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Aver   /ˈeɪvər/   Listen
Aver

verb
(past & past part. averred; pres. part. averring)
1.
Report or maintain.  Synonyms: allege, say.  "He said it was too late to intervene in the war" , "The registrar says that I owe the school money"
2.
To declare or affirm solemnly and formally as true.  Synonyms: affirm, assert, avow, swan, swear, verify.



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"Aver" Quotes from Famous Books



... rejoice; and these are their only, these their most desirable riches. Silver and gold the Gods have denied them, whether in mercy or in wrath, I am unable to determine. Yet I would not venture to aver that in Germany no vein of gold or silver is produced; for who has ever searched? For the use and possession, it is certain they care not. Amongst them indeed are to be seen vessels of silver, such as have been presented to their Princes and Ambassadors, but holden in no other esteem than vessels ...
— Tacitus on Germany • Tacitus

... about the huts and even into them, and no one ever disturbs them. They build their nests about the huts. In the Bechuana country, a fine is imposed on any man whose boys kill one, but why, no one can tell me. The boys with me aver that they are not killed, because the meat is not eaten! or because they ...
— The Last Journals of David Livingstone, in Central Africa, from 1865 to His Death, Volume I (of 2), 1866-1868 • David Livingstone

... melancholy picture of backward progress, and a family posting towards extinction. But the law (however administered, and I am bound to aver that, in Scotland "it couldna weel be waur") acts as a kind of dredge, and with dispassionate impartiality brings up into the light of day, and shows us for a moment, in the jury-box or on the gallows, the creeping things of the past. By these broken glimpses ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 16 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... so far, a melancholy picture of backward progress, and a family posting towards extinction. But the law (however administered, and I am bound to aver that, in Scotland, 'it couldna weel be waur') acts as a kind of dredge, and with dispassionate impartiality brings up into the light of day, and shows us for a moment, in the jury-box or on the gallows, the creeping things of the past. By these broken glimpses we are able to trace the existence ...
— Records of a Family of Engineers • Robert Louis Stevenson

... with fairly moderate terms is the Bayonne, also boasting of a fine cellar of wine and service a la carte. In fact many people aver that at the Bayonne one can get as good if not a better dinner than at any ...
— The Gourmet's Guide to Europe • Algernon Bastard

... dress more for the eyes of women or for effect upon men. It is a very important problem, and has been a good deal discussed, and its solution would form one fixed, philosophical basis, upon which to estimate woman's character. We are inclined to take a medium ground, and aver that woman dresses to please herself, and in obedience to a law ...
— The Gilded Age, Part 5. • Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) and Charles Dudley Warner

... the Vrouw Grobelaar's nephews and nieces were punctually obedient. Doubtless this was policy; for the old lady founded her authority on a generous complement of this world's goods. However, man is as the grass of the field (as she would constantly aver); and it fell that Frikkie Viljoen, otherwise a lad of promise, became enamored of a girl of lower caste than the Grobelaars and Viljoens, and this, mark you, with a serious eye to marriage. Even this, after a proper and orthodox ...
— Vrouw Grobelaar and Her Leading Cases - Seventeen Short Stories • Perceval Gibbon

... her bower-woman and Madge, the cook's wife. Both aver that the lady hath bewitched whoever comes in her way ever since she crossed the door. She hath wrought strange things with her father, mother, and brothers. They say she bound them to her; that the little one could not brook to have her out of sight; yet she worked on him so that ...
— Grisly Grisell • Charlotte M. Yonge

... well known throughout the South. I resided forty-four years in the slave States, and had as favorable opportunities as any man living, for forming correct opinions on the subject, and I do here most solemnly aver, that of the hundreds of manumitted slaves, that came under my immediate observation, few, comparatively very few, appeared to be benefited by the change. The condition of a large majority of the free blacks in Tennessee and Virginia, who fell under my observation, was deplorable, and farther South, ...
— A Review of Uncle Tom's Cabin - or, An Essay on Slavery • A. Woodward

... about a year or two ago I described in the 'Annals of Natural History' several beautifully coloured terrestrial species of the Southern Hemisphere, and thought it quite a new fact. By the way, you speak of a sheep with a broken leg not having flukes: I have heard my father aver that a fever, or any SERIOUS ACCIDENT, as a broken limb, will cause in a man all the intestinal worms to be evacuated. Might not this possibly have been the case with the ...
— The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, Volume I • Francis Darwin

... and slender of proportion—a very important point where space is so limited—low-voiced, and sparing of violent expletives or gestures, delicately neat in his person and apparel, one could hardly have selected a more amiable colleague under circumstances of some difficulty. I can aver that he conducted himself always with a perfect modesty and decorum: he would preserve his equilibrium miraculously, when his perpendicular had been lost long ago: he never fell upon me but once (sleeping on a sofa, I was exposed defenselessly to all such contingencies), and ...
— Border and Bastille • George A. Lawrence

... can say, without a fear: str. 4. That best, who ought to rule, am I; The mob, who ought to obey, are these; I the one righteous, they the many bad? Who, without check of conscience, can aver That he to power makes way by arms, Sheds blood, imprisons, banishes, attaints, Commits all deeds the guilty oftenest do, Without a single guilty thought, Arm'd for right only, ...
— Poetical Works of Matthew Arnold • Matthew Arnold

... "but I think informing conversation is a bore until after the nuts and raisins. A Danish proverb says that he who knows what he is saying at a feast has but poor comprehension of what he is eating. On my way hither, breakfasting at Strasburg, I enjoyed a lesson in geography, and I aver that though the lesson was elementary, I ...
— Lippincott's Magazine. Vol. XII, No. 33. December, 1873. • Various

