"Knack" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... very learned fellow, and has an excellent knack at using hard words. One morning he told me the gentleman in the next room contagious to mine desired to speak to me. I once overheard him give a fellow-servant very sober advice not to go astray, but be true to his own wife; for idolatry would ...
— A Collection of College Words and Customs • Benjamin Homer Hall
... Dimocrisy to remain firm. Suthin will come in time,—what, I can't, with any degree uv certinty, now state; but suthin will come. The Ablishnists cannot alluz rool. The cuss uv the old Whig party wuz, that the respective individooal members thereof cood read and write, and hed a knack uv doin their own thinkin, and therefore it cood not be brot into that state uv dissipline so nessary to success ez a party. That same cuss is a hangin onto the Ablishnists. They hung together from 1856 to 1860 coz ...
— "Swingin Round the Cirkle." • Petroleum V. Nasby
... And even if you are trained, no amount of medical nursing will prepare you for a bad surgical case. To begin with, I had never nursed a patient so tall and heavy that I couldn't lift him by sheer strength and a sort of amateur knack. ...
— A Journal of Impressions in Belgium • May Sinclair
... is quite easy," answered Josef. "The female silkworm spins a house which, like an egg, is a little sharper at one end than at the other. We'll choose about the same number of each gender. There is a knack in selecting good cocoons for breeding, and you've got to know lots of things about them. And after we have chosen them there will be the rest of the cocoons to sort. That will require care, too. We cannot do it as experts do, but still we can group them roughly into lots of various ...
— The Story of Silk • Sara Ware Bassett
... playing. From what is known of his delicate art as a pianist it is possible to imagine how exquisitely his accompaniments must have both sustained and mingled with that "belle voix de soprano." He had a knack of improvising a melody to any poem that happened to take his fancy, and thus he and Delphine would treat to an improvised song the elite of the musical, artistic, literary and social world that gathered in her salon. It is unfortunate that these improvisations were lightly forgotten by the composer, ...
— The Loves of Great Composers • Gustav Kobb
... answered, coolly. "But you see, Mr Merry, British seamen have a knack of getting into impregnable places, as we ...
— Marmaduke Merry - A Tale of Naval Adventures in Bygone Days • William H. G. Kingston
... unknown descends the unguarded store, Or wanders, Heaven-directed, to the poor. Pictures like these, dear madam, to design, Asks no firm hand, and no unerring line; Some wandering touches, some reflected light, Some flying stroke alone can hit 'em right: For how should equal colours do the knack? Chameleons who can paint in white and black? "Yet Chloe sure was formed without a spot"— Nature in her then erred not, but forgot. "With every pleasing, every prudent part, Say, what can Chloe want?"—She wants a heart. ...
— Essay on Man - Moral Essays and Satires • Alexander Pope
... you,' he said. 'Harrington has the knack with you women. Why, you made eyes at him. It was a toss-up between you and ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... were at school together, and I generally had the knack of getting on better than you, ...
— Some Christmas Stories • Charles Dickens
... would be supposed to have an application to every child in a large class. It is often found, however, that the character and disposition of the particular child demands, not general, but special treatment. Here, what is termed the knack of the sympathetic teacher is often more effective than the general principle of the psychologist. Admitting so much, however, it yet may be argued that a knowledge of psychology will not hinder, ...
— Ontario Normal School Manuals: Science of Education • Ontario Ministry of Education
... an attempt at severity, "quite your knack of ignoring disagreeable facts. There was Montani right in front of me, jumping like a jack-in-the-box every time you flourished your fan. There's that fellow we've got ...
— Lady Larkspur • Meredith Nicholson
... wealthy people of the country go there for a few months or weeks in the Winter. It is fashionable to do so. A great many wealthy northern men have acquired valuable landed interests in Jacksonville, among them the Astors of New York, who have a knack for pinning their interests in the soil. The people of Jacksonville were very proud to have as a resident and property holder, Mr. Wm. B. Astor. And Mr. Astor appeared to enjoy immensely the worship bestowed upon his money. He built one or two very fine buildings there, which must ...
— Black and White - Land, Labor, and Politics in the South • Timothy Thomas Fortune
... i' them days had charge o' the Sunday-school boys. He was a short-sighted man, the Deacon, tho' that were hes misfortun'; but he had faults as well, an' wan o' these was a powerful knack o' droppin' off to sleep durin' sarmon-time. Hows'ever, he managed very tidily, for he knawed he was bound to wake hissel' so soon as he began to snore, an' then he'd start up sudden an' fetch the nighest boy a rousin' whistcuff 'pon the side o' the head to cover the noise ...
— The Astonishing History of Troy Town • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... alas! who cumber the streets and porticoes of literature. They are attracted away from homely toil by the perilous sweetness of art, and when they attempt to express their raptures, they have no faculty or knack of hand. And these men and women fall with zealous dreariness or acrid contemptuousness, and radiate discomfort ...
— Escape and Other Essays • Arthur Christopher Benson
... all laughed and took it for a good omen. Umbopa was a cheerful savage, in a dignified sort of way, when he was not suffering from one of his fits of brooding, and he had a wonderful knack of keeping up our spirits. We all grew ...
— King Solomon's Mines • H. Rider Haggard
... day en time, but I remembers seein de Yankees en de people gwine to de war. Oh, dat was a tough time cause dey use de whip in dem days. Oh, yes'um, my Massa whip my gran'mammy wid a leather strap. You see she had a knack of gwine off for some cause or another en meetin de boat what run up en down dat big Pee Dee river en bring fertilizer en all kind of goods to de peoples. Massa Randall had told her not to go nowhe' bout dat boat, but some people is sorta high strung like ...
— Slave Narratives: a Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves • Works Projects Administration
... me like that!" she said, with gay imperiousness. "You pale-eyed folk have a horrible knack of making one feel as if one is under a microscope. Your worthy uncle is just the same. If I weren't so deeply in love with him, I might resent it. But Nick is a privileged person, isn't he, wherever he goes? Didn't someone once say of him that he rushes in where angels ...
— The Keeper of the Door • Ethel M. Dell
... to have lost the knack of it," he said, glancing round at the company with an air almost ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 146, June 3, 1914 • Various
... father used to say, 'Religion's putty much like fish 'n' pertetters; if it's hot it's good, 'n' if it's cold 'tain't wuth a'—well, a short word come in there, but I won't say it. Speakin' o' religion, I never had any experience in teachin', but I didn't s'pose there was any knack 'bout teachin' religion, same as there is 'bout teachin' readin' 'n' 'rithmetic, but I hed hard work makin' Timothy understand that catechism you give him to learn the other Sunday. He was all upsot with doctrine ...
— Timothy's Quest - A Story for Anybody, Young or Old, Who Cares to Read It • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... that, Reuben. In the drawing-room." She watched the servant carry the discarded containers around the house, then turned to Rand. "You know, not the least of your capabilities is your knack of finding servant-replacements on ...
