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Contrive   Listen
verb
Contrive  v. i.  To make devices; to form designs; to plan; to scheme; to plot. "The Fates with traitors do contrive." "Thou hast contrived against th very life Of the defendant."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Contrive" Quotes from Famous Books



... know. I suppose I was wrong in shrinking from his confidence. I am always wrong. It seems to me that the more I try to do right, the more mischief I contrive to make." ...
— The Irrational Knot - Being the Second Novel of His Nonage • George Bernard Shaw

... growled Mark, in as near an imitation of the monarch of the forest's roar as he could contrive after a couple of visits to the Zoo; but it had no effect whatever on their surroundings till the black, who now fully grasped his meaning, crouched down and uttered a startling, barking roar which made two or three of the nearest bullocks start up ...
— Dead Man's Land - Being the Voyage to Zimbambangwe of certain and uncertain • George Manville Fenn

... saddle, where he carried it tied with a string. Four or five times a day it would fall to the ground. Every few minutes he would drop his pipe, his knife, his flint and steel, or a piece of tobacco, and have to scramble down to pick them up. In doing this he would contrive to get in everybody's way; and as the most of the party were by no means remarkable for a fastidious choice of language, a storm of anathemas would be showered upon him, half in earnest and half in jest, until Tete Rouge would declare that there was no comfort in life, and that ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 7 • Charles H. Sylvester

... I'll send you along a man and you'll just make a bet with him—we'll fix the odds presently and they'll be heavy against us—that Thurston successfully completes the job in the canyon. The other man bets he doesn't. When it appears judicious we'll contrive something to draw Thurston away ...
— Thurston of Orchard Valley • Harold Bindloss

... Of course you contrive to see everything and find out everything. And one of the first and most startling things you find out is, that every individual you encounter in the City of Washington almost—and certainly every separate and distinct individual ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... celebrations and displays, wholly unsuitable, as they considered them, to the occasion. If such are the rejoicings, said they, which Antony celebrates before going into the battle, what festivities will he contrive on his return, joyous enough to express his pleasure if he ...
— Cleopatra • Jacob Abbott

... thou wilt not be forbidden from this talk, I will make thee a byword and a reproach among the folk.' When the vizier heard her answer, he knew that she was chaste of soul and body; wherefore he repented with the utmost of repentance and feared for himself from the king and said, 'Needs must I contrive a device wherewithal I may destroy her; else shall I ...
— Tales from the Arabic Volumes 1-3 • John Payne

... she intended to put in the middle of her corn-patch. It was now the latter week of May, and the crows and blackbirds had already discovered the little green, rolled-up leaf of the Indian corn just peeping out of the soil. She was determined, therefore, to contrive as lifelike a scarecrow as ever was seen, and to finish it immediately from top to toe, so that it should begin its sentinel's duty that very morning. Now Mother Rigby (as everybody must have heard) was one of the most cunning ...
— Short Stories of Various Types • Various

... art which I introduce with this view (which I call Interpretation of Nature) is a kind of logic; though the difference between it and the ordinary logic is great; indeed immense. For the ordinary logic professes to contrive and prepare helps and guards for the understanding, as mine does; and in this one point they agree. But mine differs from it in three points especially; viz. in the end aimed at; in the order of demonstration; and in the ...
— Prefaces and Prologues to Famous Books - with Introductions, Notes and Illustrations • Charles W. Eliot

... my ruse succeeded, it would appear. But it is a poor sort of capture that you have made; I hoped you would contrive to get hold of Don Luis, or at least of Don Esteban, or one of his sons; but who is this? He is a ...
— A Middy of the King - A Romance of the Old British Navy • Harry Collingwood

... WALLS.—Yankees, as a rule, are equal to any emergency; what the average Yankee mechanic fails to conjure up at a time when his wits are most needed, leaves very little room for foreign genius to think and work in. Yet it remained for M. Molard, a French architect, to contrive an original and ingenious plan for straightening the walls of the Conservatoire des Arts et Metiers, which threatened an absolute collapse owing to the extreme weight of the roof. A series of strong iron bars were carried across the ...
— The American Architect and Building News, Vol. 27, No. 733, January 11, 1890 • Various

... O'Shaughnessy called a "widdy" Christmas and getting supper, when a great stamping-off of snow proclaimed a newcomer. It was Gavotte, and we were powerfully glad to see him because the hired man was going to a dance and we knew Gavotte would contrive some unusual amusement. He had heard that Clyde was going to have a deer-drive, and didn't know that he had gone, so he had come down to join the hunt just for the fun, and was very much disappointed to find there was going to be no hunt. After supper, however, his good humor returned ...
— Letters of a Woman Homesteader • Elinore Pruitt Stewart

... there's another door that opens into the sunshine, and that isn't locked, and, if it is, he can pick the kay. He may work away till he becomes weary, and then he'll be back here, and we'll hare to contrive some other way, or it may be that good luck will lead him to the opening for which he sighs. Heaven grant that the same may be ...
— The Cave in the Mountain • Lieut. R. H. Jayne

... were placed on the table; and the waiters withdrew to 'clear away,'or in other words, to appropriate to their own private use and emolument whatever remnants of the eatables and drinkables they could contrive ...
— The Pickwick Papers • Charles Dickens

... she half fears that you will reject it. I cannot see why you should. We have done the only sensible thing, and of course in a month or two it will be just the same, to everybody concerned, as if we had been married in the most foolish way that respectability can contrive. Let us hear from you very soon, dear sister. We talk much of you, and hope to have many a bright day with you yet—more genuinely happy than that we spent in ...
— The Emancipated • George Gissing

... go to look at her, which I am sorry for, as I wish above all things to see a personage so illustrious by birth, and renowned by misfortune. The Doctor and my mother, who are less scrupulous, and who, in consequence, somehow, by themselves, contrive to see, and get into places that are inaccessible to all gentility, have had a full view of her majesty. My father has since become her declared partisan, and my mother too has acquired a leaning likewise towards her side of the question; but neither of them will ...
— The Ayrshire Legatees • John Galt

... thousand men; but as most of the families appear to live in the style of those in the old town of Edinburgh, that is to say, several under the same roof, though each in a separate story or flat, it is not difficult to conceive how they contrive to find sufficient room, within a compass apparently so narrow. Of its commerce and manufactures I can say little, except that I should not imagine either to be extensive. I am led to form this opinion, partly from having seen no shipping at the wharfs, and ...
— The Campaigns of the British Army at Washington and New Orleans 1814-1815 • G. R. Gleig

... It is, in some sense, unreasonable and ungrateful in us to be constantly discontented with a condition which is constantly improving. But, in truth, there is constant improvement precisely because there is constant discontent. If we were perfectly satisfied with the present, we should cease to contrive, to labour, and to save with a view to the future. And it is natural that, being dissatisfied with the present, we should form a too favourable ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 1 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... besides, she'd find out you'd been listening. But we'll follow and keep track of her; may be she'll get lost, and we can cut by her; or may be we can seem to come kinder accidentally on her, and contrive to get employed to do her errand, and so let ...
— The Rangers - [Subtitle: The Tory's Daughter] • D. P. Thompson

