"Surmise" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... embroidery wears: Bid amaranthus all his beauty shed, And daffodillies fill their cups with tears To strew the laureate hearse where Lycid lies. For so to interpose a little ease, Let our frail thoughts dally with false surmise; Ay me! whilst thee the shores and sounding seas Wash far away,—where'er thy bones are hurl'd; Whether beyond the stormy Hebrides Where thou perhaps, under the whelming tide Visitest the bottom of the monstrous world; Or whether thou, to our moist vows denied, ...
— The Golden Treasury - Of the Best Songs and Lyrical Poems in the English Language • Various
... his Pa,— Quite possibly recalling his own youth, And therefrom predicating, by high noon, The absent one was very probably Disporting his nude self in the delights Of the old swimmin'-hole, some hundred yards Below the slaughter-house, just east of town. The stoic father, too, in his surmise Was accurate—For, ...
— A Child-World • James Whitcomb Riley
... I marry, there's the point: But if without him we be thought to feeble, My iudgement is, we should not step too farre Till we had his Assistance by the hand. For in a Theame so bloody fac'd, as this, Coniecture, Expectation, and Surmise Of Aydes incertaine, should not ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare
... consequences that ensue if the phenomena of heredity are considered as phenomena of memory. Thus, when he is dealing with the phenomena of old age (vol. i. p. 538, ed. 2) he does not ascribe them to lapse and failure of memory, nor surmise the principle underlying longevity. He never mentions memory in connection with heredity without presently saying something which makes us involuntarily think of a man missing an easy catch at cricket; it is only rarely, however, that he connects the ...
— Luck or Cunning? • Samuel Butler
... exquisite significance and tenderness. It is a beautiful smile still, but that charm of rarity (if it be a charm) is lacking. It is a conventional smile more than a spontaneous or a happy one; indeed, it led me to surmise that she had perhaps not been very happy since we last met, and had learned to use this smile as a sort of veil. Not that I suppose for a moment that Courtney has ill-treated her. I never could see anything in the man beyond a superficial ...
— David Poindexter's Disappearance and Other Tales • Julian Hawthorne
... it. Fred knew that he must be a Russian. Yet in every detail of his appearance he was German. His clothes, his bearing, his every little mannerism, were carefully studied. Fred guessed that this was no servant, but a secret agent of much skill and experience. He was to learn the truth of his surmise before many ...
— The Boy Scouts In Russia • John Blaine
... In this surmise he was perfectly correct. No one of the name of Julius Hoffman was known at the Langham. The Hounslow police made no discovery, and the car was ...
— The Master Detective - Being Some Further Investigations of Christopher Quarles • Percy James Brebner
... and caution, he had succeeded in restoring Elise to her father's house, without her absence having been remarked, or having occasioned any surmise. In the close carriage in which they performed the journey home, they had not exchanged a word; but leaning hack on the cushions, each had rest and repose after the stormy and exciting scenes they had just passed through. Elise's hand still rested on Bertram's, ...
— The Merchant of Berlin - An Historical Novel • L. Muhlbach
... Might not her refusal to marry him be caused by the same fear? some crushing disgrace or misery which threatened her through the murder, and which she feared to bring upon her husband? The motive I had guessed to be strong as her love: what if it were her love? Having stepped from surmise to surmise so far, I paused to strengthen my position by the facts. There were but two ways in which this murder could have prevented her marriage—through Merrick's guilt or her own. His innocence was proven; hers I did not doubt after I had ...
— The Galaxy - Vol. 23, No. 1 • Various
... was correct in his surmise was shown later when Bob and Sam turned their craft into the stream which led to Round Lake, and then landed, evidently ...
— Messenger No. 48 • James Otis
... ye take [Sidenote: Watch knowing folk, and] Where ye be sette / right in ententyf wyse Connyng folk / connyng men shal make 500 To their connyng ye shal make your surmise [Sidenote: their skill.] And as they do / ye muste your self deuyse For this my childe / is as the gospel trewe Who wil be connyng / he must [th]^e ...
— Caxton's Book of Curtesye • Frederick J. Furnivall
... Hazy weather at noon with a considerable swell from the westward. Latitude observed to be 47 degrees 35 minutes north. NOTE—We found this morning at daybreak that the Audacious was missing, and we concluded was the ship who had secured the prize, neither being in sight.* (* Of course this surmise was incorrect. The Audacious had not secured the Revolutionnaire which was towed into Rochefort by the Audacieux (curious similarity in names). The Audacious badly crippled made her way to Plymouth ...
— The Life of Captain Matthew Flinders • Ernest Scott
... His surmise might have been correct; though all I need add on this point is that my old friend "Joe" is now an admiral, with grown-up daughters of his own, and from his austere manner no one would ever dream of his susceptible nature ...
— Crown and Anchor - Under the Pen'ant • John Conroy Hutcheson
... fair young princess at his son's expense; but similar changes in state marriages were such matters of course, that no emotions were likely to be created in consequence. There is no proof whatever, nor any reason to surmise; that any love passages ever existed between Don ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... official or registered form, touching the policy outlined by Mr. Johnson. He was the duly-elected Vice-President. He had come to the magistracy in presumed sympathy and close affiliation with the Republicans whose suffrages he had received. All beyond these facts was surmise or inference. No one knew any thing with precision ...
— Twenty Years of Congress, Volume 2 (of 2) • James Gillespie Blaine
... some fierce swearing in Dublin Castle on the day that news arrived, and perhaps many a passionate query blurted out as to whether police, detectives, magistrates, and all in that southern district were not secretly in league with the rebels. In fact, a surmise actually got into the papers that the proprietors of the gunshops knew more about the disappearance of the arms, and were less aggrieved by the "seizure" than they cared to acknowledge. However this might be, the popular party enjoyed the whole thing immensely, ...
