"Acuteness" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... Heliconidae, and along with them species of Leptalis (Pieridae), which had varied in the same way so as still to be exact imitations. But this process of imitation would be subject to check by the increasing acuteness of birds and other animals which, whenever the eatable Leptalis became numerous, would surely find them out, and would then probably attack both these and their friends the Heliconidae in order to devour the former and reject the latter. The Pieridae ...
— Darwinism (1889) • Alfred Russel Wallace
... not see that he really hid it, papa. He shut the note in a book lying openly on the table,—a dictionary, to which any one in the household was likely to go. You think Mr. Taggett a person of great acuteness." ...
— The Stillwater Tragedy • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... forest closed about him again. The beast he was trailing had paused here, had moved roundabout as though seeking the direction he required. Ralph followed the creature's movements, understanding with the acuteness of his ...
— In the Brooding Wild • Ridgwell Cullum
... English; but here was one who held his own with them in speculative discussion, speaking not only with the eloquence of a poet, but with the readiness, clearness, and fluency of a man of letters. His pure English diction astonished them, but his acuteness of reasoning, his intuitive knowledge of men and the world, was altogether beyond their comprehension. All they had got by years of laborious study this man appeared to have as a natural gift. In repartee, even, he could more than hold ...
— Robert Burns - Famous Scots Series • Gabriel Setoun
... idea of the entire plot of the Three Mousquetaires, which is, in fact, less a tale with a regular intrigue and denouement, than a narrative of adventures and incidents, extending over a period of nearly three years. D'Artagnan, whose enterprising character and Gascon acuteness qualify him admirably to take a part in the court intrigues of the time, soon finds himself almost at open war with the Cardinal, and engaged in serving the interests of Louis the Thirteenth's unhappy queen, Anne of Austria, who, by rejecting the suit of the ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 57, No. 351, January 1845 • Various
... another, like the articles of a bill of lading; but the cold and systematic gallantry of a Frenchman is not so scrupulous.—The officer, however, who is employed for this purpose here, is civil, and I suspected the infinity of my nose, and the acuteness of Mad. de 's chin, might have disconcerted him; but he extricated himself very decently. My nose is enrolled in the order of aquilines, and the old lady's chin pared off to a "menton un peu pointu."—[A ...
— A Residence in France During the Years 1792, 1793, 1794 and 1795, • An English Lady
... pipe and smiled, and I was surprised to see that he really was bringing his mind to bear on the trivial problem with all the acuteness he had in him. ...
— The Mystery of the Green Ray • William Le Queux
... nervous, bustling man, with an expression of acuteness, and a trick of rubbing his head with a circular motion, as if he were trying to effect a tonsure by force of friction. He nodded a recognition of Wilder and his men, and sent a look of surprise at Von Rittenheim, whose appearance was not what was usual in the prisoners ...
— A Tar-Heel Baron • Mabell Shippie Clarke Pelton
... Williams, whether educated or not, they had a man of no ordinary acuteness to deal with; they realised that, though apparently free as air to act as they pleased, an unceasing watch was being kept upon them, and they felt that henceforth they must not place any dependence upon the hope of help from without. They all, therefore, ...
— The Missing Merchantman • Harry Collingwood
... can be easily determined by means of an "acoumeter." This little instrument measures the acuteness of the hearing very accurately by means of shot dropped from varying heights upon strips of glass, copper and cardboard. Tests with this device indicate whether the subject's hearing is above or ...
— Initiative Psychic Energy • Warren Hilton
... Greenleaf, Kent, Story, and Parsons, are quoted in the English as in the American courts, as authorities worthy of respect and trust. In the domain of searching literary criticism, England has perhaps produced no author since the days of Gifford and Jeffrey superior in learning, acuteness, and grace to Edwin ...
— The Nation in a Nutshell • George Makepeace Towle
... listened, and observed with his usual acuteness, interrupted the farce at that moment by springing to the boat, and placing his fore paws in it, he gently seized the blanket in his mouth, and pulled it from her unresisting shoulders. A bark of pleasure ...
— The Rivals of Acadia - An Old Story of the New World • Harriet Vaughan Cheney
... was defenseless and inert, but all of him beyond the flesh was galvanized into quicksilver acuteness and determination. He was praying for a reprieve of life sufficient to call this Judas friend to an accounting—and if that failed, for strength enough to die with his denunciation spoken. Yet he realized ...
— The Roof Tree • Charles Neville Buck
... faint cry, Marie had thrown herself between them; but strength failed with the effort, and she would have fallen had not Morales upheld her with his left arm. But she had not fainted; every sense felt wrung into unnatural acuteness Except to support her, Morales had made no movement; his tall figure was raised to its fullest height, and his right arm calmly uplifted as his sole protection against Arthur. "Put up your sword," he said ...
— The Vale of Cedars • Grace Aguilar
... first place, Segrais observes with much acuteness that they who blame AEneas for his insensibility of love when he left Carthage, contradict their former accusation of him for being always crying, compassionate, and effeminately sensible of those misfortunes which befell others. They give him two contrary characters; but Virgil makes ...
— Discourses on Satire and Epic Poetry • John Dryden
... vehement protestations of the ship's captain, he stamped his foot and tapped the handle of his sword. "Aha! I have unmasked you," he cried, triumphantly. "You are tearing your hair from despair at my acuteness. Am I a child to believe that a light in that brass box can show you where the harbour is? I am an old soldier, I am. I can smell a traitor a league off. You wanted that gleam to betray our approach to your friend the Englishman. A thing like that show you the way! What a miserable lie! Que picardia! ...
— Nostromo: A Tale of the Seaboard • Joseph Conrad
... turbulent breast's burden to deliver, Mrs. Marsett's feminine acuteness was alive upon Dartrey, confirming here and there Nesta's praises of him. She liked his build and easy carriage of a muscular frame: her Ned was a heavy man. More than Dartrey's figure, as she would have said, though the estimate came second, she liked his manner with her. Not a doubt was there, ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... one of the most prevalent and most dangerous errors, for these Introductions or Explanations, easily-comprehended Treatises, Summary Abstracts, are, because of their want of originality and of the acuteness which belongs to it, much more difficult to understand than the standard work itself from which they drain their supplies. Education must train the youth to the courage which will attempt standard ...
