"Celerity" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... vested in me by acts of the last session, a loan of 3,000,000 florins, toward which some provisional measures had previously taken place, has been completed in Holland. As well the celerity with which it has been filled as the nature of the terms (considering the more than ordinary demand for borrowing created by the situation of Europe) give a reasonable hope that the further execution of those powers may proceed with advantage and success. ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 1 (of 4) of Volume 1: George Washington • James D. Richardson
... threw aside all hesitances and confessed to himself that he was glad through and through that he was going to give up this experiment and go back to his home again. His eagerness to get his father's answer began to grow, now, and it grew with marvelous celerity, after it began. He waited an hour, walking about, putting in his time as well as he could, but interested in nothing that came under his eye, and at last he presented himself at the office again and asked if any answer had come yet. The ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... before he received imperative notice to quit town with all celerity. He fell ill with what turned out to be pleurisy; and after recruiting at ...
— The Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley Volume 3 • Leonard Huxley
... age, without fixed homes or crops or culture; neither do they have a definite language. They are seen from time to time, but it has never been possible to capture one, for if, whenever they come, they see anybody other than natives approaching them, they escape with the celerity of a deer. They are said to be ...
— De Orbe Novo, Volume 1 (of 2) - The Eight Decades of Peter Martyr D'Anghera • Trans. by Francis Augustus MacNutt
... by its flight, the woodcock drops into the underwood, and is then completely lost to the sportsman; for, once on the ground, it runs with the greatest celerity, its wings working rapidly like a couple of paddles, and vanishing beneath the leaves, falls fainting ...
— Le Morvan, [A District of France,] Its Wild Sports, Vineyards and Forests; with Legends, Antiquities, Rural and Local Sketches • Henri de Crignelle
... the reduction of expenses in his department to a peace footing; and this before Taylor or Smith had surrendered, and while Jefferson Davis was still at large. The army of a million men was brought down, with incredible ease and celerity, ...
— A Short Life of Abraham Lincoln - Condensed from Nicolay & Hay's Abraham Lincoln: A History • John G. Nicolay
... effort of our imagination. It is a story of actual facts, all of which can be proven by three competent witnesses. How many human beings similarly dispossessed and robbed of home and stores, act with the same cool judgment, celerity and precision that those five tiny creatures ...
— The Minds and Manners of Wild Animals • William T. Hornaday
... warriors with their chiefs became invisible like trees when covered with locusts. They were frightened at the very sound of Gandiva, and afflicted by fear they fled away. In grief of heart they shed tears and uttered loud lamentations. The mighty warrior moved amidst that host of foes with the celerity of a fiery wheel, all the time piercing those warriors with his arrows. Like the great Indra, the wielder of the thunder-bolt, that slayer of foes, viz., Arjuna, shot from his bow in every direction that shower of arrows which resembled a sight ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 4 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... deliberately. There is another sort of Persons whom I call Pindarick Readers, as being confined to no set measure; these pronounce five or six Words with great Deliberation, and the five or six subsequent ones with as great Celerity: The first part of a Sentence with a very exalted Voice, and the latter part with a submissive one: Sometimes again with one sort of a Tone, and immediately after with a very different one. These Gentlemen ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... bird was on him. Towering high over his head, it must have been between eight and nine feet in height. One kick of its great two-toed foot sufficed. The ostrich kicks forward, as a man might when he wishes to burst in a door with his foot, and no prize-fighter can hit out with greater celerity, no horse can kick with greater force. If the blow had taken full effect it would probably have been fatal, but Considine leaped back. It reached him, however—on the chest,—and knocked him flat on the nest, where he lay stunned amid a wreck ...
— The Settler and the Savage • R.M. Ballantyne
... then that events began to move with celerity. Fat Jakey Pooley ducked and leaped. Jack Harpe kicked the tin can, the candle fell out and rolled guttering in a quarter circle only to be extinguished by one ...
— The Heart of the Range • William Patterson White
... King's Wharf, Quebec, at half-past two; being only 24 hours and a half under way between the two cities, with a strong head wind all the way. She is most superbly fitted up, and offers accommodation for passengers in every respect equal to the best hotel in Canada. In short, for celerity and security, she well {133} deserves the name of Swiftsure. America cannot boast of a more useful and expensive undertaking by one individual, than this of Mr Molson's. His Excellency, the Governor-in-chief, set out for Montreal on Tuesday ...
— All Afloat - A Chronicle of Craft and Waterways • William Wood
... will be with you in a moment," answered Dory, as he descended to the deck with a reasonable degree of celerity. ...
— All Adrift - or The Goldwing Club • Oliver Optic
... do not all cultivate within us. When once I realized the existence of the fact of human electric force, I applied the discovery to myself, and spared no pains to foster and educate whatever germ of this power lay within me. I succeeded with more ease and celerity than I had imagined possible. At the time I pursued these studies, Leo here was quite a young dog, full of the clumsy playfulness and untrained ignorance of a Newfoundland puppy. One day I was very busy reading an interesting Sanskrit scroll which treated of ancient medicines ...
— A Romance of Two Worlds • Marie Corelli
... on the point of further belabouring his son, when at the sight of Madame Wang walking in, his temper flared up with such increased violence, just as fire on which oil is poured, that the rod fell with greater spite and celerity. The two servant-boys, who held Pao-yue down, precipitately loosened their grip and beat a retreat. Pao-yue had long ago lost all power of movement. Chia Cheng, however, was again preparing to assail him, when the rattan ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin
... all done with the celerity and ease with which things are accomplished in dreams. The sudden halting of the big wagon; the swinging of the boat to the ground; the swift donning of the yellow oilskin suits by the crew; the launch, and before one had time to wink, the strong ...
— How to Cook Husbands • Elizabeth Strong Worthington
... With incredible celerity Iskander and his cavalry dashed over the plains of Roumelia, and never halted, except for short and hurried intervals of rest and repose, until they had entered the mountainous borders of Epirus, and were within fifty miles of its capital, Croia. ...
— The Rise of Iskander • Benjamin Disraeli
... later games that I saw and in which I officiated, convinced me that he was worthy of his nickname, because there are only a few men who are able to wind their way through an entire field of opponents with as much celerity and effect as Ames ...
— Football Days - Memories of the Game and of the Men behind the Ball • William H. Edwards
... information, that he had conceived violent prejudices against them, as averse to the service, wish'd me to wait upon him, not as from them, but as postmaster-general, under the guise of proposing to settle with him the mode of conducting with most celerity and certainty the despatches between him and the governors of the several provinces, with whom he must necessarily have continual correspondence, and of which they propos'd to pay the expense. My son accompanied me on ...
— The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin • Benjamin Franklin
... celerity with which such things are done in our country, was to take place on the next day. Too often the haste appears indecent, and it may be that in some instances the body has been buried before life deserted it. It would seem that the ...
— The Lost Hunter - A Tale of Early Times • John Turvill Adams
... indifference to the means by which they were to be effected. He disregarded the difficulties of the roads, and the inclemency of the season, which had hitherto put a check on military operations. Through the midst of frightful morasses, or in the depth of winter snows, he performed his marches with a celerity unknown in the warfare of that age. In less than a fortnight after leaving Milan, he relieved Bologna, then besieged by the allies, made a countermarch on Brescia, defeated a detachment by the way, and the whole Venetian army under its walls; and, on the same day with the last event, succeeded in ...
