"Approximate" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... best words I can find for it (which is in reality an affected style—be it good or bad); and my third way of writing is to say all that comes into my head for my own pleasure, in the first words that come, retouching them afterward into (approximate) grammar. These notes for the "Art Journal" were so written; and I like them myself, of course; but ask the reader's ...
— The Queen of the Air • John Ruskin
... out after her to beware she did not fall; she did not trouble to knock, but burst in. The rooms were empty. The luggage had gone, and the door into the garden, still open, showed how it had been got away. In an envelope on the table were notes for the money due on the month's board and an approximate sum for extras. Groaning, suddenly overcome by her haste, the Frau Professor sank obesely on to a sofa. There could be no doubt. The pair had gone off together. Emil ...
— Of Human Bondage • W. Somerset Maugham
... important discoveries have been made concerning matters of health: First, the advantage of cleanliness; second, the approximate chemical composition of various foods. All the other important ...
— Maintaining Health • R. L. Alsaker
... of chess, and confining the moves always to adjoining lines, like yellow to violet, violet to citrine, citrine to plum, plum to brown. Yellow and violet are true contrasts, the one color having nothing in common with the other. The citrine and the plum, however, are approximate contrasts. For greater convenience, we have numbered the contrasting colors A's and B's. Absolute contrast is where the two colors have nothing in common. For composition purposes, however, citrine and violet may be considered ...
— Color Value • C. R. Clifford
... bathroom, white tiled and spotless; and one side of it was occupied by the longest, narrowest bathtub I ever saw. Apparently English bathtubs are constructed on the principle that every Englishman who bathes is nine feet long and about eighteen inches wide, whereas the approximate contrary is frequently the case. Draped over a chair was the biggest, widest, softest bathtowel ever made. Shem, Ham and Japhet could have dried themselves on that bathtowel, and there would still have been enough dry territory left for some of the ...
— Europe Revised • Irvin S. Cobb
... I have seen working had no dividers, square, measure, or any instrument of precision. As before stated, I have seen scissors used as compasses, but as a rule they find approximate centers with the eye, and cut all shapes and engrave all figures by the unaided guidance of this unreliable organ. Often they cut out their designs in paper first and from them mark off patterns on the ...
— Navajo Silversmiths • Washington Matthews
... idealist and realist, but that he keeps these two tendencies too far apart. He thinks too much of his ideal state, as something to be reached once for all by knowledge, as a fixed type to which actual states approximate or from which they are perversions. But if we are to think of actual politics as intelligible in the light of the ideal, we must think of that ideal as progressively revealed in history, not as something to be discovered by turning our back on experience and having recourse to abstract reasoning. ...
— Politics - A Treatise on Government • Aristotle
... manuscript containing thirty pages of vellum measuring 6.9 by 4.7 inches, each page containing as a rule twenty-two lines. The approximate date is probably about the middle of the fifteenth century. This is arrived at partly from the character of the writing, and partly from the fact that the Kalendar in it contains no mention of the Feast of the Visitation of the Virgin on 2nd July, ...
— Bell's Cathedrals: A Short Account of Romsey Abbey • Thomas Perkins
... to Elisha," replied the Doctor; "nor think it is needless vigilance to make a strict inquiry how you approximate to the vices you seem most to detest. I have heard you say Eustace, that for a thousand worlds you would not grieve your father. Yet you have just said, were you young Waverly, you would renounce parental authority, and abjure your name. This shews that there is an innate principle in ...
— The Loyalists, Vol. 1-3 - An Historical Novel • Jane West
... abdominal walls, advantage will be gained by putting in a certain number of stitches so deeply as to include the whole thickness of the muscles, and in the intervals between these deep ones to insert others less deeply, so as accurately to approximate the edges of the skin. This will both facilitate union and also render the occurrence of hernia less probable. This latter accident did occur in a case, otherwise successful, in which Mr. ...
— A Manual of the Operations of Surgery - For the Use of Senior Students, House Surgeons, and Junior Practitioners • Joseph Bell
... the Hopi (Moki) language to the other Shoshonean dialects be such evidence, and none of a movement from within this area out of it, although such movements must have taken place, at least in the early history of the region. It must be borne in mind in this discussion that while we can assign approximate boundaries to the ancient pueblo region on the north, east, and west, no limit can as yet be fixed on the south. The arid country southward of Gila river and northward of the Mexican boundary would be a great ...
— The Cliff Ruins of Canyon de Chelly, Arizona • Cosmos Mindeleff
... is de jure, if not de facto, excluded from certain territories—if it ventures therein it produces only abortions. This is true of the practical sphere, which permits neither vague images nor approximate constructions; and of the scientific world, where the imagination may be used only to create a theory or invent processes of discovery (experiments, schemes of reasoning). Even with these exceptions there is still left for it ...
— Essay on the Creative Imagination • Th. Ribot
... to cross from sea to sea. Thermometers were forgotten; two mounted maps of the country from Chambers Creek to Newcastle Water, in a tin case, never came to hand, and the expedition was provided with no means of estimating even the approximate height of the elevated land or of the mountains in the interior. As Mr. Waterhouse remarks: "The thermometers were much needed, as it would have been very desirable to have kept a register of the ...
— Explorations in Australia, The Journals of John McDouall Stuart • John McDouall Stuart
... of the tree as if like rain, falling upon fertile soil, it had been absorbed to reappear in flowers of light. This species also gives forth the finest wind music. After listening to it in all kinds of winds, night and day, season after season, I think I could approximate to my position on the mountain by this pine music alone. If you would catch the tone of separate needles climb a tree in breezy weather. Every needle is carefully tempered and gives forth no uncertain sound each standing out with no interference ...
