"Poll" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... corruption from poll, a head, not only from the side itself being the coin or head, but from its being impressed most commonly with some head in contradistinction to the reverse, which, in latter times, was oftenest a cross. Thence the vulgarism, cross or pile, poll, head."—Cleland's Specimen of an Etymological Vocabulary, ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 188, June 4, 1853 • Various
... and majorities." So successful has our Government been in carrying out the benign purposes for which its heroes staked their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor, that in ordinary times we see little of the strength that stands quietly but firmly behind every law's enactment and every poll's decision. The "strong arm" of the law would lose its power to compel obedience if behind the decree of judge, jury, and legislators there was not a sheriff or a body of militia ready to commit the unconsenting criminal to prison, or to take care of an unruly minority. At an ...
— Woman and the Republic • Helen Kendrick Johnson
... proclaimed that "The king wishing to consecrate by fresh acts of kindness the happy moment when God showered his mercies on him by the birth of a dauphin, and at the same time to give to the inhabitants of his good city of Paris some special mark of his beneficence, granted an exemption from the poll-tax to all the burgesses, traders, and artisans who were not in such circumstances as ...
— The Life of Marie Antoinette, Queen of France • Charles Duke Yonge
... confined within any park palings of pedantry. Some of his most characteristic utterances owe their flavour to combining the language of the schools with the language of the tavern: as when he said of that strange inmate of his house, Miss Carmichael, "Poll is a stupid slut. I had some hopes of her at first: but when I talked to her tightly and closely I could make nothing of her; she was wiggle waggle, and I could never persuade her to be categorical." He was the very antipodes of a retailer ...
— Dr. Johnson and His Circle • John Bailey
... the payment of a toll. It was curious to see the people hurrying towards the Jacob Thor on a Sunday evening as the hour of closing approached, jostling and mobbing each other in their endeavours to escape the human poll tax. ...
— A Tramp's Wallet - stored by an English goldsmith during his wanderings in Germany and France • William Duthie
... which he conferred on the Galli, previously exhausted by extreme want, are most especially evident from this fact, that when he first entered the country he found that four-and-twenty pieces of gold were exacted, under the name of tribute, in the way of poll-tax, from each individual. But when he quitted the country seven pieces only were required, which made up all the payments due from them to the state. On which account they rejoiced with festivals and dances, looking upon him as a serene ...
— The Roman History of Ammianus Marcellinus • Ammianus Marcellinus
... Aurungzeb succeeded Shah Jehan. The profound incompatibility between Islam and Hinduism reasserted itself in him with a bitterness which the growing menace of the rising power of the Hindu Mahrattas probably helped to intensify. The reimposition of the poll-tax on the Hindus destroyed the last vestige of the great work of conciliation to which Akbar had vainly applied all his brilliant energies. Like Fatehpur Sikri itself, which for lack of water he had been compelled to abandon within fifteen years of its construction, ...
— India, Old and New • Sir Valentine Chirol
... the promptitude and cunning of his race. It was not an easy task, for although she had enemies and rivals, the daughter of the dead Baaltis, Mesa by name, was considered to be certain of election at the poll of the priests and priestesses. This ceremony was to take place within two days. Nothing discouraged, however, by the scant time at his disposal or other difficulties, without her knowledge or that of her father, Metem began his ...
— Elissa • H. Rider Haggard
... wandering about your quiet little town this morning and made some odd acquaintances. One Billy, he called himself, most amusing—most amusing. It seems that my cousin gave him money to pay his poll-tax. The poor simple fellow bought a fishing-pole and line. He was, I fancy, to vote for Buchanan. My cousin, I infer, must be like all our people ...
— Westways • S. Weir Mitchell
... into two factions about the choice of a new commander. Before proceeding to the election, it was agreed that the majority, together with the new commander, should keep the ship, and the minority should content themselves with the canoes and other small craft. On the poll, Captain Sharpe was restored, and Mr Dampier, who had voted against him, prepared, together with his associates, to return over land to ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume X • Robert Kerr
... slaves, because it had "been found very easy to the subjects of this colony, and no ways burthensome to the traders in slaves." The additional reason for continuing the law was, "that a competent revenue" might be raised "for preventing or lessening a poll-tax."[167] And in 1738, this law being "found, by experience, to be an easy expedient for raising a revenue towards the lessening a pooll-tax, always grievous to the people of this colony, and is in no way burthensom to the traders in slaves," it was re-enacted. In every instance, ...
— History of the Negro Race in America From 1619 to 1880. Vol 1 - Negroes as Slaves, as Soldiers, and as Citizens • George W. Williams
... Increased commercial prosperity is expected to compensate for the loss of revenue caused by the withdrawal of the Government from the work of production. In the mean time, it has been found necessary to impose various new and direct taxes. The most important of these is a poll tax on the natives, which has taken the place of the personal services formerly rendered by them on the Government plantations. Originally imposed in 1871, it yielded two and a half million florins in 1886. Another compensating source of revenue is the growth of the verponding. As ...
— A Visit to Java - With an Account of the Founding of Singapore • W. Basil Worsfold
... Stone hatchets rather well formed with blunt poll, distinct annular groove, and tapering blade; chiefly of basalt, three ...
— Illustrated Catalogue of the Collections Obtained from the Indians of New Mexico in 1880 • James Stevenson
... could bang them all at leein. I would not have your Joey if his lips were droppin' honey and his pockets droppin' gold. Nothing would hire me to do it. Joey indeed!" added Liza, with a vision of the blacksmith's sanguine head rising before her, "why, you might light a candle at his poll." ...
— The Shadow of a Crime - A Cumbrian Romance • Hall Caine
... that bounds their municipal allegiance. Sometimes we have an election for mayor; it is like a census but very abusive, and Red always wins. Only citizens with two legs and at least one arm and capable of standing up may vote, and voters may poll on horseback; boy scouts and women and children do not vote, though there is a vigorous agitation to remove these disabilities. Zulus and foreign-looking persons, such as East Indian cavalry and American Indians, ...
