"Speculation" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... argue, would be absurd in individual relations, we defy you to extend, even in speculation, to transactions between families, towns, counties, states. By your own avowal, it is ...
— What Is Free Trade? - An Adaptation of Frederic Bastiat's "Sophismes Econimiques" - Designed for the American Reader • Frederic Bastiat
... they have haled the intruder to Vine Street in the short twenty minutes which it had taken me to dress and to drive to the spot? That was an awful thought; but even as I hoped against hope, and rang once more, speculation and suspense were cut short in the ...
— A Thief in the Night • E. W. Hornung
... quantity of wheat which he had bought upon speculation and which was then lying idle in a Philadelphia storehouse. This he had sold at public sale and at a very great sacrifice; he realized barely one hundred pounds upon it. The financial horizon looked very black to him; nevertheless, Levi's five hundred ...
— Howard Pyle's Book of Pirates • Howard I. Pyle
... any resemblance to it in a life so different; but the old-fashioned Calvinistic divine in his small country parish, revolving in an actual world of petty details, and in another world of grim theological speculation and absorption in the contemplation of death, must have seldom smiled. The young pastor was bound by no vow of celibacy, but he knew that his life must be brief, and he gladly surrounded himself with children in the guise of pupils, and when he died he left a Bible to his church, a small sum for ...
— From the Easy Chair, vol. 1 • George William Curtis
... you wear out your wits over it with toiling at night, you throw your very life into it: and after all your journeyings in the fields of thought, the monument reared with your life-blood is simply a good or a bad speculation for a publisher. Your work will sell or it will not sell; and therein, for them, lies the whole question. A book means so much capital to risk, and the better the book, the less likely it is to sell. A man of talent rises above the level of ordinary ...
— A Distinguished Provincial at Paris • Honore de Balzac
... doubt noticed that Jim Crestwick has been going pretty hard of late," he said. "Bets, speculation, and that sort of thing. He can't keep it up on a minor's allowance. It will end in a bad smash if ...
— The Long Portage • Harold Bindloss
... of logs rammed full of earth may have given rise to the entrenchments which have lately occasioned some speculation in America, as having belonged to a people more advanced in civilization than the present race ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 5 • Robert Kerr
... London and Croydon line. The ball was set fairly rolling, and the supersession of ancient modes of communication was a question of time merely. The advance of the new system was much accelerated at the outset by the fact that railway enterprise became the favourite field for speculation, men being attracted by the novelty and tempted by exaggerated prospects of profit; and the mania was followed, like other manias, with results largely disastrous to the speculators and to commerce. But through years of good fortune and of bad fortune the iron network has continued to spread ...
— Great Britain and Her Queen • Anne E. Keeling
... of payment, then," agreed the banker, imperturbably. "If it had not been for that, half your fortune would have been goodness knows where by now. You wanted to put it into some big speculation in this country, if I remember aright. And big speculations in France are the very devil just now. Whereas, now, you see, it is all safe and you can invest it in the beginning of next year in some good English securities. It ...
— The Last Hope • Henry Seton Merriman
... first speculation in play-buying! I saw it acted, and thought I could do something with it. Henry would not buy it, so I did! He let me do it first in front of a revival of "The Corsican Brothers" in 1891. It was a great success, although my son and I did not know ...
— The Story of My Life - Recollections and Reflections • Ellen Terry
... Dorothy Chase could do about breakfast if thrown upon her own resources. It was so unusual for Sally's vigorous young frame to experience such exhaustion after even more severe effort than that of the past day that she could only wonder what it meant, and finally decided, after some speculation, that it was the effect of these first warm days of spring, combined with the stress of ...
— Strawberry Acres • Grace S. Richmond
... the headland of Fermain Bay my yellow sail began to draw, and very soon I left my pursuers behind. I had become so used to my queer yellow boat and its yellow sail and flag, that I had long ceased to see anything peculiar in it; but of course to other eyes my craft and its crew were a source of speculation and surprise. After this I never went near Guernsey ...
— Jethou - or Crusoe Life in the Channel Isles • E. R. Suffling
... written a letter of thanks to the promoters of the new speculation, and have declined their offer! This decision has restored my peace of mind. I stopped singing, like the cobbler, as long as I entertained the hope of riches: it is gone, ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... by a priest from the notorious diocese of Bombay: who proceeded to shift the table which does duty for altar to the E. side of the R.A.T.A. room and furnish the neighbourhood of it into a faint resemblance to a Church. But what has roused most speculation is the "green thing he wears over his surplice for the early service and takes off before Parade service." I suggested that it was a precaution against ...
— Letters from Mesopotamia • Robert Palmer
... cerebral functions of man, yet not localised-not susceptible of proof; the other party contending that the belief in spiritualism fetters and ties down physiological investigation—that man's intellect is prostrated by the domination of metaphysical speculation—that we have no evidence of the existence of an essence, and that organised mutter is all that is requisite to produce the multitudinous manifestations ...
— Superstition Unveiled • Charles Southwell
... mechanically took up a book, like one who watches by a sick-bed. But his eyes gathered no thoughts from the page before him. His intellect had been stunned by the bold contradiction, to its face, of all its experience, and now lay passive, without assertion, or speculation, or even conscious astonishment; while his imagination sent one wild dream of blessedness after another coursing through his soul. How long he sat he knew not; but at length he roused himself, rose, and, trembling in every portion of his frame, looked again into the mirror. She was gone. ...
— Phantastes - A Faerie Romance for Men and Women • George MacDonald
... tells whom and when you will marry, advises you upon love, courtship, marriage, business, speculation, transactions of every nature. If you are worried, perplexed, or in trouble come to this wonderful man. He reads your life like an open book; he overcomes evil influences, reunites the separated, causes speedy and happy marriage with the one of your choice, tells how to ...
— The Poisoned Pen • Arthur B. Reeve
... Jadwin. He was very rich, but a bachelor, and had made his money in Chicago real estate. Some of his holdings in the business quarter of the city were enormous; Landry Court had told her about him. Jadwin, unlike Mr. Cressler, was not opposed to speculation. Though not a member of the Board of Trade, he nevertheless at very long intervals took part in a "deal" in wheat, or corn, or provisions. He believed that all corners were doomed to failure, however, and had predicted Helmick's collapse six months ago. He had influence, was well known ...