... human nature: yet there must certainly have been something highly brutal and depraved in the character of this people, to have given rise to this description of foul and unnatural feeding. What must not be concealed, Euhemerus, an antient writer, who was a native of these parts, did aver, that this bestial practice once prevailed. Saturn's devouring his own children is supposed to allude to this custom. And we learn from this writer, as the passage has been transmitted by [640]Ennius, that not only Saturn, ...
— A New System; or, an Analysis of Antient Mythology. Volume II. (of VI.) • Jacob Bryant

... written for the most part by the very men who they say are not to be relied on as giving a true version of all that took place during their stay at St. Helena. It cannot be disputed that these gentlemen were in daily and hourly contact with England's prisoner, and, as they aver, jotted down everything that passed in conversation or that transpired in other ways between themselves and the Emperor, or ...
— The Tragedy of St. Helena • Walter Runciman

... had been a witness to most unearthly doings. There was no need of further mystery, of doubtful head-shaking, and ominous whispers—every one had seen Klaus Stringstriker near Twirling-stick Mike's house, playing his fiddle in the clear light of the moon. It was true, none could aver that he had heard a single note; but it was impossible to mistake his figure, and that had been seen, time after time, gliding in from the adjoining field, making the tour of Simon's house, and exhibiting all the gesticulations of a violin-player. Many affirmed, too, that the fiddler was followed ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Vol. 56, No. 346, August, 1844 • Various

... deprecated the resolutions altogether. He denied also the inferences which Mr. Dundas had drawn from the West Indian documents relative to the Negro population. He had looked aver his own calculations from the same documents again and again, and he would submit them, with all their data, if it should be necessary, to ...
— The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the - Abolition of the African Slave-Trade, by the British Parliament (1839) • Thomas Clarkson

... cannot learn stands in his own light. Hereafter, when I write an article which I know to be good, but which I may have reason to fear will not, in some quarters, be considered to amount to much, coming from an American, I will aver that an Englishman wrote it and that it is copied from a London journal. And then I will occupy a back seat and enjoy ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... the bishop's ear, and thus produced such a salutary convulsion in the throat, as relieved his lordship from the danger of suffocation [Footnote: Some learned persons assert that this could not have happened. We can only aver that it did happen. The assertions against the possibility of the fact remind us of the physician in Zadig, who, as the fable tells us, wrote a book to prove that Zadig should have gone blind, though he had ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. VII - Patronage • Maria Edgeworth

... can tell at this moment. He has no analogue in the East. True, he is a bird of the bushes, running sometimes like a little deer from one clump to another; but if you should see him mount a boulder or a bush, and hear him sing his rich, theme-like, finely modulated song, you would aver that he is closer kin to the thrushes or thrashers than to the towhees. There is not the remotest suggestion of the towhee minstrelsy in his prolonged and well-articulated melody. It would be difficult to find a finer lyrist ...
— Birds of the Rockies • Leander Sylvester Keyser

... for not willingly I traffic with the dead, and still aver That youth's plump blooming cheek I very much prefer. I'm not at home to corpses; 'tis my way, Like cats with captive mice ...
— Faust Part 1 • Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

... the wales, to the height of the nettings, a snow wall five or six feet thick, which soon froze as hard as a rock. This envelope did not allow the interior heat to escape outside. A canvas tent, covered with skins and hermetically closed, was stretched aver the whole length of the deck, and formed a sort ...
— A Winter Amid the Ice - and Other Thrilling Stories • Jules Verne

... trucks[122] of the British Princesa were shot away. Sir Gilbert Blane, who, though Physician to the Fleet, obtained permission to be on deck throughout the action, wrote ten days after it, "I can aver from my own observation that the French fire slackens as we approach, and is totally silent when we are close alongside." It is needless to say that a marked superiority of fire will silence that of ...
— The Major Operations of the Navies in the War of American Independence • A. T. Mahan

... exulting hopes upon the prospect thus unexpectedly opening before her. She did indeed, in the course of the evening, ask Mr. Mac-Morlan, as if by accident, what might be the annual income of the Hazlewood property; but shall we therefore aver for certain that she was considering whether an heiress of four hundred a year might be a suitable match for the ...
— Guy Mannering • Sir Walter Scott

... truth when I aver, that these words of the baron gave me infinite distress, and for a moment deprived me of speech. I hardly knew what to say or do. At first I suspected that I had made some unaccountable mistake, and brought my letter to the wrong individual. H——, who was almost a Puritan in religious matters, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 55, No. 343, May 1844 • Various

... stopping a Woman's mouth; and as the wife has absolutely nothing to say, and absolutely no constraint of wit, sense, or conscience to prevent her from saying it, not a few cynics have been found to aver that they prefer the danger of the death-dealing but inaudible sting to the safe sonorousness of a ...
— Flatland • Edwin A. Abbott

... has the purity of Taliessin, and the expressiveness of Aneurim, and is such as I know of no modern Welchman who could write. And yet, in spite as they will probably tell me of evidence and common sense, I still aver my persuasion, that it is the production of ...
— Imogen - A Pastoral Romance • William Godwin

... unfortunately physical as well as mental, caused him to be universally looked down upon by his brothers. Even Marian began to share the feeling when she saw him turn pale and start back from the verge of a precipitous chalk pit where she could stand in perfect indifference, and when she heard him aver his preference for quiet horses. Mayflower's caperings were to him and Caroline so shocking, and it appeared to them so improper that she should be allowed to mount such an animal, that but for her complete ease, her delight in the creature's spirit, ...
— The Two Guardians • Charlotte Mary Yonge

