"Extort" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... sooth, sir; my determinate voyage is mere extravagancy. But I perceive in you so excellent a touch of modesty that you will not extort from me what I am willing to keep in; therefore it charges me in manners the rather to express myself. You must know of me then, Antonio, my name is Sebastian, which I called Roderigo. My father was that Sebastian of Messaline ...
— Twelfth Night; or, What You Will • William Shakespeare [Hudson edition]
... such a way, that it always reached my ears. She played a pious, modest, reserved part, in order to excite my curiosity. And at last, to-day she plays the prude. She refuses my forgiveness, in hopes by this generous device, to extort it ...
— The Stranger - A Drama, in Five Acts • August von Kotzebue
... moment. Then with the air of a martyr, from whom the rack can only extort a fuller confession of his faith—though I fear she had no deeper gospel at the root of it than Byron had brought ...
— Alec Forbes of Howglen • George MacDonald
... not very clear about the position and duties of a chorus-girl, but it certainly had the air of being a last desperate resort. There sprang from that a vague hope that perhaps she might extort a capitulation from her father by a threat to seek that position, and then with overwhelming clearness it came to her that whatever happened she would never be able to tell her father about her debt. The completest capitulation ...
— Ann Veronica • H. G. Wells
... the merchants were cunning and often succeeded in evading the tariff. In July 1667, the habitants' syndic appeared before the council to complain of the various devices resorted to by merchants to extort higher prices from the settlers than were allowed by law. So the council made a ruling that all merchandise should be stamped, in the presence of the syndic, according to the prices of each kind and quality, ...
— The Great Intendant - A Chronicle of Jean Talon in Canada 1665-1672 • Thomas Chapais
... I was vexed by the insolence of this Jewish dog, that I was not, as he imagined, a beggar: that I had the means of paying him my just debt, but that I hoped he would not extort from me all that exorbitant interest which none but a Jew could exact. He smiled, and answered that if a Turk loved opium better than money this was no fault of his; that he had supplied me with what I loved best in the world, and that I ought not ...
— Murad the Unlucky and Other Tales • Maria Edgeworth
... purse of the numerous nobles who, either by inheritance, or in virtue of their official positions, as I have explained, owned as their followers the inhabitants of the various villages situated on its banks, and many were the devices employed to extort the uttermost farthing from the unfortunate people, who were quite incapable of offering any resistance because the warlike Kyan tribe was ever ready at hand to sweep down upon them at the behest of their Brunai oppressors. The system ...
— British Borneo - Sketches of Brunai, Sarawak, Labuan, and North Borneo • W. H. Treacher
... this regular and symmetrical detail offers a suspicion of mere mechanism, yet it is no less evident that after longer study the charms of this exquisite structure tell with a lasting power. Too subtle to extort admiration at first, it bewitches a student of architecture who notes the scholarly reticence of its detail, the masterly way in which, as a rule, the construction is legitimately ornamented and the decoration made an integral part of ...
— Bell's Cathedrals: The Cathedral Church of Salisbury - A Description of its Fabric and a Brief History of the See of Sarum • Gleeson White
... hundred years the kings were elected by the Rigsrad, or senate, and the conditions of their tenure were such as to preclude both the independence of action and the accumulation of resources which is essential to absolutism. As early as 1282 the nobles were able to extort from the crown a haandfaestning, or charter, and almost every sovereign after that date was compelled, once at least during his reign, to make a grant of chartered privileges. To the Danehof, or national assembly, fell at times a (p. 555) goodly measure of authority, although eventually ...
— The Governments of Europe • Frederic Austin Ogg
... finding that he could neither extort from Peggy an acknowledgment of love, nor make himself credible upon the subject of the large fortune, saw that he had nothing for it now, in order to produce an impression, but ...
— Phelim O'toole's Courtship and Other Stories • William Carleton
... rich were preceded by a slave bearing their lantern. This Cicero mentions as being the habit of Catiline upon his midnight expeditions; and when M. Antony was accused of a disgraceful intrigue, his lantern-bearer was tortured to extort a confession whither he had conducted his master. One of these machines, of considerable ingenuity and beauty of workmanship, was found in Herculaneum, and another almost exactly the same, at Pompeii a few years after. In form it is cylindrical, ...
— Museum of Antiquity - A Description of Ancient Life • L. W. Yaggy
... hinder his marriage on Wednesday. Now, suppose I have got a magistrate's warrant to apprehend you in my pocket? Suppose I have a constable to execute it in the next room? Suppose I bring you up to-morrow—the day before the marriage—charge you only generally with an attempt to extort money, and apply for a day's remand to complete the case? Suppose, as a suspicious stranger, you can't get bail ...
— After Dark • Wilkie Collins
... this happy course, we drew more from the colonies than all the impotent violence of despotism ever could extort from them. We did this abundantly in the last war; it has never been once denied; and what reason have we to imagine that the colonies would not have proceeded in supplying government as liberally, if you had not stepped in and ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. II. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... sense of the words, strictly necessary. Julia Wentworth had resided for years with her grandfather, a pragmatic old gentleman, to whom from pure affection she had long yielded an obedience which he would have had no right to extort, and which he was sometimes disposed to abuse. He had declared in the most ingenuous manner that she should never marry with his consent any man of less fortune than her own would be; and on his consent rested the prospect of her inheriting ...
— If, Yes and Perhaps - Four Possibilities and Six Exaggerations with Some Bits of Fact • Edward Everett Hale
... and also a stupendous hiding-place. All the treasures of the kings, increasing from century to century, all the gold of France, all that they extort from the people, all that they snatch from the clergy, all the booty gathered on the battle-fields of Europe lie heaped up in the royal cave. Old Merovingian gold sous, glittering crown-pieces, doubloons, ducats, florins, guineas; and the precious stones ...
— The Hollow Needle • Maurice Leblanc
... but with so unmistakable an air of cunning and triumph that Eric was both astonished and dismayed. Could the miscreant have any further plot against him? At first he fancied that Billy might attempt to extort money by a threat of telling Dr Rowlands; but this supposition he banished as unlikely, since it might expose Billy himself to ...
— Eric, or Little by Little • Frederic W. Farrar
... is to prove a point against Romanism, would have been an amiable frailty if it had been applied on the side of mercy. When he is bent on proving that the prophecy concerning the Man of Sin, in the Second Epistle to the Thessalonians, refers to the Pope, he can extort from the innocent word [Greek text] the meaning cathedrize, though why we are to translate "He as God cathedrizes in the temple of God," any more than we are to translate "cathedrize here, while I go and pray yonder," it is for Dr. Cumming to show more clearly than he has yet done. But ...
— The Essays of "George Eliot" - Complete • George Eliot
... has very kindly offered to take Marie down to Cairo and start her off to Alexandria, whence Ross's people can send her home. If she wants to stay in Alexandria and get placed by the nuns who piously exhorted her to extort ninety francs a month from me, so much the better for me. Ali refuses to take a penny from me for her journey—besides bringing me potatoes and all sorts of things: and if I remonstrate he says he and ...
— Letters from Egypt • Lucie Duff Gordon
... remuneration; if it were not that, by your verdict, you may prevent those little innocent defrauded wretches from becoming wandering beggars, as well as orphans on the face of this earth. Oh, I know I need not ask this verdict from your mercy; I need not extort it from your compassion; I will receive it from your justice. I do conjure you, not as fathers, but as husbands:—not as husbands, but as citizens:—not as citizens, but as men:—not as men, but as Christians:—by all your obligations, public, private, moral, and religious; by the hearth profaned; ...