— Floor Games; a companion volume to "Little Wars" • H. G. Wells
... because he could not boast a long descent, Sheridan's nomination as a member provoked his opposition. Fox, who had been enamoured of Sheridan's witty society, proposed him on numerous occasions and all the members were earnestly canvassed for their votes, but the result of the poll always showed one black ball. When this had gone on for several months, it was resolved to unearth the black-baller, and the marking of the balls discovered Selwyn to be the culprit. Armed with this knowledge, Sheridan requested his friends ...
— Inns and Taverns of Old London • Henry C. Shelley
... sophisticated. Most of our birds are yet essentially wild, that is, little changed by civilization. In winter, especially, they sweep by me and around me in flocks,—the Canada sparrow, the snow-bunting, the shore-lark, the pine grosbeak, the red-poll, the cedar-bird,—feeding upon frozen apples in the orchard, upon cedar-berries, upon maple-buds, and the berries of the mountain ash, and the celtis, and upon the seeds of the weeds that rise above the ...
— Birds and Bees, Sharp Eyes and, Other Papers • John Burroughs
... "Poll," said he to his wife, "it's an uncertain business, is the book-trade. A Court Guide hasn't been asked for over that counter, no, not for six months, and here's two parties come in and look at it in a morning. There's nothing goes off, to depend on, but hymns. Both ...
— M. or N. "Similia similibus curantur." • G.J. Whyte-Melville
... highest ranks of the nobility who was deemed to have been defrauded of his birthright on this occasion; but the disappointment of Quintus Lutatius Catulus was deemed wholly legitimate, when Cnaeus Mallius Maximus defeated him at the poll. Catulus belonged to a plebeian family that had been ennobled by the possession of the consulship at least as early as the First Punic War; but the distinction had not been perpetuated in the later annals of the house, and if Catulus received the support of the ...
— A History of Rome, Vol 1 - During the late Republic and early Principate • A H.J. Greenidge
... they gave me no peace day or night. 'What,' says they, 'are you going to sell your country for a sheepskin?' The day of the election they seized on me, one by one arm, and the other by the other, and lugged me off to the poll, whether I would ...
— Humour of the North • Lawrence J. Burpee
... conduct such a ceremony during Holy Week "would be improper and unprecedented." The night before her end the doomed woman asked to see the scene of the morrow's tragedy, and looked out from one of the upper windows upon the gibbet, "opposite the door of the gaol, and made by laying a poll across upon the arms of two trees"—in her case "the fatal tree" had a new and very real significance; then she turned away, remarking only that it was "very high." At nine o'clock on Monday morning, attended by Parson Swinton, and ...
— Trial of Mary Blandy • William Roughead
... curious, that he should blush to ask for promotion on any other ground than that of family influence. As a parliamentary candidate, Burgoyne took our common expression "fighting an election" so very literally that he led his supporters to the poll at Preston in 1768 with a loaded pistol in each hand, and won the seat, though he was fined 1,000 pounds, and denounced by ...
— The Devil's Disciple • George Bernard Shaw
... foreign nations, and showed the possibility of making war without laying new taxes. Such at least was his boast; but, in reality, they have been increased under his administration, about twenty millions, partly by a secret augmentation of the bailies and of the poll-tax, partly by some verifications of the twentieths, and partly by the natural progression, which is tested by the amount of taxes on consumption, the necessary result of the successive increase of population, of riches, and of ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... artistry, the Frenchman was in all points save one the superior. Sheppard's brain carried him not beyond the wants of to-day and the extortions of Poll Maggot. ...
— A Book of Scoundrels • Charles Whibley
... boy came straggling in, and after him, a red-headed lad, and then one with a flaxen poll, until the forms were occupied by a dozen boys, or thereabouts, with heads of every color but gray, and ranging in their ages from four years old to fourteen years or more; for the legs of the youngest were a long way from the floor, when he ...
— McGuffey's Sixth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... your Letter your Aunt is vary Ill and Lowspireted I Donte think your Aunt wood Git up all Day if My Sister Wasnot to Persage her We all Think hir lif is two monopolous. you Wish to know Who Was Liveing With your Aunt. that is My Sister and Willian—and Cariline—as Cock and Old Poll Pepper is Come to Stay With her a Littel Wile and I hoped [hopped] for Your Aunt, and Harry has Worked for your Aunt all the Summer. Your Aunt and Harry Whent to the Wells Races and Spent a very Pleasant Day your Aunt has ...
— Essays on Life, Art and Science • Samuel Butler
... the Reverend —— Tuck, his lordship's domestic chaplain, who had also grown as sleek as the Abbot of Jorvaulx, who was as prim as a lady in his dress, wore bergamot in his handkerchief, and had his poll shaved and his beard curled every day. And so sanctified was his Reverence grown, that he thought it was a shame to kill the pretty deer, (though he ate of them still hugely, both in pasties and with French beans and currant-jelly,) and being shown a quarter-staff upon a ...
— Burlesques • William Makepeace Thackeray
... inhabitants in Paris is computed at one million, one hundred and thirty thousand, (including one hundred and fifty thousand strangers) two hundred thousand of which are, through poverty, exempt from the poll-tax, and two hundred thousand others ...
— A Trip to Paris in July and August 1792 • Richard Twiss
... take the poll of their precinct or see that it is taken; and that means the putting down in a book the name of each voter, his past political allegiance, his present political inclinations, the probable ballot he will ...
— The Young Man and the World • Albert J. Beveridge
... MSS.); inermis, glaberrima, foliis coriaceis longissimis loratis obtusis in petiolum sensim angustatis, pedunculis solitariis (2 poll.) stipite ...
