"Insolvent" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the dungeon chained," and "Lives crushed out by secret, barbarous ways, that for their country would have toiled and bled." One of Britain's authors was moved to indite: "No modern nation has ever enacted or inflicted greater legal severities upon insolvent debtors ...
— An Historical Account of the Settlements of Scotch Highlanders in America • J. P. MacLean
... one worthy act;—setting fire to its old home and self; and going up in flames and volcanic explosions, in a truly memorable and important manner. A very fit termination, as I thankfully feel, for such a Century. Century spendthrift, fraudulent-bankrupt; gone at length utterly insolvent, without real MONEY of performance in its pocket, and the shops declining to take hypocrisies and speciosities any farther:—what could the poor Century do, but at length admit, "Well, it is so. I am a swindler-century, and have long been,—having learned the trick of it from ...
— History Of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. I. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—Birth And Parentage.—1712. • Thomas Carlyle
... who rather enjoys giving a little scandal at times to his drab-suited companion; but, on the whole, thinks that it would be an excellent world if the common people would adopt this harmless form of religion, which tolerates other opinions and does not give any leverage to kings, insolvent aristocrats, ...
— Hours in a Library - New Edition, with Additions. Vol. II (of 3) • Leslie Stephen
... the lawyers were enabled to save from the insolvent bank but a very scanty portion of that wealth in which Richard Templeton had rested so much of pride. The title extinct, the fortune gone—so does Fate laugh at our posthumous ambition! Meanwhile Mr. Douce, with considerable plunder, had made his way to America: the bank owed nearly half a ...
— Alice, or The Mysteries, Book XI • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... know of no stranger power than that by which men can ignore unwelcome questions; and I know of nothing more tragical than the fact that they choose to exercise the power. What would you think of a man who never took stock because he knew that he was insolvent, and yet did not want to know it? And what do you think of yourselves if, knowing that the thought of passing into that solemn eternity is anything but a cheering one, and that you have to pass thither, you never turn your head ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Isaiah and Jeremiah • Alexander Maclaren
... freemen on whom it exclusively fell, crushed every attempt at productive industry. It was the same thing as if all the farmers on each estate were to be bound to make up, annually, the same amount of rent to their landlord, no matter how many of them had become insolvent. We know how long the agriculture of Britain, in a period of declining prices and frequent disaster, would exist ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 350, December 1844 • Various
... country: it quickly opened the granaries of the rich, it revealed resources to the poor of which he had been ignorant, and it only failed in the case of those who had really nothing to give. Those who were insolvent were not let off even when they had been more than half killed: they and their families were sent to prison, and they had to work out in forced labour the amount which they had failed to pay ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 2 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... have the exemption law which secures to the debtor the food necessary for his family and the tools by which he makes his living. Christ's doctrine has been applied further still; we have the bankruptcy law which gives a new lease of life to an insolvent debtor if his failure is without criminal fault on his part. By turning over to his creditors all the property he has above exemptions he can go forth from court free from all legal obligations and begin business unembarrassed. Some who take advantage of these ...
— In His Image • William Jennings Bryan
... can distinguish, even on the darkest night, a sapphire from a ruby and tell at a glance in what quarter of the earth a gem was disinterred—all these had been too long absent from the conduct of affairs. Teresa, I was insolvent." ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 5 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... intense and long. During her illness, no tidings came of Philip. He was in another part of the country when the accident happened; and it was not till long after it had been made known that Mr Young had died insolvent,—not till after Maria had recovered, as far as recovery was possible,—not till she had fallen into the habit of earning her bread, that Philip reappeared, and shook hands with her, and told her with how much concern ...
— Deerbrook • Harriet Martineau
... taxation. The Boers have never been good taxpayers, and no Government has been able to enforce the proper payment of taxes due to the State. A decade after its establishment the Republic was practically insolvent. Even as early as 1857 the Government was compelled to issue mandaten, or bills, wherewith to raise money to buy ammunition, and to pay its servants. In 1866 a regular issue of paper money was sanctioned by the Volksraad. This was followed by further issues, until, in 1867, a Finance ...
— South Africa and the Transvaal War, Vol. 1 (of 6) - From the Foundation of Cape Colony to the Boer Ultimatum - of 9th Oct. 1899 • Louis Creswicke
... forming the notion, if we are only careful to remember that duties enter into it quite as much as rights. Our duties may overbalance our rights. A man may owe more than he is worth, and therefore if a money value is set on his collective legal relations he may be what is called insolvent. But for all that the entire group of rights and duties which centres in him is not the ...
— Ancient Law - Its Connection to the History of Early Society • Sir Henry James Sumner Maine
... again. "Had those Hussars only let him in!" said Austria afterwards: but they had not such luck. It was at this point, according to Valori, that the King burst forth into audible ejaculations of a lamentable nature. There is no getting over, then, even to Brandenburg, and in an insolvent condition. Not open insolvency and bankrupt disgrace; no, ruin, and an Austrian jail, is the one outlook. "O MON DIEU, O God, it is too much (C'EN EST TROP)!" with other the like snatches of lamentation; [Valori, i. 104.] which are not inconceivable in a ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XII. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... to the peasantry around him! How it must have exalted their ideas of the civilising influence of land agency. 'It is quite a common thing,' says a gentleman well acquainted with the estate, 'when a tenant becomes insolvent, that his tenant-right is sold and employed to pay those of his creditors who may be in favour. I know a lady who made application to have a claim against a small farmer registered in the office, which was done, and she now possesses the ...
— The Land-War In Ireland (1870) - A History For The Times • James Godkin
... says Letitia, honestly sorry. Now that the engagement is un fait accompli, and the bridegroom-elect has declared himself not altogether so insolvent as she had feared, she drops precautionary measures and gives way to the affection with which she has begun to regard him. "You are going to Herst also. Why cannot you stay here to accompany Molly? Her going is ...
— Molly Bawn • Margaret Wolfe Hamilton
... then safely borrow L1,500 more from your father; and, in the mean while, you and your partner will have had together the full sum of L3,000 to commence with. You see in this proposal I make you no gift, and I run no risk even by your death. If you die insolvent, I will promise to come on your father, poor fellow; for small joy and small care will he have then in what may be left of his fortune. There—I have said all; and I will never forgive you if you reject an aid that will serve you so much and cost me ...
— The Caxtons, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... indeed the principal one. The Budget excited fiercer passions, and raised greater issues. It was for no mere scheme of finance that the Government had to fight, but against a violation of public faith which would have left France insolvent and creditless in the face of the Powers who still held its territory in pledge. The debt incurred by the nation since 1813 was still unfunded. That part of it which had been raised before the summer of 1814 had been secured by law upon the ...
— History of Modern Europe 1792-1878 • C. A. Fyffe
... shrivelled-looking when first introduced to our readers, he appeared at the present period little else than the shadow of what he had been. He not only lost heavily the usurious credit he had given, in consequence of the wide-spread poverty and crying distress of the wretched people, who were mostly insolvent, but he suffered severely by the outrages which had taken place, and doubly so in consequence of the anxiety which so many felt to wreak their vengeance on him, under that guise, for his heartlessness and ...
— The Black Prophet: A Tale Of Irish Famine • William Carleton
... wealthy. He was pleased with his nieces, and promised to carry them back with him into New Hampshire, and (as they were to all appearance perfectly white) to introduce them into the society which by education they were fitted for. It appeared, however, that their father had died insolvent. The deficiency was very small: but it was necessary to make an inventory of the effects, to deliver to the creditors. This was done by the brother,—the executor. Some of the creditors called ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 3, 1918 • Various
... at least probable, this settlement might have been upset; but the trustees of Mrs. Walter Scott would probably also have felt bound to resist this, and leave to unsettle could only have been obtained on the humiliating and even slightly disgraceful plea that the granter, being practically insolvent at the time, was acting beyond his rights. It seems to have been proposed by the Bank of Scotland, during the negotiations for the arrangement which followed, that this should be done; and the reasons which dictated Scott's refusal would have equally, no doubt, prevented ...
— Sir Walter Scott - Famous Scots Series • George Saintsbury
... abruptly, and never returned to it. He obtained a cruising vessel, which was lost in the Atlantic two years afterward. The widow was left in affluence; but reverses of various kinds had befallen her; a bank broke—an investment failed—she went into a small business and became insolvent—then she entered into service, sinking lower and lower, from housekeeper down to maid-of-all-work—never long retaining a place, though nothing decided against her character was ever alleged. She was considered sober, honest, and peculiarly quiet in her ...
