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Risk   /rɪsk/   Listen
Risk

verb
(past & past part. risked; pres. part. risking)
1.
Expose to a chance of loss or damage.  Synonyms: lay on the line, put on the line.  "Why risk your life?" , "She laid her job on the line when she told the boss that he was wrong"
2.
Take a risk in the hope of a favorable outcome.  Synonyms: adventure, chance, gamble, hazard, run a risk, take a chance, take chances.



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"Risk" Quotes from Famous Books



... ventured in, Plunge blindly on from sin to sin! What toils he suffers, what disgrace, To get, and then to keep, a place! How often, whether wrong or right, Must he in jest or earnest fight, 10 Risking for those both life and limb Who would not risk one groat for him! Under the Temple lay a Cave, Made by some guilty, coward slave, Whose actions fear'd rebuke: a maze Of intricate and winding ways, Not to be found without a clue; One passage only, known to few, In paths direct led ...
— Poetical Works • Charles Churchill

... found the box, and discovered that she had forgotten the scissors with which she intended to break the lock. She wondered whether she might safely risk the trip down-stairs after the scissors, or whether it would be better to take the box with her and hide it in her room. Before she had made up her mind, she heard a slow, heavy tread ...
— Master of the Vineyard • Myrtle Reed

... wisest captains, Alexius resolved to risk the event of a general action, and exhorted the garrison of Durazzo to assist their own deliverance by a well-timed sally from the town. He marched in two columns to surprise the Normans before daybreak on two ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 5 • Edward Gibbon

... an impulse that takes men out of themselves and by a certain spirit of challenge to fate that every one with a sporting instinct loves to take. But the act of the sailor of the Formidable was a much bigger thing. Here was no thrill of gallantry and no sporting risk. He dealt in cold certainties: the boat and safety; the ship and death; his life or the other's. And he thought of his comrade's old parents at home and ...
— Pebbles on the Shore • Alpha of the Plough (Alfred George Gardiner)

... less in the spirit (and, thank heaven, less in the style) of Mr. Spencer than in that of Monsieur de Montaigne, has objected to music (and, I presume, in less degree to other art) that it runs the risk of enfeebling the character by stimulating emotions without affording them a corresponding outlet in activity. I agree (as will be seen farther on) that music more particularly may have an unwholesome influence, but not for the reason assigned by Professor James, who seems to me to mistake the ...
— Laurus Nobilis - Chapters on Art and Life • Vernon Lee

... of some value to know what these are, but at the same time it must be observed that no plant will grow under trees of the fir tribe, and it would be a great risk to place any under the Deodar—with all others also it must not be expected that any trees having their foliage so low as to affect the circulation of air under their branches, can do otherwise than destroy the plants placed ...
— Flowers and Flower-Gardens • David Lester Richardson

... pompously quoted Kant: "I am a bachelor, and I could not cease to be a bachelor without a disturbance that would be intolerable to me." Yet he was not a misogynist. He simply shirked responsibility and ease-threatening risk. ...
— Carmen Ariza • Charles Francis Stocking

... to stay to hear Tannhaeuser. Liszt would not hear of it; he packed his friend off under an assumed name to some other friends; they procured a passport, and he travelled to Zurich via Jena and Coburg. It should be put on record that in the meantime he ran the risk of being captured by lingering to have a last hour with his wife. Towards the end of the month he reached Zurich, and had no more fear of the ...
— Richard Wagner - Composer of Operas • John F. Runciman

... arrival, which will carry me to Charleston. It might appear ill-natured and ungrateful for the kindness John and Sally show me to regret residing at Hagley. But you, who always put the best construction on my words and deeds, will allow, that a place in which we have suffered much and run a risk of suffering ...
— Memoirs of Aaron Burr, Complete • Matthew L. Davis

... Colonel Gardiner, with his regiment of dragoons, was faithful to his trust, and the magistrates of Edinburgh did all in their power to prevent the surrender of the city. But the great body of the citizens preferred to trust to the clemency of Charles, than run the risk of defence. ...
— A Modern History, From the Time of Luther to the Fall of Napoleon - For the Use of Schools and Colleges • John Lord

... said, pushed him aside when mounting a horse he was used to: and the innocent youth would have perished under torture if Cerealis, the principal master of the horse, had not delayed the barbarous infliction at his own risk. ...
— The Roman History of Ammianus Marcellinus • Ammianus Marcellinus

... he should have no difficulty in finding it. Our escape from the pirate made us, for a time, almost forget our raging thirst; we could not, however, but admire the fidelity and resolution of the natives, who, rather than run the risk of betraying us, had refrained from asking for water ...
— A Voyage round the World - A book for boys • W.H.G. Kingston

... whom nothing that is human is wholly alien. And if in the pursuit of high abstractions and improving themes we imitate too closely Wordsworth's avoidance of Personal Talk, our dinner-table will run much risk of becoming as dull ...
— Collections and Recollections • George William Erskine Russell

... and not daring to risk another hug, darted away from the cabin. The bear, now quite angry, followed and overtook him near the fence. Fortunately the clouds were clearing away, and the moon threw light sufficient to enable the hunter to ...
— Travels and Adventures of Monsieur Violet • Captain Marryat

... its proper hour arrives, and perhaps becomes in soul a bachelor before his time. In this side of his nature he is forever incommensurate with and unintelligible to woman, be she even teacher, sister, or mother. Better some risk of gross thoughts and even acts, to which phylogeny and recapitulation so strongly incline him, than this subtle eviration. But if the boy is unduly repelled from the sphere of girls' interests, the girl is in some danger of being unduly drawn to his, and, as we saw above, ...
— Youth: Its Education, Regimen, and Hygiene • G. Stanley Hall

... from an apprehension that it might be taken by a person of some noisy calling or other; and so much at last did this fear alarm me, that I determined on taking the shop into my own hands, and running myself the risk of its letting—thus securing the choice of a tenant. Having come to this resolution, then, I called upon the landlord ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume VI • Various

... where, perhaps, some huge three-headed dragon or other horrible monster had his den. Such misshapen creatures were very numerous in those days; and nobody ever expected to make a voyage or take a journey without running more or less risk of ...
— The Children's Hour, Volume 3 (of 10) • Various

