"Passable" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... whose distance marches during this campaign were something phenomenal. Matyas found Count Vavel with his troop already at Eszterhaza, and apprized him at once of De Fervlans's arrival at the bridge-inn. The Volons had not yet rested, but they had traveled over passable roads, and were not so exhausted. Their leader at ...
— The Nameless Castle • Maurus Jokai
... way back, even though by a roundabout route. Although he spoke no English, he understood European ways and was quick to comprehend my wishes. And he proved a faithful, hard-working fellow, and a very passable cook. ...
— A Wayfarer in China - Impressions of a trip across West China and Mongolia • Elizabeth Kendall
... liked to hear of his son's successes, but it went against his prudence. There was to him something out of joint in the son of a man of his condition attempting to figure among the long-lined contemptuous elegants who had commanded him in the army during his youth. The gulf, he felt, was not passable with security nor credit. ...
— The False Chevalier - or, The Lifeguard of Marie Antoinette • William Douw Lighthall
... returned during the noon hour, the former having found, by swimming, a passable ford near the mouth of Monday Creek, while the latter reported the ferry in "apple-pie order." No sooner, then, was dinner over than the wagon set out for the ferry under Forrest as pilot, though we were to return to the herd once the ferry was sighted. The mouth of Monday ...
— The Log of a Cowboy - A Narrative of the Old Trail Days • Andy Adams
... made by the adventurous C. Bonney, Esquire, who connected Port Phillip with Adelaide by a direct road running nearly parallel to the coast, so that the portion of the continent of Australia which lies between Moreton Bay and Adelaide is now connected by a passable route. ...
— Journals Of Two Expeditions Of Discovery In North-West And Western Australia, Vol. 2 (of 2) • George Grey
... own base interests to serve. In her small sordid way she, like her employer, was persecuted by debts—miserable debts to sellers of expensive washes, which might render her ugly complexion more passable in Ovid's eyes; to makers of costly gloves, which might show Ovid the shape of her hands, and hide their colour; to skilled workmen in fine leather, who could tempt Ovid to look at her high instep, and her fine ankle—the only beauties that she could reveal to the only man whom she cared ...
— Heart and Science - A Story of the Present Time • Wilkie Collins
... himself to be covered round with snow, except a small hole which he leaves for the convenience of breathing. In this manner he lies, with his dogs around him, who assist in keeping him warm, sometimes for several days, till the storm is past, and the roads again become passable, so that he may be able to ...
— The History of Sandford and Merton • Thomas Day
... suggested "would make a few of the hounds look foolish"; and so on till we reached the first water we had encountered since the start. This was a trout-stream, well known to some of us who were fond of fishing—nowhere more than half a foot deep, and in some places easily passable, dry shod, on stepping-stones. Birch, however, avoided these, and boldly splashing into the stream over his ankles, bade ...
— Parkhurst Boys - And Other Stories of School Life • Talbot Baines Reed
... of this kind, Providence has secured us from them by a continued Ridge of vast high Hills, called the Apelachian Mountains, running nearly under the Meridian, as being passable but in very few Places; which Mountains through the Care and Conduct of the Honourable Colonel Spotswood are secured for his Majesty, tho' not guarded as yet; which might easily be done to the great Safety and Encouragement of back Settlements ...
— The Present State of Virginia • Hugh Jones
... and the work is accordingly given him to do under contract. Simultaneously with the felling, a track should be cut right through the heart of the estate by the natives, to be afterwards ditched and drained and made passable for ...
— British Borneo - Sketches of Brunai, Sarawak, Labuan, and North Borneo • W. H. Treacher
... railroad to Valliant was cleared of trees and the materials converted into posts and fuel. Two substantial oak bridges, five and ten feet long respectively, were constructed over the streams on this road to make it passable for the loaded Oak Hill team during ...
— The Choctaw Freedmen - and The Story of Oak Hill Industrial Academy • Robert Elliott Flickinger
... Afghan origin, in the North-West Frontier Province of India. It is about 45 m. long by 20. broad, and lies at a high level to the east of the Kunar valley, from which it is separated by a continuous line of rugged frontier hills, forming a barrier easily passable at one or two points. Across this barrier the old road from Kabul to India ran before the Khyber Pass was adopted as the main route. Bajour is inhabited almost exclusively by Tarkani (Tarkalanri) Pathans, sub-divided into Mamunds, ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 2 - "Baconthorpe" to "Bankruptcy" • Various
... o'clock three saddle nags were brought to the door, and we, mounting, set out for London, where we arrived about ten, the roads being fairly passable save in the marshy parts about Shoreditch, where the mire was knee-deep; so to Gracious Street, and there leaving our nags at the Turk inn, we walked down to the Bridge stairs, and thence with a pair of oars to Greenwich. Here, after our ...
— A Set of Rogues • Frank Barrett
... not expecting this tongue; besides, his German had never been a finished product. For all that, he made a passable reply. ...
— The Lure of the Mask • Harold MacGrath
... to make me happy. But how was I to find a woman who should be the equal of those women I had loved before? I had already seen half a hundred of girls, whom the town pronounced to be pretty, and who did not strike me as even passable. I thought the matter over continually, and at last an odd ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... acquaintance with you will increase my facility of saying nothing with grace, and improve my manners, even as I doubt not that under the tuition of Monsieur Pied, the aforesaid countryman might, in time, be taught to make a passable bow. ...
— The Lost Hunter - A Tale of Early Times • John Turvill Adams
... and his companion only served to accentuate the anachronisms of his appearance. She was, above all things, a woman of the moment—fair, almost florid, a little thick-set, with tightly-laced, yet passable figure. Her eyes were blue, her hair light-colored. She wore magnificent furs, and, as she threw aside her boa, she disclosed a mass of jewelry around her neck and upon her bosom, almost barbaric ...
— Peter Ruff and the Double Four • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... aurons une passable chasse a tir le jour sacramental du lr fevrier. Voulez-vous en etre? L'ennui est que c'est un lundi, et que le train du dimanche est d'une lenteur fabuleuse. Voulez-vous venir diner et coucher ici ...
— Memoirs of the Life and Correspondence of Henry Reeve, C.B., D.C.L. - In Two Volumes. VOL. II. • John Knox Laughton
... both widely and narrowly, shape themselves into some ground-scheme of a Whole: to select these with judgment, so that a leap from one to the other be possible, and (in our old figure) by chaining them together, a passable Bridge be effected: this, as heretofore, continues our only method. Among such light-spots, the following, floating in much wild matter about Perfectibility, has seemed ...
— Sartor Resartus, and On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and the Heroic in History • Thomas Carlyle
... saddled the animals, Guapo was busy with his machete in clearing away the brushwood that obstructed the path. This did not turn out such a task after all. It was only at the brow of the ridge, where the undergrowth had choked up the way. A little farther down it was quite passable, and the party, animals and all, were soon winding down the Sierra towards the valley. Half-an-hour's travelling brought them to their destination; and then a shout of joy, coming simultaneously from all of them, announced their arrival ...
