"Firm" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... Still in the best of humour, the prince coolly reached out and felt Watson's biceps. His eyes became still brighter. If not an admirer of decorum, he could appreciate firm flesh. "Sirra! You ARE strong! Answer me—do you know ...
— The Blind Spot • Austin Hall and Homer Eon Flint
... "It's my full and firm conviction," said Obed Chute, after deep thought, "that this Gualtier gained your friend's affections, and he has been the prime mover in this. Both of them must be deep ones, though. Yet I calculate she is only a tool in his hands. Women will do any thing for love. She has sacrificed you to him. ...
— The Cryptogram - A Novel • James De Mille
... length Millard had secured a book with the title, "Guide to Good Manners as Recognized in the Very Best Society. By One of the Four Hundred," he felt that he had got his feet on firm ground. ...
— The Faith Doctor - A Story of New York • Edward Eggleston
... lately, since he had joined the firm, that he had been conscious of any great strain. College had given him a glimpse of a larger life, and the office cramped him. He felt vaguely that there were bigger things in the world which he might be doing. His best friends, of whom he now saw little, were ...
— The Prince and Betty - (American edition) • P. G. Wodehouse
... believed also that the joy which she took in it was but the prelude to a much greater glory, for her god so held her heart that no other desire could enter in. Thus the witches often went to the gibbet and the stake, glorifying their god and committing their souls into his keeping, with a firm belief that death was but the entrance to an eternal life in which they would never be parted from him. Fanatics and visionaries as many of them were, they resemble those Christian martyrs whom the witch-persecutors often held in the ...
— The Witch-cult in Western Europe - A Study in Anthropology • Margaret Alice Murray
... first firm he sought happened to be disengaged, a benevolent young man wearing gold spectacles, who received his request for guidance with sympathetic interest and unfolded to him the divers methods whereby British subjects could get married all over the world, including the High Seas on board one ...
— Septimus • William J. Locke
... efforts. The lodge being ready, the spiritualist was taken and covered all over, with the exception of his head, with a canoe sail which was lashed with bois-blanc cords and knotted. This being done, his feet and hands were secured in a like firm manner, causing him to resemble a bundle more than anything else. He would then request the bystanders to place him in the lodge. In a few minutes after entering, the lodge would commence swaying to and fro, ...
— Old Mackinaw - The Fortress of the Lakes and its Surroundings • W. P. Strickland
... shocked voice, "you utter fool. That's just the way all victims talk. As if you didn't understand just as well as I do!" he sneered with scorn in his voice, and a sort of resignation. "The best thing you can do is to keep quiet and try to hold your mind as firm as possible. This feeble attempt at self-deception only makes the truth harder when you're forced ...
— The Willows • Algernon Blackwood
... and said that there wuzn't one that looked so good to me as a goose feather piller would. And I had made up my mind that I wouldn't take a note or act as a Observer at all till Monday mornin'. So I faced the crowd and the Fair ground as not seein' 'em as it were, carryin' out my firm idee to begin' the job as Observer and Delineator the first day ...
— Samantha at the St. Louis Exposition • Marietta Holley
... father's advice, and make at least a worthy effort to support yourself, under what certainly is a heavy affliction to you, in a manner becoming your own character. For his sake—for my mother's, and for mine, too, endeavor to have courage; be firm—and, Una, if you take my advice, you'll pray to God to strengthen you; for, after all, there is no support in the moment of distress and ...
— Fardorougha, The Miser - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... timber business while there is timber to handle and breath in my body. I thought if you didn't make a profession of music, and had any inclination my way, we would stretch the partnership one more and take you into the firm, placing your work with me. Those plans may sound jumbled in the telling, but they have grown steadily on me, Freckles, as you have grown ...
— Freckles • Gene Stratton-Porter
... was very good; he used to listen with half-closed eyes, and I thought he was asleep. Then, roused by the silence, he would say a consoling word, for Victor Hugo could not promise without keeping his word. He was not like me: I promise everything with the firm intention of keeping my promises, and two hours after I have forgotten all about them. If any one reminds me of what I have promised, I tear my hair, and to make up for my forgetfulness I say anything, I buy presents—in fact, I complicate my life with useless worries. It has always ...
— My Double Life - The Memoirs of Sarah Bernhardt • Sarah Bernhardt
... to be found some way to the eastward of it. The scenery was not very interesting. Near them was a narrow neck of sand, with a few palm-trees on it, and a muddy lagoon on the other side. Still, men who have been long aboard are glad to find anything like firm ground on which to stretch their legs. Now the surgeon and the lieutenant of marines were constantly joking each other as to which of them possessed the greatest physical powers. If one boasted he had ridden fifty ...
— The Three Midshipmen • W.H.G. Kingston
... live to tell the tale," added Fleming, with a firm voice, as he put another match into the bottle, and then relighted the lamp. "Come," said Fleming, fiercely; "out of ...
— Jacob Faithful • Captain Frederick Marryat
... our recent dealings with other nations and our peaceful relations with them at this time additionally demonstrate the advantage of consistently adhering to a firm but just foreign policy, free from envious or ambitious national schemes and characterized by entire ...
— Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Volume 8, Section 2 (of 2): Grover Cleveland • Grover Cleveland
... firm, boyish will unwontedly befogged. Resolute as she was, she could not at once ...
— Other Main-Travelled Roads • Hamlin Garland
... bared arm, her breath held. The long square fingers closed once more with a firm grip on the instrument. "Miss Lemoris, some No. 3 gauze." Then not a sound until the thing was done, and the surgeon had turned away to cleanse his hands in the bowl of ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick
... merely with Cowardice, but with Wisdom, or Humility. One after another they emerge again from the dead level, the Parmenidean tabula rasa, with nothing less than the reality of persons face to face with us, of a personal identity. It was as if the firm plastic outlines of the delightful old Greek polytheism had found their way back after all into a repellent monotheism. Prefer as he may in theory that [47] blank white light of the One—its sterile, "formless, colourless, ...
— Plato and Platonism • Walter Horatio Pater
... into commission, press-gangs swept the streets, and in a short time a powerful fleet was ready at Spithead to revenge the insult. Spain, relying upon the Bourbon family compact and the support of France, was disposed to stand firm; but the old king, Louis XV., was averse to war, and Choiseul, among whose enemies at court was the last mistress, was dismissed. With his fall disappeared the hopes of Spain, which at once complied with the demands of England, reserving, however, ...
— The Influence of Sea Power Upon History, 1660-1783 • A. T. Mahan
... during the morning's battle a stream of protesting officers came to interview Hubbard. Their orderly officer was suave but anxious; their signalling officer admitted the previous arrangement to share quarters; Hubbard remained firm, and said that if the Infantry brigade had upset their arrangements, they themselves had upset ours. I was too busy to enter at length into the argument, but I agreed to send a waggon and horses to fetch material if they ...
— Pushed and the Return Push • George Herbert Fosdike Nichols, (AKA Quex)
... his bonds and make his escape, he remembered that he must remain where he was, for the sake of the sister he loved so well, whose life would be forfeited so easily, if he should carry to his nihilistic friends the knowledge he possessed. I found him weak, and worn, but still firm in the determination to await my coming. I unbound him, gave him food and wine and as soon as he was sufficiently recovered ordered my droshka and took ...
— Princess Zara • Ross Beeckman
... a bridge of twenty-six boats, laid over with planks, and kept together by iron hooks and chains, which are fastened to iron pillars on each bank, as thick as a mans thigh, so that the whole is kept perfectly firm and even. On crossing this river they came to a great city, where the ambassadors were more splendidly, feasted that in any other place; and here they saw a more magnificent idol temple than any of the former. They took notice also of three public stews, full of very beautiful harlots; ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 1 • Robert Kerr
... exercised continually powers over crops and cattle, mines and wells, storms and lightning, health and disease. Riches, honors, and royalties, too, were under the command of the powers of darkness. For that generation, which was but too apt to take its Bible in hand upside down, had somehow a firm faith in the word of the Devil, and believed devoutly his somewhat startling assertion, that the kingdoms of the world were his, and the glory of them; for to him they were delivered, and to whomsoever he would ...
— Hereward, The Last of the English • Charles Kingsley
... gradually cheered up, and by the time for departure was loquacious. But he had the oddest ideas of talk suitable to a drawing-room. Had he been permitted, he would have held forth to Monica by the hour on the history of the business firm which he had served for a quarter of a century. This subject alone could animate him. His anecdotes were as often as not quite unintelligible, save to people of City experience. For all that Monica did not dislike the man; he was a good, simple, ...
— The Odd Women • George Gissing
... Aiken answered. "It's like this," he began. "You must understand that almost every republic in Central America is under the thumb of a big trading firm or a banking house or a railroad. For instance, all these revolutions you read about in the papers—it's seldom they start with the people. The puebleo don't often elect a president or turn one out. That's ...
— Captain Macklin • Richard Harding Davis
... for several minutes, but the man scarcely took his burning gaze from the child's lovely face. At length she sighed ever so gently, and, seating herself beside him, dropped her firm chin into ...
— 'Smiles' - A Rose of the Cumberlands • Eliot H. Robinson
... our system is not to govern by the acts or decrees of any one set of representatives. The Constitution interposes checks upon all branches of the Government, in order to give time for error to be corrected and delusion to pass away; but if the people settle down into a firm conviction different from that of their representatives they give effect to their opinions by changing their public servants. The checks which the people imposed on their public servants in the adoption of the Constitution are the best evidence of their capacity for self-government. ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... Walden stared blankly at the firm face almost on a level with her own, for Marcia Lowe had ...
— A Son of the Hills • Harriet T. Comstock
... peaceful night[438], Unfelt, uncounted, glided by; His frame was firm, his powers were bright, Though now his eightieth ...
— Life Of Johnson, Volume 4 (of 6) • Boswell
... together for an oratorio at the Crystal Palace. Both are sane but philosophic, and not very far apart as philosophers, I understand; but some recent productions of Balfour send him far afield speculatively—a field which Morley never attempts. He keeps his foot on the firm ground and only treads where the way is cleared. No danger of his being "lost in the woods" while searching ...