... quit. No one who has not had this experience can have an idea of the bitterness which is gradually developed in such a struggle. In a war of this kind the workmen have one expedient which is usually effective. They use their ingenuity to contrive various ways in which the machines which they are running are broken or damaged—apparently by accident, or in the regular course of work—and this they always lay at the door of the foreman, who has forced ...
— The Principles of Scientific Management • Frederick Winslow Taylor

... sports shall we contrive for to-day?" asked Herbert, at the breakfast table. "Certainly both skating and snow fights are entirely out of ...
— Christmas with Grandma Elsie • Martha Finley

... not thy peace, Sit not thou still O God of strength We cry and do not cease. 2 For lo thy furious foes now *swell And *storm outrageously, *Jehemajun. And they that hate thee proud and fill Exalt their heads full hie. 3 Against thy people they *contrive *Jagnarimu. *Their Plots and Counsels deep, *Sod. 10 *Them to ensnare they chiefly strive *Jithjagnatsu gnal. *Whom thou dost hide and keep. *Tsephuneca. 4 Come let us cut them off say they, Till they no Nation be That Israels name for ever may Be lost in memory. 5 For they consult ...
— The Poetical Works of John Milton • John Milton

... effect, and which is, as it were, the great light and sun of this firmament, unto which, by that same wonderful counsel, all other things are subordinate, and so in the working it shall appear exactly as his counsel did delineate and contrive it. ...
— The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning • Hugh Binning

... to me, specially when I observe for how little a matter some men will study, contrive, make and tell a lye. You shall have some that will lye it over and over, and that for a peny {23b} profit. Yea, lye and stand in it, although they know that they lye: yea, you shall have some men that will not stick to tell lye after lye, though themselves get nothing thereby; They ...
— The Life and Death of Mr. Badman • John Bunyan

... adopt this plan, some unprincipled boy would always contrive to have an excuse, whether necessarily tardy or not; and besides, each parent would have a different principle and a different opinion as to what was a reasonable excuse, so that there would be no uniformity, and consequently no justice ...
— The Teacher - Or, Moral Influences Employed in the Instruction and - Government of the Young • Jacob Abbott

... critical lecture—from which certain poets and novelists who contrive to caricature the ideal by their attempt to put wigs of real hair upon the heads of stone statues might borrow a useful hint or two if they would condescend to do so, which is not likely—perceived Mrs. Somers standing by him, took ...
— Kenelm Chillingly, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... From thence, as to the ear sweet harmony From organ comes, so comes before mine eye The time prepar'd for thee. Such as driv'n out From Athens, by his cruel stepdame's wiles, Hippolytus departed, such must thou Depart from Florence. This they wish, and this Contrive, and will ere long effectuate, there, Where gainful merchandize is made of Christ, Throughout the livelong day. The common cry, Will, as 't is ever wont, affix the blame Unto the party injur'd: but the truth Shall, in the vengeance it ...
— The Divine Comedy • Dante

... would excite less horror than seems now to attend it. In order to rouse the vocal organs I took two drams.... I then went to bed, and strange as it may seem I think slept. When I saw light it was time I should contrive what I should do. Though God stopped my speech, He left me my hand. I enjoyed a mercy which was not granted to my dear friend Lawrence, who now perhaps overlooks me as I am writing, and rejoices that I have what he wanted. ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 4 • Charles Dudley Warner

... letters I am ashamed: mine are notes in comparison. How do you contrive to roll out your patience into two sheets? You certainly don't love me better than I do you; and yet if our loves were to b@ sold by the quire, you would have by far the more magnificent stock to dispose of. I can only say that age has already ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 1 • Horace Walpole

... a harp-string, say, Is used to tie the jasmine back That overfloods my room with sweets, Contrive your Zorzi somehow meets My Zanze! If the ribbon's black, The Three are ...
— Dramatic Romances • Robert Browning

... I say man is not made for an active life? Far from it! . . . But there is a great difference between other men's occupations and ours. . . . A glance at theirs will make it clear to you. All day long they do nothing but calculate, contrive, consult how to wring their profit out of food-stuffs, farm-plots and the like. . . . Whereas, I entreat you to learn what the administration of the World is, and what place a Being endowed with reason holds therein: ...
— The Golden Sayings of Epictetus • Epictetus

... seems to be, the fiercer will be the bears' last attack," he said. "They have to get from under, and will take heavy chances to force prices back. As yet they may contrive to check or turn the stream, and then every wise man who has sold down will try to cover, but no one can tell how far it may carry us, once it sets ...
— Winston of the Prairie • Harold Bindloss

... get up something different? Why couldn't a dozen, or twenty, take a flat, or a whole house, and have a housekeeper, and live nice? I believe I could contrive." ...
— The Other Girls • Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney

... One should contrive to have impressions like these sufficiently often in life: this is the excitement which is helpful; the heartbeating, the breathlessness, the pain even, which brace and make us widely sensitive. Brother Wind—why did St. Francis ...
— The Spirit of Rome • Vernon Lee

... could not sleep. A little while he lay awake voluntarily, trying to contrive a plan to follow should he be found out. If, after he returned to the tilt for the pelts, there should not be sufficient snow to cover his trail, for instance, before the searching party came to look for Bob—and it surely would come, headed by Dick Blake—he would be in grave ...
— Ungava Bob - A Winter's Tale • Dillon Wallace

... no lack of dramatic imagination in the construction of the tales; and the best of them contrive to construct a strong sensational situation in a couple of pages. But the chief charm and value of the book is its fidelity to the rough character of the scenes from ...
— In the Days When the World Was Wide and Other Verses • Henry Lawson

... leave other practical difficulties out of sight, what chance of stability is there for a confederacy whose very foundation is the principle that any member of it may withdraw at the first discontent? If they could contrive to establish a free trade treaty with their chief customer, England, would she consent to gratify Louisiana with an exception in favor of sugar? Some of the leaders of the secession movement have already become aware of ...
— The Writings of James Russell Lowell in Prose and Poetry, Volume V - Political Essays • James Russell Lowell

... fatiguing; nor will it admit of any load being transported by cattle. To conduct a road over such a mountain, with proper slopes, so as to enable carriages to pass, is a work not to be expected from the natives, who, even if they were able to contrive such a work, would be afraid to put it in execution; as they would consider it as likely to afford too free an intercourse with their more powerful neighbours; and jealousy of strangers is the predominant principle ...
— An Account of The Kingdom of Nepal • Fancis Buchanan Hamilton

... of her people the girl knew it was all settled. If the stranger whipped Pedro, the boy would kill him unless he used magic to prevent it. If he did use it, they must contrive to nullify his magic. There was, too, Don Manuel, who would surely strike soon, and however the encounter might terminate, it was ...
— A Daughter of the Dons - A Story of New Mexico Today • William MacLeod Raine