— Popular Adventure Tales • Mayne Reid
... were some parts of it frayed and rubbed so that the velvet was nearly lost, but other portions were quite good, and by cutting out the worn parts and neatly joining the good pieces she at last evolved a quite passable sash. Having the sash ready she dressed herself to see how it looked, and was delighted. Then becoming dissatisfied with the severe method of doing her hair she manipulated it gently for a few minutes until a curl ...
— Mary, Mary • James Stephens
... reason of all this is twofold; partly in the book, and partly in the reader. The backbone dislikes the raising of any question which it deems to have been decided: a peculiarity which at once puts it in opposition to all fine work, and to nearly all passable second-rate work. It also dislikes being confronted with anything that it considers "unpleasant," that is to say, interesting. It has a genuine horror of the truth neat. It quite honestly asks "to be taken ...
— Books and Persons - Being Comments on a Past Epoch 1908-1911 • Arnold Bennett
... the points that are used as arguments. For our tradition does not rank this god amongst those that were born, and then made immortal, as Hercules and Bacchus, whom their virtue raised above a mortal and passable condition; but Apollo is one of the eternal unbegotten deities, if we may collect any certainty concerning these things, from the statements of the oldest ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... guard the baggage. Before daybreak, a large party of pioneers, or road-cutters, with a small guard of regulars, numbering in all about three hundred, had gone on before to open a passage for the army through the woods, and make the fords more passable by levelling ...
— The Farmer Boy, and How He Became Commander-In-Chief • Morrison Heady
... might nominate a certain proportion of their staffs, and organized trade-unions with any claim to skill, a certain proportion of their men, their "decent" men, and every artist or writer who could submit a passable diploma work; it would be, in fact, a mark set upon every man or woman who was qualified to do something or who had done something, as distinguished from the man who had done nothing in the world, the mere common unenterprising ...
— Mankind in the Making • H. G. Wells
... an important commercial centre supplying Shansi, for 130 miles to Sze-tien, the road traverses the loess hills, which extend from the Peking-Kalgan road in a south-west direction to the Yellow River, and which are passable throughout this length only by the Great Central Asian trade route to T'ai-yuan fu and by the Tung-Kwan, Ho-nan, i.e. the Yellow River route. (Colonel Bell, Proc.R.G.S. XII. 1890, p. 59.) Colonel Bell reckons seven days (218 miles) from Peking to Hwo-lu-h'ien and five days ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo, Volume 2 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa
... Birth & Quality made them impatient of the sowrer wayes of education, have from the attentive hearing these pieces, got ground in point of wit and carriage of the most severely employed Students, while these Recreations were digested into Rules, and the very Pleasure did edifie. How many passable discoursing dining witts stand yet in good credit upon the bare stock of two or three ...
— The Works of Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher in Ten Volumes - Volume I. • Beaumont and Fletcher
... regarded with suspicion anyone who talked intelligently on such subjects. On the other hand, he had been in the eleven at Eton, and was a scratch golfer. He had a fine seat on a horse and rode straight; he could play a passable game of polo, and was a good shot. Possessing as he did sufficient money to prevent the necessity of working, he had not taken the something he was supposed to be doing in the City very seriously. He had put in a periodical appearance at ...
— Mufti • H. C. (Herman Cyril) McNeile
... stammered. Yet there was something about him, with his thin features, which made one look twice. Mrs. Wagoner used to say she did not know where that boy got all his ugliness from, for she must admit his father was rather good-looking before he became so bloated, and Betty Duval would have been "passable" if she had had any "vivacity." There were people who said Betty Duval had been a beauty. She was careful in her limitations, Mrs. Wagoner was. Some women will not admit others are pretty, no matter what the difference in their ages: ...
— "Run To Seed" - 1891 • Thomas Nelson Page
... to hump treble the weight of the lime we should get after burning them. And then we should have to hump the lime at least half a mile up from the beach. There is a track through the bush up to Marahemo, and we could easily open it a bit. Half a day's work for the lot of us would make it passable for a bullock-sled; or we might pack the lime down on some of Dandy Jack's horses. Then the stuff we should get there would be easier burnt and make better lime. And we could make enough to supply the neighbourhood. A few boat-loads sold at a fair price would pay us for our work, and ...
— Brighter Britain! (Volume 1 of 2) - or Settler and Maori in Northern New Zealand • William Delisle Hay
... impossible to divert part of this ordnance to Buffalo because of the excessively bad roads, which were passable for heavy traffic only by means of sleds during the snows of winter. This obstacle spoiled the hope of putting a fighting force afloat on Lake Erie during the latter part of 1812. Chauncey consequently established his main base at Sackett's Harbor and ...
— The Fight for a Free Sea: A Chronicle of the War of 1812 - The Chronicles of America Series, Volume 17 • Ralph D. Paine
... Chia Chen exclaimed. "The state of things in my place here is passable. I've got no outside outlay. The main thing I have to mind is to make provision for a year's necessary expenses. If I launch out into luxuries, I have to suffer hardships, so I must try a little self-denial and manage to save something. It's the custom, besides, ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin
... carriage stopped, and I saw Mr Hay. I durst not speak, but he instantly said, "He is alive. I sent my servant to Waterloo this morning; he is just returned, and Sir William is better than they expected. I have horses standing harnessed, and you will soon be there if the road is passable, though it was not ...
— A Week at Waterloo in 1815 • Magdalene De Lancey
... small-voiced, flaxen-haired young woman, who stalked about the stage in high-heeled shoes and prodigious hoops, and declaimed the most fiery passages with an execrable drawl. The remainder of the company were barely passable as strolling players, with the exception of the actor who personated Osmyn. This was a young man named Bury, of respectable parentage and education, it was said, and considerable reputation, though his aspiring buskin had never yet trod ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 21, July, 1859 • Various
... this "strange eventful history." We often find that the public discover virtues and good qualities in a man after his death, which they had previously given him no credit for; let this be as it may, 1828 may be deemed a very "passable" year. To use a simile, a sick man when recovering from a fever, makes slow progress at first; and we should fairly hope that the gallant ship is at last weathering the hurricane of the "commercial ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 12, - Issue 348, December 27, 1828 • Various
... side of that mound is tip-top for skiing," remarked Nap, "better than you would expect in this country. But no one here seems particularly keen on it. I was out early this morning and tried several places that were quite passable, but ...
— The Knave of Diamonds • Ethel May Dell
... "Bugle" was, in fact, execrable; but Mrs. Cat, who served it to the two soldiers, made it so agreeable to them, that they found it a passable, even a pleasant task, to swallow the contents of a second bottle. The miracle had been wrought instantaneously on her appearance: for whereas at that very moment the Count was employed in cursing the wine, the landlady, the wine-grower, ...
— Catherine: A Story • William Makepeace Thackeray
... it proved so. A path that showed no sign of having ever been trodden, but still passable, led out past the gambling soldiers, without near approach to them. And they were still absorbed in their game—as could be told by its calls every now and then drawled out, and sounding strange in that solitary place. Ruperto Rivas conducted his trio of companions clear of the Pedregal, ...
