"Alternative" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... There is an alternative. You are interested in social problems. You are a student of sociology. Those whom I represent are genuinely interested in you. We are prepared, so that you may pursue your researches more deeply—we are prepared to send you to Europe. There, in that ...
— Theft - A Play In Four Acts • Jack London
... therefore no alternative but to adjourn to the nearest confectioner's shop and eat some sweets there. That the night would not pass in peace we were sure; but nobody dared suggest that we should not pass the night in the haunted house. Once having defied the Ghost we had ...
— Indian Ghost Stories - Second Edition • S. Mukerji
... accepting the other in their place, he would fain make his hearers believe that he has always held and taught as he now wishes he had done. It is either a case of disingenuousness or of remarkable self-deception: there appears to be no third alternative." ...
— Chips from a German Workshop - Volume IV - Essays chiefly on the Science of Language • Max Muller
... have an extreme jealousy of their husbands and female slaves. If they observe the least familiarity between them, they set no bounds to their revenge against the poor creatures, who, in general, have no alternative but that of gratifying their masters, or experiencing very harsh usage from them. On such discovery, their mistresses punish them in different ways, whipping them with ropes; or beating them with ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 13 • Robert Kerr
... going on, all force must at last turn into heat, in which case all difference of temperature would be lost and universal stagnation and death would be the result. He then concludes in the following words, which we quote from Nature, Macmillan's weekly: "We are come to this alternative; either in our highest, or most general, our most fundamental scientific abstractions some great point has been overlooked; or the universe will have an end, and must have had a beginning; could not have existed from eternity, but must ...
— Fables of Infidelity and Facts of Faith - Being an Examination of the Evidences of Infidelity • Robert Patterson
... when it left the hands of its inspired Author was in a mutilated condition. The copyist shews that he was as well acquainted as his neighbours with our actual concluding Verses: while he betrays his own incapacity, by seeming to view with equal favour the worthless alternative which he deliberately transcribes as well, and to which he gives the foremost place. Not S. Mark's Gospel, but Codex L is the sufferer by ...
— The Last Twelve Verses of the Gospel According to S. Mark • John Burgon
... alternative but to obey, for the man literally dragged him through the crowds on the sidewalks, and continued on at a rapid pace until the two were at the entrance ...
— Messenger No. 48 • James Otis
... county families, and the fast airs of the daughter had been offensive enough to destroy all pity for her. If an action in a Court of Justice were, as Miles and Julius told her, impossible,—and she would not believe it, except on the word of a lawyer,—public exposure was the only alternative for righting Archie, and she could not, or would not, understand that they would have undergone an action for libel rather than not do their best to clear their cousin, but that they thought it due to Mr. Moy to give him the opportunity ...
— The Three Brides • Charlotte M. Yonge
... the journey with ease in half the time. But Felipe reflected that there might be many things for Alessandro to arrange at Temecula. He would doubtless return prepared to take Ramona back with him, in case that proved the only alternative left them. Felipe grew wretched as his fancy dwelt on the picture of Ramona's future. He had been in the Temecula village. He knew its poverty; the thought of Ramona there was monstrous, To the indolent, ease-loving Felipe it was incredible that a girl reared as Ramona had been, could for a ...
— Ramona • Helen Hunt Jackson
... maidservant, and the wild beasts bring her wood. The king sends his troops to burn the nunnery, Kwan-in prays, rain falls, and extinguishes the conflagration. She is brought to the palace in chains, and the alternative of marriage or death is placed before her. In the room above where the court of the inquisition is held there is music, dancing, and feasting, sounds and sights to allure a young girl; the queen also urges her to leave the convent, and accede ...
— Across China on Foot • Edwin Dingle
... language can be no judges in the controversy which on this matter is, or was lately, carried on; but we can all feel how vital the question, how enormous the interests at stake; while, not less, having heard the allegations on the one side and on the other, we must own that there is only an alternative of difficulties here. Nearer home there have been difficulties of the same kind. At the Reformation, for example, when Latin was still more or less the language of theology, how earnest a controversy raged round the word in the Greek Testament which we have rendered 'repentance'; ...
— On the Study of Words • Richard C Trench
... carbuncle." This is the reading of H. 2, 17; T.C.D; which O'Curry quotes as an alternative to "forty" of the Book of Leinster. "Each one of them fit to adorn it" is by O'Curry translated "in each compartment." The Irish is a cach aen chumtach: ...
— Heroic Romances of Ireland Volumes 1 and 2 Combined • A. H. Leahy
... heard him. What a frightful position! I had been leading a happy and an increasingly profitable life—no scrapes and no dangers; and here, on a sudden, I had presented to me the alternative of saving a wretch from the gallows or of spending unlimited years in a State penitentiary. As for the money, it became as dead leaves for this once only in my life. My brain seemed to be spinning round. I grew ...
