"Composition" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... smoke apparatus consisted of an arrangement for burning phosphorus at the stern of a ship; in other cases firework composition and other chemicals were used. A dense smoke cloud was thus formed, and, with the wind in a suitable direction, a vessel could hide her movements from an enemy submarine or other vessel, and thus screen herself ...
— The Crisis of the Naval War • John Rushworth Jellicoe
... look sweet! That blue is lovely for you. It never suited me at all. Blue is angel color and I have too much—well, of the other thing in my composition to wear it. Come on. The boys have been whistling impatience for half an hour and I don't want to scare Larry out of going. It is the first function he has condescended to attend ...
— Wild Wings - A Romance of Youth • Margaret Rebecca Piper
... room! and what a brighter, fresher little girl!-as different from thy city friends, Tom Burroughs, as the cream she pours is from the chalky composition of the hotels. Thou dost half persuade me to turn Hoosier, and help thee convert the wilderness to a blooming garden, O darlingest ...
— Outpost • J.G. Austin
... something like this: A head of St. John in the corner; rays of light (two very thin small rays) shining on him, and a look of great suffering on his face. The background a sort of dull ochre. Evidently once a large composition. There are two books, one with EVAN, and the other with, I think, BIBLIA SACRA, written on it. It is quite worthless except from a ...
— Letters to Helen - Impressions of an Artist on the Western Front • Keith Henderson
... however, an essential difference to be noted in the position of these spires, those of the cathedrals at the centre, the crowning point in the composition, those of the parish churches at the west end, springing sheer from the ground. While the former have a more intimate relation to the building the latter have an almost independent existence in keeping with the theory which regards them more as symbols of municipal pride and power ...
— Bell's Cathedrals: The Churches of Coventry - A Short History of the City and Its Medieval Remains • Frederic W. Woodhouse
... Training About being Ambitious The Housewife of a Peasant Family The Management of a Farm The Days when Statesmen were Boys Culture and Striving Essence of Rural Improvement A Hundred Beautiful Stories The Art of Composition The Preparation of the Conscript A Medical Treatise A Translation of "Self-Help" Nature and Human Life The Glories of Native Places Anecdotes concerning Culture Lives of Distinguished Peasants ...
— The Foundations of Japan • J.W. Robertson Scott
... shall the politician be released from the demand made upon every one else? Why shall political life form an episode in the history traced by successive generations on the tablet of the ages, which shall have not only its own rules of composition, but its own principles of moral interpretation? Shall mercantile life be required to cover itself with the sanctity of moral obligation, shall the demand of the age be for a Christian literature, ...
— The Religion of Politics • Ezra S. Gannett
... my Lectures very much as I delivered them at Cambridge. I am fond of the form of Lectures, because it seems to me the most natural form which in our age didactic composition ought to take. As in ancient Greece the dialogue reflected most truly the intellectual life of the people, and as in the Middle Ages learned literature naturally assumed with the recluse in his monastic cell ...
— India: What can it teach us? - A Course of Lectures Delivered before the University Of Cambridge • F. Max Mueller
... opportunities to get books were scanty; but he seized on all such opportunities, and fortunately he early came upon the "Pilgrim's Progress," the Spectator, Plutarch, Xenophon's "Memorabilia," and Locke "On the Human Understanding." Practice of English composition was the next agency in Franklin's education; and his method—quite of his own invention—was certainly an admirable one. He would make brief notes of the thoughts contained in a good piece of writing, and lay these notes aside for several days; then, without looking at the book, he ...
— Four American Leaders • Charles William Eliot
... with other literary ventures before the publishing business was started. In 1800 he wrote an epilogue to his tragedy of "Antonio" (see the essay in Vol. II., "The Old Actors," for a description of the luckless first night), and he advised him in the composition of "Faulkener," another tragedy, which failed in 1807 and which also had a prologue by Lamb. And a letter is extant showing Lamb toiling at a review of Godwin's Chaucer in 1803, but the ...
— Books for Children - The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Vol. 3 • Charles and Mary Lamb
... was quite spent, and wanted matter to continue his undertaking any longer; or That he laid it down as a sort of submission to, and composition with, the Government for some past offences; or, lastly, That he had a mind to vary his Shape, and appear again ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... however, in all that had befallen Matilda, to give talk full flow; and made her tell them the whole story of the past months; the ship fever, the visit at Briery Bank, the adoption of herself to be a child of the house, the coming to New York, and the composition of the family circle in Mrs. Lloyd's house. The elder sisters said very little all the while, ...
— The House in Town • Susan Warner
... has of ours, and then we three are going to sell our furniture here, and to give up the cottage, and say good-bye to dear Hannah, and we are going to London. In London we shall learn. I am going to have lessons in painting, and Jasmine shall study English composition, and she shall be taught how to write properly; and Daisy, too, must be taught, and we will do that with our money which is now in the bank, and when it is spent we shall be able to support ourselves. After all, it is a very simple plan, and the ...
