"First-rate" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... a most magnetic personality — joined with her husband in his hearty friendship for the newly discovered poet. She was the daughter of the Marquis de la Figaniere, Portuguese minister to this country. In their home were entertained all the first-rate artistic people who came to Philadelphia, such as Salvini, Charlotte Cushman, Bayard Taylor, and others. It was a home in which music and literature were highly honored, and here Lanier met some of the most interesting people then ...
— Sidney Lanier • Edwin Mims
... part of it I have not yet got the hang of; but the first - only a few bars! The gavotte is beautiful and pretty hard, I think, and very much of the period; and at the end of it, this musette enters with the most really thrilling effect of simple beauty. O - it's first-rate. I am quite mad over it. If you find other books containing Lully, Rameau, Martini, please let me know; also you might tell me, you who know Bach, where the easiest is to be found. I write all morning, come down, ...
— Letters of Robert Louis Stevenson - Volume 2 • Robert Louis Stevenson
... could be written in a few weeks, but a solid historical biography of him, with a critical examination of his campaigns, has not yet been written, and perhaps never will be. A literary venture of Lowell and his friends in 1843, to found a first-rate literary magazine, proved a failure; and it is to be feared that he lost money by it. [Footnote: See Scudder's Life of Lowell, ...
— Cambridge Sketches • Frank Preston Stearns
... build men-of-war, or East India ships, or ships of five hundred ton burden at St. Catherines, or at Battle Bridge in the Thames? when we know that a mile or two lower, viz., at Radcliffe, Limehouse, or Deptford, they build ships of a thousand ton, and might build first-rate men-of-war too, if there was occasion; and the like might be done in this river of Ipswich, within about two or three miles of the town; so that it would not be at all an out-of-the-way speaking to say, such a ship was built at Ipswich, any more than it is to say, as they do, that ...
— Tour through the Eastern Counties of England, 1722 • Daniel Defoe
... used to drive a handsome team of four horses, and, of course, attracted a good deal of attention whenever he made his appearance in the streets. On one occasion the late Lord Sefton, who was through life a first-rate whip, drove up to Heywood's bank in his usual dashing style. Dr. Solomon was tooling along behind his lordship, and desirous of emulating his mode of handling the reins and whip, gave the latter such ...
— Recollections of Old Liverpool • A Nonagenarian
... ship rides at her anchor is now made of iron; prior to 1811 only hempen cables were supplied to ships of the British navy, a first-rate's complement on the East Indian station being eleven; the largest was 25 in. (equal to 21/4 in. iron cable) and weighed 6 tons. In 1811, iron cables were supplied to stationary ships; their superiority over hempen ones ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 4 - "Bulgaria" to "Calgary" • Various
... hope to be and do now, Susan says, if he had but the knowledge that every man may be said to have the right to be possessed of? Yet, the good fellow has raised his family to a point of comfort. A gentleman who heard of his merits, as a first-rate laborer, wrote to the same parish officers, to inquire if there were any brothers. There was Tom; and Tom is now in a happy situation, highly esteemed by his employer, and earning 14s. a week. The employer, ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 2, No. 12, May, 1851. • Various
... with my abode at the Weisser Wolf, tho' it is not a first-rate hotel. They are very civil people, and I have an excellent and spacious room for two florins Wiener Whaerung per diem. Lodgings are the only things that are dear in Vienna, every other article is, however, cheaper ...
— After Waterloo: Reminiscences of European Travel 1815-1819 • Major W. E Frye
... over an almost impassable road. He is "monarch of all he surveys," a king amongst his farm servants and Indian workmen. Nothing can exceed the independence of his position; but to enjoy this wild country life, he must be born to it. He must be a first-rate horseman, and addicted to all kinds of country sport; and if he can spend the day in riding over his estate, in directing his workmen, watching over his improvements, redressing disputes and grievances, and ...
— Life in Mexico • Frances Calderon de la Barca
... them out to the play-ground, where Napoleon treated them in turn to a very fine dance on his hind-legs, and Old Pudding-head, not to be behindhand in politeness, gave all the little boys a somersault over his nose. They had a first-rate frolic, and did not think once of ...
— The Apple Dumpling and Other Stories for Young Boys and Girls • Unknown
... that you have brushed away more cobwebs that have obscured the subject than any other, besides giving a vast deal that is new, and admirably setting forth what is old, so as to throw new light on the whole subject. It is, in short, a first-rate book. I am making notes for you, but hitherto have seen no defect of importance except in the matter of the Bahamas, whose flora is Floridan, not Cuban, in so far as we know ...
— Alfred Russel Wallace: Letters and Reminiscences Vol 2 (of 2) • James Marchant
... place, immeasurably the best we have come to. There is a quantity of first-rate architecture, and very little or ...
— The Mind of the Artist - Thoughts and Sayings of Painters and Sculptors on Their Art • Various
... first-rate! I'm glad you feel like coming," Tembarom plunged in. He didn't intend to give him too much ...
— T. Tembarom • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... it was a town hand,' said Blathers, continuing his report; 'for the style of work is first-rate.' ...
— Oliver Twist • Charles Dickens
... denied that men of undoubted talents, and even poets of true, though not of first-rate, genius, have from a mistaken theory deluded both themselves and others in the opposite extreme. I once read to a company of sensible and well-educated women the introductory period of Cowley's preface to his "Pindaric ...
— Biographia Literaria • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... by storm, but swiftly isolated and forced to surrender. It held out not quite two days. It was the first first-rate fortress taken by our men from the enemy in this engagement. In the ruins, they saw for the first time the work which the enemy puts into his main defences, and the skill and craft with which he provides for his comfort. For some weeks, the underground arrangements ...
— The Old Front Line • John Masefield
... Port Royal in safety, he might reasonably expect to obtain his long waited-for promotion. Although the majority of the men sent with us were the least reliable of the crew, we had an old quartermaster, Ben Nash, and three other seamen, who were first-rate hands, and we took care to put two of them into each watch. Of course there was plenty of work to do in getting the ship to rights. As soon as the men knocked off we heard Larry's riddle going. Stepping forward, I found that he had set all the Frenchmen dancing, and some ...
— Paddy Finn • W. H. G. Kingston
... done?" he said. "You've done something that's really good. Faults? Yes, millions; but there's a first-rate imagination at the bottom of it. How ...
— Michael • E. F. Benson
... a farmer in Pennsylvania wrote me that he wanted "to raise a first-rate crop of potatoes." I answered him as follows through ...