— The History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella The Catholic, V3 • William H. Prescott
... themselves upon this board, in white characters, problem after problem in Equation; the Rule in which we had been exercising. I cannot describe the celerity with which these problems were stated upon the board, and worked out to the intense gratification of my son and myself; the most difficult and apparently unequal quantities being with the rapidity of thought interchanged neutralized reduced and ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, May 1844 - Volume 23, Number 5 • Various
... which were not reached by the great fire. That fire had, in a few days, covered a space of little less shall a square mile with the ruins of eighty-nine churches and of thirteen thousand houses. But the City had risen again with a celerity which had excited the admiration of neighbouring countries. Unfortunately, the old lines of the streets had been to a great extent preserved; and those lines, originally traced in an age when even princesses performed their journeys on horseback, ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 1 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... heavy shower. He instantly commanded the hay-workers to pile up in ricks the quantity which each had been engaged in turning to the wind. It was afterwards remembered that Thorgunna did not pile up her portion, but left it spread on the field. The cloud approached with great celerity, and sank so heavily around the farm, that it was scarce possible to see beyond the limits of the field. A heavy shower next descended, and so soon as the clouds broke away and the sun shone forth it was observed that it had rained blood. That which fell upon the ricks ...
— Folk-Lore and Legends; Scandinavian • Various
... round the gulfs and promontories, their voyage is thrice prolonged, but rendered nearly safe from the waves, which rise with incredible celerity before the gales. The slow ships of commerce, indeed, are often days in traversing the distance between one port and another, for they wait for the wind to blow abaft, and being heavy, deeply laden, built broad and ...
— After London - Wild England • Richard Jefferies
... details will of course vary according to the configuration of the shore and the course taken by the float. Good judgment is necessary in deciding when to move from one station to the next, and celerity in setting up, adjusting the instrument, and taking readings is essential. If the boatmen can be relied upon to keep their position near the float, very long sights can be taken with sufficient accuracy by observing the position ...
— The Sewerage of Sea Coast Towns • Henry C. Adams
... the war in these seas, required a considerable degree of enterprize, I felt myself justified in departing from the regular system; and, passing through their fleet, in a line formed with the utmost celerity, tacked, and thereby separated one-third from the main body. After a partial cannonade, which prevented their rejunction till the evening, and by the very great exertions of the ships which had the ...
— The Life of the Right Honourable Horatio Lord Viscount Nelson, Vol. I (of 2) • James Harrison
... food from outside," he said, "and we're going to level all these slums—and shift into tents on to the moors;" and he began to tell me of many things that were being arranged, the Midland land committees had got to work with remarkable celerity and directness of purpose, and the redistribution of population was already in its broad outlines planned. He was working at an improvised college of engineering. Until schemes of work were made out, almost every one was going to school again ...
— In the Days of the Comet • H. G. Wells
... the weather-gage after D'Estaing left Newport, which have not been preserved, and of Howe's dispositions to receive the expected attack in New York Bay, the lessons are not tactical, but strategic, and of present application. Chief among them undoubtedly stands the value of celerity and watchfulness, combined with knowledge of one's profession. Howe learned of his danger by advices from home three weeks after D'Estaing sailed from Toulon. He had to gather in his cruisers from the Chesapeake and outside, get his ships-of-the-line from New York and Rhode Island, embark ...
— The Influence of Sea Power Upon History, 1660-1783 • A. T. Mahan
... will beat every tree-root, every osier-bed, and tuft of bulrushes; nay, sometimes they will take the water and beat it like a spaniel, and by these means the otter can hardly escape you." The otter swims and dives with great celerity, and in doing the latter it throws up sprots, or air-bubbles, which enable the hunters to ascertain where it is, and to spear it. The best time to find it is early in the morning. It may frequently be traced by the dead fish and fish-bones strewed along the ...
— Anecdotes of Dogs • Edward Jesse
... attack began on 24 October amid rain and snow, which never deterred the Germans, and on this occasion even assisted them by increasing the element of surprise. The infected front of the Second Army between Zaga and Auzza broke with such celerity that by dawn of the 25th Von Buelow's men had crossed the Isonzo, scaled Mount Matajur, 5000 feet high, and were pouring across the Italian frontier; and the gains of twenty-nine months were lost in as many hours. Elsewhere ...
— A Short History of the Great War • A.F. Pollard
... the knives and forks, and two deep saucers, with magical celerity, he plunged them into water a minute, and they hissed; he sawed off the rim of ...
— Put Yourself in His Place • Charles Reade
... steady. It's the comin' an' goin' kind. It seems silly ter mind it at all; only, when it does come, it sort o' takes the backbone right out o' my knees, and they double up so's I have ter set down. There, ye see? I'm pert as a sparrer, now!" And, with stiff celerity, Pete resumed ...
— Miss Billy Married • Eleanor H. Porter
... is proper to get out of this Enterprise at one's best speed, and never get into the like of it again! Friedrich (on this strange Saxon revelation, 30th March) takes instant order for assembling at Wischau again, for departing towards Olmutz; thence homewards, with deliberate celerity, by the Landskron mountain-country, Tribau, Zwittau, Leutomischl, and the way he came. He has countermanded his Silesian reinforcements; these and the rest shall rendezvous at Chrudim in Bohemia; whitherwards the two Dessauers are bound:—in Brunn, with its wrecked environs, famed Spielberg ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XIII. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... the office of angels and ministers of God's will, in whom is required, understanding as in a man, courage and vivacity as in a lion, service and ministerial officiousness as in the ox, expedition or celerity of ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 33, June 15, 1850 • Various
... as the former method may be to the latter in point of celerity and directness, the latter has certain advantages over the former that ought to be evident to men who are not frightened by ...
— A Short History of the Book of Common Prayer • William Reed Huntington
... London to fasten the leg bones of animals under the soles of their feet by tying them round their ankles; and then, taking a pole shod with iron into their hands, they pushed themselves forward by striking it against the ice, and moved with celerity equal, says the author, to a bird flying through the air, or an arrow from a cross-bow; but some allowance, we presume, must be made for the poetical figure: he then adds, "At times, two of them thus furnished agree to start opposite one to another, at a great distance; they meet, ...
— Christmas: Its Origin and Associations - Together with Its Historical Events and Festive Celebrations During Nineteen Centuries • William Francis Dawson
... vain explored for some months past a well-known figure, or part of the figure, of a man, who used to glide his comely upper half over the pavements of London, wheeling along with most ingenious celerity upon a machine of wood; a spectacle to natives, to foreigners, and to children. He was of a robust make, with a florid sailor-like complexion, and his head was bare to the storm and sunshine. He was a natural curiosity, a speculation ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Volume 2 • Charles Lamb
... please the Bishop of Leon, that your Lordship and Lady Buckingham will feel the same pleasing and affecting interest in what is done here, that all have been touched with who see what is going on. You will be pleased with the celerity, if not with the perfection, of our work. Five-and-forty beds are ready; the rest will be so in a very few days. An old bad stable is converted into an excellent school-room. The chapel is decent, in place and in ...
— Memoirs of the Court and Cabinets of George the Third, Volume 2 (of 2) - From the Original Family Documents • The Duke of Buckingham
... accomplished with such celerity that before the dawdling punchers had entered the bunk-house, Buck was out of sight among the bushes which thickly lined the creek. From here he had no difficulty in making his way unseen around ...
— Shoe-Bar Stratton • Joseph Bushnell Ames
... brown. On appealing to the authority of a lady, I learn that brown was the hue. His colour was a trifle hectic, as is not unusual at Mentone, but he seemed, under his big blue cloak, to be of slender, yet agile frame. He was like nobody else whom I ever met. There was a sort of uncommon celerity in changing expression, in thought and speech. His cloak and Tyrolese hat (he would admit the innocent impeachment) were decidedly dear to him. On the frontier of Italy, why should he not do as the Italians do? It would have ...
