"Better" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... southern extremity of the great lake called the Neusiedler-See, Esterhaz, as the palace was named, was quite cut off from the outside world. The work of draining and reclaiming the land, however, had effected such an improvement that what in its primitive condition had been little better than desolate swamp, resounding to the harsh cries of wild-fowl, was now become a scene of veritable enchantment. The thick wood which lay behind the house had been transformed into shady groves and open glades ...
— Story-Lives of Great Musicians • Francis Jameson Rowbotham
... the circumstances; but if the change be based upon an unsound principle, the future administration of the country will be full of difficulties. That is a danger which, as I am saying, is escaped by us, and yet we had better say how, if we had not escaped, we might have escaped; and we may venture now to assert that no other way of escape, whether narrow or broad, can be devised but freedom from avarice and a sense of justice—upon this rock our city shall be built; for there ought to be no ...
— Laws • Plato
... was no evidence of any effort on the part of himself or his personal friends to procure his election, it was resolved to abandon the contest. This determination was made known to the federal members generally, and excited some discontent among the violent of the party, who thought it better to go without a president than to elect Mr. Jefferson. A general meeting, however, of the federal members was called, and the subject explained, when it was admitted that Mr. Burr could not be elected. A few individuals persisted ...
— Memoirs of Aaron Burr, Complete • Matthew L. Davis
... Cleveland, "every man must consider himself an officer, and act from his own judgment. Fire as quick as you can, and stand your ground as long as you can. When you can do no better, get behind trees, or retreat; but I beg you not to run quite off. If we are repulsed, let us make a point of returning and renewing the fight; perhaps we may have better luck in the second attempt than in ...
— The Conquest of the Old Southwest • Archibald Henderson
... does not authorize me to become the judge of another man's political opinions—the Church is not a political association—any man has as good a right, religiously and politically, to his opinions of public matters as I have to mine—and laymen frequently know much more, and are better judges, than ministers ...
— The Story of My Life - Being Reminiscences of Sixty Years' Public Service in Canada • Egerton Ryerson
... fun, though I have seen better candy. When it was finally finished, and ourselves and the kitchen and the door-knobs all thoroughly sticky, we organized a procession and still in our caps and aprons, each carrying a big fork or spoon or frying pan, we marched through the empty corridors to the officers' ...
— Daddy-Long-Legs • Jean Webster
... before. The only trains which ran now were run by the Germans for strictly German purposes, and so the station had become a victualing point for troops going south to the fighting and a way hospital for sick and wounded coming back from the fighting. What, in better days than these, had been the lunch room was a place for the redressing of hurts. Its high counters, which once held sandwiches and tarts and wine bottles, were piled with snowdrifts of medicated cotton and rolls of lint ...
— Paths of Glory - Impressions of War Written At and Near the Front • Irvin S. Cobb
... appearance of a field of it when full grown, and the remarkable wart-like excrescences found upon the roots, are some of its more notable characteristics. Its striking preference for a calcareous soil is another of its peculiarities, the Peanut producing more and better crops on this kind of ...
— The Peanut Plant - Its Cultivation And Uses • B. W. Jones
... had the pleasure of hearing the further sentiments of such an assembly as this, upon the delicate subject," replied this polite divine, "I shall be better enabled to treat it. And pray, ladies, proceed; for it is from your conversation that I must take ...
— Pamela (Vol. II.) • Samuel Richardson
... the house or court of Gwyddno his father, and Taliesin with him. And Gwyddno asked him if he had had a good haul at the weir, and he told him that he had got that which was better than fish. "What was that?" said Gwyddno. "A Bard," answered Elphin. Then said Gwyddno, "Alas, what will he profit thee?" And Taliesin himself replied and said, "He will profit him more than the weir ever profited thee." Asked Gwyddno, "Art thou able to speak, and thou so little?" ...
— The Mabinogion • Lady Charlotte Guest
... At the same time he translated a treatise by Erasmus, the Enchiridion Militis Christiani (Manual of the Christian Soldier), and in controversy with a local disputant prophesied that he would cause that "a boye that driveth the plough" should know the Scriptures better than his opponent. Having formed the purpose of translating the New Testament T. went in 1523 to London, and used means towards his admission to the household of Tunstal, Bishop of London, but without success; he then lived in the house of ...
— A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature • John W. Cousin
... more prosperous in their undertakings. Now if the gods were good for anything, they would rather forward me, who have been more careful to serve them. It remains, therefore, that if upon examination you find those new doctrines, which are now preached to us, better and more efficacious, we immediately receive ...
— English Literature For Boys And Girls • H.E. Marshall
... the matter over. "It will be better," Edgar said, "that we should go as simple Arabs, and that we should take two horses of less value than those which we now ride. You could send them up by the party that will rejoin your father. As two young Arabs ...
— At Aboukir and Acre - A Story of Napoleon's Invasion of Egypt • George Alfred Henty
... except his Sergeant, Moncure, who was very much ashamed of it. Still, in a general, feeble sort of way Robert Fulton had managed to keep up without any flagrant act of flinching from his post. On this occasion he had stood up better than usual. He stood holding his horses, and we noticed, with pleasure, that he was behaving very well under fire. But, it seems, his courage was only "hanging by the eyelids" so ...
— From the Rapidan to Richmond and the Spottsylvania Campaign - A Sketch in Personal Narration of the Scenes a Soldier Saw • William Meade Dame
... stick it out to-night, and if I'm not better to-morrow, why, you may get one. Never mind me, Ted. Where is ...