— Autobiography of Andrew Carnegie • Andrew Carnegie
... must be fulfilled, or I shall forfeit my self-respect, my honor, and truth. But I shall be better, stronger,—I feel I shall, after passing this stern ordeal. It will soon be over, and I have a confidence so firm that it has the strength of conviction, that in this lonely conflict with the powers of darkness I shall come off conqueror, through ...
— Ernest Linwood - or, The Inner Life of the Author • Caroline Lee Hentz
... communicate his perplexity at the detection of the frauds practised on his employers. He had lately been employed in the office at Lima, where much had excited his suspicion; and, finally, from having 'opened a letter addressed by mistake to the firm, but destined for an individual, he had discovered that large sums, supposed to be required by the works, or lost in the Equatorial failure, had been, in fact, invested in America in the name of that party.' The secret was a grievous ...
— Dynevor Terrace (Vol. II) • Charlotte M. Yonge
... principal events. The next year saw two such tournaments, under the auspices of the Football and Baseball Associations respectively. The merchants of Ann Arbor gave prizes for these contests, some contributing medals, while one firm gave two boxes of cigars and another "the ...
— The University of Michigan • Wilfred Shaw
... The same shaking, wild-eyed, blood-shot-eyed and blear-eyed drunks and disorderlies, though some of the women have nerves yet; and the same decently dressed, but trembling and conscience-stricken little wretch up for petty larceny or something, whose motor car bosses of a big firm have sent a solicitor, "manager," or some understrapper here to prosecute and ...
— The Rising of the Court • Henry Lawson
... the crew of the Foam and a cloud of light skirmishers which hovered on their flanks. As they drew near, it was noticed that Captain Barber's face was very pale, and his hands trembled, but he entered the house with a firm step and required ...
— A Master Of Craft • W. W. Jacobs
... fillet a bluefish. Season with salt and pepper, and cook with melted butter and lemon-juice until firm. Take from the fire and cool. Prepare a Duxelles Sauce, boil down until thick, and cook the fish with it. Dip in crumbs, then in beaten egg, then in crumbs, and fry in deep fat. Serve with the diluted sauce poured around ...
— How to Cook Fish • Olive Green
... it served the double purpose of strengthening him in his resolve to present a firm front that for the time being could do no harm, and of keeping his opponent waiting. The effect did not quite come off. Under that enforced attendance, the Prime Minister had turned his back on the door, and wrapt in contemplation of the book-shelves ...
— King John of Jingalo - The Story of a Monarch in Difficulties • Laurence Housman
... now arise to help me; but for my sins He hath brought me into the snare, and hath left me. Then said Hopeful, My brother, you have quite forgot the text, where it is said of the wicked, "There are no bands in their death; but their strength is firm. They are not in trouble as other men, neither are they plagued like other men" (Psa. 73:4, 5). These troubles and distresses that you go through in these waters are no sign that God hath forsaken you; but are sent to ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... out of window, listened at his door; and all this time his purpose never changed. Remembering but too well the persecution he had already suffered at the hands of Mr. Yollop, the conviction that it would now be repeated with fourfold severity was enough of itself to keep him firm to his desperate intention. When he had done dressing, his thoughts were suddenly recalled by the sight of his pocket-book to his companion of the past night. As he reflected on the appointment for Thursday morning, his eyes brightened, and he said to himself aloud, while ...
— Hide and Seek • Wilkie Collins
... at a side table where her name card lay. Her eyes were fastened on Judith with a peculiarly penetrating gaze, and her firm grasp detained the ...
— Miss Pat at School • Pemberton Ginther
... Eritrea's most productive region, causing food production to drop by 62%. Even during the war, Eritrea developed its transportation infrastructure, asphalting new roads, improving its ports, and repairing war-damaged roads and bridges. Since the war ended, the government has maintained a firm grip on the economy, expanding the use of the military and party-owned businesses to complete Eritrea's development agenda. Erratic rainfall and the delayed demobilization of agriculturalists from the military kept cereal production well below ...
— The 2007 CIA World Factbook • United States
... engagement immediately followed. Later, the girl discovered he was already married, and that he had gone away from his wife and children, taking with him the compensation given to him by his employers, a firm of builders ...
— Love at Paddington • W. Pett Ridge
... wee darling," she crooned, "the plump little mannikin. What a broth he'd make, to be sure." She pinched his arm, and he started back in terror. "So firm and plump, to make the mouth water. ...
— David and the Phoenix • Edward Ormondroyd
... them in a way which shall give them share in the risks and interest in the prosperity of the business. The question is, really, whether the profits which are at present taken, as his own right, by the person whose capital, or energy, or ingenuity, has made him head of the firm, are not in some proportion to be divided among the subordinates ...
— Time and Tide by Weare and Tyne - Twenty-five Letters to a Working Man of Sunderland on the Laws of Work • John Ruskin
... This firm has branch houses in all the great capitals in Europe, and has probably lent money to every government on ...