— Adventures among Books • Andrew Lang
... portmanteau; for a few weeks only—he had no notion of making, ultimately, any great change in his plans. It was obvious that James Prince was looking forward to a year or two of harassing procedure in the courts, for old Jehiel's estate was unlikely to smooth out with celerity; but Raymond was clearly of no use at home, even as a mere source of sympathy. A fortnight after his grandfather's funeral he ...
— On the Stairs • Henry B. Fuller
... one of the women cooked—a proceeding which an Indian woman can accomplish with greater celerity and success than any I have hitherto encountered. This fowl was simply delicious, and, with boiled eggs and tortillas in addition, served as an admirable means of refreshing our starving bodies, and we partook of all heartily, in spite of the ...
— Six Days on the Hurricane Deck of a Mule - An account of a journey made on mule back in Honduras, - C.A. in August, 1891 • Almira Stillwell Cole
... stampedes there may be, but under conditions far different from those of 1849. Transportation has been so developed, travel has become so swift and easy, that no section can now long remain segregated from the rest of the world. There is no corner of the earth which may not now be reached with a celerity impossible in the days of the great rush to the Pacific Coast. The whole structure of civilization, itself based upon transportation, goes swiftly forward with that transportation, and the tent of the miner or adventurer finds immediately erected by its ...
— The Story of the Outlaw - A Study of the Western Desperado • Emerson Hough
... elevated into a thing. He would say, however competent it may be for others to justify themselves on the ground, that it was but a man, and not a thing, they had stolen; your own statutes, which, with magic celerity, convert stolen men into things, make such a plea, on your part, utterly inadmissible. He would have you as fast, as though the stolen goods, in your hands, were a bushel of wheat, or some other important thing, instead of a ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... of 1755 he was employed in returning convalescent soldiers to the army and in arresting deserters. At one time he was set on the track of a deserter, whom he found was making his way to New York. He followed him with characteristic celerity and promptness, and at length found him one Sabbath morning attending divine service in a Dutch meeting-house. Cowdin did not hesitate, but entered and seized the culprit at once, much to the surprise and consternation of the congregation. A severe struggle ensued, in which he barely ...
— Bay State Monthly, Volume II. No. 4, January, 1885 - A Massachusetts Magazine • Various
... Jenny's department was in full activity. The knights of the popinjay received and requited the hospitable entertainment of their captain, who, though he spared the cup himself, took care it should go round with due celerity among the rest, who might not have otherwise deemed themselves handsomely treated. Their numbers melted away by degrees, and were at length diminished to four or five, who began to talk of breaking up their ...
— Old Mortality, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... that, if they would only work a little in turns, they should now be trained to become invincible warriors like ourselves, and should receive fine clothing and yet finer weapons. And when at last the endless caravan with the oxen and the agricultural implements arrived; when the wonderful celerity with which tire ploughs cut through the ground was demonstrated; and when Johnston dressed up a chosen band of el-moran in the baggy red hose and shirts, the green jackets, and the dandyish plumed hats, with rifle, bayonet, ...
— Freeland - A Social Anticipation • Theodor Hertzka
... received your two letters about the watch, the first came with surprising celerity. I wish, when the watch is finished, I may be able to convey it to you ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 2 • Horace Walpole
... in the art. His daring and subtile genius perceived and seized the wonderful resources of the modern bow at one bound. He used freely every imaginable movement of the bow, and developed the movement of the wrist to that high perfection which enabled him to practice all kinds of bowing with celerity. Without the Tourte bow, Paganini and the modern school of virtuosos, which has followed so splendidly from his example, would have been impossible. To many of our readers an amplification of this topic may be of interest. ...
— Great Violinists And Pianists • George T. Ferris
... continually that we are only on the earth like pilgrims, and that we can only use, as in passing, the goods of this world; that a man wants but a few things; and that we ought to take with patience the misfortunes that happen in our journey, since they pass away equally, and with the same celerity. In short how many things in travelling make us sensible of the dependence in which we live upon Divine providence, which does not make use of, for this mixture of good and evil, men's passions, but the vicissitudes of the seasons which we may foresee, and ...
— The Country of the Neutrals - (As Far As Comprised in the County of Elgin), From Champlain to Talbot • James H. Coyne
... dissolution of family dependency and the growth of individual obligation in its place. The Individual is steadily substituted for the Family, as the unit of which civil laws take account. The advance has been accomplished at varying rates of celerity, and there are societies not absolutely stationary in which the collapse of the ancient organisation can only be perceived by careful study of the phenomena they present. But, whatever its pace, the change has not been subject to reaction or recoil, and apparent retardations ...
— Ancient Law - Its Connection to the History of Early Society • Sir Henry James Sumner Maine
... spring, Mrs. Gervase Norgate had fallen away, and changed rapidly for the worse, to the disappointment and with the condemnation of her acquaintances. She lay in bed half the morning, dawdled over her breakfast, and trailed her way from place to place, ageing too, with marvellous celerity. ...
— Girlhood and Womanhood - The Story of some Fortunes and Misfortunes • Sarah Tytler
... grandfather became convulsed with a sudden fury. He rushed upon Ralph with a celerity unlocked for in one so old, and wrenched the rifle from ...
— Ralph Granger's Fortunes • William Perry Brown
... went to live in the gardener's cottage, which had been cleaned, repaired, and furnished with the celerity which is explained by three words: Paris; French workmen; money! I was as much in love as the Count could possibly desire as a security. Would the prudence of a young man of five-and-twenty be equal to the part I was undertaking, involving a friend's happiness? To settle that matter, I ...
— Honorine • Honore de Balzac
... returned from Bodega Central with a half ounce of quinine. He had made the trip with astonishing celerity, and had arrived at the riverine town just as a large steamer was docking. The purser supplied him with the drug, and he immediately ...
— Carmen Ariza • Charles Francis Stocking
... year later Glass appeared again, jubilant. At once he broke forth into eulogies of Christian; but one chapter would not be large enough to contain them. He had trained that bear, with outrageous ease and celerity, and hadimmediately taken him upon the stage as a professional jiu-jitsu wrestler. And really, the act was admirable. As a wrestler, the bear seemed almost as intelligent as the man. He knew the "left-hand half-nelson" as well as Glass, and he knew the following words, perfectly: "Right, left, ...
— The Minds and Manners of Wild Animals • William T. Hornaday
... the villas and gardens of the nobles and opulent citizens, had been suffered to encroach on the glacis and encumber the approaches; and the ruins of these luxurious abodes, imperfectly destroyed in the panic arising from the unexpected celerity of the enemy's movements, were calculated at once to impede the fire from the walls, and to afford shelter and lodgement to the besiegers. Such preparations for defence, however, as the time allowed of, had been ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 54, No. 334, August 1843 • Various
... having disposed of the Address with their usual celerity, welcomed Baron RIDDELL of Walton Heath (and, perhaps I may add, Bouverie Street) to their ranks, and then adjourned for ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, February 18th, 1920 • Various
... description is correct: the New Mountain was born with extraordinary celerity, and woods, lake and village—familiar and beloved landmarks to the people of Baiae and Pozzuoli—disappeared at its birth. But the event was no peaceful act of Nature; on the contrary, it was accompanied by loud rumblings, by showers of red-hot stones, by ...
— The Naples Riviera • Herbert M. Vaughan
... a gentleman, sir!" the guard acknowledged, touching his cap and concealing the gold coin slid into his own ready hand with professional celerity. ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves
... had become of the enemy, who we had been informed had disappeared with such unaccountable celerity on hearing of the advance of the column, were answered by assurances that there was no need to concern ourselves about them, as they had fled across the Kari Naddi, a river thirteen miles away, and were in full retreat ...
