"Obstruct" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... Strove hand to fist against another; And still the maddest, and most crackt, Were found the busiest to transact 260 For though most hands dispatch apace, And make light work, (the proverb says,) Yet many diff'rent intellects Are found t' have contrary effects; And many heads t' obstruct intrigues, 265 As slowest insects have ...
— Hudibras • Samuel Butler
... Paul had said, 'You have been "called" in such and such worldly circumstances. The fact proves that these circumstances do not obstruct the highest and richest blessings. The light of God can shine on your souls through them. Since then you have such sacred memorials associated with them, and know by experience that fellowship with God is possible in them, do ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture: Romans Corinthians (To II Corinthians, Chap. V) • Alexander Maclaren
... streaming down his arm and he was beginning to feel an excruciating pain. Pedestrians were few, and they made no effort to obstruct the flight of the fugitive. Instead, they gave him a wide berth. From far in the rear came hoarse cries, but Quentin was uttering no shout. He was grinding his teeth because the fellow had worsted him in the rather vainglorious encounter on the porch, and was doing all in his power to catch him ...
— Castle Craneycrow • George Barr McCutcheon
... partly divided by inserting a plate of glass. He was then hunted round, and notes taken of the number of times he bumped his head against the plate of glass, and how long it took him to learn that there was something to obstruct his path. Further statistics were kept as to the length of his memory when he had learnt the existence of the glass—that is, to see if he would recollect it several days afterwards. The fish was some time learning the position of the glass; and then, if much ...
— The Life of the Fields • Richard Jefferies
... diseases of the heart and lungs; pregnancy. These all obstruct the full return of ...
— Mother's Remedies - Over One Thousand Tried and Tested Remedies from Mothers - of the United States and Canada • T. J. Ritter
... land neither moral nor intellectual pre-eminence, nor any prestige derived from past merit or present esteem, the British Executive claims to restrain our liberties, control our fortunes, and exercise over our people the power of life and death. To obstruct the recent Home Rule Bill it allowed its favourites to defy its Parliament without punishment, to import arms from suspect regions with impunity, to threaten "to break every law" to effectuate their designs to infect the Army with mutiny and set up ...
— Ulster's Stand For Union • Ronald McNeill
... our patrol that started out the Valley Pike is probably near Twin Hills and I want to cover other country. The orchard at Mason's would obstruct my view from ...
— Manual of Military Training - Second, Revised Edition • James A. Moss
... might, by cutting across the country, get on our flanks and attack us with their spears, or send a flight of arrows amongst us from behind the trees. There was a chance, too, of our meeting with elephants, which might obstruct the road, or a leopard might spring out upon us. We were all well aware of the dangers to be encountered, but no less resolved were we to face them boldly. Charley and Harry kept calling to me every now and then, to ascertain that we were keeping up with ...
— The Two Supercargoes - Adventures in Savage Africa • W.H.G. Kingston
... expostulated upon my obstinacy, in refusing a submission, which promised to give me freedom. He observed, that the rest of my family was not to be sacrificed to the peace of one child alone, and she the only one who had offended me. 'Beside,' added he, 'I don't know if it be just thus to obstruct the union of man and wife, which you do at present, by refusing to consent to a match which you cannot hinder, but may ...
— The Vicar of Wakefield • Oliver Goldsmith
... for the preservation of hospitals and the good treatment of the wounded have been sanctioned by international agreement. The distinction between the civil population and combatants has been increasingly observed. As a general rule non-combatants, if they do not obstruct the enemy, are subjected to no further injury than that of paying war contributions and in other ways providing for the subsistence of the invaders. The wanton destruction of private property has been more and more avoided. Such an ...
— The Map of Life - Conduct and Character • William Edward Hartpole Lecky
... his valise in a place where it was not likely to be seen unless a search was made for it. There was no one in the ward room to obstruct his advance to the captain's cabin. He had served as acting-commander of the vessel in a voyage from New York to the Gulf, and been the executive officer on board for a short term, and he was perfectly at home in every part of her. In the conspiracy on his last voyage in the Bronx, Pink ...
— Stand By The Union - SERIES: The Blue and the Gray—Afloat • Oliver Optic
... this work; and they all move slowly along together, the men bearing the corn in small bags, the women holding it in their aprons. The wide low-grounds at this season expand to the horizon without anything to obstruct the vision, a clear, unbroken sweep of purple ploughed land. The laborers are visible far off, those who drop the grains walking in a line ahead, the hoers following close behind to cover up the seed. Still farther in the rear come the harrows, ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, December, 1885 • Various
... a general law of Congress prohibiting the construction of bridges over navigable waters in such manner as to obstruct navigation, with provisions for preventing the same. It seems that under existing statutes the Government can not intervene to prevent such a construction when entered upon without its consent, though when such consent is asked and ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... world." This I hope and think is too strong, but at any rate try to be one of the four. And when you have made a friend, keep him. Hast thou a friend, says an Eastern proverb, "visit him often, for thorns and brushwood obstruct the road which no one treads." The affections should not be ...
— The Pleasures of Life • Sir John Lubbock
... that which we see in the Cacao it self: which, if it be not stirred, and compounded, as aforesaid, to make the Chocolate. But eating of it, as it is in the fruite, as the Criollas eate it in the Indies, it doth notably obstruct, and cause stoppings; for no other cause but this, that the divers substances which it containes, are not perfectly mingled by the mastication onely, but require the artificiall mixture, which we ...