— The Palace Beautiful - A Story for Girls • L. T. Meade
... battle the oarsmen could join in the fray instead of remaining chained to their benches, as was the custom with the slaves. It is, however, an extraordinary testimony to the influence which the corsair had attained in Constantinople that he had been able to effect this change in the composition of some of his crews; it must have been done with the active co-operation of the Sultan, as no authority less potent than that of the sovereign himself could have induced free men to undertake the terrible toil of ...
— Sea-Wolves of the Mediterranean • E. Hamilton Currey
... away from the cars. The iron-horse, as my little sister aptly remarks in her composition On Nature, is never heard to shriek in our midst; and on the whole ...
— The Complete Works of Artemus Ward, Part 1 • Charles Farrar Browne
... Morpheus inflicts on kings as well as on other men. Everything that sleep gives birth to that is lovely, its fairy scenes, its flowers and nectar, the wild voluptuousness or profound repose of the senses, had the painter elaborated on his frescoes. It was a composition as soft and pleasing in one part as dark and gloomy and terrible in another. The poisoned chalice, the glittering dagger suspended over the head of the sleeper; wizards and phantoms with terrific masks, those half-dim shadows more ...
— The Man in the Iron Mask • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... species, as yet rare in this country, is usually propagated by parting its roots in autumn; it may also be raised from seeds, which ripen frequently on strong healthy plants: to succeed in its cultivation, we should plant it in a composition of loam and bog earth, and place it in a north border, taking care that it does not suffer from want of ...
— The Botanical Magazine Vol. 7 - or, Flower-Garden Displayed • William Curtis
... he was; but the firm of Ramsay & Son had a successful launch, and Don John had compliments enough to turn the head of any one with a particle of vanity in his composition." ...
— The Yacht Club - or The Young Boat-Builder • Oliver Optic
... register, are deposited, till the great Register Office be finished. I was pleased to behold Dr Samuel Johnson rolling about in this old magazine of antiquities. There was, by this time, a pretty numerous circle of us attending upon him. Somebody talked of happy moments for composition; and how a man can write at one time, and not at another. 'Nay,' said Dr Johnson, 'a man may write at any time, if he will set himself DOGGEDLY [Footnote: This word is commonly used to signify sullenly, gloomily: and in that sense alone it appears in Dr Johnson's Dictionary. I suppose he ...
— The Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides with Samuel Johnson, LL.D. • James Boswell
... Cassiodorus which I now offer to the notice of historical students, belongs to that class of work which Professor Max Mueller happily characterised when he entitled two of his volumes 'Chips from a German Workshop.' In the course of my preparatory reading, before beginning the composition of the third and fourth volumes of my book on 'Italy and Her Invaders,' I found it necessary to study very attentively the 'Various Letters' of Cassiodorus, our best and often our only source of information, for the character and the policy of the great Theodoric. The notes which in this process ...
— The Letters of Cassiodorus - Being A Condensed Translation Of The Variae Epistolae Of - Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator • Cassiodorus (AKA Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator)
... craft lay the Gem of the Ocean. She was not a comely craft; her sides were weather-beaten, and her general appearance homely and unprepossessing; but the same waters that bore the others bore her. In her homeliness she presented a strange contrast to her surroundings. In the composition of those who were her occupants there was still greater difference. The men who trod the decks of the yachts were seekers after the pleasures of life, while those on board the Gem were engaged in the hard struggle to win bread for the loved ones who were miles and miles removed—living ...
— A Pirate of Parts • Richard Neville
... boyish, ill-spelled print; and it bears no date. The present owner, his aunt Henrietta, well remembers the circumstances and the occasion, however, having been an active participant in the acts the poem describes, although she avers that she had no hand in its composition. The original, it seems, was transcribed by The Boy upon the cover of a soap-box, which served as a head-stone to one of the graves in his family burying-ground, situated in the back-yard of the Hudson Street house, from which he was taken before ...
— A Boy I Knew and Four Dogs • Laurence Hutton
... before the great ideals of many lands. Lately, for at least a month, Modeste had warbled the songs of nightingales, musical rhapsodies whose poetry and meaning had roused the attention of her mother, already surprised by her sudden eagerness for composition and her fancy for ...
— Modeste Mignon • Honore de Balzac
... a process of induction," said the Doctor. "If any of my steps are unsound, correct me. You are silent? Then do not, I beseech you, be so vulgarly illogical as to revolt from my conclusion. We have now arrived," he resumed, "at some idea of the composition of the gang—for I incline to the hypothesis of more than one—and we now leave this room, which can disclose no more, and turn our attention to the court and garden. (Jean-Marie, I trust you are observantly following my various steps; this is an excellent piece of education for you.) ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 6 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... back of the driver, "if I could remain faithful to a dream of my youth, however illusive and unreal, can you believe that for the sake of lucre I could be false to the one real passion that alone supplanted it?" In the composition and delivery of this eloquent statement an hour was happily forgotten: the only drawback to its complete effect was that a misplacing of epithets in rapid repetition did not seem to make the slightest difference, and Cass found ...