... "I'll risk the trouble, Poke; come on," and on they went after the garrison. It was not long before they reached the soldiers, who were just rounding up the cattle mentioned, and in ...
— For the Liberty of Texas • Edward Stratemeyer

... game, as played by kings and kaisers, to the small traffic of a local government wrangling over a road-bill, or disputing over a harbour, seemed too horrible to confront, and he eagerly begged the Minister to allow him to return to his post, and not risk a hard-earned reputation on ...
— Lord Kilgobbin • Charles Lever

... speak," she said. "You have brought us these letters from Richard, for which we offer you our heartfelt thanks, but you did not risk your liberty, perhaps your life, to come here simply as his ambassador. There is something beyond this in your visit to this country. You may be a Swede, but is it not true that at the present moment you are in the service ...
— The Zeppelin's Passenger • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... thrown open, and then horses, mules, and carts, men, women, and children, pressed into Paris, at the risk of suffocating each other, and in a quarter of an hour ...
— The Forty-Five Guardsmen • Alexandre Dumas

... the craft. On thundered the buffaloes. Tom feared he could not get the motor started quickly enough. He did not dare risk rising by means of the aeroplane feature, but at once started ...
— Tom Swift and his Electric Rifle • Victor Appleton

... attention to this resemblance, and, in fact, requested that it should be mentioned on the inner side of the title-page. And he added: "I could, of course, have chosen a hundred other ideas in place of this one; but in order not to run any risk of blame on account of this intentional trifle (which the critics, and especially my enemies, will regard in a bad light), I make this avertissement. Or please add some note of a similar kind, otherwise it may prove detrimental to the sale." No. 22 (11) ...
— The Pianoforte Sonata - Its Origin and Development • J.S. Shedlock

... first. Do let me kiss him! Only once. You know it's a great risk, after all. And if he grew ...
— A Son of Hagar - A Romance of Our Time • Sir Hall Caine

... scheme attentively in my own mind, and found it not so difficult as I first imagined, if the prisoners could but escape cleverly. So before I went away I told them I approved of their purpose; and as I was their countryman, I was resolved, with their leaves, to risk my fortune with them. At this they seemed much pleased, and all embraced me. We then fixed the peremptory night, and I was to wait at the water-side and get the boats ...
— Life And Adventures Of Peter Wilkins, Vol. I. (of II.) • Robert Paltock

... to raise a crop of 30 bushels every other year, and still better to raise 45 bushels every third year. And it is here that clover comes to our aid. It will enable us to do this very thing, and the land runs no greater risk of exhaustion than Mr. Lawes' ...
— Talks on Manures • Joseph Harris

... come from an expedition through the Bosphorus to the Black Sea and the Cyanean Symplegades, up which last I scrambled with as great risk as ever the Argonauts escaped in their hoy. You remember the beginning of the nurse's dole in the Medea [lines 1-7], of which I beg you to take the following translation, done on the summit;—[A 'damned business'] it very nearly ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Vol. 7. - Poetry • George Gordon Byron

... canned foods at comparatively little cost. Of course, the woman who has a garden of her own has a decided advantage over the one who must depend on the market for foods to can. The woman with access to a garden may can foods as soon as they have been gathered, and for this reason she runs less risk of losing them after they have been canned. Nevertheless, as has been pointed out, it is really the duty of every housewife to preserve food in the home for the use of ...
— Woman's Institute Library of Cookery, Vol. 5 • Woman's Institute of Domestic Arts and Sciences

... At the risk of seeming to wander off into the boundless domain of aesthetics, we must stop at this point for a moment to make sure that we are of one mind regarding the meaning of the phrase "artistic pleasure," in so far at least as it is used ...
— The Florentine Painters of the Renaissance - With An Index To Their Works • Bernhard Berenson

... tenderness from the ground, and conjured me, in the mildest accents, to be comforted; to pardon the severity of those words, which had arisen from a fear that, by an imprudent avowal on my part, I should risk both his happiness and my own. He informed me that he was heir to one of the first families in England; and before he set out for the continent, he had pledged his honor to his father never to enter into any matrimonial engagement without first acquainting him with the particulars ...
— Thaddeus of Warsaw • Jane Porter

... morning dawned; and with such speed she almost flew on, that sunrise found her many miles from her home, Inez was fearless, or she would never have dared to undertake what lay before her. Alone, unprotected, in the guise of a man, without possessing his ordinary means of defense, there was much to risk; for Indian depredations were frequent, and she must traverse a wide waste of almost interminable length ...
— Inez - A Tale of the Alamo • Augusta J. Evans

... happy now only in my children." As those were assured her, she never thought of regretting her marriage, but only deplored the loss of her dream. Nor did she judge Stefan. She understood the wild risk she had run in marrying a man of whom she knew nothing. "He is as he is," she thought; "neither of us is to blame." Lonely and grieved, she turned for companionship to her writing, and began a series of fairy tales which she had long ...
— The Nest Builder • Beatrice Forbes-Robertson Hale

... represented; and though they spoke without direct authority from the British commanders at the lake posts, yet their words carried weight when they told the young red warriors that it was better to run the risk of dying like men than of starving like dogs. Many of the old men among the Wyandotes and Delawares spoke against strife; but the young men were for war, and among the Shawnees, the Wabash Indians, and the Miamis the hostile party was still ...
— The Winning of the West, Volume Three - The Founding of the Trans-Alleghany Commonwealths, 1784-1790 • Theodore Roosevelt

... great risk upon this hazardous expedition—that was true. But Chayne knew enough of the man to be assured that he would not hesitate on that account. The very audacity of the exploit marked it out as Gabriel Strood's. Moreover, there would be no other party on the Brenva ridge to spy upon ...
— Running Water • A. E. W. Mason

... bottle-green coat with basket buttons, just striking a light on the pommel of his saddle to indulge in a fumigation.—Keep your eye on him all day, and if you can lead him over an awkward place, and get him a purl, so much the better.—If he'll risk his neck ...
— Jorrocks' Jaunts and Jollities • Robert Smith Surtees