— Chocolate: or, An Indian Drinke • Antonio Colmenero de Ledesma
... brutality, lifted the frightened dog back to the refuge of her arms, glared at me, turned, and swept on to a modiste's door. Her haughtiness angered me. I held the fault as much hers as mine, for the pavement was not crowded and she seemed to have risen from it just to obstruct my passage. I looked about me to discover whence she had come so suddenly, and in a carriage standing at the curb I found an explanation. I said to myself that if she had emerged from so smart an equipage I had indeed committed lese-majeste, ...
— David Malcolm • Nelson Lloyd
... presented a series of recommendations designed to expedite business. One of the proposed changes provided that the chair should entertain no dilatory motions. Such motions, whose purpose was merely to obstruct action, had long been common. The Republicans were said to have alternated motions to adjourn and to fix a day for adjournment no less than one hundred and twenty-eight times in an attempt to defeat the Kansas-Nebraska bill in 1854. The second rule allowed the speaker to count members ...
— The United States Since The Civil War • Charles Ramsdell Lingley
... louder. All eyes are upon the black fringe of the forest where the trees no longer have power to obstruct the moonlight. And of a sudden a number of writhing, twisting figures ...
— The Watchers of the Plains - A Tale of the Western Prairies • Ridgewell Cullum
... permit from the Planetary Moderator, authorizing him to claim Tick-Tock for the University League and remove her from the planet, dear. So you see there is simply nothing we can do about the matter! Your mother wouldn't like us to attempt to obstruct the law, would she?" Halet paused. "The permit should have your signature, Telzey, but I can sign ...
— Novice • James H. Schmitz
... rippling water below, here pause and wait. There is a hush whose voice is more eloquent than any human appeal. The low gurgling music of the little waves that creep techily over and under the hanging boughs that teaze and obstruct them in their onward passage, the crowded leaves, rubbing their swaying heads affectionately together; the gentle wind resting in sighs of relief upon the graceful tree tops, and sending its messages of love from bough to bough, until it spends itself upon the quiet ...
— Honor Edgeworth • Vera
... in order to swallow the brains. He is most valiant and influential who has cut off most heads. No woman will marry any one who has not cut off some heads. They are so inhuman and churlish a race that they do not care whether those whom they kill are women, children, or men. They obstruct the most needed road in the island, and occupy the best land. They are near the province of La Pampanga, which is inhabited by an agricultural people, who support Manila. They prevent the latter from cultivating their fields, for seldom can the Indians, whether men or women, ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898: Volume XVIII, 1617-1620 • Various
... And be it further enacted, That any person who shall knowingly and willfully obstruct, hinder, or prevent any officer, or other person, charged with the execution of any warrant or process issued under the provisions of this act, or any person or persons lawfully assisting him or them, from arresting any person for whose apprehension such warrant ...
— History of the Thirty-Ninth Congress of the United States • Wiliam H. Barnes
... age. I have been unable to find in the literature of Greece, Egypt or the Orient, any reference to this wonderful insect who embodies in his frail physique so much of the truest philosophy of life, and who, despite the obstacles that seem so persistently to obstruct his path, buzzes blithely ever onward, singing his lovely ...
— The Autobiography of Methuselah • John Kendrick Bangs
... possession of greater pleasures, and of such as draw no troubles after them. But they look upon those delights which men by a foolish, though common, mistake call pleasure, as if they could change as easily the nature of things as the use of words, as things that greatly obstruct their real happiness, instead of advancing it, because they so entirely possess the minds of those that are once captivated by them with a false notion of pleasure that there is no room left for pleasures of a truer ...
— Utopia • Thomas More
... of the first week of January he was invited to dine at Miss Barfoot's. The afternoon had been foggy, and when he set forth there seemed to be some likelihood of a plague of choking darkness such as would obstruct traffic. As usual, he went by train to Sloane Square, purposing (for it was dry under foot, and he could not disregard small economies) to walk the short distance from there to Queen's Road. On coming out from the station he found the fog so dense that it was doubtful ...
— The Odd Women • George Gissing
... before that which was to see him the deliverer of Beatriz, constituted a sentence of such despair, that all other considerations vanished before it. He set his teeth firmly, drew his sword, dashed aside the alguazil who attempted to obstruct his path, and strode grimly on, shaking one clenched hand in defiance, while, with the other, he waved the good Toledo that had often blazed in the van of battle, at the war-cry of ...
— Calderon The Courtier - A Tale • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... had still to feel their way up the winding reaches of the James. Their progress was very slow; there was time to obstruct the passage, and batteries were hastily improvised. The people made a mighty effort; and on the commanding heights of Drewry's Bluff, six miles below the city, might be seen senators and merchants, bankers and clergymen, digging parapets and ...
— Stonewall Jackson And The American Civil War • G. F. R. Henderson
... by the relaxation of the closing muscles and should hang by its own weight, as it were. If then the lower jaw drops easily, and with no accompanying muscular contraction of face or throat, the tone may be formed or shaped well forward in the mouth, unless the soft parts referred to obstruct it. ...
