"Scant" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... pride himself on his personal appearance, for he has a handsome face, with a dark blue eye and a fine intellectual brow. His head is growing scant of hair on the crown, which induces him to be somewhat particular in the management of his locks in that locality, and these are assuming ...
— Southern Literature From 1579-1895 • Louise Manly
... so tight that the buttonholes were burst out, and it showed white on the shoulders,—while the skirt was so scant that she could not take ...
— L'Assommoir • Emile Zola
... smaller German courts were beginning to take an interest in German literature. Before the Seven Years' War the whole of German culture had been French. Even now German writers found but scant acceptance at Berlin or Vienna. The princes of the smaller states surrounded themselves with literature and art. The duke of Brunswick had made Lessing his librarian. The duke of Wuertemberg paid special attention to education; he promoted the ...
— Autobiography • Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
... received was of a clean, straight-limbed, clear-eyed fellow, who, if he had worked with his hands, had won with his brain. He looked a little older than his twenty-eight years warranted, and a little taller than his scant five-feet-eleven proved. Above all, he appeared healthful, alert, capable, and kindly. He made friends at sight with men, children, and dogs and wore his friendships as easily as he wore his clothes. The West puts an indefinable stamp ...
— The Lilac Girl • Ralph Henry Barbour
... itself prompted him to produce a work in the same vein. Wells' effort was not concluded until the December, 1897 number of the magazine, and Edison's Conquest of Mars began on the following January 12th—a scant six weeks later. For Serviss it was the initial excursion into the realm of fiction, and it is hard to conceive his so hastily adopting a new metier on personal impulse alone. These circumstances, in conjunction with the context of the novel itself, clearly stamp the entire business ...
— Edison's Conquest of Mars • Garrett Putnam Serviss
... small. At Highgate Hill to a strange house I went, And saw the people were to eating bent, In either borrowed, craved, asked, begged, or bought, But most laborious with my teeth I wrought. I did not this, 'cause meat or drink was scant, But I did practise thus before my want; Like to a Tilter that would win the prize, Before the day he'll often exercise. So I began to put in use, at first These principles 'gainst hunger, 'gainst thirst. Close to the ...
— The Pennyles Pilgrimage - Or The Money-lesse Perambulation of John Taylor • John Taylor
... Scant enough it was, as corroboration for so outrageous a facture as the cognomen Daddleskink, but it ...
— Little Miss Grouch - A Narrative Based on the Log of Alexander Forsyth Smith's - Maiden Transatlantic Voyage • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... ocean floor, and that what is now the ocean floor was once dry land. Geologists have in some cases been able to specify the exact portions of the earth's surface where these subsidences and upheavals have taken place, and although the lost continent of Atlantis has so far received scant recognition from the world of science, the general concensus of opinion has for long pointed to the existence, at some prehistoric time, of a vast southern continent to which the name of Lemuria has ...
— The Story of Atlantis and the Lost Lemuria • W. Scott-Elliot
... remark that Mr. Delepierre does very scant justice to many of the interesting questions which he discusses. It is to be regretted that he has not thought it worth while to argue his points more thoroughly, and that he has not been more careful in making statements of fact. He sometimes makes strange blunders, the worst of which, ...
— The Unseen World and Other Essays • John Fiske
... best man at the morrow's ceremony, the function having been almost thrust upon him by Dacre who, oddly enough, shared something of Tommy's veneration for his very reticent brother-officer. There was scant friendship between them. Each had been accustomed to go his own way wholly independent of the other. They were no more than casual acquaintances, and they were content to remain such. But undoubtedly Dacre entertained a certain respect ...
— The Lamp in the Desert • Ethel M. Dell
... would have seen its population trebled in 1628. As it was, the situation became worse than ever. Lewis Kirke had been careful to seize the cattle pastured at Cap Tourmente and to destroy the crops. When winter came, there were eighty mouths to feed on a scant diet of peas and maize, imperfectly ground, with a reserve supply of twelve hundred eels. Towards spring anything was welcome, and the roots of Solomon's seal were esteemed a feast. Champlain even gave serious ...
— The Founder of New France - A Chronicle of Champlain • Charles W. Colby
... steamers, which had been taken when Port Hudson fell, from their confinement in Thompson's Creek, where the falling water had left them sunk in the sand. As the army fell back, and during its stay at Grand Ecore, he had heard rumors about the scant water at the Falls, and the thought had taken hold of his mind that he might now build a dam on a greater scale and to a more ...
— The Gulf and Inland Waters - The Navy in the Civil War. Volume 3. • A. T. Mahan
... rainy, hot, humid summers (southwest monsoon, June to September); less cloudy, scant rainfall, mild temperatures, lower humidity during winter ...
— The 2004 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency
... a different way of looking at it. I confess I have scant patience with these interfering women, who want to turn everything upside down, instead of quietly ...
— The Daughters of Danaus • Mona Caird
... with deep admiration, and to adopt the vaticinatory character in prophesying their success. "Hellas" was written in a moment of enthusiasm. It is curious to remark how well he overcomes the difficulty of forming a drama out of such scant materials. His prophecies, indeed, came true in their general, not their particular, purport. He did not foresee the death of Lord Londonderry, which was to be the epoch of a change in English politics, particularly as regarded foreign affairs; nor that the navy of his ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley Volume I • Percy Bysshe Shelley
... is: Albeit lots Of people follow Dr. Watts, The sluggard, when his means are scant, Should seek an uncle, not ...