— Murder in the Gunroom • Henry Beam Piper
... and wrong at night: Another judges by a surer gage, An author's principles, or parentage; Since his great ancestors in Flanders fell, The poem doubtless must be written well. Another judges by the writer's look; Another judges, for he bought the book: Some judge, their knack of judging wrong to keep; Some judge, because it is too soon to sleep. Thus all will judge, and with one single aim, To gain themselves, not give the writer, fame. The very best ambitiously advise, Half to serve you, and half to pass ...
— English Satires • Various
... and Elasticity of a Fabric. The old-fashioned plan of testing cloth by tearing it by the hand is unreliable, because tearing frequently requires only a certain skilled knack whereby the best material can be pulled in two. In this way an experienced man may tell good from bad cloth, but he cannot determine slight differences in quality, because he has exerted his strength so often that his capacity to distinguish the ...
— Textiles • William H. Dooley
... we must confess again, were these tastes redeemed by very amiable qualities beneath the smooth external surface. There was plenty of feminine spite as well as feminine delicacy. To the marked fear of ridicule natural to a sensitive man Walpole joined a very happy knack of quarrelling. He could protrude a feline set of claws from his velvet glove. He was a touchy companion and an intolerable superior. He set out by quarrelling with Gray, who, as it seems, could not stand his dandified ...
— Hours in a Library, Volume I. (of III.) • Leslie Stephen
... little thing. And moreover, I never paid a dollar for any man's vote and never promised one. There are some ways of doing a thing that are as good as others which other people don't happen to think about, or don't have the knack of succeeding in, if they do happen to think of them. My dear sir, I am obliged to knock some of your expenses in the head—for never a cent was paid a Congressman or Senator on the part of this ...
— The Gilded Age, Complete • Mark Twain and Charles Dudley Warner
... it should be unfinished, but that, when the painter has set down what the imagination grasped in one view, he shall stop, no matter where, and not attempt to eke out the deficiency by formula or by knack of fingers. Wherever the inspiration leaves him, there is an end of the picture. Beyond that we get only his personalities; no skill, no earnestness of intention, etc., can avail him; he is only mystifying ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 77, March, 1864 • Various
... Whenever she did think of her she was sorry for her; but she had not time to think much of any single person just at present. The horse, the darling horse, the Arab, the treasure of her life, must be trained to the task which lay before him. Hollyhock had the knack of making all animals love her, and the pure-bred Arab is noted for being a most affectionate creature. He was sulky, and disinclined to obey big grooms or any one except Hollyhock. But for her he ...
— Hollyhock - A Spirit of Mischief • L. T. Meade
... from the moment he ceased to represent it from observation, the novelist could be said to be. In London fortunately a clever man was just a clever man; there were charming houses in which a person of Ray's undoubted ability, even though without the knack of making the best use of it, could always be sure of a quiet corner for watching decorously the social kaleidoscope. But the kaleidoscope of the goose-green, what in the world was that, and what such delusive thrift as drives about the land (with a fearful account ...
— Embarrassments • Henry James
... that the wood-cutter was less grieved than his wife, but she browbeat him, and he was of the same opinion as many other people, who like a woman to have the knack of saying the right thing, but not the trick of being always in ...
— Old-Time Stories • Charles Perrault
... was known on board the pranks he plays on shore, his leave would be stopped; but he is so clever that he humbugs the officers, and they think him one of the most steady and best men. You see there's another thing which brings him into favour with the captain and first lieutenant; he has a knack of finding men and getting them to join the ship, by making her out to be the most comfortable ship in the service, and there's no man knows better how to ferret out seamen, and to lead a pressgang down upon a score of them together. I learned ...
— Will Weatherhelm - The Yarn of an Old Sailor • W.H.G. Kingston
... years after. She married against his will. He never forgave her. My father did not seem to have the knack of getting along in the world, and he moved to America in the hope of bettering his condition. He did not better it. My father died ten years ago, a prematurely broken down man, and my mother and I struggled along as best we could until she died two years ago. My grandfather ...
— In a Steamer Chair And Other Stories • Robert Barr
... is involved. Looking to the way in which character is made, as coral reefs are built up, by a multitude of tiny creatures whose united labours are strong enough to breast the ocean; looking to the mysterious way in which the greatest events in our lives have the knack of growing out of the smallest; looking to the power of habit to make any action of the mind almost instinctive: it is of far more importance that we should become accustomed to apply this precept of seeking guidance from God to the million ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... was but one speaker. After a short time it was evident that what Lord Byron was hearing affected his feelings; his countenance changed, his colour went and came, and I thought he was ready to weep. But he had, on all occasions, a ready and peculiar knack in turning conversation from any disagreeable or unpleasant subject; and he had recourse to this expedient. He rose up suddenly, and, turning round on his heel as was his wont, he said something to his interpreter, who immediately repeated it to the women. All eyes were immediately ...
— The Life of Lord Byron • John Galt
... as the door was closed, Ketchum leaned back in his chair and indulged in a low sarcastic laugh. "The old sinner," he said, aloud; "he is a cute one; sharp as a pin, but needles are sharper. What a knack he has of whipping the devil round the stump! To look at that man you would suppose he was too good for preaching. And he flatters himself he is imposing on me! He must get up earlier for that. It is ...
— The Lost Hunter - A Tale of Early Times • John Turvill Adams
... blue rings of smoke out into the clear moonlit atmosphere, he was in a very agreeable frame of mind. He was crafty and clever in his way,—one of those to whom the Yankee term "cute" would apply in its fullest sense,—and he had the happy knack of forgetting his own mistakes and follies, and excusing his own sins with as much ease as though he were one of the "blood-royal" of nations. Vices he had in plenty in common with most men,—except that his particular form of licentiousness was distinguished by a callousness ...
— The Master-Christian • Marie Corelli
... queer to-do," he remarked. "What's got all the pumps? Bewitched, I reckon. Ours ain't workin' fur a cent either, an' I drove round thinkin' I'd fetch Willie home with me to have a look at it. He's got a knack with such things an' I calculate he'd know what's the matter with it. Darned if ...
— Flood Tide • Sara Ware Bassett
... chance to delude himself with vain pretences: it was quite plain to everybody that the rhetorician Augustin was not a success. Now, why was this? Was it that he lacked the gift of teaching? Perhaps he had not the knack of keeping order, which is the most indispensable of all for a schoolmaster. What suited him best no doubt was a small and select audience which he charmed rather than ruled. Large and noisy classes he could not manage. At Carthage, these ...
— Saint Augustin • Louis Bertrand
... admitted to a frank intimacy in this little circle into which whim had led her. She spent most of her time with the children. She gave Elsie two hours' lessons a day, and, since she had a knack of making them interesting, Tinker often enjoyed the benefit of her teaching. After lessons she shared most of their amusements, and learned to be a pirate, a brigand, an English sailor, a Boer, and every kind of captive and conspirator. Since she occupied some of Elsie's time, Tinker had once more ...