— The Child-Voice in Singing • Francis E. Howard
... soul, to glorious deeds, The "Captain of salvation" leads; March on, nor fear to win the day, Tho' death and hell obstruct the way. ...
— Hymns and Spiritual Songs • Isaac Watts
... the door giving on to the street on the west; and old lady Chia and the other ladies were outside the main entrance of the Jung mansion at the head of the street, while at the mouth of the lane were placed screens to rigorously obstruct the public gaze. They were unable to bear the fatigue of any further waiting when, at an unexpected moment, a eunuch arrived on horseback, and Chia Cheng went up to meet him, and ascertained what tidings he ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... edge a little lobe called the uvula. On each side where the pillars begin to arch is an almond-shaped body known as the tonsil. When we take cold, one or both of the tonsils may become inflamed, and so swollen as to obstruct the passage into the throat. The mouth is lined with mucous membrane, which is continuous with that of the throat, oesophagus, stomach, ...
— A Practical Physiology • Albert F. Blaisdell
... nature. I want every man to have his share in the world's goods, so that I am rid of his importunity, so that I can tell him: "Now you've got what you want—you've got your fair share of the world's gear. Now, you one-mouthed fool, mind yourself and don't obstruct me."' ...
— Women in Love • D. H. Lawrence
... hand is ever busy in his garden, accomplishes much; the measure of his success may be seen if the eye rest for but a moment on the garden of his neighbor, the sluggard. Even if a weed springs here and there, it is quickly plucked up, and never suffered to obstruct or weaken the growth of esculent plants. A mole may enter stealthily, marring the beauty of a flower-bed, and disturbing the roots of some garden-favorite, but through the careful husbandman's well ...
— Trials and Confessions of a Housekeeper • T. S. Arthur
... woman," said his lordship, firmly, "must come down. Obstruct the highway. Disgrace ...
— Aunt Rachel • David Christie Murray
... Carrington, curtly; "but he need not obstruct crusades. He need not talk virtue and oppose the ...
— Democracy An American Novel • Henry Adams
... fluttering down as the train pulled out of Washington; and as it raced across the Maryland fields and through the hills which grace that State the snow blew faster and faster and thicker and thicker. But even in midwinter snow storms do not much obstruct traffic so far south, and the gay party from Fairfields had no suspicion that it was being borne into any peril or trouble. What was a little snow which scarcely, at first, ...
— Betty Gordon at Mountain Camp • Alice B. Emerson
... In thus tracing his progress there is no strain or stress in our thinking nor does the element of improbability obtrude itself. We think along a straight and level road where no hills arise to obstruct the view. Each succeeding day marks an inch or so of progress toward the goal. But should we set the responsibilities of the bank president over against the powers of the child, the disparity would overwhelm our thinking and our minds would be thrown into confusion. Our thinking ...
— The Reconstructed School • Francis B. Pearson
... I do not shrink from an extermination that relieves humanity of idlers that it drags about without power to advance or to free itself, finally sinking under the load. Is it not better for the world to be rid of such people, who obstruct the advancement ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... Congress, convened under the twelfth article of the Constitution, have complete power to exclude from counting all electoral votes deemed by them to be illegal, and it is not competent for the Executive to defeat or obstruct that power by a veto, as would be the case if his action were at all essential in the matter. He disclaims all right of the Executive to interfere in any way in the canvassing or counting electoral votes, ...
— The Electoral Votes of 1876 - Who Should Count Them, What Should Be Counted, and the Remedy for a Wrong Count • David Dudley Field
... The business that goes on in the street of the mountain is tremendous, world-formative. Here go birds, squirrels, and red deer, children crying small wares and playing in the street, but they do not obstruct its affairs. Summer is their holiday; "Come now," says the lord of the street, "I have need of a great work and no ...
— The Land Of Little Rain • Mary Hunter Austin
... others, by lock and key when books are wanted. Both of these arrangements give to readers the advantage of reading the titles on the backs of most of the books in the library, while protecting them from being handled, disarranged, or removed. But they are also open to the objection that they obstruct the prompt service of the books, by just the amount of time it takes to open the doors or screens, and close them again. This trouble and delay may overbalance the supposed advantages. Certainly they must do so in all large libraries, where ...
— A Book for All Readers • Ainsworth Rand Spofford
... obstruct, impede, hamper, retard, check, curb, clog, encumber, forestall, suppress, ...
— The Century Vocabulary Builder • Creever & Bachelor
... Madame, however, heard and understood too; in fact, traced back to a certain period, her thoughts and Mr. Horace's must have been fed by pretty much the same subjects. But she had so carefully barricaded certain issues in her memory as almost to obstruct their flow into her life; if she were a cook, one would say that it was her bad dinners which she was trying ...
— Balcony Stories • Grace E. King
... night the vessels still above were busy repairing damages and getting ready for the perils of the next day. Fearing the enemy might obstruct the channel by sinking the captured pump-boat across it, a shell was fired at her from time to time. The repairs were made before noon, but the Juliet being still crippled, the Hindman took her alongside, and so headed down for the batteries. Before going far the Juliet struck ...