— Frontier Stories • Bret Harte
... several vineyards, but the climate is too cold to admit of the wine having a good flavour. They here cultivate a species of cabbage, the seed of which produces a thick oil, which is used in dying stuffs, and forms part of the composition of the black soap ...
— A tour through some parts of France, Switzerland, Savoy, Germany and Belgium • Richard Boyle Bernard
... weak, not circumstance that is strong. If I could keep my mind unmoved by the irritations; if I could quarrel with mother, and displease father, and offend all the world without a qualm, or without losing the delicate balance of thought and mood necessary for composition, then I should, to some extent, triumph over my circumstances; I should not lose so much time in this wretched unstringing. Only were I so immovably constituted, is it probable that I should be able ...
— The Daughters of Danaus • Mona Caird
... grotesque compound of knave and crank, was engaged at once in composing and setting up in type an elegy on the death of a prominent young man. He is the only poet to my knowledge who ever used the composition-stick instead of a pen for the vehicle of inspiration. The elegy may still be read in Duyckinck's Cyclopaedia, and on perusing it we may well repeat the ...
— Benjamin Franklin • Paul Elmer More
... before the steamer arrived; ample time for composition. It grieved the innkeeper that another name than the author's must be signed to his telegram; but intellect yielded to rank; ...
— Old Valentines - A Love Story • Munson Aldrich Havens
... is altogether changed. From time immemorial Boulogne has included an English alloy in its French composition, but prior to the war it shared with other coastal resorts of France an outlook of smiling carelessness. Superficially it now seems more British than French, and, partly by reason of this, it impresses one as being severely business-like. The great number of khaki travellers is rivalled ...
— Cavalry of the Clouds • Alan Bott
... support which the Administration had given to their personal rivals. The principal bond of union was the common desire to prevent the reelection of Grant. The platform adopted by the Cincinnati convention reflected the composition of the party. Opening with a bitter denunciation of the President, it declared in no uncertain terms for civil service reform and the immediate and complete removal of political disabilities. On the tariff, however, the party could come to no agreement; the free traders were ...
— The Agrarian Crusade - A Chronicle of the Farmer in Politics • Solon J. Buck
... on the stage proved a great success. The play had no special merit as a literary composition, but the character of Sellers delighted the public, and both author and actor were ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... unobserved. To my surprise I discovered Lawless (whom I did not recollect ever to have seen there before, he being not much given to literary pursuits) seated, pen in hand, at the table, apparently absorbed in the mysteries of composition. ...
— Frank Fairlegh - Scenes From The Life Of A Private Pupil • Frank E. Smedley
... the church of the Rev. Mr. Flanders. He used to preach excellent sermons, so far as composition and style of delivery were concerned; his words were smooth as oil; his manner full of the order of sanctity; his prayers were fervid eloquence. Yet, when I thought what a consummate scoundrel and hypocrite he was at heart, I viewed him with ...
— City Crimes - or Life in New York and Boston • Greenhorn
... been desirous, perhaps in vain, that all the warmth, the grace, the strength, the dignity of the original should not be lost. And he flatters himself, that the indulgence of the illustrious historian will not be wanting to a man, who, of his own motion, has taken the liberty to give this composition to the public, only from a strong persuasion, that this momentous argument will be useful, in a critical conjecture, to that country which he loves with an ardour that can be exceeded only by the nobler flame which burns in the bosom of the philanthropic ...
— A Letter Addressed to the Abbe Raynal, on the Affairs of North America, in Which the Mistakes in the Abbe's Account of the Revolution of America Are Corrected and Cleared Up • Thomas Paine
... of marshmallow, and white of egg, flea-bane seeds, and lime; powder them and mix juice of radish with the white of egg; mix all thoroughly and with this composition annoint your body or hand and allow it to dry and afterwards annoint it again, and after this you may boldly take up ...
— The Miracle Mongers, an Expos • Harry Houdini
... of the opera of Armida, and certainly it was one of the best productions ever exhibited on the French stage, no one had a better opinion of its composition than Gluck himself. He was quite mad about it. He told the Queen that the air of France had invigorated his musical genius, and that, after having had the honour of seeing Her Majesty, his ideas were so much inspired that ...
— The Secret Memoirs of Louis XV./XVI, Complete • Madame du Hausset, an "Unknown English Girl" and the Princess Lamballe
... many silver spoons, a silver salver, which are all marked with the fleur-de-lis; a pair of gold buckles, some China ware, a Spanish dollar, a piece of the ornamental work of the stern of a ship (with the arms of France) much decayed; several brass sheaves belonging to a frigate's topmast, a composition pump, copper cooking utensils, a large quantity of iron knees; the silver handle of a sword-guard that was taken to Calcutta in the St. Patrick, which led to this important discovery, and which bears the ciphers of the unfortunate Count; several large brass guns, ...