... require; we will travel together incognito; we will go wherever you please; we will hear, we will interrogate, the peasants, the townspeople, the soldiers, the rich, and the poor; and when you have seen, seen every thing with your own eyes, you may aver to M. de Metternich, that he has been deceived; and that the efforts of the allies, to impose upon us the law, can have no other result, than that of watering the ground in vain ...
— Memoirs of the Private Life, Return, and Reign of Napoleon in 1815, Vol. II • Pierre Antoine Edouard Fleury de Chaboulon

... first year at 18 lbs.; the second year at 14 lbs.; and the third year at 8 lbs.—making the product for three years 40 lbs., which I think will not materially vary from the actual result, though growers aver they have raised from 30 to 40 lbs. per acre the ...
— The Commercial Products of the Vegetable Kingdom • P. L. Simmonds

... bears a well-known name, Though it is but a little spot; I say 'tis the first on the scroll of fame, And who shall aver it is not? Of the deathless ones who shine and live In arms, in arts, or song, The brightest the whole wide world can give To that little land belong. 'Tis the star of the Earth—deny it who can— ...
— Successful Recitations • Various

... water to the garden. The Garden is built actually upon piers of concrete and stone, connected by arches of brick, and through the subterranean chambers, thus formed, the division of the streams is made, and there controlled. The whole was designed by the great Martian artist, Hinudi, whom some aver is the reincarnated Leonardo da Vinci of ...
— The Certainty of a Future Life in Mars • L. P. Gratacap

... reappearing again with a grin on his face that had frozen stiff and had never relaxed its grip. "You can still see it; turn your head, Mac, and let the gentleman see your smile." Since that time he had spent his nights writing letters, and his days poring aver the morning's mail. "Got his pocket full of them now, and is so happy he's no sort of use to anybody." Mac now ...
— A Gentleman's Gentleman - 1909 • F. Hopkinson Smith

... will not gain your supposed ends upon them by your flight,) seem to expect that you will throw yourself into Lady Betty's protection; and that she will offer to mediate for you. And they vow, that they will never hearken to any terms of accommodation that shall come from that quarter; for I dare aver, that your brother and sister will not let them cool—at least, till their uncles have made such dispositions, and perhaps your father too, as they would have ...
— Clarissa, Volume 3 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson

... require certain modes of acting quite above our reason and understanding. To the sceptics (or to the atheists, as they were termed) the orthodox could allege, 'Will you not believe in witches? The Scriptures aver their existence: to the jurisconsults will you dispute the existence of a crime against which our statute-book and the code of almost all civilised countries have attested by laws upon which hundreds and thousands ...
— The Superstitions of Witchcraft • Howard Williams

... wrote The Ruined Cottage, now incorporated in the Fist Book of the Excursion. This poem, on a subject thoroughly suited to his powers, was his first work of merit; and Coleridge, who visited the quiet household in June 1797, pronounces this poem "superior, I hesitate not to aver, to anything in our language which in any way resembles it." In July 1797 the Wordsworths removed to Alfoxden, a large house in Somersetshire, near Netherstowey, where Coleridge was at that time living. Here Wordsworth added ...
— Wordsworth • F. W. H. Myers

... whereupon he was discovered, dazed with the blow, and injured, though not seriously, in several parts of his body. He had been saved by little short of a miracle: a beam had broken in half and had left each of its two ends in the side walls; and one of these had formed a sort of roof aver the pontifical throne; the pope, who was sitting there at the time, was protected by this overarching beam, and had received ...
— The Borgias - Celebrated Crimes • Alexandre Dumas, Pere

... Benjamin Kidder was sick and unable to proceed; and the commander of the expedition decided to build a fort and leave a garrison to guard the provisions and afford a shelter in case of defeat or retreat. Sergeant Nathaniel Woods was left in command. The garrison consisted of Dr. William Aver, John Goffe, John Gilson, Isaac Whitney, Zachariah Whitney, Zebadiah Austin, Edward Spoony, and Ebenezer Halburt. With his company reduced to thirty-three effective men, Captain Lovewell pushed on toward the enemy. On Saturday morning, May 8, in the neighborhood ...
— Bay State Monthly, Volume I, No. 2, February, 1884 - A Massachusetts Magazine • Various

... of my batchelor notions!—Yet I aver, that state should be my choice, rather than swallow one grain of indifference in the matrimonial pill, gilder'd over ever so nicely.—Think what must be my friendship for Darcey, to tear myself from this engageing circle before nine!—As I ...
— Barford Abbey • Susannah Minific Gunning

... by residence in America we are unable to say. We write of the Irishman in Ireland, from lifelong acquaintance. What dreams the Fenians in America may indulge, we are also in no position to know. But this we may safely aver: The Irishmen in Ireland who are caught by such schemes of rebellion and revolution are not, as might be thought, mere vulgar agitators, eager for notoriety or perhaps plunder. They are (such of them as are the dupes, not the dupers) men whose minds from childhood have been filled with anti-historic ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 103, May, 1866 • Various

... applications, I declare here, once for all, I describe not men, but manners; not an individual, but a species. Perhaps it will be answered, Are not the characters then taken from life? To which I answer in the affirmative; nay, I believe I might aver that I have writ little more than I have seen. The lawyer is not only alive, but hath been so these four thousand years; and I hope G— will indulge his life as many yet to come. He hath not indeed confined himself to one profession, one religion, or one country; but when the first ...
— Joseph Andrews, Vol. 2 • Henry Fielding

