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Forte   Listen
adverb
Forte  adv.  (Mus.) Loudly; strongly; powerfully.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Forte" Quotes from Famous Books



... expulsiva et visiva, per hoc purgetur, et cerebrum a sua superfluitate purgetur, etc. Etiam qui sternutat frequenter, dicitur habere forte cerebrum."—Aristotelis ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 217, December 24, 1853 • Various

... excuse my describing the scene which ensued, for, as I have before said, and as the reader has probably assented, description is not my forte; beside, I am in a devil of a hurry to get the ship under weigh, ...
— Graham's Magazine, Vol. XXXII No. 4, April 1848 • Various

... says Baron de Grimm, "n'est presque jamais faux, mais malheureusement il a voix, figure, tout, contre lui. Une sensibilit'e forte et profonde, qui faisait disparaitre la laideur de ses traits sous le charme de l'expression dont elle les rendait susceptible, et ne laissait aper'cevoir que lea caract'ere et la passion dont son 'ame 'etait remplie, ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole Volume 3 • Horace Walpole

... sister. She considered it to be her duty formally and officially to disavow her senior. So reprehensible did she feel Split's conduct to be that some one must blush for it; and as blushing was not Split's forte, Sissy did it ...
— The Madigans • Miriam Michelson

... as La Martina; we always lunched with her on our way over the Colma to and from Varallo-Sesia. On one occasion we were accompanied by two English ladies and, one being a teetotaller, Butler maliciously instructed La Martina to make the sabbaglione so that it should be forte and abbondante, and to say that the Marsala, with which it was more than flavoured, was nothing but vinegar. La Martina never forgot that when she looked in to see how things were going, he was pretending to lick the dish clean. ...
— The Humour of Homer and Other Essays • Samuel Butler

... suggested that they try Boston. That city was a musical centre and Camilla would be sure to meet with a good reception there. Accordingly under the guidance of the American the entire party went to Boston. Mr. Jonas Chickering, the piano-forte manufacturer kindly welcomed her and invited her to call at his residence on Boylston street, two doors from the building now occupied by the Art Club. So much pleased was he with her simple manners and her wonderful playing ...
— Camilla: A Tale of a Violin - Being the Artist Life of Camilla Urso • Charles Barnard

... had taken, Spake in his owne linqua[62] to thiss Efect, "Gent men, I know you are men come to seeke a fortune, if You want money or Plate goe alonge with me, I will shew you wheir their is more then you all can carry away." wee gave no credit to him, butt was minded to fall on uppon the forte to take their greate gunns for the shipp, haveing none on board. Our Party being so tired, and cutt off, wee weare feigne to leave the greate gunns, money, all the Rest of the rich traide which was in that small towne. three of our Doctors being in the Hospitall Church dressing of ...
— Privateering and Piracy in the Colonial Period - Illustrative Documents • Various

... Nocte brevem si forte indulsit cura soporem, Et toto versata thoro jam membra quiescunt, Continuo templum et violati Numinis aras, Et quod praecipuis mentem suboribus urget, Te videt in somnis; tua sacra et major imago Humana turbat pavidum, cogitque fateri. JUVENAL, ...
— The Borough • George Crabbe

... learned Orientalist, you could not decorously have rejected him; and yet, once admitted, he would have beggared you before any means could have been discovered by the learned for putting a stop to him. [Greek Text: Aperantologia] was his forte; upon this he piqued himself, and most justly, since for covering the ground rapidly, and yet not advancing an inch, those, who knew and valued him as he deserved, would have backed him against the whole field ...
— Theological Essays and Other Papers v2 • Thomas de Quincey

... been my particular athletic forte, and now when my very life depended upon fleetness of foot I cannot say that I ran any better than on the occasions when my pitiful base running had called down upon my head the rooter's raucous and reproachful cries of "Ice ...
— At the Earth's Core • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... but stayed away!" Judge Gordon exclaimed. Cunning, not force, was his forte; and the measures in prospect at times had oppressed him with dreadful forebodings. He was growing old, feeble, and here when he was entitled to peace he still had to fight for ...
— In the Shadow of the Hills • George C. Shedd

... for that theer whisperin' and shout-in' in the course of a piece of music," said Sennacherib. "Pianner is pianner, and forte is forte, but theer's no call to strain a man's ears to listen to the one, nor to drive him deaf with t'other. Same time, if the young gentleman 'ud like to come an' gi'e us a lesson now and then ...
— Aunt Rachel • David Christie Murray

... how dost thou do? thou bard not of a thousand but three thousand! I wish your friend, Sir John Piano-forte, had kept that to himself, and not made it public at the trial of the song-seller in Dublin. I tell you why: it is a liberal thing for Longman to do, and honourable for you to obtain; but it will set all the 'hungry and dinnerless, lank-jawed ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. III - With His Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore

... broken in half. The condenser of the paddle engines seems to have been proved too small in this trip. For some time she went against a stiff head-wind and sea— which is now well known to be the great ship's forte—with perfect steadiness; but on getting into the channel she rolled slowly but decidedly, as if bowing—acknowledging majestically the might of the Atlantic's genuine swell. Here, too, a wave actually overtopped her towering hull, and sent a mass of green water inboard! ...
— Man on the Ocean - A Book about Boats and Ships • R.M. Ballantyne

... that he could remain at home after tea, it was his delight to settle himself comfortably down in the big rocking chair, in the well-lighted sitting-room, and to muse and doze, while Alice sang, and played upon the piano-forte. He had so many other cares, that he did not like to be troubled with bad reports of his children's conduct, This was so well understood by all the family, that even George seldom ventured to go to him with a complaint. The management of domestic affairs was ...
— Oscar - The Boy Who Had His Own Way • Walter Aimwell

... city, or to the western side of the Alleghanies. Sometimes a small attempt at music produces a partial reunion; a few of the most daring youths animated by the consciousness of curled hair and smart waistcoats, approach the piano-forte, and begin to mutter a little to the half-grown pretty things, who are comparing with one another 'how many quarters' music they have had.' Where the mansion is of sufficient dignity to have two drawing-rooms, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 19. Issue 539 - 24 Mar 1832 • Various

... Per aver pace co' seguaci sui. Amor, che al cor gentil ratto s'apprende, Prese costui della bella persona Che mi fu tolta, e il modo ancor m' offende. Amor, che a nullo amato amar perdona, Mi prese del costui piacer si forte, Che, come vedi, ancor non mi abbandona. Amor condusse noi ad una morte: 10 Caino attende chi vita ci spense.' Queste parole da lor ci fur porte. Da che io intesi quelle anime offense Chinai 'l viso, e tanto il tenni basso, Finche il Poeta mi disse: 'Che pense?' ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 4 • Lord Byron

... herself would be meted out that "peine forte et dure," that acme of humiliation and disgrace, so intensely horrible that many a little girl in that room solemnly averred and believed she would kill herself before submitting to it. Pupasse's voluminous calico skirt would be gathered up by the ...
— Balcony Stories • Grace E. King

... not his forte, and his attempt in this direction in the weeks that followed would have been humorous were they not so pathetic. How I did my part I cannot tell. Those weeks are to me now like the memory of an ugly nightmare. The ghostly old man moving out and in of his little daughter's room in useless, ...
— The Sky Pilot • Ralph Connor

... began more firmly, "you take a pinch of sand from this box—so." Tee-making is not my forte, and I was painfully conscious that I worked under the critical gaze of fully twenty ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, August 5th, 1914 • Various

... Caernarvonshire and Merionethshire, as far east as the river Conway. R. Hygden, speaking of the castle of Conway, built by King Edward the First, says: 'Ad ortum amnis Conway ad clivum montis Erery;' and Matthew of Westminster (ad ann. 1283), 'Apud Aberconway ad pedes montis Snowdoniae fecit erigi castrum forte'" (Gray). ...
— Select Poems of Thomas Gray • Thomas Gray