— The Boy Scouts Book of Stories • Various
... of a national bankrupt law I still regard as very desirable. The Constitution having given to Congress jurisdiction of this subject, it should be exercised and uniform rules provided for the administration of the affairs of insolvent debtors. The inconveniences resulting from the occasional and temporary exercise of this power by Congress and from the conflicting State codes of insolvency which come into force intermediately should be removed by the enactment of a simple, inexpensive, and ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents, Volume IX. • Benjamin Harrison
... distinguished soldier and a member of the English Parliament when in 1732 he sailed with one hundred twenty men and founded Savannah. His express object was the settlement of Georgia, not only as a home for insolvent debtors, who suffered in English jails, but also for persecuted Protestants of the Continent. It was not the least of his services that on his second visit to the future "Empire State of the South" he took with him John and Charles Wesley, whose influence has been so marked among ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, v. 13 • Various
... was declared at this period to be "altogether insolvent." This is the reason probably, if he was not in the mean time satisfied that his claim was untenable, that his case does not appear to have been brought under the notice of parliament again, and that he did not persist in his attempts to regain ...
— The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning • Hugh Binning
... many years Pompey had done nothing to sustain or to revive his obsolete reputation. Capua or other great towns knew him only as a great proprietor. And let us ask this one searching question—Was the poor spirit-broken insolvent, a character now so extensively prevailing in Italian society, likely to sympathize more heartily with the lordly oligarch fighting only for the exclusive privileges of his own narrow order, or with the great reformer who amongst a thousand plans for reinfusing ...
— The Posthumous Works of Thomas De Quincey, Vol. II (2 vols) • Thomas De Quincey
... the Duty-Commissioners Act for four years; altered certain parts of the Newcastle-District administration of justice Bill; made provision for the further appointment of parish and town officers; relieved insolvent debtors, by an Act which enabled a debtor in prison to receive five shillings weekly from his creditor during his detention, if the prisoner were not worth five pounds, worthlessness being, in this instance, to a man's advantage; the curing, packing and inspection ...
— The Rise of Canada, from Barbarism to Wealth and Civilisation - Volume 1 • Charles Roger
... time of his appointment held a county office, was postmaster, and a justice of the peace. He was a leading man, of high character and standing, and supposed to be of considerable wealth. In 1817 he became embarrassed and insolvent, and was removed from his position as deputy. His bonds proved worthless, and the whole loss and liability fell upon my father. This, with other losses occurring through the failure of other deputies, was the most unfortunate event of his life. His correspondence ...
— Recollections of Forty Years in the House, Senate and Cabinet - An Autobiography. • John Sherman
... Master of Ceremonies, which he did to the entire satisfaction of his sovereign and of the nation. But while prosperity seemed to smile with increasing brilliancy, adversity was hovering near. In 1826, Archibald Constable and Company, the famous publishers of his works, became insolvent, involving in their bankruptcy the printing firm of the Messrs Ballantyne, of which Sir Walter was a partner. The liabilities amounted to the vast sum of L102,000, for which Sir Walter was individually responsible. To a mind less balanced by native intrepidity and fortified ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel , Volume I. - The Songs of Scotland of the past half century • Various
... war preparation has come to take the lion's share of all funds, however gathered, "consuming the fruits of progress." What the end shall be, and by what forces it will be brought about, no one can now say. This is still a very rich world, even though insolvent and under control of its creditors. There is a growing unrest among taxpayers. There would be a still greater unrest if posterity could be heard from, for it can only save itself by new inventions and new exploitations or by frugality of administration ...
— Popular Science Monthly Volume 86
... up the insolvent U.S.A. economy and the resulting opposition of America's leading European trading partners is not reassuring. If western civilization has passed the zenith of its development and entered a period of decline and fragmentation even a figure of Napoleonic capacities ...
— Civilization and Beyond - Learning From History • Scott Nearing
... for the inspection of prisons, and had bestowed on them full discretionary powers to adjust all differences between prisoners and their creditors, to compound debts, and to give liberty to such debtors as they found honest and insolvent. From the uncertain and undefined nature of the English constitution, doubts sprang up in many, that this commission was contrary to law; and it was represented in that light to James. He forbore, therefore, renewing the commission, ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part D. - From Elizabeth to James I. • David Hume
... a letter telling me that a man of whose name I had never heard had been killed by a cow in Melbourne, and that under his will a legacy of three thousand pounds fell into the estate of a distant relative of my own who had died peacefully and utterly insolvent eighteen months previously, leaving me his sole heir and representative, and I put the revolver back ...
— Sketches in Lavender, Blue and Green • Jerome K. Jerome
... his farm he was by no means out of danger of absolute insolvency—he was in fact ruined; but he was not yet the victim of those processes which would make him legally insolvent. The vultures were hovering, but they had not yet swooped, and there was the Manor saw-mill going night and day; for by the strangest good luck Jean Jacques received an order for M. Mornay's new railway ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... could kill them. These changes of temper prove that I do not break off kind. Let us mock other people, and let other people mock us; it is well done on both sides.—[Poor little De Staal: to what a posture have things come with you, in that fast-rotting Epoch, of Hypocrisies becoming all insolvent!] ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XVI. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—The Ten Years of Peace.—1746-1756. • Thomas Carlyle
... return of the Marquis and the coming of a new Marchioness and a new Lord Popenjoy. Occasion had been taken to give some details of the Germain family, and public allusion had even been made to the marriage of Lord George. These are days in which, should your wife's grandfather have ever been insolvent, some newspaper, in its catering for the public, will think it proper to recall the fact. The Dean's parentage had been alluded to, and the late Tallowax will, and the Tallowax property generally. It had also been declared that the Marchesa Luigi,—now the present Marchioness,—had been born ...
— Is He Popenjoy? • Anthony Trollope
... and many payments are made among the customers of a single bank, requiring only bookkeeping transfers. A fractional reserve is therefore ordinarily fully adequate, altho with any less than a 100 per cent reserve any bank would be insolvent if all of its demand obligations were presented at the same instant. Such a contingency is made impossible by business custom and public opinion especially among the larger customers of banks, but the panic of small depositors often ...
— Modern Economic Problems - Economics Vol. II • Frank Albert Fetter
... the Surface school was one day heard to boast that from his continually breaking his promises made to his creditors, they must imagine him to have been brought up in a court:—"Yes," replied a byestander, "the Insolvent's Court." ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, No. - 287, December 15, 1827 • Various
... illness or death which I had feared and dreaded, but of something worse—disgrace. My father was an embezzler, a thief. He had absconded, had run away, like the coward he was, taking with him what was left of his stealings. The banking house of which he had been the head was insolvent. The police were on his track. And, worse and most disgraceful of all, he had not fled alone. There was a woman with him, a woman whose escapades had furnished the ...
— The Rise of Roscoe Paine • Joseph C. Lincoln
... auction, delivered over his personal effects—plate, books, furniture, etc.—to be held in trust for his creditors (the estate itself had been settled on his eldest son when he married), and bound himself to discharge annually a certain amount of the liabilities of the insolvent firm. He then, with his characteristic energy, set about the performance of his herculean task. He took cheap lodgings, abridged his usual enjoyments and recreations, and labored harder than ever. The death of his beloved lady increased the gloom which the change ...
— Great Men and Famous Women, Vol. 7 of 8 • Charles F. (Charles Francis) Horne
... nature of a pledge, the ransom cannot exceed the value of the ship, so that the master cannot bind his owner for a larger value; and on the same principle, the captor is bound to take the vessel or its value if abandoned by the owner, or what it sells for if the owner is insolvent. He is also bound to maintain the hostage, and that is an item in the ransom bill. In estimating the ransom and expenses of the hostage as a damage or loss, they are regarded in the nature of general average, and the several persons interested ...