— The Art of Public Speaking • Dale Carnagey (AKA Dale Carnegie) and J. Berg Esenwein
... fearful, thundering cry, which made the windows rattle, and called forth a terrible echo above in the deserted hall; for through all these shrieks and howls, there resounded now a piercing cry, such as only the greatest pain or the most instant need can extort from human lips. ...
— Marie Antoinette And Her Son • Louise Muhlbach
... on the strength of a foolish flirtation; knowing herself, at the time, to be privately married to another man? Was this woman—with the voice of a lady, the look of a lady, the manner of a lady—in league (as Geoffrey had declared) with the illiterate vagabond who was attempting to extort money anonymously from Mrs. Glenarm? Impossible! Making every allowance for the proverbial deceitfulness of ...
— Man and Wife • Wilkie Collins
... its inconstancy and desertion, are cut off, by this cruel interruption, from the enjoyment of their prerogatives, and doomed to lose four months in inactive obscurity. Many complaints do vexation and desire extort from those exiled tyrants of the town, against the inexorable sun, who pursues his course without any regard to love or beauty; and visits either tropick at the stated time, whether shunned or courted, ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D, In Nine Volumes - Volume the Third: The Rambler, Vol. II • Samuel Johnson
... originally designed! And here they are in the ignoble custody of some avaricious vender, who having obtained them at the sale of some departed amateur for less than half their first cost, now expects to extort more ...
— The Idler in France • Marguerite Gardiner
... something which should extort at least her admiration, if not her love, I wished I were a soldier, that I might win glory for her—or a poet, that I might write verses in her praise which should be deathless—or a painter, that I might ...
— In the Days of My Youth • Amelia Ann Blandford Edwards
... published, not one in ten could be induced to believe true.[11] It appears that the master or mistress, or both, suspected the unfortunate wretch of hiding a bunch of keys which were missing; and to extort some explanation, which, it is more than probable, the slave was as unable to do as her mistress, or any other person, her master, Major Harney, an officer of our army, had whipped her for three successive ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... not the less diligently applied to." This high-soaring ambition was the source both of his weakness and his strength in art, as well as in his commerce with the world of men. The boy who despised discipline and sought to extort her secrets from nature by magic, was destined to become the philanthropist who dreamed of revolutionizing society by eloquence, and the poet who invented in "Prometheus Unbound" forms of grandeur too colossal to be ...
— Percy Bysshe Shelley • John Addington Symonds
... such an experimental knowledge of all the modes of religious melancholy as he could never have gathered from books; and his vigorous genius, animated by a fervent spirit of devotion, enabled him, not only to exercise a great influence over the vulgar, but even to extort the half contemptuous admiration of scholars. Yet it was long before he ceased to be tormented by an impulse which urged him to utter words of horrible impiety ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 3. (of 4) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... bold indeed, but at the same time very glorious to the cause of Christianity; declaring, that any Christian who may first come, shall oblige these false gods to confess publicly, that they are but devils; and consenting that this Christian shall be immediately killed, if he does not extort such a confession from the mouth of these gods. Nisi se daemones confessi fuerint Christiano mentiri non audentes, ibidem illius Christiani procacissimi sanguinem fundite. St. Austin likewise makes frequent mention of this deity. "What is now," says he,(512) "become of Coelestis, ...
— The Ancient History of the Egyptians, Carthaginians, Assyrians, • Charles Rollin
... as did his wife, from hand to mouth, might have come to an end of this easy life if he had not maintained a sort of martial law over his family, which compelled them to work for the preservation of it. When he had brought up his children, at the cost of those from whom his wife was able to extort gifts, the following charter and budget were the ...
— Sons of the Soil • Honore de Balzac
... which they have so bitterly inveighed, and so resolutely fought. We are disgusted and shocked at reading Croly's account of the scandalous conduct of the Catholic clergy in Ireland, with regard to the emoluments they extort from their miserable flocks, and at the systematic desecration of holy things which they countenance and practise; but when the difference is considered between their spiritual condition and their moral composition as a class, the conduct of the clergy ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William IV, Vol. III • Charles C. F. Greville
... now suffering for those opinions, and suffering with a firmness, which to those who think him wrong, is stubbornness; and, thus, he affords another proof of the extreme impolicy of attempting to impose silence by prosecutions, and extort from the mind the abjuration of opinions by external and physical force. It never succeeds; but, on the contrary, works the very opposite effect to that which is its object. As the author from whom I have just now cited says, with extreme force and ...
— A Sketch of the Life of the late Henry Cooper - Barrister-at-Law, of the Norfolk Circuit; as also, of his Father • William Cooper
... their mothers' arms; for gold, parents were tortured in their children's presence; for gold, brides were scourged to death before their husbands' eyes. Wherever treasure was suspected, every expedient which ingenuity, sharpened by greediness, could suggest, was employed to extort it from its possessors. The fire, spreading more extensively and more rapidly than had been desired through the wealthiest quarter of the city, had unfortunately devoured a vast amount of property. Six ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. X (of X) - America - II, Index • Various
... governors seized upon a very worthy and amiable Indian prince, and in order to extort from him where his treasures were concealed, caused his feet to be burnt till the marrow dropped from his bones, and he expired through the extremity of the ...
— Fox's Book of Martyrs - Or A History of the Lives, Sufferings, and Triumphant - Deaths of the Primitive Protestant Martyrs • John Fox
... reimbursed himself for his outlay and for his trouble by collecting the tax in detail from the people. Of course, it was for the interest of the tax-gatherer, in such a case, after having paid the round sum to the government, to extort as much as possible from the people, since all that he obtained over and above the sum that he had paid was his profit on the transaction. Then, if the people complained to the government of his exactions, ...
— Genghis Khan, Makers of History Series • Jacob Abbott
... for the refining influences. Blanche was tilted back in her chair, with one foot on the rung of the chair before her, resuming a loud-toned discourse with Count Posen as to his projected work on American society. She was trying to extort a promise that she should appear in its pages, which, as we all remember, she did. One of her attendant nymphs sat leaning her elbows on the table, "talking horse" with a gentleman who had an undoubted professional claim to a knowledge of that commodity. Another, ...
— Malbone - An Oldport Romance • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... two-year olds entered for the race have to be watched by their trainer that they may not be overfed or drugged against the day of the race. It has come to this, that schools are bidding for clever boys in order to run them in the races, and in France, I read, that parents actually extort money from schools by threatening to take away the young racers that are likely to win ...
— Chips From A German Workshop, Vol. V. • F. Max Mueller
... delights, whether their delightfulness would not seem heartless as laughter in a house of mourning to this woman whose delight lay in a grave, and if they were sorrows, whether coming to a woman who had wept so much they would not extort some last secretion more agonising ...