— The Autobiography of a Quack And The Case Of George Dedlow • S. Weir Mitchell
... full-fledged saleswoman. For some reason there had been nothing said about the half day that she had lost, but Faith knew only too well that she would be heavily fined for her absence. Still, it was better than being discharged. She accepted the alternative thankfully. ...
— For Gold or Soul? - The Story of a Great Department Store • Lurana W. Sheldon
... November General Hildyard found that it was necessary either to reinforce the mounted troops that were posted at Willow Grange, thus dividing the forces at his disposal, or to evacuate the place. He decided on the latter alternative, and thereupon the Boers, with delighted expedition, commenced to make preparation for a ...
— South Africa and the Transvaal War, Vol. 2 (of 6) - From the Commencement of the War to the Battle of Colenso, - 15th Dec. 1899 • Louis Creswicke
... Grant, of an enchanted peacock squawking in the garden of a dream; the voice that cried: "and to him who would overthrow all this contentment, all this admirable adjustment of industrial equilibrium we offer the life and death alternative that is given to him who would violate a ...
— In the Heart of a Fool • William Allen White
... out as he sprang toward her. It was his life or hers. There was no other alternative. Murder was in his hands, in his soul. She realized this and even as he touched her, she ...
— The Light That Lures • Percy Brebner
... knew no sin had, in obedience to the Father, to take on Him the responsibility, the doom, the curse, the death of the sinful. And if any one says that this was morally impossible, may we not ask again, What is the alternative? Is it not that the sinful should be left alone with their responsibility, doom, curse, and death?"—Denny, in "The ...
— God's Plan with Men • T. T. (Thomas Theodore) Martin
... If my demand be refused, I will immediately invade thy dominions; and think not that I shall be satisfied with the conquest of Persia alone, the whole world shall be mine; therefore prepare for war." Dara had no alternative, not even submission, and accordingly assembled his army, for Sikander was already in full march against him. Upon the confines of Persia the armies came in sight of each other, when Sikander, in the assumed character of an envoy, was resolved ...
— Persian Literature, Volume 1,Comprising The Shah Nameh, The - Rubaiyat, The Divan, and The Gulistan • Anonymous
... 11. Ate the meat and rind of our ham-bone, and have the bone and the greasy cloth from around the ham left to eat to-morrow. God send us birds or fish, and let us not perish of hunger, or be brought to the dreadful alternative of feeding on human flesh! As I feel now, I do not think anything could persuade me; but you cannot tell what you will do when you are reduced by hunger and your mind wandering. I hope and pray we can make ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... Napoleon III., according belligerent rights to the Confederate States, and decreeing strict neutrality on the part of France. He was informed that it was necessary for the Iroquois either to cast anchor, or leave the waters of the isle, and if accepting the former alternative, that an interval of twenty-four hours must elapse between the departure of either belligerent; also that, in case of any breach of neutrality occurring, the forts would open on the offending party. After remaining stationary for ...
— The Cruise of the Alabama and the Sumter • Raphael Semmes
... kept from the use of spirits. He attributes this, in great part, to the undoubted fact that the men greatly exceed the women in number; but he does not know whether this is due to a failure of female offspring, or to more females dying during early youth. The latter alternative, according to all analogy, is very improbable. He adds that "infanticide, properly so called, is not common, though very frequent recourse is had to abortion." If Dr. Coulter is correct about infanticide, this case cannot be advanced in support of Colonel Marshall's view. From the rapid decrease ...
— The Descent of Man and Selection in Relation to Sex • Charles Darwin
... DEAR DAVID,—I have drawn three bills on you, and negotiated them with Metivier; they fall due in one, two, and three months' time. I took this hateful course, which I know will burden you heavily, because the one alternative was suicide. I will explain my necessity some time, and I will try besides to send the amounts as ...
— Lost Illusions • Honore De Balzac
... more as strenuous and as sustained as ever. On a subsequent division the ministry were left in a minority of thirty-five, whereupon Earl Grey proceeded to the king, and tendered to his Majesty the alternative either of arming the ministers with the powers they deemed necessary to carry through their bill (which really meant a power to create whatever new peers they might deem requisite for the purpose), ...
— English Caricaturists and Graphic Humourists of the Nineteenth Century. - How they Illustrated and Interpreted their Times. • Graham Everitt
... landing-place in a paroxysm of weeping. She always crept out of her mother's room on these occasions, for the sight of tears distressed and excited Mrs. Underwood; and the poor child, quite unable, in her hysterical condition, to drag herself alone up that steep stair, had no alternative but to sit, on what Mr. Audley called her stool of repentance, outside the door, till she had sobbed herself into exhaustion and calm—or till either Sibby scolded her, or ...