— The Laws Of War, Affecting Commerce And Shipping • H. Byerley Thomson
... "insolvency" are sometimes used indiscriminately, they have in legal and commercial usage distinct significations. When a person's financial liabilities are greater than his means of meeting them, he is said to be "insolvent"; but he may nevertheless be able to carry on his business affairs by means of credit, paying old debts by incurring new ones, and he may even, if fortunate, regain a position of solvency without his creditors ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 2 - "Baconthorpe" to "Bankruptcy" • Various
... great crowd of people following the executioner, who led a young man by a rope tied about his neck. Inquiring the crime of the culprit, she was informed that he owed a hundred deenars, which being unable to pay, he was sentenced to be hung, such being the punishment of insolvent debtors in that city. The cauzee's wife, moved with compassion, immediately tendered the sum, being nearly all she had, when the young man was released, and falling upon his knees before her, vowed to dedicate his life to her service. She related ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Complete • Anonymous
... again be the attributes of royalty. In this session, too, it conferred a boon upon Ireland, which earned little gratitude, by the consolidation of the British and Irish exchequers. Ireland was virtually insolvent before this measure was passed. With the union of the exchequers the union of the countries was completed. The administration, discredited by its financial policy, was strengthened in June by the acquisition of Canning, who succeeded Buckinghamshire ...
— The Political History of England - Vol XI - From Addington's Administration to the close of William - IV.'s Reign (1801-1837) • George Brodrick
... England abruptly, and never returned to it. He obtained a cruising vessel, which was lost in the Atlantic two years afterwards. The widow was left in affluence, but reverses of various kinds had befallen her: a bank broke; an investment failed; she went into a small business and became insolvent; then she entered into service, sinking lower and lower, from housekeeper down to maid-of-all-work,—never long retaining a place, though nothing decided against her character was ever alleged. She was considered sober, honest, and peculiarly ...
— Haunted and the Haunters • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... Puritans from the Nansemond country, vexed with the paltry persecutions of Governor Berkeley, and later by fugitives from the bloody revenge which he delighted to inflict on those who had been involved in the righteous rebellion led by Nathaniel Bacon. These had been joined by insolvent debtors not a few. Adventurers from New England settled on the Cape Fear River for a lumber trade, and kept the various plantations in communication with the rest of the world by their coasting craft plying to Boston. Dissatisfied ...
— A History of American Christianity • Leonard Woolsey Bacon
... a good deal better than hunting up the poor widows of insolvent merchants," said Mr. Jones to himself, as he walked the length of his store once or twice, rubbing his hands every now and then with irrepressible glee. "If I'd been led off by Smith on that fool's errand, just see what I would have lost. ...
— Finger Posts on the Way of Life • T. S. Arthur
... in prison near two years, my father was liberated by an Act for the benefit of insolvent debtors; he was then lost sight of for some time; at last, however, he made his appearance in the neighbourhood dressed like a gentleman, and seemingly possessed of plenty of money. He came to see me, took me into a field, and asked me how I was getting ...
— The Romany Rye • George Borrow
... liberate the rogues about him from responsibility. I heard of a nobleman who had inherited an enormous fortune, who condemned himself to the labor of a clerk at L50 a year, who remained faithful to his desk even to extreme old age, and who, thanks to some blunder or other in management, died insolvent. ...
— The Roman Question • Edmond About
... with the higher classes of society, had led him into many scrapes, out of which his father's money had in one way or another released him; but that source of safety had now failed. Old Rollet, having been too busy with the affairs of the nation to attend to his business, had died insolvent, leaving his son with nothing but his own wits to help him out of future difficulties; and it was not long before ...
— Little Classics, Volume 8 (of 18) - Mystery • Various
... being the poetry of form and colour, the other of the sounds of nature. Handel was an indefatigable and constant worker; he was never cast down by defeat, but his energy seemed to increase the more that adversity struck him. When a prey to his mortifications as an insolvent debtor, he did not give way for a moment, but in one year produced his 'Saul,' 'Israel,' the music for Dryden's 'Ode,' his 'Twelve Grand Concertos,' and the opera of 'Jupiter in Argos,' among the finest of his works. As his ...
— Self Help • Samuel Smiles
... Codrus shivers o'er his bags of gold, By famine wither'd, and benumb'd by cold, I mark his haggard eyes with frenzy roll, And feast upon the terrors of his soul; The wrecks of war, the perils of the deep, That curse with hideous dreams the caitiff's sleep; Insolvent debtors, thieves, and civil strife, Which daily persecute his wretched life, With all the horrors of prophetic dread, That rack his bosom while the mail is read. 160 Safe from the road, untainted by the school, A judge by birth, by destiny a fool, ...
— Poetical Works of Johnson, Parnell, Gray, and Smollett - With Memoirs, Critical Dissertations, and Explanatory Notes • Samuel Johnson, Thomas Parnell, Thomas Gray, and Tobias Smollett
... goods. APPRAISER. A person appointed to value real or personal property. ARBITRATION. The settlement of a disputed question by a person chosen by the parties to the dispute. ASSETS. The total resources of a person in business. ASSIGNEE. A person to whom the property of a bankrupt, or an insolvent debtor, is transferred for adjustment for the benefit of Auditors. ASSIGNMENT. The act of transferring property to the Assignee. ATTACHMENT. A warrant for the purpose of seizing a man's property. BALANCE SHEET. A statement in condensed form, ...
— Business Hints for Men and Women • Alfred Rochefort Calhoun
... answer. All my old friends turned their backs upon me. My action went against me—I had not a penny to defend it. Solomonson proved my wife's debt, and seized my two thousand pounds. As for the detainer against me, I was obliged to go through the court for the relief of insolvent debtors. I passed through it, and came out a beggar. But fancy the malice of that wicked Stiffelkind: he appeared in court as my creditor for 3L., with sixteen years' interest at five per cent, for a PAIR OF TOP-BOOTS. The old thief produced them in court, ...
— The Fatal Boots • William Makepeace Thackeray
... richer sort of prisoners in the Fleet and King's Bench, to the poorer, for their share of a room. When prisons are very full, which is too often the case, particularly on the eve of an insolvent act, two or three persons are obliged to sleep in a room. A prisoner who can pay for being alone, chuses two poor chums, who for a stipulated price, called chummage, give up their share of the room, and sleep on the stairs, or, as the ...
— 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue • Captain Grose et al.
... get round the nearest point of interception, to march with more ease at a greater distance from the enemy, and thus to render the haste required less damaging. This last way is the worst of all, it generally turns out like a new debt contracted by an insolvent debtor, and leads to greater embarrassment. There are cases in which this course is advisable; others where there is nothing else left; also instances in which it has been successful; but upon the whole it is certainly true that ...
— On War • Carl von Clausewitz
... which, for want of a better, my master and I had to cook and sleep, was one of the most miserable tumble-down erections I ever saw inhabited. It had formed part of an ancient set of offices that had been condemned about fourteen years before; but the proprietor of the place becoming insolvent, it had been spared, in lack of a better, to accommodate the servants who wrought on the farm; and it had now become not only a comfortless, but also a very unsafe dwelling. It would have formed no bad subject, with its bulging walls ...
— My Schools and Schoolmasters - or The Story of my Education. • Hugh Miller
... how do you do!' And he said, 'How do you do!' And I said, 'I'm a relation,' and he said, 'I believe so.' And I said, 'I was educated at Harvard and in Leipsic; I am full of useless accomplishments, harmless erudition, and insolvent amiability, and I am otherwise perfectly worthless. Can you give ...
— Ailsa Paige • Robert W. Chambers
... Trust Company insolvent?" he asked. "You say that the bank closed its doors this morning? Have you any idea of its condition? Looted? Is it entirely cleaned out? Is there no chance for depositors? I wish to inquire about the trust funds, bonds and other investments belonging to a friend ...
— The Crimson Tide • Robert W. Chambers
... The insolvent debtor, who in the majority of cases had studied his pleasures more than his constitution, was perhaps an even less desirable recruit than his cousin the emancipated convict. In his letters to the Navy Board, Capt. Aston, R.N., relates how, immediately after the passing of ...
— The Press-Gang Afloat and Ashore • John R. Hutchinson
... 'If I have been the dupe of a clever comedian,' I said to Bordin, 'so much the worse for him, not for me. But tell me what to do.' 'You must try to get from him a written acknowledgment; for a debtor, however, insolvent he may be, may become solvent, and then he will pay.' Thereupon Bordin took from a tin box a case on which I saw the name of Mongenod; he showed me three receipts of a hundred francs each. 'The next time ...