— Speeches from the Dock, Part I • Various
... Grant drily, "although I hope it will be, this country isn't quite free yet. I surmise that you don't know that the office of your contemporary farther east was broken into a few hours ago, and an article written by a friend of mine pulled out of the press. The proprietor was quietly held down upon the floor ...
— The Cattle-Baron's Daughter • Harold Bindloss
... about the country during, it is to be hoped, vacation- time only, and is to be found writing the most cheerful letters to his friends in Ireland (all of whom are persuaded that he is going some day to be somebody, though sorely puzzled to surmise what thing or when, so pleasantly does he take life), from all sorts of out-of-the-way country places, where he lodges with quaint old landladies who wonder maternally why he never gets drunk, and generally mistake him for an author until he pays his bill. ...
— Obiter Dicta - Second Series • Augustine Birrell
... dust, Hoping in vain to come across a crust. And, when our God-born WILHELM brings his Huns Here, he will find a few odd skeletons." Such is the tale a Teuton lately writ. How, then, I ask, does London look so fit? This is the reason, mainly, I surmise— We are fed up, of ...
— Punch or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, October 7, 1914 • Various
... own I was glad to receive your assurance that the Calcutta paper's surmise was unfounded. {398} It is said that when we wish a thing to be true, we are prone to believe it true; but I think (judging from myself) we adopt with a still prompter credulity ...
— Charlotte Bronte and Her Circle • Clement K. Shorter
... owls, in their habitation on the old ruined gateway, whenever we choose. Confident of protection, these pretty birds betray no fear when the stranger mounts up to their place of abode. I would here venture a surmise, that the barn owl sleeps standing. Whenever we go to look at it, we invariably see it upon the perch bolt upright, and often with its eyes closed, apparently fast asleep. Buffon and Bewick err (no doubt, unintentionally) when ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 19, Issue 530, January 21, 1832 • Various
... because "it is involved in the idea." Such thinkers do not reflect that the idea, being a result of abstraction, ought to conform to the facts, and can not make the facts conform to it. The argument is at most admissible as an appeal to authority; a surmise, that what is now part of the idea, must, before it became so, have been found by previous inquirers in the facts. Nevertheless, the philosopher who more than all others made professions of rejecting authority, Descartes, constructed his system on this very basis. His favorite ...
— A System Of Logic, Ratiocinative And Inductive • John Stuart Mill
... Leger, who was the commodore's cook; and as he was a Frenchman, and suspected to be a papist, it was by some imagined that he had deserted with a view of betraying all that he knew to the enemy; but this appeared by the event to be an ill-grounded surmise, for it was afterwards known that he had been taken by some Indians, who carried him prisoner to Acapulco, from whence he was transferred, to Mexico, and then to Vera Cruz, where he was shipped on board a vessel bound to Old Spain: ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 11 • Robert Kerr
... were quite alone in the room designed for his studio, 'you are to reign mistress here; but be careful never to drop a hint regarding the humble manner in which you have lived for so many years; no one must surmise that we have been in poverty, or our ruin is certain. I intend giving an entertainment to my friends a few nights hence, and then I shall introduce you to society; meantime I expect that you will provide yourself with elegant and ...
— Tales for Young and Old • Various
... The shrewdness of this surmise struck her as not without humour. She smiled, and, turning, flung the stick straight down to the path ...
— The Obstacle Race • Ethel M. Dell
... down-spout, and from the top of the window to the spout he saw stretching what looked like a double cord. It was painted the same color as the walls, and had he not been looking out specially he would not have seen it. A moment's glance at the foot of the spout showed him his surmise was correct. Pushed in behind it and normally concealed by it were two insulated wires, which ran down the wall from the window and disappeared into the ground with ...
— The Pit Prop Syndicate • Freeman Wills Crofts
... understandable. Remained only the object of an expedition of this peculiar character. Sam Bolton knew that the Indian would satisfy himself by surmises,—he would never apply the direct question to a man's affairs,—and surmise might come dangerously near the truth. So he proceeded to impart a little information in ...
— The Silent Places • Stewart Edward White
... occupied the chair in which he had expected to find Daly. He thanked the clerk and went back thoughtfully to his place, because it looked as if Daly had been there and the other had helped him to steal away. If this surmise was correct, they might be trying to follow Featherstone; but he was, fortunately, out of their reach, and Foster decided that he must not exaggerate the importance of the matter. After all, Daly might have come to Montreal on business, and the rotunda of a ...
— Carmen's Messenger • Harold Bindloss
... character and the character of that peculiar disquiet which the howl of the creature evokes. But since the senses of a dog are totally unlike those of a man, we shall never really know. And we can only surmise, in the vaguest way, the meaning of the uneasiness in ourselves. Some notes in the long cry,—and the weirdest of them,—oddly resemble those tones of the human voice that tell of agony and terror. Again, we have reason to believe that the sound of the cry itself became associated ...
— In Ghostly Japan • Lafcadio Hearn
... Shoxford, my cousin," Lord Castlewood said to me that day, after a plain though courteous refusal to enlighten me even with a mere surmise, except upon the condition before rejected. "I can not allow you to be there without strict supervision and protection. You will not, perhaps, be aware of it, as perhaps you have not been before; but a careful watch will be kept on you. I merely tell you ...
— Erema - My Father's Sin • R. D. Blackmore
... a singular exhibition of the efficiency of the Department. He had no hesitation, however, in expressing an unofficial opinion that there were five thousand of these recruits. It is scarce necessary to surmise what the condition of the army was likely to be, with James Wilkinson as the senior general officer of consecutive service, and with Dearborn, a man of sixty, and in civil life ever since the War ...