— The Pillars of the House, V1 • Charlotte M. Yonge
... really no alternative," shrugged the Captain. "But don't make impossible propositions. And be brief. It 's late; I 'm hungry, ...
— Captain Dieppe • Anthony Hope
... nothing; but there are also men who are there because they are strongminded enough to disregard the social convention (obviously not a disinterested one on the part of the ratepayer) which bids a man live by heavy and badly paid drudgery when he has the alternative of walking into the workhouse, announcing himself as a destitute person, and legally compelling the Guardians to feed, clothe and house him better than he could feed, clothe and house himself without ...
— Man And Superman • George Bernard Shaw
... whole personal history. I had no well-defined anxiety, felt no fear, was moved to no prayer, did not give a thought to home or friends; only it swept over me, as with a sudden tempest, that, if I meant to get back to my own camp, I must keep my wits about me. I must not dwell on any other alternative, any more than a boy who climbs a precipice must look down. Imagination had no business here. That way madness lay. There was a shore somewhere before me, and I must get to it, by the ordinary means, before the ebb laid bare the flats, or swept me below the lower bends of the ...
— Army Life in a Black Regiment • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... other rooms separate, and on one side is a storehouse, separate also, which will make a printing-office. It stands by the river-side upon a pretty large piece of ground, walled round, with a garden at the bottom, and in the middle a fine tank or pool of water. The price alarmed us, but we had no alternative; and we hope this will form a comfortable missionary settlement. Being near to Calcutta, it is of the utmost importance to our school, our press, and our ...
— The Life of William Carey • George Smith
... capital he can emigrate. That is what numbers of fellows do. If he has interest, he can get a commission in the militia, and from that possibly into the line; or he can enlist as a private, for the same object. There is a third alternative, he can hang himself. Of course, if he happens to have a relation in the city he can get a clerkship; but that alternative, I should say, ...
— With Kitchener in the Soudan - A Story of Atbara and Omdurman • G. A. Henty
... plantation store, so that, upon the expiration of his three-hundred-day contract, the laborer almost invariably owes his employer a debt which he is quite unable to pay. As he cannot obtain employment elsewhere in the colony under these conditions, he is faced with the alternative of being shipped back to China a pauper or of signing another contract. There is no breaking of the law by the planter, you see: the laborer is perfectly free to leave when his contract has expired—as free as any man can ...
— Where the Strange Trails Go Down • E. Alexander Powell
... latter part of the controversy there is little doubt that the Conservatives would have been in a far stronger position had they acted as a united party with a definite policy and a strong leader ready at a moment's notice to form an alternative Government. But they were deplorably led, they could agree on no policy, and their warmest supporters in the Press and in the country were the first to admit that the formation of an alternative Conservative Administration was unthinkable. Nevertheless, there could be no rival for the ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 21 - The Recent Days (1910-1914) • Charles F. Horne, Editor
... be fearfully punished, if not by a death such as Scott portrays in one of his poetical legends, by a disgrace far worse than physical suffering, from which nothing but the grave could give her relief. The alternative, flight, where no provision had been made, with no possible help from any friend, with the likelihood of treachery where they might least expect it, ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2, No. 2, August, 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... avoid getting up and now and then walking about the cave. I suffered so with the heat and thirst, that the hope of escape alone kept me from going mad. At last the rope was done and tied together with various knots. It had a creepy sort of stretchy feeling when I pulled on it, but I had no alternative but to trust to it,—it was that or nothing, and nothing meant death from thirst in ...
— Montezuma's Castle and Other Weird Tales • Charles B. Cory
... marriage is in effect compulsory upon all normal people; and until the law is altered there is nothing for us but to make the best of it as it stands. Even when no such establishment is desired, clandestine irregularities are negligible as an alternative to marriage. How common they are nobody knows; for in spite of the powerful protection afforded to the parties by the law of libel, and the readiness of society on various other grounds to be hoodwinked by the keeping up of the very thinnest appearances, most of them are ...
— Getting Married • George Bernard Shaw
... distinguished from Free Will, that is, from the liberty of choice which indeterminists have asserted and which determinists have denied; and that the Freedom for which he holds the brief is not the feeling of liberty that we have when confronted with alternative courses of action, or the feeling we have when we look back upon a choice made and an action accomplished, that we need not have acted as we did, and that we could have acted differently. Such Freedom it has been further maintained, ...