— The Admirable Tinker - Child of the World • Edgar Jepson
... the spring of 1832, the time which we are considering, Madame Hanska was not even a name to Balzac; she was merely "L'Etrangere," an unknown woman who might be pretty or ugly, young or old; but who at any rate possessed the knack—or perhaps the author of "Seraphita" or of "Louis Lambert" would have said the power by transmutation of thought and sympathy—of interesting him in the ...
— Honore de Balzac, His Life and Writings • Mary F. Sandars
... he, or they—it comes to to same thing—have the fiend's own knack of discovering a man's weak place. I confess I rather go out of my way to conciliate Number Five study. It may be soft, but so far, I believe, I am the only man here whom ...
— Stalky & Co. • Rudyard Kipling
... have a knack with can-openers, and my colleague is rather adept with machinery," Stoddard told him, "while Major Hendricks here is quite a hand with geography, ...
— Astounding Stories, July, 1931 • Various
... length of the chain, while the furious curses of the prisoners troubled the air. They found a little difficulty in steering by the winch and deck-compass (they would have mended the tiller-ropes with a section of backstay had they not bargained otherwise), but finally mastered the knack, and ...
— "Where Angels Fear to Tread" and Other Stories of the Sea • Morgan Robertson
... after my own heart. Your arrangement of the matter, I think, however, might be improved, and many of your notions remind me of Aristotle. That philosopher was one of my most intimate acquaintances. I liked him as much for his terrible ill temper, as for his happy knack at making a blunder. There is only one solid truth in all that he has written, and for that I gave him the hint out of pure compassion for his absurdity. I suppose, Pierre Bon-Bon, you very well know to what divine ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 5 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... him—But I have been so much accustomed to treat him like a fool, that I can't help thinking him one. He should not have been so tame to such a spirit as mine. He should have been angry when I played upon him. I have got a knack of it, and shall never ...
— The History of Sir Charles Grandison, Volume 4 (of 7) • Samuel Richardson
... independent, and I like her, but of course it is considered by her friends in society that since she went in for business she can't refuse to meet anyone. Dick sat next to her, and had on the other side of him Mrs. ——, who likes celebrities without the knack of selection, and whose invitations nowadays I believe are never accepted at once, but are kept open as long as possible to see if something better won't turn up. Then came Mrs. Romedek and Mr. Westington; he looking bored to death, and she as if she didn't know where ...
— The Smart Set - Correspondence & Conversations • Clyde Fitch
... and he learned to grade precious stones with a glance. Also, because Bourke was born of gentlefolk, he learned to speak English, what clothes to wear and when to wear them, and the civilized practice with knife and fork at table. And because Bourke was a diplomatist of sorts, Marcel acquired the knack of being at ease in every grade of society: he came to know that a self-made millionaire, taken the right way, is as approachable as one whose millions date back even unto the third generation; he could order a dinner at Sherry's as readily as drinks at Sharkey's. ...
— The Lone Wolf - A Melodrama • Louis Joseph Vance
... Having finally acquired the knack, Bob remounted and was soon at the ranch, where he turned his pony into the corral and carried his ...
— Bob Chester's Grit - From Ranch to Riches • Frank V. Webster
... false diamond. He receaving it know not what to make of it, went to a jeweller to try the stone, who discovered it to be false tho it had ane excellent luster. After many tossing thoughts he fell upon the knack of it, videlicet, that it was a heiroglyphick diamant faux, and that it behoved to be read thus, Tell, false lover, why hast thou ...
— Publications of the Scottish History Society, Vol. 36 • Sir John Lauder
... "I would have placed him in his proper sphere if he'd consented to it. But he wouldn't. It's a standing grievance between us. That fellow Robin is a millstone round his neck. Miss Moore," he turned on her suddenly, "you have a wonderful knack of making people see reason. Couldn't you persuade ...
— The Obstacle Race • Ethel M. Dell
... could tell him of no good that would come to him from the doing. She should either have had less to say or have been willing to say more, and he asked himself why he should be the sport of her moods and her mysteries. He perceived her knack of punctual interference to be striking, but it was just this apparent infallibility that he resented. Why didn't she set up at once as a professional clairvoyant and eke out her little income more successfully? In purely private life such a gift was disconcerting; ...
— Sir Dominick Ferrand • Henry James
... ago my finances looked up. I had news that some of my Yankee speculations were turning out well, and I unexpectedly found myself a man of means again. Rimbolt, who certainly has the knack of making ill-timed suggestions, proposed that that would be a good opportunity for making good what properly belonged to my ward. I urged in vain that my ward was lost, and that the money properly belonged to me as a reward for the trouble I had had in the matter. ...
— A Dog with a Bad Name • Talbot Baines Reed
... to me in this way, and it was from first to last a radiant month of heat and beauty; but a garden where you meet the people you saw at breakfast, and will see again at lunch and dinner, is not a place to be happy in. Besides, they had a knack of finding out my favourite seats and lounging in them just when I longed to lounge myself; and they took books out of the library with them, and left them face downwards on the seats all night to get well drenched with dew, though they might have known that what is meat for roses ...
— Elizabeth and her German Garden • "Elizabeth", AKA Marie Annette Beauchamp
... of the hands to her looks? And I took my opera-glasses to watch her proceedings. Oh! they were very simple: first of all a glance, then a smile, then a slight sign with the head, which meant: 'Are you coming up?' But it was so slight, so vague, so discreet, that it required a great deal of knack to succeed as she did. And I asked myself: 'I wonder if I could do that little movement, from below upwards, which was at the same time bold and pretty, as well as she does,' for ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Vol. 1 (of 8) - Boule de Suif and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant
... week ago Dick himself had observed that sentimental philosophers had a knack of breaking their heads against their own theories. The words had been justified sooner than she had expected. Mrs. Pettifer was not surprised at Harold Hazlewood's swift change any more than her husband had been. Harold, to her thinking, was a sentimentalist and sentimentality was like a fir-tree—a ...
— Witness For The Defense • A.E.W. Mason
... and paff is puff!" laughed Ulrich. "When I snap the twigs, you always hear them say 'knack, knack,' and 'knack' is a word too. The juggler ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... on them on the following morning. They had rooms in a quiet street in Fairtown. The landlady was accustomed to have strolling companies as lodgers, and evidently had the knack of making them comfortable. Quarles had a word or two with her before seeing her visitors, and learnt that they were the nicest and quietest people she had ever had. The poor gentleman who was dead was the quietest of ...
— The Master Detective - Being Some Further Investigations of Christopher Quarles • Percy James Brebner
... by what knack the Wasp contrives to detach the cap of the inner shell with such accuracy. Is it the art practised by the tailor when cutting his stuff, with mandibles taking the place of scissors? I hardly venture to admit as much: the tissue is so tough and the circle of division ...
— More Hunting Wasps • J. Henri Fabre
... a knack of putting everybody at ease in his presence, which perhaps accounts for the freedom with which people, even utter strangers, come to him and pour into his ear their life secrets. This earnest desire to help people, to make them happier and better, shines ...