... over into France With his lords and his nobles gay. He would teach the Frenchman quite a new dance, And bid him the piper to pay. Such his design; but the end who can tell? Who the fortunes of battle control? One thing I aver, and none will demur: If King Henry succeeds, 'twill be by the deeds Of his soldiers, who ...
— Harper's Young People, April 20, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various

... se 'l Conte Ugolino aveva voce D'aver tradita te de le castella, Non dovei tu i figliuoi porre a ...
— Stories from the Italian Poets: With Lives of the Writers, Volume 1 • Leigh Hunt

... knowledge, or of capacity. Nothing is more common than to hear men of a profession declare loudly against any practice attempted to be established for the improvement of their art, and peremptorily to aver such a practice being impossible, for no other reason than that their own study and efforts had not been able to procure them the attainment of it. In this too they are seconded by that croud of superficial people ...
— A Treatise on the Art of Dancing • Giovanni-Andrea Gallini

... believe I may aver, without hyperbole, it has been tolerably extensive in the historical; so that few nations exist, or have existed, with whose records I am not in some degree acquainted, from Herodotus down to Gibbon. Of the classics, I know about as much as most schoolboys after a discipline of thirteen ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. I. (of VI.) - With his Letters and Journals. • Thomas Moore

... in their mood! Travel with the multitude: Never heed them; I aver 35 That they all are wanton wooers; But the thrifty cottager, Who stirs little out of doors, Joys to spy thee near her home; Spring is coming, Thou ...
— The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth, Vol. II. • William Wordsworth

... Clarendon doth not aver of his own knowledge, that the Prince of Orange, with the best credit, and the assistance of the richest men in Amsterdam, was above ten days endeavouring to raise L20,000 in specie, without being able to raise half the sum in all that time? (See ...
— The Querist • George Berkeley

... several years before going to Salem, and had brought with him some slaves purchased from the Spaniards. Among them were two famous in history as John and Tituba his wife. Historians disagree as to the nationality of these slaves. Some aver they were Indians, others call them negroes, while some state they were half and half. Whatever may have been their nationality, their practices were the fetichism of western Africa, and there can be no doubt ...
— The Witch of Salem - or Credulity Run Mad • John R. Musick

... you, do the physicians lie, when they aver things good for sicknesses, which afterwards send Charon a great number of souls drowned in a potion before they come to his ferry? And no less of the rest, which take upon them to affirm. Now, for the poet, he nothing affirms, and therefore never lieth. For, as I take ...
— English literary criticism • Various

... thoughts, and know them to be inimical to my passion, what ought I to do? Not to desert my own cause, if it be a just one: and, if it be the contrary, there is no question: I will make none. Let me but be convinced of my error, and it shall be renounced. Yes, Oliver, I dare boldly aver—it shall! But shall I forego a right so precious, if it be mine?—No! Kingdoms shall not tempt me!—Why is this timidity? Why does my heart palpitate? Why with inward whispers do I murmur thoughts which I dare not speak aloud? Why do they rise quivering to my lips, and ...
— Anna St. Ives • Thomas Holcroft

... the peculiarities of an age or a nation may modify. You should have looked deeper. That which constitutes the religious life has escaped you. Your criticism has dissected a dead creed. That scalpel will never detect a soul. Or will you aver that you have indeed looked upon religion in its inward reality? Then you must acknowledge that the idea of religion is inherent in human nature, that it is a great necessity of our kind. Your quarrel lies in this case, not with religion itself, but with the corruptions of it. In the name of ...
— History of Rationalism Embracing a Survey of the Present State of Protestant Theology • John F. Hurst

... humorous. Mr. Redbrook, at least; gave no sign that they were not. He was aware that Mr. Redbrook was bringing arguments to bear on the matter of the meeting of the evening before, but he fended these lightly, while in spirit he flung a gem-studded bridle aver ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill

... strength, an eagle robbed of his freedom, or a dove bereft of his mate, all die, it is said, of a broken heart; and who will aver that this grim bandit could bear the three-fold brunt, heart-whole? This only I know, that when the morning dawned, he was lying there still in his position of calm repose, his body unwounded, but his spirit was gone—the old kingwolf ...
— Wild Animals I Have Known • Ernest Thompson Seton

... 'La princesa fue recibida con tanta alegria communemente de todos, que affirmavan aver de ser esta causa, no solo de muy grande paz y presperidad de sodo a' quel reyno, pero de la union del y de ...
— A History of England Principally in the Seventeenth Century, Volume I (of 6) • Leopold von Ranke

... justify a disregard of religion. We may sell our purple—but we must also attend to the instructions of the ministry and the word of God. If we imitate Lydia in diligence, let us not forget to imitate her in piety. It is vain and wicked to aver, that, the concerns of this world and those of another interfere; because an ardent religion is not only compatible with worldly occupations, but promotes both their purity and integrity, if it ...
— Female Scripture Biographies, Vol. II • Francis Augustus Cox

... Huguenot husband, the King of Navarre, to join him; and that the King keeps her here virtually a prisoner, lest her departure might be taken as a concession to the Huguenots; and, lastly and chiefly, they aver that she plots with her brother Anjou, to help him to join the Huguenots ...
— An Enemy To The King • Robert Neilson Stephens

... an impartial assembly), yet we confess we have seldom heard him, on such occasions, without pain for the event. He did not slur his own character and pretensions, but he compromised the argument. He spoke the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth; but the House of Commons (we dare aver it) is not the place where the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth can be spoken with safety or with advantage. The judgment of the House is not a balance to weigh scruples and reasons to the turn of a fraction: another ...
— The Spirit of the Age - Contemporary Portraits • William Hazlitt