— Talks on Manures • Joseph Harris
... he's a trump, old fellow," quoth Tom, with ardor. "He's as brave as steel, a first-rate officer, a thorough gentleman, generous, kind, and as jolly as a lark! Give me Fitz Lee to fight with, or march with, or hear laugh! He was shot in the Valley, and I have been with him in Richmond. In spite ...
— Mohun, or, The Last Days of Lee • John Esten Cooke
... struck me as characteristic of the principal plenipotentiaries: as a rule, they eschewed first-rate men as fellow-workers, one integer and several zeros being their favorite formula, and they took no account of the flight of time, planning as though an eternity were before them and then suddenly improvising as though afraid of being late for a train ...
— The Inside Story Of The Peace Conference • Emile Joseph Dillon
... occasion to the writer, and we are reminded of it when we step up to the "eight-foot" engine which is to carry us from King's Cross Station to York. To pull the fastest train in Great Britain, or indeed in the world, for one hundred and eighty-eight miles, at more than forty-eight miles an hour, is first-rate running. "Scotchmen" run also from the Midland Station at St. Pancras, and from Euston, but the quickest one is that on the Great Northern, and it is ...
— Little Folks (October 1884) - A Magazine for the Young • Various
... however, is to be observed, in the country of the Loire, in every one who carries a key. It is true that at Langeais there is no great occasion to indulge in the tourist's weak- ness of dawdling; for the apartments, though they contain many curious odds and ends of, antiquity, are not of first-rate interest. They are cold and musty, indeed, with that touching smell of old furniture, as all apartments should be through which the insatiate American wanders in the rear of a bored domestic, pausing to stare at a faded tapestry ...
— A Little Tour in France • Henry James
... sound, and retired a step or two farther from the building and looked up at it again. Then he went toward the dock and looked down into its turbid waters, and returned again with a face of hopeless perplexity. "This is Lucas Wharf, and no mistake," he said. "I know the place first-rate, now. But what I can't make out is, What's got ...
— The Lady of the Aroostook • W. D. Howells
... deny us even a proximate determination of his inquiry. Even his 1000l., which he may consider a fixed measure of value, or punctum comparationis, is varying in value (power of purchase) daily, even hourly, as regards almost every exchangeable product. Tooke On Prices is a first-rate authority on ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 238, May 20, 1854 • Various
... he acquires a sort of mathematical precision in determining the true bearings and position of objects, and is usually found, when admitted into a rifle club, to equal, without previous practice, its second-rate shots. He only falls short of its first-rate ones, because, uninitiated by the experience of his profession in the mystery of the parabolic curve, he fails, in taking aim, to make the proper allowance for it. The mason is almost always a silent man: the strain on his respiration is too great, when he is actively employed, to leave the ...
— My Schools and Schoolmasters - or The Story of my Education. • Hugh Miller
... workman should be called upon to turn out the maximum amount of work which a first-rate man of his ...
— Shop Management • Frederick Winslow Taylor
... only in exceptional cases that nursing need be given up; the natural way is always the best. But where necessary there need be no hesitation in putting an infant on the bottle. The milk of a healthy cow, or condensed milk of first-rate brand, is much to be preferred to that of a wearied, worn-out, and ...
— Papers on Health • John Kirk
... before you go; it is a home manufacture, and so are all the ingredients." Terry poured it out of a veritable big coffeepot—hot, with plenty of sugar and milk. It was pronounced excellent. "See, Harry, you and Charley may supply your family with first-rate coffee," said D'Arcy. "We shall have a thaw before the winter sets in; dig up all the dandelion roots you can find; dry them in the sun or in your oven for keeping; roast them before use; and cut them up and grind them as you would coffee-berries. This is the result. ...
— The Log House by the Lake - A Tale of Canada • William H. G. Kingston
... is at its fullest is the time for the really first-rate dancer to turn his talent to the best advantage. Nearly all London ball-givers have such an immense circle of acquaintances that, for some shorter or longer period of the evening, their parties are ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 12, No. 32, November, 1873 • Various
... fools are angry at the truth. I have given orders not to admit him to-day. I love him, but I shall never forgive him for this. Upon my word, a widower! Give me some water. But as for your sending Panshin about his business, I think you're a first-rate girl for that. Only don't you go sitting of nights with any animals of that sort; don't break my old heart, or else you'll see I'm not all fondness—I ...
— A House of Gentlefolk • Ivan Turgenev
... continued my mother, 'in sober seriousness you have been most fortunate in engaging the affections of a nobleman such as Lord Glenfallen, young and wealthy, with first-rate—yes, acknowledged FIRST-RATE abilities, and of a family whose influence is not exceeded by that of any in Ireland. Of course you see the offer in the same light that I do—indeed I ...
— The Purcell Papers - Volume III. (of III.) • Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu
... what you may have to go through when you're doing adventures. There might be thorns or snakes or anything. I'm jolly glad to get my boots back too. I say, come on. Let's go to Helen's palace and get a banquet ready. I know there'll have to be a banquet. There always is, here. I know a first-rate ...
— The Magic City • Edith Nesbit
... plays. What is stranger still, with all this he was something of a valetudinarian. He had come off from school on a foundation fellowship, and had the reputation both at school and in the University of being a first-rate scholar. He was a strict disciplinarian in his way, had the undergraduates under his thumb, and having some bonhomie in his composition, was regarded by them with mingled feelings of fear and good will. They laughed at him, but carefully obeyed him. Besides this ...
— Loss and Gain - The Story of a Convert • John Henry Newman
... Forcythe told his wife that night. "She has a first-rate head on her shoulders for a girl of her age." Mary heard him, and was pleased. She liked—we all like—to be counted useful and valuable. The bit of praise sent her back to her ...
— Nine Little Goslings • Susan Coolidge
... you've got a first-rate horse, and I hear you've got rid of a first-rate lady. You're very lucky, no doubt, in both; but I think fortune has stood to ...
— The Kellys and the O'Kellys • Anthony Trollope
... the same, are content with considerably less sums for their services. Cases have been known where as low as five dollars have been received, and very rarely do they get a chance to make more than fifty or sixty dollars, which is considered a first-rate fee. ...
— Lights and Shadows of New York Life - or, the Sights and Sensations of the Great City • James D. McCabe
... men are first-rate. It is impossible to pay too high a tribute to the manner in which they settled down to this job of submarine hunting, and to the intelligence, resource, and courage which they have exhibited. They came on the scene at the opportune moment. Our men had been ...
— Our Navy in the War • Lawrence Perry
... purpose of preparing for a professional career.[12] It was a wise choice. Vermont may have lost a skilled handworker—there are those who vouch for the excellence of his handiwork[13]—but the Union gained a joiner of first-rate ability. ...