— The Gulf and Inland Waters - The Navy in the Civil War. Volume 3. • A. T. Mahan
... faults of the Orthodox as heartily as those of the Unitarians. Standing in the forefront of Calvinism, he did not hesitate to say, "It is my deliberate opinion that the false philosophy which has been employed for the exposition of the Calvinistic system has done more to obstruct the march of Christianity, and to paralyze the saving power of the Gospel, and to raise up and organize around the Church the unnumbered multitude to behold and wonder and despise and perish, than all other causes beside.... Who of us are to suffer the loss of the most wood and ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 91, May, 1865 • Various
... the too hasty absorption of the thinner parts of the bile, the remainder is left too viscid, and crystallizes into lumps; which, if too large to pass, obstruct the ductus choledochus, producing pain at the pit of the stomach, and jaundice. When the indurated bile is not harder than a boiled pea, it may pass through the bile-duct with difficulty by changing its form; and thus gives those pains, which have been called spasms of the stomach; and ...
— Zoonomia, Vol. II - Or, the Laws of Organic Life • Erasmus Darwin
... needless now to argue in behalf of Roosevelt's legislation for the conservation of national resources as to argue against cannibalism as a practice fit for civilized men. That lawyers of repute and Congressmen of reputation should have done their utmost, as late as 1906, to obstruct and defeat the passage of the Meat Inspection Bill must seem incredible to persons of average sanity and conscience. If any of those obstructionists still live, they do not boast of their performance, nor is it likely that their children will exult over this ...
— Theodore Roosevelt; An Intimate Biography, • William Roscoe Thayer
... end to the great rebellion. But the failure of this last desperate enterprise gives the deathblow to the wicked and ambitious power of the usurpers at the head of the pretended confederacy. They may obstruct our march and harass our armies, but they can no longer hope to place any permanent obstacle in the way of our progress toward the restoration of the Union. The tide has turned at last. We have seen the ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 2, August, 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... frankly adopted the Pragmatic Sanction; but then he has, likewise, privately made league with France to secure him in that Julich-and-Berg matter, should the Kaiser break promise;—league which may much obstruct said Sanction. Nay privately he is casting glances on his Bavarian Cousin, elegant ambitious Karl Albert. Kurfurst of Baiern,—are not we all from the same Wittelsbach stock, Cousins from of old?—and will ...
— History of Friedrich II of Prussia V 7 • Thomas Carlyle
... as far as the Socialists and the Labour party are concerned, an unsatisfactory result. Before the general election Socialists asked themselves: "Will the Liberal party come into power with a clear mandate for reform which even the House of Lords will not dare entirely to obstruct, or will it shuffle into power on the misdoings of its predecessors and carry out a halfhearted policy in the hope of not estranging any of its moderate followers? If it takes the latter course, it will win the undying contempt of all real reformers; it will be the last time that ...
— British Socialism - An Examination of Its Doctrines, Policy, Aims and Practical Proposals • J. Ellis Barker
... production of gnats, herbs, and flowers should have so slept when she made man, that he should have need to be helped by sciences, which that old devil Theuth, the evil genius of mankind, first invented for his destruction, and are so little conducive to happiness that they rather obstruct it; to which purpose they are properly said to be first found out, as that wise king in Plato argues touching ...
— The Praise of Folly • Desiderius Erasmus
... first time, very quietly. The expression on his face was not visible in the gloom, but his voice was soft and unafraid. At the sound of it, Mrs. Bittacy started violently again. Bittacy drew his chair a little forward to obstruct her view of him. He felt bewildered himself, a little, hardly knowing quite what to say or do. It was all ...
— The Man Whom the Trees Loved • Algernon Blackwood
... lawless acts did not seem to result from any general organization. But they gradually developed into the formidable character of a wide-spread conspiracy and combination, with recognized general leaders, to obstruct and prevent the due execution of the laws of the United States respecting transportation and interstate commerce. The principal center of this conspiracy, and by far the most formidable combination, was in Chicago, where the greatest material interests, ...
— Forty-Six Years in the Army • John M. Schofield
... of which some of the fragments seem coated with tar. Recently, in the unfortunate expedition of Captain Tuckey, the English naturalists were struck with the same appearance in the yellalas (rapids and shoals) that obstruct the river Congo or Zaire. Dr. Koenig has placed in the British Museum, beside the syenites of the Congo, the granites of Atures, taken from a series of rocks which were presented by M. Bonpland and myself to the illustrious president of the Royal Society of London. "These ...
— Equinoctial Regions of America V2 • Alexander von Humboldt
... supposed to serve a good purpose by uprooting and destroying large water-plants that might otherwise obstruct the current of the stream and hinder the drainage of ...
— The Giraffe Hunters • Mayne Reid
... fancy has changed, and his care has turned to some newer and more favoured spot; when there is moss on the walks, but the weeds are few and fine; when the trees stand in their old honour, yet no branch is permitted to obstruct a path; when flowers have ceased to be sown or planted, but those that bloom are not disregarded; while yet it is only through some stately door that admission is gained, and no chance foot is free to stray in. But here it was altogether different. That stage of neglect ...
— Warlock o' Glenwarlock • George MacDonald
... agree with you," said Inspector Chippenfield. "He would stand more in the front of the house. The tree in front of the house doesn't obstruct the view of the ...
— The Hampstead Mystery • John R. Watson
... shelving downwards till their bases were hidden by the foam and spray of the water, over which hung a thousand withered and distorted trees. The rocks seemed crowding upon me, and, by their particular situation, threatened to obstruct every ray of light; but, notwithstanding the menacing appearance of the prospect, I still kept following my guide, up a craggy ascent, partly hewn through a rock, and bordered by the trunks of ancient fir-trees, which formed a fantastic barrier, till we came to a dreary ...