— Pedagogics as a System • Karl Rosenkranz
... Marchesa from the consequences of her deed. All Italy is ringing with your quixotic, your chivalrous, your superb action. Nevertheless, if I had quitted the Duchess' apartment, if my natural and trained acuteness had not made one last effort respecting the screen, I do not think you would have followed me into the garden to ...
— Prisoners - Fast Bound In Misery And Iron • Mary Cholmondeley
... likable young man and seemed smart and intelligent. From the very first he had shown great acuteness in observing the tracks which Mathias had left behind him, the evening before, on returning home, tracks which soon became confused with the footprints made in going and coming by the farm-labourer and the woman. Meanwhile they came to the walls of a property ...
— The Eight Strokes of the Clock • Maurice Leblanc
... circumstances which were not created by me,—and which it is possible for a faithful servant of your Majesty to regret! But a betrayer of trust I have never been, and I beseech your Majesty to believe me when I say that the acuteness of that undeserved reproach cuts me to the heart! I yield to no man in the respect and affection I entertain for your Royal person, not even to De Launay ...
— Temporal Power • Marie Corelli
... I am speaking in extreme figures, in superlatives. I wish I knew some other way to render the mental life of the immigrant child of reasoning age. I may have been ever so much an exception in acuteness of observation, powers of comparison, and abnormal self-consciousness; none the less were my thoughts and conduct typical of the attitude of the intelligent immigrant child toward American institutions. And what the child thinks and feels is a reflection of the ...
— Modern Prose And Poetry; For Secondary Schools - Edited With Notes, Study Helps, And Reading Lists • Various
... on account of this end of the stables." And she added, with an acuteness which surprised Razumov, "But anybody looking out of an upstairs window would know that you have not passed through ...
— Under Western Eyes • Joseph Conrad
... living now; but their children and grandchildren may be living, to whom these reminiscences will, doubtless, be pleasant. Reflections like these instinctively impress us with a consciousness of time's rapid flight; and make us, who were young then, realize, with more or less acuteness of perception, the impressive truth that we, too, are growing old. To such of my readers as find no pleasure or profit in things of this kind I gently say: Pass over it as you would an advertisement ...
— Life and Labors of Elder John Kline, the Martyr Missionary - Collated from his Diary by Benjamin Funk • John Kline
... for utterance,—his voice was gone! ... his lips were moveless as the lips of a stone image! Stricken absolutely mute, but with his sense of hearing quickened to an almost painful acuteness, he stood erect and motionless,—rage and fear contending in his heart, enduring the torture of a truly terrific mystery of mind-despair, . . forced, in spite of himself, to listen passively ...
— Ardath - The Story of a Dead Self • Marie Corelli
... tone, he delivered himself of a very delicate critical analysis of Catherine Elsmere's temperament and position, as in the course of several months his intimacy with her husband had revealed them to him. He did it well, with acuteness and philosophical relish. The situation presented itself to him as an extremely refined and yet tragic phase of the religious difficulty, and it gave him intellectual pleasure to ...
— Robert Elsmere • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... again, with rapid and practised acuteness, ran over all the circumstances in his mind; and his conclusion, unavoidable, as he felt it, was that the Marchese must have done the deed. That the criminal authorities would come to the same conclusion he could ...
— A Siren • Thomas Adolphus Trollope
... might seem to have taught him, not the excellence of a more temperate spirit, but the desirability of rushing toward similar extremes in an opposite direction. He delighted in controversy in proportion to its heat, and too often his pen was dipped in gall, when he directed the acuteness and learning which none denied to him against any who swerved, this way or that, from the narrow path of dogma and discipline which had been marked with his own approval. Tillotson was 'an atheist,'[45] freethinkers were 'the first-born sons of Satan,' the Established Church was 'fallen ...
— The English Church in the Eighteenth Century • Charles J. Abbey and John H. Overton
... the acuteness of my suffering was of short duration, though I remember certain sharp twinges when the announcement of the engagement burst on the city. There was much controversy over the question as to whether or not Ham Durrett's reform would be permanent; but most ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... already I begin to notice that you may pretty well count on reaching the danger point (produced by alien autos) at precisely the right instant, never the wrong one, and this gives you a beautiful confidence in your luck and your driver: although the real secret must lie in the acuteness of your guardian angel or patron saint. Vedder, who when young was a champion boxer, is very superstitious, and Mr. Somerled allows him a large gold medal of St. Christopher on the dashboard. St. Christopher, it seems, has undertaken the spiritual care of motor-cars, ...
— The Heather-Moon • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... laws, social habits, their religion, science, and arts, in short, with all that make up the elements of civilization. Ondegardo's memoirs, therefore, cover the whole ground of inquiry for the philosophic historian. In the management of these various subjects, Ondegardo displays both acuteness and erudition. He never shrinks from the discussion, however difficult; and while he gives his conclusions with an air of modesty, it is evident that he feels conscious of having derived his information through the ...
— The History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William H. Prescott
... return journey, was made to serve Miss Boyson's gift for monopoly. She took possession of him in a business-like way, inquiring into his engagements in Washington, his particular friends, his opinion of the place and the people, with a light-handed acuteness which was more than a match for the Englishman's instincts of defence. The General did not mean to give himself away; he intended, indeed, precisely the contrary; but, after every round of conversation ...
— Marriage a la mode • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... the interviews with the Monsignor and Anne did justice to her acuteness. The priest alone knew the true personality of Arthur. From Anne all but the fact of his disappearance had been kept, probably to guard against just such attempts as Curran's. The detective reminded her that her theory stood only because of her method of selection from his investigations. ...
— The Art of Disappearing • John Talbot Smith
... assuredly proves that it never decayed. They are almost all of them noble figures, too,—affectionate, frank, brave, high-spirited, 'of an open and free nature' like Shakespeare's best men. And almost all of them, again, are amusing and charming as well as pathetic; comical in their mingled acuteness and naivete, charming in their confidence in themselves and the world, and in the seriousness with which they receive the jocosity of their elders, who commonly address them as strong men, ...
— Shakespearean Tragedy - Lectures on Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, Macbeth • A. C. Bradley
... should be a witness of her humiliation; and accordingly he rang the bell, and ordered the negro to be sent up. Nero entered the room, and observing the triumphant chuckle of the Dead Man, and the dejected look of his mistress, with his natural acuteness instantly comprehended the true state of affairs. The contempt with which Julia had treated him was still fresh in his memory, and led him to view that lady with hatred; he therefore determined to add to her chagrin and hatred on the present occasion, ...