— The Yosemite • John Muir
... Glacier's case, perhaps, to there having been so many broken-down blacksmiths among her crew; I say, that though the Captain is very discreet and scientific here, yet, for all his learned "binnacle deviations," "azimuth compass observations," and "approximate errors," he knows very well, Captain Sleet, that he was not so much immersed in those profound magnetic meditations, as to fail being attracted occasionally towards that well replenished little case-bottle, so nicely tucked in on one side of his crow's nest, within easy reach of his ...
— Moby Dick; or The Whale • Herman Melville
... taken from different parts of the field will give an average for the field. Repeat this every week or oftener through the season and an approximate estimate of the water-holding capacity of the soil will be obtained and consequently an indication of the crops to which the soil ...
— The First Book of Farming • Charles L. Goodrich
... and the same. For, although these words which I have quoted, in their original application refer to God the Father, they are no less true about Him who rests at the right hand of God, and is one light with Him. He is in the light. We may approximate to that stable and calm radiance, even though our lives are passed through changing scenes, and effort and struggle are their characteristics. And oh! how blessed, brother, such a life will be, all gladdened by the unsetting and unclouded sunshine ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - St. John Chapters I to XIV • Alexander Maclaren
... Upanishads and Pur[a]nas represent collectively many different periods, but exactly to which period each individually is to be assigned remains always doubtful. Only in the case of the Buddhistic writings is there a satisfactorily approximate terminus a quo, and even here approximate means merely within the limit ...
— The Religions of India - Handbooks On The History Of Religions, Volume 1, Edited By Morris Jastrow • Edward Washburn Hopkins
... existed in that inhospitable land, that thread of water was at its silent work: through countless years it flooded and fell, depositing a rich legacy of soil upon the barren sand until the delta was created; and man, at so remote a period that we have no clue to an approximate date, occupied the fertile soil thus born of the river Nile, and that corner of savage Africa, rescued from its barrenness, became Egypt, and took the first rank ...
— The Albert N'Yanza, Great Basin of the Nile • Sir Samuel White Baker
... cut at the point where he wants to graft. He uses the bark slit method. The scion is shaped by one stroke of the grafting knife; a long slanting cut is made and the scion inserted in the stock. Just prior to placing the scion, the bark of the stock is slit, two cuts with the point of the knife, approximate width of the scion and down along the bark to the length the scion is to be inserted, then the scion is placed. The next step is to cut off the little sliver of bark which is pushed out, at the point where it does not contact the scion. In this ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Report of the Proceedings at the 44th Annual Meeting • Various
... of Luther in 1545 Melanchthon became the acknowledged head of the Lutheran party. On many questions he was inclined to disagree with the doctrine of his master. His teaching in regard to the Eucharist began to approximate more closely to the views of Calvin, so that the Impanation and Companation theories of Luther lost favour in Germany. The Philippists or Crypto-Calvinists gained ground rapidly in the country, with the result that the German ...
— History of the Catholic Church from the Renaissance to the French • Rev. James MacCaffrey
... "that, if we knew the year in which the light-house was erected, we could get the average encroachment of the sea every year, and, by a little figuring, arrive at where the point was in 1720. It would be approximate, of course, but it would give us a start—something more definite than we have now. For all we know Parmenter's treasure may be a hundred yards ...
— In Her Own Right • John Reed Scott
... one in so far as it applies to the ideal rhythm, for the melody of verse does approximate that of music. If one considers actual rhythm, however, he is forced to come to the conclusion that no such mathematical relation exists between the syllables of a foot of verse as that existing between the notes of a musical bar. In ...
— Sidney Lanier • Edwin Mims
... In the material world, the more ample the body is, the greater is the good of which itis capable supposing all the parts to be equally perfect. But in the intelligential world, the circles are more excellent and powerful, the more they approximate to the central point, which is God. Thus the first circle, that of the seraphim, corresponds to the ninth sphere, or primum mobile, the second, that of the cherubim, to the eighth sphere, or heaven of ...
— The Divine Comedy • Dante
... the edge of this commandment, and weaken our own consciousness of having failed to obey it, by getting entangled in the cobwebs of mere curious discussions as to whether the absolute ideal of perfectly unbroken communion with God is possible in this life. At all events it is possible to us to approximate to that ideal a great deal more closely than our consciences tell us that we ever yet have done. If we are trying to keep our hearts in the midst of daily duty in contact with God, and if, ever and anon in the press of our work, we cast a thought towards Him ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture: Romans Corinthians (To II Corinthians, Chap. V) • Alexander Maclaren
... dollars and seven cents of our own currency, while the commercial value is nearly four times as great, or eleven dollars sixty-seven cents, equal to two pounds twelve shillings and sixpence sterling. By adopting this as the approximate value of the peso de oro, in the early part of the sixteenth century, the reader may easily compute for himself the value, at that period, of the sums mentioned in these pages; most of which are expressed in that denomination. I have been the more particular in this statement, ...
— The History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William H. Prescott
... Facial grooves for the antennae whitish; thorax with some almost obsolete stripes, the middle pair approximate, slender, somewhat more distinct than the others; abdomen somewhat lutescent-tawny; wings slightly greyish, irregularly blackish-brown along the costa, brown at the tips, and with a brown band which is indistinct in front but much ...
— Journal of the Proceedings of the Linnean Society - Vol. 3 - Zoology • Various
... certain—great many young bees can be raised in a cell, and not be diminished in size, sufficient to be detected. The bottom fills up faster than at the sides, and as they do so, the bees add a little to the length, until the ends of these cells on two parallel combs approximate too close to allow the bees to pass freely; before which time it is unnecessary to remove ...
— Mysteries of Bee-keeping Explained • M. Quinby
... from each cutting will, of course, vary much with conditions, but it is seldom less than a ton. An approximate average would place the average cutting at about 1-1/4 tons, but as much as 2 tons have been obtained per acre at a cutting, and, again, not more than 1/2 ton. In New Jersey an average of 4.57 tons per acre was ...