... what was suggested in opposition, but which IS as much as possible what patent facts—facts which seem to live in the office, so teasing and unceasing are they—prove ought to be done. Of all modes of enforcing moderation on a party, the best is to contrive that the members of that party shall be intrinsically moderate, careful, and almost shrinking men; and the next best to contrive that the leaders of the party, who have protested most in its behalf, shall be placed in the closest contact with the actual world. Our ...
— The English Constitution • Walter Bagehot

... finite nor infinite is the heresy nawantanantawada. A name equally formidable would be, of course, found for the students of modern astronomy and the other kindred sciences, among the professed believers in Buddh, did not these contrive to get over the difficulty by observing, "that certain things, as stated in the Sastras, must have been so formerly; but great changes have taken place in these in latter times; and for astronomical purposes ...
— The Testimony of the Rocks - or, Geology in Its Bearings on the Two Theologies, Natural and Revealed • Hugh Miller

... subjects with a convenient conception of their divine right to rule. Ivan the Terrible did undoubtedly make his subjects feel very serious indeed; and stupid people are apt to believe that this sort of terror-stiffened seriousness is virtue. It is not. Any person who should set-to deliberately to contrive artificial earthquakes, scuttle liners, and start epidemics with a view to the moral elevation of his countrymen, would very soon find himself in the dock. Those who plan wars with the same object should be removed with ...
— New York Times, Current History, Vol 1, Issue 1 - From the Beginning to March, 1915 With Index • Various

... among them, would yield an abundant support, though not an extravagant living; but, unfortunately, the greatest portion of this immense sum is absorbed by the bishops, while the priests of the villages contrive to exist by the contributions they wring out of the peons. At the time of the census, 1793, the twelve bishops had $539,000[66] appropriated to their support; but now their revenues are so mixed up with the revenues of the Church, that it is impossible to say ...
— Mexico and its Religion • Robert A. Wilson

... contrive to do what one wants, he should, I suppose, do the second best thing. The only thing for me to do—the thing that'll be a comfort for me to look back on—is to render Phillida some service. In short, to save her life and ...
— The Faith Doctor - A Story of New York • Edward Eggleston

... rehearsal or prompter, and whose most attractive performance consists in unbounded cigarette smoking, and in getting in everybody's way. It is a miracle how, in the midst of this dire confusion, carpenters, scene-shifters, and managers contrive to set the stage for another act; and what a scene would be disclosed if the drop were to rise prematurely! Presently a voice is heard to cry, 'Fuera!' this being Spanish for 'Clear the stage;' the big bell tolls, and the audience in due course return to their places in front. The curtain having ...
— The Pearl of the Antilles, or An Artist in Cuba • Walter Goodman

... contrive it, never fear," said the captain. "I know to a nicety what you require. How say you now: if I was to carry him overseas to the plantations where they lack toilers of just such thews as his?" He lowered his voice and spoke with some ...
— The Sea-Hawk • Raphael Sabatini

... to the drawing-room. If you had had Mr. Howells to help you I should have admired, but not have been astonished, because I should know that together you would be equal to it; but how you managed to contrive such a stately blunder all by yourself is what I ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine

... pain. I—but, dear reader, I will not sadden your sensitive ears with details I could give you, showing how contemptible a creature this wretched I happens to be. Nor would you understand me. You would only be astonished, discovering that such disreputable specimens of humanity contrive to exist in this age. It is best, my dear sir, or madam, you should remain ignorant of these evil persons. Let me ...
— The Second Thoughts of An Idle Fellow • Jerome K. Jerome

... well be separated, something could be proposed in which each person might innocently take a share: for surely after the first half-hour, they can find little new to observe in the dress of their neighbours, or to display in their own; and with whatever seeming gaiety they may contrive to fill up the middle and end of the evening, by wire-drawing the comments afforded by the beginning, they are yet so miserably fatigued, that if they have not four or five places to run to every night, they suffer nearly as much from weariness of their friends in company, as they would do ...
— Cecilia Volume 1 • Frances Burney

... can contrive to eat that hash," she said, resentfully, "I don't understand. When my Maillard's give out I'll quietly starve ...
— The Common Law • Robert W. Chambers

... An astonishing number of Americans with the literary itch do contrive to make a living out of that affliction. They write motion-picture scenarios and fiction for the magazines that still regard detective stories as the zenith of original art. They gather in woman-scented flats to discuss sex, or in hard-voiced groups to play ...
— The Job - An American Novel • Sinclair Lewis

... could clothe one shivering thought in a hundred thousand garments, till it attained all the majesty which decoration could impart. In truth, the envoys came from Spain, Rome, and Vienna, provided with but two ideas. Was it not a diplomatic masterpiece, that from this frugal store they could contrive to eke out seven mortal months of negotiation? Two ideas—the supremacy of his Majesty's prerogative, the exclusive exercise of the Roman Catholic religion—these were the be-all and the end-all of their commission. Upon these two strings they were ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley

... there is no doubt there is considerable risk of the enemy trying to beat us up; and we must arrange for signals, so that our people may have time to fall back here. Philip and I will think it over. We ought to be able to contrive some scheme between us." ...
— Saint Bartholomew's Eve - A Tale of the Huguenot WarS • G. A. Henty

... Tarry, Jew: The law hath yet another hold on you. It is enacted in the laws of Venice, If it be proved against an alien, That by direct or indirect attempts He seek the life of any citizen, The party 'gainst the which he doth contrive Shall seize one half his goods; the other half Comes to the privy coffer of the state; And the offender's life lies in the mercy Of the duke only, 'gainst all other voice. In which predicament, I say, thou stand'st; For it appears, by manifest proceeding, That indirectly ...
— MacMillan's Reading Books - Book V • Anonymous

... ever chosen young men for companions. Was it not Plato who wished he were the heavens, that he might look down upon his young companion with a thousand eyes? Thus they do homage to the gift of youth, and by its presence contrive to nestle into its buoyant and pure existence. If youth will enjoy itself virtuously with gymnastics, with music, with friendship, with poetry, there will come no hours of lamentation and repentance. They attend the imbecile and ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 11, September, 1858 • Various

... adorned the picture of Gen. Grant with festoons of evergreens, conjuring him the while not to disappoint our hopes, but to take Richmond. Alas! you may know, by this time, that he can't; but in lack of news since a week ago, I can but hope for the best. I've taken a pew and we contrive to squeeze into it in this wise: first a child, then a mother, then a child, then an Annie, then a child, the little ones being stowed in the cracks left between us big ones. Mr. R., the parson, looking fit to go straight into his grave, was up here to ...
— The Life and Letters of Elizabeth Prentiss • George L. Prentiss

... George Combe has clearly shown in his admirable work "On the Constitution of Man, and its adaptation to the world around him," that ignorance is a statutable crime before Nature, and punishable, and punished by the laws of Providence,—you deserve, I say, unless you contrive to make Mr H. your substitute, which I think would be just, yourself to be the subject of the nocturnal visit of a vampyr. Your scepticism will abate pretty considerably, when you see him stealthily entering your room, yet are powerless under the fascination of his fixed ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 61, No. 378, April, 1847 • Various