— Stanford Stories - Tales of a Young University • Charles K. Field
... and a man about what would happen. Women had as a rule a finer instinct about characters and motives, but their advice about how to act was generally too vehement and rash; a woman could often divine the complexities of a situation better, a man could advise one better how to proceed. But what he could seldom follow was the intellectual processes of women; they intermingled too much of emotion with their logic; they made birdlike, darting movements from point to point, instead of following ...
— Beside Still Waters • Arthur Christopher Benson
... was just too heavy for a man to move unaided. What would he do next? He could not get help from outside, even if he had some one whom he could trust, without the unbarring of doors and considerable risk of detection. It was better, if he could, to have his helpmate inside the house. But whom could he ask? This girl had been devoted to him. A man always finds it hard to realize that he may have finally lost a woman's love, however badly he may have ...
— Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes • Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
... returning from the Eastern seas, with cargoes of which the value was popularly estimated at a million, fell into the hands of the enemy. These misfortunes produced some murmuring on the Royal Exchange. But, on the whole, the temper of the capital and of the nation was better than it had ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 4 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... which the extreme of those alpine summits shall be generalised or connected with our low inclined plains; and, on this occasion, I will give M. de Saussure's most excellent description of the Breven. Nothing can better suit our present purpose than the subject of this natural history; and I am persuaded that most readers will be better informed by the description of this naturalist, than they would ...
— Theory of the Earth, Volume 2 (of 4) • James Hutton
... millions who received the Roman supremacy might not be more right than the thousands {p.250} who denied it; whether the argument on the real presence, which had satisfied him for fifty years, might not be better founded than his recent doubts. It is not possible for a man of gentle and modest nature to feel himself the object of intense detestation without uneasy pangs; and as such thoughts came and went, a window ...
— The Reign of Mary Tudor • James Anthony Froude
... gross, Docthor Finnerty, so let us spiritualize it, that it may be Christian atin, fit for pious men to digest,' and then he came out with his thundering laugh—oigh, oigh, oigh, oigh! but he had consequently the most of the pudding to himself, an' indeed brought the better half of it home ...
— Going To Maynooth - Traits And Stories Of The Irish Peasantry, The Works of - William Carleton, Volume Three • William Carleton
... Doc., but I wouldn't mention it to any one else; it might get you into trouble," was Simpkins' comment. "You better—Holy, jumping Pharaoh! what a husky pussy!" As he spoke a big black cat, with blinking, tawny eyes, sprang from the floor and curled itself up on the youth's ...
— The False Gods • George Horace Lorimer
... and learning. And what good could chance than to the vniuersities, whan som of the greatest, though not of the wisest nor best learned, nor best men neither of that side, did labor to perswade, that ignorance was better than knowledge, which they ment, not for the laitie onelie, but also for the greatest rable of their spiritu- altie, what other pretense openlie so euer they made: and therefore did som of them at Cambrige (whom I will not ...
— The Schoolmaster • Roger Ascham
... shall once have vanished, when you shall have perceived the universal selfishness, idleness, and horror of work, when you yourselves shall once rightly have tasted the sweetness of plodding on in the customary rut—then the desire to be better and wiser than all others will soon fade away. They do not by any chance entertain these good expectations of you in imagination alone; they have found them confirmed in their own persons. They must confess ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries: - Masterpieces of German Literature Translated into English, Volume 5. • Various
... any attitude above and beyond belligerent Catholicism and Protestantism, or of sympathizing with the deeply-religious feelings of one who, after calculating all chances and surveying all dogmatic differences, thought that he could serve God as well and his country better in that communion which was his by birthright. To an illuminated intellect there was not in the seventeenth century much reason to prefer one of the Reformed Churches to Catholicism, except for the sake of political freedom. ...
— Renaissance in Italy, Volumes 1 and 2 - The Catholic Reaction • John Addington Symonds
... wits wil be iangling, but gentles agree. This ciuill warre of wits were much better vsed On Nauar and his bookemen, for ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare
... positive term really implies nothing but a negation of, or indifference to, the particular love of our country. By its nationality must every nation retain its independence;—I mean a nationality 'quoad' the nation. Better thus;—nationality in each individual, 'quoad' his country, is equal to the sense of individuality 'quoad' himself; but himself as subsensuous, and central. Patriotism is equal to the sense of individuality reflected from every other individual. There may come a higher virtue in ...
— Literary Remains, Vol. 2 • Coleridge
... existence, that even the roads of science lead mouth-wards, and that in the actual conditions of the society in which we live the pure instinct of knowing, der reine Erkenntnisstrieb, is still no more than an ideal. And so it always will be. Primum vivere, deinde philosophari, or perhaps better, ...
— Tragic Sense Of Life • Miguel de Unamuno
... his friends might call liberal, and his enemies time-serving. He was a churchman of the stamp of Archbishop Williams, and preferred bishops and the Common-prayer to presbyters and extempore sermons, but did not think the difference between the two of the essence of religion. In better times Gauden would have passed for broad, though his latitudinarianism was more the result of love of ease than of philosophy. Though a royalist he sat in the Westminster Assembly, and took the covenant, for which compliance he nearly lost the ...
— Milton • Mark Pattison
... men to quarters. Lieutenant Sentore, I return to you your sword; you can perhaps make better use of it alive than dead; I am not a man to be disobeyed, reason or no reason. Remember that, and now ...
— The Strong Arm • Robert Barr
... did not hold with literature. When the most notorious of the clubs met in the town-house under the presidentship of Gravia Ogilvy, who was no better than a poacher, and was troubled in his mind because writers called Pope a poet, there was frequently a wrangle over the question, "Is literature necessarily immoral?" It was a fighting club, and ...