— The Great Round World and What Is Going On In It, Vol. 1, No. 36, July 15, 1897 - A Weekly Magazine for Boys and Girls • Various
... himself. It was plain, by a paleness still greater than usual, and by those traces which loss of sleep leaves on the face, that he must have passed almost the whole of the night without sleeping. Contrary to the custom of a man so firm and decided, there was this morning in his personal ...
— Twenty Years After • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... things seem when I pick up a Wells book, or how averse I may be to launching out on a crusade of any sort, I always end by walking with a firm step to the door (feeling, somehow, that I have grown quite a bit taller and much handsomer) and saying quietly: "Meadows, my suit of armor, please; the one with a chain-mail shirt and ...
— Love Conquers All • Robert C. Benchley
... Napoleon's campaigns a consistency of plan which he here looks for in vain. If in his earlier combinations he did not in every instance take all possibilities into the account, but overlooked some, this must be ascribed not so much to the want of military penetration, as to his firm confidence in his good fortune, and in his ability to turn unforeseen accidents to his own advantage, or at least to render them harmless. Rarely has a general been so highly favoured by fortune for a long series of years as he. It is no wonder then that this confidence at length increased to such ...
— Frederic Shoberl Narrative of the Most Remarkable Events Which Occurred In and Near Leipzig • Frederic Shoberl (1775-1853)
... answer'd yet? Some men there are love not a gaping pig; Some that are mad if they behold a cat; And others, when the bagpipe sings i' the nose, Cannot contain their urine; for affection, Mistress of passion, sways it to the mood Of what it likes or loathes. Now, for your answer: As there is no firm reason to be render'd, Why he cannot abide a gaping pig; Why he, a harmless necessary cat; Why he, a wauling bagpipe; but of force Must yield to such inevitable shame As to offend, himself being offended; ...
— The Merchant of Venice • William Shakespeare [Craig, Oxford edition]
... in prices may enable them to take all that they give their men out of the pockets of the public. The strike by a trade union against competing employers has as one ground of early success the employers' distrust of each other. The danger is that as soon as prices become at all firm, one or another of the employers may quickly make terms with his men in order to seize the opportunity for new business. For this very reason, however, the range of possible gains from a strike running through a whole subgroup is smaller than it would be ...
— Essentials of Economic Theory - As Applied to Modern Problems of Industry and Public Policy • John Bates Clark
... what might be not improperly term'd an Excrescence in the Rock, the Heave on the Blast had render'd the Castle rather stronger on that Side than it was before, a Crevice or Crack which had often occasioned Apprehensions being thereby wholly clos'd and firm. ...
— Military Memoirs of Capt. George Carleton • Daniel Defoe
... think any one could have the effrontery to charge me with encouraging that mental effort which is so disastrous to the work of a soldier. The same old practices which led our forefathers to glory—the courage of tigers; the firm belief that if any one tried to be crafty it must be because he is a coward; a bull-front set straight at every obstacle, whatever its nature; a proper contempt for any plan or discovery made since the days of Father Uranus—these are the principles ...
— Hypolympia - Or, The Gods in the Island, an Ironic Fantasy • Edmund Gosse
... warnings old, that seer by words of might Subduing all things to himself—that priest, None other was than the uncomplaining boy Five years his slave and swineherd! In him rage Burst forth, with fear commixed, as when a beast Strains in the toils. "Can I alone stand firm?" He mused; and next, "Shall I, in mine old age, Byword become—the vassal of my slave? Shall I not rather drive him from my door With wolf hounds and a curse?" As thus he stood He marked the gifts, and bade men bare them in, And homeward signed the ...
— The Legends of Saint Patrick • Aubrey de Vere
... my morals no good, nor the smuggling any harm. Captain Williams was a silent man, and it was not easy to ascertain precisely what he thought on the subject of smuggling; but, in the way of practice, I never saw any reason to doubt that he was a firm believer in the doctrine of Free Trade. As for Marble, he put me in mind of a certain renowned editor of a well-known New York journal, who evidently thinks that all things in heaven and earth, sun, moon, and stars, the void above and ...
— Afloat And Ashore • James Fenimore Cooper
... eminent official city attorneys of Philadelphia, New York and Chicago have been found in this family. Ex-Governor Hoadley, of Ohio, a descendant of Jonathan Edwards, is now the head of perhaps the leading law firm of New York City or of the country. When one studies the legal side of the family it seems as though they were instinctively and chiefly lawyers and judges. It simply means that whatever the Edwards family has done it has done ably and nobly. There is no greater ...
— Jukes-Edwards - A Study in Education and Heredity • A. E. Winship
... and Mark in America, and the sixth, which described their first experiences, were published; and on the eve of the seventh, in which Mrs. Gamp was to make her first appearance, I heard with infinite pain that from Mr. Hall, the younger partner of the firm which had enriched itself by Pickwick and Nickleby, and a very kind well-disposed man, there had dropped an inconsiderate hint to the writer of those books that it might be desirable to put the clause in force. It had escaped him without his thinking of all that ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster
... up his home." Then I hung up the receiver and turned from the telephone, putting down my agitation with a firm hand ...