— Stephen A. Douglas - A Study in American Politics • Allen Johnson
... second marriage as a disgraceful mesalliance; but it is not very easy to see in what respect it was so. In social position she had certainly had the advantage over Mr. Thrale, being the daughter of a Carnarvonshire baronet of ancient family. But a first-rate musician was surely the equal of a brewer. After Johnson's death she published a volume of her reminiscences of him, which may be allowed to have been worthy neither of him nor of her, and which was ridiculed by Peter Pindar in "A Town Eclogue," in which the rivals Bozzy and Piozzi, on Virgil's ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole - Volume II • Horace Walpole
... Namur the hinge upon which depended the defence of the northern frontier of France was broken. It was to an almost forlorn hope that the British Army was committed when it took its place on the left of the French northern armies at Mons to encounter for the first time since Waterloo the shock of a first-rate European force. But for its valour and the distraction caused by the Russian invasion of East Prussia, Paris and possibly the French armies ...
— A Short History of the Great War • A.F. Pollard
... and she was chewing gum at a high speed as she stood beside him, looking up at the floating silver cone. "Now watch," she exclaimed suddenly. "She's coming down on the bar. I advised her to cut that out, but you see she does it first-rate. And she got rid of the skirt, too. Those black tights show off her legs very well. She keeps her feet together like I told her, and makes a good line along the back. See the light on those silver slippers,—that was a good idea I had. Come along to meet her. Don't be ...
— Youth and the Bright Medusa • Willa Cather
... and he was the Duke of Broadmorlands himself, in whose mind it remained hideously clear. He had been a young man, honestly and much in love when it first revealed itself to him, and for a few months he had even thought it might end by being his death, notwithstanding that he was strong and in first-rate physical condition. He had been a fine, hearty young man of clean and rather dignified life, though he was not understood to be brilliant of mind. Privately he had ideals connected with his rank and name which he was not fluent enough clearly to express. After he had realised that he should ...
— The Shuttle • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... Madame Desvarennes. "You have made enemies. Without speaking of projects which I had formed, I may say that my daughter has had offers from the best folks in Paris; from first-rate firms! Our circle was ...
— Serge Panine, Complete • Georges Ohnet
... service in India; a Mr. Harker, who had been in the church, and had left it in disgust as alike unsuited to his tastes and capacity; Mr. Windus Carr, a prosperous West-end solicitor, who had inherited a first-rate practice from his father, and who devoted his talents to the enjoyment of life, leaving his clients to the care of his partner, a steady-going stout gentleman, with a bald head, and an inexhaustible capacity for business; and last, but by no means least, John Saltram, ...
— Fenton's Quest • M. E. Braddon
... Sais has always been the royal residence, and the other palaces have in consequence become somewhat neglected. My dwelling was really splendidly situated, and beautifully furnished; it would have been first-rate, if, from the first moment of my entrance, a fearful annoyance had not ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... and though he expressed some surprise at the proposal, gave it his decided approval. He advised, at the same time, that the estate should not be sold, but be placed in the hands of some trustworthy person, to be managed in Mr. Garie's absence. Under the care of a first-rate overseer, it would not only yield a handsome income, but should they be dissatisfied with their Northern home, they would have the old place still in reserve; and with the knowledge that they had this to fall back upon, they could try their experiment of living in the North with their ...
— The Garies and Their Friends • Frank J. Webb
... that with four horses he could have a carriage dragged through the desert to the forest, which would be more comfortable for the ladies; and he made that arrangement in his own and their behalf. Freddy B. is a first-rate horseman, and an Arab steed was ordered for him. Mr. Buckle was determined to go in a thing called a mazetta, a sort of huge bedstead with curtains, borne on the back of a camel, big enough to carry a small family, in which he expected to find room ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XI., April, 1863, No. LXVI. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics. • Various
... you in future—with whom, and about what you deal. We're told, that 'Whoso is partner with a thief hateth his own soul.' Avoid taverns and bad company, and you may yet do well. You promise to become a first-rate workman. But you want one quality, without which all others are valueless. You want industry—you want steadiness. Idleness is the key of beggary, Jack. If you don't conquer this disgraceful propensity ...
— Jack Sheppard - A Romance • William Harrison Ainsworth
... the belle jeunesse of Italy; ladies with heads artfully shawled in Spanish-looking lace, but with too little art—or too much nature at least—in the region of the bodice; well- conditioned young abbati with neatly drawn stockings. These indeed are not objects of first-rate interest, and with such Turin is rather meagrely furnished. It has no architecture, no churches, no monuments, no romantic street-scenery. It has the great votive temple of the Superga, which stands on a high hilltop above the city, gazing across at Monte Rosa and lifting ...
— Italian Hours • Henry James
... bring up against him his array of objections to this or that rendering, and arguments for and against various readings, &c., till Mr Silver found himself fairly out of his depth. At first this puzzled him, and he very nearly committed the mistake of pronouncing John Brown a first-rate scholar in the common-room; but when he found his performance at lecture did not by any means keep pace with the remarkable erudition sometimes displayed by him in private, he began in his turn to suspect the trick. He ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 349, November, 1844 • Various
... was head-clerk in Monsieur Roguin's office, in Paris. A first-rate house, which you may have heard mentioned? No! An unfortunate bankruptcy made it famous.—Not having money enough to purchase a practice in Paris at the price to which they were run up in 1816, I came here and bought my predecessor's business. ...
— La Grande Breteche • Honore de Balzac
... humour him in his old age. He once attended the Squire to Oxford, when he was a student there, and enlightened the whole university with his hunting lore. All this is enough to make the old man opinionated, since he finds, on all these matters of first-rate importance, he knows more than the rest of the world. Indeed, Master Simon had been his pupil, and acknowledges that he derived his first knowledge in hunting from the instructions of Christy: and I much question whether the old man does not still ...
— Bracebridge Hall, or The Humorists • Washington Irving
... almost afraid to inquire how the sufferer fared, for Ned's eyes were fairly swimming with unshed tears; but he smiled brightly, and said, "The ladies and gentlemen in the town, they set up a subscribetion, and bought the poor chap a first-rate pair o' wooden legs, and he could even manage to ride about after a bit; and instead o' wandering about looking for country, or gold, or what not, he settled down as a carrier, and throve and did well. And I was thinking, ma'am, ...
— Station Amusements • Lady Barker
... "It was a first-rate tale," sighed Angel, contentedly, when I had done, "an' you told it awfully well, John. If you like you may just tell another 'stead o' me. Or The Seraph can tell one. Go ahead, Seraph, and make up the best ...