— The Pit • Frank Norris
... neglecting to review and comment on the case also. It had been long since so great a bit of wrong-doing in a negro had given them cause for speculation ...
— The Sport of the Gods • Paul Laurence Dunbar
... the earth affords a wide field for speculation; and, accordingly, many ingenious theories have been conceived to explain the various appearances which its surface exhibits. The best modern naturalists seem, however, to agree, that water has been one of the principal agents to produce these effects. The ...
— Travels in China, Containing Descriptions, Observations, and Comparisons, Made and Collected in the Course of a Short Residence at the Imperial Palace of Yuen-Min-Yuen, and on a Subsequent Journey thr • John Barrow
... harassed, and the vices which existed in its internal government. On the other hand, the export of so much silver was sometimes a subject of grudging and uneasiness in Europe, and a commerce carried on through such a medium to many appeared in speculation of doubtful advantage. But the practical demands of commerce bore down those speculative objections. The East India commodities were so essential for animating all other branches of trade, and for completing the commercial circle, that all nations contended ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. VIII. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... o'erturn them. 'Tis positive 'gainst all exceptions, lords, That our superfluous lackeys and our peasants, Who in unnecessary action swarm About our squares of battle, were enow To purge this field of such a hilding foe, Though we upon this mountain's basis by Took stand for idle speculation, But that our honours must not. What's to say? A very little little let us do, And all is done. Then let the trumpets sound The tucket sonance and the note to mount; For our approach shall so much dare the field That England shall crouch down ...
— The Life of King Henry V • William Shakespeare [Tudor edition]
... Street scheme, that had caused so much evil, might also cure it. Of course he could not tell his partners how he was situated. The slightest breath of suspicion might cause the evenly balanced scales in which hung all chances to hopelessly decline. The speculation now promised well. ...
— What Can She Do? • Edward Payson Roe
... had a large experience in all sorts of speculation. When old he gave this counsel to one of his proteges: "Do not speculate. I have always speculated on assured information, and that has cost me so many millions;" and he named his losses. We may believe that in this reckoning he rather ...
— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne
... a reply he hurried off, and the four Camport chums looked after him with speculation in their eyes until he was lost to view at a turn ...
— Army Boys in the French Trenches • Homer Randall
... of any district must have been when it was rumored that He was on His way to it! What eager consultations must have been held as to the best means of conveying them into His presence! What sleepless nights must have been spent of speculation as to whether, and how, ...
— Love to the Uttermost - Expositions of John XIII.-XXI. • F. B. Meyer
... with hardly so much as a notable ridge to break its uniform flatness, for 300 to 400 miles. These being the conditions of the case, the following inquiry naturally presents itself: not, be it observed, as a recondite problem, generated by modern speculation, but as a plain suggestion flowing out of that very ordinary and archaic piece of knowledge that water cannot be piled up like in a heap, like sand; or that it seeks the lowest level. When, after 150 days, "the fountains ...
— The Lights of the Church and the Light of Science - Essay #6 from "Science and Hebrew Tradition" • Thomas Henry Huxley
... horse-farms; chicken-ranches, bee-ranches, sheep-breeding, seal-poaching, cod-fishing, salmon-canning—each of these has held out the same glittering possibility. Even the humblest ventures have caught the prevailing tone of speculation. Industry and trade have been followed, not for a living, but for sudden wealth, and often on a scale of personal expenses out of all proportion to the probable results. In the sixties, when the gold-fever began to subside, it ...
— California and the Californians • David Starr Jordan
... undertook the settlement of the townships of Conway, Gage, Burton, Sunbury and New-town has been referred to in these pages as "The Canada Company," but its proper name was "The St. John's River Society." The original promoters of the gigantic land speculation—for such we must call it—set on foot at Montreal in 1764, were chiefly army officers serving in Canada, hence the name, "The Canada Company." When, however, it was determined to enlarge the association by the addition of the names of gentlemen in Boston, New York, Philadelphia, and Halifax, ...
— Glimpses of the Past - History of the River St. John, A.D. 1604-1784 • W. O. Raymond
... reasons, the enterprise was financially a failure—a fact which little concerns those who went to study and learn, and those who three years later have to describe. If the darkening of the imperial exchequer prove more than a passing shadow, and an ultimate loss on the speculation cease to be matter of question, the few millions it cost may be recovered by the disbanding of a regiment or two. For one brigade, out of half a million soldiers, to bring the world and its wealth to the seat of government, is ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. XVII, No. 99, March, 1876 • Various
... same task, make no mention of any other Bannaventa, whilst old maps and itineraries are equally silent, the Professor seemingly rests satisfied with his own mere conjecture, that there may have been another Bannaventa, which was probably situated in the regions of the lower Severn. Surely a speculation of this kind may well be ...
— Bolougne-Sur-Mer - St. Patrick's Native Town • Reverend William Canon Fleming
... losing money because of the five-cent fares. Imagine a salary list that gives $350 a month to a man that can't read and write!—yet I believe in it, even though I've seen what was once a sizable fortune melt away between speculation, extravagance, the democratic administration, and the income tax—modern, that's ...
— This Side of Paradise • F. Scott Fitzgerald
... was, on the whole, not creditable to him. Spite is more often fattened than propitiated by penitence. He may have thought besides (policy not being always a vacant space in revengeful acts) that Anthony was capable of something stronger and warmer, now that his humanity had been aroused. The speculation is commonly perilous; but Farmer Fleming had the desperation of a man who has run slightly into debt, and has heard the first din of dunning, which to the unaccustomed imagination is fearful as bankruptcy (shorn of the horror of the word). ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... already passed away. We see how completely the Mexicans and Peruvians, after the conquest, sunk from their comparatively high state of civilisation into barbarism; and such might have been the case with the inhabitants of these cities. Their origin will probably for ever afford matter for speculation. ...