— City Crimes - or Life in New York and Boston • Greenhorn
... "The acuteness of animal senses has its drawbacks. These dogs must have heard some sound in the street that is entirely inaudible to us. Well, Rupert, what is it? Lie down again ...
— Flames • Robert Smythe Hichens
... pathos, its tragedy, and its gratification for Lane. He saw clearly, and felt with the acuteness of a woman. Helen had jilted him for such young men as these. So in the feeling of the moment it cost him nothing to thrill and fascinate these girls with the story of how he had been shot through the leg. It pleased him to see Helen's green eyes dilate, to see Bessy Bell shudder. Presently Lane ...
— The Day of the Beast • Zane Grey
... respect to our own times. As a contribution to the History of Art, his work is unquestionably the most valuable which has yet appeared in England. His research has been unwearied; he has availed himself of the best results of German investigation—his own acuteness of discernment in cases of approximating or derivative style is considerable—and he has set before the English reader an outline of the relations of the primitive schools of Sacred art which we think so thoroughly verified in all its more important ramifications, ...
— On the Old Road Vol. 1 (of 2) - A Collection of Miscellaneous Essays and Articles on Art and Literature • John Ruskin
... Tyler's work on the sonnets ranks higher than that of Coleridge on the plays. I do not mean to say that it is on the same intellectual level with the work of Coleridge, though it shows wide reading, astonishing acuteness, and much skill in the marshalling of argument. But Mr. Tyler had the good fortune to be the first to give to the personages of the sonnets a local habitation and a name, and that unique achievement puts him in a place ...
— The Man Shakespeare • Frank Harris
... and their practice was correspondent to the dogmatic positions they had laid down. The Empire and the Papacy it was their great object to destroy; and this, now openly avowed and steadfastly acted upon, might have been discerned with very little acuteness of sight, from the very first dawnings of the Revolution, to be the main drift of their policy: for they professed a resolution to destroy everything which can hold states together by the ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. V. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... common life. Isabella pined in state, amidst the obsequious homages of a court, surrounded by the trophies of a glorious and successful reign, and placed at the summit of earthly grandeur. A deep and incurable melancholy settled upon her, which undermined her constitution, and gave a fatal acuteness to her bodily maladies. After four months of illness, she died on the 2eth of November, 1504, at Medina del Campo, in the fifty-fourth year of her age; but long before her eyes closed upon the world, her heart ...
— The Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus (Vol. II) • Washington Irving
... Vienna, the Bohemians carry off the palm for acuteness and ingenuity. The relation of Bohemia to the Austrian empire has some resemblance to that of Scotland to the colonies of Britain, in the supply of mariners to the vessel of state. The population of Bohemia ...
— Servia, Youngest Member of the European Family • Andrew Archibald Paton
... castrated and sold to some Roman merchants, and by them conducted to the palace of Constantine, where, while growing up to manhood, he began to display good principles and good talents, becoming accomplished in literature to a degree quite sufficient for his fortune, displaying extraordinary acuteness in discovering matters of a doubtful and difficult complexion; being remarkable also for a marvellous memory, always eager to do good, and full of wise and honest counsel. A man, in short, who, if the Emperor Constantius ...
— The Roman History of Ammianus Marcellinus • Ammianus Marcellinus
... maid," and possessed exactly of the courteous manners ascribed by our father Chaucer to the pattern of chivalry whom he describes upon his pilgrimage to Canterbury. But with all his gentleness, De Valence showed a great degree of acuteness and accuracy in his queries; and well pleased was Bertram that the young knight did not insist upon seeing his supposed son, although even in that case his ready wit had resolved, like a seaman in ...
— Waverley Volume XII • Sir Walter Scott
... unnatural sensations. Some of these, as he detailed them, interested and bewildered me; although, perhaps, the terms, and the general manner of the narration had their weight. He suffered much from a morbid acuteness of the senses; the most insipid food was alone endurable; he could wear only garments of certain texture; the odors of all flowers were oppressive; his eyes were tortured by even a faint light; and there were but peculiar sounds, and these from ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 2 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... at Madame Steno's, and just the one whom the intolerable marquis had defamed with so much ardor, the father of beautiful Fanny Hafner, Baron Justus himself. The renowned founder of the 'Credit Austro-Dalmate' was a small, thin man, with blue eyes of an acuteness almost insupportable, in a face of neutral color. His ever-courteous manner, his attire, simple and neat, his speech serious and discreet, gave to him that species of distinction so common to old diplomatists. But the dangerous adventurer was betrayed by the glance which Hafner could ...
— Cosmopolis, Complete • Paul Bourget
... Autobiography, published in 1810 in two volumes 8vo. The subject is a curious and interesting one; but, from my perusal of the tract, I should scarcely say that Huet has treated it very successfully, or that the book is at all worthy of his learning or acuteness. ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 183, April 30, 1853 • Various
... seated outside of a flower is rarely utilised as a means for cross-fertilisation by the aid of insects; but this occurs with the bracteae of the Marcgraviaceae, as the late Dr. Cruger informed me from actual observation in the West Indies, and as Delpino infers with much acuteness from the relative position of the several parts of their flowers. (10/51. 'Ult. Osservaz. Dicogamia' 1868-69 page 188.) Mr. Farrer has also shown that the flowers of Coronilla are curiously modified, so that bees may fertilise them whilst ...
— The Effects of Cross & Self-Fertilisation in the Vegetable Kingdom • Charles Darwin
... dignity as a married woman, and the reality of her grief, revolted against the shallow acuteness of the schoolgirl. But she found herself no better able to resist Agatha's domineering than she had been in her childhood, and much more desirous of obtaining her sympathy. Besides, she had already learnt to tell the story herself rather than leave its narration to others, ...
— An Unsocial Socialist • George Bernard Shaw
... Cavity, who had acted as agent for Westmacott, and who,—if anybody on the Westmacott side had been so guilty,—had been guilty in the matter of Glump's absence. Perhaps we should not do justice to Mr. Joram's acuteness were we to imagine him as believing that Glump was absent under other influence than that used on behalf of the conservative side; but there were subsidiary points on which Mr. Cavity might be made to tell tales. Of course there had been extensive bribery for years past ...