— Dreams, Waking Thoughts, and Incidents • William Beckford
... on Reconstruction be authorized to inquire what combinations have been made or attempted to be made to obstruct the due execution of the laws; and to that end the committee have power to send for persons and papers and to examine witnesses oil oath, and report to this House what action. if any, they may deem necessary; and that said ...
— History of the Impeachment of Andrew Johnson, • Edumud G. Ross
... measure be understood what is meant by possible; which may be grossly defined as "that which power is able to produce;" or yet more exactly, if to this same there be added, "provided there be nothing from without to hinder or obstruct it." Now of possible things there are some which can never be hindered, as are those in heaven, to wit, the rising and setting of the stars, and the like to these; but others may indeed be hindered, as are the most part of human things, and many also of those ...
— Essays and Miscellanies - The Complete Works Volume 3 • Plutarch
... independence of its people, than to their political exploitation of their strategic position. They profited, moreover, by the wish of their neighbors that such an important transit region between semi-tropical and temperate Europe should be held by a power too weak to obstruct its routes. The Amir of Kabul, backed by the rapacious Afridi tribes of the Suleiman Mountains, has been able to play off British India against Russia, and thereby to secure from both powers a degree of consideration not usually ...
— Influences of Geographic Environment - On the Basis of Ratzel's System of Anthropo-Geography • Ellen Churchill Semple
... supplies to the farming, mining and lumbering pioneers. They were centers about which settlement collected after the exploitation of the Indian. Although the efforts of the Indians and of the great trading companies, whose profits depended upon keeping the primitive wilderness, were to obstruct agricultural settlement, as the history of the Northwest and of British America shows, nevertheless reports brought back by the individual trader guided the steps of the agricultural pioneer. The trader was the farmer's pathfinder into some of the richest regions of the continent. Both favorably ...
— The Character and Influence of the Indian Trade in Wisconsin • Frederick Jackson Turner
... is menaced in his own earldom. To the point, then, I pass at once. I might, as my ransomed captive, detain thee here, until, without thee, I had won my English throne, and I know that thou alone couldst obstruct my just claims, or interfere with the King's will, by which that appanage will be left to me. Nevertheless, I unbosom myself to thee, and would owe my crown solely to thine aid. I pass on to treat with thee, dear Harold, not as lord with vassal, but as prince with prince. ...
— Harold, Complete - The Last Of The Saxon Kings • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... bouille at twelve o'clock, drinks only with, not after his dinner, and then mixes water with his genuine wine; he lives in a fine climate, where there is not as with us, for six weeks together, easterly winds, which stop the pores, and obstruct perspiration. A Frenchman eats a great deal, it is true, but it is not all hard meat, and they never sit and drink after dinner or supper is over.—An Englishman, on the contrary, drinks much stronger, and a variety of fermented liquors, and often much worse, and sits at it many hours ...
— A Year's Journey through France and Part of Spain, Volume II (of 2) • Philip Thicknesse
... thereof, and also upon private citizens, and who now are carrying into practice gigantic schemes of plunder through fraud, usurpation, and other villainy, in order to enrich themselves, bankrupt the nation, and destroy our government, and that their power is so great that they can and do obstruct the administration of public justice, corrupt its fountains, and paralyze to some extent the sovereign powers of the government of the United States and the people thereof." The Judiciary Committee after having patiently listened to this rigmarole, absurd and ludicrous as it was, unanimously ...
— Personal Reminiscences of Early Days in California with Other Sketches; To Which Is Added the Story of His Attempted Assassination by a Former Associate on the Supreme Bench of the State • Stephen Field; George C. Gorham
... time been unable to move about with their wonted agility in pursuit of locusts and mosquitoes. The mongrels that had any fight or vitality left in them would engage in a terrific struggle on the streets at night for the contents of the refuse buckets which our primitive sanitation laws permitted to obstruct the pathways until morning. It need hardly be said that there was not much in the way of crusts, scraps, or bones to appease canine hunger, and the resultant keenness of the competition made the night extremely hideous. This snarling struggle for existence had gone on night ...
— The Siege of Kimberley • T. Phelan
... and brilliant writer, Mrs. Josephine Daskam Bacon, among others has lent her able pen to ridicule and obstruct the gradual awakening of human intelligence in mothers, the recognition that babies are no exception to the rest of us in being better off for competent care and service. It seems delightfully absurd to these reactionaries that ages of human progress ...
— The Forerunner, Volume 1 (1909-1910) • Charlotte Perkins Gilman
... the book and consulted its pages blindly for a while, and then the mist which seemed to obstruct brain and eyesight clearing away, he read the pages indicated. It set forth the principle that all moneys lost at games of skill or chance, or upon bets made within the limits of the club, were payable within four-and-twenty hours. It set forth further that debts not paid within that time might ...
— Young Mr. Barter's Repentance - From "Schwartz" by David Christie Murray • David Christie Murray
... the last moment decided for political reasons to permit the occupation to take place without opposition, but this was unknown to the Japanese, and their arrangements were made on the assumption that their enemy would use the formidable means at his disposal to obstruct the operation. The risk was accepted, skillfully measured, and adequately provided for on principles identical with those of the British tradition. But, on the other hand, there has been nothing to show that where the enemy has a working command of the sea the hazard of such enterprises ...