... done, and to give up cock-fighting and other low- life practices. To which the landlord replied, that with respect to cock- fighting he intended to give it up entirely, being determined no longer to risk his capital upon birds, and with respect to his religious duties he should attend the church of which he was churchwarden at least once a quarter, adding, however, that he did not intend to become either canter or driveller, neither ...
— The Romany Rye - A Sequel to 'Lavengro' • George Borrow

... so treacherous!" said Tess, between archness and real dismay, and getting rid of his arm by pulling open his fingers one by one, though at the risk of slipping off herself. "Just when I've been putting such trust in you, and obliging you to please you, because I thought I had wronged you by that push! Please set me down, and let me ...
— Tess of the d'Urbervilles - A Pure Woman • Thomas Hardy

... his pocket and got out his mother's coin purse. He preferred carrying money loose in his pocket but she had said he could risk losing his own money that way, not hers. It was while he was opening the purse that he suddenly decided to ...
— Jerry's Charge Account • Hazel Hutchins Wilson

... it," said Arthur, glancing rapidly from the long-boat to the ship, "if we fail, no harm is done, except that we incur the anger of the mutineers. I, for one, am willing to take the risk." ...
— The Island Home • Richard Archer

... the diligence did not come to its time, nor till long after; and all the while, they were waiting for it they were failing their rendezvous with the mayor, and making their rendezvous with the curate impossible. But, above all, there was the risk of one or other of those friends coming up and blurting all out, taking for granted that the doctor must be in their confidence, or why ...
— White Lies • Charles Reade

... truth of the Ambrumesy mystery. I repeat that conjecture plays a certain part in the explanation which I offer, even as it played a great part in my personal investigation. But, if one waited for proofs and facts to fight Lupin, one would run a great risk either of waiting forever or else of discovering proofs and facts carefully prepared by Lupin, which would lead in a direction immediately opposite to the object in view. I feel confident that the facts, when they are known, will confirm ...
— The Hollow Needle • Maurice Leblanc

... their position was illustrated in 1785 when the new governor issued new commissions reappointing the justices of Fairfax County's court. The justices refused to accept the new commissions, and pointed out to the governor in a long letter that this duplication of oaths would set a bad precedent and risk giving the executive undue powers over the court. Far from being an artificial objection, the letter noted, this latter point was extremely touchy for the justices' standing in a great many matters was based on seniority, and both the prestige and chances for financial rewards that ...
— The Fairfax County Courthouse • Ross D. Netherton

... God! is for ever and ever.' This is not the place nor time to enter on the discussion of the difficulties of these words. I must run the risk of appearing to state confident opinions without assigning reasons, when I venture to say that the translation in the Authorised Version is the natural one. I do not say that others have been adopted by reason of doctrinal ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren

... "I will risk it," laughed Christie, "and to a novice in woodcraft like myself I know that such companionship as yours will ...
— At War with Pontiac - The Totem of the Bear • Kirk Munroe and J. Finnemore

... greater than the evil of letting it alone, but it is to be remembered that we in this country are hampered with no Parliamentary entanglements and are free to do of our own motion, and in a quiet, orderly way, that which the Church of England can only do at the risk of ...
— A Short History of the Book of Common Prayer • William Reed Huntington

... a further test, and struck out boldly to the left. This seemed to be the keyword,—to the left, to the left. The fog had now lifted, so that I could form a better idea of the lay of the land. Twice I looked down the steep sides of the mountain, sorely tempted to risk a plunge. Still I hesitated and kept along on the brink. As I stood on a rock deliberating, I heard a crackling of the brush, like the tread of some large game, on a plateau below me. Suspecting the truth ...
— A Year in the Fields • John Burroughs

... nervous on a engine but once. I never think of my own life. You go in for staking that, when you begin, and you get used to the risk. I never think of the passengers either. The thoughts of a engine-driver never go behind his engine. If he keeps his engine all right, the coaches behind will be all right, as far as the driver is concerned. But once I did think of the passengers. My little boy, Bill, was among them that ...
— Mugby Junction • Charles Dickens

... matter. She had it, and for ten days she had seen no one but her husband and physician, and had no care but such as Guy could give her. He had been unremitting in his attention. Tender and gentle as a woman, he had nursed her night and day, with no thought for himself and the risk he ran. It was a bad disease at the best, and now in its worst type it was horrible, but Julia bore up bravely, thinking always more of others than of herself, and feeling so glad that Providence had sent them to those out-of-the-way rooms, where she had at first thought ...
— Miss McDonald • Mary J. Holmes

... poems, the subjects of the English kings would construct theories and establish the rules of the art. It was carrying boldness very far; they did not realise that theories can only be laid down with safety in periods of maturity, and that in formulating them too early there is risk of propagating nothing but the rules of bad taste. This was the case with Geoffrey de Vinesauf, at the beginning of the thirteenth century. Geoffrey is sure of himself; he learnedly joins example to precept, he juggles with words; he soars on high, far above men of good sense. It ...
— A Literary History of the English People - From the Origins to the Renaissance • Jean Jules Jusserand

... unwieldy brute which was precipitated into it; and as the surface of the water was nearly twenty feet below the common level, there did not appear to be any means that could be adopted to get the animal out by main force, without the risk of injuring him. There were many feet of water below the elephant, who floated with ease on its surface, and, experiencing considerable pleasure from his cool retreat, he evinced but little inclination even to exert what means of ...
— Stories about the Instinct of Animals, Their Characters, and Habits • Thomas Bingley

... think of only one possible remedy, and that he counted well over, knowing its risk. Away in the loneliest part of the forest there lived a wise woman, to whom, now and then, folk went for help when everything else had failed them. So he had heard tell of a certain Wishing-Pot that was hers ...
— The Field of Clover • Laurence Housman

... you, thank you," exclaimed Fanny, "if we go as soon as we have had our reading, we shall be back by luncheon-time, and now I think I know the way too well to run the risk of ...
— Norman Vallery - How to Overcome Evil with Good • W.H.G. Kingston