— Ralph the Heir • Anthony Trollope
... not require much acuteness," replied I, taking the flowers, and though I could not help admiring their beauty, and feeling grateful for the attention, a shade of regret clouded their welcome; "I have so few friends it is easy to conjecture who thus administers to ...
— Ernest Linwood - or, The Inner Life of the Author • Caroline Lee Hentz
... character is an impossible being; but the interest is kept up to the end,—it has many most impressive scenes,—it abounds with shrewd and sound observations upon life, manners, and politics,—and all the legal portion is stamped with an acuteness and fidelity to truth which no professional reader can ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 09, No. 51, January, 1862 • Various
... what did this mean? Why, by any one of ordinary acuteness the matter was easily understood, but, to tell the truth, Kristian Koppig was a trifle dull, and got the idea at once that some damage was being planned against 'Tite Poulette. It made the gentle Dutchman miserable not to be minding his own ...
— Old Creole Days • George Washington Cable
... laryngology, otology, gynecology, neurology, dermatology, embryology, obstetrics, dietetics, urinary and venereal diseases, therapeutics, toxicology, operative surgery, cosmetics and even the hygiene of travel and the prevention of sea-sickness. Some of these subjects too are discussed with an acuteness and a common sense quite unexpected. Of course, scholastic speculations, superstition, charms, polypharmacy and the use of popular and disgusting remedies are not wanting. Even the mind of a philosopher like Roger Bacon was unable to rise entirely above the ...
— Gilbertus Anglicus - Medicine of the Thirteenth Century • Henry Ebenezer Handerson
... acquainted with the race, has remarked their intense keenness of vision. Their eyes, for acuteness, and capability of discerning distant objects, resemble those of the eagle or the lynx; and their cat-like tread among the grass and leaves, seems so light as scarcely to shake off the dew drops. Thus they advance on ...
— The First White Man of the West • Timothy Flint
... the fallacy was far from easy to detect, the failure by no means obvious, since in many, perhaps in most cases, the desired event did actually follow, at a longer or shorter interval, the performance of the rite which was designed to bring it about; and a mind of more than common acuteness was needed to perceive that, even in these cases, the rite was not necessarily the cause of the event. A ceremony intended to make the wind blow or the rain fall, or to work the death of an enemy, will always be followed, sooner or later, ...
— The Golden Bough - A study of magic and religion • Sir James George Frazer
... and on the country display great acuteness of observation, and had the settlers displayed the same spirit of fair treatment and respect for the customs of the natives, much of the bloody warfare that has stained the annals of the Colony might have been averted; though it is scarcely possible that with such a high-spirited ...
— Captain Cook's Journal During the First Voyage Round the World • James Cook
... certain mystery in the philosophy of clothes too deep for me to fathom. The matter has been descanted upon before; the "Havamal, or High Song of Odin," the Essays of Montaigne, the "Sartor" of Thomas Carlyle, all dwell with acuteness upon this topic; but they merely give instances, they do not interpret. I am continually meeting with things in my intercourse with the world which I cannot reconcile with any theories society professes to be governed by. How shall I ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 104, June, 1866 • Various
... truth, the gusto for life, and the love of earth, which we see in Keeling's letters and Barbellion's diary. All is shown in these two books in an exceptional degree, and, in Barbellion's diary, is expressed with a remarkable wit and acuteness, and not seldom, as in the description of a quarry, of a Beethoven Symphony, of a rock-pool of the Devon coast, with a beauty ...
— Waiting for Daylight • Henry Major Tomlinson
... store stood always open, it was standing so seven miles away at the moment of the case; and when his cattle strayed, they were duly impounded and restored to him on payment of one shilling. But recently a gentleman of great acuteness and a thousand imperfect talents had married into the family of a neighbouring proprietor; consecutively on which event the store-keeper's cattle began to be detained and starved, the fine rose to half ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 18 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... announces with pomp, as if exulting in the powers of an extraordinary telescope) his friend Mr Fledgeby, if he will permit him to call him so. For all of these reasons, and many more which he right well knows will have occurred to persons of your exceptional acuteness, he is here to submit to you that the time has arrived when, with our hearts in our glasses, with tears in our eyes, with blessings on our lips, and in a general way with a profusion of gammon and spinach in our emotional larders, ...
— Our Mutual Friend • Charles Dickens
... but not least— with the odd, subjective disturbance caused by his neighbourhood. This bore some resemblance to incipient rigour, and was accompanied by a marked sinking of the pulse. At the time, I set it down to some idiosyncratic, personal distaste, and merely wondered at the acuteness of the symptoms; but I have since had reason to believe the cause to lie much deeper in the nature of man, and to turn on some nobler hinge than the ...
— Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde • ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON
... the dryness of the method and the barrenness of the system which revolted Erasmus. It was also the qualities of his own mind, which, in spite of all its breadth and acuteness, did not tend to penetrate deeply into philosophical or dogmatic speculations. For it was not only scholasticism that repelled him; the youthful Platonism and the rejuvenated Aristotelianism taught by ...
— Erasmus and the Age of Reformation • Johan Huizinga
... prejudice, than the errors into which some of our ablest contemporary scholars have fallen by reason of their not having studied Paine. Professor Huxley, for instance, speaking of the freethinkers of the eighteenth century, admires the acuteness, common sense, wit, and the broad humanity of the best of them, but says "there is rarely much to be said for their work as an example of the adequate treatment of a grave and difficult investigation," ...
— The Writings Of Thomas Paine, Complete - With Index to Volumes I - IV • Thomas Paine
... penniless gambler, that, had he money to stake, he should infallibly make a fortune; predicting what colour would come out, and indulging, when he proved a true prophet, in a little subdued blasphemy because he was unable to profit by his acuteness. ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 62, No. 384, October 1847 • Various
... not know who had authorised the movements of the troops; their idea was that a dispute had arisen at the Horse Guards. The ordinary sapper is a great deal better educated than the common soldier, and they discussed the peculiar conditions of the possible fight with some acuteness. I described the Heat-Ray to them, and they ...
