hypocrisy, if I had seen Captain Lancy pass the window. And so for weeks and weeks we ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... didn't know it," said O'Toole, with a chuckle. "I am the cunning man, after all. She would do a great deal ...
— Clementina • A.E.W. Mason
... never distant enough to see it in this picturesque Point of View," says Uncle. "Legitimate Monarchy was, to my Mind, the Rock over which the brawling River leaped awhile, and which, in the End, successfully opposed it; and as to your Oliver, he was a cunning Fellow, that diverted its Course to ...
— Mary Powell & Deborah's Diary • Anne Manning
... heavier weapons and with weary-waking head For bread; Though sons, whose fathers fought in other ages For fame, bear in their hearts today the scar Of entering where the laborer sleeps And rousing him with masterly inquiry where he keeps His wages: Though all the cunning coil of trade appear a baser thing Than battles are, O trace through time the orbit of this troubled star! ... See, from afar off, how the valiant few Of old, each with a helmet on his head, Practiced their inconclusive feud Upon no ...
— The New World • Witter Bynner
... come to this? If none beside Will stand for justice, then, at least, will I. I'll rend the woof of cunning into shreds, And lay its falsehoods open to the day. Most reverend primate! art thou, canst thou be So simple-souled, or canst thou so dissemble? Are ye so credulous, my lords? My liege, Art thou so weak? Ye know not—will not know, ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... them; and beat them; and kill them, it is not as if they were brave men. They are only cunning cowards. I'd meet cunning with cunning. I'd outwit them somehow. I'd change my lodging every week, and live at little inns and places. I'd lock up every thing I used, as well as the rooms. I'd consult wiser heads, the ...
— Put Yourself in His Place • Charles Reade
... shopkeeper's shrewdness, and the studied carelessness of a member of the Jockey Club, was that form of disgust which set a pistol in the hands of a young Werther, bored to death less by Charlotte than by German princes. It was a thoroughly German face, full of cunning, full of simplicity, stupidity, and courage; the knowledge which brings weariness, the worldly wisdom which the veriest child's trick leaves at fault, the abuse of beer and tobacco,—all these were there to be seen in it, and to heighten the contrast of opposed qualities, there was a ...
— Cousin Pons • Honore de Balzac
... surprised to find that his cunning plot had been seen through. In fact there would be others in the same fix, for Rod could imagine the astonishment of Josh and Hanky Panky, possibly utterly unsuspicious regarding the ...
— The Big Five Motorcycle Boys on the Battle Line - Or, With the Allies in France • Ralph Marlow
... retorted Jake, with unexpected cunning, "then the flames had got a start. One don't see in the dark. They hadn't got much of a start when I left. So he must have gone up to my room ...
— Room Number 3 - and Other Detective Stories • Anna Katharine Green
... shall you hear Of accidental judgments, casual slaughters, Of deaths put on by cunning, and forc'd cause, And, in this upshot, purposes mistook Fall'n ...
— The Woman in Black • Edmund Clerihew Bentley
... advantages this new system presents; they most carefully extend the wax, and thus, without loss of time or labour, construct perfect cells. So long as the event that confronts them appear not a snare devised by some cunning and malicious god, the bees may be trusted always to discover the best, nay, the only human, solution. Let me cite an instance; an event, that, though occurring in nature, is still in itself wholly abnormal. I refer to the manner in which ...
— The Life of the Bee • Maurice Maeterlinck
... care or anxiety. Her mother's face was ploughed up with innumerable lines, and her features seemed to work with every varying passion, while her expression was hungry, eager, and wolf-like, without showing anything more intellectual than cunning, even in ...
— Mr. Hogarth's Will • Catherine Helen Spence
... or deed, not venereal sore, discoloration, privacy of the onanist, Putridity of gluttons or rum-drinkers, peculation, cunning, betrayal, murder, seduction, prostitution, But has results beyond death as really as ...
— Leaves of Grass • Walt Whitman
... his wife. The satisfaction with which he uttered, 'Well struck!' gave little hint of remorse; and the gloating delight with which he added something about the devil having assisted him to make it a safe blow as well as a deadly one, was proof not only of his having used all his cunning in planning this crime, but of his ...
— That Affair Next Door • Anna Katharine Green
... drooped forward piteously, and into his eyes came the look that spelled surrender. He had learned the hard and pathetic lesson of the brute creation, that man was the master. This strange being, who so easily defied his strength and thwarted his cunning, was stronger than he, and at last he ...