— Fables for the Frivolous • Guy Whitmore Carryl
... the bare boarded rooms, the scant furniture and rough walls of the cabin, for it ...
— Two Little Women • Carolyn Wells
... were few representatives of the Bolsheviki. The former had no place in the new Russia that was struggling for its existence; the repressive measures that had been found necessary accounted for the scant representation of ...
— Bolshevism - The Enemy of Political and Industrial Democracy • John Spargo
... stepped upon the outer ledge. She was leaving him helpless . . . the thought presented itself that she would have another thing to answer for if one of the many men with such cause to hate him should come upon him thus. Well, that was but one of the more remote chances she must take. There was scant enough likelihood that any one should come here before she could race into ...
— The Bells of San Juan • Jackson Gregory
... Whoop Up trail, a brown streak against the vivid upland green, dipped down the hillside to our right, down to the sage-grown flat, and into the river by the great boulders that gave the ford its name. The blue ridge up the river I gave scant heed to; the Writing-Stone was only a name to me, for I'd never seen the place. My attention was all for the scene at hand. The patch of soft green that I knew for the cottonwoods Rutter had spoken of drew my roving gaze whether I would or no. I have ridden on pleasanter missions ...
— Raw Gold - A Novel • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... scant time to mourn. Scarcely had he seated himself at his desk when an emergency call came snapping in; a call of such import that his secretary's usually calm voice trembled as she ...
— Triplanetary • Edward Elmer Smith
... appeared. As his knowledge of English was scant, the Princess gave him the story she herself had heard. Great was his horror on learning that when last he came—in September—and left the usual provisions, the Duc de Fontrevault had been in his grave ...
— The Pines of Lory • John Ames Mitchell
... obtained leave, Mr. Williams; I may take your offer!" he exclaimed with scant ceremony, when he found himself in that gentleman's presence, who was at tea with his wife. "Mr. Galloway has authorized me to accept it. How do you ...
— The Channings • Mrs. Henry Wood
... at Colonel Cleaves, when he was talking earnestly, were enough to show the observer that this officer meant all he said. Shirkers, among either officers or men, would receive scant consideration in ...
— Uncle Sam's Boys with Pershing's Troops - Dick Prescott at Grips with the Boche • H. Irving Hancock
... lungs and across the chest; had been spitting blood for the past six years. Menstruation was scant and caused great prostration. Suffered from constipation; cutting pains about the stomach and rumbling in the bowels; exceedingly nervous; indigestion. She writes as follows: "I wish to inform you that I am well. I never can praise you or your ways of treatment enough. I shall bring you ...
— The People's Common Sense Medical Adviser in Plain English • R. V. Pierce
... years ago. He was very sad as he pointed out this spot to his visitor. A few scraggly hedges and an apple tree, a charred bit of fence, a chimney foundation are the only markers of the home he built after years of a hard struggle to have a home. His land is all gone except the scant five acres upon which he lives, and this is only an expanse of broom straw. He is no longer able to cultivate the land, not ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States - From Interviews with Former Slaves - Florida Narratives • Works Projects Administration
... to take in the scant furniture of the laboratory at a glance and a quick step or two brought him before a steel filing cabinet. One drawer, which had not been closed as tightly as the rest, projected a bit. On its face was a little typewritten card bearing ...
— The War Terror • Arthur B. Reeve
... too, who might have given them food, were now their enemies. They indeed now and again brought scant supplies of fish to the starving men. But they demanded so much for it that soon the colonists were bare of everything they had possessed. They bartered the very shirts from their backs for food. And if they ...
— This Country Of Ours • H. E. Marshall Author: Henrietta Elizabeth Marshall
... on and on. Then long, deep swamps of alder barred his path, and, guided only by the compass, Rolf pushed in and through and ever east. Barely a mile an hour in the thickest part he made, but lagged not; drenched and footsore, warm and torn, but doggedly, steadily on. At three he had made a scant seven miles; then the level, open wood of Thunderbolt was reached and his stride became a run; trot, trot, trot, at six-mile gait, for but fifteen miles remained. Sustained, inspired, the bringer of good news, he halted not and faltered not, but on ...
— Rolf In The Woods • Ernest Thompson Seton
... Lancashire, with 1,330,000, had 14. Among towns, Birmingham and Manchester, each with upwards of 100,000 people, and Leeds and Sheffield, each with 50,000, had no representation whatever. On the other hand, boroughs were entitled to representation which contained ridiculously scant populations, or even no population at all. Gatto, in Surrey, was a park; Old Sarum, in Wiltshire, was a deserted hill; the remains of what once was Dunwich were under the waves of the North Sea. Bosseney, in Cornwall, was a hamlet of three cottages, eight of whose ...
— The Governments of Europe • Frederic Austin Ogg
... stove. Above this was a wooden mantel, painted to imitate marble, whereon were deposited two photographs, four curious Chinese shells, and a plaster cross to which there clung a very plaster young woman in scant attire, the whole being marked "Rock of Ages" in gilt ...