— The War of the Worlds • H. G. Wells
... not know, but that they do read a stranger at first sight is indisputable. That he found out Cornelius O'Dowd wasn't a member of the British Cabinet, or a junior partner in Baring's, was, you may sneeringly conjecture, no remarkable evidence of acuteness. But why should he discover the fact—fact it is—that he'd never be one penny the richer by knowing me, and that intercourse with me was about as profitable as playing a match ...
— Cornelius O'Dowd Upon Men And Women And Other Things In General - Originally Published In Blackwood's Magazine - 1864 • Charles Lever
... requires little acuteness to see that some communities of men are miserable exponents of the social will. They are deplorably governed. Read Slatin's fascinating book, "Fire and Sword in the Soudan,"—it is better than any novel,—and ask yourself what becomes of the social will ...
— A Handbook of Ethical Theory • George Stuart Fullerton
... the pursuit of their daring plans of annoyance, the restless enterprise of the French even attempted the distant and difficult gorges of the Alleghany, it may easily be imagined that their proverbial acuteness would not overlook the natural advantages of the district we have just described. It became, emphatically, the bloody arena, in which most of the battles for the mastery of the colonies were contested. Forts were erected at the different points that ...
— The Last of the Mohicans • James Fenimore Cooper
... expressions of mutual regret, and when I left him I felt a deliverance, but at the same time a certain consciousness that I was not thus to get free of him, but that he was like to be an acquaintance that was to stick to me for good or for evil. I was astonished at his acuteness and knowledge about everything; but, as for his likeness to me, that was quite unaccountable. He was the same person in every respect, but yet he was not always so; for I observed several times, when we were speaking of certain divines and their tenets, ...
— The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner • James Hogg
... the street again and there seemed something unreal in the broad pavement, the frowning houses, the glow of the gas lamps. The harmless little key burned his flesh. All the passionate acuteness of life seemed throbbing again in his veins. He retraced his steps, making no plans, obeying only an ungovernable instinct. The street was empty. He thrust the key into the lock, opened the door, replaced the key under the scraper, entered ...
— Nobody's Man • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... were, a god in the midst of this visible creation; so far doth he surpass, whether in the endowments of soul or body, all animals whatsoever that have been produced therein! For, if the body of the ox had been joined to the mind of man, the acuteness of the latter would have stood him in small stead, while unable to execute the well-designed plan; nor would the human form have been of more use to the brute, so long as it remained destitute of understanding! But in thee, Aristodemus, hath been ...
— Museum of Antiquity - A Description of Ancient Life • L. W. Yaggy
... 'I did not then know how to manage it.' His distress became so intolerable, that he applied to Dr. Swinfen, physician in Lichfield, his god-father, and put into his hands a state of his case, written in Latin. Dr. Swinfen was so much struck with the extraordinary acuteness, research, and eloquence of this paper, that in his zeal for his godson he shewed it to several people. His daughter, Mrs. Desmoulins, who was many years humanely supported in Dr. Johnson's house in London, told me, that upon his discovering that Dr. Swinfen had ...
— Life of Johnson - Abridged and Edited, with an Introduction by Charles Grosvenor Osgood • James Boswell
... in her deepened eyes and the lines about her mouth—damages done by the hurricane, that years of calm can never repair; but there had been a page or two in Lady Scapegrace's life that, with all his acuteness, would have astonished Lavater himself. Then there was Miss Molasses, the pink of propriety and "what-would-mamma-say" young ladyism—cold as a statue, and, as old Chaucer says, "upright as a bolt," but all the time over head and ears in love with Frank Lovell, and ...
— Kate Coventry - An Autobiography • G. J. Whyte-Melville
... Newman was willing to be taxed for this purpose, largely, in proportion to his means. Moreover, many of the common traditions with regard to women were with him fresh personal impressions; he had never read a novel! He had been struck with their acuteness, their subtlety, their tact, their felicity of judgment. They seemed to him exquisitely organized. If it is true that one must always have in one's work here below a religion, or at least an ideal, of some sort, Newman found his metaphysical inspiration in a vague acceptance of final ...
— The American • Henry James
... of truth in the remark. Its acuteness surprised Hermione, who thought the Marchesino quick witted but ...
— A Spirit in Prison • Robert Hichens
... Lockhart gives a delightful account of his first visit to Walter Scott in Castle Street—his first visit, mind you. He is shown into the drawing-room and finds Mrs. Scott, disposed, a la Madame Recamier, on a sofa. His acuteness comes to the aid of his bewilderment, and he is quick to extend himself in similar fashion upon the opposite sofa. In the dining-room he was much more at his ease. Before the end of the meal he had his host as "Wattie" and his hostess as "Charlotte." ...
— In a Green Shade - A Country Commentary • Maurice Hewlett
... alone, I have loved many women, but never a woman just like you. Your coldness, your haughty reserve, your refinement would intimidate most men and keep them at a distance, but not me. Your aloofness, your indifference only spurs me, only adds to the acuteness of my desire. I swore to myself that I would conquer you, overcome your resistance, bend you to my will. You turned me out of your home. I swore to ...
— The Mask - A Story of Love and Adventure • Arthur Hornblow
... —reads books, old and new,—has many recent publications sent him, they tell me, but, what is more curious, keeps up with the everyday affairs of the world, too. Whether he hears everything that is said with preternatural acuteness, or whether some confidential friend visits him in a quiet way, is more than I can tell. I can make nothing more of the noises I hear in his room than my old conjectures. The movements I mention are less frequent, but I often hear the plaintive cry,—I observe that it is rarely ...
— The Professor at the Breakfast Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes (Sr.)
... also a Book called The Presbyterian Bramble; with several other Pieces, in Defence of the King and the Church. Now to shew you the Acuteness of his Wit, I will give you an Instance: The first year that Poor Robin's Almanack came forth (about Six and Twenty Years ago) there was cut for it a Brass Plate; having on one side of it the Pictures of King Charles the First, the Earl of Stafford, the Arch-Bishop of ...
— The Lives of the Most Famous English Poets (1687) • William Winstanley
... matter of good spirits. Scarcely anything could interfere with the judge's cheerfulness, while Boswell was always falling into depressions about nothing in particular and perhaps indulging in the "foolish notion," rebuked by Johnson, that "melancholy is a proof of acuteness." But in spite of their differences the father and son managed to avoid anything like a definite breach. Boswell was sincerely anxious to please his father, and was constantly urged in that direction by his great mentor: and after all the judge went some ...