— The History of Tasmania, Volume I (of 2) • John West
... he ever seriously entertained it, seeing that my identity had been revealed to him. I regret this, inasmuch as the inventor will indubitably be the object of pressing solicitations, and as Engineer Serko will employ every means in his power to obtain the composition of the explosive and deflagrator, of which he will make such detestable use during future piratical exploits. Yes, it would have been far better if I could have remained Thomas Roch's keeper here, as ...
— Facing the Flag • Jules Verne
... stood till Josiah's time. If Solomon had ever abandoned his idolatry, he would not have left them standing. So we seem to have in him a case of a fall which knew no recovery, an eclipse which did not pass. The Book of Ecclesiastes, if of his composition, would somewhat lighten the darkness of such an end; but his authorship of it is now all but ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... Henley were engaged in writing plays in Bournemouth they made a number of titles, hoping to use them in the future. Dramatic composition was not what my husband preferred, but the torrent of Mr. Henley's enthusiasm swept him off his feet. However, after several plays had been finished, and his health seriously impaired by his endeavours to keep up with Mr. Henley, play writing was abandoned forever, and my husband returned ...
— Kidnapped • Robert Louis Stevenson
... pretty Madonna and Child in a vesica surrounded by angels. The rest of the sky has rows of angels in it, and below, on the earth, kneeling bishops, potentates, and others, with some nice little children in front. Between the two divisions is a landscape with a shrine in the centre, and the whole composition is contained in an upright oval, the corners being filled up with later painting. The usual white dog appears with a red collar-ribbon. The frame is well carved, but not architectural. In a side chapel is a S. Francis by Palma Giovane. The chapel of S. Carlo, once called ...
— The Shores of the Adriatic - The Austrian Side, The Kuestenlande, Istria, and Dalmatia • F. Hamilton Jackson
... he made the most of himself, might perhaps have amounted to five feet one inch; but he seemed somewhat inclined to stoop. Nature had gifted him with an immense head and placed it clean upon his shoulders, for amongst the items of his composition it did not appear that a neck had been included. Arms long and brawny swung at his sides, and the whole of his frame was as strong built and powerful as a wrestler's; his body was supported by a pair of short but very nimble legs. His face was very long, and would ...
— The Bible in Spain • George Borrow
... he had achieved. The reward of all his struggles with trial and temptation was lavishly bestowed in her commendation, and if fidelity had not been its own reward, he could have accepted her approval as abundant compensation for all he had endured. There was no silly sentiment in Harry's composition; he had read no novels, seen no plays, knew nothing of romance even "in real life." The homage he yielded to the fair and loving girl was an unaffected reverence for simple purity and goodness; that which the True Heart and the True Life never fail to call forth ...
— Try Again - or, the Trials and Triumphs of Harry West. A Story for Young Folks • Oliver Optic
... needless to say that the public at large could throw no light on the composition of this imitation of Dr. Watts with which Field was not already possessed, since both poem and "Melissa Mayfield" ...
— Eugene Field, A Study In Heredity And Contradictions - Vol. I • Slason Thompson
... later came Mr. Trent's letter, and with it the original composition of Mr. E. Roe, ...
— Against Odds - A Detective Story • Lawrence L. Lynch
... chronological list of his published writings. It will be observed how considerable a period, 1880 to 1885, was given up to the composition of Marius the Epicurean, the most highly finished of all his works, and the expression of his ...
— Miscellaneous Studies: A Series of Essays • Walter Horatio Pater
... magnitude. The young man was John Banim, whose noble services under trying circumstances Gerald had reason some years later to experience and appreciate. During the two years immediately preceding his departure for London, he devoted his attention almost exclusively to dramatic composition. Banim's "Damon and Pythias" appeared in 1821, and the success which had at once raised its obscure author into prominence, must have had no slight influence in confirming the resolution which Gerald had already made. A religious motive, too, entered into ...
— Donahoe's Magazine, Volume 15, No. 1, January 1886 • Various
... I spoke of, the following lines are the only tolerably complete ones I have writ out of not more than one hundred and fifty. That I get on slowly you may fairly impute to want of practice in composition, when I declare to you that (the few verses which you have seen excepted) I have not writ fifty lines since I left school. It may not be amiss to remark that my grandmother (on whom the verses are written) lived housekeeper in a family ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb IV - Poems and Plays • Charles and Mary Lamb
... Robert E. Lee to South Carolina, of the Army of the Kanawha, gallant and dashing, with an arm left in Mexico, with a gift for picturesque phrases, with a past full of variety and a future of a like composition, with a genuine tenderness and care for his men, and an entire conviction that both he and his troops were at present in the convoy of a madman—they found Loring seated on a log beside a small fire and engaged in cooling ...
