"Proficiency" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... since liberation would depend in a measure upon proficiency in the trade-school and school of letters, that some criminals whose criminality might be of a lesser degree, would be at a greater disadvantage than others. That is not so. The system is obviously a ...
— A Plea for the Criminal • James Leslie Allan Kayll
... painter of the day was at that moment superintending the placing of one of his pictures over an altar. The proficiency which I had acquired in his art during my residence in the convent had made me an enthusiastic amateur. I was struck, at the first glance, with the painting. It was the face of a Madonna. So innocent, so lovely, ...
— Tales of a Traveller • Washington Irving
... an annual prize given by a club of Yale alumni to the member of the Senior class of each of several preparatory schools "who best combines proficiency in athletics with ...
— The Boy With the U. S. Life-Savers • Francis Rolt-Wheeler
... anything about the life which she had led before the war, and her college record was of less account than the fact that she looked practical and strong. She had been given the post on the strength of her physical perfection rather than her proficiency as a V.A.D. ...
— There was a King in Egypt • Norma Lorimer
... different," thought Norcross, and yet she lost something by reason of the display of her proficiency as a clerk. "I wish she would leave business to some one else," he inwardly grumbled ...
— The Forester's Daughter - A Romance of the Bear-Tooth Range • Hamlin Garland
... neither the Hindoos nor the Mahometans should have applied themselves to painting, for there are neither good pictures nor drawings to be seen among any of these people, although they have displayed such proficiency in architecture, carving in relief, and ...
— A Woman's Journey Round the World • Ida Pfeiffer
... an instant revenge. Mataafa, a devout Catholic, was in the habit of walking every morning to mass from his camp at Vaiala beyond Matautu to the mission at the Mulivai. He was sometimes escorted by as many as six guards in uniform, who displayed their proficiency in drill by perpetually shifting arms as they marched. Himself, meanwhile, paced in front, bareheaded and barefoot, a staff in his hand, in the customary chief's dress of white kilt, shirt, and jacket, and with ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 17 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... beautiful and impressive. A chapter from the Bible, read aloud by the teacher, followed, and a hymn beautifully sung, when the pupils filed off as before to the sound of music. We next went to the elementary room, appropriated to infants, who are not sent to the higher school till their proficiency reaches ...
— The Englishwoman in America • Isabella Lucy Bird
... teacher giving instruction for wages, and liable to reproach, if those whom he undertakes to inform make no proficiency, he must have the power of enforcing attendance, of awakening negligence, and ...
— The Life Of Johnson, Volume 3 of 6 • Boswell
... give their attention to the cards, and some have acquired great proficiency in the art. On board a steamer sailing for New York, on one occasion a French lady among the saloon-passengers undertook to amuse the party by telling their fortunes. A Scotch young gentleman, who was going out to try and get a commission in the ...
— The Gaming Table: Its Votaries and Victims - Volume II (of II) • Andrew Steinmetz
... perfumes only when they smell them, and not to seek or care about them in their absence, but in the same condition as people who are hungry and thirsty are in if torn away from food and drink, we ought to follow after true proficiency in philosophy, whether marriage, or wealth, or friendship, or military service, strike in and produce a separation. For just as more is to be got from philosophy, so much the more does what we fail to ...
— Plutarch's Morals • Plutarch
... and give me his daughter. Nothing could be more generous. I set to work with zeal to study anew, and I considered myself bound in honor not to make farther advances with the daughter until I should feel satisfied with my proficiency with the law. It was all in vain. I had an insuperable repugnance to the study; my mind would not take hold of it; or rather, by long despondency had become for the time incapable of any application. I was in a wretched state of doubt ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. I, No. VI, June, 1862 - Devoted To Literature and National Policy • Various
... not read till bread-and-chocolate time, but which then took the flavour out of these refreshments. Her lover—he leaped to that verbal position in her thought in this moment of crisis—was ordered off in haste to Afghanistan. The geographical proficiency which had won her so many marks served her only too well, but she hastened to extract her atlas from the fatal niche, and to pore over her geographical misery. She felt she ought to withdraw her own letter for revision, ...
— The Grey Wig: Stories and Novelettes • Israel Zangwill
... of careful reading, not only because of the author's ability as a literary artist, but because of his conspicuous proficiency in interpreting the causes of and changes in ...
— A Spoil of Office - A Story of the Modern West • Hamlin Garland
... whole heart into his work, had been making various reforms, introducing new studies, making a point of religious instruction, and meditating on a course of lectures on history, to be given in the evenings, the attendance to be voluntary, but a prize held out for proficiency. Louis took up the subject eagerly, and Isabel entered into the discussion with all her soul, and the grammar-school did indeed seem to be in a way to become something very superior in tone to anything Northwold had formerly seen, engrossing ...
— Dynevor Terrace (Vol. II) • Charlotte M. Yonge
... the ball with the charming Siegfrid, and closed it with his dear Hulda; and he has never given any display of his proficiency in the terpsichorean art ...
— Ticket No. "9672" • Jules Verne
... right word in the right way. The question is: how have they found it possible to do this; how have they learned; how have they brought the faculty of expression to a perfected art? Or was this ability born in them? Or, if there is a secret of proficiency, do the adroit managers of words guard their secret carefully? ...
— Conversation - What to Say and How to Say it • Mary Greer Conklin
... tried to draw her from memory! for she would not be photographed. It became a common pastime to draw her profile; some attained the greatest proficiency in the art. With a broomhandle in the snow, with a match in cigar ashes, with skates on ...
— Captain Mansana and Mother's Hands • Bjoernstjerne Bjoernson
... history of my life will prove of what vital importance it is to ascertain the character of the master and mistress as to other points besides teaching Greek and Latin, before a child is intrusted to their care. I ought to have observed, that during my stay at this school, I had made some proficiency in mathematics and algebra. ...