— The Panchronicon • Harold Steele Mackaye
... hardly finished before there were loud cries, and from the huts poured a motley gathering of Indians. They were attired in very scant costumes—in fact, they were as near like the aborigines as is customary in these modern days. And most of them had, streaked on their faces and bodies, colored earth or fire-ashes. Crude, fierce, and rather terrifying were ...
— The Moving Picture Girls at Rocky Ranch - Or, Great Days Among the Cowboys • Laura Lee Hope
... a scant piece of coarse sense and stretch it on the tenterhooks of half-a-score rhymes, until it crack that you may see through it and it rattle like a drumhead. When you see his verses hanged up in tobacco-shops, you may ...
— Character Writings of the 17th Century • Various
... help you," said Godwin. And they went with him into the courtyard, where by the scant light of the stars they saw a fine mule in charge of one of the serving men, and bound upon its back a long-shaped package sewn over with sacking. This the palmer unloosed, and taking one end, while Wulf, after bidding the man stable the ...
— The Brethren • H. Rider Haggard
... intensely human and interesting facts, notable and amusing things, as enthralling as a novel by Balzac,—Louise's life record in sum and substance, since her carryings-on after she doffed her royal robes for the motley of the free woman are of no historical, and but scant human interest. ...
— Secret Memoirs: The Story of Louise, Crown Princess • Henry W. Fischer
... can say To your great country that, with scant delay, You must, perforce, ease them in their loud need: We know that nearer first your duty lies; But—is it much to ask that you let plead Your lovingkindness with you—wooing-wise - Albeit that aught you owe, and must repay, No man ...
— Moments of Vision • Thomas Hardy
... prepare our scant meal, that she was bravely endeavoring to appear gay, while her heart remained heavy from memory of her father. Whether this assumed levity deceived De Noyan I cannot say—he was of a volatile nature, easily swayed by either smile or tear, and instantly joined responsive to her seeming ...
— Prisoners of Chance - The Story of What Befell Geoffrey Benteen, Borderman, - through His Love for a Lady of France • Randall Parrish
... tree, I located myself about five feet from the nest, and after carefully securing and focussing the camera, secured the view. My second I found later in the day in an apple tree. The tree was in bloom, but not leaved out, and offered but scant hide or protection for the nest. Indeed I, at first, took it for an old crow's nest, and was about to pass on, when up over the rim of the nest bobbed two long ear-like tufts—whence the bird gets its name. Approaching the tree, the mother quietly left, and as long as I was in that vicinity ...
— Ohio Arbor Day 1913: Arbor and Bird Day Manual - Issued for the Benefit of the Schools of our State • Various
... brain, John played with these idle fancies. Barboux, being out of condition and scant of breath, conversed very little. The Indians ...
— Fort Amity • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... very scant information on which to proceed," deplored Mrs. Gray. "I confess that I made a mistake in keeping our trouble a secret. Since that newspaper spread the news abroad I have done my best to amend the ...
— Grace Harlowe's Golden Summer • Jessie Graham Flower
... book is rank melodrama. It has scant literary quality. It is not planned to edify. Its only mission is to entertain you and,—if you belong to the action-loving majority, to ...
— Black Caesar's Clan • Albert Payson Terhune
... Behold our Sharon in his last mad act. With man long warring, quarreling with God, He crouches now beneath a woman's rod Predestined for his back while yet it lay Closed in an acorn which, one luckless day, He stole, unconscious of its foetal twig, From the scant garner of a sightless pig. With bleeding shoulders pitilessly scored, He bawls more lustily than once he snored. The sympathetic Comstocks droop to hear, And Carson river sheds a viscous tear, Which sturdy tumble-bugs assail amain, With ready thrift, ...
— Black Beetles in Amber • Ambrose Bierce
... thumbscrew, of stake and fagot, does not mean the end of persecution in the world. Those who stand for this reform to-day do not tread a flower-strewn path. It is yet an unpopular subject, under the ban of society and receiving scant measure of public sympathy, but it must continue to be urged. If the assertion had been accepted as conclusive, that a measure which after years of advocacy is still opposed by the majority should be dropped, the greatest reforms of history ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume IV • Various
... rose-gardens around the mountain wells, and resiny woods, where all seemed so desolate, adorning the hot foothills as well as the cool summits, fed by cordial and benevolent storms of rain and hail and snow; all of these scant and rare as compared with the immeasurable exuberance of California, but still amply sufficient throughout the barest deserts for a clear manifestation of ...
— Steep Trails • John Muir
... destroy our trade; But dirt, and damp, and defective drainage will raise that ghost on a world afraid; And at thirty years our strength is sapped by insidious siege of the stifling fume, Or what if we linger a little longer? Scant rays of comfort ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 100, June 20, 1891 • Various
... with three children weighing her down in the fierce struggle for existence, rendered tenfold fiercer after the industrial crisis preceding and following the War of 1812. Then it was that she was forced to supplement her scant earnings with refuse food from the table of "a certain mansion on State street." It was Lloyd who went for this food, and it was he who had to run the gauntlet of mischievous and inquisitive children whom he met and who longed for a peep into his tin pail. But the future apostle ...