— Explorers of the Dawn • Mazo de la Roche
... the skeleton. The eyes are surrounded by a wide space of bright red skin, which, as well as that over the nostrils, is moderately wattled. The breast-bone is remarkably protuberant, being abruptly bowed outwards. The feet and tarsi are of great length, larger than in first-rate English Carriers. The whole bird is of large size, but in proportion to the size of the body the feathers of the wing and tail are short; a wild rock-pigeon, of considerably less size, had tail-feathers 4.6 inches in ...
— The Variation of Animals and Plants Under Domestication, Vol. I. • Charles Darwin
... Steele! Why, this is great! You used to be first-rate to me when I was a little chap. Were those your ...
— A Venetian June • Anna Fuller
... I found that my first-rate riding ox that had been lamed during the previous year by falling into a pitfall, and had been returned to Shooa, was perfectly recovered; thus I had a good mount for ...
— The Albert N'Yanza, Great Basin of the Nile • Sir Samuel White Baker
... I was going to say," continued James; "I don't know what Soames wants with a young man like that; why doesn't he go to a first-rate man?" ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... century, 20% of the island's population emigrated, mostly to Canada and the US. Limited home rule from Denmark was granted in 1874 and complete independence attained in 1944. Literacy, longevity, income, and social cohesion are first-rate by world standards. ...
— The 2005 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency
... is in first-rate order," said he to himself. "Father will be sure to find the money when he comes back, and I shall have plenty of time to see how the vulture's nest is to be got at. Mr. Seymour shall have the birds, no matter what trouble and danger it may cost me. He shall ...
— Harper's Young People, November 4, 1879 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... appearing to, keeps them under her eye? and, besides, a negro doctor has been to see them. Mr. Rudolph, I said to myself, 'Ah! but this is the coalheaver doctor, this black man; he can feel their pulse without soiling his hands!' But never mind, color is skin deep; he seems to be a first-rate hand, all the same. He ordered a potion for Madame Morel, ...
— The Mysteries of Paris V2 • Eugene Sue
... And what is going to happen when it is good enough to cease? I hope"—an uncomfortable thought occurred to me—"I hope Pugh hasn't picked up some pleasant little novelty in the way of an infernal machine. It would be a first-rate joke if he and I had been endeavoring to solve the puzzle of how ...
— The Lock And Key Library - Classic Mystery And Detective Stories, Modern English • Various
... grand distinctions of the people are these:- (1) The nobility and gentry; (2) the merchants and first-rate tradesmen; (3) the lawyers and physicians; and (4) inferior tradesmen, attorneys, clerks, apprentices, coachmen, carmen, chairmen, watermen, porters, ...
— London in 1731 • Don Manoel Gonzales
... a few years later, had a first-rate school for the education of their daughters in "Edgeworth," a noble seminary established by ...
— School History of North Carolina • John W. Moore
... albizzias. The coffee trees do not bear until their third year. At the fifth year they reach maturity, and then continue in their prime for as long as ten or fifteen years. Those grown upon the higher, and therefore cooler, ranges will sometimes remain in first-rate condition for even ...
— A Visit to Java - With an Account of the Founding of Singapore • W. Basil Worsfold
... They finally sobered up, and we resumed our journey, urging our jaded animals as much as they could stand, until we struck Marysville, on the Big Blue. From this place to Leavenworth we secured first-rate accommodations along the road, as the country had become pretty ...
— The Life of Hon. William F. Cody - Known as Buffalo Bill The Famous Hunter, Scout and Guide • William F. Cody
... his feelings. Instead of dissecting the qualities of a character or a work of art, he translates its tone and its spirit as closely as language will permit. That is why his criticism, like Lamb's or that of the master of this form, Longinus, is itself first-rate literature, recreating the impression of a masterpiece and ...
— Hazlitt on English Literature - An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature • Jacob Zeitlin
... (or governor of Rome.) Him therefore he recommended to the soldiery—that is, to the prtorian cohorts. The soldiery had no particular objection to the old general, if he and they could agree upon terms; his age being doubtless appreciated as a first-rate recommendation, in a case where it insured a speedy renewal of the ...
— The Caesars • Thomas de Quincey
... it; they delight in symbols and correspondences, in seeing a story told as if it were another and a very different story. I frankly confess that I have as a general thing but little enjoyment of it and that it has never seemed to me to be, as it were, a first-rate literary form. It has produced assuredly some first-rate works; and Hawthorne in his younger years had been a great reader and devotee of Bunyan and Spenser, the great masters of allegory. But it is apt ...
— Hawthorne - (English Men of Letters Series) • Henry James, Junr.
... are a new invention, but all accounts agree that they are an excellent one. I have obtained leave from Mr. Harcourt, who lives three miles from here, to put up a target at the foot of some bare hills on his property, and we will walk over there twice a week to practice. I used to be considered a first-rate shot with a rifle when I was a young man in America, and I have got down a rifle for my own use. I do not want you to speak about what we are doing to your mamma, or indeed to any one. We shall keep our rifles at a cottage near where we shoot, ...
— On the Pampas • G. A. Henty
... me to look at her—she couldn't have looked natural. Glad I didn't. Great Scott! but that was a first-rate prayer! Wouldn't have thought after thirty years I could have done so well. And it was all there, everything was in them words! If she knew what I was doing, she couldn't have asked nothing more, for I reckon she wouldn't expect a man like ME to ask no favors for that white-livered ...
— Lahoma • John Breckenridge Ellis
... table, and set to work at my allegory; it progressed swimmingly, better than it had done for a long time; not very fast, 'tis true, but it seemed to me that what I did was altogether first-rate. I worked, too, for the space of ...
— Hunger • Knut Hamsun
... Colonel Zane. Yes, first-rate trip," replied young Bennet. "Say, I've a word for you. Come aside," and drawing Colonel Zane out of earshot of the others, he continued, "I heard this by accident, not that I didn't spy a bit when I got interested, for I did; but the way it ...
