"Act" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... tell him that his Kitty, whom he loves—his bright, pretty, lovable daughter—can never learn manners nor accomplishments, nor be tamed in the very least. There are from six to seven hundred girls in this school, who all now know about your very daring act of disobedience. Were I not to punish you they would be astonished, and some of them might even go to the length of copying your behavior. You see ...
— Wild Kitty • L. T. Meade
... the parlour nicely drest To be presented to a guest, With finger in her mouth she'd stand And stare about on every hand, Nor answer by a single word, Nor even act as if she heard. ...
— Cole's Funny Picture Book No. 1 • Edward William Cole
... determination to champion the claims of the Khedive against all comers, Sir Edward Grey declaring officially in the debate of March 28, 1895, that the despatch of a French expedition to the Upper Nile would be "an unfriendly act[421]." We know now, through the revelations made by Colonel Marchand in the Matin of June 20, 1905, that in June 1895 he had pressed the French Government to intervene in that quarter; but it did little, relying ...
— The Development of the European Nations, 1870-1914 (5th ed.) • John Holland Rose
... annexed Southern Rhodesia from the [British] South Africa Company in 1923. A 1961 constitution was formulated that favored whites in power. In 1965 the government unilaterally declared its independence, but the UK did not recognize the act and demanded more complete voting rights for the black African majority in the country (then called Rhodesia). UN sanctions and a guerrilla uprising finally led to free elections in 1979 and independence ...
— The 2007 CIA World Factbook • United States
... and the other archons, took the alarm, and in a general body blockaded the citadel. But they grew weary of the length of the siege; many of them fell away, and the contest was abandoned to the archons, with full power to act according to their judgment. So supine in defence of the liberties of the state are a people who have not yet obtained ...
— Athens: Its Rise and Fall, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... darkness and confusion the act of the great Wyandot was not seen by the other Indians and the renegades. Paul flashed him one look of gratitude, and then he and Shif'less Sol darted away, choosing a course that led them from the crowd in pursuit of the ...
— The Scouts of the Valley • Joseph A. Altsheler
... a prevalence of barbarism. The planting of colonies, or the formation of establishments in new countries, is ever attended with circumstances unpropitious to refinement. The force with which these circumstances act, will be increased or diminished in proportion to the remoteness or proximity of those new establishments, to older societies, in which the arts and sciences are cultivated; and to the facility of communication between them. Man is, at all times, the creature of circumstances. ...
— Chronicles of Border Warfare • Alexander Scott Withers
... affirmed, that the Church had emphatically pronounced this notion to be contrary to Holy Writ, and that for him to consider a doctrine so stigmatized as having any shadow of probability in its favour was an act of disrespect to the authority of the Church which could not be overlooked. It was also charged against Galileo that in his Dialogue he has put the strongest arguments into the mouth, not of those who supported the orthodox doctrine, but of those who held the theory ...
— Great Astronomers • R. S. Ball
... act like one." He spoke almost before he thought. "You are a woman nearly twenty-six years old, yet you haven't the poise of girls eighteen that I have known. Still, they were farm or working girls. I've sometimes wondered what it ...
— The Gorgeous Girl • Nalbro Bartley
... indefinite time and indefinite abstention, on his part, from alluding to the subject. Certainly he found himself surprisingly little cast down by the event, and more resolved than ever to make the editor-in-chief admit that Elfrida's contributions were "the brightest things in the paper," and act accordingly. He realized, in the course of time, that he had never been very confident of any other answer; but nothing is more certain than that it acted as a curious stimulus to his interest in Elfrida's work. He found a co-enthusiast in Golightly ...
— A Daughter of To-Day • Sara Jeannette Duncan (aka Mrs. Everard Cotes)
... most attractive woman of his court. Madame, left alone, delightedly thought that she had made a great impression on the king. This feeling with her must remain passive, whilst the king could not but act with all the natural vehemence of the heated fancies of a young man, and of a young man who has but to express a wish ...
— Ten Years Later • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... out the silver on the table, and divide it into three. When Salve absolutely refused to take more than his one piastre back again, there came actually a look of humble admiration into the senorita's eyes. She could not comprehend such an act of self-sacrifice, although she seemed to vaguely feel that there was something noble about it. After a moment's consideration she held out her ...
— The Pilot and his Wife • Jonas Lie
... assured me—that the proposal I was about to make rather invites honour than confers it. I have been obliged, in speaking of the manners and ideas of my countrymen, to let you perceive not only that I differ from them, but that there are others who think and act as I do. We have for ages formed a society bound together by our peculiar tenets. That we individually differ in conduct, and, therefore, probably in ideas, from our countrymen, they necessarily know; that we form a body apart with laws and tenets of our own, is at least ...
— Across the Zodiac • Percy Greg
... of death. Djoni did not in this telegram allude to the position of those Catholic priests and others in northern Albania who support the Tirana Government and its Italian paymasters; some of them may believe that they are acting in the interest of their country—to act otherwise would be perilous, and everyone seems to know the precise number of napoleons a month—ranging from the 150 of an ecclesiastical magnate down to 71/2 (the pay of a simple gendarme)—which they are alleged to receive. Do they ever think ...