— Bergson and His Philosophy • J. Alexander Gunn
... valuable seignory of Ingrande; but the heirs of Gilles implored the interference of Charles VII. to stay the sale. Charles immediately issued an edict, which was confirmed by the Provincial Parliament of Brittany, forbidding him to alienate his paternal estates. Gilles had no alternative but to submit. He had nothing to support his extravagance but his allowance as a Marshal of France, which did not cover the one-tenth of his expenses. A man of his habits and character could not retrench his wasteful expenditure and live reasonably; ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions - Vol. I • Charles Mackay
... of war, to consider what was to be done. It was admitted that they must force the passage of the river without loss of time, or submit to the alternative of retreat, and the utter failure of the campaign. It was finally resolved to attempt the passage of the bridge by throwing a wooden gallery over the broken arch, and forcing their way across, at all cost. Additional batteries were now raised on the bank of the river, and a heavy fire was ...
— Orange and Green - A Tale of the Boyne and Limerick • G. A. Henty
... there seemed about my little person a universal commotion ; and it spread much farther, amongst those I have never or slightly mentioned. There seemed, indeed, but one opinion, that resignation of place or of life was the only remaining alternative. ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madam D'Arblay Volume 2 • Madame D'Arblay
... expect me to fight a duel with you, I must say you are to suffer disappointment. I do not believe in duelling, and I believe only in killing a man when there is no other alternative. To deliberately set about to shoot another man down is not our method of settling an issue. We either murder in cold blood or we fight it out like men, not ...
— Castle Craneycrow • George Barr McCutcheon
... having admitted the dogma, that slavery is a Divine institution. She has been forced by the anti-slavery discussion into this position—either to cease from slaveholding, or formally to adopt the only alternative, that slaveholding is right. She has chosen the alternative—reluctantly, to be sure, but substantially, and, within the last year, almost unequivocally. In defending what was dear to her, she has been forced to cast away ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... guessed your secret, that I have known from the first it was Jack. I always knew you were made for each other, both so splendid and noble and true. It isn't any particular credit to you two that you are good, there was no alternative—you couldn't be bad. ...
— Lady of the Decoration • Frances Little
... derived from the clause in the Constitution, or was the necessary consequence of the right to acquire. They do decide that the power in Congress is unquestionable, and in this we entirely concur, and nothing will be found in this opinion to the contrary. The power stands firmly on the latter alternative put by the court—that is, as "the inevitable consequence of the right ...
— Report of the Decision of the Supreme Court of the United States, and the Opinions of the Judges Thereof, in the Case of Dred Scott versus John F.A. Sandford • Benjamin C. Howard
... school, because the Utilitarians were apt to misconceive the position. They took Stewart to be the adequate representative of all who accepted one branch of an inevitable dilemma. The acceptance of 'intuitions,' that is, was the only alternative to thoroughgoing acceptance of 'experience.' They supposed, too, that persons vaguely described as 'Kant and the Germans' taught simply a modification of the 'intuitionist' view. I have noticed how emphatically Stewart claimed to rely ...
— The English Utilitarians, Volume I. • Leslie Stephen
... The next alternative was to throw ourselves upon the mercy of the negroes, which I stated was very hopeless and discouraging, as I did not see what favour could be expected from a beastly savage people, whose condition was worse than that of slaves, and ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume VII • Robert Kerr
... bear on several, it was discovered, with the result that there was no alternative left them but to sign the papers of enlistment. In this Anderson had been materially aided by the Military Governor's intimate knowledge of the fortunes and prospects of the bulk of the citizenry. To imply this, however, ...
— The Loyalist - A Story of the American Revolution • James Francis Barrett
... devil's name can you expect me to be happy in this city? Do you think it is pleasant to have no alternative to the society of American men except that of ...
— The Irrational Knot - Being the Second Novel of His Nonage • George Bernard Shaw
... not forego the charge, was compelled to bind him over to this court for trial. Since then he has changed his mind and has admitted his guilt to the district attorney. He would not be brought before you except we have no alternative. He has to be brought here now in order to clear ...
— The Financier • Theodore Dreiser
... Rebekah's pilgrimage Hogarth had so far failed and yielded, as almost to decide that from the Boodah nothing could be done, unless he went to the extent of ruining and starving. The other alternative was the fixing upon one nation, becoming its recognized ruler, and there furnishing an example both of modus operandi, and of a subsequent state of happiness, which others could ...
— The Lord of the Sea • M. P. Shiel
... alors: "Eh bien, puis qu'il n'y a aucune autre alternative, vous aurez le meilleur morceau de ma chair. Mais, permettez-moi de dire adieu mes enfants, et d'arranger les choses de faon donner ma mort l'apparence d'un accident. Car, si on savait que je suis mort parce ...