— The Long Roll • Mary Johnston
... novel is close, the composition elaborate. It is impossible to escape from it, the story having been once begun. 'Lorna Doone' is Blackmore at his highest point, full of truest ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 5 • Various
... Like a man with no music in his soul attempting to improve upon a sonata by Beethoven, these people not only printed, haphazard, poor impressions having the master's name, but sometimes even undertook to rearrange the composition and often to rework ...
— Rembrandt and His Etchings • Louis Arthur Holman
... many years ago, by the Honorable E.J. Phelps, once ambassador of the United States to the court of St. James's. He was allotted several hours for the contemplation of the cemetery; and his consequent meditations moved him to the composition of a poem, in four stanzas, which is a little classic of its kind. Space is lacking for a quotation of more than the initial stanza; but the taste of a poem, as of a pie, may conveniently be judged from a quadrant of ...
— The Unpopular Review, Volume II Number 3 • Various
... to refer your excellency to the communications of Lieut.-Governor Gore with Sir James Craig, for a correct view of the temper and composition of the militia and Indians. Although perfectly aware of the number of improper characters who have obtained extensive possessions, and whose principles diffuse a spirit of insubordination very adverse to all military institutions, I am however well assured that a ...
— The Life and Correspondence of Sir Isaac Brock • Ferdinand Brock Tupper
... replied Grandfather, smiling, "if Mr. Hutchinson was favored with any such extraordinary inspiration, he made but a poor use of it in his History; for a duller piece of composition never came from any man's pen. However, he was accurate, at least, though far from possessing the brilliancy ...
— True Stories from History and Biography • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... emotional, less heroical period of our history, he might have turned to the painting of manners as well as humanity. Euripides would probably, in the time of Menander, when Athens was enslaved but prosperous, have lent his hand to the composition of romantic comedy. He certainly ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... happily tempered by the laws of that kingdom, have been sometimes violated by each of the three parties, and have more than once occasioned civil wars, the last whereof was happily put an end to by this prince's grandfather, in a general composition;[82] and the militia, then settled with common consent, hath been ever since kept in the ...
— Gulliver's Travels - Into Several Remote Regions of the World • Jonathan Swift
... in his study one morning—to be accurate, it was the first Saturday in November, two days after the events of the last chapter—preparing to begin the composition of his sermon for the next day. They had dined up at the great house the night before quite quietly with Lord Talgarth and Archie, who had just ...
— None Other Gods • Robert Hugh Benson
... which look backward or forwards; as, "By and by when that was finished," or "One fine morning," or "That very next morning." Any study will show that the tale possesses the general qualities of form and has its parts controlled by the principles of composition. ...
— A Study of Fairy Tales • Laura F. Kready
... other agreed. Average Jones sat down to the composition of an epistle, which should be sufficiently imperative without being too alarming. Having completed this delicate task to his satisfaction he handed the result ...
— Average Jones • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... words, and habitually to use precisely the word with the proper meaning to express his idea. A knowledge of the derivation of words will often assist, and such books as Archbishop Trench's on "The Study of Words," or a course in English composition under a good teacher, accompanied by exercises in expression, will all contribute to {26} the formation of the habit.[2] Sometimes, however, the dictionary may give little assistance, for it may be found that one term is defined by means of another and on looking up that other, ...
— How to Study • George Fillmore Swain
... sixteen years old I belonged to a composition class. It was our custom to go on the recitation seat every day with clean slates, and we were allowed ten minutes to write seventy words on any subject the teacher thought suited to our capacity. One day he gave out "What a Man Would See if He Went to Greenland." My heart was in the ...
— Elam Storm, The Wolfer - The Lost Nugget • Harry Castlemon
... for so long as immediate inspiration lasted, the preacher, &c. frequently gave out a hymn; and when this ceased, proper portions of scripture were selected, or agreeable hymns thereto composed; but by the council of Laodicea, it was ordered that no private composition should be used in church; the council also ordered that the psalms should no longer be one continued service, but that proper lessons should be interposed to prevent the people being tired. At first the whole congregation bore a part, singing all together; afterwards the manner was altered, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 14, - Issue 403, December 5, 1829 • Various
... was well again, his young mistress led him back to the piano. Several teachers experimented with him. They found he had absolute pitch, and a remarkable memory. As a very young child he could repeat, after a fashion, any composition that was played for him. No matter how many wrong notes he struck, he never lost the intention of a passage, he brought the substance of it across by irregular and astonishing means. He wore his teachers out. He could never learn like other people, never acquired any finish. He was always a Negro ...