— The Birth of Yugoslavia, Volume 2 • Henry Baerlein
... in the act of unlocking the gate. A pale shaft of watery sunlight came and lay on her hair, showing how thick and soft it was, how closely it grew. The sun was in her eyes, dazzling, and on her cheek, making it pale. She took the hand Lady O'Gara extended ...
— Love of Brothers • Katharine Tynan
... not she felt responsible for having promoted Statira's affair with him, and therefore bound to guard her to the utmost from suffering by it, she seemed always to be on the alert to seize any advantage against him. Sometimes Statira accused her of trying to act so hatefully to him that he would never come any more; she wildly blamed her; but the faithful creature was none the less constant and vigilant on that account. She took patiently the unjust reproaches which Statira heaped upon her like a wayward child, and remitted nothing of ...
— The Minister's Charge • William D. Howells
... hillside through a little plantation at the back of the restaurant, we soon came to the military station of specially selected soldiers, who have the care of the ruins and at the same time act as guides to the visitors. Fortunately, we chanced upon a very intelligent and obliging fellow, who spoke English fluently—a sergeant, who, without being loquacious, was sufficiently communicative to make an ...
— Fair Italy, the Riviera and Monte Carlo • W. Cope Devereux
... day. He used to sit in one corner, by the huge, roaring fire, and look on, apparently as much interested as they themselves were. Nothing went amiss; and there was never wanting some slight, good-natured remark or act, to rectify mistakes and set ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, June 1844 - Volume 23, Number 6 • Various
... wag, Ha! ha! the humour o't! All the tricks are in his bag, He! he! the humour o't! He can mimic, he can mime, Draw, and act, and—what is prime— Keep you laughing all the time. Humph! humph! the ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 100, May 9, 1891 • Various
... He determined to act on the suggestion, and she felt that, for some little time at least, she had kept him out of mischief. But whenever anything was said or sung in the theatre, it was necessary, for the time, to ...
— Gryll Grange • Thomas Love Peacock
... used to come for his mending work. An old, worn pencil-case kept for his mother's sake—for Alice was on the seal—was the only thing I could rescue; but next there came an envelope with "My will" scrawled on it. Mr. Yolland thought I ought to open it, to see who had authority to act, and it proved that we alone had, for he was made executor, with L1,000. A favourite rifle was bequeathed to Eustace, an annuity of L50 to Smith, and all the rest of the property was to be shared between Dora and me. It was in the fewest ...
— My Young Alcides - A Faded Photograph • Charlotte M. Yonge
... home, there is south pass at the mouth of the Mississippi. A bar, with a nine-foot depth of water, blocked the commerce of New Orleans. Under the rivers and harbors act of 1875, Captain James B. Eads was paid $8,000,000 for building the famous jetties to provide a 26-foot channel. Since then, the channel has ...
— The Industrial Canal and Inner Harbor of New Orleans • Thomas Ewing Dabney
... action, especially when their authority falls heavily upon the officers of their own palace, till then invested with their confidence and overwhelmed with the tokens of their kindness. The disgrace of the Marquis de Lauzun can only appear in my eyes an act of justice, coming as it does from the justest of sovereigns. So I confined myself in the past to soliciting for this lord—gifted with all the talents, with bravery and merit—your Majesty's pity and indulgence. He owed later the end of his suffering, not to my instances, but to your magnanimity. ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... thus followed my genius, and occasionally I have felt inclined to complain that it did not impel me to act against my reason more frequently. Whenever I did so I found that impulse was right and reason wrong, and for all that ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... and we continued to walk the lobby till the end of the act. Major Merton was always gentleman-like; and he even behaved to me, as if he remembered the many obligations he was under. He now communicated several little facts connected with his own circumstances, alluding to the probability of his remaining in America a few years. ...
— Afloat And Ashore • James Fenimore Cooper
... rolled away, and the poor boy became insane through mental exhaustion and debility. But even then he retained a lively sense of gratitude for every word or act of kindness. At one time, the inhuman wretch who was endeavoring by slow torture to conduct this child to the grave, seized him by the hair, and threatened to dash out his brains against the wall. A surgeon, M. Naulin, who chanced to be near by, interfered in behalf of the unhappy ...
— Maria Antoinette - Makers of History • John S. C. (John Stevens Cabot) Abbott
... periods of expanding industry, the three great causes much loanable capital, good credit, and the increased profits derived from better-used labour and better-used capitalhave acted simultaneously; and though either may act by itself, there is a permanent reason why mostly they will act together. They both tend to grow together, if you begin from a period of depression. In such periods credit is bad, and industry unemployed; ...
— Lombard Street: A Description of the Money Market • Walter Bagehot
... said the sexton, after Paul had related the circumstances of his dismissal. "I wouldn't have had you act differently for twenty situations. I have no doubt you will get ...
— Paul Prescott's Charge • Horatio Alger
... join them and act as their guide through the forests of the province of Victoria and right to the eastern coast, they would have a fresh chance of success. Glenarvan was sensible of this, and asked his host whether he would have any great objection to his asking Ayrton to accompany ...
— In Search of the Castaways • Jules Verne
... burden. It is natural that he should be annoyed with me when I have to communicate unwelcome facts. This can not be avoided. I have strength, however, to brave much that is painful, so long as you and the baroness are unshaken in your conviction that I always act in your interest so ...