— Revelations of a Wife - The Story of a Honeymoon • Adele Garrison
... morning hymns or songs for recreation, is produced in nine hundred and ninety-nine cases out of a thousand in exactly the way set forth. If the vocal bands of children were less elastic, if they were composed of stronger fibres, and protected from undue exertion by firm connecting cartilage; in short, if children were not children, such forcing would not be possible. If it were not for the wonderful recuperative power of childhood, serious effects ...
— The Child-Voice in Singing • Francis E. Howard
... with restless etchings of sunbeam. Yet he knew that it was only to-day she looked past these things; that these really were her things; that she belonged to the jungle, not to the house. . . . She must greatly love this stupid cousin. . . . Skag never tired watching the firm light tread of her—like the step of one who starts out to win a race. . . . There was jubilant music of a waterfall—the priest reverently ...
— Son of Power • Will Levington Comfort and Zamin Ki Dost
... performance in this instance was the discharge of five rounds in eight seconds. In this instance the paths of the projectiles were simple and easy to follow, the flight of the shell being observed until it fell some 18,670 feet away. But the Krupp firm have found that trials upon the testing ground with a captive balloon differ very materially from stern tests in the field of actual warfare. Practically nothing has been heard of the two projectiles during this war, as they have proved ...
— Aeroplanes and Dirigibles of War • Frederick A. Talbot
... of the political community within which the question was raised; the fortunes and policy of the governors-general concerned in the discussion; the modifications introduced into British political thought by the Canadian agitation; and the consequences, in England and Canada, of the firm establishment of ...
— British Supremacy & Canadian Self-Government - 1839-1854 • J. L. Morison
... so," he grinned. "I sent a sample to a Chicago firm once. They replied to the effect that they would take all I could deliver, and pay thirty-six dollars a ton, f. o. b., my nearest ...
— North of Fifty-Three • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... prayer." There was such a ring of joyful faith in his voice I felt convinced there was one praying for me who had a firm hold on God. ...
— Medoline Selwyn's Work • Mrs. J. J. Colter
... of his hunting accounts doubtlessly spoke glowingly to Roosevelt of the huge profits that awaited Eastern dollars in the Bad Lands. Roosevelt, it appears, asked his uncle, James Roosevelt, his father's elder brother and head of the banking firm of Roosevelt and Son, whether he would advise him to invest a further sum of five thousand dollars in ...
— Roosevelt in the Bad Lands • Hermann Hagedorn
... calm temperament,—otherwise he would not have been happy in his business; a smile lies generally upon his lips, and his eyes are soft and benign; his hair is white, and his face, once ruddy, is pale, yet not shrunk and seamed with furrows as happens to so many old men, but round and firm; like his chin and lips it is clean shaven; he wears a black coat extraordinarily shiny in the sleeve, and a black silk stock just as he used to wear in the thirties when he was young, and something of a dandy, and would show himself ...
— In Luck at Last • Walter Besant
... oath,' I replied, with as firm a voice as I could command. Had I known the abject slavery to which those words would reduce me, I would have died sooner than ...
— The Pirate of the Mediterranean - A Tale of the Sea • W.H.G. Kingston
... room, with its bare, barrack-like, soldier furnishing, he stepped quickly into the bed-chamber in the rear and went unhesitatingly to the bureau. The upper drawer came out grudgingly and with much jar and friction, as the drawers of frontier furniture are apt to do even at their best, but his firm hand speedily reduced it to subjection. A little pile of handkerchiefs, neatly folded, stood in the left-hand corner. He lifted the topmost, carried it to the window, compared the embroidered initials with those of the handkerchief he took from an inside pocket, scribbled a few ...
— 'Laramie;' - or, The Queen of Bedlam. • Charles King
... hand, not because her loving gentleness won his forgiveness, but because he thought that no gentleman could refuse a lady's hand. And when she turned away with a long sigh and quivering lips, he stood firm and invincible, supported by the conviction that he alone of all those present had been right in everything. And such a conviction of one's own infallibility must be a very great support under life's ...
— Round Anvil Rock - A Romance • Nancy Huston Banks
... be talk of retreat after those terrible days of fighting before Santiago, the splendid old Confederate counselled holding the army where it was, and fighting the Spaniards again, if necessary. He said, "American prestige would suffer irretrievably if we gave up an inch; we must stand firm!" ...
— Young Peoples' History of the War with Spain • Prescott Holmes
... deliver you by kind means or by sharp ones, deliver you he will; and set your feet on firm ground, and order your goings, that you may run with patience the race which is set before you along the road of life, and the pathway of God's commandments, ...
— The Good News of God • Charles Kingsley
... the Seers of old called Prophets by men, they were filled with the terror of the Most High, yet like them they continued firm when they found themselves within the radiance where the ...