— Clovers and How to Grow Them • Thomas Shaw
... Bart., Riversdale, Northamptonshire." She would have to post it, and never again would she see him. She questioned the right of the priest in obtaining from her a promise not to see him, so long as she did not sin. But Owen was an approximate cause of ...
— Evelyn Innes • George Moore
... naivete of this undertaking to be "sufficiently elevated to live independently of foreign aids," after first getting "the free use of a spot of land, . . . including, of course, a convenient plain house, and offices, wood-lot, garden, and orchard." Establishments which would tolerably approximate to this description, and to the really essential needs of its prospective founder, have long existed in every civilized community. There are certain restrictions placed upon their inmates, however, and Mr. Alcott's desire was to make sure of his basis of earthly supplies, ...
— Life of Father Hecker • Walter Elliott
... there both in expression and in structure. It is impossible, therefore, to be absolutely certain as to the historical order of composition or publication among his numerous {136} dialogues, but a certain approximate order ...
— A Short History of Greek Philosophy • John Marshall
... The actual facts that had hastened Zephyr's location of the safe were simple. He had studied the position which the stage must have occupied before the bridge fell, its line of probable descent. From these assumed data he inferred the approximate position of the safe in the river and began prodding in the muddy water. At last he was tolerably sure that he had located it. By building a sort of wing dam with loose rock, filling the interstices with fine material, the water of the pool was cut off from the main stream and began to ...
— Blue Goose • Frank Lewis Nason
... coasts of Yucatan they found the peninsula divided into a number of independent petty states. According to an authority followed by Herrera, these were eighteen in number. There is no complete list of their names, nor can we fix with certainty their boundaries. The following list gives their approximate position. On the west ...
— The Maya Chronicles - Brinton's Library Of Aboriginal American Literature, Number 1 • Various
... instance that of Vanikoro, contain an island in the middle; while other islands, such as Tahiti, are surrounded by a margin of smooth water separated from the ocean by a coral reef. Now if we suppose that Tahiti were to sink slowly it would gradually approximate to the condition of Vanikoro; and if Vanikoro gradually sank, the central island would disappear, while on the contrary the growth of the coral might neutralise the subsidence of the reef, so that we should have simply an atoll with its lagoon. The same considerations explain the origin of ...
— The Beauties of Nature - and the Wonders of the World We Live In • Sir John Lubbock
... beyond thy account. He that so often sur- viveth his expectation lives many lives, and will scarce complain of the shortness of his days. Time past is gone like a shadow; make times to come present; con- ceive that near which may be far off. Approximate thy latter times by present apprehensions of them: be like a neighbour unto death, and think there is but little to come. And since there is something in us that must still live on, join ...
— Religio Medici, Hydriotaphia, and the Letter to a Friend • Sir Thomas Browne
... repeated submersion of continents, the slow growth of animal and vegetable deposits, the vast antiquity of life, the stripping, fracturing and gradual transformation of the terrestrial surface,[3104] and, finally the grand picture in which Buffon describes in approximate manner the entire history of our globe, from the moment it formed a mass of glowing lava down to the time when our species, after so many lost or surviving species, was able to inhabit it.—Upon this science of inorganic matter we see arising at the same time the science of organic matter. ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 1 (of 6) - The Ancient Regime • Hippolyte A. Taine
... is more than desirable that the student should know when he is reading the most approximate presentation accessible of what Shakspere uttered, and when that which modern editors have, with reason good or bad, often not without presumption, substituted for that which they received, I have given the text, letter for letter, point for point, of the ...
— The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark - A Study with the Text of the Folio of 1623 • George MacDonald
... sturdy, well-grown little boy, when being thrashed, howling at the very top of his bent. If one can conceive of a full-grown male giant twenty feet high pouring forth his whole soul and voice with similarly unrestrained fervour, he may approximate to a ...
— The Gorilla Hunters • R.M. Ballantyne
... retrogressive, and it hath subjected itself to the fates, the evolvers of the endless thread—to the stern necessity of progression. 'Idea' itself it cannot become, but it may in long and graduated process, become an image, an ANALOGON, an anti-type of IDEA. And this [Greek: eidolon] may approximate to a perfect likeness. 'Quod est simile, nequit esse idem'. Thus, in the lower animals, we see this process of emancipation commence with the intermediate link, or that which forms the transition from properties to faculties, namely, with sensation. Then the faculties ...
— Literary Remains, Vol. 2 • Coleridge
... different lands and different ages. And just here it will be seen that a partial knowledge will not meet the demand. It might be even misleading. Buddhism, for example, has assumed an endless variety of forms—now appearing as a system of the baldest atheism, and now presenting an approximate theism. Gautama was certainly atheistic, and he virtually denied the existence of the human soul. But in the northern development of his system, theistic conceptions sprang up. A sort of trinity had appeared by the seventh ...
— Oriental Religions and Christianity • Frank F. Ellinwood
... proposed and legally enforced, none have answered the expectations of their advocates. Artificial punishments have failed to produce reformation; and have in many cases increased the criminality. The only successful reformatories are those privately established ones which approximate their regime to the method of nature—which do little more than administer the natural consequences of criminal conduct: diminishing the criminal's liberty of action as much as is needful for the safety of society, and requiring him to maintain himself while living ...
— The World's Greatest Books—Volume 14—Philosophy and Economics • Various
... will assist the traveller who is not an expert, in arriving at the approximate date ...