— Auld Licht Idyls • J.M. Barrie
... first specified, is not properly a weapon at all, but it comes first because the belt keeps all the other parts of the armour in place, and gives agility to the wearer. Having girded your loins (R.V.) is better than having your loins girded (A.V.), as bringing out more fully that the assumption of the belt is the ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Ephesians; Epistles of St. Peter and St. John • Alexander Maclaren
... false. I do not know my own mind, and—and I have hurt him. I am not worthy of hurting him. He is better, finer than I ...
— The Imaginary Marriage • Henry St. John Cooper
... of annexation, and the sooner the better, but the Cuban patriots must first form a government, provisional or otherwise, and consent to annexation. This at first would have been easy, even now possible, to be brought about, but we are fast drifting away from annexation or a peaceful solution ...
— Slavery and Four Years of War, Vol. 1-2 • Joseph Warren Keifer
... the humanizing arts; nobody frequents his father's great library, nobody buys books, nobody reads the newspapers. Yet this forlorn and detestable little town has one good thing. It has a preeminently good Italian accent, better even, he thinks, than the Roman,—which would be a greater consolation to an Italian than we can well understand. Nevertheless it was not society, and it did not make his fellow-townsmen endurable to him. He recoiled from them more and more, and the solitude in which he lived among ...
— Modern Italian Poets • W. D. Howells
... Braine, "there is no better plan. About three hundred yards below the big tree, by ...
— The Rajah of Dah • George Manville Fenn
... and giving his arm to Elsie, led her towards the throng, saying in answer to her last remark, "Better act through me, then, daughter, or you will probably be asked two or ...
— Elsie's Womanhood • Martha Finley
... western prairies of Dakota is a little town called Edgeley, because it is on the edge of civilization—a very big word which means some folks have found a better way to live than other folks. The Edgeley people have a good way to live, for there are almost seventeen wooden houses there, and among them is a school-house, a church, a store and a blacksmith-shop. If people walked out their front doors they were upon the little street; if they ...
— Twinkle and Chubbins - Their Astonishing Adventures in Nature-Fairyland • L. Frank (Lyman Frank) Baum
... then," interrupted Constance. "I had rather she didn't know. It is all past, and, as long as so few persons know about it, don't you think it would be better to let ...
— Marjorie Dean - High School Sophomore • Pauline Lester
... young, he distributed a considerable sum. She repeated this to him so often, that he commanded me to set down in writing all the money I laid out, both what I gave for the expense of the house, and all that I caused to be bought, that he might better judge of what I gave to the poor. This new obligation, which I was brought under, appeared to me so much the harder, as for above eleven years we had been married I never before had this required of me. What troubled ...
— The Autobiography of Madame Guyon • Jeanne Marie Bouvier de La Motte Guyon
... indeed imposed on him a penance, but not such a one as be expected. It was to write a collection of cases of conscience for the instruction and conveniency of confessors and moralists. This produced his Sum, the first work of that kind. Had his method and decisions been better followed by some later authors of the like works, the holy maxims of Christian morality had been treated with more respect by some moderns than they have been, to our grief ...
— The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints - January, February, March • Alban Butler
... thine." Therefore, friendship imposes frightful responsibilities; in asking and receiving it we assume charge of another's destiny. This is the very genius of the teacher's influence over his pupil, the parent's over his child, the general's over his soldier, the patriot's over his people. Better a thousand times never open the furrow than to ...
— The Investment of Influence - A Study of Social Sympathy and Service • Newell Dwight Hillis
... and so good to my poor fatherless girl! But, Molly my dear, I think you'll acknowledge that you too are very fortunate in your stepmother. Are not you, love? And what happy tete-a-tetes we shall have together when Cynthia goes to London. I'm not sure if I don't get on better with you even than with her, though she is my own child; for, as dear papa says so truly, there is a love of mystery about her; and if I hate anything, it is the slightest concealment or reserve. Ten pounds! Why, it will quite set her up, buy her a couple ...
— Wives and Daughters • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... hope that there might be a loose match hiding away in some corner of my pockets, I went through them again more carefully, but alas! with no better success; whereupon I gave it up and turned to glance at the approaching figure. My astonishment may be readily imagined when I beheld him in precisely the same attitude as before—that is to say, upon his ...
— My Lady Caprice • Jeffrey Farnol
... had graciously permitted him to worship her, but had not bargained for being treated—well, as many another out-back squatter—treats his help-mate. Then Bridget would tell herself bitterly that it might have been better had she married a civilised gentleman. There would sometimes be scenes and sometimes sulks, and those times no doubt accounted for the hungry look in Lady Bridget's eyes and the slight ...
— Lady Bridget in the Never-Never Land • Rosa Praed
... 1815. It is a city of loiterers and invalids—a Vanity Pair for pipers, dancing of bears, and for the feats of Mr. Punch. I found all my family well excepting the poor pale Johnnie; and he is really a thing to break one's heart by looking at—yet he is better. The rest are in ...
— The Journal of Sir Walter Scott - From the Original Manuscript at Abbotsford • Walter Scott
... Knots of fern were about, but the tops of the mounds were firm grass, evidently well rolled, and with an eye to airy feet. Olympus one eminence was called, Parnassus the other. Olympus a little overlooked Parnassus, but Parnassus was broader and altogether better adapted for the games of the Muses. Round the edges of both there was a well-trimmed bush of laurel, obscuring only the feet of the dancers from the observing gods. For on Olympus the elders reclined. Great efforts had occasionally ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... perforation of the pistillum, and the exposure of that point of the ovulum where the embryo is formed to the direct action of the pollen; the second from the too great simplicity of structure of the supposed ovulum, which, I have shown, accords better with that of the nucleus ...