... do it in daylight will not answer. If you fail only once in any night, the tree will die, and you likewise. Do not go home to your own country any more—you would not reach there; make no business or pleasure engagements which require you to go outside your gate at night—you cannot afford the risk; do not rent or sell ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... whose servant you may be so long as you hold sway in your own domain, and you call him a blockhead who does not look after himself first of all. Yes, Kaplan Giraj, I am a blockhead no doubt, for I am not afraid to risk losing this wretched life, awaiting my reward in another world. I was not born in silks and purples but in the love of my country and the fear of God, while you are wise enough to be satisfied with the joys of this life. But, by way of reward for betraying your good friend, may Allah cause ...
— Halil the Pedlar - A Tale of Old Stambul • Mr Jkai

... features sharpening, the eyes growing almost wild, of fever patients who are listening for the entrance from the corridor of the persons whose voices they are hearing there, these would never run the risk again of creating such expectation, or irritation of mind.—Such unnecessary noise has undoubtedly induced or aggravated delirium in many cases. I have known such—in one case death ensued. It is but ...
— Notes on Nursing - What It Is, and What It Is Not • Florence Nightingale

... concerned in the crime of Serajevo, on the other hand it seemed difficult to require measures which could not be accepted, having regard to the dignity and sovereignty of Servia; the Servian Government, even if it was willing to submit to them, would risk being carried ...
— The Evidence in the Case • James M. Beck

... in check, but Jacques was seriously wounded; he was on foot, and must inevitably be beaten. I thought once of riding off in the hope of drawing the others after me, but they might stop to kill my comrade, and that I dared not risk. ...
— For The Admiral • W.J. Marx

... as the Christian religion so often repeats, the number of the elect is very small, and salvation very difficult, the number of the reprobate very great, and damnation very easily obtained, who is he who would desire to exist always with so evident a risk of being eternally damned? Would it not have been better for us not to have been born, than to have been compelled against our nature to play a game so fraught with peril? Does not annihilation itself ...
— Letters to Eugenia - or, a Preservative Against Religious Prejudices • Baron d'Holbach

... more," she promised, and her voice was like honey. "I'll tell Pancho Cueto to unlock you, even if I risk Esteban's anger by so doing. You have suffered too much, my good fellow. Indeed you have. Well, I can help you now and in the future, or—I can make your life just such a misery as it has been to-day. Will you be my friend? Will you tell me something?" She was close to the window; her black eyes ...
— Rainbow's End • Rex Beach

... be properly packed, and to have three coats of red lead before shipment—together with a cross-section of foundation to be placed on the reef known as "La Garra de Lobo"—The Claw of the Wolf—outside the harbor of San Juan—all at the risk of his Supreme Excellency, Senor Tomas Correntes Garlicho, of the Republic of Moccador, South America—the price of the ironwork to ...
— The Veiled Lady - and Other Men and Women • F. Hopkinson Smith

... could not refrain from scrutinising her appearance and watching her as she went. With that air of haughty self-possession which well became her—for it was no affectation—she swept proudly along, resolutely determined not to utter a word, or even risk a ...
— Lord Kilgobbin • Charles Lever

... the mules the last water they'll get an' we're goin' to have all we can do to make it through as it is. If we wait to go back there ain't one chance in a hundred that we-all 'll ever see Rubio City again. It ain't sense to risk killin' the kid when we've got a chance to save her—jest on a slim chance o' findin' out who ...
— The Winning of Barbara Worth • Harold B Wright

... of her mouth for a second to wipe the Pilot's blood out of her eyes. All she had was her stump with the knife screwed to it. Me, I can throw a knife left-handed if I have to, but you bet I wasn't going to risk Mother that way. ...
— The Night of the Long Knives • Fritz Reuter Leiber

... eluded her on every point when she had thought he was about to betray his passion. Here was something mere money had no power to command. Well, she had other powers. She would use them to the limit. She would no longer risk the danger ...
— The Root of Evil • Thomas Dixon

... it, or how could it be told? Would the commander of a vessel of war incur the risk of receiving such a person as yourself on board his vessel, for the reason that the master of the craft she was in when he fell in with ...
— Jack Tier or The Florida Reef • James Fenimore Cooper

... assassinate my old doctor, and run the risk of being arrested and hung? No! He thinks me dead, and I will go back to the island, redeem my treasure, and pass the remainder of my life tranquilly in the highlands ...
— Captain Brand of the "Centipede" • H. A. (Henry Augustus) Wise

... do not think we killed any one. If we had we should have heard of it afterwards. We got back to camp in time. The French chauffeur when he recovered his first shock seemed to enjoy himself. Our driver was a very gallant boy. No risk daunted him. I hope he has been transferred into the Tank service. The work there would suit him exactly and I feel sure he would ...
— A Padre in France • George A. Birmingham

... go no farther," said Agnew. "See—this stream seems to make a plunge there into the mountains. There must be some deep canyon there with cataracts. To go on is certain death. We must stop here, if only to deliberate. Say, shall we risk it among these natives? After all, there is not, perhaps, any danger among them. They are little creatures and seem harmless. They are certainly not very good-looking; but then, you know, appearances often deceive, and the devil's not so black as he's painted. ...
— A Strange Manuscript Found in a Copper Cylinder • James De Mille

... sayings: 'Better the State spoiled than the State not ours.' 'Governments cannot be carried on with paternosters.' 'An ell of scarlet makes a burgher.' 'I aim at finite ends.' These maxims represent the whole man,—first, in his egotism, eager to gain Florence for his family, at any risk of her ruin; secondly, in his cynical acceptance of base means to selfish ends; thirdly, in his bourgeois belief that money makes a man, and fine clothes suffice for a citizen; fourthly, in his worldly ambition bent on positive success. It was, in fact, his ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Complete - Series I, II, and III • John Symonds

... most of them old, and few would take the road again, but scarce one but has trained up his son or grandson to the work; not to practice it,—the hand of the whites was too heavy before, and the gains are not large enough to tempt men to run the risk—but they teach them for the love of the art. To a worshiper of the goddess there is a joy in a cleverly contrived plan and in casting the roomal round the neck of the victim, that can never die. Often in my young days, when perhaps twelve of us ...
— Rujub, the Juggler • G. A. Henty