— The Last Trail • Zane Grey
... is no more than just to the memory of Lord George, and his book affords material for an impartial judgment. At that period the noble lord was a distinguished patron of the turf: all England knew him as a sporting gentleman, a first-rate judge of horses, and an extensive winner on the course. In allusion to his habits in these respects, it became a popular sneer that the Conservatives required "a stable mind," after the versatile performances of Sir Robert Peel, and they had at last found such in Lord George. But although ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... the nation from trade and industry. It would hold out a dangerous lure to decoy the unwary to their ruin, by making them part with the earnings of their labour for a prospect of imaginary wealth. The great principle of the project was an evil of first-rate magnitude; it was to raise artificially the value of the stock, by exciting and keeping up a general infatuation, and by promising dividends out of funds which could never be adequate to the purpose." In a prophetic spirit he added, that if the plan ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds • Charles Mackay
... the civil and military life of Egypt there was not one element of sound sense; that he had been all along an egregious failure. It did not come home to him with clear, accurate conviction— his brain was not a first-rate medium for illumination; but the facts struck him now with a blind sort of force; and he accepted the blank sensation of failure. Also, he read in the faces of those round him an alien spirit, a chasm of black misunderstanding ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... while since we've seen you here, sir," said the attendant, supporting his foot, and screwing on the heel of the skate. "Except you, there's none of the gentlemen first-rate skaters. Will that be all right?" said he, ...
— Anna Karenina • Leo Tolstoy
... named Hardy has consented to take him. I have not seen the man yet, he was called away suddenly on some important business and could not let me know in time to stop rife coming here to see him. I am told it's a first-rate farm and the man is well off, which is security against Henry suddenly being discharged owing to impecuniosity on the farmer's part, a thing which seems to be of pretty frequent occurrence about here, or, in fact, anywhere ...
— Canada for Gentlemen • James Seton Cockburn
... lady Whose conduct is shady Or smacking of doubtful propriety; When Virtue would quash her I take and whitewash her And launch her in first-rate society. I recommend acres Of clumsy dressmakers - Their fit and their finishing touches; A sum in addition They pay for permission To say that they ...
— Songs of a Savoyard • W. S. Gilbert
... first pages of Casuals of the Sea give a pleasant description. Then he went to a well-known grammar school at Bury St. Edmunds in Suffolk—what we would call over here a high school. He was a quiet, sturdy boy, and a first-rate cricketer. ...
— Shandygaff • Christopher Morley
... rather striking, Miss Melville; but I did not expect such an admission from such a quarter. I see you are not strong-minded My aunt, Mrs. Rutherford, and her daughters, have rather been boring me with their theory of the equality of the sexes: this is a first-rate argument. Will you take it very much amiss if I borrow your idea, or rather your sister's, without acknowledgement? I have felt so very small, because they were always bringing up some instance or other out of books which I had never read, that to bring forward ...
— Mr. Hogarth's Will • Catherine Helen Spence
... flaming rhetoric of the Hebrew prophets until we think of them chiefly as indicters of a social order. They were not chiefly this but something quite different and more valuable, namely, religious geniuses. First-rate preaching would deal with Amos as the pioneer in ethical monotheism, with Hosea as the first poet of the divine grace, with Jeremiah as the herald of the possibility of each man's separate and personal communion with the living God. But, of course, such religious preaching, dealing with ...
— Preaching and Paganism • Albert Parker Fitch
... commanding their voluble propensities if they would wish to pass for Englishmen. It is certain, more words would have been uttered in this little lugger in one hour, had her crew been indulged to the top of their bent, than would have been uttered in an English first-rate in two; but the danger of using their own language, and the English peculiarity of grumness, had been so thoroughly taught them, that her people rather caricatured, than otherwise, ce grand talent ...
— The Wing-and-Wing - Le Feu-Follet • J. Fenimore Cooper
... own loss is easily retrieved. I have first-rate news of Ripault-Babin. He can hardly live through the week. One more campaign, dear, one more. Unfortunately the Hotel Padovani will be closed all the winter, owing to the Duchess's deep mourning. So for our scene of operations we shall have the 'at home' ...
— The Immortal - Or, One Of The "Forty." (L'immortel) - 1877 • Alphonse Daudet
... present and the perfect, and a joining of the infinitive with those two tenses. In the midst of this damaging criticism Doederlein quotes Walther, who has also commented upon the Annals, but in terms of enthusiastic commendation, for he praises such writing as first-rate workmanship—"adjustments by design," says the ingenious German; not, of course, the unconscious errors, that a modern European might make in a case of forgery: the discovery reminds me of Mr. Ruskin's unqualified ...
— Tacitus and Bracciolini - The Annals Forged in the XVth Century • John Wilson Ross
... grumbling about?" he demanded of his wife. "Shirley's a fine plantation. The water is good, the air superb; there are excellent gardens and first-rate oyster beds. The house is old-fashioned, but it's comfortable, and a little money will make it more so. What's the ...
— Princess • Mary Greenway McClelland
... in this world with a first-rate opinion of himself and the rest of mankind. No man ever started with a larger capital of good nature, human benevolence, and common honesty, than honest John. Few men ever started with better general ...
— The Humors of Falconbridge - A Collection of Humorous and Every Day Scenes • Jonathan F. Kelley
... can only keep him out of the brig," said this low-down friend of mine, "I think they might make a first-rate mess hand out of him," at which remark both of the girls, who up to this moment had been studying me silently, exploded into loud peals of mirth and then I knew where I had met them before—at Kitty Van Tassel's coming out party, and I distinctly ...
— Biltmore Oswald - The Diary of a Hapless Recruit • J. Thorne Smith, Jr.
... different parts of Europe in the prosecution of his scientific theories; he was the first among German scientists to embrace and apply the evolutionary theories of Darwin, and along these lines he has produced several works of first-rate importance in biology; his great works on calcareous sponges, on jelly-fishes, and corals are enriched by elaborate plates of outstanding value; he made important contributions to the Challenger reports, and was among the first to outline the genealogical tree of animal life; his name is associated ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood
... understood the full force of the complaint which Lady Lufton had made against her daughter; and though she had of course defended her child, and on the whole had defended her successfully, yet she confessed to herself that Griselda's chance of a first-rate establishment would be better if she were a little more impulsive. A man does not wish to marry a statue, let the statue be ever so statuesque. She could not teach her daughter to be impulsive, any more than she could teach her to be six feet high; but might it not ...
— Framley Parsonage • Anthony Trollope
... time some old farmer, with a good old taste for old roses and pinks, would send me one; I have half a mind to try. But, alas! it is no use, I have nowhere to put it; I rent a house which is built in first-rate modern style, though small, of course, and there is a "garden" to it, but no place to put a damask rose. No place, because it is not "home," and I cannot plant except round "home." The plot or "patch" the landlord calls "the garden"—it is about as wide as the border round a patch, old style—is ...
— Amaryllis at the Fair • Richard Jefferies
... bring a counter-association which dispelled her mournful memories. She might not fear to trust herself in that vessel which had once almost been her grave, with the man who had saved her from that grave. Windham showed himself a first-rate sailor. Zillah wondered greatly how he could have added this to his other accomplishments, but did not venture to ask him. There was a great gulf between them; and to have asked any personal question, however slight, would have been an attempt to leap that gulf. She dared ...