... autrefois une grande et forte ville. Elle a un tres-beau port. On voit a Zara le corps de ce saint Simeon a qui N. S. fut presente dans le temple. Elle est entouree de trois cotes par la mer, et son port, egalement beau, est ferme ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, - and Discoveries of The English Nation, Volume 10 - Asia, Part III • Richard Hakluyt

... spectacle, in which I was entrusted with a part. The piece chosen was Iphigenie en Aulide. Mademoiselle de Sabran and her brother, as well as a young Strogonoff, were, it is said, perfect actors. Armand de Polignac had a little part. Tragedy was not my forte. But in the second piece I achieved a little success, which the Chevalier de Boufflers was kind enough to celebrate in a very bright couplet, sung at the close. He gave me the name of the Little White Mouse. After that the Queen called me her little white mouse, and ...
— The Duchess of Berry and the Court of Charles X • Imbert De Saint-Amand

... Superiorum meorum voluntate, Dei gloriam et animarum salutem promoturus; verisimile esse putavi, me turbulento hoc, suspicioso ac difficillimo tempore, sive citius, sive aliquanto tardius, in medio cursu abreptum iri. Quapropter ignarus quid de me futurum sit, quum Dei permissu in carceres et vincula forte detrudendus sim, ad omnem eventum scriptum hoc condidi: quod ut legere, et ex eo causam meam cognoscere velitis, etiam atque etiam rogo. Fiet enim, ut hac re non parvo labore liberemini, dum quod multis ambagibus inquirere ...
— Ten Reasons Proposed to His Adversaries for Disputation in the Name • Edmund Campion

... number that turns up is not precisely the one you want, you can still contrive to use it equally:—in vita est hominum quasi cum ludas tesseris; si illud quod maxime opus est jactu non cadit, illud quod cecidit forte, id arte ut corrigas.[1] Or, to put the matter more shortly, life is a game of cards, when the cards are shuffled and dealt by fate. But for my present purpose, the most suitable simile would be that of a game of chess, where the plan we determined ...
— Counsels and Maxims - From The Essays Of Arthur Schopenhauer • Arthur Schopenhauer

... famous "Selah," which we used to hear pronounced with great solemnity when the Psalms were read. It is a musical term, meaning, perhaps, something like our "Da Capo" or, possibly, "Forte"—a mark of expression like those Italian words which you find over the ...
— Who Wrote the Bible? • Washington Gladden

... Verum nuperrime forte contigit, ut primam tragoediae Grotianae editionem, Hagae, an. 1601. publicatam, beneficio amicissimi mihi viri nactus fuerim, ejusque decem priores paginas, quibus, praeter chorum, actus primus comprehenditur, a Jacobo meo, optimae spei adolescente, transcriptas nunc ad te mitto. Vale, vir doctissime, ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson in Nine Volumes - Volume V: Miscellaneous Pieces • Samuel Johnson

... and purity incarnate—that is what she seemed; and what she was. "La plus forte des forces est un coeur innocent," said Victor Hugo—and if you translate this literally into English, it comes to exactly the same, ...
— The Martian • George Du Maurier

... him to do so; desired him to spend himself and that magnificent speed of his against the greater speed that whole days of fencing in succession for nearly two years had given the master. With a beautiful, easy pressure of forte on foible Andre-Louis kept himself completely covered in that second bout, which once ...
— Scaramouche - A Romance of the French Revolution • Rafael Sabatini

... so celebrated. Mendelssohn produced works in almost every department of musical composition, a great variety of chamber music, symphonies, overtures, one opera, and a very large collection of music for the piano-forte and organ. Probably his fame will last longer through the influence of three works—viz., the "Midsummer Night's Dream" overture, which opened the new world of the romantic; the oratorio of "Elijah," which is in very many respects one of the most beautiful ever written, just as it is ...
— The Masters and their Music - A series of illustrative programs with biographical, - esthetical, and critical annotations • W. S. B. Mathews

... falsa legat, taceat vel forte repente, Ante pios fratres, lector in Ecclesia. Est opus egregium sacros jam scribete libros, Nec mercede sua scriptor ...
— Bibliomania in the Middle Ages • Frederick Somner Merryweather

... rushed to me; by a strong effort, I recovered myself, swallowed the glass of water she brought, and walked to the piano-forte, where Rosa ...
— Ellen Middleton—A Tale • Georgiana Fullerton

... far as to survey the lady from a distance, and argue the point with my mother pro and con. But the fact is, the thing was distasteful, and wouldn't bear thinking about, much less arguing. I was too lazy to go and explain the matter, and writing was not my forte. Besides, I didn't want to thwart my mother in her plans, or hurt her feelings; and so the long and the short of it is, I solved the difficulty and cut the knot by crossing quietly over to Norway. I wrote a short note to my mother, ...
— The American Baron • James De Mille

... but love and admire, ventured to remove her to a more comfortable apartment, where the daylight shone brightly in through the iron bars of the window. Here she could see the clouds and the birds soaring in the free air. She was even allowed, through her friends, to procure a piano-forte, which afforded her many hours of recreation. Music, drawing, and flowers were the embellishments of her life. Madame Bouchaud, the wife of the jailer, conceived for her prisoner the kindest affection, and daily ...
— Madame Roland, Makers of History • John S. C. Abbott

... afraid of you, Esther, at least I think not; but—" He hesitated, and then stopped, and I knew he was thinking of Fred and Carrie; but he need not. Of course Carrie would work as heartily as any of us; idling was never her forte; and Fred —well, perhaps Fred ...
— Esther - A Book for Girls • Rosa Nouchette Carey

... for what traveler of taste does not doff his bonnet to the mother-church of the town through which he happens to be traveling, or in which he takes a temporary abode? The west front, always the forte of the architects's skill, strikes you as you go down, or come up, the principal street—La Rue des Carmes—which seems to bisect the town into equal parts. A small open space, which, however, has been miserably encroached upon by petty shops, called ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume 3 • Various

... meus est mos, Flumineas propter salices et murmura Cami, Multa movens mecum, fumo inspirante, iacebam. Illic forte mihi senis occurrebat imago Squalida, torva tuens, longos incompta capillos; Ipse manu cymbam prensans se littore in udo Deposuit; Camique humeros agnoscere latos Immanesque artus atque ora hirsuta videbar: Mox lacrymas inter ...
— Sagittulae, Random Verses • E. W. Bowling

... einzelne Manner gegeben, die uber ihrer Zeit Standen und von ihren Gegensatzen nicht beruhrt wurden.—BACHMANN. Hengstenberg, i. 160. Eorum enim qui de iisdem rebus mecum aliquid ediderunt, aut solus insanio ego, aut solos non insanio; tertium enim non est, nisi (quod dicet forte aliquis) insaniamus omnes.—HOBBES, quoted by DE MORGAN, 3rd June 1858: Life of Sir ...
— Lectures on Modern history • Baron John Emerich Edward Dalberg Acton

... drawing-room and sat down at the piano-forte, to try to get over the time till Edward's return as well as I could. I was bent upon mentioning to him the drive I had taken with Henry, as I quite agreed with the latter that any attempt at concealment would fatally endanger my future peace, and I had ...
— Ellen Middleton—A Tale • Georgiana Fullerton

... realised some fifteen or perhaps twenty per cent., of which the lawyer took the larger share. Something of this sort has been done in other businesses besides farming. Frank, however, was not the man to remain in a state of tutelage, working for another. His forte was not saving—simple accumulation was not for him; but he looked round the district to discover those ...
— Hodge and His Masters • Richard Jefferies