— The Free Lances - A Romance of the Mexican Valley • Mayne Reid
... of this joke as being a passable quality of joke. And then she smiled in the same sense, hastening to agree with him that as a joke it was not ...
— The Old Wives' Tale • Arnold Bennett
... undoubted, for, so long as we kept to the valley in which the river ran, we could not be wrong, but the task was to keep along it by a way that was passable to people carrying loads. ...
— To The West • George Manville Fenn
... Blackhawk, and then to Mountain City. Stubbs selected a route further south, because there was a fine camping place, with good grass, about fifteen miles, or half way up to the gold fields, from the foot of the mountains. The roads were quite passable up to this camp, though the hills were steep. With the drivers and oxen that were left after Sollitt started back, the wagons were gradually taken up to this mountain camp, while he was back on the plains ...
— A Gold Hunter's Experience • Chalkley J. Hambleton
... behind his bar and asked for a drink of English ale, a passable quality of which was served in the original imported bottles at most ...
— Port O' Gold • Louis John Stellman
... handsome conduct of Mr. Hemmings, the master-attendant, who, at the imminent risk of his life, saved hundreds. If I had not hurt my leg, and been otherwise much bruised, I would have waited on you; but hope this will be a passable excuse. ...
— The Life of Admiral Viscount Exmouth • Edward Osler
... hesitation in refusing to accept any case, to have a respectable significance. True, there Joseph's account of himself. He had a fund of natural amiability; he had a good provision of intellect; his talk was at times very persuasive and much like that of one who has been brought to a passable degree of honesty by the slow development of his better instincts. But his face was against him; the worn, sallow features, the eyes which so obviously made a struggle to look with frankness, the vicious lower ...
— The Nether World • George Gissing
... cutting of little chippes from a stick. Pilme, the dust which riseth: Brusse, that which lyeth: which termes, as they expresse our meaning more directly, so they want but another Spencer, to make them passable. ...
— The Survey of Cornwall • Richard Carew
... indifferent food, but the striped quagga is very passable; so if you intend to save any for our dinner, pray let it be some of the latter. Have you ...
— The Mission • Frederick Marryat
... and thy velvets and brocades are passable, but the heavy articles are not fit to offer to a Mohawk Sachem. There must be a reduction of prices, ...
— The Water-Witch or, The Skimmer of the Seas • James Fenimore Cooper
... their good points; they're so refreshingly sure of themselves and their views, while the rest of us don't believe in anything. You can't be a fanatic without being thorough, and in renouncing the world and the flesh you may gain more than a passable figure. Among other things, the ascetic life means straight shooting, steady hands, and an eye you can depend upon. The overcivilized man who does nothing to counterbalance his luxuriousness ...
— The Long Portage • Harold Bindloss
... silk tassels, a bunch of violets in a glass vase, and green plants in the jardinieres. Everything is arranged exactly as in the Fromonts' apartments on the floor below; but the taste, that invisible line which separates the distinguished from the vulgar, is not yet refined. You would say it was a passable copy of a pretty genre picture. The hostess's attire, even, is too new; she looks more as if she were making a call than as if she were at home. In Risler's eyes everything is superb, beyond reproach; he is preparing to say so as he enters the salon, but, in face of his wife's wrathful ...
— Fromont and Risler, Complete • Alphonse Daudet
... resembles an amphitheatre turned outside in,—for the columns that overlook the area are quite as lofty as those which should form the amphitheatre's outer wall,—sweeps round a little bay, flat and sandy at half-tide, but bordered higher up by a dingy, scarce passable beach of columnar fragments that have toppled from above. Between the beach and the line of columns there is a bosky talus, more thickly covered with brushwood than is at all common in the Hebrides, and scarce more passable ...
— The Cruise of the Betsey • Hugh Miller
... away of hindrances. 'Crooked things straight.' A careful guide lifts stones out of a blind man's way. How far is this true? There will be plenty of crooked things left crooked, but still so many straightened as to make our road passable. ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Isaiah and Jeremiah • Alexander Maclaren
... soon as there was a passable road, Isak set out for the village, full of concealment and mystery as ever, when Inger asked his errand. And sure enough, he came back this time with a new and unthinkable surprise. A ...
— Growth of the Soil • Knut Hamsun
... 1861,) the price of daily labor decreases instead of rising. Among these free negroes, there are not less than ten thousand landholders, and three-eighths of the cultivated soil is in their hands. They have established sugar-mills everywhere, imperfect, rude, yet working in a passable manner; and mills of this sort are numbered by thousands. The middle class of color thus grows richer day by day; the families that compose it all own a horse or a mule; they have their bank-books and their accounts with the savings ...
— The Uprising of a Great People • Count Agenor de Gasparin
... see the sport. I had some distance to go; and as I turned up one street and down another, the throng of people increased, until my arrival at Smithfield, where the fair was held, and where the crowd became so dense as to be hardly passable. The spectators consisted of both sexes, of all ages and degrees. But how shall I describe the scene that presented itself? A large field of several acres was filled with tents, stages and booths, with Punch and Judys, quack doctors, mountebanks ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, April 1844 - Volume 23, Number 4 • Various
... keeping we consigned the friendship which we solemnly contracted. But turning to matters human, you I look upon as our greatest blessing in this present time. With you every path is plain to us, every river passable, and of provisions we shall know no stint. But without you, all our way is through darkness; for we known nothing concerning it, every river will be an obstacle, each multitude a terror; but, worst terror of all, ...
— Anabasis • Xenophon
... bridge could not be made passable before morning, and that nothing was to be gained by marching his tired troops over the long roundabout of the bayou road, went into bivouac early in the afternoon, covering the northern approaches of Franklin. Grover occupied his battle-field of ...
— History of the Nineteenth Army Corps • Richard Biddle Irwin
... flour trade were thus centralized, what would be the effect of a succession of large crops, or even of a single one? Would not the roads be covered with wagons whenever they were passable, and even at times when, they were almost impassable? Would not every one be anxious to anticipate the apprehended fall of prices by being early in the market? Would not freights be high? Would not the farmer, on his arrival in Rochester, ...
— The trade, domestic and foreign • Henry Charles Carey
... with the trails and hunted by the swiftest tribe of Moros. The Ganassi trail was out of the question. It would be lined with the lake people watching for him. The jungle, which he had worked his way through, would be searched, and his recent camping site discovered. Every passable trail to his home ...
— The Adventures of Piang the Moro Jungle Boy - A Book for Young and Old • Florence Partello Stuart
... on the farms above-mentioned, which occasioned a flood as violent as it was sudden; doing great damage to the meadows and fallows, by deluging the one and washing away the soil of the other. The hollow lane towards Alton was so torn and disordered as not to be passable till mended, rocks being removed that weighed 200 weight. Those that saw the effect which the great hail had on ponds and pools say that the dashing of the water made an extraordinary appearance, the froth and spray standing up in the ...
— The Natural History of Selborne • Gilbert White
... or January, all, save what are artificially irrigated, fail.[18] If they fail in one district or province, the people have few equivalents to offer for a supply of land produce from any other. Their roads are scarcely anywhere passable for wheeled carriages at any season, and nowhere at all seasons—they have nowhere a navigable canal, and only in one line a ...