... brought home from India, obtained no one knows how, the Countess had amassed one of the largest fortunes possessed by any dowager in the peerage. She had it, and she held it, with a grasp that nothing but death could loosen; nay, that all-foreseeing mind of hers might contrive to cheat grim death itself, and to scheme a way for protecting this wealth, even when she who had gathered and garnered it should be mouldering in her grave. The entailed estates belonged to Maulevrier, were he never such a fool or spendthrift; but this fortune of the dowager's was her own, ...
— Phantom Fortune, A Novel • M. E. Braddon

... the tent was set up, and a rough shed was cleverly made by Cross, who seemed to glory in showing us how easily he could contrive a good shelter in case we should be overtaken ...
— Through Forest and Stream - The Quest of the Quetzal • George Manville Fenn

... the little purple flower, Oberon said to his favourite, "Take a part of this flower; there has been a sweet Athenian lady here, who is in love with a disdainful youth; if you find him sleeping, drop some of the love-juice in his eyes, but contrive to do it when she is near him, that the first thing he sees when he awakes may be this despised lady. You will know the man by the Athenian garments which he wears." Puck promised to manage this matter very dexterously: and then Oberon went, ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles Lamb and Mary Lamb

... fabulous tale which he had invented to deceive the Commandant. "I said that you alone knew where the treasure was concealed," continued Krantz, "that you might be sent for, for in all probability he will keep me as a hostage: but never mind that, I must take my chance. Do you contrive to escape somehow or ...
— The Phantom Ship • Captain Frederick Marryat

... this hostile method; he did not doubt, however, that one would be presented to them before long, and in good time for preparation. His own opinion consequently was that they should await this opportunity with patience, and in the meanwhile still keep a watchful eye upon everything, and contrive to give the people a hint of the threatened danger, that they might be ready to act if circumstances should call for their co-operation. If all present had assented to the opinion of the Prince of Orange, there is no ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller

... dressed in civilian clothes cut as nearly to the military pattern as the tailor could contrive without transgressing law, but with a too small fez perched on his capable-looking head in the manner of the Prussian who would like to make the Turks believe he loves them. Rustum Khan cursed with ...
— The Eye of Zeitoon • Talbot Mundy

... house. Ever since then—and I am now forty-seven years of age—I have never again put on a man's garments. I have traveled throughout the two capitals and the nine provinces, and always when I see a beautiful woman I contrive to go to her house. In this way I accumulate riches with but little labor; and I ...
— Eastern Shame Girl • Charles Georges Souli

... instances of false classification in his Guide to the Literature of Botany, and remarks that some authors contrive titles seemingly of set purpose to entrap the unwary. He instances a fine example in the case of Bishop Alexander Ewing's Feamainn Earraghaidhiell: Argyllshire Seaweeds (Glasgow, 1872. 8vo). To enhance the ...
— Literary Blunders • Henry B. Wheatley

... post-chaise, to Mons. Dessein, for twenty-two guineas, and bought a French cabriolet, for ten, and likewise a very handsome English coach-horse, (a little touched in the wind indeed) for seven. This equipage I have fitted up with every convenience I can contrive, to carry me, my wife, two daughters, and all my other baggage; you will conclude therefore, light as the latter may be, we are bien charge; but as we move slowly, not above seven leagues a day, I shall have the more leisure to look about me, and to consider what sort of remarks may prove ...
— A Year's Journey through France and Part of Spain, 1777 - Volume 1 (of 2) • Philip Thicknesse

... closes, Crabbe was apparently at the very end of his resources. He had pawned all his personal property, his books and his surgical implements, and was still in debt. He had begged assistance from many of the leading statesmen of the hour without success. How did he contrive to exist between June 1780 and the early ...
— Crabbe, (George) - English Men of Letters Series • Alfred Ainger

... on, or hand cups of tea to the actors when their throats become dry from vociferous singing, which is always in falsetto. All this in the face of the audience. Dead people get up and walk off the stage; or while lying dead, contrive to alter their facial expression, and then get up and carry themselves off. There is no interval between one play and the next following, which probably gives rise to the erroneous belief that Chinese plays ...
— The Civilization Of China • Herbert A. Giles

... had intellectual resources sufficient to forego the pleasures of wine. They could not otherwise contrive how to fill the interval ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 2 • Boswell

... not say that Mussulmans are becoming more religious or more elevated from their contact with Christian peoples. Indeed, I rather incline to the opposite opinion; but the European tendencies which prevail are marked clearly enough by the facile adroitness with which the followers of the Prophet contrive to evade the injunctions of the Koran, whether it be in the matter of wines and strong drinks, or the more constitutional difficulty touching loans, debts, and the like. For myself, I rather incline to the view of the old Pacha, who, after listening ...
— Herzegovina - Or, Omer Pacha and the Christian Rebels • George Arbuthnot

... admitted. "In the book the wild young man drinks without ever getting drunk. Maybe there is a difference between life and the book. In the book you enjoy your fun, but contrive somehow to escape the licking: in life the licking is the only thing sure. It was the wild young man of fiction I was looking for, who, a fortnight before the exam., ties a wet towel round his head, drinks strong tea, and passes easily with honours. He tried the wet towel, he tells me. It ...
— They and I • Jerome K. Jerome

... in all, led on by the Prince, being of his bosom friends every one or his own varlets. Albeit blinded by the dazzle of the torches, the Duke d'Andria did contrive to parry several thrusts, and gave back some shrewd blows himself. But catching his foot in the platters lying on the floor, with the remains of the pasty and conserves, he fell over backward. Finding himself on his back, a sword's point at his throat, he did seize ...
— The Well of Saint Clare • Anatole France

... the earlier than with the later stage of Arthurian tradition; the contrast between his courteous self-restraint and the impetuous ardour of the young savage is well conceived, and the manner in which he and Gareth contrive to check and manage the turbulent youth without giving him cause for offence is very cleverly indicated. Lancelot is a much more shadowy personage; if, as suggested above, the original story took shape at a period before he had attained to his full popularity, and references to his ...
— The Romance of Morien • Jessie L. Weston

... Many times we think that our own opinion might be better; nevertheless, we must leave affairs to Him who governs them, if we wish to succeed. The will of the saint was plain to be seen, nor did I desire to contrive further speech about the arrangements with his Lordship. And truly all things were guided by Heaven in order to give him the glorious victory which he attained—to the confusion of the Moros and the undeceiving of the Indians, who now know that the Spaniards ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 (Vol 27 of 55) • Various

... should think of their proposition, and rather thought that he should contrive to pay them a visit at the ...
— Whig Against Tory - The Military Adventures of a Shoemaker, A Tale Of The Revolution • Unknown

... however, much pleased with the library, and with the conversation of Dr. James Robertson, Professor of Oriental Languages, the Librarian. We talked of Kennicot's edition of the Hebrew Bible[109], and hoped it would be quite faithful. JOHNSON. 'Sir, I know not any crime so great that a man could contrive to commit, as poisoning ...
— Life Of Johnson, Volume 5 • Boswell