— Narrative of a Survey of the Intertropical and Western Coasts of Australia] [Volume 2 of 2] • Phillip Parker King
... McQuilkin were quickly brought by me to more comfortable quarters in Knockowen, and where they were more likely to have better protection. Captain Felton, on my signal, came ashore from the Gnat, and I found in him a friend indeed. He urged me to take Kit and Biddy to the house of his aunt (the widow of one of the canons of Salisbury Cathedral), who lived a peaceful life in one of the quaint old ...
— Kilgorman - A Story of Ireland in 1798 • Talbot Baines Reed
... for yourselves, we have to think of the Indians all over the country, we cannot treat one better than another, it would not be just, we will therefore do this, and what I tell you ...
— The Treaties of Canada with The Indians of Manitoba - and the North-West Territories • Alexander Morris
... name of common sense, do you remember in what a country, and in what times, we live? Oh, those Englishmen! always thinking that they are in England. My young friend, you are clearly not fit for France, and the sooner you get out of it the better." ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLV. July, 1844. Vol. LVI. • Various
... enacted he inscribed on white tablets and submitted to the senate before taking any final action with regard to them; and he allowed the senators to read, each one, the articles separately, his object being that if any provision did not please them, or if they could suggest anything better, they might speak. He was very desirous of being democratic, and once, when one of the companions of his campaigns asked him to aid him in the capacity of advocate, at first he pretended to be busy and bade one of his friends serve as advocate; when, however, the petitioner ...
— Dio's Rome, Vol. 4 • Cassius Dio
... "the future of our civilisation depends upon the widening spread and deepening hold of the scientific habit of mind." And we hope that this is what "The Outline of Science" makes for. Information is all to the good; interesting information is better still; but best of all is the education of the scientific habit of mind. Another modern philosopher, Professor L. T. Hobhouse, has declared that the evolutionist's mundane goal is "the mastery by the human mind of the conditions, internal as well as external, ...
— The Outline of Science, Vol. 1 (of 4) - A Plain Story Simply Told • J. Arthur Thomson
... of land that has now had 14 tons of manure every year for seven years, and yet there is a plot along side, dressed with ammonia-salts furnishing less than half the ammonia contained in the 14 tons of manure, that produces a better ...
— Talks on Manures • Joseph Harris
... and laughed good natured like, so I handed him this: 'Are you the big stiff that bosses the make-up?' He says, 'Mostly! I can control it if I want to.' 'All right for you,' I said. 'I live by selling your papers, but I could sell a heap more if I had a better chance.' 'Chance in what way?' said he. 'Building your first page,' said I. He said, 'Sure. What is it that you want?' 'I'll show you,' said I. 'I'll give you the call I used this morning.' Then I cut loose ...
— Michael O'Halloran • Gene Stratton-Porter
... a benignant sound—it is better than something that is worse! It is a step upward from a darker quagmire of human condition. When Peter the Great, with his terrible broom, swept all the free peasants into the same mass with the unfree serfs, and when he established the empire upon a chain of service to ...
— A Short History of Russia • Mary Platt Parmele
... with him. A battle must be fought, and the sooner the better. Every moment saw the fortifications growing stronger. But what would be the outcome of a battle? Could he embark his army in boats, land at the foot of the hill, climb the steep ascent, and drive the rebels with the bayonet? At Bunker Hill there was only a rabble,—regiments without ...
— Daughters of the Revolution and Their Times - 1769 - 1776 A Historical Romance • Charles Carleton Coffin
... good supply of apples from mine host, and had almost decided to seek shelter in an outhouse as a last resource, when I came upon a fair-sized heap of sticks, over which a hop plant sprawled, forming a straggly green covering. There being no better place, I decided that the hop would have to serve as my headquarters for that day. I was just moving some of the sticks when something caused me to remember the lateness of the hour. From a pigsty a few yards ...
— 'Brother Bosch', an Airman's Escape from Germany • Gerald Featherstone Knight
... none write so emphatically as St. Paul, especially in his Epistle to the Romans. And yet, since more importance by far belongs to the word than to the works and deeds of Christ, and where we are to be deprived of one it were better that we should want the works and the history than the word and the doctrine; those books are to be most highly esteemed which most largely treat of the doctrine and words of the Lord Christ; for though the miracles of Christ had never ...
— The Epistles of St. Peter and St. Jude Preached and Explained • Martin Luther
... 'What have we here? Joel Burns vs. Elihu Joslin. The fellow has involved me in a lawsuit to begin with. I had much better have agreed to his account—much better,' he added, almost pettishly. 'I ought to have ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol 2, No 6, December 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... better food than rye," and so Reynard thought also. But when harvest time came Reynard got the roots, while Bruin got the turnip-tops. And then Bruin was so angry with Reynard that he put an end at once ...
— East O' the Sun and West O' the Moon • Gudrun Thorne-Thomsen
... an actor, but the detective was a better one, and it was agreed that they were to meet the following morning, when our hero would have the money ready. Meantime, the detective as known to the baron had most singularly been in evidence even ...