... me by high as well as low, that if Sir Robert Blosse and Lord De Clifford can get in their rents without "all the king's horses and all the king's men," other landlords must try to do the same. To prevent misconception, I will aver, even at the risk that I may seem to "protest too much," that this argument is not thrust upon me by the Land League, but by persons who are proprietors themselves. It is held ridiculous, in this section ...
— Disturbed Ireland - Being the Letters Written During the Winter of 1880-81. • Bernard H. Becker

... cite the famous tree in a Roman convent garden, which on good authority is stated to have been planted by St Dominic nearly six hundred years ago. As to the amount of fruit yielded, the growers of Sorrento commonly aver that one good year, one bad year and one mediocre year constitute the general cycle in the prospects of orange farming. Two crops are gathered annually, the principle one in December and the other at ...
— The Naples Riviera • Herbert M. Vaughan

... obliging me. As I have once told you, that I am the conquest more of your virtue than your beauty; so not one alarming word or look shall my beloved Pamela hear or see, to give her reason to suspect the truth of what I aver. You may the rather believe me, continued he, as you may see the pain I have to behold any thing that concerns you, even though your concern be causeless. And yet I will indulge my dear girl's bashful weakness so far, ...
— Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded • Samuel Richardson

... He said, in substance, that he was glad to find from their cheers that Chicago did not believe in the thieves who stole delegates. Some who saw him say that his face was red with anger; others aver that he was no more vehement than usual, and simply strained himself to the utmost to make his voice carry throughout his audience. Still, if he said what they report, he ...
— Theodore Roosevelt; An Intimate Biography, • William Roscoe Thayer

... me and them, that Cossus was consul when he took them. Having once heard Augustus Caesar, the founder or restorer of all our temples, on entering the temple of Jupiter Feretrius, which being dilapidated by time he rebuilt, aver that he himself had read the said inscription on the linen breastplate, I thought it would be next to sacrilege to rob Cossus of such a testimony respecting his spoils as that of Caesar, the renovator of the temple itself. Whether the mistake is chargeable on the very ancient ...
— The History of Rome, Books 01 to 08 • Titus Livius

... alacrity and precision. But what with beating carpets, scrubbing floors, and turning things topsy-turvy in general, the task was not accomplished with any considerable despatch. A man is a cumbrous article at house-cleaning time, as any housewife will aver, and Mr. Grundy, recognizing this fact, betook himself to the neighboring Little Beach River to fish, and let "the boss" tear up things to her heart's content. His request that I should accompany him was almost a warning, so I assented, ...
— The Love Story of Abner Stone • Edwin Carlile Litsey

... befall us, optimists aver, is without its value; and this, I have heard, is especially true if we happen to be literary men. All is grist that ...
— The Cardinal's Snuff-Box • Henry Harland

... human even (and that the school we are considering do not aver), how did the writer come to be accurate even to that extent? Take only the order of events. I admit it does not correspond with the geologic record in the way commonly asserted; yet it has a very remarkable ...
— Creation and Its Records • B.H. Baden-Powell

... Bononcini, That Mynheer Handel 's but a ninny; Others aver that he to Handel Is scarcely fit to hold a candle. Strange all this difference should ...
— Familiar Quotations • John Bartlett

... But, as our countrymen aver, those who even to-day are said to dwell in that rugged and inaccessible desert aforesaid, are, by the mutable nature of their bodies, vouchsafed the power of being now near, now far, and of appearing and vanishing in turn. The approach ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")

... business—of the party speaker when he mounts the raging stump to roar his platitudes into the ears of those who have the simplicity to listen, though neither edified nor enlightened; to aver that the horse he rides is sixteen feet high; that the candidate he supports is a giant; and that he himself is no ...
— Marse Henry, Complete - An Autobiography • Henry Watterson

... spirit rising in Europe, tend to throw back the cause of a proscribed rebel. England swarms with revolutionists; my cousin's residence in this country is in itself suspicious. The suspicion is increased by his strange seclusion. There are many Italians here who would aver that they had met with him, and that he was ...
— My Novel, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... them report that the victim had succumbed to a sudden ailment, and by urging the whole number of the kindred, as well as the headmen of the place, to hand in a declaration to that effect. Your Worship can aver that you understand perfectly how to write charms in dust, and conjure the spirit; having had an altar, covered with dust, placed in the court, you should bid the military and people to come and look on ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin

... the undersigned, do hereby aver that Governor McDougall asked to be introduced to the executive committee of the Committee of Vigilance, which was allowed and hour fixed. The Governor, upon being introduced, states THAT HE APPROVED OF THE ACTS OF THE COMMITTEE ...
— Port O' Gold • Louis John Stellman

... pictures, the medicine men aver, are transmitted from teacher to pupil in each order and for each ceremony unaltered from year to year and from generation to generation. That such is strictly the case I cannot believe. There are no standard pictures on hand anywhere. No permanent design ...
— The Mountain Chant, A Navajo Ceremony • Washington Matthews

... young fellow.—My friend Warrington found a grim pleasure in his company; and his bright face, droll humour, and kindly laughter were always welcome in our chambers. Honest Fred Bayham was charmed to be in his society; and used pathetically to aver that he himself might have been such a youth, had he been blest with a kind father to watch, and good friends to guide, his early career. In fact, Fred was by far the most didactic of Clive's bachelor acquaintances, pursued ...
— The Newcomes • William Makepeace Thackeray