... the task of introducing to their notice electric energy in a different aspect. Although still giving evidence of swiftness and precision, the effects he should dwell upon were no longer such as could be perceived only through the most delicate instruments human ingenuity could contrive, but were capable of rivaling the steam engine, compressed air, and the hydraulic accumulator in the accomplishment ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 384, May 12, 1883 • Various

... tells us all That she never intends to be "great" and "tall"; (For how could she ever contrive to sit In her "own, own chair," if she grew one bit!) And, further, she says, she intends to stay In her "darling home" till she gets "quite gray;" Alas! we are gray; and we doubt, you know, But "little Blue-Ribbons" ...
— Collected Poems - In Two Volumes, Vol. II • Austin Dobson

... an eye-sore in my golden coat; Some loathsome dash the herald will contrive, To cipher me how fondly I did dote; That my posterity, shamed with the note, Shall curse my bones, and hold it for no sin To wish that I their father had ...
— The Rape of Lucrece • William Shakespeare [Clark edition]

... the joys of childhood. He would be, not teacher only, but fellow-student. He would strive to learn with her to conceive the ideal without losing sight of the fact that it was a human world in which they dwelt. When she wished to play, he would play with her. But he would contrive and direct their amusements so as to carry instruction, to elucidate and exemplify it, to point morals, and steadily to contribute to her store of knowledge. His plan was ideal, he knew. But he could not know then that Nature—if we may thus call it—had anticipated ...
— Carmen Ariza • Charles Francis Stocking

... government really wished to put an end to this trade, it could be very effectually accomplished, by sending small armed vessels to intercept the slave traders near their places of landing cargoes, which are not very numerous. It is also said, in the West Indies, that the Havanna traders still contrive to introduce Africans into the southern part of the United States; of the truth or falsehood of this, we know nothing. The slave vessels are generally Baltimore clipper brigs, and schooners, completely armed and very fast sailers. Two of them sailed on this execrable trade in February ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 2, 1917 • Various

... Literature neither resides at Constantinople nor passes through it. Even were I able to obtain the publications of France and Germany by way of Vienna, the road is so circuitous, that you would have them later than others who contrive to smuggle them across the North Sea. Every London newspaper that retails its daily sixpennyworth of false reports, publishes the French, the Hamburgh, the Vienna, the Frankfort, and other journals, full as soon as we ...
— A Publisher and His Friends • Samuel Smiles

... and no sooner are we supplied with everything that nature can demand, than we sit down to contrive ...
— Pearls of Thought • Maturin M. Ballou

... I will wait my chance, steal out, and then contrive to make my way to some cottage where I can get food. I can bring it back, and we can continue to remain here in hiding till you are ...
— Crown and Sceptre - A West Country Story • George Manville Fenn

... sir, don't read them; but give them to me again. That I will not, said he, till I have read them. Sir, said I, you served me not well in the letters I used to write formerly: I think it was not worthy your character to contrive to get them in your hands, by that false John Arnold! for should such a gentleman as you mind what your poor servant writes?—Yes, said he, by all means, mind what such a servant ...
— Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded • Samuel Richardson

... play; and as his aunt would not let him tease his sick brother, he began to fasten himself upon her, as she knelt, in such a way that, busy as she was about Charles, she could not shake him off. She spoke to him, ordered, entreated, and insisted in vain. Once she did contrive to push him away, but the boy had the greater pleasure in getting upon ...
— Persuasion • Jane Austen

... lest any one being in the palace, on account of this murderous deed, should contrive ...
— The Tragedies of Euripides, Volume I. • Euripides

... excitement. Such a visitation of God's Spirit, while greatly to be desired, is thought to be largely unaccountable. It is something for which one can only pray and we must wait for it in God's good time. Meantime we must go on being defeated and the Church must somehow contrive to continue her witness without New Life. Some of us are finding in actual fact that true revival is often the very reverse of all this. Revival need not be spectacular at all (it is certainly no spectacle to the one who is facing up to ...
— The Calvary Road • Roy Hession

... coiled spring, which was first called a "pendulum spring," then a "balance spring," and finally, from its diminutive size and coil form, a "hairspring." We are all aware that for the motive power for keeping up the oscillations of the escaping circle l we must contrive to employ power derived from the teeth D of the escape wheel. About the most available means of conveying power from the escape wheel to the oscillating arc l is to provide the lip of said arc with an inclined plane, along which the tooth which is disengaged from l at f to slide and move ...
— Watch and Clock Escapements • Anonymous

... pretenders to a knowledge of future events, generally discover who are in possession of property; and if they be superstitious and covetous, they contrive to persuade them there is a lucky stone in their house, and that, if they will entrust to them, all, or a part of their money, they will double and treble it. Sorry is the author to say that they often gain their point. ...
— The Gipsies' Advocate - or, Observations on the Origin, Character, Manners, and Habits of - The English Gipsies • James Crabb

... my hand, and wait till some favourable opportunity shall offer to increase it. Let me dissemble my jealousy and disappointment, that I may not alarm suspicion, or put the virtues of HAMET upon their guard against me; and let me contrive to give our joint administration such a form, as may best favour ...
— Almoran and Hamet • John Hawkesworth

... Christianity in this country is to be found in that worldly carefulness which causes our intense gravity, and makes us the most silent nation in Europe. The respectability of England is its bane; we worship respectability, and thus contrive to lose both the enjoyments of earth and the enjoyments of heaven. If Great Britain could once learn to laugh like a child, she would be in the way once more to pray ...
— The trade, domestic and foreign • Henry Charles Carey

... was gluttonous or greedy. Whatever Eskimos may feel at a feast, it is a point of etiquette that guests should not appear anxious about what is set before them. Indeed, they require a little pressing on the part of the host at first, but they always contrive to make amends for such self-restraint before ...
— Red Rooney - The Last of the Crew • R.M. Ballantyne

... cases, conscience is an elastic and very flexible article, which will bear a deal of stretching and adapt itself to a great variety of circumstances. Some people by prudent management and leaving it off piece by piece like a flannel waistcoat in warm weather, even contrive, in time, to dispense with it altogether; but there be others who can assume the garment and throw it off at pleasure; and this, being the greatest and most convenient improvement, is the one ...
— The Old Curiosity Shop • Charles Dickens

... "Who could contrive that there Rolland should die, Would strike off Carle's right arm. Then on the field That wond'rous host in death shall lie. No more Thereafter could King Carle such forces raise, And the Great Land at last would ...
— La Chanson de Roland • Lon Gautier

... on a bank of the river, and succeeded in making characters upon it by means of the tongue of a buckle, sufficient to say that they had with them Pyrrhus, the young prince of Epirus, and that they were flying with him to save his life, and to implore the people on the other side to contrive some way to get them over the river. This piece of bark they then managed to throw across the stream. Some say that they rolled it around a javelin, and then gave the javelin to the strongest of their party to throw; others say that they attached it to a stone. In some way or ...
— Pyrrhus - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott

... at a heat the whole one hundred and eleven miles, and only stopped to bait twice.' Oh, the blood- horses of old England! but they too have had their day—for everything beneath the sun there is a season and a time. But the greater number come just as they can contrive; on the tops of coaches, for example; and amongst these there are fellows with dark sallow faces and sharp shining eyes; and it is these that have planted rottenness in the core of pugilism, for they are Jews, and, true to their kind, have ...
— The Pocket George Borrow • George Borrow

... sea-corner of France, shading off near Bayonne; and are in yet greater numbers in the adjoining upper edges of Spain. It seems strange that the beginnings of this isolated race should to-day be almost no better settled than in the time of Humboldt or Ramond. Yet they contrive still to embroil the philologists and historians. Here the race has lived, certainly since the days of the Romans, probably since long before, out of kin with all the world, and the world's periods have passed on and left them. No one knows their birth-mark; ...
— A Midsummer Drive Through The Pyrenees • Edwin Asa Dix

... my father said, 'that Mr. Hipperdon does not possess the art of talking to the ladies. I shall try him in repartee on the hustings. I must contrive to have our Jorian ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... the Roman Catholics as a new set of modern dissidents under the old name. It is the sort of vengeance which, under favourable circumstances, the mouse may enjoy at the expense of the elephant. If he can mount high enough by artificial means, the smallest of created things may contrive to look down on the greatest, and to affect to compassionate his want of range. For purposes of controversy, the Anglican could talk of himself as a terrestrial ancient-of-days, and regret the rage for innovation, which led, not, of course, to his separation from Rome, but to Rome's separation ...
— The Purpose of the Papacy • John S. Vaughan

... and you, Mr. Finney," he said, "should water casks be seen going on board, the whole of Georgetown will know you mean to sail. I therefore ask you to so contrive it that the casks be hidden in bales or boxes so that they seem to be anything but what they are." He tapped the rolled charts thoughtfully on the palm of one hand. "Our only chance to steal a march on the ...
— Mr. Wicker's Window • Carley Dawson

... what should the little pig contrive But to rise at five Next day, and to go through the early dew To the field where the turnips grew; They were plenty and sweet, And he ate of them all he cared to eat, And took enough for his dinner, and ...
— On the Tree Top • Clara Doty Bates

... then, if we can contrive to do so, regard the Italians during their subjection to the Church and Austria. Were it not for these consolatory reflections, and for the present reappearance of the nation in a new and previously unapprehended form of unity, the history of the Counter-Reformation period would be almost ...
— Renaissance in Italy, Volumes 1 and 2 - The Catholic Reaction • John Addington Symonds

... in the wake of Mrs. Porter. How easily she seemed to take it! The man she married would have to be of the world, as large a world as she could contrive to get. She would always be "going on." Imaginatively, with the ignorance of a young man, he attributed to her appetites for luxury, for power, for success. He was merely an instance of her tolerance. Really he was a very little thing in her cosmos, and if he wished to be more, he ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick

... before when he betrayed John Beaudry to death. Fox was shrewd and wily, but no gunman. If Chet was alone, his prisoner did not propose to remain one. Dave did not intend to make any fool breaks, but it would be hard luck if he could not contrive a chance to ...
— The Sheriff's Son • William MacLeod Raine

... would come back. So I shipped as mate on the Mudlark, bound from London to wherever the captain might think it expedient to sail. It had not been thought advisable to hamper Captain Abersouth with orders, for when he could not have his own way, it had been observed, he would contrive in some ingenious way to make the voyage unprofitable. The owners of the Mudlark had grown wise in their generation, and now let him do pretty much as he pleased, carrying such cargoes as he fancied to ports where the nicest women were. On the voyage of which I ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce, Volume 8 - Epigrams, On With the Dance, Negligible Tales • Ambrose Bierce

... I say. I can contrive it. Come, the maids and I will make a true Rajputni of you. Only I must study how to walk as you do; please walk along in front of me—that way—follow Hasamurti through that door into my room. I will study how you move your ...
— Guns of the Gods • Talbot Mundy

... degrees to the supreme jurisdiction of the Proprietors. But their good temper was of short duration, and the next advices from England blasted all his hopes of future agreement. The planters finding that the tax-act fell heavy on them, began to grumble and complain of its injustice, and to contrive ways and means for eluding it, by stamping more bills of credit. The Proprietors having information of this, and also of a design formed by the assembly to set a price on country commodities, and make them at such a price a good tender in law for the payment ...
— An Historical Account Of The Rise And Progress Of The Colonies Of South Carolina And Georgia, Volume 1 • Alexander Hewatt

... hundred yards. But time pressed, and the usefulness of his car was at an end, as far as he was concerned; there was no saying how many times its identity might not have been established by the police in the course of that wild chase through Paris, or how soon these last might contrive to overhaul and apprehend him; and as soon as a bend in the road shut off the scene of wreck, he stopped finally, jumped down, and plunged headlong into the dark midnight heart of the Bois, seeking its silences where trees stood thickest and ...
— The Lone Wolf - A Melodrama • Louis Joseph Vance

... you belong to the vessel in the outer harbour; and, though you don't hate your enemies, you love your friends. We must contrive the means to coax the ladies to take ...
— The Red Rover • James Fenimore Cooper

... several other leading friends of the colony. But I suppose the judge did not succeed in getting his brother-in-law put on the grand-jury, and so the scheme fell through. No indictment for that "misdemeanor" then. Boston had the right men to do any thing for the crown, but they did not contrive to get upon ...
— The Trial of Theodore Parker • Theodore Parker

... afraid," was his father's answer. "Sometimes it was even worse, for the unfortunate settlers did not always contrive to escape. It took courage to be a pioneer and travel the country in those days. Undoubtedly there was much romance in the adventure but hand in hand with it went no little peril and discomfort. We owe a great deal to the men who settled the West; and, I sometimes think, ...
— Steve and the Steam Engine • Sara Ware Bassett

... class for not being familiar with opinions, which but twenty years ago they would have been expelled for dreaming of. Everything is moving onward swiftly and satisfactorily; and if, when we have made all faiths fail, we can only contrive to silence the British Association, and so make all knowledge vanish away, there will lack nothing but the presence of a perfect charity to turn the nineteenth century into a complete kingdom of heaven. Amongst changes, then, so great and so hopeful—amongst the discoveries of the rights ...
— Every Man His Own Poet - Or, The Inspired Singer's Recipe Book • Newdigate Prizeman

... especially comfortable by ourselves; when we had something particularly good for dinner, or found ourselves set cheerily down for a long day at quiet work, with everything early-nice about us; or when we were going to make something "contrive-y," "Swiss-family-Robinson-ish," that got us all together over it, in the hilarity of enterprise and the zeal of acquisition. Miss Trixie could appreciate homely cleverness; darning of carpets and covering of old furniture; she could darn a carpet herself, ...
— We Girls: A Home Story • Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney

... contracted words, the measures which the air require will not allow him; and should he suddenly lift up and bear high the standard of moral refinement, those who should attend may fail to appreciate the movement, and refuse to follow him. If he can contrive, therefore, to interest and entertain with what is at least harmless, it is much, considering how wide a field even one popular song occupies, and how many of an undesirable kind it may meanwhile displace and eventually supersede. The tide of evil communications ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volume VI - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various

... other charms, and whatever he makes shew of to Melanthe, his heart is devoted wholly to you,—begs you to permit him to entertain you without the presence of that lady, the means of which he will take care to contrive; and charged me to assure you, that there is no sacrifice so great, but he will readily offer it to convince you of the sincerity ...
— The Fortunate Foundlings • Eliza Fowler Haywood

... her hand on the door-side to prevent consequences, if, after all she should be betrayed into a loud word, she said, "I thought I'd just say, Miss Scudder, that, in case Mary should —— the Doctor,—in case, you know, there should be a —— in the house, you must just contrive it so as to give me a month's notice, so that I could give you a whole fortnight to fix her up as such a good man's —— ought to be. Now I know how spiritually-minded our blessed Doctor is; but, bless you, Ma'am, he's got eyes. I tell you, Miss Scudder, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 23, September, 1859 • Various

... Monsieur Paulin Limayrac, that little bit of a fellow, the fly of the political and literary coach, went first to one and then to another, his eye-glass incrusted in his eyebrow, stiffening his wee form as long as he could make it, rattling his high-heeled boots as loudly as he could contrive, stretching out his round, dogmatic face, puffing and blowing to give himself importance, dying to be the Coryphaeus of the company, and mortified to see himself reduced to sing his enthusiasm in the chorus; he frisked about ...
— Atlantic Monthly,Volume 14, No. 82, August, 1864 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various

... was received in a silence which would have embarrassed any other man than the Abbe Dutheil. The three priests chose to see in it one of those hidden and unanswerable sarcasms which are characteristic of ecclesiastics, who contrive to express what they want to say while observing the strictest decorum. In this case there was nothing of the kind. The Abbe Dutheil never thought of himself and had no ...
— The Village Rector • Honore de Balzac

... the exposure of the children of Rhea Silvia as to leave no reasonable ground for doubt that Romulus and Remus were his grandsons. He resolved immediately to communicate this joyful discovery to his daughter, if he could contrive the means of gaining access to her; for during all this time she had been kept in ...
— Romulus, Makers of History • Jacob Abbott

... children. He delighted to talk to children, and to play with them. He would carry them on his back, three or four at a time, roll with them on the ground, race with them in the garden, invent games for them, contrive amusements in circumstances which seemed quite adverse to all manner of delight; and, above all, his physic was not nearly so nasty as that which came ...
— Doctor Thorne • Anthony Trollope

... here. I knew from the first that all such attempts would be fruitless, but I have tried—and failed. I suggest what I suggested at first—put them to death, here and now, as they lie there, for most assuredly they will in some way contrive to take toll of lives of your own humanity if ...
— Spacehounds of IPC • Edward Elmer Smith

... contrive to let the enclosed half-sheet of paper, upon which I have written in pencil, fall into his hands? You hesitate to tell him how obedient I am; could you not, at least, help me to let him know it ...
— The Saint • Antonio Fogazzaro

... mind of Lady Tinemouth, and made her anxious to contrive some opportunity in which she might have this interesting Constantine alone, and by a proper management of the discourse, lead to some avowal of his real situation. Hitherto her benevolent intentions had been frustrated by various interruptions at various times. ...
— Thaddeus of Warsaw • Jane Porter

... whole family of children dependent on you! What does the preacher know of a woman's troubles? How many things she has to think of, day by day, not one of which she dares forget—and yet can seldom or never, for all her recollecting, contrive to get them all done? How can she help being distracted by the thought of to-morrow? Can he feel for frail me? Does he know what I go through?" Yes. I do know; and I wonder, and admire. To me the sight of any poor woman managing her family respectably and thriftily, is one of the most surprising ...
— All Saints' Day and Other Sermons • Charles Kingsley

... cannot do that!" Blaine responded, gravely. "To attempt to communicate with him where I have sent him would be to show our hand irretrievably to the men we are fighting and undo much of the work which has been accomplished. He may communicate with you or possibly with me, if he finds that he can contrive ...
— The Crevice • William John Burns and Isabel Ostrander

... relationship was so discoursed, that the said Messer Guido agreed to give his young and fair daughter in marriage to Gianciotto, the son of Messer Malatesta. Now, this being made known to certain of the friends of Messer Guido, one of them said to him, 'Take care what you do; for if you contrive not matters discreetly, such relationship will beget scandal. You know what manner of person your daughter is, and of how lofty a spirit; and if she see Gianciotto before the bond is tied, neither you nor any one else will have power to persuade her to marry him; ...
— Stories from the Italian Poets: With Lives of the Writers, Volume 1 • Leigh Hunt

... deny her, and so Eppie went to her new home—one where every care a motherly heart could contrive was given her. But Elizabeth's position was no less uncomfortable after Eppie was gone. Her aunt treated her with stately politeness, her manner saying plainly that she was merely waiting for her erring niece to confess herself mistaken, and ready to make ...
— 'Lizbeth of the Dale • Marian Keith

... become so enamoured of the abolishing process that he's keeping on. Unless we can contrive to break up the habit, in the end he will analyze himself into his original elements, and ...
— The Brentons • Anna Chapin Ray

... whom I play, who contrive to make me feel more at my ease than do others, and even look upon me in virtue of my playing with "those men at the Club" as one having authority; for among the blind the one-eyed man is king. There is ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Volume 102, March 12, 1892 • Various

... right thing," said Howard. "You must just go to Gretton and say you are very sorry you got drunk, and still more sorry you were impertinent. If you can contrive to show him that you think him a good fellow, and are really vexed to have been such a bounder, so much the better. That I leave to your natural eloquence. But you will be gated, and he will write ...
— Watersprings • Arthur Christopher Benson

... popularity. And it was on him that the hope of the Romans centred as he marched once more against the Persians, leaving his wife in Byzantium. Now Antonina, the wife of Belisarius, (for she was the most capable person in the world to contrive the impossible,) purposing to do a favour to the empress, devised the following plan. John had a daughter, Euphemia, who had a great reputation for discretion, but a very young woman and for this reason very susceptible; this girl was exceedingly loved by her father, for she was his only ...
— History of the Wars, Books I and II (of 8) - The Persian War • Procopius

... is an institution in Western cities whose inhabitants frequently take no meals at home, and the appearance of the bronzed man and girl together excited no comment, while Alton was able to contrive that they had a table in a corner to themselves. His tastes were, as his companion knew, severely simple, and she wondered a little, because that establishment was one of the most expensive in the city. In the meanwhile, the man talked assiduously, if somewhat at ...
— Alton of Somasco • Harold Bindloss