— Dr. Johnson and His Circle • John Bailey
... conversation, when I was rather put out by observing in the passage near the open door, opposite to where I sat, a pair of glittering eyes steadily fixed on mine; it was too dark to make out whom they belonged to. With the acuteness of a woman, Mrs. Williams's eyes followed the direction of mine, and going to the doorway she laughingly said, 'Come in, Shelley, its only our friend Tre just arrived.' Swiftly gliding in, blushing like a girl, a tall, ...
— Percy Bysshe Shelley • John Addington Symonds
... Sydney that she loved him no longer, and in the deadness of emotion which had followed on the first acuteness of her grief for her lost idol, and the physical exhaustion caused by her late illness, she had thought she spoke the truth. But, after all, what was this yearning over him, in spite of all his errors, but love? what this continual thought of him, this aching sense of loss, even this intense desire ...
— Name and Fame - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... so I tell you plainly, that you are turning into the wrong road. You have been listening to some mischievous stranger or other - they're always about - and the best thing you can do is, to come out of that. Now you know;' here his countenance expressed marvellous acuteness; 'I can see as far into a grindstone as another man; farther than a good many, perhaps, because I had my nose well kept to it when I was young. I see traces of the turtle soup, and venison, and gold spoon in this. Yes, I do!' cried Mr. Bounderby, shaking his head with obstinate cunning. ...
— Hard Times • Charles Dickens*
... not spoken with M. de Crillon's usual acuteness," replied the baroness. "Isidore is more likely in his anger and disappointment to betake himself anywhere else than to Beaujardin, and in any case you know that he is now married, and ...
— The King's Warrant - A Story of Old and New France • Alfred H. Engelbach
... very acuteness of apprehension induces a caution in not resenting the assaults of wit, unless the wounded can retort with success by a similar weapon, or that the attack has been so obvious that he is justified in resenting it by a less poetical one. Hence arises a difficult position for ...
— The Idler in France • Marguerite Gardiner
... first admired. He was emphatically the man of the people, easy of access, social in his habits, free in his intercourse, without reserve or haughtiness, generous, magnanimous, and conciliatory. He was unsurpassed for logical acuteness, and for bursts of overpowering passion. He reached high political station, although his habits were such as destroyed, in many respects, the respect of those great men with whom he ...
— A Modern History, From the Time of Luther to the Fall of Napoleon - For the Use of Schools and Colleges • John Lord
... of the learned, and knew how to speak a word in season. The subject-matter of his Sermons is mostly practical, and yet rational and argumentive, fit to inform the understanding of his hearers, and move their affections and when controversies come in his way, he shows great acuteness and judgment in discussing and determining them, and no less skill in applying them to practice. His discourses are so solid and substantial, so heavenly and sublime, that they not only feed but feast the reader, as with ...
— The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning • Hugh Binning
... poor consolation. In this state of mind I arrived at Avignon, which under a bright, hard winter sun was tingling—fairly spinning—with the mistral. I find in my journal of the other day a reference to the acuteness of my reluctance in January 1870. France, after Italy, appeared in the language of the latter country poco simpatica; and I thought it necessary, for reasons now inconceivable, to read the Figaro, which was filled with descriptions of the horrible ...
— A Little Tour in France • Henry James
... acuteness was indescribable. Yet the man remained a strangely sympathetic creature. Benevolence radiated from him ridiculously, mildly, impressively. It was irritating, too. But I pointed out coldly, as one who deals with the incomprehensible, that I didn't see any reason ...
— The Shadow-Line - A Confession • Joseph Conrad
... recipe for his favorite fluid, and slides by gentle gradations into an examination of the sublimest doctrines of Plato. To show how far a man of honesty and benevolence, and with a mind of singular acuteness and depth, may be run away with by a favorite notion on a subject which his habits and education do not fit him to investigate, I shall give a short account of this Essay, merely stating that as all the supposed virtues of Tar Water, made public in successive editions ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... The acuteness and the significance of the Captain's eye as he cocked it in reply, no words short of those unutterable Chinese words before referred to ...
— Dombey and Son • Charles Dickens
... cause of every sound without, distinguishing with the marvellous acuteness of senses excited to the highest pitch by passion, sounds which would have been ...
— The Honor of the Name • Emile Gaboriau
... of this, her eyes suddenly fell upon the one key which she herself possessed, and which, with a woman's acuteness of memory, she perceived to have been moved from the spot on which she had left it. It was the key of the little desk which stood in the corner of the parlour, and in which, on the top of all the papers, was deposited the necklace with ...
— Nina Balatka • Anthony Trollope
... and inward surprise; for while unwilling, through jealousy of an amateur, to flatter the barrister by a visible compliment, yet he silently admitted that Denzil had made his discoveries and profited by them with much acuteness. What annoyed him, however, was that the young man had pushed his inquiries to the uttermost limit; and that there was no chance of any glory accruing to himself by prosecuting them further. Still, on the possibility that something might come of it, he went over the ground already traversed ...
— The Silent House • Fergus Hume
... They followed the advice given them as to their participation in the war. They have played the game to the limit of their resources and to-day stand in a position almost unparalleled in its pathos and acuteness. In front of them, as they struggle with courage and desperation for the small fragment of their kingdom that remains, are the formations of the Turks, Bulgars, Austrians, Hungarians, and Germans, with Mackensen striving to give them a death-blow. Behind ...
— World's War Events, Vol. II • Various
... overshadowed at the time by the yet greater atrocity of the Baron's behavior, now loomed up in formidable proportions. And the gravity of their offence was emphasized by an unpleasant sensation she now began to experience with considerable acuteness. ...