... cabotage. Peu osent se hasarder sur les vaisseau employes aux voyages de long cours, parce qu'ils craignent d'etre transportes et vendus dans les iles.—Au physique, tous ces noirs sont generalement vigoureux,[1] d'une forte constitution, capables des travaux les plus penibles; ils sont generalement actifs.—Domestiques, ils sont sobres et fideles.—Ce portrait s'applique aux femmes de cette couleur.—Je n'ai vu faire aucune ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Vol. I. Jan. 1916 • Various

... themes. The daughter of a Dartmouth professor, she was cradled in literature, and has made it in a certain way the work of her life. There is nothing, however, of the pedantic about her. She is the embodiment of a woman's wit and humour; but her forte is a certain crisp and lively condensation of persons and qualities which carry a large amount of information under a captivating cloak of vivacious and confidential talk with her audience, ...
— Memories and Anecdotes • Kate Sanborn

... Tum pietate gravem ac meritis si forte virum quem Conspexere, silent, arrectisque auribus adstant. ...
— Discourses on the First Decade of Titus Livius • Niccolo Machiavelli

... judices, corporibus civium Tiberim compleri, cloacas referciri, e foro spongiis effingi sanguinem.... Caedem tantam, tantos acervos corporum extruetos, nisi forte illo Cinnano atque Octaviano die, quis unquam in foro vidit?"—Oratio prov P. Sextio, ...
— Caesar: A Sketch • James Anthony Froude

... Casa Guidi as it was could hardly enter the loved rooms now and speak above a whisper. They who have been so favored can never forget the square anteroom, with its great picture and piano-forte, at which the boy Browning passed many an hour,—the little dining-room covered with tapestry, and where hung medallions of Tennyson, Carlyle, and Robert Browning,—the long room filled with plaster casts and studies, which was Mr. Browning's retreat,—and, dearest ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, No. 47, September, 1861 • Various

... the forlorne hope of all dispayre Against the Forte where Beauties Army lies, Assayld with death, yet armed with gastly feare, Loe! thus my loue, my lyfe, my fortune tryes. Wounded with Arrowes from thy lightning eyes, My tongue in payne my harts counsels bewraying, My rebell ...
— Minor Poems of Michael Drayton • Michael Drayton

... spada mirando al segno; e la sua rossa strada ne brilla insino alle sue alpine porte. Tu tendi la potenza della morte come un arco tra il Vodice e l'Hermada; varchi l'Isonzo indomito ove guada la tua Vittoria col tuo pugno forte. Giovine sei, rinato dalla terra sitibonda, balzato su dal duro Carso col fiore dei tuio fanti imberbi. Questo, che in te si compie, anno di guerra splenda da te, avido del futuro, e al domani ...
— Defenders of Democracy • The Militia of Mercy

... dumb, dowie, and damnable. I hate to be silenced; and if to talk by signs is my forte (as I contend), to understand them cannot be my wife's. Do not think me unhappy; I have not been so for years; but I am blurred, inhabit the debatable frontier of sleep, and have but dim designs upon activity. All is at a standstill; books closed, ...
— The Letters of Robert Louis Stevenson - Volume 1 • Robert Louis Stevenson

... other side of the story from Captain Davy at Forte Ann. On the way there he had heard of the separation from the boy, Willie Quarrie, a lugubrious Manx lad, eighteen years old, with a face as white as a haddock and as ...
— Capt'n Davy's Honeymoon - 1893 • Hall Caine

... tender babies" (as some Saturn, turned analytical chemist, says) "is the most delicate test" of sanitary conditions. Is all this premature suffering and death necessary? Or did Nature intend mothers to be always accompanied by doctors? Or is it better to learn the piano-forte than to learn the laws which subserve the preservation ...
— Notes on Nursing - What It Is, and What It Is Not • Florence Nightingale

... Pax, don't become poetical, it isn't your forte; but listen while I talk of matters more important. You've sometimes heard me ...
— Post Haste • R.M. Ballantyne

... troubled woman, growing nervous at sight of the unresponsive quiet around her. Miss Leonora by no means replied to the covert appeals thus made to her. She left her nephew and her sister to keep up the conversation unassisted; and as for Miss Wentworth, conversation was not her forte. ...
— The Perpetual Curate • Mrs [Margaret] Oliphant

... through the blinds of No.—Wharton Street, Pentonville, late at night, would have been rewarded by the touching spectacle of a huge, rawboned ex-private in her Majesty's Life Guards, with his head bowed over the black and yellow key-board of a venerable square piano-forte (on which he could not play), dropping the bitter tear of loneliness and ...
— Peter Ibbetson • George du Marier et al

... this little room, with dark green walls, only relieved by some engravings and coats of arms, formed a pleasing contrast to Edward's eyes, after the glaring splendor of the other apartments. From behind a piano-forte, at which she had been seated in a recess, rose a tall, slender female form, in a white dress ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 4, September, 1850 • Various

... Thames, the Cotswolds, the Severn, and the sea, and with a hinterland narrowing down to the Cornish peninsula, developed a slower but more lasting strength. Political organization seems to have been its forte, and it had set its own house in some sort of order before it was summoned by Ecgberht to assume the lead in English politics. From that day to this the sceptre has remained in his ...
— The History of England - A Study in Political Evolution • A. F. Pollard

... sine morte, fuga est vitae, quam turba malorum Non vitanda gravem, non toleranda facit? Dulcia dat natura quidem, mare, sidera, terras, Lunaque quas, et sol, itque reditque vias. Terror inest aliis, moerorque, et siquid habebis, Forte, boni, ultrices ...
— Dr. Johnson's Works: Life, Poems, and Tales, Volume 1 - The Works Of Samuel Johnson, Ll.D., In Nine Volumes • Samuel Johnson

... Rosa!" I said quietly. "You have invited me into this carriage simply to lie to me. But you are an indifferent liar—it is not your forte. My dear child, do you imagine that I cannot see through your poor little plan? Mrs. Sullivan Smith has been talking to you, and it has occurred to you that if you cast me off, the anger of that—that thing may be ...
— The Ghost - A Modern Fantasy • Arnold Bennett

... difficulty in justifying Washington's course by the opinion of Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologics, 1 ma., 2 dae., Quaest. XCVI, Art. 4), who says that an unjust law is not binding in conscience "nisi forte propter vitandum scandalum vel turbationem." Aquinas is speaking of an unjust law which may be resisted unless scandal or tumult would result from resistance. Washington is speaking of a law which he considers right, but which he would not enforce if it should occasion such evils. ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 4, 1919 • Various

... my mind from the ashes of another passion. Fresh materials, of heterogeneous kinds, altered the colour, and changed the nature of the flame: I should have told you, but narrative is not my forte—I never can remember to tell things in their right order. I forgot to tell you, that when Madame de Stael's book, 'Sur la Revolution Francaise,' came out, it made an extraordinary impression upon me. ...
— Helen • Maria Edgeworth

... the very soul of harmony the world should come to the performance of this ode." Lady Fragrantia was at that moment drumming with her fingers on the edge of her fan, lost in a reverie, thinking she was playing upon——Was it a forte piano? ...
— The Surprising Adventures of Baron Munchausen • Rudolph Erich Raspe

... Explosive violence was by no means Friedrich Wilhelm's method; the amount of slow stubborn broad-shouldered strength, in all kinds, expended by the man, strikes us as very great. The amount of patience even, though patience is not reckoned his forte. ...
— History Of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Volume IV. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—Friedrich's Apprenticeship, First Stage—1713-1728 • Thomas Carlyle

... sentence of the honourable high court as follows:—That she should once more be questioned in kindness touching the articles contained in the indictment; and if she then continued stubborn she should be subjected to the peine forte et dure, for that the defensio she had set up did not suffice, and that there were indicia legitima, praegnantia et sufficientia ad torturam ipsam; to wit—1. ...
— Sidonia The Sorceress V2 • William Mienhold

... auguriis patrum et prisca formidine sacram, omnes ejusdem sanguinis populi legationibus coeunt, caesoque publice homine celebrant barbari ritus horrenda primordia. Est et alia luco reverentia. Nemo nisi vinculo ligatus ingreditur, ut minor et potestatem numinis prae se ferens, Si forte prolapsus est, attolli et insurgere haud licitum: per humum evolvuntur: eoque omnis superstitio respicit, tanquam inde initia gentis, ibi regnator omnium deus, cetera subjecta atque parentia. Adjicit auctoritatem fortuna Semnonum: ...
— Germania and Agricola • Caius Cornelius Tacitus

... great square edifices of a grand and gloomy aspect, built of dark blue stones (pietra forte) measuring from 3 to 4feet. The bases, to the height of from 20 to 30 feet, consist of coarsely chiselled rubble work, which lessens the baldness, and contributes character and effect to the from 200 to 300 feet of plain wall. At intervals are strong bronze banner-rings and torch-sockets, ...
— The South of France—East Half • Charles Bertram Black

... lose the travelling season, and come in for the droughts and famines. The tide, however, turned in my favour a little; for I obtained, by permission of the Admiralty, a passage in the British screw steam-frigate Forte, under orders to convey Admiral Sir H. Keppel to his command at the Cape; and Sir Charles Wood most obligingly made a request that I should be forwarded thence to Zanzibar in one of our slaver-hunting cruisers ...
— The Discovery of the Source of the Nile • John Hanning Speke

... d'avoir aujourd'hui Plus de nom que ... [Vaudreuil], plus de vertus que lui, Et c'est de la que part cette secrete haine Que le temps ne rendra que plus forte et plus pleine.' ...
— Montcalm and Wolfe • Francis Parkman

... her work, she insisted upon an immediate advance. Glenmore readily supported her position. Pratt developed shyness. His forte was hiking over desert hills, lugging a transit, running lines or levels; he felt out of place as a fighter, or even an accuser. Nevertheless, he went, ...
— The Furnace of Gold • Philip Verrill Mighels

... "Forte puer, comitum seductus ab agmine fido, Dixerat, ecquis adest? et, adest, responderat echo, Hic stupet; utque aciem partes divisit in omnes; Voce, veni, ...
— The Natural History of Selborne, Vol. 2 • Gilbert White

... anything that needs a veil. In alluding to the agencies of Punch, it would be doing him great injustice to leave the impression that they are all of a mirthful character. Often is he tearfully, if at the same time smilingly, pathetic. Seriousness, certainly, is not his forte, and he is not given to homilies and moral essays. Usually he gilds homoeopathic pills of wisdom with a thick coating of humor. Yet, now and then, his vein is an earnest vein, and he speaks from the abundance of a tender and deeply-moved ...
— The Atlantic Monthly , Volume 2, No. 14, December 1858 • Various

... Brown treads a circle of mysterious power but mean circumference: Washington Irving is admirable at a sketch, one of the liveliest and most graceful of essayists, and quite equal to the higher demands of imaginative prose—witness his Rip Van Winkle and Sleepy Hollow—but his forte is in miniature, and the orthodox dimensions of three volumes post-octavo would suit him almost as ill as would the Athenian vesture of Nick Bottom the spruce proportions of royal Oberon: Haliburton is inimitable in his own line of things; ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal Vol. XVII. No. 418. New Series. - January 3, 1852. • William and Robert Chambers

... Sancto, Direct. Mystic. tr. iii. disp. 5, section I, n. 315: "Visio corporea est infima, visio imaginaria est media, visio intellectualis est suprema." N. 322: "Apparitio visibilis, cum sit omnium infima, est magis exposita illusioni diaboli, nisi forte huic visioni corporali visio intellectualis adjungatur, ut in apparitione S. ...
— The Life of St. Teresa of Jesus • Teresa of Avila

... his last gold breast-pin in advertisements, he realised that to get piano-forte pupils in London was as easy as to get songs published. By the time he had quite realised it, it was May, and then he sat down ...
— Merely Mary Ann • Israel Zangwill

... turned they beheld a youth, extremely pleasing in appearance, who was coming their way in a wild gallop. As he reached them, he flung himself from his horse and addressed Roque, who then perceived that it was not a lad but a maiden. She said she was the daughter of his friend Simon Forte, and named Claudia Jeronima, and that she, unbeknown to her father, had fallen in love with and become engaged to the son of her father's arch enemy, Clauquel Torrellas, whose son was named Vicente. Yesterday, she went on, she ...
— The Story of Don Quixote • Arvid Paulson, Clayton Edwards, and Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

... His forte was that of a brilliant writer and most industrious compiler, a popularizer of science. He was at times a bold thinker; but his prudence, not to say timidity, in presenting in his ironical way his thoughts on the origin of things, is annoying, for we ...
— Lamarck, the Founder of Evolution - His Life and Work • Alpheus Spring Packard

... Quod ita Latine sonat:—'Salve rex Albanorum Alexander, filii Alexandri ... filii Mane, filii Fergusii, primi Scotorum regis in Albania'. Qui quoque Fergusius fuit filius Feredach, quamvis a quibusdam dicitur filius Ferechere, parum tamen discrepant in sono. Haec discrepantia forte scriptoris constat vitio propter difficultatem loquelae. Deinde dictam genealogiam dictus Scotus ab homine in hominem continuando perlegit donec ad primum Scotum, videlicet, Iber ...
— An Outline of the Relations between England and Scotland (500-1707) • Robert S. Rait

... to Mr. Desmond Mulligan. Political enthusiasm is his forte. He lives and writes in a rapture. He is, of course, a member of an inn of court, and greatly addicted to after-dinner speaking as a preparation for the bar, where as a young man of genius he hopes one day to shine. He is almost the only man to whom Bludyer is ...
— Men's Wives • William Makepeace Thackeray

... unconscious] Ach so—so—SO! Das ist etwas neues! [His umbrella begins to beat time, moving more and more vigorously, till at last he is conducting elaborately, stretching out his left palm for pianissimo passages, and raising it vigorously for forte, with every now and then an exclamation.] Wunderschoen!... pianissimo!—now the flutes! Clarinets! Ach, ergoetzlich ... bassoons and drums!... Fortissimo!... Kolossal! Kolossal! [Conducting in a fury ...
— The Melting-Pot • Israel Zangwill

... was done for, I covered my face with my hands, and commanded myself to God, with all the resignation that could be expected from a poor young fellow in my grievous circumstances, expecting to be cut off in the prima vera of his days, and to part for ever from—. Poo, that there line is not my forte. However, finding the haemorrhage by no means great, and that the wound was in fact slight, I took the captain's rather strong hint to be still, and lay quiet, until a 32—pound shot struck us bang on the quarter. The subdued force ...
— Tom Cringle's Log • Michael Scott

... coupler stop, sometimes called Harmonique, controls an arrangement whereby, when a key is depressed, its octave is made to sound also. "Forte" stops lift the mufflers or swells, and as these are controlled by the right knee-swell, the Forte stop may be considered of little value. The left knee-swell, called the Full Organ swell, as its name implies, opens up the full power of all sets of reeds and ...
— Piano Tuning - A Simple and Accurate Method for Amateurs • J. Cree Fischer

... it impossible to get in the sweet-pea, and the convolvulus, and lost and bewildered herself among the multitude of leaves that formed the cup of the rose, Mr. Gummage snatched the pencil from her hand, rubbed out the whole, and then drew it himself. It must be confessed that his forte lay in flowers, and he was extremely clever at them, "but," as he expressed it, "his scholars ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume V. (of X.) • Various