— Rambles and Recollections of an Indian Official • William Sleeman
... carrying this plan into execution, Moses, accompanied by a few trusty men, desired to examine the new route and ascertain whether it would be passable for the ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... tissue-paper package, evidently of roses, approached the Yates house. It was late in the afternoon. There had been a warm day, and the trees were clouds of green and more bushes had blossomed. Eudora had put on a green silk dress of her youth. The revolving fashions had made it very passable, and the fabric was as ...
— The Yates Pride • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... squire would have grieved over the capture of his almost son-in-law was never known, for events gave him no opportunity. Spring was now come, and with it the breaking up of winter quarters. The moment the roads were passable, the garrison of Brunswick, under the command of Cornwallis, marched up the Raritan to Middle Brook, driving back into the Jersey hills a detachment of the Continental army. In turn Washington's whole force was moved to the ...
— Janice Meredith • Paul Leicester Ford
... and finally with sixty dollars in his pocket, he started for New York. Some years later, he sought Gilbert Stuart, at Boston, got some systematic instruction and ended by painting very passable portraits. ...
— American Men of Mind • Burton E. Stevenson
... that were the subject to my taste, I might succeed in throwing off some passable lines upon it. He pressed gold upon me, and bade me there and then set about fashioning an ode to Madonna Paola, and to forget, when they were done, under pain of a whipping to the bone, ...
— The Shame of Motley • Raphael Sabatini
... not that!—The women of this race Are passable, good even, but the men With dirty hands and narrow greed of gain— This girl shall not be touched by such a one. Indeed, she has to better ones belonged. But then, what's that to me?—If thus or thus, If near or far—they may look ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VI. • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... as the twice before, they had taken no trouble about the matter, but had picked up the first passable looking peasant woman whom they ...
— Grimm's Fairy Stories • Jacob Grimm and Wilhelm Grimm
... country twenty-two years ago was a waste sheep-walk, covered chiefly with heath, with some dwarf furze and fern. The cabins and people as miserable as can be conceived; not a Protestant in the country, nor a road passable for a carriage. In a word, perfectly resembling other mountainous tracts, and the whole yielding a rent of not more than from three shillings to four shillings an acre. Mr. Forster could not bear so barren a ...
— A Tour in Ireland - 1776-1779 • Arthur Young
... cleverer in some ways than the average man, on a level with most as regarded his outlook on life and its possibilities. He had never been very deeply moved over anything. Things had always gone smoothly with him, and he had passed through school and college with quite passable success and complete satisfaction in himself and his surroundings. His love for Hilda Ryder was the best and highest thing in his whole life; and in his attempt to become what she believed him to be he rose to a higher mental and moral stature than ...
— Afterwards • Kathlyn Rhodes
... possible, and, concentrating their fire upon the bridge, across which reinforcements continued to press to the support of the assailants, they succeeded in sinking so many of the boats that it was no longer passable. ...
— A Knight of the White Cross • G.A. Henty
... horssemen of the Romans at the first encounter were put to the worsse, and Labienus the tribune slaine. In the second conflict he vanquished the Britains, not without great danger of his people. After this, he marched to the riuer of Thames, which as then was passable by foord onelie in one place and not else, as the report goeth. On the further banke of that riuer, Cassibellane was incamped with an huge multitude of enimies, and had pitcht and set the banke, and almost all ...
— Chronicles (1 of 6): The Historie of England (3 of 8) • Raphael Holinshed
... schools, but six school matches. The school that they played twice in the season was Ripton. To win one Ripton match meant that, however many losses it might have sustained in the other matches, the school had had, at any rate, a passable season. To win two Ripton matches in the same year was almost unheard of. This year there had seemed every likelihood of it. The match before Christmas on the Ripton ground had resulted in a win for Wrykyn by two goals and a try to a try. ...
— The Gold Bat • P. G. Wodehouse
... from Daiquiri and Siboney to the front did not become impassable for loaded wagons until the end of the second week in July. For ten days after the army landed it was comparatively dry and good; and for ten days or two weeks more it was at least passable, and was constantly traversed, not only by pack-trains, ...
— Campaigning in Cuba • George Kennan
... pass through this Mizricz, the political stronghold of Chassidism. This discovery did not displease me, for I felt that thus I should reach the Master better prepared. In my impatience I could scarcely wait for the roads to become passable, and it was still the skirt of winter when, with a light heart and a wild hope, I set my face for the wild ravines of Severia and the dreary steppes of the Ukraine. Very soon I came into parts where the question of the Chassidim was alive and burning, and indeed into towns where it had a greater ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... and carrying away its stuffs in return. The Venetians of every class amused themselves in visiting this free mart, and the gentler and more delicate sex pressed eagerly forward to traverse with their feet a space hitherto passable only in gondolas. [Footnote: Origine delle Feste Veneziane, di Giustina Renier-Michiel] The lagoon remained frozen, and these pleasures lasted eighteen days, a period of cold unequaled till last ...
— Venetian Life • W. D. Howells
... is one of the inexplicable mysteries of American civilisation that a young municipality,—or even, sometimes, an old one,—with a million dollars to spend, will choose to spend it in erecting a most unnecessarily gorgeous town-hall rather than in making the street in front of it passable for the ordinarily shod pedestrian. In New York itself the hilarious stockbroker returning at night to his palace often finds the pavement between his house and his carriage more difficult to negotiate ...
— The Land of Contrasts - A Briton's View of His American Kin • James Fullarton Muirhead
... enlarge here much upon the method I took to make my life passable and easy with the most incorrigible temper in the world; but it is too long, and the articles too trifling. I shall mention some of them as the circumstances I am to relate shall ...
— The Fortunate Mistress (Parts 1 and 2) • Daniel Defoe
... it to Fort Edward is only twenty-six miles. By a good road, in easy marches, an army should be there in two days; in an exigency, in one. It was mostly a wilderness country, and, though generally level, much of it was a bog, which could only be made passable by laying down a corduroy road. There were miles of such road to be repaired or built before wagons or artillery could be dragged over it. Indeed, a worse country to march through can hardly be imagined. On the other hand, of this twenty-six miles, ...
— Burgoyne's Invasion of 1777 - With an outline sketch of the American Invasion of Canada, 1775-76. • Samuel Adams Drake
... the Hudson which washes three-fourths of its base. The remaining fourth was in a great measure covered by a deep marsh, commencing near the river on the upper side and continuing into it below. Over this marsh there was only one crossing place, but at its junction with the river was a sandy beach passable at low tide. On the summit of this hill stood the fort which was furnished with heavy ordnance. Several breastworks and strong batteries were advanced in front of the main work, and about half way down ...
— Life And Times Of Washington, Volume 2 • John Frederick Schroeder and Benson John Lossing
... on the road and useless to us. I found after getting over the large range that I could have got round it had I kept south, and by travelling a circuitous route, but from the western side of the range the way I came was the only way visible that was passable, and it was nearly as impassable as it was possible for it to be. From the top of it you command a very extensive view in all directions. To the south in the distance is a fine long leading range, apparently running from west-north-west to east-south-east; to the north ...