— The Western World - Picturesque Sketches of Nature and Natural History in North - and South America • W.H.G. Kingston
... with the preceding, unless the link is common reference to home life and business. It contrasts the sure results of honest industry with the folly of speculation. The Revised Version margin 'vain things' is better than the text 'vain persons,' which would give no antithesis to the patient tilling of the first clause. That verse would make an admirable motto to be stretched across the Stock Exchange, and like places on both sides of the ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... imagine her fighting like a wildcat for the man she loved. Yet she had a fresh beauty and a vein of tenderness. Jim was fond of Carrie but not in love with her. He wondered whether he might have loved her had he not met the English girl, but pulled himself up. This kind of speculation led to nothing, and he began to ...
— Partners of the Out-Trail • Harold Bindloss
... zircons, and the fifty or more other minerals that have been found in the blue ground. The fragmentary character of some of these minerals would indicate that the blue ground was not their original matrix. How the diamonds originally crystallized and where, is still probably a matter for further speculation. ...
— A Text-Book of Precious Stones for Jewelers and the Gem-Loving Public • Frank Bertram Wade
... before them was none too pleasing. The congratulatory crowd being too large for Dick alone, his five partners were holding separate little receptions for groups, relating how Dick, Dave and Greg had captured Tip Scammon. Such speculation there was as to who Tip's unrecognized companion could have been the night before. As Fred stepped into the big room he was conscious of many unfriendly glances that were sent ...
— The High School Freshmen - Dick & Co.'s First Year Pranks and Sports • H. Irving Hancock
... him in the degree in which the Parthivi Mutar, or 'Earth Mother,' became incarnated in Nandana. Thus was revealed to him the astounding fact that the whole system of the occult adepts had originated in the natural brains of men who had given themselves up to egotistical transcendental speculation—in fact, I cannot better describe the process than in the words of Mr Sinnett himself, where he alludes to 'the highly cultivated devotees to be met with occasionally in India, who build up a conception of nature, the universe and God, entirely on a metaphysical basis, and who have evolved ...
— Fashionable Philosophy - and Other Sketches • Laurence Oliphant
... at the Last Supper has been the cause of much speculation throughout the centuries. The indignation of Christians is stirred at the thought of a traitor being present on this solemn occasion when Christ instituted one of the great sacraments of the Church. The Saviour not only knew what Judas was ...
— In His Image • William Jennings Bryan
... a few wretched fishermen, who, oppressed by poverty, would hardly have been able to purchase or build little fishing barks; always dreading the weight of taxes, or the servitude of men- of-war. Instead of that boldness of speculation for which the inhabitants of this island are so remarkable, they would fearfully have confined themselves, within the narrow limits of the most trifling attempts; timid in their excursions, they never could have extricated themselves ...
— Letters from an American Farmer • Hector St. John de Crevecoeur
... here, Mr. Graves! There was a time when I'd have got down on my knees and crawled from here to New York to help 'Bije Warren. I lent him money to start in business. Later on him and I went into partnership together on a—a fool South American speculation that didn't pan out for nothin'. I didn't care for that. I took my chance same as he did, we formed a stock company all amongst ourselves, and I've got my share of the stock somewhere yet. It may come in handy if I ever want to paper the barn. But 'twa'n't business deals of that kind ...
— Cap'n Warren's Wards • Joseph C. Lincoln
... said, "may do for a speculation, but it is not a good investment. You owe something to young Rollins. Your grateful feeling does you credit. But don't overwork it. Send him three or four hundred, if you like. You'll never hear from it again, except in the letter of thanks. ...
— The Unknown Quantity - A Book of Romance and Some Half-Told Tales • Henry van Dyke
... and critically discussed the articles in the daily papers and the last new book, and there was much discussion respecting a contemplated subscription boat; but still, in general, it was remarkable how they relapsed into their favourite subject—speculation upon men in office, both permanent and parliamentary, upon their characters and capacity, their habits and tempers. One was a good administrator, another did nothing; one had no detail, another too much; one was a screw, another a spendthrift; this man could make a set ...
— Endymion • Benjamin Disraeli
... 139 (on the writings and conversations of Diderot, d,Holbach and the atheists). "At that time, in this philosophy, all seemed innocent enough, it being confined to the limits of speculation, and never seeking, even in its boldest flights, anything ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 1 (of 6) - The Ancient Regime • Hippolyte A. Taine
... super-sensual region where the true, the good, and the beautiful blend in the white light of God, yet the prism of his imagination forever resolved the ray into color again, and he loved to show it also where, entangled and obstructed in matter, it became beautiful once more to the eye of sense. Speculation, he tells us, is the use, without any mixture, of our noblest part (the reason). And this part cannot in this life have its perfect use, which is to behold God (who is the highest object of the ...
— Among My Books • James Russell Lowell
... stringency, and disasters would ever be recurring with the autumn. Elasticity in our monetary system, therefore, is the object to be attained first, and next to that, as far as possible, a prevention of the use of other people's money in stock and other species of speculation. To prevent the latter it seems to me that one great step would be taken by prohibiting the national banks from paying interest on deposits, by requiring them to hold their reserves in their own vaults, ...
— State of the Union Addresses of Ulysses S. Grant • Ulysses S. Grant
... all speculation as to the form which the story assumed in the Ur-Hamlet. We have no evidence on the point; and, as the poet was no doubt free to remodel the material as he thought fit, even in following his original he was making a deliberate ...
— Play-Making - A Manual of Craftsmanship • William Archer
... clearly a person given to the boldest speculation, and of liberal and varied acquirements. Not wanting in imaginative power, she has the rarest good sense and discretion. She adopts the Spiritual Philosophy, and has the subtlest perception of its bearings. She takes large ...
— Memoirs of Margaret Fuller Ossoli, Vol. I • Margaret Fuller Ossoli
... is offered with some reservation, but it has seemed to me to be more than mere idle speculation. It relates to the phenomena of one of the most interesting diseases in the entire category of human ailments—I refer to exophthalmic goiter, or Graves' disease, a disease primarily involving the emotions. This disease is frequently the direct ...