— William Lloyd Garrison - The Abolitionist • Archibald H. Grimke
... love will work!" sighed the matchmaker after he had bidden the light-hearted Danvers good-night. "Standing practically alone against the might of Burroughs' millions—holding his scant forces by sheer force of character, yet downed by the mistaken attitude of a ...
— A Man of Two Countries • Alice Harriman
... for woman; they are her equitable portion. Let her keep near them if they are a part of life to her, and if she will. She is no traitor to herself, as Esau was; for she keeps he birthright and the pottage she earns is often very scant. ...
— The Trimmed Lamp and Others • O Henry
... shreds of flannel, which might once have borne the shape of drawers, a tattered shirt of unbleached linen, with an old blanket drawn uncouthly around his waist and shoulders, completed the costume of the man. His wife's was equally scant and rude, but so arranged as to present the idea that even in her breast the sense of fitness, the last feeling of froward womanhood, was not quite extinguished. The squalid rags and matted hair, by a single touch ...
— The Felon's Track • Michael Doheny
... he had missed was, however, of scant consequence now. All he asked was to get the car safely back to his father's garage before the family returned from New York on the afternoon train. Now that his excitement had cooled into sober second thought, he marveled that he had been led into committing such a monstrous offense. He ...
— Steve and the Steam Engine • Sara Ware Bassett
... was," said Gerald, with that scant smile of his; "but I was not so fortunate as to ...
— Aurora the Magnificent • Gertrude Hall
... away it began to rain. The next morning the water was coming down in torrents. Richling, looking out from a door in Prieur street, found scant room for one foot on the inner edge of the sidewalk; all the rest was under water. By noon the sidewalks were completely covered in miles of streets. By two in the afternoon the flood was coming into many of the houses. By three it was up at the door-sill on which he stood. ...
— Dr. Sevier • George W. Cable
... and often passing into verrucose and chinky conditions, but scarcely ever areolate, sometimes scant and evanescent; apothecia usually minute or small, and commonly adnate, exciple weak and often becoming covered; hypothecium and hymenium passing from pale through shades of brown, the former becoming darker than the latter, this rarely tinged blue or violet ...
— Ohio Biological Survey, Bull. 10, Vol. 11, No. 6 - The Ascomycetes of Ohio IV and V • Bruce Fink and Leafy J. Corrington
... now also that the feeble and the aged shunned the darkening shadows of the streets, and crept and cowered over the kindling hearth in the sheltered home. In Rehoboth October and November were ever drear; and now that the old Bridge Factory was in ruins, and work scarce and food scant, the minds of the people were overcast with what threatened to be the winter ...
— Lancashire Idylls (1898) • Marshall Mather
... book-learning that forms one part of it; and the result was that Ruth determined to get up early all through the bright summer mornings, to acquire the knowledge hereafter to be given to her child. Her mind was uncultivated, her reading scant; beyond the mere mechanical arts of education she knew nothing; but she had a refined taste, and excellent sense and judgment to separate the true from the false. With these qualities, she set to work under ...
— Ruth • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... a small town Built near the Sound, but of a scant renown, That always to its biggest size did run At summer-time, beneath a blazing sun, But rested as a town, as if to say, "I'll pay no further taxes, come what may;"— The ancient cobbler, JOHN, unknown to fame (So many cobblers ...
— Punchinello, Vol. II., No. 34, November 19, 1870 • Various
... 100,000, among which are 100 Europeans. The streets are broader and finer than any I had yet seen in any Indian town. The principal street, Tchandni-Tschank, would do honour to an European city: it is nearly three-quarters of a mile long, and about a hundred feet broad; a narrow canal, scant of water and half filled with rubbish, runs through its entire length. The houses in this street are not remarkable either for magnitude or splendour; they are at most one story high, and are furnished below with miserable ...
— A Woman's Journey Round the World • Ida Pfeiffer
... over a little doubtfully, but evidently impressed with the early hours I kept told me that I might try. He waved me to a desk, bidding me wait until he had made out his morning book of assignments; and with such scant ceremony was I finally introduced to Newspaper Row, that had been to me like an enchanted land. After twenty-seven years of hard work in it, during which I have been behind the scenes of most of the plays that go ...
— Analyzing Character • Katherine M. H. Blackford and Arthur Newcomb
... well understand your surprise. My father gave me scant thought—his soul was bound up ...
— The Empire Annual for Girls, 1911 • Various
... a danger to the universities in this very opportunity. At first pioneer democracy had scant respect for the expert. He believed that "a fool can put on his coat better than a wise man can do it for him." There is much truth in the belief; and the educated leader, even he who has been trained under present university conditions, in direct contact with the world about him, ...
— The Frontier in American History • Frederick Jackson Turner
... crept out—the peoples sat at home, And finding the long invocated peace (A pall embroidered with worn images Of rights divine) too scant to cover doom Such as they suffered, nursed the corn that grew Rankly to bitter bread, ...
— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne
... claim in living, when we have scant time to spare, Who are plundering the sea-depths, taking tribute of ...