— Count Bunker • J. Storer Clouston
... did not concern him, his way of unmasking her secret thoughts, his powers of seeing round corners, if not through sealed envelopes, but as time went on she grew fond of his honest boy-nature, and learned to laugh at his precocious acuteness. Perhaps with Stephen's departure there were fewer occasions for her to resent the challenge of his intrusive eye. There were, also, alleviations coincident with the school year, for then she was free from his company from the time he slammed the front door, at five minutes to nine, ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 5, June 1905 • Various
... world's ideas and employments. Why should modern painters be afraid of thus venturing into the ideal of colouring? Never was there a greater mistake, than that the common natural can represent the ideal. Wilkie with all his acuteness and good sense was bewildered with a notion of their union, and thought his sketches from the Holy Land would assist him in painting sacred subjects; whereas the truth is, that the very realities before his eyes would unpoeticise his ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, Number 385. November, 1847. • Various
... unable to leave or preferring to run all risks, remained throughout the war. This unhappy remnant constantly looked to the American ministry for aid to subsist and to escape violence. Mr. Hoffman ventures to place the banishment of the Germans, for acuteness if not mass of suffering, by the side of the ejection of the Huguenots and the Moors. This exaggeration serves at least to show the impression it made on ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 20, August 1877 • Various
... a single leaf was to look for buds in the axils, but incautiously drew their attention to the stipules at the base of a rose leaf as a means of knowing that the whole was one. Soon after, they had a locust leaf to describe; and, immediately, with the acuteness that children are apt to develop so inconveniently to their teacher, they triumphantly refuted my statement that it was one leaf, by pointing to the stiples. There was no getting over the difficulty; and although I afterwards explained to them ...
— Outlines of Lessons in Botany, Part I; From Seed to Leaf • Jane H. Newell
... his lordship's style of conversation, and understood his friend at all times. Maulevrier was not an intellectual companion, and the distance was wide between the two men; but his lordship's gaiety, good-nature, and acuteness made amends for all shortcomings in culture. And then Mr. Hammond may have been one of those good Conservatives who do not expect very much intellectual power in an ...
— Phantom Fortune, A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... had added a fourth quarter, the New Town, to his city of Prague, moved thereto by the acuteness of the "Housing Problem," which, by the way, is equally urgent to-day. Prague is again the capital of a free and flourishing State, and is again hard put to it to find room for all those who feel attracted to her. The New Town ...
— From a Terrace in Prague • Lieut.-Col. B. Granville Baker
... and supply the necessities of those, whose modesty would endeavour to conceal them; of which our author was a signal instance, as several others have been, who are now living. In fine the integrity of his life, the acuteness of his wit, and easiness of his conversation, had rendered him most acceptable to all men; yet he prudently avoided a multiplicity of acquaintance, and wisely chose such only whom his discerning judgment could distinguish ...
— Hudibras • Samuel Butler
... well as between North and South. Thus it became the typically American region. Even the New Englander, who was shut out from the frontier by the Middle region, tarrying in New York or Pennsylvania on his westward march, lost the acuteness of his ...
— The Frontier in American History • Frederick Jackson Turner
... detected, resolved to depart; and having taken ship, he repaired, not, as he should have done, to Pisa, but to Naples; where at that time resided our gossip, Pietro dello Canigiano, treasurer of the Empress of Constantinople, a man of great sagacity and acuteness, and a very great friend of Salabaetto and his kinsfolk; to whom trusting in his great discretion, Salabaetto after a while discovered his distress, telling him what he had done, and the sorry plight in ...
— The Decameron, Vol. II. • Giovanni Boccaccio
... vanity of finishing with the encomium of Dr. Johnson, whose friendly partiality to the companion of his Tour represents him as one 'whose acuteness would help my enquiry, and whose gaiety of conversation, and civility of manners, are sufficient to counteract the inconveniences of travel, in countries less hospitable than we have passed[154].' ...
— Life Of Johnson, Volume 5 • Boswell
... no great acuteness to see that a system of control which, in selecting a Professor of Mathematics or Language or Rhetoric or Physics or Chemistry, asked first and above all to what sect or even to what wing or branch of a sect he belonged, ...
— History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom • Andrew Dickson White
... Springfield. You will find it very entertaining and instructive; but perhaps the writer is somewhat too harsh in his judgment of this singular man. He estimates him fairly, indeed, and understands him well; but he unriddles his character rather by acuteness than by sympathy. Now, his life should have been written by one who, knowing all his faults, ...
— Grandfather's Chair • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... a hesitation that did not escape the acuteness of the child. Whether moved only by her ordinary freakishness, or because an evil spirit prompted her, she put up her small forefinger and ...
— The Scarlet Letter • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... Surgeon-General of the Navy respecting the advisability of providing for representation on the part of the United States in any international convention that may be organized for the purpose of establishing uniform standards of measure of color perception and acuteness of vision. ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 2 (of 2) of Volume 8: Chester A. Arthur • James D. Richardson
... wonder at this strange scholar's knowledge of a distant past, evidenced in his familiarity (it was as if he might once have spoken them) with the dead languages in which their text-books are written. There was more surely than the utmost merely natural acuteness in his guesses as to the words intended by those crabbed contractions, of their meaning, in his sense of allusions and the like. An ineffaceable memory it might rather seem of the entire world of which those languages had been the living speech, once more vividly awake under ...
— Miscellaneous Studies: A Series of Essays • Walter Horatio Pater
... because the change of any constitutional rule is impeded by endless difficulties. The vigour which is wanting to Congress, is indeed to a certain extent to be found in the extensive executive power left in the hands of the President; but it takes little acuteness to perceive that in point of pliability, power of development, freedom of action, English constitutionalism far excels the Federalism of the United States. Nor is it less obvious that the very qualities in which the English constitution excels that ...
— England's Case Against Home Rule • Albert Venn Dicey
... contracts and last wills and testaments, for the peasantry, who had a genuine Norman predilection for law and chicanery, and a respect amounting to veneration for written documents, red tape, and sealing-wax. Master Pothier's acuteness in picking holes in the actes of a rival notary was only surpassed by the elaborate intricacy of his own, which he boasted, not without reason, would puzzle the Parliament of Paris, and confound the ingenuity of the sharpest advocates of Rouen. Master Pothier's actes ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... disciple of Irenaeus, and one of the soundest theologians of his generation. His works, which are written in Greek, illustrate his learning, his acuteness, and his eloquence. His views on some matters of ecclesiastical discipline were, indeed, too rigid; and, by a writer of the fifth century, [375:1] he has been described as an abettor of Novatianism; but his zeal and piety are universally admitted. He is said to ...