— Some Principles of Maritime Strategy • Julian Stafford Corbett
... relieved. Accordingly the whole garrison mounted their horses at midnight, and rushing suddenly from the gate, made their escape through the middle of their enemies. As the Araucanians supposed this to have been one of the ordinary sallies, they took no measures to obstruct their flight, and Reynoso got off with his men. Having destroyed the fort of Arauco, Caupolican led his army to attack that of Tucapel, which was commanded by Martin Erizar with a garrison of forty men. Erizar defended himself ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 5 • Robert Kerr
... to sit on the veranda and read, don't interrupt him every half page to ask if he really does not want to do something else. If, on the other hand, a guest wants to exercise, don't do everything in your power to obstruct his starting off by saying that it will surely rain, or that it is too hot, or that you think it is senseless to spend days that should be a rest to ...
— Etiquette • Emily Post
... and so much Truth, as ought to have preserved him in the Empire of her Heart. It contained, besides, a Discovery of his whole Design upon her Father, for the compleating of their Happiness; which nothing then could obstruct but her self. But Henrique had seen her; he had gaz'd, and swallowed all her Beauties at his Eyes. How greedily his Soul drank the strong Poison in! But yet his Honour and his Friendship were strong ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn - Volume V • Aphra Behn
... "Vich Ian Vohr," it said, in a voice that made my very blood curdle, "beware of to-morrow!" It seemed at that moment not half a yard from my sword's point; but the words were no sooner spoken than it was gone, and nothing appeared further to obstruct my passage. I got home and threw myself on my bed, where I spent a few hours heavily enough; and this morning, as no enemy was reported to be near us, I took my horse and rode forward to make up matters with you. I would not willingly fall ...
— Waverley, Or 'Tis Sixty Years Hence, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... misgives me. ... Alas, Hilarion! how limited is our knowledge! ... even with all the spiritual aids of spiritual life how little can be accomplished! We learn one thing, and another presents itself—we conquer one difficulty, and another instantly springs up to obstruct our path. Now if I had only had the innate perception required to foresee the possible flight of this released Immortal. creature, might I not have saved it from some ...
— Ardath - The Story of a Dead Self • Marie Corelli
... what is now talked of—make as many Peers as may be necessary to carry the Bill, which I doubt their daring to do or the King consenting to do. The lapse of time and such difficulties and absurdities will probably obstruct the Bill, so as to prevent its passing. God knows ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William IV, Vol. II • Charles C. F. Greville
... of moral life from doing them, and from thus manifesting the tendencies of his depraved will. Who cannot see that the Lord cannot flow in out of heaven into man and teach him and lead him until these evils have been removed? For they obstruct, repel, pervert, and suffocate the truths and goods of heaven, which present themselves from above, press down, and strive to flow in. For evils are infernal and goods are heavenly, and everything infernal burns ...
— Spiritual Life and the Word of God • Emanuel Swedenborg
... before they had their bridge. There were many difficulties in the way. For one thing, the river is very broad; for another, the tall-masted ships ply up and down so frequently that it would never do to build anything which would obstruct their passage; and to overcome these difficulties would mean the expenditure of a vast sum of money. But the folk who earned their daily bread in New York and lived in Brooklyn grew thoroughly tired of spending chilly hours in foggy weather on the river-side piers, waiting for the ferry-boat ...
— Chatterbox, 1906 • Various
... and said, "When I hired these houses which surround the Hotel de Ville, the square was unoccupied; these barracks obstruct my sight; I hereby ...
— Ten Years Later - Chapters 1-104 • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... had a present from young Craggs of some south-sea stock, and once supposed himself to be master of twenty thousand pounds. His friends persuaded him to sell his share; but he dreamed of dignity and splendour, and could not bear to obstruct his own fortune. He was then importuned to sell as much as would purchase a hundred a year for life, "which," says Fenton, "will make you sure of a clean shirt and a shoulder of mutton every day." This counsel was rejected: the profit ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D. in Nine Volumes - Volume the Eighth: The Lives of the Poets, Volume II • Samuel Johnson
... separate vessel known as a filter. Among filtering materials in common use may be named cotton-wool, fine canvas or gauze, felt and asbestos-wool. The gas must be fairly well dried before it enters the filter, otherwise the latter will become choked with deposited moisture, and obstruct ...
— Acetylene, The Principles Of Its Generation And Use • F. H. Leeds and W. J. Atkinson Butterfield
... are being punished by greater anxiety; as they cannot see that this is taken as a matter of general course and in earnest, and the fortifications are being continued—which is, I believe, the chief reason why Japon is moved to try to obstruct it Your Majesty will ordain what is most to your service. May our Lord preserve your Majesty many long years, as Christendom requires. ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, Volume VIII (of 55), 1591-1593 • Emma Helen Blair
... no anger. I felt no impulse to strike back. I had reached such an elevation on my mountain of Self-discovery, as Esther would have put it, that I commanded vision at last. Tom and his ideas did not obstruct my progress, like the huge blow-down that he had once been in my way, against which I had blindly beaten my fists raw. I had found my way around Tom. I could look down now and see him in correct proportion ...