— Forty-one years in India - From Subaltern To Commander-In-Chief • Frederick Sleigh Roberts
... sight to see a black-robed priest with his hand on a boy's head giving him a benediction that he may be enabled to sell his newspapers or lottery tickets with more celerity. ...
— Through Five Republics on Horseback • G. Whitfield Ray
... some tea," was the sole rejoinder she got. She hastened to ring the bell; and when the tray came, she proceeded to arrange the cups, spoons, &c., with assiduous celerity. I and Adele went to the table; but the master did not ...
— Jane Eyre - an Autobiography • Charlotte Bronte
... then increased. It stopped and then started forward again with all the ease and celerity that it could have done if really human, while it showed a reserve of power and velocity capable of performing ...
— The Huge Hunter - Or, the Steam Man of the Prairies • Edward S. Ellis
... into the chair John vacates at her ladyship's side, and his celerity to take advantage of the circumstance arouses a little suspicion in her mind that after all it may be a ruse to get him away, with the Briton's ...
— Miss Caprice • St. George Rathborne
... only done the work now, which he had been told was urgent and was to be done carefully? The ink was still quite fresh, the writing was very careless, even if legible; it was no business hand. Schlieben frowned; he was strangely irritable to-day. At any other time he would have been struck by the celerity with which the boy had finished the work he had neglected; but to-day the careless writing, the inkspots in the margin, the slipshod manner in which it had all been done, which seemed to him to point to a want of ...
— The Son of His Mother • Clara Viebig
... to spare; the clock points to 11.38; we must start at 11.45 by the Great Western express, the "Dutchman," as it is familiarly called, after that mysterious sailor who came and went with such alarming celerity. ...
— Little Folks (July 1884) - A Magazine for the Young • Various
... of a country to pay taxes must always be proportioned, in a great degree, to the quantity of money in circulation, and to the celerity with which it circulates. Commerce, contributing to both these objects, must of necessity render the payment of taxes easier, and facilitate the requisite supplies to the treasury. The hereditary dominions of the ...
— The Federalist Papers • Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, and James Madison
... understood to be speaking here only of those cases in which the 'guarantee' is used as an additional argument for eliciting subscriptions, not of those cases in which, for convenience sake, or in order to secure celerity of execution, a few wealthy persons generously advance the whole sum required for a project, being quite willing to pay it themselves, unless they meet ...
— Progressive Morality - An Essay in Ethics • Thomas Fowler
... was made more quickly than either West or Ingleborough had anticipated; in fact, the celerity was wonderful considering that the cavalry brigade was burdened with the great convoy of wagons captured ...
— A Dash from Diamond City • George Manville Fenn
... pen, as if in intimation of his wish that his father would advance. Mr. Joseph Tuggs, with considerable celerity, removed his face from the curtain and ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens
... impatiently, and wondered how he could ever have found such favor with Lady De Aldithely. But in silence he took the brawn and oat-cake Humphrey gave him. The horses were already feeding, and, despatching his own breakfast with great celerity, Humphrey soon had them ready for the day's journey. Still in silence Hugo mounted, for a glance at the stubborn Humphrey's face told him he might as well ...
— A Boy's Ride • Gulielma Zollinger
... With the celerity of long practice in boating, the two men changed places, and with such quickness was the change in position effected, that the onrushing shell scarcely lessened its headway. The trapper seized the oars on ...
— How Deacon Tubman and Parson Whitney Kept New Year's - And Other Stories • W. H. H. Murray
... thought, or a celerity producing nearly the same effect, which brings within the short space of a few minutes the images of many foregoing years. In almost the same moment, Thaddeus reflected on his strange meeting with the countess; the melancholy story; her forlorn ...
— Thaddeus of Warsaw • Jane Porter
... feet. I often saw a wasp trying to clear a leaf from ants that were already in full possession of a cluster of leaf-hoppers. It would sometimes have to strike three or four times at an ant before it made it quit its hold and fall. At other times one ant after the other would be struck off with great celerity and ease, and I fancied that some wasps were much cleverer than others. In those cases where it succeeded in clearing the leaf, it was never left long in peace. Fresh relays of ants were continually ...
— The Naturalist in Nicaragua • Thomas Belt
... put to flight and Charles made the arrangements for the encamping of his troops with the skill and celerity of one trained in the art of warfare, instead of a boy on his first campaign and to whom the whistle of a musket ball was a sound unknown. He showed his ability and judgment also by the strict discipline he maintained, winning the good will of the peasantry by paying for ...
— Historical Tales, Vol. 9 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality. Scandinavian. • Charles Morris
... Mr. Paraday about it, but in the morning, after my remove from the inn, while he was occupied in his study, as he had notified me he should need to be, I committed to paper the main heads of my impression. Then thinking to commend myself to Mr. Pinhorn by my celerity, I walked out and posted my little packet before luncheon. Once my paper was written I was free to stay on, and if it was calculated to divert attention from my levity in so doing I could reflect with satisfaction that I had never been so clever. ...
— The Death of the Lion • Henry James
... with a celerity engendered of much practice, and, having crossed the obstacle on foot, sat down to await the coming of ...
— A Holiday in the Happy Valley with Pen and Pencil • T. R. Swinburne
... companions by rowing as quickly as possible round the Roman ships, so as not to allow them to make use of the corvi. But the Romans proved themselves to be even more expert seamen than their enemies; for, though their vessels were much heavier, they worked them with so much ease, celerity, and skill, that they presented the machines to the enemy on whatever side they ...
— Robert Kerr's General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 18 • William Stevenson
... struck too high, glanced off the tough hide, and skipped over the backs of the animals. Now there was a pretty to do! Ten or twelve great weird faces glared upon us at once; the colossal creatures twisted themselves round with incredible celerity, and came waddling with lifted heads and hollow bellowings to the edge of the ice where we lay. It was undeniably an imposing sight; but I laid my gun to my shoulder and fired at one of the biggest heads. The animal staggered, ...
— Farthest North - Being the Record of a Voyage of Exploration of the Ship 'Fram' 1893-1896 • Fridtjof Nansen
... which sat a single rower, bare-armed, and with little apparel, save a shirt and drawers, pale, anxious, with every muscle on the stretch, and plying his oars in such fashion that the boat skimmed along with the aerial celerity of a swallow. I wondered at myself for so immediately catching an interest in the affair, which seemed to contain no very exalted rivalship of manhood; but, whatever the kind of battle or the prize of victory, it stirs one's sympathy ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 11, Issue 67, May, 1863 • Various
... former even with a tottering wooden structure, was a work of time and labor. Meanwhile the army waited wearily, General Nelson chafed at the delay, and the rebel leaders Beauregard and Sidney Johnston were concentrating their forces at Corinth with ominous celerity. It was their purpose to crush, at one blow, so suddenly and so surely dealt that succor should be impossible, the National army, which had established itself on the borders of one of the southernmost States of the Confederacy, and was menacing lines of communication of prime necessity to their ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 6, No 4, October, 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... match. The country being fertile, waggons, cattle, and provisions of all kinds, were swept off; every thing was taken, even to such of the inhabitants as were necessary to conduct these convoys. Some days after, at the Niemen, the embarrassment of the passage, and the celerity of the first hostile marches, caused all the fruits of these requisitions to be abandoned with an indifference only equalled by the violence with which they had ...
— History of the Expedition to Russia - Undertaken by the Emperor Napoleon in the Year 1812 • Count Philip de Segur
... celerity the 700 miles lying between me and Fort Garry became the chief object of my life. The next morning, with the lightest of equipment, I started for Cumberland House, the oldest post of the Hudson Bay Company in the interior. There I obtained, at fabulous expense, ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Volume 19 - Travel and Adventure • Various
... a tail to display, however, that I should hardly think the display was worth while. "It is very cunning, and especially noticeable for the subtlety with which it wearies the dog of the sportsman by executing a thousand evolutions with surprising celerity; whence comes the trivial name of 'kill-dog' bestowed upon it in some localities. Pursued to extremity, it casts itself into the water, swims with ease, and dives at the moment its enemy is about to seize it; or it conceals itself in a tuft of reeds or a bush, and by this means ...