... Switzerland, and every week thousands of copies found their way across the border and were passed from hand to hand among determined readers and converts. A compact organization was maintained, a treasury was established and kept well filled, and with truth the Social Democrats aver to-day that in no small measure they owe their superb organization to the Bismarckian era of repression. At the elections of 1878 the party cast but 437,158 votes, but in 1884 its vote was 549,990 (9.7 per cent of the whole) and the contingent of representatives ...
— The Governments of Europe • Frederic Austin Ogg

... aver it, and I aver it again, I was unafraid. The death which Wolf Larsen and even Thomas Mugridge had made me fear, I no longer feared. The coming of Maud Brewster into my life seemed to have transformed me. After ...
— The Sea-Wolf • Jack London

... awed by rumour; Not grave through pride, or gay through folly— An equal mixture of good humour And sensible, soft melancholy. 'Has she no faults then,' (Envy says,) 'Sir?' 'Yes, she has one, I must aver; When all the world conspires to praise her— The woman's ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 1 • Horace Walpole

... declare that they are mere non-essential circumstances, and that a man may reach the same end by studying himself in himself. It is as if a man should use a ladder to reach a lofty crag, and then kick it over contemptuously, and aver that he could just as well have flown up, and ask the crowd below to break up that miserable ladder and try their wings. Doubtless they have wings, if they only knew it. But seriously, I am not inclined ...
— Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, March 1844 - Volume 23, Number 3 • Various

... to relieve the pa. The garrison of Wereroa were beaten by tactics, the most deadly of weapons, and they accepted the verdict. The victory was the more complete, in that the Governor lost never a man of his tiny army. It would be hard to aver that he did not, even as the grave Pro-Consul, love such an adventure for itself. That ...
— The Romance of a Pro-Consul - Being The Personal Life And Memoirs Of The Right Hon. Sir - George Grey, K.C.B. • James Milne

... brother here, sir, and Mr Bracewell, and the boatswain of the 'Arrow,' aver that they were taken out of their vessel and detained by force on board this ship, and there can be no doubt of ...
— The Two Supercargoes - Adventures in Savage Africa • W.H.G. Kingston

... she no faults, then (Envy says), sir? Yes, she has one, I must aver— When all the world conspires to praise her, The woman's ...
— Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges • William Makepeace Thackeray

... or half-a-dozen men arise, who believe that the world is not the devil's world at all, but God's: that the multitude of the people is not, as Malthusians aver, the ruin, but as Solomon believed, "the strength of the rulers"; that men are not meant to be beasts of prey, eating one another up by competition, as in some confined pike pond, where the great pike having despatched the little ones, begin to devour each other, ...
— Alton Locke, Tailor And Poet • Rev. Charles Kingsley et al

... language entirely incomprehensible to all without a key. The gambler, though not anywise connected, stands in his profession ready to conciliate them in their works of death, under the horrible idea that Nature, as their God, has plainly sanctioned the profession. And the religion of Nature they aver to be the only true ...
— Secret Band of Brothers • Jonathan Harrington Green

... I say, and you may even aver the best—that ever was, or is again likely for many a day to be, on the unquaking and fruitful earth, where one could calculate on a pillar's standing fast, once well set up; and where aisles of aspen, ...
— Our Fathers Have Told Us - Part I. The Bible of Amiens • John Ruskin

... discovered that this was a common belief among the Indians of the plains. Some old men claimed to have seen these caves far down in Texas, and it was quite common for the ancients of the tribes to aver that their fathers or grandfathers had seen them. Most of them held, too, to the consoling belief that however great the slaughter of buffaloes by white man and red, Manitou would continue to send them in such vast numbers that the supply could never be exhausted, although a few ...
— The Great Sioux Trail - A Story of Mountain and Plain • Joseph Altsheler

... court and country bevy Chose the gallant of loins less heavy, And would have laid upon the shelf Him who could talk but of himself. Reason is stout, but even Reason May walk too long in Rhyme's hot season. I have heard many folks aver They have caught horrid colds with her. Imagination's paper kite, Unless the string is held in tight, Whatever fits and starts it takes, Soon bounces on the ground, and breaks. You, placed afar from each extreme, Nor dully drowse nor wildly dream, But, ever flowing with good-humour, Are bright ...
— Imaginary Conversations and Poems - A Selection • Walter Savage Landor

... have been no dishonour to me to have been led by such conductors! Yet, as the truth cannot dishonour me neither, I must aver, that my little system was projected, and brought to the exact state it now is in, without my having the least apprehension that any thing similar had been suggested before by any person whatever; nor have I, in consequence ...
— An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Taste, and of the Origin of - our Ideas of Beauty, etc. • Frances Reynolds

... said Kate hastily. 'It is true I know nothing of your people, but I think I could aver that for a shrewd calculation of the cost of a venture, for knowing when caution and when daring will best succeed, the Irish peasant has scarcely ...
— Lord Kilgobbin • Charles Lever

... naturally revolt, the clergy will endeavor to seduce your imagination by vague pictures of the ineffable delights which will be enjoyed in Paradise by the souls and bodies of those who have adopted their reveries; they will aver that you cannot refuse to believe them upon their mere word without encountering the eternal indignation of a God of pity; and they will attempt to alarm your fancy by frightful delineations of the cruel torments which a God of goodness has prepared ...
— Letters to Eugenia - or, a Preservative Against Religious Prejudices • Baron d'Holbach