— Frank Mildmay • Captain Frederick Marryat
... Ariosto, I learned from his notes on the latter, that the Italian language contained a fund of romantic lore. A part of my earnings was dedicated to an Italian class which I attended twice a week, and rapidly acquired some proficiency. I had previously renewed and extended my knowledge of the French language, from the same principle of romantic research. Tressan's romances, the Bibliotheque Bleue, and Bibliotheque de Romans, were already familiar to me, and I now acquired ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott, Volume I (of 10) • John Gibson Lockhart
... drills, however, the squads were consolidated into others of four, six, and eight each. The surplus drill-masters were "turned in." Their hopes were withered, for it was almost a certainty that those who were "turned in" would not be "made." They expected to be "made" on their proficiency in drilling, and when it was shown by being "turned in" that others had been thought better drill-masters, they were not a little disappointed. How they "boned" tactics! What proficiency they manifested! How they yelled out their commands! What eagerness they showed to correct ...
— Henry Ossian Flipper, The Colored Cadet at West Point • Henry Ossian Flipper
... tunes of the Italians. Accordingly he took service as a violinist with a traveling operatic troupe, and in this capacity visited the south of France. In Paris he became a pupil of the court organist Marchand, of whom we hear again in connection with certain tests of proficiency with Haendel. Marchand was at first delighted with his new pupil, but presently dropped him when he discovered how talented he was, and liable to prove a dangerous rival. Accordingly he left Paris and took service as organist ...
— A Popular History of the Art of Music - From the Earliest Times Until the Present • W. S. B. Mathews
... Frederiksvaern, Norway, September 23, 1848; died in 1895) was a university graduate who came to this country in 1869 to take a professorship of languages in a small Ohio college. Soon after he was called to Cornell, and in 1882 he became Professor of German in Columbia. His proficiency in the English language was phenomenal. His mastery of scholarly English in the essay form was to be expected, but his ready command of the delicately shaded style required of a literary novelist has ...
— Short Story Classics (American) Vol. 2 • Various
... to pieces the whole web of his mind. He must unlearn much of that knowledge which has, perhaps, constituted hitherto his chief title to superiority. His very talents will be a hinderance to him. His difficulties will be proportioned to his proficiency in the pursuits which are fashionable among his contemporaries; and that proficiency will in general be proportioned to the vigor and activity of his mind. And it is well if, after all his sacrifices and exertions, his works do not resemble a lisping man or a modern ruin. We ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XIII • John Lord
... forests of Le Morvan may be, and certainly are, to the citizen of Paris, whose knowledge of wood-craft, whatever may have been his delightful visions of forest life, of fairy revels, and hair-breadth escapes, is about equal to his proficiency in navigation, they are no labyrinth to the true sportsman of this province; in his mind, they are mapped with an accuracy perfectly astonishing to the uninitiated in the countless indications of nature, of which the eye of man becomes so ...
— Le Morvan, [A District of France,] Its Wild Sports, Vineyards and Forests; with Legends, Antiquities, Rural and Local Sketches • Henri de Crignelle
... marks may be obtained by adequate proficiency in any two or more of the five branches of science included under ...
— Practical Essays • Alexander Bain
... between English Staff officers and French ladies, but to transmit billets-doux between the two Armies and, generally, to promote the amenities of military intercourse. As a rule they are charming fellows, chosen with a very proper eye to their personal qualities as well as their proficiency in the English language. Among them I met a Count belonging to one of the oldest families in France, an Oriental scholar of European reputation, and a Professor of English literature. The younger ones studied our peculiarities with the most ingratiating ...
— Leaves from a Field Note-Book • J. H. Morgan
... through every single office of the heavenly powers. From which, I think, this will follow as an inference—that every rational nature can, in passing from one order to another, go through each to all, and advance from all to each, while made the subject of various degrees of proficiency and failure, according to its own actions and endeavors, put forth in the enjoyment of its power of ...
— A Source Book for Ancient Church History • Joseph Cullen Ayer, Jr., Ph.D.
... Mrs. Stowe, under correction; it was only the beginners and the more ignorant who were angry; and almost always the proof-reading editor had his way on disputed points. I look back now, with respectful amazement at my proficiency in detecting the errors of the great as well as the little. I was able to discover mistakes even in the classical quotations of the deeply lettered Sumner, and I remember, in the earliest years of my service on the Atlantic, waiting in this statesman's study amidst the ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... other remnants of the most ancient Greek poets. The Druids, even in Gaul, where they were not altogether ignorant of the use of letters, in order to preserve their knowledge in greater respect, committed none of their precepts to writing. The proficiency of their pupils was estimated principally by the number of technical verses which they retained in their memory: a circumstance that shows this discipline rather calculated to preserve with accuracy a few plain maxims of traditionary science than to improve and extend it. ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. VII. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... Muslim boys and called an idol-maker; and, traversing a Christian hamlet among the gardens, had been reviled and pelted by its Orthodox inhabitants. For company he had been obliged to consort with English-speaking touts and dragomans, who welcomed his proficiency in the foreign tongue; and these he hated, for they mocked his art. The one exception was Elias Abdul Messih. Elias could read Arabic fluently (a feat beyond Iskender, who had been schooled in English), and from trips to Beyrut and the towns of Egypt had brought back any number ...
— The Valley of the Kings • Marmaduke Pickthall
... derived his descent from Casca, one of the conspirators against Julius Caesar! *4 Having the misfortune to lose his father early in life, he was placed by his uncle in the famous seminary of Alcala de Henares, founded by the great Ximenes. Here he made rapid proficiency in liberal studies, especially in those connected with his profession, and at length received the degree of ...
— The History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William H. Prescott
... Dionysius of Syracuse and Nero; and his great measure, the Stamp Act, the noblest legislation since the edict of Nantz. And further, the undersigned doth uphold the great Established Church, and revere its ministers, so justly celebrated for their piety and card-playing, their proficiency in theology, and their familiarity with that great religious epic of the Reformation, 'Reynard the Fox'—the study of which they pursue even on horseback. And lastly, the said undersigned doth honor the great college of Virginia, and revere the aristocracy, ...