— Journal of an Expedition into the Interior of Tropical Australia • Thomas Mitchell
... the South, and South as the North; but not so as to slaves: that experience has shown that those colonies have been always able to pay most, which have the most inhabitants, whether they be black or white; and the practice of the Southern colonies has always been to make every farmer pay poll taxes upon all his laborers, whether they be black or white. He acknowledged indeed that freemen worked the most; but they consume the most also. They do not produce a greater surplus for taxation. The slave is neither fed nor ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... that the colonies ought at least to support the troops thus generously sent them; and various suggestions looking to this end were made by royal governors. Thus Shirley in 1756 devised a general system of taxation, including import duties, an excise, and a poll-tax; delinquents to be brought to terms by "warrants of distress and imprisonment of persons." When, in 1762, Governor Bernard of Massachusetts promised 400 pounds in bounties on the faith of the colony, James ...
— Formation of the Union • Albert Bushnell Hart
... seems a precious swell. His curly poll will grace the hangman's pole, A charming barber's block, upon my soul! 'Twill cut a figure in our "Rotten Row;" I think that jest is ...
— Turandot: The Chinese Sphinx • Johann Christoph Friedrich von Schiller
... conformity with this act, and, so far as may be consistent therewith, shall proceed in the manner used in the State prior to the rebellion. The oath of allegiance shall be taken and subscribed on the poll book by every voter in the form above prescribed, but every person known by or proved to the commissioners to have held or exercised any office, civil or military, State or Confederate, under the rebel usurpation, or to have voluntarily borne arms against the United States, shall be ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents: Lincoln - Section 1 (of 2) of Volume 6: Abraham Lincoln • Compiled by James D. Richardson
... in Nature's university, who learn the laws which govern men and things and obey them, are the really great and successful men in this world. The great mass of mankind are the "Poll,"[10] who pick up just enough to get through without much discredit. Those who won't learn at all are plucked; and then you can't come up again. Nature's ...
— English Prose - A Series of Related Essays for the Discussion and Practice • Frederick William Roe (edit. and select.)
... lovely Poll at Portsmouth, When in my arms I caught her, Was worth a hundred foreign gals On the ...
— Miriam's Schooling and Other Papers - Gideon; Samuel; Saul; Miriam's Schooling; and Michael Trevanion • Mark Rutherford
... overdress the part. To some prescriptive right gives settled things— Black wigs to murderers, feathered hats to kings. But Michael Cassio might be drunk enough, Though all his features were not grimed with snuff. Why should Poll Peachum shine in satin clothes? Why every devil dance ...
— A Book of the Play - Studies and Illustrations of Histrionic Story, Life, and Character • Dutton Cook
... will be too delighted at hearing of your arrival. Give my love to Clive—a remarkable fine boy, Clive—good morning:" and the Baronet was gone, and his bald head might presently be seen alongside of Mr. Quilter's confidential grey poll, both of their faces turned into an ...
— The Newcomes • William Makepeace Thackeray
... providing new homes for these children in responsible families. The money to pay for the land, the buildings, the care of the sick and needy, the salary of the minister, and other parish needs was collected from the parishioners through an annual "tithe" of so many pounds of tobacco per poll. The vestry upon occasion also had certain civil duties not within the scope of ...
— Religious Life of Virginia in the Seventeenth Century - The Faith of Our Fathers • George MacLaren Brydon
... us too, like one of the wild bulls of Bowland, if we would let him have his way. But I would treat him as I would the bull aforesaid, a wild boar, or any other savage and intractable beast, hunt him down, and poll his horns, or pluck out ...
— The Lancashire Witches - A Romance of Pendle Forest • William Harrison Ainsworth
... include the property tax, which is quite low, one and a half per cent. Every male adult pays a poll tax of one dollar, a school tax of two dollars, and a road tax of two dollars. The following is the detail of the internal taxes for ...
— Northern California, Oregon, and the Sandwich Islands • Charles Nordhoff
... from the province of Amadia unto the province of Gilan, twenty-five days distant, on the border of the kingdom of Persia. They are under the authority of the king of Persia, and he raises a tribute from them through the hands of his officer, and the tribute which they pay every year by way of poll tax is one gold amir, which is equivalent to one and one-third maravedi. [This tax has to be paid by all males in the land of Islam who are over the age of fifteen.] At this place (Amadia), there arose ...
— The Itinerary of Benjamin of Tudela • Benjamin of Tudela
... window; the east one blazoned with the royal arms, and the stars and jewels of the English orders of knighthood; the west with the City arms and supporters. At the east end of the hall (the ancient dais) was a raised enclosed platform, for holding the Court of Hustings and taking the poll at elections, and other purposes. The panelled wainscoting (in the old churchwarden taste) was separated into compartments by fluted Corinthian pilasters. Over these was a range of ancient canopied niches in carved stone, vulgarly imitated by modern work on the west side. Our old friends ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... Poll Parrot Sat in her garret, Eating toast and tea; A little brown mouse Jumped into the house, And stole it ...
— The Little Mother Goose • Anonymous
... frankness, Mr. Riley. And I will tell you now that we didn't poll many votes in New Ireland last year. I don't just remember how many—I have mislaid the figures; but I wish to tell you frankly—frankly, I say—that we did not poll many. What they need there, I think, is a determined man like yourself to pile into them hammer and ...
— Sonnie-Boy's People • James B. Connolly
... He had sure hope of defeating Carnac with the help of Luzanne Larue. The woman had remained hidden since her coming, and the game was now in his hands. On the night before the poll he could declare the thing, not easy to be forgiven by the French- Canadian public, which has a strong sense of domestic duty. Carnac Grier was a Protestant, and that was bad, and if there was added an offence against domestic morality, he would be beaten at the polls as sure as ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... a general election, we have known him to feed his masters (the S.A. party), upon flapdoodle, fabricating the mess out of imaginary native votes of confidence for his masters' delectation, and leaving them to discover the real ingredients of the dish, at the bottom of the poll, when ...