— Debit and Credit - Translated from the German of Gustav Freytag • Gustav Freytag
... when needed, nothing could be much worse than becoming dependent upon it. The bowels must be made to act for themselves without such artificial assistance, by the use of proper food, especially graham flour and oatmeal, and the avoidance of hot drinks, milk, sugar, and other clogging and constipating articles; by wearing the abdominal ...
— Plain Facts for Old and Young • John Harvey Kellogg
... to be designated by the name of village, the little settlement on the Leesburg turnpike known as Falls Church was, by an act of the General Assembly of Virginia, incorporated as a town. The act in question was approved March 30, 1875, and on April 13 following the new town began its career with the following officials duly installed: Mayor, Dr. J. J. Moran; Clerk, H. J. England; Town Sergeant, ...
— A Virginia Village • Charles A. Stewart
... in his tone.] Well ... why not? Listen here. In drafting an act of Parliament one must alternately imagine oneself God Almighty and the most ignorant prejudiced little blighter who will be affected by what's passed. God says: Let's have done with Heaven and Hell ... it's the Earth that shan't ...
— Waste - A Tragedy, In Four Acts • Granville Barker
... you very cold?" Henry inquired, placing coal on the fire, drawing a chair up to the grate, and laying aside her cloak. Her indifference to such details often forced Henry to act the part generally taken by women in such dealings. It was one of the ...
— Night and Day • Virginia Woolf
... Good to hear; hard to act upon. Nevil Sinclair—knowing they would act upon it—let out an involuntary sigh and tightened his hold of the gentle, adoring woman, whose spirit towered so far above ...
— Far to Seek - A Romance of England and India • Maud Diver
... human carnage fill'd, A milky deluge next the giant swill'd; Then stretch'd in length o'er half the cavern'd rock, Lay senseless, and supine, amidst the flock. To seize the time, and with a sudden wound To fix the slumbering monster to the ground, My soul impels me! and in act I stand To draw the sword; but wisdom held my hand. A deed so rash had finished all our fate, No mortal forces from the lofty gate Could roll the rock. In hopeless grief we lay, And sigh, expecting the return of day. Now did the rosy-fingered morn arise, And shed her sacred light ...
— The Odyssey of Homer • Homer, translated by Alexander Pope
... And not dismember Caesar! But, alas, Caesar must bleed for it! And, gentle friends, Let's kill him boldly, but not wrathfully; Let's carve him as a dish fit for the gods, Not hew him as a carcass fit for hounds; And let our hearts, as subtle masters do, Stir up their servants to an act of rage, And after seem to chide 'em. This shall mark Our purpose necessary, and not envious; Which so appearing to the common eyes, We shall be call'd purgers, not murderers. And for Mark Antony, think not of him; For he can do no more than Caesar's ...
— Julius Caesar • William Shakespeare [Hudson edition]
... his absurd silence," she said suddenly. "This ridiculous suspicion which still seems to be entertained in some quarters would be removed of course; but his every act since the night of the ...
— The Green Eyes of Bast • Sax Rohmer
... cried. "A pony, eh? Who'd have thought it? Anyhow, you've never been shod in your life. I can tell that by the way you act." And she cackled in a most ...
— The Tale of Pony Twinkleheels • Arthur Scott Bailey
... had passed the preceding day; and neither of the parties would discover a tittle of the matter. The mayor observed that it was great presumption in Wilson, who was a stroller, to proceed to such extremities with a gentleman of family and fortune; and threatened to commit him on the vagrant act. — The young fellow bustled up with great spirit, declaring he was a gentleman, and would be treated as such; but he refused to explain himself further. The master of the company being sent for, and examined, touching the said Wilson, ...
— The Expedition of Humphry Clinker • Tobias Smollett
... Character.—The picture comes from the action—resides in it. The action comes from the act, and is natural to it, expressive of it. Any gesture or position which is the natural and unaffected result of an essential action will be true and vital, suggestive of nature, and beautiful because it will inevitably have character—be characteristic. The beauty of ...
— The Painter in Oil - A complete treatise on the principles and technique - necessary to the painting of pictures in oil colors • Daniel Burleigh Parkhurst
... crossed my mind that he would be too late, for the whole thing happened in the "wink of an eye," he raised his right hand high in the air, standing up to his full height on the bulwarks, while holding on to the ratlines of the foreshrouds—thus allowing his body to act as a sort of additional headsail to aid the fore-topmast staysail, which, as I've said before, was the only rag the ship had on her, ...
— On Board the Esmeralda - Martin Leigh's Log - A Sea Story • John Conroy Hutcheson
... Cat seems to act as if she wanted to speak to me," thought the Donkey. "Perhaps, after the store is closed to-night, as the workshop of Santa Claus is closed, I may ...
— The Story of a Nodding Donkey • Laura Lee Hope
... the railroad, promoted the bond election, which gave Daniel Sands the franchises for the distribution of water, gas and electricity—not because the Doctor had any particular regard for Daniel Sands but because, first of all, the good of the town, as the Doctor saw it, seemed to require him to act as he acted; and second, because his triumph at any of these elections meant power, and he was greedy for power. But he always used his power to make others happy. No man ever came to the Doctor looking for work that he could not find work for ...