— Sea Power in its Relations to the War of 1812 - Volume 1 • Alfred Thayer Mahan
... How the two hosts managed to live in the mean time the tellers of the story do not say. Thucydides, the historian, thinks it likely that the Greeks had to farm the neighboring lands for food. How the Trojans and their allies contrived to survive so long within their walls we are left to surmise, unless they farmed their streets. And thus we reach the opening of the tenth year ...
— Historic Tales, vol 10 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... great satisfaction. "Those two are going to catch it!" she said to herself; "I am glad I am out of it!" Mr Roberts knew sorrowfully that the surmise was woefully true, but he was rather relieved to find that his sister-in-law was "going to catch it" with him. Her presence was a sort of stick for him to ...
— All's Well - Alice's Victory • Emily Sarah Holt
... fallen into the way of not considering things, especially such things as were under Jack's care. We had, therefore, never doubted for a moment that all was going well, so that it was with no little anxiety that we heard him make the above remark. However, we had no time for question or surmise, for at the moment he spoke a heavy squall was bearing down upon us; and as we were then flying with our lee gunwale dipping occasionally under the waves, it was evident that we should have to lower our sail altogether. In a few seconds the squall ...
— The Coral Island - A Tale Of The Pacific Ocean • R. M. Ballantyne
... I asked what made him surmise all this: when it seemed to me that with speedy country horses they might already be far ...
— Debts of Honor • Maurus Jokai
... enough to contradict this unfair insinuation, and also the incorrect surmise that I went to the States to the interest of any paper or person? I simply made the journey in search of health, and not interest of ...
— The Confessions of a Caricaturist, Vol 2 (of 2) • Harry Furniss
... conjectured that he and Marcia had an understanding; and some of the ladies used such scant opportunity as he gave them to make sly allusions to her absence and his desolate condition. They were confirmed in their surmise by the fact, known from actual observation, that Bartley had not spoken a word to any other young lady since Marcia ...
— A Modern Instance • William Dean Howells
... Love and Personal Beauty I intimated (116) that Oliver Goldsmith was the first author who had a suspicion of the fact that love is not the same everywhere and at all times. My surmise was apparently correct; it is not refuted by any of the references to love by the several authors just quoted, since all of these were written from about a half a century to a century later than Goldsmith's Citizen of the World (published in 1764), which contains ...
— Primitive Love and Love-Stories • Henry Theophilus Finck
... have been her protector since she was fourteen years of age. She is the possessor of a large fortune in her own right. Her father,—who was my brother,—gave her into my care when he was on his death-bed. I leave you to surmise just what were his dying words to me. She was his idol. I have not failed him in any respect. You ask me to give my consent to your marriage. I cannot do so. No doubt you will be married, just as you have planned. ...
— West Wind Drift • George Barr McCutcheon
... surmise, Herbert," said George Melville, after a pause. "It did occur to me that our worthy landlord might be the famous outlaw in question, but the description to which you refer seems to fit the colonel better. There is one thing, however, that ...
— Do and Dare - A Brave Boy's Fight for Fortune • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... on the part of the vessel. Why did she steer so straight for land? Why did she so quickly drop anchor and put out two boats? Could it be that this vessel had been on their track? Could it be that the Peruvian government—But he could not waste time in surmise as to what might be. They must act, ...
— The Adventures of Captain Horn • Frank Richard Stockton
... employed in this manner, but none of those on whom he called could give him the slightest information. They all believed that Master Pearson had left the country, and some supposed that he had gone to one of the plantations in America, but that was only a surmise, as he had for some reason or other left no trace of the direction he had taken. Very unwillingly, therefore, Jack and his companion returned ...
— John Deane of Nottingham - Historic Adventures by Land and Sea • W.H.G. Kingston
... his hand upon it, found that it was attached to his lady's great toe, and said to himself:—This must be some trick: and afterwards discovering that the thread passed out of the window, was confirmed in his surmise. Wherefore, he softly severed it from the lady's toe, and affixed it to his own; and waited, all attention, to learn the result of his experiment. Nor had he long to wait before Ruberto came, and Arriguccio felt him jerk the thread according to his wont: and as Arriguccio had not known how ...
— The Decameron, Vol. II. • Giovanni Boccaccio
... once had a surmise, nor was it mistaken. The usual greetings had scarcely passed, when the girl, with cheeks on ...
— The Disentanglers • Andrew Lang
... habitations were observed on the small streams. Though these occur sometimes in little groups, the court-yards are not connected so as to form a defensive village. Small inclosed surfaces, with no evidence that a house ever was connected with them, were also observed. Mr. Bandelier could only surmise that these were garden-plots, something like the ...
— The Prehistoric World - Vanished Races • E. A. Allen
... His surmise proved correct. The holder of the fort was taken at a disadvantage; he fired wildly in consequence, and had the mortification of perceiving that not one of ...
— A Tale of the Summer Holidays • G. Mockler
... he said, "is not a great strategist, yet I surmise he is ready in case of trouble to seize ...
— The Sword Maker • Robert Barr
... Dick's surmise that the advancing party was being spied on seemed to be correct, since before they reached the cave shots came from the cavern, and there was the vicious whine and ping of bullets. One or two of the cowboys were hit, ...
— The Boy Ranchers in Death Valley - or Diamond X and the Poison Mystery • Willard F. Baker
... made up of the two metals; and hence the supply of silver would be increased in the other countries. And so it is quite possible, up to a certain point, that the larger silver coin should be replaced by small gold ones, ten and five franc pieces etc. Rau is certainly right in his surmise that a general rise in the price of commodities as compared with coin, the result of a great increase of gold, would go farthest in countries in which the gold is the medium of circulation, begin later in those which had a mixed circulation, and continue for the the shortest time in those countries ...