— Contes et lgendes - 1re Partie • H. A. Guerber
... alternative but to regard both stories as legends independently circulated in the ancient Church. "So artificial an explanation would probably have found little favour with scholars if there had been no miracle to suggest it. It is too commonly assumed that evidence which would be good under ordinary circumstances ...
— The Virgin-Birth of Our Lord - A paper read (in substance) before the confraternity of the Holy - Trinity at Cambridge • B. W. Randolph
... the power of Behram to avoid putting into the harbour, for he had no alternative but to be dashed to pieces against the frightful rocks that lay off the shore. In this extremity he held a council with his pilot and seamen. "My lads," said he, "you see to what a necessity we are reduced. We must choose one of ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments vol. 2 • Anon.
... our fancies. It is enough they were held impracticable the night before, and as there was no alternative in my uncle Toby's wardrobe, he sallied forth in ...
— The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman • Laurence Sterne
... the opinion of a number of geologists we must glance once more at the alternative view of the planetesimal school. In their opinion the molecules of water were partly attracted to the surface out of the disrupted matter, and partly collected within the porous outer layers of the globe. As the latter quantity grew, it would ooze upwards, fill the smaller depressions in the crust, ...
— The Story of Evolution • Joseph McCabe
... grain that found no soft place where it fell for hiding in. Even if it should happen in any case that no birds were near, the seed that fell on the way side was as surely destroyed in another way: the alternative suggested in Luke's narrative is, that "it is trodden under ...
— The Parables of Our Lord • William Arnot
... Tell it not, breathe it not, to a mortal soul! Leah, my darling, has promised to marry me, and not go to Europe, as her father had determined. She told me last night, when I met her in the park, that her mind was made up. She would not go. She did not wish to go, and to marry me was her only alternative. She loves me, though, and we shall be happy, I am sure. My parents are bitterly opposed, and hers will be, to such a union, but we will be married, for all that. Helen alone is in my confidence; she has none of that pride that revolts at Leah's being a Jewess. ...
— Leah Mordecai • Mrs. Belle Kendrick Abbott
... be gradually propagated, till it has votaries enough to countenance an open avowal of it. For nothing can be more evident, to those who are able to take an enlarged view of the subject, than the alternative of an adoption of the new Constitution or a dismemberment of the Union. It will therefore be of use to begin by examining the advantages of that Union, the certain evils, and the probable dangers, to which every State will be exposed from its dissolution. This shall accordingly constitute ...
— The Federalist Papers • Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, and James Madison
... sculpture and Gothic architecture, and the mere name of the creator does not signify. George Frederick Watts is reported to have said, "If I were asked to choose whether I would like to do something good, as the world judges popular art, and receive personally great credit for it, or, as an alternative, to produce something which should rank with the very best, taking a place with the art of Pheidias or Titian, with the highest poetry and the most elevating music, and remain unknown as the perpetrator of the work, I should choose the latter." Sidney Lanier wrote, "It is of little consequence ...
— The Gate of Appreciation - Studies in the Relation of Art to Life • Carleton Noyes
... detect it; or, at least, did not foresee the consequences; though both were quite apparent to the more experienced capitaine de fregate astern. It was too late, or the latter would have signalled his superior to put him on his guard; but, as things were, there remained no alternative, apparently, but to run the gauntlet, and trust all to the ...
— The Two Admirals • J. Fenimore Cooper
... fortifications thus arranged cannot shelter a state against all reverses; but these reverses will not, in this case, be attended by total ruin; for they cannot take from the state the means nor the time for collecting new forces; nor can they ever reduce it to the cruel alternative of ...
— Elements of Military Art and Science • Henry Wager Halleck
... alternative more than once hinted by the Sieur de Mauprat as the months grew into years after the mother died—marriage; a husband, a notable and wealthy husband. That was the magic destiny de Mauprat figured for her. It did not elate her, it did not disturb ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... disappointed. Harold found, too, by his spies, as he drew near, to his utter dismay, that William's forces were four times as numerous as his own. It would, of course, be madness for him to think of attacking an enemy in his intrenchments with such an inferior force. The only alternative left him was either to retreat, or else to take some strong position and fortify himself there, in the hope of being able to resist the invaders and arrest their advance, though he was not ...
— William the Conqueror - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... disadvantage which has arisen out of the modern worship of progress and novelty; and he thinks anything odd and new must be an advance. If you went to him and proposed to eat your grandmother, he would agree with you, so long as you put it on hygienic and public grounds, as a cheap alternative to cremation. So long as you progress fast enough it seems a matter of indifference to him whether you are progressing to the stars or the devil. So his house is filled with an endless succession of literary and political fashions; men who wear ...