— The Origin and Nature of Emotions • George W. Crile
... navigating the river upwards from the sea, and the want of wood for forming an establishment, would prove insuperable objections to rendering the collection of copper at this part worthy of mercantile speculation. ...
— The Journey to the Polar Sea • John Franklin
... phrase, turned out an accomplished young lady. But alas! she had been qualified for a station which fate seemed determined not to let her occupy; for just at this important period of her life, her father became involved in an unfortunate speculation, that ended in ruin, dishonor, and his own bodily confinement in prison for debts he could never discharge. Naturally high spirited and proud, this misfortune and persecution proved too much for his philosophy—and what ...
— Ella Barnwell - A Historical Romance of Border Life • Emerson Bennett
... Academic, exclaims in one place that he is afraid the Stoics are the only philosophers, and whenever he is combating Epicureanism his language is that of a Stoic. Some of Vergil's most eloquent passages seem to be inspired by Stoic speculation. Even Horace, despite his banter about the sage, in his serious moods borrows the language of the Stoics. It was they who inspired the highest flights of declamatory eloquence in Persius and Juvenal. Their moral philosophy affected the world ...
— A Little Book of Stoicism • St George Stock
... over that farm?" and he stopped in his walk and struck his stick into the ground. "Ten pounds an acre, every farthing of it—and say a thousand for the covenants—about four thousand pounds in all. Now where am I to get four thousand pounds to speculate with in that way, for it is a speculation, and one which I am too old to look after myself, even if I had the knowledge. Well, there you are, and now I'll say good-night, sir. It's getting chilly, and I have felt my chest for the last year or two. By-the-way, I suppose I shall ...
— Colonel Quaritch, V.C. - A Tale of Country Life • H. Rider Haggard
... Hawkins good-bye, but he had no doubt that Harry would console himself with the next pretty face he saw —a remark which was thrown in for Ruth's benefit. Col. Sellers had in all probability, by this time, some other equally brilliant speculation in ...
— The Gilded Age, Part 3. • Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) and Charles Dudley Warner
... sprang from her own fruitful brain. The 'Fashion Club,' a wheel within a wheel, was merely the goose-club; strictly a goose-club, for the licensed victualler addresses himself to the male of the species. The larger net, cast for those who lacked money or a spirit of speculation, caught all who, in the realm of grocery, are lured by the teapot. Every sovereign spent with the Association carried a bonus, paid not in cash but in kind. These startling advantages were made known through ...
— In the Year of Jubilee • George Gissing
... present or future punishment, or as a storehouse of anaesthetics for those who find the pains of life too hard to bear, I have nothing to do; and, so far as it may be possible, I shall avoid the expression of any opinion as to the objective truth or falsehood of the systems of theological speculation of which I may find occasion to speak. From my present point of view, theology is regarded as a natural product of the operations of the human mind, under the conditions of its existence, just as any other branch of science, or the arts of architecture, or music, or painting are such ...
— The Evolution of Theology: An Anthropological Study - Essay #8 from "Science and Hebrew Tradition" • Thomas Henry Huxley
... gone. Late the previous evening it had disappeared behind a prominent headland far up a valley farther to the south, and probably had there gone into camp for the night. Late this night they get the news that gives rise to vast speculation and some genuine anxiety. Runners come in who say that instead of camping there, the White Chief rode all night; turned northward soon as it was dark; crossed this very valley far above them at dawn, and ...
— Marion's Faith. • Charles King
... little doubt as to what the decision would be. Hawtrey would yield, and afterwards it would not be difficult to draw him into some unwise speculation with the object of getting the money back, which he imagined that Hawtrey would be desperately anxious to do. As the result of this, he expected to get such a hold upon the Range that he would be master of the situation when the property fell into the hands of Wyllard's trustees. ...
— Masters of the Wheat-Lands • Harold Bindloss
... card does not prove a trump, then the next eldest is to show the uppermost card, and so on—the company speculating as they please, till all are discovered, when the possessor of the highest trump, whether by purchase or otherwise, gains the pool. To play at speculation well, recollection is requisite of what superior cards of that particular suit have appeared in the preceding deals, and calculation of the probability of the trump offered proving the highest ...
— Enquire Within Upon Everything - The Great Victorian Domestic Standby • Anonymous
... remuneration of 200,000 acres, bounded by the Ohio and Green rivers. The State of Tennessee claimed the lands, but made a similar grant to the company in Powell's Valley. Thus, though the original scheme of founding an independent republic failed, the company made their fortunes by the speculation. Henderson died at his seat in Granville, January 30, ...
— Life & Times of Col. Daniel Boone • Cecil B. Harley
... living and the dead can render each other important services, and they never quarrel. You should be satisfied; you play a fine role; you are the signature of the house. We will not speak of your gun; that was a poor speculation, for which I scarcely can pardon you. It was the fault of your disordered brain that we wandered off on that bypath, but, thanks be to Heaven! we have at last gained the highway. Five weeks ago we met a woman, and what a woman! She has velvety-brown eyes, whence glances well forth like fresh and ...
— Samuel Brohl & Company • Victor Cherbuliez
... was a happy certainty she told his mother, and entered at once into the world of advice and reassurance, planning and speculation that belongs to women alone. Mrs. Valentine was also full of eager interest and counsel, and Rachael enjoyed their solicitude and affection as she had enjoyed few things in life. This was a perfectly natural symptom, that was a perfectly natural phase, ...
— The Heart of Rachael • Kathleen Norris
... she perceived the significance of anything affecting their relations. Her husband, in casting her off, had virtually flung her at Gannett: it was thus that the world viewed it. The measure of alacrity with which Gannett would receive her would be the subject of curious speculation over afternoon-tea tables and in club corners. She knew what would be said—she had heard it so often of others! The recollection bathed her in misery. The men would probably back Gannett to "do the decent thing"; but the ladies' eye-brows ...
— The Greater Inclination • Edith Wharton
... didn't feel called on to take you off, not after I told him who you was. You see, Mr. Williams,' I says, 'Darius Baker was my partner in that wheat speculation I was ...