— The Cryptogram - A Novel • James De Mille
... lesson of high instructiveness to examine the essential qualities which give first-rate poetical rank to lyrics such as "To-morrow" or "Sally in our Alley," when compared with poems written (if the phrase may be allowed) in keys so different as the subtle sweetness of Shelley, the grandeur of Gray and Milton, or the delightful Pastoralism of the Elizabethan ...
— The Golden Treasury - Of the Best Songs and Lyrical Poems in the English Language • Various
... the colonel, "but it is just as well to be prepared for all emergencies. You are first-rate sailors," he added, stepping on board. "Cast her off and up with ...
— The Boy Scouts Patrol • Ralph Victor
... "Well the hay's first-rate!" said Earl, taking off his hat and sitting down in the nearest chair;—"I've been feedin' it out, now, for a good spell, and I know what to think about it. We've been feedin' it out ever since some time this side o' the middle o' November;—I never see nothin' sweeter, and I don't want ...
— Queechy • Susan Warner
... pretence of health, were there for economy, grew shy of so excellent a player; and though Gawtrey always swore solemnly that he played with the most scrupulous honour (an asseveration which Morton, at least, implicitly believed), and no proof to the contrary was ever detected, yet a first-rate card-player is always a suspicious character, unless the losing parties know exactly who he is. The market fell off, and Gawtrey at length thought it prudent to ...
— Night and Morning, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... abounded in bitter invectives; but after a long debate, in which the government were fully vindicated from all blame, all the motions were negatived. On this occasion, however, Sheridan obtained the reputation of a first-rate orator, which probably pleased him more than he would have been had his propositions received the sanction ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... for it has put forth poetry by a young man, and that where we should least expect it—namely, in a prize poem. These productions have often been ingenious and elegant but we have never before seen one of them which indicated really first-rate poetical genius, and which would have done honour to any men that ever wrote. Such, we do not hesitate to affirm, is the little work before us; and the examiners seem to have felt it like ourselves, for they have assigned the prize to the author, though the measure in which he writes ...
— The Suppressed Poems of Alfred Lord Tennyson • Alfred Lord Tennyson
... our room—a valuable old painting of the Mater Dolorosa. I always fancied there was a look of my mother, particularly about the eyes, in the countenance. I should like to have it copied by some first-rate artist to hang ...
— May Brooke • Anna H. Dorsey
... or hold forth at a small gathering of friends on the problems of the earliest Italian races, and the causes that met in the founding and growth of Rome, was to understand how no scholar or archeologist can be quite first-rate who is not also something of a poet. The sleepy blue eyes, so suddenly alive; the apparently languid manner which was the natural defense against the outer world of a man all compact of imagination ...
— A Writer's Recollections (In Two Volumes), Volume II • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... are first-rate!" said the Doctor. "We must find a proper field for them!" And he assured her most respectfully of his regret at having so greatly discomposed her. "It's all for my poor Catherine," he went on. "You must know her, and ...
— Washington Square • Henry James
... specimen of such a process; here it will be sufficient to make use of two documents, different in kind, as far as they go, which have come down to us. The first is an alto-relief, which once was coloured, not first-rate in art or execution, and of the date of the Emperor Constantius, about a century later. It was lately discovered in the course of excavations made at El Kaf, the modern Sicca, on the ruins of a church or Roman basilica, for the building in question seems ...
— Callista • John Henry Cardinal Newman
... what do I do? Stumble on a family I know, who are constantly assisting of us in all sorts of ways, from that time to this! That won't do, you know; that ain't what I'd a right to expect. If I had stumbled on a serpent and got bit; or stumbled on a first-rate patriot, and got bowie-knifed, or stumbled on a lot of Sympathisers with inverted shirt-collars, and got made a lion of; I might have distinguished myself, and earned some credit. As it is, the great object of my voyage ...
— Life And Adventures Of Martin Chuzzlewit • Charles Dickens
... represented, in the eyes of the poor artificer, as ennobling and sanctifying labour and toil; and the quiet domestic duties and affections were here elevated, and hallowed, by religious associations, and adorned by all the graces of Art. Even where the artistic treatment was not first-rate, was not such as the painters—priests and poets as well as painters—of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries would have lent to such themes,—still if the sentiment and significance were but intelligible to those especially addressed, the purpose ...
— Legends of the Madonna • Mrs. Jameson
... morning, while I was prowling around the settlement," said Charlie, "who said that there was plenty of vacant land, of first-rate quality, up around Manhattan. Where's that, father—do you know? He didn't, but some other man, one of the New England Society fellows, ...
— The Boy Settlers - A Story of Early Times in Kansas • Noah Brooks
... in 1830, Paganini saved the Musical Festival, which would have failed but for his individual attraction, although supported by an army of talent in every department. All was done in first-rate style, not to be surpassed. There were Braham, Madame Stockhausen, H. Phillips, De Begnis, &c. &c., Sir G. Smart for conductor, Cramer, Mori, and T. Cooke for leaders, Lindley, Nicholson, Anfossi, Lidel Hermann, Pigott, ...
— The International Magazine, Volume 2, No. 2, January, 1851 • Various
... anyhow, he didn't come to fish for barrels nor yet for cook-stoves; so we went on, and there they be—are yet, I suppose. Bimeby we came to Marks's camp, where we were to stay. It was a bark lean-to, big enough for us all, with a nice fire burning, and all comfortable. Doctor and I liked it first-rate; but the city chaps,—they said they must have their tents up, so we spent a good part of a day getting the ...
— Hildegarde's Holiday - a story for girls • Laura E. Richards
... "I won't jump in for you again, Joe. The fact is, boys, I oughtn't to have done it without waiting to find out whether there was really anything the matter with Joe. I'll tell you what we'll do. Joe is a first-rate swimmer, and we'll make a rule that whenever anybody is to jump into the river for anything, Joe shall do it. What ...
— Harper's Young People, June 15, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... doubtless, will exploit her in Biskra. You may have her for two years. By that time she may toss her own handkerchief. Then she reverts to me. I shall take her to Cairo, where second-rate Englishmen and first-rate Americans abound. ...
— The Turquoise Cup, and, The Desert • Arthur Cosslett Smith
... said that the British Empire is very large and respectable, and that the United States are a first-rate power. We do not believe that a tide rises and falls behind every man which can float the British Empire like a chip, if he should ever ...