— The Club of Queer Trades • G. K. Chesterton
... ago Daisy was left an orphan under peculiarly sad conditions. She resented the solicitude of an only sister—tho' her senior—and as neither was a Christian, the friction grew into a quarrel. She was given the alternative of submission or separation, and her sensitive spirit sought a place in ...
— Fighting the Traffic in Young Girls - War on the White Slave Trade • Various
... I am too old a man to be indulged leniently by the public in such a proceeding. Moreover, I am conscientiously averse to initiating it. Besides, it will not be permissible in this case to drag my wife's name into any publicity. My only alternative, therefore, is to remain content with the private discovery of your rascality, and hereafter to forbid you any association with what pertains to me ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. I. February, 1862, No. II. - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... law as it stands, while the compensation to them for carrying the mail is limited and regulated, and although railroads are made post-roads by law, there is no authority reposed anywhere to compel the owner of a railroad to take and carry the United States mails. The only alternative provided by act of Congress in case of refusal is for the Postmaster-General to send mail forward by pony express. This is but an illustration of ill-fitting legislation, reasonable and proper at the time of its enactment, but long ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 3 (of 3) of Volume 8: Grover Cleveland, First Term. • Grover Cleveland
... scar tissue. If the cyst re-forms, it should be removed by open dissection under local anaesthesia. Puncture with a tenotomy knife and scraping the interior, and the injection of irritants, are alternative, but less ...
— Manual of Surgery - Volume First: General Surgery. Sixth Edition. • Alexis Thomson and Alexander Miles
... conviction as soon as I found myself outside the house, was that no alternative was left me but to act at once on the information I had received—to make sure of the Count that night, or to risk the loss, if I only delayed till the morning, of Laura's last chance. I looked at my ...
— The Woman in White • Wilkie Collins
... Alternative Path. A second path for a current appearing as a disruptive discharge. Where two paths are offered the discharge, as it is of alternating or oscillatory type, selects the path of least self-induction. Thus a thick bar of copper, with no air ...
— The Standard Electrical Dictionary - A Popular Dictionary of Words and Terms Used in the Practice - of Electrical Engineering • T. O'Conor Slone
... Gwydir and Lord Cholmondeley filled the office of Lord High Chamberlain for alternative lives as the representatives of the joint claimants ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William IV, Vol. II • Charles C. F. Greville
... I had seen enough of the country, while wandering about in Lotta's company, to convince me that this statement might be quite true, although Lotta had never said a word to lead me to believe that she was aware that it was so. And if there was no possibility of escaping landward, the only alternative was to escape by going out to sea. But a boat voyage was an undertaking not to be rashly entered upon, especially where a woman was in the case; the inconvenience and discomfort, to say nothing of the danger, of such an attempt were such as to make me pause long and consider the matter very seriously ...
— A Middy in Command - A Tale of the Slave Squadron • Harry Collingwood
... upon her, so close that he had almost grasped her ankle had she not made a furious leap far into space from one tree to another—a perilous chance which apes seldom if ever take, unless so closely pursued by danger that there is no alternative. ...
— Tarzan of the Apes • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... whose rackets he was developing and consolidating, Brink was the only man who resisted Big Jake's civic enterprise—and got away with it! And nobody who runs rackets can permit resistance. It is contagious. So Big Jake had ordered that Brink be brought into line or else. The or else alternative had run into snags, before, but it was being given a big ...
— The Ambulance Made Two Trips • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... a vision of the Mistress of the Kennels, sitting, white and shaky, in the dismal little room on the far side of the city, waiting for the change which was to give her health again. He did hesitate for another minute; but he knew all the time that there was no alternative for him, and, watching the expression on his careworn face, the merchant, good-natured creature though he was, told himself that he had been a fool to offer that extra five guineas. It really was a preposterous price ...
— Finn The Wolfhound • A. J. Dawson
... hectares under cultivation in 2000, a 33% decrease in overall cultivation of coca from 1999 levels; intermediate coca products and cocaine exported to or through Colombia, Brazil, Argentina, and Chile to the US and other international drug markets; eradication and alternative crop programs have slashed illicit coca cultivation during the ...
— The 2001 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... the two the latter alternative is more likely to happen. We abuse and imitate them. They laugh at, ...
— Table-Talk - Essays on Men and Manners • William Hazlitt
... that, being mindful of human vicissitudes, he would, if they would make a treaty with him, allow them to depart uninjured; only that they must pass under the yoke, and quit Numidia within ten days." These terms were severe and ignominious; but, as death was the alternative[137], peace was concluded ...