— McKinlay's Journal of Exploration in the Interior of Australia • John McKinlay
... five-and-twenty, who had devoted himself to the cultivation of his intellect and the suppression of his soul. Because his mother had been a religious woman, he reasoned that faith was merely an amiable feminine weakness, and because he himself was clever enough to make passable Latin verses, he argued that no Supernatural Being could have been clever enough to ...
— The Farringdons • Ellen Thorneycroft Fowler
... law of learning to the effect that continued repetition of a performance necessarily makes it perfect in speed, ease, or adaptation to the task in hand. What the manual worker attains as the result of prolonged experience is a passable performance, but not at all the maximum ...
— Psychology - A Study Of Mental Life • Robert S. Woodworth
... very passable," said the voice. "Small, of course, and underfurnished, but some pictures and antimacassars would take off that bare look. And Marmaduke is adorable. Your cook would soon be devotion itself. ...
— The Spanish Chest • Edna A. Brown
... land. A bonde, by name Bruse, who dwelt there in More, and was chief over the valley, came down to King Olaf, together with many other bondes, and received him well, and according to his dignity; and he was friendly, and pleased with their reception of him. Then the king asked if there was a passable road up in the country from the valley to Lesjar; and Bruse replied, that there was an urd in the valley called Skerfsurd not passable for man or beast. King Olaf answers, "That we must try, bonde, ...
— Heimskringla - The Chronicle of the Kings of Norway • Snorri Sturluson
... the face and figure to disguise well; as a Turk, for instance'—Dave made a wry face—'or as an Arab, and even Bob could manage to transform himself into a passable Algerian. Your discovery of this morning, Dave, simply means that, from this moment, in addition to the task of watching all the European faces in search of our men, we shall have the added perplexity of peering under the hoods, turbans, fezes, ...
— Against Odds - A Detective Story • Lawrence L. Lynch
... enough now to discover the differences between this front and the old fighting-line in Gallipoli. The rain has been heavier in March than for thirty-five years, and April until yesterday seemed almost as bad. The trenches are made passable by being floored with a wooden pathway which runs on piles—underneath which is the gutter of water and mud which is the real floor of the trench. Sometimes the water rises in the communication trenches so that the boards float or disappear, and if you happen to step ...
— Letters from France • C. E. W. Bean
... and settled themselves at last in Pannonia. A hardy bold and warlike Nation; who ventured next after Hercules, (to whom the like Attempt gave a Reputation of extraordinary Valour, and a Title to Immortality) to cross those almost inaccessible Rocks of the Alps, and Places scarce passable by Reason of the Cold: Where after having totally subdued the Pannonians they waged War with the bordering Provinces for many Years.—And afterwards—being encouraged by their Success, subdivided their Parties; when some took ...
— Franco-Gallia • Francis Hotoman
... crosses the North River just above the junction, carrying the Harrisonburg road into Port Republic; but the South River, which cuts off Port Republic from the Luray Valley, is passable ...
— Stonewall Jackson And The American Civil War • G. F. R. Henderson
... and the baggage horse, with Ito upon him, rolled head over heels, sending his miscellaneous pack in all directions. Good roads are really the most pressing need of Japan. It would be far better if the Government were to enrich the country by such a remunerative outlay as making passable roads for the transport of goods through the interior, than to impoverish it by buying ironclads in England, and ...
— Unbeaten Tracks in Japan • Isabella L. Bird
... passed; but, from the statements of contemporary writers, it would appear that they were followed by very little substantial progress, and travelling continued to be attended with many difficulties. Even in the neighbourhood of the metropolis, the highways were in certain seasons scarcely passable. The great Western road into London was especially bad, and about Knightsbridge, in winter, the traveller had to wade through deep mud. Wyatt's men entered the city by this approach in the rebellion of 1554, and were called the "draggle-tails" ...
— The Life of Thomas Telford by Smiles • Samuel Smiles
... books will under present conditions repeat the history of these books. There is now no wide region of fertile country rapidly filling with settlers and separated from their former sources of supply by great distance and by mountain ranges unprovided with passable roads. Even the more newly settled regions of the country are reached by railroads and the parts early settled are covered by a network of railroads, of telegraph and telephone wires which bring the consumer and the producer ...
— A History of the McGuffey Readers • Henry H. Vail
... and railed, or pretended to rail, against their indecent conduct with great vigour. Thus at last we succeeded, though not without some difficulty, in making the corridor outside my door once more passable. ...
— My Life, Volume I • Richard Wagner
... communes have become more or less vast lodging-houses, all built on the same plan and managed according to the same regulations, one as passable as the other, with apartments in them which, more or less good, are more or less dear, but at rates which, higher or lower, are fixed at a uniform tariff over the entire territory, so that the 36,000 ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol XII. - Modern History • Arthur Mee
... into both author and subject. Edmee thereupon had to give him an account of the Crusades. This was not the most difficult part of her task. Thanks to the stores of information derived from the abbe and to his prodigious memory for facts, Patience had a passable knowledge of the outlines of universal history. But what he had great trouble in grasping was the connection and difference between epic poetry and history. At first he was indignant at the inventions of the poets, and declared that such impostures ought never to have been allowed. ...
— Mauprat • George Sand
... we weren't to talk now, and I must tell you everything afterwards. Oh, I got on better than I expected, though most of the people were rather starchy. How did my dress look? Well—promise you won't breathe a word to darling Mother—it was just passable, and that's all. Some girls had lovely things. I didn't care. The second part of the evening was far nicer than the first, and I enjoyed the dances that I sat out the most. The conservatory was all hung ...
— A Popular Schoolgirl • Angela Brazil
... 3D snaps of Grandson, I modeled a passable reptile head over my own features. It was a little short in the jaw, me not having one of their toothy mandibles, but that was all right. I didn't have to look exactly like them, just something close, to soothe the native mind. It's logical. If I were an ...
— The Repairman • Harry Harrison
... while white sheep and pigs are upset by certain plants dark-coloured individuals escape. At any rate blacks are not affected by the fruit, though large consumers of it, and many whites also eat of it raw and preserved, without fear and without untoward effects. Some of the Eugenias produce passable fruits, and one of the palms (CARYOTA) bears huge bunches of yellow dates, the attractiveness of which lies ...
— The Confessions of a Beachcomber • E J Banfield
... it too well; for many of my works have perished from their union with his weak and sentimental verses. Perished, in MY estimation, I mean; for to make my operas passable, I have often been obliged to write fiery music to insipid words; and introduce fioritures out of place, that the nightingales might compensate to the world for the shortcomings of the poet. Well, my heart has bled while I wrote such ...
— Joseph II. and His Court • L. Muhlbach
... it—the picture of discontent. The gaslight showed her the possessor of bright brown eyes, under fine brows slenderly but clearly marked, of a pink and white skin slightly freckled, of a small nose quite passable, but no ways remarkable, of a dainty little chin, and a thin-lipped mouth, slightly raised at one corner, and opening readily over some irregular but very white teeth. Except for the eyes and eyebrows the features could claim nothing much in the way of beauty. Yet at this moment of seventeen—thanks ...