— My Antonia • Willa Cather
... return They worse abhorr'd. Satan beheld thir plight, And to his Mates thus in derision call'd. O Friends, why come not on these Victors proud? Ere while they fierce were coming, and when wee, 610 To entertain them fair with open Front And Brest, (what could we more?) propounded terms Of composition, strait they chang'd thir minds, Flew off, and into strange vagaries fell, As they would dance, yet for a dance they seemd Somwhat extravagant and wilde, perhaps For joy of offerd peace: but I suppose If our proposals once again were heard We should compel them to a quick result. To whom thus Belial ...
— The Poetical Works of John Milton • John Milton
... pretty accurately the composition of the Japanese naval strength, shook his head as he contemplated the collection of vessels in the river. There was a sad lack of homogeneity in the squadron, which would render quick and effective manoeuvring extremely difficult. Some of the newer ships—his own, for instance— ...
— A Chinese Command - A Story of Adventure in Eastern Seas • Harry Collingwood
... a composition at school on the defense of the rights of dumb animals, and there was one piece in the school Reader in which he must have found a sympathetic chord, and which was probably one of those that he loved to recite. It was written by the sad poet Cowper, ...
— In The Boyhood of Lincoln - A Tale of the Tunker Schoolmaster and the Times of Black Hawk • Hezekiah Butterworth
... subject to be selectively resumptive, and not nearly so much in the fact that it was produced early enough to forestall other dramatic presentations of the same materials. Mr. Thomas has himself explained, in certain semi-public conversations, that he postponed the composition of this play—on which his mind had been set for many years—until the general public had become sufficiently accustomed to the ideas which he intended to set forth. Ten years before, this play would ...
— The Theory of the Theatre • Clayton Hamilton
... lads did not devote their leisure to the composition of religious treatises, nor to the learning of Latin and Greek. On the other hand they reckoned it more worthy of their profession to turn the Whig garrison out of the Bass, and to hold it for King James. ...
— The Red True Story Book • Various
... me that here I had a text for my sermon. The cruel circumstances of the composition of Ivanhoe might be neglected. The interesting point was in the contrast between the original home of Scott's imagination and the widespread triumph of his works abroad—on the one hand, Edinburgh and ...
— Sir Walter Scott - A Lecture at the Sorbonne • William Paton Ker
... the same. At all events, the greatest musical composers—Bach, Handel, Haydn, Gluck—are proofs that no degree of genius and natural aptitude for their art is sufficient without long-continued effort and exhaustive study of the best models of composition. And this is the moral to be drawn from ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 7, May, 1858 • Various
... my curiosity concerning your modes of composition in these singular and quaint creations, for which you have no models; and tell me how this ideal ...
— Vashti - or, Until Death Us Do Part • Augusta J. Evans Wilson
... of Moses—consists of two parallel documents, called respectively Yahvistic and Elohistic, from the name applied to God in each. On this basis, German science after him raised a superstructure. No date was deemed too late to be assigned to the composition of the Pentateuch. If the historian Flavius Josephus had not existed, and if Jesus had not spoken of "the Law" and "the prophets," and of the things "which were written in the Law of Moses, and in the Prophets, and in the Psalms," critics would have been disposed ...
— Jewish Literature and Other Essays • Gustav Karpeles
... which, considered in isolation from the Christian Gospel of redemption and the power of the Holy Spirit, could only terrify and daunt a man who had a spark of honesty in his composition: and for this reason the mass of men refuses to take it seriously. It is an ideal which, in the case of all who do take it ...
— Religious Reality • A.E.J. Rawlinson
... and desirous of employing pointed arches in his new building, he might discreetly mix some round-headed arches with them, in order to make the contrast less offensive by causing the mixture of forms to pervade the whole composition, as if an ...
— The Cathedral Church of Canterbury [2nd ed.]. • Hartley Withers
... which contain Indian mythology may be divided, broadly speaking, into four classes. First, and most ancient in date of composition, are the collections of hymns known as the Vedas. Next, and (as far as date of collection goes) far less ancient, are the expository texts called the Brahmanas. Later still, come other manuals of devotion and of sacred learning, called Sutras and Upanishads; and last are the epic poems ...
— Myth, Ritual, and Religion, Vol. 1 • Andrew Lang
... chiefs have theirs cut; and several of the chiefs made me a present of some mats, and promised to send me some pigs the next day. I now put on a mat covered over with red ochre and oil, such as was worn by the other chiefs; and my head and face were also anointed with the same composition by a chief's daughter, who was entirely a stranger to me. I received, at the same time, a handsome stone mery, which I afterwards ...
— John Rutherford, the White Chief • George Lillie Craik
... It is a matter of very little moment whether he owes his origin to the white English Terrier or to the Bull-terrier crossed with the Black and Tan, or whether he has a mixture of Beagle blood in his composition, so it will suffice to take him as he emerged from the chaos of mongreldom about the middle of the last century, rescued in the first instance by the desire of huntsmen or masters of well-known packs to produce a terrier somewhat ...