— Bert Wilson in the Rockies • J. W. Duffield
... face, the fairest face, till Care, Till Care the graver - Care with cunning hand, Etches content thereon and makes it fair, Or constancy, and love, ...
— New Poems • Robert Louis Stevenson
... a fiery spirit was discovered by an Arab, about nine hundred years ago. The effects of this abuse of nature's gifts were soon viewed with alarm. Efforts were made, even by a heathen people, to arrest the evil; and it shows the mighty agency and cunning of Satan, that Christian nations should ever have been induced to adopt and encourage this deadliest of man's inventions. In the guilt of encouraging the destructive art, our own free country has largely participated. In the year 1815, as appears from well-authenticated statistics, our number ...
— Select Temperance Tracts • American Tract Society
... was noisily affectionate and hopelessly clumsy; Jim could pull splendidly when he chose, but he was up to all the tricks of the trade and was extraordinarily cunning at pretending to pull; [Page 110] Spud was generally considered to be daft; Birdie evidently had been treated badly in his youth and remained distrustful and suspicious to the end; Kid was the most indefatigable worker in the team; Wolf's character possessed no redeeming ...
— The Voyages of Captain Scott - Retold from 'The Voyage of the "Discovery"' and 'Scott's - Last Expedition' • Charles Turley
... blood is quite chilled in the blue veins, and the limbs fall passively down. There's a bud from Nannie's bush in one hand, but she does not hold it first to your nostrils and then to her own, with her cunning little ways, as she used to do. Do not ask them how it all happened; how can they tell you, and their hearts almost breaking? They did not even hear the angel's wings as he came to bear away the sweet babe. All they knew was, that there was a convulsive movement of the little ...
— The Elm Tree Tales • F. Irene Burge Smith
... of Germany is maintained by force. On the day that another force arises, Germany will collapse, for her cohesion has only been attained and cemented by cunning and contempt for the truth; she has lived by the sword and she ...
— The Schemes of the Kaiser • Juliette Adam
... water, and the bullfrog disappeared from sight. Bumper reared up on his hind legs and looked around him. He had never seen a fox, but his mother had often told him tales about their cruelty. They were forever hunting little rabbits to eat, and they were as sly and cunning as they were barbarous. ...
— Bumper, The White Rabbit • George Ethelbert Walsh
... knowledge, capable of awakening the soul, unto that person, O king, who though not conversant with the Vedas is nevertheless, humble and has a keen desire for acquiring the knowledge of Brahma. It should never be imparted unto one that is wedded to falsehood, or one that is cunning or roguish, or one that is without any strength of mind or one that is of crooked understanding, or one that is jealous of men of knowledge, or one that gives pain to others. Listen to me as I say who they are unto whom this knowledge may safely be communicated. ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown
... country, whom they visit from time to time, bringing back with them great bags of flour. It is illegal for private persons to bring food into Moscow, and the trains are searched; but, by corruption or cunning, experienced people can elude the search. The food market is illegal, and is raided occasionally; but as a rule it is winked at. Thus the attempt to suppress private commerce has resulted in an amount of unprofessional buying and selling which far exceeds what happens in capitalist countries. It ...
— The Practice and Theory of Bolshevism • Bertrand Russell
... horror on this printed pasteboard, as though it were the legitimate offspring of the Devil and Dr. Faustus, plays his own pious game at winning souls, and risks—charity. The griping money-catcher, who shudders at the thought of losing gold in spendthrift play, takes his own close and cunning game at winning wealth, and risks—esteem. The ambitious aspirant, who scorns such empty things as cards, plays boldly at his daring game at winning position, and risks—honor. The bright-eyed girl throws heart and soul into the ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 100, February, 1866 • Various
... threw off the damp cloth, and revealed the clay model of a head. The face was unmistakable, but it expressed every baseness—cunning, ...
— The Eternal City • Hall Caine
... be my class. First, I chose the dearest little Irish girl. Her name is Norah, and she's just as pretty as she can be, only her face was dreadfully dirty, and her clothes all rags. Then her little sister Kathleen cried to come; so I took her too. Then I chose a cunning little German tot named Gretchen. She has yellow hair, braided in tight little tails down her back, and is a good deal cleaner than the rest, but not very clean, you know; and she hadn't any shoes at all. Then Mrs. Wallis brought up the funniest little French girl, with a name ...