— In the Heart of a Fool • William Allen White
... from the salesman to say that there had been a sudden glut in the market. Fishermen boat-owners have an independence of character which makes it difficult for them to combine together effectively, as wage-servers do. They act too faithfully on the adage that a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush, and ten shillings on the beach a sovereign at ...
— A Poor Man's House • Stephen Sydney Reynolds
... prisoner in the Tower under Mary Tudor, Amy was allowed to visit him. She lost her father, Sir John, in 1553. Two undated letters of Amy's exist: one shows that she was trusted by her husband in the management of his affairs (1556-57) and that both he and she were anxious to act honourably by some poor persons to whom money was due.* The other is to a woman's tailor, and, though merely concerned with gowns and collars, is written in a style of courteous friendliness.** Both letters, in orthography and sentiment, do credit to Amy's education and character. ...
— The Valet's Tragedy and Other Stories • Andrew Lang
... was the Juno. Her commander, Captain Knox, was a very different sort of person to my late captain; and from his kind manner, and the way he spoke to the officers and men, he seemed truly to act the part of a father to his crew. The ship had been out a year and a half, and it was expected she would remain another ...
— Tales of the Sea - And of our Jack Tars • W.H.G. Kingston
... bondage, and intimated a hope of our aid, or connivance at least. He was at once informed, that, although we had great cause of complaint against Spain, and even of war, yet whenever we should think proper to act as her enemy, it should be openly and above board, and that our hostility should never be exercised by such petty means. We had no suspicion that he expected to engage men here, but merely to purchase military stores. ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... the day for that sort of thing. Men want something more than a worthy sentiment. Social conditions are not made out of words. They are the net result of the daily relations between man and man. The best social spirit is evidenced by some act which costs the management something and which benefits all. That is the only way to prove good intentions and win respect. Propaganda, bulletins, lectures—they are nothing. It is the right ...
— My Life and Work • Henry Ford
... with no adverse traditions and a population similar to ours, has been no exception to the rule. The Canadian courts indeed define the limits of provincial and federal jurisdiction as fixed under an act of Parliament, but they do not pretend to limit the exercise of power when the seat of power has been established. I take the cause of this distrust to be obvious. Although our written Constitution was successful in its primary purpose of facilitating the ...
— The Theory of Social Revolutions • Brooks Adams
... that it belonged to Miss Joliffe, but I find on inquiry from her that she sold it to you some little time ago, and that it is with you now. I do not suppose that you can attach any great value to it, and, indeed, I suspect that you bought it of Miss Joliffe as an act of charity. If this is so, I should be obliged if you would let me know if you are disposed to part with it again, as my wife would like ...
— The Nebuly Coat • John Meade Falkner
... curtain rose upon the second act—or scene. Whichever it was, that was all that I was fated to see or hear of the Opera. And for the little while I could consider it, I must say I was disappointed. The scenery was ...
— The Bacillus of Beauty - A Romance of To-day • Harriet Stark
... position," returned the traveller, gravely nodding. "Gondremark loves to temporise; his policy is below ground, and he fears all open courses; and now that I have seen you act with so much spirit, I will cheerfully risk myself on your protection. Who knows? You may ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 7 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... himself in the garden, he discovered that they had managed to detach a section of the lattice-work from a window, and were in the habit of sticking out their heads - awful discovery. Flying into a righteous rage at this act of flagrant disobedience, he seized a thick stick and sought their apartments, only to find the lattice-work skilfully replaced, and to be confronted with a general denial of what he had witnessed with ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle V1 • Thomas Stevens
... that he could have no trial that would deserve the name. To have pleaded "Not guilty" would have made him, by his own act, a party to the proceeding, and have been, by implication, an assent to putting his case to the decision of a blind, maddened, and utterly perverted tribunal. He would not, by any act or utterance of his, leave his case with "the country" represented ...
— Salem Witchcraft, Volumes I and II • Charles Upham
... that you do not even know yourself as yet. You must know yourself in order to know your powers, and not until you know them can you use them wisely and fully. Don't say you can't help it. If you think you can't, the chances are that you can't. If you think you can, and act in accordance with this thought, then not only are the chances that you can, but if you act fully in accordance with it, that you can and that you will is an absolute certainty. It was Virgil who ...
— In Tune with the Infinite - or, Fullness of Peace, Power, and Plenty • Ralph Waldo Trine
... to beatitude, which is the reward of virtue, and consists in the full enjoyment of God. Whereas the union of the Incarnation, inasmuch as it is in the personal being, transcends the union of the beatified mind with God, which is by the act of the soul in fruition; and therefore it cannot fall under merit. Secondly, because grace cannot fall under merit, for the principle of merit does not fall under merit; and therefore neither does grace, for it is the principle of merit. Hence, still less does the Incarnation fall under merit, ...
— Summa Theologica, Part III (Tertia Pars) - From the Complete American Edition • Thomas Aquinas
... forty-seven suits, in the assurance that he will wear them till they are worn out, for the love of and in remembrance of his master. Moreover, I bequeath to M. le Vicomte de Bragelonne my old servant and faithful friend Mousqueton, already named, providing that the said vicomte shall so act that Mousqueton shall declare, when dying, he has never ...