— Dogs and All About Them • Robert Leighton
... letter into her pocket she sniffed doubtfully at the envelope, and tossed her head in scorn: "I thought so! Smells of tobacco." It was true, for Lisle, as we know, had smoked while he revised his composition. "If I were a young man going a-courting I'd scent my letters with rose or something nice, and I'd write 'em on pink paper—I would!" Susan reflected. But Lisle was wiser. There is no perfume for a young ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 22, September, 1878 • Various
... of cakes." In spirit I am ever present with them, and rambling 'midst their mountains and passes. If an Author may criticise his own works, I should say that the preface to the Scotch Tour is the best piece of composition of which I have been ...
— Bibliomania; or Book-Madness - A Bibliographical Romance • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... law he constantly exercised his pen in the composition of essays, some of which were published under the title of the "Rhapsodist;" but it was not until 1797 that his career as an author began, by the publication of "Alcuin: a Dialogue on the Rights of Women." This and the romances which followed it show the powerful influence ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... "Chant of Hate Against England" to music for male voices. The song was rendered publicly at a great meeting in a concert in the Alberthalle at Leipsic, and was taken up in roaring chorus by the audience. The composer himself accompanied his composition on the piano. ...
— The New York Times Current History: the European War, February, 1915 • Various
... did, my boy," answered Smith, who had but little of the milk of human kindness in his composition. "You spoke loud enough to be ...
— Ernest Bracebridge - School Days • William H. G. Kingston
... subject of so much importance to the bleacher, textile colourist or textile manufacturer as the structure and chemistry of the cotton fibre with which he has to deal. By the term chemistry we mean not only the composition of the fibre substance itself, but also the reactions it is capable of undergoing when brought into contact with various chemical substances—acids, alkalies, salts, etc. These reactions have a very important bearing on ...
— The Dyeing of Cotton Fabrics - A Practical Handbook for the Dyer and Student • Franklin Beech
... That composition had to wait awhile, in the earliest time, to find its proper centre, having been from the free point of view I thus cultivate a little encumbered by the presence of the most aged of our relatives, the oldest person I remember to have familiarly known—if it can be called familiar to have ...
— A Small Boy and Others • Henry James
... him—that is already too much wounded for me, now, to be careful about any thing, but how to act so as that my own heart shall not reproach me. As to the world's censure, I must be content to suffer that—an unhappy composition, however.—What a wreck have my fortunes suffered, to be obliged to throw overboard so many valuables, to preserve, indeed, the only valuable!—A composition that once it would have half broken my heart to think there would have been the least ...
— Clarissa, Volume 4 (of 9) - History Of A Young Lady • Samuel Richardson
... some things brought to me. There was a well prepared chicken with plenty of rice but made so hot with pepper that I threw it into the sea; next, some sort of salad floating in oil and smelling of garlic, it went overboard. Eggs cooked in oil followed the salad; last the "dulce," a composition of rice and custard perfumed with anise seed oil, made the menu of the fishes complete. I now gladly opened my box of crackers and ...
— An Ohio Woman in the Philippines • Emily Bronson Conger
... to find that Talon attempted to establish a method of settlement out of court, the principle of which was accepted by the legislature of the province of Quebec more than two centuries later. What was called the amiable composition of the French intendant may be regarded as a first edition of the law passed at Quebec in 1899, which provides for conciliation or arbitration proceedings before a lawsuit is begun. [Footnote: 62 Vict. cap. 54, p. 271.] Talon also introduced ...
— The Great Intendant - A Chronicle of Jean Talon in Canada 1665-1672 • Thomas Chapais
... and strength, but with most admirable result as to external appearance. And here you touch your fundamental principle, that the best outward effect can only be obtained by a judicious use of the materials with which you build. You must not make the walls without any reference to their composition or proportions, and then try to conceal the poverty and awkwardness of the structure by pinning up preposterous window-caps, hanging horrible brackets under the eaves that must always be in doubt whether they support the cornice or are supported by ...
— Homes And How To Make Them • Eugene Gardner
... when I entered the sitting-room. She was not only playing—but (a rare thing with her) singing too. The song was, poetry and music both, of her own composing. "I shall see him! I shall see him!" In those four words the composition began and ended. She adapted them to all the happy melodies in her memory. She accompanied them with hands that seemed to be mad for joy—hands that threatened every moment to snap the chords of the instrument. Never, since my first day ...
— Poor Miss Finch • Wilkie Collins
... having made some polite observations upon the services I had already performed, and those I might yet perform, for my master and mistress, he spoke to me of the King's imminent danger, of the plots which were hatching, and of the lamentable composition of the Legislative Assembly; and he particularly dwelt upon the necessity of appearing, by prudent remarks, determined as much as possible to abide by the act the King had just recognised. I told him ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... power of any part whatsoever of the King's dominions; no appointment to a foreign embassy; no elevation of a commoner to rank or title; no issue of royal patents; no free pardons for criminals, and no change in the composition of either of the two Houses of Parliament. All these things must be formally submitted to the will of the Crown before being entered as items of the ...
