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Scarcely   /skˈɛrsli/   Listen
Scarcely

adverb
1.
Only a very short time before.  Synonyms: barely, hardly, just, scarce.  "We hardly knew them" , "Just missed being hit" , "Had scarcely rung the bell when the door flew open" , "Would have scarce arrived before she would have found some excuse to leave"
2.
Almost not.  Synonym: hardly.  "He was hardly more than sixteen years old" , "They scarcely ever used the emergency generator"






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"Scarcely" Quotes from Famous Books



... were being wound up. Considering the fact that the stockholders had been assessed dollar for dollar of their holdings, and that, even with this assessment added to the assets, the depositors would get back only a fraction of their money, Vaniman could scarcely marvel at the hard looks and the muttered words he met up ...
— When Egypt Went Broke • Holman Day

... bringing forward the name of Isaac T. Hopper, and recognizing the part he took in its affairs, from the earliest moment of its existence until the close of his life, would be an unpardonable omission. A few words must be said where a volume would scarcely suffice. ...
— The Underground Railroad • William Still

... of consulting Dorothy's opinion. Indeed, they scarcely missed her presence when, a few moments later, she slipped from the room to have a ...
— Pretty Madcap Dorothy - How She Won a Lover • Laura Jean Libbey

... March 3d scarcely a bank in the country was open to do business. Proclamations temporarily closing them in whole or in part had been issued by the governors in almost all ...
— The Fireside Chats of Franklin Delano Roosevelt • Franklin Delano Roosevelt

... Kayan the name of the Long-Glats was Hu-van-ke-raw. Attached to Long Tujo is a small kampong occupied by the Oma-Tapi, who speak a different language, and almost opposite, scarcely a kilometre down the river, is another inhabited by the Oma-Lokvi, who speak a dialect other than Long-Glat. Not far west of here is a kampong, Nahamerang, where the Bato-Pola live, said to be Kayan. The Long-Glats ...
— Through Central Borneo: - An Account of Two Years' Travel in the Land of Head-Hunters - Between the Years 1913 and 1917 • Carl Lumholtz

... to the left, and just at sunrise found that we were at the edge of the forest once more, with a well-defined track, showing where the river ran. Where we stood we were under the shade of the great trees, where scarcely anything grew beneath the spreading, tangled branches, while just beyond them there was a dense thicket of succulent growth glittering in the sunshine, where the leaves were still moist with dew, and some hundred or a hundred and fifty yards away there once more was the other edge of the ...
— Mass' George - A Boy's Adventures in the Old Savannah • George Manville Fenn

... interfered with. These investigations all have shown that the railroads first crushed out the small operators by a conspiracy of rates, blockades and reprisals, and then by a juggling process of stocks and bonds, bought in the mines with the expenditure of scarcely any actual money. Having done this they formed a monopoly and raised prices which, in law, was a criminal conspiracy. The same weapons destructively used against the small coal operators years ago are still being employed against the few independent companies remaining in the coal fields, ...
— Great Fortunes from Railroads • Gustavus Myers

... servant, a fine upstanding young Korean, Wo by name, who had been out on many hunting and mining expeditions. I noticed that he was looking uneasy, and I was scarcely surprised when at the end of the third day he came to me with downcast eyes. "Master," he said, "my heart is very much frightened. Please excuse me ...
— Korea's Fight for Freedom • F.A. McKenzie

... second Manassas, at Sharpsburg, Fredericksburg, the last day at Chancellorsville, to Pennsylvania, at Gettysburg, and back to the Rappahannock. From the commencement of the campaign in 1864 at Orange, till its close around Petersburg, the saddle was scarcely off his back, as he passed through the fire of the Wilderness, Spottsylvania, Cold Harbour, and across the James River. He was almost in daily requisition in the winter of 1864-65 on the long line of defenses from Chickahominy, north of Richmond, to Hatcher's Run, south of the ...
— Recollections and Letters of General Robert E. Lee • Captain Robert E. Lee, His Son

... of his magical power through letting his young wolf grandson fall through the thin ice and drown. No one knew where his grandmother had gone to. He married the arrow maker's daughter, and became the father of several children, but he was very poor and scarcely able to procure a living. His lodge was pitched in a distant part of the country, where he could get no game, and it was winter time. One day he said to his wife, "I will go out walking and see if I can find ...
— The Junior Classics, Volume 1 • Willam Patten

... this, nor regards it as God's Word, because it sees that those who trust in God and not in Mammon suffer care and want, and the devil opposes and resists them, that they have neither money, favor, nor honor, and, besides, can scarcely support life; while, on the other hand, those who serve Mammon have power, favor, honor, possessions, and every comfort in the eyes of the world. For this reason, these words must be grasped as being directed against such appearances; and we must consider ...
— The Large Catechism by Dr. Martin Luther

... that a bill might be brought in for the association of all his majesty's Protestant subjects. He also openly denounced the king's counsellors, and voted for an address to remove them. He appeared in defence of Lord Russell at his trial, at a time when it was scarcely more criminal to be an accomplice than a witness. After the condemnation he gave the utmost possible proof of his attachment by offering to exchange clothes with Lord Russell in the prison, remain in ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 8, Slice 3 - "Destructors" to "Diameter" • Various

... were a blank in his mind. On reaching Bonn, he went straight from the station to the old house in ———strasse. As he turned into it from the scarcely less familiar streets leading thither, and noted each accustomed landmark, he seemed to have just returned to tea from an afternoon lecture at the university. In every feature of the street some memory lurked, and, as he passed, threw out delaying tendrils, ...
— Lost - 1898 • Edward Bellamy

... confess, that he formed his style upon the model of Sir Thomas Brown. The great number of excellent translations which were constantly appearing through all its progressive stages of improvement, must naturally have given the language a classical turn. It is scarcely possible that a work so extensive, and so universally read, as Pope's admirable translation of Homer, should not leave some gloss of grecism upon the idiom into which so many of its greatest beauties had been transfused. At the same ...
— The Fourth Book of Virgil's Aeneid and the Ninth Book of Voltaire's Henriad • Virgil and Voltaire

... cloth to be spread under the shade of a great oak, on the grassy margin of a clear running stream; and to their astonishment, they were served, not with the flesh of the boar, but with dainty cheer, such as the merchant had scarcely hoped to find out of the walls of his ...
— Wolfert's Roost and Miscellanies • Washington Irving

... made upon his thoughts by Haco's warnings could scarcely fail to yield beneath the prodigal courtesies lavished upon him, and the frank openness with which William laughingly excused himself for having so long detained the hostages, "in order, my guest, to make thee come and fetch them. And, by St. Valery, now thou art here, thou shalt not depart, ...
— Harold, Complete - The Last Of The Saxon Kings • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... ask anybody to take me," she said with evident amusement, "and possibly, if Mr. Dalton tries hard, he may find somebody even to take you, Joyce. I scarcely think ...
— Joyce's Investments - A Story for Girls • Fannie E. Newberry

... above, appointed his seven great disciples to be the teachers of this association of people, to whom they imparted their wisdom and precepts. Many of these ancient Indians needed but little preparation for reviving within them the scarcely extinct faculties leading to observation of the supersensible world. For longing after that world was really a fundamental quality of the Indian soul. It was felt that man's original home was in that world. He is transplanted out ...
— An Outline of Occult Science • Rudolf Steiner

... were thrown into the Rhine by the Gaulish conquerors of Mallius.[837] We have seen that the white oxen sacrificed at the mistletoe ritual may once have been representatives of the vegetation-spirit, which also animated the oak and the mistletoe. Among the insular Celts animal sacrifices are scarcely mentioned in the texts, probably through suppression by later scribes, but the lives of Irish saints contain a few notices of the custom, e.g. that of S. Patrick, which describes the gathering of princes, ...
— The Religion of the Ancient Celts • J. A. MacCulloch