— The Judge • Rebecca West
... (riding a griffin, doubtless also imaginary) follows, kind but timid, to advise submission; then appears Io, victim of Zeus' love and Hera's jealousy, to whom Prometheus prophesies her future wanderings and his own fate; lastly Hermes, insolent messenger of the gods, who tries in vain to extort Prometheus' secret knowledge of the future. Oceanus, the well-meaning palavering old mentor, and Hermes, the blustering and futile jack-in-office, gods though they be, are vigorous, audacious and very human character-sketches; ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... thought. She had tacitly said herself that under the bitter pains of the rack they would be able to extort a false confession from her. It was a hint worth remembering, and it ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... it. When they have beaten her with straps till they have lacerated her flesh, and till the blood which issues through her wounds runs down from them, and when for all that they can do nothing nor extort sigh or word promise her; they are meddling to no purpose. And from her, and she never moves nor stirs, then they tell her that they must seek fire and lead, and that they will melt it and will pour it into her palms rather than fail to ...
— Cliges: A Romance • Chretien de Troyes
... almost hath its sundry manner of torturing persones suspected for murder or even great crimes to extort from them a confession of the truth. At Paris the hangman takes a serviet, or whiles a wool cloath (which I remember Cleark in his Martyrologie discovering the Spanish Inquisition also mentioned), which ...
— Publications of the Scottish History Society, Vol. 36 • Sir John Lauder
... the power would be transferred to the minority. Were the defensive privilege limited to particular cases, an interested minority might take advantage of it to screen themselves from equitable sacrifices to the general weal, or, in particular emergencies, to extort unreasonable indulgences. Lastly, it would facilitate and foster the baneful practice of secessions; a practice which has shown itself even in States where a majority only is required; a practice subversive of all the principles of ...
— The Federalist Papers
... sternest doctrines of a renovated Catholicism. A spell which acted so widely and so marvellously could not be altogether unfelt by a mind whose peculiar property it was to yield itself to every influence in order to extort its secret and comprehend its power. Beyond this point the magic failed. "In all my transitions,"—thus he has written of himself,—"I have never alienated my judgment and my will; I have never pledged my belief. But I had a power of comprehending persons and things which ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 102, April, 1866 • Various
... Heaven are so severe as those for mercies abused; and no instrumentality employed in their infliction is so dreadful as the wrath of man. No spasms are like the spasms of expiring liberty, and no wailing such as her convulsions extort. ...
— McGuffey's Sixth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... of his passion. In a certain sense, he was to be pitied. Love of this kind begins as a gift; but a woman of this temperament does not leave it so. She promptly turned it into a debt, and the more she loved the debtor, the more oppressively and inexorably did she extort the uttermost penny from him. About this time she was introduced to an eminent medical specialist in mental diseases, who, by some inexplicable means, was induced to give a certificate of her insanity. Then her cousins ...
— Danger! A True History of a Great City's Wiles and Temptations • William Howe
... consideration for them, he began to think of again leaving France. The dragoons were practising much cruelty on the Protestant population, being quartered in their houses, and at liberty to plunder and extort money to any extent. They were also incessantly on the look out for the assemblies, being often led by mounted priests and spies to places where they had been informed that meetings were about to be held. Their principal object, besides hanging the persons ...
— The Huguenots in France • Samuel Smiles
... so. He did come. Came to extort money, goods—I don't know what else. Wanted to set up as a trader—the swine! I kicked his hat into the courtyard, and he went after it, and that was the last of him till he showed up with Abdulla. How ...
— An Outcast of the Islands • Joseph Conrad
... Before a year was over he had personally visited almost every English gaol, and in nearly all of them he found frightful abuses which had been noticed half-a-century before, but which had been left unredressed by Parliament. Gaolers who bought their places were paid by fees, and suffered to extort what they could. Even when acquitted, men were dragged back to their cells for want of funds to discharge the sums they owed to their keepers. Debtors and felons were huddled together in the prisons which Howard found crowded by the legislation of the day. No separation was preserved between ...
— History of the English People, Volume VIII (of 8) - Modern England, 1760-1815 • John Richard Green
... Montoni, 'unless you yield to my demand: for, come what may, you shall not quit the castle till then.' Madame Montoni burst into loud lamentation, which she as suddenly checked, considering, that her husband's assertions might be only artifices, employed to extort her consent. She hinted this suspicion, and, in the next moment, told him also, that his designs were not so honourable as to serve the state, and that she believed he had only commenced a captain of banditti, to join the ...
— The Mysteries of Udolpho • Ann Radcliffe
... intelligence and amiability, and for more than two years had been heartily devoted to Christ. "The younger who had left the school," says the report of the mission, "was taken, a few days since, into a room where many of her relatives and a priest had assembled, to extort from her a renunciation of her faith, and was told that she would either have to give up, or die; that they would give her no peace so long as she persisted in her present course. But the Lord sustained her. They resorted to entreaty, and besought her merely to make the sign of submission, telling ...
— History Of The Missions Of The American Board Of Commissioners For Foreign Missions To The Oriental Churches, Volume II. • Rufus Anderson
... Death............................................... G Grangeneuve "Although many Of my colleagues have manifested "sentiments ill agreeing with the impartiality of a "court of judicature; and have employed all "possible means of influence, in order to extort "from the national convention a sentence of death; "I vote for confinement ...
— Historical Epochs of the French Revolution • H. Goudemetz
... forlornly precarious post only when they could not send them by the "urbanity" of such or such a one! Could you have contrasted with them the homeless, shelterless, pencil-borrowing, elbow-scratching, musty, fusty tatterdemalions who stretched out on the turfless ground beside their mess fires to extort or answer those cautious or incautious missives, or who for the fortieth time drew them from hiding to reread into their guarded or unguarded lines meanings never dreamed by their writers, you could not have laughed without a feeling of tears, ...
— Kincaid's Battery • George W. Cable
... can only say—God have mercy upon us all. I feel it my duty to take the child away, but I shall take him straight from your house to the best school in Southampton; and I give you my honor that I will extort nothing from his innocent simplicity which can in any manner—I mean," he said, breaking off abruptly, "I mean this. I will not seek to come one step nearer the secret through him. I—I am not a detective officer, and I do not think the most accomplished detective would like ...
— Lady Audley's Secret • Mary Elizabeth Braddon
... hungry, dirty faces, men who called themselves clerks, evil-disposed persons who traded under such names as their owners could use no longer on their own account. These prowlers amongst thieves, under the protection of the Law, were permitted to extort what they could from the friends of miserable prisoners under pretence of engaging counsel to defend them. Counsel they would engage after a fashion—sometimes: but not unfrequently they cheated counsel, client and the law at the same time, which is rather better than killing ...
— The Humourous Story of Farmer Bumpkin's Lawsuit • Richard Harris
... is called "the stone of famine," because it is supposed capable of causing either dearth or abundance, but is oftener used by the sorcerer to create, or at least to threaten, dearth, in order thereby to extort presents from his alarmed fellow tribesmen. This stone is kept in a burial-ground and derives its potency from the dead. The worshipper or the sorcerer (for he combines the two characters) who desires to cause a famine repairs to the burial-ground, uncovers the stone, rubs it with ...
— The Belief in Immortality and the Worship of the Dead, Volume I (of 3) • Sir James George Frazer
... already a prisoner for life was no punishment; the major's powers were, therefore, limited to the cat and the gallows. And as the first gallows had been built to carry only eight passengers, his daily death sentences were also limited to that number. For twenty years torture was used to extort confession— even women were flogged if they refused to give evidence, and an order of the Governor was held to be equal to law. ...
