"Expert" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... between the races, come the athletic sports; foot-racing and wrestling, rope-dancing and high leaping, quoit-throwing and javelin matches. One man runs a race with a fleet Cappadocian horse; another expert rider drives two bare-backed horses twice around the track, leaping from back to back as the horses dash around. Can you see any very great difference between the circus performance of A. D. 138 and one of ...
— Historic Boys - Their Endeavours, Their Achievements, and Their Times • Elbridge Streeter Brooks
... an expert housekeeper. "I love a little house that I can clean all over," said she. She would have liked a Roman villa made of polished marble, that could be scrubbed from top to bottom, or a house of the melted and dyed cobble-stones that some genius has promised ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 26, September 1880 • Various
... expert in making camp, and soon the dogs were tethered off to one side, and were snarling and snapping over their supper of frozen seal blubber. After that they burrowed down under ...
— The Young Treasure Hunter - or, Fred Stanley's Trip to Alaska • Frank V. Webster
... the first time that we were practically in the hands of three pilots, two of whom were Eskimos, one of them on a salary of five hundred dollars per month. This man was perfectly familiar with the entire river, being an expert pilot, as he proved during this trip ...
— A Woman who went to Alaska • May Kellogg Sullivan
... sure, our trousers were necessarily wet, as our legs were dangling in the water on each side of the log; but as they could be easily dried, we did not care. After half-an-hour's practice, we became expert enough to keep our balance pretty steadily. Then Peterkin laid down his paddle, and having baited his line with a whole oyster, ...
— The Coral Island - A Tale Of The Pacific Ocean • R. M. Ballantyne
... came upon a pre-historic hearth. There were the big stones that had propped up the fire, and there were the ashes. By the side were the remains of a heap of food-refuse. The pieces of decayed bone were not much to look at; yet, submitted to an expert, they did a tale unfold. He showed them to be the remains of the woolly rhinoceros, the mammoth's even more unwieldy comrade, of the reindeer, of two kinds of horse, one of them the pony-like wild horse still to be ...
— Anthropology • Robert Marett
... is succeeded by obedience. That is the one condition of becoming a saint—to follow the immediate call of the Lord. And it is the one condition of becoming an expert listener. Every time I hear the voice, and follow, I sharpen my sense of hearing, and the next time the voice will sound ...
— My Daily Meditation for the Circling Year • John Henry Jowett
... weariness to thrilling interest had been its own justification. Wealth had robbed her of the mystery and charm of accident. The future was fixed; there could be no unknown. The men she had met in society were mere fops, or expert butlers who wrote books on etiquette. Life was a problem for them of what the ...
— The One Woman • Thomas Dixon
... galleys chase them, their custom is, by way of game and sneer, to point to their fresh-tallowed poops, as they glide along like fishes before them, all one as if they showed them their backs to salute: and as in the cruising art, by continual practise, they are so very expert, and withal (for our sins) so daring, presumptuous, and fortunate, in a few days from their leaving Algiers they return laden with infinite wealth and captives; and are able to make three or four ...
— The Story of the Barbary Corsairs • Stanley Lane-Poole
... of remark, that the people of what is called Venta {70} are more accustomed to war, more famous for valour, and more expert in archery, than those of any other part of Wales. The following examples prove the truth of this assertion. In the last capture of the aforesaid castle, which happened in our days, two soldiers passing over a bridge to take refuge in a tower built on a mound of ...
— The Itinerary of Archibishop Baldwin through Wales • Giraldus Cambrensis
... good, Hicks," quavered Theophilus, whose faith in the shadow-like youth was prodigious. "Oh, that will be splendid, for I am going to take a course at a business college in Baltimore. I want to become an expert ...
— T. Haviland Hicks Senior • J. Raymond Elderdice
... the Surface. "The way you talk one would think you were drawing L400 a year at Westminster, and working up a reputation as an Aeronautical Expert. I must have some depth and chord to take my Spars and Ribs, and again, I must have a certain chord to make it possible for my Camber (that's curvature) to be just right for the Angle of Incidence. If that's not right the air won't get a nice ...
— The Aeroplane Speaks - Fifth Edition • H. Barber
... expert gardener, who in his day had been famous for his skill in naturalisation. His feats in this work have made a stir beyond our shores. Alpine plants grow wild upon English rock-faces at his whim, irises from the glaring crags of the Caucasus spread out their ...
— Rest Harrow - A Comedy of Resolution • Maurice Hewlett
... antiquary, introduced the continuation of the Irish history of Giraldus Cambrensis with a fervent encomium on the illustrious Warden of the Stannaries, who was 'rather a servant than a commander to his own fortune.' A medical treatise was inscribed to him as an expert. A list which has been preserved of his signs for chemical substances and drugs, shows that as early as 1592 he had paid attention to medicine. He appears to have kept amanuenses to copy interesting ...
— Sir Walter Ralegh - A Biography • William Stebbing
... struck with her stern, sir," said a short, squat man, hurrying to Armitage's side. He spoke with a strong accent and passed as a Lithuanian. His expert knowledge of electricity as well as his skill in making and mending apparatus had caused Armitage to intrust him with much of the delicate work on the model, as well as on the torpedo of regular size, based on the model, now in ...
— Prince or Chauffeur? - A Story of Newport • Lawrence Perry
... altogether a more elegant vessel. An account of it will be found in our chapter on "Boats." The South Sea islanders also use a canoe which they propel with a double-bladed paddle similar to that of the Eskimos. They are wonderfully expert and fearless in the management of this canoe, as may be seen from the ...