— The Depot Master • Joseph C. Lincoln
... bell, and I knew that the pressures were equalised within and without, and that, for the moment, the worst was at an end. But I knew also that at any moment the darkness might come down anew; and while, I dwelt on this speculation precisely as a man torments a raging tooth with his tongue, it ebbed away into the little grey shadow on the brain of its first coming, and once more I heard my brain, which knew what would recur, telegraph to every quarter fox help, release ...
— Actions and Reactions • Rudyard Kipling
... conduct this business of ours without always telling quite so many downright lies about it?" The old man looks back at him reproachfully, and says with a solemn shake of the head, "Ah, Simon, Simon, little did I ever think I should live to see a son of mine go in for speculation!" Well, my dear sir, that's pretty much how a modern manager feels about the literary element in the drama. The Public isn't accustomed to it, and there's no knowing how they may take it. Shakespeare, now, they stand readily enough, because he's an old-established ...
— Philistia • Grant Allen
... at the man in astonishment, for she had never treated a death as a speculation, and she hesitated, tempted by the idea of the possible gain, but she suspected that he wanted to play her a trick. "I can say nothing until I have ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant
... L105. The odd 'fiver' will pay all the expenses, and if the Q.P. win the Cup, why all that will be mine. Oh! glorious Q.P., invincible Q.P., you must and shall win the Cup," raved excited Pate. "Lizzie, my own dear lassie, I have not told you about my speculation, nor will I till the tie is over, and we'll get married ...
— Scottish Football Reminiscences and Sketches • David Drummond Bone
... I could see that she was watching us intently through her thin veil. The Sultan also watched us, stroking his long beard, a look of speculation in his eyes, for evidently this play interested him and he wondered how ...
— Queen Sheba's Ring • H. Rider Haggard
... been commissioned. They are offering an immense reward however—a very pleasant sum, indeed. I have had a short note from Radcot Hall informing me of the amount, and that's all. Probably they fancy that I may take the case up as a speculation, but that is a great mistake. I'm not a beginner, and I must be commissioned in a regular manner, hit or miss, if I am to deal with the case. I've quite enough commissions going now, and no time to waste hunting ...
— Martin Hewitt, Investigator • Arthur Morrison
... obtuse among his friends, that whereas in former times the professor's nights were centrifugal they have now become centripetal—the Keeling Islands being the great centre towards which he flies. Verkimier is, and probably will always be, a subject of wonder and of profound speculation to the youthful inhabitants of the islands. They don't understand him and he does not understand them. If they were insects he would take deep and intelligent interest in them. As they are merely human beings, he ...
— Blown to Bits - or, The Lonely Man of Rakata • Robert Michael Ballantyne
... other amazons of old, be passed down to remote posterity in petticoats. If the electrotype from which the New York Journal prints its portraits of Mark Hanna should be found among the tumuli of Manhattan Island, it were well worth remaining alive until that time to hear the curious speculation of craniological cranks. Should the paleologists unearth the World building, they will find in the basement an imperishable object about the size of a bushel-basket, which will puzzle them not a little, ...
— Volume 1 of Brann The Iconoclast • William Cowper Brann
... was much excitement and a good deal of speculation. Every one realized that the full effect of this daring plunge could not be properly gauged until after it had stood the test of print. But on the whole comment was strikingly optimistic. Brooks for some time was absent. In the corridor he had come ...
— A Prince of Sinners • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... from Europe inform us of M. Necker's resignation and removal, which occasions much speculation, as to the causes which produced this event. I should be glad to hear from you ...
— The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Vol. XI • Various
... showing that a man may get into a very unpleasant predicament, where he runs a great risk and gets some hard knocks, and yet be able to thank God for it, in perfect earnestness of spirit. A case of the kind came under my own observation, and while there was not much philosophy, or abstract speculation about it, there was a great deal of hard practical fact. It happened when I was a boy, at the old homestead, in the valley that stretches to the southwest from the head of Crooked Lake. That valley is hemmed in by high and steep hills, and at the tune of which ...
— Wild Northern Scenes - Sporting Adventures with the Rifle and the Rod • S. H. Hammond
... if I am? Tell me, point-blank, most self-tormenting of men, can I help you in practice, even though I choose to leave you to yourself in speculation?' ...
— Hypatia - or, New Foes with an Old Face • Charles Kingsley
... the Carberry twins, immediately bounced erect; and it happened that he stood just under the framed charter granted by the National Committee to Stanhope Troop. Every eye was glued upon his face, for it had been a matter of considerable speculation among the scouts as to where they might "hike" for the Summer vacation, so as ...
— The Banner Boy Scouts on a Tour - The Mystery of Rattlesnake Mountain • George A. Warren
... Farnham came up into the mountains with his wife. Some city speculation had made him rich, and they sat a terrible dash—but I won't speak of that, Mary. If ever the old adversary does rise in my bosom, it is when I remember the way those two persons drove by the house they had made ...
— The Old Homestead • Ann S. Stephens
... as Madame Roland was known in her childhood, was born in Paris in the year 1754. Her father was a worker in enamel, who thrived well enough in his art when he was content to toil at it, but a restless spirit of speculation led him into ventures which brought him ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 6 of 8 • Various
... case of the Sciences where experiments are required and have proved so fertile in the extension of our knowledge, there were grave defects, and too much trust was placed in mere observation and hasty speculation; but what they accomplished in Science is no less but more marvellous than what they accomplished in Art. The idea of Science was there, disengaged from the limiting restrictions of practical necessities, the idea of free and ...
— The Unity of Civilization • Various
... only concerned at the moment with the object of this unusual visit, and his shrewd speculation turned upon the pursuit ...
— The Golden Woman - A Story of the Montana Hills • Ridgwell Cullum
... you have had to remind me to be more direct. You will not have to do so again, Mr. Gryce. To begin, then, I noticed the house, because I always notice it. I never pass it without giving a thought to its ancient history and indulging in more or less speculation as to its present inmates. When, therefore, I found myself in front of it yesterday afternoon on my way to the art exhibition, I naturally looked up, and—whether by an act of providence or not, ...