— The American Mind - The E. T. Earl Lectures • Bliss Perry
... because he didn't much care what happened he was able to force Mr. Mortimer R. Guilfogle to raise his salary to twenty-three dollars a week. Mr. Guilfogle went out of his way to admit that the letters to the Southern trade had been "a first-rate stunt, son." ...
— Our Mr. Wrenn - The Romantic Adventures of a Gentle Man • Sinclair Lewis
... see Mr. Babbage while he was making his Calculating-machines. He had a transcendant intellect, unconquerable perseverance, and extensive knowledge on many subjects, besides being a first-rate mathematician. I always found him most amiable and patient in explaining the structure and use of the engines. The first he made could only perform arithmetical operations. Not satisfied with that, Mr. Babbage ...
— Personal Recollections, from Early Life to Old Age, of Mary Somerville • Mary Somerville
... cheerful temper to match." And there above me was my unknown necessitous fellow-creature, crying out in printers' types:—"Wanted, a companion for a lady. Must be an accomplished musician, and have a cheerful temper. Testimonials to capacity, and first-rate references required." Exactly what I had offered! "Apply by letter only, in the first instance." Exactly what I had said! Fie upon me, I had spent three and sixpence for nothing. I threw down the newspaper, in a transport of anger (like a fool)—and then took it up again (like a sensible woman), ...
— Poor Miss Finch • Wilkie Collins
... Ethel. He is facile princeps here in his own world, but we do not know how it may be when he is measured with public schoolmen, who have had more first-rate tutorship than poor ...
— The Daisy Chain, or Aspirations • Charlotte Yonge
... besides being a great humorist and a great sportsman and a great preacher, William Guthrie was a great writer. A great writer is not a man who fills our dusty shelves with his forgotten volumes. It is not given to any man to fill a whole library with first-rate work. Our greatest authors have all written little books. Job is a small book, so is the Psalms, so is Isaiah, so is the Gospel of John, so is the Epistle to the Romans, so is the Confessions, so is the ...
— Samuel Rutherford - and some of his correspondents • Alexander Whyte
... I've got 'most fifteen hundred dollars in the bank. Laviny keeps the pass book in her bureau, but you could get it from her. I own my house. I'm a man of good character. You're poor, but I don't let that stand in the way. Anyhow, you're a first-rate housekeeper. And I really do think an ...
— Keziah Coffin • Joseph C. Lincoln
... in thunder on the beach, Wolfe was standing up in the stern-sheets, scanning every inch of the ground to see if there was no place where a few men could get a footing and keep it till the rest had landed. He had first-rate soldiers with him: ...
— The Winning of Canada: A Chronicle of Wolf • William Wood
... said to the two friends who had remained at home; "there is a report that Amasis is at the point of death. We had all met on the place of exchange in order to settle our business, and I was on the point of selling all my stored goods at such high prices as to secure me a first-rate profit, with which, when the prospect of an important war had lowered prices again, I could have bought in fresh goods—you see it stands me in good stead to know your royal brother's intentions so early—when suddenly the Toparch appeared ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... jailer said, "Come, boys, it is time to lock up"; and so they dispersed, and I heard the sound of their steps returning into the hollow apartments. My room-mate was introduced to me by the jailer as "a first-rate fellow and clever man." When the door was locked, he showed me where to hang my hat, and how he managed matters there. The rooms were whitewashed once a month; and this one, at least, was the whitest, most simply furnished, and probably neatest apartment in town. He naturally wanted to know ...
— On the Duty of Civil Disobedience • Henry David Thoreau
... in the same Barcelona the first universal Exposition of Spain. It was not possible to choose a more favorable place, for the capital- town of Catalonia is a first-rate city ...
— Literary Blunders • Henry B. Wheatley
... dying by starvation at home." For his worshippers too a most questionable thing! If doing Hero-worship well or badly be the test of vital wellbeing or illbeing to a generation, can we say that these generations are very first-rate?—And yet our heroic Men of Letters do teach, govern, are kings, priests, or what you like to call them; intrinsically there is no preventing it by any means whatever. The world has to obey him who thinks and sees in the world. The world can alter the manner ...
— Sartor Resartus, and On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and the Heroic in History • Thomas Carlyle
... head, proved to be a first-rate type of an Americanized Irishman. His wife was a Scotch woman. They had a family of five or six children, two of them grown-up daughters,—modest, comely young women as you would find anywhere. The elder of the two had spent a winter in New York with her aunt, ...
— Wake-Robin • John Burroughs
... commercialized cads we are, doing everything and anything for money, and selling our souls and bodies by the pound and the inch after wasting half the day haggling over the price. Decidedly, whether you think Jesus was God or not, you must admit that he was a first-rate ...
— Preface to Androcles and the Lion - On the Prospects of Christianity • George Bernard Shaw
... in illustrated papers as characteristic of "Celebrities at Home". A palm, on its last legs, draped in shabby green silk, was dying by the window. The gloom was mitigated by an air of cosiness. There were books, first-rate and second-hand. Books (their outsides) were a hobby with Mervyn. Smoking in this den seemed as natural as breathing, and rather easier, though its owner never touched tobacco. On the Chesterfield sofa there ...
— The Twelfth Hour • Ada Leverson
... this first-rate collaborator, I have my seat on the magic carpet. Behold me in the pampas of the Argentine Republic, eager to draw a parallel between the industry of the Serignan[12] Dung-beetles and that of their rivals ...
— The Glow-Worm and Other Beetles • Jean Henri Fabre
... to disperse my store; Another, not to heed to treasure more! Glad, like a boy, to snatch the first good day, And pleased, if sordid want be far away. What is't to me (a passenger, God wot) Whether my vessel be first-rate or not? The ship itself may make a better figure, But I that sail, am neither less nor bigger, I neither strut with every favouring breath, Nor strive with all the tempest in my teeth. In power, wit, figure, virtue, fortune, placed Behind the foremost and before the last. "But why ...
— Essay on Man - Moral Essays and Satires • Alexander Pope
... purpose to be good sport, and make a jolly good dish, a pleasant addition to the ceaseless round of mutton and beef to which the dead level of civilisation reduces us. Coursing is capital, the harriers first-rate. Now every man who walks about the fields is more or less at heart a sportsman, and the farmer having got the right of the gun he is not unlikely to become to some extent a game preserver. When they could not ...
— Field and Hedgerow • Richard Jefferies
... was very comfortable where I was, settin' in the hotel room there, smoking my pipe. GREEN the Guide gave us, "Rocked in the Cradle of the Deep," in first-rate style—he is a ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 103, October 15, 1892 • Various
... a first-rate boy, and I'd hate to hear worse of him. But I mustn't take your time over our affairs. I think you mentioned ...