— The Brotherhood of Consolation • Honore de Balzac
... not held in high esteem at St. Ogg's, and men who busied themselves with political questions were regarded with some suspicion, as dangerous characters; they were usually persons who had little or no business of their own to manage, or, if they had, were likely enough to become insolvent. ...
— The Mill on the Floss • George Eliot
... hostilities that had been begun. They would have been ended by the care that the archbishop was taking, had the unyielding disposition of Don Sebastian de Corcuera, in what had been begun, allowed him to be less insolvent in what he was attempting. For if on such occasions something is not yielded on both sides, the fire that has been started will continue to increase until any check will be entirely impossible—as was experienced ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, Volume XXV, 1635-36 • Various
... greatly given to him, for he never appeared quite able to pay for them. Although he became deeply involved in debt, he never cultivated luxurious or unworthy delights. His pleasures were of the simplest. His insolvent condition was due, true enough, to pleasure and his foremost luxury—the luxury of ceaseless charities that he could as ill afford as a coach-and-four. He was one of the hearts not meant to draw near the gates of heaven alone, and could ...
— Oliver Goldsmith • E. S. Lang Buckland
... provinces, as in Education, Polity, Religion, where so much is wanted and indispensable, and so little can as yet be furnished, probably Imposture is of sanative, anodyne nature, and man's Gullibility not his worst blessing. Suppose your sinews of war quite broken; I mean your military chest insolvent, forage all but exhausted; and that the whole army is about to mutiny, disband, and cut your and each other's throat,—then were it not well could you, as if by miracle, pay them in any sort of fairy-money, feed them on coagulated water, or mere imagination of meat; whereby, till the real supply ...
— Sartor Resartus - The Life and Opinions of Herr Teufelsdrockh • Thomas Carlyle
... years, and in the mean time suffer the cost of the spirits to accumulate by simple interest only, the whole town, at the end of the term, could not pay their rum bills. It can be no consolation that all other towns would be alike insolvent. ...
— Select Temperance Tracts • American Tract Society
... the Memoirs of the Life and Writings of Dr. Johnson, 1785, p. 25, says:—'Mrs. Porter's husband died insolvent, but her settlement was secured. She brought her second husband about seven or eight hundred pounds, a great part of which was expended in fitting up a house for a boarding-school.' That she had some money can be almost inferred ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 1 • Boswell, Edited by Birkbeck Hill
... "The week's list of insolvent traders includes an Englishman named James Bellbridge, formerly connected with a disreputable saloon in this city. Bellbridge is under suspicion of having caused the death of his wife in a fit of delirium tremens. The unfortunate woman had been married, for the first ...
— The Evil Genius • Wilkie Collins
... use. This was about ten years ago, when his own life fell to pieces. I had been associated with magazines for some time, and knew how little that was really good found its way into the plainer people's homes. At Mac's suggestion I bought an insolvent monthly, and began to remodel it. 'You've got the home-and-children bug; well, do something for other people's'—was the way Mac put it to me. Later we started the two other magazines, always keeping before us our aim of giving the average home ...
— The Nest Builder • Beatrice Forbes-Robertson Hale
... surrounded him. Another gentleman who, having nothing to lose, surrendered himself to his creditors, was a director of more than twenty lines. A third was Provisional Committeeman to fifteen. A fourth, who commenced life as a printer, who became insolvent in 1832 and a bankrupt in 1837, who had negotiated partnerships, who had arranged embarrassed affairs, who had collected debts, and turned his attention to anything, did not disdain, also, to be a Railway promoter, a Railway director, or to spell ...
— Gossip in the First Decade of Victoria's Reign • John Ashton
... say,' said Aunt Becky, rather stiffly, pulling him up; for though she had fought a round for poor George Anne Bellamy for Mossop's sake, she nevertheless had formed a pretty just estimate of that faded, good-natured, and insolvent demirep, and rather recoiled from any anecdotes ...
— The House by the Church-Yard • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... of a quantity of his surplus stock. He had only been gone a few days before word came that he was dead. It then came out that Mr. Blackwell had allowed him to run up a debt of nearly seven hundred pounds for printing. It also came out that Mr. Townsend was insolvent. He had been in difficulties for years, and he had used the money he had received for my books to prevent his creditors from making him a bankrupt. His journey to Scotland was his last shift, and failing in that, he had taken opiates, it was said, to such an extent, ...
— Modern Skepticism: A Journey Through the Land of Doubt and Back Again - A Life Story • Joseph Barker
... Pageantry, similar to Balthazzers quaffing in the holy vessels, did not pass long without a note of observation, for though Milne had scraped together much riches, yet, in a short time, he became an insolvent bankrupt, and was forced to flee to the Abbey; after which he became distracted, and died ...
— Biographia Scoticana (Scots Worthies) • John Howie
... do not try to tell a man how he should provide for his family. Men of honor need no such reminder, though they may be bothered by the question: "How much can I afford?" On that point, sufficient to say that it is not more blessed to be insolvent and worried about debts from being overloaded with insurance than for any other reason. Many retired officers supplement their pay by selling insurance. When a young service officer wants insurance counsel, he will find that they are disposed to deal sympathetically ...
— The Armed Forces Officer - Department of the Army Pamphlet 600-2 • U. S. Department of Defense
... Parliament, still gave it as his "positive opinion that the debts ought to be paid immediately, for the dignity of the country and the situation of the Prince, who ought not to be seen rolling about the streets, in his state-coach, as an insolvent prodigal." With respect to the promise given in 1787, and now violated, that the Prince would not again apply to Parliament for the payment of his debts, Mr. Sheridan, with a communicativeness that seemed hardly prudent, put the House in possession of some details of the transaction, which, ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Rt. Hon. Richard Brinsley Sheridan Vol 2 • Thomas Moore
... being troubled about a woman was not, for him, a habit: that itself was an inconsistency. George Gravener could stand straight enough before any other combination of forces. It amused me to think that the combination he had succumbed to had an American accent, a transcendental aunt and an insolvent father; but all my old loyalty to him mustered to meet this unexpected hint that I could help him. I saw that I could from the insincere tone in which he pursued: "I've criticised her of course, I've ...
— The Coxon Fund • Henry James
... known that La Salle was insolvent. Tonty had long served without pay. Douay says that he made the stay of the party at the fort very agreeable, and speaks of him, with some apparent compunction, as "ce brave Gentilhomme, toujours inseparablement attache aux ...
— France and England in North America, a Series of Historical Narratives, Part Third • Francis Parkman
... these German banks, which could at any given moment sum up the prospects as well as the actual situation of each of their customers. It was this comprehensive survey which warranted some of the large advances they made to seemingly insolvent firms which afterwards grew to be the most ...
— England and Germany • Emile Joseph Dillon
... History, Constitutions, Laws, Land Titles, Cities, Colleges, Army and Navy, Rate of Mortality, Growth of Cities, Insolvent and Assignment Laws, Debts, Rates of Interest, and other Useful Knowledge, ...
— Thrilling Narratives of Mutiny, Murder and Piracy • Anonymous
... says Sismondi, "the gratuitous distributions of grain made to the Roman people, rendered the cultivation of grain in Italy still more unprofitable: it then became absolutely impossible for the little proprietors to maintain themselves in the neighbourhood of Rome; they became insolvent, and their patrimonies were sold to the rich. Gradually the abandonment of agriculture extended from one district to another. The true country of the Romans—central Italy—had scarcely achieved the conquest of the globe, when it found itself without an agricultural population. In the provinces ...
— Blackwoods Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 365, March, 1846 • Various
... Nova, p. 27) says that Johnson mistook the nature of the compliment. Sheridan had fled to France from his debtors. In 1766 an Insolvent Debtors' Relief Bill was brought into the House in his absence. Mr. Whyte, one of his creditors, petitioned the House to have Sheridan's name included. A very unusual motion was made, 'that petitioner ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 3 • Boswell, Edited by Birkbeck Hill
... with it, and for a time at least his brother sovereigns must continue to be at enmity. The negotiations for the recovery of the French princes out of their Spanish prison, were on the point of conclusion; and, as Francis was insolvent, Henry had consented to become security for the money demanded for their deliverance. Beda had, moreover, injured his cause by attacking the Gallican liberties; and as this was a point on which the government was naturally sensitive, some tolerable excuse was furnished for the lesson which ...