— Man on the Ocean - A Book about Boats and Ships • R.M. Ballantyne
... the business of laying in supplies from the "Company." Garth tasted to the full the sweets of partnership, as he and Natalie gauged each other's appetite, and made their calculations. Paul Smiley accompanied them in the capacity of expert adviser; but the old man was inclined to be scandalized at the extravagant luxuries Garth insisted on adding to the five great staples of Northern travel; viz., bacon, flour, baking-powder, tea and sugar. Garth must have besides, canned vegetables and ...
— Two on the Trail - A Story of the Far Northwest • Hulbert Footner
... migration came to an end. There seemed no reason to go farther, since here was everything they wanted. The Pup, by this time an expert pursuer of all but the swiftest fish, was less careful now to keep always within his mother's reach, though the affection between the two was still ardent. One day, while he was swimming some little distance apart from the herd, he noticed ...
— Kings in Exile • Sir Charles George Douglas Roberts
... settle near at hand, and I discovered the reason. A deer-stalking peace drooped upon everything, and in it a man could invoke the passing of a lazy pageant of twenty years of his life. The dignity of a coffin being lowered into a grave surrounded the ultimate appearance of the lift. The expert we in America call the elevator-boy stepped from the car, took three paces forward, faced to attention and saluted. This elevator boy could not have been less than sixty years of age; a great white beard streamed towards his belt. I saw that ...
— Men, Women, and Boats • Stephen Crane
... to find an operator to my wish, I sent one who appeared more expert than the rest from New York to a 50-gun ship lying not far from Governor's Island. He went under the ship and attempted to fix the wooden screw into her bottom, but struck, as he supposes, a bar of iron which passes from the rudder hinge, ...
— Aircraft and Submarines - The Story of the Invention, Development, and Present-Day - Uses of War's Newest Weapons • Willis J. Abbot
... admired him and seen the danger for a long time," De Froilette answered. "The commercial interests I have in this country force me to keep pace with its politics. I am not an expert, and ...
— Princess Maritza • Percy Brebner
... mother's period of convalescence I acted—in my hours of leisure—as nurse-maid quite indifferent to the smiles of spectators, who made question of my method. I became an expert in holding the babe so that her spine should not be over-taxed, and I think she liked to feel the grip of my big fingers. That she appreciated the lullabies I sang to her I am certain, for even my Aunt Deborah was ...
— A Daughter of the Middle Border • Hamlin Garland
... had bought awaited him with a horse. Once he would have thought nothing of walking the eight miles to Basseterre, but the Tropics, while they sharpen the nerves, caress unceasingly the indolence of man. During the hurricane season he crossed as often as he thought necessary, for with expert oarsmen there was little danger, even from squalls, and the ...
— The Conqueror • Gertrude Franklin Atherton
... hardy; your enemies timid and enervated; you were expert in battle, your enemies unskillful; your leaders were experienced, your soldiers warlike and disciplined. Booty excited ardor, bravery was rewarded, cowardice and insubordination punished, and all the springs of the human heart ...
— The Ruins • C. F. [Constantin Francois de] Volney
... great captain equally a work of genius? Napoleon is here the high sovereign critic, the Goethe in this department, as the Feuquieres, the Jominis, the St. Cyrs are the La Harpes or the Fontanes, the Lessings or the Schlegels, all good and expert critics; but he is the first of all, nor, if you reflect on it, could it have been otherwise. And who then would say better things of Homer than Milton?"—Goethe supreme in literary criticism, Milton on Homer; this touches the ...
— Essays AEsthetical • George Calvert
... a curious fact, known to some, that all the heroes of Bellona are not expert in the wars of Venus, the strongest and most valiant souls being weak in combats in which valor plays an unimportant part. The poet Chaulieu says upon ...
— Life, Letters, and Epicurean Philosophy of Ninon de L'Enclos, - the Celebrated Beauty of the Seventeenth Century • Robinson [and] Overton, ed. and translation.
... Wednesday night spectacle was entirely dissimilar. Then, heavy smoke boiled and swirled in a broad, dark ribbon fanning out at least a mile in width and stretching across the sky in a straight line. Since there was no proof as to what caused the strange predark manifestation, and because even expert witnesses were unable to explain the appearance, the matter remains a subject for ...
— The Flying Saucers are Real • Donald Keyhoe
... Peruvians kept the accounts of their army. On one string were numbered the soldiers armed with slings; on another, the spearmen; on a third, those who carried clubs, &c. In the same manner the military reports were prepared. In every town some expert men were appointed to tie the knots of the quipu, and to explain them. These men were called quipucamayocuna (literally, officers of the knots). Imperfect as was this method, yet in the flourishing period of the Inca government the appointed ...
— Travels in Peru, on the Coast, in the Sierra, Across the Cordilleras and the Andes, into the Primeval Forests • J. J. von Tschudi
... the proof-reader and his wife. The three girls approached them, and Lechuguino invited Milagros to dance. Leandro glanced in anguish at his sweetheart; she, however, whirled off heedlessly. The band was playing the pas double from the Drummer of the Grenadiers. Lechuguino was an expert dancer; he swept his partner along as if she were a feather and as he spoke, brought his lips so close to hers that it seemed as if ...
— The Quest • Pio Baroja
... moving tragedies not unfamiliar to the screen enthusiast. The beautiful but misguided wife had been saying good-by to her little one and was leaving her beautiful home at the solicitation of the false friend in evening dress—forgetting all in one mad moment. The watcher was a tried expert, and like the trained faunal naturalist could determine a species from the shrewd examination of one bone of a photoplay. He knew that the wife had been ignored by a husband who permitted his vast business interests to engross his whole attention, ...
— Merton of the Movies • Harry Leon Wilson
... is essentially that of "the peacock, not of the gander," and is redeemed by his willingness to raise a laugh at his own expense (Strachan-Davidson, p. 192). Some critics have impugned his legal knowledge, but probably without justice. It is true that he does not claim to be a great expert, though a pupil of the Scaevolas, and when in doubt would consult a jurisconsult; also, that he frequently passes lightly over important points of law, but this was probably because he was conscious of ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 3 - "Chitral" to "Cincinnati" • Various
... James had their first quarrel. She took the liberty of reminding him that it was time to give notice of the marriage at the church, and to secure berths in the steamer for herself and her son. Instead of answering one way or another, James asked how the Expert ...