— Russell H. Conwell • Agnes Rush Burr
... you believe that the departing of that first Summer was a sad matter to him. He had done his best, you see, and a whole new world of trying had been thrown open to him. And really he was beginning to get the knack of that kind of weaving. And she was a fine big ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1915 - And the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... gentlemen, perfectly versed in war's alarms; but pardon me if I say that a more wretched company of strolling wretches never graced a barn. Now, come, don't be angry, but let me proceed. Like all amateur people, they have the happy knack in distributing the characters—to put every man in his most unsuitable position—and then that poor dear thing Curzon—I hope he's not a friend of yours—by some dire fatality always plays the lover's parts, ...
— The Confessions of Harry Lorrequer, Complete • Charles James Lever (1806-1872)
... to look back upon it is really impossible for me to be much affected by the passing wave of dissatisfaction with Mr. Balfour. Men of first-rate ability and character are rare. Still rarer are men who, having those qualities, also have the knack of compelling the attention and respect even of a hostile House of Commons. When a party possesses a leader with all these gifts, it is not likely to change him in ...
— Constructive Imperialism • Viscount Milner
... down to the table; and at that moment a young and elegant man lounged into the room. He was deemed handsome, with his clearly-cut features, his dark eyes, his raven hair, and his white teeth; but to a keen observer those features had not an attractive expression, and the dark eyes had a great knack of looking away while he spoke to you. It was ...
— East Lynne • Mrs. Henry Wood
... is, what can be done by a person from twenty-one years of age to fifty. I know no husbandry-work (mowing hardly excepted) that is not equally within the power of all persons within those ages, the more advanced fully compensating by knack and habit what they lose in activity. Unquestionably, there is a good deal of difference between the value of one man's labour and that of another, from strength, dexterity, and honest application. But I am quite sure, from my ...
— Selections from the Speeches and Writings of Edmund Burke. • Edmund Burke
... good sort of a man, in his own estimation, but not greatly or generally beloved by his neighbors. He was a church-going man, and had a knack, somehow or other, of getting along decently with the forms—the outside garments, so to speak—of religion. It was really astonishing how glibly he would talk about religion. But as to the practical part of it, he did not succeed as well. ...
— Mike Marble - His Crotchets and Oddities. • Uncle Frank
... little chap, that any father might be proud of;" but "Sammy" did not please him as well; he was not so frank, or so respectful,—seemed really to be a little sulky. There are some boys who pass off finely before strangers, because they are not in the least bashful, and have a knack of putting on any manner they choose; and Fred was one of these. Willy, a far nobler boy, was naturally timid before his betters; but even if he had been as bold as Fred, his conscience would never have let him say and ...
— Little Grandfather • Sophie May
... talker, like Macaulay, Sydney Smith, or Jeffrey: he seems rather to have aimed at a striking effect in all that he said. When found tripping he had a clever knack of getting out of the difficulty. In the Hastings speech he complimented Gibbon as a 'luminous' writer; questioned on this, he replied archly, ...
— The Wits and Beaux of Society - Volume 2 • Grace & Philip Wharton
... BELL: Well, you've a knack of getting your own way: But, tripe and trotters, you can look on him, And still say that? Ay, you're his grandson, surely— All Barrasford, with not a dash of Haggard, No drop of the wild colt's blood. Ewe's milk you'd bleed If your nose were tapped. ...
— Krindlesyke • Wilfrid Wilson Gibson
... must have been something mysterious in it, for it caused Edwin's heart to leap as it had never leapt before. On the strength of it he began to relate some of Colonel Jones's adventures, addressing himself now partly to the captain and partly to Emma. He had a happy knack of telling a story, and had thoroughly interested his hearers when the train slowed and stopped, but as this was not the station at which he meant to get out— Langrye being the next—he took no notice of the stoppage. Neither did ...
— The Iron Horse • R.M. Ballantyne
... violently dishonorable as the Tannese. But they had the knack of asking in a rather menacing manner whatever they coveted; and the tomahawk was sometimes swung to enforce an appeal. We strove to get along quietly and kindly, in the hope that when we knew their language, and could teach them the principles of Jesus, they would be saved, and life ...
— The Story of John G. Paton - Or Thirty Years Among South Sea Cannibals • James Paton
... account of an autumn trip to an unhackneyed land is much better worth reading than many more pretentious volumes.... The authoress has an eye for what is worth seeing, a happy knack of graphic description, and a literary style which is commendably ...
— A Girl's Ride in Iceland • Ethel Brilliana Alec-Tweedie
... contained in it, and with a pair of compasses, painfully design a map to suit the data. I did it; and the map was drawn again in my father's office, with embellishments of blowing whales and sailing ships, and my father himself brought into service a knack he had of various writing, and elaborately FORGED the signature of Captain Flint, and the sailing directions of Billy Bones. But somehow it was never ...
— The Art of Writing and Other Essays • Robert Louis Stevenson
... tightly round their bosoms and then allow to fall to the feet. All are followers of the Prophet, and their social customs are consequently much the same as those of any other Mohammedan race, though with a good admixture of savagedom. They have a happy knack of giving a nickname to every European with whom they have to do, such nickname generally making reference to something peculiar or striking in his habits, temper, or appearance. On the whole, they are a kindly, generous folk, whom one ...
— The Man-eaters of Tsavo and Other East African Adventures • J. H. Patterson
... coach! Steeds that confess "the luxury of wo!" True mourning steeds, in no extempore black, And many a wretched hack Shall sorrow for thee,—sore with kick and blow And bloody gash—it is the Indian knack— (Save that the savage is his own tormentor)— Banting shall weep too in his sable scarf— The biped woe the quadruped shall enter, And Man and Horse go half and half, As if their griefs met in a ...
— The Poetical Works of Thomas Hood • Thomas Hood
... learn, but a knowledge which was quick to offer valuable suggestions. I remember Pennell condemning anything but scientific learning in dealing with the problems round us; 'no guesswork' was his argument. But he emphatically made an exception of Scott, who had an uncanny knack of hitting upon a solution. Over and over again in his diary we can read of the interest he took in pure and applied science, and it is doubtful whether this side of an expedition in high northern or southern latitudes has ever been ...
— The Worst Journey in the World, Volumes 1 and 2 - Antarctic 1910-1913 • Apsley Cherry-Garrard
... however, to whom in her seclusion winter and summer were much alike, grew fond of the little lad, and never ceased to urge on her husband the wisdom of so treating Prince Akbar, that should King Humayon by good luck—and he had a knack of being lucky—find himself again with an army at his back, his hands would be tied from revenge ...
— The Adventures of Akbar • Flora Annie Steel
... few things in this world more difficult to manage than a common or garden ladder; among other peculiarities it has a most unpleasant knack of kicking out suddenly just as everything appears to be going smoothly, which is apt to prove disconcerting to the novice. However, after sundry mishaps of the kind, I eventually got it reared up to the window, and a moment afterwards ...