... joy, sir; believe it. But you need not take her by surprise, sir, even supposing that she does not expect you. Indeed, in no event would it be well that you should risk doing so. When we reach Cameron Court you can remain in the fly, while I go in, and to her ladyship alone announce ...
— Self-Raised • Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte Southworth

... Count great pleasure to observe this proof of the confidence, which Congress and their Ministers reposed in the friendship and advice of his Court. That the Count informed Mr Dana, that he would run the risk of exposing his person, and the dignity of the United States, if he assumed any character whatsoever in Russia, while the Empress had not acknowledged the independence of the United States, and expected to act the part of a mediatrix, which demanded the ...
— The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Vol. XI • Various

... Pop., working parties were daily sent up on missions varying in detail but never in hardship or risk. They groused and growled, maintained that their physical condition was becoming worn down by the excess of work, insisted angrily that a rest should be a REST and not a camouflaged existence of heavy fatigues, ...
— Norman Ten Hundred - A Record of the 1st (Service) Bn. Royal Guernsey Light Infantry • A. Stanley Blicq

... voluntaryism in religion. 3. Legislation not to be meddlesome or over-puritanical. 4. University and scholastic endowments to be made the rewards of approved merit. 5. Entire liberty of publication at the risk of the publisher. 6. Constant inclination towards the generous view of things. The advice of an enthusiastic idealist, Puritan by the accident of his times, but whose true affinities were with Mill ...
— Life of John Milton • Richard Garnett

... return there, and when I came back, said Eugen, he would have something to tell me; he was going to speak with his brother—to tell him that we should be married, "and to speak about Sigmund," he added, decisively. "I will not risk such a thing as this again. If you had not been here he might have died without my knowing it. I feel myself absolved from all obligation to let him remain. My child's happiness shall ...
— The First Violin - A Novel • Jessie Fothergill

... woman of the family; in desertion cases it is more than desirable, it is vitally necessary to have dealings with the man. Many social workers feel that, at all events with a first desertion, they would rather take the risk of having the man vanish a second time after having been found, than have him arrested before an attempt to talk the matter out with him. More stringent measures, they believe, can be resorted to later—but the man must first be convinced that he will ...
— Broken Homes - A Study of Family Desertion and its Social Treatment • Joanna C. Colcord

... up to that gate. They would often fall before his threshold more dead than alive. And then, after the gate was opened and the pilgrims pulled in, the gate had only opened on a path of such painfulness, toil, and terrible risk, that at whatever window Goodwill looked out, he always saw enough to make him and keep him a grave, if not a sad, man. It was, as he sometimes said, his meat and his drink to keep the gate open for pilgrims; but the class of men who came ...
— Bunyan Characters - First Series • Alexander Whyte

... the ocean had now been stopped, and that they would have to coal in the open sea or not at all. Some of us thought the Germans might go back to Tristan da Cunha, or even to Gough Island—both British possessions in the South Atlantic—but the Germans would not risk this. Even St. Helena was mentioned as a possible coaling place, but the Germans said that was impracticable, as it would mean an attack on an unfortified place: as if this would have been a new procedure for German armed forces! The fact that they knew St. Helena to ...
— Five Months on a German Raider - Being the Adventures of an Englishman Captured by the 'Wolf' • Frederic George Trayes

... for betting, and, when carried away by it, was capable of giving unauthorized notes upon his opulent relative, who paid them in honor of the family name, but objected to the practice. He himself affected to discourage betting, though his State pride actually induced him to risk money on the 'little mare' Albine, a South-Carolina horse, who subsequently and very unexpectedly triumphed over her Virginian opponent. But this ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 3, No. 1 January 1863 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various

... people object to geographical discovery, especially in the inclement parts of the earth, on the ground that it could be of no use, and involved great risk to life and limb. "Of no use!" Who can tell what discoveries shall be useful and what useless? "The works of God are great, sought out of all those that have pleasure therein," saith the Scripture. There is no reference here to usefulness, ...
— The Pioneers • R.M. Ballantyne

... been cut nearly all round the property outside the fence, in spite of the risk one runs of having it subsequently claimed by the owner of the section, who is generally a half-breed, a loss only to be avoided by leading it home at once, which ...
— A Lady's Life on a Farm in Manitoba • Mrs. Cecil Hall

... if he could have had such a partner as Laura. Such a partner! psha, what had a stiff bachelor to do with partners and waltzing? what was he about, dancing attendance here? drinking in sweet pleasure at a risk he knows not of what after sadness and regret, and lonely longing? But yet he staid on. You would have said he was the widow's son, to watch his constant care and watchfulness of her; or that he was an adventurer, and wanted to marry her fortune, or ...
— The History of Pendennis, Vol. 2 - His Fortunes and Misfortunes, His Friends and His Greatest Enemy • William Makepeace Thackeray

... carefully avoided the risk of hurting the poor woman's feelings by needless reference ...
— Dusty Diamonds Cut and Polished - A Tale of City Arab Life and Adventure • R.M. Ballantyne

... it is not as you think. The sweet girl is blameless as the angels, but she is bound by promises and obligations that even I cannot feel free to fling aside: yet this secrecy can only end in pain. It is my duty, at any risk, to free her name from reproach. Ralph, I have something very distressing to tell you, ...
— Mabel's Mistake • Ann S. Stephens

... to eat in it and all around it, for sweet clover grew almost up to the very edge of it, and you know Peter is very fond of sweet clover. So there was plenty for Peter to eat without running any risk of danger. With nothing to do but eat and sleep, Peter should have grown fat ...
— Mrs. Peter Rabbit • Thornton W. Burgess

... that the dark fluid portion of farmyard manure was purified on passing through clay. He concluded that soils, more especially clayey soils, possessed the property of being able to fix from their watery solutions the necessary plant-food constituents, and fix them beyond risk of loss, only affording a gradual supply to ...
— Manures and the principles of manuring • Charles Morton Aikman

... my boy. "For total loss of reputation, six and eightpence." But,' continued Mr Wickham with more seriousness, 'could I be bowled out of the Commission for this little jest? I know it's small, but I like to be a JP. Speaking as a professional man, do you think there's any risk?' ...
— The Wrong Box • Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne

... This was assuming considerable risk, as all must admit, but the boy took it with much caution and with his eyes wide open, meaning to make the most hurried kind of retreat the instant ...
— Camp-fire and Wigwam • Edward Sylvester Ellis

... the very same," he said laughingly. "The hard life of the quarries hath not robbed thee in the least of thy radiance. But by the gambling god, Toth, thou didst take a risk! Dost dream what thou didst miss through a malevolent caprice of the Hathors? Five months ago I would have taken thee out of bondage into luxury but for an industrious taskmaster and the unfortunate interference of a royal message. But the Seven Sisters ...
— The Yoke - A Romance of the Days when the Lord Redeemed the Children - of Israel from the Bondage of Egypt • Elizabeth Miller

... risk their lives for me. The other kind know enough to leave me alone. Besides, I know better now how to take care of myself. You remember the frightened cry-baby I used to be—well, I've learned to hold ...
— The Trail of '98 - A Northland Romance • Robert W. Service

... my invariable repugnance has stopped any advances, their wishes and their views immovably adhere. I am but too certain they will now listen to no other. I dread, therefore, to make a trial where I despair of success; I know not how to risk a prayer with those who may silence me ...
— Life Of Johnson, Volume 4 (of 6) • Boswell

... even of silk interwoven with spangles—like Tara's impromptu token. The two who are bracelet-bound might possibly never meet face to face. Yet she, who sends, may ask of him who accepts, any service she pleases; and he may not deny it—even though it involve the risk of ...
— Far to Seek - A Romance of England and India • Maud Diver

... or Buell against Bowling Green; but he had nothing to say about a Tennessee River expedition, or cooeperation with Buell to effect it, except by indirectly complaining that to withdraw troops from Missouri would risk the loss of ...
— A Short Life of Abraham Lincoln - Condensed from Nicolay & Hay's Abraham Lincoln: A History • John G. Nicolay

... that if the cave was going to be flooded we must get Greg out of it before the water came much higher, but it was still raining pitch-forks outside, and we didn't know whether to risk waiting a bit ...
— Us and the Bottleman • Edith Ballinger Price

... have for his show copy, and he will probably keep it at his country house. Another he will require for his own use and reference; and unless he is inclined to part with this, which is very inconvenient, or risk the injury of his best copy, he must needs have a third at the service of his friends.' Soon after the peace of 1815 Heber paid a visit to the Continent to collect books for his library, and in 1825 he again left England for a considerable period for the purpose of still further adding to his ...
— English Book Collectors • William Younger Fletcher

... its tail between its legs—at such an inflexible curve that, on the authority of Sam Bedell, a misstep caused it to "turn a back somersault"—was painfully disconcerting. But Peggy endured this, as she did the greater dangers of the High Street in the settlement, where she had often, at her own risk, absolutely to drag the dazed and bewildered creature from under the wheels of carts and the heels of horses. But this shyness wore off—or rather was eventually lost in the dog's complete and utter absorption in Peggy. His limited intelligence and ...
— Openings in the Old Trail • Bret Harte

... letter to the Directors, it is evident that he was fully aware of the risk he ran, in his new line of work, of appearing to sink the missionary in the explorer. There is no doubt that next to the charge of forgetting the claims of his family, to which we have already adverted, this was the most plausible of the objections taken to his subsequent career. But any one ...
— The Personal Life Of David Livingstone • William Garden Blaikie

... a good risk, neither," Morris retorted. "I suppose the interviewer didn't say how his ...
— Potash and Perlmutter Settle Things • Montague Glass

... even Gor-wah was in doubt. He was old and he had known this time would come, the time when another took the tribe, and that one would be Otah. But now he stood straight and made pronouncement. "I say no! The risk is too great. You, Otah—and you, Gral—you will destroy this weapon. It must not be ...
— The Beginning • Henry Hasse

... deepened, his eyes grew harder. "That's all very fine," he objected, "but if you hated this woman, why did you risk prison and—worse, to get her things? You knew what you ...
— Through the Wall • Cleveland Moffett

... away his head to avoid the fond but keen scrutiny of her eyes,—at the same time gently, but ineffectually, attempting to free his hand. Once more he resolved, since the conversation had taken such a turn, to risk the consequences, and prepare her mind for a separation. But a sudden thought struck her, and, before he could frame ...
— Atlantic Monthly Vol. 3, No. 16, February, 1859 • Various

... cried Frau von Treumann, interrupting the endless questions. "My dear princess—your rheumatism—and I who so easily get colds. Come, we will go off the grass—we are not young enough to risk wet feet." ...
— The Benefactress • Elizabeth Beauchamp

... in flannel, there came up a dreadful storm, and a small London packet was wrecked on the coast, near her father's cottage. The passengers were all lost except a little boy, about three years of age, whom John Jenkins saved at the risk of his life. Two of the crew escaped, but they could tell nothing of the child more than that he came from Ireland, and was bound for London, with his nurse. The boy could give no clear account of himself, but he wore round ...
— Stories and Legends of Travel and History, for Children • Grace Greenwood

... the Creek and kindred Indians of the United States compelled women at menstruation to live in separate huts at some distance from the village. There the women had to stay, at the risk of being surprised and cut off by enemies. It was thought "a most horrid and dangerous pollution" to go near the women at such times; and the danger extended to enemies who, if they slew the women, had to cleanse themselves from ...
— The Golden Bough - A study of magic and religion • Sir James George Frazer

... successful and most frequently failed-in of all motives—again as it is everywhere. Comedy in letters is good: but it should be fairly "genteel" comedy, such as this age excelled in—not roaring Farce. An "excruciatingly funny" letter runs the risk of being excruciating in a sadly literal sense. Now the men of good Queen Anne and the first three Georges were not given to excess, in these ways at any rate; and there are few better examples of the happy ...
— A Letter Book - Selected with an Introduction on the History and Art of Letter-Writing • George Saintsbury

... better ballast for keeping the mind steady on its keel, and saving it from all risk ...
— Familiar Quotations • John Bartlett