— King John of Jingalo - The Story of a Monarch in Difficulties • Laurence Housman
... windows he gave the alarm without delay. The fire soon showed itself, when it had once got ahead. When the new Exchange was erected, after the former one had been taken down in 1748, somebody persuaded the authorities to have the woodwork and timber of the new building steeped in a composition of rosin and turpentine, so as to make the wood more durable. It may therefore be readily imagined how inflammable such a composition would make the wood, and how fiercely it burned when once ignited. There had been a perceptible odour of some sort ...
— Recollections of Old Liverpool • A Nonagenarian
... eighteenth century, particularly during the rebellion of 1745, afforded a theme, perhaps the finest that could be selected for fictitious composition, founded upon real or probable incident. This civil war and its remarkable events were remembered by the existing generation without any degree of the bitterness of spirit which seldom fails to attend internal dissension. ...
— Redgauntlet • Sir Walter Scott
... of light hue, or dark, with black specks. Soft.—Composition of a part of the ranges that form the ...
— Two Expeditions into the Interior of Southern Australia, Complete • Charles Sturt
... Pitch, Colour, and Intensity. That is, he must be able to sing every note throughout the compass of the voice (Pitch) in different qualities or timbres (Colour), and with various degrees of power (Intensity). And although the modern schools of composition for the voice do not encourage the display of florid execution, a singer would be ill-advised indeed to neglect this factor, on the plea that it has no longer any practical application. No greater error is conceivable. Should ...
— Style in Singing • W. E. Haslam
... "The composition is simple. Basically, it is a two-phase material-like fiberglass. It consists of a strong, hard material imbedded in a matrix of softer material. The difference is that, in this case, the stronger fibers are borazon—boron nitride formed under tremendous pressure—while the softer matrix ...
— Thin Edge • Gordon Randall Garrett
... banker very well off, rich even, and had destined Auber to be a banker, like himself; but when Auber went to London to commence his clerkship he found he had no vocation for finance, and began to devote himself to music and composition. He was thirty-six years old when he wrote his first opera. He told us that his first ones were so bad that he had given them to the Conservatoire pour encourager ...
— In the Courts of Memory 1858-1875. • L. de Hegermann-Lindencrone
... thing to let him test the glass himself, it was quite another to show him a piece of it. He would see it sooner or later, and he could guess nothing of its composition. ...
— Marietta - A Maid of Venice • F. Marion Crawford
... numerous attempts at poetical composition, and several booklets were published. Perhaps the most promising was George Horton's The Hope of Liberty, which appeared in 1829. Unfortunately, Horton could not get the encouragement that he needed and in course of time settled down to the life of a janitor at the ...
— A Social History of the American Negro • Benjamin Brawley
... to say, atomic structures are literally "frozen." Living bodies are similarly affected. It is a widely held belief on the part of many eminent scientists that all matter, broken down into its elementary atomic composition, is electrical in structure. ...
— The Day Time Stopped Moving • Bradner Buckner
... friend, a hearing from those who were the subjects of his observations. These circumstances furnish to his own mind an apology for undertaking what no one seemed willing to attempt, notwithstanding his want of practice in literary composition, and notwithstanding the impediments of professional avocations, constantly recurring, and interrupting that strict and continued examination of the work, which became necessary, as well to detect any errors of the author, ...
— American Institutions and Their Influence • Alexis de Tocqueville et al
... examined the exterior structure of the Peak, and the composition of its volcanic productions, from the region of the coast to the top of the Piton:—I have endeavoured to render these researches interesting, by comparing the phenomena of the volcano of Teneriffe with those that ...
— Equinoctial Regions of America • Alexander von Humboldt
... Regnault, some fragments of which we have just read, contains a most interesting letter concerning the composition of Indiana. It is dated February 28, 1832. George Sand first insists on the severity of the subject and on its resemblance to life. "It is as simple, as natural and as positive as you could wish," she says. "It is neither romantic, ...
— George Sand, Some Aspects of Her Life and Writings • Rene Doumic
... Colombia, while Italy claimed their literal fulfillment. The award having been made by the President of the United States, as an act of friendly consideration and with the sole view to an impartial composition of the matter in dispute, I could not but feel deep concern at such a miscarriage, and while unable to accept the Colombian theory that I, in my official capacity, possessed continuing functions as arbitrator, with power to interpret or revise the terms of ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... audiences that attended the performances of the plays of the Abbey Theatre Players were of a very different composition. At their average they included a certain proportion of the younger intellectuals among the Irish-Americans, but very many of these were kept away from the performances, as many, indeed, in Ireland and in England, too, are kept away from the performances, by the opposition in the patriotic ...
— Irish Plays and Playwrights • Cornelius Weygandt |