... the duties of my sex: that I should be a good economist, a good mistress, as well as a good mother of a family. I wish my Eudora to be able to accompany her voice agreeably on the harp. I wish that she may play agreeably on the piano-forte; that she may know enough of drawing, to feel pleasure from the sight and from the examination of the finest pictures of the great painters; that she may be able to draw a flower that happens to please her; and that she may unite in her dress elegance and simplicity. I should wish that ...
— Practical Education, Volume II • Maria Edgeworth

... me devint subitement plus forte et, n'hsitant davantage Monsieur, dis-je, ou Madame, j'implore vritablement votre pardon; mais le fait est que je somnolais et vous vntes si doucement frapper, et si faiblement vous vntes heurter, heurter la porte de ma chambre, que j'tais ...
— Le Corbeau • Edgar Allan Poe

... quis forte mei domum Catonis, Depictas minio assulas, et illos Custodis vidit hortulos Priapi, Miratur, quibus ille disciplinis, Tantam sit sapientiam assecutus, Quam tres cauliculi et selibra farris; Racemi duo, tegula sub una, Ad ...
— The Lives Of The Twelve Caesars, Complete - To Which Are Added, His Lives Of The Grammarians, Rhetoricians, And Poets • C. Suetonius Tranquillus

... the Deacon's forte, but it seemed proper for some one to break the ice that seemed suddenly to be very thick in the ...
— The Story Of Waitstill Baxter • By Kate Douglas Wiggin

... iustitia bonitas omnipotentia substantia inmutabilitas uirtus sapientia et quicquid huiusmodi excogitari potest substantialiter de diuinitate dicuntur. Haec si se recte et ex fide habent, ut me instruas peto; aut si aliqua re forte diuersus es, diligentius intuere quae dicta sunt et ...
— The Theological Tractates and The Consolation of Philosophy • Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius

... when the last Venetian Count had gone, but there are later additions. At this time the Castel S. Lorenzo was built, displacing an oratory built on the site of a nunnery established before the eleventh century. Forte Molo, by the harbour (formerly Fort S. Giovanni, and now much altered) and the tower of S. Luca still remain of the earlier fortifications. As the town spread it was fortified by the addition of the Torre Menze (built in 1464 by Michelozzo and George of Sebenico, but altered ...
— The Shores of the Adriatic - The Austrian Side, The Kuestenlande, Istria, and Dalmatia • F. Hamilton Jackson

... Shakespeare's forte lay in characterization, and that endlessly diversified. But when he sketched each several character it seems that he was never content till he had either found or fabricated the aptest words possible for representing its form and pressure most true ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XXVI., December, 1880. • Various

... the most singular form you can imagine. I can't describe it. The hair is all put out of sight, turned back, and no border to the cap, very unbecoming and very singular, tied under the chin with a pink ribbon—blue for the married, white for the widows. Here was a Piano forte and another sister teaching a little girl music. We went thro' all the different school rooms, some misses of sixteen, their teachers were very agreeable and easy, and in every ...
— Woman's Life in Colonial Days • Carl Holliday

... on ... once, ter please her, but I reckon hit didn't make much of a showin' under this." He ran his fingers reflectively through his heavy beard for a moment; then, with his voice still a forte whisper, he added, "Say, stranger, I've got a leetle drap o' white liquor hid out in the woodshed whar Smiles kaint find hit, an' ef yo'd delight ter wet yo'r throat afore she comes back, ...
— 'Smiles' - A Rose of the Cumberlands • Eliot H. Robinson

... me," said Jerry, now arousing himself and sauntering to the fire; "I hardly ever feel well,"—complaining was Jerry's especial forte, an excuse for all his laziness; yet his appetite never failed; and when, as was sometimes the case, one of the neighbours sent a small piece of meat, or any little article of food to his wife, under the plea of ill health ...
— Friends and Neighbors - or Two Ways of Living in the World • Anonymous

... forte, and his nervousness made him sputter. His speech was vibrant, trenchant, like hammerstrokes, and he said things to which there was no answer. He had a horror of discussion: ...
— Georges Guynemer - Knight of the Air • Henry Bordeaux

... and crossing her legs, "I've found my forte at last. For three years, nearly, I've been employed by the Secret Service Department ...
— Mary Louise in the Country • L. Frank Baum (AKA Edith Van Dyne)

... conversation with Jones on business affairs, unless in the presence of a third party. Jones represented that if they went on as they were now doing, the property would soon be swallowed up by the lawyers. To this Mr. Brown, whose forte was not eloquence, tacitly assented with ...
— The Struggles of Brown, Jones, and Robinson - By One of the Firm • Anthony Trollope

... Scott was not likely often to undertake the reviewing of books that did not, in one way or another interest him or move his admiration; and he would lay as much stress as possible on their good points. Gifford told him that "fun and feeling" were his forte.[243] In his early days he was probably somewhat influenced by Jeffrey's method, and his articles on Todd's Spenser and Godwin's Life of Chaucer indicate that he could occasionally adopt something of the tone of the Edinburgh Review. Years afterwards ...
— Sir Walter Scott as a Critic of Literature • Margaret Ball

... which they carried to their northern homes. It was both directly and indirectly through one of these officers that the claims of Nice as a sanatorium came to be put so plainly before Smollett. [Losing its prestige as a ville forte, Nice was henceforth rapidly to gain the new character of a ville de plaisir. In 1763, says one of the city's historians, Smollett, the famous historian and novelist, visited Nice. "Arriving here shattered in health and depressed ...
— Travels Through France and Italy • Tobias Smollett

... dear," said he, placing an arm about her shoulders, "now that you have seen many of the wonder-spots of Europe, and know more about antiques and art than any of us, I suppose you are quite decided that business is not your forte, eh? The next thing I'll hear from you, you'll have dropped your ambitions and be sailing down a love-stream ...
— Polly's Business Venture • Lillian Elizabeth Roy

... The Entertainment is written; and the rehearsals are in steady progress. All difficulties are provided for, but the one eternal difficulty of money. Miss Vanstone's resources stretch easily enough to the limits of our personal wants; including piano-forte hire for practice, and the purchase and making of the necessary dresses. But the expenses of starting the Entertainment are beyond the reach of any means we possess. A theatrical friend of mine here, whom I had hoped to interest in our undertaking, ...
— No Name • Wilkie Collins

... never been Roland's forte. He sat and stared at the white paper and chewed the pencil which should have been marring its whiteness with stinging paragraphs. No sort of ...
— A Man of Means • P. G. Wodehouse and C. H. Bovill

... from the old entrance-hall is the favorite sitting-room of Mary Chaworth in her happy childhood and youth; and here, in his boyish days, Byron often sat beside her while she played for him his favorite airs on the piano-forte. Beneath the window is a little garden, where she cultivated the flowers she loved best, and which are still cherished for her memory. Our guide gathered a few of these, and gave them to our young companion: they now lie before us, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 13, No. 76, February, 1864 • Various

... never seen till now so round and shapely an arm, hands so small and white, tipped with pink filbert nails. He did not learn the game so quickly as might be. He, like Maurice, was pondering over the unusual position in which he found himself; but analysis of any sort was not his forte; so he soon forgot all save the delicate curve of Madame's chin and throat, the soft ripple of her laughter, the abysmal gray ...
— The Puppet Crown • Harold MacGrath

... sweet and sour, that were served, according to preparation, with dishes that ranged from fish to pudding. She taught Sheldon the superiority of cocoanut cream over condensed cream, for use in coffee. From the old and sprouting nuts she took the solid, spongy centres and turned them into salads. Her forte seemed to be salads, and she astonished him with the deliciousness of a salad made from young bamboo shoots. Wild tomatoes, which had gone to seed or been remorselessly hoed out from the beginning of Berande, were foraged for salads, soups, and sauces. The chickens, which had ...
— Adventure • Jack London

... forte," observed the count, good-naturedly, seeing Baldassare's embarrassment at having his ignorance exposed. (The cavaliere never could leave poor Adonis alone.) "We all know your forte is the ballroom; ...
— The Italians • Frances Elliot