— The Youth of Jefferson - A Chronicle of College Scrapes at Williamsburg, in Virginia, A.D. 1764 • Anonymous
... the greener rested primarily upon the fear that one day he would expose him to Appleton; added to this was a mighty jealousy of his rapid rise to proficiency and the rankling memory of the scene of their first meeting ...
— The Promise - A Tale of the Great Northwest • James B. Hendryx
... not. Lifting the fingers high is not good for the tone, though it may be used for velocity playing. I use quite the reverse where I wish beautiful, singing, tone quality. The young pupil, at the beginning, must of course learn to raise fingers and make precise movements; when greater proficiency is reached, many modifications of touch are used. That the best results are not more often obtained in piano teaching and study, is as much the fault of the teacher as the pupil. The latter is usually willing ...
— Piano Mastery - Talks with Master Pianists and Teachers • Harriette Brower
... British seamen gained their victories as much by their proficiency in gunnery and their activity as by their strength and courage. Of this there are numberless instances, among others the following. In 1761, on the evening of the 13th of August, the Bellona, of 74 guns, and a crew of 550 men, Captain Robert ...
— How Britannia Came to Rule the Waves - Updated to 1900 • W.H.G. Kingston
... he thought it for his interest to strive for the convict's prize. In fact, "good conduct," as exemplified by a convict according to the prison standard, affords no more reliable evidence of his moral qualities and industrious habits, than proficiency in drill affords of the moral character of ...
— Six Years in the Prisons of England • A Merchant - Anonymous
... to the next stand, where Mr. Mangan was displaying an altogether different standard of proficiency. The Duchess came up to Dominey a ...
— The Great Impersonation • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... would have been to take complete charge of her late husband, had Dr. Page chosen to trust her. She administered with scrupulous regularity to the invalid such medicines as were ordered, and kept him cheerful by reading and conversation, so that the physician in charge complimented her on her proficiency. Trained nurses were unknown in Benham at this time, and any old or unoccupied female was regarded as qualified to watch over the sick. Selma appreciated from what she had observed of the conduct of Wilbur's nurse that there was a wrong and a right way ...
— Unleavened Bread • Robert Grant
... "'An abnormal proficiency at games has apparently destroyed all desire in him to realise the more serious issues of life.' There is more ...
— Mike • P. G. Wodehouse
... took his bachelor's degree at Heidelberg University, and when only eighteen years of age Erasmus said of him, "What hopes may we not conceive of Philipp Melanchthon, though as yet very young, almost a boy, but equally to be admired for his proficiency in both languages! What quickness of invention! What purity of diction! What vastness of memory! What variety of reading! What modesty and gracefulness of behavior! ...
— History of Education • Levi Seeley
... knowledge." Years are spent by most upper-class boys and girls in half-learning several languages which they will never use, in acquiring the technique of the piano, or of some other art which they will never learn to practice with proficiency. There is, to be sure, a certain mental training in all this, but no more than can be found in more useful studies. A foreign language is essentially a tool for carrying on conversation with its users, or for utilizing the literature written therein; the technique ...
— Problems of Conduct • Durant Drake
... "adventure." Taking men in the average one may say this: the younger a man is, when he learns to fly, the better for him. Much depends, naturally, on the sort of flying he intends to do after he has attained proficiency. If he is going to fly in war, or under conditions that impose a heavy strain, then he must be a young man. But if he intends to fly for his own pleasure, and under favourable conditions, then this factor of age ...
— Learning to Fly - A Practical Manual for Beginners • Claude Grahame-White
... Francis Talbot, "moreover, there is one in use for the English traitors, her friends, and another for the French. This looks like the French sort. Let me see, they are read by taking the third letter in each second word." Francis Talbot, somewhat proud of his proficiency, and perfectly certain of the trustworthiness of his cousin Richard, went on puzzling out the ciphered letters, making Richard set each letter down as he picked it out, and trying whether they would make sense in French or English. Both understood French, having learned it in their ...
— Unknown to History - A Story of the Captivity of Mary of Scotland • Charlotte M. Yonge
... monasticism and all that belonged to it, must have been nursed by him from youth; for having been placed, when a boy, in a convent, he ran away with the aid of Crotus, when only sixteen. Sharing the literary tastes of his friend, he learned to write with proficiency the poetical and rhetorical Latin of the Humanists of that time. In spite of all his irregularities, adventures, and unsettlement of habits, he had preserved an elastic and elevated turn of mind, desirous of serving the interests of a 'free and noble learning,' and a knightly courage, which ...
— Life of Luther • Julius Koestlin
... other christened name, it was unknown to men—was an original. As Nola had said, he belonged back a few hundred years, when musical proficiency was not so common as now. The profession was not crowded in that country, happily, and Banjo traveled from ranch to ranch carrying cheer and entertainment with him ...
— The Rustler of Wind River • G. W. Ogden
... he did not publish, his fine epistle to Jervas, the painter. Pope was passionately fond of the art of painting, and practised it a good deal under Jervas's instructions, although he did not reach great proficiency. The prodigy has yet to be born who combines the characters of a great painter and ...
— The Poetical Works Of Alexander Pope, Vol. 1 • Alexander Pope et al
... he said, 'Sir, I wish you a better employment.' Then hastily changing the subject he called out, 'What party are you in the Church—Tractarian, Moderate, or Evangelical? I am happy to say I am the old High.' 'I am happy to say I am not,' was Elwin's emphatic reply. Borrow boasted of his proficiency in the Norfolk dialect, which he endeavoured to speak as broadly as possible. 'I told him,' said Elwin, 'that he had not cultivated it with his usual success.' As the conversation proceeded it became less disputatious, and the two ended by becoming so cordial that they promised to visit each other. ...
— George Borrow and His Circle - Wherein May Be Found Many Hitherto Unpublished Letters Of - Borrow And His Friends • Clement King Shorter
... applicants entering the University who, on strict and thorough examination and open competitive trial by examiners whom the Senatus will appoint for that end, are judged to show the best attainment of actual proficiency and the best likelihood of more in the department or faculty called of arts, as taught there. Examiners to be actual professors in said faculty, the fittest whom the Senatus can select, with fit assessors or coadjutors and witnesses, if the Senatus see good, ...