... continue fully in force. This expedient, although, it was very prejudicial to our evident and peaceful possession to discontinue it by any compact, and withal a compact made with the side opposing us, the ambassadors would scarcely listen to, declaring that they were not empowered by the King of Portugal to discuss any halfway measures. And afterwards, although with great urging on our part they consented to write the latter concerning this question (and they say they did write ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1803 • Emma Helen Blair

... extricating himself from the grasp of an outstretched marble hand, which bad seemed to clutch desperately at his elbow, and narrowly escaping a plunge into a too convenient bird's bath, turned to see her eyes following him, and waved gaily, but she scarcely realized that he had done so. It was rather with the eye of her mind that she was contemplating the dark, quadrangular area outstretched before her. In spirit she was moving to and fro among the statuary, bringing a housewifely ...
— Outside Inn • Ethel M. Kelley

... years, had been taught nothing but Latin, and had little or no access to English books of poetry and romance, I should have acquired about the same amount of Latin as I suppose Shakspere to have possessed. Yet I could scarcely, like him, have made the second syllable in "Posthumus" long! Sir Walter Scott, however, was guilty of similar false quantities: he and Shakspere ...
— Shakespeare, Bacon and the Great Unknown • Andrew Lang

... carcasses of many dead animals lay half-buried in the mud. Up on a little knoll where a few stunted trees grew, the negroes dug a long, deep hole. Mother's eyes were often filled with tears that day, and the cowboys scarcely talked at all when they gathered at ...
— Cow-Country • B. M. Bower

... barrows on Cranbury Common. In 1882 and 1883 the Dowager Lady Heathcote, assisted by Captain John Thorp, began to search the barrows on the left hand side of the high road from Hursley to Southampton, and found all had been opened in the centre, but scarcely searched at all on the sides. In July they found four or five urns of unbaked clay in one barrow—of early British make, very coarse, all either full of black earth or calcined bones, and all inverted and very rough in material, with the exception of one which was of a finer ...
— John Keble's Parishes • Charlotte M Yonge

... the river, clinging with one arm thrown over a log, expecting each moment the musket of some startled picket would spit red through the dark, and scarcely daring to guide my unwieldy support by the slightest movement of hand in the water. The splash of motion might mean death in an instant, for keen eyes, sharpened by long night vigils, were on the stream, ...
— Love Under Fire • Randall Parrish

... without representation." So the Stamp Act of 1765 was repealed. The necessity for a continental revenue, nevertheless, remained, and in the effort to adopt some expedient, like the duty on tea, Crown and Colonies became involved in bitter disputes. The idea of independence, however, had, in May, 1774, scarcely entered the mind of the wildest New York radical. In their instructions to delegates to the first Continental Congress, convened in September, 1774, the Colonies made no mention of it. Even in May, 1775, the Sons of Liberty in Philadelphia cautioned John Adams not to use the word, since "it ...
— A Political History of the State of New York, Volumes 1-3 • DeAlva Stanwood Alexander

... I grant ye; but that were motive sufficient with Sir Christopher. Besides, what is it he would burn up but a heap of old logs, whose whole value could scarcely exceed ...
— The Knight of the Golden Melice - A Historical Romance • John Turvill Adams

... him curiously. She scarcely understood what she was thinking, but this man drew her. If she had realized in what way she would have fled his presence ...
— Jennie Gerhardt - A Novel • Theodore Dreiser

... bile,[7] sometimes to the kidneys and loins, sometimes to the bladder. If the blood is pure and clear, in large quantity, mixed perfectly with the urine and accompanied by pain in the right hypochondrium, it comes from the liver. Such urine presents scarcely any sediment. If the blood comes from the lrili vein, it is also rather pure, but less pure than in the former case, nor is the quantity so great, while pain is felt over the region of the seventh vertebra, counting from below. If it comes from the ...
— Gilbertus Anglicus - Medicine of the Thirteenth Century • Henry Ebenezer Handerson

... country is so essentially connected with every other and so superior in importance to them all that it is scarcely necessary to invite to it your particular attention. It is principally as manufactures and commerce tend to increase the value of agricultural productions and to extend their application to the wants and comforts of society that they deserve ...
— State of the Union Addresses of Andrew Jackson • Andrew Jackson

... which appealed to the imagination of the masses had as yet come to the front to create any strong desire for the ability to read. As a result, the education of the masses was in hand labor, the trades, and religion, and not in books, and the need for book education was scarcely felt. ...
— THE HISTORY OF EDUCATION • ELLWOOD P. CUBBERLEY

... and ten o'clock when Marshall Langham reached his office. He scarcely had time to remove his hat and overcoat when a policeman entered the room and handed him a note. It was a hasty scrawl from Moxlow who wished him to come at ...
— The Just and the Unjust • Vaughan Kester

... the White River, where they had left it. The banks of the Bahr-Seboth were precipitous and high, whereas those of the Bahr-el-Abiad were low, and on both sides covered with lakes, the remains probably of the preceding inundation. Scarcely a hill or mountain was in sight from the river till approaching the bifurcation, when the country became mountainous, the climate more cool, and the vegetation and trees around those of the temperate zone. ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 55, No. 344, June, 1844 • Various

... "The Ball breaks up,"—the printer prefers "breakes up,"—"in wild confusion" carried out? No one knows better than this present scribe what changes are necessitated at the last moment, and after the book is published. But an alteration which omits the point of the story is scarcely an improvement. It does not affect me that the demon Scroogins was reduced comparatively to a dummy, for poor Mr. SHIEL BARRY was suffering from dreadful hoarseness, and could hardly speak, much less sing. There were originally too many plums in the ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 98 January 11, 1890 • Various

... even for a moment, with pain. Madame de Maintenon entered into her sorrow, and went every day to bear her company at the pillow of Courcillon. Madame d'Heudicourt, another intimate friend of Madame de Maintenon, was admitted there also, but scarcely anybody else. Courcillon listened to them, spoke devotionally to them, and uttered the reflections suggested by his state. They, all admiration, published everywhere that he was a saint. Madame d'Heudicourt and a few others who listened to these discourses, ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre

... whether I shall do well or kindly in telling the reader anything about this beautiful design. Perhaps the less he knows about early art or early traditions, the more deeply he will feel its purity and truth; for there is scarcely an incident here, or anything in the manner of representing the incidents, which is not mentioned or justified in Scripture. The bold, hilly background reminds us that Bethlehem was in the hill-country of Judah. But it may seem to have two purposes besides this literal one: the first, that it ...
— Giotto and his works in Padua • John Ruskin

... Skippy scarcely heard. All he wanted was to have the drive over and to be alone with his memories. How bold he had been at the end when he had crushed her little hand in his! Had she understood—and just what had she meant when ...
— Skippy Bedelle - His Sentimental Progress From the Urchin to the Complete - Man of the World • Owen Johnson

... way, to account for these appearances. They had not yet learned to measure the distances of the stars, nor to calculate the motions of the earth. The changing of the seasons was a mystery which they scarcely sought to penetrate. But they spoke of these occurrences in a variety of ways, and invented many charming, stories with reference to them, not so much with a view towards accounting for the mystery, as towards giving expression to ...
— The Story of Siegfried • James Baldwin

... not go so far out of the track as it would otherwise have gone. When a man is in the right course, with a good hope of the port, rowing and steering, however toilsome, is a cheerful thing; but when the track is so far lost that the sailor scarcely hopes to regain it—then perhaps (God only knows) it requires more virtue to row and steer at all, even though it ...
— The Zeit-Geist • Lily Dougall

... passed on. I saw William frequently. Often he spoke to me of his love, and I scarcely checked him; I liked to feed him with false hopes, as once he had done to me. He did not speak again of marriage; I knew his pride forbade it. I also knew that he believed I loved him, and ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, Issue 15, January, 1859 • Various