— The Fifth Wheel - A Novel • Olive Higgins Prouty
... old, sombre, Etruscan streets of ancient Rome, not where the Roman market-place, joined the Capitoline hill and began to ascend it, crossed the road from Palatinus thither, and began to obstruct it, not in the courts and colonnades of the primeval hill of palaces, were the terms of this proposal found. And not from the old logician's chair, was the sweep of their comprehension made; not in any ancient school of rhetoric or logic were they cast and ...
— The Philosophy of the Plays of Shakspere Unfolded • Delia Bacon
... feet tends greatly to preserve health. The perspiration and dirt with which these parts are frequently covered, cannot fail to obstruct their pores. This piece of cleanliness would often prevent colds ...
— Enquire Within Upon Everything - The Great Victorian Domestic Standby • Anonymous
... music, the record of a game of chess—anything—and it is there. This is the immortal mind—nothing is beyond its reach. Nothing can obstruct my vision; the rocks are transparent to me, and darkness is daylight. I do not need to open a book; I take the whole of its contents into my mind at a single glance, through the cover; and in a million years I could not forget a single word of it, or its place in the volume. ...
— The Mysterious Stranger and Other Stories • Mark Twain
... bodily. The Texans know these winds well, and call them "northers." They come from Hudson's Bay to the Gulf of Mexico, right down the Continent of North America, over a level plain with hardly a hill to obstruct their course, the Rocky Mountains and the Alleghanies forming a sort of trough for them. When the "norte" blows fiercely you can hardly keep your feet in the streets of Vera Cruz, and vessels drag their anchors or break from their moorings in the ill-protected harbour, ...
— Anahuac • Edward Burnett Tylor
... understanding things clearly. They will surge round you, impress their thoughts upon you, force their impressions on your astral body, so that you may have a kind of shell of objectionable hangers-on to your aura, who will much obstruct you in your efforts to see and hear correctly. That is the chief reason why every one who is teaching Yoga on the right-hand path absolutely forbids indulgence ...
— An Introduction to Yoga • Annie Besant
... himself, undertaken with the object of protecting Babylon from Cyrus. They consisted in part of defences within the city, designed apparently to secure it against an enemy who should enter by the river, in part of hydraulic works intended to obstruct the advances of an army by the usual route. The river had hitherto flowed in its natural bed through the middle of the town. Nabonadius confined the stream by a brick embankment carried the whole way along both banks, after which he ...
— The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 4. (of 7): Babylon • George Rawlinson
... the large bay of Seven Islands. The trees around are thinly scattered, and very small. In the background, rugged hills stretch as far as the eye can see; and in front, seven lofty islands, from which the bay and post derive their name, obstruct the view, affording only a partial glimpse of the open sea beyond. No human habitations exist within seventy miles of the place. Being out of the line of sailing, no vessels ever visit it, except when driven to the bay for shelter; and the bay is so large, that many vessels come ...
— Hudson Bay • R.M. Ballantyne
... nobleman, in common with some other Andalusian lords, had taken umbrage at the little estimation and favor shown them, as they conceived, by Ferdinand, in comparison with the nobles of the north; and his temerity went so far, as not only to obstruct the proceedings of one of the royal officers, sent to Cordova to inquire into recent disturbances there, but to imprison him in the dungeons of his castle ...
— The History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella The Catholic, V3 • William H. Prescott
... the homespun garb, half Roman and half Puritan, of a virtuous republicanism. Small matters were thus stamped with great character. To debate a point of procedure in the Boston or Williamsburg assembly was not, to be sure, as high a privilege as to obstruct legislation in Westminster; but men of the best American families, fashioning their minds as well as their houses on good English models, thought of themselves, in withholding a governor's salary or limiting his executive power, as but reenacting on a lesser stage the great parliamentary ...
— The Eve of the Revolution - A Chronicle of the Breach with England, Volume 11 In The - Chronicles Of America Series • Carl Becker
... beyond the Gallic bounds An island which the western sea surrounds, By giants once possessed; now few remain To bar thy entrance, or obstruct thy reign. To reach that happy shore thy sails employ; There fate decrees to raise a second Troy, And found an empire in thy royal line, Which time shall ne'er destroy, nor bounds confine.'" GEOFFREY OF MONMOUTH ...
— Legends of the Middle Ages - Narrated with Special Reference to Literature and Art • H.A. Guerber
... sufficient time, all adverse circumstance may be overcome. "The body dies if it be thwarted. Mind—in other words, intellectual truth—triumphs through opposition. Envy, hatred, and stupidity, are to it as the rocks which obstruct the descending stream, and toss it in jewelled spray above the chasm by which it is confined. Abstract thinkers have therefore their rights also; and it is well that those, in some respects, greater and better men than he, who are engaged in ...
— A Handbook to the Works of Browning (6th ed.) • Mrs. Sutherland Orr
... always been so sorry for Lindau, and admired his courage and generosity so much, that he had never fairly considered this question. "Why, yes," he answered; "he died in the cause of disorder; he was trying to obstruct the law. No doubt there was a wrong there, an inconsistency and an injustice that he felt keenly; but it could not be reached in his way without ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... cannot very well dispense with our wheat and corn and the oil from the earth and the cotton to weave into those delicate tissues with which they clothe the world. [Applause.] So that, after all, these superficial barriers of customs duties do not really obstruct our commerce; and even if they have too much of our pork, as would seem to be the notion at present, we have no desire to dispense ...