— The Book of the Bush • George Dunderdale
... God, with an awful submission and meekness. But Beatrix's nature was different to that tender parent's; she seemed to accept her grief, and to defy it; nor would she allow it (I believe not even in private, and in her own chamber) to extort from her the confession of even a tear of humiliation or a cry of pain. Friends and children of our race, who come after me, in which way will you bear your trials? I know one that prays God will give you love rather than pride, and that the Eye all-seeing shall find you ...
— Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges • William Makepeace Thackeray
... Parliament in London that was very much engrossed with other matters. We cannot do better than to quote the Puritan biographer Clarke.[31] "A report was carried to the Parliament ... as if some busie men had made use of some ill Arts to extort such confession; ... thereupon a special Commission of Oyer and Terminer was granted for the trial of these Witches." Care was to be used, in gathering evidence, that confessions should be voluntary and should be backed by "many collateral circumstances." ...
— A History of Witchcraft in England from 1558 to 1718 • Wallace Notestein
... of our neighbor into a huge "beam," a little dimple in his face into a monstrous wen. This is plainly slander, at least in degree, and according to the surplusage whereby the censure doth exceed the fault. As he that, upon the score of a small debt, doth extort a great sum, is no less a thief, in regard to what amounts beyond his due, than if without any pretense he had violently or fraudulently seized on it, so he is a slanderer that, by heightening faults or imperfections, doth charge his neighbor with greater ...
— The World's Best Orations, Vol. 1 (of 10) • Various
... darkened and their hearts depraved, its applauses and contempt will for the most part be systematically misplaced; that though the beneficent and disinterested spirit of Christianity, and her obvious tendency to promote domestic comfort and general happiness, cannot but extort applause; yet that her aspiring after more than ordinary excellence, by exciting secret misgivings in others, or a painful sense of inferiority not unmixed with envy, cannot fail often to disgust and offend. The word of God teaches us, that though such of the ...
— A Practical View of the Prevailing Religious System of Professed Christians, in the Middle and Higher Classes in this Country, Contrasted with Real Christianity. • William Wilberforce
... this spirit proved to be nothing more than a poor Bedlam beggar who had crept into this deserted hovel for shelter, and with his talk about devils frighted the fool, one of those poor lunatics who are either mad, or feign to be so, the better to extort charity from the compassionate country people, who go about the country calling themselves poor Tom and poor Turlygood, saying, "Who gives anything to poor Tom?" sticking pins and nails and sprigs of rosemary into their arms to make them bleed; and with horrible actions, ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles and Mary Lamb
... Government by Pasquin, the writer goes on to say that Giffard, the manager of Goodman's Fields, brought Walpole a farce called The Golden Rump, which had been proposed for exhibition. Whether he did this to extort money, or to ask advice, is not clear. In either case, Walpole is said to have "paid the profits which might have accrued from the performance, and detained the copy." He then made a compendious selection of the treasonable and profane passages it contained. These ...
— Fielding - (English Men of Letters Series) • Austin Dobson
... abominations were made manifest, for those who came nigh his barrow were cut off by a kind of sudden death; and after his end, he spread such pestilence that he seemed almost to leave a filthier record in his death than in his life: it was as though he would extort from the guilty a punishment for his slaughter. The inhabitants, being in this trouble, took the body out of the mound, beheaded it, and impaled it through the breast with a sharp stake; and herein that people ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")
... year the plot known as Ridolfi's was discovered, and it is to be noted that Elizabeth herself ordered the rack to be used to extort information. The result was condemnation of Norfolk to the block. The recalcitrance of Henry of Anjou led to his definitely withdrawing from his courtship, while the young Alencon became the new subject ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol X • Various
... and excellence be which can extort this from us, freelivers, like yourself, and all of your just resentments against the rest of her family, and offered our assistance to execute your vengeance on them? But we cannot think it reasonable that you should punish an innocent creature, who loves you so well, and ...
— Clarissa, Volume 4 (of 9) - History Of A Young Lady • Samuel Richardson
... and leaving us without the means of making any presents to the Esquimaux, or other Indians we might meet. I resolved, therefore, on steadily refusing every request; and when he perceived that he could extort nothing more, he rose in an angry manner, and addressing his young men, said: "There are too few goods for me to distribute; those that mean to follow the white people to the sea may ...
— Narrative of a Journey to the Shores of the Polar Sea, in the years 1819-20-21-22, Volume 2 • John Franklin
... I should only tell you what I have to say to you," said Gochard. "Ah! you claimed that I wanted to extort blackmail. I, an old brigadier, extort blackmail? Well, so let it be! Let us ...
— His Excellency the Minister • Jules Claretie
... deeply admired the Boston prophetess, left the country in disgust. Mrs. Hutchinson was arraigned at the bar as if she had been a criminal of the most dangerous kind. Winthrop, who presided, catechised her mercilessly, and all endeavoured to extort from her some damaging admission. But in this they were unsuccessful. "Mrs. Hutchinson can tell when to speak and when to hold her tongue," commented the governor, in describing the court proceedings. Yet when all is said, the "trial" was but a mockery, and those who ...
— The Romance of Old New England Rooftrees • Mary Caroline Crawford
... however, that this melancholy position began, in June, 1852, to extort some sighs from the sorrowful personages who form a portion of the concern. The report of the commission on the budget will remain in the memory of men, as one of the most heart-rending masterpieces of the plaintive style. Let us ...
— Napoleon the Little • Victor Hugo
... reason why, in the church, the accused and the guilty have but one and the same appellation. Whoever is arraigned at her tribunal has heaven and earth against him; the interrogatory is already a species of torture. When the church accuses, she seems already convinced; all her efforts tend to extort the confession of the crime, which, in virtue of her infallibility, she discovers in darkness; from this anticipated conviction of the guilt of the accused are produced all those ambushes and snares laid for ...
— The Christian Foundation, June, 1880
... empire, confine themselves to blackmailing the countries and petty states that tremble before the shadow of Rome; the courts of the secondary kings of the Orient, the court of the Ptolemies at Alexandria,—all are invaded by a horde of insatiable senators and knights, who, menacing and promising, extort money to spend in Italy and foment the growing extravagance. The debts pile up, the political corruption overflows, scandals follow, the parties in Rome rend each other madly, though hail-fellow-well-met in the provinces to plunder subjects and vassals. In the ...
— Characters and events of Roman History • Guglielmo Ferrero
... of Basil conceded the whole sacrament to the Bohemians, on condition that they would acknowledge that it may, with propriety, be taken and received in one kind only. This confession they also wish to extort from us. Eckius says he contends for this point, merely because the people cannot be retained in the discharge of duty, unless we also release their consciences in regard to the sacrament (that is, unless the reformers would admit, that its reception in one kind was also allowable). ...
— American Lutheranism Vindicated; or, Examination of the Lutheran Symbols, on Certain Disputed Topics • Samuel Simon Schmucker
... the safety of Clotelle, while she felt glad that Jerome had escaped. In vain did they try to extort from the girl the whereabouts of the man whose escape she had effected. She was not aware that he had fled on a steamer, and when ...
— Clotelle - The Colored Heroine • William Wells Brown
... to extort money!" said the lawyer confidently. "I can have him before a magistrate to-morrow, my lord, if it be thought well." It was, however, felt to be expedient that Mr. Cumming should in the first case send for Mr. Greenwood, and ...