— My Lady Caprice • Jeffrey Farnol
... an' took the papers out o' his pockets. I see then a number o' British boys was makin' fer me on the wobbly top o' the river. They'd see me goin' as easy as a hoss on a turnpike an' they was tryin' fer to git the knack o' it. In a minute they begun poppin' at me. But shootin' on logs is like tryin' to walk a line on a wet deck in a hurricane. Ye got to know how to offset the wobble. They didn't skeer me. I went an' hauled that runt out o' the ...
— In the Days of Poor Richard • Irving Bacheller
... confess the truth, I pawned it, my bud. Dear, every cloud has its silver lining, and meanwhile what shall we say to a simple fry? You have an incomparable knack of frying." ...
— True Tilda • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... out a "candy store." He had had a few years at the public school, and a few months at a business college, to which he went at night, after work hours. He had been "up against it good and plenty," he told them. He seemed, however, to have had a knack of making friends and of giving them "a boost along" when such a chance was possible. Both of his listeners realised that a good many people had liked him, and the reason was apparent ...
— The Shuttle • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... do and then to undo a garment hitching behind. Nature, which so fashioned her elbows that she cannot throw a stone at a hen in the way in which a stone properly should be thrown at a hen, made suitable atonement for this articular oversight by endowing her joints with the facile knack of turning on exactly the right angle, with never danger of sprain or dislocation, for the subjugation of a back-latching frock. Moreover, years of practice have given her adeptness in accomplishing this achievement, so that to her it ...
— The Life of the Party • Irvin Shrewsbury Cobb
... her old," he said, divining my thoughts (with his strange knack); "I knew her young and lovely. I danced with her at the Bury ball. Did I not, dear, dear ...
— Roundabout Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray
... be fudge, too, which Nancy had the knack of making. The chums had a chafing dish hidden away, and this was brought forth and the ingredients made ready, while Nancy hovered over the ...
— A Little Miss Nobody - Or, With the Girls of Pinewood Hall • Amy Bell Marlowe
... comers are they from the Saal and Mayne; Much booty they bring of the rarest sort— 'Tis ours, if we cleverly drive our sport. A captain, who fell by his comrade's sword, This pair of sure dice to me transferred; To-day I'll just give them a trial to see If their knack's as good as it used to be. You must play the part of a pitiful devil, For these roaring rogues, who so loosely revel, Are easily smoothed, and tricked, and flattered, And, free as it came, their gold is scattered. But we—since by bushels our all is taken, By spoonfuls must ladle it ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... extensive. A knowledge of Greek was thought quite superfluous for a country gentleman. Science was in its infancy, mathematics a subject only to be taken up by those who wanted to obtain a college fellowship. Latin, however, was considered an essential, and a knack of apt quotation from the Latin poets an accomplishment that every man who was a member of society or aspired to enter Parliament was expected to possess. Thus Mark Thorndyke's lessons lasted but two or three ...
— Colonel Thorndyke's Secret • G. A. Henty
... knack, a knack, a knack, Well cut, well bound, Well shocked, well saved from the ground, Whoop! ...
— Love and Life • Charlotte M. Yonge
... the lamps of the piazza. Those marble countenances were placid with an eternal youth, beneath the same stars that had embellished irrevocable nights, that recalled some excursions into an enchanted world, some romantic gestures the knack for ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1920 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... been working for my father five years before I was born. He was not a strong man and had never been able to carry the wide swath of the other help in the fields, but we all loved him for his kindness and his knack of story-telling. He was a bachelor who came over the mountain from Pleasant Valley, a little bundle of clothes on his shoulder, and bringing a name that enriched the nomenclature of our ...
— Eben Holden - A Tale of the North Country • Irving Bacheller
... writing implements. Even long after adhesive envelopes had become common in European Turkey, their use was considered over familiar, if not actually disrespectful, for formal letters, and there was a particular traditional knack in cutting and folding the special envelope for each missive, which was included in the instruction given by every competent Khoja as the present writer well remembers in the quiet years that ended with ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo Volume 1 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa
... peculiarities, and Neill had his. He was a really brilliant back and pretty sure tackler, but relied too much on his feet while defending goal, instead of using the breast and head. His individuality consisted in meeting the charge of an opponent with bended knees, and he had the knack of taking the ball away and making a brilliant return in a style that roused the cheers of the spectators. He was a very hard worker to the last, and only retired from football to go abroad some years ago. He has, however, returned ...
— Scottish Football Reminiscences and Sketches • David Drummond Bone
... attacking each other, and each in his own way was formidably effective—Palmer in virile and eloquent abuse, Forbes in courtly and elegant but scalding satire. I could always tell which of them was talking without looking for his name. Naylor had a polished style and a happy knack at felicitous metaphor; Norris's style was wholly without ornament, but enviably compact, lucid, and strong. But after all, Calder was the gem. He never spoke when sober, he spoke continuously when he wasn't. And certainly they were the drunkest speeches that a man ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... rolled painfully off Ras Mohammed, which obliged us with its own peculiar gusts; and the 'Akabah Gulf, as usual, acted wind-sail. A long detour was necessary in order to spare the mules, which, however, are much less liable to injury, under such circumstances, than horses, having a knack of ...
— The Land of Midian, Vol. 1 • Richard Burton
... than in, say, Cheltenham. The form was English, the furniture was English, the pictures and books were English; photographs of school and college cricket elevens gave it the final home touch. Only in the garden were there exotic indications. The English certainly have the knack of carrying their atmosphere with them. I had noticed that often in India; but this Yokohama ...
— Roving East and Roving West • E.V. Lucas
... and patiently worked all day, striving earnestly to catch the knack of the needle, and emulating the tireless industry of the Sister, who worked thus during daylight that she might pursue her mission of mercy and succour at night. Thus passed some days, and then Jessica's ...
— Adrien Leroy • Charles Garvice
... qualities in language and appetite by which good men are known; but he had a gift of civic virtue—important in a wicked world, and of unusual importance in Viking. He had neither self-consciousness nor fear; and while not possessed of absolute tact in a social way, he had a knack of doing the right thing bluntly, or the wrong thing with an air of rightness. He envied no man, he coveted nothing; had once or twice made other men's fortunes by prospecting, but was poor himself. And in all he was content, ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... direction of cutting out pretty shapes in thin cardboard with the point of a penknife. But when, at his suggestion, Brotteaux gave him some string and a bodkin, he showed himself very apt in endowing with motion the little creatures he had failed to make and teaching them to dance. He had a happy knack, by way of trying them afterwards, of making them each execute three or four steps of a gavotte, and when they rewarded his pains, a smile would flicker on ...