— The Man in the Iron Mask • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... racking sobs he began to pray aloud a broken prayer. He did not pray for divine forgiveness of the thing he meant to do. By the narrow tenets of his faith his soul, through the deliberate act of his hands, would go forth from the body, doomed to everlasting torment. It did not appear feasible to him that God might understand. The God he believed in was a stern God of punishments, sitting in strict judgment upon mortal ...
— From Place to Place • Irvin S. Cobb
... are openly saying that the men-at-arms and archers will not act against them. It maybe but empty boasting, but there may be something in it. The men are almost all enlisted from Kent, Sussex, Essex, and Hertford, and I have heard report that there is sore discontent among them because their pay is greatly in arrear, owing ...
— A March on London • G. A. Henty
... de Quille, Mark's closest friend, to act the part of Judas—to tell Mark privately that he, was going to be presented with a fine pipe, so that he could have a speech prepared in reply to Pope's. It was awful low-down in Dan. We arranged to have the affair come off in the saloon beneath the Opera House after the ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... insurmountable torpor, like those unfortunate wretches, who, surprised by a snow-storm, yield to a suicidal repose. Thus I awaited the fatal moment. At last, according to the rule of discipline, choking with the death rattle,(17) I hastened the moment of accomplishing the final act of my expiring will—the vow to ...
— The Wandering Jew, Complete • Eugene Sue
... from such a thought with horror. The male child, and especially the heir, is a prince in his own family circle. Everything is deferred to his wishes unless he can be persuaded to surrender it. With female children it is different. They must submit to every act of tyranny on the part of their brothers at once, or feel the weight of a parent's hand. Nothing would seem more abhorrent to an Esquimau mind than the thought of striking a man or boy; but to strike a woman or girl is, on the contrary, quite proper, and, indeed, laudable. And when one ...
— Schwatka's Search • William H. Gilder
... forward and spoke an encouraging word to Nancy; then settled back in his chair and fidgeted uneasily with his papers. He glanced covertly at her. Surely her frank, fearless eyes, her unruffled demeanor, hid no criminal act; and yet.... Angry with himself for permitting a doubt, he pulled out his watch and glanced at its face. A ...
— The Lost Despatch • Natalie Sumner Lincoln
... as the years passed, did she continue to seem so strange to him. On the contrary, he now thought it more marvelous by far that the world, after nineteen centuries of Christianity, did not think and act more as did this girl, whose religious instruction he knew to have been garnered at the invisible hand of God. That she must some day leave him, despite her present earnest protestations, he felt to be inevitable. And the thought pierced his soul like a lance. But he could not ...
— Carmen Ariza • Charles Francis Stocking
... wife at a time," he smokes his old meerschaum pipe and writes a column of razor blades every day. He is the buzz saw upon which polygamy has tried to sit. Fighting these rotten institutions hand to hand and fighting a religious eccentricity through an annual message, or a feeble act of congress, are two ...
— Remarks • Bill Nye
... bottle-green coat with large white-metal buttons, and a black stock that accentuated his cold stingy face, lighted up by gray-blue eyes as keen and passionless as a cat's. Being very gentle, as men are who act on a fixed plan of conduct, he seemed to make his wife happy by never contradicting her; he allowed her to do the talking, and was satisfied to move with the deliberate ...
— Parisians in the Country - The Illustrious Gaudissart, and The Muse of the Department • Honore de Balzac
... is not despatched so quickly; he takes a great deal of dying,—the whole of the third act being occupied by that inevitable operation. Newgate—a "stock" scene at this theatre—an execution, a lady in black and a state of derangement, a muffled drum, and a "view of Kennington Common," terminate the life of "James Dawson," who, we had the consolation ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 1, September 12, 1841 • Various
... legation at Vienna. Then a mother with one child,—a boy, now six or seven years old, who is hardly ever out of her arms." He stopped, toyed for a moment with his match-safe, slipped it into his pocket, and said carelessly, "So much for Act I." ...
— A Gentleman Vagabond and Some Others • F. Hopkinson Smith
... had the misfortune to be born a slave, with the blood of a freeman in his veins; which, stirring him to discontent with his ignoble lot, at length forced him to become a fugitive. With a subtlety partly instinctive, but strengthened by many an act of injustice, he divines the object of ...
— The Death Shot - A Story Retold • Mayne Reid
... swinging above and around, so that these unfortunates, some of whom were pretty bad, had to take this strange musical medicine whether they liked it or no, and the mouth-organ band which attended on these occasions was by no means calculated to act as an opiate. Of course we had sports, both aquatic and athletic, and on the 18th Williams and I conceived the idea of publishing a newspaper; and without delay wrote, and posted up, an extravagant prospectus of the same. Helpers came, and ideas were plentiful. A most prolific poet knocked off ...
— In the Ranks of the C.I.V. • Erskine Childers
... services.[Footnote: This comes from fees paid by those examined.] The latter method was introduced in the latter part of the nineteenth century and is steadily gaining in favor. A committee of a local bar is unavoidably subject to some local influences or prepossessions. A State board can act with greater independence and maintain with more ease a ...