— Love's Meinie - Three Lectures on Greek and English Birds • John Ruskin
... Elector of Baden, who was more than seventy-five years old, and had come with his son and grandson, appeared as if vassals of the new Charlemagne, the second Theatre Francais had been summoned from Paris, and played before this public of Highnesses. Every one was struck by the celerity with which this crowned soldier had acquired the appearance of a sovereign belonging to an old line, while he still preserved the language and appearance of a soldier. One day he asked the hereditary Prince ...
— The Court of the Empress Josephine • Imbert de Saint-Amand
... "The Board of Health hereby adjudges that the deposit of sputum in street-cars is a public nuisance."[28] The framer of this announcement would undoubtedly speak of the limbs of a piano and allude to a spade as an agricultural implement. And in social intercourse I have often noticed needless celerity in skating over ice that seemed to my ruder British sense quite well able to bear any ordinary weight, as well as a certain subtlety of allusiveness that appeared to exalt ingenuity of phrase at the expense of common sense and common candour. Too ...
— The Land of Contrasts - A Briton's View of His American Kin • James Fullarton Muirhead
... combinations took shape in his brain and were transferred to the drawing with marvellous speed and skill. Those who have been associated with him bear testimony that the amount of his work was simply astounding, and that only by a combination of the most remarkable celerity and industry could they have ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XIV • John Lord
... following the doctor's instructions, and smiled at his steady swearing as the wrappings were removed and the blisters redressed. They walked across to the hoist, entered the cage, and felt the sinking sensation as they were dropped, rather than lowered, to the six-hundred-foot level. The celerity of the descent almost robbed him of breath, but he thought of sturdy old Bells' boast, that he had "never run a cage into the sheaves, nor dropped it to the sump, ...
— The Plunderer • Roy Norton
... that the oil had been disappearing with miraculous celerity, and Amar Singh cast aspersions on the kitmutgar and his wife. A jealous feud subsisted between him and them; and as ruler-in-chief of the Sahib's establishment, the bearer made it a point of honour to let no one cheat Desmond save himself. He had a grievous ...
— Captain Desmond, V.C. • Maud Diver
... was rewarded by a post of some importance in the army. Successful in detached service, while his general was unfortunate in the field, he was instructed to take off the head of his commander, and head the troops in his stead; both of which services he performed with equal skill and celerity. Success attended him, and the pacha, his predecessor, having in his opinion, as well as in that of the sultan, remained an unusual time in office, by an accusation enforced by a thousand purses of ...
— The Pacha of Many Tales • Captain Frederick Marryat
... to the crew, they could sense the situation by the sharp commands emanating from the conning tower and the celerity with which the navigating officer and his assistant were ...
— The Brighton Boys with the Submarine Fleet • James R. Driscoll
... came from. Wiki went off into a paroxysm of falsetto sneezes the like of which I have never heard; nor evidently had the gorilla, who doubtless thinking, as one of his black co- relatives would have thought, that the phenomenon favoured Duppy, went off after his family with a celerity that was amazing the moment he touched the forest, and disappeared as they had, swinging himself along through it from bough to bough, in a way that convinced me that, given the necessity of getting about in tropical forests, man has made a mistake in ...
— Travels in West Africa • Mary H. Kingsley
... heel, setting his teeth in precisely the same spot, where, some years before, a Tartar dog had placed his, making but a single scar. He caused an Iroquois cur to be tied by his tail to a log of wood, and the celerity with which he drew it, yelping and screaming over a bed of ice, fully convinced M. Verdier that he was a legitimate descendant from those which perform the part of dray-horses among the Tartars. So much for canine resemblances, which one would think of little ...
— Traditions of the North American Indians, Vol. 1 (of 3) • James Athearn Jones
... was untouched, gave a howl that you might have heard a league off; advanced towards us as if he would attack us, and then turned and ran away with inconceivable celerity ...
— Roundabout Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray
... was just rising, making the gloom below more sweet. A full moon is poison to some; they shut it out at every crevice, and do not suffer a ray to cross them; it has a chemical or magnetic effect; it sickens them. But I am never more free and royal than when the subtile celerity of its magic combinations, whatever they are, is at work. Never had I known the mere joy of being so intimately as to-night. The river slept soft and mystic below the woods, the sky was full of light, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 5, No. 28, February, 1860 • Various
... of materials. He brings together images the most alike, but placed at the greatest distance from each other; that is, found in circumstances of the greatest dissimilitude. From the remoteness of his combinations, and the celerity with which they are effected, they coalesce the more indissolubly together. The more the thoughts are strangers to each other, and the longer they have been kept asunder, the more intimate does their union seem to become. ...
— Lectures on the English Poets - Delivered at the Surrey Institution • William Hazlitt
... celerity than they had mounted, and then to our surprise brought the animal to us, ...
— Adventures in Australia • W.H.G. Kingston
... thing, you have nothing to grieve about that you are not with the king. He is marching hither and thither with wonderful celerity but, do what he will, he cannot induce either Daun or Lacy to give battle; though together they are three to one against him. Whenever he approaches they simply shut themselves up in impregnable places, erect palisades and ...
— With Frederick the Great - A Story of the Seven Years' War • G. A. Henty
... fixed bayonets, and fourteen rounds of ball-cartridges each in their belts, and every road round Klang was being patrolled by pickets. I knew instinctively that it was "humbug," arranged to show the celerity with which the little army could be turned out; and shortly an orderly arrived with a note—"False alarm;" but Klang never subsided all night, and the Klings beat their tom-toms till daylight. I am writing at dawn now, in order that my letter may ...
— The Golden Chersonese and the Way Thither • Isabella L. Bird (Mrs. Bishop)
... Roldan, finding him earnest in his intention of serving the government, and that there was no hope of engaging him in their new sedition, sought to waylay and destroy him on his march, but his vigilance and celerity prevented them. [59] ...
— The Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus (Vol. II) • Washington Irving
... the river there plied, with wind and tide, A pig with vast celerity; And the Devil look'd wise as he saw how the while, It cut its own throat. "There!" quoth he with a smile, ...
— Poems of Coleridge • Coleridge, ed Arthur Symons
... ratios for those who live by the lower form of brain-work; so that the bribe to use the hand is growing daily, and pure mechanical labor, as opposed to that of the clerk, is being "levelled upward" with fortunate celerity. ...
— Wear and Tear - or, Hints for the Overworked • Silas Weir Mitchell
... have seen him or heard. He poured his own drink and shoved the bottles toward his friend, who helped himself with skilful celerity. ...
— Under Handicap - A Novel • Jackson Gregory
... to Lindau, and left the whole of his right flank exposed. He, nevertheless, looked upon Napoleon's defeat and the invasion of France by his troops as close at hand. He was in ill-health and highly irritable. Napoleon, in order to move with greater celerity, sent a part of his troops by carriage through Strasburg, declared to the Margrave of Baden, the duke of Wurtemberg, and the elector of Bavaria, his intention not to recognize them as neutral powers, that they must be either against him or with him, and made them ...
— Germany from the Earliest Period Vol. 4 • Wolfgang Menzel, Trans. Mrs. George Horrocks
... and she could have shrieked with triumph when, five minutes later, the priest bade her be of good cheer and to have confidence in him. He would come for her on the next night but one, and she should be freed. From her window in the castle she saw the holy man descend the steep with celerity not born of fatigue. When he reached the road below he turned and waved his hand to her and then made his ...