— The Gods are Athirst • Anatole France
... proceed. You have heard of the sins of his youth, of his apprenticeship, and how he set up, and married, and what a life he hath led his wife; and now I will tell you some more of his pranks. He had the very knack for knavery; had he, as I said before, been bound to serve an apprenticeship to all these things, he could not have been more cunning, he could not have been more artificial ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... he had hopes of gain, he spared not the shedding of blood: his desires were ever carried to great things, and he encouraged his hopes from those mean wicked tricks which he was the author of. He had a peculiar knack at thieving; but in some time he got certain companions in his impudent practices; at first they were but few, but as he proceeded on in his evil course, they became still more and more numerous. He took care that none of his partners should ...
— The Wars of the Jews or History of the Destruction of Jerusalem • Flavius Josephus
... built, and there were several biggish mining settlements at the end of it. Deira itself was filled with offices of European firms, it had got a Stock Exchange of its own, and it was becoming the usual cosmopolitan playground. It had a knack, too, of getting the very worst breed of adventurer. I know something of your South African and Australian mining town, and with all their faults they are run by white men. If they haven't much morals, they have ...
— The Moon Endureth—Tales and Fancies • John Buchan
... amusing; they put on grave, philosophic faces, and mimic the savans to the life; if the noble president, thinking he is doing the polite thing, points out to them a poet, for example, or a professor, they have a knack of elevating the shoulders, looking at the man with a pitying air, and whispering the words "poor beast," with a tone and manner quite inimitable. Indeed this is one of the few clever things they do, and on or off the stage we have never ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 327 - Vol. 53, January, 1843 • Various
... and my party took me along only because I had a knack at cooking and was willing to do anything in order to see the place where such wonderful fortunes were made. It was a hot summer afternoon when, crossing a region of low, thinly wooded hills, we looked down upon American River; away ...
— History of California • Helen Elliott Bandini
... scholar, and had the book appeared anonymously there could hardly have failed of a unanimous opinion that a miracle had enabled the writer of the famous Army and Navy and other series to resume his pen for the volume in hand. Mr. Stratemeyer has acquired in a wonderfully successful degree the knack of writing an interesting educational story which will appeal to the young people, and the plan of his trio of books as outlined cannot fail to prove both interesting ...
— The Campaign of the Jungle - or, Under Lawton through Luzon • Edward Stratemeyer
... general moralizing vein— (We know we have a happy knack that way. We have observed, moreover, that young men Are fond of good advice, and so are girls; Especially of that meandering kind, Which winding on so sweetly, treats of all They ought to be and do and think and wear, As one may say, from creeds ...
— Poems by Jean Ingelow, In Two Volumes, Volume I. • Jean Ingelow
... cloth which set off his straight form; the leather jacket, which made him look like some craftsman; the jaunty cap, which emphasized the high cheek-bones in the lean face. Both his face and his figure being spare, he promised energy. He had the knack of making a sensation whenever he appeared. Only a few among mortals are gifted that way. Most of us have to get our own slippers and light our own cigars. But he was able to convey the idea that it was a privilege to serve him. The busy superintendent of the hospital, ...
— Young Hilda at the Wars • Arthur Gleason
... Macaulay somewhere in his "Life and Letters," that in a moment of despair, when he instituted a comparison between his manuscript and the work of Thucydides, he thought of throwing his into the fire. I suspect that Macaulay had not the knack of discarding material on which he had spent time and effort, seeing how easily such events glowed under his graphic pen. This is one reason why he is prolix in the last three volumes. The first two, ...
— Historical Essays • James Ford Rhodes
... critical eye the cavalry regiments that have lately trooped through our cities from various States of the Union, on their way to the banks of the Potomac, must in candor, if with reluctance, acknowledge that we are not just yet a nation of horsemen. That our troopers have got a knack of 'sticking on' we will admit; but there are ways of fulfilling that necessary condition with more ease to the horse, more grace in the action, and more certainty of being able to use the weapons with precision, than the present very ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 1, July, 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... head-master of a neighbouring grammar-school and his governing body, of which Aldous was one. The affair was difficult, personal, odious. To have wasted nearly three hours upon it was, to a man of Aldous's type, to have lost a day. Besides he had not his grandfather's knack in such things, and was ...
— Marcella • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... the therapist began. Then he grinned weakly and stopped. On the golf course, Stanton was impossibly good. It had taken him a little while to get the knack of it, but as soon as he got control of his club and knew the reactions of the ball, his score started plummeting. Now it was so low as to be almost ridiculous. One long drive to the green and one putt to the cup. An easy thirty-six strokes for eighteen holes! An occasional hole-in-one sometimes ...
— Anything You Can Do ... • Gordon Randall Garrett
... transitions are bold; he enveloped his objects in atmosphere and gave his shadows a due share of luminosity. He placed his colours so that at times his work resembles mosaic or tapestry. He knew a century before the modern impressionists the knack of juxtaposition, of opposition, of tonal division; his science was profound. He must have studied Watteau and the Dutchmen closely. Diderot was amazed to find that his surpassing whites were neither ...
— Promenades of an Impressionist • James Huneker
... prune whip was brought on and pronounced good by every one and "bully" by Tom, who ate his in great spoonfuls. "I see I'll have to let you get the meals after this," said Mrs. Gardiner to Migwan. "You have a knack of putting things together, which I ...
— The Camp Fire Girls at School • Hildegard G. Frey
... ma'am. I'll send him a little quieting draught to be taken directly—pill at night, aperient in the morning. If wanted, send for me—always to be found. Bless me, that's my boy Bob's ring. Please to open the door, ma' am. Know his ring—very peculiar knack of his own. Lay ten to one it is Mrs. Plummer, or perhaps. Mrs. Everat—her ninth child in eight years—in the grocery line. A woman in ...
— Night and Morning, Volume 1 • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... Customs officials in New York have a knack of making a person feel that he belongs ...
— In a Steamer Chair And Other Stories • Robert Barr
... delight. What happiness to meet again, to renew the pleasant friendship that was broken off by the fault of the events of life rather than by our own! How many things we shall have to tell each other! You, who alone had the knack of driving the frowns from my terrible grandpapa's brow, will bring us gayety, and I assure you we ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... had a sympathy with the animal he was riding, which enabled him not only to know what he could do himself, but also what the horse could do. He knew exactly where a horse wanted assistance from his rider. And he had another knack too, not unfrequently made use of in steeple-chases—Bob seldom let his own horse baulk, but he very generally made those that others were riding do so. And then, at a finish, how admirable was Bob! ...
— The Macdermots of Ballycloran • Anthony Trollope
... approach him by correspondence, his private secretary, who opens every letter, is one of my own appointing. I have exaggerated none of these things. It will be difficult for you to approach the King. You may succeed—you seem to have the knack of success—but it will take time. Isobel's re-appearance will be without dignity, and open to many remarks for various reasons. You may even fail to convince my father, and if you failed the first time there would be no ...
— The Master Mummer • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... in. An' he's wise. Jim knows engines. He has a knack for machinery. An' nerve! No boy ever had more. ...