— A Successful Shadow - A Detective's Successful Quest • Harlan Page Halsey
... could not have notice of his coming. To this proposition some answered, "they had not a sufficient number of men to assault so strong and great a city." But Captain Morgan replied, "If our number is small, our hearts are great; and the fewer persons we are, the more union and better shares we shall have in the spoil." Hereupon, being stimulated with the hope of those vast riches they promised themselves from their success, they unanimously agreed to that design. Now, that my reader may better comprehend the boldness of this exploit, it may be necessary ...
— The Pirates of Panama • A. O. (Alexandre Olivier) Exquemelin
... "You had better play the secretary for once, Lady Betty," said Atley, who was related to his chief. "You will then be able to satisfy your curiosity. Shall I ...
— Stories of Modern French Novels • Julian Hawthorne
... reached a lunch cairn, which had been made when they were only a week out from the Upper Glacier Depot. With eight days' food in hand Scott hoped that they would easily reach it, for their increased food allowance was having a good effect upon all of them, and Wilson's leg was better. On the other hand, Evans was still a ...
— The Voyages of Captain Scott - Retold from 'The Voyage of the "Discovery"' and 'Scott's - Last Expedition' • Charles Turley
... we are all for ourselves in this world," responded Mr Underhill philosophically. "As to like, it may be no more like than chalk to cheese, and yet be in every man's mouth from Aldgate to the Barbican. My Lord Protector is neither better nor worse than other men. If you or I were in his shoes, ...
— Robin Tremain - A Story of the Marian Persecution • Emily Sarah Holt
... merry-go-rounds, as you put it, are much better fun than sitting in a nursery or a school-room. But I assure you I am not so frivolous as you think; I have been going out distributing tracts ...
— Hetty Gray - Nobody's Bairn • Rosa Mulholland
... you give me fair warning, and I'll practise the accustomed and essential reel. Upon my soul, I haven't danced since Lady Mary left, unless you call it so that foolish minuet. You should have seen her Grace at St. James's last month. Gad! she footed it like an angel; there's not a better dancer in London town. See that your wife's a dancer, whoever she may be, Sim; let her dance and sing and play the harpsichord or the clarsach—they are charms that will last longer than her good looks, ...
— Doom Castle • Neil Munro
... shook his head. Something let go with a soggy snap, and the misty man was gone. I'd better take it easy on the whiskey, he thought. You got to wait, Donegal, old lush, until Nora and Ken get here. You can't get drunk until they're gone, or you might get them mixed up with memories ...
— Death of a Spaceman • Walter M. Miller
... Maybe you would," the doctor said, with a roughness of tone intended to hide the sinking of his heart and the faltering of his voice. "All I know is, that you had better get away from here. Some of Sotillo's men may turn up here looking ...
— Nostromo: A Tale of the Seaboard • Joseph Conrad
... had they seen me at a hippopotamus two days afterward, they would have set me down as being as much a heretic as any of that nation; but I ventured to tell them that I agreed with the English, that it was better to let the children grow up and comfort their mothers when they became old, than to carry them away and sell them across the sea. This they never attempt to justify; "they want them only to cultivate the land, and take care of them as their children." ...
— Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa - Journeys and Researches in South Africa • David Livingstone
... had had a nightmare, and asked him if he had not had one as well; but Braun said he had never slept better in ...
— Orpheus in Mayfair and Other Stories and Sketches • Maurice Baring
... half-humorous, that the average weekly proportion of desertions was 25 Spaniards, 15 Irish, 12 English, 6 Scotch, and half a Portuguese! One indignant English colonel drew up his regiment on parade, and told the men that "if any of them wanted to join the French they had better do so at once. He gave them free leave. He wouldn't have men in the regiment who wished to join ...
— Deeds that Won the Empire - Historic Battle Scenes • W. H. Fitchett
... devoted much of his writing to technical questions of production. In "Fields, Factories and Workshops'' and "The Conquest of Bread'' he has set himself to prove that, if production were more scientific and better organized, a comparatively small amount of quite agreeable work would suffice to keep the whole population in comfort. Even assuming, as we probably must, that he somewhat exaggerates what is possible with our present scientific knowledge, it must nevertheless be conceded that his contentions ...
— Proposed Roads To Freedom • Bertrand Russell
... Jewish rights in formal legislation and, if possible, for the removal of all the legal disabilities which stand in the way of their equality with the rest of the population (although in some cases they have already more rights than the aboriginal population, or, better, they have greater possibilities to utilise the ...
— The Shield • Various
... way, the mysterious and proverbial little bird has whispered to me that Sir Stephen will not be Sir Stephen much longer. In fact, that they are going to make a peer of him very shortly. And upon my word, they couldn't find a better man for the place; for, unlike some noble lords you and I could mention, Staff, he will wear his robes and coronet—do they ever wear them now—right nobly; and for once the House of Lords will get a man who knows his own mind, knows what he wants and the way ...
— At Love's Cost • Charles Garvice
... as he rose to go, with an air of finality. "Better sell the smelter while you have ...
— Ridgway of Montana - (Story of To-Day, in Which the Hero Is Also the Villain) • William MacLeod Raine
... "All the same he left us for that creature, so he must love her better than us, as he did not ...
— Une Vie, A Piece of String and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant
... and golden girdles, tossed their tawny limbs wildly among the throng.... What was the meaning of it all? Why had it all been? Why had it gone on thus, the great world, century after century, millennium after millennium, eating and drinking, and marrying and giving in marriage, and knowing nothing better.... how could they know anything better? Their forefathers had lost the light ages and ages before they were born.... And Christ had not come for ages and ages after they were dead.... How could they ...