— The Evil Genius • Wilkie Collins
... so useful, that he had been permitted to practice with a fowling-piece carrying ball, and had proved himself very expert. He now was mounted on the Major's spare horse; that in case the Major's was knocked up, he might change it, for Omrah's ...
— The Mission • Frederick Marryat
... "Are you an expert?" asked Jack. The way people searched his title, examined his tax receipts and rammed hypodermics into his property without permission was, to ...
— Peter - A Novel of Which He is Not the Hero • F. Hopkinson Smith
... upon the table before him—the silken cord. But it was a clue of such a nature that, whatever deductions an expert detective might have based upon it, Robert Cairn could base none. Dusk was not far off, and he knew that his nerves were not what they had been before those events which had led to his Egyptian journey. He was back in his own chamber—scene ...
— Brood of the Witch-Queen • Sax Rohmer
... of the experiments which have been tried in the progress of any science, and of the manner in which observations of minute facts have led to great discoveries, will be useful to the understanding, and will gradually make the mind expert in that mental algebra, on which both reasoning and invention (which is, perhaps, only a more rapid species of reasoning) depend. In drawing out a list of experiments for children, it will, therefore, be advantageous to place them in that order which will best exhibit their relative connection; ...
— Practical Education, Volume I • Maria Edgeworth
... on the doctor's face. "Give you something for it? Well now, we aren't Therapeutic men, you understand. Always best to let the expert handle the problem in his own field." He paused, stroking his chin for a moment. "Tell you what we'll do. Dr. Epstein is one of the finest Therapeutic men in the city. He could take care of you in a jiffy. We'll see if we can't arrange an appointment with him after you've ...
— An Ounce of Cure • Alan Edward Nourse
... due, I believe, to the method of firing and the unequal contraction or expansion of the slip employed. All modern imitations are covered with a white slip which, after firing, becomes crackled, a characteristic unknown to ancient ware. The most expert modern potter at East Mesa is Nampeo, a Tanoan woman who is a thorough artist in her line of work. Finding a better market for ancient than for modern ware, she cleverly copies old decorations, and imitates the Sikyatki ware almost perfectly. ...
— Archeological Expedition to Arizona in 1895 • Jesse Walter Fewkes
... crooked, and to stop, and splash, and sidle into corners like a saddle-donkey. It was very odd to see what old letters Charley's young hand had made, they so wrinkled, and shrivelled, and tottering, it so plump and round. Yet Charley was uncommonly expert at other things and had as nimble little fingers as ...
— Bleak House • Charles Dickens
... The voyage was rough and stormy and lasted nearly three months and a half. When they arrived in Boston on November 28, the snow was knee-deep, and the winter set in so cold and forbidding that there was some delay in carrying out the plans for the new colony. As Lieutenant Gardiner was an "expert engineer," the people of Boston were glad to take advantage of his stay with them to employ him in finishing some fortifications for ...
— Once Upon A Time In Connecticut • Caroline Clifford Newton
... of Jim's hotel was up, at Number Nine, and those who had assisted in its erection were out of the woods, he and his architect entered with great industry upon the task of covering it. Under Mr. Benedict's direction, Jim became an expert in the work, and the sound of two busy hammers kept the echoes of the forest awake from dawn until sunset, every day. The masons came at last and put up the chimneys; and more and more, as the days ...
— Sevenoaks • J. G. Holland
... shore, or plough the faithless deep, O'er bar and shelf the watery path they sound With dexterous arm, sagacious of the ground: Fearless they combat every hostile wind, 160 Wheeling in mazy tracks, with course inclined: Expert to moor where terrors line the road, Or win the anchor from its dark abode; But drooping, and relax'd, in climes afar, Tumultuous and undisciplined in war. Such Rodmond was; by learning unrefined, That oft enlightens to corrupt the mind— Boisterous of manners; train'd in early ...
— The Poetical Works of Beattie, Blair, and Falconer - With Lives, Critical Dissertations, and Explanatory Notes • Rev. George Gilfillan [Ed.]
... dog. They are now as toads and aspics. I feel all day like one situated amidst gins and pitfalls. Sovereigns, which I once took such pleasure in counting out, and scraping up with my little tin shovel, (at which I was the most expert in the banking-house,) now scald my hands. When I go to sign my name, I set down that of another person, or write my own in a counterfeit character. I am beset with temptations without motive. I want no more ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 85, November, 1864 • Various
... while allowed to run down in others. A community was reluctant to spend money on a highway only to have the improvements destroyed by through traffic from neighboring communities who had no responsibility for maintaining the road. Local communities could not afford to employ expert officials to plan and supervise ...
— Community Civics and Rural Life • Arthur W. Dunn
... years of teaching by the fishermen and Tom Bodger, the wooden-legged old man-o'-war's man of Rockabie, had made Aleck, young though he was, an expert manager of a fore and aft sailing boat, and the boy sat fast, rudder in one hand, sheet in the other, ready at the right moment to ease off the rope and by a dexterous touch at the rudder to lessen the pressure upon the canvas ...
— The Lost Middy - Being the Secret of the Smugglers' Gap • George Manville Fenn
... hear. The motion was put, in the midst of the uproar, and declared carried; and the bill was killed. It was killed so neatly that there is to-day no record of its decease in the official account of the proceedings of the House! Expert treason, bold and ...