— On the Choice of Books • Thomas Carlyle
... visitor such a general air of order and cleanliness as this first encampment of Colonel Higginson's regiment. As we enter one of the streets a company inspection of arms is going on, which displays to good advantage the proficiency of the colored soldier in the minutiae of his work. Soon after, we are summoned to witness a battalion drill, and my companion, who has been both an army officer and a 'Democrat,' is extravagant in his praise of the movements and evolutions of the troops. Before leaving ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 2, August, 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... difficulty in settling what to talk about which handicaps most people under similar circumstances, but poured forth a stream of commonplaces in such fluent, rapid French as showed that she had good reason for boasting of proficiency. When she finished, the lady looked at her husband with ...
— More about Pixie • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... according to Ovid was born at Carthaea, a town in the isle of Cea, was probably a youth of considerable poetical talent and proficiency in the polite arts, which caused him to be deemed the favourite of Apollo. His transformation into a Cypress is founded on the resemblance between their names, that tree being called by the Greeks kuparissos. ...
— The Metamorphoses of Ovid - Literally Translated into English Prose, with Copious Notes - and Explanations • Publius Ovidius Naso
... West Point cadets are trained for all arms of the service, sometimes doing duty as infantry, sometimes as artillery and at other times acting as engineers or cavalry; and during the closing week of the year, they give public exhibitions of their proficiency before the official visitors. On this particular occasion the cavalry drill was held in the great riding hall, and after the whole corps had completed their evolutions and were formed in line ready to be dismissed, the commanding officer ordered an extraordinarily ...
— On the Trail of Grant and Lee • Frederick Trevor Hill
... designs. His intellects appear to have failed afterwards, and he died 1677. Sir William Poultny, subsequently M.P. for Westminster, and a Commissioner of the Privy Seal under King William. Ob. 1691. Sir William Petty, an eminent physician, and celebrated for his proficiency in every branch of science. Ob. 1687. Thomas Scott, M.P., made Secretary of State to the Commonwealth ...
— The Diary of Samuel Pepys • Samuel Pepys
... your early Piety to that Kingly Martyr whose Sacred dictates did institute your tender years, and whose sufferings were so much alleviated by your Majesties early proficiency in all that might presage a hopefull and glorious Successor: For so did you run through all his Vicissitudes, during that implacable war, which sought nothing more then to defeat you of all opportunities of a Princely education, as ...
— An Apologie for the Royal Party (1659); and A Panegyric to Charles the Second (1661) • John Evelyn
... to the history of the British nation for an example. Most assuredly the British people are powerful in war, but their might and renown are in a great measure due to their proficiency in the works which make a time of ...
— Letters and Journals of James, Eighth Earl of Elgin • James, Eighth Earl of Elgin
... those which, relating to the common world of men, were within the scope of my reason. Haroun led his wild guest to boast of his own proficiency in magic, and, despite my incredulity, I could not overcome the shudder with which fictions, however extravagant, that deal with that dark Unknown abandoned to the chimeras of poets, will, at night and in solitude, send through the veins of ...
— A Strange Story, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... party and return to the house; while her sister gave me from time to time certain knowing glances, as if intimating that my knowledge of farming and political economy was pretty much on a par with my proficiency in botany. ...
— The Confessions of Harry Lorrequer, Vol. 1 • Charles James Lever
... of running out and hauling in the seine, demanded a skilful crew of at least five men; and as whole lives were devoted to rowing, the proficiency finally attained in it can be fancied. It was only natural, therefore, that the thirty communities should each insist upon having the crew of greatest excellence—the crew which could outrow any other five on the Bosphorus; ...
— The Prince of India - Or - Why Constantinople Fell - Volume 2 • Lew. Wallace
... and salamanders, pelicans and porcupines—the length and language of mottoes—how the wind should be pictorially portrayed, with many other equally weighty considerations, still the chivalrous knights of the tournay, and the fair ladies of their devoirs, attained proficiency in the art. Wolf of Wolfrath, the lute-player, records, that at a grand tournament held at Vienna in 1560, crowns of laurel were awarded to the knights who wore the wittiest devices, as well as to those who excelled in feats ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 444 - Volume 18, New Series, July 3, 1852 • Various
... their journey toward the coast. The boy took much pride in his new weapons and ornaments. He practiced continually with the spear, throwing it at some object ahead hour by hour as they traveled their loitering way, until he gained a proficiency such as only youthful muscles may attain to speedily. All the while his training went on under the guidance of Akut. No longer was there a single jungle spoor but was an open book to the keen eyes of the lad, ...
— The Son of Tarzan • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... situated for study, she takes up the doctrines of the Gospel as believed and taught by the Methodists, and makes rapid proficiency. Her pastor, one of the flaming heralds of early Methodism in New England, furnished her with the best of reading, and all her associates in the studies and active work of Zion wondered at the rapid progress of the disinherited girl. Little could they realize how vividly those ...
— Elizabeth: The Disinherited Daugheter • E. Ben Ez-er
... to forsake his own ground in order to share that from which he has been addressed. Of course it must be conceded that even this modest demand will mean much study for the preacher and a careful preparation of the sermon. Surely, however, the end is worth the labour. In no work is proficiency gained without some taking of pains. That preacher who is afraid of a little toil in order that he may thereby improve his usefulness, and increase his success, should find proof in this fear of effort that his commission—if ...
— The Message and the Man: - Some Essentials of Effective Preaching • J. Dodd Jackson
... the President was the will of Jeff. Davis, whispered in the temples of the Sons of Liberty or American Knights, into the ears of those of the members of the Orders, who had made the most proficiency in their teachings, and these beings, true to their oaths, went forth upon their mission ...