— Nine Little Goslings • Susan Coolidge
... that the wisdom of the serpent is frequently outwitted by a crafty woman, or a cunning priest. A well-known Lancashire tradition gives a humorous account of how the devil was on one occasion deluded by the shrewdness of a clever woman. Barely three miles from Clitheroe, on the high road to Gisburne, stood a public house with this title, "The Dule upo' Dun," which means ...
— Strange Pages from Family Papers • T. F. Thiselton Dyer
... those who had hitherto leant most upon the charity of the Hall. A certain picturesquely tattered man, living at some distance from the village, who was in the habit of waylaying my father at certain points on the estate, with well-timed agricultural remarks and a cunning affectation of half-wittedness and good-humour, got henceforward no half-crowns ...
— A Flat Iron for a Farthing - or Some Passages in the Life of an only Son • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... Cunning, as the Italian peasant is by nature, Masin made a sign to his master that the man, if he were really below, could hear all ...
— The Heart of Rome • Francis Marion Crawford
... have the cunning of foxes," he said to Agathe. "In all my days I never saw a man carry things with such a high hand as that soldier; they say war educates young men! Joseph has let himself be fooled. They have shut his mouth with wine, ...
— The Celibates - Includes: Pierrette, The Vicar of Tours, and The Two Brothers • Honore de Balzac
... What had there been about it to make it the happiest hour he could recall? Such a simple, outdoor encounter! He had spent many an hour which had lingered in his memory—hours in places made enchanting to the eye by every device of cunning, in the society of women chosen for their beauty, their wit, their power to allure, to fascinate, to intoxicate. He had had his senses appealed to by every form of attraction a clever woman can fabricate, herself a miracle of art in dress, in ...
— The Twenty-Fourth of June • Grace S. Richmond
... His cunning glance changed instantly to an absolutely expressionless mask. My white skin no longer made any difference to him. We were now ...
— The Reckoning • Robert W. Chambers
... read of his time in human character, imputes Ferdinand's successes, in one of his letters, to "cunning and good luck, rather than superior wisdom." [71] He was indeed fortunate; and the "star of Austria," which rose as his declined, shone not with a brighter or steadier lustre. But success through a long ...
— The History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella The Catholic, V3 • William H. Prescott
... when she ate. One day a small twig with insects' eggs on it was handed to her. She sat up straight in her cunning way, took the twig in her hands, and held it in her mouth. While she nibbled, she sang; so that she looked very much like a little musician ...
— Dew Drops, Vol. 37, No. 8, February 22, 1914 • Various
... change in everyone's character the moment the gold was discovered in the shining sand. Some became savages, others grew crafty and cunning, and Old Hal had his hands full to keep discipline in the camp. Dwight and Herrick saw the tendency of their hired men to mutiny against Hal and themselves, and perhaps jump the claim when the owners were out of the way, but they were farsighted men, and Hal was no greenhorn ...
— The Blue Birds' Winter Nest • Lillian Elizabeth Roy
... Dutch vessels in pursuit of the Spaniards, and had compelled all the herring-fishermen for the time to serve in the ships of war, although the prosperity of the country depended on that industry. "I find the man very wise, subtle, and cunning," said Seymour of the Dutch Admiral, "and therefore do ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... the cunning of the foe; Thy grace bring peace and make us whole, That we glad after thee may go, And shun that ...
— Rampolli • George MacDonald
... more to a quiet country life, took care of his health, cultivated his garden, and wrote long weekly letters to the Home Journal. He had by this time five children, middle age had stolen upon him, and now that he could no longer pose as his own allconquering hero, his hand seems to have lost its cunning. His editorial articles, afterwards published under the appropriate title of Ephemera, grew thinner and flatter with the passing of the years; yet slight and superficial as the best of them are, they ...
— Little Memoirs of the Nineteenth Century • George Paston
... emperor. The Protestants greatly preferred the duke to any one of the race of the bigoted Ferdinand. The emperor was excessively chagrined by this aspect of affairs, and abruptly dissolved the diet. He felt that he had been duped by France; that a cunning monk, Richelieu's ambassador, had outwitted him. In his vexation he exclaimed, "A Capuchin friar has disarmed me with his rosary, and covered six ...
— The Empire of Austria; Its Rise and Present Power • John S. C. Abbott |