— The Circular Study • Anna Katharine Green
... taxes. But the increasing military expenditures and the greater difficulty of securing large sums by indirect taxation will increase this proportion. It is likely, then, that State enterprises which, under private capitalism, were used recklessly as aids to land speculation will now be required, as in Germany and other continental countries, to produce a surplus to relieve taxpayers. Private capitalism used the State for promoting the private interests of its directors, State capitalism uses it to produce profits for its ...
— Socialism As It Is - A Survey of The World-Wide Revolutionary Movement • William English Walling
... mysteries in Egypt and India. Without asking a question, tells your name and reads your secret troubles and the remedy. Reads your dreams. Great questions of life quickly solved. Failure turned to success, the separated brought together, advice on all affairs of life, love, marriage, divorce, business, speculation, and investments. Overcomes all evil influences. Ever ready to help and advise those with capital to find a safe and paying investment. No fee until it ...
— Constance Dunlap • Arthur B. Reeve
... words with such an intention is quite unfair. [Footnote: For a discussion of Grimm's theories, together with much interesting speculation on the origin of the ballads, the reader should study the admirable introduction to English and Scottish Popular Ballads, published by George Harrap & Co., Ltd.] Obviously a multitude of people could ...
— Book of Old Ballads • Selected by Beverly Nichols
... rule, the buying and selling of stocks through brokers is a hazardous form of speculation, which has in it all the elements of gambling, and we cannot ...
— Business Hints for Men and Women • Alfred Rochefort Calhoun
... bridge, and when I landed I found myself alone. I was hard pressed for a time, till they came up and relieved me. There were 52 soldiers killed here. Other charges near Goodrich's Landing and at Omega put an end to the cotton speculation in ...
— The Story of Cole Younger, by Himself • Cole Younger
... to buy some blue-grass farm, and wondering how far this peaceful dispossessment might go in time; and whether a fusion of these social extremes of civilization might not be in the end for the best good of the State. And he knew that the basis of his every speculation about the fortunes of the State rested on the intertwining hand of fate in the lives of Marjorie and Gray Pendleton and ...
— The Heart Of The Hills • John Fox, Jr.
... Senior stood strong for Law; but it was becoming daily more impossible. Madrigals, dramas (not without actresses), satirical wit, airy verse, and all manner of adventurous speculation, were what this young man went upon; and was getting more and more loved for; introduced, even, to the superior circles, and recognized there as one of the brightest young fellows ever seen. Which tended, of course, to confirm him in his folly, and open other outlooks and harbors ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. X. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—At Reinsberg—1736-1740 • Thomas Carlyle
... a field of crystal under the dark pines, and they laughed with exuberance of spirit as they swept over it on their skis. Even Lawrence became an adept as long as he had one of their guiding hands to hold. All speculation was gone for the time being. Lawrence and Claire gave themselves up to a frank comradeship, in which Philip formed a splendid third, so that they seemed a trio of happy, healthy animals whose lives flowed without a break in the ...
— Claire - The Blind Love of a Blind Hero, By a Blind Author • Leslie Burton Blades
... strange and characteristic admixture of neighbourly and Christian kindness, blended with a keen regard of the main chance. If the former duties are rarely neglected by the descendants of the Puritans, it may be said, with equal truth, that the latter are never lost sight of. Speculation, and profit, are regarded as so many integral portions of the duty of man; and, as our kinsmen of Old England have set up an idol to worship, in the form of aristocracy, so do our kinsmen of New England ...
— The Sea Lions - The Lost Sealers • James Fenimore Cooper
... no doubt that this foolish practice of assuming arms without right has of late years grown to an absurd height; and I fear the assumption is by no means confined to persons who have risen by trade, or by some lucky speculation in railways &c.; even those who have been "advanced into an office or dignity of publique administration" have but seldom made their "instant request" to the heralds "to devise a coate of armes to be borne by ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 194, July 16, 1853 • Various
... promising opening, when such should appear. His astronomical tutor, Maestlin, encouraged him to devote himself to his newly adopted science, and the first result of this advice appeared before very long in Kepler's "Mysterium Cosmographicum". The bent of his mind was towards philosophical speculation, to which he had been attracted in his youthful studies of Scaliger's "Exoteric Exercises". He says he devoted much time "to the examination of the nature of heaven, of souls, of genii, of the elements, of the essence of fire, of the cause ...
— Kepler • Walter W. Bryant
... Early Greek speculation culminates in the ideas of Plato, or rather in the single idea of good. His followers, and perhaps he himself, having arrived at this elevation, instead of going forwards went backwards from philosophy to psychology, ...
— Meno • Plato
... Sigma} is worth the learning, no other being true. To know him is to know God. And he only who obeys him, does or can know him; he who obeys him cannot fail to know him. To Janet, Jesus Christ was no object of so-called theological speculation, but a living man, who somehow or other heard her when she called to him, and sent ...
— Sir Gibbie • George MacDonald
... steamboat. On being directed to the best English hotel in that truly social Anglo-Gallic little town, I chanced to find in the coffee-room an old crony, whom I had known years since at Cambridge, and who had just arrived from Switzerland, on a speculation connected with ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 12, - Issue 323, July 19, 1828 • Various
... have left out one of the important reasons for the meeting. It is to make money; a grand speculation, whereby the fortunes of these same leaders are to be made at the expense of the poor victims ...
— Four Girls at Chautauqua • Pansy
... invested; what percentage of the gains would belong to me, giving him his full due for labor and skill? And then the credit of the authorship,—which he flatly robbed me of,—what would be its value? But that is all matter for mere speculation. As to the twenty thousand alone, ...
— The Mystery of Murray Davenport - A Story of New York at the Present Day • Robert Neilson Stephens
... nothing a year, encumbered up to the eyes, and loaded with first rent-charges, jointures, settlements. Money, indeed! poor Kynaston! It's my brother Marmaduke's I mean; lucky dog, he went in for speculation—began life as a guinea-pig, and rose with the rise of soap and ...