— The Reign of Henry the Eighth, Volume 1 (of 3) • James Anthony Froude
... know, Julia, that when your father started in life he had not much capital, and began business in a small way. But he did very well until there came a time of commercial depression, and a man who owed him a considerable sum of money died insolvent. Then your father found that he was so much embarrassed that he thought the wisest and most honourable course would be to divide what he had amongst his creditors at once. He gave up everything to ...
— Ruth Arnold - or, the Country Cousin • Lucy Byerley
... were not slaves, the property of their master; for afterwards it is assumed that he may sell them, not as an ordinary right, but as the special penalty incurred by an insolvent debtor. A king, in ancient times and oriental regions, entered into pecuniary transactions with his servants on a great scale. One man, who owes all to the personal favour of the sovereign, is the governor of a wealthy ...
— The Parables of Our Lord • William Arnot
... men. We have met a great many persons of this description in the neighbourhood of the inns of court. They may be met with, in Holborn, between eight and ten any morning; and whoever has the curiosity to enter the Insolvent Debtors' Court will observe, both among spectators and practitioners, a great variety of them. We never went on 'Change, by any chance, without seeing some shabby-genteel men, and we have often wondered what earthly business they can have there. They will sit there, for hours, ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens
... to which insolvent debtors retired, to enjoy an illegal protection, which they were there suffered to afford one another, from the ...
— The Poetical Works Of Alexander Pope, Vol. 1 • Alexander Pope et al
... to be looked into, it was found that he was practically insolvent, his stock of goods and personal property barely—but nearly enough to free him from censure—covering his liabilities. Following came the disclosure that he had been entrusted with the sum of twenty ...
— Roads of Destiny • O. Henry
... lawsuit, so objectionable to Quakers, the decision was left to William Penn, then a rising young Quaker about thirty years old, dreaming of ideal colonies in America. Penn awarded Fenwick a one-tenth interest and four hundred pounds. Byllinge soon became insolvent and turned over his nine-tenths interest to his creditors, appointing Penn and two other Quakers, Gawen Lawrie, a merchant of London, and Nicholas Lucas, a maltster of Hertford, to hold it in trust for them. Gawen Lawrie afterwards became deputy governor of East Jersey. Lucas was one of those ...
— The Quaker Colonies - A Chronicle of the Proprietors of the Delaware, Volume 8 - in The Chronicles Of America Series • Sydney G. Fisher
... the eighteenth century closed with the death of Louis XV, all intelligent French administrators recognized the dilemma; either relief must be given, or France must become insolvent, and revolution supervene upon insolvency. But for the aristocracy revolution had no terrors, for they believed that they could crush revolution as their class had done ...
— The Theory of Social Revolutions • Brooks Adams
... is filled with color and action, the background of which is the rather motley life of colonial Georgia, or rather of the time during which Georgia was being established as a colony for insolvent debtors through the efforts of General Oglethorpe. The suspicions and uneasiness existing in the midst of the heterogeneous population attracted to the new colony, the constant state of alarm from the threatened incursions by the Spanish from the ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 6, July 1905 • Various
... that Lexley Park, with all its improvements, was now the property of John Julius Altham, Esq.!—the only dilemma still to be decided by the law, being the extent to which, his kinsman having died insolvent and intestate, he was liable to the suit of Jonas Sparks for the return of the purchase money, amounting ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXXVI. October, 1843. Vol. LIV. • Various
... of war and all persons bought from foreigners were condemned to perpetual slavery. Others became slaves for limited periods,—freemen who married slaves, insolvent debtors, servants out of employment, and various other classes. As the legal interest of money was forty per cent., the enslavement of debtors must have been very common, and Russia was even then largely a land ...
— Historic Tales, Vol. 8 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... and currencies in this Earth have as good as ceased for ever and ever! God is great; all Lies do now, as from the first, travel incessantly towards Chaos, and there at length lodge! In some parts of Ireland (the Western "insolvent Unions," some twenty-seven of them in all), within a trifle of one half of the whole population are on Poor-Law rations (furnished by the British Government, L1,100 a week furnished here, L1,300 there, L800 there); the houses stand roofless, the lands unstocked, ...
— The Correspondence of Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1834-1872, Vol II. • Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson
... If we had to deny the obsequies to all who die without confession, we should forget the De profundis! These restrictions, as you well know, are enforced when the impenitent is also insolvent. But Capitan Tiago—out on you! You've buried infidel Chinamen, and ...
— The Reign of Greed - Complete English Version of 'El Filibusterismo' • Jose Rizal
... Mohammed who enjoined mercy to debtors while in the flesh (chapt. ii. 280, etc.) said "Allah covereth all faults except debt; that is to say, there will be punishment therefor." Also "A martyr shall be pardoned every fault but debt." On one occasion he refused to pray for a Moslem who died insolvent. Such harshness is a curious contrast with the leniency which advised the creditor to remit debts by way of alms. And practically this mild view of indebtedness renders it highly unadvisable to oblige a Moslem friend ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 9 • Richard F. Burton
... several pleas, among which was a certificate of discharge under the act of the legislature of the State of New York, of April 3d, 1801, for the relief of insolvent debtors, commonly called the ...
— The Great Speeches and Orations of Daniel Webster • Daniel Webster
... church, or in the magistracy, should be suspended whenever they should be legally sued by a creditor, and that they should be unremittingly deprived of their rank whenever they should be declared insolvent by the tribunals. It appears to me that money would then be lent with more confidence, and borrowed with greater circumspection. Another advantage which would accrue from such a regulation, would be, that the subaltern orders of men, who imitate the customs ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 2, 1917 • Various
... international trade. They are an indispensable means of intermediation only in so far as pecuniary interests are to be furthered or safeguarded in the intermediation. When, as has happened with the belligerents in the present instance, the national establishment becomes substantially insolvent, it is beginning to appear that its affairs can be taken care of with less difficulty and with better effect without the use of financial expedients. Of course, it takes time to get used to doing things by the more direct method and without the accustomed circumlocution ...
— An Inquiry Into The Nature Of Peace And The Terms Of Its Perpetuation • Thorstein Veblen
... give one example out of a score—he had been obliged to apply for the benefit of the Insolvent Act, in Philadelphia, owing to losses he had sustained by lending money to distressed compatriots, and eleemosynary outcasts, and had been opposed in the Court of Insolvency by Colonel John Stille, Jr. and Mr. Henry McIlvaine, who threatened ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 122, December, 1867 • Various
... of the ruling orders had already reduced the laboring classes to poverty and abject dependence; and all whom bad times or casual disasters had compelled to borrow had been impoverished by the high rates of interest; while thousands of insolvent debtors had been sold into slavery, to satisfy the demands of relentless creditors. In this situation of affairs the most violent or needy demanded a new distribution of property; while the rich would have held on to all the fruits of their ...
— Mosaics of Grecian History • Marcius Willson and Robert Pierpont Willson
... to bear a still further sorrow to-day," said Mr. Ness. "On the part of Mr. Johnson and myself I have a very painful duty to perform to you as well as to her. Mr. Wilkins has died insolvent. I grieve to say there is no hope of your ever receiving ...
— A Dark Night's Work • Elizabeth Gaskell
... house; and Eliza Vestris went bankrupt at last. Management after management tried its fortunes in the doomed little house, but without success. Desperate adventurers seized upon it as a last resource, or chose it as a place wherein to consummate their ruin. The Olympic was contiguous to the Insolvent Debtors' Court, in Portugal Street, and from the paint-pots of the Olympic scene-room to the whitewash of the commercial tribunal there was but ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 80, June, 1864 • Various
... Fifty guineas here or there did not signify to their client, whilst to us—well, really, let a lawyer be as kind and disinterested as he will, fifty guineas disbursed upon the suit of an utterly insolvent, or persistently insolvent, client means something eminently disagreeable ...
— The Uninhabited House • Mrs. J. H. Riddell
... is done, and done at once, by the policy-holders, each and every one of the largest companies may become insolvent; that is, they may not be able to meet the engagements of their policies, because of waste of funds, tremendous falling off of new business, tremendous cost of new business, and the nature of the new business—so-called "graveyard business"; ...
— Frenzied Finance - Vol. 1: The Crime of Amalgamated • Thomas W. Lawson
... in every circle, married to men not by any means insolvent, who have unlimited credit, but never any money of their own. They have carriages but no car fare; fine stationery, monogrammed and blazoned with a coat of arms, but not by any chance a ...