— Seaward Sussex - The South Downs from End to End • Edric Holmes
... less. The larger n becomes the more negligible is its value relatively to n^2. If, therefore, the coupling were very close, the series 3n^2 - (2n - 1) : (2n - 1) : (2n - 1) : n^2 - (2n - 1) would approximate more and more to the series 3n^2 : n^2, i.e. to a simple 3 : 1 ratio. Though the point is probably of more theoretical than practical interest, it is not impossible that some of the cases which have hitherto been regarded as following a simple ...
— Mendelism - Third Edition • Reginald Crundall Punnett
... closely into the defences and soundings; to do which it was necessary not only to observe every precaution of seeming indifference,—even to the extent of appearing engrossed with social duties,—but also to conduct under this cover measurements and observations of at least approximate correctness. This duty was performed with singular diligence and success, with the double result of revealing the hopeless inaccuracy of existing charts and of placing in Exmouth's hands a working plan of the ground, perfectly trustworthy ...
— Types of Naval Officers - Drawn from the History of the British Navy • A. T. Mahan
... the correct relative positions and movements of the sun and moon (see figs. 17 and 18). Like the earlier Muslim example it contains wheels with odd numbers of gear teeth (14, 27, 39); however, the teeth are no longer equilateral in shape, but approximate a more modern slightly rounded form. This example is French and appears to date from ca. 1300. Another Gothic astrolabe with a similar gear ring on the rete, said to date from ca. 1400 (it could well be much earlier) is now ...
— On the Origin of Clockwork, Perpetual Motion Devices, and the Compass • Derek J. de Solla Price
... Poland and West Galicia the changes brought about by the great Austro-German drive of 1,500,000 men from Cracow are shown by the heavy dotted and solid lines. The dotted line shows the approximate position of the German battle front when the drive began and the solid line its approximate position according to latest advices from Berlin and Vienna, Jaroslau (3) being the latest important ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 3, June, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... single specimen of each type of modern war-ships would to a certainty weary the reader, for to any but an expert there would inevitably be a sense of repetition in the perusal of such a narrative. But in order to place before our readers something like an approximate idea, at any rate, of the present state of our navy, we shall examine briefly one other first-class ironclad, the Inflexible, which may be regarded as a leading example of ironclad ships, and, at the time of writing, as one ...
— Man on the Ocean - A Book about Boats and Ships • R.M. Ballantyne
... Table, the difference between the number of feet opposite the height of a barometer, at one station, and that at another station, is their approximate difference ...
— Barometer and Weather Guide • Robert Fitzroy
... believes that this peculiar adaptation of Nature—which may be observed in all her kingdoms—may explain the difference that exists between the wolves of the Northern parts of America and those of the South of Europe. He believes, moreover, that those of the Southern parts of the American continent approximate more nearly to the Pyrenean wolves, as he has seen in the tropical forest of Mexico some that possessed all that "gaunt" form and "sneaking" aspect that characterize ...
— Popular Adventure Tales • Mayne Reid
... however, not to cut any mortises on the post below, as was done in cutting the stretcher mortises on the ends of the table. A good plan is to set the posts upright in the positions they are to occupy relative to one another and mark with pencil the approximate positions of the mortises. The legs can then be laid flat and the mortises accurately marked out with a fair degree of assurance that they will not be cut where they are not wanted and that the legs shall ...
— Mission Furniture - How to Make It, Part I • H. H. Windsor
... collection of reconnaissance reports is work of a highly skilled nature, or ought to be. Spying out the land is much more than a search of railways, roads, and the terrain generally. The experienced observer must know the German area over which he works rather better than he knows Salisbury Plain. The approximate position of railway junctions and stations, aerodromes, factories, and depots should be familiar to him, so that he can without difficulty spot any new feature. Also he must be something of a sleuth, particularly when using smoke as a clue. In the ...
— Cavalry of the Clouds • Alan Bott
... a noun seems to be going out of use; the word now commonly used in the sense of "opinion" or "regard" is estimation. An estimate is "an approximate judgment, based on considerations of probability, of the number, amount, magnitude, or position ...
— Practical Exercises in English • Huber Gray Buehler
... regard to both these fibres, we must state that the VERY MINUTE QUANTITY of each specimen has prevented our subjecting them to any thing like the full treatment of our process, and we can therefore only give you an APPROXIMATE ...
— Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa - Journeys and Researches in South Africa • David Livingstone
... (1603-25) Catholics expected if not a repeal at least a suspension of the penal laws. As a son of Mary Queen of Scots for whose rescue Catholics in England and on the Continent had risked so much, and as one whose religious views were thought to approximate more closely to Catholicism than to Nonconformity, it was hoped that he would put an end to the persecution that had been carried on so bitterly during the reign of his predecessor. But whatever might ...
— History of the Catholic Church from the Renaissance • Rev. James MacCaffrey
... individual himself rather than by some outsider who insists on reading in a certain interpretation. I have come to believe that it is possible for one to become trained to the point at which he is able to decide just how far the interpretation goes, or, at least, to approximate it. ...
— The Journal of Abnormal Psychology - Volume 10
... the eighteenth century, followed by a school in our day, universally assumed that an approximate equality of condition was desirable. Rousseau agreed with Montesquieu, in believing that a small republic, none of whose citizens were either very rich or very poor, was likely to be in a desirable condition. ...
— The Eve of the French Revolution • Edward J. Lowell
... sobs shook her until every nerve ached and her very fingers cramped; and she had gone wild at other times, burying her head, that her screams might not be heard: the last, as imagination pictured her lover's certain physical suffering. But of all agonies, none could approximate to that induced by Death. When that rumour reached her, she realized that hope had given her some measure of support, and how insignificant all other trouble is beside that awful blank, that mystery, whose single ...
— The Splendid Idle Forties - Stories of Old California • Gertrude Atherton
... every person must decide for himself in view of the facts which have been presented. If he find that the animal in his nature is too strong to allow him to comply with what seems to be the requirements of natural law, let him approximate as nearly to the truth as possible. "Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind," and act accordingly, not forgetting that this is a matter with serious moral bearings, and, hence, one in which conscience ...