— Principles Of Political Economy • William Roscher
... fie upon you! how bawdy[137] you are! I-wis, Friendship, it mought[138] have been spoken at twice: What think you, for your saying that the people will surmise? ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. II • Robert Dodsley
... she had carried my mother in her arms, as she had carried me, and had made the proud discovery of her first tooth, as, piously exploring among my tender gums with her little finger, she had found mine, I stared at the Pacific of her possible nursings, in a wild surmise, silent upon a peak of wonder. "Well, then, Auntie," I asked, "do you think you're much more ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 105, July 1866 • Various
... marked on the chart, such as Christmas Harbour and Cumberland Bay, which have been properly sounded and have the points laid down; but of this western coast little appears known, and it has been only from surmise that the outlines of the map have been sketched in. I really don't think any exploring party has ever visited it since Monsieur Lieutenant de Kerguelen-Tremarec briefly surveyed it in 1772—more than a hundred ...
— The Wreck of the Nancy Bell - Cast Away on Kerguelen Land • J. C. Hutcheson
... The conversation turned principally upon the trade and customs of the coast. The slave-trade was freely discussed; and the subject had a peculiar interest, under the circumstances, because this identical Frenchman, at table with us, is suspected to have some connection with it. It is merely a surmise. The French captain speaks a little English; but, after dinner, as a matter of courtesy, we all adopted his native language. Our friend Colonel Hicks, as usual, did most of the talking; he is as shrewd, ...
— Journal of an African Cruiser • Horatio Bridge
... them before in my life. They was about as old as he. Well, by and by one of them stood up in the boat. I surmise he had been drinkin'. Then, a minute afterward, I saw the boat upset, and the three was ...
— Chester Rand - or The New Path to Fortune • Horatio Alger, Jr
... ruled his life; but now and again he would hesitate perplexedly as if at the thought of something that she did not understand, or act suddenly in response to an overwhelming flood of impulse whose spring was beyond her control or even her surmise. Women mother all their men because men are on the whole such big babies, but from a generation of babies is born occasionally the master. Women get so used to the rule that they forget the exception. When he comes, then, ...
— Simon Called Peter • Robert Keable
... again subside at once; but his attempts soon began again, and again, Undine was obliged to warn him off; so that the pleasure of the little party was grievously disturbed. To make things worse, the watermen would mutter many a dark surmise into each other's ears, and cast strange looks at the three gentlefolks, whose very servants began to feel suspicion, and to show distrust of their lord. Huldbrand said to himself more than once, "This comes of uniting with ...
— Famous Stories Every Child Should Know • Various
... flush'd that rosy cheek Spoke what the heart forbade the tongue to speak, And told the feelings of that heart as well, Nay, with more candour than the tongue could tell. Though this fair lass had with the wealthy dwelt, Yet like the damsel of the cot she felt; And, at the distant hint or dark surmise, The blood into the mantling cheek would rise. Now Anna's station frequent terrors wrought, In one whose looks were with such meaning fraught, For on a Lady, as an humble friend, It was her painful office to attend. Her duties here were of the usual kind - And some the body ...
— Tales • George Crabbe
... surprise her dressing room transformed into a bower of roses. A great bouquet of three dozen American beauties on her table bore her father's name and all the rest were from Stuart. She had a vague surmise that he paid for her father's, too. Every tint of rose that blooms he had sent, hiring an artist to arrange them so that their colouring made a veritable song of joy as she entered. There was no card to indicate who had ...
— The Root of Evil • Thomas Dixon
... Mrs. Draper was too outrageously late at an appointment for tea, the two girls gave her up, and leaving the house, walked side by side back across the campus, Sylvia quite aware of the wondering surmise which followed their appearance together. On these occasions, Eleanor talked with more freedom than in Mrs. Draper's presence, always in the quietest, simplest way, of small events and quite uninteresting minor matters in her life, or the life of the various household pets, of ...
— The Bent Twig • Dorothy Canfield
... Your surmise that I could not go away from Weymar at present was quite correct. The Altenburg is indeed very deserted, as Princess Marie went away directly after her marriage on the 15th October, and the Princess went to Paris yesterday for several days—yet I will not leave my own hearth ...
— Letters of Franz Liszt, Volume 1, "From Paris to Rome: - Years of Travel as a Virtuoso" • Franz Liszt; Letters assembled by La Mara and translated
... except that Codfish may have got cold feet when it came to traveling up this way in such a snowstorm. You know there is nothing brave about that little sneak." And in this surmise Gif was correct. Stowell had found a boarding place in the town and had said he would remain there until the storm cleared away and the ...
— The Rover Boys on a Hunt - or The Mysterious House in the Woods • Arthur M. Winfield (Edward Stratemeyer)
... reports furnished. Reconnoitring parties must be sent out, roads examined, positions surveyed, and shelter and supplies requisitioned in advance. Thus the movements of staff officers are a clue to the projected movements of the army, and the smallest hint may set a hundred brains to the work of surmise. There will always be many who are just as anxious to discover the general's intentions as he is to conceal them; and if, by any possibility whatever, the gossip and guesses of the camp may come ...
— Stonewall Jackson And The American Civil War • G. F. R. Henderson
... of the heroes are miraculously prolonged—in short, we find ourselves in a land of Faery; secondly, we find that the historic conditions in which the heroes are represented as living do not, for the most part, answer to anything we know or can surmise of the third century. For Finn and his warriors are perpetually on the watch to guard Ireland against the attacks of over-sea raiders, styled Lochlannac by the narrators, and by them undoubtedly thought of as Norsemen. But the latter, ...