— Native Life in South Africa, Before and Since • Solomon Tshekisho Plaatje
... big a word, and then resumed, graciously, "You see, most of our hills comes from that there Hillstoke. If there's a poacher, or a thief, he is Hillstoke; they harbors the gypsies as ravage the whole country, mostly; and now they have let loose this here young 'oman on to us. She is a POLL PRY: goes about the town a-sarching: pries into their housen and their vittels, and their very beds. Old Marks have got a muck-heap at his door for his garden, ye know. Well, miss, she sticks her parasole into this here, and turns it about, as if she was agoing to spread it: says she, ...
— The Woman-Hater • Charles Reade
... with a dumb appeal for assistance. Samuel looked a very different man from the old bachelor who used to come a-wooing every six months at the Home. Either marriage had brought him a new growth of hair, or else Blossy had selected a new wig for him—a modest, close, iron-gray which fitted his poll to perfection. Marriage or Blossy had also overcome in Samuel that tendency to hang his head "to starb'd"; and now he lifted his bright eyes with the manner of one ...
— Old Lady Number 31 • Louise Forsslund
... the creek fairly blossomed with young faces. The children of the Kollanders, the Perrys, the Calvins, the Nesbits, and the Bowmans—girls and boys were everywhere and they knew all times and seasons. But the red poll and freckled face of Grant Adams was the center of ...
— In the Heart of a Fool • William Allen White
... given, and the cars started, when Miss Hobbs, thinking it was needless to keep up a longer lookout, reentered, and was surprised to find a nice-looking young man by her side. He wore a heavy yellow watchguard, yellow kid gloves, and a moustache to match, patent-leather boots, a poll-parrot scarf, and a brilliant breast-pin. Ann Harriet was delighted to have such a companion; and her wish that he would enter into conversation was ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 3, No. 1 January 1863 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... distinction! "Oliver Goldsmith, for shortness called Noll, Who writes like an angel but talks like poor Poll." That sort ...
— Fair Margaret - A Portrait • Francis Marion Crawford
... evidently regarded it as an insincere caress, whereas it was a perfectly honest expression of hostility. This attack was all the more unjust and undeserved since the bear was a most hardworking and underpaid member of the community. When a politician reached the top of the poll he got L400 a year. When a bear did the same he ...
— Punch or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, July 8, 1914 • Various
... return journey. But this was not all. The yoke was a heavy as well as a degrading one. Each Prince with his Drujina must be always ready to lead an army in defense of the Mongol cause if required; and, last of all, the poll-tax bore with intolerable weight upon everyone, rich or poor, excepting only the ecclesiastics and the property of the Greek Church, which with a singular ...
— A Short History of Russia • Mary Platt Parmele
... Boswell observes, of his pension. It was sometimes more than he could do, to reconcile so many jarring interests. "Williams," says he, in a letter to Mrs. Thrale, "hates every body: Levett hates Desmoulins and does not love Williams: Desmoulins hates them both. Poll loves none of them." Poll was Miss Carmichael, of whom I do not find that any thing else is recorded. Boswell ventured to call this groupe the seraglio of Johnson, ...
— Lives of the English Poets - From Johnson to Kirke White, Designed as a Continuation of - Johnson's Lives • Henry Francis Cary
... carrying out Emerson's doctrine by becoming independent of others' opinions. What he thought right, he said or did. He disapproved, for example, of slavery, and consequently refused to pay his poll tax to a government that upheld slavery. When he was imprisoned because of non-payment, Emerson visited him and asked, "Why are you here, Henry?" Thoreau merely replied, "Why are you ...
— History of American Literature • Reuben Post Halleck
... Dahomey was not on one occasion only, but on many; such as on the reception of messengers from neighbouring states, or of white merchants, or on days of ceremonial. But the great carnage was once a year, when the poll-tax was paid by his subjects. A thousand persons, at least, were sacrificed annually on these different occasions. The great men, too, of the country, cut off a few heads on festival-days. From all these ...
— The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the - Abolition of the African Slave-Trade, by the British Parliament (1839) • Thomas Clarkson
... much of respect as he hath of hair," answered naughty Nancy. "His poll is nearly ...
— The Puritan Twins • Lucy Fitch Perkins
... Paper Poll, as the servants call her, is hardly out of sight, and not out of hearing, when a young fellow and his wife come clattering along the pavement, appealing to all who may require their good offices in the matter of chair-mending. The man is built up in a sort of cage-work of chairs stuck about ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 448 - Volume 18, New Series, July 31, 1852 • Various
... Ravens' rights, an undefended prey: Excepting Martin's race; for they and he Had gain'd the shelter of a hollow tree: But soon discover'd by a sturdy clown, He headed all the rabble of a town, 630 And finish'd them with bats, or poll'd them down. Martin himself was caught alive, and tried For treasonous crimes, because the laws provide No Martin there in winter shall abide. High on an oak, which never leaf shall bear, He breathed his last, exposed to open air; And there his corpse, ...
— The Poetical Works of John Dryden, Vol I - With Life, Critical Dissertation, and Explanatory Notes • John Dryden
... comment in detail, are appropriate methods of strengthening these basic rights which have our full support. The right to vote, for example, should no longer be denied through such arbitrary devices on a local level, sometimes abused, such as literacy tests and poll taxes. As we approach the 100th anniversary, next January, of the Emancipation Proclamation, let the acts of every branch of the Government—and every citizen—portray that ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... my time, and I've played the deuce with men! I'm speaking of ten years past—I was barely sixty then: My cheeks were mellow and soft, and my eyes were large and sweet, POLL PINEAPPLE'S eyes were the standing toast of the ...