— Conspiracy of Catiline and The Jurgurthine War • Sallust
... only one way to do it. I shrank at my own thoughts, yet there was no alternative: it must be done. I was hidden from the rays under a projection of ice, terminite bombs were dropping methodically over a rapidly devastated sector with methodical regularity. Sooner or later the master machine would feel that we were exterminated, ...
— Astounding Stories, July, 1931 • Various
... door-bell nor knocker, scraper nor mat; and the floor of the lobby seemed but slightly acquainted with the broom,—to say nothing of the scrubbing-brush. It looked like the floor of a corn or provision warehouse. I had no alternative but to venture in. Immediately after, there entered a young man with a fowling-piece, whom before I had seen at a little distance watching the movements of a flock of wild pigeons. I took him for a sportsman; but he was a young divine! I asked him if Dr. Beecher ...
— American Scenes, and Christian Slavery - A Recent Tour of Four Thousand Miles in the United States • Ebenezer Davies
... not without the ambition and the passions of youth: he went into the world, ardent, inexperienced, and without a guide. He drew back before errors grew into crimes, or folly became a habit. It was nature and affection that reclaimed and saved him from either alternative,—fame or ruin. His widowed mother was suddenly stricken with disease. Blind and bedridden, her whole dependence was on her only son. This affliction called forth a new character in Edward Aubrey. This mother had stripped herself of so many comforts to provide for him,—he ...
— Alice, or The Mysteries, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... scarce make one possibility. If justice will take all and nothing give, Justice, methinks, is not distributive. To die or kill you, is the alternative. Rather than take your life, I will ...
— Lives of the Poets, Vol. 1 • Samuel Johnson
... the standard of loyalty in the north. It is not the golden fruit of conviction, but the stern and unpromising result of necessity, arising from unsuccessful insurrection. The white population of the State accept the condition which has been imposed upon them, simply because there is no alternative. ...
— Report on the Condition of the South • Carl Schurz
... possible to hold an opinion quite honestly, and yet to hesitate about dying for it. We consider ourselves, at the present day, persuaded honestly of many things; yet which of them should we refuse to relinquish if the scaffold were the alternative—or at least seem to relinquish, under ...
— Short Studies on Great Subjects • James Anthony Froude
... vois avec Chagrin que vous vous tourmentes et mois aussi bien innutillement, et en tout sans [sens]. Ou vous voules me servire, ou vous ne Le voules pas; ou vous voules me protege, ou non; Il n'y a acune autre alternative en raison qui puis etre. Si vous voules me servire il ne faut pas me soutenire toujours que Blan [blanc] est noire, dans Les Chose Les plus palpable: et jamais Avouer que vous aves tort meme quant vous Le santes. Si vous ne voules pas me servire, ...
— Pickle the Spy • Andrew Lang
... single example. To one of the dioceses of Munster was assigned the area now occupied by the two dioceses of Waterford and Lismore. It consisted of the original Danish diocese of Waterford, together with a much more extensive non-Danish area. Alternative sees were named; it was described as the parish of Lismore or Waterford. Now Lismore was the most sacred spot in the enlarged diocese. It was the site of a monastery founded by St. Mochuta. It was an ideal place for a bishop's see. But it was doubtless ruled at the moment by an abbot, ...
— St. Bernard of Clairvaux's Life of St. Malachy of Armagh • H. J. Lawlor
... a sort o' last alternative, just to keep me in existence, I began a bit shop in a neighbouring town, and took in sewing and washing; and, after I had tried them awhile, and found that they would hardly do, I commenced a bit school, at the advice of the minister's ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume VI • Various
... produce goods to meet human wants has multiplied so that each man accomplishes almost thirty or forty times what he did before, then the world at large ought to be about thirty or fifty times better off. But it is not. Or else, as the other possible alternative, the working hours of the world should have been cut down to about one in thirty of what they were before. But they are not. How, then, are we to explain this extraordinary discrepancy between human power and resulting ...
— The Unsolved Riddle of Social Justice • Stephen Leacock
... form any, were to enter the diplomatic service as soon as I left Oxford, and it seemed to me that this or that distinguished and beautiful lady, old enough to be my mother, would meanwhile be blighted by some hopeless passion for myself, or else—what, in my opinion, was a still more exciting alternative—that I should, like another Byron, be blighted into renown through her treachery by a misplaced passion for her. As I paced the sands at Littlehampton, I pictured myself as having discovered her faithlessness on the eve of my own departure for the Embassy at Constantinople, ...
— Memoirs of Life and Literature • W. H. Mallock
... the second, with limbs farther apart. It is the alternative attitude. The body faces one of the two legs. It is alternative from the fact that it ends in the expression of two extreme and opposite sentiments; that is, in the third or the fourth. It serves for eccentricity with reticence, for menace and jealousy. It ...
