"Test" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... I had done a lot of scrambling on rocks and used to promise myself a season in the Alps to test myself on the big peaks. If I ever go it will be to climb the honest rock towers around Chamonix, for I won't have anything to do with snow mountains. That day on the Colle delle Rondini fairly sickened me of ice. I daresay I might have liked it if I had done it in a holiday mood, ...
— Mr. Standfast • John Buchan
... a heavy year And put to proof his singing, While helpless children standing near His trust to test were bringing. But glad the more, As soft notes soar When winds o'er hidden harp-strings pour, His ...
— Poems and Songs • Bjornstjerne Bjornson
... on to tell of the skill of the victorious riata man, and mentioned among other wonderful feats, his lassoing an antelope running at high speed 100 feet away. To make the test more extraordinary, the correspondent wrote that he would pick out one of the animal's feet and get ...
— The Jungle Fugitives • Edward S. Ellis
... courage was put to the test, and he made good his words. It was a curious conflict, and took place near the spot where I had captured the large snake. In the morning I had been following a new species of paroquet, and, the day being rainy, I had taken an umbrella to keep the gun dry, and had left it under a tree; ...
— Wanderings In South America • Charles Waterton
... occult student possesses something which shows him the pure, clear reality of the psycho-spiritual world. And if he applies this recognized test to all that meets his observation in the realm of psycho-spiritual realities, he will be well able to distinguish appearance from reality. He may also feel sure that the application of this law provides just as effectually against delusions in the spiritual world as does the knowledge in the ...
— An Outline of Occult Science • Rudolf Steiner
... Good, good! It had been a quick, imperfect job of jimmying the lock, so obviously poor that it had worried him a lot—but why should they test it? There ...
— Martyr • Alan Edward Nourse
... ish de test of your power:- Vhile ve shtand ourselfs round in a row, You moost roll from de dop of dis tower, Down shdairs to de valley pelow. Id ish rough and shteep ash my virtue:" (Mit schwanenshweet accents she sang:) "Tont ...
— The Breitmann Ballads • Charles G. Leland
... Narrative was taken from the official dispatches of Governor Phillip, and forms a continuation of the history of the people and country under his charge, from the conclusion of his late Voyage to the I test period. ...
— An Historical Journal of the Transactions at Port Jackson and Norfolk Island • John Hunter
... they fail to come up quickly, if at all. First ascertain if the trouble is really in the key, or in the upper part of the action. To do this, lift the extension or wippen until the upper part of the action is entirely free from the key, so that you may test the key independently. Some keys are leaded so that they will fall in front of the balance rail, others so that they will fall back of it; in either case, lift the low end and let go, to see if it will fall by its own weight. If it seems quite free, you may know the trouble is not in the ...
— Piano Tuning - A Simple and Accurate Method for Amateurs • J. Cree Fischer
... a new life in many of its phases. I cannot look forward to such a complete revolution with any degree of pleasure, so I guess I will have to keep along in the old store, much as I would like to devote the rest of my life to test-tubes, ...
— Analyzing Character • Katherine M. H. Blackford and Arthur Newcomb
... that man thinks out with his brain and perfects with his hands is wonderful," agreed the priest. "It is a test of ingenuity and patience, and as such should be respected. Moreover, velvet is a useful product. The best silk varieties are very durable. They ravel little, and can be steamed almost to their original freshness ...
— The Story of Silk • Sara Ware Bassett
... were pledged to sustain each other to the last farthing, in case either became involved in difficulty. That pledge I had never broken, and I looked for the same fidelity on the part of my associates. I never before had occasion to test their sincerity, but found all their solemn promises a mere 'rope of sand.' I found I was gone, as far as they were concerned, and turned ...
— Secret Band of Brothers • Jonathan Harrington Green
... have agreed to furnish him with moderate supplies for a year or so; he asks no more. I shall let him be tried by the test ...
— Middlemarch • George Eliot
... to afford even a guess at the situation of the river and its seven islands; only it may be mentioned, that the most northern part of the coast of Patagonia is in lat. 38 deg. S. and that no river answering the description in the test is to be found on all ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume X • Robert Kerr
... advise you, do not be too hasty. Do not try to hurry matters too much. It would spoil everything if you pressed for an answer too soon and received an unfavorable one. And I'm afraid it would be an unfavorable one if you put it to the test now." ...
— Kilo - Being the Love Story of Eliph' Hewlitt Book Agent • Ellis Parker Butler
... enclosed. With the common trash of slander I should not think of troubling you; but the forgery of one's hand-writing is too imposing to be neglected. A mutual knowledge of each other furnishes us with the best test of the contrivances which will be practised by ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... question because Jess was notorious for her memory, and he gloried in putting it to the test. ...
— A Window in Thrums • J. M. Barrie
... these orders may be used either by itself or, as has been stated, in connection with the maneuver of a strong column intended to turn the enemy's line. In order to a proper appreciation of the merits of each, it becomes necessary to test each by the application of the general principles which have been laid down. For example, it is manifest that the parallel order (Fig. 5) is worst of all, for it requires no skill to fight one ...
— The Art of War • Baron Henri de Jomini
... appeared so inviting, and the sufferers from scurvy were in such pressing need of green provisions, that Surville determined to send a boat to test the ...