— The Certain Hour • James Branch Cabell
... the aborigines were comparatively few or had disappeared altogether, did the whites remain racially distinct. Socially the Indian and the negro counted for little. They constituted the laboring class on whom all the burdens fell and for whom advantages in the body politic were scant. Legally the Indian under Spanish rule stood on a footing of equality with his white fellows, and many a gifted native came to be reckoned a force in the community, though his social position remained a subordinate one. Most of the ...
— The Hispanic Nations of the New World - Volume 50 in The Chronicles Of America Series • William R. Shepherd
... Ring, for the scant salvation! Toll, for the bonnie souls, — Neighbor and friend and bridegroom, Spinning upon ...
— Poems: Three Series, Complete • Emily Dickinson
... not far away and the indirect danger to it in any finicky growth of law and order. Still he had a keen sense of justice, and he knew that Dave had not told all the story, and from him Dave, to his wonder, got scant comfort—for another reason as well: with a deal pending for the sale of his lands, the shrewd old man would not risk giving offence to Hale—not until that matter was settled, anyway. And so June was safer from ...
— The Trail of the Lonesome Pine • John Fox, Jr.
... however, would be sure to be crotchety and hot-tempered enough to be easily offended. It would not be very pleasant if there were such a one, and he should learn all the truth about the thin, shabby clothes, the scant food, and the hard work. She felt very queer indeed, and very uncertain, and she gave ...
— A Little Princess • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... legs and could dig his feet into the unstable clay. Then, inch by inch, scarce daring to hope, he pulled himself up, up until he was free of the flood and between him and the ground above only a scant yard remained. Below him the rushing torrents roared, as though angry at his escape, and tossed horrid ...
— The New Boy at Hilltop • Ralph Henry Barbour
... point out that the sentence of exclusion from the land was but the necessary consequence of the temper and character which the refusal to advance had betrayed. Such people were not fit for the fight. A new generation, braced by the keen air and scant fare of the desert, with firmer muscles and hearts than these enervated slaves had, was needed for the conquest. The sentence was mercy as well as judgment; it was better that they should live in the wilderness, and die there by natural process, after having had more education ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus and Numbers • Alexander Maclaren
... been old, in feeble health and my husband's mother, I would have considered the words scant reparation for the contemptuous phrases with which she had scourged my spirit a few ...
— Revelations of a Wife - The Story of a Honeymoon • Adele Garrison
... modern, who got rich by any ignoble means. They would rather face poverty with gladness of heart. Fu-gai, one of the most distinguished Zen masters just before the Restoration, supported many student monks in his monastery. They were often too numerous to be supported by his scant means. This troubled his disciple much whose duty it was to look after the food-supply, as there was no other means to meet the increased demand than to supply with worse stuff. Accordingly, one day the disciple advised Fu-gai not to admit new students any more into the monastery. ...
— The Religion of the Samurai • Kaiten Nukariya
... 31, Edward resumed his eastward march. At Lisieux, the next important stage, came the inevitable two cardinals with their inevitable proposals of mediation, which Edward put aside with scant civility. The army was soon once more on the move, and on August 7 struck the Seine at Elbeuf, a few miles higher up the river than Rouen. Here Edward was at last in touch with his enemy. During the English march through ...
— The History of England - From the Accession of Henry III. to the Death of Edward III. (1216-1377) • T.F. Tout
... together to Pole's, and returning she stopped before the barn-like building where Grace gathered on Sundays a scant audience to hear the sermons which Rivers had told him had too much ...
— Westways • S. Weir Mitchell
... time in reaching Cartown with the belated mail, and so was obliged to leave the girls an the road with scant ceremony, hardly pausing to discuss why he had been bound when no ...
— The Motor Girls on a Tour • Margaret Penrose
... reverently watching her every movement, hanging on her every word—no light task. And my reward? A scant unceremonious "Hallo!" when we meet; a scanter "Night" or "Morning," according to the circumstances, when we part. A brave smile from me and she is gone, an unwitting spectator of ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 146., January 14, 1914 • Various
... of astonishment annoyed the Master, even while it hurt him. He took scant pleasure in rebuffing this old friend; but certainly "Captain Alden" would not bear discussing. Feeling himself in a kind of impasse regarding Alden, and fearing some telltale expression in his eyes, the Master swung up his binoculars ...
— The Flying Legion • George Allan England
... small room in the left wing, as far removed from her own apartments as possible, and transferring all details of his care to Misery Agnew, the old housekeeper. Misery endeavored to "do her duty" by the boy, but appreciating the scant courtesy with which he was treated by her mistress, it is not surprising the old woman regarded him merely as a dependent and left him mostly ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces • Edith Van Dyne
... no point exceeds a quarter of a mile. It is separated from the mainland by a scarcely perceptible creek, oozing its way through a wilderness of reeds and slime, a favorite resort of the marsh-hen. The vegetation, as might be supposed, is scant, or at least dwarfish. No trees of any magnitude are to be seen. Near the western extremity, where Fort Moultrie stands, and where are some miserable frame buildings, tenanted during summer by the fugitives ...
— Short Stories Old and New • Selected and Edited by C. Alphonso Smith
... her dishes, set the scant furniture in place, made up the bed with the clean sheet spread the night before, ...