— Castle Craneycrow • George Barr McCutcheon
... train afforded him unspeakable relief, and at the first opportunity he put himself and his belongings aboard with a celerity very remarkable in one ...
— The Award of Justice - Told in the Rockies • A. Maynard Barbour
... Mr. Watson's presses, Fig. 1 being an earlier construction, which, although very rapid at the date at which it was brought out, has been far surpassed in celerity by the arrangements shown in Figs. 3 to 8. It was introduced in 1873, and forty-three presses according to this design were sent to India by the makers, Messrs. Fawcett, Preston & Co., of Phoenix Foundry, Liverpool, between that ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 561, October 2, 1886 • Various
... accordingly, from Lichfield, I became the distracted master, and he the scholar—how shall I say? indefatigable, but uninspired. His interest never flagged. He would hear the same word twenty times with profound refreshment, mispronounce it in several different ways, and forget it again with magical celerity. Say it happened to be STIRRUP. 'No, I don't seem to remember that word, Mr. Anne,' he would say: 'it don't seem to stick to me, that word don't.' And then, when I had told it him again, 'Etrier!' he would cry. 'To be ...
— St Ives • Robert Louis Stevenson
... whizzed past me, chugging into the wall at my back, and I skipped around the corner with a celerity of movement which caused the fellows watching me ...
— My Lady of the North • Randall Parrish
... imbibed for the sustenance of the body. Absorption, like all other functional processes, employs agents to effect its purposes, and the villi of the small intestine, with their numberless projecting organs, are specially employed to imbibe fluid substances; this they do with a celerity commensurate to the importance and extent of their duties. They are little vascular prominences of the mucous membrane, arising from the interior surface of the small intestine. Each villus has two sets of vessels. (1.) The blood-vessels, which, by their frequent blending, form a complete net-work ...
— The People's Common Sense Medical Adviser in Plain English • R. V. Pierce
... the house. Leslie stopped brushing his clothes. At the same moment, a head was again thrust against the window, and immediately withdrawn. Then the light against the curtain dimmed suddenly. Leslie "put that and that together" with the celerity of a lawyer and the confidence of a man of the world. The people in that house were going away. Where? That was something to ...
— Shoulder-Straps - A Novel of New York and the Army, 1862 • Henry Morford
... warning. But this the colt did not heed. Instead he wheeled suddenly and plunged directly toward her, bunting her sharply. Nor did the single bunt satisfy him. Again and again he attacked her, plunging in and darting away each time with remarkable celerity, until, her patience evidently exhausted, she whisked her head around and nipped him sharply. Screaming with pain and fright, he plunged from her, sought the opposite side of the inclosure, and turned upon her a pair of very hurt and ...
— Bred of the Desert - A Horse and a Romance • Marcus Horton
... Major Maule. The design of the enemy against this depot being suspected, Lieutenant-Colonel Battersby, commanding the Glengarry Regiment, upon being notified to that effect by Lieutenant-Colonel Harvey, Deputy-Adjutant-General, moved forward from York, and, by a march of extraordinary celerity, arrived with a reinforcement in time to save the depot, which the enemy, on finding the British ready to receive them, did not deem it prudent ...
— The Loyalists of America and Their Times, Vol. 2 of 2 - From 1620-1816 • Edgerton Ryerson
... warfare, and were thus doubly prepared to encounter the enemy in whose ranks they had received their best military lessons. Such a force very far exceeded that of the Carolinians. Mustering but two thousand men, Col. Montgomery found it advisable to urge his march upon the nation with equal celerity and caution. Having reached a place called Twelve-mile River, within twenty miles of the Indian town of Estatoee, he advanced by night upon it, secretly, and with a view to its surprise. In his ...
— The Life of Francis Marion • William Gilmore Simms
... old boar!" muttered young Ingoldsby; alluding, perhaps, to a slice of brawn which he had just begun to operate upon, but which, from the celerity with which it disappeared, did not seem so very difficult ...
— Humorous Ghost Stories • Dorothy Scarborough
... Their celerity and force he affirmed to be wonderful, insomuch that one of those Creatures, which he struck himself, towed the boat wherein he was, after him, for the space of six or seven Leagues, in 3/4 of an ...
— Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society - Vol 1 - 1666 • Various
... found Bacon on the upper York. Acting with his accustomed energy, he sent out, far and wide, ringing appeals to the country to rouse itself, for men to join him and march to the defeat of the old tyrant. Numbers did come in. He moved with "marvelous celerity." When he had, for the time and place, a large force of rebels, he marched, by stream and plantation, tobacco field and forest, forge and mill, through the early autumn country to Jamestown. ...
— Pioneers of the Old South - A Chronicle of English Colonial Beginnings, Volume 5 In - The Chronicles Of America Series • Mary Johnston
... facing the building, and this command he was to pass on to the second, and the second to the third, and so on till the last. [5] And while they saw to this he went in to Cyaxares himself, wearing his simple Persian dress without a trace of pomp. Cyaxares was well pleased at his celerity, but troubled by the plainness of his attire, and said to him, "What is the meaning of this, Cyrus? How could you show yourself in this guise to the Indians? I wished you to appear in splendour: it would have done me honour for my sister's son to ...
— Cyropaedia - The Education Of Cyrus • Xenophon
... not the leading idea, so propounded, is new, or is new in its application as an auxiliary to Christian evidences, the writer is unaware: to his own mind it has occurred quite spontaneously and on a sudden; neither has he scrupled to place it before others with whatever ill advantage of celerity, because it seemed to his own musings to shed a flood of light upon deep truths, which may not prove unwelcome nor unuseful to the doubting minds of many. It is true that in this, as in most other human efforts, the realization ...
— The Complete Prose Works of Martin Farquhar Tupper • Martin Farquhar Tupper
... the Duke of Wellington inspected all the passengers in Pall Mall, from the steps of the United Service Club-house, and expressed himself highly pleased with the celerity of the 'busses and cabs, and the effective state ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various
... and certainty just where he wished it; the hams were beautifully trimmed out; the pieces fashioned clean; no ragged cutting; and his quick-going knife disposed of carcase after carcase with admirable neatness and celerity. Sam meanwhile arranged the pieces in different parcels at his direction, and minded the kettle, in which a great boiling and scumming was going on. Ellen was too much amused for a while to ask any questions. When the cutting up was all done, the hams and shoulders were put in a cask by themselves, ...
— The Wide, Wide World • Susan Warner
... speed which they will attain in a few days, when in full practice and training. Their nerve, muscle, eye, endurance, will be all at, so to speak, concert-pitch, and sheep after sheep will be shorn with a precision and celerity even awful ...
— Shearing in the Riverina, New South Wales • Rolf Boldrewood
... France, and the same anxiety to assist M. Guizot on the part of my friends, when they came to consider what was possible and would be safe and justifiable, they were unable to find any expedient to meet the immense practical difficulties of the case; that events had proceeded with such celerity, and placed the question in so different a position, that concessions formerly contemplated as reasonable and possible were now out of the question. They all felt that they could offer nothing in Syria; that it was possible the ...
— The Greville Memoirs (Second Part) - A Journal of the Reign of Queen Victoria from 1837 to 1852 - (Volume 1 of 3) • Charles C. F. Greville
... quilted the yawning heel of Tommy Sutton's sock with precision and celerity, and she ruminated silently upon the vicissitudes and failures of mortal life until she was interrupted by Mrs. ...
— At Last • Marion Harland
... a person to approach very closely, but when they have viewed him they dive into their holes with wonderful celerity. They are difficult to kill. If hit they usually succeed in getting underground before they ...