— The American Judiciary • Simeon E. Baldwin, LLD
... obedience are as needful as strong arms, if a campaign is to be carried out successfully. The Bishop of Norwich is young and fiery, and he hath many like himself round him, so that he frets openly at this delay. Moreover, Sir Thomas Trivet and Sir William Helmon are too full of ardour to act with discretion, and are ready enough to back up the bishop in his hot desire to be doing something. I regret that this army is not, like the army which fought at Crecy and Poictiers, composed of men well inured to war, with ...
— A March on London • G. A. Henty
... Gilbert, when they were out of earshot, "you didn't put what Uncle Dave calls 'a little of the Scott Act' in that lemonade you gave me just before we ...
— Anne's House of Dreams • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... are content to believe important things on hearsay, because, on the whole, they love or trust the people who teach them. The word 'believing,' when I use it, doesn't mean that a good man says it, and that I can't disprove it, but a sort of vital assent, so that I can act upon the belief almost as if I knew it. It means for me some sort of personal experience, I could not love or hate a man on hearsay, just because people whom I loved or trusted said that they either loved or hated him. ...
— Father Payne • Arthur Christopher Benson
... herdsmen. Tracing this, they found the decaying corpse of the old Spaniard hanging from the branch of a balete tree. [51] In life he had inspired fear by his deep, hollow voice, his sunken eyes, and his mirthless laugh, but now, dead by his own act, he disturbed the sleep of the women. Some threw the jewels into the river and burned the clothes, and from the time that the corpse was buried at the foot of the balete itself, no one willingly ventured near the spot. A belated herdsman looking for some of his strayed charges ...
— The Social Cancer - A Complete English Version of Noli Me Tangere • Jose Rizal
... State shall withdraw from the Union without the consent of all the States, given in a Convention of the States, convened in pursuance of an act passed by two-thirds of each House ...
— A Report of the Debates and Proceedings in the Secret Sessions of the Conference Convention • Lucius Eugene Chittenden
... his no small surprise and anger, interrupted by the audible inquiry of little Schiller, "But was this Song, then, actually sung to the Church?" Schiller Senior took the little heretic to task for this rash act; and got as justification the innocent question, "Has the Church really got teeth of ivory?" The Father was enlightened enough to take the Boy's opposition for a natural expression of sound human sense; nay, he could scarcely forbear a laugh; whirled swiftly round, and murmured to himself, "Occasionally ...
— The Life of Friedrich Schiller - Comprehending an Examination of His Works • Thomas Carlyle
... Finally, in a hasty and secret execution, where is the example? where is the terror? And then, as the execution takes place, as we may say, privately, in a byplace, with great precipitation, the whole town is ignorant of this bloody and solemn act; nothing announces that, on this day, they are killing a man; they laugh and sing at the theaters; the multitudes pass on, careless and indifferent. As it regards society, religion, and humanity, this judicial homicide, ...
— Mysteries of Paris, V3 • Eugene Sue
... how long the Blake boys had been courting her. I came too late to see anything but the climax of that unbrotherly tournament, and only by grace of the hundredth chance of luck did I witness even one act of that. ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1920 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... hidden—safe from the penalty of crime, and exposed only to the obloquy which he laughed to scorn. If ever there was a man formed alike by nature and education to betray the land which gave him birth, and to act openly as the pander of political corruption, or secretly as the agent of defamation; who would stoop to seek his fortune by effecting the fall of a frail woman, or would strive to advance it by stabbing the character of an honest one; who could crush aspiring ...
— Little Memoirs of the Nineteenth Century • George Paston
... the milk should be boiled—not simply scalded, but heated to boiling over hot water—then set aside to cool before mixing. Simple heating will not prevent bread from turning sour in the rising, while boiling will act as a preventative. So the milk should be thoroughly scalded, and should be used when it is just ...
— The Whitehouse Cookbook (1887) - The Whole Comprising A Comprehensive Cyclopedia Of Information For - The Home • Mrs. F.L. Gillette
... deduced from the phenomena is to be called an hypothesis; and hypotheses, whether metaphysical or physical, whether of occult qualities or mechanical, have no place in experimental philosophy.... And to us it is enough that gravity does really exist, and act according to the laws which we have explained, and abundantly serves to account for all the motions of the celestial bodies ...
— A History of Science, Volume 2(of 5) • Henry Smith Williams
... I am affected by a sense of my own unfitness for the work, and the honour which the Lord puts upon me; for I look not at second causes, in thus placing me to watch over His people. It is, and may it ever be, a stimulus to seek a closer walk with God, that I may know His will, and act in conformity with it. Walking down High Ousegate about half-past eight in the evening, in company with my daughter, I had my pocket picked of a small silver box, given me by a cousin. I can, and have prayed for the miscreant who did it; but wish to have my box again: I fear this is ...
— Religion in Earnest - A Memorial of Mrs. Mary Lyth, of York • John Lyth
... of a female culprit in the act of undergoing the fatal punishment from which her beloved sister had been so recently rescued, was too much, not perhaps for her nerves, but for her mind and feelings. She turned her head to the other ...