— A Daughter of the Dons - A Story of New Mexico Today • William MacLeod Raine
... small feet and big eyes, were stabbing each other close by, and a disheveled female was flying away in the background with her mouth wide open. Pausing to turn a page, the lad saw her looking and, with boyish good nature offered half his paper, saying bluntly, "want to read it? That's a first-rate story." ...
— Little Women • Louisa May Alcott
... 'Why, to a first-rate bonnet, as I think you would prove, I could afford to give from forty to fifty shillings ...
— Lavengro - The Scholar, The Gypsy, The Priest • George Borrow
... good humor as one of the preservatives of our peace and tranquillity. It is among the most effectual, and its effect is so well imitated and aided, artificially, by politeness, that this also becomes an acquisition of first-rate value. In truth, politeness is artificial good humor, it covers the natural want of it, and ends by rendering habitual a substitute nearly equivalent to the real virtue. It is the practice of sacrificing to those whom we meet in society, all the little conveniences and preferences which ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... nothing to compare with stopping a charging lion at twenty yards. I've done it, my boy. You can come back for all this pow-wow afterwards." He gave the diplomatic service as a second choice. "There you are," he said, "first-rate social position, nothing to do, theatres, operas, pretty women, colour, life. The best of good times. Barring Washington, that is. But Washington, they say, isn't as bad as it used to be—since Teddy has ...
— The Research Magnificent • H. G. Wells
... "Those will do first-rate, and there are lots in the ma'sh, if I can only get 'em," he said to himself, and turned off from the road on his way home ...
— Under the Lilacs • Louisa May Alcott
... familiar to you all. As the inventor of murder, and the father of the art, Cain must have been a man of first-rate genius. All the Cains were men of genius. Tubal Cain invented tubes, I think, or some such thing. But, whatever were the originality and genius of the artist, every art was then in its infancy, and the ...
— Miscellaneous Essays • Thomas de Quincey
... to the rock he had been squatting on. A most remarkable instance of courage on the part of a native occurred when a brother planter of mine was out tiger shooting on the Ghauts to the north of my abode. A tiger flew at a Hindoo peasant—a first-rate plucky sportsman, and as the tiger charged, the man struck at it with his hacking knife (a formidable weapon in the hands of a man who knows how to use it, and used to cut underwood, and thick boughs ...
— Gold, Sport, And Coffee Planting In Mysore • Robert H. Elliot
... the season, it was a very full house. Cooper's, in that day, was a name that filled every mouth, and he seldom failed to fill every theatre in which he appeared. With many first-rate qualifications for his art, and a very respectable conception of his characters, he threw everything like competition behind him; though there were a few, as there ever will be among the superlatively intellectual, ...
— Afloat And Ashore • James Fenimore Cooper
... he said presently. "Fortunes of War. I got to pick the proper time with Susan—else she'll get depressed. Not that she isn't a first-rate brick whatever comes along." ...
— Tono Bungay • H. G. Wells
... The dogs, too, had coverings put on their feet, and on every other delicate place, which made them less agile. In ordinary cases, on a smooth surface, it is not very difficult to guide a team of dogs, when the leader is a first-rate animal. But this is an essential point, otherwise it is impossible to get along. Every time the dogs hit on the track of a bear, or fox, or other animal, their hunting instincts are developed: away they dart like mad, leaving the line of march, and in spite of all the efforts ...
— International Weekly Miscellany, Vol. 1, No. 5, July 29, 1850 • Various
... The World's Food Resources (Holt), is a larger and more detailed discussion than most of those recommended above, but contains a number of general facts and comment of first-rate importance. ...
— The Mind in the Making - The Relation of Intelligence to Social Reform • James Harvey Robinson
... of men to be kept on an estate to preserve it in first-rate order after it has come into bearing, must depend of course upon the size of the plantation, but in general one man for every one hundred trees will be found sufficient, provided there be some four or five thousand trees. ...
— The Commercial Products of the Vegetable Kingdom • P. L. Simmonds
... the near neighborhood of a very nice young man, who listened with well-bred interest while she told of her troubles concerning the sheep pasture, and how she was going to New York to consult a first-rate lawyer. ...
— Family Pride - Or, Purified by Suffering • Mary J. Holmes
... philosophy of In Memoriam may be, indeed is, regarded by robust, first-rate, and far from sensitive minds, as a "damned vacillating state." The poet is not so imbued with the spirit of popular science as to be sure that he knows everything: knows that there is nothing but atoms ...
— Alfred Tennyson • Andrew Lang
... impossible that all, of such works, though the greatest yet produced, should approach abstract perfection; that there is certainly something left for us to carry farther, or complete; that any given generation has just the same chance of producing some individual mind of first-rate calibre, as any of its predecessors; and that if such a mind should arise, the chances are, that with the assistance of experience and example, it would, in its particular and chosen path, do greater things than had ...
— Modern Painters Volume I (of V) • John Ruskin
... poor heart now," said he, "a good deal of it; it has been wasted; it wants first-rate management to bring it in order and make much of it for two or three years to come. I never see an Irishman's head yet that was worth more than a joke. Their hands are all of ...
— Queechy • Susan Warner
... don't agree with her, take her up on the platform, and have it out there; the public would like that, first-rate!" Mr. Filer said to Ransom, as if ...
— The Bostonians, Vol. II (of II) • Henry James
... nobody, except perhaps William, listened, near the Martyrs' Memorial. And William wore a flannel shirt, and rode a bicycle—very strange habits in those days, and very horrible. He was said to be (though he was short-sighted and wore glasses) a first-rate 'back' at football; but, as football was a thing frowned on by the rowing men, and coldly ignored by the bloods, his talent for it did not help him: he was one of the principal pariahs of our College; and ...
— And Even Now - Essays • Max Beerbohm
... would not undertake to say that any modern mind has equalled Aristotle in the range of his intellectual powers; but in point of intensity of grasp in any one subject, he has many rivals; so that to obtain his equal, we have only to take two or three first-rate moderns. ...
— Practical Essays • Alexander Bain
... papers, are watched occasionally in a disagreeable manner by the police. Itinerant philosophers are absolutely not understood in England. Intruders into private premises, even for grand missionary purposes, are constantly served with summary notices to quit. Mrs. Quickly gave a first-rate character to Simple; but for all that, Dr. Caius with too much show of reason demanded, 'Vat shall de honest young man do in my closet?' And we fear that Coleridge's beneficent old man, lecturing gratis upon things in general, would be regarded with illiberal jealousy by ...
— The Posthumous Works of Thomas De Quincey, Vol. II (2 vols) • Thomas De Quincey |