... creation, one would think, cannot be easy; your Jove has severe pains and fire flames in the head, out of which an armed Pallas is struggling! As for manufacture, that is a different matter.... Write by steam if thou canst contrive it and sell it, ...
— Thomas Carlyle - Biography • John Nichol

... the majority of the miners are concerned," Brace replied; "but there's no telling what Billings may contrive to do between ...
— Down the Slope • James Otis

... Noah contrive to bring these beasts, birds, and insects all together in one spot? The task seems superhuman. Some species could be found only in very remote places—the kangaroo only in Australia, the sloth only in South America, the polar bear only in the Arctic regions. How could Noah, in those ...
— Bible Romances - First Series • George W. Foote

... Daas had reached his full eighty, his daughter had died in the Ardennes, hard by Stavelot, and had left him in legacy her two-year-old son. The old man could ill contrive to support himself, but he took up the additional burden uncomplainingly, and it soon became welcome and precious to him. Little Nello—which was but a pet diminutive for Nicolas—throve with him, and the old man and the little ...
— Stories of Childhood • Various

... the precepts of Duty, or even the lessons of Truth, may not be introduced into a poem and with advantage; for they may subserve, incidentally, in various ways, the general purposes of the work; but the true artist will always contrive to tone them down in proper subjection to that Beauty which is the atmosphere and the real essence of ...
— Harvard Classics Volume 28 - Essays English and American • Various

... in a third; and if he can have no part of that which he purposed, yet to turn the use of it to somewhat else; and if he cannot make anything of it for the present, yet to make it as a seed of somewhat in time to come; and if he can contrive no effect or substance from it, yet to win some good opinion by it, or the like. So that he should exact an account of himself of every action, to reap somewhat, and not to stand amazed and confused if he fail of that he chiefly meant: for nothing is more impolitic ...
— The Advancement of Learning • Francis Bacon

... on the wing for shore, looking right into the wind, and with smooth water and a light breeze, they drew rapidly away from the heavier ship. I must observe that our Mercury's correctness was by no means commensurate with his activity; for such ingenious changes did this worthy contrive in the names of the passengers, that the mothers of some would have failed to have discovered the arrival of their sons, except ...
— Impressions of America - During the years 1833, 1834 and 1835. In Two Volumes, Volume I. • Tyrone Power

... radical leaders won. Their victory was due to adroit tactics on their own part and to mistakes, bad judgment, and bad manners on the part of the President. When all hope of controlling Johnson had been given up, Thaddeus Stevens and other leaders of similar views began to contrive means to circumvent him. On December 1, 1865, before Congress met, a caucus of radicals held in Washington agreed that a joint committee of the two Houses should be selected to which should be referred matters relating to reconstruction. This ...
— The Sequel of Appomattox - A Chronicle of the Reunion of the States, Volume 32 In The - Chronicles Of America Series • Walter Lynwood Fleming

... pluck the maid from her mother's enfolding, pluck from her mother's enfolding the firm-clinging maid, and canst give the chaste girl to the burning youngster. What more cruel could victors in vanquished city contrive? Hymen O Hymenaeus, Hymen ...
— The Carmina of Caius Valerius Catullus • Caius Valerius Catullus

... she was accustomed to observe, as a pleasurable pursuit, but, as with any other pursuit, when it began to impair the appetite and to affect the quality and the quantity of one's work, then a serious person would at once contrive to get rid of the passion. And Madame prided herself with reason upon being a strictly serious person. She had been through the experience of love innumerable times; she had lost four husbands, and, as she pointed out with complacency, she ...
— Life and Gabriella - The Story of a Woman's Courage • Ellen Glasgow

... Anthony Dassel in Guinea. By consent of Francis Tucker, John Browbeare, and the other factors of Richard Kelley, with whom this Pedro Gonzalves came from England, it was agreed that we should detain Gonzalves in our ships until their departure, to avoid any other mischief that he might contrive. Therefore, on 9th January 1592, he was delivered to go for England in the same ship that brought him, being all the time he remained in our ship, well and courteously treated by me, though much against the will of our mariners, who were much disgusted at seeing one ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume VII • Robert Kerr

... all this mischief, and how it would end, was a thought which caused me some anxiety. The tall savage had set his heart upon our goods and chattels, and it was not in human nature for him to desist from his aggressive purpose, if we could not, in some way, contrive to cheek the pursuit. I knew instinctively, by the first sound of a loud whisper of his at "Tagando" at night, near our tents, that there was no music in this man's soul. We soon arrived at a ridge of ferruginous sandstone, whereof the strike tended S. S. W. and the dip was to the eastward. ...
— Journal of an Expedition into the Interior of Tropical Australia • Thomas Mitchell

... less by fully two-thirds. And the benefit to mankind would be far more considerable than if it lay in our power to guide the storm or govern the heat and the cold, to direct the course of disease or the avalanche, or contrive that the sea should display an intelligent regard to our virtues and secret intentions. For indeed the poor far exceed in number those who fall victims to shipwreck or material accident, just as far more disease is due to material wretchedness than to the caprice ...
— The Buried Temple • Maurice Maeterlinck

... verse, are distinguished one from an other by two things, and in general by two only; the number of syllables taken as a foot, and the order of their quantities. Trochaic verse is always as distinguishable from iambic, as iambic is from any other. Yet have we several grammarians and prosodies who contrive to confound them—or who, at least, mistake catalectic trochaic for catalectic iambic; and that too, where the syllable wanting affects only the last foot, and makes it perhaps but ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown

... is positively nothing doing; and the growers, who are every day becoming less, complain bitterly. Raspberries were very slack, at 2-1/2d. per pottle; but dry goods still brought their prices. We have heard of several severe smashes in currants, and the bakers, who, it is said, generally contrive to get a finger in the pie, are among ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various

... with the tricks of those who seek human life, and still contrive to keep out of the clutches of the law, will see in the scene above recited an attempt to provoke an altercation which would have been fatal to Judge Sawyer, if he had resented the indignity put upon him by Mrs. Terry, by even so much as ...
— Personal Reminiscences of Early Days in California with Other Sketches; To Which Is Added the Story of His Attempted Assassination by a Former Associate on the Supreme Bench of the State • Stephen Field; George C. Gorham

... I lay trying so to contrive our next conversation that it should not flow, as all before it had so irresistibly done, into that one deep channel of her thoughts which took in everything that fell upon her mind, as a great river drinks the rains of all its valleys. Presently the open window ...
— The Flower of the Chapdelaines • George W. Cable

... "I'll contrive, however, to make my meaning very plain to ye, Mosha le Viscount," she continued. "I suppose you desire ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 20 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... vividly each its own aspect, and contrive their own explanations of what they see, it is almost impossible for them to credit each other with honesty. If the pattern fits their experience at a crucial point, they no longer look upon it as an interpretation. ...
— Public Opinion • Walter Lippmann



Words linked to "Contrive" :   excogitate, send, map out, map, invent, contrivance, concert, create by mental act, create mentally, throw, project, shoot, design, cast, forge



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