— The History of David Grieve • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... the beer?' said the lady of the caravan with an appearance of being more interested in this question than the last, 'is it passable, George?' ...
— History of English Humour, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange
... certainly an "undertaking," therefore it must be a job—a big one at that. It interferes with the holding of any more remunerative job and consumes most of one's time in trying to keep his health in a passable condition. I have had positions of some importance handed to me, which I discharged with eminent satisfaction to all concerned until I got ready to go off at some new tangent. If I did not imagine myself in the actual embrace ...
— Confessions of a Neurasthenic • William Taylor Marrs
... it, if I didn't mean it," answered Joan; "but you haven't got to trouble yourself about that . . . You're quite passable." She smiled. It seemed to her that most women would find him more ...
— All Roads Lead to Calvary • Jerome K. Jerome
... Wear-and-tear plus luxury is said to break down the human system more rapidly than wear-and-tear plus want; but perhaps wear-and-tear plus pensive self-consideration is the most destructive agent of all. "Apres tout, c'est un monde passable"; and the Duchess of Gordon was too busy acquainting herself with this fact to count the costs, or even pay ...
— Americans and Others • Agnes Repplier
... "One of their big guns clear in the open, and moving at a crawl. I want you to take the battery along the road here, sharp to the right at the cross-road, and through the wood. The Inf. tell me there is just a passable road through. Take guns and firing battery wagons only; leave the others here. When you get through the wood, turn to the right again, and along its edge until you come to where I'll be waiting for you. I'll take the range-taker with me. The order will be 'open sights'; it's the only way—not ...
— Action Front • Boyd Cable (Ernest Andrew Ewart)
... an indifferent person in every way. His wealth, combined with his situation in the fashionable world, placed him in a fictitious light; but he had little intelligence, no originality, and only a passable personal appearance. I was constantly drawing the comparison between him and Harry Morton. Harry was so handsome, so brilliant in conversation—and this thought rendered poor Mr. Langley, with all ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 4 October 1848 • Various
... coach-box, but I look, as I pass, at all the women ear, for the box; but not none I see. "Well," I tell myself once more, "never mind, we shall see;" and we drive on very passable and agreeable times till we approached ourselves near London; but then come one another coach of the opposition to pass by, and the coachman say, "No, my boy, it shan't do!" and then he whip his horses, and made some traverse upon ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 357 - Vol. XIII, No. 357., Saturday, February 21, 1829 • Various
... His body's a passable carcass, if he be not hurt; it is a throughfare for steel, ...
— Cymbeline • William Shakespeare [Tudor edition]
... fairly picked their steps among squirming reptiles. A stream, sometimes large as a river, crawling languidly through deep fissures in the red shale, protected the left flank of the column. The cavalry was forced to hold the narrow wood road, as the bush was hardly passable for men. ...
— The Iron Game - A Tale of the War • Henry Francis Keenan
... a considerable distance, he came to a spot where it was passable, and made his way down to the river bank. Here he indulged in a long drink of fresh water, and then began to examine the caves which perforated the rocks. These caves Cuthbert knew had formerly been the abode of hermits. It was supposed ...
— The Boy Knight • G.A. Henty
... from the best places, and gets them fitted and sent home, and that's all there is to it. But how about me? I've got a hundred things to attend to every day. I've got to make my own clothes, or take a long chance on a mail-order house. That's why, when I do get anything that looks passable, I like it ...
— Desert Conquest - or, Precious Waters • A. M. Chisholm
... while in another, some twelve miles off, it was to be had for a penny. It follows that the carriage of goods along twelve miles of road cost a farthing a pound. At Sonnino bad wine was sold for sevenpence the litre, while the same quantity of passable wine might be had at Pagliano, thirty miles off, for twopence halfpenny; so the cost of carrying an article weighing some two pounds for thirty miles was fourpence halfpenny. Wherever governments make roads, prices naturally find ...
— The Roman Question • Edmond About
... et de chercher quelque chose qu'ils pussent manger, ils apercurent entre les rochers qui etoient le long du rivage, de gros limacons, et de plus petits, qui y venoient de la mer, et dont le gout, qui etoit passable, parut excellent a des gens affamez. Mais n'aiant point de feu pour les faire cuire, l'usage continuel qu'ils en firent, commenca de les incommoder, et ils sentirent bien que ce foible remede ne les empecheroit pas de mourir ...
— Narrative of a Survey of the Intertropical and Western Coasts of Australia - Performed between the years 1818 and 1822 • Phillip Parker King
... seventeenth and eighteenth centuries write their memoirs they boldly present themselves to the reader thus: "I have a well-shaped mouth," said the Marquise of Courcelles, "beautiful lips, pearly teeth, good forehead, cheeks, and expression, finely chiselled throat, divine hands, passable arms (that is to say, they are a little thin); but I find consolation for that misfortune in the fact that I have the prettiest legs ...
— Parisian Points of View • Ludovic Halevy
... having got his forces into a passable state of re-organization, began to reconnoitre the Federal position, with a view to another assault upon it. It was his belief that one more hearty effort would drive Hooker across the river; and ...
— The Campaign of Chancellorsville • Theodore A. Dodge
... Fashionable Novelist (or should it be Miss?),—Before going to my tailor, I venture to write to you on a subject of some importance. I am fairly well educated, of good family and address, and, so my friends tell me, of passable appearance. I yearn to become a gentleman. If it is not troubling you too much, would you mind telling me how to set about the business? What socks and ties ought I to wear? Do I wear a flower in my button-hole, or is that a sign ...
— The Angel and the Author - and Others • Jerome K. Jerome
... cuisine. She was counted a severe moralist, and her tongue was more dreaded than a bayonet-charge. To be sure, her enemies more than hinted that her extraordinary virtue was trebly guarded by her ugliness. On the latter subject she says herself, "I must be cruelly ugly: I never had a passable feature. My eyes are little, my nose short and big, my lips long and flat, my cheeks hanging, my face long, my waist and my legs large, my stature short: sum-total, a little old fright." But she was intelligent and witty, and that, in France at least, ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 15, - No. 90, June, 1875 • Various
... friends, my relatives, my enemies, bowed to us, and I saw—for one sees everything in spite of one's self on these solemn occasions—that they did not think that I looked ugly. On reaching the gilt chair, I bent forward with restrained eagerness—my chignon was high, revealing my neck, which is passable—and thanked the Lord. The organ ceased its triumphal song and I could hear my poor mother bursting into tears beside me. Oh! I understand what a mother's heart must feel during such a ceremony. While watching with satisfaction the clergy who were solemnly advancing, I ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... level, the greener and more fertile pampas, which are serviceable to mankind, produced an equal impression? I can scarcely analyze these feelings; but it must be partly owing to the free scope given to the imagination. The plains of Patagonia are boundless, for they are scarcely passable, and hence unknown; they bear the stamp of having lasted, as they are now, for ages, and there appears no limit to their duration through future time. If, as the ancients supposed, the flat earth was surrounded by an impassable breadth of water, or by deserts heated to an intolerable ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern — Volume 11 • Various
... grounded, bounded, and founded, that by force of man it can never be confounded; the foundation and walls are unpenetrable, the rampiers impregnable, the bulwarks invincible, no way but one it is or can be possible to be made passable. In a word, I have seen many straits and fortresses, in Germany, the Netherlands, Spain and England, but they must all give place to this unconquered Castle, both for strength ...