— Plain Facts for Old and Young • John Harvey Kellogg
... means by which persons with two eyes, or with only one eye, judge of distance, I say not one word, that being irrelevant to this subject. But that the axes of the eyes approximate when we view objects nearer and nearer cannot be doubted, and I expressed no doubt; and it appears to me very probable that on this fact MR. SHADBOLT founds his conclusion that the cameras should radiate. This, however, ought not to be done for the reasons I have assigned. It will ...
— Notes and Queries, No. 209, October 29 1853 • Various
... still the exceptions, and the average out of a given number of lines in any rock formation whatsoever, will be found increasing in perpendicularity as they rise. Consequently the great skeleton lines of rock outline are always concave; that is to say, all distant ranges of rocky mountain approximate more or less to a series of concave curves, meeting in peaks, like a range of posts with chains hanging between. I do not say that convex forms will not perpetually occur, but that the tendency of the majority will always be to assume the form of sweeping, curved valleys, with angular ...
— Modern Painters Volume I (of V) • John Ruskin
... full, that it would require, as the rabbis say of a certain pedigree in the Book of Chronicles, four hundred camel loads of commentaries to expound the difficulties in their text; others so empty, that nothing can approximate so nearly to the notion of an ...
— Colloquies on Society • Robert Southey
... that no one has seen this trick, as described above, or in any way similar to the above description, who can come forward to give the approximate date, of such a performance, the place, and the names of the performer, his assistants, or of any two other persons who saw the trick done at that time ...
— Indian Conjuring • L. H. Branson
... the little ingenious arrangements that she is so fond of making for the safety and comfort of her neighbours, is so often misunderstood. It should be obvious by this time that her attitude to International Law has always been one of approximate reverence. The shells with which she bombarded Rheims Cathedral were contingent shells, and the Lusitania was ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, March 7, 1917. • Various
... as the name implies, is the approximate center of the finger impression. It will be necessary to concern ourselves with the core of the loop type only. The following rules govern the selection of ...
— The Science of Fingerprints - Classification and Uses • Federal Bureau of Investigation
... been made acquainted with the said conditions. We should be obliged if you would cable to us your decision whether or no you intend to hear them, and—should the answer be in the affirmative—the approximate date we may ...
— Antony Gray,—Gardener • Leslie Moore
... The lines we draw, the moments we choose for cutting this or that off at this or that place, and thenceforth the dubbing it by another name, are as arbitrary as the moments chosen by a South-Eastern Railway porter for leaving off beating doormats; in each case doubtless there is an approximate equity, but it is of a very rough and ...
— Luck or Cunning? • Samuel Butler
... strongly occupied position in the field, a squadron of aerostats has winged its way through the air under cover of the darkness of night, and silently and unperceived has marked the disposition of forces, the approximate strength of the army or the position to be attacked, and, as far as they were observable, the points upon which the attack could be most favourably delivered. Then they have returned with their priceless ...
— The Angel of the Revolution - A Tale of the Coming Terror • George Griffith
... structures for their dead kings or conquerors would carry the usage with them in their migrations, but arriving in Egypt, and seeing the impossibility of finding earth sufficiently tenacious for a mound, they would approximate as nearly as might be to their ancient custom by raising up a round heap of stones—in short, conical pyramids. Of these there are several at Sakkara, and the materials of some are thrown together without any order or regularity. The transition from this simple form to that of the square angular ...
— Eothen • A. W. Kinglake
... the introduction of a new religion, and successfully oppose it by every means in their power. They urge, and with justice, that Confucius has laid down an admirable rule of life in harmony with their own customs, and that the conduct of those who approximate to this standard would compare not unfavourably with the practice, as distinguished from the profession, of any religion ...
— Chinese Sketches • Herbert A. Giles
... speculation regarding the approximate condition of Mr. Chugg—would he be wholly or partially incapacitated for his job? Mrs. Dax, flirting a feather-duster in the neighborhood of Miss Carmichael in a futile effort to beguile her into giving a reason for her solitary journey ...
— Judith Of The Plains • Marie Manning
... point of view, there is an enormous difference between the very best and the very worst cottons; so much so, indeed, that they are never blended together. Between these two extremes there is a well-graded number of varieties and classifications of cotton, and some approximate so closely to others in quality, that they are often blended ...
— The Story of the Cotton Plant • Frederick Wilkinson
... they came in a great number of canoes of various sizes,—many of which could carry a hundred men,—which were ordinarily employed in bringing agricultural products to the Charleston market. To get an approximate knowledge of the number, the city government once ordered the persons thus arriving to be counted,—and that during the progress of the trials, at a time when the negroes were rather fearful of coming into town; and it was found, ...
— Black Rebellion - Five Slave Revolts • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... information the master in his turn took an approximate bearing of the southernmost extremity of the range of hills, after which he stepped down on to the deck again and, going to the capstan, spread out his chart upon the head of it, calling me to help him ...
— The Pirate Slaver - A Story of the West African Coast • Harry Collingwood
... flames of the grand spree that had burned, Johnny figured out his approximate location and began once more his three miles east, one mile south journey to Cape Prince of Wales. Some hours later, having landed safely at the Cape, and having displayed the postmarked one dollar bill to the ...
— Triple Spies • Roy J. Snell
... they have agreeable countenances: and as to stature, many of them are very tall, though apparently not very robust. Some are of light olive complexion, with straight noses and thin lips; but others, indeed the great number, approximate to ...