— An Autobiography of Buffalo Bill (Colonel W. F. Cody) • Buffalo Bill (William Frederick Cody)
... my thanks briefly at the Regent's condescension, descended from the carriage (which instantly drove off with renewed celerity), and once more entered ...
— Devereux, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... her bustling mother were of material assistance to Mrs. Pemberthy; and the presence of Sophie in that house of mourning—where the mourning had been speedily got over and business had begun again with commendable celerity—was a considerable source of comfort to young Reuben, when he had leisure after business hours which was not always the case, to resume those tender relations which had borne to him last autumn such ...
— Stories by English Authors: England • Various
... pork-packing establishments of Cincinnati he marvels at the immensity and celerity of the various manipulations, which commence with the killing of a squealing pig, and the transformation of his hogship, in a few minutes, into a well-cleaned animal, hanging up to cool in a store-room, from ...
— Four Months in a Sneak-Box • Nathaniel H. Bishop
... of them linked the mean to the grand, the base to the noble, in a way which often proves fatally inextricable to the poor infirm mind of the ordinary spectator. Here is Napoleon, simply because he wields a vast national machinery, throwing a magic of celerity and power into a particular action which absolutely overpowers the genus attonitorum, so that they are reconciled by the dazzle of a splendour not at all in Napoleon, to a baseness which really is ...
— The Posthumous Works of Thomas De Quincey, Vol. 1 (2 vols) • Thomas De Quincey
... was rainy and misty. We did not move with the practised celerity of my own camp; and it was nearly nine o'clock when our motley crew had finished their breakfast and were ready to start. Once afloat, however, they worked steadily and well, and we advanced at a good rate up the river; and in the afternoon a breeze sprung ...
— The Exploring Expedition to the Rocky Mountains, Oregon and California • Brevet Col. J.C. Fremont
... near, he concluded that it had fallen wounded from the sky. As such it was treasure trove. He set to work to gather bits of driftwood, and started a fire. His bright eyes and the celerity of his movements ...
— The Huntress • Hulbert Footner
... can get on," and with wonderful celerity Sam scraped away with light hand till the last line of lather was taken off, a touch or two here and there given with the brush, and this fresh soap removed, after which the razor was closed, sponge and water applied, and a clean towel handed to the Sheikh, who received ...
— In the Mahdi's Grasp • George Manville Fenn
... Bamboo is used in another way. Pieces are cut about a yard long, and opposite notches being made at each end, holes are formed through which pegs are driven, and firm and convenient steps are thus formed with the greatest ease and celerity. It is true that much of this will decay in one or two seasons, but it can be so quickly replaced as to make it more economical than using a harder and ...
— The Malay Archipelago - Volume I. (of II.) • Alfred Russel Wallace
... his exploit; insomuch that those of Corinth, who had as yet no certainty that their auxiliaries were landed on the island, had tidings brought them at the same time that they were safe and were conquerors. In so prosperous a course did affairs run, and such was the speed and celerity of execution with which fortune, as with a new ornament, set off the ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... being left for a couple of months on the farther side of a flooded river. The details do not matter, but what happened was that when Tabitha intervened that which had been declared to be impossible proved possible, and the furniture arrived with wonderful celerity. Moreover, Tabitha made no request; as Dorcas knew, though she hid it from Thomas, she sent for the headmen, and when they were seated on the ground before her after their fashion, Menzi among them, issued ...
— Smith and the Pharaohs, and Other Tales • Henry Rider Haggard
... had now shown the energy and celerity which hitherto had so often marked the Southern. Hooker, with seventy thousand splendid troops, had gone behind Lee and now three divisions were united in the forest close to Chancellorsville. Sedgwick, with his formidable corps, lay in the plain of Fredericksburg, facing ...
— The Star of Gettysburg - A Story of Southern High Tide • Joseph A. Altsheler
... indeed say, that Epicurus does intolerable things and violates the conceptions, in moving all bodies with equal celerity, and admitting none of them to be swifter than another. And yet it is much more intolerable and farther remote from sense, that nothing can be ...
— Essays and Miscellanies - The Complete Works Volume 3 • Plutarch
... built a much faster locomotive than Stephenson's "Rocket;" and although it had been constructed with such celerity that it broke down before the final point was reached, and he thereby lost the prize, yet the superiority of the principle involved in it was universally recognized. John Bourn said: "To most men the production of such an engine would have constituted an adequate claim to ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 6 of 8 • Various
... you may say, almost within three points of the wind; and his own accidental allusion to Romeo had brought it about with an aptness and a celerity which were better for my purpose than anything I had privately developed from the text of Bottom and Titania; none the less, however, did I intend to press into my service that fond couple also as basis for a moral, in spite of the sharp turn which those last words of mine now caused ...
— Lady Baltimore • Owen Wister
... frequently repeated the words "Ven aca, Ven aca," accompanied with an invitation to land; but, as we approached, she retired towards the shore; when suddenly two natives, who had slowly walked towards us, sprang into the water and made towards the boat with surprising celerity, jumping at each step entirely out of the sea, although it was so deep as to reach their thighs. Their intention was evidently to seize the remaining tomahawk which I had been endeavouring to exchange for the stand, and the foremost had reached within two or three yards of the boat when I found ...
— Narrative of a Survey of the Intertropical and Western Coasts of Australia - Performed between the years 1818 and 1822 • Phillip Parker King
... few weeks after the marriage we all departed for the Continent, where we remained for the six following years, Gabrielle and myself receiving instructions in every accomplishment suitable to our position. It was charming to witness with what celerity my beautiful sister acquired every thing she undertook, for she was as anxious as her lord to adorn the high station to which she now belonged. Wherever we went the fame of Lady Treherne's beauty went with us, while her fascination of manner and high-bred elegance perfectly satisfied her fastidious ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 2, No. 12, May, 1851. • Various
... Kitchens and Stoves, and a broad planked Promenade over all railed in, and with Flowering Plants in pots by the sides, quite like a garden. They are rowed by twelve men each, and move with an almost Incredible Celerity, so that in the same day one can Delight one's Eye with a vast Variety of Prospects; and within a short space of time the Traveller has the diversion of seeing a populous City adorned with magnificent ...
— The Strange Adventures of Captain Dangerous, Vol. 2 of 3 • George Augustus Sala
... endowed with every great and noble quality that could exalt human nature, and give a man the ascendant in society. Formed to excel in peace as well as war; provident in council; fearless in action, and executing what he had resolved with an amazing celerity; generous beyond measure to his friends; placable to his enemies; and for parts, learning, and eloquence, scarce inferior to any man. His orations were admired for two qualities, which are seldom ...
— The Illustrated London Reading Book • Various
... and saw the recreant gathering himself up from the top of a shed upon which he had dropped from the second-story window. Without stopping to collect his hat he then plunged downward the remaining ten feet to the alley, up which he flew with prodigious celerity until the surrounding building ...
— Whirligigs • O. Henry
... nation rose as one man. Recruits poured to the borderland singing the Marseillaise, their newly adopted national hymn. Rapidly reducing this motley force to order, Kellermann, with 22,000 men, marched from Metz, on September 4th, for Chalons with the utmost celerity, reached Bar before the Prussians, saved the magazines on the upper Saone and Marne, and put himself in a situation to communicate with Dumouriez. The latter general was attacked on September 16th, and immediately ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 2 of 8 • Various
... vacation! How rapid as we go on in life becomes the awful beat of each recurring year! When the feeling of novelty has grown rare, and when interests have lost their edge, time glides by with an ever-increasing celerity. Campbell has justly noticed as a beneficent provision of nature that it is in the period of life when enjoyments are fewest, and infirmities most numerous, that the march of ...