... their depth cannot be estimated. They all empty themselves into one immense central chamber about two hundred feet wide, rushing into it with astounding velocity. . . . A more imposing spectacle can scarcely be conceived, and I doubt whether abysses such as these exist elsewhere in the world.' He places the falls in latitude 24d 2' 59", but corrects the longitude given by Azara as 56d 55' west of Paris to 58d 18' 8" — that is, 53d 57' 53" west from Greenwich, which certainly has some importance ...
— A Vanished Arcadia, • R. B. Cunninghame Graham

... the more conspicuous actors. The nation's profoundest gratitude is due to all of these brave men who by their skill and devotion in a few short hours crushed the sea power of Spain and wrought a triumph whose decisiveness and far-reaching consequences can scarcely be measured. Nor can we be unmindful of the achievements of our builders, mechanics, and artisans for their skill in the construction of our ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various

... by day, whereas the foe rarely attempted raids over our lines during daylight. However, after dusk, the air was filled with the planes, as the weather was particularly favourable, and the hum of the machines coming and going was incessant throughout the whole night. At times one could scarcely get any sleep for the continual drone they made, like the hum of gigantic bees around their hives. One thing certain was that we had almost complete control of the air and both out-numbered and out-witted the enemy to a marked extent. (p. 081) It was ...
— Three years in France with the Guns: - Being Episodes in the life of a Field Battery • C. A. Rose

... replied Torres, "to have you killed in her service. As to accomplishing her rescue, it is out of the question in the way you propose. You will inevitably be shot or taken prisoner. If, on the contrary, you have a little patience, and wait a few days, something may be done. This Don Baltasar, there can scarcely be a doubt, is with the army in our front, and his prisoner must therefore be free from his persecutions. Besides, admitting that your project had a shadow of common sense, how can you suppose, that on the eve of a battle against superior numbers, ...
— Blackwoods Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 365, March, 1846 • Various

... view of the country round but not the slightest appearance of water anywhere; start at 4 a.m. and I scarcely think from the look of the horse that he will be able to take me in. I never in so short a time saw an animal fall away so much. At 7 a.m. struck the tracks of our horses and camels as we returned from Cadhibaerri and followed them to camp. ...
— McKinlay's Journal of Exploration in the Interior of Australia • John McKinlay

... inhaling oxygen from either a bag or cylinder is a serious matter not easily overcome, and it has been suggested that the helmet invented by M. Fleuss might prove of value. This contrivance, which has scarcely attracted the attention it has merited, provides a receptacle for respiration, containing oxygen and certain purifying media, by means of which the inventor was able to remain for hours under water without any communication ...
— The Dominion of the Air • J. M. Bacon

... Temple scarcely blushed at all, she was so engrossed in trying to find out whether or not anyone was noticing any change. No one seemed to notice anything out of the ordinary. So, ...
— Masters of Space • Edward Elmer Smith

... emigrant-ship would, it might be thought, be somewhat dull and monotonous. As a matter of fact, it is scarcely ever found to be so. First of all, the little community of two or three hundred souls—men, women, and children—contrives to find sufficient fund for amusement in itself, in all ...
— Brighter Britain! (Volume 1 of 2) - or Settler and Maori in Northern New Zealand • William Delisle Hay

... if I were to think really lost, what you for instance have new found in your own powers of receiving and giving pleasure, the beautiful faculties you have, scarcely venturing even to show the consciousness of them, when it awakes in you, what a woeful conception I should have of God's not caring for us. He will gather all ...
— Hortus Inclusus - Messages from the Wood to the Garden, Sent in Happy Days - to the Sister Ladies of the Thwaite, Coniston • John Ruskin

... another in those of the South. As early as the opening of the nineteenth century, the social tendencies of the two regions were already so far alienated that they involved differences which would scarcely admit of reconciliation. It is a truism to say that these differences gradually were concentrated around fundamentally different conceptions of labor—of slave labor in the South, of ...
— Abraham Lincoln and the Union - A Chronicle of the Embattled North, Volume 29 In The - Chronicles Of America Series • Nathaniel W. Stephenson

... perpetual motion may pass for little likewise; but one thing which is worth mentioning, for indeed it caused him considerable distress, was, that in reading the Paradise Lost he could not help sympathizing with Satan, and feeling—I do not say thinking—that the Almighty was pompous, scarcely reasonable, and somewhat revengeful. ...
— Robert Falconer • George MacDonald

... can scarcely tell you, but very many years since. The old woman I spoke of said it was haunted when she rented it between thirty and forty years ago. The fact is, that my life has been spent in the East Indies, and in the civil service of the Company. I returned to England last year, on inheriting ...
— The Best Ghost Stories • Various

... at once, and so softly one could scarcely hear a yard away. Katherine was agitated with the thought that she was really being wedded, and hardly heeded when the Chaplain raised or lowered his voice; appearing almost like one in a dream, so blinded was she with the glamour of her ...
— Mistress Penwick • Dutton Payne

... regions into which the line and its constructors plunged. A smooth ocean of bright-coloured sand spread far and wide to distant horizons. The tropical sun beat with senseless perseverance upon the level surface until it could scarcely be touched with a naked hand, and the filmy air glittered and shimmered as over a furnace. Here and there huge masses of crumbling rock rose from the plain, like islands of cinders in a sea of fire. Alone in this vast expanse stood Railhead—a canvas town of 2,500 inhabitants, complete ...
— The River War • Winston S. Churchill

... here and there flowers and weeds entwined; while its front, turned to the south's warm breath, is enlivened by a few statues, round the pedestals of which creep the vine and honey-suckle. Though the footfall of time is scarcely heard on the soft moss, which oozes in patches from the broad terrace where princes trod, the hand of desolation seemed to be busy here; and as I looked around me, and observed how each relic of antiquity was crumbling ...
— A Yacht Voyage to Norway, Denmark, and Sweden - 2nd edition • W. A. Ross

... that the world might move forward and you and I enjoy the benefits of civilization. Remember it and be grateful to the past and to that vast army of toilers who offered up their all that you might, without effort, profit by the things it took their blood to procure. There is scarcely a comfort you have about you that has not cost myriad men labor, weariness, and perhaps life itself. Therefore value highly your heritage and treat the fruits of all hard work with respect; and whenever ...
— Steve and the Steam Engine • Sara Ware Bassett

... practice of piety, civil history would be almost reduced to empty dates. This reflection extorted from the pen of a famous wit of our age, in his history of the empire of the West since Charlemagne, the following confession: "This history is scarcely any more than a vast scene of weaknesses, faults, crimes, and misfortunes; among which we find some virtues, and some successful exploits, as fertile valleys are often seen among chains of rocks and precipices. ...
— The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints - January, February, March • Alban Butler

... the virtue and nobility of the bee, I don't see it. The only way in which she is able to accumulate all that honey at all is by massacring the unfortunate males by the thousand as soon as she conveniently can, a piece of Prussianism which may be justified on purely material grounds, but is scarcely consistent with her high reputation for morality and lovingkindness. If it could be shown that the bee consciously collected all that honey with the idea that we should annex it there might be something to be said for her on moral grounds; but nobody pretends that. Now ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 159, August 11, 1920 • Various

... shallow cant which holds up the errors of men of genius as if they were especial warnings, and proofs of how little the rarest gifts avail. Is it intended to put men on their guard against being geniuses? That is scarcely called for till those who yield to the temptation become more numerous. Do they mean, We, too, might have been geniuses, but we chose rather to be good and dull? Self-denial is always praiseworthy, and we reconcile ourselves to the Ovid lost in consideration of the Deacon ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 6, Issue 35, September, 1860 • Various

... Causing scarcely a ripple in the water, she paddled to the boat. There she clung to the rail and listened. She ...
— Wyn's Camping Days - or, The Outing of the Go-Ahead Club • Amy Bell Marlowe

... in his success; for it was no small achievement for a lad of his years to have killed, single-handed and poorly armed, a full grown polar bear. It was an accomplishment, indeed, in which a grown man and a more experienced hunter than Bobby might have taken pride; and a grown man could scarcely have employed better tactics, or shown greater skill and courage, after the first foolhardy shot had ...
— Bobby of the Labrador • Dillon Wallace