— Gods and Fighting Men • Lady I. A. Gregory
... opprobrium (as I hold) of the Middle Age. For if such were the dreams of its noblest and purest genius, what must have been the dreams of the ignoble and impure multitude? But had he seen this lake, how easy, how tempting too, it would have been to him to embody in imagery the surmise of a certain 'Father,' and heighten the torments of the lost beings, sinking slowly into that black Bolge beneath the baking rays of the tropic sun, by the sight of the saved, walking where we walked, beneath cool fragrant shade, among the pillars of a ...
— At Last • Charles Kingsley
... nauseating morality, but I inferred that he is trying to force Vetch to agree to this general strike, and that he is prepared to threaten him with some kind of exposure if he doesn't. This, however, was mere surmise on my part. The fellow is as shrewd as he ...
— One Man in His Time • Ellen Glasgow
... rise to its present position, it will be best to dispose of that outlying state on the southeast, probably an ally or even client of Lydia, which, we are told, was at this time one of the "four powers of Asia." These powers included Babylon also, and accordingly, if our surmise that the Mede was then the overlord of Nebuchadnezzar be correct, this statement of Eusebius, for what it is worth, does not imply that Cilicia had attained an imperial position. Doubtless of the four ...
— The Ancient East • D. G. Hogarth
... you, because when I heard your warning cry and took to flight, hoping for a chance later on to rescue you, I ran within two hours straight into the camp of the rangers and the Mohawks. You can easily surmise how glad I was to see them, and ...
— The Rulers of the Lakes - A Story of George and Champlain • Joseph A. Altsheler
... smiling day Rejoices in its clamor. Earth and sky Resound with glory of its majesty, Impetuous splendor of its rushing by.— But on those heights the woodland dark is still, Expectant of its coming.... Far away Each anxious tree upon each waiting hill Tingles anticipation, as in gray Surmise of rapture. Now the first gusts play, Like laughter low, about their rippling spines; And now the wildwood, one exultant sway, Shouts—and the light at each tumultuous pause, The light that glooms and shines, Seems hands in ...
— Poems • Madison Cawein
... more senses than one. Listen to me, Mr. Thane, and don't mind if I am not very lucid. In speaking of the affairs of another, and a young woman, I can only deal in outlines. You will be able to surmise and hope the rest. I feel in duty bound to tell you that at the time of my son's death there was a misunderstanding on my part which forced Miss Lewis into a false position in respect to her relations to my son. Too much was assumed ...
— A Touch Of Sun And Other Stories • Mary Hallock Foote
... sick of a fever, and died January 28, 1596. His death, like that of his coadjutor, is attributed to mental distress, and nothing is more probable than that disappointment may have made that noxious climate more deadly. Hints of poisoning were thrown out, but this is a surmise easily and often lightly made. "Thus," says Fuller, in his "Holy State," "an extempore performance, scarce heard to be begun before we hear it is ended, comes off with better applause, or miscarries with less disgrace, than a long-studied and openly premeditated action. ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 1 of 8 • Various
... important rules in education is to impress children with a persuasion that the vices we would keep them from, such as lying and breaking one's word, are too shocking to be thought possible. A maxim this worthy of the great Fenelon, his beloved model, and which common tutors do not so much as surmise. ...
— The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints - January, February, March • Alban Butler
... whom he had left with me. I told him what I had done, in my anxiety about himself, and that more than sufficient time had elapsed for his brother's return. His reply was: "They have caught him. The poor fellow is dead." His surmise proved correct; for news soon came that the poor boy had been captured at his father's house, and hanged. The blow to Card was a severe one, and so hardened his heart against the guerrillas in the neighborhood of his father's home—for he knew they were guilty of ...
— The Memoirs of General P. H. Sheridan, Complete • General Philip Henry Sheridan
... he could feel the dampness from it, but the soft, rippling character showed that it did not amount to much. It was a mere cascade, the water of which entered and passed out the cavern by some means which the boy could only surmise. ...
— In the Pecos Country • Edward Sylvester Ellis (AKA Lieutenant R.H. Jayne)
... his hand; and, in his irritable surmise of what was to come, losing his habitual self-control, "I know not what all this has to do with you; surely you trespass upon ground sacred to Miss Cameron and myself? Whatever you have to say, let me beg you to come ...
— Alice, or The Mysteries, Book V • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... day following the editor promised the character of Buonaparte, but the surmise of a visit from the French minister, then at our court, was sufficient to put a stop to its publication; accordingly it 'never appeared'. Coleridge was requested by the proprietor and editor to report a speech of Pitt's, which at ...
— The Life of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - 1838 • James Gillman
... candles would burn in still air a little over six hours. It would thus be possible for the person who inhabited these rooms to go away at seven o'clock in the evening and leave a light which would burn until past one in the morning and then extinguish itself. This, of course, was only surmise, but it destroyed the significance of the night ...
— The Mystery of 31 New Inn • R. Austin Freeman
... trail. Once in a while he broke a branch and left it swinging as a guide to Sam when he should follow with the riders from the ranch. They would be coming in now and in a few minutes would start on remounts. Perhaps Brandon had come? Sandy wasted little time on surmise. ...
— Rimrock Trail • J. Allan Dunn
... several times, and I must confess that the mention of that other wire from Joe worried me a good deal. Just how far the telegram I had just sent might conflict with the facts as known to the Kents, I could not surmise. I could only trust to luck and pray for the best. I learned from the chambermaid that the Goblin had come in very late the night before, and had gone out at six A.M. That bothered me ...