— The Desert of Wheat • Zane Grey
... have the strangest knack of startling you with unpleasant surprises. To-day you see them bouncing, buxom, red as cherries, and round as apples; to-morrow they exhibit themselves effete as dead weeds, blanched and broken down. And the reason of it ...
— Shirley • Charlotte Bronte
... Quite young, most beautiful, and formed for mirth, Bartholomea Galandi her name; The lady's parents were of rank and fame; Our JUDGE herein had little wisdom shown, And sneering friends around were often known To say, his children ne'er could fathers lack: At giving counsel some have got a knack, Who, were they but at home to turn their eyes, Might find, perhaps, ...
— The Tales and Novels, Complete • Jean de La Fontaine
... into weeks, the weeks into months, and the Girl neither saw nor heard anything of him, it was inevitable that the picture that he had left on her mind should begin to grow dim. Nevertheless, it was surprising what a knack his figure had of appearing before her at various times of the day and night, when she never failed to compare him with the miners in the camp, and, needless to say, unflatteringly to them. There ...
— The Girl of the Golden West • David Belasco
... particularly informed by Col. Hawker, is reduced to a perfect system in London, and carried on by a set of fellows who, by their cunning and peculiar knack, are enabled to avoid all detection in their nefarious traffic, and thus, by extortion of rewards or sales of stolen dogs, reap a rich harvest for the whole fraternity from the well-stored pockets of the numerous ...
— The Dog - A nineteenth-century dog-lovers' manual, - a combination of the essential and the esoteric. • William Youatt
... opinion, lying only, and, which is of something a lower form, obstinacy, are the faults which are to be severely whipped out of them, both in their infancy and in their progress, otherwise they grow up and increase with them; and after a tongue has once got the knack of lying, 'tis not to be imagined how impossible it is to reclaim it whence it comes to pass that we see some, who are otherwise very honest men, so subject and enslaved to this vice. I have an honest lad to my tailor, whom I never knew guilty of one truth, ...
— The Essays of Montaigne, Complete • Michel de Montaigne
... to sleep under the stars. Yet he had been extraordinarily happy. He had held up his head, and kept it, alike with the learned—for he had learning—and with the simple, whose simplicity he shared. He had had the knack, in fact, of getting himself accepted on his own terms, exorbitant as they were; and of both rich and poor alike he had demanded entire equality. "Barefoot I stand," had been his proposition, "of level inches with your ...
— Rest Harrow - A Comedy of Resolution • Maurice Hewlett
... around her thrilling with pleasant excitement—the craving for which was unduly whetted by the splendor and aimlessness of the life of this Eastern court—for a romance with such a beginning might have an indefinitely delightful termination; and Dama Ecciva had some strange knack of always knowing more than others of any savory morsel of gossip of which there might be hints ...
— The Royal Pawn of Venice - A Romance of Cyprus • Mrs. Lawrence Turnbull
... comrades to come along with a superior officer in charge. The lieutenant had taken quite a sudden fancy for Rob and his two chums; but then that was not strange, Tubby told himself, since the patrol leader always had a knack of making friends wherever ...
— The Boy Scouts on Belgian Battlefields • Lieut. Howard Payson
... favorite game of the Maynards. Father Maynard had a knack of turning off verses, and they usually sang them to some well-known air, or perhaps made up a little ...
— Marjorie's Maytime • Carolyn Wells
... Esmond, who had a knack of stringing verses, turned some of Ovid's epistles into rhymes, and brought them to his lady for her delectation. Those which treated of forsaken women touched her immensely, Harry remarked; and when Oenone called after Paris, and Medea bade Jason come back again, ...
— Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges • William Makepeace Thackeray
... flowers. Let us ever remember that the imagination also has its products and the themes of a symphony may certainly be considered its children. The public often seems to have slight idea of the sanctity and mystery of a musical idea. Composers are considered people with a kind of "knack" in writing down notes. In reality, a musical idea is as wonderful a thing as we can conceive—a miracle of life and yet intangible, ethereal. The composer apparently creates something out of nothing, pure fancy being wrought into ...
— Music: An Art and a Language • Walter Raymond Spalding
... I have a very good Knack for novel writing? I have Just this minute been called away from writing to you by two Gentlemen who have given me an invitation to go over to Screveton, a village a few miles off, and spend a few days; but however I shall not accept it, so you will continue to address your letters ...
— The Works Of Lord Byron, Letters and Journals, Vol. 1 • Lord Byron, Edited by Rowland E. Prothero
... were large snakes of a beautiful golden-brown color. On warm days these used to crawl out, and lie sunning themselves on the rocks. Woe to any such snake, if one of the cats caught sight of him! Big Tom had a special knack at killing them. He would make a bound, and come down with his fore claws firm planted in the middle of the snake's back; then he would take it in his teeth, and shake it, flapping its head against the stones ...
— The Hunter Cats of Connorloa • Helen Jackson
... in those days by the name of Jack Leonard who was a perfectly wonderful creature. I do not know that Jack knew anymore about the river than most of us and perhaps could not read the water any better, but he had a knack of steering away ahead of our ability, and I think he must have had an eye that could ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... best of them, day by day," she answered quickly. "What is left of either will be merely the scum. The people will come to us. Their discarded leaders can crawl back to obscurity. The people may follow false gods for a very long time, but they have the knack of recognising the truth ...
— Nobody's Man • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... out of Chris's surprised and reluctant fingers and began circling it over his head and giving it a sudden jerk. It didn't crack at first, but soon he got the knack of it and cracked it loudly as close to Celia Jane's ears and ankles as he could ...
— The Circus Comes to Town • Lebbeus Mitchell
... shaking as if caused by the motion of some heavy animal which moved off to an adjoining tree. I immediately shouted for all of them to come up and try and get a view, so as to allow me to have a shot. This was not an easy matter, as the Mias had a knack of selecting places with dense foliage beneath. Very soon, however, one of the Dyaks called me and pointed upwards, and on looking I saw a great red hairy body and a huge black face gazing down from a great height, ...
— The Malay Archipelago - Volume I. (of II.) • Alfred Russel Wallace
... insinuate that a really well-dressed Frenchwoman is not better dressed than most English women, or that the French have not a peculiar knack of putting on their clothes to the best advantage; for there is no doubt upon the matter. But, if we maybe allowed to judge from the examples brought over to us in the shape of bonnets and head-dresses, and other articles of a lady's toilette, we should say that there must be a ...
— Routledge's Manual of Etiquette • George Routledge
... outset of Gerty's campaign this vision of the green-and-white shop had been dispelled. Other young ladies of fashion had been thus "set-up," selling their hats by the mere attraction of a name and the reputed knack of tying a bow; but these privileged beings could command a faith in their powers materially expressed by the readiness to pay their shop-rent and advance a handsome sum for current expenses. Where was Lily to ...