... Webster of yours! Why, I can remember when he had a hard push to have his ability acknowledged. We used to aver that he never said anything, and that it was only his big way that carried the crowd. I have in mind an old-time report of one of his deliverances: 'Mr. Chairman (applause), I did not graduate at this university (greater applause), at this college ...
— The Last Leaf - Observations, during Seventy-Five Years, of Men and Events in America - and Europe • James Kendall Hosmer

... under the pretence of taking her to see Mr. Fechter in Hamlet, I led her down to the New River at Sadler's Wells, where a body of a child in a nankeen pelisse was subsequently found, and has never been recognized to the present day. And this Mrs. Lynx can aver, because she saw the whole transaction with her own eyes, as she told ...
— Roundabout Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray

... do say, monsieur, that philanthropy plays but a sorry part in your hero's schemes. They aver that he looks on his own efforts and the adventures through which he goes only ...
— El Dorado • Baroness Orczy

... holiness, by you described; which holiness you aver is that, which is the great and only design of Christ to promote both by his ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan

... one) girls in the country would have been highly unconventional, and he was very wise not to. So that was disposed of. They had missed their train and motored down instead, arriving half-way through dinner. What of that? Unless she was prepared to aver that there had been no breakdown, what was there to build on here? So that was disposed of. They had played two games of billiards together last night—the second fifty, so it appeared, had been doubled—but why not? Before each game ...
— Daisy's Aunt • E. F. (Edward Frederic) Benson

... order that you may have full information; yet, he is ill to-day in body and mind, and, even were it not so, I am older than he and know more of men. That Decius Magius has sympathizers, it is vain to deny; but that they are many or influential, I, who know the Capuans, aver is not the case. As for our horsemen, it is easy to see that their safety demands an apparent friendship for Rome. It is not wise for three hundred to revile ...
— The Lion's Brood • Duffield Osborne

... conceal the fact that most earnest patriotism sometimes arouses in the soldier's breast what might seem to be a fiendish desire to witness the slaughter of his country's enemies. Only a soldier of fortune or a hireling can be a stranger to such feelings. Yet I aver that I had not the slightest feeling of personal enmity toward my old friend and classmate General Hood, or his comrades. It was the "accursed politicians" who had led them into such a fratricidal strife who were the objects of our maledictions. But even that feeling has been softened by ...
— Forty-Six Years in the Army • John M. Schofield

... the morning. Four hours remained to us before the sun could be observed with advantage. I directed our steps towards a vast bay cut in the steep granite shore. There, I can aver that earth and ice were lost to sight by the numbers of sea-mammals covering them, and I involuntarily sought for old Proteus, the mythological shepherd who watched these immense flocks of Neptune. There were more seals than anything else, forming distinct ...
— Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea • Jules Verne

... claim, maintain, produce, advance, assign, declare, offer, say, affirm, aver, introduce, plead, state. ...
— English Synonyms and Antonyms - With Notes on the Correct Use of Prepositions • James Champlin Fernald

... Ercol le colonne, E che piu la molti periti sonne. Sappi che questa opinione e vana; Perche piu oltre navicar si puote, Pero che l' acqua in ogni parte e piana, Benche la terra abbi forma di ruote: Era piu grossa allor la gente humana; Falche potrebbe arrosirne le gote Ercule ancor d' aver posti que' segni, Perche piu oltre passeranno i legni. E puossi andar giu ne l' altro emisperio, Pero che al centro ogni cosa reprime; Si che la terra per divin misterio Sospesa sta fra le stelle sublime, E la giu son citta, castella, e imperio; Ma nol cognobbon quelle genti prime: Vedi che il ...
— Literary Remains (1) • Coleridge

... so the chroniclers aver, though outwardly impassive, was evidently deeply moved. He had very expressive eyes, clear mirrors of the fine, upright soul within, and in them there was a look of intense emotion as he watched the crowd, ...
— I Will Repay • Baroness Emmuska Orczy

... want to achieve a reputation as a 'knocker,'" said the Observer, knitting his brow thoughtfully, "but, I nevertheless, aver and maintain that the national evil of this great ...
— Said the Observer • Louis J. Stellman

... Canadas in no time, swearing to repay tenfold every moment's misery he spent in jail. He did repay—at Cherry Valley. Think, sir, what bloody ghosts must haunt his couch at night—unless he be all demon and not human at all, as some aver. Yet he has ...
— The Reckoning • Robert W. Chambers

... yellow soap, be rubbed over the seams, and round the inner rim of the head of the cask, it will preserve it from opening. The equal temperature of the kitchen is preferred by experienced housewives to letting the vinegar stand abroad; they aver the coldness of the nights in this country is prejudicial to the process, being as speedily perfected as if it underwent no such check. By those well skilled in the manufacture of home-made wines and beer, excellent maple-wine and beer might be produced at a very trifling expense; ...
— The Backwoods of Canada • Catharine Parr Traill

... a mistake to boil over with anything—confidence, doubt or fear," said Roger. "When the kettle boils aver, the soup gets scorched. Come, Phil, shake the kinks out of your arm with me, while they're taking their ...
— Rival Pitchers of Oakdale • Morgan Scott

... it should be forthcoming, if needed for any fit purpose, such as the purchase of an office, an apprentice's fee, or an outfit as a squire. It was a vague promise that cost him nothing just then, and thus could be readily made, and John's great desire was to get them away so that he could aver that they had gone by their own free will, without any hardship, for he had seen enough at his father's obsequies to show him that the love and sympathy of all the scanty dwellers in the ...
— The Armourer's Prentices • Charlotte M. Yonge