... Mr. Guffins went on. "For me, I mean. To pay for my time. Mrs. Lippett was most generous. I told her," he said angrily, "I couldn't guarantee to materialize her dead husband. I said to her: 'Mrs. Lippett, we had better not try it. My power may be too weak. And think of the risk. He may be pure spirit, floating in Nirvana, and come to us as a pure spirit, but what if his life was not all it should have been on earth? What if his spirit has passed into a lower form as a punishment for misdeeds? You will pardon me for speaking ...
— Philo Gubb Correspondence-School Detective • Ellis Parker Butler

... than the others, to suggest the manufacture of a raft, whereby they might make the attempt to reach the island, where, as they guessed, we, with our well-armed fellows, were safely settled. 'For,' as the man argued, 'we risk death either way. If we stop here we must either perish among these trees for lack of sustenance or must creep back to the piratical camp with little other hope than a stroke from a hanger, or tempt the seas in the hope of friends and safety.' So they ...
— Marjorie • Justin Huntly McCarthy

... entirely due to Philip, Katharine, that I am here," said Seymour. "He commanded the little brig which ran down to the Yarmouth at the risk of destruction, and picked me up. Disobeyed orders too, the young rogue. He brought me into Charleston, nursed me like a woman, and then brought me here. I should ...
— For Love of Country - A Story of Land and Sea in the Days of the Revolution • Cyrus Townsend Brady

... said pathetically; "but then you may also be wrong. The risk is too terrible for me to run. It will comfort me all my life to think that perhaps she does ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume VI. (of X.) • Various

... a forced march with scant supplies, suffered greatly from thirst, but volunteers, taking buckets, slipped down to the river, at the imminent risk of torture and death, and brought them back filled for their comrades. It was done more than a dozen times, and Dick himself was one of the heroes, which pleased ...
— The Last of the Chiefs - A Story of the Great Sioux War • Joseph Altsheler

... supposed nefarious designs. Mutual explanations averted bloodshed, and the peasants then began to dissuade the sailors from performing their vow in so literal a manner, pointing out that they would be abandoning their precious charge to the risk, if not the certainty, of sacrilegious theft at the hands of the corsairs who frequented that harbour. In the end the simple mariners yielded to the arguments of the peasants, and with many tears consigned the picture to their care. The peasants put it into a cart harnessed with two oxen who ...
— Diversions in Sicily • H. Festing Jones

... to an end if it, being often turned aside either by business or by some new study. Considering which I have finally judged that it was better worth while to publish this writing, such as it is, than to let it run the risk, by waiting ...
— Treatise on Light • Christiaan Huygens

... Reuben. I'd take a much greater risk to win your friendship, and if you'll give it to me I'll be very proud of it. You are going to make a ...
— A Day Of Fate • E. P. Roe

... the car. You get in and drive slowly—so slowly. Give him this letter—put in bosom of dress not to lose. He tells you maybe something, and he gives you envelope. Then he gets out, and you come home—but carefully. Don't let one of those buses run you over in the fog. I should not risk ...
— The Cup of Fury - A Novel of Cities and Shipyards • Rupert Hughes

... her real state, and to whom the knowledge must come gradually. The only person—the only one who could sympathise with me and help me—whose presence could comfort my mother more than any other earthly thing—is falsely accused—would run the risk of death if he came to see his dying mother. This I tell you—only you, Bessy. You must not mention it. No other person in Milton—hardly any other person in England knows. Have I not care? Do I not know anxiety, though I go about well-dressed, and have food enough? ...
— North and South • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell

... of wind, nothing at all to cause it, yet this thick bough snapped. No other tree is subject to these dangerous falls of immense limbs, without warning or apparent cause, so that it is not safe to rest under elms. An accident might not occur once in ten years; nevertheless the risk is there. Elms topple over before gales which scarcely affect other trees, or only tear off a few twigs. Two have thus been thrown recently—within eighteen months—in the fields opposite Tolworth Farm. The elm drags up its own roots, which are often ...
— The Toilers of the Field • Richard Jefferies

... unbeliever. So desirous of this maiden is thy master, upon whom may the blessing of Allah rest, that he even gave unto her father the ring of emerald from off his right hand. Art satisfied, or is't best to risk the tempest by ...
— Desert Love • Joan Conquest

... least of objections was the risk to which Sackett's Harbor, the naval base, was to be exposed. After October 16, Chauncey had remained cruising between there and Kingston, covering the approaches to the St. Lawrence. His intended trip to Genesee, to bring up ...
— Sea Power in its Relations to the War of 1812 - Volume 2 • Alfred Thayer Mahan

... of Literature' which he advocated with gloom, pertinacity, and a certain youthful brilliance that might well have carried the day, had not an Irishman got up and pointed out the danger hanging over the Old Testament. To that he had retorted: "Better, sir, it should run a risk than have no risk to run." From which moment ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy

... to sell in spite of the law, and when some want to sell and a great many want to buy, considerable business will be done, while there are fewer saloons and less liquor sold in them. The liquor is poorer and the price is higher. The consumer has to pay for the extra risk. More liquor finds its way to homes, more men buy by the bottle and gallon. In old times nearly everybody kept a little rum or whiskey on the sideboard. The great Washingtonian temperance movement drove liquor out of the home and increased the taverns and saloons. Now ...
— The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Volume VIII. - Interviews • Robert Green Ingersoll

... slowly push his rod and wire loop towards the basking jack. If he were going to shoot partridges at roost on the ground, he would raise his gun in an equally slow and careful manner. As a partridge is a small bird, and stands at about a shilling in the poacher's catalogue, he does not care to risk a shot at one, but likes to get several at once. This he can do in the spring, when the birds have paired and remain so near together, and again in the latter part of the summer, when the coveys are large, not having ...
— The Life of the Fields • Richard Jefferies

... want us to do?" men ask me. "Do you seriously suggest that America or Great Britain should risk a breach of good relations or even a war with Japan to help Korea? If not, what is the use of saying anything? You only make the Japanese harden their ...
— Korea's Fight for Freedom • F.A. McKenzie