— House of Mirth • Edith Wharton
... We are aware of no limit to which the mind of man may evolve; other men may appear who will surpass the Immortal Five, but this fact remains: none that we know have. Great men, so-called, are usually specialists: clever actors, individuals with a knack, talented comedians—who preach, carve, paint, orate, fight, manipulate, manage, teach, write, perform, coerce, bribe, hypnotize, accomplish, and get results. There are great financiers, sea-captains, mathematicians, football players, ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great - Volume 12 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Scientists • Elbert Hubbard
... her credit at Clifden, and she is doing no business. When I looked in on her she was engaged in combing the hair of one of her fair-skinned children, an operation not common in these parts, where the back hair of even grown women in such centres of commercial activity as Clifden has a curious knack of coming down. It is part of the tumble-downishness of the neglected West. At some remote period things must have been new, but bating Casson's Hotel, at Letterfrack, there is nothing in good order between Mr. Mitchell-Henry's well-managed estate at Kylemore and Galway. At Clifden and all ...
— Disturbed Ireland - Being the Letters Written During the Winter of 1880-81. • Bernard H. Becker
... and that's your luck, and not your deserts at all. To have the handsomest girl in the county dying for love of ye'—(Panurgus had a happy knack of blurting out truths— when they were pleasant ones). 'And she just the beautifulest creature that ever spilte shoe-leather, barring Lady Philandria Mountflunkey, of Castle Mountflunkey, Quane's County, ...
— Yeast: A Problem • Charles Kingsley
... sailors have a knack, Haul away, yo ho, boys, Of hauling down a Frenchman's jack 'Gainst any odds, you ...
— Newton Forster - The Merchant Service • Captain Frederick Marryat
... some sort. There was also a poet, German by name, but a Russian poet; very presentable, and even handsome-the sort of man one could bring into society with impunity. This gentleman belonged to a German family of decidedly bourgeois origin, but he had a knack of acquiring the patronage of "big-wigs," and of retaining their favour. He had translated some great German poem into Russian verse, and claimed to have been a friend of a famous Russian poet, since dead. (It is strange how great a multitude ...
— The Idiot • (AKA Feodor Dostoevsky) Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... when I tell you I think myself the only woman in the world who could live with a brother's wife and make a real friend of her—partly from a knack I know I have of looking into people's real characters and never expecting them to act out of it. Never expecting another to do as I would in the same case. I do not expect you or want you to be otherwise than you are. I love you ...
— Judy of York Hill • Ethel Hume Patterson Bennett
... sonorous harangues, often prepared for them by outside hacks, their own colleagues soon taught them that such methods were no longer likely to pay even for purposes of advertisement. The majority quickly acquired a knack of suppressing wind-bags and bores quietly and effectively. The Act of 1919 reserved to Government the appointment of the President of the Assembly for the first four years, after which he will be chosen by the Assembly itself. Not ...
— India, Old and New • Sir Valentine Chirol
... less of a heaven to be in her presence and watch her, I must long ago have flung myself at her feet, and requested her to tell me, with less indirectness, whether she wished me to blow my brains out. I have a knack of hoping, which is as good as an estate in reversion, if one can keep from the temptation of turning it into certainty, which may spoil all. My Hope wanders among the orchard blossoms, feels the warm ...
— Daniel Deronda • George Eliot
... say, now without doubt, that I have laid the foundation for a study of Oriental languages, if I have time and opportunity that may be fairly given to them. Think what one hour a day is, and the pleasure to me is very great, and I feel that I have a knack rather (if I may say so) of laying hold of these things. Don't mention ...
— Life of John Coleridge Patteson • Charlotte M. Yonge
... the moving picture company save Mrs. Maguire. She declared she was too old to learn, and as she would not be required in mounted scenes she was excused. But her little grandchildren were provided with gentle ponies and taught how to sit in the saddle. Mr. DeVere had ridden in his youth, and the knack of it soon came back to him, though he was a trifle heavy. Paul took to it naturally, and Miss Pennington and Miss Dixon were soon able to hold their ...
— The Moving Picture Girls at Rocky Ranch - Or, Great Days Among the Cowboys • Laura Lee Hope
... not quite so certain of that, Digby," answered Captain Brine. "But if she is not an enemy, she is the Diamond frigate, commanded by Sir Sydney Smith. He has a wonderful knack of disguising his ship. I have known him to deceive the French themselves, and quietly to sail under a battery, look into a port, and be out again before he was suspected. He delights in such sort of work, and is not over bashful in describing afterwards what he has done. We shall ...
— True Blue • W.H.G. Kingston
... Bowie's brother, who was a queer stock himself, but was not aware of it; "but, ou, I'm thinkin' the wife had something to do wi't. She was ill to manage, an' Little Rathie hadna the way o' the women. He hadna the knack o' managin' them's yo micht say—no, Little ...
— Auld Licht Idyls • J.M. Barrie
... I can make out, one object is ridicule of what the zoologists said about the polypus: a reprint in the form of the Transactions was certainly satire on the Society, not on Peter Walter and his knack of ...
— A Budget of Paradoxes, Volume II (of II) • Augustus de Morgan
... with black, twinkling eyes, plump face, rosy cheeks, and nose twisted at the top. In his character, humor appeared to be the predominant principle. He was evidently an original, and, I am sure, had the knack of turning the ludicrous side of every object towards him. His eye would roll about from one person to another while fingering his beads, with an expression of humor something like delight beaming from his fixed, steady countenance; and when anything that ...
— The Station; The Party Fight And Funeral; The Lough Derg Pilgrim • William Carleton
... made the house ring with her shouts and her healthy glee. She toddled over everything without restraint; tumbled over Chinese tea-poys and Japan idols; upset the alabaster Graces in the best parlor, and pulled every knick-knack ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 104, June, 1866 • Various
... state, about two or three dollars per pound; and it was susceptible of being wrought into certain shapes (by their own mechanical ingenuity, or that of artisans in their employment) which would enable them to sell it again at a much higher figure. Such men, on the strength of some small knack in handling clay, which might have been fitly employed in making wax-work, are bold to call themselves sculptors. How terrible should be the thought that the nude woman whom the modern artist patches together, bit by bit, from a dozen heterogeneous ...
— The Marble Faun, Volume I. - The Romance of Monte Beni • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... now,' he said to those nearest him in the crowd. 'He is a French or Dutch sign-painter, one of ourselves, and he only wanted to have a joke against me. It is but fair to own that he has the real knack, and paints even better ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 439 - Volume 17, New Series, May 29, 1852 • Various
... concerning a dispute between the head-master of a neighbouring grammar-school and his governing body, of which Aldous was one. The affair was difficult, personal, odious. To have wasted nearly three hours upon it was, to a man of Aldous's type, to have lost a day. Besides he had not his grandfather's knack in such things, and was abundantly conscious ...
— Marcella • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... the shop in vain. "Sir, you may find them in Duck Lane, I sent them with a load of books Last Monday to the pastrycook's. To fancy they could live a year! I find you're but a stranger here. The Dean was famous in his time, And had a kind of knack at rhyme. His way of writing now is past, The town has got a ...
— The Age of Pope - (1700-1744) • John Dennis |