— The Great North-Western Conspiracy In All Its Startling Details • I. Windslow Ayer
... common, profundity and directness. And in their histories, so far as we may judge from the scanty records of ancient civilizations, all have a general resemblance. Always, as the sense of reality decays, the artist labours to conceal under technical proficiency the poverty of his emotional experience. For the inspired artist technique was nothing but a means; for his hungry successors it becomes an end. For the man who has little to say the manner of saying it gains consequence, and in a manner which has been elaborated into an intricate craft ...
— Pot-Boilers • Clive Bell
... slowly repeated to Peter the words of the Lord's prayer. She gave him its history, and explained the meaning of several of its words that might otherwise have been unintelligible to him, notwithstanding his tolerable proficiency in English—a proficiency that had greatly increased in the last few weeks, in consequence of his constant communications with those who spoke it habitually. The word "trespasses," in particular, was somewhat difficult for the Indian to ...
— Oak Openings • James Fenimore Cooper
... Platitudes; when one loses, things like that are somehow said, as they are never said, for instance, at Bridge. From this specimen the beginner will learn the right style and method. Only by study of the best models and by constant practice can he attain anything like proficiency. ...
— Punch or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, July 8, 1914 • Various
... which decided the matter launched us upon yet wider conjecture regarding the unknown: was he a retired courier, a concierge out of place, a professor of languages on his holiday, or merely an amateur of philological studies? His declared proficiency was manifested in unexpected measure as we drove away from the Temple of Neptune on through the narrow street leading to it. Every motor has its peculiar note, and our car had something like the scream of a wild ...
— Roman Holidays and Others • W. D. Howells
... to say, 24 bob for two and a half days. We used to reckon that ten shillings a day would do us very nicely, barring luxuries and emergencies. We attained a zealous proficiency in reckoning shillings and pence, and our fervour in posting our ledgers would have gladdened a firm of auditors. I remember lying on the coping of a stone bridge over the water of Teviot near Hawick, admiring the green-brown tint of ...
— Shandygaff • Christopher Morley
... had a dim idea that she was to do something for Mara in her own department, while Moses was reciting his lesson; and therefore producing a large sampler, displaying every form and variety of marking-stitch, she began questioning the little girl, in a low tone, as to her proficiency in that useful accomplishment. ...
— The Pearl of Orr's Island - A Story of the Coast of Maine • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... commended the officers and crew for the promptness and skill they had displayed in their first concerted attempt at making sail. He then directed Captain Carnes to furl. Both evolutions were then repeated, until a proficiency satisfactory for one day ...
— Outward Bound - Or, Young America Afloat • Oliver Optic
... His former proficiency in gymnastics and his natural love of climbing stood him in good stead. He had never been addicted to nerves, had never known what it was to experience any vertigo or attacks of giddiness when exploring some dizzy height or negotiating some mountain ...
— Afterwards • Kathlyn Rhodes
... of mind for an artist, and yet, like most youthful painters, he attempted more than his proficiency warranted, for in this same letter he adds: "I am going to begin, as soon as I have finished it [the landscape], a piece, the subject of which will be 'Marius ...
— Samuel F. B. Morse, His Letters and Journals - In Two Volumes, Volume I. • Samuel F. B. Morse
... made a chatting acquaintance with the notary in the town, the Spaniard speaking English with tolerable proficiency. ...
— Jack Harkaway's Boy Tinker Among The Turks - Book Number Fifteen in the Jack Harkaway Series • Bracebridge Hemyng
... extraordinary proficiency in modern languages, the Countess looked at her narrowly. Where had she seen those lineaments before? She passed her hand over her brow in thought, and spit upon the floor, but no, ...
— Nonsense Novels • Stephen Leacock
... was in the Raven Patrol and was called Doc because he was the troop's official first aid scout. He was the son of a physician, which fact had doubtless helped to raise him to proficiency in that splendid part of scouting. It was one of Blythe's most noticeable characteristics that he got the names of the scouts confused in his mind. Almost the only name which he consistently pronounced ...
— Roy Blakeley in the Haunted Camp • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... the establishment of an efficient system of registration in steam vessels, to insure a large and rapid economy in the consumption of fuel, as this quality would then become the test of an engineer's proficiency, and would determine the measure of his fame. In the case of the Cornish engines, a saving of more than half the fuel was speedily effected by the introduction of the simple expedient of registration. In agricultural engines a like economy has speedily ...
— A Catechism of the Steam Engine • John Bourne
... respect of his period and his repertory, to limitations from which his predecessors were free, there has never been a time when English fiction has exhibited, in competent hands, greater fertility of invention and resource, or so high an average proficiency in the art of writing. The vastly increased demand for amusement in modern life has stimulated the production of light literature, which is now cultivated far more widely than heretofore, like tea, and the market is flooded with an article of sound moderate quality. At this moment we have ...
— Studies in Literature and History • Sir Alfred Comyn Lyall
... that technical proficiency should be one of the first acquisitions of the student who would become a fine pianist. It is impossible to conceive of fine playing that is not marked by clean, fluent, distinct, elastic technic. The technical ability of the performer should be of such ...
— Great Pianists on Piano Playing • James Francis Cooke
... did consist of four hundreth and fortie, and the foot of five hundreth and upwards.... The horsemen were armed for most part with suord and pistoll, some onlie with suord. The foot with musket, pike, sith (scythe), forke, and suord; and some with suords great and long." He admired much the proficiency of their cavalry, and marvelled how they had attained to it ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. XXII (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... dislocation. It was satisfactory nevertheless to know that much labor of a very thorough and persevering sort must have been expended upon their training before they could have come within sight of the proficiency they had gained. She believed this proficiency bore strong witness to some kind of moral excellence in them, and that theirs might well be a nobler way of life than many in which money is made more rapidly, and which are regarded as more respectable. There ...
— Weighed and Wanting • George MacDonald
... second of April, from nine to eleven o'clock in the morning, we had a mounted brigade-drill. Colonel Kilpatrick was in command. He appeared well pleased, at the close, with the proficiency of his men, and they are all enthusiastic over him. There seems to be a wonderful unanimity of feeling in the brigade, all regarding Kilpatrick as the right ...