— Stories of Achievement, Volume III (of 6) - Orators and Reformers • Various
... expert views on "Beautiful Women," Lola had plenty of other subjects up her sleeve, to be incorporated in a series of lectures. The list covered a wide range, for it included such diverse headings as "Ladies with Pasts," "Heroines of History," "Romanism," "Wits and Women ...
— The Magnificent Montez - From Courtesan to Convert • Horace Wyndham
... instrument with the practised eye of an expert, and turning to Satan said: "The four strings are beautifully white and transparent, but this one is black and ...
— The Fifth String, The Conspirators • John Philip Sousa
... mannish, and I have very frequently been told that I do things—such as sewing,—'just like a man.' My voice is quite low but not coarse. I dislike household work, but am fond of sports, gardening, etc. When so young that I cannot remember it, I learned to whistle, a practice at which I am still expert. When a young girl, I learned to smoke, and ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 2 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... a story at this time which contained some Western mining incident and environment. He sent the manuscript to Clemens for "expert" consideration and advice. Clemens wrote him at great length and in careful detail. He was fond of Aldrich, regarding him as one of the most brilliant of men. Once, to ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... expert in all exercises than any man in Norway whose memory is preserved to us in sagas; and he was stronger and more agile than most men, and many stories are written down about it. One is that he ascended the Smalsarhorn, and fixed ...
— Heimskringla - The Chronicle of the Kings of Norway • Snorri Sturluson
... doubt were full as desperate as the fights described in the Iliad, and which were certainly much more bloody than the combats of modern Greece in the war of independence. The callants not only employed their hands in hurling stones, but not unfrequently slings; at the use of which they were very expert, and which occasionally dislodged teeth, shattered jaws, or knocked out an eye. Our opponents certainly laboured under considerable disadvantage, being compelled not only to wade across a deceitful bog, but likewise to clamber ...
— Lavengro - The Scholar, The Gypsy, The Priest • George Borrow
... curves and a clock set at the apex above the writing-shelf pleased Alban immensely—he thought that he had seen nothing more graceful even at "Five Gables"; while the chair to match it needed no sham expert to declare its worth. The carpet was of crimson, without pattern but elegantly bordered. There were many shelves for books, but no evidence of commercial papers other than a great staring ledger which ...
— Aladdin of London - or Lodestar • Sir Max Pemberton
... cheap cambric, as ribbons are ruined by being made over too many times. Bow-making is sometimes quite difficult for an amateur, while for some students of millinery it is very easy, but any one with patience may become quite expert in time. ...
— Make Your Own Hats • Gene Allen Martin
... looked at her hands, but they were red and rough, and the nails were broken and not at all like the nails which an expert has polished for an hour or more. Mrs. Atherton's diamond rings would be sadly out of place on Dolly's fingers, but time and abstinence from work would do much for them, she reflected, and after all it would be nice to live in a grand house, ...
— Tracy Park • Mary Jane Holmes
... lard; below they took out the refuse, and this, too, was a region in which the visitors did not linger. In still other places men were engaged in cutting up the carcasses that had been through the chilling rooms. First there were the "splitters," the most expert workmen in the plant, who earned as high as fifty cents an hour, and did not a thing all day except chop hogs down the middle. Then there were "cleaver men," great giants with muscles of iron; each had two men to attend him—to slide the ...
— The Jungle • Upton Sinclair
... us. Both Spaniards and Creoles patronize them, and occasionally a negro tries his luck with a trifle. In open squares, or at the intersection of several streets, one sometimes sees a carpet spread upon the ground, upon which an athlete accompanied by a couple of expert boys, dressed in high-colored tights ornamented with spangles, diverts the throng by exhibiting gymnastics. At the close of the performance, a young girl in a fancy dress and with long, flowing hair passes among the spectators and gathers a few shillings. Not far away is observed ...
— Due South or Cuba Past and Present • Maturin M. Ballou
... freely with the men, while still maintaining his own position, he was well able to manage them. The second mate, Ralph Grey, was a great contrast to Jonas Scoones. He was a young man of good manners and disposition, well-educated, and was an especially expert navigator, so that he was well able to assist ...
— Owen Hartley; or, Ups and Downs - A Tale of Land and Sea • William H. G. Kingston
... entrance into the state of womanhood that male circumcision denotes the entrance into manhood on the part of the males among the Bassoutos. At the appointed time the maids are gathered together and conducted to the riverbank; they are placed under the care of expert matrons. They here reside, after having undergone a kind of baptism; they are maltreated, punished, and abused by the old women, with a view of making them hardy and insensible to pain; they are also schooled in the science and art of African household duties. Among ...
— History of Circumcision from the Earliest Times to the Present - Moral and Physical Reasons for its Performance • Peter Charles Remondino
... house. It is, of course, unnecessary to make the solid 400 lb. bales for Indian consumption; this practice is usually observed only for jute which is to be exported, and all such bales are weighed and measured at the baling station by a Chamber of Commerce expert. ...
— The Jute Industry: From Seed to Finished Cloth • T. Woodhouse and P. Kilgour
... be seen, all classes of rogues are represented among the apparently devout worshipers. On the occasion of our second visit to the cathedral, a gentleman who had his pockets picked by an expert kneeling devotee hastened for a policeman, and soon returning, pointed out the culprit, who was promptly arrested; but, much to the disgust of the complainant, he also was compelled to go with the officer and prisoner to the police headquarters, where we heard ...
— Aztec Land • Maturin M. Ballou
... restriction against the women taking part in the men's dances. They also act as assistants to the chief actors in the Totem Dances, three particularly expert and richly dressed women dancers ranging themselves behind the mask dancer as a pleasing background of streaming furs and glistening feathers. The only time they are forbidden to enter the kasgi is when the shaman is performing certain secret rites. They also have ...