— More Bab Ballads • W. S. Gilbert
... gets up with her big round face, Like Mistress Poll's in the market-place, Down to the village below we pace;— We know a supper that wants a grace: Past the curtsying women we go, Past the smithy, all a glow, To the snug little houses at ...
— The Poetical Works of George MacDonald in Two Volumes, Volume I • George MacDonald
... The following estimate is taken from "The History of the British empire in North America," and is there said to be an authentic account from the militia rolls, poll taxes, bills of mortality, returns from governors, ...
— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 1 (of 5) • John Marshall
... his white poll across the table with the perkiness of a quaint bird—Paul saw that the years had brought a striation of tiny red filaments to his weather-beaten face—and fixed her with his little glittering eyes. "Bill what? You think I'm 'urting his feelings?" He jerked a thumb towards his ...
— The Fortunate Youth • William J. Locke
... up an' thin some wan said 'twud be a fine thing f'r science if a white man cud get to th' North Pole. What he'd do if he got there no wan has anny thought. Accordin' to what I hear, th' North Pole ain't like a tillygraft pole, a barber pole, a fishin' pole, a clothes pole, a poll-tax, a Maypole, a Russhyan Pole, or annything that ye can see, smell or ate. Whin ye get to it, it is no diff'rent fr'm bein' annywhere on th' ice. Th' on'y way ye know ye're there is be consultin' a pocket arithmetic, a watch an' a compass. Don't get it into ye'er head that if me frind Baldwin ...
— Observations by Mr. Dooley • Finley Peter Dunne
... the Swiss are mercenary, as a parrot says 'Poor Poll,' or as the Belgians here say the English are not brave, or as the French accuse them of being perfidious: there is no ...
— The Professor • (AKA Charlotte Bronte) Currer Bell
... allowed, that if it were not for the mock-democratical form of administrating sic the funds for the maintenance of the poor, they would never suffer the extortion, and the bare-faced iniquities that are committed. {99} The ship- money, the poll-tax, the taxes on the Americans, and others, that have caused so much bloodshed and strife, never amounted to one-tenth, if all added together, of what the English public pays to be applied to maintain the poor, and administered by rude illiterate men, who render scarcely ...
— An Inquiry into the Permanent Causes of the Decline and Fall of Powerful and Wealthy Nations. • William Playfair
... a poor old Poll Parrot, Who had nothing to eat but a carrot, And nothing to wear But a wig of red hair, And nowhere to live ...
— The Jingle Book • Carolyn Wells
... a third, an old sparrow with a white poll; "they have something they call a calendar; it's an invention of their own, and everything must be arranged according to it, but it won't do. When spring comes, then the year begins. It is the voice of nature, and ...
— Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen • Hans Christian Andersen
... outer courts were stalls of oxen, pens of sheep, cages of doves and pigeons; and the ceremonial fitness of these sacrificial victims was cried aloud by the sellers, and charged for in full measure. It was the custom also to pay the yearly poll tribute of the sanctuary at this season—the ransom offering required of every male in Israel, and amounting to half a shekel[350] for each, irrespective of his relative poverty or wealth. This was to be paid "after the ...
— Jesus the Christ - A Study of the Messiah and His Mission According to Holy - Scriptures Both Ancient and Modern • James Edward Talmage
... said good-natured Mr. Bright; and Rosa and little Lila were soon furnished with a cracker and a lump of sugar for Poll. ...
— A Romance of the Republic • Lydia Maria Francis Child
... flash of dark eyes and white teeth, answer that travellers lose their way when idle boys and girls tell tales by daylight. And Naraini, the herd-girl, will hang her head and cover her dusky face with her rag of a veil, if you put the question to her; or little Râm Jas shake his bald shaven poll in denial; but not one of the dark-skinned, bare-limbed village children will yield to your request ...
— Tales Of The Punjab • Flora Annie Steel
... from Pennsylvania in the convention which framed the Constitution, and ranked at that time as one of the ablest lawyers in the Union. The opinion of the judges seemed to be, though no formal decision was rendered to that effect, that a tax on land, and a capitation or poll tax, are the only levies which within the terms of the Constitution are to be considered direct taxes. The decision was one of extraordinary interest to the Government, as, had it been the other way, one great resource for the raising of money, indeed the greatest resource, would have been ...
— Twenty Years of Congress, Vol. 1 (of 2) • James Gillespie Blaine
... night with her mother. Mr. Broad's house, at the end of the town, was very quiet, and George did not care to leave her alone with the servant. Those were the days when the state of the poll was published every hour, and as Cowfold lay near the centre of the county a very fair opinion could be formed of the progress of the voting. By three o'clock it was known that up to eleven parties were neck and neck, ...
— The Revolution in Tanner's Lane • Mark Rutherford
... proud and happy bird; he was proud of his gorgeous red and green feathers, of his ability to say 'Pretty Poll' and 'How do?' and, above all, of his fine gilded cage, which stood just inside the ...
— Chatterbox, 1905. • Various
... thrusting his hands into his pockets, began counting the marbles with which they were filled. Soon afterwards another white-headed little boy came straggling in, and after him a red-headed lad, and after him two more with white heads, and then one with a flaxen poll, and so on until there were about a dozen boys in all, with heads of every colour but gray, and ranging in their ages from four years old to fourteen years or more; for the legs of the youngest were a long way from the floor when he sat upon the form, and the eldest was a heavy, good-tempered, ...
— The Ontario High School Reader • A.E. Marty
... their suzerain's right to exact military service from them, refused to acknowledge any further duty towards him. The kings of Susa declined to recognise their privileges: they subjected them to a poll-tax, levied the usual imposts on their estates, and forced them to maintain at their own expense the troops quartered on them for the purpose of guaranteeing ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 6 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... that sturdy, voyaging Englishman who was always on the lookout for adventures and was never discouraged by any circumstances in which he found himself. The picture of the brave captain in his hairy goatskin clothes, Poll on his shoulder, his faithful dog by his side, and Friday following along behind, is one that remains stamped for life on ...