— Celebrated Travels and Travellers - Part 2. The Great Navigators of the Eighteenth Century • Jules Verne
... satisfied with the king's compliance, had not lost all those apprehensions to which the measures of the court had given so much foundation. A law passed for imposing a test on all who should enjoy any public office. Besides taking the oaths of allegiance and supremacy, and receiving the sacrament in the established church, they were obliged to abjure all belief in the doctrine of transubstantiation. ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part F. - From Charles II. to James II. • David Hume
... better, thank God (though still bad), and that I hope to be able to stagger through to-night. After dinner yesterday I began to recover my voice, and I think I sang half the Irish Melodies to myself, as I walked about to test it. I got home at half-past ten, and mustard-poulticed and ...
— The Letters of Charles Dickens - Vol. 2 (of 3), 1857-1870 • Charles Dickens
... Miracles furnish the test in matters of doubt, between Jews and heathens, Jews and Christians, Catholics and heretics, the slandered and ...
— Pascal's Pensees • Blaise Pascal
... they had been defeated. Their present success was like the bursting of a torrent through a dam. At the instant when they attained it they found themselves involved in a political swirl and clash of momentous difficulties. It was a tremendous test to which they were being subjected. The part which Lincoln played, at their head, I have endeavored to depict in his life. The manner in which he controlled without commanding, his rare combination of confidence in his own judgment with entire absence ...
— Abraham Lincoln, Vol. I. • John T. Morse
... difficult to realise what a blow his arrival was to those who held a brief for the evil spirits in possession; hardly had he reached Saint-Jouin than he sent his own physician to the convent with orders to see the afflicted nuns and to test their condition, in order to judge if the convulsions were real or simulated. The physician arrived, armed with a letter from the archbishop, ordering Mignon to permit the bearer to make a thorough examination ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... place, will fill up the gap that you leave in the ranks of those who fight for freedom. And we shall fight till we get the true peace that we want—not the peace which some of you have advocated, fraternising with the common foe, listening to the specious pleas of those who shirk the one test of their honesty when they are asked to revolt against a tyranny as least as deadly as that which ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, June 27, 1917 • Various
... a year or two, when the average falls are short. Thence it is we have so many "Winterbournes" in the counties of Wilts, Hants, and Dorset; as Winterbourne-basset, Winterbourne-gunner, Winterbourne-stoke, &c. (Vide Lewis's Topog. Dict.) The highest sources of the Test, Itchen, and some other of our southern rivers which take their rise in the chalk, are often dry for months, and their channels void of water for miles; failing altogether when the rains do not fill the ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 191, June 25, 1853 • Various
... on. It was as though the Water Dweller had read his mind, and drew its foe towards itself to put the matter to the test. Otter took one step forward—rather would he have sprung again off the head of the colossus—and the eyes glowed more dreadfully than ever, as though ...
— The People Of The Mist • H. Rider Haggard
... which he had been second in command under Wallenstein, duke of Friedland (with whom he was a great favourite), he was next placed at the head of the corps formed by Maximilian I. of Bavaria to support Wallenstein. In this post his tact and diplomatic ability were put to a severe test in the preservation of harmony between the two dukes. Finally Count Aldringer was won over by the court party which sought to displace the too successful duke of Friedland. After Wallenstein's death Aldringer commanded against the Swedes on the Danube, and at the ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... like equal numbers," he said. "The officer who works hard in the army deserves more credit than he would in any other profession because the incentive for results seems remote. But what a terrible test of results may be made in a single hour's action. There is nothing you have learned or ever will learn that may not be of service to you. There is no invention, no form of industrial organization that must not be included ...
— The Last Shot • Frederick Palmer
... single-hearted and she was. In spite of all that he said, she knew he didn't really want to give up that girl. How could he? Even if the girl would let him go! And slowly there formed within her a gruesome little plan to test him. Then, ever so gently withdrawing her arms, she turned ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... the quarrels and mutual destruction of the magnificent people. His intrusion on the scene, his judgment of the situation, is proof of the variety of the life from which the Saga is drawn. More than that, there is here a rather cruel test of the heroics of Laxdla, of the story itself; the notable thing about this spectator and critic is that his boorish judgment is partly right, as the judgment of Thersites is partly right—"too much blood and too little brains." He is vulgar common sense in the presence of heroism. ...
— Epic and Romance - Essays on Medieval Literature • W. P. Ker
... the gates and paused before the darkened lodge. The wind had risen and was sweeping the snow into his face in lacerating streamers. The cold had him in its grasp again, and he stood uncertain. Should he put his sanity to the test and go back? He turned and looked down the dark drive to the house. A single ray shone through the trees, evoking a picture of the lights, the flowers, the faces grouped about that fatal room. He turned and plunged out into ...
— Short Stories for English Courses • Various (Rosa M. R. Mikels ed.)
... Then, when it was cut, they put all they had cut off upon a scale, and upon the other side of the scale copper, silver, or gold money, according to their means. If poor, they put copper coins upon the scales to test the weight of the hair, and then distributed these copper coins among the poor. In fact, it just looks as if those who receive charity take it in one hand and ...
— Pictures of Jewish Home-Life Fifty Years Ago • Hannah Trager
... these extracts we have the issue clearly set before us: Feeling valid only for the individual is pitted against reason valid universally. The test is a perfectly plain one of fact. Theology based on pure reason must in point of fact convince men universally. If it did not, wherein would its superiority consist? If it only formed sects and ...
— The Varieties of Religious Experience • William James
... amongst those who loudly insist upon the palpable nature of the distinction we are now examining, a matter of controversy; and there are a class of scientific truths, of which it is debated whether they are contingent or necessary. The only test that they belong to the latter order is, the impossibility of conceiving their opposites to be the truth; and it seems that men find a great difference in their powers of conception, and that what is impossible with ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXXVI. October, 1843. Vol. LIV. • Various
... address the Senate had taken as a test the documents it had received from the Government in relation to the intrigues of Drake, who had been sent from England to Munich. That text afforded the opportunity for a vague expression of what the Senate termed the necessities of France. ...
— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne
... him awake half the night, but when he arose next morning it was with the firm resolve to put his fortune to the test that day. At four o'clock he changed his neck-tie for the third time, and at ten past sallied out in the direction of the school. He met Miss Lindsay just coming out, and, after a well-deserved compliment to the weather, turned ...
— Deep Waters, The Entire Collection • W.W. Jacobs
... take us unawares, And our hearts are made to bleed For a thoughtless word or deed, And we wonder why the test When we try to do our best, But we'll understand ...
— God's Plan with Men • T. T. (Thomas Theodore) Martin
... dexterity with which he managed his eye-glass; he never inadvertently stepped on the one nor unconsciously let slip the other. This caused Mr. Talbot considerable mental strain, but as it was all to which he ever subjected himself he stood the test bravely. ...
— The Fortunes of Oliver Horn • F. Hopkinson Smith
... Tried in the fire, his character underwent some noted changes. He developed unexpected aptitudes, became a marksman of big guns, showed resource and skill in boat-work, earned the repeated commendations of his superiors. He put his resolutions to the test, and emerged, surprised, thankful, and satisfied, to find that he was a brave man. He rose in his own esteem; it was borne in on him that he had qualities that others often lacked; it was inspiriting to win a reputation for daring, fearlessness, ...
— Love, The Fiddler • Lloyd Osbourne
... a kind of instruction to myself,—a lesson and a test," she said—"But I had far better have run the risk of being called an old maid and a recluse than have got these people round me,—all of whom I thought were my friends,—but who have been more or less tampered with by Aunt Emily and Roxmouth, and pressed in to help carry on the old scheme against ...
— God's Good Man • Marie Corelli
... of his transcendent genius. The unprecedented originality of his style, and the distinct national coloring of his compositions, did not meet with a sympathetic appreciation in Germany and Vienna, when he first went there to test his musical powers. Some of the papers indeed had a good word for him, but, as in the case of Liszt and later of Rubinstein, it was rather for the pianist than for the composer. On his first visit to Vienna he was ...
— Chopin and Other Musical Essays • Henry T. Finck
... the Courtier's Love, and the Sage's Comfort II The Man awakes in the Sage, and the She-wolf again hath tracked the Lamb III Virtuous Resolves submitted to the Test of Vanity and the World IV The Strife which Sibyll had courted, between Katherine and herself, commences in Serious Earnest V The Meeting of Hastings and Katherine VI Hastings learns what has befallen Sibyll, repairs to the King, and ...
— The Last Of The Barons, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... the whole tithe into the store-house, That there may be provision in mine house; and test me thereby, If I will not open to you the windows of heaven, And pour you out a blessing, until there is more than enough. I will rebuke for your sakes the devourer that he destroy not the fruit of the ground, Neither shall the vine fail to ripen its fruit in the ...
— The Makers and Teachers of Judaism • Charles Foster Kent
... for anything but the swift traveling fire on his left. It was the pace of his horse against the pace at which the gale was driving this furnace. It was the great heart of his horse against endurance. Would it stand the test with its double burden? If they could reach that bald, black hill, there was safety and rest. If not—but they must reach it. They must reach it if it was the last service he ever claimed from his faithful servant. For once in his ...
— The Golden Woman - A Story of the Montana Hills • Ridgwell Cullum
... my Eliza sparkled with delight at this proposal. She regarded this youth with a sisterly affection, and considered his candour, in this respect, as an unerring test of his rectitude. She was prepared to hear and to forgive the errors of inexperience and precipitation. I did not fully participate in her satisfaction, but was nevertheless most zealously disposed to listen to ...
— Arthur Mervyn - Or, Memoirs of the Year 1793 • Charles Brockden Brown
... indications of an allegiance that gave little hope for the future. If he felt as she did, and were free, he would not have gone away; and when he had gone, time grew leaden-footed. Absence is the touchstone, and by its test she knew that her father was right, and that she, to whom so much love had been given unrequited, had bestowed hers apparently in like manner. Then had come an invitation to join a yachting party to Fortress Monroe, and she had ...
— Nature's Serial Story • E. P. Roe
... Bowany, and Aspenhill (Dissenters), and interchanged views on the subject of obtaining relief from all religious disabilities. Similar meetings were held in other localities which were attended by several members of the community, the result being, as is well known, the repeal of the Test and Corporation Act. ...
— Diaries of Sir Moses and Lady Montefiore, Volume I • Sir Moses Montefiore
... in the first division that the Protococcus may be placed, as also those microscopic plants called Diatoms and Desmids. The former, the Diatomaceae, are a very numerous group of minute organisms, some of which are used as test objects for microscopes. They contain in their outer coat or case a relatively large portion of silex, and their remains here and there form deposits—vast beds many feet in thickness—known as "tripoli," and used for polishing. The minute particle of their protoplasm is contained within the ...
— The Contemporary Review, Volume 36, September 1879 • Various
... fact unimpeachable, the law was clear; non-intercourse with Great Britain would go into effect February 2, without further action. But the doubts started were so plausible that it was certain any condemnation or enforcement under the law would be carried up to the highest court, to test whether the fact of revocation, upon which the operativeness of the statute turned, was legally established. Even should the court decline to review the act of the Executive, and accept the proclamation as sufficient evidence for its own decision, such feeble indorsement would be mortifying. ...
— Sea Power in its Relations to the War of 1812 - Volume 1 • Alfred Thayer Mahan
... not a good thing for a girl to have. The fewer secrets that lie in the hearts of women at any age, the better. It is almost a test of purity. She who has none of her own ...
— The King's Daughter and Other Stories for Girls • Various
... France in May 1916 I was inclined to believe that only a small percentage of women would stand the test; but since then I have seen hundreds of women at work in the munition factories of France. As I have told in another chapter, they had then been at work for some sixteen months, and, of poor physique in the beginning, were now strong healthy animals with no sign ...
— The Living Present • Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton
... to be impertinent. I am trying my hardest to tell the truth. And my pulses do gallop when you test them; they're galloping now! This ...
— The Tracer of Lost Persons • Robert W. Chambers
... or toxic chemical sites associated with former defense industries and test ranges scattered throughout the country pose health risks for humans and animals; industrial pollution is severe in some cities; because the two main rivers which flowed into the Aral Sea have been diverted for irrigation, it is drying up and leaving ...
— The 2007 CIA World Factbook • United States
... hastening back in seven-league-boots and every one of our brave blesses is turning out to be handsome. Each day a real face emerges from its black chrysalis and we find it beautiful. The refinery was of the cruelest type, but the temper of such men stood the test and their souls shine out undeniably over ...
— Lige on the Line of March - An American Girl's Experiences When the Germans Came Through Belgium • Glenna Lindsley Bigelow
... the minute circulation of the blood, on the digestive organs, on the secreting and excreting organs, on the nervous system and brain, on the animal temperature and on the muscular activity. By these processes of inquiry, each specially carried out, I was enabled to test fairly the action of the different chemical agents that came before me. * ...
— Alcohol: A Dangerous and Unnecessary Medicine, How and Why - What Medical Writers Say • Martha M. Allen
... the palings. The peculiarity about the garden is that every handful of soil that lies upon it has been carried on Peggotty's back across the four-mile waste of shingle that separates the sea-coast from Lydd. That is, perhaps, as severe a test as could be applied to a man's predilection for a garden. There are many people who like to have a bit of garden at the back of their house. But how many would gratify their taste at the expense of bringing the ...
— Faces and Places • Henry William Lucy
... absolutely necessary, but the best-regulated nursery is that in which it is least evident. Something is definitely wrong if a child of two years will not play for half an hour at a time happily and busily in a room by himself. It is an even better test if the child will play amicably by himself with nurse or mother in the room, without the two parties crossing swords on a single occasion, without reproof or repression on the one side or undue attempts to attract attention ...
— The Nervous Child • Hector Charles Cameron
... practice, his creed will be short enough. Christianity, however, will be in no worse condition than morals, the theory of which has ever been in lamentable advance of the practice. And least of all can scepticism stand such it test, of which you have just given a passing illustration. Of this system, or rather no-system, there has never been a consistent votary, if we except Pyrrho himself; and whether he were not an insincere sceptic, the world will ...
— The Eclipse of Faith - Or, A Visit To A Religious Sceptic • Henry Rogers
... to the neighbor boys, and felt so; but this feeling was curiously mingled with a sense of degradation. By every test of common life, he was a failure. His family history was a badge of failure. People despised a man who was so incontestably smarter than they, and yet could do no better with himself than to work in the fields alongside the tramps and transients ...
— The Brown Mouse • Herbert Quick
... Sesostris, Ramestes the Great, who slew the Israelite infants, and of the inscription on his obelisk, containing, in my opinion, one of the oldest records of mankind, see Essay on the Old Test. Append. p. ...
— The Antiquities of the Jews • Flavius Josephus
... The test, though of doubtful virtue, was eagerly adopted, for the truth had now become so involved, as to excite a keen interest in all present. The desire to explain the mystery was general, and the slightest means of attaining such an end became of a value ...
— The Headsman - The Abbaye des Vignerons • James Fenimore Cooper
... a kind of tournament, called a "Pas d'Armes," to keep the young gentlemen of the Court from idleness. He meant by this a mimic attack and defence of a military position, supposed to be a "pas" or difficult and narrow pass in the mountains. It was a very popular test of chivalry, as the defender hung up his escutcheons on trees or posts put up for the purpose, and whoever wished to force this "pas" had to touch one of the escutcheons with his sword, and have his name inscribed by the King-at-arms in charge ...
— Bayard: The Good Knight Without Fear And Without Reproach • Christopher Hare
... new: I can furnish the key to the puzzle. There is always a certain mystery about these adventures: I can dispel it. I reprint articles that have been read over and over again; I copy out old interviews: but all these things I rearrange and classify and put to the exact test of truth. My collaborator in this work is Arsene Lupin himself, whose kindness to me is inexhaustible. I am also under an occasional obligation to the unspeakable Wilson, the friend ...
— The Blonde Lady - Being a Record of the Duel of Wits between Arsne Lupin and the English Detective • Maurice Leblanc
... to do," David declared as he laid the rope down. "'Tis strange they calls that a test, 'tis ...
— Troop One of the Labrador • Dillon Wallace
... deeper impression upon me. I suppose that my whole mental and nervous being was wound up to the utmost possible state of tension. I felt that I was steady and able to brave the onset. But I was not aware of the severity of the test to which I was destined to be subjected. Instead of coming quickly on and deciding my fate at once, the savage animal advanced slowly, sometimes a step or two at a time, and then pausing for a moment ere it again advanced. Sometimes it even sat down on its haunches for ...
— The Gorilla Hunters • R.M. Ballantyne
... farce, stuck up only to be knocked down: they are men and women. Page after page, they show their true characters and reveal themselves; they are consistent; even when they are most absurd they are most real; we learn to love them. It is a really serious test paper; no one could answer any of it who had not read and re-read the Pickwick Papers, and acquired, so to speak, a mastery of the subject. No one could do well in the examination who had not gone much further than this and got ...
— Pickwickian Studies • Percy Fitzgerald
... always says; she had been so much interested, she had never dreamed that such conditions existed in the world. I, applying the acid test, responded, "So many people have said that to me that I have begun ...
— Sylvia's Marriage • Upton Sinclair
... bishops; it would be whether the French-Canadians, whose imagination and affections had already been captured by Laurier, would or would not vote to put their great man in the chair of the prime minister of Canada. All through the winter and spring of 1895 Tarte was sinking test wells in Quebec public opinion with one uniform result. The issue was Laurier. So the policy was formulated of marking time until the government was irretrievably committed to remedial legislation; then ...
— Laurier: A Study in Canadian Politics • J. W. Dafoe
... Likewise we see a Test of his wicked Subtilty in his Management of those dark Nations, when he was more immediately worship'd by them; namely, the making them believe that all their good Weather, Rains, Dews, and kind Influences upon the ...
— The History of the Devil - As Well Ancient as Modern: In Two Parts • Daniel Defoe
... own ideas on the subject of Gherardi's visit to his fair betrothed,—ideas which he kept to himself, for if his surmises were correct, now was the time to put Sylvie's character to the test. He did not doubt her stability in the very least, but he could never quite get away from her mignonne child-like appearance of woman, to the contemplation of the spirit behind the pretty exterior. Her beauty was so riante, so dazzling, so dainty, ...
— The Master-Christian • Marie Corelli
... it the more she longed to test her strength. Just a few steps back and forth, back and forth—then sleep. She was sure she could sleep then. Very quietly, that she might not disturb the sleepers in the bedroom beyond, the blind woman sat up in bed and slipped her feet to ...
— Across the Years • Eleanor H. Porter
... with which his host had undertaken his task. Grant would be just, deciding nothing without the closest test. George felt that the man he meant to punish must be guilty. For all that, he ...
— Ranching for Sylvia • Harold Bindloss
... animal had not strayed accidentally into the Lepas, but appertained to it as a regular and permanent guest, is evidenced by its considerable size in proportion to the narrow entrance of the test of the Lepas, by the complete absence of the iridescence which usually distinguishes the skin of free Annelides and especially of the Amphinomidae, by the formation and position of the inferior setae, etc. But that a worm belonging to this particular family Amphinomidae ...
— Facts and Arguments for Darwin • Fritz Muller
... decorations and medals. He may be marked as a rising soldier. And yet each time he comes under fire his chances of being killed are as great as, and perhaps greater than, those of the youngest subaltern, whose luck is fresh. The statesman, who has put his power to the test, and made a great miscalculation, may yet retrieve his fortunes. But the indiscriminating bullet settles everything. As the ...
— The Story of the Malakand Field Force • Sir Winston S. Churchill
... here, captain," said the doctor, and he took a bright glass measure from where it hung by its foot in a little rack, safe from falling by the rolling of the vessel; "I was just going to test these spirits, and I thought I should like you to ...
— The Ocean Cat's Paw - The Story of a Strange Cruise • George Manville Fenn
... Besides, he must test for the first time the power of his new patroness, St. Clare, instead of his old one, St. Leodegar. But the former served him ill enough—she denied him her aid, at any rate in gambling. The full purse ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... away a stone. My father was so accustomed to hearing she must go that at last the idea became familiar to him. I am quite sure that Miss Reinhart had made this her test; that she had said to herself—if she had her own way in this, she should in everything else. It was her test of what she might do and how ...
— My Mother's Rival - Everyday Life Library No. 4 • Charlotte M. Braeme
... But said that his Hair was streight and that it parted behinde. Seem'd to argue that men might as well shave their hair off their head, as off their face. I answered men were men before they had any hair on their faces (half of man-kind never have any). God seems to have ordain'd our Hair as a Test, to see whether we can bring out to be content at his finding: or whether we would be our own Carvers, Lords, and come no more at Him. If we disliked our Skin or Nails; tis no Thanks to us for all that we cut them not off.... He ...
— Customs and Fashions in Old New England • Alice Morse Earle
... what Craven did, or did not do. And Craven should be made to understand that she went on her way happily without him, and not with an old man, though he had chosen as his companion an old woman. And, incidentally, she would put Arabian to the test which had been missed in Glebe Place. With this determination in her mind ...
— December Love • Robert Hichens
... test of discipline and deliberate valor. Both centers are holding stoutly. Everything rests on the respective victorious right wings. Either they will foolishly forget that there is still fighting elsewhere on the field, and with ill-timed huzzaing pursue the men they have just routed, ...
— A Day In Old Athens • William Stearns Davis
... school, and where's it got him? He'd make more dough if he owned the local garage and dealer franchise for one of the automobile companies in some jerkwater town. And look at Ross. He'd probably make more money playing pro football than he does messing around with all those test tubes and Bunsen burners and everything. What good has ...
— The Common Man • Guy McCord (AKA Dallas McCord Reynolds)
... scepticism: he inferred that I had been borrowing, not inventing: though where such prose and such verse could have been borrowed, and, in especial, such grammar and such spelling, even cleverer men than he might well have despaired of ever finding out. And in order to test my powers, he proposed furnishing me with a theme on which to write. "Let us see," he said, "let us see: the dancing-school ball comes on here next week—bring me a poem on the dancing-school ball." The subject ...
— My Schools and Schoolmasters - or The Story of my Education. • Hugh Miller
... studied the prisoner's face, and remembered that he, too, once went a-courting. As he walked his room that Friday night, he bethought him of the Texan. Did he love his State better than he loved his affianced wife? The Commandant would test him. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 93, July, 1865 • Various
... service, though it did not immediately nor necessarily lead to active employment. The third and final examination took place at Peking, and was open to provincial graduates from all parts of the empire. Out of 6000 competitors entering for this final test, which was held triennially, some 325 to 350 succeeded in obtaining the degree of Chin shih, or metropolitan graduate. These were the finally selected men who became the officials ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 2 - "Chicago, University of" to "Chiton" • Various
... imagination to assume a starting-point when the vast Ice Period was vanishing and language was not the test of race, but of social contact, it must be allowed that the River Drift-man was the first of his species that touched our shores, followed by the Cave-dwellers some thousands of years later; the latter man having his abode fixed to a locality, and ...
— A History of Nursery Rhymes • Percy B. Green
... honorabilis viri Arnaldi Guillelmi de Brocario, artis impressoris Magistri. Anno Domini 1517. Julii die decimo." Biblia Polyglotta Compluti. Postscript to 4th and last part of Vetus Test. ...
— The History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella The Catholic, V3 • William H. Prescott
... great defects or weaknesses; an overweening vanity, which, as it is valued applause above every thing, led him to regard the popularity which they might win for him as the natural motive and the surest test of his actions; and an abstract belief in human perfection and in the submission of all classes to strict reason, which could only proceed from a total ignorance of mankind.[8] Yet, greatly as financial skill was needed, if the ...
— The Life of Marie Antoinette, Queen of France • Charles Duke Yonge
... with him was all the test of truth; "It must be right: I've done it from my youth." The ...
— The World's Best Poetry — Volume 10 • Various
... of an all-wise Providence been removed from amongst us, and by the provisions of the Constitution the efforts to be directed to the accomplishing of this vitally important task have devolved upon myself. This same occurrence has subjected the wisdom and sufficiency of our institutions to a new test. For the first time in our history the person elected to the Vice-Presidency of the United States, by the happening of a contingency provided for in the Constitution, has had devolved upon him the Presidential office. The spirit of faction, which is directly opposed to the spirit of ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents: Tyler - Section 2 (of 3) of Volume 4: John Tyler • Compiled by James D. Richardson
... confirmed in a great measure by travellers who had voyaged southward along the coast. Francisco Pizarro, a restless spirit who had been associated with Balboa and others in discovery and exploration, determining to test the truth of these ...
— Wealth of the World's Waste Places and Oceania • Jewett Castello Gilson
... heathen around them considered to be Divine honour, to the emperor or the heathen deities, by sacrificing a few grains of incense when required thus to show their loyalty to their ruler and his faith. Over and over again was this burning of incense made a test by which to discover Christians or to try their steadfastness, and over and over again was its rejection followed by agonizing ...
— A Key to the Knowledge of Church History (Ancient) • John Henry Blunt
... others as a test of our character. The worth of a man will always be rated by his companions. The proverbs of all nations show this. "A man is known by the company he keeps." "Like draws to like." "Birds of a feather flock together." If our companions are worthless, the verdict of society regarding us will ...
— Life and Conduct • J. Cameron Lees
... the children rose at once; gave and received a hearty kiss all round, and went off to "turn in," as sailors express it, "with a will." They had learned obedience—the most difficult lesson that man has got to learn—the lesson which few learn thoroughly, and which our Lord sets us as a test of our loyalty to Himself, when He says says,—"If ye love ...
— The Thorogood Family • R.M. Ballantyne
... women and girls, against whom there was no sufficient evidence, were sent to the Lock Hospital for examination in order to determine in that manner their character. In half-a-dozen cases or so, it is recorded that the result determined the virginity of the person. But such a test as this rests upon the accidental presence of an exceptional condition among even virgins, and what became of those who did not answer to the exceptional test, and yet were as pure as the rest? They ...
— Heathen Slaves and Christian Rulers • Elizabeth Wheeler Andrew and Katharine Caroline Bushnell
... composers[255] in whom there is far more style than substance, we should not carp at Brahms for the "stuff" in his work. The matter might be put in a nut-shell by saying that Brahms is Brahms; you accept him or leave him, as you see fit. The bulk of his music not only has stood the test of time but becomes more potent each year; surely this is the highest possible endorsement. He is rightly considered a great master of pure melodic line and a consummate architect, especially in the conciseness and concentration of certain compositions, e.g., the Third ...
— Music: An Art and a Language • Walter Raymond Spalding
... claimed our chief attention, because we had heard and read so much about it. Every body has written about the Grotto del Cane and its poisonous vapors, from Pliny down to Smith, and every tourist has held a dog over its floor by the legs to test the capabilities of the place. The dog dies in a minute and a half—a chicken instantly. As a general thing, strangers who crawl in there to sleep do not get up until they are called. And then they don't ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... the door closed behind him than the laird put his fate to the test as promptly and directly as ...
— Simon • J. Storer Clouston
... and she was deeply distressed to learn that Mr. Lincoln was ill. She wished to go to him at once, but the Doctor reminded her that she was the cause of his illness. She frankly acknowledged her folly, saying that she only desired to test the sincerity of Mr. Lincoln's love, that he was the idol of her heart, and that she ...
— Behind the Scenes - or, Thirty years a slave, and Four Years in the White House • Elizabeth Keckley
... must test his sources before he can use them in his history. To do this, he must first of all be able to distinguish the primary sources which will reward future study from those which are secondary and are based on other and more contemporary documents which even now are actually in our possession. ...
— Assyrian Historiography • Albert Ten Eyck Olmstead
... without incurring too serious an expense. Thus far the value of the products obtained by absorption of sulphurous acid has not been equal to the cost of producing them. Herr C. Landsberg, who is general manager of the Stolberg Company, has had similar experience, though his experiments were made to test methods suggested at various times by Dr. E. Jacob and Dr. Aarland. Both are very ingenious, and were successful on a small scale, but failed when tried in ...
— Scientific American Suppl. No. 299 • Various
... father's place very soon.... She turned white, as though something had given her a pang, and such a pang, that she wondered and pondered long after, what could be the meaning of it. Bazarov had spoken of his departure with no idea of putting her to the test, of seeing what would come of it; he never 'fabricated.' On the morning of that day he had an interview with his father's bailiff, who had taken care of him when he was a child, Timofeitch. This Timofeitch, a little old man of much experience and astuteness, with faded ...
— Fathers and Children • Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev
... men deride; For Englishmen to boast of generation Cancels their knowledge, and lampoons the nation, A true-born Englishman's a contradiction, In speech an irony, in fact a fiction: A banter made to be a test of fools, Which those that use it justly ridicules; A metaphor intended to express, A man ...
— The True-Born Englishman - A Satire • Daniel Defoe
... about my preparations in a leisurely way. I knew that a supreme test was ahead of myself and the horses, and I meant to have daylight for tackling it. Once more I went over the most important bolts; once more I felt and pulled at every strap in the harness. I had a Clark footwarmer and made sure that it functioned properly ...
— Over Prairie Trails • Frederick Philip Grove
... and I will not stop to consider whether or not it was sensible and prudent. And I want to say to you that whenever you see or hear of an action that has these qualities of heroism and generosity and devotion, it is well to admire and praise it, whether it will bear the test of cold reason or not. I hope your hearts will never get to be so dry and hard that they will not beat responsive to brave and noble deeds, even if they ...
— Bible Stories and Religious Classics • Philip P. Wells
... their fright to rally at the stream. But he felt that in any event he and his comrades must strike. Blackstaffe, Yellow Panther and Red Eagle with their forces would soon be in pursuit, and to escape the net would test the skill and courage of the five to the utmost. Yet all of them believed attack to be the best plan, and, after their sleep, they resumed the trail with renewed strength and vigor, pressing northward at great speed through the ...
— The Eyes of the Woods - A story of the Ancient Wilderness • Joseph A. Altsheler
... out-of-the-way phrases is doing us no favor. A dictionary is not a drag-net to bring up for us the broken pots and dead kittens, the sewerage of speech, as well as its living fishes. Nor do we think it a fair test of such a work, that one should seek in it for every odd word that may have tickled his fancy in a favorite author. Like most middle-aged readers, we have our specially private volumes. One of these—but we will not betray the secret of our loves—contains some rare words, such as the Gallicism ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 31, May, 1860 • Various
... Jude told him the names and addresses of the cottagers who were willing to test the virtues of the world-renowned pills and salve. The quack mentally registered these with ...
— Jude the Obscure • Thomas Hardy
... fanatic can display, they plugged their bayonets into the first opposing man. Cold steel is hard to face. Few armies can face it. Only Russians, Britishers, and Japs are good at the game. And these sons of John Bull stood up to the test with a magnificent courage. They plunged, thrust, hacked, butted, cursed, and fumed in this awful combat. Civilisation had gone. Primitive lusts were triumphant. Blood flowed in streams, men fought with gaping wounds, dying ...
— The Kangaroo Marines • R. W. Campbell
... can, kettle; bowl, basin, jorum, punch bowl, cup, goblet, chalice, tumbler, glass, rummer, horn, saucepan, skillet, posnet|, tureen. [laboratory vessels for liquids] beaker, flask, Erlenmeyer flask, Florence flask, round-bottom flask, graduated cylinder, test tube, culture tube, pipette, Pasteur pipette, disposable pipette, syringe, vial, carboy, vacuum flask, Petri dish, microtiter tray, centrifuge tube. bail, beaker, billy, canakin; catch basin, catch drain; chatti, lota, mussuk, schooner ...
— Roget's Thesaurus • Peter Mark Roget
... special committee of the New York State Commission of Prisons, shows that in the New York Reformatory only eight per cent passed the required physical examination. In the penitentiary, where the average age was higher, only five per cent passed the test. In the work house—the home of the "down and outs"—only one per cent passed. The health tests employed were those for admission to the army. It was likewise found by the same commission that of ...
— Crime: Its Cause and Treatment • Clarence Darrow
... narrow and difficult Indian trails. The whole distance to be traversed was not less than five hundred and sixty miles, with an equal distance to return. The season was winter. It was a task calculated to try the powers and test the endurance of the ...
— Historic Tales, Vol. 1 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... of human taste within the range of conventional history helps the pretension. But in principle it is untenable. Nothing has less to do with the real merit of a work of imagination than the capacity of all men to appreciate it; the true test is the degree and kind of satisfaction it can give to him who appreciates it most. The symphony would lose nothing if half mankind had always been deaf, as nine-tenths of them actually are to the intricacies of its harmonies; but it would have lost much if no Beethoven had ...
— The Sense of Beauty - Being the Outlines of Aesthetic Theory • George Santayana
... full freedom, are living witnesses of the blessing of heaven upon immediate emancipation. In Antigua, one of the old sugar colonies, where slavery had had its full sway there has been especially a fair test of immediatism, and the increasing prosperity of the island does the utmost honor to the principle. After the fullest inquiry on the point, Messrs. Thome and Kimball say of ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... be Irish, now!" said a gentlemen at a meeting a short time since, and in a great measure the assertion will stand the test. When Hugh O'Brien sought the suffrages of his fellow-citizens, a year ago, for the mayorality, thousands, who then malignantly sneered at his candidacy, were this year found among his most earnest ...
— Donahoe's Magazine, Volume 15, No. 1, January 1886 • Various
... on race differences are dangerous, because they are so easy to form and so hard to test. Still, no one denies that there are qualities and tendencies generally found in the minds of men of certain stocks, just as there are peculiarities in their faces or in their speech. Mr. Gladstone was born and brought up ...
— William Ewart Gladstone • James Bryce
... a home where I could claim you and have the joy of your daily companionship instead of brief glimpses of you at the intervals of months. My voice, never properly trained, was beginning to break. I resolved to put Mr Irving to a test; I would tell him the true story of your birth, and if he still wished me to be his wife, I ...
— An Ambitious Man • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... engaged the attention of a rational being,—the never-ending torments of the wicked in another world. Though plausible arguments and objections have been urged against this doctrine, we are perfectly satisfied they will not bear the test of a close examination. They have derived all their apparent force and conclusiveness, it seems to us, from two distinct sources, namely: from the circumstance that this appalling doctrine has been too often placed, by its advocates, upon insecure and untenable grounds; and from the fact, ...
— A Theodicy, or, Vindication of the Divine Glory • Albert Taylor Bledsoe
... psychological causes of religious belief must be carefully distinguished from the reasons which make it true. No logic of discovery. Many religious ideas have occurred in a spontaneous or apparently intuitive way to particular persons, the truth of which the philosopher may subsequently be able to test by philosophical reflection, though he could not have discovered them, but they are not necessarily true because they arise in a spontaneous or unaccountable manner, . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ...
— Philosophy and Religion - Six Lectures Delivered at Cambridge • Hastings Rashdall
... to translate Latin with facility was the true test of genius has fallen somewhat into desuetude, yet there are a few who still hold to the idea that to reason, imagine and invent are not the tests of a man's powers; he must conjugate, decline and derive. But Grant Allen, possessor of three college degrees, avers ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 4 (of 14) - Little Journeys to the Homes of Eminent Painters • Elbert Hubbard
... which contradict established knowledges, or which result in bizarre and fanciful combinations of them; to that man we deny the name genius; he is a crank, an agitator, an anarchist, or what not. The test, then, which we bring to bear upon the intellectual variations which men show is that of truth, practical workability—in short, to sum it up, "fitness." Any thought, to live and germinate, must be a fit thought. ...
— The Story of the Mind • James Mark Baldwin
... servants—retainers, one might say. Margaret, who was fresh from her history class, recalled the days of Elizabeth, when a man's importance was gauged by the retinue of servitors and men and women in waiting. And this is, after all, a better test of wealth than a mere accumulation of things and cost of decoration; for though men and women do not cost so much originally as good pictures—that is, good men and women—everybody knows that it needs more revenue to maintain them. Though the dinner party was not ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... she thought. "Charley would know, if he was in, but he wasn't. He was in mischief, somewhere or other, she had no doubt. Boys always were. He would break his neck some day, she knew"; so saying, she quietly spat upon her fresh iron, to test its heat, and then went ...
— Mary Barton • Elizabeth Gaskell
... tireless hands. This indeed was being in a front line of battle. The scene was weird, dark, fitful, at times impressive and again unreal. These neighbors of his, many of them aliens, some of them Germans, when put to this vital test, were proving themselves. They had shown little liking for the Dorns, but here was love of wheat, and so, in some way, loyalty to the government that needed it. Here was the answer of the Northwest to the I.W.W. No doubt if the perpetrators ...
— The Desert of Wheat • Zane Grey |