— Delsarte System of Oratory • Various
... contains everything baby needs. That is why, if Baby cannot have breast milk, he must have Glaxo, which is milk enriched with extra cream made pure and easily digestible. It costs you but a trifle more than ordinary milk, and is not only the one safe alternative for breast-milk, but is also more economical than foods which have to be mixed with milk to make them nourishing. Glaxo can be given either in turn with breast-milk or as the ...
— The Illustrated War News, Number 21, Dec. 30, 1914 • Various
... from its predecessor by violent revolutions, but were the result of gradual and ordinary changes, discredited the old idea of frequent fresh creations after each catastrophe, and familiarised the minds of men of science with the alternative notion of slow and natural evolutionary processes. The past was seen in effect to be the parent of the present; the present was recognised as the child ...
— Luck or Cunning? • Samuel Butler
... in human heredity is further shown by the close relationship that exists between the appearance of albinoes and cousin marriages. An albino is a homozygote; that is, all its gametes are carrying the character of albinism and none of them bear the alternative character —the allelomorph—-of pigmentation. By pigmentation is here meant all those factors which go to its production. Now such a gametic (egg or sperm) constitution can only result when two individuals, all or some of whose ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... compel the Southern division of the administration party to occupy the ground of which he proposes to take possession, to wit, the ground of the old State-rights party. They will have, he says, no other alternative. ...
— The Great Speeches and Orations of Daniel Webster • Daniel Webster
... be over, and promptly went to work. Some assistance being needed, he demanded it of the cook, a robust, strong- armed woman; but she, the portress, and the nurse instantly fled. I did not like to touch that small, tortured limb, but thinking there was no alternative, my hand was already extended to do what was requisite. I was anticipated; Madame Beck had put out her own hand: hers was steady while ...
— Villette • Charlotte Bronte
... the marriages of the Queen to the Duc d'Aumale and of the Infanta (her sister) to the Duc de Montpensier: such a proposal, however gratifying to the French King's ambition, would naturally not have been favourably viewed in England; but Guizot promoted warmly the alternative project of a marriage of the Queen to her cousin Don Francisco de Asis, Duke of Cadiz, son of Don Francisco de Paula, the Infanta being still to marry Montpensier. It was believed that, if this marriage of the Queen took place, ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Volume 1 (of 3), 1837-1843) • Queen Victoria
... species of bramble we possess. Of the latter genus, Rubus, there is one set of forms respecting which it is still a question whether it ought to be regarded as constituting three species or thirty-seven. Mr. Bentham adopts the first alternative and Mr. Babington the second, in their ...
— The Antiquity of Man • Charles Lyell
... out his hand as if to touch hers, but Winsome withdrew herself with a swift, fierce movement, and held the door open for him to pass in. He had no alternative but ...
— The Lilac Sunbonnet • S.R. Crockett
... how could they be expected to keep awake while on duty? He pleaded. The answer of that stern man was that if he and the second mate didn't like the noise, they were welcome to pack up their traps and walk over the side. When this alternative was offered the ship happened to be 600 miles from ...
— The Shadow-Line - A Confession • Joseph Conrad
... was written my attention has been directed to Mr. Francis Galton's Theory of Heredity (already referred to at p. 417) which was published thirteen years ago as an alternative for Darwin's theory ...
— Darwinism (1889) • Alfred Russel Wallace
... still in the dark while our veins grew icy. Somebody below was begging and pleading for mercy, while somebody else was commanding quiet in a voice that meant bloodshed as an alternative. At intervals there was a fierce struggle, mingled with ...
— The Van Dwellers - A Strenuous Quest for a Home • Albert Bigelow Paine
... the serene order of that majestic life which Heaven meant for thoughtful man. Our souls should be as stars on earth, not as meteors and tortured comets. What could I offer to Ellinor, to her father? What but a future of patient labor? And in either answer what alternative of misery,—my own existence shattered, or ...
— The Caxtons, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... armorial composition, properly what would be charged upon a Shield or Banner, but often used as an alternative for Achievement, q.v. ...
— The Handbook to English Heraldry • Charles Boutell
... since his first residence at Boulogne, became at this time almost habitual, and the satisfactions which home should have supplied, and which indeed were essential requirements of his nature, he had failed to find in his home. He had not the alternative that under this disappointment some can discover in what is called society. It did not suit him, and he set no store by it. No man was better fitted to adorn any circle he entered, but beyond that of friends and equals he rarely passed. He would take as much pains to keep out of the houses ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster |
