"Problematical" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... thought some of the excitement will be gone, and the struggle of the 'survival of the fittest' will become less problematical," ...
— A Journey in Other Worlds - A Romance of the Future • John Jacob Astor
... General Freire's information was correct, there was evidently a desire to restore San Martin to the Empire of Peru! when possession could be got of the squadron, and he in return had deluded General O'Higgins into the plot by promise of support. Whether this was so in reality is problematical, but there is General Freire's letter, for the first time published, and the Chilian people can thence draw ...
— Narrative of Services in the Liberation of Chili, Peru and Brazil, - from Spanish and Portuguese Domination, Volume 1 • Thomas Cochrane, Tenth Earl of Dundonald
... shall come to London must always be problematical like all my movements, and of course this sickness of Bob's makes it still more uncertain. If all goes well I may have to go to the country and take care of him in his convalescence. But I shall come shortly. Do not hurry to write ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 23 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... we found the mosses all drained, and the very existence of sometime moss-troopers would have seemed problematical, but for the remains of Gilnockie,—the tower of Johnnie Armstrong, so pathetically recalled in one of the finest of the Scottish ballads. Its size, as well as that of other keeps, towers, and castles, whose ruins ...
— At Home And Abroad - Or, Things And Thoughts In America and Europe • Margaret Fuller Ossoli
... that has mocked thousands like himself. If he could have gone to an asylum and surrounded his infirm will by every possible safeguard, he might have been carried through the inevitable period of horrible depression; but even then the habit had become so confirmed that his chances would have been problematical, for experience sadly proves that confirmed opium-consumers are ever ...
— Without a Home • E. P. Roe
... and a perfect knowledge of the character of the people over whom he reigns. Could but justice and humanity be added to his other qualities, but, unfortunately for my nation, I fear that the answer of General Mortier to a remark of a friend of mine on this subject is not problematical: "Had," said this Imperial favourite, "Napoleon Bonaparte been just and humane, he would neither ...
— Memoirs of the Court of St. Cloud, Complete - Being Secret Letters from a Gentleman at Paris to a Nobleman in London • Lewis Goldsmith
... its harmonious organisation under the control of a lucid reason—whether it will ever be possible again to realise this ideal, and that not only in the members of a privileged class, but in the whole body of the State, is a question too problematical to be raised with advantage in this place. But it is impossible not to perceive that with the decline of the Greek city-state something passed from the world which it can never cease to regret, and the recovery of which, if it might be, ...
— The Greek View of Life • Goldsworthy Lowes Dickinson
... west of the Mississippi, in which the Indian tribes have been placed, will tend to promote their civilization, arrest their deterioration in morals, or their decline in numbers, we think extremely problematical. Should such, however, be the happy result, it may be anticipated that the tribe which has produced a Logan, a Cornstalk and a Tecumseh, will be among the first to rise above the moral degradation in which it is shrouded, and foremost ...
— Life of Tecumseh, and of His Brother the Prophet - With a Historical Sketch of the Shawanoe Indians • Benjamin Drake
... tails. * The prodigies of meteorites and masses of stone and metal fallen from the sky. * The cataclysms that have wrecked the moon. * The problem of life and intelligence on the planet Mars. * The problematical origin and fate of the asteroids. * The strange ...
— Curiosities of the Sky • Garrett Serviss
... mother, with some gentle anticipations of pleasure, but none that were exaggerated or excessive. All that was likely to happen, as far as she knew, was that dinner party at Mrs. Benson's, and a play or two, and a problematical hall. This was all that the "vortex" meant about which her mother had laughed; she had not any idea at that time that the vortex would mean Dick Cavendish. But now that she fully understood what it meant, and now that it was all over, ...
— A Country Gentleman and his Family • Mrs. (Margaret) Oliphant
... however, fail to attain success in the cultivation of plants in boxes at the window-sill, and their failures have given rise to the impression in the minds of those who have watched their undertaking, that success with them is very problematical. "It looks easy," said a woman to me last season, "when you see somebody else's box just running over with vines, but when you come to make the attempt for yourself you wake up to the fact that there's a knack to ...
— Amateur Gardencraft - A Book for the Home-Maker and Garden Lover • Eben E. Rexford
... experience either with them or of them. While it is true that cares of a certain type increase with age the knowledge of how to deal with them increases, or ought to increase, in the same progression. With no practical experience to support them the young are up against the unknown and problematical—occupation, marriage, sexual urge, life in general—around which clings that terror of the dark which frightened them in childhood. Home training, school training, college training, religious training, social influences of every kind, throw the emphasis on dangers ...
— The Conquest of Fear • Basil King
... society is composed will differ completely from those now existing. It is quite out of the question, however, to build a new economic structure and new economic units at the same time. Habit and convention are too strong. Innovation is too terrifying and too problematical. The life of local economic units will be carried on to-morrow very much as it is carried on to-day by the masses of the people. The most workable economic superstructure, for a new society, will be built upon an answer to the question: "How is work done now?" This method of approach ...
— The Next Step - A Plan for Economic World Federation • Scott Nearing
... whatsoever of the governmental order. The successful operation of proportional representation in adjoining countries, especially Belgium and Sweden, renders it probable that the system will be adopted ultimately in Holland. The future of woman's suffrage is more problematical. Women already possess the right to vote in the proceedings of the dike associations if they are taxpayers or if they own property adjoining the dikes, and in June, 1908, the Lutheran Synod gave women the right to vote in ecclesiastical ...
— The Governments of Europe • Frederic Austin Ogg
... De Faria, III. 347—364. Both as in a great measure unconnected with the Portuguese transactions, and as not improbably derived from the worse than suspicious source of Fernand Mendez de Pinro, these very problematical occurrences have been kept by themselves, which indeed they are in de Faria. After this opinion respecting their more than doubtful authenticity, it would be a waste of labour to attempt illustrating their geographical ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume VII • Robert Kerr
... country, or a dissolution of the government. On the whole, we think it may with candor be said, that whether the possession at this time of any territory west of the river Mississippi will be advantageous, is at best extremely problematical. For ourselves, we are very much inclined to the opinion that, after all, it is the Island of N. Orleans by which the command of a free navigation of the Mississippi is secured, that gives to this interesting cession its greatest value, and will render it in every ...
— The French in the Heart of America • John Finley
... inserted) and the legends of the negroes who, generation after generation since forgotten times, had told the story of the "Mountain of the Golden Pyramid." Nobody, within the memory of man, had ever searched for the problematical tomb: and as tales of more or less the same character are common in Egypt, I did not place much faith in the enthusiastic jottings of Ferlini. However, my love of the unknown, the mysterious and romantic, made me feel that the possession of the notebook was worth the price asked: two ...
— It Happened in Egypt • C. N. Williamson & A. M. Williamson
... whole party save that one. I have stood by this, and read in the sad story of its inscription a sufficient warning on the subject of marsh malaria. Once or twice I have come in its way, but never willingly, and happily always without calamitous result. Once only I have slept within its problematical range, and that was off that pestiferous bit of coast near Epidaurus, and I fancy at a season when the marshes had ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 61, No. 380, June, 1847 • Various
... words had an immediate effect on the spirits of my children, who at once regarded our problematical chance of escaping as a happy certainty, and began to enjoy the relief from the violent pitching and rolling of the vessel. My wife, however, perceived my distress and anxiety, in spite of my forced composure, ...
— Journeys Through Bookland V3 • Charles H. Sylvester
... all, that which most business men would take—which even the unbusiness-like Nott would take—which the girl herself might be tempted to listen to. Clearly he could do nothing but abandon the Pontiac and her owner to the fate he could not in honor avert. And even that fate was problematical. It did not follow that the treasure was still concealed in the Pontiac, nor that Nott would be willing to sell her. He would make some excuse to Nott—he smiled to think he would probably be classed in the long line of absconding tenants—he would say good-by to Rosey, and leave for Sacramento ...
— By Shore and Sedge • Bret Harte
... in Latium may be mainly regarded as direct extensions of her territory and people presenting the same general features, a further and special significance attached to the conquest of Alba. It was not merely the problematical size and presumed riches of Alba that led tradition to assign a prominence so peculiar to its capture. Alba was regarded as the metropolis of the Latin confederacy, and had the right of presiding among the thirty communities that belonged to it. The destruction ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen
... comfort and safety during the expedition. In vain I urged that our motto was Rescue and Retire, and that such elaborate preparations might prevent our retiring from our native shore, and therefore make rescue exceedingly problematical. ...
— Much Darker Days • Andrew Lang (AKA A. Huge Longway)
... cylinder preserved in the British Museum, representing two figures, a man (with horns) and perhaps a woman, both clothed, on either side of a fruit-tree, towards which they stretch out their hands.23 For the meaning of this is extremely problematical. Some better monumental illustration may some day be found, for it is clear that the Babylonian sacred literature had much to tell of offences against the gods in ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... him, hardly was he settled down at Carthage than his father died. This made his future again problematical. How was he to keep up his studies without the sums coming from his father? The affairs of Patricius must have been left in the most parlous condition. But Monnica, clinging to her ambitious plans for ...
— Saint Augustin • Louis Bertrand
... would have gone is problematical. I had noticed a look of disgust slowly creeping into the Citizen Quartermaster's eyes, and at this juncture he seized the Citizen Captain and thrust him into ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... received attention; two battleships were building in England and another was purchased from one of the South American states. There would this time be no escape. The death sentence had been passed upon the Turk, and if he waited for his enemies to gather and descend upon him defense would be problematical. It was, of course, realized that in the long run Germany would save Turkey by battles won in France or in Poland, and also that German defeats in Europe would in the long run spell the downfall of Turkey whatever the Turk did. It was, therefore, advisable to postpone action as long as possible. ...
— World's War Events, Vol. I • Various
... rather than a deliberate purpose, yet, certainly, as our church has well determined, proves "the infection of our nature, and has in it the nature of sin." Convinced that positive evil may not be committed to procure problematical good, and that no uninspired person should presume to think himself God's champion, unless placed in that station which visibly arms him with his authority, Evellin had often lamented this rash letter, as one of his secret faults. He now severely felt it also, as ...
— The Loyalists, Vol. 1-3 - An Historical Novel • Jane West
... been criticised and burned away, was of divine authority. The Bible never became for them merely an ancient Jewish encyclopaedia, often eloquent, often curious, and often barbarous. God never became a literary symbol, covering some problematical cosmic force, or some ideal of the conscience. But for the modernist this total transformation takes place at once. He keeps the whole Catholic system, but he believes in no part of it as it demands to be believed. He understands and shares ...
— Winds Of Doctrine - Studies in Contemporary Opinion • George Santayana
... the Scripture tells us of St John the Baptist, that when in the wilderness 'his meat was locusts and wild honey,' we have no reason to suppose that he lived always even on these. What these locusts were is problematical, but it is likely they were the fruit of the locust-tree, Hymenaea, which bears a pod containing a sort of bean, enclosed in a whitish substance of fine filaments, as sweet as sugar or honey. The wild bees ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 462 - Volume 18, New Series, November 6, 1852 • Various
... is the acquisition of wealth, and who are not cemented by any common ties of nationality. Under these circumstances, and bearing in mind the immense political machinery which the Papacy can set to work in Canada, the transfer of British institutions to the colony must at present remain a matter of problematical success. It is admitted that the failure of representative institutions arises from the unworthiness of constituencies; and if the efforts which are made by means of education to elevate the character of the next generation of electors should prove fruitless, it is probable that, with the independence ...
— The Englishwoman in America • Isabella Lucy Bird
... them he knew had rolled off the slightly sloping roof after accomplishing their duty. If only he could lay hands on them they might be made to serve again but the darkness would make this problematical. There was that log he had mentioned to Jack—with it he fancied he might do something to keep up the feverish interest in the game and hold Oswald's ...
— Eagles of the Sky - With Jack Ralston Along the Air Lanes • Ambrose Newcomb
... callers, and by the swing of Palmyra's broom; but she let him alone and said nothing, thinking to herself, no doubt, that the exploitation of the national calamity is a more profitable treasure than problematical caskets. ...
— Under Fire - The Story of a Squad • Henri Barbusse
... Clancy was both capable and useful, and was already inclined to make him one of his chief lieutenants in the South. He understood the young man's relations to his daughter perfectly, and was not at all averse to a union between them. At the same time, he knew how problematical Caroline's action would be, and that it would be useless for him to appear for or against the match. He was aware of his daughter's attitude in regard to marriage, and also convinced that she would ...
— The Earth Trembled • E.P. Roe
... makes the best justification of it by saying that while Charles lived the projected republic could never be secure. But to justify taking away the life of an individual upon the principle of self- defence, the danger must be not problematical and remote, but evident and immediate. The danger in this instance was not of such a nature, and the imprisonment or even banishment of Charles might have given to the republic such a degree of security as any government ought to be content with. It must be confessed, however, on the other aide, ...
— A History of the Early Part of the Reign of James the Second • Charles James Fox
... our course due west, principally by the screw and rudder, which answer their purposes to admiration. I regard the project as thoroughly successful, and the easy navigation of the air in any direction (not exactly in the teeth of a gale) as no longer problematical. We could not have made head against the strong wind of yesterday; but, by ascending, we might have got out of its influence, if requisite. Against a pretty stiff breeze, I feel convinced, we can make our way with the propeller. At noon, to-day, ascended to an elevation of nearly 25,000 ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 1 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... has an adverse effect upon safety of operation. The decisive question is whether in the circumstances the total effect of the law as a safety measure in reducing accidents and casualties is so slight or problematical as not to outweigh the national interest in keeping interstate commerce free from interferences which seriously impede it and subject it to local regulation which does not have a uniform effect on the interstate train ...
— The Constitution of the United States of America: Analysis and Interpretation • Edward Corwin
... little real solidity about them as the houses and dwellings which were built at a moment's notice from corrugated iron and a few logs. They thought that they understood how to govern a nation because they had thoroughly mastered the mysteries of bookkeeping in problematical financial undertakings. ...
— Cecil Rhodes - Man and Empire-Maker • Princess Catherine Radziwill
... dispensations in the other! And how the one realizes the bursting of bonds and the setting free of the immortal spirit unto the vast environments and accidents of life, whilst the other sees but dead clay with some dim ideas of a shadowy and problematical eternity! "His soul! his soul!" Here was the burden of Bittra's grief. Ormsby could not understand it; he was frightened and bewildered. I tried every word of solace, every principle of hope, that are our inheritance, only to ...
— My New Curate • P.A. Sheehan
... legislatively operative. If it were so defined we should have dogma and not Christianity. Nevertheless, it may be practically potent. The degree in which a given man may justly identify his own consciousness and experience with that of the Christian world is problematical. In Schleiermacher's own case, the identification of some of his contentions as, for example, the thought that God is not personal with the great Christian consciousness of the past, is more than problematical. To this Schleiermacher ...
— Edward Caldwell Moore - Outline of the History of Christian Thought Since Kant • Edward Moore
... bell of Number Forty-eight. Mrs. Pennycherry, peeping from the area and catching a glimpse, above the railings, of a handsome if somewhat effeminate masculine face, hastened to readjust her widow's cap before the looking-glass while directing Mary Jane to show the stranger, should he prove a problematical boarder, into the dining-room, ...
— Passing of the Third Floor Back • Jerome K. Jerome
... finally entered into a partnership which lasted until 1433. The whole subject is obscure, and until we have a critical biography of Michelozzo his relation with various men and monuments of the fifteenth century must remain problematical. Michelozzo has not hitherto received his due meed of appreciation. As a sculptor and architect he frequently held a subordinate position, and it has been assumed that he therefore lacked independence and originality. But the man who ...
— Donatello • David Lindsay, Earl of Crawford
... moored alongside a small quay. From the nearest building it was necessary to cross a low wharf some fifty yards in width, and De Sylva's whispered commands could not restrain the eager men when escape appeared no longer problematical but assured. They broke, and ran, an almost fatal thing, as it happened, since the soldiers whom Philip had seen from the rock were still on board. One of them noticed the inexplicable disorder among a body ...
— The Stowaway Girl • Louis Tracy
... uncanny ability to "get" Elliston when the play was in his direction, and so far the blonde-haired star had failed to distinguish himself save in that one thirty-three-yard gambol at the beginning of the contest. What might happen later was problematical, but so far Brimfield ...
— Left Guard Gilbert • Ralph Henry Barbour
... Jean rates mightily the natives of Cologne for their bigotry and superstition and for the bad reception they gave to him and to his philosophy. That people are happier from a blind belief, as some pretend, appears to me extremely problematical. For my part, under no circumstances can I think bliss to consist in ignorance; nor have I felt any particular discomfort in having learned at a very early age to put under my feet, as Lucretius expresses ...
— After Waterloo: Reminiscences of European Travel 1815-1819 • Major W. E Frye
... pay a pious visit to the problematical dungeon in which Tasso, mad with love and grief, passed so many years, according to the poetic legend which grew up concerning his misfortune. We did not have time to spare and we regretted it very little. This dungeon, ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Vol VIII - Italy and Greece, Part Two • Various
... as our time is already short," Crane replied after a time. "We know enough, I believe; and furthermore, any additional assistance is problematical; in fact, it is more than doubtful. The Norlaminians have surveyed the system rather thoroughly, and no other planet seems to have inhabitants who have even ...
— Skylark Three • Edward Elmer Smith
... But since, on calculation, he found it would be at least six o'clock in the morning before he got to the loop in question, he decided not to risk abandoning, in the state he would then be in, the beaten track for any such problematical advantage. ...
— Bressant • Julian Hawthorne
... cases these press notices are reprinted solely as advertising. It is simply the commercial process of "acquainting the trade" and if done right may prove one of the most fortunate investments for the young artist. Do not imagine, however, that the pianist's American manager speculates in the problematical success of the coming virtuoso. On the contrary, his fee for putting the artist on his "list" and promoting her interests may range from five hundred dollars to two thousand dollars in advance. After that the manager usually requires a commission on all ...
— Great Pianists on Piano Playing • James Francis Cooke
... his letters to St. Clement; if, in a word, Columbus proved by his discovery the existence of the land which Madoc had visited before him, as Hakluyt and Powell pretended; and ascertained for a certainty that which for the ancients had always been so uncertain, problematical, and mysterious—his glory becomes only the more splendid, and more an object to ...
— Christopher Columbus and His Monument Columbia • Various
... the Industry of all Nations has succeeded beyond all anticipations. Long after every other doubt had been removed, its financial success was considered problematical, and it was feared that application must be made to Government to supply a large deficiency in the amount of funds. A writer in the Times, who professed to speak after careful investigation, estimated the expenditures at L120,000; the receipts from subscriptions at L60,000, and the utmost that ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 3, July, 1851 • Various
... heavy seas, and there are good harbours at convenient distances. I entertain, indeed, sanguine hopes that the skill and exertions of my friend Captain Parry will soon render this question no longer problematical. His task is doubtless an arduous one, and, if ultimately successful, may occupy two and perhaps three seasons; but confiding as I do, from personal knowledge, in his perseverance and talent for surmounting difficulties, the strength of his ships, and the abundance of provisions with which they ...
— Narrative of a Journey to the Shores of the Polar Sea, in the years 1819-20-21-22, Volume 2 • John Franklin
... he invited the Professor's wife as an excellent neutral figure-head, to keep her in countenance. Ladies were scarcer then in Oxford than they are nowadays. The married fellow was still a tentative problematical experiment in those years, and the invasion of the Parks by young couples had hardly yet begun in earnest. So female society was still at a considerable local premium, and Berkeley was glad enough to secure even colourless old Mrs. Martindale to square his party ...
— Philistia • Grant Allen
... were equally vain. There were two ways of proceeding. Silence and safety might be purchased: or the law might be let loose on a knave, who set it at defiance. The one was secure: the other problematical; and replete with the danger which we ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft
... Slegge's remarks remained problematical for a few moments, and then the meaning came with a flash to Burton, who had suddenly caught ...
— Glyn Severn's Schooldays • George Manville Fenn
... that of the nuns of Loudun, on which such various opinions have been given, the reality of which was doubted at the very time, and is very problematical to this day. Those who are curious to know the history of that affair will find it very well detailed in a book I have already cited, entitled, "Examen et Discussion Critique de l'Histoire des Diables de Loudun, ...
— The Phantom World - or, The philosophy of spirits, apparitions, &c, &c. • Augustin Calmet
... solely because I had resolved to save them that I had ventured into the camp; but they would have to wait patiently until circumstances favoured my plans for their escape. I did not conceal from them that my being able to take them away at all was extremely problematical; for I could see that to have raised false hopes would have ended in real disaster. Gradually they became quieter and more reasonable—and my position obviously more embarrassing. I quickly told ...
— The Adventures of Louis de Rougemont - as told by Himself • Louis de Rougemont
... such a society as that of the Rose-cross was problematical, it was quite evident that somebody or other was concerned in the promulgation of these placards, which were stuck up on every wall in Paris. The police endeavoured in vain to find out the offenders, ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds • Charles Mackay
... verifying, that a former inmate of our house had hung himself in it, but I do not know to this day whether it was true or not. The doubt did not prevent him from dangling at the door-post, in my consciousness, and many a time I shunned the sight of this problematical suicide by keeping my eyes fastened on the book before me. It was a very simple device, but perfectly effective, as I think any one will find who employs it in like circumstances; and I would really like to commend it to growing boys troubled as ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... exception of three or four, were entirely unproductive." It is almost needless to remark, that if the suggestions which Krusenstern has given, have not been adopted and acted on, the superiority of the diminishing agents will have wrought such an effect since his visit, as may render it problematical whether or not this country ought to be reckoned amongst the ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 17 • Robert Kerr
... the gods after the simple manner of the people, and he therefore seizes every opportunity of interspersing something of the allegorical interpretation of them, and carefully gives his spectators to understand that the sincerity of his own belief was very problematical. We may distinguish in him a twofold character: the poet, whose productions were consecrated to a religious solemnity, who stood under the protection of religion and who, therefore, on his part, was bound to honour it; and the sophist, with his philosophical dicta, who endeavoured to insinuate ...
— Lectures on Dramatic Art - and Literature • August Wilhelm Schlegel trans John Black
... in Washington toward the middle of the seventies one of those problematical characters the fiction-mongers delight in. This was John Chamberlin. During two decades "Chamberlin's," half clubhouse and half chophouse, was all ...
— Marse Henry, Complete - An Autobiography • Henry Watterson
... produce a perfectly clean but mild flavor, and a delicate but not pronounced aroma. The "high, quick" flavor and aroma that is so much desired in the American market is not readily obtained by the use of cultures. It is quite problematical whether the use of any single species will give any more marked aroma than ...
— Outlines of Dairy Bacteriology, 8th edition - A Concise Manual for the Use of Students in Dairying • H. L. Russell
... could not see the observer ship hovering out in space, but its occupants had no doubt seen them, seen what had happened. It, no doubt, was telling Earth what it had seen—the attorney general's office, at any rate. Doubtful that it was including E.H.Q. in its report. Problematical that the attorney general would ...
— Eight Keys to Eden • Mark Irvin Clifton
... recognizes the hole of its own making, slips its neck into it and little by little dives into the Cetonia's belly, so that the original state of affairs appears to be exactly restored. And yet its successful rearing is henceforth highly problematical. It is possible that the larva will prosper, complete its development and spin its cocoon; it is also possible—and the case is not unusual—that the Cetonia-larva will soon turn brown and putrid. We then see the Scolia itself turn brown, distended as it ...
— More Hunting Wasps • J. Henri Fabre
... the plan favoured by the best military minds at the council, for it was possible and legal for the opinions of sixteen corporals to be adopted although fifteen generals and commandants opposed the plan with all their might. That there ever was such a result is problematical, but there were many Krijgsraads at which the opinion of the best and most experienced officers were cast aside by the votes of field-cornets and corporals. It undoubtedly was a representative way of adopting the will of the people, but it frequently was exceedingly costly. At the Krijgsraad in ...
— With the Boer Forces • Howard C. Hillegas
... departure for Los Angeles, our next field of labor, and, permit me to add, at this time a difficult one. There was an agitation on foot for the closing of all the questionable resorts, and this meant much strenuous, problematical work on the part of the agitators. Amongst these I make mention of the, late Rev. Sidney Kendall, a noted writer and rescue worker, a person who proved to be one of our very valuable friends and advisers during our sojourn in that great and beautiful ...
— Fifteen Years With The Outcast • Mrs. Florence (Mother) Roberts
... more rapidly under suitable conditions and furnishes much more food. The advantage of growing it northward in the Western mountain valleys when sown in spring, as intimated by the writer of the bulletin already referred to, would seem to be at least problematical, since it could not be sown early enough in the spring to produce a crop as early as alfalfa already established. It would then be grown also as the crop of the season, rather than as a catch crop. The place for Egyptian clover in the rotation is clearly ...
— Clovers and How to Grow Them • Thomas Shaw
... three-quarters of an hour taking a bearing based upon the problematical position of the lights, the height and density of the box screen and then boldly and rapidly opened the door, stepped through and closed it behind him. His calculations had been accurate. He found himself in a room, the extent of which he could only conjecture. What, however, interested ...
— The Green Rust • Edgar Wallace
... ever such things as vampyrs?" tantamne rem tam negligenter? I turn to the learned pages of Horst for a luminous and precise definition of the destructive and mysterious beings, whose existence you have ventured to consider problematical. ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 61, No. 378, April, 1847 • Various
... was limited to an old creature almost doting and totally deaf, the advantages of whose presence might have been considered problematical; but, then, as Miss Blake ...
— The Uninhabited House • Mrs. J. H. Riddell
... fact we ascertain demonstratively that the palm kernels which are thrown away here (leaving out the whole leeward coast of our possessions) are sufficient to make thirty thousand gallons of oil, more or less. This is not at all a problematical speculation of ours, but we feel authorised to advance this assertion from the fact that one bushel of kernels, completely worked up, will make two gallons of oil. But to work them up is the thing, plentiful as they are; we however, ...
— The Commercial Products of the Vegetable Kingdom • P. L. Simmonds
... him Desgas still stood mute and impassive, waiting for further orders, whilst two soldiers were kneeling beside the prostrate form of Marguerite. Chauvelin gave his secretary a vicious look. His well-laid plan had failed, its sequel was problematical; there was still a great chance now that the Scarlet Pimpernel might yet escape, and Chauvelin, with that unreasoning fury, which sometimes assails a strong nature, was longing to ...
— The Scarlet Pimpernel • Baroness Orczy
... of human nature easily recognized in her one of those characters which Goethe has so aptly named "problematical," for she was one of those individuals who are always dissatisfied and at variance with themselves and with the world, who are a riddle to themselves, and who can never be relied on, and with the interesting and captivating, though unfortunate contradictions ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume IV (of 8) • Guy de Maupassant
... suffering and our poverty. That troubles you not at all: you have sophistries and to spare to reassure you: the sacred rights of property, the fair struggle for life, the supreme interests of that Moloch, the State and Progress, that fabulous monster, that problematical Better to which men sacrifice the Good,—the Good of other men.—But for all that, the fact remains, and all your sophistries will never manage to deny it: "You have too much to live on. We have not enough. And we are as good as you. And ...
— Jean-Christophe Journey's End • Romain Rolland
... unfrequently, bodies similar to these "coccoliths" were aggregated together into spheroids, which he termed "coccospheres." So far as we knew, these bodies, the nature of which is extremely puzzling and problematical, were peculiar to the ...
— Young Folks' Library, Volume XI (of 20) - Wonders of Earth, Sea and Sky • Various
... schools in removing the prejudice of parents against glasses when needed. Because knowledge of chemistry preceded knowledge of the human body, the teaching of medicine still shows the effect of predilection for the remote, the problematical, the impossible. This predilection has influenced many specialists as well as many general practitioners, both overlooking too frequently obvious causes that even intelligent laymen can be taught to detect. Very naturally the man who makes money out of attention to simple troubles ...
— Civics and Health • William H. Allen
... point of India, stands in the same relation to it that Madagascar does to Africa, and is very ancient in its historical associations, having been in the prime of its glory four hundred years before the coming of Christ, and how far back of that period its history extends is only problematical. It is separated from the continent by a strait called the Gulf of Manar, and is about the size of Massachusetts; containing, also, nearly the same aggregate population. It is believed to be the Ophir of the Hebrews, abounding as it ...
— Due West - or Round the World in Ten Months • Maturin Murray Ballou
... German reinforcements arrived at the critical moment and all the British objectives had been captured and held. Whether or not the only night-bombing squadron engaged in that action was responsible for the tie-up of the Hun transportation system is problematical, but all the members of the squadron remember that night and hope that ...
— Night Bombing with the Bedouins • Robert Henry Reece
... Parson B———, with thy pale student's brow and rubicund nose, with thy rusty and tattered black coat overswept by white flowing locks, with thy professional white neckcloth scrupulously preserved when even a shirt to thy back was problematical,—art by no means to be overlooked in the muster-roll of vagrant gentlemen possessing the entree of our farm-house. Well do we remember with what grave and dignified courtesy he used to step over its threshold, saluting its inmates with the same ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier
... in life. From time to time, however, and specially, I think, in talking art, talk becomes effective, conquering like war, widening the boundaries of knowledge like an exploration. A point arises; the question takes a problematical, a baffling, yet a likely air; the talkers begin to feel lively presentiments of some conclusion near at hand; towards this they strive with emulous ardour, each by his own path, and struggling for first utterance; and then one leaps upon the summit of that matter ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume 9 • Robert Louis Stevenson
... a matter on which he really had no ideas except the broad and general one that truth is mighty and shall prevail—but that the speed of its forward march is problematical. ...
— The Brown Mouse • Herbert Quick
... down indispensables in civil life at half a million or at four millions just as you liked; but it made the difference of three and a half millions in your pool to start with, according to which estimate you preferred. After that you had to cut out the unfit—another problematical figure. Finally came the question of casualties based on suspicious enemy statistics, and the perplexities involved in the number of wounded who would, and who would not, be able to return to the ranks. The only conclusion ...
— Experiences of a Dug-out, 1914-1918 • Charles Edward Callwell
... when they are whirled about by the wind; now here, now there, now up a tree. Though each had taken the measure of the other with fair accuracy, each had misjudged the other's strength; and it was becoming problematical just how much longer he would be able to hold out. Nothing had ever daunted him. All his life long he had never failed to accomplish the things of real importance. No undertaking had ever proved too great. ...
— When Dreams Come True • Ritter Brown
... retain the same partner for several dances, or even for the greater part of the evening, he will, unless he is a Bayard absolutely sans peur et sans reproche, naturally think twice of engaging a lady from whom his release is problematical. Hence the tendency is to increase the triumphs of the belle, and decrease the chances of the less popular maiden. It is also extremely uncomfortable for a girl to feel that a man has (to use the ugly slang of the occasion) ...
— The Land of Contrasts - A Briton's View of His American Kin • James Fullarton Muirhead
... Problematical as was the peril my fancy had formed, there were moments when it appalled me—moments when my mind laboured under a painful presentiment, and I could not cast the load by any act of volition. With all my philosophy, I could not fortify myself against the belief that "coming events cast their shadows ...
— The War Trail - The Hunt of the Wild Horse • Mayne Reid
... third kind of ignorance more dangerous still—that of knowing more than one ought to know?" interposed another speaker, whose countenance had already struck me as one of the most problematical that I had ever seen. His composed yet keen physiognomy, strongly reminded me of the portraits of the Italian Conclave—some of the cardinals of Giorgione and Titian; at once subtle ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 55, No. 343, May 1844 • Various
... and spanker, slowly standing to the westward, and again anchoring full half a mile farther out to sea than before; not, to be sure, out of reach of the guns of the battery, but at such a distance as to render it extremely problematical whether Spanish artillerymen would be able to throw a shot within half a mile of her, ...
— An Old Sailor's Yarns • Nathaniel Ames
... his Confessions in 397, lived to experience the capture and sack of Rome by Alaric the Goth, 410, composed his great work, The City of God, amidst the clear dissolution of a mighty past and the dim presage of a problematical future, and died at Hippo, his episcopal city, in 430, whilst the Vandals were besieging it. St. Augustine is more largely a convert and a rigorist even than St. Paul when St. Paul is most incisive. But here he shall testify only to the natures of Eternity ...
— Progress and History • Various
... broke, however, these very provisions saved their lives, for the Hudson Bay men, being without means of shelter or sustenance, had given up the chase, rather than lose their lives in a pursuit of which the favorable outcome was so problematical. Seguis, striking into the usual trail to the camp, had overtaken his men that night, while they were still struggling on, and had ordered a halt. Confident of their safety, they had camped, and then resumed their march at daybreak, finding their bearings, and keeping ...
— The Wilderness Trail • Frank Williams
... storms of political life. A face that might be called insignificantly pretty and caressing manners thinly disguised the man's deeply-rooted egoism and habit of continually calculating the chances of a career which at that time looked problematical enough; though his choice of Mme. de Chaulieu (a woman past forty) made interest for him at Court, and brought him the applause of the Faubourg Saint-Germain and the gibes of the Liberal party, who dubbed him "the ...
— Lost Illusions • Honore De Balzac
... the comparatively narrow creed of this or that particular Church, but the Divine Spirit of its Founder, that Spirit which, exactly in proportion as they are true to their name, informs, and animates, and underlies, and overlies them all—is not problematical, but certain, and in His good time, across the lapse of ages, will prove to be, not local but universal, not partial but ...
— Oriental Religions and Christianity • Frank F. Ellinwood
... pine away in her new place. The house where she had taken service as a maid of all work was what servants call "a barrack." A spendthrift and glutton, devoid of order as of money, as is often the case with women engaged in the occupations that depend upon chance, and in the problematical methods of gaining a livelihood in vogue in Paris, the depilator, who was almost always involved in a lawsuit of some sort, paid but little heed to her small servant's nourishment. She often went away for the whole day without leaving her any dinner. The little one ...
— Germinie Lacerteux • Edmond and Jules de Goncourt
... It appears less problematical to extend the ideas of practical geometry to spaces of cosmic order of magnitude. It might, of course, be objected that a construction composed of solid rods departs more and more from ideal rigidity in proportion ...
— Sidelights on Relativity • Albert Einstein
... scarcely necessary to add, in view of so superficial a way of looking at the problem, that we hardly ever find any attempt to deal with the more fundamental question of the meaning of a low birth-rate, and the problematical character of the advantages of rapid multiplication. The whole question is usually left to the ignorant preachers of the gospel of brute force, would-be patriots who desire their own country to increase at the cost of all ...
— The Task of Social Hygiene • Havelock Ellis
... in the fullest meaning of the word was revealed at the first glance. They proved it when, to stand by their convictions, they put themselves and their families at the mercy of a problematical future; and when, in advanced years, they undertook the gigantic work of compiling so large and profound a German dictionary. Jakob looked as if nothing could ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... of problematical nature into the following sixteen classes: the sad, the extremely good or bad, star-gazers, scatter-brains, apathetic, misanthropic, doubters and investigators, reverent, critical, executive, stupid and clownish, naive, funny, anamnesic, disposed ...
— Youth: Its Education, Regimen, and Hygiene • G. Stanley Hall
... the hopes of life began to revive; but a further difficulty presented itself, which seemed to render their safety more problematical than ever. This was, who was to lead the way. The pause had well nigh been fatal to them all. At length a junior lieutenant, long known on board, and celebrated for his courage, agreed to lead the way, the rest ...
— Narratives of Shipwrecks of the Royal Navy; between 1793 and 1849 • William O. S. Gilly
... out some of the circumstances, geographical and economical, which would make the success of a violent revolution in England problematical in the extreme, and put to him the same suggestion that I put to Bucharin (see page 81), namely, that a suppressed movement in England would be worse for Russia than our traditional method of compromise. He agreed at once, but ...
— Russia in 1919 • Arthur Ransome
... else obtuse and unobserving. These were the symptoms of a rapid physical change, the catastrophe of which was at hand. How far the excitement growing out of his daughter's flight and marriage may have precipitated this result, is problematical. It may be said, in this place, that my wife's mother charged it all to my account. I was pronounced the murderer of her husband. On this head I did not reproach myself. It was necessary, however, that a reconciliation should take place between the father and his child. ...
— Confession • W. Gilmore Simms
... one of the rarest shots in the journalist's bag, as time is sure to prove. If we had newspaper-accounts of the age of Augustus, the chances are that no other epoch in history would be so absolutely problematical, and Augustus himself would be lucky, if he were not resolved into a myth, and the journal into sibylline oracles. The dissertational department is equally faulty; for to first impressions everything on earth is chameleon-like. The ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 83, September, 1864 • Various
... be guessed. The treasure was at hand and enormous, whereas the wrath of a Heavenly or an earthly king was problematical and far away. So greed, outstripping caution and superstitious fear, won the race, and Ramiro threw himself into the adventure with a resource and energy which in their way ...
— Lysbeth - A Tale Of The Dutch • H. Rider Haggard
... virginity as something sacred, and God has so honored it that he willed that his son be born of a virgin, fecundated, however, by the Holy Ghost. Still, it appears problematical whether the Virgin Mary, complete virgin that she was, did not have the same pleasure as those who are not virgins, when she received the divine annunciation. Father Sanchez has discussed the question very fully "whether the Virgin Mary 'spent' in copulation with the Holy-Ghost," unhappily, ...
— The Satyricon, Complete • Petronius Arbiter
... the other hand, the Sphagnales show such considerable and important differences from the rest of the mosses, that like the Anthocerotales among the liverworts, they may be regarded as a group, the relationship of which to the main stem is at least problematical. Between the Hepaticae, Anthocerotales, Sphagnales and Musci, there are no connecting forms known, and it must be left as an open question whether the Bryophyta are ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 3 - "Brescia" to "Bulgaria" • Various
... in God, but she believes also in M. de Voltaire, so that her devotion is, to say the least, problematical. However, she is on good terms with the curate of her parish, and is very particular about the arrangement of her dinner on the days she honours him with an invitation to her table. She seems to consider him a subaltern, very useful to her salvation, and capable of opening the gate of paradise ...
— The Widow Lerouge - The Lerouge Case • Emile Gaboriau
... is problematical, but who says, "I's been here for a long time," lives in a small cottage at 3151 Clay St., Houston, Texas. Born on the Kit Patton plantation near West Columbia, Texas, Aunt Sarah was probably about fifteen years old when emancipated. She had eleven children, the first born during ...
— Slave Narratives: a Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves. - Texas Narratives, Part 2 • Works Projects Administration
... and we think it a privilege to be able to take such advantage of our wide circulation as will give repining invalids to understand, that the advantages of a foreign climate are closely limited by one portion of the profession, and considered by another portion as highly problematical, if not entirely visionary. This applies, however, mainly to consumption; for the advantages of the climatic change are seldom denied in dyspepsy, rheumatism, scrofula, and the tribe of nervous diseases. Even in these, however, the locality chosen is rarely a proper ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 444 - Volume 18, New Series, July 3, 1852 • Various
... able to understand it quite well and to explain its possibility, while they regard it only psychologically, whereas if they had studied it in a transcendental point of view, they must have recognized that it is not only indispensable as a problematical concept, in the complete use of speculative reason, but also quite incomprehensible; and if they afterwards came to consider its practical use, they must needs have come to the very mode of determining the principles of this, to which they are now so loth to assent. The concept of ...
— The Critique of Practical Reason • Immanuel Kant
... of which wandering speculations it may be gathered that Morris Monk was that rather common yet problematical person, ...
— Stella Fregelius • H. Rider Haggard
... could be avoided in some such way or at a certain price, and the discrepancy between the cost and the value of the life were squarely brought to your particular attention, you might and probably would do something. How much is problematical. ...
— The "Goldfish" • Arthur Train
... with a waist measurement of twenty-five thousand miles the very existence of toes is purely problematical. ...
— This Giddy Globe • Oliver Herford
... an actual instinct, which proves to be a conscious willing of the means towards an unconsciously willed purpose. This conception explains clearly and without violence all the problems which instinct presents to us; or more truly, all that was problematical about instinct disappears when its true nature has been thus declared. If this work were confined to the consideration of instinct alone, the conception of an unconscious activity of mind might excite opposition, ...
— Unconscious Memory • Samuel Butler
... it is important to find out first just how much money has been expended and what the likelihood of future outlay will be. Like every other phase of the stupendous upheaval this one is both speculative and problematical. ...
— The War After the War • Isaac Frederick Marcosson
... some of the excitement will be gone, and the struggle of the 'survival of the fittest' will become less problematical," said Bearwarden. ...
— A Journey in Other Worlds - A Romance of the Future • John Jacob Astor
... poorer by any exchange they made, but she was sometimes pricked to the reflection that the freemasonry between them was all hers, and the things she said to him had still the flavour of adventure. She found herself inclined—and the experience was new—to make an effort for a reward which was problematical and had to be considered in averages, a reward put out in a thin and hesitating hand under a sacerdotal robe, with a curious concentrated quality, and a strange flavour of incense and the air of cold churches. ...
— The Path of a Star • Mrs. Everard Cotes (AKA Sara Jeannette Duncan)
... those excavations, and we could not judge of the richness of the lode. Notwithstanding the expense incurred under the intendancy of Don Jose Avalo, the great question whether the province of Venezuela contains mines rich enough to be worked, is yet problematical. Though in countries where hands are wanting, the culture of the soil demands unquestionably the first care of the government, yet the example of New Spain sufficiently proves that mining is not always unfavourable ...
— Equinoctial Regions of America • Alexander von Humboldt
... inevitable seclusion from the high place it at present occupies in the estimate of the poet's most uncompromising admirers. But surely equally rash is the assertion that it will be the "poem of the future." However, our concern is not with problematical estimates, but with the poem as it appears to us. It is one of the most characteristic of Browning's productions. It would be impossible for the most indolent reader or critic to attribute it, even if ...
— Life of Robert Browning • William Sharp
... this theory has met with, all, I think, anticipated that the appearance of Mr. Darwin's large and careful work on "Animals and Plants under Domestication" could but further increase that acceptance. It is, however, somewhat problematical how far such anticipations will be realized. The newer book seems to add after all but little in support of the theory, and to leave most, if not all, its difficulties exactly where they were. It ...
— On the Genesis of Species • St. George Mivart
... cellar are visible, 58 feet in extent, and east of the present house. It is probable a similar wing was on the south aspect and thereby formed a Greek II. The ancient apple trees which cover the flank, render such an idea very problematical." Near the building is a very deep well, said to have been used as a place of destruction for those members of the convent, who had dared to break their vows ...
— The History and Antiquities of Horsham • Howard Dudley
... comments must be made on this passage; first, that it only refers to making a stipulation in advance for compensation for profit lost, and does not condemn the actual payment of compensation;[2] second, that the point is made that the probability of gaining a profit on money is so problematical as to make it unsaleable. As Ashley points out, the latter consideration was peculiarly important at the time when the Summa was composed; and, when in the course of the following two centuries the opportunities for reasonably safe and profitable business investments increased, the great theologians ...
— An Essay on Mediaeval Economic Teaching • George O'Brien
... That the mother threatened corporal punishment, whereat the father tremblingly intervened. That David continuing to rejoice exceedingly in his word, the father spoke darkly of a cane, but the mother rushed between the combatants. That the problematical chastisement became to David an object of romantic interest. That this darkened the happy home. That casting from his path a weeping mother, the goaded father at last dashed from the house yelling that he was away to ...
— The Little White Bird - or Adventures In Kensington Gardens • J. M. Barrie
... the early deposits extended to the north of the Laurentian Hills, as well as the outline of that portion of the continent in those times, remains still very problematical; but the investigations thus far undertaken in those regions would lead to the supposition that the same granite upheaval which raised Canada stretched northward in a broad, low ridge of land, widening in its upper part and extending to the neighborhood of Bathurst Inlet and ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 11, Issue 67, May, 1863 • Various
... nurse will neglect the application of the most important remedies, and necessarily give an unfaithful report of symptoms; hours the most valuable to the child's well-doing are thus lost, and the chances of saving its life worse than problematical. ...
— The Maternal Management of Children, in Health and Disease. • Thomas Bull, M.D.
... bees had made good their escape, and that whether they had stopped on one side of the valley or the other, or had indeed cleared the opposite mountain and gone into some unknown forest beyond, was entirely problematical. I turned back, therefore, thinking of the honey-laden tree that some of these forests would hold before the ...
— Locusts and Wild Honey • John Burroughs
... to think Elgin about the most problematical public man in high position I had ever met, but I now know him one of the ablest. Deeds, not words; judgment, ...
— Autobiography of Andrew Carnegie • Andrew Carnegie
... ford led straight out to the centre of the stream, and then veered slightly toward the right. He knew the sand ridge was only used by horsemen, not being wide enough for the safe passage of wagons, but the depth of the water on either side was entirely problematical. He was taking a big chance, yet dare not wait for daylight. Summoning all his nerve and alertness, he urged his horse slowly forward, the intelligent animal seemingly comprehending the situation, and feeling carefully ...
— Keith of the Border • Randall Parrish
... except under Christian influence. His own genial, beautiful character was itself a tribute to Christian civilization, and his life, as critic and essayist, has left an impression which we shall not soon lose. Professor Richardson thinks that the three problematical characters in American literature are Emerson, Hawthorne, and Poe. The shrewdest estimate of Poe that has ever been given us is in Lowell's Fable ...
— The Greatest English Classic A Study of the King James Version of • Cleland Boyd McAfee
... better of problematical risk, I went in. The room allotted me lay on the ground floor just off the garden, and I had not been there many minutes before I became aware, as one does, that I was being stared at. The culprit instantly pretended, with a very sheepish ...
— Noto, An Unexplored Corner of Japan • Percival Lowell
... to carry. He also gave Rina an open letter he had written, setting forth their situation (without implicating Mabyn or Rina) and asking that food and an escort be sent. That it would ever fall into responsible hands was problematical; but it was a chance. He refrained from any suggestion that it should be concealed from Mabyn, but Rina of her own accord thrust it in her dress; and he argued ...
— Two on the Trail - A Story of the Far Northwest • Hulbert Footner
... who desire love, deserve it," said Sara. "The means to this are always, in a manner, certainties, the end is always problematical. But those who want love could never be ...
— Robert Orange - Being a Continuation of the History of Robert Orange • John Oliver Hobbes
... intently. To a man of another stripe, the proposal might have been alluring. It meant that although the organization ticket won, he would, in the public eye at least, have the credit of beating the System, of going into office unhampered, of having assured beyond doubt what was at best only problematical ...
— The Ear in the Wall • Arthur B. Reeve
... is said about a cackling rooster! Worse still, a crowing hen is so rare a thing that its very existence is problematical. I never heard of one out of that couplet. I have made diligent inquiry, but I have not been able to find any person who had heard, or who had ever seen or heard of any one who had heard, a crowing hen. But these very hands have fed, these very eyes seen, and these ears heard a cackling ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 92, June, 1865 • Various
... included here two figures (Pl. 15, figs. 8, 9) that undoubtedly represent a single species of bird. It is characterized by a deeply forked tail and long beak, which has part way on its length, a circular object surrounded by a circle of dots. It seems still problematical what this object may be. In one figure (fig. 9), the beak is strongly hooked, in the other (fig. 8) it is straight, but as the latter is plainly a much more carelessly made drawing, we may infer that ...
— Animal Figures in the Maya Codices • Alfred M. Tozzer and Glover M. Allen
... things in this Discourse, which I do not now approve; my judgement being a little altered since the writing of it: but whether for the better or worse, I know not. Neither indeed is it much material in an Essay, where all I have said is problematical. ...
— An English Garner - Critical Essays & Literary Fragments • Edited by Professor Arber and Thomas Seccombe
... so yesterday I resolved to give them a holiday, though sorely against my will, by not opening a book the whole day. Whether I should have succeeded in observing such a desperate resolution without the aid of circumstances is quite problematical, but Mr. Gray opportunely came with a request that I should take a ride with him to Cambridge, and visit the libraries there. This occupied four or five hours, and a lyceum lecture provided for the evening. ...
— The Life and Letters of Elizabeth Prentiss • George L. Prentiss
... in the same proportion as giants and dwarfs do in the human race (I believe the proportion is one in five thousand), and the advent of which would surprise the average kennel man as much as if the President had sent him a special invitation to dine with him at the White House, the price is problematical, and is negotiated solely by the demand for such a wonder ...
— The Boston Terrier and All About It - A Practical, Scientific, and Up to Date Guide to the Breeding of the American Dog • Edward Axtell
... brethren not to incur the curse denounced against the inhabitants of Meroz, who came not to the help of the Lord against the mighty. The orators on the other side thundered against sinful associations. There were malignants in William's Army: Mackay's own orthodoxy was problematical: to take military service with such comrades, and under such a general, would be a sinful association. At length, after much wrangling, and amidst great confusion, a vote was taken; and the majority pronounced ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 3 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... about Soho was perfectly clear to her mind, although to many it might have seemed to convey an agreeably worded acceptance of her suggestion, only laying its translation into action in a rather problematical future, the sort of future which would become present when "neither of us ...
— December Love • Robert Hichens
... spell that they seemed to have laid upon themselves. They were conditional New-Yorkers of long sojourn, and it was from no apparent motive that the son wore evening dress, which his unbuttoned overcoat discovered, and an opera-hat. He would not have dressed so for that problematical French table d'hote; probably he was going on later to some society affair. He now put in effect the father's impulse to go closer ...
— The Daughter of the Storage - And Other Things in Prose and Verse • William Dean Howells
... the preceding essay on p. 155; and there succeeded, in subsequent editions, a paragraph aiming to show that the inferred structure of the Sun's interior was congruous with the low specific gravity of the Sun—a conclusion which, as indicated on p. 156, implies some very problematical assumptions respecting the natures of the unknown elements of the Sun. There then came ...
— Essays: Scientific, Political, & Speculative, Vol. I • Herbert Spencer
... a little problematical. The left and right we satisfied ourselves about at once, but the centre was in a class by itself. We demanded an investigator, somebody with wide mine-sweeping ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 150, March 15, 1916 • Various
... philosophic discussion would have continued is problematical had it not been interrupted by the entry of a young gentleman dressed with a somewhat ostentatious elegance, whose wizened face bore an expression at once of vast good nature and of a deep and ...
— Tutt and Mr. Tutt • Arthur Train
... which would have been far beyond our means last year or any year except just now when the Pope's obstinacy and the rumoured departure of the French have left Rome a solitude and called it peace—very problematical peace. (Peni, in despair at leaving Florence, urged on us that 'for mama to have cold air in her chest would be better than to have a cannon-ball in her stomach'; but she was unreasonably more afraid ...
— The Letters of Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Volume II • Elizabeth Barrett Browning
... successfully in any month of the year. But practically I think that grafting will be limited to that part of the year during which the cambium layer of the stock is active. At other times of the year preservation of the vitality of the scion will be too problematical, it seems to me, even if it is very carefully waxed. However, I may be mistaken. At any rate grafting is not very pleasant work out of doors in very cold weather. The success of bench grafting would be an argument for the success of dormant ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Report of the Proceedings at the Fifteenth Annual Meeting • Various
... forgive, O Hara San," he said awkwardly, and as she sought to go this time he did not keep her. She walked to the edge of the verandah and stared down into the garden. Problematical ghosts and demons paled to insignificance before this real trouble. She fought with herself gallantly, crushing down her sorrow and disappointment and striving to regain the control she had let slip. Her feminine code Was simple—complete ...
— The Shadow of the East • E. M. Hull
... to say "squeeze Mulhausen," it was a different thing to do it. He came to this conclusion after a few minutes' earnest concentration of mind on that problematical person. Hitherto he had been dealing with small men and wasters. Voles was a plain scoundrel, quite easily overthrown by direct methods. But Marcus Mulhausen he guessed to be a big man. The first thing to be done ...
— The Man Who Lost Himself • H. De Vere Stacpoole
... only have given some startling proofs of his energy or of his penetration! But, after all, what had he accomplished? Was the mystery solved? Was his success more than problematical? When one thread is drawn out, the skein is not untangled. This night would undoubtedly decide his future as a detective, so he swore that if he could not conquer his vanity, he would, at least, compel himself to conceal it. Hence, it was ...
— Monsieur Lecoq • Emile Gaboriau |