— Marion Fay • Anthony Trollope
... suffer at the hands of the police and gendarmes are identical with those employed in the famous conspiracy trials. I read affidavits, now on their way to the United States and British Governments, which made one's blood boil, so frightful were the means used in trying to extort confessions from prisoners. And many of these had no part in the demonstrations, ...
— Korea's Fight for Freedom • F.A. McKenzie
... but the latitudes and longitudes. No art of the deacon's, and he practised many, could extort from the mariner these most material facts, without which all the rest were useless; and the old man worked himself into a fever almost as high as that which soon came over Daggett, in the effort to come at these ...
— The Sea Lions - The Lost Sealers • James Fenimore Cooper
... assembled we may have, all winter, for the asking—if we will but ask ourselves instead of the lawn-mower man—an effect of home, of comfort, cheer and grace, of summer and autumn reminiscences and of spring's anticipations, immeasurably better than any ordinary eye or fancy can extort from the rectangular and stiffened-out nakedness of unplanted boundaries; immeasurably better than the month-by-month daily death-stare of shroud-like snow around houses standing barefooted on the frozen ground. It ...
— The Amateur Garden • George W. Cable
... (to the keeper's lodge) perfectly well, and when he came out again, he was in the greatest disorder; his thumbs were much swollen, and very sore; and he declared that the occasion of his being in that condition was, that the keeper, in order to extort from him a confession of the names of those who had assisted him and others in their attempt to escape, had screwed certain instruments of iron upon his thumbs, so close, that they had forced the blood out of them with exquisite pain. After this, he was carried into the strong room, where, ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 454 - Volume 18, New Series, September 11, 1852 • Various
... trying to extort a confession from Sarah, the most active agents of the Pi-Bast police, and with them every Phoenician under the leadership of Hiram, were hunting the Greek Lykon and ...
— The Pharaoh and the Priest - An Historical Novel of Ancient Egypt • Boleslaw Prus
... potion. The gum of warpy juniper shoots is seethed With the torn marrow of an adder's spine; An unflawed emerald is pashed to dust And mingled there; that broth must cool in moonlight. I have indeed attempted this already, But the poor emeralds I could extort From wry-mouthed earls' women had no force. In two more dawns it will be late for potions ... There are not many emeralds in Britain, And there is none for vividness and strength Like the great stone that hangs ...
— Georgian Poetry 1913-15 • Edited by E. M. (Sir Edward Howard Marsh)
... of rapid motion. But Lord Altamont was firm in resisting this petition at that time. The remote consequence was, that by way of redressing the violated equilibrium to our feelings, we subscribed throughout Wales to extort six horses from the astonished innkeepers, most of whom declined the requisition, and would furnish only four, on the plea that the leaders would only embarrass the other horses; but one at Bangor, from whom we coolly requested ...
— Memorials and Other Papers • Thomas de Quincey
... two separate flaps. Valiantly he strove to extort some penalty by thrust of massive shoulder and clash of fangs. But Bill to all seeming was twice his own length away in the same instant that he flashed in to the attack. Jan breathed hard in a ...
— Jan - A Dog and a Romance • A. J. Dawson
... rob; poll, to exact, to extort. 'The church is pilled and polled by its own flocks.'—South, ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... to extort such a sense from the words of the commandment; seeing that the reason for which the command itself was originally given, namely, as a memorial of God's having rested from the creation of the world, cannot be transferred from the seventh day to the first; ...
— Our Day - In the Light of Prophecy • W. A. Spicer
... Gods forgotten,—or is it that subtler mirth The Gods extort of a certain sort of folk ...
— The Certain Hour • James Branch Cabell
... virtues alone. Her sympathies are clearly mine!' These conclusions emboldened me. I haunted your house nightly with music. Sheltered beneath your trees, I poured forth the most plaintive strains which I could extort from my flute. Passion increased the effect of art. I strove at no regular tunes; I played as the mood prompted; and felt myself, not unfrequently, weeping over ...
— Confession • W. Gilmore Simms
... the election of the deacons, Peter and John had been incarcerated. The Sanhedrim wished to extort from them a pledge that they would "not speak at all nor teach in the name of Jesus," [55:1] but the prisoners nobly refused to consent to any such compromise. They "answered and said unto them—Whether it be right ...
— The Ancient Church - Its History, Doctrine, Worship, and Constitution • W.D. [William Dool] Killen
... Cooper would extort commendation from the most churlish critic. Alexander is a compound of Hero and Lover, and in both extravagant and enthusiastic almost to madness. It is in the former of these Mr. C. chiefly displayed his powers. His voice, his person, ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor, Vol. I, No. 5, May 1810 • Various
... plainly Mr. Simmons' duty to hand young Short over to the authorities, but when he found that Matthew De Vere was the principal offender, a scheme instantly suggested itself to him—a plan to extort money from the rich banker to keep the affair a secret, and save his family from disgrace. Thus Jacob's regard for the law and justice, which was sincere at first, before he saw an opportunity of turning his knowledge ...
— Under Fire - A Tale of New England Village Life • Frank A. Munsey
... we made enemies was because Richard found it necessary to inform the Jews that he would not aid and abet them in their endeavours to extort unfair usury from the Syrians. Some of the village Shaykhs and peasantry, ignorant people as they were, were in the habit of making ruinous terms with the Jews, and the extortion was something dreadful. Moreover, certain Jewish usurers were suspected of exciting massacres between the Christians ...
— The Romance of Isabel Lady Burton Volume II • Isabel Lady Burton & W. H. Wilkins
... followed the fellow," Ralph said. "I would not have slain him could I have helped it, but would have left it for the hangman to extort from him the name of his employer; but, in truth, he struck so hard, and you fell so straight before the blow, that I feared the mail had given way, and that you were sorely wounded if not killed. You have oft told me that I was over-careful of you, but you see that ...
— Saint George for England • G. A. Henty
... waiting-women: take them, and extort By any kind of torment the truth from them. —Our present business is, I take it, this: That I should win the wife of Pamphilus To return home; which so I but effect, I sha'n't regret the same of having done What others of my ...
— The Comedies of Terence • Publius Terentius Afer
... practical result of secession. All who stopped short of that consummation (on whatever plea), are the 'chaff.' The writer is something of an incendiary, or something of a fanatic; but he is consistent with regard to his own principles, and so elaborately careful in his details as to extort admiration of his energy and ...
— Theological Essays and Other Papers v2 • Thomas de Quincey
... of this here hammer, now, before your face.' Ay, and the villain would have done it too, if I had not instantly complied; but what was worse, the abominable scoundrel had the audacity to tell me, when I wanted him to deliver the horse first, for fear he should extort a further sum from me, that he had more honour than to break his word. A whelp of a boy had yesterday caught a young hedgehog, and perceiving me, threw it into the water to make it extend its legs; then with the rough side of a knotty stick sawed ...
— Heads and Tales • Various
... that we have no right to tax him, which is only one mode of inflicting a fine or penalty for an act, the right to do which we have acceded. In the strong language of the Committee of Correspondence of Maryland:[94] "The object of Masonry never was to extort, nolens volens, money from its votaries. Such are not its principles or teaching. The advocating such doctrines cannot advance the interest or reputation of the institution; but will, as your committee fear, do much to destroy its usefulness. Compulsive membership deprives it of the ...