... prize. She was quickly boarded by boats from the shore, every one in them eager to be on board, for a prize crew are supposed to have their pockets well lined with coin, and to be ready to spend it. She was soon known to be "La Forte," captured by the "Thisbe" in the East Indies. She at once went into dock, her crew was paid off, and Rawson got confirmed in his rank of commander; but Ronald Morton received no further acknowledgment ...
— Ronald Morton, or the Fire Ships - A Story of the Last Naval War • W.H.G. Kingston

... obsecro vostram fidem, ubi ego perii? ubi immutatus sum? ubi ego formam perdidi? an egomet me illic reliqui, si forte oblitus fui? nam hic quidem omnem imaginem meam, quae ...
— Amphitryo, Asinaria, Aulularia, Bacchides, Captivi • Plautus Titus Maccius

... with terrible slaughter. "But the stout heart of the American nation quickly rallied, and inspired by the loyal determination of Abraham Lincoln the United States turned once more to their apparently hopeless task" (Colonel G. F. R. Henderson). McClellan's forte was organisation, and although at first slow in the field, he had assembled and trained a magnificent fighting force, with which he was "feeling his way to victory." He suffered defeat indeed at Gaines's Mill (June 27, ...
— Lectures on Land Warfare; A tactical Manual for the Use of Infantry Officers • Anonymous

... in Pentecoste resedit rex Londoniae in Turri, episcopo tantum modo Sagiensi praesente: ceteri vel fastidierunt vel timuerunt venire. Aliquanto post, mediante legato, colloquium indictum est inter imperatricem et regem. si forte Deo inspirante pax reformari posset."—Malmesbury, Hist. Nov. (Rolls ...
— London and the Kingdom - Volume I • Reginald R. Sharpe

... stick, and threw down a cent, without a word. One more did her a similar favor, and she left the store well satisfied with the visit. Pretty soon she came to a large piano-forte manufactory, where she knew that a great many men were employed. She went up-stairs to the counting-room, where she sold three sticks, and was about to enter the work-room, when a sign, "No admittance except on business," confronted her. Should she go on? Did the sign refer ...
— Poor and Proud - or The Fortunes of Katy Redburn • Oliver Optic

... that the prominent taste of his wife, which is for music, is the only one denied to him. He afforded an amusing instance of this fact last night, when Mrs. Hare, having performed several airs on the piano-forte, he asked her, "Why she played the same tune so often, for the monotony was tiresome?"—an observation that ...
— The Idler in France • Marguerite Gardiner

... letter was quite long, which surprised me, for writing essays is not Annetta's forte, and hers are generally as brief as St. Clair's. Annetta is a quiet little puss and a model of good behavior, but there isn't a shadow of orginality in her. Here is ...
— Anne Of Avonlea • Lucy Maud Montgomery

... broad-shouldered, with a commanding presence and amiable countenance. He was bold, earnest, energetic, persevering; artless, and honest as the day. He said exactly what he meant. His mental vision was clear, strong, and accurate. Imagination was never active; oratory was not his forte. Demonstrative evidence suited him best. In his religious character he was conscientious, devout, and ...
— The History of Dartmouth College • Baxter Perry Smith

... richer civilizations can do well—that Anatole France and occasional essayists of Punch or The Spectator can do well and most of us do indifferently. We are a humorous people, but not a playful one. Light irony is not our forte. Strength and humorous exaggeration come more readily to our pens than grace. We are better inspired by the follies of the crowd, or the errors of humanity, than by the whims of culture or aspects of pleasant leisure. And when we try to put on style in the manner of Lamb or Hazlitt, Stevenson ...
— Definitions • Henry Seidel Canby

... It cruor, inque humeros cervix collapsa recumbit; Purpureus veluti cum flos succisus aratro Languescit moriens; lassove papavera collo Demisere caput, pluvia cum forte gravantur.' ...
— Proserpina, Volume 1 - Studies Of Wayside Flowers • John Ruskin

... preliminaries in order to do justice to his subject. He had that day returned from a pilgrimage to one of the pictures, and was able to inform the artists who were present with regard to the smallest accessory. We fancied, had painting, and not penning, been his forte, he could have reproduced the picture for us on the spot, could we, at the same time, have transformed the ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 102, April, 1866 • Various

... at work as a veneerer in a piano-forte factory at Attica, when some tariff or other was passed or repealed; there came a great financial explosion, and our boss, among the rest, failed. He owed us all six months' wages, and we were all very poor and very blue. ...
— If, Yes and Perhaps - Four Possibilities and Six Exaggerations with Some Bits of Fact • Edward Everett Hale

... and magnificent adjectives; and now a little paragraph, charming in its exquisite daintiness, like a miniature rarely done upon the face of a costly gem. It is in this word-painting that he is surpassingly admirable. Delineation, description, portraiture are his forte. The same quality of mind which gives dreams of princely men and divine women seems to have brought also a generous endowment of warm, rich words, wherewith to do justice to the imaginings. All the beauty, ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol III, Issue VI, June, 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various

... commodatam accepit, ad ipsam restituendam tenetur, vel ejus precium, si forte incendio, ruins, naufragio, ant latronum, vel hostium incursu, consumpta fuerit vel deperdita, substracts, vel ablata." Fol. 99 a, b. This has been thought a corrupt text (Guterbock, Bracton, by Coxe, p. 175; ...
— The Common Law • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

... offered me his arm, which I gladly accepted, happy to be relieved from the impertinence of my female companion. We returned to tea; after which the ladies sung, and played by turns on the piano forte; while some of the gentlemen accompanied with the flute, the clarinet, and the violin, forming in the whole a very decent concert. An elegant supper, and half an hour's conversation after it, closed the evening; when we ...
— The Coquette - The History of Eliza Wharton • Hannah Webster Foster

... think twice before they carried things with too high a hand. Not having a half-penny at command, she was helpless. Without money and without friends, you may wonder how she supported herself while the correspondence was going on. She supported herself by playing the piano-forte at a low concert-room in Brussels. The men laid siege to her, of course, in all directions; but they found her insensible as adamant. One of these rejected gentlemen was a Russian; and he was the means of making her acquainted with a countrywoman of his, whose name is unpronounceable by English ...
— Armadale • Wilkie Collins

... sound Janet leant and kissed the maid's pink-palmed hands as they lay upon the coverlet, and taking them within her own fondled them, saying,—"And thou wilt surprise my lord and his friends by thy rare playing of the clavichord, and 'tis possible so great and wealthy a man will own a piano-forte of which we have heard so much; and mayhap thou will be presented at Court, and in great London town thou mayest see many musicians from France, for 'tis not improbable they are brought over the channel at the instance of his Majesty. Is it not grand ...
— Mistress Penwick • Dutton Payne

... her arrival, having finished her piano-forte practice, touched her harp twice, and arpeggioed the Spanish Fandango on her guitar, Miss Betty read two paragraphs of "Gilbert" (for she was profoundly determined to pursue her tasks with diligence), but the open windows disclosing a world ...
— The Two Vanrevels • Booth Tarkington

... with heraldic devices, seen at the house of Mr. Tomkisson, the famous piano-forte-maker, is said to have first inspired the boy Turner with a love for art. He commenced to imitate the drawing of a certain rampant lion that especially took his fancy. Very soon after this the father announced that his son William ...
— Art in England - Notes and Studies • Dutton Cook

... Aeneas;—but it is as fallacious as the breath of fame;—and, moreover, bespeaks a narrow genius. I am not ignorant that the Italians pretend to a mathematical exactness in their designations of one particular sort of character among them, from the forte or piano of a certain wind-instrument they use,—which they say is infallible.—I dare not mention the name of the instrument in this place;—'tis sufficient we have it amongst us,—but never think of ...
— The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman • Laurence Sterne