— The Dance Festivals of the Alaskan Eskimo • Ernest William Hawkes
... "As an expert. They want to prove that Mitya's mad and committed the murder when he didn't know what he was doing"; Alyosha smiled gently; "but ...
— The Brothers Karamazov • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... had ridden away as the early evening shadows were falling and, to pass the time until the hour for seeking their bunks, the boy ranchers sought some amusement. Shooting at a mark was one form, and Nort and Dick were endeavoring to become as expert as their western cousin in the use of ...
— The Boy Ranchers on the Trail • Willard F. Baker
... physician followed her into the sick room, while the three mariners gazed wide-eyed in at the door. They watched, as Doctor Palmer explained medicines and gave directions. It did not need an expert to see that the new nurse ...
— Cap'n Eri • Joseph Crosby Lincoln
... the monarch seemed to have resolved upon some plan, whereby he hoped to relieve himself from the dilemma that so seriously annoyed him. He was most expert at disguises; indeed, it was often his custom to walk the streets of his capital incog, or to ride out unattended, in a plain citizen's dress, as we have seen, that he might the better observe for himself those things concerning which he required accurate information. It was then nothing new for ...
— The Circassian Slave; or, The Sultan's Favorite - A Story of Constantinople and the Caucasus • Lieutenant Maturin Murray
... solitary breakfast. He had grown expert in the daily preparation of bacon, eggs, cornbread, and coffee; but that is a poor feast which is denied the sauce of companionship, and he dallied with his spoon, while he stared gloomily through the open door. The jaded green of ...
— A Tar-Heel Baron • Mabell Shippie Clarke Pelton
... men made progress by becoming daily more expert in building, and as their ingenuity was increased by their dexterity so that from habit they attained to considerable skill, their intelligence was enlarged by their industry until the more proficient adopted the trade of carpenters. From ...
— Ten Books on Architecture • Vitruvius
... would eat corncakes with bacon grease a while longer. (They were really good. I became an expert in making them.) And we still had some bacon left, and the corn; a little syrup in the pail would take the place of sugar. Uncle Sam hadn't won that bet yet, on the Ammons homestead, though most of the settlers thought ...
— Land of the Burnt Thigh • Edith Eudora Kohl
... woman of sense, worth, and cultivation, yet not very expert at cutting out a shirt, or making paste, pies, and puddings (though I would not by any means undervalue this necessary part of female knowledge, or tolerate ignorance in my sex respecting them), yet pray, my good sir, do not, on this account only, show ...
— The Wedding Guest • T.S. Arthur
... me. Taking care of Louis is, as you must know, very like angling for shy trout; one must understand when to pay out the line, and exercise the greatest caution in drawing him in. I am becoming most expert, though it is an anxious business. I do not believe that any of Louis's friends, outside of his own family, have ever realized how very low he has been; letters followed him continually, imploring, almost demanding his immediate ...
— The Life of Mrs. Robert Louis Stevenson • Nellie Van de Grift Sanchez
... his science in Greek, Persian, Turkish, Arabian, Latin, Syrian, and Hebrew books; and, besides that he was an expert philosopher, he fully understood the good and bad qualities of all sorts of plants and drugs. As soon as he was informed of the king's distemper, and understood that his physicians had given him over, he clad himself the best he could, and found a way to present himself ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Volume 1 • Anonymous
... is a wonderful sight," Verisschenzko said, as he stood by her side. "Paris has lost all good taste and sense of the fitness of things. Look! the women who are the most expert in the wriggle of the tango are mostly over forty years old! Do you see that one in the skin-tight pink robe? She is a grandmother! All are painted—all are feverish—all would be young! It is ever thus when a country is ...
— The Price of Things • Elinor Glyn
... Cromwell one of them, so regardless of the difference between true and false.] treacherous Mamsell Ramen, valet-surgeon Eversmann, and plenty more: readers of Wilhelmina's Book are too well acquainted with them. Nor are expert Conjurers wanting; capable to work strange feats with so plastic an element as Friedrich Wilhelm's mind. Let this one short glimpse of such Subterranean World be sufficient indication to the ...
— History Of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Volume IV. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—Friedrich's Apprenticeship, First Stage—1713-1728 • Thomas Carlyle
... and ran errands for his father, who was a tallow-chandler. He did not, however, neglect his books, for he tells us, "I do not remember when I could not read." Though no boy ever worked harder, he was fond of manly sports, and was an expert swimmer. Not liking the tallow-chandlery business, his father apprenticed him to a printer. This was precisely the kind of work which suited Franklin. When hardly eighteen years old, he was sent to England to buy printing material, and to improve himself ...
— Harper's Young People, November 25, 1879 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... this lawyers and jurists assist, who twist and stretch the law to suit it to their cause, stress words and use them for a subterfuge, irrespective of equity or their neighbor's necessity. And, in short, whoever is the most expert and cunning in these affairs finds most help in law, as they themselves say: Vigilantibus iura subveniunt [that is, The ...
— The Large Catechism by Dr. Martin Luther
... of an experimental character, peculiar conditions and special qualities are required. First, it is necessary to envisage distinctly the promising though risky opportunity, and this calls not infrequently for imagination of a none too common order. Then it must be studied with insight and expert knowledge and weighed by processes which are as much intuitive as intellectual. The reasons for or against taking a particular business risk are seldom such as can adequately be expressed in terms of arithmetic, or even by clear arguments the soundness of which is proportioned ...
— Supply and Demand • Hubert D. Henderson
... me to acknowledge the kindness of Mr. Henry Pyne, who, immediately on the appearance of the study, sent me his edition of the Debate between the Heralds: a courtesy from the expert to the amateur only too ...
— Familiar Studies of Men & Books • Robert Louis Stevenson
... of purloining a watch, a snuff-box, or a purse, unperceived by the owner, may, no doubt, be acquired by constant practice, till the novice becomes expert in his profession: but the admirable presence of mind displayed by Parisian sharpers must, in a great measure, be inherited from nature. What can well surpass an example of this kind mentioned by a ...