— Special Messenger • Robert W. Chambers
... their physiography scant in fact, and stuffed out with fables; their physiology imbrangled with an inapplicable logic and a misgrowth of 'entia rationalia', that is, substantiated abstractions; and their physiogony a blank or dreams of tradition, and such "intentional colours" as occupy space but cannot fill it. Yet if ...
— The Literary Remains Of Samuel Taylor Coleridge • Edited By Henry Nelson Coleridge
... woman emerge from a lodge and in the face of the storm begin to climb the hill, down which the wind swept, laying low the grass and whipping the heads of the flowers. Seemingly unmindful of the storm, on the woman went, her scant garments flapping, and her hair, seamed with grey, tossing about her wrinkled face. The sight was so strange that I paused to watch her, as she climbed on and on, steadfastly breasting the storm. The ...
— Indian Story and Song - from North America • Alice C. Fletcher
... Dona Concepcion's favourite pupil, and when at home spent her time reading, embroidering, or riding about the rancho, closely attended. She rarely talked, even to her mother. She paid not the slightest attention to Ygnacio's serenades, and greeted him with scant courtesy when he dashed up to the ranch-house in all the bravery of silk and fine lawn, silver and lace. But he knew the value of Dona Brigida as an ally, and was content to ...
— The Splendid Idle Forties - Stories of Old California • Gertrude Atherton
... 1899, the Legislature of Massachusetts effaced the last vestige of State ownership by giving the Vanderbilts a perpetual lease of this richly profitable railroad for a scant two million dollars' payment a year. During the debate over this act Representative Dean charged in the Legislature that "it is common rumor in the State House that members are receiving $300 apiece for their votes." The acquisition of this railroad enabled the New York Central ...
— Great Fortunes from Railroads • Gustavus Myers
... (Hippeastrum) is altogether too little known in its modern varieties. Everyone has seen one of the old forms, red or red with a white stripe, with the lily-like flowers borne well aloft above scant foliage. But the new named sorts are tremendous improvements and should by all means be tried, even if they seem expensive beside other bulbs, of which you can get a dozen for the price of one good amaryllis. Remember, however, that the amaryllis is of the very easiest ...
— Gardening Indoors and Under Glass • F. F. Rockwell
... worth while to realize that the voice that first sung it was that of the irritable little poet who found some of his scant comfort in the grand words and phrases and ...
— The Greatest English Classic A Study of the King James Version of • Cleland Boyd McAfee
... can you inform us how we can get some food? We have picked up two Spanish traders on our way here from Dover, but our larders were emptied before we sailed, and we found but scant supply on board ...
— By Pike and Dyke: A Tale of the Rise of the Dutch Republic • G.A. Henty
... bottom of which it turned along the line of High Street, past St. Julian's Church which overhung it, to the top of Wyle Cop, when it followed the ridge back to the castle. Of the part extending from Pride Hill to Wyle Cop only scant traces exist at the back of ...
— Vanishing England • P. H. Ditchfield
... said; "what has befallen during my absence at Gradiska? The familiars of the Inquisition have been seeking you here—you, the last person whose name I should expect to hear in such mouths. Alarm me it did not; for well I know that you are too scant of energy and settled purpose to be mixed up ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLII. Vol. LV. April, 1844 • Various
... was such a dear, quiet little nurse, he said, and with that scant meed of praise Fay was supposed ...
— Wee Wifie • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... Rheineck at once accorded him the hospitality he required, for though he had but scant cheer for himself, and nought of comfort to bestow, he had still some of the feeling of a gentleman ...
— Folk-lore and Legends: German • Anonymous
... translation is the English or Saxon Chronicle. This was probably at first a dry record, especially of important births and deaths in the West-Saxon kingdom. Alfred enlarged this scant record, beginning the story with Caesar's conquest. When it touches his own reign the dry chronicle becomes an interesting and connected story, the oldest history belonging to any modern nation in its own language. The record of Alfred's reign, probably by himself, is a splendid bit of ...
— English Literature - Its History and Its Significance for the Life of the English Speaking World • William J. Long
... earlier date, speaks of roots of mighty trees found in the sand about the Mount, but without giving the exact place. Lelant (1533-40) knows of "Spere Heddes, Axis for Warre, and Swerdes of Copper wrapped up in lynist, scant perishid," that had been found of late years near the Mount, in St. Hilary's parish, in tin works; but he places the land that had been devoured of the sea between Penzance and Mousehole, i.e. more than two ...
— Chips From A German Workshop. Vol. III. • F. Max Mueller
... house of the good and godly man, for he, as his God, abhors them; but they are to be found in the house of evil doers, such as Mr. Badman's is. 'Are there,' saith the prophet, 'yet the treasures of wickedness in the house of the wicked, and the scant measure that is abominable!' (Micah 6:10). Are they there yet, notwithstanding God's forbidding, notwithstanding God's tokens of anger against those that do such things! O how loth is a wicked man to let go a sweet, a gainful ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... years later he left Illinois the foremost man in the nation, and known to all the world. He assisted his father in clearing fifteen acres of land, and split the rails with which to build the fence. Although of age, he had no money, and having but a scant supply of clothing, made a bargain with Nancy Miller to make him a pair of trousers. For each yard of cloth required he split four hundred fence-rails, and as he was over six feet in height it took ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 4 of 8 • Various
... of England could live easily for years on oatmeal, sour milk, and cod's heads, while the fighting clothes of a whole regiment would have been a scant wardrobe for the Greek Slave, and after two centuries of almost uninterrupted carnage their war debt was only a trifle ...