— The Ancient Church - Its History, Doctrine, Worship, and Constitution • W.D. [William Dool] Killen
... effected by means of these modern mental methods, and any one who denies this must surely be ignorant of the vast amount of steadily accumulating evidence in their favour. The many advantages of the system are doubtless pointed out with acuteness and insisted upon with vigour in the books which defend it, and need not be re-stated here. And yet, while I acknowledge all this; while I am forced to admit the many wonderful cures and much mental relief on account of these newer methods of healing, I still believe ...
— The Problems of Psychical Research - Experiments and Theories in the Realm of the Supernormal • Hereward Carrington
... with acuteness and success by M. Barbier's nephew. It seems rather that the MS. was finished in 781, to commemorate the victories of Charlemagne over his Lombardic ...
— A Bibliographical, Antiquarian and Picturesque Tour in France and Germany, Volume Two • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... Roman arm could never have reached it. Matthew Arnold saw these things in his day, and argued for the Neo-druidism of the sixth century. He was a man accustomed to deal in ideas. You may easily train your mind to an acuteness and sagacity in dealing with grammatical roots, and forms, that will not help ...
— The Crest-Wave of Evolution • Kenneth Morris
... in Jack's nervous features, but she guessed that his consciousness had not reached the pitch of her own acuteness, and made him only aware of a difference as yet unadjusted between them. Indeed, with a quiet interest that she knew was not assumed, he presently commented to her on the odd disproportion between the streaming ...
— A Fountain Sealed • Anne Douglas Sedgwick
... hear a sound, but I had great faith in Jimmy's hearing, for in old times he had given me some remarkable instances of the acuteness of this sense. ...
— Bunyip Land - A Story of Adventure in New Guinea • George Manville Fenn
... most elaborate and energetic attempt to prove Shakspere classically learned is that made in the Critital Observations on Shakspere (1746) of the Rev. John Upton, a man of great erudition and much random acuteness (shown particularly in bold attempts to excise interpolations from the Gospels), but as devoid of the higher critical wisdom as was Bentley, whom he congenially criticised. To a reader of to-day, his arguments from Shakspere's diction and syntax are ...
— Montaigne and Shakspere • John M. Robertson
... shelter till a proper distance is gained. The stalking is the most exciting sport in the world. I have frequently heard my own heart beat while creeping up to a deer. He is an animal of wonderful acuteness, and possessing the keenest scent; he is always on the alert, watching for danger from his stealthy foe the leopard, who is ...
— The Rifle and The Hound in Ceylon • Samuel White Baker
... are serviceable against their enemies, and they had before them the most animating prospect of rewards and promotion, if their conduct was distinguished. Under these circumstances, the native vigour, and activity, and acuteness of their minds, took the very direction which was likely, not merely to make them good soldiers, but to fit them for becoming great officers; and this ultimate destination of his experience, and ability, ...
— Travels in France during the years 1814-1815 • Archibald Alison
... enlightened. Whatever was written, either on rhetoric, or logic, geometry, music, and arithmetic, by myself without much difficulty or any instructor, I understood, Thou knowest, O Lord my God; because both quickness of understanding, and acuteness in discerning, is Thy gift: yet did I not thence sacrifice to Thee. So then it served not to my use, but rather to my perdition, since I went about to get so good a portion of my substance into my own keeping; and I kept not my strength for Thee, but wandered from Thee into a far country, to spend ...
— The Confessions of Saint Augustine • Saint Augustine
... preceding few years, and especially of the last day or two, had given Mr. Storms an astonishing acuteness, which enabled him often to detect the truth without difficulty. The strong suspicion he now formed was that Fred Sanders was expecting the appearance of the craft, and that he was guiding his own proa in accordance ...
— Adrift on the Pacific • Edward S. Ellis
... will be able to make correct distinctions which simply do not exist for anyone less actively interested in that particular lady. Concentration enables any sense to become more acute. This increased acuteness naturally gives its possessor the power to receive impressions which would otherwise escape record. In the sense of not being usual, this acute sensitiveness of the artist is thus an abnormality: but it is only ...
— Spirit and Music • H. Ernest Hunt
... of 48, after having been for five years afflicted by a paralysis, which did not however affect his mental powers. He was Professor of Public Hygiene, at the School of Medicine, and drew crowded audiences to his lectures. To a mind of rare scientific acuteness and endowments, he added an active and fertile imagination, and great youthfulness of spirit. He inherited the intellectual tendencies of his uncle, and was ...
— The International Magazine, Volume 2, No. 3, February, 1851 • Various
... large distribution of acuteness among those naked skinny aboriginals, or they couldn't have been such unapproachable trackers and boomerangers and weet-weeters. It must have been race-aversion that put upon them a good deal of the low-rate intellectual reputation which they bear and have borne this long time in the world's ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... discipline. Or in modern times, he is something between Franklin and Charles Fox, with the comfortable double-chin and sleek thriving look of the one, and the quivering lip, the restless eye, and animated acuteness of the other. His eye is quick and lively; but it glances not from object to object, but from thought to thought. He is evidently a man occupied with some train of fine and inward association. He regards the people about him no more than the flies of ...
— The Spirit of the Age - Contemporary Portraits • William Hazlitt
... is always either an intentional or unintentional copy of some constant natural form; and that in this particular instance, the pleasure we have in these geometrical figures of our own invention, is dependent for all its acuteness on the natural tendency impressed on us by our Creator to love the forms into which the earth He gave us to tread, and out of which He formed our bodies, knit itself as it was separated from ...
— The Stones of Venice, Volume I (of 3) • John Ruskin
... often thought," replied Alice, "that my father, though retaining a preternatural strength and acuteness of intellect, was really not altogether sane. And, besides, he had made it his business to keep this estate, and all the complicated advantages of the representation of this old family, secure to the person who was deemed to have inherited them. A ...
— The Ancestral Footstep (fragment) - Outlines of an English Romance • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... seemed, however, not to have been quite overwhelmed by them; he was fat and flourishing—with an acuteness and power in the upper half of his face which accounted for his having attained his present position. The lower half, somehow Miss Leaf did not like it, she hardly knew why, though a physiognomist might have known. For Peter Ascott had the underhanging, obstinate, ...
— Mistress and Maid • Dinah Craik (aka: Miss Mulock)
... young white lord says he wishes in our country?" asked the cold Komba, who with diabolical acuteness had read some of Stephen's meaning ...
— Allan and the Holy Flower • H. Rider Haggard |