... things an' these the men Some day you'll long to see again. Now it's so near you scarcely see The beauty o' that big elm tree, But some day later on you will An' wonder if it's standin' still, An' if the birds return to sing An' make their nests there every spring. Mebbe you scorn them now, but they Will bring you back ...
— When Day is Done • Edgar A. Guest

... currents, when blowing through an open window upon smoke. What do you see? Sometimes the impression is strong upon your ocular belief that the window is driving the smoke in. You can hardly be convinced of the contrary—scarcely when five or seven minutes has absolutely rarefied the smoke so much that a book-lettering previously invisible has become even legible. And at last, when the fact, the result, the experience, has corrected the contradictory ...
— The Posthumous Works of Thomas De Quincey, Vol. 1 (2 vols) • Thomas De Quincey

... reached, to which motion is transmitted and in which vital energy is thereby generated. The hands have not the power, by kneading, manipulating, or rubbing to impress the system except in a very mild degree, and deep-seated organs and parts are scarcely influenced by the comparatively slow movements thus administered. Among the most important, mechanical inventions devised for administering motion as a remedial agent, is one which has received the name ...
— The People's Common Sense Medical Adviser in Plain English • R. V. Pierce

... be observed farther, that scarcely any practice can be conceived, however generally unreasonable and unjust, which may not be sometimes equitable and proper; and that if we are to lay aside all regard to futurity, and act merely with regard to the present exigence, it may be often proper to violate every part of our constitution. ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, Vol. 11. - Parlimentary Debates II. • Samuel Johnson

... the facts it seems highly probably that kinship society, as it exists among the tribes of North America, has developed from connubial society, which is discovered elsewhere on the globe. In fact, there are a few tribes that seem scarcely to have passed that indefinite boundary between the two social states. Philologic research ...
— Wyandot Government: A Short Study of Tribal Society - Bureau of American Ethnology • John Wesley Powell

... pool close by, so she knelt down and bathed her hands and face; and as she rose up she caught sight of herself in the pool, and for a moment she scarcely knew herself, for she was dressed so grandly. She had on a pink satin gown and a white satin apron with cherry-coloured bows, and a gauze cap, and red shoes ...
— Little Folks (Septemeber 1884) - A Magazine for the Young • Various

... visitor, as Lorraine judged him. He was an oldish man with the lines of failure in his face and on his lean form the sprightly clothing of youth. He had been a reporter,—was still, he maintained. But Lorraine suspected shrewdly that he scarcely made a living for himself, and that he was home-hunting in more ways than one when he came ...
— Sawtooth Ranch • B. M. Bower

... is too late; one struggle more, and the hush of a great and unknown fear falls on the wrangling nations; they are silent, and the world is his. He is the man who is already thinking when others have scarcely begun to feel; who is creating before the thoughts of his rivals have reached any conclusion; who acts suddenly, terribly and irresistibly, before their creations have received life. And yet, the greatest and the richest inheritance of all is not his, for it has fallen to another, to the man ...
— The Witch of Prague • F. Marion Crawford

... scarcely believe her ears. To stay on the stairs all day long seemed a funny punishment; and except for missing the row on the river, it did not seem a very ...
— Marjorie's Vacation • Carolyn Wells

... altogether unredressed: For although they have been set forth in the clearest manner by humble petitions to the throne, yet such an ascendency over us have the officers of the crown here in the minds of administration, that our complaints are scarcely heard; our very petitions are deemed factious, and instead of obtaining any relief, our oppressions have been more aggravated, & we have reason to apprehend ...
— The Writings of Samuel Adams, volume II (1770 - 1773) - collected and edited by Harry Alonso Cushing • Samuel Adams

... cochons," down to Zimmermann, the director of the piano-classes at the Conservatory of Paris, who, without hearing me, gave as a reason for refusing to receive me in 1841, that "America was a country that could produce nothing but steam-engines," there is scarcely an eminent man abroad who has not made a thrust at the Americans.—It may not be irrelevant to say here that the little Louisianian who was refused as a pupil in 1841 was called upon in 1851 to sit as a judge on the same bench with Zimmermann, at ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 91, May, 1865 • Various

... shelter. At length, when we were nearly under the peak, he began to ascend. The rise in this place was gentle, and the vegetation, chiefly composed of dwarf thorn trees rooted in the clefts of the rock, scarcely impeded our progress; yet Nuflo moved obliquely, as if he found the ascent difficult, pausing frequently to take breath and look round him. Then we came to a deep, ravine-like cleft in the side of the mountain, ...
— Green Mansions - A Romance of the Tropical Forest • W. H. Hudson

... flames of war continued in France, Coligni could find no leisure to send supplies to his infant colony, and Ribaud was obliged to abandon the settlement. Great were the extremities to which he was reduced in returning to Europe: one of his crew was killed for subsistence to the rest, who had scarcely done eating him, when an English vessel providentially appeared, took the emaciated crew on board, and carried ...
— An Historical Account Of The Rise And Progress Of The Colonies Of South Carolina And Georgia, Volume 1 • Alexander Hewatt

... divides into several small creeks, in swampy ground, covered with small melaleucas so thickly, that although they are not at all bushy below, but have straight trunks of from three to five inches in diameter, and from ten to twenty feet high, a man can scarcely ...
— Voyage Of H.M.S. Rattlesnake, Vol. 2 (of 2) • John MacGillivray

... young man complained to the National Convention that his elder brother, who had been acting as administrator of his deceased father's estate, had paid the heirs in assignats, and that he had received scarcely one three-hundredth part of the real value of his share. [67] To meet cases like this, a law was passed establishing a "scale of proportion." Taking as a standard the value of the assignat when there ...
— Fiat Money Inflation in France - How It Came, What It Brought, and How It Ended • Andrew Dickson White

... in the open street; but he recollected a third inn, whither we went immediately, and to our joy found just accommodation sufficient. We saw the carriage safely put into the remise, and retired to rest. The next morning, upon looking out of window, every thing seemed to be faery land. I had scarcely ever before viewed so beautiful a spot. I found the town of Baden perfectly surrounded by six or seven lofty, fir-clad hills, of tapering forms, and of luxuriant verdure. Thus, although compared with such an encircling belt of hills, Baden ...
— A Bibliographical, Antiquarian and Picturesque Tour in France and Germany, Volume Three • Thomas Frognall Dibdin

... retirement at Yuste, he expressed the deepest regret that he did not burn Luther at Worms. He was constantly urging Philip to use greater severity in dealing with his heretical subjects, and could scarcely restrain himself from leaving his retreat, in order to engage personally in the work of extirpating the pestilent doctrines, which he heard were ...
— A General History for Colleges and High Schools • P. V. N. Myers

... general sympathy when, sooner or later, he has to pay the claims of offended morality. Yet one could not help being a little sorry for Colonel Herrick, the leading delinquent in Mr. Jerome's play. For scarcely had they started for the Continent from Charing Cross (to be precise, the train was passing through Chislehurst) when the lady suddenly repented of her rash act and burst into unassuageable tears. If, on reaching Dover, ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, May 27, 1914 • Various

... sharp cry, the miner loosened his hold, and by the impulse of our own weight we shot, with a velocity not to be described, two hundred and forty-feet into the earth. The miner acting as a brake brought us up gently enough, so that we felt scarcely anything of a shock. Cecilia, to be sure, left her breath about two-thirds of the way up, and suffered some inconvenience till she accumulated more, and the curate forgot to loosen his hold on Elise for an unpardonable length of time, while he gathered his wits, and I could feel that he was ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, October 1885 • Various

... at the dread realities of your situation! The curses of the millions are upon you; myriads of brawny arms are already raised to hurl you to destruction! Of all the vaunted Past nothing remains to you save a few feet of earth, scarcely enough to offer you a grave. Even your last fortress, the castle of the Holy Trinity, can hold out but a few days longer. Where is your artillery? Where are the arms and provisions for your soldiers? Where are your soldiers? and what dependence can you place on ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol 6, No 5, November 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various