— Kathleen • Christopher Morley
... in his surmise, and though her ladyship was vexed at losing a new acquaintance whom it would have been "nice to know in Paris," she resigned herself for the morning to the society of husband and Baedeker. It was kind old Sir Samuel's proposal that I should be left free to do some sight-seeing on my own account ...
— The Motor Maid • Alice Muriel Williamson and Charles Norris Williamson
... it's under thirty it means that the next number is the number of a play. Over thirty, it means nothing. Your second digit of your second number is your runner. The second digit of the third number is the hole. The fourth number, as you doubtless surmise, is also a fake. Now, then, sir! ...
— Left Guard Gilbert • Ralph Henry Barbour
... "however, soon come to an understanding with Montenegro. The scandalous discord which exists between Belgrade and Cetinje must be cleared off the carpet. We have most urgently pressed this on Prince Nikola when he was in Petersburg." The Prince, we may surmise, went to ask Russian support, received no sympathy, began to realize he was no longer Russia's "only friend," and was filled with ...
— Twenty Years Of Balkan Tangle • Durham M. Edith
... important and, one may surmise, far-reaching step which has been taken in respect of Irish industries in the last few years is to be found in the registration, under the Merchandise Marks Act of 1905, of a national trade-mark, the ...
— Ireland and the Home Rule Movement • Michael F. J. McDonnell
... only thing she could surmise, with any semblance of probability, was that the whole was some frolic of Lady Honoria Pemberton, who had persuaded Delvile to send her the dog, and perhaps assured him she had herself requested to ...
— Cecilia vol. 2 - Memoirs of an Heiress • Frances (Fanny) Burney (Madame d'Arblay)
... sense of the awakening of the East, who would teach the deaf to hear, the blind to see, that the millions only await their leader? He will die. And this is only one phase of the devilish campaign. The others I can merely surmise." ...
— The Insidious Dr. Fu-Manchu • Sax Rohmer
... Suddenly closed his book, And lifted his blue eyes With doubt and strange surmise Depicted ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 10, August, 1858 • Various
... will, sooner or later, come to open strife in the southern states of the Union? But if it be asked what the issue of the struggle is likely to be, it will readily be understood, that we are here left to form a very vague surmise of the truth. The human mind may succeed in tracing a wide circle, as it were, which includes the course of future events; but within that circle a thousand various chances and circumstances may direct it in as many different ...
— American Institutions and Their Influence • Alexis de Tocqueville et al
... at length. Jill, who know him so well, could tell by the restored ring of cheeriness in his tone that he was himself again. He had dealt with this situation in his mind and was prepared to cope with it. The surmise was confirmed the next instant when he rose and stationed himself in front of the fire. Mr Pilkington detested steam-heat and had scoured the city till he had found a studio apartment with an open fireplace. Uncle Chris spread his legs and expanded his chest. "Of course," he said. ...
— The Little Warrior - (U.K. Title: Jill the Reckless) • P. G. Wodehouse
... 858; dependence on, reliance on. persuasion, conviction, convincement[obs3], plerophory[obs3], self- conviction; certainty &c. 474; opinion, mind, view; conception, thinking; impression &c. (idea) 453; surmise &c. 514; conclusion &c. (judgment) 480. tenet, dogma, principle, way of thinking; popular belief &c. (assent) 488. firm belief, implicit belief, settled belief, fixed rooted deep-rooted belief, staunch belief, unshaken belief, steadfast belief, inveterate belief, calm belief, sober ...
— Roget's Thesaurus • Peter Mark Roget
... two ways of viewing the gentleman, doubted whether she ought to express her opinion. It was Flora's disposition, and the advantages of the match, that weighed most upon her, and, in spite of her surmise having been treated as so injurious, she could not rid ...
— The Daisy Chain, or Aspirations • Charlotte Yonge
... relatively unchanged for a long, but not an interminable, period. Indeed, exactly here comes in the novel and startling feature of. Helmholtz's calculation. According to Mayer's meteoric hypothesis, there were no data at hand for any estimate whatever as to the sun's permanency, since no one could surmise what might be the limits of the meteoric supply. But Helmholtz's estimate implied an incandescent body cooling—keeping up a somewhat equable temperature through contraction for a time, but for a limited time only; destined ultimately to become liquid, solid; to cool below the temperature of ...
— A History of Science, Volume 5(of 5) - Aspects Of Recent Science • Henry Smith Williams
... a great admirer of Richard, and when the lion-hearted king was ill, sent him fruits and even ice, so the historian says. Where the Saracens got their ice at that time we can only surmise. ...
— Comic History of England • Bill Nye
... here the beginning of April. Be here by that time, if possible. Get Mr. Thaddeus Burr to enclose your letter to Loudon the printer, who will be careful to forward it to me. How could I write to you How divine your residence? Never again harbour, for a moment, a surmise that derogates ...
— Memoirs of Aaron Burr, Complete • Matthew L. Davis
... brown furze bushes; amongst which, a meagre, shaggy ass, more miserable still, with his hind legs logged and chained, was endeavouring to pick up a scanty subsistence. What the road of the other day could have been, it surpassed even my capacity, with this specimen of "the bootiful" before me, to surmise; but my companion was evidently one of those enviable individuals, whose ignorance is indeed their happiness, or whose imagination supplies the deficiencies of ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 472 - Vol. XVII. No. 472., Saturday, January 22, 1831 • Various
... Knowing your unbounded influence, and believing that your appearance among the seditious might bring them back to peace and reconciliation, individuals suggest the propriety of an invitation to you from congress to pay us a visit. This is only a surmise, and I take the liberty to mention it to you, that, should the conjuncture of affairs induce congress to make this request, you may have some previous time ...
— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 4 (of 5) • John Marshall
... "Boys, you surmise that I'm feelin' lonesome. And I am. But I won't be lonesome long. The widder can't let that cow o' hers go without two milkin's, an' her pigs an' chickens must be fed. She'll be back in the village 'bout four or five; an' to-night, to-night, ...
— Bunch Grass - A Chronicle of Life on a Cattle Ranch • Horace Annesley Vachell
... collision that must be disastrous to the patriots. More than once Ned Clinton was certain a warrior was crouching so near him that he could touch him by reaching out his hand. The young scout was possibly correct in his surmise, for Rosa, who was next to him, was equally sure of the presence of an enemy, the supposition, in her case, extending even further. Her eyes were fixed upon the spot where she believed she could detect a dark form stealing ...
— The Wilderness Fugitives • Edward S. Ellis
... many-figured arras, all alive with beauties and significance that the dull eye conjectures not, that the impure, unpurged eye shrinks away from, lest it be seared by the too great splendor! I know it all now. I began gropingly, in surmise, error, darkness; but now my brow catches, ay, and reflects, the calm, pure, effulgent light of Nature's definite day, and I bathe myself in its happy warmth. Erst, I grovelled like a worm, blind and earth-fed: now, I shall speed through very space, winged heel and shoulder, a swift, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 32, June, 1860 • Various
... attempt to explain what is to me inexplicable. Was my policeman right when he called Quidnunc a herald angel? Is there any substance behind the surmise that the ancient gods still sway the souls and bodies of men? Was Quidnunc, that swift, remorseless, smiling messenger, that god of the winged feet? The Argeiphont? Who can answer these things? All I have to tell you by way of ...
— Lore of Proserpine • Maurice Hewlett
... tongues of the passing people, saying In their surmise, "Ah—whose is this dull form that perambulates, seeing nought Round him that looms Whithersoever his footsteps turn in his farings, Save ...
— Satires of Circumstance, Lyrics and Reveries, with - Miscellaneous Pieces • Thomas Hardy
... he grew animated I thought, as others have thought, and as one would suspect from his name, that he must have Scandinavian blood in his veins—that he was of the heroic, restless, strong and tender Viking strain, and certainly from that day his works and wanderings have not belied the surmise. He told me that he was the author of that charming book of gipsying in the Cevennes which just then had gained for him some attentions from the literary set. But if I had known that he had written those two stories of sixteenth-century Paris—as I learned afterwards ...
— Robert Louis Stevenson - a Record, an Estimate, and a Memorial • Alexander H. Japp
... not murder or otherwise wrong another, since it might possibly cost him the life of his best friend. Did the Greenlander know that it would probably cost him his own life, his sense of responsibility, we may surmise, might be somewhat quickened. On the other hand, duelling is not a satisfactory way of redressing the balance, since it merely gives the powerful bully an opportunity of adding a second murder to the first. Hence the ordeal marks an advance in legal evolution. A good many Australian peoples, for ...
— Anthropology • Robert Marett
... the hotel, I could feel forty or fifty pairs of anxious eyes concentrated on me, as if to read from the expression of my face whether the news was good or bad. Colonel Michler of General Miles's staff was there, and if we should happen to be together talking, the women would surmise that the news was bad; and many times their surmises were just about right. One sweet little black-eyed woman always said she could tell from my face whether I was bluffing or not. July 1st, 2nd, and 3rd, were very gloomy days for we poor chaps who had been left behind—and for the women. ...
— Danger Signals • John A. Hill and Jasper Ewing Brady
... then my friend was not satisfied, and he voyaged about until I knew luncheon was long since a thing of the past, and I hated so the shape of his face I could have screamed. When at last we did return, I found my surmise as to luncheon had been only too correct, and we had to content ourselves with scraps. The next duck-shoot I attend I shall choose as companion a ...
— Olivia in India • O. Douglas
... little knots of folk at doors, and men in twos and threes on the pavement, and it needed no particular stretching of his ears to inform him that everybody was talking of the murder of his cousin. He caught fragmentary bits of surmise and comment as he walked along; near a shadowy corner of the great church he purposely paused, pretending to tie his shoe-lace, in order to overhear a conversation between three or four men who had just emerged from the ...
— In the Mayor's Parlour • J. S. (Joseph Smith) Fletcher
... out-generalled himself by making all too tidy to be natural. Hence, suspicion at the inquest; for the "apoplexy" thought was really such a good one, that, but for so exact a laying out, the fat old corpse might have easily been buried without one surmise of the way she met her end. Again and again, in the history of crimes, it is seen that a "Judas hangs himself;" and albeit, as we know, the murderer has hitherto escaped detection, still his own dark hour shall arrive ...
— The Complete Prose Works of Martin Farquhar Tupper • Martin Farquhar Tupper
... there must be a reason for this strange procrastination—there must be an unrevealed cause which the future will in due time disclose and unravel. All the recollections of the past forbid one unrighteous surmise on His tried faithfulness. "Now, Jesus loved Lazarus," is a soft pillow on which to repose;—raising the sorrowing spirit above the unkind insinuation, "My Lord hath forsaken me, and my God hath ...
— Memories of Bethany • John Ross Macduff
... "My surmise was correct, you see," said the professor some ten minutes afterwards, as he pointed to another gauge on the wall of the pilot- house. "We are now running steadily at a speed of one hundred and fifty miles per hour; and we have already travelled ...