— The Pennyles Pilgrimage - Or The Money-lesse Perambulation of John Taylor • John Taylor
... has exaggerated history to caricature. Romances are the destruction of human interest. The moment you begin to move the individuals, they are puppets. 'Nothing but poetry, and I say it who do not read it'—(Chancellor von Redwitz is the speaker)'nothing but poetry makes romances passable: for poetry is the everlastingly and embracingly human. Without it your fictions are flat foolishness, non-nourishing substance—a species of brandy and gruel!—diet for craving stomachs that can support nothing solider, and must have the ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... of the country can adhere to them. What, however, can be expected from stocking-weavers and such like? Well, well! I was speaking of that worthy man Deane. There is his wife, a good dame and a careful mother, and his two daughters. You know them better than I do—passable girls though, they seem to me; not exactly such as I might have chosen as your companions; but tempora mutantur, as we used to say at college! I'faith, most of my Latin has slipped out of my memory. And then ...
— John Deane of Nottingham - Historic Adventures by Land and Sea • W.H.G. Kingston
... were dancing all together, dancing the Schuhplatteln, the Tyrolese dance of the clapping hands and tossing the partner in the air at the crisis. The Germans were all proficient—they were from Munich chiefly. Gerald also was quite passable. There were three zithers twanging away in a corner. It was a scene of great animation and confusion. The Professor was initiating Ursula into the dance, stamping, clapping, and swinging her high, with amazing force and zest. When the crisis came even Birkin ...
— Women in Love • D. H. Lawrence
... of this timid hope. He was now in his element, knew all about it, rushed into details, and sawed away all doubt from their minds. The sum was this. Dodd's general performance was mediocre, but passable; he was plucked for his Logic. Hardie said he was very sorry for it. "What does it matter?" answered Kennet; ...
— Hard Cash • Charles Reade
... is the same as in other prisons,—that is, very bad; the lodging is very unhealthful, but, on the whole, passable for a dungeon; but it is not that which I wish to speak of, but a secret I have to reveal of ...
— The Count of Monte Cristo • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... and sit on Allen's and on the Clarks' porch and we can have Chas. too. I suppose he will have had his holiday but he can come up for a Sunday. We expect to move up on Santiago the day after to-morrow, and it's about time, for the trail will not be passable much longer. It rains every day at three o'clock for an hour and such rain you never guessed. It is three inches high for an hour. Then we all go out naked and dig trenches to get it out of the way. It is very rough living. I have to confess that I never knew how well off I ...
— Adventures and Letters • Richard Harding Davis
... glass," she explained, "to see if it was fit for the senorita to use. These common mirrors, you understand, they draw the countenance this way, that way,—" she expressed her meaning in vivid pantomime,—"one thinks one's visage of caoutchouc. But this is passable; I assure you, ...
— Rita • Laura E. Richards
... of asking if she is passable in appearance," Winston said, with his smile of conscious superiority. "Judge for yourself!" taking from his pocket ...
— At Last • Marion Harland
... the reason is that it is genuine coffee, no chicory or other mixture. Yet I have seen passable coffee made of poor material by an adept. Our dear old grandmother was compelled in war-times to make it from chicory, but would use no deception, so when she invited friends to take supper she would not say, 'Come to afternoon coffee,' ...
— Pixy's Holiday Journey • George Lang
... room they had cleared with dried skins, laying them with the hairy side up, thus making a comfortable carpet; large blocks of stone were piled at intervals around the rooms for seats, and these were also covered with soft skins, making very passable but immovable seats. A table was built by setting four blocks of stone up endwise in the centre of the room and laying one large, smooth, thin slab on its top, around which were placed five movable seats to be used ...
— The American Family Robinson - or, The Adventures of a Family lost in the Great Desert of the West • D. W. Belisle
... his with the cord he had been keeping dry within the breast folds of his tunic. He fitted an arrow to the string, grateful to be a passable marksman. The slash on his arm smarted in protest as he moved, and he noted that Ashe did ...
— The Time Traders • Andre Norton
... upon Events Control Me; I Cannot Control Events Falsehood Farce Father Abraham Favor to Me Would Be Injustice to the Public Fees We Earn at a Distance Gals, Tied as Tight in the Middle General Grant Good, Bright, Passable Lie His Parts Seemed to Be Raised by the Demands of Great Station House Divided Against Itself Cannot Stand I Can't Spare That Man, He Fights! Idealization Which So Easily Runs into the Commonplace If Slavery Is Not Wrong, Nothing Is Wrong Ignored the Insult, but Firmly ...
— Widger's Quotations from Abraham Lincoln's Writings • David Widger
... fellow, you are joking then," said I, "this is a very passable SKULL—indeed, I may say that it is a very EXCELLENT skull, according to the vulgar notions about such specimens of physiology—and your scarabaeus must be the queerest scarabaeus in the world if it resembles it. Why, we may get up a very thrilling bit of superstition upon this hint. I presume ...
— Stories by Modern American Authors • Julian Hawthorne
... for men to go sailing is in spring when a man first sees leaves on the topmost shoot of a fig-tree as large as the foot-print that a cow makes; then the sea is passable, and this is the spring sailing time. For my part I do not praise it, for my heart does not like it. Such a sailing is snatched, and you will hardly avoid mischief. Yet in their ignorance men do even this, for wealth means life to poor mortals; ...
— Hesiod, The Homeric Hymns, and Homerica • Homer and Hesiod
... Mayo, late of the crack liner Montana, was a very passable mulatto, his crisply curling hair adding to the disguise. He swapped his neat suit of brown with a deck-hand, and ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day
... twice, an offshoot of that establishment in Victoria Street near the Army and Navy Stores, where candidates for the position of translator—quasi-confidential work and passable pay, five pounds a week—were interviewed. On the second occasion, after waiting in an ante-room full of bearded and be-spectacled monsters such as haunt the British Museum Library, I was summoned before a board of reverend elders, who put me through ...
— Alone • Norman Douglas
... passable trail will have been built up to Doubtful Lake and another one up that eight-hundred-foot mountain-wall above the lake, where, when one reaches the top, there is but room to look down again on the other side. Perhaps, too, there will be a trail ...
— Tenting To-night - A Chronicle of Sport and Adventure in Glacier Park and the - Cascade Mountains • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... These drop from them, but stagnate here. We, you perceive, have no tears, not even at moments—' Then, 'You will soon be accustomed to all this,' he said. 'You will fall into the way. Perhaps you will be able to amuse yourself to make it passable. Many do. There are a number of fine things to be seen here. If you are curious, come with me and I will show you. Or work,—there is even work. There is only one thing that is impossible, or if not impossible—' And here he paused again and raised his eyes to the ...