— Paris As It Was and As It Is • Francis W. Blagdon
... abode, and Clo and Victoria had for some time been promising Dolf a visit there. That night seemed a favorable occasion for the expedition, as a store of fruit pies, blanc mange and chicken salad, had that day been moulded by Clo's own expert hands, and half a jelly cake set aside in the closet ready for the basket which took so many mysterious ...
— A Noble Woman • Ann S. Stephens
... to get married, James hit the mark when he guessed that she was interesting herself in the accessories that would go with such an event. The position she took in the matter was characteristic. She had gone the length of taking expert counsel with her New York modiste concerning gowns for the occasion, without having at all decided that she would exchange her present independence for another venture into stormy ...
— The Vision Spendid • William MacLeod Raine
... hours," Mr. Waddington continued. "He seemed to like the way I put it to him, and instead of being scared he went to an expert in drains, who advised him that there was only quite a small thing wrong. He's doing up some of the rooms and moving in in ...
— The Double Life Of Mr. Alfred Burton • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... stream by swimming occurred to him. A sailor by profession, he was an expert swimmer, and the river was not wide enough to daunt him. But his pockets were filled with the gold he had stolen, and gold is well known to be the heaviest of all the metals. But nevertheless he could not leave it behind since it was for this he had incurred his present peril. ...
— Brave and Bold • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... the fire and moved toward the hobbled ponies, Bunt complaining of the quality of the outfit's meals. "Down in the Panamint country," he growled, "we had a Chink that was a sure frying-pan expert; but this Dago—my word! That ain't victuals, that supper. That's just a' ingenious device for removing superfluous appetite. Next time I assimilate nutriment in this camp I'm sure going to take chloroform beforehand. Careful to draw your cinch tight on that pinto bronc' of yours. She ...
— A Deal in Wheat - And Other Stories of the New and Old West • Frank Norris
... just now balancing MACARTNEY'S hat by brim on tip of his nose. Looks easy enough when done by an expert; those inclined to scoff at the accomplishment should try it themselves. Opportunity came suddenly, and unexpectedly. No ground for supposing GORST had been practising the trick in the Cloak-room before entering House. No collusion; all fair and above-board—or, rather, above ...
— Punch or the London Charivari, Vol. 104, May 27, 1893 • Various
... was a valuable man, an old-fashioned labourer of many aptitudes, equally good as a woodman, as an expert in "fagging" or sickling beaten-down corn, as a thatcher of roofs or ricks, as a setter of traps for moles, or snares for rabbits. Halsey was the key-stone of the farm labour. Betts was well enough. But without Halsey's intelligence to ...
— Harvest • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... I began to scout in every direction, to obtain a knowledge of the enemy's whereabouts and learn the ground about me. My standing in drawing at the Military Academy had never been so high as to warrant the belief that I could ever prove myself an expert, but a few practical lessons in that line were impressed on me there, and I had retained enough to enable me to make rough maps that could be readily understood, and which would be suitable to replace the erroneous ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan
... dead-weight into tons by measurement, as the two are not always exactly equivalent. In the following enumeration only estimated amounts are stated, and the figures are to be considered as approximate and not precise. It is likely that in each item an expert maybe able to discover some variation from the rigorously exact; but the general result will be sufficiently accurate for practical purposes, especially as experience will ...
— Sea-Power and Other Studies • Admiral Sir Cyprian Bridge
... are expert seamen, but especially dexterous in swimming and diving. They fetch any thing with ease from the bottom of the sea, even at very considerable depths. The upsetting of a boat causes them no uneasiness; men and women swim round it till they succeed in righting it again; and then, ...
— A New Voyage Round the World in the Years 1823, 24, 25, and 26. Vol. 1 • Otto von Kotzebue
... different. Socialism implies popular selection of industrial leadership. Wherever tried thus far in the world's history there has usually been abject failure. The mass can choose leaders in emotion but not directors of industry. The selection of experts by the non-expert can be wise only by accident. If the selection is not popular, then Socialism is tyranny, as its enemies charge. If it be popular, or in so far as it is popular, direction is likely to fall to the great persuaders and ...
— The Inhumanity of Socialism • Edward F. Adams
... could report good luck. The woods goats, swift and elusive at best, were vanishing with the unicorns. The last cartridge had been fired and the bowmen, while improving all the time, were far from expert. The unicorns, which should have been their major source of meat, were invulnerable to arrows unless shot at short range in the side of the neck just behind the head. And at short range the unicorns invariably charged and presented ...
— Space Prison • Tom Godwin
... "run," and the sockeye season was almost over. For that reason I wondered many times why my old friend, the klootchman, had failed to make one of the fishing fleet. She was an indefatigable workwoman, rivalling her husband as an expert catcher, and all the year through she talked of little else but the coming run. But this especial season she had not appeared amongst her fellow-kind. The fleet and the canneries knew nothing of her, and when I enquired of her tribes-people they ...
— Legends of Vancouver • E. Pauline Johnson
... city in the reign of Henry VIII.(1558) The lottery was advertised in 1567 as being a very rich lottery general, without any blanks, containing a number of good prizes of ready-money, plate and divers sorts of merchandise, the same having been valued by expert and skilful men. The lottery was, as we should say at the present day, "under the immediate patronage" of the queen herself, and the proceeds, after deducting expenses, were to be devoted to the repair of harbours and other public works conducive to strengthening the realm. ...
— London and the Kingdom - Volume I • Reginald R. Sharpe
... of suicide was that the second joint of the first finger was pressing against the trigger. Mr. Challoner was an expert shot, and would instinctively have used the pad of the finger, ...