... Rostrum forte, subarcuatum, subcultratum, mandibulis utrisque apice emarginatis; naribus basalibus, lateralibus, subovalibus, membrano ...
— Narrative of a Survey of the Intertropical and Western Coasts of Australia] [Volume 2 of 2] • Phillip Parker King

... wheel. That noble fellow, true as steel, had perceived the accident as soon as any of us, and he sprang to the very part of the vessel where he was most needed. He had a seaman's faculties in perfection, though ratiocination was certainly not his forte. A motion of my hand ordered him to put the helm hard up, and the answering sign let me know that I was obeyed. We could do no more just then, but the result ...
— Miles Wallingford - Sequel to "Afloat and Ashore" • James Fenimore Cooper

... whoever should dare to condemn it. The two great families of Este and Medici interested themselves in the poet's favour. Without that protection it is probable that the one line on the donation of Rome by Constantine to Silvester, where the poet speaks 'puzza forte' would have sufficed to put the whole poem under ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt

... Miss Fanshaw was about sixteen, her prudent mother began to think that it was time to take her from school, and to introduce her into the world. Miss Fanshaw had learned to speak French passably, to read a little Italian, to draw a little, to play tolerably well upon the piano-forte, and to dance as well as many other young ladies. She had been sedulously taught a sovereign contempt of whatever was called vulgar at the school where she was educated; but, as she was profoundly ignorant of every ...
— Tales And Novels, Volume 1 • Maria Edgeworth

... example, the letter given by Wadding: Annals, ii., p. 16 (Rome, 1732). Tanta me amaritudo cordis, abundantia lacrymarum et immanitas doloris invasit, quod nisi ad pedes Jesu, consolationem solitae pietatis invenirem, spiritus meus forte deficeret et penitus anima liquefieret. Wadding's text should be corrected by that of the Riccardi MS., 279. f^o 80a and b. Cf. Mark of Lisbon, t. i., p. ...
— Life of St. Francis of Assisi • Paul Sabatier

... the strings of the piano now in use is claimed by several nations, but the credit is probably due to Italy, although the first pianos are said to have been made in Germany, probably in the city of Freyburg. The piano was first called the hammer-harpsichord, afterward by the Italian name forte-piano, as it could give both loud and soft tones, while the harpsichord produced only loud ones. The name was changed later to piano-forte. Pianos are first mentioned as being in use about the middle of the ...
— Harper's Young People, April 20, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various

... proved himself capable of violent fits of work, but of "few continuous drudgeries." He would turn out an unusual number of hexameters, and again lapse into as much idleness as the teachers would tolerate. His forte was in declamation: his attitude and delivery, and power of extemporizing, surprised even critical listeners into unguarded praise. "My qualities," he says, "were much more oratorical and martial than poetical; no one had the least notion that I should subside ...
— Byron • John Nichol

... conduct negotiations of the very highest importance, but she was surprised, in view of her earnest request, that he had even mentioned this particular matter to anybody. She reminded him that insurance was his forte, and that their understanding had been that she was to take exclusive charge of their oil business. While she was talking, Tom realized with a disagreeable shock that of late there had been no insurance ...
— Flowing Gold • Rex Beach

... encouraging him by these words: Iddio maravigliosamente fece sonar tuo nome nella terra. Le Indie que sono pa te del mondo cosi ricca, te le ha date per tue; tu le hai repartite dove ti e piaciuto, e ti dette potenzia per farlo. Delli ligamenti del mare Oceano che erano serrati con catene cosi forte, ti dono le chiave, etc. [God marvellously makes thy name resound throughout the world. The Indies, which are so rich a portion of the world, he gives to thee for thyself; thou mayest distribute them in the way thou pleasest, and God gives thee power ...
— Equinoctial Regions of America V3 • Alexander von Humboldt

... veracious—and of which, I am proud to say, the distinguished subject of this memoir had the honor once of being chosen semi-monthly secretary, after a sharp and close canvass. In the transactions of this society the principal forte of Daniel was debating; albeit the character of his elocution was not the most brilliant, and it was not often until after the ayes and noes were called, that it could be determined from the drift of his argument, which side he had espoused, or in fact whether he himself understood the proposition—unless, ...
— Ups and Downs in the Life of a Distressed Gentleman • William L. Stone

... for you gladly, Miss Travers, but waltz-music is not my forte. Let me see what else there is here." And he began turning over ...
— The Deserter • Charles King

... years younger than Tom, and for a time there was an attempt to utilise him in the green-grocer's shop when Tom at twenty-one married Jessica—who was thirty, and had saved a little money in service. But it was not Bert's forte to be utilised. He hated digging, and when he was given a basket of stuff to deliver, a nomadic instinct arose irresistibly, it became his pack and he did not seem to care how heavy it was nor where ...
— The War in the Air • Herbert George Wells

... rinforzando, E in ogni parte apparisce la morte: E mentre in qua e in la, combatte Orlando, Un tratto a caso trovo Bujaforte, E in su la testa gli dette col brando: E perche l'elmo e temperato e forte, O forse incantato era, al colpo ha retto: Ma de la testa gli balzo ...
— Stories from the Italian Poets: With Lives of the Writers, Volume 1 • Leigh Hunt

... exige? Le jour du repos n'appartient-il pas a tous les hommes, et plus particulierement a ceux qui sont employes aux penibles travaux de la campagne? Ce sont des questions qui n'en seroient pas, si l'avarice, plus forte que l'humanite, ne dominoit presque tous les hommes, mais sur-tout les habitans des colonies. Que resulte-t-il cependant de cette avarice mal entendue? les Negres mal nourris et trop fatigues s'epuisent et ne peuplent pas; de l'epuisement nait la foiblesse, de la foiblesse le decouragement, la ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 2, 1917 • Various

... Astolpho found it in the moon, among the things that were lost upon earth, (Orlando Furioso, xxxiv. 80.) Di vari fiore ad un grand monte passa, Ch'ebbe gia buono odore, or puzza forte: Questo era il dono (se pero dir lece) Che Constantino al buon Silvestro fece. Yet this incomparable poem has been approved by ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 5 • Edward Gibbon

... Question preparatoire; question prealable, sometimes called q. definitive. Desmaze, Supplices, 177. Desjardins, p. xx. Howard, passim. The English have long boasted that torture is not allowed by their law; and although the peine forte et dure was undoubted torture, the boast is in general not unfounded. Torture was abolished in several parts of Germany in the eighteenth century, but lingered in other parts until the nineteenth. It was ...
— The Eve of the French Revolution • Edward J. Lowell

... Warren was speedily on the look-out, off the coast of Cape Breton, and in the course of events fell in with, and captured, the "Vigilant," seventy-four, commanded by Captain Stronghouse, or, as his title runs, "the Marquis de la Maison Forte." The "Vigilant" was a store-ship, filled with munitions of war for the French town. Here was a glorious opportunity. If the saints could only intimate to Duchambon, the Governor of Louisburgh, that his supplies had been cut off, Duchambon might think of capitulation. But unfortunately the ...
— Acadia - or, A Month with the Blue Noses • Frederic S. Cozzens

... "is hardly our forte at present. The park's been Nature's playground for over a century, and she's made ...
— Anthony Lyveden • Dornford Yates

... still speaking, somebody in the next room has begun to play the finale of Beethoven's Sonata in D-minor (Op. 31, No. 3). The allegretto is first played piano, then more forte, and at last passionately, violently, ...
— Plays by August Strindberg, Second series • August Strindberg

... no such intent; and amply did their performance repay my curiosity, for visiting Venetian beauties, so justly celebrated for their seducing manners and soft address. They accompanied their voices with the forte-piano, and sung a thousand buffo songs, with all that gay voluptuousness for which ...
— Observations and Reflections Made in the Course of a Journey through France, Italy, and Germany, Vol. I • Hester Lynch Piozzi