... Merwyn could scarcely have believed that he had sunk so low in Marian's estimation as her words at the close of the previous chapter indicated, yet he guessed clearly the drift of her opinion in regard to him, and he saw no way of righting himself. In the solitude of his country home he considered and ...
— An Original Belle • E. P. Roe

... from Hobart on the 19th of July and carried a strong fair wind to within a few days' sail of Sydney, when we experienced a current that set us 40 miles South-East in 24 hours; this was the more extraordinary as we did not feel it before, and scarcely afterwards; and our course being parallel to the shore, was not likely to have brought us suddenly within the influence of the currents said to prevail along the coast. The ship's position was 40 miles east of Jervis Bay ...
— Discoveries in Australia, Volume 1. • J Lort Stokes

... them. It might have been noticed coming across the water in a white line. With it came a gust of wind, to which that which had already been blowing was a trifle. There was no more talking, for nothing less than a shout could have been heard above the roaring of the wind. It was scarcely possible to stand against the fury of the squall, and they were driven across the road, and took shelter at the corner of some houses, where the ...
— With Wolfe in Canada - The Winning of a Continent • G. A. Henty

... and the better to attayne the same he toke her by the hande, and prayed her to shewe him the commodities of the fortresse. Which shee did so well, and with so good grace intertaigne them all the whyle wyth infinite talke of diuers matters, that the litle grifts of loue which were scarcely planted, began to growe so farre as the rootes remayned fast grounded in the depthe of his harte. And the kyng not able any longer to endure such a charge in his minde, pressed with griefe, deuised by what meanes he might enioye her, which was the cause ...
— The Palace of Pleasure, Volume 1 • William Painter

... moment in silence the justice of the charge. "I can scarcely be called fierce, I think, when I so freely take my chance of the possibility, the danger, of being influenced in a sense counter to ...
— The Ambassadors • Henry James

... cry of horror and disgust. It attracted the attention of my shipmates. We now looked along the deck. In several places were other dark clotted marks scarcely yet dry. Other signs there were which showed that plunder had been the object of the deadly attack, which, it was evident, had been made on the crew of the brig. Articles of dress were strewed about, and cases of provisions, ...
— Old Jack • W.H.G. Kingston

... victories flew with astonishing rapidity.[1552] The brevity of authentic accounts was amply supplemented by the eloquence of loquacious clerks and the popular imagination. The Loire campaign and the coronation expedition were scarcely known at first save by fabulous reports, and the people only thought of ...
— The Life of Joan of Arc, Vol. 1 and 2 (of 2) • Anatole France

... frontal muscle; these latter fasciae draw up the inner ends of the eyebrows and wrinkle the forehead in a peculiar manner, which we instantly recognize as the expression of grief or anxiety. Slight movements, such as these just described, or the scarcely perceptible drawing down of the corners of the mouth, are the last remnants or rudiments of strongly marked and intelligible movements. They are as full of significance to us in regard to expression as are ordinary ...
— Introduction to the Science of Sociology • Robert E. Park

... cravat. One hand leaned on a gold-headed cane, the other lay on his shirt front. His dark, thinnish face was full of insolent haughtiness. The fine long eyebrows almost grew together over the pitch-black eyes, about the thin, scarcely discernible ...
— The Jew And Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev

... asked me to share his tent until I could make other arrangements. He had no bed to offer me, but I required none, as I was thoroughly tired out, and all I wanted was a spot on which to throw myself down. A good night's rest quite set me up. I awoke early, scarcely able to believe in my good fortune. I was actually at Delhi, and the city was still in the possession of ...
— Forty-one years in India - From Subaltern To Commander-In-Chief • Frederick Sleigh Roberts

... bitter to Madeleine, it is her own fault; I would have been as true as steel to her if she had but trusted me. Now and again, when a hard word and look escape me, she gives me a great surprised, reproachful glance, as of a petted child that has been hurt; but mostly she scarcely seems to notice the change in me—Moonlike in dreamy serenity she sails along, wrapt in her own thoughts, and troubles no more over Molly's breaking her heart than over Rupert's determined suit. To me when she remembers me, she gives the old caresses, the old loving words; to ...
— The Light of Scarthey • Egerton Castle

... true, but all through the years of preparation for the war and during the war itself the Negro showed himself to be an uncompromising friend to the Union. In fact, of all the charges brought against him, there is scarcely a single instance where one has been charged with being a traitor to his country. This has been true whether he has been in a state of slavery or ...
— The Future of the American Negro • Booker T. Washington

... that De Castro had sailed away, leaving only a detachment of ten vessels before Malacca. Matelief at once attacked this force, whose strength was about equal to his own, and with such success that he sank or burnt every single ship of the enemy with scarcely any ...
— History of Holland • George Edmundson

... a husband and father who sells his wife to a merchant, and his son to a cowherd, in order that he may be able to keep his promise to a holy mendicant, and bestow upon him two pounds and a half of gold, can scarcely be expected to invest itself, to western eyes, with the air of a manly virtue. In the same way, the great sitting powers displayed by King Burtal, who never once moves from his seat in the jungle for twelve whole years, during which space of time he neither eats ...
— Indian Fairy Tales • Anonymous

... that Roger barely noticed how slowly he was riding. As he rode along he liked to watch the broad winding bridle path with its bobbing procession of riders that kept appearing before him under the tall spreading trees. Though he knew scarcely anyone by name, he was a familiar figure here and he recognized scores of faces. To many men he nodded at passing, and to not a few alluring young dames, ardent creatures with bright eyes who gave him smiles of greeting, Roger gravely raised his hat. One was "The Silver Lady" in a ...
— His Family • Ernest Poole

... Scarcely less is it used in Italy, and other parts of southern Europe. It was first introduced into Europe from the East by the great family of Polenta, who ruled the important town of Ravenna for nearly two hundred years. Ground maize is still ...
— On the Pampas • G. A. Henty

... patriotic self-love, often wounded by the ignorance of Europeans, above all in what concerns the New World, if only that national pride were without mixture of personal vanity; but how comes it that Mark Twain, so severe upon those poor Turks, finds scarcely anything to criticize in Russia, where absolutism has nevertheless not ceased to flourish? We need not seek far for the cause of this indulgence: the Czar received our ferocious republicans; the Empress, and the Grand Duchess Mary, ...
— Mark Twain • Archibald Henderson

... Osgod—who had scarcely spoken since his fall, so furious was he at having been outwitted by a boy, and having not only allowed him to escape, but being himself rolled in the mire—raised his voice in a tremendous shout. All listened intently, but ...
— Wulf the Saxon - A Story of the Norman Conquest • G. A. Henty

... broken, bass. It is suggestive of his having roosted during the night in a draft, which has inflamed his vocal chords so that his tones have lost their sweetness. It is as if a coffee-mill had essayed to crow. The theme is taken up by a thin-voiced rooster a quarter of a mile away, and scarcely has he reached the concluding note before a baritone cock, a little more remote, repeats the cadence, only to have his song broken in upon by a nearer bird who understands exactly the part he is to play in the fugue. And so it passes on from the one to the other, ...
— Elbow-Room - A Novel Without a Plot • Charles Heber Clark (AKA Max Adeler)

... street. It was the man who at the temperance meeting had begun with "bah!" and "pooh!" and had ended by putting on the Blue Ribbon. He had once been a comrade of Ned Frog, but had become so very respectable that his old chum scarcely recognised him. ...
— Dusty Diamonds Cut and Polished - A Tale of City Arab Life and Adventure • R.M. Ballantyne

... the steep hill with my train, scarcely any greeting was addressed to me, no shouts of haeremai, so universal a welcome to the ...
— A Dictionary of Austral English • Edward Morris

... on the ways of Fate Long hours he daily wasted, His food remained upon his plate, 'Twas scarcely touched or tasted: He said the bitter things of love, All lovers, save a few, say, And learned by heart the verses of Swinburne, and ...
— Grimm Tales Made Gay • Guy Wetmore Carryl