— Narrative of a Mission to Central Africa Performed in the Years 1850-51, Volume 1 • James Richardson
... level of the river (of which the apparently very uniform inclination has been calculated from its total height at a point 135 miles from the mouth), slopes towards the Atlantic at an angle of only 0 degrees 7 minutes twenty seconds: this must be considered only as an approximate measurement, but it cannot be far wrong. Taking the whole thirty-five miles, the upper surface slopes at an angle of 0 degrees 10 minutes 53 seconds; but this result is of no value in showing the inclination of any one stream, for halfway between the two points of measurement, ...
— South American Geology - also: - Title: Geological Observations On South America • Charles Darwin
... should neither exceed nor modify the former instructions given them. They asked to be relieved, as these instructions placed them in an embarrassing position. A council of ministers was called, and their former instructions were changed so as to authorize them "to approximate to them as much as possible, agreeing to some modifications which the circumstances of the country may exact, as well as to things of minor importance which may ...
— General Scott • General Marcus J. Wright
... that this prediction is no more than approximate. The calculation does not give the exact date of delivery more than four or five times in a hundred cases. It is accurate within a week in half the cases and within two weeks in four-fifths. We also know that delivery ...
— The Prospective Mother - A Handbook for Women During Pregnancy • J. Morris Slemons
... of this figure, not uncommon in English, are the putting of adjectives for adverbs, of adverbs for nouns, of the present tense for the preterit, and of the preterit for the perfect participle. But, in the use of such liberties, elegance and error sometimes approximate so nearly, there is scarcely an obvious line between them, and grammarians consequently disagree in ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... surveyed: this is a problem. Which problem the best insight, seeking light from all possible sources, shifting its point of vision whithersoever vision or glimpse of vision can be had, may employ itself in solving; and be well content to solve in some tolerably approximate way. ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle
... bliss, as well as its conception of responsibility to the immortal and supernatural powers of the universe. Whatever may be the actual reality, and however closely the conceptions of one or another religion may approximate to the truth, such reality and approximation are not the subjects of the present discussion. Nor is it our purpose to bring out more explicitly the genetic relationship of one religion to another; the evolution ...
— The Doctrine of Evolution - Its Basis and Its Scope • Henry Edward Crampton
... do exist, it is quite true; and often they cunningly approximate the originals—but after all, in the matter of certain physical patent rights there is only one England. Now that I have sampled the globe, I am not in doubt. There is a beauty of Switzerland, and it is repeated in the glaciers and snowy ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... bearing north 14 W (true). Our approximate position is forty miles east-north-east of Nordenskjold Ice Tongue. At 9 p.m. Hooke called Cape Evans and sent weather reports to Wellington and Melbourne via Macquarie Island. Hooke and Ninnis on several evenings at about 11 o'clock have heard what happened to be faint messages, but unreadable. ...
— South! • Sir Ernest Shackleton
... since that time the increase has been still more rapid. On the other hand, not only has the number of the large agricultural landlords shown no increase whatever, but since the year 1880 or thereabouts their aggregate rental has suffered an actual decrease, having fallen in the approximate proportion of seventy to fifty-two. This shrinkage in the fortunes of the old landed families, except those who were owners of minerals or land near towns, and the multiplication of families newly enriched by business, were, when I first knew London, proceeding at a rate which had ...
— Memoirs of Life and Literature • W. H. Mallock
... placed at the disposal of the Association by the Government, it was found that the following varieties of big game are still found in the Province. The numbers, however, are only approximate: ...
— Our Vanishing Wild Life - Its Extermination and Preservation • William T. Hornaday
... of which in the church brings the greatest power and influence for good, and the recognition of which in the Government would enable us finally, as near as it is possible for humanity, to perfect our form of government. Probably we can never have a perfect form of government, but the nearer we approximate to the divine the nearer will we attain to perfection; and the divine government recognizes neither caste, class, sex, nor nationality. The nearer we approach to that divine ideal the nearer we will come to realizing our hopes of finally securing at least the most perfect form of human government ...
— Debate On Woman Suffrage In The Senate Of The United States, - 2d Session, 49th Congress, December 8, 1886, And January 25, 1887 • Henry W. Blair, J.E. Brown, J.N. Dolph, G.G. Vest, Geo. F. Hoar.
... in approximate summary, that Thackeray is the novelist of memory—of our memories as well as his own. Dickens seems to expect all his characters, like amusing strangers arriving at lunch: as if they gave him not only pleasure, but surprise. But Thackeray ...
— The Victorian Age in Literature • G. K. Chesterton
... of paying for enough wire and posts to run the fence straight through from Meeker's south line to the north line of the Flying U. He had figured the price of posts and the price of wire and had come somewhere near the approximate cost of the undertaking. He was not at all sure that the Happy Family had faced the actual figures on that proposition. They had remarked vaguely that it was going to cost some money. They had made casual remarks about being broke personally and, so far ...
— The Flying U's Last Stand • B. M. Bower
... home specimens, with particulars of the width of the lode. Of course you would crush pieces up and wash them yourself, or get your Indian to wash them; that would give you an approximate idea of the percentage of gold. If it were rich, I could introduce you to men who would advance money for working it, giving you a share of the profits. They would send out a mining expert with you. He would verify your report, and then you would take up the concession. I don't know ...
— The Treasure of the Incas • G. A. Henty
... polygonal as they become approximate or crowded, hoary canescent, sessile; peridium rather thick, persistent, circumscissile in dehiscence, covered without by minute whitish calcareous (?) scales, within punctate by the imprint of the spores; hypothallus distinct, white; capillitium ...
— The North American Slime-Moulds • Thomas H. (Thomas Huston) MacBride
... strange discrepancies that occur in early charts and narratives, for it took time to realize how different portions of our coast lines, which had been sighted from time to time might be connected, and how the gaps might be filled in by fresh discoveries and approximate surveys. ...