— The Spinster Book • Myrtle Reed
... He was clerk in the office of Bordin, procureur of Chatelet. In 1798 he lent one hundred crowns in gold to Monegod his life-long friend. This sum not being repaid, M. Alain found himself almost insolvent, and was obliged to take an insignificant position at the Mont-de-Piete. In addition to this he kept the books of Cesar Birotteau, the well-known perfumer. Monegod became wealthy in 1816, and he forced M. Alain to accept a hundred and fifty thousand francs in payment ...
— Repertory Of The Comedie Humaine, Complete, A — Z • Anatole Cerfberr and Jules Franois Christophe
... do occur, the man of honor dies when he cannot fulfil his word. But you—you do not wish to die. Oh no! You wish to break your word in order to live pleasantly. You wish to profit by your breach of promise. You wish to declare yourselves insolvent and cheat your creditors of their money, and thereby ...
— The Merchant of Berlin - An Historical Novel • L. Muhlbach
... of April the king went to the house of lords, where, after giving the royal assent to the bills then depending; for granting a certain sum out of the sinking fund for the relief of insolvent debtors, for the better regulation of marine forces on shore, for the better raising of marines and seamen, and to several other public and private bills; his majesty put an end to the session of parliament by a speech, in which he acquainted the two houses, ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... patriotic,—this being the best he could get—is it probable that his application would be rejected? or that the officer would do more than inquire whether the bank then paid specie, without troubling his head to ascertain whether it merely made a show of paying it, and whether it would not be insolvent in a month. Let it not be said, that if doubts were entertained of the solidity of the bank, its paper might be immediately converted into specie; for, in the first place, the bank may be some hundreds of miles distant; and though it were in the immediate ...
— The American Quarterly Review, No. 17, March 1831 • Various
... to take charge of the Electric Light Company at a time when it was insolvent and in disgrace with the people, and he took the Corporation in hand on the specific understanding that he should be allowed to put his soul into it, that he should be allowed his own way for three years—in believing in people, and ...
— Crowds - A Moving-Picture of Democracy • Gerald Stanley Lee
... abuses the English Residents find it necessary to be the most watchful to restrain them. In some cases one half of the produce of the labour is applied to the reduction of the debt, and this situation of the insolvent debtor is termed be-blah. Meranggau is the condition of a married woman who remains as a pledge for a debt in the house of the creditor of her husband. If any attempt should be made upon her person the proof of it annuls the debt; but should she bring an accusation of that nature, ...
— The History of Sumatra - Containing An Account Of The Government, Laws, Customs And - Manners Of The Native Inhabitants • William Marsden
... risk. 'Regarded as an extrinsic title, risk of losing the principal is connected with the contract of mutuum, and entitles the lender to some compensation for running the risk of losing his capital in order to oblige a possibly insolvent debtor. The greater the danger of insolvency, the greater naturally would be the charge. The contract was indifferent to the object of the loan; it mattered not whether it was intended for commerce or consumption; it was no less indifferent ...
— An Essay on Mediaeval Economic Teaching • George O'Brien
... mortgageable value of which she and Ralph had been living for some time. Ralph Wotchett also had expectations. By profession he was an architect, but perhaps because of his expectations, he had always had bad luck. The involutions of the reasons why his clients died, became insolvent, abandoned their projects, or otherwise failed to come up to the scratch were followed by him alone in the full of their maze-like windings. The house they inhabited, indeed, was one of those he had designed for a client, but the 'fat chough' had refused to go ...
— Tatterdemalion • John Galsworthy
... town, it is enough to say that the landlords of some of the houses tenanted by working men without work, by dangerous characters, and by the very poor employed in unhealthy toil, dare not demand their rents, and can find no bailiffs bold enough to evict insolvent lodgers. At the present time speculating builders, who are fast changing the aspect of this corner of Paris, and covering the waste ground lying between the Rue d'Amsterdam and the Rue Faubourg-du-Roule, will no doubt alter the character of the inhabitants; ...
— Cousin Betty • Honore de Balzac
... banker's heart diseased. A week after this sudden and awful visitation, all that remained of Abraham Allcraft was committed to the dust, and Michael discovered, to his surprise and horror, that his father had died an insolvent and a beggar. ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 54, No. 337, November, 1843 • Various
... Mrs. Johnson was, that she had a good understanding and great sensibility, but inclined to be satirical. Her first husband died insolvent [this is a mistake, see ante, i. 95, n. 3]; her sons were much disgusted with her for her second marriage; ... however, she always retained her affection for them. While they [Mr. and Mrs. Johnson] resided in Gough Square, her son, the officer, knocked ...
— Life of Johnson, Volume 6 (of 6) • James Boswell
... you, Adam? You will help me again?" asked the Elector. "Twice you have rescued me already from want, and supported my poverty with your wealth. I am your debtor, your insolvent debtor, who pays no interest, to ...
— The Youth of the Great Elector • L. Muhlbach
... and it is said that we advocates get our money for nothing," he remarked, after a pause. "I have freed one insolvent debtor from a totally false charge, and now they all flock to me. Yet every such case costs enormous labour. Why, don't we, too, 'lose bits of flesh in the inkstand?' as some writer or other has said. Well, ...
— Resurrection • Count Leo Tolstoy
... they knew, to lead always. One evening Martine told them that she had only fifty francs left, and that they would have difficulty in managing for two weeks longer, even giving up wine. In addition to this the news was very serious; the notary Grandguillot was beyond a doubt insolvent, so that not even the personal creditors would receive anything. In the beginning they had relied on the house and the two farms which the fugitive notary had left perforce behind him, but it was now certain that this property was ...
— Doctor Pascal • Emile Zola
... held that year changes in the statutes were made which gave to women many rights and privileges not before possessed. Dower but not curtesy obtains. If there are no lineal descendants, and the estate is solvent, the widow takes one-half of the real estate for life, but if the estate is insolvent, one-third only. If there are lineal descendants, then the dower right is one-third, whether the estate is solvent or not. If a husband die without a will, his widow, if there are no children, is entitled to all of his personal property; if ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume IV • Various
... was in possession of small or no substance, did again cruelly and inhumanly, and without any legal authority, order the said Durbege Sing to be strictly imprisoned; and the said Durbege Sing, in consequence of the vexations, hardships, and oppressions aforesaid, died in a short time after, insolvent, but whether in prison or not ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. VIII. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... was highly advantageous to the State, and in accordance with the injunctions of the charter, reflecting the highest credit on the Commissioners, and bringing timely aid to an embarrassed community.' In little more than two years, however, the Mississippi Bank became totally insolvent, having lost the entire five millions invested in it by the State. Immediately on this having transpired, the Governor of the State sent a message to the Legislature recommending them to repudiate (this was the first time the word was used) their obligations, being founded on the plea, that ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 2, August, 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... They will take you)—Ver. 334. At Rome, insolvent debtors became the slaves of their creditors till ...
— The Comedies of Terence - Literally Translated into English Prose, with Notes • Publius Terentius Afer, (AKA) Terence
... hidalgos were, exempt—had been able to earn and to lay by enough to offer the monarch fifty millions of dollars to purchase themselves out of semi-slavery into manhood, and yet found their offer rejected by an almost insolvent king. Nothing could exceed the idleness and the frivolity of the upper classes, as depicted by contemporary and not unfriendly observers. The nobles were as idle and as ignorant as their inferiors. They were not given to tournays nor to the delights of the chase and table, but were fond of brilliant ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... of the heaviest losers, was elected to the chair, but beyond making a statement which told them nothing, he could do little. When he informed them that Lord Highcliffe had died practically insolvent, a murmur arose, a deep guttural murmur which was something between a hiss and a groan, and it was while this unpleasant sound was filling the room ...
— At Love's Cost • Charles Garvice
... controls, and in some cases substantially owns, and by its money supports some of the leading presses of the country is now more clearly established. Editors to whom it loaned extravagant sums in 1831 and 1832, on unusual time and nominal security, have since turned out to be insolvent, and to others apparently in no better condition accommodations still more extravagant, on terms more unusual, and some without any security, have also ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 1 (of 2) of Volume 3: Andrew Jackson (Second Term) • James D. Richardson
... had no preacher, it will be readily imagined it had no church. With the first crowd who located there came an insolvent rumseller from the East. He called himself Pentecost, which was as near his right name as is usual with miners, and the boys dubbed his shop "Pentecost Chapel" at once. The name, somehow, reached the East, for within a ...