— Three Years in the Federal Cavalry • Willard Glazier
... Dick, and did not hesitate to show it. A blunt man, of plain speech, he resented anything in the nature of double- dealing. Royson's remarkable proficiency in most matters bearing on the navigation of a ship had amazed him in the first instance, and this juggling with names led him to suspect some deep-laid villainy with which the midnight attack on von Kerber ...
— The Wheel O' Fortune • Louis Tracy
... make mention, was the son of a man of the same name, viz., Lumley Davis, who was, it seems, in circumstances good enough to procure his sons being brought up in one of the greatest and best schools in England. There his proficiency procured him an election upon the establishment, and he became respected as a person whose parts would do honour even to that remarkable seminary of learning where he had been bred. But unaccountably growing fond, all on a sudden, ...
— Lives Of The Most Remarkable Criminals Who have been Condemned and Executed for Murder, the Highway, Housebreaking, Street Robberies, Coining or other offences • Arthur L. Hayward
... changes from a cold house and a thinly-clad bed at the Credit, to warm rooms in York. My indisposition of body has generally induced a depression of spirits, which has often unfitted me for a proper discharge of duties, or proficiency in study. However, in the midst of bodily indisposition, the blessings of the Holy Spirit have been at times abundantly poured into my soul, insomuch that I could glory in tribulation, and rejoice that I am counted worthy to labour and suffer among the most unprofitable and worthless ...
— The Story of My Life - Being Reminiscences of Sixty Years' Public Service in Canada • Egerton Ryerson
... founded in October, 1891. At first only the privileges of university examinations and certificates of proficiency were granted. In June, 1892, all the university degrees and the graduate courses were opened. In November, 1897, the institution was accepted by the corporation and officially designated the Women's ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume IV • Various
... having first placed his son Richard at a school, under the tuition of an able master of his own principles: under whose care our young gentleman, by a ready genius, strong memory, and close application, made a great proficiency. At seventeen years of age he was sent to Utrecht, to be further instructed in liberal knowledge, by the celebrated Graevius, with ...
— Medica Sacra - or a Commentary on on the Most Remarkable Diseases Mentioned - in the Holy Scriptures • Richard Mead
... extremely diverting in company, and could behave himself before gentlemen very agreeably. He had a political genius—not altogether surprising in so eminent a Tory—and would have made great proficiency in learning if he had rightly applied his time. He composed several songs, and put tunes to them; and by his skill in music gained the favor of some of the leading musicians in the country, who endeavored to get him reprieved."—History of the Rapparees. The particulars of the Songster's ...
— Rookwood • William Harrison Ainsworth
... only songster of my acquaintance excepting the canary, that displays different degrees of proficiency in the exercise of his musical gifts. Not long since, while walking one Sunday in the edge of an orchard adjoining a wood, I heard one that so obviously and unmistakably surpassed all his rivals, that my ...
— Wake-Robin • John Burroughs
... drill instruction of the little detachment continued. Its members had acquired a considerable degree of proficiency in the mechanical handling of their guns, and were beginning to appreciate the destructive possibilities of their weapon. They were enjoying a degree of liberty which they had not found in their regimental camp, because when not on duty they were free to come and go at will, when ...
— The Gatlings at Santiago • John H. Parker
... Greek, he employed it critically in his theological studies, he taught it, amongst others, to William Cop, the French physician-humanist. A few years later he was to find little in Italy to improve his proficiency in Greek; he was afterwards inclined to believe that he carried more of the two ancient languages to that country ...
— Erasmus and the Age of Reformation • Johan Huizinga
... Having myself witnessed, in several instances, within the last ten months, the practical results of Mr. Kirkham's plan, I am enabled to give a decisive opinion of its merits. The extensive knowledge acquired in one course by his class in Pittsburgh, and the great proficiency evinced by his classes elsewhere, are a demonstration of the utility and superiority of his method of teaching, and a higher encomium on him than I ...
— English Grammar in Familiar Lectures • Samuel Kirkham
... really believed that the boy took gold from their sluice boxes, it was their duty to watch their CLAIMS and not the boy. That it was only their excuse for "snooping" after him, and they only wanted to find his "strike," which was as much his as their claims were their own! All this with great proficiency of epithet, but also a still more recognized proficiency with the revolver, ...
— Tales of Trail and Town • Bret Harte
... might, in obtaining a place in his contemplated publication, enlighten the human race, and at the same time immortalize himself—ideas which, I should have added, his visitor's great age, and well-known proficiency in the science of morals, might very well ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 5 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... real love affair, felt but a blunderer. Perhaps Mr. Snelling realized this and rather enjoyed the amateur's chagrin. However that may have been, he certainly let no opportunity slip for the display of his proficiency. The discomfited lover fumed with jealous rage; yet on analyzing the causes of his wrath he discovered he actually had but scant ground for complaint. He was not engaged to Delight, and until he was he had ...
— Flood Tide • Sara Ware Bassett
... period—and they happen to be amongst the most weighty—argue strongly in favour of the pre-Patrician mission (Cfr. Prof. Kuno Meyer, "Learning Ireland in the Fifth Century"). Discussing the way in which letters first reached our distant island of the west and the causes which led to the proficiency of sixth-century Ireland in classical learning Zimmer and Meyer contend that the seeds of that literary culture, which flourished in Ireland of the sixth century, had been sown therein in the first and second decades of the preceding ...
— The Life of St. Declan of Ardmore • Anonymous
... women have an education; let their minds be well informed; well stored with useful information and practical proficiency, rather than the light superficial acquirements, popularly and fashionably called accomplishments. We desire accomplishments, but ...