— The Junior Classics, V5 • Edited by William Patten
... Beck, with disdain; "no, I 'as a gritter mother nor she. Sint Poll's is my mother. But the h-old crittur tuk care ...
— Lucretia, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... scent bough reign scene sail bier pray right toe yew sale prey rite rough tow steal done bare their creek soul draught four base beet heel but steaks coarse choir cord chaste boar butt stake waive choose stayed cast maze ween hour birth horde aisle core rice male none plane pore fete poll sweet throe borne root been load feign forte vein kill rime shown wrung hew ode ere wrote wares urn plait arc bury peal doe grown flue know sea lie mete lynx bow stare belle read grate ark ought slay thrown vain bin ...
— The Art Of Writing & Speaking The English Language - Word-Study and Composition & Rhetoric • Sherwin Cody
... abingdons Fan of witch brede Bounser esqre nose on the merritts onnerd Sir he is very Smal and smooth air and most xlent aither for wood Or warter a liter before Tug onnerd Sir is nam is Vermin and he hant got his nam by no mistake as No Vermin not even poll katts can live long before him onnerd Sir I considders as vermin is very sootble compannion for a Gent indors or hout and bein lively wold ...
— The Adventures of Mr. Verdant Green • Cuthbert Bede
... make the greatest appearance in the field, and cry the loudest, the best of it is they are but a sort of French Huguenots, or Dutch boors, brought ever in herds, but not naturalised, who have not land of two pounds per annum in Parnassus, and therefore are not privileged to poll. Their authors are of the same level; fit to represent them on a mountebank's stage, or to be masters of the ceremonies in a bear-garden. Yet these are they who have the most admirers. But it often happens, to their mortification, that as their readers improve their ...
— Discourses on Satire and Epic Poetry • John Dryden
... studies; indeed, there are over seventy species that find their way into the United States. Many are named from the distribution of colour upon their plumage—the blue-winged yellow, the black-throated blue, chestnut-sided, bay-breasted, and black poll. Perhaps the two most beautiful—most reflective of bright tropical skies and flowers—are the magnolia and the blackburnian. The first fairly dazzles us with its bluish crown, white and black face, black and olive-green back, white marked wings and tail, yellow throat and ...
— The Log of the Sun - A Chronicle of Nature's Year • William Beebe
... sometimes suffered me to talk jocularly of his group of females, and call them his Seraglio. He thus mentions them, together with honest Levett, in one of his letters to Mrs. Thrale: 'Williams hates every body; Levett hates Desmoulins, and does not love Williams; Desmoulins hates them both; Poll* loves ...
— Life of Johnson - Abridged and Edited, with an Introduction by Charles Grosvenor Osgood • James Boswell
... the same time his earnestness and flowing eloquence proved that he was a true son of his father. He conducted the campaign with signal ability, and laid the foundation of a lasting reputation in the constituency. At the close of the poll the returning-officer declared Mr. Clark to have been duly elected, but, as it was notorious that corrupt practices had been resorted to, a protest was entered by the friends of the Reform candidate, who himself appeared in person at the bar of the House to conduct the argument. The result of the ...
— The Story of the Upper Canada Rebellion, Volume 1 • John Charles Dent
... playing the game, and made up my mind to go to the poll on the political questions which were agitating the public mind, as I was informed, by a simple honest candidature, thinking that in political as in every other warfare honesty is the best policy. On that noble maxim I entered into the contest, ...
— The Reminiscences Of Sir Henry Hawkins (Baron Brampton) • Henry Hawkins Brampton
... Ain't much used to city gals. Hope they don't bring no sarrytogys. There ain't nothin but your room, an mine, an old Poll's, and the gerrit. Me and you might go out in the hayloft like, or sleep on the pyazzer ...
— A Pessimist - In Theory and Practice • Robert Timsol
... when he steals through the green herbage, and basks unmolested in the sun, he crowds perhaps as much enjoyment into one summer hour as a parrot, however pampered and erudite, spreads over a whole drawing-room life spent in saying "How dye do" and "Pretty Poll." ...
— What Will He Do With It, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... chosen as candidates. They were opposed to Romilly, the old friend of Bentham and of Mill himself. Both Mill and Bentham regarded him as not sufficiently orthodox. Romilly, however, was throughout at the head of the poll, and the Radical committee were obliged to withdraw their second candidate, Kinnaird, in order to secure the election of Burdett against the government candidate Maxwell. Romilly soon afterwards dined at Bentham's house, and met Mill, with Dumont, Brougham, and Rush, on friendly terms. ...
— The English Utilitarians, Volume II (of 3) - James Mill • Leslie Stephen
... the day of battle, the day of the Poll, when the burgesses were to indicate plainly by means of a cross on a voting paper whether or not they wanted Federation. And on this day Constance was almost incapacitated by sciatica. It was a heroic day. The walls of the town ...
— The Old Wives' Tale • Arnold Bennett
... Majority for Ministers thirty-seven! Never had the opposition made such a bad division, and this too on their trial of strength for the session. Everything went wrong. Lord Milford was away without a pair. Mr Ormsby, who had paired with Mr Berners, never came, and let his man poll; for which he was infinitely accursed, particularly by the expectant twelve hundred a-yearers, but not wanting anything himself, and having an income of forty thousand pounds paid quarterly, Mr Ormsby bore their ...
— Sybil - or the Two Nations • Benjamin Disraeli
... in consideration of these things, taking into account the terror of our departure to Brussels last January, we decide, my brother and I, that the payment of both gabelle and poll tax must be forced, and that we cannot permit the retarding of such taxes under any colour or pretence. At the request of our brother and cousin we order the inhabitants of the said territories to pay both gabelle and poll tax, all that is due from the time it was imposed and for ...