... and rush off to spend it elsewhere, others to settle themselves in the country and develop schemes for financial outlay, profitable alike to themselves and to the land of their adoption. Now these permanent visitors were scarcely appreciated by the Boers. They foresaw the alien transformed into the citizen, and objected to him. The power which they had acquired, both by long years of hardship and long hours of scheming, they wished to keep entirely in their own ...
— South Africa and the Transvaal War, Vol. 1 (of 6) - From the Foundation of Cape Colony to the Boer Ultimatum - of 9th Oct. 1899 • Louis Creswicke

... threads in his hands, to deal with such numbers of people; his correspondence is enormous; his office, when he is at home, is surrounded and stormed by all sorts of people—Mohammedans, Chinese, Burmese, all waiting on his good pleasure and his nod. I scarcely see anything of him except at meals, and then he is too much taken up with eating to have time to spare for conversation; but we meet in one spot—music-land! He plays the violin; we do Beethoven together and ...
— The Road to Mandalay - A Tale of Burma • B. M. Croker

... front, when a staff officer rode rapidly along the column, crying out: "Little Mac is in command and we are whipping them." It was a futile attempt to evoke enthusiasm and conjure victory with the magic of McClellan's name. There was scarcely a faint attempt to cheer. There was no longer any potency ...
— Personal Recollections of a Cavalryman - With Custer's Michigan Cavalry Brigade in the Civil War • J. H. (James Harvey) Kidd

... West Point and served seven years; and then think of our ignorance in a military sense of the ground over which we were called to fight. Every one must agree that it was amazing. Even now, I can scarcely realize it. McClellan was as superior to us in knowledge of our own land as were the Germans to the French in their late war, and owed the success of his retreat to it, although credit must be given ...
— Destruction and Reconstruction: - Personal Experiences of the Late War • Richard Taylor

... cutbank, that formed the wall of a shallow coulee a thin curl of smoke rose and was immediately dispersed. So fleeting was the glimpse that he was not sure his eyes had not played him false. Long and intently he stared at the spot—yes, there it was again,—a gossamer wraith, so illusive as to be scarcely distinguishable from the blue haze of early dawn. Easing his horse from the ridge, he worked him toward the spot, being careful to keep within the shelter of a coulee that slanted diagonally into the one from which the smoke rose. ...
— Prairie Flowers • James B. Hendryx

... splendid view here," he remarked, staring steadily out of the window, for he felt rather than saw that the girl was a little shy—not shy, but, rather, that she scarcely knew ...
— Nell, of Shorne Mills - or, One Heart's Burden • Charles Garvice

... of the circle nearest the center is the path of the North star. The other arcs are the impressions left by neighboring stars, and it will be noticed that their brightness varies with their relative brilliancy. Many are so faint as to be scarcely distinguished, and, of course, telescopic power would reveal myriads of heavenly bodies which leave no trace on a plate in an ordinary camera. The North or pole star is commonly considered at a point directly out from the ...
— The Boy Mechanic: Volume 1 - 700 Things For Boys To Do • Popular Mechanics

... although his lips moved, they gave utterance to no sound. He could but stare into those eyes confronting him. Enright scarcely gave him opportunity. ...
— The Strange Case of Cavendish • Randall Parrish

... was the imperative duty of the person with whom the decision rested to select the safer method of the two, particularly when that method offered equally satisfactory results with the other. But, being merely a lad, and as yet scarcely certain of himself, remembering also that his future prospects were absolutely at Butler's mercy, to make or mar as he pleased, Harry contented himself with a disclaimer of any such feeling as fear, and expressed his readiness to perform the task in any manner ...
— Harry Escombe - A Tale of Adventure in Peru • Harry Collingwood

... Cyprus, because the winds were contrary, [27:5]and sailing through the sea by Cilicia and Pamphylia we came to Myra in Lycia; [27:6]and the centurion finding there an Alexandrian ship sailing to Italy, put us into it. [27:7]And sailing slowly in those days, and scarcely being by Cnidus, the wind not permitting us [to proceed in a direct course] we sailed under Crete, by Salmone, [27:8]and sailing by it with difficulty, we came to a place called Fair Havens, near which is the ...
— The New Testament • Various

... to Jesus' feasting, and could scarcely in the same breath find fault with Him for not fasting, but they put forward some of John's disciples to bring that fresh objection. Common hatred is a strong cement, and often holds opposites together for a while. It was bad for John's followers that they should be willing ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - St. Matthew Chaps. IX to XXVIII • Alexander Maclaren

... monopoly less injurious to the natives than hitherto it has been; the writer's labour will have been amply compensated. Interested as he still is in that Company, with a considerable stake depending on its returns, it can scarcely be supposed that he has any intention, wantonly or unnecessarily, ...
— Service in the Hudson's Bay Territory • John M'lean

... blinded with tears that she could scarcely see the pieces she took into her hand, she picked up each bit, and then on the spur of the moment hid them among the thick branches of hemlock. Now what was she to do next? Could she earn money to buy another hundred-years-old yellow pitcher? ...
— Miss Prudence - A Story of Two Girls' Lives. • Jennie Maria (Drinkwater) Conklin

... should be no longer elective, but should be appointed by the central government, directly or by its departmental agents. By law of February 17, 1800, there was established in each department a prefect, appointed by the First Consul, responsible only to him, and endowed with functions scarcely less comprehensive than, in the days of the Old Regime, had been those exercised by the intendant. The general council of the department was perpetuated, but its sixteen to twenty-four members were henceforth to be named for a term of three years by the First ...
— The Governments of Europe • Frederic Austin Ogg

... "it is true that I am an outcast. I have scarcely a relative in the world. But what you say about yourself is hard to believe. I have never asked you questions because it is not my business, but there are many little things by which one tells. I think that somewhere you have a family belonging ...
— The Lighted Way • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... muttered, scarcely audibly, "but I hardly thought it would come to this." Then after a short silence, he added: "However, in her state, it is quite consistent with the natural ...
— The Idiot • (AKA Feodor Dostoevsky) Fyodor Dostoyevsky

... scarcely noticed the small service. She was too intent upon her work of destruction. "You don't know him—yet," she said. "But anyone you meet can tell you the same. Why, he had a young cousin here—such a nice ...
— The Top of the World • Ethel M. Dell

... hand, each pressing his lips devoutly upon it. Then they rose to their feet. Nigel was the first to lower himself down the hole; then Simon; then the priest, who was instantly seized by the other two. The men-at-arms followed them. They had scarcely moved away from ...
— Sir Nigel • Arthur Conan Doyle

... Scarcely had the smoke of the long conflict cleared away or civil authority been fully restored in this long-besieged city, when General Saxton, then Assistant Commissioner of the Freedmen's Bureau, opened a school in the Memminger building on St. Philip Street, built for and since used for the education ...
— The American Missionary — Volume 54, No. 2, April, 1900 • Various

... the demons, but also the saints, are sometimes guardians of treasure; unless you will say that the devil had taken the shape of the prelate. But what could it avail the demon to give the treasure to these gentlemen, who did not ask him for it, and scarcely troubled themselves about him? I have seen two of these pieces in the ...
— The Phantom World - or, The philosophy of spirits, apparitions, &c, &c. • Augustin Calmet

... One may scarcely call an estimate in art matters complete without an opinion from Mr. Ruskin. "In art we look for a record of man's thought and power, but photography gives that only in quite a secondary degree. Every touch of a great painting is instinct with feeling, but howsoever carefully the objects ...
— Pictorial Composition and the Critical Judgment of Pictures • Henry Rankin Poore

... shaking the leafy boughs, and then dashing them suddenly against the ground'. Mr. Im Thurn bit one of the boughs which came close to his face, and caught leaves in his teeth. As a rule he lay in a condition scarcely conscious: 'It seems to me that my spirit was as nearly separated from my body as is possible in any circumstances short of death. Thus it appears that the efforts of the peay-man were directed partly to the separation ...
— Cock Lane and Common-Sense • Andrew Lang