— Seraphita • Honore de Balzac
... man was pursued by a unicorn, and while he tried to flee from it, he fell into a pit. In falling he stretched out both his arms, and laid hold of a small tree that was growing on one side of the pit. Having gained a firm footing, and holding to the tree, he fancied he was safe, when he saw two mice, ablack and a white one, busy gnawing the root of the tree to which he was clinging. Looking down into the pit, he perceived a horrid dragon with his mouth wide open, ready to devour him, and when examining the place ...
— Chips from a German Workshop - Volume IV - Essays chiefly on the Science of Language • Max Muller
... third glume. It is very small in Digitaria and entirely suppressed in Paspalum. In Eriochloa it is reduced to a minute ridge lying just close to the swollen ring-like joint of the rachilla. The second and the third glumes are more or less equal and similar in texture. The fourth glume becomes firm and rigid along with its palea and usually ...
— A Handbook of Some South Indian Grasses • Rai Bahadur K. Ranga Achariyar
... was the firm answer. "They were here constantly. I shall send them a line; I don't like to have them think we have gone back ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume X (of X) • Various
... first Gov.-General of the Philippines, was born in Tennessee in 1847, the son of Judge Archibald Wright. At the age of sixteen he took arms in the Confederate interest in the War of Secession. Called to the bar in 1868, he became a partner in his father's firm and held several important legal appointments. At the age of twenty-four he became Attorney-General, and held this post for eight years. A Democrat in politics, he is a strong character, as generous and courteous ...
— The Philippine Islands • John Foreman
... two months of it now. The relieving column can't be far off," suggested John; for these foolish people in Pretoria laboured under a firm belief that one fine morning they would be gratified with a vision of the light dancing down a long line of British bayonets, and of Boers evaporating in every direction like storm clouds ...
— Jess • H. Rider Haggard
... munificent, tender, and bounteous to the poor, and loved a flowing hospitality. A keen sportsman, he was not untinctured by letters, and had indeed a cultivated taste for the fine arts. Though an ardent politician, he was tolerant to adverse opinions, and full of amenity to his opponents. A firm supporter of the corn-laws, he never refused a lease. Notwithstanding there ran through his whole demeanour and the habit of his mind, a vein of native simplicity that was full of charm, his manner was finished. He never offended any ...
— Coningsby • Benjamin Disraeli
... prospects, all our solid hopes for future greatness. He has taught us to maintain this union, not by seeking to enlarge the powers of the government, on the one hand, nor by surrendering them, on the other; but by an administration of them at once firm and moderate, pursuing objects truly national, and carried on in a spirit of ...
— The Great Speeches and Orations of Daniel Webster • Daniel Webster
... family. In early childhood I was deprived of a mother's care, but the tenderness of my surviving parent made her loss, as to my welfare, almost unfelt. Suffer me here to do justice to the character of my noble father. He united in an eminent degree the mild virtues of social life, with the firm unbending qualities of the noble Romans, his ancestors, from whom he was proud to trace his descent. Their merit, indeed, continually dwelt on his tongue, and their actions he was always endeavouring to imitate, as ...
— A Sicilian Romance • Ann Radcliffe
... how strangely, wildly rung That dictum in the world's dull ear, Breathed with a firm, unfaltering tongue, "No tyrant's pride ...
— Lays of Ancient Virginia, and Other Poems • James Avis Bartley
... the degraded dollar-chaser of European legend, then what is he? We offer an answer in all humility, for the problem is complex and there is but little illumination of it in the literature; nevertheless, we offer it in the firm conviction, born of twenty years' incessant meditation, that it is substantially correct. It is, in brief, this: that the thing which sets off the American from all other men, and gives a peculiar colour not only to the pattern of his daily life but also to the play of his inner ideas, is what, ...
— The American Credo - A Contribution Toward the Interpretation of the National Mind • George Jean Nathan
... That's just what I DO want you to do. Nobody can help me but you," he cried with that coaxing manner which would have seemed effeminate until one looked at his well-built, muscular body and the firm lines about his mouth. "You tell her of all the painters you knew in London when you lived there, and of what they do and how they are looked up to, and that some of them are gentlemen and not idlers and loafers. Mother will ...
— The Fortunes of Oliver Horn • F. Hopkinson Smith
... enough to scare them?" replied the Prince. "It seems to me that a body of men, to whatever nation they belonged, would require a good deal of hardening before they would stand firm and ...
— Trapped by Malays - A Tale of Bayonet and Kris • George Manville Fenn
... though the wood appears to be the same. Many of them are full one hundred and fifty feet high; but most of those that we cut down were decayed at the heart. There are, besides the forest trees, several other kinds that are firm good wood and may be cut for most purposes except masts; neither are the forest trees good for masts, on account of their weight, and the difficulty of finding them thoroughly sound. Mr. Nelson asserted that they shed their bark every ...
— A Voyage to the South Sea • William Bligh
... but those of Maud were now turned upon the fray, which was practically a hand to hand conflict. Nearer and nearer came the confused mass of warriors and then, scarce a hundred yards away, it halted and the Belgians stood firm. ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces in the Red Cross • Edith Van Dyne
... glass with a firm hand, she said, "Drink. This wine will give you strength, drink!" And she put the glass to the lips of the young woman, ...