— Hypatia - or, New Foes with an Old Face • Charles Kingsley
... fence and smoked, each contemplating carefully the end of his pipe. I knew better than to say anything. The Trader was looking me over, making up his mind about me. Speech on my part would argue lightness of disposition, for it would seem to indicate that I was not also making up my ...
— The Forest • Stewart Edward White
... the Gainsborough shape and had been covered with confusion when she turned sharply round on him with a "Now, clumsy, I'm not a door-mat." Then he had noticed that the sad sisterhood were out in force where the bright gas-jets of the better-class shops illuminated the pavement, swaggering it mostly where the kerbs were lined with young fellows, fairly-well dressed as a rule, who talked of cricket and race horses and boating and made audible remarks concerning the women, grave and gay, who passed by in ...
— The Workingman's Paradise - An Australian Labour Novel • John Miller
... attack was a failure. On the whole, the Grand Duke Nicholas had shown better strategy than the best of the German generals. Outnumbered from the very start, his tactics had been admirable. Twice he had saved Warsaw, and he was still threatening Cracow. The Russian armies were fighting with courage and efficiency, and were ...
— History of the World War - An Authentic Narrative of the World's Greatest War • Francis A. March and Richard J. Beamish
... and swamps, and dykes, and fortified towns, what chance should we have who have none of these things? What I say, comrades, is this: we have got to fight Spain — you know the grudge Philip bears us — and it is far better that we should go over and fight the Spaniards in the Low Countries, side by side with the people there, and with all the advantages that their rivers and dykes give, and with the comfort that our wives and children are safe here at home, ...
— By Pike and Dyke: A Tale of the Rise of the Dutch Republic • G.A. Henty
... to his income through the new arrangement volunteered by Fanny's guardian, gave to his external condition a more favourable aspect. He was no longer troubled about the ways and means of providing for his needful expenses. A much better situation, so far as a higher salary was concerned, had, during this time offered; but, as it required an amount of confinement and labour which he could not give, without endangering his health, ...
— True Riches - Or, Wealth Without Wings • T.S. Arthur
... their poison a dang sight better 'n I do. Say, are them guys goin' to march behind us? I don't want no poison needles slipped into my back, accidental ...
— The Pathless Trail • Arthur O. (Arthur Olney) Friel
... watching from here?" she asked, showing enthusiasm at the sight of the crowd below. "You should be enjoying this immensely, you know. Not all the people here have windows to look out of like this." There, now, that should make him feel a little better. ...
— Life Sentence • James McConnell
... personality—The crowd is always dominated by considerations of which it is unconscious—The disappearance of brain activity and the predominance of medullar activity—The lowering of the intelligence and the complete transformation of the sentiments—The transformed sentiments may be better or worse than those of the individuals of which the crowd is composed—A crowd is as easily heroic ...
— The Crowd • Gustave le Bon
... Miss Lambert? Would you like to see mine?" returned Richard quickly; and his face lighted up as he spoke. He looked younger and better than he did the previous night. His powerful, muscular figure, more conspicuous for strength than grace, showed to advantage in his tweed shooting-coat and knickerbockers, his ordinary morning costume. The look of sullen discomfort had gone, and his face looked less ...
— Our Bessie • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... the city. There was a time when I ate and drank it. It was the very breath of life to me. I charged on Broadway like a caterpillar tank charging in battle; but it is very remarkable how quickly one changes in this world. I have had some success in my work, and the higher I go, the better work I feel I can do in a quiet place and among less enervating surroundings. John and I were in college together, roommates, and no doubt he has told you that we graduated with the same class. He has found his location here and I would particularly enjoy having a home near him. They tell me there ...
— Her Father's Daughter • Gene Stratton-Porter
... the voyage over. In the evening, when the watch was called, not a man came on deck, every one of them being drunk, while most of the men in the other watch, who had managed to slip down every now and then, were in no better condition. The captain, who had been ailing, was in bed. Mr Griffiths, the doctor and I, Jim and Brown, were the only sober ones. The second mate evidently did not know what he was about. Mr Griffiths advised him ...
— Peter Trawl - The Adventures of a Whaler • W. H. G. Kingston
... international: in 1996, the Estonia-Russia technical border agreement was initialed but both states have been hesitant to sign and ratify it, with Russia asserting that Estonia needs to better assimilate Russian-speakers and Estonian groups pressing for realignment of the boundary based more closely on the 1920 Tartu Peace Treaty that would bring the now divided ethnic Setu people and parts of the Narva region within Estonia; ...
— The 2005 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency
... Plains. My examination only confirmed my previous conjectures in favour of the capabilities of the soil. From what I had seen at Port Essington, as ground considered favourable for the growth of cotton, there can be no doubt that on these plains it would thrive much better; but the soil on the Victoria is of too fertile a character to bear any comparison with that ...
— Discoveries in Australia, Volume 2 • John Lort Stokes
... kinds," continued the Queen earnestly. "Now in a butterfly race it's always best just to hold on and let them do as they like. It's not a bit of use trying to make them go straight. Rabbits are better in that way, but even rabbits are a little uncertain at times. Full of nerves. But have you ever tried swallow-racing?" she went on enthusiastically. "It's simply splendid. You give them their heads and you never know where you may get to. But, anyway, it doesn't ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 159, August 4th, 1920 • Various
... and the Secretary. I think you had better see them; they both look worried. Really I do, ...
— Visionaries • James Huneker
... about it. This man told me he was connected with the family Mrs. Anstey sprang from. Better still, Tom, this same Lorrainer was at the old chateau just a few days ago, sent there on duty because of his being from the same section of country as von Berthold, he says. And, ...