... scarcely for a righteous man will one die: yet peradventure for a good man some would even dare to die. But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died ...
— An Explanation of Luther's Small Catechism • Joseph Stump

... "you often think I am asleep when I am not; and you think I scarcely have my mind about me yet, when I lie so long quite still, looking away into the blue sky: but I am thinking; I am always thinking, and very often I am praying—asking forgiveness for the past, and hoping that I shall be changed ...
— The One Moss-Rose • P. B. Power

... England and in America, felt that they had lost a real friend. Just at the present moment one does not hear or read a great deal about him, but a similar lull in criticism follows the deaths of most celebrities of whatever kind, and it can scarcely be doubted that Daudet is every day making new friends, while it is as sure as anything of the sort can be that it is death, not estrangement, that has lessened the number ...
— The Nabob • Alphonse Daudet

... guide and servant to the Western moneyed civilian who clothes his lower limbs in straight, funnel-like cloth casings, shaped to the strict resemblance of an elephant's legs, and finishes the graceful design by enclosing the rest of his body in a stiff shirt wherein he can scarcely move, and a square-cut coat which divides him neatly in twain by a line immediately above the knee, with the effect of lessening his height by several inches. The Desert-Born surveys him gravely and in civil compassion, sometimes with a muttered ...
— Ziska - The Problem of a Wicked Soul • Marie Corelli

... who said that he was the mate of the vessel to which the rest belonged, replied that he was afraid none of them would be able to walk across the island, as they had scarcely any strength remaining, and that he believed a few days more would ...
— Captain Mugford - Our Salt and Fresh Water Tutors • W.H.G. Kingston

... Emperours and noble men) in regarde of the great winde we were constrained to lye groueling on the earth, and could not see by reason of the dust. There is neuer any raine in Winter, but onely in Sommer, albeit in so little quantitie, that sometimes it scarcely sufficeth to allay the dust, or to moysten the rootes of the grasse. There is often times great store of haile also. Insomuch that when the Emperour elect was to be placed in his Emperiall throne (my selfe being then present) there fell such abundance ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, and Discoveries - Vol. II • Richard Hakluyt

... O-jeb-way, as the civilized natives of that nation now tell us the word should be spelled. His ordinary appellation among his own people was that of Pigeonswing; a name obtained from the rapidity and length of his flights. This young man, who was scarcely turned of five-and-twenty, had already obtained a high reputation among the numerous tribes of his nation, as a ...
— Oak Openings • James Fenimore Cooper

... shudder and her child-like face became a shade paler than before. Marguerite took her hand and gave it a kindly pressure. Juliette Marny, but lately come to England, saved from under the very knife of the guillotine, by a timely and daring rescue, could scarcely believe as yet that she and the man she loved ...
— The Elusive Pimpernel • Baroness Emmuska Orczy

... the terraced mansions, the sparkling equipages, the cavaliers cantering up the hill, the swarming multitude, and enter the region of which we are speaking, the effect is at first almost unearthly. Not a carriage, not a horseman, scarcely a passenger; there seems some great and sudden collapse in the metropolitan system, as if a pest had been announced, or an enemy were expected in alarm by a vanquished capital. The approach from Curzon Street has not this effect. Hyde Park has still about it something of Arcadia. There ...
— Tancred - Or, The New Crusade • Benjamin Disraeli

... of Greece which exactly answers to our word "God" as used in the passage cited. Individuals, by dint of piety or of speculation, might approach the conception, and probably many did, both in and out of the philosophic schools. But traditional ritual and myth could scarcely rise to this ideal; and it seems exaggerated to say of the crowded Eleusinian throng of pilgrims that "the race of mankind was lifted on to a higher plane when it came to be taught that only the pure in heart can see God." {78} The black native boys in Australia pass through a purgative ceremony ...
— The Homeric Hymns - A New Prose Translation; and Essays, Literary and Mythological • Andrew Lang

... current came a rakish york boat floating as idly as a piece of wreckage. Its hold was filled with bags of grain, on which squatted and lay many dark figures scarcely to be ...
— The Fur Bringers - A Story of the Canadian Northwest • Hulbert Footner

... the broadening shade Grow slowly over the mound, That reached with one long level slope Down to a rich vineyard ground: The air about lay still and hushed, As if in serious thought: But I scarcely ...
— The Germ - Thoughts towards Nature in Poetry, Literature and Art • Various

... lion-spring than ever; and it brought on him, in the aerial or vocal way, its usual result: huge clamor of rage and logic from uninformed mankind. Clamorous rage and logic, which has now sunk irresuscitably dead;—nothing of it much worth mentioning to modern readers, scarcely even its HIC JACET (in Footnotes, for the benefit of the curious!),—and it is, at last, a thing not doubtful to anybody that Friedrich, in that matter did read aright. So that now the loud uproar is reduced to one small question with ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XVII. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—The Seven-Years War: First Campaign—1756-1757. • Thomas Carlyle

... certain proportion criminals, and about as difficult a class to manage as I should think could be got together, and while there will be 200 of them in a single building night after night, from the first opening of the doors in the evening until the last man has departed in the morning, there shall scarcely be a word of dissatisfaction; anyway, nothing in the shape of angry temper or bad language. No policemen are required; indeed two or three nights' experience will be sufficient to turn the regular frequenters of the place of their ...
— "In Darkest England and The Way Out" • General William Booth

... in a haze—a haze of long evenings on the club veranda with the graphophone playing "Poor Butterfly" inside... for "Poor Butterfly" had been the song of that last year. The war seemed scarcely to touch them and it might have been one of the senior springs of the past, except for the drilling every other afternoon, yet Amory realized poignantly that this was the last spring ...
— This Side of Paradise • F. Scott Fitzgerald

... the day was very fair, and the omens all auspicious. She carried with her close to her heart two precious letters received that morning and scarcely glanced at as yet, one from Gardley and one from her mother. She had had only time to open them and be sure that all was well with her dear ones, and had left the rest to read on ...
— A Voice in the Wilderness • Grace Livingston Hill

... question might be mentioned. There is scarcely an oil field or mining camp in the world without a cherished tradition to the effect that, prior to discovery, the mineral possibilities had been reported on unfavorably by the geologists,—again implying that success has been due to the ...
— The Economic Aspect of Geology • C. K. Leith

... above humanity." Accustomed to reverence her uncle, Mademoiselle Cormon dared not initiate him into the desires which filled her soul for a change of state. The worthy man, accustomed, on his side, to the ways of the house, would scarcely have liked the introduction of a husband. Preoccupied by the sufferings he soothed, lost in the depths of prayer, the Abbe de Sponde had periods of abstraction which the habitues of the house regarded as absent-mindedness. In any case, he talked little; but ...
— An Old Maid • Honore de Balzac

... below the well, but I shall go in his place—that is, if I can prevail upon him to allow me—and endeavor once for all to put an end to this business: mark that I said, if he will allow me, although I scarcely think he will. Now, good-night, and many thanks for your good wishes towards myself and him. Accept of this, and good-night again." As he spoke he placed some money in her unreluctant hand, and returned ...
— The Evil Eye; Or, The Black Spector - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton

... follow you and do mine, sir," said the Captain, much moved, he could scarcely say by what emotions, they were so many ...
— Short Story Classics (American) Vol. 2 • Various

... be able to adjust their sights correctly and quickly. An error in adjustment so small that one can scarcely see it on the sight leaf is sufficient to cause a miss at an enemy at ...
— Manual for Noncommissioned Officers and Privates of Infantry • War Department

... and had perforce to encroach upon the scanty store left to me a bare quart at the outside; barely sufficient to keep life in me another day in the terrible heat. The horses, too, were suffering and would scarcely last that time, and I was now faced with the terrible problem as to whether I should attempt to return or to penetrate farther into the desert. To return would be difficult, for the storm had passed that way and all our spoors would be obliterated; moreover, we had gone ...
— A Rip Van Winkle Of The Kalahari - Seven Tales of South-West Africa • Frederick Cornell