— Romance of California Life • John Habberton
... daughter of Ex-Gov. ——, of Virginia, by a quarteron woman. She was born a slave, but was acknowledged as her father's child, and reared in his family with his legitimate children. When she was ten years of age her father died, and his estate proving insolvent, the land and negroes were brought under the hammer. His daughter, never having been manumitted, was inventoried and sold with the other property. The Colonel, then just of age, and a young man of fortune, bought her and took ...
— Continental Monthly - Volume 1 - Issue 3 • Various
... Captain Wragge, with an ominous emphasis on the last word. "The Grand Difficulty of humanity from the cradle to the grave—Money." He slowly winked his green eye; sighed with deep feeling; and buried his insolvent hands in ...
— No Name • Wilkie Collins
... became insolvent. The landlord locked up the hall with all the belongings of the troupe nor would he release the goods until the rent was paid in full. Harrison was appealed to. He sneered at the impecunious minstrels and taunted them by saying: "Now go get your stuff out. If you all hadn't ...
— Watch Yourself Go By • Al. G. Field
... letters, letters! Some that please and some that bore, Some that threaten prison fetters (Metaphorically, fetters Such as bind insolvent ...
— The Bab Ballads • W. S. Gilbert
... extremely unlikely. To bear ten or fifteen children would probably kill most modern women or so completely wear them out that the remnant of their lives would not be worth living. And families of this size would similarly exhaust even unusually large pocket-books, leaving most fathers insolvent. Though it is probably true, as economists say, that our land and its resources, if more equitably distributed and scientifically exploited, are capable of supporting many more millions of Americans than at present, ...
— The Good Housekeeping Marriage Book • Various
... has as much right to fail in business as he has to get sick and die. In most cases it is more honourable to fail than to go on. Every insolvent is not necessarily a scoundrel. The greatest crime is to fail rich. John Bonner & Co., as brokers, had loaned money on deposited collaterals, and then borrowed still larger sums on the same collaterals. Their creditors were duped to the extent of from one to three millions of dollars. ...
— T. De Witt Talmage - As I Knew Him • T. De Witt Talmage
... powers of Europe." Burdened with debts which were the legacy of an era of speculation, a considerable part of the population, especially of the farmer class, was demanding measures of relief which threatened the security of contracts. "Laws suspending the collection of debts, insolvent laws, instalment laws, tender laws, and other expedients of a like nature, were familiarly adopted or openly and ...
— John Marshall and the Constitution - A Chronicle of the Supreme Court, Volume 16 In The - Chronicles Of America Series • Edward S. Corwin
... twenty-five hundred dollars worse than nothing. Several of his unpaid bills to eastern houses were placed in suit, and as he lived in a state where imprisonment for debt still existed, he was compelled to go through the forms required by the insolvent laws, to keep ...
— Graham's Magazine, Vol. XXXII No. 4, April 1848 • Various
... life of slaughter to that continually insolvent butcher, who exhibited the body of a sheep once more, with an eye to the approach of Christmas, this universal factor made it a point of duty to encourage him. In either saddle-bag he bore a seven-pound leg of mutton—a credit to a sheep of that district then—and to show himself ...
— Mary Anerley • R. D. Blackmore
... prophets, whom he maintained by fifty in a cave," in the days of Ahab and Jezebel, 1 Kings 18:4; which circumstance rendered it highly fit that the prophet Elisha should provide her a remedy, and enable her to redeem herself and her sons from the fear of that slavery which insolvent debtors were liable to by the law of Moses, Leviticus 25:39; Matthew 18:25; which he did accordingly, with God's help, at the ...
— The Antiquities of the Jews • Flavius Josephus
... stated the unavoidable misfortunes that had crushed him down;—or the delicate and prettily dressed lady, who had been bred in affluence, but was suddenly thrown upon the perilous charities of the world by the death of an indulgent, but secretly insolvent father, or the commercial catastrophe and simultaneous suicide of the best of husbands; or the gifted, but unsuccessful author, appealing to my fraternal sympathies, generously rejoicing in some small prosperities which he was kind enough to term my own ...
— Our Old Home - A Series of English Sketches • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... Knickerbocker Trust Company was in a precarious condition, and the directors, following the example of the other bank, appealed to the same committee. The investigation of the committee showed the company insolvent and aid was refused. When the facts became known, a run on the bank began and it was compelled to close its doors. The lack of confidence in other financial institutions was ...
— History of the United States, Volume 6 (of 6) • E. Benjamin Andrews
... Whatever government there may be in Italy, it will never associate itself with actions directed to compelling Russia, in order to be recognized, to guarantee the payment of obligations assumed previous to the War and the revolution. Civilization has already suppressed corporal punishment for insolvent debtors, and slavery, from which individuals are released, should not be imposed on nations by democracies which say they ...
— Peaceless Europe • Francesco Saverio Nitti
... unappeasable than any appetite; and that the destiny she was choosing with this snarling intensity was so glorious that it justified her scorn. He felt a conviction, which had the vague quality of melancholy, that he was morally insolvent, and a suspicion, which had the acute quality of pain, that his financial solvency was not such a great thing after all. For Ellen looked like an angry queen as well as an angry angel. It seemed possible that these young people were not ...
— The Judge • Rebecca West
... order, verbal or written, was deemed a sufficient title. Not unfrequently, the applicant changed his choice, and migrated from one spot to another. The governor often permitted the issue of rations and implements a second time, to enable indolent or insolvent settlers to till a second heritage.[165] Trade was, however, more agreeable to many emancipists than agriculture. The officers located near them were willing to purchase their petty farms: thus the small holdings were bought up,[166] and the estates of the greater landholders ...
— The History of Tasmania, Volume I (of 2) • John West
... poetical partners should bankrupts be made; If from dealings too large, we plunge deeply in debt, And Whereas issue out in the Muses Gazette; We'll on you our assigns for Certificates call; Though insolvent, we're honest, and ...
— Sganarelle - or The Self-Deceived Husband • Moliere
... petitioned the Emperor Leopold—who was a great patron and lover of music—to render him pecuniary assistance, but failed to procure it. Over-burdened with troubles, he was bereft of his reason, and died insane and insolvent in the ...
— The Violin - Its Famous Makers and Their Imitators • George Hart
... pay the bill, you having no money, and receiving no greater income than 22 shillings per week, all of which was necessary to the maintenance of yourself and family. We regret again to call to your notice the Statute of 16 Eliz., entitled, "Concerning the Imprisonment of Insolvent Debtors," which we trust you will not oblige us to invoke in aid of our suffering client's rights. To be lenient and merciful is his inclination, and we are happy to communicate to you this most favorable tender for an acquittance of his claim. ...
— Shakespeare's Insomnia, And the Causes Thereof • Franklin H. Head
... second week of my prostration, Mr. Marcus Weatherley absconded. This event so totally unlooked for by those who had had dealings with him, at once brought his financial condition to light. It was found that he had been really insolvent for several months past. The day after his departure a number of his acceptances became due. These acceptances proved to be four in number, amounting to exactly forty-two thousand dollars. So that that part of my uncle's story was confirmed. One of the acceptances was payable in Montreal, and ...
— The Gerrard Street Mystery and Other Weird Tales • John Charles Dent
... trenchant sentences—a legislation severe and rude like the semi-barbarous people for whom it was made. It punished the sorcerer who by magical words blasted the crop of his neighbor. It pronounced against the insolvent debtor, "If he does not pay, he shall be cited before the court; if sickness or age deter him, a horse shall be furnished him, but no litter; he may have thirty days' delay, but if he does not satisfy the debt in this time, the creditor may ...
— History Of Ancient Civilization • Charles Seignobos
... daily occurrence up to the end of the year 1843. No one durst push his neighbour for payment of debt: were such a thing attempted, an immediate surrender of his affairs to the official trustee of the Insolvent Court, was the consequence. Several of the first and oldest merchants in the Colony have sunk under the long-continued pressure; and, at the date of the last accounts, more failures were looked for. These, however, were expected as the result of old causes, ...
— Trade and Travel in the Far East - or Recollections of twenty-one years passed in Java, - Singapore, Australia and China. • G. F. Davidson
... come to the office at two o'clock, stating that the company was insolvent and but enough money remained to square accounts with the contractor. Pat had cast a shrewd glance at Lee and nodded. This was during the morning. Afterward the engineer had gone for a visit to the dam, the drops, and the canal line, a last view of the project ...