— Malcolm Sage, Detective • Herbert George Jenkins
... in the tunnel, poking here and there, but with little success. His week was about up, and he would soon have to resume his character as powder expert, for the debris was nearly all cleaned up, and another blast would have to be ...
— Tom Swift and his Big Tunnel - or, The Hidden City of the Andes • Victor Appleton
... board; but he quickly recovered it, and soon regained his credit. Shouts of laughter bursting forth on all sides when any such mishap occurred, showed that there was little fear of damage. The women and children kept generally on the inner bar, but were quite as expert as the men. On mounting to the top of the rocks we saw two of the men swim out beyond the rest, on the further side of the breakers. The natives seemed to be watching them attentively. Soon one of them was seen to dive, then the other. In a little ...
— A Voyage round the World - A book for boys • W.H.G. Kingston
... word of reply, Demdike snatched a sword from the wall, and the next moment was engaged in deadly strife with the squire. They were well matched, for both were powerful men, both expert in the use of their weapons, and the combat might have been protracted and of doubtful issue but for the irresistible fury of Nicholas, who assaulted his adversary with such vigour and determination ...
— The Lancashire Witches - A Romance of Pendle Forest • William Harrison Ainsworth
... never think of my old woman; I mean my Teresa Panza, whom I love better than my own eyelids." "You say well, Sancho," said the duchess, "and I will take care that my Altisidora employs herself henceforward in needlework of some sort; for she is extremely expert at it." "There is no occasion to have recourse to that remedy, senora," said Altisidora; "for the mere thought of the cruelty with which this vagabond villain has treated me will suffice to blot him out of my memory without any other device; with your ...
— Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... not likely to realize on your first introduction to a potato joust the amount of skill and practice required to really become expert in handling the fork. A slight turn of the wrist, a quick push and the practised knight will defeat the novice so deftly, so easily that ...
— Camping For Boys • H.W. Gibson
... and to compel such peasant communes to accept a feudal overlordship. Nor were they at all scrupulous in the means adopted for attaining their ends. The ecclesiastical foundations, as before said, were especially expert in forging documents for the purpose of proving that these free villages were lapsed feudatories of their own. Old rights of pasture were being curtailed, and others, notably those of hunting and fishing, had in most manors ...
— German Culture Past and Present • Ernest Belfort Bax
... on a sled and hauled to camp in one trip. Skinning them was but short work for such expert hands. All the choice cuts of meat were saved. No time was lost in broiling a steak, which they found sweet and juicy, with a flavor of ...
— The Last of the Plainsmen • Zane Grey
... ever learned their trades thoroughly. Some were taught to make sleeves; others cuffs or button-holes, and so on. The result was that in a short time each one became very expert and quick at one thing; and although their proficiency in this one thing would never enable them to earn a decent living, it enabled Mr Sweater to make money during the period of their apprenticeship, and that was all he ...
— The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists • Robert Tressell
... spirits, or whatever else their passions made them covet, or the colony could furnish. These unhappy men have been seen to play at their favourite games for six, eight, and ten dollars each game; and those who were not expert at these, instead of pence, ...
— Australia, its history and present condition • William Pridden
... asked in the House of Commons, where the expert in foreign affairs was not so rare as he became in a subsequent period; but the inquiries of inexpert persons were the most troublesome ...
— The Life of the Rt. Hon. Sir Charles W. Dilke V1 • Stephen Gwynn
... taking them with an earnest pursuit after these his pretended truths; persuading them, that they shall be as God himself, able to discern between good and evil (Gen 3:5). And in this he is exceeding subtle and expert, as having practised it ever since the days of Adam. These things being thus considered, and in some measure hungered after, and the rather because they are good (as they think) to make one wise (Gen 3:6). The poor ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... allurement, but at last he ventured to lift the diamond from the box. It was perfect, so far as he could see; perfect in cutting and color and depth, prismatic, radiant, bewilderingly gorgeous. Its value? Even he could not offer an opinion—only the appraisement of his expert would be worth listening to on that point. But one thing he knew instantly—in the million-dollar stock of precious stones stored away in the vaults of the H. Latham Company, there was not one ...
— The Diamond Master • Jacques Futrelle
... engagement. Maurice had passed his fiftieth year, so clean from dissipation, so full of vitality and the beauty of a long race of strong men, that he did not look forty, and in all out-door activities rivalled the boys in their early twenties. He was an expert mountain-climber and explorer of regions from which he brought his own literary material; inured to fatigue, patient in hardship, and resourceful in danger. Money and reputation and the power which attends them he had wrung ...
— The Indian On The Trail - From "Mackinac And Lake Stories", 1899 • Mary Hartwell Catherwood
... American, and said he had traveled a great deal. As my ill luck would have it, he stood in no need of my instructions. On the two or three occasions when he amused himself with my foils and my pistols, he proved to be one of the most expert swordsmen and one of the finest shots that I ever met with. It was not wonderful: he had by nature cool nerves and a quick eye; and he had been taught by the masters of the art ...
— Little Novels • Wilkie Collins
... are accustomed to making caches, they are expert at this; and soon sink a shaft that would do credit to the "crowing" of a South African Bosjesman. It is a cylinder full five feet in depth, with a diameter of less than two. Up to this time its ...
— The Death Shot - A Story Retold • Mayne Reid
... of those who are masters of the trade; not those who can write about it, but those who have practised it and proved their capacity. But those men, the generals who are, believed to have a grasp of the way to carry a war through, are all outside the Cabinet. The Cabinet has its chosen expert adviser, the Commander-in-Chief; but rumour or surmise hints that his advice has been by no means uniformly followed. Surely the wisest course which the Cabinet could now adopt would be to call Lord Wolseley to their board as an announcement and a guarantee that in the ...