... in a direction as different as possible from that of his cares. A third and very valuable use of the story which grew up in his Washington days was to turn aside some persistent but impossible application; and to give to the applicant, with the least risk of unnecessary annoyance to his feelings, the "no" that was necessary. It is doubtless also the case that, as has happened to other men gifted with humour, Lincoln's reputation as a story-teller caused to be ascribed to him a great series of anecdotes and incidents ...
— Abraham Lincoln • George Haven Putnam

... the whole. Here was a combination of the tenacity of steel with much of the flexibility of rope. The insulation of the copper was so excellent as to exceed by a hundredfold that of the core of 1858—which, faulty though it was, had, nevertheless, sufficed for signals. So much inconvenience and risk had been encountered in dividing the task of cable-laying between two ships that this time it was decided to charter a single vessel, the Great Eastern, which, fortunately, was large enough to accommodate the cable in an unbroken ...
— Little Masterpieces of Science: - Invention and Discovery • Various

... portion of the sand if desired. The only saving, then, in using crusher-run stone direct is the very small one of not having to screen out the fine material. The conclusion must be that the economy of unscreened stone for concrete is a very doubtful quantity, and that the risk of irregularity in unscreened stone mixtures is a serious one. The engineer's specifications will generally determine for the contractor whether he is to use screened or crusher-run stone, but these same specifications will not ...
— Concrete Construction - Methods and Costs • Halbert P. Gillette

... was another example of the same thing," replied Madame Bretton. "Your father was afraid to risk keeping the man. The caterpillars might scent the tobacco and ...
— The Story of Silk • Sara Ware Bassett

... claims to be, and the treatment of my case was accomplished without pain and apparently any risk. Your method of using locally cocaine as an anaesthetic is such a decided improvement. I did not have to take any dangerous ether or chloroform, but had a small quantity of medicine injected that made the operation as painless as though it was being ...
— The People's Common Sense Medical Adviser in Plain English • R. V. Pierce

... received for himself large concessions, among them the entire island of Montreal. However, he was persuaded, probably for a consideration, to part with a grant that brought him no return, and which he could visit only at the risk of his scalp. Olier and Dauversiere and their associates secured the land, and Maisonneuve was appointed governor ...
— The Jesuit Missions: - A Chronicle of the Cross in the Wilderness • Thomas Guthrie Marquis

... worm fence. After about an hour of such fighting, Brockman, discovering that all of the sixty-one cannon balls with which he had provided himself had been shot away, decided that it was perilous "to risk a further advance without these necessary instruments." Accordingly, he ordered a retreat and his whole force returned to its camp. In this engagement no Antis were killed, and the surgeon's list named only eight wounded, ...
— The Story of the Mormons: • William Alexander Linn

... call for help had been urgent. Also, the scream he had heard, while the manner of the two men had shown that to them it was a commonplace, was to him a spur to instant action. In haste he knew there was the risk of failure, but he ...
— The Lost House • Richard Harding Davis

... and supernatural effects are never seen, except by the weakest or most ignorant of mankind, in ages or states of society when the people might be made to believe any thing; or at times so distant, or places so remote, that the narrators run no risk of detection or exposure. The love of the marvellous, the force of early impressions, the craft of many persons, and the folly of others, will however occasion every village to have its haunted house for ages to come, in spite ...
— A Morning's Walk from London to Kew • Richard Phillips

... sum would, a principal part of it, rest in France and give a great spring to their manufactures, and afford them the advantage of anticipating others in American commerce. These are important objects, and I have no doubt would be considered of consequence sufficient for them to risk such a credit. Rich individuals offer to supply any quantity of goods or stores on such security, and I believe the latter would do considerable, were they only assured of five per cent interest on their debts after they become due. But I submit the whole to the mature consideration of ...
— The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Vol. I • Various

... the Shakespeares weighed their desire to have back the land, which they probably then wished, with their growing family, to farm themselves. Nothing seems then to have been settled, and they were too poor to risk the perils of a great law-suit. Doubtless, with sad hearts and bitter retrospect, they regretted their unlucky purchases in 1575, which seemed to have pinched them so, and wished at least they had been contented with the ...
— Shakespeare's Family • Mrs. C. C. Stopes

... have the benefit of his advice and assistance. I knew that I dared not summon Mr. Hamilton: the brothers had parted in ill blood, with bitter words and looks. Eric looked on his step-brother as his worst enemy. All these years he had been hiding himself from him. I dared not run the risk of bringing them together. I could not make a confidante of Aunt Philippa or Uncle Brian. They had old-fashioned views, and would have at once stigmatised Eric as a worthless fellow. Circumstantial evidence was so strong against him that few would ...
— Uncle Max • Rosa Nouchette Carey

... he was not to be compared with Mr. Edwardes, and he hesitated and coughed, until once or twice I was almost inclined to help him out, for I knew what he was going to say and he fidgeted me. I was, however, in too great a hole to risk much, so as soon as he began I remained silent and hoped steadily that he would either end soon or be interrupted. He did not know how to begin or when to finish, and if Collier had not knocked at the door and come into the room, it seemed to me that nothing but ...
— Godfrey Marten, Undergraduate • Charles Turley

... particularly of horses on such journeys, requires great attention; to stand idle on a fine morning, unable to proceed, until by some fortunate chance, stray cattle or horses are discovered in a boundless forest, is like a calm on the line, irksome enough; but there is also the risk of losing the men sent in pursuit who, even after coming on the objects of their search, may be unable afterwards to find the camp, especially when there may be no watercourse ...
— Three Expeditions into the Interior of Eastern Australia, Vol 1 (of 2) • Thomas Mitchell

... was shot through the heart with a stound of love; and that, unless a suitable remedy could be got, there was no hope for him on this side of time, let alone blowing out his brains, or standing before the minister. Right it was in him to run the risk of deciding on the last; and so well did he play his game, that, in two months from that date, after sending sundry presents on his part to the family, of smeaked hams and salt tongues—acknowledged on theirs, by return of carrier, in the shape of sucking ...
— The Life of Mansie Wauch - Tailor in Dalkeith, written by himself • David Macbeth Moir



Words linked to "Risk" :   assay, crapshoot, essay, bell the cat, sword of Damocles, probability, attempt, luck through, health hazard, stake, moral hazard, go for broke, jeopardize, seek, luck it, try, venture, occupational hazard



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