— Air Service Boys Flying for Victory - or, Bombing the Last German Stronghold • Charles Amory Beach
... relations are present; their silver-decorated swords proclaim the importance of the family. Others, too, have come to receive us, for our arrival, announced beforehand by those we had met at the entrance pass, is a sort of event in the town; the dress of some betokens poverty, others are better clad, but all have a very polite and decorous manner. Many a question is asked about our native land and town, that is to say, Syria and Damascus, conformably to the disguise already adopted, and which it was highly important to keep well up; then follow ...
— All About Coffee • William H. Ukers
... bailiff concerning you. He tells me that you have become quite an anchorite, and that, save at your meals and for an occasional bout-at-arms, you are seldom to be seen. I was glad to hear of your devotion to study, and thought it better to leave you undisturbed at it. Yesterday evening I sent for your instructor. He is a man of influence in Syria, and I wished to learn how he was affected towards us, now that he is about to return there. We talked for some time, and I ...
— A Knight of the White Cross • G.A. Henty
... we can allow the servants to go away? We can then better go into the matter." I nodded approval; the servants took the hint and withdrew, though unwillingly, the last one closing the door behind him. Then the Detective ...
— The Jewel of Seven Stars • Bram Stoker
... historic names, stood face to face with death. Among the fallen was the only son of her whose writings have been given us. Let us think without bitterness of the sacrifice of one influenced and formed by the rare nature we find in these poems. What better result of culture than to dissipate intellectual mists and uncertainties, and to fix the grasp firmly upon some great practical good? There is nothing wasted in one who lived long enough to show that the refinement acquired and inherited was of the noble kind which could prefer ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 55, May, 1862 • Various
... shall see better,' came his voice, sudden and mechanical and belonging to the world of man. She could scarcely believe there was a world of man. She leaned round and blew out her lanterns. They were difficult to blow out. Everywhere the lights were gone save the coloured points on the sides of the launch. ...
— Women in Love • D. H. Lawrence
... the situation at a glance. She beheld Cayrol livid, tottering, and excited. She felt Jeanne trembling on her breast; she saw something serious had occurred. She calmed herself and put on a cold manner to enable her the better to suppress any ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... what the other fellows on the Leader would say if they knew I was working this assignment in company with the millionaire's daughter," said Larry to himself. "I guess I'd better not say anything about it. They'd make fun of me. I know it's all right to take her, or I wouldn't do it. Besides, if she knows the captains she can be of considerable aid to me. Queer, though, for Larry Dexter, who used to rush copy, to be hunting for a missing millionaire in company ...
— Larry Dexter's Great Search - or, The Hunt for the Missing Millionaire • Howard R. Garis
... with the zamorin. But Trimumpara would by no means consent to this measure; saying that it would occasion a mutiny among the Moors, by whom the city was furnished with provisions in exchange for goods, and be thought it were better to dissemble with them all. Pacheco then said that he would have a conference with the Moors, meaning to use policy with them, since the rajah did not approve of violent measures; and to this the rajah consented, giving orders to his naires to obey the orders ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. II • Robert Kerr
... pistol-practice. After much forethought and self-denial, Dick had saved seven shillings and sixpence, the price of a badly constructed Belgian revolver. Maisie could only contribute half a crown to the syndicate for the purchase of a hundred cartridges. 'You can save better than I can, Dick,' she explained; 'I like nice things to eat, and it doesn't matter to you. Besides, boys ...
— The Light That Failed • Rudyard Kipling
... you have not met Mademoiselle Laurentia; unfortunately she has been suffering for the last two days with a very severe nervous headache, and to-night did not feel inclined to come to dinner. However, I hope later on she will be better, and able to sing for you. Before dinner she went out into the garden, thinking the cool air would ...
— Marie Gourdon - A Romance of the Lower St. Lawrence • Maud Ogilvy
... to Paris most of the harsh precautions were abandoned; the doors were not kept open; greater respect was paid to the sovereign; it was known that the constitution soon to be completed would be accepted, and a better order ...
— Memoirs Of The Court Of Marie Antoinette, Queen Of France, Complete • Madame Campan
... Miss Spitfire! I'd never be such a cross thing as you, making faces like that. Lucy doesn't do so. I like Lucy better than you; I wish Lucy ...
— The Mill on the Floss • George Eliot
... laughed the millionaire, who never remained in a bad humor long. It was beneath him to bandy words with his employee. The fellow was impertinent, but what of it? He simply did not know any better. ...
— Bought and Paid For - From the Play of George Broadhurst • Arthur Hornblow
... him to be present at his interview with Penreath. Colwyn forbore to ask him on what pretext he had obtained the gaol governor's consent to his presence, but merely signified that he was ready. Mr. Oakham replied that they had better go at once, and asked the porter to ...
— The Shrieking Pit • Arthur J. Rees
... house was simply, that "she hated town and loved the country; that she loved the sea better than the land, and loved society of her own selection better than society forced upon her.—On the sea-shore she found all that she liked, and escaped all that she hated. She therefore lived on the sea-shore.—She had persuaded her ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine—Vol. 54, No. 333, July 1843 • Various
... Pharaohs of Egypt. Then no doubt the latter-day Thebans sighed for the good old times of the XVIIIth Dynasty, when their city ruled a considerable part of Africa and Western Asia and garnered their riches into her coffers. But the days of the XIIth Dynasty had really been better still. Then there was not so much wealth, but what there was (and there was as much gold then, too) was used sparingly, tastefully, and simply. The XIIth Dynasty, not the XVIIIth, was the real Golden Age ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, And Assyria In The Light Of Recent Discovery • L.W. King and H.R. Hall
... endured to establish our priceless liberty! It makes better Americans of us all to turn and re-turn the pages of the real Hudson, the most picturesque volume of ...