— Charles the Bold - Last Duke Of Burgundy, 1433-1477 • Ruth Putnam
... the petty chiefs [cabecillas] of the tribute and of champans, both past and present. When any number is lacking, it is made up from the petty heads of the trades. At present the collection of tribute or the poll-tax from the Chinese is in direct charge of the alcalde-mayor in the province of Tondo, with a supervisor chosen from among the officials of administration of the royal treasury. In the other provinces it is attended to in person by the chief of each province. This ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898: Volume XVII, 1609-1616 • Various
... polling, and Tallyn, with its open windows and empty rooms, had the look of a hive from which the bees have swarmed. According to the butler, only Lady Niton was at home, and the household was eagerly awaiting news of the declaration of the poll at Dunscombe Town Hall. Lady Niton, indeed, ...
— The Testing of Diana Mallory • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... Ohio and the Mississippi there were about twenty barges, which averaged 100 tons burden, and more than three months was occupied in ascending from Orleans to Louisville with West India produce, the crew being obliged to poll or cordelle the whole distance. Seldom more than one voyage to Orleans and back was made within the year. In 1817, a steam-boat arrived at Louisville from New Orleans in twenty-five days, and ...
— A Ramble of Six Thousand Miles through the United States of America • S. A. Ferrall
... are we not ofttimes hungry? Doth not our toil make the vine hang heavy in the vineyard, yet do not our bottles droop empty of wine? Doth not the substance of our bitter toiling go to the tax-gatherer? Aye, Joseph, thou knowest I speak truly. It is tax—tax—tax,—land tax, temple tax, poll tax, army tax, court tax—always tax; and when there is to be a great orgy in the banquet halls of Rome, or Herod is to give a mighty feast for that brazen harlot, his brother's wife, are we not reduced to the bran and vinegar fare of slaves to pay the cost? A curse ...
— The Coming of the King • Bernie Babcock
... Baltimore, as the successor of his father, who had begun before his death the movement for settling his people in America. The charter gave to all freemen a voice in making the laws. Among the first laws passed was one giving to every human being upon payment of poll-tax the right to worship freely according to the dictates of his own conscience. America thus became the refuge for those who had any peculiarity of religious belief, until to-day no doubt more varieties of religion may ...
— Comic History of the United States • Bill Nye
... Hebrew, Greek, or Latin, learn him to translate with rapidity or speak our own language fluently. If he has not thereby learned the knowledge of things signified by such language, he is, in principle, advanced no farther than the parrot which says "pretty poll, pretty poll." ...
— Lectures on Language - As Particularly Connected with English Grammar. • William S. Balch
... horsemen, freeholders of all degrees, now flocked to the house, hearing that Mr. Vivian had thoughts of standing for the county. They were unanimously loud in their assurances of success. Old and new copies of poll books were produced, and the different interests of the county counted and recounted, balanced and counterbalanced, again and again, by each person, after his own fashion: and it was proved to Mr. Vivian, in black and white, and as plain as ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. V - Tales of a Fashionable Life • Maria Edgeworth
... doors walked Hamilton and Burr, Jerome Bonaparte, and a comic-pathetic emigre marquis, who in poverty awaited the greater Bonaparte's downfall, cherishing his order of Saint Louis and powdering his poll with Indian meal; the Livingstons and Clintons divided the land between them; Van Buren and the Regency ...
— The Henchman • Mark Lee Luther
... With his taxes super-sated 1380 The peasants grew exasperated; They threw their spades and pitchforks down And marched as rebels into town. Thirteen-eighty's Poll taxation Puts equal tax on all the nation; Lays seven thousand peasants dead; Wat Tyler and Jack Straw at head. Praemunire Praemunire Act is passed To check the Papal Bulls at last. Chaucer Chaucer the Poet this same year Makes Pilgrimage to ...
— A Humorous History of England • C. Harrison
... you made a poll of newspaper editors, you might find a great many who think that war is evil. But if you were to take a census among ...
— The Haunted Bookshop • Christopher Morley
... party's preference would be tolerated. And if, passing over the mob of Generals and of Politicians by trade, the choice should fall on some modest and unambitious citizen, who has earned a character by quiet probity and his bread by honest labor, I shall hope to see his name at the head of the poll in spite of the unconstitutional overthrow of Universal Suffrage. After this, though the plurality should fall short of a majority and the Assembly proceed to elect Louis Napoleon or Changarnier, there need be ...
— Glances at Europe - In a Series of Letters from Great Britain, France, Italy, - Switzerland, &c. During the Summer of 1851. • Horace Greeley
... at first been regarded with indifference by the party managers, both Democratic and Republican, in New York, would command a vote certainly larger than that of one of these parties, and possibly larger than that of either of them. To put him at the head of a poll of three parties would elect him. This was so apparent that he and his friends, including Dr. M'Glynn and Mr. Davitt, were warranted ...
— Ireland Under Coercion (2nd ed.) (1 of 2) (1888) • William Henry Hurlbert
... shrewdness of his fellow-conspirator; but he had solemnly promised to abide the result of the election, and he could not recede from his position without a violation of the "honor among thieves" which is said to exist. The poll would not be closed for half an hour; and as he had been cheated he deemed it quite right to restore the equilibrium by a resort to the ...
— Outward Bound - Or, Young America Afloat • Oliver Optic
... of voting is provided in the act to be by ballot. The board will keep a record and poll book of the election, showing the votes, list of voters, and the persons elected by a plurality of the votes cast at the election, and make returns of these to the ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 2 (of 2) of Volume 6: Andrew Johnson • James D. Richardson
... let thy trumpet sound! Tell all the world around How Capet fell! And when great George's poll Shall in the basket roll, Let mercy ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 88, February, 1865 • Various
... them as a whole— Are careless on the score of grace; And hence you needn't comb your poll ...