— Miss Cayley's Adventures • Grant Allen
... have drank have been of a variety of goodness, badness, and indifferentness which has brought me to the point where I never touch it. But to return to inventions, since you desire to limit our discussion to a single subject, I think it is about the most interesting field of speculation imaginable." ...
— The Idiot • John Kendrick Bangs
... once the seat of civilization and the arts, but which, at present, consists of little more than an assemblage of wretched hovels, the principal buildings having been nearly all destroyed. Near the gate, one good house has been rebuilt; and, a little farther on, a still larger mansion on speculation. [Sidenote: ENGLISH RESIDENTS AT ATHENS.]This being a holyday, the bazaar was closed, and after examining the remains of a building of Corinthian architecture, supposed to have been Adrian's Library, we passed on to the residence of Mr. Bell, an English gentleman, ...
— Journal of a Visit to Constantinople and Some of the Greek Islands in the Spring and Summer of 1833 • John Auldjo
... places are preferred. The choice spots over here among the rocks, however, not only yield the finest variety, but in far greater abundance; so that we often got in a single day, what the more timid of the craft could not scrape together in a week. In fact, we made it a matter of desperate speculation—the risk of life standing instead of labor, and courage answering ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 2 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... did not waste much time in speculation as to the spending of that "check for her immediate needs"; such would have been truly idle dreaming. Miss Eliza would spend it. She would attend to the providing of a wardrobe for the visit, and that wardrobe would be utilitarian first and foremost, and ...
— The Heart of Arethusa • Francis Barton Fox
... I intend to have her with me very soon. Your mother is anxious that she should get into a high family, trusting that her beauty will captivate some of the members—a bad kind of speculation. I will advertise for a companion, and so arrange that your mother shall not see me; and when your sister does come to me, it shall not be as a companion, but as a child of my own. I owe you much, Tom— indeed, almost everything; and it is the only way in which I ...
— Poor Jack • Frederick Marryat
... deserts, where they founded Tannote, Derawal and Jaisalmer, the last in A.D. 1157. It has been suggested in the main article on Rajput that the Yadus might have been the Sakas, who invaded India in the second century A.D. This is only a speculation. At a later date a Yadava kingdom existed in the Deccan, with its capital at Deogiri or Daulatabad and its territory lying between that place and Nasik. [582] Mr. Smith states that these Yadava ...
— The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India - Volume IV of IV - Kumhar-Yemkala • R.V. Russell
... speculation alone, although he remembered the whimsical air with which Rupert delivered it. He was now on fire to be gone, his ill-balanced brain leaping from the depths of despondency to the certainty of ...
— Rupert of Hentzau - From The Memoirs of Fritz Von Tarlenheim: The Sequel to - The Prisoner of Zenda • Anthony Hope
... those two persons whom many of the old slanders at Bath remembered for many years after to have made such an eclat, but nobody could, at the time, conjecture who they were, which was the occasion of much speculation ...
— The Surprising Adventures of Bampfylde Moore Carew • Unknown
... how many a brave adventurer has navigated the perilous seas of speculation upon Art, how Aristotle's marvellous insight gave him glimpses of its beauty, how Plato threw away its golden fruit, how Baumgarten sounded the depth of its waters, Kant sailed along its coast without landing, and Vico hoisted the ...
— Aesthetic as Science of Expression and General Linguistic • Benedetto Croce
... upholding them under a different form in my 'Origin of Species.' At this time I admired greatly the 'Zoonomia;' but on reading it a second time after an interval of ten or fifteen years, I was much disappointed; the proportion of speculation being so ...
— The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, Volume I • Francis Darwin
... it with transparent gratitude. All his gruff mannerisms were forgotten in the sorrow of the moment. The poor lad who had passed so suddenly into the valley of death was looked upon as a promising captain in embryo, and there was much speculation as to the deeds he would have accomplished and the high position he would have attained had the sea not claimed him so soon. All this and a good deal besides was spoken to the sorrowing parents by way of ameliorating their suffering, and also because the occasion was opportune for speaking that ...
— The Shellback's Progress - In the Nineteenth Century • Walter Runciman
... up, and drifted off into speculation. "I wonder what she could have found in that man to think of! A girl brought up ...
— The Squirrel-Cage • Dorothy Canfield
... unfortunate deaths of his partners, Count de Chamartin, of Madrid, and the Baron van Veltrup, of Amsterdam, but he had expressed himself ready to carry the great deal through himself, though it involved the speculation of ...
— The Stretton Street Affair • William Le Queux
... judgment of the writer, the thinking of the Middle Ages was sophistry and their belief superstition. For the erring and suffering mass of mankind he has an enlightened sympathy; for the intricacies of speculation he has none. He cherishes a disbelief, theological or inductive it matters not, in sinners rescued by repentance and in blessings obtained by prayer. Between remitted guilt and remitted punishment he draws a vanishing line that makes it doubtful whether Luther started from the limits of purgatory ...
— The History of Freedom • John Emerich Edward Dalberg-Acton
... Rich Bar. The author safely ensconced therein. California might be called the "Hotel State," from the plenitude of its taverns, etc. The Empire the only two-story building in Rich Bar, and the only one there having glass windows. Built by gamblers for immoral purposes. The speculation a failure, its occupants being treated with contempt or pity. Building sold for a few hundred dollars. The new landlord of the Empire. The landlady, an example of the wear and tear of crossing the plains. Left behind her two children and an eight-months-old baby. Cooking for six people, her two-weeks-old ...
— The Shirley Letters from California Mines in 1851-52 • Louise Amelia Knapp Smith Clappe
... change, to alter consignar, to consign, to record contrato social, articles of partnership cordoban, morocco leather despacio, slowly despreciable, despicable dinero efectivo, cash discutir, to discuss especulacion, speculation, venture garrote, cudgel, stick *impedir, to hinder, to preclude ladron, thief (el) matiz, shade *mover, to move, to actuate mozalbete, beardless youth *quebrantamiento, breakage, break down ...