... remained in force until the English invasion, and was observed for many centuries after outside the Pale. The bards dwell with manifest unction on the "fruit and fatness" of the land in his time, and describe him as the noblest and most bountiful of all princes. Indeed, we can scarcely omit their account, since it cannot be denied that it pictures the costume of royalty in Ireland at that period, however poetically the details may be given. This, then, ...
— An Illustrated History of Ireland from AD 400 to 1800 • Mary Frances Cusack

... they are?" asked the Franciscan in a hollow voice, scarcely stirring in his seat and making only a faint gesture with his skinny hand. "Here you have in the province a bridge, constructed by a brother of ours, which was not completed because the scientists, relying on their theories, condemned it as weak and scarcely safe—yet look, it is the bridge that ...
— The Reign of Greed - Complete English Version of 'El Filibusterismo' • Jose Rizal

... tool-traveler. From the moment when he landed in Calcutta to the moment when he watched the low coasts of the Ganges delta merge into the horizon far astern, India would not let him alone. He saw poverty such as could scarcely be described, and religious rites the very telling of which might sear the tongue. If China's poor had a certain apathy which seemed like poise, even in their wretchedness, not so India's, but, rather, a slow-moving misery, a dull ...
— John Wesley, Jr. - The Story of an Experiment • Dan B. Brummitt

... received yours. Mr. Conway, I suppose, has received them too, but not to my knowledge; for I have received but one from him this age. He has had something else to do than to think of Pretenders, and pretenders to pretensions. It has been a question (and a question scarcely decided yet) not only whether he and his friends should remain Ministers, but whether we should not draw the sword on our colonies, and provoke them and the manufacturers at home to rebellion. The goodness of Providence, ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole - Volume II • Horace Walpole

... such as Ekron and Ghederah in Judea, Yesod Hama'alah, Rosh-Pinah, Zikhron Jacob in Galilee—the last two founded by Roumanian Jews. Called into life by enthusiasts with inadequate material resources, these colonies would have scarcely been able to survive, had not their plight aroused the interest of Baron Edmond de Rothschild in Paris. Beginning with 1884, the baron, pursuing purely philanthropic aims, gave his support to the colonies, spending enormous sums on cultivating ...
— History of the Jews in Russia and Poland. Volume II • S.M. Dubnow

... his purse to his compatriot, telling him to come to him the next day, that arrangements might be made to secure the comfort of the family. The value of Piombo's property in Corsica, if sold, would scarcely maintain ...
— Vendetta • Honore de Balzac

... a Greek urn filled with priceless relics. Hundreds of brains, ancient and modern, are daintily picked of their best thoughts, and there is scarcely a page that is not enriched with some rifled treasure. It is, in fact, concentrated ...
— The Life Radiant • Lilian Whiting

... It is scarcely necessary to mention the fact, that there were several very cogent passages in the first draught of the Declaration of Independence that were finally omitted. The one most pertinent to this history ...
— History of the Negro Race in America From 1619 to 1880. Vol 1 - Negroes as Slaves, as Soldiers, and as Citizens • George W. Williams

... of Spirit can undoubtedly communicate with men, but, as a rule, its members have to pay dearly for exercising the privilege, while it is scarcely possible for them to do otherwise than lower and debase the moral nature of those with and through whom they have much communication. It is merely, broadly speaking, a question of degree; of much or little injury resulting from such communication; the ...
— Death—and After? • Annie Besant

... about it. Now that the moment was come, he almost doubted, himself, Hamish's guilt. All the improbabilities of the case rose up before him in marked colours; he lost sight of the condemning facts; and it suddenly occurred to him that it was scarcely fair to judge Hamish so completely without speaking to him. "Perhaps he can account to me for the possession of the money which he applied to those debts," thought Mr. Huntley. "If so, in spite of appearances, I will not deem ...
— The Channings • Mrs. Henry Wood

... the iron, the wood, the harbor pavement, the ships and the men—all swelled the mighty strains of this frenzied, impassioned hymn to Mercury. But the voices of men, scarcely audible in it, were weak and ludicrous. And the men, too, themselves, the first source of all that uproar, were ludicrous and pitiable: their little figures, dusty, tattered, nimble, bent under the weight of goods that lay on their backs, under the weight of cares that drove them hither ...
— Creatures That Once Were Men • Maxim Gorky

... Bahraetch and came south-east to Imaleea, on the road to Gonda, over a plain in the Pyagpoor estate, almost entirely waste. Few groves or single trees to be seen; scarcely a field tilled or house occupied; all the work of the same atrocious governor, Rughbur Sing. No oppressor ever wrote a ...
— A Journey through the Kingdom of Oude, Volumes I & II • William Sleeman

... an hour and was in truth ill with the cold when she heard,—and scarcely heard,—a light step come quickly along the passage towards her door. Her woman's ear instantly told her who owned that step, and her heart once more rose with hope. Was she coming there to comfort her, to speak to the poor bruised sinner one word of feminine sympathy? The quick light step ...
— Orley Farm • Anthony Trollope

... Penelope practiced her allotted hour with a patience born of the novelty of the experience. The third week the "hour" dwindled perceptibly, and the fourth week it was scarcely thirty minutes long. ...
— The Tangled Threads • Eleanor H. Porter

... she could not draw back—she signed; but scarcely had she done so when pride burst forth and ...
— Twenty Years After • Alexandre Dumas, Pere

... as that," she responded quickly, her eyes fixed on his face. She scarcely knew herself what she was thinking when she said it; but most people who read this history will think she was hinting that her assets might be united with his, and so enable him to wipe out his liabilities and do a good deal more besides. Yet, how could that be, since Carmen Dolores was ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker

... being a man of great good nature took no offense, although he could scarcely fail to notice Wallie's hesitation; on the contrary, he inquired ...
— The Dude Wrangler • Caroline Lockhart

... in bliss, the story turns Where hopeless Palamon in prison mourns. For six long years immured, the captive knight Had dragg'd his chains, and scarcely seen the light: Lost liberty and love at once he bore: His prison pain'd him much, his passion more: Nor dares he hope his fetters to remove, Nor ever wishes to be free ...
— The Poetical Works of John Dryden, Vol II - With Life, Critical Dissertation, and Explanatory Notes • John Dryden

... early as happily in later days. There is, perhaps, the most flagrant example of young Wedderburn in the Scottish Court of Session, when with dramatic effect he threw off his gown and declared he would never enter the Court again; but he rose to be Lord Chancellor of England. Scarcely less disrespectful (but not said openly to the Bench) was young Edward Hyde when hinting that the death of judges was of small moment compared with his chances of preferment. "Our best news," he wrote to a friend, "is that we have good wine abundantly come over; our worst that the plague ...
— Law and Laughter • George Alexander Morton

... expected. Nothing occurred of any consequence until the 20th, in the morning, when Captain McKay, visiting the picquet between three and four o'clock, perceived the enemy fording the River La Cole, and at the same instant heard them cock their firelocks in the surrounding bushes. He had scarcely time to apprise the picquet under Captain Bernard Panet, of their danger, when the enemy, who had surrounded the guardhut on all sides, discharged a volley of musketry so close that their wads set fire to the roof and consumed the hut. The militia ...
— The Loyalists of America and Their Times, Vol. 2 of 2 - From 1620-1816 • Edgerton Ryerson

... the fragmentary ejaculations of a private journal. But Mr. Parker never scrupled to exhibit before the world all that was worst in him. There are few chapters that will not recall defects publicly shown by the preacher and author. The reader can scarcely miss a corroboration of a shrewd observation of Macaulay, that there is no proposition so monstrously untrue in politics or morals as to be incapable of proof by what shall sound like a logical demonstration from admitted ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 75, January, 1864 • Various



Words linked to "Scarcely" :   hardly



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