— The Three Musketeers • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... another man to climb upon the first man's back, and stretch his hands up to mine. He did so, and I pulled him up beside me. The guide came next, then the other tourist, then Lord Beckenham. After which I took off and lowered my coat to the man who had stood for us all, and having done so, took a firm grip of the wall with my legs, and dragged him up as I had done the others. It had been a longer business than I liked, and every moment, while we were about it, I expected to hear the cries of the mob inside the mosque, ...
— A Bid for Fortune - or Dr. Nikola's Vendetta • Guy Boothby
... 1. The blade should be about 27 in. long with a handle of sufficient length to be grasped by both hands. The width of the blade near the handle is about 2-1/2 in., tapering down to 1-1/2 in. near the point end. Several ridges are cut around the handle to permit a firm grip. The cross guard is flat and about 1 ...
— The Boy Mechanic: Volume 1 - 700 Things For Boys To Do • Popular Mechanics
... in and around Red Wharf Lane could have told you, had they been able to speak, that things prospered with that firm. These jovial creatures, that revelled so luxuriously in the slime and mud and miscellaneous abominations of that locality, could have told you that, every morning regularly, they were caught rioting in the lane and sent squealing ...
— The Lifeboat • R.M. Ballantyne
... hardening down into a firm, decided look, while Lillie, stroking his whiskers and playing with his collar, went on ...
— Pink and White Tyranny - A Society Novel • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... then revealed: its walls smoothly plastered; the ceiling broken by great oaken rafters, brown with rain stains and time; the floor of small diamond-shaped white and blue tiles, very firm and enduring; a few stools with legs carved in imitation of the legs of lions; a divan raised a little above the floor, trimmed with blue cloth, and partially covered by an immense striped woollen blanket or shawl—in ...
— Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ • Lew Wallace
... he had come home after the armistice Ruth thought he was going to buckle right down to business with Mr. Cameron's firm. There seemed to be a super-abundant supply of energy in Tom that had to be worked off. And Ruth thought it would be worked off properly under the yoke of business. Besides, Mr. Cameron was getting no younger, and he ought to have the ...
— Ruth Fielding on the St. Lawrence - The Queer Old Man of the Thousand Islands • Alice B. Emerson
... partner of the firm of solicitors, Rodgers, Son, and Irvine, of London, had made his final statement with regard to Rosebud, and had now given himself up ...
— The Watchers of the Plains - A Tale of the Western Prairies • Ridgewell Cullum
... Ishmael would be as firm as a rock in a good cause; but I don't believe that he could be obstinate in a bad one," said ...
— Ishmael - In the Depths • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... you anything definite about it," he said. "I want to submit it to the firm. I wouldn't undertake to accept any such unusual thing for the magazine without consulting them, and especially seeing if they ...
— The Journal of Arthur Stirling - "The Valley of the Shadow" • Upton Sinclair
... their specialties. The headquarters of their wholesale trade | | is at the old Broadway and Grand street store, while their | | stock of carpets and oil-cloths is mainly limited to the | | Grand and Chrystie street establishment. Since the | | organization of the firm, five partners have retired with | | fortunes, to make room for younger men, thus affording | | opportunities for others to profit by the experience and | | success of the house. These changes have also had the effect | | to maintain the original ...
— Punchinello, Vol. II., No. 34, November 19, 1870 • Various
... the pleasure of giving a lecture on "Scotch Ballads," at a little village not more than half a mile from the birthplace of Dandie Dinmont. The place was full of sturdy, firm-knit Borderers, descendants of the dare-devil troopers who wrought such devastation along the Marches when the Stuarts reigned in Holyrood. Fresh, ruddy faces, coloured by breeze and sun; hard, keen, inquisitive looks; intelligence ...
— Literary Tours in The Highlands and Islands of Scotland • Daniel Turner Holmes
... boundaries; but there was no likelihood that they would come to agreement; and if France would make good her Western claims, it behooved her, while there was yet time, to prevent her rival from fastening a firm grasp ...
— Montcalm and Wolfe • Francis Parkman
... said a firm, deep, manly voice, in tones of friendship, rather than of menace; "I love a hound, and should be sorry to do an injury ...
— The Prairie • J. Fenimore Cooper
... place the destinies of this great enterprise in the hands of men born and bred in Africa. Then, and not till then, will the experiment of African colonization, and of the ability of the colonists for self-support and self-government, have been fairly tried. My belief is firm ...
— Journal of an African Cruiser • Horatio Bridge
... the question as to the reality of the progress attained by the arts and sciences, not our own rapture, but that standard upon the basis of which the division of labor is defended,—the good of the laboring man,—we shall see that we have no firm foundations for that self-satisfaction in which we are ...
— What To Do? - thoughts evoked by the census of Moscow • Count Lyof N. Tolstoi
... conciliating her stepson. She began by recognizing him outwardly as master, and secretly trying to dominate and guide him. But she soon found her mistake. Richard was accessible to kindness, and Mrs. Sefton could have easily ruled him by love, but he was firm against a cold, aggressive policy. Secretly he shrunk from his stepmother's sarcastic speeches and severe looks; his heart was wounded by persistent coldness and misunderstanding, but he had sufficient manliness to prove himself master, ...