... German is seldom amusing, Since humour is hardly his forte, But I've frequently smiled in perusing His latest pronouncement on sport; For it seems that he thinks it the duty Of sportsmen to aim at the goal Of adding to bodily beauty A ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, January 3, 1917 • Various

... them had not until quite recently been printed. He composed fifty-three works for the church, a hundred and eighteen for orchestra, twenty-six operas and cantatas, a hundred and fifty-four songs, forty-nine concertos, sixty-two piano-forte pieces, and seventeen ...
— Music and Some Highly Musical People • James M. Trotter

... and applied for an engagement. The manager, after scrutinizing the various qualifications of the youthful candidate, inquired, "and pray sir, to what particular parts have your studies been directed? What is your forte?" "Why, sir, (replied the youth in a modest tone) I rather think that I excel in your line." "My line! (exclaimed the manager with peculiar complacency) what is that? What do you mean?" "To confess the truth, (rejoined the tyro) I flatter myself that I am most at home ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor, Vol. I, No. 5, May 1810 • Various

... is the most funny, the second the most affecting. We have observed that the critics are not decided on the question of our merits as a writer; some maintaining that we are strongest in humour—others, that our power is in pathos. The judicious declare that our forte lies in both—in the two united, or alternating with each other. "But is it not quite shocking," exclaims some scribbler who has been knouted in Ebony, "to hear so very serious an affair as the death of a Quaker in the snow among mountains, treated ...
— Recreations of Christopher North, Volume 2 • John Wilson

... Moffletus. Mofletus Panis delicatioris species, qui diatim distribui solet Canonicis praebendariis; Tolosatibus Pain Moufflet, quasi Pain molet dictus; forte quod ejusmodi panes singulis diebus coquantur, atque recentes et teneri ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 227, March 4, 1854 • Various

... qui tant as dure et qui as este si large, si ferme et si forte, en manche de clere yvoire: duquel la croix est faicte d'or et la supface doree decoree et embellye du pommeau faiet de pierres de beril; escript et engrave du grand no de Dieu singulier, Alpha et OO. ...
— Barn and the Pyrenees - A Legendary Tour to the Country of Henri Quatre • Louisa Stuart Costello

... Toujours est-il que ces grands rugissements de sauvage qu'il allait chercher dans le fond de sa gorge, en agitant sa forte crinire rouge, auraient fait frmir les plus braves. Moi-mme, Robinson, j'en avais quelquefois le c[oe]ur boulevers, et j'tais oblig de lui dire voix basse: "Pas si fort, Rouget, ...
— Le Petit Chose (part 1) - Histoire d'un Enfant • Alphonse Daudet

... jest at him; had he abandoned the expedition? Oliver could not understand indecision; perhaps he did not see so many sides to the question, his mind was always quickly made up. Action was his forte, not thought. The night came, and still Felix ...
— After London - Wild England • Richard Jefferies

... was established in 1860 in the house, not far from the ancient "Cat-Hole," of one Mrs. O'Toole, "a pretty good all-round cook, whose forte was apple dumplings" served daily. The steward was Charles Kendall Adams, '61, while other members were Walter W. Perry and Byron M. Cutcheon of the class of 1861 and Martin L. D'Ooge ...
— The University of Michigan • Wilfred Shaw

... afternoon. He is a most interesting man to talk to. Only don't—" She nearly said, "Don't protect him." But the bell was ringing for lunch, and, as often happened, Cecil had paid no great attention to her remarks. Charm, not argument, was to be her forte. ...
— A Room With A View • E. M. Forster

... confisticated great buzz-fly knocking about, and I can't kill him. I told you in my last letter I would give you some idea of what Ottawa was like, but now the time has arrove for the ordeal, I don't like it; descriptions of scenery are not my forte, and they're always uninteresting both to write and to read. By-the-bye, before I begin, how's old Frank's ear, poor old chap, I suppose he growled away by himself, till it was found out by accident by some of you. I hope it will soon be all right again, and that he will be ...
— Canada for Gentlemen • James Seton Cockburn

... anything that she really could play on the piano, her forte lay in those very Scottish airs, which she certainly rendered with exquisite feeling and with skill enough for the moderate demands of that class of music. And on this occasion she felt bound to exert herself, to repay the obligation of Crawford's coming out to hear ...
— Shoulder-Straps - A Novel of New York and the Army, 1862 • Henry Morford

... validus tenuisset forte catervas, Vix quisquam profugus vitam servasset inertem: Non audita Ducis verum mandata supremi Omnibus, insequitur fugientes plurima turba, Perque agros, passim, trepida formidine captos Obtruncat, saevumque adigit per viscera ...
— Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, Vol. II (of 3) • Walter Scott

... covering inventions of great ingenuity and value, which are now being perfected and will shortly be brought into operation. The apparatus consists of an instrument, operated by keys similar to those of a piano-forte, for punching characters, composed of dots and lines, upon a narrow strip of paper. The paper, when thus prepared, is passed rapidly through an instrument attached to a telegraph-wire, at the other end of which is a similar instrument which runs in unison. The ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 97, November, 1865 • Various

... its authority; or they expend their energies in devising the cruel ingenuities of the reconciler, and torture texts in the vain hope of making them confess the creed of Science. But when the peine forte et dure is over, the antique sincerity of the venerable sufferer always reasserts itself. Genesis is honest to the core, and professes to be no more than it is, a repository of venerable traditions of unknown origin, claiming no ...
— The Reception of the 'Origin of Species' • Thomas Henry Huxley

... votum, cognatio, crimen, Cultus disparitas, vis, ordo, ligamen, honestas, Si sis affinis, si forte coeire nequibis, Si parochi, et duplicis desit praesentia testis, Raptave si mulier, parti nec reddita tutae; Haec facienda vetant connubia, facta retractant.'"—From Essay on Scripture Doctrines of Adultery and Divorce, by H. V. Tabbs, 8vo.: ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 207, October 15, 1853 • Various

... delectable boudoirs" facing the Marble Court, above the private apartments of the King. Everywhere appeared the initial L linked with the torches of Love. One of the objects most admired in the drawing-room was an English piano-forte, with a case adorned with rosewood medallions, blue and white mosaics and gilded metal. In this room there were chests of drawers of antique lacquer and ebony, statues of marble, and garnishings of sculptured bronze. At night ...
— The Story of Versailles • Francis Loring Payne

... is your majesty's forte," exclaimed Count Hacke, endeavoring to give the conversation another direction. "Never before in my life did I feel my heart beat as it did when I crossed the threshold ...
— Frederick the Great and His Court • L. Muhlbach

... gravures l'eau-forte, par Rveil, d'aprs les dessins de A. Colin. Paris. Audot, diteur du ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Vol. 7. - Poetry • George Gordon Byron

... still your life from day to day Nae "lente largo" in the play, But "allegretto forte" gay Harmonious flow: A sweeping, kindling, bauld ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham

... bewailings were not a natural resource with Polly, whose forte was action. Her first thought in the morning was: what should she do about it? Something must be done, of course, and she was the only one to do it. What it was she had not the faintest idea, but then ...
— A Bookful of Girls • Anna Fuller

... had won, by O'Hara's recommendation, an entree into the Palace as servant to a gentleman-usher-daily-waiter: and now he made bright the knife of the assassin, tending its edge as a gardener the tender sprout, the knife being his metier and forte, he despising the noisy, mediate, uncertain pistol, nor could use it, his instincts belonging to the Stone Age. But the days passed, and he could by no means get ...
— The Lord of the Sea • M. P. Shiel



Words linked to "Forte" :   piano, speciality, fortissimo, music, metier, long suit, green fingers, loud, green thumb, volume, fortemente, forte-piano, brand, portion, loudly, sword, strength



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