— The Little Pilgrim: Further Experiences. - Stories of the Seen and the Unseen. • Margaret O. (Wilson) Oliphant
... prisoners began on the same day at 2.30 p.m. and lasted over six hours. They were conducted to trains and despatched to Germany. Some of the infantry made a good impression, while the pioneers and artillery can only be classed as passable. ...
— What Germany Thinks - The War as Germans see it • Thomas F. A. Smith
... the squadron, the Americans began work boldly with the islands nearest at hand. Noddle's Island, now East Boston, stretched within easy cannon shot of the town; it was reached from Hog Island by means of a couple of fords, passable at low tide. In broad day, on the 27th, the Americans occupied the islands, and were promptly assailed by the British in a schooner and a sloop. The skirmish grew very obstinate, but the schooner was left by the ...
— The Siege of Boston • Allen French
... will find it quite passable to-night," was all the answer he got; and a little later, when they had turned out of the main road and were ascending the small canyon, the prophecy came true. The brush barricade had been thrown aside, and there were fresh wheel tracks in ...
— The Honorable Senator Sage-Brush • Francis Lynde
... the creek "fell," and the bridge became again passable to Miles and his waddling horse. The operators disconnected their wires, put their apparatus in order, locked the wooden cases over their instruments, and rode in triumph (Mr. Loudon had come in the buggy for ...
— What Might Have Been Expected • Frank R. Stockton
... purposes, and which is performed in the open air. About the door of the long, rambling posada, a dozen or more horses were seen tied to a long bar, erected for the purpose, but no wheeled vehicles were there. The roads are only fit for equestrians, and hardly passable even for them. At rare intervals one gets a glimpse of the volante, now so generally discarded in the cities, and which suggested Dr. Holmes's old chaise, prepared to tumble to pieces in all parts at the same time. The ...
— Due South or Cuba Past and Present • Maturin M. Ballou
... cold did not make the swamp passable except by the roadway because warm springs here and there prevented the ice from freezing sufficiently strong to bear the troops. The German gunners noted too that their shots fell practically without effect, plunging quietly into ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume V (of 12) - Neuve Chapelle, Battle of Ypres, Przemysl, Mazurian Lakes • Francis J. Reynolds, Allen L. Churchill, and Francis Trevelyan
... willing. He realized that he was busy most of the time, writing. He was not much of a companion except at the table. So Dorothy wrote to her friend, who was in Los Angeles and had already planned to drive East when the roads became passable. ...
— Jim Waring of Sonora-Town - Tang of Life • Knibbs, Henry Herbert
... (not being able to sleep) I composed a couplet, as my first essay in poetry. It was passable; better, or at least composed with more taste than it would have been the preceding night, the subject being tenderness, to which my heart was now entirely disposed. In the morning I showed my performance to Venture, who, being pleased with the ...
— The Confessions of J. J. Rousseau, Complete • Jean Jacques Rousseau
... through the swamp going right by the hummock on which the old man's farm was situated. She knew there was a corduroy road most of the way—that is, a road built of logs laid side by side directly over the miry ground. Save in very wet weather this road was passable for most vehicles. ...
— Nan Sherwood at Pine Camp - or, The Old Lumberman's Secret • Annie Roe Carr
... departed, giving Ma a pinch of yellow powder, saying, "In case you are ill after we are separated, this will cure you." Next day, sure enough, a go-between did come, and Ma at once asked what the proposed bride was like; to which the former replied that she was very passable-looking. Four or five ounces of silver was fixed as the marriage present, Ma making no difficulty on that score, but declaring he must have a peep at the young lady. [41] The go-between said she was a respectable girl, and would never allow herself to be seen; however, it was arranged that ...
— Myths and Legends of China • E. T. C. Werner
... triangles with an incurved hypotenuse and two straight sides of 3 feet) can easily be contrived to round off corners and salient angles. These blocks can be bored to take trees, etc., exactly as the boards in Little Wars are bored, and with them a very passable model of any particular country can be built up from a contoured Ordnance map. Houses may be made very cheaply by shaping a long piece of wood into a house-like section and sawing it up. There will always ...
— Little Wars; a game for boys from twelve years of age to one hundred and fifty and for that more intelligent sort of girl who likes boys' games and books • H. G. Wells
... death, La Salle?" said a voice in good and even polished French; and La Salle, turning, found that Regnar stood beside him. An air of education which he had never noticed before seemed to pervade this youth, who spoke English almost execrably, and had shown little more than a passable knowledge of the coast of Labrador, and a keen insight into all the varied craft ...
— Adrift in the Ice-Fields • Charles W. Hall
... any certainty, it behoves us not to go beyond what we really know. I am beginning to have a passable acquaintance with insects, after spending some forty years in their company. Let us question the insect, then: not the first that comes along, but the most gifted, the Hymenopteron. I am giving my opponents ...
— The Mason-bees • J. Henri Fabre
... nets, surmount the dams and fishways, escape the poachers, and succeed in depositing their eggs under conditions favorable to their development. The dam at Bangor, while certainly a formidable obstruction to the passage of fish, is probably passable at high water. It is provided with a fishway, and some fish are known to surmount the dam by this means. Above Bangor, in the main river, there are dams at Great Works and Montague, the dam at Montague being an especially serious obstruction, ...
— The Salmon Fishery of Penobscot Bay and River in 1895-96 • Hugh M. Smith
... rather than pretty: a soft peachy skin neither dark nor fair, with a creamy tint; deep lustrous hazel eyes, that seemed to change with her moods; hair that had barely shaken off the golden tint, and clustered in rings about the low broad forehead; a passable nose of no particular design, but a really beautiful mouth and chin, the latter dimpled, the former with a short curved upper lip, displaying the pearly teeth at the faintest smile; barely medium height, with a figure that was slim yet not thin, rounded, graceful, pliant, ...
— Hope Mills - or Between Friend and Sweetheart • Amanda M. Douglas
... make a sad mess of our simplest English names, but their Greek must be Greek indeed! A Quarterly Reviewer observes that Miss Mitford has found it difficult to make the maurandias and alstraemerias and eschxholtzias—the commonest flowers of our modern garden—look passable even in prose. But what are these, he asks, to the pollopostemonopetalae and eleutheroromacrostemones of Wachendorf, with such daily additions as the native name of iztactepotzacuxochitl icohueyo, or the more ...
— Flowers and Flower-Gardens • David Lester Richardson
... two letters are is a matter of taste,—how impossible, a matter of knowledge; but we submit that any man with a passable degree of either taste or knowledge is able to decide, and will decide that No. 6 is not more impossible than No. 1, or No. 4 more monstrous than No. 2; while in Nos. 1, 2, 3, and 4, there is exhibited ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, No. 47, September, 1861 • Various
... there!" The German slipped into the real owner's place. So far as appearances went, he was a very passable sweetmeat and lemonade seller, and Ranjoor Singh proved competent ...
— Winds of the World • Talbot Mundy |