— The First Discovery of Australia and New Guinea • George Collingridge
... to try—though I did, again and again, try to draw from the old man something definite. It seems that she was so rounded and so proportioned as to meet every artistic demand, and to divert even from her beautiful face the glance of her enraptured beholders. If we are to gain an approximate idea of a figure so perfect, we must try to conceive what might be the result of a supreme effort of nature to show by comparison to the most artistic of her people just what puling infants they were in their attempts to create forms ...
— A Strange Discovery • Charles Romyn Dake
... November it lies hot, still, and unbearable, sick with violent unrelieving storms; then on until April, chill, quiescent, drinking its scant rain and scanter snows; from April to the hot season again, blossoming, radiant, and seductive. These months are only approximate; later or earlier the rain-laden wind may drift up the water gate of the Colorado from the Gulf, and the land sets its seasons by ...
— The Land of Little Rain • Mary Austin
... you will finally use for practice at the target will not be a hunting bow. It will be longer and more whip-ended and not so sturdy. But if you are to get the best results for the hunting field, I believe it should approximate in weight the hunting weapon. It should not be quite as heavy, for one shoots it more continuously. The one I use weighs sixty pounds. With a lighter bow one would probably make a somewhat better score; but that ...
— Hunting with the Bow and Arrow • Saxton Pope
... between the human ear and that of apes. The last two figures illustrate the general resemblance between the normal ear of foetal man and the ear of an adult orang-outang. The other two figures on the lower line are intended to exhibit occasional modifications of the adult human ear, which approximate simian characters somewhat more closely than does the normal type. It will be observed that in their comparatively small lobes these ears resemble those of all the apes; and that while the outer margin of one is not unlike that of the Barbary ape, the outer margin of the other follows those ...
— Darwin, and After Darwin (Vol. 1 and 3, of 3) • George John Romanes
... tell exactly," he replied. "I can approximate our speed by a study of the power consumed in our stern motors and again I can approximate it by a series of celestial observations, provided we do not have to change our course ...
— Giants on the Earth • Sterner St. Paul Meek
... ice, is constantly at work on the earth's surface; the eroded materials are in large part carried off by streams, ultimately to be deposited in the ocean near the continental margins. The final result is the reduction of the land surface to an approximate plain, called a peneplain, somewhere near sea level. Geological history shows that such peneplains are often elevated again with reference to sea level, by earth forces or by subsidence of the sea, when ...
— The Economic Aspect of Geology • C. K. Leith
... four-wheelers, obtaining fares, rattled away over the stones. Yet the Lady of the Windswept Dust tarried. It grew late, and Iglesias greatly desired her coming, greatly desired to speak with her, and speaking to find approximate solution, at least, of some of the problems which lay so heavy upon his mind. Meanwhile, the crowd melted and vanished, leaving him alone in the blurred yellowish light beneath the low-hanging roof of impenetrable gloom, save for the haunting ...
— The Far Horizon • Lucas Malet
... "Light" being taken from a standard list. The second column shows the refractive power of heat, applied to the actual stones, and consisting of a fine pencil blowpipe-flame, one line (the one twelfth part of an inch) in length in each case. This list must be taken as approximate, since in many instances the test has been made on one stone only, without possibility of obtaining an average; and as stones vary considerably, the figures may be raised or lowered slightly, or perhaps even changed in class, because in some stones the least stain or impurity may cause the ...
— The Chemistry, Properties and Tests of Precious Stones • John Mastin
... arrange the work for the morrow. After a long day spent with one of the carters delivering such things as faggots—locally "kids"—of wood, he would recall the names of the recipients, and the exact quantities delivered at each house without the slightest effort. His only memoranda for approximate land measurements would be produced on a stick with a notch denoting each score yards or paces. This primitive method is particularly interesting, the numeral a score being derived from the Anglo-Saxon sciran, to divide. Similar words are plough share, shire, shears, and shard. He could keep ...
— Grain and Chaff from an English Manor • Arthur H. Savory
... words is no quotation when the context is different, and there is no break between the context and the words relied upon. "It is absurd and most arbitrary to dissect a passage, quoted by Justin as a consecutive and harmonious whole, and finding parallels more or less approximate to its various phrases scattered up and down distant parts of our Gospels, scarcely one of which is not materially different from the reading of Justin, to assert that he is quoting these Gospels freely from memory, altering, excising, combining, and inter-weaving ...
— The Freethinker's Text Book, Part II. - Christianity: Its Evidences, Its Origin, Its Morality, Its History • Annie Besant
... and the War of Classes. New topics, or rather new forms of old themes, they seemed to Vickers. Fosdick, from his rolling around the earth, had become an expert on the social revolution; he could tell the approximate dates when it "would be pulled off" in all the great countries. He had bought a farm somewhere in Vermont, and had sat down to wait for the social revolution; meantime he was raising apples, and at intervals descended ...
— Together • Robert Herrick (1868-1938)
... duty; and, for the sake of impressing our duty on our hearts, it is of use to draw the picture of a man perfectly obedient, as a pattern for us to aim at. In proportion as we grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Saviour, so shall we approximate to Him in obedience, who is our great example, and who alone of all the sons of Adam lived in the perfection of ...
— Parochial and Plain Sermons, Vol. VII (of 8) • John Henry Newman
... negatives," Manton explained. He pulled out a box at random, opening it. "The negative is not all spliced together, the same length as the reels of positive, because the printing machines are equipped to take two-hundred-foot pieces at a time, or approximate fifths of a reel, the size of a roll of raw positive film stock. Then whenever there is a change in color, as from amber day that to blue tint for night, the negative is broken because pieces of different coloring ...