— The Condition, Elevation, Emigration, and Destiny of the Colored People of the United States • Martin R. Delany
... existing in English-speaking states. If "the difficulties of English spelling" be a serious cause of illiteracy in England and the United States, the simplicity of the Italian and Spanish spelling ought to be a cause of high proficiency in literary and educational attainments among the people of Italy and Spain. A commendation of those two nations for their taste in discarding "Greek orthography" to be effective ought to be supplemented with some evidence ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 26, July 1880. • Various
... were looked forward to with much pleasure, and few were absent. Music was provided, and appropriate addresses were delivered. Sumptuous hospitality was shown, and every effort was made to make these occasions socially enjoyable and morally beneficial. The prizes and certificates of proficiency were distributed in the school-room, at Christmas, in the presence of the whole of the employes ...
— Personal Recollections of Birmingham and Birmingham Men • E. Edwards
... saying that after our grand success in playing before the public such a programme that required the talent of old actors, we felt that we were a regiment of intelligence and culture, and we also considered that we had acquired a high state of proficiency in every department, that we were an important unit in H.M. ...
— A Soldier's Life - Being the Personal Reminiscences of Edwin G. Rundle • Edwin G. Rundle
... commemorate some halting stanzas. Thus I lived with words. And what I thus wrote was for no ulterior use, it was written consciously for practice. It was not so much that I wished to be an author (though I wished that too) as that I had vowed that I would learn to write. That was a proficiency that tempted me; and I practised to acquire it, as men learn to whittle, in a wager with myself. Description was the principal field of my exercise; for to any one with senses there is always something worth describing, ...
— Memories and Portraits • Robert Louis Stevenson
... telegraph line from the station to the village, a distance of about a mile, and opened an office in a drug store; but the business was naturally very small. The telegraph operator at Port Huron knowing of his proficiency, and wanting to get into the United States Military Telegraph Corps, where the pay in those days of the Civil War was high, succeeded in convincing his brother-in-law, Mr. M. Walker, that young Edison could fill the position. Edison was, of course, well acquainted with ...
— Edison, His Life and Inventions • Frank Lewis Dyer and Thomas Commerford Martin
... suddenly and shortly after draw up boats and machines. Priscus, a fellow-citizen of mine, had designed most of them, and this fact both caused him to incur the death penalty and saved his life. For Severus, on learning his proficiency, prevented his being executed. Subsequently he employed him on various missions, among others at the siege of Hatra, and his contrivances were the only ones not burned by the barbarians. He also furnished the Byzantines with five hundred boats, ...
— Dio's Rome, Volume V., Books 61-76 (A.D. 54-211) • Cassius Dio
... 17th to the island, though drawn from it on the 10th; by which the whole was subjected to a miscarriage." What Washington politicly calls bad luck was French bad management, provoked and baffled by Howe's accurate strategy, untiring energy, consummate seamanship, and tactical proficiency. Clinton's army delivered, the forcing of New York frustrated, Rhode Island and its garrison saved, by a squadron never more than two thirds of that opposed to it, were achievements to illustrate any career; and the more so that they were effected ...
— Types of Naval Officers - Drawn from the History of the British Navy • A. T. Mahan
... flat-topped red fez, which distinguishes their profession. The curate had received a certain amount of education at one of the Bosnian convents, whence he had been sent to Rome, where he had, at any rate, attained a tolerable proficiency in Italian, and a few words of French. Another occupant of the house, who must not be allowed to go unmentioned, was the priest's mother, a charming old lady in her ninety-seventh year. Age had in no way impaired her faculties, and she was more active and bustling ...
— Herzegovina - Or, Omer Pacha and the Christian Rebels • George Arbuthnot
... intricate questions we have been considering. I have, however, thought it advisable to leave what may be termed the "drudgery" to the end of the chapter, in the hope of thereby creating a more lively interest in the subject. It must, nevertheless, be remembered that, to attain to any sort of proficiency with the sword, a long ...
— Broad-Sword and Single-Stick • R. G. Allanson-Winn
... the field of battle, and the great proportion of lives preserved after the terrible wounds inflicted by deadly fragments of shell and the still more deadly rifle bullet. Military surgery has attained a degree of proficiency during the experiences of the past three years which a layman cannot adequately describe; its results are, ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol. 6, No. 1, July, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various
... as he approached the line. Putting a company into its place on parade is one of the crucial tests of tactical proficiency. To march a company to exactly the right spot, with every man keeping his proper distance from his file-leader—"twenty-eight inches from back to breast," clear down the column, so that when the order "front" was given, every one turns, as if on pivot, and touches elbows with those on ...
— The Red Acorn • John McElroy
... of excellence in all professions, rather than the immediate science of 'any'. 'Languages' will engross one or two hours in every day: the 'elements' of Chemistry, Geometry, Mechanics, and Optics the remaining hours of study. After tolerable proficiency in these, we shall proceed to the study of 'Man' and of 'Men'—I mean, Metaphysics and History—and finally, to a thorough examination of the Jewish and Christian Dispensations, their doctrines and evidences: an examination necessary for all men, but peculiarly so to your son, if he be destined ...
— Biographia Epistolaris, Volume 1. • Coleridge, ed. Turnbull
... and all the occult arts, for which the city in question is renowned. He ceased not from his tenderest years to study and learn in his native land Africa till he became versed in all sciences, and of the much skill and proficiency which he acquired, by dint of study and application for the space of forty years, in the matter of incantations and conjurations, it was discovered to him, [254] one day of the days, that among the uttermost of the cities of China was a city called El Kelaas and in this city a vast ...
— Alaeddin and the Enchanted Lamp • John Payne
... benign air, as of an affable archangel; the critical brow and enquiring eyeglass bent on some very immature performance in penmanship or needlework; and the frightened children and the anxious teacher, gradually lapsing into smiles and peace, as the great man tested the proficiency in some such humble art as spelling. "Well, my little man, and how do you spell dog?" "Please sir, d-o-g." "Capital, very good indeed. I couldn't do it better myself. And now let us go a little further, and see if we can spell cat." ...
— Matthew Arnold • G. W. E. Russell
... through the mysterious ways of Providence, I ought to regard as infinitely more than compensated by the introduction I have thence obtained to the knowledge of the Christian religion, and of a nation which, by its liberal sentiments, its humanity, the glorious freedom of its government, and its proficiency in arts and sciences, has exalted ...