— Comic History of England • Bill Nye
... unable to defend themselves were robbed of their scanty supplies of food and clothing. Dark stories were afloat, of men, both sick and well, who were murdered at night, strangled to death by their comrades for scant supplies of clothing or money. I heard a sick and wounded Federal prisoner accuse his nurse, a fellow-prisoner of the United States Army, of having stealthily, during his sleep inoculated his wounded arm with gangrene, that he might destroy his life and fall ...
— Andersonville, complete • John McElroy
... can discern the outline of a strong, bold, prompt nature. He had a hard task, and he did it like a man. Patient, yet vigorous, glowing with enthusiasm, yet clear-eyed, self-forgetful, and brave, he has had scant justice done him, and ought to be a very much more familiar and honoured figure than he is. 'Who art thou, O great mountain? Before Zerubbabel thou shalt become a plain.' Great mountains only become plains before men of strong wills ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... Quodlings' and had his interview with the head of the firm. Mr. Quodling, senior, was a gruff, heavy-featured man, decidedly of coarse fibre; when moved he swore with gusto, and it did not take much to put him out. At present he was in an irritable mood, and, very unlike his habit, gave scant attention to the affair of which Gammon spoke. It would not have improved his temper had he known that the town traveller was amusing himself with the reflection that there was no trace of personal resemblance between him and his brother Francis, ...
— The Town Traveller • George Gissing
... it may be," said Trenchon, with easy confidence. "I, for one, fear him not. Come, lass, with me, and see if I cannot, after all these years, pick out thy father's dwelling. Come, I say, thou must not longer tarry here; the rain is coming on afresh, and these trees, thick as they are, form scant protection. It is outrageous that thou should wander in this storm, while thy brutal father lies in shelter. Nay, do not fear harm for either thee or me; and as for him, he shall not suffer if thou but wish ...
— The Face And The Mask • Robert Barr
... settled the coffee with a piece of ice, glanced from Malemute Kid to her husband, then at the dogs, but vouchsafed no reply. It was such a palpable truism that none was necessary. Two hundred miles of unbroken trail in prospect, with a scant six days' grub for themselves and none for the dogs, could admit no other alternative. The two men and the woman grouped about the fire and began their meager meal. The dogs lay in their harnesses for it was a midday halt, and watched ...
— The Son of the Wolf • Jack London
... and searched the sky for wind clouds, while the sailors whistled shrilly for a breeze. But none came and the night descended calm, dark, and still. As the slow hours dragged themselves away, the ship's company, weary of the monotony of their watch, sought their sleeping places, or found such scant comfort as the decks afforded, until of them all only the sentry ...
— At War with Pontiac - The Totem of the Bear • Kirk Munroe and J. Finnemore
... thought of killing and the joy it had experienced as the cat died scant moments before, was replaced by another thought. ...
— The Monster • S. M. Tenneshaw
... this harbor of the hills was rough with outcropping rock. In some great stress of nature the trees had been destroyed utterly, and only a scant growth of weeds and wild flowers remained. The place suggested a battle-ground for the winds, where they might meet and struggle in wild combat; or more practically, it was large enough for the evolutions of a squadron ...
— The Port of Missing Men • Meredith Nicholson
... mind had scant patience with the policy of cowardice which dictates death-bed confessions, regretted that Alice, having remained silent so long, had not kept ...
— The Moon Rock • Arthur J. Rees
... OF THE SUBJECT. One of the commonest methods of arousing interest in an audience apathetic and indifferent is to impress upon them the importance and gravity of the question at issue. Matters thought to be trivial are apt to receive scant attention. This fact is so universally recognized that many writers and speakers attempt at the very outset to show that upon the correct solution of the problem at hand depend serious and far-reaching results. It is seldom enough merely to state that a subject is important; ...
— Practical Argumentation • George K. Pattee
... week, when Riverville was the boundary of her interests, a letter from him would have had scant attention. But coming at this time, when a homesick mood brought the old life so vividly before her that it had suddenly become very dear and desirable, she opened it eagerly. It was the first one she had received from him, for she had told him on leaving ...
— Mary Ware's Promised Land • Annie Fellows Johnston
... Carfax treated Scarlett with scant ceremony. The lean-faced fellow devoured the item that the Princess of Aragon was safe at Gamewell, but gave nothing in return. Scarlett had been left to cool his heels in the great hall of Nottingham Castle for near an hour afterward, whilst Simeon Carfax was closeted ...
— Robin Hood • Paul Creswick
... he went into the tent after G. W., he found the boy divested of his splendid regimentals, kneeling in a very scant and child-like costume before the table—which, by the way, was composed of two soap-boxes covered with a flag—and scanning the faces of "the Boy and his Mother." A strange yearning in G. W.'s eyes caused the officer ...