— The Heart of Mid-Lothian, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... for many generations to come—perhaps for good. If the task of leadership in the arts of government remains with us, let us face the responsibility conscious of the vast spiritual issues which it involves, and let us so plan and act that history, looking back on these years of blood, may date from them a new birth of freedom and progress, not for ourselves in this country alone but throughout that kingdom of Man which must one day, as we believe, become in very truth ...
— Progress and History • Various
... radical change of opinion on theological questions, led Mr. McKim formally to sever his connection with the Presbyterian Church, and ministry. Being now free to act without sectarian constraint, he was, in the beginning of 1840, made Publishing Agent of the Pennsylvania Anti-slavery Society, which caused him to settle in Philadelphia, where he was married, in October, to ...
— The Underground Railroad • William Still
... only one laugh like yours north of 60 deg.—less a bull moose can act that way." Then he went on. "Sharp to your left. I'm down here on the creek. I was making your place and this way ...
— The Heart of Unaga • Ridgwell Cullum
... only other resource was to laugh, which, in Peggy's opinion, was even worse than the former. A Shylock who chuckled between his speeches, and gave a good-humoured "Ha! ha!" just before uttering his bitterest invective, was a ridiculous parody of the character, with whom it would be impossible to act. It would be hard indeed if all her carefully rehearsed speeches lost their effect, and the famous trial scene were made into a farce through ...
— About Peggy Saville • Mrs. G. de Horne Vaizey
... guests were surprised. They regarded the act as a direct insult to the commander-in-chief. Washington read their feelings in their faces, and he remarked: "Gentlemen, my friend is right; I do not wish any of my guests to partake of anything against their inclination, and I certainly do not wish them to violate any established ...
— From Farm House to the White House • William M. Thayer
... above act, I, Juan Soriano, notary-public, one of the registered notaries of this city of Manila, in the Filipinas Islands, for the king our lord, attest and assert truthfully to those who may see these presents that on this day of the above date, at the hour of ten in the morning or thereabout, ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 • Various
... your methods are all wrong. Tell him—— Nay, I will question him myself. Messer Fortemani, you have been guilty of an act of gross abuse. You and your men were hired for me by Messer Gonzaga, and to you was given the honourable office of captain over them, that you might lead them in this service of mine in the ways of duty, ...
— Love-at-Arms • Raphael Sabatini
... the time, Josiah wuz so fearful riz up in his mind, that it wuz doubtful if he ever would be settled down agin, and act in a way becomin' to a grandfather and a Deacon in ...
— Samantha at the World's Fair • Marietta Holley
... arms calmly and commenced its study. He had meant to act a part—-to pretend deep interest and desire for long critical study—-that he might secure more time, but in a few moments he became honestly absorbed in the ...
— Barriers Burned Away • E. P. Roe
... in the process: knowledge means Ever-renewed assurance by defeat That victory is somehow still to reach, But love is victory, the prize itself: Love—trust to! Be rewarded for the trust In trust's mere act."[A] ...
— Browning as a Philosophical and Religious Teacher • Henry Jones
... thrilling mixture of pleasure and apprehension. My purse, though by no means amply replenished, was in a situation to supply all the wants and wishes of a traveller. I had been accustomed, while at Bourdeaux, to act as my own valet; my horse was fresh, young, and active, and the buoyancy of my spirits soon surmounted the melancholy reflections with which my ...
— Rob Roy, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... Powder & other provisions if hee would attempt to deliver him out of my hands. The Englishman made no reply, neither did hee tell me of what had ben proposed unto him. I understood it by my frenchman, that heard the whole matter, & I found it was high time to act ...
— Voyages of Peter Esprit Radisson • Peter Esprit Radisson
... thought like a pistol thrust into my face. "What if 'they' should include Roebuck!" And just as a man begins to defend himself from a sudden danger before he clearly sees what the danger is, so I began to act before I even questioned whether my suspicion was plausible or absurd. I went into the hall, rang the bell, slipped a lightweight coat over my evening dress and put on a hat. When Sanders appeared, I said: "I'm going out for a few minutes—perhaps an hour—if anyone should ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 5, June 1905 • Various
... Lutha shall come into his own some day, and my dearest hope is that his first act may be to mete out to such as you the punishment ...
— The Mad King • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... had done this on impulse, and it was not usual for her to act in such a way. But her parents had gone home and she had nobody to ask permission of but Mrs. Havel—and she did not really know where ...
— Wyn's Camping Days - or, The Outing of the Go-Ahead Club • Amy Bell Marlowe
... this arrangement—it saved him from a task of finding new servants, a task which he would have bungled sadly, and which he would have had to attempt, for he had decided to enjoy all the pleasures of a country place, and to act the country gentleman until he wearied of the part. Life is but a farce, and the more different parts you play in that farce the more you enjoy. Here was a new farce—he the Bohemian, going down to an old ancestral home to play the part of the Squire of the parish. It could ...
— Mike Fletcher - A Novel • George (George Augustus) Moore
... before received the visits of some strangers, was evinced by the knowledge which the natives had of fire arms; they imitated the act of shooting when we first landed, and when a musket was fired at their request, were not much alarmed. A quantity of posts was lying near the water, which had been evidently cut with iron instruments; and when we inquired of the inhabitants concerning them, they ...