— The Principles of Masonic Law - A Treatise on the Constitutional Laws, Usages And Landmarks of - Freemasonry • Albert G. Mackey
... gardens, which was in turn protected by exterior works; its plains were well cultivated, and its commerce extended from China to Europe. Its riches were proportionally great; the Saracens were able to extort a tribute of two million gold pieces from the inhabitants; we read, moreover, of the crown jewels of one of the Turkish princesses; and of the buskin of another, which she dropt in her flight from Bokhara, as being worth two thousand ...
— Historical Sketches, Volume I (of 3) • John Henry Newman
... Cavelier, MS.] When they crossed the tropic, the sailors made ready a tub on deck to baptize the passengers, after the villanous practice of the time; but La Salle refused to permit it, to the disappointment and wrath of all the crew, who had expected to extort a bountiful ransom, in money and liquor, from their victims. There was an incessant chafing between the two commanders; and when at length, after a long and wretched voyage, they reached St. Domingo, Beaujeu showed clearly that he was, to say the least, ...
— France and England in North America, a Series of Historical Narratives, Part Third • Francis Parkman
... week Derek Pruyn, having practically announced an engagement which did not exist, found himself in a somewhat ludicrous situation. Too proud to extort a promise of secrecy from Mrs. Bayford, he knew the value of his indiscretion—if indiscretion it were—to any purveyor of tea-table gossip; and while Diane and he remained in the same relative positions ...
— The Inner Shrine • Basil King
... to help me—Ann Woolper and yourself. Ann Woolper I hold only by a feeble bond. I think she will be true to us; but I am not sure of her. Sheldon's influence over her is a powerful one; and God knows what concession he might extort from her. She is the ostensible guardian of Charlotte's room; you must contrive to be the real guardian. You must keep custody over the custodian. How is your room situated ...
— Charlotte's Inheritance • M. E. Braddon
... surveillance; but you do not mention who and what he is—whether he is a prisoner under sentence, or a free agent, or of what caste and profession. Some men make these offers in order to have opportunities of escape, while engaged in the pretended search after associates in crime; others to extort money from those whom they may denounce, or have the authority and means to arrest. He should be made to state distinctly the evidence he has against persons, and the way he got it; and all should be recorded against ...
— A Journey through the Kingdom of Oude, Volumes I & II • William Sleeman
... witnessed to the impression made by the lifelong consistency of Daniel. He must be a good man who gets such a testimony from those who are harming him. The busy minister of state had done his political work so as to extort that tribute from one who had no sympathy with his religion. Do we do ours in that fashion? How many of our statesmen 'serve God continually' and obviously in their ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Ezekiel, Daniel, and the Minor Prophets. St Matthew Chapters I to VIII • Alexander Maclaren
... unwillingly resolved to extort, by force of arms, what he could not obtain by negociation. Suddenly assembling his troops, he appeared before Prague ere the Saxons had time to advance to its relief. After a short resistance, the treachery of some ...
— The History of the Thirty Years' War • Friedrich Schiller, Translated by Rev. A. J. W. Morrison, M.A.
... wealthy merchants would assemble for mutual protection, because of the audacious outlaws, often headed by some powerful baron, who lay in wait for them to despoil them of their merchandise, and often to carry them off prisoners and extort heavy ransom. My grandfather would tell hew long files of mules, laden with rich silks, cloths, serges, camlets, and furs, from Montpelier, from Narbonne, from Toulouse, from Carcassonne, and other places, would wend towards Beaucaire, as the day called the Feast ...
— Jacques Bonneval • Anne Manning
... of these parasites; note how they grind down the stipend they are compelled to bestow upon the human tools they must use to still further swell their ungodly gains! Note how they take advantage of the public; how they extort, with Shylock avarice, every penny they possibly can from those who are compelled to use the appliances which wealth enables them to contrive for the public convenience and comfort; how they corrupt legislatures and dictate to the unscrupulous minions ...
— Black and White - Land, Labor, and Politics in the South • Timothy Thomas Fortune
... bad grace, muttering and swearing between his set teeth. The doctor, strange to say, was considerate enough to go out into the hall to question him; but no information of value was gained by the man's answers. He declared that the gentleman had hired him at twelve o'clock, hoping by this means to extort pay for five hours' driving, which, joined to the liberal gratuity he could not fail to obtain, would remunerate him handsomely for his day's work. Living is dear, it should be remembered, and a fellow makes as much ...
— The Count's Millions - Volume 1 (of 2) • Emile Gaboriau
... iron severity and sleepless energy, he insisted on and worked for a settlement by consent, with a formal promise of future self-government to the Boers. In this he was in sharp opposition to Lord Milner, who desired to extort an unconditional surrender. Of these two strong, able, high-minded men, the soldier, curiously enough, was the better statesman. In temperament he recalls the General Abercromby of 1797 on the eve of the Irish ...
— The Framework of Home Rule • Erskine Childers
... was trying with all his might to extort a confession from him. But Dutreuil drew himself up and coldly, with a sort of scorn in his ...
— The Eight Strokes of the Clock • Maurice Leblanc
... intended to extort a declaration from the House in favour of Free Trade, and describing the Corn Law Repeal as "a just, wise, and beneficial measure," was naturally distasteful to the Ministers. Their amour-propre was saved by Lord Palmerston's Amendment omitting the "odious epithets" ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Vol 2 (of 3), 1844-1853 • Queen Victoria
... writing tablets; hand back, O putrid punk, our writing tablets." Not a jot dost heed? O Muck, Brothel-Spawn, or e'en loathsomer if it is possible so to be! Yet think not yet that this is enough. For if naught else we can extort a blush on thy brazened bitch's face. We'll yell again in heightened tones, "O putrid punk, hand back our writing tablets, hand back, O putrid punk, our writing tablets." But naught we profit, naught she budges. Changed must ...
— The Carmina of Caius Valerius Catullus • Caius Valerius Catullus
... which belong to the silent life of the spirit in God, unless, side by side with these, there is the doing of the common deeds which the world is actually able to appraise in such a fashion as to extort, even from them, the confession, 'We find no ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Ezekiel, Daniel, and the Minor Prophets. St Matthew Chapters I to VIII • Alexander Maclaren
... gold, but only to both the men who had committed it to her charge, and that therefore both must appear to claim it. This was a blow to the rogues, who attempted to escape, and, failing to do so, at length confessed that they had plotted to extort money from the widow, the chest containing nothing but pieces ...
— Legends & Romances of Brittany • Lewis Spence
... that the captain's share of the spoil would have enabled him to live at home as an opulent gentleman. With the rapacity Kidd had the cruelty of his odious calling. He burned houses; he massacred peasantry. His prisoners were tied up and beaten with naked cutlasses in order to extort information about their concealed hoards. One of his crew, whom he had called a dog, was provoked into exclaiming, in an agony of remorse, "Yes, I am a dog; but it is you that have made me so." Kidd, in a fury, struck ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 5 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... to the great glacier—or gros gletscher, as Melchior called it— was now familiar, so that the various points of view had ceased to extort ejaculations of wonderment from Saxe, who trudged on, with geological hammer in hand, "tasting," as he called it, the different ...
— The Crystal Hunters - A Boy's Adventures in the Higher Alps • George Manville Fenn
... cunning that fat people possess, the corpulent matron succeeded in vanquishing Germinie's last resistance by dint of this tacit assurance and promise of marriage; and she finally allowed the young man's ardor to extort from her what she believed that she was giving ...