— Lessons of the War • Spenser Wilkinson
... Sherwood. He was about nineteen and almost as big as his father. He was gentle with her, and showed himself to be an expert driver of the roan colts. Otherwise Nan might have been much afraid during the first mile of the journey to Pine Camp, for certainly she had never seen horses behave ...
— Nan Sherwood at Pine Camp - or, The Old Lumberman's Secret • Annie Roe Carr
... this service uniform under conditions entirely opposite you are convinced that for the German soldier it is one of his strongest weapons. Even the most expert marksman cannot hit a target he cannot see. It is not the blue-gray of our Confederates, but a green-gray. It is the gray of the hour just before daybreak, the gray of unpolished steel, ...
— With the Allies • Richard Harding Davis
... to wait," said Graham; "they can afford to wait. I know. I'm not a Latin. There's questions I want to ask some expert—about your machinery. I'm keen. ...
— When the Sleeper Wakes • Herbert George Wells
... Sumpitan, the (blow-pipe); expert makers of; method of holding; poison for darts of; the poison-carrying point; the spear ...
— Through Central Borneo: - An Account of Two Years' Travel in the Land of Head-Hunters - Between the Years 1913 and 1917 • Carl Lumholtz
... amputation cases. He was accustomed to cashing missing arms and legs at a thousand dollars apiece for the victims of rolling-mill and railway accidents, and when the sympathetic jury brought in their generous verdict Max paid the expert witnesses and pocketed the net proceeds. These rarely fell ...
— Potash & Perlmutter - Their Copartnership Ventures and Adventures • Montague Glass
... in a small way, Jimmie's father was a handy man with tools. He had no union card, but, in laying shingles along a blue chalk line, few were as expert. It was August, there was no school, and Jimmie was carrying a dinner-pail to where his father was at work on a new barn. He made a cross-cut through the woods, and came upon the young man in the golf-cap. The stranger nodded, and his eyes, which seemed to be always laughing, smiled pleasantly. ...
— The Boy Scout and Other Stories for Boys • Richard Harding Davis
... to decide whether he was an expert flirt with new methods, or really and truly a man with a heart as guileless as his eyes. But, at any rate, he was amusing, and April forgot her tears and anger completely in the pleasant hour they spent together until ...
— Blue Aloes - Stories of South Africa • Cynthia Stockley
... technical vocabulary; he stored away in his brain strange words as a squirrel sticks nuts and acorns into a hole. Hondo, tapaderos, bad hombre, tecolote, bronco, maverick, side-winder—rapaciously he seized upon them as bits of the argot of fairyland. He watched the expert roll the brown tube of a cigarette and yearned for the skill; he observed tricks in riding, and there was within him the compelling urge to ride like that; not a trifle escaped his shark-eyes, be it the way the men combed their hair, mounted their horses, or dragged their spurs. To-night ...
— The Desert Valley • Jackson Gregory
... Red Indian points his birch-bark. The bottom of the boat in either case was made flat, for convenience in hauling over shoals or up rapids. The inside of the boat was hollowed out by fire, with the help of the Indians, who were very expert at the management of the flame. For oars they had paddles made of ash or cedar plank, spliced to the tough and straight-growing lance wood, or to the less tough, but equally straight, white mangrove. ...
— On the Spanish Main - Or, Some English forays on the Isthmus of Darien. • John Masefield
... wander about in groups of kinless society,[352] and it is in accord with other evidence. Thus the Zaparos, belonging to the great division of unchristianised Indians of the oriental province of Ecuador, have the fame of being most expert woodsmen and hunters. To communicate with one another in the wood, they generally imitate the whistle of the toman or partridge. They believe that they partake of the nature of the animals they devour. ...
— Folklore as an Historical Science • George Laurence Gomme
... Charlemagne, about the year 757. In 812, Charlemagne had another one built in the same way. This is related by Eginhard, who was Charlemagne's secretary. In 880, Pope John VIII. had an organ from Germany, and an expert player was sent with it. It is supposed that this organ was the first ever used in Rome. Of the quality of these early organs little is known."—Answers also received from F. CROPPER, GAMBA, ...
— Little Folks (July 1884) - A Magazine for the Young • Various
... Peterhof with Rasputin at about three o'clock that afternoon, and on our return to the Poltavskaya I spoke over the telephone, at the monk's orders, to Doctor Badmayev, the expert herbalist who prepared those secret drugs with which Madame Vyrubova regularly doped the little Tsarevitch, keeping him in a constant state of ill-health and in such a condition that he puzzled the most ...
— The Minister of Evil - The Secret History of Rasputin's Betrayal of Russia • William Le Queux
... old dog at it; expert or accustomed to any thing. Dog in a manger; one who would prevent another from enjoying what he himself does not want: an allusion to the well-known fable. The dogs have not dined; a common saying to any one whose shirt hangs out behind. To dog, or dodge; to follow at a distance. ...
— 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue • Captain Grose et al.
... Those familiar with the Navaho admire their energy, industry, independence, and cheerful disposition, and their ability to attack the problems of life in a way that no other wandering tribe has exercised. On the other hand, cunning and trickery are among their characteristics, and they are expert horse-thieves. With the Indian, as well as with civilized man, honesty may be interpreted in various ways. If one should leave his camp equipage unprotected in a tent, it would be entirely safe from all except the renegade, already recognized by his people as a thief. But if one should turn his ...
— The North American Indian • Edward S. Curtis
... scattered through the surrounding sea. The frozen and barren land which this people inhabited obliged them from time immemorial to depend on the ocean for their sustenance: first, by fishing; later on, by piracy. They soon became expert navigators, though their ships were merely small boats made of a few pieces of timber joined together, and covered with the hide of the walrus and the seal. It seems, from the Irish annals, that they belonged to two distinct races ...
— Irish Race in the Past and the Present • Aug. J. Thebaud |