— The Poems of Henry Kendall • Henry Kendall
... of whom he was in quest, came presently to the horsekeeper and feeling his heart beat high, said in himself, 'This is the man.' Nevertheless, an he would have nought be known of that which he purposed to do, he did nought to him but poll, with a pair of scissors he had brought with him, somewhat on one side of his hair, which they then wore very long, so by that token he might know him again on the morrow; and this done, he withdrew and returned to his own chamber. The culprit, ...
— The Decameron of Giovanni Boccaccio • Giovanni Boccaccio
... the parrot screamed, And "Pretty Poll," repeated I, The while I stole a merry glance Across the room all on the sly, Where some one plied her needle fast, Demurely by the window sitting; But I beheld upon her cheek A ...
— The Wit of Women - Fourth Edition • Kate Sanborn
... far as Poland can settle it. We said the Destinies had ceased, some time since, to ask Poland for its vote; it is other people who have now got the real power of voting. But that is the correct state of the poll at Warsaw, if ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. IX. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... had not been known nor taken notice of; and several persons suffered by false accusations. There were little less than five thousand who were convicted and sold for slaves; those who, enduring the test, remained in the government and passed muster for true Athenians were found upon the poll to be fourteen thousand ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... in resisting Orangemen, and yet O'Connell said, "Every one who dares to vote for the Orange knight of Kerry shall have a death's head and cross-bones painted on his door." The voters at the Irish elections were collected in the chapels by the priests, and led forth to the poll under threats of being refused all the rites and visited with all the punishments of their Church. Under these influences, the Knight of Kerry, supported by nearly all the property, intelligence, and respectability of the county, ...
— English Caricaturists and Graphic Humourists of the Nineteenth Century. - How they Illustrated and Interpreted their Times. • Graham Everitt
... head, n. poll, cephalon; costard (Contemptuous), noddle, pate. Associated Words: phrenology, phrenologist, craniology, craniologist, cephalology, sinciput, occiput, cephalism, behead, decapitate, decapitation, capitation, vertex, crown, skull, cranium, fontanel, trepan, coronal, microcephaly, craniometry, ...
— Putnam's Word Book • Louis A. Flemming
... conversation so spiritedly; and it is certainly singular to observe how accurately a well-trained bird will apply his knowledge. A friend of mine knew one that had been taught many sentences; thus, "Sally, Poll wants her breakfast!" "Sally, Poll wants her tea!" but she never mistook the one for the other; breakfast was invariably demanded in the morning, and tea in the afternoon; and she always hailed her master, but no one else, by "How do you do, ...
— McGuffey's Fourth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... election, which began on the first of the month, had now gone on more than three weeks: ten thousand voters had polled; and it was even expected that, since the voters were exhausted, the books would be closed, and Wray, who was second on the poll, Lord Hood being first, would ...
— Beaux and Belles of England • Mary Robinson
... Skarphedinn," he answers, "and thou hast often seen me at the Thing; but in this I am wiser than thou, that I have no need to ask what thy name is. Thy name is Skapti Thorod's son, but before thou calledst thyself 'Bristle-poll,' after thou hadst slain Kettle of Elda; then thou shavedst thy poll, and puttedst pitch on thy head, and then thou hiredst thralls to cut up a sod of turf, and thou creptest underneath it to spend the night. ...
— The story of Burnt Njal - From the Icelandic of the Njals Saga • Anonymous
... Conference did not grow less as time went on. When the Ballot Bill of 1870 was in Committee, he moved an amendment to extend the hours of polling from four o'clock to eight, as many working men would be unable to reach the poll by the earlier hour. There was much talk in debate of the danger which would ensue from carrying on so dangerous an operation as voting after dark, and the Government Whips were actually put on to tell against this proposal; nor was any extension ...
— The Life of the Rt. Hon. Sir Charles W. Dilke V1 • Stephen Gwynn
... little heart! Miss, why so impatient? Hav'n't you as genteel a parlour as any lady in the land could wish to sit down in?—The bed's turn'd up in a chest of drawers that's stain'd to look like mahogany:—there's two poets, and a poll parrot, the best images the jew had on his head, over the mantlepiece; and was I to leave you all alone by yourself, isn't there an eight day clock in the corner, that when one's waiting, lonesome like, for any body, keeps going ...
— John Bull - The Englishman's Fireside: A Comedy, in Five Acts • George Colman
... owner of Saulsby, was able to raise a little trouble against our hero. Mr. Slide was proposed by Mr. Vellum, and seconded by Mr. Vellum's clerk,—though, as it afterwards appeared, Mr. Vellum's clerk was not in truth an elector,—and went to the poll like a man. He received three votes, and at twelve o'clock withdrew. This in itself could hardly have afforded compensation for the expense which Mr. Slide or his backers must have encountered;—but he had an opportunity of making a speech, every word of which was reported in the People's Banner; ...
— Phineas Finn - The Irish Member • Anthony Trollope
... another difficulty; for a proclamation being issued, that all betwixt thirteen and sixty was to pay Poll-money; word was sent his father, that if he would pay it, he should have his liberty; which was no small temptation. But this he absolutely refused, and also told his father plainly (when urged by him to ...
— Biographia Scoticana (Scots Worthies) • John Howie
... Congress, with no effective means of explaining and justifying their conduct. Congress then had a prestige which it does not now possess, and its utterances then received consideration not now accorded. Whenever presidential electors were voted for directly by the people, the poll was small compared with the vote for members of Congress. Moreover, there was then a feeling that the Cabinet should be regarded as a bureaucracy, and for a long period this conception tended to give remarkable ...
— Washington and His Colleagues • Henry Jones Ford |