— Germinie Lacerteux • Edmond and Jules de Goncourt
... in prevailing upon Mistress Maud to enter, and then had but little difficulty in forcing upon her some of the confections, though all his efforts could not extort a compliment to ...
— The Buccaneer - A Tale • Mrs. S. C. Hall
... her neck, and gave way to tears, such as Cipher could not extort by his pounding. She gave him a good-night kiss,—so sweet that it seemed to lie upon his ...
— Our Young Folks, Vol 1, No. 1 - An Illustrated Magazine • Various
... amicum. The Piper, who the Pythian Measure plays, In fear of a hard matter learnt the lays: But if to desp'rate verse I would apply, What needs instruction? 'tis enough to cry; "I can write Poems, to strike wonder blind! Plague take the hindmost! Why leave me behind? Or why extort a truth, so mean and low, That what I have not ...
— The Art Of Poetry An Epistle To The Pisos - Q. Horatii Flacci Epistola Ad Pisones, De Arte Poetica. • Horace
... they arrested fifteen of those whom they most strongly suspected of attachment to the deposed viceroy, among whom was Diego Lopez de Zuniga. Having thrown these men into prison, the Pizarrians were inclined to have given them the torture to extort confession, and afterwards to have procured their condemnation by Pedro Martin the provost marshal of the city; so that they were in imminent danger of being put to death, if Lorenzo de Aldana had not exerted himself promptly ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 5 • Robert Kerr
... Oxford Meeting of 1860 was of no small importance in Huxley's career. It was not merely that he helped to save a great cause from being stifled under misrepresentation and ridicule—that he helped to extort for it a fair hearing; it was now that he first made himself known in popular estimation as a dangerous adversary in debate—a personal force in the world of science which could not be neglected. From this moment he entered the front fighting line in the most ...
— The Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley Volume 1 • Leonard Huxley
... that in consideration for his nomination he should, if elected, permit no temperance legislation during his term. It was the brewing interests of Indiana, not the distillers, that sought on the eve of election, after his nomination in spite of their opposition, to extort a like promise as the price ...
— Government By The Brewers? • Adolph Keitel
... clearly a minor issue that to break up a great country upon it would have gone beyond the limit of solemn frivolity, and Calhoun must be taken to have been forging an implement with which his own section of the States could claim and extort concessions from the Union. A protective tariff had been passed in 1828. The Southern States, which would have to pay the protective duties but did not profit by them, disliked it. Calhoun and others took the intelligible but too refined ...
— Abraham Lincoln • Lord Charnwood
... of Monmouth was not that highest sort of fortitude which is derived from reflection and from selfrespect; nor had nature given him one of those stout hearts from which neither adversity nor peril can extort any sign of weakness. His courage rose and fell with his animal spirits. It was sustained on the field of battle by the excitement of action. By the hope of victory, by the strange influence of sympathy. All such aids ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 1 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... statesmen; or in our Sordido, all farmers; and so of the rest: than which nothing can be uttered more malicious or absurd. Indeed there are a sort of these narrow-eyed decypherers, I confess, that will extort strange and abstruse meanings out of any subject, be it never so conspicuous and innocently delivered. But to such, where'er they sit concealed, let them know, the author defies them and their writing-tables; and hopes no sound or safe judgment will ...
— Every Man Out Of His Humour • Ben Jonson
... dark-faced wanderers already are educated a little too much. At all events, they occasionally manifest an ability to 'take a stave' out of the rest of the community. At the court in question a Gipsy woman named Emma Barney was brought to task for 'imposing by subtle craft to extort money' from a Bournemouth shopkeeper named Richard Oliver. It seems that Oliver is troubled with pimples on his face, and that Emma Barney—not an inappropriate name, by the way—said she could cure these by means of a certain herb, the name of which she would divulge 'for a consideration.' ...
— Gipsy Life - being an account of our Gipsies and their children • George Smith
... with England, in order to establish a claim upon her for concessions advantageous to France in some other quarter. With these views, Vergennes secretly aimed at delaying the negotiations; for as long as hostilities were kept up, he might hope to extort from his American allies a recognition of the Spanish claims and a renouncement of the fisheries, simply by threatening to send them no further assistance in men or money. In order to retard the proceedings, he refused to take any steps ...
— The Critical Period of American History • John Fiske
... with rage, a crowd of soldiers beset Laudonniere, and fiercely demanded to be led against Outina to take him prisoner and extort from his fears the supplies which could not be looked for from his gratitude. The commandant was forced to comply. Those who could bear the weight of their armor put it on, embarked, to the number of fifty, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 12, August, 1863, No. 70 - A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics • Various
... roosters, "that when you tip the hat-check girl she gets the tip? She doesn't. It goes to a man who rents from the restaurant the privilege of bullying you out of a dime or a quarter. The girl holds you up, because if she doesn't extort fifteen dollars a week, she loses her job and her own munificent wages of seven dollars. The 'Clarion' takes pleasure in announcing a series of portraits of the high-minded pirates of finance whom you support in luxury, when you 'give up' to the check-girl. ...
— The Clarion • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... torture chamber, where the rack, the thumb-screw, the hot irons, the whip, and other survivals of the Inquisition were applied. When the officers had extorted what they wanted, or had made sure there was nothing to extort, the poor, white wreck of a human being was delivered by the judges to an executioner, and a ...
— Myths & Legends of our New Possessions & Protectorate • Charles M. Skinner
... he could command that old-time manner of unclouded ease. He would stifle every surmise, deny every rumor if rumor blew about, of the blow he had received. A few days, and Storri would be himself again. As for immediate money, Storri would extort that from Mr. Harley, who, in his dull-head ignorance or worse, had been the author of his losses. Who first spoke of Northern Consolidated? Who suggested the "bear" raid? Was it not Mr. Harley? The affair had ...
— The President - A novel • Alfred Henry Lewis
... of war are improved by the sailors to their own private advantage; how generally they shun the publick service, in hopes of receiving exorbitant wages from the merchants; and how much they extort from the merchants, by threatening to leave their service for that of the crown, is universally known to every officer of the navy, and every commander ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, Vol. 10. - Parlimentary Debates I. • Samuel Johnson
... both indulgent and discriminating. They applauded the pretty prima donna con furor; they praised the bass when he deserved it, the tenor when it was possible; but where he sang false, nothing could extort from them a solitary viva. This discrimination makes their applause worth having, and proceeds less from experience or cultivation, than from ...
— Life in Mexico • Frances Calderon de la Barca
... complete. The man is a skilful blackmailer; he has practiced in many cities and has served more than one term in jail. I knew at once what had occurred; the two men fancied they 'had something on' Miss Cavanaugh regarding this murder, and had endeavored to extort money from her. I leave it to you," with a smiling nod toward Nora, "to tell how near I am to ...
— Ashton-Kirk, Criminologist • John T. McIntyre
... overwhelmed the guilty soul of Boris with melancholy. His fears were so strongly excited, that several nobles, who were supposed to be in the interests of the young prince, were put to the rack to extort a confession. But no positive information respecting Dmitri could be gained. The mother of Dmitri was banished to an obscure fortress six ...
— The Empire of Russia • John S. C. Abbott
... who say, in connection with this question, that you are at liberty to extort anything you can from your fellow men, provided you do not use a pistol; that you are at liberty to fleece the sailor who implores you to save him from a wreck, or the emigrant who is in danger of missing his ship. I say that this is a moral robbery, ...