— The Log of the Flying Fish - A Story of Aerial and Submarine Peril and Adventure • Harry Collingwood
... This surmise was confirmed as, turning his head at the sound of the opening door, the fellow withdrew from the lantern the end of the black cord—which was of course a length of fuse composed of spun-yarn well coated with damp powder, now fizzing and spluttering and smoking as the fire swiftly travelled along ...
— The Pirate Slaver - A Story of the West African Coast • Harry Collingwood
... mouth. Bea's labors over the classes in manners had included some research in the subject of physiognomy. Now she leaned forward to secure another view of that profile in the front pew. Then she settled back with the contented sigh of an investigator whose surmise has proved correct. Miss More's features certainly expressed an impulsive, reckless and lovable temperament as opposed to Miss Whiton's conscientious and calculating prudence. Oh, yes, there was conscience enough in the icily handsome face among the instructors. ...
— Beatrice Leigh at College - A Story for Girls • Julia Augusta Schwartz
... English taste for wildness in us. There had been Buffalo Bill, with his show, and there had been other Buffalo Bills, literary ones, who were themselves shows. There had then arisen a conjecture, a tardy surmise, of an American fineness, which might be as well in its way as the American wildness, and the American who had any imaginable touch of this found as warm a liking ready for him then as the wild American found earlier, or the rich ...
— London Films • W.D. Howells
... he was surprised at their lack of discipline and general unruliness—all except some of the Indians, and those, he must say, were well-trained—fine fellows and good soldiers. One could surmise the workings of his mind as one thought of the average happy-go-lucky Tommy Atkins, and then came across one of those tall, straight, hawk-eyed Sikhs and saw him snap his heels together and his arms to his sides and stand there ...
— Antwerp to Gallipoli - A Year of the War on Many Fronts—and Behind Them • Arthur Ruhl
... A wild surmise darted through Peter's soul. Could it be? Could it conceivably be? Was it possible that—that—was it possible, in fine, that this was a kind of signal, ...
— The Cardinal's Snuff-Box • Henry Harland
... Mrs. Dinneford. "If you and I keep our own counsel, we are safe. The testimony of a condemned criminal goes for nothing. People may surmise and talk as much as they please, but no one knows anything about those notes but you ...
— Cast Adrift • T. S. Arthur
... he said, "is perfectly correct in her surmise. I do not want the life of this poor drivelling old man: my intentions are much more peaceable, be assured. It rests entirely with this accomplished young lady (whose spirit I like, and whose ready wit I admire), whether the business between us shall be a matter of love or ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray
... in wonder after the disappearing animal. It was certainly Big Bob. The animal was fully familiar to Andy. The beast wobbled to one side as it ran, and this the boy discerned was due to the sore paw. He was a fugitive, and his escape had been discovered. Andy could surmise this from shouts and calls in the distance, back in the direction of ...
— Andy the Acrobat • Peter T. Harkness
... anon.' What more? in sooth, The mother of to-morrow is to-day, And brings forth after her kind. There is no ruth On the heart's sigh, that 'more' is hidden away, And man's to-morrow yet shall pine and yearn; He shall surmise, and he ...
— Poems by Jean Ingelow, In Two Volumes, Volume II. • Jean Ingelow
... from his smile a genial glow Of green mid-summer seemed to overflow, Filling with verdure all that barren place. The warm red blood rushed to Sir Gawayne's face; He caught his breath, and in his eager eyes There shone a sudden flash of dark surmise, And then he stood a long while pondering; But in his breast his heart began to sing The old, old music whose still echoes roll Forever voiceless through the listening soul. He said farewell to his good fairy friend As in a dream, where real and unreal blend In phantom unison, and with the light ...
— Gawayne And The Green Knight - A Fairy Tale • Charlton Miner Lewis
... occasion Be servant to my wits. "The dinner-hour." Twice hath he come; and first upon parade Inspected all the men; the second time The transport visited. Surmise hath grown To certainty. He will inspect the dinners! Go, faithful Adjutant, stir up the cooks And bid them thicken ...
— Punch, or The London Charivari, Vol. 153, November 7, 1917 • Various
... into the river with his waif, was at least to do something. In half an hour he had reached the straggling cabin and sheds of Trinidad Joe, and from the few scanty flowers that mingled with the brushwood fence, and a surplus of linen fluttering on the line, he knew that his surmise as to Trinidad Joe's domestic ...
— Drift from Two Shores • Bret Harte
... the scene of the murder. They also pay, in common with other and less atrocious robbers, a portion of their gains to the Polygars, or native authorities of the districts in which they reside, to secure protection. The friends and relatives of the victims, perhaps a thousand miles off, never surmise their fate till a period has elapsed when all inquiry would be fruitless, or, at least, extremely difficult. They have no clue to the assassins, and very often impute to the wild beasts of the jungles the slaughter committed by ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions - Vol. I • Charles Mackay
... his mistress and her agent at this dying interview Paul could not surmise, but he believed that it concerned himself. He perceived that Mrs. Everett treated him more considerately afterward; and many times, as he looked up from a long silence, he found her regarding him inquisitively. She asked him strange questions once, bearing upon his early life, and he was almost ...
— Tales of the Chesapeake • George Alfred Townsend
... traffic with the New West was, perforce, billed over American roads. These details and a score of others called for patience, for tact, and a judicious distribution of dollar bills. Harris made a mental note of his obligation to Tom Morrison in the matter. He was shrewd enough to surmise that this was the farmer's very practical wedding gift, but he ...
— The Homesteaders - A Novel of the Canadian West • Robert J. C. Stead
... obliged to give you so strong an impression that you may never forget that you have seen a Salamander, which is a sign that your destiny is to become a learned man, perhaps a magician. Your face also made me surmise favourably of your intelligence." ...
— The Queen Pedauque • Anatole France |