— Our Bessie • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... being emptied. Whence the motion, which is generally regarded as the diastole of the heart, is in truth its systole. And in like manner the intrinsic motion of the heart is not the diastole but the systole; neither is it in the diastole that the heart grows firm and tense, but in the systole; for then alone when tense is it moved and made vigorous. When it acts and becomes tense the blood is expelled; when it relaxes and sinks together it receives the blood in the manner and wise which will by ...
— The World's Greatest Books - Volume 15 - Science • Various
... and devotees was exciting the pity and indignation of the townsfolk. The two brothers, who were now well known as partisans of the Revolution, were threatened with violence, and were saved only by their own firm demeanour and the intervention ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose
... Exit, immediately inside semi-tendinosus tendon at level of central popliteal crease. Fulness but no pulsation was noted at end of three weeks; seven days later pulsation was evident, and an aneurism the size of a pigeon's egg, with firm walls, became localised and palpable. It gave rise to no symptoms, and patient refused operation during the three weeks he remained in hospital. The aneurism continued to contract, and the patient was sent home. The aneurism has since ...
— Surgical Experiences in South Africa, 1899-1900 • George Henry Makins
... Conrad was very good to look at. He had tawny hair and kind brown eyes, a straight nose, and a good firm chin. He wore eye-glasses, and his face might have seemed severe had it not been discredited by his mouth. He was smooth-shaven, and knew enough to wear brown clothes ...
— Flower of the Dusk • Myrtle Reed
... Her head was inclined to one side, her hand so supporting her face that a prettily shaped ear peeped out from between her fingers. In the look of her eye there was a slight suggestion of immaturity, which, however, was contradicted by the firm outlines of her face. As the porter drew near her seat she significantly directed her look to a certain spot on the car floor, thence to ...
— The Hindered Hand - or, The Reign of the Repressionist • Sutton E. Griggs
... it seemed to me then! I remember that it gave Time a rather slow foot. I wrote the words very neatly and plainly on a sheet of paper and mailed it to Mrs. Dunkelberg. I wondered if Sally would stand firm and longed to know the secrets of the future. More than ever I was resolved to be the principal witness in some great matter, as my friend in Ashery Lane ...
— The Light in the Clearing • Irving Bacheller
... once, the shock was almost overwhelming. Then, the unequalled gentleness of her disposition, the unaffected worth of her affections, and miraculous simplicity of character and manners, which made her always appear as pure and innocent as an infant, took so firm, though gentle a hold on the heart of every one who approached her, that even those who have been comparatively strangers to her worth, have been greatly affected by her loss.... During the whole of her illness, she looked beautiful; and when I gazed upon her the moment ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 435 - Volume 17, New Series, May 1, 1852 • Various
... The house was old, and comfortably sturdy. It gave him a sense of refuge, of having reached a safe haven at last. The house was over-warm, and there was a musty smell of over-aged furniture, old leather, and the pungence of mothballs. It seemed to generate a feeling of firm stability. Even the slightly stale air—there probably hadn't been a wide open window since the storm sashes were installed last autumn—provided a locked-in feeling that conversely meant that the world ...
— The Fourth R • George Oliver Smith
... Aylmer, starting; but then he added in a dry, cold tone, affected for the sake of concealing the real depth of his emotion:—"I might well dream of it; for, before I fell asleep, it had taken a pretty firm ...
— Masterpieces of Mystery - Riddle Stories • Various
... are sometimes scanty, and partly because books themselves have been few in number. If we could prove that since the days of Caxton the world's total of original thought declined in proportion to the increase of published works, we should stand on firm ground, and might give orders for a holocaust such as that which Hawthorne once imagined. But no such proof is either possible or probable. We can only be impressed by the fact that the finest intellectual epoch of ...
— Introduction to the Science of Sociology • Robert E. Park
... States hereby severally enter into a firm league of friendship with each other, for their common defence, the security of their liberties, and their mutual and general welfare, binding themselves to assist each other against all force offered to, or attacks made upon them, or any of them, on account of religion, sovereignty, ...
— Civil Government in the United States Considered with - Some Reference to Its Origins • John Fiske
... in a firm, terribly hostile voice, "you have yourself, with your own hands, opened that window to-night; and you have opened it to him many other times besides. While everyone else here does his duty and watches that no person shall be able to enter at night the house where ...
— The Secret of the Night • Gaston Leroux
... in five years I laughed aloud. This was something worth. Here was an atom, not yet five, who took her pen in hand and misspelled her firm intention to do as she chose. I folded the paper and laid it aside, wondering what kind of offspring I had begotten, and the following morning took horse to Landgore to see this very determined little body ...
— Nancy Stair - A Novel • Elinor Macartney Lane
... sat on a bench of rock, their backs to him, unaware of his presence. Terry's trim head was bent forward as if he studied the western horizon; she leaned against him in gentle contact of firm white shoulder. ...
— Terry - A Tale of the Hill People • Charles Goff Thomson |