— Lectures and Essays • Goldwin Smith
... a Parisian lawyer, whose signature the widow Morin tried to extort. She also attempted his assassination, and was condemned, January 11, 1812, on the evidence of a number of witnesses, among others that of Poiret, to twenty years of hard ...
— Repertory Of The Comedie Humaine, Complete, A — Z • Anatole Cerfberr and Jules Franois Christophe
... Hobson's choice. V. compel, force, make, drive, coerce, constrain, enforce, necessitate, oblige. force upon, press; cram down the throat, thrust down the throat, force down the throat; say it must be done, make a point of, insist upon, take no denial; put down, dragoon. extort, wring from; squeeze, put on the squeeze; put on the screws, turn on the screw; drag into; bind, bind over; pin down, tie down; require, tax, put in force; commandeer; restrain &c 751. Adj. compelling &c v.; coercive, coactive^; inexorable &c 739; ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... yesterday's interview there was a sort of bullying swagger in his air, which towards the end gave place to the brutal vehemence of an undisguised ruffian—a transition which had tempted me into a belief that he might seek even forcibly to extort from me a consent to his wishes, or by means still more horrible, of which I scarcely dared to trust myself to think, to possess ...
— The Purcell Papers - Volume II. (of III.) • Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu
... alternative. Caiaphas might put Jesus on His oath, and extort from His own lips the charge on which to condemn Him; but he was evidently reluctant to do it, and only availed himself of this process as a last resource. It was well known to this astute and cunning priest that Jesus on more than one occasion had claimed, not only to ...
— Love to the Uttermost - Expositions of John XIII.-XXI. • F. B. Meyer
... the consuls had no proceeding on hand, by opposing which they could extort that which they desired; when by an extraordinary and favourable occurrence an account is brought that the Volscians and AEquans had proceeded beyond their frontiers into the Latin and Hernican territory to commit depredations. ...
— The History of Rome, Books 01 to 08 • Titus Livius
... for some moments. "Suppose we agree to purchasing your silence at this price," he said, "what guarantee have we that you will not come and extort more money, or that you may not betray ...
— The Firm of Girdlestone • Arthur Conan Doyle
... two serious difficulties in our path; first, to make the plant itself consent to give its evidence; second, through plant and instrument combined, to induce it to give it in writing. It is comparatively easy to make a rebellious child obey: to extort answers from plants is indeed a problem! By many years of close contiguity, however, I have come to have some understanding of their ways. I take this opportunity to make public confession of various acts of cruelty which I have from time to ...
— Sir Jagadis Chunder Bose - His Life and Speeches • Sir Jagadis Chunder Bose
... Curzon Street: longing to say something that would still, at the last moment, gain her John's approval, or his understanding at least. But she could think of nothing to say. He had promised to manage it all for her: he had not reproached her; and yet not content with that she wanted to extort a favourable word from him before he should go. But she could not find a word to say. He it was only who spoke. He asked when she was going to return home, with his ...
— The Marriage of Elinor • Margaret Oliphant
... fatigue to look up a poem of Herrick's, or a letter of Shelley's, or a novel of Peacock's (these things are accessible and repay enquiry), and it would be a rational and self-respecting thing to do, instead of endeavouring to extort information (like an intellectual footpad) from writers who are in no way called ...
— Americans and Others • Agnes Repplier
... "picketings;" to say nothing of houses burned, and farms laid waste—things which were done daily, and under military orders; the purpose avowed being either vengeance for some known act of insurrection, or the determination to extort confessions. Too often, however, as may well be supposed, in such utter disorganization of society, private malice, either personal or on account of old family feuds, was the true principle at work. And many were thus driven, by mere frenzy of just indignation, or, perhaps, by mere ...
— Autobiographic Sketches • Thomas de Quincey
... theories have occurred to me as possibly true respecting this most remarkable assault: First—The aim may have been simply to extort from me such admissions as in the hands of money and influence would have sent me to the Penitentiary for libel. This, however, seems unlikely, because any statements elicited by fear or force could not be evidence in law or ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... from this that our captain was either vengeful or bloody-minded; or that he really desired to inflict on Raoul any penalty for the manner in which he had baffled his own designs and caused his crew to suffer. So far from this, his intention was to use the sentence to extort from the prisoner a confession of the orders he had given to those left in the lugger, and then to use this confession as a means of obtaining his pardon, with a transfer to a prison-ship. Cuffe had no great veneration for privateersmen, nor was his estimate of their morality ...
— The Wing-and-Wing - Le Feu-Follet • J. Fenimore Cooper
... control her curiosity, and opened the door. She saw her mistress reclining in a beautiful bed. In the evening the lady returned and asked her what she had seen; but she answered: "I have seen nothing." The lady could extort no other answer from her, and finally clothed her in her peasant's dress, and took her back to the wood ...
— Italian Popular Tales • Thomas Frederick Crane
... persons—four of them bowmen, and twelve billmen. They were arrayed in blue and red (after my Lord Norfolk's fashion), hats and hose red and blue, and with doublets of white fustian." This same year, the greedy despot Henry having discovered some slight inaccuracy in the assay, contrived to extort from the poor abject goldsmiths a mighty fine of 3,000 marks. The year this English Ahab died, the Goldsmiths resolved, in compliment to the Reformation, to break up the image of their patron saint, and also a great standing cup with an image of the same ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... refused to sign the document. He maintained that the new lease was not a verbatim copy of the old lease, that L200 had not been expended on the buildings, and that Burbage was a bad tenant and owed him rent. In reality, Alleyn wanted to extort a larger rental than L14 for the property, which had ...
— Shakespearean Playhouses - A History of English Theatres from the Beginnings to the Restoration • Joseph Quincy Adams
... any formal stipulations which fetter its primacy of influence and control on the American continent and in American seas; and the concessions of principle over-eagerly made in 1850, in order to gain compensating advantages which our weakness could not extort otherwise, must needs cause us to chafe now, when we are potentially, though, it must be confessed sorrowfully, not actually, stronger by double than we were then. The interest of Great Britain still lies, as it then lay, in the maintenance of the ...
— The Interest of America in Sea Power, Present and Future • A. T. Mahan
... but it was a great deal more than I had been able to extort from Mr. Grewter. I took a second cup of the sweet warm liquid which my new friends called tea, in order to have an excuse for loitering, while I tried to obtain more light from the ...
— Birds of Prey • M. E. Braddon
... her own happiness. One kiss from him would be payment for it all. But all his love, all his sweetness, all his truth, all his eloquence should avail nothing with her towards overcoming that spirit of self-sacrifice by which she was dominated. Though he should extort from her all her secret, that would be her strength. Though she should have to tell him of her failing health,—her certainly failing health,—though even that should be necessary, she certainly would not be won from her purpose. It might ...
— Marion Fay • Anthony Trollope
... buildings and improvements of other proprietors. They then prosecuted these proprietors for having encroached, as they called it, upon the crown lands, and the Star Chamber assessed very heavy fines upon them. The people said all this was done merely to get pretexts to extort money from the nation, to make up for the want of a Parliament to assess regular taxes; but the government said it was a just and legal mode of protecting the ancient and legitimate rights ...
— Charles I - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott |
