"Least of all" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... speaks were Greek to her. She was masterful, being a Madigan, and daring and impertinent. A creature utterly impatient of forms, with a boy-like chivalry, revealing how incomplete the work of sex was yet, for the woman misunderstood—whom she, in her crude purity, understood least of all. This was Kate, ready, at fifteen, to battle single-handed with windmills, with world-old problems, with world-young prejudices; to burn intolerance to ashes in the white flame of her brave young innocence; to cry aloud ...
— The Madigans • Miriam Michelson
... endured permanently; it can endure least of all in our days, in which an array of mighty armed powers stand prepared to guard their independence. World domination sooner or later leads inevitably to an alliance of the States whose independence is threatened; and thereby it leads to the overthrow ...
— New York Times Current History: The European War, Vol 2, No. 1, April, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... were very few. Scott understood dimly that many people in the India of the South ate rice, as a rule, but he had spent his service in a grain Province, had seldom seen rice in the blade or ear, and least of all would have believed that in time of deadly need men could die at arm's length of plenty, sooner than touch food they did not know. In vain the interpreters interpreted; in vain his two policemen showed in vigorous pantomime what should be done. The starving crept away to their bark ...
— The Day's Work, Volume 1 • Rudyard Kipling
... or hostile. It may move on the humdrum plane of business and trade relations or it may consist of a borrowing or interchange of spiritual goods—art, science, religion. It would be difficult to point to a completely isolated language or dialect, least of all among the primitive peoples. The tribe is often so small that intermarriages with alien tribes that speak other dialects or even totally unrelated languages are not uncommon. It may even be doubted whether intermarriage, ...
— Language - An Introduction to the Study of Speech • Edward Sapir
... cried Media. "I had no idea that a mere mortal, least of all a philosopher, could acquit him-self so well. By my scepter, but it is well done! Ha, ha! blind men round a banian! Why, Babbalanja, no demi-god could surpass ...
— Mardi: and A Voyage Thither, Vol. II (of 2) • Herman Melville
... to bear their thirst as they could. But now, after passing the basins of the Shott, and gaining the slight elevation beyond, we entered on a tract of desert as yet untrodden by European feet, and met with trials of a nature the least of all expected. ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 452 - Volume 18, New Series, August 28, 1852 • Various
... flatteries, intimidations, that would secure his power. If the greatest satirist the world ever hath seen had writ against Harley, and not for him, what a history had he left behind of the last years of Queen Anne's reign! But Swift, that scorned all mankind, and himself not the least of all, had this merit of a faithful partisan, that he loved those chiefs who treated him well, and stuck by Harley bravely in his fall, as he gallantly had supported him in ...
— Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges • William Makepeace Thackeray
... the lectures. During their delivery it was remarked by many of Mr. C.'s friends, with great pain, that there was something unusual and strange in his look and deportment. The true cause was known to few, and least of all to myself. At one of the lectures, meeting Mr. Coleridge at the inn door, he said, grasping my hand with great solemnity, "Cottle, this day week I shall not be alive!" I was alarmed, and speaking to another ...
— Reminiscences of Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Robert Southey • Joseph Cottle
... an exceptionally fine leader. There was no sort of doubt about it. He set a tremendously high working standard, and hustled the team into accepting it by the exercise of an almost uncannily far-seeing severity. Nothing escaped him, least of all a hint of any kind of shirking. He was quicker than Jean's whip, more sure, and more compelling. But while Jean saw all this, and more, with genuine admiration for Jan, and for his own astuteness in foretelling this exceptional capacity and acquiring ownership of the hound, ...
— Jan - A Dog and a Romance • A. J. Dawson
... heard at a distance—and, worst of all, he thinks, because some stake in life may be jeopardised by bolder action, he is justified. The answer is, simply he is not justified. Nor should anyone who is prepared to take the risk himself take it on himself to absolve others—nor, least of all, openly preach a milder doctrine to lead others who are timid to the farther goal, believed in at heart. Encourage them by all means to practise their principles as far as they go; never restrict yours, or you will find yourself saying things you can't altogether ...
— Principles of Freedom • Terence J. MacSwiney
... devoutly glad that his horse was trained thoroughly and stood quite still while the Northern scouts passed. A movement of the bushes would have attracted their attention, and he did not wish to be captured at any time, least of all on the certain eve of a great battle. After a battle he always felt an extra regret for those who had fallen, because they would never know whether ...
— The Shades of the Wilderness • Joseph A. Altsheler
... They were going to ancient historical places, full of grave and beautiful associations; places to go to, it seemed to me, with some single like-minded associate, places to approach with leisurely and untroubled mind, with no feeling of a programme or a time-table—and least of all in the company of busy professional people with ...
— The Upton Letters • Arthur Christopher Benson
... an extra girl, and still more difficult to ask for older people, because the hostess has no ground on which she can refuse without being rude; she can't say there is no room since no dance is really limited, and least of all a ball. Men who dance are always an asset, and the more the better; but a strange young girl hung around the neck of the hostess is about as welcome as a fog at a garden party. If the girl is to be brought and "looked after" ...
— Etiquette • Emily Post
... outward bearing went, such a family of turbulent children, given free rein by their parents, or indifferent to check, should have come to more or less grief. Certainly no one was strong enough to control them, least of all their mother, the queen-bee of the hive, on whom nine-tenths of the burden fell, on whose strength they all depended, but whose children were much too self-willed and self-confident to take guidance from her, or from any one else, unless in the direction they fancied. ...
— The Education of Henry Adams • Henry Adams
... Apostolical labors even to the remote island of Britain. We find him described by two names, Saul and Paul, the first being Hebrew, relating to his Jewish origin and the other Latin, assumed by him, as some think, at his conversion, as an act of humility, styling himself less than the least of all saints. St. Paul suffered martyrdom, having been beheaded, in the sixty-eighth year of his age, at Rome, under Nero, in the general {210} persecution of Christians upon the pretense that they set fire to the city. It was from the instrument ...
— The American Church Dictionary and Cyclopedia • William James Miller
... "reclining on the cushion's velvet lining" when the topside would have been more convenient for any purpose except that of rhyme. But it cannot be demanded of a poet that he should explain himself to anybody, least of all to himself. To his view, the shadow of the raven upon the floor was the most glaring of its impossibilities. "Not if you suppose a transom with the light shining through from an outer ...
— Literary Hearthstones of Dixie • La Salle Corbell Pickett
... world flies like a butterfly. Birds and other things fly straight, or sweep in curves, or rise and drop in understandable straight lines. But the Painted Lady obeyed no such rules. It dodged and darted, it jerked and shot, it was everywhere and anywhere, least of all where it ought to have been. The swallows always missed it. It simply doubled—and disappeared round the ...
— The Extra Day • Algernon Blackwood
... will. For there was no evading the truth, that, in the past weeks, the drug had gained fresh hold upon him; had resuscitated the old paralysing pessimism and dread of defeat, so that he asked himself bitterly what right had he to sit in judgment upon any one, least of all upon the dear woman who was the core and mainspring ...
— The Great Amulet • Maud Diver
... follow my business again and sensible of Sir W. Coventry's jealousies, I doubt, concerning me, partly my siding with Sir G. Carteret, and partly that indeed I have been silent in my business of the office a great while, and given but little account of myself and least of all to him, having not made him one visitt since he came to towne from Oxford, I am resolved to fall hard to it again, and fetch up the time and interest I have lost or am in a fair way of doing it. Up about eight o'clock, being called up by several people, among others by ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys
... of torturers formed about Jerry again, and again was wreaked upon him all abusive contempt for having lost his taboo. What drove Jerry the maddest were not the blows and physical torment, but the laughter. No dog enjoys being laughed at, and Jerry, least of all, could restrain his wrath when they jeered him and cackled close ...
— Jerry of the Islands • Jack London
... that Old Testament history is largely mingled with myth and legend; that not only were the laws attributed to Moses in the main a far later development, but that much of their historical setting was an afterthought; also that Old Testament prophecy was never supernaturally predictive, and least of all predictive of events recorded in the New Testament. Thus it was that his genius gave to the thinking world a new point of view, and a masterly exhibition of the true method of study. Justly has one of the most eminent divines of the contemporary ...
— History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom • Andrew Dickson White
... this was sin unto David; and like all sin, brought with it its own punishment. I do not mean to judge him: to assign his exact amount of moral responsibility. Our Lord forbids us positively to do that to any man; and least of all, to a man who only acted according to his right, and the fashion of his race and his age. But we must fix it very clearly in our minds, that sins may be punished in this life, even though he who commits them is not aware that they are sins. If you are ignorant that fire burns, your ignorance will ...
— David • Charles Kingsley
... with him and Kwaque on the steamer Makambo. Steward was most in his visions, against a hazy background of vessels, and of individuals like the Ancient Mariner, Simon Nishikanta, Grimshaw, Captain Doane, and little old Ah Moy. Nor least of all did Scraps appear, and Cocky, the valiant-hearted little fluff of life gallantly bearing himself through his brief adventure in the sun. And it would seem to Michael that on one side, clinging to him, Cocky talked ...
— Michael, Brother of Jerry • Jack London
... of the Spirit seeth the grain of mustard-seed, that is the least of all seeds, how it shall become a great tree, and the fowls of heaven shall lodge in its branches. Let us, then, lift up the hands that hang down and the feeble knees, and let us hope that, like as great salvation to all people came out of small beginnings of ...
— Betty's Bright Idea; Deacon Pitkin's Farm; and The First Christmas - of New England • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... if you could but understand what this involves for me, you wouldn't hesitate! I was shocked at the shooting, but I saw its necessity on your part; you're not one to run from a foe, a cowardly foe least of all. But what I heard there in the street horrified me. I couldn't believe it; I can scarcely credit my ears yet. Mr. Sorenson and Mr. Burkhardt were not near when you were attacked; they are not acquainted with the circumstances or facts as you, Mr. Martinez and I know ...
— In the Shadow of the Hills • George C. Shedd
... Tolstoi's Peace and War, have it; but what do such large, loose, baggy monsters, with their queer elements of the accidental and the arbitrary, artistically mean? We have heard it maintained, we well remember, that such things are "superior to art"; but we understand least of all what that may mean, and we look in vain for the artist, the divine explanatory genius, who will come to our aid and tell us. There is life and life, and as waste is only life sacrificed and thereby prevented from ...
— The Tragic Muse • Henry James
... the war does not last long, its havoc will take years to repair. Endless readjustments will have to take place in each country affected by the war. Russia, being more an agricultural, intellectual-aristocratical country, will fell least of all the after effects of the past horrors, therefore has the greatest potentialities. There is not only a great work, adventure and romance that waits an American pioneer in Russia, but a great mission which will ultimately benefit both nations. It should be understood that the Russian ...
— Defenders of Democracy • Militia of Mercy
... but be the Truth; who will not only point, but open and be, the Way; who will not only communicate thought, but give, because He is, the Life. Not the rabbi's pulpit, nor the teacher's desk, still less the gilded chairs of earthly monarchs, least of all the tents of conquerors, are the throne of the true King. He rules from the Cross. The one dominion worth naming, that over men's inmost spirits, springs from the one sacrifice which alone calms and quickens men's inmost spirits. ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Ezekiel, Daniel, and the Minor Prophets. St Matthew Chapters I to VIII • Alexander Maclaren
... wonderful elements of the cow-form, which the dynamic soul perfectly perceives. The ideal-image is just outside nature, for a child—something false. In a picture, a child wants elemental recognition, and not correctness or expression, or least of all, what we call understanding. The child distorts inevitably and dynamically. But the dynamic abstraction is more than mental. If a huge eye sits in the middle of the cheek, in a child's drawing, this shows that the deep dynamic consciousness ...
— Fantasia of the Unconscious • D. H. Lawrence
... throat now a cave of the winds for her unreleased sobs. "The years have brought me, Zoe. She is my fulfillment. You can't frighten me—life cannot take her from me. I'm not afraid—only, I can't bear anything to-night, least of all from you—" ...
— Star-Dust • Fannie Hurst
... judge now," Mavriky Nikolaevitch pronounced firmly. "God forgive you. I least of all can ...
— The Possessed - or, The Devils • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... cried, with a righteously indignant air. "That's an ugly word. I blackmail nobody; and least of all the father of a lady whom I still regard, in spite of all she can say or do to make my life a blank, with affection and respect as profound as ever. How can my inquiries into the ...
— What's Bred In the Bone • Grant Allen
... read too much, in order that his mind may not become accustomed to the substitute and thereby forget the reality; that it may not form the habit of walking in well-worn paths; nor by following an alien course of thought grow a stranger to its own. Least of all should a man quite withdraw his gaze from the real world for the mere sake of reading; as the impulse and the temper which prompt to thought of one's own come far oftener from the world of reality than ...
— The Art of Literature • Arthur Schopenhauer
... stark amazement he now noted Bruce's strange attitude toward the nurse. Never before had he seen the dog show active hostility toward a stranger—least of all toward a stranger who had in no way molested him. It was incredible that the wontedly dignified and sweet-tempered collie had thus returned a greeting. ...
— Bruce • Albert Payson Terhune
... doubtless conducted them in a certain degree like the gipsies and fortune-tellers of modern times, cunningly procuring to themselves intelligence in whatever way they could, and ingeniously worming out the secrets of their suitors, at the same time contriving that their drift should least of all be suspected. But their main resource probably was in the obscurity, almost amounting to unintelligibleness, of their responses. Their prophecies in most cases required the comment of the event to make them understood; and it not seldom happened, that the meaning in the sequel was found to be the ...
— Lives of the Necromancers • William Godwin
... lay awake through the morning I realized how much she had been to me, and wondered what the men would do with her. Most of all I wondered why they should have wanted to catch her at all. We had no wish to do them any harm. We were nobody's enemy; least of all was little Kahwa. Why could not men live in peace with us as we were willing to live ...
— Bear Brownie - The Life of a Bear • H. P. Robinson
... had seen things in her. Freda had a little thrill of discomfort at that thought; but she rallied from it bravely. What if Julia did see? She was not aware of anything that she was anxious to conceal from her. Least of all had she desired to hide her part in Wilton Caldecott. It was, if you came to think of it, the link between her and Julia, the ground of their acquaintance. She could not suspect Julia of any vulgar desire to take that ...
— The Return of the Prodigal • May Sinclair
... notice what fine feet this boy has. There may be some truth in his story. For the sake of our only daughter, I will choose two maids who talk the least of all our train, and my chamberlain, who is the most discreet officer in our household. Let them go with the princess; who knows but our sorrow ...
— Children's Literature - A Textbook of Sources for Teachers and Teacher-Training Classes • Charles Madison Curry
... pronouncing of a vow: "Only he who forswears the power of love, only he who casts from him the joys of love, can learn the spell by which the gold may be forced into a ring."—Wherefore, they hold, the gold is safe, "for all that lives wishes to love, no one will give up love," least of all this Nibelung, the heat of whose sentiments had come near scorching them! And they laugh and swim around the gold with their light-hearted Wallalaleia, diversified with mocking personalities to the gnome ...
— The Wagnerian Romances • Gertrude Hall
... a practical reformer; least of all in a matter which concerns Englishmen only—namely, the spelling of the English language. I should much rather, therefore, have left the fight to others, content with being merely a looker-on. But ...
— Chips From A German Workshop, Vol. V. • F. Max Mueller
... is not impossible but some will see in this desperate game of hazard a sort of courage on the part of the conspirators which may redeem their knavery. But the courage of desperation is seldom genuine, and least of all where the desperation itself was uncalled for. Yet even this sort of merit the conspirators wanted. The most urgent part of the danger was that which in all probability they had not heard of, viz., the casual presence at Rome of Julian soldiers. ...
— The Posthumous Works of Thomas De Quincey, Vol. II (2 vols) • Thomas De Quincey
... out of the woodpile and from the dead weeds on every side, all converging to that one spot where a generous table was spread for them and for the brown carrion hawks that came by day. Big, old, grey rats with long, scaly tails, others smaller, and smaller still, the least of all being little bigger than mice, until the whole place swarmed with them, all busily hunting for food, feeding, squealing, fighting, and biting. I had not known that the whole world contained so many rats as I now saw congregated ...
— Far Away and Long Ago • W. H. Hudson
... proceeds for me in the best to your wisdom known company, and without delay. Perfect confidence." Now I can assure His Royal Highness, who will look in vain for any other answer than this, that no power on earth, and least of all the cajoleries or menaces of the great and highly-placed shall induce me to depart by one jot or tittle from the course I have marked out for myself. And I take this occasion to assure all other potentates that I do ...
— Punch, Or the London Charivari, Volume 101, November 21, 1891 • Various
... was the house—about which there was no mystery—least of all, as to its cost. Interminable broad corridors, carpeted with ugly Brussels and suggesting a railway hotel, branched out before Miss Drake's eyes in various directions; upon them opened not bedrooms but "suites," as Mr. Marsham pere had loved ...
— The Testing of Diana Mallory • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... his father had left the room Osborne did not take up his book again. He laid it down on the table by him, leant back in his chair, and covered his eyes with his hand. He was in a state of health which made him despondent about many things, though, least of all, about what was most in danger. The long concealment of his marriage from his father made the disclosure of it far far more difficult than it would have been at first. Unsupported by Roger, how could he explain it all to one so passionate as the squire? how tell of the temptation, ...
— Wives and Daughters • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... and orphans," replied Aaron, dismissing the matter with a curt wave of the hand. "Least of all, on the widow ...
— The Rushton Boys at Treasure Cove - Or, The Missing Chest of Gold • Spencer Davenport
... remember seeing their father brought home dead with a knife wound in his breast six years earlier. Now they took hands as they looked at their dead mother with a sort of wondering gaze. There were no tears, no cries of despair—least of all did they ...
— The Children of the King • F. Marion Crawford
... the last person in the world to look after anybody—least of all, you!" said Sorell with indignant energy. "But of course it's a joke! You mean it for a joke. If he proposed it, it was like his audacity. Nobody would, who had a shred of delicacy. I suppose he wants to ...
— Lady Connie • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... things in writing history is for the historian to recollect that it is history he is writing. The narrative must not be oppressed by reflections, even by wise ones. Least of all should the historian suffer himself to become entangled by a theory or a system. If he does, each fact is taken up by him in a particular way: those facts that cannot be so handled cease to be his facts, and those that offer ...
— Friends in Council (First Series) • Sir Arthur Helps
... Constitution planned by the convention with the standard here fixed, we perceive at once that it is, in the most rigid sense, conformable to it. The House of Representatives, like that of one branch at least of all the State legislatures, is elected immediately by the great body of the people. The Senate, like the present Congress, and the Senate of Maryland, derives its appointment indirectly from the people. The President is indirectly derived from the choice of the people, according to ...
— The Federalist Papers • Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, and James Madison
... too well pleased. She had no liking for unexpected company, and least of all for Uncle Aaron, whom she ...
— The Rushton Boys at Rally Hall - Or, Great Days in School and Out • Spencer Davenport
... trouble to hide his pleasure. "Ah! If that were only true! We would arrange everything to your satisfaction without another word." His admiring gaze seemed to envelop her, and its warmth was unmistakable. "No one could have the cruelty to deny your slightest wish—I least of all." ...
— Heart of the Sunset • Rex Beach
... if now by all, by some at least So known—if not entreated—heretofore— Though not by you—For, now I think again, Of what should be your attestation worth, You that of all my questionable subjects Who knowing what, yet left me where I was, You least of all, Clotaldo, till the dawn Of this first day ...
— Life Is A Dream • Pedro Calderon de la Barca
... looked at his son with a sneer on his face, which was called forth by the thought that any one, least of all his bitter personal enemy, should aspire to hold any relations with ...
— Little Bobtail - or The Wreck of the Penobscot. • Oliver Optic
... much to the States' envoy, Calvaert, who had walked with him down to the strand, and had left him when the conference began. Henry was not easily thrown from his equanimity nor wont to exhibit passion on any occasion, least of all in his discussions with the ambassadors of England, but the cool and insolent egotism of this communication was too much ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... "Least of all, my dear fellow, should I have hid the story from you, for from the first to the last you have been the means, under God, of my finding him; and, Mallery, one of the longest strides I ever took toward the 'strait gate' was that evening when you almost made me sign the pledge. Oh, we have a new ...
— Three People • Pansy
... Otter found that out when he took Grandfather Frog's advice. He wouldn't have admitted that he was afraid of Buster Bear. No one ever likes to admit being afraid, least of all Little Joe Otter. And really Little Joe has a great deal of courage. Very few of the little people of the Green Forest or the Green Meadows would willingly quarrel with him, for Little Joe is a great fighter when he has to fight. ...
— The Adventures of Buster Bear • Thornton W. Burgess
... that none of the officers, least of all Borgert, refrained from criticising in a most uncompromising spirit both Kolberg and his paramour. And Weil's proceedings were unanimously adjudged perfectly correct. The remarks made in regard to this whole matter were by no means couched ...
— A Little Garrison - A Realistic Novel of German Army Life of To-day • Fritz von der Kyrburg
... farm is only an opportunity, a tool. A cornfield, a plow, a woodpile, an oak tree, will cure no man unless he have it in himself to be cured. The truth is that no life, and least of all a farmer's life, is simple—unless it is simple. I know a man and his wife who came out here to the country with the avowed purpose of becoming, forthwith, simple. They were unable to keep the chickens out of their summer kitchen. They discovered ...
— Adventures In Contentment • David Grayson
... the stallion or Black Bart. In the same silence they sat under the last light of the sunset and ate their supper. Calder, with head bent, pondered over the man of mystery and his two tamed animals. Tamed? Not one of the three was tamed, the man least of all. ...
— The Untamed • Max Brand
... by Ruskin, in "the denial or neglect of the quality and intrinsic worth in things, the incapacity of discerning or refusal to discern worth and unworth in anything, and least of all in man." ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood
... himself an avenger? How is it, that when the sovereign of the territory, which it is said has been violated, makes no complaint; when all the princes, his neighbors and his allies, are silent—how is it that the Emperor of Russia, least of all interested in the affair, raises his voice alone? Does it not arise from complicity with England, that machinator of conspiracies against the power and the life of the First Consul? Is not Russia engaged in similar conspiracies ...
— The Empire of Russia • John S. C. Abbott
... letter, there could have been some relenting. But the poor lady had been inadequate in this, as in all other searching moments of her life: she had sent messages,—kind ones, to be sure,—but only messages. If this had hurt the Virginian, no one knew it in the world, least of all the girl in whose heart it had left a cold, frozen spot. Not a good spirit in which to be married, you will say. No; frozen spots are not good at any time. But Molly's own nature gave her due punishment. Through all these days of her warm happiness a chill current ...
— The Virginian - A Horseman Of The Plains • Owen Wister
... latest artistic insanities (Cubism and Post Impressionism and Mr. Picasso) are eulogists and nothing else. They are not critics; least of all creative critics. They do not attempt to translate beauty into language; they merely tell you that it is untranslatable—that is, unutterable, indefinable, indescribable, impalpable, ineffable, and all the rest of it. The cloud is their banner; they cry to chaos and old night. They ...
— A Miscellany of Men • G. K. Chesterton
... that the product of industry is ill-distributed, or its conduct tyrannical, or its operation interrupted by bitter disagreements. It is that industry itself has come to hold a position of exclusive predominance among human interests, which no single interest, and least of all the provision of the material means of existence, is fit to occupy. Like a hypochondriac who is so absorbed in the processes of his own digestion that he goes to the grave before he has begun to live, industrialized communities ...
— The Mind in the Making - The Relation of Intelligence to Social Reform • James Harvey Robinson
... [Footnote: Scene after the Battle of Sedan: Herald of Peace for 1870, October 1st, p. 121] Such a sight would have shocked the Heathen of Rome. They could not have looked on while the brave gladiator was thus changed into a bloody hash; least of all could they have seen the work of slaughter done by machinery. Nor could any German gladiator have written the letter I proceed to quote from a ...
— The Duel Between France and Germany • Charles Sumner
... chimes of perfect verse. It is but lost labour that they rise up so early, and so late take rest; not a Scaliger or Salmasius of them all will sooner solve the riddle of the simplest than of the subtlest melody. Least of all will the method of a scholiast be likely to serve him as a clue to the hidden things of Shakespeare. For all the counting up of numbers and casting up of figures that a whole university—nay, a whole universe of pedants could accomplish, no ...
— A Study of Shakespeare • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... that mountain home when the earliest gleams of morning struggled through the deep recesses of the low mullioned windows. Perhaps on the day following market day he sometimes lay an hour longer; but his stern rule of life spared none, and himself least of all. If at sixty his powerful limbs were less supple than of old, if his Jove-like head with its flowing beard had become tipped with the hoar frost, he had relaxed nothing of his rigid self-government on that account. ...
— The Shadow of a Crime - A Cumbrian Romance • Hall Caine
... arms—these foolish arms, had better not have been here," he added, casting the pistols and dagger indignantly, through a window, into the shrubbery; "Ah! if you knew how unwillingly I would harm any—and, least of all, a ...
— The Water-Witch or, The Skimmer of the Seas • James Fenimore Cooper
... prosper, it is an outrage on common human feeling; if he fall into disaster, it is merely what he deserves. Neither is it admissible to represent the misfortunes of a thoroughly good man, for that is merely painful and distressing; and least of all is it tolerable gratuitously to introduce mere baseness, or madness, or other aberrations from human nature. The true tragic hero is a man of high place and birth who having a nature not ignoble has fallen into sin ...
— The Greek View of Life • Goldsworthy Lowes Dickinson
... communion, he expected to hear the voice of Jesus speaking to his heart and announcing the line of conduct he ought to follow. The abbe was afraid of betraying uneasiness, if he insisted on probing this "Christian mystery," so he returned with this answer, which was least of all calculated to reassure me. He did not appear again either at the castle or in the neighbourhood, and kept himself so closely shut up in the convent that few people ever saw his face. However, it soon became known, and the prior was most active in spreading the news, that John Mauprat ...
— Mauprat • George Sand
... concealed the size of the tiny revolver in his hand. Anyway it would be effective at that distance, and he expected to see the mysterious stranger's hands go over his head the moment he recovered from the shock that had apparently gone with the command. What did happen he expected least of all. The arm holding the pot of steaming coffee shot out and the boiling deluge hissed straight at Philip's face. He ducked to escape it, and fired. Before he could throw back the hammer of the little single-action weapon for a second shot the stranger was at him. The force of the ...
— The Golden Snare • James Oliver Curwood
... excuse for resolution. There were, no doubt, many ardent and sincere persons who seemed to think this as simple a thing to do as to lead off a Virginia reel. They forgot what should be forgotten least of all in a system like ours, that the administration for the time being represents not only the majority which elects it, but the minority as well,—a minority in this case powerful, and so little ready for emancipation that it was opposed even to war. Mr. Lincoln ...
— The Writings of James Russell Lowell in Prose and Poetry, Volume V - Political Essays • James Russell Lowell
... influence in the country; he may have expected reputation, but certainly not advancement in life, from its publication; nor could he have supposed that it would raise up anything but enemies for him in powerful quarters: least of all could he have expected favour from the East India Company, to whose commercial privileges he was unqualifiedly hostile, and on the acts of whose government he had made so many severe comments: though, in various parts of his book, he bore a testimony ...
— Autobiography • John Stuart Mill
... incompatible with the absence of a regular ethical scheme; and there was this peculiarity in the system, that its end, though professedly moral, was to be attained by means of an intellectual regimen. In setting up its ideal of human effort, it was least of all careful about prescribing a definite course of ...
— Moral Science; A Compendium of Ethics • Alexander Bain
... sinful deeds, arise— A plan our ancient sires would hate, O fallen from thy virtuous state? For in the line from which we spring The eldest is anointed king: No monarchs from the rule decline, And, least of all, Ikshvaku's line. Our holy sires, to virtue true, Upon our race a lustre threw, But with subversive frenzy thou Hast marred our lineal honour now, Of lofty birth, a noble line Of previous kings is also thine: Then whence this hated folly? whence This sudden change ...
— The Ramayana • VALMIKI
... least of all these Comforts is, The Man that's Wedded unto some Disease, A peevish, crazy, and a sickly Wife, The Burthen and the Nusance of his Life; Her Bed, the meer resemblance of a Tomb, And an Apothecarys Shop her Room; Coughing ...
— The Fifteen Comforts of Matrimony: Responses from Men • Various
... self-defense, after he had first been attacked by the deceased. But no—he had had no pistol, did not know the man, and had not killed him. Why should he have killed him? he inquired. No one could answer the question, least of all the jury. The twenty witnesses were positive that he had done so, but he was equally positive that he had not. No one could offer the slightest explanation of the deed—if it had in fact taken place. The jury puzzled over the case for hours, at one time, I am informed, being on the point of acquitting ...
— The Confessions of Artemas Quibble • Arthur Train
... her bringing Damaris back twelve years ago to Europe. But whether his attitude were cynical or not, he would hold his peace. Such cogent reasons existed for silence on his part that if he did slightly distrust her, hold her a little cheap, he would hardly venture to say as much, least of all to Damaris.—Venture or condescend?—Again Mrs. Frayling left the term in doubt and went forward with her schemes, which did, unquestionably just now, add a pleasing zest ...
— Deadham Hard • Lucas Malet
... said nothing. All that lay within his heart he kept hidden far out of sight. No chance word or weak moment should reveal it. No one should ever know, least of all Rosebud. ...
— The Watchers of the Plains - A Tale of the Western Prairies • Ridgewell Cullum
... acquainted. Elections, therefore, become a matter of heavy expense; and if contests are frequent, to many they will become a matter of an expense totally ruinous, which no fortunes can bear; but least of all the landed fortunes, encumbered as they often, indeed as they mostly are, with debts, with portions, with jointures; and tied up in the hands of the possessor by the limitations of settlement. It is a material, it is in my opinion a lasting, consideration, in all the questions concerning ...
— Thoughts on the Present Discontents - and Speeches • Edmund Burke
... (by Bradlaugh) in 1889 and rejected. The reform is urgently needed. It would "prevent the recurrence at irregular intervals of scandalous prosecutions which have never in any one instance benefited any one, least of all the cause which they were intended to serve, and which sometimes afford a channel for the gratification of private malice under ...
— A History of Freedom of Thought • John Bagnell Bury
... It was necessary I should grow fat, and necessary that good Joseph, your master, should grow lean. I could have pretended to be lame, but that no horse, least of all an angel-horse would do. So I must be lame, and so I sprained my ankle—for the angel-horses have ankles—they don't talk horse-slang up there—and it hurt me very much, I assure you, Diamond, though you mayn't be good enough to be ...
— At the Back of the North Wind • George MacDonald
... not to be supposed that she was, or that any one, at the age at which I first saw her, could be, all that she became afterwards. Least of all could this be true of her, with whom self-improvement, progress in the highest and in all senses, was a law of her nature; a necessity equally from the ardor with which she sought it, and from the spontaneous ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Vol. 13 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Lovers • Elbert Hubbard
... important commission than that of the ministry of the word. So highly did the apostle of the Gentiles appreciate his work, that, gifted as he was in every requisite to discharge it with honour and success, he exclaimed, "Unto me, who am less than the least of all saints, is this grace given, that I should preach amongst the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ." But if each heavenly ambassador be really convinced that he and his brethren are intrusted with an office at once so dignified in its nature, ...
— Female Scripture Biographies, Vol. I • Francis Augustus Cox
... this! Your love, Bee, is the only earthly thing that can comfort all the sorrows that may come into my life, or crown all its joys. You will believe this, dearest Bee, when you remember that I never in my life varied from the truth to anyone, and least of all would I prevaricate with you. I love you. Bee, let those three ...
— Self-Raised • Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte Southworth
... and put it in my pocket to read later on. I did not feel like reading it then. I did not feel like doing anything or seeing any one; yet least of all did I feel like being alone. For if I was alone I should think, and I did not want to think. I prowled about my room for a time and then went down and spent a short time with Mother. Her first question was concerning my day at the bank, and her second if ...
— The Rise of Roscoe Paine • Joseph C. Lincoln
... unsympathetic. Here, least of all places, could she escape from herself, from her hateful thoughts. It was a chilly day, and a bright fire crackled on the hearth. The square was almost deserted, though the sun illuminated it, and showed all the delicate tracery of the branches and twigs. It was a December sun. Her ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... Diogenes and others—was conducted on a large scale, but the human body was still taboo. Aristotle confesses that the "inward parts of man are known least of all," and he had never seen the human kidneys or uterus. In his physiology, I can refer to but one point—the pivotal question of the heart and blood vessels. To Aristotle the heart was the central organ controlling the circulation, the seat of vitality, ...
— The Evolution of Modern Medicine • William Osler
... a matter I love not to speak about," said he; "but it is no secret, and least of all could I have any wish to conceal it from you, my good and kind friends. We have yet an hour before the arrival of the mail, and if you are disposed to listen, I will relate to you the strange incidents, the recollection of ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXXVI. October, 1843. Vol. LIV. • Various
... questioned the wealth of the Crudens, least of all did the Crudens themselves, who took it as much for granted as the atmosphere they ...
— Reginald Cruden - A Tale of City Life • Talbot Baines Reed
... world, but to a pearl-grey floor far beneath him. It was the sea, the thing he knew and loved. The sight screwed up his courage. He remembered that he was Lemnian and a seafarer. He would be conquered neither by rock, nor by Hellene, nor by the Great King. Least of all by the last, who was a barbarian. Slowly, with clenched teeth and narrowed eyes, he began to clamber down a ridge which flanked the great cliffs of Kallidromos. His plan was to reach the shore and take the road to the east before the Persians completed ...
— The Moon Endureth—Tales and Fancies • John Buchan
... like very much to get hold of her,' said Lyon. This was a false statement, for he had no desire for any further conversation with Miss Geraldine. He had exposed his friends to himself, but he had no desire to expose them to any one else, least of all ...
— A London Life; The Patagonia; The Liar; Mrs. Temperly • Henry James
... you, my dear. Politics least of all. You could be a soldier, if you chose. You could fight as your father and your grandfather and the others of your house have done. You could lead a forlorn hope in the field. You could suffer and starve and go on fighting. You could die splendidly, ...
— Jason • Justus Miles Forman
... a trip to the gunsmith's, for a new hatchet and to have the mainspring of the rifle replaced. Nobody could afford to have a rifle that couldn't be trusted, least of all a hunter and prospector. And he'd had words with Alex Barrett, the gunsmith, just the other day. Not that Barrett wouldn't be more than glad to do business with him, once he saw that hard tool-steel he'd dug out of that place down the river. Hardest steel he'd ever found, ...
— The Return • H. Beam Piper and John J. McGuire
... to discover the customs of nations, and the best of these they always adopt. Practice makes the women suitable for war and other duties. Thus they agree with Plato, in whom I have read these same things. The reasoning of our Cajetan does not convince me, and least of all that of Aristotle. This thing, however, existing among them is excellent and worthy of imitation—viz., that no physical defect renders a man incapable of being serviceable except the decrepitude of old age, since even the deformed are ...
— The City of the Sun • Tommaso Campanells
... of her, to the number of seven hundred, was drowned. The one exception was a man in irons, who came safely and serenely ashore seated upon a piece of wreckage. Nobody ever knew how the shipwreck happened, least of all the survivor in irons, but the tradition of the terror of the scene yet lives in the district, and the spot where the bones of the drowned men still peep grimly through the sand is not unnaturally supposed to be haunted. Ever since this catastrophe ...
— Beatrice • H. Rider Haggard
... its freedom in passing through the grooves, each of which should be made to receive the string not too tightly nor too loose. Of course the width of each groove must be in agreement with the thickness of the string, the widest being the D, the G a little less, the A less still and the E least of all; the E should be a trifle closer to the fingerboard than the D or G, the last, having the widest swing during play, should be raised further off the board than the others. The arching of that side of the nut may also be left a little higher. The nut should also be ...
— The Repairing & Restoration of Violins - 'The Strad' Library, No. XII. • Horace Petherick
... not like to be seen off. Least of all, do I like to be seen off by those who are dear to me. If the thing must be done, I prefer it to be done by strangers—committees from chambers of commerce and the like, who have no interest in me save the hope that I will live to write agreeably of their city—of ...
— American Adventures - A Second Trip 'Abroad at home' • Julian Street
... have not adopted a single observation of the accuracy of which I was not myself most positively convinced. Least of all can one rely on the reports of nurses, attendants, and other persons not practiced in scientific observing. I have often, merely by a brief, quiet cross-examination, brought such persons to see for themselves the erroneous character of their statements, particularly in case these ...
— The Mind of the Child, Part II • W. Preyer
... arbitrary control over affairs of religion. The high places were not removed; this is what is regularly told us in the case of them all. For Israel properly so called, Jerusalem was at no time, properly speaking, the place which Jehovah had chosen; least of all was it so after the division ...
— Prolegomena to the History of Israel • Julius Wellhausen
... confine my remarks in this chapter, are not aware, that such sentiments as these are floating in the minds of many. They are not aware, that it is considered as one of the strongest things for those who have been born in the society, and been accustomed to its particularities, to leave it. And least of all are they aware of the worthless motives, which the world attributes to them for ...
— A Portraiture of Quakerism, Volume III (of 3) • Thomas Clarkson
... at first, believed myself quite safe (the more so as I cannot think of marrying without impairing my whole scheme of mental development, and, least of all, could I think of pretending to a girl of fortune), I ...
— Chips From A German Workshop. Vol. III. • F. Max Mueller
... consequence. The Papal Nuncio complained that the resistance of the ambassador weakened the Catholics and emboldened the Protestants. But his remonstrance had no effect on the Emperor. After his previous experiences Ferdinand II had no more fear of his adversaries, least of all of King James, who would certainly not in his old age make his first appearance as a warrior and try the doubtful fortune of war. He thought besides that he always consulted his security best when he had nothing before his eyes but the advantage ...
— A History of England Principally in the Seventeenth Century, Volume I (of 6) • Leopold von Ranke
... the end, and you never knew. As soon as he had a half an hour to spare he would give attention. Till Tuesday he was pretty well took up. No one need fidget himself about the noises he mentioned; least of all need the landlord be communicated with, as he was not a Practical Man, but in Independent Circumstances. Moreover, he lived ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan
... The thing is infamous. I can't hide behind the skirts of a girl, least of all you. I can die, but, by God, I'll keep ...
— Brand Blotters • William MacLeod Raine |