— The Map of Life - Conduct and Character • William Edward Hartpole Lecky
... army must have succumbed towards the evening had it not been for the arrival of Bulow's division of Prussians, followed closely by Blucher and the rest of the army, which had rallied with uncommon celerity. These moved on the right flank of the French, and decided the fortune of the day by a charge which was seconded by a general charge from the whole of the English line on the centre and left of the French. Seeing themselves thus turned, a panic, it is said, spread among the young ...
— After Waterloo: Reminiscences of European Travel 1815-1819 • Major W. E Frye
... asked him to dine; but it was as it was. Gaston's alert glance found the empty seat. He was about to make towards it, but he caught Sir William's eye and saw it signal him to the end of the table near him. His brain was working with celerity and clearness. He now saw the woman whose portrait had so fascinated him in the library. As his eyes fastened on her here, he almost fancied he could see the boy's—his ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... times rendered the granite and the porphyry in the neighbourhood of the Red Sea indispensable. To obtain the immense columns, and the enormous porphyry vases, which were then admired, with sufficient celerity and in sufficient quantity, it became necessary to render the canal navigable for a longer period of time every year. In order to effect this, Trajan constructed a new canal from the vicinity of Babylon, and connected it with the ancient ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Vol. 56, No. 346, August, 1844 • Various
... Miss Jansell, rising with a celerity which spoke well for the discipline maintained on the Aquila; "he wants me to mend his ...
— Many Cargoes • W.W. Jacobs
... won't." Torrance's mind was working with unusual celerity. "They got what was coming to them from my fists this time. Next time they'll need a doctor—or an undertaker. Besides, it's not your business ...
— The Return of Blue Pete • Luke Allan
... kings both Christian and Saracen, having in divers wars and by divers lavish displays of magnificence spent all his treasure, and in order to meet a certain emergency being in need of a large sum of money, and being at a loss to raise it with a celerity adequate to his necessity, bethought him of a wealthy Jew, Melchisedech by name, who lent at usance in Alexandria, and who, were he but willing, was, as he believed, able to accommodate him, but was so miserly that he would never do so of his own accord, nor was Saladin disposed to constrain ...
— The Decameron, Volume I • Giovanni Boccaccio
... lavish of ornaments; and in perorations, for the most part weighed down by distress? Of the variety which ought to be in a discourse, we may find another parallel instance in the motions of the body. With all of them, do not the circumstances regulate their respective degrees of slowness and celerity? And for dancing as well as singing, does not music use numbers of which the beating of the time makes us sensible? As our voice and action are indeed expressive of our inner feelings in regard to the nature of the things of which we ...
— The Training of a Public Speaker • Grenville Kleiser
... Darling," was the sweet response; the small figure rolled over the edge of the car with a cat-like celerity. "Where are your tools, ...
— The Flying Mercury • Eleanor M. Ingram
... to all this stupendous celerity, Which—to the no small relief of posterity— Pays off at sight the whole debit of fame, Nor troubles futurity even with a name (A project that won't as much tickle Tom Tegg as us, Since 'twill rob him of his ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al
... before, seemed the natural scheme. But to this McClellan still remained unalterably opposed. In the letter of February 3 he had said: "The worst coming to the worst, we can take Fort Monroe as a base and operate with complete security, although with less celerity and brilliancy of results, up the Peninsula." This route, low as he had then placed it in order of desirability, he now adopted as the best resource, or rather as the only measure; and his judgment was ratified upon March 13 by unanimous ...
— Abraham Lincoln, Vol. II • John T. Morse
... tells the story of his youth, was born on July 24, 1802, and died on December 5, 1870. He was a man of prodigious vitality, virility, and invention; abounding in enjoyment, gaiety, vanity, and kindness; the richness, force, and celerity of his nature was amazing. In regard to this peculiar vivacity of his, it is interesting to remember that one of his grandparents was a full-blooded negress. Dumas' literary work is essentially romantic; his themes are courage, loyalty, ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol IX. • Edited by Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton
... distance of some thirty yards away it stopped short, and from the near end of it rose into the air what I at first thought a great white bird. Its ascent was so smooth and easy and regular that I could not realize its extraordinary celerity, and was lost in admiration of its grace. To this day the impression remains that it was a slow, deliberate movement, the ram—for it was that animal—being upborne by some power other than its own impetus, and supported through the successive stages of its flight with infinite ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce, Volume 8 - Epigrams, On With the Dance, Negligible Tales • Ambrose Bierce
... place of this Tractate endeavour to make probable. And that, in all extreamly hot shining bodies, there is a very quick motion that causes Light, as well as a more robust that causes Heat, may be argued from the celerity wherewith the bodyes ...
— Micrographia • Robert Hooke
... the range as communicated by the aeroplane, to bring the artillery into position speedily, to discharge salvo after salvo with all speed for a few minutes, and then to wheel the artillery away before any hostile fire can be returned. The celerity with which the British artillery comes into, and goes out of, action has astonished even our own authorities. This mobility is of unique value: it is taking advantage of a somewhat slow-witted enemy with interest. By the time the Germans have opened fire upon the point whence ...
— Aeroplanes and Dirigibles of War • Frederick A. Talbot
... seat with amazing celerity, she whisked into the house before Doctor Stedman's astonished eyes, and closed the door ...
— Mrs. Tree • Laura E. Richards
... resembled the Yuga fire in energy, he sped it at that fierce wanderer of the night. Beholding that arrow, blazing as Indra's bolt, thus coursing towards him, the high-souled Ghatotkacha baffled it by the celerity of his movements. With eyes red in wrath, he once more shouted fiercely, frightening all thy troops, like the clouds that appear at the end of the Yuga. Hearing those fierce roars of the terrible Rakshasa, Bhishma the son of Santanu, approaching the preceptor, said these words, 'These ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 2 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... lips, and wiped out the mouth with marvellous celerity, paying no heed to the clamorous voices around her. "Some one give me a sharp knife," she cried, "and don't crowd ...
— A Young Girl's Wooing • E. P. Roe
... Cadiz, the most distinguished champion in the war that followed. With a select force of three thousand light cavalry and four thousand infantry, adherents of several nobles who attended the expedition, the mountains were traversed with the greatest secrecy and celerity, the marches being made mainly by night and the troops remaining quiet and concealed during the day. No fires were made and no noise was permitted, and midnight of the third day found the invaders in ...
— Historical Tales - The Romance of Reality - Volume VII • Charles Morris
... country without architecture, occupied Iermak until the month of April. Then a mirza informed him that the bold Mahmetkul had again approached the Irtysh and encamped near Vagai with a small band. The occasion was favorable; but in order to exterminate this indefatigable enemy, secrecy and celerity were more necessary than force. Consequently the Cossack leaders, having chosen sixty of their braves, furtively approached the camp of the Tartars, cut the throats of many in their sleep, took Mahmetkul ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 1-20 • Various
... Phlius, complimented by Agesipolis on the amount of the funds contributed by them to his expedition and the celerity with which the money had been raised, and in full belief that while one king was in the field they were secure against the hostile attack of the other (since it was hardly to be expected that both kings should be absent from Sparta at one moment), boldly desisted from ...
— Hellenica • Xenophon
... occupied by the enemy's militia and the Indians. When the signal is given for putting to the shore, the corps of Lieutenant-Colonel Ball will precede the left wing: the regiment of volunteer riflemen the right wing: these corps will land with the utmost celerity, consistent with the preservation of good order, and as soon as landed will seize the most favourable position of annoying the enemy and covering the disembarkation of the troops of the line. General Cass's brigade will follow Colonel Ball's corps, and General Calmes the volunteer ...
— The Medallic History of the United States of America 1776-1876 • J. F. Loubat |