— Pitman's Commercial Spanish Grammar (2nd ed.) • C. A. Toledano
... for speculation. Any one of half a dozen things might have happened, for to one who is utterly in the dark, there ...
— Miss Caprice • St. George Rathborne
... bolstering or depressing the price of the corporation's shares, as the management may be long or short of the market. So far as the utility of the railways is concerned as instruments of anything but speculation, such offices and officers might as well be located in the moon, and their cost saved to the public. The average yearly cost of such offices (and officers) is more than $50,000, and the transfer of the railways to the nation would, in this ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 21, August, 1891 • Various
... together the small splinters of wood, my fingers absolutely refusing their office, and my knees knocking violently against each other. My mind ran over rapidly a thousand absurd projects by which to avoid becoming a partner in the awful speculation. I thought of falling on my knees to my companions, and entreating them to let me escape this necessity; of suddenly rushing upon them, and, by putting one of them to death, of rendering the decision by lot useless—in short, of every thing but of going through with ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 3 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... brought into the public treasury. But nothing afflicted Marcellus so much as the death of Archimedes; who was then, as fate would have it, intent upon working out some problem by a diagram, and having fixed his mind alike and his eyes upon the subject of his speculation, he never noticed the incursion of the Romans, nor that the city was taken. In this transport of study and contemplation, a soldier, unexpectedly coming up to him, commanded him to follow to Marcellus; which he declining to do before he had worked out ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... was a sharp-bowed, full-rigged ship, with a tremendous bilge, built for carrying a goodish cargo, which consisted, as I believe I mentioned before, mainly of Manchester goods and Birmingham hardware, besides a private speculation of our captain consisting of a peculiarly novel consignment of Dundee marmalade, packed up in tins like those used for preserved ...
— Afloat at Last - A Sailor Boy's Log of his Life at Sea • John Conroy Hutcheson
... there had been considerable speculation among those who knew Sam Kirby best, for none of them had ever seen the old fellow in quite such a frame of mind as now. His misfortune had crushed him; he appeared to be numbed by the realization of his overwhelming loss; gone entirely was that gambler's nonchalance ...
— The Winds of Chance • Rex Beach
... could he believe? Gladly he would have fooled himself into believing it all, but the rational soul in him cast out credulity. Every phrase of the letter was calculated for its impression. And the very risk she had run, was not that too a matter of deliberate speculation? She might succeed in her design upon Narramore; if she failed, the 'poorer man was still to be counted upon, for she knew the extent of her power over him. It was worth the endeavour. Perhaps, in her insolent self-confidence, she did not fear the effect on ...
— Eve's Ransom • George Gissing
... months of Mr. Hutchinson's government of Massachusetts, it is obvious that his ill-advised policy and mode of proceeding—arising, no doubt, in a great measure, from his personal and family interest in speculation in the new system of tea trade—was the primary and chief cause of those proceedings in which Boston differed from New York, Philadelphia, and Charleston in preventing the landing of the East India Company's tea. Had ...
— The Loyalists of America and Their Times, Vol. 1 of 2 - From 1620-1816 • Egerton Ryerson
... of opinion among scholars and critics concerning the meaning of the various scenes in these sculptures; and as all their writing is speculation, and no one knows the truth about it, I shall only say that it is a very interesting object in the history of art, and shall speak of the four corner figures on the shortest parts of the frieze, from which the whole work takes its name. The Harpies are very curious; they had wings, and arms ...
— A History of Art for Beginners and Students - Painting, Sculpture, Architecture • Clara Erskine Clement
... forcible and complete presentation of those ideas with which what is called the modern spirit is supposed to be engaged in deadly war. For one thing, the Protestantism of England strips a genuinely Catholic movement of speculation of that pressing and practical importance which belongs to it in countries where nearly all spiritual sentiment, that has received any impression of religion at all, unavoidably runs in Catholic forms. With us the theological reaction against the ideas of the eighteenth ...
— Critical Miscellanies (Vol. 2 of 3) - Essay 4: Joseph de Maistre • John Morley
... from the rest. So far, experiment seems to show that they are either of the nature of melanic factors, or of inhibitory {87} factors, or of reduplication factors as in the case of the fowls' combs. But while the data remain so scanty, speculation in these matters is too hazardous ...
— Mendelism - Third Edition • Reginald Crundall Punnett
... Muller conceives that this belief in universally distributed personality (the word 'Animism' is not very clear) was the result of an historical necessity—not of speculation, but of language. 'Roots were all, or nearly all, expressive of action. . . . Hence a river could only be called or conceived as a runner, or a roarer, or a defender; and in all these capacities always as something active and animated, nay, as ...
— Modern Mythology • Andrew Lang
... use to think of the Goldwing. If five dollars would have bought her, he had not the money to invest in the enterprise. He had no friend upon whom he could call for aid in such a speculation. He might as well think of buying and running one of the large steamers on ...
— All Adrift - or The Goldwing Club • Oliver Optic
... hearth, in front of which revolved the skinned carcass of a rabbit, suspended by a string from a nail. Leaning with one arm on the mantle-shelf stood Winterborne, his eyes on the roasting animal, his face so rapt that speculation could build nothing on it concerning his thoughts, more than that they were not with the scene before him. She thought his features had changed a little since she saw them last. The fire-light did not enable her to perceive that they ...
— The Woodlanders • Thomas Hardy
... and new theories flourished in equal vigor side by side. The people, having no constitutional means of checking even the most flagitious misgovernment, were indemnified for oppression by being suffered to luxuriate in anarchical speculation, and to deny or ridicule every principle on which the institutions of the state reposed. Neither those who attribute the downfall of the old French institutions to the public grievances, nor those who attribute it to the doctrines of the philosophers, appear to us to have taken into ...
— Critical and Historical Essays, Volume III (of 3) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... unintelligible to his brother. Only he could not make up his mind whether it was unintelligible because he was not capable of expressing his meaning clearly, or because his brother would not or could not understand him. But he did not pursue the speculation, and without replying, he fell to musing on a quite ...
— Anna Karenina • Leo Tolstoy |