— The Hudson - Three Centuries of History, Romance and Invention • Wallace Bruce
... the reciprocal bonds of god-parents and god-children. The self-same causes operated to prevent any large blending of the two races, inasmuch as the immigrant from Britain who [247] had gone forth from his country to better his fortune had not left behind him his attachment to the institutions of the mother-land, among which marrying, whenever practicable, was one of the most cherished. Above all, too, as another powerful check at first to such alliances between ...
— West Indian Fables by James Anthony Froude Explained by J. J. Thomas • J. J. (John Jacob) Thomas
... had the good fortune of visiting more than once between 1875 and 1878, was situated in the middle of his farm, at some distance from the dwellings. Of course it was treated with more care, and especially kept [812] in better conditions of fertility than was possible for the fields at large. A continued study of the qualities and exigencies of the elite plants accompanied this selection, and gave the means of gradually increasing the standard. Resistance against disease was observed and other qualities were ameliorated ...
— Species and Varieties, Their Origin by Mutation • Hugo DeVries
... turned upon the money-lender. There was no wrath in her face, no anger in her tones; only that horrid, stony purpose which Lablache dreaded. He wished she would hurl invective at him. He felt that it would have been better so. ...
— The Story of the Foss River Ranch • Ridgwell Cullum
... perfectly well that your affections always were a safer guide than your judgment. There was no bad intention on the part of the sinner—for we are all sinners—this was just an unfortunate accident, and Jim shows in every possible way his regret. There has been no public scandal, and so I think you had better drop the whole thing and forget it. I know enough about Jim to know that he has made out the worst ...
— The Preacher of Cedar Mountain - A Tale of the Open Country • Ernest Thompson Seton
... necessity he lay under still to get rid of the Cardinal, without saying much of the particulars, for fear of hazarding the secret, but only to entertain him with the general proposal of that affair, thereby to make him the better in love with the measures when proposed; and that they might, at a proper time and place, tell him they had concealed the detail to the execution from his Highness upon no other account but that they had experienced on several occasions that there was ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... insufficient retinue of servants, and none served her as was their duty. The old woman Sir Jeoffry had dubbed Mother Posset had been her sole attendant at such times as these for the past five years, because she would come to her for a less fee than a better woman, and Sir Jeoffry had sworn he would not pay for wenches being brought into the world. She was a slovenly, guzzling old crone, who drank caudle from morning till night, and demanded good living ...
— A Lady of Quality • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... or on Sunday, some papers print special feature stories on topics of little or no importance, often written in a light vein. Articles with no more serious purpose than that of helping readers to while away a few spare moments are obviously better adapted to newspapers, which are read rapidly and immediately ...
— How To Write Special Feature Articles • Willard Grosvenor Bleyer
... decidedly, and positively, I am happy to say. Is there anything so very wonderful in my having declared an attachment to Elinor; I am sure I have liked her better than any one else ...
— Elinor Wyllys - Vol. I • Susan Fenimore Cooper
... earnestly recommend you not to push the thing, or to move one step, or to show your offence, but suffer the whole thing to proceed from themselves, and see the result. You will then stand on much better ground, and have the strongest complaint against the conduct of the Duke ...
— Memoirs of the Court of George IV. 1820-1830 (Vol 1) - From the Original Family Documents • Duke of Buckingham and Chandos
... had a very cruel day. I heard this morning that yesterday Bob had been very much worse and I went down to Portobello with all sorts of horrible presentiments. I was glad when I turned the corner and saw the blinds still up. He was definitely better, if the word definitely can be used about such a detestably insidious complaint. I have ordered Consuelo for you, and you should have it soon this week; I mean next week of course; I am thinking when you will receive this letter, not of now ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 23 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... and synthesis to his father and mother and the neighbours, hardly sparing even his dog. This 'one in many' is a revelation of the order of the world, which some Prometheus first made known to our ancestors; and they, who were better men and nearer the gods than we are, have handed it down to us. To know how to proceed by regular steps from one to many, and from many to one, is just what makes the difference between eristic and dialectic. And the right way of proceeding is to look for one idea or class in all things, ...
— Philebus • Plato
... "It is better to be childless than fatherless," said Zadok, "yet it is the will of God that children should bury their fathers. When ...
— The Unknown Quantity - A Book of Romance and Some Half-Told Tales • Henry van Dyke
... me to be getting into a tangle," said Lalage, "so you'd better not go on. If you're afraid of the Archdeacon—and I suppose that is what your excuses will come to in the end—I'll do it myself. After all, you'd most likely have made ...
— Lalage's Lovers - 1911 • George A. Birmingham
... part of the year. Fine nights are at all times chilly, and men employed out of doors from the fall of the evening to the dispersal of the morning mists rely on an unusually warm under-dress of soft leather, as flexible as kid, but thicker, which is said to keep in the warmth of the body far better than any woven material. Women who, from whatever reason, venture out at night, wear the warmest cloaks they can procure. Those of limited means wear a loosely woven hair or woollen over-robe in lieu of their usual outdoor garment, resembling tufted ...
— Across the Zodiac • Percy Greg
... "Let them not drag me to a fate worse than death. Better that I die now while my eyes behold a brave friend than later, fighting alone among enemies in defense ...
— The Chessmen of Mars • Edgar Rice Burroughs |