— The Iron Furrow • George C. Shedd
... his relation to society, is a debtor who of necessity dies insolvent. The proprietor is an unfaithful guardian who denies the receipt of the deposit committed to his care, and wishes to be paid for his guardianship ...
— What is Property? - An Inquiry into the Principle of Right and of Government • P. J. Proudhon
... measures which would render it possible for landlords to reside at home. A coercion act is opposed, while Sir Francis Hopkins, a resident and admirable landlord, is fired at at his own hall door, and for what? because, six years ago, he dispossessed an insolvent tenant, "forgiving his arrears, and paying him his own valuation for his interest;" while the life of Sir David Roche is attempted, because "he refused to assist a tenant to turn out his brother's widow while her husband lay on his bed of death, hardly allowing ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 367, May 1846 • Various
... being generally acknowledged, it is almost needless to state, that the faintest indication of seediness will be fatal to your reputation; and as a presentation at the Insolvent Court is equally fashionable with that of St. James, any squeamishness respecting your inability to pay could only be looked upon as a want of moral courage upon ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various
... of the Konigsmark who vanished instantaneously from the light of day at Hanover long since, and has never reappeared more. It was in search of him that Aurora, who was indeed a shining creature (terribly insolvent all her life, whose charms even Charles XII. durst not front), came to Dresden; and,—in this Comte de Saxe, men see the result. Tall enough, restless enough; most eupeptic, brisk, with a great deal of wild faculty,—running to waste, ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XIII. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... thousand dollars had been appropriated by Congress for the purchase of new furniture during the Administration of Mr. Monroe; but his friend, Colonel Lane, Commissioner of Public Buildings, to whom he had intrusted it, became insolvent, and died largely in debt to the Government, having used the money for the payment of his debts, instead of procuring furniture. When a appropriation of fourteen thousand dollars was made, to be expended under the direction of Mr. Adams, for furniture, he took charge of it himself. ...
— Perley's Reminiscences, Vol. 1-2 - of Sixty Years in the National Metropolis • Benjamin Perley Poore
... if he who borrowed the money became insolvent, and had not means to pay his debt, he was considered a slave therefor, together with the children born during his slavery; those ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1803, Volume V., 1582-1583 • Various
... several colonies they long kept to themselves the right of deciding private controversies on equitable principles. They sat as a court of review, to grant new trials or review judgments. They passed acts of attainder. They settled insolvent estates.[Footnote: Wheeler's Appeal, 45 ...
— The American Judiciary • Simeon E. Baldwin, LLD
... to financing these schemes the Universal Bank was formed, and by force of advertising became immediately successful. Emboldened by success, Saccard launched into wild speculation, involving the bank, which ultimately became insolvent, and so caused the ruin of thousands of depositors. The scandal was so serious that Saccard was forced to disappear from France and ...
— A Zola Dictionary • J. G. Patterson
... April 29, 1916. One might also mention for its verisimilitude the situation described at the end of Mr. F. Brett Young's novel The Iron Age (Secker, 1916), in which the insolvent ironworks of Mawne are saved in the nick of time by the declaration ...
— The World in Chains - Some Aspects of War and Trade • John Mavrogordato
... right. I do believe he had never thought so before, or thought about it. It was the first remonstrance I had ever made about my lot, and perhaps it opened up a little more than I intended. A back-attic was found for me at the house of an insolvent-court agent, who lived in Lant Street in the borough, where Bob Sawyer lodged many years afterwards. A bed and bedding were sent over for me, and made up on the floor. The little window had a pleasant prospect of a timber-yard; ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster
... "life, liberty, and happiness." Hence his pursuit is really legal. This is logic. G.A.S.] might have provoked a less fiery people than the Southrons. At the inception of the struggle a large amount of Southern indebtedness was held by the people of the North. To force payment from the generous but insolvent debtor—to obtain liquidation from the Southern planter—was really the soulless and mercenary object of the craven Northerners. Let the common people of England look to this. Let the improvident literary hack, the starved impecunious Grub Street debtor, the newspaper frequenter of sponging- ...
— The Luck of Roaring Camp and Other Tales • Bret Harte
... uncle alone in what Mrs. Gawffaw had shown to her as the drawing room. He guessed her curiosity to know something of her hosts, and therefore briefly informed her that Mrs. Gawffaw was the daughter of a trader in some manufacturing town, who had lived in opulence and died insolvent. During his life his daughter had eloped with Bob Gawffaw, then a gay lieutenant in a marching regiment, who had been esteemed a very lucky fellow in getting the pretty Miss Croaker, with the prospect of ten thousand pounds. None thought more highly of ...
— Marriage • Susan Edmonstone Ferrier
... administration of justice. The gentlemen of the bar being barristers and attorneys too (for there is no division of those functions as in England) are no more removed from their clients than attorneys in our Court for the Relief of Insolvent Debtors are, from theirs. The jury are quite at home, and make themselves as comfortable as circumstances will permit. The witness is so little elevated above, or put aloof from, the crowd in the court, that a stranger entering during a ...
— American Notes for General Circulation • Charles Dickens
... reserve belonging to all the policies which they have in force. This means that they must retain or keep invested a sum equal to about two-thirds of all the premiums paid on all existing policies. The moment they part with any portion of this reserve for any purpose whatsoever, they are declared insolvent and wound up by a receiver. In other words, the corporation is d——d if it does and the policy holder is d——d if it doesn't. That the latter gets the sulphur bath goes without saying. The four largest old system companies doing business in New York had, on Jan. 1, 1893, ...
— Volume 10 of Brann The Iconoclast • William Cowper Brann
... gave offence to the Bamberg public on the very first evening; Count von Soden had placed the management of the theatre in the hands of a certain Cuno, whose affairs were so embarrassed that he never, or only seldom, paid his officials, and finally became insolvent in February, 1809. The disappointed director, embittered against the public by his failure to recommend himself to them, supported himself and his wife by composing the incidental music for the various pieces given at the theatre, at a small monthly ...
— Weird Tales, Vol. II. • E. T. A. Hoffmann
... He in his turn became the friend of the Regent, and to repair his shattered fortunes he engaged, at the advice of Lau, in those disastrous financial enterprises that paved the way for the Revolution. He failed completely in his ventures, left Paris insolvent, and took refuge in the Chateau de Chamondrin, where he hoped to escape the wrath of his creditors. But they complained to the king, and brought such influence to bear upon him that Louis XV., the Well-beloved, who had just ascended the throne, ...
— Which? - or, Between Two Women • Ernest Daudet
... said difficulties were bad trade, unfair competition, and price-cutting at home and abroad, especially in Germany, and the modern spirit of unrest among the working-classes making it impossible for an employer to be master on his own works. I was not insolvent, but I needed capital, the life-blood of industry. In justice to myself I ought to explain that my visit to South Africa was very carefully planned and thought out. I had a good reason to believe that a lot of business in door-furniture ...
— The Price of Love • Arnold Bennett
... that, business being more impeded than ever, the President had despatched an agent to England to contract with the Barings a loan of $6,000,000. Seeing the Bank to be insolvent he resolved not to renew its charter. The Bank tried to hide its insolvency by the most foolish land speculations, which had already caused such great disaster in 1818 and 1820. The issue of bank notes ...
— A Brief History of Panics • Clement Juglar
... of hope, rather than of actual prosperity, he had added a wife and family to his cares, but the dawn was speedily overcast. Everything retrograded with him towards the verge of the miry Slough of Despond, which yawns for insolvent debtors; and after catching at each twig, and experiencing the protracted agony of feeling them one by one elude his grasp, he actually sunk into the miry pit whence he had been extricated by ...
— The Heart of Mid-Lothian, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... and sent home money, and three younger sisters growing up. And father,—she evaded the subject of father at first. Then presently Lady Harman had some glimpses of an earlier phase in Susan Burnet's life "before any of us were earning money." Father appeared as a kindly, ineffectual, insolvent figure struggling to conduct a baker's and confectioner's business in Walthamstow, mother was already specializing, there were various brothers and sisters being born and dying. "How many were there of you altogether?" ...
— The Wife of Sir Isaac Harman • H. G. (Herbert George) Wells |