— The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, Or Gustavus Vassa, The African - Written By Himself • Olaudah Equiano
... good, a little too good," said Ethel, making a little face. "Isn't it splendid about Larry Gwynne getting the Proficiency, and the first in Engineering? Now he is what I call a sport. Of course he doesn't go in for games much, but he's into everything, the Lit., the Dramatic Society, and Scuddy says he helped him tremendously with the Senior class in the Y. M. C. ...
— The Major • Ralph Connor
... insubordination must be congenial, and who would eagerly grasp at any projects, however absurd and impracticable, the proposed object of which was their emancipation from the punishment which their crimes had drawn upon them. Men who have obtained a proficiency in crime, and are callous to the voice of conscience, science, are seldom very choice as to the degree of the criminality which they are inclined to commit; and it is highly creditable to Governor Hunter's prudence and skilful management, ...
— The Present Picture of New South Wales (1811) • David Dickinson Mann
... would not have spitted on a bayonet. At first he chafed under the hourly duplicity necessary in his service to the Khalifa, then he took an interest in it, and at last he wept tears of joy over his dangerous proficiency. Day after day Macnamara waited, in the hope of making sure that the Khalifa's treasure was under the room where he slept. Upon the chance of a successful haul, he had made fervid promises, after the fashion of his race, to the shoemaker Mahommed Nafar. At first the shoemaker would have nothing ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... wanted was the abolition of the system of classes; the division of the college into departments; the election of studies by the students; the separation of the students into divisions according to their proficiency; and the opening of the college to those who cared to follow only certain courses without applying for a degree. The first of these changes he forebore to press, but all the others he urged most warmly. He was so far successful that the ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XVII. No. 101. May, 1876. • Various
... toros en Madrid. Baedeker's guide-book to Spain and Portugal says: "Bull-fights were instituted for the encouragement of proficiency in the use of martial weapons and for the celebration of festal occasions, and were a prerogative of the aristocracy down to the sixteenth century. As the mounted caballero encountered the bull, armed only with a lance, ...
— Modern Spanish Lyrics • Various
... of magic, when a combination of skill and fraud imposed upon the vulgar, is easily settled. The priests of the ancient mythology, the adepts of the middle ages, turned their knowledge of chemistry and mechanics and their proficiency in legerdemain to account; and before we denounce the latter as impostors, we should bear in mind the ignorance of the times in which they lived. People would not have believed any natural explanation, though they might have felt inclined to persecute ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 2, May, 1851 • Various
... Henry, with much the same plain countenance, only more subtle and pleasant, and his talk a thousand times more entertaining. He had many questions to ask me, I remember, of Edinburgh College, where I had just received my mastership of arts, and of the various professors, with whom and their proficiency he seemed well acquainted; and thus, talking of things that I knew, I soon got liberty of speech in my ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition, Vol. XII (of 25) - The Master of Ballantrae • Robert Louis Stevenson
... was three or four years older than himself, a fine, hardy lad, of a bold and ardent temper. He was the leader of his comrades in all their enterprises and amusements. As to his proficiency at study, there was not much to be said. He had sense and ability enough to have made himself a scholar, but found so many pleasanter things to do, that he seldom took hold of a book with his whole ...
— True Stories from History and Biography • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... Buttar, who had resolved to be a soldier, and took a deep interest in all military exercises, was never weary in practising it. When Sergeant Dibble came again, he told Ernest that he would be perfect in another week, and complimented Buttar also on his proficiency. ...
— Ernest Bracebridge - School Days • William H. G. Kingston
... experiments, while open to the objection that there may be more or less muscular direction consciously or unconsciously given by the sender, nevertheless tend to develop proficiency in both sender and receiver. In fact, such experiments are perhaps one of the very best methods of developing projecting or receiving power along the lines of occult or psychic forces. This because the persons become familiar with the ...
— Genuine Mediumship or The Invisible Powers • Bhakta Vishita
... in mathematics and classics, as well as of acquiring the English language, which at that period was but partially spoken in these islands, he was sent to Southampton, and there placed under the care of Mr. Isaac Watts and Mrs. Kinsman. That he made considerable proficiency in learning, and employed the short time which in those days was devoted to education, preparatory to entering the service to advantage, may be justly inferred, if we may judge from the style of his letters, and from the precision and accuracy which mark the astronomical ...
— Memoirs and Correspondence of Admiral Lord de Saumarez. Vol II • Sir John Ross
... with the temper of the province, and taught by the experience of former governors how little proficiency had been made by arms, when success was followed by injuries, he next undertook to eradicate the causes of war. And beginning with himself, and those next to him, he first laid restrictions upon his own household, a task no less arduous to most governors ...
— The Germany and the Agricola of Tacitus • Tacitus
... of her learned preceptor Roger Ascham abound with anecdotes of a pupil in whose proficiency he justly gloried; and the particulars interspersed respecting other females of high rank, also distinguished by the cultivation of classical literature, enhance the interest of the picture, by affording objects of comparison ...
— Memoirs of the Court of Queen Elizabeth • Lucy Aikin
... on the surface, remains as unseizable to their wits as a high flight of metaphysics—namely, that the business of life is mainly carried on by means of this difficult art of literature, and according to a man's proficiency in that art shall be the freedom and the fulness of his intercourse with other men. Anybody, it is supposed, can say what he means; and, in spite of their notorious experience to the contrary, people so continue to suppose. Now, I simply open the last book I have been reading—Mr. Leland's captivating ...
— Harvard Classics Volume 28 - Essays English and American • Various
... most notable antiquarians of this city on the meaning of Thur gut Luetis. I can get no satisfactory interpretation. In my own opinion 'tis Welsh. I don't love offering conjectures on a language in which I have hitherto made little proficiency, but I will trust you with my explication. You know the famous Aglaughlan, mother of Cadwalladhor, was renowned for her conjugal virtues, and grief on the death of her royal spouse. I conclude this medal was struck in her ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 1 • Horace Walpole |