— The Film Mystery • Arthur B. Reeve
... two evils, and so I chose the lesser and got under him. I did this by a simple expedient that occurred to me at the moment. I fell off. I was tramped on considerably, and the earth proved to be harder than it looked when viewed from an approximate height of sixteen miles up, but I lived and breathed—or at least I breathed after a time had elapsed—and I was satisfied. And so, having gone through this experience myself, I am in position to appreciate what any other man of ...
— Cobb's Anatomy • Irvin S. Cobb
... could not decently be put forward. But, as everybody is not, in the peaceful course of his threatened by such an absolutely convincing event, the clairvoyant cannot always reveal to the person experimenting—and reveal it for a more or less approximate date—one of those incidents whose ...
— The Unknown Guest • Maurice Maeterlinck
... and Sergeant RUNNYMEDE had also to repeat their evidence. Dr. ROBINSON, police surgeon, likewise retendered his evidence as to the nature of the wound, and the approximate hour of death. But this time he was much more severely examined. He would not bind himself down to state the time within an hour or two. He thought life had been extinct two or three hours when he arrived, so that the deed had been committed between seven and eight. Under gentle pressure from the ...
— The Grey Wig: Stories and Novelettes • Israel Zangwill
... crossing it at right angles. Then from points on the baseline six miles and multiples thereof from the meridian, lines are run due north. And parallels to the base-line are run at distances of six miles. The approximate squares thus formed are called townships. The rows of townships running north and south are called ranges. Townships are numbered north and south from the base-line; ranges east and west from the meridian. The diagram on page 341 illustrates ...
— Studies in Civics • James T. McCleary
... Vagina.—The elasticity of the vagina allows the presence in this passage of the most voluminous foreign bodies. When we consider the passage of a fetal head through the vagina the ordinary foreign bodies, none of which ever approximate this size, seem quite reasonable. Goblets, hair-pins, needles, bottles, beer glasses, compasses, bobbins, pessaries, and many other articles have been found in the vagina. It is quite possible for a phosphatic ...
— Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine • George M. Gould
... characteristic pointing to the fact that he spends his days in arboreal seclusion. The question which we have to face is whether he approaches more closely to the ape or the man. In the latter case, he may well approximate to what the vulgar have called the 'missing link.' The solution of this problem ...
— The Lost World • Arthur Conan Doyle
... we do not want all men to be alike. We do not want to lay down a pattern or type to which men of all sorts are to be made by some means or another to approximate. This is the ideal of the impatient administrator. A bad teacher will aim at imposing his opinion, and turning out a set of pupils all of whom will give the same definite answer on a doubtful point. Mr. Bernard Shaw is said to hold that Troilus and Cressida is the best ...
— Political Ideals • Bertrand Russell
... rapid, owing to the use of the magnetic disengaging gear, that the chances of two or more meters making contact at the same moment are rendered extremely small. Should such a thing happen, it would not matter, as it is only approximate results that we require in this case; and the error, if any, would add to the apparent amount of leakage, and so be on the right side. Of course, the record of each consumer's meter would be taken by ...
— Scientific American Supplement, Vol. XXI., No. 531, March 6, 1886 • Various
... granted, that the metal will burst in the operation. It has borne at various times, not to say at this time, a great infusion of Catholic truth without damage. As to the result, viz. whether this process will not approximate the whole English Church, as a body to Rome, that is nothing to us. For what we know, it may be the providential means of uniting the whole Church in one, without fresh schismatising or use ...
— Apologia pro Vita Sua • John Henry Newman
... beyond reach, it should be caught or "picked up" on the short bound, and to do this safely requires a great deal of skill. It is a pretty play, and often of invaluable service, and it should therefore be practiced carefully until it can be made with approximate safety. The short-stop must not betray beforehand his intention, but pretend that he is going to catch the ball ...
— Base-Ball - How to Become a Player • John M. Ward
... matter to inquire what arrangements on our part would persuade him to undertake the morrow's rehearsal. After a moment's reflection he asked what sort of baton I was accustomed to use when conducting. With my hands I indicated the approximate length and thickness of a medium-sized wooden rod, such as our choir-attendant was in the habit of supplying, freshly covered with white paper. He sighed, and asked if I thought it possible to procure him by ...
— My Life, Volume I • Richard Wagner
... proceeding would make the humans laugh at me—though to look into their serious faces one would not believe this possible. The thoughts of those about me, as I divined them, seemed anything but jocular. They came to me incoherent and inconsecutive, a jumble of conditional premises leading to approximate conclusions expressed in symbols having no intrinsic meaning.—Of course, it is unfair to judge too soon, but I have already begun to doubt the existence of direct perception among them.—What did you say, dear?—Bother direct perception?—Well, I wonder how ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume IV. (of X.) • Various
... needful in society. There are those, who so appear, as "thoughtless of gracefulness, to be yet grace itself." This is the native endowment of some; but all may approximate toward it. Propriety is a rich ornament of female speech. Modesty is a cardinal point in good taste. But let it be sincere. In the early ages of Rome, the women, in general, wore veils in public. Latterly they were worn by certain of the beautiful, but disreputable ...
— The Young Maiden • A. B. (Artemas Bowers) Muzzey
... portion of the cerebrum, being devoted to the sensibility, appetites, and muscular impulses, is that which first presents itself, being the first outgrowth from the great inferior ganglion or summit of the spinal system. As human brains degenerate to a lower type they approximate this form. The frontal and occipital lobes dwindle and the principal mass remaining is that in the basis of the skull between the ears. We see this form distinctly in congenital idiots. The embryo cerebrum ...
— Buchanan's Journal of Man, June 1887 - Volume 1, Number 5 • Various
... thousand four hundred and ten visitors passing these two entrances; and supposing the number of persons coming by the other ten entrances to be not more than those recorded at these two, we shall have three millions as the approximate number ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Volume 11, No. 26, May, 1873 • Various |