— A Little Dusky Hero • Harriet T. Comstock
... ate, or rather devoured, their small portion, wondering where their brother had found it. Perchance they might have relished it less if they had known that Dominick had saved it off his own too scant allowance, when he saw that the little store in the boat was drawing to an end—saved it in the hope of being able to prolong the lives of Pauline ...
— The Island Queen • R.M. Ballantyne
... shoulders when a puff of wind threw back the folds of her veil. She rose in splendour from behind the mountain in the waning hour of night, like the 'Morning Star' to help all travellers astray, like the very dawn of Love. And when he had ascended to this height—scant of breath, yet still unsatiated—he could only further glorify her with the title of 'Queen,' with which he nine times hailed her, as with nine parting salutations from the censer of his soul. His canticle ...
— Abbe Mouret's Transgression - La Faute De L'abbe Mouret • Emile Zola
... Prentiss's card in a drawer she was cleaning and the thought had come to her that therein lay a possibility which never had been tested. After all these years it might not be possible to reach him, and when he was found it might not be possible to derive any benefit from the scant acquaintance, but it was worth trying, and if there was a way, Jap would find it, so she had shown him the card and he had joined her ...
— The Fighting Shepherdess • Caroline Lockhart
... 'Thou dost me scant justice, cousin,' said Rowland, 'maintaining that I love but myself or for mine own ends. I know that ...
— St. George and St. Michael • George MacDonald
... will be polite and delightful to you—as a doctor, he would treat you with scant civility, and would probably give you little or none of ...
— The Strand Magazine: Volume VII, Issue 37. January, 1894. - An Illustrated Monthly • Edited by George Newnes
... kind woman's home, but was surprised to learn of her removal, no one knew where. Supplies and money soon were gone, and for several months she and her children lived on scant fare from wages for odd ...
— Oswald Langdon - or, Pierre and Paul Lanier. A Romance of 1894-1898 • Carson Jay Lee
... early, both from long habit, and from the scant sleep of an elderly man; he could not lie in bed; but his wife always had her breakfast there and remained so long that the chambermaid had done up most of the other rooms and had leisure for talk with her. As soon as he was awake, he stole softly out and was the first in the dining-room for breakfast. ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... the early morning steamer and went straight to Naples. They drove from the quay to the station, then took the little local train for Vesuvius. Italian railways generally provide scant accommodation for the number of passengers, so there ensued a wild scramble for seats, and it was only by the help of the conductor, whom she had judiciously tipped, that Miss Morley managed to keep her flock together, and settle them in one of the small saloon carriages. ...
— The Jolliest School of All • Angela Brazil
... English intensely and that it galled him exceedingly to see them pushing further and further to the north and the west. His own lands around the Great Lakes were being invaded, and when his tribe went to the English for redress they got but scant attention. ...
— On the Trail of Pontiac • Edward Stratemeyer
... maddening, after that, he would ride down to the Wolverine for news. And the news was monotonously scant. Phoebe could read and write, after a fashion, and Billy Louise sent her a letter now and then, saying that mommie was about the same, and that she wanted John to do certain things about the ranch. She ...
— The Ranch at the Wolverine • B. M. Bower
... meat—when the swarm of beggars that came forth was a sight truly calamitous. Many a decent auld woman that had patiently eiked out the slender thread of a weary life with her wheel, in privacy, her scant and want known only to her Maker, was seen going from door to door with the salt tear in her e'e, and looking in the face of the pitiful, being as yet unacquainted with the language of beggary; but the ...
— The Provost • John Galt
... would not" was the obstinate reply. "I should take care to find a lotos as soon as I reached the Nile. Whoever eats of that forgets his past life, you know. I have scant reason for wishing to remember mine," he ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XII. No. 30. September, 1873 • Various
... that is the sole dramatic element. Nevertheless, by sheer wit interest is maintained to the end, every one smiling over the rival claims of such veteran humbugs as the old-time pardoner and apothecary; scant reverence does 'Pothecary vouchsafe to Pardoner's potent relics, his 'of All Hallows the blessed jaw-bone', his 'great toe of the Trinity', his 'buttock-bone of Pentecost', and the rest. One of the raciest passages occurs in the Pardoner's ...
— The Growth of English Drama • Arnold Wynne
... heavily across the field, for the Pioneer was much overloaded for a quick take-off. She bumped and bounced for a quarter-mile before taking to the air and then climbed very slowly indeed, for several minutes. Our speed was a scant two hundred miles an hour when we swung out over New York and headed for the Atlantic. And then Hart made first use of the rocket tubes, not daring to discharge the hot gases below while over populated land ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science July 1930 • Various
... nothing definite was done until after his departure for Italy. It was then, while staying in Rome, that he began to put upon paper that plot which had first occupied his thoughts three years before, in the scant leisure allowed him by his duties at the Liverpool consulate. Of leisure there was not a great deal at Rome, either; for, as the "French and Italian Note-Books" show, sight-seeing and social intercourse took up a good deal of his time, and the daily record in his journal likewise had to ...
— Sketches and Studies • Nathaniel Hawthorne |