— Modern Eloquence: Vol II, After-Dinner Speeches E-O • Various
... mass of our countrymen, and which, while inefficient for the purpose of revenue, curtailed our trade relations and impeded our entrance to the markets of the world, has been superseded by a tariff policy which in principle is based upon a denial of the right of the Government to obstruct the avenues to our people's cheap living or lessen their comfort and contentment for the sake of according especial advantages to favorites, and which, while encouraging our intercourse and trade with other nations, recognizes the fact that American self-reliance, thrift, and ingenuity can ...
— Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Volume 8, Section 2 (of 2): Grover Cleveland • Grover Cleveland
... is a new State or Territory formed before the same principle manifests itself again and gives rise to a further emigration; and so is it destined to go on until a physical barrier must finally obstruct its progress."[7:4] ...
— The Frontier in American History • Frederick Jackson Turner
... insensibly accustomed itself to the grandeur of a Royal State; and whereas he had at first rejected this undertaking as an impracticable thing, the difficulties of it were now worn out of his imagination, and he no longer saw anything to obstruct his way. ...
— The Princess of Cleves • Madame de La Fayette
... this windrow of trees, and presently entered a little prairie, where there was nothing to obstruct them. The rain was now entirely gone, and the clouds were retreating far down in the southwest. ...
— The Riflemen of the Ohio - A Story of the Early Days along "The Beautiful River" • Joseph A. Altsheler
... together with the militia of the State, would compel Clinton to raise the siege. As the regular troops in the town did not exceed 1,400, a council of war found that the garrison was too weak to spare detachments to obstruct the progress of the royal army. Only a small party of cavalry and some light troops were ordered to hover on its left flank and observe ...
— Life And Times Of Washington, Volume 2 • John Frederick Schroeder and Benson John Lossing
... and the child does not breathe perfectly and regularly, no ligature should be applied. The first thing to be done here, is to pass the finger, covered with the fold of a handkerchief or soft napkin, to the back of the child's mouth, to remove any mucus which might obstruct the passage of air into the lungs, and at the same time to tickle those parts, and thereby excite respiratory movements. The chest should then be rubbed by the hand, and a gentle shock given to the body by slapping the back. If these means fail, the chest and soles of the feet must ...
— The Maternal Management of Children, in Health and Disease. • Thomas Bull, M.D.
... the dense axillary fascia, and have attained to a large size, will press upon the vessels and nerves of this region, and cause very great inconvenience. Adipose and other kind of tumours occurring in the axilla beneath the fascia, and in close contact with the main vessels, have been known to obstruct these vessels to such a degree, as to require the collateral or anastomatic circulation to be set up for the support; of the limb. When abscesses take place in the axilla, beneath the fascia, it is this structure which will prevent the matter from pointing; ...
— Surgical Anatomy • Joseph Maclise
... foot of the basement stairs was a door, and on the outside was a bolt. This Marlowe had noticed on going up, and the knowledge stood him in good stead. He got downstairs sufficiently in advance of the policeman to bolt the door and so obstruct his progress. This gave him time, and time was all-important to him. While the officer was kicking at the door and trying to burst it open, as he finally did, Marlowe dashed through the kitchen and got out at the open window. Then he had to scale ...
— Slow and Sure - The Story of Paul Hoffman the Young Street-Merchant • Horatio Alger
... Entreated, adjured, commanded, Skepsey commiseratingly observed to Colney Durance, 'The ladies do not understand, sir!' For Turk of Constantinople had never a more haremed opinion of the unfitness of women in the brave world of action. The persistence of these ladies endeavouring to obstruct him in the course of his duty, must have succeeded save that for one word of theirs he had two, and twice the promptitude of motion. He explained to them, as to good children, that the loss of five minutes ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... of its landed aristocracy, that their mothers shall not breed another race of traitors. This is not vengeance. It is justice, it is patriotism, it is the highest wisdom and humanity. Nature, at times, blots out whole communities and races that obstruct progress. Such is the political genius of these people that, unless you make the negro the ruler, the South will yet reconquer the North and undo ...
— The Clansman - An Historical Romance of the Ku Klux Klan • Thomas Dixon
... to control it with the senses; but they may make the darkness thicker. From a confused sensation a defective law will be inferred, which, later, will obstruct the clear view ...
— Bouvard and Pecuchet - A Tragi-comic Novel of Bourgeois Life • Gustave Flaubert
... practiced it at much the same risk; for the Ohio people were becoming every moment madder and more mischievous. At first they only cut down trees to check Morgan's march after he got by, but they soon began to obstruct the roads in front of him; and though they burned one bridge over a river that he could easily ford, it was not long before they learned to destroy bridges where ...
— Stories Of Ohio - 1897 • William Dean Howells
... two inches per hour. Inasmuch as about 85 per cent. of the total light is emitted by the upper (positive) carbon and most of this from the crater, the lower carbon is made as small as possible in order not to obstruct any more light than necessary. The positive carbon of the open arc is often cored and the negative is a smaller one of solid carbon. This combination operates quite satisfactorily, but sometimes ...
— Artificial Light - Its Influence upon Civilization • M. Luckiesh |