— A Voyage to Terra Australis Volume 2 • Matthew Flinders
... left the meal, courtesied, called down the blessings of the saints upon the visitors, and, assuring them that it would be her happiness to come whenever wanted and to act the part of slave all her life to them, went away, and once more our friends were alone. The Senorita did not fasten the door, for there was no call to do so, and in due time, the two drew up their chairs and partook ...
— Up the Forked River - Or, Adventures in South America • Edward Sylvester Ellis
... because she patronised the Town Clerk her rates ought to be reduced! Such is human nature in the provinces! So different from human nature in London, where nobody ever dreams of offering even a match to a municipal official, lest the act might be construed into ...
— The Card, A Story Of Adventure In The Five Towns • Arnold Bennett
... birth and birth royal place certain families above the common body of freemen (landed or not); and for a commoner to pretend to a king's daughter is an act of presumption, and ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")
... said contracts were urged in Council to the said Warren Hastings, he declared that he should deliver a reply thereto; but it does not appear that he did ever deliver such reply, or ever enter into a justification of any part of his conduct in this transaction.—That the act of Parliament of 1773, by which the first Governor-General and Council were appointed, did expressly limit the duration of their office to the term of five years, which expired in October, 1779, and that the several ...
— The Works Of The Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. IX. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... re-upholstered and redecorated, and the fact was duly advertised. Mr Smithson, in the leisure given him by his being relieved of full responsibility for the scenery, had painted a new act-drop, photographs of which appeared in the newspapers. Mr Gillies was interviewed. Sir Henry was interviewed, Charles Mann was interviewed. The ball of publicity was kept rolling merrily. Even Mr Halford Bunn, the famous author ...
— Mummery - A Tale of Three Idealists • Gilbert Cannan
... pictures far surpassing anything of the kind I had ever seen. These included chambers, palaces, streets, landscapes, and forest scenery. One, I remember particularly, was the outside of a Norman castle, and another of a cottage charmingly painted, and of which I have a sketch. But the act scene, which was a view on the Clyde looking towards the Highland mountains with Dumbarton Castle in the middle distance, was such a combination of magnificent scenery, so wonderfully painted, that it excited universal admiration. These productions I studied ...
— James Nasmyth's Autobiography • James Nasmyth
... ballad is introduced in Act II. of Claudine of Villa Bella, where it is suddenly broken off, as it is ...
— The Poems of Goethe • Goethe
... no manners. I don't mean that they are bad-mannered; quite the contrary; what I mean is that their manners are not codified. Having no rules for behaviour under various circumstances, they must on each occasion act according to their kindliness and desire to please, or the reverse. They must go back to the first principles of manners. What they are, that they appear. What they feel at the moment, that they show. The kind man or child ...
— A Poor Man's House • Stephen Sydney Reynolds
... to place ourselves en rapport with our highest ideals of purity, nobility, Truth. Then cannot we get the idea of universal brotherhood firmly fixed in our consciousness as an actual reality to be attained, and always act upon that basis. To me, the thought of the absolute unity of all life, affords as high an ideal for putting into practical shape as my deficient development allows me. Cannot we get this ideal or some other ideal so essential a part of our thought that it colours all our feelings, emotions and actions? ...
— AE in the Irish Theosophist • George William Russell
... white light filled the room, but for the moment I did not perceive the peculiarity of his smile. I was fatuously full of my own late tremors and present relief; and my first idiotic act was to spill some whiskey and squirt the soda-water all over in my anxiety to do ...
— The Amateur Cracksman • E. W. Hornung
... existence—and at the same time like the maker of it, who is accountable for that existence. I am a blot on God's creation that must be wiped off. For this my strength is given back to me, and I am once more able to will and resolve. You will find I can act too. Helen, if you will indeed be my sister, you must NOT prevent me now. I know it is hard upon you, awfully hard. I know I am dragging your life down with mine, but I cannot help it. If I don't do it, I shall but go out of ...
— Thomas Wingfold, Curate • George MacDonald
... General Fono (48 seats; members chosen by each atoll's Council of Elders or Taupulega to serve three-year terms); note - the Tokelau Amendment Act of 1996 confers limited legislative power on the ...
— The 2002 CIA World Factbook • US Government
... be depending solely on her own act. If she told him of the lost handkerchief, the future might be one thing: if she did not tell him, ...
— Hilda Lessways • Arnold Bennett
... not flatter myself that to them I am more than an object of kindly thought at long intervals. It is enough; it signifies that I have not erred wholly. And when I think that my daily life testifies to an act of kindness such as I could never have dreamt of meriting from the man who performed it, may I not be much ...
— The Private Papers of Henry Ryecroft • George Gissing
... may cast their eyes on these memoranda, that the skin having been rubbed off my heel by my wearing too tight a shoe, though I desisted from walking, I found that the irritation of the wounded part was kept up by the act of composition, to a degree that made it necessary to give my constitution a holiday. A rapid cure was ...
— The Prose Works of William Wordsworth • William Wordsworth
... often poisoned now-a-days by design. I do not mean to say that the act of poisoning is accompanied by malice toward mankind; far from it. It is added to color it, as in the form of anatto; or to give it freshness and tenderness, as in the ...
— Vegetable Diet: As Sanctioned by Medical Men, and by Experience in All Ages • William Andrus Alcott |