... all this obstinacy of sentiments, once more I dare aver, the savages would have been easily won over and attached to the English party, had these gone the right way about it: and I well know that the French, who knew best the nature of the savages, much dreaded ...
— An Account Of The Customs And Manners Of The Micmakis And Maricheets Savage Nations, Now Dependent On The Government Of Cape-Breton • Antoine Simon Maillard

... of fortune, and then to independence of spirit. As I am only giving an opinion on this point, and not at all debating it in an adverse line, I hope I may be excused in another observation. With great truth I may aver, that I never remember to have talked on this subject with any man much conversant with public business, who considered short Parliaments as a real improvement of the constitution. Gentlemen, warm in a popular cause, are ready enough to attribute all the declarations of such persons to corrupt ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. I. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... this apparently but just, though really impracticable demand, I weighed well certain thoughts long revolving, and of late nearly bursting forth and the result was this—to try all, while yet there is time. Reproach else may aver, when too late, greater courage Would have had greater success. This idea settled my resolutions, and they all bent to one point, risking ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madam D'Arblay Volume 2 • Madame D'Arblay

... writer that during an eclipse at Lamoo he ridiculed the native notion of driving away a beast which devours the moon, and explained the real cause of the phenomenon. But his native friend protested that "he could not be expected to believe such a story". Yet other savages aver an old agreement with the belief in ...
— Myth, Ritual, and Religion, Vol. 1 • Andrew Lang

... West Indians that self-interest is a sufficient check to the indulgence of vindictive feelings in the master; for here is a case where a man (a respectable and benevolent man as his friends aver,) prefers losing entirely the full price of the slave, for the mere satisfaction of preventing a poor black woman from returning home to her husband! If the pleasure of thwarting the benevolent wishes of the Anti-Slavery Society in behalf of the deserted negro, ...
— The History of Mary Prince - A West Indian Slave • Mary Prince

... be? Why, man, and wilt thou doubt, Where Sylla deigns these dangers to aver? Sirrah, except not so, misdoubt not so: See here Aneparius' letters, read the lines, And say, Lucretius, that I favour thee, That darest but suspect thy general. [Read the ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VII (4th edition) • Various

... possessed of the good taste, good humour, and agreeable manners which are more requisite to make a good leader than eloquence, however brilliant. With these qualities, it may be asked why he was not a better Minister, and who can answer that question? or who can aver that he did not pursue the policy which he conscientiously believed to be most advantageous to his country? Nay, more, who can say but from surmise and upon speculation that it was not the best? I believe that he was seduced by his vanity, that his head was turned ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William - IV, Volume 1 (of 3) • Charles C. F. Greville

... Abyss is a vast shambles. Year by year, and decade after decade, rural England pours in a flood of vigorous strong life, that not only does not renew itself, but perishes by the third generation. Competent authorities aver that the London workman whose parents and grand-parents were born in London is so remarkable a specimen that he is ...
— The People of the Abyss • Jack London

... the matter. Perhaps the prince and his army are no more upon the air on such a night than on any other; or that being so, they no more hastened their departure by reason of the bells than the eclipse does by reason of the beating of the Emperor of China's gongs. But this I aver, whatever the cause, upon such nights of storm, the sensoria of some men are crossed by such wild variety and succession of images, as amounts very nearly to the Walpurgis of a fever. It is not the mere noise—other noises won't do it. The air, to be sure, is ...
— The House by the Church-Yard • J. Sheridan Le Fanu

... of slavery, nor denounce the crime of holding human beings in bondage. They dare not lead to the onset against the forces of tyranny; and if they shrink from the conflict, how shall the victory be won? I do not mean to aver that in their sermons, or addresses, or private conversations, they never allude to the subject of slavery; for they do so frequently, or at least every Fourth of July. But my complaint is that ...
— William Lloyd Garrison - The Abolitionist • Archibald H. Grimke

... his time praying the saints to assist him in his atheistical studies; indeed a satire of the day ascribes him as making a novena to the Virgin to obtain a clearer understanding of the universality of matter. Others with more likelihood aver that he frequented the churches to escape from the tyranny of his pedagogue; and it is certain that from one cause or another his education threw him into the opposite extreme of a superstitious and mechanical ...
— The Valley of Decision • Edith Wharton

... his neighbors were about to cast out the devil of irreverence in good old-fashioned manner, when one of Mynheer's daughters interceded, carried off the handsome miscreant, and—such was her imperious way!—married him! He was heard in after years to aver that the whipping would have been the milder punishment, but, be that as it may, a child was born unto them who inherited the father's adventuresome and graceless character, deserted his home, joined ...
— The Strollers • Frederic S. Isham

... high-favouring donor Presents immortal bowers to mortal sense; As now 'tis done to thee, Endymion. Hence 440 Was I in no wise startled. So recline Upon these living flowers. Here is wine, Alive with sparkles—never, I aver, Since Ariadne was a vintager, So cool a purple: taste these juicy pears, Sent me by sad Vertumnus, when his fears Were high about Pomona: here is cream, Deepening to richness from a snowy gleam; Sweeter than that nurse Amalthea skimm'd For the boy Jupiter: and here, undimm'd 450 By any ...
— Endymion - A Poetic Romance • John Keats

... walked back to that fresh aforetime of a single bright Sunday in autumn or early spring. Before noon they felt its airs upon their cheeks, and by nightfall, on the banks of some quiet stream, or along some path in the wood, or on some hilltop, aver they have heard the voices and felt the wonder and the mystery that so enchanted the ...
— Winter Sunshine • John Burroughs



Words linked to "Aver" :   protest, attest, asseverate, avow, plead, tell, maintain, assure, hold, declare, claim, take



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